“You are very fortunate to live here. President Bush should tax the people for living in such a beautiful place.” —Mikhail Gorbachev

SAN FRANCISCO — As the nation marks 250 years, San Francisco’s storied harbor still tells the story of exploration, ambition and reinvention. The Golden Gate scene recalls the Spanish expedition that found the harbor in 1769, Ayala’s 1775 passage, the settlement’s transformation into San Francisco, and the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge from 1933–1937 under Joseph B. Strauss and a team of engineers.

It continues with Amadeo Giannini and Bank of America, the Palace Hotel, Fairmont, Mark Hopkins, Tony Bennett’s “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” and the garages and people behind Silicon Valley: Hewlett and Packard, Shockley Semiconductor, Fairchild, Apple and Google.

A Harbor That Keeps Its Promise

Two hundred and fifty years after a scouting party stumbled onto a bay hidden behind fog, San Francisco remains a place where outsiders kept finding room to build something larger than themselves.

LIKE® Magazine, 7.7.27 — Photo © Michael de la Force, RR Collection.