Coit Tower - Murals on the Hilltop
Photo: Almonroth, CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped)
A stop on San Francisco, District by District, a free self-guided tour.
Climb Telegraph Hill by the stairs and paths from Washington Square, or ride the 39 Coit bus, to reach Coit Tower. Lillie Hitchcock Coit, who as a girl in the 1850s chased fire engines and became the mascot of a volunteer fire company, left a third of her fortune to beautify the city. The tower her bequest paid for, designed by Arthur Brown Jr., was dedicated in 1933 and rises 210 feet.
The fluted shape is often said to look like a fire hose nozzle, a coincidence the legend refuses to give up. The real treasure is inside. In 1934 more than two dozen artists, paid by the first federal art relief program, covered the lobby walls with frescoes of California life during the Depression: farms, factories, docks and city streets. Some images stirred political controversy, and the opening was delayed.
Check current hours and fees, especially for the elevator to the top.
More on Wikipedia: Coit Tower · Lillie Hitchcock Coit · Public Works of Art Project
Stops on this tour
- Ferry Building and the Embarcadero - Where the City Met the World
- Financial District and Jackson Square - Gold Rush on the Old Shoreline
- Chinatown - The Neighborhood That Refused to Move
- North Beach and Telegraph Hill - Little Italy and the Beats
- Fisherman's Wharf - Italian Boats and Old Ships
- Nob Hill and Russian Hill - Cable Cars, Mansions and the Great Fire
- The Presidio - Two Centuries Guarding the Golden Gate
- Japantown and the Fillmore - Two Communities, One Neighborhood
- Haight-Ashbury - From Victorian Suburb to Summer of Love
- Golden Gate Park - Sand Dunes Turned Into a Park
- The Castro - A Neighborhood That Became a Movement
- The Mission - Where San Francisco Began
- Civic Center - Domes, Charters and Protest
- South of Market - From Rincon Hill to the Tech Boom