Seismic City In The Late 19th Century

During the 19th century Americans expanded west to capture the new freedoms and economic opportunities that these lands had to offer. San Francisco became one of these desired locations in the mid 19th century mainly due to the 1848 California Gold Rush. As time went on San Francisco went from being a small town of sorts to a major city on the Western Coast. Along with the many Americans who migrated to San Francisco there were also many immigrants coming over from places like Italy, Ireland, and especially China. As the city population grew so did the city itself.
As the city was growing the people constructing it were not thinking about the natural disasters that were common on the West Coast like earthquakes, landslides, or wildfires. Because of this most of the city was constructed of wooden materials on unstable and man-made lands. Many working class citizens and immigrants were crammed together living in these wooden constructed buildings on unstable soil. In Joanna Dyl’s book, Seismic City, she discusses how these working class citizens and immigrants were affected the

most by the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, the fire that ensued, and the post-recovery efforts simply due to their economic and racial backgrounds.
Since San Francisco became such a popular destination in such short amount of time the construction of the city was not done properly.

Most, if not all, of the buildings were constructed of wood and most of them were put on man-made lands with very unstable soil. The buildings that were constructed of steel or brick were next to wood buildings too. All of these buildings lacked proper fire safety equipment like fire-sprinklers and the city streets were very narrow making it easy for fire to spread. Out of all the buildings in San Francisco at this time under two percent of them were considered to be fireproof (52).Working class and immigrant families at this time were living in these poorly constructed buildings often with many families assigned to one single room. These conditions made it almost impossible for them to have a chance of hope when the deadly San Francisco Earthquake of 1906

hit.
When Dyl is explaining how many of the working class and immigrant homes were being destroyed by the initial shock of the Earthquake she states, “The severe earthquake damage in the neighborhoods occured not only because of the shoddy construction of large wood-frame residential hotels and workers’ cottages but also because of the type of ground the structures were built on. A combination of geology and history turned particular blocks into death traps” (57). This quote is significant because it shows how the buildings these people were living in were just disasters waiting to happen. While all of this chaos was happening, many of the wealthier people who lived north of Market street and in the western areas of the city were not nearly as affected as the immigrants and working class who lived in parts of the city that the initial shock affected the most. Dyl is discussing how many of these wealthier people acted during the initial earthquake when she states, “Treating the earthquake as a holiday. Men and women left vases, mirrors, and books where they had fallen and ventured out to see the sights” (55). It is a shame that while many of these immigrant and working class people were losing their homes and belongings that the richer areas of the city were treating it as a source of entertainment. While the initial shock of the Earthquake did cause harm to a majority of the San Francisco population the immigrants and working class citizens were affected the most, and the fires that ensued would ultimately destroy almost everything in the city not damaged by the initial shock.
When the initial Earthquake struck the little fires that broke out ended up turning into large fires due to the wooden constructions of the buildings, how close the buildings were together, and the climate of the area, which was dry air and windy. These winds would fuel the fire and help spread them across the city. When the fires reached Chinatown the fire department decided that it was a good idea to use dynamite in trying to create fire breaks so the fire could not spread anymore. Dyl states, “John Bermingham, who was intoxicated at the time, took charge of the explosives in Chinatown and the Barbary Coast and later testified he started sixty fires. An unknown number of Chinese were reported to have died in the explosions in Chinatown” (63). The fact that they had an intoxicated man blowing up dynamite to stop the spread of fires was ridiculous enough, but the fact that those explosions killed more people is absolute insanity. If this were to of happen in a rich white neighborhood this would have made the papers, but since it was just Chinese immigrants affected noone in America really seemed to care, which backs up the statement that the immigrants and working class citizens were affected the most by all this tragedy.
The fires that occured in the three days after the Earthquake were absolutely devastating to the city of San Francisco. Joanna Dyl is discussing the effects the fire left on the city when she states, “Roughly 250,000 people had seen their dwellings destroyed...The fire had burned a total of 28,188 buildings, more than 24,000 of them wood-frame construction, and destroyed 514 city blocks covering 4.7 square miles or half the acreage of the city.” (65). This just shows how devastating the earthquake and the fires were to the city. Out of all those people who lost their homes a large majority of them were immigrants and working class citizens. When all of this was done the post recovery efforts were almost as harsh to working class citizens and immigrants than the initial earthquake and fires were to them.
After the earthquake and fires the people who were not killed had nowhere to live or go and because of this the government had set up refugee camps for these people to live in the meantime. These were often referred to as “earthquake cottages”. Dyl is discussing how these refugee camps were going at first when she states, “Long-standing spatial divisions of class and ethnicity broke down, and an initial period of class leveling quickly gave way to a resurgence of class and ethnic tension as disparities in people’s ability to recover from disaster became apparent” (85). This quote is significant because it foreshadows how the different social classes and races would be treated at these refugee camps. The poorer working class citizens and immigrants of different races were affected the most by this and forced to live in worse camps, in tighter quarters, and have less food. Although all of the working class citizens and immigrants were crammed into refugee camps noone had it quite as bad as the Chinese. Dyl is discussing how the different camps were made up when she says, “Chinese refugees were first gathered into a single camp and then relocated multiple times under pressure from white property owners who did not want Chinese near their homes. They were finally isolated in a segregated camp above Fort Point at the eastern edge of the Presidio, exposed to cold winds blowing off the pacific and far from any possibilities of employment.” (99). This just shows how awful they treated immigrant people like the Chinese solely because of race. Life was very rough in these camps due to many different reasons. There were full families living in and out of tents in very close quarters. The government tried to say that living in these camps would promote healthy outdoor living, but it was very hard for people to embrace the nights of cold windy rain when all they had protecting them was a canvas tent (84-85). It was very hard living in these camps for the working class citizens and immigrants and the saddest part was that they had nowhere else to go.
In Joanna Dyl’s book, Seismic City, she discusses how the working class citizens and immigrants were affected the most by the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, the fire that ensued, and the post-recovery efforts simply due to their economic and racial backgrounds. The fact that these people were either killed or lost everything because of where they had to live is quite sad. The lucky ones who did not lose their lives from the fire or earthquake still faced many hardships in the coming months, whether it was struggling to live at one of the refugee camps or even trying find work to move out of them. The earthquake and fire took so much from so many different people, but especially from the immigrants and working classes who came from poorer backgrounds. Coming from these poor backgrounds made it so hard to bounce back after the destruction. However, San Francisco would eventually bounce back and learned its lesson, and will also never take mother nature for granted again.