3444 UNITED STATES (California) - Big Sur Coast Highway

Big Sur Coast Highway is a section of California State Route 1 that is widely considered to be one of the most scenic driving routes in the United States, if not the world. It was the first California Scenic Highway and the first federal All American Road. It is generally considered to include the 114 km segment adjoining the region of Big Sur between Malpaso Creek near Carmel Highlands in the north and San Carpóforo Creek near San Simeon in the south.

3315 UNITED STATES (California) - San Francisco

Located on the West Coast of the United States at the north end of the San Francisco Peninsula, San Francisco includes significant stretches of the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay within its boundaries. There are more than 50 hills within the city limits, and some neighborhoods are named after the hill on which they are situated. The nearby San Andreas and Hayward Faults are responsible for much earthquake activity, although neither physically passes through the city itself. Although it is only the 15th-most populous city in the United States with almost 900,000 residents as of 2018, is the second most densely populated large U.S. city.

2901 UNITED STATES (California) - Downtown San Francisco

San Francisco's Downtown area saves the city from being seen simply as a series of villages. With a high concentration of cultural attractions and a substantial shopping district, its cosmopolitan character exceeds its modest size, yet the compact urban center is easy navigate on foot. To the east, the Financial District has been San Francisco's business and banking hub since the 1849 Gold Rush. The area is marked by the cluster of high-rise towers in the triangular area east of Kearny Street, south of Washington Street, west of the Embarcadero that rings the waterfront, and north of Market Street.

2895 UNITED STATES (California) - Chief Lemee from Yosemite Valley

Yosemite Valley was a protected area (at least theoretically) since 1864, but even in the early 20th century was very little visited, due to the  transport difficulties. In order to encourage families to visit, many activities were planned in 1920's, among which was the presentation of Indian culture through dance performances in traditional dress, basket-making demonstrations and sales, and a event called Indian Field Days. During this period Chris Brown began his dances, under the name Chief Lemee.

2653 UNITED STATES (California) - The Leap Frogs navy parachute team over Coronado

2653 The Leap Frogs navy parachute team freefalls from
12.000 feet and forms a star formation over the Coronado
Bay Bridge and the Naval Amphibious Base Coronado.
The SEAL parachuting demonstration occurred on the Fourth of July.

The United States Navy Parachute Team, commonly known as the "Leap Frogs", consists of active-duty personnel drawn from parachute riggers, naval special warfare, including Navy SEALs, special warfare combatant-craft crewmen, and support personnel. The Leap Frogs are all volunteers. The team was officially commissioned as the U.S. Navy Parachute Team in 1974 by the Chief of Naval Operations and assigned the mission of demonstrating Navy excellence throughout the United States.

2614 UNITED STATES (California) - Old Town San Diego State Historic Park

The first European settlement on the West Coast of the present-day United States was the San Diego Presidio, a military outpost of Spanish California, founded by Gaspar de Portolà in 1769, in an area inhabited by the Kumeyaay people. Mission San Diego de Alcalá was founded by Father Junípero Serra the same year. Both were built on Presidio Hill, which remained the primary settlement for several decades because it was defensible.

2592 UNITED STATES (California) - Lombard Street in San Francisco

Named after Lombard Street in Philadelphia by San Francisco surveyor Jasper O'Farrell, Lombard Street is an east-west street in San Francisco, that is famous for a steep, one-block section with eight hairpin turns, being considered the crookedest street in the world. Its west end is at Presidio Boulevard inside The Presidio; it then heads east through the Cow Hollow neighborhood. For twelve blocks is an arterial road, and continues through the Russian Hill neighborhood and to the Telegraph Hill neighborhood. At Telegraph Hill it turns south, becoming Telegraph Hill Boulevard to Pioneer Park and Coit Tower. Lombard Street starts again at Winthrop Street and ends at The Embarcadero as a collector road.

2480 UNITED STATES (California) - Redondo Beach

Located in the South Bay region of the greater Los Angeles area, Redondo Beach is one of the three  Beach Cities which lie on the south end of the Santa Monica Bay west and south of downtown Los Angeles, north of the Palos Verdes Peninsula on the Pacific Ocean. The city's territory has an unusual shape including an area along the beach (South Redondo Beach) and another strip inland from Manhattan Beach and Hermosa Beach (North Redondo Beach).

2476 UNITED STATES (California) - Pirate Cove in Shoreline Village, Long Beach

Located in Long Beach, within walking distance of the Aquarium of the Pacific, across the harbor from the Queen Mary, Shoreline Village is a waterfront shopping, dining and entertainment center that overlooks Rainbow Harbor. Styled after a quaint Cape Cod fishing village, it is a family friendly destination by day that develops a sense of romance when night falls. It features an antique carousel, bike rentals to explore the coastline, watercraft rentals, harbor cruises, and unique shops. One of these is Pirates Cove, which offer a large selection of Pirate clothing, Pirate gifts, and souvenirs.

2467 UNITED STATES (California) - Alcatraz Island

Located in the San Francisco Bay, 2.0km offshore from San Francisco, Alcatraz Island is a small island which was developed with facilities for a lighthouse, a military fortification, a military prison (1868), and a federal prison from 1933 until 1963. Beginning in November 1969, the island was occupied for more than 19 months by a group of aboriginal people from San Francisco who were part of a wave of Native activism across the nation with public protests through the 1970s. In 1972, Alcatraz became a national recreation area.

0706, 0978, 1018, 2258 UNITED STATES (California) - San Francisco cable car system

0706 San Francisco cable car system - Powell-Hyde Line - Car no. 9

Posted on 28.06.2013, 21.01.2014, 01.03.2014, 01.02.2016
It is said that there is no better way to experience the hills and views of San Francisco than aboard one of the city’s famous open-air cable cars, the world's last manually operated such system, and the only mobile National Monument in the United States. Of the 23 lines established between 1873 and 1890, have remained three and all three cross Nob Hill, which lies just north of downtown: the Powell-Hyde Line (the most scenic - it is in the postcards), the Powell-Mason Line, and the California Street Line.

0978 San Francisco cable car system - Powell-Hyde Line - Car no. 11

As I said before, cable cars were introduced in San Francisco in 1873 by Andrew Smith Hallidie and the Clay Street Railroad company, and until the time of the great fire of 1906, they criss-crossed the entire city. After that, many of the cable car lines where re-opened using cheaper and more energy efficient electric streetcars, but however the cable cars were still much better at navigating the steep slopes of the downtown hills (in 1912 there were only eight lines). In the 1940's, the cable cars were almost destroyed again, making way for automobiles, but the Citizens Committee to Save the Cable Cars managed to defeat the corrupt politicians, who backed the auto industry. Since 1984, Muni (San Francisco Municipal Railway) has continued to upgrade the system.

1018 San Francisco cable car system - Powell-Hyde Line - Car no. 24

This system is served today by two type of cable cars: single-ended (as those in the postcards) and double-ended. The first ones, which serve the Powell-Hyde and Powell-Mason lines, have an open-sided front section, with outward-facing seats flanking the gripman. The rear half of the car is enclosed, with seats facing inward and entrances at each end and the car has a small platform at the rear. These cars must be rotated to reverse direction at each end of the line, an operation performed on turntables. Most of these cars (28 in total) were built or rebuilt in the 1990s at Muni's Woods Carpentry Division.

2258 San Francisco cable car system - Cable car turntable
at Powel and Market Streets

According to Market Street Railway, a nonprofit preservation partner of the Muni, the cable car no. 9 (in postcard 0706) "was built as open car No. 542 by Mahoney Bros., 1887. Converted to standard car 1923 and renumbered 509, rebuilt 1952, retired after accident in 1995. Currently in storage; could possibly be restored as open car." In the background of this postcard can be seen the Alcatraz Island, which housed probably the world's most famous prison. In the postcard 0978 is the cable no. 11, operational, rebuilt in 1979-1980, and in the postcard 1018 the cable no. 24, also operational, renumbered from 534 to 524 in 1929, rebuilt 1958, and displayed at Chicago Railroad Fair 1949.

2187, 2188 UNITED STATES (Washington / Oregon / California) - Pacific coast lighthouses

The Pacific Coast, stretching some 1,300 miles from Mexico’s border with California up to the Canadian border, was a dark and daunting line to mariners in the 1800s. The earth’s geology had given the West Coast a dramatically different contour from the Atlantic Coast: jagged, irregular, high cliffs, and, worse, a sudden, steep drop off the continental shelf that allowed prevailing winds from the west to drive waves onto the shore with incredible speed and power.

In 1848, the U.S. Congress created the Oregon Territory, and with the same act, appropriated funds for the U.S. Light House Establishment to construct the first two lights on the far northwest coast: the first at Cape Disappointment, and the second on New Dungeness spit, south of the new busy port of Nootka, on Vancouver Island. Thus began the history of lighthouses on the West Coast of the United States. I will present below, in short, fourteen of them. 

2155 UNITED STATES (California) - Seaport Village and some skyscrapers in San Diego

Seaport Village is a waterfront shopping and dining complex adjacent to San Diego Bay in downtown San Diego, at the intersection of Harbor Drive and Kettner. It was developed by Morris Taubman on landfill over Punta de los Muertos (Spanish for Point of the Dead), where the Spanish expedition of 1782 buried those who had died of scurvy. It houses more than 70 shops, galleries, and eateries, and contains several freestanding buildings in an assortment of architectural styles, from Victorian to traditional Mexican.

2125, 2126 UNITED STATES (California) - The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco

2125 The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco (1)

The Golden Gate Bridge, one of the most internationally recognized symbols of  San Francisco, is a suspension bridge spanning the Golden Gate strait, the channel between San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean. It has been declared one of the Wonders of the Modern World by the American Society of Civil Engineers. Built between 1933 and 1937, was, until 1964, the longest suspension bridge main span in the world, at 1,300m.

2126 The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco (2)

 

Chief engineer in charge of overall design and construction of the bridge project was Joseph Strauss, but, because he had little experience with cable-suspension designs, responsibility for much of the engineering and architecture fell on other experts. The graceful design was conceived by New York’s Manhattan Bridge designer Leon Moisseiff, and Charles Alton Ellis was the principal engineer of the project. Irving Morrow designed the overall shape of the bridge towers, the lighting scheme, and Art Deco elements.

2116 UNITED STATES (California) - The Old Mill in Busch Gardens, Pasadena

In nowadays, Busch Gardens is the name of two amusement parks, located in Tampa, Florida, and in  Williamsburg, Virginia. There were also previously Busch Gardens parks in Pasadena, California (1905-1937), Van Nuys, Los Angeles, California (1964-1979) and Houston, Texas (1971-1973).. These parks were initially developed as marketing vehicles for Anheuser-Busch, a brewing company founded and based in St. Louis, Missouri.

2113 UNITED STATES (California) - Palm Springs Aerial Tramway

Palm Springs is a water desert resort city within the Coachella Valley, at approximately 172km east of Los Angeles. Thither can be found The Palm Springs Aerial Tramway, the largest rotating aerial tramway in the world. It was opened in September 1963 as a way of getting from the floor of the Coachella Valley to relatively near the top of San Jacinto Peak and was constructed in rugged Chino Canyon.

2087 UNITED STATES (California) - Bakersfield

Located near the southern "horseshoe" end of the San Joaquin Valley, with the southern tip of the Sierra Nevada just to the east, Bakersfield, the county seat for Kern County, is one of the fastest growing cities in California, between 1970 and 2010 growing 400% (from 70,000 to 347,483). Its historic and primary industries have related to Kern County’s two main industries, oil and agriculture. Kern County is the most oil productive county in America, and ranks in the top five most productive agricultural counties.

2067 UNITED STATES (California) - The Painted Ladies from San Francisco

Painted ladies is a term in American architecture used for Victorian and Edwardian buildings painted in more colors that enhance their architectural details. The term was first used for San Francisco Victorian houses by writers Elizabeth Pomada and Michael Larsen in their 1978 book Painted Ladies - San Francisco's Resplendent Victorians. Since then the term has also been used to describe groups of colorful Victorian houses in other American cities.

1962 UNITED STATES (California) - University of California, Santa Barbara

1962 University of California, Santa Barbara - Stork Tower

 

The University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) is a public research university and one of the 10 campuses of the University of California system, located near Goleta, California, 13km from Santa Barbara. Tracing its roots back to 1891 as an independent teachers' college, UCSB joined the University of California system in 1944 and is the third-oldest general-education campus in the system. The university is a comprehensive doctoral university and is organized into five colleges and schools offering 87 undergraduate degrees and 55 graduate degrees. Current UCSB faculty includes six Nobel Prize laureates, and 31 members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

1912 UNITED STATES (California) - RMS Queen Mary and the domed hangar of the Spruce Goose in Long Beach Harbor

 

 

Downtown Long Beach is located approximately 35 km south of Downtown Los Angeles, though the two cities border each other for several miles on Long Beach's southwestern portion. The  Port of Long Beach is the United States' second busiest container port and one of the world's largest shipping ports. In the harbour, right at the mouth of the Los Angeles River, is permanently docked the Art Deco ocean liner RMS Queen Mary, famous for being the fastest in the world from 1936 to 1952.