SAN FRANCISCO by E. J. Hibbard

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, Cal. · May 23, 1906

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 32, No. 20.

SAN FRANCISCO.

By E. J. Hibbard

AS A description of the stupendous crisis through which we San Franciscans have just passed, I wish to substitute that of one (Mr. Fred Hewitt, in the Examiner) who was awake and in the midst of the very worst when the crash came. He wrote under the inspiration

of the moment, and for that reason has given a touch to it that I have read from no other pen. It is better and fuller than I could possibly write, for I was in bed, and wakened only in the worst of that dreadful scene.

On the left side of the picture is the San Francisco Examiner Building, or what was left of it after the fire. On the right side is the Call Building. The walls stand intact with all woodwork burned by the fire.

His description follows: I was within a stone's throw of that City Hall when the hand of an avenging God fell upon San Francisco. The ground rose and fell like an ocean at ebb tide. Then came the crash. Tons upon tons upon tons, of that mighty pile slid away from the steel framework and the destructiveness of that effort was terrific. I had just reached Golden Gate Avenue and Larkin Street, and had tarried a moment to converse with a couple of policemen. With me were two local newspaper men. We had just bid good-by to the officers, who proceeded down Larkin Street to the City Hall station. They had gotten midway in the block when the crash came. I saw those policemen enveloped in a shower of falling stone. Their lives must have been blotted out in an instant. "Keep the middle of the street, Mac," I shouted to one of my friends. "That is the only avenue of escape," returned he. We staggered over the bitumen.

An Eternity.

It is impossible to judge the length of that shock. To me it seemed an eternity. I was thrown prone on my back and the pavement pulsated like a living thing. Around me the huge buildings, looming up more terrible because of the queer dance they were performing, wobbled and veered. Crash followed crash and resounded on all sides. Screeches rent the air as terrified humanity streamed out into the open in an agony of despair. Affrighted horses dashed headlong into ruin as they raced away in their abject fear. Then there was a lull. The most terrible was yet to come. The first portion of that shock was just a mild forerunner of what was to follow.

The pause in the action of the earth's surface couldn't have been more than a fraction of a second. It was sufficient, however, to allow me to collect myself. In the center of two streets I arose to my feet. Then came the second and more terrific crash. The street beds heaved in frightful fashion. The earth rocked, and then came the blow that wrecked San Francisco from bay shore to ocean beach, and from the Golden Gate to the end of the peninsula. As if in sympathy for its immediate neighbor, the old Supreme Court building danced a frivolous frolic and then tumbled into the street. Beneath that ruin of stone and brick were buried the blue-coated guardians of the city to whom I had been talking a few minutes before. That few minutes, however, seemed to me a century.

Praying to God.

The second upheaval was heart-rending. It made me think of loved ones in different portions of the country. It turned my stomach, gave me a heart-ache that I will never forget, and caused me to sink upon my knees and pray to the Almighty God that me and mine should escape the awful fate I knew was coming to so many thousands. Down Golden Gate Avenue the houses commenced again their fantastic, ogreish dancing. One long line of frame buildings tottered a moment and then, just as a score or more of terror-stricken, white-shirted humanity tried to reach the open, it laid flat. The cries of those who must have perished reached my ears, and I hope that never again this side of the grave will I hear such signals of agony.

God's Mercy.

I turned about from that point of view to shut out the terrible sight, but what went on on all sides seemed to be just a repetition of what I had already witnessed. Looking up Golden Gate Avenue, I saw tons and tons of brick and stone coping poise for a fraction of a second on beam end and then plunge into the street below. Then it was that the idea flashed through my mind that God is merciful. What would have been the loss of life had the Almighty allowed that earthquake to occur in midday? Suddenly, as sharply and as abruptly as it had begun, the end of the temblor came. Ruin endeavored, it seemed, to outdo ruin. A world of structural work found resting-place on mother earth. Bent steel girders and huge blocks of decorative stones made their sleeping-place beside all this. A cloud of deep dust hung tenaciously about the City Hall. I realized that there something dreadful had happened. I peered into the cloud, but I could not see even a mark of that building. And as I waited, the dust began to settle. First showed the steel shaft on which had for so long floated the country's flag. Imbedded in a ton of steel block, the entire mass had shifted many feet, but still maintained its position atop that pile of structural steel. As the wind carried the dust away and uncovered the ruins, there stood a mountain sheared of all its crowning glory. It could be fittingly compared with a mountain that had passed through a forest fire. The dome appeared like a huge bird-cage against the morning dawn. The upper works of the entire building laid peaceably—if that term can be used—in the street below. I thought of those guardians of law and order whose headquarters are in the basement of the hall on the McAllister and Larkin Streets corner, and wondered if the sergeants and office men on duty had escaped. I thought of those angels of mercy nursing their patients in the Central Emergency Hospital and the physicians there, all of whom I knew from personal contact, and whom I had learned to respect and revere, not so much for their ability and cleverness, but because of their usefulness to me in my capacity as a newsgetter. I wondered if they had escaped death as they stood by to help the injured that might have been brought to them. After I had drawn myself together I found my way to my home, where, thank God, the wreck had not been as complete as many others I had witnessed. Then it was that I realized the condition of an excitement-crazed populace. Herds of huddled creatures, attired in next to nothing, occupied the center of the streets, not knowing what would happen next or which way they would turn for safety. Each and every person I saw was

Temporarily Insane.

Laughing idiots commented on the fun they were having. Terror marked their faces, and yet their voices indicated a certain enjoyment that maniacs have when they kill and gloat over their prey. Women, hysterical to an extreme point, cried and raved for those they loved when they were standing at their elbow. Mothers searched madly for their children who had strayed, while little ones wailed for their protectors. It was bedlam. Strong men bellowed like babies in their furor. All humanity within eyesight was suffering from palsy. No one knew which way to turn, when on all sides of them destruction stared them in the very eye. A number of slight tremors followed the first seven series of shocks. As each came in turn fearful agony spread over the countenances of the afflicted ones. Terror stamped its mark on every brow. Then an unnatural light dimmed the rising sun and the word went forth from every throat: "The city is ablaze. We will all be burned. This must be "The End of This Wicked World." From down south of Market Street the glare grew and grew. The flames shot heavenward and licked the sky. It looked as if the end of the world was surely at hand. For an hour or more after that terrible shock which shook the buildings of all San Francisco to the very foundations, people wandered about in an inane fashion. There was no attempt at concerted action to hold the sufferers. People were stupefied. And meanwhile the fire burned and burned. Read the following from the Book of books: "The city of confusion is broken down; every house is shut up, that no man may come in." "In the city is left desolation, and the gate is smitten with destruction." "Fear, and the pit, and the snare, are upon thee, O inhabitant of the earth. And it shall come to pass, that he who fleeth from the noise of the fear shall fall into the pit; and he that cometh up out of the midst of the pit shall be taken in the snare; for the windows from on high are open, and the foundations of the earth do shake." "The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a cottage; and the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it; and it shall fall, and not rise again." These are the words of the Almighty concerning "the end of this wicked world." The people of San Francisco were wrong when they thought the final stroke of God's justice had fallen on this wicked world. They were right in that they were impressed with the proximity of its approach. But the twenty-fourth of Isaiah, from which the above is quoted, is not confined to the ungodly and their impenitence. We are also told how those who trust in Him will pass through these calamities: "When thus it shall be in the midst of the land among the people, there shall be as the shaking of an olive tree, and as the gleaning grapes when the vintage is done. They [the remnant thus symbolized] shall lift up their voice, they shall sing for the majesty of the Lord, they shall cry aloud from the sea. Wherefore, glorify ye the Lord in the fires, even the name of the Lord God of Israel in the isles of the sea. From the uttermost part of the earth have we heard songs, even glory to the righteous." Verses 13-16. O man of this world, O woman of earth, flee from the wrath to come. Seek the mercy of your God while probation's moments linger. E. J. HIBBARD.