This Mother’s Day, why not visit a monument of our city’s namesake in Golden Gate Park made by a local mother?
‘Looking Back’: St. Francis Assisi
‘Looking Back’: Disc Golf
At the 18-hole Golden Gate Park Disc Golf Course, the tees at the start of each hole’s play are flat concrete slabs.
‘Looking Back’: Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk
Thomas (or “Tomáš”) Garrigue Masaryk (March 7, 1850 – Sept. 14, 1937) is honored with a monument in Golden Gate Park. Masaryk was an important leader in the establishment of Czechoslovakia and became its first president in 1918. He was re-elected president of Czechoslovakia three more times consecutively.
‘Looking Back’: Poème de la Vigne
Why have a giant vase in Golden Gate Park depicting bugs attacking cherubs?
Looking Back: Sarah B. Cooper
How can a children’s educator have roused passions so much during her lifetime, but her monument today is so easily overlooked?
Looking Back’: Robert Burns
What would we be singing on New Year’s Eve without Robert Burns?
‘Looking Back’: The Cider Press
How did a statue “that may be too strong for the prudes” wind up in Golden Gate Park? Here is the story of The Cider Press statue across from the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park.
Looking Back: Sister City Pavilion
How could a large gift for Golden Gate Park from Taiwan not have “Taiwan” or the older name “Formosa” on it? What is lyrical about the acronym “R.O.C.”?
‘Looking Back’: Henry Halleck
Why would a Golden Gate Park monument dedicated to one of the framers of California’s Constitution “revive painful feelings,” as said by the Oakland Tribune?
‘Looking Back’: Angler’s Lodge
Tokyo is hosting the Olympics, but did you know about the international sports competition venue hidden beyond the trees near Golden Gate Park’s Polo Field or Bison Paddock?
‘Looking Back’: Rideout Fountain
An exuberant fountain, now restored to its original glory, entices visitors to the center of the Music Concourse in Golden Gate Park.
Looking Back: Goethe and Schiller
The Economist, for their February 2015 article on German-Americans, chose the title “America’s largest ethnic group has assimilated so well that people barely notice it.”
‘Looking Back’: Gen. John Pershing
Pershing lived in the San Francisco Presidio in 1914, when he had the rank of brigadier general (one-star). On Aug. 27, 1915, Pershing’s wife and three of their four children perished in a Presidio house fire; Pershing was in Texas, due to instability of the Mexican Revolution.
‘Looking Back’: GG Park’s Polo Field
The first polo match at the Polo Field was on Nov. 11, 1898 (reported the next day by the San Francisco Call). Horsemen from the Burlingame Club played for two hours, with an intermission, in front of thousands of spectators.
Looking Back: William McKinley Monument
“I killed the president because he was the enemy of the good people – the good working people,” were among Czolgosz’s last words before being executed.
Richmond Review/Sunset Beacon 