Cadillac Hotel (San Francisco, California)

The Cadillac Hotel is a historic building from c. 1907 – c. 1908 in the Tenderloin neighborhood of San Francisco, California, U.S.. It was the first non-profit single-residence occupancy (SRO) hotel in the Western United States. Since 2015, the first two floors of the building is the home to the Tenderloin Museum, a cultural history museum dedicated to the neighborhood. It was called the A.A. Louderback Building, and nicknamed "The House of Welcome" during the early 20th-century. The Cadillac Hotel has been listed as a San Francisco Designated Landmark since 1985; and is part of the NRHP-listed Uptown Tenderloin Historic District since 2009. The building also has a historical marker, erected by Uptown Tenderloin, Inc.

1. History

The Cadillac Hotel was designed by architectural firm, Meyer and O'Brien (Frederick Herman Meyer and Michael Smith O'Brien) as a hotel for client Andrew A. Louderback (1831–1926). It is a four-story steel beam building with reinforced brick, with a three-part design in a Renaissance Revival/Baroque Revival architectural style with the influence of Art Nouveau. In the early 19th-century, the building had 180 guest rooms, a ballroom, and the first floor had many retail stores. It was built right after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire. It pre-dated the majority of the residential building in the Tenderloin neighborhood, which occurred years later around the opening of the Panama–Pacific International Exposition of 1915. From 1924 until 1992, the Cadillac Hotel housed the Newman's Gym, founded by Billy Newman. It was noted for being one of the oldest boxing facility in the country, and the practice space for Muhammad Ali, Joe Louis, Jack Dempsey, George Foreman, and Sugar Ray Robinson. In the 1960s, businessman Donald Fisher owned the building, and stripped away many of the historical details from the architecture. In the 1970s and 1980s, single-residence occupancy (SRO) and tenant rights activism grew, along with a desire to preserve the Tenderloin. Community activist Leroy Looper and Reality House West purchased the building in 1979, with the goal of creating housing for the homeless. Lopper rehabilitated the Cadillac Hotel building through the help of various grants, and housed some 160 tenants. In 2015, Tenderloin Museum (formerly Tenderloin History Museum) moved into the ground floor of the building. The Cadillac operates as a "shelter plus care hotel" in modern-day. In 2023, the building made the news with the elevator breaking many times a year, and trapping vulnerable residents.

1. See also

African Americans in San Francisco List of San Francisco Designated Landmarks

1. References


1. External links

Official website Tenderloin Museum website Video: Newman's Gym (August 16, 1974), from KPIX-TV and DIVA/SFSU

Nearby Places View Menu

YMCA Hotel (San Francisco)

The YMCA Hotel is a historic building in the Tenderloin District of San Francisco, California, United States. It is listed on the listed on the National Register of Historic Places in San Francisco, California since 1986; and it is a contributing property to the National Register of Historic Places's Uptown Tenderloin Historic District since 2009.

Hotel Landmark

94 m

Hospitality House

Hospitality House (aka Central City Hospitality House) is a house of hospitality-type center that serves the homeless and poor of San Francisco, specifically those of the Tenderloin district of the city, where it is located. At a drop-in day center it provides counseling, instruction, computer access, medical triage, and other forms of assistance. It also runs a 30-bed shelter, two Employment Resource Centers, and a fine arts studio. Its main office is located at 290 Turk Street. It has been in operation since 1967. Hospitality House is known for encouraging the homeless and poor to take part in art and creative writing. It has published the work of many artists and writers, and holds periodic exhibitions where the artists can sell their work. Hospitality House operates the Community Art Studio, a storefront art gallery and studio, which has been offering free working space and art supplies to all comers since 1969. Hospitality House is a beneficiary of numerous fund raising events such as the Up Your Alley Fest. In 2014 the facility attracted international news coverage when a 53-year-old homeless man competed in the San Francisco Marathon to raise funds for Hospitality House. He also raffled off one of his paintings to benefit the charity. He wound up running a half-marathon and raised nearly $10,000 for Hospitality House. Outsider artist Jane Winkelman was originally introduced to painting at Hospitality House.

Art Charity

Boeddeker Park

Boeddeker Park, more formally known as Father Alfred E. Boeddeker Park, is an urban park in the Tenderloin neighborhood of San Francisco. This 1-acre park was renovated and reopened in 2014, especially intended to serve the needs of people in the surrounding neighborhood who experience amongst the highest levels of poverty in the city. The park was completed with a large mural, Everyone Deserves a Home, on the building above the park in 2016.

Landmark Park

176 m

Black Hawk (nightclub)

The Black Hawk was a San Francisco nightclub that featured live jazz performances during its period of operation from 1949 to 1963. It was located on the corner of Turk Street and Hyde Street in San Francisco's Tenderloin District. Guido Cacianti owned the club along with Johnny and Helen Noga.

Music Nightlife