San Francisco's Sunset District, California

Then and Now

by Lorri Ungaretti

Located in the southwestern part of San Francisco, the Sunset District developed late because of its distance from downtown and because of the sand dunes that covered it for thousands of years. After 1900, as public transportation spread and the automobile became available, housing and streets soon began to cover the Sunset District dunes.

96 pages, Paperback

First published January 23, 2012

Reviews

[Haley · Rating 4 out of 5]

A small, cute book with before-and-after photos spanning decades of the Sunset District. I really enjoy seeing how this part of San Francisco was transformed from barren sand dunes to a cute residential neighborhood, and it's a bit trippy seeing photos of street corners that look essentially unchanged over the past 70 or 80 years.
Ungaretti has written several books on the history of this particular neighborhood - this one, unlike others, is almost entirely photos with captions. If you're looking for more of a history, try Stories in the Sand: San Francisco's Sunset District, 1847-1964. I also have San Francisco's Sunset District checked out from the library, but it looks to be almost identical to this one, if a bit longer, so I might skip it.