27 Fun Facts about San Francisco

San Francisco is small and cozy, full of mysteries and odd things. Whether you have 3 days in San Francisco or just some hours, San Francisco attractions, stories and myths will not leave you indifferent. Get all fun facts about San Francisco!

San Francisco is in Top 50 most visited cities worldwide. In 2014 San Francisco tourism brought the city 18 million visitors, that spent about $10 billion in local businesses.
New York is 10 times bigger than San Francisco in population (about 8.5 million people) and twice as big in area (around 470 sq mi (1,200 km²);
The first Chinese Fortune cookies with a prediction of destiny were created in San Francisco by a Japanese man;
The first jeans were born in San Francisco. Their creator Levi Strauss died at the age of 73 never being married;
The lowest crime rate in San Francisco was in the beginning of the 20^th century among the Japanese. Simply because the violators were sent back to Japan;
San Francisco has the biggest percent of homeless inhabitants in the USA. They are attracted here by the extent of the help from the city government and soft climate;
The Irish coffee was invented in San Francisco;

Artisan coffee in SF

San Francisco takes the 4th place in the world by the number of billionaires — after Moscow, New York and London;
Every year on January 1 or 2 San Francisco hosts Rose Parade, well-known to all America, represented by florists from all over California and other states of America;
In 1848 the population of San Francisco grew up from 300 inhabitants to 25000 just in 2 years, women being less than 5%.
At the beginning of the 20th century San Francisco had a law under which cars could not park for more than 15 minutes. And it has nothing to do with traffic. The oil dripping from cars ate holes in asphalt;
San Francisco forbids using the used underwear for washing cars;
After an earthquake of 1906 225 000 people out of 400 000 population of San Francisco were left without a roof over the head because of lack of water. Some lucky houses were rescued from the fire because they were watered with red wine;
The Golden Gate Bridge is the best-known symbol of San Francisco, and has been a scene for at least one hundred movies. The bridge has its own website and facebook;

Golden Gate Bridge in SF

San Francisco hosted the last official concert of Beatles in 1966;
Alcatraz, the most known prison of the United States and, perhaps, the whole world is a small picturesque island, located in 15 minutes from the pier. Of all San Francisco tourist attractions it’s #1, according to TripAdvisor.
Eight abrupt turns on the Russian hill made 600 feet (180 m) long Lombard Street the most photographed Street of “San Fran”. Always must-see on our San Francisco tours;
The museum of Asian art in San Francisco is the largest museum of the New World with more than 15 thousand exhibits from India, China, Japan, Indonesia and other Asian regions. The right place to track the development of life on the planet;
The most part of the exposition of Wells Fargo museum is devoted to the years of the Gold-rush with items like tools for gold mining;
Chinatown in San Francisco has a history is at least 150 years old, and is home to 200 thousand citizens of Celestial Empire. Being just twelfth most populated city in the USA, San Francisco has the largest number of Chinese in one place outside China.
It is hard to believe, but Chinatown attracts more tourists than the Golden Gate Bridge;

City by the Bay

Names of many streets and cafes in San Francisco are duplicated in Chinese;
Catholic cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul ironically is located at 666 Filbert Street. The cathedral became home church and the cultural center for the Italian population of the city;
Transamerica Pyramid is the tallest building in San Francisco (260 meter, or 853 ft);
Haight Ashbury neighborhood is known as the center of hippie culture;
By the way, fog in San Francisco has its own name. Meet Karl (Karl the Fog)! Karl is very famous, he even has his own facebook, Instagram and twitter with almost 200 K followers in Instagram and over 100 K in Twitter;
You can either hate it or love it, the city has a very distinct character, which many people find weird. By the way, for weird things go to Ripley’s Believe It or Not!, which we personally find the weirdest of all San Francisco tourist spots.