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Guide Map of San Francisco, 1891

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, it was fashionable for middle-class people, especially young men, to visit working-class and immigrant neighborhoods. Such tourism was really voyeurism, exoticizing immigrants and laborers as enticing, perhaps dangerous, "others." Well-to-do visitors hoped to encounter unfamiliar people, food, and entertainment and possibly brush up against the dangers and vices sensationalized in the popular press. The most popular destination was Chinatown. White middle-class visitors assumed that San Francisco's Chinatown was like China itself, not understanding the particular economic and social factors that contributed to Chinatown's "bachelor society." To meet the demand for this tourism, publishers printed maps and guidebooks that showed visitors where to go to experience the most exciting thrills.

Langley's San Francisco Directory, 1891
Source |

"Langley's San Francisco Directory, 1891," Bancroft Library, University of California; from Calisphere, http://content.cdlib.org/dynaxml/data/13030/b2/hb838nb2b2/files/hb838nb2b2-FID4.jpg. Modified by the American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning.  


Creator | American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning
Rights | Copyright American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning.  Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Item Type | Map
Cite This document | American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning, “Guide Map of San Francisco, 1891,” SHEC: Resources for Teachers, accessed March 28, 2024, https://shec.ashp.cuny.edu/items/show/831.

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