Old St Mary’s Cathedral

Many thought it a lost cause, but California’s first cathedral, inaugurated in 1854, tried for decades to give San Francisco some religion – despite its location in brothel central. Hence the stern admonition on the church’s brick clock tower: ‘Son, observe the time and fly from evil.’ Eventually the archdiocese abandoned attempts to convert Dupont St whoremongers and handed the church over to a Chinese community mission run by the activism-oriented Paulists. During WWII, the church served the US military as a recreation center and cafeteria. The 1906 fire destroyed one of the district’s biggest bordellos directly across from the church, making room for St Mary’s Square. Today, skateboarders do tricks of a different sort on the park’s rails and benches, under the watchful eye of Beniamino Bufano’s 1929 pink granite and steel statue of Sun Yat-sen.