Research – Empowering women through fiction and history.

One Thing Leads To Another: The Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906

America is no stranger to natural disasters. We’ve seen it all: hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, fires, earthquakes. Only last month, Florida experienced two hurricanes back-to-back (Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton) and the damage and lives lost from these two disasters combined was devastating.

Whether due to Mother Nature’s temperament or human error, disasters seem to come in packs. In the case of the above-mentioned Hurricane Milton, damage was caused not only by the winds and floods it brought but also by the tornadoes that formed even before the hurricane hit the ground. Looking back in history, this is not something we can blame on climate change or global warming. One of the worst natural disasters in the history of Northern California endured a back-to-back disaster: the Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. While there is no doubt that the earthquake itself caused a lot of damage in San Francisco and smaller cities along the coast, reports show most of the damage (nearly eighty percent and some sources state it was closer to ninety-five) happened because of the fires that followed.

The facts of the earthquake are well-documented, and I go into them in the author’s note included in my upcoming Adele Gossling Mysteries book. The earthquake began on April 18, 1906, at 5:12 a.m. in, ironically, the ocean. But it quickly moved to land and tore up cities along the coast, including San Francisco (though to call it the San Francisco Great Earthquake is misleading, since many smaller cities in the area, including Santa Rosa and San Jose, suffered massive damage). The magnitude of the earthquake has been debated, but most experts put it at 7.9-8.25 which stands today as the biggest quake in the area. The strong shock lasted about 45-60 seconds. While that might not seem like a long time, it was enough to completely incapacitate the entire city. The quake broke gas and power lines, damaged water pipes, and made telegraph lines useless. Houses and buildings of the time were made of wood (and still are, so they easily crumbled with the strong tremors, especially in the downtown area. There were a few buildings that withstood the disaster and survive even today in their more-or-less natural state, including the Flood Building (a majestic-looking office building on Market Street) and St. Mary’s Cathedral.

Photo Credit: Residents looking toward the downtown at the fires breaking out during the 1906 Great San Francisco Earthquake, 1906: U.S. Geological Survey/Flickr/CC0 1.0 Universal

While the earthquake did its damage to buildings, infrastructure, and pavements, leaving some places with such huge cracks that horses fell through them, many argue the majority of the disaster came not from the tremors but from the multiple fires that broke out in the city almost immediately after the earthquake. Gas lines broke all over the city and ignited fires that were difficult to stop. There’s the famous “Ham and Eggs Fire,” for example, where a housewife in Hayes Valley turned on her gas stove to make breakfast for her family soon after the earthquake. Little did she know the chimney had been damaged by the quake. The stove ignited a fire that spread throughout the downtown area. Before it was finally quenched, it had destroyed some of the city’s most important and iconic buildings, including City Hall. To add insult to injury, water lines were broken so firefighters had trouble getting water out of the pipes to put the fires out. And human error had a hand in it as well. When water was clearly not going to be the answer to putting out the massive flames, the military resorted to dynamiting buildings (in an effort to prevent the fires from spreading), but their lack of experience in this area only made the fires worse.

Photo of San Francisco downtown area after the earthquake and fires had ceased, taken from a camera attached to a kite and suspended some 1,000 feet from the air. The large street going down the center is Market Street. Note how nearly all the buildings on either side are completely destroyed.

Photo Credit: Taken by George R. Lawrence, 28 May 1906, Panoramic photographs, Library of Congress: Grook Da Ogre/Wikimedia Commons/PD US

All told, by the time the fires had subsided (and it would take four days for this to happen), they had claimed three thousand lives across the Bay Area and eighty percent of San Francisco. It took two years for the city to rebuild.

My book, Murder Among The Rubble, features this disaster and focuses on the rebuilding phase just a few weeks after the earthquake (featuring a murder, of course). You can pick up a copy on preorder now at a special price here.

I’ll be talking more about the 1906 San Francisco Great Earthquake, its aftermath, and the effect it had on the lives of the residents in my newsletter as the release date for this book gets closer in December. You won’t want to miss that! If you’re not already signed up for my newsletter, I encourage you to click here and do so. You’ll get lots of free goodies, including my book The Missing Ruby Necklace (not available anywhere else!) if you do.

The Treatment of the Chinese in San Francisco after the 1906 Earthquake

Today is a special day for the people of China as it’s National Day of the Chinese Republic. On this day in 1911, a group of revolutionaries led a revolt against the Qing Dynasty. They overthrew the imperial rule that had dominated for centuries, declaring the country a republic. You can read more about the revolution here.

Why am I mentioning this? First, we are all connected to one another in some way, so knowing about the history of other countries besides our own is part of that connection. Second, I’ve come to appreciate the struggles of the Chinese not only in their own country but in others as well, especially during the early 20th century. In fact, it was researching the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and the rebuilding that happened afterward for my upcoming book, Murder Among the Rubble, that led me to not only appreciate the way the Chinese were treated during this time but also to include this community in that book.

Photo Credit: Chinatown, Waverly Place at Clay Street, 9 April 1900 (six years before the earthquake), glass plate negative: San Francisco Public Library/Flickr/CC BY NC ND 2.0

San Francisco is known as a liberal city that opens its arms to all and celebrates its diversity. But it wasn’t always this way. Many ethnic groups like the Latino and Asian communities, experienced abominable racism in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Before the earthquake, the Chinese, who numbered about 15,000, were seen as instigators of corruption and vice. They were regulated to a twelve-block radius known as Chinatown and forced to live under squalid conditions. Many couldn’t find decent work and resorted to earning a living with businesses catering to the tourist trade or related to vices, such as opium dens and prostitution houses. The community was stereotyped as one without morals and willing to engage in criminal activity such as the slave trade. This stereotype was so prevalent that a film made in 1965 portraying the Chinese in Chinatown in this way garnished protest from Asian-American actors and led to the creation of the East West Players. I wrote about that here.

When the earthquake hit San Francisco in 1906, Chinatown was, like eighty percent of the city, destroyed. About two-thirds of the Chinese living there fled to Oakland (where they weren’t welcomed – if you can stomach it, read this article that appeared in the Oakland Herald and really shows the attitude toward the Chinese at the time). The other third remained in the city.

Photo Credit: Chinatown after the earthquake, 1906, Harold B. Lee Library: Picryl/Public Domain

The committee that was formed after the earthquake to oversee the rebuilding was faced with what to do with these people. The remaining Chinese were first placed in makeshift tents on Van Ness Avenue, far away from any of the main camp locations, but officials feared they would slowly migrate back to their ruined homes in Chinatown (more about why this was a concern to the committee later). So they were transferred to the Presidio to a separate camp on the other side of the reservation, far away from the main camps populated by Caucasians. Their tents were much smaller, and the food, supplies, and medical attention they received were inferior to those of the whites.

During the rebuilding phase after the earthquake, one of the biggest debates was the question of the fate of Chinatown. Logic would dictate the city would rebuild Chinatown where it had been before, just as they were rebuilding all other neighborhoods in the city. But the real estate of those twelve blocks was prime and businessmen who had been trying to get their hands on it for years saw an opportunity to steal it from the Chinese (since records of their leases would have been burned in the ires). These businessmen tried to get officials to move Chinatown to Hunter’s Point, a remote part of the city used by the Navy shipyard at the time.

Luckily, they did not succeed. The Chinese community in San Francisco, though relatively small, was not without a voice or its supporters. A delegation consisting of American-Chinese and Chinese authorities like the Consul-General of San Francisco called upon the governor to protest against the move, threatening to cut off commercial ties with China. The delegation made the following powerful statement: “America is a free country, and every man has a right to occupy land which he owns provided that he makes no nuisance.”

Photo Credit: Chinatown in San Francisco (in all its glory), taken 2 December 2007 by Tony Webster from Portland, OR: Hiku2/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 2.0

Moved by this plea (and by the idea of losing trade relations with China), officials nixed the idea of moving Chinatown to Hunter’s Point. Chinatown was rebuilt where it had stood before the earthquake and where it still stands today. The area lost its reputation for vice after the earthquake when the city “cleaned up” such places as the Barbary Coast and Chinatown. Instead, it became a tourist attraction, rebuilt with ornamental gates, panoramas, and pagodas. It’s now one of the most popular places to visit when in San Francisco.

If you want to find out more about how the Chinese faired after the San Francisco earthquake, be sure and check out Murder Among the Rubble, coming out at the end of this year. You can pick up a copy for preorder now at a discount on all online bookstores.

If you love fun, engaging mysteries set in the past, you’ll enjoy The Missing Ruby Necklace! It’s available exclusively to newsletter subscribers here. By signing up, you’ll also get news about upcoming releases, fun facts about women’s history, classic true-crime tidbits, and more!

Works Cited:

“Chinese Make Strong Protest”, San Francisco Chronicle, 30 April 1906. https://sfmuseum.org/chin/4.29.html. Accessed October 4, 2024.

Working Women’s Tragedy: The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire of 1911

Photo Credit: A cartoon referring to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire depicts a factory owner, his coat adorned with dollar signs, holding a door closed while workers shut inside struggle to escape amid flames and smoke, 1911, artist unknown (name illegible), International Ladies Garment Workers Union Photographs: Kheel Center, Cornell University/Flickr/CC BY 2.0

Today is Labor Day in the United States. Sadly, much of the meaning behind this day has been lost in the fanfare of celebrations and BBQs. Labor Day is about celebrating the strides made by working men and women in America in establishing more humane conditions, like the 8-hour work day and work environments that don’t resemble old sweatshops.

To say working women especially didn’t have it easy in the 19th and early 20th centuries is a gross understatement. They had to endure extremely low wages (more so than working men), long hours, unsafe and unsanitary conditions, and harassment from all sides. Even with Progressive Era reforms, change came very slowly.

Probably the most famous example of the consequences of the injustices working women had to face during this time was the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. I became fascinated with this piece of women’s history when I saw a PBS special a long time ago. The story, in fact, was part of what inspired me to write historical fiction. I have somewhere in my files a story idea based on this event which may or may not get written and published someday.

What intrigued me then and now is the question of who were the victims of the fire. From the list of 146 workers who died in the fire, only fifteen were men. And yes, I counted them (there’s a list on the Cornell University website of all of the victims here.) That means that 131 women died in the fire. According to historical documents, we know they were immigrant women, mostly of Italian and Eastern European origin. A quick scan of the list mentioned above shows the majority of these women were between the ages of sixteen and twenty-five.

But what do we really know about them? The Cornell University list doesn’t give us much more than their names, ages, nationalities, how long they had lived in the United States and their addresses. In other words, statistical data that’s easy to locate in historical records.

But what was their life like? To answer this question, we have put ourselves in their place. Many of these women had been in America for less than five years. They came with their families and carried with them hopes and dreams of a better life. Some were escaping persecution like the pogroms in Russia and Eastern Europe. Others came from Southern Italy where hardship and few job opportunities were the norm.

What they got instead was extreme poverty, misery, and exploitation. Their work week was hardly the 9-to-5 schedule we know today. It was not uncommon for these women to start their workday before the sun went up and end it well after the sun went down. They worked ten or eleven hours a day, every day (no weekends off here!) with only a tiny break for lunch.

How much were they paid? An average of six dollars a week, roughly equivalent to $210 today (that’s less than $11,000 a year – imagine trying to live on that in post-COVID inflation times!) To add insult to injury, these women often had to bring their own materials to work (like sewing needles) because their employers refused to provide them. That’s like coming to work and bringing your own laptop and printer!

They not only worked long hours for little pay, but they also experienced severe indignity and humiliation. In most cases, they were so closely watched, that they didn’t even have the freedom to go to the ladies’ room whenever they needed it. Doors were locked and kept locked, ostensibly because employers were afraid they would steal materials and smuggle them out during working hours or leave for an extra long bathroom break. This was, in fact, one of the reasons why the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire turned into a tragedy of massive proportions. There was one entrance that would have offered escape for the workers but to get to it, they had to open the doors, and the doors were locked and bolted.

The fire escape leading from the upper floors where the fire hose and ladders didn’t get to was in such bad shape that it collapsed when workers tried to use it as an escape from the fire.

Photo Credit: Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire escape after the fire, 1911, photographer unknown, International Ladies Garment Workers Union Photographs: Kheel Center, Cornell University/Flickr/CC BY 2.0

These women also worked in appalling conditions. The floor was littered with dirt and debris from the work they did and never cleaned. Sanitation was a joke. For the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, most of the materials, like cotton and paper, were highly inflammable. Reports lay blame on this waste lying around for the quick spreading of the fire. How quick? Everything was over in less than twenty minutes.

Things did begin to change in the latter part of the 1910s, partly as a result of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory tragedy. In New York, where the tragedy occurred, the state legislation passed thirty-six bills regarding labor laws. Around the country, fire laws were put in place to ensure buildings and workers worked in safety.

In San Francisco, my favorite city and the birthplace of my protagonist for the Adele Gossling Mysteries, building safety laws were in place a little earlier because of the city’s own tragedy — the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. My book, Murder Among The Rubble, coming out at the end of this year, includes not only a murder mystery but also a little background on the earthquake and its aftermath. You can preorder it here.

Medicinal Purposes: The History of the Hot Toddy

For centuries, alcohol was used as an alternative to medicine. In the mid-1800s, hard liquor like whiskey, rum, and gin were given to babies (I kid you not) to help with teething and doctors would even recommend a hot toddy to an infant who was having trouble sleeping. If that shocks you, bear in mind the consensus is that the hard liquors in the 19th and early 20th centuries were weaker than they are today (which is one reason why they drank so much more then than we do today).

In Book 2 of my Adele Gossling Mysteries, the hot toddy plays a vital role in the murder (spoiler alert: It’s not the murder weapon). Hot toddies bring visions of a cold night in Dickensian London with the wind whistling outside, the snow falling, and people cozying up by the fire with the warm drink to warm themselves up and soothe their nerves before bed.

Photo Credit: Hot Toddy, Frank Moss Bennett, 1929, oil on canvas: Picryl/Public Domain

The main ingredients of a hot toddy, as we know it today, are, as one of my characters in Book 2 describes it: hot water or hot cider “if Mr. Poland brings it around”, sugar, lemon juice, whiskey, and “the trimmings” which include a slice of lemon and a cinnamon stick.

Ironically, the hot toddy wasn’t hot when it first appeared. And its ingredients weren’t much like the hot toddy we know today. British soldiers serving in India in the 19th century were sent expensive beer, among other provisions, and to make it stretch, they would water it down with water and fermented palm sap.

Later in the century, the drink started to take the form we know it today with add-ons like lemon, cinnamon, and sometimes honey and became popular in Britain. As mentioned above, it was used for medicinal purposes, such as to ward off colds and coughs before we had the kind of medicines we have today.

When exactly the hot toddy moved from a cold cocktail to a hot drink is questionable. Some speculate it was the Scotch who made it hot to accommodate the cold and damp weather of their country. Others say that, since the toddy was used as medicine, people started to heat it up as it made those medicinal properties that much more potent.

The hot toddy is, of course, associated with Britain, but it made its way to America in the 1880s. Americans preferred to call it a “hot scotch” and, while the British hot toddy could use a variety of hard liquors, the Americans mostly stuck to scotch as the alcohol of choice in the beverage. If you’re into cocktails and never tried a hot toddy, you can check out this site for some interesting recipes.

And if you’ve never read A Wordless Death, the second book of the Adele Gossling Mysteries, I invite you to check it out, as it’s at a great discount for this entire month! You can get the details here. And don’t forget that Book 1, The Carnation Murder, is always free! Check that one out here.

America’s Mini War: The Spanish-American War of 1898

Today, on Memorial Day, we honor those who fought for our country and the sacrifices they made. We think of war as a big, complex thing — that is, they go on for years and cost many lives. World War I lasted 4 years (though America didn’t get involved until the last year of the war) and World War II lasted six (though, again, America didn’t enter the war until three years after it started). The Vietnam War was even longer and more complex. It began in 1955 and ended in 1975, though American involvement lasted from 1965 to 1973.

So it’s no wonder many do not remember the war that happened in between the Civil War (1861-1865) and World War I (1914-1918). But its implications and impact resonated for years to come and even today.

Photo Credit: Headline in the New York Journal of Congress declaring war which began the Spanish-American War, 25 April 1898, New York Public Library: Picryl/Creative Commons CC0 1.0

The Spanish-American War stands out in the annals of American history for several reasons. First, it was a very short war. War was officially declared on April 21, 1898, and the fighting ended on August 13, 1898 (though the war itself officially ended four months later). America was involved in this war for financial and humanitarian reasons. The consequences of the war for the United States helped to push the nation toward one of the greatest changes that occurred during the Gilded Age — it hurled the country onto the world stage.

The war involved fighting in Cuba, a colony of Spain at the time. Spanish rule was oppressive to Cuban insurgents, and they had been fighting three years prior. The brutal treatment of the Cubans by the Spanish gained a lot of sympathy in the United States, thanks to the yellow journalism popular at the time. It was very much on the minds of Americans. In Senator North, a novel by Gertrude Atherton published in 1900 but set a bit earlier, shows Washington society discussing the war constantly at their dinner parties and picnics, and outlines some of the great debates going on in the Senate about whether America should or should not enter the war. The thing that pushed America to declare war on Spain was the sinking of the battleship USS Maine, which newspapers played up as having been caused by either mines or torpedoes fired by the Spanish army (though it was never established whether this was really true, or whether it was some kind of technical error having nothing to do with the Spanish).

A major player in the war was Teddy Roosevelt, who left his position as Assistant Secretary of the Navy to join in the fighting with a group of soldiers known as the Rough Riders. This short war made Roosevelt a hero and cemented his emerging political career at the turn of the 20th century. The nation ensured independence for Cuba (which helped with political and financial trade) and gained control over the Pacific, including the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Guam. The war also allowed the United States to declare Hawaii its territory (though Hawaii wouldn’t become a state until 1959).

There were relatively few casualties in this war (about two thousand, as compared to 116,000 during World War I, 700,000 in World War II, and 58,000 in the Vietnam War). But those who fought made this little war an important part of American foreign politics and trade.

False Fathers, the second book of my historical coming-of-age series, the Waxwood Series, takes place during the summer of 1898, so the war is very much on the minds of Waxwood’s resort guests. In one scene, Jake and Stevens, a father figure who guides Jake throughout the book on his journey to manhood, are watching Stevens’ cousin Roger and his friends play billiards, and the subject of the Spanish-American War comes up:

The sky grew black, and the sea calmed. The young men played and drank into the night, and Stevens showed no signs of retiring. Jake wanted to leave, but his feet felt cemented int hat room. He listened as their talk moved from college professors and sports to the war in Cuba.
“We ought to pull out while we can,” said Mr. Harrington. “It’s not worth the lives we’ve already given for it.”
“We’re not there for fancy, boy.” Mr. Trent shot two balls in the left side pocket. “Let Spain and every other country see we’re a force to be reckoned with.”
Mr. McDonaugh cocked his head. “The frontier’s all taken, so what have we left?”
“Virile man conquer virgin territory,” Roger agreed, his words sounding thick.
“We’ve almost won anyway,” said Ivan Morvell. “Not two weeks ago, the Rough Riders—”
“Those braggarts!” Roger snarled. “Posing for the papers like gladiators. And that goose with his mustache and spectacles!”
Stevens jumped up. In the shadow left by two lamp, his indignation was unavoidable. “I suggest you speak about Mr. Roosevelt with respect.”

For these young men who are coming of age in the last years of the 19th century, the war symbolizes the potential for bigger and better things, not only on a national level but on a psychological level for them as young men going out into the world. The idea of power expands both in the public and private spheres.

The complete Waxwood Series will be out in one box set next month, but feel free to get a head start by grabbing Book 1, The Specter, now. The book is free on all book vendor sites and you can get all the details and links here.