Amazing film. There is not that much difference between the way people acted then and now. People hitching rides on the backs of cars, kids running in front of the trolly or the seemingly absolute confidence of the drivers with so many near misses.

Wonderful experience! I want to save it and watch it over and over. My own father could have been one of the boys. It's interesting to think that the traffic, which would be condemned today, was simply FREE. Free of government telling us how to behave. There is wonderful sense of freedom in the film. Thank you, GVL

Wonderful experience! I want to save it and watch it over and over. My own father could have been one of the boys. It's interesting to think that the traffic, which would be condemned today, was simply FREE. Free of government telling us how to behave. There is wonderful sense of freedom in the film. Thank you, GVL

Mt grandfather, Lester Jones, was an aide to General Pershing. He awakened the general that morning to inform him of the earthquake.

Mt grandfather, Lester Jones, was an aide to General Pershing. He awakened the general that morning to inform him of the earthquake.

Wonderful. It's easy to believe that these are the days of "miracle and wonder," but my gosh, horses and autos sharing the same street. Imagine that.

Wonderful. It's easy to believe that these are the days of "miracle and wonder," but my gosh, horses and autos sharing the same street. Imagine that.

People dressed with such dignity back then, particularly the women.

Thanks for this. My grandfather was the age of these newsboys. You can feel the energy in the place, can't you?

I worked at the San Francisco Medical Examiner's Office and all death records (MEO death registry) prior to the earthquake were destroyed by the fire and documentation goes forward from around April 14. It is fascinating to leaf through the old records, when all information was handwritten by men, with flourishes of sometimes unreadable cursive penmanship because it is so calligraphic. These records sometimes included pictures of the deceased, pasted in and preserved for posterity. Did you know that the Chinese were not counted among the dead and that an old Chinese cemetery was found in the Civic Center area when the City was building the new Public Library? All human skeletal remains were called in by the construction crew to the SF MEO to secure for a proper burial, which was done by the Chinatown mortuary on Green Street. The Chief Medical Examiner when I was there, the late Boyd G. Stephens, MD, also had an opium pipe collection in his office from the opium dens of Chinatown that were uncovered when BART was being constructed. Did you also know that many of the house fires were a result of arson, because there was no insurance payment for earthquake losses but was for fires? (Who even knew they even had insurance back then?)

Another bit of SF trivia, horse carriage or horse versus pedestrian deaths were not uncommon. I recall reading one death narrative where a child darted into the street into the path of a horse and the death investigator actually documented that the parents were careless. One could never ever say that or anything remotely like that today.

*documentation of death records goes forward from after the '06 earthquake.

Who even knew they even had insurance back then?

Actually, Nancy, insurance is pretty old. Lloyd's of London went bankrupt trying to pay claims following the Great Fire of 1666, so the concept, at least in the West, has been around for a very long time.