Showing posts with label Landmark. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Landmark. Show all posts

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Joe DiMaggio's Sand Box

The (San Francisco) Historic Preservation Commission had voted to make the North Beach branch library a landmark, but forgot to say why, according to San Francisco Chronicle. I have to wonder what made it a landmark.

When I lived in North Beach, I used that branch often. It is very small and cramped. It boasts no significant architectural distinction, it doesn't really fit into the richness of Italian-American neighborhood North Beach like gloves. It is dilapidated and in urgent needs of expansion or replacement.

I don't like the modernistic design for the replacement but that should not be the excuse of keeping this deplorable old facility. I believe that one of the reasons for some to keep it was due to Joe DiMaggio factor - he used to play there, in a tiny sandbox no bigger than your flower bed, perhaps. I don't think a library is a fitting tribute to a baseball player, however, if one insists, wouldn't a statue of DiMaggio a better monument than this pathetic, outdated little barn?

St. Peter and St. Paul Cathedral, San Francisco / 聖彼得和保羅教堂, 舊金山 /  Heiliges Peter und Saint Paul-Kathedrale, San Francisco
St. Peter and St. Paul Cathedral, San Francisco © Matthew Felix Sun