120 Years Later: The 1906 Earthquake in 13 Photos

120 Years Later: The 1906 Earthquake in 13 Photos
By Jeremy Menzies

On April 18, 1906, the ground under San Francisco shook violently. A 7.9 magnitude earthquake hit at 5:12 a.m. as residents slept. The Great San Francisco Earthquake and Fires nearly destroyed the city. More than half the residents were displaced from their homes. And the transit system was devastated. In 1906, United Railroads of San Francisco ran most of the city’s transit lines. Company photographer John Henry Mentz documented the tragedy in a series of photographs. He took 14 photos on the day of the quake. And 13 of them have been preserved in the SFMTA Photo Archive collections. For the...

Published 2026-04-24T00:00:00Z
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