I'm watching this, and it makes me really sad... My absolute best friend Al Timmons was born in SF in 1929. He served in the Navy during WW2, and when he got out, he began his education to become a professor, obtaining his PHD in educational psychology. He was a professor at Long Beach State University when it first opened. He retired in 1981, and bought a house at 27th and Noe Sts. Anyhow I met him in 1985, as I was a Marine stationed at Naval Weapons Station Concord. By this time he was a widow, and he showed me around the city, and on my liberty weekends, I would stay with him. He had all these really great out of print books on the City, and he used to take me to the little known historic places. It was because of this that he inspired my love for San Francisco. And when I got out, I ended up renting a room from him... Al was like the Grandpa that I never got to know. I could talk to him about anything, and in the late afternoon we'd sit out on the deck overlooking the city, while having a few beers, and having these really great discussions. I ended up meeting a great girl, and we ended up getting married, and we moved up north. I was really excited, but sad because I was leaving my best friend, and my long-term home. Al passed away in 2009, and it was an incredible loss for me... Something that I'm still feeling. And watching this makes me realize that Al was alive and well....

Born and raised in the City. Although the standard of dress began to change in the '50s, I still recall in the late '50s and even early '60s having to "dress-up" whenever my mom would take me downtown to go shopping. Memories!

Look how civilized the city was.

Better cars, better architecture, cleaner streets, people dressed better. No one living on the streets. What happen to our dignity?????

This is real time traveling, and this is what KZfaq should be, quality contents like this. Thanks for sharing!

Do you see the Leeds store at around the 2 minute mark? I worked there as a part-timer during high school and early college. I remember Anne, Duke, Buzz, and Mr. Mac!

this is UNBELIEVABLE; the clarity. Makes you feel like you stepped back in time....

Crazy! Dr. Doane retired from Dentistry at age 87 and passed in 2004. Hope a family member sees this video and his business sign.

Clean streets, no shit or trash. It's not the era, it's the people who were different. Raised different.

I like how people used to jump on and off the cable car while it’s moving!!😎

Judging by the cars at 2:19, this is an older shot mixed in with the rest of the 50's shots. I was born In S.F. in '46 and I remember riding in the old style streetcars as a youngster. I also remember that the Owl Drugstore at Powell and Market, where the Cable car turnaround is, became a Woolworths store. Used to go in and eat at the lunch counter inside. My friends and I used to catch the L streetcar out in the Sunset and go downtown just to walk around and look at stuff, or go to the movies. There were a bunch of movie houses down on Market St.

This looks like an alternate universe. I can't believe it used to be like this and we changed it... changed everything.

No computers, no internet, no cellphones, etc. Men wore suits and women wore skirts.

This is great. My dad grew up in San Francisco in the 40s and 50s. I'm sure he'll like this. My mom grew up in Denver. It would be nice to find something like this for that city.

Look how clean the streets are and well dressed the population is!

Every time I watch these types of videos I’m just glad that someone had the foresight to just film something,no matter how mundane or “boring”

Weirdest thing about this film? 1:00 UPS trucks have not changed in 70 years.

Best resolution and high definition ive seen yet! Excellent job "Vivid History"!!!

I lived at the Navy Base at Hunters Point. Loved to hop on the Bus and go into the city. A wonderful department store was the Emporium. Great sboppin. Going to Golden Gate Park was always a day well spent. This was in 1952.

I enjoyed my days in San Francisco, starting in the 1960's through the 70's. I would walk the downtown area, fisherman's wharf, Coit tower, and many other areas, sometimes with my camera. Great fun, and totally different than what it is today. I hope one day to walk safe streets again their one day (although I'm not sure when)

The UPS truck at the 1:00 minute mark…those things haven’t changed in 70 years…lol

Fascinating watching the guys turn the tram around. I love all things 50s, so these vids just bring me joy. Great work 👌🤗

People dressed so nicely back then. So much class.

SF was my home for 20 years, it was beautiful, vibrant, and bohemian. I left in 2017, just before it began its true decay. Sad state of affairs in SF right now 😞

Better dressed, better educated, cleaner streets. It was not just a different time, it was a better time. In every way. Yes, medical care has advanced but if you can’t afford it, what difference does it make? This is what drugs does to society. We have failed as Americans, there is simple no candy coating it. Our country has turned into a cesspool.

It's just so sad seeing what has happened to this once so beautiful city 😭

I remember getting a kick out of watching the cable car turnaround! Makes me very nostalgic.

Amazing high quality of films and coloring makes time traveling even better - THANKS

Clean streets, well dressed people. When we were civilized.

Thanks so much for posting the video of my favorite city. Its like going back in time.

This video appears to have been taken at several different times during the first half of the 1950s; the vehicles on much of it looks to have been around 1950 or '51 (possibly 1952); and at 3:24, there is a large black and white "SP" sign (Southern Pacific) - that sign was constructed in March,1954 and stood until Sept.1961; the sign in this video indicates that this part of the film was most likely taken in 1954 - by 1956, the background of it had faded to a gray color.

Love the "air conditioned" 1952 Ford at 3:25. Wow!

It's amazing that these videos were made in the first place, and that somehow they survived(in a box in someone's attic?) and then restored for us to marvel at!

This is fabulous!! It really is like time travel. Thank you!

With all those 50s cars, I don't see how anybody could think this is the 40s.

The streets were so clean!

So sad to see what a wonderful city San Francisco used to be.

AMAZING !!! Thank You for posting this 👍👍👍

Where all all the homeless and obese people. Someone should do a side by side comparison of then and now, filming from identical vantage points.

san francisco, before it became a trash can...

The shot at 00:31 and the stuff with the trolley after 4:00 hurt because that architecture was still around in my city when I was a young kid, but by the time I was old enough to appreciate it everything had been torn down and replaced with modern buildings.

No homeless no drugs no trash clean streets and well dressed people

It's 1952. "Bend of the River" with James Stewart appears on a marquis early into this clip.

Great work, wonderful images, thanks a lot.

Remember all those shops on Market at Powell that were replaced by Nordstrom and the Mall that are now closed. In my youth, I lived on the cable car line and used to commute on it. Would run onto the turntable when it was moving so I could get the seat I wanted. The fare was 15 cents and I could sometimes get a free ride by smiling at the conductor. Most of the views towards The bridge and the bay have now been obscured by highrises. Love these old films.

Very heart-warming, thank you for sharing.

When normal people were in office

The quality of image is amzing

Absolutely Fantastic

How People were able to parallel park those huge cars is beyond me!

I’m 71. I miss the San Francisco of my youth. My great aunt lived near 19th and Judah. Just up from Golden Gate Park. I loved visiting her.

🌎🌎🌎perfectly remastered ! 🌎🌎🌎

It is so amazing how people were so elegant clothed...especially, women...I am really sorry that nowadays almost all women lost their elegance and wear only pants...

California was a beautiful state....long time ago.

Astonishing quality footage

This is a new hobby for me to watch.

Notice everyone is well dressed, no one is obese, everyone is respectful of each other, no shouting, clean sidewalks, no destruction of anything, amazing how lean people looked and how well they moved. Even middle-aged people moved so well and had great postures, Note the lack of diversity, Makes me sad about what we've become

Excelent! Greetings from MX 🇲🇽

Thank You!

Wow! San Francisco used to be beautiful!

I remember the 50s. Mama would put on her best day suit, and we would take the Key train across the bridge. Go shopping at the White House and City of Paris. It was all so grand and beautiful.

Fantastic work! At least part of this gem can be dated to about the first week of 1953: Note the Streetcar ad (e.g. at 2:16 ) promoting a story on the Hotel St. Francis, to appear in the Saturday Evening Post "on sale Jan 7." Almost surely that's the Jan. 10, 1953 edition, which included the article, "Dan London and his St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco - the Magnificent Innkeeper".

wow, I see the Tonga Room at the Fairmont Hotel. Did not know it's been in existence for that long but I think they closed now. I also saw Woolworth Dept. Store next to the Cable Car Turn Table. Used to go there for breakfast at their Resto downstairs with my Uncle in the early 80's.

i could sit here watching all day...maybe i will...i dont want to be in our present day mess...

Women could actually walk the streets back then. Today, there are people walking the streets in dresses and high heels but they're not women.

My parents lived in SF in the 50s and my mother has memories of that time - Dad was stationed at the Presidio Amy Base. Mum has images from their apartment window, which looked over the bay to Alcatraz

Amazing quality.

I was born in 1958. I want to teleport myself into that environment right now and leave this hellish modern day society behind. But only if I could bring my beloved parrots.

Notice how little anxiety there seems to exist among the public. Before the Internet, before social media and before sugar was added to every food item on the market.

I lived the best of San Francisco from 1986 to 2012.

Город какой чистый.красивый

Lady getting on tram at 4:49. Looking at us. What a great place , would of been nice to see a bit of Alcatraz , what a great place to live in the 50s. USA at its best

That world is gone forever…so sad 😞

It looks like it might have been stock footage for a movie or something. Notice the couple at 3:09 they are both just standing there facing each other, then seem to start walking on cue.

The car beeping sounded like a 1970s Toyota!😂😂

2:33 I was expecting a crash and whew it did not. I used to drive streetcars.

It's frustrating to see what downtown SF used to be, when I've only been able to experience today's comparatively anemic version (though, the same could be said of any modern city...) Superb video though!

Nice restoration work, but it really needs the purple toned down, especially in the shadows.

This is unbelievable

This should not be possible. There's no way a person could watch life in the streets that occured seventy years ago. It's inhuman, and illogical. These moments were totally dull, insignificant at this time. It's the fact that we should never see this that makes these images precious and fascinating. Thanks, George Eastman.

Nice to see it so clean compared to s hole it is now

A would love to live back in that time ❤

muhteşem olmuş.. thanks

Decency, law & order, beauty Please Come Back!

@1:14 24 hour parking for 1.50. Crazy

Stunning!

If I had a time machine I would repeatedly go back to 1950 spend time until 1960 and start again.

Great resolution and mesmerizing! Nicely done.

When regular folks used the cable cars not just tourists. well, there were more lines back then. buses and the muni underground replaced them.

Beautiful

Good quality video

Wow... I've never seen SF so clean

I'm 36 years old. I was born at the end of 1986. What I miss the most from this era is how everyone dressed with class and self respect. Imagine that being the norm today instead of the garbage you typically see in metro areas. Modern day society has really taken a massive dump in a disgusting toilet in a public restroom. Shameful.

Wonderful ❤.

I remember going with my brother and my parents driving onto the ferry from Oakland to San Francisco

I left my heart in San Francisco ❤❤❤ i was 5 times in San Francisco. Good Collage Film..Greetings from Germany Cologne......

I work in san fran and damn is it dirty I'm here as I speak!!!

anyone else wish with every fibre of their being they could go back to this time?

It is incredible how the physical aspect of the human being has deteriorated in the last 80 years. In the video you see thin, well-dressed, elegant and well-mannered people. If we go to the same places today we will see obese people, badly dressed, bad manners and the last with indeterminate sexes. what a disgrace

At the 2:34 mark the sign on the back of the municipal railway streetcar on Market street says Chutes at the Beach. If this video is from the 40's or 50's muni never updated their signs on their streetcars. Chutes at the Beach became Whitney's Playland at the Beach in 1923, when George & brother Leo Whitney bought the land and the amusement park. They also bought the Cliff House in the 40's. What a fantastic city San Francisco was in the 40's & 50's!!!!!!!! ❤️