Early Water Supply
My mind drifts back to the days when our water system was dependent in part upon a well near the corner of Market and First streets. This was in 1855 when the population of San Francisco was between 40,000 and 50,000. I was then living on Third street near Mission and got my supply of water from a man named Somers who conveyed water about the city to his various customers in a cart. I took water from him for about three years at the rate of $1.50 per week.
Many’s the time I have gone out to the Mission hunting rabbits. All that part of the city was as wild as it ever was, sand dunes and low grounds. About three years later a company built a plank toll road on Mission street from some point near the water front to the Mission, a distance of about three miles. This made an opening through the sand dunes and that section filled up rapidly.