Notice the white bollards on the sidewalk: they're a wink, but they make sense. Where you're standing was water in 1849. The bar in front of you was born, quite literally, inside a ship.

1The Arkansas

The Arkansas sailed from New York in 1849 carrying gold seekers and, after a voyage of nearly six months, ran aground on rocks near Alcatraz Island. She was towed to this shore and left stuck in the mud. In the early 1850s, an enterprising man opened a tavern inside her hull: customers walked up a gangplank and in through a hole cut in the bow. Landfill eventually buried the ship, and in 2016 construction next door uncovered remains that appear to be hers, some eight meters down.

2Shanghaiing

These streets formed the Barbary Coast, the waterfront district of saloons, dance halls and brothels. This is where «shanghaiing» was practiced: with sailors in short supply, middlemen known as crimps got men drunk or drugged them and delivered them, unconscious, to captains who paid a fee for each one. When they woke up, they were out at sea.

Books such as Herbert Asbury's «The Barbary Coast» place some of those shanghaiers in this very bar; these are secondhand accounts, best read with caution.

The present building was rebuilt in 1907 by Henry Klee, after the earthquake, and it still operates as a bar.

3What to look for

  • The ship-shaped sign hanging on the corner.
  • The painted sign «Henry Klee Prop.» on the east side wall.
  • The bollards on the sidewalk, a reminder that this was once the shoreline.

Documented

The Arkansas was beached here around 1850, a bar operated inside her hull and the current building dates from 1907; remains of the ship were found during construction in 2016.

Oral tradition

The specific kidnappings attributed to this bar come from secondhand accounts and are not documented case by case.

Sources and credits

Herbert Asbury, «The Barbary Coast» (1933); Bill Pickelhaupt, «Shanghaied in San Francisco» (1996); San Francisco Legacy Business Registry, Old Ship Saloon application.

Photos:

  • Brick facade of the Old Ship Saloon with its ship-shaped sign: LittleT889, CC BY-SA 4.0.

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