Huntington Park, at 1050 Taylor St., is a city-block park at the top of Nob Hill. Grace Cathedral is to the west and the Pacific-Union Club is to the northeast. The San Francisco Recreation and Park Department runs the 1.3-acre park, which has landscaped lawns, a playground and two fountains.
From mansion to park
The Nob Hill Association says railroad attorney David D. Colton picked the corner in 1872 and built a white Neoclassical mansion with marble steps and Corinthian columns. Wikipedia says the Huntington family’s house stood on the site until the 1906 earthquake and fire destroyed it. For a time afterward, some people left homeless by the disaster lived in tents on the block.
In 1915, Arabella Huntington, whom Wikipedia identifies as the widow of railroad tycoon Collis P. Huntington, donated the land to the city as a park. The association notes that the gift came the same year San Francisco celebrated its recovery with the Panama-Pacific International Exposition.
The Fountain of the Tortoises
The fountain at the center of the park is a marble and bronze replica of the 16th-century Fontana delle Tartarughe in Rome. The San Francisco Arts Commission says the Crocker family bought it in 1924 from an Italian villa outside Rome and shipped it to their Hillsborough estate. After the Crockers sold that estate to the Burlingame Country Club, they gave the fountain to the city in 1954, and it was installed in Huntington Park in early 1955.
The California Street cable car line stops at the corner. For more on the hill, see our Cable Car Museum guide.