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Originally Posted by
richstyle 
The Neiman Marcus in Union Square, across from the Palace Hotel, where Kim tries on dresses under the snippy watch of Jimmy Stewart is still there—the showroom is notable for its big bow window, which is visible from the street, much as it looks in the movie. They tried to demolish it but the historical society prevailed.
It's the original rotunda from the old City of Paris department store. As late as the 70s, Union Square was still ringed by native SF institutions, including CofP and I. Magnin. When CofP closed in (I believe) '75, Neiman's wanted to replace the whole building, but preservationists forced them to retain the rotunda. The rest of the facade is new, or was new to Neiman's. (BTW, it is a couple of blocks from the Palace, which is actually on the south side of Market.)
Back then, even a few private houses remained on the square. I dimly recall visiting a house on Stockton, at the east side of the square, where the mother of one of my father's law partners lived alone. Or, really, not one of his partners because at the time he was not a partner. Anyway, she was an intimidating old dowager. I could have the location wrong, but I don't think so, because he and I have spoken about it in more recent years.
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I haven't checked out all of these photos but I hope Jimmy Stewart's apartment at the bottom of Lombard Street is among them.
It's in there. There are also great shots of the "McKitrick Hotel," a/k/a Carlotta Valdez's house, at Eddy & Gough. The movie was filmed shortly before the house was torn down. The pictures were taken just after the film, and right before demolition. Today, the lot is a soccer field.
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And he takes you to the exact spot where Kim jumps into the soup--an exterior shot and the actually dunking was filmed on a sound stage too. That water is cold!
That water is unbelievably dangerous. If the tide sucks you out even a little bit, you are going to have a problem. Sailing out the gate, while a hell of a lot of fun, has a delightful element of danger, in that if you pitch into the drink between the towers, over the channel, you are probably not coming out. The water is like 300 feet deep in the channel, and the sides are steep as hell, and that narrow gauge combined with the tides means that the water zips in and out of there at incredibly high speeds.
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Also on the tour is the art deco apartment Bogart and Bacall inhabited in DARK PASSAGE--unchanged, amazingly, and the building itself, with its hone-combed windows and working wrought-iron elevator, is quite beautiful. When I was there the current resident placed a life-sized cutout of Bogart peering out from behind the curtains, no doubt a man with a sense of humor.
There is a guy who is convinced that he lives in Dashiell Hammet's Tenderloin apartment, where he wrote
The Maltese Falcon. He can't prove it, but he makes a good circumstantial case.
