The Neighborhood Through Time
Reforming the Landscape
The natural setting of South of Market made it an ideal 
location
for many industries. Fast flowing springs could provide the necessary
water for industries like sugar-refining, stock-butchering, and tanning;
Mission Creek and Mission Bay could act as a drain for industrial wastes;
and the area's proximity to deep water offered easy shipping of raw
materials and finished goods. However, the expansion of industries into
the area was hampered by its sand hills and marshlands.
From
1852 to 1854 and from 1858 to 1873, San Francisco began to level its
inconvenient sand hills along Market Street using David Hewe's “Steam
Paddy” that combined a steam shovel with movable tramways for hauling
the sand. The term “Steam Paddy” was a derogatory reference to the Irish
workers who provided much of the non-mechanized earth-moving labor of
the time. The removed sand was used to fill the nearby bogs and marshes
of the South of Market area (and ultimately Mission Bay itself). Houses,
tenements and factories quickly rose upon the newly created dry land.
During the 1860s, San Francisco grew steadily southward into the South
of Market as the growing industry attracted laborers and their families,
many of them Irish immigrants. The neighborhood's streets became a bustle
of people, horse cars, carriages and the drays used for hauling materials
to and from factories.
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