Sure, we know about iconic San Francisco natives such as Jerry Garcia, Bruce Lee, Ansel Adams and Steve Jobs. They helped mold the city, proving that it’s a place where greatness is regularly born — a place of imagination, art, creativity, liberalism, acceptance and innovation.
But what about those other epic SF natives who did big things but whom we don’t hear about that often? Or at all? Many under-the-radar fab folks were born and raised in San Francisco who went on to accomplish great things that we should know about and celebrate. Here are 11 of them.
1. Xigmacse
We couldn’t write this list without going all the way back and looking at the real, original San Francisco natives, the American Indian Yelamu Ohlone—the people who were here well before any of the other famous SF natives you know about were even born. One such native of the area was Xigmacse (also known as Guimas). He was the local Yelamu tribe captain or chief when Mission Dolores was established, which made him the city’s earliest known leader, in 1777. More specifically, he was the “headman of the Sitlintac-Chutchui village group, and probably of all the Yelamu villages.” Two of Xigmacse’s wives (reportedly, he had three) were named Huitinac and Uittanaca. As Spanish Father Cambon noted, they came “from the other shore to the east at the place known as Cosopo.” They were among the first “Mission Indians” at Mission Dolores, and Xigmacsme, Huitinac and three of his children were baptized there.
2. Vicki Manalo Draves
Did you know that a Filipina American from San Francisco earned two gold medals at the 1948 Olympic Games — the very first Asian American to ever win any medal at the Olympics? Victoria “Vicki” Manalo Draves (her entire maiden name means “victory win” in Tagalog) beat discrimination in San Francisco — she wasn’t allowed to swim at the Fairmont Hotel Swimming and Diving Club because of her name — to eventually make history (Korean American Sammy Lee would win a gold two days after her). Draves also held a bunch of other firsts:
- First woman to win gold medals for the three-meter springboard and 10 -meter platform
- First American woman to win two Olympic gold medals in diving
- First woman to win two gold medals in an Olympic game
- First woman to do a cutaway two-and-one-half somersault in diving
3. Frances Marion
San Francisco has produced some amazing, independent and accomplished women. One of them was Frances Marion. The screenwriter, author, director and journalist was the first screenwriter to win two Academy Awards back in the 1930s. The first was for Writing (Best Adapted Screenplay) in 1931 for the film The Big House; the second was for 1932’s The Champ, for Best Story. To put her success into context, for the category of Best Adapted Screenplay, she was the first woman to win the category (and the second to be nominated), and another woman didn’t win the award for 10 years. In total, only seven women have won Oscars for this category. For Best Story, which was awarded from 1927–1928 to 1956, Frances was one of three women to win the honor. In addition to these accomplishments, she also wrote scripts for and directed legendary actress Mary Pickford, and served as a WWI combat correspondent.
4. Mary McHenry Keith
Next on our list of badass San Francisco natives is Mary McHenry Keith. Mary didn’t just sit pretty as the daughter of a prominent judge; she chose to study law and became the first woman to earn a law degree at Hastings School of Law, in 1882. She practiced for a year, specializing in probate law, before getting married to artist William Keith. In addition, Keith became a women’s and animal-rights’ activist and joined the suffrage campaign in California in the early 1890s. She also led an excursion to the top of Mount Tam with Susan B. Anthony, lectured on behalf of the Political Equality Club of Alameda County and became president of the Berkeley Political Equality Society.
5. James “Sunny Jim” Rolph
We are used to hearing stories of San Franciscans with interesting nicknames and unique stories who have become immortal in SF culture. Mayor James “Sunny Jim” Rolph is such a character. Nicknamed “Sunny” for his pleasant demeanor (his theme song was “There Are Smiles That Make Us Happy”), Rolph also allowed the city to run amok. As the longest-running mayor of SF (a whopping 19 years) who then became the governor of California, he owned his own whorehouse, threw epic parties that sometimes lasted days, condoned the lynching of the men who killed a wealthy merchant’s son and allowed gambling and prostitution to continue in the city. He also was rumored to have had an affair with movie star Anita Page. We didn’t say that everyone on this list is iconic for having done good.
6. Kazue Togasaki
Japanese American San Francisco native Kazue Togasaki made some significant strides against all odds in the medical field in the early 20th century. She led herself and most of her siblings into medicine, making history as one of the first two women of Japanese descent to earn a medical degree in the United States (at the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania in 1933 after having first been a nurse). Of her five sisters, two others joined her in becoming doctors, while the other two became nurses — their parents had serious bragging rights. Togasaki practiced medicine in San Francisco as a gynecologist and obstetrician, delivering over 10,000 babies during her career.
7. Mervyn LeRoy
Born in San Francisco, Mervyn LeRoy made big moves in Old Hollywood, acting, directing and producing major classic films from the 1920s to the 1960s. While he was the head of production at MGM, he decided to make The Wizard of Oz and discovered such iconic talent as Loretta Young, Lana Turner, Clark Gable and Robert Mitchum. Eight of the films LeRoy directed or co-directed were nominated for Best Picture Oscars, and he was personally nominated for a Best Director award (he received an honorary Oscar for the short film The House I Live In and an Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award). LeRoy is the cousin of Hollywood movie pioneer Jesse L. Lasky, also a San Francisco native.
8. Julia Morgan
If you like Hearst Castle, the Fairmont San Francisco and the Berkeley City Club, then you should know that these legendary historic Bay Area buildings were designed by SF native Julia Morgan. Morgan was the first woman ever to be admitted to the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts architecture program, the first woman to become licensed as an architect in California and the first woman architect to be awarded the AIA Gold Medal. During her illustrious career, which began in 1902 and spanned almost 50 years, she designed more than 700 buildings in California at a time when very few women entered the field.
9. Dante Ross
Although he was raised in New York, legendary music-industry executive, A&R rep and producer Dante Ross was born in San Francisco. Ross worked in A&R at Tommy Boy Records and was the first A&R man to be signed to a major label (Elektra) specifically to work in the hip-hop genre. He signed several iconic acts, including Queen Latifah, Digital Underground, Pete Rock & CL Smooth, Busta Rhymes and Ol’ Dirty Bastard. As a producer, Ross worked on albums such as Everlast’s Whitey Ford Sings the Blues and Eminem’s 8 Mile soundtrack. In 1999, he won a Grammy for his production work on Carlos Santana’s hit album Supernatural.
10. John W. Young
So many dream of becoming an astronaut and walking on the moon, but San Francisco native John W. Young actually got to do that. And he was also the first person to fly around the moon—solo.
Other achievements of his include the following:
- The ninth person on the moon
- One of only three people to fly to the moon twice
- The only person to pilot and be commander of four different spacecraft
- The astronaut with the longest career ever, at 42 years of active service at NASA
11. Tye Leung Schulze
Born in 1887, San Francisco native Tye Leung Schulze is a feminist who accomplished many important firsts. On May 19, 1912, she became the first Chinese American woman to vote in a US primary election when she cast her vote in San Francisco. The San Francisco Examiner called the historic moment “the last word in the modern movement for the complete enfranchisement of women…it was the latest achievement in the great American work of amalgamating and lifting up all the races of the earth.” But Tye didn’t just break ground starting there. By 1910 she had become the following:
- The first Chinese American to pass the civil service exam
- The first Chinese American woman to become a US civil servant
- The first Chinese American woman hired to work at Angel Island
