Snow on a sunny day…

Posted: October 9, 2005 at 7:03 pm by John

Today was another spectacular Indian summer day in San Francisco. For one thing, we visited the new deYoung museum “sneak preview” in Golden Gate Park. The crowds obviously agreed that this is a truly an amazing building, and a grand new feather in the City’s already featherful cap. The only downside was that the rest of the City chose this beautiful day to visit the deYoung…soooooo the parking in GGP was horrendous. The silver lining? We got to catch glimpses of the Blue Angels performing for a Fleet Week crowd as we walked to the museum.

So, what’s up with the snow? Well, even though I spent the waning hours of the day in our garden (pictured), I am fixated on a fascinating factoid from a recent Examiner article. (For the record, I fixed the drip irrigation system this weekend.)

About a week and a half ago, San Francisco hosted a truly “only in SF” event. In X Game fashion, some extreme skiers turned the Fillmore Street hill in Pacific Heights into a ski jump (photos below). I love it! Oh of course it got a few snotty types in a huff, but what a great idea. Anyhow, it generated quite a bit of local press, including an article that answered one of my age-old questions: has it ever snowed in San Francisco?

Well, the answer surprised me. Turns out that we have had measurable snow 10 times in the last 150 years. To quote the Examiner: “Snowfall in San Francisco is rare, but there have been a handful of storms during the last 150 years. There was even a white Christmas in 1856.”

1856 – Dec. 25 – 2.5″

1868 – Jan. 12 – 2.0″

1882 – Dec. 31 – 3.5″

1884 – Feb. 07 – 1.5″

1887 – Feb. 05 – 3.7″

1888 – Jan. 16 – 0.1″

1896 – Mar. 03 – 1.0″

1932 – Dec. 11 – 0.8″

1952 – Jan. 15 – 0.3″

1976 – Feb. 05 – 1.0″

I normally don’t post pictures from other places, but I didn’t attend this event. So for posterity, here is a photo from the San Francisco Chronicle. It is amazing what humans can do 🙂