Coit Tower

This tower exists because of a woman who crashed a firemen's funeral when she was fifteen years old — and that was the most normal thing Lillie Hitchcock Coit ever did.

Lillie was born into San Francisco high society in the eighteen forties, but she had zero interest in being a proper lady. She smoked cigars, wore trousers, gambled, and was absolutely obsessed with firefighters. At fifteen, she chased Engine Company Number Five to a fire and helped them haul hose. They made her an honorary member, and she wore her company badge for the rest of her life. She became the mascot of the San Francisco Fire Department, attending fires in her formal gowns.

When Lillie died in nineteen twenty-nine, she left a third of her estate to beautify the city she loved. That money built this tower, completed in nineteen thirty-three. And despite what every tour guide in town will tell you, it was not designed to look like a fire hose nozzle. That's a myth. Architects Arthur Brown Jr. and Henry Howard designed it as a fluted column. The resemblance to a nozzle is a coincidence that's too perfect to let go of.

But the real story is inside. The city hired twenty-two artists to paint murals covering the interior walls. This was the Depression, and these artists were influenced by Diego Rivera. At least four of them were Communist Party members, and they didn't hide it. The murals are full of workers, breadlines, and — if you look carefully — Communist symbols, including a hammer and sickle. City officials were so alarmed that they sealed the tower and delayed the opening. There was serious talk of destroying the murals entirely. In the end, they opened the tower but kept the most politically charged stairwell murals hidden from the public for decades.