San Francisco is a patchwork of unique neighborhoods, and one of the most distinctive is the Richmond District. Stretching from the city's dense urban core outward to the rocky, rugged cliffs of Land's End, the Richmond contains schools, shops, churches, hospitals, and citizens from many different backgrounds and countries. San Francisco historian and tour guide Lorri Ungaretti, author of San Francisco's Sunset District, showcases here a stirring collection of vintage Richmond images, detailing this district's journey from windswept sand dunes to the modern and livable place we know today....

The transformation of San Francisco's Sunset District from a seemingly uninhabitable, windswept realm of sand dunes and shrub to a comfortable residential and commercial neighborhood is one of the city's most surprising stories. Originally outside of San Francisco's boundaries on federal land, the district was part of a large tundra-like expanse then forbiddingly called the "Outside Lands." As changes overtook the established parts of the city around the turn of the century, the industrialized eastern edge seemed less hospitable to many citizens. These people looked to the Sunset's open...