San Francisco (
/ˌsæn frənˈsɪskoʊ/), officially the
City and County of San Francisco, is the leading financial and cultural centre of
Northern California and the
San Francisco Bay Area. The only
consolidated city-county in California. San Francisco encompasses a land area of about 46.9 square miles (121 km2) on the northern end of the
San Francisco Peninsula, giving it a density of about 17,179 people per square mile (6,632 people per km2). It is the most densely settled large city (population greater than 200,000) in the state of California and the
second-most densely populated major city in the United States after
New York City.[13] San Francisco is the
fourth most populous city in California, after
Los Angeles,
San Diego and
San Jose, and the
14th most populous city in the United States—with a population of 805,235 as of the
2010 Census. The city is also the financial and cultural hub of the larger
San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland metropolitan area, with a population of 7.6 million. San Francisco (Spanish for "Saint Francis") was founded on June 29, 1776, when
colonists from Spain established
a fort at the
Golden Gate and
a mission named for
St. Francis of Assisi a few miles away. The
California Gold Rush of 1849 brought rapid growth, making it the largest city on the
West Coast at the time. Due to the growth of its population, San Francisco became a
consolidated city-county in 1856. After three-quarters of the city was destroyed by the
1906 earthquake and fire, San Francisco was quickly rebuilt, hosting the
Panama-Pacific International Exposition nine years later. During
World War II, San Francisco was the port of embarkation for service members shipping out to the
Pacific Theater. After the war, the confluence of returning servicemen, massive immigration, liberalising attitudes, and other factors led to the
Summer of Love and the
gay rights movement, cementing San Francisco as a centre of
liberal activism in the United States. Today, San Francisco is one of the top tourist destinations in the world, and is renowned for its cool summers, fog, steep rolling hills,
eclectic mix of architecture, and landmarks including the
Golden Gate Bridge,
cable cars, the former
prison on
Alcatraz Island, and its
Chinatown district. It is also a primary banking and finance centre.
