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San Francisco, 1920. "Standard Eight touring car." Today's entry in the Shorpy Digest of Dingy Digits. 5x7 glass negative by Christopher Helin. View full size.
Was tarring over the street once de rigueur?
I hope he doesn't try to loosen his collar with that hand.
The touring car is parked on Van Ness Avenue near Bay Street.
The building in the left background is still standing. Located in historic Fort Mason, it served as headquarters for the sprawling "San Francisco Port of Embarkation" during World War II and processed the deployment of over 1.5 million troops and 23 million tons of cargo to the Pacific Theater.
Today the building serves as headquarters for another government agency: National Park Service's "Golden Gate National Recreation Area."
This is the hand (and tire-changing smock) of an automobilist who has just fixed a flat.
I still have to use hand signals in my 1952 MG TD (pictured below). It never came with electrical signals. I think it might have been the last brand of car sold in the US that didn't.
I remember my mother using turn signal lights for the first time in a 1949 Mercury and the guy behind her chewing her out for not using the proper hand signal.
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