Podcasts about pac heights

Painter George, aka George Harry Crampton-Glassanos, is fine if you wanna call him just "George." In this episode, meet and get to know George. Both of his parents came to San Francisco early in their lives. His mom hails from the East Coast and her family were all working-class folks. His grandpa was a business agent for a machinist's union in Massachusetts. That grandfather shaped George's later involvement in organized labor. (Today, he's a member of the ILWU). George never knew this grandparent who had an outsize impression on him. He died shortly after George was born. But in Massachusetts, in addition to his union involvement, he owned a store that sold records on one half and hats on the other. His dad moved to San Francisco from the Midwest to attend school at the Art Institute (RIP). He got into that school and often slept overnight on a ledge on campus. Both of George's parents were punk rockers in SF in the late-Seventies. Amazing. His dad even lived with the guitarist from The Avengers (Penelope Houston's punk band). Though they would meet later, both spent time at the famed Mabuhay Gardens back in the day. George's dad was a painter as well, and that turned out to have a huge influence on George. His parents met when his mom got a job with his dad's construction working crew. This was around the mid-Eighties. George came along in 1989. After that, his parents had two more boys, making George the oldest of three. His earliest memories are from around the mid-Nineties in The Mission. George spent time when he was a kid running around The Mission and pre-gentrification Dogpatch with his dad. They lived on 18th between San Carlos and Lexington (or, zooming out a bit, between Mission and Valencia). That's two blocks from where I lived from 2003 to 2017, incidentally. But George's family got evicted from that apartment on 18th. The building sold and the new owners evicted tenants one by one, including families like George's. Both of his brothers were born in that apartment. His dad had made modifications there, handyman that he was. And George was old enough to remember all the awesome neighbors they had. I ask George about his favorite restaurants when he was a kid. "I fuckin' ate burritos every night of the week," he answers. He'd hit up nearby La Cumbre or El Buen Sabor around 300 times a year. Whiz Burger also figured big in George's childhood diet. There was a diner across 16th from The Roxie called Aunt Mary's (George shows me a coin purse from the place while we're recording) that he loved as well. Art was always encouraged at home. George's dad would bring home boxes of fax paper for him to draw on with ballpoint pens. He'd draw and draw and draw, often of things he saw. He remembers staring out the window of their place on 18th and watching cars go by, and he'd draw those. But it wasn't until high school at School of the Arts that George really started cranking it out. At SOTA, teachers encouraged George to draw whatever the hell he wanted to. He remembers drawing a skeleton pushing a paleta cart. When George tells me he attended SOTA 2004–2008, I mention that a number of past guests of this show went there around that time. "[The school] churned out a lot of us," he says. Joe Talbot, who co-wrote, produced, and directed The Last Black Man in San Francisco, went to SOTA in that era. George goes on a sidebar to share a story of getting caught smoking pot by a SOTA vice principal. I ask him to rattle off the SF schools he went to, and George obliges. Waldorf in The Mission for Kindergarten, then a Waldorf school in Pac Heights through eighth grade. They wanted him to attend their high school, but he chose SOTA instead. The Waldorf schools also encouraged art, which George appreciated. The social dynamics could be strange, though. You'd have kids like him who got into that school thanks to financial aid being classmates with kids who lived in mansions. After eighth grade, he needed a change. After he graduated from School of the Arts, George took some classes at City College. He'd been working summers painting houses for his dad, and eventually, college tailed off so he could work more. It also gave George more time for his artistic painting. This was about 20 years ago, and since then, he's been painting murals, hanging out with graffiti painters, doing work on Clarion Alley, and working with Precita Eyes to paint various houses and walls in The Mission. I ask whether George's art has evolved over the years. After thinking it over, he talks about the influence of cars and his mom and dad's comic book collections. He loved his mom's underground comics collections, and talks about going down to 23rd Street with them to Scott's Comics and Cards and SF Comic Book Co. next door. George points to artists like Spain Rodriguez, R. Crumb, and the Hernandez Brothers as having shaped his art from a young age. He'd go to Avalon on Mission for iron-on old English letters to have put on hats. The cholo influence of his neighborhood was seeping in, and George ran with it. The gumball machines on Mission with their foil stickers also played a part. He'd take those stickers home, many with images of cars on them, and draw from them. And of course the cars cruising Mission Street caught his artistic eye. George also touches on some of the violence he witnessed in The Mission in the Nineties, when he was a kid. George and his friends got around on skateboards, beater bikes, and Muni. He's quick to point out how, back in the day, you could take the 26-Valencia if you wanted to avoid potential trouble on the 14-Mission. I ask whether George got into any trouble himself. He says mostly harmless stuff like shoplifting. That was before his aforementioned time at School of the Arts. George has mixed feelings about the art scene, and I get it. He's had his art in shows, but prefers bookstores or community-oriented spaces vs. white-walled galleries. He doesn't feel like the audience that goes to those spaces is his. When he talks about painting at home after a long day at work, I ask George to talk about that work. He's currently part of a crew painting the new container cranes in the Port of Oakland. The ILWU is assembling the cranes and George and others use marine enamels to make the cranes look good. We end the podcast with how you can find George and his art. "You can find me on 24th Street," he says. No website. He's on Instagram at @paintergeorge415. We recorded this podcast at George's home in South San Francisco in April 2026. Photography by Nate Oliveira

Part 2 picks up where we left off in Part 1. Marga had just arrived in San Francisco and lived in a collective house with a lesbian and two gay men ("of course, the decorations were fabulous"). It was a bit of a party house, known for throwing spectacular Halloween fests. Marga talks about collective living, chore charts and stuff like that. Eventually, the woman Marga drove across country with split from her, as so often happens (I certainly relate). Everyone who lived in that first house, she says, was into rolfing and coffee enemas. Marga wasn't too keen on any of it. The meals were vegetarian and bland, and perhaps most importantly for her, not Cuban. Her roommates gave painful hugs and held hands before they ate. It just wasn't her scene. And so she found work in a Hippie coffeehouse called Acme Cafe on 24th Street. All her coworkers there were performers. She was just happy to make omelettes. Underground celebrities like R. Crumb and John Waters came in regularly, and Marga loved it. Her fellow cafe employees, many of whom were artists, would ask her, “So, what do you do?” And she would answer, “I make omelettes.” She also worked at a bath house on Market called Finilla's Finnish Baths. Marga's job there was to hand out towels to spa-goers. She later learned that the owner sexually abused and exploited workers there, mostly the masseuses. A perk of her job, though, was access to the steam sauna, and Marga took advantage of that as much as she could. That sauna room also served as a meeting space for a group of older women. One of them, an older Mexican woman, would leave her Chihuahua in the lobby while she steamed, the idea being that Marga would take care of the dog. Eventually, Ms. Montoya got 86'd from the bathhouse for steaming flour tortillas in the sauna on the hot stones. Another regular, a famous singer whom Marga won't name, was kicked out for a different reason. Marga takes a sidebar to explain what a “primal scream” is. Then she takes us back to the sauna and the famous singer, who proceeded one day to launch into her own primal scream. Marga describes other women from the sauna running out frantically. Meanwhile, she says, over in the men's sauna, “there was a different kind of screaming.” She goes on another sidebar about the time she got crabs at the bathhouse. You just have to listen to that one. Marga also had a job as a gardener at a house in Pac Heights, despite not loving that kind of work. She shares a story of using the “servant's bathroom” on that job and discovering that she had crabs. Then the conversation shifts to Marga's next show—Spanish Stew. It will be her 15th one-person show, which she began developing at The Marsh here in The City, where she did her first-ever one-person show back in the day. The New Conservatory Theater Center commissioned the show, which is set in 1976 San Francisco, the year that Marga landed here. It's also about cooking, something near and dear to her heart. Marga points out that the New Conservatory Theater Center recently lost its NEA funding thanks to the fascist US regime, but that the community is helping keep the theater afloat. Please go see this show. I know I will. It opens October 17, 2025. For more info and to buy tickets, please visit Marga's website. Follow her on Instagram @themargagomez to keep up with everything she does and says. This episode is brought to you by Standard Deviant Brewing. We recorded this podcast at Noe Cafe in Noe Valley in August 2025. Photography by Jeff Hunt  

Grant Wood, wine educator and certified sommelier and Robert Tas review the wine list at Sorrel, an Italian contemporary restaurant located in Pac Heights that has earned a Michelin star thanks to Chef Alexander Hong. Grant spots some sensational sparklers, wines that are perfect for pairing with all things pasta, and some devilshly robust reds to take your dining experience to a whole new level of sumptuous.   Wines reviewed include: 2021 Ryme “hers” Vermentino from Carneros 2019 Idlewild Arneis, Lost Hills Ranch 2012 Malvasia by Kante in Venezia-Giulia  

Riordan goes to a cocktail party in San Francisco's swanky Pacific Heights neighborhood. _______ Listen, subscribe, rate, review: Apple Podcasts Other players Follow me on Mastodon.social.Subscribe to my newsletter.

In this podcast, Vandor picks up where he left off in Part 1. He traces his family history back to his grandfather, who moved from Mobile, Alabama, to San Francisco around the time of the Second Migration and met his wife (Vandor's grandma) here in The City. She was born and raised here; he was a quiet, strong man who learned how to dress from his new wife. When he was two, ​Vandor's dad left the family. But he was surrounded by relatives and loved ones, most of them living in the same Victorian in Lower Pac Heights, on the lip of the Fillmore. Because his mom was young when she had Vandor, her own parents took over raising the boy. Family gatherings in the house were common, and there was always a lot to eat. Vandor talks about those meals as well as some of the neighborhood spots they'd get their produce and meat from. They're places that aren't around anymore, but the owners were often friends of the family. We turn to Vandor's teen years. He got into art, graffiti, and break-dancing in those days. He describes the contrast once he transferred from a private high school to Galileo, for him both socially and academically. In his junior year, his sister was born, his parents were fighting, and he relocated to the East Bay because his mom and his grandma were on bad terms. He began to struggle in his schoolwork. He was working at the Exploratorium. The next year, his senior year in high school, he was told he was one credit short of what was needed to graduate. He had befriended a photographer who also worked at the Exploratorium. They were set to attend and work at an event together, but Vandor got lost and missed it. It didn't matter, though. His friend had committed suicide. Shortly after that, the family found out they were losing their house in Pac Heights over a family quarrel. Despite all this, Vandor graduated high school. ​We end this episode with Vandor's thoughts on what it means to still be here in San Francisco. Follow Whack Donuts on Instagram. Order Whack Donuts online. We recorded this podcast at Abanico Coffee Roasters in the Mission in April 2022. Photography by Jeff Hunt

In Today's Show, a continued look at the great exodus from California to Texas and Florida. The odyssey of one couple who want to move, from one climate change hot spot to another.The brief look at the most expensive real estate in the bay area. 

Lily Janiak talks to local magician, storyteller, solo performer and now San Francisco Ghost Hunt Walking Tour guide Christian Cagigal. We talk about how he got into leading tourists, local history buffs and fans of the supernatural on a one-mile nighttime jaunt through Pacific Heights, some of the lore he shares along the way, whether ghosts are real, what makes a good ghost story, and why so many ghost stories happen to take place in Pac Heights. Produced by Lily Janiak. Music by Steven Boyle. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If faith is the measure, how do I measure my faith? Pastor Adam tackles this question in his conclusion to the series, Any Given Sunday.

Guest speaker, Canon J John powerfully (and hilariously) unpacks what it means to be a Christian, and extends a compelling invitation to receive the gift of salvation in his message.

In week two of our Any Given Sunday series, Pastor Vance preached powerfully about living compassionately, even though it's not always comfortable or convenient.

Pastor Adam launches the new series, "Any Given Sunday" with a powerful message, in a special combined service with Palo Alto joining up with the San Jose campus.

Pastor Keira closed our The Way You Move series with an inspiring message about the question, "Are you waiting on God or is God waiting on you?"

Pastor Adam continues in our series "The Way You Move" with an encouraging message about understanding that God's presence is the ultimate gift of the Holy Spirit.

In our spiritual gifts series, "The Way You Move", Pastor Adam preaches powerfully about how surrender doesn't mean defeat, but how it will actually free you to see the spiritual breakthrough that you're looking for.

Pastor Adam continues in our series on spiritual gifts, "The Way You Move" with an empowering message about filtering your spiritual gifts through the fruit of the Holy Spirit.

Pastor Adam kicks off 2016 with a powerful message about the purpose behind the gifts of the Holy Spirit and how they’re given based on the merit of the giver, not the receiver.

Pastor Vance preaches a powerful message to prepare you for 2016 end 2015 strong!

Pastor Keira preaches a Christmas message about what to do in life when "the inn is full" and your situations don't line up with what God said.

Guest speaker and lead pastor of C3 Los Angeles, Jake Sweetman, preaches a dynamic message about God's constant faithfulness to us, even in our faithlessness and fearfulness.

In his message, "Privilege of Pressure" Pastor Adam gives us tools to use for how to make pressure work for us.