igh. The building covered
about three acres and cost more than $7,000,000.

The Grand Opera House, where the Metropolitan Opera Company opened a
two weeks' engagement the previous Monday night, was one of the oldest
theaters in San Francisco. It was located on Mission street between
Third and Fourth streets and for a number of years was the leading
playhouse of the city.

In 1885 when business began to move off of Mission street and to seek
modern structures this playhouse was closed for some time and later
devoted to vaudeville. Within the past four years, however, numerous
fine buildings had been erected on Mission street and the Grand Opera
house had been used by many of the leading independent theatrical
companies.

All efforts to prevent the fire from reaching the Palace and Grand
hotels were unsuccessful and both were completely destroyed together
with all their contents.

All of San Francisco's best playhouses, including the Majestic,
Columbia, Orpheum and Grand Opera house were soon a mass of ruins. The
earthquake demolished them for all practical purposes and the fire
completed the work of demolition. The handsome Rialto and Casserly
buildings were burned to the ground, as was everything in that
district.

The scene at the Mechanics' Pavilion during the early hours of the
morning and up until noon, when all the injured and dead were removed
because of the threatened destruction of the building by fire, was one
of indescribable sadness. Sisters, brothers, wives and sweethearts
searched eagerly for some missing dear one.

Thousands of persons hurriedly went through the building inspecting
the cots on which the sufferers lay in the hope that they would locate
some loved one that was missing.

The dead were placed in one portion of the building and the remainder
was devoted to hospital purposes. The fire forced the nurses and
physicians to desert the building; the eager crowds followed them to
the Presidio and the Children's hospital, where they renewed their
search for missing relatives.

The experience of the first day of the fire was a great testimonial to
the modern steel building. A score of those structures were in course
of erection and not one of them suffered. The completed modern
buildings were also immune from harm by earthquake. The buildings that
collapsed were all flimsy, wooden and old-fashioned brick structures.

On the evening of Wednesday, April 18, the first day of the fire, an
area