Baker Beach is a public beach on the peninsula of

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

U.S. The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

The beach lies on the shore of the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contin ...

in the northwest of the city. It is roughly a long, beginning just south of Golden Gate Point (where the Golden Gate Bridge connects with the peninsula), extending southward toward the

Seacliff Seacliff comprises a beach, an estate and a harbour. It lies east of North Berwick, East Lothian, Scotland. History The beach and estate command a strategic position at the mouth of the Firth of Forth, and control of the area has been con ...

peninsula, the

Palace of the Legion of Honor The Legion of Honor, formally known as the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, is an art museum in San Francisco, California. Located in Lincoln Park, the Legion of Honor is a component of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, which al ...

and the

Sutro Baths The Sutro Baths was a large, privately owned public saltwater swimming pool complex in the Lands End area of the Outer Richmond District in western San Francisco, California. Built in 1894, the Sutro Baths was located north of Ocean Beach, ...

. The northern section of Baker Beach is "frequented by clothing-optional sunbathers," and as such it is considered a

nude beach A nude beach, sometimes called a clothing-optional or free beach, is a beach where users are at liberty to be nude. Nude beaches usually have mixed bathing. Such beaches are usually on public lands, and any member of the public is allowed to ...

."Baker Beach"
ParksConservancy.org. Retrieved 8 May 2009. The property was settled by John Henry Baker in the 1850s and was known as Golden Gate Milk Ranch. The property location description varied, but is generally described as being approximately west of the city on the then Point Lobos Road (now Geary Blvd.) Baker died in 1863 and his widow, Maria, lost the property to foreclosure in 1879. In 1897, Baker's grandson, Fairfax Henry Wheelan sued to have the title returned to the heirs of John H. Baker citing the claim that Baker's widow did not have the legal power to mortgage the property.

History

Golden Gate Bridge from Baker Beach (Nighttime)

Baker Beach is part of the

Presidio A presidio ( en, jail, fortification) was a fortified base established by the Spanish Empire around between 16th and 18th centuries in areas in condition of their control or influence. The presidios of Spanish Philippines in particular, were cen ...

, which was a military base from the founding of

by the

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

in 1812 until 1997. In 1904, it was fortified with

disappearing gun A disappearing gun, a gun mounted on a ''disappearing carriage'', is an obsolete type of artillery which enabled a gun to hide from direct fire and observation. The overwhelming majority of carriage designs enabled the gun to rotate back ...

installations known as Battery Chamberlin, which can still be viewed today. When the Presidio was decommissioned as a U.S. Army base, it became part of the

Golden Gate National Recreation Area The Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA) is a U.S. National Recreation Area protecting of ecologically and historically significant landscapes surrounding the San Francisco Bay Area. Much of the park is land formerly used by the United ...

, which is administered by the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propert ...

. From 1986 to 1990, the north end of Baker Beach was the original site of the Burning Man art festival. In 1990, park police allowed participants to raise the traditional large statue but not to set it on fire, since the beach enforces a limit on the size of any campfires. Subsequent Burning Man events have taken place in

Black Rock Desert __NOTOC__ The Black Rock Desert is a semi-arid region (in the Great Basin shrub steppe eco-region) of lava beds and playa, or alkali flats, situated in the Black Rock Desert–High Rock Canyon Emigrant Trails National Conservation Area, a si ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a state in the Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the 7th-most extensive, ...

. A fatal

shark attack A shark attack is an attack on a human by a shark. Every year, around 80 unprovoked attacks are reported worldwide. Despite their rarity, many people fear shark attacks after occasional serial attacks, such as the Jersey Shore shark attacks of 1 ...

occurred on Baker Beach on May 7, 1959, when 18-year-old Albert Kogler Jr. was attacked by a

great white shark The great white shark (''Carcharodon carcharias''), also known as the white shark, white pointer, or simply great white, is a species of large Lamniformes, mackerel shark which can be found in the coastal surface waters of all the major ocean ...

while he was in water deep."Fatal Shark Attacks"
SoutheasternOutdoors.com. This was the only shark attack recorded on Baker Beach. Baker Beach path with shrubs and crow

Large outcrops of serpentine cliffs occur along the Pacific coast near Baker Beach. When rising from the land surface, serpentine produces a low-

calcium Calcium is a chemical element with the symbol Ca and atomic number 20. As an alkaline earth metal, calcium is a reactive metal that forms a dark oxide-nitride layer when exposed to air. Its physical and chemical properties are most similar t ...

, high-

magnesium Magnesium is a chemical element with the symbol Mg and atomic number 12. It is a shiny gray metal having a low density, low melting point and high chemical reactivity. Like the other alkaline earth metals (group 2 of the periodic ta ...

soil that can allow for rare species of plants to develop in the vicinity. This may explain the presence of ''

Hesperolinon congestum ''Hesperolinon congestum'', or Marin dwarf flax, is an annual herb, which is known to occur only in San Mateo, San Francisco and Marin County, California, United States. This plant occurs chiefly on serpentine soils, especially in dry nati ...

'' (the Marin Dwarf Flax, a threatened plant) in surrounding areas. To the north of the beach is Marshall's Beach and was the site of a Japanese

Type 93 torpedo The was a -diameter torpedo of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN), launched from surface ships. It is commonly referred to as the Long Lance by most modern English-language naval historians, a nickname given to it after the war by Samuel Eliot Mori ...

imbedded in the beach sand in 1946. Historian Mark Felton believes it was fired by Japanese submarine I-15 in 1941, which was sailing near the waters off San Francisco.

References

External links

* {{authority control Golden Gate National Recreation Area San Francisco Bay Area beaches Nude beaches Beaches of San Francisco Presidio of San Francisco Parks in San Francisco

History

See also

References

External links