Ma-Tsu Temple (San Francisco, California)

Ping Yuen and North Ping Yuen (sometimes collectively called The Pings) form a four-building public housing complex in the north end of Chinatown, San Francisco along Pacific Avenue. In total, there are 434 apartments. The three Pings on the south side of Pacific (West, Central, and East Ping Yuen) were dedicated in 1951, and the North Ping Yuen building followed a decade later in 1961. Some of the largest murals in Chinatown are painted on Ping Yuen, which are prominent landmark buildings taller than the typical two- or three-story Chinatown buildings that date back to the early 1900s. The formal effort to build Ping Yuen started in 1939 after Chinatown was called "the worst [slum] in the world"; it was the first public housing project completed in the neighborhood, and unlike the typical single room occupancy housing of Chinatown, featured private bathrooms and kitchens for each apartment when the first building opened in 1951. Like most buildings in Chinatown, it was designed by western architects with Chinese thematic elements. Although it was touted as potentially drawing more tourists to the area, it soon became known as a dangerous place, with the July 4 shooting over fireworks sales that occurred at Ping Yuen leading to the Golden Dragon massacre of 1977. The murder of Julia Wong in 1978 inspired residents to go on a rent strike, led by future mayor Ed Lee, for improvements to building maintenance and security. Ownership of Ping Yuen passed from the city to the Chinatown Community Development Center in 2016, which is continuing to work with residents' associations to improve conditions.

The Barbary Coast was a red-light district during the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries in San Francisco that featured dance halls, concert saloons, bars, jazz clubs, variety shows, and brothels. Its nine block area was centered on a three block stretch of Pacific Street, now Pacific Avenue, between Montgomery and Stockton Streets. Pacific Street was the first street to cut through the hills of San Francisco, starting near Portsmouth Square and continuing east to the first shipping docks at Buena Vista Cove. The Barbary Coast was born during the California Gold Rush of 1849, when the population of San Francisco was growing at an exponential rate due to the rapid influx of tens of thousands of miners trying to find gold. The early decades of the Barbary Coast were marred by persistent lawlessness, gambling, administrative graft, vigilante justice, and prostitution; however with the passage of time, the city's government gained strength and competence, and the Barbary Coast's maturing entertainment scene of dance halls and jazz clubs influenced American culture. The Barbary Coast's century-long evolution passed through many substantial incarnations due to the city's rapid cultural development during the transition to the 20th century. Its former location now is overlapped by Chinatown, North Beach, and Jackson Square.

Jackson Street is a street in San Francisco, California, running through the Pacific Heights, Nob Hill, Chinatown and Jackson Square districts of the city. It runs between Pacific Avenue and Washington Street, beginning at Arguello Boulevard to the south of the Presidio Golf Course and ending at Drumm Street, to the west of Pier 3, near Sydney G. Walton Square.

The Great Star Theater, formerly known as Great China Theater, is a 410-seat theater located at 636 Jackson Street in San Francisco's Chinatown. It was built in 1925 for the Chinese opera and is the last Chinese theater in any Chinatown in the United States.

The Comstock Saloon is a historic saloon in San Francisco, California. Located in San Francisco's North Beach, and was founded in 1907. The bar is named after Henry Comstock and for his Comstock Lode. The building itself was home to the oldest microbrewery in San Francisco, San Francisco Brewing Company (1907-2012). Currently, it is owned by Jeff Hollinger and Jonny Raglin, both also bartenders for Absinthe Brasserie & Bar.

Vesuvio Cafe is an historic bar in San Francisco, California, United States. Located at 255 Columbus Avenue, across an alley from City Lights Bookstore, the building was designed by Italian architect Italo Zanolini and finished in 1916.

Jack Kerouac Alley, formerly Adler Alley or Adler Place, is a one-way alleyway in San Francisco, California, that connects Grant Avenue in Chinatown, and Columbus Avenue in North Beach. The alley is named after Jack Kerouac, a Beat Generation writer who used to frequent the pub and bookstore adjacent to the alley.

Grant Avenue in San Francisco, California, is one of the oldest streets in the city's Chinatown district. It runs in a north–south direction starting at Market Street in the heart of downtown and dead-ending past Francisco Street in the North Beach district. It resumes at North Point Street and stretches one block to The Embarcadero and the foot of Pier 39. Grant Avenue is primarily a one-way street; automobile traffic can travel only northbound. In 2012, however, the two blocks of Grant Avenue between Sutter and Geary streets were converted to two-way traffic in order to ease southbound traffic congestion during the multi-year closure of Stockton Street, part of the construction plan for the Central Subway.

City Lights is an independent bookstore-publisher combination in San Francisco, California, that specializes in world literature, the arts, and progressive politics. It also houses the nonprofit City Lights Foundation, which publishes selected titles related to San Francisco culture. It was founded in 1953 by poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Peter D. Martin (who left two years later). Both the store and the publishers became widely known following the obscenity trial of Ferlinghetti for publishing Allen Ginsberg's influential collection Howl and Other Poems (City Lights, 1956). Nancy Peters started working there in 1971 and retired as executive director in 2007. In 2001, City Lights was made an official historic landmark. City Lights is located at 261 Columbus Avenue. While formally located in Chinatown, it self-identifies as part of immediately adjacent North Beach.

Specs' Twelve Adler Museum Cafe (also known as "Specs") is a historic bar, located in the North Beach district of San Francisco. The bar is known to be "home to a menagerie of misfits, from strippers and poets to longshoremen and merchant marines." Notable patrons have included Thelonious Monk, Jack Hirschman, Warren Hinckle, and Herb Caen.

The hungry i was a nightclub in San Francisco, California, originally located in the North Beach neighborhood. It played a major role in the history of stand-up comedy in the United States. It was launched by Eric "Big Daddy" Nord, who sold it to Enrico Banducci in 1951. The club moved to Ghirardelli Square in 1967 and operated mostly as a rock music venue until it closed in 1970.The name of the nightclub was reused later as a strip club in San Francisco, from the late 1960s until 2019.

The Golden Dragon massacre was a gang-related shooting attack that took place on September 4, 1977, inside the Golden Dragon Restaurant at 822 Washington Street in Chinatown, San Francisco, California. The five perpetrators, members of the Joe Boys, a Chinese youth gang, were attempting to kill leaders of the Wah Ching, a rival Chinatown gang. The attack left five people dead and 11 others injured, none of whom were gang members. Seven perpetrators were later convicted and sentenced in connection with the murders. The massacre led to the establishment of the San Francisco Police Department's Asian Gang Task Force, credited with ending gang-related violence in Chinatown by 1983. The restaurant itself closed in 2006.