S.F. Castro road to be renamed after legendary rock photographer

The intersection  of sixteenth and Noe streets within the Castro shouldn’t be often known as a rock ‘n’ roll cornerstone, however Bob Weir has been there, as has Carlos Santana, Joan Baez, John Mayer and Slash of Guns N’ Roses in his prime hat. They all got here to 3622 sixteenth St., the modest first ground flat the place the pioneering rock photographer Jim Marshall lived and labored, with a glass of whiskey at his facet and a relentless circulate of musicians coming via the door to purchase his prints.

Marshall carried a gun and was identified for being irascible. But he additionally listed his telephone quantity and welcomed drop-ins, and a whole lot of them will likely be coming when the 3600 block of sixteenth is renamed Jim Marshall Way in tribute to somebody who helped put the San Francisco Sound on the sonic map within the Sixties and 70s.

The road will likely be redesignated throughout an on-location civic ceremony on Dec. nineteenth the place Market, sixteenth and Noe streets come collectively. Though Marshall died in 2010 at age 74, a 2-foot-cutout of him at Woodstock, full along with his 5 Leica cameras,will stand in his place. It will likely be carried by his longtime assistant, Amelia Davis, who lived a block away and is the proprietor and supervisor of the Jim Marshall Estate and Archive.

“Jim used to roll out of bed and open his window and yell ‘Davis!’ and I could hear it across Market Street,” she stated in an unique interview with the Chronicle. “Jim was recognized as The rock ‘n’ roll photographer from early on, and his apartment housed rock ‘n’ roll history for 28 years.”  

Marshall, the primary photographer to be awarded a Grammy, was identified for at all times having the within observe. He was within the locker room at Candlestick Park with the Beatles earlier than their final paid live performance in August 1966, and he was onstage on the Civic Auditorium, standing up behind the Rolling Stones, once they made their San Francisco debut in May 1965. He frolicked in resort rooms with bands and rode with the musicians in limos to concert events at Candlestick, the Cow Palace, Winterland, the Fillmore and Fillmore West, Avalon Ballroom and Oakland Coliseum for Days on the Green.

His photos appeared on the quilt of Rolling Stone and the large three glossies – Life, Look and Time – plus an estimated 1,000 album covers for the whole lot from nation to chamber music. The Marshall archive of greater than 1 million photos continues to seem in motion pictures, books and magazines. 

Just final summer time, “The Grateful Dead by Jim Marshall: Photos and Stories from the Formative Years, 1966-1977” was launched to coincide with the sixtieth anniversary of the founding of San Francisco’s most well-known band.

“Jim is still relevant because every year Jim’s photos are in at least three or four movies and documentaries,” stated Benita Passarelli, who manages licensing for the property and archive. “We are in books and museum shows worldwide every year. We do a lot with the U.K. and France. They love eccentric men.”

 Before he moved to the Castro, Marshall had an residence on Union Street the place he was visited by the likes of Jerry Garcia, Duane Allman and Eric Clapton. That flat would  most likely be the honored landmark if Marshall had not been busted there for possessing weapons and ammo in 1981. This acquired him a felony conviction and a 12 months of labor furlough, which price him his residence.

But he’d grown up within the Western Addition and graduated from Lowell High School, and he had sufficient connections to get a spot when he’d completed serving his time, a five-room flat for lower than $1,000 a month in 1982. This is the place Davis went to work for him. Marshall, who was married and divorced twice, was nonetheless dwelling there on the finish of his life, though he died in his sleep in a resort throughout a visit to New York like “a rock star,” Davis stated. 

Last spring, she went door-to-door on Marshall’s block amassing signatures from householders and renters to current to District 8 supervisor, Rafael Mandelman. She needed to present that not less than  70% of  sixteenth Street residents permitted of renaming the block after Marshall, which was straightforward with the previous timers who remembered him as “an a-hole but a great photographer,” she stated. For youthful residents, she carried a two-page printout displaying his pictures of Janis Joplin on her psychedelic Porsche on the Palace of Fine Arts, Jimi Hendrix enjoying the Panhandle and the Dead enjoying on a stage arrange in the course of Haight Street. Mandelman acquired approval from Public Works and the Board of Supervisors, who unanimously handed laws to vary the title in October. 

“He befriended many San Francisco bands including the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Quicksilver Messenger Service, the Charlatans, Big Brother and the Holding Company with Janis Joplin,” stated Mandelman in his decision. “His photographs of these bands helped push them into the mainstream consciousness and put San Francisco in the epicenter of the 1960s counterculture movement.” 

Commemorative indicators will likely be hung below the prevailing sixteenth Street indicators on the intersections of Noe and Castro streets. The ceremony begins at 10 a.m. on Dec. 19, and the general public is welcome. Maybe somebody will deliver an previous Leica on a strap to hold over the signal.  

“Jim would be embarrassed by all the hoopla because despite his bravado he was very humble and quite shy,” Davis stated. “Jim is now forever a part of San Francisco history, the city that he loved.”