San Francisco

What it's known for

The California gold rush of 1849 made San Francisco the largest city on the West Coast, and it grew into a centre of finance, tourism and technology. The United Nations was created here in 1945, when the United Nations Charter was signed in the city.

Fun facts

1. Spanish settlers founded a fort and a mission here in 1776, and the town that grew up was called Yerba Buena until it was renamed San Francisco in 1847.
2. Its cable cars, which first climbed Clay Street in 1873, are the world's last manually operated cable car system.
3. Alcatraz, a small island in the bay, was a federal prison from 1934 to 1963, and the gangster Al Capone was locked up there.