Beneath contemporary streets of San Francisco lie the remains of many sailing ships that brought people to San Francisco during the gold rush that began in 1849. The ships have different stories, but many were used at storage as the city's shoreline was expanded outward around them by landfill--some of these and other abandoned ships burned in fires and were buried afterward. The Park's Collections Department holds many resources about these ships in addition to the resources highlighted here--please contact us for more information.
"The Buried Ships of Yerba Buena Cove, San Francisco, California" by Michael Warner et al., July 2017--the high resolution version of the map is provided above, and a low-resolution version of the map is also available.
Buried Maps Comparison
The Buried Ships of Yerba Buena Cove, San Francisco, California by Michael Warner et al., July 2017 (San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, National Park Service)
Gold Rush Vessels Beached, Scuttled, and Broken Up (San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, National Park Service)
Last updated: October 26, 2017