Mark Hopkins Hotel

"In January 2017, before President Donald Trump's inauguration, I attended the annual conference in San Francisco. I stayed at the Mark Hopkins Hotel high up on —a walk away from the conference site at the Hilton in the business district near . My well-appointed vintage-style room was on an upper floor that overlooked the city, the and the . At night, a thick fog rolled in, blocking out the views—fog so dense that it was impossible to see beyond it. The fog gradually burned off in the morning. Nob Hill appeared first, then the city below, the tops of the bridges and, finally, and in the crystalline distance beyond and the bay."

"My favorite room in the hotel is 1508, also known as the Suite. One of our long time resident guests, Mr. Magnin, lived here for over 30 years. His family owned the . Cyril, the old man, was a bachelor (at least when he was here). He was alone with his little named Tippycanoe. He had his own butler and a driver who picked him up daily. He was an old-school gentleman, a bon vivant. When I started here, we had four or five resident guests that stayed 30 to 40 years. This Cyril Magnin suite has a beautiful living room, dining room along with an outdoor terrace overlooking the and the . The bedroom and bath are large and very luxurious. ... The Lounge was opened in 1939 and soon became a favorite for all the servicemen as their last drink in the city before shipping off overseas for World War II."

"Wesley Dumm's , the first television station, came on the air from the Mark Hopkins Hotel on 1948, when there were just 3,500 television sets in California."

"... The hotel is in the abbreviated of the 1920s and is notable for its site plan, which incorporates a drive-in entrance court, and for the 1936 rooftop lounge designed by , the , long the most famous cocktail lounge in town and ancestor of many hoteltop restaurants."