The San Francisco Examiner from San Francisco, California • 115

IV July 7 1963 Iff S.F. EXAMINER Stately mansions, and neighborhood's status quo, up for grabs Consulate offices can still be stalled in a Pacific Heights single- i I family area anytime a foreign govern- 'J ment wishes. Diplomatic treaties take precedence over local codts. but al- though San Francisco still contains the greatest number of consular rep- resentatives of any US. city outside jjg New York, there is no indication that the consulates are growing in size.

Bloomfield disagrees: "I don't think that would do very well" Sweden's houses were designed by William Bliss of the firm of Bliss Faville, architects of the St Francis Hotel the original Southern Pacific' Building and the University Club. The older, 1960 Jackson, was built In 1921 by Lillian Matson, wife of William Matson, Swedish-born founder of the Matson Navigation Co. 1 Later, recalls William Matson By Gerald Adams Examiner staff writer -Back in October 1M5, three of San Francisco's more prominent grandes dames confronted one another before the Planning Commission. It was a classic tussle over prime Pacific Heights property. Lurline Both, daughter of the Mat-son Navigation Co.

founder, wanted permission to rezone the site of the original Matson home at 1918 Jackson for an apartment house. 4 Her opponents were the elite Mrs. Alma deBretteville Spreckels of the sugar clan and Mrs. Felix McGinnis, widow of the onetime Southern Pacific vice president, who vanquished Mrs. Roth's bid.

Mrs. Spreckels fought to protect the view from her pearly palazzo across the street: "It doesn't seem fair to the people who built their homes in good faith to suddenly have an apartment house go up." Now, nearly 40 years later, another such conflict could erupt along the same stretch of Jackson Street There, the Matson family's later mansions at 1950 and 1960 Jackson Street have been put up for sale by their current owner, Sweden. It's moving most of its consulate staff to Los Angeles. Anytime a million-dollar house on a Pacific Heights block goes up for sale, the neighbors get nervous. When two side-by-side million-dollar houses go on the market simultaneously and they are on the verge of Pacific Heights' condo belt the event portends more than a neighborhood squabble.

There indeed "goes the neighborhood." Some conflict is inevitable. Potential mansion buyers tend to look for tax writeoffs to offset the expense. They try to turn such mansions into institutions, condominiums or off ices. That leads them directly into combat with those, like the dowagers Spreckels and McGinnis, who strive ward off anything that will change' Pacific Heights' neighborhood character or, worse, bring traffic. Anne Bloomfield is a soft-spoken but tenacious urban guerrilla for the Pacific Heights Residents Association.

She says of the Swedish Consulate's buildings, "We shall oppose any proposal that conflicts with the single-family zoning." She means that if a prospective buyer for the two mansions housing the Swedish Consulate has anything in mind but selling to a single family, the buyer must do battle with her organization. And maybe with combined forces of the Department of City Planning and the Planning Commission. So it's not surprising that in the two months since Grubb and Ellis has had the properties listed, it has sold neither. The shortage of single-family buyers is understandable. Fewer families than ever are prepared to shell out million or $1.25 million, the prices for the Jackson Street mansions.

Even if they can afford the prices, they cant afford the staff necessary to maintain them. Nor can many people use the space. The house at 1960 Jackson St contains 9,000 square feet four times the size of an average three-bedroom home, with 15 principal rooms, seven baths, sitting rooms, dressing rooms, servants' quarters and storage rooms and the "secret passageways" that connect it with 1950 Jackson next door. What about an Arab potentate? 1 don't know of any Arabian sheiks buying in San Francisco," says Libby Lawrence, Grubb Ellis' saleswoman for the properties. If families arent buying these places, how are they being used? Two blocks west of the consulate, the California Historical Society occupies two mansions on another block with its museum, offices and library.

On Broadway, the Convent of the Sacred Heart runs a school out of two opulent houses; the Sarah Dix Hamlin School operates inside another one The Planning Commission allows schools if the applicant undergoes a conditional use public hearing. Less publicly, some Pacific Heights and Presidio Heights mansion dwellers use their lavish drawing rooms to -exhibit art work for sale in discreet, low-traffic unofficial galleries. One mansion on Webster Street functions alternately as a party pad and dance class studio while neighborhood asso-ciation watchdogs fume. Occasionally, a rock group takes over a mansion, in spite of the planning code restrictions. In some mansions doctors see their patients.

That's legal if the patients use the same entrance as the resident, there's a non-resident staff, no sign larger than a discreet brass plate and no traffic. Occasionally, an owner can get approval for a bed-and-breakfast place, as adman Robert Pritikin did to legalize his Mansion Hotel on Sacramento Street In that case, the house must be an official landmark threatened with demolition. "my grandmother gave it to my parents who moved in at the same time she moved into one next door." The "one next door" Is at 1950 Jackson, a smaller house with a curving staircase fit for a debutante's theatrical descent and plaster ceilings In the elaborate Italians style. Both houses have rooms with gilded ceilings. It to the price, rather than the turnover, that neighborhood guardian Bloomfield fears threatens the area with change: "Owners and realtors put such high prices on these houses that the only thing a buyer can do to recoup his investment and payments is to turn the place into condos, try to install a business or squeeze in an illegal unit" If that Is the case, the battle for Pacific Heights mansions is just heating up.

1 "i 4 1 EMnwnwQordon 8lon Million-dollar mansions at 1950-1960 Jackson St. in San Francisco are on the block, and the neighbors are definitely nervous 1 4 Allstate Savings irwites you to join Dean Witter, Coldwell Banker and Allstate Insurance at your neighborhood Sears Financial Network Center. CALL Examiner Paul Glint Ernestina Verduzco, 11, who lost her legs, Is a poster child for the disabled FRttl TAPE CASE ft HEAD CLEANER WITH TKIS AD Welcome to the Sears Financial Network. Now open at a Sears store near you, your local Sears Financial Network Center brings you the services of some of Americas most respected companies: Allstate Savings for banking, Dean Witter for investments, Coldwell Banker for residential real estate, and Allstate for insurance. At most Sears Financial Network Centers, a full-service Allstate Savings branch office is always open seven days a week during regular store hours to handle all your banking needs-from interest-earning checking and Money Market accounts to IRAKeogh plans, T-Bills and more.

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