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by Andy Evangelista
1st appeared 29 July 1998
1,130 Days
and Counting
 While
most baseball people are tallying the homers in the
Roger Maris chase, the Giants are counting the days
to the opening of their downtown, waterfront stadium,
aka Pac Bell Park. In their current digs -- the park
formerly known as Candlestick -- the team prominently
displays a curious figure (605 as of July 29), which
actually is the number of days to the April 2000
afternoon when the first $6 bag (considering
inflation) of peanuts is tossed across a section of
brand new box seats.
Since UCSF will be
joining the Giants as neighbors in Mission Bay --
only about two McGwire homers away in distance -- The
Eye has begun its own countdown. If all goes well --
and despite the problems of building in this town,
it's not Mission Improbable -- UCSF could pitch its
first scientific idea at the new site in about 1,130
days (1,129 if you're reading this column a day
late).
Target date for
occupation of the first UCSF building at Mission Bay
is September in the year 2001. (Yeah, we know a lot
can happen in between now and then, but we'll just
adjust the count.) The campus hopes to break ground
in September of 1999, but even though Chancellor
Michael Bishop is a huge baseball fan, don't expect a
Barry Bonds-like swat of a baseball into the Bay
(which the Giant pulled off at the new stadium
groundbreaking last year). There just isn't enough
Bay there.
But, once there
was. In fact, there was nothing but Bay bordering the
SF district known as the Mission. In the 1850s, giant
(nothing to do with the baseball team) steam shovels
began leveling SF's sand hills and filling marshlands
around Mission Bay. Ten years later, filling in of
the Mission Bay shallows began in earnest, and after
the big one hit in 1906, earthquake rubble was used
to finish the filling of the tidal area.
Long before any
baseball team, or team of university planners, set
its sights on the site, part of Mission Bay was a
sporting place. Rowing clubs and fishermen enjoyed
the nearby waters, and down the way in the early
1850s, the moist ground offered the speedy surfaces
for horse racetracks. Mission Bay has a rich past --
one that will be described in a feature in the Aug. 7
Newsbreak. Before you hear more about building
phases, environmental impacts, architectural design,
and other planning talk, you'll have a chance to look
at the area's remarkable history.
Can't wait for the
countdown to get down to three digits.
Photowatch
Note: As the
future of Mission Bay is being planned, UCSF is
interested in learning more about its past. The
Publications Unit of the Public Affairs Office is
working on a history of the site (see above) and
would like to hear from the UCSF community of their
knowledge and memories (more likely your great
grandfathers/mothers' memories) of this area. We're
particularly interested in obtaining old photographs
of Mission Bay.
If you would like
to share a photo of Mission Bay, or have a story
about this area, please send us an email at dybreak@itsa.ucsf.edu . If you have a photo, please send us a
description of the photo and the events surrounding
it.
Moving to
California
In a UCSF move
coming much sooner than the big one described above,
the Medical Anthropology Program will relocate from
Laguna Honda School to the fourth floor of the Laurel
Heights building at 3333 California St. The program
is the first in a wave of social scientists and staff
moving to LHts. (They join the Institute for Health
and Aging, which has been there a few years). The
Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences moves
into LHts in the middle of August, and Health
Psychology comes at the end of the month. These and
other groups have been part of the Center for Social,
Behavioral and Policy Sciences, which will be renamed
the Center for Health and Community. Watch for the
celebration and official announcement soon.
Unjust
Desserts?
Some campus
give-and-take: Martha Geraty of Public Service
Programs, who helped coordinate UCSF's participation
in the July 19 AIDS Walk SF, vows to stay charitable
despite an ironic end to a rough, but rewarding day
that started even before the Sunday comics and
department store ads hit the damp pavement. At 5
a.m., she loaded into a van a variety of foods for
the 420 UCSF walkers, delivered them to Golden Gate
Park, handed out T-shirts, helped feed breakfast to
participants, collected forms and pledges, rushed to
the finish area, helped feed lunch, cleaned up, and
delivered the leftover goodies -- including hot dogs
and garden burgers -- to Hamilton House, a homeless
shelter in the Haight.
By the time Martha
got back to her office in the Woods Building it was
5:30 p.m., and she was itching to get home to her
family. But not so fast -- well that's what a UCSF
police officer said. She was red-lighted down Twin
Peaks, 3/4 of a mile from the campus, and told by the
officer that she had run a stop sign on Johnstone
Drive, near the student housing complex and the
Chancellor's residence. "I thought it was kind
of hysterical, considering the day I had," said
Martha, who was unable to convince the officer to be
charitable. Martha, however, isn't laughing about the
$100 ticket. She didn't think she ran the stop, and
plans to take this story to traffic court and
hopefully a sympathetic judge.
Readers: If you
have any items or suggestions for this column, send
us an email: andye@itsa.ucsf.edu .
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