The Vanished Ruin Era; San Francisco's Classic Artistry of Ruin Depicted in Picture and Song

"..that modern Acropolis which the Fire God created, that ephemeral and vanished ruin era which in the weird, flame-wrought transformation made things of beauty out of hovels; which carved shapes of classic dignity out of structural atrocities which lent a touch of magical, if spurious, age-refinement to the fire-ravished areas, akin to the decadent and time-hallowed grandeur of Athens and of Rome." --from the introduction.