San Francisco Real Estate - San Francisco Bay Area Real Estate

W. H. CRIM, Jr.
Architect
(1879-1930)

William Henry Crim, Jr. was born in San Francisco on May 20,1879, one of three children born to William Henry and Catherine Sarah (Garratt) Crim. The elder Wm. H. Crim was born in Ohio and came to California as a young man, subsequently becoming a prominent real estate broker in the City and

Kohl Building

one of the founding members of the San Francisco Real Estate Board in 1905. His son graduated from Lick School and the California School of Mechanical Arts. He was accepted as a draftsman by architects Percy and Hamilton, receiving a sound architectural training with them. The two principals died within a year of each other (Frederick F. Hamilton in 1899 and George W. Percy in 1900). At that time the company had on the drawing boards an important early Financial District skyscraper, the Alvinza Hayward Building (400 Montgomery at California, now known as the Kohl Building, San Francisco Landmark #161), which Henry H. Meyers and Crim completed in 1901. It is built in an ‘H’ shape with a steel-frame and reinforced concrete floors, which helped it to become one of the few buildings in the area to survive the 1906 earthquake and fire. It was later described by architect and critic B. J. S. Cahill as “one of the most beautiful buildings in San Francisco”.

Alexander Young, Hotel, Honolulu

Crim also worked with Meyers on the Alexander Young Hotel in Honolulu (completed in 1901, but demolished in 1981), and later joined architect Willis Polk, after Polk opened a new office in the City in 1904. Following an extensive European trip to study architecture, Crim returned to San Francisco in late 1905 and began working with fellow Lick alumni, Earl Blakely Scott (1877-1922), who had trained for eight years with architect William Curlett. The Crim and Scott partnership was destined to continue until mid-1911.

After the 1906 earthquake and fire, Crim and Scott obtained a number of commissions, including:

Financial District - 225-27 Front (1907), 240-42 California (1909, Tadich Grill);
Cow Hollow - 2659 Filbert (1907);
Downtown - 706 Ellis (1908, hotel & retail), 667 Mission (1909, offices);
Nob Hill - 830 Powell (1908, 7 apts.), 1501-21 Hyde (1909, 12 units),
- 900 Powell (1909, 14 apts.), 1242 Taylor (1909, 6 apts.);
Lake Street - 62-64 & 66-68 6th Avenue (1908), 108-10 7th Avenue (1909);
Presidio Heights - 40 Arguello (1910);
Sea Cliff - 150 El Camino (1911).

Working as a sole practitioner, Crim produced a number of commercial buildings which survive today and, in some cases, have been adapted for residential use. An example is One South Park, distinctive for its series of arched openings on the first floor, built originally in 1913 for the American Tobacco Company and converted recently to 35 residences.

Some of Crim’s other surviving buildings include a fine hotel from 1913 at 1666-68 Market Street, now the CAV Wine Bar and Edwardian Hotel; the Second Church of Christ Scientist, 651 Dolores at Cumberland, in 1916; 400 2nd Street, built for the Pacific Coast Envelope Company in 1917, now offices; an auto repair shop at 955 Post in 1919; a fine retail store at 433 Grant in 1922; the Church of Christ, 2899 Clay at Divisadero in 1923; and a three-story industrial building with an integral railroad siding for the Los Angeles Soap Company at 599 2nd Street, also in 1923.

His residential structures continued to cover the range from single-family homes through pairs of flats to apartment buildings, in many different neighborhoods, including:

Crim died unexpectedly at Lane Hospital on July 12, 1930, at the age of 51, just eight years after his father. He had suffered an illness about 12 months before, but it was thought that he had made a complete recovery. He was survived by his wife of 28 years, Juanita (Castillar) and a son William Castillar Crim, who graduated from U.C. Berkeley that same year. A tribute published in the 1932 edition of Rockwell D. Hunt’s California and Californians included these words: “Many of San Francisco’s most beautiful and substantial structures stand as monuments reflecting the skill and genius of the late William Henry Crim, Jr., one of the leading architects of his time, who passed to his final rest in 1930. His career commenced in young manhood, and he early displayed the possession of qualities that were to carry him so far in his profession and to make him a leading and substantial citizen. In his death the city lost a man who had contributed much to its beauty and greatness and who had won the confidence and admiration of his fellow citizens in a marked degree.”