Interesting site in the city …
https://localwiki.org/sf/Old_Mission_Police_Station
When it was a station, 1890s-1950
In 1897, the Chief of Police argued for building new police stations for San Francisco. His opinion on the existing 17th Street Station was scorching: “this station is without proper accommodations, badly lighted, in a wretched condition, so far as draining and plumbing are concerned, a condition of things which is the natural outcome of the use of an old, small and dilapidated building.” He goes on to ask for proper funding to build a “substantial” and “fire-proof” station nearby, noting the everpresent risk of riotous mobs.
The fallen turret after the 1906 earthquake. (From a 1994 survey of the building as a historical resource.)
This seems to have worked! A few years later, the Mission got a new police station in the Romanesque Revival style of the time. A historical resources survey says “Built in 1899, the two-story concrete police station was designed by the firm of Shea & Shea. Damaged in 1906, the police station was repaired – minus its original corner turret – and placed back into service. It remained in service as the Southern District station until 1950 when the SFPD moved to a new district headquarters at 1240 Valencia Street.” (It later moved to its current location at 630 Valencia Street.)
The police department says it was built in 1902, and the city’s building records say it was built in 1903. According to this survey of the building, the story is that it was built from 1899-1900 and then completed in 1902.
Credit toUC Berkeley, Bancroft Library