The Palace Hotel – Market Street, Financial District, San Francisco, California

The Palace Hotel is a landmark historic hotel in San Francisco, California, located at the southwest corner of Market and New Montgomery streets.

The original Palace Hotel was built by San Francisco banker and entrepreneur William Chapman Ralston who heavily depended on his shaky banking empire to help finance the $5 million project. Although Ralston’s Bank of California collapsed in late August 1875, and Ralston himself unexpectedly drowned in San Francisco Bay on the same day that he lost control of the institution, the Palace Hotel opened two months later on October 2, 1875. Ralston’s business partner in the project was U.S. Senator William Sharon who had helped cause the collapse of the Bank when he dumped his stock in the Comstock Lode. Sharon ended up in control of the hotel as well as both the Bank and Ralston’s debts – both of which he paid off at just pennies on the dollar

With 755 guest rooms, the original Palace Hotel (also known colloquially as the "Bonanza Inn") was at the time of its construction the largest hotel in the Western United States. At 120 feet (37 m) in height, the hotel was San Francisco’s tallest building for over a decade. The monarch of the Kingdom of Hawaii, King Kalakaua, died in this hotel on January 20, 1891. Although the hotel survived the initial damage from the early morning April 18, 1906, San Francisco earthquake, by late that afternoon it had been consumed by the subsequent fires. Notably, tenor Enrico Caruso (who had sung the role of Don José in Carmen the night before) was staying in the hotel at the time of the quake, and swore never to return to the city. The urban legend is Caruso, "stood in his nightshirt holding a personally autographed photograph of President Theodore Roosevelt and demanded special treatment."

Completely rebuilt from the ground up, the "New" Palace Hotel opened on December 19, 1909. It quickly resumed the role of its namesake predecessor as an important San Francisco landmark and host to many of the city’s great events. While externally much plainer then the original Palace, the new "Bonanza Inn" is in many ways as elegant, sumptuous, and gracious on the inside as the 1875 building. The "Garden Court" (also called the "Palm Court") – which occupies the same area that the Grand Court did in the earlier structure – has been one of San Francisco’s most prestigious hotel dining rooms since the day it opened. Equally famous was the "Pied Piper" Bar located just off the gleaming polished marble lobby which was overseen by its famous Maxfield Parrish painting of the same name. The 16 by 6 foot, 250-pound mural was removed on March 23, 2013 for sale at a planned auction at Christie’s which was anticipated to bring between up to five million dollars. In the light of strong public opposition to its removal, however, the hotel’s owners relented and instead had the painting cleaned, restored, and returned to the bar where it was rehung with considerable fanfare on August 22, 2013. The Ralston Room, named for co-founder William Ralston, is off the main lobby to the left.

The building in the background with the large clock tower culminating in a spike at its top is located at 33 New Montgomery Street.