• California Hall
• The Cinch Saloon
• Polk Street Corridor
• Francisco Park

Polk Gulch draws its name from two sources: Polk Street, named for James K. Polk — the 11th President of the United States — and the creek-filled gulch that once ran beneath the street before it was buried during the city's nineteenth-century development. Settled in the decades following the Gold Rush, the corridor between Russian Hill and Nob Hill developed as a neighborhood shopping district serving the affluent residents on either side. By the early 1900s, the area south of California Street had become a stronghold for German immigrants who called it 'Polk Strasse,' and in 1910 they completed California Hall — a landmark civic building that would later become central to the neighborhood's next defining chapter.

California Hall became a key gathering place for San Francisco's LGBTQ+ community beginning in the 1960s, when Polk Gulch served as the city's primary gayborhood — predating the Castro by more than a decade. San Francisco's first Gay Pride parade was held on Polk Street in 1972, and at its peak the corridor housed over one hundred LGBTQ+-identified establishments. The Cinch Saloon, one of the last remaining legacy gay bars, still anchors Polk Street today.

From Polk Strasse to the first gayborhood, Polk Gulch has shaped San Francisco's identity at every turn. MY-NHD's Polk Gulch collection is for those who understand the neighborhood's long and layered role in the city's story.