Treasure Island-Golden Gate International Exposition, 1939-40

The fair on the bronze was the island's placeholder. Treasure Island was filled from the bay's shoals with federal money to become San Francisco's airport, and the only buildings put up to last were the ones an airport needed: a curving Art Deco terminal and two hangars. During the exposition the terminal already served Pan American's Clipper flying boats. Then the Navy took the island and offered the city Mills Field on the Peninsula in exchange, and the airport went there instead. The terminal became the Navy's Building One.

What the plaque says

Treasure Island This artificial island was constructed of bay sand in 1936-7 and was the site of Golden Gate International Exposition, Feb. 18, 1939-Sept. 29, 1940. Tall towers, gigantic goddesses and dazzling lighting effects turned the island into a "Magic City." The exposition celebrated the ascendancy of California and San Francisco as economic, political and cultural forces in the increasingly important Pacific region. Treasure Island has been a U.S. naval station since 1941. California Registered Historical Landmark No. 987 Plaque placed by the State Department of Parks and Recreation in cooperation with U.S. Navy, Treasure Island Museum, GGIE Research Associates, and Art Deco Society of California, February 18, 1990.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Muir Woods National Monument — 12 mi
  A redwood canyon saved from a reservoir by a gift, and named for a man who had been there once.
• Muir Beach Overlook — 12 mi
  A cliff edge on Highway 1, and the concrete dugouts where two-man crews watched the sea after Pearl Harbor.
• Earthquake Trail — 27 mi
  A short loop along the San Andreas, where a broken fence shows how far Point Reyes moved in under a minute in 1906.
• Kule Loklo — 28 mi
  A Coast Miwok village built in the 1970s to honour a people its builders were told had died out. They had not.

More markers nearby

• Telegraph Hill — 2.2 mi
• Farnsworth's Green Street Lab — 2.2 mi
• Original Site of Third Baptist Church — 2.3 mi
• Fort Gunnybags — 2.3 mi