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59-517: The Lower Nob Hill Apartment Hotel District is a historic district located in downtown San Francisco, California , in an area that sits between the Nob Hill and Tenderloin neighborhoods. It covers roughly a five-block stretch on the southern slope of Nob Hill, but due to its location between California Street (Nob Hill's southern border) and Geary Street (the Tenderloin's northern border),

118-754: A "very critical Marxist" who was "often contemptuous of the Soviet Union " and "bitingly sharp about the American Communist Party ", to which he was nevertheless loyal. At the beginning of 1942, he wrote the screenplay of Watch on the Rhine , based on Hellman's successful play, which received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay) . But that year the Oscar went to Casablanca . In early 1942, following

177-713: A San Francisco jewelers, are given in: Starting in December 1925 and ending August 1926, there appeared monthly, in Western Advertising “Books Reviews by S. H.” Hammett is using not using D. but his other initial S. for Samuel. After their initial publication in pulp magazines, most of Hammett's short stories were first collected in ten digest-sized paperbacks by Mercury Publications under an imprint, either Bestsellers Mystery , A Jonathan Press Mystery or Mercury Mystery . The stories were edited by Ellery Queen (Frederic Dannay) and were abridged versions of

236-493: A home in San Francisco , where Hammett would visit on weekends. The marriage soon fell apart; however, he continued to support his wife and daughters with the income he made from his writing. Hammett was first published in 1922 in the magazine The Smart Set . Known for the authenticity and realism of his writing, he drew on his experiences as a Pinkerton operative. Hammett wrote most of his detective fiction while he

295-399: A larger urban setting, but they can also be parts or all of small towns, or a rural areas with historic agriculture-related properties, or even a physically disconnected series of related structures throughout the region. Much criticism has arisen of historic districts and the effect protective zoning and historic designation status laws have on the housing supply. When an area of a city

354-413: A letter of November 25, 1937, to his daughter Mary, Hammett referred to himself and others as "we reds". He confirmed, "in a democracy all men are supposed to have an equal say in their government", but added that "their equality need not go beyond that." He also found, "under socialism there is not necessarily... any leveling of incomes." Hellman wrote that Hammett was "most certainly" a Marxist , though

413-881: A little corbeling ; after about 1912 many buildings were influenced by Mission/Spanish/Mediterranean revival influence with flat brick or stucco facades; late buildings (1929–1935) tend to Art Deco , especially the Maurice Hotel at 761 Post Street, and 820 Bush Street. Notable architects and firms that designed building in the Lower Nob Hill Apartment Hotel District included Frederick Herman Meyer , Sylvain Schnaittacher , G. Albert Lansburgh , James Francis Dunn , Herman Carl Baumann, Charles Oliver Clausen, and Rousseau & Rousseau. The streetlights at 680–1140 Sutter Street were designed by sculptor Arthur Putnam with "The Winning of

472-985: A member (and in 1941 president) of the League of American Writers, he served on its Keep America Out of War Committee in January 1940 during the period of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact . Especially in Red Harvest , literary scholars have seen a Marxist critique of the social system. One Hammett biographer, Richard Layman, calls such interpretations "imaginative", but he nonetheless objects to them, since, among other reasons, no "masses of politically dispossessed people" are in this novel. Herbert Ruhm found that contemporary left-wing media already viewed Hammett's writing with skepticism, "perhaps because his work suggests no solution: no mass-action... no individual salvation... no Emersonian reconciliation and transcendence ". In

531-425: A nameless private investigator, The Continental Op , appeared in leading crime-fiction pulp magazine Black Mask . Both Hammett and the magazine struggled in the period when Hammett became established. Because of a disagreement with editor Philip C. Cody about money owed from previous stories, Hammett briefly stopped writing for Black Mask in 1926. He then took a full-time job as an advertisement copywriter for

590-479: A remarkable achievement, the last word in atrocity, cynicism and horror. Dashiell Hammett's dialogues, in which every character is trying to deceive all the others and in which the truth slowly becomes visible through a fog of deception, can be compared only with the best in Hemingway." Hammett devoted much of his life to left-wing activism . He was a strong antifascist throughout the 1930s, and in 1937 joined

649-460: A unique, transitional identity between the two neighborhoods. It covers roughly a 5-city block length in downtown San Francisco on the south slope of Nob Hill; in the south boundary of the district is adjoining the Tenderloin neighborhood, and in the west it is adjoining the Polk Street / Van Ness corridor. It is bound by 590–1209 Bush, 680–1156 Sutter, and 600–1099 Post Streets. This district

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708-401: Is a California Historical Landmark due to its architectural significance and its role in the social history of San Francisco. The district features many early 20th-century apartment hotels that were once home to middle-class residents and now reflect the architectural styles of that era. Though historically linked to Nob Hill, its location closer to downtown and the Tenderloin gives the district

767-551: Is dedicated to Hellman. Why he moved away from fiction is not certain; Hellman speculated in a posthumous collection of Hammett's novels, "I think, but I only think, I know a few of the reasons: he wanted to do new kind of work; he was sick for many of those years and getting sicker." In the 1940s, Hellman and he lived at her home, Hardscrabble Farm, in Pleasantville, New York . The French novelist André Gide thought highly of Hammett, stating: "I regard his Red Harvest as

826-553: Is dedicated to his wife Josephine. For much of 1929 and 1930, he was romantically involved with Nell Martin , a writer of short stories and several novels. He dedicated The Glass Key to her, and in turn she dedicated her novel Lovers Should Marry to him. In 1931, Hammett embarked on a 30-year romantic relationship with the playwright Lillian Hellman . Though he sporadically continued to work on material, he wrote his final novel in 1934, more than 25 years before his death. The Thin Man

885-524: Is deemed "significant". The term "old street" refers to a neighborhood with historic buildings. Many of these are tourist attractions and filled with hawkers catering to visitors. Many jurisdictions within the United States have specific legislation identifying and giving protection to designated historic districts. Criticism of historic districts in Chicago and elsewhere in the United States

944-804: Is designated as part of a 'historic district', new housing development is artificially restricted and the supply of new housing permanently capped in area so designated as 'historic'. Critics of historic districts argue that while these districts may offer an aesthetic or visually pleasing benefit, they increase inequality by restricting access to new and affordable housing for lower and middle class tenants and potential home owners. In Canada , such districts are called "heritage conservation districts" or "heritage conservation areas" (known as "arrondissements historiques", "secteurs de conservation du patrimoine" or "districts de conservation du patrimoine" in French ) and are governed by provincial legislation. In Taiwan ,

1003-576: Is located near other National Register of Historic Places defined historic districts, at the south is the Uptown Tenderloin Historic District . There are social differences between living on the lower hill versus living in the "flatlands" of the Tenderloin, and researchers have defined the neighborhood break line at Post Street. Since the early 20th century, the rents in the Lower Nob Hill have been higher than in

1062-408: Is primarily based on arguments that such laws creating such districts restrict the supply of affordable housing, and thus the result of such districts is that of enforcing caste structures and class divisions by region and segments of urban areas. Several historic districts have been proposed not for a true preservation purpose but to prevent development. The term "Historic District" is not used in

1121-436: Is said to have lacked heart, yet the story he thought most of himself [ The Glass Key ] is the record of a man's devotion to a friend. He was spare, frugal, hard-boiled, but he did over and over again what only the best writers can ever do at all. He wrote scenes that seemed never to have been written before." Currently, 82 complete and standalone short stories are known to be written by Dashiell Hammett. They are listed below in

1180-551: The Cultural Heritage Preservation Act    [ zh ] protects certain historic districts under the "groups of buildings" category. Districts are overseen by their respective municipality, city, or county governments, but can also be promoted to a "significant" status and overseen by the Ministry of Culture directly. As of July 2021, there are twenty protected districts, one of which

1239-557: The Communist Party . On May 1, 1935, Hammett joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Lillian Hellman, Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers , Frank Folsom, Louis Untermeyer , I. F. Stone , Myra Page , Millen Brand , Clifford Odets , and Arthur Miller . (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers .) He suspended his anti-fascist activities when, as

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1298-737: The Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin . This archive includes manuscripts and personal correspondence, along with a small group of miscellaneous notes. The Irvin Department of Rare Books and Special Collections at the University of South Carolina holds the Dashiell Hammett family papers. Hammett's relationship with Lillian Hellman was portrayed in the 1977 film Julia . Jason Robards won an Oscar for his depiction of Hammett, and Jane Fonda

1357-559: The House Un-American Activities Committee about his own activities, but refused to cooperate with the committee. No official action was taken, but his stand caused him to be blacklisted , along with others who were blacklisted as a result of McCarthyism . Hammett became an alcoholic before working in advertising, and alcoholism continued to trouble him until 1948, when he quit under doctor's orders. However, years of heavy drinking and smoking worsened

1416-676: The Mystery Writers of America ; Red Harvest , The Glass Key and The Thin Man were also on the list. His novels and stories also had a significant influence on films, including the genres of private eye/ detective fiction , mystery thrillers, and film noir . Hammett was born near Great Mills on the "Hopewell and Aim" farm in Saint Mary's County, Maryland , to Richard Thomas Hammett and his wife Anne Bond Dashiell. His mother belonged to an old Maryland family, whose name in French

1475-661: The Tay-Bush Inn raid occurred at 3:00 AM at roughly 900 Bush Street, this event was pivotal for gay rights in the city. [REDACTED]  This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the National Park Service . Historic district Historic districts may or may not also be the center of the city . They may be coterminous with the commercial district , administrative district , or arts district , or separate from all of these. Historical districts are often parts of

1534-635: The attack on Pearl Harbor , Hammett again enlisted in the United States Army . Because he was 48 years old, had tuberculosis, and was a Communist, Hammett later stated he had "a hell of a time" being inducted into the Army. However, biographer Diane Johnson suggests that confusion over Hammett's forenames was the reason he was able to re-enlist. He served as an enlisted man in the Aleutian Islands and initially worked on cryptanalysis on

1593-705: The Albert S. Samuels Co., a San Francisco jeweller. He was wooed back to writing for the Black Mask by Joseph Thompson Shaw, who became the new editor in the summer of 1926. Hammett dedicated his first novel, Red Harvest , to Shaw and his second novel, The Dain Curse , to Samuels. Both these novels and his third, The Maltese Falcon , and fourth, The Glass Key , were first serialized in Black Mask before being revised and edited for publication by Alfred A. Knopf . The Maltese Falcon , considered to be his best work,

1652-555: The Army as a patient at Cushman Hospital in Tacoma, Washington , where he met a nurse, Josephine Dolan, whom he married on July 7, 1921, in San Francisco. Hammett and Dolan had two daughters, Mary Jane (born 1921) and Josephine (born 1926). Shortly after the birth of their second child, health services nurses informed Dolan that, owing to Hammett's tuberculosis, she and the children should not live with him full time. Dolan rented

1711-484: The Gap, Dash & Lily in 2020. The book series was made into a Netflix television series. Raymond Chandler , often considered Hammett's successor, summarized his accomplishments in his essay " The Simple Art of Murder ": "Hammett gave murder back to the kind of people that commit it for reasons, not just to provide a corpse; and with the means at hand, not with hand-wrought dueling pistols, curare, and tropical fish... He

1770-614: The Pinkertons he was sent to Butte, Montana , during the union strikes, though some researchers doubt this really happened. The agency's role in strike-breaking eventually left him disillusioned. Hammett enlisted in 1918 and served in the United States Army Ambulance Service . He was afflicted during that time with the Spanish flu and later contracted tuberculosis . He spent most of his time in

1829-636: The Southern District of New York issued subpoenas to the trustees of the CRC bail fund in an attempt to learn the whereabouts of the fugitives. Hammett testified on July 9, 1951, in front of United States District Court Judge Sylvester Ryan, facing questioning by Irving Saypol , the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York , described by Time as "the nation's number-one legal hunter of top Communists". During

Lower Nob Hill Apartment Hotel District - Misplaced Pages Continue

1888-465: The Tenderloin. The Lower Nob Hill Apartment Hotel District is architecturally remarkable for its dense multiple-unit residential buildings, unequaled in quantity and quality anywhere in California except possibly in the Tenderloin. It has 296 contributing buildings, and most are at the height of three to seven stories. Historically there has been a progression of many of the building types (in both

1947-717: The United Kingdom. The equivalent urban areas are known as Conservation Areas . Iranian Heritage and Tourism organization has nominated and selected several cities for their valuable historical monuments and districts. Baft-e Tarikhi (In Persian: بافت تاریخی or historical texture) is the name such areas are labelled with. Naein , Isfahan and Yazd are examples of Iranian cities with historic districts. [REDACTED] Media related to Historic districts at Wikimedia Commons Dashiell Hammett Samuel Dashiell Hammett ( / ˈ d æ ʃ ə l ˈ h æ m ɪ t / DASH -əl HAM -it ; May 27, 1894 – January 10, 1961)

2006-552: The West" ( c.  1908 ) bases, installed with architects D. H. Burnham & Co. In 1911, William Lawrence Murphy the inventor of the Murphy bed , lived in the district at 625 Bush Street. About a third of the buildings in the district were built for the 1915 Panama–Pacific International Exposition . Academy of Art University owns and uses several buildings in this area for both housing and educational purposes. This district

2065-581: The amount of "$ 260,000 in negotiable government bonds" was posted "to free eleven men appealing against their convictions under the Smith Act for criminal conspiracy to teach and advocate the overthrow of the United States government by force and violence." On July 2, 1951, their appeals exhausted, four of the convicted men fled rather than surrender themselves to federal agents and begin serving their sentences. The United States District Court for

2124-450: The district and the city), from boarding house to lodging house to hotel to apartments. After the 1906 earthquake , this district burned for three days and demolished all of the buildings. Because of the outcome of the 1906 earthquake, virtually the entire district was constructed between 1906 and 1925. The city enacted a rule for using fireproofing materials in the new construction. Early buildings (1906–1910) tend to simple brick facades with

2183-503: The district is often considered part of downtown San Francisco. The area is sometimes referred to as ' Tendernob ,' a colloquial term that reflects the blending of the two neighborhoods, and is also commonly called ' Lower Nob Hill ' by real estate agents and developers to market properties in this transitional zone. The Lower Nob Hill Apartment Hotel District is officially listed on the National Register of Historic Places and

2242-530: The hearing, Hammett refused to provide the information the government wanted, specifically the list of contributors to the bail fund, "people who might be sympathetic enough to harbor the fugitives." Instead, on every question regarding the CRC or the bail fund, Hammett declined to answer, citing the Fifth Amendment , refusing to even identify his signature or initials on CRC documents the government had subpoenaed. As soon as his testimony concluded, Hammett

2301-544: The hearings. He found himself impoverished due to a combination of the cancellation of radio programs The Adventures of Sam Spade and The Adventures of the Thin Man , and a lien on his income by the Internal Revenue Service for back taxes owed since 1943. Furthermore, his books were no longer in print. During the 1950s Hammett was investigated by Congress . He testified on March 26, 1953, before

2360-548: The island of Umnak . For fear of his radical tendencies, he was transferred to the Headquarters Company where he edited an Army newspaper entitled The Adakian . In 1943, while still a member of the military, he co-authored The Battle of the Aleutians with Cpl. Robert Colodny, under the direction of an infantry intelligence officer, Major Henry W. Hall. While in the Aleutians, he developed emphysema . After

2419-589: The last four years of his life with Hellman. "Not all of that time was easy, and some of it very bad", she wrote, but, "guessing death was not too far away, I would try for something to have afterwards." Hammett died in Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan on January 10, 1961, of lung cancer , diagnosed just two months beforehand. A veteran of both world wars, Hammett is buried at Arlington National Cemetery . Many of Hammett's papers are held by

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2478-841: The need for him to earn money to support the family. He left school when he was 13 years old and held several jobs before working for the Pinkerton National Detective Agency . He served as an operative for Pinkerton from 1915 to February 1922, with time off to serve in World War I . While working for the Pinkerton Detective Agency in Baltimore, he learned the trade and worked in the Continental Trust Building (now known as One Calvert Plaza). He said that while with

2537-529: The order of initial publication. Unfinished writings, fragments, drafts, screen stories, and stories that were later reworked into novels are listed separately below. All 28 Continental Op stories and one unfinished story have been collected in their original unabridged forms in The Big Book of the Continental Op (2017). Examples of Hammett's advertising copy for the Albert S. Samuels Company,

2596-441: The original publications. Some of these digests were reprinted as hardcovers by World Publishing under the imprint Tower Books . The anthologies were also republished as Dell mapbacks . An important collection, The Big Knockover and Other Stories , edited by Lillian Hellman, helped revive Hammett's literary reputation in the 1960s and fostered a new series of anthologies. However, most of these used Dannay's abridged version of

2655-479: The release of defendants arrested for political reasons." The trustees were Hammett, who was chairman, Robert W. Dunn , and Frederick Vanderbilt Field . The CRC was designated a Communist front group by the US Attorney General . Hammett endorsed Henry A. Wallace in the 1948 United States presidential election . The CRC's bail fund gained national attention on November 4, 1949, when bail in

2714-401: The role of Hammett in the 1992 made-for-TV film Citizen Cohn . Sam Shepard played Hammett in the 1999 Emmy -nominated biographical television film Dash and Lilly along with Judy Davis as Hellman. Hammett's influence on popular culture has continued well after his death. For example, in 1975, the film The Black Bird starred George Segal in the role of Sam Spade, Jr.; the film

2773-515: The sleuths in Hammett's Thin Man series. The book was made into a film of the same name and released in 2008. Later, Rachel Cohn and David Levithan authored several books whose main characters are named for Hammett and his partner. In 2011, they published the YA suspenseful romance, Dash & Lily's Book of Dares . That was followed by the sequels The Twelve Days of Dash and Lily in 2016 and Mind

2832-406: The stories. The first collection that prints stories in their original unedited forms is Crime Stories & Other Writings (2001) edited by Steven Marcus (especially after the third printing that incorporates the original text of This King Business ). Subsequent collections that print the original texts include Lost Stories (2005), The Hunter and Other Stories (2013), and The Big Book of

2891-456: The tuberculosis he contracted in World War I, and then, according to Hellman, "jail had made a thin man thinner, a sick man sicker ... I knew he would now always be sick." Hellman wrote that during the 1950s, Hammett became "a hermit", his decline evident in the clutter of his rented "ugly little country cottage", where "signs of sickness were all around: now the phonograph was unplayed,

2950-420: The typewriter untouched, the beloved foolish gadgets unopened in their packages." He may have meant to start a new literary life with the novel Tulip , but left it unfinished, perhaps because he was "just too ill to care, too worn out to listen to plans or read contracts. The fact of breathing, just breathing, took up all the days and nights." Hammett could no longer live alone, and they both knew it, so he spent

3009-617: The war, Hammett returned to political activism, "but he played that role with less fervour than before". He was elected president of the Civil Rights Congress (CRC) on June 5, 1946, at a meeting held at the Hotel Diplomat in New York City, and "devoted the largest portion of his working time to CRC activities". In 1946, a bail fund was created by the CRC "to be used at the discretion of three trustees to gain

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3068-711: Was De Chiel. He had an elder sister, Aronia, and a younger brother, Richard Jr. Known as Sam, Hammett was baptized a Catholic and grew up in Philadelphia and Baltimore . Hammett's family moved to Baltimore when he was four years old in 1898, and for the most part, it was the city where he lived until he left permanently in 1920 when he was 26 years old. As a teen, Hammett attended the Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, but his formal education ended during his first year of high school; he dropped out in 1908 due to his father's declining health and

3127-548: Was a sequel and parody of the Maltese Falcon . The 1976 comedic film Murder by Death spoofed a number of famous literary sleuths, including several of Hammett's. The film's characters included Sam Diamond and Dick and Dora Charleston, which were parodies of Hammett's Sam Spade and Nick and Nora Charles. In 2006, Rachel Cohn published the YA novel, Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist , whose main characters were named for

3186-533: Was an American writer of hard-boiled detective novels and short stories. He was also a screenwriter and political activist. Among the characters he created are Sam Spade ( The Maltese Falcon ), Nick and Nora Charles ( The Thin Man ), The Continental Op ( Red Harvest and The Dain Curse ) and the comic strip character Secret Agent X-9 . Hammett is regarded as one of the very best mystery writers. In his obituary in The New York Times , he

3245-533: Was described as "the dean of the... 'hard-boiled' school of detective fiction." Time included Hammett's 1929 novel Red Harvest on its list of the 100 best English-language novels published between 1923 and 2005. In 1990, the Crime Writers' Association picked three of his five novels for their list of The Top 100 Crime Novels of All Time . Five years later, The Maltese Falcon placed second on The Top 100 Mystery Novels of All Time as selected by

3304-440: Was found guilty of contempt of court . Hammett served time in a West Virginia federal penitentiary, where, according to Lillian Hellman, he was assigned to clean toilets. Hellman noted in her eulogy of Hammett that he submitted to prison rather than reveal the names of the contributors to the fund because "he had come to the conclusion that a man should keep his word." By 1952, Hammett's popularity had declined as result of

3363-449: Was living in San Francisco in the 1920s; streets and other locations in San Francisco are frequently mentioned in his stories. He said, "I do take most of my characters from real life." His novels were some of the first to use dialogue that sounded authentic to the era. "I distrust a man that says when . If he's got to be careful not to drink too much, it's because he's not to be trusted when he does." The bulk of his early work, featuring

3422-482: Was nominated for her portrayal of Lillian Hellman. Hammett was the subject of a 1982 prime time PBS biography, The Case of Dashiell Hammett , that won a Peabody Award and a special Edgar Allan Poe Award from the Mystery Writers of America. Frederic Forrest portrayed Hammett semifictionally as the protagonist in the 1982 film Hammett , based on the novel of the same name by Joe Gores . He would reprise

3481-632: Was the subject of Dashiell Hammett 's The Maltese Falcon (1930) with the fictional private detective Sam Spade living in the area. The film Vertigo (1958) by Alfred Hitchcock features a book shop named the Argosy that was inspired by the Argonaut Book Shop at 786 Sutter Street; and when Kim Novak walks into a hotel as the character Judy Barton, that hotel is now known as the Hotel Vertigo (1928) at 940 Sutter Street. In 1961,

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