de would
eventually demand an outlet on the floor of Carson Valley, four miles
away. He secured the legislation and surprised both friends and enemies
by raising the money to begin construction of the famous Sutro Tunnel.
He began the work in 1859, and in some way carried it through, spending
five million dollars. The mine-owners did not want to use his tunnel,
but they had to. He finally sold out at a good price and put the most
of a large fortune in San Francisco real estate. At one time he owned
one-tenth of the area of the city. He forested the bald hills of the San
Miguel Rancho, an immense improvement, changing the whole sky-line back
of Golden Gate Park. He built the fine Sutro Baths, planted the
beautiful gardens on the heights above the Cliff House, established a
car line that meant to the ocean for a nickel, amassed a library of
twenty thousand volumes, and incidentally made a good mayor. He was a
public benefactor and should be held in grateful memory.

The memories that cluster around a certain building are often
impressive, both intrinsically and by reason of their variety. Platt's
Hall is connected with experiences of first interest. For many years it
was the place for most occasional events of every character. It was a
large square auditorium on the spot now covered by the Mills Building.
Balls, lectures, concerts, political meetings, receptions, everything
that was popular and wanted to be considered first-class went to Platt's
Hall.

Starr King's popularity had given the Unitarian church and Sunday-school
a great hold on the community. At Christmas its festivals were held in
Platt's Hall. We paid a hundred dollars for rent and twenty-five dollars
for a Christmas-tree. Persons who served as doorkeepers or in any other
capacity received ten dollars each. At one dollar for admission we
crowded the big hall and always had money left over. Our entertainments
were elaborate, closing with a dance. My first service for the
Sunday-school was the unobserved holding up an angel's wing in a
tableau. One of the most charming of effects was an artificial
snowstorm, arranged for the concluding dance at a Christmas festival.
The ceiling of the hall was composed of horizontal windows giving
perfect ventilation and incidentally making it feasible for a large
force of boys to scatter quantities of cut-up white paper evenly and
plentifully over the dancers, the evergreen garlands decorating the
hall, and the polished flo