FoundSF

Unfinished History

In 2015, the University of California San Francisco opened its Toland Hall to the public for a rare 2-week opportunity to see the remarkable murals painted by Bernard Zakheim and his colleagues in the 1930s. The series of panels depicts a complicated social history of medicine in California. As of June 2020, UCSF is threatening to destroy these murals as part of a plan to tear down Toland Hall and build a large new medical office building on its site.

Inside Toland Hall during the brief period in 2015 when the murals were open to public viewing.

Photos: Chris Carlsson

Local first peoples bringing medicinal herbs to a Franciscan friar.

Authorities making their declaration about bubonic plague in San Francisco, c. 1900.

Conflicting declarations on the death of James King of William that gave rise to the second Vigilante Committee hangings in San Francisco.

Credits panel

This panel's wood framing is remarkable in its own right.