Dr John Hays McLaren (1846 - 1943) served as superintendent of the Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, CA for 53 years. Born at Bannockburn, near Stirling in Scotland, he emigrated to the United States in 1870. He was friends with John Muir, and dedicated his life to vigorous advocacy and development Golden Gate Park, one of the largest public parks in the world, using considerable political skill in addition to his remarkable gardening skill.

Michael Harry de Young (September 30, 1849 - February 15, 1925), an American journalist and businessman, born in St. Louis, Missouri moved with his family to San Francisco, California while he was still young. There, he and his brother Charles de Young founded the "Daily Dramatic Chronicle" newspaper, first published on January 16, 1865. "The Chronicle" was the predecessor of the "San Francisco Chronicle", …

Chet Helms, often called the father of San Francisco's 1967 Summer of Love, was a music promoter and a cultural figure in San Francisco during its hippie period in the late Sixties. Helms was the founder and manager of Big Brother and the Holding Company and recruited Janis Joplin as its lead singer. He was a producer and organizer, helping to stage free concerts and other cultural events at Golden Gate Park, the backdrop of San Francisco's Summer of Love in 1967, …

Dede Wilsey is a San Francisco socialite and philanthropist, the widow of prominent San Francisco businessman Al Wilsey. She was born Diane Dow Buchanan in 1944, to Mr. and Mrs. Wiley T. Buchanan, Jr.. Her father was, variously, the U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg and Austria, as well as the White House chief of protocol under Dwight Eisenhower. Her great-grandfather, Herbert Henry Dow, was the founder of Dow Chemical.

Baron Makoto Hagiwara (?-1925) was a Japanese landscape designer responsible for the creating and maintaining the Japanese Tea Garden at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, California from 1895 until his death in 1925. He was also responsible for introducing the fortune cookie to American culture.

William Hammond Hall (1846 in Hagerstown, Maryland, United States of America - 1934) was a civil engineer who was the first State Engineer of California, and designed Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, CA. After serving with the U.S. army engineers in the Civil War, Hall was assigned in the latter part of the 1860s to surveying the Western regions of the United States and preparing topographical maps.

Lenore Kandel (born 1932) is a poet who was briefly notorious as the author of a short book of poetry, "The Love Book", a small pamphlet of 8 pages with 4 poems, including "To Fuck with Love" which was prosecuted for obscenity in 1967 in San Francisco during the hippie movement in Haight-Ashbury. She was a speaker at the Human Be-In in Golden Gate Park, January 14, 1967. She was one of 15 people interviewed in "Voices from the Love Generation".

Alice Marble (September 28, 1913 - December 13, 1990) was an American tennis player who won 18 Grand Slam championships from 1936 through 1940. Five of those championships were in singles, six were in women's doubles, and seven were in mixed doubles. Born in the small town of Beckwourth, California, Marble moved with her family at the age of five to San Francisco. A tomboy, she excelled in many sports such as baseball, …

Frank McCoppin (born July 4, 1834, County Longford, Ireland; died May 26, 1897, San Francisco, California) was the first Irish-born Mayor of San Francisco. McCoppin was a member of the Royal Irish Constabulary from 1851 until he emigrated to the United States in 1853. In 1860, he was made supervisor of the Market Street Railway, where he encouraged planting among the railroad tracks, to lessen the problem of drifting sands.

Clark Natwick is a former cyclocross cyclist from the United States. Natwick was the U.S. senior national cyclocross champion in 1981, 1986 and 1987. He is also the namesake for the Grand Prix Clark Natwick cyclocross race held each November in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Natwick is currently a coach in Mill Valley, California.

Bruce D. Judd, FAIA, is an historic preservation architect based in San Francisco, California. As a founding principal of Architectural Resources Group, Mr. Judd has been actively involved in the assessment, recommendations, and design of the rehabilitation of over 200 historic buildings. He has directed high-profile projects, including the repair and restoration of the Conservatory of Flowers in Golden Gate Park, …

Masten Gregory was a Formula One/sports car driver from the United States. He participated in 42 grands prix, debuting on May 19, 1957. He achieved 3 podiums, and scored a total of 24 championship points. Known as the "Kansas City Flash", Masten Gregory was born in Kansas City, Missouri as the youngest of three children (brother Riddelle L. Gregory Jr, sister Nancy James) and heir to an insurance company fortune.

Freddie Letuli, (b. April 30, 1919 as Uluao Letuli Misilagi in the village of Nu'uuli in American Samoa, d. 2003), originated the fire knife dance in 1946 at the Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, previously dancing in Hawaii and Los Angeles with two knives. Along with performing, Freddie was also the teacher to the early fire knife dancers. Dating back from the 40's to the 60's, …

Cordelia Botkin (1854-1910) was an American murderer who sent a box of poisoned candy to her ex-lover's wife. In 1895, Cordelia met John Preston "Jack" Dunning while he was bicyling in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Although Cordelia was then 41, nine years his senior, and both were married, he was smitten. A highly-regarded reporter for the Associated Press, after overseas assignments in Samoa and Chile, …

Robert George Fowler (August 10, 1884 - June 15, 1966) was an early aviation pioneer and was one of the first people to set the transcontinental airspeed record. Aero, America's Aviation Weekly wrote on September 16, 1911: <blockquote&gt; Ocean-to-Ocean Race Begins.

I ain't got no legs. The trout chopped my legs off in Fort Lauderdale. I have a magnificent chrome-plated steel wheelchair.