Presidio Dig Seeks Ruins Of 1820s House

Presidio dig seeks ruins of 1820s house A couple of archaeologists, helped by some interns and a handful of volunteers, are sifting through the soil in a little marshy hollow in the Presidio in search of the ruins of one of the oldest houses in San Francisco. The only clues to what Jones calls "San Francisco's first small neighborhood" are an old hand-drawn map, and some testimony in a long-forgotten land case. Jones, Eric Blind and Nick Triozzi are professional archaeologists, and they are assisted by half a dozen interns and also by volunteers who spend afternoons digging in the dirt. The trash, she said, shows how people lived, what she calls "the mundane part of existence." At the top of one dig, the archaeologists found bits of golf balls, and in another place, shards of vinyl records. Don Francisco obtained a land grant on the San Mateo County coast at what is now the Linda Mar neighborhood of Pacifica, and built an adobe home there. American forces seized California in July 1846, and U.S.