THIRD TIME THE CHARM? — Over the last 12 years, The Emperor Norton Trust has launched and led two different campaigns to name a major landmark after Emperor Norton: (1) the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge and (2) the SF Ferry Building clock tower. Here's a third proposal: Name Yerba Buena Tunnel — the tunnel that makes the Bay Bridge possible — “Emperor Norton Tunnel.” Next year is the 90th anniversary of the bridge and the tunnel. And it's the 180th anniversary of Emperor Norton's first arrival in the United States. Go to EmperorNortonTunnel.org and click "Learn More" to read our proposal.

The Emperor Norton Trust

TO HONOR THE LIFE + ADVANCE THE LEGACY OF JOSHUA ABRAHAM NORTON

RESEARCH • EDUCATION • ADVOCACY

Filtering by Tag: California Sketches

Rev. Fitzgerald's Recollections

Arriving in San Francisco in 1858, Oscar Penn Fitzgerald (1829-1911) was the founder and sometime preacher at one of the churches that was on Emperor Norton's Sunday rotation. By the time he returned to his native South in 1878, Fitzgerald had become an influential leader in the development of higher education in California. They were twenty years that enabled Fitzgerald to witness firsthand nearly the whole of the Emperor's reign. 

O.P. Fitzgerald's second book of "California Sketches," published in 1881, features one of the most carefully observed and wonderfully drawn portraits of Emperor Norton that we have — exploring, with great empathy, the paradox of an Emperor who carried a Bologna sausage in his hip pocket but whose nobility of mind and bearing were such as to rob his title of any paradox at all.

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