Advertisement in the San Francisco Directory for Adolph Sutro and Co., tobacco store, 1858.

Adolph Sutro (1830-1898)

Adolph Sutro, a German immigrant, headed for the West from Baltimore at the age of twenty-one. By 1860 he had established a successful quartz reducing mill near the Comstock Lode where many mines could not be worked due to the lack of fresh air and frequent flooding. Sutro envisioned building a tunnel to provide ventilation and drainage. He battled bankers and politicians throughout most of the 1860s and '70s, emerging victorious in 1878 with the October opening of the "Sutro Tunnel." Sutro sold his holdings at a substantial profit in 1879 and moved to San Francisco. His dealings with dishonest politicians and underhanded bankers during his battle for the tunnel supplied him with the motivation to lead a Populist ticket, the People's Party, resulting in his 1894 victory as mayor of San Francisco.