SF Great Famine Memorial by SFGate
Exclusive: Plans for Irish Great Famine memorial moving ahead in S.F.
Pat Uniacke is a champion hurler, not a golfer, but on Sunday he drove his construction truck up from San Bruno just to stand at an overlook of the 17th tee at San Francisco’s Lincoln Park golf course with a rolled-up set of architectural plans in his hand.
Those plans represent the San Francisco Irish Great Famine Memorial Plaza, and sometime before St. Patrick’s Day, Uniacke will file them with the Building Department — to begin, at last, preliminary work on a tribute to the victims of the mass starvation, known widely as the Potato Famine, that killed 1 million Irish, with a million more fleeing to America to escape it between 1845 and 1852.
The memorial will start with a concrete and steel plaza carved into the berry brambles along Camino Del Mar, the main approach to the Legion of Honor. The top edge of the concrete will be inlaid with tablets describing the famine and the legacy of the survivors. At a later date, it will include a statue or sculpture that is yet to be determined by the San Francisco Arts Commission. To pay for phase one, the plaza will require a private capital campaign in the Irish-American community, with a goal of $300,000.
The building permit is routine, and Uniacke, a building contractor who is chair of the San Francisco Irish Famine Memorial Committee, expects to have it in hand the same day he applies for it.
“We can’t fundraise until we have the permit,” said Uniacke, 70, a Dubliner who emigrated in 1984. “I don’t believe in fundraising for a concept.”
Uniacke’s measured approach is understandable because the memorial has been in the conceptual stage for 13 years, and it has been five years since the Board of Supervisors passed a resolution in support of the plan, and designating the site.
Just last month, the city Recreation and Park Commission endorsed the plan and recommended that gifts of cash and in-kind services be accepted for it.
“The memorial will serve, not only as a reminder of an unprecedented tragedy for Ireland but as a monument of gratitude for the City of San Francisco, and State of California who welcomed Irish people and connected them with opportunity upon their arrival,” said Micheal, Smith, Consul General of Ireland to the Western United States, in a letter to Rec and Park.
The total maximum estimated budget, to include lighting, is $500,000, according to the city. Phase two, the artwork, will require a separate campaign. Rec and Park owns the site, on one of its five city golf courses. On April 2, the concept and design of the plaza will move to the Rec and Park capital committee for approval.
Uniacke boldly predicts that the plaza will be constructed and open in six months to a year. He also predicts that the fundraising will go smoothly because San Francisco is the only major U.S. city with a large Irish American population without a Great Famine memorial.
Irish immigrants played a major role in the building and shaping of San Francisco. Their long and distinguished history here dates back to the Gold Rush, when the potato-killing blight was spreading cruelly throughout their native country.
“There is a famine memorial even in Phoenix, Arizona,” Uniacke said. “We’ve been waiting a long time for this.”
Much of the wait was for a location to build the monument, he said. The committee did not choose the overlook at Lincoln Park — it would have been happy with any location, Uniacke said.
According to the Rec and Park staff report, it was selected because the view of the blue waters of San Francisco Bay set against the green Marin Headlands “capture the spirit of the Irish coast.”
Once Uniacke saw the spot assigned along El Camino del Mar, it all made sense. The Holocaust Memorial is maybe 300 yards away, next to the Legion parking lot, and along the hillside are monuments to both the Chinese and Japanese experience in San Francisco.
The Great Famine Memorial Plaza will be larger and more dramatic than either of those, its concrete platform extending 16 feet into the golf course buffer zone, and spanning 20 feet along the roadway.
“When finished this will be the most picturesque site of an Irish memorial in America,” Uniacke said. “It’s so peaceful and tranquil.”
Golfers were finishing up their rounds in the city amateur championship Sunday when Uniacke suddenly appeared with his rolled-up plans at the tee box, alongside Tony Bucher, a committee member who is also president of the Irish Literary and Historical Society.
Patrick Kelly, a tournament player from Santa Rosa, didn’t mind the interruption once he heard what the spectators represent.
“The Irish love their golf,” he said.
Mark Childers of Lafayette, who claimed to be descendant from a line of Irish horse thieves, even interrupted his tournament play to look at a rendering of the plaza.
“It will be a gorgeous overlook and a great way to honor the ancestors,” he said.
Reach Sam Whiting: swhiting@sfchronicle.com