Chinese Telephone Exchange

North Beach & Chinatown


California's earliest high-tech adopters weren't 1970s Silicon Valley programmers – they were Chinatown switchboard operators c 1894. To connect callers, operators spoke six languages fluently and memorized 1500-plus Chinatown residents by name, residence and occupation. Managers lived at the pagoda-topped exchange, operating the switchboard 365 days a year until 1949. Since people born in China were prohibited from entering the US during the 1882–1943 Chinese Exclusion era, the exchange provided Chinatown residents with their only family contact for 60 years.

The landmark building was bought and restored by the Bank of Canton in 1960.


Lonely Planet's must-see attractions

Nearby North Beach & Chinatown attractions

1. Wentworth Place

0.04 MILES

Dragons bring this shadowy brick byway roaring to life. The narrow entryway is illuminated with 'Dragon Boats Chasing Moonlight,' a new mosaic mural…

2. Portsmouth Square

0.05 MILES

Chinatown's unofficial living room is named after John B Montgomery's sloop, which staked the US claim on San Francisco in 1846. SF's first city hall…

3. Waverly Place

0.05 MILES

Grant Ave is Chinatown's economic heart, but its soul is Waverly Place, lined with flag-festooned, colorful temple balconies and family-run businesses…

4. Tin How Temple

0.06 MILES

There was no place to go but up in Chinatown in the 19th century, when laws restricted where Chinese San Franciscans could live and work. Atop barber…

5. Chinatown Alleyways

0.06 MILES

If you look close today at the clinker-brick buildings lining these narrow backstreets, past the temple balconies jutting out over bakeries, acupuncture…

6. Spofford Alley

0.07 MILES

Sun Yat-sen once plotted the overthrow of China’s last dynasty here at number 36, and during Prohibition, this was the site of turf battles over local…

7. Ross Alley

0.07 MILES

Colorful murals hint at the colorful characters who once roamed SF’s oldest alleyway – known during the Gold Rush variously as Mexico, Spanish or Manila…

8. Chinese Culture Center

0.08 MILES

You can see all the way to China from the Hilton's 3rd floor inside this cultural center, which hosts exhibits ranging from showcases of contemporary…