Sea Lions have lived in San Francisco Bay for millennia, feeding on the schools of anchovies that thrive there.
At the time this postcard was printed (late 1930’s), the sea lions sunned primarily on Seal Rock in the harbor.
After the earthquake of 1989, however, boats were removed temporarily from Pier 39, and Sea Lions began to use the pier.
It was easier for the seals to climb onto the pier than onto the rocky shores of Seal Island, they did not have to move for rising or falling tides, and they seemed to like the activity that went on around them.
Sea lions became so numerous on the Pier (over a thousand at Thanksgiving of 2019) that the marina was moved and the seals became a tourist attraction for the busy commercial pier.
When grandmother visited San Francisco in June of 1940, she sent a postcard photograph of the sea lions to her granddaughter in Arizona.
San Francisco can be chilly in all seasons, and grandmother wrote that she missed the Arizona sun.
(The mother of Meta Jo, and the daughter of the woman who mailed the postcard, died in Glendale, Arizona at the age of 95. This passing occurred in 2004.)
