1906 earthquake’s last survivor
SAN FRANCISCO— William A. (Bill) Del Monte died at a retirement home in nearby Marin County this week. He was 11 days shy of his 110th birthday.
He’d been doing “great for 109 years old,” his niece, Janette Barroca of San Francisco said.
Del Monte was the last survivor of the devastating San Francisco earthquake and fire of 1906. He was just three months old when the quake struck, forcing his family into the streets to escape in an open horse-drawn carriage with fire burning on both sides, Barroca said. The family crossed the bay to Alameda County but eventually came back to the city after their home was rebuilt, Barroca said.
His father had opened the famous Fior d’Italia restaurant on Broadway in 1886 and it was destroyed in the quake but reopened in a tent not long after. By 1915, the Italian restaurant was prospering again, according to a 2011 San Francisco Chronicle story.
Del Monte attended San Francisco schools and after graduation went to work briefly for his father at his North Beach restaurant. But even in his teens he was interested in playing the stock market. And he was good at it. By 1929, at age 23, he was worth $1 million, according to the San Francisco Chronicle story.
He lost the money but, around the same time, he gained a wife, Vera Minetti. They eloped to Reno in 1935 and were married for more than 55 years before she died in 1991. They never had children. While his true passion was playing the stock markets, he also ran a San Francisco Bay Area theatre for years.
Del Monte’s death leaves a void in the city’s history.
Ruth Newman was the oldest remaining survivor of the earthquake before her death last summer. She was 113. Newman was 4 years old when the quake struck in the early morning of April 18, 1906. She died July 29 at her home in Pebble Beach, Calif.
Del Monte attended the annual earthquake commemorations events in San Francisco, which include gatherings at Lotta’s Fountain in downtown before dawn. In 2010, he was the only survivor who made it to Lotta’s Fountain, riding in the back of the city’s big, black 1930 Lincoln convertible.
More than 1,000 people were killed in the earthquake and fires. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, measurements of the quake have ranged from magnitude 7.7 to 8.3.