Crockers 'spite' fence.

I found this on the San Francisco geneology web site:http://www.sfgenealogy.com/sf/history/hgoe75.htm




Famous Spite Fence Has Outlived Its Purpose.
Built Around Small Lot by Charles Crocker Because Owner Would Not Sell to Him.
"FOR SALE" signs have been placed by real estate agents on the lot on Sacramento street, near Taylor, which Charles Crocker surrounded with a high spite fence twenty-six years ago because the owner, Nicholas Yung, refused to sell the property to him at the price Crocker offered.

This fence is the most famous memorial of malignity and malevolence in the city. Thousands of persons have gone up Nob Hill to view it since its erection in 1876. Crocker has long been dead, but his heirs have preserved this testimonial of rancor. Yung went to the grave in 1880, but his offense of fixing his own price on his own residence was never pardoned by the Crockers. The fence has been an eyesore to them as well as to everybody else, but they have kept up the feud and sought to hide the ugliness of the lofty barricade on their side of it by covering the boards with ivy and other greenery.
The fence cost about $3000, but Crocker was a millionaire and did not mind the expense, and he had the satisfaction of driving the Yung family away from their home. Their house was boxed up and the sunlight shut out, and Yung was compelled to move the dwelling to another lot which he owned on Broderick street. The tall fence destroyed the value of the Sacramento street lot, which for about a quarter of a century has remained unused and unsightly. Mrs. Rosina Yung, widow of the man who incurred the deep displeasure of the Crockers, had a considerable estate and preferred to keep the cooped-up lot rather than sell it for the trifle which she might have been able to obtain. She died in last January and bequeathed the property, which has been appraised at about $80,000, to her daughters, who are Mrs. C. D. Postel, of Alameda, Mrs. O. J. Kron of San Francisco, Mrs. Frank Church of El Paso, Tex., and Mrs. John Kelly Russell of San Jose. In the course of administration the sale of the property belonging to the estate has been ordered.
When the last lot has been sold to someone not of the Yung blood it may be that the Crockers will drop their legacy of hatred and let the inartistic monument of resentment be torn down. Perhaps they may conclude to buy the lot which they wanted so badly.