Wax Museum at Fishermans Wharf

This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please improve this article if you can. (November 2008)

The Wax Museum at the Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco, has a population of more than 250 international wax figures. Originator, Thomas Fong, opened this implausible Museum in 1963. Fong was enthused to open The Wax Museum after being fully inspired by the wax figures at the Seattle World's Fair. Just about three generations of the Fong family have gone through the Wax Museum and have kept it a fundamental and altering favorite tourist attraction. This highly anticipated museum is one of San Francisco's largest wax museums known to date. Inside you can view King Tut's Magnificent Tomb which is only shown at the Wax Museum.

Another great eye catching area inside the museum is the Palace of Living Arts. This part is where the museum's most respected and well known artists show off their masterpieces. Since the opening in 1963, more than ten million people have visited the Wax Museum. This one hundred year old monumental landmark was fiercely torn down to make room for a fifteen million dollar project. On September 1998, this project was built into a 100,000 square foot museum. After building this new gigantic museum its location is on 145 Jefferson Street, between Mason and Taylor. The design of the new Wax Museum building was inspired by a traditional San Francisco architect. After the new creation, "this new Museum consists of spectacular domes, ornate bay windows, ornamental metalwork and complex roof lines, all enhanced by the artistic use of brick, stucco, metal and glass to lend a fresh, new appeal to the much beloved unique San Francisco style."^[1] With a more retro-style it is about four times larger than its original structure.

This museum has attracted over 400,000 visitors a year to gawk at the international wax figures. Ten percent of visitors came from other countries but the large percentages are Bay Area visitors. In The Wax Museum there are many exhibits to witness and enjoy. The exhibits they present for the public to observe are Hall of Religions,King Tut, Chamber of Horrors, Sports and History. In these exhibits there is a cornucopia of history to examine, for example, one of the most popular is the birth of Christ. Inside the Museum a familiar maze, located in the walkway, is anticipated to surprise the visitor.

Founder

Thomas L. Fong founded the Wax Museum at Fisherman’s Wharf on May 12, 1963. He was born in Canton Providence of China on January 4, 1913. He left rural China at age 17 and arrived in San Francisco alone and penniless. But Thomas Fong worked hard, took chances and saved his money, eventually running a jewelry store in 1938, developing real estate projects and founding the Wax Museum at Fisherman's Wharf. Mr. Fong peacefully died on Thanksgiving Day November 26, 2000, at his home in the Richmond District. He was 87. He'd had several strokes and was suffering from Parkinson's disease.

His son, Ronald Fong, who now runs the museum and the family's other business interests, said his father had an incredible work ethic, and a knack for fitting in and making friends. "No work was too hard, and nothing would scare him," he said. "This is one situation where he made the best of the opportunities he had."^[2] Mr. Fong grew up in a small, poor village outside of Canton, China, and never knew his father, who died when he was very young. A family friend who was in San Francisco offered to sponsor a member of the family, and he was chosen to go.

One of his first jobs was as a houseboy at Grace Cathedral, where he tripped on a throw rug while carrying a tea service, breaking the dishes and prompting a threat to call the police. He told his family that he was so scared he bolted out the door and never looked back. Soon after, Mr. Fong acquired land in far Southern California, near the Mexican border, where he grew cotton, tomatoes, sugar beets and garlic. That led him to become a garlic broker. It also led him to meet his wife, Eva, whose family was also involved in farming. Eventually, he and Eva moved back to San Francisco and he became a tailor and salesman.

After years of farming he learned quite a bit about the way businesses and negotiations work. Mr. Fong later on led himself into the jewelry business by selling watches. After some time in the business he opened Tommy’s Jewelers in Chinatown, San Francisco which lasted several years. He designed very ornate and expensive items for local customers.

In the 1960s Fong decided to close the store because he had gotten into real estate. He started off by doing things such as buying land and constructing apartment buildings. A year later he bought an old run down grain mill called Smith Anderson Mill, just minutes away from Fisherman’s Wharf. Not sure what to do with the grain mill, he finally came to the conclusion to open a wax museum. With the help of a Canadian friend who had previous experience with wax figures, the two paired up and became business partners. It was a huge success from the start, "The first day they opened, it was gangbuster's business -- there was a line out the door and around the block,"^[2] said Fong. Things did not go as planned when Tommy Fong found out his partner was a crook wanted by the United States and Canada. He took all of his wax figures and disappeared over night.

With a fresh new start, Fong decided to bring his son Ron into the business with him. The two of them traveled to England to have new figures made by the granddaughter of Madame Tussaud and reopened in 1964. The museum was torn down in 1998 and reopened two years later, completely remastering the old building. The new building was a state of the art structure, which attracted more guests. With the success of their first museum, the family decided to purchase Movieland Wax Museum in Buena Park, California located near Knott's Berry Farm. By 1989, Thomas decided to leave the business and museum to Ron and his grandson Rodney Fong. Mr. Fong was cremated, and funeral services were private. The Wax Museum at Fisherman's Wharf creates wax figures for both the San Francisco museum as well as the Movieland Wax Museum.

New building

The extravagant new Wax Museum has an exceptional replica of Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio standing at the bow of the Titanic just like in the movie but at Fisherman’s Wharf. The new building is beneath the sea and there is not an iceberg in sight. The Wax Museum, which officially reopened on July 13, 2000, stands nine feet below the bay level. The new four-story building was designed by the Alameda firm MBH Architects and is a major addition to the tourist-rich Wharf. When visiting San Francisco, the Wax Museum is one of the most visited sites by tourists. The original Wax Museum was just a ramshackle old warehouse razed in 1998.

The new building stands in sand-colored brick, with twin towers capped by gray zinc domes. It also has faux-iron metalwork where the railings and fixtures have marine imagery of crab-leg and kelp forms. The design of the new building comes from French Victorian public architecture. The president of the Wax Museum, Ron Fong, fell in love with the Gustave Eiffel-designed train stating that he saw in Santiago, Chile and also the look of San Francisco’s arched pier buildings. Most of the two-hundred and eighty wax figures on display at the old wax museum included familiar characters such a Fidel Castro, Frankenstein, Jesus Christ, Mohandas K. Gandhi, Bette Davis, Bogie, Jezebel, Muhammad Ali and Vincent Van Gogh with half of wax ear lopped off. The Fong family, the owners of the building, spent about two-million dollars on murals, all-new sets, and music and sound effects to create more of a dramatic experience.

Exhibit

The museum displays a few figures in the lobby, which is open to the street. The figures that are on display in the lobby are of current interest and they are change seasonally. This small display is meant to entice the passers by to enter the museum. The public has to pay just a small fee to visit the entire exhibition.

The bodies of the wax statues are made of wood, fiberglass, papier-mâché and beeswax. The process to make each figure and prepare it for display takes approximately two or three months. The wax figures are displayed in different sections throughout the museum. The dictators' scene features Fidel Castro, Saddam Hussein and Napoleon Bonaparte standing in a rubble of bricks. Adolf Hitler shares space in the Axis war room with Benito Mussolini and Tojo. Across the way, Major stands opposite a giant globe from Mikhail Gorbachev, who has the telltale red splotch on his waxy bald head. Elsewhere, World War II generals Dwight D. Eisenhower and Douglas MacArthur appear with Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt in a rich war-scene tableau. This particular display features an authentic World War II Willys jeep, a pile of sand bags and a mural by painter Simon Zadovsky. The mural itself is full of bazooka-firing soldiers, tanks and shattered buildings. The sound of explosions and machine-gun fire are part of the display. The Fongs paid a Petaluma collector $750 for the jeep, which came with the windshield shattered; museum craftsmen put the bullet holes in the hood. Like most of the new sets, this one was sketched out by Rodney and Ron Fong and built by the Oakland firm Chiodo. When visitors journey into the underground exhibits, they find more than 270 figures and scenes, ranging from The Last Supper and Wizard of Oz to the Chamber of Horrors and King Tut. Visitors can also find famous scientists, queens, presidents, and dictators. The Fongs also included a slash of culture by adding displays of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Salvador Dali and Andy Warhol in the museum. There are also displays of current celebrities such as actress Julia Roberts, musician Carlos Santana, and actor Will Smith.

Then there's the scientists' section, where Galileo and Albert Einstein come in contact with a nerdy-looking Bill Gates holding a Windows 95 box. Rodney Fong is particularly partial to the Einstein figure. “Look at his hair,'” he says, “the wrinkles on his forehead, his piercing eyes. The artist captures Einstein.” Many of these sculptures were created over the years by Gem's Wax Figures in London. A few were crafted by Ron Fong, others by Los Angeles wax sculptor Henry Alvarez. But perhaps the most convincing figures are the three created by the museum's new resident sculptor, master realist Kahn Gasimov. A master realist, Kahn was hired away from London's Madame Tussauds by the San Francisco Wax Museum.

Rigorously trained in Soviet-era Azerbaijan, Gasimov made the Titanic scene and the extraordinary Donny Osmond piece. He is now at work on Marie Osmond and Mayor Willie Brown. Fong marvels at the perfection of Donny's head and relaxed body position. ``He just comes alive, from a distance and up close. It really is lifelike.^[3]

In the big new skull-lined Chamber of Horrors, visitors find classic creepy characters such as the Phantom of the Opera and Anton LaVey, the late San Francisco satanist whose wax figure attended his funeral, at the LaVey family's request.

The new museum at Fisherman’s Wharf, open from 9 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. Thursday-Sunday and until midnight Friday and Saturday, is located at 145 Jefferson St., San Francisco. Admission $6.95-$12.95. Call (415) 202-0400 for more information.

References

1. ^ http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/e/a/1998/10/27/BUSINESS5672.dtl&hw=recasting+wax+museum&sn=001&sc=1000
2. ^ ^{a b} http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS
3. ^ http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2000/07/13/DD92881.DTL&hw=Wax+figures+move+into+new+home&sn=004&sc=723

1. Amstrong, David. “Recasting a wax museum” San Francisco Chronicle. 27 October 1998. 19 October 2008 <http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/e/a/1998/10/27/BUSINESS5672.dtl&hw=recasting+wax+museum&sn=001&sc=1000>.

2. Hamlin, Jesse. “Wax Figures Move Into a New Home.” San Francisco Chronicle. 13 July 2000. 19 October 2008 <http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2000/07/13/DD92881.DTL&hw=Wax+figures+move+into+new+home&sn=004&sc=723>.

3.Hamlin, Jesse. "Minding His Beeswax / Sculptor is immortalizing Donny Osmond, Mayor Brown and others for the expanded Fisherman's Wharf museum ." San Francisco Chronicle (Dec 9, 1999): B1. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Gale. Orange Coast College Library. 19 October 2008 <http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS>.

4. Torassa, Ulysses. "Thomas Fong." San Francisco Chronicle (Nov 26, 2000): D9. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Gale. Orange Coast College Library. 19 October 2008 <http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS>.

5. Wildermuth, John. “Wharf’s Changing Faces.” San Francisco Chronicle. 18 May 1999. 19 October 2008 <http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/1999/05/18/MN64108.DTL&hw=wax+museum&sn=002&sc=941>.

6. Yollin, Patricia. “Bonds wheeled downstairs in S.F. Wax Museum” San Francisco Chronicle 18 April 2008. 19 October 2008 <http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/04/18/BATR107GHT.DTL>.

7. Downs, Tom. San Francisco: The liveliest guide to the USA’s most exuberant city. Australia: Lonely Planet, 1999. 121.

8. Otteson, Paul. Northern California: Travel Smart. New Mexico: John Muir, 1998. 44.

External links

• Wax Museum at Fisherman's Wharf Website