Marquard's, 1999

 

Marquard's - San Francisco  1999

Closed in 2004:

Marquard's Smoke Shop feels like a little slice of Sam Spade's San Francisco. Squint through the dusty windows under the vintage awning and you can almost picture the hard-boiled private eye sauntering in for a bottle of whiskey and a pack of smokes.

But by the end of the month, the newsstand on the corner of Powell and O'Farrell streets will go the way of many mom-and-pop shops, closing as commercial rents soar out of reach.