California is a state in the Western United States, lying on the American Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares an international border with the Mexican state of Baja California to the south. With nearly 39 million residents across an area of 163,696 square miles (423,970 km2), it is the most populous U.S. state, the third-largest by area, and most populated subnational entity in North America.
The Golden Gate Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the Golden Gate, the one-mile-wide (1.6 km) strait connecting San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean. The structure links the U.S. city of San Francisco, California—the northern tip of the San Francisco Peninsula—to Marin County, carrying both U.S. Route 101 and California State Route 1 across the strait. It also carries pedestrian and bicycle traffic, and is designated as part of U.S. Bicycle Route 95. Recognized by the American Society of Civil Engineers as one of the Wonders of the Modern World, the bridge is one of the most internationally recognized symbols of San Francisco and California.
San Francisco Bay is a large tidal estuary in the U.S. state of California, and gives its name to the San Francisco Bay Area. It is dominated by the cities of San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland.
The San Francisco 49ers are a professional American football team based in the San Francisco Bay Area. The 49ers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) West division. The team plays its home games at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, California, located 38 miles (61 km) southeast of San Francisco. The team is named after the prospectors of the California gold rush.
The San Francisco Giants are an American professional baseball team based in San Francisco. The Giants compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) West Division. Founded in 1883 as the New York Gothams, the team was renamed the New York Giants three years later, eventually relocating from New York City to San Francisco in 1958. The Giants play their home games at Oracle Park in San Francisco.
San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, financial, and cultural center within Northern California. With a population of 808,988 residents as of 2023, San Francisco is the fourth-most populous city in the U.S. state of California behind Los Angeles, San Diego, and San Jose, and the 17th most populous in the US. It covers a land area of 46.9 square miles at the upper end of the San Francisco Peninsula, making it the second-most densely populated major U.S. city behind New York City and the fifth-most densely populated U.S. county, behind four of New York City's boroughs. Among the 92 U.S. cities proper with over 250,000 residents, San Francisco is ranked first by per capita income and sixth by aggregate income as of 2022. San Francisco anchors the 13th most populous metropolitan statistical area in the United States, with almost 4.6 million residents in 2023. The larger San Jose–San Francisco–Oakland combined statistical area, the fifth-largest urban region in the U.S., had a 2023 estimated population of over 9 million.
San Jose, officially the City of San José, is the largest city in Northern California by both population and area. With a 2022 population of 971,233, it is the most populous city in both the Bay Area and the San Jose–San Francisco–Oakland Combined Statistical Area—which in 2022 had a population of 7.5 million and 9.0 million respectively—the third-most populous city in California after Los Angeles and San Diego, and the 13th-most populous in the United States. Located in the center of the Santa Clara Valley on the southern shore of San Francisco Bay, San Jose covers an area of 179.97 sq mi (466.1 km2). San Jose is the county seat of Santa Clara County and the main component of the San Jose–Sunnyvale–Santa Clara Metropolitan Statistical Area, with an estimated population of around two million residents in 2018.
Harvey Bernard Milk was an American politician and the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California, as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.
San Francisco International Airport is the primary international airport serving the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is located in an unincorporated area of San Mateo County, and is about 12 miles southeast of San Francisco.
The Zodiac Killer is the pseudonym of an unidentified serial killer who murdered five known victims in the San Francisco Bay Area between December 1968 and October 1969. The case has been described as "arguably the most famous unsolved murder case in American history," and has become both a fixture of popular culture and a focus for efforts by amateur detectives.
Joseph Clifford Montana Jr. is an American former professional football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 16 seasons, primarily with the San Francisco 49ers. Nicknamed "Joe Cool" and "the Comeback Kid", Montana is widely regarded as one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time. After winning a national championship with the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, Montana began his NFL career in 1979 at San Francisco, where he played for the next 14 seasons. With the 49ers, Montana started and won four Super Bowls and was the first player to be named the Super Bowl Most Valuable Player (MVP) three times. He also holds Super Bowl career records for most passes without an interception and the all-time highest passer rating of 127.8. In 1993, Montana was traded to the Kansas City Chiefs, where he played for his last two seasons and led the franchise to its first AFC Championship Game. Montana was inducted to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2000.
The San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as The Daily Dramatic Chronicle by teenage brothers Charles de Young and Michael H. de Young. The paper is owned by the Hearst Corporation, which bought it from the de Young family in 2000. It is the only major daily paper covering the city and county of San Francisco.
Jerry Lee Rice is an American former professional football wide receiver who played for 20 seasons in the National Football League (NFL). He won three Super Bowl titles with the San Francisco 49ers before two shorter stints at the end of his career with the Oakland Raiders and Seattle Seahawks. For his accomplishments and numerous records, Rice is widely regarded as the greatest wide receiver of all time and one of the greatest players in NFL history. His biography on the official Pro Football Hall of Fame website names him "the most prolific wide receiver in NFL history with staggering career totals". In 1999, The Sporting News listed Rice second behind Jim Brown on its list of "Football's 100 Greatest Players". In 2010, he was chosen by NFL Network's NFL Films production The Top 100: NFL's Greatest Players as the greatest player in NFL history.
Gavin Christopher Newsom is an American politician and businessman serving since 2019 as the 40th governor of California. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the 49th lieutenant governor of California from 2011 to 2019 and the 42nd mayor of San Francisco from 2004 to 2011.
Kimberly Ann Guilfoyle is an American television news personality and former prosecutor in San Francisco and Los Angeles. She served as an advisor and led the fundraising division of Donald Trump's 2020 presidential campaign.
Kamala Devi Harris is an American politician and attorney who has been the 49th and current vice president of the United States since 2021 under President Joe Biden. She is the first female U.S. vice president, making her the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history. She is also the first African American and the first Asian American vice president. A member of the Democratic Party, she was the party's nominee in the 2024 presidential election, becoming the second woman nominated for president by a major U.S. political party. From 2017 to 2021, she represented California in the U.S. Senate, and was Attorney General of California from 2011 to 2017. From 2004 to 2011, she served as District Attorney of San Francisco.
The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a region of California surrounding and including San Francisco Bay, and anchored by the cities of San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose. The Association of Bay Area Governments defines the Bay Area as including the nine counties that border the estuaries of San Francisco Bay, San Pablo Bay, and Suisun Bay: Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano, Sonoma, and San Francisco. Other definitions may be either smaller or larger, and may include neighboring counties which are not officially part of the San Francisco Bay Area, such as the Central Coast counties of Santa Cruz, San Benito, and Monterey, or the Central Valley counties of San Joaquin, Merced, and Stanislaus. The Bay Area is known for its natural beauty, prominent universities, technology companies, and affluence. The Bay Area contains many cities, towns, airports, and associated regional, state, and national parks, connected by a complex multimodal transportation network.
At 05:12 AM Pacific Standard Time on Wednesday, April 18, 1906, the coast of Northern California was struck by a major earthquake with an estimated moment magnitude of 7.9 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme). High-intensity shaking was felt from Eureka on the North Coast to the Salinas Valley, an agricultural region to the south of the San Francisco Bay Area. Devastating fires soon broke out in San Francisco and lasted for several days. More than 3,000 people died, and over 80% of the city was destroyed. The event is remembered as the deadliest earthquake in the history of the United States. The death toll remains the greatest loss of life from a natural disaster in California's history and high on the lists of American disasters.
The 2017 NFL draft was the 82nd annual meeting of National Football League (NFL) franchises to select newly eligible American football players. It was held in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art on April 27–29, returning to Philadelphia for the first time since 1961.
Cristopher Javier Fiermarin Forlán is a Uruguayan professional footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for Argentine Primera División club Defensa y Justicia.
