James Lick's loss is our gain. The real estate king was kind enough to croak after ordering a Victorian greenhouse kit, but before erecting it on his Santa Clara Valley estate. Lick's trustees had no need for the giant terrarium and offered it for sale in 1877. Just in time, too -- John McLaren was finally wresting a luxuriant park from an uninhabitable three-mile strip of sandy, wind-swept dunes. Civic-minded San Franciscans purchased the kit, still in its original crates, and offered it to... More >>>