Darnay McPherson on Growing Up in the Fillmore in the '60s

Darnay McPherson likes to stress that, when he was a kid growing up in San Francisco's Fillmore neighborhood in the 1960s, "no one locked their doors and police officers walked the beat." It was even more than that for the generation of Darnay's parents—a vibrant area full of black-owned businesses and some of the best jazz clubs in the country.

In this podcast, Darnay, who has lived his entire life in the Fillmore, talks about being a kid there, the community, the book Harlem of the West, musicians Bobby Webb, Roland Mitchell, Etta James, and Johnny Mathis, and more.

Sidenote: We featured Darnay's daughter, Fernay McPherson, in Episode 14.

We recorded this podcast in Hayes Valley in April 2019.

Film photography by Michelle Kilfeather