“the time of your life”

The Time of Your Life mural takes it’s title from William Saroyan’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 1939 play, which takes place in the original Izzy’s saloon. A dozen characters from the play are pictured mixing with real-life players in Izzy’s long history, including Gomez himself, Saroyan, Herb Caen, Sam DuVall, and DuVall’s giant bird Sydney Greenstreet, who actually lived for a time in the restaurant.

Izzy Gomez was a penniless Portuguese immigrant who landed in San Francisco just in time to survive the city’s catastrophic events of 1906. He opened his modest second-floor saloon in The Barbary Coast (the city’s legendary vice district) just in time for Prohibition, later becoming famous as the city’s “most beloved violator of the Volstead Act.” His bootlegging landed Gomez in jail, but Roosevelt eventually granted him a presidential pardon. A friend to all and a local legend, he was known for his generosity, often giving away meals and liquor to anyone he happened to like. Izzy served thick, luscious steaks, french fries, and salads. He became so famous that he was profiled by Life Magazine in 1943, who called him the “best-known saloonkeeper in the city,” and his dive bar with great food “an open house for San Francisco’s Bohemians.” As described by Saroyan, the joint attracted Artists, Sailors, Longshoremen, Prostitutes, Lonely hearts, and “hard-boiled, sophisticated Newspapermen.” With Izzy’s fame, society people began to drop in too, to experience the wild bohemian life and see how the other half lived. Gomez died in 1944, and the building and the entire block it was on were demolished in 1952.

“Izzy’s was a dump,” reported Herb Caen, who nonetheless had been a regular.

Then in the 1980s, Restaurateur/Art Collector/Antiquarian, and Bon Vivant Sam DuVall told the San Francisco Examiner that he had become fascinated with the fedora-wearing barkeeper because of his good nature. Though DuVall had never met Gomez, he was inspired by the larger-than-life character and decided to bring Izzy’s back to life, reopening in it’s current location, a former Art Deco Post Office in the Marina. A Dump no longer, the beloved Izzy’s Steaks and Chops was granted San Francisco Legacy Restaurant status in 2017.

This is the artist’s second collaboration with Gachot Studios.

Special Thanks to Samantha and Cory at Izzy’s, John Gachot, Sarah and Max at Merenda Wallpaper, and Gloria and crew at Glorious Walls.