Saints Peter and Paul Church

Saints Peter and Paul Church is a Roman Catholic Church in San Francisco's North Beach neighborhood. It is directly across from Washington Square and is administered by the Salesians of Don Bosco. It is known as 'la cattedrale italiana dell'Ovest', or the Italian Cathedral of the West, and has served as the home church and cultural center for San Francisco's Italian-American community since its consecration. It offers English, Italian, and Cantonese-language services. The first Saints Peter and Paul Church, built in 1884 on the corner of Filbert Street and Grant Avenue, was destroyed by the Great Quake of 1906. Construction on the current cathedral was completed in 1924. During 1926–27, the church was the target of radical anti-catholic anarchists, who instituted five separate bomb attacks against the building in the space of one year. On March 6, 1927, police shot and killed one man and seriously wounded another, Celsten Eklund, a radical anarchist and local soapbox orator, as the two men attempted to light the fuse of a large dynamite bomb in front of the church. The dead man, known only as 'Ricca', was never fully identified; Eklund died of his wounds some time later without giving any information about his co-conspirators. In recent years, Saints Peter and Paul has also become the home church for the city's Chinese-American Roman Catholic population, offering weekly masses in Italian, Cantonese, and English. Mass in Latin is offered monthly as well. Saints Peter and Paul serves the Archdiocese of San Francisco.