Sam Wo restaurant in Chinatown, San Francisco, CA 🇺🇸

Sam Wo, literally "Three Harmonies Porridge and Noodles" is a Chinese restaurant located in San Francisco, California. The restaurant's first location on 813 Washington Street was famous for being a venerable mainstay in the local Chinatown area, having been in the same location since 1912. Sam Wo gained notoriety in the 1960’s for being the employer of Edsel Ford Fung, who was known locally as the "world's rudest waiter". The restaurant was closed in 2012 due to safety concerns, and reopened in 2015 on nearby Clay Street.
There is no documented history on Sam Wo Restaurant and its early beginnings from its founding in 1912, although it was believed to be the oldest restaurant in Chinatown, built sometime around or after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. One account states that Sam Wo had occupied the same 813 Washington Street location from 1907. Sam Wo was primarily well known by San Francisco locals for its "famous ... no-frills, late-night food and its you-get-what-you-pay service" and 3 am closing time. In the 1950s Sam Wo was a Beat Generation hangout, featuring poets including Michael McClure, Allen Ginsberg, and Charles Bukowski.
The Sam Wo Restaurant was famed as the workplace of Edsel Ford Fung, often called the "world's rudest, worst, most insulting waiter". Fung would refuse to serve customers whose appearance he disliked and would also harass patrons that complained about mistaken orders. After his passing in 1984, he left a lasting impression for a generation of San Franciscans. Some of his signs on the Washington Street eatery remain, such as one that says "No Booze ... No Jive, No Coffee, Milk, Soft Drinks, Fortune Cookies."
The Chinatown centered on Grant Avenue and Stockton Street in San Francisco, California, is the oldest Chinatown in North America and one of the largest Chinese enclaves outside Asia. It is also the oldest and largest of the four notable Chinese enclaves within San Francisco. Since its establishment in the early 1850s, it has been important and influential in the history and culture of ethnic Chinese immigrants in North America. Chinatown is an enclave that has retained its own customs, languages, places of worship, social clubs, and identity.
There are two hospitals, several parks and squares, numerous churches, a post office, and other infrastructure. Recent immigrants, many of whom are elderly, opt to live in Chinatown because of the availability of affordable housing and their familiarity with the culture. Due to a combination of factors, some more broad-based related to difficult circumstances for San Francisco itself, while other factors are more specific to this neighborhood, San Francisco's Chinatown faces a struggle for survival.
Officially, Chinatown is located in downtown San Francisco, covers 24 square blocks, and overlaps five postal ZIP codes (94108, 94133, 94111, 94102, and 94109). It is within an area of roughly 1⁄2 mi (0.80 km) long (north to south) by 1⁄4 mi (0.40 km) wide (east to west) with the current boundaries being, approximately, Kearny Street in the east, Broadway in the north, Powell in the west, and Bush Street in the south. Owing to a combination of multifactorial issues, some more generally tied to socioeconomic difficulties afflicting downtown San Francisco itself, while other factors are more specific to this neighborhood, San Francisco's Chinatown faces a struggle for survival and is shrinking.