San Francisco Portolá [Portola] Festival 1909

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Portola - Part 4 of 5

Presentation
Queen Virgilia of the 1909 Portolá [Portola] Festival

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A Pacific Novelty card shows Virgilia walking on Covarrubias’ arm on Market Street. The message on the back whispers of Virgilia’s secret marriage... no, engagement, news of which leaked out six weeks later. The husband-to-be was Carlo Cesarej Baron, an interior decorator turned streetcar motorman. After their marriage the couple moved to Italy where depression overtook Virgilia. She was eventually institutionalized.  Yet looking at a postcard of the royal couple walking proudly down San Francisco’s grandest thoroughfare, one should take note that “She had been Queen.”