This silent, historic film from 1959 shows a portion of the visit of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev to San Francisco. Khrushchev and his party stayed at the Mark Hopkins Hotel and toured San Francisco Bay on Sept. 21, 1959 aboard the U.S. Coast Guard cutter USCGC Gresham (WAVP-387). The cruise was arranged by the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., who selected the Gresham, which at the time was in port at the naval station in Alameda. His day-and-a-half visit to San Francisco was part of a tour of the United States, ahead of a meeting at Camp David with President Dwight Eisenhower. The San Francisco leg of Khrushchev’s trip was much less controversial than the previous stop in Los Angeles, where the Soviet leader got into a spat with the mayor and was famously refused entry to Disneyland. “All American cities I have visited are good,” Khrushchev told the San Francisco Chronicle,”but San Francisco is the best.”

In addition to Nikita Khrushchev, the film contains footage of his second wife Nina Petrovna Khrushcheva, Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., and senior members of the Coast Guard and U.S. Navy staff.

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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com