California Directories

Online Resources

 * 1878 Mckenney's Pacific Coast Directory, 1878 at MyHeritage — images ($)
 * California City Directories ($)
 * San Francisco, California Directories, 1889-91 ($)
 * California City Directories

History
Directories of heads of households were published for major cities of California.

Libraries and Archives

 * California State Libraries City Directory Database


 * The Los Angeles Public Library has the following with a few small gaps in the years available. The 1872 directory is a combination city-county one.

Directories Online

 * Fold3 ($) has Los Angeles Directories 1873, 1875, 1878-1924 (5 yrs. missing) and San Francisco Directories 1861-1923 (4 yrs. missing) available online. This database is sometimes free at libraries.


 * Ancestry ($) has California directories available online in its U.S. City Directories collection.

The FamilySearch Library
The FamilySearch Library has city directories for various years from throughout the state of California including:

Los Angeles

San Francisco

To find directories, consult the Place Search of the FamilySearch Catalog under:


 * CALIFORNIA, [COUNTY] — DIRECTORIES
 * CALIFORNIA, [COUNTY], [TOWN] — DIRECTORIES

Websites

 * Los Angeles Public Library
 * Ancestry($)
 * US City Directories. Identifies printed, microfilmed, and online directories and their repositories.