The tacky robber baron palaces of Nob Hill Monuments to bad taste were destroyed in the Great San Francisco Earthquake

The Victorian fairy castle home of railroad baron Mark Hopkins was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake. The Victorian fairy castle home of railroad baron Mark Hopkins was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake. Image 1 of / 28 Caption Close The tacky robber baron palaces of Nob Hill 1 / 28 Back to Gallery

Mark Zuckerberg reportedly overpaid for his Mission Dolores home by about $7 million, but that's nothing compared to the wretched excess that transformed one of San Francisco's hills 140 years ago.

In the 1870s, four enterprising railroad men — some called them robber barons — ruled over San Francisco and California, using their immense wealth and power to dominate politics and commerce. They built their over-the-top, wedding-cake mansions on Nob Hill for all to see.

In a little more than a generation, their gaudy palaces were gone, reduced to rubble and ash in the 1906 earthquake.

The "Big Four," or as they preferred to be called, "The Associates" — Leland Stanford, Charles Crocker, Collis P. Huntington and Mark Hopkins — made fortunes as merchants selling supplies to Gold Rush miners, but their really big score was funding the construction of the transcontinental railroad. As directors of the Central Pacific Railroad, they became hugely wealthy and the most powerful men in California. They extended their influence by bribing congressmen and politicians.

The four tycoons sought a prominent location where they could build their mansions and lord over the city. They settled on what was then called California Hill. California Hill became Nob Hill, "nob" deriving from "nabob," an Anglo-Indian term for a ostentatiously wealthy man.

Crocker, the last to build, attempted to out-gauche his partners with a particularly garish 12,500-square-foot monument to nouveau-riche affectation. He succeeded.

As Hearst journalist Ambrose Bierce wrote:

"There are uglier buildings in America than the Crocker House on Nob Hill, but they were built with public money for a public purpose; among architectural triumphs of private fortune and personal taste it is peerless."

Stanford became governor and a senator, but is most famous for founding the university that bears his name. The first student admitted to his university (or at least one of the very first) was Herbert Hoover, future 31st president.

Hopkins' fortune eventually established what became the San Francisco Art Institute (formerly the Mark Hopkins Institute of Art). The Intercontinental Mark Hopkins Hotel stands on the grounds of his mansion. He married his first cousin, whose lack of architectural restraint in designing their home was on full display for the city. Perhaps fittingly, he died on a train.

After heading a Central Pacific subsidiary, Crocker later founded the even bigger Southern Pacific Railroad. His Crocker Bank eventually became Wells Fargo, with Crocker the controlling shareholder. He briefly served as Wells Fargo president.

Besides the Central Pacific, Huntington developed the Chesapeake & Ohio, the Southern Pacific and the city of Newport News, Va. His nephew, Henry E. Huntington, founded the stunning Huntington Library in San Marino, Calif. C.P. Huntington was a character in AMC's Western drama "Hell on Wheels."