in 1879; he left for a brief period, returning in 1882. After an extensive tour of Europe (1883-1884), Brown rejoined the firm in 1884. At that point, he started doing some additional work for Nancy Fowler McCormick, a Chicago philanthropist. Under her patronage, he opened his own office in December 1884, under the name A. Page Brown, and hired the young Willis Polk as a draftsman. In 1889 Brown was commissioned by Mary Ann Deming Crocker to design a mausoleum for her late husband, the wealthy California industrialist, Charles Crocker. The massive granite structure is located on "Millionaire's Row" at Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland, California. Mrs. Crocker also commissioned him to design the Crocker Old People's Home in San Francisco. These opportunities allowed Brown to move his office to San Francisco where the city's rapid development would offer greater opportunities. He persuaded Willis Polk to go with him to San Francisco, California, and the two were among a number of talented architects who moved from the East Coast at the end of the 19th century and established firms in San Francisco. With his newly established office, his highly regarded upper-class social contacts, a developed East Coast portfolio, and a talented staff that included not only Willis Polk, but Bernard Maybeck and A. C. Schweinfurth, Brown was the favored architect of San Francisco society. His reputation for bringing the most contemporary design aesthetic from the East Coast created the perception that he led the "reorientation of San Francisco architecture from the Victorian to the academic sphere," popularizing the Beaux-Arts style. In 1892 Brown designed the San Francisco Ferry Building, a ferry terminal for both commuters and travelers who visited San Francisco. When completed in 1898, the Ferry Building was the largest single project undertaken in the city up to that time. Located on the Embarcadero at the foot of Market Street, it was a prominent structure intended to be a symbol of the city, and its 245-foot clock tower, which Brown designed after the 12th-century Giralda bell tower in Seville, Spain, could be seen across the city and the bay. Prior to the 1930s (when both the Golden Gate and Bay bridges were completed), the Ferry Building was the second busiest transportation terminal in the world, seeing an average of 50,000 commuters a day. In 1894, Brown introduced the Mission Revival style to Santa Barbara, where it became popular for