He was born '' ' Clifford F. Michaels ' '' , the son of a millionaire 's chauffeur . His father 's employer , Morgan MacNeil Hardy , had been responsible for rebuilding much of San Francisco after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake , and was disturbed by the alleged degeneration of manners and mores in subsequent decades . After a failed movement that Hardy started to correct the social decline , he retreated with a young , recently orphaned Clifford as a surrogate son , whom he sheltered from the current world and taught to idealize earlier times
1906 San Francisco earthquake
1906 San Francisco earthquake
Turner D. Century