Footage shot not long after the 1906 earthquake in San Francisco is edited together so that more than one scene and more than one vantage are included.
The subject is two grotesque-looking human beings who are sitting on the deck of a ship. The two weird individuals sit cross-legged and do the bidding of a man in oriental costume.
This Lubin actuality of the aftermath of the San Francisco Earthquake begins with a group of men, pans to the left, and the people vanish, leaving only the shattered landscape.
In the beginning of the film, a streetcar passes in front of the camera position. The camera starts to move, indicating that it was on a streetcar since it is in the same position as the car in the first scene.