Never doubt the resolve of a nude model. The Legion was a gift to San Francisco from Alma de Bretteville Spreckels, a sculptor's model who married well and decided to create a fitting artistic tribute to Californians killed in France in WWI. Today, the Legion still 'honors the dead while serving the living' with groundbreaking exhibitions, including a retrospective for folk-art visionary Howard Finster and crowd-pleasing shows.

This 1924 building was modeled after the French Pavilion for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition and filled to the brim with an excellent collection spanning medieval to 20th-century European art, including many works by the Impressionists and the Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts, one of the premier collections of works on paper in the US. In honor of 'Big Alma's' early career, the museum also has a huge collection of sculpture by Auguste Rodin and Henry Moore.