Culture of San Francisco year-round and available for private functions. Classical and Opera venues in San Francisco include the San Francisco Symphony, the San Francisco Opera and the San Francisco Ballet. They all perform at the San Francisco War Memorial and Performing Arts Center. San Francisco's Ballet and Opera are some of the oldest continuing performing arts companies in the United States. San Francisco is the birthplace and home city of the vocal ensemble Chanticleer. The city is also home to the American Conservatory Theater, also known as A.C.T., which has been routinely staging original productions since its arrival in San Francisco in 1967.
San Francisco Bay arrived at a large arm of what is now called Drakes Bay. At the time, Drakes Bay went by the name "Bahia de San Francisco" and thus both bodies of water became associated with the name. Eventually, the larger, more important body of water fully appropriated the name "San Francisco Bay". The first European to enter the bay is believed to have been the Spanish explorer Juan de Ayala, who passed through the Golden Gate on August 5, 1775 in his ship the "San Carlos", and moored in a bay of Angel Island now known as Ayala Cove. Ayala continued