SAN FRANCISCO REMEMBERS CAEN'S ERA OF `GRACE'.

Byline: Scripps-McClatchy Western Service

Socialites and street people, young Turks and old, tough guys, construction workers and captains of industry bowed their heads and raised their glasses in memory of one man Friday - legendary newspaper columnist Herb Caen.

For this beautiful city - a place Caen virtually immortalized under his byline for nearly 60 years - Friday was truly a moment in time, a day for the ages, an opportunity to say thanks and goodbye.

But it was not just Caen, the venerable San Francisco Chronicle scribe, that San Franciscans of all ages and persuasions were honoring Friday. Six days after his death from inoperable cancer, the daylong, citywide memorials were as much a swan song to the end of an era, Caen's era - a gilded, bygone time when San Francisco was known as a gleaming city on a hill.

That time of jazz and martinis, of opening night galas and ``extravagant sunsets,'' had given way to the realities of the '90s - realities San Franciscans are left to confront without their gentle, stylish, romantic interpreter.

``The city has changed so much, and now Herb is gone and so are all those old times we remember,'' said Keith Thomas, a 75-year-old retired food consultant.

In his ponytail and black biker jacket, Thomas summed up in one word a quality he and scores of others said San Francisco now lacks but Caen personified: grace.

On Friday, under skies that were supposed to bring rain but, fittingly, didn't, thousands of San Franciscans summoned up that old magic during an elegant church service atop spectacular Nob Hill and two public events along this city's famed waterfront.

And from one end of the city to another, five-star restaurants and hamburger joints either played Caen's favorite big-band music or sold his treasured meat loaf/mashed potato dinners and ``Vitman V'' vodka martinis at bargain rates.

``There will never be anyone like him,'' said Pamela Wiget, a 50-year-old San Francisco native who has been a Caen fan ``as long as I have been able to read.''

``He made us feel at home and that everyone in the city was part of a family, and so when we read his column it was like we were checking up on everyone.''