In 1859, Joshua Norton, a businessman who had lost his fortune, sent a newspaper a letter naming himself "Emperor of the United States." The paper printed it.
San Franciscans played along, and newspapers printed his royal orders. But when a policeman arrested him as insane, an uproar made the police chief free him.
One order called for a bridge across San Francisco Bay. The Bay Bridge, which spans it, opened 56 years after he died.