Created by June Morrall
Story/Mural Photos by Carole Delmar
Email Carole [[email protected]]
Hi June,
Did you know that Martin’s Beach has sold? The sign on the highway is
painted over and I’d wish I would have taken a photo before it was gone
forever. I did get some photos of the mural though.
Carole
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John Vonderlin recommended this good story, including history and more background on the sale. The article dates back to August 27, 2007. To read, please click here
Story by Tom Andersen
Email Tom ([email protected])
Hello June,
We put up our holiday lights on our deck railing, a 7′ diameter circle of clear lights, with a 4′ colored light star in the center, a giant “O”. We’ll leave it up through January 20th. We took a photo and made it into our holiday cards, adding a rainbow lettered “Hallelujah”. It can be seen while driving the straight stretch of the 400-500 block of El Granada Blvd. and looking straight ahead and up about 15 degrees.
Here is the review of Margie Baker’s performance at Cetrella last week:
Saturday December 13, 2008
Saying goodnight to Margie Baker after her performance at Cetrella in Half Moon Bay, I told her it mattered little what song she chooses, because the essence of her performance is her interpretation of the song.
Born in East Texas, but a virtual lifelong Bay Area resident, Margie Baker is as good as it gets in music. Her phrasing, that is, how she groups lyrics, the emphasis she gives, makes each song uniquely her own, regardless whether it is Ellington, Beatles, or Billie Holiday. She grew up in the Fillmore district in San Francisco which she defines the limits as Franklin to Masonic, certainly not past Van Ness! Margie spent her “day job” career in education, in which she holds a doctorate. But music has been her life long passion, beginning with the blues & gospel in Texas.
She opened the set with “In A Mellow Tone”, saving her usual opener, “Let The good times Roll,” to liven up the third set, when there were fewer audience members than musicians. Her set ranged from the Righteous Bros.’ “OH! My Love”, which we danced to, to blues in b flat “Real Gone Guy” to “White Christmas”.
She really cut loose on the second set with “All blues”, where she opened up the improvisation with incarnations of Ella, Sarah, Dinah & Billie. She repeatedly sent out holiday wishes a la Jewish, Muslim, Christian & African. Her interpretations of Christmas standards were entirely her own, as hip & jazzy as it gets.
She announced her third set would be all blues: she knows the blues are our favorite, and because, at that point we composed half of the audience, so there you go! Beginning with her signature “Let the Good Times Roll!” (with which she usually opens her show) she continued with “Put Your Hand in the Hand of the Man Who Calms the Water” spiritual, at which point an amazing thing happened. After playing most of the evening to an almost empty room, a flood of people arrived, dressed to the nines, including Michael O’Neil. Cetrella is Michael’s gig. He books the players, and is usually the “maestro”. But this evening he was playing a private party down the street at Pasta Moon, and, apparently when they folded their tent there, most of the party came down to Cetrella, right in the middle of Margie’s rousing blues & gospel closing set! Energized, there were whoops, cheers, and clapping along to CC Rider. After an incredibly nuanced version of Sarah Vaughns “Black Coffee” she launched into “Hallelujah! I Just Love Him So”, much more clapping along & whooping support. She then did a great “Georgia”, and a jazz/gospel sounding “Silent Night”. She closed the show with “When the Saints Go Marching In”, Michael having brought his clarinet in from the car, wailing away in classic ‘Nawlins” style.
Once again, Margie had given us an “all time great” performance. Amazingly, she outdoes herself every time. She is an incredible talent, a treasure, and we are so fortunate to have her performing at all, much less once or twice a month at Cetrella, where you can routinely sit within five to fifteen feet of the band.
Margie is as kind and generous a person there is, deeply spiritual, with a great world view and understanding of the human spirit and soul. She is inclusive, like Barack Obama, bringing everyone into the tent.
Her next performance at Cetrella is on Friday, January 2, 2009, 6-11:30. We’ll as always, be there from start to finish. You never know what will happen next these days, so enjoy it while it lasts!
I think Calara Valley is in Vallemar, an Ocean Shore Railroad subdivision. Yes, those are cows you see and not a bucolic scene with Ocean Shore Railroad cars grazing.
San Francisco History: The Great Diamond Hoax of 1872
To read more, please click here and here
Asbury Harpending wrote “The Great Diamond Hoax.”
I wonder why Hollywood hasn’t done something with The Great Diamond Hoax, a true story of post-Gold Rush California.. I can see a documentary but wouldn’t a movie be better? One of the chief characters in The Great Diamond Hoax was USGS legend Clarence King, who had earned the description: “man of mystery.” Unfortunately mysterious people don’t tell other people waht they are up to. Clarence King was one of the “good guys,” and although he had a home back East where his fascinating circle of friends included the historian Henry Adams and his artist wife Clover. Some years ago I read Patricia O’Toole’s The Five of Hearts.
I loved reading about the special relationship between pioneer geologist Clarence King, Henry Adams, great grandson of President John Adams; artist/photographer Clover Adams; Ambassador John Hay and his wife Clara. The author calls them “The Five of Hearts.”
Back to who would Hollywood cast in the role of Clarence King in a movie based on the Great Diamond Hoax? Immediately Brad Pitt came to mind. I know, that’s not an original thought, is it?
December 28, 1887
“A Halfmoon Bay Building Crushed in.
“A severe windstorm set in about 10 o’clock last night and increased in force during this morning. The Centennial flag pole, erected in 1876, was blown down, falling across the Ames saloon building and cutting it down to the ceiling. The chanderliers an, d lamps were demolished. The temperance refreshment saloon, now occupying the building happened to be closed while the proprietor was at breakfast, so no one was hurt. The pole was over 100 feet tall and much admired for its symmetrical proportions but now lies broken in several pieces. It was treated by the patent process for preserving piles, but had rotted off at the ground. The telegraph wires were broken by its fall so we have only mail communication with this world. No other damage is reported, though a man was sleeping in the house, but the wind had been the strongest experienced here for some years, and it may have cut up other pranks on the coast. Rain is falling, and if the wind holds south will doubtless be heavy by night. Some plowing had been done but much of the land was very dry and the grazing sadly need rain.”
From the San Mateo County History Museum
Wave Crest, December 18, 1905
Arleta Park, January 15, 1906
Miramar, February 19, 1906
Grandview Terrace, April 9, 1906
Farallone City, June 2, 1906
Lipton-by-the-Sea, September 27, 1906
Manhattan Beach, March 18, 1907
Venice Beach, May 6, 1907
Montara, June 3, 1907
City of Naples, September 10, 1907
El Granada, November 18, 1907
Redondo Beach, December 2, 1907
Moss Beach, May 4, 1908
Princeton-by-the-Sea, September 8, 1908
Marine View, July 6, 1909
Story by Kai Tiura
Email Kai: [[email protected]]
This is a very cool little flash app that anyone with a web browser should be able to get. It was sent to me by a friend, and I’m forwarding it to my friends. It’s very well done. Click the link and enjoy, and happy holidays to all of you!
Please click here
Kai
PS To my newest friends in the geocaching community (you know who you are), the link, if you’ll notice, is from “gpsinformation.info” (which has, since it was put out, changed to http://gpsinformation.net/ ) a total coincidence, I assure you, but you can click that link also and it’ll take you to a website that looks to be full of GPS unit and firmware/software reviews and notes. Might find something of interest there…
From John Vonderlin
Email John ([email protected])
Hi June,
This is from the 1893 book, “A Memorial and Biographical History of the Central Coast Counties…” by Henry D. Barrows and Luther Ingersoll. It is available on Archive.org. The text contains errors because of the type recognition system.
HALFMOON BAY.
Of all the towns in San Mateo this most
wears the air of the pre-American regime.
It is a quaint, rambling place with as much
variety in its architecture as there is in the
patois of its people. Situated in the beauti-
ful and fertile Pilarcitos valley, on the border
of that serai-luna of water, from which it
takes its name, it is one of Nature’s chosen
spots, but unfortunate in its isolation. The
valley spreads out into thousands of acres,
through which the Pilarcitos creek makes its
way to the sea. The climate is not excelled
in its loveliness by any on the ocean side, not
excepting the much vaunted Santa Barbara
channel. From the town there stretches
away to the north for miles a clean gradually
shoaling beach, the finest without exception
in California. From Pilar point, the north-
ern headland, a reef of rocks. Just discernible
at low water by the break of the waves, ex-
tends southward for two miles, forming a
natural breakwater and rendering the beach
absolutely free from undertow, high rollers
and every possible danger. Here is the
grandest bathing place in the world, prepared
and protected by Nature. The building of the
coast railroad will deflect the great army of
people who annually flock to Monterey and
places farther south. Half moon Bay will
be rediscovered and the borders of the cres-
cent be ornamented with summer hotels and
villa residences. There is room for all in the
spacious waters of the bay and the most ele-
gant sites for hotels or summer homes to be
found anywhere on tlie coast.
This valley was the seat of the Miramontez
and Vasquez families long before the appear-
ance of the American settler, and by all old
residents the town is still called Spanishtown.
The old adobe homestead is still here, but
before many years will have yielded to the
assaults of time and become an unnoticed
tumulus. There is something in the atmos-
phere of Spanishtown that breeds a spirit of
independence. The people believe in them-
selves. Not that they consider that they are
the salt of the earth entirely, but they love
the valley where they have made their homes
and cling to it as to a family tie which they
are loth to sunder. The business of the
place is drawn mainly from dairymen and
farmers. At Amesport, a short distance
north of town, there is a wharf and warehouse
where coasting vessels call and take away the
butter, cheese and beans.
In the romantic canon of the San Greg-
orio, where giant redwoods cast their elon-
gated shadows and the murmuring waters of
the stream sing a ceaseless lullaby, Mr. John
H. Sears, one of the pioneers of San Mateo,
is passing the afternoon of his life. Here
he has built a hotel and store and does not
lack for company. During the summer sea-
son the woods ring with the merry voices of
campers and the hotel and cottages are
crowded to repletion. No more charming
place can be found anywhere in the State.
It is reached by stage from Redwood City
over a fine road, but so strong is the impres-
sion of a primeval wilderness when once in
the heart of the forest that even the rattle of
the daily coach and the receipt of diurnal
messages from home does not suffice to break
it. White tents peep through the bushes at
every turn, but that serves to highten the
illusion. You are out of the world when
you know you are in it. The days are spent
in eager angling after the elusive trout with
which the stream abounds. In the evening
there are concerts in the camps; bear stories
to be swapped with the landlord; compara-
tive fish yarns by young men, who could’nt
catch three trout in a week, but who love to
talk about it; a championship game at crib-
bage with the drummer, who knows it all
and then to be abed for seven hours in
deepest oblivion. It is a joyful place, un-
conventional, unaffected, but unexceptionable
in the. personnel of its patrons. A writer in
one of the many visits to this favorite spot
was introduced to a camp, where the party
was almost entirely composed of ladies.
“When out of hearing of the camp he asked
the lady who acted as chaperon of the party
how they managed to enjoy themselves with-
out the aid of the sterner sex. ” Enjoy
themselves?” said she in a burst of enthus-
iasm, ” oh, yes; they do! We have plenty of
horses, wear divided skirts, ride astride like
men and have such lots of fun.” Of course
they did. It was harmless, healthful fun,
and they were free to throw their souls into
it. It was an active exercise of body and
mind in a pure air, and with such surround-
ings as induced joyful hearts, consuming ap-
petites and refreshing sleep. Every day so
spent added a year to their lives. It is not
strange that when the sun dips to the south
they look forward with eager anticipation to
the June days when they shall again set up
their tents at La Honda.
Terry Pratchett, Discworld