To see “The Mystery of Half Moon Bay,” click here
Postcard…..from Michael Powers & the Naked Tsunamis
Happy Thanksgiving!
(Photo: A typical Tsunami Ranger’s camp on the southern Oregon coast. Michael Powers, second from right. Who are the others?)
Email Michael
Is this “Easterday” ….our Easterday?
A fire on University Ave in Palo Alto destroyed a large building—and on the surviving building next door, revealed this weathered sign that says “Easterday Furniture Co.” Were the Palo Alto Easterdays related to the Coastside Easterdays?
1965: “The Idyllic Days Spent in the Country are Over!”
To read story, click here
Meet Ron Schmidt, Grandson of Dante “The Artichoke King” Dianda
Photos: at left, Dante Dianda, El Granada’s “Artichoke King” with unidentified woman and Alessio Mearini. Mearini was born in Arezzo, Italy and immigrated to the U.S. in 1914. He ws a partner and cook at Dianda’s ranch. Alessio Mearini stands next to Dianda in photo at right.
Ron Schmidt (RS): My Mother was Dante Dianda’s third child. I am curious about the photo of Dante with the other two people. It is not his son-in-law nor his son.
Where does the picture come from?
HMBM: Hi Ron,
I believe I got that photo from a Mr. Vellutini–I may have the spelling of his name wrong–I interviewed him in El Granada years ago. He is now gone. He said he had worked for Mr. Patroni at the Patroni House in Princeton during Prohibition.
Who do you think the people might be? I want to get it right. Please tell me something about yourself.
RS: I do not know who the two people are in the photo.
I know everyone who was around the farm and the men who worked there.
I know a great deal about Dante; he was influential in my philosophy of life and I have great respect for memories he has left me.
We have found just this year his relatives in Italy. We will be traveling to Italy next April.
If you have specific questions I would be happy to answer them.
Continue reading “Meet Ron Schmidt, Grandson of Dante “The Artichoke King” Dianda”
As If We Don’t Have ENUFF To Worry About….John Vonderlin Alerts Us To Sleeping Oil Monsters Off Our Coastline…
(Oil spill…photo courtesy Leon Kunke.)
Hi June,
If you’re a fan of shlock Japanese horror movies of the kaiju (monster) subset of the tokusatsu (special effects) genre, involving undersea monsters, you remember their typical opening with murky underwater shots, accompanied by the building of melodramatic, danger-portending music, ultimately showing something large and mysterious as it begins to stir.
Unfortunately, there are just such dangerous monsters lurking off our coast, veritable organic time bombs, waiting for their chance to spread death and destruction.
Only instead of the panic-stricken people of Tokyo, the victims of these impending scourges will mainly be the vulnerable animals that inhabit or use our coastal waters. If these âdirty bombsâ? go off once again, tens of thousands of birds and other animals could be killed, industries could be crippled, and our world famous coastal natural beauty will be scarred for years to come.
I’m referring to sunken ships like the S.S. Jacob Luckenbach, that with its load of over 400,000 gallons of heavy fuel oil, was sent to the ocean’s bottom, in water 185 feet deep, 17 miles southwest of the Golden Gate Bridge. Its trip to Davey Jones’ Locker, occurred on July 14th, 1953, when it collided with one of its sister ships, the Hawaiian Pilot, thanks to the egregious mistakes made by both pilots. The 468- foot, 8700- ton Luckenbach sank in 30 minutes with no loss of human life.
The Luckenback was a C3 Cargo Ship commissioned in 1943 as the Sea Robin, strangely just four months after the Hawaiian Pilot, was launched, as the U.S.S. Burleigh, from the same Pascagoula shipyard. While the U.S.S.Burleigh, had a distinguished record hauling needed supplies and men around the Pacific during the war, the Luckenbach, had to wait nearly sixty years before its name became well known. That happened in February 2002, when scientific analysis of an oil slick’s signature was connected to samples taken from dead oil-fouled birds gathered from the previous ten years.
Until that connection was made, nearly every winter from 1991 on, with some as far back as 1972, there had been a series of “orphan spills” or “Mystery Oil Spills of the San Mateo Coast,” that had repeatedly plagued our area from Marin to Monterey, killing upwards of 50,000 birds.
1974: Miramar’s “Stylish Beachboy Philospher”
Portrait of photographer Michael Powers, 1974, the year his daughter Marika was born. Photo courtesy Dennis Swenson.
Visit Michael’s website: oceanstudio.org
Outside the Ferry Bldg in SF we met Al Ferreira who was working, selling
fresh produce from Iacopi Farms of Half Moon Bay (they farm around Princeton.) It was great to chat with
somebody from back home!
Cabrillo Farms (located directly across the road from the airport) sent along their brussels sprouts which can be purchased by the pound–or you can buy a very cool stalk of brussels sprouts.
If you haven’t visited the Ferry Building in San Francisco, they have a wonderful farmer’s market outside and you’ll see businesses from Half Moon Bay selling flowers and vegetables. There are many great restaurants to choose from–and they must give a special test to all possible employees because the folks who work there are genuinely nice. There’s something fun–or someone fun–to look at every minute.
El Granada Shines In the “Banana Belt”……….
Christine Hopf-Lovette Marketed the 1970s Ladies Home Companion Calendar….Here is my interview with her
Half Moon Bay Memories (HMBM): What does “Bo-Tree�? mean and where was the business located?
Christine Hopf-Lovette: Bo-Tree is the tree under which Buddha sat when he attained enlightenment. Oddly enough, the name came from my mother, a librarian. I told her I was entering into a publishing venture. I failed to enlighten her about the exact nature of our first product, however.
The company was first headquartered in my apartment in San Francisco. After a year or so, we rented space in the back of an old Victorian on an alley off Union Street.
HMBM: What did Bo-Tree originally produce? Was there something before the Ladies Home Companion Calendar?
Christine: The Ladies Home Companion was our first product.
HMBM: This was, when? The early 1970s– or earlier? Producing books and calendars was very different then [note: I’ve had some experience with both.] You had to hire a typesetter & designer– please tell me about the process, how different it was from today.
Christine: The calendar grid and all the type was pasted on boards that were delivered to the printer along with the photos. The printer made plates and the job was printed by the offset litho method. I don’t think the printing method has changed much but the preprint materials have changed tremendously since the advent of computers.
HMBM: You did the marketing: what did that mean? You contacted the press, got the books into the stores? Which bookstores? Nationwide? How did you sell, pre-Internet?
Christine: We marketed the calendars through gift and stationery reps. We found our first reps through a directory. Some worked but some did not. I remember that we had hired a rep in southern California—a firm that was recommended by our New York rep. Judy [Horst] flew down to the Los Angeles Gift Show. She called me after the first day to say that the rep wasn’t even displaying the calendars. He seemed to be hiding them under the table. The rep was uncomfortable with the product, to say the least.