(WSB photos by Patrick Sand)
After a mostly cloudy day, the golden evening sunshine was a perfect complement to the first of four Outdoor Concerts at The Mount last night. The concertgoers’ soundtrack for The Macarena, above, was courtesy of featured musicians Mariachi Fiesta Mexicana, below:
Next Friday night, it’s Maia Santell & House Blend on stage (free), with jambalaya, burgers, and hot dogs available for dinner (purchase). And for kids – a bouncy house, face painter, and caricature artist. Gates open 5 pm, music at 6. Full 4-week lineup here. (Before Friday arrives, of course, it’ll be the third edition of Summer Concerts at Hiawatha next Thursday night, with Pearl Django and guest vocalist Greta Matassa, 6:30 pm, more info here.)
2 quick food-truck updates to share: Kamala from the fabled Marination Mobile e-mailed to say they will be closing early tomorrow (Saturday) during their regular weekly Saturday stop at 35th/Graham – 1:30 instead of 2 pm. Also, Amy of the new burger truck Buns on Wheels asked us to share the news that they’re now spending most of the weekend at Alki – Friday nights, Saturday all day, Sunday lunch. (We’re checking on exact hours.) They’ve been parking by Alki Auto Repair. Food trucks tend to send last-minute updates via Twitter, so if you want to keep close track of these two, MM is at @curb_cuisine and BoW is at @bunsonwheels.
That’s one of the official trailers for last year’s “Star Trek” movie, which is tomorrow night’s big feature at West Seattle Outdoor Movies (co-sponsored by WSB) in the courtyard next to Hotwire Online Coffeehouse (WSB sponsor). There’s music before the movie, Dream Date with Paul Fischer, “performing his original pop songs with the help of Steve Moore,” according to Hotwire’s Lora Lewis. Featured sponsors for the night: Martha L. Davis, Highline Therapy Services, and West Seattle Music Studio. The movie’s free, but bring a few dollars so you can buy tickets for the raffle benefiting forest-restoring Nature Consortium, with prizes donated by Feedback Lounge (WSB sponsor), Shadowland, Elliott Bay Breweryand Hotwire, and also for concessions, which also are nonprofit fundraisers. The movie’s at dusk – which keeps getting earlier, but you don’t want to show up at the last minute, anyway – the crowd’s usually pretty big; come stake out a spot sooner rather than later. One note: IF it rains or threatens to – there is NO indoor backup this year, so a rainout is possible; if the weather looks dicey, we will have the latest info here on WSB (as well as updates on our Twitter and Facebook pages).
Another longtime West Seattle businessperson has died: Helen Armfield (Williamson, Zaar) Damron, 94, who had lived in West Seattle for almost 80 years and was an active member of the business community for several decades. Her memorial service is set for tomorrow, starting at 1 pm atGrace Church, 10323 28th Avenue SW. In 1966, she and husband Clarence Zaar opened Clarence Zaar Real Estate in The Junction (it now operates under the name Keller Williams Realty). She had worked in the real estate business in West Seattle since 1935, starting out as an errand runner for E.H. Savage Realty. Helen was a 1932 graduate of West Seattle High School; her family moved to Seattle from LaCrosse, Washington, in 1931, so that her father could seek work. Read on for more about her:Read More
Five West Seattle Crime Watch reports this afternoon – starting with a theft that netted loot whose owners are hoping they’ll somehow get it back. They signed themselves “Disappointed in Alki“:
We live in Alki on Halleck Ave. SW just off 53 Avenue [map]. Sometime in the past 24 hours we had a few things stolen from the steps of our front porch. Now, it may sound insignificant but along with a few pots with herbs in them a small Indian statue was stole which has HUGE sentimental value to us. I’m guessing it was just kids being stupid but the fact that someone walked up our steps, were literally at our front door and stole something that that is very special to us and cannot be replaced feels awful and breaks our hearts. If this is posted and by chance the person who took is reading this post, can you do the right thing? Can you please bring back our little Indian sculpture… no questions asked, we promise, you would not believe how important it is to us. We have always felt so safe and comfortable in our little home on a dead end road, this is a sad wake-up call.
(In case you see something – we verified, that’s “Indian” as in South Asia, not as in Native American.) Four more reports ahead:Read More
ORIGINAL 1:59 PM REPORT: Clouds don’t keep the Blue Angels down, assuming the ceiling isn’t too low – so the Navy’s aerial-demonstration team is up right now over Lake Washington (and points beyond) for its “practice show,” before the “real” ones tomorrow and Sunday. As is usually the case, we’re at Boeing Field to watch the takeoff/landing, and whatever’s visible inbetween (more than you might suspect). Our current location south of the Boeing Field tower on the west side of BFI is close to where the jets lift off after taxiing away from the Museum of Flight further south, and while 1-4 took off in formation northbound, 5 and 6 peeled away almost immediately, and that’s how our iPhone – lens poked through opening in the chain-link, barb-wire-topped fence – caught the shot you see above. Reminder that the I-90 bridge is closed until they’re done, 2:45 or so. More later! 2:17 PM UPDATE: The Blue Angels have landed. For our fellow timeline fans, they were up approximately 1:33 pm-2:12 pm. (Other air-show acts are resuming their practices – like the gray fighter jet that just took off.)
ADDED 5:28 PM: One of the not-so-celebrated-but-memorable aspects of Blue Angels-watching involves their support plane, the C-130 known as “Fat Albert.” It goes up to scope things out before the six jets practice/perform; then it usually thrills the Boeing Field/Museum of Flight crowd with flybys and an extra-steep landing. Then, if you watch by the runway, you see “Fat Albert” taxi back with a crew member poking her/his head out of a top hatch, waving a flag. Today, look who was seen from the hatch:
Thanks to David DeSiga for the photo. ADDED EARLY SATURDAY: A different angle, from Jim Clark:
In case you don’t regularly check the WSB Forums – which are close to the 100,000-post mark after 2 1/2 years in existence – we like to mention what’s going on in there from time to time – they’ve been particularly busy lately, and you’re welcome to join the discussion OR start one of your own. Today, for example, the Target political-donation controversy has sparked talk of a boycott, and longtime WSB Forums member JoB declared she would deliver her boycott notice to Westwood Village Target today. Also, you are also welcome to publish yard/garage-sale notices for free in the Freebies/Deals/Sales section, and a quick check reveals more than a few in the works for this weekend. Lots more going on – like the rest of WSB, the Forums are in business 24/7/365 – start here.
For the second consecutive Saturday, Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn will visit West Seattle tomorrow – not for an event this time (he was here last Saturday to help celebrate the Camp Long Lodge reopening), but to find out more about our area, specifically the Delridge neighborhood. His tour guide: Ron Angeles, Delridge Neighborhood District Coordinator for the Department of Neighborhoods and longtime West Seattleite; the tour starts at Ron’s HQ, the Neighborhood Services Center in the same building as the Delridge Library (5405 Delridge Way), 10 am tomorrow, and will end about an hour and a quarter later at the Delridge P-Patch – all welcome – one of the first stops will be the Clean Greens produce-sales stand alongside Super 24, which is open 10 am-6 pm every Friday and Saturday this summer.
… and they’re asking for feedback. We spotted this about a week after its recent “soft launch”; now DNDA executive director Derek Birnie has published an item on the Delridge Grassroots Leadership site (one of 100+ featured on the WSB “Blogs” page) asking for feedback on the new dnda.org format, which offers more aggregation of Delridge-area news/info from multiple sources, as well as a bolder look at what DNDA itself is up to. Check out the revamped website here.
Thanks to Dave G for the tip – we’re just back from confirming, and photographing, the fact that the “Press Day” mural is going back up on the north side of the Terry Gangon Insurance Agency building in The Junction right now. We’ve reported on its “disappearance” the past two days – Ken Beres sent us a note wondering what happened; the agency told us it was removed so work could be done on their building, but promised it would be back – and this is even sooner than they’d said! The photo is also proof of something we’d heard but hadn’t been previously aware of – some of the two-decades-old West Seattle murals are on removable panels. The crew here says they’ll be done within a few hours. (Thanks again to Ken and Dave for sharing the news – here’s how to reach WSB any time.)
Received from the family of West Seattle sailor Jarod Newlove, killed last week in Afghanistan:
Petty Officer 2nd Class Jarod Newlove’s memorial service will be held on Monday, August 9, 2010, 11:00 am at Holy Family Catholic Church, 9622 20th Avenue SW [map]. Following the memorial service there will be a procession to Tahoma National Cemetery, 18600 SE 240th Street, Covington [map], where committal service with full military honors will be given at 2:00 pm. There will be a reception directly after the committal service at Kent Civic Center, 10120 SE 260th Street, Kent [map], to honor and remember Jarod and all the joy he brought to our lives. All events are open to the public; please join his family and friends to honor PO2 Jarod Newlove.
From the WSB Events calendar: West Seattle’s own Twelfth Night Productions (WSB sponsor) debuts its newest production tonight: “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying” – a musical based on a Tony Award-winning show and Pulitzer-winning book. Besides getting entertained, you’ll also be doing a good deed, since part of the proceeds are benefiting FareStart. This is the first of three weekends for “How to Succeed” in the West Seattle High School Theater, with showtimes this weekend at 7:30 pm tonight and tomorrow, 3 pm Sunday – tickets available online here, in advance at Square One Books in Jefferson Square, or at the door. Also tonight: more outdoor music!
That’s Christopher Boffoli‘s WSB video from Mariachi Fiesta Mexicana performing atProvidence Mount St. Vincent during last year’s Summer Concerts at The Mount series – and tonight, they’re back as this year’s four-performance series begins. Bring your own chair/blanket for music at and around the courtyard on the south side of The Mount (4831 35th SW) at 6 pm – the concert’s free, and dinner’s available for purchase around 5 pm (more details in this PDF). Last but not least, today’s Blue Angels schedule:
That spot along the west side of the Boeing Field runway is just one of the many places to watch them take off – as we did yesterday – but the best place is the Museum of Flight, where the famous blue jets are based during the Blue Angels’ annual Seafair visit. (Here’s our story from last year about the MoF timeline on a Blue Angels day.) Of course, you can also go to Lake Washington today and see the practice air show (and hydroplane time trials) for free, as a sneak preview of Saturday/Sunday, when you have to pay admission. But even if you have no interest in watching all this, you might need to know that the I-90 bridge will close again each of the next three days while the Angels are practicing/performing – 12:45 pm-2:40 pm is the schedule each day. And did we mention the Seafair Fleet tours on the waterfront? More at the Seafair website. (The drama as we write this, of course, is what the weather will do – if it stays cloudy but is not too murky, of course, they can have their “low show.”)
West Seattle’s Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic parish has announced a community event for the end of this month as it revs up a fundraising campaign for a $4 million project. The rendering above shows what they’re hoping to build. Here’s the full text of the announcement sent by a PR rep for the church:
Our Lady of Guadalupe, an 800-family Catholic parish in West Seattle, will kick off Building for Our Future: The Next 50 Years Campaign with a community celebration at Noon on Sunday, August 29.
The event, which will take place on the parish campus at 7000 35th Avenue SW, will feature food, music and games for kids to mark the official start of an initiative to build a new Parish Gathering Hall/Gymnasium to serve Our Lady of Guadalupe’s church and school. The 10,000-square foot Parish Life Center/Gymnasium will include beautiful spaces for large events, a full kitchen, outdoor play areas, and a bright and modern gymnasium.
“More than a meeting hall, more than a gym, the building will benefit every person in our parish while also allowing us to better serve the greater good of our entire community,” said Father Jack Walmesley, pastor of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
“The tunnel’s going to be closed for quite a while.” That’s what we just heard on the scanner, as police call in the major-incident investigators for a crash on northbound Highway 99 at the Battery Street Tunnel. We don’t have details of the crash, but in case you drive the Alaskan Way Viaduct northbound overnight, you should be aware. (“Quite a while” translates to “at least two hours,” according to more scanner traffic heard as we wrote this.) FRIDAY AFTERNOON UPDATE: SPD Blotter has the story of what happened – motorcycle crash with two people hurt.
The other night, we heard from the West Seattle High School Class of 1990 reunion organizers – and now, another milestone reunion – WSHS Class of 1980 alums are invited to the 30-year reunion tomorrow night and Saturday. Here’s the order of events: Friday night at Brickyard BBQ in the Admiral District, there’s a no-host bar/barbecue get-together, starting at 6 pm; then the big event is at Youngstown Cultural Arts Center on Saturday night – here’s the schedule, plus a message from reunion organizers:
Greetings, fellow WSHS Class of ‘80 classmates! Our reunion event is coming up fast and this is a last-ditch effort to reach those of you who we may have missed in connecting with. Our official party will be at Youngstown Cultural Arts Center where, in addition to live music brought to you by the 30 Year Itch band made up of fellow classmates, the evening will include beverages (beer, wine, soda), casual main dishes & dessert. All are invited to contribute a (optional) potluck appetizer or side dish!
A small crew of planners have tried hard to contact all of you, and invite your help in spreading the word to get folks onboard. Price is $40 advance or $50 at the door per adult, kids $10 and under 5 free.
Check out our Facebook sites, where you may also submit a casual pre-register to secure your $40 advance rate.
That video clip is tonight’s KING5 story about Jayme Miller, a White Center woman, and 1994 West Seattle High School graduate, whose friends are working to get the word out about a fundraiser coming up in a little over two weeks. As you’ll hear in the story (here’s the full online version with text), she is fighting her way back from a rare neurological problem, transverse myelitis, that struck out of the blue three months ago and left her suddenly, terrifyingly paralyzed. Jayme’s friend Sydni Smith also sent WSB word of the fundraiser (and a photo), explaining:
… While in therapy Jayme surprised the doctors again and again. She pushed her herself harder and added new challenges each day. Walking 10 feet down the hallway last month, using a walker and with an aide behind her in case she fell, was a monumental victory. Every time she was told she might not be able to regain a function, she willed herself right through that obstacle.
Jayme went home on Tuesday the 20th of July. She still has many mountains to climb, but hopefully she will keep progressing and regain full function. At this point she’s able to walk short distances with the aid of a walker and a “spotter” behind her in case her legs suddenly give out.
She has medical insurance, thankfully, but with three months of hospitalization and being away from work, her medical bills are another mountain she’ll need to climb. The ten-day stay in the hospital cost $200,000. The Doctor visits while in the hospital were between $80 – $140 each. The ambulance ride cost nearly $900 and each day in Mount St Vincent she was charged $575 a day for the room alone.
We’re holding a fundraiser/birthday bash we’re calling Walk On, Jayme! which will be held at RockSport Bar and Grill August 21st. There will be a silent auction from 7:30 to 9:30. Bring cash or your checkbook and bid on items from local artists and businesses and follow it up with Karaoke and dance hits hosted by DJ Tony B.
You can also donate to help her right now – viaPayPal (which works if you have a credit card – you don’t have to be a PayPal accountholder), click “Send Money” and send it to WalkOnJayme@gmail.com. Or if you can give something for the silent auction at the August 21st event, e-mail Sydni at heysyd@gmail.com. There’s a sharable Facebook event page for this too – find it here.
(WSB photos by Patrick Sand)
2 face painters – that’s Wild Smiles in action, above – are among tonight’s special features at the second Summer Concerts at Hiawatha show, presented by the Admiral Neighborhood Association, co-sponsored by businesses including WSB. New tonight, they’re testing a different configuration for the stage – angled south instead of facing east:
That’s the PCC Natural Markets (WSB sponsor) Kid Picks van at right – PCC’s one of the series’s two major sponsors, along with The Johnson Team. On stage tonight: Back Burner with bluegrass:
(video added later)
Next Thursday night – also 6:30 pm on the east lawn of Hiawatha Community Center – it’s Pearl Django with guest vocalist Greta Matassa. (And if you want to enjoy more outdoor music sooner – be at Providence Mount St. Vincent tomorrow night for the first of their four Friday night freebies, starting with Mariachi Fiesta Mexicana, 6 pm.)
Thanks to MargL for the tip that the California/Oregon stoplight is out. (Also thanks to those who messaged us about it via Twitter.) No word at this point if it’s part of a larger outage; we’re checking. Earlier this afternoon, according to a note we received from Craig, there was a small outage in Admiral:
A crow got a little too close to the primary and secondary terminals on the transformer between Fairmount Ave SW and Walnut Ave SW alley close to Hanford St. There were about six customers that were without power for about 35 minutes. The Seattle City Light Crew was here in 28 minutes. That’s GREAT.
(Craig included a photo of the crow atop its final resting place; we’ll just let it be.)
Ron Angeles, Delridge Neighborhood District Coordinator for the city Department of Neighborhoods, just put out the call for volunteers for a big event coming here later this month: The 2010 Seattle Race Conference will be held at South Seattle Community College, 8 am-4:30 pm on August 28th. The theme: “Racism and Health Inequities: Eliminating Barriers and Healing Our Communities.” Registration is open at seattleraceconference.org, and since the event is “100 percent volunteer-powered,” they’re looking for help – if you can pitch in, contact Joyce at Tseng_joyce@hotmail.com or 206-579-5330. Read on for the list of volunteer opportunities:Read More
Another side note on the Admiral Safeway project: The old house on the southeast corner of the site, 42nd/Lander, had been offered for many months to anybody who would pay to have it moved – but no takers – it’s now set for demolition. We got a tip from area resident Forest that the fencing had come down and some windows were boarded up; went by, and found the banner you see in the photo above. The company named on the banner, Earthwise, salvages what it can from old houses like this and resells the material to both contractors working on projects and homeowners in the throes of DIY work. That’s according to James Klicpera, Earthwise’s acquisitions manager, who, it turns out, is a West Seattleite. He tells WSB they subcontracted with Safeway to salvage whatever would be reusable and have actually finished most of the work, with much of the “recyclable” material coming from inside the house: 400 square feet of fir flooring, some appliances, windows, a few doors, and he mentions, “There was a very nice fireplace front – kind of Art Deco, tile – so we gathered up as many of those tiles as we were able to.” They also salvaged “several pallets” of bricks from the backyard patio as well as the fencing from around the house (as Forest had noticed). They resell the material, James explained, from a warehouse on 4th Avenue South in SODO. He says some of what they’ve salvaged from other sites is incorporated around West Seattle – like the bar top at Beveridge Place Pub, a recycled bowling lane. Safeway’s Sara Corn tells us other material from the house will be reused after demolition, which could happen as soon as next week – or as late as mid-September, when the existing grocery store comes down. (As first reported here last week, the store will close August 21, with the new store to be open next July.)
The BECU ATM located in the Admiral Safeway will remain there until the store is officially closed on August 21st. While the Safeway is closed there are additional ATM’s in the area that can be utilized. BECU members are encouraged to visit www.becu.org and look under “locations/ATM’s” to find the one that is most convenient for them. We are pleased to announce that when the new Safeway opens in 2011, BECU will have two ATM’s at the new store, one inside and one on the outside of the store.
The idea of the outside ATM came up at Design Review Board meetings, as noted in our report on the 5th and final such meeting for the Admiral Safeway project – though at the time, it was cautioned that Safeway hadn’t finalized a deal with a bank; now, BECU’s announcement indicates, it has. (The sketch above is from the artwork shown at that meeting last February; it shows part of the California SW frontage of the new store.)
A team of Seattle Parks managers and design consultants made it clear last night: They’re just beginning to dig into the details of one potential layout for the West Seattle Golf Course‘s future $3.4 million driving range.
Here’s what else they made clear: Whether you’re a golfer, a neighbor, or an occasional visitor to the vicinity, they want to hear from you about what they’re looking at – right now, and down the line as the design proceeds.
The 50-stall driving range has to go somewhere between the golf course’s 9th hole and 35th SW. The very-tentatively-sketched-out location (photo above shows roughed-out art displayed at the meeting) would require a whole lot of earth-moving and tree-removal – and would dramatically change the experience at West Seattle Rotary Viewpoint Park immediately west of the driving range (see the “dash” type marker on the left side of the drawing): What’s now a greenery-framed view to downtown would wind up on the other side of the net setup meant to keep golf balls from flying onto 35th – a net that would rise 50 to 90 feet above the street level at the viewpoint site.
Last night, we published a brief note about the “disappearance” of one of West Seattle’s beloved murals, “Press Day,” from the side of the building that’s home to the Terry Gangon Insurance Agency (and others) – thanks again to Ken Beres for noticing it was gone, and e-mailing to ask what we knew. This morning, we have additional info from Julia Gangon regarding what exactly is being done and when the mural will be back:
The mural was removed to paint the surface underneath. It has been over twenty years since the wood beneath was inspected and treated.
The wood was intact. It needed some cleaning, primer and two coats of paint. The mural will be put back up as soon as we are finished with the surrounding area. We want to make sure that it is not damaged by the painting process.
We have been surprised how much concern has been generated in such a short time. The mural was removed Monday August 2nd and stored inside the building. By Tuesday we were receiving calls, questions and emails.
The mural should be reinstalled by next Monday or possibly sooner. We are sorry it has caused such a stir. Our aim was to protect the wood underneath from potential moisture damage.
We have a bit of background on the murals in the “West Seattle 101” excerpts republished on WSB – read it here. “Press Day” was painted in the early ’90s by Alan Wylie, who also painted the “Bank Day” mural on the side of the Chase branch at California/Oregon.
Another longtime West Seattle businessperson has died: Helen Armfield (Williamson, Zaar) Damron, 94, who had lived in West Seattle for almost 80 years and was an active member of the business community for several decades. Her memorial service is set for tomorrow, starting at 1 pm at 
Petty Officer 2nd Class Jarod Newlove’s memorial service will be held on Monday, August 9, 2010, 11:00 am at Holy Family Catholic Church, 9622 20th Avenue SW [
… While in therapy Jayme surprised the doctors again and again. She pushed her herself harder and added new challenges each day. Walking 10 feet down the hallway last month, using a walker and with an aide behind her in case she fell, was a monumental victory. Every time she was told she might not be able to regain a function, she willed herself right through that obstacle.
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