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"bio": "Marisol Medina-Cadena is a radio reporter and podcast producer. Before working at KQED, she produced for PBS member station, KCET, in Los Angeles. In 2017, Marisol won an Emmy Award for her work on the televised documentary, \u003cem>City Rising\u003c/em>, examining California's affordable housing crisis and the historical roots of gentrification.",
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"slug": "bay-bridge-anniversary-1936-opening-fdr-celebrations-sf-oakland",
"title": "The Bay Bridge’s 1936 Opening Was Four Days of Non-Stop Drama",
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"content": "\u003cp>Picture it. The Bay Area. November 1936. The first of the region’s two major bridges just got finished. The world is starting to feel smaller. Your brain is struggling to keep up with all of the feats of engineering going on in your midst, and the future feels closer than ever. What do you do?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You write a poem, that’s what.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m not kidding. The opening of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge inspired \u003cem>a lot\u003c/em> of poetry. A lot of \u003cem>really bad\u003c/em> poetry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s one the \u003cem>Sacramento Bee \u003c/em>saw fit to publish on Nov. 12 — the same day the Bay Bridge first opened to traffic:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>I like a bridge —\u003cbr>\nIt cries ‘Come on,\u003cbr>\nI’ll take you there from here and here and from there\u003cbr>\nAnd save you time and toll.’\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>I like a bridge —\u003cbr>\nIt breathes romance;\u003cbr>\n‘There’s new adventure on the further side\u003cbr>\nAnd I will help you cross.’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I like a bridge —\u003cbr>\nIt makes me think\u003cbr>\nThat when a worry comes, my mind will find\u003cbr>\nSomewhere a friendly bridge.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>No, I don’t know either.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A less bad poem by Jack Burroughs also made it into the\u003cem> Oakland Tribune \u003c/em>that week:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>We’ve watched you grow from a buttress low\u003cbr>\nTo a towering spread of steel\u003cbr>\nYour form arose with hammer blows\u003cbr>\nAnd the turn of the spinner’s wheel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now you stand complete and our eyes you greet\u003cbr>\nWith the fruit of a thousand thoughts\u003cbr>\nA span flung wide from the Oakland side\u003cbr>\nTo the Port of the Argonauts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We have seen you write of a victor’s might\u003cbr>\nOf a battle fought and won.\u003cbr>\nYou’ve spanned the Bay and you seem to say:\u003cbr>\n‘I’m the link that makes you one!’\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>Certainly, poetry was the chosen medium in which to feel overwrought that month. Schoolchildren in Berkeley, Oakland, Alameda and Piedmont were all given assignments to write poems about the brand new bridge. Even \u003ca href=\"https://localwiki.org/oakland/Grant_Miller_Mortuary\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Grant D. Miller\u003c/a>, Alameda County’s coroner (\u003cem>the actual coroner!\u003c/em>) felt the need to share some rhyming words of wisdom about “this modern miracle … the Bay Bridge.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a large newspaper ad, Miller shared:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>The bridge that links the cities\u003cbr>\nis gleaming in the sun,\u003cbr>\nIts towers capped and saddled,\u003cbr>\nits massive cables spun.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>Nice one, Grant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Looking back, you kind of can’t blame everyone for temporarily lapsing into overly dramatic fugue states. Everything about the Bay Bridge was almost unfathomably huge. The construction had cost $77 million (which was actually under budget). It had taken three years, 152,000 tons of steel, 30,000 tons of reinforcing steel, 70,815 miles of cable wire, 1 million cubic yards of concrete, 1.3 million barrels of cement, 200,000 gallons of paint, 30 million feet of boards and 55 million man hours to complete. Hell, PG&E had to lay a 25,000-foot long underwater power cable before the work could even start.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bridge’s completion also felt a little miraculous, given how unfinished it had looked just months before the opening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921130\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921130\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782-800x469.jpg\" alt=\"The Bay Bridge's towers and cables stand in the Bay, but have no roadways.\" width=\"800\" height=\"469\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782-800x469.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782-160x94.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782-768x450.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">This is what the Bay Bridge looked like at the start of 1936. Literally nowhere to put cars. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.4782)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This is what the San Francisco side (specifically Perry, near Fourth St.) looked like in September 1935:\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921124\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921124\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350-800x612.jpg\" alt=\"A very rickety-looking construction of wooden boards to make up a section of bridge.\" width=\"800\" height=\"612\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350-800x612.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350-160x122.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350-768x588.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Bay Bridge 14 months before opening, looking like a backyard treehouse with lofty ambitions. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.3350)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Here’s the Eastern cantilever section that same year:\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921132\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921132\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599-800x496.jpg\" alt=\"An unfinished bridge stretches out into open waters.\" width=\"800\" height=\"496\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599-800x496.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599-160x99.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599-768x476.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Evel Knievel could’ve done something really cool with this. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp27.3599)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>On top of that, folks were also in a tizzy about the small matter of San Francisco and Oakland suddenly being indelibly connected. At one point, the\u003cem> San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em> pondered whether “this new metropolitan area, knit into a single unit” would be called “San Fran-Oakland” or “Oak-Francisco.” (We owe a debt of gratitude to the 1930s humans who refused to allow these terms to catch on.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Needless to say, when the work on the bridge was finally finished, the entire region celebrated in a variety of consistently over-the-top ways. After the poetry had been penned, then came the parades. The first one, on Nov. 11, took over 30 blocks of downtown Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921183\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 768px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13921183\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/Screen-Shot-2022-11-01-at-2.42.19-PM.png\" alt=\"A hand drawn map of downtown Oakland and Lake Merritt with arrows depicting a parade route.\" width=\"768\" height=\"874\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/Screen-Shot-2022-11-01-at-2.42.19-PM.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/Screen-Shot-2022-11-01-at-2.42.19-PM-160x182.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Armistice Day parade route, as seen in ‘The Oakland Tribune’ on Nov. 9, 1936. It was the largest parade in Oakland’s history. \u003ccite>(Newspapers.com/ Oakland Tribune)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Armistice Day party was meant to honor the lives of those lost in World War I, while also marveling at the possibilities for the future that were symbolized by the Bay Bridge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921232\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921232\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-800x569.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"569\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-800x569.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-1020x726.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-160x114.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-768x547.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-1536x1093.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-2048x1458.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-1920x1367.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Armistice Day parade moving along Broadway in Oakland, Nov. 11, 1936. \u003ccite>(MediaNews Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Holding the largest parade in Oakland history apparently didn’t feel quite big enough because, that day, there was also a luncheon, a military pageant, a football game, a ball \u003cem>and\u003c/em> fireworks. All of which, believe it or not, was merely the opening act for the actual bridge opening on Nov. 12. Which was, as you may have guessed by now, completely bonkers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The day started with Franklin D. Roosevelt hitting a little button in the Oval Office, which turned on traffic signals on the bridge. This activation of the lights was a more measured gesture to Northern California than the one FDR had offered at the beginning of Bay Bridge construction. That time, the little button on his desk set off a dynamite explosion on Yerba Buena Island.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One can only assume that this is how people showed off before the internet existed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921252\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921252\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-800x623.jpg\" alt=\"A distinguished older man sits at his desk about to press down on a device that resembles a morse code machine.\" width=\"800\" height=\"623\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-800x623.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-1020x794.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-160x125.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-768x598.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">FDR, very casually messing with our traffic lights. \u003ccite>(Getty Images/ Bettmann)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Once those lights were on, cars could begin crossing. Truly, the Bay Bridge started as it continues to this day — with way, \u003cem>way\u003c/em> too much traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921292\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921292\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179310-800x498.jpg\" alt=\"Cars lined up as far as the eye can see, in eight lanes.\" width=\"800\" height=\"498\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cars line up at the toll plaza to be some of the first to cross the Bay Bridge. \u003ccite>(Digital First Media Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, there was a bridge dedication on both sides of the Bay, while an Army and Navy air show roared overhead. \u003cem>In\u003c/em> the bay, there was a regatta, as well as races involving fishing boats, a merchant life boat, the Sea Scouts and rowing clubs. There were demonstrations by the Coast Guard and the fire-boat service. San Francisco also held swimming and diving competitions at Aquatic Park, and the day culminated in firework displays at either end of the bridge. So, bedlam basically.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13910308']There was so much going on at the same time, one radio journalist decided that the easiest way to see it all was by climbing 400 feet to the top of the Bay Bridge’s tower and reporting from there. He stayed up there all day despite objections from his editor that his script might get blown away. (Journalists, amiright?)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those of you accustomed to forking over $7 each time you cross might be interested to hear what then-Governor Frank Finley Merriam declared at the opening. “This bridge belongs to the generation,” he said. “We built it and we shall pay for it. But in a broader sense it belongs to the generations that are to come. When the youths of today became the citizens of tomorrow, they will use it without cost.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sure, Frank. Sure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921143\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921143\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323-800x646.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"646\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323-800x646.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323-160x129.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323-768x620.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Bay Bridge Dedication Pageant parade marched down Market St. on Nov. 13, 1936, between decorations that resembled the new bridge. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.12323)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Things didn’t get any less dramatic on Day Three. A parade dominated downtown San Francisco from the Ferry Building to Civic Center. Per a report that week from the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em>, the floats —“a type finer than any which have been shown hereabouts in the past” — depicted “the past, present and future of the Metropolitan Bay Area.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921126\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921126\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476-800x541.jpg\" alt=\"A float carrying a replica of San Francisco's city hall, plus the new Bay Bridge rolls past spectators.\" width=\"800\" height=\"541\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476-800x541.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476-160x108.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476-768x519.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nov 13, 1936:\u003cbr>The Bay Bridge Dedication Pageant parade, featuring here a ‘Flying A’ gasoline float. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.4476)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The parade also, weirdly, facilitated the first horse crossing on the Bay Bridge. The horse in question was named Sundown, he was owned by California Highway patrolman Mark Freitas, and the two were traveling to San Francisco to take part in the pageantry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921251\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921251\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-800x586.jpg\" alt=\"A black horse stands in an open top cart being towed by a classic 1930s car.\" width=\"800\" height=\"586\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-800x586.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-1020x747.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-160x117.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-768x563.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sundown on the Bay Bridge. \u003ccite>(Digital First Media Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Sundown, the futuristic floats, marching bands, a 150-foot-long dragon from Chinatown and hordes of dancing girls made their way down Market St., in what the \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> described as “a kaleidoscopic procession of gaiety.” They were surrounded on all sides by “miles of garlands and miles of painted canvas, hundreds of immense colored pylons and replicas of bridges, all designed to form a perfect picture of the spirit of the fiesta.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13913489']Fun fact: One of those bridge replicas wound up smashing through the window of a sporting goods shop a few days later. The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> reported that “heavy trolley wires and lamp standards were torn down in the crash. Traffic was disrupted more than an hour,” and had to be diverted to Mission St.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13960576\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1536px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13960576\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/20240627_150310-scaled-e1719613641842.jpg\" alt=\"1930s-style artwork depicting crowds gathered in front of the Bay Bridge with a rainbow curved across the sky.\" width=\"1536\" height=\"1920\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A souvenir program for the Bay Bridge’s opening celebrations. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the San Francisco History Center)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The parade caused a traffic jam of sorts too — a human one. “They were clustered on the heads of statuary at the Donahue monuments at Bush and Battery,” the \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> reported. “They climbed on the precarious silver arch that linked the street decorations at the Palace Hotel, they clung to dizzy cornices of the buildings, and in window embrasures, showering snow storms of paper upon the marching throngs. Perspiring police threw up their hands as time and again the cheering spectators broke through into the line of march.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After a final burst of revelry on the 14th, the party was over. The \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> called the bridge opening “the greatest event in the history of the Bay region.” The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> declared: “San Francisco has seen nothing like it. The Portola Festival, the homecoming of the troops from the World War, the spontaneous Mardi Gras of New Year’s Eve — roll them all in to one and they’d give but feeble whispers compared to yesterday’s mighty cheer.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Parades, parties, pageantry and way too much bad poetry. The Bay Bridge's 1936 opening was bedlam.",
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"title": "The Bay Bridge Turns 86: Revisit its 1936 Opening | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Picture it. The Bay Area. November 1936. The first of the region’s two major bridges just got finished. The world is starting to feel smaller. Your brain is struggling to keep up with all of the feats of engineering going on in your midst, and the future feels closer than ever. What do you do?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You write a poem, that’s what.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I’m not kidding. The opening of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge inspired \u003cem>a lot\u003c/em> of poetry. A lot of \u003cem>really bad\u003c/em> poetry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s one the \u003cem>Sacramento Bee \u003c/em>saw fit to publish on Nov. 12 — the same day the Bay Bridge first opened to traffic:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>I like a bridge —\u003cbr>\nIt cries ‘Come on,\u003cbr>\nI’ll take you there from here and here and from there\u003cbr>\nAnd save you time and toll.’\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>I like a bridge —\u003cbr>\nIt breathes romance;\u003cbr>\n‘There’s new adventure on the further side\u003cbr>\nAnd I will help you cross.’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I like a bridge —\u003cbr>\nIt makes me think\u003cbr>\nThat when a worry comes, my mind will find\u003cbr>\nSomewhere a friendly bridge.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>No, I don’t know either.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A less bad poem by Jack Burroughs also made it into the\u003cem> Oakland Tribune \u003c/em>that week:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>We’ve watched you grow from a buttress low\u003cbr>\nTo a towering spread of steel\u003cbr>\nYour form arose with hammer blows\u003cbr>\nAnd the turn of the spinner’s wheel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now you stand complete and our eyes you greet\u003cbr>\nWith the fruit of a thousand thoughts\u003cbr>\nA span flung wide from the Oakland side\u003cbr>\nTo the Port of the Argonauts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We have seen you write of a victor’s might\u003cbr>\nOf a battle fought and won.\u003cbr>\nYou’ve spanned the Bay and you seem to say:\u003cbr>\n‘I’m the link that makes you one!’\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>Certainly, poetry was the chosen medium in which to feel overwrought that month. Schoolchildren in Berkeley, Oakland, Alameda and Piedmont were all given assignments to write poems about the brand new bridge. Even \u003ca href=\"https://localwiki.org/oakland/Grant_Miller_Mortuary\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Grant D. Miller\u003c/a>, Alameda County’s coroner (\u003cem>the actual coroner!\u003c/em>) felt the need to share some rhyming words of wisdom about “this modern miracle … the Bay Bridge.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a large newspaper ad, Miller shared:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>The bridge that links the cities\u003cbr>\nis gleaming in the sun,\u003cbr>\nIts towers capped and saddled,\u003cbr>\nits massive cables spun.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>Nice one, Grant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Looking back, you kind of can’t blame everyone for temporarily lapsing into overly dramatic fugue states. Everything about the Bay Bridge was almost unfathomably huge. The construction had cost $77 million (which was actually under budget). It had taken three years, 152,000 tons of steel, 30,000 tons of reinforcing steel, 70,815 miles of cable wire, 1 million cubic yards of concrete, 1.3 million barrels of cement, 200,000 gallons of paint, 30 million feet of boards and 55 million man hours to complete. Hell, PG&E had to lay a 25,000-foot long underwater power cable before the work could even start.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bridge’s completion also felt a little miraculous, given how unfinished it had looked just months before the opening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921130\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921130\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782-800x469.jpg\" alt=\"The Bay Bridge's towers and cables stand in the Bay, but have no roadways.\" width=\"800\" height=\"469\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782-800x469.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782-160x94.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782-768x450.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4782.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">This is what the Bay Bridge looked like at the start of 1936. Literally nowhere to put cars. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.4782)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This is what the San Francisco side (specifically Perry, near Fourth St.) looked like in September 1935:\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921124\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921124\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350-800x612.jpg\" alt=\"A very rickety-looking construction of wooden boards to make up a section of bridge.\" width=\"800\" height=\"612\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350-800x612.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350-160x122.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350-768x588.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.3350.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Bay Bridge 14 months before opening, looking like a backyard treehouse with lofty ambitions. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.3350)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Here’s the Eastern cantilever section that same year:\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921132\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921132\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599-800x496.jpg\" alt=\"An unfinished bridge stretches out into open waters.\" width=\"800\" height=\"496\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599-800x496.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599-160x99.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599-768x476.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp27.3599.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Evel Knievel could’ve done something really cool with this. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp27.3599)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>On top of that, folks were also in a tizzy about the small matter of San Francisco and Oakland suddenly being indelibly connected. At one point, the\u003cem> San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em> pondered whether “this new metropolitan area, knit into a single unit” would be called “San Fran-Oakland” or “Oak-Francisco.” (We owe a debt of gratitude to the 1930s humans who refused to allow these terms to catch on.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Needless to say, when the work on the bridge was finally finished, the entire region celebrated in a variety of consistently over-the-top ways. After the poetry had been penned, then came the parades. The first one, on Nov. 11, took over 30 blocks of downtown Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921183\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 768px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13921183\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/Screen-Shot-2022-11-01-at-2.42.19-PM.png\" alt=\"A hand drawn map of downtown Oakland and Lake Merritt with arrows depicting a parade route.\" width=\"768\" height=\"874\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/Screen-Shot-2022-11-01-at-2.42.19-PM.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/Screen-Shot-2022-11-01-at-2.42.19-PM-160x182.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Armistice Day parade route, as seen in ‘The Oakland Tribune’ on Nov. 9, 1936. It was the largest parade in Oakland’s history. \u003ccite>(Newspapers.com/ Oakland Tribune)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Armistice Day party was meant to honor the lives of those lost in World War I, while also marveling at the possibilities for the future that were symbolized by the Bay Bridge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921232\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921232\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-800x569.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"569\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-800x569.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-1020x726.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-160x114.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-768x547.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-1536x1093.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-2048x1458.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1172276945-1920x1367.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Armistice Day parade moving along Broadway in Oakland, Nov. 11, 1936. \u003ccite>(MediaNews Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Holding the largest parade in Oakland history apparently didn’t feel quite big enough because, that day, there was also a luncheon, a military pageant, a football game, a ball \u003cem>and\u003c/em> fireworks. All of which, believe it or not, was merely the opening act for the actual bridge opening on Nov. 12. Which was, as you may have guessed by now, completely bonkers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The day started with Franklin D. Roosevelt hitting a little button in the Oval Office, which turned on traffic signals on the bridge. This activation of the lights was a more measured gesture to Northern California than the one FDR had offered at the beginning of Bay Bridge construction. That time, the little button on his desk set off a dynamite explosion on Yerba Buena Island.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One can only assume that this is how people showed off before the internet existed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921252\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921252\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-800x623.jpg\" alt=\"A distinguished older man sits at his desk about to press down on a device that resembles a morse code machine.\" width=\"800\" height=\"623\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-800x623.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-1020x794.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-160x125.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1-768x598.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-515450230-1.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">FDR, very casually messing with our traffic lights. \u003ccite>(Getty Images/ Bettmann)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Once those lights were on, cars could begin crossing. Truly, the Bay Bridge started as it continues to this day — with way, \u003cem>way\u003c/em> too much traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921292\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921292\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179310-800x498.jpg\" alt=\"Cars lined up as far as the eye can see, in eight lanes.\" width=\"800\" height=\"498\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cars line up at the toll plaza to be some of the first to cross the Bay Bridge. \u003ccite>(Digital First Media Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, there was a bridge dedication on both sides of the Bay, while an Army and Navy air show roared overhead. \u003cem>In\u003c/em> the bay, there was a regatta, as well as races involving fishing boats, a merchant life boat, the Sea Scouts and rowing clubs. There were demonstrations by the Coast Guard and the fire-boat service. San Francisco also held swimming and diving competitions at Aquatic Park, and the day culminated in firework displays at either end of the bridge. So, bedlam basically.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>There was so much going on at the same time, one radio journalist decided that the easiest way to see it all was by climbing 400 feet to the top of the Bay Bridge’s tower and reporting from there. He stayed up there all day despite objections from his editor that his script might get blown away. (Journalists, amiright?)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those of you accustomed to forking over $7 each time you cross might be interested to hear what then-Governor Frank Finley Merriam declared at the opening. “This bridge belongs to the generation,” he said. “We built it and we shall pay for it. But in a broader sense it belongs to the generations that are to come. When the youths of today became the citizens of tomorrow, they will use it without cost.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sure, Frank. Sure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921143\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921143\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323-800x646.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"646\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323-800x646.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323-160x129.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323-768x620.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.12323.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Bay Bridge Dedication Pageant parade marched down Market St. on Nov. 13, 1936, between decorations that resembled the new bridge. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.12323)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Things didn’t get any less dramatic on Day Three. A parade dominated downtown San Francisco from the Ferry Building to Civic Center. Per a report that week from the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em>, the floats —“a type finer than any which have been shown hereabouts in the past” — depicted “the past, present and future of the Metropolitan Bay Area.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921126\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921126\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476-800x541.jpg\" alt=\"A float carrying a replica of San Francisco's city hall, plus the new Bay Bridge rolls past spectators.\" width=\"800\" height=\"541\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476-800x541.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476-160x108.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476-768x519.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/opensfhistory_wnp14.4476.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nov 13, 1936:\u003cbr>The Bay Bridge Dedication Pageant parade, featuring here a ‘Flying A’ gasoline float. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.4476)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The parade also, weirdly, facilitated the first horse crossing on the Bay Bridge. The horse in question was named Sundown, he was owned by California Highway patrolman Mark Freitas, and the two were traveling to San Francisco to take part in the pageantry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921251\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921251\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-800x586.jpg\" alt=\"A black horse stands in an open top cart being towed by a classic 1930s car.\" width=\"800\" height=\"586\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-800x586.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-1020x747.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-160x117.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288-768x563.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/GettyImages-1006179288.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sundown on the Bay Bridge. \u003ccite>(Digital First Media Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Sundown, the futuristic floats, marching bands, a 150-foot-long dragon from Chinatown and hordes of dancing girls made their way down Market St., in what the \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> described as “a kaleidoscopic procession of gaiety.” They were surrounded on all sides by “miles of garlands and miles of painted canvas, hundreds of immense colored pylons and replicas of bridges, all designed to form a perfect picture of the spirit of the fiesta.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Fun fact: One of those bridge replicas wound up smashing through the window of a sporting goods shop a few days later. The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> reported that “heavy trolley wires and lamp standards were torn down in the crash. Traffic was disrupted more than an hour,” and had to be diverted to Mission St.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13960576\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1536px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13960576\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/20240627_150310-scaled-e1719613641842.jpg\" alt=\"1930s-style artwork depicting crowds gathered in front of the Bay Bridge with a rainbow curved across the sky.\" width=\"1536\" height=\"1920\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A souvenir program for the Bay Bridge’s opening celebrations. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the San Francisco History Center)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The parade caused a traffic jam of sorts too — a human one. “They were clustered on the heads of statuary at the Donahue monuments at Bush and Battery,” the \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> reported. “They climbed on the precarious silver arch that linked the street decorations at the Palace Hotel, they clung to dizzy cornices of the buildings, and in window embrasures, showering snow storms of paper upon the marching throngs. Perspiring police threw up their hands as time and again the cheering spectators broke through into the line of march.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After a final burst of revelry on the 14th, the party was over. The \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> called the bridge opening “the greatest event in the history of the Bay region.” The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> declared: “San Francisco has seen nothing like it. The Portola Festival, the homecoming of the troops from the World War, the spontaneous Mardi Gras of New Year’s Eve — roll them all in to one and they’d give but feeble whispers compared to yesterday’s mighty cheer.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "haight-ashbury-photography-elaine-mayes-summer-of-love-san-francisco",
"title": "Elaine Mayes’ Portraits Offer a Starker View of the Haight’s Summer of Love",
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"content": "\u003cp>A pretty young woman, age 18, sits cross-legged on a pillow-strewn nook. Her long blonde hair is parted in the center, her slender arms are neatly arranged in her lap, but her facial expression is forlorn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another young woman sits cross-legged on the grass in Golden Gate Park. Her curly hair is parted in the middle and her wrists decorated with beads, but her face is downbeat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A 16-year-old boy, shirtless underneath a velvet jacket, leans against a tree, arms folded defensively in front of him, looking cynical and serious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921000\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921000\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-800x400.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"400\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-800x400.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-1020x510.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-160x80.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-768x384.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-1536x768.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-2048x1024.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-1920x960.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Frank French (L) and Ruth Murphy (R), two of the young subjects of Elaine Mayes’ new book, ‘Haight Ashbury Portraits 1967-1968’. \u003ccite>(Elaine Mayes)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.elainemayesphoto.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Elaine Mayes\u003c/a>’ new book, \u003ca href=\"https://www.damianieditore.com/en-US/product/836\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Haight Ashbury Portraits 1967-1968\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, is full of photographs like these. They are of young people caught in an historic moment. Teenagers in the midst of rebelling against the status quo while also being simultaneously crushed by it. There are a few exceptions to the rule, but the vast majority of Mayes’ subjects carry an air of concern that belies their youthful features.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mayes’ images offer a more measured depiction of the Summer of Love than is typically presented in these kinds of retrospectives. In her introduction to the 43 images collected here, the photographer explains that she simply asked her subjects “to pose or sit naturally, to look into the camera and project their image onto the film.” The results speak volumes about the stress placed on young people in the era of the draft.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921005\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921005\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rebel-and-Cathleen-800x400.jpg\" alt=\"A Black man wearing denim jeans and jacket standing in a wooded area; a teenage girl sitting on a leather couch in a simple white robe.\" width=\"800\" height=\"400\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rebel (L) and Cathleen (R), two young people living in the Haight in 1968. \u003ccite>(Elaine Mayes)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mayes’ Haight Ashbury photography isn’t concerned with directly documenting the hedonism of the period. There is no carefree dancing in the park here, no nudity and — despite \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13310178/she-photographed-jimi-hendrix-without-knowing-his-name\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mayes also being known for her Monterey Pop photos\u003c/a> — no live music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, Mayes catches the individuals at the center of a whirlwind in quiet, contemplative repose, after the music, the party, the protest has stopped. The aura of the time is captured in the small details — peace signs hanging around necks, messages scrawled on walls about love and war and religion. Subjects sit in rooms decorated with rock ‘n’ roll posters, with guitars, empty cups and dirty ashtrays strewn around them. A few of Mayes’ male subjects remain nameless because they were avoiding the draft at the time she took the picture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921001\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921001\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-800x568.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"568\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-800x568.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-1020x724.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-160x114.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-768x545.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-1536x1090.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM.png 1620w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(L-R) Shari Maynard 19, Red Pappas 18, Stefanie Wyatt 17, Michael 20, and Sean Herrick 18, gather on Haight Street front steps in August 1968. \u003ccite>(Elaine Mayes)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13310178']Mayes’ work doesn’t offer the broad overview or the depth that Jim Marshall’s collection of photos did in his excellent 2014 book,\u003cem> \u003ca href=\"https://www.jimmarshallphotographyllc.com/haight-love-rock-and-revolution\">The Haight: Love, Rock and Revolution\u003c/a>\u003c/em>. But it does offer a quieter, more introspective view of the kids who were there. Kids that — as \u003cem>Haight Ashbury Portraits 1967-1968\u003c/em> so brilliantly encapsulates — were often lost and simply trying to find their place in a world that was pushing down hard on their young shoulders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘Haight Ashbury Portraits 1967-1968’ by Elaine Mayes is out Nov. 8, 2022, published by Damiani.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>A pretty young woman, age 18, sits cross-legged on a pillow-strewn nook. Her long blonde hair is parted in the center, her slender arms are neatly arranged in her lap, but her facial expression is forlorn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another young woman sits cross-legged on the grass in Golden Gate Park. Her curly hair is parted in the middle and her wrists decorated with beads, but her face is downbeat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A 16-year-old boy, shirtless underneath a velvet jacket, leans against a tree, arms folded defensively in front of him, looking cynical and serious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921000\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921000\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-800x400.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"400\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-800x400.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-1020x510.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-160x80.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-768x384.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-1536x768.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-2048x1024.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Frank-and-Ruth-1920x960.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Frank French (L) and Ruth Murphy (R), two of the young subjects of Elaine Mayes’ new book, ‘Haight Ashbury Portraits 1967-1968’. \u003ccite>(Elaine Mayes)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.elainemayesphoto.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Elaine Mayes\u003c/a>’ new book, \u003ca href=\"https://www.damianieditore.com/en-US/product/836\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Haight Ashbury Portraits 1967-1968\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, is full of photographs like these. They are of young people caught in an historic moment. Teenagers in the midst of rebelling against the status quo while also being simultaneously crushed by it. There are a few exceptions to the rule, but the vast majority of Mayes’ subjects carry an air of concern that belies their youthful features.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mayes’ images offer a more measured depiction of the Summer of Love than is typically presented in these kinds of retrospectives. In her introduction to the 43 images collected here, the photographer explains that she simply asked her subjects “to pose or sit naturally, to look into the camera and project their image onto the film.” The results speak volumes about the stress placed on young people in the era of the draft.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921005\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921005\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rebel-and-Cathleen-800x400.jpg\" alt=\"A Black man wearing denim jeans and jacket standing in a wooded area; a teenage girl sitting on a leather couch in a simple white robe.\" width=\"800\" height=\"400\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rebel (L) and Cathleen (R), two young people living in the Haight in 1968. \u003ccite>(Elaine Mayes)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mayes’ Haight Ashbury photography isn’t concerned with directly documenting the hedonism of the period. There is no carefree dancing in the park here, no nudity and — despite \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13310178/she-photographed-jimi-hendrix-without-knowing-his-name\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mayes also being known for her Monterey Pop photos\u003c/a> — no live music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, Mayes catches the individuals at the center of a whirlwind in quiet, contemplative repose, after the music, the party, the protest has stopped. The aura of the time is captured in the small details — peace signs hanging around necks, messages scrawled on walls about love and war and religion. Subjects sit in rooms decorated with rock ‘n’ roll posters, with guitars, empty cups and dirty ashtrays strewn around them. A few of Mayes’ male subjects remain nameless because they were avoiding the draft at the time she took the picture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921001\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921001\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-800x568.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"568\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-800x568.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-1020x724.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-160x114.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-768x545.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM-1536x1090.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Screen-Shot-2022-10-27-at-2.01.26-PM.png 1620w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(L-R) Shari Maynard 19, Red Pappas 18, Stefanie Wyatt 17, Michael 20, and Sean Herrick 18, gather on Haight Street front steps in August 1968. \u003ccite>(Elaine Mayes)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Mayes’ work doesn’t offer the broad overview or the depth that Jim Marshall’s collection of photos did in his excellent 2014 book,\u003cem> \u003ca href=\"https://www.jimmarshallphotographyllc.com/haight-love-rock-and-revolution\">The Haight: Love, Rock and Revolution\u003c/a>\u003c/em>. But it does offer a quieter, more introspective view of the kids who were there. Kids that — as \u003cem>Haight Ashbury Portraits 1967-1968\u003c/em> so brilliantly encapsulates — were often lost and simply trying to find their place in a world that was pushing down hard on their young shoulders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘Haight Ashbury Portraits 1967-1968’ by Elaine Mayes is out Nov. 8, 2022, published by Damiani.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">At the heart of Día de los Muertos is a celebration of the cycle of life. It’s a time to talk with our dead. We sing to them, prepare altars with flower and food offerings, and share stories to keep their memories alive. It’s both a sacred and joyous time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here in the Bay Area, we go all out for the tradition. Elaborate public altars are constructed in \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.dayofthedeadsf.org/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">parks\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, schools, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.schoolofartsandculture.org/events/2019/11/2/avenida-de-altares-amp-cumbia-g7kzt-82smw\">community spaces\u003c/a>. Museums and \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://richmondartcenter.org/exhibitions/de-fantasias-y-realidades/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">galleries\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> have exhibits with Day of the Dead themed art and \u003ca href=\"https://missionculturalcenter.org/event/day-of-the-dead-events/\">installations\u003c/a>. It’s truly a moment of visibility for Latino and Latinx culture and tradition.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But it wasn’t always this way in the Bay Area or the United States, for that matter. To shed light on the history of how Day of the Dead became such a significant tradition in San Francisco, we are talking to artist and curator Rio Yañez.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921006\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921006\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"A polaroid photo of young Rio Yañez holding a comic book and embraced by his father Rene.\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid-800x800.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid-160x160.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid-768x768.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Father and son, Rene and Rio Yañez co-curated Day of the Dead Altar exhibits at SOMArts until Rene’s passing. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Rio Yañez)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">His father, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://rioyanez.com/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rene Yañez\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, is credited with helping start the Day of the Dead procession that runs through the Mission. The procession (now in its 41st year) started in 1981 and was an extension of the curatorial and educational work Rene Yañez and other Chicano/Latino artists were doing at \u003ca href=\"http://www.galeriadelaraza.org/\">Galería de La Raza\u003c/a> to educate the community about Dia de los Muertos. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio carries the legacy forward by continuing to curate annual Day of the Dead altar exhibits that his father, Rene, started at SOMArts. In doing so, he also continues his parents’ work of mentoring younger artists. Now in its 23rd year at \u003ca href=\"https://somarts.org/\">SOMArts\u003c/a>, this year’s Day of the Dead show is titled, “\u003ca href=\"https://somarts.org/event/toloveandbeloved/\">To Love and Be Loved in Return\u003c/a>,” and invites viewers to collectively grieve and heal. The exhibit is open through November 4th and can also be viewed \u003ca href=\"https://somarts.org/toloveandbeloved-virtual/\">virtually\u003c/a>. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921007\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-13921007 size-large\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-1020x1020.jpg\" alt=\"A light up lantern sculpture made with papel picado cut outs. Patterns include hummingbirds and hearts. \" width=\"640\" height=\"640\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-1020x1020.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-800x800.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-160x160.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-768x768.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-1536x1536.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-2048x2048.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-1920x1920.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Day of the Dead altar sculpture at SOMArts by Victor-Mario Zaballa. \u003ccite>(Marisol Medina-Cadena/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC3684311534&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://bit.ly/3sD5yV6\">Read the podcast transcript\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Below are lightly edited excerpts of my conversation with Rio Yañez\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Marisol: Do you remember your earliest memory of celebrating Day of the Dead in San Francisco? \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio: It would probably be watching my dad assemble an altar at Galeria de la Raza on 24th and Bryant Street here in San Francisco in an art gallery that he was the creative director of. I just remember sitting on the carpet of the gallery and looking at my dad assemble it and I was so little. It was probably before I could walk. So it just seemed like he was putting together some sort of like puzzle or some sort of like sculpture. I just remember the colors! It was black and white and then these, like, pastel purples. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Marisol: Growing up, do you remember any conversations with your mom? Like when she was teaching you the tradition, creating a home altar… Was there any explicit conversation about, oh, “the way we do it here in California, in San Francisco isn’t necessarily the way it’s done in Mexico”? For example, like we don’t spend the night in cemeteries… \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio: I think it’s always been for my family, and I think really the roots of it in San Francisco have always been very Mexican-American, without the pretense of doing like a super “authentic,” you know, replication of what’s being practiced in Mexico. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To me… the procession, the altars, the art exhibits like it, it’s very 2nd generation. It’s very Mexican-American. I think it’s always been about kind of making something that’s our own and not necessarily just trying to duplicate something. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Marisol: Separate from your curatorial artistic practice. I’m just curious for your home altar or your private altar. What are some of the things you’re going to put on your altar for your parents and why? \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio: So for my dad, outside of being a curator, when he would get home, he just loved to draw in his sketchbooks. And, you know, his routine was just always to brew a cup of coffee and roll a joint and work at his sketchbook. And so art supplies coffee and a little bit of mota is always what I leave out for him. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio: For my mom… I left out some of her favorite CDs in in our altar and photographs of her uncle, who is the reason why she came to the Bay Area in the first place. Even in grief, having lost both of my parents in the recent years, there’s just a lot of joy in making these things and sharing them with them for the night. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">At the heart of Día de los Muertos is a celebration of the cycle of life. It’s a time to talk with our dead. We sing to them, prepare altars with flower and food offerings, and share stories to keep their memories alive. It’s both a sacred and joyous time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here in the Bay Area, we go all out for the tradition. Elaborate public altars are constructed in \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.dayofthedeadsf.org/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">parks\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, schools, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.schoolofartsandculture.org/events/2019/11/2/avenida-de-altares-amp-cumbia-g7kzt-82smw\">community spaces\u003c/a>. Museums and \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://richmondartcenter.org/exhibitions/de-fantasias-y-realidades/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">galleries\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> have exhibits with Day of the Dead themed art and \u003ca href=\"https://missionculturalcenter.org/event/day-of-the-dead-events/\">installations\u003c/a>. It’s truly a moment of visibility for Latino and Latinx culture and tradition.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But it wasn’t always this way in the Bay Area or the United States, for that matter. To shed light on the history of how Day of the Dead became such a significant tradition in San Francisco, we are talking to artist and curator Rio Yañez.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921006\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13921006\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"A polaroid photo of young Rio Yañez holding a comic book and embraced by his father Rene.\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid-800x800.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid-160x160.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid-768x768.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/Rio-and-Rene-Polaroid.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Father and son, Rene and Rio Yañez co-curated Day of the Dead Altar exhibits at SOMArts until Rene’s passing. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Rio Yañez)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">His father, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://rioyanez.com/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rene Yañez\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, is credited with helping start the Day of the Dead procession that runs through the Mission. The procession (now in its 41st year) started in 1981 and was an extension of the curatorial and educational work Rene Yañez and other Chicano/Latino artists were doing at \u003ca href=\"http://www.galeriadelaraza.org/\">Galería de La Raza\u003c/a> to educate the community about Dia de los Muertos. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio carries the legacy forward by continuing to curate annual Day of the Dead altar exhibits that his father, Rene, started at SOMArts. In doing so, he also continues his parents’ work of mentoring younger artists. Now in its 23rd year at \u003ca href=\"https://somarts.org/\">SOMArts\u003c/a>, this year’s Day of the Dead show is titled, “\u003ca href=\"https://somarts.org/event/toloveandbeloved/\">To Love and Be Loved in Return\u003c/a>,” and invites viewers to collectively grieve and heal. The exhibit is open through November 4th and can also be viewed \u003ca href=\"https://somarts.org/toloveandbeloved-virtual/\">virtually\u003c/a>. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13921007\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-13921007 size-large\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-1020x1020.jpg\" alt=\"A light up lantern sculpture made with papel picado cut outs. Patterns include hummingbirds and hearts. \" width=\"640\" height=\"640\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-1020x1020.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-800x800.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-160x160.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-768x768.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-1536x1536.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-2048x2048.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/IMG_1138-1920x1920.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Day of the Dead altar sculpture at SOMArts by Victor-Mario Zaballa. \u003ccite>(Marisol Medina-Cadena/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC3684311534&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://bit.ly/3sD5yV6\">Read the podcast transcript\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Below are lightly edited excerpts of my conversation with Rio Yañez\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Marisol: Do you remember your earliest memory of celebrating Day of the Dead in San Francisco? \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio: It would probably be watching my dad assemble an altar at Galeria de la Raza on 24th and Bryant Street here in San Francisco in an art gallery that he was the creative director of. I just remember sitting on the carpet of the gallery and looking at my dad assemble it and I was so little. It was probably before I could walk. So it just seemed like he was putting together some sort of like puzzle or some sort of like sculpture. I just remember the colors! It was black and white and then these, like, pastel purples. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Marisol: Growing up, do you remember any conversations with your mom? Like when she was teaching you the tradition, creating a home altar… Was there any explicit conversation about, oh, “the way we do it here in California, in San Francisco isn’t necessarily the way it’s done in Mexico”? For example, like we don’t spend the night in cemeteries… \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio: I think it’s always been for my family, and I think really the roots of it in San Francisco have always been very Mexican-American, without the pretense of doing like a super “authentic,” you know, replication of what’s being practiced in Mexico. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To me… the procession, the altars, the art exhibits like it, it’s very 2nd generation. It’s very Mexican-American. I think it’s always been about kind of making something that’s our own and not necessarily just trying to duplicate something. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Marisol: Separate from your curatorial artistic practice. I’m just curious for your home altar or your private altar. What are some of the things you’re going to put on your altar for your parents and why? \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio: So for my dad, outside of being a curator, when he would get home, he just loved to draw in his sketchbooks. And, you know, his routine was just always to brew a cup of coffee and roll a joint and work at his sketchbook. And so art supplies coffee and a little bit of mota is always what I leave out for him. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rio: For my mom… I left out some of her favorite CDs in in our altar and photographs of her uncle, who is the reason why she came to the Bay Area in the first place. Even in grief, having lost both of my parents in the recent years, there’s just a lot of joy in making these things and sharing them with them for the night. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>In 1930, Adolph Gilbert Sutro decided to build a mansion on land that had been in his family since his more famous grandfather purchased it in the 1870s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The plot of land, though it came with views of San Francisco and the East Bay stretching all the way to Mount Diablo, was a cold and uninviting place that got swallowed by thick fog on a daily basis. It had but one hidden entrance, at the end of a narrow lane, encased on all sides by dense rows of trees and tangled blackberry vines. Still, Sutro decided that this isolated southern crest of Mount Sutro would be the perfect place to build his dream home. A mansion that, 40 years later, more closely resembled something out of a nightmare.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13881990']Sutro’s mansion, dubbed La Avanzada, cost $250,000 to build (about $5.4 million in 2022 money) and was designed by English architect \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_G._Stoner\">Harold G. Stoner\u003c/a>. It had three stories, 15 rooms, a footprint of 15,000 square feet, and several turrets. It had unusual features like big stone lions at its entrance, a door completely covered with animal hide, and wall sconces that could accommodate torches. Each room was decorated elaborately with wood panels, stained glass and spider-web motifs. One room even resembled a Swiss chalet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutro lived in the mansion with his mother for 18 years, but when they left, they did so in a hurry. In August 1948, Sutro sold his home for less than half of what he had spent on building it. The buyer? A brand-new television station, KGO-TV.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919697\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 795px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13919697\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp26.1405.jpg\" alt=\"An old mansion with turrets and multiple levels sits incongruously with a giant communications tower emerging from directly behind it.\" width=\"795\" height=\"1000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp26.1405.jpg 795w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp26.1405-160x201.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp26.1405-768x966.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 795px) 100vw, 795px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">When KGO-TV moved into the mansion, it was responsible for putting up the first tower and antenna on Mount Sutro. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp26.1405)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>KGO Radio had long operated out of 420 Taylor St. in downtown San Francisco, but those studios were not equipped to accommodate a TV station. KGO’s chief engineer A. E. “Shorty” Evans scouted suitable locations and landed on the Sutro mansion as the perfect place to build out a studio. (In 1949, the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em> called it “the finest site in the Bay Area for the purpose.”) A director of engineering for Channel 7 named Harry Jacobs was brought in to build a 500-foot transmission tower for KGO-TV. It took a year to construct and had a range of 60 miles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KGO agreed to terms in its real estate contract that forbade the company from altering the mansion’s exterior or cutting down trees on the property’s five acres, unless it was absolutely necessary. The TV station even agreed to have no more than 25 people on the land at any given time. In the channel’s earliest days, that was doable — it broadcast for only 12 hours per week. (Within a year, that amount had increased to 35 hours.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inside the house, the former library acted as a rehearsal studio. The mansion’s ballroom hosted variety shows. Its great hall was used as an “auxiliary studio for live telecasts.” The lounges were remodeled for office use, and the bedrooms were locked up altogether. It didn’t take long for Sutro’s former house to get a creepy reputation. KGO-TV staff members nicknamed it “the haunted mansion” and complained about working in such strange environs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a 1977 \u003cem>Berkeley Gazette\u003c/em> column, a former employee named George Tashman recalled:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>I did some telecasting for KGO-TV at the time, and driving up the curving, tortuous road to the mansion — which resembled nothing so much as Castle Dracula — was a dreadful job. But coming out after a broadcast, and finding the entire road socked in by fog made driving down a two-man operation: one to drive and one to stand next to the left fender and walk on the white line for guidance.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>Still, local people and media held a fascination with the mansion. “Imagination could have a splendid time making [the house] an eerie background for thrills and excitement,” the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> reported in 1969. “Especially on a dark night with the wind whipping the tall eucalyptus trees and the fog curling up the hill to blot out the lights below.” The newspaper described the property as “brooding and baffling.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KGO-TV endured only four years — between 1949 and 1953 — of filming and broadcasting in the mansion. At that time, the studios temporarily moved to Taylor Street, before arriving in 1954 at their new headquarters at 277 Golden Gate Ave. Only KGO-TV’s trusty engineers remained behind at the house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919698\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 788px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13919698\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp14.4746.jpg\" alt=\"The KGO-TV mansion, as viewed from beneath, with a TV truck parked outside, and giant transmission tower stretching up into the sky.\" width=\"788\" height=\"1000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp14.4746.jpg 788w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp14.4746-160x203.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp14.4746-768x975.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 788px) 100vw, 788px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The KGO-TV mansion, as viewed from beneath, with a ramshackle TV truck parked outside, and giant transmission tower thrusting up into the sky. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.4746)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>By the end of the ’60s, the city had decided the mysterious old mansion had to go. Arguments, hearings and legal battles about how and where to build a better transmitter and higher tower for the Bay Area’s television stations had been dragging on since 1956. The Federal Aviation Agency objected to Mount San Bruno as a location because of its close proximity to the airport, so Mount Sutro became the chosen place. The new $4 million tower was intended to eliminate the frequency with which Bay Area television viewers needed to adjust their TV antennas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13917340']In 1969, ground was broken for the construction of the Sutro Tower as we know it today. Adolph G. Sutro’s once protected home was deemed a fire hazard, eyesore and vandal attraction — by then, the windows were regularly broken by thrill seekers and had long been boarded up. The now-dilapidated mansion was unceremoniously demolished.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That is, except for the two lions that once greeted visitors at the front of Adolph G. Sutro’s house — which originally come from his grandfather’s Virginia City home. As the mansion was destroyed, the lions were gifted to San Francisco Parks and Recreation and moved to Meadow Park at Fort Mason. It’s unclear now where they ultimately ended up. (The lion currently at Sutro Heights Park came from the original Sutro mansion that overlooked Sutro Baths.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, all that remains of the mansion is a set of stone stairs that sits within a restricted area underneath Sutro Tower. KQED Network Systems Engineer Michael Kadel had to brave steep slopes and a group of beehives to get the photo below.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13920496\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13920496\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/2022-10-18-07.08.57-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"An old set of stone stairs hidden under leaves and overgrowth.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The mansion’s old front steps as they look today. \u003ccite>(Michael Kadel)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13883118']As construction neared its end, the new Sutro Tower — with its 3.5 million pounds of steel, anchored by 15 million pounds of cement — was considered by neighbors to be far uglier than the mansion ever had been. In 1972, just months away from the tower’s completion, the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em> called it an “ungainly, ugly, iron atrocity” — a far cry from how the structure is viewed today.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As for Adolph G. Sutro? After selling his mansion to KGO-TV, he resided in San Luis Rey near San Diego until his mother’s death in 1961. At that point, he moved to the Portuguese island of Madeira where he died in 1981. According to newspaper reports, he also owned a mysterious mansion there, though no trace of it can be found today — a fate that befell so many of his family’s homes.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Adolph Sutro’s grandson owned a mansion in Twin Peaks until he sold to KGO in 1948. Twenty years later, it was gone.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Sutro’s mansion, dubbed La Avanzada, cost $250,000 to build (about $5.4 million in 2022 money) and was designed by English architect \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_G._Stoner\">Harold G. Stoner\u003c/a>. It had three stories, 15 rooms, a footprint of 15,000 square feet, and several turrets. It had unusual features like big stone lions at its entrance, a door completely covered with animal hide, and wall sconces that could accommodate torches. Each room was decorated elaborately with wood panels, stained glass and spider-web motifs. One room even resembled a Swiss chalet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutro lived in the mansion with his mother for 18 years, but when they left, they did so in a hurry. In August 1948, Sutro sold his home for less than half of what he had spent on building it. The buyer? A brand-new television station, KGO-TV.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919697\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 795px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13919697\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp26.1405.jpg\" alt=\"An old mansion with turrets and multiple levels sits incongruously with a giant communications tower emerging from directly behind it.\" width=\"795\" height=\"1000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp26.1405.jpg 795w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp26.1405-160x201.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp26.1405-768x966.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 795px) 100vw, 795px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">When KGO-TV moved into the mansion, it was responsible for putting up the first tower and antenna on Mount Sutro. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp26.1405)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>KGO Radio had long operated out of 420 Taylor St. in downtown San Francisco, but those studios were not equipped to accommodate a TV station. KGO’s chief engineer A. E. “Shorty” Evans scouted suitable locations and landed on the Sutro mansion as the perfect place to build out a studio. (In 1949, the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em> called it “the finest site in the Bay Area for the purpose.”) A director of engineering for Channel 7 named Harry Jacobs was brought in to build a 500-foot transmission tower for KGO-TV. It took a year to construct and had a range of 60 miles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KGO agreed to terms in its real estate contract that forbade the company from altering the mansion’s exterior or cutting down trees on the property’s five acres, unless it was absolutely necessary. The TV station even agreed to have no more than 25 people on the land at any given time. In the channel’s earliest days, that was doable — it broadcast for only 12 hours per week. (Within a year, that amount had increased to 35 hours.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inside the house, the former library acted as a rehearsal studio. The mansion’s ballroom hosted variety shows. Its great hall was used as an “auxiliary studio for live telecasts.” The lounges were remodeled for office use, and the bedrooms were locked up altogether. It didn’t take long for Sutro’s former house to get a creepy reputation. KGO-TV staff members nicknamed it “the haunted mansion” and complained about working in such strange environs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a 1977 \u003cem>Berkeley Gazette\u003c/em> column, a former employee named George Tashman recalled:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>I did some telecasting for KGO-TV at the time, and driving up the curving, tortuous road to the mansion — which resembled nothing so much as Castle Dracula — was a dreadful job. But coming out after a broadcast, and finding the entire road socked in by fog made driving down a two-man operation: one to drive and one to stand next to the left fender and walk on the white line for guidance.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>Still, local people and media held a fascination with the mansion. “Imagination could have a splendid time making [the house] an eerie background for thrills and excitement,” the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> reported in 1969. “Especially on a dark night with the wind whipping the tall eucalyptus trees and the fog curling up the hill to blot out the lights below.” The newspaper described the property as “brooding and baffling.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KGO-TV endured only four years — between 1949 and 1953 — of filming and broadcasting in the mansion. At that time, the studios temporarily moved to Taylor Street, before arriving in 1954 at their new headquarters at 277 Golden Gate Ave. Only KGO-TV’s trusty engineers remained behind at the house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919698\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 788px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13919698\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp14.4746.jpg\" alt=\"The KGO-TV mansion, as viewed from beneath, with a TV truck parked outside, and giant transmission tower stretching up into the sky.\" width=\"788\" height=\"1000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp14.4746.jpg 788w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp14.4746-160x203.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp14.4746-768x975.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 788px) 100vw, 788px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The KGO-TV mansion, as viewed from beneath, with a ramshackle TV truck parked outside, and giant transmission tower thrusting up into the sky. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.4746)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>By the end of the ’60s, the city had decided the mysterious old mansion had to go. Arguments, hearings and legal battles about how and where to build a better transmitter and higher tower for the Bay Area’s television stations had been dragging on since 1956. The Federal Aviation Agency objected to Mount San Bruno as a location because of its close proximity to the airport, so Mount Sutro became the chosen place. The new $4 million tower was intended to eliminate the frequency with which Bay Area television viewers needed to adjust their TV antennas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In 1969, ground was broken for the construction of the Sutro Tower as we know it today. Adolph G. Sutro’s once protected home was deemed a fire hazard, eyesore and vandal attraction — by then, the windows were regularly broken by thrill seekers and had long been boarded up. The now-dilapidated mansion was unceremoniously demolished.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That is, except for the two lions that once greeted visitors at the front of Adolph G. Sutro’s house — which originally come from his grandfather’s Virginia City home. As the mansion was destroyed, the lions were gifted to San Francisco Parks and Recreation and moved to Meadow Park at Fort Mason. It’s unclear now where they ultimately ended up. (The lion currently at Sutro Heights Park came from the original Sutro mansion that overlooked Sutro Baths.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, all that remains of the mansion is a set of stone stairs that sits within a restricted area underneath Sutro Tower. KQED Network Systems Engineer Michael Kadel had to brave steep slopes and a group of beehives to get the photo below.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13920496\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13920496\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/2022-10-18-07.08.57-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"An old set of stone stairs hidden under leaves and overgrowth.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The mansion’s old front steps as they look today. \u003ccite>(Michael Kadel)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As for Adolph G. Sutro? After selling his mansion to KGO-TV, he resided in San Luis Rey near San Diego until his mother’s death in 1961. At that point, he moved to the Portuguese island of Madeira where he died in 1981. According to newspaper reports, he also owned a mysterious mansion there, though no trace of it can be found today — a fate that befell so many of his family’s homes.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "preserving-oakland-arts-and-culture-at-b-loves-guesthouse",
"title": "Preserving Oakland Arts and Culture at B-Love’s Guesthouse",
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"content": "\u003cp>Inside of a classic Queen Anne Victorian in West Oakland, photographer \u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/tracibartlow/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Traci Bartlow\u003c/a> displays beautifully framed images of the people who shaped hip-hop culture here in the Bay Area, and across the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her exhibition, \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-gallery-experience-at-b-loves-guest-house-tickets-403783887477\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Oakland Picture Lady: Tales of the 90’s Girl\u003c/a>\u003c/em>, features photos of Outkast and Queen Latifah, Busta Rhymes and ODB, alongside images of the Luniz and Shock-G, as well as E-40 and The Click.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the photos tell a story about what life was like in growing up in Oakland, it’s her house that tells the complex story of multiple generations of Black folks, land ownership and community appreciation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Traci is the owner of \u003ca href=\"https://www.b-lovesguesthouse.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">B-Love’s Guesthouse\u003c/a>, which is a photography museum \u003cem>and\u003c/em> a boutique hotel. With its picturesque front porch and flourishing garden in the back, the building features seven different rooms that folks can rent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13920339\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13920339\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-800x535.jpg\" alt=\"Traci Bartlow holds up an image of the wash house her mother once owned in East Oakland. \" width=\"800\" height=\"535\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-800x535.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-1020x682.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-768x513.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-1536x1027.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426.jpg 1616w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Traci Bartlow holds up an image of the washhouse her mother once owned in East Oakland. \u003ccite>(Pendarvis Harshaw)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>An \u003ca href=\"https://www.alvinailey.org/school\">Ailey School\u003c/a> graduate turned \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjBa6yqRau4\">Emmy-winning dancer\u003c/a> and choreographer, Traci fell in love with the arts through what she experienced in her neighborhood as a child. Block parties and family functions introduced her to her love of dance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Born and raised in East Oakland, she also saw firsthand the importance of a neighborhood hub by watching the multiple ways people would use her mother’s washhouse. It wasn’t just a laundromat but a corner store, a place to get your prom dress made or pick up your Avon order.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She acquired her current home from the late Eddie Mae Holmes, a Black woman who once owned multiple properties in West Oakland. And Traci envisioned using the space for the purposes of artistic expression and community gatherings, including showcasing her work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13920342\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-13920342 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-800x535.jpg\" alt=\"Traci Bartlow.\" width=\"800\" height=\"535\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-800x535.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-1020x682.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-768x513.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-1536x1027.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446.jpg 1616w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Traci Bartlow sits on the stairwell of her Queen Ann Victorian home in West Oakland \u003ccite>(Pendarvis Harshaw)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Now B-Love’s Guesthouse stands as a home for hip-hop history and a safe haven for folks to come together.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This week we take a tour of the property and walk down memory lane through her photos. If you’re interested after listening to this episode, you can take a \u003ca href=\"https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-gallery-experience-at-b-loves-guest-house-tickets-403783887477\">tour\u003c/a> too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC5621038255&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://bit.ly/3TiAwgf\">Read the transcript\u003c/a>.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Below are lightly edited excerpts of my conversation with Traci Bartlow.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pen: \u003c/span>Just a few blocks from the women of the Black Panther Party mural and West Oakland BART station is Traci Bartlow’s home and hotel, B-Love’s Guesthouse. It’s on a residential street with lots of history.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Traci:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I acquired the house in 2007 from a team of people that would buy houses, flip them, and then sell them. They bought the house from a woman named Eddie Mae Holmes. And Ms. Holmes was an African-American woman that came to West Oakland when she was 14 years old. And, through her family ownership, she acquired this house, this house on the corner. And in 1965, she had that apartment building around the corner built. On the lower level of the apartment building, she had Holmes Barber Shop. So Ms. Holmes is one of those black women in the community that was providing in so many different ways for everyone. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pen: \u003c/span> About 15 years ago, Traci converted her home into a guesthouse. People can choose from one of seven rooms for an overnight stay. And at the same time, folks can enjoy the framed photos from Traci’s archives. Her photos are a time machine, instantly transporting me back to the East Oakland that I knew as a youth. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[aside postid='arts_13891300']Traci: These are people that I grew up with. You know, we went to middle school and high school together. My mother owned the laundromat on 98th and Birch, and so everyone would come and do their laundry at my mom’s laundromat. And her business wasn’t just where you can do your laundry. It was like a community center where my mom had a sewing machine in the corner and she would do alterations and she would make prom dresses and make outfits for people. She also sold Avon, and we had a little store in the back where you could buy candy and chips and sandwiches. I would make homemade cookies and we would have those ghetto Icees, you know, like Kool-Aid in a cup. So people were always coming to the laundromat. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pen: \u003c/span> Even before she got into photography, Traci was already into the arts. At age 19, she was awarded a scholarship to study dance at the \u003ca href=\"https://www.alvinailey.org/school\">Ailey School\u003c/a> in New York. After finishing the two-year professional dance training program, she took performing gigs across the globe. One thing led to another and Traci dabbled in modeling before picking up the camera herself. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Traci: I would also find myself at modeling shoots and just be like, ‘What kind of light is that? Oh, that’s a diffuser? What does that do?’ \u003c/span>It was just like this natural progression of me knowing about photography and wanting to learn more. \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m self-taught, so I started photographing other dancers. And you’ll see many images from this photo shoot, because this was an assignment I gave myself to practice with high speed film. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>Rightnowish is an arts and culture podcast produced at KQED. Listen to it wherever you get your podcasts or click the play button at the top of this page and subscribe to the show on \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/721590300/rightnowish\">NPR One\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://open.spotify.com/show/7kEJuafTzTVan7B78ttz1I\">Spotify\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rightnowish/id1482187648\">Apple Podcasts\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://tunein.com/podcasts/Arts--Culture-Podcasts/Rightnowish-p1258245/\">TuneIn\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/kqed/rightnowish\">Stitcher\u003c/a> or wherever you get your podcasts. \u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Inside of a classic Queen Anne Victorian in West Oakland, photographer \u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/tracibartlow/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Traci Bartlow\u003c/a> displays beautifully framed images of the people who shaped hip-hop culture here in the Bay Area, and across the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her exhibition, \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-gallery-experience-at-b-loves-guest-house-tickets-403783887477\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Oakland Picture Lady: Tales of the 90’s Girl\u003c/a>\u003c/em>, features photos of Outkast and Queen Latifah, Busta Rhymes and ODB, alongside images of the Luniz and Shock-G, as well as E-40 and The Click.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the photos tell a story about what life was like in growing up in Oakland, it’s her house that tells the complex story of multiple generations of Black folks, land ownership and community appreciation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Traci is the owner of \u003ca href=\"https://www.b-lovesguesthouse.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">B-Love’s Guesthouse\u003c/a>, which is a photography museum \u003cem>and\u003c/em> a boutique hotel. With its picturesque front porch and flourishing garden in the back, the building features seven different rooms that folks can rent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13920339\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13920339\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-800x535.jpg\" alt=\"Traci Bartlow holds up an image of the wash house her mother once owned in East Oakland. \" width=\"800\" height=\"535\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-800x535.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-1020x682.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-768x513.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426-1536x1027.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04426.jpg 1616w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Traci Bartlow holds up an image of the washhouse her mother once owned in East Oakland. \u003ccite>(Pendarvis Harshaw)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>An \u003ca href=\"https://www.alvinailey.org/school\">Ailey School\u003c/a> graduate turned \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjBa6yqRau4\">Emmy-winning dancer\u003c/a> and choreographer, Traci fell in love with the arts through what she experienced in her neighborhood as a child. Block parties and family functions introduced her to her love of dance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Born and raised in East Oakland, she also saw firsthand the importance of a neighborhood hub by watching the multiple ways people would use her mother’s washhouse. It wasn’t just a laundromat but a corner store, a place to get your prom dress made or pick up your Avon order.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She acquired her current home from the late Eddie Mae Holmes, a Black woman who once owned multiple properties in West Oakland. And Traci envisioned using the space for the purposes of artistic expression and community gatherings, including showcasing her work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13920342\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-13920342 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-800x535.jpg\" alt=\"Traci Bartlow.\" width=\"800\" height=\"535\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-800x535.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-1020x682.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-768x513.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446-1536x1027.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/10/DSC04446.jpg 1616w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Traci Bartlow sits on the stairwell of her Queen Ann Victorian home in West Oakland \u003ccite>(Pendarvis Harshaw)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Now B-Love’s Guesthouse stands as a home for hip-hop history and a safe haven for folks to come together.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This week we take a tour of the property and walk down memory lane through her photos. If you’re interested after listening to this episode, you can take a \u003ca href=\"https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-gallery-experience-at-b-loves-guest-house-tickets-403783887477\">tour\u003c/a> too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC5621038255&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://bit.ly/3TiAwgf\">Read the transcript\u003c/a>.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Below are lightly edited excerpts of my conversation with Traci Bartlow.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pen: \u003c/span>Just a few blocks from the women of the Black Panther Party mural and West Oakland BART station is Traci Bartlow’s home and hotel, B-Love’s Guesthouse. It’s on a residential street with lots of history.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Traci:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I acquired the house in 2007 from a team of people that would buy houses, flip them, and then sell them. They bought the house from a woman named Eddie Mae Holmes. And Ms. Holmes was an African-American woman that came to West Oakland when she was 14 years old. And, through her family ownership, she acquired this house, this house on the corner. And in 1965, she had that apartment building around the corner built. On the lower level of the apartment building, she had Holmes Barber Shop. So Ms. Holmes is one of those black women in the community that was providing in so many different ways for everyone. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pen: \u003c/span> About 15 years ago, Traci converted her home into a guesthouse. People can choose from one of seven rooms for an overnight stay. And at the same time, folks can enjoy the framed photos from Traci’s archives. Her photos are a time machine, instantly transporting me back to the East Oakland that I knew as a youth. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Traci: These are people that I grew up with. You know, we went to middle school and high school together. My mother owned the laundromat on 98th and Birch, and so everyone would come and do their laundry at my mom’s laundromat. And her business wasn’t just where you can do your laundry. It was like a community center where my mom had a sewing machine in the corner and she would do alterations and she would make prom dresses and make outfits for people. She also sold Avon, and we had a little store in the back where you could buy candy and chips and sandwiches. I would make homemade cookies and we would have those ghetto Icees, you know, like Kool-Aid in a cup. So people were always coming to the laundromat. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pen: \u003c/span> Even before she got into photography, Traci was already into the arts. At age 19, she was awarded a scholarship to study dance at the \u003ca href=\"https://www.alvinailey.org/school\">Ailey School\u003c/a> in New York. After finishing the two-year professional dance training program, she took performing gigs across the globe. One thing led to another and Traci dabbled in modeling before picking up the camera herself. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Traci: I would also find myself at modeling shoots and just be like, ‘What kind of light is that? Oh, that’s a diffuser? What does that do?’ \u003c/span>It was just like this natural progression of me knowing about photography and wanting to learn more. \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m self-taught, so I started photographing other dancers. And you’ll see many images from this photo shoot, because this was an assignment I gave myself to practice with high speed film. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>Rightnowish is an arts and culture podcast produced at KQED. Listen to it wherever you get your podcasts or click the play button at the top of this page and subscribe to the show on \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/721590300/rightnowish\">NPR One\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://open.spotify.com/show/7kEJuafTzTVan7B78ttz1I\">Spotify\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rightnowish/id1482187648\">Apple Podcasts\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://tunein.com/podcasts/Arts--Culture-Podcasts/Rightnowish-p1258245/\">TuneIn\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/kqed/rightnowish\">Stitcher\u003c/a> or wherever you get your podcasts. \u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>[dropcap]I[/dropcap]t was the strangest of restaurants. Situated on the top floor of a Green Street apartment building, diners were asked to leave their coats in a bedroom, walk through the kitchen to get to a table, and take a seat in one of four small, separate dining rooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, customers came from all over San Francisco, lining up in the hallway for a chance to eat at Elena Zelayeta’s apartment. Her cheese-stuffed green peppers, enchiladas and chilies rellenos were the stuff of legend around the city. And, if not for the depression, there’s a good chance no one would ever have tasted them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13906189']When 1930 began, Zelayeta was working as a secretary and her husband of five years, Lorenzo, was employed as a structural engineer. As soon as the depression hit, they both lost their jobs and had to scramble to support their four-year-old son, Lawrence. Zelayeta came up with the idea of opening a restaurant. She had learned to cook as a child from her Spanish mother and the chefs who worked at her parents’ hotel in El Mineral del Oro, a small mining town on the outskirts of Pachuca, Mexico. Concerned about being a good wife, Zelayeta had honed her culinary skills carefully after getting married.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once Zelayeta started inviting the public into her home, the 32-year-old immediately took on a punishing schedule. She worked seven days a week, rising at 5 a.m. each day and working until midnight. It wasn’t easy, but Zelayeta greatly appreciated her faithful clientele. Not only was Mexican cuisine in general not yet popular with white diners, but hostilities towards Latinos were at an all-time high due to the national work shortage. Zelayeta’s cooking skills were enough to silence the skeptical and attract a diverse group of customers. At her restaurant’s peak popularity, she prepared and served over 100 meals a day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zelayeta’s faith and bravery had paid off. She would soon need more of both.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[dropcap]W[/dropcap]ithin three years of opening her apartment doors, Zelayeta’s popularity outgrew the space. She reopened her restaurant in a more formal setting: the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kinggeorge.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">King George Hotel\u003c/a> near Union Square. This time it had a name: Elena’s Mexican Village. By all accounts, it was a vibrant, colorful place to spend an evening. Zelayeta herself was known to emerge from the kitchen, greet people and dance joyfully through the dining room, much to customers’ delight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13909738']A twist of fate arrived in 1934. Zelayeta had been left with permanent eye damage after suffering a bout of scarlet fever as an infant. The popular chef noticed her eyes beginning to fall out of focus; she stopped being able to recognize customers at the restaurant until they were within inches. Zelayeta finally visited a doctor, who told her the situation was hopeless. A detached retina and severe cataract were about to render her blind, and there was no way to stop it. Compounding Zelayeta’s fears at the time was something else — she was pregnant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Zelayeta lost her sight, she fell into a deep depression. “At first I was in darkness,” she said later. “I had watched my sight go. I would look in the mirror, and gradually I saw my image growing dimmer and dimmer.” A few days after going completely blind, in total despair, Zelayeta attempted to throw herself from her seventh-story apartment window. Lorenzo caught her in the act and pulled her back from the ledge. Two months later, her second son was born. “Billy’s coming was like an Easter for me,” Zelayeta recognized later. “Not just a birth, but a rebirth.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, the period after going blind was a tough one for Zelayeta. When she left the restaurant in the hands of other chefs, diners slowly stopped coming. At home, Zelayeta slowly learned how to live without sight while also fighting a deep depression. “For two years I was in the dark,” she said in a 1944 interview. “Then I said to myself, ‘Elena, you aren’t being anything but a burden to your family.’ So I changed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zelayeta decided to live as she had before her sight loss. Gradually, she taught herself to cook again, relying on her sense of touch and smell to re-master her favorite dishes. She timed how long things had been in the oven based on radio programming. She started inviting more guests over, and attended movies and dances. She found silver linings in her sight loss. “To me, people cannot age,” she said later. “I can see them as I saw them 10 years ago. Young, pretty, never growing old.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1944, Zelayeta turned a major corner. She began teaching cookery classes at the San Francisco Center for the Blind. That same year, the chef wrote and released her first book, \u003cem>Elena’s Famous Mexican and Spanish Recipes.\u003c/em> The tome included many of the dishes she had served in her restaurant, and her warm personality was a constant presence throughout. In her introduction, she noted that “All recipes have been thoroughly tested. All carry my wishes for \u003cem>buena suerte\u003c/em>!” The book was an immediate success and went on to sell half a million copies. Zelayeta was finally able to pay off the debts she’d accrued after she lost the restaurant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13906222']Zelayeta’s status as the only blind cooking teacher in the United States meant that her skills stayed in demand. At the invitation of the Mexican government, she visited Mexico City and established a rehabilitation program for people who had lost their sight. She also traveled all over America teaching blind students how to prepare their own meals. One of the things that made Zelayeta such a great teacher was her wicked sense of humor, captured in a 1950 Chicago Tribune story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Elena rocks with glee when she tells the story of the young lad who had just been blinded and was so despondent he wouldn’t bathe,” the paper reported. “Elena was going to see that he bathed, if she had to do the job herself. She escorted the boy to the bathroom while he protested in embarrassment. ‘What’s the difference — we’re both blind as bats!’ she jollied him.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[dropcap]S[/dropcap]adly, in 1945, tragedy struck Zelayeta’s life once more. Her husband Lorenzo was killed in a catastrophic collision on Bayshore Highway when his car was flipped by a Greyhound bus. (\u003ca href=\"https://casetext.com/case/zelayeta-v-pacific-greyhound-lines\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Zelayeta would later win $75,000 in a wrongful death lawsuit\u003c/a>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her grief, recovery and many experiences teaching blind students inspired Zelayeta’s second book, 1947’s \u003cem>Elena’s Lessons in Living\u003c/em>. It proved so uplifting and full of comforting wisdom, Zelayeta found herself inundated by strangers with personal questions and requests for advice — some of whom would show up to her home and knock on her door. She began speaking regularly at women’s clubs. Around this time, the president of Mexico even decorated Zelayeta for her “service to humanity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By 1950, Zelayeta was considered the foremost authority on Mexican cooking in America. So it made sense when a brand new San Francisco television station, KGO-TV, asked her to host her own show. She was the first Latina with a televised cooking show in the United States. For 15 minutes every Friday, \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://diva.sfsu.edu/collections/sfbatv/bundles/189406\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Fun to Eat with Elena\u003c/a> \u003c/em>announced its arrival with a catchy jingle and an image of her two books. During the show, her son Billy regularly appeared to fetch things from around the kitchen for her. Somebody had to. Every week, too, the crew attached strings to Zelayeta’s ankles and pulled on them to let her know which direction to turn for the camera.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zelayeta’s ambitions grew further. In 1951, she opened \u003cem>Elena’s Food Specialties\u003c/em>, a frozen food enterprise run by her son Lawrence out of a building on South Van Ness in the Mission. The new affordability of home freezers allowed Zelayeta’s food to be enjoyed anywhere there were people with iceboxes. When not busy with her own company, she also served as a consultant to Lawry’s Foods Inc. in the development of Mexican products.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13894842']As if that weren’t enough to keep Zelayeta busy, three more cookbooks followed. In 1952, \u003cem>Elena’s Fiesta Recipes\u003c/em> featured dishes she cooked for her own family. In 1958, \u003cem>Elena’s Secrets of Mexican Cooking\u003c/em> arrived and was hailed the “definitive volume on the subject” by the New York Times. The year 1967 brought \u003cem>Elena’s Favorite Foods, California\u003c/em> Style, a reflection on how Mexican and American cuisines had successfully mingled together. Somehow, Zelayeta also found time to write a memoir, titled simply \u003cem>Elena\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Elena Zelayeta died in 1974 at the age of 76, following a stroke. Today, though her books are hard to find and her legacy has been largely forgotten, her influence looms large on Mexican food in Northern California. Perhaps even more importantly, Zelayeta lived her life as the very picture of creative resilience. She overcame tough odds again and again, and never lost her infectious smile, sharp sense of humor or desire to help others.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Many of us want everyone to adjust to us,” she said in a 1950 interview. “We should begin with ourselves. There is little we can do about others. But there is much we can do to improve ourselves.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>To learn about other Rebel Girls from Bay Area History, visit the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/rebelgirls\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Rebel Girls homepage\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A book celebrating women from the Rebel Girls series, \u003ca href=\"https://citylights.com/politics-current-events-history/unsung-heroines35-women-who-changed/\">‘Unsung Heroines: 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area,’\u003c/a> is available now from City Lights.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">I\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>t was the strangest of restaurants. Situated on the top floor of a Green Street apartment building, diners were asked to leave their coats in a bedroom, walk through the kitchen to get to a table, and take a seat in one of four small, separate dining rooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, customers came from all over San Francisco, lining up in the hallway for a chance to eat at Elena Zelayeta’s apartment. Her cheese-stuffed green peppers, enchiladas and chilies rellenos were the stuff of legend around the city. And, if not for the depression, there’s a good chance no one would ever have tasted them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>When 1930 began, Zelayeta was working as a secretary and her husband of five years, Lorenzo, was employed as a structural engineer. As soon as the depression hit, they both lost their jobs and had to scramble to support their four-year-old son, Lawrence. Zelayeta came up with the idea of opening a restaurant. She had learned to cook as a child from her Spanish mother and the chefs who worked at her parents’ hotel in El Mineral del Oro, a small mining town on the outskirts of Pachuca, Mexico. Concerned about being a good wife, Zelayeta had honed her culinary skills carefully after getting married.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once Zelayeta started inviting the public into her home, the 32-year-old immediately took on a punishing schedule. She worked seven days a week, rising at 5 a.m. each day and working until midnight. It wasn’t easy, but Zelayeta greatly appreciated her faithful clientele. Not only was Mexican cuisine in general not yet popular with white diners, but hostilities towards Latinos were at an all-time high due to the national work shortage. Zelayeta’s cooking skills were enough to silence the skeptical and attract a diverse group of customers. At her restaurant’s peak popularity, she prepared and served over 100 meals a day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zelayeta’s faith and bravery had paid off. She would soon need more of both.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">W\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>ithin three years of opening her apartment doors, Zelayeta’s popularity outgrew the space. She reopened her restaurant in a more formal setting: the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kinggeorge.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">King George Hotel\u003c/a> near Union Square. This time it had a name: Elena’s Mexican Village. By all accounts, it was a vibrant, colorful place to spend an evening. Zelayeta herself was known to emerge from the kitchen, greet people and dance joyfully through the dining room, much to customers’ delight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>A twist of fate arrived in 1934. Zelayeta had been left with permanent eye damage after suffering a bout of scarlet fever as an infant. The popular chef noticed her eyes beginning to fall out of focus; she stopped being able to recognize customers at the restaurant until they were within inches. Zelayeta finally visited a doctor, who told her the situation was hopeless. A detached retina and severe cataract were about to render her blind, and there was no way to stop it. Compounding Zelayeta’s fears at the time was something else — she was pregnant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Zelayeta lost her sight, she fell into a deep depression. “At first I was in darkness,” she said later. “I had watched my sight go. I would look in the mirror, and gradually I saw my image growing dimmer and dimmer.” A few days after going completely blind, in total despair, Zelayeta attempted to throw herself from her seventh-story apartment window. Lorenzo caught her in the act and pulled her back from the ledge. Two months later, her second son was born. “Billy’s coming was like an Easter for me,” Zelayeta recognized later. “Not just a birth, but a rebirth.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, the period after going blind was a tough one for Zelayeta. When she left the restaurant in the hands of other chefs, diners slowly stopped coming. At home, Zelayeta slowly learned how to live without sight while also fighting a deep depression. “For two years I was in the dark,” she said in a 1944 interview. “Then I said to myself, ‘Elena, you aren’t being anything but a burden to your family.’ So I changed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zelayeta decided to live as she had before her sight loss. Gradually, she taught herself to cook again, relying on her sense of touch and smell to re-master her favorite dishes. She timed how long things had been in the oven based on radio programming. She started inviting more guests over, and attended movies and dances. She found silver linings in her sight loss. “To me, people cannot age,” she said later. “I can see them as I saw them 10 years ago. Young, pretty, never growing old.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1944, Zelayeta turned a major corner. She began teaching cookery classes at the San Francisco Center for the Blind. That same year, the chef wrote and released her first book, \u003cem>Elena’s Famous Mexican and Spanish Recipes.\u003c/em> The tome included many of the dishes she had served in her restaurant, and her warm personality was a constant presence throughout. In her introduction, she noted that “All recipes have been thoroughly tested. All carry my wishes for \u003cem>buena suerte\u003c/em>!” The book was an immediate success and went on to sell half a million copies. Zelayeta was finally able to pay off the debts she’d accrued after she lost the restaurant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Zelayeta’s status as the only blind cooking teacher in the United States meant that her skills stayed in demand. At the invitation of the Mexican government, she visited Mexico City and established a rehabilitation program for people who had lost their sight. She also traveled all over America teaching blind students how to prepare their own meals. One of the things that made Zelayeta such a great teacher was her wicked sense of humor, captured in a 1950 Chicago Tribune story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Elena rocks with glee when she tells the story of the young lad who had just been blinded and was so despondent he wouldn’t bathe,” the paper reported. “Elena was going to see that he bathed, if she had to do the job herself. She escorted the boy to the bathroom while he protested in embarrassment. ‘What’s the difference — we’re both blind as bats!’ she jollied him.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">S\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>adly, in 1945, tragedy struck Zelayeta’s life once more. Her husband Lorenzo was killed in a catastrophic collision on Bayshore Highway when his car was flipped by a Greyhound bus. (\u003ca href=\"https://casetext.com/case/zelayeta-v-pacific-greyhound-lines\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Zelayeta would later win $75,000 in a wrongful death lawsuit\u003c/a>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her grief, recovery and many experiences teaching blind students inspired Zelayeta’s second book, 1947’s \u003cem>Elena’s Lessons in Living\u003c/em>. It proved so uplifting and full of comforting wisdom, Zelayeta found herself inundated by strangers with personal questions and requests for advice — some of whom would show up to her home and knock on her door. She began speaking regularly at women’s clubs. Around this time, the president of Mexico even decorated Zelayeta for her “service to humanity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By 1950, Zelayeta was considered the foremost authority on Mexican cooking in America. So it made sense when a brand new San Francisco television station, KGO-TV, asked her to host her own show. She was the first Latina with a televised cooking show in the United States. For 15 minutes every Friday, \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://diva.sfsu.edu/collections/sfbatv/bundles/189406\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Fun to Eat with Elena\u003c/a> \u003c/em>announced its arrival with a catchy jingle and an image of her two books. During the show, her son Billy regularly appeared to fetch things from around the kitchen for her. Somebody had to. Every week, too, the crew attached strings to Zelayeta’s ankles and pulled on them to let her know which direction to turn for the camera.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zelayeta’s ambitions grew further. In 1951, she opened \u003cem>Elena’s Food Specialties\u003c/em>, a frozen food enterprise run by her son Lawrence out of a building on South Van Ness in the Mission. The new affordability of home freezers allowed Zelayeta’s food to be enjoyed anywhere there were people with iceboxes. When not busy with her own company, she also served as a consultant to Lawry’s Foods Inc. in the development of Mexican products.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>As if that weren’t enough to keep Zelayeta busy, three more cookbooks followed. In 1952, \u003cem>Elena’s Fiesta Recipes\u003c/em> featured dishes she cooked for her own family. In 1958, \u003cem>Elena’s Secrets of Mexican Cooking\u003c/em> arrived and was hailed the “definitive volume on the subject” by the New York Times. The year 1967 brought \u003cem>Elena’s Favorite Foods, California\u003c/em> Style, a reflection on how Mexican and American cuisines had successfully mingled together. Somehow, Zelayeta also found time to write a memoir, titled simply \u003cem>Elena\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Elena Zelayeta died in 1974 at the age of 76, following a stroke. Today, though her books are hard to find and her legacy has been largely forgotten, her influence looms large on Mexican food in Northern California. Perhaps even more importantly, Zelayeta lived her life as the very picture of creative resilience. She overcame tough odds again and again, and never lost her infectious smile, sharp sense of humor or desire to help others.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Many of us want everyone to adjust to us,” she said in a 1950 interview. “We should begin with ourselves. There is little we can do about others. But there is much we can do to improve ourselves.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>To learn about other Rebel Girls from Bay Area History, visit the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/rebelgirls\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Rebel Girls homepage\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A book celebrating women from the Rebel Girls series, \u003ca href=\"https://citylights.com/politics-current-events-history/unsung-heroines35-women-who-changed/\">‘Unsung Heroines: 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area,’\u003c/a> is available now from City Lights.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Lizzo Played James Madison's Crystal Flute Onstage in D.C., Proving History Rocks",
"headTitle": "Lizzo Played James Madison’s Crystal Flute Onstage in D.C., Proving History Rocks | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>Some people visit Washington, D.C., for the tourist attractions, like monuments and museums. They probably don’t expect to see history being made at a pop concert—but that’s what happened to an arena full of fans at Lizzo’s concert Tuesday night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The superstar singer, rapper and classically trained flutist took a quick but momentous break from the setlist of “The Special Tour” to play a crystal flute that was owned by former President James Madison and loaned to her by the Library of Congress.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That makes Lizzo the first and only person to play the centuries-old flute, she \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/lizzo/status/1575003731640274944?s=20&t=0ViPkYJzGgjR-QFMojQcLQ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">said in a tweet\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“NOBODY HAS EVER HEARD THIS FAMOUS CRYSTAL FLUTE BEFORE,” she wrote. “NOW YOU HAVE.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://twitter.com/lizzo/status/1575003731640274944\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A French fluter made the ornate instrument in 1813 specifically for Madison in honor of his second inauguration, according to the \u003ca href=\"https://blogs.loc.gov/loc/2018/10/the-mystery-of-james-madisons-crystal-flute/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Library of Congress\u003c/a>. It says it’s possible that the flute was one of a handful of valuables that former first lady Dolley Madison took with her from the White House as she fled just before \u003ca href=\"https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/generic/August_Burning_Washington.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">British troops set fire to Washington, D.C.\u003c/a>, in 1814.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13858111']So how did it make its way onto the Capital One Arena stage and into the hands of the chart-topping artist? With a lot of security, is the short answer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s the longer version. The flute is among the more than 1,800 flutes that now live in the Library of Congress, which has the largest such collection in the world, according to Carla Hayden, the librarian of Congress (a position nominated by the U.S. president and confirmed by the Senate). Notably, Hayden is \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/07/14/485992207/senate-approves-carla-hayden-as-new-librarian-of-congress\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the first woman\u003c/a> and first African American to hold the title.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Friday, Hayden \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/LibnOfCongress/status/1573327405196115969?s=20&t=CpqHhg8oL4qbpku5CuRPQQ\">tagged Lizzo in a tweet\u003c/a> showcasing some of Library’s flutes — including Madison’s — and inviting her “to come see it and even play a couple when you are in D.C. next week.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Like your song they are ‘Good as hell,’ ” she added, with a winking emoji.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://twitter.com/LibnOfCongress/status/1573327405196115969\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lizzo quickly RSVP’ed with an enthusiastic tweet of her own:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s worth noting that Lizzo has been \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbsnews.com/news/extended-interview-lizzo-on-her-flute-and-being-a-band-geek/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">playing the flute since she was in grade school\u003c/a>, first learning by ear and then in private lessons (she initially dreamed of becoming a concert flautist before getting into rap and singing). She whips out her flute—which is named Sasha after Beyonce’s “I Am Sasha Fierce” and has its own \u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/sashabefluting/?hl=en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Instagram account\u003c/a>—often, including on \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhctLo_qS10\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Saturday Night Live\u003c/em>\u003c/a> and at her \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFiLdByWIDY\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NPR Tiny Desk Concert\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Monday, a \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/AntonioDeLoeraB/status/1574473966957346824?s=20&t=c6MDbjT_yBLRiQS7mojDqw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">patron tweeted\u003c/a> that they had spotted Lizzo at the Library of Congress and that Hayden had personally asked if it was OK with them if she broke the library’s “quiet rule” to play the flute (they said yes, of course). The Library of Congress also dropped a hint about its celebrity visitor, \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/librarycongress/status/1574912334769840128?s=20&t=Bfr7x3jPsfloIXbxtYMNyQ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tweeting a photo\u003c/a> of a sign with Lizzo’s picture and a piece of tape reading, in all caps, “flute guest.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13882779']Handlers brought the flute onstage at Lizzo’s concert the next night. Clad in a shimmering bodysuit, she gingerly accepted the instrument and carried it carefully to the standing microphone a few steps away, remarking that “it’s like playing out of a wine glass, so be patient.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lizzo lined up her fingers and played a clear, reverberating note—then widened her eyes and stuck out her tongue in apparent amazement. She played another trill while twerking to the beat, as the audience roared. After that she returned the instrument and ran back to the mic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“B***h, I just twerked and played James Madison’s crystal flute from the 1800s,” she exclaimed. “We just made history tonight!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She thanked the Library of Congress for “preserving our history and making history freaking cool.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carrie Arnold, who was in the crowd on Tuesday, told NPR that the moment felt like a celebration of progress, in a way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not often you see a founding father’s personal artifacts reclaimed as a symbol of pop culture and a celebration [of] Black female empowerment,” she wrote via text. “It was so uniquely a moment that could only happen in D.C. and … the audience took pride in that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The library later tweeted that the flute had made it back safely, thanks to an escort from Capitol Police, and hinted it will be sharing more from Lizzo’s visit soon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://twitter.com/librarycongress/status/1574969878208978944?s=20&t=vUjG12byGM7710kwVW0v7Q\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the meantime, D.C. residents as well as history buffs and Lizzo fans from far and wide are amplifying the \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/search?q=lizzo%20flute&src=typed_query\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">videos on social media\u003c/a> and praising all involved for making the unforgettable moment possible—and especially Lizzo for championing the importance of history. As she said herself onstage:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“History is freaking cool, you guys!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Lizzo+played+James+Madison%27s+crystal+flute+onstage+in+D.C.%2C+proving+history+rocks&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Some people visit Washington, D.C., for the tourist attractions, like monuments and museums. They probably don’t expect to see history being made at a pop concert—but that’s what happened to an arena full of fans at Lizzo’s concert Tuesday night.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The superstar singer, rapper and classically trained flutist took a quick but momentous break from the setlist of “The Special Tour” to play a crystal flute that was owned by former President James Madison and loaned to her by the Library of Congress.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That makes Lizzo the first and only person to play the centuries-old flute, she \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/lizzo/status/1575003731640274944?s=20&t=0ViPkYJzGgjR-QFMojQcLQ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">said in a tweet\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“NOBODY HAS EVER HEARD THIS FAMOUS CRYSTAL FLUTE BEFORE,” she wrote. “NOW YOU HAVE.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A French fluter made the ornate instrument in 1813 specifically for Madison in honor of his second inauguration, according to the \u003ca href=\"https://blogs.loc.gov/loc/2018/10/the-mystery-of-james-madisons-crystal-flute/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Library of Congress\u003c/a>. It says it’s possible that the flute was one of a handful of valuables that former first lady Dolley Madison took with her from the White House as she fled just before \u003ca href=\"https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/generic/August_Burning_Washington.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">British troops set fire to Washington, D.C.\u003c/a>, in 1814.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>So how did it make its way onto the Capital One Arena stage and into the hands of the chart-topping artist? With a lot of security, is the short answer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s the longer version. The flute is among the more than 1,800 flutes that now live in the Library of Congress, which has the largest such collection in the world, according to Carla Hayden, the librarian of Congress (a position nominated by the U.S. president and confirmed by the Senate). Notably, Hayden is \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/07/14/485992207/senate-approves-carla-hayden-as-new-librarian-of-congress\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the first woman\u003c/a> and first African American to hold the title.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Friday, Hayden \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/LibnOfCongress/status/1573327405196115969?s=20&t=CpqHhg8oL4qbpku5CuRPQQ\">tagged Lizzo in a tweet\u003c/a> showcasing some of Library’s flutes — including Madison’s — and inviting her “to come see it and even play a couple when you are in D.C. next week.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Like your song they are ‘Good as hell,’ ” she added, with a winking emoji.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\n\u003cp>Lizzo quickly RSVP’ed with an enthusiastic tweet of her own:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s worth noting that Lizzo has been \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbsnews.com/news/extended-interview-lizzo-on-her-flute-and-being-a-band-geek/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">playing the flute since she was in grade school\u003c/a>, first learning by ear and then in private lessons (she initially dreamed of becoming a concert flautist before getting into rap and singing). She whips out her flute—which is named Sasha after Beyonce’s “I Am Sasha Fierce” and has its own \u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/sashabefluting/?hl=en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Instagram account\u003c/a>—often, including on \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhctLo_qS10\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Saturday Night Live\u003c/em>\u003c/a> and at her \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFiLdByWIDY\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NPR Tiny Desk Concert\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Monday, a \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/AntonioDeLoeraB/status/1574473966957346824?s=20&t=c6MDbjT_yBLRiQS7mojDqw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">patron tweeted\u003c/a> that they had spotted Lizzo at the Library of Congress and that Hayden had personally asked if it was OK with them if she broke the library’s “quiet rule” to play the flute (they said yes, of course). The Library of Congress also dropped a hint about its celebrity visitor, \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/librarycongress/status/1574912334769840128?s=20&t=Bfr7x3jPsfloIXbxtYMNyQ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tweeting a photo\u003c/a> of a sign with Lizzo’s picture and a piece of tape reading, in all caps, “flute guest.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Handlers brought the flute onstage at Lizzo’s concert the next night. Clad in a shimmering bodysuit, she gingerly accepted the instrument and carried it carefully to the standing microphone a few steps away, remarking that “it’s like playing out of a wine glass, so be patient.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lizzo lined up her fingers and played a clear, reverberating note—then widened her eyes and stuck out her tongue in apparent amazement. She played another trill while twerking to the beat, as the audience roared. After that she returned the instrument and ran back to the mic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“B***h, I just twerked and played James Madison’s crystal flute from the 1800s,” she exclaimed. “We just made history tonight!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She thanked the Library of Congress for “preserving our history and making history freaking cool.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carrie Arnold, who was in the crowd on Tuesday, told NPR that the moment felt like a celebration of progress, in a way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not often you see a founding father’s personal artifacts reclaimed as a symbol of pop culture and a celebration [of] Black female empowerment,” she wrote via text. “It was so uniquely a moment that could only happen in D.C. and … the audience took pride in that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The library later tweeted that the flute had made it back safely, thanks to an escort from Capitol Police, and hinted it will be sharing more from Lizzo’s visit soon.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\n\u003cp>In the meantime, D.C. residents as well as history buffs and Lizzo fans from far and wide are amplifying the \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/search?q=lizzo%20flute&src=typed_query\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">videos on social media\u003c/a> and praising all involved for making the unforgettable moment possible—and especially Lizzo for championing the importance of history. As she said herself onstage:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“History is freaking cool, you guys!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Lizzo+played+James+Madison%27s+crystal+flute+onstage+in+D.C.%2C+proving+history+rocks&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Latino Legends Helped Pave the Way in Hollywood, But the Road is Still Rocky",
"headTitle": "Latino Legends Helped Pave the Way in Hollywood, But the Road is Still Rocky | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>Latinos have been a part of Hollywood since the silent movie era. But they continue to be underrepresented in front of and behind the cameras. \u003ca href=\"https://assets.uscannenberg.org/docs/aii-hispanic-latino-rep-2021-09-13.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">USC’s Annenberg Inclusion Initiative\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://socialsciences.ucla.edu/hollywood-diversity-report-2022/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">UCLA’s latest Hollywood Diversity Report\u003c/a> show that Latino actors get just 7% of film leads.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the early days of cinema and to this day, Anglo actors played so-called Spanish roles, sometimes in brownface. USC professor Laura Isabel Serna says Latinos were often used as background extras, wrangling horses for Western pictures. Luis Reyes, author of a new book called \u003ca href=\"https://www.dropbox.com/sh/d01xp0e9tng4t2j/AAD8n-o0CTMfp-BpXiufMbaVa?dl=0&preview=Press+Release++-+VIVA+HOLLYWOOD.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Viva Hollywood\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, says Latino actors who did get speaking parts were typecast in cliched roles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You know, the stereotypes: Oh, you’re Latino? You’ll play the \u003ca href=\"https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bandido\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">bandido\u003c/a>,” Reyes says. “There was a guy that played a bandido so often he had his own costume. It was about earning a living. ‘I got black hair, I look dark. You wanted me to be a cantina girl? No problem.'”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919255\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919255\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-800x677.jpg\" alt=\"A suave man with slicked back hair and a pencil mustache stands with his hands on his waist, wearing a sharp suit and tie.\" width=\"800\" height=\"677\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-800x677.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-1020x864.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-160x135.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-768x650.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d.jpg 1519w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ramon Novarro, circa 1930s. \u003ccite>(George Hurrell/ullstein bild via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Hollywood stars Ramon Novarro and his second cousin Dolores del Rio got their starts in silent pictures and were promoted as “Latin lovers.” Both came from influential aristocratic families in Mexico. Navarro’s family had moved to Los Angeles to escape the Mexican Revolution in 1913. He went from being an extra to starring in the 1925 silent film \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63t9ue_0pUU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>.\u003c/em> Among his hits is the 1931 film \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5DVB3iIxAw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Mata Hari\u003c/em>\u003c/a> with Greta Garbo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dolores del Rio was also recruited to Hollywood to be a sex symbol. Her famous friends Charlie Chaplin, Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich reportedly regarded her as the most beautiful woman in Hollywood. Del Rio starred in silent films such as \u003cem>High Steppers\u003c/em>, \u003cem>Pals First\u003c/em> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4nhSpOiKZk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Ramona\u003c/em>\u003c/a>. When talking pictures took over, she was also a success, after proving she could sing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919256\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919256\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-800x891.jpg\" alt=\"A striking woman with short dark hair stands powerfully with her hands on the surface of a dining table.\" width=\"800\" height=\"891\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-800x891.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-1020x1136.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-160x178.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-768x856.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-1379x1536.jpg 1379w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11.jpg 1825w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dolores del Rio in her dining room, circa 1935. \u003ccite>(Hulton Archive/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“She was seen as an exotic woman,” says Cynthia Prida Bravo, consul for cultural affairs for the Consulate General of Mexico. “She played the European, very sophisticated woman and she played the Indigenous woman. She was so sure of herself. That’s why we’re still celebrating her almost after a hundred years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Serna further explains del Rio’s appeal in Hollywood. “She’s exotic looking, but she’s not particularly dark. I think that works for the studios, as it continues to work for the studios today. So she’s portrayed as being very ‘acceptable.’ And she was very insistent that she didn’t want to play roles that she considered stereotypical.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919257\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919257\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-562640519_sq-e6c295b48c35ffa324ca77c5964b51ae0fd2df48-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"A beautiful woman strikes a strong, confident pose while wearing a wearing a revealing feather outfit\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lupe Vélez, circa 1931. \u003ccite>(Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>There were other tropes used then, and even now. For comedic effect, there was the “hot-tempered, fast-talking, spicy wildcat” Latina. Actress Lupe Vélez, known as Lupe “Tabasco” Vélez, starred in at least eight \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJrplHd1m-o\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mexican Spitfire\u003c/a> movies in the 1930s and ’40s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then there were the sultry femme fatales not billed as Hispanic. Rita Hayworth, born Margarita Carmen Cansino, whose dad was from Spain, and Raquel Welch, born Jo Raquel Tejada, whose father was Bolivian.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everybody changed their names in those days,” says Reyes. He adds that the studios may have anglicized names to appeal to white audiences, but that didn’t mean the actors were ashamed of their heritage. And some, like del Rio, returned to their roots. In the 1940s, she helped launch Mexico’s Golden Age of Cinema. Among her most famous films were \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0i-yu87FkA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>María Candelaria\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, the first Mexican film screened at the Cannes International Film Festival, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2LKFdDu-MU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Las Abandonadas\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, for which she won an Ariel, Mexico’s equivalent of an Oscar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2LKFdDu-MU\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in Hollywood, it took years for the Academy Awards to give its\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eIozJu2yBA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> first Oscar to a Latino actor\u003c/a>. Puerto Rican José Ferrer got it for playing an adventurer, swordsman and poet in the 1950 film \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzmP2NyvQR0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Cyrano de Bergerac\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>.\u003c/em> Two years later, Mexican American actor Anthony Quinn won his first Oscar for \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ek2K5cLQ8E8\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Viva Zapata!\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13864820']Actor Edward James Olmos credits Oscar winners Ferrer and Quinn for paving the way for later generations to play serious, non-Latino roles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, like those before him, Olmos says he was often cast in cliched roles, but he says that didn’t mean he played them “stereotypically.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He says the head of casting at MGM asked him to change his name. So he did, from Eddie Olmos to Edward James Olmos.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am a Latino actor and I’m proud of it,” says Olmos. “I said no to more things than I said yes. My intention was to tell stories about me and my culture.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919258\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919258\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/olmos_custom-b2f5faade73e9d0eb9f8194baa1ed5d8cb3a76c5-800x541.jpg\" alt=\"An older man with a grey mustache and spectacles stands in a grand ballroom, wearing a hoodie and a fedora.\" width=\"800\" height=\"541\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Edward James Olmos at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel earlier this year. \u003ccite>(Mandalit del Barco/NPR)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The actor born in East LA starred in some of the most iconic Chicano films, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/video/vi3575825177/?ref_=tt_vi_i_1\">\u003cem>Zoot Suit\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdd_20JwndQ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>,\u003c/em> \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEj9ZwIzk44\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Stand and Deliver\u003c/em>\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIBYaeYQF0k\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Selena\u003c/em>\u003c/a>. In 1997, he helped found the \u003ca href=\"https://laliff.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival\u003c/a> to showcase the work of Latino and Latinx creators. He also helped start a youth cinema project for children from fourth grade through college.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before that, in 1962, Rita Moreno was the first Latina actress to win an Oscar for her role as Anita in the 1961 film \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhSKk-cvblc\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>West Side Story\u003c/em>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaOy0eb0Tbs&t=1s\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Moreno was born in Puerto Rico and raised in New York and in Hollywood played a lot of what she called “Conchita Lolita” Latina roles or the generic ethnic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I never ever was able to do a part without assuming some kind of an accent,” \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2011/10/24/141594495/moreno-leguizamo-talk-latin-life-in-hollywouldnt\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">she told NPR in 2011\u003c/a>, adding that even for the Nuyorican musical \u003cem>West Side Story \u003c/em>there were challenges. “We all had to wear one color makeup, very very dark. And I remember asking the makeup man in real annoyance, why can’t the makeup match our different skin tones because Hispanics are many different—some of us are very fair.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13898388']Moreno says it took years to get another good role after her Oscar. But she persevered, acting on television and onstage. And now, at age 90, Rita Moreno continues to act in Hollywood. She was in last year’s \u003cem>West Side Story\u003c/em> \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoQEddtFN3Q\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">remake\u003c/a>, where newcomer Ariana DeBose played Anita.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>DeBose made history at this year’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2022/03/27/1088846361/ariana-debose-oscar-best-supporting-actress\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Academy Awards\u003c/a>, where she accepted her Oscar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You see a queer, openly queer woman of color, an Afro Latina who found her strength in life through art, and that’s what I believe we’re here to celebrate,” DeBose said onstage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919259\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919259\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-800x1187.jpg\" alt=\"Two women, wearing elaborate evening gowns stand face to face and gaze warmly at each other on the red carpet.\" width=\"800\" height=\"1187\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-800x1187.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-1020x1513.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-160x237.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-768x1139.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-1035x1536.jpg 1035w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-1380x2048.jpg 1380w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-1920x2848.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-scaled.jpg 1726w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rita Moreno and Ariana DeBose attend the 94th Annual Academy Awards in Hollywood. \u003ccite>(David Livingston/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Actor John Leguizamo was also onstage at this year’s Oscars celebration, which included an \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQ62TFSQUGI\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">all-Latino performance\u003c/a> from Lin-Manuel Miranda’s animated musical film \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2022/03/20/1087778299/best-of-the-groundbreaking-latinos-behind-disneys-encanto\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Encanto\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13912474']“All these beautiful Latinx faces, \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1508260264965283848\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">we got great representation tonight\u003c/a>, people,” he said, before reminding the audience of \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2014/02/28/284081430/latin-pride-swells-for-mystery-model-behind-oscar-statuette\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the legend\u003c/a> that the Oscar statuette was modeled on Emilio “El Indio” Fernández in 1928.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For years, Leguizamo has railed about Hollywood’s limited opportunities for Latino actors and stories. \u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cg6l9OvFV3b/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">He recently shared his outrage\u003c/a> on social media when film producers cast white actor James Franco to play Cuban leader Fidel Castro.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I grew up in an era where Latin people couldn’t play Latin people on film, where Charlton Heston played a Mexican, where Pacino played Cuban and Puerto Rican,” Leguizamo said on Instagram. “They told you to change your name. Stay out of the sun, that only white Latinos or white-passing Latinos will get jobs. I’ve been told so many times you can’t have two Latin people in the movie, otherwise, people think it’s a Latin movie, you know how, whatever. So no, no appropriating our stories? No, no more of that. I’m done with that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story is part of NPR’s ‘Latinos in Hollywood’ series, which pays tribute to some of the legends and pioneers in the film industry and examines how some Latinx actors, film composers and directors are getting or creating more opportunities. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">visit NPR\u003c/a>\u003c/em>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Latino+legends+helped+pave+the+way+in+Hollywood%2C+but+the+road+is+still+rocky&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Latinos have been a part of Hollywood since the silent movie era. But they continue to be underrepresented in front of and behind the cameras. \u003ca href=\"https://assets.uscannenberg.org/docs/aii-hispanic-latino-rep-2021-09-13.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">USC’s Annenberg Inclusion Initiative\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://socialsciences.ucla.edu/hollywood-diversity-report-2022/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">UCLA’s latest Hollywood Diversity Report\u003c/a> show that Latino actors get just 7% of film leads.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the early days of cinema and to this day, Anglo actors played so-called Spanish roles, sometimes in brownface. USC professor Laura Isabel Serna says Latinos were often used as background extras, wrangling horses for Western pictures. Luis Reyes, author of a new book called \u003ca href=\"https://www.dropbox.com/sh/d01xp0e9tng4t2j/AAD8n-o0CTMfp-BpXiufMbaVa?dl=0&preview=Press+Release++-+VIVA+HOLLYWOOD.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Viva Hollywood\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, says Latino actors who did get speaking parts were typecast in cliched roles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You know, the stereotypes: Oh, you’re Latino? You’ll play the \u003ca href=\"https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bandido\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">bandido\u003c/a>,” Reyes says. “There was a guy that played a bandido so often he had his own costume. It was about earning a living. ‘I got black hair, I look dark. You wanted me to be a cantina girl? No problem.'”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919255\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919255\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-800x677.jpg\" alt=\"A suave man with slicked back hair and a pencil mustache stands with his hands on his waist, wearing a sharp suit and tie.\" width=\"800\" height=\"677\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-800x677.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-1020x864.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-160x135.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d-768x650.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-548811509-2048x2048_custom-9239238b13d6b1893c1787d53049e4f8ef9bad4d.jpg 1519w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ramon Novarro, circa 1930s. \u003ccite>(George Hurrell/ullstein bild via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Hollywood stars Ramon Novarro and his second cousin Dolores del Rio got their starts in silent pictures and were promoted as “Latin lovers.” Both came from influential aristocratic families in Mexico. Navarro’s family had moved to Los Angeles to escape the Mexican Revolution in 1913. He went from being an extra to starring in the 1925 silent film \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63t9ue_0pUU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>.\u003c/em> Among his hits is the 1931 film \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5DVB3iIxAw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Mata Hari\u003c/em>\u003c/a> with Greta Garbo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dolores del Rio was also recruited to Hollywood to be a sex symbol. Her famous friends Charlie Chaplin, Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich reportedly regarded her as the most beautiful woman in Hollywood. Del Rio starred in silent films such as \u003cem>High Steppers\u003c/em>, \u003cem>Pals First\u003c/em> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4nhSpOiKZk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Ramona\u003c/em>\u003c/a>. When talking pictures took over, she was also a success, after proving she could sing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919256\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919256\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-800x891.jpg\" alt=\"A striking woman with short dark hair stands powerfully with her hands on the surface of a dining table.\" width=\"800\" height=\"891\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-800x891.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-1020x1136.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-160x178.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-768x856.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11-1379x1536.jpg 1379w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-3306413_custom-3afe6959f66e9783ffb7cdcea02baefbffe33d11.jpg 1825w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dolores del Rio in her dining room, circa 1935. \u003ccite>(Hulton Archive/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“She was seen as an exotic woman,” says Cynthia Prida Bravo, consul for cultural affairs for the Consulate General of Mexico. “She played the European, very sophisticated woman and she played the Indigenous woman. She was so sure of herself. That’s why we’re still celebrating her almost after a hundred years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Serna further explains del Rio’s appeal in Hollywood. “She’s exotic looking, but she’s not particularly dark. I think that works for the studios, as it continues to work for the studios today. So she’s portrayed as being very ‘acceptable.’ And she was very insistent that she didn’t want to play roles that she considered stereotypical.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919257\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919257\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-562640519_sq-e6c295b48c35ffa324ca77c5964b51ae0fd2df48-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"A beautiful woman strikes a strong, confident pose while wearing a wearing a revealing feather outfit\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lupe Vélez, circa 1931. \u003ccite>(Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>There were other tropes used then, and even now. For comedic effect, there was the “hot-tempered, fast-talking, spicy wildcat” Latina. Actress Lupe Vélez, known as Lupe “Tabasco” Vélez, starred in at least eight \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJrplHd1m-o\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mexican Spitfire\u003c/a> movies in the 1930s and ’40s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then there were the sultry femme fatales not billed as Hispanic. Rita Hayworth, born Margarita Carmen Cansino, whose dad was from Spain, and Raquel Welch, born Jo Raquel Tejada, whose father was Bolivian.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everybody changed their names in those days,” says Reyes. He adds that the studios may have anglicized names to appeal to white audiences, but that didn’t mean the actors were ashamed of their heritage. And some, like del Rio, returned to their roots. In the 1940s, she helped launch Mexico’s Golden Age of Cinema. Among her most famous films were \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0i-yu87FkA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>María Candelaria\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, the first Mexican film screened at the Cannes International Film Festival, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2LKFdDu-MU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Las Abandonadas\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, for which she won an Ariel, Mexico’s equivalent of an Oscar.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/i2LKFdDu-MU'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/i2LKFdDu-MU'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>But in Hollywood, it took years for the Academy Awards to give its\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eIozJu2yBA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> first Oscar to a Latino actor\u003c/a>. Puerto Rican José Ferrer got it for playing an adventurer, swordsman and poet in the 1950 film \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzmP2NyvQR0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Cyrano de Bergerac\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>.\u003c/em> Two years later, Mexican American actor Anthony Quinn won his first Oscar for \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ek2K5cLQ8E8\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Viva Zapata!\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Actor Edward James Olmos credits Oscar winners Ferrer and Quinn for paving the way for later generations to play serious, non-Latino roles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, like those before him, Olmos says he was often cast in cliched roles, but he says that didn’t mean he played them “stereotypically.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He says the head of casting at MGM asked him to change his name. So he did, from Eddie Olmos to Edward James Olmos.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am a Latino actor and I’m proud of it,” says Olmos. “I said no to more things than I said yes. My intention was to tell stories about me and my culture.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919258\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919258\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/olmos_custom-b2f5faade73e9d0eb9f8194baa1ed5d8cb3a76c5-800x541.jpg\" alt=\"An older man with a grey mustache and spectacles stands in a grand ballroom, wearing a hoodie and a fedora.\" width=\"800\" height=\"541\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Edward James Olmos at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel earlier this year. \u003ccite>(Mandalit del Barco/NPR)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The actor born in East LA starred in some of the most iconic Chicano films, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/video/vi3575825177/?ref_=tt_vi_i_1\">\u003cem>Zoot Suit\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdd_20JwndQ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>,\u003c/em> \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEj9ZwIzk44\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Stand and Deliver\u003c/em>\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIBYaeYQF0k\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Selena\u003c/em>\u003c/a>. In 1997, he helped found the \u003ca href=\"https://laliff.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival\u003c/a> to showcase the work of Latino and Latinx creators. He also helped start a youth cinema project for children from fourth grade through college.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before that, in 1962, Rita Moreno was the first Latina actress to win an Oscar for her role as Anita in the 1961 film \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhSKk-cvblc\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>West Side Story\u003c/em>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/ZaOy0eb0Tbs'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/ZaOy0eb0Tbs'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Moreno was born in Puerto Rico and raised in New York and in Hollywood played a lot of what she called “Conchita Lolita” Latina roles or the generic ethnic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I never ever was able to do a part without assuming some kind of an accent,” \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2011/10/24/141594495/moreno-leguizamo-talk-latin-life-in-hollywouldnt\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">she told NPR in 2011\u003c/a>, adding that even for the Nuyorican musical \u003cem>West Side Story \u003c/em>there were challenges. “We all had to wear one color makeup, very very dark. And I remember asking the makeup man in real annoyance, why can’t the makeup match our different skin tones because Hispanics are many different—some of us are very fair.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Moreno says it took years to get another good role after her Oscar. But she persevered, acting on television and onstage. And now, at age 90, Rita Moreno continues to act in Hollywood. She was in last year’s \u003cem>West Side Story\u003c/em> \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoQEddtFN3Q\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">remake\u003c/a>, where newcomer Ariana DeBose played Anita.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>DeBose made history at this year’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2022/03/27/1088846361/ariana-debose-oscar-best-supporting-actress\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Academy Awards\u003c/a>, where she accepted her Oscar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You see a queer, openly queer woman of color, an Afro Latina who found her strength in life through art, and that’s what I believe we’re here to celebrate,” DeBose said onstage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13919259\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13919259\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-800x1187.jpg\" alt=\"Two women, wearing elaborate evening gowns stand face to face and gaze warmly at each other on the red carpet.\" width=\"800\" height=\"1187\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-800x1187.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-1020x1513.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-160x237.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-768x1139.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-1035x1536.jpg 1035w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-1380x2048.jpg 1380w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-1920x2848.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/gettyimages-1388090590-1-_custom-65655ea81034f5b84de6ac55a1d91c027491f2a6-scaled.jpg 1726w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rita Moreno and Ariana DeBose attend the 94th Annual Academy Awards in Hollywood. \u003ccite>(David Livingston/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Actor John Leguizamo was also onstage at this year’s Oscars celebration, which included an \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQ62TFSQUGI\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">all-Latino performance\u003c/a> from Lin-Manuel Miranda’s animated musical film \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2022/03/20/1087778299/best-of-the-groundbreaking-latinos-behind-disneys-encanto\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>Encanto\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“All these beautiful Latinx faces, \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1508260264965283848\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">we got great representation tonight\u003c/a>, people,” he said, before reminding the audience of \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2014/02/28/284081430/latin-pride-swells-for-mystery-model-behind-oscar-statuette\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the legend\u003c/a> that the Oscar statuette was modeled on Emilio “El Indio” Fernández in 1928.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For years, Leguizamo has railed about Hollywood’s limited opportunities for Latino actors and stories. \u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cg6l9OvFV3b/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">He recently shared his outrage\u003c/a> on social media when film producers cast white actor James Franco to play Cuban leader Fidel Castro.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I grew up in an era where Latin people couldn’t play Latin people on film, where Charlton Heston played a Mexican, where Pacino played Cuban and Puerto Rican,” Leguizamo said on Instagram. “They told you to change your name. Stay out of the sun, that only white Latinos or white-passing Latinos will get jobs. I’ve been told so many times you can’t have two Latin people in the movie, otherwise, people think it’s a Latin movie, you know how, whatever. So no, no appropriating our stories? No, no more of that. I’m done with that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story is part of NPR’s ‘Latinos in Hollywood’ series, which pays tribute to some of the legends and pioneers in the film industry and examines how some Latinx actors, film composers and directors are getting or creating more opportunities. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">visit NPR\u003c/a>\u003c/em>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Latino+legends+helped+pave+the+way+in+Hollywood%2C+but+the+road+is+still+rocky&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Ken Burns Connects the Past and the Present in 'The U.S. and the Holocaust'",
"headTitle": "Ken Burns Connects the Past and the Present in ‘The U.S. and the Holocaust’ | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>In his newest documentary series, \u003cem>The U.S. and the Holocaust,\u003c/em> Ken Burns and his collaborators are revisiting some very familiar ground. Geoffrey C. Ward, who wrote the script for this new series, also wrote the Burns epic documentaries \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2007/09/18/14496870/ken-burns-releases-the-war\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>The War\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, about World War II, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2014/09/10/347276638/three-roosevelts-come-alive-in-pbs-documentary-ken-burns-best-yet\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>The Roosevelts: An Intimate History\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, in which Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt figured prominently, as they do here. And Ward wrote \u003cem>The Civil War, \u003c/em>which put Ken Burns on the map in the first place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13917075']More than 30 years later, the structure and methods of a Ken Burns production are so familiar as to be almost comforting, and\u003cem> The U.S. and the Holocaust \u003c/em>employs them all. There are celebrity voices reading the words of historical figures—this time, the voices include Meryl Streep, Paul Giamatti, Liam Neeson and Werner Herzog. Photographs are used patiently and poetically, revealing new elements as they pan and zoom in and out. Music and sound effects make every moment both more real and more emotional. And a Ken Burns documentary series always starts with a clear-cut summary of things to come—provided, this time, by frequent Burns narrator Peter Coyote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The U.S. and the Holocaust,\u003c/em> like many Ken Burns history projects, examines his subject from the bottom up. Instead of interviewing military experts, he talks to survivors or their relatives. When historians and other experts are heard from, they discuss events from that same perspective. In this case, they try to understand, and explain, what it was like to endure Nazi atrocities—or even to believe that they were happening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCffe1USg18\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The documentary spends a great deal of time delving into the intricacies of national politics—not only in Germany, where Adolf Hitler rose from prison to dictatorial power, but in America, where waves of isolationism kept the U.S. out of the war for years. It shows that most everyday Americans were not unaware of what the Nazis were doing in Europe. Throughout the documentary, we see newspaper headlines proving that the facts indeed were out there. Yet they were questioned by many, until after the war, when concentration camps were liberated and their atrocities documented.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13914530']The opening installment, which premiers on Sept. 18, stops in the year 1938, and part two goes up to 1942. The concluding two hours cover the end of World War II, and its aftermath—the formation of Israel, the Nuremberg war trials, even the invention and introduction of the word “genocide.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not until the final five minutes that the story is brought fully up to date. But those final sounds and images that conclude \u003cem>The U.S. and the Holocaust\u003c/em>—scenes with which we’re all too familiar, of hate crimes and hate-filled marches—connect the past to the present without Coyote, or anyone else, having to say a word. Once again, Burns and company have made history come to life—and reminded us that our life, right now, is indeed history in the making.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2022 Fresh Air. To see more, visit \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/programs/fresh-air/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Fresh Air\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Ken+Burns+connects+the+past+and+the+present+in+%27The+U.S.+and+the+Holocaust%27&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In his newest documentary series, \u003cem>The U.S. and the Holocaust,\u003c/em> Ken Burns and his collaborators are revisiting some very familiar ground. Geoffrey C. Ward, who wrote the script for this new series, also wrote the Burns epic documentaries \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2007/09/18/14496870/ken-burns-releases-the-war\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>The War\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, about World War II, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2014/09/10/347276638/three-roosevelts-come-alive-in-pbs-documentary-ken-burns-best-yet\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>The Roosevelts: An Intimate History\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, in which Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt figured prominently, as they do here. And Ward wrote \u003cem>The Civil War, \u003c/em>which put Ken Burns on the map in the first place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>More than 30 years later, the structure and methods of a Ken Burns production are so familiar as to be almost comforting, and\u003cem> The U.S. and the Holocaust \u003c/em>employs them all. There are celebrity voices reading the words of historical figures—this time, the voices include Meryl Streep, Paul Giamatti, Liam Neeson and Werner Herzog. Photographs are used patiently and poetically, revealing new elements as they pan and zoom in and out. Music and sound effects make every moment both more real and more emotional. And a Ken Burns documentary series always starts with a clear-cut summary of things to come—provided, this time, by frequent Burns narrator Peter Coyote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The U.S. and the Holocaust,\u003c/em> like many Ken Burns history projects, examines his subject from the bottom up. Instead of interviewing military experts, he talks to survivors or their relatives. When historians and other experts are heard from, they discuss events from that same perspective. In this case, they try to understand, and explain, what it was like to endure Nazi atrocities—or even to believe that they were happening.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/VCffe1USg18'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/VCffe1USg18'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>The documentary spends a great deal of time delving into the intricacies of national politics—not only in Germany, where Adolf Hitler rose from prison to dictatorial power, but in America, where waves of isolationism kept the U.S. out of the war for years. It shows that most everyday Americans were not unaware of what the Nazis were doing in Europe. Throughout the documentary, we see newspaper headlines proving that the facts indeed were out there. Yet they were questioned by many, until after the war, when concentration camps were liberated and their atrocities documented.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The opening installment, which premiers on Sept. 18, stops in the year 1938, and part two goes up to 1942. The concluding two hours cover the end of World War II, and its aftermath—the formation of Israel, the Nuremberg war trials, even the invention and introduction of the word “genocide.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not until the final five minutes that the story is brought fully up to date. But those final sounds and images that conclude \u003cem>The U.S. and the Holocaust\u003c/em>—scenes with which we’re all too familiar, of hate crimes and hate-filled marches—connect the past to the present without Coyote, or anyone else, having to say a word. Once again, Burns and company have made history come to life—and reminded us that our life, right now, is indeed history in the making.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2022 Fresh Air. To see more, visit \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/programs/fresh-air/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Fresh Air\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Ken+Burns+connects+the+past+and+the+present+in+%27The+U.S.+and+the+Holocaust%27&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "bart-50th-anniversary-bay-area-rapid-transit-september-1972",
"title": "BART Opened 50 Years Ago This Week—And Boy Were People Excited",
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"content": "\u003cp>As we all know, the 1970s were a brutalist hellscape made of concrete, brown platform shoes, serial killers and—especially in California—LSD hangovers. It was not a cute time to be alive, even in our beloved Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Making things infinitely worse in the early-’70s was the relentless construction of a new-fangled transportation system known as Bay Area Rapid Transit. Building started in 1964 and went full tilt in the run-up to BART’s opening day on Sept. 11, 1972. And that construction ran through some major thoroughfares. San Francisco’s Market Street, for example, was decimated for \u003cem>years\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Let’s look at the traffic misery as it escalated:\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918627\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918627\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815-800x594.jpg\" alt=\"A series of wooden slats run the length of Market Street, surrounded by small orange cones as streetcars drive up the opposite side of the road.\" width=\"800\" height=\"594\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815-800x594.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815-160x119.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815-768x571.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">These temporary streetcar tracks look totally safe! Market and Second, 1967. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp32.2815)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918616\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918616\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789-800x544.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"544\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789-800x544.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789-160x109.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789-768x522.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Market Street, near First Street, in 1969. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp32.2789)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918623\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918623\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817-800x534.jpg\" alt=\"A street car runs up Market St on top of a temporary wooden roadway. Construction is visible on one half of the street.\" width=\"800\" height=\"534\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Market and Hyde, 1970. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp25.6817)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918625\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918625\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785-800x541.jpg\" alt=\"A downtown intersection including five buses, two cranes and a van, all stationary as construction goes on on all sides.\" width=\"800\" height=\"541\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785-800x541.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785-160x108.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785-768x519.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Market and Battery, doing a chaos in 1970. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp32.2785)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918629\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 674px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13918629\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2836.jpg\" alt=\"A major intersection is entirely closed as construction takes place.\" width=\"674\" height=\"1000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2836.jpg 674w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2836-160x237.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 674px) 100vw, 674px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Market and Fremont in February 1972. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp32.2836)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In San Francisco, BART didn’t even start running until 1973, the Transbay Tube between downtown and West Oakland wasn’t ready until ’74, and Embarcadero Station only arrived in ’76. But after so much buildup and chaos, the Bay Area was \u003cem>psyched\u003c/em> to see the first sections of BART open in ’72—even though that only included 12 East Bay stations between MacArthur and Fremont.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the fact that they could hop on a train the next day, next week, or, who knows, 50 years down the line, approximately 15,000 people showed up to ride on BART’s first day. They waited for hours on crowded platforms, as trains struggled to keep up with the passenger loads—an issue exacerbated by revelers refusing to get off the trains for hours. The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> reported that the very patient humans stuck at stations handled it “with good grace and a sense of history.” Many were apparently wearing pins that read: “Day One. I was there. Sept. 11.” (If you happen to stumble across one of these while thrifting, remember it’s about BART and not, well, you know, the other thing.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the trains, according to a \u003cem>Concord Transcript\u003c/em> report the following day, “Passengers crowded aboard, and seats on many trains were full with people in the aisles, packed like sardines, three abreast in a 70 mile-per-hour aluminum can.” (So like every pre-pandemic rush-hour then…)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13909983']After one intrepid reporter tried out the trains, the \u003cem>Peninsular Times Tribune\u003c/em> noted: “Compared to the subway systems in New York and Philadelphia, BART offers a very smooth quiet ride at high speeds.” (Tell that to the KQED listener who wrote to \u003cem>Bay Curious\u003c/em> in 2016 to ask why the trains “\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11030282/why-are-bart-trains-so-loud\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">scream like banshees\u003c/a>.”)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The reason everyone was so excited about the smoothness and comfort levels of BART at the time was because it was more modern than literally every other transport system in the country. So much so that \u003cem>U.S. News & World Report\u003c/em> magazine called it “a marvel of technology.” Everything about the heavily computerized BART system was indeed state of the art—as evidenced by this photo of a train controller in 1972.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918650\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918650\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/GettyImages-1172830317-800x552.jpg\" alt=\"A Black man in 1970s attire sits at a control desk with several keyboards, a phone receiver, a screen and a microphone.\" width=\"800\" height=\"552\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Train Controller Carroll Shepard at the console of then-BART headquarters, Lake Merritt Station, two weeks before opening day. \u003ccite>(MediaNews Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>I think we can all agree that that gorgeous console in front of Mr. Shepard would be perfectly at home in sci-fi classics like \u003cem>Battlestar Galactica\u003c/em> (\u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076984/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_3\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the original series\u003c/a>), \u003cem>Westworld\u003c/em> (\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/pop/107664/missing-hbos-westworld-watch-the-amazing-1973-original\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the original movie\u003c/a>) or \u003cem>THX 1138\u003c/em> (\u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0066434/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">George Lucas’ first feature film\u003c/a>). What’s that? You’ve never heard of \u003cem>THX 1138\u003c/em>? Well, it stars Robert Duvall with a shaved head, it’s about humans being denied sex lives, and it actually \u003cem>did\u003c/em> use the real-life, under-construction BART control room and tunnels as sets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Let’s marvel now at how futuristic BART—and the Broadway Street tunnel!—looks once there’s a bunch of motorcycle-riding robots involved:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5nmxHjPuvY\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Sept. 11 itself, the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em> interviewed several transportation enthusiasts who were in attendance for opening day. These included a 25-year-old San Franciscan named George Mitchell, who had set a record in 1966 for riding every train and stopping at every station in every borough of New York City. Which took him 24 hours and 44 minutes and sounds like a wretched ordeal no human should ever suffer. “I plan to do the same with BART when it’s completed,” he said, like a maniac.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13913489']Then there was a 63-year-old Albany resident named Bonida Cargile who, for some reason, had spent her life trying to be on the first and last modes of transport as they were introduced or canceled. “In the 1930s,” the \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> noted, “she and her husband rode the last F Line Key System train … The same day, she took the first Red Train from San Leandro.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s possible that Mitchell and Cargile had a little too much time on their hands, but to each their own! There were plenty of regular, \u003cem>not\u003c/em> train-obsessed people in attendance as well. Like Theresa Edwards and her daughter Mekela, seen below, who were the first paying customers at 12th Street Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918652\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918652\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/GettyImages-1172830320-800x641.jpg\" alt=\"A Black woman carrying a toddler makes her way through BART barriers, ticket in hand, as crowds watch on.\" width=\"800\" height=\"641\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sept. 11, 1972. BART opened. Solid fashion choices were made. \u003ccite>(MediaNews Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> also encountered a young couple on a train who were full of the early-1970s Bay Area spirit (i.e. drugs). The paper reported:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>All segments of society were numbered among BART’s opening day riders, and one of these was a pretty little redhead, snuggled in the denimed crook of her boyfriend’s arm, who was especially admiring of the differing station decors. ‘If you get too stoned to read the station signs,’ said she, as the train whisked from the red-brick Oakland Civic Center station to the blue-brick 19th Street Oakland station, ‘all you have to do is remember what color to look for!’\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>That’s the spirit!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s what Theresa and Mekela and the stoned couple’s train might have looked like on that very first day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918653\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918653\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/GettyImages-515107660-1-800x618.jpg\" alt=\"A train travels on elevated tracks, with the sparse Oakland skyline in the distance.\" width=\"800\" height=\"618\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">BART on September 11,1972. Hi, Tribune building!\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> later claimed that 92% of travelers on BART’s opening day thought it was “wonderful.” The paper also noted: “Another 5 percent put it this way: ‘It’s swell!’ While the remaining 3 percent said, ‘It’s tops!’” It’s an approval rating BART has spent the last half century trying its damnedest to match.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"title": "BART Turns 50: Look Back at the Brouhaha of Opening Day | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>As we all know, the 1970s were a brutalist hellscape made of concrete, brown platform shoes, serial killers and—especially in California—LSD hangovers. It was not a cute time to be alive, even in our beloved Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Making things infinitely worse in the early-’70s was the relentless construction of a new-fangled transportation system known as Bay Area Rapid Transit. Building started in 1964 and went full tilt in the run-up to BART’s opening day on Sept. 11, 1972. And that construction ran through some major thoroughfares. San Francisco’s Market Street, for example, was decimated for \u003cem>years\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Let’s look at the traffic misery as it escalated:\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918627\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918627\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815-800x594.jpg\" alt=\"A series of wooden slats run the length of Market Street, surrounded by small orange cones as streetcars drive up the opposite side of the road.\" width=\"800\" height=\"594\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815-800x594.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815-160x119.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815-768x571.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2815.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">These temporary streetcar tracks look totally safe! Market and Second, 1967. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp32.2815)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918616\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918616\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789-800x544.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"544\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789-800x544.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789-160x109.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789-768x522.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2789.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Market Street, near First Street, in 1969. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp32.2789)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918623\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918623\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817-800x534.jpg\" alt=\"A street car runs up Market St on top of a temporary wooden roadway. Construction is visible on one half of the street.\" width=\"800\" height=\"534\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp25.6817.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Market and Hyde, 1970. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp25.6817)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918625\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918625\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785-800x541.jpg\" alt=\"A downtown intersection including five buses, two cranes and a van, all stationary as construction goes on on all sides.\" width=\"800\" height=\"541\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785-800x541.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785-160x108.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785-768x519.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2785.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Market and Battery, doing a chaos in 1970. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp32.2785)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918629\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 674px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13918629\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2836.jpg\" alt=\"A major intersection is entirely closed as construction takes place.\" width=\"674\" height=\"1000\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2836.jpg 674w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/opensfhistory_wnp32.2836-160x237.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 674px) 100vw, 674px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Market and Fremont in February 1972. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp32.2836)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In San Francisco, BART didn’t even start running until 1973, the Transbay Tube between downtown and West Oakland wasn’t ready until ’74, and Embarcadero Station only arrived in ’76. But after so much buildup and chaos, the Bay Area was \u003cem>psyched\u003c/em> to see the first sections of BART open in ’72—even though that only included 12 East Bay stations between MacArthur and Fremont.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the fact that they could hop on a train the next day, next week, or, who knows, 50 years down the line, approximately 15,000 people showed up to ride on BART’s first day. They waited for hours on crowded platforms, as trains struggled to keep up with the passenger loads—an issue exacerbated by revelers refusing to get off the trains for hours. The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> reported that the very patient humans stuck at stations handled it “with good grace and a sense of history.” Many were apparently wearing pins that read: “Day One. I was there. Sept. 11.” (If you happen to stumble across one of these while thrifting, remember it’s about BART and not, well, you know, the other thing.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the trains, according to a \u003cem>Concord Transcript\u003c/em> report the following day, “Passengers crowded aboard, and seats on many trains were full with people in the aisles, packed like sardines, three abreast in a 70 mile-per-hour aluminum can.” (So like every pre-pandemic rush-hour then…)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>After one intrepid reporter tried out the trains, the \u003cem>Peninsular Times Tribune\u003c/em> noted: “Compared to the subway systems in New York and Philadelphia, BART offers a very smooth quiet ride at high speeds.” (Tell that to the KQED listener who wrote to \u003cem>Bay Curious\u003c/em> in 2016 to ask why the trains “\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11030282/why-are-bart-trains-so-loud\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">scream like banshees\u003c/a>.”)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The reason everyone was so excited about the smoothness and comfort levels of BART at the time was because it was more modern than literally every other transport system in the country. So much so that \u003cem>U.S. News & World Report\u003c/em> magazine called it “a marvel of technology.” Everything about the heavily computerized BART system was indeed state of the art—as evidenced by this photo of a train controller in 1972.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918650\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918650\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/GettyImages-1172830317-800x552.jpg\" alt=\"A Black man in 1970s attire sits at a control desk with several keyboards, a phone receiver, a screen and a microphone.\" width=\"800\" height=\"552\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Train Controller Carroll Shepard at the console of then-BART headquarters, Lake Merritt Station, two weeks before opening day. \u003ccite>(MediaNews Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>I think we can all agree that that gorgeous console in front of Mr. Shepard would be perfectly at home in sci-fi classics like \u003cem>Battlestar Galactica\u003c/em> (\u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076984/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_3\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the original series\u003c/a>), \u003cem>Westworld\u003c/em> (\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/pop/107664/missing-hbos-westworld-watch-the-amazing-1973-original\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the original movie\u003c/a>) or \u003cem>THX 1138\u003c/em> (\u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0066434/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">George Lucas’ first feature film\u003c/a>). What’s that? You’ve never heard of \u003cem>THX 1138\u003c/em>? Well, it stars Robert Duvall with a shaved head, it’s about humans being denied sex lives, and it actually \u003cem>did\u003c/em> use the real-life, under-construction BART control room and tunnels as sets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Let’s marvel now at how futuristic BART—and the Broadway Street tunnel!—looks once there’s a bunch of motorcycle-riding robots involved:\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/J5nmxHjPuvY'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/J5nmxHjPuvY'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>On Sept. 11 itself, the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em> interviewed several transportation enthusiasts who were in attendance for opening day. These included a 25-year-old San Franciscan named George Mitchell, who had set a record in 1966 for riding every train and stopping at every station in every borough of New York City. Which took him 24 hours and 44 minutes and sounds like a wretched ordeal no human should ever suffer. “I plan to do the same with BART when it’s completed,” he said, like a maniac.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Then there was a 63-year-old Albany resident named Bonida Cargile who, for some reason, had spent her life trying to be on the first and last modes of transport as they were introduced or canceled. “In the 1930s,” the \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> noted, “she and her husband rode the last F Line Key System train … The same day, she took the first Red Train from San Leandro.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s possible that Mitchell and Cargile had a little too much time on their hands, but to each their own! There were plenty of regular, \u003cem>not\u003c/em> train-obsessed people in attendance as well. Like Theresa Edwards and her daughter Mekela, seen below, who were the first paying customers at 12th Street Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918652\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918652\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/GettyImages-1172830320-800x641.jpg\" alt=\"A Black woman carrying a toddler makes her way through BART barriers, ticket in hand, as crowds watch on.\" width=\"800\" height=\"641\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sept. 11, 1972. BART opened. Solid fashion choices were made. \u003ccite>(MediaNews Group/Oakland Tribune via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> also encountered a young couple on a train who were full of the early-1970s Bay Area spirit (i.e. drugs). The paper reported:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>All segments of society were numbered among BART’s opening day riders, and one of these was a pretty little redhead, snuggled in the denimed crook of her boyfriend’s arm, who was especially admiring of the differing station decors. ‘If you get too stoned to read the station signs,’ said she, as the train whisked from the red-brick Oakland Civic Center station to the blue-brick 19th Street Oakland station, ‘all you have to do is remember what color to look for!’\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>That’s the spirit!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s what Theresa and Mekela and the stoned couple’s train might have looked like on that very first day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13918653\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13918653\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/GettyImages-515107660-1-800x618.jpg\" alt=\"A train travels on elevated tracks, with the sparse Oakland skyline in the distance.\" width=\"800\" height=\"618\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">BART on September 11,1972. Hi, Tribune building!\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003cem>Examiner\u003c/em> later claimed that 92% of travelers on BART’s opening day thought it was “wonderful.” The paper also noted: “Another 5 percent put it this way: ‘It’s swell!’ While the remaining 3 percent said, ‘It’s tops!’” It’s an approval rating BART has spent the last half century trying its damnedest to match.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>[dropcap]I[/dropcap]n 1969, Rosalie Ritz’s frank take on Robert F. Kennedy’s assassin was controversial. Ritz, the sketch artist at \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirhan_Sirhan\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sirhan B. Sirhan\u003c/a>‘s trial, described him after the fact as “the only honest man” in the courtroom. “It was my first experience with a revolutionary,” she told the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> shortly after the guilty verdict came down. “Of course it was pointless—all killing is pointless. You have to be nutty to do it. But Sirhan knew exactly what he wanted to do and he did it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Sirhan trial was not the only time Ritz came into close contact with a revolutionary. She spent the late-1960s and ’70s covering the trials of Black Panthers including \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13881407/huey-newton-h-rap-brown-stokely-carmichael-speech-1968\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Huey P. Newton\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13891079/the-archivist-and-the-activist-behind-a-new-book-about-angela-davis\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Angela Davis\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soledad_Brothers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Soledad Brothers\u003c/a>. She also documented the high profile prosecution of heiress-turned-“urban guerrilla” \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/pop/101956/patty-hearst-how-the-outlaw-heiress-became-a-chameleon\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Patricia Hearst\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, Ritz was one of the most in-demand courtroom sketch artists of the era, providing illustrations for the Associated Press, CBS News, KPIX, KNXT and, yes, KQED. She was known to make up to 21 drawings a day in court and could sketch an entire jury in minutes. Ritz was also an accomplished writer who took readers behind the scenes. This article she wrote for the \u003cem>Los Angeles Free Press\u003c/em> used the Patricia Hearst trial to highlight the overzealous security Ritz had experienced at similarly high profile cases involving Black defendants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917966\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917966\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-800x920.png\" alt=\"A newspaper article titled 'Near Mayhem—Tight Security.' '\" width=\"800\" height=\"920\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-800x920.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-1020x1173.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-160x184.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-768x883.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR.png 1148w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ritz wrote and illustrated several articles for the ‘Los Angeles Free Press’ during the high-profile trial of Patricia Hearst. \u003ccite>(Los Angeles Free Press, Oct. 1975)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Ritz didn’t just have a front-row seat to one of the most turbulent eras in Bay Area history—she had the talent and determination to share it with the rest of the world. “It’s never as tough as you think it is,” she once said, “if you act from strength, not from fear, and you speak the truth to power.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That Ritz wasn’t shy about offering her opinions about the events of the day made her work all the more compelling. When Sirhan was sentenced to death, she said, “I am unutterably opposed to the death penalty. It seems vengeful to me. I think anyone who attends a lot of trials would feel very strongly on this point.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of Huey P. Newton, she shared: “Huey Newton was a very attractive young man and most intelligent. I learned a lot about social conditions from that trial … It was really awakening. Everyone was impressed by him—you couldn’t help but be.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13904183']When \u003ca href=\"http://peter-barnes.org/article/the-presidio-mutiny/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">14 soldiers were tried for mutiny\u003c/a> after participating in a peaceful demonstration against the Vietnam War, Ritz was clear about whose side she was on. “I feel very sorry for those 14 young men,” she told the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em>. “They all have low IQs, they are very young and vulnerable and not one of them, in my opinion, would be capable of initiating anything like a mutiny. The fact that [the Army] would even take such young men into the service strikes you.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[dropcap]R[/dropcap]itz was brave, willful and outspoken from a very young age—possibly the result of being the seventh of 10 children, all of whom lost their father at an early age. (Ritz was just 9.) At 14, Ritz’s prodigious artistic skills allowed her to attend art college in Milwaukee. At 16, she hit the road with her big sister’s ID, alongside four other young women, and earned money for her family making portraits of people at circuses, fairs and other community events across the midwest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After graduating from Layton Art College, Ritz married a Navy officer (and future accountant) named Erwin in 1946, and had four daughters, Sandy, Barbara, Terry and Janet. The family’s home life was a happy one, full of painting, laughter and dance. (“She and my dad were like Fred and Ginger,” Sandy tells KQED Arts today.) The couple, together for more than 60 years, was also athletic—Ritz was an excellent golfer who competed in amateur championships.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was in 1966 that the Ritz family relocated to Walnut Creek from Washington D.C. Ritz was already established as a courtroom artist with a vibrant, vigorous style, having landed her first job at the Army-McCarthy hearings of 1954. Speaking to the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> 15 years after the fact, Ritz recalled: “Somebody I knew there knew Joe McCarthy, so I went to his office and asked if I could attend his closed Senate hearings. I just started sketching while I was there and when I came out of the room, [a TV station] offered to buy the sketches. That started it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What kept it going was Ritz’s tenacity and people skills. On the first day of Huey P. Newton’s trial, Ritz successfully talked her way into the courtroom, despite the fact that she’d not yet been issued a press pass. That there were also 3,000 protesters outside made her entrance all the more miraculous. Later, she was permitted to visit Newton in a holding cell to draw him—a privilege not afforded to any other court reporters. It probably helped that she understood fundamentally what the Black Panthers were trying to do. “These were people who really believed in doing the right thing,” she later said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13881675']Despite Ritz’s commitment to covering the toughest, most high-profile cases of her day, the trials sometimes took their toll. Ritz’s daughter Sandy describes her mom’s days in court as “often stressful to her psyche. The mass murderers, violent outbreaks, the injustices, the racism. The work was challenging.” But, Sandy continues, “She always knew the historical significance of what she was doing, and was passionate about it. She knew that she was the eyes for the world. She knew that her work was the only pictorial record of history occurring in California at that time, and she was often the first and only reporter in the courtroom for some trials.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was this knowledge that impacted Ritz’s decision to retain ownership of all of her own artwork. Though it would have earned her a better living, she never sold her courtroom sketches—only the use of them. After her death from lung cancer in 2008, Ritz donated more than \u003ca href=\"https://oac.cdlib.org/view?docId=kt8g50226j&doc.view=items&style=oac4&item.position=1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">1,800 of her courtroom drawings\u003c/a> to the Bancroft Library at U.C. Berkeley. Sandy and her sisters worked on cataloging and digitizing the collection so the drawings could stand as a public record of some of the most important moments in California history. “Justice was one of her strongest forces,” Sandy recalls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[dropcap]A[/dropcap]way from the courtroom, Ritz was passionate about making large-scale oil paintings and sculptures, and she always had one eye on the wider Bay Area art community. In 1974, she opened the Upstairs Art Gallery at 927 Broadway alongside fellow artists, Thomas Bray and Edy Keeler. Opening a gallery in Oakland was extremely important to Ritz. She recognized that the Bay Area arts scene—including the organizations responsible for handing out grants and funding—was focused almost exclusively on San Francisco. And she desperately wanted to change that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My opinion of Oakland is that it is a very beautiful city,” Ritz told the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> in 1974. “[Its neglect] is due to snobbery of people around Oakland, and we let them get away with it. What we’re going to do is start saying ‘The Oakland San Francisco Bay Area’ and they’ll complement one another.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ritz was also determined that the Upstairs Gallery should be warm and welcoming for all people. She believed that the large art institutions in the Bay could be off-putting for everybody but the elite. “People don’t relate to it because it’s for people dressed in fancy clothes,” she once said of the \u003ca href=\"https://museumca.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Oakland Museum\u003c/a>. With that in mind, Ritz and her friends lovingly restored the Upstairs Gallery space, including a 100-year-old fireplace. (“These buildings are museum pieces and I think they should be saved,” she said at the time.) The \u003ca href=\"https://www.betheden.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Beth Eden Baptist Church\u003c/a> choir performed at the gallery opening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13916612']Though the Upstairs Gallery was a scrappy endeavor once described by the \u003cem>Tribune\u003c/em> as a “struggling, always dollar-short art colony above a pawn shop,” Ritz successfully made the impact on the arts scene that she had hoped for. In 1979, when the City of Oakland and the Labor Department awarded federal unemployment seed money to the Oakland art community for the first time, it went to Ritz and the Upstairs Gallery. She used the $100,000 check to hire staff artists at $700 a month. (That’s about $4,200 in 2022 money.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the gallery was inundated with applicants, Ritz told the \u003cem>Tribune\u003c/em>: “It was shocking, and a good indication this city has deeper problems than it realizes. It’s not only the tradesmen, the unskilled, the young people, minorities, or the ex-felons who can’t find jobs. It’s right here in our cultural midst.” Ritz pledged to help as many of the non-successful candidates as she could, seeking out other outlets that might offer art-related jobs in Oakland. “Oakland can’t afford to lose them to other cities,” she said of the artists.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the end, Rosalie Ritz approached everything she did with a full-hearted determination that enabled her to live life on her own terms \u003cem>and\u003c/em> in a way that sought to benefit others. Her uncompromising vision—for both her art and her Bay Area communities—drove her to leave her mark on the world. And at the end of her life, she knew that she had.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just had a wonderful life,” Ritz said. “It was a great ride. I always had a smile because I did what I wanted to do. I interpreted the world in drawings, in writing. I had a good time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>To learn about other Rebel Girls from Bay Area History, visit the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/rebelgirls\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Rebel Girls homepage\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A book celebrating women from the Rebel Girls series, \u003ca href=\"https://citylights.com/politics-current-events-history/unsung-heroines35-women-who-changed/\">‘Unsung Heroines: 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area,’\u003c/a> is available now from City Lights.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Rosalie Ritz illustrated Patty Hearst's and the Black Panthers' trials. But she also helped put Oakland's art scene on the map. ",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">I\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>n 1969, Rosalie Ritz’s frank take on Robert F. Kennedy’s assassin was controversial. Ritz, the sketch artist at \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirhan_Sirhan\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sirhan B. Sirhan\u003c/a>‘s trial, described him after the fact as “the only honest man” in the courtroom. “It was my first experience with a revolutionary,” she told the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> shortly after the guilty verdict came down. “Of course it was pointless—all killing is pointless. You have to be nutty to do it. But Sirhan knew exactly what he wanted to do and he did it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Sirhan trial was not the only time Ritz came into close contact with a revolutionary. She spent the late-1960s and ’70s covering the trials of Black Panthers including \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13881407/huey-newton-h-rap-brown-stokely-carmichael-speech-1968\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Huey P. Newton\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13891079/the-archivist-and-the-activist-behind-a-new-book-about-angela-davis\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Angela Davis\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soledad_Brothers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Soledad Brothers\u003c/a>. She also documented the high profile prosecution of heiress-turned-“urban guerrilla” \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/pop/101956/patty-hearst-how-the-outlaw-heiress-became-a-chameleon\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Patricia Hearst\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, Ritz was one of the most in-demand courtroom sketch artists of the era, providing illustrations for the Associated Press, CBS News, KPIX, KNXT and, yes, KQED. She was known to make up to 21 drawings a day in court and could sketch an entire jury in minutes. Ritz was also an accomplished writer who took readers behind the scenes. This article she wrote for the \u003cem>Los Angeles Free Press\u003c/em> used the Patricia Hearst trial to highlight the overzealous security Ritz had experienced at similarly high profile cases involving Black defendants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917966\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917966\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-800x920.png\" alt=\"A newspaper article titled 'Near Mayhem—Tight Security.' '\" width=\"800\" height=\"920\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-800x920.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-1020x1173.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-160x184.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR-768x883.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Los-Angeles-Free-Press-10-75-RR.png 1148w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ritz wrote and illustrated several articles for the ‘Los Angeles Free Press’ during the high-profile trial of Patricia Hearst. \u003ccite>(Los Angeles Free Press, Oct. 1975)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Ritz didn’t just have a front-row seat to one of the most turbulent eras in Bay Area history—she had the talent and determination to share it with the rest of the world. “It’s never as tough as you think it is,” she once said, “if you act from strength, not from fear, and you speak the truth to power.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That Ritz wasn’t shy about offering her opinions about the events of the day made her work all the more compelling. When Sirhan was sentenced to death, she said, “I am unutterably opposed to the death penalty. It seems vengeful to me. I think anyone who attends a lot of trials would feel very strongly on this point.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of Huey P. Newton, she shared: “Huey Newton was a very attractive young man and most intelligent. I learned a lot about social conditions from that trial … It was really awakening. Everyone was impressed by him—you couldn’t help but be.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>When \u003ca href=\"http://peter-barnes.org/article/the-presidio-mutiny/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">14 soldiers were tried for mutiny\u003c/a> after participating in a peaceful demonstration against the Vietnam War, Ritz was clear about whose side she was on. “I feel very sorry for those 14 young men,” she told the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em>. “They all have low IQs, they are very young and vulnerable and not one of them, in my opinion, would be capable of initiating anything like a mutiny. The fact that [the Army] would even take such young men into the service strikes you.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">R\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>itz was brave, willful and outspoken from a very young age—possibly the result of being the seventh of 10 children, all of whom lost their father at an early age. (Ritz was just 9.) At 14, Ritz’s prodigious artistic skills allowed her to attend art college in Milwaukee. At 16, she hit the road with her big sister’s ID, alongside four other young women, and earned money for her family making portraits of people at circuses, fairs and other community events across the midwest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After graduating from Layton Art College, Ritz married a Navy officer (and future accountant) named Erwin in 1946, and had four daughters, Sandy, Barbara, Terry and Janet. The family’s home life was a happy one, full of painting, laughter and dance. (“She and my dad were like Fred and Ginger,” Sandy tells KQED Arts today.) The couple, together for more than 60 years, was also athletic—Ritz was an excellent golfer who competed in amateur championships.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was in 1966 that the Ritz family relocated to Walnut Creek from Washington D.C. Ritz was already established as a courtroom artist with a vibrant, vigorous style, having landed her first job at the Army-McCarthy hearings of 1954. Speaking to the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> 15 years after the fact, Ritz recalled: “Somebody I knew there knew Joe McCarthy, so I went to his office and asked if I could attend his closed Senate hearings. I just started sketching while I was there and when I came out of the room, [a TV station] offered to buy the sketches. That started it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What kept it going was Ritz’s tenacity and people skills. On the first day of Huey P. Newton’s trial, Ritz successfully talked her way into the courtroom, despite the fact that she’d not yet been issued a press pass. That there were also 3,000 protesters outside made her entrance all the more miraculous. Later, she was permitted to visit Newton in a holding cell to draw him—a privilege not afforded to any other court reporters. It probably helped that she understood fundamentally what the Black Panthers were trying to do. “These were people who really believed in doing the right thing,” she later said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Despite Ritz’s commitment to covering the toughest, most high-profile cases of her day, the trials sometimes took their toll. Ritz’s daughter Sandy describes her mom’s days in court as “often stressful to her psyche. The mass murderers, violent outbreaks, the injustices, the racism. The work was challenging.” But, Sandy continues, “She always knew the historical significance of what she was doing, and was passionate about it. She knew that she was the eyes for the world. She knew that her work was the only pictorial record of history occurring in California at that time, and she was often the first and only reporter in the courtroom for some trials.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was this knowledge that impacted Ritz’s decision to retain ownership of all of her own artwork. Though it would have earned her a better living, she never sold her courtroom sketches—only the use of them. After her death from lung cancer in 2008, Ritz donated more than \u003ca href=\"https://oac.cdlib.org/view?docId=kt8g50226j&doc.view=items&style=oac4&item.position=1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">1,800 of her courtroom drawings\u003c/a> to the Bancroft Library at U.C. Berkeley. Sandy and her sisters worked on cataloging and digitizing the collection so the drawings could stand as a public record of some of the most important moments in California history. “Justice was one of her strongest forces,” Sandy recalls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">A\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>way from the courtroom, Ritz was passionate about making large-scale oil paintings and sculptures, and she always had one eye on the wider Bay Area art community. In 1974, she opened the Upstairs Art Gallery at 927 Broadway alongside fellow artists, Thomas Bray and Edy Keeler. Opening a gallery in Oakland was extremely important to Ritz. She recognized that the Bay Area arts scene—including the organizations responsible for handing out grants and funding—was focused almost exclusively on San Francisco. And she desperately wanted to change that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My opinion of Oakland is that it is a very beautiful city,” Ritz told the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> in 1974. “[Its neglect] is due to snobbery of people around Oakland, and we let them get away with it. What we’re going to do is start saying ‘The Oakland San Francisco Bay Area’ and they’ll complement one another.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ritz was also determined that the Upstairs Gallery should be warm and welcoming for all people. She believed that the large art institutions in the Bay could be off-putting for everybody but the elite. “People don’t relate to it because it’s for people dressed in fancy clothes,” she once said of the \u003ca href=\"https://museumca.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Oakland Museum\u003c/a>. With that in mind, Ritz and her friends lovingly restored the Upstairs Gallery space, including a 100-year-old fireplace. (“These buildings are museum pieces and I think they should be saved,” she said at the time.) The \u003ca href=\"https://www.betheden.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Beth Eden Baptist Church\u003c/a> choir performed at the gallery opening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Though the Upstairs Gallery was a scrappy endeavor once described by the \u003cem>Tribune\u003c/em> as a “struggling, always dollar-short art colony above a pawn shop,” Ritz successfully made the impact on the arts scene that she had hoped for. In 1979, when the City of Oakland and the Labor Department awarded federal unemployment seed money to the Oakland art community for the first time, it went to Ritz and the Upstairs Gallery. She used the $100,000 check to hire staff artists at $700 a month. (That’s about $4,200 in 2022 money.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the gallery was inundated with applicants, Ritz told the \u003cem>Tribune\u003c/em>: “It was shocking, and a good indication this city has deeper problems than it realizes. It’s not only the tradesmen, the unskilled, the young people, minorities, or the ex-felons who can’t find jobs. It’s right here in our cultural midst.” Ritz pledged to help as many of the non-successful candidates as she could, seeking out other outlets that might offer art-related jobs in Oakland. “Oakland can’t afford to lose them to other cities,” she said of the artists.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the end, Rosalie Ritz approached everything she did with a full-hearted determination that enabled her to live life on her own terms \u003cem>and\u003c/em> in a way that sought to benefit others. Her uncompromising vision—for both her art and her Bay Area communities—drove her to leave her mark on the world. And at the end of her life, she knew that she had.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just had a wonderful life,” Ritz said. “It was a great ride. I always had a smile because I did what I wanted to do. I interpreted the world in drawings, in writing. I had a good time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>To learn about other Rebel Girls from Bay Area History, visit the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/rebelgirls\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Rebel Girls homepage\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>A book celebrating women from the Rebel Girls series, \u003ca href=\"https://citylights.com/politics-current-events-history/unsung-heroines35-women-who-changed/\">‘Unsung Heroines: 35 Women Who Changed the Bay Area,’\u003c/a> is available now from City Lights.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "hidden-old-tombstones-guide-san-francisco-history",
"title": "Beyond the Grave: How Old Tombstones Became Part of the Fabric of San Francisco",
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"headTitle": "Beyond the Grave: How Old Tombstones Became Part of the Fabric of San Francisco | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>At first glance, San Francisco is strangely devoid of gravestones. It’s been illegal to bury new bodies in the city for over 120 years. And, as most Bay Area residents already know, the city was emptied of the vast majority of its dead back in the 1930s, when bodies were moved en masse to Colma.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Twenty-six thousand occupants of the Odd Fellows Cemetery—today’s \u003ca href=\"https://sfrecpark.org/1000/Rossi-Playground-Picnic-Area\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Rossi Park\u003c/a> and surrounding areas—ended up in \u003ca href=\"https://www.greenlawnmemorialpark.com/history\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Greenlawn Memorial Park\u003c/a>, for example. Those bodies are now buried in a part of the Colma cemetery not open to the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917413\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917413\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208-800x502.jpg\" alt=\"A woman in black Victorian mourning dress gazes down upon a graveyard full of marble monuments and gravestones.\" width=\"800\" height=\"502\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208-800x502.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208-160x100.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208-768x482.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Odd Fellows Cemetery as it was in the 1900s. The Columbarium on the right of the shot is the only thing that remains today. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp15.208)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917412\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917412\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426-800x636.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"636\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426-800x636.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426-160x127.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426-768x611.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Workers in the process of converting Odd Fellows Cemetery into Rossi Playground in December 1933. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.2426)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>While almost all of San Francisco’s dead were moved to Colma, many of their headstones and mausoleums remained in the city. That’s because even when relatives of the deceased were successfully contacted, they frequently couldn’t afford to have grave markers moved. (The mass eviction happened during the Great Depression, after all.) The thousands of gravestones left behind were inherited by the Department of Public Works, who started using them in city infrastructure projects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result, the north and west sides of San Francisco are still awash with tombstones. They ended up on that side of the city in large part because of where San Francisco’s four largest burial plots were originally located. The Laurel Hill, Masonic, Odd Fellows and Calvary cemeteries once dominated the area around Geary and Masonic. (Laurel Hill Cemetery alone covered 54 acres.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s where you can still find glimpses of what’s left of the grave markers in our midst.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Ocean Beach / The Great Highway\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917358\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917358\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-800x532.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"532\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-800x532.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-768x511.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-1536x1022.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-2048x1363.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-1920x1278.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A small dog hangs out on part of an old mausoleum, half submerged in sand. The former burial chamber showed up at the intersection of Rivera St. and the Great Highway in 2012. \u003ccite>(Megan Farmer/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When the 35,000 bodies in Laurel Hill Cemetery were exhumed and removed, their once distinguished burial monuments were smashed up into more manageable slabs and transported to the beach. Some of the largest pieces were then piled up into fortifying, erosion-reducing diagonal walls along Ocean Beach. Some of the gravestones were also used as bedding in the Great Highway—the road the new walls were intended to protect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Entirely intact headstones with perfectly legible epitaphs have since been uncovered at sporadic intervals on the shoreline. In 1977, \u003cem>The Chronicle\u003c/em> talked to beachgoers who were stunned to find headstones in the sand. In 2012, grave markers from 1876 and 1890 showed up on the beach within weeks of each other. Brace yourself after inclement weather, then—there’s undoubtedly more where these came from.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Buena Vista Park’s Gutters\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917441\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917441\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-800x495.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"495\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-800x495.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-1020x631.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-160x99.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-768x475.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-1536x951.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-2048x1267.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-1920x1188.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(R, L) Pieces of headstones in Buena Vista Park’s rain gutters, (C) How the gutters look from the path. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>While many of the Ocean Beach tombstones stayed intact, the marble ones that made it to Buena Vista Park were smashed up into small fragments and used to line rain gutters. Tantalizing small portions of names and dates are still visible in places, though the vast majority of the stones were positioned with their epitaphs facing down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13883118']While Buena Vista is the oldest park in San Francisco (it was established in 1867), the gravestone gutters were a direct result of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s solution to the Great Depression in 1935. Roosevelt introduced the \u003ca href=\"https://www.history.com/topics/great-depression/works-progress-administration\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Works Progress Administration\u003c/a> to improve and beautify public spaces while also providing millions of people with jobs—8.3 million people over eight years, in fact. It was some of those WPA workers who constructed the gutters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To visit the former headstones, enter near the playground at Waller. The gutters run directly opposite and can be followed from there.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Aquatic Park’s Sea Wall\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917437\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917437\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Remnants of gravestones and pieces of tombs seen next to Aquatic Park’s seawall during low tide. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The WPA was responsible for more than just city maintenance in the 1930s. Workers also constructed schools, hospitals and recreation areas. Aquatic Park’s sea wall—to the left of the beach and on the walk towards the long, curved pier that helps keeps the waters calm—was one of these projects. And it utilized unclaimed gravestones from Odd Fellows Cemetery in order to save money on construction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At low tide, the tombstones at Aquatic Park are remarkably visible once you start actively looking for them. What’s left of the rectangular gravestones stands out starkly against the Bay’s natural detritus.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The Wave Organ\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917454\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917454\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-800x800.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-1020x1020.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-160x160.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-768x768.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-1536x1536.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-2048x2048.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-1920x1920.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Details of the Wave Organ clearly show large segments of old mausoleums and tombs. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Behind St. Francis Yacht Club, at the end of a jetty, a strange sculpture stands, amplifying the sounds of the waves below. \u003cem>The Wave Organ\u003c/em> was designed by artist Peter Richards in 1986, constructed by sculptor and stone mason George Gonzales, and sponsored by the Exploratorium. (Both men had previously been artists-in-residence at the museum.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The organ is made from cement tubes, 25 PVC organ pipes, found bricks and, yes, large chunks of abandoned turn-of-the-century crypts and mausoleums. Roman numerals are still visible in several parts of \u003cem>The Wave Organ\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917455\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917455\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Inscriptions of old roman numerals on the Wave Organ. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The walk along the jetty up to the sculpture is also littered with old graveyard remnants. Parts of gravestones and unusual corners of crypts and tombs are clearly visible on either side of the path.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917457\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917457\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Large pieces of old grave monuments are dotted along either side of the jetty approaching the Wave Organ. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The fact that there were still so many of these cemetery relics available in the 1980s to construct \u003cem>The Wave Organ\u003c/em> demonstrates just how much was left behind in the 1930s.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Marina District’s Yacht Harbor\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917444\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917444\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-800x591.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"591\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-800x591.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-1020x753.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-160x118.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-768x567.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-1536x1134.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM.png 1734w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The white portions of the wall at the Marina’s yacht club are likely made up of old gravestones. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In November 1934, piles of discarded gravestones arrived in the Marina District and construction crews began turning them into a sea wall for the yacht harbor. Photos from the time show workers organizing small uniform rectangles of white slabs. The white stones in the harbor wall still stand out next to the bricks and darker stones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13894837']Not all of the abandoned gravestones in San Francisco found themselves utilized in such a fashion. Over the years, random tombstones have been uncovered in a variety of unexpected places. In July 1977, a group of Miraloma Park children called the police after they found a collection of turn-of-the-century headstones while playing on Mount Davidson. In 1998, a rototiller working at Turk and Arguello hit the gravestone of a saloon owner named Pierre Giraud who had died in 1878, aged 39. And in 2017, electricians working on an Iris Avenue home in Laurel Heights found a 155-year-old headstone etched with the names of an entire family, including an infant son.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though few graves remain in the city—the Columbarium and cemeteries at the Presidio and Mission Dolores are all that’s left—the memories of the evicted dead are harder to scrub from the city. Their memorials, after all, make up the very fabric of it.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "When San Francisco’s dead were moved to Colma, their gravestones stayed put. Here’s where to find them today.",
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"title": "A Guide to Finding Hidden Tombstones in San Francisco | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>At first glance, San Francisco is strangely devoid of gravestones. It’s been illegal to bury new bodies in the city for over 120 years. And, as most Bay Area residents already know, the city was emptied of the vast majority of its dead back in the 1930s, when bodies were moved en masse to Colma.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Twenty-six thousand occupants of the Odd Fellows Cemetery—today’s \u003ca href=\"https://sfrecpark.org/1000/Rossi-Playground-Picnic-Area\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Rossi Park\u003c/a> and surrounding areas—ended up in \u003ca href=\"https://www.greenlawnmemorialpark.com/history\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Greenlawn Memorial Park\u003c/a>, for example. Those bodies are now buried in a part of the Colma cemetery not open to the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917413\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917413\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208-800x502.jpg\" alt=\"A woman in black Victorian mourning dress gazes down upon a graveyard full of marble monuments and gravestones.\" width=\"800\" height=\"502\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208-800x502.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208-160x100.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208-768x482.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp15.208.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Odd Fellows Cemetery as it was in the 1900s. The Columbarium on the right of the shot is the only thing that remains today. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp15.208)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917412\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917412\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426-800x636.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"636\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426-800x636.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426-160x127.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426-768x611.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/opensfhistory_wnp14.2426.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Workers in the process of converting Odd Fellows Cemetery into Rossi Playground in December 1933. \u003ccite>(OpenSFHistory / wnp14.2426)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>While almost all of San Francisco’s dead were moved to Colma, many of their headstones and mausoleums remained in the city. That’s because even when relatives of the deceased were successfully contacted, they frequently couldn’t afford to have grave markers moved. (The mass eviction happened during the Great Depression, after all.) The thousands of gravestones left behind were inherited by the Department of Public Works, who started using them in city infrastructure projects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result, the north and west sides of San Francisco are still awash with tombstones. They ended up on that side of the city in large part because of where San Francisco’s four largest burial plots were originally located. The Laurel Hill, Masonic, Odd Fellows and Calvary cemeteries once dominated the area around Geary and Masonic. (Laurel Hill Cemetery alone covered 54 acres.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s where you can still find glimpses of what’s left of the grave markers in our midst.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Ocean Beach / The Great Highway\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917358\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917358\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-800x532.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"532\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-800x532.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-160x106.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-768x511.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-1536x1022.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-2048x1363.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/GettyImages-1298760629-1920x1278.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A small dog hangs out on part of an old mausoleum, half submerged in sand. The former burial chamber showed up at the intersection of Rivera St. and the Great Highway in 2012. \u003ccite>(Megan Farmer/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When the 35,000 bodies in Laurel Hill Cemetery were exhumed and removed, their once distinguished burial monuments were smashed up into more manageable slabs and transported to the beach. Some of the largest pieces were then piled up into fortifying, erosion-reducing diagonal walls along Ocean Beach. Some of the gravestones were also used as bedding in the Great Highway—the road the new walls were intended to protect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Entirely intact headstones with perfectly legible epitaphs have since been uncovered at sporadic intervals on the shoreline. In 1977, \u003cem>The Chronicle\u003c/em> talked to beachgoers who were stunned to find headstones in the sand. In 2012, grave markers from 1876 and 1890 showed up on the beach within weeks of each other. Brace yourself after inclement weather, then—there’s undoubtedly more where these came from.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Buena Vista Park’s Gutters\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917441\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917441\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-800x495.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"495\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-800x495.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-1020x631.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-160x99.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-768x475.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-1536x951.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-2048x1267.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/buena-vista-1920x1188.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(R, L) Pieces of headstones in Buena Vista Park’s rain gutters, (C) How the gutters look from the path. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>While many of the Ocean Beach tombstones stayed intact, the marble ones that made it to Buena Vista Park were smashed up into small fragments and used to line rain gutters. Tantalizing small portions of names and dates are still visible in places, though the vast majority of the stones were positioned with their epitaphs facing down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>While Buena Vista is the oldest park in San Francisco (it was established in 1867), the gravestone gutters were a direct result of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s solution to the Great Depression in 1935. Roosevelt introduced the \u003ca href=\"https://www.history.com/topics/great-depression/works-progress-administration\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Works Progress Administration\u003c/a> to improve and beautify public spaces while also providing millions of people with jobs—8.3 million people over eight years, in fact. It was some of those WPA workers who constructed the gutters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To visit the former headstones, enter near the playground at Waller. The gutters run directly opposite and can be followed from there.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Aquatic Park’s Sea Wall\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917437\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917437\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/aquatic-park-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Remnants of gravestones and pieces of tombs seen next to Aquatic Park’s seawall during low tide. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The WPA was responsible for more than just city maintenance in the 1930s. Workers also constructed schools, hospitals and recreation areas. Aquatic Park’s sea wall—to the left of the beach and on the walk towards the long, curved pier that helps keeps the waters calm—was one of these projects. And it utilized unclaimed gravestones from Odd Fellows Cemetery in order to save money on construction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At low tide, the tombstones at Aquatic Park are remarkably visible once you start actively looking for them. What’s left of the rectangular gravestones stands out starkly against the Bay’s natural detritus.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The Wave Organ\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917454\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917454\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-800x800.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-800x800.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-1020x1020.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-160x160.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-768x768.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-1536x1536.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-2048x2048.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-1920x1920.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Details of the Wave Organ clearly show large segments of old mausoleums and tombs. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Behind St. Francis Yacht Club, at the end of a jetty, a strange sculpture stands, amplifying the sounds of the waves below. \u003cem>The Wave Organ\u003c/em> was designed by artist Peter Richards in 1986, constructed by sculptor and stone mason George Gonzales, and sponsored by the Exploratorium. (Both men had previously been artists-in-residence at the museum.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The organ is made from cement tubes, 25 PVC organ pipes, found bricks and, yes, large chunks of abandoned turn-of-the-century crypts and mausoleums. Roman numerals are still visible in several parts of \u003cem>The Wave Organ\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917455\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917455\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-numerals-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Inscriptions of old roman numerals on the Wave Organ. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The walk along the jetty up to the sculpture is also littered with old graveyard remnants. Parts of gravestones and unusual corners of crypts and tombs are clearly visible on either side of the path.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917457\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917457\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/wave-organ-approach-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Large pieces of old grave monuments are dotted along either side of the jetty approaching the Wave Organ. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The fact that there were still so many of these cemetery relics available in the 1980s to construct \u003cem>The Wave Organ\u003c/em> demonstrates just how much was left behind in the 1930s.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Marina District’s Yacht Harbor\u003c/h2>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13917444\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13917444\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-800x591.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"591\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-800x591.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-1020x753.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-160x118.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-768x567.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM-1536x1134.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/08/Screen-Shot-2022-08-11-at-10.30.24-AM.png 1734w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The white portions of the wall at the Marina’s yacht club are likely made up of old gravestones. \u003ccite>(Rae Alexandra)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In November 1934, piles of discarded gravestones arrived in the Marina District and construction crews began turning them into a sea wall for the yacht harbor. Photos from the time show workers organizing small uniform rectangles of white slabs. The white stones in the harbor wall still stand out next to the bricks and darker stones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Not all of the abandoned gravestones in San Francisco found themselves utilized in such a fashion. Over the years, random tombstones have been uncovered in a variety of unexpected places. In July 1977, a group of Miraloma Park children called the police after they found a collection of turn-of-the-century headstones while playing on Mount Davidson. In 1998, a rototiller working at Turk and Arguello hit the gravestone of a saloon owner named Pierre Giraud who had died in 1878, aged 39. And in 2017, electricians working on an Iris Avenue home in Laurel Heights found a 155-year-old headstone etched with the names of an entire family, including an infant son.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"tagline": "Where conversation and cultura meet",
"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
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"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
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"marketplace": {
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"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 4pm-4:30pm, MON-WED 6:30pm-7pm",
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"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
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},
"mindshift": {
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"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
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"order": 12
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"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
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"title": "On The Media",
"info": "Our weekly podcast explores how the media 'sausage' is made, casts an incisive eye on fluctuations in the marketplace of ideas, and examines threats to the freedom of information and expression in America and abroad. For one hour a week, the show tries to lift the veil from the process of \"making media,\" especially news media, because it's through that lens that we see the world and the world sees us",
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"planet-money": {
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"politicalbreakdown": {
"id": "politicalbreakdown",
"title": "Political Breakdown",
"tagline": "Politics from a personal perspective",
"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
"airtime": "THU 6:30pm-7pm",
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"possible": {
"id": "possible",
"title": "Possible",
"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Possible-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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"pri-the-world": {
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"title": "PRI's The World: Latest Edition",
"info": "Each weekday, host Marco Werman and his team of producers bring you the world's most interesting stories in an hour of radio that reminds us just how small our planet really is.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 2pm-3pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-World-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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},
"radiolab": {
"id": "radiolab",
"title": "Radiolab",
"info": "A two-time Peabody Award-winner, Radiolab is an investigation told through sounds and stories, and centered around one big idea. In the Radiolab world, information sounds like music and science and culture collide. Hosted by Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich, the show is designed for listeners who demand skepticism, but appreciate wonder. WNYC Studios is the producer of other leading podcasts including Freakonomics Radio, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and many more.",
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},
"reveal": {
"id": "reveal",
"title": "Reveal",
"info": "Created by The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX, Reveal is public radios first one-hour weekly radio show and podcast dedicated to investigative reporting. Credible, fact based and without a partisan agenda, Reveal combines the power and artistry of driveway moment storytelling with data-rich reporting on critically important issues. The result is stories that inform and inspire, arming our listeners with information to right injustices, hold the powerful accountable and improve lives.Reveal is hosted by Al Letson and showcases the award-winning work of CIR and newsrooms large and small across the nation. In a radio and podcast market crowded with choices, Reveal focuses on important and often surprising stories that illuminate the world for our listeners.",
"airtime": "SAT 4pm-5pm",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/reveal300px.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.revealnews.org/episodes/",
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"rss": "http://feeds.revealradio.org/revealpodcast"
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},
"rightnowish": {
"id": "rightnowish",
"title": "Rightnowish",
"tagline": "Art is where you find it",
"info": "Rightnowish digs into life in the Bay Area right now… ish. Journalist Pendarvis Harshaw takes us to galleries painted on the sides of liquor stores in West Oakland. We'll dance in warehouses in the Bayview, make smoothies with kids in South Berkeley, and listen to classical music in a 1984 Cutlass Supreme in Richmond. Every week, Pen talks to movers and shakers about how the Bay Area shapes what they create, and how they shape the place we call home.",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 16
},
"link": "/podcasts/rightnowish",
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},
"science-friday": {
"id": "science-friday",
"title": "Science Friday",
"info": "Science Friday is a weekly science talk show, broadcast live over public radio stations nationwide. Each week, the show focuses on science topics that are in the news and tries to bring an educated, balanced discussion to bear on the scientific issues at hand. Panels of expert guests join host Ira Flatow, a veteran science journalist, to discuss science and to take questions from listeners during the call-in portion of the program.",
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"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Science-Friday-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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},
"snap-judgment": {
"id": "snap-judgment",
"title": "Snap Judgment",
"tagline": "Real stories with killer beats",
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