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"content": "\u003cp>When night falls, you can stand almost anywhere in the San Gabriel Valley, look to the north at Mt. Wilson in the distance, and see the glowing lights of TV and radio antennae spiking into the darkness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that’s not all that’s up there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Among the pine trees and coyotes, high above the humdrum, terra firma existence of Los Angeles mortals, sits the \u003ca href=\"https://www.mtwilson.edu/\">Mt. Wilson Observatory\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For over a century, it’s been a gateway to the heavens.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The twin, chalk-white domes atop the ridge are home to two aging but still mighty telescopes. The 60- and 100-inch machines are arguably the most important in the history of astronomy.\u003cbr>\n[ad fullwidth]\u003cbr>\nSuperstars of astro science like Edwin Hubble, George Ellery Hale and Albert Einstein have looked through them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And you can, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, anyone can rent the scopes for the whole night. The rental includes an astronomer to guide your trip through the astonishing wonders of the dark and endless firmament. And snacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The 100-ton dome wails like a metallic banshee as it slowly turns to accommodate the view of the 60-inch telescope, a move it’s been making since things began here so long ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In 1908, it was the largest telescope in the world,” said telescope operator Tom Mason. He’s one of a devoted cadre of amateur astronomers and retired engineers who keep things going atop Mt. Wilson. He’s been volunteering at the observatory for 17 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11899383\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11899383 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A man wearing glasses sits on a chair in front of a desk and several computer screens. He looks at the camera.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Tom Mason has been guiding visitors through the heavens for 17 years. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It was the first telescope placed on a mountain this size,” he continued. “It was the first real enactment of the mirror-reflecting-type telescope. So you have a lot of history here.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the early part of the 20th century, conventional wisdom held that refracting telescopes were the only professional-grade instruments. Mt. Wilson’s mirror-based, reflecting technology proved that notion untrue, setting a new industry standard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The telescope is a sight to behold. It’s an industrial latticework of tubular steel angled toward a crack in the dome like a cannon. It’s about the size of a crouching Tyrannosaurus rex. It’s painted baby blue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The tube got here 113 years ago on the back of a truck that barely made it up the winding dirt road from Pasadena.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11899385\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1705px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11899385 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"Albert Einstein wears a suit and stands on the steps leading to the Observatory\" width=\"1705\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-scaled.jpg 1705w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-800x1201.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-1020x1532.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-1023x1536.jpg 1023w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-1364x2048.jpg 1364w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1705px) 100vw, 1705px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Albert Einstein at the Mt. Wilson Observatory in 1931 on one of his many research visits. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The unbelievably delicate, 60-inch mirror that’s the reflecting heart of the scope arrived by a team of pack mules.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the machine opened its enormous eye on the skies, it’s lived to become the grandparent of virtually every modern scope in existence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And while Los Angeles constantly grows and mutates upon itself, demolishing and building, again and again, year after year, on Mt. Wilson, things barely change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Now, do we have the technology to hook this up to a computer and guide it?” asks Mason. “Yes. But Mt. Wilson is not willing to trust it to a computer and that’s why we still operate it by hand.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>They don’t trust it to a computer.\u003c/em> It’s a notion that’s absolutely breathtaking in this day and age. The observatory operates on a DC power system that’s been refurbished over the years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The operator’s desk is a simple control center that features buttons. Buttons you press to make things move. That’s it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And don’t even think about cell reception up here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That means you can look down the scope’s eyepiece at an ancient, long-dead star still beaming its ghost light toward Earth, but you can’t text anyone about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11899370\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11899370\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A large metallic building wit a dome on top of the ceiling in a green, rural setting.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The home of the 60-inch telescope atop Mt. Wilson, one of the most historic scopes on the planet. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>This little dust spot, Earth\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Many celestial mysteries were solved at the observatory.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scientist Harlow Shapley worked at Mt. Wilson from 1914 to 1921. He used the telescopes to determine the size of the Milky Way galaxy. Yes, the size of the galaxy. This guy you’ve never heard of did that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Tom Mason, telescope operator\"]‘So as big as it is out there, and everything that’s out there, you just keep going.’[/pullquote]He also found that Earth was not the center of that galaxy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So what did that do? That moved us out here off one of the arms of the galaxy,” said Mason. “Great discovery right here with the 60-inch telescope.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And a blow to the ego of those who thought Earth was king of the hill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Well, our ego’s been blown a couple of times up here, ’cause we thought we were the only galaxy, and then Edwin Hubble came along and discovered that, yes, there is another galaxy out there. And now we’re in the billions-of-galaxies type thing,” said Mason.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s enough to make a person feel a bit tiny.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Yes, it does,” Mason said. “Because of how big this is, but also as a Christian, it also brings my attention to something. The Scripture says, ‘Oh, Lord, oh, Lord, what is man that you are mindful of him, compared to this great universe you made?’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So as big as it is out there, and everything that’s out there, you just keep going and keep going and keep going, and we keep learning about it. And [there’s] this little dust spot, the Earth, and then I’m a dust spot on that Earth. And He’s mindful of me. That’s also exciting.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label ='Related Stories' tag='science']Mason is a member of Christ Community Church in West Covina. Tonight some of his fellow church members are renting the telescope.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Vicki Heim is part of the congregation. When it comes to her favorite heavenly sighting, she doesn’t hesitate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Oh, I just love Saturn. That’s my favorite,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Heim, the God-versus-science question is a nonissue. “To me, it just couldn’t be anything else but God’s creation,” she said. “Just no possibility.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that includes the telescope? Heim glances at the contraption peeping at the heavens. “Yeah,” she said, laughing. “Yeah.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>A sanctuary of science\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>For the 60-inch scope, your rental tab is $1,050 for a half-night and $1,700 for the entire night. Plus, you get coffee, cold cuts and brownies to go with the quasars, nebulas and white dwarfs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So, how did this sanctuary of science become a fun night out for anyone with a credit card? Just too much light. Astronomy loves the darkness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the late 1990s, Los Angeles had become ground zero for light pollution. As scientific research was moving from Mt. Wilson to low-wattage places like Chile, the decision was made to open the facility to the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This rare opportunity has drawn all kinds of people up the mountain. Some come to marvel, and — though there’s a strict no-booze policy — others come to party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As a matter of fact, in the other dome tonight, there’s even a birthday party going on,” said Mason. “We’ve had engagements here, we’ve even had a wedding party that stopped by after the wedding before they started their honeymoon. Now, they didn’t stay too long, but that’s up to them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>A “divine order to things”\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Sunshine Daye came from Long Beach with an open mind and no real idea of what she would experience. She’s not part of the church group. A friend gave her a ticket.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As she stepped away from gazing through the telescope, she looked stunned — even with her mask on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11899388\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11899388 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A person stands in front of a very large telescope and holds their face mask in their hands.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-800x1067.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-1020x1360.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-1536x2048.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Like Albert Einstein before her, Sunshine Daye traveled up Mt. Wilson to gaze through the scope. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Wow. I’m looking at what appears to be like dots, but they’re actually the planets, and as I fine-tune the eyepiece, I can actually see how different the two planets are. It’s amazing to be able to see that far,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So, looking through this mountaintop window into the distant reaches of space, what does she think about?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think about what’s happening out there in the sky is actually happening inside of me. Like all my cells and capillaries, my organs, how things are just kind of orbiting and rotating, how my lungs fill with air. There’s just like this divine order to things,” said Daye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Those are things I get to think about when I come to places like this. Having it to rent out and to be able to come and see this is absolutely awesome.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was originally broadcast on \u003ca href=\"https://www.kcrw.com/news/shows/greater-la/observatory-la-sheriff-alex-villanueva-oc\">KCRW’s Greater LA\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Thanks to a devoted team of volunteers, the Mt. Wilson Observatory, located outside Los Angeles, keeps its doors open to the public, making this important piece of scientific history available to all.",
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"title": "Einstein and Hubble Once Looked Into These Iconic LA Telescopes. Now, You Can Rent Them | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>When night falls, you can stand almost anywhere in the San Gabriel Valley, look to the north at Mt. Wilson in the distance, and see the glowing lights of TV and radio antennae spiking into the darkness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that’s not all that’s up there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Among the pine trees and coyotes, high above the humdrum, terra firma existence of Los Angeles mortals, sits the \u003ca href=\"https://www.mtwilson.edu/\">Mt. Wilson Observatory\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For over a century, it’s been a gateway to the heavens.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The twin, chalk-white domes atop the ridge are home to two aging but still mighty telescopes. The 60- and 100-inch machines are arguably the most important in the history of astronomy.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cbr>\nSuperstars of astro science like Edwin Hubble, George Ellery Hale and Albert Einstein have looked through them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And you can, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, anyone can rent the scopes for the whole night. The rental includes an astronomer to guide your trip through the astonishing wonders of the dark and endless firmament. And snacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The 100-ton dome wails like a metallic banshee as it slowly turns to accommodate the view of the 60-inch telescope, a move it’s been making since things began here so long ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In 1908, it was the largest telescope in the world,” said telescope operator Tom Mason. He’s one of a devoted cadre of amateur astronomers and retired engineers who keep things going atop Mt. Wilson. He’s been volunteering at the observatory for 17 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11899383\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11899383 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A man wearing glasses sits on a chair in front of a desk and several computer screens. He looks at the camera.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52421_IMG_3416-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Tom Mason has been guiding visitors through the heavens for 17 years. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It was the first telescope placed on a mountain this size,” he continued. “It was the first real enactment of the mirror-reflecting-type telescope. So you have a lot of history here.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the early part of the 20th century, conventional wisdom held that refracting telescopes were the only professional-grade instruments. Mt. Wilson’s mirror-based, reflecting technology proved that notion untrue, setting a new industry standard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The telescope is a sight to behold. It’s an industrial latticework of tubular steel angled toward a crack in the dome like a cannon. It’s about the size of a crouching Tyrannosaurus rex. It’s painted baby blue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The tube got here 113 years ago on the back of a truck that barely made it up the winding dirt road from Pasadena.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11899385\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1705px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11899385 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"Albert Einstein wears a suit and stands on the steps leading to the Observatory\" width=\"1705\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-scaled.jpg 1705w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-800x1201.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-1020x1532.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-160x240.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-1023x1536.jpg 1023w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52424_p15150coll2_1549_full-qut-1364x2048.jpg 1364w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1705px) 100vw, 1705px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Albert Einstein at the Mt. Wilson Observatory in 1931 on one of his many research visits. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The unbelievably delicate, 60-inch mirror that’s the reflecting heart of the scope arrived by a team of pack mules.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the machine opened its enormous eye on the skies, it’s lived to become the grandparent of virtually every modern scope in existence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And while Los Angeles constantly grows and mutates upon itself, demolishing and building, again and again, year after year, on Mt. Wilson, things barely change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Now, do we have the technology to hook this up to a computer and guide it?” asks Mason. “Yes. But Mt. Wilson is not willing to trust it to a computer and that’s why we still operate it by hand.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>They don’t trust it to a computer.\u003c/em> It’s a notion that’s absolutely breathtaking in this day and age. The observatory operates on a DC power system that’s been refurbished over the years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The operator’s desk is a simple control center that features buttons. Buttons you press to make things move. That’s it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And don’t even think about cell reception up here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That means you can look down the scope’s eyepiece at an ancient, long-dead star still beaming its ghost light toward Earth, but you can’t text anyone about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11899370\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11899370\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A large metallic building wit a dome on top of the ceiling in a green, rural setting.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52420_IMG_3395-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The home of the 60-inch telescope atop Mt. Wilson, one of the most historic scopes on the planet. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>This little dust spot, Earth\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Many celestial mysteries were solved at the observatory.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scientist Harlow Shapley worked at Mt. Wilson from 1914 to 1921. He used the telescopes to determine the size of the Milky Way galaxy. Yes, the size of the galaxy. This guy you’ve never heard of did that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>He also found that Earth was not the center of that galaxy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So what did that do? That moved us out here off one of the arms of the galaxy,” said Mason. “Great discovery right here with the 60-inch telescope.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And a blow to the ego of those who thought Earth was king of the hill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Well, our ego’s been blown a couple of times up here, ’cause we thought we were the only galaxy, and then Edwin Hubble came along and discovered that, yes, there is another galaxy out there. And now we’re in the billions-of-galaxies type thing,” said Mason.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s enough to make a person feel a bit tiny.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Yes, it does,” Mason said. “Because of how big this is, but also as a Christian, it also brings my attention to something. The Scripture says, ‘Oh, Lord, oh, Lord, what is man that you are mindful of him, compared to this great universe you made?’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So as big as it is out there, and everything that’s out there, you just keep going and keep going and keep going, and we keep learning about it. And [there’s] this little dust spot, the Earth, and then I’m a dust spot on that Earth. And He’s mindful of me. That’s also exciting.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Mason is a member of Christ Community Church in West Covina. Tonight some of his fellow church members are renting the telescope.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Vicki Heim is part of the congregation. When it comes to her favorite heavenly sighting, she doesn’t hesitate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Oh, I just love Saturn. That’s my favorite,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Heim, the God-versus-science question is a nonissue. “To me, it just couldn’t be anything else but God’s creation,” she said. “Just no possibility.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that includes the telescope? Heim glances at the contraption peeping at the heavens. “Yeah,” she said, laughing. “Yeah.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>A sanctuary of science\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>For the 60-inch scope, your rental tab is $1,050 for a half-night and $1,700 for the entire night. Plus, you get coffee, cold cuts and brownies to go with the quasars, nebulas and white dwarfs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So, how did this sanctuary of science become a fun night out for anyone with a credit card? Just too much light. Astronomy loves the darkness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the late 1990s, Los Angeles had become ground zero for light pollution. As scientific research was moving from Mt. Wilson to low-wattage places like Chile, the decision was made to open the facility to the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This rare opportunity has drawn all kinds of people up the mountain. Some come to marvel, and — though there’s a strict no-booze policy — others come to party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As a matter of fact, in the other dome tonight, there’s even a birthday party going on,” said Mason. “We’ve had engagements here, we’ve even had a wedding party that stopped by after the wedding before they started their honeymoon. Now, they didn’t stay too long, but that’s up to them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>A “divine order to things”\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Sunshine Daye came from Long Beach with an open mind and no real idea of what she would experience. She’s not part of the church group. A friend gave her a ticket.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As she stepped away from gazing through the telescope, she looked stunned — even with her mask on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11899388\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11899388 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A person stands in front of a very large telescope and holds their face mask in their hands.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-800x1067.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-1020x1360.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/12/RS52422_IMG_3417-qut-1536x2048.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Like Albert Einstein before her, Sunshine Daye traveled up Mt. Wilson to gaze through the scope. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Wow. I’m looking at what appears to be like dots, but they’re actually the planets, and as I fine-tune the eyepiece, I can actually see how different the two planets are. It’s amazing to be able to see that far,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So, looking through this mountaintop window into the distant reaches of space, what does she think about?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think about what’s happening out there in the sky is actually happening inside of me. Like all my cells and capillaries, my organs, how things are just kind of orbiting and rotating, how my lungs fill with air. There’s just like this divine order to things,” said Daye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Those are things I get to think about when I come to places like this. Having it to rent out and to be able to come and see this is absolutely awesome.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was originally broadcast on \u003ca href=\"https://www.kcrw.com/news/shows/greater-la/observatory-la-sheriff-alex-villanueva-oc\">KCRW’s Greater LA\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "The Beauty Bubble Brings Vintage Style to the High Desert",
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"content": "\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"//www.kqed.org/news/tag/hidden-gems\">\u003cem>Read more from The California Report Magazine’s ‘Hidden Gems’ series.\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>The sun-scorched desert terrain of Joshua Tree is striking, stunning and glorious. But local beauty isn’t confined to the national park. In this small high-desert community, Jeff Hafler has created an oasis of style that’s part salon, part museum and all roadside attraction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Welcome to the Beauty Bubble Salon and Museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s the kind of spot where hair care baubles — even grandma’s worn-out rollers — are revered as historical discoveries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Outside on Highway 62, the temperature is well into three digits. But inside the Beauty Bubble, it’s a cool and constant 69 degrees, with a strong chance of time warp.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walk on in and the vintage hair products take you back to the decades of yesteryear. Hafler greets you flashing a photo-ready grin — part endearing host, part fast-talking emcee, part carnival ringmaster.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re welcome to walk through the museum so I would start in the back. It’s my life’s work,” he says. “It’s 30 years of collecting back there. They call me America’s ‘hairstorian\u003cstrong>,’\u003c/strong> now. Somebody had to do it!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a couple leaves the shop, he yells out, “Hair’s to ya!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886183\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886183 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A man sits in a vintage salon chair, smiling, next to a mannequin wearing vintage hair rollers. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-800x1067.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-1020x1360.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-1536x2048.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jeff Hafler, founder, owner and operator of the Beauty Bubble museum and salon in his element. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I’ve got all my puns. I should have an animatronic version of me standing at the door,” he says. “Put in a quarter and I go through my whole thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since 2004, Hafler has been the owner-operator of the Beauty Bubble, currently housed in a 1940s one-bedroom bungalow turned storefront. Floor to ceiling, wall to wall, the place is crammed with some 3,000 beauty care artifacts going back over 100 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Jeff Hafler, owner of the Beauty Bubble Salon and Museum\"]“I thought, this is fascinating history. And this is beautiful, interesting stuff. So I was 20 years old and I said, ‘I’m going to make a roadside attraction, beauty parlor museum.’ And so here I am, 29 years later, I’m 49 now. And I’m living that dream.”[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are vintage advertisements, framed magazine covers and unopened hair nets from the ’20s and ’30s with names like Bon Ton, Jac-O-Net and Pretty Miss. Outlandish wigs sit on sloe-eyed mannequin heads. Along with the portraits of Elvis Presley and Dolly Parton painted on black velvet are aging mechanical devices that look like instruments of torture. On a deco dresser, there’s a matching set of pink mirrors, brushes and jars with a note that says, “Marion’s dresser set from the 40s, found in Mom’s attic. Donated by her daughter.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Almost the entire time I’ve been collecting, people have been donating these random beauty things … like rollers and clips and barrettes,” he says. “Someone threw a bag of rollers in the front door and said, ‘Here’s grandma’s rollers! We didn’t want to throw ’em away!’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886254\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886254 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Multi-colored wigs adorn mannequin heads with vintage posters in the background. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Beauty Bubble is covered with vintage ephemera from floor to ceiling. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>To paraphrase Will Rogers, Hafler is a man who \u003cem>never\u003c/em> saw a beauty item he didn’t like.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s part of the problem. That’s part of the disease, right? I can’t say no!,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that’s what makes the place unique. Included with your modern-day cuts, colors and curls comes the sensory-engulfing overkill of it all, taking you on a journey to a bygone era of beauty care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886255\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886255 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A pink hair care supply box with gold cloth and a mirror sits open. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Beauty Bubble owner Jeff Hafler says he can’t say no when people donate items to his massive collection. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“One of the most common comments is that it reminds people of their mother or their grandmother,” says Hafler. “I hear that multiple times every week. And I love that because I was close with my grandmother. I’m very close with my mother and, you know, it’s true. I like old ladies’ trinkets.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886185\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886185 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A woman with what appears to be a fresh haircut sits in a blue dress, smiling, with a vintage hair dryer behind her.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-800x1067.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-1020x1360.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-1536x2048.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Heather Morgan, Beauty Bubble patron since 2017. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Heather Morgan is sitting in a salon chair wearing a big smile and a platinum blonde pixie cut crafted by Hafler. She’s been a regular at the Beauty Bubble since she relocated from Los Angeles in 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s a lot of people in the desert who go out and rock their LA style,” she says. “So I didn’t have to change my hair or my style. I thought I would have to, like, stop going platinum or become some old desert rag. But Jeff is out here paving the way for style.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hafler grew up in Pickerington, Ohio, just outside of Columbus, where he went to beauty school. Back then, he fell in love with a 1940s hairdryer — it’s still on display. That hairdryer sparked an interest in the vintage tools of his newfound trade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For that first year I was just collecting and decorating my bathroom with it,” he says. “And I thought, this is fascinating history. And this is beautiful, interesting stuff. So I was 20 years old and I said, ‘I’m going to make a roadside attraction, beauty parlor museum.’ And so here I am, 29 years later, I’m 49 now. And I’m living that dream.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886257\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886257 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Two mannequin heads sit with a red raggedy-anne wig and a pink curly-haired wig.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Colorful wigs are everywhere. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 2004, Hafler and his husband, jewelry designer Mikal Winn, bought a home in Wonder Valley, a dot on the desert map 30 miles east of Joshua Tree.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s an unincorporated land of rough dirt roads and endless horizons. And it’s such a rural part of San Bernardino County that home salons were, and are still, legal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Says Hafler, “I had the ‘high society of the high desert,’ is what I call them. Business owners, retired artists, Hollywood actresses. And we live next to a pretty large Marine base here and I would get the general’s wives and officer’s wives. I mean, you name it!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those early clients have stayed loyal. But here in Joshua Tree — where Hafler moved his salon in 2015 — a steady stream of tourists and locals wander in to gawk at the display.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But these days, Jeff Hafler is not styling any new heads. He’s turning his focus to selling his vintage items and curating his ever-expanding museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Since I turned my lobby into a gift shop, it’s doing so well that I don’t have to cut hair anymore,” he says. “And I was ready to stop. I’m going to maintain a handful of dear clients that I’ve done for 17 years. But I have three incredible stylists that rent the chairs, so we’ll still have hairdos down at the Beauty Bubble four days a week.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Hafler is taking his trinkets on the road.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He had a recent show at the SFO Museum at the San Francisco International Airport featuring vintage beauty items and the sculptures he creates from discarded hair care ephemera. And there’s an upcoming documentary about the Beauty Bubble. If that weren’t enough, Hafler has plans even past that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I dream about building a geodesic dome and making it look like a giant hairdryer, like that blue hairdryer up in the corner. So the beauty museum would be housed in the world’s largest hairdryer. It just has to happen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like the miles of hair that got him here, Hafler’s dream in the desert never stops growing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- /wp:paragraph -->\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"//www.kqed.org/news/tag/hidden-gems\">\u003cem>Read more from The California Report Magazine’s ‘Hidden Gems’ series.\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>The sun-scorched desert terrain of Joshua Tree is striking, stunning and glorious. But local beauty isn’t confined to the national park. In this small high-desert community, Jeff Hafler has created an oasis of style that’s part salon, part museum and all roadside attraction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Welcome to the Beauty Bubble Salon and Museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s the kind of spot where hair care baubles — even grandma’s worn-out rollers — are revered as historical discoveries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Outside on Highway 62, the temperature is well into three digits. But inside the Beauty Bubble, it’s a cool and constant 69 degrees, with a strong chance of time warp.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walk on in and the vintage hair products take you back to the decades of yesteryear. Hafler greets you flashing a photo-ready grin — part endearing host, part fast-talking emcee, part carnival ringmaster.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re welcome to walk through the museum so I would start in the back. It’s my life’s work,” he says. “It’s 30 years of collecting back there. They call me America’s ‘hairstorian\u003cstrong>,’\u003c/strong> now. Somebody had to do it!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a couple leaves the shop, he yells out, “Hair’s to ya!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886183\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886183 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A man sits in a vintage salon chair, smiling, next to a mannequin wearing vintage hair rollers. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-800x1067.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-1020x1360.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50442_IMG_3324-qut-1536x2048.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jeff Hafler, founder, owner and operator of the Beauty Bubble museum and salon in his element. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I’ve got all my puns. I should have an animatronic version of me standing at the door,” he says. “Put in a quarter and I go through my whole thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since 2004, Hafler has been the owner-operator of the Beauty Bubble, currently housed in a 1940s one-bedroom bungalow turned storefront. Floor to ceiling, wall to wall, the place is crammed with some 3,000 beauty care artifacts going back over 100 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "“I thought, this is fascinating history. And this is beautiful, interesting stuff. So I was 20 years old and I said, ‘I’m going to make a roadside attraction, beauty parlor museum.’ And so here I am, 29 years later, I’m 49 now. And I’m living that dream.”",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are vintage advertisements, framed magazine covers and unopened hair nets from the ’20s and ’30s with names like Bon Ton, Jac-O-Net and Pretty Miss. Outlandish wigs sit on sloe-eyed mannequin heads. Along with the portraits of Elvis Presley and Dolly Parton painted on black velvet are aging mechanical devices that look like instruments of torture. On a deco dresser, there’s a matching set of pink mirrors, brushes and jars with a note that says, “Marion’s dresser set from the 40s, found in Mom’s attic. Donated by her daughter.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Almost the entire time I’ve been collecting, people have been donating these random beauty things … like rollers and clips and barrettes,” he says. “Someone threw a bag of rollers in the front door and said, ‘Here’s grandma’s rollers! We didn’t want to throw ’em away!’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886254\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886254 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Multi-colored wigs adorn mannequin heads with vintage posters in the background. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51137_IMG_3259-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Beauty Bubble is covered with vintage ephemera from floor to ceiling. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>To paraphrase Will Rogers, Hafler is a man who \u003cem>never\u003c/em> saw a beauty item he didn’t like.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s part of the problem. That’s part of the disease, right? I can’t say no!,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that’s what makes the place unique. Included with your modern-day cuts, colors and curls comes the sensory-engulfing overkill of it all, taking you on a journey to a bygone era of beauty care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886255\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886255 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A pink hair care supply box with gold cloth and a mirror sits open. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51141_IMG_3311-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Beauty Bubble owner Jeff Hafler says he can’t say no when people donate items to his massive collection. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“One of the most common comments is that it reminds people of their mother or their grandmother,” says Hafler. “I hear that multiple times every week. And I love that because I was close with my grandmother. I’m very close with my mother and, you know, it’s true. I like old ladies’ trinkets.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886185\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886185 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A woman with what appears to be a fresh haircut sits in a blue dress, smiling, with a vintage hair dryer behind her.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-800x1067.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-1020x1360.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS50443_IMG_3273-qut-1536x2048.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Heather Morgan, Beauty Bubble patron since 2017. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Heather Morgan is sitting in a salon chair wearing a big smile and a platinum blonde pixie cut crafted by Hafler. She’s been a regular at the Beauty Bubble since she relocated from Los Angeles in 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s a lot of people in the desert who go out and rock their LA style,” she says. “So I didn’t have to change my hair or my style. I thought I would have to, like, stop going platinum or become some old desert rag. But Jeff is out here paving the way for style.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hafler grew up in Pickerington, Ohio, just outside of Columbus, where he went to beauty school. Back then, he fell in love with a 1940s hairdryer — it’s still on display. That hairdryer sparked an interest in the vintage tools of his newfound trade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For that first year I was just collecting and decorating my bathroom with it,” he says. “And I thought, this is fascinating history. And this is beautiful, interesting stuff. So I was 20 years old and I said, ‘I’m going to make a roadside attraction, beauty parlor museum.’ And so here I am, 29 years later, I’m 49 now. And I’m living that dream.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11886257\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11886257 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Two mannequin heads sit with a red raggedy-anne wig and a pink curly-haired wig.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/08/RS51144_IMG_3266-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Colorful wigs are everywhere. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 2004, Hafler and his husband, jewelry designer Mikal Winn, bought a home in Wonder Valley, a dot on the desert map 30 miles east of Joshua Tree.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s an unincorporated land of rough dirt roads and endless horizons. And it’s such a rural part of San Bernardino County that home salons were, and are still, legal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Says Hafler, “I had the ‘high society of the high desert,’ is what I call them. Business owners, retired artists, Hollywood actresses. And we live next to a pretty large Marine base here and I would get the general’s wives and officer’s wives. I mean, you name it!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those early clients have stayed loyal. But here in Joshua Tree — where Hafler moved his salon in 2015 — a steady stream of tourists and locals wander in to gawk at the display.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But these days, Jeff Hafler is not styling any new heads. He’s turning his focus to selling his vintage items and curating his ever-expanding museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Since I turned my lobby into a gift shop, it’s doing so well that I don’t have to cut hair anymore,” he says. “And I was ready to stop. I’m going to maintain a handful of dear clients that I’ve done for 17 years. But I have three incredible stylists that rent the chairs, so we’ll still have hairdos down at the Beauty Bubble four days a week.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Hafler is taking his trinkets on the road.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He had a recent show at the SFO Museum at the San Francisco International Airport featuring vintage beauty items and the sculptures he creates from discarded hair care ephemera. And there’s an upcoming documentary about the Beauty Bubble. If that weren’t enough, Hafler has plans even past that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I dream about building a geodesic dome and making it look like a giant hairdryer, like that blue hairdryer up in the corner. So the beauty museum would be housed in the world’s largest hairdryer. It just has to happen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like the miles of hair that got him here, Hafler’s dream in the desert never stops growing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"disqusTitle": "'We're Not Stoic': Book Traces the History of Native Americans in Comedy",
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"content": "\u003cp>Author Kliph Nesteroff has written about comedy for years. His new book, \"We Had a Little Real Estate Problem,\" takes a look at Native American comedians — a community that's been misunderstood, stereotyped and often erased in Hollywood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The book's title is the punchline of a famous joke from pioneering Native American stand-up comedian, Charlie Hill, a member of the Oneida Nation of Wisconsin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"That was the crux of his joke,\" says Nesteroff. \"'My people are from Wisconsin. We used to be from New York, but we had a little real estate problem.'\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://youtu.be/545t5SvcyDo\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the mid-1970s, Hill was hot on the Los Angeles stand-up circuit. He worked clubs on the Sunset Strip along with Jay Leno, David Letterman and Jimmy Walker. He also appeared on \"The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson,\" the ultimate anointment for a comic during that period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hill's act tackled the absurd stereotype that Native Americans aren’t funny.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11882635\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut-800x938.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"938\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11882635\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut-800x938.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut-1020x1196.jpg 1020w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut-160x188.jpg 160w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut.jpg 1080w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Comedian Charlie Hill. \u003ccite>(Photo courtesy Nasbah Hill)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\"You know, a lot of you white people never seen an Indian do stand-up comedy before,\" said Hill in a 1977 appearance on the Richard Pryor Show. \"Like, for so long you probably thought Indians never had a sense of humor. We never thought you were too funny either.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hill died in 2013, without ever reaching stardom and still doing his real estate joke. But his unique stature in the comedy world of four decades ago shows young Native comics and writers that taking their skills to Hollywood is not impossible. To this day, he’s still the only Native American comic to have made it to \"The Tonight Show.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though Nesteroff’s book is named for Hill’s signature joke, the subtitle is no punchline: The Unheralded Story of Native Americans & Comedy. Nesteroff says the stereotype of the stoic Native American was a dehumanizing tactic. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It helped to justify federal policy that subjugated Native Americans,\" he says. \"They're unsmiling. They're unfeeling. And if somebody doesn't have feelings, it doesn't matter what you do to them.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nesteroff’s past work is meticulous and deeply researched, but this book came with a particular challenge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It's a very delicate situation being a non-Native author, diving into the realm of Indigenous studies of any kind,\" he says. \"There's a long history and a huge stigma of racist anthropology, of racist historians studying Native Americans like they’re an amoeba under a microscope. What I really tried to do was to let people speak for themselves.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11882675\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 843px\">\u003cimg src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49635_Kliph-Nesteroff-credit-Jim-Herrington-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"843\" height=\"591\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11882675\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49635_Kliph-Nesteroff-credit-Jim-Herrington-qut.jpg 843w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49635_Kliph-Nesteroff-credit-Jim-Herrington-qut-800x561.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49635_Kliph-Nesteroff-credit-Jim-Herrington-qut-160x112.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 843px) 100vw, 843px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Author Kliph Nesteroff, whose new book, \"We Had a Little Real Estate Problem,\" examines the history of Native Americans in comedy.\u003cbr> \u003ccite>(Jim Herrington)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One of those people is comedian and writer \u003ca href=\"http://www.joeyclift.com/\">Joey Clift\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"There's definitely a stereotype of the stoic Indian who's best friends with an eagle, and flute music plays whenever they're pontificating about whatever,\" says Clift. \"That's just not reality. Some of us are stoic. Some of us are also real funny.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clift is a member of the Cowlitz Tribe and was raised on the Tulalip reservation just north of Seattle. He says the misconceptions about Native Americans aren’t confined to simply determining who’s funny or not.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"I've had grown adults who went to college, live in Los Angeles, work in comedy—ask me if I was born in a teepee, if my reservation had electricity growing up,\" says Clift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clift is quick to point out that he was born in a hospital, and he grew up with not only electricity, but with a television set. He spent hours in front of it, soaking up \"The Simpsons,\" \"Family Guy\" and \"Late Night with Conan O’Brien.\" He saw his future in those shows, but how to make it happen — that was the problem.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Because I didn't necessarily see any Native American comedians on TV growing up, I didn't think I was allowed to work in comedy,\" he says. \"So, instead I went to school for what to me was the next best thing, which was to be a small market TV weather guy.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s exactly what he became, but it wasn’t enough. In 2010, at the urging of his college professors, Clift decided to take a stab at a life beyond predicting sunny skies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"When I moved to LA, one of the first things that I did was just Google Native American TV writers or Native American comedians and see if anything came up.\" \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It did and Clift ended up at a Writers Guild diversity event that changed his life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"There was one Native American writer on the panel,\" Clift recalls. \"And he very quickly introduced me to Native Hollywood, the loose collection of Native people working in the entertainment industry.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clift started doing stand-up in L.A. clubs. In 2018, he created the annual Native American Comedy Showcase for the Hollywood sketch comedy group Upright Citizens Brigade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s currently writing for the animated Netflix series \"Spirit Rangers,\" created by Native American showrunner Karissa Valencia. The show’s entirely Native American writing staff is a Hollywood first.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Because I’ve been featured in this book, there are a lot of younger, up-and-coming Native comedians who have reached out to me and said, 'Hey, I read your chapter in Kliph’s book, it really resonated with me. We should do a Zoom and talk. And can you give me any advice?' says Clift. \"I think that it's a really good Bat-Signal for Native comedy, letting Native comedians know that we exist.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Native Americans getting a legitimate foothold in show business — on and offscreen — is still new.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There's a history of casting non-Native actors in native roles in Hollywood. Anthony Quinn, Charles Bronson, Burt Lancaster, Rock Hudson, Audrey Hepburn, Johnny Depp, Burt Reynolds, Boris Karloff and Elvis Presley all portrayed Native Americans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You might also recognize the late actor Iron Eyes Cody from the character he played known as \"the Crying Indian\" from a famous 1970s public service announcement on littering. He had a tear running down his cheek as he witnessed America being consumed by garbage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In real life, Cody was an Italian American named Espera de Corti, who made a career wearing an eagle feather headdress. He posed as a Native in over 100 films, and maintained that identity offscreen, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://youtu.be/h0sxwGlTLWw\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the better part of a century, Hollywood has gone out of its way to not only exclude Native Americans from serious acting roles, but to create and perpetuate negative stereotypes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Westerns were among the first movies ever made,\" Nesteroff says. \"And by the year 1911, a contingent of Indigenous leaders were already registering formal complaints with the White House saying, 'Can you do something to stop the spread of racist misinformation appearing in silent movies?'\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those requests went ignored.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11882633\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-800x1000.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"1000\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11882633\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-800x1000.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-1020x1275.jpg 1020w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-160x200.jpg 160w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-1229x1536.jpg 1229w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-1638x2048.jpg 1638w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Stand up comic, writer and actor Adrianne Chalepah, a featured voice in Kliph Nesteroff's new book.\u003cbr> \u003ccite>(Matthew Williamson)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\"The stoic Indian is my favorite stereotype because there's nothing further from the truth,\" says comic \u003ca href=\"http://chalepah.com/\">Adrianne Chalepah\u003c/a>. She’s featured in Nesteroff’s book, and grew up on the Kiowa-Comanche-Apache Reservation in Oklahoma. As a kid, her father turned her on to Monty Python, Cheech & Chong and Mel Brooks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"I grew up in a very humorous family,\" she says. \"You can't go five minutes without someone making fun of someone. You know, culture’s cool, language is cool, tribal stuff is all cool, but humor is the foundation. That is what keeps us just thriving. Because without that humor? Man, you know, things get really dark.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After college, she was working a straight job at a bank when she finally decided to try stand-up in her early twenties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It was a huge risk because I was actually about six months pregnant with my second child,\" says the mother of four. \"But the way that I looked at it is, it can't be any worse than what I've already been through. Because I grew up in so much poverty that, worst case scenario, I would tuck my tail between my legs and go live with my mom in a trailer park.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That didn’t happen. Chalepah moved to Albuquerque, maneuvering her comedy career around her young sons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She gigged at tribal communities all over the country, from nighttime outdoor shows lit by car headlights to reservation casino stages. Pre-coronavirus, she was averaging four jobs a month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"I chased every stage, every opportunity. I had no ego and no pride in the matter. If they were like, 'Okay, you get five minutes in front of people who hate you,' I would've been like, great, I'll be there.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, unlike Joey Clift, who came to Hollywood to carve out a career, Chalepah stayed away from the belly of the beast. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>My opinion of the industry is that it is elitist because it's a pay-to-play thing,\" she explains. \"You’ve got to pay for training. You’ve got to pay for headshots. You’ve got to pay to live in LA. It's expensive. And then what ends up happening is you exclude middle America, and specifically the Natives on reservations get completely excluded because the idea is, 'No, you have to come to us.'\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the pandemic drags on, Chalepah is taking care of her kids and focusing on acting. The stand-up gigs are dead on the vine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s still a struggle for Natives in Hollywood, but she says Nesteroff’s book is a positive step.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Really, my hope is that it will just open doors to more comedians, or at least let industry folks know that we're not a relic or we're not an antique. We have iPhones. We're not stoic.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Author Kliph Nesteroff has written about comedy for years. His new book, \"We Had a Little Real Estate Problem,\" takes a look at Native American comedians — a community that's been misunderstood, stereotyped and often erased in Hollywood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The book's title is the punchline of a famous joke from pioneering Native American stand-up comedian, Charlie Hill, a member of the Oneida Nation of Wisconsin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"That was the crux of his joke,\" says Nesteroff. \"'My people are from Wisconsin. We used to be from New York, but we had a little real estate problem.'\"\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/545t5SvcyDo'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/545t5SvcyDo'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>In the mid-1970s, Hill was hot on the Los Angeles stand-up circuit. He worked clubs on the Sunset Strip along with Jay Leno, David Letterman and Jimmy Walker. He also appeared on \"The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson,\" the ultimate anointment for a comic during that period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hill's act tackled the absurd stereotype that Native Americans aren’t funny.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11882635\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut-800x938.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"938\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11882635\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut-800x938.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut-1020x1196.jpg 1020w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut-160x188.jpg 160w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49634_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_18_8ACharlieHillheadshot-2-qut.jpg 1080w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Comedian Charlie Hill. \u003ccite>(Photo courtesy Nasbah Hill)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\"You know, a lot of you white people never seen an Indian do stand-up comedy before,\" said Hill in a 1977 appearance on the Richard Pryor Show. \"Like, for so long you probably thought Indians never had a sense of humor. We never thought you were too funny either.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hill died in 2013, without ever reaching stardom and still doing his real estate joke. But his unique stature in the comedy world of four decades ago shows young Native comics and writers that taking their skills to Hollywood is not impossible. To this day, he’s still the only Native American comic to have made it to \"The Tonight Show.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though Nesteroff’s book is named for Hill’s signature joke, the subtitle is no punchline: The Unheralded Story of Native Americans & Comedy. Nesteroff says the stereotype of the stoic Native American was a dehumanizing tactic. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It helped to justify federal policy that subjugated Native Americans,\" he says. \"They're unsmiling. They're unfeeling. And if somebody doesn't have feelings, it doesn't matter what you do to them.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nesteroff’s past work is meticulous and deeply researched, but this book came with a particular challenge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It's a very delicate situation being a non-Native author, diving into the realm of Indigenous studies of any kind,\" he says. \"There's a long history and a huge stigma of racist anthropology, of racist historians studying Native Americans like they’re an amoeba under a microscope. What I really tried to do was to let people speak for themselves.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11882675\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 843px\">\u003cimg src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49635_Kliph-Nesteroff-credit-Jim-Herrington-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"843\" height=\"591\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11882675\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49635_Kliph-Nesteroff-credit-Jim-Herrington-qut.jpg 843w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49635_Kliph-Nesteroff-credit-Jim-Herrington-qut-800x561.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49635_Kliph-Nesteroff-credit-Jim-Herrington-qut-160x112.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 843px) 100vw, 843px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Author Kliph Nesteroff, whose new book, \"We Had a Little Real Estate Problem,\" examines the history of Native Americans in comedy.\u003cbr> \u003ccite>(Jim Herrington)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One of those people is comedian and writer \u003ca href=\"http://www.joeyclift.com/\">Joey Clift\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"There's definitely a stereotype of the stoic Indian who's best friends with an eagle, and flute music plays whenever they're pontificating about whatever,\" says Clift. \"That's just not reality. Some of us are stoic. Some of us are also real funny.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clift is a member of the Cowlitz Tribe and was raised on the Tulalip reservation just north of Seattle. He says the misconceptions about Native Americans aren’t confined to simply determining who’s funny or not.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"I've had grown adults who went to college, live in Los Angeles, work in comedy—ask me if I was born in a teepee, if my reservation had electricity growing up,\" says Clift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clift is quick to point out that he was born in a hospital, and he grew up with not only electricity, but with a television set. He spent hours in front of it, soaking up \"The Simpsons,\" \"Family Guy\" and \"Late Night with Conan O’Brien.\" He saw his future in those shows, but how to make it happen — that was the problem.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Because I didn't necessarily see any Native American comedians on TV growing up, I didn't think I was allowed to work in comedy,\" he says. \"So, instead I went to school for what to me was the next best thing, which was to be a small market TV weather guy.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s exactly what he became, but it wasn’t enough. In 2010, at the urging of his college professors, Clift decided to take a stab at a life beyond predicting sunny skies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"When I moved to LA, one of the first things that I did was just Google Native American TV writers or Native American comedians and see if anything came up.\" \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It did and Clift ended up at a Writers Guild diversity event that changed his life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"There was one Native American writer on the panel,\" Clift recalls. \"And he very quickly introduced me to Native Hollywood, the loose collection of Native people working in the entertainment industry.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clift started doing stand-up in L.A. clubs. In 2018, he created the annual Native American Comedy Showcase for the Hollywood sketch comedy group Upright Citizens Brigade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s currently writing for the animated Netflix series \"Spirit Rangers,\" created by Native American showrunner Karissa Valencia. The show’s entirely Native American writing staff is a Hollywood first.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Because I’ve been featured in this book, there are a lot of younger, up-and-coming Native comedians who have reached out to me and said, 'Hey, I read your chapter in Kliph’s book, it really resonated with me. We should do a Zoom and talk. And can you give me any advice?' says Clift. \"I think that it's a really good Bat-Signal for Native comedy, letting Native comedians know that we exist.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Native Americans getting a legitimate foothold in show business — on and offscreen — is still new.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There's a history of casting non-Native actors in native roles in Hollywood. Anthony Quinn, Charles Bronson, Burt Lancaster, Rock Hudson, Audrey Hepburn, Johnny Depp, Burt Reynolds, Boris Karloff and Elvis Presley all portrayed Native Americans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You might also recognize the late actor Iron Eyes Cody from the character he played known as \"the Crying Indian\" from a famous 1970s public service announcement on littering. He had a tear running down his cheek as he witnessed America being consumed by garbage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In real life, Cody was an Italian American named Espera de Corti, who made a career wearing an eagle feather headdress. He posed as a Native in over 100 films, and maintained that identity offscreen, too.\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/h0sxwGlTLWw'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/h0sxwGlTLWw'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>For the better part of a century, Hollywood has gone out of its way to not only exclude Native Americans from serious acting roles, but to create and perpetuate negative stereotypes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Westerns were among the first movies ever made,\" Nesteroff says. \"And by the year 1911, a contingent of Indigenous leaders were already registering formal complaints with the White House saying, 'Can you do something to stop the spread of racist misinformation appearing in silent movies?'\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those requests went ignored.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11882633\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-800x1000.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"1000\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11882633\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-800x1000.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-1020x1275.jpg 1020w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-160x200.jpg 160w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-1229x1536.jpg 1229w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut-1638x2048.jpg 1638w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS49631_WeHadaLittleRealEstateProblem_INS1_29_13AAdrianneChalepahjpg-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Stand up comic, writer and actor Adrianne Chalepah, a featured voice in Kliph Nesteroff's new book.\u003cbr> \u003ccite>(Matthew Williamson)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\"The stoic Indian is my favorite stereotype because there's nothing further from the truth,\" says comic \u003ca href=\"http://chalepah.com/\">Adrianne Chalepah\u003c/a>. She’s featured in Nesteroff’s book, and grew up on the Kiowa-Comanche-Apache Reservation in Oklahoma. As a kid, her father turned her on to Monty Python, Cheech & Chong and Mel Brooks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"I grew up in a very humorous family,\" she says. \"You can't go five minutes without someone making fun of someone. You know, culture’s cool, language is cool, tribal stuff is all cool, but humor is the foundation. That is what keeps us just thriving. Because without that humor? Man, you know, things get really dark.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After college, she was working a straight job at a bank when she finally decided to try stand-up in her early twenties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It was a huge risk because I was actually about six months pregnant with my second child,\" says the mother of four. \"But the way that I looked at it is, it can't be any worse than what I've already been through. Because I grew up in so much poverty that, worst case scenario, I would tuck my tail between my legs and go live with my mom in a trailer park.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That didn’t happen. Chalepah moved to Albuquerque, maneuvering her comedy career around her young sons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She gigged at tribal communities all over the country, from nighttime outdoor shows lit by car headlights to reservation casino stages. Pre-coronavirus, she was averaging four jobs a month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"I chased every stage, every opportunity. I had no ego and no pride in the matter. If they were like, 'Okay, you get five minutes in front of people who hate you,' I would've been like, great, I'll be there.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, unlike Joey Clift, who came to Hollywood to carve out a career, Chalepah stayed away from the belly of the beast. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>My opinion of the industry is that it is elitist because it's a pay-to-play thing,\" she explains. \"You’ve got to pay for training. You’ve got to pay for headshots. You’ve got to pay to live in LA. It's expensive. And then what ends up happening is you exclude middle America, and specifically the Natives on reservations get completely excluded because the idea is, 'No, you have to come to us.'\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the pandemic drags on, Chalepah is taking care of her kids and focusing on acting. The stand-up gigs are dead on the vine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s still a struggle for Natives in Hollywood, but she says Nesteroff’s book is a positive step.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Really, my hope is that it will just open doors to more comedians, or at least let industry folks know that we're not a relic or we're not an antique. We have iPhones. We're not stoic.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "a-trojan-horse-of-funk-and-soul-the-story-of-the-black-panthers-house-band",
"title": "A Trojan Horse of Funk and Soul: The Story of the Black Panthers House Band",
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"headTitle": "A Trojan Horse of Funk and Soul: The Story of the Black Panthers House Band | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>Fifty years ago, an unlikely musical group evolved out of the Oakland chapter of the Black Panther Party. They were called the Lumpen. And although they quickly gained a following for their air-tight funk and striking lyrics, they were always meant to be much more than mere entertainment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Where other bands of their era were content to coast on good vibes, the Lumpen\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>were out to preach a message of revolution in places where that message wasn’t always wanted. They were a musical cadre whose mission was to spread the seed of social revolution, armed with funk, attitude and matching outfits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1973, Michael Torrence is a 22-year-old Black Panther. He’s dedicated himself to the cause and obeyed every command. He’s a true soldier.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were definitely as hardcore as anybody cause we dropped everything to come,” says Torrence. “We didn’t join to sing. We joined to be revolutionaries. We joined to make the revolution. We joined … to be Panthers!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But five years of complete devotion to the Panthers has taken a toll. Now, Torrence is desperate to focus on his personal life, just for a while.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But to do this, he needs to get permission and it’s got to come from the top.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11730261\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11730261\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-800x475.jpg\" alt=\"When the Black Panthers needed a funk band to help galvanize the masses, the Lumpen didn't miss a beat.\" width=\"800\" height=\"475\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-800x475.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-160x95.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-1020x605.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-1200x712.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">When the Black Panthers needed a funk band to help galvanize the masses, the Lumpen didn’t miss a beat. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of It's About Time Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Torrence shows up at the Lamp Post — it’s a bar in West Oakland — where Panther leader Bobby Seale is having a birthday party. The two men huddle in a corner and talk for a while, but it’s all good.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Seale gives Torrence his blessing for some leave time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence is relieved. But as he’s making his way out of the bar, someone tells him that Huey Newton wants to see him. And he wants to see him now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newton is Seale’s comrade and co-founder of the Panthers. For years, Newton has been a strong and charismatic leader. But recently his moods have been unstable. Tonight, for whatever reason, he’s agitated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence is ushered into a chair in a back room. And there, flanked by a couple enforcers, is Newton.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And he says, ‘Comrade, I hear you want to leave us. Well, do you want to leave bad enough to die? Do you really want to leave bad enough to die?’ I don’t understand the question,” Torrence says. “And [Newton’s enforcer] June takes a gun and puts it to my head. ‘Oh no, comrade, I don’t want to die.'”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He say, ‘Okay. So this is what’s going to happen, you say…’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence starts to object. Newton isn’t having it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Would you tell this brother not to talk when I’m talking?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence gets a swift kick in the mouth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newton begins again, “Okay then. So. You say, all power to the people.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“All power to the people,” mumbles Torrence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Michael Torrence has just been persuaded to rethink his request for some time off — a pistol to the head is hard to argue with.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828362\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828362\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-536x402.jpg 536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former Black Panther and Lumpen member Michael Torrence. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch3>People Get Ready\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>By 1973, Torrence’s years with the Panthers have been a rollercoaster life of extremes. Many times he’s picked up a gun.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But he’s also picked up a microphone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though Torrence did not join the Panthers to sing, the movement’s Minister of Culture gave him and three other young soldiers a special assignment for the cause. It was an R&B group called the Lumpen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Michael Torrence, former member of the Lumpen\"]‘You could really feel the energy, particularly among younger people, that we felt we could really make a change. Not only could we make a change, we were going to make a change. ‘[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When it all began in 1970, the Lumpen’s music was explosive. The band was powerful, and so was the message.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen worked nonstop for the cause, killing it wherever they performed: San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia and the Midwest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it only lasted 11 months. Then things in the Black Panther Party began to implode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is the story of the rise and fall of an unlikely R&B group born out of social upheaval. The Lumpen weren’t out to make hit records, they were out to change American culture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a journey unlike that of any other band.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Michael Torrence was at the center of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Rise of the Panthers\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>In 1966, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale co-found the Black Panther Party. They’re both students at Merritt Community College in Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Within a few years, the Party offers educational programs, food service, free medical care and drug rehab to the Black community. And the Panthers are leading the fight against rampant police brutality.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the end of the ‘60s, change is in the air, and the Bay Area is ground zero.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[In] San Francisco at that time, we were in the Fillmore District,” Torrence says. “It was very high-tension. Police were riding, you know, four or five deep. If you were out selling your papers they would come and harass you, snatch your papers, maybe arrest you, threaten you. But at the same time there was a lot of energy. That’s the best thing about it. You could really feel the energy, particularly among younger people, that we felt we could really make a change. Not only could we make a change, we were going to make a change. There was this commitment to die if necessary.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those papers are the weekly bible of party information, a publication called The Black Panther. And the Howard Quinn Printing Company on Alabama Street is where the Lumpen story begins.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828364\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828364\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-536x402.jpg 536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lumpen singer and former Black Panther James Mott, aka Saturu Ned. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Former Lumpen singer James Mott, now known as Saturu Ned, takes up the story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Wednesday night was distribution night, where we would get out the paper. Everybody would come,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s in 1970: He’s newly arrived from the Sacramento Panther chapter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All the future members of the Lumpen are in attendance that Wednesday night: Torrence, Mott — now Saturu, William Calhoun and Clark “Santa Rita” Bailey. They all have musical backgrounds ranging from church choirs to professional-level experience, but when they meet, they’re just loyal young soldiers taking orders along with everybody else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was a community gathering in Fillmore,” Saturu says. “At that time, Fillmore is not like it is now, changed, and the gentrification. It was … Fillmore.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And on those distribution nights when various chapters would all come together from the Bay Area to get the paper out, we would sing,” Torrence says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And we would sing, at that point, just doo-wop songs,” Saturu recalls. “So one night I went over there and the three of us sang and I joined in. And we started harmonizing. We just blended in so cool!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Michael Torrence, former member of the Lumpen\"]‘If this is how we can be helpful, if this is how we can be useful, if this will advance the cause, this is what we’ll do.’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And then what we began to do was, we’d just put other words to the popular songs. Because we would be singing what we called revolutionary songs to encourage us in the struggle. In terms of the Lumpen, it kinda grew out of that. Just us singing together. Part of, I guess, the tradition of just singin’ while you work,” Torrence says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a typical Wednesday. The four Panthers are at the print shop, stacking and racking and harmonizing into the night. But this time, there’s someone listening: Emory Douglas, the party’s Minister of Culture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So after I got back to Central [headquarters], Emory comes in and says, ‘Hey brother, comrade James, you know, everybody relates to music.’ I say, ‘Yeah Emory, they do.’ He says, ‘You guys sound good. We could create a group and the group could be part of the Ministry of Culture, where we could be able to get that message out in the music.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Emory Douglas is the brilliant style guru and visual artist whose iconic posters and flyers helped brand the movement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just would make suggestions,” Douglas says. “Possibly adding some social justice context to the lyrics.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At this point, Bobby Seale and Huey Newton are both behind bars. So Douglas approaches Panthers Chief of Staff David Hilliard. He understands the value of spreading the word through music, and he greenlights the project. He also gives the group a name: The Lumpen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a play on Karl Marx’s idea of the lumpenproletariat: the lower class that would rise up to crush the capitalist power structure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828363\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828363\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-536x402.jpg 536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former Black Panther Billy X Jennings, friend of the Lumpen members, and fan of the band. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“At the time the party was coming about, political education, political awareness, was growing tremendously,” says Billy X Jennings. He’s a former Panther and the party’s long time historian. He was tight with the Lumpen members fifty years ago, and still is to this day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In 1968, James Brown put out a song that really changed everything, because Black people, prior to that time, referred to themselves as Negro,” Jennings continues. “James Brown came out and said, ‘We’re Black and we’re proud.’ And once that record come out, you could never go back and say you’re a Negro. You could never go back! James Brown couldn’t have did that in ‘68 if there wasn’t a group like the Black Panther Party that had set up a foundation of knowledge already.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Emory was recognizing the role of music historically in Black people’s struggle and part of our culture period,” Torrence says. “He began to say, we can do something with this! You guys sound decent together anyway, because we just clicked like that. And so he encouraged us to put something together.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Whatever rehearsal we would do, we would have to do after whatever other assignments or duties we had,” Torrence continues. “So we had to go sell the papers, we had to do the breakfast program, we’d have to do the garbage run, we’d have to do security. We’d have to do whatever it is that any other Panther would do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From the Panthers’ perspective, The Lumpen was not about show business. It was about contributing to the revolution.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Singing for us was just political work,” Torrence clarifies. “And if they said the next day, ‘Okay, that’s it,’ fine. Cause we didn’t join for that. If I was really about that, I could have been trying to do it out there in the world. I could have been out there trying to get paid. We never got paid, it was just, if this is how we can be helpful, if this is how we can be useful, if this will advance the cause, this is what we’ll do. But it was always, we follow orders.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And now, only a few months since they were harmonizing to the oldies at the printing plant, their orders are to get onstage and get to work: Educate the people, spread the word and earn money for the party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen assemble a six-piece interracial backing band from local players sympathetic to the cause. They’re called the Freedom Messengers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the summer of 1970, the group is performing at rallies, community gatherings and Panther events around the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And they’re good. They’re tight. It’s a professional show on par with almost any act. They’ve got the energy of James Brown, and the dance moves and harmonies of the Temptations. But the lyrics are all about what the Panthers are all about.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2llXaUMMqc\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bobby Seale has just been arrested in New Haven. The first and only single the group makes is “Free Bobby Now.” It’s written by Bill Calhoun, recorded at Tiki Studios in San Jose in August of 1970. Calhoun’s song “No More” is on the flip side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The record is released on the Panthers’ own Seize the Time label, with credit to Black Panther Party Productions. It’s promoted in the Party newspaper, and sold at live shows and Panther events. Any profits are funneled back into the party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen take the single around to Bay Area radio stations, but the lyrics are considered too provocative for airplay. But no one questions the quality of what they’re hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They took the craft seriously,” says Rickey Vincent. He’s the author of “Party Time: The Inside Story of the Black Panthers’ Band” and “How Black Power Transformed Soul Music”. It’s a subject he knows well. His mother was an early Panther.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When they did ‘People Get Ready’ by Curtis Mayfield and The Impressions, they hit those notes that you had to hit that show respect for those aspirations that were in that song in 1964-65. The Lumpen flipped the lyrics, obviously. Instead of saying ‘People get ready there’s a train a’comin’,’ they said, ‘People get ready, the revolution’s comin’, you don’t need a ticket, you need a loaded gun.’ And it was like, wait a minute, that’s soul music the way it’s supposed to be sung, but those are not lyrics the way we’ve heard them before.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828372\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828372\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-800x1100.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"1100\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-800x1100.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-1020x1402.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-160x220.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-1117x1536.jpg 1117w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit.jpg 1276w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Lumpen performed a benefit show in Oakland on Oct. 11, 1970. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of It's About Time Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen start headlining shows. They’re gigging weekly, doing benefits and playing college campuses up and down the West Coast. And when they’re not headlining, they’re on bills with the Grateful Dead, Carla Thomas and Curtis Mayfield.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And not only is the music on fire, but the live show takes choreography to a whole ‘nother level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Once we hit the stage, [it was] nonstop,” Torrence says. “Even mixed in a dance routine where we would act out brothers on the block playing dice, and James Mott would be a cop. He’d come and harass one and he’d be beating this brother up, and he’d be beating him with a club and I’m watching it, and then I’d finally get disgusted and I’d jump on the cop and Clark and I together, we’d beat the cop down. So it wasn’t just the singing, it was the choreography. The whole experience was something they hadn’t seen before.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the winter of 1970, the band hits the road for a tour of the Midwest and East Coast. The crowds are enthusiastic. But tensions are running high.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>David Levinson is the Freedom Messengers’ 19-year-old sax player. After a show at the University of Minnesota, a snowstorm is kicking in. The band is packing up their gear when they’re approached by members of the Black Student Union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll never forget this,” Levinson says. “They invited the Black members of the band to stay with them, but they didn’t want the white members of the band, of which there were two of us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These guys from the student group come out and they look like a military junta,” says Saturu Ned. “[They] got on the black berets and the black boots. I’m like, ‘What are you guys doing?’ ‘Oh, uh, who are those white guys?’ ‘Excuse me? They’re a part of the Lumpen band.’ ‘Well, they can’t stay!’ We told ’em, ‘Look you motherfuckers, we’re not staying if they’re not staying.’ I said, ‘This is a people’s revolution and these are our brothers that we stand behind.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Levinson is still close with Saturu and the other former band members. “That’s just a small example of the kind of camaraderie and unity we felt. There never was any racism promoted for or practiced by the Black Panther Party at all.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828371\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828371\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-800x1092.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"1092\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-800x1092.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-1020x1393.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-160x218.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-1125x1536.jpg 1125w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4.jpg 1294w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Lumpen performed at Stanford University on Feb. 17, 1971. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of It's About Time Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen are also in the crosshairs of the cops wherever they go. Late one night after a college show in New Jersey, the police follow the band down an empty road heading out of town.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They made us get out the car,” Saturu says. “They knew who we were and it was pitch dark where they pulled us over. We were like, this is it. They gonna kill us. There was a general rule back then, go to a lighted area. What they did was, one car got in front of us, slowed down. The other one got right behind us. And they waited for that real dark area to pull us over — this is part of the intimidation, right?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There were four of’em. They was grinnin’. ‘Sing for us!’ So we started singing—what was that song? ‘As we stroll along together…’ They would harass us to let us know, we watching you. We know who you are.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the Lumpen are battling another force besides the authorities. And it’s coming from within the party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There were people in the party, some in leadership, some in the rank and file that said, ‘Yeah, these guys [in the Lumpen] think they’re something special,'” Torrence says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If it wasn’t for Emory, I don’t think the Lumpen would have came about because Emory is the one who had the juice,” Billy X Jennings emphasizes. “And there was people that wasn’t into the Lumpen. They didn’t think revolutionaries should be doing that kind of thing. But they were older people too, there weren’t R&B people, they were blues people, and during that time there was a difference. Most of the leadership was southern guys. Southern guys like blues. We are young guys, we like R&B. So that’s why [the Lumpen] never really got any more higher than they were because they were always related to as Panthers first.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that didn’t stop them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>On Fire in Oakland\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>It’s Nov. 10, 1970, at Merritt College in Oakland. It’s the alma mater of Huey Newton and Bobby Seale. The birthplace of the Black Panther Party. Tonight, to a packed auditorium, the Lumpen will get the message out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bear in mind: this group has been together for less than a year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While almost everybody else in the San Francisco music scene has been getting high and jamming, the Lumpen have been working as full time revolutionaries, pursued by the police and the FBI.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And they still find time to get this group together.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Billy X Jennings, a former Black Panther and the party’s historian\"]‘It was one of the best shows in my life because the audience was electrified. … We were thinking about the same thing — revolution.’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And tonight is special. The show is being recorded for a live album, and the group pulls out all the stops. Billy X Jennings is there with his fist in the air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was one of the best shows in my life because the audience was electrified. Once the Lumpen came on and the band start playing, you would hear them repeat something to the crowd and the crowd would throw it back. Like when they say, ‘All power to the people,’ the crowd would say, ‘All power to the people!’ with a force! And when they’d say, ‘Death to the Fascist pigs,’ they’d say, ‘Death to fascist pigs!’ If you just listen to the people’s feedback alone, you could get high on that. They were killin’ me boy! And even to this day when I hear that, it gives me that revolutionary enthusiasm cause everybody was on the one that night. We were thinking about the same thing — revolution.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The show was an undeniable success… but no album ever appeared.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The master tapes made that night went missing, and have never been found. Some have suggested that they were confiscated by the FBI. It’s also possible that they were mislabeled and disappeared in the chaos and discord of the time period. Or they could be decaying in an attic somewhere, long forgotten.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Only a grainy, multi-generation cassette of the show has ever surfaced, but it captures the raw power of the band.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828149\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 582px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11828149\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/The_Lumpen_DC_2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"582\" height=\"391\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/The_Lumpen_DC_2.jpg 582w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/The_Lumpen_DC_2-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 582px) 100vw, 582px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Lumpen’s mission was to spread the seed of social revolution. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of It's About Time Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>As 1971 arrives, the Panther Party leadership is in chaos. Bobby Seale is still in prison in New Haven. Eldridge Cleaver, the Minister of Information, has fled to Algeria to escape an attempted murder charge on an Oakland cop. The FBI is working to weaken and target the party through a secret \u003ca href=\"https://www.history.com/topics/civil-rights-movement/black-panthers#section_4\">counterintelligence program.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The party is factionalizing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Huey’s come back out with some different ideas about how things should go,” Torrence says. “In some cases you got Panther against Panther, whether you with Eldridge division or National Headquarters.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At this point, Eldridge is strongly promoting violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Right,” Torrence says, but “Huey and Bobby were moving toward a survival program. Even we had to change because all of our original songs was about picking up the gun. There was some other things going on internally, in terms of some of the things being done by Huey that I didn’t agree with, I didn’t join for. And it wasn’t about the police. That was the thing that was bad about it. I was never scared about the police. It’s a bad thing when you get more concerned about the people that you work with than you do with the cops.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the atmosphere within the Party becomes more desperate, interest in the group from those in power dwindles to nothing. The Lumpen members are reassigned. They’re taken off R&B duty and put on security detail. Their days as a group are numbered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No, it wasn’t justified,” says Emory Douglas of the group’s demise. “It could have been worked out, but you know we had people who wanted to exercise their position, as far as being in charge. All those things played into it, petty spitefulness. All that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Torrence said earlier, if the day came when the singing had to stop, fine. That day finally came.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Michael Torrence, former member of the Lumpen\"]‘We never did it to get famous, we never did it to get rich. We did it because we really wanted to do something for our people, and make a change.’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We never thought of ourselves as anything other than Panthers. And the Lumpen was a cadre, a unit for a cultural purpose. We loved it, we enjoyed it, but in the big picture, it’s just another assignment. And so when the situation and circumstances change, then you move on to the next assignment. And we didn’t really have time to mourn about it. Because that’s exactly what happened.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On May 23, 1971, in Sacramento, the Lumpen play their last gig. A few days later, Bill Calhoun decides to leave the party. He was the group’s songwriter. So only 11 months after it began, the band is done.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the Panther Party is still Michael Torrence’s life. It’s all he’s known since he was a teenager. Which brings us back to that night in 1973 at the bar in West Oakland: The night Torrence talked to Bobby Seale and asked for some time off from the Panthers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So anyway, I go to Bobby at his birthday party at the Lamp Post and I said, ‘Well, Chairman, I have a daughter. She needs some support. Plus, I’m having these little anxiety attacks that’s affecting my work, it’s affecting my effectiveness. I don’t wanna quit, I don’t wanna leave, but I need some time. Get myself back together, and then I’m coming back. I’m coming back.’ And Bobby was real cool with me on it, you know. And I’m crying. I’m shedding tears.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence is leaving the bar when Huey Newton calls him back upstairs. He says the Party will contribute $50 a month for to support Torrence’s daughter. Then Newton puts a gun to Torrence’s head and says this:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“’Okay then,’” Torrence recalls. “’We send fifty dollars, but you say: All power to the people.’ All power to the people. So I stuck around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And about six months later, one of the guys from Chicago comes by, says, ‘You still wanna go? Cause we can’t afford to pay for your kid no more. So you can go, you can leave now.’ OK. Well, all right then. Power to the people now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that’s it. Michael Torrence is out of the Black Panthers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside tag=\"black-panthers\" label=\"Related coverage\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And it was traumatic,” he says. “What was traumatic for me was leaving. What was traumatic was what it had become.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Did he feel betrayed?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Yes! Absolutely. Betrayed, angry, bitter, frustrated. Yes. It took me a while to get back to what they call livin’ in the world. ‘Cause the Party was my world. You ask me what I was, I was a Panther. That’s what I was and who I was. And then to lose that … and try and adjust to out being here, and get a job. What am I gonna put on my resume? Where you been the last five years?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Torrence did have something on his resume that worked outside of the revolution: The Lumpen. It got him a job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence wound up singing behind Marvin Gaye, and he appeared on the singer’s 1974 album, “Marvin Gaye Live!” It was recorded just a few miles away from where the Lumpen recorded their own live album just four years earlier, in Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence went on to write, produce and sing for other artists for the rest of the 1970s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though he parted ways with the Panthers almost 50 years ago, it’s still part of him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As far as the Black Panther Party’s concerned, I don’t regret anything,” he says. “I was with people, [and] these things last a lifetime … and I wouldn’t take that back for anything. Did we make some mistakes? Yeah. But at the time, for what it was, it was right on time. I was just glad to be a part of it. Like I said, we never did it to get famous, we never did it to get rich. We did it because we really wanted to do something for our people, and make a change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Fifty years ago, an unlikely R&B group evolved out of the Oakland chapter of the Black Panther Party. The Lumpen weren’t out to make hit records, they were out to change American culture.",
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"title": "A Trojan Horse of Funk and Soul: The Story of the Black Panthers House Band | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Fifty years ago, an unlikely musical group evolved out of the Oakland chapter of the Black Panther Party. They were called the Lumpen. And although they quickly gained a following for their air-tight funk and striking lyrics, they were always meant to be much more than mere entertainment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Where other bands of their era were content to coast on good vibes, the Lumpen\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>were out to preach a message of revolution in places where that message wasn’t always wanted. They were a musical cadre whose mission was to spread the seed of social revolution, armed with funk, attitude and matching outfits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1973, Michael Torrence is a 22-year-old Black Panther. He’s dedicated himself to the cause and obeyed every command. He’s a true soldier.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were definitely as hardcore as anybody cause we dropped everything to come,” says Torrence. “We didn’t join to sing. We joined to be revolutionaries. We joined to make the revolution. We joined … to be Panthers!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But five years of complete devotion to the Panthers has taken a toll. Now, Torrence is desperate to focus on his personal life, just for a while.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But to do this, he needs to get permission and it’s got to come from the top.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11730261\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11730261\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-800x475.jpg\" alt=\"When the Black Panthers needed a funk band to help galvanize the masses, the Lumpen didn't miss a beat.\" width=\"800\" height=\"475\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-800x475.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-160x95.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-1020x605.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin-1200x712.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/03/lumpen_hangin.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">When the Black Panthers needed a funk band to help galvanize the masses, the Lumpen didn’t miss a beat. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of It's About Time Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Torrence shows up at the Lamp Post — it’s a bar in West Oakland — where Panther leader Bobby Seale is having a birthday party. The two men huddle in a corner and talk for a while, but it’s all good.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Seale gives Torrence his blessing for some leave time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence is relieved. But as he’s making his way out of the bar, someone tells him that Huey Newton wants to see him. And he wants to see him now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newton is Seale’s comrade and co-founder of the Panthers. For years, Newton has been a strong and charismatic leader. But recently his moods have been unstable. Tonight, for whatever reason, he’s agitated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence is ushered into a chair in a back room. And there, flanked by a couple enforcers, is Newton.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And he says, ‘Comrade, I hear you want to leave us. Well, do you want to leave bad enough to die? Do you really want to leave bad enough to die?’ I don’t understand the question,” Torrence says. “And [Newton’s enforcer] June takes a gun and puts it to my head. ‘Oh no, comrade, I don’t want to die.'”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He say, ‘Okay. So this is what’s going to happen, you say…’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence starts to object. Newton isn’t having it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Would you tell this brother not to talk when I’m talking?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence gets a swift kick in the mouth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newton begins again, “Okay then. So. You say, all power to the people.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“All power to the people,” mumbles Torrence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Michael Torrence has just been persuaded to rethink his request for some time off — a pistol to the head is hard to argue with.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828362\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828362\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut-536x402.jpg 536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43861_Michael-Torrence-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former Black Panther and Lumpen member Michael Torrence. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch3>People Get Ready\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>By 1973, Torrence’s years with the Panthers have been a rollercoaster life of extremes. Many times he’s picked up a gun.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But he’s also picked up a microphone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though Torrence did not join the Panthers to sing, the movement’s Minister of Culture gave him and three other young soldiers a special assignment for the cause. It was an R&B group called the Lumpen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When it all began in 1970, the Lumpen’s music was explosive. The band was powerful, and so was the message.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen worked nonstop for the cause, killing it wherever they performed: San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia and the Midwest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it only lasted 11 months. Then things in the Black Panther Party began to implode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is the story of the rise and fall of an unlikely R&B group born out of social upheaval. The Lumpen weren’t out to make hit records, they were out to change American culture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a journey unlike that of any other band.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Michael Torrence was at the center of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Rise of the Panthers\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>In 1966, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale co-found the Black Panther Party. They’re both students at Merritt Community College in Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Within a few years, the Party offers educational programs, food service, free medical care and drug rehab to the Black community. And the Panthers are leading the fight against rampant police brutality.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the end of the ‘60s, change is in the air, and the Bay Area is ground zero.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[In] San Francisco at that time, we were in the Fillmore District,” Torrence says. “It was very high-tension. Police were riding, you know, four or five deep. If you were out selling your papers they would come and harass you, snatch your papers, maybe arrest you, threaten you. But at the same time there was a lot of energy. That’s the best thing about it. You could really feel the energy, particularly among younger people, that we felt we could really make a change. Not only could we make a change, we were going to make a change. There was this commitment to die if necessary.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those papers are the weekly bible of party information, a publication called The Black Panther. And the Howard Quinn Printing Company on Alabama Street is where the Lumpen story begins.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828364\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828364\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut-536x402.jpg 536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43863_James-Mott-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lumpen singer and former Black Panther James Mott, aka Saturu Ned. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Former Lumpen singer James Mott, now known as Saturu Ned, takes up the story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Wednesday night was distribution night, where we would get out the paper. Everybody would come,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s in 1970: He’s newly arrived from the Sacramento Panther chapter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All the future members of the Lumpen are in attendance that Wednesday night: Torrence, Mott — now Saturu, William Calhoun and Clark “Santa Rita” Bailey. They all have musical backgrounds ranging from church choirs to professional-level experience, but when they meet, they’re just loyal young soldiers taking orders along with everybody else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was a community gathering in Fillmore,” Saturu says. “At that time, Fillmore is not like it is now, changed, and the gentrification. It was … Fillmore.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And on those distribution nights when various chapters would all come together from the Bay Area to get the paper out, we would sing,” Torrence says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And we would sing, at that point, just doo-wop songs,” Saturu recalls. “So one night I went over there and the three of us sang and I joined in. And we started harmonizing. We just blended in so cool!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘If this is how we can be helpful, if this is how we can be useful, if this will advance the cause, this is what we’ll do.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And then what we began to do was, we’d just put other words to the popular songs. Because we would be singing what we called revolutionary songs to encourage us in the struggle. In terms of the Lumpen, it kinda grew out of that. Just us singing together. Part of, I guess, the tradition of just singin’ while you work,” Torrence says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a typical Wednesday. The four Panthers are at the print shop, stacking and racking and harmonizing into the night. But this time, there’s someone listening: Emory Douglas, the party’s Minister of Culture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So after I got back to Central [headquarters], Emory comes in and says, ‘Hey brother, comrade James, you know, everybody relates to music.’ I say, ‘Yeah Emory, they do.’ He says, ‘You guys sound good. We could create a group and the group could be part of the Ministry of Culture, where we could be able to get that message out in the music.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Emory Douglas is the brilliant style guru and visual artist whose iconic posters and flyers helped brand the movement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just would make suggestions,” Douglas says. “Possibly adding some social justice context to the lyrics.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At this point, Bobby Seale and Huey Newton are both behind bars. So Douglas approaches Panthers Chief of Staff David Hilliard. He understands the value of spreading the word through music, and he greenlights the project. He also gives the group a name: The Lumpen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a play on Karl Marx’s idea of the lumpenproletariat: the lower class that would rise up to crush the capitalist power structure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828363\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828363\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut-536x402.jpg 536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/RS43862_Billy-Jennings-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former Black Panther Billy X Jennings, friend of the Lumpen members, and fan of the band. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“At the time the party was coming about, political education, political awareness, was growing tremendously,” says Billy X Jennings. He’s a former Panther and the party’s long time historian. He was tight with the Lumpen members fifty years ago, and still is to this day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In 1968, James Brown put out a song that really changed everything, because Black people, prior to that time, referred to themselves as Negro,” Jennings continues. “James Brown came out and said, ‘We’re Black and we’re proud.’ And once that record come out, you could never go back and say you’re a Negro. You could never go back! James Brown couldn’t have did that in ‘68 if there wasn’t a group like the Black Panther Party that had set up a foundation of knowledge already.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Emory was recognizing the role of music historically in Black people’s struggle and part of our culture period,” Torrence says. “He began to say, we can do something with this! You guys sound decent together anyway, because we just clicked like that. And so he encouraged us to put something together.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Whatever rehearsal we would do, we would have to do after whatever other assignments or duties we had,” Torrence continues. “So we had to go sell the papers, we had to do the breakfast program, we’d have to do the garbage run, we’d have to do security. We’d have to do whatever it is that any other Panther would do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From the Panthers’ perspective, The Lumpen was not about show business. It was about contributing to the revolution.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Singing for us was just political work,” Torrence clarifies. “And if they said the next day, ‘Okay, that’s it,’ fine. Cause we didn’t join for that. If I was really about that, I could have been trying to do it out there in the world. I could have been out there trying to get paid. We never got paid, it was just, if this is how we can be helpful, if this is how we can be useful, if this will advance the cause, this is what we’ll do. But it was always, we follow orders.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And now, only a few months since they were harmonizing to the oldies at the printing plant, their orders are to get onstage and get to work: Educate the people, spread the word and earn money for the party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen assemble a six-piece interracial backing band from local players sympathetic to the cause. They’re called the Freedom Messengers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the summer of 1970, the group is performing at rallies, community gatherings and Panther events around the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And they’re good. They’re tight. It’s a professional show on par with almost any act. They’ve got the energy of James Brown, and the dance moves and harmonies of the Temptations. But the lyrics are all about what the Panthers are all about.\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/G2llXaUMMqc'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/G2llXaUMMqc'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Bobby Seale has just been arrested in New Haven. The first and only single the group makes is “Free Bobby Now.” It’s written by Bill Calhoun, recorded at Tiki Studios in San Jose in August of 1970. Calhoun’s song “No More” is on the flip side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The record is released on the Panthers’ own Seize the Time label, with credit to Black Panther Party Productions. It’s promoted in the Party newspaper, and sold at live shows and Panther events. Any profits are funneled back into the party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen take the single around to Bay Area radio stations, but the lyrics are considered too provocative for airplay. But no one questions the quality of what they’re hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They took the craft seriously,” says Rickey Vincent. He’s the author of “Party Time: The Inside Story of the Black Panthers’ Band” and “How Black Power Transformed Soul Music”. It’s a subject he knows well. His mother was an early Panther.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When they did ‘People Get Ready’ by Curtis Mayfield and The Impressions, they hit those notes that you had to hit that show respect for those aspirations that were in that song in 1964-65. The Lumpen flipped the lyrics, obviously. Instead of saying ‘People get ready there’s a train a’comin’,’ they said, ‘People get ready, the revolution’s comin’, you don’t need a ticket, you need a loaded gun.’ And it was like, wait a minute, that’s soul music the way it’s supposed to be sung, but those are not lyrics the way we’ve heard them before.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828372\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828372\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-800x1100.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"1100\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-800x1100.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-1020x1402.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-160x220.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit-1117x1536.jpg 1117w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_seize_the_time_benefit.jpg 1276w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Lumpen performed a benefit show in Oakland on Oct. 11, 1970. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of It's About Time Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen start headlining shows. They’re gigging weekly, doing benefits and playing college campuses up and down the West Coast. And when they’re not headlining, they’re on bills with the Grateful Dead, Carla Thomas and Curtis Mayfield.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And not only is the music on fire, but the live show takes choreography to a whole ‘nother level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Once we hit the stage, [it was] nonstop,” Torrence says. “Even mixed in a dance routine where we would act out brothers on the block playing dice, and James Mott would be a cop. He’d come and harass one and he’d be beating this brother up, and he’d be beating him with a club and I’m watching it, and then I’d finally get disgusted and I’d jump on the cop and Clark and I together, we’d beat the cop down. So it wasn’t just the singing, it was the choreography. The whole experience was something they hadn’t seen before.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the winter of 1970, the band hits the road for a tour of the Midwest and East Coast. The crowds are enthusiastic. But tensions are running high.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>David Levinson is the Freedom Messengers’ 19-year-old sax player. After a show at the University of Minnesota, a snowstorm is kicking in. The band is packing up their gear when they’re approached by members of the Black Student Union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll never forget this,” Levinson says. “They invited the Black members of the band to stay with them, but they didn’t want the white members of the band, of which there were two of us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These guys from the student group come out and they look like a military junta,” says Saturu Ned. “[They] got on the black berets and the black boots. I’m like, ‘What are you guys doing?’ ‘Oh, uh, who are those white guys?’ ‘Excuse me? They’re a part of the Lumpen band.’ ‘Well, they can’t stay!’ We told ’em, ‘Look you motherfuckers, we’re not staying if they’re not staying.’ I said, ‘This is a people’s revolution and these are our brothers that we stand behind.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Levinson is still close with Saturu and the other former band members. “That’s just a small example of the kind of camaraderie and unity we felt. There never was any racism promoted for or practiced by the Black Panther Party at all.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828371\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11828371\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-800x1092.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"1092\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-800x1092.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-1020x1393.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-160x218.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4-1125x1536.jpg 1125w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Lumpen_4.jpg 1294w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Lumpen performed at Stanford University on Feb. 17, 1971. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of It's About Time Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The Lumpen are also in the crosshairs of the cops wherever they go. Late one night after a college show in New Jersey, the police follow the band down an empty road heading out of town.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They made us get out the car,” Saturu says. “They knew who we were and it was pitch dark where they pulled us over. We were like, this is it. They gonna kill us. There was a general rule back then, go to a lighted area. What they did was, one car got in front of us, slowed down. The other one got right behind us. And they waited for that real dark area to pull us over — this is part of the intimidation, right?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There were four of’em. They was grinnin’. ‘Sing for us!’ So we started singing—what was that song? ‘As we stroll along together…’ They would harass us to let us know, we watching you. We know who you are.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the Lumpen are battling another force besides the authorities. And it’s coming from within the party.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There were people in the party, some in leadership, some in the rank and file that said, ‘Yeah, these guys [in the Lumpen] think they’re something special,'” Torrence says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If it wasn’t for Emory, I don’t think the Lumpen would have came about because Emory is the one who had the juice,” Billy X Jennings emphasizes. “And there was people that wasn’t into the Lumpen. They didn’t think revolutionaries should be doing that kind of thing. But they were older people too, there weren’t R&B people, they were blues people, and during that time there was a difference. Most of the leadership was southern guys. Southern guys like blues. We are young guys, we like R&B. So that’s why [the Lumpen] never really got any more higher than they were because they were always related to as Panthers first.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that didn’t stop them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>On Fire in Oakland\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>It’s Nov. 10, 1970, at Merritt College in Oakland. It’s the alma mater of Huey Newton and Bobby Seale. The birthplace of the Black Panther Party. Tonight, to a packed auditorium, the Lumpen will get the message out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bear in mind: this group has been together for less than a year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While almost everybody else in the San Francisco music scene has been getting high and jamming, the Lumpen have been working as full time revolutionaries, pursued by the police and the FBI.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And they still find time to get this group together.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘It was one of the best shows in my life because the audience was electrified. … We were thinking about the same thing — revolution.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And tonight is special. The show is being recorded for a live album, and the group pulls out all the stops. Billy X Jennings is there with his fist in the air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was one of the best shows in my life because the audience was electrified. Once the Lumpen came on and the band start playing, you would hear them repeat something to the crowd and the crowd would throw it back. Like when they say, ‘All power to the people,’ the crowd would say, ‘All power to the people!’ with a force! And when they’d say, ‘Death to the Fascist pigs,’ they’d say, ‘Death to fascist pigs!’ If you just listen to the people’s feedback alone, you could get high on that. They were killin’ me boy! And even to this day when I hear that, it gives me that revolutionary enthusiasm cause everybody was on the one that night. We were thinking about the same thing — revolution.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The show was an undeniable success… but no album ever appeared.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The master tapes made that night went missing, and have never been found. Some have suggested that they were confiscated by the FBI. It’s also possible that they were mislabeled and disappeared in the chaos and discord of the time period. Or they could be decaying in an attic somewhere, long forgotten.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Only a grainy, multi-generation cassette of the show has ever surfaced, but it captures the raw power of the band.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11828149\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 582px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11828149\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/The_Lumpen_DC_2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"582\" height=\"391\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/The_Lumpen_DC_2.jpg 582w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/The_Lumpen_DC_2-160x107.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 582px) 100vw, 582px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Lumpen’s mission was to spread the seed of social revolution. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of It's About Time Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>As 1971 arrives, the Panther Party leadership is in chaos. Bobby Seale is still in prison in New Haven. Eldridge Cleaver, the Minister of Information, has fled to Algeria to escape an attempted murder charge on an Oakland cop. The FBI is working to weaken and target the party through a secret \u003ca href=\"https://www.history.com/topics/civil-rights-movement/black-panthers#section_4\">counterintelligence program.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The party is factionalizing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Huey’s come back out with some different ideas about how things should go,” Torrence says. “In some cases you got Panther against Panther, whether you with Eldridge division or National Headquarters.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At this point, Eldridge is strongly promoting violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Right,” Torrence says, but “Huey and Bobby were moving toward a survival program. Even we had to change because all of our original songs was about picking up the gun. There was some other things going on internally, in terms of some of the things being done by Huey that I didn’t agree with, I didn’t join for. And it wasn’t about the police. That was the thing that was bad about it. I was never scared about the police. It’s a bad thing when you get more concerned about the people that you work with than you do with the cops.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the atmosphere within the Party becomes more desperate, interest in the group from those in power dwindles to nothing. The Lumpen members are reassigned. They’re taken off R&B duty and put on security detail. Their days as a group are numbered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No, it wasn’t justified,” says Emory Douglas of the group’s demise. “It could have been worked out, but you know we had people who wanted to exercise their position, as far as being in charge. All those things played into it, petty spitefulness. All that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Torrence said earlier, if the day came when the singing had to stop, fine. That day finally came.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘We never did it to get famous, we never did it to get rich. We did it because we really wanted to do something for our people, and make a change.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We never thought of ourselves as anything other than Panthers. And the Lumpen was a cadre, a unit for a cultural purpose. We loved it, we enjoyed it, but in the big picture, it’s just another assignment. And so when the situation and circumstances change, then you move on to the next assignment. And we didn’t really have time to mourn about it. Because that’s exactly what happened.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On May 23, 1971, in Sacramento, the Lumpen play their last gig. A few days later, Bill Calhoun decides to leave the party. He was the group’s songwriter. So only 11 months after it began, the band is done.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the Panther Party is still Michael Torrence’s life. It’s all he’s known since he was a teenager. Which brings us back to that night in 1973 at the bar in West Oakland: The night Torrence talked to Bobby Seale and asked for some time off from the Panthers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So anyway, I go to Bobby at his birthday party at the Lamp Post and I said, ‘Well, Chairman, I have a daughter. She needs some support. Plus, I’m having these little anxiety attacks that’s affecting my work, it’s affecting my effectiveness. I don’t wanna quit, I don’t wanna leave, but I need some time. Get myself back together, and then I’m coming back. I’m coming back.’ And Bobby was real cool with me on it, you know. And I’m crying. I’m shedding tears.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence is leaving the bar when Huey Newton calls him back upstairs. He says the Party will contribute $50 a month for to support Torrence’s daughter. Then Newton puts a gun to Torrence’s head and says this:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“’Okay then,’” Torrence recalls. “’We send fifty dollars, but you say: All power to the people.’ All power to the people. So I stuck around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And about six months later, one of the guys from Chicago comes by, says, ‘You still wanna go? Cause we can’t afford to pay for your kid no more. So you can go, you can leave now.’ OK. Well, all right then. Power to the people now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that’s it. Michael Torrence is out of the Black Panthers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And it was traumatic,” he says. “What was traumatic for me was leaving. What was traumatic was what it had become.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Did he feel betrayed?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Yes! Absolutely. Betrayed, angry, bitter, frustrated. Yes. It took me a while to get back to what they call livin’ in the world. ‘Cause the Party was my world. You ask me what I was, I was a Panther. That’s what I was and who I was. And then to lose that … and try and adjust to out being here, and get a job. What am I gonna put on my resume? Where you been the last five years?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Torrence did have something on his resume that worked outside of the revolution: The Lumpen. It got him a job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence wound up singing behind Marvin Gaye, and he appeared on the singer’s 1974 album, “Marvin Gaye Live!” It was recorded just a few miles away from where the Lumpen recorded their own live album just four years earlier, in Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Torrence went on to write, produce and sing for other artists for the rest of the 1970s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though he parted ways with the Panthers almost 50 years ago, it’s still part of him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As far as the Black Panther Party’s concerned, I don’t regret anything,” he says. “I was with people, [and] these things last a lifetime … and I wouldn’t take that back for anything. Did we make some mistakes? Yeah. But at the time, for what it was, it was right on time. I was just glad to be a part of it. Like I said, we never did it to get famous, we never did it to get rich. We did it because we really wanted to do something for our people, and make a change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "you-can-find-californias-last-roller-rink-organist-at-the-moonlight-rollerway-in-glendale",
"title": "You Can Find California’s Last Roller Rink Organist at the Moonlight Rollerway in Glendale",
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"headTitle": "You Can Find California’s Last Roller Rink Organist at the Moonlight Rollerway in Glendale | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>After dark, along the endless industrial stretch of San Fernando Road in Glendale, pretty much all you’ll hear is traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But on Tuesday nights, there’s another sound.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Hammond organ is very strong. It fills the rink and you can hear it out into the parking lot. Makes people curious,” says Dominic Cangelosi or, as he is known professionally, the Fabulous Dominic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At 86, he is the last roller-skating rink organist in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11751625\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11751625\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"The Fabulous Dominic at the Hammond B3 organ has been keeping skaters happy since the early '50s.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-536x402.jpg 536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Fabulous Dominic, at the Hammond B-3 organ, has been keeping skaters happy since the early ’50s. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When he first sat down behind a rink organ, the world was a different place. It was the early 1950s, and roller rink skating was in full bloom in a postwar country looking for light recreation. To quote a period promo film made by the Roller Skating Foundation of America, “This is roller-skating, America’s favorite fun sport. A wholesome, year-round recreation. One of our truly great, All-American participant sports.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s right around the time the Moonlight Rollerway opened its doors, and that’s also when Cangelosi started his musical career, at the original Moonlight location in nearby Pasadena.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At that time in the ‘50s, there was nothing but live organ music in most roller-skating rinks around the country,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size='medium' align='right' citation='Betty Palubeski, the rink manager']‘Tuesday night, it kinda takes you back in time. Doesn’t matter how old you are, it makes you feel young.’[/pullquote]Business was so good that the Moonlight expanded, buying the Glendale rink in 1963. Cangelosi worked both places — he was one of three staff organists — but as the years went by, the glory days of skating to an organ began to disappear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Back in the ‘70s and ‘80s, I was still working as a staff organist, only part time because after Elvis Presley and the Beatles, rock ‘n’ roll [records] came into the picture, and they kinda fazed out live organ music in the skating rinks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that didn’t stop Cangelosi. He was determined to keep the sound alive for die-hard rollers who craved the human touch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1985, he dropped $96,000 and bought the Glendale rink.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Since I was the organist here for so many years and I took over the business,” he says, “I kept the live organ music going at least one night a week.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That night is Tuesday. And Tuesday is tonight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s almost 8, almost time for Cangelosi to fire up the mighty Hammond B-3. He sits and opens a spiral notebook filled with aging sheet music. But before he touches the keys, he’s on the microphone, a rare moment, offering a bit of simple Zen guidance that applies as much to a roller rink as it does to human existence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Do not stop along the rails. If you fall down, get up as quickly as you can.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then, the tradition begins.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The drum machine clicks off a midtempo beat, and the Fabulous Dominic kicks into a mellow version of the standard, “Ain’t Misbehavin.’ ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, as they have for decades, people start to skate clockwise under the giant mirrored ball. They’re gliding slowly, arms out to the sides. Some are awkward, some are graceful. And almost everyone is smiling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s an almost David Lynchian moment of transcendent American beauty.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11751634\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11751634\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Queenie Black, left, with fellow Moonlight Rollerway fan Ava Garcia. Both are regulars on Tuesday nights when the Fabulous Dominic commands the organ.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-536x402.jpg 536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Queenie Black, left, with fellow Moonlight Rollerway fan Ava Garcia. Both are regulars on Tuesday nights when the Fabulous Dominic commands the organ. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Skater Michael Mannix has been here nearly every Tuesday for the last quarter-century.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Dominic is special. He puts emotion into his music,” says Mannix. “His music makes me skate. I follow the music and I feel so happy.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size='medium' align='right' citation='Dominic Cangelosi']‘The Hammond organ is very strong. It fills the rink and you can hear it out into the parking lot. Makes people curious.’[/pullquote]Queenie Black is back at the rink for the first time in three years. Before that, she was a longtime regular, and — like everyone here tonight — a big Dominic fan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The music is a nice, relaxing time,” she says. “And it’s funny sometimes, too, he’ll play modern songs, but he’ll have the organ playing like, toot de toot — ahahahaha!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Dominic adapts new songs as well as old songs, Broadway musical songs, and he plays all tempos. People come from all over just to listen to his music,” says Betty Palubeski, the rink manager.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Palubeski also works the register and the skate counter and pretty much anything else that needs doing in the place. She has been on the job for 26 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Tuesday night, it kinda takes you back in time,” she offers. “Doesn’t matter how old you are, it makes you feel young.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11751632\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11751632\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Betty Palubeski, Moonlight Rollerway manager the last 26 years, began skating at the rink as a child.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-536x402.jpg 536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Betty Palubeski, Moonlight Rollerway manager for the last 26 years, began skating at the rink as a child. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“We do have a following, they’re old-timers, and we’re getting new people all the time,” Cangelosi says. “A lot of young people that find it very interesting to skate to live organ music because it’s not heard anywhere else but in a roller rink.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size='medium' align='right' citation='Michael Mannix, a regular at the Moonlight Rollerway']‘Dominic is special. He puts emotion into his music. His music makes me skate. I follow the music and I feel so happy.’[/pullquote]Cody Littlefield is one of those young people. He’s about to step into the rink. He has spiky hair dyed white, a nose ring, and in large gothic letters across the front of his throat, there’s a tattoo that says: LEAVE ME ALONE.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“(It’s my) first time. Never been here before,” he says cheerfully. “I love it! The music is sweet and it makes me want to skate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then he leaves the walking world and joins the hypnotic, circular parade of skaters as Cangelosi’s organ playing guides them all into the only time machine with a mirror ball and a snack bar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFiQakfFpLA&t=1s\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But what is the future for a roller rink with a live organist in California?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t know,” admits Cangelosi. “There’s not going to be any after I’m gone. I don’t have anybody looking to be a skating rink organist anymore.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So the position could be open?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Yes, it could be. If somebody wanted to step up, I’d be glad to train them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cangelosi’s shoes are big and fabulous. Filling them will be no easy task. But for now, the organ is alive and well, and the Tuesday nights roll on and on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "At 86, Dominic Cangelosi is the last roller-skating rink organist in California. His organ playing guides the circular parade of skaters into the only time machine with a mirror ball and a snack bar.",
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"title": "You Can Find California’s Last Roller Rink Organist at the Moonlight Rollerway in Glendale | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>After dark, along the endless industrial stretch of San Fernando Road in Glendale, pretty much all you’ll hear is traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But on Tuesday nights, there’s another sound.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Hammond organ is very strong. It fills the rink and you can hear it out into the parking lot. Makes people curious,” says Dominic Cangelosi or, as he is known professionally, the Fabulous Dominic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At 86, he is the last roller-skating rink organist in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11751625\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11751625\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"The Fabulous Dominic at the Hammond B3 organ has been keeping skaters happy since the early '50s.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/The-Fabulous-Dominic-at-the-Hammond-B3-organ-keeping-the-skaters-happy-as-has-since-the-early-50s-qut-536x402.jpg 536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Fabulous Dominic, at the Hammond B-3 organ, has been keeping skaters happy since the early ’50s. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When he first sat down behind a rink organ, the world was a different place. It was the early 1950s, and roller rink skating was in full bloom in a postwar country looking for light recreation. To quote a period promo film made by the Roller Skating Foundation of America, “This is roller-skating, America’s favorite fun sport. A wholesome, year-round recreation. One of our truly great, All-American participant sports.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s right around the time the Moonlight Rollerway opened its doors, and that’s also when Cangelosi started his musical career, at the original Moonlight location in nearby Pasadena.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At that time in the ‘50s, there was nothing but live organ music in most roller-skating rinks around the country,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Business was so good that the Moonlight expanded, buying the Glendale rink in 1963. Cangelosi worked both places — he was one of three staff organists — but as the years went by, the glory days of skating to an organ began to disappear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Back in the ‘70s and ‘80s, I was still working as a staff organist, only part time because after Elvis Presley and the Beatles, rock ‘n’ roll [records] came into the picture, and they kinda fazed out live organ music in the skating rinks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that didn’t stop Cangelosi. He was determined to keep the sound alive for die-hard rollers who craved the human touch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1985, he dropped $96,000 and bought the Glendale rink.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Since I was the organist here for so many years and I took over the business,” he says, “I kept the live organ music going at least one night a week.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That night is Tuesday. And Tuesday is tonight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s almost 8, almost time for Cangelosi to fire up the mighty Hammond B-3. He sits and opens a spiral notebook filled with aging sheet music. But before he touches the keys, he’s on the microphone, a rare moment, offering a bit of simple Zen guidance that applies as much to a roller rink as it does to human existence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Do not stop along the rails. If you fall down, get up as quickly as you can.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then, the tradition begins.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The drum machine clicks off a midtempo beat, and the Fabulous Dominic kicks into a mellow version of the standard, “Ain’t Misbehavin.’ ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, as they have for decades, people start to skate clockwise under the giant mirrored ball. They’re gliding slowly, arms out to the sides. Some are awkward, some are graceful. And almost everyone is smiling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s an almost David Lynchian moment of transcendent American beauty.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11751634\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11751634\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Queenie Black, left, with fellow Moonlight Rollerway fan Ava Garcia. Both are regulars on Tuesday nights when the Fabulous Dominic commands the organ.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Queenie-Black-left-with-fellow-Moonlight-Rollerway-fan-Ava-Garcia.-Both-are-regulars-on-Tuesday-nights-when-the-Fabulous-Dominic-commands-the-organ-qut-536x402.jpg 536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Queenie Black, left, with fellow Moonlight Rollerway fan Ava Garcia. Both are regulars on Tuesday nights when the Fabulous Dominic commands the organ. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Skater Michael Mannix has been here nearly every Tuesday for the last quarter-century.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Dominic is special. He puts emotion into his music,” says Mannix. “His music makes me skate. I follow the music and I feel so happy.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘The Hammond organ is very strong. It fills the rink and you can hear it out into the parking lot. Makes people curious.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Queenie Black is back at the rink for the first time in three years. Before that, she was a longtime regular, and — like everyone here tonight — a big Dominic fan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The music is a nice, relaxing time,” she says. “And it’s funny sometimes, too, he’ll play modern songs, but he’ll have the organ playing like, toot de toot — ahahahaha!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Dominic adapts new songs as well as old songs, Broadway musical songs, and he plays all tempos. People come from all over just to listen to his music,” says Betty Palubeski, the rink manager.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Palubeski also works the register and the skate counter and pretty much anything else that needs doing in the place. She has been on the job for 26 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Tuesday night, it kinda takes you back in time,” she offers. “Doesn’t matter how old you are, it makes you feel young.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11751632\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11751632\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Betty Palubeski, Moonlight Rollerway manager the last 26 years, began skating at the rink as a child.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1832x1374.jpg 1832w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1376x1032.jpg 1376w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-1044x783.jpg 1044w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-632x474.jpg 632w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2019/05/Betty-Palubeski-Moonlight-Rollerway-manager-for-the-last-26-years.-She-started-skating-here-as-a-child-qut-536x402.jpg 536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Betty Palubeski, Moonlight Rollerway manager for the last 26 years, began skating at the rink as a child. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“We do have a following, they’re old-timers, and we’re getting new people all the time,” Cangelosi says. “A lot of young people that find it very interesting to skate to live organ music because it’s not heard anywhere else but in a roller rink.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Cody Littlefield is one of those young people. He’s about to step into the rink. He has spiky hair dyed white, a nose ring, and in large gothic letters across the front of his throat, there’s a tattoo that says: LEAVE ME ALONE.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“(It’s my) first time. Never been here before,” he says cheerfully. “I love it! The music is sweet and it makes me want to skate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then he leaves the walking world and joins the hypnotic, circular parade of skaters as Cangelosi’s organ playing guides them all into the only time machine with a mirror ball and a snack bar.\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/vFiQakfFpLA'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/vFiQakfFpLA'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>But what is the future for a roller rink with a live organist in California?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t know,” admits Cangelosi. “There’s not going to be any after I’m gone. I don’t have anybody looking to be a skating rink organist anymore.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So the position could be open?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Yes, it could be. If somebody wanted to step up, I’d be glad to train them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cangelosi’s shoes are big and fabulous. Filling them will be no easy task. But for now, the organ is alive and well, and the Tuesday nights roll on and on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "songwriter-in-a-cage-meet-glen-sherley-johnny-cashs-friend-in-folsom",
"title": "Songwriter in a Cage: Meet Glen Sherley, Johnny Cash’s Friend in Folsom",
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"headTitle": "Songwriter in a Cage: Meet Glen Sherley, Johnny Cash’s Friend in Folsom | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>This was originally published Jan. 23, 2018.\u003c/strong>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fifty years ago this month, Johnny Cash performed at Folsom Prison to an audience of 1,000 convicts. The recording of the show, \u003ca href=\"https://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/50-greatest-live-albums-of-all-time-20150429/johnny-cash-at-folsom-prison-1968-20150427\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">“Live at Folsom Prison,”\u003c/a> went on to become a landmark album.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It solidified Cash’s image as a champion of the downtrodden, revitalized his career and forever linked him with those behind bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the singer’s connection with Folsom went far beyond a triple platinum release. It was there that he met a jailhouse songwriter and career criminal named \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glen_Sherley\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Glen Sherley\u003c/a>. Their friendship would have a profound effect on both men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It all begins on the morning of Jan. 18, 1968. Johnny Cash is onstage under the raw fluorescent lights in mess hall #2 at Folsom Prison. Cash is giving the convicts what they want, running through numbers like “Folsom Prison Blues”, “Dark As a Dungeon,” “I Still Miss Someone,” “Send a Picture of Mother.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11643192\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11643192\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel.jpg\" alt=\"Greystone Chapel at Folsom Prison. The granite building was the inspiration for Glen Sherley’s song of the same title.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel-240x135.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel-375x211.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel-520x293.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Greystone Chapel at Folsom Prison. The granite building was the inspiration for Glen Sherley’s song of the same title. \u003ccite>(Kristina Khokhobashvili/California Department of Corrections)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Standing tall up there, dressed in black, sweat rolling down his cheek, Cash squints through the choking haze of cigarette smoke at a prisoner in the front row with a chiseled face, a high pompadour, and a Pall Mall dangling from his mouth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is Glen Sherley, California state convict A-59795C, a repeat offender doing a life sentence for armed robbery. He has no idea what’s about to happen, no idea his life is about to change forever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From the stage, Cash pauses to introduce the next and final song.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This next song was written by a man right here in Folsom Prison, and last night was the first time I’ve ever sung this song. Anyway, this song was written by our friend Glen Sherley.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The room erupts, Sherley’s inmate brothers clapping, whistling and hooting for their man as he beams in shock and wonder. Cash kicks the band into “Greystone Chapel.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem> Inside the walls of prison, my body may be\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> But my Lord has set my heart free\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> There’s a grey stone chapel here at Folsom\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> A house of worship in this den of sin\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> You wouldn’t think that God had a place here at Folsom\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> But He’s saved the soul of many lost men\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cash played two sets at Folsom that day and closed both with Sherley’s raw anthem to the small, sacred building.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you took the Glen Sherley component out of that record there would be a big hole,” says country musician Marty Stuart. He played with Cash in the ‘80s, and Johnny introduced him to Sherley many years ago. “To me that was kind of the heart of that record. That was a great gesture, but it was also a great song and a deserving song.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So how did this guy who’d spent most of his adult life buried in the toughest prisons California had to offer — Chino, Soledad, San Quentin and Folsom — write a song that ended up on one of the most revered and powerful albums ever?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It all began with a behind-bars demo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sherley was friendly with the prison DJ, convicted killer Earl Green. Green loved Johnny Cash, and convinced Glen to write something in Cash’s style. Thus was born “Greystone Chapel.” Green recorded Sherley’s song, and — by all accounts without his knowledge — gave the tape to the Rev. Floyd Gressett, a traveling chaplain who brought the Good Word to the incarcerated. He also had a church in Ventura where Cash, who lived in nearby Casitas Springs, was known to darken the door on Sunday mornings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The evening before the Folsom show, Cash was rehearsing in a Sacramento hotel when the Rev. Floyd dropped by with that tape straight from the big house. Cash loved what he heard, and performed the song the next morning onstage at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sherley’s song was a crowd pleaser. It put the spotlight on a humble prisoner, and would be a savvy promo for the release.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most artists would have left it at that and moved on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Johnny Cash was not most artists.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By 1968, he was getting a handle on his years of drug and alcohol abuse, resurrecting his career, and renewing his deep faith in the Lord. When he met Glen Sherley, Cash was meeting a kindred spirit, a darker version of himself, had he made slightly different life choices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Oh, I think it was just a country boy thing, just a Southern boy thing,” says Marty Stuart. “You see a buddy down in the ditch, you stick out your hand. They helped each other, I think they shored each other up. I think it was the best of intentions.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nashville pedal steel master Lloyd Green, who recorded with both Sherley and Cash, has a slightly different take on the relationship.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was that messianic complex thing kicking into high gear,” he says. “’I’m going to save this guy, and in the process save myself.’ [Cash] looked at it like, I’ve been redeemed because I was special. He really felt he was a special man. And he said it, you know, more than once. He might have been.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cash was finding salvation. Now, with the help of God and Nashville, he was going to save Glen Sherley, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But what brought Sherley to this point?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was born in state of Oklahoma in ’36. I think it was the latter part of ’38 when the whole family moved to California,” he said in a 1971 interview with CBS News. “If you read Steinbeck’s book the ‘Grapes of Wrath’ it kind of fits that, you know? Mattresses on the car, buckets on the side, stopping getting water. Got to California, I started school.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>School didn’t go so well. In his teens, Sherley started getting in trouble with the law. Over the years, he developed lifelong drug and alcohol addictions. Despite having a dedicated wife and two young children, by 1960 he would be in and out of prison for most of the next decade. So, what went wrong?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11643066\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11643066\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Retired Tennessee State Trooper Ronda Sherley, daughter of Glen Sherley, at home in Nashville with her dog, Tank. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I’ve asked myself that a lot of times,” says his daughter, Ronda Sherley, a retired Tennessee state trooper living in Nashville. “Because if you knew my grandmother and his brothers and sisters, they were all hardworking people, they were all very responsible, very honest people. But I guess that’s something you don’t really figure out. That was just something in him.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In that 1971 interview, Sherley shed some light on his criminal motivation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What turned me to committing robberies, I think, well, the hardest thing for me to admit about five years ago to myself was the fact that I was in prison because I wanted to be in prison. …You’re fed and you’re housed and you’re clothed and you don’t have to worry about where your next meal is coming from. There’s no responsibility there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sherley was not a criminal mastermind. He’d get loaded and impulsive, and once robbed a Burbank ice cream company of $28 using a toy gun.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In his brief moments of civilian life, he’d listen to the radio — George Jones was a favorite — and strum a few chords on a beat-up six string.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can remember him playing guitar and singing in the living room when we were going to bed,” says Ronda. “But he would be in and out, in and out [of prison] so I don’t have a whole lot of memories as a child of him being there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You got to do something in prison or go insane,” said Glen in ‘71. “You can do it gambling, you can do it hustling, you can do it shooting narcotics or taking pills, but you’ve got to have something going to let you face that next day.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11643187\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11643187\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3.jpg\" alt=\"Folsom Prison’s imposing gatehouse. \" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3-240x160.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3-375x250.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3-520x346.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Folsom Prison’s imposing gatehouse. \u003ccite>(Kristina Khokhobashvili/California Department of Corrections)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>What Sherley did was write songs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the Folsom performance, the “\u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_in_Black_(song)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Man In Black\u003c/a>” was on a mission to set Sherley free. He stepped in with connections that included Gov. Ronald Reagan and the Rev. Billy Graham, and got Sherley transferred to the minimum-security prison at Vacaville. Cash also landed him a record deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lloyd Green was one of the session players imported from Tennessee to back up Sherley on his self-named album, recorded live in Vacaville while he was still doing time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Glen was the most humble, nicest guy in the world,” recalls Green. “He was just so grateful, you know? It was a major day, as it turned out, it was a major event in his life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Glen was treated as the hero by his friends in prison and it was a wonderful thing to see,” Green continues. “It was a very emotional thing for me because I just I got caught up in it, too. and I thought, ‘Wow, this is terrible this man spent a large portion of his adult life in prison.’ ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In March 1971 Glen Sherley was paroled. His record was released a few weeks later and climbed up the Billboard country charts to #63 — not a hit, but nothing to be ashamed of. Cash moved him to Nashville, gave him a spot on his road show and signed him to a publishing deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11643065\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11643065\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former inmate and songwriter Glen Sherley after being released from prison in 1971 with his children Ronda and Bruce in Nashville. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Ronda Sherley)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But after about a year and a half of traveling and performing with Cash, including a gig at the Los Angeles Forum in front of a crowd of 17,000 people, things started going south for Sherley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a big statement, but to get turned out of the California penal system and to be put into the world of hillbilly show business, good ol’ boy show business, there ain’t a hell of a lot of difference in a lot of ways,” says Marty Stuart. “You just swapping jailhouses.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He knew how to be in prison,” Ronda says. “He knew how to be someone in prison. He didn’t know how to be Glen Sherley out here.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ultimately, he couldn’t play the Nashville game, couldn’t adjust to life beyond a cell. Sherley’s addictions kicked in, his behavior became unpredictable and dangerous, and when he threatened a band member, that was the last straw.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though it crushed him, Cash finally had to cut his friend loose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the next several years, Sherley drifted and drugged. His only goal was to stay out of prison. By 1978 — just six years after his album was released — he was living in the cab of a truck on a cattle farm near Salinas. In May of that year, he took his own life at the age of 42.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve heard a lot of people say, ‘Well, do you think John [Cash] should have taken more responsibility?’ ” says Ronda Sherley. “He did his job. He gave him a job, he gave him a home. He was his friend. He gave him advice, but Dad was a grown man and chose to take it or not. So it was never John’s job to guide my father through life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She still listens to her father’s music, a long gone voice that continues to speak to her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The words, the way he writes … you think of somebody who’s in prison, you think, oh he’s a bad person,” says Ronda. “But somebody who’s a bad person couldn’t put those words together. They couldn’t feel what it takes to put those words together.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the last five decades, the Johnny Cash “Live at Folsom Prison” album has sold more than 3 million copies, and Johnny Cash is still probably the most recognized name in country music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Glen Sherley? Now you know who he is, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>More of Peter Gilstrap’s reporting on Glen Sherley will be featured as part of a music documentary series, presented by \u003ca href=\"https://www.kcrw.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">KCRW\u003c/a>, this spring.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"title": "Songwriter in a Cage: Meet Glen Sherley, Johnny Cash’s Friend in Folsom | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>This was originally published Jan. 23, 2018.\u003c/strong>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fifty years ago this month, Johnny Cash performed at Folsom Prison to an audience of 1,000 convicts. The recording of the show, \u003ca href=\"https://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/50-greatest-live-albums-of-all-time-20150429/johnny-cash-at-folsom-prison-1968-20150427\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">“Live at Folsom Prison,”\u003c/a> went on to become a landmark album.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It solidified Cash’s image as a champion of the downtrodden, revitalized his career and forever linked him with those behind bars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the singer’s connection with Folsom went far beyond a triple platinum release. It was there that he met a jailhouse songwriter and career criminal named \u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glen_Sherley\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Glen Sherley\u003c/a>. Their friendship would have a profound effect on both men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It all begins on the morning of Jan. 18, 1968. Johnny Cash is onstage under the raw fluorescent lights in mess hall #2 at Folsom Prison. Cash is giving the convicts what they want, running through numbers like “Folsom Prison Blues”, “Dark As a Dungeon,” “I Still Miss Someone,” “Send a Picture of Mother.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11643192\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11643192\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel.jpg\" alt=\"Greystone Chapel at Folsom Prison. The granite building was the inspiration for Glen Sherley’s song of the same title.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel-240x135.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel-375x211.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/greystone-chapel-520x293.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Greystone Chapel at Folsom Prison. The granite building was the inspiration for Glen Sherley’s song of the same title. \u003ccite>(Kristina Khokhobashvili/California Department of Corrections)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Standing tall up there, dressed in black, sweat rolling down his cheek, Cash squints through the choking haze of cigarette smoke at a prisoner in the front row with a chiseled face, a high pompadour, and a Pall Mall dangling from his mouth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is Glen Sherley, California state convict A-59795C, a repeat offender doing a life sentence for armed robbery. He has no idea what’s about to happen, no idea his life is about to change forever.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From the stage, Cash pauses to introduce the next and final song.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This next song was written by a man right here in Folsom Prison, and last night was the first time I’ve ever sung this song. Anyway, this song was written by our friend Glen Sherley.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The room erupts, Sherley’s inmate brothers clapping, whistling and hooting for their man as he beams in shock and wonder. Cash kicks the band into “Greystone Chapel.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem> Inside the walls of prison, my body may be\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> But my Lord has set my heart free\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> There’s a grey stone chapel here at Folsom\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> A house of worship in this den of sin\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> You wouldn’t think that God had a place here at Folsom\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003cem> But He’s saved the soul of many lost men\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cash played two sets at Folsom that day and closed both with Sherley’s raw anthem to the small, sacred building.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you took the Glen Sherley component out of that record there would be a big hole,” says country musician Marty Stuart. He played with Cash in the ‘80s, and Johnny introduced him to Sherley many years ago. “To me that was kind of the heart of that record. That was a great gesture, but it was also a great song and a deserving song.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So how did this guy who’d spent most of his adult life buried in the toughest prisons California had to offer — Chino, Soledad, San Quentin and Folsom — write a song that ended up on one of the most revered and powerful albums ever?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It all began with a behind-bars demo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sherley was friendly with the prison DJ, convicted killer Earl Green. Green loved Johnny Cash, and convinced Glen to write something in Cash’s style. Thus was born “Greystone Chapel.” Green recorded Sherley’s song, and — by all accounts without his knowledge — gave the tape to the Rev. Floyd Gressett, a traveling chaplain who brought the Good Word to the incarcerated. He also had a church in Ventura where Cash, who lived in nearby Casitas Springs, was known to darken the door on Sunday mornings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The evening before the Folsom show, Cash was rehearsing in a Sacramento hotel when the Rev. Floyd dropped by with that tape straight from the big house. Cash loved what he heard, and performed the song the next morning onstage at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sherley’s song was a crowd pleaser. It put the spotlight on a humble prisoner, and would be a savvy promo for the release.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most artists would have left it at that and moved on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Johnny Cash was not most artists.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By 1968, he was getting a handle on his years of drug and alcohol abuse, resurrecting his career, and renewing his deep faith in the Lord. When he met Glen Sherley, Cash was meeting a kindred spirit, a darker version of himself, had he made slightly different life choices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Oh, I think it was just a country boy thing, just a Southern boy thing,” says Marty Stuart. “You see a buddy down in the ditch, you stick out your hand. They helped each other, I think they shored each other up. I think it was the best of intentions.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nashville pedal steel master Lloyd Green, who recorded with both Sherley and Cash, has a slightly different take on the relationship.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was that messianic complex thing kicking into high gear,” he says. “’I’m going to save this guy, and in the process save myself.’ [Cash] looked at it like, I’ve been redeemed because I was special. He really felt he was a special man. And he said it, you know, more than once. He might have been.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cash was finding salvation. Now, with the help of God and Nashville, he was going to save Glen Sherley, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But what brought Sherley to this point?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was born in state of Oklahoma in ’36. I think it was the latter part of ’38 when the whole family moved to California,” he said in a 1971 interview with CBS News. “If you read Steinbeck’s book the ‘Grapes of Wrath’ it kind of fits that, you know? Mattresses on the car, buckets on the side, stopping getting water. Got to California, I started school.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>School didn’t go so well. In his teens, Sherley started getting in trouble with the law. Over the years, he developed lifelong drug and alcohol addictions. Despite having a dedicated wife and two young children, by 1960 he would be in and out of prison for most of the next decade. So, what went wrong?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11643066\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11643066\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28919_Ronda.Tank-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Retired Tennessee State Trooper Ronda Sherley, daughter of Glen Sherley, at home in Nashville with her dog, Tank. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“I’ve asked myself that a lot of times,” says his daughter, Ronda Sherley, a retired Tennessee state trooper living in Nashville. “Because if you knew my grandmother and his brothers and sisters, they were all hardworking people, they were all very responsible, very honest people. But I guess that’s something you don’t really figure out. That was just something in him.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In that 1971 interview, Sherley shed some light on his criminal motivation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What turned me to committing robberies, I think, well, the hardest thing for me to admit about five years ago to myself was the fact that I was in prison because I wanted to be in prison. …You’re fed and you’re housed and you’re clothed and you don’t have to worry about where your next meal is coming from. There’s no responsibility there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sherley was not a criminal mastermind. He’d get loaded and impulsive, and once robbed a Burbank ice cream company of $28 using a toy gun.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In his brief moments of civilian life, he’d listen to the radio — George Jones was a favorite — and strum a few chords on a beat-up six string.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can remember him playing guitar and singing in the living room when we were going to bed,” says Ronda. “But he would be in and out, in and out [of prison] so I don’t have a whole lot of memories as a child of him being there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You got to do something in prison or go insane,” said Glen in ‘71. “You can do it gambling, you can do it hustling, you can do it shooting narcotics or taking pills, but you’ve got to have something going to let you face that next day.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11643187\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11643187\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3.jpg\" alt=\"Folsom Prison’s imposing gatehouse. \" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3-240x160.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3-375x250.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/cash3-520x346.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Folsom Prison’s imposing gatehouse. \u003ccite>(Kristina Khokhobashvili/California Department of Corrections)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>What Sherley did was write songs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the Folsom performance, the “\u003ca href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_in_Black_(song)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Man In Black\u003c/a>” was on a mission to set Sherley free. He stepped in with connections that included Gov. Ronald Reagan and the Rev. Billy Graham, and got Sherley transferred to the minimum-security prison at Vacaville. Cash also landed him a record deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lloyd Green was one of the session players imported from Tennessee to back up Sherley on his self-named album, recorded live in Vacaville while he was still doing time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Glen was the most humble, nicest guy in the world,” recalls Green. “He was just so grateful, you know? It was a major day, as it turned out, it was a major event in his life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Glen was treated as the hero by his friends in prison and it was a wonderful thing to see,” Green continues. “It was a very emotional thing for me because I just I got caught up in it, too. and I thought, ‘Wow, this is terrible this man spent a large portion of his adult life in prison.’ ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In March 1971 Glen Sherley was paroled. His record was released a few weeks later and climbed up the Billboard country charts to #63 — not a hit, but nothing to be ashamed of. Cash moved him to Nashville, gave him a spot on his road show and signed him to a publishing deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11643065\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11643065\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS28921_Glen.kids-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former inmate and songwriter Glen Sherley after being released from prison in 1971 with his children Ronda and Bruce in Nashville. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Ronda Sherley)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But after about a year and a half of traveling and performing with Cash, including a gig at the Los Angeles Forum in front of a crowd of 17,000 people, things started going south for Sherley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a big statement, but to get turned out of the California penal system and to be put into the world of hillbilly show business, good ol’ boy show business, there ain’t a hell of a lot of difference in a lot of ways,” says Marty Stuart. “You just swapping jailhouses.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He knew how to be in prison,” Ronda says. “He knew how to be someone in prison. He didn’t know how to be Glen Sherley out here.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ultimately, he couldn’t play the Nashville game, couldn’t adjust to life beyond a cell. Sherley’s addictions kicked in, his behavior became unpredictable and dangerous, and when he threatened a band member, that was the last straw.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though it crushed him, Cash finally had to cut his friend loose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the next several years, Sherley drifted and drugged. His only goal was to stay out of prison. By 1978 — just six years after his album was released — he was living in the cab of a truck on a cattle farm near Salinas. In May of that year, he took his own life at the age of 42.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve heard a lot of people say, ‘Well, do you think John [Cash] should have taken more responsibility?’ ” says Ronda Sherley. “He did his job. He gave him a job, he gave him a home. He was his friend. He gave him advice, but Dad was a grown man and chose to take it or not. So it was never John’s job to guide my father through life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She still listens to her father’s music, a long gone voice that continues to speak to her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The words, the way he writes … you think of somebody who’s in prison, you think, oh he’s a bad person,” says Ronda. “But somebody who’s a bad person couldn’t put those words together. They couldn’t feel what it takes to put those words together.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the last five decades, the Johnny Cash “Live at Folsom Prison” album has sold more than 3 million copies, and Johnny Cash is still probably the most recognized name in country music.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Glen Sherley? Now you know who he is, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>More of Peter Gilstrap’s reporting on Glen Sherley will be featured as part of a music documentary series, presented by \u003ca href=\"https://www.kcrw.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">KCRW\u003c/a>, this spring.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Golden State Plate: Where in L.A. Was the French Dip Born? Probably at Philippe's",
"headTitle": "Golden State Plate: Where in L.A. Was the French Dip Born? Probably at Philippe’s | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>California is the birthplace of many iconic dishes and drinks, from cioppino to mai tais to the fortune cookie. So \u003ca href=\"http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-california-report-magazine/id1314750545?mt=2\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The California Report Magazine\u003c/a> decided to look into the origin stories of some of those classics with a new series: \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/series/golden-state-plate\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Golden State Plate\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[dropcap]L[/dropcap]os Angeles is a city of constant change, but there are a few sacred, iconic things in this town that have remained the same for decades. And one, in particular, that you can eat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You can get the same dish that your grandfather and your great-grandfather and your ancestors had,” says \u003ca href=\"https://www.lamag.com/author/chris-nichols/\">Chris Nichols\u003c/a>. He’s been writing about L.A. culture for over 20 years. “At Philippe’s, you can get that sandwich and it’s just beautiful and simple and authentic and real and great!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.philippes.com/\">Philippe’s\u003c/a> is just down from Union Station on the southern edge of Chinatown. It’s a blue-collar area bordered by train tracks, the mighty Terminal Annex post office building and small shops in humble brick-and-mortar structures that date back to the 1920s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11693777\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11693777\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Andrew Binder, fourth generation managing partner of Philippe's restaurant in Los Angeles, stirs 50 gallons of simmering meat that will soon become French dip sandwiches.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Andrew Binder, fourth generation managing partner of Philippe’s restaurant in Los Angeles, stirs 50 gallons of simmering meat that will soon become French dip sandwiches. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“A lot of the same people who are buying that sandwich today are the types of people who would have bought it a century ago,” says Nichols.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You get city employees and workers and you see garbage men and you see people in suits. People from every walk of life are coming in and out of that place enjoying the history and authenticity and the realness of it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Stepping inside this cavernous, former machine shop feels like an older Los Angeles. There’s a bank of wooden phone booths, glowing neon clocks on the walls, sawdust covering the floors and long communal tables where customers perch on stools, often eating next to strangers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s no music in the place, just the easy ebb and flow of conversation.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">‘A lot of the same people who are buying that sandwich today are the types of people who would have bought it a century ago.’\u003ccite>Chris Nichols, Los Angeles Magazine\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>There are no waiters either. You line up at the deli counter where a row of women in classic waitress uniforms, known as carvers, wait to take and make your order.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And if you walk in and get a French dip today, it’ll be one of the 19,000 sandwiches served up this week. They’ve been doing this for a while.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were open for 10 years until the French dip was actually created, and it was an accident,” says Andrew Binder. He’s a fourth generation managing partner who literally grew up in the restaurant. The carvers were his babysitters. In 1927, his great-grandfather bought the place from Hypolite Philippe Mathieu, who opened it in 1908.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Philippe was carving a sandwich and the French roll fell into the pan drippings of some meats that were being roasted,” continues Binder. “The customer was in a hurry. We used to think it was a policeman, but we were actually told by a relative of Philippe that it was a fireman. That customer came back the next day with friends requesting the sandwich being dipped, so that really is the birth of the French dip.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11693776\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11693776\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Gloria Camacho has been making French dip sandwiches at Philippe's for 25 years. That's a lot of sandwiches.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gloria Camacho has been making French dip sandwiches at Philippe’s for 25 years. That’s a lot of sandwiches. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Gloria Camacho has been a handmaiden to the French dip for over 25 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m a carver,” she says of her front-line duties. “We slice the bread, we slice the lamb, the pickle.” Camacho is part of am all-female staff of carvers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And for customers who aren’t French dip veterans, Camacho reveals the different ways to dip your beef, lamb, pork, ham, turkey or pastrami sandwich.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They ask us, what does it mean, dip? It just means how much moisture you want on your roll,” she says. “You can get dry, single, double, wet, meat on the side, the roll on the side, cut in half, cut in thirds, for here or to go, so there’s a couple of options.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11694443\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11694443\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-800x574.jpg\" alt=\"A vintage photo of the parking lot of Philippe's in Los Angeles.\" width=\"800\" height=\"574\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-800x574.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-160x115.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-1020x732.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-1200x861.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-1180x847.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-960x689.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-240x172.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-375x269.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-520x373.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A vintage photo of the parking lot of Philippe’s in Los Angeles. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Philippe's)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The lines are growing as breakfast transitions into lunch. Eric Woods is in the queue, gazing at the cream pie, cheesecake, potato salad, pickled pigs’ feet and other delights under the deli counter glass as he inches slowly toward his carver.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a wait he’s used to.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been coming since I been like 10 years old,” says Woods. “I’m 53 now. I just like the atmosphere. Family atmosphere. With no headache.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11693774\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 291px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-11693774\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"French dip fan Eric Woods and his wife Sonja. He's been coming to Philippe's since he was a toddler.\" width=\"291\" height=\"218\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 291px) 100vw, 291px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">French dip fan Eric Woods and his wife Sonja. He’s been coming to Philippe’s since he was a toddler. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The tradition of Philippe’s French dip is deep and vast, but they’re not the only place in town claiming the sacred birthright.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://213hospitality.com/coles/\">Cole’s\u003c/a>, also open since 1908, maintains the sandwich had its first au jus baptism in their kitchen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have my own theory as to why Philippe’s might be the originator as opposed to Cole’s,” offer Chris Nichols. “It’s simply that Hypolite Philippe Mathieu was born in France, and Harry Cole was a German, so maybe that’s why it’s a French dip because it came from a Frenchman.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not exactly a Beatles vs. Stones rivalry, and fans of both sandwiches can always agree on at least one thing: the sturdy, humble French dip is a proud creation of the City of Angels.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>California is the birthplace of many iconic dishes and drinks, from cioppino to mai tais to the fortune cookie. So \u003ca href=\"http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-california-report-magazine/id1314750545?mt=2\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The California Report Magazine\u003c/a> decided to look into the origin stories of some of those classics with a new series: \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/series/golden-state-plate\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Golden State Plate\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">L\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>os Angeles is a city of constant change, but there are a few sacred, iconic things in this town that have remained the same for decades. And one, in particular, that you can eat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You can get the same dish that your grandfather and your great-grandfather and your ancestors had,” says \u003ca href=\"https://www.lamag.com/author/chris-nichols/\">Chris Nichols\u003c/a>. He’s been writing about L.A. culture for over 20 years. “At Philippe’s, you can get that sandwich and it’s just beautiful and simple and authentic and real and great!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.philippes.com/\">Philippe’s\u003c/a> is just down from Union Station on the southern edge of Chinatown. It’s a blue-collar area bordered by train tracks, the mighty Terminal Annex post office building and small shops in humble brick-and-mortar structures that date back to the 1920s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11693777\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11693777\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Andrew Binder, fourth generation managing partner of Philippe's restaurant in Los Angeles, stirs 50 gallons of simmering meat that will soon become French dip sandwiches.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32733_ANDREW-BINDER-qut-1-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Andrew Binder, fourth generation managing partner of Philippe’s restaurant in Los Angeles, stirs 50 gallons of simmering meat that will soon become French dip sandwiches. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“A lot of the same people who are buying that sandwich today are the types of people who would have bought it a century ago,” says Nichols.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You get city employees and workers and you see garbage men and you see people in suits. People from every walk of life are coming in and out of that place enjoying the history and authenticity and the realness of it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Stepping inside this cavernous, former machine shop feels like an older Los Angeles. There’s a bank of wooden phone booths, glowing neon clocks on the walls, sawdust covering the floors and long communal tables where customers perch on stools, often eating next to strangers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s no music in the place, just the easy ebb and flow of conversation.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">‘A lot of the same people who are buying that sandwich today are the types of people who would have bought it a century ago.’\u003ccite>Chris Nichols, Los Angeles Magazine\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>There are no waiters either. You line up at the deli counter where a row of women in classic waitress uniforms, known as carvers, wait to take and make your order.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And if you walk in and get a French dip today, it’ll be one of the 19,000 sandwiches served up this week. They’ve been doing this for a while.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were open for 10 years until the French dip was actually created, and it was an accident,” says Andrew Binder. He’s a fourth generation managing partner who literally grew up in the restaurant. The carvers were his babysitters. In 1927, his great-grandfather bought the place from Hypolite Philippe Mathieu, who opened it in 1908.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Philippe was carving a sandwich and the French roll fell into the pan drippings of some meats that were being roasted,” continues Binder. “The customer was in a hurry. We used to think it was a policeman, but we were actually told by a relative of Philippe that it was a fireman. That customer came back the next day with friends requesting the sandwich being dipped, so that really is the birth of the French dip.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11693776\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11693776\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Gloria Camacho has been making French dip sandwiches at Philippe's for 25 years. That's a lot of sandwiches.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32736_gloria-1-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gloria Camacho has been making French dip sandwiches at Philippe’s for 25 years. That’s a lot of sandwiches. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Gloria Camacho has been a handmaiden to the French dip for over 25 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m a carver,” she says of her front-line duties. “We slice the bread, we slice the lamb, the pickle.” Camacho is part of am all-female staff of carvers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And for customers who aren’t French dip veterans, Camacho reveals the different ways to dip your beef, lamb, pork, ham, turkey or pastrami sandwich.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They ask us, what does it mean, dip? It just means how much moisture you want on your roll,” she says. “You can get dry, single, double, wet, meat on the side, the roll on the side, cut in half, cut in thirds, for here or to go, so there’s a couple of options.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11694443\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11694443\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-800x574.jpg\" alt=\"A vintage photo of the parking lot of Philippe's in Los Angeles.\" width=\"800\" height=\"574\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-800x574.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-160x115.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-1020x732.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-1200x861.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-1180x847.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-960x689.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-240x172.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-375x269.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/PhilippesParking-520x373.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A vintage photo of the parking lot of Philippe’s in Los Angeles. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Philippe's)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The lines are growing as breakfast transitions into lunch. Eric Woods is in the queue, gazing at the cream pie, cheesecake, potato salad, pickled pigs’ feet and other delights under the deli counter glass as he inches slowly toward his carver.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a wait he’s used to.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been coming since I been like 10 years old,” says Woods. “I’m 53 now. I just like the atmosphere. Family atmosphere. With no headache.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11693774\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 291px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-11693774\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"French dip fan Eric Woods and his wife Sonja. He's been coming to Philippe's since he was a toddler.\" width=\"291\" height=\"218\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-1200x900.jpg 1200w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/09/RS32735_eric-woods-1-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 291px) 100vw, 291px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">French dip fan Eric Woods and his wife Sonja. He’s been coming to Philippe’s since he was a toddler. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The tradition of Philippe’s French dip is deep and vast, but they’re not the only place in town claiming the sacred birthright.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://213hospitality.com/coles/\">Cole’s\u003c/a>, also open since 1908, maintains the sandwich had its first au jus baptism in their kitchen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have my own theory as to why Philippe’s might be the originator as opposed to Cole’s,” offer Chris Nichols. “It’s simply that Hypolite Philippe Mathieu was born in France, and Harry Cole was a German, so maybe that’s why it’s a French dip because it came from a Frenchman.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not exactly a Beatles vs. Stones rivalry, and fans of both sandwiches can always agree on at least one thing: the sturdy, humble French dip is a proud creation of the City of Angels.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>What does \u003ca href=\"http://adamschoenberg.com/\">Adam Schoenberg\u003c/a> have in common with Body Count, Los Amigos Invisibles and the entire cast of Hello Dolly?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the tender age of 37, the classical composer is up for two Grammys this weekend, including Best Contemporary Classical Composition for his work “Picture Studies,” and Best Engineered Album, Classical.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You may not be aware of this guy, but in the classical world, Schoenberg’s work is so popular he’s made the annual list of the top 10 most performed living composers in the country. Twice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since he began composing professionally in 2006 when he was still a doctoral student at Juilliard, his writing has been commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Kansas City Symphony, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, among others, and his compositions have premiered at venues like Lincoln Center, the Library of Congress, the Kennedy Center and the Hollywood Bowl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[audio src=\"https://www.kqed.org/.stream/anon/radio/tcrmag/2018/01/GilstrapComposer.mp3\" Image=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/RS29028_Schoenberg-1-qut-1180x885.jpg\" Title=\"The Grammy-Nominated Classical Star You've (Probably) Never Heard Of\" program=\"The California Report\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Schoenberg combines that life with his work as an assistant professor specializing in composition and film scoring at Occidental College in the small community of Eagle Rock in Los Angeles. It’s also the school where a fellow named Barack Obama spent his first two years of higher education.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walk into the leafy, Zen-like courtyard of the small music building at Occidental, pass the tiered, cascading fountain and it’s not hard to find Adam Schoenberg’s corner studio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Just follow the sounds of the piano. Whether he’s teaching or composing, things for this man pretty much center around 88 keys.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though he’s actually a very distant relation to George Gershwin, Schoenberg’s music is quite close in spirit, and it’s drawn comparisons to his iconic relative and other big names. Not all of them classical.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One of the greatest compliments I’ve ever had is someone came up to me and said, ‘your music sounds like Radiohead meeting Aaron Copland,’” says Schoenberg. “In my car I have Sirius radio and I listen to Lithium, which is Stone Temple Pilots and Nirvana, and Backspin, which is hip-hop from the ‘80’s and ‘90’s. I really do feel my music embraces the pop idiom or hip-hop idiom because it’s part of my DNA. So yeah, I embody the music of our time and put a little twist to it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[contextly_sidebar id=”IbO0TgUTXm4nc25SH1iEgT1mMZ71tb4d”]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Much of Schoenberg’s work has a cinematic feel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was drawn to soundtracks, but we didn’t really own soundtracks,” he says. “My father is also a film composer, and when we would go see movies we always stayed to the end of the credits. And we would always listen, we’d be the last people in the theater.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Schoenberg is prolific, but his creative process begins with sitting down and winging it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll improvise for hours upon hours, record my improvisations and then I’ll extract a chord progression, it could be just a note, it could be a melody, it could be a texture, it could be a rhythm. Then I’ll start to sculpt it and craft it, and at that point I begin to think of myself as an architect building from this base material.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s got computers and keyboards to capture those nuggets, but inspiration won’t always wait until a man’s in his studio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For right now, I basically record on my iPhone,” he says. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sure enough, he’s got all manner of fragments stowed away on his voice memo, bits of singing with his young sons yelling in the background, a few skeletal notes on a piano, chords that repeat over and over as he searches for a path to open up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, from one 27-second bit of humble warbling sprang the opening line of Schoenberg’s upcoming work, “Orchard in Fog.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11644688\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-800x1149.jpg\" alt=\"Violinist Anne Akiko Meyers commissioned Adam Schoenberg's first violin concerto.\" width=\"800\" height=\"1149\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11644688\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-800x1149.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-160x230.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-1020x1465.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-1180x1695.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-960x1379.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-240x345.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-375x539.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-520x747.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Violinist Anne Akiko Meyers commissioned Adam Schoenberg’s first violin concerto. \u003ccite>(Courtesy David Zentz)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It’s based on a photograph by Adam Laipson, who’s from the same town in Massachusetts where I grew up, Salem, but not the witch one,” says Schoenberg. “My wife and I got married in an apple orchard on a gorgeous farm, quintessential New England, and Adam happened to take a photograph of the orchard in the winter. It’s haunting and beautiful. It’s in our bedroom and I wake up to it every single morning.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The piece is his first violin concerto, and it will have its world premiere \u003ca href=\"http://purchasing.sandiegosymphony.org/single/eventDetail.aspx?p=6361\">February 10 with the San Diego Symphony\u003c/a> featuring renowned concert violinist Anne Akiko Meyers, who commissioned the piece. But right now it’s still very much a work in progress, and will be so down to the wire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Oh yeah,” says Schoenberg. “I’ll be in my hotel room in San Diego making changes to this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Oh God, I don’t want to hear that!” laughs Meyers. “I really wish you didn’t tell me that! Composers.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Meyers, the consummate pro, will no doubt come through in the clinch. And after all, she commissioned the work, and she’s a big fan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“His music is easily accessible and I mean that in the best sense,” she says. “Like a lot of other music can be non-transparent, and you feel like you almost need a degree in some kind of science to understand what is going on, but there’s none of that with Adam’s music. It just speaks to you, and it speaks simply and beautifully.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think in the 21st Century we’re sort of at this renaissance,” Schoenberg says. “Every kid who gets a laptop can write a track and upload it to Youtube and say, ‘I wrote this.’ And at that point you have to figure out your voice, who you are, what it is you want to say and then how you’re going to distinguish yourself. But that’s a lifelong journey, I suppose.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At this point, Schoenberg’s well on the road, and the next stop is New York City for the Grammy Awards. After that, it’s back to the piano.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"title": "The Grammy-Nominated Classical Star You've (Probably) Never Heard Of | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>What does \u003ca href=\"http://adamschoenberg.com/\">Adam Schoenberg\u003c/a> have in common with Body Count, Los Amigos Invisibles and the entire cast of Hello Dolly?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the tender age of 37, the classical composer is up for two Grammys this weekend, including Best Contemporary Classical Composition for his work “Picture Studies,” and Best Engineered Album, Classical.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You may not be aware of this guy, but in the classical world, Schoenberg’s work is so popular he’s made the annual list of the top 10 most performed living composers in the country. Twice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since he began composing professionally in 2006 when he was still a doctoral student at Juilliard, his writing has been commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Kansas City Symphony, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, among others, and his compositions have premiered at venues like Lincoln Center, the Library of Congress, the Kennedy Center and the Hollywood Bowl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Schoenberg combines that life with his work as an assistant professor specializing in composition and film scoring at Occidental College in the small community of Eagle Rock in Los Angeles. It’s also the school where a fellow named Barack Obama spent his first two years of higher education.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Walk into the leafy, Zen-like courtyard of the small music building at Occidental, pass the tiered, cascading fountain and it’s not hard to find Adam Schoenberg’s corner studio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Just follow the sounds of the piano. Whether he’s teaching or composing, things for this man pretty much center around 88 keys.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Though he’s actually a very distant relation to George Gershwin, Schoenberg’s music is quite close in spirit, and it’s drawn comparisons to his iconic relative and other big names. Not all of them classical.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One of the greatest compliments I’ve ever had is someone came up to me and said, ‘your music sounds like Radiohead meeting Aaron Copland,’” says Schoenberg. “In my car I have Sirius radio and I listen to Lithium, which is Stone Temple Pilots and Nirvana, and Backspin, which is hip-hop from the ‘80’s and ‘90’s. I really do feel my music embraces the pop idiom or hip-hop idiom because it’s part of my DNA. So yeah, I embody the music of our time and put a little twist to it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Much of Schoenberg’s work has a cinematic feel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was drawn to soundtracks, but we didn’t really own soundtracks,” he says. “My father is also a film composer, and when we would go see movies we always stayed to the end of the credits. And we would always listen, we’d be the last people in the theater.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Schoenberg is prolific, but his creative process begins with sitting down and winging it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll improvise for hours upon hours, record my improvisations and then I’ll extract a chord progression, it could be just a note, it could be a melody, it could be a texture, it could be a rhythm. Then I’ll start to sculpt it and craft it, and at that point I begin to think of myself as an architect building from this base material.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’s got computers and keyboards to capture those nuggets, but inspiration won’t always wait until a man’s in his studio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For right now, I basically record on my iPhone,” he says. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sure enough, he’s got all manner of fragments stowed away on his voice memo, bits of singing with his young sons yelling in the background, a few skeletal notes on a piano, chords that repeat over and over as he searches for a path to open up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, from one 27-second bit of humble warbling sprang the opening line of Schoenberg’s upcoming work, “Orchard in Fog.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11644688\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-800x1149.jpg\" alt=\"Violinist Anne Akiko Meyers commissioned Adam Schoenberg's first violin concerto.\" width=\"800\" height=\"1149\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11644688\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-800x1149.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-160x230.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-1020x1465.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-1180x1695.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-960x1379.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-240x345.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-375x539.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/01/AnneAkikoMeyers-520x747.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Violinist Anne Akiko Meyers commissioned Adam Schoenberg’s first violin concerto. \u003ccite>(Courtesy David Zentz)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It’s based on a photograph by Adam Laipson, who’s from the same town in Massachusetts where I grew up, Salem, but not the witch one,” says Schoenberg. “My wife and I got married in an apple orchard on a gorgeous farm, quintessential New England, and Adam happened to take a photograph of the orchard in the winter. It’s haunting and beautiful. It’s in our bedroom and I wake up to it every single morning.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The piece is his first violin concerto, and it will have its world premiere \u003ca href=\"http://purchasing.sandiegosymphony.org/single/eventDetail.aspx?p=6361\">February 10 with the San Diego Symphony\u003c/a> featuring renowned concert violinist Anne Akiko Meyers, who commissioned the piece. But right now it’s still very much a work in progress, and will be so down to the wire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Oh yeah,” says Schoenberg. “I’ll be in my hotel room in San Diego making changes to this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Oh God, I don’t want to hear that!” laughs Meyers. “I really wish you didn’t tell me that! Composers.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Meyers, the consummate pro, will no doubt come through in the clinch. And after all, she commissioned the work, and she’s a big fan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“His music is easily accessible and I mean that in the best sense,” she says. “Like a lot of other music can be non-transparent, and you feel like you almost need a degree in some kind of science to understand what is going on, but there’s none of that with Adam’s music. It just speaks to you, and it speaks simply and beautifully.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think in the 21st Century we’re sort of at this renaissance,” Schoenberg says. “Every kid who gets a laptop can write a track and upload it to Youtube and say, ‘I wrote this.’ And at that point you have to figure out your voice, who you are, what it is you want to say and then how you’re going to distinguish yourself. But that’s a lifelong journey, I suppose.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"disqusTitle": "The 'Church of Type' Spreads the Gospel of Letterpress",
"title": "The 'Church of Type' Spreads the Gospel of Letterpress",
"headTitle": "The California Report | KQED News",
"content": "\u003cp>If Johannes Gutenberg or Ben Franklin walked off of Pico Boulevard and into Kevin Bradley’s Santa Monica shop, they’d feel pretty much at home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It's keeping that direct connection to the past alive in a contemporary fashion, but this doesn't exist in L.A.,” says Bradley. “It's been pure madness to come here and do this alone and try and make it work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">'I just do it by hand... I’m a dinosaur. But it’s satisfying. It’s so satisfying to make something that you feel good about.'\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Like those old school giants of the printing world, Bradley is a master of the handset \u003ca href=\"https://www.britannica.com/technology/letterpress-printing\">letterpress\u003c/a>. After two decades working in Tennessee -- including a stint at the famed Hatch Show Print design company in Nashville -- he came to California five years ago to carry on the sacred tradition in his storefront studio, the Church of Type.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The higher power is obvious the minute you enter this holy place. The walls and ceiling are covered with posters heralding classic country, blues and soul singers and prints boldly announcing wrestlers, robots, civil rights heroes, pork chops, Communists and Bigfoot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a sensory overload, like hundreds of people screaming at your eyeballs in big block letters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[audio src=\"https://www.kqed.org/.stream/anon/radio/tcrmag/2017/10/ChurchOfType.mp3\" Image=\"https://u.s.kqed.net/2017/10/20/ChurchofType.jpg\" Title=\"The Church of Type Spreads the Gospel of Letterpress\" program=\"The California Report\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are trays of ancient of fonts, massive drawers heavy with metal type, and at the heart of it all, the enormous machines that speak a mechanical language from a time gone by.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The printing presses, one's called Baby and one's called Maimy because she pinched my finger off once,” Bradley says. “But they all have personalities, idiosyncrasies; they're temperamental. They want some love.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s not something you would say about a cold, silent, brushed steel laptop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I'm the only guy who's 100 percent no computer,” says Bradley. “I just do it by hand, I carve wood blocks or set type. I have over 2,000 fonts of type in here from six point to three feet tall. And so I'm a traditionalist in that way. I’m a dinosaur. But it's satisfying. It's so satisfying to make something that you feel good about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bradley’s pouring a teaspoon of black ink onto the roller of a machine the size of buffalo, which creates a sound that pretty much mimics the sizzle of bacon frying. He’s making a poster for \u003ca href=\"https://www.lucindawilliams.com/\">Lucinda Williams\u003c/a> right now. It’s taken him two full days just to set the type. He scrapes off excess ink bumps -- 'hickeys' in print shop talk -- with a razor blade and his finger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everyone thinks this is so glamorous when they come in here,” he says. “But you know, I'm a dirty monkey every day with ink all over me, and my clothes are ruined. And that's how glamorous it is, you know? I'm a glorified janitor in most ways.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11624940\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-11624940\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kevin Bradley holds a 200-year-old \"K,\" used on a recent poster he created for musician Lucinda Williams. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Bradley has the janitor look down pat. He wears a rumpled work shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and his splattered jeans look like a printing press threw up on them. But the shoes are a different story: vintage black and white wing tips that could have come from the closet of a Tennessee Williams lawyer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s ink on the shoes too, but it goes with the work. And one-man-show Bradley certainly works, often seven days a week, well into the night as James Brown, Will Oldham and George Jones keep him company blasting from the stereo. He designs and prints everything from business cards to album covers to wedding invitations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the last decade he’s created posters for the \u003ca href=\"http://www.ponderosastomp.com/\">Ponderosa Stomp\u003c/a>, the yearly New Orleans roots music festival.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To be honest, when he does posters for the Stomp, I don't even know what they are until he sends them to me,” says Dr. Ike Padnos, who founded the Stomp. He became a Church of Type disciple after seeing Bradley’s posters displayed at New Orleans’ \u003ca href=\"http://www.nojazzfest.com/\">Jazz Fest\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was that old school letterpress that just was so cool,” reveals Padnos. “People don't do that anymore. And then he's just taken it to another level and started going back and doing posters that almost look like the ‘50s and ‘60s with the coloring and photos, and the subject matter. Here was a guy doing wrestling stuff. You'd see the Ox. I mean, who puts the Ox on posters? Who puts Link Wray on posters? Who puts Robert Johnson on posters? It’s things that people weren’t doing at the time that made it so cool.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Bradley also creates pieces for himself, unexpected combinations of words, images, block print and primitive, outsider drawings. It’s striking, raw and original stuff, but is it art?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think that Kevin does make art and is an artist. It’s not his fault that he’s not rich and famous,” says painter and musician \u003ca href=\"http://www.bobneuwirth.com/\">Bob Neuwirth\u003c/a>. He produced the traditional country music documentary \"\u003ca href=\"https://phfilms.com/films/down-from-the-mountain/\">Down From the Mountain\u003c/a>,\" hiring Bradley to do some design work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One of the things that might be standing in Kevin's way is his authenticity,” continues Neuwirth. “I mean, he actually means it. I better keep my mouth shut after saying that, but part of what goes with being an artist are the vicissitudes of the art world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11625098\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-800x990.jpg\" alt=\"Kevin Bradley with one of his larger letterpress works at his Santa Monica-based Church of Type.\" width=\"800\" height=\"990\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11625098\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-800x990.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-160x198.jpg 160w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-1020x1262.jpg 1020w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-1180x1460.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-960x1188.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-240x297.jpg 240w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-375x464.jpg 375w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-520x644.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kevin Bradley with one of his larger letterpress works at his Santa Monica-based Church of Type. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“My overriding idea coming to L.A. with this was I wanted to present letterpress as an art form,” Bradley says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Los Angeles art community apparently didn’t see it that way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I haven't fit into the art scene proper hardly at all. I'm such an outsider, I work on the outside of almost everything, but I can live there and do my thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But he won’t be doing his thing in Los Angeles much longer. Bradley, who shares a Tennessee hometown and a passion for coonskin caps with the late Davy Crockett, will soon be returning to his roots.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You know, it works better in the South and I think I'll be moving back there as my lease comes up here next year,” he says. “You can afford real estate, you can afford to live. It's a labor of love to be here. There's no money to be made. I wanted to share this so much with L.A. and I'm so glad I did, but they just never seen it before, and I don't know that they'll see a big operation like this again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With 30 tons of equipment to haul, relocating the Church will be a tribulation to be reckoned with. But moving the spirit behind the place is an effortless task for a man driven by faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want it to live and breathe and get people excited about it,” Bradley says. “And usually if I can get'em in my door I can win 'em over and at least sell 'em a poster on the way out. So that's just the uphill battle that we're all going to face with it, is trying to keep it alive.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>If Johannes Gutenberg or Ben Franklin walked off of Pico Boulevard and into Kevin Bradley’s Santa Monica shop, they’d feel pretty much at home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It's keeping that direct connection to the past alive in a contemporary fashion, but this doesn't exist in L.A.,” says Bradley. “It's been pure madness to come here and do this alone and try and make it work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">'I just do it by hand... I’m a dinosaur. But it’s satisfying. It’s so satisfying to make something that you feel good about.'\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Like those old school giants of the printing world, Bradley is a master of the handset \u003ca href=\"https://www.britannica.com/technology/letterpress-printing\">letterpress\u003c/a>. After two decades working in Tennessee -- including a stint at the famed Hatch Show Print design company in Nashville -- he came to California five years ago to carry on the sacred tradition in his storefront studio, the Church of Type.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The higher power is obvious the minute you enter this holy place. The walls and ceiling are covered with posters heralding classic country, blues and soul singers and prints boldly announcing wrestlers, robots, civil rights heroes, pork chops, Communists and Bigfoot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a sensory overload, like hundreds of people screaming at your eyeballs in big block letters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are trays of ancient of fonts, massive drawers heavy with metal type, and at the heart of it all, the enormous machines that speak a mechanical language from a time gone by.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The printing presses, one's called Baby and one's called Maimy because she pinched my finger off once,” Bradley says. “But they all have personalities, idiosyncrasies; they're temperamental. They want some love.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s not something you would say about a cold, silent, brushed steel laptop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I'm the only guy who's 100 percent no computer,” says Bradley. “I just do it by hand, I carve wood blocks or set type. I have over 2,000 fonts of type in here from six point to three feet tall. And so I'm a traditionalist in that way. I’m a dinosaur. But it's satisfying. It's so satisfying to make something that you feel good about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bradley’s pouring a teaspoon of black ink onto the roller of a machine the size of buffalo, which creates a sound that pretty much mimics the sizzle of bacon frying. He’s making a poster for \u003ca href=\"https://www.lucindawilliams.com/\">Lucinda Williams\u003c/a> right now. It’s taken him two full days just to set the type. He scrapes off excess ink bumps -- 'hickeys' in print shop talk -- with a razor blade and his finger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everyone thinks this is so glamorous when they come in here,” he says. “But you know, I'm a dirty monkey every day with ink all over me, and my clothes are ruined. And that's how glamorous it is, you know? I'm a glorified janitor in most ways.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11624940\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-11624940\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-800x600.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-160x120.jpg 160w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-1180x885.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-960x720.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-240x180.jpg 240w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-375x281.jpg 375w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/RS27567_kevin-3-qut-520x390.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kevin Bradley holds a 200-year-old \"K,\" used on a recent poster he created for musician Lucinda Williams. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Bradley has the janitor look down pat. He wears a rumpled work shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and his splattered jeans look like a printing press threw up on them. But the shoes are a different story: vintage black and white wing tips that could have come from the closet of a Tennessee Williams lawyer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s ink on the shoes too, but it goes with the work. And one-man-show Bradley certainly works, often seven days a week, well into the night as James Brown, Will Oldham and George Jones keep him company blasting from the stereo. He designs and prints everything from business cards to album covers to wedding invitations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the last decade he’s created posters for the \u003ca href=\"http://www.ponderosastomp.com/\">Ponderosa Stomp\u003c/a>, the yearly New Orleans roots music festival.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To be honest, when he does posters for the Stomp, I don't even know what they are until he sends them to me,” says Dr. Ike Padnos, who founded the Stomp. He became a Church of Type disciple after seeing Bradley’s posters displayed at New Orleans’ \u003ca href=\"http://www.nojazzfest.com/\">Jazz Fest\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was that old school letterpress that just was so cool,” reveals Padnos. “People don't do that anymore. And then he's just taken it to another level and started going back and doing posters that almost look like the ‘50s and ‘60s with the coloring and photos, and the subject matter. Here was a guy doing wrestling stuff. You'd see the Ox. I mean, who puts the Ox on posters? Who puts Link Wray on posters? Who puts Robert Johnson on posters? It’s things that people weren’t doing at the time that made it so cool.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Bradley also creates pieces for himself, unexpected combinations of words, images, block print and primitive, outsider drawings. It’s striking, raw and original stuff, but is it art?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think that Kevin does make art and is an artist. It’s not his fault that he’s not rich and famous,” says painter and musician \u003ca href=\"http://www.bobneuwirth.com/\">Bob Neuwirth\u003c/a>. He produced the traditional country music documentary \"\u003ca href=\"https://phfilms.com/films/down-from-the-mountain/\">Down From the Mountain\u003c/a>,\" hiring Bradley to do some design work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One of the things that might be standing in Kevin's way is his authenticity,” continues Neuwirth. “I mean, he actually means it. I better keep my mouth shut after saying that, but part of what goes with being an artist are the vicissitudes of the art world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11625098\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-800x990.jpg\" alt=\"Kevin Bradley with one of his larger letterpress works at his Santa Monica-based Church of Type.\" width=\"800\" height=\"990\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11625098\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-800x990.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-160x198.jpg 160w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-1020x1262.jpg 1020w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-1180x1460.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-960x1188.jpg 960w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-240x297.jpg 240w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-375x464.jpg 375w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/10/InsidePrintShop-520x644.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kevin Bradley with one of his larger letterpress works at his Santa Monica-based Church of Type. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“My overriding idea coming to L.A. with this was I wanted to present letterpress as an art form,” Bradley says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Los Angeles art community apparently didn’t see it that way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I haven't fit into the art scene proper hardly at all. I'm such an outsider, I work on the outside of almost everything, but I can live there and do my thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But he won’t be doing his thing in Los Angeles much longer. Bradley, who shares a Tennessee hometown and a passion for coonskin caps with the late Davy Crockett, will soon be returning to his roots.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You know, it works better in the South and I think I'll be moving back there as my lease comes up here next year,” he says. “You can afford real estate, you can afford to live. It's a labor of love to be here. There's no money to be made. I wanted to share this so much with L.A. and I'm so glad I did, but they just never seen it before, and I don't know that they'll see a big operation like this again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With 30 tons of equipment to haul, relocating the Church will be a tribulation to be reckoned with. But moving the spirit behind the place is an effortless task for a man driven by faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want it to live and breathe and get people excited about it,” Bradley says. “And usually if I can get'em in my door I can win 'em over and at least sell 'em a poster on the way out. So that's just the uphill battle that we're all going to face with it, is trying to keep it alive.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Can Joining a Band Fight Cognitive Decline? Just Ask 'The 5th Dementia'",
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"headTitle": "Can Joining a Band Fight Cognitive Decline? Just Ask ‘The 5th Dementia’ | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>When you think of the debilitating, painful trauma of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s, you probably don’t think of people climbing onstage to belt out feel-good classics from the “Great American Songbook.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But then you’re probably not thinking of The 5th Dementia, a Los Angeles group that keeps folks with neurodegenerative disease in the moment by playing music of the past — with help from a few teenage musicians.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">‘The brain doesn’t forget music, it forgets everything else but music.’\u003ccite>Kelly Hodell, Marine Corps veteran and 5th Dementia volunteer\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>It’s a Monday afternoon at the Brentwood Presbyterian Church in West Los Angeles, three facts that many of the members of The 5th Dementia are probably unaware of.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s no joke.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of the dozen or so singers and musicians onstage, most are dealing with some form of cognitive decline. They’re men and women, mostly seniors. Some no longer speak, yet they can still sing songs they heard Frank and Dean croon decades ago, songs that have been embedded in their memories, tucked away in an area of the brain untouched by disease.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11611865\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11611865\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-800x568.jpg\" alt=\"The 5th Dementia rehearse at Brentwood Presbyterian Church in West Los Angeles. Many of the group suffer from Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other neurodegenerative diseases.\" width=\"800\" height=\"568\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-800x568.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-160x114.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-1020x725.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-1180x838.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-960x682.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-240x171.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-375x266.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-520x369.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The 5th Dementia rehearse at Brentwood Presbyterian Church in West Los Angeles. Many of the group suffer from Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other neurodegenerative diseases. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Family members and caregivers settle into pews in this cavernous chapel, which features massive karaoke screens on either end displaying lyrics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the obvious toll disease has taken on band members, many greet each other with hugs. Those who can speak say hello, those who can laugh do that, too. The mood is not what you might expect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I thought, how am I going to do this? It’s going to depress me and I’m going to see things I don’t want to see,” says singer Diana Davidow, who has Parkinson’s. It’s mild, she says, so she feels lucky. Though she initially loved the idea of the band, joining two years ago was a big step.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“After a couple of times I fell in love with this whole group,” Davidow says. “I didn’t see anything but these personalities and their bodies, and it doesn’t matter. We’re all here to support each other, have a few good laughs, which we do, and fool around.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not everyone in The 5th Dementia is suffering from cognitive issues. The group’s musical vision includes student volunteers from the Windward School in West L.A.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11610772\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11610772\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-800x1067.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"1067\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-800x1067.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-1020x1360.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-1180x1573.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-960x1280.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-240x320.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-375x500.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-520x693.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The 5th Dementia student volunteer Spencer Lemann, 17, who’s played bass with the group for three years. \u003ccite>(David Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The kids don’t look at us as the old people, They kinda just have a good time,” offers Davidow. “One of them said, ‘They don’t even look sick. How come they don’t they look sick?’ ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Spencer Lemann is one of the “kids.” The 17-year-old is a gifted upright bassist, and has been a part of The 5th Dementia for almost three years. For Lemann — who literally keeps the musical pulse of the band going — the idea of a teenager playing oldies with the elderly is no stretch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve never really viewed it that way,” he says. “What we’re really sharing with each other is music. And for a lot of these guys, I’ve learned more about them from playing with them than talking with them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As far as the playing goes, not everyone’s chops are up to Lemann’s level, but the band’s mission is not to redefine shredding. The amazing thing about The 5th Dementia is that it exists at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It is a miracle, it’s magical and it’s given us a life,” says Carol Rosenstein who, along with her husband Irwin, founded \u003ca href=\"http://www.musicmendsminds.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Music Mends Minds\u003c/a> in 2014, the nonprofit organization that spawned The 5th Dementia. Carol had the idea when Irwin was diagnosed with Parkinson’s and dementia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I noticed when he was playing the piano at home he was resurrected like a plant needing water, and this was coming from playing a musical instrument,” says Rosenstein. “The neurologist said, ‘Carol, you’re looking at the power of music changing brain chemistry.’ ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11611893\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11611893\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-800x563.jpg\" alt=\"Carol Rosenstein, who founded the 5th Dementia with her husband Irwin after he was diagnosed with dementia.\" width=\"800\" height=\"563\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-800x563.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-160x113.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-1020x718.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-1180x831.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-960x676.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-240x169.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-375x264.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-520x366.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Carol Rosenstein, who founded the 5th Dementia with her husband, Irwin, after he was diagnosed with dementia. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The brain doesn’t forget music, it forgets everything else but music,” says Kelly Hodell. He’s a Marine Corps and Navy veteran who served as a medic during the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. Now he serves with The 5th Dementia, volunteering on harmonica.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have people in here that can play all kinds of songs but can barely carry on a conversation,” says Hodell. “I think it wakes up a part of their mind and a part of their memories ’cause music is like a time machine. It takes you back to times and places and people that meant something to you in your life, and also keeps them socialized and active and a part of life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to a report in AARP magazine, “music can not only improve the mood of people with neurological diseases, it can boost cognitive skills and reduce the need for antipsychotic drugs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Right now there are six other bands in California and Washington under the Music Mends Minds umbrella, with five more in the works, including a group in the Philippines. So far, Carol Rosenstein has handed out over 1,000 How to Start a Band kits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll tell you, when serious disease comes, there’s a lot of isolationism, and now we have people from the community, and they come weekly to be in this musical and healing environment and become happy,” says Rosenstein, as the band kicks into the classic song, \u003cem>As Time Goes By.\u003c/em> “That’s what we’re selling, happiness!”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>When you think of the debilitating, painful trauma of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s, you probably don’t think of people climbing onstage to belt out feel-good classics from the “Great American Songbook.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But then you’re probably not thinking of The 5th Dementia, a Los Angeles group that keeps folks with neurodegenerative disease in the moment by playing music of the past — with help from a few teenage musicians.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">‘The brain doesn’t forget music, it forgets everything else but music.’\u003ccite>Kelly Hodell, Marine Corps veteran and 5th Dementia volunteer\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>It’s a Monday afternoon at the Brentwood Presbyterian Church in West Los Angeles, three facts that many of the members of The 5th Dementia are probably unaware of.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s no joke.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of the dozen or so singers and musicians onstage, most are dealing with some form of cognitive decline. They’re men and women, mostly seniors. Some no longer speak, yet they can still sing songs they heard Frank and Dean croon decades ago, songs that have been embedded in their memories, tucked away in an area of the brain untouched by disease.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11611865\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11611865\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-800x568.jpg\" alt=\"The 5th Dementia rehearse at Brentwood Presbyterian Church in West Los Angeles. Many of the group suffer from Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other neurodegenerative diseases.\" width=\"800\" height=\"568\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-800x568.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-160x114.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-1020x725.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-1180x838.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-960x682.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-240x171.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-375x266.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/5Dementia-520x369.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The 5th Dementia rehearse at Brentwood Presbyterian Church in West Los Angeles. Many of the group suffer from Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other neurodegenerative diseases. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Family members and caregivers settle into pews in this cavernous chapel, which features massive karaoke screens on either end displaying lyrics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the obvious toll disease has taken on band members, many greet each other with hugs. Those who can speak say hello, those who can laugh do that, too. The mood is not what you might expect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I thought, how am I going to do this? It’s going to depress me and I’m going to see things I don’t want to see,” says singer Diana Davidow, who has Parkinson’s. It’s mild, she says, so she feels lucky. Though she initially loved the idea of the band, joining two years ago was a big step.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“After a couple of times I fell in love with this whole group,” Davidow says. “I didn’t see anything but these personalities and their bodies, and it doesn’t matter. We’re all here to support each other, have a few good laughs, which we do, and fool around.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not everyone in The 5th Dementia is suffering from cognitive issues. The group’s musical vision includes student volunteers from the Windward School in West L.A.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11610772\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11610772\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-800x1067.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"1067\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-800x1067.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-160x213.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-1020x1360.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-1180x1573.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-960x1280.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-240x320.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-375x500.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/RS26129_5D-4-qut-520x693.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The 5th Dementia student volunteer Spencer Lemann, 17, who’s played bass with the group for three years. \u003ccite>(David Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The kids don’t look at us as the old people, They kinda just have a good time,” offers Davidow. “One of them said, ‘They don’t even look sick. How come they don’t they look sick?’ ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Spencer Lemann is one of the “kids.” The 17-year-old is a gifted upright bassist, and has been a part of The 5th Dementia for almost three years. For Lemann — who literally keeps the musical pulse of the band going — the idea of a teenager playing oldies with the elderly is no stretch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve never really viewed it that way,” he says. “What we’re really sharing with each other is music. And for a lot of these guys, I’ve learned more about them from playing with them than talking with them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As far as the playing goes, not everyone’s chops are up to Lemann’s level, but the band’s mission is not to redefine shredding. The amazing thing about The 5th Dementia is that it exists at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It is a miracle, it’s magical and it’s given us a life,” says Carol Rosenstein who, along with her husband Irwin, founded \u003ca href=\"http://www.musicmendsminds.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Music Mends Minds\u003c/a> in 2014, the nonprofit organization that spawned The 5th Dementia. Carol had the idea when Irwin was diagnosed with Parkinson’s and dementia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I noticed when he was playing the piano at home he was resurrected like a plant needing water, and this was coming from playing a musical instrument,” says Rosenstein. “The neurologist said, ‘Carol, you’re looking at the power of music changing brain chemistry.’ ”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11611893\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11611893\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-800x563.jpg\" alt=\"Carol Rosenstein, who founded the 5th Dementia with her husband Irwin after he was diagnosed with dementia.\" width=\"800\" height=\"563\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-800x563.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-160x113.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-1020x718.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-1180x831.jpg 1180w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-960x676.jpg 960w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-240x169.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-375x264.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2017/08/Rosenstein-520x366.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Carol Rosenstein, who founded the 5th Dementia with her husband, Irwin, after he was diagnosed with dementia. \u003ccite>(Peter Gilstrap/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The brain doesn’t forget music, it forgets everything else but music,” says Kelly Hodell. He’s a Marine Corps and Navy veteran who served as a medic during the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. Now he serves with The 5th Dementia, volunteering on harmonica.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have people in here that can play all kinds of songs but can barely carry on a conversation,” says Hodell. “I think it wakes up a part of their mind and a part of their memories ’cause music is like a time machine. It takes you back to times and places and people that meant something to you in your life, and also keeps them socialized and active and a part of life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to a report in AARP magazine, “music can not only improve the mood of people with neurological diseases, it can boost cognitive skills and reduce the need for antipsychotic drugs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Right now there are six other bands in California and Washington under the Music Mends Minds umbrella, with five more in the works, including a group in the Philippines. So far, Carol Rosenstein has handed out over 1,000 How to Start a Band kits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll tell you, when serious disease comes, there’s a lot of isolationism, and now we have people from the community, and they come weekly to be in this musical and healing environment and become happy,” says Rosenstein, as the band kicks into the classic song, \u003cem>As Time Goes By.\u003c/em> “That’s what we’re selling, happiness!”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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}
},
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"id": "bbc-world-service",
"title": "BBC World Service",
"info": "The day's top stories from BBC News compiled twice daily in the week, once at weekends.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 9pm-10pm, TUE-FRI 1am-2am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/BBC-World-Service-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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"meta": {
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},
"link": "/radio/program/bbc-world-service",
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"rss": "https://podcasts.files.bbci.co.uk/p02nq0gn.rss"
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},
"californiareport": {
"id": "californiareport",
"title": "The California Report",
"tagline": "California, day by day",
"info": "KQED’s statewide radio news program providing daily coverage of issues, trends and public policy decisions.",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-California-Report-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/californiareport",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 8
},
"link": "/californiareport",
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}
},
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"id": "californiareportmagazine",
"title": "The California Report Magazine",
"tagline": "Your state, your stories",
"info": "Every week, The California Report Magazine takes you on a road trip for the ears: to visit the places and meet the people who make California unique. The in-depth storytelling podcast from the California Report.",
"airtime": "FRI 4:30pm-5pm, 6:30pm-7pm, 11pm-11:30pm",
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"order": 10
},
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM3NjkwNjk1OTAz",
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},
"city-arts": {
"id": "city-arts",
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"info": "A one-hour radio program to hear celebrated writers, artists and thinkers address contemporary ideas and values, often discussing the creative process. Please note: tapes or transcripts are not available",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/05/cityartsandlecture-300x300.jpg",
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"airtime": "SUN 1pm-2pm, TUE 10pm, WED 1am",
"meta": {
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"source": "City Arts & Lectures"
},
"link": "https://www.cityarts.net",
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"rss": "https://www.cityarts.net/feed/"
}
},
"closealltabs": {
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"order": 1
},
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"title": "Code Switch / Life Kit",
"info": "\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em>, which listeners will hear in the first part of the hour, has fearless and much-needed conversations about race. Hosted by journalists of color, the show tackles the subject of race head-on, exploring how it impacts every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, sports and more.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em>, which will be in the second part of the hour, guides you through spaces and feelings no one prepares you for — from finances to mental health, from workplace microaggressions to imposter syndrome, from relationships to parenting. The show features experts with real world experience and shares their knowledge. Because everyone needs a little help being human.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch\">\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/lifekit\">\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />",
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"meta": {
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"id": "commonwealth-club",
"title": "Commonwealth Club of California Podcast",
"info": "The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. As a non-partisan forum, The Club brings to the public airwaves diverse viewpoints on important topics. The Club's weekly radio broadcast - the oldest in the U.S., dating back to 1924 - is carried across the nation on public radio stations and is now podcasting. Our website archive features audio of our recent programs, as well as selected speeches from our long and distinguished history. This podcast feed is usually updated twice a week and is always un-edited.",
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"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Commonwealth-Club-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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"meta": {
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"source": "Commonwealth Club of California"
},
"link": "/radio/program/commonwealth-club",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5jb21tb253ZWFsdGhjbHViLm9yZy9hdWRpby9wb2RjYXN0L3dlZWtseS54bWw",
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"id": "forum",
"title": "Forum",
"tagline": "The conversation starts here",
"info": "KQED’s live call-in program discussing local, state, national and international issues, as well as in-depth interviews.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 9am-11am, 10pm-11pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Forum-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Forum with Mina Kim and Alexis Madrigal",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 9
},
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM5NTU3MzgxNjMz",
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"freakonomics-radio": {
"id": "freakonomics-radio",
"title": "Freakonomics Radio",
"info": "Freakonomics Radio is a one-hour award-winning podcast and public-radio project hosted by Stephen Dubner, with co-author Steve Levitt as a regular guest. It is produced in partnership with WNYC.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/freakonomicsRadio.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://freakonomics.com/",
"airtime": "SUN 1am-2am, SAT 3pm-4pm",
"meta": {
"site": "radio",
"source": "WNYC"
},
"link": "/radio/program/freakonomics-radio",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/freakonomics-radio/id354668519",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/WNYC-Podcasts/Freakonomics-Radio-p272293/",
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},
"fresh-air": {
"id": "fresh-air",
"title": "Fresh Air",
"info": "Hosted by Terry Gross, \u003cem>Fresh Air from WHYY\u003c/em> is the Peabody Award-winning weekday magazine of contemporary arts and issues. One of public radio's most popular programs, Fresh Air features intimate conversations with today's biggest luminaries.",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=214089682&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"info": "A live production of NPR and WBUR Boston, in collaboration with stations across the country, Here & Now reflects the fluid world of news as it's happening in the middle of the day, with timely, in-depth news, interviews and conversation. Hosted by Robin Young, Jeremy Hobson and Tonya Mosley.",
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"hidden-brain": {
"id": "hidden-brain",
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"info": "Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7pm-8pm",
"meta": {
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"source": "NPR"
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"link": "/radio/program/hidden-brain",
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"how-i-built-this": {
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"title": "How I Built This with Guy Raz",
"info": "Guy Raz dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7:30pm-8pm",
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"link": "/radio/program/how-i-built-this",
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"hyphenacion": {
"id": "hyphenacion",
"title": "Hyphenación",
"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. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Hyphenacion_FinalAssets_PodcastTile.png",
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"order": 15
},
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},
"jerrybrown": {
"id": "jerrybrown",
"title": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"tagline": "Lessons from a lifetime in politics",
"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. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-Political-Mind-of-Jerry-Brown-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"order": 18
},
"link": "/podcasts/jerrybrown",
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},
"latino-usa": {
"id": "latino-usa",
"title": "Latino USA",
"airtime": "MON 1am-2am, SUN 6pm-7pm",
"info": "Latino USA, the radio journal of news and culture, is the only national, English-language radio program produced from a Latino perspective.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/latinoUsa.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://latinousa.org/",
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"source": "npr"
},
"link": "/radio/program/latino-usa",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=79681317&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510016/podcast.xml"
}
},
"marketplace": {
"id": "marketplace",
"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",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Marketplace-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.marketplace.org/",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "American Public Media"
},
"link": "/radio/program/marketplace",
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"rss": "https://feeds.publicradio.org/public_feeds/marketplace-pm/rss/rss"
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},
"masters-of-scale": {
"id": "masters-of-scale",
"title": "Masters of Scale",
"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.",
"airtime": "Every other Wednesday June 12 through October 16 at 8pm (repeats Thursdays at 2am)",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://mastersofscale.com/",
"meta": {
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"source": "WaitWhat"
},
"link": "/radio/program/masters-of-scale",
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"apple": "http://mastersofscale.app.link/",
"rss": "https://rss.art19.com/masters-of-scale"
}
},
"mindshift": {
"id": "mindshift",
"title": "MindShift",
"tagline": "A podcast about the future of learning and how we raise our kids",
"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>",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Mindshift-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED MindShift: How We Will Learn",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/mindshift/",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 12
},
"link": "/podcasts/mindshift",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
"npr": "https://www.npr.org/podcasts/464615685/mind-shift-podcast",
"stitcher": "https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/kqed/stories-teachers-share",
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}
},
"morning-edition": {
"id": "morning-edition",
"title": "Morning Edition",
"info": "\u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> takes listeners around the country and the world with multi-faceted stories and commentaries every weekday. Hosts Steve Inskeep, David Greene and Rachel Martin bring you the latest breaking news and features to prepare you for the day.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3am-9am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Morning-Edition-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/programs/morning-edition/",
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"link": "/radio/program/morning-edition"
},
"onourwatch": {
"id": "onourwatch",
"title": "On Our Watch",
"tagline": "Deeply-reported investigative journalism",
"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?",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/On-Our-Watch-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "On Our Watch from NPR and KQED",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "kqed",
"order": 11
},
"link": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
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