The Mail Pouch Tobacco Sign Makes Merced Building the Barn of the Year
Mail Pouch Tobacco
Every town should have an icon that immediately tells people why that place is special. San Francisco has the Golden Gate and Bay bridges. Turlock has the big tractor in front of United Equipment Company.
In Merced, we now have the recently refurbished Mail Pouch Tobacco sign painted on the barn belonging to Victor and Lorraine Dragovich. You can see the barn on highway 99 south of Merced. Going south, the barn is on the left side of the highway. Going north on 99, it’s on the right side just before you enter the city limits.
The original, and up to recently faded, Mail Pouch sign was painted by three men working on behalf of the Mail Pouch Tobacco Company back in 1940. Victor says the trio took two days to paint the sign on the roof and a smaller version of it along the side of the building. He doesn’t recall how much the company paid his dad to use the barn to promote the tobacco company.
“I was ten years old when they did the job,” Victor told me recently. “I remember it well. I have lived here all my life.”
1937
The barn was built in 1937 by Victor’s dad with help from Victor’s older brother. Victor’s parents, his brother, and three sisters lived there growing up in rural Merced. Victor and his wife Lorraine have lived at the homestead ever since they were married. They raised their son and daughter there.
“There were lots of barns with advertising painted on them back in those days,” Victor said.
But as billboards came into popularity, a lot of the barn signs were painted over. Victor even painted over his Mail Pouch sign once. “Painted it once, and then the paint faded, and the letters started to show again,” he said. “So I just left it.”
He left it without repainting until about three years ago when APG Solar made a deal to paint their company logo and telephone number on a side of his barn. APG Solar installed solar panels to power lights that shine on the APG sign at night. “Brent Jerner from the solar company was the one who got the Mail Pouch Barnstormers interested in restoring the sign,” Victor said. “He made all the arrangements to have the work done.”
Mail Pouch Barnstormers is a non-profit group dedicated to preserving and celebrating the history of the tobacco company signs all over the United States. The group’s website (www.MailPouchBarnstormers.org ) explains how the group name was chosen.
The term barnstormer refers to anyone who crosses the country to sell something. The term has its roots in the early days of aviation when pilots would fly across the country selling airplane rides and parachute jumps. The word is often used to describe efforts to travel around the country for political campaigns, sport exhibitions, and theatrical performances.
Starting in the 1930’s the men who went out across the country selling farmers on the idea of using their buildings for advertising were called barnstormers. They would cross the country from their home base in Syracuse, New York. According to the website, some farmers were paid very little for the use of their barns for advertising space.
But, the website’s history section explains that many were willing to have the job done, and some were grateful to get a little money out of the transaction. From the Barnstormers website, the visitor can read news articles, more history about roadside advertising in the 1940s and 1950s, and even shop the on line store.
“Barn of the Year.”
The Barnstormers group offers memberships for $20 a year. Victor gladly plopped down his money to be part the association. “They sent me a map of the United States that shows where all the remaining Mail Pouch signs are in the United States,” he said. “There are about two-hundred left, but only about a half-dozen in California.”
Victor says the Mail Pouch Barnstormers are naming his recently painted barn the “Barn of the Year.” A story on the honor will likely be posted to the organization’s website in the coming months.
I was impressed by the restoration work done by artist Deanna Schmidz. The restoration was made possible by a grant from the Barnstormers group. While the best view of the barn is from highway 99, the safer way to view it is from the frontage road that you can access at the Mission Avenue exit. The barn is located at the corner of that frontage road and 5525 East Worden Avenue.
So take a good look on the east side of highway 99 south of Merced the next time you’re making your way to Madera, Fresno, and beyond. Tell those heading to Merced to keep an eye out for the facelift of an iconic community landmark.
To learn more about other Mail Pouch signs across the United States, go to www.MailPouchBarnstormers.org
To see the story about the Mail Pouch Tobacco sign restoration that was reported by ABC-30 Action News-
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
50 Years on the Job
Imagine going to work, finding just the right job within the company, and staying with that company for fifty years. I know someone who is reaching that milestone this month.George is the morning announcer for a radio station in upstate New York near the village where I grew up. This April, George and his loyal listeners are celebrating his fiftieth anniversary.
I owe a lot to George. As a teenager, I’d listen to his program as I got ready for school every morning. Mom may have been the one to get us out of bed, but George’s morning program kept us on task to finish breakfast and meet the school bus.
When I decided to pursue broadcasting as a career, I visited him at the station occasionally. Those visits eventually led to the station manager hiring me as a part time announcer during my college years.
George started at the radio station in much the same way I did. He worked part time for a while before being offered a full time job. He played rock-and-roll records on the air in the afternoons, and then was promoted to middays where he switched over to country music in keeping with the station’s format back in the days before stations picked one type of music and stuck with it all day long.
Eventually, George moved into the coveted morning slot and that is where he stayed. He endured two changes in ownership, heart surgery, cancer treatments, and dozens of brutal northern New York winters.
He is a survivor, but more importantly, he is able to have his passion be his life’s work.
In my book Grown Up, Going Home, I interviewed George for one of the chapters. The book is about my experiences growing up in the 1970s in a rural upstate New York village. I felt as though George, while not living in my hometown, had come into nearly every house with a radio in it within its broadcast range. He told me "Every day is different. There's a great deal of satisfaction in knowing we'll have a different adventure every day. It is hometown radio, and it made me want to spend my whole life right here."
Some of those adventures about hometown radio include using a snowmobile to get to work on more than one stormy winter morning, trying so hard to hold back a laugh when a coworker would play a practical joke while live on the air, or handling the many calls from listeners who observed a deer in their backyard or lost a pet.
"People come up to me and say do you remember broadcasting my cat was missing several years ago?” he muses. “Maybe I don’t remember, but they do. The little things like that have made it all worthwhile.”
Over my thirty-plus years as a working professional, I have averaged about four years at a particular job before moving on to something I thought might be bigger or better. The longest I’ve stayed at any job was ten years, although I hope to at least match that number with the position I’m currently in. I admire the folks who have stayed on at one company and built satisfying careers in their professional journeys.
It’s remarkable that anyone would still be working at the same company for fifty years. While I can’t imagine what that would be like, I’d be the first one to tell you I would have done the same thing had the right job brought the same level of satisfaction that it has to George.
I congratulate George on this accomplishment. He has been a gentleman and a great role model. It has been a pleasure knowing him.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
The Pink House in Town
photo by steve newvine
My grandparents lived in a pink house on the same street as my parents’ home in a small village in upstate New York. To my family, Grandma and Grandpa lived down the street. To anyone else who knew them, they lived in the pink house in town.I’m not sure why the small two-story home was pink. One family legend has it my grandfather got a good deal on pink slate shingles. That’s plausible given grandpa’s penchant for squeezing every last cent out of each one of those hard-earned dollars that came into the household.
Inside the house was the center of our family life in the sixties and seventies. The front room, or parlor as my grandmother occasionally referred to it, was lined with chairs and a daybed. Overhead was a fluorescent light which offered a harsh well-lit view of our faces and the rest of the room. I can still hear the clicking sound of the light fixture when the switch was flicked on
This was the room where all the conversation started. The latest news about family members, updates on unusual things seen or heard in the area over the past few days, and a weather report were among the topics brought up for discussion.
Eventually, the conversation shifted to the kitchen where a teakettle would be on the stove warming up, a jar of Maxwell House instant coffee would pass among the adults at the table so that everyone could adjust the strength of their beverage, and a box of donuts that came from the bread section at the grocery store would be opened. Topping all this off was the jar of peanut butter. Spreading peanut butter on a donut was as much a part of life for me growing up as going to church on Sunday.
The pink house was across the street and one house down from the local school. We passed the house when we would walk to school, so my grandmother could see us every day. On the last day of the school year, I’d stop in along with some of my cousins to show Grandma my report card and prove that I once again passed all my classes and would be heading up to the next grade in the fall.
Calling hours when my uncle Billy and my grandmother passed away were held in their home. We celebrated birthdays there. Grandma and Grandpa celebrated their fortieth and fiftieth wedding anniversaries with parties at that house. Later milestone anniversaries were held at their winter home in Florida.
After my grandparents passed away, an auction was held to sell off the possessions that were accumulated over the seventy-plus years of a life together. I think the auctioneer, along with my dad, and others who attended were surprised when several of the grandchildren started to bid on some of the items. It seemed as though each one of us wanted to hold on to some piece of that home. It truly had been a part of our lives.
My nephew bought the house from the estate, and changed the color. It’s no longer the pink house in town. He and his wife have made a lot of changes and that’s a good thing. They have made it their own just like my grandparents made it their own many decades earlier.
The pink house still generates a lot of fond memories about growing up in a small town.
It’s forming new memories with a younger generation keeping it in the family.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
The ER returns to Merced, and other items
Modesto Bee
There’s a columnist for the Modesto Bee by the name of Ron Agostini who uses a writing technique that is appealing to me. About once a week, Ron publishes a sports oriented column that contains about a dozen items.
The content of each item is too short for a complete column, but bundled together, it makes for interesting reading. He always begins the feature with the claim “estimated reading time, two minutes.”
So in tribute to Ron, here is my bundle of items from around Merced County.
Estimated reading time: two-and-a-half minutes.
Merced City Signs
It’s so nice to see the letters E and R replaced on the Merced sign heading north on G Street just beyond the railroad overpass.
The letters had been missing for about a year and it made the city seem a little less than welcoming to visitors and residents. Thank you to the City of Merced for replacing the letters. Shame on whoever removed them in the first place.
Speaking of letters, some are missing from the sign in front of Merced City Hall downtown. Maybe these missing letters can be restored soon.
Perhaps future designs of signs can take into consideration the elimination of letters and numbers that can be pried off by those with little or no regard for their community.
Town Hall Meetings
Two town hall meetings were held by the City of Merced in recent weeks to gather citizen input on how our community should move forward in the near future. According to the Merced Sun Star, the north side town hall was sparsely attended while the south side meeting had great attendance. What’s that telling us?
Presidential Visit
Regardless of your politics, having a U.S. President visit your community is a big deal. It was great to see Los Banos added to the President’s schedule on his Valentines’ Day visit.
The visit including a meeting with a foreign dignitary Friday night, and was extended by a couple of days so he’d have time to play three rounds of golf with some school buddies.
While in Merced County, the President got to see our water issues front and center with a flyover of the San Luis Reservoir. No matter how long the visit could have been, not every community can have the honor of welcoming the Chief Executive.
I would have appreciated seeing more diversity among the lawmakers invited to accompany the President, namely Valley Republican House members Jeff Denham and Devon Nunes. But I still see the visit for what it meant to our community; it was a big deal.
Google at Castle
Speaking of big deals, congratulations to the Merced County Office of Aviation, Commerce and Economic Development on landing Google at the Castle Commerce Center in Atwater. Google was interested in the wide open spaces offered by Castle’s expansive runways to test new technologies involving cars that drive themselves. The number of jobs coming to the community may be small, but you never know whether this small step by Google might lead to a giant leap for ancillary jobs that could be created in Merced County by other high tech companies from the Silicon Valley.
Panera and Chipotle
It’s also nice to see Panera Bread and soon Chipotle operating in the old Blockbuster building at Olive Avenue and R Street. Little by little, the region is picking up more economic activity. Why not celebrate these small signs of success with a Panera cookie or a Chipotle burrito.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
The Beatles, the Ed Sullivan Theater, and Memories of New York City
It was fifty years ago this month that the Beatles made their debut on The Ed Sullivan Show live on CBS television from New York City. I have many thoughts about that event: the band, the venue, and New York City.
The performance took place on the stage of what is now called the Ed Sullivan Theater. The theater is now the home of Late Night with David Letterman. Most of America saw it from their family living rooms.
I was less than six weeks away from my seventh birthday the night the Beatles appeared on the Sullivan Show. My memory of watching it has faded somewhat over the years. I recall my Dad remarking how funny the girls in the audience appeared with their screaming. I think my Mom commented on the long hair worn by Ringo, George, John, and Paul.
I wasn’t moved in a musical sense by the Beatles on that night in February 1964. It would take a couple more years before another foursome, the Monkees, came onto the scene. I owe my introduction to rock-and-roll to Davy, Mickey, Peter, and Mike.
As a kid growing up in the sixties and early seventies, it was hard to fathom how a city just six hours away from my hometown in upstate New York was the entertainment center of the world. I got my first taste of the Big Apple while in high school when my cousin Ed took me to a Yankee game.
We stayed with a cousin from the other side ofEd’s family who lived north of the City. We arrived on a Saturday night. Once that cousin found out I had never seen New York City, he insisted on taking us for a nighttime tour by car. We saw Broadway, Times Square, and lots of lights in the City that never sleeps.
The Yankees/Angels game the next day was also an adventure as Ed and I rode a bus to the subway station, and then took the subway to Yankee Stadium.
I forgot who won the game, but I do remember buying a Mets cap for myself and an Oakland A’s cap for my brother. Both teams would play in the 1973 World Series.
From that Yankee game in the early seventies and onward, I had a fascination with the City. There were three visits with friends during my college years that included tours of Radio City Music Hall and standing-room-only tickets to about a half-dozen Broadway shows including one called Beatlemania.
In the eighties, my wife and I took the train from Utica to our honeymoon in New York City. In the late nineties and into the new century, my friend John and I would meet there with me driving in from Rochester and John taking a train from Philadelphia for a day of fast paced walking tours followed by being in the audience for a taping of either Late Night with Conan O’Brienor The Late Show with David Letterman.
And that takes me back to the Ed Sullivan Theater. It is the place where Letterman started his program on CBS in the summer of 1993. During my visits to the theater, I recall seeing blown up photographs of the Fab Four’s Sullivan appearances hanging on the walls in the hallway leading to the audience seating area.
As fascinated as I was to see the Letterman show and the behind-the-scenes mechanics of the production, I couldn’t help but think about what it must have been like that famous night in February 1964 when the Beatles had performed.
The stage seemed much smaller than I imagined it would be. I felt as though I could almost see Sullivan standing at the far left of the stage where he would introduce all his guests. I could visualize the band making their music at center stage. And I could only guess at how loud the audience’s screaming must have been.
Several years ago, I worked with a man who sat in that audience on that night in February 1964. He confirmed to me how noisy the Ed Sullivan Theater was on that historic night. I recall him saying to me something to the effect, “We really didn’t hear the band because the screaming was so loud. But we didn’t care. We were there.”
Thankfully, the microphones on stage captured the singing and the music coming from those instruments so that the rest of America experienced the Beatles in their glory. That special moment when rock-and-roll music changed forever will live on for many of us baby boomers.
For all of us who saw the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show in front of a television set in February 1964, we are part of a truly unique moment in history.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
Ten Years in California
photo by steve newvine
The picture here is of a miniature snowman I made one afternoon. A coworker had returned to Merced from the higher elevations in Mariposa with his pick-up truck box filled with snow. I took home a bucket of it, and fashioned a small reminder of the snow I left behind to come out west.
This month marks the tenth anniversary of when my wife and I left upstate New York for California. For the past ten years, I have worked, played, and lived in the Golden State.
The move has been marked by giving up a snow shovel for an electric lawn mower, donating boxes of winter clothes while adapting to the new normal of golf shirts, and removing the color white from most of my images of the outdoors in winter.
Thinking about January 2004 brings about clear pictures from a life that has been about change. My wife and I moved frequently in the first years of our marriage. But when children blessed our home, we stayed rooted in one community for twenty years.
The move to California actually took about six months with my wife handling the sale of our home and coordinating the packing while I started up in a new job in the Central Valley. I flew back to our New York home two or three times over that interim time span. I did my first ever red eye flight during that period. I continue that practice most of the time when I fly back east for visits.
We bought a house within months of moving to California, and sold it just two years later when I accepted the job that brought us to Merced. We missed the collapse of the housing market by just a few months.
We have lived in Merced since late 2006. It was right about that time I decided to put down some of the stories about my family and friends I knew growing up in upstate New York. Eight years and seven books later, I consider myself a writer who thankfully, doesn’t have to rely on book sales to make a living.
We remain connected to upstate New York with annual visits to family and friends. Sadly, two of my friends passed away in 2013. But happily, I can look back and cherish the efforts I made to visit both over the past several years.
The color white I mention in the second paragraph is about the snow that was left behind when we moved to California. Now, the only snow we see it comes when we head up to the mountains or when we see a vehicle that returned from the mountains with some snow still hanging on until it all melts away. The mini snowman I made lasted about two hours.
Also absent from the California color palette is the rich green we knew in the northeast United States. With water in good supply, the summer leaves were deep in green hues. Irrigation for most agricultural enterprises I knew in upstate New York was handled by Mother Nature. That’s not the case in California. Read a newspaper just about any day and you’ll find a story or two about water supplies, diversions, dams, allocations to the coastal regions, and agricultural needs.
It’s been a good ten years in our adopted community of the Central Valley. There are so many good things about life in Merced that I can’t do the subject justice. But I am grateful for the farmer’s markets, the alphabetized and numbered streets, UC Merced and Merced College, and reasonable weather most of the year. I could do without bad air days, some freeway drivers, and bans of plastic bags in the Bay Area.
It’s been a good ten years. Life changing in some respects, adventure almost always, and very few dull moments.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
Looking Back
photo by steve newvine
Just about every newspaper or magazine I read in late December or early January is filled with lists of the best and worst things of the year. This is the time most of us look back on what went well in the past twelve months, reflect on why some things did not go as planned, and reset our life journey GPS for the next fifty-two weeks.Over the years, I’ve grown accustomed to listing the top ten things in many areas of my life. Past columns have shared with you my top ten favorite Christmas songs, holiday movies, things for which I am thankful, and even books I bought from a store that was closing.
Permit me to list ten things that happened to me in the past year. Some are not necessarily accomplishments. A few are sad. You have been warned. Read on, and remember these are in no particular order.
Thanks to the good people at Love INC in Merced, I met some very special ladies who participated in the Love Plus program this fall. Love Plus pairs up people in need with mentors, while providing classes on such things as personal finance and job preparedness. These women were my best audience ever for my lectures on Soft Skills for Hard Times.
My Dad celebrated his eightieth birthday surrounded by his children, three of his grandchildren, his brother, a few friends, and other family members. Thanks to judicious use of my vacation time and frequent flyer miles, I was able to fly to my hometown to be part of the celebration.
Two friends of mine, Dan and Rick, died within three months of one another, both from complications related to kidney disease. I was honored to be asked to write a eulogy for Dan, and read with great pride of Rick’s acknowledgment of a moment in his life when I helped him understand that he needed no apology for the life he lived.
A version of Dan’s eulogy was published here a few months ago.
Click here to read
Click here to read:
Rick’s blog entry about the early years of our friendship is here: http://rickwestermanbellinger.wordpress.com/author/rickwestermanbellinger/page/4/
The game I enjoy so much saw me through forty-nine of the year’s fifty-two weeks. I resolved two years ago to play golf every week. I missed the mark by about five weeks in 2012 and missed it by only three in 2013.
My wife and I celebrated thirty-three-and-a-third years of marriage in November; 25th is the silver anniversary, 50th is gold, 33 1/3 should be vinyl just like a long-playing record album playing the classic music we love to hear.
Thanks to a chance meeting of my first mentor in broadcasting, and inspired by the passing of another radio mentor, the novel Sign On at Sunrise became my seventh published book. The book is a fictionalized account based on the three years I worked at an upstate New York radio station in the 1970’s.
In March, I called the person who hired me at my current company to thank her again for taking a chance on me seven years ago. I call her every year on the anniversary of my hiring, even though she is no longer with the company.
In spite of visits with our daughters Alison and Colleen in the past year, it’s never enough. Those of you with family living near your home, cherish that gift.
With cheap long-distance rates, email, Facebook, and even an occasional snail-mail notecard, I try to stay connected with as many friends, former co-workers, and relatives as I can.
I return to the radio airwaves on January 4 and 5 with a discussion of my books with Community Conversations host Nathan Quevedo.
Listen to KYOS 1480 AM on Saturday, January 4th at 7 PM and Sunday, January 5th at 10 AM. It will be available later on the station’s web site at www.mercedcommunityconversations.com and on the KYOS web site at http://www.1480kyos.com/.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
Hopeless Collector and Hoarding
photo by steve newvine
I'm in deep
I am what you might call a hopeless collector. I’m not one of those hoarders you see on cable television, although people who know me well might dispute that statement. But I do acquire things that have meaning for me.
To paraphrase a popular commercial on television, “I’m in deep.”
Just how deep I am into saving stuff became apparent as we were looking for holiday items during this Christmas season. I had to scour a closet looking for one small box. I eventually found it, but not before uncovering several items that have been stored away for safe keeping.
I have dozens of small picture frames that have been occupying space in that closet. Before you say “why not put those pictures out where you and others can see them” let me say that our house already has dozens of photographs on display. In my den right now, I count approximately fifty pictures either hanging on the wall, or sitting on a shelf.
On the walls of my den, there are many pictures of my two daughters, my dad, brother, sister, old black and white shots from my home town, some pen and ink drawings from a family friend, and a montage of photos of my friends and me. For our anniversary, my wife gave me a beautiful collage of photos from our wedding and honeymoon. That’s on the wall too.
The pictures share space with a golf ball shelf that is filled with mementoes from courses I played, or balls with logos I like. Also on the wall is a poster from the cowboy band Riders in the Sky when they played at the Gallo Center in Modesto a few years ago.
Stumbling upon stuff you put away for another day can be a lot of fun. I found a letter dated 1974 from a radio station news director inviting me to audition for an unpaid school news reporter job when I was in high school. I did the audition, got the job, and started a career in communications that took me all over the country. That’s why I saved that letter nearly forty years ago; that single piece of paper launched me into my chosen profession.
Stuff and more stuff
I seems as though I just can’t stop acquiring things from my past. Whether its mugs from places I worked, a coffee maker just like the one in my dad’s house some three-thousand miles away, or the old camera my mother would use to document the early years of my childhood. All had a place in my life at one time. Now each occupies a spot in my home.
But there’s no way I could be called a hoarder. My stuff is confined mostly to a closet in my den. I display a relatively small portion of it, and try to rotate things so that everything gets out from time to time. If you’re a fan of old time radio shows (and I am a fan by the way, in fact I have a collection of shows, but I digress), you may recall Fibber McGee retrieving something from the family closet. Thanks to radio magic and an excellent sound effects man, listeners would hear a pile of items falling from the closet onto the hallway floor.
I’m not quite there yet, but give me time.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
Excerpt from "Sign On at Sunrise" by Steve Newvine
photo by steve newvine
Grey arrived at the station onSunday atabout ahalf-hour before his shift was to begin. The station was doing a remote broadcast from the annual winter festival so this debut would be shortened with his role essentially being that of a news anchor with an hourly newscast. His other duty would be to stand by and be ready to go on the air in the event the remote line failed.
While in anticipation of his debut, Grey could not help but be amused by the remote broadcast from the scene of the annual snowmobile races that were a big part of the winter festival. The two race announcers were sales representatives who had sold the advertising for the event. The pair practically stumbled over one another to frequently mention each other’s clients who were sponsoring the radio broadcast.
The announcers were set up near the finish line of the snowmobile racetrack. Their audio was great while a race was in progress, but every time the racers got close to the finish line, all that could be heard was the loud sound of souped-up snowmobile engines swooshing past the broadcasters. The listeners rarely heard who actually won each race, but at least the advertisers could hear their names mentioned every five minutes.
“The racers are coming across the final turn, Johnson is in the lead, with Jones inching up closer. As they approach the finish line, it’s…. (VROOM, VROOM). …oh what a race that was. And now, a word from our sponsor.”
The remote broadcast ended shortly after four o’clock. This gave Grey about a half-hour of real on-air time. Loretta was there to be sure he was doing everything in accordance with F.C.C. (Federal Communications Commission) regulations with regard to meter readings. She was also a security blanket in the event Grey became too nervous to finish the shift.
The nervousness was there as the announcer on the remote broadcast wrapped up the event and pitched it back to the studio for the remainder of the broadcast day.
The first song Grey played as a professional disc jockey was How Deep is Your Love by the Bee Gees. He had prepared a formal introduction for his audience, but he was so tense, all he could do was start the turntable and turn on his microphone, only to shut the microphone off immediately. He let the song finish, then said hello to his listeners.
“You just heard the Bee Gees, and I’m Grey Harriman, your new voice on Sunday afternoons. It’s thirty-three degrees outside and twelve minutes after the hour.”
He quickly started up another record and flipped his microphone switch to the off position. He thought to himself, I wonder if my family is listening? He looked over at Loretta who was smiling.
“You’re doing just fine,” she said.
He played a few records, talked a little in between songs, read the weather forecast, and signed off at 4:45 p.m. Then, under the watchful eye of Loretta, he completed his F.C.C. log, turned off the station transmitter, straightened up the studio area of his used wire copy, put away records that were pulled but didn’t make it on the air, turned off the lights, locked the station door, and headed home.
His first shift on the air in a real radio station was over.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
The All Souls Day Procession in Hornitos
The All Souls Day Procession in Hornitos has been one of those things my wife and I have wanted to do ever since her friend Judy took her to this historic ghost town upon our arrival in Merced about seven years ago.
We’ve been to the town several times especially when we had friends or relatives visiting us. But every November 2, we’d hear about the nighttime procession to the churchyard cemetery in the small Mariposa County community and say to ourselves, “One of these years, we’re going to go there.”
We finally made the trip on a cool autumn night at dusk. This year, we were joined by over seven-hundred participants including Roman Catholic Diocese Bishop Armando X. Ochoa. Bishop Ochoa attended in honor of the faith community of St. Joseph Church yearlong celebration of their one-hundred-fiftieth anniversary. St. Catherine of Sienna Mission Church in Hornitos is part of the St. Joseph faith community. St. Catherine of Sienna Mission Church is only open a couple of times each year.
Bishop Ochoa and Father Stephen Bulfer welcomed the crowd from the front of the town’s community center. We were told that the Procession should be thought of as a moving meditation.
We were asked to process in silence, and to not use our flash cameras. Candles were lit among the crowd and provided the only light other than scarce street lights and a trail of luminaire along the hillside roadway in the processions final stretch.
Because of this request, you will not see photographs in this column of the actual procession.
Walking two by two, the crowd made their way to the cemetery behind the Church. It was fascinating to listen to only the sounds of foot traffic along the paved road to the cemetery.
It was stunning to look back while walking to see only candles moving slowly toward the cemetery. The walk took about fifteen minutes.
My wife and I ducked out of the procession as we approached the church in hopes that we might secure two seats for the Mass following the blessing of the graves.
A special remembrance was done at the grave of Dofia Camdelaria De Sapien. She was a local woman credited with restoring the tradition of the All Souls Day Procession in Hornitos.
Followers were asked to place their candles at the grave markers throughout the small cemetery.
The Mass that followed was inside the very small St. Catherine of Sienna Church. A sign outside says the church was built in the 1860s. There was seating for seventy. We were not surprised that the seats were not very comfortable. Nothing has changed in the past one-hundred-fifty years.
On this night, a gas generator powered the makeshift lighting fixtures that were clamped onto the candle holders along the inside walls and on the altar of the church. One guitarist served as song leader. Other members of the St. Joseph’s faith community served as Lectors and Eucharistic Ministers.
Upon leaving the Mass, we waited our turn to shake hands with Bishop Ochoa and Father Bulfer. We then used our flashlight to help guide us down the hill from the church and cemetery back to the community center. Inside the community center, the Hornitos Patrons Club and the St. Joseph’s Ladies Guild served a later evening snack of hot dogs, chili, beans, and desert.
We then navigated our way back home to Merced along the winding road from Hornitos to Cathys Valley. I couldn’t help but note to my wife how there was no law enforcement presence at the event, or if there was a presence, it must have been subtle. The evening was carried about with respect for the departed, appreciation of the community that comes together year after year, and respect for the visit to this area by the Bishop.
It was a memorable evening.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced
Bakersfield gets the Nashville Treatment
photo by steve newvine
There’s a new compact disc out from Vince Gill and steel guitaristPaul Franklin called Bakersfield. The CD is a tribute to the country music known as the Bakersfield Soundmade popular by Merle Haggard and the late Buck Owens among others.
The music on the CD is true to the roots of the Bakersfield Sound which is characterized by steel and electric guitars, some piano, maybe a trifle bit more treble turned up on the amplifiers, and a backbeat. The music has its roots in the 1950s and was founded in part as a reaction to a growing trend in Nashville-based country music toward slick orchestrations. There’s more to the definition and the comparisons than that, but as with any art form, you know it when you hear it.
The CD takes me back to the four occasions I have visited the Crystal Palace in Bakersfield. The Palace was built by Buck as a means to bring the special brand of country music to a broader audience. Many credit Buck with taking the Bakersfield Sound from the honky tonks to the mainstream night clubs. The Palace has become a popular motor coach stop for group tours and other visitors in southern California.
The first time I saw the Crystal Palace was a pass through on my way to Los Angeles. I noted at the time that Buck would be playing every Friday night and promised myself I’d return to see his show. Six months later, Buck Owens died from a heart attack shortly after performing at his night club. My second visit was another pass through in my way to L.A.; only this time, the front lawn of the building was covered with flowers and signs from fans mourning their loss.
About a year after that, my wife and I went to the Palace for dinner and a show. Buck’s son Buddy Alan Owens was the headliner that night. Buddy did several of his dad’s hits, plus several songs made popular by other artists. After the show, he greeted every person who walked over to him in the lobby of the club. Knowing I was writing a book about California that would include a chapter on Bakersfield, he spent several minutes with us to talk about his dad and the music that put the city on the country music map. We saw Buddy Alan Owens perform again a couple of years later.
The Crystal Palace is more than a night club for country music. It is a museum celebrating the career of Buck Owens.
As I wrote about it in my 2010 book Nine From Ninety-Nine, Experiences in California’s Central Valley, cases upon cases of memorabilia from Buck’s television and music careers are on display. The most fascinating thing I saw on display was an autographed picture of Buck and Dean Martin, signed by Dean with the inscription “Thanks for doing our show… and I mean it.”
Dean Martin had a popular variety show in the 1960s and early seventies. He recorded some of Buck’s songs during those years.
Also inside the night club is the Cadillac convertible positioned over the bar. Visitors will scratch their heads wondering how the builder got it in there.
A visitor can’t miss the Crystal Palace. It’s visible off highway 99 just south of the famous Bakersfield sign that crosses Buck Owens Boulevard. The sign owes its reprieve from the junk yard to Buck who donated and raised the funds to restore and move the sign to its current location.
Both the larger than life sign and the Cadillac are included in the artwork that accompanies the Bakersfield CD. The artwork is very good. The music does not disappoint. The only thing that could have made it better would have been for the pair to have recorded the album in Bakersfield instead of Nashville.
The Bakersfield Sound is alive in California at the Crystal Palace. And thanks to Vince Gill and Paul Franklin , it’s alive on CD as well.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
My Friend Dan
The man working in this picture is my friend Dan. When he was no longer able to work at his regular job due to kidney disease, he’d spend a little time making toys and other things out of wood. He would donate these craft items to charities that would turn around and sell them as part of fundraisers.
A number of local churches and non-profit organizations benefited from Dan’s handiwork. Dan beat back cancer, and had been on dialysis in recent years. He recently lost his battle with health problems. Those of us who knew him lost something as well.
A mother lost a son, four sisters no longer have their big brother, a child won’t have a dad to learn about life, and two grandchildren have only memories of a grandfather.
I lost a good friend I’ve known for fifty years.
Dan and I met on the playground behind Port Leyden Central School in the summer of 1964. We were friends right from the get go. In the early years, we’d go fishing, camp outside his house in the summer, and go sledding down a big hill in front of his house in the winter.
In junior high, another friend Jerry joined us. We were quite the threesome. We’d buy candy from the local store, order a bottle of Coke or Dr. Pepper at the local diner, and just hang out on the borderline of mischief. As teens, we were a three-person, Dennis the Menace.
When we were a little bit older, we got a hold of some cigars and inserted cigarette loads into them. Cigarette loads are about the size of a quarter-length toothpick. Little explosions are created when the cigar burns the tip of the load.
We weren’t old enough to smoke, although there was no law against cigarette loads. We sneaked a smoke in a booth at the diner. When the load exploded the cigar, it looked like a cartoon as the end of the stogie ripped apart. Why the owner never threw us out of her restaurant is still a mystery.
One night, we took a rubber snake into a local tavern. We were not old enough to drink alcohol, but we knew the rubber snake might scare some of the older adults standing at the bar with their beer. We cleared the barroom before anyone had the chance to throw us out. We ran away laughing.
You could do things like that when you were a kid growing up in a small town in upstate New York in the 1970s.
After high school graduation, I left my hometown for college. We lost touch shortly after that. For the next four decades, Dan and I went on with our lives. Childhood memories stayed behind as we raised families and worked at our jobs.
He visited me at the funeral home the time my mother passed away thirteen years ago. I sent him a card when his dad died several years ago.
And that’s where the story might have ended had it not been for Dan’s effort to reconnect with me.
He saw my dad in church and gave him my email address. I sent Dan a message. He sent a message back. For the next four years, we were in weekly email contact. We’d call one another occasionally, and I visited with him in person when I would go back to my boyhood home to see my dad.
Three years ago, Dan called me on the night when he made the agonizing decision to remove life support from his wife He told me how he would help her pray every day, sometimes several times a day. He told me how much he loved her. The only comfort I could offer was a listening ear some three-thousand miles away.
On one of my visits, I met his two grandchildren. He raised his grandkids for a couple of years. It had to be a struggle given his deteriorating health, but he never saw it that way. I saw how much the children loved their grandfather. I saw Dan’s patience in action as he cared for them without regard to his own struggles that included dialysis three times a week.
In the past four years, I never heard Dan complain about his life. He talked about blessings. He’d ask how my family was doing. He demonstrated by example how to live life with dignity and compassion.
I think he knew four years ago that his days on earth would likely run out sooner than most of us. He made the most of those years. As a dialysis patient, he helped raise money to help build a treatment center closer to where he lived. He was consulted on building plans. Ironically, that center will open in a few months. Dan never got to use it. But others will, and that is all that really matters.
As often as death has touched people around me, I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it. We accept death as part of the human condition. But it doesn’t make it any easier when you lose a family member or a close friend. We’ll get by, but we are changed in some way.
And we’re thankful for the time we have with our friends and our family.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced
Port of Stockton Celebrates Eighty Years
Agriculture, food processing, and several other Merced County industrial sectors rely on the transportation and logistics systems in place throughout the state of California. One of those transportation systems reached an important milestone this year.
The Port of Stockton is celebrating eighty years of service to the business community.
Every Saturday this summer, the Port has been providing free boat tours to the public in celebration of this milestone anniversary. Recently my wife and I took advantage of a two hour tour of the area served by the Port.
As our boat set off at the docks near downtown Stockton, we were impressed by the substantial investment of time and money to create an attractive vantage point of this city of four-hundred thousand.
The city has had a lot of negative attention in recent years with the local government filing for bankruptcy, CBS 60 Minutes describing the area as ground zero of the national mortgage crisis, and general bad news about crime.
Seeing the beautiful waterscape at the Port injects some optimism as well as civic pride.
Through the Port of Stockton, more than ninety percent of the chemical fertilizer used by the Central Valley agriculture industry comes in every year.
More than a million and a half tons of American products, everything from agricultural goods to tire chips, to cement goes through the waterway. The value of these products, as estimated by the Port, is over one-billion dollars annually.
The Port says it pays more than five million dollars annually in taxes.
Before the US Housing bubble burst in the middle of the past decade, the Port hit an all-time record in the shipping of concrete.
More than 2.2 million metric tons of cement were brought in for use throughout California and other states to feed the demand for new housing.
Those numbers fell throughout the housing crisis, but there is hope now as we see signs of a slow recovering in the building of new homes. Builders expect the demand for cement will intensify.
In 2011, the Port issued a report that showed the amount of material leaving the Stockton facility exceeded the value of goods coming into the facility. While the rest of the United States was experiencing a trade deficit, the Port of Stockton activity was going against the trends.
On top of that, management is proud of the environmental initiatives that have improved the soil, water, and air in the region.
We were shown wildlife habitats along the waterway as we passed under Interstate 5 and made our way west past Rough and Ready Island. Rough and Ready Island was a Naval Base that was turned over to the Port in 2000. The acquisition drastically increased the size and scope of services available to users of the shipping site.
Our cruise boat passed a number of warehouses that line the shoreline. There are seven-point-seven million square feet of covered storage space available to users. In addition to storage, the Port has U.S. Customs offices, scales, and an in-house police force providing security.
Both the Union Pacific and Northern Santa Fe Railroad lines run to the facility. With rail, truck, and ship traffic, this is truly a full intermodal transportation and logistics center.
There are also a number of private homes that line the north side of the waterway. These homes are considered prime real estate in a community that has hadmore thanits share of bumps in the midst of the mortgage crisis.
One home in particular shows its community pride with a replica of the Statue of Liberty on display for international visitors to see as they pass through the Port.
Nearly five dozen countries have some form of trade relationship that touches the Port of Stockton. Leadership at the Port takes pride in estimates that this community asset effectively supports over forty-five hundred jobs in the San Joaquin County area that includes Merced, Stanislaus, and other counties. These jobs generate an annual payroll of about $180-million to the region.
We take great pride in the bounty our farmers produce here in Merced County. Our agricultural producers know even the greatest products we can grow are of little value without a system to move these goods to the marketplace. Excellent products, coupled with a sound transportation system, add value to what our community contributes in terms of economic activity.
Thanks to the Port of Stockton and other transportation systems, the true economic engine of the Central Valley can be realized.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced
A Buffalo Bills Sweatshirt and a Season of High Hopes
photo by steve newvine
I will be pulling out my faded blue Buffalo Bills sweatshirt soon as the National Football League season gets underway. The sweatshirt is now over twenty years old. It never brought any luck to my beloved Bills back when I bought it in the early 1990s. I should have tossed it out many seasons ago. But I can’t.
In the late 1980s, the Buffalo Bills started a winning dynasty. Back then, quarterback Jim Kelly, running back Thurman Thomas, and defensive back Bruce Smith were household names in western New York. Coach Marv Levy led a team of skilled players to several winning seasons, many division and conference titles, and four trips to the Super Bowl.
That’s where the heartache began for fans of the team.
The Bills went to the Super Bowl four times and never won. Each time, they came back to western New York as winners for getting into the big game. But each time, there was an undercurrent of “wait until next year”.
I became a Bills fan during those years. In fact, I became an NFL fan during those years. Before the Bills started winning, Sunday afternoons were reserved for family activities as my wife and I raised our two daughters.
Once Buffalo became a contender, I started to carve out a little time to watch their games. As our daughters got older, the Bills became more of a focal point in the house during football season. I never converted the girls to full-fledged football followers, but that did not stop me from trying.
My attempt to start a little football pool, much like the ones most work places had in those years, often found my daughters making picks without regard to the win and loss records, but more on jersey colors or interesting team names.
But it did not matter. I had a lot of fun following the Buffalo Bills in that time of my life. Every Sunday, I’d put on that blue sweatshirt and watch their game.
As the Bills’ winning years started to fade from view, I continued to watch the NFL. By the time I moved to California in 2004, there wasn’t much to cheer about for my team. Every season started with optimism. Every season ended with hopes for better luck next year.
The one thing that remained constant has been my faded blue sweatshirt. I’ll retire it when the Buffalo Bills win a Super Bowl.
In the meantime, I have come up with some rules I’ll follow as this newest season of football gets underway:
I will not resign myself to believe any team that starts 0-3 is out of it for the season.
I will not be convinced that any team starting the season at 3-0 has a playoff berth locked up.
I will use the time between the end of the Sunday late afternoon game and the start of Sunday Night Football to get out of my chair and exercise.
I will diversify my snack food mix to include cheese curls.
Having kept my pre-season resolution not to care about exhibition games, I’ll refuse the temptation to talk back to the television when an announcer says, “He looked good in the pre-season.”
I’ll make a better effort to remember who won on Sunday when I’m watching Monday Night Football.
I will add to this list one more item: I will continue to wear my Buffalo Bills sweatshirt every Sunday throughout the football season.
Here’s to another season of America’s game. Enjoy!
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
Remembering the Day Elvis Died
photo by steve newvine
I was twenty years old the night I heard that Elvis Presley had died at his home in Memphis. The date was August 16, 1977.
My shift as a checker at a grocery store ended at nine o’clock that evening. Unlike most nights, I drove home without the radio on. When I got home, my parents asked me whether I had heard the news.
They told me. I reacted in shock to the few details we knew that night: heart attack, at his mansion called Graceland, and fans were holding a vigil in front of the home.
I went to my room and began tuning in radio stations on my Sony AM/FM/record player. All over the radio dial, disc jockeys were playing Elvis songs, interviewing fans, and sharing stories about man who elevated rock-and-roll into popular culture.
I became an Elvis fan on December 6, 1968. That was the night NBC broadcast Singer Presents Elvis. Singer referred to the sewing machine company that sponsored the one-hour special.
The show was billed as the first television appearance by Elvis in nearly a decade. I was impressed with the long list of hits he performed. I was really impressed by the closing song If I Can Dream. The next day, I bought the record.
Over the years, I’d buy each new Presley single. In the Ghetto was the next single release coming in the spring of 1969. Suspicious Minds came later that year. Kentucky Rain would soon follow. I bought them all.
I saw the songs shift from rock-and-roll to more of a country-rock sound in the mid-1970s. It didn’t matter to me. I was a fan right on through to college where I studied to be a radio announcer and ended up being a television reporter. I even had a part time job at a radio station where I could play his records even as his popularity flattened in the last two years of his life.
And that leads to that night in August when I heard that Elvis had died. The disc jockeys I listened to that evening were paying tribute to the man who popularized the music of a generation. Radio was hosting a wake. Those of us who enjoyed the music took part by simply tuning in.
At 11:30 that evening, I moved from the radio in my bedroom to the television set in the living room. NBC was airing a half hour Presley retrospective with David Brinkley as the anchor.
A friend of mine recorded the audio from that broadcast and gave me a copy. I have probably played that tape hundreds of times. I’ll never forget how David Brinkley kicked off the broadcast with what amounted to a reason why America cared about the loss of the rock-and-roll icon:
“It didn’t matter a great deal whether you liked Elvis or not. He changed our lives. So did a lot of other peoplechange parts of our lives. Montovani played Charmagne. We heard it a thousand times on the radio, in elevators and at the dentist office.
But it didn’t change anything. Elvis Presley did. He changed the way then teenage America thought about things: public entertainment, popular attitudes, toward behavior and attitudes about dressing and sex. And so when he died today from a heart ailment at the age of forty-two, people felt a sense of loss whether they ever liked his singing or not.”
I got through that night thanks to the community of broadcasters who wouldn’t let this death go unnoticed. The fans kept up the outpouring of sympathy on through the funeral a few days later. That affection for Elvis has kept on going ever since.
Soon, we would read of allegations of drug abuse, physical decline, and just plain weird things that went on during those final years. The image of a slick rock-and-roll icon was tarnished for a long time.
But the music endured. And with time, the entertainment industry has found a place for the man who, as David Brinkley said so eloquently some thirty-six years ago, changed things.
We have Elvis Presley to thank for that as well.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced.
School Spirit at El Capitan High School
A student car wash fund raiser is a common site on just about any Saturday in our community. But when the fund raiser is held at a school that has yet to open its’ doors for classes, the event takes on a special significance.The car wash was held in late July to tie in with the community open house for Merced’s newest high school: El Capitan High School (ECHS).
Among the many things I had to grow accustomed to when I started living in California nine years ago was the start of the new school year in August. Keep in mind I’m a transplant from another part of the country. Most schools in the northeast United States begin classes on the day after Labor Day.
El Capitan High School is located at the city’s northernmost border. The school is setting the stage to be the jewel in the district’s crown. At the very least, it has one outstanding benefit: on a clear day outside the east side classrooms, students may enjoy a view of the Sierras. When I was in high school, the closest thing to a distraction outside the classroom window was watching a local farmer operate his manure spreader.
This campus speaks state of the art at every level. During that recent community open house tour, my wife and I learned there would be no student lockers. Each student will have a laptop where all their textbooks will be digitally stored. We saw the library that will have very few paper books but lots of computer connectivity.
Outside, there are two football fields, many tennis courts, numerous outdoor basketball courts, and a large swimming pool. You get the feeling that once classes begin, there will hardly be any time when there isn’t some sort of activity going on among these outdoor athletic facilities.
photo by steve newvine
Inside, there is a large gymnasium with lots of room for fans to cheer on the El Capitan Gauchos. There’s also a smaller “practice gym” with no spectator seats. My wife joked that when she went to school the practice gym was better known as the “girls gym”. Thank goodness those days are behind us.
There’s a large quad in the middle of the array of buildings. The quad includes an amphitheater. The design will encourage social interaction. Our tour guide at the open house, an incoming freshman named Markus, says he is really impressed with the trash cans that have the school name cut through the metal.
750 students will make El Capitan their academic home this year. In their first academic year at ECHS, only freshmen and sophomores will attend. Incoming freshmen will join the student population over the next two years so that by 2015, the school will serve students in all four high school grade levels. Eventually, the student population will rise to about 1,800.
It is an exciting time for students at El Capitan High School. The start of a new academic cycle is always special. At schools throughout Merced County, students should be coming back to shinny floors, freshly painted walls, and updated landscapes. They will come prepared with new school supplies, new school clothes, and maybe a change in hairstyle. With any luck, they should also be welcomed by recharged faculty, encouraged by energized parents, and basking in a culture of lifelong learning.
Those students raising money for their school activities are doing much more than washing cars. They are engaging in a journey that offers knowledge, connectivity, and community service.
We should all be optimistic for the promise of this new school year.
Memories and Photographs
Remember when taking a picture was a special thing in your family. My parents’ photograph albums are filled with snapshots from birthdays, graduations, first communions, and other special events. In our house, a camera was a very common accessory on many occasions.
My family’s photograph albums are also filled with many pictures of things that are not tied to a special event. There are shots from a heavy snowfall, kids playing croquet in the backyard, or family members chowing down at a picnic.
Today with digital photography and web services such as Facebook and Instagram, I feel as though the special aspect of taking pictures has lost something. I remember having to wait a week from the time we sent a roll of film in by mail for processing to when the pictures were returned by mail. Today, you can post an image on-line within seconds of taking the picture.
I guess that’s why I got a little nostalgic this week when an envelope containing old photographs arrived at my mail box.
My sister found the pictures while helping my dad clean out his attic. I cherish this gift of old photos. I’m not only grateful to my sister for sending them to me. I’m also appreciative that someone took the time many years ago to make sure special moments were documented on film.
The package contains some prints that are quite familiar. There’s a shot of my dad’s family: Dad, his two brothers, his sister, and his mom and dad. I remember the original hanging on the wall in my grand-parents’ home during the years I was growing up. It was taken in the family parlor at the home where Dad was raised.
There are a few pictures of my dad from his high school years. I had not seen any of these. In one shot, he’s smiling broadly. In another, he had a quite serious look on his face.
There is a baby picture of me at about one-year old. I believe it was colorized using some kind of 1950’s technology. I guess I was a happy baby, or at least happy at the time that photograph was shot. There’s a big smile across the face of this future husband, father, and writer of columns and books.
Also in the batch is a three-shot featuring my sister, brother, and me. We’re dressed up in our Sunday best for that studio shot. I was probably four years old. I have no real memory of the time it was taken.
There’s a shot of my mother with my two daughters taken in the mid-1980s. I took that picture and sent a copy of it to my family at the time I had the film processed. My mom passed away thirteen years ago. Anytime a picture of her shows up, it brings back nice memories as well as an appreciation for her desire to take pictures, maintain photo albums, and capture those special times in all our lives.
According to my sister, these photos were kept in a box belonging to my grandmother. When my grandmother passed away nearly twenty years ago, my mom got the box of photographs. She probably put them away in the attic where they remained until my sister found them.
The pictures were well travelled, yet they didn’t leave my dad’s house for the past two decades.
Now, some of those treasured memories belong to me. I’ll keep them for as long as I can. Hopefully, they will pass on to the next generation. By that time, who knows what Facebook or Instagram will do to our traditions of taking and storing photographs. All I can hope for is that future generations of my family will have as great an appreciation as I have had for these slices of life, preserved through the magic of photography.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced
Merced’s Musical Memories
I recommend that before the summer comes to an end, spend about an hour at the Merced County Courthouse Museum and see the exhibit on our community’s musical heritage.
The exhibit, called: “On the Banks of the Old Merced: A Music History” opened June 27th at an open house that included live musical performances.
The woman’s singing group Harmony Valley Chorus sang California Here I Come and a song written about our area On the Banks of the Old Merced. By the way, the song about Merced is pretty good. To paraphrase a contestant on Dick Clark’s American Bandstand’s Rate-A-Record segment, “I liked the beat, but found it hard to dance to. I’d still give it a 90.”
Early rock and roll local legend Roddy Jackson apologized to the opening night audience that doctor’s orders were to not sing or play. He then talked for about a half hour sharing his memories of early rock and roll and his contribution to local history.
Roddy introduced three musicians who made up the Merced Blue Notes, a blues band that captured a lot of attention in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The music returned with Crystal Syphon, a psychedelic rock band that recorded one album back in their heyday.
The performances were well received by the crowd at the Courthouse Park on that opening night of the exhibit. I hope some of the folks made it inside to see the exhibit. “On the Banks of the Old Merced: A Music History” is a fascinating look at the City of Merced through music, photographs, and artifacts from the past.
We saw the trumpet that belonged to Warren Lewis, sheet music from Along the Banks of the Old Merced, records (both 45-singles and 33-long playing albums) among dozens of pieces that make up the exhibit.
The visitor can read the stories behind the people who were making local history in the early days of rock and roll. There are dozens of photographs depicting some of the musicians. A lot of familiar landmarks are shown as they were seen decades ago.
Fortunately for us on the opening night of the exhibit, many musicians and their families were on hand to recall their recollections from that era. One band member told he always thought the name of his band was spelled one way, and learned for the first time after viewing a vintage concert poster, that the band, or possibly the concert promoter, preferred the spelling in a different way.
Crystal Syphon’s musicians may look familiar. Many of the band’s members were part of The Beatles Project that covered many of the Fab Four’s hits for several years up until about a couple of years ago when the group began to focus on returning to their roots.
Interestingly, you won’t find too much about The Beatles Project among the items on display at the museum. That is because their history is far too recent. This exhibit is divided into four categories: Early Musical Development, The Swing Era, Rock & Roll, and Music Melting Pot of the 1980s.
“On the Banks of the Old Merced: A Music History” will be on display through early October. The Museum, at 21st and N Streets in Merced, is open Wednesday through Sunday, from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.
This exhibit is about Merced’s past. I encourage you to take a look before it closes. You’ll learn something about early rock and roll as well as other categories of music. You’ll get a better understanding of Merced area musicians and their contributions to the evolution of the art form.
With any luck, you may be entertained by stories about the people who loved their craft and who were willing to share it with all of us.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced
Golf Hazards
photo by steve newvine
Having spent a lot of time on golf courses over the past few years, one can discover certain types of hazards. Some are a direct result of nature. Some are a direct result of human nature.I squeeze in at least one nine-hole round of golf every week.
Before moving to California from the northeastern United States nine years ago, golf season lasted all of five months. I can now play every week of the year. For about the past three years, playing golf every week for fifty-two weeks has been my New Years’ resolution. I have not achieved it yet, but I’m getting closer to that goal every year.
As for hazards, why would anyone complain about a golf season that never ends? I don’t complain. But I have encountered some problems on local courses that might give the golf purist reason to become rankled. So with my tongue firmly in my cheek, here are some frustrations I’ve endured.
Earlier in the spring, I found tumbleweeds littering one of my favorite courses. They would roll through the fairway as they made their way across the landscape. Some remain stationary as I approached a putting green. They’re easy to move out of the way, but they have proven to be a pesky diversion.
I usually see tumbleweeds in the spring, and they usually are accompanied by winds; another nature-induced hazard. All I need is the cowboy singing group Sons of the Pioneers to serenade my golf group with the song Tumbling Tumbleweeds.
I remember one night a few years ago playing at the Rancho Del Rey course in Atwater. I was walking up to the putting green to survey what my chances would be to sink a putt. Pondering the possibility of getting par on the hole, I spotted a dog from one of the homes that encircle the course coming up onto the green.
The dog was friendly, but a little greedy. It picked up my ball with its mouth and ran away. I never saw that ball again. While amused by the dog’s behavior, I can only wonder what kind of ruling I would have received had the animal dropped the ball in the cup.
Nature and animals are always watched by golfers for potential hazardous situations. But one shouldn’t leave out the human element when it comes to difficult days on the golf course.
A golf partner and I were behind a group of young men on an area course one hot summer afternoon. These young men were learning the game, but had not yet mastered the elements of etiquette expected from more seasoned golfers. In short, they couldn’t keep their mouths shut.
I remember both my partner and I sharing a bemused laugh after one of the golfer’s struck his ball and yelled to the other members of his foursome, “Hey you guys better watch out, my ball might hit you.”
Hey pal, we have a term for that particular situation. One word spoken loudly: fore!
On a least a couple of occasions in my three decades of playing the game, I have encountered the kindly older gentleman who believes a golf course is the perfect place to discuss religion. Whether it’s asking where I am in my faith journey, or whether I know what the true meaning is of an upcoming religious holiday, I really don’t want to discuss it while I’m trying to break forty on the front nine.
I try to be polite. If that ever happens to me again, I’ll remind the well-intentioned proclaimer what the Reverend Billy Graham has said about religion and the game of golf. “The golf course is the only place where the Lord doesn’t answer your prayers.”
I have lots of disappointing score cards to prove that point.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced
Ping Pong and Family Time
Recently, my brother told me he was putting the old family ping pong table out for his upcoming garage sale. After more than forty years in the family, the old ping pong table is going to either the first person to pay the asking price or the first person who makes “a better offer”. I suspect it will go to the first person willing to clear it out of the garage.
I’m going to miss that table.
It was heavy duty, made of plywood and two-by-four boards. That’s the only way ping pong tables were made back in the early decades of the last century. It was sturdy. It was not necessarily portable like the lightweight, folding game tables that you see today.
It was at least forty years old when we acquired it in the early 1970s from a friend of my mother. This friend wanted to clear space in her attic, and thought our family might enjoy playing the game at our house.
To accommodate the table, we had to remove a wall between two rooms in the first floor of our house. That job in and of itself was a story to share.
It was Thanksgiving 1970. We had come home from a dinner with aunts, uncles, and cousins at my Grandma’s house. After changing into work clothes, my whole family: brother, sister, Mom, Dad, and I attacked the wall between the two rooms. I never saw so much dust and plaster in my life as we sledge-hammered our way through the wall and emptied about a dozen trash cans of plaster onto a trailer bound for the dump.
I remember the exact day because after about two hours of bull work, we all cleaned up, and watched the television premier of the movie Oklahoma. According to Wikipedia, that night was November 27, 1970.
We let the dust settle in that corner of our house on Friday. We spent that day after Thanksgiving engaged in the holiday tradition of Christmas shopping. I think we also bought some ping pong paddles and a net to cross the center of the table.
On Saturday, after a few runs with the mop, the room was prepared for painting. We did that project again as a family. I recall it didn’t take long for us to paint the walls. Nothing takes too long when you’re dedicated to the mission. Our mission was to play ping pong.
By Sunday, my Dad and brother set up the ping pong table. Our family then began learning and playing the game. Over the next few years, the table provided lots of competition among family and friends.
When I think about that old ping pong table, I think about the games. I think about waiting my turn to take on the winner of the game I was watching. I remember wanting to hold onto my winner’s spot for as many games as possible. My older brother won most of the games. I recall playing doubles, always with one of our family of five having to sit out the game while the other four went into battle. I remember gentle lofts of the ball coming over the net only to be slammed back so fast the opposing player had no way of returning the shot.
But I also remember how getting ready for that ping pong table became a true family endeavor. The whole family got involved in making space available so that the table could be set up. We all worked to prepare the room. And we all played the game together.
We took the table down after a few years once the novelty of the game wore off. Dad insulated and paneled the room, turning it into his den. He had his desk there. He built a sewing table for Mom and she moved her sewing machine into the room. The ping pong table was stored in the barn behind the house.
Several years later, my brother set up the table in the basement of his house shortly after he got married. The game of ping pong was revived for a few more years until the space was needed to store firewood.
And now, in a few weeks, some other family may take it home, and start new memories of ping pong and family time.
I hope they have as much fun with that ping pong table as my family had when it was part of my life growing up.
Steve Newvine lives in Merced
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