A REDWOOD VALLEY WOMAN was killed this week when her car drove off Highway 253 and hit a tree, the California Highway Patrol reported. According to the CHP, the driver of a 2010 Honda Civic — who was identified as Erica Gonzalez, 37, of Redwood Valley — was heading eastbound on Hwy 253 sometime between 3 p.m. Nov. 27 and 2 a.m. Nov. 28 when her vehicle left the roadway. [Meaning the wreckage of her vehicle wasn’t spotted for nearly a full day] “As the Honda approached a slight left-hand curve in the roadway, Gonzalez allowed the vehicle to exit the roadway … and travel down a steep grass embankment approximately 400 feet.” As the Honda continued down the embankment, it collided with a tree and rolled several times, the CHP reports, adding that the driver was ejected from the vehicle and “succumbed to her injuries as a result of this crash.” The CHP notes that “the death investigation is being handled by the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office, (and) at this time, is does not appear that alcohol or drugs were a contributing factor to the crash.”
A READER WRITES: I saw this today online and thought you might be interested. The Emerald Earth 189 acres outside of Boonville has new tenants and they have plans. It all sounds so familiar. They want donations so they can live for free.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/37gqiyeb60
Support the Black to the Land Movement!, organized by Kanchan Hunter
25 years ago Zappa Montag suggested an idea called Black to the Land. Back… Kanchan Hunter needs your support for Support the Black to the Land Movement!
www.gofundme.com
THE PHILO-BASED “sexual wellness” company accused of abusing women and forcing them into sex acts is suing Netflix over a documentary which claimed an employee was “raped and beaten.” In new filings, the “orgasmic meditation cult” OneTaste claims the allegations levied against them by several former members and staff featured on the Netflix documentary are “completely false.” Netflix first aired ‘Orgasm Inc: The Story of OneTaste’ in 2022, five months before founder Nicole Daedone, 56, and Rachel Cherwitz, 43, were indicted for allegedly forcing women into sex acts. Both women deny the accusations. A lawsuit, filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court, focuses on the final 15 minutes of the documentary, which discusses ex-employee Ayries Blanck experiencing “sexual violence” that was “condoned” by the company.
CHRISTMAS is upon us, and although the Valley's hands-down number one outdoor decoration maestro, Shorty Adams, is ailing and no longer up to his remarkable display, I hope his descendants will carry on, as will, I'm sure, his neighbors along Highway 128. Boonville never looks better than it does at Christmas time.
BILL KIMBERLIN: This past Saturday I attended a performance of “Bullrusher” a play by the niece of Angela Davis, who is a sometimes resident of Boonville as am I. The niece is Eisa Davis of Brooklyn, N.Y.
The play takes place in a somewhat mythical town of Boonville and the young black woman who is featured carries the Boontling name of Bullrusher which connotes an illegitimate child. She had been sent down the Navarro River in a basket landing in some bulrushes and was discovered by a white male school teacher who took her in and raised her.
We meet her in the 1950's era of Boonville with many references to for instance, the “Anyhow Saloon” which building currently resides in Philo but was a real place in the 1930s. Only Boonters, of which there was only one in the audience, would know any of this but the printed program for the play did have a page of Boontling names and definitions, which one of my female companions later said she wished she had looked at more closely. In truth all the Boontling was just window dressing but the Berkeley audience seemed to appreciate it.
There was a phone call in the play using a dial phone which I could have told them was incorrect because in the 1950’s all our phones in the Valley were party lines where you needed an operator to place the call for you. This, of course is a detail that only a local would ever notice or question.
Our heroine is a young black girl who has some special powers. She can predict the weather accurately and she can also, through a mysterious connection with water, tell people’s future, which is a recurring element in the play, from the Navarro to her gifts with a type of clairvoyance that adds a nice touch to the plot.
All good stories tend to jump off from either, “A stranger arrives in town,” or the central character, “Goes on a journey.” In this case a young Black woman from Birmingham, Alabama arrives and brings the real world knowledge of Southern Jim Crow to the ears of our Bullrusher young lady.
The “Navarro River” part of the set is cleverly done with real water and two of the actresses do a couple of scenes getting very wet splashing around in their underwear. I meant to check the temperature of that water but forgot. For their sake I hope it was warm.
The opening acting and dialogue made me think it was a student play effort but if you stick with it, as I did, I wound up impressed. The joint was full and there was applause a few times and at the end. I will let others judge it, however it has played on the East Coast and was a 2007 Pulitzer Prize finalist. It strangely reminded me of a Eugene O’Neal play as far as its realistic style goes, Chekhov as well.
VERO BARRAGAN:
Many of know the Gutierrez family. Mr. Gutierrez is dealing with medical complications and could really use the support of his, our, community. Please join Anastacio and his family on December 9 at the Philo grange. There will be food and drinks for sale as well as live music in the evening.
The family thanks you
Happy Holidays!
(If you’d like to offer the family a cash donation please private message (on facebook) for details.)
AV FIRE DEPARTMENT:
Can you believe it's already time for the toy drive? To donate: bring a new, unwrapped toy to a local collection location before December 8th. In past years, popular selections have been lego, soccer balls, and art or craft kits. Thanks so much to everyone who has donated and made someone's holiday a little brighter! Toy distribution is on Saturday, December 9th from noon to 3pm at AVFD. You can drop off your new, unwrapped toy (ages 0-12, about $10-$15) or a monetary donation at any of the following locations: the Yorkville Post Office, AV Market, Lemon's Market, the Farmhouse Mercantile, and the Fire Station in Boonville. The toys will be collected on December 8th and handed out at the Anderson Valley Fire Department Boonville Station, 14281 Hwy 128 - Boonville, December 9, 2023 - From 12:00-3:00p.m. Questions/more info: Call 707 895-2017.
AVHS AG DEPT. WREATH MAKING IS UNDERWAY!
Students are learning how to make a wreath.
They will decorate them soon. Having fun in the cold!
You can still order your wreath. Use this link to place an order.
https://forms.gle/WPHQKEVwizjPLrBg9
Don't forget to push the submit button!
BOONVILLE MUSIC SERIES IS BACK at it again!
Some of you might remember percussionist Chris Froh, teacher of percussion at UC Davis and Sacramento State, who has performed in Boonville before. A virtuoso giant who regularly concertizes with the leading groups across the US, Chris is also warm and engaging, a true delight. He will be joined by special guests/locals/AVUSD teachers Dustin Carlson (guitar) and Shane Cook (more percussion).
Saturday, December 16th at 6:30pm (Doors open at 6pm)
Sliding scale: $10-$20, youth under 18 and families of AVUSD students get in for free.
Location: Anderson Valley Grange on Highway 128, Philo
Come prepared to have your socks knocked off, ringing in the holiday season!
BILL KIMBERLIN: Saw this sign in Philo. I'm guessing a fire hose is involved.
WHY WE NEED A RESIDENT DEPUTY:
A Reader Writes: Just a warning:
We live over behind Lemon's Market in Philo and two cars pulled in and parked by the old restaurant last night around 3AM and broke into our truck and stole money and paperwork. So just a heads up to everyone in the valley to be aware that people are driving around in the middle of the night looking to steal things. One car pulled in coming from the direction of Navarro and met up with another car pulling in coming from Boonville's direction.
SUPERINTENDENT SIMSON, having worked funding miracles as she chased down state money for major infrastructure upgrades, laments that Mendo law enforcement doesn't enforce the truancy laws, which is an ongoing problem in the Anderson Valley because too many students simply don't show up regularly. In Calaveras County, the superintendent's previous berth, the sheriff “would arrest parents for absenteeism, and take parents to court and fine them for not getting their kids to school.”
THE SUPERINTENDENT also laments the casual attitude of some parents about drugs, especially marijuana; the loose parents coming up with the ancient false argument that pot is less dangerous and damaging than alcohol. I'm sure a lot of local old timers, like me, can name the depressingly large number of local kids who became clinically schizophrenic because they started smoking pot when they were still children. Today's marijuana is not the ditch weed grandpa smoked. Today's dope is very strong.
SOME YEARS AGO, a writer for Boonville's beloved weekly commented to me, his ostensible boss, “You know, this new dope is great. It knocks me out for four or five hours at a toke.” Dude! I said, we have work to do here. You drop whole paragraphs from your reports. Don't tell me about how great the new dope is. This is a newspaper, not the casbah!
A READER RECOMMENDS: As for hot chocolate, you can make the wonderful Mexican one as noted previously in your column. Both Abuelita and Ibarra brands are available in major groceries. Plus, with the latino community around Boonville, are there no Mexican tiendas? You could even buy a molinillo for whipping!
ED NOTE: Yes, we have a very nice little tienda called Mi Esperanza in downtown Boonville. I'ma gonna check with them for the real deal choco-ingredients.
MAJOR KUDOS to Terri Rhoades for pulling off that much appreciated community pozole-fest at the high school, managing the event with her usual aplomb from her wheelchair because she has a broken foot, nonetheless efficiently directing her student crew from the seated position.
ANOTHER REDWOOD CLASSIC hoops tournament has come and gone, and John Toohey, with a big assist from his student tournament director, Lucy Espinoza, got 'er done in fine fashion. There was one oddity in the long weekend of basketball when Willits High School failed to show up for their consolation bracket game. Never had a no-show in more than a half-century of basketball. The Boonville team gallantly took Willits' place.
IT WAS GOOD to see more Northcoast teams in the Redwood Empire's oldest basketball tournament, and gooder yet to see South Fork High School come out on top as the South HumCo team won it all in their first appearance ever in the event. (Special thanks to Ms. Espinoza for getting the results to us in a complete and timely manner, and gratitude to Leilani Bucio for her photographs of the participants.)
WITH all the loose talk about anarchists in the news lately, a local man, now in his mid-90s, told me how as a kid he'd knocked around logging camps from here to Idaho, working in the woods and in the mills. In Idaho he spent a summer in a logging camp dominated by the IWW or Wobblies, the original American anarchists and, speaking in a very broad generality here, the best pure radicals, along with the great Eugene V. Debs, this country has ever produced. The Yorkville man recalled driving over mostly dirt roads all the way to Spokane with an older worker he'd become friendly with in the mill. “The guy didn't talk a lot and he'd lost part of his leg in some kind of accident. We drove to Spokane in an old Model T. He asked me if I wanted to go to a political meeting. Having nothing much else to do and not much money to do it with, I went along. It was an IWW meeting. I'm telling you these guys did not fool around! I was just a kid but they scared hell outta me. They were tough bastards who would fight anybody, and use dynamite when they had to.” A handful of suburban kids dressed in black break a few windows in Oakland and you'd think the revolution had started.
MARSHALL NEWMAN: Clare's Cafe used to be where The Last Resort used to be in Philo (i.e. across Highway 128 from the Philo Market), but I have not seen this particular matchbook cover previously. It probably dates from the late 1940s or early 1950s.
THE OTHER AFTERNOON, dark coming on, I was footing it up Deer Meadows Road where I have seldom encountered another pedestrian, and from whose heights one enjoys a vista to the west as beautiful as any in the world, I saw a young woman approaching from the other direction pushing a stroller with a baby in it. A dog trotted along beside them. Oh christ, a pit bull. I looked around for a likely tree to climb as mother, child and pit approached. Mom was smiling. The dog wasn't. It jogged right at me. “Does this thing bite?” I asked, visions of myself in the AV Ambulance with a dog embedded in my leg “Oh no,” the young mom assured me. “He just wants to say hello.” Maybe. It seemed to me he preferred to attack rather than introduce himself. But the beast immediately returned to mom at her command, and I exhaled and continued on up the hill, muttering to myself at the pure presumption of Dog People.
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