I wonder how many isolated rural milltowns there were in California when the Wendling mill started production in 1907. I say dozens, perhaps hundreds along the redwood belt alone. Think of Aptos and the Santa…
Posts published in “Essays”
From early 1987 and for about the next 10 years I was employed at a small law office in downtown Oakland. The office consisted of two bright, hardworking attorneys and me. I was the office…
The Lockdown has sparked a renaissance in correspondence. I’ve been exchanging postcards with my mother and letters with my youngest nephew. Emails have gotten longer, more interesting, more personal, more fun. I’m not on FaceBook…
From the headlines: “Ailing Nations Push to Reopen, Accepting More Illness as the Price to Pay” “Despite Growth in Cases, Easily Distracted Washington Moves On” “Fed Chair Sees Years of Economic Woes” “Heaps of Complaints,…
(Before we get rolling here, I’m going to ask that you imagine, before reading the first line of this little time-waster, it coming from the mouth of Dr. Nick Riviera. If you don’t know who…
In 1996, his first year in office, Terence Hallinan was the only district attorney in California to call for a "yes" vote on Proposition 215, the initiative to legalize the medical use of marijuana. (Even…
At the foot of Phoenix Lake there is a small parking lot where people park their cars and walk the last quarter mile to the top of the hill where a great view of the…
Life on the Mendocino Coast was a different affair as the year 1962 began. Montgomery Ward had a store on the corner of 200 East Redwood in Fort Bragg. One could walk almost effortlessly north…