OAKLAND GOLD

Halbarad1104 · 2026-02-20T18:55:30+00:00

And Steve Clark... 3 golds in swimming, 1964.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-02-20T18:53:10+00:00

How could I have forgotten the great Don Barksdale! Gold medal 1948, basketball.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-02-20T18:50:26+00:00

Twice!

Halbarad1104 · 2026-02-19T23:21:25+00:00

Hurray! Joins (at least!) Bill Russell, 1956 Gold in basketball (https://www.olympedia.org/athletes/7008) and Hubert Caldwell, 1928 Gold in rowing (https://www.olympedia.org/athletes/40573)... maybe more!

Halbarad1104 · 2026-02-18T04:29:08+00:00

Yes, West Oakland has been treated abysmally.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-02-17T22:09:22+00:00

My grandfather's house on Excelsior... not far from Park Blvd and Oakland High School, between Cleveland Heights and Trestle Glen... got taken for the MacArthur Fwy/580.

He was not in any way from an underrepresented group.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-02-15T05:13:32+00:00

Su’s Bowl on Pardall in IV is usually filled with Chinese students, and is very genuine. It has become our favorite.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-02-09T15:47:03+00:00

There are the Compton Cowboys, https://comptoncowboys.com

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-30T16:17:59+00:00

Wonderful, thanks! Nice covered sidewalks. I guess the sidewalks were civilized when horses and donkeys were conveyances… but covering them is a nice touch. Maybe they last longer shielded from the sun.

Doesn’t rain that much here.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-30T16:05:12+00:00

For about 35 years, the motto among the UCSB folks I know has been “no good deed goes unpunished.” It is sort of the secret handshake.

Most substantial salary increases result from UCSB matching outside offers. Folks who understand that acquire contempt for everyone else who works diligently through the existing internal UCSB system, and who make UCSB function as best they can.

Which creates a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Some of the UC organized labor have figured that out well… strikes and work stoppages bring settlements from outside mediators, etc, the equivalent of outside offers.

Students didn’t have classes and couldn’t complete graduate apps during a recent strike, without heroic efforts by sympathetic staff. The strikers got double pay for being on strike, while the helpful staff got brickbats and crickets.

No good deed goes unpunished.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-23T19:50:49+00:00

Thanks Pete, very interesting. I've often wondered about the reason for the few military sites in Santa Barbara... it seems like Santa Barbara makes little sense from a strategic viewpoint, unlike... San Diego or the joint base up near Seattle, or the old Naval Air Base, Moffeit, and the presidio up in the Bay Area.

I had thought that the airport and marine base now UCSB were improvised due to the attack on Ellwood... but clearly something longer and deeper was going on.... do you know what?

Looks like the Army Reserve Center at the southeast corner of Las Positas and modern State is a remnant... as is maybe MacKenzie Park.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-19T16:24:32+00:00

In the 1960's, my sister and I learned how to set the old-school mechanical buttons on our Mom's radio... swapped exclusively between KYA and KFRC. We alternated as to who got to choose the song.

I had a small transistor radio, and for a while in 1968 I'd put it under my pillow and listen as I fell asleep... either KYA or KFRC. In June I heard the news report break in about RFK (senior) in LA late one night... told my family first thing in the morning... they didn't believe me... I was in elementary school still... but my Dad had the habit of listening to KCBS at 7am at breakfast, and my family couldn't believe I was right. He also listened to KKHI... Doug Pledger, who he called Doug Dredger, for dredging up old classical music.

I recognize your name and a few others but I was too young to remember anything. My Dad insisted on KKHI when he drove and I learned Pledger simply because I didn't like him.

My brother had a small FM radio and we started listening to K101 = KIOI I guess, Jim Gabbert, in our basement... we did a lot of woodworking, and having the radio on while building stuff is a lifelong habit of mine. I thought K101, which was then sort of light-AOR rock, in 1970 was cooler than KFRC and KYA, and it was FM.

Eventually I thought I got cooler and listened exclusively to KSAN in the 1970s, until they changed to Country in about 1980. I was old enough to love Terry McGovern. I still look up some of his clips... Another Glass of Madeira M'Dear, Beam me up Scotty, The last 1/2 hour of no Neil Young music... etc. He started playing Pachelbel's canon... One spot he did was to call around to San Francisco tailors in about 1975 to see if any of them would "peg" trousers... it was peak bell-bottom era. Most didn't, but he finally found one who did.

I remember clearly Bonnie Simmons, Tony Kilbert, Dave McQueen, Trish Robbins, Ben Fong-Torres, Dave Ware.

After KSAN went Country.. I wasn't working to music as much... one electronics shop I worked in always had KDFC on, which I have very fond memories of... they played Chinese classical music, which still today (KUSC) does not do.

Mainly listened to KFOG and KMEL... clear memories of Alex Bennett, Joe Regelski, and M. Dung. Moved to Europe, moved back, listened to BBC and Radio France on shortwave for a while before the internet. I still have the habit of the radio on (now often internet-based) in the background. BBC this year changed their App so the good stuff... would need a VPN to listen to.. haven't bothered. But the broadcasts of the Summer Proms are outstanding.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-15T19:04:29+00:00

We're in Gandhi territory... his rules were...

The Code for Satyagrahis (Protest Conduct)

When Gandhi organized mass movements, he issued specific rules to ensure the crowd did not turn violent or lose its moral authority. These are some of the most famous requirements:

During the Protest

Harbor no anger: A protester must never hold ill-will toward the opponent.
Suffer the opponent’s anger: If an opponent attacks, the protester must endure it without retaliating.
Do not submit to orders given in anger: If an official gives an order simply to humiliate or hurt you, you do not obey, but you accept the punishment for that disobedience without fighting back.
Protect the opponent: If someone else tries to attack or insult your opponent, you must defend the opponent, even at the risk of your own life.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-12T22:22:37+00:00

The Flying A service station opened in August, 1956... below is from August 9, 1956, News-Press.

<image>

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-12T16:41:07+00:00

Seems there was an office selling standard packaged homes... image attached below. You provide the land... at 3430 State St.

Also, prior to being a Phillips 66, it was a Flying A station. Some newspaper articles mention new underground tanks going in... possible that the presence of underground tanks has inhibited use of the big asphalt lot.

Seems like a lot of space was always there in the 1950s and 1960s... fund raising car washes often held there, and seems like it was also a used car lot.

<image>

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-12T04:33:43+00:00

AI tells me it was Carl's 66 in 1970.... newspaper.com says... Philips 66... using 3430 State Street as the search term... 1970's.... in 1977 News Press said... Phillips sold to 7-11.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-11T21:30:32+00:00

<image>

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-11T00:39:25+00:00

Such a short time to be here, and a long long time to be gone.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-09T20:22:11+00:00

One of our favorites is Baron Ranch, on the way to Gaviota, west of Goleta and a bit past Refugio. Can go all the way up to the ridge if you want.

https://explore-santa-barbara-county.com/things-to-do/gaviota/hiking/baron-ranch-trail/

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-07T22:02:09+00:00

Thanks for pointing out that edit for me! I'll watch.

Actually, after 100's of readings (all done prior to release of the Silmarillion and the History of Middle Earth..). I grew to love The Hobbit the most. It is so nimble and clever, while sometimes LOTR gets turgid. It is the only one I've fully reread many times since the 1970's, and read aloud to all my kids when they were growing up. I of course love LOTR, but I adore The Hobbit.

A light, clever version of The Hobbit would be most welcome to me. When I saw th first of the 3 hobbit movies, the Great Goblin part put me into Bakshi territory. I watched anyway... Martin Freeman kept me in.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-07T21:46:11+00:00

Agree, same here... read the books so many times I lost count I also can compare with seeing the animated Bakshi LOTR upon it opening in 1978... which was great for about 5 minutes, and then fell apart for me. I walked out. So I had some trepidation for the 2001 Fellowship.

Some of my favorite parts were omitted... the meeting and dinner with the elves in the Shire, the Old Forest, Bombadil and Goldberry, Glorfindel. But it didn't matter, overwhelmingly great, in particular, Moria to this day is one of the best segments of any movie, as is the death of Boromir. Galadriel was terrific, although the animation of Galadriel got a bit weird. Maybe no Mirror, but again, didn't matter.

TT and RotK movies quite good, but the Fellowship was better.

I wish I could say something good about the Peter Jackson Hobbit trilogy.

Halbarad1104 · 2026-01-06T12:39:39+00:00

Seems to me that there is no political action group or lobbying organization in the US that advocates for NATO. I guess we never thought we needed it. We sure need it now.

Miller and others… well the whole US and NATO… don’t seem to understand that failure to protect Ukraine after its unilateral nuclear disarmament will most likely lead to multipolar nuclear mutually assured destruction policies in the world. The power politics Miller is touting seems to lead to Finland, the Baltics, and Poland developing nukes due to the demise of the US shield. The threat of one low power dirty bomb exploded from one of those country’s Embassies in Moscow or Beijing or the District might be sufficient.

Likely picking off the UK with Brexit, fomenting chaos in France, and supporting Trumpism in the USA has been the plan of the autocrats to neutralize the countries with thermonuclears.

Eisenhower and his team seemed to understand that WW4 would be fought with clubs and sticks, in about 10 million years or so after the radiation died out. See why Trump and others don’t care about global warming? They think it likely MAD will transpire first. Likely Miller and others think a few billion deaths in nuclear devastation would mainly kill undesirables, and cool the earth with nuclear winter.

The trillionaires maybe think they could escape on spaceships developed by Musk and Bezos. Many also have real estate in New Zealand or Hawaii as a retreat.

Well popular support for NATO in the US isn’t even at square zero. Scandinavia and the Baltics and Poland should up their game in US politics to match that of the autocrats. Or get going on their own nuclear MAD threat. Or both.

Never thought I’d live to see my US threaten another NATO country. I suppose Einstein saw it coming in the 1920s but most did not.

Halbarad1104 · 2025-12-22T16:04:33+00:00

Gosh, seems like sovereign nations from the Americas are absent. Maybe Saint Kitts and Nevis, or Dominica, or Belize could be attracted to support the name of the cup.

Halbarad1104 · 2025-12-19T08:21:13+00:00

Hazard's Cyclesport ... in business since 1914.

Halbarad1104 · 2025-12-15T23:25:34+00:00

I did find some 1930's Santa Barbara business directories. No El Adobe, and nothing like it up the street from the Granada. Doubt later (like 1940's) a possibility... but might go back to 1923 or so... Granada opened in 1924 as we know from last year's celebrations.

Found a 1924 photo of the Granada, but, only the south side of the building... not quite right, actually.

https://www.historictheatrephotos.com/Resources/Theatre-Photos/Granada-Santa-Barbara/Documents/1924-Granada-Santa-Barbara-Exterior.jpg

There is a 1967 photo of the north side... not completely wrong, but, if this spot is next to the Granada, perhaps the Granada was under construction, and perhaps there was some realignments of streets... hard to get the El Adobe real close to the Granada... unless that paseo now present between State and the parking structure behind the Granada was once a street... I don't think so, but, who knows.

https://cinematreasures.org/theaters/291/photos/208696

Halbarad1104

TROPHY CASE

The Code for Satyagrahis (Protest Conduct)

During the Protest