We’re always delighted to see articles about nature, but the Codornices Creek reach between 6th and 8th referred to was not in a pipe, nor were the reaches downstream.

Since 2000, three projects have carved new channels … Continue reading »]]>

This section of Codornices Creek, at 6th Street in Berkeley, used to run through a concrete pipe. Photo: Neil Mishalov

Update, 01.31.12: Susan Schwartz, President, Friends of Five Creeks, provides an informative clarification on the history of this section of Codornices Creek. (This is why we love the Berkeleyside community so much — our expert readers always bring the latest intelligence to the table!):

We’re always delighted to see articles about nature, but the Codornices Creek reach between 6th and 8th referred to was not in a pipe, nor were the reaches downstream.

Since 2000, three projects have carved new channels In this post-industial area, giving more meander to what had been a more or less straight ditch. In some areas concrete cladding was removed from banks and/or bottom. Native plants have been planted, with, we hope, more such diversity to come. The hope is to reduce flood danger, improve habitat for the rainbow trout/steelhead already in the creek (more than 100 had to be moved in order to improve just one of these three sections), and generally revitalize nature in the city, for the sake of people as well as wildlife.

We commonly call this “restoration,” but that may not be the best term. Before European settlement, Codornices Creek appears to have petered out in a wet grassland before reaching the slough and salt marsh that drained north-northwest to the Bay behind Fleming Point (now Golden Gate Fields race track; the channelized slough is still there). Without a Bay connection, there probably were no trout/steelhead (rainbow trout and steelhead are the same species).

The creek probably was ditched through to the slough in the 1870s, when what is now the transcontinental railway tracks were built through Berkeley. Probably in the 1980s or 90s, improving water quality (due to disappearance of industry and the federal Clean Water Act) let adventurous steelhead successfully reproduce in the creek. The reason we think it was that late is that kids, who know these things, don’t seem to remember the fish before then. But we’d love to know more about this!

The reach between 8th and 9th, referred to by Charles [in the Comments section], was actually taken out of a culvert in 1995, largely by volunteers, including Richard Register, who has faithfully maintained the project ever since.

Original story: Never let it be said that Berkeley isn’t teeming with wildlife, be it scavenging turkeys, mountain lions on the prowl, or — in this case — some happy-looking ducks and a white egret.

The photo above was submitted by Neil Mishalov and it shows a section of Codornices Creek east of 6th Street, just before the creek goes under 6th (see map, below). This part of the creek, which marks the border between Albany and Berkeley, was culverted for many years, reports Mishalov. It was recently opened, and life is flourishing in what was once a dark, closed concrete pipe.

Berkeleyside publishes many articles every day. To catch up on ones you have missed, check out All the News.

By Tracey Taylor. | Permalink | 10 comments |
Post tags: Berkeley nature, Codornices Creek

Nostalgia, like politics and real estate, is local.

Which helps explain how a 40-something man returns to the Berkeley California School for the Deaf and Blind (Clark Kerr Campus, as you know it today) and becomes the 11-year-old boy of his childhood.

I spent the better part of two years at that school, daydreaming in its classrooms, kicking a football across its playing fields, climbing its rooftops when adventure or mischief (or both) … Continue reading »]]>

Aged 11, Greg Fuson wandered the hallways of the old School for the Deaf and Blind "in idle search of who knows what". Photo: Jason Holmberg

By Greg Fuson

Nostalgia, like politics and real estate, is local.

Which helps explain how a 40-something man returns to the Berkeley California School for the Deaf and Blind (Clark Kerr Campus, as you know it today) and becomes the 11-year-old boy of his childhood.

I spent the better part of two years at that school, daydreaming in its classrooms, kicking a football across its playing fields, climbing its rooftops when adventure or mischief (or both) swelled up in me, but mostly just wandering its hallways in idle search of who knows what.

I confess: I broke some things. Windows. Drywall. Light fixtures. Toilet paper dispensers.

No teachers ever told me to stop. How could they?

The place was abandoned.(...)

Read the rest of A latchkey kid roams Berkeley ghost town full of promise (683 words)

By guest. | Permalink | 5 comments |
Post tags: Berkeley School for the Deaf and Blind, Clark Kerr, UC Berkeley

Just as with the new Magnes, which unveiled its new space on Sunday, BAM/PFA is to be housed in a 1920s-era 1939 building originally designed as a printing plant for UC Berkeley. It is located at 2120 Oxford Street at Center Street, in the heart of downtown.

Is it not fitting that, … Continue reading »]]>

The old printing plant in downtown that will one day be home to the Berkeley Art Museum. All photos: David Stark Wilson

Call it “beautiful decay”: these stunning photographs, taken by David Stark Wilson, show the interiors of the future home of the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAM/PFA).

Just as with the new Magnes, which unveiled its new space on Sunday, BAM/PFA is to be housed in a 1920s-era 1939 building originally designed as a printing plant for UC Berkeley. It is located at 2120 Oxford Street at Center Street, in the heart of downtown.

Is it not fitting that, as the demand for printed thesis, documents, books and monographs has waned, the engine rooms that produced these volumes are now being put to good use while remaining in the cultural realm?

(...)

Read the rest of The “before” pictures: Berkeley Art Museum/PFA (183 words)

By Tracey Taylor. | Permalink | 7 comments |
Post tags: BAM/PFA, Berkeley Art Museum, David Stark Wilson, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, WA Design

The building, which was … Continue reading »]]>

The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art & Life is housed in a 1920s former printing plant on Allston Way. Photos: Tracey Taylor

On Sunday, the doors will open to a new cultural institution in Berkeley. The many thousands of books, paintings, prints, textiles, and photographs that make up The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art & Life – which was formerly located in an early 20th-century family home on Russell Street in the Elmwood neighborhood — will now be readily accessible to the public in a beautifully renovated, centrally located 25,000 sq ft space at 2121 Allston Way.

The building, which was designed in the 1920s as a printing plant for UC Berkeley, was most recently used by UC’s Bancroft Library, with whom the Magnes now partners. Before that, the Berkeley Public Library occupied the space. Marks left by book stacks on the stained, maple-colored concrete floors bear the stamp of the building’s history.

The heart of the new museum is an open exhibition space featuring elm wood and glass, transparency and warmth being key to the space's design

The building has been transformed by San Francisco architects Pfau Long in collaboration with local design and fabrication company Picassa Studios. The goal, said the museum’s Director Alla Efimova, was to create a warm, inviting place with an emphasis on transparency.

“We wanted an open space with a good flow where the community could spend time discovering the collection,” she said.(...)

Read the rest of Berkeley’s new Magnes building to be unveiled on Sunday (718 words)

By Tracey Taylor. | Permalink | 8 comments |
Post tags: Alla Efimova, Magnes Museum, Pfau Long, Picassa Studios, The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art & Life

By Pete Rosos

Doris Moskowitz was born in 1966, the youngest daughter of Moe and Barb Moskowitz. After graduating from Mills College 1990 with degrees in English and Music, she began working with her dad, Moe, at the legendary Berkeley store he founded in 1959 on Telegraph Avenue. Now it is Doris who owns and operates Moe’s Books, keeping her father’s legacy alive. In 2003, she and her husband, Johnny Williams, opened Boss Robot Hobby on College. … Continue reading »]]>

By Pete Rosos

Doris Moskowitz was born in 1966, the youngest daughter of Moe and Barb Moskowitz. After graduating from Mills College 1990 with degrees in English and Music, she began working with her dad, Moe, at the legendary Berkeley store he founded in 1959 on Telegraph Avenue. Now it is Doris who owns and operates Moe’s Books, keeping her father’s legacy alive. In 2003, she and her husband, Johnny Williams, opened Boss Robot Hobby on College. Their son, Eli Williams, is a freshman at Berkeley HIgh. She is a proud resident of Berkeley, graduate of Griffin Preschool, Walden School and Berkeley High, and a member of an elite class of those who attended the Berkeley Co-op’s popular “Kiddie Corral.”

When did you arrive in Berkeley?
I was conceived in Berkeley on McGee street. I was born at the French Hospital in San Francisco because my dad, Moe, wanted to be a part of my birth on his birthday in 1966. I grew up on the most beautiful street, Lewiston, near College and Woolsey.

What’s your ‘hood?
I am most often found on The Ave or in the Elmwood… where I grew up.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
For a while a wanted to be a vet, but I don’t handle blood very well. Then a forest ranger. Then a great writer. Then a torch singer. I still wish this were true!(...)

Read the rest of Snapshot: Doris Moskowitz, owner, Moe’s Books (345 words)

By guest. | Permalink | 4 comments |
Post tags: Doris Moskowitz, Griffin Nursery School, Moe's Books, Pete Rosos, Walden School

Then a group of neighbors got together, and, with hard work and the assistance of funding from the city and UC Berkeley, transformed the steps into an inviting path. New lights now illuminate the walkway, and every March hundreds of daffodils push their way to … Continue reading »]]>

Bruce McMurray and Vicki Wade stand along the LeRoy Steps, which they have spent years improving. Photo: Frances Dinkelspiel

Five years ago the steps leading from Hilgard Avenue down to LeRoy were a tangled mess, ill lit, broken in spots, and dotted with graffiti. Scraggly trees and brambles grew unrestrained along the steps’ borders.

Then a group of neighbors got together, and, with hard work and the assistance of funding from the city and UC Berkeley, transformed the steps into an inviting path. New lights now illuminate the walkway, and every March hundreds of daffodils push their way to the surface, creating a yellow burst of color.

“Several years ago it was just a dump,” said City Councilmember Susan Wengraf. “It was overgrown, strewn with garbage, basically abandoned by the city. Over time it really became transformed from a very unattractive place to quite a beautiful place.”(...)

Read the rest of LeRoy Steps: Source of pride and local controversy (2,317 words)

By Frances Dinkelspiel. | Permalink | 68 comments |
Post tags: Andrew Harth, Bruce McMurray, Daniel Gallagher, Helen Alvarez, LeRoy Steps Stewardship Project, Luis Alvarez, Mark Selvaggio, SEEDS, Shar Etebar, Sue Ferrara, Susan Wengraf, The Big Orange House, Vicki Wade

Telegraph Avenue’s Sequoia Apartments building, seriously damaged in a fire on Friday, November 18, 2011, is a stately and historic edifice that helped define the character of Telegraph Avenue in both the early 20th century and in the 1960s.

Constructed in 1916, the 96-year-old, 39-apartment, building was part of an early 20th century development boom that transformed Telegraph Avenue into a bustling business and residential district.

When the Sequoia was built, Berkeley was one of most populous … Continue reading »]]>

An undated view, probably from the early 1960s, shows the Sequoia with the Cinema Guild theatre marquee visible at far left, on the commercial façade. Photo: Courtesy Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association

By Steven Finacom

Telegraph Avenue’s Sequoia Apartments building, seriously damaged in a fire on Friday, November 18, 2011, is a stately and historic edifice that helped define the character of Telegraph Avenue in both the early 20^th century and in the 1960s.

Constructed in 1916, the 96-year-old, 39-apartment, building was part of an early 20^th century development boom that transformed Telegraph Avenue into a bustling business and residential district.

When the Sequoia was built, Berkeley was one of most populous cities in California, riding a wave of suburb development and urbanization that had started with the construction of streetcar lines around the turn of the century, and accelerated after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire.(...)

Read the rest of The Sequoia Building: At heart of Berkeley’s rich heritage (1,205 words)

By guest. | Permalink | 12 comments |
Post tags: Amoeba Music, Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association, Berkeley Cinema Guild, Berkeley civil rights, Berkeley counter culture, Berkeley Historical Society, Cafe Intermezzo, Cody’s Books, Edward Landberg, Garden Spot, Lucky’s market, Mario’s La Fiesta Restaurant, Pauline Kael, Raleigh’s, Sequoia Building, Telegraph Avenue

The TONA General Meeting, which will feature the talk and an accompanying slideshow, takes … Continue reading »]]>

Ohlone Native Americans in a tule boat in the San Francisco Bay, 1822

Berkeley’s Thousand Oaks neighborhood and its environs are not only regarded as a swell place to live — they have a rich history too. No doubt the two are connected.  Tomorrow night, Alan Leventhal, a tribal ethnohistorian specializing in the Ohlone will speak at the invitation of the Thousand Oaks Neighborhood Association about the lives of the Muwekma Ohlone tribe who lived in Thousand Oaks.

The TONA General Meeting, which will feature the talk and an accompanying slideshow, takes place at the Thousand Oaks Baptist Church Auditorium, Catalina at Colusa Avenues, 7:00 – 9:00pm.

Find out more on  the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area website.

To find out what is going on in Berkeley and nearby, be sure to check out Berkeleyside’s Events Calendar. We also encourage you to submit your own events.

By Tracey Taylor. | Permalink | No comment |
Post tags:

Shirley Dean, the former Mayor of Berkeley, was wearing the broad-brimmed velvet hat which is decorated with clusters of appliquéd flowers and leaves. Dean also wore the hat to the 1996 ceremony held to mark the fountain’s restoration. And — most … Continue reading »]]>

Former Mayor of Berkeley Shirley Dean wearing "the hat". Photos: Nancy Rubin

Many people turned out on Sunday for the 100th anniversary celebration of the Fountain at the Circle in north Berkeley. But, despite the beloved landmark being the center of attention, it was a hat which threatened to steal the show.

Shirley Dean, the former Mayor of Berkeley, was wearing the broad-brimmed velvet hat which is decorated with clusters of appliquéd flowers and leaves. Dean also wore the hat to the 1996 ceremony held to mark the fountain’s restoration. And — most remarkably — her husband Dan Dean’s grandmother, Margaret, wore the very same hat to the inauguration of the original fountain in 1911.

Children enjoy the water at the Fountain at the Circle's 100th birthday celebration

(...)

Read the rest of A fancy hat is the star of the show at Fountain celebration (58 words)

By Tracey Taylor. | Permalink | 7 comments |
Post tags: Fountain at The Circle, Marin Circle, Shirley Dean