Archive for February, 2010

Musical Chairs

troy mightyBeginning this month, Troy Mighty will be taking over the Incoming! section from our much-beloved, but greatly-in-need-of-a-break Heather Klinger.  Mighty first came to our attention a decade ago with his fantastically drawn indie rock posters that seemed so cutting edge in SactoY2K.  It came as no surprise when he also turned out to be the driving force behind Dead Western, a music project that effortlessly keeps the ‘freak’ in freak folk.  Mighty just kept turning up, so it was probably inevitable that he’d end up in our pages at some point. Read more »

Art Picks, February 2010

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A Brief History of Oak Park

By William Burg   Photos courtesy of the Center for Sacramento History

In 1887, real estate developer Edwin Alsip subdivided the 230-acre William Doyle ranch into 56 whole and partial blocks and gave the subdivision the name “Oak Park,” named after an eight-acre oak grove at its center.

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Some Historic Buildings of Oak Park

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February Wine Picks

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Faith and Steel

By James W. Cameron photos by Jesse Vasquez

Imani students Myles Mitchell, Malik Hill, and Breeana Johnson

Imani students Myles Mitchell, Malik Hill, and Breeana Johnson

The sound of shuffling feet, soft thuds, and the solid clang and clank of metal on metal dominate an otherwise eerie stillness as the fencers move back and forth, thrusting and parrying in a balletic movement all their own.  The action is rapid, fluid, as the fencers advance and retreat, intent on scoring on their opponents and eluding efforts to score on them. The atmosphere is hushed but expectant, rife with excitement. Read more »

Editor’s Letter

by Tim Foster

I lived in Oak Park for 11 years.

In that time I had two cars hit and run, my windshield broken, a side window smashed, a bike stolen, countless power tools stolen, was attacked and ‘whitey-bashed’ by a drunk teenager, watched as my neighbor across the street got shot at, and finally, had my home robbed for three days straight by a gang of crackheads who plundered everything they could cart off (make that ‘shopping-cart off’) while I was traveling. Read more »

The Pickin’s are Slim but Worth the Diggin’

By Liv Moe  Photos by Scott Duncan

I worry that I’m not going to make any friends with this article by suggesting that there ain’t much to dine on in Oak Park.  If I do ruffle some feathers with this piece it is my hope that it will be the result of some amazing culinary gem in the OP that I have overlooked. I gotta say, however, that after multiple cruises through the neighborhood, there ain’t much. Read more »

Memories of Belmonte

by Tim Foster

Robert Arneson, Bruce Nauman and the whole TB9 crew posed for this 1965 Belmonte show poster

Robert Arneson, Bruce Nauman and the whole TB9 crew posed for this 1965 Belmonte show poster

Gone for four decades, and now nearly forgotten, Oak Park’s Belmonte Gallery was once the headquarters of the art vanguard in Sacramento.  The brainchild of Sal Yniguez, an artist and woodworker, the Belmonte consistently showed the most groundbreaking work in the region from such seminal artists as Robert Arneson, Willam Wiley and Bruce Nauman.  Though never as famous as Folsom’s Candy Store Gallery, the Belmonte Gallery probably played an even more crucial role in developing Sacramento’s artistic identity. Read more »

Joyland

By Niki Kangas  Images courtesy the Sacramento Room

Let’s go back a little over a hundred years to a time when Oak Park was in its beginnings- a new neighborhood adjacent to the hustle and bustle of post-Gold Rush Sacramento. Read more »