But this is Chico, too

What would Annie Bidwell do? It was the topic of a recent installment of “But This is Chico,” my column in the Enterprise-Record. I have more to say on the subject.

It’s interesting to speculate about what Chico’s founding mother would think, say and do 90 years after her death. (She died March 9, 1918). One of the ways I explored this in my column was to assume she didn’t die and, at 168, is now the oldest person who ever lived. I took kind of a SciFi approach. But it would have been nice if she had lived just a little longer. I think if today’s medical treatments had been available to her, she could have lived well into her 80s.

It’s possible that the treatments she received in her old age may have hastened her death. The late Lois McDonald alluded to some of them in her biography of Bidwell. For example, she was prescribed medicines that contained arsenic and cocaine. Physical therapies she was subjected to included jolts of electricity to her body and the breaking of ligaments in her shoulder to correct a “constriction” problem. It’s the old story of the “cures” being worse than the ailments.

If she had lived just one more year, she would have been pleased at the ratification of the 18th Amendment, which outlawed the manufacturing, importing and exporting of alcoholic beverages. Throughout her life, she was an ardent Prohibitionist.

If she had lived just two more years, she would have applauded the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote. Woman’s suffrage was another of her causes —a progressive one, in this case.
If she had lived into the 1920s, she would have seen drastic changes in women’s fashions — not just the tossing of the corset, but the coming of short hair and knee-length dresses.

She would have observed that female students at Chico State College were starting to live on their own, unchaperoned. She wouldn’t have failed to notice that grown women were now pursuing careers and defining themselves as more than just wives, mothers and community volunteers.

What would she have thought of all this? Would she have said “All we wanted was the vote. What did we unleash?” Or would she have concluded that it was high time for these other changes to occur?

There would have been a lot of technological changes in the 1920s for her to react to. This was the decade that the last of Chico’s streets were paved and cars replaced horses and carriages as the main way to get around. Would Bidwell have learned how to drive? Would she have owned several cars?

Would she have been among the first commercial airline passengers? When she was first married, the coming of the transcontinental railroad made it possible for her to reach her family in Washington, D.C. in a week’s time. How would she have felt if she knew she could cross the country in a matter of hours?

Bidwell would have found herself living in interesting times if she had managed to stay around another decade.

Posted by Steve Brown at 03:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Eating out is one of life’s pleasures. When I was growing up, it was a rare event — maybe once a month. Nowadays, it’s a routine event — twice a week or more, but it’s no less pleasurable.

Chico offers innumerable dining choices at reasonable prices. Even the high-end places aren’t that expensive. You could go out for three meals a day for three months without exhausting the choices and without doing serious damage to your wallet.

The city’s ethnic offerings continue to expand. Two years ago, there were no Indian restaurants. Today there are three. So far we have no Eritrean restaurants, but I’m sure that will change before long.

So what are the best places in Chico to eat? In general, the food is so good that few establishments rise above the others. But here are my picks. Bustolini’s has the best sandwiches, mainly because of its selection of Italian deli meats. The Rice Bowl has the best Chinese food, with each mouthful offering subtle, varied flavors. In-N-Out has the best fast food hamburgers. Chili’s is the best chain. Spice Creek has the most imaginatively prepared and intense-tasting dinners.

Casa Ramos is my favorite Mexican restaurant, but I have to admit I latched on to it soon after I moved here and haven’t explored other places.

We don’t go out to Italian restaurants. My wife is content to prepare those kinds of meals at home. We don’t go to heavy-duty carnivore places. I love meat, but I went to so many steakhouses when I was growing up that I got tired of them.

Breakfast is difficult to do badly, but I will single out Jedidiah’s for its outstanding Eggs Benedict. It’s the Hollandaise sauce that makes or breaks this dish.

What Chico needs is a dessert and coffee house offering table service and live music that opens its doors at about 8 p.m. and doesn’t close until the wee hours of the morning — a place to go after dinner and a concert or theater performance.

What I’d love to see is in this town is just one eating place where nobody would be allowed to talk above a whisper. There’s far too much “din” in “dinner” these days.

Posted by at 11:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Wood was available in abundance as a building material in Northern California in the 19th century. The problem was that wooden buildings readily caught fire and quickly spread to similar structures. San Francisco went through conflagrations that destroyed three or four successive downtowns before it switched to more fire-resistant materials.

Oroville's Chinese temple burned down twice before brick replaced wood as the main building material. The third time was the charm. The current temple has stood since 1863, although floods played havoc with it until a levee was built along the Feather River.

In Chico, the brick building at the southwest corner of of Eighth Street and Broadway (first photo) has stood since 1874, although the west end was added later. The building was part of a section of downtown Chico known as The Junction. Over the years it has been used as a brewery, hotel, saloon, restaurant, antique store, bicycle shop and deli.

Despite their relative durability, bricks were rarely used to build Chico houses. The few brick residences include the Bidwell Mansion, the Lusk house (now Madison Bear Garden) and the Walker house (second photo), at the northwest corner of Ivy and Third streets. It was built in 1875 by Jefferson Walker, who owned a brick yard. Walker's company also built the Phoenix building and the old Chico High School.

After the 19th century, brick became more a decorative than a structural element in Chico buildings. The fireplace chimneys of many of the city’s craftsman bungalows are accented with clinker bricks, which get their name from their tendency to become discolored when they are placed too close to the fire in a kiln. They are usually discarded, but in the early 20th century they became popular with architects associated with the arts and crafts movement.

Brick is a common design element of Chico State University's buildings. Even the ugliest buildings on campus, such as the Meriam Library (third photo), make use of it.

A newer building that puts brick work to good use is the Tri-Counties Bank at the southeast corner of Salem and Fifth streets (fourth photo). The building is the former Sequoia Hotel.

Most brick walls are built in a running bond pattern, which consists entirely of stretchers (bricks placed lengthwise). In a running bond, the placement of the bricks alternates from row to row. Other patterns combine stretchers and headers (bricks placed so that the short side faces out).

Posted by at 10:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here’s a “then” and “now” look at a small corner of Chico. The building, on the west side of Nord Avenue north of Big Chico Creek, has been around for 100 years.

Chico is lucky to have so many structures that are at least a century old. But some of them get overlooked. I had no idea this building was that old.

The “then” photo was brought in several months ago by Ted De Bernardi. I wasn’t in, so he placed it on my desk, along with some notes. I decided to wait to run it until the building reached the century mark. The man in the photo is De Bernardi’s grandfather, Warren B. Todd, who is shown working on the building in 1908. De Bernardi writes that his grandfather operated a grocery store at this site until he died in 1933.

The next business was the Hacienda, a Mexican restaurant, which later moved to The Esplanade. It then became a pizza parlor and it’s now a Thai restaurant.

The only reason I recognized the building from De Bernardi’s photo is that when I came to Chico 10 years ago, it was painted a gaudy color. It was hard to miss. Today, it’s a bluish gray and harder to spot.

It won’t be long before Chico has entire neighborhoods that are 100 years old. The avenues, Mansion Park, the Barber neighorhood and the west side all got their start in the first decade of the 20th century. They were pretty much built out by the 1930s.

The area between Bidwell Park, the freeway, Eighth Street and downtown has survived almost intact. Most of the houses there are at least 70 years old. Downtown and the South Campus neighborhood still have a smattering of 19th century buildings.

California’s perennial newness gets old fast. Most of the state’s cities look like perpetual construction sites. Chico’s core provides an antidote to that. I shudder to think what would happen to the quality of life in Chico if its center ceased to hold.

Posted by at 01:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

This is my favorite almond blossom viewing site — the part of the Midway that crosses over the railroad tracks north of Durham.

From this vantage point, the orchards seem to go on forever in every direction. On clear days, you can see snow-capped mountains east and west of the valley. This is the picture postcard version of California.

I don’t advise stopping on the overpass to look at the orchards. The road is too narrow to safely pull over. Park your car on the side of a nearby road and walk along the overpass. Take lots of photos.

It’s become almost an annual tradition for me to write about why I’m so attached to blooming orchards. I grew up in the Santa Clara Valley. In 1958, when I was 6, prune orchards stretched all the way from the edge of our back yard to Campbell, the nearest town.

When I was 12, we moved out of the valley. By that time, there was nothing but houses stretching from the edge of our back yard to Campbell. The change from rural to suburban sprawl happened quickly. I mourn the loss of such a familiar landscape, which was so memorable in the spring.

The 1960s gave rise to at least two pop songs about people who cherished the small towns where they were raised. They had to move to big cities when they grew up, but they always longed to get back to their hometowns. But when they do return, they find everything has been paved over. “I looked for the meadows, there wasn’t a trace, six lanes of highway had taken their place,” Verdelle Smith sings in “Tar and Cement.”

“There’s a drag strip down by the riverside where my grandma’s cow used to graze. Now the grass don’t grow and the river don’t flow like it did in my childhood days,” Joe South sings in “Don’t It Make You Want to Go Home.”

People who grew up in Chico and then head off to the big city often feel nostalgic for the place they knew when it was a small town. It’s hard to say what they make of their hometown now that it has grown to the size of a small city. But at least the orchards are still here. I’d like to believe there’s some consolation in that.

Posted by at 10:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Downtown Chico businesses seem to be geared to a couple of specific populations. Cheap places to eat and bars are for college students (of legal drinking age, of course) and expensive places to eat and specialty stores are for high-end shoppers.

There isn’t much that appeals to families, which seems strange when you consider that the charm of downtown is supposed to be based on a wholesome, small-town atmosphere. So I was pleased when Old Town Rootbeer opened a couple of years ago and Powell’s Sweet Shoppe made its debut last year. They inject an element of kid-friendliness that had been missing. They are kin to Shubert’s Ice Cream and Candy, a downtown staple.

It’s a shame there are no longer any move theaters downtown. They have disappeared over the last 10 years. They offered family-oriented activites. I’m not forgetting The Pageant, but it offers mainly grownup fare.

I’m not trumpeting the virtues of families over other demographic groups per se. Families are well-represented in suburban parts of Chico, but they are in short supply downtown, which ought to be a place that feels comfortable to everyone.

The success of City Plaza depends on the willingness to Chicoans think of it as their front yard, just as they have laid claim to Bidwell Park as their back yard. The more downtown businesses that appeal to every age group, the better the mix of people using the plaza.

Posted by at 10:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The last block I wrote about has one good building on it — the 99-year Park Silberstein.

The block directly to the north has three.

Start this walk around the block on the northwest corner of Broadway and Fourth Street in front of the Morehead building, named after a longtime farming family. It has been around since 1901, but has been remodeled twice. In the 1940s, the original facade, which had windows and a cupola, was modernized. In the 1990s, when modern was no longer the preferred look for old buildings, the effect was softened.

Wayne Cook, who owns the building, told me a couple of years ago that he plans to restore it to its original look.

Head west on Fourth. The next building on your right is the Hotel Diamond, which Wayne Cook also owns and has already restored. It has a hotel and restaurant.

It dates from about 1904. For years it was knwon as Traveler's Hotel, In the early 1960s, it was a Chico State University women’s residence, called Morehead Hall. Delancy Restaurant, which closed in 1983, was the last tenant until Cook began his work. The building stood empty for more than 20 years and became one of downtown’s eyesores. Today it is a showplace.

Turn right on Diamond Alley. As you head north, admire the bay windows on Hotel Diamond and imagine how they looked (and may again look) on the Morehead building.

When you reach Third Street, you will be at the northwest corner of what is now known as the Phoenix Building. Built by Jerry Noonan in 1889, it was gutted by a fire in 1975, a fate that has befallen so many downtown Chico buildings. At that time it was called Toad Hall. The latest name alludes to its resurrection after the fire.

When it was rebuilt, it was turned into a mini-mall. Most of the original brick walls remain. The building is owned by the Morehead family.

The Phoenix building has been one of Chico’s principal downtown commercial buildings for almost 120 years.

Posted by at 11:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Here’s another block anchored by a single exquisite building. As you walk the block, you will go from the ridiculous to the sublime and back again.

The Bank of America building, on the southwest corner of Broadway and Fourth Street, is the site of Nichols Hardware, a landmark business that burned down in 1950. Decades ago, Bank of America occupied the vacant building that most recently was the home of Chevy’s Restaurant.

I suppose it’s an exaggeration to call the current Bank of America building ridiculous, but it’s far from sublime. Its neighbor to the south, the Silberstein Park building, comes close to being that, however. One of the best things about the building, which will turn 100 next year, is that it looks good from both the front and back, as you can see by the photos.

Although it was designed to be an office building, Silberstein Park spent most of its life as the La Grande Hotel. At one time, a movie theater, called The Lyric, occupied the ground floor.

The hotel closed in 1982. Local developers Bob Fortino and Bud Tracy refurbished the building in 1984.

Next door to the Park Silberstein is Taco Bell. It vies with Jack in the Box across the street and the 7-11 at First and Main streets for the distinction of being the most inappropriate building in downtown Chico. Taco Bell’s predecessor, a building that stood for 50 years and housed such businesses as Hannah’s Grocery and Betty’s Dress Shop, was torn down in 1966.

Turn right on Fifth Street. All that’s left of this block is the Bank of America parking lot. But here I pay homage to the Italianate style Crew Canfield house, which stood at the northeast corner of Fifth and Salem streets from 1883 until it was torn down in 1966 to make was for the expansion of the bank’s parking lot.

It was built by Alexander Crew, who established one of Chico’s first banks in 1872.

I haven’t lost hope for this block. One day, the Bank of America and Taco Bell buildings may be torn down and be replaced by successors that are more worthy of this setting. But I’m sure the parking lot wil be with us forever.

Posted by at 06:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Here’s an impertinent question for you.

Did John and Annie Bidwell have sex?

Why would we assume they didn’t? Well, for one thing, they didn’t have chidren. And then there’s the fact that they were Victorians, who have a reputation for being uptight. Furthermore, Annie was very religious, and made sure John was as well. But does this mean they weren’t physically intimate?

This is one of the delicate topics the late Lois McDonald raised in her biography of Annie Bidwell. McDonald is convinced that John Bidwell fathered children with Indian women before he married Annie. And she doesn’t doubt for a minute that the Bidwells had sex after they were married. She even has a snippet of erotic writing to prove it.

We’ll get to that soon. But first let’s think about the Victorian era. People may have been prudish about sex, but that just means they didn’t talk about it. Back then, one of the main purposes for marriage was to have children. And in those days, you still had to have sex in order to procreate.

Britain’s Queen Victoria, for whom the era was named, had nine children in the first 18 years of marriage to Prince Albert. Then he died.

Although the Bidwells had no children, it wasn’t by choice. So you can be sure they tried.

McDonald speculates in her book that the reason Annie became violently ill early in their marriage was because she suffered a miscarriage. Then she spent a couple of weeks confined to her bed, presumably to recover.

Her bed, by the way, was their bed. Unlike a lot of wealthy Victorians, the Bidwells shared a bedroom — except whenever one of them was out of town, which happened a lot. Early in their marriage, Annie spent months at a time visiting her family in Washington, D.C. And John was often away on business trips.

Their letters — which they wrote to each other every day whenever they were parted — often express an intense longing.

In one exchange McDonald included in her book, John wrote, “While I was in Dr. Harkness’ waiting room, a man said that the juice of the pomegranate afforded great wonders in the night.”

Annie later replied, “Oh, how I long for some of your pomegranate juice — more than any other fruit.”

That’s pretty racy stuff for a couple of Victorians.

Posted by at 10:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

What a mess. Wouldn’t you know it that two days after sweeping my patio, the storm of the decade would come along, burying it and the rest of the back yard in two feet of twigs and branches.

A person visiting my back yard now wouldn't even know I have a patio.

But what can I do? Life is full of storms — meteorological and otherwise, predictably turning order into chaos and undoing progress on every front. We are doomed to go back and do the same things again.

Six months ago, I finally had a tooth that had lost a filling fixed. After congratulating myself for braving a visit to the dentist and getting the work done, the filling broke off again.

Two years ago, I had my gallbladder removed to try to put an end to bouts of wrenching pancreatitis attacks. The gallbladder was diseased, so I sighed in relief at having gotten rid of it. But a few months later the attacks returned with greater vehemence. So I had to go back and reluctantly resume my odyssey through the labyrinthine medical system.

About four years ago, I left my copy desk job at the Enterprise-Record and moved into the Style section to focus on my first love — writing. Three years later the job was eliminated and I had to go back to the desk and, except for my column “But this is Chico” and this blog, put my writing aside.

I’ve had longtime relationships fray. I try and try to mend them and think I've succeeded, only to have them unravel again.

There are things I do every day that hardly qualify as storms, yet contribute to my conviction that, as The Red Queen said to Alice in “Through the Looking Glass,” “Now, here, you see. It takes all the running you can do to keep in the same place. To get somewhere else you have to run twice as fast.”

Leave a garden untended for just a month and it will become a jungle, even without a storm to mess it up.

Then there are dirty dishes and clothes to wash, whiskers to shave, bills to pay, e-mails and phone messages to answer, children and pets to feed, broken stuff to fix — again and again and again.

Nowadays, you hear a lot of people assert “I’m a doer, I’m a problem-solver.” That’s good to hear because there are always things to do and there are so many problems that come to us unbidden.

I like to call myself a thinker and a dreamer, but I spend surprisingly little of my time in those hallowed states. When I’m not doing something that will keep me in the same place, I’m either planning for it or recovering from it.

Posted by at 11:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)