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October 1 2015 Landmark Tree Meeting Minutes Draft
Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015, 4:15 p.m.
1. Call to Order and Roll Call. The Landmark Tree Committee meeting convened at 4:18 p.m.
Present: Chair Hillson, Members Short and Swae. Excused: Members Hillan and Kida. Ms. Hui
ascertained quorum and called the agenda items.
2. Approval of Minutes of the August 6, 2015 Urban Forestry Council Landmark Tree
Committee Special Meeting. (Explanatory Document: August 6, 2015 Draft Minutes) (Discussion
and Action).
Upon Motion by Member Short, second by Member Swae, the August 6, 2015 Draft Minutes were
approved without objection (Members Hillson, Short and Swae).
3. Hearing on Nominations for Landmark Tree Status. The Landmark Tree Committee will hold a
hearing to determine whether the tree nominated at the following location meets the criteria for
designation as a landmark tree. (Discussion and Action)
Norfolk Island Pine (Araucaria heterophylla (synonym A. excelsa)), located at 46A Cook
Street, Assessor's Block 1067, Lot 032, San Francisco, CA. (Explanatory Documents: Nomination
Form, Committee and Staff Evaluation Forms, Tree Images)
Coordinator Hui asked if anybody from the Planning Commission was present as Sponsor of the
nomination. There was no representative from the Planning Commission present.
Next was Staff Report. Ms. Hui stated that from the last time, meeting, she stated that the species was
still unclear, was a nice-looking tree, and has some potential historic value, environmental value and
cultural value as well.
Next was the Property Owner's Presentation. Ms. Barry Bonaparte, attorney for the applicant, stated
that at the August 6 hearing there were some questions as to the historical significance of the tree and
the species. Ms. Bonaparte stated that in regards to the historical significance of the tree, although
there were allusions made to this tree having been connected with historical figures or historical
properties, there was insufficient or contradictory evidence that was presented at the last hearing. She stated that there was an excerpt from Here Today which was actually part of an appendix and when read in its entirety seemed to suggest no trees remained from the time of George Smith. She stated "we" showed photos from the late 1880s which showed no significant trees on that same block including the so-called "sister tree" shown in many of the photos of members of the public prior to its removal and that would have appeared in that frame of the 1885 photo. She stated that photo is now part of Mr. McNair's addendum which you (the Committee) now has; it is on the last page of that report. She stated there is a new submittal that attributed those reports added to the historical connection but it does not and is simply duplicative of the last submittal – just repackaged. She stated that included in it was a photo from the late 1940s / 1950s and in Mr. McNair's addendum compares that 1940s historic photo to the current photo which shows that the tree from the historic photo is not the same tree. Ms. Bonaparte stated that the tree in the historic photo is already quite large and mature. She stated that if this were the same tree, it would likely be already be nearing the end of its life span if not already past it. She stated that it concludes that the tree in the historic photo has since been removed and that the current tree was at best a seedling at the time. Ms. Bonaparte stated that in short the historic connection has only become more tenuous since the last hearing. Ms. Bonaparte then addressed the question on the species as to whether it had been correctly identified and heard from others that it had not. She stated there is a concern with staff weighing in with regards to substantive issues and understands that will be a question that will be addressed later on. She stated that the parties would seek more information as to the species identification whether the tree is a Norfolk Island Pine which everyone including the folks advocating landmarking had been asserting or whether it was a Cook Pine. She stated Cook Pines apparently are more rare in this area. Ms. Bonaparte stated she went to a leading authority on this and contacted Dr. Matt Ritter who is at Cal Poly and a professor in the Biological Sciences Department and a well-regarded taxonomist who specializes in plant diversity and rare species. Ms. Bonaparte stated that his opinion is that the tree is not a Cook Pine but rather a hybrid and not particularly rare because the hybrid species is fairly common in California. Ms. Bonaparte states that the documents stating the tree as a Cook Pine are wrong and not "authoritative" per Dr. Ritter. Ms. Bonaparte stated that it was important to note that when the applicants were first pushing for landmarking that they identified the tree unequivocally as a Norfolk Island Pine. Ms. Bonaparte stated that it was not until the last hearing when they sensed that their chances of landmarking were not as good if the tree was a Norfolk rather than a Cook that they came up with this new source material identifying it as a Cook Pine. Ms. Bonaparte stated that what matters is the criteria as set forth in the ordinance. Ms. Bonaparte stated that Mr. McNair and Mr. Costello, both experts in their field, have gone over the criteria and are known for calling it as they see it stated that they concluded that this tree is not suitable for landmark status. Ms. Bonaparte stated that it is a backyard tree that is not rare or distinguished and as Mr. Costello stated is unsuitable for its location and stated that in short, it was the wrong tree in the wrong place. She stated that applying the landmark criteria for it would be inappropriate.
Richard Worn who lives at 60 Cook Street spoke. He stated the tree is so big and comparing the photos – the '46/'51 photo -- is at an angle, and this tree (referring to the current photo) is along the side the house at different angles and a tree like that is sizeable and he disagrees that this one ('46/'51 photo tree) was removed and another one (current) was put in there and that is just physically impossible. Mr. Worn produced a letter to verify the species from Laura Money-Brodick and read it: To Whom It May Concern, My name is Laura Money-Brodick. I am the field botany teacher for the Potomac ? School of Herbal Studies and many others around the United States. I often have to make very precise and important differentiations between species due to the fact that I study plants with the intention of harvesting them to make herbal medicine. For this reason, I look to often small distinctions to make positive identifications between plants that may look quite similar to the mortal eye. For the tree in
dispute on Cook Street, one can look to Hortus Third and read through the technical descriptions of both Araucaria columnaris and the Araucaria heterophylla to make that positive identification. Our botanical classification system of binomial nomenclature is based on reproductive parts of plants. So let's examine the cones of both species. Mr. Worn referred to the Hortus Third document (in the packet).
Vanessa Rituolo ? or Jenn Levitt ? stated that it was brought up at the last meeting that "we" had misrepresented the historic status of the property at the time and were not educated on the correct terminology at the time; and to clarify these buildings had been deemed "Category A historic resources" by the city and are shown on the SF Planning Department website as such. She asked that the committee refer to the SF Heritage correspondence written by the Senior Project Manager, Desiree Smith. Ms. Levitt stated that Ms. Smith, after having discussed this with several members of SF Heritage they think this property has the potential to be designated as landmark and encouraged "us" to consider the entire property as historic including the buildings and the landscape. Ms. Levitt stated they have begun the process of landmarking the buildings as well. Ms. Levitt asked that the worthiness of the tree to be landmarked be looked at per the criteria in the ordinance; specifically, the undeniable evidence that this tree is a significant historical landmark and wanted to ensure (the committee) read the historical material submitted and refer to the evidence of the historical timeline that was sent a few weeks ago.
Levi Levitt stated that they did come to the last meeting stating that it was a Cook Pine and did not change their minds and came into the meeting stating what it was. He stated he also had two arborists independent of each other saying that it was a Cook. Mr. Levitt stated that in the packet (of documents for the committee) – he and his wife started also thinking that it might be a hybrid – in the packet, there was something from "Flora-something" that talks about how all hybrids are classified as Cooks. So Cook being one of the things we look to establish rarity -- that evidence goes directly into that. Mr. Levitt asked if "you all" (the committee) had read the packets and mentioned the historical presence, the species identified and the Hortus Third that is put out by Cornell and seems to be a pretty viable source. Mr. Levitt stated we have learned about historical assets and historical landmarks for the property and did not know that before and they did not know they were misbehaving when saying it was a landmark property but a "Historic resource -- A," the highest historical resource category before a landmark and apologized for that. Mr. Levitt brought up that there was the mention of abusing the landmark tree ordinance. Mr. Levitt stated that in the two months between the time tree people who were cutting down the trees and finally got this thing protected, Dale Rogers could have cut down the tree had he wanted to. Mr. Levitt said he (Mr. Rogers) never said that he wants to, said it was the wrong tree in the wrong spot but he made no attempts to actually cut it down. So Mr. Levitt said we are not abusing the landmark ordinance by landmarking this beautiful tree. Mr. Levitt stated that it almost seems that if "we" were to not landmark it, that would be a reverse abuse of the same ordinance.
Veronica Beasley ?, Environmental Studies student at SFSU. She stated that she came across this tree as a landmark and stated even though the species is questionable, and the age 70 to 125 years, the tree provides a great environmental benefit because it is a large tree; and it contributes to the biodiversity and to help conserve nature. She feels that if it inflicts no harm or consequences of the tree, she stated it can make it.
James McNair stated that in regards to species, Dr. Ritter has pretty much laid to rest the issue of the species and explained why there was so much controversy because it is a hybrid so that it has characteristics of both. Mr. McNair stated that being a hybrid does not mean that it is necessarily superior and it means it has a mixture of genetics between the species and he stated that he does not think that anybody has demonstrated that this tree is really special in a genetic sense. Mr. McNair stated that in terms of the historical or rarity, he noted that there was a reference to the urbanforest map that
showed 15 Norfolk Island Pines in the city. Mr. McNair stated that as "we" drove in on Lombard, "we" saw 5 just driving down Lombard and turning on Van Ness. Mr. McNair stated that he spoke to Peter Erlich in the Presidio and he stated he has at least 20 so the number is much greater than what has been put out there in terms of the 15 and he stated now he is up to 50 and he believes a lot of them are probably hybrids than we previously realized. Mr. McNair went on to historical significance and he stated he did the comparison with the two photos virtually in the same location as the circa 1946 photo (compared to current photo) when he took it and stated it is not the same tree and that it makes sense in terms of its condition now. Mr. McNair states that the subject tree was probably planted in the 1940s, 50s when the tree shown in the 1946 photo was removed and someone had planted a replacement tree and believes that this is pretty likely.
Larry Costello, consulting arborist, stated that he put together a short report that was sent hours ago and was not sure if (the committee) got that but that there were three key points, tree identification, location or suitability for location, and unintended consequences of landmark action. Mr. Costello stated that in his mind, Matt Ritter is the statewide authority on tree identification and if he says it is a hybrid, he believes that so Mr. Costello stated it is not heterophylla and it is not columnaris. Mr. Costello asked, "Is it a named hybrid? No.;" "Is it a 50-50 hybrid of the two? We don't know. Could be. Could be 75-25 mix." Mr. Costello said there are a lot of questions about its identity. Mr. Costello asked, "Does it have traits that are more desirable than the species? It may, we don't know;" "Does it have traits that are less desirable? It may, we don't know." Mr. Costello stated that we really don't have a good understanding of the tree that is being landmarked and that that was of concern to him. Mr. Costello stated that hybrids are not rare according to Matt (Ritter). Mr. Costello stated that secondly, the suitability of the location, it is just a large tree on a small lot. Mr. Costello stated that perhaps long ago, if that was the tree, perhaps it is OK on a large estate. Mr. Costello stated that Sunset states and other references state that it should be in parks and larger properties and open spaces; and Mr. Costello stated that there is a risk involved here.
Committee member evaluations:
Carla Short stated that she did her evaluation based on the fact that this was a Norfolk Island Pine. She also stated that at the last meeting, she had also reached out to an expert who was also Dr. Matt Ritter and she is also convinced that it is a hybrid if that is what he believes it is because he knows far better than she. Ms. Short stated that Mr. Ritter indicated to her that while it is not uncommon, certainly he was not aware of a huge quantity of these in San Francisco; and she stated that the other, saying she was unsure of going over all the physical attributes and everything else she found last time, stated that she was struggling with this one a lot because she is intrigued by the notion that it is a hybrid and how many of our Norfolk Island Pines are hybrids and how many are Cook Pines and she stated it actually makes it a little more significant to her that it is a hybrid although if it turns out that most of what we have are hybrids then it suddenly becomes more common but stated that she thinks we don't know. Again, Ms. Short says from her perspective that that is what is what makes it more intriguing. Ms. Short stated that there are some real challenges to not knowing what we have although we have a precedent for that because we did that with Rose's (tree). Ms. Short stated that she was very swayed by the amount of neighborhood support for this and that is one of the factors that we weigh. Ms. Short stated that she was very concerned about the use of the ordinance to prevent development from happening and worries about potential backlash and the unintended consequences that Dr. Costello noted and are valid concerns and that was something we talked about early on when the Landmark Ordinance itself was being created – did we need to worry that people would go out and remove big trees because they were afraid of that; and Ms. Short stated that she does not believe she has seen too much of that but that is something to be aware of. Ms. Short, at this point, stated that she was struggling with what her vote would be at this point.
Ms. Hillson stated that at the full Urban Forestry Council, it was stated that the Committee decided that the tree was in good condition, it had distinguished form, it does not provide erosion control, not an interdependent group of trees but had neighborhood appreciation. Ms. Hillson stated she had a list of all the previous landmark trees and stated that all the trees did not hit every single criteria. Ms. Hillson stated that her tree did not hit every single criteria and was also unknown and it hit the one mark that was rarity because it is the only one in the city. Ms. Hillson also stated that there was another tree, a redwood, on Market Street. She stated there was community support for it and did not hit on much of the other ones but it was community support. Ms. Hillson stated that this was like a crap shoot because nobody knows who is going to think what and that this whole thing is going to end up at the Board of Supervisors if the Urban Forestry Council decides a certain way though it is not known yet but Ms. Hillson put it out there. Ms. Hillson then asked Ms. Bonaparte to clarify her prior explanation of the 1885 picture from the Bancroft Library and which tree she was referring to in comparison to the 1946 picture. Ms. Hillson asked Ms. Bonaparte whether this (pointed to tree in upper left of 1885 photo) was the tree that did not have or is the tree, or it didn't have any trees on that lot in 1885. Ms. Bonaparte responded that the (1885) photo was meant to show the absence of large trees in that lot and she stated the tree in question would be to the right of the frame and so is not seen but the "sister tree" is not even shown. Ms. Hillson then brought up that the neighbors had a trunk cutting of the other "sister tree" and if it is true that it was estimated to be 120 years, Ms. Hillson was thinking 2015 minus 120 years would be 1895 and this (photo) is 1885; and if 10 years later the guy had planted these trees, that is one thing we do not know either. Ms. Hillson said that is something that will probably never be figured out but that she was putting that out there because the years and the dates of the photos what could be calculated to this year is another factor that is unknown along with whether the species is a hybrid.
Mr. Swae stated that he had questions regarding historical significance. He spoke to the Planning Department's Historic Preservation staff and according to them, in order for a tree to be landmarkable based on its historical attributes from their perspective, the tree would not have to just be of a certain age but associated with some exceptional element of history of San Francisco. Mr. Swae stated that so as discussed in the last hearing, the building is mentioned in the Here Today book and was determined to be historically significant, but Mr. Swae stated that he learned from the Historic Preservation staff that the historical significance is really based on the architectural significance of the property – the 46 Cook property – and not related necessarily to the historic person or event associated with the property. Mr. Swae stated that for the nominated tree to receive a landmark designation because of its historic significance would require the tree or the landscape to be associated with a historic event or person or a historically designed landscape which he stated he believes we don't have evidence for. Mr. Swae stated that a good example of this are the blue gum eucalyptus on Octavia Street which were planted by Mary Ellen Pleasant who was involved with the Underground Railroad during the Gold Rush and was clearly a historic person at the time so Mr. Swae does not see, in his perspective, to landmark the tree based on the historic associations with past residents or any historic event. Mr. Swae stated that it is clear it is a beautiful tree and of quite some age. Mr. Swae stated that as he stated at the last hearing he encouraged that the Council explore new alternative protections of trees on private property outside of the landmark tree designation process.
Ms. Hui stated that she wanted to note that she was asked if it was appropriate that she provide a report. Ms. Hui stated that it was her job to provide a report. Ms. Hui stated that the documents that came in from the community members, she did identify to Ms. Bonaparte were emailed so she did have that information and the last point is that the Urban Forestry Council has evaluated specimens of unknown species and they have been landmarked so that is not necessarily a problem.
Next was Property Owner Rebuttal:
Ms. Bonaparte stated that as a follow-up to what Rose was saying that not all criteria have to be met and she understands that but that unlike yours (Rose's) and probably most other landmark situations if not all of them it's not the property owner nominating it. Ms. Bonaparte stated that you have a backyard tree on a property, the owner of which is objecting to the landmark of his own tree. She stated that he was asked for access to his property for the Committee to inspect and he respectfully declined to provide access because he was opposing the process. Regardless of that objection, apparently there were photos taken of his property without his permission in order to count rings and others have been taken of his property without his permission. Apparently a pine cone was removed from his property and taken without his permission. Ms. Bonaparte stated that all of this started when he started to embark on a property improvement project including some tree removal. Ms. Bonaparte stated that that's not what the Landmark Ordinance is for; that is not what this Committee is for. She stated that as Mr. Costello stated in his report that if you were to landmark under these unusual circumstances you would not only be harming the credibility of this Committee and its good works but the Committee would be encouraging the pre-emptive removal of large beautiful trees in order to avoid what is happening here; and for these reasons she encouraged (the Committee) to end the matter now.
Committee discussion and action: Ms. Hillson stated that Ms. Bonaparte mentioned that it does not hit on every single point, clarity, definite species being known, the fact that her (Rose's) tree is rare but it is she (Rose) who put in the nomination as opposed to some property owner who did not want it done and the sequoia on Market Street was one that was landmarked because the property owner didn't want it but it still happened and the plans were looked at and everything through Planning Department so we have two things that have already happened in the past and this is a hard one. Ms. Hillson stated that she was in the Community Seat, so from that perspective, I see the petitions and the enthusiasm and importance they place on this large tree and it was the same with the redwood tree and that's why she is on the Council to represent the community. Other than that, Ms. Hillson wanted to hear other members comments. Ms. Hillson stated that it was interesting that there were only 3 out of the 5 (Committee members) today.
Ms. Short stated that even if the Committee all voted 'No' today, it does not end today. Ms. Short explained that it will go to full Council and it will vote on it and it can potentially move on to the Board of Supervisors. Ms. Short stated it was a tough one for her. She stated that she usually looks for more than one criterion to be met and in the past, even though the neighbors value trees and she is in her job because she loves trees and appreciate when people care about their environment and their community and is effected by that but that alone has not been sufficient to sway her personally to vote for trees and she stated she voted against the Giant Sequoia on Market Street but it got landmark status anyway. Ms. Short stated that we think we do not have enough on the historical connection to make her feel like we are meeting that criterion. Ms. Short stated that she is struggling with is that she does not really know if it is rare enough for her to say this makes sense. Ms. Short stated that, with the belief that she feels the neighbors really love this tree, she felt that the neighbors would like to see it landmarked whether anyone has any intention to remove it or not but the reality is they were spurred into action because of concern that it would be removed. Ms. Short stated she was very uncomfortable with the Landmark Ordinance potentially being used in that way. Ms. Short stated she was not really sure but those were her thoughts.
Mr. Swae stated that his two holdouts were the rarity of the species, which from what he was hearing, is that it is not super rare and that even the hybrids are not super rare. He stated that he has seen a lot of Norfolks around the city and that the urbanforest map is definitely not as accurate and maybe someday it will be. (Ms. Short chimed in to agree and stated that she does not believe anybody is relying on that for rarity.) Mr. Swae then talked about the historical piece; and when he spoke to the Preservation folks to clarify, he stated that the property is actually historical because of its architecture and we don't have
it associated with a key individual or event or something to make it related specifically to that tree. Mr. Swae stated that those were the two big holdouts for him and he does not really see a strong case in either of those.
Ms. Short stated that today she felt there was not a ton of new information and is now convinced that it is now a hybrid. She stated that she wished there was clearer confirmation of what that meant in terms of its rarity. She stated that Matt (Ritter) told her that he did not think they were very common in San Francisco though – the hybrids. Ms. Short stated that in order to be sure, his grad student would actually have to actually take samples to look at the genetics.
Ms. Hillson asked about the hybrids that Matt Ritter said are not rare if there were any peer-review papers? She stated that somebody mentioned that there was some "Flora" document. Ms. Hillson read the line from the document: "One popular theory holds that many Norfolk Island Pines in the Hawaiian Islands are all of hybrid origin but pollen of the two species (heterophylla and columnaris) is shed 6 months apart making hybridization unlikely. These reported hybrid trees are virtually all Cook Pines." Ms. Hillson stated the document is in Tropical Garden Flora.
Ms. Short stated that if Matt Ritter has a Ph.D. and his student is actually taking genetic testing and finding that these are hybrids, then she would put a little more stock in that. Ms. Short stated she was not sure if this (Tropical Garden Flora) was peer-reviewed or not but also stated that the document was from 2005 and a lot may have changed since then in terms of genetics systems. Ms. Hillson stated she just wanted to clarify.
Ms. Hillson sympathized regarding property owners, not property owners, figuring out the species or not figuring out the species, and all of these scenarios have come up before; and her vote was not going to make any difference with the three of us. Ms. Hillson made a motion to support landmarking this unknown hybrid tree at 46A Cook. No second, motion failed.
Ms. Short did not particularly want to make the motion to not support the nomination so Mr. Swae made the motion to not support the nomination to landmark the tree. Ms. Short seconded the motion.
Roll call vote on motion to not support: Ayes: Short, Swae; Noes: Hillson. (2 to 1)
Ms. Hui stated that there was no quorum vote and the motion does not pass. She stated the tree nomination will move forward to the full Council with no recommendation from the Committee.
4. Landmark Tree Visible Identification. The Committee will discuss on-site identification of landmark trees. (Discussion)
Ms. Hillson stated that the reason for having this topic was that Mei Ling, Dan Kida and Carla Short have been working on these markers for the trees. She stated there has been discussion since 2008 on this; the design is already made, and it was voted by the Council that these be made and it was put on the back burner until Dan has time to go out and look at the landmark trees and that was the last status. Ms. Hillson stated that she was at the Historic Preservation Commission meeting when Mei Ling was giving her presentation on the Cook tree and an item came up on their agenda on how they were going to get markers for landmark buildings. Ms. Hillson then thought about their funding stream because it is for landmarking. Ms. Hillson reported that the Historic Preservation commissioners discussed sources such as SF Travel, having funding from Friends of City Planning, funding programs, hotel tax, Visitors and Convention Bureau, and if there is any way to expedite this (for tree markers) – and Ms. Hillson does not know if it has to go through the Planning & Funding
Committee (of UFC), although she doubts it because it was already voted on at the full Council and because it has been done since 2008 and not wanting to keep creating motions to do this.
Ms. Hui gave some historic background in that SFE (SF Environment Department) had a small budget for materials that they were going to use to buy plaques and that budget disappeared so that is where the design came from. Ms. Hillson stated the circular design with the Monterey, and Ms. Hui stated the tree that is in front of McLaren Lodge, the City tree. Ms. Hui stated that ultimately we need to decide what would work for DPW and if we can go in the sidewalk before we do anything on this.
Ms. Short stated that the question was about where the marker goes. If it is in the sidewalk, it was going to be a problem but if it was in the tree well, it probably was not going to be a problem. Ms. Short stated that something had to be found that could be within the tree basin. Ms. Short stated that if it is in the sidewalk and if somebody is willing and able to maintain it, unless the adjacent property owner says it is find and they are willing to maintain it, Ms. Short stated that typically if it is in the sidewalk itself there needs to be a permit to put something in the sidewalk and a long-term maintenance agreement. She stated if it is within the tree basin, we could just have it there.
Ms. Hillson also contacted the Japantown people who had the 150-year Cherry Blossom tree installation and the fan on Webster and all the trees had small plaques. There was a grant and also people contributed $500 for a tree and a plaque. Ms. Hillson restated it was $500 for a tree AND (with emphasis) a plaque, and when she submitted information to the Committee back in 2014…Ms. Short interjected and stated that those trees were heavily subsidized. Ms. Hillson stated that these are the things that we do not know about. She stated that she would like to get the funding straightened out. Mr. Swae asked if there was a cost estimate and Ms. Hillson stated she gave information in 2014 on vendors' names for concrete stamps.
Ms. Short stated that there could be a little concrete thing but it would need to be in the tree well itself and not be in the sidewalk; but if it is in the sidewalk, it is going to have to be through a permit process and there is going to have to be some willingness from whoever is formally responsible for that sidewalk.
Ms. Hillson stated that she did send out the vendor information in July '14 and she contacted them but the vendors could not give a quote without knowing the size of the stamps.
Ms. Short then questioned about PG&E and their willing to fund the effort because that was one of the reasons she thought Dan was going out to look at the trees. Ms. Hui stated that Dan said there is a small grant funds that could pay for the stamp but not for the plaques. Ms. Hui stated it would be an amount "sub-a-thousand" dollars, under a thousand dollars, though there was no specificity with that. Ms. Hui stated that we could ask Dan what is available.
Mr. Swae stated it would be good to get some cost estimates. Ms. Hui stated that initially the discussion for the markers and the permitting was only for trees that were publicly accessible and that was probably for sidewalks maintained by Rec and Park or DPW in a lot of cases. Ms. Short stated that private property sidewalks are maintained by the adjacent property owner. She stated that if the tree is in an area specifically maintained by the city for the sidewalk, the city might take care of that; but the sidewalk is the responsibility of the private property owner adjacent. Ms. Hui brought up the trees on the Dolores median or the Quesada median or trees off of Third with trees not directly associated with the property. Ms. Short stated that median trees are the city responsibility and street trees are the responsibility of the adjacent property owner. Ms. Short stated that those median trees would be DPW responsibility.
Mr. Swae asked about the tree well option, whether it was a plaque or what. Ms. Short stated it could be a plaque that would be in the tree well and should be flush. Ms. Short stated that FUF used to do it with a little thing that they set in the concrete in the tree well; and it could be a concrete thing like a concrete brick that is dug in and most people wouldn't dig it out. Ms. Short stated that if it is metal, people would dig it out. Mr. Swae did not think that this sounds as if it would be that costly.
Ms. Hillson stated that, since FUF was mentioned, it was FUF that did the Japantown cherry trees; and we have the sources – Dan with FUF -- and by the next meeting would like to come up with something a bit more definite and we are not getting anywhere and this is not some topic she even started.
Ms. Hui asked if we were to get a concrete stamp, would that be something DPW could use to stamp a brick. Ms. Short stated that there is a frame and wet concrete and just stamp it. She stated that there would need to be someone to administer this and there is not DPW staff for this.
Ms. Hillson commented that if somebody could get her potential dimensions, she would start calling and get some work done. Mr. Swae asked what information would there be on the stamp. Ms. Hillson responded that in Ms. Hui's design, it said, "City and County of San Francisco," "Landmark Tree" and a picture of the Monterey Cypress from the park. Ms. Hui added that on the design they had before, there was also a flat space that could be engraved with a number or ID as it relates to a "QR" code so people would have something to look up to get more information. Ms. Hillson stated that on the Planning website, people can look up the number and get the additional information.
Mr. Swae asked if there were names of contractors for stamped concrete bricks. Ms. Short mentioned Sunset Concrete. Ms. Short stated she could ask what her crew would cost but she would need dimensions.
Ms. Short thought the size cannot be too small or large to be legible nor too big for tree basins. Ms. Hillson (looking at Ms. Short's sizing with her hands) suggested maybe 9"x9" and Mr. Swae stated there could be one skinny and short since some of the basins are almost all trunk.
Ms. Hui stated we needed to go out to look at the trees. Ms. Hillson does not want to duplicate Dan's work but is willing to look at the trees for markers. Ms. Hui stated Dan did go out to look for obvious conflicts for markers and to look at maps for underground conflicts. Ms. Hui stated that he has already performed all the site visits of all the trees. Ms. Hillson stated she will ask Dan what he has done thus far. Ms. Hui stated that Dan did not take measurements and were not thinking about markers in the tree wells at the time they went out to check the trees.
Ms. Short asked about what the sidewalk trees were. Ms. Hillson had a list of the landmark trees for Ms. Short to reference. Ms. Hui will ask the public library (for the flowering ash) could be tight. The other is the blue elderberry with a sidewalk across the way but is on Rec & Park land. Ms. Hillson will do the site visits.
Mr. Swae stated maybe the Committee can come up with some dimensions that would work for all cases and come up with some cardboard models for sizing. He stated perhaps we need two sizes and it would not be too expensive.
5. Landmark Tree Process. The Committee will discuss steps in the Landmark Tree evaluation process from application submittal to hearing at Urban Forestry Council to Board of Supervisors. (Discussion)
Ms. Hillson explained that this topic was instigated by the situation that occurred at Planning Commission when the commissioners got a Landmark Nomination Form and they did not know what to do with it except stating they had no tree expertise. She stated that she hoped there was a documented process to show the commission members that this is the process and staff and committee members move on and the process is not even on the website and then somebody has to go before the commission to explain the process all again. Ms. Hillson is not sure how city agencies handle this but maybe a memo to potential city agencies who are potential nominators of trees, perhaps a Director's letter or something, so that it is more clarifying to everyone.
Mr. Swae stated perhaps a flowchart. Ms. Hillson can draw a flowchart from what she presented and bring it back to committee. Ms. Hillson stated that she can draw a flowchart based on what Mei Ling presented and later on can bring that back to review. As well, the stated that later on, there is a need to look also at the Nomination Form because that also caused some uncertainty on people's part because it said, "Authorized nominator: Planning Commission." Ms. Hillson asked if it was the entire Planning Commission or a member of the Planning Commission; and that when they have that done, nobody signs off on it from Planning and there is no space for anyone to sign off on anything.
Ms. Hui stated that that process is defined by ordinance – how the Planning Commission makes a nomination, how the Historic Preservation Commission makes the nomination – that is identified in the ordinance.
Ms. Hillson stated, people ask is it a tree on private property or not, is it the owner that's nominating it or not. She referred to the Nomination Form for today's tree hearing and read who could nominate a tree: Property owner, Board of Supervisors member, Head of a department or city agency, Planning Commission member. She stated that on the other part, it states Board of Supervisors – the whole thing, Planning Commission – the whole thing; and it is not real clear. Ms. Hillson states there is Richard Worn nominating the tree as a member of the public but is he the owner? Some of these things are not clear.
Ms. Short agrees and she said the Ordinance refers to the Historic Preservation Commission as the Landmarks Preservation Advisory Board and thinks having a flowchart would help people and to clean this up a little to make it a little more user-friendly. Ms. Short stated that maybe we need words to say, please indicate if you are the following or have checkboxes to indicate if you are the property owner. Ms. Short agrees that the form it is not intuitive to people and if someone from the Historic Preservation Commission is approached, they don't know what to do with it since this is the first time they ever did it. Ms. Hillson stated that one of the HPC commissioners stated that none of them have tree knowledge so what are they going to do with this?
Ms. Hillson stated that was what got her thinking about process and that it may not just be the Nomination Form to look at. Some person questioning the process we use here in Committee; and for full disclosure, she was contacted by Dr. Costello who questioned about whether staff should say anything during this and Ms. Hillson stated that it has been the process. Ms. Hillson stated if it needed to be changed, probably not but she did not know and people had questions. The Committee wanted to know what Dr. Costello's concern was and Ms. Hillson responded that he questioned why the staff was giving an analysis when not part of the Committee and Ms. Hillson stated it was part of DOE, the staff analysis and it has always been like that for every other nomination and it has always been like that and asked Ms. Hillson to bring it up but she explained to Committee that she rather have him bring it up in case she were to misinterpret his words. Ms. Hillson stated that anyway, there were questions about process.
Ms. Hui stated that she had never heard anything like that before and was always asked to provide an analysis. Ms. Short stated that it has been consistent even when Grace was in that (Ms. Hui's) job. Ms. Short stated that whether it is appropriate is a bigger question. Ms. Hillson stated that she was only stating it and not making it up as she has an email on it. Ms. Hillson stated that the biggest concern right now was to deal with the next Nomination Form that comes in and what if it gets to Planning or HPC so she wants to get at least a flowchart started for the commission people. Mr. Swae stated that it would really be helpful and to get just a rough draft he could help on his end. Ms. Short stated maybe there needs to something very specific for each type of nomination but stated it would be helpful for the public to know because she gets calls a lot and got calls about this tree. Ms. Hillson stated maybe two charts with one for the public. Ms. Short stated she thinks it would be helpful to have a process chart for everyone. Ms. Short stated maybe one for each of the five different nominators.
Ms. Hui said that it might be good to have that because trees get protections at different stages so for the nominators we want to know when that happens.
Ms. Hillson states she can make a flowchart and work on that.
Ms. Short stated that maybe there could be a graphic person. Mr. Swae said he can look into that.
Ms. Hillson said that the next meeting will probably be in December since she does not think she will get it done by early November.
Ms. Hui asked if we would talk about changing of the code for Landmarks Advisory Board to Historic Preservation Commission and for Landmark Nomination Form edits and stated that in the past all those edits have gone to the Board of Supervisors for approval. Ms. Hillson stated that there was the one she worked on (with Committee) from 2012 to 2014 with Carla, Chris Buck and we took it to the full Urban Forestry Council and it was up to DPW city attorney to look at it or something and that is where it sat. Ms. Hillson stated we did revise the Nomination Form, the grove thing and worked on the code for a long time. Ms. Short stated that she thinks the feedback was that our city attorney did not like it. Ms. Hillson stated then so we leave the grove language out and we stick with this.
Ms. Short stated that we need to go through some edits but if we did go through this process we will find where we need to do it and we can do it all at once rather than doing them piecemeal.
Ms. Hillson will work on the flowchart and look at the trees (for the marker idea).
Public Comment: Levi Levitt stated that he would like to volunteer when he can. Ms. Hillson stated that he can come to the next meeting to see where we are on the process even though it is time-consuming but under the Brown and Sunshine Ordinance, we cannot hide things behind closed doors. Ms. Short stated that he could attend the next meeting and if we have a flowchart, Mr. Levitt can potentially validate or see where the holes are in the current process and the timing of things.
6. New Business/Future Agenda Items. (Information and Discussion)
Ms. Short stated that one of the Mary Ellen Pleasant trees is in decline, pretty substantial. She stated that we have never removed a landmark tree before and believes we will have to initiate that. Ms. Short can bring to the next Committee an evaluation and photos to document it. Ms. Short was not sure about the code to see if this Committee has to make a recommendation for that part. Ms. Hillson had happened to have brought the code that pertained to the removal of landmark trees. Ms. Short read parts of it about the Council shall develop and recommend for adoption by the Board uniform criteria, rules and procedures governing determination to remove landmark trees. Ms. Short stated
that there is criteria for removal for emergencies and would like to do this before it becomes an emergency. Ms. Hillson asked if it was leaning. Ms. Short said it is leaning a little but that that lean was not an issue but it was in decline. Ms. Short continued to read the code. She stated that we can recommend rules, procedures to the Board but in the interim can follow street tree process. Ms. Short stated that maybe it's not so urgent we do that but someday we should -- recommend rules, procedures to remove landmark trees. Removal criteria rules, criteria for landmark tree as new business.
7. Public Comment. Members of the public may address the Committee on matters that are within the Committee's jurisdiction and are not on today's agenda.
Levi Levitt asked whether establishing a dialogue with members of the Committee outside of these meetings is illegal or not. Mr. Levitt mentioned that the packets are thick and instead of having a dialogue, it felt like he was talking at the Committee. He asked if there was a way through emails or telephone calls or if everything was done at these meetings. Ms. Hillson stated that one of the things governing city meetings is the Brown Act and the Sunshine Ordinance and asked Ms. Hui to correct her if she was wrong; but that if someone has something to share with the whole Committee, it is sent to the Coordinator and she can get it out to the Committee. Ms. Hui stated that Committee members and Council members are not to be talking to each other about business outside meetings. Mr. Swae believes that committee members are allowed to speak to members of the public. Ms. Short stated she speaks to the public as part of her job. Mr. Swae stated that Planning commissioners speak to members of the public. Ms. Hui stated that UFC has not published any of the members' contact information because there has not been permission given by the members to publish their private contact information. Ms. Hui stated that that might be a question for the full Council on whether people want to have their contact information distributed. Some people – who work for the city – already have the information available but some people have not. Ms. Hui stated that she thinks it is dependent on what the Committee/Council wants re contact information. Ms. Short stated that the general reason for all was to ensure that everybody has access to the same information and prevent somebody from lobbying a Committee and other people not knowing what they are saying. Mr. Levitt stated something about a couple of notes; and Ms. Hui stated that they were very specific restrictions about taking gifts.
Mr. Swae stated that he understands what Mr. Levitt is saying in that it creates a kind of awkward format and does not create an opportunity for dialogue or human conversation. Ms. Hillson stated that she was warned not to engage in conversation about itemized things on the agenda outside of the meetings. Ms. Hillson stated that was why she disclosed the thing about staff reports otherwise anyone can say do this, do that, influencing any one of us.
Mr. Levitt stated they had to sit and listen to the lies about the materials and all the materials are still there on the property. Ms. Hui chimed in that this is beginning to be a discussion on a non-agendized item. Ms. Short stated that it is allowed to be non-agendized because that is what public comment…
Ms. Hui stated that public comment was for, with feedback from her city attorney, was that we can provide brief answers mostly about agendizing items for the future. Ms. Hui stated that if we were engaging in a conversation on an item that is not agendized then it is against the rules and we should probably turn it off.
Mr. Levitt started to speak about the garden cemeteries that this tree was from. Ms. Hui interjected to ask if this was about something to do with the landmark tree that was on the agenda today. He stated he thought so. Ms. Hui stated that this (time period) was for items not on the agenda. Mr. Levitt stated that he misunderstood what the public comment at the end was for the entirety of the meeting. He apologized for misunderstanding.
Ms. Hillson stated that was another process thing. Mr. Levitt asked if it was OK to send Ms. Hui emails and she stated he can always send emails to her and the Committee members would get them as soon as she is able and today she got some emails that she was not able to get out to "you guys" but she did not get them until this morning.
Minutes written and submitted by Chair Hillson (October 16, 2015).
Copies of explanatory documents are available to the public at (1) the Department of Environment, 1455 Market Street, Suite 1200, San Francisco, California 94103 between the hours of 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., (2) or may be available at the Landmark Tree Committee Meeting website http://www.sfenvironment.org/about/taskforce/urban-forestry-council/agendas posted with each agenda or meeting minutes, or 3) upon request to the Council Secretary at the above address, telephone number 415-355-3709, or via e-mail at [email protected] Audio recordings of all meetings can be accessed at the following website https://sites.google.com/a/sfenvironment.org/commission/urban-forestry-council/urban-forestry-council-and-committee-meeting-audios
Meeting mintues submitted by Chair Rose Hillson.
100115_landmark_tree_minutes_draft.pdf


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1987 was the transformative year for the label as we started to take on the rest of the Fantasy catalogue: Stax and the Creedence Clearwater Revival albums; then, in 1988, Prestige, Riverside, Milestone and all the other jazz Fantasy had tucked away. Pablo was added in 1989 and this all culminated in all the jazz labels being housed under the OJC umbrella in 1992. More of this later, but it had a big impact on what we were doing and even in the new Harlesden premises we were rapidly running out of space so we bought two adjoining buildings to expand the warehouse.
We also started two new labels to accommodate very different styles of music.
Initially BGP stood for Baz [Fe Jazz], Gilles [Peterson] Productions. The label was aimed at a different dance floor from the one that the Northern soul of Kent records was being played on. Named Rare Groove back then, though it went through a number of name changes, including Wah Wah Jazz. The first BGP release was a Mongo Santamaria compilation, the ideal Latin/jazz mix for the times. Right through its life the vast majority of BGP releases were drawn from the Fantasy jazz labels..
BLUE HORIZON was producer Mike Vernon's label. It started in 1965 with a Hubert Sumlin outing and eventually mixed US-licensed material with recordings by Fleetwood Mac, Chicken Shack, Duster Bennett as well as US bluesmen like Otis Span and Eddie Boyd.
The early recordings ended up in the maw of CBS Records but Mike retained the label name. So, together, we resurrected it and as expected he brought us impeccably produced recordings by Blues And Trouble and Louisiana's Lazy Lester and over the next nine years a series of mainly local blues and R&B artists. Mike also features in the Ace story as producer and later member of Rocky Sharpe and the Replays. A real gent to do business with.
We gradually eased into the deal with Fantasy, initially taking in the Stax catalogue and then Creedence Clearwater Revival. Our contact was their overseas licensing person, the highly knowledgeable Bill Belmont. He brought the labels to us piecemeal. At the start we weren't sure we could handle such huge catalogues, so easing into them was actually a blessing.
When the post-Atlantic Stax (the finger clicking logo) came our way we got straight down to business, issuing original albums by the Staple Singers, Shirley Brown and Jean Knight. By the end of the year we had not only issued our first STAX CD, a Best Of the Staple Singers but at the other end of sound-carrying history, 20 classic 45s.
Leon René and his brother Otis formed the twin labels Exclusive and Excelsior in 1944, the first black-owned record companies in theUS. When they closed, Leon started Class Records and later Rendezvous. As soon as we cut a license we made a bee line for the Bobby Day "'Rockin' Robin" album - and not just because Michael Jackson had a hit with the song. There was more to those labels than just one big bird hit. They issued a wide range of discs: from B. Bumble and the Stingers novelty records to the svelte proto soul of Eugene Church.
Another new licensing arrangement was the Challenge catalogue - which included the biggest B-side with the best break, in the shape and sound of 'Tequila' by the Champs. Challenge was founded by the unlikely figure of the singing cowboy Gene Autry and, within less than a year, it had its first #1 with 'Tequila'. Its A&R ran the gamut from country to soul via rock'n'roll. It 'stayed in tune with the kids' right through the 60s with hits from the Knickerbockers, the very best of the Beatles sound-a-likes. It even gave a home to aging rocker Gene Vincent for some great swansong sides. An ideal fit for Ace. Roger went to Nashville and copied the Challenge tapes at Cowboy Jack Clement's studio with original co-owner Joe Johnson in attendance – surely that's not the smell of jazz cigarettes?
Another old time industry mover and shaker was Harry Maselow, with whom a deal was cut in a diner in Hollywood for two disparate albums: Dobie Gray's "In Crowd" and Terry Stafford with the superb original of Elvis' 'Suspicion'.
Kent continued to flourish. We even had several cassettes on the label. This new-fangled CD thing would never work on the dance floor.
GlobeStyle cut the wonderful Sudanese singer Abdel Aziz El Mubarak in a single afternoon session. Mixed that night, the recording became an instant classic of what was about to be referred to as World Music. That term came out of a series of meetings at the Empress Of Russia public house near the Angel, Islington. The aim was to create a rack in a record shop and promote the whole range of non-Anglo music, from Azerbaijan to Zanzibar. The term still divides people. Some find it patronising and anglo-centric and others think it is useful for marketing. There is no doubt it helped to sell a lot of records over the years, for a lot of non-anglo artists.
By the end of the year we had put out 34 more CDs, but still vinyl reigned. More than 100 12" slabs of vinyl, all in those lovely big picture sleeves, came out. And there were, in fact, even more cassettes than CDs.
Though it appeared to be a normal June, halfway through 1987 the last "Teenage Rock'n'Roll Party (Vol 7)" was released.
Roger's unlikely favourite album reissues of the year – "Soft Machine 1 and 2".
This was a quiet year for the Ace label but there was a wave of issues of material from the Fantasy, Prestige and Riverside jazz catalogues. There were good showings from GlobeStyle and Kent was dancing away nicely. Ray Topping produced a real Ace with his magnificent tribute to the great arranger-producer Maxwell Davis. Revered by fellow producers Leiber and Stoller, among others, Davis is now recognised as a musical genius, including his production and arrangements for B.B. King. Another view of the backroom of the process was a superb Ike Turner set highlighting his role as a talent scout.
BGP thrived with the addition of 17 new LPs and its first three CDs. The important release was "Acid Jazz Vol 1". Gilles Peterson had suggested to Roger that with Acid House Music blowing in from Chicago we could start a new craze called Acid Jazz and maybe get some of that audience. Ace being an indie company that didn't have to farm an idea through several sub-committees, Gilles compiled the first Acid Jazz album. Its last track was, appropriately, 'Psychedelic Sally'. We issued it with a suitably trippy-looking cover and sold a lot of records. As Gilles said at the time, it might introduce the dancers to at least some form of jazz. It did.
We launched Prestige and Riverside with a pair of samplers, flew in Riverside's founder Orrin Keepnews and took him clubbing. He was astonished to see young British kids dancing to records he had made many, many years before.
Fantasy itself was a cornucopia of all sorts of music. Folk and folk/rock reigned for a while as we drew from Prestige for releases from the Holy Modal Rounders, Geoff Muldaur and Dave Van Ronk. Licensing the Dunhill and Kapp labels from MCA, we put together compilations by P.F. Sloan and the Critters, plus ones on the Thirteenth Floor Elevators and the Litter to disturb the peace with some raucous psychedelic rock.
Kent's output continued to be dancefloor compilations, though there were diversions with the very cool collection, "Cool" and the equally aptly titled "Dance Floor Disaster".
On Ace we issued more from the Dootone, Modern and Laurie catalogues but 1988 was overall a year of consolidation rather than new deals. We had so much catalogue on board already and with Fantasy we had the opportunity to release records by performers that Prestige captured on tape in the 60s blues revival; Scrapper Blackwell, Sam "Lightning" Hopkins, Homesick James and Shakey Jake.
Ben Mandelson and Roger spent a couple of January weeks in the searing heat of Zanzibar, with engineering wonder Adam Skeaping recording the orchestral Taarab Music. The first two issues from those sessions came out that winter. "Worldwide Your Guide", a compilation of GlobeStyle's work-to-date was issued, the first of a series that was to be ever more absurdly titled as the years went by
Though CD was the coming thing, this was the year we issued the greatest number of LPs and overall output was climbing steadily.
We bought our first catalogue this year, purchasing the Spring/Event/Posse labels. This was a quite a move for us, both financially and in taking on board music of the 70s. Till then, apart from the BGP/Fantasy releases, we had mainly stuck to the 50s and 60s. But we couldn't turn down the chance to acquire remarkable albums from Millie Jackson, Fatback (Band) and Joe Simon plus a lot of great soul and funk sides. We also acquired 'King Tim III (Personality Jock)' widely regarded as the first ever rap record.
Radical move of the year – LPs by Allen Ginsberg, Kenneth Rexroth and nearly Lawrence Ferlinghetti – the latter withdrawn for some reason.
As if we didn't have enough on our plate with the acquisition of the Spring catalogue, Ted cut a deal with Armen Boladian for his WESTBOUND/EASTBOUND catalogue. This gave us access to repertoire by Funkadelic, the Detroit Emeralds, Denise LaSalle and the Ohio Players. At that point, although we had the Spring catalogue, the deal didn't include the actual label name. So we came up with SOUTHBOUND as the vehicle for those tracks. We also used the Westbound label, but the catalogue prefixes were the same, (CD)SEW. End of technical note and on with the music. We issued the original albums by the most significant artists in LP, CD and cassette formats. Most of the labels involved anthologising singles but as we moved on up into the 70s we reached the era of the album – concept and otherwise.
Another slew of LPs came our way from a deal struck with Round Records which gave us access to six albums by the Grateful Dead, four by Jerry Garcia, two by Bob Weir, two by Robert Hunter and a Mickey Hart. The Dead LPs were "Wake Of The Flood" (1973), "From The Mars Hotel" (1974), "Blues For Allah" (1975), and a live double album, "Steal Your Face" (1976). The Dead were persuaded to come and play Europe — in part by very good coverage of our reissues in the UK music press, which had by then got over its punks-hate-hippies stance. The band played two nights at the Empire Pool, Wembley. Though the crowd was mainly plane loads of imported Americans, we did get a chance to see what all the fuss was about. They really were a remarkable live experience. Sadly, our deal ended sourly a few years later in the wake of Jerry Garcia's death, but we were proud of the fact that he had said it was great to be with Ace Records. The swansong CD from that deal was the punningly titled "Devout Catalyst" by beat poet Ken Nordine. A short strange trip indeed.
With a rush of blood to the head, GlobeStyle dished up 15 new releases as well as a good number of uplifts from vinyl to CD. Six of the new ones were recordings made in London, Berlin, Kenya and Zanzibar. The 3Mustaphas3 epic "Heart Of Uncle" offered a potted tour of the World's hottest night spots in the safety of your own hi fi. Jova Stojiljkovic and Orkestar blew hot in Berlin fresh from somewhere then known as Yugoslavia. Ben and Roger, with their sensible hats on, headed into the middle of a war in Mozambique to record some music.
CD continued to grow apace. With new releases and uplifts from vinyl, we more than doubled the number of shiny discs in the warehouse. We still weren't going straight to CD, but some releases were on cassette as well. This started to become a problem: originating three formats but not selling three times the amount of records.
Things were also bumping along sweetly with a pair of Everly Brothers Warner rarities, a nice Willie Mae "Big Mama"Thornton sequel to "Quit Snoopin' Round My Door", "You Ole Houn' Dawg" and the best new Doug Sahm record for years with his "Jukebox Music".
The blockbuster of the year was the Little Richard six CD Specialty box set. It had been a hard sell persuading Art Rupe that this was worth doing but, boy, was it worth doing – twice too, on vinyl and CD. There were great sessions on there, the first appearance of the demo sent to Specialty and many fantastic live shots of the gonest cat in town – any town.
Kent and BGP just kept coming up with fabulous floor-fillers. With a boost from the Atlantic catalogue, we put out a compilation with a call to "Get On The Right Track" — which we did six years later so watch out for that.
The first Ace information bulletin, Network News, was published in October. "First Issue!!!" carried advance news of impending releases and exciting sales notes on new ones. The back page had a list of gigs for Alias Ron Kavana, the first new signing in a long time to Chiswick Records. Network News lasted 57 varied issues before re-emerging with a different name.
This was the year in which we originated more individual items than in any other in the history of the company.
Very pleasant surprise of the year: the return of the Radiators with the lovely mid-tempo single 'Under Cleary's Clock'. Which was soon followed by unpleasant surprise of the year when a BBC producer said he couldn't play it as it was about two blokes, nudge nudge – groan.
We now had deals with our US namesake Ace, the Modern group of labels, Pappy Daily's Glad Music, Era Records, Laurie, Cadence, Goldband, Jin, Swallow, Swan, Specialty, Scepter/Wand, Brunswick, Buddah, Chancellor, Charger, Dootone, Combo, Old Town, Duke/Peacock, ABC, Dot, Deccas UK and US, EMI, WEA / Atlantic, Spring, Westbound, the whole Fantasy jazz shebang, Galaxy, Stax and Creedence Clearwater Revival records. Plus we were trawling the world to bring back out-there music. And never mind all the records we cut in London. Man, we were shakin'… tremblin' with so much good music and we were only getting to 15 years into it.
The year of 1989 heard the first "dong" of the death knell of rock'n'roll on vinyl. In fact, the last vinyl we put out with the words rock'n'roll in the title was a Specialty compilation — and a very good one it was, too. And, though those sacred words rock'n'roll were not in the actual titles, their very essence was certainly there in the grooves of a pair of Link Wray albums we cut at Pathway Studio. "Wild Side Of The City Lights" and "Apache"- each title reflecting a different side of the guitar maestro - both went straight to CD.
As vinyl died so the shiny disc spun its way into becoming the primary means of transport for all things audio, including rock'n'roll in all its incarnations, or even incantations. This was the first year in which we issued more CDs than LPs. We liked it. Our records sounded good on it. We had spent the previous seven years transferring original masters to digital. In Adam Skeaping, Duncan Cowell and the late Bob Jones cutting the vinyl, we had three very different but great mastering engineers. The Digital-to-Analogue converters still had a way to go, so the output was not always all it might be. But what was on the disc was fine for those with better gear. We had always taken care over our audio but somehow we were galvanised to greater heights of fidelity by the CD.
The only new label deal of the year was with Bob Keane's Del-Fi / Donna / Mustang. Keane was the unluckiest of label owners: two of his big stars Ritchie Valens and then Bobby Fuller died at the height of their success. Bob was a fine musician (clarinet) and pioneering producer and engineer. His records sound great and he cut reams of fabulous surf and drag as well as the exotica sounds of Eden Ahbez. He cut three big beat group standards in Valens' 'La Bamba', Chan Romero's 'Hippy Hippy Shake' and the Bobby Fuller 4's 'I Fought The Law'. For reasons we never fathomed his missing tape vault turned up in Nashville among the Excello Records reels. We repatriated them.
We also started a very good relationship with Dion DiMucci, which endures. Our first Dion release was his late 70s "Return Of The Wanderer" and we went on to put out both his Warner Brothers records and his Day Spring sides. He has to be the most consistently creative artist who started in the 50s and is still turning out high quality recordings.
The new decade saw Ace on a buying spree. Though over the next few years we would mainly concentrate on West Coast labels — some of which we had already been licensing — none of the three labels we bought in the first few months of 1990 were West Coast.
Harry Carlson's Fraternity Records was based in Cincinnati, Ohio. It had a #2 smash with the wry 'All American Boy' by Bobby Bare (as Bill Parsons) and, in a similar vein, Dale Wright's 'That's Show Biz'. But the star of the label was the Flying V guitar in the hands of that 'Wham' man, Lonnie Mack, whose recording career has lasted over 50 years since his first 45 came out. His 'Memphis' (Fraternity 906) still spits out of speakers. Lonnie also backed a lot of the Fraternity artists; never better than on the Charmaines' great reading of 'Rockin' Pneumonia And The Boogie Woogie Flu'.
Bernard (Bernie) Besman ran one of Detroit's earliest black music labels, Sensation Records. In 1948 he cut John Lee Hooker's 'Boogie Chillen'. It was great for us to re-present to the world one of the most seminal records in the history of blues and rock'n'roll. Bernie had already put out jazz and boogie records on Sensation, by Todd Rhodes, Russell Jacquet and Doc Wiley, among others. But he originally licensed 'Boogie Chillen' to Modern on the West Coast. That track was just one of many remarkable, intense and varied recordings by the young John Lee. Downbeat on the original 'Crawling King Snake', many-voiced on 'I'm In The Mood' or upbeat and doing the House Rent, Hastings Street, Rock House or Hoogie Boogie. You get thrills just thinkin' about it.
You may never have heard of Harold Doane's Florida-based Art label but we already had a connection to it. Chiswick band Whirlwind's debut 45 covered 'Hang Loose' by Tommy Spurlin — which first appeared on Art and can be found on our "Miami Rockabilly" CD. We also put out some blues sides from the label on a series that lasted three issues of limited edition LPs.
The big news of the year was that we finally bought the rights to Modern Records, a label we had been mining for over 10 years. It had ended up in the hands of Frank DiLeo, two times manager of Michael Jackson. When he split with the star in 1989, we started negotiations that led to the purchase of the European rights to the label. After the work we had put into increasing its value, I think we deserved it.
Modern was one of the biggest West Coast operations of the era and I doubt we will ever mine it fully. Started in 1945, it was run by the Bihari brothers (and sisters) out of Los Angeles and incorporated the RPM, Flair and Kent labels. Joe was the producer, travelling all over the South cutting great blues. Jules was the business head but, according to Jake Porter, couldn't keep a beat to save his life. Modern's biggest star by far was B.B. King. Back in the 60s when the young hipsters in Britain were learning the blues, B.B. King was less highly regarded than the more vernacular Chicago artists. Maybe that was because his range was so broad and he could wear a tux and go all uptown and adult. Modern did, though, also cut seminal sides by Elmore James, Sam "Lightning" Hopkins and the Howling Wolf. Saul Bihari ran Meteor Records out of Memphis, with Joe doing most of the recording. Meteor captured the smoke that was some of the finest downhome blues as well as hot rockabilly and hillbilly boogies. The Modern catalogue is a huge storehouse of American blues, R&B and rockabilly recordings and we are privileged to be its keepers.
"Blues It Up", Dana Gillespie's third album for Ace was issued in August.
'Makes you wonder' of the year – a Balfa Brothers Cassingle. An EP of 4 tracks repeated on the other side.
Vinyl sales collapsed. In a brave attempt to keep them going, we issued three LPs in the Ace LTD series, obscure blues and hillbilly, not cheap. That there were only three tells the tale. Otherwise there was a Jimmy Witherspoon LP and a handful of others, including three Funkadelics and one triple Grateful Dead, as if to make up for it. This was the first year since its inception that there wasn't any vinyl on Kent. A nation mourned – well north of London anyway. The cassette was still hanging in there.
The signature aspect of Ace, begun in the 90s, is the tightly focused, well-honed and superb-sounding compilation, impeccably conceived, researched and packaged.
The granddaddy of them all is "The Golden Age of American Rock'n'Roll" series, compiled by Trevor Churchill, Rob Finnis and John Broven. Its subtitle is "Hard To Get Hot 100 Hits From 1954-63". When CD hit the scene in the mid-80s, we were in early on it — to some scepticism from both industry and customers. The oldies sector was not very well served and more arcane US Top 100 hits were not available on CD. Far from being collections of the same old, same old Billboard hits, the Golden Age series featured hand-picked tracks that were hard to get. And get them people did. The series went on to be the best-selling (and sounding) we ever had. The significance of the 1963 cut-off date was they pre-dated the British Invasion, when classic US pop music was murdered by mop tops.
The success of the Golden Age CDs spawned further series: "Fabulous Flips" (1993), "Teenbeat" (1993), "Early Girls" (1995), "Rockin' From Coast To Coast" (1996), "Where The Girls Are" (1997), "Chartbusters USA" (1999), "Land Of A 1000 Dances" (1999). On Kent there was "Birth Of Soul"(1996) and the awe-inspiring "Dave Godin's Deep Soul Treasures" (1997). Many have tried to copy the Ace formula over the years none have managed to get just that right mix of tracks.
Johnny Otis was not just a ubiquitous band leader in Los Angeles from the late 40s, he was an all-round entrepreneur and artist, a Renaissance man of his day. In the mid- 50s he turned his talents to running a record label, the aptly named Dig Records, which put out many ragged-but-somehow-right blues and doo wop discs. Ace made a great series of Dig discs, including one of our finer titles, "Dapper Cats, Groovy Tunes and Hot Guitars". Our excavation of the Dig mine began with "Creeping With The Cats" which kicked off, appropriately, with Dig #101, Preston Love's 'Groove Juice'. Johnny became a good friend of the company. He even officiated at the wedding of Ace consultant Alec Palao and his wife Cindy Vorte.
Two great Bobby "Blue" Bland compilations graced the catalogue this year. We also made contact with the great Memphian Quinton Claunch, Goldwax producer and the man who kept the creative side of James Carr on track. We issued "Take Me To The Limit" the first of two excellent new recordings Quinton made with James and the last significant work of the soul man who had more depth than anyone this side of Otis Redding. It was one of the last records we issued on CD and vinyl.
Also from Memphis came three Jerry Lee Lewis CDs salvaged from bankruptcy and glad they were as the Ferriday fireball whipped up a storm at the Vapors Club – pass those smelling salts.
Still on a Memphis tip, Roger went to Berkeley to rummage through the Stax section of Fantasy's tape vaults. Bill Belmont provided fantastic access and Roger was as happy as a sand boy burrowing away for hours. When Stax Records left Atlantic distribution they were distressed to find out that the contract that they had signed left Atlantic with a permanent licensing rights to any back catalogue they had distributed.
Atlantic: great label, run by hard-nosed businessmen. However - and it's a big however - the Stax-Atlantic catalogue deal only covered previously issued material. So the many hours of unissued Stax recordings were not included. First to the racks was a superb collection by William Bell (one of the nicest guys you could meet), quickly followed by sets from Rufus Thomas and Carla Thomas. The historically significant find of this initial set of releases, though, was "Stax Revue Live At The 5/4 Ballroom", recorded in 1965 just as the Watts riots were about to happen. It wasn't issued as DJ The Magnificent Montague had spent the evening running around the stage shouting out his slogan "burn, baby, burn" — which unfortunately they did, all too soon and for real, on the streets of Los Angeles.
We catered for teen fans with Fabian and Frankie Avalon sets of perfectly groomed and played pop. We continued our series of original albums by the 'Poetry In Motion' man Johnny Tillotson - who developed in a country direction well before his contemporaries. And also with a pop slant - though not in 'Bobby' territory - we issued the first collection of tracks drawn from the Fraternity catalogue, "All American Rock'n'Roll From Fraternity Records".
Six fantastic compilations of gospel were issued, drawn from the vaults of Specialty Records, now owned by Fantasy. They featured the Swan Silvertones, the 5 Blind Boys of Alabama, Dorothy Love Coates and Sam Cooke. There was also a standout CD set from the poet of the blues, the impeccable Percy Mayfield.
The first fruits of GlobeStyle's hair-raising Mozambique adventure came in the shape of an album of Timbila (a xylophone made from 'sneeze' wood) by Eduardo Durao. And in contrast, "Modern Mandolin Maestro" from U. Srinivas, who went on to very successful collaborations with John McLaughlin.
The consultancy base expanded. Author, journalist, blues fan and bank manger John Broven ceased being the latter and joined Ace. He had already written two books, Walking To New Orleans and South To Louisiana. For many years he had contributed to our Louisiana releases and to a wide selection of blues as well as the "Golden Age Of Rock'n'Roll" series.
In August 1991, Sound Mastering Ltd opened for business in Ace's backyard, in customised premises that eventually expanded into two fully equipped and acoustically balanced rooms - essential for high-level mastering. Ace's ace master masterers, Adam Skeaping and Duncan Cowell, had long done a fine job given the restraints of working out of a bedroom in Highbury, but the new facilities were a considerable and productive improvement. This experienced team of post-production engineers was augmented by Bob Jones, who had cut Ace vinyl for many years. Later, they were joined by Nick Robbins, who came from a recording studio background. Bob died in 2009 and Adam has retired, but when it comes to the sound of music SML is still hard to beat.
Outrageous record of the year – "Movie Mondo" the soundtrack to some of the most fabulously appalling 'D' movies ever projected to 'scream'.
With tears - and cheers from the finance department - we put out the very last Ace record to be issued on 3 formats: B.B. King's "My Sweet Little Angel". CHD, CHDC and CDCHD 300 marked the end of an era. Not a single 7" vinyl single came out this year; the first time this had happened in Ace's history. Curtains were drawn.
Though Ace had the rights to Fantasy in the UK and largely ploughed its own furrow, the catalogues were licensed to other companies in Europe. They were all issuing the same jazz titles and, given the porous borders of the EU, records were circulating from country to country. Territory rows were breaking out wholesale. Fantasy's Bill Belmont rode to the rescue, setting up a central pan-European manufacturing system with ZYX, the German licensee. This prevented duplication of production and alleviated the trans-shipping issue. The calm and certainty this brought to the market also gave us the confidence to widen and deepen the jazz catalogue. Around 180 new titles were added that year.
For some years Trevor had been trying to get rights to the Fireballs material from Norman Petty's estate. In 1992, the first fruits of his efforts, the "Best Of The Fireballs" finally came out on Ace. Norman Petty was from Clovis, New Mexico and it was also home to his studio, which he kept to the last, where he cut much of Buddy Holly's output. It was restored in the early 90s to become a museum. All the original equipment was retained, including Norman's curved-walled recording room and the celeste which Vi Petty played on 'Everyday'. By this time, the catalogue was controlled by an old friend of the Pettys, Kenneth Broad, who became another friend of Ace, as did the Fireballs' guitarist George Tomsco.
Roger and John Broven ventured into the swamp lands of Louisiana (quite literally at one stage, with Johnnie Allan) for some of that renowned hospitality, stopping now and again to pick up a label or two. Two weeks of fairly intense tape-copying and deal-doing were done, and the adventuresome duo brought back with them a brace of new labels; La Louisianne and Lanor. They consolidated our established deal with Goldband, accessing the label vaults down inLake Charlesand spent hours chatting with the affable Eddie Shuler. Eddie's studio was a museum piece but with the able assistance of engineer Bert Frillo they were able to connect Eddie's old with Ace's new to make digital copies of this remarkable archive of vernacular American music. The first album to come out from this trawl was by the font of latter-day Cajun music, accordionist Iry LeJeune. It came without the misconceived bass overdubs that had blighted previous re-issues.
The Ace method of doing business has always been very hands-on. Directors and consultants spend time in America copying tapes and gathering the various elements that make up a package. As a methodology, it's more reliable, makes for the best possible product and, frankly, is more fun.
Another deal cut around this was with AVI, a company that controlled various catalogues including the great blues and soul label Excello. As a way of easing into the bits of the AVI list that we really wanted we issued three volumes of West Coast Rap – not our bag, but sometimes needs must. We also put together a Rap confection from the Spring catalogue, which at least we owned.
A noisier little brother to the Golden Age series was added, with "Radio Gold" jumping from airways to CD player. Yes, we do like a little nostalgia now and then.
Lonnie Mack had his first solo airing for Ace and a set of Dale Wright's Fraternity sides was compiled. It included a prime example of a great alternate take of the terrific tale, 'That's Show Biz'.
The jewel in the crown of the Stax sessions tapes was enough prime Otis Redding material to fill a CD. Take 1 of 'Dock Of The Bay' had Otis impersonating seagulls over the intro, replaced on the issued version with a sound effects tape. This light-hearted atmosphere in the studio was a sad, ironic contrast the melancholy air that would surround the record's release just days after Otis's death in a plane crash. Soul's late king also featured in a long overdue third volume of the Stax/Volt tour of Europe in 1967. Also well worthy of mention is the first ever secular album from Mable John, one of the few artists to appear on Stax and Motown. Some years later we were very pleased to get to know Mable. We later issued four CDs by her brother, Little Willie John.
GlobeStyle specialised in artists with awkward-for-English-tongues names. Kalesijski Zvuci, for example. The album's title "Bosnian Breakdown" could have been a reference to the Balkan troubles but was actually just a punning cross-reference to bluegrass.
Our Big Beat label was quiet, though we did indulge ourselves with a celebratory overview of the now resting Chiswick Records: a lavishly packaged double CD which sounded pretty good. Always the poor relation of the indie scene we made a wide range of very good records. The companion piece to this was "Single Minded", a rush to judgment of the late 80s UK garage scene. Twenty years before that, the Standells copped an attitude on Sunset Strip, with such sneery songs as 'Why Pick On Me' and 'Sometimes Good Guys Don't Wear White' - the latter thesis being the title of their second LP, which we twinned with their first album, the defiant "Dirty Water" which celebrated life among "lovers, fuggers and thieves (aw, but they're cool people)". You bet.
Kent continued to tread water as it got to grips with the CD era. That label's world was, after all, a vinyl one deep down to its heart and soul.
Best name of the year - Milquinhento '1500' and Conjunto Popombo De Nampula, led by Mr 1500 playing "Saba Saba" that can only be described as a form of Mozambiquan Skiffle.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
HRISHIKESH JOSHI
Should We Have Open Borders?: A Debate (with Christopher Freiman), under contract with Routledge Press
Why It's OK to Speak Your Mind, Routledge Press, (March 9, 2021)
"What Are the Chances You're Right About Everything? An Epistemic Challenge for Modern Partisanship" Politics, Philosophy & Economics 19 (1): 36-61, 2020.
"What's Personhood Got to Do With It?" Philosophia (online first), 2019. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-019-00148-7
"Why Not Socialism" Public Affairs Quarterly 33(3): 243-264, 2019.
"Is Liberalism Committed to Its Own Demise?" Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy 10(2), 2018.
"What's the matter with Huck Finn?" Philosophical Explorations 20(1): 70-87, 2017. (An earlier draft is available here.)
"The Liberal Tradition" in SAGE Encyclopedia of Leadership Studies, George Goethals, Scott Allison, and Georgia Sorenson eds., forthcoming.
"Immigration" in The Routledge Companion to Libertarianism, Matt Zwolinski and Ben Ferguson, eds., forthcoming.
"For (Some) Immigration Restrictions" forthcoming in Ethics: Left and Right, Bob Fischer ed., Oxford University Press. (click link for a draft version)
"Immigration Enforcement and Fairness to Would-Be Immigrants" in The Palgrave Handbook of Philosophy and Public Policy, David Boonin ed., Palgrave MacMillan, 2018. (click link for draft version)
Review of Welfare, Meaning, and Worth (Routledge) by Aaron Smuts, Journal of Moral Philosophy, forthcoming.
Review of Knowing Our Limits (OUP) by Nathan Ballantyne, The Philosophical Quarterly, 2020.


Avon: And you were right. That must be a novel experience for you.
Avon and Vila teleport down to the planet Fosforon and discreetly break into a Federation base on the planet. They are there to steal an important TP Crystal which will allow Blake to decipher Federation communications. Avon enlists the aid of Tynus, an old friend of his who works on the base and owes Avon a favour.
Back on board the Liberator, Blake, Jenna and Cally have found an old spaceship adrift in space and heading for the planet. Blake is about to go aboard the ship but Cally stops him, detecting a nasty presence on board the abandoned ship. Shortly afterwards, the derelict is boarded by a party from the base on Fosforon and it is taken back down to the planet.
While Avon and Vila plot with to Tynus to steal the crystal, Blake teleports down to the base to assist the scientists there with the derelict space craft. He meets Dr Bellfriar, whose team have discovered a mummified body on the ship. During autopsy, the 'mummy' seems to come to life and attacks the doctor performing the autopsy before collapsing again.
Shortly afterwards, members of the team that had salvaged the space craft become ill and start to die. The base is put into quarantine as the disease spreads rapidly and Blake returns to the Liberator to see if he can find more information on the disease. Meanwhile Avon and Vila use chaos caused by the disease to steal the crystal. They also discover that Tynus has contacted the Federation and alerted Servalan to the presence of Avon and the others. Tynus and Avon get into a fight and Tynus is killed in the struggle. Avon and Vila return to the Liberator with the crystal.
Meanwhile, Blake, communicating with Bellfriar, has discovered that the disease is a virus that was specifically designed to attack people who had travelled in space with the intention of ensuring the human race stayed confined to Earth. Some unknown alien race had found the derelict space craft and deliberately infected it before sending it back into human space.
Bellfriar is on the verge of discovering a cure but, before he can tell Blake, he too succumbs to the disease and dies. Unable to to do anything further to help the people of Fosforon, Blake puts out a plague warning in order to prevent the disease from spreading.
Blake: He's either being doing some soul-searching after events of the past couple of episodes or Blake is behaving somewhat out of character as he decides to aid the crew of the Federation base on Fosforon. It would seem that he doesn't view all members of the Federation as being evil and/or corrupt which - whilst a sensible viewpoint - doesn't entirely chime with Blake's actions in the past. He's attacked a number of Federation bases in the past (the communications base on Centaro in 'Seek-Locate-Destroy' for example) and has never once considered the welfare of any of the staff members there who are just doing their job.
Blake also chooses to put out a plague warning on the planet despite the fact that, if he didn't, there's a chance that Servalan could land there and contact the disease. His reasoning is sound - if even one person with the disease escaped the planet then it would spread and kill billions. Given recent events, it's understandable that Blake wouldn't want more deaths on his conscience.
Avon: Was previously good friends with Tynus. They pulled a bank job together some time in the past which went wrong. Avon took the blame while Tynus got away unscathed. It's not explicitly stated but it seems likely that the failed bank job was the same one that got Avon sentenced to life on Cygnus Alpha and involved with Blake in the first place - in 'Space Fall' Avon says that he was caught because "I relied on other people," which would tie in with what we learn here. And Tynus is certainly someone not to be trusted as he betrays Avon again when he locates the Federation to his presence.
Vila: Teams up with Avon to steal the TP crystal from Fosforon. He is happy to take advantage of Tynus's hospitality while on the base but doesn't seem to entirely trust. With good reason as it's Vila that discovers that Tynus has informed the Federation of the Liberator's presence. He's also, not surprisingly, alarmed at the fact that a space plague has broken out on the base.
Cally: Cally's telepathic abilities come to the fore again as she senses a presence on board the derelict space craft and stops Blake from going across there.
This is one of the best episodes of the season thus far, written by Doctor Who veteran Robert Holmes. In his 'Who' work, Holmes was particularly well known for his strong characterisation and sharp dialogue, both of which are very much in evidence here.
He was also well known for creating 'double acts' - putting two characters together who would work together and bounce off each other. Here we get too such parings - Avon and Vila and Blake and Doctor Bellfriar. This isn't the first Avon and Vila have worked together of course but it is the first time that an episode has really focused on them as a team and they work together well. The team of Blake and the genial Doctor Bellfriar also work well. It's been well-established that Blake is an intelligent, well-schooled man and he seems to enjoy being in the company of another learned individual who isn't Avon. I could imagine him and Bellfriar having many a long chat about science and history over a cigar and nice glass of port. That is if Bellfirar didn't meet his end and the climax of the story.
It's also nice to encounter members of the Federation who are just normal people doing their jobs. With the exception of Tynus, the inhabitants of the base of Fosforon have no political axe to grind, couldn't care less about who Blake is and aren't ambitious, corrupt or insane. We haven't had a character like that since Commander Leylan in episode 2.
I really only have two criticisms of the episode. One is the use (or mis-use) of the female characters. Both Jenna and Cally are almost entirely absent from the episode (again) which is a great shame as both characters still have much to offer. The other criticism is more cosmetic as the costumes for the inhabitants of Fosforon as some of the most ridiculous seen on the series - which is, frankly, saying something.
Next time: Hostage, an episode I remember virtually nothing about. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not.


I love dragons. They are one of my favourite mythical creatures; they are powerful, cunning, destructive, disturbing, uncanny, magical, and downright terrifying. English literature is full of dragons, beginning with Beowulf, the oldest surviving manuscript in Old English. More than this, western mythology is full of dragon slayers, including heroes from ancient Greece, such as Cadmus, Perseus, and Heracles. Dragons have literally fired the imaginations of writers for hundreds of years.
•	and, Yevaud, from Ursula Le Guin's A Wizard of Earthsea.
You can find an extensive list of young adult books about dragons on Goodreads. Just follow the link.
As so many writers have depicted these amazing creatures, it's difficult to find much that is new or different in the world of dragons. Recently, I discovered a new book by Brandon Mull. Dragon Watch is Mull's latest book that continues the story of Fablehaven, a series centring on Kendra and Seth Sorenson—sister and brother—who discover their grandparents are keepers of a magical preserve, a place that houses and maintains mythical creatures. This five-book series is well worth the read.
In Dragon Watch, the first book of the new series, Kendra and Seth find themselves caretakers of Wyrmroost, one of the world's dragon preserves. Kendra is fairykind, and Seth is a shadow charmer; together, they have the power to resist the enchantment of dragons. While written less well than the books in the original series, Dragon Watch is full of, well, dragons, so if you love these creatures, then add these books to your list.
Where I live is pretty short on mythical creatures—but perhaps not as short as you might think. I recently took a trip with a friend to visit the royal Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller. The museum is an amazing walk through the geological and palaeontological history of Alberta. Even if you aren't' a dinosaur person, you will find this museum fascinating. All the fossils are creatures that walked the swampy forests or swam the Bearpaw Sea that was once Alberta.
The Tyrannosaurus Rex and Edmontosaurus on display might not be dragons of myth, but looking at these fossils will help you understand why dragons, or even the thought of dragons, has so fully entered the imaginations of countless writers. They are those creatures that lie on the edges of our imaginations. They slumber in caves or under mountains; they are hoarders of wealth and of secrets. Wake them, if you dare.


In the opening paragraph in a story on the persistent economic slowdown, the AP finds several groups to blame: "Shoppers won't shop. Companies won't hire. The government won't spend on economic stimulus—it's cutting instead. And the Federal Reserve is reluctant to do anything more." Yes, the AP feels that after hundreds of billions of dollars of "stimulus" and two rounds of unsuccessful quantitative easing, the national economy just needs more government intervention. Likewise, the AP is miffed that households, after years of historically minimal saving, are spending more responsibly.
When the AP considers why "economists are lowering their forecasts for the full year and recalculating the odds that the economy will slide back into recession," the AP acknowledges "a short-term rise in gasoline prices and an earthquake in Japan" and claims that "a political fight over debt and deficits raised the risk that the U.S. government would not be able to pay all its bills." The AP lets pass without mention that the day after the signing of the "Debt Control Act of 2011" the national debt exceeded national income as measured by GDP.
The AP also cites several stocks that have taken a value hit because of the economic slowdown. Several of these, however, have problems that go beyond those the AP is willing to mention. Among those AP cites are Boeing, Caterpillar, ExxonMobil, Shell and Amazon.
Boeing has been harassed by regulators at the National Labor Relations Board, which has insisted that it build its new 787 airliner in Washington State with trade union labor rather than in right-to-work South Carolina as the company planned. Caterpillar's CEO sent a letter to Gov. Pat Quinn (D-IL) protesting an increase in that state's corporate income tax. Caterpillar employs 23,000 workers in Illinois. Both ExxonMobil and Shell (as well as all other oil producers) face constant attacks from the President himself. Amazon has been hit with a California law that would force online retailers to collect sales tax, driving up costs to consumers in the largest state economy.
Of course, the AP finds it easier to blame government spending cuts than increasing regulation costs. The AP asserts that "government cutbacks reduced economic growth by 0.2 percentage points" but does not question the costs of the 4,200 new and pending regulations. In the month of July alone, federal regulators proposed or promulgated over 600 new rules.
An intern at the American Journalism Center, a training program run by Accuracy in Media and Accuracy in Academia.


One week till Easter? ALREADY?
With that in mind, I think it's best to start sorting out my plans for the upcoming summer!
Seeing as uni summer holidays are between 4-5 months long (£9,000 a year for what you say??), this is definitely a time to use effectively. Many people opt to undertake internships and insights in the industries that they are hoping to enter upon graduation. This is perfect as some internships are well over 3 months long which means you can comfortably do these plus the normal summer job. Not only is this an invaluable experience to add to your CV alongside your studies, but some of these are paid which means you are not only working, but doing something worthwhile!
Alternatively, others (like me) decide there is no better way to spend the summer than going volunteering in Fiji! Cardiff University hosts a fantastic global opportunities department which basically does what is says on the tin and offers a huge diversity of, well, global opportunities. Included in this are study abroad options for both the summer and semester times, plus volunteering projects. These include Vietnam, Fiji, Japan and Cambodia to name a few. There is even an opportunity for you to work at a summer camp in the US for 12 weeks where you can obtain a bursary to go, AND get paid while you are there!
Cardiff places a lot of value on the benefits of going abroad, whether for study or volunteering and this is why they offer a substantial bursary for most, if not all their global options. Therefore, there is no reason for you not to give it a go. Volunteering will not only be a great character builder and confidence booster, but it is again, something you can add to your CV to (cliché) make it stand out.
As I mentioned, I decided to use my first summer at university to go volunteering in Fiji which will not only be challenging but hopefully life changing. From what I've heard about the project, it should be incredible. Working with the charity Think Pacific, I will travelling to the other side of the world to provide one to one teaching aid for children between the ages of 6-14. I will also be doing sports coaching in the afternoons, which for many of the children, will be their first time experiencing this. I am beyond excited! A month in the sun does not sound bad at all eh? Even if I do have to sleep on the floor and have cold bucket showers every morning.
In addition to this, I have also applied for a Journalism insight at Hay Festival; an arts and literary event where I will potentially work alongside industry professionals to provide coverage for it. Exciting stuff – now I just need to keep my fingers crossed that I get the job!
Having a 5 month long summer is something that you will probably never have again for the rest of your life (well until your retirement), so it is something that you should completely take advantage of. Use it, work, have fun, volunteer, get in more debt, but at the same time make it as memorable as you can because these types of opportunities don't come around often.