Table of Contents

Editor’s Page

California Noir: Raymond Chandler’s L. A. – The Dark Side

Octobermania: Oktoberfest & Car Shows & More

Remember When…

October…

Cover photograph, Frank Winterbourne, San Juan Capistrano Mission, 1949

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Editor’s Page

Welcome to the first edition of a new monthly online magazine called California Times. I am a

California native son of a California Native son. In fact, on my mother’s side, we can claim

generations of native sons and daughters going back to 1769 when our ancestor, Jose Antonio

Yorba, came up with Portola and Father Junipero Serra to found the missions and presidios.

My father’s parents came to California in 1912 in an open-top Model T touring car when

Route 66 was but a dream. I am invested –- I am committed – to California and all that it

means and can mean, from past to future.

There are those media critics who say that the magazine is dead. But, rather, I think it is

merely in metamorphosis – changing its distribution to fit into the Internet age.

This magazine is a mixed-blend of history, pop culture, nostalgia, news, and event calendar.

It will inform you what’s going on where – whether you’re a foodie tourist of harvest and

produce festivals. a beer afficianado, a follower of surf festivals and car shows, a re-enactor

or just interested in history events, or a Native America pow-wow attender. If we think it’s

fun or interesting, you’ll find it in our monthly calendar section.

Our feature articles may range from California Noir to the Art & Crafts scene, from Hollywood

nostalgia to how gas stations evolved from the old stagecoach stops, from the best places to spot

classic cars to “the best eats in town”. We’ll be a guide, a story-teller, and a friend to remind

you of the great glories, the tragedies, the humor and the triumphs that make our great state

what it is.

Despite the grumbles, the occasional mutter, the traffic and the crush of populace, California

is a wonderful place to live and enjoy life. Help us commemorate and celebrate our delightful

“California Times”.

William S Dean

Editor-Publisher

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California Noir

RAYMOND CHANDLER’S L. A. – THE DARK SIDE WITH

A DASH OF HOPE

"The lights of the city were an endlessly glittering sheet. Neon signs glowed and flashed. The languid ray of a searchlight prodded about among high faint clouds.”

“Dead men are heavier than broken hearts” reads the memorial stone marking the final resting place of Raymond Chandler. Ironically,

perhaps, the world-famous noir writer of shattered dreams and cynical

anti-heroes is buried at New Hope Cemetery in San Diego.

Fellow author S.J. Perleman called Chandler "the major social

historian of Los Angeles” and maybe he was for that shadowed

growing metropolis that was Los Angeles in the 1930s through the

the 1950s, but what about now? Certainly, some of the same human

characters are roaming the mean streets. Heart-wounded veteran

soldiers searching for meaning and jobs. Women cynical about that

crazy mixed-up thing called love. Thugs and gangsters hiding in

the shadowlands and tough cops who don’t play by the rules, along

with corrupt politicians and greed-inspired “big shots” in tailored

suits. It seems that Raymond Chandler’s archetypes never left L.A.

They just changed clothes and bought new technological toys.

Chandler called California “the department store state”. By that,

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I think he meant everything was on display and everything was for

sale. That was his cynical side, but he could also wax lyrical and

poetic.

In “The Big Sleep”, he writes ““It was about eleven o'clock in the

morning, mid-October, with the sun not shining and a look of hard

wet rain in the clearness of the foothills.”

Chandler’s city could be one of fallen angels, naïve, yet dangerous

and corrupted. It was “rich and vigorous and full of pride, a city

lost and beaten and full of emptiness."

Chandler’s enduring quality was his gift for metaphor. Everything

reminded him of something else; something very human and fragile.

"My theory,” Chandler once wrote, “was that readers just thought

That they cared about nothing but the action; that really although

they didn't know it, they cared very little about the action.

The thing they really cared about, and that I cared about, was the

creation of emotion through dialogue and description."

Those emotions, those dialogues still play out across Los Angeles

where the dawn and noon and the twilight tint our shadow-world with

the kiss of sunlight and hope.

Like Raymond Chandler, Los Angeles could be summed up, as he once

wrote, “I never looked back, although I had a good many uneasy

periods looking forward.”

Cissy Pascal Chandler; the Chandler headstone at New Hope cemetery, San Diego

Next month - California Noir: Dashiel Hammett’s San Francisco – Out of the Fog

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OCTOBERMANIA:

Oktoberfest

The Oktoberfest celebration began with a royal marriage. Bavarian Crown Prince Ludwig (later

Mad King Ludwig) married Princess Therese of Saxony-Hildburghausen on October 12, 1810.,

and the great party began. It’s been going on ever since. During September and October,

Bavarians and everyone else with a thirst for beer and polka gather to celebrate the glory of beer

suds.

Where to get your brew on:

Alpine Village, Torrance, weekends through October 23

The Phoenix Club, Anaheim, weekends through October 30

Modesto Octoberfest, John Thurman Field, Modesto, October 7

California Beer Festival, Claremont, October 8

Oktoberfest, Petalauma, October 8

3rd

Annual Los Angeles Beer Week, A 14 Day Celebration of Beer Culture in Los Angeles

And Orange Counties, October 10-23 website: http://www.labeerweek.com/

Beer & Wine Festival, Yuba City, October 15

Santa Barbara Beer Festival, Santa Barbara, October 15

Fall Bay Area Craft Beer Festival, Martinez, October 22

Los Osos Oktoberfest, Los Osos, October 30

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Car Shows

10th Annual NSRA Golden State Street Rod Nationals, Sacramento, October 7-9

"Cruise for the Cure" Car Show, Barstow, October 8

"Hot Rod Gathering" Runway Drags, Eagle Field, Fairbaugh, October 8

Del Mar Concours D'Elegance, Del Mar, October 16

Long Beach - Hi-Performance Swap Meet & Car Show, Long Beach, October 9

20th NHRA Hot Rod Reunion, Bakersfield, October 21-23

25th Annual Concours D'Elegance, Santa Barbara, October 29-30

Mustang Madness Car Show, Costa Mesa, October 30

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Veggie Lovin’ ’

October 7-9, California Avocado Festival, Carpenteria

October 8-9, Los Banos Tomato Festival, Los Banos

October 8, Point Arena Hemp Hops & Harvest Festival, Point Arena

Gathering of the Tribes

October 7-9, 2011 Redding Rancheria's Stillwater Pow Wow & Hand Game Tournament

Redding, CA

October 15, 2011 Auburn Big-Time Pow Wow http://www.sierranativealliance.org/

October 27 thru October 30, 2011 26th Annual California Indian Conference, held in

Chico at California State University

Surf’s Up!

October 13-16 4th Annual California Surf Festival, Oceanside

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REMEMBER WHEN…

October 1981 – Twenty Years Ago

October 1 - The first cellular telephone system is inaugurated. Nordic Mobile Telephone

(Nordisk MobilTelephoni), NMT, set up the network in Sweden.

October 6 - Egypt's President Anwar Sadat is assassinated at Nasr City while watching

the annual Armed Forces Day parade.

October 9 - American rock musician Prince performs before the largest crowd of his career,

an opening acts for the Rolling Stones' tour at Los Angeles Coliseum. He is booed off

the stage by an impatient crowd.

October 13 - Hosni Mubarak, the former Vice-President under Sadat is confirmed as President

of Egypt

October 15 - "The Wave" is first led by “Krazy” George Henderson in Oakland, during

the 7th inning stretch of a game between the Oakland A's and the New York Yankees.

October 22 - US national debt tops $1 trillion

October 26 - Iron Maiden plays its first show with Bruce Dickinson as the new lead singer in

Bologna, Italy.

October 28 - The Los Angeles Dodgers win the 1981 World Series over the New York Yankees.

- The heavy metal band Metallica is formed

ON THE CHARTS - MUSIC

"Endless Love" by Diana Ross and Lionel Richie

"Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can Do)" by Christopher Cross

"Start Me Up" by The Rolling Stones

"For Your Eyes Only" by Sheena Easton

"Step By Step" by Eddie Rabbitt

"Private Eyes" by Hall & Oates

"Stop Draggin' My Heart Around" by Stevie Nicks & Tom Petty/Heartbreakers

"Who's Crying Now" by Journey

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October 1991 – Ten Years Ago

Completely MAD, the official history of MAD magazine, written by Maria Reidelbach, hits

bookstores and becomes an immediate best-seller.

X-Men: Legacy Issue #1

Tomb of Dracula Issue #1

Clive Barker's Book of the Damned: A Hellraiser Companion Issue #1

October 6 - Elizabeth Taylor weds for 8th time (Larry Fortensky)

October 11 – Comedian Redd Foxx dies

October 23 - "Les Miserables," opens at Mogador Theatre, Paris

October 24 – Star Trek creator, Gene Roddenberry dies

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"There is no season when such pleasant and sunny spots may be lighted on, and produce so pleasant

an effect on the feelings, as now in October."

- Nathaniel Hawthorne

The scene above, photographed in the Owens Valley near June Lake, belies the calumny always

spread by non-Californians that we here in the Golden State have no seasons, particularly no

colorful changing of the leaves in Autumn. Our forests, our parks, and the stately shade tree in

many yards and apartment complexes – everywhere you look past the concrete and pavement

the brilliant hues of Fall adorn our trees.

October is a month of orange. Halloween pumpkins, squashes, and tree leaves combine with the

color of the Autumn sky at sunset to remind us where we are – between Summer and Winter.

October is a harvest month. A time to reflect back on the wild heat of Summer and to start taking

out the warming clothes for Winter’s chill.

“I have been younger in October than in all the months of spring” writes W. S. Merwin in The

Love of October.

"Listen! the wind is rising, and the air is wild with leaves,

We have had our summer evenings, now for October eves!"

- Humbert Wolfe

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