Edith Macefield is stubborn. Man, is she stubborn. That's what her mother told her when she was a little girl back in the 1920s. It's a characteristic that has followed her all her life. Now that unrelenting stubbornness has won the 86-year-old woman admirers throughout Ballard. Macefield refused to sell her little old house where she has lived since 1966 to developers, forcing them to build an entire five-story project, which includes a grocery store, fitness club and parking garage, around her. She was offered $1 million to leave. She turned it down flat.
Old Ballard's new heroNewsfilter, local interest filter, too, but, oh, man, it lifts the spirits. Her's is the last house on the block, the one in which she grew up, the one her mother died in. She is going to be surrounded by five storys of shopping mall but she isn't moving. It's like
The Little House come to life. And bonus points:
Mike's Chili Parlor, the other hold out on the same block, is the bomb. So you get two Old Lost Seattle treasures in one post.
posted by y2karl
on Oct 15, 2007 -
81 comments
OK, Seattleites, see the American flag
here ? On the sidewalk below is where your 3rd & Pine McDonalds now sits. Man, I can see five buildings here that are still standing, but that red brick one at the lower right got replaced
early. Now here's the
Northern Life Tower. Note how the bricks lighten towards the top, so as to make it look taller from below--very subtle, that. It's one of Seattle's two Art Deco buildings, the other being the
Exchange Building. You can cut through that one, coming off the ferry at First Avenue and take the elevator to walk out on Second Ave rather than climb that steep hill, you know.
And consider on what
playground equipment our grandparents got to play. Lucky stiffs--you can't even find a decent 50s era swing set in a park in this town anymore.
Penny Postcards From King County, from
Penny Postcards of Washington, from
Penny Postcards. Man, I loves me some vintage postcards. And if you do, too, check that last link--it's got all 50 states.
posted by y2karl
on Dec 19, 2004 -
17 comments
Richard Petersen a Seattle street musician... an emotionally impaired savant with encyclopedic recall who taught himself the trumpet and piano by studying a production LP of musical cues from the obscure early-fifties television show Sea Hunt has been a touchstone in many Seattle lives for years. He has played trumpet outside of concerts, sporting events and blockbuster movie premieres with a can labeled "No Canadian Coins" at his feet for at least three decades. He is ubiquitous--apart from agoraphobics, the bedridden and those chained to a basement wall, everyone in Seattle has one or two Richard Peterson stories: he is well known and well loved. Here,
Irwin Chusid, on an
Incorrect Music Hour entitled
Music everyone at work can agree on, eternally plays--albeit on RA--Peterson's
The Enemy (Is on the Radio Singing My Song) and
After The Gold Rush from
Richard Peterson's First Album. His first album did well--he was big in Japan. He has four albums out. His
My Second Album is the
hidden song on the Stone Temple Pilots
Purple. He has put four albums out. And now there is
Big City Dick: Richard Peterson's First Movie--a
well received documentary.
posted by y2karl
on May 3, 2004 -
8 comments
