Beast Blog

A fountain pours in Oakland...

This sounds really great, and I'm happy to pass it along.

From my inbox:

Here's a cool happening thing in the East Bay that I wanted you folks to know about:

Right on the north east shore of Lake Merritt, Cleveland Cascade is a park that climbs steeply up the hill to Cleveland Street in the Haddon Hill and China Hill neighborhoods. In the 1920s, a noted landscape architect created an Italian-inspired water feature that cascaded down the hill, giving the park its "Cascade" name. Over the years, its maintenance was neglected, the water stopped flowing, and the Cascade was ultimately buried so that few knew what lay beneath the surface.

This May a neighborhood group launched a campaign to restore the Cleveland Cascade to its original state. We've already fully excavated the Cascade. We're working closely with a landscape architecture firm (PGA Design) that's donated tons of their time to develop a landscaping plan. And we're working with the City of Oakland, with an ultimate goal of combining some Measure DD money with privately raised money to fund the full restoration.

You can find out more about the Cascade and what the neighbors are up to at the web site:

http://clevelandcascade.org

You can see the photograph (from a 1931 landscape architecture journal) of the original Cascade that got us all inspired at

http://clevelandcascade.org/Photo.Cascade.1931.Gilkey.html

You can also read the 1923 SF Chron article written soon after the Cascade was built at

http://clevelandcascade.org/cited.1923.03.11.SFChronicle.html

You can find a map of exactly where the Cascade is at

http://clevelandcascade.org/where.html

If you have any questions, I'm a good person to ask!

Thanks!
Jim

--
Jim Ratliff
Friends of the Cleveland Cascade
jim [AT] clevelandcascade.org
http://clevelandcascade.org

Creek Crooning

Yesterday, a friend and I went to see Mark Growden perform in Sausal Creek in Dimond Park.

Thanks to Justin for this and the following photos.

It proved to be an amazing venue. A traffic bridge about 80 feet above provided resonant acoustics, and Mark's choices of instruments (accordian, banjo, a Norwegian flute) carried beautifully. The songs were soulful. And Mark was a delightful host.

It also smelled damn good. If you follow the Sausal Creek link above, you'll learn about how a bunch of Oakland residents are working to restore the creek to its native state, difficult in the face of creeping ivy.

Mark plans on other such concerts once he gets back from a tour. Join his mailing list (I think you just email him from his website) to find out what's next.