A Taste for Antique Prints It's Tea Time in Japantown Who Says We're
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n INSIDE n FOOD & DRINK n LOCALS News 3 Crime Watch 4 It’s Tea Time A Taste for Fillmore Beat 5 in Japantown Antique Prints First Person 9 A cross-cultural match Divisadero shop offers Home Sales 14 sets a proper English tea museum quality work Local History 15 PAGE 6 PAGE 11 THE NEW FILLMORE SANSAN FRANCISCO FRANCISCO n n AUGUST APRIL 2010 2017 ictoria Dunham is bucking the trend. VAt a time when many small businesses with unique offerings have been priced out and forced off Fillmore Street, the propri- etor of the HiHo Silver jewelry store at 1904 Fillmore has just opened a second shop next door, doubling her retail space. “I live in this neighborhood, too,” she says. “I know what it means to have mom-and-pop stores here, and this is a mom-and-pop — or at least a mom.” In mid-July, Dunham opened a new boutique one door north, naming it simply for its address: 1906. The spot allows her to showcase the many gems and curiosities she finds too weird or wonderful to resist while traveling the world scouting for silver: scarves and shawls, framed insects, stainless steel vases, sting ray wallets and coin purses and polished wooden boxes. “The bugs, baskets and textiles were all in hiding in the other place,” she says of her 300 square foot HiHo shop next door. “This new space liberates them.” Among the items now on display are Insects finds from her spring shopping trip to framed as art pieces Thailand and Burma. are among While traveling, Dunham seeks out the offerings people she wants to support and do busi- at a new ness with, as well as objects to sell in her shop at 1906 shops. Over the years, she has forged rela- Fillmore. tionships with craftspeople and with non- profit groups that make it possible for local villagers to earn an income and preserve traditional crafts. She says: “It feels good to get involved with something I know is helping people — truly making a differ- ence in many lives.” Some cases in point: n She offers scarves and shawls in ikats, silk and cotton by Studio Naenna, a non- profit training ground for young weavers and a source of support for master weavers in Thailand. n From Siam With Love provides sophis- ticated textiles made in Thailand by villagers who farm by day and weave by night. n And from Sop Moei Arts, a nonprofit working with artisans in the Mae Hong Son Province in Thailand, she imports more intricate textiles and unique baskets. Dunham says the added space has also Victoria’s Secret helped refuel her love of retail. “I’m going to offer whatever I find that I think is cool. And there are cool things everywhere,” she Who says we’re losing all the one-of-a-kind shops offering says. “The ‘this and that’ part of the shop is what’s exciting, and now it’s more visible.” unusual treasures on Fillmore? She has two. One of her associates says it’s already been good for sales: “In this new space, the framed bugs are just flying out the door.” By Barbara Kate Repa TO PAGE 8 u FURTHERMORE Sugar’s Broiler stood for decades — rarely open — at Fillmore and Sacramento. HE ATE AT SUgar’S n enduring local mystery has been selling the hard stuff and it really got bad.” resolved. For decades people have “There were a lot of murders,” Max asked: Did anyone ever actually see said. “The naivete of the young hippie girls ASugar’s Broiler open? The hamburger joint attracted the bad guys.” that long occupied the corner of Fillmore It was during that period that Rev. Jim and Sacramento — now home to Peet’s Jones moved into the neighborhood and Coffee — is remembered by established his People’s many longtimers for the “on Temple in the old Masonic vacation” sign that perpetu- temple on Geary, where the ally hung on the front door. post office now stands. In our July article, “50 “There was a very nice, Years on Fillmore,” local kindly black gentlemen, artist Dan Max and local Mr. Oliver, who repaired poet Ronald Hobbs — both watches,” Max recalled. of whom have lived on Fill- “The story always was that more for half a century and he was very upset about his experienced its more color- son being a member of the ful days — confessed that People’s Temple. He helped neither ever had a burger at Sugar’s sign is still in the get people to blow the whis- Sugar’s. basement at Peet’s. tle on Jim Jones.” Then came this response: After that Mr. Oliver suf- “I had more than a few burgers at Sugar’s fered a stroke and his watch shop became a Broiler,” commented Mark J. Mitchell, part of Mrs. Dewson’s Hats. another writer who has lived in the neigh- “They just left everything behind,” Max borhood for decades, and spent many years said, when the People’s Temple moved to behind the counter at Bi-Rite Liquors, the jungle in South America. “They left their then across the street at D&M. “But I cars parked on the street. Later I remember think I’m the only person who ever did,” he there was yellow FBI tape around the cars.” acknowledged. n n The article sparked recollections from a Dan Max said many people commented number of others as well, including thera- about his and Hobbs’ recollections of the pist Beth MacLeod, who was a journalist old days on Fillmore Street — “especially and creative soul living in the neighbor- young people,” he said. “They’re not nos- hood in the late ’70s. talgic for anything, but they didn’t know “You could take care of life’s daily tasks” Fillmore was ever like that.” on Fillmore Street, she remembered. “ ‘Oh, Of the mid-70s, he recalled: “It really I need a lightbulb.’ The hardware store. ‘Oh, was dark in that period. It seemed that I need a typewriter ribbon.’ Brown Bag every day there was something darker. Stationers. My favorite was Millard’s, by There were a lot of different kinds of cults, the Clay Theatre, with its very small coun- including remnants of the Manson gang — ter and a line out the door. I could splurge just the females. They still believed in the on a savory crepe, a glass of wine and a slice cause. They were unrepentant — a lot of of fabulous carrot cake and walk out barely screwballs. Then the Hells Angels started spending $10.” THE NEW FILLMORE P. O. Box 15115 n San Francisco, CA 94115 n 415-441-6070 [email protected] Editors | Barbara Kate Repa & Thomas R. Reynolds Production Editor | Ginny Lindsay Copy Editor | Donna Gillespie Advertising inquiries [email protected] or 415.441.6070 Published on the first weekend of each month. Deadline: 20th of prior month Subscriptions by mail are available for $30 per year. Please send a check. Connecting the neighborhood Every month, 20,000 copies of the New Fillmore circulate to homes and businesses in the Fillmore, Pacific Heights and Japantown. We thank you for your support and encouragement and welcome your ideas and suggestions. newfillmore.com| for updates and archives 2 NEW FILLMORE August 2017 n STREET TALK NEIGHBORHOOD NEWS In the Loop After a total overhaul, the Shell station at California and Steiner Bumzy’s is back reopened in mid-July — without its garage, Their fans were almost ready to give but with a new Loop up, but not the mother-daughter duo convenience store. Sheila and Toni Young. The promised salad Their labor of love — Bumzy’s and sushi bars are not Chocolate Chip Cookies, at 1460 included, but the store Fillmore — was shut down by offers hot dogs, corn flooding last September and stayed dogs, tacos, popcorn closed for nine long months. chicken and tater tots, But just in time for Fillmore’s along with pastries annual Juneteenth Festival, their and coffee. cheery pink balloons were back on the sidewalk and an entirely new Bumzy’s was baking all-natural, handmade cookies. “We had to start all over,” says Toni Young (above, with a chocolate chip). “It was a real nightmare. But we’re back better and stronger than No Zen on Cottage Row: Issei Garden Sidelined before. Something positive always plan to build a Zen-style Japa- addition to the Cottage Row Mini Park. Japantown. He said “faulty reasoning” was comes out of something negative.” nese rock garden at the foot of Lambert’s challenge was to be heard used in city documents that say otherwise. Their chocolate chip cookies Cottage Row has been derailed, at by the city’s Historic Preservation Com- “It’s not over,” said Paul Osaki, execu- have been hailed as the best in the least for now. mission on July 19. But the sponsors of tive director of the Japanese Cultural and neighborhood. A “We make homemade products,” In June, a committee of the Recreation the garden pulled their project from the Community Center, who has spearheaded she says. “We want it to feel like and Park Commission approved the gar- agenda as the meeting began. the project. “The garden proposal is not home.” den, which would honor the Issei genera- Lambert spoke nonetheless. dead. It’s just in suspension.” In addition to a dozen kinds of tion of Japanese-Americans who founded “I hope we can now close the books on Osaki dismissed Lambert’s appeal as “an cookies, made one small batch at Japantown 110 years ago after the 1906 the proposed Cottage Row Zen Garden,” abuse of the system and taxpayers’ dollars.” a time, they also churn homemade earthquake.