Go to SDNEWS.COM to sign up for a FREE one week of camp at in La Jolla San Diego Community Newspaper Group THURSDAY, MAY 13, 2010 www.SDNEWS.com Volume 15, Number 35 Raquel Welch still dazzles Beachgoers at La Jolla Shores will be able to enjoy warm fires on the sand for another year. DON BALCH | Village News Fire pits saved again BY JENNA FRAZIER | VILLAGE NEWS Mayor Jerry Sanders announced in a May 10 press conference that San Diego’s fire pits will survive another fiscal year, thanks to last- minute donations from the San Diego Foundation, the La Jolla Com- munity Foundation and the infrastructure funds of City Coun- cilmembers Sherri Lightner and Kevin Faulconer. The outlook was bleak as of 1 p.m. on May 7, the deadline for Sanders’ 2011 budget submission to the City Council, when only $2,800 of the required $120,500 to keep 186 fire pits in place city- wide had been raised. “We will start making preparations for removal,” said Rachel Laing, the mayor’s press spokeswoman, on that day. “We are going to store the fire pits and hope that during better budget times we’ll be able to restore the service.” In a triumphant address Monday, Sanders said he was pleased to announce the donors’ commitment to the fire pits and to San Diego’s families. “Today, we see what happens when civic-minded folks step forward for the sake of the public good,” he said. Bob Kelly, president and CEO of The San Diego Foundation, said the cause aligns with the foundation’s mission to make San Diego a bet- ter place in which to live, work and play. SEE FIRE PITS, Page 3 Baby sea lion surprises Raquel Welch at Warwick’s Books on May 10 to promote and sign copies of her new book, “Raquel: Beyond the Cleavage.” DON BALCH | Village News Scripps researchers Welch revisits La Jolla to promote new book BY JENNA FRAZIER | VILLAGE NEWS BY JENNA FRAZIER | VILLAGE NEWS not a product of the ing roles and respect as an actress, and her film industry and resolution to never lie about her age. Welch Employees at Scripps Institute She remains one of Hollywood’s stressed the impor- also reveals some of her beauty and health of Oceanography’s Marine Sci- most symbolic icons. She has cap- tance of maintain- regimens, including her passion for fashion ence Development Center received tured men’s hearts and women’s ing physical and and yoga, which she says have helped her an unexpected visitor April 27. admiration everywhere. And she emotional wellness stay positive past age 50. At about 7 a.m., senior lab spent most of her childhood right here through proper Born Jo Raquel Tejada on Sept. 5, 1940 in mechanician Michael Bludworth in La Jolla. diet and yoga. Chicago as the first of three children to an was carrying some materials into Raquel Welch, 69, visited Warwick’s In “Beyond American mother and a Bolivian father, the the shop when he noticed some- Books on May 10 to promote and sign the Cleavage,” family relocated to La Jolla when Welch was thing out of place. copies of her new woman-to-woman man- Welch employs two. With her sights set on theater and the “I looked over and saw what I ifesto, “Raquel: Beyond the Cleavage.” her autobiog- performing arts from an early age, Welch thought was a seal, but turned Before taking a seat at the signing table to raphy and grew up taking dance classes and later won out to be a sea lion sitting on top of one of our dive gear carts used talk and pose for photos with a crowd that her personal phi- a slew of teen beauty titles, including Miss to transport gear down to the beach,” Bludworth said. “He started Warwick’s staff estimated at 250, Welch losophy to counsel women San Diego and Miss La Jolla. walking up the hill, and when he headed toward the shop I started briefly remarked that she was happy to be about love, sex, health, body image, Determined to follow her dreams, Welch recording a video.” back in La Jolla, which she remembered as career, family, forgiveness and aging. She graduated from La Jolla High School in 1958 Bludworth posted the 57-second video on Scripps Oceanography’s the site of many fond childhood memories. divulges details about a temperamental and enrolled at San Diego State College on a Accompanied by her sister, Gayle Tejada, father, her first love, marriage and divorce, scholarship that fall. The year after that, she SEE SEA LION, Page 2 who said she lives down the street from the her struggles as a single working mother in bookstore, Welch also asserted that she was Hollywood, her battle to acquire challeng- SEE WELCH, Page 2 THURSDAY · MAY 13, 2010 2 LA JOLLA VILLAGE NEWS NEWS sion series “Seinfeld” and American televi- WELCH sion comedy “Welcome to the Captain.” CONTINUED FROMPage 1 With the release of her new book, Welch, long wary of the media, hopes to married her high school sweetheart and set the record straight and dispel her lega- first husband, James Welch, and worked cy as one of the film industry’s most endur- off campus as a San Diego weather fore- ing sex symbols. caster for KFMB TV. The couple had two “Although this book is not intended to be children, Damon and Tahnee Welch, an autobiography, I feel the need to let you before the marriage dissolved in 1961. Fol- in on who is lurking behind the loincloth,” lowing the split, Welch moved briefly to she writes. “It’s me, Raquel: a woman not Dallas with her children before returning unlike you in many ways and singular in to Los Angeles to pursue film full-time. others. Like we all are. Hello there! Nice to Her early, minor roles included an meet you.” episode of “Bewitched” (1964) and with Following a separation with her fourth Elvis Presley in “Roustabout” the same husband, Richard Palmer, Welch wrote in year. Her first contract film, a 1966 remake “Beyond the Cleavage,” “I don’t think I’m of “One Million B.C.,” solidified her role as a good candidate for wifedom. I like my Raquel Welch, still gorgeous at 69, greets fans a sex symbol when she struck an infamous independence too much.” and signs copies of her book “Raquel: Beyond the Cleavage” at Warwick’s Books on May 10. pose in a prehistoric animal-skin bikini Her book also includes a nostalgic recol- DON BALCH | Village News that evolved into a best-selling poster. Her lection of her high school years in La Jolla. leading role in “Fantastic Voyage” (1966) “I enrolled in La Jolla High School, catapulted her into international stardom, which was only three blocks away from Newell, 54, also said she “couldn’t and Playboy later named her “Most the famous Windansea surfing beach!” she believe how great” Welch looked. Desired Woman” of the 1970s. wrote. “From the high school’s second- “It’s phenomenal,” she said. “She talks a In an effort to pursue more serious roles, story windows, my classmates could check lot about all the aspects of taking care of Welch appeared as a transsexual heroine out the coastline to see if the surf was up.” yourself — mentally, physically, and emo- in 1970’s “Myra Breckinridge” and in con- Adrian Newell, buyer and manager on tionally. She takes care of the whole pack- troversial sex scenes with African-Ameri- the book side of Warwick’s, said that she age, and that positive energy she feels can athlete Jim Brown in “100 Rifles” considers Welch a positive role model for exhibits itself in the way she looks.” (1969). women, especially as they approach middle Considering Welch’s local roots, Newell After launching her own television age. said the size of the crowd and duration show “Raquel!” in 1970, Welch dabbled “She exudes so much confidence,” people were willing to wait for a meeting with careers in pop singing, a one-woman Newell said. “She sends a really great mes- did not surprise her. nightclub musical act in Las Vegas and a sage to our youth-obsessed culture that it’s “She’s a great role model, and I think a Broadway musical. More recently, Welch not about the number. It’s about how you lot of people here know her from child- appeared in a cameo on the popular televi- see yourself and the world.” hood and high school,” she said. SEA LION Thank you La Jolla Village News readers CONTINUED FROMPage 1 YouTube channel, where it generated more than 2,000 views within a week. for the confidence you expressed Meanwhile, the curious guest made himself at home. “He parked himself right in front of the door, then came inside and crawled in voting Mark A. Krasner BEST ATTORNEY around the machine,” Bludworth said. “He wasn’t bothering anybody. We fed him some squid that we got from Birch Aquarium, which he swallowed right down. Then he passed out on the floor and napped for a few hours, waking up Blanchard, Krasner & French looks forward periodically to explore and urinate a few times.” Bludworth assumed responsibility for to continuing to assist with your legal needs the sea lion’s welfare during the ani- mal’s nearly five-hour stay at the devel- opment center. “I didn’t get much work done at all,” Bludworth said. “I just acted as a buffer between him and people and kept him out of harm’s way.