‘Kapu-Kai: The Polynesian Paradise’

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Photo courtesy TikiRoom.com

We’ve posted before about the Kapu-Kai bowling alley, coffee shop and cocktail lounge in Cucamonga, built in 1962, according to Charles Phoenix’s “Cruising the Pomona Valley,” and occupying the northwest corner of Foothill Boulevard and Vineyard Avenue until 1969, when a devastating flood buried the business under water and mud. The building sat vacant for years, later became Holiday roller rink and was demolished in 1994. An Albertsons was erected on the site.

Colin Sato, a son of owner Warren Sato, has produced a 27-minute film on the Kapu-Kai and tiki culture, and it’s quite well done. This blog provided quiet assistance, as I put Sato in touch with Joe Filippi and Linda Frost, who’d both commented here on the Kapu-Kai; Sato flew here from Honolulu to interview them, conduct research at the Ontario library and talk to SoCal tiki fetishists.

Watch “Kapu-Kai: The Polynesian Paradise” here. And way to go, Colin.

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Column: Big Boy lumbers to life at Pomona fairgrounds

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The world’s largest steam locomotive, Big Boy No. 4014, on Thursday began its journey out of the Rail Giants train museum at Pomona’s Fairplex, its home since 1962, to Wyoming. But it’s a slow journey, as the locomotive isn’t functional and it’s being towed as track can be laid. Friday’s column has the details. The Big Boy was the subject of a column in August. You can watch a 45-second video from Thursday here.

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Restaurant of the Week: Roscoe’s Famous Deli

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Roscoe’s Famous Deli, 14700 Pipeline Ave. (at Chino Hills Parkway), Chino Hills

You can’t get chicken and waffles at this Roscoe’s, a sandwich shop and bar in suburban Chino Hills that seems to share DNA with Claremont’s Heroes, at least its original incarnation, and Beer Belly Deli: sports on TV, peanuts on the table, peanut shells on the floor and giant portions of food. It’s one of those places of which people say, “You won’t leave hungry.”

I met three friends there for lunch on a recent Saturday. Mugs of water 8 inches tall were placed before us. “You won’t leave thirsty,” one friend quipped.

I got the meatloaf sandwich ($12, below) with curly fries. It was turkey meatloaf and provolone on a French roll, really good. The others liked their sandwiches too: the Martini ($12), which was chicken and mozzarella on parmesan bread; Your Godfather ($11, bottom), capicolla, prosciutto, salami and pepperoni (“the spiciness was a delicious surprise,” he said) on a French roll; and the veggie ($9), avocado, provolone and more on squaw bread. The latter two diners took home half their meal for later. I could have, and maybe should have. But I didn’t eat dinner, so it all worked out.

“My wife says the portions and prices are too much, but I like it,” declared the Martini orderer. He did not follow up with a belch.

The menu has many more sandwiches, plus burgers, hot dogs, salads and a few dinner entrees.

The walls have funky signs and there’s an attic-like feel to the decor reminiscent of Beer Belly Deli. The restaurant was busy, but our modest needs for service were met. Like Heroes (now Heroes and Legends), the atmosphere is a little amped-up for my taste, but the food’s good and it’s a fun spot to meet friends.

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Spelling refresher might be just the ticket

 

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Downtown Pomona’s ticket machines for its parking lots have been controversial since their installation in 2012, as many people don’t notice the signs or realize they have to check in at the machines and thus get a $58 ticket for time that would have cost $1 or $2. Some 1,000 parking tickets per month are being issued. But the system’s perceived failings run much deeper, into unexpected territory: poor spelling.

A recently installed parking lot sign, above, said rules would be “strickly” enforced. A business owner who is a stickler for good English pointed out the mistake and a strict official made sure the error was fixed — but not before a photo could be snapped for posterity.

But that’s only the tip of the iceberg. I have searched for free street parking to avoid parking in the lots because I didn’t want to have to figure out the technology, but on a recent Sunday I resolved to try it out. Shockingly, when I examined my receipt I learned that I had “payed.”

Is it possible that this misspelling of “paid” has been on every receipt since February 2012, probably tens of thousands of them, and nobody — nobody official, at least — has noticed?

Suggestion for City Hall: Use some of the proceeds from your $58 parking tickets to buy spelling primers!

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Charles Phoenix in Claremont!

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Pop culture entertainer Charles Phoenix showed slides of midcentury bowling alleys, car washes, tiki apartments, ranch houses, dairies, donut shops, laundries and coffee shops Sunday in an event organized by Claremont Heritage. An L.A. resident who grew up in Ontario, he had slides from all around Southern California, with loads from the Inland Valley.

Local sites mentioned were Griswold’s, Betsy Ross, La Paloma, Tugboat Annie’s (“the best restaurant in Claremont,” he quipped), the Folk Music Center, the Chaffey High tiger, the Fair’s monorail and Fine Arts Building, the downtown Pomona mall, Scripps College’s Garrison Theater, the Bowlium (“science fiction style with a little Fred Flintstone thrown in”), Tate Cadillac, White Front, Valley Drive-In, Magic Lamp Inn (“I don’t know who built it, but they were pretty drunk when they did”), Santa’s Village, Northwoods Inn, and the Colby Kai and The Claremont apartments in Claremont.

Above, Phoenix discusses the unusual design of the old Hot Dog Show stand in Ontario. “I want to ask the owner, did you ever step back and see what your designer gave you? It looks like a rather large person wearing red and white tights is squatting over your stand! That makes those halo’d, floating hot dogs especially unappetizing.”

He did have a serious message, of sorts, about the surviving examples of the above and why we ought to save them: “Don’t you guys think people in the future might want to see it?” Indeed.

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Farewell to arms?

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On Merrill Avenue near Chino Airport, motorists appear to enter a zone in which they may donate unused shoulders. (Perhaps the repository is the convenient ditch to their right.) It’s probably okay to slow down for the drop off, but as the second sign warns, don’t come to a full stop.

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