Hot off the Progress-Bulletin linotype machine

The former Progress-Bulletin newspaper headquarters in downtown Pomona is still around, now dubbed the Progress Building and used for lofts, retail, a bar and an art gallery. The latter, the Prog Gallery, is in the basement. And in the basement, off in a corner, stands the Prog’s old linotype machine.

That’s the machine on which articles were typeset for decades. It looks like a beast, but at the time the linotype was an advancement over handsetting of type, i.e., a human picking out metal bits of type from boxes for each letter and form of punctuation.

The linotype would set, yes, entire lines of type all at once when an operator typed out the lines on a 90-character keyboard. The Prog’s machine was made by the leading manufacturer, the Mergenthaler Linotype Co. It was in use until about 1976, retired Prog/Daily Bulletin staffer Mike Brossart tells me. That’s when phototypesetting was introduced.

I was in the basement looking at art a few weeks ago and noticed the machine. I must have seen it before, but it caught my eye, so I snapped a couple of photos for posterity.

Here’s a Wikipedia entry for linotype if you want to delve more deeply.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Plusone Linkedin Digg Reddit Stumbleupon Tumblr Email

Restaurant of the Week: Rad Coffee

Rad Coffee, 232 N. 2nd Ave. (at 9th), Upland; open 6 a.m. to midnight daily

This is a sequel of sorts to last week’s no doubt thrilling Restaurant of the Week post about Daddy O’s, in that Rad Coffee is immediately next door to Daddy O’s and was visited after my fine burger and fries there. Put both posts together and you have a complete two-hour experience (that will take five minutes to enjoy).

I was aware of Rad Coffee, which after all has been written up in LA Weekly and elsewhere, but that write-up, while positive, had not been enticing somehow. It focused on Rad’s unusual drink combinations that use colored whipped cream and breakfast cereal. Shortly afterward, an Upland friend said something dismissive to me about the place, to the effect that it was great if you like cereal in your coffee.

That was a couple of years ago. After Daddy O’s, the friend with whom I had dinner suggested we go next door for Rad, telling me it was a good spot. And as I try to keep an open mind, I was game, because I remained curious about the place.

The first surprise was that one of the baristas is a friend whom I had lost track of after he’d left a Claremont restaurant I frequented. So immediately I felt welcome.

Rad does have some crazy drinks in its “specialty blended” category, some of which, yes, have cereal. They also serve espresso shots in cold brew with ice cream ($10), for you big spenders.

But they serve standard espresso and coffee drinks, made with Verve Coffee from Santa Cruz, as well as tea and lemonade. I got a sea salt caramel iced coffee ($5.50 for 12 oz.) and liked it.

Notable is the decor and vibe. The walls are papered in punk rock photos and concert fliers, horror movie posters and the like. Its mascots, male and female, are cartoonish skulls with ’50s hair. Halloween will be big for Rad with various horror-themed specialty drinks and events this month.

Among the wall art that typifies the irreverent tone is the Lee Harvey Oswald-Jack Ruby doctored photo below. Some will say it’s in bad taste. Well, it IS in bad taste, but it makes me laugh.

Most impressive is how busy Rad was and how many young people were there. Can you believe a business in downtown Upland (that’s not a bar) is open until midnight? Can you believe a business in downtown Upland is cool? I can barely believe it myself.

Rad may or may not be for you, but I liked it, hope to return and wish them continued success on their fourth anniversary. It always pays to keep an open mind. You never know what you’ll find.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Plusone Linkedin Digg Reddit Stumbleupon Tumblr Email

Reading Log: September 2019

Books acquired: “A Tan and Sandy Silence,” “The Scarlet Ruse,” “The Turquoise Lament,” John D. MacDonald; “Sweet Thursday,” John Steinbeck; “The Best of Edmond H. Hamilton,” Edmond H. Hamilton (duh); “The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Stories,” H.P. Lovecraft

Books read: “The Cambridge Companion to Bob Dylan,” Kevin Dettmar, ed.; “Counter-Clock World,” Philip K. Dick; “A Canticle for Leibowitz,” Walter M. Miller, Jr.; “Can and Can’tankerous,” Harlan Ellison

It’s not really c-c-c-cold, but I may as well pretend it is, the better to introduce my reading for September, all of them with titles that employ at least one C.

It came about like this: I wanted to read “Cambridge Companion,” and in fact had been slowly reading it on my nightstand all summer, while also desiring to get to “Counter-Clock,” one of the oldest unread books in my collection. (Not exactly unread, as I’d read and discarded an earlier copy in the early 1980s, but I’d been wanting to read it again as an adult who now loves Philip K. Dick.)

“Can and Can’tankerous,” a recent acquisition, fit the theme, and out of nowhere I realized so would “Canticle for Leibowitz,” which I’d owned for a decade and had had no plan to read. So, with a cackle, I added that C-book to the stack.

With that accounting, let’s get to the books.

“Cambridge Companion” (2009): Targeted to the college curriculum, this collection of essays about Bob Dylan is by design academic. For the rest of us, it’s definitely for the committed Bobhead. The first half’s thematic essays are often turgid, although Alan Light’s on Dylan as performer stands out. The back half, with commentary on eight albums, is much stronger, with Carrie Brownstein on “Blood on the Tracks” and Jonathan Lethem on “Infidels” (the reason I bought the book) being particularly good. Editor Dettmar is a Pomona College prof of my acquaintance, btw.

“Counter-Clock World” (1967): In the near future, time has begun running backward, which means the dead are returning to life in reverse chronological order. They include a black nationalist spiritual leader (think: MLK) whose return might upset society. There are serious concerns here about what exists beyond the grave, as well as a lot of hilarity about saying “goodbye” upon meeting, smoking cigarette butts back into full cigarettes, muttering “food” as a curse, wanting to eat in privacy and babies crawling back into the womb. Perhaps also a sign of the topsy-turvy world, the most powerful government agency is the library, which has commandos. Not in PKD’s first tier, but impressive and a personal favorite.

“Canticle” (1959): The conceit of a grocery list treated as holy relic makes for a compelling back-cover come-on, but the novel takes the matter of faith after a nuclear holocaust much more deeply and seriously. Thoughtful and well-written, this has flashes of humor, an ethical underpinning and a despair over the ability and willingness of mankind to destroy the planet.

“Can and Can’tankerous” (2016): A decent final book by Ellison collecting his 21st century output. I’d say two-thirds of the stories are entertaining, one-third weak. (I could have done without the Sarsaparilla Alphabet’s 26 brief, unrelated vignettes) I don’t know if Ellison was self-publishing for monetary or control reasons or because nobody wanted to work with him, but either way, it’s a little sad that a writer of his stature self-released this oddly sized, print-on-demand book. All that said, it’s an envoi to a long, remarkable career.

Have any of you read “Canticle”? I know Doug Evans has, and surely the absent Rich P. has as well. It’s the best book this month, although “Counter” was my favorite.

These books came into my hands as follows. “Counter-Clock” was bought by mail in 1994 from the legendary, and now defunct, The Other Change of Hobbit store in Berkeley. “Leibowitz” was bought at the likewise legendary-and-defunct Shakespeare & Co. in Berkeley in 2009. “Cambridge” was bought used in December 2018 from North Hollywood’s legendary, still in business Iliad Bookstore. “Can” was a Christmas gift, arriving this January via Amazon, an obscure online retailer with which a few of you may, perhaps, have dealt.

In other words, they arrived over the course of a quarter-century and were dispatched all in the same month. C-c-c-crazy!

Next month: books about Los Angeles.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Plusone Linkedin Digg Reddit Stumbleupon Tumblr Email

Column: The man who put Chino in a Grateful Dead song

I catch up on some of the news from when I was away, starting with the passing of “Friend of the Devil” lyricist Robert Hunter and continuing with demolition of the former Marie Callender’s in Claremont and the deaths of Chuck Keagle and Trisha Martinez, the latter with the inclusion of comments from an informal gathering in her honor Thursday night that I attended. All that makes up Sunday’s column.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Plusone Linkedin Digg Reddit Stumbleupon Tumblr Email

Restaurant of the Week: Daddy O’s Rockin’ Cafe

Daddy O’s Rockin’ Cafe, 228 N. 2nd Ave. (at 9th), Upland; open noon to 7 p.m. Wednesday to Saturday, 12:30 to 5:30 p.m. Sunday, closed Monday and Tuesday

I had heard of Daddy O’s, in business in downtown Upland since 2014, but had not eaten there. In fact, I was skeptical that it was as good as Yelp reviews would lead us to believe; it currently has 5 stars. But a friend whom I trust raved about it and invited me for an early dinner (Daddy O’s closes at 7), so I showed up with optimism. Spoiler alert: Even my sense of optimism underrated Daddy O’s.

The interior is narrow and kitschy, with some midcentury-style memorabilia and modest, two-person wooden booths. It looks like an actual business from the 1950s rather than the gleaming, overdone, Marilyn and Elvis-decorated diners around us today.

We ordered off the limited menu — hamburgers with or without cheese, a hot dog and deli sandwiches were about it — and took a seat at a sidewalk table on a warm late afternoon.

The owner, who appeared to be running the place by herself, said our food would take a few minutes since everything is made fresh, and that was fine. Some 15 or 20 minutes later, she brought out our plastic baskets.

My cheeseburger, cooked medium rare as requested, was made from hand-pressed Angus beef, with a sheaf of lettuce, tomato, onion and thousand island dressing. It was the best burger I’d had in some time. The crinkle-cut fries were crisp on the outside, soft on the inside. The combo with a soda: $10.50.

My friend’s hot dog, fries and soda ($7.50) were declared very good, with the grilled onions a good choice. “I’ve always liked crinkle-cut fries,” she said. “They remind me of high school.”

Daddy O’s also sells Thrifty ice cream and has since added vegetarian burgers. It’s small, but it’s mighty. Five stars is about right.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Plusone Linkedin Digg Reddit Stumbleupon Tumblr Email