Mike Johnson carries on the legacy of woodworker Sam Maloof by reproducing chairs, tables and other furniture and restoring original pieces, all in Maloof’s former studio in Rancho Cucamonga. Maloof died 15 years ago this month. “Sam was kind of a mentor,” Johnson says. I visit with him for my Sunday column.
Also, enjoy your Memorial Day weekend!
I attend the biggest meeting yet of the Rancho Cucamonga Silent Book Club and make a bit more progress on “Swann’s Way.” That’s the subject of my Friday column, which includes the schedule for the next meetings in Rancho, Redlands and Twentynine Palms, the three IE chapters.
Michelle Dowd’s memoir “Forager: Field Notes on Surviving a Family Cult” has become an unexpected success. The Chaffey College professor was the featured guest on “The Joe Rogan Experience” last month, a rare appearance by an author on the popular podcast and certainly a rare if not unprecedented experience by an Inland Empire resident. I write about that for my Friday column.
Another authentic Chinese restaurant, Seven Grams, has opened in Rancho Cucamonga, drawing the attention of a prominent food blogger. It’s a sign of how the city’s demographics have changed. I eat there with the local couple who left China two years ago to return to the IE and we catch up. Also, two child stars from “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids” will be at a Rancho Cucamonga comics shop on Saturday for Free Comic Book Day. And two Cucamonga mentions show up back to back in a Looney Tunes program. It’s an all-Rancho column for Wednesday.
Visitors journeyed from Palm Springs’ Modernism Week to Rancho Cucamonga’s Sam Maloof Home via charter bus on Sunday, lured 75 miles by the chance to see the home of the late woodworker. I joined them, sheepish about never having seen the house myself. It’s quite the place. It’s the subject of my Wednesday column.
Toby Keith’s death reminded me (eventually) that his name had been on a bar and restaurant at Victoria Gardens until 2015. I refresh everyone’s memory about this local tie-in to the singer who died earlier this month. Also, as the downtown Pomona Starbucks serves its last customers, I’m there to bear witness. And, finally, theater seats are there for the taking at Palm Springs’ Plaza Theatre before the space is renovated. All this is in my Sunday column.
I delve into the local impacts of the Brightline West project linking Las Vegas and Rancho Cucamonga by high-speed rail. It’s akin to “adding a small airport,” one city official says. I also make some wisecracks, under the theory that if we, as a nation, can’t joke about a bullet train to Cucamonga, what can we joke about? All aboard for my Sunday column!
A sculpture of a 12-foot dog, made of steel, slightly abstracted and painted bright yellow, stands outside Rancho Cucamonga’s new Bark at Central Park dog park. It’s got its detractors, both online and at the dog park, but some admirers too, including me. I round up opinion, speak to the artist and tell the tail, er, tale in my Sunday column.
Klatch Coffee started in Rancho Cucamonga 30 years ago (as Coffee Klatch — do you remember?). For its anniversary, I talk to the family behind the seven-shop chain to hear how they got started in 1993, before coffee was a thing and before people carried phones and laptops into coffeehouses with them. See what’s brewing (zing!) in my Wednesday column.
Hoyt’s Ace Hardware in Rancho Cucamonga will be closing next month. The family has sold the property and is having a sale the next few weeks. Opened by S.M. Hoyt in Ontario in 1926, Hoyt’s moved to Rancho in 1979 and was a survivor among mom-and-pop hardware stores in the age of big-box retailers. Read about it in my Friday column.