Volume XXXIX, No. 10
December 2015 / January 2016
THE NOE VALLEY VOICE Turning Backyards Into Fertile Fields
Farmers’ Market Headed to the Street
By Richard May
By Matthew S. Bajko
Muni to Be Rerouted on Saturdays During Construction
Ideas Range From Garden Beds To Community Farms
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veryone knows the good taste and health benefits of fresh fruits and vegetables. Wouldn’t it be great to grow them in your own backyard? That’s what Noe Valley green thumb Daniel Cumings does. Cumings, an accountant in his other day job, has been raising vegetables on Sanchez Street for over 30 years. He started planting when he moved to San Francisco after college. “In the ’60s and ’70s, the only access to clean food was to grow it yourself,” Cumings says. Even though we now have farmers’ markets and organic fruits and vegetables in stores, he thinks “the freshest food is from your backyard. And,” he says with a smile, gardening “is entertaining.” Cumings has lots of good advice for backyard farmers. If you’re new to gardening, he recommends you “start small.” Although he has worked in larger areas in previous years, his garden now is just 50 square feet. That’s 10 feet by 5 feet. But in Cumings’ yard, the planting bed is 2.5 feet by 20 feet, because he likes “to be able to reach everything without stepping into the garden.”
tarting Saturday, Jan. 2, the weekly Noe Valley Farmers’ Market will take over a block of 24th Street due to the construction of a brand new neighborhood park. The relocation of the weekly market will mean that for much of 2016 the 48Quintara buses will be rerouted Saturday mornings till early in the afternoon. The 13-year-old farmers’ market is being forced out of the parking lot it has
Trip to Bountiful: Brad Wolfe (right), pictured with housemate Maika Nicholson, wants Noe residents to join him in creating a Noe Valley Neighborhood Farm. Photo by Beverly Tharp
Lesbian Pioneers A Feature of Gay History Document
Noe Valley Also Cited for Early LGBT Support By Matthew S. Bajko
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To plant winter vegetables in January, you need to get the garden ready in December, he says. Pick your sunniest spot, dig up the area, add “amendments” (compost, manure), and mix. Cumings advises
ince gay men began moving into San Francisco’s Castro District in the early 1970s, the centrally located neighborhood has been seen as the heart of the city's lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community. Yet Noe Valley, just south of the Castro, has also had a part in the history of the local LGBT community. The neighborhood has been home to many LGBT leaders over the years, long before the
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Getting Your Farm On
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With This Ring. On June 16, 2008, as then Mayor Gavin Newsom looked on, Del Martin placed a wedding band on the finger of longtime partner Phyllis Lyon. The event marked the first state-sanctioned same-sex marriage in San Francisco. Photo by Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP
Tom Mazzolini Still Spinning the Blues Blues Fest Founder Keeps It Real on Radio By Tim Simmers
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Blues-EyeView. Blues by the Bay radio host Tom Mazzolini has seen his musical passion bring sweet sounds to hundreds of thousands over the past 42 years in the Bay Area. Photo by Beverly Tharp
t’s been seven years since Tom Mazzolini had to pull the plug on the San Francisco Blues Festival, the popular outdoor music fest he ran for 36 years. But the Noe Valley resident is still broadcasting his passion for the blues, on KPFA Radio’s Blues by the Bay. Mazzolini’s lively Saturday show is in its 42nd year and may be the longest-running radio blues show in the nation. The program sizzles with gutsy, emotional blues and a righteous blend of the culture and history of the music. Mazzolini weaves in his own stories, improvising like a jazz musician. A native of Chicago, he also talks about the origins of the music, with its themes of suffering and overcoming great odds, and its colorful cast of characters. “People want to know what they’re listening to,” says Mazzolini, 73. “I play a record, and it might rekindle a memory of CONTINUED ON PAGE 14