Each year the McKinley Hill neighborhood has a street festival fair and I hear that this wall is painted with a new mural. So this is last year’s mural when Pokémon Go was so popular. Notice how the pokeball is actually part of the building?
The wall is in the alleyway next to Fergie’s on the Ave and as of tomorrow the Pokémon mural will be gone. The McKinley Hill Street Fair is August 19th and I’m looking forward to visiting the new mural!
Ocean Concrete is Granville Island’s longest established tenant (1917) and they have a splendid mural on their silos. The mural is by Brazilian brothers Gustavo and Otavio Pandalfo and was created in 2014. Ocean Concrete is an active industrial use in an area that had been primarily industrial, but in the 1970s it began its transition to a mixed use of retail, education and craftfolks. More about Granville Island can be found on their website.
While dear husband, dear daughter, dear (future and now present) son-in-law were on the island, I also discovered a Little Free Library (8963). The LFL’s owner blogged about it here.
And of course there are a couple of more photos because the island is just that wonderful! As you can see in one store front, it was almost Canada Day (7/1). This is a national holiday. According to Wikipedia, “Canada Day (French: Fête du Canada) is the national day of Canada. A federal statutory holiday, it celebrates the anniversary of the July 1, 1867, enactment of the Constitution Act, 1867 (then called the British North America Act, 1867), which united the three separate colonies of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick into a single Dominion within the British Empire called Canada.” This particular Canada Day is the 150th anniversary of the original, so of high importance.
Catching up from the Texas trip
There is some debate on the fate of John Wilks Booth. Most say he was killed by Federal soldiers who had tracked him down at the Garrett Farm.
But the more interesting theory is that the wrong man was killed at Garrett Farm, Booth escaped to Granbury, TX, changed his name to John St. Helen and tended bar in what is now the Nutshell Cafe. While extremely sick, St. Helen made a death bed confession, but then he recovered. Since his story was then out there, he needed to leave town. He went to Enid, Oklahoma where he committed suicide. A book, Escape and Suicide of John Wilkes Booth by Finis Bates, was written about this (that part is for sure true). Bates later gained control of St. Helen/Booth’s body and exhibited in carnival sideshows.
So, that explains where there is a mural featuring John Wilks Booth next to his wanted poster and near a picture of Lincoln. The mural also features the Lady in Red, who was suppose to be the love of Booth’s life. And on the other wall is Davy Crockett. The Nutshell Cafe is reportedly haunted by the Lady in Red with her boyfriend, Booth, supposedly haunts the adjacent Granbury Opera House.
On a lighter note, I found the coffee to be good at the Nutshell Cafe and would be glad to go back to try the ice cream.
In 1990, artist Paul Cislo painted three murals on walls in downtown Sumner to commemorate Sumner’s Centennial which occurred in 1991. This Cislo mural on Main Street is titled Ryan Sawmill in 1888, (Sumner, WA) and illustrates a sawmill and loggers on Elhi Hill. George Ryan, who owned the mill, was an important person in Sumner’s history.
The Sumner Mural Restoration Project is raising funds to restore all three murals. This summer Trackside Pizza will move into the building.
I stopped here after a Holiday BBQ. While snapping my photos my dear husband wandered into an antique store and purchased two chairs, so this was an expensive stop for me!
“Beyond the Bluff, Beneath the Bay”, by Janice Lee Warren is part of the Tacoma Murals Project. More work by Ms. Warren can be found here. It was painted this year along Stadium Way and replace another mural that had been in place. That mural, featuring sailboats on the bay, had been extensively tagged. The house shown represents the home of “Skookum” Smith who made history by bringing the Northern Pacific rails into Tacoma just one day before the line’s charter expired. While I was out and about, I noticed the mountain was out 🙂
While Poulsbo was indeed settled primarily by Norwegians and other Scandinavian immigrants, sadly the Vikings did not make an appearance. But perhaps now they have through James R. Mayo’s humongous mural on Boehm’s Chocolates on Front Street. The mural was painted in 2011. I was surprised to learn that until World War II Norwegian was the dominate language in Poulsbo.
While visiting the small city for a seasonal day trip, I also captured a few Christmas photos.
I wandered off to revisit the lovely leaf mural on S. 43rd Street (310 East 43rd Street). But it was gone! Of course the bridge is still there, but there is a new mural. I had to consider it a while before I decided that although it was very different from the leaf mural, I really like it. My first impression when I drove over the bridge, is that it was swirls of colors, but when I took the time to get out of the car, I realized that it was words that said “No One Else But You Can Feel Along the Grooves”. The mural was created in 2013 by David Long.
To see the previous mural, go here.
There is a swirling, bold mural on the building at 2502 Sixth Avenue. The building had previously housed Sixth Avenue Photography, but they went out of business in February 2014.
There is a great mural wrapped around the lot of Last Stop Computers, 3101 Sixth Avenue. It features Mt. Rainer. There is also one of those dear carved bears welcoming visitors.
There is a Ed Kane mural next to the blue house at 412 Garfield Street. The house is echoed in the mural and there is also a white house and a brick building that I assume are original to the neighborhood. More information about the mural can be found here.
