Griffith Park, one of LA’s most beloved spots, is turning 120. Too bad its namesake was an alcoholic, murderous misanthrope who thought the pope was plotting against him. ... We talk with a 77-year-old woman who's found herself homeless for the first time, forced into a short sale of the home they shared. ... If you love classical music on the radio, but hate the stodgy attitude, you’re a fan of Rich Capparela, who is semi-retiring as KUSC's afternoon drive DJ. ... It is traditional when SantaCon rolls around each year to talk with the Santa fans who dress as St Nick. So of course we'll talk with an elf.
SantaCon LA: 5 questions for a very grumpy Christmas elf
SantaCon is back. The annual holiday themed pub crawl happens all across the country around this time of year, and hits LA Saturday. The goal is to drink (a lot), be loud, obnoxious, and jolly, and all while wearing your best Santa beard and suit.
But even some of Santa’s elves make their way to the con, despite this being a very busy time of year. We talked with an elf named Sugar PoleNorth about what it’s like to work at the North Pole.
On the living wage:
"Right now I’m at like three sugar cookies an hour, but I’m working up to get paid a reindeer a week. You can get paid in anything at the North Pole."
On Christmas sweaters:
"I don’t know why people wear Christmas sweaters in Southern California… it’s not like negative 20 degrees; it’s in the 70s right now and people are still buying sweaters."
On visiting Southern California:
"I’m trying to get out of the Pole before, you know, it explodes. We got a couple weeks before Christmas so I am taking my break now. I’m actually buying Christmas presents ... I don’t want to make them because that’s what I do for a living."
On Santa Claus:
"I work there 17 ½ hours a day. I have never seen the guy. I see a flash of white sometimes. I hear his boots, but that could be anybody.
Ever thought of forming an elf union?
"Listen man, us making gifts and him delivering has been going on for thousands of years. All I’m going to say is that you can’t really fight the power. Christmas is way too big, it's bigger than all of us. It’s bigger than Santa."
SantaCon will take place in downtown Los Angeles on Saturday, December 10. The starting location of the crawl is not disclosed until the day of the event. So to find out, visit their Facebook or
. And if you see Sugar PoleNorth, slip her some cash.
So long, KUSC's Rich Capparela: Classical music, without the 'strategically placed stick'
Rich Capparela, the man who comforts thousands of Southern Californians on their tortuous drive home, is himself tired of commuting, and is quitting his full-time gig at KUSC.
It's a blow for people who prefer his irreverent style -- "It's already dark out, so the hell with it. Here's a little night music from Mozart" -- to your typical listing of orchestra, conductor, Köchel number, key, opus, and on and on.
For 10 years, since the demise of K-Mozart, the commercial classical station, Capparela has been Classical KUSC's afternoon drive DJ, on the air from 4-7. This is his last month on the full-time grind, so I took the opportunity to talk with him about radio, music, and life.
Basically, I am your standard classical announcer, but with a subtext. For those who who want to listen, there are always subversive elements to everything I do, and that's what I've been doing for more than four decades. I try to make sure there are two shows going on. One for those who like their classical music served up missionary style, and then for people who want a little bit of something under the sheets, as it were.
What is the subtext? What are you subverting?
The preconception that classical music has a strategically placed stick. I got into classical music because of the announcer for the Boston Symphony. It was in the late 60s that I heard a broadcast and the announcer said [here Rich does a perfect imitation of the kind of soporific stuffy announcer that used to populate public radio] and I thought "Wait a minute! That music was much much better than what I just heard!" And so I decided that maybe I should participate rather than complain.
How do you imagine your listeners?
I've done seminars for how to announce for classical radio. And I've told the people, "Here's what the audience is doing while you are explaining the tumultuous first performance of Beethoven's whatever. They are brushing their teeth, arguing with their spouse, taking care of bodily functions, and are talking to somebody else at this very moment. Once in a while, if you say something that is intriguing, they may listen to you for a second. But they have lives to take care of and you're in the background."
Why retire from full-time drive-time? (He'll still do Friday afternoons from the beach, as he does now.)
I've gotten to the point where I think I may have another chapter. About every seven years, I have made it a point to shake myself up by doing something major with my career. And it's because one of the great fears I have is complacency.
Capparela says he'll continue to give pre-concert lectures, wants to develop a sort of composer stand-up, will do voice-over work, scuba, and do more gigs with his rock band, Otherwise Normal. Listen to the audio to hear what needlepoint inspired Rich, and the backstory to his very popular anti-road rage selection he plays every day to keep people from killing each other on the road.
Rabe sings Off-Ramp's Song of the Week: The Muff's "That Awful Man"
Off-Ramp's Song of the Week celebrates The Muffs' Saturday concert at the Whiskey a Go Go, with the Bangles. (The Bangles play with The Pandoras Thursday, and The Las on Friday.)
The Muffs -- Kim Shattuck, Roy McDonald, and Ronnie Barnett -- formed in LA in 1991 and have so far made six albums. "The Muffs came up in the ‘90s," Chris Conaton writes on popmatters.com, "where Shattuck’s sugary pop hooks and punky attitude nestled right in with the pop-punk explosion. That explosion never really translated into major success for the band, whose only mainstream claim to fame was their cover of 'Kids in America' for the soundtrack to the movie 'Clueless.'"
You play follow the leader
And I don't understand
Why you want to spend your life
With that awful man
He only wants you for one thing
He'll have some more if he can
And now you want to spend your life
With that awful man
And he doesn't mean it when he says he loves you so
Dedicated to himself as if you didn't know
And he doesn't mean it when he says he loves you so
Dedicated to himself as if you didn't know
You play follow the leader
And I don't understand
Why you want to spend your life with that awful man
Why you want to spend your life with that awful man
Why you want to spend your life with that awful man
Your father left you
And no one loves you
And you'll take it
-- The Muffs, "That Awful Man"
"That Awful Man" -- which is basically every good friend's response to the wedding they don't want to stand up in -- is from 1997's "Happy Birthday to Me."
I have a warm spot for the song because it's one of the songs I performed with my friend Greg Holmbeck when we had a band called Belt in The Twin Cities in the late 1990s.
from
on Vimeo.
The Bangles and The Muffs perform Dec. 10 at the Whiskey a Go Go.
Rabe videography by Taylor Orci
Happy 120th Griffith Park, but your founder was a jerk
Griffith Park, one of LA’s most beloved spots, turns 120 on Dec. 16. Too bad its namesake was an alcoholic, murderous misanthrope who thought the pope was plotting against him.
Here's the story, from Robert Petersen, who hosts and produces the podcast The Hidden History of Los Angeles.
Griffith J. Griffith was born poor in Wales in 1850. He migrated to the U.S. and moved to San Francisco where he made a fortune in mining. He moved to Los Angeles in 1881 and bought Rancho Los Feliz – a tract that included present day Los Feliz, Silverlake, and part of the Santa Monica Mountains. He married the daughter of a prominent family and started referring to himself as a colonel.
He was an odd man, condescending, long-winded, and unpopular. They said of him, "He's a midget egomaniac, a roly-poly pompous little fellow.”
Unable to charm his way into the hearts of Angelenos, he then tried to use his wealth. In 1896, Griffith gave the city of LA the biggest Christmas gift it had ever received. He donated more than 3,000 acres of Rancho Los Feliz to the city for use as a public park. This became Griffith Park.
But soon Griffith started drinking – as much as 2 quarts of whiskey every day – and arguing religion with his wife. Tina was staunchly Catholic. Griffith was Protestant. And he came to believe that his wife was conspiring with the Pope to poison him and steal his money.
And then in 1903, things came to a head.
Griffith and his wife, Tina, were vacationing with their 15-year-old son at the presidential suite of the Arcadia Hotel - a seaside resort in Santa Monica.
During their stay, Griffith kept insisting on changing plates and coffee cups with Tina — to stave off any attempt by the Pope, or his wife, to poison him. Then on the last day of their vacation, Griffith entered their bedroom with Tina’s prayer book in one hand — and a revolver in the other.
According to a 1904 article in the Los Angeles Times, He ordered Tina to get on her knees and said: “Remember I am a dead shot.”
He handed Tina her prayer book and ordered her to swear her truthfulness.
Tina described it to the Times:
“He told me to take my prayer book and get down on my knees; that he had some questions to ask me. I begged him to please put the pistol away. Oh, I begged him to please put it away. I saw that I was in the hands of a desperate man, so I asked him if I might have time to pray. He said I might, so I knelt and raised my eyes and prayed.”
Griffith then pulled out a card with a list of questions on it. The Colonel asked the questions as he held the pistol over his wife kneeling before him:
Griffith: “Did you ever know of Briswalter being poisoned in your house?”
Tina: "No, he was not poisoned; he died of blood poisoning brought on from a sore foot. He —"
Griffith: “That will do. Have you been implicated with or do you know of anyone having given me poison?”
Tina: “Why, Papa, you know I never harmed a hair of your head.”
Griffith: “Have you ever been untrue to me?”
Tina: “Papa, you know I never have.”
Griffith took aim with the pistol and started pull the trigger. But just as he pulled the trigger, Tina jerked her head to one side and the bullet struck her in the eye but did not kill her. Bleeding and blinded, Tina jumped out the window and landed on a wooden piazza roof one floor below. She landed next to the window of the couple who owned the hotel and they pulled her to safety. They also called the sheriff.
Griffith was put on trial for attempted murder. His defense attorney argued that Griffith was the victim of “alcoholic insanity” and the jury convicted Griffith of the lesser charge of assault with a deadly weapon and he was sentenced to the maximum sentence possible — 2 years and a $5,000 fine.
His wife filed for divorce and a judge granted her request in less than 5 minutes, arguably the fastest divorce in L.A. history.
After a two-year prison term at San Quentin, Griffith returned a sober and somewhat more humble man, intent to mend his broken reputation. But most Angelenos didn’t want to have anything to do with him.
Before his death, Griffith attempted to rehabilitate his image once again by giving to the city – this time money to build a public observatory and theater in Griffith Park. Some in the city wanted to turn down the money, not wanting to accept anything from a social pariah. But ultimately, the money went to the city after Griffith’s death by way of a trust. The Colonel died in 1919. The Greek Theatre was completed in 1929. The Griffith Observatory was completed in 1935.
Griffith Park, Griffith Observatory, the Greek Theater — all of these L.A. landmarks owe their existence to the Colonel.
And through these gifts to the city, his name has been rehabilitated. Today, the name Griffith is associated with some of the most beloved landmarks of our city. And the near murder of his wife is long forgotten.
Griffith Park, Griffith Observatory, and the Greek Theater, more places where you can find the hidden history of L.A.
What it's like to be 77 and homeless for the first time
Elena Mays was excited Thanksgiving Day to get out of the homeless shelter. "That was my move out date," she explained. But for bureaucratic reasons unknown the day came and went in the shelter she remained.
"The ups and downs make it really hard," she tells Offramp producer Taylor Orci at Languille Emergency Shelter, part of Good Shepherd Center. "I've never been in the system. It's all new to me." Before her current hardships began, Mays had never been on food stamps or government assistance. She didn't know what Section 8 was and she didn't know what the Housing Authority did. But when her husband died three years ago, Mays found herself in dire straights unable to keep up with the payments on her home. She found herself dealing with things she never thought she'd have to deal with.
"I miss my dogs more than I miss my home," she reflects. The stress of her new situation makes it tough for her to sleep, and sometimes she stays up till 3am playing solitaire on her phone. "Some of the other ladies in the shelter go out in the daytime," she says. "But then you spend money, so I just stay in my room. I don't even go out into the courtyard."
Because of the complications that have kept her from moving into her own place, Mays has become withdrawn and admittedly depressed. "Pray for me," she says, mustering a laugh.
The day after Mays spoke with KPCC, she was admitted to the hospital due to complications from stress.
You can donate to the Good Shepherd Center by clicking here.
Expert: Ghost Ship blaze could have happened here in Southern California
The fire at Ghost Ship was a tragedy that could have also happened here.
"I believe it can," says Bill Murphy, a former fire marshal and current instructor at the Rio Hondo Fire Academy, says it is easy to find warehouses like Ghost Ship in LA: "I don't believe that building or the use of it is particularly unique to San Francisco or the Bay Area. There are plenty of areas in Southern California where there are similar situations." Ghost Ship wasn't what he calls a "legally permitted and inspected occupancy," so there were many uncontrolled life-threatening hazards.
When living in permitted, regularly inspected buildings, residents can expect smoke detectors, alarms, clear exits, sprinkler systems, etc. But in artist communes like Ghost Ship, Murphy wonders if it would have been on the inspectors' radar, "From everything I've heard so far, this was an occupancy that was not permitted. So then you'd be in some kind of nuisance enforcement - which they had been doing over the years, due to public complaints and requests for inspections."
Murphy says it is difficult but not impossible to inspect these buildings. But it will require money, manpower, and new priorities. "You would need multiple agencies, working simultaneously to affect some type of change [in safety] ... in a timely manner, and through a legal process."
It's an open question whether officials have the political will to persevere, but Murphy says "the skills and knowledge are there. In the fire prevention community: absolutely. Code writing: absolutely the skills are there. It's just putting it together in a reasonable, thoughtful approach to get to some sort of solution."