Kathlyn Clore

(This was originally published in my local newspaper, to which I contribute occasionally. It’s here.)

An autumn moon rises over the pink sunset on Monterey Bay as Kathleen Tarp calls out to the day’s final visitors at the Monterey Peninsula Art Foundation Gallery. Constantly smiling, she chats up a middle-aged couple visiting from Ohio. On a wooden easel, a trumpeter wearing a purple beret plays colorful jazz against a previous Pacific coast sunset Tarp captured in vivid strokes of oil paint.

Tarp is one of 31 local artists who display and sell their work in the waterfront gallery at 425 Cannery Row.

“Artists and Cannery Row go together like Coke and pizza. We have a history of artists being here on the Row,” said Dick Crispo, the notable local artist who helped start the Monterey Peninsula Art Foundation at a 1981 meeting in his living room.

Crispo looks on from a second-story window as Tarp locks up and descends into the night. His home, studio and personal gallery is next door to the collective’s gallery, which was his boyhood home.

“People come here looking for artists because they associate artists and writers with Cannery Row,” Crispo said.

Cannery Row was made famous in John Steinbeck’s 1945 novel of the same name. Even then, Steinbeck’s first-chapter descriptio of Monterey’s sardine-canning district reads like an elegy, as though he sensed the rowdy character of the place would disappear.

“Cannery Row in Monterey in California is a poem, a stink, a grating noise, a quality of light . . . a nostalgia, a dream,” he wrote.

Fish are no longer caught or canned here as they were then, when the smokestacks and corrugated metal of sardine canneries dominated the waterfront.

But the flavor of the Row as Steinbeck depicted it lives on in the vibrant characters making their living on this meandering street.

Among them are local businessmen braving the frigid business climate. There’s the local firefighter who opened a frozen yogurt shop in July. In the same month, a pair of brothers from Utah began selling gourmet sardines, bringing the oily fish back to the Row for the first time in 50 years. A family of Nepalese immigrants opened an import shop in September and a family of Thai-Americans began filling a tiny shop with startlingly uniform hand-knit hats in October.

The newcomers join the entrenched businesses that have thrived in the area for decades, including the Sardine Factory, the Whaling Station, the Monterey Plaza Hotel & Spa, and the kitsch shops in the Bear Flag Building. The Intercontinental recently opened a waterfront resort known as The Clement. Mix in the franchise presence - Bubba Gump’s, El Torito, the Chart House and the Holiday Inn - and Cannary Row is a premier tourist destination.

But if there is a keystone of Cannery Row, a central focus to ensure enough business to ensure sales of the “catch of the day” remain high enough to pay the dishwasher, its the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

The Aquarium, which marked its 25th anniversary on October 25, 2009, is today the main draw for visitors to Cannery Row. Aquarium officials estimate that in 2009 about 1.9 million visitors will enter and be inspired by the magical worlds of live kep forests, sea-horses, sea otters and jellyfish.

AGE OF AQUARIUM

“It really anchors one end of Cannery Row,” said Mimi Hahn, the aquarium’s director of marketing. “And in our surveys we see that people find our exhibits actually inspiring. … When you come to the aquarium, you’re seeing what’s right under the water.”

Nearly all the sea life available to watch or touch in the aquarium connects to the ecosystem of Monterey Bay itself. Some staff like to say a visit to the aquarium is akin to strolling through the underwater neighborhoods of Monterey, Hahn said.

In addition to enchanting exhibits like The Secret Life of Seahorses, a local ecological focus is part of how the aquarium creates a unique sense of place for its millions of visitors.

In 2006, aquarium staff began partnering with local restaurants to cultivate awareness in Cannery Row kitchens about sustainable seafood eating habits. Twenty-four restaurants participate in the free partnership, in which they are asked not to serve seafood that is on the aquarium’s “red list.” The partnership seeks to helps tourists and locals quickly implement consumer knowledge they glean at the aquarium.

“People who go to the aquarium are generally environmentally aware and they choose restaurants that are similarly motivated,” said Sheila Bowman, senior manager of outreach and education for the Seafood Watch program.

Many are also interested in cutting back on paper. In January, the program unveiled a free iPhone application version of its Seafood Watch card. The application displays three categories of seafood supper options: Green for best choice, yellow for good alternatives and red for seafood to avoid at the table.

“We like the overall idea that people could carry around their iphone and have better and more current information than someone who has a piece of paper,” Bowman said. “That way you don’t just read the list on paper. You can click through the list and read why you should be eating wild alaskan salmon.”

The app has been downloaded about 200,000 times.

Appropriately, sardines - the bread and butter of businessmen on the Row during the early 1900s - are on its list of best choices for seafood purchases on the West Coast. This is good news for Daren

Warnick, who opened the Cannery Row Sardine Company in July.

THEY’RE BACK: DOWN TO BUSINESS

“This area is missing sardines,” Warnick said. “I was walking to my car one day and jut thought, ‘Hey, sardines would work.’ With the history and tourism here, it just seemed to fit.”

Tucked next to the Fish Hopper restaurant, Warnick’s shop in July began selling boneless, skinless sardines for about $7 a can, in addition to other canned seafood. With his kitschy label on T-shirts and the sardines receiving good reviews among foodies, business is good, Warnick said. Whole Foods will also soon begin stocking Warnick’s sardines, which are fished from as far north as Washington.

Cannery Row Sardine Company is one of a spate of new businesses on Monterey with plans to become mainstays for locals and tourists. Another good bet is Myo, a self-serve frozen yogurt shop at 685 Cannery Row.

Stuart Roth, an outgoing Monterey native and career firefighter with the Monterey Fire Department, opened Myo in July with longtime buddy Paige Meyer and two additional business partners. The Row previously had no frozen yogurt shops.

Myo, for Make It Yourself, is sparklingly clean and blindingly colorful. It offers constantly changing flavors and types of frozen yogurt as well as toppings ranging from fruity pebbles to fresh fruit from Del Monte Produce.

“Cannery Row is just a magnificent spot,” he said. “It’s got everything, so much to offer. It’s a neat area, and for locals I think it is underutilized.”

Over at the Little Hat Shop, at 645 Cannery Row, Nicole Chalardpru and her family of Thai-Americans are knitting up hats in just about every color, texture and style imaginable.

Many are sized and themed for children, including a series of fruit-themed hats. Each is made by hand.

“You can’t just go anywhere and find these,” Chlardpru said. “It’s a unique product. We have fun making them. Once you start doing it, you just can’t stop.”

ARTISTS ABOUND

“I came here in 1974 for the Monterey Jazz Festival, and I thought, ‘This is where I want to get old,’” said Kathleen Tarp, a singer who has been painting for about seven years. “So I travelled all around the country doing the music thing and then came back here in 1999.”

Tarp is one of 31 artists who volunteer at the gallery one day a month so the collective can save on commission fees. Small oil, water color and mixed media prints sell for as little as $35; larger works cost more.

Tarp welcomes customers heartily, freely punctuating her remarks with an emphatic, “Right on!” She’s quick to get on the phone to other artists when customers have questions or requests for companion paintings. There is no trace of the snooty atmosphere often associated with art galleries.

“We’re artists, we don’t have any money either,” Tarp exclaims. “They’re always checking you out see if you have any money. And you know those salespeople don’t have a dime either!”

Just as much as smelly sardines, artists have always been a part of Cannery Row. In the late 60s, Crispo and other artists worked in the former Hovden Cannery, which they could rent collectively for $150 a month as long as they agreed not to damage any of the knotty pine or copper inside the former cannery.

That space is now the main entryway to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, constructed in the late 1970s with a $55 million gift from David and Lucile Packard.

Heading to the California International Airshow tomorrow for a story - and ride on Fat Albert, a C-130 (transport) plane.

I know, it’s the sexiest name for an airplane that you’ve heard of.

I’ll go early in the day to check out what’s going on, catch some demonstrations before my flight, at 3 p.m. Tricky part with the flight is, I’m advised by my editor to stay away from first-person accounts. Apparently the paper has had several first-person ride-along stories in recent years.

Any ideas for what angles I could take? I’m bringing my secret weapon, the boyfriend, along for the assignment. He has worked in aviation in the military and can help me understand what’s happening.

So, what would you want to read about your local airshow?

Jessica Simpson’s PR people seem to really like circulating the oft-repeated story about her boobs being too big for the Christian music circuit.

After covering the Spirit West Coast music festival here in Monerey, California, on Saturday, I realized this story is a load of baloney.

Because people playing the Christian music circuit are actually, um, pretty hot. Like Christy Johnson. She’s the stand-up keyboardist and singer in the morbidly-named bandWorth Dying For. And for sure the crowd here really dig her breathy calls to worship as well as the band’s sometimes punky, sometimes Evanescence-esque sound.

I think she def has cross-over appeal.

I learned a few other things at this festival, too:

1. Christian music is a unique niche. It is a genre that includes everything from hip-hop to heavy metal. It’s basically the same music that’s on the rest of the airwaves, only repurposed with lyrics that don’t have any any “bad stuff.”

At least four teenagers I interviewed insisted adamantly that Christian music is “better because it doesn’t have any bad stuff”… And they seemed entirely uncomfortable when I asked what exactly they meant by “bad stuff.”

“You know… like cussin’.”

2. More seriously, while I was pretty entertained by these super psyched believers, I struggled internally with an unexpected aspect of reporting a simple man-on-the-street story from the festival: People asking me my religious beliefs.

My mind isn’t really made up about how to handle this issue.

Is it only fair that I reveal my religious beliefs if I’m asking my sources to talk about theirs? That’s the kind of premise I normally would operate under. If I’m asking a source to share his thoughts, then it seems right that I should be equally open (if asked and time permitting). However, this kind logic once saw me strip down while interviewing a (fellow?) Dutch nudist at a nude beach in the Netherlands. So perhaps my approach needs another thought.

But then again, I was not really there to do anything other than a man-on-the-street story. I was not at all asking interviewees about their beliefs when they asked about mine. So perhaps it would have been OK for me to refrain from answering the question. To beg off.

But would that only draw more attention to the issue? I’m not sure.

I am flipping through the morning news shoes today here in Monterey.

They are all showing weather reports and traffic reports every 10 minutes or so. Every station is reporting a traffic backup near the Bay Bridge. Live images of a idling cars flash across the screen corroborating reports of a 30-minute backup near a major toll plaza.

After making some kind of cutesy comment about being glad not to be stuck in that sea of metal, the traffic reporter hands the broadcast back to the main announcer. He moves on to another story.

Why not follow this report with images of what’s happening for public transport commuters? There are plenty of CalTrain stations at which to shoot pictures. It would also be good to report any major delays on the train or bus systems in and around San Fransisco and San Jose.

Reporting what’s happening for morning commuters taking public transport would be a good service for viewers (especially folks who might be tuning in to updates via smart phone) and a great way to bring the public transportation systems more into the public consciousness.

If you are looking for info on public transportation issues, check out StreetsBlogs.

Digital skills have become de rigeur, but let me take a minute to remember and pay tribute to that most old-fashioned reporter’s tool: Curiosity.

Mine took me to the California Rodeo Salinas last week for a bit of freelance reporting. I’d never been to a rodeo before, but enjoyed my first chance to check it out. Nothing too serious; my contribution to the Monterey County Herald’s coverage included a preview, profile of a local cowboy and - most hilariously - a feature on the world of rodeo queens.

Side question: Is it effective for reporters be sent to cover events they’ve not previously been exposed to for non-niche publications like newspapers? Or should newspapers consistently recruit experts to contribute to reporting - not just as sources but as content creators? I debated this with my sister, who is training to run her first marathon, last week. She thinks “no journalist can understand or convey accurately” what she’s going through in her training. Having written about several marathoners but not run longer than a 10k, I disagreed.

Thoughts?

A few notes about my first rodeo round-ups:

1. Rodeos can be fun, especially once you learn to wear proper footwear. I’m a city girl for sure - a fact given away the flip-flop sandals I wore on my first excursion to the Salinas Sports Complex - but walking through the dirt on the track to see the bulls and cowboys up close was a sensory experience anyway. The “Old West” is certainly still alive in a lot of American (and Australian and Brazillian) hearts, minds and faces: Good lord, the facial hair! Mustaches abounded, as did Wranglers, boots (spurs included) and hats.

2. Not even cowboys have missed the Web 2.0 revolution. The California Rodeo Salinas may be a 100-year-old tradition, but damn it, they sho’ can Tweet. And don’t cha worry yo’ pretty lil’ head, missy: they’re a-gittin’ their 8 seconds of glory on Facebook and MySpace, too.

3. Rodeo queens are more interesting and wholesome than beauty queens. (I did my best Google Searching to make sure of it, let me tell ya).And rodeo girls can at least ride horses and identify “pieces of tack” while onstage. I don’t see Carrie Prejean being able to do such a pretty wave while on horseback. Plus, I doubt the Miss Rodeo California committee buys its queen a new set of fake boobs.

Story idea for next year: Who provides health insurance for these bullridin’ yahoos?

I just read this job advertisement on JournalismJobs.com, which was the premier job board for newspaper gigs when I graduated from J-School a few years ago:

“Looking for a new challenge and a new venue for those writing and reporting skills? Then help us create a paradigm-shifting website for one of Los Angeles’ most effective and popular elected officials, L.A. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky. With fewer journalists covering our political institutions, we’re looking for a writer with sharp editorial skills to produce web stories across a variety of topics, including health, transportation, arts, environment, criminal justice and the economy. Our goal is to connect and communicate with constituents on issues that impact their lives and intersect their interests.

This part-time job is best suited for applicants who’ve worked at newspapers, have superior story instincts, appreciate the complexities of government and have embraced the visual storytelling and community-building of the Internet.”

I think this is evidence of an argument I have been making to my former editor: That the work journalists produce is a public service. News reports, especially local news reports, can provide a lot of value to communities. At many past local events I’ve covered, I was the only reporter there. Local newsrooms are so often the only places producing content for people who want to read about local events.

This advertisement demonstrates (happily) that there IS a market for local news. What I’m not sure about is if I want all the laid-off reporters going to work for government officials. That’s sort of scary.

Although, better to have some reporting on local affairs instead of none. And perhaps my trepidation regarding jobs like this one speak to a sort of old-school American bias: That journalists should be totally objective and separated, to an extent, from society (some even going so far as not to vote). Probably journalists can produce fine work just being honest about their position and ethical in their dealings with sources and the public.

I made this video yesterday.

I had put it off for a while because, sadly, the hard drive on my MacBook is running low. It got all the way down to 2 GB!

So I bought an external hard drive, finally. Took a recommendation from Macworld on an external hard drive which can plug in via USB or Firewire. Plus, I scoured my computer to eliminate anything saved twice or otherwise taking unnecessary space. Surprisingly, a few things had been doubly saved (a good thing to check!).

Anyway, I had fun going to Palo Alto for an afternoon in April to make this video. It’s evident that the Innovation Journalism fellows are committed to increasing coverage of innovation ecosystems.

Plus, I think for all the gloom and doom that reigns over the newsgathering industry, the InJo people are a ray of optimism. A lot of publishers and newsroom managers would do well to integrate some of the ideas from the Innovation Journalism blog into the way they view their operations.