Southern Sonoma Country Life

Celebrating the Fiftieth Birthday of the Renaissance Pleasure Faire

On May 11th and 12th, 1963, Pacifica Radio in Los Angeles presented the first Renaissance Pleasure Faire and May Market.

Culled from nearly six hours of live broadcasting, in celebration of the 50 years since the founding of this iconic Californian cultural event, forty minutes of the pageantry and revelry from the Pleasure Faire has been lovingly edited down from the original reel tape into a commemorative soundscape and generously shared by one of the radio host's and co-founder of the Firesign Theatre, David Ossman.

Phyllis Patterson, a high school history and English teacher, home on maternity leave and her husband, Ron Patterson, a theatrical and whimsical art director at a Hollywood graphics firm were on the forefront of inventive new theater.

The couple invited neighborhood schoolchildren, many the offspring of Hollywood writers, directors and musicians to sign up for innovative new drama and art classes called "Into the Woods." To quote the Renaissance Pleasure Faire history page, there, in the Hills of Hollywood: "they gathered around them a band of merry artists, actors and musicians, and a thrilling concept was conceived."

Curated by the Patterson Family, the Renaissance Pleasure Faire online history page records a rich and significant cultural experience enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of participants and time traveling visitors since that first weekend in May 1963.

Two commemorative books also provide an illuminating insight into this much loved American phenomenon. Though there have been many spin-off events around the United States over the past many decades, there was and will always be only one authentic Renaissance Pleasure Faire. Happy Half Century RPF.

Pimm's New Number 1 Cup Blackberry and Elderflower Special Edition

Sudden onset of sweltering summer has me in the mood for whipping up a jug of Pimm's Number 1 Cup.

Britain's classic tea-colored spicy sweet highball summer time drink of choice and increasing popularity in the States has just released a brand new Blackberry and Elderflower edition in the UK. I'll be looking for a couple of bottles to bring back with me as soon as my feet hit the homeland soil when I visit the folks in a couple months time. 

Garnished with cucumber, mint, orange and strawberry, Pimm's Cup is the easiest of warm weather drinks to mix up in just a minute or two. You can buy the liqueur in most American supermarkets and specialty drinks stores. 

Fill a 12 oz glass with ice and 1 1/4 oz of Pimm's, top off with Seven Up or Sprite or something along those lines. Add mint, cucumber and fruit. Don't be confused by the British recipe that calls for lemonade. American lemonade is referred to as 'cloudy lemonade'  in the UK and is not the ticket for a truly tasty Pimm's Cup, unless carbonated. 

I like the illustrated label on the new edition Blackberry Elderflower version, created by British designer Oliver McAinsh, inspired by a summer hedgerow, which seems to be a theme for me this week. 

James Pimm blended the first ever Pimm's Cup in his famous Oyster bar in Poultry Street in the City of London, back in the 1840s. In those days it was served in metal tankards.

 

 

 

Happy St.George's Day 2013

Happy St. George's Day to my fellow English readers and Anglophiles, here and there and many other places in between!

The cultured folks at Google have come up with this classic doodle for St. George's Day 2013, depicting the Patron Saint of England dragon slaying. St. George is traced back to the 8th Century. Nothing much has changed in the world, seemingly. We're still slaying dragons.

In the meantime, be sure to celebrate your Englishness today. Share a pot of afternoon tea, a pint at the pub or maybe a Pimms cup if the weather is as warm as it was yesterday. Fish and chips, beans on toast, bangers and mash, shepherd's pie.... 

The Independent newspaper outlines Google's take on this most English of days quite succently, here.

 

"I Usually Make Up My Mind About a Man in Ten Seconds and I Rarely Change It," Margaret Thatcher 1925-2013

"I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack me personally it means they have not a single political argument left,"

Baroness Margaret Thatcher - October 13th, 1925 - April 8th, 2013

Big Ben's bells of Westminter will be silenced on Wednesday in respect for one of the most dominant figures in the political history of the 20th Century, Baroness Margaret Thatcher, longest serving British Prime Minister of the era and the only woman to have held the office.

Which ever side of the political camp the politically inclined take to standing on, there is no disputing the fact that the grocer's daughter from Grantham, Lincolnshire, later dubbed as Britain's Iron Lady, would expect no less than massive national debate as to whether the country's tax payers should foot the bill for her stately funeral.

Vogue featured a terrific selection of some of her most famous quotes, along with a great bunch of black and white and color shots of Maggie in her various roles - wife, mother, cook, world leader.  

As a teen in Margaret Thatcher's England (she was PM from 1979 - 1990 - the year I moved to the States), it never crossed my mind that her political status was historic because she wasn't a male. 

How Does Your Garden Grow? Innovative New British Fringe Gardening Event Overlaps RHS Chelsea Flower Show

If you happen to be in the UK between the 18th of May and June 9th and you're looking for something cutting edge, green and completely cool to add to your travel itinerary, check out the happenings at one of Britain's most dynamic new fringe events. Though this isn't traditional theatre, it is a massive production involving a cast of hundreds, staging sustainable green scenes in all sorts of random spots of central London's urban Chelsea landscape and beyond.

photos: Chelsea Fringe

Coinciding and overlapping with the world famous Royal Horticultural Society's Chelsea Flower Show, though completely independent of it, the first Chelsea Fringe took place in 2012 and is a new festival for everyone who’s interested in gardens and gardening.

With its emphasis on participation (most events are free), the Chelsea Fringe is also about pushing the boundaries – its inguaural programme included a peripatetic bicycling beer garden, a floating forest installation in Portobello dock, an aromatic ‘garden of disorientation’ as well as pop-up community gardens and horticultural happenings of all hues.

Projects range rom community-garden events to avant-garde art installations, from walks, talk and performances, to workshops, dinners, demonstrations and on-street ‘happenings’. 

Anyone can enter a project – as long as it’s interesting, legal and about gardens, flowers, veg-growing or landscape. The event which gained most media attention last year was the ‘Bicycling Beer Garden’, which involved a bicycle contraption festooned with planted-up beer gardens, cycled to various Fringe venues.

As yet unfunded and unsponsored, the Chelsea Fringe is entirely powered by volunteers. There were more than 100 events during the inaugural year of the Chelsea Fringe, attracting an estimated 45,000 people to Fringe events over a three-week period. 

‘Satellite’ Fringes are planned in Bristol, Brighton and Vienna this year. The Chelsea Fringe is the brainchild of founder-director Tim Richardson, a garden writer and historian. It operates with the blessing of the Royal Horticultural Society, encouraging 'fringe gardening' all year round. 

Meanwhile, the RHS Chelsea flower Show is celebrating its Centenary from May 21st to 25th, 2013. I think it's fair to say that it is the most famous flower show in the world. It is held in the grounds of the Royal Hospital, Chelsea. 

 

 

Suffering Downton Withdrawal? Try Mr.Selfridge

Did you catch the first episode of PBS Masterpiece Classic's airing of the Downtown Abbey fan club's surrogate, Mr. Selfridge?

I'm not too sure what to make of it so far. Though I liked it enough to tune in again this Sunday evening, I keep coming back to an exhausting Jeremy Piven's (Agent Ari Gold of Entourage fame) remarkable Willy Wonkerish take on Harry Gordon Selfridge, the flamboyant American entrepreneur and showman who brought the concept of lavish shop windows, luxury goods and surrounds to the Oxford Street shopping experience in London, circa 1909. 

The three-time Emmy® winner, Piven prances around at such a pace it's almost a little off-putting. Certainly not on the same leisurely timeline as Downtown and yet, the first episode alone packed so much punch in its multitude of story line teasers, it's compelling to want to know what happens next. A sort of prelude to Are You Being Served almost, with uniformed elevator beauties and the powers that be positioned in their glass door offices somewhere way up on the top floor. 

Selfridge was a self-made business man from Chicago. The series, produced by Britain's ITV is an adaptation of Lindy Woodhead's bio: "Shopping, Seduction & Mr. Selfridge" and began airing in the UK in January.

I used to shop at in-store boutique Miss Selfridge, as a teen. Taking the train into London, Oxford Street's Selfridge's store was a first stop. Of course, the days of Harry Gordon and his sparkling entourage were long gone, but the department store's still going strong. 

To quote Masterpiece Classic's plug for the show: "Award-winning writer Andrew Davies (Pride and Prejudice, Bleak House) conjures the opulence and excitement of Selfridges and the story of its founder, a man of exuberant, outsized, and potentially dangerous, appetite.

"Behind Selfridges' lavish shop windows, gleaming counters, and majestic doors, appetite intersects with ambition and desire not just for Harry, but for his staff, his family, and the various women drawn to the store and the man."

Zoe Tapper (Stage Beauty) is showgirl and temptress Ellen Love; Frances O’Connor (Madame Bovary) is Harry's loyal wife, Rose; Grégory Fitoussi (Spiral) is the mercurial French window designer, Henri Leclair; and Aisling Loftus (Case Histories) is the shop girl we're clearly going to watch rise to retail fame - Agnes Towler. Mr. Selfridge airs Sundays,  through May 19, 2013 on PBS' MASTERPIECE Classic.

HBO's American Premier of Parade's End - Dubbed the Thinking Person's Downton Abbey

A new, sweeping, highly-acclaimed five part mini series is set to air for the first time to American viewers on HBO on Tuesday, February 26th.

Adapted by British playwright Sir Tom Stoppard from the novels by Ford Maddox Ford, 

Parade's End spans the glittering, shallow world of London's high society at a time of impending change. As with Downtown Abbey, prepare to be transported from the glorious, Edwardian English countryside, to the bloody, trench-scarred battlefields of France.

Yet, Parade's End promises much more than the pleasant upstairs downstairs predictability of Downtown.This new BBC series aired in Britain last August, to an opening episode audience of some 3.5 million, rapidly establishing itself as one of the most successful mini series in recent UK history.

Starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Christopher Tietjens and Rebecca Hall as his wife Sylvia (pictured above), look out for Rupert Everett and Miranda Richardson amongst a stellar cast. 

Can't wait....

A Blustery Boxing Day in Sonoma County

December 26th - Boxing Day (or Saint Stephen's Day) for Brits abroad is always a bit of an oddity to anyone other than those with Anglo origins.

While you may be striding onwards towards New Year, the keepers of Boxing Day ready for another round of festive gatherings and tasty traditions.

Though not such a spectacle as Christmas Day with its piles of presents and trimmings, Boxing Day brings a more relaxed approach to the season of goodwill.

Dating back to the middle ages, charitable origins of Boxing Day are deeply entrenched in the British culture, though nowadays provide one more day to do the rounds of family and friends.

A little birdie told me that our pal Mel from A Mouse in the Pantry's expanding the Petaluma Boxing Day tradition into her new home in Oahu this Dec 26th. Party on Hawaii....

May your week continue to be merry and bright as we move forward together into 2013.

 

 

Beautiful New Book on The Poppy Lady - American Moina Belle Michael and her Tribute to Allied Veterans

Author Barbara Elizabeth Walsh and prolific children's book illustrator, Layne Johnson have released a beautiful tribute to America's historic Poppy Lady, a humanitarian and school teacher from Georgia, Moina Belle Michael who singlehandedly launched a campaign to establish as a symbol the red poppy from the First World War torn Fields of Flanders. 

Inspired by finding a box in the attic as a child, containing a postcard signed Pat's Poppy Lady, with a red, crepe -paper poppy pinned to the card, the author learned that her father had met Moina Belle Michael while he was a private first class studying communication at the University of Georgia during World War II. He was living at the Georgian Hotel, along with some 300 additional soldiers in training when he heard that his two brothers, serving in the Italian army, had been taken as prisoners of war. The school teacher/humanitarian lived on the fifth floor of this same hotel at the time and, after having established herself as the Poppy Lady, made it a personal mission to talk to troubled young soldiers whenever she had a chance.

Moina Belle Michael had written to the young soldier's fiancee, the author's mother, on his behalf. Half a century later, the author traveled to the Georgian Hotel after deciding it was time to write the story of Moina Belle Michael's poppy legacy.

Published by Calkins Creek Books/Boyds Mills, a portion of proceeds of The Poppy Lady book sales will go to support the National Military Family Association's Operation Purple(R), which benefits children of the U.S. military.

This gloriously illustrated tribute to veterans marks almost a century since the Poppy Lady handed our her first 23 red silk poppies in New York before pursuading several national and international organizations adopted the poppy as their memorial flower. Millions of disabled service people have been employed in producing these memorial poppies around the world, over the years, raising millions of dollars for veterans. 

What a great way to teach young children about the sacrificies made by allied veterans in World War I and II and also to share the simple, powerful story of a school teacher who made such a marvelous and lasting huminatarian contribution.

 

 

My Favorite Olympic Torchbearer - Octogenarian Paul Zetter CBE

photo: Adam Zetter

Longtime family friend Adam Zetter's darling Dad, Paul Zetter, CBE carried the Olympic Flame through Duncton, West Sussex, as one of 8,000 specially selected, inspirational Brits to bear the torch across the length and bredth of the United Kingdom, this summer.

89-year-old Paul Zetter was nominated by his grandaughter, Keely Wells and selected by Lloyds TSB for his services to sports.

"My grandpa, Paul Zetter was instrumental in putting numerous sports athletes in to the position of enabling them to compete in the Olympic Games," wrote Keely in her nomination, adding: "Paul set up 'Sports Aid Foundation'. Sports people were funded by this organization. Some of the recipricants of his work are Sebastian Coe, Torvill and Dean, David Wilkie to name but a few. I feel this is a very fitting nomination, for someone whose passion has helped young sports athletes to achieve their goal. He would love to be a part of this history because he has done so much for other people. He really really deserves this."

Sports Aid Foundation was established in 1976 and has since helped thousands of young sports people on their way to international success.

Adam Zetter flew to the UK from his home in Southern California this week to witness this monumental moment in his distinguished (and most delightful) father's life.

Honored by the Queen as A Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE), Paul Zetter was longtime chairman of one of the three most famous British Football Pools companies, family-owned Zetters Pools, established in London in 1933. Zetter gave up his executive duties when he retired as Chairman, in 1997.

Since retiring to Sussex, Paul Zetter has penned several books, including his compelling autobiography, Bow Jest.

The old brick Victorian warehouse building in Clerkenwell that was home to Zetters Pools for so many decades of football pools history was  purchased by restaurateurs Michael Benyan and Mark Sainsbury and transformed into a much acclaimed, 59-room Zetter's boutique hotel and restaurant, in 2004.

Football Pools companies, Zetters, Vernons and Littlewoods were known for their  charitable donations of an estimated  £1.1 billion plus  to sports-related causes since the 1920s. The UK National Lottery, established in 1994 put a serious dent in the popularity of football pools. European gaming company giant Sportech PLC, subsequently bought Littlewoods back in 2000, Zetters in 2002 and Vernons in 2007. In 2009 Littlewoods, Vernons and Zetters Football Pool companies were merged by Sportech to form The Football Pools.

Football (soccer) pools are cheap to play and have the potential for huge wins. Based around 49 numbers, pools are like the lottery, though in this case, each number corresponds to a match  to be played on the coming Saturday. To win the jackpot prize, a pools holder must correctly predict eight matches that end in a score draw. Smaller prizes are won for selecting six or or seven score draws combined with one or more no-score draws.

The look on his face, here in Adam Zetter's super shot of his Dad, says it all. An Olympic Champion in his own right!