Beat blues with brews at Gilman Village
February 5, 2013
There is a solution to chase away the doldrums of a rainy, cool Issaquah winter, and if the Issaquah Chamber of Commerce is correct, it comes pouring from your favorite wine or pilsner glass.
The chamber will host its inaugural Beat the Winter Brews Fest, complete with spirit, beer and wine tastings, food and music, all scattered along the storefronts and boardwalk of Gilman Village on Feb. 26.
“We were looking to do something in the winter, when people are saying there is nothing to do, and we came up with this unique adult-friendly event,” said Robin Kelley, director of festivals for chamber.
Salmon Days Festival is ‘Streaming Live’
January 29, 2013
2013 Salmon Days Festival logo
Salmon Days Festival organizers adore puns. For the next festival theme, expect a blend of homespun and high-tech.
The theme for the October celebration is “Streaming Live” — a nod to instantaneous communication and salmon habitat.
“Even after 44 years, our Salmon Days Festival promises to be more current than ever,” Robin Kelley, lead Salmon Days organizer, said in unveiling the theme Jan. 24. “Innovation and interpretation, pixilation and Pinterest, in the cloud, going viral, browsing and blogs. This year’s theme is today and looking to the future.”
Salmon Days Festival is packed to the gills
October 9, 2012
Unseasonably warm weather greets visitors for fun, sun
Thousands of visitors to Salmon Days fill Sunset Way on a warm and sunny Saturday to help set an attendance record for the annual two-day festival. By Greg Farrar
The calendar says it is October. The changing colors of the tree leaves suggest that autumn is in the air and the endless stream of chinook congregating at the Issaquah Salmon Hatchery definitely confirms it.
Iconic clown J.P. Patches, Salmon Days Festival star, dies
July 24, 2012
By Greg FarrarAlec Sharon, then 5, with mom Jill and dad Tod, don clown noses to pose with J.P. Patches for a family photo Nov. 7, 2008, during a celebration at Front Street Market. Tod lived in Mirrormont and watched the legendary Northwest clown on TV when he was his son’s age. By Greg Farrar
Before the Salmon Days Festival turned into a Pacific Northwest icon, organizers turned to a bona fide Pacific Northwest icon in 1970 to lead a parade at the celebration.
The clown J.P. Patches, a mainstay of after-school TV for generations of Seattle-area children, and sidekick Gertrude marched in the initial Salmon Days parade before a 15,000-member crowd.
Chris Wedes, a.k.a. Julius Pierpont Patches, died July 22 after a long battle against multiple myeloma, a blood cancer.
Dressed in a tattered hat and patchwork coat, J.P. Patches resided in a landfill, cavorted alongside the mop-headed Gertrude — played by ex-Marine Bob Newman in lipstick and a Raggedy Ann wig — and introduced TV audiences to a colorful cast of characters as a host on KIRO.
Iconic clown J.P. Patches, Salmon Days star, dies
July 23, 2012
Alec Sharon, then 5, with mom Jill and dad Tod, don clown noses to pose with J.P. Patches for a family photo Nov. 7, 2008, during a celebration at Front Street Market. Tod lived in Mirrormont and watched the legendary Northwest clown on TV when he was his son’s age. By Greg Farrar
NEW — 11:30 a.m. July 23, 2012
Before the Salmon Days Festival turned into a Pacific Northwest icon, organizers turned to a bona fide Pacific Northwest icon to lead a parade at the celebration.
Celebrate Independence Day in Issaquah with parade
June 26, 2012
Fireworks are banned in Issaquah and surrounding areas, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of ways to celebrate Independence Day.
City plugs in energy-saving zHome, leader in ‘green’ living
September 13, 2011
Family spends night at zero-energy townhouse to test innovations
Some of the 10 carbon-neutral townhomes of the zHome community glow in the setting sun along Northeast High Street in the Issaquah Highlands. By Greg Farrar
The steeply angled roofs and street-side rain garden attract attention to the townhouses along Northeast High Street.
The effect is deliberate, because the 10-townhouse complex, called zHome, is designed to encourage people to explore and rethink notions about “green” living. The project is the first carbon-neutral and zero-energy multifamily community in the United States.
Man files lawsuit against city about free speech at Salmon Days
August 9, 2011
The iconic Salmon Days Festival is at the center of a free-speech lawsuit after police threatened to arrest a man for distributing religious leaflets at the festival last year.
Snoqualmie resident Paul Ascherl sued the city in U.S. District Court in Seattle on Aug. 5 to challenge a municipal ordinance created to limit leafleting and other activities to designated “expression areas” at the fall festival.
Ascherl said Issaquah police officers threatened to arrest him for handing out Christian literature in places outside the pair of downtown “expression areas” on the festival grounds.
The city ordinance, crafted in 2000, prohibits leafleting, protests, unscheduled entertainment or nonprofit activities outside of booths and designated areas. The ordinance also sets rules for festivalgoers’ signs and bans megaphones on festival grounds. The city considers violations as misdemeanors punishable by fines and possible imprisonment.
City Attorney Wayne Tanaka said the city developed the ordinance “in response to concerns, frankly, about crowd control and public safety” at the festival. Salmon Days attracted more than 180,000 people to downtown Issaquah last year.
Salmon Days free-speech rules prompt lawsuit against city
August 8, 2011
NEW — 4 p.m. Aug. 8, 2011
The iconic Salmon Days Festival is at the center of a free-speech lawsuit after police threatened to arrest a man for distributing religious leaflets at the festival last year.
Snoqualmie resident Paul Ascherl sued the city in U.S. District Court in Seattle on Aug. 5 to challenge a municipal ordinance created to limit leafleting and other activities to designated “expression areas” at the fall festival.
Ascherl said Issaquah police officers threatened to arrest him for handing out Christian literature in places outside the pair of downtown “expression areas” on the festival grounds.
The city ordinance, crafted in 2000, prohibits leafleting, protests, unscheduled entertainment or nonprofit activities outside of booths and designated areas. The ordinance also sets rules for festivalgoers’ signs and bans megaphones on festival grounds. The city considers violations as misdemeanors punishable by fines and possible imprisonment.
Off the Press
July 12, 2011
Slugs ooze to finish at slimy sprint
Laura Geggel Press reporter
I found the slug underneath a garden pot housing a lemon-scented geranium. The slimy hermaphrodite didn’t stand a chance. I scooped it up in a Tupperware container filled with damp leaves and dirt, and left it outside on my porch where it would stay cool during the night.
The next day, I brought it to Issaquah’s annual Down Home Fourth of July slug race. Jenna Powell, an 11-year-old from Tennessee who was visiting her Sammamish cousin, crowded around the racetrack with the other children, trying to get a better view of the slugs.
“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” she said. “I’ve seen duck, frog and turtle races, but not a slug race.”
Before the competition, children presented their gastropod mollusks for the traditional beauty pageant — several slugs wore paper crowns and conical princess hats (all were winners, Salmon Days Festival organizer and slug race referee Robin Kelley said).
It was a hot day to race, let alone to be a slug, but all eight of them revved up their slime machines the moment they were placed on the circular racetrack.
The first slug to reach the outer circle of the target sign won, and that honor fell on Slimy, a leopard slug uncovered by Clark Elementary School student Hannah Prouty, who went slug hunting by her playhouse.
