All posts by Wendi Dunlap

Editor of the Beacon Hill Blog.
BH in the News

Beacon Hill mentioned (briefly) in the New York Times

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Beacon Hill received a brief mention in the New York Times today:

The deep recession, with its lost jobs and falling home values nationwide, poses another kind of threat: to the character of neighborhoods settled by the young creative class, from the Lower East Side in Manhattan to Beacon Hill in Seattle. The tide of gentrification that transformed economically depressed enclaves is receding, leaving some communities high and dry.

It’s a bit odd, because Beacon Hill doesn’t actually seem to fit the pattern described in the article, of neighborhoods gentrified by “the young creative class” and then finding their new hipster shops and cafés collapsing from the effects of the recession. Beacon Hill is still a neighborhood seemingly on the verge of gentrification, but we haven’t yet seen an influx of shops “playing the Decemberists in a continuous loop,” as the Times puts it. We have a couple of newish coffee shops, and a couple of newer businesses that might have been on the cutting edge of gentrification up here, but, honestly, it sounds more as if the Times meant to name-check Georgetown.

Education, Weather

Seattle Schools on two-hour delay today

The dusting of snow we’ve gotten has made the streets slick enough for Seattle Public Schools to run two hours late today. Buses are on their snow routes, there is no door-to-door service, no breakfast service, no Head Start, and no half-day kindergarten. (Full-day kindergarteners will have the two-hour delay.) Most private schools in town seem to be two hours late as well. See schoolreport.org for details.

Other Neighborhoods

Updated: Our SODO neighbors had a blog

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SODO at sunset. Photo by Wendi.
SODO at sunset. Photo by Wendi.
(Editor’s note, Feb. 26: Only two days after SODO Agogo went live, a post on that blog today says it’s shutting down. Perhaps someone else in the neighborhood will pick up where SODO Agogo left off.)

We’d like to welcome the folks at the SODO Agogo blog to the Seattle neighborhood blogosphere! Many of us pass through SODO on a regular basis, so a blog for that area should be useful to Beaconians. It may end up with a different feel than other neighborhood blogs, since it’s not really a residential neighborhood, but it has lots of businesses, restaurants, and entertaining.

(On another topic: I wonder why people spell it SODO. Why not SoDo since it was, originally, “South of the Dome” and now is “South of Downtown”? Sometimes I spell it with lower-case letters anyway because I don’t like the all-caps version.)

Local Events, Urban Planning

Neighborhood plan update meeting March 28 at El Centro

The existing North Beacon Hill neighborhood plan for the light rail station area is in the process of being revised. As we have seen recently, the topic of density and transit-oriented development in the neighborhood is controversial. You can make your voice heard in the process of rezoning and changing North Beacon by attending the City’s neighborhood plan update meeting on Saturday, March 28, from 9:00 am – 2:00 pm at El Centro de la Raza, 2524 16th Ave South.

Food and Drink

Street food market site sought; could this be the place?

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Skillet serving meals in the Queen Anne neighborhood last summer. Photo by Benjamin Hollis.
Skillet serving meals in the Queen Anne neighborhood last summer. Photo by Benjamin Hollis.
Skillet, the folks who serve bistro cuisine in an Airstream trailer, have an idea:

Hey skillet nation !!

an idea……

we have an idea we would like to implement. Seattle doesn’t have enough street food, and we want to help change that. We are toying with the idea of creating a weekend street food market. We would like to have a parking lot of some kind perhaps in a neighborhood say ballard, fremont, cap hill, udistrict, beacon hill etc…where us and maybe 5-10 other street food vendors could set up for a saturday and sunday during the day and perhaps even into the evening. I believe it could be a great experiment (and successful) and perhaps couple it with some farmers, musicians etc…anyways…if you have any suggestions or perhaps a location…please don’t hesitate to email me (josh) at eat@skilletstreetfood.com…

and thanks…we want to make seattle the epicenter of street food..!!!

Beacon Hill currently lacks a farmers’ market. Something like this would be an interesting alternative. Perhaps at El Centro, next to the train station (once it’s opened)? An event like this would draw visitors to the neighborhood, potentially helping the Hill’s economy, as well as giving us something interesting to do on the weekends. However, it’s possible the local restaurateurs would feel threatened by potential weekend competition. Have an opinion? Let Josh know at eat@skilletstreetfood.com.

Thanks to Slog for the heads-up.

History of the Hill

Angetina Isernio, 1906-2009

Angetina Isernio, a long time Beacon Hill resident and mother of Frank Isernio of Isernio’s Sausage fame, passed away on February 15 at the age of 102 years old.

She was born in San Marco la Catola, Italy, in 1906. Her family later settled on Beacon Hill, where she met and married Frank Isernio Sr., who was born here in Seattle and, along with his brothers, farmed land in what is now part of Boeing Field, and sold produce at Pike Place Market. She raised rabbits and chickens in the backyard of their Beacon Hill family home (where she lived for 70 years of her life) while Frank Sr. raised vegetables. Together, they raised two children, Gloria and Frank.

Angetina’s homemade sausages from the family recipe eventually inspired Frank Jr. to found his gourmet sausage business. Angetina made a special effort to contribute to his success, by going around to local grocery stores and asking the meat department managers “Do you have any of that wonderful new Isernio’s Italian Sausage?”

A funeral mass and life celebration will be held at Saint George Catholic Church, 5306 13th Avenue South, this Saturday, February 21, 10:00 am. There is an online guestbook/memory book to post your memories of Angetina Isernio.

Life on the Hill

Visiting one of Beacon Hill’s smallest parks

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McClellan Place. Photo by Wendi.
McClellan Place. Photo by Wendi.
Recently I was browsing the Seattle Parks website, looking for Beacon Hill area parks. One park caught my eye: McClellan Place. There is no picture on the park’s web page, but the address is there: 16th and McClellan. “16th and McClellan? But… that’s the Red Apple!” I thought. And then I realized — McClellan Place is the tiny triangle of greenery at the corner there, the one that cars cut in front of when taking a right turn onto McClellan from Beacon Avenue. It has a tree and a rhododendron plant, and unfortunately, usually a few pieces of debris as well.

The Seattle Parks and Recreation Department has a collection of histories about most of the city’s parks, including one that gives us a fragment of information about this most tiny park. The original improvement, it tells us, was financed by the Beacon Hill Lions Club. Unfortunately, it gives no date. (Anyone know when? Do we even still have a Lions Club on the Hill?)

Next time you walk past the Red Apple, take a moment to visit McClellan Place, and enjoy a bit of one of the Hill’s — and Seattle’s — smallest parks. Perhaps next summer it would be nice to bring a lawn chair and a hibachi out there and have a picnic.

Its OK to enter the park! Photo by Wendi.
It's OK to enter the park! Photo by Wendi.
Beacon Bits

Beacon Bits: Pets, books, and a neighbor needing help

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