San Jose lost one of its real characters — and a strong voice for historic preservation — when John Mitchell died last month at age 74. A July 9 gathering at his Naglee Park home, hosted by his daughter Sarah Rush, drew dozens of longtime friends and colleagues, who swapped stories about his antics, his right-leaning politics and his passion for San Jose and its history.
“My dad was such a character and such a special person,” she said, conceding he could be both generous and combative, sometimes with the same person, and had a gift for debate. “Whether you agreed with him or not, he was good at it.”
Anyone who talked to Mitchell for any length of time quickly discovered the topic that occupied him most: The restoration of the clock tower at what’s now the San Jose Museum of Art downtown. The sandstone structure, originally built in 1892, served as San Jose’s post office for its first 40 years before becoming the main library and then part of the museum.
The 1906 earthquake toppled the tower’s top floors, littering the area around the Market Street post office with sandstone blocks and destroying the original clock. A couple years later, the roof was flattened and a Nels Johnson Century Clock was installed — it’s still a mystery how a small, agricultural city like San Jose was at the time ended up with such a magnificent timepiece — along with a 1,700 bell made by the famed Meneely & Co. foundry in West Troy, N.Y.
But the tower was never completed, so there was no belfry in which to place the bell. Anytime it was rung, the sound would be trapped by the stone walls and reverberate down to the building below — remember it’s been a post office, library and a museum — instead of out into the city.
More than two decades ago, Mitchell launched a campaign, “It’s About Time,” to fully restore the clock tower. He hoped the clock and the bell’s centennial could be done by 2008 but it never gained enough traction. But despite Mitchell’s death — or maybe spurred by it — there’s a renewed spirit to finish what he started.
Mike Sodergren, advocacy chair for the Preservation Action Council, said Mitchell worked on the project with PAC-SJ in his final months seeking state grant funding for a vertical extension of the tower. PAC-SJ funded a feasibility study by Degenkolb Engineers in San Francisco that confirmed the work could be done without altering the defining characteristics of the building, which was added to the list of California historic landmarks in 1972. The price tag was estimated by another firm at $5 million.
State Sen. Dave Cortese’s office is reviewing the possibility of seeking surplus state funds for the work, Sodergren said, and both candidates for San Jose mayor — Cindy Chavez and Matt Mahan — have provided letters of recommendation. You can read some of Mitchell’s research on the tower at www.sjclocktower.org and get details on the PAC-SJ campaign at www.preservation.org/sj-tower-view.
“John Mitchell’s literal dying request was that the people of San Jose carry out this vertical extension and belfry activation project that shows off this turn-of-the-century masterpiece of timekeeping technology and let the bell ring again,” Sodergren said.
DINE DOWNTOWN RETURNS: It’s probably a testament to how busy we get around here that Dine Downtown, San Jose’s version of “restaurant week,” actually lasts 11 days, starting July 21 and running through the end of the month. That just means more time to return to old favorites or try out new places that have opened since the pandemic.
Among the newbies participating this year are the FAB on Paseo de San Antonio, Mama Kin on South First Street, San Pedro Social and Secco in the Hilton Hotel next to the San Jose McEnery Convention Center. Of course, there are more than a dozen others — from Mezcal and Scott’s Seafood to Voyager Craft Coffee and Orchestria Palm Court — that may be new to you.
You can see the full list of participants and some of the offerings at www.sjdowntown.com/dine-downtown.
EXHIBITION REALLY COOKS: With today’s Instagram-ready recipes, time-lapse meal prep videos and a cabinet-full of cooking shows, it can be tough to wrap your head around what home cooking was like nearly a century ago. But the Los Altos History Museum has a new exhibition that looks at the ways Americans fed their families during the Great Depression and World War II.
Jordan Grealish, who is curating the exhibit along with Sharon Barkoff, says there are actually a lot of parallels in the recipes used then and those being made today. And not just for the sake of nostalgia.
“As supply chains shut down during the pandemic, we’re making some of the same dishes with the same ingredients,” Grealish said. “It’s interesting how history repeats itself, and how food items popular during the ’30s and ’40s are still popular today.”
That includes “convenience” foods like Spam, Bisquick and Jell-O. Cooking utensils, cookbooks and World War II ration books are also part of the exhibition, “Fabulous Food of the 30s and 40s: From Hunger to Hope,” which opened July 14 and is open Thursdays through Sundays until Aug. 28. Get more information at losaltoshistory.org.
TRIBUTE TO A TEACHER: Pierluigi Oliverio, the former San Jose City Council member and current Planning Commission member, relayed the sad news that his father, Italo Oliverio, died June 28 at age 92.
Italo and his wife, Matilde, moved to San Jose in 1964 and he began a 40-year teaching career in the Santa Clara Valley. He taught Spanish and Latin at Bellarmine College Prep, but Pierluigi Oliverio said his Italian immigrant father’s best work was done teaching English to more than 1,000 adult immigrants who hailed from Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe.
Friends or former students can pay their respects at services at 4 p.m. July 21 at St. Christopher’s Church in San Jose.
Source: www.mercurynews.com