Besides the beauty of nature and sharing it with family, the #2 reason we love our new home on Palomar Mountain would be the mountain people. After a long week at work, we drove up to our cabin and found a random act of kindness. A neighbor must have placed this much needed table between our two new adirondack chairs. We’d like this to be posted on Palomar Mountain News so it is known how much the mystery neighbor is appreciated.
Jim and Teresa McCarthy
Posted in Palomar Mountain News
Just off the phone with Karina, she and her folks have arrived, and are ready for their concert tomorrow night. YOU are invited! Don’t you love their photo? I found it on her Facebook, titled “The Usual Suspects”. It was taken after a performance when they were still living in Mexico.
Munchies and mingle starting at 5:29, and the Concert at 6 pm, followed by the potluck! Come one, come all!
At Round House Ranch – click for directions and more. Hope you can join us!
Posted in Palomar Mountain News
What a pleasure to catch up with Bill Leibold over the past few weeks. At 91, he is the last survivor of the USS Tang, a submarine that went down after Pearl Harbor. Some of you know Bill from Palomar. He and his wife Grace built the “Ship House” out on Birch Hill. (See the 2004 message below from a post telling a little of their story.) Ken and Michele Easton are “manning the ship” now. You’ll also find below, a 2009 post from Ken about one of the several books written about the Tang.
Bill and Grace were high school sweethearts. Bill was on a ship, serving his Country at Pearl Harbor during the attack. A year later he was on the most decorated submarine during that time, the USS Tang with 87 officers and men. She sank approximately at 0230, 25 October 1944 after being struck in the stern by her last torpedo, that had run erratically on the surface, port side. Tang was on the surface, attacking a Japanese convoy in the Formosa Straits and sank in 180 feet. Grace was notified in early 1945 that Bill’s submarine was overdue & presumed lost (the original notice is in his album).
For 15 long months Grace refused to believe the news. Some of the wives, understandably, went on with their lives, and remarried. But not Grace, she waited for Bill.
After the war was over, Bill was found in a Japanese Internment Camp. He was one of nine men who survived that fateful night, all night, in the water and then endured the treatment of imprisonment. Because they were submariners, they were looked down upon by the Japanese, so they were given only half rations. Japs declared Tang men were criminals, not POW’s, and subsequently placed in solitary confinement at Ofuna (not a POW Facility). In mid 1945, Tang men and others were transferred to Omori, a Jap army run POW facility, again placed in “Group solitary confinement”, ultimately put on work details and provided one half ration of food, that POW’s received. Bill came back to America weighing less than 100 pounds. After recuperating, he then continued to serve his country and retired from the Navy as a Commander.
Of the nine men that returned, seven were married. After the war was over and the men returned, four of the wives had remarried, which was understandable, with the telegram they had received. Bill has always been so thankful for his wife Grace, that she waited for him, and cared for him as he gained his health, and went on to command two ships, a shore base, and other activities with the Navy. They raised a family of two sons and a daughter, who all want copies of a wonderful scrapbook their father has made, and added to, over the years.
Bill has moved recently. His home in “shipshape”, sold in about a week. I got to see the most recent additions to his scrapbook and he allowed me to take a few photos to share with you.
The ship’s flag went down with the Tang. Someone else had a drawing of what they thought the flag might look like. It was not correct. So, at a Tang reunion a few years ago, Bill drew up a sketch and circulated it with the other survivors. He revised the sketch several times, based on their input, and then had a company in Escondido make two flags. One is on display at the submarine base in New London, CT. His youngest son has the other flag.
Bill’s dog tags made in 1941 are very unique with his fingerprint on them. With the war starting, it became too much of a task to make these tags, so very few were made and there are very few left.
We only live in the land of the free, because of the brave, and because of women and men like Bill Leibold.
Thankfully, enjoying our Memorial Day Weekend,
Bonnie Phelps
Posted in Palomar Mountain News | Tags: william bill leibold uss tang
Recently I posted about the need one of our locals had to be able to have a computer. (Here was that post: Do you have an extra computer?) Within about 2 minutes, a call came in from a subscriber in Julian saying she didn’t have a computer but would like to donate a printer. Then I spoke to someone planning a their move. He said that she could have his nice desk top. But, the generosity of these people on Palomar doesn’t stop there…. an email soon arrived from a New Neighbor, saying that a brand new laptop would be dropped off at our place for her. Wow.
It was very wonderful to sneak over, and drop this box off at her door. What a pleasure and privilege to be a little ‘conduit’ in the wonderful things that come from this mountain.
A sincere thanks to you all. She couldn’t really believe it happened – just like a very special Christmas! That was a fun phone call to visit with her, so excited. A brand new laptop will add so much ease to the work she is doing and open up the world.
Feeling blessed!
Bonnie
Posted in Palomar Mountain News
Everyone is invited to the very yummy breakfast this coming Saturday morning.
Breakfast of fresh orange juice, strawberries, hot mountain pancakes, sausage, and steaming hot coffee is served from 8 am to 11 am at the Fire Station.
All that for $3.00 for adults and $1.00 for children!
The Annual Meeting immediately follows Breakfast at 11 am.
Come on out, meet your neighbors, enjoy a delicious breakfast and hear about what’s happening on Palomar Mountain!
Can you help? Help is needed and appreciated on Friday, May 23 to help set up for the breakfast on Saturday. If you can help out in any way, please connect withBruce Graves at 76O 994 7six97.
Posted in Palomar Mountain News
What a delight to meet Karina and her Mama and Papa, one chilly evening on the deck of Cabin Fever. Wrapped in blankets, they were eating her homemade soup in the drippy mist. I suggested they go in by the warm fire, but no, being in the cloud reminded them “of their homeland”. They had fallen in love with the mountain.
You’ll enjoy reading a little of Karina’s Family Legacy, below. I found a link to her CD, Golden Dream.
Karina’s Family Legacy:
Music is in our blood, or maybe it is our blood at this point – there is no test to confirm it.
For 3 generations we’ve been dedicating our lives to this sacred art of painting the World with our instruments – the sound of music –truly the only art that knows no borders or limits of expression, when it comes to a human experience and beyond that.
Together as a family, with our magical instruments in hand , we’ve traveled the World – back home, when still Soviet Union in Russia and Latvia, many countries in Europe –Germany, France , Italy , UK…to name the few, Taiwan and China, 10 years in Mexico and now another decade as US citizens.
Languages and landscapes do change, just as our faces, but something doesn’t- our dream to inspire and create together, to share and transcend with the sound of music, that will stay long after us.
We are passionate educators too, inspiring children in every place we’ve been, to take an instrument and try to make music on their own.
Many of “our” kids, as I call them, are now teachers and performers around the Globe, continuing the tradition of life performance and soul nourishment.
We hope we can bring a little sweetness and reflection, or maybe simply a moment of peace into so often hectic life we all have.
We discovered our beautiful Mountain first by meeting Cecilia Borland, the dear lady with the goats out on Birch Hill. Then we ‘caught the fever’ at Cabin Fever, one misty weekend enveloped in the clouds! Now, as my Facebook page proves to the world, I just can’t seem to get enough of this mountain and must visit as often as I can. It reminds us so of our homeland! We adore Palomar Mountain with all our heart. Brought up in the country with a strong connection to nature and forest, after so many years of constant looking, God has showed me the way to our local “Sierra” like mountain. And we just can’t get enough of it.
We’ve met some truly wonderful people up here , who opened their hearts and homes to us and made us feel so much more home, that we could possibly be without friends and souls alike. We are now enjoying the view from the Round House. It would be our great pleasure to give you kind folks on the mountain, a concert next weekend. Please come and enjoy. We look forward to making more friends on the Mountain.
Karina Bezkrovnaia
(Concert was May 2014 – we must have an encore!)
Posted in Palomar Mountain News
So very sorry to look out from the Mountain today and see all the smoke below. The fire locations look much better but the air quality looks pretty smoky.
It just so happens that a Vacation Rental on Palomar, Cabin Fever, is available this weekend – first time since mid July! If you or your friends, would like to “Escape the Smoke and Heat” in the cities below, we invite you to come up to our fresh air, bright blue sky, but much cooler temperatures here on the Mountain. Tomorrow it is to get all the way up to 73 degrees on the Mountain!
Click to reserve Cabin Fever When the reservation comes back to me, I’ll take $50.00 off.
The Ponderosa has guests arriving soon, but you are invited to check it out for another time.
Come and join us and thank you for sharing with your friends!
Bonnie Phelps
76O 742 one 742
When we saw a couple of these fires flare up this afternoon, we went to Boucher Lookout in the Palomar Mountain State Park. Curt Waite, Glenn Borland, and Bill Cummings were on watch today. Glenn said it takes about 8 minutes to do a complete pan around the deck. Now you can’t see a thing because the smoke is blocking the visibility. Curt and Barb are here for supper with us. He has his radio so it will be an interesting evening – always fun with Barb and Curt-the-Chairman-of-the-San-Diego-Riverside-Chapter-of-the-Forest-Fire-Lookout-Association! Thankful for these Volunteers! Take care out there everyone!
Posted in Palomar Mountain News
May 15, 2014 but news you can use today, too:
Got a couple minutes? Just in case you ever need to deal with what some folks are confronted with after loosing their homes, you might want to do what I just did.
Photograph your stuff. Inside and out of all the cupboards and closets, patio furniture, jewelry, sleds lined up, EVERYTHING. Save it on your computer, but also post it up on a Cloud. Google Drive is free, easy, and you can make it a private album. Then you might walk through with your video on and do the same thing, making comments, and put that up. It is a lot easier than trying to convince an insurance company that you had all those sets of dishes. (What am I thinking?!?? You only use one bowl at a time! But they were my mother’s! Ah, ‘stuff’.)
Scan your files. The cover page of insurance policies, deeds to your properties, birth certificates, etc. Tonight I plan to photograph the pages of our photo albums. After evacuating and being away for 18 days with the last fire up here, we aren’t planning on packing up a lot of stuff if it happens again. (Sometimes there is no time to pack anything at all, anyway). Over the years, I’ve planned to scan paperwork and photos (maybe between midnight and 4 am), but it hasn’t happened. My iPad photos came out as clear as can be. And, Genius Scan (free app) gives you a very clean pdf! Just an idea for a little project for you!
Go Bag – Be sure you have an updated To Go bag including prescriptions, eyeglasses, water, pet food…
County Records – Check with your County Assessor’s office to confirm what they have on your record. Perhaps someone added on to your home (maybe you) with our without permits, or there are detached outbuildings. When your records show all of what is currently existing – permits or not – it is much easier to rebuild. Otherwise all you get for the quick ‘rebuild after a fire’ permits, is what is on the records … I am glad to assist with this free service.
Thanks to Rosemary for passing on the following UT Article: FIRES GOOD REMINDER TO REVIEW INSURANCE POLICIES FOR HOMES
This week’s wildfire outbreak in San Diego County is giving homeowners a real-world reminder to make sure their insurance policies are up to date and adequate.
After the 2007 wildfires, a number of San Diegans found out the hard way that they were underinsured and couldn’t replace everything that was lost.
“One of the biggest challenges that we have after major disasters is people don’t realize what coverage they have,” said Pete Moraga, a spokesman for the Insurance Information Network. “Many times people will buy a home, they’ll get their policy and then throw it in a drawer and just pay every year.”
In California, a standard homeowners insurance policy covers fire damage, but the extent of that coverage may not be enough for what a person needs to protect. That’s especially important in San Diego, where the insurance network says 239,000 homes, about 20 percent of all properties in the county, are at high or extreme risk of wildfire damage. An additional 276,000, or 23 percent, are at moderate risk of damage.
Homeowner’s insurance covers not only the home itself, but property inside. More than 90 percent of homeowners buy the insurance, and about 30 percent to 40 percent of renters buy insurance for their belongings, Moraga said. Here are some tips on how to make sure you’re protected:
For more information, call the Department of Insurance at 1-800-927-HELP (4357), or visit Cal Fire’s website readyforwildfire.org.
Posted in Palomar Mountain News | Tags: be prepared photograph your stuff
From: CLIFF KELLOGG [mailto:clkellogg@wildblue.net]
Sent: Thursday, May 15, 2014 9:27 AM
To: Bonnie@BonniePhelps.com
Subject: Palomar Fire Dept update for you
The Palomar Mountain Fire Department water tender (WT-7759) is assigned to the Freeway Fire with two of our members.
We have two members staffing a county water tender from Ranchita (WT-7558) and is assigned to the CoCos Fire in San Marcos.
We have Warner Springs water tender on Palomar now (WT-7552) to protect our community.
We have seven members staffing the station.
Cliff Kellogg
Station Chief
Palomar Mountain Volunteer Fire Department
21610 Crestline Road
Palomar Mountain, CA. 92060
Office: (760) 742-3701
Fax: (760) 742-0574
KJ6MTA
Posted in Palomar Mountain News
Palomar Mountain News 