Tell the Bank to Wake Up and Smell the Coffee

A Wells Fargo bank branch in South Pasadena that has combined operations with a Starbucks has a framed photo of a guy you wouldn’t expect to see in a place that stores people’s money: Black Bart, the 19th century stagecoach robber. Bart’s photo is next to a security camera too.

THE EIFFEL TOWER OF WOODEN PALLETS: As if you didn’t have enough to worry about, the Wall Street Journal said in a Page 1 story that the nation is suffering from a surplus of pallets--those wooden platforms used to cart about consumer goods.

Which naturally got me to thinking about L.A. Historic Cultural Monument No. 184, the 22-foot-tall Tower of Wooden Pallets built by Daniel Van Meter of Sherman Oaks 47 years ago (see photo).

Van Meter, now 85, said his backyard assemblage of 2,000 pallets, obtained from a brewery, is holding up. He still laughs that one Cultural Heritage Commission later said of the landmark vote: “Maybe we were drunk.”

“I just built it so I could look over all of the Valley,” he said, not knowing that buildings and freeways would soon obliterate his view.

Would Van Meter accept more pallets to ease the surplus? “Well, I might,” he said. “I’m still pretty active. And the [1994 Northridge] earthquake did damage the [tower] stairway.”

AN ENCHILADA A DAY KEEPS THE DOCTOR AWAY: Not that any further proof is needed, but Emery Fekety of La Canada snapped a sign illustrating the healthful nature of Mexican food (see photo).

KISS AND WHAT? In a juice store’s newsletter, Jean Cinader of L.A. came upon health tips that seemed to have been edited by someone who had consumed some fermented brews (see excerpt). I get so tired of this male-bashing.

THE NOT-SO-FARAWAY LAND: Some of the strange questions received by the Catalina Visitors Bureau:

* “Is Catalina where Alcatraz is?”

* “How old do you have to be to come to Catalina?”

* “When are clocks turned back on the island?”

* “Is the beach by the ocean?”

* “Can I have the address for Catalina? I want to drive there.”

* “On which side of the island do you park your car?”

* “What’s the least tacky of your tacky hotels?”

* “How long are visitors allowed to stay on the island?”

* “Is this Catalina Island? Do you sell bathing suits?”

* “Do you have food on the island?”

HALF AN APPLE A DAY . . . : Our piece on the dearth of colorful street characters such as General Hershy Bar prompted Steven Katz to point out that I forgot to mention Hershy Bar’s faithful companion, also garbed in a fake uniform. He called himself General Waste More Land.

Casey Peters recalled the wiry guy of the early 1960s who “wore a well-used ball glove” and threw invisible pitches at the corner of Santa Monica Boulevard and Western Avenue. “As a kid I knew this guy had to be weird but still thought he was way cool,” Peters said.

And Charlee Hutton remembered “the older woman who wandered around on Cahuenga Boulevard. She invariably had a piece of fruit in her hand, most often a used apple. She would hold it out and ask, ‘Wanna buy this?’ It was not a difficult offer to refuse.”

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You can imagine the beautification pressures on a city named Cypress. Officials there are asking citizens to make tax-deductible donations for a Tree Donation Project: (714) 229-6780. Now if Seal Beach would do something about bringing back the seals . . .