Olympia Time

History, politics, people of Oly WA

Author: Emmett O'Connell (Page 54 of 177)

Holy cats, in my previous blog life, I was a jerk

May 26, 2011 / / 0 Comments

I’m manually scrapping the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine this morning for old posts from my previous local blog “Oly News Boy” (killed off sometime in 2004). And, man alive, I was a jerk. I know I probably thought the way I wrote back then, but damn Emmett, calm down, would you?

Here’s an example:

See? SEE? I told you that Matt Heins was a freaking stupid candidate.

I knew something like this was going to happen, the law would eventually bite him in the butt, and for God sakes, he deserves it. Wasting our time like this, making the Position 3 race go into a primary like that, wasting the “tens of thousands of dollars” that he says that he’s not going to raise, so I guess the freaking laws just don’t apply to him.

“I know it was a form, but I didn’t know it was a legal requirement.” Nuff said.

My memory is fuzzy now, but I suppose Matt Heins ran for city council. Boy, and I suppose I was mad at him for not filing forms correctly.

Anyway, “Nuff said” Emmett? Who are you, Stan Lee?

Here’s what I’ve saved so far. The plan is to repost them on the archive of this blog, so you’ll get everything in one place. Stupid mid-20’s Emmett and all.

One lesson learned, I have learned not to delete blogs without saving them. God bless the good folks at the internet archive, but I cannot for the life of me remember why I deleted Oly News Boy.

Olympia Reign (Local summer semi-pro sports Part 3)

May 7, 2011 / / 0 Comments

3. Last (but only in my eyes) is the Olympia Reign of the International Basketball League. I’m glad this team is still around, but I’m sorry to admit that semi-pro basketball is in third place for me behind soccer and baseball. I might go see them this year, but that’s still a might. They’re out at Evergreen State College this year, which isn’t a bad home court, just a bit of a hike. It might seem small-time, but it might be worth them trying out a high school court. I imagine St. Martin’s field house is a bit steep in price.

I’d just also like to note the other reasons I’m lame for not trying to support the Reign more. First, they’re name is great.

Also, I’ve complained in the past that there really is no minor or independent league basketball in the country, but that there should be. And, independent basketball should play along side college and the NBA on the calendar, not try to carve out a summer league like the IBL. So, if you love basketball and hate (like me) that the NBA took the Sonics out of Seattle, then spend money on teams like the Reign. Because only because of support by fans like us will the NBA ever reform.

That’s true of all sports leagues, by the way. If you don’t like the major league option in your area, for whatever reason, support your local independent franchise.

Olympia Reign are on the web and on Facebook.

Thurston County Premier FC (Local summer semi-pro sports Part 2)

May 7, 2011 / / 0 Comments

2. Second most exciting is the emergence of a Super 20 soccer team.  First under the moniker of Capital City FC Inc. and now Thurston County Premier FC, this team will play a two month season in the United Soccer League’s Super 20 Northwest Division. If  you find that last sentence sort of arduous, there is a reason for that. While its a great that there is a local team in the deep and broad USL setup, its not at a level that most community’s around us are already at. Bremerton, Tacoma, Everett already play a step above in the Premier Development League level of the USL, which draws collegiate and actual professional players.

Also, TCPFC seems to be one side of a division between two different organizations with the same plan, to bring high level (possibly PDL) semi-pro soccer to Thurston County. Over the winter, TCPFC seemingly broke off from Capital City FC Inc. (and on Facebook taking its arrangement with the USL to field a Super 20 team. Whatever strife is between the two groups, it likely isn’t helping.

Thurston County Premier FC is on the web and on Facebook.

Puget Sound Collegiate League (Local summer semi-pro sports Part 1)

May 7, 2011 / / 0 Comments

All three local semi-pro sport outlets are either underway already or have their schedules up.

1. Most exciting is the local collegiate wood bat baseball league, Puget Sound Collegiate League. Think of the mythic Cape Cod League or the more local West Coast Collegiate, but just in Thurston County. Most of the games on the schedule will be played at the RAC in Lacey and the rosters are made up of college players on summer break.

The largest differences I’ve seen from last summer are the inclusion of a Japanese college baseball team (Riseisha College) and a full schedule for the league’s all-star team (Thurston County Senators). The league is made up of a half dozen teams that play a full season against each other (mostly at the RAC), and also fields a couple of all star teams (Senators and Junior Senators).

You can find the Puget Sound Collegiate League on the web, and Facebook and Twitter.

Tono’s landscape

March 28, 2011 / / 0 Comments

This is an attempt to show how the landscape of the old Tono site has changed in the decades since it was an actual town.

Here is a good a picture as any to show the general flat nature of the town in the early part of the last century (from UW Digital Archives):

Here is a aerial photo of the town in 1940 overlaid in Google Earth with today’s topography, at a low angle, so you can see the warped layout of the town.
And, this is nearly the same perspective with the overlay at around 70 percent so you can see the current sediment ponds where roads had been.

This is the amazing part of Tono for me, not that its a ghost town, but that only a small pocket (on the southwest corner of town) was untouched after the it was abandoned and then the site was strip mined.

Tono, Washington

March 27, 2011 / / 0 Comments

If anyone is wondering, USGS Earth Explorer sometimes publishes upside down historic aerial photos, thereby making it easy for people to mistake one town for another. On the original version of this post I used an upside down version of Bucoda, Tono’s neighbor to the northwest. 


Below is the real Tono, circa 1941, well past its prime. But, you can still see where the town certainly was.

Source: USGS Earth Exporer

Halfway through a random Sunday drive through southern Thurston County, I thought it might be interesting to see if we could get all the way up to the old Tono townsite. I’d read about Tono before, and after looking at where the old town was on a map, I thought there was no way the current landowners (Transalta) left the Tono Road open so anyone could drive up.

The road is no only still open, but paved with plenty of places to pull out and take a look. Transalata would probably prefer you not hike out too far, but let’s just say its possible.

We made it all the way to the old town site. From the road you can see at least one old building, but other than that, there is no real evidence that anything at all existed here.


View Larger Map

This is most likely because of the extensive strip mining in the area since the town went into decline in the early 1930s. Tono was a coal town, and specifically, a coal for trains town. When the switch was made to diesel, towns like Tono had no real reason to exist.

The most interesting thing was locating an aerial photo of Tono (above). That shot is from June 1941, a probably catches Tono on its very last steps out. More than 20 years past its peak, there is very little on that photo that still exists today and much of what is the north part of town, is no under water  in two sediment ponds.

Tono from Asahel Curtis Photo Company Photographs from UW Special Collections (more photos):

One Billion by Congratulations (in which I try to become a music blogger)

March 21, 2011 / / 0 Comments

From Congratulations on Bandcamp:

Congratulations is a four piece band from Olympia, Washington. The group consists of Jordan Ingram on piano and lead vocals, Abigail Ingram on bass guitar and backing vocals, Matt Buscher on guitar, and Chad Austinson on drums. The band has been described as “moody indie rock with occasional meanderings into jazz and country, jumbling it all together and spitting forth a sound uniquely their own”.

Uniquely their own is probably over-selling it a bit, but they do have a good sound.

I especially like the single “Two of Us,” which has a change of pace about 2/3s of the way through that is very cool.

You can download two albums by Congratulations free at Bandcamp. I suggest you do, its good listening. And, when I mean “free,” its name your own price, which could be more than $0 if you’re not like me.

So, onto explaining what this music blogging thing is supposed to be. Basically, just all local bands. I think there is enough in the Bandcamp Olympia tag category to keep me going. I’ll be honest, this is more about another way to approach the Olympia topic than about music.

Yes, some of it, I really do like (like Congratulations), but some I won’t at all, but I’ll use it to talk about something else.

Also, this is a way for other folks who might not know about this local talent to get out and support it.

American Celtic clubs (Happy Saint Patrick’s Day)

March 17, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Celtics and Celtic hoops are not an uncommon soccer team name across the world. Most popular obviously is Glasgow Celtic, but there are even some American Celtic teams sprinkled across the Northeastern United States.

Jersey City Celtics lasted five games.

Brooklyn Celtic lasted several years (eventually transforming into Brooklyn St. Mary’s Celtic) and even won a U.S. Open Cup.

Kearny Celtic is the most famous and succesful, lasting from the Great Depression well into the post war period. And, now there is a bit of rebirth of the Kearny club, playing in the Northern Jersey Soccer League as the Kearny Irish FC. They even draw their history direclty from the historic Kearny club and play in the same facility.

These folks really need to sell some t-shirts.

There are even Celtics in England and Spain.

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