Cover Story
Owls of the Bell Tower
Paul Beatie still remembers that January night in 2017 when he first turned on the video feed from the camera he’d set up in the bell tower of a former Ferndale church to catch a glimpse of the barn owls that had made themselves at home inside. So excited he couldn’t sleep, Beatie waited for…
Flash Flood Watch Issued for Mendocino Complex Burn Scar
The National Weather Service has issued a flash flood watch, in effect until 7 p.m., for areas impacted by the Mendocino Complex fire. According to the NWS, scattered showers and isolated thunderstorms could produce “intense rainfall that may cause debris flows and flash flooding in these areas.” In Mendocino County, Cold Creek along State Route…
North Coast Night Lights: A Second Visit to the Houda Beach Cave
It is strange how something so interesting can hide itself for decades, virtually in plain sight. I’d been to this beach many times in daylight over the years, thrown many a frisbee beside the giant, brush-covered rock into which this cave penetrates, yet somehow I had never walked around to the far side and seen…
Testing of National Alert Systems This Morning
Just a reminder: Those text messages coming over your phone today are part of a nationwide test of emergency alert systems that begins at 11:18 a.m Two systems — the Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) and Emergency Alert System (EAS) — are being given a test run. According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, the test…
Music Tonight: Wednesday, Oct. 3
Hey, hey it’s Whomp Whomp Wednesday at The Jam tonight, with impossibly bass-heavy dubstep, drum ‘n bass and djent shit presented for the 011010000110000101110000011100000 masses. Tonight’s activities will be curated by Skeler, Djedi, YAMA and Norman. The cover charge is $5 before 10:30 p.m. and a cool $10 for the hours after.
McKinleyville Man Receives Major Injuries in Motorcycle Crash
A 60-year old McKinleyville man was airlifted to Redding with major injuries he suffered after being thrown from his motorcycle in a crash this morning, according to the CHP. A California Highway Patrol press release states that David Karr was traveling southbound on Central Avenue at an unknown rate of speed when he collided with…
Make it Fast: The Flash Fiction Contest is Back
Hurry up! It’s time to flex your storytelling skills for the annual North Coast Journal Flash Fiction Contest. You’ve got 99 words or fewer, not including the title. You might just win a prize or see your story in the Journal. Email your entries as attachments to fiction@northcoastjournal.com with your full name and contact information…
Eureka Council to Consider Allowing Cannabis Use Establishments
The Eureka City Council is set to consider today whether to allow the consumption of cannabis products — with the possibilities ranging from ointments and edibles to vaping and smoking, or all of the above — at certain establishments in order to provide tourists and others a space to legally imbibe. If approved, Eureka would…
UPDATE: Reverse 911 Lifted in McKinleyville Neighborhood
UPDATE: Sheriff’s deputies found no one inside the Railroad Drive residence where a person was thought to be barricaded after searching the premises and the gas leak appears to be from an underground source, leading officials to cancel the emergency procedures for the surrounding neighborhood. McKinleyville Middle School voluntarily went on lockdown during the incident,…
Music Tonight: Tuesday, Oct. 2
Guess what? It’s Top Grade Tuesdays at The Jam tonight. What does that mean, you ask? It means that Who Is She Productions will be spinning the best bass-heavy dance tracks from the canonical gospels of hip-hop, dancehall and reggae for all comers at 10 p.m. (price TBA).
APD: Reports of Mountain Lion Near LK Wood
The Arcata Police Department has received reports of a mountain lion being spotted at the bus stop at California Street and LK Wood and on the porch of a nearby residence, although few other details were immediately available. According to an APD Facebook post, the time of the sightings was unknown but the department reminds…
Rossbacher to Step Down at HSU
Humboldt State University announced today that President Lisa Rossbacher will retired at the end of this academic year, bringing an end to a short but controversial tenure. According to the release, Rossbacher will spend the remainder of her time at the campus focusing on the goals she outlined in her fall welcome address, including “the…
Deep Welles
When he wasn’t scaring the bejeesus out of radio audiences, American movie icon Orson Welles had wild directorial freedom within the Hollywood studio system. October gives the Humboldt County Library five Tuesdays for 6:30 p.m. screenings during the Based on the Book Film Series. On Oct. 2, host Bob Doran opens up the series with…
Music Tonight: Monday, Oct. 1
No big shows tonight but here’s a weird idea: There is something called Arcata Contact Improv Jam at the Arcata Presbyterian Church tonight at 7:30 p.m. From what I can glean from my research, it’s a sort of ad hoc open theater experience for anyone interested in the art of spontaneity. Musicians are encouraged to…
HumBug: A Dead Crane Fly and a Strange Nursery
I grew up calling them “mosquito catchers.” Other folks know them as daddy longlegs (a name also used for Opiliones,a type of arachnid) or mosquito hawks. More properly they are known as crane flies, or family tipulidae of the order diptera — true flies. Resembling giant mosquitos, they inspire fear in some people. But unlike…
HumLook: Cows, Elk and a War Moth
Local photographer Jose Quezada has launched a pair of new websites, HumSport and HumLook, showcasing the work of a team of local photographers. Photographers will be uploading galleries of photos on both sites regularly, showcasing their best images of local sports, cultural events and landscapes. High-resolution downloads of the images are also available for $5 apiece.…
HumSport: Your Week in Sports Photos
Local photographer Jose Quezada has launched a pair of new websites, HumSport and HumLook, showcasing the work of local photographers. Photographers will be uploading galleries of photos on both sites regularly, showcasing their best images of local sports, cultural events and landscapes. High-resolution downloads of the images are also available for $5 apiece. The Journal…
Music Tonight: Sunday, Sept. 30
Long before I dove into the Sonic Youth school of “tuning every guitar string to the same note and droning your way through a track,” I discovered an even older master of the form in Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young’s Suite: Judy Blue Eyes, with its “all E’s and a B” acoustic strum. Written a…
Major 101 Crash North of Willits
A major accident involving a car and a semi has closed U.S. Highway 101 north of Willits near Outlet Creek, according to a witness at the scene. The crash caused the vehicle to catch fire with at least one person inside and the semi spilled an entire load of lumber across the roadway. Southern Humboldt…
Music Tonight: Saturday, Sept. 29
Newly minted local metal act Unholy Orifice — possibly named after the trepanning spout at the cervical base of my skull, which I use to excise most of the memories from my adolescence — is graduating tonight from fast-rising local opener to bona fide recording artist with a demo release party at Siren’s Song at…
Can’t Stop the Serenity
And you can’t take the sky from me. Agree? Then get to Arcata Theatre Lounge on Sunday, Sept. 30 from 5 to 9 p.m. to nerd out with the Humboldt Browncoats over your love of all things Firefly ($5). T-shirts, trivia, prize drawings and a screening of Serenity at 6 p.m. Costumes encouraged, of course.
Music Tonight: Friday, Sept. 28
The Outer Space has a promising show tonight at 7 p.m. for fans of the sacred art of the DIY six-string (and synth) samurai. Oakland’s post-punk trio Moira Scar is really, really cool. It’s just that simple. Joining in for the fun are Shively’s heaviest trio of evergreen rumblers Blackplate, punk rock royal upsetters The…
We #BelieveChristine and All Survivors Rally in Arcata
Some 40 people gathered at the Arcata Plaza today to show their support for Christine Blasey Ford, who testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee this morning about a high school party during which she says she was sexually assaulted by U.S. Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh. There was also a minute of silence at the…
Huffman, Other Dems Call For Postponement of Kavanaugh Nomination Process
On the same morning Christine Blasey Ford testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee about a high school party at which she says U.S. Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her, Congressman Jared Huffman called for his confirmation proceedings to be postponed. In a letter signed by Huffman and 65 other Democratic members of Congress,…
Let it Pride
After a successful inaugural year, Redwood Pride is back with a three-part festival Saturday, Sept. 29 called Pride with a Purpose, celebrating and supporting LGBTQ+ people and their allies in an environment of inclusivity and acceptance. The all-day, family-friendly event gets underway with a Community Festival from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Jefferson Community…
Fieldbrook Art and Wine Festival
Voted Best Wine Festival in this year’s NCJ Best of Humboldt. And for good reason. The Fieldbrook Art and Wine Festival, Saturday, Sept. 29 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. is held on the beautiful grounds of Fieldbrook Winery and features live music, artisan booths, oysters, smoked and grilled albacore and chicken, desserts and wine…
Boiling Point
Do you love lobster but face an ethical dilemma when tossing the live crustaceans into a pot of boiling water? Well, a Maine restaurant owner has you covered. Just get them high first, says Charlotte Gill, who owns Charlotte’s Legendary Lobster Pound in Southwest Harbor. Gill tells the Mount Desert Islander that she has long…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Do you have any skills at living on the edge between the light and the dark? Are you curious about what the world might look like and how people would treat you if you refused to divide everything up into that which helps you and that which doesn’t help you? Can…
Quinoa’s Boom and Bust
Let’s say you first heard of quinoa reading about the winner of a local recipe contest and you decide to try making the new dish for dinner. They call quinoa an “ancient grain” but you only started hearing about it a couple years ago — a healthy, gluten-free rice substitute. Not as heavy as rice,…
Music Tonight: Thursday, Sept. 27
It’s an unusually busy Thursday night here in Hum. Co. First up is EDM duo Hippie Sabotage, pulsing the knobs at the Mateel at 9 p.m. for all of the jet-setting pleasure seekers in the SoHum industrial matrix ($40, $35 advance). At the same hour in Arcata for $30, you can hear syrup-thick twee pop…
No Pardon
Friends sometimes ask me what I actually listen to, as I seem to carry an annoying aloofness in this column when it comes to music. And it grates, I am told. Well, tonight there is a big ol’ harvest moon outside so I am listening to … anything but Neil Young. I hate to be…
Thank God
A warm cup of coffee Finds familiar grounds As the fog rolls out, Where conifers reach Towards another Stellar day. Still, I recall us Standing there Where love began, Smiling like suns Just newborn Into light. Home, We embrace Each corner Stitched in cobwebs…
Commission OKs Asphalt Plant Near Big Lagoon
The Humboldt County Planning Commission has approved plans for the continued operation of an asphalt plant less than a half-mile from iconic Big Lagoon despite objections that all the relevant data about the plant has not yet been received and over requests to postpone the decision until next month. The plant has been operating for…
EPA Considers Hoopa Mine for Superfund Designation
Yellow tinted water flows out of a mine shaft located below a small stretch of State Route 96, just outside of Hoopa. A metallic smell engulfs the mountainside as the water trickles into the Trinity River. It’s part of the discharge from the now defunct Copper Bluff Mine. According to a press release from the…
Bag by Bag
Editor: First of all, thank you Joe Abbott for your inspiring story about the genesis of your coastal clean up escapades (“Beach by Beach: The Humble Humboldt Roots of the World’s Largest Coastal Cleanup Event,” Sept. 6). Beach addicts like us are hooked on pleasures such as watching multitudes of migrating shore birds, looking out…
Vote Seaman!
Editor: On a recent Tuesday, the Eureka City Council continued exploring the possibility of a public bank. I am glad to live in a city willing to consider big ideas, while still proceeding with caution and humility. With the election coming up quickly, I am looking ahead at how the new candidates can continue to…
Get Your Hand Out of My Pocket!
Editor: Once again the schools want more money. Whether it passes or not, and it probably will, because “it’s for the children!” And even if it does, they’ll still be back next time for still more. According to the flyer, if they don’t get it, the school system as we know it will fall to…
No on M!
Editor: The Organizers of the 2018 Women’s March in Humboldt support NO on Measure M, which will allow the city of Arcata to continue removing the McKinley statue from the plaza. While we’re not all from Arcata, this does impact all of us indirectly. The statue is seen as a symbol of oppression and racism…
Vote Castellano!
Editor: Over the past 10 years or so I have seen Ward 1 candidate Leslie Castellano be an effective and active force in community support and connection. Leslie has shown me time and time again how creative problem solving is really done. She is not only creative, though, she is highly intelligent and amazing at…
Putting the “Ass” in Asphalt
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