Letters

Los Gatos eyes are smiling in Ireland

Two years ago, the Los Gatos High School Marching Band and Colorguard was invited to march in the St. Patrick's Festival Parade in Dublin, Ireland. At the time, the honor was gratifying and exciting, but soon reality set in and questions began to arise.

Would the school board allow students to miss five full days of high school? Could we possibly raise enough money to send 102 persons overseas for a week? Were we really good enough to compete with bands from around the world? What about the events of Sept. 11--would we still be allowed to go?

After all was said and considered, the answer to each of these questions was a resilient "yes!"

But the yes to these questions was answered by more than just the students of the Los Gatos High School Marching Band and Colorguard; it was also echoed by the town and people of Los Gatos. So to all of you who purchased our candy bars and baked potatoes, left your Christmas tree out for us to pick up, let us flock your front yard with pink flamingoes, called in to pledge at the KCAT Music-a-thon, hired the band to perform at your event, or let us wash your car ... we thank you. We took a little a piece of each you with us to Ireland this week.

Special thanks are due to the staff and administration of Los Gatos High School for their belief in our mission to share American music abroad, for they bent over backward to help get our students there. A huge thank you is also due to the town of Los Gatos, CB Hannegans, Upstream Flyfishing, George Sampson and KCAT television for their generosity and willingness to help.

The band would also like to thank the parents of our members for their constant and undivided resolve to help get us to Ireland. We wish that you were all in Ireland with us ... you are, after all, our greatest fans.

So as you read this letter, there are three buses full of students from Los Gatos High and an entourage of fans spreading American music to the people of Ireland in the name of the townspeople of Los Gatos. However, the real lesson of this experience is not just the trip abroad, but also the knowledge that our young people live in a community that supports their goals and believes in their talents.

Thank you, Los Gatos.

James Francisco
Band Director, Los Gatos High School
Kelly Johnson
Drum Major, Los Gatos Wildcat Marching Band
Darien Hirotsu
Student Director, Los Gatos High Concert Band
Sherrill and Walter Downey,
Presidents, Los Gatos High Band Boosters

Town should be flying Old Glory, not Irish flag

As a Vietnam veteran, it was with dismay that I saw the streets of downtown Los Gatos displaying numerous flags of Ireland. How quickly our town forgets Sept. 11. How quickly the compassion for our men and women in Afghanistan fades.

We lost eight dedicated, young patriots [last] week. The flag poles of Los Gatos should be flying the red, white and blue of Old Glory 365 days a year. When our president declares the war over, then we can think about flying the flag of another country.

Support our troops.

Dodie Gaines
Los Gatos

Controversy over canopies 'ridiculous'

I've lived here in the lovely town of Los Gatos for the past 10 years and have seen a lot of silly issues come and go, but this "golf ball-canopy issue" is ridiculous. It seems clear that Mr. Mark Medalie, by resourcefully erecting his canopies, has done the logical and correct thing to protect his property--end of story. But Mr. Bud Lortz, director of community development, wants to make an issue out of it.

Question: What does a director of community development do? Obviously not much if Mr. Lortz has enough free time on his hands to persecute Mr. Medalie for his canopies. Canopies, for God's sake! It's not like he's showing X-rated films on them at night (unless there's something the Los Gatos Weekly-Times left out).

It's robot-like, inflexible thinking like Mr. Lortz's that frightens me. Is his next crusade going to be haranguing me for the birdhouse I have out on my patio, because the structure hasn't been approved?

Mr. Lortz says, "We can't have a violation, out of fairness to all the other people who have been cooperative in abating violations." Huh? Fairness to who? No one is complaining about the canopies but him, and it seems to me that it's Mr. Medalie who's getting violated--not some nameless, faceless mass of angry, non-canopy-owning residents who exist only in Mr. Lortz's imagination.

It's this kind of closed-minded, gobbledy-gook, double speak that blindly leads large masses to begin small wars.

Lisa N. Henson
Los Gatos

Search begins for stained glass windows

Back in the early 1880s, my great-great-grandfather, Lemuel Morris Hancock, was pastor at the Methodist church in Los Gatos. He died there in 1883 and is buried in Oak Hill. In the 1890s, my great-grandmother and great-uncles gave two large and beautiful stained-glass sunburst windows to the church in memory of him and his wife, Eliza Ann Gould, my great-great-grandmother, who died in Kansas in 1869.

These windows hung in the sanctuary until the Methodist church was remodeled sometime around 1970. Therein begins the mystery.

I first saw the windows in the Gazebo Bar and Restaurant at Old Town in the early 1980s, before I really knew who these people were. Although my mother recognized Lemuel's name, she didn't know who Eliza Ann Gould was.

When I started doing the family genealogy in the early 1990s, I discovered how they fit into the family tree. Although I had taken a picture of Lemuel's window, I could not get one of Eliza's. When I went back to try to find these windows, they were gone. I have searched diligently to try to track them down for more than 10 years, as I would like to photograph them for our family history album.

I am hopeful that one of your gentle readers would know what happened to them after they left the Gazebo and how I could arrange to have them photographed.

Jerry Estruth

Sobrato project welcomed but better highway access needed

A. P. Schultz brings up a very important point in his letter to the editor in the Los Gatos Weekly-Times Feb. 20 issue, regarding the Sobrato project. While we welcome the aspects of the project, Mr. Schultz's question about access to Highway 85 southbound is a valid one.

For me to access Highway 85 southbound, I must drive through seven lights, when access to 85 from Winchester would require one light!

A narrow down ramp paralleling the railroad tracks and curving down would neatly provide access without utilizing a zillion acres, as does the present design.

When one drives in Honolulu and uses the freeway exits there, one marvels at the tight turns and minimum land use for the exits. Is there anyone else out there who is appalled at the excessive land use of this newest freeway? What happened to the neat cloverleaf design that does not need a light at the end of it?

June Fromm
Monte Sereno

Voter turnout is low, and that's an ominous sign

The record low voter turnout of 31 percent in Santa Clara County, and California, is an ominous sign for whatever freedom we have left in the United States.

This, the lowest voter turnout ever, comes on the heels of the greatest curtailment of our civil liberties in U.S. history. Our constitutional freedoms have been eroding for years, but the USA Patriot Act has crystallized this erosion and converted it into an elimination. The Fourth Amendment has been obliterated, and the others sharply reduced.

These primary elections provided the first opportunity to send a message to our elected representatives that we value freedom. Instead, the clear message sent was that the electors do not care and no longer want a say; that voting is a nuisance and a bother.

Among other reasons, the primary elections were important because they provide the choices for the general election in November.

Voting used to be viewed as a civic duty, a sacred responsibility. I wonder how those who do not vote can look their children and grandchildren in the eye, knowing that they are bestowing to them a servile society in place of the more libertarian and egalitarian society that was bequeathed to them.

Thomas Spielbauer
San Jose

Correction

There were errors in the front page photo caption of the March 13 Los Gatos Weekly Times. Werner Barasch is from Germany, and his book Survivor chronicles his numerous escapes from concentration camps in France, Italy, Switzerland, and Spain. The book can only be obtained by calling the author, whose number is in the phone book.

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