MaryGrady_FeatureWriter330

Wednesday, May 27, 2009 • Mercer Island Reporter 13www.mi-reporter.com

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Lifestyle

By Elizabeth CelmsMercer Island Reporter

Rina Shimizu, a freshman at Mercer Island High School, recently visited St. Peters-burg, Russia, as part of a cultural study hosted by the International School of Clas-sical Ballet in Kirkland. Shi-mizu has been a student at the school for one year.

While in St. P e t e r s b u r g , Shimizu and 12 other students took classes at the Vaganova Ballet Academy and attended a performance at The Mariinsky Theatre. The Mariinsky is one of the world’s leading ballet com-

panies, where Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker” made its debut in 1892. The group also put on its own show, perform-ing in the Estrada Theater along with Russian dancers.

While not on stage, Shimizu and her classmates toured the

historic St. Petersburg, v i s i t i n g museums, cathedrals and ornate palaces. The experience, S h i m i z u

said, was once in a lifetime. “The view of the palace and

the cathedrals was amazing. We went to Spilt Blood Church and Catherine the Great’s pal-ace, which was my favorite,”

the 14-year-old said. The MIHS student was also

inspired by the dancers she met in St. Petersburg.

“They were beautiful. They have amazing technique. Their bodies are very struc-tured,” she said.

Shimizu is one of 13 stu-dents who study classical bal-let as part of the International Ballet Theatre’s professional development program. The dance school is committed to the preservation of classical ballet repertory.

The young dancer has been performing since she was 4 years old. She hopes to be-come a professional ballerina one day and, maybe, return to St. Petersburg.

By Mary L. GradyMercer Island Reporter

It was an ordinary after-noon a couple of weeks ago when the phone

rang in an Island Square apartment. A young boy’s voice asked the man who an-swered if he was Ted Mogil from Omaha, Neb. Mogil, 85, puzzled by the young voice, said yes, and then listened as the boy turned from the phone and said excitedly, “Dad, Dad, this is him!”

Wil Beach, 12, had found something that belonged to Mogil, something he had last held in his hands more than 60 years ago. It was a tiny prayer book that he carried with him daily when he was in the U.S. Marine Corps dur-ing World War II in the South Pacific.

The tiny book was written in both Hebrew and English. It had both daily prayers and those for High Holy Days. Inside the cover, Mogil had written:

Nov. 5, 1942Pvt. Teddy Mogil

USMC, Headquarter Squadron,

2ndMarine Wing

The book was given to him by the New York-based Jew-ish Welfare Board on the day in Des Moines, Iowa, when Mogil took the oath to serve his country. From there he moved with his unit to San Diego and Camp Kearny, now NAS Miramar, before shipping out to the South Pa-cific. He was trained to be an aircraft electrician.

“But there were no airplanes for us quite yet,” he laughed. There were some soon after, but by then Mogil had been assigned to the infantry.

The book became part of his uniform, he said. He car-ried it, carefully wrapped, in the left breast pocket of his uniform “so it wouldn’t get wet.” But it did anyway, he remembered. The book ap-pears no worse for the wear, its orange paper cloth cover only worn a bit. The pages are clean and the font is clear.

He was the only Jew in his unit, Mogil said.

Due to a good deal of anti-Semitism, he was naturally wary around his comrades. While he wasn’t afraid, he said he did not mix too much with the other Marines. But there were two young men, both Southern Baptists, who took it upon themselves to look after Mogil. They pledged that they would pro-tect him if anyone looked the

wrong way at him. When asked why he took

such care to keep the little book with him, Mogil — a matter-of-fact former build-ing contractor — paused. “Well, for comfort,” he said. “It was for luck.”

After the war, Mogil re-turned to Omaha and mar-ried his childhood sweet-heart, Etta. After a brief stay in Omaha, they moved west, eventually living for several years in California, then in Hawaii. They never returned to the Midwest.

Mogil and his wife believe that the book was lost when they moved from Nebraska in 1948.

Wil Beach and his fam-ily live in the small commu-nity of Harlan, Iowa, about an hour away from Omaha, where they attend Temple Israel. Beach, who will start seventh grade in the fall, is already beginning his stud-ies toward his Bar Mitzvah next year.

Earlier this spring, he was at the annual book fair with his father at the temple, where his eye fell upon the tiny orange book. He saw the imprint on the cover and the handwritten inscription in-side. He called for his father, “Dad, we have to find the man this book belongs to.”

He picked it up, he said, because “it looked really cool. It was small and old.”

When asked if he could read the He-brew, he said well, no — not enough vowels.

The boy, who just turned 12 on May 9, paid 15 dollars of his own money for the book. It is money that he makes from mowing the lawn.

Beach’s father, Ron, said his son was not a collector of books. He is a busy middle schooler with many inter-ests. He has an older sister, Dru, and a younger brother, Jack. There are three dogs, a hamster and a cat at home. He has been wrestling since he was six. He plans on run-ning cross country next year in seventh grade. He likes to fish and hunt.

“Video games, texting and hanging out with his friends consumes much of his time,” his father said.

Ron Beach said that his son

may have been drawn to the book because of his friends, Donald and Pearle Norgaard. Donald Norgaard, 84, was in the Army infantry. He was wounded and captured dur-ing WWII, but escaped via help from the French under-ground, then captured again. The Norgaards, who attend many games and events in Harlan, have become like surrogate grandparents to the family, Ron Beach said.

Like many families, war followed the Mogils for many years. The couple was intro-duced after a fashion by Etta Mogil’s brother, Sol Marcus, who was Mogil’s best friend. Mogil said that he fell in love with Etta the day they met. It wasn’t as quick for her. She was miffed that the two boys were late picking her up that evening from school.

Yet Sol Marcus died fighting in Italy in 1948. Etta Mogil’s other brother, Nate, was in WWII, as were Ted Mogil’s brothers, Charlie and Earl. The Mogils’ eldest son, Bar-ry, served in Vietnam during the long and bloody Tet Of-fensive in South Vietnam in 1968.

The Mogils moved to the Island three years ago. They live in Island Square. Etta Mogil has Parkinson’s and

has daily help from Mila, a caregiver, who is originally from Russia. Their son, Scott Mogil, and his fam-ily also live on the Island. Another son lives in Port-land, Ore., and one in Cali-fornia. They have seven grandchildren and two great-

grandsons. A fourth son died six years ago. They are happy here. They enjoy the leafy view from their living room window, and Mogil is pleased that he can walk ev-erywhere.

Finding Mogil and return-ing the book seemed a bit un-likely after Beach and his dad found dozens of Ted Mogils on the Internet.

But the first call they made was the right one. His father, who overheard the conver-sation, noted that there was disbelief on both sides. First, from Mogil who was very surprised, and then his son, who was shocked that they had found the right person

on the very first try.Beach mailed the book to

Mercer Island. And Mogil wrote back with photos of himself from the war and of his family. Mogil hopes to attend Beach’s Bar Mitzvah next May. Beach is planning a Mitzvah project which will involve WWII veterans or concentration camp survi-vors in some way.

Like many veterans, Mogil did not speak of his time in the service, his son Scott Mogil said. Yet the book did come up once.

“My father mentioned the book many years ago in pass-ing when we were talking about what, if anything, he brought back from the war,” Scott Mogil said. “Most of his gear was lost in the ocean as he was boarding a ship for home. He was climbing a rope ladder from a troop

transport to the ship when a Marine above him acciden-tally kicked him in the head. His duffel bag fell into the wa-ter. Yet the prayer book was tucked away in his uniform pocket, where he had always kept it during his tour.”

Ron Beach said that the book fair is held every year

at the temple. At the end of each fair, the books are boxed up and stored to sell the next year, he explained.

“Who knows how many years the book had been put out and then stored at Tem-ple Israel before Wil found it there?”

A precious memento is lost and recovered, a new friend is found

Island freshman dances in Russia

Contributed photo

Rina Shimizu, left, a freshman at MIHS, performs on stage at the Estrada Theater in St. Petersburg, Russia, along with her Kirkland-based dance class.

Above, Ted Mogil, at his Island apartment last

week, shows the prayer book he lost in 1948 that Wil Beach found

recently in Omaha.

Right, Mogil poses in his uniform at a synagogue

during WWII.

Left, Wil Beach at home in Harlan, Iowa.

Elizabeth Celms/Mercer Island Reporter

Contributed photo

‘They have amazing technique.’Rina Shimizu

Dancer

Wednesday, March 31, 2010 • Mercer Island Reporter 13www.mi-reporter.com


Early on the morn-ing of Feb. 27, Islander Paul

Calderon was asleep, staying with friends in the lakefront town of Vil-larrica, Chile, just 120 miles southwest of the city of Concepcion.

He awoke at 3:45 a.m., his bed moving back and forth. He lay still for sev-eral seconds, wondering if he should get up and out.

“All I could think,” he said, “is I hope this house holds together.”

But then the shaking and swaying got worse.

He remembers vividly what happened next: “I jumped out of bed, put my shoes on and went to a doorway when motion rapidly got violent, slam-ming back and forth. The house was swaying from left to right more

than a foot in each direc-tion, and I could hear the timbers creaking and things crashing onto the floor, glass breaking and lots of noise downstairs during the quake, which lasted at least two min-utes. Outside, large oak trees were swaying as if

in a strong windstorm, except it was perfectly still!”

It was loud, he said. As loud as loud music.

Within the groaning and straining of the structure, he heard a large book case in the main room fall over; dishes and spice bottles in the kitchen tumbled off counters and shelves; the vene-tian blinds kicked and clanged back and forth on the windows.

When the shaking fi-nally stopped, Calderon said that he and the oth-er people in the house gathered in the main

room to look over the damage and check on each other.

There were nine people in the 7,000-square-foot house. Yet no one made a sound, he said. No one screamed or cried out. But there was more to come.

“Right after the violent motion stopped, the lake sloshed out of its banks about 30 feet. In the dark, the whooshing sound of the water reminded us all of a strong wind.

Later they found that many neighbors had lost their docks, boats had broken free and floated away, but fortunately no

one (most of them cous-ins and relatives of his host) on their side of the lake suffered structural damage to their homes.

Calderon is no stranger to South America and its

sporadic shaking. Calderon was born in

Chicago in 1943. His mother was from Spo-kane, Wash., the daugh-ter of a Methodist min-ister, and his father, a physician, was a native of Peru. In 1946, the fam-ily moved back to Peru where Calderon stayed until he turned 18 and returned to the United States for college.

Despite having lived at the foot of the Andes Mountains, as well as

the quake-prone Puget Sound for many years, Calderon said the Feb. 27 quake was an earth-quake like no other.

The largest earth-quake ever instrumen-tally recorded occurred in Chile in 1960. The Feb. 27 quake is said to be the second largest ever. Calde-ron was liv-ing in South A m e r i c a in 1960, as were his hosts, who said that the F e b r u a r y 8.8 quake was the largest they had ever ex-perienced.

The house where Calderon stayed was built by his

host, Raul Diaz, specifi-cally to withstand such shaking. Diaz, who holds an engineering degree from the United States, built the structure out of the native hardwood logs from his own land. The logs are attached with steel bands and bolted to a concrete foundation. During the quake, the building only suffered a broken win-dow or two and a couple of cracks.

The power went off during the quake at the home, but visitors were able to gain Internet access on their battery-powered laptops and contact relatives back in the United States. Pow-er came back after two days. The main house and most of those in the nearby neighborhood

were intact; there was food and water, and rela-tively little damage.

“We felt guilty,” Calde-ron said. “We could see the damage in Concep-cion and Santiago on the television. Here we were with food, water and shelter.”

Aftershocks continued t h r o u g h -out the next sev-eral days, he said. Some as power fu l as 6.7.

“ E v e r y -one was a bit dis-or iented. There is a sadness and wor-

ry,” he said. “When you felt another quake, you would think, ‘Oh, not again.’”

There was consola-tion in the fact that the damage from the earth-quake was contained to areas around the epi-center. The most dev-astating damage was from the tsunami that followed the quake. Yet many key pieces of infra-structure were affected. One man staying at the house needed to catch his flight from Santiago just a couple of days af-ter the quake. It took 24 hours by car instead of the usual nine.

When Calderon flew from Santiago to the United States on March 17, almost three weeks after the quake, at least one terminal at the air-port had been deemed too dangerous for pas-sengers. It had been shut down with opera-tions moved outdoors under tents. But despite the difficulties, the air-port and flights operated smoothly.

Calderon emphasized that the country he knows is well prepared for earthquakes. Build-ing codes and engineer-ing standards, and the fact that most buildings are built with wood, kept the area somewhat protected from extreme damage. Yet many need help, Calderon said. Highways and hospitals were affected. Many are in need.

Calderon, now retired, worked for companies such as Sun Microsys-tems and Phillips Medi-cal Systems as a finan-cier who arranged for client financing to pur-chase large, high-tech medical diagnostic and computer systems.

Despite moving here in 1988 with his wife, Wan-da, who died in 2007, Calderon has spent much of his life traveling and working throughout the world. He has no doubt that he will return to stay with his friends in Chile in the future.

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QUAKE!Islander Paul Calderon rides out 8.8 earthquake in Central Chile

Earthquake relief is needed for the dev-astated victims of the quake and tsunami on the Chilean coast and cities like Concepcion, Chillan, Talcahuano and Valparaiso. To help go to www.habitat.org, www.worldvision.org, The American Red Cross or Save the Children.

Paul Calderon/Special to the Reporter

Upper left, a Google map shows the epicenter of the Feb. 27 earthquake in Central Chile near the city of Concepcion, just 120 miles northwest of the town of Villarrica. Center, at top, two photos show some of the damage in Concepcion. Upper right, Paul Calderon stands with his host, Raul Diaz, at his left, above Lake Villarrica. Above, the Diaz family gathers with friends for dinner in the main house.

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CONTACT USNews: 206-232-1215Circulation: 253-872-6610Retail ads: 206-232-1215Classifieds: 800-388-2527Fax: 206-232-1284E-mail: [email protected]

16 pagesVol. 53 • No. 9

This Week

iNsiDe

Wednesday, March 3, 2010 75¢www.mi-reporter.com


Spring is in the air — per-haps a little early, but the sun and budding trees are here nonetheless. This also means that Islanders are out on the paths and in the parks; whether cycling, walking or skateboarding along.

The City Council could not have picked a better time to review and update its Pedes-trian and Bicycle Facilities (PBF) plan. The extensive project, which is a constant work in progress, includes months of tweaking, imple-mentation and completion. Although the final draft is set to be brought before City Councilmembers later this spring, the Council reviewed the hefty packet at its Feb. 16 regular meeting. In particular, the city focused on changes that the PBF Planning Com-mission has proposed.

The main topic of conversa-tion surrounded cycling ac-commodation plans for the

“Island loop,” which includes East and West Mercer Way. Ideas about introducing shar-rows — painted signs delin-eating the direction in which cyclists must ride — and of-ficial bike lanes have been popular. Last week, however,

city staff announced that bike lanes will not be possible along East and West Mercer Ways.

Planning Commission mem-ber and former mayor Bryan Cairns explained.

“We have fought the fight

for many years with the defi-nition of bike paths on West and East Mercer. They are not officially paths,” he ex-plained.

So what can the city do to

MIHS earns four academic state titlesReporter Staff

Mercer Island High School was awarded four academic state titles last week by the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association.

The high school band, choir, orchestra and dance and drill teams were each awarded 3A state academic championships for their high grade point av-erages and work throughout the winter season.

The band, with 54 partici-pants, had an average GPA of 3.7. The choir, led by Tom Cox, had 21 members and an average GPA of 3.6 while the dance and drill team, coached and advised by Shannon Ver-schueren, had a 3.7 average GPA. The orchestra, led by Vicki White-Miltun, had a 3.6 average.

See Tent Law page 2

Archive photo/Mercer Island Reporter

Cyclists, reflected in a vehicle mirror, ride along North Mercer Way in March 2009. The city is making an effort to improve Island roads for cyclists, pedestrians and drivers alike.

See Bikes page 2

Learn about East Link Light Rail

Learn about plans for the East Link Light Rail and the Mercer Island station during an engineering workshop next Tuesday. The event will be held from 5 to 7:30 p.m., March 9, at the Community Center. East Link is an 18-mile extension between Seattle and East King County with stations on Mercer Island, in Bellevue and at Overlake in Redmond. For more information, visit www.soundtransit.org/eastlink.

Paw Promenade next weekend

The city’s annual St. Pat-rick’s Day Paw Promenade dog walk will be held from 1 to 3 p.m. on March 13. The parade begins at City Hall and ends at Luther Burbank Park’s off-leash dog park. Dogs and own-ers are encouraged to wear green. Prizes will be awarded for the “most spirited” dog in honor of St. Patrick’s Day.

Outdoors for All fundraiser at Alpental

The 13th annual Spree at Alpental, a fundraiser for Outdoors for All — dedicated to enriching the lives of children and adults with disabilities — will be held at Alpental on March 14, beginning at 9 a.m. The event features ski and snowboard gear from top companies, as well as a beer garden, live music, demos by Sturtevant’s and a Red Robin lunch. Regis-tration is $79 and comes with a full day of unlimited use of ski, snowboard and snowshoe demo gear, a day lift ticket, event T-shirt, continental break-fast, lunch and entrance into the Apres Ski Party. Register online at www.outdoorsforall.org or by calling (206) 838-6030, ext. 214.

WinnersNW Yeshiva girls at state tournament Page 8

Alex Milkie/Contributed photo

Bill on tent cities invokes freedom of religion

City bike plan focuses on busy and popular ‘Island loop’

ProtectorsMIPD names employees of the year

Page 7 TroopersLocal Scouts fix trail

Page 10


A state bill that prohibits cities from enacting ordinances which “un-

reasonably interfere” with churches’ decisions to provide shelter to the homeless is be-ing heard in the state Senate this week, after the House of Representatives passed the legislation.

According to Mercer Island City Attorney Katie Knight, the Mercer Island Clergy Association is closely follow-ing the bill in Olympia, as it applies to their freedom in hosting Tent City on Mercer Island.

“The clergy association is still talking with the city. I think they’re also waiting to see what happens with this bill,” she said.

House Bill 1956, drafted by state representative Brendan Williams, was reintroduced to state legislators earlier this year. The House of Represen-tatives passed the bill on Feb. 10, 57 to 39. Two members were excused. The bill went on to a public hearing in the Senate Committee on Human Services and Corrections for discussion on Feb. 18. Ac-cording to Washington state Legislature coordinator Ger-ry Sheehan, HB 1956 still has a few hoops to jump before reaching the Senate.

“The next step is for the [Committee on Human Ser-vices and Corrections] to vote it out of committee or not,” he explained. “After that, it goes to the rules committee and then to the floor of the Senate. This could take until the end of the session, March 11.”

According to the bill’s sum-mary, in addition to prohibit-ing a “county, city or town”

A solitary tributeFred Milkie Jr., an Island native and commercial photographer, pauses during a trip to photograph Mt. Rainier for his book “Alone Around the Mountain: A Visual Memoir,” to honor his father, Fred Milkie Sr. See the full story on page 11.



There must be mil-lions of images of the iconic Mt.

Rainier. What is there that is new to see? Plen-ty. A new book by Island-er photographer Fred Milkie Jr. entitled “Alone Around the Mountain: A Visual Memoir” takes a very personal look at the peak. The black and white images inside re-veal that the mountain is far more than the snowy alp we see from afar and think we know by heart. It is an intimate view shaped by a lifetime on its slopes, glaciers and forests.

Milkie has brought to life the varied views and moods of the mountain that shaped his family and his life’s work. His tools? A pair of old snow-shoes and a black and white film camera.

The son of a highly-regarded commercial photographer, Milkie is a similarly skilled and ar-tistic photographer who graduated from Mercer Island High School in 1968. He and his wife, Renee, who have two grown children, still live here.

His father, Fred Milkie Sr., was a successful and talented commercial photographer who was also the official photog-rapher of the 1962 Se-attle World’s Fair. Pho-tographs by the elder Milkie, who died a few years ago, documented the changing culture and look of Seattle and its en-virons through the mid-

dle of the last century. The book represents a

tribute to the fading art of what he considers the truest form of photogra-phy: the use of black and white film. The book is an atonement of sorts for Milkie — to honor his fa-ther’s memory and make peace with him at last.

For many who came of age in the 1960s, perhaps

the most difficult of r e la t ion -ships was those be-tween fa-thers and sons.

It was a stormy time for Fred Jr.

and his father. There was the Vietnam War, chang-ing mores and old-fash-ioned teenage rebellion. Up to and during those years, Milkie Sr. took his family, which included Fred, his brother Paul and his two sisters, up to the mountain nearly every weekend. They traced the trails and the sites that his father then — and later, they — knew by heart. As the children became teenagers, they wearied of the weekend trips, their attitudes doc-umented in family photos on the mountain.

Born in Seattle, Fred Milkie Sr. was the son of Lebanese immigrants who scrimped and sac-rificed to send their son off to college. The duti-ful son excelled, finish-ing a business degree at the University of

Washington. But fate in-tervened. Not long after he completed college, an offer came for work that ended up changing the course of his life. He found himself running Paradise Lodge within the Mt. Rainier National Park. He fell under the spell of the wonder and beauty of the mountain. He left his other work and told his undoubtedly confused parents that he was going to become a photographer. His first studio was in the Pike Place Market, then in the basement of the St. Regis Hotel at the cor-ner of Second Avenue and Stewart Street. His professional work docu-mented the swift and startling change that came about in Seattle af-ter World War II into the 1960s and beyond.

Milkie Jr. and his broth-er, Paul, followed their father into commercial photography, both at-tending arts school at the University of Wash-ington. They joined their father’s flourishing stu-dio in Seattle.

As the years passed, Milkie began to return to the touchstone that was his father’s — the moun-tain. He began to retrace the routes that his fa-ther had led them on so many years ago and that they both knew so well. He began to see more clearly the magic and meaning it held for his father. And after years of taking pictures of frozen food and the like, Milkie wanted “to be a photog-rapher again.” Practic-ing his craft in solitude on his father’s mountain provided the perfect av-

enue.To understand the

physical undertaking of the book, one must rec-oncile the idea of a single person on a pair of aging $99 MSR snowshoes cir-

cumnavigating the giant volcano with a pack and a camera — over and over again.

Milkie figures he start-ed taking photos for the book sometime in 1995 or 1996 and finished late last year. He has thou-sands of images. Many of these trips took place in the winter. He would begin at daybreak and walk up to 18 miles.

“Most of my trips were day trips,” he wrote in an e-mail. “I’d sleep in the back of my car and start early in the morning.”

He made things difficult for himself. He wanted a balanced set of views from around the peak. As such, he had to make sure that each side of the mountain, and each view, was included. That balance required dozens of extra trips. Nearly all were done alone.

He wants to make the point that the photos are not alerted or changed in any way. The prints re-flect exactly what Milkie saw and photographed with his equipment on the mountain. The vari-ables involved were only the use of a particular lens, a filter perhaps and ambient light. The pho-tos in the book are not cropped. Instead, they are printed with a black edge showing the frame of the negative, he said.

Each has the name of the place — from “The Grove of the Patriarchs,” to the “Ipsut Pass Trail” to a view named “Puyal-lup Cleaver from Aurora Lake.” Names and views no doubt he learned from his father.

It has been a bitter-sweet journey.

The brothers are letting go of the studio where they have practically spent all their lives. Pho-tography has changed, Milkie says simply.

Their father built the studio in 1962 when Milkie was 7. It is very much reminiscent of the time and includes a curved interior glass-brick wall and a deco concrete frieze adjacent to the front door.

It was once a busy place.

There is a huge high-ceilinged studio space in the rear of the building with a full kitchen, where photos were taken of fro-zen pies and dinners and other products for adver-tisements. There were darkrooms and offices, drawers that held hun-dreds of contact sheets and thousands of nega-tives. But it is no longer needed. It is up for lease. Nearly all of the shoots that Milkie and his broth-er, Paul, do for clients are

�laces of Worship�laces of Worship�laces of WorshipMERCER ISLAND

A contemporary, evangelical, charismatic, non-denominational, Spirit-filled church.

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Lutheran Church6001 Island Crest Way 232-1711

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Sunday Worship & Kids' Church 10:00am

Fellowship & Bible Study 11:00am

Congregational Church on Mercer Island

United Church of Christ 4545 Island Crest Way

206-232-7800 www.ucc-ccmi.org

WORSHIP SERVICE 10:30 a.m.

• Child Care • Sunday School • Youth Groups

Come as you are!

St. MonicaCatholic Church

www.stmonica.cc

Sunday Vigil: Saturday, 5:00 pm

Sunday: 8:00 am, 9:30 am, Noon

232-29004301 - 88th Ave S.E., M.I.

Top of the Hill on Island Crest Way(206) 232-5595 | MIPC.org

NURSERY AVAILABLE

SUNDAY, March 7, 2010

7:30am Breakfast Buffet

8:15am Worship

9:15am Christian Education for All

10:35am Worship in Sanctuary

5:00pm Worship in Sanctuary

ELCA

Welcome to Worship!

Worship and Holy Communion:Sundays 8:00 am and 10:15 am

Sunday School: 9:00 am

Deanna Wildermuth, Pastor

8501 SE 40th 206.232.3270www.htlcmi.org

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GARY S. ODEGARDLandscape Construction and Design

• Courtyards, Lattice Work• Lawns, Flowers• Container Plantings• Arbors, Decks• Pruning, Maintenance• Renovations, Consultations• Interior & Exterior Design

206-236-0651/206-605-7037

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LANDSCAPING

TO ADVERTISE IN THIS DIRECTORY, PLEASE CALL REBECCA AT 206.232.1215

Mercer Island

Service Directory

Lifestyle

Fred Milkie Jr./Contributed photos

Above, a view of Comet Falls on the mountain’s south side, after a rain storm. Below right, a view of the peak above Indian Henry’s Hunting Ground.

‘Alone Around the Mountain’ honors a father, a place

See Mountain page 13

Fred Milkie Jr.


done on location.There are no takers for

the space as of yet. Most of the equipment and fur-nishings are gone. There are a couple of drawers with family photos still waiting to be sorted and dispersed. The thousands of negatives and prints of his father’s were contrib-uted a few years ago to the Museum of History and Industry. But there is no hurry. The brothers have as much work as they want. Other proper-ties owned by the family along the block, just off busy Olive Way, only a few blocks from down-town, are all rented out.

As with similar endeav-ors, many hands made

the project complete. The writing, Milkie said, was a challenge for him. He wrote out what he wanted and gave it to his writer friends and fellow Islander grads, Greg and Kathy Palmer. He said they “put it all in order.” Another friend and col-laborator, Terri Naka-mura, did the design, and sister Melanie made the maps “of his wanderings” and encouraged him in the project.

Milkie is considering another book. There are one or two that are wait-ing to be done, he said. But instead of on foot, it will likely be on his bike, which he rides back and forth from Mercer Island to Capitol Hill every day, rain or shine.

On his back there will be a camera with film.

Ogden-Vannatter

Suzanne Ogden, daughter of Susan and David Dykstra of Mercer Island, and the late War-ren Ogden, and Charles Vannatter, son of Sueann and Greg Vannatter of Napa, Calif., were mar-ried at the Mercer Island Presbyterian Church on Sept. 12, 2009.

Corinne Rogers, sister of the bride, and Marisa Kelley, cousin of the bride, were the matrons of honour. Greg Vannat-ter, father of the groom, was the best man.

The reception was held at the Columbia Winery and the couple spent their honeymoon in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.

The bride graduated from the University of Southern California in 2003 with a Bachelor of

Arts and in 2007 with an MBA degree. She cur-rently works as a manag-er at a department store in Salem, Ore.

The groom graduated from Indiana University and also graduated from

the University of South-ern California with an MBA in 2007. He is a financial consultant with Fisher Investments in Vancouver, Wash., where the couple now lives.

Our parents raised us, and now they need help. So

what is our obligation to them? This is one of the most agonizing decisions to make as an adult. We are forced to face the irreversible deterioration of someone we love, as well as the dif-ficult decision of how we should approach their care. These things are rarely planned and have a long learning curve.

For some, the an-swer is clear. In or-der to honor their parents, many stand up to offer their own personal care. For others, making sure that professional assistance is available is how they honor their parents. But

it gets harder when you are unwilling, for whatev-er reason, to participate in providing care and be-come the martyr because it is expected. Many of these expectations come

from your cul-tural heritage. Generations of your family had their parents live with them for help, and so should you. Never mind that you are working, or your house is not set up for care, or emotion-ally you cannot keep up the tra-dition. Some-

times, those expectations come from other people’s opinions on how things should be done. “You put your mother into assisted living? Why? When my

mother needed help, she moved in with us.”

It is often difficult to sort out the best solution for both you and your parents when there are feelings of guilt. Guilt is a powerful motivator to drive some adult children to provide care. For many, it is self-administered guilt, and for others, the guilt has been heaped on over the decades by oth-ers. And for some, it is the constant worry of, “Am I doing the right thing?”

This really can affect your emotional well-be-ing. Not to mention that this may be the first time you have actually looked at your own mortality. It can seem very over-whelming and, at times, unsolvable.

You are not alone. There is a tremendous amount of help out there, from

support groups to Web sites with information. This can make all the dif-ference on how you get through the labyrinth of decision making for both you and your parents.

No matter what deci-sion is made for your parents, it should not ne-gate who you are or who your loved one is. It is OK to be mindful about who provides the care. There is no map or formula on the best way to take care of your parents when they need help. It really is about what makes sense for the situation — can you live with your deci-sion, and is it the best decision, with what you know now.

Betsy Zuber, geriatric spe-cialist for the city, can be reached at (206) 275-7752 or [email protected].

MERCER ISLAND F O O T & A N K L EPhysicians and Surgeons of the Foot & Ankle

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Mercerdale Professional Bldg 3236 78th Ave SE, Suite 201

321937

Please join us Tuesday, March 9, 20105-7:30 p.m. (presentation at 6 p.m.) Community Center at Mercer View • 8236 SE 24th St., Mercer IslandInterpreters, as well as accommodations for persons with disabilities, can be arranged upon request with sufficient notice by calling 1-800-823-9230 or TTY Relay: 711.

Tell us what you thinkThe East Link light rail preferred alternative route is being designed to run in the center reversible lanes of I-90, with a station between 77th and 80th streets in Mercer Island.

A public workshop is scheduled to go over the preliminary engineering work done to date on the Mercer Island Station. At the meeting you can:n Learn about the East Link light rail system and view in-progress preliminary

engineering drawingsn Share your thoughts about the Mercer Island station layoutn Tell us more about your community and how East Link can best serve you and

Mercer Island.

Please visit www.soundtransit.org/eastlink, or contact Katie Kuciemba, Community Outreach Specialist at 206-398-5459 or [email protected]. For information in alternative formats, call 1-800-201-4900/TTY Relay: 711 or e-mail [email protected].

LINK LIGHT RAIL East Link Project

Can’t attend the meeting? Sign up for e-mail updates at www.soundtransit.org/subscribe.

40-minute interactive mu-sical variety show. Ages 2 and up.Preschool Story Times: 11 a.m., Tuesdays, March 9, 16-30. Ages 3-5. Please register.Story Time for Wonderful Ones: 10 a.m., Wednes-days, March 10-31. Ages 12 to 24 months with adult.Story Time for Terrific Twos: 11 a.m., Wednes-days, March 10-31. Ages 2-3 with adult.Italian Story Time: 1:30 p.m., March 14.“The Tiger and the Dried Persimmon”: 7 p.m., March 29. Ages 3 and up with adult. Join the Thistle Theatre for this Korean folktale about a young tiger.

TeensTeen Zone: 1:30 p.m., March 8 and 22. Ages 12 and up. Hang out, do homework, play board games.Homework Time with Boys & Girls Club: 1:45 p.m., Mondays, March 8-29. Start with Home-work Time at the library

and get help from Boys & Girls Club tutors. Then, catch a van to the Boys & Girls Club for games, crafts, activities. Contact (206) 436-1947. Register at www.mipositiveplace.org. Percy Jackson and the Olympians Party: 3 p.m., March 15. Fans of the Percy Jackson book series are invited to a party in celebration of the recent movie release “Percy Jack-son and the Olympians: Lightning Thief.” Scaven-ger hunt, Greek mythology trivia and other activities. Registration required.

SAT Prep with Sandweiss: 2-5 p.m., Sundays, March 28, April 4-25. The series includes three prep ses-sions, a practice test and a review of test results. Participants must register for and attend all five ses-sions.

Parks & RecreationEvents take place at the Community Center at Mer-cer View (CCMV) unless otherwise noted.

8236 S.E. 24th St.

(206) 275-7609

www.myparksandrecre-ation.com

Ballroom Dancing: 6:30-7:30 p.m., Wednesdays, March 3-31. $50.Salsa Dancing: 7:45-8:45 p.m., Wednesdays, March 3-31. $50.After School Nature Program: 2:30-4:30 p.m., Mondays, through March 29. Hands-on after-school program with a Nature Vision Naturalist. Nature topics, stories, snacks, provided by Friends of Luther Burbank Park. Ages 4-9. $77.

SeniorsWidow and Widowers Grief & Loss Support Group: 1-2:30 p.m., March 11. A support group for senior adult men and women who have lost a spouse or partner in death. Free. Call Betsy Zuber to reserve a spot: (206) 275-7752.Grocery Shopping Trans-portation: Wednesdays, 10 a.m.-12 p.m. Get transportation to a North-end grocery store and one errand. Call 275-7895, press 1 and leave a mes-sage by 4 p.m. the day before shopping. $2.

CALENDARContinued from page 12

Pageon Age

BetsyZuber

How to help and honor aging parents

Wedding

Contributed photoSuzanne Ogden and Charles Vannatter were married on Sept. 12, 2009.

MOUNTAINContinued from page 11

Contributed

The cover of Milkie’s book reflects the topog-raphy of the mountain seen throughout the book. It can be purchased at Island Books.

By John NayeSpecial to the Reporter

What if they threw an Olympics and nobody raced? I’ve been here at Whistler for almost a week now, and virtually every al-pine race scheduled during the first five days has been postponed, either due to fog or warm, slushy snow con-ditions. And do you want to know what the irony is? The skiing for the public has been fabulous.

The snow has been falling regularly, and though it has been pretty darn wet near the mountain bottom (where the race course finishes), up higher the snow has been wonderful. Although some of the mountain terrain has been closed for races and training, the rest of the mountain has been wide

open, with generally light crowds. It turns out that skiing Whistler during the Olympics is a fantastic idea if you like having the moun-tain to yourself most of the time.

Of course, if you came to Whistler with the intent to actually watch a race, the ev-er-changing schedule made that really difficult. I ran into Mercer Islanders Tom Ro-mary, Chris Hughes, Martin Frogatt and Greg Brown, four guys who drove up to ski, with plans to watch the men’s downhill. Guess what: because they had to be back home for Valentine’s Day, they departed without see-ing any ski racing at all. The downhill race scheduled for Saturday ran on Monday; sorry, boys.




This Week

iNsiDe

Wednesday, February 17, 2010 75¢www.mi-reporter.com

41st District lawmakers’ town hall meetings set

State Rep. Judy Clibborn (D-Mercer Island), Rep. Marcie Maxwell (D-Renton) and Sen. Randy Gordon (D-Bellevue) will host two local town hall meetings on Feb. 20 for constituents of the 41st Legislative District. The meetings offer an op-portunity to learn about the issues facing the 2010 Legislature, now in ses-sion through mid-March, especially lawmakers’ ideas for balancing the state budget and promoting economic recovery. The events are free and open to the public.

Town hall meetings on Saturday, Feb. 20:

Hazelwood Elementary School

7100 116th Ave. S.E.Newcastle, WA 980569:30-11 a.m. Eastgate Elementary4255 153rd Ave. S.E.Bellevue, WA 980061:30-3 p.m. Questions can be directed

to any legislator’s office:Rep. Judy Clibborn, (360)

786-7926Rep. Marcie Maxwell,

(360) 786-7894Sen. Randy Gordon, (360)

786-7641

Girl Scouts Silver and Gold Banquet

Mercer Island Girl Scouts invite former girl scouts to join their first annual Silver and Gold Banquet to cele-brate the girl scouting com-munity from 6 to 8 p.m. on Feb. 19 at the Mercer Island Presbyterian Church. The program will include a potluck dinner, flag and candle ceremonies, songs and more at no cost. To RSVP, e-mail Anne Hritzay at [email protected] or call 275-2322.

Reflections2010 winners and a sampling of art

Pages 8-9


Mercer Island bank tellers are looking out for their senior clientele. In an arena where fi-nancial scams abound, Island tellers are careful to identify the warning signs, especially when it comes to their elder customers.

Just last month, a Key Bank employee was able to identify and stop a bank transfer scam from going through.

According to Mercer Island geriatric specialist Betsy Zu-ber, who was informed of the incident, an Island senior was almost conned into a fraudu-lent money transfer to an un-known person in Canada. The teller immediately picked up on the suspicious transaction, politely explained her doubts to the senior and contacted the Mercer Island police. In the end, the Key Bank em-ployee was able to prevent the scam from occurring.

Zuber expressed admira-tion for the teller’s prudent response.

“I was just very impressed. There’s no law that says the bank has to do something about [suspicious transfers]. I’m glad that in this recent scenario, the [teller] refused to give the person the money. They caught the scam, and this takes extra effort,” Zuber said.

According to Key Bank Mercer Island manager Jan Hernandez, this is not the first time that employees have saved a customer from be-coming the victim of a finan-cial scam.

“I have found in the last couple of months that we’ve had three or four instances of this type of thing happening,” Hernandez said. “It’s not un-usual, but it’s happening more and more often.”

Fortunately, Key Bank em-ployees are adept at noticing the warning sings of fraud and have been able to prevent many scams from occurring. The tellers are encouraged to contact the Mercer Island po-lice if fraud is suspected.

“One of the things we pride ourselves on is the relation-ship we have with our clients and knowing them and the types of transactions they do,” said Hernandez, who has worked at Key Bank for years. “We take permission and ask questions, especially with our seniors. If it’s some-thing that’s not their usual way of banking, we ask, ‘Why are you doing this? Why are you sending money to Canada when there’s no relations in Canada?’”

This personal approach to customer service has been the strongest antidote against financial scam for Key bank-ers, Hernandez emphasized.

“Our best defense in these instances is the fact that cli-ents are coming into our branch and we’re being very attentive that these cases are

See Fraud page 4

Rumon Carter/Special to the ReporterRyan Clarke, a Mercer Island High School graduate, proposed to his girlfriend, Claire Jean, after completing his leg of the Olympic torch relay last Wednesday evening, Feb. 10. Jean said yes.

A torch and a diamond

See Proposal page 2

Island banks keep eye out for scams targeting seniors

See Snow page 7


Ryan Clarke was one of 12,000 torchbear-ers to bring the live

burning symbol of the 2010 Olympics on its journey of 100 days and 45,000 kilome-ters (28,000 miles) across Canada to Vancouver, British Columbia. Most likely, the former Islander and Mercer Island High School graduate was the only one bearing a diamond engagement ring in a glass Mason jar tucked in his pocket.

As the sun set last Wednes-day evening after completing his portion of the torch relay along Inglewood Street in West Vancouver, Clarke knelt in the street and, while the flame was still burning, asked his girlfriend, Claire Jean, to marry him.

Jean, a varsity runner at the University of Victoria in Vic-toria, British Columbia, had come along to support the relay and her boyfriend. Jean, wearing a 1980s Team Cana-da Olympics jumpsuit, moved to run alongside Clarke as his leg ended. Then Clarke dropped to one knee on the pavement as Jean, with a red-stenciled maple leaf on her cheek, stood shocked and still for a moment, her hands over her face. She quickly re-gained her composure to say,

Rainy Olympics still has a lot to offer visitors

Jenna Hauck/Black PressPatrick Deneen, of Enumclaw, Wash., flies through his second jump in the men’s moguls finals at Cypress Mountain during the 2010 Winter Games on Sunday, Feb. 14.

2 Mercer Island Reporter • Wednesday, February 17, 2010 www.mi-reporter.com

Reporter StaffA Mediterranean-

inspired 22,800-square-foot waterfront estate at 1631 Roanoke Way is being offered for sale in a sealed bid auction. Pre-viously listed at $40 mil-lion, the minimum bid for the North-end man-sion is set at $15 million.

The property is owned by Charles and Karen Lytle. The Lytles are the founders of Leisure Care, a Bellevue-based retirement community management firm that they sold in 2003. They still operate Lytle En-terprises, which builds and owns more than two dozen upscale commu-nities in nine states that Leisure Care manages. They have moved to an-other house in the Belle-vue area.

When the Mercer Is-land property was first listed for sale, several newspapers wrote about the immense and lavish estate, including the Re-porter.

The three-story build-ing lies on two mani-cured acres. The prop-erty includes a multitude of formal and informal living spaces, including two master suites, four additional guest rooms, a sumptuous master bath salon, three kitchens, a personal workout gym,

two wine cellars and an indoor 66-foot salt water pool, according to listing information.

The auction announce-ment describes the home in the following way: The interiors are defined by the finest natural materi-als and meticulous atten-tion to detail, from gold leaf cove ceilings and silk wall treatments to Italian marble and hardwood floors. The grandeur of the living space is exem-plified by its centerpiece, a one-of-a-kind 12-foot Chihuly chandelier in the grand entry.

The sprawling, lush

grounds at the Mercer Is-land home, designed by R. David Adams, feature a sizeable greenhouse, formal outdoor pool with fountains, meandering walking path leading to the lakefront, a stocked trout pond, and a deep water dock that previ-ously accommodated a 140-foot yacht.

A bidder’s information packet priced at $75 is a requirement for bidding, as well as a certified or cashier’s check totaling five percent of the total bid.

For more information, go to www.sheldongood.com.

For delivery/billing concerns, please call 253-872-6610 or e-mail [email protected]

7845 S.E. 30th Street • P.O. Box 38 • Mercer Island, WA 98040

Janet Taylor [email protected](425) 453-4270

Mary L. Grady [email protected](206) 232-1215

Advertising (206) 232-1215Deadline is 10 a.m., Friday

Classified Marketplace (800) 388-2527Deadline is 11 a.m., Monday

Accounting (800) 485-4920

Phone (206) 232-1215

Fax (206) 232-1284

The Mercer Island Reporter (USPS 339620) is published weekly every Wednesday by Sound Publishing. Second-class postage paid at Mercer Island, WA. Subscription rate: $39 per year.

POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Mercer Island Reporter, P.O. Box 38, Mercer Island, WA 98040

www.mi-reporter.com

“Yes, yes!”An avid runner, Clarke

was the single represen-tative from the Vancou-ver Olympic Committee (VANOC) and the BC Ministry. Clarke gradu-ated from Mercer Island High School in 1997.

Now living in West Vancouver, he works for the BC Provincial Government in the 2010 Olympic Winter Games Ministry, doing interna-tional media relations and communications.

“It’s a very exciting time to be right in the mix of it all,” he said. .

“I was chosen to run based on my submis-sion [in which I high-lighted my dad’s par-ticipation in the 1996 Olympic Torch Relay] to a 2010 Torch Relay video contest.”

The Clarke family orig-inally moved to Mercer Island from Canada in 1993. Ryan Clarke re-turned to Canada after high school for college and stayed.

It is not the first time when a Clarke has borne the mythi-

cal flame. Ryan’s dad, Rory Clarke, a native of Canada who still lives on Mercer Island, car-ried the Olympic torch up and around Capitol Hill in Seattle on its way to the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.

“My reason [was that] I wanted to represent all those young South Afri-cans, black and white, as South Africa was ex-cluded from participat-ing in the Olympics,” Rory Clarke explained. “I wanted to represent them in a small way. My wife, Barbara, did all the hard work in apply-ing for me to run,” he added, “so it was a fam-ily affair.”

The older Clarke played semi-pro soccer while at college and has coached on Mercer Is-land for MIYSC since 1995, both recreational and select teams. His commitment to coach-ing youth soccer, he said, “is a repayment for the gift of being coached when I was a 9-year-old.”

Rory Clarke and his wife have three chil-dren. Ryan is the el-dest.

Rory Clarke said that he and family members

were in on the plan for the proposal, but kept it secret.

“I think she’s going to be a fabulous daughter-in-law,” he told the Prov-ince newspaper after the event.

The proposal was care-fully planned.

The morning of the event, Clarke rode his bicycle up and down the street where his run was to happen later that evening. He slowed enough to mimic how long it would take to run, then when at the point where he planned to propose, he stopped and went over his lines.

“I needed to commit them to memory so that I could get through what I wanted to say without bursting out in tears,” he explained.

But what about that Mason jar?

“Claire and I have a tradition of putting ideas for trips and adventures on folded pieces of pa-per in little glass mason jam jars,” Clarke wrote in an e-mail. “We label them ‘Big,’ ‘Medium,’ and ‘Small,’ correspond-

ing to the relative size of the adventure, and we pull from the ideas when we’re looking for our next adventure. With this as a running theme in our relation-ship, I decided that the ring just had to be in a Mason jar. So I put the ring in the ‘Big’ jar, tucked the jar in my torchbearer jacket, and ran the torch [relay] as gingerly as I could.”

The length of his run was only 328 yards long — a sprint, really. Clarke, however, had a lot to think about as he ran with the torch held high.

“It was the longest 300 meters of my life,” he said. “Talk to any other torchbearer [including my dad], and they’ll say it’s over in a flash. But because I was so in-tensely focused on what I was about to do, the run just seemed end-less.”

He worked hard, he said to savor every mo-ment carrying the flame and share it with the people along the route.

“The streets were lined with people, so I made sure to keep calm and live it up a bit with the crowd,” he explained.

“When I finally got to Claire, there wasn’t much time to make my move, so I grabbed her and gave her that look — the look that only a man who is hoping for the best yet at the same time fearing the worst can show — and she immediately broke into tears. I knelt down and pulled out the jar. I didn’t even need to say a word; she just knew.”

PROPOSALContinued from page 1

Rumon Carter/Special to the ReporterFormer Islander Ryan Clarke carries the Olympic torch in West Vancouver last Wednesday night. At the end of his run, Clarke proposed to his girl-friend, Claire Jean.

Lakeside mansion up for auctionLuxurious estate first listed at $40 million

Contributed photoThis opulent Island estate is now up for auction. The minimum bid is $15 million.

ContributedIslander Rory Clarke, Ryan’s dad, carried the flame in the torch run for the 1996 Olympics.

Boats, RVs, trailers multiply on Island streets and drivewaysBy Elizabeth CelmsMercer Island Reporter

A Winnebago Recreation-al Vehicle has stirred the embers of a neighborhood dispute over right-of-way parking laws and residential eyesores, leading to a peti-tion for the City Council to change Mercer Island’s pub-lic parking ordinance.

During their Sept. 21 meet-ing, City Councilmembers discussed a proposal to change ordinance 10.36.229, “Rules of the Road,” by add-ing a section that prohibits “oversized vehicle parking and storage on city streets, highways and right-of-ways.” Currently, such vehicles are allowed to park on Island streets for a maximum of 72 hours, after which they must be moved.

Yet the residents of a North-end neighborhood feel that

this stipulation is inappropri-ate.

On Sept. 8, Michael Agather, elected by his neighbors to rid their street of an RV, pre-sented the City Council with a 23-name petition to “amend the parking ordinance to pre-vent violators from avoiding penalties by making incon-sequential changes in where the vehicle is parked.” Last week, the city proposed a so-

lution.

Public eyesoreAccording to the city’s re-

cently proposed ordinance, No. 09C-12, Mercer Island’s existing 72-hour grace period for parked vehicles will be eliminated. The ordinance does not apply to vehicles parked “temporarily” — three hours or less — for delivery

and pick-up purposes.

The proposed dimensions for an “oversized vehicle” are any mobile unit greater than 22 feet in length or nine feet in height. This includes RVs, moving vans, boat trailers and any other mobile unit of such size.

The draft ordinance, pre-

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This Week

iNsiDe

Wednesday, September 30, 2009 75¢www.mi-reporter.com

Island finances ‘in reasonably good shape’Reporter Staff

The city published its 2009 second quarter financial re-port earlier this month, show-ing that revenue and expendi-ture numbers were on target for the year. The second quar-ter ended on June 30.

According to the report, “Given the current recession, the General Fund ended the second quarter of 2009 in rea-sonably good shape.” Total actual revenues were “slightly behind,” and total actual ex-penditures were “significantly below” the 50 percent bud-get threshold. The revenue shortfall for 2009 is projected to be $1 million, yet Finance Director Chip Corder does not anticipate needing to tap the city’s $2.34 million “Rainy Day” fund. Rather, he believes that the city can address the shortfall through expenditure savings and using the General Fund’s $300,000 revenue sta-bilization reserve.

Comparing total actual to to-tal budgeted revenues (which excludes the beginning fund balance and transfer from other funds) through June 30, the General Fund is 47.9 percent of budget for quar-ter two, versus 54 percent of budget for last year’s second quarter.

According to Corder, the “slight revenue shortfall” is primarily a result of weaker than projected sales tax, de-velopment fees and invest-ment interest. The report in-cludes a table that represents these numbers.

Total revenues for June 30 were $11 million, as compared with $11.5 million for June of last year. This represents a

An RV parked on S.E. 34th Street in a March photo has spurred neighbors to petition the city to change its parking ordinance. The vehicle has since been moved into storage.

Elizabeth Celms/Mercer Island Reporter

November election looms

Boats, RVs fill neighborhood streets

Old Island photos needed

The Mercer Island His-torical Society is looking for old photos of Mercer Island for a new history book of the Island. The organization is especially seeking photos of the downtown area and land-marks around the Island, as well as photos depicting events and organizations. The photos will be scanned and returned to the owner, and credited in the book. Contact Jane Meyer Brahm at 232-0701 or [email protected] for more information.

Voter deadlines coming

If you have not registered to vote in Washington or need to update your registration information, act soon. Monday, Oct. 5, is the deadline to register online or via regular mail if you want to vote in the statewide general elec-tion on Nov. 3. The Oct. 5 deadline also applies for people who moved or changed their name and want to update their voter registration information ac-cordingly.

Monday, Oct. 26, is the last day for in-person regis-tration for citizens not cur-rently registered to vote in Washington. People should go to their county elections office to register in person. To visit a county’s elections Web page, go to www.secstate.wa.gov/elections, click on the state map and then click on the county.

Oct. 5 City Council meeting canceled

The Oct. 5 Mercer Island City Council meeting has been canceled, due to a lack of items on the agenda.

The next regular meeting will take place on Monday, Oct. 19, beginning at 7 p.m. in the City Council Chambers at City Hall.

See Parking page 7


For Islander Shannon Russell, 15, clinging with the tip of her

extraordinarily long fin-gers to a chunk of plastic some 12 feet or more in the air is a natural thing.

Russell, a sophomore at Mercer Island High School, is a climber — but not the social kind. She spends her free time climb-ing rocks and walls.

It is an avocation that gives her more than strength. It gives her les-sons in competition, strat-egy and focus.

Russell discovered the sport as a fifth-grader when she was living with her family in San Fran-cisco. She began training in earnest in the seventh grade.

As her climbing grew into a passion, it all made sense, her mother said. Her daughter has always had an affinity for climbing, Pamela Russell said. When Shannon and her older sister were small, their parents put up a swing set in the backyard. The first thing that Shannon did was not get onto a swing, but to climb on top of the set, she said. She loved to climb trees, scaring a succession of nannies. The sport be-came another extension of her athletic self.

Chad Coleman/Mercer Island Reporter

Islander sophomore Shannon Russell trains last week at Vertical World gym in Ballard. The teen trains and competes in climbing, speed climbing and bouldering.

See Climbing page 12

City Council, School Board candidates up the anteReporter Staff

Mercer Island’s four contest-ed City Council and School Board candidates have sig-nificantly increased their campaign funding in the past month.

As of Sept. 25, Ira Appelman, running for City Council Posi-tion 2, has raised $12,198 and spent $4,614 on his campaign. His political opponent, Dan Grausz, has earned $5,822 and spent $2,220, according to the Public Disclosure Com-mission.

As for School Board candi-dates, Dave Myerson, running for Po. 2, was reported with $1,485 in campaign funds. He has spent $1,050. Competi-tor Terry Caditz has earned $2,713 and spent $1,015.

The Reporter will be inter-viewing all four candidates for its Oct. 14 issue, the same day that ballots are being sent out for the Nov. 3 election.

Born to climb

See Finance page 2

Faith across continentsIsland artist takes Jewish art to Africa Page 13

Gridiron showdownFootball falls to Interlake

Page 9

Day tripVisit the Duwamish Tribe’s longhouse

Page 14

12 Mercer Island Reporter • Wednesday, September 30, 2009 www.mi-reporter.com

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But just what is the sport of climbing beyond scal-ing mountains and cliffs?

The sport evolved into what it has become today from mountain climbers who trained by practic-ing certain moves over and over on a man-made structure.

There are three types of basic competition in climbing.

The first is free climbing, which entails only using your body to as-cend a climb; ropes or harnesses are there just for safety reasons.

Next, boulder-ing is the art of free-climbing giant rocks, sometimes referred to as glacial er-ratics, whether it be in a desert, a rock at a climb-ing gym or a large stone at a shopping center or REI.

Bouldering is done at very low heights so that just a mat is placed on the ground to break a fall. The difference is clear when you look at the size difference between the two objects. The Vertical World Web site explains it this way: “Sometimes the line between bouldering and climbing blurs, but the general rule is that if the rock isn’t an intrinsic part of the mountain, or if you can fall without being killed, it counts as a boul-der.”

Finally, speed climbing is a sport where partici-pants are scored on how quickly they can conquer a climb or a boulder. Climbers are each given a set number of minutes to look over an ascent be-fore starting out.

Climbing is equal parts technique and mind set, Russell said. The teen’s lanky build seems well suited to the sport. But she appreciates how her

occas iona l fear and technique , born of hours of practice, make it work. Focus, rhythm and adr ena l ine are impor-tant parts of being suc-cessful.

It is perhaps surpris-ing that such a singular pursuit is a team sport. Winners are declared on a points system. The scor-ing is determined by how far each individual gets up a route and how fast.

Russell competes with a team from her climb-ing gym. Russell and her team have had a good deal of success. The Ver-tical World team and Rus-sell have taken top hon-ors at local and national climbing events. The team has between 30 and 40 people of all ages. The competitions are against climbers from all over the United States. Ironically, Team Texas, from one of the flattest places on the

planet, has the largest and most successful team of all with 50 members.

Russell is yet another example of a busy Island teen. Beyond climbing three nights each week for three hours, she of-ten has swimming prac-tice, other sports and, of course, school. She spent much of this past summer at the gym in between a nanny gig and working at a gym camp for younger kids. Her parents support her completely and take turns driving her back and forth. Russell will not be 16 until January — and then a license, well, maybe.

“Having all of these ac-tivities has helped me with my time manage-ment skills,” she said with a laugh.

The climber is the younger of two sisters. Her sister, Caitlin, is a se-nior at MIHS.

Russell was born in Vir-ginia and lived with her family on Mercer Island for a time before her par-ents, both in the United States Coast Guard, were transferred to California. The family knew they would return here after both Pamela and Douglas Russell retired from the military.

Climbing is apparently a growing sport and is not just for fearless teens. “You see whole families,” Russell said, “parents climbing with the kids.”

The ages of her team-mates range from very

young to older adults, she added.

But it must be said that this sport can cause seri-ous injury. It is dangerous and not recommended without some type of ad-vance training.

Russell said she appre-ciates the risks. She said she has been afraid. But fear is a healthy thing. She has fallen. She points out that the heights are not that extreme. In par-ticular, bouldering rocks are not high enough to get seriously hurt from a fall, she explained.

“It is not a big deal,” she shrugs. “But the fear teaches you.”

There are all kinds of safety measures in place. But the safe sense goes beyond physical well-being. It is what climbers like Russell and her moth-er call a ‘safe place to fail,’ a place where everyone encourages everyone else.

Russell said her closest friends are the ones on the Vertical team. It is a sport where self-confidence is born and nurtured.

Participants say it is a challenging way to stay in shape and is curi-ously seen as a way to relax. Climbers say the focus and concentration required to climb helps them let go of the clutter of everyday life and re-lieve stress.

For more information on climbing and the Vertical World Teams, go to www.verticalworld.com.

By Megan ManaganMercer Island Reporter

The Mercer Island boys and girls varsity cross country teams finished in sixth and 14th place, re-spectively, at the Bellevue Invitational on Saturday at Lake Sammamish State Park in Issaquah.

The boys team earned sixth place with 146 points overall, while the girls team finished 14th with 223 points. The Eisenhow-er girls team finished in first place and the Bellevue boys team captured first place in the boys finals.

During the meet, the races were broken up into flight times based on runners’ previous perfor-mances due to the sheer number of runners and schools involved.

In the fastest boys flight race, Mercer Island’s Aar-on Elefson finished 20th with a time of 16:43, and Nick Ford was 21st with a time of 16:45. Senior Molly O’Callahan finished 22nd in the girls fastest flight race with a time of 20:08, while Stephanie Pedreira was 36th with a time of 20:49.

Islander co-head coach Erica Hill said the girls team leader, Lindsay Ben-ster, did not compete in the invitational because she was taking part in the Stanford Invitational in Palo Alto over the week-end. Hill said she finished 33rd overall with a time of 19:27.

In the second flight race, Wil Clausen finished 11th in 17:01, while his team-mate Zoe Spranger, was 31st in 21:58. In that same race James Kashima fin-ished 36th with a time of 17:56, and Gabrielle Goy-ette was 46th with a time of 23:44.

The third flight race fea-tured Mercer Island’s Leo Phillips, who posted a sev-enth-place finish in 17:17, while Robbie Frankel was 13th in 17:33. Julia Davis also finished the same flight in 21:49, and Carly Andersen was 22nd with a time of 22:00.

Hill said the team has

been suffering from some sickness, and the runners just haven’t been at 100 percent lately.

“The boys team, finishing sixth, was an outstanding finish,” she said after the race. She added that, with Benster gone and others out sick, it was a chance for other members of the team to step up.

“It was a good wake up call ... if we want to get to the postseason,” said Hill. The team will be focus-

ing on what it can do to achieve those goals.

Hill also said that while the team is strong when it comes to pack running, this meet was not one in which it could really show-case that strength given the way it was set up, but that it is something which will be a benefit during the rest of the season.

In the boys open race, Daniel Vu posted the Is-landers’ top time, complet-ing the 5,000-meter race in

18 minutes and 55 seconds for 19th place. Junior Tyler Goolsby finished 31st with a time of 19:26, while senior Charlie Landsman was 36th overall with 19:37.

In the girls open race, Mercer Island freshman Kaya McRuer finished in fourth place overall with a time of 23:44. The next Islander to cross the finish line was sophomore Alana Osborne, who earned 72nd with a time of 27:42.

Cross country finishes strong at Bellevue Invitational

ClImbContinued from page 1

Shannon Russell

Chad Coleman/Mercer Island Reporter

Shannon Russell works out several times each week at her gym and climbs with others as part of a team in competitions. Russell said that all ages and abilities train, climb and compete together.

Visit our Web site www.mi-reporter.com

Skill, focus and a bit of fear are key to climbing

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