A Town in the Wild West

I really didn’t expect that my blog of yesterday would generate quite so much response.  But I’m glad it did.  There was a lot of commentary to remind us that  we aren’t so far removed from the “wild west” of a hundred and thirty or forty years ago and, furthermore, we’re not nearly so civilized as some of us would like to believe.  From what readers wrote about this weekend’s holiday happenings, it would seem that the hot-spot of the Peninsula, wild-west-wise, is Long Beach.

from our bookmark

That’s not exactly a new situation.  It seems to me that there have always been renegades in Long Beach.  Right now, one of the most blatant is the World’s End Public House whose FaceBook page begins a long statement saying: “Worlds end public house simply stated… ‘we support everyone.’  It’s not complicated?! Wear a mask if your [sic] comfortable doing that! Don’t wear a mask if your [sic] not…” And on it goes.  It’s painful reading and even more so for me because the restaurant occupies the space in the former Campiche Building where we had the Bookvendor for a number of years.  It’s a great location and used to stand for something positive in the community — or so we always thought.  Now…it will be interesting to see how many of the locals (especially us old ducks) support the restaurant after all is said and done.

It all reminds me of something I wrote on this site back in 2017.  The blog title was “You just can’t make this stuff up!” and, among other weird law-and-order situations in Pacific County, I wrote this:  And here I thought it was pretty crazy, back in 1985, when Mayor Fred Rutherford fired all the policemen (or maybe it was ‘almost’ all) in Long Beach.  I can’t remember the details except that we got a call at Ocean Park School where I was then teaching that “Everything is under control.  Fred is marching down the center of Pacific Avenue wearing his six shooters and the town is pretty quiet.”  Just like Yosemite Sam!  Perhaps you remember that?  It doesn’t seem nearly so strange in the light of more recent law-and-order events in the county.

Fortunately, we are content staying home.  And I must say, most of the tourists in Oysterville this week have been wearing masks even though they appear to be in family groups and are outside strolling around the village.  Thank you!