Sunday, October 10, 2021

Pat Caraher bio by Ron Nordquist, April 2018


PAT CARAHER bio by Ron Nordquist, April 2018

Pat Topics

 

I asked some of Pat’s friends and family to describe him in two words or less. The responses were interesting, yet not surprising to someone who knows Pat. His coffee klatch buddies said:

“Kind Hearted,” “Mr. Sincere,” “Unassuming,” “True Gentleman.”

 

Given the regard in which he is held by others, as evidenced by the two word descriptors, his work ethic and personality, it isn’t surprising that he was able to get his dream job at WSU. In a bit of a twist on the old cliché, “It isn’t what you know, but who you know”, it’s fair to say that Pat got his dream job at WSU both because of “what he knew” and “who he knew.”

 

What he knew was journalism. Degree from WSU in Communications with journalism emphasis, chosen outstanding graduate in journalism upon his graduation, three semesters working on the Daily Evergreen staff while at WSU, stringer for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer newspaper while still a student and intern in the Sports Information Office while at WSU. And then, after graduation, three and one half years working for the Eugene, Oregon Register- Guard. Oh, “Humble Pat” (my 2 word descriptor) would be the first to say he had much more to learn about his profession but he was well on his way.

 

So he’s 3 ½ years in Eugene and he said that he began pondering what’s more important in life: Location or Job. He likes where he lives – easy access to the ocean, about the right distance from Portland, all the amenities of a large university near at hand and he likes the job pretty well but there are some drawbacks. Working schedule for one. Working in the office during the day and then having to cover nighttime sporting events. He wonders how all that might shake out if and when he gets married and has a family. As he ponders this, he gets a phone call from another Pat, the “Who you know” part of the equation.

 

But before you learn about this other Pat who called, you need to know more about the Pat who got the call, Pat Caraher. He was born and grew up in Seattle. His Dad, Joe, was a Cougar, having graduated from then WSC in 1935 and then served as the WSC Alumni Director prior to WWII. After the war Joe was twice President of the WSU Alumni Association so Pat had Cougar influence in his life from the git-go. Pat had a normal growing-up time in Seattle. One thing he really enjoyed from a young age was baseball. He played in some of the very first Little League games in the Seattle area and later first base and outfield for his high school team. He graduated from Seattle Prep in 1957 and then had to decide where to attend college. Two things swayed him towards Pullman and WSU. One, he wanted to go somewhere away from Seattle and two, his father influenced him to a great extent.

 

So he enrolled at WSU in the fall of 1957 not knowing anyone there and not knowing what he wanted to study. He solved the “not knowing anyone bit” by going through rush and joining the Phi Kappa Theta Fraternity. As to the “what to study” he took general courses and got a degree in Social Science in 1962. He noted that famous WSU Alum Edward R. Murrow was the commencement speaker that year. Upon his graduation, Uncle Sam was waiting for him and he was drafted into the army and spent his next two years at Fort Richardson in Alaska. Pat relates that two notable events occurred while he was at Fort Richardson. First was the assassination of President Kennedy in 1963 and the second was the massive 9.2 Good Friday Alaska earthquake in 1964. The buildings shook and the ground trembled for several minutes, “seemingly an eternity,” Pat said. “In a flash my life passed before my eyes.”

 

After discharge from the army he went back to Seattle and looked for work. He said the job market was tough. He worked a couple of months in construction and then three months as a railroad switchman. These five months of manual labor plus some thinking about his future, convinced him he needed to go back to school and get more of a specialty degree and he settled on journalism. His father was a journalist and Pat saw that his father liked what he was doing so Pat re-enrolled at WSU in January 1965 majoring in Communications. He graduated in 1966 and armed with that degree and the work experiences noted earlier, got the job with the

Eugene Register-Guard.

 

We’re now back to 3 ½ years in Eugene and his pondering about “Job vs Location” when he gets that call from the other Pat. That “other Pat” is Pat Patterson, WSU’s Alumni Director. The Alumni Office had been one of Pat Caraher’s beats while working on the Evergreen Staff as a student, so he knew Pat Patterson and more importantly, Pat Patterson remembered him and thus the call.

 

Pat Patterson said the Alumni Office was going to start a new alumni publication and wondered if Pat was interested in interviewing for the editor’s job. The words “Job vs Location” flashed through his mind and he quickly said, “Yes.” He interviewed, got the job and became the Founding, and as it turned out, the only Editor of the new publication, which was given the name Hilltopics, for its 31 year run at WSU.

 

He moved to Pullman in 1969 and began his 35 year career at WSU, for 31 years as Hilltopics editor and four more as Co-Editor of the Washington State University magazine, which was the successor magazine to Hilltopics. Pat said his 31 years as Hilltopics editor were very interesting and satisfying because he got to know people from all aspects of WSU life. His list of friends, acquaintances, and interviewees reads like a Who’s-Who of all the movers and shakers at WSU during those years. The job was also a bit taxing. Ten issues a year (later cut back to 8) with 24 pages each issue. That’s a lot if interviewing.

 

Pat’s working companions in University Relations had nothing but good to say about him. A few quotes: “I never saw him angry,” “Wow, could that man write,” “He was totally dedicated,” “All Around,” “Always Inquisitive,” “Trusted Friend.”

 

It was during those early years back at WSU that he met Laurie, his wife also a Cougar (’75 Music Education). They met in church. Laurie was from a Pullman family which was also a golfing family. Pat said their first date was playing golf on the old WSU nine hole golf course. They got married in 1976.  Pat and Laurie have three daughters, Maureen, Kelly and Theresa all of whom graduated from WSU and who have produced four grandchildren for Grandpa Pat to spoil. Family members, including a couple of grandkids, described Pat as follows: “People Person,” “Selfless,” “Loyal,”  “Consistent,” “Faithful,” “Lifetime Volunteer,” “Pullman’s Mayor,” “Lots of Friends,” “Likes to Read.” One elaborated on her choices by saying, “Selfless because he always puts others before himself and Loyal because he is loyal to his family, friends, community, faith/church and his beloved Cougs.”

 

Because of his work on Hilltopics and other WSU and community activities, Pat received the WSU Alumni Achievement Award in 1995.

 

Pat’s hobbies and activities apart from work were and are quite varied: International and domestic travel, reading books, newspapers and obituaries. Obituaries because each one is a vignette of a person’s life, birth to death. He also likes golfing and exercising, particularly walking with Laurie and friends, and all Cougar sports, especially baseball which he calls his “love and vice.” He was a Rotary Club member for 42 years. Rotary’s motto of “Service above Self” certainly epitomizes who Pat is. Also, for the last 14 years Pat has served as a Volunteer Chaplain at Pullman Regional Hospital. And he can’t stop writing. In 2016 he started writing random stories of his memories and reflections. The titles of two so far are: “Three Broken Teeth and Two Broken Legs,” and “Flying Kites and Building Sand Castles.” I told Pat he should combine these stories in book form and title it “Pat-Topics.”

 

So, back in Pullman at WSU, Pat got both “Location” and “Job satisfaction”, a wife and family and many friends. Pat said he loved his job and his wife, “Best thing that ever happened to me,” he said, meaning his wife not the job. But maybe the job was second best.

 

David Nordquist

 April 2018

 

 

 

 

 

Sunday, August 29, 2021

Isle-style menu is a hit at WSU -- but bento a bust (1988 story)





 

Isle-style menu is a hit at WSU -- but bento a bust

 By Bob Krauss, Advertiser Columnist
Honolulu Advertiser daily newspaper, Dec. 25, 1988

Thanks to Myles Lee of Pearl City, members of the Washington State University football squad from Pullman, Wash., have no trouble ordering from local menus while working out here for today’s Aloha Bowl .

They’ve been chowing for two years on teri beef and chicken katsu at a place called Coconut Joe’s that serves Hawaiian plates just across the border from Idaho.

Lee, a refugee from Pearl City, runs the local establishment with his parents. He’s back in town for the game.

“You might say we’re the Zippy’s of Pullman, Wash.,” he explained. “Lotta students come in .Once they try it, they like it, but it’s really a challenge to get them to try.”

“Teri chicken is the favorite. Some things you can’t get them to eat.

“Saimin just didn’t sell. We tried bento. People asked what’s in it? I’d tell them rice, teri chicken, beef, fish and Spam.

"As soon as I said Spam that was it. On the Mainland Spam is concentration camp food. I think people in Hawaii eat more Spam than the rest of the country put together.”

“Fried noodles goes good, but loco moco never got off the ground. That’s rice, a hamburger patty with a fried egg on top with brown gravy. The only people who ate it were local kids.“

Lee said he gets steady business from Hawaii students at the university. The student body includes a Hawaiian Club with a membership of 134 students.

“Some of our counter clerks are local kids from Hawaii,” said Lee. “Our cooks all are from Pullman. They don’t have any problem but my parents and me do preparation, make teriyaki sauce and cut up the vegetables.”

Lee said most of his customers take him for Hawaiian. When he says he’s not, they guess Chinese. Then he explains he’s Korean, they say, “Oh yeah, that’s what I thought.”

He said his parents operated the Pearl City Korean Restaurant before his father retired and they moved to Pullman. Lee attended Iolani School and graduated from Waipahu High School, then the University of Hawaii and Washington State.

Lee said his mother makes her own kim chee and serves it free to anyone who wants some. “There aren’t many people in Pullman who ask for kim chee,” he admitted.

Lee said he gets steady business from Hawaii students at the university. The student body includes a Hawaiian Club with a membership of 134 students.

Saturday, August 7, 2021

Crop art offers big Pullman welcome -- Artist from Kansas returns to the Palouse for third year to create large crop mural





Crop art offers big Pullman welcome

Artist returns to the Palouse for third year to create large crop mural

By Anthony Kuipers Moscow Pullman Daily News 8/7/2021

For the third consecutive year, a group of people worked diligently to create an art project welcoming back Washington State University students to Pullman in a way befitting the Palouse.

Wind and heat did not stop crop artist Stan Herd and his team from completing the latest crop mural on the hillside of Jack Fulfs' farmland overlooking the intersection of U.S. Highway 195 and State Route 270 this week.

They were only interrupted by the vehicles that honked their horns in excitement when passing.

“We get honks all day long,” Herd said. “The only thing sore on my body is my arm from waving.”

This year’s design, when completed today, will say “Welcome Home” with the Cougar logo and BECU’s logo included. It is 360 feet tall and 220 feet wide. It took a week to complete.

Herd once again partnered with Fulfs and BECU, a credit union sponsoring the project, to create a mural that immediately catches the eye of anyone leaving or entering northwest Pullman. Five Washington State University students volunteered on the project.

The 70-year-old Kansas man has been creating crop art all over the world for 48 years and said he has never worked with the same partners three times until now. In that time, he has grown fond of the Palouse.

“The first year we came up, we fell in love with Pullman and this incredible terrain and the people,” he said.

His team used compost, garbanzo beans, pinto beans and red mulch to complete the design, which he created with the help of DNA Seattle, an advertisement agency based in Seattle.

Though his future plans still include taking his talents across the world, he is open to returning to Pullman.

“I’d love to come back,” he said.

Kyra Roesle, also from Kansas, has been working with Herd for six years.

She said the key to making crop art is being able to envision the artwork three ways: on paper, from the ground level and from the sky.

She calls it “triangulating between the three eyes.”

“If you can triangulate a location off of that, of those three images together, you can build anything,” she said. “It’s just paint by numbers. Just really, really, really, big.”

Roesle said she enjoys the reactions the mural draws from people, especially from the tight-knit Pullman community.

“It’s really special here in particular because Cougar country people are a family,” she said.

Tuesday, July 20, 2021

Photographer Ron Cooper: Palouse rolling hills 'early evening lighting skims the surfaces emphasizing the textures'


For a Palouse rolling hills photo in June 2021, Ron Cooper of Salem, Oregon, didn't use his drone. Instead he used a 600 mm telephoto lens that "compresses all the hills together. The early evening lighting skims the surfaces emphasizing the textures."

Saturday, July 17, 2021

Wheat and canola along Palouse Highway/State Route 27 in June 2021

Wheat and canola photo taken in June 2021 along the Palouse Highway/State Route 27 going from Pullman  to Palouse by photographer Ron Cooper of Salem, Oregon, from his drone.



Thursday, July 1, 2021

Ron Cooper captures the Palouse with drone camera in June 2021

Professional photographer Ron Cooper of Salem, Oregon, visited the Palouse country of eastern Washington in June 2021. He gave permission to share these three photos he took with his drone camera.

He said, “We were in Eastern Washington at the right time.  Most of the wheat fields were still a beautiful green, and the moon was full.”




Wheat and canola photo taken in June 2021 along the Palouse Highway/State Route 27 going from Pullman  to Palouse by photographer Ron Cooper of Salem, Oregon, from his drone. 

 


For a Palouse rolling hills photo in June 2021, Ron Cooper of Salem, Oregon, didn't use his drone. Instead he used a 600 mm telephoto lens that "compresses all the hills together. The early evening lighting skims the surfaces emphasizing the textures."





THE LATE KEN VOGEL-- PULLMAN BUSINESS OWNER, TRAIN BUFF AND CHOCOLATE LOVER -- WILL BE HONORED DURING ‘DEPOT DAYS’ AT PULLMAN DEPOT HERITAGE CENTER



 

Pullman Community Update's July 2021 issue features a full page of Pullman Depot Heritage Center news and notes.

Among interesting information on the page is that "Depot Days" will be held Fri., Aug. 20 and Sat., Aug. 21, 2021, in the center which originally was Pullman’s Northern Pacific Railway depot.

On that Saturday, "businessman and Whitman County Historical Society member Ken Vogel" will be honored!

The page also says new exhibits in the Pullman Depot Heritage Center from Ken's estate and Jon Anderson will be highlighted. "Come see 'George' the conductor and grab a piece of chocolate in honor of Ken."

Those who knew Ken (1945-2016) appreciated his personality, business skills, love of Pullman, railroads/trains, chocolate and more.

Ken should be enshrined in the Pullman "Walk of Fame." Do you agree? If so, please make Ken's enshrinement happen!

Assuming he in enshrined, where should Ken’s "Walk of Fame" tile be located? Answer: On the sidewalk at Lily Bee’s, which in previous life was location of Ken Vogel Clothing. Before that it was J. C. Penney. A “plus” is that the tile would be close on Main Street to where the Empire department store was located. Ken worked at the Empire before opening his own store.

 ..

Posted with this text are two photos I took of Ken and Sally Vogel. One (Ken’s wearing long-sleeved shirt) is at a train show, perhaps in WSU Beasley Coliseum. Other is the Vogels at home in Winlock.

Wednesday, March 24, 2021

Sue & Mike Hinz, 2017 Pullman 'Walk of Fame' members


Sue & Mike Hinz, newly enshrined Pullman 'Walk of Fame' members, in Pullman's National Lentil Festival Parade 8/19/2017. Barb Wachter at wheel of convertible in which the Hinzes ride. Video by 'Pullman: Cup of the Palouse' blog.


https://youtu.be/8Ll3fP8M4QY