The ties that bind
The ties that bind
(February 03, 2006)
By Don Frances
YOUR 10TH wedding anniversary gets you a weekend away. For your 50th, they throw you a party. Seventy years into it, you're attracting the attention of the powers-that-be.
So it was for Joe and Roberta Sweeney, whose 70th year of marital bliss, celebrated Jan. 26, earned them a resolution in the state Legislature, courtesy of Assemblywoman Sally Lieber.
But the real story is the Sweeneys themselves. The couple met in 1932 at a Christmas Eve caroling party at First Presbyterian Church on Miramonte Avenue, played violin and cello at the church, were married at the church in 1936, and eventually moved across the street from it in 1972.
Their ties to Mountain View don't end there. Roberta, for instance, is the granddaughter of local pioneer Benjamin Bubb, of Bubb Elementary School fame.
A marriage as storied and stable as the Sweeneys' deserves more than a government resolution -- it deserves the emulation of all married couples. ...
MEANWHILE, a much younger Mountain View resident, 11-year-old Kelsey Carlson, is winning her own accolades as a new "Official Explorer" of the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
Kelsey, along with another kid from Monterey County, beat out 87 other applicants for the position and is now charged with a "Year of Exploring" at the aquarium. Her duties seem to be of a diplomatic sort, hosting events, writing a blog for the aquarium's Web site, and generally acting as an emissary for youngsters everywhere.
Kelsey is a Graham Middle School student by way of Castro Elementary, and her mother Molly would like to point out that she is a graduate of the dual immersion program there. "The kids had to submit an essay and a letter of recommendation from a teacher," she wrote, giving credit to the Castro teachers for giving Kelsey "the skills that helped her get selected."
Whatever it was, Kelsey's sitting pretty now. Have you seen the aquarium lately? It is absolutely stunning: swaying kelp forests, surreal jellyfish -- and my favorite, the vast deep-water tank, with massive tuna and sharks and a big weird sunfish all going in a woozy blue merry-go-round. When you go, tell 'em Kelsey sent you. ...
ALSO WESTWARD, more news in the open-space wars: The Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District has officially purchased -- for a cool $9 million -- a large piece of coastal real estate known as Driscoll Ranch. The newly acquired 3,681 acres will be integrated into the district's neighboring La Honda Creek Open Space Preserve (located along Skyline Boulevard), creating a single, beautiful parcel of more than 5,700 acres that eventually will be open to the public.
Apparently the only way to preserve what's left of this paradise called California is to buy it outright. On a more modest scale, Mountain View nonprofit Sempervirens is attempting to do the same thing with another piece of the Santa Cruz Mountains (see page 5). ...
BACK IN TOWN, a local baseball club has been honored by the city council for its success on the diamond. Lately the Los Altos-Mountain View PONY Baseball league has more or less trampled the competition, becoming, according to the club's Web site, "one of the most successful youth sports programs in the San Francisco Bay Area."
Our city council must agree, because on Jan. 24 each 11- or 12-year-old boy of the Bronco Zone All Star Team was given a "certificate of proclamation" for winning the state championship -- and finishing the season just one game shy of the Bronco World Series.
Don Frances is editor of the Mountain View Voice. Send any items, tips, nods or feedback to dfrances@mv-voice.com.
