YOUR HOMETOWN WEEKLY NEWSPAPER ward Winning News al A pa
Vol. 9, No. 11
Antioch, California
www.antiochpress.com
Bach bash to pull out the stops by Dave Roberts Staff Writer
If you want to start a brawl, perhaps a riot, in a bar filled with classical music musicians and aficionados, just ask, “Who was the greatest composer of them all?” Fists will fly in favor of Mozart, violins will crash over heads in favor of Beethoven and various ear twists, nose jabs and elbow digs will ensue for Haydn, Schubert, Wagner and Stravinsky, among others. But when someone stands up on the bar and shouts out “Johann Sebastian Bach,” it’s likely that harmony will once again prevail, for he is the one composer just about everybody can agree on and with whom classical music essentially began. On Saturday, March 21, Bach, were he still with us, would be 324 years young. But, of course, he is still with us in his music – it’s likely that no one has ever placed more notes on paper, and what glorious notes they are. In celebration of Bach’s birthday, an extremely rare event in East County – an organ concert – will take place at St. Ignatius of Antioch Church, which, see Bach page 21A
March 13, 2009
THIS WEEK
Hands-on compassion
A host of caring communities were front and center in the effort to help those in need.
Page 4A
Bracing for H2O blues Photo by Dave Roberts
Donald Pearson will pull out all the stops on the Rodgers Custom Trillium Masterpiece 958 Organ in a free Bach concert on Saturday, March 21.
Coming of age in far East County by Rick Lemyre Staff Writer
This is the first of a three-part series on the efforts of two far East County towns, Knightsen and Byron, to retain their heritage and remain rural and small in the face of regional growth and changing local politics. This week: Setting the stage; Part two: The changes play out; Part three: Looking ahead. The downtown block of Knightsen Avenue is dark and quiet, except for the soft glow from the sign at Sonja’s Country Inn and the rhythmic clank of someone setting up metal chairs at the Garden Club next door. It’s a Thursday night in February, and the rest of the half-dozen buildings lining one side of the tiny town’s main drag – railroad tracks, the reason for the town’s founding, run along the other side – are locked up tight, the curb beside them void of parked cars. Home to fewer than 1,000
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Photo by Stacey Chance/DiscoveryBaStudios.com
Bucolic downtown Knightsen has remained relatively unchanged for more than a century. Residents are wary that recent changes made by the county could threaten their rural lifestyle. souls (not counting the livestock), Knightsen has been a proud rural hamlet for more than 100 years, boasting a post office, a fire station founded by volunteers and a
500-student school district whose test scores are more than a match for the bigger districts surrounding it. Folks swarm to town for the Annual Knightsen Family
Fun Days, and help fill the stands at the County Fair in support of the 4-H Club as it shows off animals and carries home ribbons. In 2005, a community services district was formed to get a handle on the occasional floods that vexed the town, which is situated just a half-mile from the San Joaquin River Delta. The Knightsen Town Advisory Council (KTAC) was established in 1994 to represent the town to the county supervisor and make recommendations on matters of development. (The prevailing attitude, for the most part, has been “No thanks.”) As the area’s representative to the Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors (BOS) is historically elected from the bigger cities of Antioch and Pittsburg to the west, Knightsen residents have trouble getting the county’s attention for things like repairing the fractured sidewalk see Coming of age page 9A
Residents are urged to conserve water so that rationing doesn’t become the next step.
Page 10A
Deer Valley dominates
In a semifinal matchup, the Yellowjackets were no match for the Wolverines.
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INSIDE Calendar ..........................23B Classifieds ........................17B Cop Logs ..........................17A Entertainment ................14B Food .................................12B Health & Beauty ............... 7B Milestones .......................10B Opinion ...........................16A Sports ................................. 1B WebExtras! ....................... 1B
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FOR MOVIE TIMES SEE PAGE 5A