Encore May 2021

ncore E

Wednesday, May 12, 2021

What’s Inside....

C4 — The Lynden Community Center’s noon meals return to in-person June 1 C6 — Four “Mount Vernon celebrate 60 years of friendship

girls”

C9 — Harry and Eric Engstrom team up on a new mural for Seventh Street

A supplement of the Lynden Tribune and Ferndale Record

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021 | Ferndale Record

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021| Ferndale Record

Upcoming webinar focuses on phone scams AARP teaming up with multiple organizations to inform community about rampant scams

By Brent Lindquist brent@lyndentribune.com

WHATCOM — Phone scams are a major issue for not only senior citizens, but for everyone who owns a telephone.

Scammers and con artists make it their business to trick unsuspecting people into losing their hard-earned money, and they have gotten very good at it, says Jason Erskine, communications director with the Washington state office of the AARP. The AARP is joining forces with the Bellingham Police Department, the Whatcom Asset Building Coalition, the Northwest Regional Council, BECU and Nomorobo to hold a free “Tip-offs to Rip-offs” online event aimed at helping local consumers stay a step ahead of the scammers, Erskine said in a press release.

The free online event will take place from 10 to 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday, June 2.

Participants will hear about the latest scams targeting residents of Bellingham and Whatcom County, and a deep-dive presentation will inform them on robocalls and imposter scams that are becoming increasingly common.

Speaking to the Tribune, Erskine said Nomorobo, a service that blocks suspected spam calls, has provided data and even recordings to help people avoid being taken

Bellingham Police Chief Flo Simon will speak as part of the June 2 webinar on not getting hurt by phone scams. advantage of by scammers.

“They block hundreds of thousands of calls, but they’re able to tell us specifically

what calls are coming into the area,” Erskine said. “We’re going to listen to tapes of some of those calls.”

Beyond area-specific calls, the presentation will detail robocalls in general, including a scam called “spoofing,” in which scammers make their caller ID numbers look like they are coming from the same area as potential victims.

Erskine said some scammers may trick victims with fake technical support calls, credit card offers, vehicle warranty calls and claims that a computer is infected with a virus.

“At worst, they want to remote into your computer,” he said. “Now they have control of your machine.”

It’s getting harder and harder to recognize these scams, Erskine said, and people are losing a lot of money to very convincing fakes that may use just one piece of information to gain the victim’s trust. The industry term is putting someone “under the ether,” meaning that a call can sometimes convince

even the most cautious of victims with the right con.

“What we know about the cons is that they’re master manipulators,” he said. “They get you under the ether, which means they put you in this mental state, whether it’s fear that your computer is infected, your social security number has been compromised, you missed jury duty so we’re coming out to arrest you.”

While elderly people are often the victims of these kinds of scams, young people are falling victim to them at an increasing rate, too. An older person may have no idea what a payment app like Venmo is, Erskine said, but young people might fall for scams using services like Venmo.

The free June 2 event is a collaboration between the Bellingham Police Department, the Whatcom Asset Building Coalition, the Northwest Regional Council, BECU and Nomorobo. Bellingham Police Chief Flo Simon will speak at the webinar. Register online at www.aarp.org/BellinghamTipOffs.

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021 | Ferndale Record

Senior Center starting up in-person noon meals on June 1 However, the max is 25 people per day, by reservation and spaced out with table service

Lynden Senior Center chef Keith McKenzie has kept up his daily cooking of a noon meal all through the pandemic, which patrons can pick up at a Grover Street window, and that aspect of service will continue. (File photo)

LYNDEN ­ — In-person lunch service will return to the Lynden Community/Senior Center on June 1.

To start, the seating will be limited to just 25 people and reservation for a day must be made a week in advance, according to an email from administrative assistant Karen Coleman.

Reservations will be accepted starting May 24 to the office at 360-354-2921.

“It will look a little different as we are moving to a ‘restaurant style’ of service [at tables, no getting in line] to make sure we can continue even if phases change,” Coleman said. “We will continue to offer our pick-up window while we are limiting in-person dining numbers.”

That window service of prepared hot noon meals has been going on all through the pandemic, with the cooking of chef Keith McKenzie made available at a Grover Street window as well as delivered by volunteers to the homes of those who cannot pick up for themselves.

The in-person meal service will be mostly on an alphabetical basis. Last names beginning with A-L may reserve spots on Mondays and Wednesdays while last names beginning with M-Z may reserve spots on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Friday reservations will be on a first-come, first-served basis.

These are other terms of the in-person resumption: Continued on next page

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021| Ferndale Record

ENCORE • The doors will open at 11:45 a.m., with lunch served at noon.

First, check in at the front desk with the new MySeniorCenter system.

Please wear a mask into the center and keep it on until you are at your table.

• Chairs need to remain as placed at tables, as social distancing is still the key to making this work. Once you pick a seat, stay in it.

• “Let our staff and volunteers serve you!

"Meals and beverages will be brought to each table — if you need anything, flag down a “waiter/waitress” who will have a bright yellow vest on. Clean-up of tables is the same — let the wait staff do it.

• If you need to use the restroom, please put your mask back on before leaving your table.

This is the way things used to be, but it is not the format that will be used when in-person meal service resumes at the Lynden Senior Center on June 1. Service will be to only 25 persons per day, staying at their tables and served restaurant-style. (File photo)

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021 | Ferndale Record

Foursome keep up friendship for 60 years

As they looked at 1970 graduation from LCHS are, from left, Sadie Annema, Fran Speelman, Jeannette Oosterhof and Sally Stuurmans.

They met as 9-yearolds in Mount Vernon

friendship of “Mount Vernon girls” who attended Lynden Christian High School together. They still retain a strong relationship, doing things together, 60 years

LYNDEN ­— Fran Matheis calls it a

where living is easy.

Continued on next page

,

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021| Ferndale Record

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Sally (Stuurmans) Hoekert, Sadie (Annema) Holleman, Jeannette (Oosterhof ) DeGroot, and Frances (Speelman) Matheis, each at 9 years of age, met in 1961 on the first day of fourth grade at Mount Vernon Christian School. Fran, Sadie and Jeannette had all just recently moved from California to Mount Vernon.

They graduated together in 1966 from the eighth grade and then, because their parents wanted them to continue their education at a Christian high school, the girls took the daily bus run from Skagit County up to LCHS. After their freshman year, Fran’s family moved to Whatcom County, and the other three girls continued the daily bus ride with frequent stayovers at Fran’s home so that they could be involved with the many various activities of high school life.

The four girlfriends graduated together from LCHS in 1970, attended various colleges, eventually met their spouses and then settled down with their families in either California, Oregon or Washington. The friends stayed in touch over the years with occasional calls or visits and Christmas letters. But about 10 years ago, they decided it was time to reconnect in person. In this past See Friendship on C8

The four 60-year friends' excursions today have taken them to many places together along the West Coast. From left are Sally Hoekert, Jeannette DeGroot, Sadie Holleman and Fran Matheis. (Courtesy photo/Fran Matheis)

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021 | Ferndale Record

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Friendship Continued from C7

Goofy hats could be part of the fun together. The four friends from fourth grade in 1961 in Mount Vernon will celebrate the 60 years of their friendship now in 2021. (Courtesy photo/Fran Matheis)

Honoring your loved one

decade they have accumulated more sweet and fun memories with trips together to Monterey CA, the Oregon Coast, Victoria BC, and locally in Skagit and Whatcom counties.

Their Class of 1970 had hoped to celebrate with a 50thyear reunion last year, but that was postponed due to COVID. This year, these long-time girlfriends are planning a celebration of their 60 years of friendship!

Fran sums up their friendship with the words of this poem

by Joseph Parry: Make new friends, but keep the old.

One is silver, the other is gold.

A circle is round, it has no end.

That’s how long, I will be your friend!

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021| Ferndale Record

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Father-son pair creating a new Lynden mural In his 67 years, Harry Engstrom has done more than 200 murals

By Calvin Bratt editor@lyndentribune.com

LYNDEN ­— Harry Engstrom is the man in the center of a family of artistic painters. His father painted some of the art in the state capitol rotunda of Helena, Montana. That was long ago. Now Harry and his son Eric are bringing their craftsmanship to redoing a mural facing Seventh Street in downtown Lynden.

They are working for seven weeks on a 13-by-132-foot wall as their ”canvas” for scenes of Holland and Lynden. Their work replaces what was left of a mural done by See Mural on C10

Both artists and painters, son Eric Engstrom is learning some of the finer points of large-scale mural work from his dad, Harry Engstrom, as they create a new mural in downtown Lynden this May and June. (Calvin Bratt/Lynden Tribune)

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021 | Ferndale Record

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Mural Continued from C9

local artist Bill Swinburnson in 2002.

“I did my first mural when I was 17 years old,” Harry Engstrom said Monday during a break from the pair’s long day of work when the weather is good. That first public artwork for him, a 10-by-12-foot mural, was in a Baptist church in Great Falls, Montana.

Across some five decades now he has done at least 200 murals, Engstrom estimates, with Arlington WA as the family home base since 1998 and the center of much of the artistic work.

And he has been a pastor or evangelist along much of that life-track as well, reducing a stressful ministerial load to part-time in 2008 to teach art for six years at Arlington High School.

Engstrom, 67, would sometimes do blacklight illustration, or other art, to go along with his sermons in churches or chapel talks at camps and conferences. In that regard, he is also like his own father back in Montana in merging art and pastoral ministry.

The artistic talent is passed down to

Harry Engstrom has been a pastor in his life's work as well as an artist, and sometimes he drew or painted as illustration of his talks and sermons. The Engstroms live in Arlington. (Calvin Bratt/Lynden Tribune)

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Eric, 37, although not the inclination to pastoring.

Eric Engstrom said he has mostly done smaller artistic painting that he sells to coffee shops or friends. It is more of a hobby than a livelihood.

But for the last 10 years he has worked on some of the murals his father heads up, the most recent one similar to Lynden’s being a 16-by-70-footer they did in Arlington last year. It renders a 1940s historic view of the city’s Olympic Avenue.

“It’s fun. It’s challenging,” Eric Engstrom said. “I’ve learned a lot from him as I go, like lines and angles and perspective on a larger scale.”

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The largest mural the senior Engstrom has done is also in Arlington, a 285-footer in length, about a city block.

The farthest he has gone to do a mural is Alaska.

“Somebody sees one of my paintings, and they want one. It’s just word-ofmouth. I never advertise,” he said.

But it wasn’t an eye-catching mural that landed the Engstroms this Lynden job. It was their more mundane other form of off-and on painting — painting buildings in the ordinary way as Northlight Painting, begun in 2002. Months ago,

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ENCORE they painted the exterior of two upper levels of this The Terrace Apartments building of Ron Hanson and Tim Keiper.

When Hanson and Keiper found out about the mural-making sideline, they at first wondered if the Engstroms would work in the same style as Swinburnson, who created the first whimsical Dutchcharacters mural on this surface. Harry Engstrom said no to that, but he did agree to do a complete replacement mural in his own “realist” style.

The new mural will recast some elements of the Swinburnson one, such as two Dutchman carrying a load of cheeses to market. It will also try to incorporate specific Lynden people into the characters who are on street. It will be a pictoral history of Lynden buildings and people from about 1895 to the present, as well as the roots of Lynden culture in the Netherlands.

The pair got their start on the new mural last week. Already the landmark downtown Dutch Village Mall windmill — which is immediately across Front Street — is painted at the far right end. Near to it will be a view of Mount Baker.

On Monday, they were in a process of covering over the entire wall surface with a base paint, light blue for sky on the upper part of the 13-foot height and a brown shade for the bottom portion where ground-level buildings will take shape eventually.

“You can’t add dark color to your painting after the fact. You have to have that first,” Harry explained.

On Monday, Harry and Eric were also doing a fair amount of the masking that is part of any paint job, protecting those areas where the paint should not go — upper gutters and windows, in this case.

Three windows and one door have been cut into the concrete wall of the first floor of the building, which will have commercial uses.

The Engstroms will paint directly onto one steel door, which is flush to the surface of the mural — no extra steps needed.

For six windows, they will paint first on a Masonite board, which will then be taken to a sign maker to digitize and make into a thin vinyl sheet to be applied to the glass. The image of the mural will appear uninterrupted across the windows.

During this project, the pair is staying Mondays through Thursdays at The Inn at Lynden, working until 8 p.m. to take advantage of daylight. This week, Harry’s wife, Grace, will join him on Friday.

The weather has been mostly good, although at times a little cold and windy and then they hang a tarp for some protection but usually keep working. Harry said this creation will be done in June.

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021| Ferndale Record

One door and six windows have been created in the concrete wall facing Seventh Street parking lot. But the new Engstrom mural will appear continuous and uninterrupted across them. (Calvin Bratt/Lynden Tribune)

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, May 12, 2021 | Ferndale Record

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