December 10 - 16, 2009
San Gabriel Valley
S.G.V. EXAMINER
A1
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Volume XIII, Issue No. 50
INSIDE
STRIVING FOR JOURNALISTIC EXCELLENCE IN LOCAL NEWS
December 10 - 16, 2009
Team Jacob Fundraiser
By George Shutt
Around Azusa / B1
100th Year
Guadalupe Fierro / A2
INDEX
City Notices
B14
Classifieds
B15
Financial/ Consumer
B4
Legal Notices
B9
GLENDORA — On Saturday December 5th, the Glendora
community, family and friends
came together to support
Glendora High School’s 15 year
old Jacob Barrett in his cancer
experiences with very generous
donations to help their expenses
of treatment and travel.
Even the weather cooperated
although somewhat cloudy but
with good temperatures.
Some 500, from toddlers to
senior citizens, attended. 350
had their heads shaved by up to
5 professional hairdressers from
Side by Side Salon from 1 pm
to 5:30 pm.
The homerun derby was very
popular, too.
While Jacob is the one undergoing the cancer treatments, his
mother, Carrie, is carrying a very
heavy load. A great milestone
was reached that day when Jacob
hadn’t thrown up the liquid tube
feeding to his stomach for a
whole three weeks!
His radiation treatments had
ended, hopefully permanently, a
couple of days before the event,
but there are about another nine
months of chemo, every weekday of driving to Loma Linda
Hospital for his mother and
Posada Para Los Ninos
(Children’s Christmas Party)
By Jorge V. Rosales
AZUSA — This year the Pena
Family will be hosting their 7th
annual Children Christmas Party
better known as "Posada Para
Los Niños," in memory of
Michael Pena Sr., who passed
away in January 2009, on Tuesday, December 22 at 17626 E.
Renwick Road in Azusa from
5:00-8:00 P. M. with Santa
Claus arriving at 6:00 P. M.
Michael and Yolanda Pena
started planning this event after
Christmas 2002 when their son
invited them to a Christmas
party just for children in a neighborhood in Pomona. The children were being served cocoa
and cookies and entertained with
arts and crafts and a train ride.
Yolanda saw how happy those
children were and she convinced
Mike and her family to help her
do the same for children in their
Azusa neighborhood.
It was not hard to convince
Mike because when he and she
grew up in Boyle Heights, she
lived near Fresno Park and he
lived close to Costello Park.
When they were children they
were taken from the parks on
field trips during Christmas time
to the Shrine Auditorium and
they were given free gifts and
Christmas stockings. They never
forgot the big Christmas tree and
Santa Claus, as well as the beautiful Christmas music playing
throughout the event.
When they were growing up
they were not as fortunate as
other children to have a Christmas tree at home or have the
opportunity to go out and see
Santa Claus because their parents could not afford it. It was
then that they realized that many
parents in their existing neighborhood would not have the opportunity to take their children
to go see Santa because they
could not afford it.
They realized that they could
do a similar event like the one
in Pomona for the less fortunate
children in their neighborhood.
It was their opportunity and turn
to give back to the Azusa community. So they decided to bring
Santa to them.
They loved to see all the children and their parent's faces
when they came to our home. It
made them so happy to give back
the same joy that was given to
them when they were children.
They normally have over 200
children along with their parents.
When they held their first
event in 2003 they were only
able to serve cocoa and cookies
and give each child a candy cane.
However each year it continued
to grow thanks to the generosity
of many people and sponsors.
Yolanda will continue to provide face painting for the children as well as a balloon artist.
She will continue to serve cocoa and cookies, in addition to
hot dogs, chips, goodie bags and
a present for each child from
Santa. Her brother in law, Hector, usually brings in a puppet
show for the children, and why
not the parents also. It's free to
all present.
She will get help from many
people in the community and
friends from work to continue
to make this Posada 2009 a success. Her family is very helpful
in decorating the yard with snow
globes and lights and the setting
up for this big event each year.
Children in the community
look forward to this event each
year. When they see her in the
neighborhood, they come up to
her and ask her if she is going to
have a Posada this year.
Yolanda's granddaughters
Veronica and Violet help her distribute flyers throughout the
neighborhood to remind parents
and children of the Posada.
There's nothing sadder in this world
than to awake Christmas morning and
not be a child.
~Erma Bombeck, I Lost Everything in the
Post-Natal Depression
Brooke, Jacob’s big little sister with one of the “Team
Jacob” shirts donated by
Picasso’s Mylene Neufarth.
Mayor Karen Davis visited with Jacob.
many extra miles on their Ford
leased car.
Mayor Karen Davis attended
for a long time and presented
Jacob with a certificate from Assemblyman Anthony Adams for
outstanding sportsmen in baseball and football.
Jacob and his mother, Carrie,
particularily want to thank
Lynda Denman & Ashlyn
Salgado, and others who are too
many to name, for organizing
the event and publicizing the
Team Jacob Day, (Lynda is the
face of Glendora Pony Baseball.
She is involved with every part
of the Pony Baseball organization), and all the families who
have been bringing delicious
dinners upon their return from
the hospital each day.
They thank the Cory Lidle
Foundation for a generous donation. Cory was the Glendora
resident and NY pro baseball
player who tragically crashed his
plane in New York a couple of
years ago.Other sincere thanks
go to manager Mylene Neufarth
and Picasso's Restaurant and
Laura Hibbard, who is having an
open house Cookie Lee jewelry
party as a fundraiser for Jacob
next Sat. at her home at 124
Grand Oaks, Glendora, Saturday 12/12.
And thanks finally, but not
Young men and seasoned citizens getting a haircut and shave
from the salon volunteers.
least, to KSGV Radio for get- boosters.
ting them to Jacob’s especially
The whole family is grateful
thrilling meeting of the team and for the great support from those
USC practice; and GHS football both known and unknown.
Ground Breaking for Target Store in Azusa
By George Ogden
AZUSA — On Thursday, December 3, the City of Azusa held
a
ceremony
for
the
groundbreaking for the new
“home” of a Target Store in
Azusa.
The Azusa High School band,
cheerleaders and the drill team
led the opening for the ceremony. The high school’s Jr.
ROTC brought in the Colors
(flags) for the event.
The cheerleaders were from
Azusa and Glendora High
Schools and led the attendees in
cheers for the Target project.
Mayor Joe Rocha, City Manager Fran Delach and other City
Officials celebrated the ground
breaking of the project. Representative for Senator Gloria
Romero, Bill Baca and the representative for Assemblyman Ed
Hernandez, Jorge Marquez also
attended the event.
Rocha, Delach and other officials talked about the project
and the future of the area after
the Target store opens. They
talked about the fact that it will
bring 150 to 200 jobs to the
store. It will be a magnet store
that will bring other businesses,
much needed shopping services
and revenue to the city.
The planned store, which will
be located at 809 N. Azusa Ave.,
will be 159,000 square feet. The
parking for the new store will be
under the shopping area of the
structure.
Rocha, while speaking stated,
he had a few favorite snacks that
he likes to get at Target, and he
Council and staff breaking ground for the Target store.
has to go into other cities to get
them, only to find out they are
out of them. At this new store,
he will see to it that they will
always have a supply and always
in stock. While talking from the
podium, a pick-up truck drove
by and the driver was yelling, as
he was driving by, repeatedly
yelling, “A Supermarket, a Supermarket, a Supermarket,”
which brought laughter from the
very large crowd that attended.
At that, Rocha spoke on the fact
that a supermarket is indeed
planned for the area.
City and Target officials soon
manned over a dozen shovels to
break ground for the project.
Duarte’s Christmas
Tree Lighting
DUARTE — Duarte Mayor Margaret Finlay,
holding grandchildren Gavin and Brielle, is
aglow after ceremoniously lighting the City's
official Christmas tree, a 38 foot high living
Redwood, assisted by Santa and Mrs. Claus and
young dancer, Rosanna Rico. More than 200 residents turned out to celebrate the annual tree lighting and fiesta at the Duarte Community Center
that included musical entertainment provided by
the City of Hope singers and folklorico dancers.
The San Gabriel Valley
Examiner
The rendering of the future Target Store in Azusa.
Refreshments were served after the event and officials were
available to answer many ques-
tions that people had about the
project.
A2
S.G.V. EXAMINER
December 10 - 16, 2009
The Story Lady Of Glendora Azusa Resident Celebrates
100 Years Of Life
By Jayam Rutnam
Yesterday, I bumped into a
lady whom I had seen on television about 25 years ago. It was
on Channel 3, The Glendora
Channel that I had seen Bonnie
Deering, affectionately known
as Miss Bonnie to thousands of
little kids who live in Glendora.
Miss Bonnie is a regular story
teller to kids between 3 and 5 at
the Glendora Public Library.
She has between 15 and 30 children, who are brought in usually, by their mothers, for a
memorable experience of listening to Miss Bonnie read them
stories. Today it was mainly
about Christmas, the reindeer,
jingle bells and such. She also
very plainly spoke about how
one should cover their mouths
when sneezing. A show and tell
session was very popular among
the kids and they also got a
chance of singing their favorite
song. What one would normally
consider to be thirty minutes of
fun, was also a teaching session.
The love of books starts with listening to stories.
Bonnie does not look a year
older than she looked 25 years
ago, when my six year old
daughter pointed her out to me
on the Glendora Channel. She
is still full of expression when
she reads the stories, keeping the
attention of the children focused
on what she is saying. I was not
only impressed by her demeanor,
but also by the impression she
makes on the little children.
Miss Bonnie can be visited by
everybody on Wednesday mornings at 10.30 a.m. at the
Glendora Public Library. The
By Jorge V. Rosales
Miss Bonnie reads a story to Glendora’s children
library also has many other reading programs which are conducted by librarians Susan Nock
and Gail Jebbia. The library also
has many programs for older
children.
Getting on to the Library itself, I admit that I had not visited the library for many years.
Next to the Glendora Police Station, the Glendora Public Library is centrally and conveniently located in the heart of
Glendora, on Glendora Avenue.
As you enter the library, you feel
welcomed by the staff. It is not
only extremely well organized,
the semi bright colors and airy
feeling you get because of the
windows all around, makes the
place extremely comfortable.
The library is also equipped with
many computers, which could
be used on a first come first
served basis. I met with the very
accommodating Library Director, Robin Weed- Brown, who
was more than helpful and took
me on a tour of the library, the
new addition, the Friends Room
and her office. Although very
quiet, the library was well attended. I left with the feeling
that I would like to come back
and spend some time at
Glendora's very own, Public Library.
The Glendora Library was
founded in 1887 and incorporated in 1911. It is not only a
showpiece of our community, it
is an institution that should be
used by all. One should visit our
Library with y our kids, believe
me, it will be a memorable outing. You will feel good when
your little child says, "Mom,
could we go to the library
again?"
The Glendora Public Library
is open six days a week. They
have an average of 1000 people
visiting every day. This is one
institution that remains free of
any charge. It is paid for with
our taxes. It belongs to us! Let's
be proud of our library!
It was the famous Astronomer,
Scientist and Writer Carl Sagan,
who said…..
"The health of our civilization, the depth of our awareness
about the underpinnings of our
culture and our concern for the
future can all be tested by how
well we support our libraries."
Guadalupe Sotelo Fierro was
born on November of 1909 in
Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico.
At that time William Howard
Taft was the 27th President of
the United States and it was five
years before the commencement
of World War I. Back then it
might as well have been in a different world as the values, ethics and morals were different.
On Saturday, November 7,
2009, Guadalupe celebrated
with family and friends at the
Veterans of Foreign War Post
8070's social hall her 100th
birthday. It was a surprise for her
as she was transported there
without her knowledge of the
party by the care home's shuttle
bus where she now lives in
Covina.
Her family and friends, all
have shared in the joy of having
her in the midst of their life for
10 decades, and where she has
dispensed love and direction as
the matriarch of the family. With
her strict discipline in raising
them to be righteous, respectful,
and honest, her children have
become successful in their individual endeavors.
She married Elias in 1925 at
the tender age of 16 and was
blessed with nine children, Al,
Danny, Emma, Sarah, Ortencia,
Cruz, Guadalupe, Lulu, and
Caroline. All of her children
were born in the United States
and raised in Azusa. Through the
years she has lost five of her precious children, including
Caroline, who died when she
was only four months old.
Guadalupe's children created
a full and fruitful life for her and
her husband, but her life changed
when she lost her husband and
became a single parent, acting
both as Father and Mother for
Make A Holiday Candy
House At The Library
May the holidays bring you the joy of friends and
family. As your good neighbor State Farm agent I can
appreciate your business and look forward to a new
year together.
Kyle A Cline, Agent
CA lic. #: 0D16727
Glendora, CA 91740
Bus: 626-335-0815
[email protected]
WEST COVINA - West
Covina Library invites the whole
family to make houses out of
tasty holiday treats. Visit the
Library's meeting room anytime
between 3:30 and 5:30 PM on
Wednesday, December 16th, to
Thank You For
Patronizing Our
Advertisers
make a candy house that is yours
to keep. The program is sponsored by the Friends of the West
Covina Library. West Covina
Library, part of the County of
Los Angeles Public Library, is located at 1601 West Covina
Parkway in West Covina. For
more information about the library and its programs, please
call (626) 962-3541 or visit the
County Library Web site at
www.colapublib.org.
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The San Gabriel Valley
Examiner
Guadalupe Fierro in the birthday picture blowing out the candles.
Guadalupe Fierro, the Birthday Celebrant, with Ortencia
Gutierrez, Emma Rubio, Lupe Duran and Antonia Singh.
her children. Living in a cold
garage without windows and
walls plastered with street signs
and billboards was "home" for
her and her children for many
years. There were many moments of sadness and discontent
in her life, but each disappointment was a lesson to be learned.
Before entering the work
force in 1941, she did housecleaning for other families,
pressed clothes, and other chores
in order to feed her children and
give them their education. Her
first job for a couple of years
was with Pacific Railroad and in
1943 transferred to the RTD
Long Beach Terminal where she
worked until her retirement in
1973. She never took "welfare"
and is proud of that.
Her teachings have been car-
SGV
Examiner
ried down from one generation
to another, following her life
pattern of values that are very
significant to her. "No one deserves anything one has not
worked for or earned, and nothing should make one break its
word or lose its self-respect in
order to acquire one's wishes in
life," is a simple rule that
Guadalupe has always adhered
to.
Guadalupe raised her children
in Azusa, and in addition to her
longevity, she has received and
is blessed with 21 grandchildren,
58 great-grandchildren, 66 greatgreat-grandchildren, and 9 greatgreat-great-grandchildren, all of
which have or are being thought
how to live life with dignity,
self-respect, integrity, and with
a firm religious foundation in
order to enjoy life to the fullest.
Azusa Mayor Joe Rocha celebrated with Guadalupe her
milestone and on behalf of the
entire City Council presented
her with a Proclamation, proclaiming it's most sincere and
heartfelt wishes for a Happy
100th Birthday. "May she continue to share this world with us
for many more years marked
with the joy and fulfillment she
so richly deserves," said Mayor
Rocha.
Guadalupe also received a
birthday greeting from Barack
and Michelle Obama wishing her
a year of good health filled with
happiness.
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December 10 - 16, 2009
S.G.V. EXAMINER
Delta Nu Learns of Life in Internment Camps
By Lynda Siminske
Delta Nu chapter of Delta
Kappa Gamma (teaching) Society International recently invited
Toshi Ito, a member and past
president of Delta Phi chapter to
speak at their meeting. A larger
than normal number of members
and their friends came to hear
this wonderful lady speak about
her ;life in an internment camp
for Japanese in Minidok, Idaho.
Toshi
was
born
in
Seattle,Washington where grew
up and attended school. In 1940
when World War II broke out,
120,000 Japanese people were
sent to ten internment camps
(called concentration camps by
the Japanese as soldiers pointed
machine guns at them during the
day). These internment camps
were located throughout Western United States. Toshi has
authored a a book, "Endure",
about her experiences in the internment camp. (Japanese children were frequently told by
their parents to "Endure"). She
decided to write the book when
her grand daughter asked her
about her younger life. This way
her grand daughter, as well as
many other people could learn
by reading her book. Toshi sold
and autographed copies of her
book at the Delta Nu meeting.
Toshi recalled that in 1976
President Gerald Ford issued a
Proclamation stating the "Liberty and Freedom should be
available for all Americans," including those of Japanese heritage. In 1990, President George
Bush passed a measure giving
$230,000 to Japanese citizens
who had been sent against their
wishes to an internment camp.
Toshi recalled how she and
her family had to be ready to
quickly leave their home and
possessions and go to the internment camp. (Even Japanese students in college had to leave.)
Some neighbors and church
friends watched over their
homes and possessions while
they were gone; others were not
so lucky and lost everything.
Families were kept together in
little rooms or cabins at the internment camps. They ate in a
mess hall …hot dogs, rice, other
A3
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in the Downtown
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Approximately 1500 Sq. Ft.
Jan Mix, Lou Jones, Presidents, Toshi Ito, Author and Speaker, Lynda
Siminske, Ist Vice President (Programs), and Diane Brister, President of
Delta Nu thank Toshi for speaking at their meeting and presented her with a
red rose, the Delta Kappa Gamma symbol.
food, and more hot dogs and rice. They
were not beaten or tortured, life was
okay. Toshi actually graduated from
high in the internment camp (they had
schools there). She lived in the internment camp for a year. If you could get
a job outside the camp, you were allowed to leave. Many women, including Toshi did this by taking jobs in
home cleaning and doing other chores.
When they left the internment camp they
were given $25; families were given
$50. After the war, Toshi commented
that she felt the prejudice against Japanese but not against Chinese. It wasn't
hard to find work outside the internment camp, but housing was very difficult to find. After the war, Toshi moved
to the Chicago area and attended junior college and Helm School of Beauty.
Later she moved to this area and worked
in the School of Cosmetology at Citrus College from 1973 to 1991 as a
teacher. Toshi earned a Bachelor of
Vocational Education and a Masters of
Public Administration from California
State University, Los Angeles. A long
question and answer period follow
Toshi's presentation. Delta Nu members
were intrigued by her story.
The San Gabriel Valley
Contact Eugene Moses
(626) 852-3374 or (626) 260-5564
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Examiner
A4
S.G.V. EXAMINER
December 10 - 16, 2009
The San Gabriel Valley
Examiner