Category Archives: Home & Family

July 16, 2011 · 5:44 pm

Last Harry Potter Movie

I went with family and friends to see the last Harry Potter movie last night. It was dark and sad but with a marvelous battle at the end. My kids love J.K. Rowling’s books and have read each of the seven Harry Potter stories many times. My son listens to recordings of the stories regularly. For the last fourteen years, our whole family has awaited each book and movie eagerly. We have several copies of each book, some in more than one language. In 2003, when we took a family trip by Amtrak train from Chicago home to the San Francisco Bay Area, we had to share just two newly-arrived books among the four of us. I think I achieved a personal best by reading Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix (870 pages) in a day and a half. I am sorry to see the end of new stories about our favorite boy wizard.

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Tagged as Jessica, John, Paul, San Francisco, San Jose

July 13, 2011 · 7:24 pm

Van Gilder Glass – 3rd Home

My Great Grandfather was Walter Van Gilder, a glass maker. You can read my 2009 blog entry about his home at 1007 Circle Park Drive, Knoxville Tennessee. I own several engraved and picture mirrors made by him but I think Walter Van Gilder’s best work is a stained glass panel (about five feet wide) which until this morning was over the door of my parents’ house in San Francisco. The panel is lovely but in deteriorating condition, so I asked Architectural Art Glass expert Vince Taylor to remove and fix it. Vince has created three stained glass panels for our house in San Jose and he does beautiful work. Once the lead has been replaced and the frame restored or replaced (depending on what is possible), the Van Gilder panel will be ready for its next hundred years. Ours will be the third house it has graced and we look forward to welcoming it home later this year.

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Tagged as Eleanor, San Francisco, San Jose

July 11, 2011 · 10:01 pm

Geeky Model Trains

While I was in Washington DC with the TechWomen mentoring program, my husband John was giving technical presentations at the National Model Railroad Association convention in Sacramento, California. He talked about state-of-the-art for model train layout wiring and the use of Arduino electronics in model trains. John also went on a Yolo Short Line train ride in Sacramento, a tour of the Lehigh Permanente Cement Plant in Cupertino, Sacramento area model railroad layout tours, a visit to the excellent California State Railroad Museum, and a generally had fun with the boys while I was off hanging out with the girls.

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Filed under Caboose Project and Other Trains, Home & Family, Mentoring & Other Business, News & Reviews

Tagged as Geeks, John, Mentoring, Middle East, technical women, TechWomen

July 11, 2011 · 9:08 pm

Swimming Alcatraz

Last weekend, my brother Pete swam around Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay in the Swim Around the Rock open water competition. He said it was a tough 3.25 mile course (from Aquatic Park around Alcatraz and back) but that the calm water on the far side of the island gave him a rest from the current. The water was a relatively-warm 60 degrees F. Only 40 swimmers were allowed to enter. The course was monitored by kayakers, lifeguards, and support boats. Pete was met at the finish with family hugs and tea.

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Tagged as San Francisco

June 26, 2011 · 6:02 pm

TechShop San Jose Opens

Yesterday, John and Paul and I went to the crowded opening of the new TechShop in San Jose, California. We also joined as lifetime family members!

TechShop is a membership-based workshop that provides members with access to tools and equipment, instruction, and a community of creative and supportive people so they can build the things they have always wanted to make.

Location: 300 South 2nd Street San Jose, CA 95113
http://www.techshop.ws/ts_sanjose.html

We heard the opening talk by my former boss, Greg Papadopoulos, on the topic “Think Global, Innovate Local”. There were at least dozen ex-Sun-Microsystems Engineering staff there to cheer for Greg.

Being the owners of WP668 (backyard caboose), our family already has developed a basic workshop but having access to some of the larger TechShop equipment and the classes will help with a variety of home and hobby projects. Some of the equipment I want to learn to use: FlowJet 4′ x 8′ CNC Water Jet Cutter, Epilog Helix 60-Watt Laser Cutters, Tin Lizzie Quilting Machine, Hand-Held Plasma Cutter, and the Computer Controlled Embroidery Sewing Machine. Paul and I plan to take classes together in Autodesk Inventor, and Arduino 101 (Board Soldering) later this summer.

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Tagged as John, Paul, San Jose, Sun Microsystems, teaching, WP668

June 25, 2011 · 11:00 am

Portrait in Charcoal

My son Paul just finished his Freshman year at Foothill College (Los Altos Hills, California). Like his Grandmother, Eleanor Dickinson, he is an artist. Paul spent his first college year studying art and math. This quarter, he did an extra credit portrait for his first Drawing class. Paul took a photograph of his sister Jessica and played with the image to increase contrast, then created the portrait above in charcoal on paper. The teacher liked it so much, Paul got an “A” in the class! Paul has also been taking ceramics each quarter, so we now have dozens of lovely small bowls to find homes for.

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Tagged as Eleanor, Foothill College, Jessica, Paul

June 14, 2011 · 10:36 pm

Jo Hanson’s Art

One of the closest friends of my mother, Eleanor Dickinson was Jo Hanson (1918 – 2007). Like herself, Jo’s art was always interesting, precise, well-considered, and different. Three of Jo’s pieces owned by my family are good examples:

An oak coffee table she made for me in 1982 out of scrap wood Jo salvaged from abandoned shipping pallets
A plywood cutout painting of two figures taken from a news photo
Foam tombstones and pictures of leaves from the trees near “The Crab Orchard Cemetery” from a 1974 exhibition of that name based on Jo’s Southern Illinois ancestral graveyard

One of my favorite Jo Hanson memories is hearing her talk about taking on the IRS. The tax service kept auditing her. Year after year, they said that Jo could not deduct her art supplies because was a only a hobbyist since never made a profit. Her many art exhibits, career as a San Francisco Arts Commissioner, and National Endowment for the Arts artist’s fellowship made no impression on the IRS. After many years of fighting, she eventually convinced the IRS that she had a citizen’s right to be in an unprofitable profession. Only Jo could have won that battle with such style and energy.

18 January 2022 update:

Artists’ Taxes: The Hands-on Guide, An Alternative to “Hobby” Taxes by Jo Hanson, 1987.
Crab Orchard Cemetary by Jo Hanson, 1975 (Exhibition, University of California, Mandeville Art Gallery, 25 September – 26 October 1975).
Women Environmental Artists Directory by Jo Hanson and Susan Leibovitz Steinman, 2004.
“About Our Founder, Jo Hanson,” Artist in Residency Program, Recology, recology.com
“Receipt of Delivery: Jo Hanson – Snails and Street Sweeping,” by Tanya Zimbardo, 8 March 2013, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, openspace.sfmoma.org
“Interview with the Curators – Women Eco Artists Dialog: The Legacy of Jo Hanson,” 14 April 2020, YoloArts, yoloarts.org