Yes, the food is good at A Bite of Wyoming. The green salsa in the squeeze bottles is also excellent. But for me, it is the memory of eating here with my Nana and Tata as a kid that makes it so wonderful. I take pictures for this blog in an attempt to capture some of the beauty that is everywhere here in San Jose and the surrounding area. But some of the beauty found anywehere by people comes from the memories that have aged well and continue to be appreciated. This restaurant represents some of those memories for me. It is also pretty neat to show my children their first jackelope, the very same that was my first jackelope, as they sit in a booth I sat in when I was their ages.
Being introduced to this place this year pleased me beyond all expectations. If I found this place anywhere in any town on any road trip, I would have been so completely proud and happy with myself. So, to be taken here, right in San Jose, on 4th street, where I had never been… well, it blew me away.
Coffee Shop at 4th Street Bowl
First, I should say that I find Diners and Coffee Shops to be one of humanity’s special places. And, I love to enjoy them, to eat, drink coffee, and basque in the humanity and time within them.
This one, right in San Jose at 4th Street Bowl, is quite special. Let me share some of the beautiful highlights about this coffee shop. Plenty of energy with customers and staff. Lots of windows. A looooong counter and a bunch of booths. A big menu. A glass door and windows that connect and look into the bowling alley. The alley is not updated. There is a cocktail lounge, a pool hall, a few video games, and of course, the coffee shop, all connected to the alley. Despite the simplicity of my words, the reality is a poetry of place and presence. It is a block of time and a splash of nostalgia whipped with distraction and covered in coffee. It is a treasure.
An interesting place. Also, once each summer they put on a “Play like a miner” event. Crafts, learning, gold panning for kids; its a good time to tour the museum in the historical Casa Grande mansion, as an adult or child, with so many extra activities and staff throughout the buildings and grounds. The displays and artifacts dealing with the historical mercury mining done in the area are intriguing.
San Jose has had several centers of government. From 1889 to 1958, the San Jose City Hall stood where today you find the water fountains in the middle of Plaza de Cesar Chavez that are popular with children on summer days.
Many people began playing with radio waves in the early 1900’s, but one man named Charles Herrold in San Jose was the first to set up a regularly scheduled broadcast forming the first radio station.
Where now stands the KQED building, right between the Fairmont Hotel, Cathedral Basiilica, San Jose Museum of Art, and Cesar Chavez Park, once stood a bank building from where Charles Herrold attached his antenna and began broadcasting his weekly radio show. He may even have coined the term broadcasting, a term taken from farming, when he was “broadcasting for the people San Jose.” On the show, he, his wife, and a friend, entertained with talk, stories, contests, and the reading of the newspaper.
There are at least three plaques placed on the building now standing in the location of the world’s first radio station including the California State Historical Landmark plaque, the above pictured plaque commemorating 100 years, and one commemorating 50 years.
After the radio broadcasting act in 1921, Charles Herrold obtained a license and his station became radio station KQW. In an interesting circle of fate, CBS eventually purchased KQW and changed its call sign to KCBS in 1949. Then, in 2006, KCBS moved their San Jose news team into the building without at the time knowing the history of the location and how it related to the KCBS radio station’s early origins.
This is a creative way to utilize old fluorescent light bulbs; covered up during their lighting life, now made part of the beauty as decoration and utility as light diffuser.
“It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up.” – Ferris Bueller talking about a Ferrari in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
Something San Jose has a lot more of these days is exotic sports cars. You can even rent them. If you have a chance to cruise around with a friend in a Ferrari, I highly recommend it. There are lots of types of experiences in this world. I like many of them and sometimes squishing them together. So, for example: start in San Jose, take an adventure to the coast, a cup of coffee, some beautiful nature, great conversation with a friend, and wrap up the curvy road sways with the art- visual/tactile/mechanical/aural- of a Ferrari. That’s a pretty fantastic day’s experience.
These roads are beautiful in any vehicle, really.Where the music comes from; you can see the twin-turbo V-8 out the back window.The great Pacific Ocean along Highway 1 at Pescadero State Beach.Could a coffee shop counter be any more happy?Two guys getting coffee on the coast as seen in the espresso machine’s reflection.
RAMAC Park is named after the first disk drive system. RAMAC stands for Random Access Method of Accounting and Control. It’s first level of development and invention occurred at the first California IBM laboratory in a rented building near the De Anza Hotel in San Jose. When the the new 190 acre IBM campus was ready on Cottle Ave., the lab moved to this south San Jose location and went on to innovate in big ways.
If you look around the park area today there is very little, but some, of the original tile mural work still up and visible. Other areas have covered the mural work to protect it, hopefully for a good and public purpose in the future.
A bit of the old tile mural, designed to symbolize the computer punch cards that originally played a role in bringing IBM out to San Jose, is visible past a security gate near RAMAC Park.
