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On many mornings over the past two weeks, Jim Walker and Alan Pasternak have headed out before dawn in the cold and the rain with a message for Clark County commuters.
Standing on the Southeast 10th Street overpass of Interstate 205, the two Vancouver retirees held a sign reading, “VOTE like Your RIGHTS Depend on It!” On one morning last week, Walker said, volunteers for U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler beat them to a prime spot on the Evergreen Boulevard overpass.
Otherwise, they’ve been able to find places where they can urge people to use their right to vote in upcoming races for Congress, Clark County government, Vancouver City Council and others.
“I thought a woman was going to fall out of her car waving at me,” Pasternak said. “I only got flipped off once.”
As of Friday afternoon, about 39 percent of Clark County voters had turned in their ballots. The votes they cast will determine whether politically purple Clark County is more a shade of violet or indigo.
A big shout-out to Vancouver resident Pam Nordick from best-selling author Craig Johnson, the creator of the “Longmire” Western-crime novels that became a super-popular TV series.
Popular or not, the A&E Network canceled the show after three seasons, so Nordick sprang into action just the way Wyoming Sheriff Walt Longmire might. She formed up a posse — the Longmire Posse, an official fan group — that rode social media hard and managed to save the show. It lived on Netflix for three more years.
“I’m a warrior, whether you’re talking about ‘Longmire’ or my neighborhood,” said Nordick, a longtime organizer in the Landover-Sharmel neighborhood of east Vancouver. Nordick loves the “Longmire” books for their rich narratives, character development and scenic descriptions — “One of the co-stars is the environment itself,” she said — but there’s a good reason why she lobbied for the “Longmire” TV show too: her nephew, Adam Bartley, is in the cast. He plays sheriff’s Deputy Archie “The Ferg” Ferguson.
Related: ‘Longmire’ author to keynote library event
Nov. 3-4: See what Clark County’s notable artists are creating during the Open Studios Tour, a self-guided exploration of 50 local studios. Meet the artists, see one-of-a-kind works and buy pieces made available especially for this event. Download a map at ccopenstudios.org.
Nov. 3-4: The Vancouver Symphony Orchestra presents Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 3 — the stirring “Scottish Symphony” — and Khachaturian’s Piano Concerto with Dimitri Zhgenti. Concerts are 3 p.m. Nov. 3 and 7 p.m. Nov. 4 at Skyview Concert Hall, 1300 N.W. 139th St. Tickets are $35, or $10 for students. 360-735-7278 or vancouversymphony.org
Through Nov. 17: Magenta Theater debuted the original “Once Upon a Palace Purple” in 2008. This updated revival, which tells the story of warring Red and Purple kingdoms, caps off Magenta’s 16th season. Performances are Nov. 3, 8, 9, 10, 15, 16 and 17. Tickets are $22 at the door or $20 in advance, available at 360-635-4358 or www.magentatheater.com.
Nov. 7: Craig Johnson, award-winning author of the best-selling Walt Longmire mystery series, is the keynote speaker at Fort Vancouver Regional Library Foundation’s Authors & Illustrators Dinner and Silent Auction at the Hilton Vancouver Washington, 301 W. Sixth St., Vancouver. Tickets are $90, available at fvrlf.org/.
Read the full list of November events.
About a decade ago, Pat Jollota started getting offers from retiring and retired law enforcement officials, or their descendants, who were unloading artifacts otherwise headed for the landfill.
The former Clark County Historical Museum director and retired Vancouver City Council member had made a name for herself as this city’s chief popular historian and the author of several books. So did she want these old detective notebooks, scrapbooks, photographs and other materials connected with a notorious abduction and murder that took place in downtown Vancouver in 1950?
Of course she did. Jollota used to work as a police dispatcher in Los Angeles, where her late husband was a detective. “I spent 22 years with those guys. It marks you,” she said.
Michelle Perez of Vancouver worked four years in the Toys R Us at Jantzen Beach and she loved her job.
Perez worked most of the time in the baby registry, helping excited parents through one of the modern-day rituals of welcoming a newborn. Toys R Us had that kind of status. She was surrounded by neighbors — about three-quarters of the Jantzen Beach Toys R Us staff were Clark County residents, most of them from Vancouver.
Perez rose from part-time clerk to supervisor status, adding a new layer to her retail experience.
“I really enjoyed that, but it was also one of the most stressful jobs that I’ve had,” she said, noting that parenthood can bring out the worst as well as best in people.
“Definitely being put in the position of being yelled at and screamed at all the time,” she recalled in a recent interview.
But Toys R Us closed the last of its 800 U.S. stores in June after filing for bankruptcy protection last fall, putting Perez and 33,000 others out of work.
