Culture: Page 210

Flown the Coop

Bird Woman, disillusioned, skips out on Fair this year

Culture

Shirley Musgrove is a costume designer and puppeteer, most known for her elaborate Oregon Country Fair costumes, which include a unicorn and fiery phoenix. One year, she dressed as a wolf and made people howl if they wanted a photo with her.  Musgrove first attended Fair in 1978 as a merchant with The Great Hooey Man, a puppeteer she met in her hometown of Spokane. She sold puppets and performed puppet shows for her first four years at the Fair, before spending time in New York to work with Muppeteer Jim Henson. Continue reading →

Diamond in the Ruff

Outgoing general manager Charlie Ruff reflects on the past, present and future of OCF

Culture
Charlie Ruff

“The thing I love most about the Fair,” says Charlie Ruff, Oregon Country Fair’s outgoing general manager “is that, at its best, as a community, people can come and be themselves — they can express themselves in an environment as free from judgment as you’ll find.”  Ruff steps down later this summer after 12 years on staff, the last seven of which he served as GM. He will remain, for the time being, a Fair volunteer. Ruff's replacement is Tom Gannon, a longtime Seattle resident who recently relocated to the area. Continue reading →

Peach Pit Jams

Culture

Walking down the trodden dirt path of the Oregon Country Fair can be intimidating at first. To your left, there’s a beeswax candle merchant; to your right is a group of leather-clad didgeridoo players. Straight ahead, on a wooden stage in a meadow, a jam band that may or not be the Grateful Dead reincarnated plays. The Fair offers a ton of great live music from which to chose, and here are a few acts you won't want to miss.    TAARKA Continue reading →

It’s About Time – July 2015

About Time

Hot weather is great for the bugs. Swallowtails and dragonflies dart around with incredible zip in the morning sun, their warm bodies full of energy. Spiders are getting prominent now, with dozens of little, baby spider webs all around our house. They protect us from mosquitoes. When approached they shake their webs vigorously, supposedly to make themselves appear a blur and not catchable by potential predators. Continue reading →

Hop to It

Oregon researchers seek to produce new varieties of hops

Drink
OSU hop breeder Shaun Townsend prepares to dry hops in Corvallis. Photo by Lynn Ketchum of Oregon State University.

In 1981, when Philomath hops purveyor David Wills first started tinkering with home brewing, “microbrew” was a burgeoning term, and not all that familiar to Oregonian ears.  The hops available to home brewers at that time were “really ugly,” Wills says. “I thought hops were supposed to be brown, and it wasn’t until I visited the USDA Hop Research Farm that I realized hops are actually green.” Continue reading →

Growl It Out

Growler Underground celebrates one year of filling up downtown Springfield

Drink
Owner David Platt mans the taps at Growler Underground. Photo by Todd Cooper.

Downtown Eugene isn’t the only urban core in the area experiencing a revival — downtown Springfield is undergoing a resurgence as well.  “I’ve been a craft beer aficionado for a long time,” says David Platt, owner and founder of Growler Underground located at 521 Main St.   “I was watching what was happening downtown,” Platt adds. “With both downtown [Springfield] on the rise and this sort of business on the rise, I thought the two would work well together.” Continue reading →

Beer Beat

Drink

Let’s face it, we all have a little Homer Simpson in us, and sometimes leaving the house to replenish the beer supply is just too much. Enter ManCäve Brewing Company: “Give us a call and we’ll deliver your beer,” co-owner Brandon Woodruff says. As of early June, ManCäve officially has its license to do same-day home deliveries through OLCC’s Malt Beverage Delivery Privilege program. ManCäve will now deliver six packs, 12 packs and growlers within a 2-mile radius of the brewery (540 Fillmore St. in Eugene). Continue reading →

Comin’ Up Rosies

Drink

If it’s July — and it is — and we’re getting hot — and we are — then, it must be time for pink wines.  Years ago, when Mole and I launched our investigation of pinks, we were both skeptical. I had tasted too many insipid pinks. He took a kinda Italian view: “Pink wines. Why?” For one, because they’re so pretty, in the glass, in the sun and across the palate. Continue reading →