18 10 181 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral Histories Description An account of the resource Video and audio oral histories can be viewed here. Histories are listed alphabetically by last name. Individual histories are indexed and transcribed and can be searched. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <p>Rights to oral histories vary depending on the history. The library owns the copyright to some histories, and has license to reproduce for nonprofit purposes for others. Please contact CSUSM University Library Special Collections at <a href="mailto:%20archives@csusm.edu">archives@csusm.edu</a> with any questions about use.</p> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Judith Downie Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Tomme Arthur OHMS Object This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS Viewer) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=ArthurTomme_DownieJudith_2019-08-08.xml OHMS Object Text This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka 5.4 Arthur, Tomme. Interview August 8, 2019 SC027-044 01:09:58 SC027 California State University San Marcos University Library Special Collections oral history collection CSUSM csusm Brewers -- California -- San Diego County. Brewing industry -- California -- History. Lost Abbey Brewing (San Marcos, Calif.) Microbreweries -- California -- San Diego County. Tomme Arthur Judith Downie ArthurTomme_DownieJudith_2019-08-08.m4a 1:|17(6)|44(4)|71(12)|94(8)|117(10)|139(3)|172(14)|214(13)|227(11)|264(9)|284(2)|311(5)|345(12)|373(2)|393(14)|427(5)|450(16)|474(12)|493(6)|523(7)|562(8)|583(6)|616(10)|634(16)|649(12)|670(14)|698(10)|717(5)|743(3)|760(6)|779(6)|802(9)|824(12)|843(10)|860(6)|877(13)|894(13)|911(17)|930(11)|953(3)|976(2)|991(14)|1021(12)|1039(7)|1062(14)|1098(8)|1146(15)|1159(9)|1189(15)|1231(3)|1246(10)|1270(9)|1300(3)|1321(3)|1342(16)|1363(2)|1384(4)|1401(4)|1421(14)|1439(11)|1459(4)|1475(10)|1499(6)|1521(2)|1535(4)|1559(5)|1590(9)|1610(2)|1627(6)|1643(11) Undefined 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/77ba455fa57d5b0079ba70f5e57ea2db.m4a Other audio English oral history Tomme Arthur has been involved in several San Diego breweries, most notably as founder and managing owner of Lost Abbey Brewing located in San Marcos, CA. His first professional brewing position was at the short-lived Cervecería La Cruda in San Diego, California. Arthur moved to Pizza Port Brewing in Solana Beach, California as an assistant brewer. After becoming Director of Brewing Operations for the increasing number of locations, he led the chain in garnering numerous beer awards. Arthur opened Lost Abbey Brewing in 2006 to focus on his interest in Belgian-style beers. In late 2023, Arthur separated Lost Abbey from Port Brewing operations in a ‘right-sizing’ plan in response to beer industry trends. Port Brewing retained the Hop Concept, Tiny Bubbles, and Kharisma brands in their portfolio and took over the San Marcos production space and closed the tasting room. Lost Abbey entered an alternating proprietorship agreement with Mother Earth Brewing to share their production space in nearby Vista, CA. &#13 ; &#13 ; In his 2019 interview, Arthur discusses his introduction to craft beer and home brewing ; entry into the profession and work at various breweries beginning in the 1990s ; founding Lost Abbey Brewing and other brewery ventures ; mentoring individuals in the industry ; and awards. &#13 ; Judith Downie: So today is August 8th, 2019 and this is Judith Downie, the Curator of the CSUSM Brewchive® with Tomme Arthur, founder and co-owner of Lost Abbey, the Hop Concept, Port Brewing, and myriad other projects that we're going to be asking about. So tell me, the purpose of this is to kind of record in one place things I've seen in a lot of places. You know, you've been very generous with your time with people mentoring and interviewing. And so this is for the Brewchive®, basically an overall history of your life experiences as a brewer, thoughts, things like that. So, we do have a list of questions here, which again I'll read them off, I may reword them a little bit and you are open to responding to them however you need. And I hope we have plenty of time that you've talked about things that maybe nobody's ever asked you. Tomme Arthur: That would be fun. JD: Yeah. So record these things for posterity. So, let's start with your background. To be clear, from what I've seen, you started home brewing in Arizona while you were in college and how did that start? TA: So I am a native San Diegan. My family's three to four generations on both sides. Went to Saint Augustine High School. When I was in high school, I decided that I really liked the English language and I wanted to study English and felt that teaching was a path that I would probably take. JD: Okay. TA: And so I fell in love with Flagstaff as a campus and community. And the school at Northern Arizona University had a really good education teaching program. So that's how I ended up in Flagstaff. When I got to school, I met a family, last name is Gardner and, and their son, Tom. And I became very close and the Gardner family really was into beer and they were sort of my mentors to beer. And they said, you know, we're going to teach you about better beer. And of course, I was only 18 at the time, but you know, I wasn't gonna say no. And they kind of pushed me in this direction of here's what better beer looks like, tastes like. American beer, imported beer, Canadian, very English, you know, all the, all the different countries where a great beer would have come from. A lot of it at that time was imported of course. JD: Right. Because really, you know, we're talking what the... TA: 1991 and 95 was when I was in school. JD: Okay. So there really wasn't much of a craft beer scene in Arizona I don't think. TA: There were very few craft breweries in Arizona. In fact, there were no craft breweries in Flagstaff at the time. We ended up having three open up in my last year of school. But there were no craft breweries in Flagstaff and at that time. There was likely to be 10 or 15 probably in the entire state. But we've got a lot of regional beers. There was a lot of beer from Oregon, Washington, Northern California, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado beer. So there was some American craft. But mostly from very older players, you know, Sierra Nevada Anchor, Deschutes (Brewery), big, bigger breweries. JD: And being that the craft beer scene in San Diego was still pretty young in that time period. Do you remember seeing anything from San Diego? TA: No. In fact we, we actually talk about this a lot, that prior to Stone Brewing coming into San Diego, nobody actually sent beer outside of San Diego. Karl Strauss (Brewing) had beer in San Diego at the time and packaged in bottles. But they, I don't believe much of their beer, if any, was leaving the San Diego area. So my understanding is that it really wasn't until Stone opened their doors and shipped beer to Arizona, likely maybe Nevada, you need to ask them, where they crossed the state line and perhaps were one of the original new craft breweries to actually make beer to leave San Diego. JD: Which is really interesting because I have in my pre-Prohibition research on San Diego craft brewing found Mission Brewing. They were brewing beer to supplement San Diego Consolidated Brewing, which is San Diego Brewing Company (today). They were San Diego Consolidated Brewing for a while and Arizona passed Prohibition in 1914, five years before National Prohibition and halted any shipment of even Hopski, which was a near beer Mission was brewing, into the state. They weren't even allowing that. And there was a big lawsuit and Mission Brewing lost and that was the contributing factor to the closure of Mission through that. TA: They actually lost out on a nonalcoholic or near beer. JD: Yeah. Hopski, and they didn't continue to brew that because J. H. Zitt, who was the president, the current owner of San Diego Consolidated Brewing had said ‘I will never brew anything but real beer.’ So he's the one who decided to close Mission. Because he actually owned it at the time because his father-in- law and brother-in-law, who had founded Mission, had walked away. TA: Yeah, the old San Diego stuff is really interesting. JD: Yeah, and it's a, it's an interesting kind of parallel between you being in Arizona and starting your interest in beer there and then coming back to San Diego. But I've also seen that you've noted that your favorite beers are Belgian style. What? TA: I just find them to be very unique and I think that there's, there's a pretty, I guess when I first got started in brewing in my sort of craft foundation, they were the most unique things out there. And that, that today is not necessarily the case. There's so many new producers and people that have really taken the boundaries and, and stretched them and moved them in directions. I think ostensibly under a Belgian influence or sort of what amounts to be a Belgian artistry, but there's a lot more to it these days. And I just think that if you, if you become imaginative about beer, you have to look at what the Belgians did or were doing at that time. Technique wise, yeast wise flavors, just process things. Very unconventional via what, what would amount to be a very conventional sort of brewing, you know, take four malts or take four ingredients. You can, you used a lot of water and hops and that's beer. And then you look at what they do. And it's completely different. JD: So you think the Belgians weren't constrained by the purity law that the Germans had and that's part of what led to their inventiveness? TA: Yeah, I just feel like they as a group embraced different methodologies and, and that sometimes weren't easy. And those methods at least preserved flavors that couldn't be found in beer, again, conventional beer. JD: Okay. Very interesting. So, onto your actual brewing experiences. You started home brewing? I read it was a homebrew kit... TA: So the Gardner’s bought me a home brew kit early for my graduation. So, I was gifted it in January of 1995 and that's when we started homebrewing. JD: Okay. And you didn't like the first beer you brewed? TA: The first beer we brewed, it was a black style, you know, sort of a dry Irish Guinness-style stout, but it came out very thin and didn't taste like Guinness or anything. So it wasn't, it was not a good beer. But you know, I think the expectations were high and probably should have set the bar a little lower. JD: Was this extract or all grain? TA: It was extract for sure. JD: Yeah. Because of course supplies even in the 90s, were still kind of hard to come by. TA: Yeah, we were pretty lucky there was a homebrewer outpost in Flagstaff, so there was a store that sold ingredients that we could've, we could've started in an all-grain basis. But I was living in a house with four people and it just wasn't really, I didn't have the resources to go build a full all grain brewing system, with the plastic fermenters and you know, boiling on the stove top kind of stuff was definitely where it was at. JD: Yeah, you got to start somewhere. So, then you came back to San Diego. Was that, what was the reason for coming leaving Arizona? TA: So I graduated in June or May of 1995. JD: So was this your bachelor's or your teaching credential? TA: This was my bachelors of arts in just English. And at that point I didn't really want to stay in Flagstaff and I wasn't gonna attend grad school there. So, I moved back home and so I left. And when I got home I kind of kicked around a little bit trying to figure out what I was going to do and really didn't have a plan necessarily I was able to go back and live with my parents. And you know, the only requirement was that I find a job. So, I found a job and that's kinda how I got in the downtown life. My dad had a printing business when I was growing up, so I was very, very well trained and I worked in the campus print shop when I was in school. So, I applied for a printing job in a downtown San Diego business and I was commuting, taking the trolley from La Mesa down into downtown San Diego every day. And I happened to be reading want ads, just, it was all that was left in the newspaper at that point. And stumbled upon a brew pub opening that had an ad in the paper for cooks, dishers, all that stuff in it said assistant brewer and I circled it. And I walked over the next day at lunch and applied for a job. And that was actually Cervecería La Cruda. JD: Right, with Troy Hojel? So, you actually opened Cervecería La Cruda in September of ‘96? TA: No, they, they would have opened, I think it would've been March of 96 ‘cause we ended up, we attended the great American beer festival in September, October of 96 and then it closed. It was less than a full year. I think I was hired in April, May-ish. and then I wasn't there even for a full year. JD: Yeah. I have, I have March ‘97 is when it closed. TA: So I think it probably was mid April-ish I would've been hired in. We didn't even make it a full year. JD: Yeah. This is the kind of thing I like because I have a very large Excel spreadsheet of every brewery from 1868 which was Chollas Valley Brewery through today. Whether they opened or closed, it never made it, pulled the license, whatever... TA: So, how many different breweries have attempted to open? Are we in the three hundreds or? JD: Well, my Excel spreadsheet also includes all the individual tasting rooms because generally they pull a separate ABC license. I'm up over 550 getting close to 600 I think, but I could certainly get back to you with how many tried and never even actually opened. I think there's a real object lesson there. TA: I think the most interesting thing is that we operate that there's 160 or whatever right now that are active, but it's really interesting to know kind of how many have kind of opened and closed and opened and closed and where you know, you can say, okay, since prohibition we've had 208 that have tried or participated in this, in this scene. JD: Yeah, because I break the whole history into three parts. There was a pre-Prohibition 1868 to 1919, 1919/1920 then 1933 to 1953 because Aztec, which had sold to Altes Brewing, closed and they were the last brewery operating post-Prohibition and then we didn't pick up again until the (19)80s so I can extract that information and get it to you because those numbers are always very powerful. TA: Yeah. I just feel like it'd be interesting to say since Prohibition, there's been 208 licenses that were issued or over, you know-- JD: And then there were others that announced a name or announced that they were going to open and never even got around to pulling a license. You know, so I have, I have every single possible name of any business that ever said ‘we are going to be a brewery or a brew pub, or...’ TA: No one ever drops on in front of you and you say, haven't heard of it. JD: Well actually not too long ago, I ran across one called the Royal Duffer. And that evidently they were contract brewing. They were in Carlsbad and they were like four golf buddies. And so they had beer for, again, I think it was less than a year. And I haven't been able to find out too much information from them, but I'm very alert to, ‘Oh, I don't think I've ever heard of that name before’ so this is the first one I've not heard of in a long time. So I think I'm pretty comprehensive. But yeah. Yeah, it's been interesting and a lot of work. But going back to Troy, is Troy still around? TA: He is in somewhere in Colorado outside of Denver. In fact, I just talked to him the other day. He texted me, I think his cousin opened a brewery in Texas and he had a question or two. TA: So yeah. He's in Colorado and doing the software. JD: Okay. So he's no longer in the brewing business. TA: No, actually he left the brewery business and ended up doing software in Northern California for a bit, I think, and then moved off to Colorado. JD: Well, it's gotta be sad to watch your dream die especially so quickly. TA: You know, it was a pretty aggressive life lesson, you know? It taught me a lot in the short time that we were into it. I still think that Troy is one of the best brewers I've ever met. And it would've been a really cool thing to see it succeed at, but certainly would've put me on a different life path, I think if it had. So I don't, I don't try not to, you know, revisionist history, that part of it. But the beers that he made and he was a very technical brewer, I think, I think it would've been, it would've added to the scene even more. JD: Yeah. What actually happened? Was it just lack of sales? TA: I think more than anything it was a bad, is a bad business model. I don't know if you know the story of Baja Brewing Company. JD: I'm familiar with the name, but not really the story. TA: So Baja Brewing Company opened up and they claimed to be the very first Mexican-themed brewpub in the United States. Now it was their claim to fame. But what happened is that the partners at Baja Brewing and the partners at La Cruda actually had a schism and they split. They were going to open the Baja Brewing Company together or something along those lines and they had a falling out and the partnership dissolved. And so these guys opened Baja Brewing Company and less than three or four months later Cervecería La Cruda opened up three blocks away. So the very first Mexican theme brewpub in this country opened up and three blocks later and three months and three blocks over the second one opened. So, very underfunded from the get-go. Very, it was a 13,000 square foot building at Forth and Island, you know, big, big building. Too much of it to just for the time I, I'd be nervous opening a 13,000 square foot building brewpub today. And you know, back when the Gaslamp was kind of still new and trendy and hot, I don't know what the rent was, but just overall a bad, a bad vision I think for what was going on. JD: Ahead of its time. Really. TA: Yeah. And the thing that's kind of crazy is that Cervecería La Cruda to them is a hangover brewery. So when you say ‘tengo la cruda’, that means I have the crud, I'm not feeling well. That's not a real great way to tell people you want to come here and drink. They opened up with a menu that they had sourced from the family that owned El Callejon in Encinitas. So, they had this really great, I would say deep, deep Mexican Sonoran source, you know, moles (sauces) and things. But that wasn't on anyone's radar with respect to craft brew at the time. So, good people, great, great opportunity. But not even something, that I think today, even if you attempted to tackle it, would probably work really well. JD: So as you say, a real experience. TA: Yeah, a lot I learned from, you look around and you see simplicity sometimes wins. JD: Or slow growth. Planned slower. TA: Or have more money than you think. Yeah. JD: Somebody said to me one time something like, you need five times more than you think you do. And I would, I think that's true with any business really. But the expense of equipment and materials and everything and you just can't do it all yourself. TA: No. You gotta be able to weather a lot of storms. JD: And you know, with this, I know in September of 2016 I went to the craft beer conference up in Sacramento and I saw you speak there and you at that time, this is three years ago now, said that San Diego was already over-saturated, and you would not open up a brewery at this point in San Diego. And how many breweries have we had open up? TA: Continues to be a head-scratching thing. Yeah. Well, we joke, I mean, we're here in San Marcos now. I've got three breweries within a one-mile stretch. Right. So yeah, that's just the way it is. Yeah. JD: But you're each different. Accommodating everybody at some point. But so when La Cruda closed, you moved to White Labs for just a couple of months in yeast sales. Was that based because you knew about yeast? TA: So White Labs had just kinda gotten their feet wet. So I remember the very first day when I was at La Cruda, one of the very first days I was at La Cruda. Chris White (founder of White Labs) walked in on a sales call. And so we were chatting and talking and at some point, and this is a part of my history that I don't remember all of that clearly, but I ended up moving in with them. I mean I was a roommate and I think there was a crossover point where I was working at La Cruda, but I already moved into their house. Cause he and Lisa had an empty room. I needed a place to stay. And then when La Cruda was on its way to be closing it became kind of obvious that I could help them in their infancy of their company with some just R and D and just different trialing and things like that. TA: You know, I had met a lot of brewers in Arizona at that time. So Chris said, well, why don't you come help me just kind of knock down some doors and you know, we just need somebody that can walk in and kind of talk about this in a very brewer friendly kind of way. So my goal was I was kind of like an ambassador really. You know, I didn't really do a lot of pure sales but my job was to talk about it and explain how my experience with different yeasts and temperatures and things like that. So it was kind of just yeah, I think it was more of a product, product knowledge and ambassador at that point. JD: Was there any conversation at that time about opening up a tasting room for yeast labs? TA: No. No. I mean, maybe Chris had it, but it you know, that was a pretty, it was a long time ago and there wasn't really a sense of yeast as a business outside of the yeast business. I don't think there was sort of that auxiliary layer to it. I'm sure Chris would have liked to have had a bunch of beers on tap, but I, I would imagine if he had had that thought back then that they would have probably just wanted 10 beers on tap for their customers to come sample them, but not necessarily not, not really treat it as an educational function for the consumer as much as an educational experience for a brewer who maybe hadn't worked a certain use and things like that. I mean there's just an enormous amount of yeasts that have been banked since we started. Since I got my first job in 1996 there's been an enormous amount of new yeast that had been added. So, they need an avenue to show people what those yeasts do. JD: And back then too, you probably had a lot of brewers, even professional brewers, would be how I see it. That didn't really understand a lot about the hops that were available. The yeast that was available, you know, cause a lot of them had, were coming out of the homebrew experience and you know, all of a sudden here's more stuff you need to know. TA: If you go back and look at it ‘95, ‘96 to, so that time, I mean we're talking about a dial up modem, you know, we're talking about low internet speed, we're talking about not... JD: A lot of people, not even having computers or knowing how to use it. TA: Not even a lot of Information online. Frankly. I mean you couldn't, you could not do all the kind of information that's out there today. And, and past that, a lot of the information that did exist in book format was highly technical through the ASBC (American Society of Brewing Chemists) and the big brewers. And then what was available that had been written about the sort of homebrew level and medium brewery. There wasn't a lot of medium brewery stuff in there, so you were getting a lot of books on how to brew ales, but they had this really big English, you know, sort of basis to them. Cask condition, real ale ingredients weren't American in their basis. So there was no ability to look up and say, Oh, how do I use this German hefeweizen yeast? You know, how do I, how much do I pitch it, what temperature, how does it behave? And none of that information existed. JD: So a lot of technical stuff. TA: Yeah. even just simplistic technical. What's the right temperature? JD: And around here San Diego was still something of a Coors town that's San Diego was test market for a couple of different, for Coors Light and for Herman Joseph's 1868 and you know, so really do you have much of a market for... TA: In fact, we joked about it here. This was the best, I think this was the best-selling Coors light town when I took in, when I got into brewing, this was the number one Coors Light in the country. JD: Yes, it was. TA: Well that explains to you, you know, where we're, where we were and where we came from. And on top of that you had all the import beers too, right? You still had Coronas and Pacifico and the Modelos in the world doing very well here at that time too. So yeah, it was a, it was a long ways to the top. JD: So you weren't at White Labs for very long before you were hired by Pizza Port. Pizza Port just had the one location then, right? TA: They had the one location in Solana Beach. Vincent (Marsaglia), Gina (Marsaglia) had been partners in the Carlsbad Public House with a guy named Brett. I think his last name was Stamp. JD: Tetley Ridden, I, it's a hyphenated name. (correct name is Redmayne-Titley) TA: Yeah. And then he became a, they, they had a falling out with Carlsbad Public House and they were in, they were in the process of converting the Public House, which is the Pizza Port in Carlsbad in the village into the Pizza Port at that time. So I was, I was brought into assist on Solana Beach because the head brewer was going to go have shoulder surgery and then they were supposed to move me up to Carlsbad to take over the production of the brewing and Carlsbad once, once he came back. So there was almost a second Pizza Port in line at that time. So they were, they were in the home stretch of the construction to convert it from the Public House to Pizza Port, which opened in July of 1997 so they were real close. And I always like to tell the story ‘cause I think it's very fascinating to me. I'd never stepped foot in Pizza Port before I got interviewed for the job. So I had no real perceived concept or notion of what exactly they did or what they didn't do. JD: Okay. And so you were an assistant brewer then? You weren't head brewer? TA: Yeah. Eddie Class, I think his last name was Classic. He was the head brewer at that time. And Vince was going to be the head brewer in Carlsbad when they opened. So yeah, Eddie was in charge of the brewery in Solana Beach and he was gonna go, I think I was going to have rotator cuff surgery and take about three months off. And then when he came back I was supposed to go take the job in Carlsbad. JD: Okay. but you, you obviously that didn't quite work out that way, but you were promoted to Director of Brewery Operations in June of 2005. TA: Yeah, that was a short stint ‘cause we were getting ready to open this place too. So yeah. JD: So you already knew you were going to be moving on? TA: We were having conversations at that point about how to get to here. We, I think in June it kind of was a collective. They terminated Kirk McHale, who was the brewer in Carlsbad in June of 2005 and then there was the San Clemente location, Carlsbad location, and Solana Beach. And I was asked to kind of tackle all three of them at the same time, make sure that they were more or less on the same page, collectively, kind of get them aligned. And then we also knew that we were having conversations about a new partnership and trying to build up the partnerships so that we could get this, this facility put into our orbit. JD: Okay. So that leads me into the founding Port Brewing in partnership with Vince and Gina. And you know, you have Port Brewing, you have Lost Abbey, you have the Hop Concept and I've also seen that you're involved in an Arizona brewery called Moto Sonora. So can you explain the structure of everything? TA: Yeah. When we started talking to Stone Brewing about buying this facility from them you know, my love of Belgian beers was pretty strong and I knew that we wanted to make some things out here that were very barrel aged, Belgian influenced and all that. And we had this, Vince had the idea for the brand called the Lost Abbey. So we were very, very keen on the fact that we knew that was going to happen. There were a lot of beers at Pizza Port that were being produced that needed to kind of stretch and grow and needed to get from get out from under just being a pub-based beer. And that allowed, you know, people who had been asking for more, you know, basically Pizza Port beer. And that's where the Port Brewing came from. So the Port Brewing beers, many of them when we opened our doors here came from Solana Beach recipes that I had produced, Hop 15, Santa’s Little Helper, Shark Attack. We brought the Wipe Out recipe over from Carlsbad and those beers had a lot of legacy towards the pubs and, and kind of, you know, grew them out of that realm. But we knew that there'd be the Port brand’s very West coast centric, you know, kind of that Ballast Point, Coronado, Green Flash, Stone kind of mentality. You know, higher hopping rates, you know, sometimes imperial, things like that. We always knew that that wasn't really that wasn't going to be our principal focus in the sense that we were going to have the two brands, but we also knew that having the two brands side by side allowed us to walk in and have a wide range of beers without having everything be a Lost Abbey beer or Port Brewing beer. JD: Okay. And then the Hop Concept is a fairly recent addition to the portfolio. TA: So a few years ago I walked into a bar and all the beer names on the wall really just confused me. There were so many new beers and I had no idea what they tasted like. And I didn't want to be a bother to the bartenders and try to, you know, ask them this or that. And I'm not an Untappd person. I don't really use digital media to tell me what I should be drinking. So, it kinda came back to we wanted to create a line of beers that were very fresh and simplistic in their makeup. So, the Hop Concept beers, we had a line called the Hop Freshener series and they were basically we had ‘Dank and Sticky’ and ‘Citrus and Piney and ‘Lemon and Grassy’ and ‘Tropical and Juicy’. And it was essentially taste and smell. And we, all we were trying to do was tell the consumer and the bartender, this is what you should expect the beer to taste like, or smell like. And it was a quick, straightforward deliverable and it was meant to be a, I use the word simple, but simple deliverable like you knew what you were getting. We were setting you up to understand how that beer should taste and behave. JD: Yeah, it does seem like naming beers because they do have to be registered names or whatever, becomes a bigger and bigger challenge. And in just looking at a name on the board, you frequently have no idea of what that beer really is. So, something like this where you're going back to the basics, this is what you're going to get. I think must be very attractive. TA: I thought so. I thought the cleanliness of it for us, which was just straightforward and nomenclature and deliverable, like this is this is what you can expect and... JD: Your label designs are very clean and very clear. Where Lost Abbey looks much more European, Medieval in a lot of ways. TA: And we went out and we went out and hired a firm for the first time to really, we told them this is what our vision is and this is why we're doing it this way, but we want you to make sure we produce this with a very crisp look to it. And they, they certainly executed that and I, and I think that's always been a strength of that brand. JD: Yeah. Let me ask you a little bit about the latest venture, Moto Sonora. I read that this was evidently your college roommate you are in partnerships with and his younger brother. And, of course, this is taking you back to Arizona. TA: It is. Tucson, not Flagstaff. I wish it was in Flagstaff, but I'm going to come to like Tucson cause it's closer. But yeah, my, it's kind of ironic because this was a random sort of thing back when, when I was in college with Jeff. Jeff really wasn't a big beer drinker but it turns out but his brother Jeremy really fell in love with craft beer and the two of them kind of decided that they have a high value for the city of Tucson. They loved that area. They've got deep roots in the community there. Their family, the DeConcini family's been a, been a big part of the Arizona scene and they just wanted to do this project. And I started talking to them as a consultant and just kind of saying, let me, let me hear what you're thinking. And then they said, well, maybe you could spend some more time on it. And I said, yeah, I've got the time to do that. TA: Let's, let's do this. So, I am coming in as one of the co-founders on that project. Port Brewing is not involved in the sense that we're not invested in it. JD: That was a question I had. TA: We're not, Port Brewing is not an investor in the company. Although I have permission with my partners to supply as many ingredients and things, you know, that we can, we can work to make sure that the beers there are at the highest, you know, sort of capacity. And if it means we're buying the hops and selling them hops and things like that, that's gonna happen. You know, I see it as potentially a training ground where if one of our brewers wants the position when we get going or they, you know, we want to move people out that way. But this is not anything more than a co-founding situation where I have the freedom to go tight, you know, take on other projects. I, I kind of liken it to chefs having multiple locations or bar owners having, you know, other projects and things. But I'm not moving to Tucson and I'm not going to be the head brewer there. I'm going to, you know, I'm going to establish what we're doing and push the company in the right direction and make sure that we become a really valuable part of that community. We've been definitely looking forward to the, just being involved in it and you know, a different beer scene at the same time. JD: Well, this kind of jumps over some of the questions I have because it leads into the amount of mentoring and work with newer brewers and the collaborations you do with the more established brewers. You are renowned in the industry for how people can come to you and pick your brain and you support and mentor in so many different ways. I see you as a one-person campaign to ensure craft beer success. And, and this is in comparison with efforts like Stone's True Craft where there were more financial assistance. Have you always been a remarkable mentor? It sounds kind of like, you know, you're, you're thinking to become a teacher. TA: Yeah. I think that's a big part of it, right? It's a, it's a sense of, you know, that shared piece. You know, I remember very, very early in my, in my Solana Beach days, I wanted to make a Saison-style beer and I needed to find somebody who could give me the answer for how much ginger I was supposed to put in the beer. Cause I wanted to make the beer with some ginger. And there weren't many places where I could turn to. And I picked up the phone one day and I called the owner of Left-Hand Brewing Company, his name was Dick Doore. And I said, Dick, you guys have this amazing Juju, ginger pale ale. I love it. Would you be willing to share that information with me? And he did. And he, you know, and we'd barely met. And it was one of those things that, okay, yeah, that's how the industry works. Right. And you know, this is something that I think Troy had put in my head back in the day was like, there are the right people to be talking to and then there's the wrong people. And the wrong people are the ones that don't freely exchange the information, or they don't, they don't try to push it uphill. And for the longest time we had so much work to do in this town to push the level uphill that we collectively had to talk about it. I mean, everybody I think that you would interview would have the similar sense of if we didn't all work together then we wouldn't have gotten to where we were. JD: Isn't that the principle behind the San Diego Brewers Guild? TA: Of course, you know, the very first Guild meeting was out at La Cruda. So yeah. Yes, for sure that the Guild, you know, I think we were the very first city in the country to have its own brewers guild. And that, that's kind of a, you know, a feather in the cap for what I think, you know, the old, the old guard or the people that really did, you know, hunker down back in the day was that there was a true sense that there was going to be something really good about the scene here. But we had to work really hard at it. So, I've always liked that conversational aspect of it. I believe that I can, I can ask the right questions with friends and people and, and if I can turn around and get that information back out, it makes sense. So yeah, why not? I mean, there's, there's very little, I guess I don't feel very competitive or threatened by it by that, you know, that dialogue or that sharing of information. JD: I think that's, I mean, I, I'm on certain, like the San Diego Plexus Facebook group and stuff, and your name comes up and everybody says, Tomme Arthur, he's the person to talk to. He is the god locally, you know, I mean, your name is always used in very positive way, which I think really speaks to the efforts that you have put into the community and supporting, especially newer brewers, but also working with other established brewers and not treating it as competition but treating it as we can all be better. TA: And I think the one thing that's kind of maddening these days, and this is, this is my personal soap box, is that there's a lot of people that are collaborating on things. And I'm, I'm very concerned about this new sense of collaborating because I don't know that it's doing much other than it's bringing people together. And then you say, well what did we change and what did we do? And I'm like, okay. But I think the collaborative narrative of old was we collaborated on something because it was going to be something demonstratively different than we could have done singularly. And I'm not sure that much of that's going on today. So, when we collaborate with an old guard or with someone new, we're, we're really trying to have a sense of purpose. And I hope that people continue to realize that just collaborating with someone for the sake of sales isn't always, I guess from where I come, from isn't always the best course of action. JD: Again, going to your mentoring, have you had the opportunity to open doors for specific groups? And I'm thinking women or minorities or people with disabilities, people, you know, because the standard concept of a brewer is a male, white guy, you know, I mean that just still is. It's not that way anymore. But have you had opportunities to work with or speak to groups to encourage them? TA: I was thinking about this the other day because you know, I look at our staff, it is generally mostly male. We have had a few female employees on the beer side in the past and they've been phenomenal employees. And I was thinking the other day that we haven't done enough in our world to cultivate that specifically. And I know the Brewers Association is pretty keen on promoting diversity and things these days. And I'm wondering as an educational mentor, et cetera, where I should be looking to do some of those things or how I get involved in that. You know, where, where can I be impactful in that, in that space. And I don't know if it's through the university or through, you know, there's a big Latino population up here in San Marcos and Vista. But clearly, you know, being white and being white isn't always the best thing. With respect to trying to, you know, we've got to find new, new people to energize and really enthuse about what we do. And preaching to the 40-year-old male white choir isn't, isn't the best place to live in. JD: Well, I don't know if you're aware of Border X (Brewing), which is of course down in Barrio Logan has, is sponsoring a women's beer club called Mujeres Brew Club. I'm sorry, I, my Spanish isn't that swell. And they invited me to be their first speaker and they're doing a meeting each month on a different aspect and at the end they are going to brew a beer at Border X. And the women that are in there, many of them don't know even beer styles. I mean, one woman evidently asked the question, what's an IPA? And so, you know, and it's, it's a safe space for women and it does have a large number of Latina women, which I think is phenomenal because maybe some of these will become brewers and there are women are working in the beer industry in San Diego who are also members. Some of them are speakers and some are just attending the meetings because they're always eager to learn more. So maybe reaching out to, or you know, helping sponsor a group like that or Pink Boots Society (international organization for women and non-binary people in the fermentation industry. The first chapter was founded in San Diego.) of course, you know, is always looking for speakers and educational opportunities and things. But you know, there's a growing presence, but it is hard to, when women are so scattered or you know, like you say it's underrepresented with the minorities or you know, and there are certain positions that probably someone with a physical disability couldn't perform in a brewhouse, what could they do? Can they be the quality control people, things like that. So, it seems like there are places that we need to increase. TA: Yeah. It's interesting because I was thinking about this again the other day. I was like, we just don't have that many women apply for jobs. It's, it's you know, I, you know, I have a, a fairly good amount of men working, you know males, working on the floor. But I can't remember the last time I saw an application come in for a brewing position from a woman. So somehow the outreach needs to get further than, you know, I'm talking entry-level packaging jobs, things like that. There's, there's clearly, you know, there's, it's not a bias in our world. They're just not coming and knocking down our door. So somehow we have to convince them that this isn't, this is a pretty good place where they could, you know, they can, they can find careers and homes. JD: Well, if you do want to advertise positions, I have a couple of resources. I can push things out to Pink Boots San Diego for one. And then there's another Facebook page of women interested in beer. Some are working in the industry ; some are maybe looking to get into the industry. And of course, maybe pushing the word out to the EngiBeering® program at Cal State San Marcos. ‘Cause there are, there's at least a couple of women enrolled in that program. But yeah, it's hard because there aren't many women available to bring in. But then, you know, we do have a, you know, a fairly strong Hispanic population in this area. So, you know, why can't we leverage that? And it's finding those points of contact. That's a, that's a continual problem that I have seen. Also, to kind of jump back, I mentioned Stone's True Craft effort, which, you know, obviously died. It was a great idea to help small, small breweries with financing to where they didn't have to sell themselves to big beer. What did you think of that idea when you thought, heard of it? TA: You know, I had a lot of friends that took meetings with them. I mean, at least on the surface I was told, you know, Hey, we've, we've gone and talked to them about it. I think the biggest challenge was, is that that was at a time when there was a lot of unrealistic expectations about valuations and what, what things were worth or how, how long term, you know, how companies would be out, people would work long term together. You know, it's an interesting model because this business is such a, almost a loner thing. Like most people open their own little brewery and then at some point you need more investment in that comes with a lot more triggers and kinds of parameters and stuff in some small breweries never outgrow the small, you know, model. They, I'm the single proprietor, not me. They are a single proprietor, ownership kind of environment and you know, they borrow money from the bank and that's what they get and that's what they want to be. You know, there's a very passionate pursuit for them. And then there's the big business side of it, which says if you're going to scale and grow and you know, buying equipment is not cheap and putting concrete in the ground and copper piping and just every single thing you could think of. JD: And the length time it takes to just deal with all the permitting within the city, within the state, with the ABC (California’s Alcoholic Beverage Control agency in charge of licensing alcohol production, distribution and sales.) TA: And the regulatory. Yeah. All of those pieces. So I applaud Greg for, and Steve, for putting the platform together. You know, the, I think the biggest hurdle for a lot of people is just how, how do you entrepreneurially sign up for something like that? Right? It's, it's, you know, it's a different, it's a different (unclear) in you. You're talking about an environment where you went from being in charge of your own facility to now having new investment that comes with different, again, different triggers and things. I think it's interesting cause nobody signed up to do it and I don't know if that was that the metrics didn't align or how that was. But I know a lot of people took meetings and so I guess the question is, is what, what was, what was unrealistic on both sides for, for that, how come it, how come they didn't get anybody to, to partner with? JD: Yeah. I'm, I don't know who took meetings, but it would be interesting to talk to them to ask them why they didn't pursue that, and did they find an alternative that worked better for them. So that's on my list of things to do. Since we've mentioned big beer, have you ever been approached by big beer with an offer to purchase you or to work with them in some sort of way? TA: No. In the 13 years that we've been open no one has put an offer sheet on the table and said, we want to buy you for XYZ dollars or otherwise. We have met with some family offices, venture people, people, you know, my thing is we'll take any meeting just to say hi. Mostly to learn about what people are looking for, what they're doing. But pretty emphatically we've never actually been offered, no one's ever actually offered to purchase us in, in a minority capacity and majority otherwise. So no. JD: Good. I won't ask you what your response would be, but do you think that maybe partly it's because, I don't want to say you do extreme beers, but you do less run-of-the-mill beers in many cases that might just be something that big beer would not find attractive. TA: If we live in a fringe world, we're, you know, we're sort of known as a super-premium producer and we have a lot of niches that we feel from barrels and sour. You know, they've, big breweries have a need in sometimes to do that, but they, they, I think they've found those elsewhere and they want scale and they want all kinds of things. You know, San Diego is an interesting model, right. We had Ballast Point sold, you know, Green Flash had sold and we've had a lot of big, bigger companies come through and, and, and have taken investments. And so I don't know if there was any real need beyond, I think big beer came and found what they needed from San Diego. I'd be surprised if, if there's any big beer-ness left in San Diego. I mean, I say that, and you know, we'll see. But you know, I, I don't, I don't really feel like that the big beer is kind of be knocking down the doors in San Diego anytime soon. JD: They got their toe in. TA: Potentially because of the desaturation and just some of the difficulties that they might experience. ah, it's a, it's a whole, it's a whole run of things and it really has to do with, you know, where can they, where can they scale and where can they find their return on their investment and things like that. JD: Yeah, no, that's what they're looking at is a bottom line. TA: It is 100% about how much can they make on what they're buying it. Yeah. JD: Because your beers are not run of the mill Coors-type beers, not to bash Coors, but just, you know, as an example, where did you get your early inspirations? I mean, you, you said you like the Belgians and you were exposed to a wide variety of European and, and what craft beer was made in the US. But things like oak aging and sour beers, were those things that you were exposed to early on or were those things that you found out later while you were experimenting? TA: Yeah, it was early. I remember, I remember my first Chimay Red. I remember my first Guinness and I vividly remember the very first Rodenbach I ever had. And I, you know, the Rodenbach I think hit me more than anything else in that really portend, you know, that really does explain why, you know, like, Oh my God, that's okay. I know there's weird beer out there, but this is way to the left, right? This thing is way, way downstream from anything I'd had at that point. You know, I was, when on the four years I was in college, I was sampling a lot of beers and then I continued to continue to buy beer. And, and it's just when you get one that's put in front of you and you say, wow, how did they do that? And that was kind of the, the aha that was the light bulb, I think was, was that first Rodenbach. That somebody who's living in a world where that, that's so to the extreme and delicious. But why can't, why can't I, why can't I think about beer like that? And that's, that definitely pushed me in that direction. JD: Well that's great to have such an open mind. Do you remember who, if anyone else was doing things like barrel aging and sour beers or anything when you started doing it? TA: Vinnie (Cilurzo, founded Blind Pig Brewing in Temecula, CA before moving to Northern California to found Russian River Brewing.) and I joke about this a lot cause Vinnie at Russian River and I are pretty good friends and a lot of it comes back to when we first picked up oak barrels and really got into that, you know, late 19, late 1990s, you know, the first batch of cuvée that we were making and they were making beer called Temptation. There was very little of that going on and I knew Belgian had (inaudible. in the market. But out West there weren't a lot of people making sour beer in barrels. And so we had to just kinda kick the can on how to do it. Talk collectively. Again, it got back to, we were not we did not, you know, you know, withhold the secrets. And we talked a lot about the what ifs and things and that I think was a big, big part of the success was just, okay, how are we going to do this in this environment? Because again, you couldn't open a book and read how to do it. Today you can open plenty of books. JD: Or just find it out there on the web. TA: I mean, you pick up the phone and call someone, but then back then it isn't, you know, how do you manage your barrel program or what do you, how do you do this? It was, well, I'm going to try, I'm going to try this. Okay. That sounds like that. That seems reasonable to me. JD: Oh, so you can't think of anybody specifically locally though? You, I mean, Vinnie, to me, is still local as they were nearby-- TA: For sure, it’s California. JD: but I'm thinking in San Diego. TA: You know, I don't know if we, I always say we, being Pizza Port. I don't know if we were the first ones to make intentionally sour beer in San Diego. I don't recall running into it anywhere at that point. But for the sake of clarity, I never say we were the first ones because I truly don't know. There was some oak aging going on the guys at Rock Bottom (Restaurant and Brewery) in La Jolla specifically ‘cause I got barrels from them. AleSmith (Brewing Company)I think was right about that same time, ‘97, ’98-ish where they were getting into having some bourbon barrel kind of things going on. JD: But that was Skip (Virgilio founded AleSmith Brewing and later sold to Peter and Vicky Zien.). TA: Skip doing that. There was not a lot of sour beer in California at that point. So, or even San Diego can that I can recall. JD: I’m glad sour beer’s around. Okay. You just mentioned cuvée. And I've seen it said that that is your favorite beer. TA: Perhaps. JD: Yeah. Perhaps. TA: It’s the only one that bears my name (Cuvée du Tomme). How's that? JD: That's true. That's true. On the other hand, is there a beer that you ever made that you didn't care for, but everybody else said, no, we've got to put this on tap. TA: Ooh, that's a damn good question. JD: Did they, did it actually sell well? TA: There is a running joke here at the brewery. We made a beer a few years ago called Spontaneous Cheer. And the Spontaneous Cheer was a peach sour and it was actually spontaneously fermented. So we, we've got some spontaneous fermentation barrels and things that we do from time to time and we have a large library of barrels. We have over a thousand oak barrels full of now and we made this batch of beer and it tasted pretty darn good. That being said, I struggled with it personally because it didn't really manifest our house culture. We have a very strong sour beer sense. Like there's a terroir in our world. You can taste the Lost Abbey beer and it's white grapey and it's stone peach fruit. And you can tell that there's something about the way that we blend in and package. And that beer had none of it, even though it was a peach beer. But that's because all of the cultures came from the spontaneous portion. And so, people were like, you have to release this beer. And I can't in good conscience release it because you could open it in a tasting room in Texas and you'd have no idea it came from us and what's the point of that? So that's probably the one in this environment that had garnered a lot of energy I would say, okay, that's not what I was, didn't hate the beer, just wasn't keen on it. Bearing the name Lost Abbey being sour and didn't, didn't exude us. JD: And so you have not brewed it again since. TA: No, we haven’t. Even though we likely could, and people would freak for it, but it doesn't, again, it gets really to the point of, you know, we're really trying to have that identity in a big sea of imitations. I would think that that was probably a one-and-done. I'd be surprised if it came back. JD: Okay, if I ever see an unopened bottle of it, I'll know that that's truly special. TA: So we never bottled it. That's the only bottle that I think, I mean it was, it was literally only one oak barrel, so 50 gallons. But I think we only bottled it. I had a friend who had a baby and there was a request, but I, there shouldn't, there shouldn't be any bottles of that out in the world. There are, they probably aren't real. JD: Yeah. Well, we'll know that they are shams. What was your very first award for brewing? TA: That's a good question. JD: You've had so many. TA: I know like, let's see. We had strong ale in 19... Well, okay. The very first award that I know for certain was the gold medal that I participated in at La Cruda. We won a gold medal (awarded at the Great American Beer Festival) for the Makanudo Porter, but that was not my beer and I was not the recipe generator. So I would say probably a beer that we brewed at Pizza Port and that was part of the Strong Ale Festival in ‘97 or ‘98. And then at that point we started entering the Real Ale Festival in Chicago or some California State Fair stuff. We did not win a GABF (Great American Beer Festival.) award until 1999, 2000. JD: Shame on them. TA: It took me a little while to figure out where our beers sort of fit in the competitive landscape. JD: The pantheon of beers. TA: So once I figured that part out, we got on a roll pretty, quickly. JD: That does seem to be a little bit of a challenge cause I'm a member of the Society of Barley Engineers when they talk about submitting for homebrew (competitions). Sometimes there are quite intense discussions about where a particular beer, that somebody’s having everybody sample, what category that fits into. And you do then deal with judges’ taste buds. Which, you know, it's a constantly moving landscape. TA: I’ve been a GABF judge since ‘99-ish. And that has afforded me an enormous amount of opportunities to watch the process, participate in it, and even potentially piss off brewers and people who maybe didn't, you know, like the way that it went. It's fascinating to watch the competition evolve at a table relative to the dialogue, the strength of the judges, the opinions of the judges. Even just the sheer age of the, the judging has come from, there were only this block of people that used to do it and now it's expanded and now the categories have morphed and they're different. And the, you know, we talk about it a lot because it's, it's interesting to see how difficult, first of all, there's so many more beers, but the sheer, the sheer perspective that people are operating under relative to, I've had these style beers or I've never been think about, okay, I'm supposed to judge a Kölsch-style beer, but I'm a judge and I've never been to Cologne and had the six beers from there that are the, that are the standards. Well, how do you judge that? Like that's, that's a, it's an interesting scenario because you're being asked to read this against what was written, how this is how a standard should taste. Yet. You've never been in situ and had that environmental condition. JD: Right, with that terroir and all everything else, all those factors that work into it. TA: 100 percent. I do agree with you that there's, one of the things about entering competitively is that there's so many different places beers can fit and sometimes it's really environmentally like time and place. Sometimes the beer exudes more oak and sometimes it doesn’t, and it wants to be in an oak category, but it can't cause it has brett (industry jargon for Brettanomyces, a fungi used to sour beer.) We did a sampling a couple months ago back in early July and I think we went through 20 different beers for GABF trying to get down to the five that we wanted to send. And in order to do that we had to kind of pick the beers. We'd, you know, we brought out all the beers that we thought were really well done and then we had to go say, well that would fit here, wouldn't fit here, but it probably fits best here, but we don't want to send that beer there because we already have another one that wants to go there. So, you don't wanna compete against yourself either? JD: Now are you limited to five beers for competition? TA: Of late? They've been in the four to five range. Okay. A few years ago, you could send up to eight and prior to that it was kind of unlimited. But when it went from eight to five it got a lot harder. JD: Yeah. But it just seems like, I mean you can see what thousands of entries that seems like and yeah-- TA: I think there's over 8,000 beers that'll be judged. But we always say this, it's like if, if back when we were going to sending eight beers, I don't know if we make eight world-class beers every fall. Right? So how many are really well done and how many of them are like, you know, that far up the channel. I think we make eight great beers but are they going to sit at the table and really, really compete. But I think when you have eight versus four, your odds are better. But perhaps being in categories that some, some years are strong, and some years are weak, is, is where it kind of comes from. JD: Yeah. But you're also trying to be selective. I'm sure there are people that “I'll send as many beers as I can to increase my odds of winning an award.” Because of course the GABF awards still mean a lot. TA: Yeah. There was a year, I know this to be true, where at least one or two breweries that don't need to be, and they're not from San Diego, sent somewhere between 30 to 50 beers. And didn't win an award. And these are pretty good breweries. So, you know, you're talking about the shotgun approach. You hit the side of the barn. But it was pretty interesting to see that they didn't win. You know, the years of late where we haven't, we haven't managed to win an award. You know, we look up and we talked to the guys and we say, you know, look at the breweries that didn't win. Like, you know, these are, these are still some, you know, solid, solid producers and congratulations to the ones that did. But yeah, there's no guarantee anymore. I mean, winning one is a pretty dang good achievement. JD: Yeah. Well then in some cases, like just recently, what happens to the beer while is being transported? It could completely knock a perfectly good beer that left here out of any consideration because what happens to it or it doesn't even get there. TA: Yeah. So we've tried to mitigate that as best we can. Where the consolidation point and we have been for a long time that helps with refrigeration and, you know, just really making sure that the beer is better taken care of, competitive, you know, competitive judging or, you know, competitive brewing. I would say this is far different than it was 10, 15 years ago. JD: I guess for good and for bad both. But back to your awards, is there any award that you have one that is the most meaningful to you? Not to discount the other awards. TA: Sure, I think two really come to mind. The, we've been lucky to win a (GABF) Brewery of the Year award four different times. And I'm, I'm personally, I really want to get to five. I want to have that. I want to have that, that last one on the, you know, in that, you know, if I, if they gave out rings, I want to have the handful. The last time we won was 2007, so it's been a long time. And we may never get that opportunity again. I think the one that I won last year, which was the Russell Schehrer Award for Innovation and Craft Brewing, that that's you know, that's a hall of fame landscape kind of thing. And it just speaks to the community involvement and the, you know, being, being a participant in this, you know, only 22 people have won it at that point. And I, I, yeah, the legacy award, you know, something like that. I mean, I, I still love, I love the GABF and World Beer (Cup) Awards, a couple of awards cause they're, you know, they're purely blind. They're your peers. They show your team that they're, you know, they're making the right decisions. But the Russell award was probably the one that was singular in the sense that that was, you know, personally with my name on it. Where it's almost every other award that we've had that we've been lucky enough to garner comes with somebody else, you know, participating in doing work in that regard. JD: Yeah. Okay. Well, very good. So, we're just about at the end of all my questions, from your experience, is there anything in the way of advice or a lesson you've learned or anything else that you think either can't be said enough or you haven't ever had the opportunity to say? TA: You know, I think that we were talking yesterday, it's kind of interesting. We were talking about how difficult this business has become and there's a lot of noise and chatter and 50 years from now when someone's looking at this, they'll say, wow it's not as easy as it used to be. And I don't know where the fall line's going to be. We're going to get to 10,000 breweries in this country. I don't doubt that that'll happen. And I don't know where, where the relevancy will be. I don't know what it will look like. I feel pretty strongly that in the time that I've been lucky enough to be in this business, a lot of what's made us successful has come from a very strong sense of this is the beer I want to produce. And nowadays there seems to be a lot of, you have to just do what the consumer is saying they want. And tons of breweries I think are kind of losing their way, respectful of an identity. And I don't know if the artist in me can, can sort of reconcile that for the long haul. I think there's this sense that if, if that's the way the industry is going, you know, is that what I signed up for? Part of me wants to see the consumerism shift and I, I talk about this a lot, but it's kind of like when you throw the boomerang out, it comes back a little slower than it went out and maybe the boomerang is coming back. You know, that there's just too much ubiquity right now. But maybe not. Maybe with 10,000 brewers, you just, there is ubiquity and that's just part of the nature of it. But you know, I think the success that I've had, you know, in this business has been built on beers that, that, that have something that look and tastes like things that I've, you know, imagined and there's been a lot of success for that. But I don't know how you continue to do that when there's 10,000 imitators and people trying to, trying to find the same sort of, you know, sense of their worth. So for me, I think the biggest thing moving forward is just where, where do we all fit in? It's just dense stuff. JD: Giving everybody a chance to attain their dream. But yeah, you know. TA: Yeah. I think that we're going to see, I think in the next two years we're going to see a lot of dreams getting crushed because it's getting, it's getting even harder today than it was probably a year ago. But there might be a light at the end of the tunnel in the sense that, you know, there's been a lot of distributor consolidation. There's been a lot of breweries, what they say, you know, rightsizing or trying to figure this all out. But it's a business. It's gonna eat people alive, you know? And, and that's what businesses do, right? There's, there is this, there's, there's a success rate attributed to craft beer that's not as high. I mean, it's higher than most consumer goods, and there will probably be a little bit more reckoning that will come along with it because you just can't, you just can't all swim in the same ocean. It just doesn't work. And so we're going to find some sense of corrective correlations. I mean, we're going to find smaller, you know, people are going to be making less beer for the next few years and if you're actively making more beer, you're one of the very few people that's, that's winning in that, in that space. JD: It does seem like we had a real bump up in numbers of breweries that opened in 2016-2017 which is being that this is 2019, we're looking at entering the fourth and fifth year of leases for a lot of the breweries. And I think that might be a time where people are going to have to sit down and assess. TA: Sure. I mean, if you've got a five-year lease and you're about to come into that fourth year, you're in the fourth year and you're now triggering the, am I going to renew? Right. I haven't, I haven't been taking a paycheck or I've been taking very little. And then at some point you're like, are we, is this a real thing? You know, I don't, I don't know. You know, people, people certainly I think come into it, you know, really, you know, eager and excited about it. And then little by little you're, you're grinding and there's a lot of grinding going on right now, which is okay, but you know, there's, but grinding isn't fun. JD: No. And when people come into it with a passion, which is a term you used earlier, passion cannot sustain you forever, unfortunately. I mean, it's what maybe gets you up the next morning, but at some point it's not paying the bills and you have managed to raise a family, you know, other people, you know, that they've got investors that may or may not understand the actual brewing industry and cause and effect and impacts. And, you know, yeah, it's going to be real interesting to see what happens. TA: Yeah. I've been pretty lucky. My partnership here hasn't had an unrealistic expectation of financial return. And, and you know, so, you know, we, we opened our doors, we borrowed some money, we repaid the money, and then we've basically reinvested all of that money into the company when we needed to. So we are not sitting here saying okay, you're, you know, you were relying on us for a dividend. And you know, that doesn't, it doesn't work like that. But the, the business of beer is very difficult. And you know, you, you talked about that word passion. We, when we opened our doors, I published this list of the 10 commandments of our brewery and one of the 10 commandments was that you, you know, passion isn't something you can buy at the corner store. And I meant that with a sense of like, if you come into this, you know, you can't just throw that term around. Like you've got to live it and breathe it. And I think that that kind of what you were speaking to earlier is, is, has always been like, I think there's a lot of people that will say, I am very passionate about what I do. And I have been, and that's, you know, over the 20 plus years I've been doing this. That's that, that is a word that I would associate with, with getting out of bed every day. And it's been very, it's been very conducive to being successful. That being said, you don't have to be overly passionate, but you have to be, you still have to be passionate about getting out of bed every day, even when you're struggling, even when you're not killing it. And I can guarantee you right now, there's a lot of people when they're getting out of bed who used to kill it and were, you know, who thought they were going to kill it and are saying to themselves, man, this is, this is real. Like, and you know, how do you, how do you put your game face on and, and, and really keep, keep grinding and to tackle the, you know, look, we want to get to the other side. JD: Yeah. Yeah. And you don't want to be a long face when your consumers come in because they're going to say, Hey, I came in here for a beer and a good time. TA: I am here. I am here for a good time. Right. Any happy people? JD: Oh dear. Oh dear. Something that just came to me, which is not on the list of questions, but we are sitting in the space that Stone originated at. And you had just mentioned that you've expanded. Talk a little bit about the physical plant. What was it like when you moved in as Lost Abbey? What did you have to do to it and how many times have you expanded? TA: All right. So, when we took over in January of 2006 and Stone moved out to the facility in Escondido, they controlled at that point about 30,000 square feet of I think the building is 85,000 square feet. So, they had about a third of it. And when they moved out, we collapsed the entire building back down to their original suite, suite 104, and that suite is 7,500 square feet. So, we started with a 30-barrel brewhouse in 19, I'm sorry, in 2006. And we had 30, 7,500 square feet, including the tasting room, cold box, and our barrel warehouse. In 2009, I believe we moved across the parking lot and took over another 10,000 square feet and moved the cold box, all the barrels and our distribution. So, for awhile we had that space. We were up to about 17,000 square feet. 2012 or so we took over this suite that we're sitting in here, which was another 7,500 square feet. So that allowed us to build our packaging hall, this office, the lab, things like that. We rolled for the next few years, for the next five years. We had that 27,000 square feet of space. And then we added we added a second, third, fourth warehouse across the parking lot. And that took us to almost 40,000 square feet. And then last January we moved out of that distribution warehouse into another building here, which is now connected from the front of the street to the back. Behind us. We control 40,000 square feet under one roof line for the first time. And we moved out of the facility across the parking lot, all of our barrels and everything. So we now are under one building, one roof line. We can't drive from the packaging hall to the rest of the building. But every other building we can drive forklifts through. And that never happened. Two years ago, we owned four (forklifts) ‘cause we had four different buildings. JD: Now does Port distribute all the beers here in San Marcos? TA: Everything comes out of this facility. We are doing a batch or two a year out of the Pizza Port facility when we need to, but we don't, it's this, this facility can handle a lot more beer than we're currently making. So most, most everything that has the word Port Brewing, Lost Abbey, or Hop Concept on it has come out of San Marcos. It's only been this year that we've brewed two or three batches of beer down the street at Pizza Port. And most of that was for efficiency to do big runs of things that we could, we did a giant Hop Freshener, Hop Concept release at Costco and needed to have beer all at the same time. JD: So are you, in Costcos outside of California as well? TA: No, and that has been something we haven't really tackled or looked at. JD: Like it would be just an overwhelming amount of production yet I think... TA: Costco's pretty, pretty keen on a lot of local these days, at least for beer. So, I don't know how relevant we would, you know, we might be able to get into some in Arizona, maybe in Washington and Northern California, but you know, there's a ton of breweries in each of those locations. Tapping the same buyer on the shoulder saying, can I get, can I get in here? And, and the buyers probably got enough options that they don't even need something from out of here. And frankly, the cost associated with getting it to them would almost make it prohibitive in terms of trying to put it on the shelf at their right price point. JD: Yeah. Have you ever had to turn down any kind of requests because you just knew that trying to fill that big an order was going to just break you? TA: No, we've, we've been pretty lucky in the sense that when we do get we just came off of couple of pretty good-sized Costco orders and they were about 40 pallets worth of beer. But the brewery can handle that without being too burdened in the sense. I mean, it's certainly a lot of attention on one thing but we're not overly stretched at our capacity right now. So, when those things pop up, we certainly snap at them and want, you know we wanna make sure we execute on it. If we were making a lot more beer, we probably would have, we would struggle with that a little more. But when you get an order for 40 pallets of beer, you figure it out, you know, you really do. JD: When we walked back here, we passed one of your employees building a bike. What other sorts of things do you do with the employees or for the employees to support maybe their self-education, other interests that they have, things like that. TA: We've definitely put it on our radar this year. We've lost a lot of employees in the last two years. I think we've turned over 20 employees and we only have about 50 total. So, we've put an emphasis on that level of communication, you know, what can we do to assist you in this endeavor? It's not something that we've programmed in the past or been terribly good at. That being said, we haven't, we have really seen that there are some simple opportunities to do things like that and Tim's running his own small bike shop and it's just a, you know, it's a pocket, pocketed space here at the brewery. You know, we've announced that if there's other brewer or other brewery employees from the tasting room all the way up that have an idea, we would love to hear about it. We don't make a dime on it. There's no, there's no real emphasis towards, you know, trying to co-partner on things. It's just we, we want to, we want to foster the opportunities if it makes sense. And Tim's the pilot sort of program right now with the bike, the little bike shop that he's running and it gets interesting, I hope. I hope it sparks other employees to say, okay, cool, I've wanted to do this, that or the other and it looks like I could and come to us and say, ‘Oh, could you carve out this space again?’ We are, we are under more, more efficient space right now and we do have a little bit of room. So, I hope that, I hope somebody else says, okay, I want to do this and it, and it fits the needs and the use and isn't a big deal. It'd be great because it means that we can, we can continue to lift what they want to be a part of and retain them at some time. JD: Yeah. Very good. It was fun. Oh, okay. Well, I think that pretty much has run through my list plus of questions for you about your career, your history, and what's going on with Lost Abbey/Port Brewing. And I want to thank you for that. And I'm going to go ahead and turn this off. https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en audio Property rights reside with the university. 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The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=ArthurTomme_DownieJudith_2019-08-08.xml ArthurTomme_DownieJudith_2019-08-08.xml https://archivesearch.csusm.edu/repositories/3/resources/19 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Arthur, Tomme. Interview August 8, 2019 Description An account of the resource Tomme Arthur has been involved in several San Diego breweries, most notably as founder and managing owner of Lost Abbey Brewing located in San Marcos, CA. His first professional brewing position was at the short-lived Cervecería La Cruda in San Diego, California. Arthur moved to Pizza Port Brewing in Solana Beach, California as an assistant brewer. After becoming Director of Brewing Operations for the increasing number of locations, he led the chain in garnering numerous beer awards. Arthur opened Lost Abbey Brewing in 2006 to focus on his interest in Belgian-style beers. In late 2023, Arthur separated Lost Abbey from Port Brewing operations in a ‘right-sizing’ plan in response to beer industry trends. Port Brewing retained the Hop Concept, Tiny Bubbles, and Kharisma brands in their portfolio and took over the San Marcos production space and closed the tasting room. Lost Abbey entered an alternating proprietorship agreement with Mother Earth Brewing to share their production space in nearby Vista, CA. In his 2019 interview, Arthur discusses his introduction to craft beer and home brewing; entry into the profession and work at various breweries beginning in the 1990s; founding Lost Abbey Brewing and other brewery ventures; mentoring individuals in the industry; and awards. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC027-044 Subject The topic of the resource Brewers -- California -- San Diego County Brewing industry -- California -- History Lost Abbey Brewing (San Marcos, Calif.) Microbreweries -- California -- San Diego County Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-08-08 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Tomme Arthur Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Judith Downie Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Marcos (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. California State University San Marcos Brewchive(r) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/226612c0577f663c67ab24dd321c55c1.pdf cd7aae43e52969e82eec74a15793f4d1 PDF Text Text TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 Biographical Note: Throughout his career Tomme Arthur has gained a reputation in the industry for his focus on Belgianstyle ales, national awards, and mentorship of newer brewers. He is a frequent presenter at various brewing conferences. Tomme Arthur has been involved in several San Diego breweries, most notably as founder and managing owner of Lost Abbey Brewing located in San Marcos, CA. His first professional brewing position was at the short-lived Cervecería La Cruda in San Diego, CA founded by Troy Hojel. Arthur moved to Pizza Port Brewing in Solana Beach, California as an assistant brewer. After becoming Director of Brewing Operations for the increasing number of locations, he led the chain in garnering numerous beer awards. He opened Lost Abbey Brewing in 2006 to focus on his interest in Belgian-style beers. Lost Abbey remained in a partnership with Pizza Port under the Port Brewing umbrella. The Lost Abbey opened in the original location for Stone Brewing, vacated when Stone moved to Escondido, CA. The brewhouse underwent an extensive expansion in 2019 to accommodate the additional beverage brands Hop Concept, Tiny Bubbles and Kharisma. Lost Abbey expansion included tasting rooms The Confessional in Cardiff, CA, The Sanctuary in the San Elijio Hills neighborhood of San Marcos, CA, and The Church in downtown San Diego, CA. In late 2023, Arthur separated Lost Abbey from Port Brewing operations in a ‘right-sizing’ plan in response to beer industry trends. Port Brewing retained the Hop Concept, Tiny Bubbles, and Kharisma brands in their portfolio and took over the San Marcos production space and closed the tasting room. Lost Abbey entered an alternating proprietorship agreement with Mother Earth Brewing to share their production space in nearby Vista, CA. Mother Earth had closed a tasting room at this location when they moved the bulk of brewing operations to Idaho. Arthur announced plans to renovate and re-open the tasting room space. Judith Downie: 00:00:00 So today is August 8th, 2019 and this is Judith Downie, the Curator of the CSUSM Brewchive® with Tomme Arthur, founder and co-owner of Lost Abbey, the Hop Concept, Port Brewing, and myriad other projects that we're going to be asking about. So tell me, the purpose of this is to kind of record in one place things I've seen in a lot of places. You know, you've been very generous with your time with people mentoring and interviewing. And so this is for the Brewchive®, basically an overall history of your life experiences as a brewer, thoughts, things like that. So, we do have a list of questions here, which again I'll read them off, I may reword them a little bit and you are open to responding to them however you need. And I hope we have plenty of time that you've talked about things that maybe nobody's ever asked you. Tomme Arthur: 00:00:59 That would be fun. Yeah. JD: 00:01:01 So record these things for posterity. So, let's start with your background. To be clear, from what I've seen, you started home Transcribed by Judith Downie 1 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 brewing in Arizona while you were in college and how did that start? TA: 00:01:16 So I am a native San Diegan. My family's three to four generations on both sides. Went to Saint Augustine High School. When I was in high school, I decided that I really liked the English language and I wanted to study English and felt that teaching was a path that I would probably take. JD: 00:01:30 Okay. TA: 00:01:31 And so I fell in love with Flagstaff as a campus and community. And the school at Northern Arizona University had a really good education teaching program. So that's how I ended up in Flagstaff. When I got to school, I met a family, last name is Gardner and, and their son, Tom. And I became very close and the Gardner family really was into beer and they were sort of my mentors to beer. TA: 00:02:00 And they said, you know, we're going to teach you about better beer. And of course, I was only 18 at the time, but you know, I wasn't gonna say no. And they kind of pushed me in this direction of here's what better beer looks like, tastes like. American beer, imported beer, Canadian, very English, you know, all the, all the different countries where a great beer would have come from. A lot of it at that time was imported of course. JD: 00:2:22 Right. Because really, you know, we're talking what the... TA: 00:2:26 1991 and 95 was when I was in school. JD: 00:2:27 Okay. So there really wasn't much of a craft beer scene in Arizona I don't think. TA: 00:2:31 There were very few craft breweries in Arizona. In fact, there were no craft breweries in Flagstaff at the time. We ended up having three open up in my last year of school. But there were no craft breweries in Flagstaff and at that time. There was likely to be 10 or 15 probably in the entire state. But we've got a lot of regional beers. There was a lot of beer from Oregon, Washington, Northern California, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado beer. So there was some American craft. But mostly from very older players, you know, Sierra Nevada Anchor, Deschutes <Brewery>, big, bigger breweries. Transcribed by Judith Downie 2 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 JD: 00:03:08 And being that the craft beer scene in San Diego was still pretty young in that time period. Do you remember seeing anything from San Diego? TA: 00:03:16 No. In fact we, we actually talk about this a lot, that prior to Stone Brewing coming into San Diego, nobody actually sent beer outside of San Diego. Karl Strauss <Brewing> had beer in San Diego at the time and packaged in bottles. But they, I don't believe much of their beer, if any, was leaving the San Diego area. So my understanding is that it really wasn't until Stone opened their doors and shipped beer to Arizona, likely maybe Nevada, you need to ask them, where they crossed the state line and perhaps were one of the original new craft breweries to actually make beer to leave San Diego. JD: 00:03:51 Which is really interesting because I have in my pre-Prohibition research on San Diego craft brewing found Mission Brewing. They were brewing beer to supplement San Diego Consolidated Brewing, which is San Diego Brewing Company <today>. They were San Diego Consolidated Brewing for a while and Arizona passed Prohibition in 1914, five years before National Prohibition and halted any shipment of even Hopski, which was a near beer Mission was brewing, into the state. They weren't even allowing that. And there was a big lawsuit and Mission Brewing lost and that was the contributing factor to the closure of Mission through that. TA: 00:04:28 They actually lost out on a nonalcoholic or near beer. JD: 00:04:31 Yeah. Hopski, and they didn't continue to brew that because J. H. Zitt, who was the president, the current owner of San Diego Consolidated Brewing had said ‘I will never brew anything but real beer.’ So he's the one who decided to close Mission. Because he actually owned it at the time because his father-inlaw and brother-in-law, who had founded Mission, had walked away. TA: 00:04:58 Yeah, the old San Diego stuff is really interesting. JD: 00:05:00 Yeah, and it's a, it's an interesting kind of parallel between you being in Arizona and starting your interest in beer there and then coming back to San Diego. Transcribed by Judith Downie 3 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 JD: 00:05:12 But I've also seen that you've noted that your favorite beers are Belgian style. What? TA: 00:05:16 I just find them to be very unique and I think that there's, there's a pretty, I guess when I first got started in brewing in my sort of craft foundation, they were the most unique things out there. And that, that today is not necessarily the case. There's so many new producers and people that have really taken the boundaries and, and stretched them and moved them in directions. I think ostensibly under a Belgian influence or sort of what amounts to be a Belgian artistry, but there's a lot more to it these days. And I just think that if you, if you become imaginative about beer, you have to look at what the Belgians did or were doing at that time. Technique wise, yeast wise flavors, just process things. Very unconventional via what, what would amount to be a very conventional sort of brewing, you know, take four malts or take four ingredients. You can, you used a lot of water and hops and that's beer. And then you look at what they do. And it's completely different. JD: 00:06:10 So you think the Belgians weren't constrained by the purity law that the Germans had and that's part of what led to their inventiveness? TA: 00:06:17 Yeah, I just feel like they as a group embraced different methodologies and, and that sometimes weren't easy. And those methods at least preserved flavors that couldn't be found in beer, again, conventional beer. JD: 00:06:33 Okay. Very interesting. So, onto your actual brewing experiences. You started home brewing? I read it was a homebrew kit... TA: 00:06:44 So the Gardner’s bought me a home brew kit early for my graduation. So, I was gifted it in January of 1995 and that's when we started homebrewing. JD: 00:06:50 Okay. And you didn't like the first beer you brewed? TA: 00:06:52 The first beer we brewed, it was a black style, you know, sort of a dry Irish Guinness-style stout, but it came out very thin and didn't taste like Guinness or anything. So it wasn't, it was not a good beer. But you know, I think the expectations were high and probably should have set the bar a little lower. JD: 00:07:08 Was this extract or all grain? Transcribed by Judith Downie 4 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 TA: 00:07:09 It was extract for sure. JD: 00:07:12 Yeah. Because of course supplies even in the 90s, were still kind of hard to come by. TA: 00:07:15 Yeah, we were pretty lucky there was a homebrewer outpost in Flagstaff, so there was a store that sold ingredients that we could've, we could've started in an all-grain basis. But I was living in a house with four people and it just wasn't really, I didn't have the resources to go build a full all grain brewing system, with the plastic fermenters and you know, boiling on the stove top kind of stuff was definitely where it was at. JD: 00:07:40 Yeah, you got to start somewhere. So, then you came back to San Diego. Was that, what was the reason for coming leaving Arizona? TA: 00:07:47 So I graduated in June or May of 1995. JD: 00:07:50 So was this your bachelor's or your teaching credential? TA: 00:07:52 This was my bachelors of arts in just English. And at that point I didn't really want to stay in Flagstaff and I wasn't gonna attend grad school there. So, I moved back home and so I left. And when I got home I kind of kicked around a little bit trying to figure out what I was going to do and really didn't have a plan necessarily I was able to go back and live with my parents. And you know, the only requirement was that I find a job. So, I found a job and that's kinda how I got in the downtown life. My dad had a printing business when I was growing up, so I was very, very well trained and I worked in the campus print shop when I was in school. So, I applied for a printing job in a downtown San Diego business and I was commuting, taking the trolley from La Mesa down into downtown San Diego every day. And I happened to be reading want ads, just, it was all that was left in the newspaper at that point. And stumbled upon a brew pub opening that had an ad in the paper for cooks, dishers, all that stuff in it said assistant brewer and I circled it. And I walked over the next day at lunch and applied for a job. And that was actually Cervecería La Cruda. JD: 00:09:00 Right, with Troy Hojel? So, you actually opened Cervecería La Cruda in September of ‘96? TA: 00:09:10 No, they, they would have opened, I think it would've been March of 96 ‘cause we ended up, we attended the great Transcribed by Judith Downie 5 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 American beer festival in September, October of 96 and then it closed. It was less than a full year. I think I was hired in April, May-ish. and then I wasn't there even for a full year. JD: 00:09:27 Yeah. I have, I have March ‘97 is when it closed. TA: 00:09:31 So I think it probably was mid April-ish I would've been hired in. We didn't even make it a full year. JD: 00:09:39 Yeah. This is the kind of thing I like because I have a very large Excel spreadsheet of every brewery from 1868 which was Chollas Valley Brewery through today. Whether they opened or closed, it never made it, pulled the license, whatever... TA: 00:09:55 So, how many different breweries have attempted to open? Are we in the three hundreds or? JD: 00:09:58 Well, my Excel spreadsheet also includes all the individual tasting rooms because generally they pull a separate ABC license. I'm up over 550 getting close to 600 I think, but I could certainly get back to you with how many tried and never even actually opened. I think there's a real object lesson there. TA: 00:10:18 I think the most interesting thing is that we operate that there's 160 or whatever right now that are active, but it's really interesting to know kind of how many have kind of opened and closed and opened and closed and where you know, you can say, okay, since prohibition we've had 208 that have tried or participated in this, in this scene. JD: 00:10:37 Yeah, because I break the whole history into three parts. There was a pre-Prohibition 1868 to 1919, 1919/1920 then 1933 to 1953 because Aztec, which had sold to Altes Brewing, closed and they were the last brewery operating post-Prohibition and then we didn't pick up again until the <19>80s so I can extract that information and get it to you because those numbers are always very powerful. TA: 00:11:05 Yeah. I just feel like it'd be interesting to say since Prohibition, there's been 208 licenses that were issued or over, you know, JD: 00:11:12 And then there were others that announced a name or announced that they were going to open and never even got around to pulling a license. You know, so I have, I have every single possible name of any business that ever said ‘we are going to be a brewery or a brew pub, or...’ Transcribed by Judith Downie 6 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 TA: 00:11:28 No one ever drops on in front of you and you say, haven't heard of it. JD: 00:11:30 Well actually not too long ago, I ran across one called the Royal Duffer. And that evidently they were contract brewing. They were in Carlsbad and they were like four golf buddies. And so they had beer for, again, I think it was less than a year. And I haven't been able to find out too much information from them, but I'm very alert to, ‘Oh, I don't think I've ever heard of that name before’ so this is the first one I've not heard of in a long time. So I think I'm pretty comprehensive. But yeah. Yeah, it's been interesting and a lot of work. But going back to Troy, is Troy still around? TA: 00:12:10 He is in somewhere in Colorado outside of Denver. In fact, I just talked to him the other day. He texted me, I think his cousin opened a brewery in Texas and he had a question or two. TA: 00:12:20 So yeah. He's in Colorado and doing the software. JD: 00:12:23 Okay. So he's no longer in the brewing business. TA: 00:12:25 No, actually he left the brewery business and ended up doing software in Northern California for a bit, I think, and then moved off to Colorado. JD: 00:12:33 Well, it's gotta be sad to watch your dream die especially so quickly. TA: 00:12:35 You know, it was a pretty aggressive life lesson, you know? It taught me a lot in the short time that we were into it. I still think that Troy is one of the best brewers I've ever met. And it would've been a really cool thing to see it succeed at, but certainly would've put me on a different life path, I think if it had. So I don't, I don't try not to, you know, revisionist history, that part of it. But the beers that he made and he was a very technical brewer, I think, I think it would've been, it would've added to the scene even more. JD: 00:13:05 Yeah. What actually happened? Was it just lack of sales? TA: 00:13:09 I think more than anything it was a bad, is a bad business model. I don't know if you know the story of Baja Brewing Company. JD: Transcribed by Judith Downie 00:13:17 I'm familiar with the name, but not really the story. 7 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 TA: 00:13:20 So Baja Brewing Company opened up and they claimed to be the very first Mexican-themed brewpub in the United States. Now it was their claim to fame. But what happened is that the partners at Baja Brewing and the partners at La Cruda actually had a schism and they split. They were going to open the Baja Brewing Company together or something along those lines and they had a falling out and the partnership dissolved. And so these guys opened Baja Brewing Company and less than three or four months later Cervecería La Cruda opened up three blocks away. So the very first Mexican theme brewpub in this country opened up and three blocks later and three months and three blocks over the second one opened. So, very underfunded from the get-go. Very, it was a 13,000 square foot building at Forth and Island, you know, big, big building. Too much of it to just for the time I, I'd be nervous opening a 13,000 square foot building brewpub today. And you know, back when the Gaslamp was kind of still new and trendy and hot, I don't know what the rent was, but just overall a bad, a bad vision I think for what was going on. JD: 00:14:31 Ahead of its time. Really. TA: 00:14:32 Yeah. And the thing that's kind of crazy is that Cervecería La Cruda to them is a hangover brewery. So when you say ‘tengo la cruda’, that means I have the crud, I'm not feeling well. That's not a real great way to tell people you want to come here and drink. They opened up with a menu that they had sourced from the family that owned El Callejon in Encinitas. So, they had this really great, I would say deep, deep Mexican Sonoran source, you know, for and things. But that wasn't on anyone's radar with respect to craft brew at the time. So, good people, great, great opportunity. But not even something, that I think today, even if you attempted to tackle it, would probably work really well. JD: 00:15:12 So as you say, a real experience. TA: 00:15:14 Yeah, a lot I learned from, you look around and you see simplicity sometimes wins. JD: 00:15:20 Or slow growth. Planned slower. TA: 00:15:22 Or have more money than you think. Yeah. Transcribed by Judith Downie 8 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 JD: 00:15:27 Somebody said to me one time something like, you need five times more than you think you do. And I would, I think that's true with any business really. But the expense of equipment and materials and everything and you just can't do it all yourself. TA: 00:15:40 No. You gotta be able to weather a lot of storms. JD: 00:15:44 And you know, with this, I know in September of 2016 I went to the craft beer conference up in Sacramento and I saw you speak there and you at that time, this is three years ago now, said that San Diego was already over-saturated, and you would not open up a brewery at this point in San Diego. And how many breweries have we had open up? TA: 00:16:06 Continues to be a head-scratching thing. Yeah. Well, we joke, I mean, we're here in San Marcos now. I've got three breweries within a one-mile stretch. Right. So yeah, that's just the way it is. Yeah. JD: 00:16:21 But you're each different. Accommodating everybody at some point. But so when La Cruda closed, you moved to White Labs for just a couple of months in yeast sales. Was that based because you knew about yeast? TA: 00:16:34 So White Labs had just kinda gotten their feet wet. So I remember the very first day when I was at La Cruda, one of the very first days I was at La Cruda. Chris White1 walked in on a sales call. And so we were chatting and talking and at some point, and this is a part of my history that I don't remember all of that clearly, but I ended up moving in with them. I mean I was a roommate and I think there was a crossover point where I was working at La Cruda, but I already moved into their house. Cause he and Lisa had an empty room. I needed a place to stay. And then when La Cruda was on its way to be closing it became kind of obvious that I could help them in their infancy of their company with some just R and D and just different trialing and things like that. TA: 00:17:15 You know, I had met a lot of brewers in Arizona at that time. So Chris said, well, why don't you come help me just kind of knock down some doors and you know, we just need somebody that can walk in and kind of talk about this in a very brewer friendly kind of way. So my goal was I was kind of like an ambassador really. You know, I didn't really do a lot of pure sales but my job was to talk about it and explain how my experience with 1 Chris White is the founder of White Labs. Transcribed by Judith Downie 9 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 different yeasts and temperatures and things like that. So it was kind of just yeah, I think it was more of a product, product knowledge and ambassador at that point. JD: 00:17:47 Was there any conversation at that time about opening up a tasting room for yeast labs? TA: 00:17:51 No. No. I mean, maybe Chris had it, but it you know, that was a pretty, it was a long time ago and there wasn't really a sense of yeast as a business outside of the yeast business. I don't think there was sort of that auxiliary layer to it. I'm sure Chris would have liked to have had a bunch of beers on tap, but I, I would imagine if he had had that thought back then that they would have probably just wanted 10 beers on tap for their customers to come sample them, but not necessarily not, not really treat it as an educational function for the consumer as much as an educational experience for a brewer who maybe hadn't worked a certain use and things like that. I mean there's just an enormous amount of yeasts that have been banked since we started. Since I got my first job in 1996 there's been an enormous amount of new yeast that had been added. So, they need an avenue to show people what those yeasts do. JD: 00:18:41 And back then too, you probably had a lot of brewers, even professional brewers, would be how I see it. That didn't really understand a lot about the hops that were available. The yeast that was available, you know, cause a lot of them had, were coming out of the homebrew experience and you know, all of a sudden here's more stuff you need to know. TA: 00:19:02 If you go back and look at it ‘95, ‘96 to, so that time, I mean we're talking about a dial up modem, you know, we're talking about low internet speed, we're talking about not... JD: 00:19:08 A lot of people, not even having computers or knowing how to use it. TA: 00:19:12 Not even a lot of Information online. Frankly. I mean you couldn't, you could not do all the kind of information that's out there today. And, and past that, a lot of the information that did exist in book format was highly technical through the ASBC2 and the big brewers. And then what was available that had been written about the sort of homebrew level and medium brewery. There wasn't a lot of medium brewery stuff in there, so you American Society of Brewing Chemists. Transcribed by Judith Downie 2 10 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 were getting a lot of books on how to brew ales, but they had this really big English, you know, sort of basis to them. Cask condition, real ale ingredients weren't American in their basis. So there was no ability to look up and say, Oh, how do I use this German hefeweizen yeast? You know, how do I, how much do I pitch it, what temperature, how does it behave? And none of that information existed. JD: 00:19:59 So a lot of technical stuff. TA: 00:20:00 Yeah. even just simplistic technical. What's the right temperature? JD: 00:20:03 And around here San Diego was still something of a Coors town that's San Diego was test market for a couple of different, for Coors Light and for Herman Joseph's 1868 and you know, so really do you have much of a market for... TA: 00:20:18 In fact, we joked about it here. This was the best, I think this was the best-selling Coors light town when I took in, when I got into brewing, this was the number one Coors Light in the country. JD: 00:02:26 Yes, it was. TA: 00:02:28 Well that explains to you, you know, where we're, where we were and where we came from. And on top of that you had all the import beers too, right? You still had Coronas and Pacifico and the Modelos in the world doing very well here at that time too. So yeah, it was a, it was a long ways to the top. JD: 00:20:42 So you weren't at White Labs for very long before you were hired by Pizza Port. Pizza Port just had the one location then, right? TA: 00:20:48 They had the one location in Solana Beach. Vincent, Gina3 had been partners in the Carlsbad Public House with a guy named Brett. I think his last name was Stamp. JD: 00:21:00 Tetley Ridden4, I, it's a hyphenated name. TA: 00:21:07 Yeah. And then he became a, they, they had a falling out with Carlsbad Public House and they were in, they were in the 3 4 Vincent and Gina Marsaglia Redmayne-Titley Transcribed by Judith Downie 11 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 process of converting the Public House, which is the Pizza Port in Carlsbad in the village into the Pizza Port at that time. So I was, I was brought into assist on Solana Beach because the head brewer was going to go have shoulder surgery and then they were supposed to move me up to Carlsbad to take over the production of the brewing and Carlsbad once, once he came back. So there was almost a second Pizza Port in line at that time. So they were, they were in the home stretch of the construction to convert it from the Public House to Pizza Port, which opened in July of 1997 so they were real close. And I always like to tell the story ‘cause I think it's very fascinating to me. I'd never stepped foot in Pizza Port before I got interviewed for the job. So I had no real perceived concept or notion of what exactly they did or what they didn't do. JD: 00:22:02 Okay. And so you were an assistant brewer then? You weren't head brewer? TA: 00:22:10 Yeah. Eddie Class, I think his last name was Classic. He was the head brewer at that time. And Vince was going to be the head brewer in Carlsbad when they opened. So yeah, Eddie was in charge of the brewery in Solana Beach and he was gonna go, I think I was going to have rotator cuff surgery and take about three months off. And then when he came back I was supposed to go take the job in Carlsbad. JD: 00:22:30 Okay. but you, you obviously that didn't quite work out that way, but you were promoted to Director of Brewery Operations in June of 2005. TA: 00:22:38 Yeah, that was a short stint ‘cause we were getting ready to open this place too. So yeah. JD: 00:22:43 So you already knew you were going to be moving on? TA: 00:22:46 We were having conversations at that point about how to get to here. We, I think in June it kind of was a collective. They terminated Kirk McHale, who was the brewer in Carlsbad in June of 2005 and then there was the San Clemente location, Carlsbad location, and Solana Beach. And I was asked to kind of tackle all three of them at the same time, make sure that they were more or less on the same page, collectively, kind of get them aligned. And then we also knew that we were having conversations about a new partnership and trying to build up the partnerships so that we could get this, this facility put into our orbit. Transcribed by Judith Downie 12 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 JD: 00:23:24 Okay. So that leads me into the founding Port Brewing in partnership with Vince and Gina. And you know, you have Port Brewing, you have Lost Abbey, you have the Hop Concept and I've also seen that you're involved in an Arizona brewery called Moto Sonora. So can you explain the structure of everything? TA: 00:23:49 Yeah. When we started talking to Stone Brewing about buying this facility from them you know, my love of Belgian beers was pretty strong and I knew that we wanted to make some things out here that were very barrel aged, Belgian influenced and all that. And we had this, Vince had the idea for the brand called the Lost Abbey. So we were very, very keen on the fact that we knew that was going to happen. There were a lot of beers at Pizza Port that were being produced that needed to kind of stretch and grow and needed to get from get out from under just being a pub-based beer. And that allowed, you know, people who had been asking for more, you know, basically Pizza Port beer. And that's where the Port Brewing came from. So the Port Brewing beers, many of them when we opened our doors here came from Solana Beach recipes that I had produced, Hop 15, Santa’s Little Helper, Shark Attack. We brought the Wipe Out recipe over from Carlsbad and those beers had a lot of legacy towards the pubs and, and kind of, you know, grew them out of that realm. But we knew that there'd be the Port brand’s very West coast centric, you know, kind of that Ballast Point, Coronado, Green Flash, Stone kind of mentality. You know, higher hopping rates, you know, sometimes imperial, things like that. We always knew that that wasn't really that wasn't going to be our principal focus in the sense that we were going to have the two brands, but we also knew that having the two brands side by side allowed us to walk in and have a wide range of beers without having everything be a Lost Abbey beer or Port Brewing beer. JD: 00:25:15 Okay. And then the Hop Concept is a fairly recent addition to the portfolio. TA: 00:25:20 So a few years ago I walked into a bar and all the beer names on the wall really just confused me. There were so many new beers and I had no idea what they tasted like. And I didn't want to be a bother to the bartenders and try to, you know, ask them this or that. And I'm not an Untappd person. I don't really use digital media to tell me what I should be drinking. So, it kinda came back to we wanted to create a line of beers that were very fresh Transcribed by Judith Downie 13 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 and simplistic in their makeup. So, the Hop Concept beers, we had a line called the Hop Freshener series and they were basically we had ‘Dank and Sticky’ and ‘Citrus and Piney and ‘Lemon and Grassy’ and ‘Tropical and Juicy’. And it was essentially taste and smell. And we, all we were trying to do was tell the consumer and the bartender, this is what you should expect the beer to taste like, or smell like. And it was a quick, straightforward deliverable and it was meant to be a, I use the word simple, but simple deliverable like you knew what you were getting. We were setting you up to understand how that beer should taste and behave. JD: 00:26:16 Yeah, it does seem like naming beers because they do have to be registered names or whatever, becomes a bigger and bigger challenge. And in just looking at a name on the board, you frequently have no idea of what that beer really is. So, something like this where you're going back to the basics, this is what you're going to get. I think must be very attractive. TA: 00:26:36 I thought the cleanliness of it for us, which was just straightforward and nomenclature and deliverable TA: 00:26:44 Like this is this is what you can expect and... JD: 00:26:47 Your label designs are very clean and very clear. Where Lost Abbey looks much more European, Medieval in a lot of ways. TA: 00:26:55 And we went out and we went out and hired a firm for the first time to really, we told them this is what our vision is and this is why we're doing it this way, but we want you to make sure we produce this with a very crisp look to it. And they, they certainly executed that and I, and I think that's always been a strength of that brand. JD: 00:27:13 Yeah. Let me ask you a little bit about the latest venture, Moto Sonora. I read that this was evidently your college roommate you are in partnerships with and his younger brother. And, of course, this is taking you back to Arizona. TA: 00:27:30 It is. Tucson, not Flagstaff. I wish it was in Flagstaff, but I'm going to come to like Tucson cause it's closer. But yeah, my, it's kind of ironic because this was a random sort of thing back when, when I was in college with Jeff. Jeff really wasn't a big beer drinker but it turns out but his brother Jeremy really fell in love with craft beer and the two of them kind of decided that Transcribed by Judith Downie 14 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 they have a high value for the city of Tucson. They loved that area. They've got deep roots in the community there. Their family, the DeConcini family's been a, been a big part of the Arizona scene and they just wanted to do this project. And I started talking to them as a consultant and just kind of saying, let me, let me hear what you're thinking. And then they said, well, maybe you could spend some more time on it. And I said, yeah, I've got the time to do that. TA: 00:28:18 Let's, let's do this. So, I am coming in as one of the co-founders on that project. Port Brewing is not involved in the sense that we're not invested in it. JD: 00:28:26 That was a question I had. TA: 00:20:28 We're not, Port Brewing is not an investor in the company. Although I have permission with my partners to supply as many ingredients and things, you know, that we can, we can work to make sure that the beers there are at the highest, you know, sort of capacity. And if it means we're buying the hops and selling them hops and things like that, that's gonna happen. You know, I see it as potentially a training ground where if one of our brewers wants the position when we get going or they, you know, we want to move people out that way. But this is not anything more than a co-founding situation where I have the freedom to go tight, you know, take on other projects. I, I kind of liken it to chefs having multiple locations or bar owners having, you know, other projects and things. But I'm not moving to Tucson and I'm not going to be the head brewer there. I'm going to, you know, I'm going to establish what we're doing and push the company in the right direction and make sure that we become a really valuable part of that community. We've been definitely looking forward to the, just being involved in it and you know, a different beer scene at the same time. JD: 00:29:24 Well, this kind of jumps over some of the questions I have because it leads into the amount of mentoring and work with newer brewers and the collaborations you do with the more established brewers. You are renowned in the industry for how people can come to you and pick your brain and you support and mentor in so many different ways. I see you as a oneperson campaign to ensure craft beer success. And, and this is in comparison with efforts like Stone's True Craft where there were more financial assistance. Have you always been a remarkable mentor? It sounds kind of like, you know, you're, you're thinking to become a teacher. Transcribed by Judith Downie 15 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 TA: 00:30:05 Yeah. I think that's a big part of it, right? It's a, it's a sense of, you know, that shared piece. You know, I remember very, very early in my, in my Solana Beach days, I wanted to make a Saison-style beer and I needed to find somebody who could give me the answer for how much ginger I was supposed to put in the beer. Cause I wanted to make the beer with some ginger. And there weren't many places where I could turn to. And I picked up the phone one day and I called the owner of LeftHand Brewing Company, his name was Dick Doore. And I said, Dick, you guys have this amazing Juju, ginger pale ale. I love it. Would you be willing to share that information with me? And he did. And he, you know, and we'd barely met. And it was one of those things that, okay, yeah, that's how the industry works. Right. And you know, this is something that I think Troy had put in my head back in the day was like, there are the right people to be talking to and then there's the wrong people. And the wrong people are the ones that don't freely exchange the information, or they don't, they don't try to push it uphill. And for the longest time we had so much work to do in this town to push the level uphill that we collectively had to talk about it. I mean, everybody I think that you would interview would have the similar sense of if we didn't all work together then we wouldn't have gotten to where we were. JD: 00:31:18 Isn't that the principle behind the San Diego Brewers Guild? TA: 00:31:21 Of course, you know, the very first Guild meeting was out at La Cruda. So yeah. Yes, for sure that the Guild, you know, I think we were the very first city in the country to have its own brewers guild. TA: 00:31:31 And that, that's kind of a, you know, a feather in the cap for what I think, you know, the old, the old guard or the people that really did, you know, hunker down back in the day was that there was a true sense that there was going to be something really good about the scene here. But we had to work really hard at it. So, I've always liked that conversational aspect of it. I believe that I can, I can ask the right questions with friends and people and, and if I can turn around and get that information back out, it makes sense. So yeah, why not? I mean, there's, there's very little, I guess I don't feel very competitive or threatened by it by that, you know, that dialogue or that sharing of information. Transcribed by Judith Downie 16 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 JD: 00:32:05 I think that's, I mean, I, I'm on certain, like the San Diego Plexus Facebook group and stuff, and your name comes up and everybody says, Tomme Arthur, he's the person to talk to. He is the god locally, you know, I mean, your name is always used in very positive way, which I think really speaks to the efforts that you have put into the community and supporting, especially newer brewers, but also working with other established brewers and not treating it as competition but treating it as we can all be better. TA: 00:32:34 And I think the one thing that's kind of maddening these days, and this is, this is my personal soap box] is that there's a lot of TA: 00:32:39 People that are collaborating on things. And I'm, I'm very concerned about this new sense of collaborating because I don't know that it's doing much other than it's bringing people together. And then you say, well what did we change and what did we do? And I'm like, okay. But I think the collaborative narrative of old was we collaborated on something because it was going to be something demonstratively different than we could have done singularly. And I'm not sure that much of that's going on today. So, when we collaborate with an old guard or with someone new, we're, we're really trying to have a sense of purpose. And I hope that people continue to realize that just collaborating with someone for the sake of sales isn't always, I guess from where I come, from isn't always the best course of action. JD: 00:33:25 Again, going to your mentoring, have you had the opportunity to open doors for specific groups? And I'm thinking women or minorities or people with disabilities, people, you know, because the standard concept of a brewer is a male, white guy, you know, I mean that just still is. It's not that way anymore. But have you had opportunities to work with or speak to groups to encourage them? TA: 00:33:51 I was thinking about this the other day because you know, I look at our staff, it is generally mostly male. We have had a few female employees on the beer side in the past and they've been phenomenal employees. And I was thinking the other day that we haven't done enough in our world to cultivate that specifically. And I know the Brewers Association is pretty keen on promoting diversity and things these days. And I'm wondering as an educational mentor, et cetera, where I should be looking to do some of those things or how I get involved in that. You know, where, where can I be impactful in that, in that space. And I don't know if it's through the university or through, 17 2024-01-04 Transcribed by Judith Downie �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 you know, there's a big Latino population up here in San Marcos and Vista. But clearly, you know, being white and being white isn't always the best thing. With respect to trying to, you know, we've got to find new, new people to energize and really enthuse about what we do. And preaching to the 40-year-old male white choir isn't, isn't the best place to live in. JD: 00:34:47 Well, I don't know if you're aware of Border X <Brewing>, which is of course down in Barrio Logan has, is sponsoring a women's beer club called Mujeres Brew Club. I'm sorry, I, my Spanish isn't that swell. And they invited me to be their first speaker and they're doing a meeting each month on a different aspect and at the end they are going to brew a beer at Border X. And the women that are in there, many of them don't know even beer styles. I mean, one woman evidently asked the question, what's an IPA? And so, you know, and it's, it's a safe space for women and it does have a large number of Latina women, which I think is phenomenal because maybe some of these will become brewers and there are women are working in the beer industry in San Diego who are also members. JD: 00:35:40 Some of them are speakers and some are just attending the meetings because they're always eager to learn more. So maybe reaching out to, or you know, helping sponsor a group like that or Pink Boots Society5 of course, you know, is always looking for speakers and educational opportunities and things. But you know, there's a growing presence, but it is hard to, when women are so scattered or you know, like you say it's underrepresented with the minorities or you know, and there are certain positions that probably someone with a physical disability couldn't perform in a brewhouse, what could they do? Can they be the quality control people, things like that. So, it seems like there are places that we need to increase. TA: 00:36:24 Yeah. It's interesting because I was thinking about this again the other day. I was like, we just don't have that many women apply for jobs. It's, it's you know, I, you know, I have a, a fairly good amount of men working, you know males, working on the floor. But I can't remember the last time I saw an application come in for a brewing position from a woman. So somehow the outreach needs to get further than, you know, I'm talking entrylevel packaging jobs, things like that. There's, there's clearly, you know, there's, it's not a bias in our world. They're just not International organization for women and non-binary people in the fermentation industry. The first chapter was founded in San Diego. 5 Transcribed by Judith Downie 18 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 coming and knocking down our door. So somehow we have to convince them that this isn't, this is a pretty good place where they could, you know, they can, they can find careers and homes. JD: 00:37:04 Well, if you do want to advertise positions, I have a couple of resources. I can push things out to Pink Boots San Diego for one. And then there's another Facebook page of women interested in beer. Some are working in the industry; some are maybe looking to get into the industry. And of course, maybe pushing the word out to the EngiBeering® program at Cal State San Marcos. ‘Cause there are, there's at least a couple of women enrolled in that program. But yeah, it's hard because there aren't many women available to bring in. But then, you know, we do have a, you know, a fairly strong Hispanic population in this area. So, you know, why can't we leverage that? And it's finding those points of contact. That's a, that's a continual problem that I have seen. Also, to kind of jump back, I mentioned Stone's True Craft effort, which, you know, obviously died. It was a great idea to help small, small breweries with financing to where they didn't have to sell themselves to big beer. What did you think of that idea when you thought, heard of it? TA: 00:38:01 You know, I had a lot of friends that took meetings with them. I mean, at least on the surface I was told, you know, Hey, we've, we've gone and talked to them about it. I think the biggest challenge was, is that that was at a time when there was a lot of unrealistic expectations about valuations and what, what things were worth or how, how long term, you know, how companies would be out, people would work long term together. You know, it's an interesting model because this business is such a, almost a loner thing. Like most people open their own little brewery and then at some point you need more investment in that comes with a lot more triggers and kinds of parameters and stuff in some small breweries never outgrow the small, you know, model. They, I'm the single proprietor, not me. They are a single proprietor, ownership kind of environment and you know, they borrow money from the bank and that's what they get and that's what they want to be. You know, there's a very passionate pursuit for them. And then there's the big business side of it, which says if you're going to scale and grow and you know, buying equipment is not cheap and putting concrete in the ground and copper piping and just every single thing you could think of. Transcribed by Judith Downie 19 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 JD: 00:39:07 And the length time it takes to just deal with all the permitting within the city, within the state, with the ABC6. TA: 00:39:11 And the regulatory. Yeah. All of those pieces. So I applaud Greg for, and Steve, for putting the platform together. You know, the, I think the biggest hurdle for a lot of people is just how, how do you entrepreneurially sign up for something like that? Right? It's, it's, you know, it's a different, it's a different <unclear> in you. You're talking about an environment where you went from being in charge of your own facility to now having new investment that comes with different, again, different triggers and things. I think it's interesting cause nobody signed up to do it and I don't know if that was that the metrics didn't align or how that was. But I know a lot of people took meetings and so I guess the question is, is what, what was, what was unrealistic on both sides for, for that, how come it, how come they didn't get anybody to, to partner with? JD: 00:40:01 Yeah. I'm, I don't know who took meetings, but it would be interesting to talk to them to ask them why they didn't pursue that, and did they find an alternative that worked better for them. So that's on my list of things to do. Since we've mentioned big beer, have you ever been approached by big beer with an offer to purchase you or to work with them in some sort of way? TA: 00:40:25 No. In the 13 years that we've been open no one has put an offer sheet on the table and said, we want to buy you for XYZ dollars or otherwise. We have met with some family offices, venture people, people, you know, my thing is we'll take any meeting just to say hi. Mostly to learn about what people are looking for, what they're doing. But pretty emphatically we've never actually been offered, no one's ever actually offered to purchase us in, in a minority capacity and majority otherwise. So no. JD: 00:41:02 Good. I won't ask you what your response would be, but do you think that maybe partly it's because, I don't want to say you do extreme beers, but you do less run-of-the-mill beers in many cases that might just be something that big beer would not find attractive. TA: 00:41:23 If we live in a fringe world, we're, you know, we're sort of known as a super-premium producer and we have a lot of 6 California’s Alcoholic Beverage Control agency in charge of licensing alcohol production, distribution and sales. Transcribed by Judith Downie 20 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 niches that we feel from barrels and sour. You know, they've, big breweries have a need in sometimes to do that, but they, they, I think they've found those elsewhere and they want scale and they want all kinds of things. You know, San Diego is an interesting model, right. We had Ballast Point sold, you know, Green Flash had sold and we've had a lot of big, bigger companies come through and, and, and have taken investments. And so TA: 00:41:57 I don't know if there was any real need beyond, I think big beer came and found what they needed from San Diego. I'd be surprised if, if there's any big beer-ness left in San Diego. I mean, I say that, and you know, we'll see. But you know, I, I don't, I don't really feel like TA: 00:42:13 That the big beer is kind of be knocking down the doors in San Diego anytime soon. JD: 00:42:16 They got their toe in. TA: 00:42:18 Potentially because of the desaturation and just some of the difficulties that they might experience. ah, it's a, it's a whole, it's a whole run of things and it really has to do with, you know, where can they, where can they scale and where can they find their return on their investment and things like that. JD: 00:42:32 Yeah, no, that's what they're looking at is a bottom line. TA: 00:42:35 It is 100% about how much can they make on what they're buying it. Yeah. JD: 00:42:41 Because your beers are not run of the mill Coors-type beers, not to bash Coors, but just, you know, as an example, where did you get your early inspirations? I mean, you, you said you like the Belgians and you were exposed to a wide variety of European and, and what craft beer was made in the US. But things like oak aging and sour beers, were those things that you were exposed to early on or were those things that you found out later while you were experimenting? TA: 00:43:10 Yeah, it was early. I remember, I remember my first Chimay Red. I remember my first Guinness and I vividly remember the very first Rodenbach I ever had. And I, you know, the Rodenbach I think hit me more than anything else in that really portend, you know, that really does explain why, you know, like, Oh my God, that's okay. I know there's weird beer out there, Transcribed by Judith Downie 21 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 but this is way to the left, right? This thing is way, way downstream from anything I'd had at that point. You know, I was, when on the four years I was in college, I was sampling a lot of beers and then I continued to continue to buy beer. And, and it's just when you get one that's put in front of you and you say, wow, how did they do that? And that was kind of the, the aha that was the light bulb, I think was, was that first Rodenbach. That somebody who's living in a world where that, that's so to the extreme and delicious. But why can't, why can't I, why can't I think about beer like that? And that's, that definitely pushed me in that direction. JD: 00:44:06 Well that's great to have such an open mind. Do you remember who, if anyone else was doing things like barrel aging and sour beers or anything when you started doing it? TA: 00:44:17 Vinnie7 <Cilurzo> and I joke about this a lot cause Vinnie at Russian River and I are pretty good friends and a lot of it comes back to when we first picked up oak barrels and really got into that, you know, late 19, late 1990s, you know, the first batch of cuvée that we were making and they were making beer called Temptation. There was very little of that going on and I knew Belgian had <inaudible. in the market. But out West there weren't a lot of people making sour beer in barrels. And so we had to just kinda kick the can on how to do it. Talk collectively. Again, it got back to, we were not we did not, you know, you know, withhold the secrets. And we talked a lot about the what ifs and things and that I think was a big, big part of the success was just, okay, how are we going to do this in this environment? Because again, you couldn't open a book and read how to do it. Today you can open plenty of books. JD: 00:45:06 Or just find it out there on the web. TA: 00:45:10 I mean, you pick up the phone and call someone, but then back then it isn't, you know, how do you manage your barrel program or what do you, how do you do this? It was, well, I'm going to try, I'm going to try this. Okay. That sounds like that. That seems reasonable to me. Vinnie Cilurzo founded Blind Pig Brewing in Temecula, CA before moving to Northern California to found Russian River Brewing. 7 Transcribed by Judith Downie 22 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 JD: 00:45:22 Oh, so you can't think of anybody specifically locally though? You, I mean, Vinnie, to me, is still local as they were nearby, TA: 00:45:30 For sure, it’s California. JD: 00:45:32 but I'm thinking in San Diego. TA: 00:45:34 You know, I don't know if we, I always say we, being Pizza Port. I don't know if we were the first ones to make intentionally sour beer in San Diego. I don't recall running into it anywhere at that point. But for the sake of clarity, I never say we were the first ones because I truly don't know. There was some oak aging going on the guys at Rock Bottom <Restaurant and Brewery> in La Jolla specifically ‘cause I got barrels from them. AleSmith <Brewing Company>I think was right about that same time, ‘97, ’98-ish where they were getting into having some bourbon barrel kind of things going on. JD: 00:46:06 But that was Skip <Virgilio>8. TA: 00:46:07 Skip doing that. There was not a lot of sour beer in California at that point. So, or even San Diego can that I can recall. JD: 00:46:17 I’m glad sour beer’s around. Okay. You just mentioned cuvée. And I've seen it said that that is your favorite beer. TA: 00:46:26 Perhaps. JD: 00:46:27 Yeah. Perhaps. TA: 00:46:28 It’s the only one that bears my name 9. How's that? JD: 00:46:30 That's true. That's true. On the other hand, is there a beer that you ever made that you didn't care for, but everybody else said, no, we've got to put this on tap. TA: 00:46:43 Ooh, that's a damn good question. JD: 00:46:45 Did they, did it actually sell well? TA: 00:46:48 There is a running joke here at the brewery. We made a beer a few years ago called Spontaneous Cheer. And the Spontaneous 8 9 Skip Virgilio founded AleSmith Brewing and later sold to Peter and Vicky Zien. Cuvée du Tomme. Transcribed by Judith Downie 23 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 Cheer was a peach sour and it was actually spontaneously fermented. So we, we've got some spontaneous fermentation barrels and things that we do from time to time and we have a large library of barrels. We have over a thousand oak barrels full of now and we made this batch of beer and it tasted pretty darn good. That being said, I struggled with it personally because it didn't really manifest our house culture. We have a very strong sour beer sense. Like there's a terroir in our world. You can taste the Lost Abbey beer and it's white grapey and it's stone peach fruit. And you can tell that there's something about the way that we blend in and package. And that beer had none of it, even though it was a peach beer. But that's because all of the cultures came from the spontaneous portion. And so, people were like, you have to release this beer. And I can't in good conscience release it because you could open it in a tasting room in Texas and you'd have no idea it came from us and what's the point of that? So that's probably the one in this environment that had garnered a lot of energy I would say, okay, that's not what I was, didn't hate the beer, just wasn't keen on it. Bearing the name Lost Abbey being sour and didn't, didn't exude us. JD: 00:48:15 And so you have not brewed it again since. TA: 00:48:18 No, we haven’t. Even though we likely could, and people would freak for it, but it doesn't, again, it gets really to the point of, you know, we're really trying to have that identity in a big sea of imitations. I would think that that was probably a one-anddone. I'd be surprised if it came back. JD: 00:48:35 Okay, if I ever see an unopened bottle of it, I'll know that that's truly special. TA: 00:48:39 So we never bottled it. That's the only bottle that I think, I mean it was, it was literally only one oak barrel, so 50 gallons. But I think we only bottled it. I had a friend who had a baby and there was a request, but I, there shouldn't, there shouldn't be any bottles of that out in the world. There are, they probably aren't real. JD: 00:48:55 Yeah. Well, we'll know that they are shams. What was your very first award for brewing? TA: 00:49:04 That's a good question. JD: Transcribed by Judith Downie 00:49:08 You've had so many. 24 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 TA: 00:49:09 I know like, let's see. We had strong ale in 19... Well, okay. The very first award that I know for certain was the gold medal that I participated in at La Cruda. We won a gold medal10 for the Makanudo Porter, but that was not my beer and I was not the recipe generator. So I would say probably a beer that we brewed at Pizza Port and that was part of the Strong Ale Festival in ‘97 or ‘98. And then at that point we started entering the Real Ale Festival in Chicago or some California State Fair stuff. We did not win a GABF11 award until 1999, 2000. JD: 00:49:44 Shame on them. TA: 00:49:46 It took me a little while to figure out where our beers sort of fit in the competitive landscape, JD: 00:49:52 The pantheon of beers. TA: 00:49:53 So once I figured that part out, we got on a roll pretty, quickly. JD: 00:49:57 That does seem to be a little bit of a challenge cause I'm a member of the Society of Barley Engineers when they talk about submitting for homebrew <competitions>. Sometimes there are quite intense discussions about where a particular beer, that somebody’s having everybody sample, what category that fits into. And you do then deal with judges’ taste buds. Which, you know, it's a constantly moving landscape. TA: 00:50:17 I’ve been a GABF judge since ‘99-ish. And that has afforded me an enormous amount of opportunities to watch the process, participate in it, and even potentially piss off brewers and people who maybe didn't, you know, like the way that it went. It's fascinating to watch the competition evolve at a table relative to the dialogue, the strength of the judges, the opinions of the judges. Even just the sheer age of the, the judging has come from, there were only this block of people that used to do it and now it's expanded and now the categories have morphed and they're different. And the, you know, we talk about it a lot because it's, it's interesting to see how difficult, first of all, there's so many more beers, but the sheer, the sheer perspective that people are operating under relative to, I've had these style beers or I've never been think about, okay, I'm 10 11 Awarded at the Great American Beer Festival. Great American Beer Festival. Transcribed by Judith Downie 25 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 supposed to judge a Kölsch-style beer, but I'm a judge and I've never been to Cologne and had the six beers from there that are the, that are the standards. Well, how do you judge that? Like that's, that's a, it's an interesting scenario because you're being asked to read this against what was written, how this is how a standard should taste. Yet. You've never been in situ and had that environmental condition. JD: 00:51:41 Right, with that terroir and all everything else, all those factors that work into it. TA: 00:51:45 100 percent. I do agree with you that there's, one of the things about entering competitively is that there's so many different places beers can fit and sometimes it's really environmentally like time and place. Sometimes the beer exudes more oak and sometimes it doesn’t, and it wants to be in an oak category, but it can't cause it has brett12. We did a sampling a couple months ago back in early July and I think we went through 20 different beers for GABF trying to get down to the five that we wanted to send. And in order to do that we had to kind of pick the beers. We'd, you know, we brought out all the beers that we thought were really well done and then we had to go say, well that would fit here, wouldn't fit here, but it probably fits best here, but we don't want to send that beer there because we already have another one that wants to go there. So, you don't wanna compete against yourself either? JD: 00:52:35 Now are you limited to five beers for competition? TA: 00:52:39 Of late? They've been in the four to five range. Okay. A few years ago, you could send up to eight and prior to that it was kind of unlimited. But when it went from eight to five it got a lot harder. JD: 00:52:48 Yeah. But it just seems like, I mean you can see what thousands of entries that seems like and yeah, TA: 00:52:56 I think there's over 8,000 beers that'll be judged. But we always say this, it's like if, if back when we were going to sending eight beers, I don't know if we make eight world-class beers every fall. Right? So how many are really well done and how many of them are like, you know, that far up the channel. I think we 12 Industry jargon for Brettanomyces, a fungi used to sour beer. Transcribed by Judith Downie 26 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 make eight great beers but are they going to sit at the table and really, really compete. But I think when you have eight versus four, your odds are better. But perhaps being in categories that some, some years are strong, and some years are weak, is, is where it kind of comes from. JD: 00:53:29 Yeah. But you're also trying to be selective. I'm sure there are people that “I'll send as many beers as I can to increase my odds of winning an award.” Because of course the GABF awards still mean a lot. TA: 00:53:41 Yeah. There was a year, I know this to be true, where at least one or two breweries that don't need to be, and they're not from San Diego, sent somewhere between 30 to 50 beers. And didn't win an award. And these are pretty good breweries. So, you know, you're talking about the shotgun approach. You hit the side of the barn. But it was pretty interesting to see that they didn't win. You know, the years of late where we haven't, we haven't managed to win an award. You know, we look up and we talked to the guys and we say, you know, look at the breweries that didn't win. Like, you know, these are, these are still some, you know, solid, solid producers and congratulations to the ones that did. But yeah, there's no guarantee anymore. I mean, winning one is a pretty dang good achievement. JD: 00:54:24 Yeah. Well then in some cases, like just recently, what happens to the beer while is being transported? It could completely knock a perfectly good beer that left here out of any consideration because what happens to it or it doesn't even get there. TA: 00:54:39 Yeah. So we've tried to mitigate that as best we can. Where the consolidation point and we have been for a long time that helps with refrigeration and, you know, just really making sure that the beer is better taken care of, competitive, you know, competitive judging or, you know, competitive brewing. I would say this is far different than it was 10, 15 years ago. JD: 00:55:00 I guess for good and for bad both. But back to your awards, is there any award that you have one that is the most meaningful to you? Not to discount the other awards. TA: 00:55:12 Sure, I think two really come to mind. The, we've been lucky to win a <GABF> Brewery of the Year award four different times. And I'm, I'm personally, I really want to get to five. I want to have that. I want to have that, that last one on the, you know, in Transcribed by Judith Downie 27 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 that, you know, if I, if they gave out rings, I want to have the handful. The last time we won was 2007, so it's been a long time. And we may never get that opportunity again. I think the one that I won last year, which was the Russell Schehrer Award for Innovation and Craft Brewing, that that's you know, that's a hall of fame landscape kind of thing. And it just speaks to the community involvement and the, you know, being, being a participant in this, you know, only 22 people have won it at that point. And I, I, yeah, the legacy award, you know, something like that. I mean, I, I still love, I love the GABF and World Beer <Cup> Awards, a couple of awards cause they're, you know, they're purely blind. They're your peers. They show your team that they're, you know, they're making the right decisions. But the Russell award was probably the one that was singular in the sense that that was, you know, personally with my name on it. Where it's almost every other award that we've had that we've been lucky enough to garner comes with somebody else, you know, participating in doing work in that regard. JD: 00:56:29 Yeah. Okay. Well, very good. So, we're just about at the end of all my questions, from your experience, is there anything in the way of advice or a lesson you've learned or anything else that you think either can't be said enough or you haven't ever had the opportunity to say? TA: 00:56: You know, I think that we were talking yesterday, it's kind of interesting. We were talking about how difficult this business has become and there's a lot of noise and chatter and 50 years from now when someone's looking at this, they'll say, wow it's not as easy as it used to be. And I don't know where the fall line's going to be. We're going to get to 10,000 breweries in this country. I don't doubt that that'll happen. And I don't know where, where the relevancy will be. I don't know what it will look like. I feel pretty strongly that in the time that I've been lucky enough to be in this business, a lot of what's made us successful has come from a very strong sense of this is the beer I want to produce. And nowadays there seems to be a lot of, you have to just do what the consumer is saying they want. TA: 00:57:38 And tons of breweries I think are kind of losing their way, respectful of an identity. And I don't know if the artist in me can, can sort of reconcile that for the long haul. I think there's this sense that if, if that's the way the industry is going, you know, is that what I signed up for? Part of me wants to see the Transcribed by Judith Downie 28 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 consumerism shift and I, I talk about this a lot, but it's kind of like when you throw the boomerang out, it comes back a little slower than it went out and maybe the boomerang is coming back. You know, that there's just too much ubiquity right now. But maybe not. Maybe with 10,000 brewers, you just, there is ubiquity and that's just part of the nature of it. But you know, I think the success that I've had, you know, in this business has been built on beers that, that, that have something that look and tastes like things that I've, you know, imagined and there's been a lot of success for that. But I don't know how you continue to do that when there's 10,000 imitators and people trying to, trying to find the same sort of, you know, sense of their worth. So for me, I think the biggest thing moving forward is just where, where do we all fit in? It's just dense stuff. JD: 00:58:49 Giving everybody a chance to attain their dream. But yeah, you know. TA: 00:58:53 Yeah. I think that we're going to see, I think in the next two years we're going to see a lot of dreams getting crushed because it's getting, it's getting even harder today than it was probably a year ago. But there might be a light at the end of the tunnel in the sense that, you know, there's been a lot of distributor consolidation. There's been a lot of breweries, what they say, you know, rightsizing or trying to figure this all out. But it's a business. It's gonna eat people alive, you know? And, and that's what businesses do, right? There's, there is this, there's, there's a success rate attributed to craft beer that's not as high. I mean, it's higher than most consumer goods, and there will probably be a little bit more reckoning that will come along with it because you just can't, you just can't all swim in the same ocean. It just doesn't work. And so we're going to find some sense of corrective correlations. I mean, we're going to find smaller, you know, people are going to be making less beer for the next few years and if you're actively making more beer, you're one of the very few people that's, that's winning in that, in that space. JD: 00:59:51 It does seem like we had a real bump up in numbers of breweries that opened in 2016-2017 which is being that this is 2019. We're looking at entering the fourth and fifth year of leases for a lot of the breweries. And I think that might be a time where people are going to have to sit down and assess. TA: 01:00:11 Sure. I mean, if you've got a five-year lease and you're about to come into that fourth year, you're in the fourth year and you're now triggering the, am I going to renew? Right. I haven't, I 29 2024-01-04 Transcribed by Judith Downie �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 haven't been taking a paycheck or I've been taking very little. And then at some point you're like, are we, is this a real thing? You know, I don't, I don't know. You know, people, people certainly I think come into it, you know, really, you know, eager and excited about it. And then little by little you're, you're grinding and there's a lot of grinding going on right now, which is okay, but you know, there's, but grinding isn't fun. JD: 01:00:46 No. And when people come into it with a passion, which is a term you used earlier, passion cannot sustain you forever, unfortunately. I mean, it's what maybe gets you up the next morning, but at some point it's not paying the bills and you have managed to raise a family, you know, other people, you know, that they've got investors that may or may not understand the actual brewing industry and cause and effect and impacts. And, you know, yeah, it's going to be real interesting to see what happens. TA: 01:01:18 Yeah. I've been pretty lucky. My partnership here hasn't had an unrealistic expectation of financial return. And, and you know, so, you know, we, we opened our doors, we borrowed some money, we repaid the money, and then we've basically reinvested all of that money into the company when we needed to. So we are not sitting here saying okay, you're, you know, you were relying on us for a dividend. And you know, that doesn't, it doesn't work like that. But the, the business of beer is very difficult. And you know, you, you talked about that word passion. We, when we opened our doors, I published this list of the 10 commandments of our brewery and one of the 10 commandments was that you, you know, passion isn't something you can buy at the corner store. And I meant that with a sense of like, if you come into this, you know, you can't just throw that term around. TA: 01:02:06 Like you've got to live it and breathe it. And I think that that kind of what you were speaking to earlier is, is, has always been like, I think there's a lot of people that will say, I am very passionate about what I do. And I have been, and that's, you know, over the 20 plus years I've been doing this. That's that, that is a word that I would associate with, with getting out of bed every day. And it's been very, it's been very conducive to being successful. That being said, you don't have to be overly passionate, but you have to be, you still have to be passionate about getting out of bed every day, even when you're struggling, even when you're not killing it. And I can guarantee you right now, there's a lot of people when they're getting out of bed who used to kill it and were, you know, who thought Transcribed by Judith Downie 30 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 they were going to kill it and are saying to themselves, man, this is, this is real. Like, and you know, how do you, how do you put your game face on and, and, and really keep, keep grinding and to tackle the, you know, look, we want to get to the other side. JD: 01:02:54 Yeah. Yeah. And you don't want to be a long face when your consumers come in because they're going to say, Hey, I came in here for a beer and a good time. TA: 01:03:02 I am here. I am here for a good time. Right. Any happy people? JD: 01:03:06 Oh dear. Oh dear. Something that just came to me, which is not on the list of questions, but we are sitting in the space that Stone originated at. And you had just mentioned that you've expanded. Talk a little bit about the physical plant. What was it like when you moved in as Lost Abbey? What did you have to do to it and how many times have you expanded? TA: 01:03:34 All right. So, when we took over in January of 2006 and Stone moved out to the facility in Escondido, they controlled at that point about 30,000 square feet of I think the building is 85,000 square feet. So, they had about a third of it. And when they moved out, we collapsed the entire building back down to their original suite, suite 104, and that suite is 7,500 square feet. So, we started with a 30-barrel brewhouse in 19, I'm sorry, in 2006. And we had 30, 7,500 square feet, including the tasting room, cold box, and our barrel warehouse. In 2009, I believe we moved across the parking lot and took over another 10,000 square feet and moved the cold box, all the barrels and our distribution. So, for awhile we had that space. We were up to about 17,000 square feet. 2012 or so we took over this suite that we're sitting in here, which was another 7,500 square feet. TA: 01:04:35 So that allowed us to build our packaging hall, this office, the lab, things like that. We rolled for the next few years, for the next five years. We had that 27,000 square feet of space. And then we added we added a second, third, fourth warehouse across the parking lot. And that took us to almost 40,000 square feet. And then last January we moved out of that distribution warehouse into another building here, which is now connected from the front of the street to the back. Behind us. We control 40,000 square feet under one roof line for the first time. And we moved out of the facility across the parking lot, all of our barrels and everything. So we now are under one building, one roof line. We can't drive from the packaging hall to the rest of the building. But every other building we can drive forklifts through. Transcribed by Judith Downie 31 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 TA: 01:05:30 And that never happened. Two years ago, we owned four <forklifts> ‘cause we had four different buildings. JD: 1:05:37 Now does Port distribute all the beers here in San Marcos? TA: 1:05:43 Everything comes out of this facility. We are doing a batch or two a year out of the Pizza Port facility when we need to, but we don't, it's this, this facility can handle a lot more beer than we're currently making. So most, most everything that has the word Port Brewing, Lost Abbey, or Hop Concept on it has come out of San Marcos. It's only been this year that we've brewed two or three batches of beer down the street at Pizza Port. And most of that was for efficiency to do big runs of things that we could, we did a giant Hop Freshener, Hop Concept release at Costco and needed to have beer all at the same time. JD: 01:06:15 So are you, in Costcos outside of California as well? TA: 01:06:20 No, and that has been something we haven't really tackled or looked at. JD: 01:06:23 Like it would be just an overwhelming amount of production yet I think... TA: 01:06:28 Costco's pretty, pretty keen on a lot of local these days, at least for beer. So, I don't know how relevant we would, you know, we might be able to get into some in Arizona, maybe in Washington and Northern California, but you know, there's a ton of breweries in each of those locations. Tapping the same buyer on the shoulder saying, can I get, can I get in here? And, and the buyers probably got enough options that they don't even need something from out of here. And frankly, the cost associated with getting it to them would almost make it prohibitive in terms of trying to put it on the shelf at their right price point. JD: 01:06:59 Yeah. Have you ever had to turn down any kind of requests because you just knew that trying to fill that big an order was going to just break you? TA: 01:07:09 No, we've, we've been pretty lucky in the sense that when we do get we just came off of couple of pretty good-sized Costco orders and they were about 40 pallets worth of beer. But the brewery can handle that without being too burdened in the sense. I mean, it's certainly a lot of attention on one thing but we're not overly stretched at our capacity right now. So, when those things pop up, we certainly snap at them and want, you Transcribed by Judith Downie 32 2024-01-04 �TOMME ARTHUR TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2019-08-08 know we wanna make sure we execute on it. If we were making a lot more beer, we probably would have, we would struggle with that a little more. But when you get an order for 40 pallets of beer, you figure it out, you know, you really do. JD: 01:07:49 When we walked back here, we passed one of your employees building a bike. What other sorts of things do you do with the employees or for the employees to support maybe their selfeducation, other interests that they have, things like that. TA: 01:08:05 We've definitely put it on our radar this year. We've lost a lot of employees in the last two years. I think we've turned over 20 employees and we only have about 50 total. So, we've put an emphasis on that level of communication, you know, what can we do to assist you in this endeavor? It's not something that we've programmed in the past or been terribly good at. That being said, we haven't, we have really seen that there are some simple opportunities to do things like that and Tim's running his own small bike shop and it's just a, you know, it's a pocket, pocketed space here at the brewery. You know, we've announced that if there's other brewer or other brewery employees from the tasting room all the way up that have an idea, we would love to hear about it. We don't make a dime on it. There's no, there's no real emphasis towards, you know, trying to co-partner on things. TA: 01:08:56 It's just we, we want to, we want to foster the opportunities if it makes sense. And Tim's the pilot sort of program right now with the bike, the little bike shop that he's running and it gets interesting, I hope. I hope it sparks other employees to say, okay, cool, I've wanted to do this, that or the other and it looks like I could and come to us and say, ‘Oh, could you carve out this space again?’ We are, we are under more, more efficient space right now and we do have a little bit of room. So, I hope that, I hope somebody else says, okay, I want to do this and it, and it fits the needs and the use and isn't a big deal. It'd be great because it means that we can, we can continue to lift what they want to be a part of and retain them at some time. JD: 01:09:35 Yeah. Very good. It was fun. Oh, okay. Well, I think that pretty much has run through my list plus of questions for you about your career, your history, and what's going on with Lost Abbey/Port Brewing. And I want to thank you for that. And I'm going to go ahead and turn this off. Transcribed by Judith Downie 33 2024-01-04 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Arthur, Tomme. Interview transcript. August 8th, 2019. Description An account of the resource Tomme Arthur has been involved in several San Diego breweries, most notably as founder and managing owner of Lost Abbey Brewing located in San Marcos, CA. His first professional brewing position was at the short-lived Cervecería La Cruda in San Diego, California. Arthur moved to Pizza Port Brewing in Solana Beach, California as an assistant brewer. After becoming Director of Brewing Operations for the increasing number of locations, he led the chain in garnering numerous beer awards. Arthur opened Lost Abbey Brewing in 2006 to focus on his interest in Belgian-style beers. In late 2023, Arthur separated Lost Abbey from Port Brewing operations in a ‘right-sizing’ plan in response to beer industry trends. Port Brewing retained the Hop Concept, Tiny Bubbles, and Kharisma brands in their portfolio and took over the San Marcos production space and closed the tasting room. Lost Abbey entered an alternating proprietorship agreement with Mother Earth Brewing to share their production space in nearby Vista, CA. In his 2019 interview, Arthur discusses his introduction to craft beer and home brewing; entry into the profession and work at various breweries beginning in the 1990s; founding Lost Abbey Brewing and other brewery ventures; mentoring individuals in the industry; and awards. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Tomme Arthur Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Judith Downie Ernest Cisneros Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-08-08 Subject The topic of the resource Brewers -- California -- San Diego County Brewing industry -- California -- History Lost Abbey Brewing (San Marcos, Calif.) Microbreweries -- California -- San Diego County Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Marcos (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In copyright</a> Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. California State University San Marcos Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context ArthurTomme_DownieJudith_2019-08-08_transcript Brewchive(r) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/07a30db156660d21bcc54bcf2578a48f.png e13aceb4ac3aad4e6fd69fef3dbf5efe Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource SpackmanA_250px https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/57472b9333efa19b9ebe8960b41ee200.jpg 78719f1ce978bea4311b31c24fd55ffe Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Joe's Pluming cartoon Description An account of the resource This cartoon was submitted by Greg Evans to Playboy Magazine when he was eleven years old. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Greg Evans https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/66a2b1c382db3edb43d61109e166cfd7.jpg a7bdc4a3ce73b3f1bb934a178c6fb8c9 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Two Guys comic strip Description An account of the resource This is a photograph of one of Greg Evans' early ideas for a comic strip. https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/fb841c79c6e1cf90c170666c56a9e32a.jpg b9f360d9a7e6e072fc17c96afa546cf8 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Seamy Heights comic strip Description An account of the resource This is a photograph of one of Greg Evans' early ideas for a comic strip. https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/c77ab444004d9f888e5725e96492b391.jpg e80723aa476b5a493714592d62bdf4cc Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource MaXwel the Robot Description An account of the resource This is a photograph of MaXwel the Robot. Running this robot for entertainment purposes was one of Greg Evans' early jobs. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Evans, Greg and Karen. Photographs, March 25, 2025. Description An account of the resource Four photos related to the oral history of Greg and Karen Evans. Photograph #1, "Joe's Pluming Cartoon," was drawn by Greg Evans for submission to Playboy Magazine when he was eleven years old. Photograph #2, "Two Guys Comic Strip," is one of Greg Evans' early ideas for a comic strip. Photograph #3, "Seamy Heights Comic Strip," was one of Greg Evans' early ideas for a comic strip. Photograph #4, "MaXwel the Robot," is a photograph of a robot. Running MaXwel the Robot for entertainment purposes was one of Greg Evans' early jobs. Click on the thumbnails to view the full images in more detail. https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/7f72e1cce3c6fed5bc5600bafc040034.png ba4bfc8c99a3d48117506493f5f2b84a Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource EvansG_250px https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/010490bb4e1eee6c6b68387114144d01.png a77bcbe5e028ea6754d6a4ff36186b85 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource EvansK_250px https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/2f5f1f5e8e2ab849149ddd2d77b15aa4.jpg ba32d71554e6120c0b7841a00e58146b Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Alphonso Cevera titled "Poc-Chuc Iteraciión 4" Description An account of the resource Guest artist choreographer Alphonso Cevera. Collaboration and Performance with Dance Studies Students: Vanesa Bedolla, Nicole Carr, Kati Echeverria, Xochitl Garnica, Alex Maravillas, Emilia Medina, Raelen Pellos, Karen Rocha, Maria Sandoval, and Nina Watts. This performance is part of the The Experimental Dance Project (EDP), which celebrates dance through interaction with professional artists and project-based learning. The EDP brings outstanding dance artists to perform, lecture, dialogue, teach and create with CSUSM students. Importantly, the EDP offers cutting-edge training and performance opportunities by hosting dance artists across the spectrum, including people of color, Latinx, Black, and LGBTQ identities. The EDP embraces our campus’ mission of inclusivity.  The EDP focuses on experimental and improvisational approaches to dance, with a particular emphasis on social justice and community engagement. The EDP aims to break down societal norms around dance and create a space where students can explore their own unique movement styles. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Tim Richards https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/803d77588fbc77f28af85130979c60c1.jpg 9ced4a5c7480b90010047507e5db9e0e Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Jaamil Olawale Kosoko titled "The Chameleon Complex" Description An account of the resource Guest artist choreographer Alphonso Cevera. With Live composition/sound designer Malesha Tayloy, Professor/Dr. Karen Schaffman and Dance Studies students: Kevine Benitez, Xochitl Garnica, Alex Maravilles, Emilia Medina, Raelene Palos and Cornelius Stringer. This performance is part of the The Experimental Dance Project (EDP), which celebrates dance through interaction with professional artists and project-based learning. The EDP brings outstanding dance artists to perform, lecture, dialogue, teach and create with CSUSM students. Importantly, the EDP offers cutting-edge training and performance opportunities by hosting dance artists across the spectrum, including people of color, Latinx, Black, and LGBTQ identities. The EDP embraces our campus’ mission of inclusivity.  The EDP focuses on experimental and improvisational approaches to dance, with a particular emphasis on social justice and community engagement. The EDP aims to break down societal norms around dance and create a space where students can explore their own unique movement styles. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Tim Richards https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/0e7e677cdb8596e444b17c80b2adfb8c.jpg 45067d84631621666986f8424dcf45c0 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Karen Schaffman and Ishmael Houston Jones Description An account of the resource Karen Schaffman and Ishmael Houston Jones at Think Gravity Dance Tank.Think Gravity Dance Tank: Celebrating & Reckoning with Contact Improvisation and Performance was an intergenerational research gathering in Boulder Colorado from March 21-26, 2022. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Tim Richards https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/5f893935bd6c92420817c088e0d444cc.jpg 5e968aadd43e72d0487cb77679d8b7c9 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Karen Schaffman and Darrell Jones Description An account of the resource Karen Schaffman and Darrell Jones at Think Gravity Dance Tank.Think Gravity Dance Tank: Celebrating & Reckoning with Contact Improvisation and Performance was an intergenerational research gathering in Boulder Colorado from March 21-26, 2022. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Tim Richards Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Schaffman, Karen. Photographs, June 5, 2025. Description An account of the resource Four photos related to the oral history of Karen Schaffman. Photograph #1 depicts dancers in a performance of the Experimental Dance Project titled "Poc-Chuc Iteraciión 4." Photograph #2 depicts dancers in a performance of the Experimental Dance Project titled "The Chameleon Complex." Photograph #3 depicts Karen Schaffman with with Ishmael Houston Jones in the Think Gravity Dance Project. Photograph #4 depicts Karen Schaffman with Darrell Jones in the Think Gravity Dance Project. Click on the thumbnails to view the full images in more detail. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral Histories Description An account of the resource Video and audio oral histories can be viewed here. Histories are listed alphabetically by last name. Individual histories are indexed and transcribed and can be searched. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <p>Rights to oral histories vary depending on the history. The library owns the copyright to some histories, and has license to reproduce for nonprofit purposes for others. Please contact CSUSM University Library Special Collections at <a href="mailto:%20archives@csusm.edu">archives@csusm.edu</a> with any questions about use.</p> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Robert Sheehan Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed David Taitingfong OHMS Object This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS Viewer) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=TaitingfongDavid_SheehanRobert_access_2024-08-30.xml OHMS Object Text This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka 6.0 Taitingfong, David. Interview August 30th, 2024. SC027-083 00:00:00 SC027 California State University San Marcos University Library Special Collections oral history collection CSUSM csusm Guam ; San Diego (Calif.) ; Chamorro language ; Decolonization ; Colonization ; Language revival David Taitingfong Robert Sheehan audio file TaitingfongDavid_SheehanRobert_access_2024-08-30.wav 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/7dcf86c4fe6bc8b429316d83d49b9a41.mp4 Other video This interview is conducted in English and Chamorro 0 Introduction Dabit (David) Taitingfong sits down to discuss Chamorro, indigenous Guamanian, culture, heritage, and language. Chamorro ; language ; culture Guam ; Chamorro 0 23 Early Childhood and Growing up in San Diego David talks about where he was born and his early connection to the Chamorro community and culture. 0 183 Visiting Guam for the First Time David discusses how his first visit to Guam and his ancestral village, Yona, impacted his cultural and language learning process. 0 592 Colonial Occupation of Guam David talks about the history of colonialism on Guam and how that has affected the culture and the Chamorro language. 0 1481 Fluency vs. Literacy in Chamorro David talks about the two orthographies in the Chamorro language and how some Chamorro elders are only fluent in Chamorro and lack any education in Chamorro literacy. 0 2007 Chamorro Social Media David discusses how he created his Instagram page which is dedicated to teaching Chamorro language and culture. 0 2515 How the Chamorro Language Creates Connections within the Chamorro Community David talks about how his language learning process has reignited his family's and friend's interest in speaking Chamorro and learning more. 0 Oral history David Taitingfong is a member of the Chamorro community and involved with the group Prugraman Sinipok, which teaches a two week Chamorro language immersion program. David describes his involvement with Prugraman Sinipok and how his interest in sharing the Chamorro lanugage and culture has shaped his life. NOTE TRANSCRIPTION BEGIN 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:10.000 So today is Friday, August 30th, 2024. My name is Robert Sheehan and I'm here with David Taitingfong for an oral history interview with Cal State San Marcos. How are you doing today, David? 00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:11.999 I'm good. How are you? 00:00:11.999 --> 00:00:23.000 I'm doing well, thank you. Thanks for being here with me today and dealing with our technical difficulties. Um, if it's all right, I'd like to start with your childhood, um, and your family. Could you tell me a little bit about where you grew up and how you grew up? 00:00:23.000 --> 00:01:24.000 Yeah, so I was born and raised in Southern San Diego. Um, my parents, we lived in Otay Mesa, which is real close to the border, about two or three exits away from the border. But because my parents had to work, we actually used my dad's mom's address as like, this is where we'll go to school. That way after school, I can go to my grandma's house. And so my childhood mostly was waking up, getting up, getting dropped off in a completely different neighborhood, like 30 minutes away. But that meant I got to be with my cousins because we all kind of went to the same, we all went to the same elementary school then like one or two middle schools, and then we branched out from high school. But, um, me and my brother, we did that growing up. Um, so that was more in Southeast San Diego. The, it was in the, the Jamacha neighborhood, which is near Skyline, which is, I mean, overall just, yeah, Southeast San Diego. And so that's where, that's where like most of my childhood was, honestly. 00:01:24.000 --> 00:01:32.000 Okay. And other than your nuclear family, did you have any sort of connection with the Chamorro community, uh, outside of your family? 00:01:32.000 --> 00:02:24.000 Yes, very much so. So my grandma, my dad's mom, um, in the neighborhood she lived in right next door was her cousin, and across the street was her cousin. And then down the street was my mom's sister. And then around the corner was like my mom's aunt. And so it was just, it felt like I grew up around the community a lot. And then also the thing I remember a lot is in Southeast San Diego, in the Lincoln area, there's a club, The Sons and Daughters of Guam's Club. I think it used to be, I don't know if it used to be called the San Diego Guam Club, but either way, the initials work out the SD Guam Club. And every year they host like little fiestas for the patron saint of each village on Guam. And the saint where my mom's mom was from. 00:02:24.000 --> 00:03:01.000 That fiesta always happened around my birthday. And so that's where I, I would say I got most of the interaction with the Chamorro community at large was going to the fiesta, going to the fiesta, which was for the village of Yona, the village of Yona and Guam's. They call it the south. It's like the middle south, but it's where I would say I feel most mostly attached to. 'Cause it's the fiesta we always went to, and it's my mom's side. And like traditionally culturally, Chamorros' are matrilineal. And so for me it's like, I feel like I've always gravitated towards my mom's side at least later on. For sure. 00:03:01.000 --> 00:03:04.000 And have you ever visited, is it Zonia? Yona? 00:03:04.000 --> 00:04:03.000 Yeah. Um, yeah, so I , I went to Guam two years ago, maybe for the first time in my life. I was supposed to go there for a language immersion program. I wasn't able to make it in time. I got there the day it ended and then I was like, you know what? My cousin was in it, let me just spend time with her. And then I got COVID and we all did actually. So I spent my entire trip with like five people, the same five people. But I was able to go to the village of Yona. I have a cousin who still lives there. I was like, I don't know if I should visit you because I got COVID. She's like, oh, I had it two weeks ago. You're fine. Like, come here. I have gifts for you . So I was able to visit, uh, I don't know exactly which parts within the village, my mom's side is from, but my cousin from my mom's side, she was there. So she showed me a little bit of her land and I was like, okay, this is cool. I, I'm, I actually going back next year. 00:04:03.000 --> 00:04:10.000 Oh, very nice! It seems like a good way to connect back with family and cultural roots and stuff like that. Can you describe the village? 00:04:10.000 --> 00:04:59.000 Uh, you know, not entirely, because again, like when I had went, it was kind of like, I don't know if I should, my cousin was like, just come on through. But where she lived most of the houses, it was like a house, and then I would say a good chunk of land around each house. Because even when she invited me, she's like, you come over and see the ranch. And I was like, what does that mean? You know? And sure enough, we go there. It's like she has a house and I mean, I'm not even good with geography, but she definitely had enough land that I could probably do like, maybe it was like two basketball courts side by side. And she's like, yeah, this is like, we grow stuff and catch pigs here sometimes 'cause they try and eat all her stuff. 00:04:59.000 --> 00:05:34.000 But it's, yeah. And I want to say actually where she lives too used to be a lot of military housing. So it kind of has a feel like that where it looks modern American, but the military have since moved out of that specific area. I don't know if that's how it was, but that's how it felt like to me. Like I pulled up and I was like, okay, like a lot of these houses look like they were like, what's the -- cookie cutter? You know? Um, 'cause you go to other parts of Guam and it's not like that, like houses kind of tend to look different. 00:05:34.000 --> 00:05:37.000 And there's a big military presence on, on Guam, correct? 00:05:37.000 --> 00:05:52.000 Yeah. Yeah. Biggest I think would be [US] Air Force and Navy and I know they're building, or no, they've already built a Marine Corps base there, which I mean a department of the Navy. 00:05:52.000 --> 00:05:58.000 How do local Guamanians and Chamorros feel about the United States military on Guam? 00:05:58.000 --> 00:06:48.000 It's a, it's a mixed bag, I would say. Because after World War II, everyone was split. I know on my dad's side, they were more grateful. So there was, there's a story of a man, I believe his name was, Robert? Robert Tweed? Well, I just know his last name's Tweed. And he was one of, he was an American, service member who was hiding from the Japanese. And a lot of families helped him. My dad's mom, her family was one of the people who had helped him, like, helped him hide until more reinforcements came and stuff. And so I know on my dad's side of the family, they're very much grateful for that. I never really got much war stories from my mom's side. I don't know how they feel about that. 00:06:48.000 --> 00:07:26.000 But I would say where I'm at in my life now, most of my peers, most of the people I associate with are against it for sure. In the sense of like, at least against it in the sense of if you want to use our stuff, at least ask. 'cause that's currently not the relationship, right? It's pretty much anything at the federal level kind of just kind of just goes, GovGuam [Government of Guam] does a lot of stuff, but if the military's like, Hey, we want to do this. I think one of the requirements that they have to do is just like, conduct studies, but they conduct the study. So it's like, it's kind of kinda weird. 00:07:26.000 --> 00:07:27.000 Who's watching the watchers kinda thing? 00:07:27.000 --> 00:07:29.000 Yeah. . 00:07:29.000 --> 00:07:35.000 Okay. Can I rewind a little bit back to high school? What high school did you go to? 00:07:35.000 --> 00:07:41.491 I went to Morris High School, also in Southeast, skyline area. 00:07:41.491 --> 00:07:45.000 Okay. And was there a large contingent of Chamorro kids who went to your high school? 00:07:45.000 --> 00:08:47.000 Uh, I wouldn't say it was large. There's definitely, we all knew each other. I would say that for sure. And there was enough of us, because again, the Guam Club is literally down the street from Lincoln. Lincoln, while I was in high school, had closed for renovations. And so all the kids who could have went there had to go to other schools. A lot of 'em went to Morris. And I did meet a lot of Chamorros that way. And then because again, of the big military presence on Guam and the other island, on the other northern islands, kids tend to find their way, either through their -- mostly, I mean, if I was in high school -- through their parents. Right. And so most of the people I met, they're like, oh yeah, like my parent, my family just moved out here 'cause they're stationed here, you know? And so not a lot. Well enough for sure. It was nice. Like, you see somebody, you see, in their papers or in class, they're doing roll call. You hear the last name. You're like, that's, that's a chamorro last name. 00:08:47.000 --> 00:08:51.000 Okay. Can you gimme some examples of what a Chamorro last name would be or how you can tell? 00:08:51.000 --> 00:09:50.000 Yeah. So like, my last name is, um, we would pronounce it Taitingfong. And so we have a lot of last names with T-A-I, it's a prefix that means like, without, and there's like a lot of history there, but if you heard someone Taitingfong, Taitano, Taimagung, Taisagui and then like on my mom's side, there's Acadino, and then there's some Spanish ones that are mixed in. But there's like, you, you could, if, so like my mom, her middle, um, her name was Mediola Acadino, and a Mendiola is not technically Chamorro, but if, if you say your name's Mendiola, and I look at you and I'm like you look Chamorro. Um, so there's some Spanish ones, but then yeah, like the Chamorro ones, [Chamorro surnames] there's like Q-U-I was another popular one, like a prefix where I was like, oh, that might be Chamorro. Because that's how the Spanish wrote it. But in our language, it would be like a K-E. 00:09:50.000 --> 00:10:09.000 And just like the US military, Spain has a long history in that area as well. And with language it seems to have bled through a little bit. Yeah. Uh, can you talk a little bit about how that heritage or history happened and how it affected language? 00:10:09.000 --> 00:11:08.000 Yeah. I want to say, I mean, 'cause Spain has, Spain had a presence in the Marianas for a long time, since like the 1500s. But from what I've read, it was primarily through commerce. They didn't have intentions of colonizing the islands. They were just like, we want a port here. We want to stop. 'Cause they were going from Mexico to the Philippines straight. But if they needed to stop, eventually at some point they're like, oh, here's Guam and here's the other islands, the Northerner Islands and stuff. But I wanna say Guam was the main port. It was the biggest island. And in terms of how that language spread, I mean, again, through commerce and stuff, and then through eventual colonization, primarily through a religious means, the language bled through. And one thing that I think is interesting though is that the Chamorros kind of took their words that they liked and they don't, sometimes they don't mean the same thing. 00:11:08.000 --> 00:11:51.000 And then we also treat them as if they are Chamorro words, if that makes sense. Like, we affix them as if they're our own words. And one, one of my friends told me, he's like, the true tale of if we have fully adopted a word is if we afix it however we want, there's some words where we don't, we still -- there's certain phrases I think that stay through. Like, um, if someone says sabe dios, like, we took the word dios for God and say Yu'os, but we also don't say sabe. So like in that context of the phrase sabe dios, it's like, well, we kept that otherwise though. Yeah. We just took words and we're like, we're gonna say it how we say it. Hey, fix it how we affix it. 00:11:51.000 --> 00:11:56.000 Very interesting! I like you kind of flip it around and say, no, this is our word now. 00:11:56.000 --> 00:11:57.000 Yeah, yeah. 00:11:57.000 --> 00:11:58.000 Are you said that happens quite a bit in the Chamorro language. 00:11:58.000 --> 00:12:00.000 Yeah. 00:12:00.000 --> 00:12:06.000 And did you start speaking Chamorro at home when you were little or later on? 00:12:06.000 --> 00:13:35.000 Later on. Much later. When the pandemic started, my teacher at the time, Dr. Michael Lujan Bevacqua, he was doing a weekend class on Guam at a coffee shop, maybe like at max 10 people. When the Pandemic started, coffee shops closed, he was like, oh, I should just do it online. And a few months before he had actually like, kind of trial ran it with another group, a group that was based outta the east coast of the United States. And he did like a, I forgot how long it was, but he did a few classes online and was like, oh, this is a feasible way to instruct and so -- excuse me --. And so he was like, okay, I'll open it up to the public at large, you know, Saturday Guam time, Friday in the States. And that's when I, that's when I like really found a good schedule because the first time, technically when I learned online with him was when he did that trial run. And it, quite interestingly, I was on my honeymoon and I was like, Hey, can I do this? And she's like, if you're okay with the time difference, like, sure. You know, and so I was up at like 2:00 AM in Barcelona, in a class for an hour, you know? Um, but that's when it started for me. So I really only started 2020. At the beginning of 2020 00:13:35.000 --> 00:13:37.998 Okay. Do you consider yourself fluent? 00:13:37.998 --> 00:14:05.000 I would say pretty, I would say, I could definitely hold a conversation with most speakers. Um, like the real, real fluent elders. Sometimes they speak really fast or if they're, if they're chewing pugua, which is a bit, um, beetle net, which is just something like we, we chew out on the islands sometimes, like the words can get jumbled. I can't catch it. Um, but I would say I'm pretty fluent now. 00:14:05.000 --> 00:14:12.486 How popular is Chamorro on Guam? Do people still speak it as a primary language? 00:14:12.486 --> 00:15:02.000 Not right now. There's definitely a cultural shift to get there, especially recently, just within the past, I think month, there is a school that's been running for I think 17 ish years. The Chief Hurao Academy, they do [an] immersion program for children. And I know sometimes they try and do it for adults as well. They just got charter status. And so I want to say it's gonna grow to become even more. But definitely on Guam, it's been in a decline. It's been in decline since World War II. And then I can't speak much for the northern islands for Rota or Saipan. I know folks still speak it. Um, and I want to say though, it is still mostly a at home thing. 'cause even when I went there, I was like really excited to flex my tongue. And I was like, okay. 00:15:02.000 --> 00:15:39.000 And then I'd go into a coffee shop, you know, I'm just like, hafa adai and they're like, hafa adai. And then like, that's it, you know? Or the first, actually the first time I was, I had a full conversation was I went to a cemetery to look for family, like family graves and stuff. And I saw this lady and I heard her speaking Chamorro to another coworker. So I walk up and I, I talk, I'm talking to her in Chamorro. And it's funny 'cause she's like snacking on something and she's like, oh, nen, how are you? And nen is short for neni, which is just like, it means baby, but, you know, and a term of endearment, oh nen, how can I help you? And I was just like, oh. 00:15:39.000 --> 00:16:28.000 [Speaking Chamorro] Which is like, oh, I'm sorry, like, if you don't mind, can you help me? And she like wiped her mouth and put her food away. And she was like, whoa. You know? She was kind of like -- and I think it's because I looked younger than somebody who she would assume can speak Chamorro. And I also, I think she could tell I wasn't from the island, you know, the way I was dressed and my accent wasn't good, or like, as typical sounding. And so she started talking back to me and she gave me instructions. And I was just like, okay [speaking Chamorro]. And then, yeah. But I could tell she was like, what is going on? Which was when I realized like, okay, out here, it's still, it's still blossoming, it's still, seeds are still being planted and it's definitely not as much. 00:16:28.000 --> 00:16:38.000 Why do you think that the Chamorro language was in a decline and it's needed this revitalization? 00:16:38.000 --> 00:17:26.000 So post World War II, effectively it was made -- I don't know the correct, like legal terms -- I wanna say it was made law made mandate. I don't know what legal term they used, but effectively they were saying, you can't speak Chamorro in public. You can't speak Chamorro at schools. And then at schools, if you were speaking Chamorro, you were like fined financially or physically punished. And because of that, when, you know, you go home and that word gets to your family, they're like, okay, well learn English then. Like, well, maybe we'll speak Chamorro more to you at home. Like, I know my grandparents spoke Chamorro to each other, and I know my parents grew up hearing the language, but because of that, it, it just bled out into all of the villages. 00:17:26.000 --> 00:18:22.000 They're like, don't speak this language, it's your language, but don't speak it. And in public, in schools, you know, save it for the home. And because of that, the language -- maybe if it's only being spoken at home, you go out in public -- it's you, you go out in public and now post World War II, life is different, right? There's so many other things happening now. There's industries that are coming to fruition because of post-war. And, now it's like, well, if I can't speak Chamorro, I can't even create new terms for this. So it's like, I can't communicate, oh, we all speak English though, so, or we're all trying to learn English. So it was, I think it was definitely one of those things, 00:18:22.000 --> 00:18:26.000 And that's horrible. First off, ut that, that kind of historical trauma, does it still have its kind of finger around moral culture? 00:18:26.000 --> 00:19:15.000 I would say yes. Um, and I actually didn't feel that way until recently. I tend to be on the optimistic side, I tend to feel very optimistic about the future of the language and the future of many things. Because, on my mom's side, I have one native speaker left. I might have -- my mom understands, I know her, one of her other sisters understands. I actually haven't talked with my uncles in a while. Should probably do that -- I don't know if they understand, but I know a lot of, like my mom's generation, they understand but they don't speak it. And so my mom's eldest sister, um, when I started learning, my mom was like, Hey, by the way, Dabit is learning the language, Dabit is what, like David in Chamorro, like Dabit's learning Chamorro, you should talk with them. 00:19:15.000 --> 00:19:50.000 And at first my aunt was like, for real, you know? And I think she even said something to me like, really fast. And I was like, Ooh, I didn't catch that. So she said, it began slower. And I was like, okay, I have someone I can at least try to talk with. And when I finally sat and had a conversation with her, she did open up to me. And we actually had a good long cry, which just like it was, we were at a party and then we just kind of sat off to the side talking about our own thing. And she told me something that like her sisters didn't even know, you know? So when I asked my mom later -- like in the moment, I was already crying 'cause it was sad -- And then later I was like, Hey mom, how come you didn't tell me this? 00:19:50.000 --> 00:20:34.000 And she's like, I have no idea what you're talking about. And I was like, wow. Um, and then I found that to be the case with a lot of the elders, at least who I was talking to in my circles. And, you know, I would go to certain events and I would try and find someone who looks like they'll talk to me or maybe someone I already know and I'm like, oh, I can speak Chamorro now, let me try this. And some of 'em were receptive. Um, but I guess it would depend on where you're at. Because recently I had some family file from the east coast and my dad, it's on my dad's side, and he's like, Hey, your uncle speaks Chamorro, you should talk to him. And when I would try to talk Chamorro to him, he would acknowledge me, but respond in English, you know? 00:20:34.000 --> 00:21:24.000 And after a few sentences, he was like, why are you trying to learn the language? It's dead, you know? And I was like, whoa. Like, it was the first time I had an elder say that. So I was like, oh shoot. And so there's definitely, there's definitely people like that. There's definitely people out there and Chamorro's out there who were like, there's no point. Even though they have the, the knowledge and to share. It's the, I would say the trauma is still there. And then there's also the, um -- my, my mom's sister, the fluent speaker, one reason she was hesitant to converse with me -- primarily the way I asked her, I was like, can you teach me stuff? And the first thing she said was, I can't read the language. And I don't know, like the grammar, you know? And so I was like, okay, let me rephrase this. 00:21:24.000 --> 00:22:01.000 Can we just talk in Chamorro? You know, because like, I didn't care, right? Like your my [aunt], your mom, my grandma wasn't a teacher. Her mom wasn't [a teacher], her mom wasn't. Right. Like these official titles I think sometimes can prevent the elders from wanting to pass down the generation. 'cause they're like, oh, I don't know if it's right. You know? But it's like, but if this is the language you speak with all your peers, like it's technically right, right? Like we have grammar based rules, but at the same time, you know, language has changed, languages fluctuate. 00:22:01.000 --> 00:22:10.000 Especially with the influx of all the new technology post World War II, we were talking about. How have the Chamorro people in the Chamorro language incorporated those new terms into language? 00:22:10.000 --> 00:23:05.000 I would say there's like three routes that I can think of off the top of my head. The first route is kind of a common sense approach. Like do we just, do we try to make a word for it or do we just call it what it's, right. So like the word bus, they just say bus. For truck, they just say truck for a machete, they just say machete, right? So like there's that where it's like, just take the word and say it in our tone. There's another approach which is like to take -- oh, and actually in that regard too -- it's like, take the English word or take the Spanish word or whatever and just kind of funnel it into the language. I would say the second approach is trying to create the word or change the word using our own words. 00:23:05.000 --> 00:24:37.000 So I would say one example is, -- excuse me again -- Um, the word escuela, we use it for school, but with a lot of my peers, we also have interest in like reclaiming the language, so to speak. And so when possible it's like, can we recreate this word? And so instead of saying escuela, um, I have friends, actually, I think this is a more accepted term now is fa'na'gue yanggen. And the word [speaking Chamorro] means to learn by doing. And then one of my favorite things about the language, we have a circum-fix. Something that encompasses a word. So it's fan and an if it ends in a consonant or fan and yan if it ends in a vowel. And so [speaking Chamorro] means like a place of learning. So there's like, there's that approach. Um, and then the third approach would be, if it's just too complicated, just spell it how it's, so one example is the app WhatsApp, right? Like, Chamorro's love WhatsApp. And if you have to literally write it, if there's like legal text or something, again, you might see escuela, [speaking Chamorro] and blah blah blah. But they'll put a single quote and just write WhatsApp single quote. And that's kind of how they take, that's kind of how we take the approach to the language. It's like what's actually being said? What can we create so that it's said? And then if not -- like no one's gonna translate X-ray. We're just gonna write X-ray. Just leave it alone. 00:24:37.000 --> 00:24:55.000 That's really interesting. I like that. You'd mentioned, um, kind of the grammatical structure of the language and also writing. You said your aunt was not fluent in a written way, but she was in an oral way. Are you fluent in Chamorro writing? 00:24:55.000 --> 00:26:05.000 Yes. And I would actually say maybe more so than some of my peers because in the current moment there are two official orthographies, orthography being the, like the written rules about how we portray the language. And so there's the Guam orthography and the NMI orthography, the Northern Marianas Island orthography. Um, the Guam orthography is a one word, one spelling approach. And the NMI orthography is a one sound, one symbol. And this comes in, I think they both have strengths, they both have weaknesses. Um, but I know both and right now, because, I mean Guam's the bigger island and, I would say they have more resources. I think more people know the Guam orthography than they do the NMI orthography. And so for me, I started with the Guam orthography and I was getting confused at some points. But once I started teaching I realized I liked the NMI orthography more for helping people pronunciate things. 00:26:05.000 --> 00:27:00.000 Because when you read something written in the NMI, it's written how it sounds, which is useful for reading. Um, I would say for new people it's confusing. Because like the word tiningo', which means like knowledge tiningo' that last syllable was like, ooh. Um, but when you start to afix it and change it, like if I wanted to say my knowledge, I would say tiningo'-hu right? And so that difference in sound when you read it, it's like, okay, yeah. But now if you're trying to learn the word, you don't know which one to look up really. Guam doesn't have that problem one word, one spelling, no matter how you say it. Which I think has created interesting variations in speakers already. Like I have friends who only know the Guam orthography and they pronounce words the way they see 'em. And I would say that's due to a lack of speakers around them. 00:27:00.000 --> 00:27:33.000 But again, like that's probably just what's gonna happen. There's gonna be like a dialect of folks who learned by reading. Not a problem. But it's just like, it's something I've started to pick up on through my, through listening. Whereas like with the NMI orthography too. If I give somebody something in the NMI orthography, they think they're looking up like three or four words, you know? I'm like, oh no, this is the same word. It's just they spell it based on how it sounds and so that it can get confusing there. Uh, but yeah, to answer your question, I would say I'm pretty good with it. , 00:27:33.000 --> 00:27:45.000 It sounds like it! Your pretty knowledgeable about both just sets of orthographies. Is Chamorro a gendered language? Like Spanish is where there's a masculine and a feminine 00:27:45.000 --> 00:28:15.000 For borrowed words. Yeah. So like for teacher you would say most folks would probably say maestro or maestra. Uh, but we do have like, let's say an indigenous term fafa'na'gue, which isn't gendered at all. Um, and then we have like the word saina, which means like elder. But we do also have mom and dad, Nana and Tata. But I believe even those are borrowed. So in its the truest sense, no, but when we borrow words, definitely. 00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:22.000 I see. Alright. Rewinding once again after high school, um, did you go to college? 00:28:22.000 --> 00:29:07.000 Yes. Yeah. So, well, I went to college and then I got DQ'ed, I got academically disqualified, went to community college and then was too proud to pull out loans or ask for money. So I was working. So I did that. School, got kicked out, work. I did that for four years. 2012, joined the military. A lot of irony there. Got out in 2016, went back to school. Well, I went back to school before I even got out. But at 2016, went back to Southwestern College in Chula Vista, got my associates, transferred to Cal State Long Beach. And then I finished up in 2019. 00:29:07.000 --> 00:29:08.000 Okay. And what was your degree in? 00:29:08.000 --> 00:29:09.999 Computer science. 00:29:09.999 --> 00:29:12.000 Computer science. And what branch of the military were you in? 00:29:12.000 --> 00:29:13.998 Marine Corps. Yeah. 00:29:13.998 --> 00:29:26.000 Okay. And after you graduated, did you immediately go into the computer science field or was there a time where you were kind of figuring out what you wanted to do? 00:29:26.000 --> 00:30:33.000 So I went right into it because during my last semester, I had an internship when I was at Cal State Long Beach. I had an internship with Northrop Grumman in their, like, aerospace sector. They like renamed it. At the time it was called Aerospace. It might be called something different like space. Oh, it's called, I think now it's called Space Systems. And they have aeronautical systems. 'cause they wanted that elevation difference . Um, but I, so I was doing that. And yeah, it was a mix of like computer science, computer engineering, what I was doing there. When they gave me a job offer, I asked them if I can go to San Diego. They got me one, went down to San Diego, one of the offices in RB (Rancho Bernardo). And yeah, I was doing, I would say it was still like a mix of what I was doing. There was like a little computer sciencey somewhat IT, like some--they call it DevOps. Like it's kind of like the middle boat. And then now I work at Apple and I'm doing like legit software development. 00:30:33.000 --> 00:30:44.000 Very cool. Congratulations! And do you meet Chamorro software engineers frequently or Pacific Islanders software engineers? 00:30:44.000 --> 00:31:55.000 Yeah. I wouldn't say frequently. 'cause that definitely whenever I meet even a Pacific Islander in, in tech, it's always like, oh wow. Um, in terms of Chamorro's though, I wanna say the first software engineer I met was through one of Dr. Michael's classes. I'm not, I'm gonna just call him Miget , um, Miget's classes. And he's a software engineer for Costco. I think he lives in the Pacific Northwest. And I was like, oh wow, that's cool. Like, I've never met another one. He's like, oh, have you met Benny? And so he introduced me to another, another guy older than me. I was like, should I call him uncle? I don't think so. But Benny, he's a, he's been a software developer for like 20 something years. Doing mostly like web development. And so I was like, oh wow, okay. There's more of us. But aside from that, I don't think, I know there is, I haven't met this person, but I know someone is running, there's like an online dictionary. They took this Chamorro dictionary and made it into a website. And I know they're running it or like they were given the grant to do it or something. And so I know, I don't know who that person is though. I, I should reach out. 00:31:55.000 --> 00:32:03.968 That's very cool. So they're like a, so it sounds like there's like a network--Or at least loosely? 00:32:03.968 --> 00:32:28.000 If there is, I'm not a part of it yet. I have always wanted to, because even though my interest started in computer science, because I got so deep in the language space, I, I have always wanted to do something in the computational linguistics field. Ever since I started learning, I'm like, man, this would be really cool. But I just haven't because I've been too busy trying to learn the language and trying to teach the language. 00:32:28.000 --> 00:32:48.000 Do you feel like you're close to a point now where you might be able to move towards that computational linguistics? Because from an outsider's perspective, it sounds like you're very fluent and very knowledgeable about the language and how it's structured and you could teach it. 00:32:48.000 --> 00:33:27.000 Yeah, I don't think so. I think it's, to me, it's still a dream just because I have found so much community and love and appreciation for the work I'm doing. Like, just like on social media, you know, or just by meeting with people and speaking the language to them. I think right now, that outweighs my desire to try and beat Google at creating a translate. Because if you go to translate.google.com, they have Chamorro. And in the past month we've been roasting it 'cause it's incredibly wrong. It's so wrong. It's funny. 00:33:27.000 --> 00:33:42.000 Okay. Um, speaking of social media, I noticed that you have an Instagram page that's kind of devoted to the Chamorro language and Chamorro culture and experience. What caused you to want to create that? 00:33:42.000 --> 00:33:53.000 There was a time, I think I started last year. So currently I'm on break because I have a four month old at home. 00:33:53.000 --> 00:33:54.000 Congratulations! 00:33:54.000 --> 00:34:32.000 Thank you. But I was like, I'm gonna take a break because I'm probably not gonna have the time. And then my wife's back in school, so it was like, okay, really no time. But when I had started it, my cousin had showed me a video from TikTok and there was a guy, he's not even Chamorro, but I think his wife is Chamorro, and he was just speaking Chamorro. He was a student of the Chief Hurao Academy. He did their adult program. He's like, uh, he's like, I should learn because my kid, I want my kid to learn. And so he had a video and he made stuff he like, was just saying, I think, I don't even remember what the video was about. 00:34:32.000 --> 00:35:14.000 I think it was just phrases. But you can tell from the video that he was on island because he was making references that like, you probably only understand if you're around the culture. And specifically on the island though. And my cousin showed me this and she was like, Dabit, you should do this. You should make videos like you're a good teacher. 'cause at the time too, actually, I was doing my own Zoom class with my cousins, which reminds me, I told them I'd start back up and I haven't, but I was doing that and they're like, you should do this. You're so social, you're so out there. Like, you should just do it. And yeah, that's really it. I just, one day I was like, you know what, here's some lines. Make a video. I put it out there. And then I did it again. 00:35:14.000 --> 00:35:51.000 I don't think it was until maybe the fifth video where people were like, who is this guy? Why are you, you know? And then I had people comment, I had friends who were like, do you write scripts? And I was like, not really. They're like, you should write scripts, blah, blah, blah. They're like, it looks like you're doing all your videos in one take. I'm like, I am. They're like, don't. They're like, just say what you can. Don't stop recording if you mess up. Just like kind of run it back and just stitch things together. And I was like, oh my god. Yeah. This is so much better. Um, and then it's actually funny because I haven't made a video since like four or five months ago. But recently I went to Oregon. They had the first annual, the first ever, I don't know what the correct term is. 00:35:51.000 --> 00:37:01.000 There was a Mariana's Festival in Fair, Fairview, Oregon. And I went there and there's another Chamorro social, um, like social media person who doesn't make language content necessarily. It's like, not the focus, but she's trying to incorporate it. And she was like, we should go around and ask people stuff. I'll ask in English, you ask, you want, and when I checked this morning, I think the video, the video's been up for like a week and it has like over a hundred thousand views. Wow. People are texting my mom and she's like, is this your son? Because it came up on my feed. You know, people are, people are texting my wife, they're like, is this your husband? Like, what? he popped up on my feed? You know? Or like my sister-in-law, she's like, oh my God, look what just popped up on my feed. You, you know? And I'm just like, wow. Um, and yeah, like, man, like practically every comment is like, wow, it's so cool to hear the language. Because at the festival I knew the, I knew like my friends who were there, who were speakers who were in the same classes as me, so I felt comfortable asking them, you know, I was like, yeah, like blah, blah, blah. And people were like, wow, these people, these kids, you know, they look at me and they're like, these kids know the language and Okay. 00:37:01.000 --> 00:37:15.000 It, it's a very cool video. I actually watched it before our meeting today. It's really interesting. And I actually had a couple questions regarding the video. Mostly to do with kind of food and culture and how those two kind of intersect. You have mentioned that one of your favorite foods was apigigi'? 00:37:15.000 --> 00:37:19.000 Apigigi' 00:37:19.000 --> 00:37:21.497 Apigigi'. And what is apigigi'? 00:37:21.497 --> 00:38:02.000 So it is a, it's a cooked dessert. So you get like coconut shreds. Well, I used coconut shreds. I don't know if some people use the shredded coconut. I'm not sure. Actually. I use coconut shreds. But you put that and then you have, um, we call it mendioka. It's, I think it's tapioca like the starch and stuff. Um, with some leche niyok , which is the coconut milk and sugar, you mix it all together, you slap it in, traditionally a banana leaf and then you wrap it up, close it, you grill it, and then you wait until it closes down and then you can eat it. 00:38:02.000 --> 00:38:03.499 Sounds delicious! 00:38:03.499 --> 00:38:07.000 It is! Yeah. And it's not that many ingredients, you know, so it's like really easy. 00:38:07.000 --> 00:38:11.000 And the other dish that I heard mentioned was, um, Kelaguen? 00:38:11.000 --> 00:38:12.000 Kelaguen. 00:38:12.000 --> 00:38:16.000 And it sounded like you could have kelaguen with multiple different kinds of protein? 00:38:16.000 --> 00:38:17.000 Yes. 00:38:17.000 --> 00:38:18.998 So what is kelaguen? 00:38:18.998 --> 00:39:18.000 Kelaguen is effectively, it's kind of like an escabeche. That's how we say it. I don't even know what the?...a ceviche? Okay. Um, I think technically the term comes from a Filipino word, kilawin. And their kilawin was, I wanna say more fish based. But yeah, you, you effectively take a protein and cook it in acid. Like that's really all it is. I think. I was actually taught recently that the traditional word before kelaguen was just, um, naynay. And I could see how that can fall out of use. Mm. Um, but technically that, yeah, that it's just cooking something in like acids. So the most popular one is kelaguen mannok or chicken kelaguen. You grill your meat, you chop it up, not too big, not too small. And then you get like, salt, lemon, add your decorations, like your green onions and stuff. 00:39:18.000 --> 00:39:57.000 But effectively the salt also helps cook it. And it come and you serve it cold though, you know, so you, after you cook and everything, you mix everything. You don't serve it, you can eat it the same day. Growing up, my family always did it, and then we ate it the next day. Because it's a bit softer. The first and last time I made kelaguen katne, which is beef kelaguen. Um, I cut it too big. But yeah, it was just that. And then it was like lemon vinegar, soy sauce or something. So I forget all the ingredients I added. Put it in the fridge the next day we were eating it, you know, and I was like, I was like, is this really gonna cook it? And they're like, yes, chemistry, it's gonna work. I promise 00:39:57.000 --> 00:40:05.000 That's great. And when you prepare food, is it a communal thing or is it a single chef preparing meals for everyone? 00:40:05.000 --> 00:40:50.000 You know, growing up it was definitely a communal thing. At least when it came to, I mean, especially when it came to the Fiesta, you're doing a lot of things. You know, at the Guam Club, they have an outdoor kitchen, or they had, I haven't been there in a while, like the kitchen area, but I remember they had a table that was really just like a cutting board. The, the whole table was like a cutting board. And yeah, they would have people grilling, they'd bring the chicken over and you chop it up, you know, you're doing everything and then you pass it on to the next person. Each person kind of had a role, you know. You had people grilling, you had the people tearing the meat off the bone, then you had the people cutting, then you had the people mixing, you know, and then you had the people like, um, setting it aside, preparing it and stuff. 00:40:50.000 --> 00:41:44.000 When I, the last, the first and last time, no, no, no. It wasn't the first last time I made apigigi' I did it for the language immersion program we did here. Prugraman Sinipok. And I taught the class. And so like, that was a communal thing. We had everybody make it. I was worried at first 'cause like, oh, they're not gonna all be the same. But I think it gave it a kind of like, nice little style. It's like, oh, some people made it this way. Some people made 'em real small. Some people made 'em big , you know. And, and I remember when we brought it to the, the following day, there was a picnic for the Guam Liberation. And I brought it and people were so surprised. They were like, nobody ever does this. And in my mind I was like, what? This is the easiest thing to make . And so now it's like something I want to do, kind of a tradition. Like I almost wanna start in my family now. Maybe with just me first, like, oh, I think I can show you how to make it if you like it. Um, so traditionally I would say very communal thing. 00:41:44.000 --> 00:41:58.359 And you mentioned your family and bringing the Chamorro culture into your family and making it a part of your own family. Do you speak Chamorro to your children? 00:41:58.359 --> 00:42:50.000 So I try to with our 4-year-old, gonna be five in October. I try to as much as I can with him because he is more cognizant and more responsive. It can be hard, but I know he's getting it. With our baby. I only speak Chamorro to the baby. Sometimes I'll say things to my mom in Chamorro because I know she understands. Not so much with my dad though, because I know his understanding is less. And so I guess it would depend on what it is. Like, if it's like, I'm like, oh, where's mom? I'll say that, you know. But with my mom, I can say like, oh, are you gonna go outside because if you are, can you do this? You know, like longer thoughts. My wife picks up the things I say to the kids. So she knows those words, but I don't talk to her in Chamorro. 00:42:50.000 --> 00:42:52.000 Okay. 00:42:52.000 --> 00:42:56.000 And my sister lives with us. She said she wants to learn. She's waiting for me to start teaching 00:42:56.000 --> 00:43:00.000 So you gotta get on it. . 00:43:00.000 --> 00:43:02.994 Yeah, gotta get on it. 00:43:02.994 --> 00:43:09.000 Has your wife or your father or mother, have they shown more interest now that you are so into the language? 00:43:09.000 --> 00:43:23.000 Yes. My mom, especially now that I only speak Chamorro to this baby. And so within the last four months I've heard more Chamorro come out of my mom's mouth than the last two or three years we've lived together. Which is something, you know. 00:43:23.000 --> 00:43:24.000 That's wonderful. 00:43:24.000 --> 00:44:01.843 Yeah. Even if it's funny little things like, did you poop? Or why are you stinky? Let's change your diaper. But because it's the only way I communicate with this baby, I think it makes my mom want to. And my dad will say words like, you're stinky, you know, or you pooped, you threw up. You know, very short things. But definitely again, like the most Chamorro I've ever heard, leave his mouth, you know? Um, yeah. 00:44:01.843 --> 00:44:09.000 That's great! And, you mentioned the Prugraman Sinipok and that's a cultural immersion program. For two weeks or so outta the year, they take students from all over and immerse them in the Chamorro cultural and language. 00:44:09.000 --> 00:44:09.500 Yes. 00:44:09.500 --> 00:44:11.995 And how did that start? 00:44:11.995 --> 00:45:35.000 So this was the third year. This was the first year I helped though. It started through someone else. Uh, her name is June Pangelinan. She lives in like the Bay Area (near San Francisco, CA). Or near there, I would say. But she, it, it was like her thing. She was also a student of Miget's and was like, I think we should, I think we should do a language immersion program. You know, and Miget was just like, if you plan it, I'll do it. You know, 'cause Miget is always down, but in, in the same way. For me, it's like, I'm always down, but I don't want to plan. Like, if you tell me what I can do or give me a spot, I will fulfill that role for however long. I'm just not good at planning though. But yeah. So it was, it was June's like, whole vision. You know, she linked up with Miget and the first two years they actually did it on Guam. And like, so yeah, like that first year I tried to go. It, it didn't work out for me 'cause I was actually in the middle of switching jobs. So when the program was happening, that's when I was going to join Apple. And so it didn't line up. I tried to, I tried to make it line up. I was like, no, okay, I'll leave work, go to Guam, come back, start working. 00:45:35.000 --> 00:45:37.495 Just didn't quite line up. 00:45:37.495 --> 00:45:38.495 Yeah, exactly. 00:45:38.495 --> 00:45:45.000 And how many students in general have you seen the program grow over the last three years? Or has it stayed kind of the same core group of students? 00:45:45.000 --> 00:46:29.000 It's stayed the same number of students. I would say. Like no more than 20, maybe especially the first two years. Because they had to fly to Guam and then pay for the program and then probably get housing if they didn't have family or know anybody out there. Out here, it was less of a, I would say a burden, but maybe less of a interest for some people. Because from my understanding, from what I was told the first two years, I would say we're definitely more culturally focused. Not as much language. This year, there was a lot of language, but we didn't have as much culture. We definitely had culture and they definitely had language, but the offset was there for sure. 00:46:29.000 --> 00:46:34.000 Because it was harder to do here in San Diego. Couldn't go to the same Island towns? 00:46:34.000 --> 00:47:04.000 Yeah. I, we had a Liberation picnic at Balboa Park. They have a house of Chamorros, which is like amazing within itself because usually it's relegated for countries. Right. and then the Guam Club. And then we have local folks whose parents are still alive. And so like, there was a day where we went out, we went down to Chula Vista and, you know, tried to get with them and hear the language come from them. 00:47:04.000 --> 00:47:12.000 Very cool. Is it, is it common that elders will want to participate in the program? 00:47:12.000 --> 00:47:54.000 I would say not common. Definitely not common. We have some elders. We have some elders in the classes that Miget teaches because for them they're like, oh, I know the language, but I don't know how to read it. You know, or I don't know how to write it. So that's what they join for, but they speak the language mm-hmm. So it's like a big benefit to the other students who join. 'cause they could hear it come fluently. But then, and it's always funny too. Yeah. 'cause when I started communicating with, with these folks and when they would write stuff, I'm like, they're literally writing it the way they say it. And to me, that was amazing. You know, it's like, oh, I wasn't sick. 00:47:54.000 --> 00:48:15.000 But yeah,it was really hard. This wasn't my job and I'm thankful it wasn't my job. It was my friend, Clarissa Mangiola, I call her mames, which just means sweet. Reese, it was, it was, it was her job to find folks who would want to participate. And from what she told me, it was really hard. Yeah. 00:48:15.000 --> 00:48:17.000 Why do you think that is? 00:48:17.000 --> 00:48:49.000 There's, I think this goes back to maybe the trauma part where some folks might not see use in the language. A lot of times they don't feel qualified to teach us. And I, I think it's part of the approach of the way we approach them, where it's like, can you teach these kids what you know? Or can, you know, impress upon them your knowledge or whatever. And they feel like, well, oh, they don't want to hear me speak because I don't speak like academically or I don't speak professionally. 00:48:49.000 --> 00:49:45.000 I don't speak eloquently. You know, which is to me always been funny because that's not the Chamorro I've ever wanted to learn. Like, I didn't want to learn like a city academic, Chamorro, you know, I wanted to hear the way my grandparents spoke, specifically my mom's mom. When I think back, my dad's mom did kind of feel, she definitely had an accent and stuff, but it definitely felt more proper. And where, and the village she's from is like the capital of Guam, you know? So it's like, very much surrounded by the like American culture, but where my mom's mom is from, considered the south and very much different. You know, more rural, you know, country living, so to speak. And so that, that's when I actually started learning the language. She, my mom's mom is who I picked to model my speak chapter. 00:49:45.000 --> 00:50:04.000 And my aunties are like, that's not how mom sounded, you know. But it's gotten me a lot of compliments from elders. They're like, wow, you're good. Like, where did you learn to speak? You know? I'm like, memory really? Because I don't have any audio recordings or anything of my grandmother. Just kind of what's embedded in me. 00:50:04.000 --> 00:50:07.000 Were you able to speak more with your grandmother while she was here? 00:50:07.000 --> 00:50:36.000 No. So I didn't start learning until 2020. My dad's mom passed in, 2009, 2010. And then my mom's mom passed in 2012. And so yeah, I did not. The closest I would say is my mom's sister. She's still around, thankfully. And every time I get the chance I talk to her in Chamorro. 00:50:36.000 --> 00:50:44.397 If you could have a conversation with your mom's mom, what would you like to talk about? 00:50:44.397 --> 00:51:30.000 Wow. That's a good question. I would probably, I would ask her about her childhood and just start from there. Because there's, when we started learning the language, when Miget started teaching the language, he told everyone, if you have speakers in your family, talk to them. He's like, don't ask them about the war. Do not ask them about the war. You know, he was always very, you know, because it's definitely not something they like to talk about, you know? Um, but I would definitely just be like, where did you actually grow up? 'cause I don't know if she grew up in Yona, it's the village. She repped and claimed, but I don't know if she like spent her childhood there. I would ask her what she remembers about her grandparents or her parents. What her favorite foods were, what her most annoying chores were. 00:51:30.000 --> 00:52:16.000 Things like, what did you do for fun? You know? 'cause that's like another thing that I came to realize was, something that kind of skipped--it would come into this language barrier where the things, as I've talked to other elders, I asked them what they used to do for fun. It's like stuff I wouldn't consider fun. It's like, not stuff I thought they would say. You know, like I had an elder tell me, oh, when we were cleaning, we would race to see who could clean certain-- a board of the house faster. You know, they would like, okay, these are my two boards. These are your two boards and we'll race. And the reason it was fun though, is because for scrubbers, they would literally use coconut shells, you know, the really husky ones and they would just like scrub it. 00:52:16.000 --> 00:53:03.000 They're like, whoever can do it first, you know, wins. And he told me that and I was like, oh, okay. Yeah. I mean, I could see how that could be fun if you're doing it with your siblings. You know, your friends. And so I definitely would like to know what my grandmas liked doing for fun, what her favorite foods were. 'cause they're definitely, I would assume different, you know? 'cause even something like kelaguen mannok, I wouldn't even consider that like an everyday meal because it takes so much labor. It's not, it's definitely not something you're doing all the time. You know, we have like soups for that, you know. If she remembers what kind of music. As I've learned, as I've delve deeper into the language, I've become more aware of cultural things. I'd probably ask her that. I'd ask her if there were any talageros who's in her family, which are like the fisher people who go out and throw the nets. 00:53:03.000 --> 00:53:39.000 If any of her family sang. Kantan Chamorrita, which is like a, it's like a free verse style singing, which I've come to been told is some folks used to communicate like that. Like just through singing they would say the language, they'd be singing what they're doing. And then if the other person knows the tune, they do it back. You know, some kantan chamorritas are meant for competition. Some of 'em are meant to be endearing. Some of 'em are meant to be wooing someone, you know. So I definitely would ask her like very specific her things, maybe village things. But then definitely would like, I'd be interested about the culture, 00:53:39.000 --> 00:53:45.000 That would be a very cool way to communicate with somebody in kind of a song. Call and repeat kind of thing. 00:53:45.000 --> 00:54:33.000 Yeah. When I went to Oregon, actually, when I was hanging out, I went there with two of my-- I went there to visit two of my friends, they live there. They're speakers. They're like, I would consider them my teachers now, you know? And we were out in the city, we were like walking back from dinner or something, and my friend just starts going with a tune, like, you know. And he was like and then he looked at me and I was like, oh, shoot, okay. I was like, you're not done with your verse, but I'll go, you know . And we just, we did that for a good couple of blocks and I was actually surprised. I was like, wow. Like I was able to do that, you know? 00:54:33.000 --> 00:54:35.000 I was like, sometimes they didn't make sense, but-- 00:54:35.000 --> 00:54:48.000 You just stuck with it and you were right there in the, the melody and verse.--and I know we're running out of time here, but did you have anything that you wanted to talk about or anything that you wanted to say? 00:54:48.000 --> 00:55:51.000 I don't know if I have anything specific. Just that I'm very grateful that I'm able to learn the language because I've had tremendous support from my family, from my friends, from my wife, my kids, you know. I know people who struggle to find the time, you know, struggle to fit it within the typical schedules, right? Like Miget's class used to be Fridays at 4:00 PM until-- 4:00 PM or 5:00 PM and 6:00 PM all the way up until 7:00 PM. And then, once November rolls around. We do daylight saving times. Guam doesn't. And so it's like 3:00 PM--, you know, now though, it's Saturday in the States 'cause he does 'em on Sunday, so it'll probably be a little bit easier. But, I just know so many people. There's people who we started in the same classes 2020 January. Right. And I'm so far ahead of them. 00:55:51.000 --> 00:56:53.000 It's, and I don't know if that's a testament to just how deep I went or also how much time I've been able to give because, yeah, like, at the festival I ran into someone and I was, we've been in classes for years and I was, I didn't have a good grasp of how fluent they were, but when I saw 'em, I was so excited. I hugged them really tight and I was like, oh my God. And then I just started going, you know, and she was just like, you're so fluent now. What happened? You know? And so, yeah, like honestly, I'm just incredibly grateful that I've been able to learn as much as I can. And actually recently, well not even recently, it's been since December, I have another teacher who's teaching me stuff too. I would say like deeper context of things because as much as I love Miget's class, there was a point where he has to start over. 00:56:53.000 --> 00:57:25.000 You know, it's like college for him. Gotta start over, gotta start over. And so there came to a certain point where I was like, shoot, I need more. You know? 'cause I definitely don't think staying in his classes forever will benefit you as much as getting the taste. It's like college, getting the taste and then going on. And so I'm just happy that I was able to find other people who also want to go deeper into the language, learn as much as we can. We found a teacher and so, I mean, that's really it. I'm just incredibly grateful. 00:57:25.000 --> 00:57:31.000 That's awesome. We're very grateful for you coming out here and spending the time and giving this interview. So I just wanna say thank you very much. 00:57:31.000 --> 00:57:33.545 Yeah, of course. Thank you. 00:57:33.545 --> 00:57:38.545 Alright., take this. We were an hour on the dot. NOTE TRANSCRIPTION END ]]> https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en video Property rights reside with the university. Copyrights are retained by the creators of the records and their heirs. This resource is licensed for noncommercial educational use using CC NC-BY 4.0. Please contact Special Collections at archives csusm.edu if you need reproductions made. Please see the related “Preferred Citation note” for language on citing materials&#13 ; from this collection. Permission to examine Library materials is not authorization to publish or to reproduce the examined material in whole, or in part. 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The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=TaitingfongDavid_SheehanRobert_access_2024-08-30.xml TaitingfongDavid_SheehanRobert_access_2024-08-30.xml https://archivessearch.csusm.edu/repositories/3/resources/19 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Taitingfong, David. Interview August 30th, 2024. Description An account of the resource David Taitingfong is a member of the Chamorro community and involved with the group Prugraman Sinipok, which teaches a two week Chamorro language immersion program. David describes his involvement with Prugraman Sinipok and how his interest in sharing the Chamorro lanugage and culture has shaped his life. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC027-083 Subject The topic of the resource Language revival Chamorro language Chamorro (Micronesian people) -- History Chamorro (Micronesian people) -- Social life and customs Colonization -- Spain -- Oceania Colonization -- Japan Colonization -- United States -- Guam Decolonization -- Guam Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2024-08-30 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video Asian Pacific Islander Desi American experience Community history Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral Histories Description An account of the resource Video and audio oral histories can be viewed here. Histories are listed alphabetically by last name. Individual histories are indexed and transcribed and can be searched. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <p>Rights to oral histories vary depending on the history. The library owns the copyright to some histories, and has license to reproduce for nonprofit purposes for others. Please contact CSUSM University Library Special Collections at <a href="mailto:%20archives@csusm.edu">archives@csusm.edu</a> with any questions about use.</p> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Judith Downie Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Jim Carr OHMS Object This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS Viewer) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=CarrJim_DownieJudith_2017-09-26.xml Interview Keyword This filed adds keywords to the Omeka Oral History item type. Keywords are included in the OHMS XML, this field in Omeka will allow for full data migration between OHMS XML and the Omeka Record. This field does not impact the OHMS / Omeka integration and is optional if you do not need to map the "keywords" field in the OHMS XML to the corresponding Omeka record. Distribution Services;CSUSM;Asset tracking OHMS Object Text This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka 6.0 Carr, Jim. Interview, September 26, 2017 SC027-091 00:00:00 SC027 California State University San Marcos University Library oral history collection CSUSM csusm Distribution Services ; CSUSM ; Asset tracking Jim Carr Judith Downie sound CarrJim_DownieJudith_2017-09-26.m4a 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/31e232bd190157b0333d3c3a3d37e764.m4a Other audio English 0 Introduction 0 28 Accountable fixed assets for CSUSM Jim talks about the folder he brought into the interview that documents Cal State San Marcos' fixed assets across 82 pages. That folder is included in CSUSM library Special Collection. Fixed assets ; Cal State San Marcos ; Asset tracking 0 333 Education and Employment in the CSU System Jim talks about his education at San Diego State University where he received a Bachelor's degree in English and worked as a student assistant. His work as a student assistant at SDSU eventully led him to his career as a property manager at SDSU and then CSUSM. Asset tracking ; Education ; San Diego State University ; Cal State San Marcos ; Student employment 0 1008 Watching the University Grow Jim discusses how CSUSM has grown in his 24 years working on the campus. Blossoming into a campus with over 17,000 students. CSUSM ; Expansion ; Student experience 0 1379 Barcoding Assets Jim talks about one of the largest projects during his tenure at CSUSM, barcoding all of the fixed assets on campus. Barcodes ; Fixed assets ; Asset tracking 0 1604 Sustainability and Purchasing Jim talks about the ways that his department worked with other departments on campus to create sustainable plans for the retirement of assets and how on campus purchasing plays a part in that project. Sustainability ; Asset retirement ; Asset planning ; Asset tracking 0 2175 Technology Growth in Higher Education Jim talks about how technology has been implemented within the CSU system over the course of his career. Email ; Technology development ; Higher education ; CSUSM ; SDSU 0 2292 Retirement Jim talks about his plans for retirement which include staying active on the Retiree's Association and backpacking with his grandson. Backpacking ; Retirement ; Retiree's Association 0 2542 Asset End of Life Planning Jim talks about how assets are retired from the CSU system through sustainable means. Donations or reselling old er assets are often used as ways to retire old assets and keep them out of landfills. Sustainability ; Asset retirement ; CSUSM ; Donations 0 2898 Crunching the Numbers Jim talks about how he did some quick calculations to see how many thousands of miles he drove during his commutes and how much money was spent on fuel. Trivia ; Commuting ; Expenses ; CSUSM 0 Oral history Jim Carr spent 23 years at California State University San Marcos working for the Distribution Services team and was instrumental in implementing the first barcoded inventory tracking system for the University. Jim discusses his time working for CSUSM as part of Distribution Services and how his education and background led to him this job. NOTE TRANSCRIPTION BEGIN 00:00:01.314 --> 00:00:16.155 Okay, this is Tuesday, September 26th, 2017. Judith Downie, Special Collections and History Librarian at Cal State San Marcos with Jim Carr, of Materials Management at CSUSM to record an oral history. 00:00:16.155 --> 00:00:19.545 Okay, so this picks up very, very well. So-- 00:00:19.545 --> 00:00:19.885 Very well, 00:00:19.885 --> 00:00:20.714 Don't worry about speaking. 00:00:20.714 --> 00:00:21.942 Good morning, Judith. 00:00:21.942 --> 00:00:23.047 Good morning. Jim 00:00:23.047 --> 00:00:28.995 Jim Carr here, also known as James Carr, in case any official documents need to be-- 00:00:28.995 --> 00:00:48.704 Okay. So let's go back to what you were talking about before I got the recorder started. There's about three quarters of an inch of eleven by four or --eight and a half by fourteen (inch) paper. Computer printout with signatures from Ernest Zumwalt, Patricia Harris, and Ron Neu-- 00:00:48.704 --> 00:00:49.395 Farris 00:00:49.395 --> 00:00:50.085 Harris. 00:00:50.085 --> 00:00:51.005 Farris. Farris. 00:00:51.005 --> 00:01:12.355 Farris, I'm sorry, it's been so long since I've used her name. And Ron New who, in regards to an inventory of assets here at Cal State San Marcos. And Jim is giving it to us for storage in the archives as part of our campus startups. The document is dated 1994. And so this will be in the University collection when it is processed. 00:01:12.355 --> 00:01:13.685 Okay. Yes. 00:01:13.685 --> 00:01:14.754 So you wanna explain this document? 00:01:14.754 --> 00:01:50.484 It's 82 pages of, the accountable fixed assets that the university, first accounted for after a long process of converting, manual inventory labels into barcoded assets. And once we were all accounted for, this is what we used and was signed up for as a dollar amount and a number of items that the University was gonna start accounting for in the fixed asset category, for accounting purposes. 00:01:50.484 --> 00:01:55.954 And what I love is I'm seeing computer monitors. Apple. Back in the days when we had Apples. 00:01:55.954 --> 00:01:56.525 Yeah. There's-- 00:01:56.525 --> 00:01:59.564 Then we went to PC and then we came back to Apple. So. 00:01:59.564 --> 00:02:00.000 Yeah, 00:02:00.000 --> 00:02:02.000 We've kind of gone full circle here. 00:02:02.000 --> 00:02:32.044 Yeah. We kind of went back and forth there for a while and of course back then we were asset tracking at a $500 threshold. And then around the year 2000 we went to a $1,500 threshold and now we're at a $2,500 threshold. Hopefully at some point the Chancellors office will find a way for all the campus' to be on common ground in that regard. But right now every campus is a little different in how they track assets, so there we are. 00:02:32.044 --> 00:02:35.155 That's kind of a campus system standard it seems like. 00:02:35.155 --> 00:02:48.914 Yeah. I also have some old, letterhead that I happen to have acquired somehow that actually talks about, the old address at the University before it moved onto our current location here. 00:02:48.914 --> 00:02:50.564 Without a logo or anything. 00:02:50.564 --> 00:03:00.555 Yeah. Without a logo. It's from the College of Arts and Sciences, and the address on it is 820 West Los Viacitos Boulevard in San Marcos. So, in other words, when we were across the freeway. 00:03:00.555 --> 00:03:03.965 With the area code of 619. That's been a long time. 00:03:03.965 --> 00:03:27.000 Yeah, that's right. Also some old one with our old logo here. From accounting. That's nothing much there. I also have something,(19)91 that was just kind of interesting. back in the earlier days of the University, of course we had a program called Central Stores and it was kind of like what would later become Office Max or Staples or something. And-- 00:03:27.000 --> 00:03:28.354 I had forgotten about that. 00:03:28.354 --> 00:03:36.485 --chargebacks at the time, 1991. Just little things of what we used to carry in the warehouse that we would deliver to campus when somebody was interested in that. 00:03:36.485 --> 00:03:39.205 I remember ordering reams of colored paper and things like that. 00:03:39.205 --> 00:04:21.444 And then of course, in the early days too, being a small university, our department, and our warehouse workers were responsible for every move on campus at the time. And Ron Neu at the time, used to track who had asked for a particular move on a date, when it was completed and how long it took. So anyway, that's just kind of interesting in that it references a lot of the employees that were on campus at the time, in fact there's even a few that are still around, like Kathy Martin. It won't be around much longer. Or, Marcy Boyle up in, the provost's office, that kind of a thing. So there's some very interesting history to look at. So if you're interested in that. 00:04:21.444 --> 00:04:22.764 Oh, that's fabulous. Yes! Thank you. 00:04:22.764 --> 00:04:24.444 You're more than welcome to archive that. 00:04:24.444 --> 00:04:32.095 That's in the manila folder. Yeah, I, let's see, Mitchell, I wonder if that's Dannis Mitchell or. 00:04:32.095 --> 00:04:34.264 Susan Mitchell. It's probably Dannis. 00:04:34.264 --> 00:04:38.345 And then there was also another D. Mitchell. It was Judy Taylor's daughter. 00:04:38.345 --> 00:04:39.644 Oh, really? 00:04:39.644 --> 00:04:46.774 Oh, what was her name? She worked in, boy. Yeah, this is going back. Oh, I see. Yee. So that would be probably Michael Yee. 00:04:46.774 --> 00:04:48.963 Mike Yee or Criselda Yee maybe. 00:04:48.963 --> 00:04:50.426 Yeah, who just retired. 00:04:50.426 --> 00:04:51.706 Yeah, he just retired. 00:04:51.706 --> 00:04:52.475 Oh, there's Theresa Handy. 00:04:52.475 --> 00:04:53.764 Yeah. Still here. 00:04:53.764 --> 00:04:58.125 Oh yeah, I'm seeing a lot of names down there that take me down-- 00:04:58.125 --> 00:05:04.925 Yeah, interesting names. So I, again, I just kind of thought something I found when I was going through my files that I thought maybe the archives would be interesting. 00:05:04.925 --> 00:05:17.725 Yeah, no, definitely. Wonderful. Okay. Very good. Well, here's a rough idea of kinds of questions you could answer. And of course, if you take off from those and talk about something else, that's absolutely fabulous. 00:05:17.725 --> 00:05:19.463 Okay. That sounds good. 00:05:19.463 --> 00:05:33.485 And here is a clipping from the San Diego North County Times with-- this goes through 2004. So that's not, of course exhausted by any means, but it might trigger a few things 'cause. 00:05:33.485 --> 00:05:51.024 Absolutely. And I can certainly, relate to this in, in several regards. And I'll tie in my history here. I'll start with where I was before. CSUSM back, of course my history with the CSU actually spans 44 years. 00:05:51.024 --> 00:05:51.634 Wow. 00:05:51.634 --> 00:08:53.206 When you count the idea that I actually went to San Diego State and was a college student there, starting in the fall of 1973. And I graduated in May of 1978. And during that time, I was able to be employed as a student assistant in the property office there under a gentleman named John Hines at the time. And, he put me to work as a inventory student to go around to different buildings and do inventory. So I'd take a clipboard and a piece of paper and I would write down asset tag numbers and record those and give them to John to, you know, do his tracking and accountability for those. And I remember, at the time we had just opened a brand new art building and I was very excited 'cause John handed me his master keys, said, Jim, go through every room in this building and find every asset you can find 'cause we wanna make sure we know what got moved into that new building. So that was fun. And it was a very good experience and a very good precursor to learning all the things that I did that I brought to Cal State San Marcos. But before I got to San Marcos again, I spent a couple years as a student assistant. I also worked over in, what was called the Duplication Department, doing deliveries of printed materials as, what they would call secretaries back then needed particular copies made. And of course, back then they had their great big printing machines. There was no such thing as, printers. There were still mimeograph machines and all that back then and typewriters by the galore 'cause that was the mid seventies (1970s). So, apparently I was well-liked as a student assistant. 'cause I did graduate and I worked off campus for a couple of years. And during those couple of years off campus, I worked for a delivery service that handled a lot of medical accounts. It was kind of like a small, say like a FedEx home delivery type business. And our accounts were mainly, medical at the time. So we delivered to a lot of pharmacies, medical labs, dental labs. And for a short while, there was actually a veterinary account that we carried. And one of my routes during that time carried me from Kearney Mesa, all the way up to the small town of San Marcos. So this would see be around 1979, 1980, somewhere in there. And on one trip at the end of my day, I remember driving down this long road delivering to a chicken ranch, and I can almost guarantee that it was the Prohoroff Chicken Ranch. And I delivered a small box of veterinary supplies. And I don't remember much of it other than it was a long road. And I found someone out there that could sign for the package. I handed it to 'em and off I went. But it's just fascinating that I probably came to the Chicken ranch once in my career. 00:08:53.206 --> 00:08:56.195 And no inkling you were going to be back there for something. 00:08:56.195 --> 00:09:01.294 I had no idea. Absolutely. So that was just a great story. 00:09:01.294 --> 00:10:51.645 later on, I found out that there was an opening in the department, that I had worked for at San Diego State, and I applied for that position and, took that position in September of 1980. And that began my employment career in the California State University system. So I went to work, in the property office. And, I spent twelve and a half years working at San Diego State. And during that time, I certainly remember that, San Diego State, of course had a satellite campus out in Imperial Valley at the time. Well, up there in the North County, growing as it was, the University wanted to establish a North County campus up there. And, again, based on your history here, I can see that in September of 1979, a satellite branch of the university opened in Vista, for 148 students. And I remember, it may have been after this point, but at one point, the North County satellite campus moved to a location on the Lincoln Middle School, I believe. And they actually, assigned an admin coordinator, secretary, whatever you wanna say, in a trailer there at that location. And that secretary needed some furniture. She would need a desk, she would need a table, a file cabinet, maybe, bookcase, something like that. And, John, my supervisor, said, well, Jim and Larry, my coworker at the time, go to our surplus area, pick out a nice desk, pick out some furniture, and you're gonna make a road trip up to that location and deliver that for that secretary. So I do remember making a trip up to Vista at the time and delivering some, surplus furniture. So that staff employee-- 00:10:51.645 --> 00:10:53.725 Yeah. Was this Prison Industry's furniture do you remember? 00:10:53.725 --> 00:12:27.384 It probably-- Well, I, no, it wasn't Prison Industries. It would've been an old, like World War II type metal desk. That would've been what we had a lot of at San Diego State. A lot of that type of furniture at the time. So that was kind of another little piece of history. And of course, as the, North County satellite campus grew larger and larger, we would make trips up there when they would order tablet armchairs that would come into our receiving at San Diego State. And then we'd have to make, again, another road trip up to deliver a tablet armchairs or other furniture as it grew and grew and grew. And then, obviously it got to the point, at San Diego State, John Hines retired and I became the, the property clerk there for a while. So, it became obvious that San Marcos was going to be dedicating a brand new campus up there in North County. And it was about the time I had become the property clerk. So employees were getting hired up there at, the new campus. It officially dedicated again in, I believe, July of 1989. It was, established. And, some of the new employees would come down to San Diego State, like Ron Neu, who had been hired in there at the time, would come down to San Diego State and visit with me to kind of get ideas of how we did processes and set up policies and how we did that kind of business to support the University in categories such as fixed asset tracking, shipping and receiving, if you had a central store's mail, that kind of thing. 00:12:27.384 --> 00:14:21.825 So, I would talk to Ron and, he was impressed with, how we ran things at San Diego State. And it wasn't too long after that, that burgeoning campus there at, Cal State San Marcos, was now going to be separating completely from San Diego State. There was a little transitional time where San Diego State supported Cal State San Marcos in some of their processes and business practices. Well, once the split occurred, I was tasked to go up to Cal State San Marcos when they're still at the Jerome's location. And do an inventory again, of tracking fixed assets to find out what assets the University (CSUSM) was gonna keep that used to belong to San Diego State. And which ones they wanted to relinquish back to San Diego State. So again, I went up to the Jerome's location and went through all the buildings and track things. And I walked around with Ron who said, okay, we're gonna keep these pieces and these, you're gonna, you know, gonna be moved back to San Diego State at some point. So that was, again, a great experience. And again, meeting more people at the new campus and being very excited for them. And, so went back, took care of that project. And then before long I was getting calls from Ron Neu, asking if I might be interested in coming to work at Cal State San Marcos. And this was in, late 1992. And, that was one of the times when, our CSU system was undergoing one of its budget downturns. And there were some, tough times there. There was new management coming in. There were workers that were getting laid off, only because they were temporary, but there were some tough times. And the prospect of a new, vibrant, exciting university just up the road, was very appealing. And, again, Ron was wooing me, and it didn't take me too long to realize that this would be a very good move. 00:14:21.825 --> 00:16:47.004 So in, December of 1992, right before Craven Hall (Academic Hall) was occupied, I came up to the campus and submitted my application for a warehouse worker position that had opened up in, Support Services there at the USB (University Services Building) building, one of our first buildings on campus. And, Human Resources was in Academic Hall at the time. And I submitted my application and I interviewed with, Ron and Ivalee Clark and a gentleman, from procurement at the time, and ended up getting the job. So in February of 1993, I had given my notice, and I came up, started working at Cal State San Marcos, and, a couple years later I got reclassed into the property clerk position. And again, we were starting to barcode all our assets, and it was a very exciting time at the, the young campus. The, Craven Hall building was dedicated in April of 1993. And that was exciting, to go through that ceremony. And, one other interesting thing about, my previous history at San Diego State was when I was a college student, I took an English class and it was called, John Milton. And it was about that writer, John Milton, and a lot of his writings. And the particular faculty member that taught that class was none other than Mr. Richard Rush, who was one of the very first, administrators here at the new university. I think by the time I started, he had already moved on to become president back at, the University of Minnesota that he was. But, it was neat to, have had him as an instructor. And find out he was an administrator here. And then of course, he spent a very great distinguished career up at, (CSU) Channel Islands. And I think he came down to campus a couple times to visit. And I think I got a chance to talk to him a few times and mention that I had been a student of his and, put a smile on his face there. He was a good instructor. So, that was kind of another neat little piece of history. And then I've of course spent 24 and a half years here at Cal State San Marcos, always down there in the University Services Building, whether we were called Support Services or Materials Management, or now we're Distribution Services. And it's been a--it's been a great career and I've loved working here. 00:16:47.004 --> 00:16:48.754 I've always seen you with a smile on your face. 00:16:48.754 --> 00:17:08.755 Well, thank you. It's-- there's been great people here. There were of course, great people working at San Diego State too. So--but to see the university grow and blossom from, you know, just the few buildings that were here when I started to our large vibrant campus now with 17,000 students has been--has been a great experience. 00:17:08.755 --> 00:17:11.204 Yeah. Very. It's been amazing. It's definitely been amazing. 00:17:11.204 --> 00:17:13.243 Absolutely. So-- 00:17:13.243 --> 00:17:16.607 I came in (19)91 as a student, so yeah, I've done that. 00:17:16.607 --> 00:17:17.125 Oh. There you go. 00:17:17.125 --> 00:17:22.924 It's very similar trajectory of being here to help schlep all the stuff. 00:17:22.924 --> 00:17:25.434 Yeah. Yep. And been a lot of schlepping over time. 00:17:25.434 --> 00:17:26.194 Yeah. Yeah. 00:17:26.194 --> 00:17:56.444 It's been great to see the buildings come up and people move and the students come in and, and the technology change to, to see how education has grown over the years. It would've been neat to have been a little more involved on the academic side, but, I was very proud to have, supported the University with our customer service and the frontline people that are behind the scenes on the business side of the University that, you know, really keep it going. 00:17:56.444 --> 00:17:58.404 Yeah. You're the grease that makes the wheels turn. 00:17:58.404 --> 00:18:00.233 That's, that's kinda it. Yeah. 00:18:00.233 --> 00:18:01.684 Very essential to getting things done. 00:18:01.684 --> 00:18:20.005 Yeah. And the nice thing about San Marcos, we've generally had pretty good, support from management to, you know, continue our operation and make sure that we provide the service that's best for the campus. So, very glad to have been part of that. Very good. So thank you, Judith. 00:18:20.005 --> 00:18:26.045 Well and so, you talked about being a student at San Diego State. What was your degree? 00:18:26.045 --> 00:18:27.869 My degree was in English. 00:18:27.869 --> 00:18:28.599 Oh, okay. 00:18:28.599 --> 00:19:11.505 And, I guess I could have pursued a teaching credential or something might've been the logical direction to go, but the employment that I had experienced as a student assistant was really good. And, my mother in fact was a department secretary there at San Diego State for about 20 years. And, her promoting the benefits of state employment kinda said, well, you know, this would be a good direction. I kind of like what I was doing. And, so again, when, that position opened up, it was a great draw and I'm glad I did, because, our benefits are very good. 00:19:11.505 --> 00:19:26.444 And do you think that having been a student assistant maybe also helped you decide to go that way? Just because you had worked with good people, you also saw how the system worked rather than going blindly into something completely different and saying wait a minute I don't think I like this? 00:19:26.444 --> 00:19:57.000 Absolutely. Yep. The student assistant definitely was part--it was fun to work on a campus. You worked with really good people. You worked with, other student assistants that were, you know, enjoying being employed before they headed off in their careers and things. And, working with people that, had--were actually in second careers. Because a lot of the people at the time I worked with were veterans from World War II and they were working in that support business for the University, because that's what they had done in the military. 00:19:57.000 --> 00:20:00.964 The military runs on logistics and things, so, yeah-- 00:20:00.964 --> 00:20:16.275 Exactly. So it was, it was kind of neat. And I had always, enjoyed logistics like that. So it was a very good fit. And, so the student assistant experience was a very good precursor to going into that business. And I was glad I did. Yeah. It was a good fit. 00:20:16.275 --> 00:20:19.785 Okay. So, have you ever attended any classes at Cal State San Marcos? 00:20:19.785 --> 00:20:46.243 I never did, other than, some, you know, classes that you get sent to as an employee. I did join a national association called the National Property Managers Association, which is a nationwide group of property professionals, again, property having to do with fixed assets and tracking. 00:20:46.243 --> 00:20:47.315 As opposed to real estate? 00:20:47.315 --> 00:21:41.674 Correct. Correct. Tracking fixed assets in all kinds of different applications. Everything from the military, a lot of federal programs, universities, cities, counties, state agencies. So, it's a very good support group for property professionals. And I got my certification in that. And, kept that for a while. I wish I could have pursued it more, but at some point, the University decided that, we'd move a different direction in that regard. So I'm hoping maybe, anyone that follows me in the fixed asset world might be able to join that association. Because it's a very great support group along with the other property clerks. In the CSU system, which are also very good resources. 00:21:41.674 --> 00:21:47.894 So is there anything formal in the CSU for the property? 00:21:47.894 --> 00:22:42.855 No, not really. Other than, like the Chancellor's office attempting to, you know, set new standards and guidelines for, tracking assets. Whether it be capital assets, non-capital assets, theft sensitive assets. But the property clerks, had some meetings that they would get together in the late nineties (1990s), early two thousands (2000s). They kind of fell off during the recession, but about three years ago (circa 2014), they started having them again. So, the CSU property clerks are getting together for a conference, in fact next month in October at San Diego State and my successor is gonna be joining that conference and a couple other people here on campus. So I'm glad to see that that's been revived. And that, they get together and talk about different challenges that they have amongst the campuses in their business practices. So it's good to share that information and learn something. 00:22:42.855 --> 00:22:47.134 And communication is only augmented when you can do face to face and build some relationships that way. 00:22:47.134 --> 00:22:48.214 Exactly. 00:22:48.214 --> 00:22:49.365 So that's great. That's great. I'm glad to hear that. 00:22:49.365 --> 00:22:52.674 I'm glad to hear they're doing that. Yeah, absolutely. 00:22:52.674 --> 00:22:58.000 And you talked about your mother working at San Diego State for 20 years and being a champion. 00:22:58.000 --> 00:22:59.515 Yes! 00:22:59.515 --> 00:23:06.585 but what are some of the most notable projects you can remember having worked on? I mean, the barcoding the assets was a huge project-- 00:23:06.585 --> 00:25:10.434 Right. That's a big project because even ongoing, as we add new buildings, you have to go into each building and kind of update where all your equipment is moved. So if everything was in the first science building (Science Hall 1), now they've opened a new science building (Science Hall 2), first thing you have to do is go through the whole building and barcode all the rooms so that you can track locations. And then, you kind of go through and have to update, locations within all those labs, what centrifuges--microscopes, whatever it might be, have moved. And, of course we've been very lucky as a campus that, we have centralized computing on our campus, but we used to barcode every computer that came into the campus. And of course, computers were very important piece of equipment. And even more so these days in our information age where computers are holding a lot of data and basically have become a very, very strong security risk. As we all know, when you're talking about data breaches and things like that. So, IITS we're lucky on our campus being very centralized as we have it, makes it a lot easier for them to kind of grab the reins on tracking data security with the new software and technology that they have, which makes tracking computers much better for them to do than (have) me slap on my paper asset tag and go, it is located here. Well, the datas are the most important part. So, we actually haven't been tagging, with our barcodes, computers in some time because they've been tracking that on their own with their own asset tags. And, the important part of course is tracking the data security of that. Because when a computer is now not gonna be used, they'll pull a hard drive and make sure that's taken care of. Or wipe a computer because you don't want any information to be disposed. Because again, you've got assets that come into the university, they have a life, well, at some point that life's gonna end. And so how do you dispose of assets? 00:25:10.434 --> 00:26:30.164 It's very important that you wanna make sure everything is--there's no data on them. How are you gonna dispose of it? Is it--'cause again, with sustainability, a big part of dispositions of assets, you're gonna avoid having to go to the landfill at all. So you have assets that you might be able to sell. You have assets you can donate to a charity. If you can do that. You have assets that go to an e-waste vendor because of their particular criteria that makes them e-waste. So you do the best you can. Which is a big part of, asset tracking of accounting for how you dispose of assets. How do you think sustainability and you think going forward, okay, what is the University procuring that at the end of its life, it's not going to be, you know, having to be disposed of in the landfill. Is it made of something that can be recycled? Is it made of something that, you know, can be reused for a long time that is gonna have a good life to it. So there's a lot of thoughts that you can use, as the University moves forward to kind of, you know, follow that sustainability. So that's now become kind of a part of my thought process. And hopefully others in that process going forward as, the University grows, 00:26:30.164 --> 00:26:33.964 Which means you collaborate a lot with the recycling program that Carl Hanson kind of-- 00:26:33.964 --> 00:26:34.650 Correct. Yeah, exactly. 00:26:34.650 --> 00:26:44.000 --Spearheaded. And you have to think, not just something's come in or I have to make sure I know where it is, but what's gonna happen to it over a long run. So there's a lot of planning and forethought going into this as well. 00:26:44.000 --> 00:27:30.000 Correct. Exactly. And, we now have a department on campus called, Sustainability. It's part of, sustain,--well, what we used to call, Risk Management. They're in that department. So we work a lot with them to say, going forward, you know, how are we gonna be sustainable in our dispositions? That kind of a thing. So they have a good Sustainability Committee on this campus. They put forward a policy that the University's now been following, and I've been--I believe it's been approved by the President. So, that's a step in the right direction also. So working with them, and again, like you say, the recycling program, under Energy Management, which is now a part of, Facilities Management. So-- 00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:35.674 yeah, we have shifted things from department to department to division to division. And, well. 00:27:35.674 --> 00:27:42.434 When you have a brand new campus, a lot of things are gonna change over time and it's exciting to watch those happen. 00:27:42.434 --> 00:27:45.045 Yeah. So any other projects. 00:27:45.045 --> 00:28:54.984 Well definitely have watched procurement change and implement system-wide power of purchasing to bring in our office vendors like, OfficeMax and Staples that we have. So that the unit that the CSU is now again using their purchasing power to try and save money. Certainly makes it better than the central stores that we used to have. So that transition's been good. Of course, as we procure things. Now, of course we've seen procurement go into the credit card business, so Pro Card (procurement card) is happening. But, that kind of implements a new level of asset tracking because now you have to track pro card purchases. Because again, it's the technology of our new world. You know, that's the way to procure. Now all of a sudden you've got Amazon being used significantly, and that's a major development that we have to look at to make sure we're able to account for those kind of packages as they come in. So, the technology is changing and it brings new challenges. Those are always exciting to work with. 00:28:54.984 --> 00:29:08.285 And my impression, since I don't do--I don't order supplies, I don't do any of that stuff anymore, is that the Pro Card and Amazon are generally the smaller ticket items, which means a lot of little stuff coming in. 00:29:08.285 --> 00:29:46.434 Right. And you have to look at those Amazon packages and go, well, okay, yeah, someone can be using the university credit card to buy things and they're getting their packages, but how do we know they're not using their personal credit cards, buying things that they have come into their office through Amazon, you know, how can we in receiving look at those and say, what's a personal package and what's a University business related package? There's no way to tell anymore. So that, that leads to challenges that, you know, we're looking at. And hopefully, we'll come up with a process to check those, so yeah. Other than the end user, which might really be the only genuine way to do it. 00:29:46.434 --> 00:30:00.724 Yeah. And we already have so much workload, but people are here so much all the time. It's kind of like, well, I'd rather have it delivered at my work because I know it's gonna be secure, as opposed to, you know, being left on my doorstep at home and not be there when I get home and stuff. 00:30:00.724 --> 00:30:11.994 Right. Yeah and it doesn't help that the news focuses on look at the thieves taking these packages from this poor person's porch. So, yeah, so there's a challenge right there. 00:30:11.994 --> 00:30:18.065 Just to complicate issues. What campus events are most remarkable in your memory? 00:30:18.065 --> 00:31:07.184 Oh, gosh. The dedication of any new building was always something new because it just showed how fast we were growing and, becoming more focused in our community as we grow, because we're certainly putting a greater thumbprint on our local area. So each time a new building came on, it just showed that, you know, the campus is just becoming more and more of a fixture here in North County. The Kellogg Library was a huge addition because of course, it freed up a lot of space in Craven Hall and enabled the Library to actually be a functioning department that it was meant to be all along. And, was, I'm sure that was great. It was a great project for Marian Reid, and, I'm sure it was the feather in her hat, and it was --that was a great moment in it-- 00:31:07.184 --> 00:31:12.005 It was a delight to get rid of those horrible old hand me down copiers from SDSU. 00:31:12.005 --> 00:31:25.805 Yeah, there you go. Yes. And microfiche readers and all those things that were there at the time. And, of course it made for, you know, much more securing the library to make sure, you know, your archives were good too. Yeah. All your books. 00:31:25.805 --> 00:31:28.684 And a multitude of access points in the new building. 00:31:28.684 --> 00:32:27.755 Exactly. So Library was big. Gosh, just as new programs came on, whether it was, you know, we didn't have a physics program. Visual and performing arts came on, you know, all those different programs as we grew, of course, as we started, we only had upper division. Then all of a sudden we had freshmen and sophomores were coming in so we were a full four year college, which was notable. Again, building a parking structure, it's like, whoa, we are getting big. That kind of a thing. Sports came in, where we had nothing for a long time. All of a sudden, look, we have a memorable and notable coach. Steve Scott is coming. He's bringing a track program, and then all of a sudden we have golf, and then it's like, well, look at this. We're now--we're playing basketball and baseball and, getting big, you know, down the line who knows? I don't know if we'd get football, but, eh (inaudible). 00:32:27.755 --> 00:32:32.265 Well, we are-- they are retiring the first Crash, the Cougar costume. 00:32:32.265 --> 00:32:32.964 Oh, okay. 00:32:32.964 --> 00:32:35.881 And it's coming to the archives. 00:32:35.881 --> 00:32:36.714 Oh, neat. 00:32:36.714 --> 00:32:41.285 And they said it's an off-the-shelf costume, so we're having a custom design costume the second time around so-- 00:32:41.285 --> 00:32:42.884 Oh, okay. Well that's gonna be neat 00:32:42.884 --> 00:32:49.394 That shows they're growing up, too, but, yeah. I wish we'd been able to get an oral history from Debbie Dale about her years with the Athletics. 00:32:49.394 --> 00:32:51.964 Oh, absolutely. In the early days. Yeah. 00:32:51.964 --> 00:32:57.565 Because I know she mentioned to me one time that the athletes used to change in her office because there was no place else. 00:32:57.565 --> 00:34:03.644 Oh, look at that. That's a great--that's a great piece of history right there. Yeah. So things like that. So, just watching the University grow, of course, we've had some of the great challenges that are somewhat memorable. Like, the fires that have gone through were always memorable. They would have to send us home or, something like that. Very scary times. But again, the university's been very blessed that we haven't really been affected by that luckily. Of course, I remember 9/11 (2001) coming to work the day that happened, and then the University sent us home, things like that. And, other events like that. But, again, usually focus on all the memorable things. Of course, we had commencements down at Del Mar for a long time when the students would graduate, and it's like, how many did we graduate? It's like, wow. And then now we're back on campus because we have our athletic fields and things. So, that was exciting. The building of the McMahon House was kind of neat, because it's like, well, they were looking at building something there for a long time and it finally happened, and it's like-- came out very nice. 00:34:03.644 --> 00:34:08.545 I remember the big piles of compost that used to be down there, along that front corner. 00:34:08.545 --> 00:35:41.925 Oh, down there. Yeah. And now that's, it's all been cordoned off as an environmental area of some kind. So that's interesting there. We'll have to see how the University expands in that direction, if anything will change in that regard. Of course, remember the early days just watching some of the springs and waters that would come up out of the ground and flow off in that direction. And, I believe now the university is getting groundwater to help with some of our irrigation. There's some wells that are coming in from further up, La Marea (Carlsbad, California), I believe that flow onto our property. So we're tapping into that to, for irrigation now. So we're using some well water and trying to get very energy sufficient on our own. If we can do that. Solar panels have gone on some of the new buildings now, and they may further that, I know they're looking at--they have the fuel cell going. I don't know how successful that's been, but I'm sure they're gonna be looking at other energy changes as we move on. So, little things like that. They're in the background too. I believe, Procurement's finalizing, working with AT&T to partner with them for a cell tower, but that's gonna be a win-win for them and us, because it's gonna enable us to get some, new, very efficient and, well used, lighting for our baseball fields and any other expanding for sports in that direction too. So, that's something we'll look forward to. So again, all these changes keep happening and it's, good to see. 00:35:41.925 --> 00:35:47.525 Yeah. The side of the house you work on, you know about things that I had no idea. We were talking cell towers-- 00:35:47.525 --> 00:35:57.965 Yeah. Until they happen. Yeah. It has been a very, very long process. Because there's been a lot of issues with AT&T and getting permission from the Chancellor's office, that kind of thing is always something. 00:35:57.965 --> 00:36:03.244 Yeah. You get the state involved, you probably get all sorts of environmental agencies involved. You know, there's just. 00:36:03.244 --> 00:36:03.905 Yep. 00:36:03.905 --> 00:36:09.605 You know, and so many strictures about what we can accept. So it doesn't look like a bribe probably. 00:36:09.605 --> 00:36:15.285 Right. Exactly. Exactly. There's all that, legal-ease involved in that kind of a thing. And, of course, budgetary and logistics and, and all that. You know, what's it--what are we gonna get out of this? So, a lot of tough questions have to be asked. 00:36:15.285 --> 00:36:31.304 One thing I-- that crossed my mind while you've been talking is did you use email at San Diego State at all? 00:36:31.304 --> 00:37:18.445 No. In fact, when I left San Diego State, we were actually just in the early, days of using computers, we had gone through the whole transition of--remember typewriters, well, typewriters were a big thing when I was a student. And then, slowly transitioned into word processors. And then in the mid eighties (19080s) there, the first computers were coming into some of the student labs to use. And, they gradually made their way into our offices. Because being a support agency, we weren't always needing the technology. We had our old business practices. And, that change was a tough time coming. So really didn't start using email until I got to Cal State San Marcos here. And it--the first one was implemented and I think, Netscape was our first-- 00:37:18.445 --> 00:37:20.244 Or was it Eudora? I seem to remember. 00:37:20.244 --> 00:37:23.994 Well, Eudora was the email program. I think Netscape was our first. 00:37:23.994 --> 00:37:24.844 Browser system. 00:37:24.844 --> 00:37:36.445 Browser system, yeah. And then we eventually went to, Windows, of course. But, yeah, I think, I'm trying to remember what we were using for barcodes. It might have been Windows 95 back then, something like that. 00:37:36.445 --> 00:37:41.005 Yeah. And you're scampering out just in time to miss this whole move to SharePoint and OneDrive. 00:37:41.005 --> 00:38:04.635 Yeah. All that going on. So, exactly. So it's been fun to, to work with the new technology and, of course phones are in now, and I'm sure there's, a lot of adjustment to our Millennials coming in that are, only familiar with, you know, telephones and things. So, that technology is something I'm sure they're using. 00:38:04.635 --> 00:38:08.885 They're using equipment and media. Their expectations are so very different than-- 00:38:08.885 --> 00:38:10.364 Yeah, esactly. 00:38:10.364 --> 00:38:12.875 Who've been there through all of this growth and development. 00:38:12.875 --> 00:38:30.965 Yeah. It's been fascinating. So, it'll be, fun to watch and change as I keep contact with the University through the Retirees Association to kind of talk to people to see how things are changing in the education business. So, it'll be fascinating to watch. 00:38:30.965 --> 00:38:38.144 Yeah. I did wanna ask what your plans were for retirement. And it sounds like you're gonna be active in the Retirees Association which-- 00:38:38.144 --> 00:38:39.244 Yes. In fact-- 00:38:39.244 --> 00:38:41.875 I see their newsletter and they do lots of great stuff. So-- 00:38:41.875 --> 00:39:24.744 Yeah. I've been to a couple of their meetings and one neat thing that they advise, they say, well, when you first jump into retirement, you know, don't jump too hard, too fast into like, another part-time job or volunteering or something. But, for someone in, say, a type A personality, which is more like me, it's like, it's gonna be hard to just spend six months chilling, as they say, to transition into retirement. But, you know, that's good advice. So, can certainly do a blend of that. There'll be plenty of things around the house for me to work on and catch up on. I would love to do more traveling. I've got a grandson now. So I'll be definitely spending time with him. 00:39:24.744 --> 00:39:26.566 How old is he? 00:39:26.566 --> 00:40:12.824 He's 13 months. And just a joy. We're-- my wife's been retired for a couple of years, and she's babysitting him two and a half days a week. Because my daughter went to work-- back to work part-time after he was born. And, so we're helping her out by babysitting. So I'm sure I'll be helping with that. And--but I would love to do some more backpacking. I love going up to the Sierras and hiking. I've summited Mount Whitney nine times now. My goal is to get my grandson up to the top. And that would mean four generations have actually summited Mount Whitney, because my parents did it and took me up when I was very young. And then, of course, both my brothers and I summited and two of my daughters have now summited. And I would look forward to seeing if I can get my grandson up. 00:40:12.824 --> 00:40:14.153 That's a wonderful goal. I'm sure you will! 00:40:14.153 --> 00:40:15.335 That would be would be neat. 00:40:15.335 --> 00:40:36.676 Thank you. So, you know, I've talked to a lot of people that have retired and they say, I don't know how I had time to work. I'm so busy. So we'll just see how it goes. But, I'm a little anxious of course, because I've had this wonderful family here at Cal State San Marcos for over 24 years. And, it'll be kind of hard to step away from that. So-- 00:40:36.676 --> 00:40:41.048 Well, the retirees will certainly be a transition. Because that's part of the family. 00:40:41.048 --> 00:40:54.164 Yeah, absolutely. That'll definitely help. So I'm looking forward to that. And, I do see some things they do, and they do look like they're a lot of fun. And to touch base with previous employ--employees who have been here will be a lot of fun. 00:40:54.164 --> 00:40:55.394 And swap those stories. 00:40:55.394 --> 00:41:05.155 Exactly. Exactly. So, that'll--I'm looking forward to that. So, we'll just transition in gently and see how it goes. 00:41:05.155 --> 00:41:08.724 Well, since your wife is already retired, it sounds like she'll be able to help you transition as well. 00:41:08.724 --> 00:41:12.085 Absolutely. I'm sure she'll have a "honey-do" list for me. 00:41:12.085 --> 00:41:52.585 Yeah. What free time? Yeah, I think the same way. I just --I think that all sounds so wonderful, and this is--you have reminded me of some things--and I forgot about Central Stores. I mean, I forgot that that's how we used to order things. And then the whole decentralization where, you know,--because it used to be, back in the old days at Jerome's where you needed something done, you just grabbed whoever was available and they came over and did it. Now it's fill out forms, get permission. Plot everything. Track everything. And so it has been a big change, but we--it's a sign of our maturity. It's not a negative, it's just a sign of our maturity. 00:41:52.585 --> 00:42:02.195 It absolutely is. So, yes, there's always challenges going forward, but, so far we're doing very well. And I look forward to the University continuing that path. 00:42:02.195 --> 00:42:08.224 Yeah. And so how much do you have to do with the (inaudible) building to refer to it by its old name? 00:42:08.224 --> 00:42:10.284 Oh, the one that's being built now? 00:42:10.284 --> 00:42:11.485 No, with the, existing-- 00:42:11.485 --> 00:42:12.445 Oh, the old Foundation (CSUSM Foundation)-- 00:42:12.445 --> 00:42:14.445 You know, where we had the Library collection stored for a while. 00:42:14.445 --> 00:42:20.644 Yes. In fact, I had some pictures of that. I might still have, of the collection that was over there because 00:42:20.644 --> 00:42:22.074 Oh, that'd be fun. 00:42:22.074 --> 00:43:50.545 I'll send them over to you if I can--if I can find them. I hopefully, well, I hope I haven't deleted 'em. But anyway, that was an interesting building because, as the University has grown, of course, in the early days it was--it seemed like we were almost required or mandated that we had to buy Prison Industries furniture. So every year we would expect, okay, we're gonna have another 20 faculty, so we'll need to order 20 more Prison Industries desks, and 20 more--or for each faculty three more bookcases. And a couple of file cabinets. And a chair. And a lot of this was, from Prison Industries. Everything was standalone. And as the University has matured and aged, all that thought process has gone away, and now we've just entered Cubicle World. So it is been very change--much of a change. So as each new building's come online and people have moved as desks and those old pieces of furniture have gone away, we needed a place to put them. And that's what we always used, was that old Foundation building. And it became a challenge to dispose of all that kind of equipment. So we finally were able to find charities that would take those, whether it be Goodwill or we found a very excellent, charity from Mexico that supplies schools and classrooms and libraries down in, the Tijuana area with some of our old furniture that's still usable. We can't use it. Sometimes it's very hard to donate or sell furniture. 00:43:50.545 --> 00:43:52.324 We have regulations within the state system that really restrict what you can do. 00:43:52.324 --> 00:43:59.217 Right. You wanna account for, again, your disposition. So, that's why we were able to find charities to take these and made the process a lot easier. 00:43:59.217 --> 00:44:01.371 That's wonderful. 00:44:01.371 --> 00:44:50.394 So, that building now, after these many, many, many years, looks like it's going to be--we're gonna give up the lease on that. So the admin offices upstairs will come over to campus or into the new Extended Learning building, depending on how all that pans out. And, as far as the warehouse space, that's something University's gonna have to kinda figure out to see how we're gonna work on, you know, moving out, pieces of furniture as they become access. So again, that's part of something we're working on with our Sustainability group, with the Recycling group. And, it's gonna be a little bit of a challenge. So, space is something the University has always struggled with. So, this will be another a little example of how we can adjust to that challenge. 00:44:50.394 --> 00:45:08.695 Yeah. Well, I have to say, the last time I was over at the Foundation slash (inaudible) building, it seemed like there was a lot less down in the Land of Misfit Furniture as I called it. So it shows that you've been very effective in weeding things out and getting them moved through. But yeah, there will always be a need for some sort of holding space. 00:45:08.695 --> 00:45:55.744 Space holding space, right. Staging area. Yeah. And in fact, kudos to, Planning, Design and Construction (PDC) who have really sort of stepped up and taken the lead in finding ways to reuse a lot of that surplus furniture on campus because now we're getting more and more of the cubicle surplus. So as departments sometimes can expand or need extra space, they can refurbish and reuse some of the cubicle furniture that's there. That Prison Industries furniture is kind of finally--there's not much of it left out there. So really PDC has stepped up and has really done very well in reusing a lot of that. They're kind of continuing that. So I've sort of stepped away from that part of it as they've stepped in. 00:45:55.744 --> 00:46:04.664 And the Prison Industry furniture was never ergonomically appropriate, which is something that campus has really been placing a focus on very wisely. 00:46:04.664 --> 00:46:08.545 Wisely. Very important. And it was also very heavy. 00:46:08.545 --> 00:46:29.264 Oh, I remember one time my--the desk, because I still have a Prison Industries desk in my office. And I cannot remember his name, but he was a very-- he was a shorter, very stocky built man. And he was underneath the desk and he just kind of got on all fours and then arched his back to push the desk up. And I was just like, oh. 00:46:29.264 --> 00:46:30.704 Oh, that might've been Eli. 00:46:30.704 --> 00:46:35.525 No, it wasn't Eli. I know Eli hurt his back and ended up going over to Parking Services. 00:46:35.525 --> 00:46:36.125 Went over to Parking. 00:46:36.125 --> 00:46:51.114 But, no, this-- Bobby, maybe his name was? I really don't remember. It's been a lot of years. I mean, I've been in the same office since we moved into the library. And that's--it's kinda like, gee, when I--when do I get a wall painted in my office or something? 00:46:51.114 --> 00:47:27.284 Yeah. Well that you've been in your space for that long is something unusual on this campus. Because so many people have moved so many times, I think there have been people that have moved 20 times just because of--a building comes online and so people move around and you have the whole domino effect. So you move from one place to another, to another, to another over the course of your history. And I may have actually set the record for actually been in the same office for the longest amount of time, in the building that I am. Although once I actually did move from downstairs to upstairs where I am now. But, I think I was 19 years in the exact same location. 00:47:27.284 --> 00:47:29.195 Oh my gosh. Yeah. Yeah. I don't quite make that. 00:47:29.195 --> 00:47:30.445 Yeah. I think-- 00:47:30.445 --> 00:48:14.505 I think all of my colleagues up on the third floor, with maybe the exception of one person have moved because there's an office down at the end that's not very desirable. It's kind of dark, odd shape. And so every time somebody shifts position, it's kind of this, okay, everybody's playing musical offices again and--My office is--it's fine. It serves my needs. So, really haven't gotten--I've moved the furniture around it a couple times. But not moved out of that office. But there are very few of us that are probably in the same location simply because of the, the numbers of buildings. All of a sudden you school or your unit, whatever you're in, has the whole thing's been moved over to another building, which you know, is great because you've expanded. You need that room. But yeah so-- 00:48:14.505 --> 00:48:17.763 But then you have to move all your stuff. 00:48:17.763 --> 00:48:18.000 A lot of people don't move outta choice. 00:48:18.000 --> 00:49:29.125 Yep. Exactly. Exactly. So that was kind of neat to stay in one place. Another thing I was thinking, one day, it's like, well, what is my legacy? And it's like, well, I certainly have a lot of history here, but it's like, I was thinking, it's like, well, in the business that I am, I'm very fortunate that I often get to go over to campus and meet people one-on-one because I'm either doing deliveries or maybe I'm doing inventory or tracking a piece of equipment. So you're out on campus and you're going from building to building. And it was the same thing I was doing at San Diego State. I spent many years doing central stores deliveries down there, shipping and receiving deliveries. So I'd be out on campus quite a bit, and I was thinking, it's like, wow, I might be the only person in CSU history that may have used almost every bathroom on two different campuses. It's like, ah, okay. There's a little bit of trivial information. So it's like, of course then San Diego State has changed immensely since I left. But, at the time, you know, I could say it's like, no, that's an interesting little fact. You know, when you're out and about, you know-- 00:49:29.125 --> 00:49:30.764 That's a wonderful trivia question. 00:49:30.764 --> 00:49:39.204 It's like, yes, it might be--my best legacy right there. 00:49:39.204 --> 00:49:48.875 No you've certainly made an impact on the campus and certainly facilitated a lot of the growth and a lot of the changes we've been through. And like I say, always done it with a smile, but.-- 00:49:48.875 --> 00:49:51.724 Well thank you. I appreciate that. 00:49:51.724 --> 00:49:54.074 Having been in nearly every bathroom-- 00:49:54.074 --> 00:51:03.000 Some of 'em are very nice. Yeah. You know, I don't think I use the president's bathroom at San Diego State, but I did see ours here. That was a little trivia. And, you know, people talk about, serving the campus community and you know, they usually talk about the amount of time that they spent, someone was here for 25 years. I had 24 and a half, 37 in this system. But you never really think about how many miles did you spend working for the CSU driving to work? Okay. How much money over your long tenure, if you are blessed enough to have a long tenure, did you spend on gasoline going to work? And most people don't think about that. Well, when you're in the fixed asset business, you deal a lot with numbers. You have, barcode numbers that you place on equipment. That piece of equipment has a serial number, it has a model number, it has a dollar value, it has a building number location, it has a room number location. There's a lot of numbers. There's-- 00:51:03.000 --> 00:51:05.000 And you just have quantities. 00:51:05.000 --> 00:52:17.000 Correct. So I got to thinking, it's like, well, okay, my brain thinks in numbers a lot. It's like, you know, I'm gonna really do quickly, I'm just gonna do the math. Because having lived in San Diego and working at San Diego State, well that was a short commute. But when I had to start traveling to San Marcos, all of a sudden I became a commuter and I was putting on a lot of miles. So I thought, well, how many miles did I put on driving like five different cars that I had in the course of my time here, 24 and a half years, how many miles did I drive? And I thought, well, okay, this is gonna be a little bit of fun math because you have to figure out a lot of different factors involved, right? So I figured, okay, 365 days in a year, but working days are only about 260 because you have your weekends, right? Well then you'd subtract from the 260 working days, the holidays, well, there's about 15 that come off. And then you figure out, okay, over time you accrued more vacation as you worked, you started with two weeks, you ended up with about five weeks. so I kind of rounded it off. Did some calculations and figured on average we work around 200 days a year. 00:52:17.000 --> 00:52:19.000 Right. I think it's between 200 - 220, depending-- 00:52:19.000 --> 00:53:29.525 Something. Sort of again, depending on vacation and, and how much sick leave you use. I looked at kind of my sick leave, 'cause I used to track it and I--most of my time off was like appointments. So you'd go to work, but you'd leave to go to your appointment and actual days I was actually sick, luckily, knock on wood, I was very healthy and didn't take too many days. So I subtracted that too. And again, it came out to around 200. So, for like the first, 16 years or something like that, I--my round trip to work was about 60 miles and then I moved once and it became maybe 55 'cause I didn't move too far. So I put that all in. And to make a long story short, I calculated that I drove to San Marcos about 286,000 miles. Back and forth over the course of my 24 and a half years. And figuring the price of gas somewhere, maybe averaging around $2 a gallon, I think it ended up like $23,000 worth of gas just driving to work. And it's amazing, you think about that, how far, I mean, people probably come from Temecula and may have put on even more miles. And they had the commute to San Diego State that might been another 30,000 miles. And another $3,000 worth of gas or something like that. 00:53:29.525 --> 00:53:30.364 Yeah. You are a numbers man. 00:53:30.364 --> 00:53:38.724 So it's definitely numbers, but it's just fascinating to think how many miles you put on. It's like 286, somewhere around there, thousand miles. Close to 300,000. 00:53:38.724 --> 00:53:40.795 Wow. No wonder you went through so many cars. 00:53:40.795 --> 00:53:44.324 Exactly. 00:53:44.324 --> 00:53:58.474 Yeah. But that also says something about our, our commuting system here. In San Diego still is not adequate to serve the needs of people. It's gotten better over the years. I mean, we've gotten the sprinter, we've gotten the coaster, things like that-- 00:53:58.474 --> 00:54:21.844 It's great for the students to be able to do that. The ones that either live here or can commute by using the Sprinter. And, I know our, our Parking Services tries to get the commuter information out to everybody. To have them take advantage of that whenever they can. But, yeah, we don't realize how much time we spend behind the wheel when we come to our jobs. So, it's fascinating to kinda look at that. 00:54:21.844 --> 00:54:24.565 Oh my gosh. 00:54:24.565 --> 00:54:25.514 A little trivia. 00:54:25.514 --> 00:54:26.844 Yeah. 00:54:26.844 --> 00:54:27.235 Absolutely. 00:54:27.235 --> 00:54:35.206 Well, at that point I will bring this interview to a close. I wanna thank you, Jim. That's been absolutely phenomenal. Just so much fun. 00:54:35.206 --> 00:54:36.706 Thank you, Judith. 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The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=CarrJim_DownieJudith_2017-09-26.xml CarrJim_DownieJudith_2017-09-26.xml https://archivesearch.csusm.edu/repositories/3/resources/19 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Carr, Jim. Interview, September 26, 2017 Description An account of the resource Jim Carr spent 23 years at California State University San Marcos working for the Distribution Services team and was instrumental in implementing the first barcoded inventory tracking system for the University. Jim discusses his time working for CSUSM as part of Distribution Services and how his education and background led to him this job. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC027-091 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-09-16 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Subject The topic of the resource Barcoding Distribution Services California State University San Marcos Fixed asset tracking San Diego State University Sustainability Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Diego (Calif.) San Marcos (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">In copyright</a> Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Jim Carr License A legal document giving official permission to do something with the resource. <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/</a> https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/00489b285627c9a6866f172944112fe8.jpg 35c5e00c18f7596b84d9e666d6751988 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Aviation Cadet Description An account of the resource Williams dressed as an Aviation Cadet at an unknown location and unknown date https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/cbae0566763ce0270fef5d0ce938bcf7.jpg 6cfb3c021344133fed396067d8844597 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource P105 in Saipan Description An account of the resource Williams posing with a P105 plane in Saipan, 1946 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/0282d85f8cb82816431c217d88442ad3.jpg c66638dba65f748b3e0953e8422311a5 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Wedding Day Description An account of the resource Camilla and Elmer Royce Williams on their wedding day in Clinton, Minnesota, June 1, 1947 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/4a703a89795ad0efa0544261d8fd56e5.jpg 846e93989267282dbe4cfb29d90d9fdd Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Christmas Dinner Description An account of the resource Mark, Elmer Royce, Bruce, and Craig Williams having Christmas dinner, December 25, 1962 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/6cb0bce3640d8b5336eeafafe1c22ca4.jpg cba0af63d47198f9508ab961b6e2ec14 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Arrival of VF-33 Description An account of the resource Commander Neilsen T.L., Camilla Williams, and Elmer Royce Williams at the arrival of VF-33 from Key West, U.S. Naval Air Station Oceana, Virginia Beach, Virginia, January 2, 1965 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Williams, Elmer Royce. Photographs, Various dates. Description An account of the resource Five photos related to the oral history of Elmer Royce Williams. Photograph #1 depicts Williams dressed as an Aviation Cadet at an unknown location and unknown date. Photograph #2 depicts Williams posing with a P105 plane in Saipan, 1946. Photograph #3 depicts Camilla and Elmer Royce Williams on their wedding day in Clinton, Minnesota, June 1, 1947. Photograph #4 depicts Mark, Elmer Royce, Bruce, and Craig Williams having Christmas dinner, December 25, 1962. Photograph #5 depicts Commander Neilsen T.L., Camilla Williams, and Elmer Royce Williams at the arrival of VF-33 from Key West, U.S. Naval Air Station Oceana, Virginia Beach, Virginia, January 2, 1965. Click on the thumbnails to view the full images in more detail. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource undated - 1962