SEA GULL
The Sea Gull Restaurant was a popular hangout in Mendocino during the 1970s and 80s. Lots of things happened there, good and bad. I knew sooner or later this would all be converted to words. On this page you will find stories, experiences, and reflections on my time at the Sea Gull. Pictures, articles, art, and more will be posted as they become available. If you were an employee or customer during that time and have pictures or experiences you want to share, send them to me at dhj@thinkinthemorning.com. Don’t expect this to be a foodie site. I might from time to time venture into the joys of mezcal or review a favorite restaurant or offer up a recipe that I’ve found tasty, but my primary purpose is to document some of the happenings at the Sea Gull during the 70s and 80s for those who care.
New Years at The Sea Gull 1975
The post below was transcribed from My Bag by Joe Fitzpatrick published in the Monterey Peninsula Herald on Friday, January 10, 1975. Mendocino in the 1970s was a different place than it is today. Things moved at a slower pace. The article describes accurately but...
Music At The Sea Gull
Music at the Sea Gull is an ongoing post that will be updated periodically as new material becomes available. If you have stories or photos to share, please send them to dhj@thinkinthemorning.com. Origin of Music When Orpheus caressed the strings of the lyre, the oak...
Lella
Lella Doherty operated a large farm near the small town in the Sacramento Valley where I grew up. She was an independent woman, lived alone, and had an intimidating demeanor. I worked at the local grocery store. One of my jobs was to deliver her orders. She did a...
The Sea Gull Saga — Part 2
In October and November of 1995, Mike L. Evans wrote The Sea Gull Saga, a two part series for The Mendonesian, a local Mendocino publication. Part 2 of the series is transcribed below. Pictures were copied from a variety of sources including the...
The Sea Gull Saga Part 1
In October and November of 1995, Mike L. Evans wrote The Sea Gull Saga, a two part series for The Mendonesian, a local Mendocino publication. Part 1 of the series is transcribed below. Some of the original pictures in the article were not usable....
The New Pied Piper of the Sea Gull
[Article transcribed from the Mendocino Beacon, June 2, 1977, Pat McKay author) James Maxwell is one of several local artists and craftspersons to donate pieces to the new Mendocino Sea Gull restaurant and Cellarbar which re-opens Monday for...
Fire !
A typical winter day: cold, clear, calm, quiet. I walked downstairs from the bedroom in the house next to the restaurant, the historic Jacob Stauer House. In the kitchen below, I looked out the window into the garden behind the Inn. There wasn’t much left of the...
Short Fiction: Here I Am Washing Dishes
I am washing dishes at The Frolic Café and keeping my mouth shut about a past I’d like to forget. I’m living on the north coast of California right up against the ocean where the air smells like salt and fish and seaweed and where it rains in buckets and the wind...
Short Fiction: Dora
An old woman walks, stooped so far forward that she can hardly see through her thick eyeglasses. She wears a cotton dress with a floral pattern of red, pink, blue and white flowers under a purple wool coat. A little wobbly on her feet, she puts her arms out for...
Where The Artists Play
The artists arrived so quietly the locals could not say when Mendocino became an artists’ colony. Like a solitary ant that finds a pot of honey laying down its pheromones to attract the others, one artist discovered the beauty of the Mendocino Coast, then another,...
The Attic – Where Artists And Browsers Can Meet
The elemental properties that made up the Sea Gull Restaurant were food, art, music, people, and place. The atmosphere ultimately created was one of home and family. The properties and atmosphere came together at a particular point in time. It was during the...
The Sad Story of Three Misfits
Three men I knew but not as well as I thought—a father, a disgruntled employee, a son. Tragedy, families ruined, a bizarre plot to assassinate a President and detonate a dirty bomb in Washington D.C. by a disturbed young man who according to a TIME magazine reporter...