Tickets and information at www.twistedgypsyband.com.

Willow Park Mercantile is located at 205 G Street in historic, downtown Rivertown. For more information, visit willowparkmercantile.com.

Live entertainment, dunk tank and fireworks will happen

Activities begin at 6:00 p.m.

Watch the Dunk Tank Fundraiser Livestream on Instagram @antiochrec_ca

By City of Antioch

After announcing earlier Tuesday, July 2, 2024, that the annual July 4th “parade and festivities are moving forward as planned” as of 6:05 p.m., the City of Antioch changed course and issued cancelled the parade and issued the following announcement:

The City of Antioch is cancelling the Independence Day Parade because of forecasted hot weather. The US National Weather Service San Francisco Bay Area/Monterey California issued an excessive heat warning and heat advisory that will remain in effect until July 9th at 11:00 p.m.

The remainder of the event will start at 6:00 p.m. in historic Rivertown. Families can enjoy rides and games along with our dunk tank fundraiser in the Kids Zone, music by Universal Soul and Foreverland, and Food Truck Thursdays by the Foodie Crew, followed by our spectacular fireworks show over the Delta at 9:15 p.m.

Thank you to our community for your patience. Please stay cool and be safe this 4th of July!”

The National Weather Service for the San Francisco Bay Area/Monterey California issued the following Tuesday afternoon:

“An Excessive Heat Warning and a Heat Advisory is in effect now until 11 PM NEXT Tuesday. San Francisco will be under a Heat Advisory now until 7 PM Thursday. High temperatures in the upper 90s to near 110 are expected in the Excessive Heat Warning, while highs from the lower 80s to mid-90s are expected within the Heat Advisory. In addition, limited overnight cooling is expected for areas away from the immediate coast and in higher terrain. Never leave people or pets in vehicles! Limit outdoor activities during the afternoon and evening. Stay hydrated and take cooling breaks.”

As previously reported, two cooling centers plus, hydrating and misting stations in Rivertown will be provided during the celebration.

·Cooling Centers: City Hall and the Nick Rodriguez Community Center will be open as cooling centers during the event.

·Misting Stations: Stay refreshed with misting stations located throughout festivity locations.

·Hydration Stations: Free water stations will be available to keep you hydrated throughout the day.

4 PM “parade and festivities are moving forward as planned”

City will offer options to beat the heat

By Allen Payton

In a post on its Facebook page today, Tuesday, July 2, 2024, the City of Antioch wrote, “We’re excited to celebrate Independence Day with you this year. Despite the expected high temperatures, our July 4th parade and festivities are moving forward as planned.

That’s in spite of the temperature forecast of 104 degrees that day.

The post continued, “Your safety is our priority. City of Antioch Recreation Department will offer additional resources to help you beat the heat:

·Cooling Centers: City Hall and the Nick Rodriguez Community Center will be open as cooling centers during the event. (See related article)

·Misting Stations: Stay refreshed with misting stations located throughout festivity locations.

·Hydration Stations: Free water stations will be available to keep you hydrated throughout the day.”

For more information about the parade, live entertainment, dunk tank, fireworks and more visit Celebrate
America’s 248th Independence Day on July 4th in Antioch.

“We hope that this free adoption fee event will help…find new homes for the plethora of wonderful pets in our care.” – Acting Animal Services Manager Cat Cottle

Antioch Animal Services is excited to announce that we are participating in BISSELL Pet Foundation’s Summer National Empty the Shelters™ reduced-fee adoption event, taking place from July 8th to July 31st. This event aims to find loving homes for deserving pets by offering reduced adoption fees and promoting pet adoptions. As the nation’s largest funded adoption event, Empty the Shelters has helped more than 253,000 pets find loving homes. During each nationwide event, BISSELL Pet Foundation sponsors reduced adoption fees of $50 or less to make adoption affordable for prospective pet owners.

• Antioch Animal Services will participate July 8-31 offering $0 adoption fees for all dogs and cats.
• Our business hours are Tuesday – Saturday, 10am to 5pm
• All pets are listed at 24petconnect.com, and are spayed/neutered, microchipped & vaccinated
• Walk ins are welcome, appointments will get priority, phone lines open at 830am, (925) 779-6989

“Shelters are struggling with a variety of challenges right now – some are evacuating pets because of wildfires, tornadoes, or even loss of air conditioning in extreme heat, and others are overcrowded and having to euthanize highly adoptable pets to make space, a tragic situation,” said Cathy Bissell, Founder of BISSELL Pet Foundation. “BISSELL Pet Foundation’s upcoming Summer National Empty the Shelters event is a crucial opportunity for people to make a real difference in their community through adoption. Every single adoption saves a life and creates space to save another. Please adopt and give a pet a chance it might otherwise not have. If you can’t adopt, fostering saves lives when shelters are full. Deserving pets across the country are counting on all of us.”

Following are key points and additional facts about BISSELL Pet Foundation and Antioch Animal Services:

• Empty the Shelters is the nation’s largest funded adoption event and has helped more than 233,000 pets find homes
• across the country and in Canada since its inception in 2016.
• Empty the Shelters provides reduced adoption fees at shelters, typically ranging from $0 to $50 per animal adoption.
• Each participating organization has their own adoption process and requirements.
• Our nation’s shelters need your support. Please consider fostering or donating if you unable to add a pet to your family.
• Antioch Animal Services has been a party of the Bissell Empty the Shelters™ event since 2016.
• All of our adoptable pets are listed at 24petconnect.com, filter by zip code 94509.

“Our little shelter by the Delta is not escaping the effects of the rising cost of living, the increased cost of veterinary care and the restrictions placed on rentals / leases that require hefty deposits or don’t allow any pets to live in them and so, we have many owners requesting surrender of their pets or not coming to get them if they have come in as stray,” said Acting Animal Services Manager Cat Cottle. “With 4th of July fast approaching we know we will be seeing a spike in the number of stray animals that get loose after being spooked by the fireworks and so we will be waiving redemption fees for anyone’s pet that arrives at Antioch Animal Services between July 2nd and July 7th.”  

“We hope that this free adoption fee event will help alleviate the overcrowding we have been experiencing and find new homes for the plethora of wonderful pets in our care,” she added.

Antioch Animal Services is located at 300 L Street next to the Antioch Police Facility in historic, downtown Antioch. For more information visit www.antiochca.gov/police/animal-services.

Allen D. Payton contributed to this report.

By City of Antioch

Due to the excessive heat warning, the City of Antioch is providing cooling centers for your convenience. Residents without home air conditioning or with health conditions made worse with extreme heat and poor air quality are encouraged to seek out the cooling centers.

Cooling centers will be held:

Tuesday, July 2nd through Monday, July 8th from 12:00pm-8:00pm at the Nick Rodriguez Community Center in Rivertown, and the Antioch Community Center in Prewett Family Park except for Thursday, July 4th.

On Thursday, July 4th, cooling centers will be held at the Nick Rodriguez Community Center and Antioch Water Park in Prewett Family Park. The Antioch Community Center will be closed.

• Nick Rodriguez Community Center is located at 213 F Street
• Antioch Community Center is at 4703 Lone Tree Way
• Antioch Water Park is at 4701 Lone Tree Way

Let’s do our best to stay cool, Antioch!

Live entertainment and the best seats for the fireworks show over the river

Come celebrate America’s Independence Day with us this Thursday, July 4th!! Monica’s Riverview will be open ALL DAY!!!
Brunch and lunch menu ’til 5pm. Cuco’s Tacos on the river side from 4-9 pm!

Entertainment starts at 2:30 pm
Old School DJs 2:30-5:30 pm
Ariel Marin Music with Full Motown Band 5:30-8:30 pm

Exclusive outdoor seating on the river to view the fireworks!!

Entry is $10 for adults $5 for kids, includes beverage ticket

Monica’s Riverview is located at 1 I (eye) Street on the pier in Antioch’s historic, downtown Rivertown. For menu and more information see www.visitmonica’s.com.

Paid advertisement.

“We’re going to update it” – Sean McCauley

By Allen D. Payton

Good news for those concerned about the removal of the historic mural on the W. 4th Street side of the building on the corner of G Street in Antioch’s downtown Rivertown.

After reading the Herald article about the mural, Sean McCauley who, with his partner Ron Harrison, owns the building, shared that a new mural would be painted on the building.

“We’re going to update it,” he stated.

“We are working with (Acting City Manager) Kwame (Reed) and (Mayor) Lamar (Hernandez-Thorpe), to redo the mural and to depict a similar and more inclusive scene for the community,” McCauley shared. “Grant funds were secured for this mural and others.”

Asked about the funds for the other murals in Rivertown, specifically the Sesquicentennial mural on the side of the building at 505 W. 2nd Street he said, “The only mural that was in bad shape was the one on W. 4th Street.”

“It wasn’t just the paint. The stucco was failing on the building and has been for years,” McCauley explained. “The building was literally falling off and hitting people.”

“We aren’t going to take the easement off of it,” he continued. “We’re working with Kwame and Brad to get a good mural up there. This is a positive thing for downtown.”

“We tried to get in contact with the muralist (who lives out of state) but she isn’t interested in redoing it,” said McCauley. “We have a muralist we’re working with on our downtown Pittsburg buildings and trying to use the same muralist for this one.”

The design is not done yet but it “will be more inclusive”, he reiterated.

“It’s a $650,000 to $700,000 investment that we’re putting into that G Street block (between W. 3rd and 4th Streets),” McCauley stated. “We’re doing what we can to improve the downtown.”

That includes investments by the two partners purchasing and improving multiple other buildings in Rivertown, including the Salon Suites on W. 4th and I Streets, and bringing several restaurants to the Rivertown Dining District including Smith’s Landing Seafood Grill, Monica’s Riverview, Guadalajara Taqueria, Abuelita’s House Pastries and Peruvian Sandwiches, and Buford’s BBQ.

In addition, Sylvia’s Florist is returning to Antioch and will soon open in McCauley’s building at 101 H Street in the old Casino building next to Waldie Plaza.

UPDATE 1: Original Mural Leader Wants Replacement to be Historically Correct

After reading the article above, former Antioch Councilwoman Elizabeth Rimbault, who was instrumental in leading the effort for the W. 4th Street mural, offered additional information about who it depicted and wants to ensure the replacement is historically correct.

“The original Operators Telephone Office Mural was historically correct for the occupants of the corner office in the 1940’s and 1950’s of downtown Antioch. The people depicted were real and were prominent figures of the time with names and families some still in Antioch,” she shared.

“Bill Friedrickson was the telephone repairman leaning against the truck and in the late 1990’s cleared hundreds of pounds of abandoned phone wires in the attic of the Historical Society Museum when they acquired the Riverview Union High School,” Rimbault continued. “Bob Beswick was a driving force of the community without serving on the city council.”

“When it is stated, the new mural will be more ‘inclusive’, does that mean people will be painted in that were not an employee of the phone company? Or not a resident in 1950? That would constitute revised history which I am sad to say there has been too much of that in Antioch lately in these 2020’s being more politically driven,” she stated. “I suggest that as the Historical Society received all rights, obligations, and remaining funds from the Antioch Friends of the Arts, that the Society be given final say of correctness of all historical facts depicted in the new design of the mural.”

“The boys seen in the window were just children that Char Downs Siska, the artist, painted in. They don’t depict anyone specific,” Rimbault added.

“It should be noted the only murals granting a city easement are W. 4th and G Street and 505 2nd Street. All other murals on private buildings and walls are totally the property owners’ right to choose,” she stated.

UPDATE 2: Mural Leader Suggests Depicting Two Black Sisters to Make New Mural Inclusive While Maintaining Historical Accuracy

After a few days thinking about it, Rimbault shared additional historical information about a Black family who lived in Antioch during the time the mural depicted. She offered a suggestion of adding depictions of two of the sisters to make the new mural more inclusive and keeping it historically accurate, as McCauley mentioned.

“Hold the presses,” Rimbault requested after her memory was triggered. “The mural was for 1951. It’s possible that at that time the Blanton (sp) family lived on railroad property near Railroad Avenue and A Street. The two oldest girls were in Antioch schools until Vergy was told to attend Pittsburg High School as she was graduating from junior high to high school. Her sister Joyce was in my husband’s Class of ‘61 and Vergy would have been in the Class of ’62.”

“If you count backwards, both girls would have been six and seven years old in 1951 and the only Black children in Antioch at the time,” Rimbault stated. “So, if the mayor wants the mural to be inclusive, two children looking into the operators’ window need to be little girls and it could be a tribute to the two, as they had many friends in school and should have been allowed to stay. But due to the underlying, unwritten law of Antioch the superintendent of schools suggested to their parents they would be better off in Pittsburg where they would be able to date boys of their own race.”

“And little girls would be more appropriately curious about all the women operators,” she added.

“Years ago, Joyce attended my husband’s class reunion of 50 years and had always considered it her class even though she was made to transfer as a junior,” Rimbault shared. “Her sister had a much harder adjustment, dropping out later and died as a young woman.”

“It’s amazing what memories this situation has caused to flood back to me. Have not thought about this in years,” the former Antioch historian mused.