Freight train carrying hazardous materials plunges into Yellowstone River as bridge fails

• June 25, 2023

By Matthew Brown and Gene Johnson | Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Mont. — A bridge that crosses the Yellowstone River in Montana collapsed early Saturday, plunging portions of a freight train carrying hazardous materials into the rushing water below.

The train cars were carrying hot asphalt and molten sulfur, Stillwater County Disaster and Emergency Services said. Officials shut down drinking water intakes downstream while they evaluated the danger after the 6 a.m. accident. An Associated Press reporter witnessed a yellow substance coming out of some of the tank cars.

David Stamey, the county’s chief of emergency services, said there was no immediate danger for the crews working at the site, and the hazardous material was being diluted by the swollen river. There were three asphalt cars and four sulfur cars in the river.

The train crew was safe and no injuries were reported, Montana Rail Link spokesman Andy Garland said in a statement. The asphalt and sulfur both solidify quickly when exposed to cooler temperatures, he said.

Railroad crews were at the scene in Stillwater County, near the town of Columbus, about 40 miles (about 64 kilometers) west of Billings. The area is in a sparsely populated section of the Yellowstone River Valley, surrounded by ranch and farmland. The river there flows away from Yellowstone National Park, which is about 110 miles (177 kilometers) southwest.

“We are committed to addressing any potential impacts to the area as a result of this incident and working to understand the reasons behind the accident,” Garland said.

In neighboring Yellowstone County, officials said they instituted emergency measures at water treatment plants due to the “potential hazmat spill” and asked residents to conserve water.

The cause of the collapse is under investigation. The river was swollen with recent heavy rains, but it’s unclear whether that was a factor.

The Yellowstone saw record flooding in 2022 that caused extensive damage to Yellowstone National Park and adjacent towns in Montana. Robert Bea, a retired engineering professor at the University of California Berkeley who has analyzed the causes of hundreds of major disasters, said repeated years of heavy river flows provided a clue to the possible cause.

“The high water flow translates to high forces acting directly on the pier and, importantly, on the river bottom,” Bea said. “You can have erosion or scour that removes support from the foundation. High forces translate to a high likelihood of a structural or foundation failure that could act as a trigger to initiate the accident.”

Bea said investigators would also want to look at whether there was wear or rust in bridge components as well as a record of maintenance, repair and inspections.

Federal Railroad Administration officials were at the scene.

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Kelly Hitchcock of the Columbus Water Users shut off the flow of river water into an irrigation ditch downstream from the collapsed bridge to prevent contents from the tank cars from reaching nearby farmland. The Stillwater County Sheriff’s Office called the group Saturday morning to warn it about the collapse, Hitchcock said.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency notes that sulfur is a common element used as a fertilizer as well as an insecticide, fungicide and rodenticide.

Johnson reported from Seattle.

​ Orange County Register 

Pride celebrated in Orange County

• June 24, 2023

Crowds took to 3rd Street in downtown Santa Ana to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community with this year’s parade and festival hosted by OC Pride.

The day’s theme, “Brilliant Resilience,” was in full effect with lots of dancing, themed festivities for blocks and a lineup of performers.

The parade marched down 3rd Street from Ross Street to Bush Street, where the festival picked up and lasted into the night.

Attendees could also catch a breather at one of the many festival zones, including areas designed for families and teens, Pride Speaks with talks on a variety of topics scheduled throughout the day and Trans Central. New this year was a Health and Wellness Zone.

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​ Orange County Register 

Angel City FC looking to maintain momentum

• June 24, 2023

A lot has changed since the last time Angel City Football Club played a home game.

Freya Coombe has been replaced as coach by assistant coach Becki Tweed and, for the first time since early May, Angel City will be looking for a second consecutive win.

Last week’s 2-1 win over rival San Diego Wave FC snapped a six-game winless streak across league and Challenge Cup competitions.

Sunday, Angel City hosts the Houston Dash (5 p.m., Paramount+, Bally Sports SoCal) at BMO Stadium.

“We’ve been speaking about how it isn’t just 11 players,” Tweed said. “We need to find a way to come together collectively as 26 players to really put on a performance. Along with focusing on how we can support each other and bring energy into every moment.”

Last Saturday’s win moved Angel City (3-6-3) to 12 points in the NWSL standings. As of the start of the week, that was six points behind sixth place and the final playoff berth.

“We need to continue to grow and continue to be the best version of ourselves,” Tweed said. “This is an incredible group of players. We need to know that we can go toe to toe with anybody in this league, we just have to remain focused.

“Momentum is something that’s really important. This league is crazy and picking up back-to-back points is something that’s really important and it can really push you on in the league. Our goal is to pick up points in back-to-back games and keep moving forward.”

Houston has scored the fewest goals (10) in the league, but has also allowed the fewest (10). The Dash currently sits in seventh place (4-3-5, 17 points).

“They’re like a workhorse team,” Angel City defender Jasmyne Spencer said. “They’re going to apply a lot of pressure and are very organized. We’ve been working all week on how we can find ways to break them down and also contain their offensive threats.”

After Sunday’s game, Angel City will have a quick turnaround before Wednesday’s Challenge Cup game at home against Wave FC at 7:30 p.m. Angel City is in last place (one point) in the West Division for the Challenge Cup. Wave FC is tied with Portland at three points. This will be Angel City’s fourth of six games in the Challenge Cup.

World Cup send-off

This will be the last game for Alyssa Thompson and Julie Ertz before the FIFA World Cup. Both players will join the U.S. national team for a training camp starting Monday, leading up to a July 9 send-off game in San Jose against Wales.

Angel City has three games (July 29, Aug. 5 and Aug. 19) during the duration of the World Cup (July 20-Aug. 20).

Houston at Angel City FC

When: 5 p.m. Sunday

Where: BMO Stadium

TV: Paramount+, Bally Sports SoCal

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​ Orange County Register 

Bobby Miller, Emmet Sheehan will remain in Dodgers’ rotation

• June 24, 2023

LOS ANGELES ― Bobby Miller and Emmet Sheehan have passed their auditions.

The rookie right-handers will remain in the Dodgers’ starting rotation this week after Julio Urías returns from the 15-day injured list in Kansas City later this week, manager Dave Roberts confirmed.

“It is a game of performance,” Roberts said. “As it stands now, those two have really performed well and will continue to earn opportunities.”

Sheehan, 23, has allowed three hits in 12 innings to begin his major-league career. He earned his first major-league win Friday against the Houston Astros after throwing six no-hit innings in his debut a week earlier against the San Francisco Giants.

Miller, 24, entered Saturday’s start against Houston with a 3-1 record and 2.83 ERA five games into his career.

Their sudden emergence – Miller from Triple-A Oklahoma City, Sheehan from Double-A Tulsa – allowed the Dodgers to go a combined 4-3 in their starts since Miller’s May 23 debut. They’re 8-11 in all other games during that stretch.

“I think this is the 100th percentile, as far as what we had hoped how they would handle if given the opportunity to pitch for us this year,” Roberts said. “Given the injuries and how it’s been for these guys to fill in more than admirably and carry themselves as such gives us a lot of confidence on the pitching side.”

Urías is making a minor-league rehabilitation start Sunday for Class-A Rancho Cucamonga. If that goes well, he’ll start during the Dodgers’ three-game series in Kansas City next weekend.

The odd man out in that case figures to be right-hander Michael Grove, who threw two scoreless relief innings Friday against the Astros.

The Dodgers might opt to send Grove back to Triple-A Oklahoma City to improve as a starter. The 26-year-old had an 8.10 ERA in 30 innings to begin the season. But neither he nor Roberts shot down the possibility that Grove will stick around as a reliever – an area of concern with right-hander Shelby Miller expected to miss several weeks with a neck injury.

“My first time coming out of the ’pen like that, so I didn’t know exactly what to expect, how I’d feel, nerves, all that stuff,” Grove said. “I don’t know how these guys go through it. Build a sweat out there, the gates open, it’s definitely a rush. It’s something I’ve never experienced.”

SYNDERGAARD THROWS

Noah Syndergaard threw three simulated innings to Dodger hitters prior to Saturday’s game, his first action against live hitters since being placed on the 15-day injured list with a finger blister June 8.

The injury is no longer a hindrance. Neither is the defeatist mindset that wore on Syndergaard as he tried “different things, to come up with the same results, feel like you’re letting your teammates down,” Roberts said.

Syndergaard is 1-4 with a 7.16 ERA in 12 starts this season. He signed a one-year, $13 million contract with the Dodgers in December.

Roberts described Saturday’s simulated game as “checking a box.” The next step is to be determined.

“We’re still a ways away,” Roberts said. “I know that’s a vague statement but that’s kind of where we’re at.”

INJURY UPDATES

Max Muncy (hamstring) was among the hitters who faced Syndergaard, and he’ll take live at-bats again Sunday at Dodger Stadium. Roberts said Muncy is expected to travel to Colorado with the rest of the team Monday and be active and play third base Tuesday against the Rockies.

“Wednesday, we’ll reassess how he’s feeling if he’s going to play back-to-back,” Roberts said.

The Dodgers are expected to face left-hander Kyle Freeland on Wednesday.

Chris Taylor (knee contusion) was not in the Dodgers’ starting lineup Saturday but could be back in Sunday, Roberts said.

UP NEXT

Dodgers (RHP Tony Gonsolin 4-2, 2.92 ERA) vs. Astros (RHP Hunter Brown, 6-4, 3.78 ERA), 4 p.m. Sunday, ESPN, 570 AM

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​ Orange County Register 

Kings trade Sean Durzi to Arizona for a 2024 2nd-round draft pick

• June 24, 2023

The Kings have traded defenseman Sean Durzi to the Arizona Coyotes in exchange for a 2024 second-round draft selection, which originally belonged to the Montreal Canadiens.

Durzi, 24, notched 65 points in 136 games over the past two campaigns, placing him second behind Drew Doughty among Kings defensemen in points-per-game average and 61st in the NHL among blue-liners since Durzi made his debut in November 2021.

Acquired in 2019 in the Jake Muzzin trade with Toronto, Durzi’s development pace was accelerated two seasons ago when injuries felled the typically uber-durable Doughty. Durzi entered the mix and showed a propensity for power-play production, while enduring trials by fire on defense that made him less of a liability over time as well.

“Sean is a reliable two-way defenseman who has good vision and contributes offensively,” Arizona general manager Bill Armstrong said. “He will be a very good addition to our blue line and we look forward to having him on our roster this season.”

The Kings have been busy this offseason, using another young defenseman, prospect Helge Grans, and a second-round pick to sweeten a deal that sent struggling goalie Cal Petersen and the final year of defenseman Sean Walker’s contract to Philadelphia, offloading their salaries. They then signed trade-deadline acquisition Vladislav Gavrikov to a two-year contract extension, with the defenseman’s raise signifying that the Kings were again tight on cap space while remaining without a clear No. 1 goalie and having other peripheral concerns to address.

Though Durzi stands to earn a relatively modest $1.7 million, largely because he is still under team control for two more seasons, the rationale for the trade goes beyond breathing room under the cap.

The aforementioned trades, as well as one for winger Kevin Fiala last summer, had left the Kings short on higher draft selections as they dealt away their first-rounders this season and last, as well as a second-round pick next season and their third-rounders this season and next season.

With Saturday’s move, the Kings acquire draft capital in the form of what projects to be a high pick in next year’s second round.

Beyond that, defenseman Brandt Clarke, a lottery pick two seasons ago, is expected to be with the Kings full-time next season. He is also an offensive-minded, right-handed-shooting defender. Though Durzi showed an aptitude for playing the left side, the Kings may not have loved the stylistic fit of having two younger defenders with risk in their games paired together.

Whether or not some other shoe will drop remains to be seen. The upcoming draft, held Wednesday and Thursday in Nashville, boasts a deep field of prospects and the Kings may trade back into the higher rounds if the right opportunity were to present itself. In years past, scouting guru Mark Yannetti revealed numerous contingency plans that the Kings had to move up and there was little doubt they had some for a strong talent pool.

They also now may seek a left-handed-shooting partner for Clarke, though they have internal options like Tobias Bjornfot and Jacob Moverare and another promising right-shooting, offensively savvy rearguard in Jordan Spence. Spence projects to either begin the year in their top-six mix or as the No. 7 defenseman for depth purposes.

More intriguing still, the Kings need to resolve their situation in net and have also been linked increasingly to trade talks for Winnipeg’s Pierre-Luc DuBois. The 25-year-old center can also play wing and could be an eventual successor to Anze Kopitar, but competition, asset cost and contract value may all be rather elevated on 2016’s No. 3 overall pick.

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​ Orange County Register 

3 years after fire nearly destroyed it, Mission San Gabriel is ready to reopen

• June 24, 2023

Three years after Mission San Gabriel was nearly destroyed by fire, the more than 250-year-old church is set to reopen on July 1, capping a multimillion-dollar drive to restore the landmark after months of delays and introduce a long-in-the-works effort to “re-imagine” the narrative of its impact on Indigenous people.

“It is a very exciting moment … a very exciting time. It is finally coming to completion,” said Rev. Parker Sandoval, vice chancellor and senior director of ministerial services for the Los Angeles Archdiocese, who was part of the planning process of reopening the historic chapel and the accompanying museum at the site.

It was July 10, 2020, when a fire that began in the adobe and wood building’s choir loft consumed the roof of the mission — Mission San Gabriel Arcángel —  and seriously damaged its interior.

Scores of firefighting teams — more than 85 firefighters and 12 engine companies from through the west San Gabriel Valley — doused the blaze. But by then there was major damage not just to the roof but to the interior, including its pulpit and altar.

Fallen debris from the roof and ceiling, and firefighters’ heavy equipment, caused severe cracks in the floor tiles.

A few items were saved, including its bell and some historical relics, which were in storage because of some previous renovations at the time.

The church was founded by Father Junipero Serra in 1771 and is widely known as the birthplace of Christianity in Los Angeles.

The home to L.A.’s first generation of Roman Catholics was now a shell of itself. Its roof was destroyed, its relics and religious artifacts threatened or gone.

And a stunned church community, and the city of San Gabriel where the landmark resides, faced a long journey of restoration ahead.

In December, the man accused of setting the fire, John David Corey, was ordered to stand trial. The case is pending.

The roof of Mission San Gabriel Arcángel on Sunday, July 12, 2020, following a fire that damaged the Mission’s church. The Mass was held in the Mission’s Chapel of the Annunciation. on Sunday, July 12. (Photo by Dean Musgrove, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)

‘We are going to rebuild’

Mission San Gabriel itself is a relatively small church that sits on what over the decades has become a larger campus, complete with another, more modern church and a school.  The campus is often called the Mission, but technically, the Mission is the old church. And that’s what was burned.

Two days after the fire started, the chapel’s charred and partially collapsed roof in the backdrop, Archbishop Jose Gomez told a crowd of faithful on a Sunday morning that “we are going to rebuild.”

“It’s time for committing ourselves to a new beginning,” he said.

And that they did, leading to the coming July 1 opening, when the entire Mission will fully open for the first time since before the pandemic.

The inside of the church after a fire tore through the church at Mission San Gabriel destroying the inside of the 245-year-old building in San Gabriel on Saturday, July 11, 2020. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/ SCNG)

Sandoval said on Friday that after extensive work, and a series of delays — repairing, and in effect, replacing the roof being the largest undertaking — the main part of the restoration is complete. In an effort that required teams of specialists, from laborers to historians, windows were replaced, stucco was restored, there was major work on the pulpit, the altar ceiling, three major chandeliers, the choir loft and its Wurlitzer. In a final phase the altar was restored.

“It was an amazing feat to see unfold,” Sandoval said, acknowledging “bureaucratic obstacles” but also thanking restoration teams and donors from all over the country whose money supplemented the insurance that paid for the work.

During the three years of work, the community got glimpses of the restoration, and indeed, many thought the opening would be sooner.

In September, church leaders offered a glimpse, ahead of a Mass that celebrated the end of its jubilee. The Mission opened its doors to the public during a one-day event on Sept. 8. A Mass two days later celebrated the founding of the mission. But it closed again for additional art restoration work, which required a dust-free environment. At the time it was projected to reopen in early December. But delays persisted.

‘A complex history’

While California’s missions are still beloved by many people of faith, the blaze at Mission San Gabriel and its restoration came as the legacy of missions throughout California spur significant debate.

The San Gabriel Mission, founded in 1771, was the fourth of what would become 21 Spanish missions in modern-day California, all established with a goal of converting Native Americans to Christianity, in the process expanding the Spanish empire.

Serra, who founded the first nine missions including the San Gabriel Mission, has come deeper scrutiny in recent years, as part of a broader reckoning with racial injustice across the country.

Back in 2020, Gomez wrote that he has “come to understand how the image of Father Serra and the missions evokes painful memories for some people.”

Alecia Ballin prays outside the Mission San Gabriel Arcangel Sunday, July 12, 2020, after a fire destroyed much of the 249-year-old mission early Saturday. (Photo by David Rosenfeld/SCNG)

But, he would add, “The real St. Junípero fought a colonial system where natives were regarded as ‘barbarians’ and ‘savages,’ whose only value was to serve the appetites of the white man.

“St. Junípero did not impose Christianity, he proposed it,” Gomez added. “For him, the greatest gift he could offer was to bring people to the encounter with Jesus Christ.”

That has not stopped many critics reflecting on Serra’s legacy to see him as an invader of indigenous lands. Church officials say they are trying to acknowledge the historical impact of the Mission on Indigenous people.

During the Mission’s jubilee Mass in September, in the church’s courtyard before the Mass, Chief Anthony Morales of the Gabrieleño/Tongva San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians led a special blessing.

Gomez said the blessing represented a unity in remembering a “first-generation of Catholics in Los Angeles, including of the Gabrielino Tongva, the first peoples of this land.”

Church officials and some scholars say the reopening of a “re-imagined” Mission museum attempts to face what they said is a “complex history” while seeking to add a more comprehensive layer to the narratives on the Mission’s impact in the region. Those narratives up to now have often been much in part a Eurocentric story that revolved around legacies of Spanish colonization and Catholic missionization.

“We used to have a story focused on the missionaries of this area,” said Steven Hackel, a UC Riverside history professor who secured several grants, including $25,000 from the National Trust for Historic Preservation and $30,000 from the California Bishops Council to help cover costs for his team’s work on the museum. “Now we brought as much as we could of Native people, mainly the Gabrieleño community, who along with other Indigenous groups had lived in these lands for more than 10,000 years prior to the colonization period.”

Indeed, as UC Riverside noted in announcing the professor’s role, the Mission, built by native labor, is the site of 5,600 Native American burials. But scholars noted that Native voice, knowledge and history until now have not been weaved into the Mission museum’s curatorial practices or gallery displays.

Hackel worked alongside a team of collaborators, including associate curator Yve Chavez, a Gabrieleno/Tongva San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians member and assistant professor of art history at the University of Oklahoma.

“I think what’s been unusual here — and both challenging and exciting — has been our work to create a narrative of the mission’s history that honors and reflects diverse interpretations of the history of the mission and its many legacies,” said Hackel in a statement.

RLA Conservation worker, Sonia Jerez Frap, paints some architecture inside of the Mission San Gabriel Arcangel in San Gabriel on Thursday, Sept. 8th, 2022. The location sustained major damage from a July 2020 fire.(Photo by Michael Ares, Contributing Photographer)

The museum, which opens July 1, includes a Wall of Names, a comprehensive list of 7,054 Native Americans who were once baptized at Misión San Gabriel Arcángel.

An exhibit, “Mission San Gabriel Arcángel, 1771-1900: Natives, Missionaries, and the Birth of Catholicism in Los Angeles,” is the culmination of a multi-year effort to engage Native consultants on a history of the Mission in what would become Los Angeles through baptismal records, textiles, baskets, paintings, and audio recordings. Among the museum’s 30 artifacts is a space dedicated to the contemporary Gabrieleno/Tongva San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians.

“We are not a federally recognized tribe, so the mission is an important space for our history and community,” said Chavez in a statement from UC Riverside, echoing a broader attempt in California to inform people on Native American History. “We are still part of a living community, with many of our members still active Mission San Gabriel parishioners. Through this exhibition we also want to give non-native audiences a look at how many people were here and hope they walk across the breezeway from the main museum to the building where community photos are on view to see we are still here, living in our neighborhoods and communities.”

The Wall of Names is a memorial in honor of the Native American community. The wall is a complete name list of 7,054 Native Americans who were once baptized at Mission San Gabriel, between 1771 and 1848. It also includes the person’s tribal affiliation. (Photo courtesy of UC Riverside)

‘His heart beat for the Mission’

Sandoval was mindful of one person who won’t be at the special ceremony for dignitaries and Indigenous representatives in the coming week.– physically anyway.

The late Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles David O’Connell was honored during a special bilingual prayer service led by Archbishop José H. Gomez at the Religious Education Congress 2023 (RECongress 2023) at the Arena of the Anaheim Convention Center on Sunday, Feb. 26. Photo: Screenshot from livecast

Bishop David O’Connell, whose fatal shooting in March stunned the Southern California Roman Catholic community, was the top administrator for the Archdiocese’s San Gabriel Valley region and was engaged with the project to restore the Mission. One of the first people on scene when the fire broke, he would later raise funds for the project and advocated for the more comprehensive accounting of the Mission’s impact on Indigenous people.

“His heart beat for the Mission,” Sandoval said, reflecting on an image he still remembers of O’Connell praying at the scene of the fire, clutching his Rosary, “eyes raised to Heaven.”

Sandoval added: “Our hearts will be a little sad because he will physically not be with us.”

Things to Know:

The Mission’s reopening date is pegged to the beatification of Junipero Serra by Pope St. John Paul II in 1988. In the United States, the Church celebrates that date on July 1.
Mission San Gabriel was founded by Spanish Franciscans in 1771 as a small outpost in what is now Whittier. It moved to its present-day location in 1775, and is the fourth of the 21 Catholic California missions.
Records indicate that an estimated 90,000 Native people came to California’s 21 missions at some point. At the time the Spanish arrived in California in 1769, the Gabrieleño population stood at 5,000.
Mission Museum visitors will experience 36 reproductions, two videos, five infographics, 30 original artifacts, and 12 audio components. The audio features a contemporary reading of the interrogation and testimony of Toypurina, a Native woman arrested and jailed during an attempted 1785 Native rebellion at the mission. It was voiced by actors from the Autry’s Native Voices theatre group.

Source: UC Riverside

Staff writer Ethan Huang contributed to this article.

​ Orange County Register 

A street corner in downtown L.A. honors LGBTQ+ community and civil rights pioneers

• June 24, 2023

In the 1950s and 60s, a 24-hour donut shop on the corner of 2nd and Main streets in downtown Los Angeles was regarded as a safe haven for the LGBTQ+ and gender non-conforming community.

The now-shuttered shop was called Cooper Do-nuts — and that street intersection, in what was once known as “The Run,” a strip of gay bars and businesses, is now a historic landmark for the LGBTQ+ community. Officials designated the Cooper Do-nuts/Nancy Valverde Square in a small unveiling ceremony this week.

“We came together in the heart of downtown L.A. to unveil the Cooper Do-Nuts/Nancy Valverde Square, a powerful symbol of resilience, defiance, and the relentless pursuit of equality,” said District 14 Councilmember Kevin de Leon, in a statement posted Thursday to social media. “This unveiling pays tribute to Nancy Valverde, an activist who shattered barriers through her fearless pursuit of justice, significantly advancing the LGBTQIA+ community.”

Nancy Valverde, a Chicana and lesbian activist, frequented the donut shop with friends while attending school in the neighborhood. She was recognized for her efforts to end old “masquerading” laws in L.A. that targeted the queer and gender non-conforming community.

Valverde often wore men’s clothing and was repeatedly harassed by Los Angeles police — like many of the gay and gender non-conforming patrons who hung out at Cooper Do-nuts, advocates said.

Valverde’s family members, community leaders, LGBTQ+ groups and allies gathered for an unveiling ceremony of the new Cooper Do-nuts/Nancy Valverde Square on Saturday, June 24.

The event was put on by the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council, which proposed a motion for the new sign designation on 2nd and Main streets. It was unanimously approved by the L.A. City Council on June 7.

“I’m very humbled. I didn’t know I was making history,” said Valverde, now 91, in a statement before the unveiling. She was unable to make the ceremony.

Valverde was routinely harassed and arrested by police for violating a citywide cross-dressing ban, Ordinance #5022, according to the motion. She found legal rulings at a law library supporting her defense — that wearing masculine clothing was not a crime — which helped in the fight for ending such laws targeting LGBTQ+ individuals, the motion said.

Cooper Do-nuts was revered a safe space for the queer community, and also became the site of one of the earliest reported gay uprisings in the U.S. in the late 1950s — nearly a decade before the Black Cat Tavern protests in L.A. or the Stonewall Riots in New York. The incident involving protestors and L.A. police, known as the Cooper Do-nuts Riot, has not been confirmed.

LAPD Commander Ruby Flores apologized on behalf of the department at the June 22 unveiling.

“Sadly, rather than working to protect this community, the LAPD of that time was not always kind to our gay, lesbian, transgender, our non-conforming Angelenos,” said LAPD Commander Ruby Flores at the June 22 unveiling. “This mistreatment of our citizens was wrong and should never have happened.”

Leaders with the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council said the efforts to get public recognition for Valverde and the donut business took years. Working with city officials, they plan to commemorate other LGBTQ+ icons and historic spaces in the future.

The city commemoration happened amid increasing tensions between conservatives and gay rights advocates during Pride Month — including the burning of a Pride flag at a school in North Hollywood; a heated debate on whether gender identity should be taught in Glendale schools; and the banning of a history textbook mentioning slain gay rights activist Harvey Milk in Temecula.

A few blocks down from the site, a large Progress Pride Flag waved in front of the L.A. County Kenneth Hanh Hall of Administration for the first time in county history.  L.A. County supervisors also voted to expand gender-affirming healthcare and services for the LGBTQ+ community.

Related links

LGBTQ leaders reflect on Pride, from defiance and visibility to bridge-building
Pride flag flies over LA County headquarters for first time in history
An East LA Latino and LGBTQ marketplace merges authenticity with creativity
LGBTQ protections and gender policy sparks Glendale school board war
LA County to create its first LGBTQ+ Commission, enhance gender-affirming care
What Pride looks like in Orange County now

Councilmember De Leon called Cooper Do-Nuts a “welcoming sanctuary to all.”

“Let their legacy ignite our hearts and remind us that change begins with the power of one.”

​ Orange County Register 

Saudi Arabia wants tourists. It didn’t expect Christians.

• June 24, 2023

HAQL, Saudi Arabia — The caravan of five Toyota Land Cruisers raced across Saudi Arabia’s rocky desert, weaving onto a highway so new it was not on the map. At the cleft of sea that splits the kingdom from Egypt, they stopped on a barren beach. Fifteen tourists spilled out and gathered around Joel Richardson, a Kansas preacher.

As the sun dipped below the mountains of the Sinai Peninsula — hazy across the water in Egypt — Richardson asked the group to imagine standing on the other side at the moment of the biblical Exodus, fleeing from Pharaoh’s army with Moses, when the sea ripped in half.

He opened a Bible, donned his glasses and began to recite. “Who among the gods is like you, oh Lord?” he said. “Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders?”

Two Florida retirees, a Colorado pharmacist, an Idaho bookkeeper and an Israeli archaeologist listened intently.

These were not the visitors Saudi officials expected when they opened the country’s borders to leisure tourists in 2019, seeking to diversify the oil-dependent economy and present a new face to the world. First would come the adventurers, they thought — seasoned travelers searching for an unusual destination — and then the luxury market, with yacht owners flocking to resorts that the government is building on the Red Sea coast. No one in the conservative Islamic kingdom had planned for the Christians.

Yet Christians of many stripes — including Baptists, Mennonites and others who call themselves “children of God” — were among the first people to use the new Saudi tourist visas. Since then, they have grown steadily in numbers, drawn by word of mouth and viral YouTube videos arguing that Saudi Arabia, not Egypt, is the site of Mount Sinai, the peak where Jewish and Christian Scriptures describe God revealing the Ten Commandments.

Mainstream biblical scholars vigorously dispute this. But that does little to dampen the pilgrims’ enthusiasm as they embark on what is, for many of them, the trip of a lifetime, hunting for evidence that they think could prove the truth of the Exodus.

“It makes something tangible that you have believed in your whole life,” said Kris Gibson, 53, the Idaho bookkeeper on Richardson’s trip, who had never traveled beyond the United States and Mexico before she boarded a plane in February to Saudi Arabia.

For decades, nearly all the tourists who entered Saudi Arabia were pilgrims going to Mecca, the birthplace of Islam. Openly practicing other religions was effectively forbidden. Synthetic Christmas trees were smuggled in and sold as contraband. People accused of “witchcraft” were executed.

The country’s religious dogmatism began to ease early in the 2000s when tens of thousands of Saudis studied in the United States. Then, in 2015, a new king elevated his 29-year-old son, Prince Mohammed bin Salman, into the line of succession.

Prince Mohammed declared that he would turn the kingdom into a global business hub. He unleashed a cascade of social changes, stripping religious police of their powers, loosening dress codes and lifting a ban on women’s driving.

He also oversaw an increase in political repression, silencing almost every Saudi voice that might challenge him. In 2018, Saudi agents in Istanbul murdered and dismembered Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a critical exile. A U.S. intelligence assessment determined that the prince probably ordered the killing, a charge he denied.

Since then, Prince Mohammed has defied attempts to isolate him, deploying Saudi Arabia’s oil wealth in new ways to cement the country’s influence, including this month’s surprise deal between a Saudi-backed golf league and the PGA Tour.

As Saudi Arabia traverses this fluid new age, once-unthinkable events have become commonplace, giving daily life the texture of a surreal dream.

Few Saudis would dare to speak of full religious freedom; atheists — and even Muslims who question the tenets of Islam — can face imprisonment. But religious taboos are shifting rapidly. Buddhist monks attended an interfaith gathering in the kingdom last year, and Jewish visitors recently planted date palm trees in Medina, Islam’s second holiest city. An American-Israeli man turned up in the capital, Riyadh, with a website proclaiming himself “chief rabbi of Saudi Arabia.”

The kingdom is changing so fast that people are often unsure what has official approval and what is an accident. Government entities did not respond to requests for comment about Christian tours. Some Saudis privately expressed bemusement, though, and expanding tourism is a priority as the country diversifies its economy.

There is also a more subtle incentive. Saudis have long been portrayed in North America and Europe through tropes that brand them as backward and barbaric. They view tourism as a way to redefine the narrative and showcase their culture: its hospitality, its generosity, its spiced coffee and deep-fried sweets.

“When you think of Saudi Arabia from the States, you certainly don’t think of this,” said Gibson, strolling through a canyon filled with palm trees.

‘How beautiful’

When Gibson told a friend she was going to Saudi Arabia, he called her crazy. She worried about offending Saudis — wearing the wrong thing, eating with the wrong hand — but once she arrived, no one seemed to care.

“I’m just absolutely shocked at how beautiful it is,” she said. “Because, you know, in my head I’m thinking, nothing but sand.”

Israel and Egypt have local Christian populations and long ago welcomed Christian travelers, drawing millions of people a year, many of them American evangelicals. Saudi Arabia is a nascent market. But several tour companies now offer packages geared toward Christians.

Like most similar journeys, Richardson’s tour — costing $5,199 per person — covered an area that Prince Mohammed chose for a science fiction-inspired mega-project, Neom, where he plans to build a linear metropolis composed entirely of two parallel skyscrapers.

Neom’s planners promise to preserve archaeological sites. Still, some Christian tourists worry.

“I wanted to see it in its pristine nature,” said Michael Marks, 52, the pharmacist from Colorado, who accelerated his plan to visit because of the project.

Like many Christian tourists, Marks became interested in the kingdom through the story of Ron Wyatt, an American nurse who popularized the idea that Saudi Arabia was the location of Mount Sinai.

Biblical archaeologists typically place Mount Sinai in Egypt, although there are other theories. A minority points to writings by Roman historian Flavius Josephus suggesting that Jebel al-Lawz, a mountain in northwestern Saudi Arabia, is the site. There is also local lore that Moses spent time in the area. “No historical or archaeological evidence support these stories,” Saudi archaeologists wrote in a 2002 paper.

In the 1980s, Wyatt smuggled himself into Saudi Arabia and was arrested for entering illegally. He made a series of dubious claims, including that he had discovered the remains of ancient Egyptian chariots under the Red Sea.

Nevertheless, his ideas — initially on the fringe of evangelical beliefs — spread. Several years ago, Ryan Mauro, a self-described security analyst and Fox News commentator, narrated a popular YouTube video, “Finding the Mountain of Moses,” in which he said: “The Saudis have been hiding the evidence of the Exodus.”

Such conspiratorial assertions are often coupled with Islamophobia, but Saudi officials appear to see little conflict in courting conservative American Christians. For one, they are relatively inured to prejudice against Muslims; declarations by Donald Trump, like “I think Islam hates us,” did not dent his warm ties with Prince Mohammed when he was president.

But also, links to these groups offer a new source of soft power, coveted as an alternative way of connecting to Americans even when formal U.S.-Saudi ties are rocky. In 2018, weeks after Khashoggi’s murder, the prince hosted a delegation of American evangelical leaders in Riyadh.

Evidence in the desert

Richardson led his first tour to the kingdom in 2019 when the tourist visas were first available. A bearded man with a dry sense of humor, he was raised nominally Catholic in Massachusetts. As a teenager, he was a “very successful hedonist,” he joked.

But in the early 1990s, he came across a tent revival meeting in Tennessee and became an evangelical. “The Holy Spirit just spoke to me and said, ‘Your entire life is just a complete lie,’” he said.

He became fascinated by end-times prophesies, and in two books published more than a decade ago, argued that the Antichrist will be Muslim, describing Islam as a “totalitarian ideology” with “satanic origins.”

Asked how he reconciles his writing with what he calls a love of the Middle East, he said his perspective has changed, describing himself as a “conservative libertarian” who now has more of a live-and-let-live attitude.

On one of their last days in the kingdom, he took the tourists to a Bedouin camp, where their hosts milked a camel, pouring the frothy liquid from a silver bowl into cups for them to drink. Inside a tent lined with burgundy carpets, they dipped dates into fresh goat butter and feasted on meat and rice piled on platters the size of chandeliers. “This is such a privilege, that we get to be at the forefront of all this,” he said, praising the cultural exchange.

That pleasure alone is not what brings him to the kingdom; nor is profit from the tours, which are costly in a country where tourism is still new. Like many of the tourists, he is driven by an urge to uncover proof of the Bible’s stories, to walk where he believes they happened. The scenes of the Exodus fill him with awe. Finding signs that it occurred “would be the single greatest sacred biblical step forward in the past couple of thousand years,” he said.

“In my opinion,” he said, “all the evidence is sitting right out there in the desert.”

As they planned their journey, Luis Torres, 54, and his wife, Elinette Ramirez, 55, wanted to mark the occasion. They printed shirts with an image of a mountain crowned in flames with the GPS coordinates of Jebel al-Lawz.

To get there, the group drove for hours and hiked through a golden-brown canyon. “I want to give everyone time to reflect and pray,” Richardson said.

As a child, Ramirez had struggled to connect to the Bible’s stories. Now, she and her husband had traveled all the way from Puerto Rico to see the peak they believed was the mountain of God.

The sun beamed, sending rays floating into the valley, as they lifted their palms to the sky. “Hallelujah! Christ is coming!” they sang. “The trumpet will sound soon and the heavens will open up.”

When the time came to leave, Gibson lingered. She swayed as she gazed at the valley, wrapped in thoughts of the divine.

“All the majesty,” she said, her cheeks wet with tears. “I just got overwhelmed.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

​ Orange County Register