I met Rita Cofield back in late 2013 so she could interview me while a team was putting together an inch thick report that is quite costly for the new owners, the Dornins. I loved answering Rita’s questions as I loved that she loved history and, in this case, found our history so interesting. A report already completed for Steven Udar-Hazy was on the history of the architectural design. This new report focus on the social cultural aspects of history. And then a third summary report was done by Jan Ostrshay in 2015, whom the city works with directly.
These reports take a long time because of the amount of in-depth research that needs to be completed. It was some of Rita’s questions that inspired me to delve into this website project. One question she had of me was about the location of the “Coffee Pot.” I had assumed the South Seas bar was always in the lower level off Mountain Road. Well, Rita wondered and sure enough that lower location was eventually the electric Coffee Pot in 1950. It is always fun to discover these different details.
The biggest question on the historians’ minds was documenting as accurately as possible the timeline of the gay culture. The gay period was already recognized by the city as significant with both the current and past owner agreeing on the significance. So it was agreed early on by both Udar-Hazy and Dornins to dedicate the period of the gay community by a plaque to hang along with other history pieces and the Smith era once development is completed. So for those historians that are interested, I asked Rita to summarize her findings that you can read below.