Beloved Mural Packs It In

by Steed Dropout
Feb. 4, 2015

Take-down on Telegraph. Photo by Ted Friedman.

The other Peoples Park Mural; you’ve passed it every time you visit Telegraph Avenue. the mural is the work of Edithe (“Edy”) Boone, 77, who installed it, overlooking the burned-down Berkeley Inn site at Telegraph/Haste, early in the 1990s.

The Berkeley Inn, destroyed by fires in 1986, was a bohemian be-hive on Telegraph Ave.

Mural Artist taking it down. Photo by Ted Friedman.

Boone was packing up the murals eighteen panels, a few days ago, for storage nearby.The mural has been marred by graffiti at least three times, recently, Bonne said. The mural’s more famous cousin, “A History of People’s Park,” is still being restored across the street after a series of vandal attacks.

Mural cousins. Photo by Ted Friedman.

The site of Boone’s mural will eventually begin construction as student apartments, but Boone said she is storing her work to protect it, not to avoid construction–which would have led to her mural needing to move anyway, she said.

Mad Monk heats up. Photo by Ted Friedman.

A thousand parks blooming is packing up as the corner of Telegraph/Haste throbs with game-changing construction. Mad Monk, a night spot, across the street from both murals, lurches fitfully towards an opening. After struggling with mud from a recent storm and other obstacles, workers established a cement foundation last week for replacement apartments and a restored popular pub and adjacent salad palace.

Establishing Foundation, Telegraph Ave. Photo by Ted Friedman.

Meanwhile, a development at Dwight and Telegraph will mark the end of another Telegraph landmark, Shakespeare’s Books, the present owner said.

Changes to the Telegraph Ave. block below Haste have left a number of landmarks: Maxi’s, 44 years old, Caffe Mediterraneum, 1956, site of Amoeba, since the ’70s, the venerable Print-Mint and Moe’s books, since the ’60s. The Cody Building and soon to open Mad Monk, night-spot, will always symbolize Fred Cody’s famous bookstore.

As much as things change on Teley–the tude abides.


More photos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/berkboy/

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