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Doug Styles, Denise Coleman, and Huckleberry Youth, Part 2 (S6E10)

Storied: San Francisco

Release Date: 03/05/2024

Nathan Tan, Part 2 (S6E14) show art Nathan Tan, Part 2 (S6E14)

Storied: San Francisco

Part 2 picks up where we left off in Part 1, with Nate's arrival at SF State and his counselor's suggestion that he switch his major from Business to Art. Nathan graduated from State in 1994. With airbrushing becoming popular around that time, he and his buddy E had opened an airbrush store in the Bayview that did quite well. Nathan wasn't even 20 yet.   The store on Third stayed open about a year and a half, he says. At this point in the conversation, Nathan and I go on a sidetrack about how we both approach life and big decisions. He says he tries to stay open to opportunities, to seize...

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Nathan Tan, Part 1 (S6E14) show art Nathan Tan, Part 1 (S6E14)

Storied: San Francisco

In Part 1, meet and get to know Nathan, who today owns and operates New Skool Clothing and Accessories.   Nathan's parents are both from Myanmar, but fled their home country during years of political upheaval. They landed in England, where his mom's mom already lived and where Nathan was born in the early Seventies. He, his older sister, and their parents then moved to the Bay Area, where their dad had family, when Nathan was three.   He attended preschool in The City, but then his parents moved their young family to Daly City, where they could afford to buy a house. His dad started...

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SFFILM's Anne Lai (S6 Bonus) show art SFFILM's Anne Lai (S6 Bonus)

Storied: San Francisco

In this bonus episode, meet SFFILM Executive Director Anne Lai. Learn all about Anne's upbringing, what drew her to California, her stint with the Sundance Institute, and her arrival in 2020 in San Francisco at the famed San Francisco International Film Festival (SFFILM). Anne will walk listeners through the history of this 67-year-old festival, the oldest such event in North America. Then she touches on some highlights of this year's festival (April 24–28), including the Opening Night screening of Didi, the feature-length debut of Bay Area filmmaker Sean Wang. Please visit for more info,...

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Mitchell's Ice Cream, Part 2 (S6E13) show art Mitchell's Ice Cream, Part 2 (S6E13)

Storied: San Francisco

Part 2 is the story of how open-mindedness met opportunity. It's also an explanation for how an ice cream store opened by someone named Mitchell came to carry several flavors familiar to both the Filipino- and the Latin-American community.   Brian shares the story: The Asian flavors started around 1965 when a customer and friend of Larry Mitchell's introduced Larry to the Gina Corporation in Philippines, who process and package the fruits Mitchell's uses to this day in many of its ice cream flavors. They started with mango puree, a fruit that his friend had to introduce Larry Mitchell to....

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Mitchell's Ice Cream, Part 1 (S6E13) show art Mitchell's Ice Cream, Part 1 (S6E13)

Storied: San Francisco

This oh-so-San Francisco story begins with two brothers and a dairy farm at Noe and 29th Street.   Larry Mitchell and his older brother Jack opened in 1953. Five years earlier, the building that now houses the well-known ice cream shop was going to be torn down for the widening of San Jose Avenue. The Mitchell family fought those efforts and a compromise was reached—The City would turn and move the building. The old liquor store that had been on San Jose was no more.   That space sat empty for a couple years until Larry Mitchell decided that he wanted to do something with it....

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Photographer Chloe Sherman, Part 2 (S6E12) show art Photographer Chloe Sherman, Part 2 (S6E12)

Storied: San Francisco

In Part 2, we hear about Chloe's first photo show, which took place at The Bearded Lady. Chloe describes The Bearded Lady as a hub, a place to do and get everything you could possibly need. It and the Kiki Gallery next door were both on 14th Street near Guerrero.   Another queer artist, Cathy, liked Chloe's show and suggested that she go to art school. And so Chloe got into San Francisco Art Institute. She had a darkroom at her home and sometimes printed at Harvey Milk Photo Center in Duboce Park. But she was able to do so much at her school.   At this point in the podcast, Chloe and...

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Photographer Chloe Sherman, Part 1 (S6E12) show art Photographer Chloe Sherman, Part 1 (S6E12)

Storied: San Francisco

Chloe Sherman's eyes are intense, but not the way you might think.   Chloe, who's been taking photographs since she was young, was born in New York City. Her mom and her mom's mom were both New Yorkers, and her dad was from Chicago, with his family going back generations there. When she in was grade school, the family moved to Chicago, where Chloe was raised by aunts and grandparents as well as her parents, just like she had been in NYC.   It was the Seventies and her parents were hippies. They soon headed west, taking their family to Portland, Oregon, where Chloe spent the rest of...

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Mark DeVito and Standard Deviant Brewing, Part 2 (S6E11) show art Mark DeVito and Standard Deviant Brewing, Part 2 (S6E11)

Storied: San Francisco

In Part 2, we pick up right where we left off in Part 1. Mark was walking around the Mission taking down numbers of places with "for rent" signs. A resident in one of those spots leaned out the window and invited Mark in to see the place. Mark reveals that he and his wife still live in that same apartment 20 years later.   Paul Duatschek lived nearby in the Mission. He and Mark were introduced by a mutual friend at Bottom of the Hill. Soon enough, Paul was coming in regularly to Luna Park on Valencia, where Mark managed and bartended. His new friend kept urging Mark to carry his homebrew...

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Mark DeVito and Standard Deviant Brewing, Part 1 (S6E11) show art Mark DeVito and Standard Deviant Brewing, Part 1 (S6E11)

Storied: San Francisco

Mark DeVito, co-owner and COO of , wouldn't last a day in a police lineup. But it might not be his curly handlebar mustache that gave him away. Mark has an outsize personality, to put it mildly. And back in December, I sat down with him and one of the SDB dogs, Beans, at the Mission brewery for what turned out to be quite the wild ride of a recording.   In Part 1, we learn about Mark's upbringing in smalltown New Hampshire—Hopkinton, to be specific. It's still a town-with-no-stoplights small. The summers were hot and the winters cold and snowy.   After hearing about two rather...

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Doug Styles, Denise Coleman, and Huckleberry Youth, Part 2 (S6E10) show art Doug Styles, Denise Coleman, and Huckleberry Youth, Part 2 (S6E10)

Storied: San Francisco

In Part 2, we really get into the meat of what Huckleberry Youth is and how it got started. You know, I keep finding out ways in which our city pioneered things for the nation. I recently saw the upcoming Carol Doda documentary and learned that she was the first topless dancer in the US. And in this episode, we hear from Doug and Denise something very important that Huckleberry Youth did before anyone else. And of course, at the time they did it, it was illegal.   1967 is also known as the "Summer of Love" in San Francisco. And that meant young people from all over the country and world...

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In Part 2, we really get into the meat of what Huckleberry Youth is and how it got started. You know, I keep finding out ways in which our city pioneered things for the nation. I recently saw the upcoming Carol Doda documentary and learned that she was the first topless dancer in the US. And in this episode, we hear from Doug and Denise something very important that Huckleberry Youth did before anyone else. And of course, at the time they did it, it was illegal.
 
1967 is also known as the "Summer of Love" in San Francisco. And that meant young people from all over the country and world flocked to our city to find whatever it was they were looking for. Not all of them were lucky. Many faced hardship, having trouble finding shelter, making friends, and getting sick or addicted to drugs. A group of faith-based organizations and folks in the nonprofit world got together to do something about it, and Huckleberry House was born.
 
But back then, both being a youth runaway was illegal, and, if you provided shelter for a runaway, it was considered aiding and abetting. Huckleberry House was the first such shelter for runaway youth in the country.
 
But all it took was one complaint from a parent. SFPD raided the house and arrested youth and staff alike. Now they needed a lawyer, and they found one in a young man named Willie Brown. The future mayor got the charges dropped, and Huckleberry House reopened in February 1968. It has been in legal operation ever since.
 
Denise and Doug talk about several programs that Huckleberry Youth has established over the years. One such program was HYPE, established in the 1980s to help young people with HIV/AIDS. They give thanks and respect to Huckleberry's own Danny Keenan—the first to say, in effect, "We need to have kids talking to kids" to address problems like young people who are sick.
 
I bring up the fire at their Geary Boulevard administrative offices back in 2019 because I witnessed it (I live not too far from there). The office had been at Geary and Parker for more than 30 years. The fire in front of Hong Kong Lounge 2 destroyed memorabilia and photos at Huckleberry's office, but they were able to save a lot too.
 
During COVID, Huckleberry House stayed open and even took in new youth. Partly because of the fire, they had been moving a lot of admin stuff online before the pandemic, so they were able to make that transition.
 
The conversation then shifts to kids who come to them addicted. Huckleberry gets those youth into its justice program, known as CARC (Community Assessment and Resource Center). Denise tells this story, because she was at Delancey Street when the program started in 1998 (see Part 1 of this podcast). It turned out to be too much for that nonprofit, and so they handed it over to Huckleberry 2000. Doug and Denise estimate that the program has helped at least 7,000 individuals, and possibly as many as 10,000.
 
We end this episode with Denise and Doug responding to our theme this season: "We're all in it."
 
Go to Huckleberryyouth.org to donate and learn more about all that they do to help underserved youth in San Francisco.
 
Photography by Jeff Hunt
 
We recorded this podcast in December 2023 at Huckleberry Youth's administrative offices on Geary.