A place primed with passion

By MARK HIGGINS
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

To understand the passion Wallingford residents have for their neighborhood, consider The Durn Good Grocery. When neighbors heard five years ago that the homey little market was losing its lease, they mobilized. Petitions were signed. A boycott was threatened against the building's owner -- all to no avail.

The Durn Good -- a neighborhood fixture since 1912 -- moved down the street and is doing fine. But a new market tried and failed to take its place.

Then came Bill Kraut and his wife, Micheal Smith. They opened Roadrunner Coffeehouse in the old storefront on North 40th Street. Despite the passage of time "people still come in and say they haven't been in before because of the petition, and some of them hadn't even signed it," says Kraut.

Kraut and Smith can smile about such loyalty now that they have carved a neighborhood niche with tasty coffee, home cooking and live folk music three nights a week.

Wallingford, says Kraut, possesses "a real sense of community you find in some parts of town, but missing in others."

Wallingford's desire to be a cohesive, connected neighborhood runs deep. How else can you explain the nutty night in May when the new QFC grocery store on North 45th Street threw the switch on its neon sign? There, spelled out for the world to see, was W-A-L-L-I-N-G-F-O-R-D.

Three hundred people in the street laughed, clapped and cheered. It may not be as hip as the old Food Giant sign that had marked the spot, but it's next best.

"Everyone knows where Fremont is, but Wallingford didn't want to take the chance," jokes Ron Petty, a builder and artist who created Wallingford's totem sculpture titled "Animal Storm."

Petty's stack of swirling bronze is anchored at the northwest corner of Wallingford Center, the 90-year-old school turned retail center. At the top of Petty's 18-foot totem, watching the world go by with unblinking eyes, is an aluminum casting of his cat.

"Moma Cat" would often flop down in the middle of Petty's drawing board as he sat working on sketches of the sculpture. "I told her if I got the commission I would put her on top," Petty says.

Along with the bronzed impressions of 28 animals found in Wallingford is a dog with a peace sign in its collar -- one of two items on the sculpture recalling Wallingford's counterculture past.

Continued:

• Some never want to leave fun, quirky community
• Home isn't just a place to live; it's an ongoing project
• With popularity comes stress, stress, stress