THE OLD OLDER GAME PLAYED WITH 'MEMORY LETTERS'

I used to say that someday I would take the letters I have received over

all the years of column writing and put them into a book.

That was before I actually sat down and wrote a book or two. That put me

out of that notion- forever.

But much of my mail is for sharing, no doubt about that; particularly the

letters from people who like to play that silly Old Older Game. When we

indulge ourselves in a wash of nostalgia, the responses are always better than

the game just played.

I don't know that you've noticed, but we seem to have less time for games

in these busy days. Looking through my files, I note with interest that in

1975, when the game began, I wrote six Old Older columns, each loaded with

readers' memories.

The game began by accident. In an October 1975 column about trains I wrote

''You're an old-timer if you remember when there was NWP passenger service

north to Eureka. You're an older-timer if you remember when passengers as well

as Gravensteins came from Sebastopol and points west on the P&SR.'' And then I

added, having no idea what I was getting into, ''But then, the Old Older game

is one that can be played about any number of things around here.'' Within the

week, I had half a column of memories. There is plenty of irony in looking

back these 21 years. First, of course, is the NWP passenger service, which is

coming again. And next game's lead-off, which was: ''You're an old-timer if

you remember when there were two rows of parking spaces in front of the Topaz

Room, but you're an older-timer if you can remember driving the whole circle

around the courthouse.''

If history doesn't exactly repeat itself, it certainly tries.

The first burst of enthusiasm has lessened. It isn't that I have lost

interest, but every column uses up 20 or 30 good old memories. It's hard not

to repeat. Last year, 1995, I compiled just two Old Older lists. This year we

haven't played the game once. The last of the ''Do You Remember'' columns was

in September 1995. That's when Marc Mott wrote to me. Marc lives in Petaluma,

but it is Santa Rosa where he plays Old Older.

''What prompted my nostalgia trip,'' he wrote ''was the demolition of the

tavern (Gene's Bar) at College and Mendocino. Everytime I drive south at this

intersection I see the ''Shakes'' and ''Ice Cream'' lettering that was

exposed. That was the old Borden's Creamery where I had many a 30-cent

sandwich and shake when attending St. Rose School.

''As I continue south on Mendocino, I kinda still keep looking for the

courthouse which should have been preserved. I also cast an eye at the

northeast corner of Fifth and Mendocino which was Gabe's Pool Hall and a half

a block kitty-corner was Kurlander's Billiards. About half my misspent youth

was in those 'dens of inequity.' Boy, how I remember, the 25-cent 'goona'

games at Kurlander's.''

Marc moved to Santa Rosa in 1936, when he was 10 years old. It wasn't until

his job took him away 20 years later that he realized, as he puts it, ''what

an enchanted place it was in those times.''

Among the enchantments: his first real job, after-school employment at the

Occidental Hotel on B Street. ''Wow, the things I learned at age 14,

bell-hopping at the Occidental!''

IF, IN THE OLD OLDER game mode, Marc would be an ''old'' then Robert

Herbert, a retired naval architect who wrote to me in 1989 about growing up in

Santa Rosa, would be an ''older.''

''We spent so much of our time in the streets and they remain in my

memory,'' wrote Herbert, who was a kid here in the 1920s. ''The hot asphalt of

College Avenue on a summer's day, outer Mendocino on the way to school, Second

Street by the tannery and the creek. On the Fourth of July the veterans of the

Great War ... would parade up McDonald Avenue under the trees, stopping at

Soldiers Park to hear speeches and 'Taps' played against the echo bugle in the

Odd Fellows Cemetery. The dust hung in the warm, still air after they

passed.''

The streets play a big role in memories of the days when traffic was

lighter and so was our mood. Bob Murray, whose family lived on the old Rogers

Ranch on Franklin Avenue, east of the Odd Fellows Cemetery, writes with still

another ''street scene'' to jog the Old Older skills.

''In 1937, my brother, Lex Murray, exhibited 12 Jerseys at the Sonoma

County Fair. He gathered friends (and his brother) to lead the animals, one to

a person. We went down Franklin Avenue to McDonald and took a street past

Veterans Park (the same park as Soldiers Park in Herbert's recollection, it is

now the site of the First Presbyterian Church).

''Then we went south in an alley behind the first row of houses facing west

on McDonald, crossed Fourth Street to the Alderbrook Bridge, then through

Doyle Park, over the creek, through the edge of a prune orchard, to Bennett

Avenue and to the fairgrounds. When the fair was over, we returned home the

same way.''

Murray, who later milked his own Jerseys on a 200-acre dairy on Summerfield

Road, remembers his Santa Rosa ''history lessons.'' He writes about walking

from his family ranch in what is now known as Hidden Valley over the hill to

his friend Will Parsons' house (where Will still lives).

''The pavement ended 20 feet past Parsons' mailbox, where ALL the mailboxes

for the people who lived on Montecito were. The mailman would back his Model-T

into the Parsons' driveway to turn around and go back into town. One day in

1936,'' writes Murray, ''I went horseback riding with Will and his dad, Ike.

We rode up the dirt road until the last turn before dropping down to Rincon

Valley. Ike hooked a left and we went north through somebody's yard. We came

on a dirt road through thick manzanita and Ike told us this was the old

Spanish Trail from Sonoma to Mark West. The tracks we saw there dated back to

the Mexican era. He said it was on that road that Bear Flaggers Cowie and

Fowler were captured by the Mexicans and executed.''

Arthur McCord lived near that ''history road.'' McCord, who wrote a letter

to the editor in 1950, remembering ''the good old days,'' was a resident of

Chanate Road. He had been a subscriber, he said, for 40 years. What McCord

remembered is definitely in the Older realm, maybe Oldest.

He wrote of ''the Talbot addition when it was was a hop field and the Lewis

addition was a prune and apple orchard. When Proctor Terrace was a grain field

and there was a ballpark and bicycle raceway where the PG&E warehouse was

built on Pacific Avenue. Remember,'' he challenged readers of 45 years ago,

''the old street railway which ran from the NWP depot to the end of McDonald

Avenue and the old yellow buckskin horse that supplied the 'motor power' who,

at times, used to break the single tree when ready to leave the car barn,

leaving the driver and the car behind. He would run down the track to the

depot then turn around and run back to his stall in the barn.

''Remember when plenty of salmon were caught with a gig in Santa Rosa

Creek, when Ma and Pa used to put us into a wagon and drive over to Ballard's

Lake on the lagoon and stay overnight for catfishing.''

FOR ROAD TRIP MEMORIES we rely on a Napa man, Beverly Tallman. Bev was 84

when he wrote me last year.

His father's first automobile, he told me, was a 1917 six-cylinder,

seven-passenger Buick touring car. The Tallman family (eight children) went

all over Northern California in that car, stopping at creeks. ''My father sure

did love his small-stream trout fishing,'' said Bev. But fishing isn't his

story.

''Well, what I had in mind to tell you,'' wrote Bev, ''was a trip we made

to the lighthouse on Point Reyes. We were at Inverness on Tomales Bay and the

old yellow road sign said 4 miles to the light house. As it turned out, it

should have said 14 miles.

''Well, anyway, we finally got there about four or five o'clock when the

keeper was just about to light up the kerosene lantern in the lighthouse. The

keeper invited my family -- or at least seven of us -- to go down the 104

steps. My, what a wonderful thing to be shown to a family.

''Well, anyway, by the time we had done all this and headed back to

Inverness it was very dark. My folks stopped about 5 or 6 miles going north

and built a bonfire and we had a supper. Of course, in those days we always

took food along for at least two meals on the side of the road, generally a

pot full of baked beans.

''Well, anyway, we came home to Napa after that. I generally slept all the

way home. All those old dirt roads!''

WELL, ANYWAY, that's all the letters, all the memories, all the Old and

Olders I have space for today.

The good folks who want to know why I never write about the Santa Rosa

Speedway on Russell Avenue or the Cotati Drag Strip or locate the five (or

six?) service stations that used to be in Montgomery Village must wait for

another turn. So will those who suggest a whole column in which people

remember where they were when they first met Pepper. This is not a bad idea,

but I will have to explain about Pepper, because Old comes so quickly now.

Is the world turning faster than the Point Reyes light? Did we really have

a bicycle race track in town? Who can explain what a ''goona'' game is? How

long has has it been since you've seen a Jersey cow crossing Fourth Street?

Keep those cards and letters coming.