September 29, 2005 - Ed is Vane

The picture in yesterday’s Wednesday Where Is It (WWII) was taken from the top floor of the city parking lot at the corner of Figueroa and Anacapa. The weather vane is on top of a building on Figueroa. The little guy at the end of the weather vane is a blacksmith.

The dedicated staff of edhat.com originally did not see any significance to the blacksmith. For today’s story, we drove around town looking for other weather vanes to photograph. Our goal was to create a photo gallery showing the weather vanes of Santa Barbara. As yesterday’s contest entries show, people are familiar with these decorative wind direction indicators. Most people guessed Paseo Nuevo, where there is an old car blowing in the wind.

Yesterday’s contest entries also proved that many people are well aware of the old ironworks on the corner of Anacapa and Ortega – a place we had planned for a future WWII.

As it turns out, there is some significance to the blacksmith in our photo. Proving once again that our dedicated subscribers are far smarter than we, we received this email from Santa Barbara old-timer Cyned,

El Hererro - the blacksmith - at 16 East Figueroa St. The Old blacksmith, placed in the 1920's, and once pointing east, which I can't remember why now, since weather vanes generally point north. Maybe the last renovation pointed things north? Will Mr. Levy ever complete renovations on this building? It's been in torment during all the years I've walked past it. Hope they don't get rid of the old fireplace inside this time...

Cyned, who by far gave the most complete answer, wins an Edhat t-shirt. Hopefully, we will get more info tomorrow on 16 East Fig.

Here is our weather vane photo gallery. Mouseover pictures to see where they are.

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