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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 19, 2018)
6A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 2018 editor@dailyastorian.com KARI BORGEN Publisher JIM VAN NOSTRAND Editor Founded in 1873 JEREMY FELDMAN Circulation Manager DEBRA BLOOM Business Manager JOHN D. BRUIJN Production Manager CARL EARL Systems Manager SOUTHERN EXPOSURE W hat makes you smile? For everybody it’s a little different. Some people like baby ani- mals. Others chuckle over sound effects. Me, the thought of a Chicago-style hot dog. A comfort food extraordinaire, food of my youth, a meal (replete with veggies: tomato, pickle, peppers) on a poppy seed bun. That’s why when I first moved here I made it a point to visit Jim Mudd of Manzanita, whose Chicago-style hot dog cart was parked on Laneda to serve up the Windy’s City comfort food. It was a great dog: Mudd had the knack and I was an immediate fan. Little did I know the epic impact that Mudd, who died on Oct. 1, R.J. MARX had on people in the region, especially in Tillamook, our neighboring county to the south. James “Jim” Malburn Mudd, the self-proclaimed “Manzanita Man of the Century,” according to his obituary, dedicated himself to making others happy. He shared a smile for everyone and his self-proclaimed motto was: “Life doesn’t get any better than this.” In 1990, Mudd and his friend Doug Nicholson, who had met as students at Oregon State University, decided to launch a coed golf tournament, which they christened the “Mudd Nick Invitational.” The founders opened their arms to both OSU and rival U of O, with a duck dressed as a beaver the logo, satisfying alumni of both schools, reported the Tillamook Headlight-Herald. The invitational was a hit early on, and Jim’s wife Lynn proposed the Mudd Nick charity golf tournament as an annual event. The first tournament took place in 1993 and the nonprofit Mudd Nick Foundation formed in 2006. Since that time, the foundation has raised more than $1.4 million. Funds support up to 50 educational and recre- ational programs every year. A former Bridgestone executive, Mudd and his family “moved all over the coast” before settling in Manzanita. After frequent trips to Chicago, his love affair with Chicago-style hot dogs began. “When we retired, we came out here,” he told me over an all-beef Vienna frank in the summer of 2016. “This was my parents’ home. Since this is the last chapter of my life, I thought what can I do to help? I thought we could open a hot-dog stand, a Chicago- deal like I’ve eaten all my life, and we’d draw people in and we’d talk about the Mudd Nick Foundation.” As he envisioned, the hot dogs drew people in, and Mudd spread the word to the benefit of arts and humanities. THE SMILE GUYS Photos by R.J. Marx/The Daily Astorian CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: Jim Mudd serves up a culinary classic. Rich- ard Ortez and Chloe keep watch at Sabra J’s Attic in Cannon Beach. The store moved next door in July. Sabra J’s Attic owner Diane Ortez and her husband Richard celebrated their 60th anniversary this year. Ortez is closing the store after 18 years in December. Donations for science, technology, engineering and math, higher education and careers, camps, literacy, sports came in from around the world. The foundation continues to benefit children with special needs, the talented and the gifted, providing “learning experiences that stimulate children to aspire to their greatest potential and pursue their dreams.” “It’s been a great ride,” he said in 2016. The ‘gurgle pot king’ I didn’t know what a “gurgle pot” was until I read about Richard Ortez. Ortez was the subject of many news- paper articles for the pots that make a distinctive “glug glug” sound when they pour. The gurgling reminded me of the character “Ix” my dad invented to my delight when I was 3 or 4, an ulular sound (“ung-diddy-ung-diddy”) that could reduce me to uncontrollable laughter. Ortez had that effect on people — delighting customers at Sabra J.’s Attic in Cannon Beach since its opening in 1998. Ortez died Sept. 4 in his King City home. Born in 1936 in Los Angeles, Ortez was a sergeant in the Marine Corps and stationed in Camp Pendleton, California, and Okinawa, Japan. He was an expert instructor and mechanic of amphibious landing vehi- cles and tanks. He married his wife of 62 years, Diane Porterfield, in Los Angeles. The couple had four children in California before moving to the Portland area in the 1980s, where he was the top performing salesman of heavy-duty brakes for a Fortune 500 company. Richard and Diane became min- istry leaders for Worldwide Marriage Encounter and Walk To Emmaus before they opened up their Cannon Beach store, “with no experience, just (our) faith,” Diane said in 2015. Sabra J.’s Attic — named after Diane’s great-grandmother — became a destination antique and gift store, with a specialty in the aforementioned gurgle pots, fish-shaped pitchers that make a whimsical gurgling noise when pouring, modeled after an 1885 invention. Richard Ortez became known as the “gurgle pot king.” Between 2008 and 2011 alone, he estimated he sold 1,200 gurgle pots. “People always commented when they came in that they just felt the peace,” Diane Ortez said. “No matter how tired I was or what was going on, whenever I would go in and walk into that shop it would feel like I was in a different, wonderful place.” The couple sold the original store on Beaver Street in June 2014. That store became Harding’s Trading Co. and they moved next door, where they continued to do business. Richard Ortez had more than his share of challenges: a cancer diagnosis, and a fall that forced him to use a wheelchair. That didn’t stop him from spreading life’s joy. After his fall, his mission remained “to make people laugh and smile,” Diane Ortez said in a 2015 interview. With a singing voice “like Frank Sinatra,” he offered a song with every gurgle pot sold. The store carried three sizes. Each one came with a song — sung by Ortez — and a history lesson of the pot. Ortez sold 42 gurgle pots in one shot to one customer at one point. In recent years, he became a wel- come face at Fred Meyer in Warrenton, offering a “smile award” to ‘‘people who smile with their whole face.” “He gives out the awards because he knows ‘how a little compliment just changes somebody,’” the Daily Astorian’s Elleda Wilson wrote in a 2015 profile. “You might also get one if you look like you could use a smile. After all, who needs it more?” “Richard really loved life and lived it to the fullest,” Diane Ortez recalled shortly after her husband’s passing. “He did his best to uplift others, and touched many lives. He will be dearly missed by family and friends.” For those who love to laugh, the loss of two of the South County’s happiest fellows will be felt. We need them more than ever. R.J. Marx is The Daily Astorian’s South County reporter and editor of the Seaside Signal and Cannon Beach Gazette. FOR THOSE WHO LOVE TO LAUGH, THE LOSS OF TWO OF THE SOUTH COUNTY’S HAPPIEST FELLOWS WILL BE FELT. WE NEED THEM MORE THAN EVER.
