THURSDAY, MARCH 21, 2019 // 3
SCRATCHPAD
A hidden talent discovered in retirement
Photographer
Linda Fenton-
Mendenhall sells
prints, calendars
all over the world
By ERICK BENGEL
COAST WEEKEND
A
Linda Fenton-Mendenhall
North Coast photographer Linda Fenton-Mendenhall.
coast
INSIDE THIS ISSUE
weekend
arts & entertainment
7
8
THE ARTS
‘Vicious’
18
COAST WEEKEND EDITOR
ERICK BENGEL
CONTRIBUTORS
DAVE FISHER
LYNETTE RAE McADAMS
BARBARA LLOYD McMICHAEL
NATALIE ST. JOHN
PATRICK WEBB
JONATHAN WILLIAMS
A backstage look at the thriller, which screened in Manzanita
FEATURE
Coastal
Celtic Music
Festival
To advertise in Coast Weekend,
call 503-325-3211 or contact
your local sales representative.
© 2019 COAST WEEKEND
Inaugural event
features 10 Irish bands
at four venues
12
mid the kaleido-
scopic blur of col-
ors, compliments,
cheese, crackers, loose con-
versations and winey rev-
elry of a recent Astoria Art
Walk, my attention was
New items for publication
consideration must be
submitted by 10 a.m.
Tuesday, one week and two
days before publication.
DINING
Hearthfi re and Brimstone
Bloodroot, sweat and tears
BOOK
‘To Inspire the Young’
Former Peninsula writer Anne Nixon pens work on life goals
FURTHER ENJOYMENT
MUSIC CALENDAR .....................5
CROSSWORD ...............................6
SEE + DO ............................. 10, 11
CW MARKETPLACE.......... 15, 16
WILD SIDE .................................. 18
BOOKMONGER ........................ 19
Find it all online!
CoastWeekend.com
features full calendar listings,
keyword search and easy
sharing on social media.
TO SUBMIT AN ITEM
Phone: 503.325.3211 Ext. 217
or 800.781.3211
Fax: 503.325.6573
E-mail: editor@coastweekend.com
Address: P.O.Box 210 •
949 Exchange St. Astoria,
OR 97103
Coast Weekend is published every
Thursday by the EO Media Group,
all rights reserved. No part of this
publication can be reproduced
without consent of the publisher.
Coast Weekend appears weekly
in The Daily Astorian and the
Chinook Observer.
seized by a calendar for sale
in the Pier 11 Building.
I didn’t need a calendar,
but I bought this one. Each
month of 2019 displays a
simple, textured image of
the North Oregon Coast:
Astoria’s West Mooning
basin for January, a lone
paraglider at Clatsop Beach
for May, a driftwood fort at
Indian Beach for Septem-
ber and so on. A memento
of my adopted home and a
medium to literally mark
my time at the coast.
The woman I bought it
from, it turned out, was the
photographer, Linda Fen-
ton-Mendenhall. For 24
years, Linda worked at
Fred Meyer in Warrenton,
where she was the apparel
manager. It was a solid,
good-paying job with some
creative outlets, but those
were days spent in a big-
box store with limited sun-
light and a windowless
offi ce.
“The minute I got out of
there, I was outside a lot,”
she said, “so I took advan-
tage of it and just kind of
became a tourist in my own
county again.”
Linda, who lives between
Warrenton and Gearhart,
isn’t a lifelong photogra-
pher. She wasn’t patiently
waiting for the freedom of
retirement to express her
gift. In fact, she had no idea
this gift was lurking in her.
“It just wasn’t really a thing
for me,” she said.
When out-of-town rel-
atives would visit and do
touristy things, she’d snap
photos right along with
them and thought, “‘Huh,
this is kind of fun. Might
keep doing this.’”
She now sells prints all
over the world, and her cal-
endars have shipped to other
states and countries. “It just
sort of took off,” she said.
Linda Fenton-Mendenhall
A St. Patrick’s Day Starfi sh at Hug Point, part of Linda Fenton-
Mendenhall’s ongoing series of holiday photos.
Linda’s still on the learn-
ing curve, she said. She
hasn’t trained on Photo-
shop or taken photogra-
phy classes. What she has
is an eye. She discovered
she knew intuitively what
makes a compelling photo:
detail, composition, a fresh
angle. She frequently shoots
at ground level, giving maj-
esty to seagulls and sea
stacks.
She keeps two shops
in the county — Trea-
sure Alley on Pier 11 and
another at the Seaside
Antique Mall, where she’s
part of an antique collective.
She also sells on Etsy, has a
permanent display at Fair-
weather House & Gallery in
Seaside and is the photog-
rapher for the Seaside First
Saturday Art Walk.
Her ongoing holi-
days series featuring star-
fi sh — a pair of starfi sh in
love for Valentine’s, a lep-
rechaun-capped starfi sh for
St. Patrick’s, etc. — makes
the rounds on social media.
A photo she posted before
Christmas of a starfi sh in a
Santa hat reached more than
350,000 Facebook users.
“It came out of the blue,”
she said. “I didn’t expect
to even be able to take pic-
tures, let alone have it grow-
ing like it has.”
The Fentons are a
fi ve-generation family in
Clatsop County. Linda’s
father, Allen Fenton, runs
the Memories of Warrenton
Facebook page. He passed
down his appreciation of
the region to his daughter,
though his projects empha-
size the local history, hers
the views and landscapes.
Linda’s been getting
a lot of requests to shoot
weddings and portraits
lately. “But I’d much rather
do landscapes,” she said,
“and you don’t have to
get anyone’s approval that
way.” CW