The Regulars

Rich Chivers, a volunteer electrician aboard the historic Red Oak Victory World War II ship, reestablishes an electrical connecton in the engine room in Richmond, Calif. on Tuesday, July 9, 2019.

Volunteer electrician ensures Richmond WWII vessel remains in

By Paul Chinn

Former Navy sailor Rich Chivers has volunteered for 23 years for the Red Oak Victory, helping restore the ship, giving tours and providing security.

Vivvyanne ForeverMORE sits at the bar of The Stud before emceeing Drag Alive July 26, 209. The Stud has been a staple of queer nightlife for over 50 years and is owned and operated by an 18-person worker-owner cooperative of which Vivvyanne ForeverMORE is one of.

Dressing up, creating a scene a perfect fit for drag queen

By Steve Rubenstein

Mica Sigourney, part owner of the Stud nightclub in San Francisco, puts his theatrical background to work as drag show host VivvyAnne ForeverMORE.

Darren Powell poses for a portrait on his Free•Double•You Bus motorized skateboard, which he custom built in his live/work space in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, August 8, 2019. Powell runs Freejac Nation, a company he founded for customizing skateboards that are both manually-powered and motorized. The more glamorous boards are eye-catching and he hopes to attract the attention of artists and rappers and begin to market the unique creations.

Oakland skateboard designer finds vehicles for creativity

By Carlos Avila Gonzalez

In his live/work space, Darren Powell custom-builds skateboards resembling classic cars, futuristic vehicles and even airplanes.

Len Ramirez of Ramirez Rattlesnake Removal searches for rattlesnakes at a ranch in Napa, Calif., on Saturday, June 22, 2019.

Rattlesnake wrangler constantly on call to remove, relocate

By Scott Strazzante

Len Ramirez, whose passion for snakes began as a child, travels Northern California to catch rattlers before they harm humans or pets.

LaRance Braggs, 39, prays with his wife Lanise, 40, as they bless their taco dinner in their apartment in Tracy, Calif., on Tuesday, July 9, 2019. The couple has been married since July 30, 2017. A month ago they were homeless and living in their car on MLK Jr. Way in West Oakland. �She�s been supportive through everything. She�s my backbone when I need a backbone,� LaRance said of Lanise. �She just kept telling me to don�t give up. She knew it was going to work out better.� With help from Bay Area organization Swords to Plowshares, a program for military veterans, Braggs was recently hired as a supervisor for Mint Security, Inc., a private security company based in San Francisco.

Veteran rebuilds life after fighting internal battle against

By Yalonda M. James

LaRance Braggs, after living in an Oakland homeless encampment for months, found a home and a job with the help of the nonprofit Swords to Plowshares.

Christopher Nguyen, a 12-year old classical pianist, who has over a 120 classical pieces memorized and enjoys playing everything from FrŽdŽric Chopin ƒtude Op. 10, No. 3 to George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, sits by his favorite piano which is in his home and looks out the window on June 1, 2019 in San Leandro, California.

12-year-old piano prodigy strikes a chord with seniors

By Steve Rubenstein

Christopher Nguyen has been performing at an Alameda assisted living center since age 7 — for the residents as well as himself.

Skate Like a Girl volunteer Alexandra Pepin (right) assists Maryzelle Ungo, 21, while she practices dropping into a ramp during a skate clinic held by Skate Like a Girl at Playland at 43rd skate park in San Francisco, Calif., Saturday, April 13, 2019.

Skate Like a Girl ramps up confidence through inclusivity

By Jessica Christian

The nonprofit’s Bay Area chapter hosts camps and meet-ups for female, transgender and nonbinary boarders in San Francisco and Oakland.

JaVonne Hatfield, who is known as the Heart Guy, performs on the Highway 101 pedestrian bridge near the Vermont Street exit on Wednesday, April 10, 2019, in San Francisco, Calif.

Overpass dancer’s heart goes out to motorists on Highway 101

By Steve Rubenstein

For six years, JaVonne Hatfield has been waving a giant red heart to motorists below the 18th Street pedestrian overpass in San Francisco. He could be the most watched performer in the city’s history.

Peter Oboyski, assistant director and collections manager at the Essig Museum of Entomology takes out a display case from the 'Oh My Collection' of specimens in the archives at the museum on March 15, 2019 at the Essig Museum in Berkeley California.

UC Berkeley insect expert eases bias against bugs

By Steve Rubenstein

Pete Oboyski, curator of the Essig Museum of Entomology, will lend 10,000 of his specimens to San Francisco International Airport for an exhibition.

Melorra Green (left) and her twin sister Melonie Green (right), who are co-executive directors of the African-American Art and Culture Complex lead a meeting at AAACC in San Francisco, California, on Monday, Feb. 11, 2019. The Green twins work as curators, artists, radio show hosts and community activists throughout the Bay Area.

Twin sisters have singular vision for art, culture

By Gabrielle Lurie

Melorra and Melonie Green have lived together their whole lives — 41 years to be exact. Born one minute apart, the fraternal twins are from Memphis and have brought their Southern charm and vision to the ...

Jessica Lefebvre asks Kevin Alpiche to hold Sookie so she an apply flea medication through the fence from the Home Depot Parking lot to a homeless camp in Oakland, Calif., on Tuesday, January 29, 2019. Jill Posner of Paw Fund, and Jessica Lefebvre of PALS East Bay are doing what they can to provide healthcare for the pets of the homeless and low income residents of the East Bay, through on site outreach and monthly clinics to help the less fortunate keep their pets healthy.

Care providers for pets of homeless prevent disease, maintain

By Carlos Avila Gonzalez

Jessica Lefebvre, the founder of People, Animals, Love and Support East Bay, walks past a barrier into a homeless encampment near Interstate 880 in Oakland carrying a McDonald’s bag. The devout vegan ...

Emily Taylor, 45, teaches Adia Smith, 6, how to tie a knot during a Brown Girls Climbing mini-camp at Great Western Power Company in Oakland, Calif., on Wednesday, January 2, 2019. The program was birthed two years ago when Taylor saw the need to introduce girls of color to the world of rock climbing.

Coach honors MLK’s legacy by helping girls climb for their

By Yalonda M. James

This month, the nation celebrates civil rights hero the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., a Southern Baptist minister and activist who fought peacefully for justice and equality. He was assassinated nearly 51 ...

Bob Isaacson (right) and Ginny Stearns enjoy breakfast while reading the paper inside their floating home in the Mission Creek Harbor community in San Francisco, Calif. on Friday, Dec. 7, 2018.

Wonder of water keeps couple afloat in Mission Creek home

By Jessica Christian

When Bob Isaacson moved into the Mission Creek Harbor community 38 years ago, the landscape looked very different from what exists today. “It was fairly grubby. It was really outcast,” says Isaacson, ...

Boyhood dreams become reality for singer at Oakland

By Lea Suzuki

Christopher Poston, 63, coasts slowly along the freeway behind the steering wheel of his black truck, wearing a red, white and blue tie over a crisp white shirt, singing along to music playing on the truck ...

Betty Reid Soskin stands for a portrait outside the Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park on Tuesday, Sept. 25, 2018, in Richmond, Calif. Reid Soskin, 97, is a ranger with the National Park Service. She's the oldest active park ranger and has worked at the Richmond park since 2004.

Richmond ranger, 97, proud to repeat history of women’s role

By Santiago Mejia

The chatter within the small, packed theater quickly subsides as Betty Reid Soskin walks into the room. She commands the crowd’s attention. Her forest green uniform is tidy, her badge and nameplate are ...

J.R. Rogers, fire chief of the Angwin Volunteer Fire Department, works with Selena Diaz, a volunteer firefighter for the past six years, in Angwin, Calif. on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2018.

Volunteer fire chief helps Napa County town through tough times

By Paul Chinn

When the alarm bell rings in the Napa County town of Angwin, J.R. Rogers drops everything and is usually one of the first to answer the call. Rogers, 33, is associate vice president for student life at ...

Charles Curtis Blackwell is bathed in sunlight at Youth Spirit Artworks on Saturday, July 28, 2018 in Berkeley, Calif. where he works as a writing mentor for students. After an accident in college, he lost his tunnel vision and now only has sees through his peripheral vision.

Blind Oakland artist seen by many as a mentor and an inspiration

By Liz Moughon

The fog rolled into Sacramento, and the bright red traffic lights flashed to green as Charles Curtis Blackwell, a painter currently in Oakland, squinted his eyes and froze at the steering wheel. He ...

Kathi Pugh sails near the Bay Bridge in San Francisco, Calif. on Friday, September 7, 2018.

Disabled sailor takes to the bay to navigate life’s choppy

By Scott Strazzante

On a sunny Saturday in the fall of 1991, attorney Kathi Pugh sat in her San Francisco office watching sailboats navigate the waters of the bay. Pugh had sailed as a kid because her father was an avid ...

Sam Gubera plays with Pin, an Arabian stallion she works on at Earthquake Arabians in Clayton, Calif., on Thursday, August 30, 2018. Sam Gubera has been working as a farrier, a profession largely dominated by men, for three years after having ridden horses since she was 6 years old.

Woman gains footing in male-dominated field of shoeing horses

By Carlos Avila Gonzalez

Sam Gubera holds the red-hot horseshoe with a pair of tongs in one hand and, with the other, quickly lifts the Arabian gelding’s foot up and back and deftly clenches it between her knees. Within seconds, ...

Keith �K-Dub� Williams converses with skateboarder Vanessa Touset at Town Park skatepark in West Oakland, Calif., on Wednesday, August 15, 2018. Williams is a dreadlocked, 55-year-old 6�5� artist, educator, mentor, and former skateboarder who founded Town Park, a skatepark located at DeFremery Park. �I think my role in it in being that liaison and being that Pied Piper on that piece is really cemented what an artist can give back to a community," Williams said. "I think the fact that we were able as young people participating in elements in helping shape Town Park and the culture is another act of what the power of young people can do.�

Oakland artist harnesses power of young people to build skate

By Yalonda M. James

Sounds of reggae, Anderson Paak and Portishead pump through the speakers of Keith “K-Dub” Williams’ laptop, via YouTube, as he paints in his Oakland art studio. The 55-year-old artist, educator, ...

Downtown Street Team supervisor out with his teams near Union Square on Friday, July 27, 2018 in San Francisco, Calif.

SF street cleanup supervisor beautifies blocks, gives homeless

By Liz Hafalia

Downtown Streets Team supervisor Darryl Cage, 50, can often be seen speaking with San Francisco’s homeless and removing rubbish most mornings. Cage gets to know people and their needs while leading teams ...

Tim Snyder works on a painting in his apartment in the Tenderloin in San Francisco, California, on Wednesday, July 18, 2018.

Painting provides canvas for art of recovery

By Gabrielle Lurie

Tim Snyder is always busy creating. He walks around San Francisco wearing psychedelic shirts that he’s sewn together and bright accessories that he’s repurposed from vintage finds. But ...

Glass bender Amy Palms works over an open flame as she bends and vacuums air and impurities from a neon piece in her studio at Neon Works in Oakland, Calif. Tuesday, June 26, 2018.

Glass bender melds art, science to create and restore neon signs

By Jessica Christian

Amy Palms has been perfecting her skills as a glass bender for more than 20 years. Palms, a Brooklyn native, studied glass blowing, neon and mixed-media sculpture at Alfred University in Upstate New York, ...

Olivia Byers-Straus teaches a dance class at Steppin� Out Dance Studio in San Francisco on Tuesday, May 15, 2018.

Dancer follows her heart, feet to inspire others with

By Guy Wathen, San Francisco Chronicle

Angela Rose Dorantes, owner of Steppin’ Out Dance Studio in the Mission District, was teaching a class for young children when she noticed a student’s younger sister dancing along on the sidelines. ...

Redwood Valley Railway chief engineer Ray Pimlott operates the No. 7 �Oak� steam locomotive while leading passengers on a train ride through Tilden Park in Orinda, Calif. on Saturday, May 19, 2018.

Tilden Park’s railway engineer rolls through decades of train

By Paul Chinn

The Redwood Valley Railway has been around for 66 years. Ray Pimlott has been around for 40 of them. Pimlott, 85, is the chief train engineer for the narrow-gauge railroad, which takes ...

Sita Bhaumik�makes a traditional west Bengali pastry made for special occasions known as Gayna Bori a decorative savory pastry made out of lentil flour.�Oakland February 27th, 2018.

Artist, educator uses food to tell stories of migration

By Manjula Varghese

Slowly dipping a silver ladle into a jar filled with plums swirling around in amber-colored shochu and sugar, Sita Kuratomi Bhaumik carefully draws out a plum and pours it into a glass goblet containing ...

Jim Motch sets up a music stand for his tablet containing pdfs of music before playing from the cliff above Ocean Beach on Friday, May 4, 2018 in San Francisco, Calif. Motch began learning to play the bagpipe when his mother became ill as a way to give back to her.

Bagpiper inspires Ocean Beach visitors by playing eternal ode to

By Lea Suzuki

The beach breeze swirled around Jim Motch’s head as he plodded through the sand, stepping between ice plants to conduct his ritual. Since he learned to play bagpipe, he’s visited Ocean Beach regularly ...

Scout Tran, left, and Cordelia Millerwhite, right, prepare for kickboxing class at Four Elements Fitness in Oakland, CA on April 20, 2018.

Oakland fight gym opens its doors for all

By Emily Harger

From the street outside Four Elements Fitness in downtown Oakland, one can hear sounds of boxing gloves against polyester punching bags, feet shuffling across the mat during warm-up laps, and heavy ...

Golden State Warriors' fan Natalie Palos of Corning kisses Draymond Green's bicep on a mural in the upper concourse at Oracle Arena before the Warriors play San Antonio Spurs in Game 1 of NBA Western Conference First Round playoff game in Oakland, Calif., on Saturday, April 14, 2018.

Warriors: Focused on the Finals

By RJ Mickelson

It was a tumultuous 2017-2018 regular season for the Golden State Warriors. The team experienced a number of key injuries (Draymond Green, Klay Thompson, Kevin Durant and Stephen Curry), emotional flare ups ...

Mill Valley Seniors for Peace's Helen Anderson heads back to her apartment after the group's weekly protest outside Redwoods Retirement Community in Mill Valley, Calif., on Friday, March 16, 2018.

Singing for peace gives Mill Valley senior energy, hope

By Scott Strazzante

Every Friday, shortly before 4 in the afternoon, Helen Anderson, 92, gets on her motorized wheelchair, grabs a cardboard sign from her closet, leaves her Redwoods senior community apartment, and motors to ...

Self-taught mycologist Alan Rockefeller removes fungi samples from a log on the Berkeley Fire Trails in Berkeley, California.

The Regulars: For East Bay mushroom hunter, it’s not simply fun

By Nani Walker, Robin Simmonds and Lauren Schwartzman

Most people dread rainy days, but Alan Rockefeller revels in them. Rockefeller, 40, works in cybersecurity to pay the bills. But his true passion emerges after a downpour, when the wooded areas of the East ...

Master Craftsman Luis Ferreira shapes a piece of wood for a window frame at the SFMTA Woods Division Cable Car shop Wednesday, March 14, 2018 in San Francisco, Calif.

The Regulars: Carpenter crafts cable cars’ beauty

By Jessica Christian

Luis Ferreira moved to San Francisco over 30 years ago from Madera, Portugal, with ambitions to follow in his grandfather’s footsteps and become a master craftsman. Today, he serves as one of four ...

Ahmet Ustunel, 37, with his navigation stick and kayak at Lake Merced, Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2018, in San Francisco, Calif. He was born in Turkey with Retinoblastoma, a type of eye cancer, but no one noticed until it was too late. He�s fully blind. He is now training to kayak the Bosporus, a natural strait that separates Asian Turkey from European Turkey.

The Regulars: Lifelong passion for water keeps blind kayaker

By Santiago Mejia

Ahmet Ustunel unfolds his 12-foot deflated kayak that was neatly tucked in a large rolling bag. He sets the yellow kayak at the edge of a dock at Lake Merced. He begins to fill the three ...

Jay Van Arsdale marks the segments of a platform he's making from western red cedar in his home wood shop in Oakland, Calif., on Wednesday, February 14, 2018. The stands will replace crumbling ones at the Bonsai Garden in Oakland near Lake Merritt. Van Arsdale, who comes from Kentucky and is descended from a long line of blacksmiths dating back to the revolutionary war, is a teacher at Laney Community College in Oakland where he has been teaching Japanese wood working and joinery. He and his students have restored or built various pieces in the Japanese style for cultural centers around the Bay Area.

The Regulars: Kentucky woodworker teaches Japanese carpentry at

By Carlos Avila Gonzalez

Jay van Arsdale ambles around his workshop, his sandal-clad feet cutting through piles of wood chips, paper-thin wood shavings, and sawdust that he’s brushed off his work table onto old rugs that cushion ...

Robert Tacchetto, owner Camera Obscura, opens the door to the lens of the Giant Camera to clean it before opening for business that day on Monday, January 30, 2018 in San Francisco, Calif.

The Regulars: Camera Obscura still makes a big impression on

By Lea Suzuki

Robert Tacchetto, 62, nimbly climbs up a ladder and opens a small, oval hinged door to the lens that projects live images of Ocean Beach, Seal Rock, Cliff House and Point Lobos down to a parabolic table in ...

Brian Peron (left), Wayne Justmann (middle), and Lynette Shaw (right) talk about events taking place before Proposition 215 at a table where discussions took place in creating the California Compassionate Use Act on Wednesday, January 10, 2018, in San Francisco, Ca.

The Regulars: Pot advocate is the ‘Godmother of Ganja’

By Liz Hafalia

Cannabis activist Lynnette Shaw has been working to legalize medical use marijuana for the past 20 years. Her work advocating the benefits of marijuana has earned her the name the Godmother of Ganja. ...

Gabriel Mata rehearses at ODC theater in San Francisco with SJ Dance company on November 3rd 2017. Mata came to the United States from Mexico when he was 5 years old.

The Regulars: A Dreamer and a dancer

By Manjula Varghese

Gabriel Mata, a 26-year-old slender framed man, moves his body with strength and grace across the stage, reaching his arms out and above his head. As Mata pivots on his feet, he arches his back while ...

A portrait of Will Wood, who is Father Christmas during the Great Dickens Christmas Fair at the Cow Palace exhibition halls on Thursday, Dec. 21, 2017, in Daly City, Calif.

The Regulars: This Father Christmas has embodied the holiday

By Santiago Mejia

Will Wood puts on his red robes and combs his long white beard and leaves the dressing room as a different yet very familiar person. “I have the privilege of having children tell me their ...

Vallejo resident Latashia Govan, who goes by the stage name Sgt. Die Wies, performs at DNA Lounge in San Francisco on Monday, November 20, 2017. Govan, whose performances often involve elaborate costumes, challenges body image stereotypes on stage. �It�s so much more than taking off your clothes and a lot of people don�t know that. They think that you�re just up there to be a sexual object,� says Govan, �They don�t think that you�re up there trying to break body stereotypes or type casts and all the different constraints that society tries to put on us.�

The Regulars: Burlesque performer aims to bust body stereotypes

By Guy Wathen, San Francisco Chronicle

For Bay Area performer Sgt. Die Wies, whose given name is Latashia Govan, burlesque is about more than taking off her clothes for an audience. “It’s so much more than taking off your ...

James Mitchell shapes a surfboard at his shop Sunset Shapers in the Outer Sunset of San Francisco July 5, 2017.

The Regulars: Surfboards take shape in this Sunset shop

By Kat Duncan

James Mitchell starts his day by walking the couple blocks from his home to Ocean Beach. As he stands atop the sand dunes with his dog to watch the waves, other surfers appear, dotting the shore in small ...

David Hegarty sits down at the theater organ at the Castro getting ready to play music.

The Regulars: Organist at the Castro keeps musical tradition

By Manjula Varghese

Audience members pile into their seats getting ready to watch a show at the Castro Theater; on this particular day it happens to be a “Sound of Music” sing-a-long. Since taking the stage in 1976, ...

Jesse Fink, left, co-owner of Toy Boat Dessert Cafe, chats with customers in his cafe in the Inner Richmond on Thursday, June 29, 2017. Fink and his wife, Roberta, have run the cafe for 35 years.

The Regulars: Toy Boat Dessert Cafe serves ice cream,

By Guy Wathen, San Francisco Chronicle

Toy Boat Dessert Cafe serves ice cream, conversation Toy Boat Dessert Café in the Inner Richmond is a welcoming place, open to all people, and that’s just the way co-owner Jesse Fink intended it to be. ...

George Sherikian gets set up to begin his work repairing shoes that customers have dropped off to be fixed June 21, 2017 at Westfield Mall in San Francisco, Calif.

The Regulars: Cobbler believes that with good shoes, ‘life will

By Manjula Varghese

A rhythmic cacophony of buzzing, hammering, and sewing sounds emerge out of a unassuming small shoe repair shop located at the back of the bottom floor of Westfield mall in downtown San Francisco. ...

Kira Mei Herrera, 6, collects eggs from the chicken coop at home May th, 2017 in San Francisco. Her parents Jamie Chan, 37, and Blas Herrera, 38, grow their own food, raise chickens and have bee hives at their San Francisco home.

The Regulars: Family of four farms in urban spaces

By Kat Duncan

Jamie Chan walks slowly from terrace to terrace to water the many plants to the sounds of soft clucking from her chickens and buzzing from the bee hives at her home in San Francisco. Blas Herrera, husband ...

Security guard Mike Burt laughs as a customer enters Doc's Clock bar in San Francisco, California, on Tuesday, May 23, 2017.

Last call at Doc’s Clock dive bar with its bouncer

By Gabrielle Lurie

Glasses clink as security guard Mike Burt and bartender Lisa Francis cheer the start of their evening at Doc’s Clock, the classic Mission District dive bar with the distinctive neon sign. Burt’s job is ...

Three harbor seals gather around a curious elephant seal at Chimney Rock Wednesday May 24th, 2017. Four harbor seals were rescued, nursed back to health and released by the Marine Mammal Center.

The Regulars: Pacifica volunteer’s lifelong love of the ocean

By Kat Duncan

Marie Kazan-Komarek’s childhood summers were spent digging in the flats for mussels and quahogs in Massachusetts. When her oldest daughter was 2, she began volunteering at the Marine Mammal Center in ...

San Francisco Bird Hotel owner Birgit Soyka poses for a portrait with Diamond on top of her motorcycle in the warehouse of the bird hotel in South San Francisco, Calif. on Wednesday May 17, 2017. Soyka fell in love with birds because they represented the same feeling of freedom she felt while racing motorcycles in Germany and southern California.

The Regulars: S.F. Bird Hotel owner finds freedom in creating her

By Emily Harger

S.F. Bird Hotel owner finds freedom in creating her business Birgit Soyka doesn’t seem to mind the bird sitting on her head as she stands in thought, remembering which guest enjoys cheese with his ...

Robert Tyler, 59, of Hayward, performs on the pedestrian bridge outside of Oakland Coliseum on Thursday, April 20, 2017. For over three decades he worked on and off in the communications field but was unable to keep a steady job. �Somehow it don�t last,� says Tyler, �Always have good jobs, but they don�t last.� Now Tyler survives as a street performer and can often be found outside Bay-area sporting events.

The Regulars: Mr. Rob Bass plays sweet music outside the Coliseum

By Guy Wathen, San Francisco Chronicle

The 59-year-old pauses to give money to a man singing for change before boarding a train en route to Oakland Coliseum for work. For over three decades he had worked on and off in the communications field ...

Shelia Ash, owner of Noe's Nest bed and breakfast, talks to her friend Barbara at the Bouquets to Art exhibit at the de Young museum in San Francisco, Calif. Tuesday, March 14, 2017.

The Regulars: Colorful San Francisco B&B; owner lives as

Emma Marie Chiang

Combing through her racks of eccentric vintage dresses, embellished purses and patterned pantaloons, Sheila Ash tops off her selected outfit with the perfect hat before heading up the stairs to greet her ...

The Regulars: S.F. chorus group sings their hearts out

By Kat Duncan

“You get in there and you think, I’m kinda tired,” she said “But then you start singing and you start moving, you get energized and laughing and having a great time,” she said. Whether in ...

Above: Maurice Ford plays “Duck Hunt” behind his 1991 Honda Accord at 19th and Mission streets.
Below: Ford shows customers pictures of his game car during his job at the Halal Guys restaurant.

The Regulars: ‘Magic’ video game car roams S.F.’s streets

Emma Marie Chiang

On a Thursday night at the corner of 19th and Mission streets in front of the Beauty Bar, a smiling man standing next to a car full of flashing video consoles hollers: “Free to play, no charge!” Every ...

�If i'm really concerned about a cat that has aggression towards strangers, i'll put these on. You can't bite through this.� Said Daniel �DQ� Quagliozzi as he slipped on a pair of kevlar gloves in his apartment in San Francisco on February 1st, 2017. As a cat behavior consultant, DQ uses a variety of tools to help his clients and their troubled cats better live in harmony.

The Regulars: Touching humans’ hearts through feline friends

By Max Bouvette

Touching humans’ hearts through feline friends After leaving his 9-to-5 job at the San Francisco SPCA, DQ wanted to use his skills in decoding the mysterious and often frustrating conduct of cats. ...

Emilia Stoica, 7-months, right, smiles up at her mother Renata Stoica as she rolls chocolate in their home in San Francisco January 7, 2017.

The Regulars: Three Chocolatiers spread the love of Brazil

By Kat Duncan

Renata Stoica stands at her living room counter carefully creating little spheres of cooled chocolate and then rolling them in flakes of almonds before placing them individually into wrappers. Piles of ...

The Regulars: Female boxer paves the way for young women

By Kat Duncan

Raquel Miller’s last training day before her professional fight on Jan. 21 was not just sparring in the ring with her coach Basheer Abdullah, but greeting friends, family and supporters who came to see ...

The Regulars: 30 years of magic, balloon twisting

By Kat Duncan

“Wiggle those fingers!” Robert Shapiro yelled to a room of entranced children and their parents as he made a card disappear into a balloon and then out again at the Potrero Recreation Center. Dressed ...

Christina Moretta sorts through photos to archive at the San Francisco Public Library where she works as photo curator in the San Francisco History Center December 6, 2016.

Historical detective on the case at SF Library

By Kat Duncan

More than 2 million photos and other visual materials are taken care of by Moretta as a photo curator, archivist and librarian at the San Francisco History Center inside the San Francisco Public Library. ...

Joel Phmah, owner Piazza Wholesale, hands Darren Fanelli,activity director SteppingStone Mission Creek Day Health,, bouquets of flowers he donates to be used in an activity for the seniors at SteppingStone on Friday, October 21, 2016 in San Francisco, California.

The Regulars: Relationship blooms among seniors, activity

By Lea Suzuki

Relationship blooms among seniors, activity director, florist Darren Fanelli paced back and forth in the courtyard outside of SteppingStone Day Health as he called Joel Phmah to let him know he was ready ...

Gary Shields, owner of God's Gym located at 2501 Broadway in Oakland, takes a moment to pray before he opens up up his business to the early morning workout crew which arrive at 4:30 A.M. December 2nd, 2016

Oakland’s Regulars: Meet the heart and soul of God’s Gym

By Max Bouvette

A mural of Jesus adorns the exterior, the eyes peering down to the empty sidewalk below, its hands grasping broken chains. Shields rides a stationary bike, his legs pumping to the beat of the gospel songs ...

Dr. James Hutchinson, 93, listens to Diego Ope�a's heartbeat during a checkup at Hutchinson's office of 63 years on Tuesday, October 18, 2016 in San Mateo, Calif. Hutchinson, who was San Mateo county's first African American doctor, is now seeing three generations of patients.

San Mateo doctor, 93, has simple prescription: Keep on working

By Erin Brethauer

The morning that Dr. James Hutchinson opened his family practice in San Mateo in a large house on a corner of a tree-lined street nicknamed “Doctor’s Row,” he received what he refers to with a ...

Vladimir Vitkovsky discusses technique with examples from an art text with his student, Polina Lushova, 10, of Hunters point, as she paints in his studio in the outer Richmond district in San Francisco September 15, 2016.

San Francisco artist, surrounded by art, constantly produces it

By Kat Duncan

The sounds of his brush strokes are accompanied by the sleepy Balboa street noises from outside his windows and the soft Russian music flowing from his record player. Piles of oil paints, cups of ...

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