As 2025 concludes, the alley denizen once again exudes gratitude and looks back on the highlights of the previous year. The hometown curiosity must continue.
This year, perhaps more so than usual, this column covered the ghosts of San Jose’s recent past, while celebrating the various phenomena that still endured. We’ve lost a lot, but that doesn’t mean anyone should downplay that which continues.
San Jose is a resonating chamber of identities, all bouncing off each other, in the same way audio frequencies bounce off the walls of an auditorium. That’s the best way to understand this place. Forget the worn-out clichés like “melting pot” or “mosaic.” Use the term “resonating chamber.” To me, that makes more sense.
In 2025, on these very pages, anniversaries reigned supreme. The columnist just couldn’t see it any other way—especially during the year that Metro Silicon Valley celebrated its 40th anniversary.
For example, Streetlight Records celebrated 50 years since the original store’s inception in 1975, while the Vietnamese diaspora memorialized 50 years since the fall of Saigon. The results came in the form of two very different cover stories, but they were both worth more than the usual Alleys format, so the ghosts expanded themselves. That’s what happened.
It didn’t stop there. The Triton Museum in Santa Clara celebrated 60 years in 2025. Their convoluted history was perfect for Silicon Alleys because the story captured the absurdities of San Jose in general. Robert Morgan, a legendary attorney and rancher in these parts in the ’60s, helped start what came to be known as the Triton Museum. Originally named after one of his horses, an early incarnation, the Triton Gallery, was located on Martha Street between 11th and 12th, now condos.
The institution eventually moved into the former Lion Furniture Building at 99 S. 2nd St. However, even after numerous high-profile art exhibitions that put San Jose on the cultural map all over the country, the San Jose Fire Marshall nailed Morgan for numerous code violations and forced him out to the city of Santa Clara, which was already waiting in the wings with a better arrangement. This was textbook San Jose, so I wrote a column and a cover feature.
Then came the Italians. Cinequest in 2025 was a masterful gathering, as usual, and still proved why it’s one of the best things that happens around here. David Fiore’s documentary of Amadeo Pietro (A.P.) Giannini stole the festival. Seriously. I wrote a cover story and the film sold out the Hammer Theatre. Then the whole team went and partied into the night at the Little Italy speakeasy near Poor House.
Throughout the rest of the year, the temporal landscape of San Jose merged with the physical landscape in numerous ways. The local merged with the global. I couldn’t view it any other way. For example, the gritty underbelly of Istanbul in Orhan Pamuk’s hometown memoir inspired a Metro column on the ugly concrete fiasco of urban planning at Curtner and 87. In another column, I suggested a long-abandoned strip along Bascom Ave should apply for UNESCO World Heritage Status. If Athens, Rome and Cairo can turn their ruins into tourist traps, then why not San Jose?
All in all, Garden City, Big Al’s Record Barn, Lenny’s Cocktails, Ginza Cafe, the Jose Theatre and Cactus Club all made appearances on this very page in 2025. Ladies and gentlemen, it just doesn’t get much more San Jose than that.
As always, I learned that ghosts of people and places often aren’t ready to become invisible yet. Collectively, they will continue to exert a presence no matter how many grotesque “data centers” begin to pollute the visual landscape. The only sane solution is to transform the ghostly spirits into poetry, so they will resonate more, at least according to the responses that appeared on the letters page all year long.
Lastly, if creative editors keep coming up with amazing headlines like “Raze the Bar,” or “Rubble Yell,” then I assure you San Jose will continue to exist in a state of constant poetic renewal. For many of us—the curious types, the explorers—this is why we still live here.
For this upcoming year, feel free to send any ghosts my direction. Twelve months from now, I’m looking forward to remembering 2026.
