The building formerly known as Richard’s Bar is getting a cool six million from the Knight Foundation. I can feel the transformation already.
A few weeks ago, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation announced a landmark investment of over $6 million to support La Placita, a massively overdue community development project in East San Jose. The School of Arts and Culture at Mexican Heritage Plaza has been planning for years to transform the 28,000-square-foot strip mall across Alum Rock into a thriving community hub, including a black box theater and a cafe, plus more health care services and nutrition programs. The game-changing grant from the Knight Foundation will catalyze the process in ways previously unimaginable.
Many heroic individuals have talked about this for a long time, especially the late Chris Esparza, who told us over the years about his dreams for that building, how he envisioned a whole new cultural neighborhood, anchored by the Mexican Heritage Plaza itself. Esparza was a dude who actually worked to make things happen, for decades, rather than someone who shoots his mouth off in a newspaper, so I believed him. He would be so stoked if he were still around to see this.
The Knight Foundation grant is even more amazing for those of us who remember what that building used to look like 16 years ago. Man, it was depressing.
In 2009, the Urban Blight Exploration Junkie, one of the alter-egos that occasionally narrated this column, called the building “a gorgeously decrepit, faded pink, infirmary-looking blighted strip mall—a splendid half-boarded-up paean to negligent landlords worldwide.”
It really was that bad. The whole strip hadn’t been maintained in ages. There was a boarded-up Vietnamese pool hall, a crumbling appliance dealer and a cringeworthy place called Thrift City. One felt bad for the neighborhood, a community with all sorts of creative, hard-working and spiritual people who deserved so much more.
The only interesting architectural component of the whole mess was the mid-century rock-facade stylings of Richard’s Bar, the tiny window and the swirling corner elements above the entrance. Don’t even get me started on that pay phone out front. Remember pay phones?
There is some history here, of course. Before Richard’s Bar, it was called Bob’s Lounge. Back in the ’80s, it was called Joe’s Lounge. To me, this is far more interesting history than the damn orchards, but that’s just me.
Fortunately or unfortunately, the bar, in its final incarnation, developed a history of trouble. There were reports of violence, underage drinking and other nefarious activity. I can’t imagine anyone was sad to see it go.
Then the synchronicity happened. Soon as I heard about the cool six million from the Knight Foundation, I rifled through my files and found the only image I had retained from Richard’s Bar, a low-resolution snap left over from stuff I’d posted to Instagram way back when. On my drive, the file was titled “richards-bar.” I then uploaded it to one of those AI-based image enhancer websites, the kind that increased the resolution even if the result wasn’t spectacular. The website automatically titled the resulting file “richards-bar-transformed.”
The AI image enhancer website did not know the very building itself was going to be transformed, but I considered this to be enough of a coincidence to start celebrating. The cosmic muses of synchronicity, the ones that used to inspire this column years ago, were back with me again. I’d missed them. When synchronicities happened in this fashion, it usually meant I was “in the zone” creatively speaking, or that a heightened sense of awareness was present. At the least, it meant the column was going to be a good one.
So here we are in 2025. The amazing folks at the School of Arts and Culture now have a well-deserved foundation to help their dreams begin to materialize. A neighborhood overlooked by the city for years is on a much better track toward its next stage—the black box theater stage and the stage of life. Maybe they’re one and the same.
In any case, I know Chris Esparza is looking down at the whole corner, right now, as I write this. He would be the first one eagerly awaiting the transformations about to unfold.
