A big thank you to Alison Presser for sharing this snapshot from around 1996 — kids on the merry-go-round at Castle Park, celebrating the end of a Riverside Children's Theater season production of "The Wizard of Oz." (Alison Presser) Have a photo that captures the spirit of Riverside? Share it with us and help celebrate the beauty of our community!
Sunday Gazette: May 24, 2026
Hello Riverside, and Happy Sunday! You may have noticed something a little different at the top of today's edition: a photo that looks like it was pulled out of a shoebox. That's because it was. Starting today, we're launching Snapshot Sundays, a weekly series featuring vintage photos of Riverside shared by the people who live here.
Do you have old photos of the Brockton Arcade or The Plaza? Maybe breakfast at the counter, or back-to-school shopping? We'd love to see them. Send them our way!
See you tomorrow!
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Thank you to the Subscribers who became paid supporters this week: Kay Beach, Velda Kelley, Clarke Prescott, and Elizabeth Saunders. Your ongoing financial support is vital to our success in serving Riverside with the news it deserves!
Riverside Is Making Room for More Riders as Bikes, Safety and Community Converge
From a monthly light ride to a Blue Zones partnership and a federal streetscape overhaul, Riverside's cycling community is having a moment.
Riverside Light Parade founders John Arnold, Gigi and Rodney crouch in front of the group's signature red bike and boombox sidecar as riders gather on the steps of The Riverside Historic Courthouse. (Riverside Light Parade)
Riverside's monthly light bike parade has grown into a community institution — and now a federal infrastructure grant and a Blue Zones wellness partnership are backing the movement.
Why it matters: Whether you ride or just enjoy the street energy, the South Main Complete Street Project will change how the Northside looks and moves — adding protected bike lanes, wider sidewalks, and the city's first tree canopy along a corridor that's seen serious traffic injuries.
Driving the news: The Riverside Light Parade, founded by John and Gigi Arnold, is now leading the Blue Zones Project Biking Moai, a free Saturday morning ride at Fairmount Park running through June 20.
The series ties into a broader city push: Gallup Poll data shows Riversiders spend significantly less time outdoors than the national average.
By the numbers: Riverside has nearly 90 miles of bike lanes and 3,000 acres of parkland — but the city's $11 million federal Safe Streets for All grant will add protected Class 2 bike lanes on both sides of Main Street between Third Street and Highway 60.
What's next: The first-ever CicloRiverside — modeled on Bogotá's ciclovía and LA's CicLAvia — is set for Feb. 27, 2027, closing one mile of Magnolia Avenue between Adams Street and Van Buren Boulevard.
Blue Zones Project Biking Moai rides Saturdays 8–9 a.m. through June 20 at Fairmount Park, 2601 Fairmount Blvd. Bike rentals: riversidelightparade.com.
Neighbor of the Week is a series profiling the hidden heroes of Riverside, doing incredible works of service throughout our different neighborhoods.
Etta Brown at the Bordwell Park Senior Center, where the 94-year-old continues to organize monthly brunches and activities for fellow members of the Society of Military Widows. (Brenda Flowers)
Etta Brown has called Riverside home since 1956, and in the nearly seven decades since, she has rarely stopped working to make it better. She arrived from Louisiana with her husband, Jesse, an Air Force serviceman stationed at March Air Force Base, and their family settled first in Casa Blanca before purchasing a home on Vasquez Place on the Eastside in 1957 — a home she still owns and lives in today. She joined Our Lady of Guadalupe Shrine shortly after arriving and has never left, singing in the choir and volunteering for years at La Grande Fiesta Ranchera. Now 94, she is one of the longest-serving and most decorated community servants in the city's history.
Etta's civic record spans an extraordinary range. She served on the Sheriff's Oversight Committee, the Park and Recreation Committee, Bordwell Park Seniors, the Bordwell Park Advisory Council, Neighbor Partnership East Side, and the MLK Seniors. She participated in the Scholarship Committee, Bingo Committee, Bus Trips and outings, and the Women's Auxiliary. Through People Reaching Out, she collaborated with community members on state-sponsored health programs focused on smoking cessation, breast cancer awareness, and hypertension control — and went further by developing church-driven hypertension programs of her own.
After Jesse's passing, Etta became a charter member of the Society of Military Widows, an organization founded in 1968 to advocate for women whose husbands served their country. She has held every leadership position in her chapter and sat on the Board of Directors of the National Association for Uniformed Services (NAUS). Even now, she organizes monthly brunches and plans activities to keep the women connected and encouraged. For Etta, service has never been a season of life — it is simply how she lives.
This week, we’re changing our focus from high tech to all natural, from the buttons we press to the proof we leave behind every time we press them. Our creative nudge this week is the fingerprint.
Fingerprints are strange little signatures we never have to practice. I’d like to think of them as precise doodles connected to you and you alone. Before we can hold a pencil, our fingers are forming their new, never before created pattern of whorls and swirls; those telltale markers of where you have been.
That’s why fingerprints belong to the world of crime stories and courtroom dramas. They suggest proof. Presence. Contact. You were here. Explain yourself.
Of course, artists know all about leaving marks. A brushstroke is a kind of fingerprint. So is a run on sentence. So is the way you arrange objects on a shelf or season soup or fold laundry.
See something? Say something. Your tips and ideas are what fuel The Raincross Gazette. If you know of something newsworthy happening in our city, please share it with us.
