August 8-Farm to Menu at the Downtown Art Market

The Downtown Art Market , featuring a Farmers Market is announcing a special event at the August 8th event. In conjunction with the Texas Department of Agriculture and the Farm To Menu program, Chef Rocky Rockwell of Texas Tech Hospitality Services, will be demonstrating recipes using locally grown, fresh food. Chef Rockwell was recently named South Plains Chef of the Year and prepared local and regional food at the Ogallala Commons Local Food Day in March. This demonstration and tasting will be going on from 10am-2pm at the Down Town Art Market.
The Downtown Art Market takes place on the second Saturday of each month at 19th Street and Buddy Holly Avenue, centered around Tornado Gallery. The Market has over 40 vendors, showing leather work, glass work, jewelry, photography, painting, metalwork and more. In addition to that the Farmers Market features locally grown fresh fruit, produce, plants, herbs and flowers. The July Market attracted over 600 visitors.
We are very excited about this, the July Market was just beyond all expectations and its only going to get better. Y'all make it better, every one who comes to shop and all who come to sell make the Downtown Art Market the event that it is.

Ping Pong Balls

Well , Larry and I talked tonight. First good talk since Saturday. As we talked I thought of Don Herbert - " Mr. Wizard ". The coolest thing I ever saw was Don Herbert toss a ping pong ball onto a ping pong table, covered with mouse traps. .

This is 1959 folks, and I was about to drag our PhilCo TV to my 6th grade class in my long forgotten red wagon. Just so we could see all those very early rockets explode in black & white.

" Mr. Wizard " was explaining nuclear fission to all us baby boomers, and he had baited all those mouse traps with more ping pong balls.
Imagine a ping pong table covered , completely carpeted with mouse traps. EACH BAITED with 1 ping pong ball.

So Don tells us about splitting the atom. Why it works in reactors, & why it works in the bomb.
Then he tossed one ball onto that table, what follows next isn't a bunch of dominoes falling down .
It's pure insight into a nuclear chain reaction.

50 years later, as I listened to my friend Larry , I was just thinking of all those ping pong balls going everywhere.

One of our ping pong balls -

Paul Aguilar's Images of from 7-11-09.

The July DAM-Off The Charts

This weekend was a resounding smash. That's all that can be said. It was a group effort, a community event and a whole lot of fun all rolled into one...a neighborhood happening. We had 29 Artists, 7 produce and plant vendors, Mad Solar Scientist Colorado Bob experimenting and...drum roll please...over 600 people through the Market. People that numbered more than doubled in 60 days, 3 markets. Everyone who participated and supported this should be very proud of it, it was a killer event.
Tornado Gallery and The Downtown Art Market would really like to thank all the Artists who have been there all events and the ones who continue to sign on, all the growers who came this time and from now on to add another local flair to it all, and to the folks who get out and buy items -that's a key- this is a great event but to sell thangs is what its about, these Artists and Growers pour their time and hearts into their crafts and plants and by purchasing, them y'all are showing that you want local items, local food and want this to be a success-that is a great thang.
The Lubbock Arts Alliance,The Lubbock Avalanche Journal and McDougal Properties really stepped up to the plate and helped knock this one out of the park...Thank You!

Tony Greer, Jennifer Greer, Colorado Bob, our unsung hero Randy Fisher-Fish- who does our remarkable graphics and I want to express our thanks to every one of you out there who sold, showed or supported The Downtown Art Market...please keep it up and we will too!
Larry Simmons

Farmers Market Meeting

This is a nice shot of the first meeting for the Fresh Produce and Plants arm of the Downtown Art Market. Over 40 food gurus, growers, consumers and Downtown supporters gathered in Peggy Chapman's Garden at the Gallery to discuss the next step in this evolving concept. This will be a great market in July with 6, maybe more folks adding natural items to the markets wares.
The Downtown Art Market thanks each and everyone of those people who came to help in this project.