Butte County Strong

Better than a Championship

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Invincible Bobcats helped resurrect a community

This morning, I suspect the players and coaches of the Paradise High School Bobcats are unhappy, but they should be proud.

What they gave the communities of the Paradise Ridge is something better than a Championship. I hope they know it. Through their disappointment, I hope they hear this.

In researching for Three Days in Paradise, I’ve come across dozens of old west mining towns in Butte County’s early days. Most of them are unknown.

I’ve found one thing separates settlements which become communities and those that fade into ghost towns. It’s schools.

All budding towns open bars, general stores, hotels and even a town hall. It’s the ones with schools that remain. Schools aren’t for the towns of today. They and their students are the town of tomorrow… the citizens, leaders, business people who will enrich and improve the town long after all the founders are gone.

Schools and the families they make possible, are the thing that separates a collection of buildings from a civilized town. Schools are how a town shows hope.

In the days, weeks and months after the fire, I interviewed dozens and met hundreds of survivors, recovery workers and public and private leaders. On camera and off they talked about, worried about, wondered about whether a community like Paradise could rise from the blow we had taken.

Yes, people vowed to rebuild, some businesses opened, but in whispers and wonders from across the spectrum I heard real worries from smart, informed people about the possibility Paradise would fade.

Then the schools re-opened in August, and it was a good sign.

But for many, it was the first game of the Bobcat’s Football Season on August 23 which made what remained of Paradise feel like what we remembered of Paradise. As survivors watched, coached and played in ame after game, our battered optimism reasserted itself.

Listening to the cheers of the crowds, watching the exploits of Harrison and Blood, Bettencourt and Hartly, Velasquez and everyone else made Paradise feel like a hopeful, happy place again. Through every regular season game, they won, finishing with a 10-0 record.

Their run helped us remember we could do this. We could clear the debris, claw through the heartache and remember those we had lost, and could have a town that felt like a place again. The Bobcats brought our eyes to the horizon again and let reminded us there is something more than ash in the future.

So they the players and coaches may not have gone to where they wanted to go this year.

But they gave us all something more dear. To do that you have to be something better than a champion.

You have to be Paradise Invincible.

 

Bittersweet Rebirth of Bobcats Football

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So our Paradise High School Bobcats are on the front page of the Los Angeles Times.

It’s bittersweet to see their work and grit and hustle recognized, but under circumstances we would never choose.

Here’s an image of the front page, and a link to the story. It had me tearing up in the middle of a restaurant, so be careful.

The LA Times is not sold in Northern California, so yes see what we can do to get all the players/coaches their own copies.

MARCH UPDATE: Production powers and some interesting meetings…

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Since we began pre-production in December 2018, just days after the last embers of the Camp Fire were extinguished, we have been working tirelessly to gather the stories, moments and images to best tell the comprehensive story of what happened to all of us in Butte County.

We have already conducted dozens of interviews, shot at many county, town and public events and are looking to conduct dozens and dozens more interviews in the months ahead. If you’ve contacted us and we have not yet scheduled your interview, fear not.

The feedback and interest in Three Days in Paradise has been nearly overwhelming. But we will be here for the long haul, and currently are managing with a small and professional crew, so please know we will get back with all of you. It just may take a bit.

On that note, we want to let you in on some early indications for some very big things coming. While we cannot yet share details, the Three Days team has had some very hopeful meetings with parties well placed to get this series funded and then shown to the world in the way we all hoped.

Our ambitions are high, but our calling to tell this story is higher. We hope to be able to tell you more soon.

We are also working on a very interesting project which would gather imagery shot by all of us during the Camp Fire to help planning agencies see that this kind of disaster never happens again. We hope to have something to announce soon on that too.

Our final announcement is we’re revamping the way you can share your videos, pictures and historical imagery with us. That should be in the menu bar of this website in the next day or so. To tell the story of Butte County before, during and after the Camp Fire, we’ll need you.

Until then, thank you for your attention.

January Update 2 – A bit about Three Days in Paradise

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Amid the tumult unleashed starting November 8, the geiser of information we are tasked to absorb is something beyond what any of us have experienced.

Keeping so many things straight… insurance claims, FEMA information, cleaning up our communities and most importantly remembering the over 80 people we lost, it is more than understandable a project like Three Days in Paradise has escaped your notice.

So for those far and wide, here’s a little bit about who we are, what we’re doing, and how (hopefully) you can get involved.

Three Days in Paradise is a documentary series not only about the Camp Fire but also the communities we all knew before the fire and what we’re working to rebuild. It’s being written and directed by an Emmy Award-winning local filmmaker, Christopher Allan Smith who lived in Paradise until November 8. Like almost everyone in town, he fled from his home with his family and when he returned only ash remained.

Since the week of the fire Chris and a small, dedicated crew has been shooting footage, interviews, doing research and gathering historical files to put the thousands of disparate threads in this story together in a meaningful, understandable way.

This project is eyeing two audiences. Those of us who live and lived in Butte County and experienced this disaster and those around the world who need to hear our story. So yes, we’re trying to make something to move everyone. Not only will we be touching on the topics we’ve all witnessed in recent years (worsening wildfires, longer fire seasons, the struggle to make Paradise, Magalia and Concow safe to evacuate and more) but when people see this, we want everyone to see our communities as we did. That way, they can  love the communities we knew before November 8, they can cheer and help our rebuilding afterward, and we can claw back from the fading past just a bit of what we lost.

We’re confident with Chris’ experience and the filmmaking talent available, both local and out of the area, we can create something to stand shoulder to shoulder with any production going on this subject. There are people working on Camp Fire documentaries with better resumes, but none with better experience to tell this story.

If you’d like to help, or make sure we include a story you think is vital, check out the links below:

There are two ways to get us footage.
1). Get on our computer and go to this link:
https://www.dropbox.com/request/XoKYqh7YQe5IHhPx1qPF
When asked, enter your name and email (this will tag each video you upload with your name so we know who contributed it). Only we will see the video you send.
Or…
2). Contact Chris below and he’ll get in touch about getting your footage.
Email: ThreeDaysInParadiseTV@gmail.com
Twitter: @3DaysInParadise
Facebook: facebook.com/ThreeDaysInParadise
Chris’ personal page: facebook.com/RocketSpots
Or call 530-680-7125

Welcome to 2019 and your part in making Three Days in Paradise happen. We welcome what you’ve seen… stories, video and pictures

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Happy 2019! Here’s hoping it’s better than 2018 for all of us.

To make a TV series, you need footage. To make this series, the Three Days In Paradise team needs YOUR footage.

The enthusiasm you’ve shown for this project has inspired and touched us even while many of us work to put our own lives back together in the wake of the #CampFire disaster. When it comes to Three Days in Paradise, many of the crew and subjects are in this together. As posted elsewhere, I’ve lost my home in Paradise along with many of you.

Since we announced the project, we’ve had hundreds of people offer the footage they shot on November 8, 9, 10 and beyond. So many, we collect them from you one by one.

So we’ve been working on the best way to make it easy for people to send us their high quality, uncompressed footage. We’ve found a way and here it is.

Why can’t you just send Facebook or YouTube links?

We’ll explain.

Most non-professionals understandably think they can just send us links to Facebook or YouTube postings. The problem is, modern cameras shoot surprisingly high quality footage, often 4K footage (advertised as UHD), or 1080 footage (advertised as HD). But Facebook compresses that down to 720 or less and YouTube also compresses the footage.

That compression takes sharp, vivid footage and makes it look blurry, degraded and less colorful. They do this to lessen the load on their networks.

So the upshot is, we need your original camera files if at all possible.

Best Way to Send Us Pictures and Video Files

One of the strengths of this project is we’ll be using footage from the entire range of past and present video sources. That includes phone videos, home videos, old pictures, modern phone pictures as well as old VHS tapes, slides, news station tapes and 8 mm films.

We’ll be announcing how to get some of that to us in the future, but if you have phone or camera pictures or video, here’s how you get them to us.

Get on our computer and go to this link:

https://www.dropbox.com/request/XoKYqh7YQe5IHhPx1qPF

When asked, enter your name and email (this will tag each video you upload with your name so we know who contributed it).

The nice thing about doing it like this is you can send us video but only we will see it.

If this method doesn’t work for you, check below.

Best Way to Send Historial Films or Video Tape files

As Three Days in Paradise is being produced by the Emmy-Award-winning company RocketSpots.tv, we have just the ability to convert old video tapes, photos, slides, 8mm and super 8 film to museum quality digital copies. And we’re willing to do it, if you’ve got images of Old Paradise, Chico, Magalia, Concow or more.

For these transfers, at this point it’s best to meet in person.

Feel free to call me at 530-680-7125

Or email ThreeDaysInParadiseTV@Gmail.com

Or find us on Twitter @3DaysInParadise

Or find us on Facebook.com/ThreeDaysInParadise

Or find director Christopher Allan Smith directly on his personal page: Facebook.com/RocketSpots.