Lash Stevenson has a special fondness for local history, especially when it involves sports. So it's logical that the San Mateo barber is worried about the future of artifacts from Bay Meadows.

The San Mateo race track, which opened in the 1930s, is ticketed for closure later this year. Its final racing dates will coincide with the San Mateo County Fair in August.

Then, the facilities off South Delaware Street are scheduled to be razed and the land transformed into housing, offices, parks and commercial development.

Stevenson, concerned that important racing memorabilia may be lost in the transition, has e-mailed a note urging that items from the track be retained, preferably locally.

Here's a suggestion along those lines: Donate such materials to the County History Museum in Redwood City or to the County Events Center next door to the storied pony palace.

The Events Center is going to create an off-track betting parlor on site once Bay Meadows goes the way of the dodo.

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BRICK OF GOLD — Speaking of history, Matthew Reising of Redwood Shores has responded to a recent item in this space regarding Murray's Hardware in Millbrae.

Reising grew up in Millbrae. He said the departed hardware store featured wooden floors and a "nail tree," among other things. "You could find every nail size known to man," he noted in an e-mail.

But the real

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fun on Broadway, he explained, came at the old Brick of Gold soda fountain and candy store.

"Howard Cobb was the proprietor," recalled Reising. "He didn't smile much but his crammed little store offered every candy imaginable in the front and hamburgers, shakes and leather booths in the back." Happy Days had nothing on Cobb's place.

As for ice cream, there were just nine flavors available back in the very early 1960s at Cobb's establishment. He closed down his business at about the same time Baskin Robbins opened nearby.

"They had the audacity to offer 31 flavors," rued Reising. Today, he said, the former Brick of Gold venue is a Round Table Pizza emporium.

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SUCH A DEAL — Has inflation got you down? Take heart. If you are a member of the San Mateo Elks Lodge, relief, albeit temporary, is on the way.

As part of that club's centennial observation, those in the club will be treated to a special anniversary affair later this month. The meal's total price will be rolled back to what it would have been in 1908 when the outfit opened its doors on B Street in downtown San Mateo. Today it's on West 20th Avenue.

The cost of dinner and drinks for two will be the princely sum of $1. That is correct, a single dollar bill. Again, please don't misunderstand. That welcome bargain is for those fortunate Elks only. For good reason. If it wasn't, the eager grub line would stretch east all the way to El Camino Real and beyond.

If you have a local vignette or a San Mateo County tip, don't hesitate. Send it to John Horgan by telephone at 650-348-4334 or by mail at 477 Ninth Ave., Suite 110, San Mateo, 94402. Check out his blog, Read It and Rant, anytime day or night at www.sanmateocountytimes.com.