One of Point Reyes Station’s best-loved merchants, Chris Giacomini, proprietor of Toby’s Feed Barn, suffered serious injuries Tuesday, March 31, when he fell from a loft in the building.

Chris (foreground) frequently lets the Feed Barn be used for fundraisers and other community events. Here he and a throng of townspeople clap as they watch President Barack Obama’s 2008 inaugural address on a large-screen television in the building.

Chris fell about 20 feet, landing on the cement floor, shattering a wrist and ankle, as well as receiving major bruises. He’s already had surgery and is scheduled for more this coming week, but he is recovering, according to his family and staff. Get well cards can be dropped off at Toby’s.

New business.

Dan Thompson, owner of Perry’s Inverness Park Grocery and Deli, last Thursday opened a bistro called Gather on the east side of the store in a room created from a onetime railroad car.

From 5 to 9 p.m. Thursday through Sunday, Gather serves dinner featuring organic meat and vegetables, small-batch wines, unique beer, sours and cider. Lynn and I had dinner there Sunday. She ordered chicken with kale, mashed potatoes, and hush puppies. I ordered potato cakes with sauteed greens, caramelized baby carrots, mushroom ragout, and crème fraiche.

What we got was Parisian-style haute cuisine with a down-home presentation. We shared a bottle of hard cider, which came with canning jars for drinking glasses. Lynn and I loved our dinners, but the portions were so large we couldn’t finish them and we brought quite a bit home.

The view of the Giacomini Marsh as seen from Gather. Throughout the day, the bistro is also a fun place to have espressos and to eat sandwiches, salads, etc. from the deli.

At the moment, the walls are adorned with nature photography by local resident Daniel Dietrich.

Here’s some history of the place. In the 1920s, Michael and Filomina Lucchesi Alberigi bought about five acres on the marsh side of Inverness Park and moved into a large home there, the Jack Mason Museum publication Under the Gables reported two years ago. They built barns behind the house. They grew vegetables and eventually used a small house next to their home as a general store. Later it also had a small café and became the social hub of the village.

In 1949, the Alberigi family leased the old store to Annie and Victor Turkan to run while the Turkans built a larger store across the street. After the Turkans retired, their daughter Wilma Van Peer, who lived next door in what is now Spirit Matters and had the first television set in Inverness Park, ran it, Under the Gables notes.

Waving Bear, one of Daniel Dietrich’s photos currently on display in Gather.

In the 1960s, Vern and Diane Mendenhall bought the grocery and expanded it. The bistro part of the building, which is an old railway car, was added as a diner. The enterprise went through two more ownerships before Dan bought it more than 30 years ago.

In the early 1970s, the railroad car section housed a pizzeria before becoming a succession of bakeries under various names and owners. Under the name Foggy Mountain Bakery, it was run by Mountain Girl (Jerry Garcia’s first wife) along with Kate Gatov and Irene Keener. Later Station House Café founder Pat Healy owned it for a brief time, as Under the Gables notes. It was also Knave of Hearts Bakery run by Matthew and Robin Prebluda; Debra’s French Bakery (Debra had been a partner of Brigit Devlin in starting the Bovine Bakery in Point Reyes Station); and more recently the Busy Bee Bakery.

Mainstreet Moms at 6 p.m. Tuesday, April 7, will present an informational evening led by historian Dewey Livingston regarding Caltrans’ proposal to replace the Green Bridge in Point Reyes Station. The meeting will be in the old gym at West Marin School.

A couple from England misjudged a turn at Highway 1 and the Point Reyes-Petaluma Road at approximately 3 p.m. Monday, and their motorcycle ran off the highway. The Harley Davidson traveled a short distance in a roadside ditch, careened over a driveway’s culvert and back into the ditch where it knocked down a 25 mph sign.

Highway Patrol officer Will Thompson (pictured) said there was no evidence the motorcycle had been speeding. Neither the driver, Michael Hacker, 55, of Kensington, Ashford, in the UK, nor his passenger, Kay Hardie, 53, was injured although their rental motorcycle was damaged, and their trip to Mendocino was interrupted.