City recalls Hendrix, but without official memorial

SEATTLE —  Sixty years after his birth, one of the most important artists ever to emerge from Seattle is -- at least officially -- almost invisible here.

There’s no Jimi Hendrix Boulevard, no Hendrix Arena, no Hendrix Elementary School.

The only thing the city has done to recognize the man many consider the world’s greatest guitar player is to give him a rock -- at the Woodland Park Zoo.

Biographer Charles Cross of Seattle, who has spent years researching Hendrix for an upcoming book, called the oversight “almost criminal.”

Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen first envisioned his $240-million Experience Music Project here as a temple to Hendrix, who remains the rock museum’s focus. On Sunday, the facility threw him a 60th birthday party.

Casey Corr, a spokesman for Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, said the lack of a memorial is not because of the city’s unwillingness; it simply hasn’t been an issue.

But for years, city officials refused to name anything after him because of his drug use.

Hendrix enjoyed living in Seattle and planned to return to live on Mercer Island, said his half-sister, Janie Hendrix.

As for the zoo memorial, she said: “Would we have done that? Probably not, but at the time that they did it, there was nothing in the city that recognized Jimi.”

She added, “We’d love to have a street named for him.”