Today was a good day for a haunting 11/17/14

If you were in New England that is. At about 37 degrees with cold drizzly rain all dark day, it felt like a haunted day. One more day until I get stitches out of my 2nd wrist carpal tunnel surgery. Yeah, you'd think typing is not good, but when my off-loading activities include knitting and hand drumming, then typing is piece of cake.

So of course I culled through my Cali pictures. What cramful event do I want to relive today? What fly-into-and-virtually-run-through-and-meet-the-Park ranger-at-the-gate-at 5:04p. with a huge apology-place had the power to pull me back in and feel dark and maudlin and depressed about?

Oh yeah, it had to be Jack. It was at once the most beautiful and peaceful place and yet the saddest and sorrowful land of unfulfilled destiny, tragedy, and untimely death. SO much mystery shrouding the life and death of one of America's finest writers. Come along, I'll take you back with me.

We'll begin on the road. From Sonoma through Eldridge into Glen Ellen, all of it called by the Indigenous Peoples who once inhabited it, "The Valley of the Moon." Jack also titled a book that.

 When we saw this we thought we were there, but no- just another knock off in the small town trying to pull some of our tourist dollars away from us. We weren't buying any of it. The town only has a population of 784.

Yeah we did a double take too. YETI! Well it is Northern CA after-all. But look at the little lettering. Indian (like from India?) and Nepalese. Okay, maybe they brought there own Bigfoot and it's on ice in the back, it still didn't get us to stop.

 Apparently this former grist mill, looking luscious has had many, many incarnations most recently several have tried to run restaurants here.

 Aventine is the latest incarnation of the Grist Mill, next door to the Yeti (which is not Northern CA's Bigfoot).

They are calling this  luxury condominiums now, but still have per night ($645) and weekly ($3,850) rates

  Each unit is generously sized at almost 2,000 square feet. The large master bedrooms include a huge walk-in closet. The other two bedrooms in each unit are spacious as well. Bathrooms boast designer fixtures, jetted tubs and separate, glass enclosed showers with massage jets (in the master bathrooms), with some handicapped accessible features in Unit 1A and 1B.

 The more reasonable ($95-135) joint in town, of course, has no vacancies!

 This is also part of the JL Lodge, the Wolf House restaurant, which of course is a rip-off on the JL mansion that the author and his wife had built and burnt to the ground. I suppose the town has to somehow cash in on Jack's fame.

 This the neighbor of the Jack London site

 Nope we didn't even stop for a taste!

The Jack London Ranch consisted of seven parcels purchased over several years. 

The view from JL's Beauty Ranch. London's Beauty Ranch in the "Valley of the Moon" was 1402 acres.

By the time it was turned into a state park, the land was down to 800 acres

Early in January 1910 London ordered 15,000 C. tereticornis eucalyptus trees for his ranch.

The planting of eucalyptus trees wasn't a rash move on Jack's part. The La Motte place was ideal for the purpose, being unsuitable for anything else except pasture land. Before ordering the trees, he studied everything he could find about the viability of the eucalyptus as a cash crop. Certainly he didn't fall under the spell of the eucalyptus promoters. He checked every government bulletin on the subject and went up to the University of California at Davis to talk to with the agricultural experts there. Every possible piece of information was digested.

When it turned out that the eucalyptus tree was worthless, the critics berated London for foolishly planting them, forgetting to mention that nobody knew of their uselessness at the time. Actually, a careful study reveals that Jack London was an excellent businessman, but an unlucky investor. The eucalyptus trees proved to be a mistake because when the wood cured, it became twisted and split. Consequently, the wood was no good for lumber, or for the use of pilings for the construction of wharves.

When he realized that his investment in eucalyptus was a failure he turned his attention to stock breeding, determining finally to produce the finest strains of Shire horses, Shorthorn cattle and Duroc Jersey hogs in America.

 
The smell was incredible and I felt bad for Peter who couldn't smell the amzing smells.

These were gorgeous trees.

I think they are manzanita trees.

 And just nature all around! So beautiful.

 Even the scary stuff. No we did not see one.

This is what I saw:

Of course I became a little obsessed w/ that bird.

That is until another one came around:

And then the scenery opened up and the structures came into view:

The Barns

The Stallion Barn, commissioned by London and built by Italian laborers in the Italian style, housed six highly prized Shire stallions.  Note the similar roof style but differing stone work on the newer buildings.

 This is a barn that Jack had built by a Sonoma contractor, was an innovation designed by Jack in 1914 to collect and store manure for later distribution in the fields.

 These buildings from the Kohler purchase were not the 1st ranch JL purchased in 1905. This acquisition was a 700 acre parcel he bought in 1910. 

The lava-terraced Beauty Ranch vineyards are now cultivated by the Kenwood winery, which produces the Jack London Series with a wolf’s head label.

 Wood stoves used for sherry production

 The Sherry Barn, originally built by Chinese laborers with the flat exterior walls typical of Chinese stonework was built for the former Kohler and Frohling winery in 1884. London converted it to a stable for his English Shire mares.

 The Distillery building, originally constructed in 1888 as part of the old winery, was used by London's ranch hands to store and repair farm equipment. Today, the distillery holds an exhibit for horse-drawn farm equipment used in  London's time.  During Jack's time as a farmer, machine-driven farm equipment came into use but Jack preferred horse-drawn machinery. Jack London brought an entire blacksmith's shop from Glen Ellen to the Ranch to maintain the farm equipment.  Today, only a small section of wall that was once the blacksmith shop remains next to the distillery building.

It was a beautiful, serene setting- filled with the chattter of various birds and almost too much for the eye to take in and hold. Thank goodness for technology and smart phones so we could bring the memories home with us to re-process at a  later date.

There it is, another of Natures heart-shaped creatures- and this one is even smiling at you!

A 'shroom grows on Jack's farm

The old winery

Jack's purchase of the Tokay Ranch didn't include the buildings - the twelve acres containing the ruins of the old winery destroyed in the 1906 earthquake, or the old six room cottage, the two small stone buildings, and the stone sherry house which were owned by the California Wine Association. Jack's goal was to now buy these twelve acres and the five hundred-acre Freund Ranch above his property, which was vital to his water needs. When, and if, those purchases were made, the Jack London Ranch, as he envisioned it, would be complete.

In 1911, heartily sick of living in makeshift accomodations at Wake Robin, and seeing that the Wolf House would not be completed for at least another two years, he made a move that brought him the happiest and richest years of his life: he bought the twelve acres in the middle of the Kholer vineyards upon which stood an abandoned winery, a broken-down ranch house, and some barns.

The Cottage was London's principal home on the Beauty Ranch. This wood-framed cottage was purchased by London in 1911 along with the Kohler and Frohling winery buildings. It was enlarged after 1911 until it included some 3,000 square feet of living space. Here he wrote many of his later stories and novels.

In 2006, restoration of the cottage was completed and the re-furnished cottage and Stone Dining Room were opened to visitors. These two buildings capture Jack and Charmian's bohemian lifestyle and close working relationship.

I just loved the cottage. I struggled with trying to comprehend how someone who almost had it all, had to die so young. Or drink so much. What kind of demons eat people alive? What is the backstory here? I so wanted to know. I remember reading a pretty salacious biography type thing years ago, but the woman at the Jack London store poo-poo'ed that one (Irving Stone's) and I know that one of my favorite contemporary historians, Eric Foner's uncle also wrote a biography. The issue is limited access to Jack's papers. But as lay people on an adventure, it was still an amazing trip. Let's continue on.

 I mean come on- building a boat and sailing around the world with the one you love to far flung exotic places!?! Who gets to do that?

 The man seemed bigger than life and of course time and this place promulgates that.

 With his friend George Sterling, they could be literary folk or bohemian poets (Sterling) who could view and interpret the world with a pen, but couldn't live in it without a drink or in Sterling's case, a vial of cyanide which he decided to drink one day when he was but 57 years old.

 I loved the pattern on these drapes.

Oddly enough, there were many things that had this bamboo pattern. He or they must have loved something from their journeys that they wanted to be reminded of. We have a few things ourselves that are made from different fronds from around the world that we save (utilitarian things like containers for prints that we think are so cool).

 Loved this room, second to the library coming up.

 Hey, a jaw- just like ours, almost. Ours is a moose, his looks like a wild boar or something.

 Now that is a very awesome library!

 Really, really hard to reconcile the man dead at 40 right there. AT 40!!! That's just wrong, it's just wrong. That's what made this whole dark, overcast, dreary sort of hauntingly beautiful day hard to bear.

 What's in those bottles? What is this table supposed to represent? There have been forums, symposiums, and heated debates that continue to this day about the man's final hours. Was it suicide? Was there morphine? Was it renal failure? And on and on and on. Some can't let it go, because we need our idols and he was going to be it. Bigger than Steinbeck, Hemingway, Kerouac, F.Scott, and Faulkner. He just shouldn't have died.


Can you see what Jack saw? I couldn't, try as I might.

 

 That's Peter entering the addition, which was the dining/entertaining room.

 I couldn't help snapping this one off. Look it's a MILL! Except I checked, and couldn't find it in existence anywhere in Ohio anymore.

Then we trudged down and up the landscape to the museum, which was another impressive stone house.

Jack London House of Happy Walls Museum

The Museum was built by Charmian London and Eliza Shepard, Jack London's step sister, after London's death in 1916. The House of Happy Walls was designed to be a museum as well as Charmian's home. She lived in the house from 1934 until 1955 (when she was not traveling abroad or staying with relatives). Today the House of Happy Walls includes displays in many rooms, with a complete set of first-edition books by Jack London, Charmian's 1901 Steinway piano, and many unique crafts and mementos Jack and Charmian collected in their travels around the world.

Hardware, my favorite!

This house is similar to the Wolf House in some ways - the Spanish-style roof tiles and walls of field stone, for example - but it is much smaller and more formal. Much of the furniture in the house was designed by the Londons and custom-built for use in Wolf House, though never used there due to the fire that destroyed Jack and Charmian's dream home just days before they were to move in. 

 This was a surprise to me (and made me feel a teensy weensy bit hopeful that I still could have that novel buried somewhere deep in me- I just had to make it thru a few rejections). Okay, now I was getting a better picture on the desire to drink.

And damn if he wasn't so good looking. He was made for Hollywood!  Why wasn't there ever a movie made of his life? I know I certainly watched The Call of the Wild too many times to count. When I searched, I only found this:

https://www.facebook.com/jacklondonfilm
but this is about some sort of documentary

 
This estate, his excesses, all bespoke a conflicted life. It didn't make him flawed, merely human. In that respect I feel a kinship to Jack.

Can you imagine the shock? The Rumors, the innuendo. Endless and even still debated to this day.

Peter doing what lumbersexueal men do when they are deep in reflection, they stroke their beards (he really is channeling Walt Whitman but doesn't even know it. I do, I am psychic).

Some of the many accumulated treasures that never made the journey to Wolf House :(

A picture of Jack's Wet nurse? Caretaker? Babysitter? He had such a bizarre start, perhaps that's why he had such a tragic end?

We said goodbye to Happy Walls and began our super jog to the unhappy walls, heeding the signs along the way.

I hugged Peter close, for despite his manly lumbersexual appearance, he can sometimes be quite childlike, and I was afraid of Mountain Lions (especially the female ones).

 I will always make time to stop and fondle the ferns (much to my husband's chagrin when we are time-pressed).

The Wolf Club, under the able leadership of Gianna Biaggi helped clean up several park sites this summer as part of their high school senior project. In case you have been wondering who is responsible for dressing up the old storage building on the route to wolf house ruins with
a mural – that’s the Wolf Club at play! (And boy was I ever wondering, enough so I had to come home and internet dig).

 Loved the moss trees here too! I have decided I really, really love trees and truly mean it that I hope to be reincarnated as one. I'm still thinking on the location (not that I think I'll have a say in the matter, but 'ya never know).

 Peter was practically at a super trot by this point, so he was awed first (another nana-nana boo-boo

 moment for him- see told you he was childlike).

This was what it was supposed to look like, and I imagine it did for a hot minute there (oh I just read that, sorry Jack).

But this is what you saw instead. It was heart-breaking, and haunted, and sad. Maybe I would want morphine and alcohol if this happened to my dream home. Or maybe I was so tormented I sabotaged the entire project myself. It is/was another of those unsolved mysteries that shroud the myth and the man.

That sad chimney staring me down almost made me want to look away in shame that I even came here to gawk at another person's loss.

Here is another picture of what it was supposed to look like.

And here it actually was almost completed from: http://jacklondonpark.com/jack-london-wolf-house.html

And then what we saw as we quickly circled and ran out of the park at dusk

The fire . . . was it set deliberately? Through the years many stories have grown up about the fire. The building superintendent, Mr. Forni, believed it was a simple case of spontaneous combustion started by oily rags carelessly thrown in a corner by one of the workmen. According to Forni, the men were wiping everything down with turpentine. It is also logical to assume that they were using linseed oil. The workmen were careless, for they too believed the building to be fireproof. Despite Forni's pleading, they were throwing their oily rags on the floor to be used again the next day. Only there was no next day this time. Source: Kingman, Russ. A Pictorial Biography of Jack London (Crown 1979).

Note: A team of ten experts in fire investigation headed by Bob Anderson, a retired San Jose State University professor and California forensic expert, met in Glen Ellen in May 1995 and spent four days going through the Wolf House ruins and as a result of this investigation, it was concluded that a very high probability existed that the Wolf House fire was accidental and caused by spontaneous combustion; substantiating the building superintendent, Mr. Forni's claim of oily rags being the cause.

We ran right past this one, had no desire to go stand at their rock. We'd seen enough of their sad rocks and were vastly grateful for the journey. It was a sad sorrowful goodbye- such a loss, such a loss.

A Big P.S. here in case Cupcake ever reads my splather,

From the Wiki world of ABSOLUTE TRUTH:

On August 18, 1904, London went with his close friend, the poet George Sterling, to "Summer High Jinks" at the Bohemian Grove. London was elected to honorary membership (not quite a joiner...) in the Bohemian Club and took part in many activities. Other noted members of the Bohemian Club during this time included Ambrose Bierce, Gelett Burgess, Allan Dunn, John Muir, and Frank Norris.

 A P.P.S. TO P.S.:

BOHEMIAN GROVE ADDRESS= 20601 Bohemian Avenue, Monte Rio,California,

However:

On June 29, 1878, somewhat fewer than 100 Bohemians gathered in the Redwoods in Marin County near Taylorville (present-day Samuel P. Taylor State Park)  This festive gathering was repeated the next year, and became the club's yearly encampment.^[10] By 1882 the members of the Club camped together at various locations in both Marin and Sonoma County, including the present-day Muir Woods and a redwood grove that once stood near Duncans Mills, several miles down the Russian River from the current location. From 1893 Bohemians rented the current location, and in 1899 purchased it from Melvin Cyrus Meeker who had developed a successful logging operation in the area.^[2] Gradually over the next decades, members of the Club purchased land surrounding the original location to the perimeter of the basin in which it resides.

Sometimes Dearfart, only rarely, but and yet still sometimes we both are right!