QUARTERLY MEETING

May 12, 2009 | Chapel of the Chimes, Oakland

Mark your calendar for the next meeting: August 18, 2009. Location to be announced.

Prior to the meeting Chris Pattillo led a mini tour of Mountain View Cemetery, designed by F.L. Olmsted, which is adjacent to the Chapel of the Chimes, designed by Julia Morgan where the meeting was held.

1. Report on the Written Narrative for Piedmont Way - Fredrica Drotos

   Fredrica thanked us for approving funding for the written narrative. She reported that several members indicated they were interested in working on the project, so we have a pool of good resources. Friends chose to work with HALS member Michael Crowe because he has experience with historic roadways. They have completed a written agreement for the services. Michael will provide a draft of the document for review that will be posted on our website. Friends would like feedback on the content and the structure. Draft is due this Friday May 22. Final due date for comments is June 4. The final document is to be submitted June 30.

   Chris reported that she has not heard anything new from Marlea regarding the narrative for the Kaiser Roof Garden, and that PGA is very close to having the drawings ready to send to NPS.

2. Meeting With State Office of Historic Preservation

   One of the responsibilities of the HALS liaisons is to communicate with the State Office of Historic Preservation (OHP), so we have scheduled a meeting for June 16th with Wayne Donaldson and members of his staff. Objective of the meeting is to inform them of our activities. The agenda includes: an overview of our membership - who we are, logistics of our group and meetings, our purpose and goals, successes in getting funding, a brief report on the 3 sites we are documenting, the inventory forms we've done, and the California Historic Resources Information System (CHRIS) which lists professionals involved in historic preservation work but does not include Landscape Architects. Wayne has indicated his interest in correcting that. Lastly, we will cover the HALS documentation being done for Doyle Drive at the Presidio in San Francisco by PGAdesign and Janet Gracyk, with Brian Grogan. The remainder of the meeting will be to answer their questions and ask how way we can support the office.

   Cathy reminded us to check out their website. It is a very useful reference.

3. HALS Inventory Challenge

   Regrettably Janet, who issued the challenge for each member to fill out one HALS inventory form, was unable to attend this meeting so Cathy led this discussion.

   Cathy invited us to each talk about the sites we visited and discuss the use of the form. Cate visited the Fleming Garden in Berkeley which is the oldest, largest, privately-owned all-native garden in California. Jenny and Scott Fleming created it in the 1950s. They were friends with James Roof who created the botanic garden in Tilden Park, Berkeley. The Flemings were part of a group that saved the Tilden garden when it was threatened, and with that momentum they went on to create the Native Plant Society.

4. Quirks of the Form

   The form has boxes for information. You can add information beyond the size of the box but when you print the form the additional information does not print. All of the information is transmitted to Washington as an XML file and it is then put into a database. One way to get around this problem is to copy the text into a WORD document and print from WORD.

   Cate created a WORD version of the entire form that lets you enter, edit, spellcheck and save the file as you work on it. Then when you have it the way you want it you can copy and paste the final text into the HALS inventory form and transmit it to Washington. You will find a link to Cate's "scratch pad" on our website in her "Instructions" section.

   It also works to enter data directly into the HALS inventory form as long as you use "save as" each time you add or change information. When you first open the blank form, do "save as" and assign a new name. This only works with the new version of Acrobat.

   Another problem with the form is that it is very large, so it is not something that can be emailed or uploaded to the web. It is better to send forms to Cate from the scratch pad. This saves her time getting it on our website.

   It is not possible to save the form as a PDF; you can only save it as a form. If you hit the button to print the form, you have the option to save it as a PDF and that works according to Noel Vernon.

   It is unnerving to send the form off and not be able to print or see all the data, and the sender has no idea what is happening with the information. Washington does not acknowledge receipt. If NPS will be making the forms available on the web, then our website can simply link to their site and Cate will not have to continue to put the forms on our website. Brian thinks it may take a long time before the forms will be accessible on the web. We need a list of what sites have been submitted to NPS.

   Cathy noted that it is important to be precise when naming the site. The link regarding naming procedure is very helpful. As an example, Jack London State Historic Park has had several names. Jack London called it Beauty Ranch. The instructions say use the original name - but if its later periods were more historically significant how should you name it? Cathy decided on "Jack London's Beauty Ranch" aka Kohler + Frohling Vineyard and "Jack London State Historic Park."

   Brian - Getting our 3 full submissions and these inventory forms is NPS's way of building a database of sites to demonstrate the need for HALS. So all of this is very beneficial to the program.

   Cate is the keeper of the list of who is working on what sites, so it is important to let her know when you are working on a site.

5. Other Inventory Forms

   Sonoma Developmental Center on Arnold Drive, Sonoma County was submitted by Janet Gracyk. The material she included in the description box is very lengthy - several pages long. Everyone was impressed. In talking to Janet prior to the meeting, she explained that this was a site she had worked on for a previous project and she said it was easier to simply copy all the information into the form rather than edit it down to a briefer text. Janet agreed that the thoroughness went beyond an inventory form and should suffice for at least a short form. Betsy added that the original name for this site was "Hospital for the Feeble Minded", then became the Sonoma State Hospital or Home.

   Janet also submitted forms for Fischer-Hanlon House in Benicia and Walnut Park in Petaluma. Walnut Park was the second park established in the town of Petaluma and appears to meet National Register Criteria A and C. It covers a full city block in the historic section of downtown. It has traditional diagonal paths leading to the center with an octagonal bandstand.

   The Fischer-Hanlon landscape is over 100 years old and appears to meet Criteria C as an excellent example of the evolution of a small town residential landscape. The property is on the National Register. It is .43 acre in Benicia's historic residential neighborhood. The house and gardens are part of the Benicia Capitol State Historic Park.

   Betsy Flack wrote up Alcatraz Historic Gardens. They have lots of information - the challenge was picking the best short statements to fit into the form. Betsy found that the form worked well for recording the information they had. The story is how these plants have survived with no maintenance over the many years. She shared historic before and after photos of the garden showing the restoration work and announced that the Conservancy is planning a trip to celebrate and show off the garden at the end of May. We agreed that we need to have a HALS meeting at Alcatraz.

   Betsy's next challenge is to work on Western Hills Rare Plant Nursery in Occidental. She worked with Marshall and Lester years ago when the garden was 25 years old; it is now 50+ and under new ownership. They have done a tree survey and are looking for volunteers to help the current owners maintain the gardens.

   Noel has been working with a group of 11 students and the park service to undertake a cultural landscape preservation project - Peter Strauss Ranch in the Santa Monica Mountains National Resources Area. They prepared a HALS form so the students would learn how to do a form. They used a cultural landscape inventory from 2005, current base maps and a variety of information about the site, plus their own observations. They did a short form (as opposed to the simpler inventory form) and took GPS, looked at the trees and determined that the Eucalyptus are not on a grid. They used aerial maps to understand the evolution of the property. This group of students is now prepared to do HALS inventory forms to identify sites suited for more thorough documentation.

   Gretchen Hilyard wrote up the Badger Pass Ski Area in Yosemite Park using the cultural landscape report worked on by Page & Turnbull and PGAdesign, which made doing the inventory form very easy. We already had a long bibliography, a statement of significance that has been approved by NPS, historic and current photos, and all the other information needed to complete the inventory form. Gretchen feels it will be easy to fill out forms for all the projects she has been working on - using the information she already has rather than going to new sites and doing new research. Badger Pass is still operated as a ski resort mostly for families. In the 1930s when it was built, it was a very popular downhill ski resort - the first ski resort in the western United States, the first in a national park in the West, one of the first ski resorts this side of the Mississippi. There were many high profile ski competitions held at this site. It became the center of skiing until the 1950s when its use shifted to a family-oriented ski area. The period of significance for the ski area (1933) predates the building (1935) to 1950s.

   The National Park Service Wilderness boundary that was used for the CLR is a line of "no build", so the edge of the forest defines the boundary and there is a service road along much of the boundary. This correlates approximately with the view shed of the ski slope area. This also aligns with the topography and the extent of the area used for skiing. Everything funnels back down to the area where the lodge was built.

   Fairyland prepared by Jen Liw was built in Oakland in the late 1940s at Lake Merritt and became the model for Disneyland. Arthur E. Navlett visited the Detroit Children's Zoo and was inspired to promote one for Oakland so he approached the Lake Merritt Breakfast Club and William Penn Mott and convinced them to support the idea to build Fairyland.

   Noel - Has anyone done a study on theme parks? Gretchen is doing a study in Fresno at Roeding Park which has an amusement park called Playland and a theme park Storyland like Fairyland. The site has a significant landscape associated with Playland. A local artist was commissioned to do the fairytale sculptures that have now deteriorated. As part of that study, Gretchen prepared a context statement and found that theme parks are located all over California. Theme parks originated in the Adirondack region of New York. There was Playland at Ocean Beach in San Francisco. Fairytale Land at Lake Enchanto may pre-date Disneyland - Noel.

   Chris visited Micke Grove Park in Lodi. This is a 258 acre community park with picnic area, sports fields, a Japanese garden, interesting stone walls, a grouping of historic buildings imported to the park house the San Joaquin Historic Museum - the first agricultural museum west of the Mississippi, and Fun Town - a theme park for small children. This is a site that I have not yet submitted to NPS because I was not certain that it qualifies as a cultural landscape, but based on this conversation I would say it does. Noel - it sounds like a vernacular landscape. We could define a set of character-defining features to judge these sites that started pre-Disneyland.

   That brings up another topic - Fairyland opened in September 1950 and was very popular and heavily used and as a result had deteriorated, so recently it underwent a significant renovation including the addition of new fairytale story sets, so some features are brand new while all of the elements are part of a historic theme park. Is it a valid HALS site if it has been altered? Brian - good question but I see the "seeds that begat Magic Mountain" - all of these sites collectively. Our history of large amusement parks began with all these small, local theme parks. Gretchen - it is an untapped historic context that she could find some information on but no one has written a thesis on it yet.

   So do theme parks have similar patterns? Brian mentioned the Enchanted Forest which is outside of Washington DC. Noel poses a good question - was there a common typology for these theme parks? It would be good to identify the character-defining features and then compare them to identify commonalities. For HALS we need to document; later we can identify which of these sites are the most exceptional for nomination for the National Register. Brian - we should look at where these theme parks are located and how do they relate to the automobile? Noel, yes this was all about automobile tourism. This topic might lead to a new thematic bulletin.

   Chris - I just had a great idea - we should issue a challenge to the rest of the country for each state to write up a HALS inventory form for the theme parks in their area. Noel - those prior to Disneyland. Brian - that should be the period of significance. Betsy - that would be great fun and a good way to communicate with other HALS groups.

   Noel - one of the things the Garden Club of America used to do in the 1930s would be to have a survey where all of the club chapters would survey their gardens. They would document with slides each of the clubs gardens. This collection of slides is now housed at the Smithsonian. We could create a collection of theme parks, web publish them, and do a context statement for the collection. There could be a group of students who might be interested in doing a thesis - it's a great topic. Cathy - as chair of the ASLA Historic Preservation PPN, Chris could promote this challenge. Chris - or David Draipsi, ASLA HALS Liaison Coordinator. Noel thinks she can get some students interested. Gretchen feels they are definitely threatened resources because they are 50 or more years old and deteriorated. At the Fresno Park, they have features from the early 1900s and they don't know what to do with them. It would be good to provide context and significance.

   Chris visited the Mailliard State Reserve and is questioning whether or not it qualifies for HALS. The site is one of several Redwood reserves that were set aside as part of Save the Redwoods League. The Mailliard Family were early preservationists and leaders in the conservation movement. The reserve is 242 acres and includes first and second growth trees. There are few improvements on the property. John Mailliard was Treasurer of the State Republican Central Committee and served as a Trustee with the California Academy of Sciences. Cathy - the property is of local note because the family is associated with a movement or a concept. As to character-defining features, integrity and significance of the site itself - they are all open questions. This is a natural landscape. Cultural landscapes have to do with their association with people - is owning the land and preserving a grove of Redwoods - is that enough? It may not be.

   Noel - it is not a designed landscape. A vernacular landscape documents cultural patterns on the land and this does not sound like patterns; it's just a stand of trees. Cathy - the connection with Save the Redwoods is not enough to have it qualify for HALS. Betsy - there were several small forests along Route 66 where people put up signs and people stopped and camped - those are cultural. Noel when you get that many together you have a pattern and if you add camping that gets to be design and would qualify as a cultural landscape. Chris - so if one of the many reserves includes more improvements that site would be a better representative of the Save The Redwoods movement and the nomination would all be listed on that HALS form. The group would provide the context as a landscape that humans modeled.

   Cathy - HALS can be a natural landscape unlike HABS and HAER where you must have a built feature. Brian worked on a HAER project called Keys Ranch in Joshua Tree National Park. It was considered HAER because of its association with the mining operation. Noel - it reminds her of Amish communities where the layout of farms has a particular pattern of layout that is repeated over and over.

   Fredrica asks how to fill in the address when her project, Piedmont Way, is 7 blocks long? Brian - Describe the landscape as beginning at 2222 Piedmont and ending at Dwight Way more like a historic district.

   How to get coordinates? Use Google maps, a hand held GPS or navigation system, or go to Terraserve.com.

   Cathy presented Casa Amesti on Polk Street in Monterey which Cate helped with. It is a walled garden built in 1833 then added to over the next 40 years as the Amesti family grew. It is the second Monterey Colonial house in Monterey. The garden was a functioning Spanish-style working garden for 80 years. Then acquired by Francis Elkins, who was a notable interior designer and her brother who was an architect, David Adler. Together they designed a formal garden somewhat French in character. Elkins left the garden to the National Trust - their first West Coast property.

   Chris approached the challenge much differently than the in-depth scholarly efforts done by others. She treated it more as a fun weekend activity visiting one or more new sites, taking photos, making notes about her observations, doing mostly online research and writing up brief narratives. Chris brought 6 forms that were originally completed by Jennifer Liw of PGAdesign in 2005 and 15 additional forms that were prepared as part of the challenge. The original 6 have been put into the new HALS form, and GPS points and photos were added. Noel interjected congratulations from Washington from a conversation she had recently about a group of sites they had received recently.

   Of Chris' 21 sites, 7 are private estates each of which originally was much larger. All but one have been converted to public parks and the acreage has been reduced from hundreds of acres to much smaller sites. Are they worthy HALS sites? The Meek Mansion in San Lorenzo is on the National Register and is a state and local landmark. Meek was a prominent resident of San Lorenzo and an associate of the Lewellings - the fruit growers. Meek grew mostly cherries and today there is an area known as Cherryland. The original home is extraordinary and has been restored. The gardens are a city park and appear to have integrity. There are many heritage trees, out buildings and an ornate fountain and pool. So this one clearly qualifies for HALS in my mind.

   Ravenswood Estate in Livermore was owned by Christopher Buckley who was known as the Blind Boss of San Francisco and heavily involved in SF politics. He was a colleague of Hearst. Ravenswood was his summer home originally many acres now 32 and is owned by the City of Livermore. The home and cottage have been restored plus there are several out buildings and the ruin of the winery. There is a drawing of the property dated 1899 that shows a semi-circle of newly planted Date Palms, and I took a photo from the same vantage point showing the mature Palms. This property is on the National Register and is a state and local landmark.

   The Dunsmuir Historic Estate (aka Dunsmuir House and Garden, Dunsmuir-Hellman Estate) in Oakland, written up by Jen, would also qualify for HALS. The Shinn Historic House and Arboretum in Fremont has many features that are clearly historic such as the original home, barn, out buildings, ornamental iron fencing and gate, Japanese garden, and many mature trees. Many of the understory plants have been replaced. The family owned a nursery and a quarry that supplied gravel for the Transcontinental Railroad. The McConaghy Estate has been shrunk down to 3.5 acres. The home and property remained in one family for over 85 years. A portion of the original property became Kennedy Park. The property includes the home, a tank house, carriage house, many heritage trees, and some of the original planting beds and paths.

   Each of these was single family homes with large acreage that is now shrunk and turned into a community park. Most are the last, best examples of a Victorian farmstead in each of these small towns. Does being the last best example in a small, suburban community make it worthy of HALS documentation?

   Cathy - Character-defining features, the integrity of the elements, patterns that you can see are good but if the property is so whittled away it may not. Noel - remember this is not the National Register. Noel was talking with Paul Dolinsky and they acknowledged that NPS will receive all kinds of inventory forms for all kinds of sites - these probably do not deserve Level 1 HALS documentation but including them in the HALS inventory as the last best example from this small town, why not? If someone wants to spend time on these sites of lesser importance, they should. Ultimately this will turn out to be a very large listing of resources, with a wide variety of quality because much of this inventory work is going to be done by individuals who simple love the property. Over time the collection will be vetted. Think of HALS as an all-American project.

   Gretchen agrees with Noel. The purpose of the inventory is to see what you have. Until each site is inventoried, we cannot know what the best example from any particular area is. We should include everything for now. These properties are similar to looking at the theme parks. Once we have a collection of forms, we may be able to see patterns that are not evident from looking at only the obvious, premier sites. Brian concurs, assembling the inventory and then being able to see the patterns emerge is important. Maybe individually they are not significant but when you suddenly have 100s - or 40 in the East Bay - then you have a pattern that you can look at as a cultural development.

   Noel - there is a point though where the garden has been so severely reduced in size, the house is gone, the formal gardens are gone. There is a site in Southern California where all that is left is the Japanese garden but there is a whole story behind it - who designed it, why it was built. It is probably one of the few first generation Japanese gardens that survive. The owner was just about finished when he was taken to Santa Anita and interned in a camp. This was his life's big project. She is trying to figure out how many more Japanese gardens remain from this era. Cathy knows of one in Orinda associated with a Frank Lloyd Wright house. Noel - how many are in California, what condition are they in and are they worthy of being on the National Register?

   On one of my adventures, Lottie Pattillo took me to the Mohr-Fry Ranch in Hayward. This property has been held by the original family until last year, and it is a wholly intact ranch house "unsanitized". It is a large property with a Victorian ranch house, gorgeous barn, dirt paths, out buildings, sheds, tank houses, wood piles, orchards in active use, and farm equipment. The Hayward Historic Society told me its name and explained that it has been set aside for preservation, but the details of how it will be preserved have not yet been determined. It's perfect. This is a property that we or the Garden Conservancy might consider playing a role in its future. Betsy - does it have a garden? Chris - yes, it is a working garden. It's a gem. This garden is not publicly accessible and will not be submitted to NPS at this time.

   JC Miller arrived and reported that he has 2 inventory forms ready to submit and others in the works from the class he is teaching at UC Extension. Submissions include the Saint Vincent-Silvera Property in Marin, the Falkirk Center in San Rafael, City Cemetery in Sacramento, and JC did the Ocotillo Lodge in Palm Springs. A student submitted an excellent form for a George Rockrise/Lawrence Halprin house and landscape in Tiburon that is private property and cannot be submitted because the owner did not give permission.

   The other sites visited by Chris include The California Nursery Company in Fremont founded in 1884 and once the largest retail nursery west of the Mississippi. They provided the Palm trees for the San Francisco Pan-Pacific Exposition. Cathy - Jill Singleton has been doing research of that site. Included on that site is an 1842 adobe built by Jose de Jesus Vallejo that served as vaquero headquarters on the Rancho Arroyo de la Alameda - should this be written up on one or two inventory forms?

   The Marin Art and Garden Center that Royston's office was involved in. It is similar to Lakeside Park Garden Center but nicer. Marin Art and Garden was started in the 1940s as a self-supporting arts and crafts league modeled on the Allied Arts Guild in Menlo Park. The property was originally owned by James Ross who founded the town of Ross.

   The Robson-Harrington Garden in San Anselmo is a fascinating landscape. Tom Brown has done some research on this property. The site has an eclectic variety of brick work with molten globs of glass mortared into brick walls and many (maybe 50) unique, gorgeous terra-cotta medallions embedded in the walls. Walking through the garden makes you feel like Alice in Wonderland discovering things.

   Jen Liw also wrote up the Oakland Museum of California, Mills Hall, and the Kaiser Roof Garden.

   Chris wrote up 2 properties in Point Arena that have a lot to do with why the town is where it is - the Point Arena Lighthouse and Point Arena Cove. The lighthouse is on the National Register and one of a series of lighthouses along the California coast. The landscape is minimalist, influenced by the harsh climate. Plantings consist of low-growing vegetation and a few Monterey Cypress. There are several other buildings, utilitarian paths and fencing as part of the site. A chute and wharf were constructed at the cove and used to ship lumber and passengers to San Francisco. The town developed around the lumber industry as did many small towns along the Mendocino coast.

   Chris also brought forms for Concannon Winery in Livermore, Rancho Higuera Historical Park in Fremont, and Centerville Pioneer Cemetery in Fremont. Concannon is a California Historical Landmark founded in 1883 by James Concannon. It is a 200 acre actively producing winery with several historic features and some new improvements. Higuera came to California as part of the Anza expedition and built this adobe in 1840, which has been recorded by HABS. The site known as "Agua Caliente" or Hot Water was part of a 9,534 acre land grant made in 1838. The Centerville Cemetery started in 1850 and is the final resting place of many pioneer Fremont residents. It occupies one-half city block and is surrounded by single family homes.

   One of the most interesting sites Chris visited was China Camp State Park in San Rafael. Chinese immigrants who were brought to California to work on the railroad ended up in San Rafael and started a community based on harvesting shrimp from the Bay. This is a very interesting cultural landscape. During the 1880s, nearly 500 people lived at China Camp. Several buildings and structures remain including the 1895 General Store still operated by the grandson of the original owner.

   Cathy - We can report back to Janet that her challenge was a great success.

6. Other Agenda Items

   Cate recommended that we allocate funds to pay for mylars for the submission of the Kaiser Roof Garden drawings to NPS. Motion, Fredrica Drotos that we allocate up to $1,200 to have mylars made of the Kaiser Roof Garden plans. Second Betsy Flack. Motion approved.

7. Announcements

   Gretchen - Chris Pattillo, JC Miller and Gary Strang will be part of panel at the SF AIA Landscape panel on June 18th at 6:00 PM. The topic is "Designing Landscape in a Historic Context."

   Fredrica - the Thorsen House is celebrating their centennial year and is having a benefit and tours of the house on May 30th, 2:00-5:00 on Piedmont Avenue at Bancroft.

   Betsy - Andy Cochran is doing an evening at Flora Grubb Nursery on June 11th with her new book.

   Cathy - ASLA had their National Trustees meeting where they discussed legislation and California submitted more letters in support of legislation than any other state. That gives our state kudos in Washington which is valuable. Trustee Christopher Kent reports that "it is mostly the HALS letters. The HALS group needs to know you are doing great stuff." The rest of California ASLA is riding on the coattails of us HALS folks.

   Chris - the HALS funding bill has more signatures on it this year than any previous year. Cathy - they picked up 7 additional endorsements, while the Trustees completed their recent advocacy effort bringing the total to 28 signors.

   In closing, Betsy reminded us that this is supposed to be fun, so instead of always going to the same familiar place we should go visit new sites and write up inventory forms.