A Child's Memory of Woodside (First Appeared in the Almanac)

Here is a story from my nephew, Albert.  Enjoy!


Ours was a close and traditional family, and one thing we did every Sunday without fail was to go to a place we simply called “Woodside.”  My parents, three siblings and I would drive from Burlingame to our family home in the country on Kings Mountain Road.  It was a property of several acres with large oaks spreading above thick vinca.  At its center was the house where we gathered.  Even though my father and his two brothers labored every weekday at the family business, they met yet again on one of their precious free days to sit and relax together.

As a young boy in the 60’s I couldn’t wait to explore the surrounding countryside or to splash in the nearby creek.  This was allowed only after my morning chore was done.  Before our arrival, our uncles were busy sweeping the driveway loop of the crisp brown oak leaves.  My brothers and I had to pick up the piles with old license plates to transport them to the compost pile in the back.  We had many arguments about who got to push the wheelbarrow and who had to scoop the leaves.  Being the youngest, I was usually burdened with the latter.

After that I was free to take the neighbor’s dog on long walks up into Huddart Park.  There were plenty of trees to climb, creeks to ford, and miles of rocky trails to hike.  It was heaven.

Sometimes there was a horse show at the Woodside Mounted Patrol.  I would sneak in through the bushes to watch a few events and to pet the well-groomed horses.  On occasion, I got a mild case of poison oak as punishment for not taking the road and paying my entrance fee.

Returning before 3:30, I had to wash and change into clean clothes for dinner.  There were always at least ten family members at the table plus a few guests.  Dinner was served promptly at 5:00 to allow everyone to return at a reasonable hour to their homes in San Francisco and other parts of the Bay Area.  Frequently there were guests of great-uncle Will or my grandma May.  I had to greet lady guests with a kiss and shake the hands of older gentlemen.  This ordeal was repeated upon departure.

When I was older I started bringing my own friends.  I had to introduce them to everyone there before we could run off to play.  I felt pride showing off my family to my friends, because I thought my family was nice.  At that time I didn’t know why my friends sometimes seemed uncomfortable with all this.  It was what I did every week.  I was occasionally invited to do something with a friend, but my father decreed that family came first, and I went to Woodside.

I often brought my bike to explore even farther from the house.  I enjoyed pedaling all over and down the country roads through the tunnels of trees.  I sometimes ended up near Searsville Lake.  Then I followed the road along the Stanford Accelerator and liked to imagine what exciting discoveries were being made over the fence.

All too soon, I grew up and started college.  Sundays were my own at last.  In no time I was working at my own job and seldom visited.  Then I married and was blessed with a family of my own.

It wasn’t until years later that I became aware of how special my extended family was.  My friends weren’t uncomfortable; they were amazed to see something unusual.  I had a place to go and more important, a close family with whom to enjoy it.

Every guest was treated like a new best friend.  Anyone who was invited was always hoping to come back.  This was true of my friends who loved being in the country.

I learned important lessons during my childhood:  Work before play, respect one’s elders, and treat your guests like family and your family like guests.

Now that I live away from the Bay Area, I look forward to my few visits a year to Woodside.  Although some of the trees have fallen as have some of the residents, it remains a place of great comfort to me and a joy for my children.  One thing that we don’t speak of much in our family is Love.  We don’t have to, we live it.

When the Men Came Back

For women who entered Stanford in ’43, the dating situation was bleak.  Few men escaped the call to arms, and those who did were quickly spoken for.  We invited service personnel from local bases to our parties, and the A.S.T.P. filled in the gaps, but, in general, we women spent most of our leisure together.

     At the end of the war in 1945 things began to pick up, and by 1946 droves of men flooded the campus.  Our social lives were back on track.

     After graduation in 1947, I stayed on for graduate work and was invited to teach a couple of sections of Spanish in the Romanic Language Department.  It was quite thrilling to see my name in the Time Schedule along with those of my eminent professors.  One of them actually addressed me as “colleague”.  What I didn’t realize was that most of my students would be returning veterans, some of them older than my twenty-one years and also quite handsome. 

     The first time I stood on the podium in the room where I had long sat as a student myself, was probably the longest hour of my life.  It seemed that the hands of the clock were stuck.  I could hardly look up from my book.  I certainly did not make eye contact with anyone.

As the quarter progressed, my students and I learned to work together and became friends.  One freshman, the grandson of a president, enlivened our translations by bringing in books on Spanish California that had belonged to his grandfather.

Later, on several occasions, ten or twelve students came up to Russell House where I lived, for extra pre-exam tutoring.  My fellow residents were noticeably impressed as I closeted myself with that large gathering of attractive guys. 

One class member, a senior from Norway, dated a friend of mine and shocked us both by his espousal of the concept of “Free Love.”  The romance did not last.

Although I dated students from time to time, I can honestly say it did not influence my grading.  My only questionable action was to fill in a few accent marks on test papers for all my students.  It would have been ½ point off for each one forgotten, and I thought it was the least I could do for the men who had fought for our country.  I also decided that the Honor Code did not apply to teachers.

The Poker Gang (First Appeared in the Country Almanac)

What’s with all this poker business?  People who have never played the game are taking it up in droves while all over America viewers’ eyes are glued to the TV poker channels.  These Johnny-come-latelies seem to think they are the innovators and would be astonished to know how long many people have been at it.

In 1947 or 1948 my brother Charles and some of his old buddies from San Francisco’s George Washington High School began meeting once a month at each other’s homes for an evening of poker.  In the early 50’s the game moved to our family summer home in Woodside.  Fifty years later, they are still gathering there for a monthly mid-week meeting.  This works well, because the family only uses the house on weekends.

These men call themselves the Poker Gang, and they permit few changes to their traditional routine.  Each person has a special seat no one else would dare usurp.  They cover the table with an old pink electric blanket, wire ridges and all, which has made it through most of the fifty years.  One man always comes in his lucky hat.  My brother wore one Pendleton shirt until it fell to tatters.  The group started with a 25 cent limit, but about 25 years ago, amid heavy protest, they upped it to 50 cents.  Only after 47 years were the poker chips replaced.

In early years the guys were young and hale and arrived early for a few sets of tennis, went out to dinner and then returned for poker.  By that time the members lived in various parts of the Bay Area, so it seemed prudent to spend the night where they were instead of returning to their homes in the wee hours.  The fun continued as they all went out to breakfast in the morning.  As time went on, age set in along with bad knees and other physical problems, so tennis was gradually dropped.  When Poker nights began to end earlier, they dropped the sleep-overs, and most of the group went home to the comfort of their own beds.

About twenty years ago, two of the guys who were gourmet cooks proposed that they prepare the dinners.  Tired of local restaurants, the group welcomed the amazing meals their two friends concocted.  The only problem was that they cooked huge quantities of everything and upset the kitchen in the process.  They stuffed the leftovers in the refrigerator, and left no room for arriving family members to store their own weekend provisions.  The poker food was undoubtedly wonderful, but the ladies of the family believed that the only good leftovers were their own, not someone else’s.  After a while, the group began to understand that the family liked their kitchen to themselves.  The wives of the chefs concurred, because their husbands destroyed the kitchens in their own homes with pre-preparations before doing the same with ours.  The poker gang once again resorted to restaurant food.

Most important among the group is the depth of their fellowship.  A true esteem unites them; they care sincerely for one another.  When my brother, a bachelor, underwent a serious operation, I wanted to be there when he came back from surgery.  It warmed my heart to find several of the Poker Gang already in his room when I arrived. 

Over the years the group has become expert on every ailment known to man and probably saved the lives of several members by unrelentingly insisting that they seek medical help.  Despite this, two of them have died.  One beloved friend had moved to Carson City where he passed away, but six of the Poker Gang attended his services, there to don white gloves and act as his pallbearers.

All the smokers have successfully quit the habit, and almost no one drinks alcohol any more.  Despite this they have a fine time together and no one would dream of missing a meeting.  Someone new might steal his chair.

This is a real poker game.

Remembering Aunt Grace

     When I asked why Uncle Herman had married her, Grandmother’s answer came in one word—“Guilt.”

     We four children had not been invited to the wedding.  Nor had Grandmother, Mother, or the uncles.  But no one could fault Aunt Grace.  She had been planning those nuptials for years and had never been able to drum up any enthusiasm, especially Uncle Herman’s.  This time she had known better than to seek the family’s blessing.  They would have talked him out of it again.

     Uncle Herman called from Reno right after the ceremony.  I guess he felt safe with the width of California between him and his mother.  Grandmother did not have a heart attack when the news broke, but she came close.

     We kids could never figure out why Mother and the uncles were all afraid of Grandmother.  She was an old, old lady, probably seventy, and her children were pretty old, too.  But Grandmother held her children tightly, particularly her sons.  Uncle Herman showed more courage than King Edward VIII of England.  To renounce a throne was child’s play compared to defying Grandmother.

     Aunt Grace had been in the picture for nearly twenty-five years, and right along, everyone would have liked her out of it.  Even our easy-going grandfather put thumbs down on Grace.  He called her a chippie, whatever that was.

     I rather liked her brassy blonde hair and cupid’s-bow lips.  It seemed more interesting than Mother’s gray-brown tresses and light lipstick.  Grandmother, of course, was snow white and wore only the barest trace of powder.  I think what really annoyed them was the way Aunt Grace sat and tugged her dress above her knees.

     But that wasn’t the worst of it.  It was how she talked.  For some reason, she tried to impress the family with her fancy friends and her executive position.  Our family was not impressed.

     Grace was always putting on airs and was ashamed of the house she lived in.  As a matter of fact, Uncle Herman told his brother, Uncle Albert, that for the first five years he took her out she always stood on the steps of the house next door, because it was grander.  One night he arrived early and caught her coming out of her own house.  She never explained and he didn’t ask, but after that she waited on her own stoop.

     Grandmother wanted Uncle Herman to take out Anna Bahrs, the daughter of an old friend.  Anna was a school teacher and a head taller than Uncle Herman.  He like Anna, but we children decided that he didn’t have a case on her.

     Helen, Grandmother’s housekeeper, had gone all through St. Paul’s school with Aunt Grace.  Helen was always good to us children when we were at Grandmother’s house.  She was quite deaf and was always snapping off her hearing aid to save the battery.  It was a complicated contraption with head phones connected by a cord to a battery pack that she wore somewhere down inside the front of her dress.  When we asked her about Aunt Grace she would flip on the switch and start talking.  I noticed the adults in the family pretended to be doing something else, but we knew they were listening.

     Helen said Grace made a fuss if she didn’t get the best parts in school plays.  “Actually,” Helen said and stooped in front of the big wood stove to take out a steaming pie, “she was pretty good.  It was one of the few times she let herself go, and the real Grace seemed to shine through.”  Adult conversation ceased as their ears turned in our direction.  “The rest of the time she was always pushing and never having fun.”

     “Did she have a lot of boy friends?” Brother Peter asked.  He was older and knew more about all that than the rest of us children.

     “The boys liked her, all right.”  Helen looked around before lowering her voice.  “But she wanted someone with sugar in the old sock.”

     I knew better than to believe that.  Uncle Herman would never put sugar in his sock.

     There was a lot of speculation as to Grace’s age.  I couldn’t imagine why it mattered, but Grandmother sent a friend to St. Paul’s Church to check out her baptismal record.  I think she was disappointed that Grace wasn’t as old as she had thought and was even younger than Uncle Herman.

     Once Aunt Grace married she felt she’d arrived and insisted on an apartment on Pacific Avenue.  Grandmother supposed that if you'd waited until you were almost fifty to get married, the right address was even more important.  I think what irritated the family most was that Uncle Herman looked happy.

     Aunt Grace didn’t like to visit our Woodside home any more than the family wanted her.  The problem was Uncle Herman.  Because he loved being there, she had to go once in a while.  Then everything was touchy.  We had to be careful about what to say.

     Before they were married, Grandmother once asked Aunt Grace if she had a pension for her old age.  Grace never forgave her for that, and now she wasn’t going to take anything from anyone—especially Grandmother.  I didn’t blame Aunt Grace for being miffed, but the whole atmosphere changed when she arrived.  She looked scornfully at all of us.  She now had a “Mrs.” before her name and an apartment with a view.

     Aunt Grace didn’t find anything humorous at our house, particularly the comments of Uncle Bill’s friend, Mr. Prince.  If Mr. Prince happened to be visiting when Aunt Grace came, he tried hard to be funny which meant he was irritating.  Even Uncle Bill looked uncomfortable.  Aunt Grace sniffed and said in a voice just loud enough for us to hear, “And to think we could have been with our own set.”

     One good thing, when Aunt Grace came she usually brought the cake, which was a lot better than the ones Uncle Bill bought at the Sanitary Bakery.  One day Mr. Prince was there when she was bragging about her cake being “Pure butter and cream from Goldberg Bowen.”  Mr. Prince tried to be nice and said it looked like it was all blown up with a bicycle pump.  She really exploded, grabbed Uncle Herman, jumped in the car, and roared out of the driveway.

     It might have made a difference if the family had welcomed Grace with open arms.  They were polite, of course, but there was no warm-hearted acceptance.  They knew it and she knew it.  If she hadn’t boasted so much about her elegant connections and had cut down on the makeup it might have worked, but I doubt it.  She had one of those changeable personalities where, just as you were beginning to enjoy her, she flipped back to her usual unpleasant self.  On occasion she could be fun and showed a keen Irish wit, but too often she berated our whole family, leaving us limp and antagonistic.

     Although Grandmother’s relationship with her soured how she felt about all of us, the family agreed that Grandmother had been right all along.  Uncle Herman should have married Anna Bahrs.

     As ornery as Aunt Grace was to the older generation, she truly loved children and endeared herself to us.  She was generous to me and my brothers, particularly when we were small.  If she was coerced into going to the country, she always brought us gifts.  I remember one Easter when she covered the lawn with chocolate eggs and sugar bunnies.  As we grew older she began to lump us with our tainted elders, but even at that, years later when my first son was born she requested the privilege of buying his christening dress.

     They had been married only two years when Uncle Herman had a stroke from which he never fully recovered.  She blamed us, saying his stress had come from family pressure.  Grandmother held a different opinion.  I think the poor man was in a terrible position between two strong women.

     Aunt Grace took good care of our uncle, but she expected the rest of the family to jump when she spoke.  She herself was in poor health, which could have accounted for her temperament.  One or the other of them was often in the hospital, and on these occasions she demanded and received my brothers’ services as drivers.  Uncle Herman enjoyed his only freedom when Aunt Grace was indisposed.  He liked to be with my brothers who drove him to the peace and beauty of the country and the arms of his family.

     Meanwhile, Aunt Grace loved being in the hospital—not the illness, of course, but receiving non-stop personal attention.  She insisted on having the room the Archbishop had once used and the cachet she imagined went with it.  This was her opportunity to wear her frilly pink nightgown and peignoir sets.  She would pile on the makeup, lean back on the pillows, and hold court.

 Every evening my brothers took Uncle Herman to see her, and they did it willingly.  They were not nearly as happy to drive Aunt Grace to see Uncle Herman when he was the patient.  The trips to and fro gave her extra time to complain and criticize.

     Years later, Uncle Albert became seriously ill, and my brother Charles offered to take Uncle Herman to see him.  Grace would not let them go off alone and climbed into the car to supervise the excursion. 

     I was there that day with my two little boys who were too young to sense the troubled undercurrents.  Walt, the five-year old, took a shine to Aunt Grace and decided to do her a kindness.  He went outside, picked up the family cat, and carried it into the living room where he deposited it on her lap.  Walt didn’t know that Grace hated animals and cats most of all.  She jumped up, dumping the poor creature on the floor, screamed, and grabbed her digitalis pills.  Within two minutes she had Uncle Edward back in the car and my brother behind the wheel.  It was a terrible afternoon.

     When Uncle Herman died, Aunt Grace lost her hold on the rest of us.  She could no longer command the assistance or presence of the family.  There was no audience upon whom to heap her invective.  My saintly mother still called her faithfully once a week, and just as faithfully Aunt Grace unleashed her week’s supply of venom.  My brothers and I, who had long since moved into adulthood, invited her to family occasions and tried to take her out at other times.  More often than not she refused.

     When Aunt Grace died, the undertaker asked me to select a dress for her.  I felt a pang of remorse when I looked in her closet.  Only one or two suitable garments hung there.  The rest of the hangers held lacy pink peignoirs and nightgowns—all in readiness for her next hospital stay, the only pleasure in her life.

Eighty-Eight Years in the Kitchen (First Appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle)

In 1918 my grandfather purchased a small property at the edge of a forest on the Peninsula.  The house, an old wood frame building from the 1880’s, burned in 1933.  One friend termed it a good fire. 

Even though I was a small child at the time of the fire, I remember the kitchen.  A large room, it had a free standing sink with one minute drain-board.  Food was kept cold in a wooden ice box whose drip pan had to be emptied frequently to prevent spillage.  A huge behemoth of a wood and coal stove occupied the other wall, and in the center of the room stood a round oak table where I recall being seated to eat a bowl of the oatmeal I detested.  Only when Aunt Margaret arranged red, white, and blue crepe paper streamers around my plate and placed the fancy sugar spoon in my hand would I eat my breakfast.  This probably only happened once, but children do not forget special kindnesses.

After the fire our elders built the house we still enjoy today.  The kitchen was a marvel where raised tiled platforms held a modern electric stove from which the legs were removed and a refrigerator which also had been shorn of its appendages.  This was supposed to be the latest thing in 1934. 

Over the years, that kitchen provided sustenance for countless family meals and gatherings of friends.  Nine family members lived in the house during the summer as well as houseguests, as we children took turns inviting friends from San Francisco.  At breakfast-time Grandmother’s kind-hearted housekeeper kept popping out from the kitchen with platters of toast and eggs.  Her daily question:  “Is anyone filled up yet?”

 At Sunday dinners in years past, the dinner count started at twelve and went up from there as city friends dropped in.  During the summer Grandmother, our chief, had a lot to say about meal planning, but Mother occasionally was permitted an opinion.  After a shopping expedition to the local market where she handed her list to a clerk, Mother returned with provisions that filled the counters.  When Grandmother asked why she had only bought four or five loaves of bread, I remember Mother’s reply. “I would have been ashamed.”

During college years, social and academic groups would occasionally hold parties and meetings at our house, and as always, the kitchen had a workout.  At a party for one living group, the house cook came along to prepare breakfast for the gang.  She seemed to have great difficulty getting the pans of scrambled eggs off and on the stove.  She had apparently discovered the family liquor supply and had a party of her own.

My brother and his San Francisco high school friends  have had a monthly poker game at our country house for over fifty years.  This works well, because other family members only come on weekends.  About ten years ago two of the players, both gourmet cooks, proposed preparing the dinner in our kitchen instead of going to a restaurant.  The guys were delighted and loved the marvelous food the two concocted.  We ladies were not happy to arrive on a Saturday with our weekend provisions and find no room in the refrigerator now stuffed with massive amounts of leftovers.  After a few years the men finally understood that we really wanted the kitchen for ourselves.  The two wives of the cooks were also delighted not to have their own kitchens destroyed with the pre-preparations.

A few years ago the old kitchen began to show its age as the floor curled up and the ceiling sagged.  We knew it was probably past time to have it redone and summoned a contractor.  He performed wonders, and the wide counters gave the three of us ladies plenty of space to prepare our assigned parts of the family dinner.

The Sunday dinner tradition continues, but except for holidays, we now have only five or six regulars.  Our  children come with their children whenever they can, and that brings a special joy.  The youngest occupies her great-uncle’s highchair.

We love the remodeled kitchen, and it seems to provide the traditional level of hospitality.  The new appliances, counters, and floors improve greatly upon the old, but we cannot forget that over the past eighty-eight years, all three kitchens have been the center of fun, the heart of our home.

Hi Bottger, Pioneer and Friend (First Appeared in the Country Almanac)

     When Henry Bottger was a youth, he grew so tall that his friends named him High-Pockets, then shortened it to “Hi”.  After that, no one ever called him Henry. 

     Hi was always at our house.  He was there as a kind of caretaker, but more than that, he was our friend.  During the week he did anything that needed doing, but on Sundays he put on his good suit and came for dinner.

Hi grew up in Woodside and graduated from the Woodside School in 1887.  Like most of his friends, he went to work after the eighth grade.  He held a variety of jobs but the one he spoke about most was in a lumber mill on the other side of Kings Mountain.  At the end of the work week he hiked down the dusty road to Woodside for home and recreation.  On Sunday nights he made the return trek to rest up before his regular Monday eighteen hour shift.  Alternate days were light-—only twelve hours.  He camped out or slept in one of the many small huts that dotted the mountain for use by wood-choppers.  When his work took him to the Huddart Park area he was able to stay at home, but other workers sheltered in the tiny structures, two of which remained on the Huddart estate close to Greer Road well into the forties.  Hi was the one who built the bridge at the end of Greer Road.

The Bottger family home lay at the foot of the mountain.  The original building on the property was a toll house manned by Hi’s mother and his sister Lucy. Alerted by bells on the animals, often eight-horse teams, the Bottger ladies were on hand to collect from lumber, tanbark, and farm wagons that traveled the thoroughfare.  Water wagons sprayed occasionally to keep down the dust.  Later, the family lived in a more spacious wood-framed building which upon the death of his mother, Hi put up for sale.

Our Grandfather learned about the property, bought it, and took possession on Armistice Day, 1918.  Grandmother was horrified by the old house, the barns and outbuildings and much preferred being in San Francisco, but to please her husband, she made the arduous weekend drives down the Peninsula.  All Grandfather saw were the beautiful forest-covered mountains that reminded him of his European homeland.

Grandfather immediately began to make improvements.  The old barns and sheds came down.  Neighbors adopted the cow and the chickens, the well was filled in.  Grandmother was delighted to have a place to throw everything she wanted to get rid of, including the grindstone.  Hi gritted his teeth at the changes, but the loss of the grindstone was almost more than he could bear.

My grandparents asked Hi to stay on.  He did and occupied his boyhood room for a number of years until our family expanded and needed more space.  He then moved to Albion Way to the home of his sister and brother-in-law.

Meanwhile, he helped my grandparents settle in.  Over the years he built a wide porch around the house, constructed a fireplace, laid out a garden, seeded a lawn, fabricated a brick patio and paths, planted a grove of redwoods, created a screened recreation room, and everything else that was suggested to him.

      He also entertained my brothers.  He told them stories, taught them how to make root beer and took them all to the cowboy movies in Menlo on Saturday afternoons.  At least once a summer he piled the boys in his old Ford for a day of huckleberry picking on Kings Mountain.  This involved the ladies of the house in a spate of pie baking, a somewhat unpleasant task because of the small stems that clung to the berries.  Hi, of course, came to devour the finished product.

He also seemed to enjoy the Sunday night dinners.  Grandmother always provided a substantial array of food for our large family and numerous guests, of which Hi was one.  Right before dinner, Grandfather invited him to the tank house, a tall building next to the house that contained a ground floor room with a sink and a cabinet of glasses.  We children sometimes peeked in to see the two gentlemen toasting one another. 

Hi explored every foot of Kings Mountain.  He knew the location of the old lumber mills and took us on hikes to see the remnants of their boilers.  He even knew of the existence of a pocket of coal which he dug out and burned in the stove of his cottage on Albion Way.  He told us the location of two Indian burial grounds along Kings Mountain Road, one close to Woodside Road near what he called “Dobe” Corners (because of the old adobe that stood there) and another about a half mile up the road.   Another point of interest on the same road was a small cemetery where some of his contemporaries were buried.  The graves were later removed.  He also showed us a hidden spring of mineral water near our house to which we sometimes walked after dinner, often taking our guests. Best of all, he shared with us the location of his two favorite swimming holes in the creek.

Every summer Hi took off on a long car trip.  He had an old car with a canvas top held up by side braces.  Because he camped along the way, he stored boxes of canned goods on the running boards of the Ford and filled the inside with necessary gear.  Over the years he visited almost every state and always sent cards to the family.  On one he wrote, “The Grand Canyon’s great, but I’ve seen a nutmeg grater.”

Hi liked all the ladies, but his enduring love was the local school teacher.  She was interested in him as well but grew tired of waiting for his declaration and married someone else.  Until his death, he kept her picture hanging on the wall of his cottage.  He was always somewhat of a ladies’ man until an explosion caused him to become deaf.  Even at that, in his later years he would occasionally dye his white hair red and come calling on Grandmother’s housekeeper, Helen.  Although Helen professed a complete lack of interest, we children noticed she did a lot of giggling when he was there.  Despite his conquests, he remained a lifelong bachelor.

Hi was a hard worker, a kind person, and a good friend.  We were too young to realize that we should have listened more closely to his wonderful stories.  His memories and experiences would have provided a treasure trove of local history.  Henry Bottger exemplified the best of old Woodside.        

Exciting Departure from Mills Field (First Appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle)

In 1938 the San Francisco Peninsula looked far different than it does today.  Every Sunday of my childhood our family traveled out of the city to Grandmother’s country house at the base of King’s Mountain, and we had three ways to get there.

El Camino Real with its curved mission bell markers took us through separate little cities, each with its own identity and points of interest long before they had grown together to form an almost continuous series of commercial enterprises and homes.  El Camino led past the first “auto court” I remember seeing.  The forerunner of the modern motel, it was on the border of Daly City and Colma.  I thought it would be dreadful to sleep in one of those little boxes, even though each had an attached garage.  My brothers and I also watched for the dairy farms where a tunnel under the highway allowed the cows to wander freely from one side of the road to the other.

By far the most scenic route south was the Skyline-Crystal Springs road.  It was largely agricultural, but the reservoir section traveled over a dam and followed the contours of the lakes.  No mighty Highway 280 spanned the countryside in those days, and the twisty road caused me great anguish.

The old Bayshore was our least favorite road.  It was a boring stretch with miles of salt evaporating ponds.  We children did like the view of the roller coaster in the amusement park on the north side of Coyote Point.  We never stopped, nor did anyone else apparently, because it fell to ruins and was eventually torn down.

Driving on the Bayshore finally started to pick up with the construction of the marvelous new San Francisco airport, Mills Field.  All the Bay Area took pride in the fine facility that promised to meet the air travel needs of its citizens.  A wind sock caught the breezes as passengers awaited their flights behind chain link gates, truly gates in those days.

In September of 1938 as a twelve year old girl, I received an incredible invitation.  Grandmother asked me to accompany her on a short visit to her niece in Salt Lake City.  Best of all, we would make this trip by air.  It would be the first flight for both of us.

All the family escorted us to Mills Field and waited with us by one of the few gates to the field.  Grandmother wore an orchid corsage to mark the importance of the event.  The attendant finally allowed us to pass through to the field where, nervous and excited, we climbed the short stairway to the door of the United Air Lines Mainliner.  There were so few passengers that no one seemed to mind as we posed outside for a photo shoot by family members.

Grandmother let me sit by the window where I kept my eyes on my mother and brothers who stood safely on firm ground.  At that moment I wished I were with them.  I had little time to worry, because our stewardess, a tall young woman in a smart uniform with wings on the lapels, came to check our seat belts.  She chatted in a friendly manner to alleviate our fears, and I thought she was more beautiful than a movie star.  Our pilot must have been given clearance, because we took off immediately, close to the terminal without today’s long delays at distant runways.

A short time after we were airborne, our lovely stewardess brought our lunches.  Each was served on a compartmentalized cardboard tray on top of a kind of cardboard box which became a tray table.  I don’t remember the menu, although it must have been enticing because I ate it all and saved the little salt and pepper containers to show my junior high science class when I got home. 

The flight started out smoothly, but we soon ran into turbulence that tossed the little plane all over the skies, or so it seemed to me.  Grandmother must have been as frightened as I, and although she tried to hide her qualms I could see how tightly she grasped the arm rests.  The rocking and shaking of the plane upset me far more than the curvy roads of the Peninsula, and I soon had reason to regret eating my delicious lunch. 

Toward the end of the journey the stewardess distributed flight logs with the exciting information that we were flying at an altitude of 13,000 feet at the unbelievable speed of 185 miles per hour.  The log, signed by the pilot, would prove to my classmates that I had indeed made this trip. 

We finally landed in Salt Lake City to be met by our cousins.  They seemed most impressed with our bravery to have actually flown in an airplane.  Grandmother glanced at me knowingly, and neither of us confessed how nerve-wracking it had been for both of us.  We wouldn’t think about the flight home yet.  We’d face it when it came.

Mr. Personality

Losing a dog is like losing a family member, and sometimes it seems almost as hard as the loss of a human counterpart.  It’s been a while since our Golden died, but it’s never been the same around our house.  I still look at the place in the hallway where he liked to lie, and my eyes go automatically to the site of his water bowl, the level of which I always checked.

Rex was our buddy, and any time he saw the car door open he hopped right in, ready to go anywhere with us.  When we got where we were going he stayed close, for fear of being left behind.

We tried to give him every advantage, including seven semesters of dog training at our local community center.  He had a wonderful time, but sadly, was always at the bottom of the class.  When the teacher saw him arrive, she shook her head and said, “Here comes Rex again.  He doesn’t know he’s at dog school.  He thinks he’s at a dog party.”

He loved the children of the family and wanted to be with them whether they liked it or not.  Too often when they played board games on the floor, Rex rushed into their midst as chips and counters went flying.  If he didn’t lie on the board he sat so close that his wagging tail swept it clean.

As for protection, he did not supply much.  One evening at dusk we found him close to the sliding screen door, staring out at an opossum poised against the shrubbery.  The opossum stood outside, playing possum.  Rex remained inside, playing chicken.

He loved to eat paper.  I had an envelope containing sixty dollars in my purse, and unfortunately, I left the purse open on the floor of my bedroom.  The money never made it to wherever it was intended to go.  On another occasion he took a big bite out of my nephew’s first paycheck.  Happily, that could be replaced.  One friend lost legal papers, another, her appointment calendar.

When guests arrived he thought they came to see him.  He ignored us and sat at or on their feet.  Whenever possible he snatched a pile of paper cocktail napkins for pleasurable ingestion and seemed to enjoy them more than the hors d’oeuvres, although he was known to snag a wedge of Brie.  He particularly enjoyed paper guest towels, and sometimes we heard the thump-bang-bang as he caught his head in the wastepaper basket in the bathroom.

When he discovered that newspapers were particularly delicious, we had to keep the gates closed to protect the neighbors’ reading matter.  As hard as we tried he could occasionally find a crevice to wriggle through for foraging expeditions.

Rex remained rambunctious into old age, and when he died we placed him in a sunny corner of the orchard.  I know it will never happen, but when we go, I wish they would put us there beside him.  One thing for sure, when we get to heaven, I know we’ll find the gates locked, not to keep us out but to keep him in.

Katie Finds the Wright Architect (First Appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle)

     Carmel has the distinction of a stunning Frank Lloyd Wright home visible on a far point beyond the beach and above the surf.   San Francisco boasts a Wright building which lies on the north side of Maiden Lane and was built as the V.C. Morris store for gifts and homewares.  Marin County possesses an extraordinary example of the Wright genius in its Civic Center, where visitors can arrange for docent tours through buildings whose every facet was designed by the master architect.        

An architectural treasure lies almost hidden in a cul-de-sac off a quiet Orinda road.  Aside from the Hanna home on the Stanford University campus, it is one of the few homes in the immediate San Francisco Bay Area designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. 

In 1948 Katie and Maynard Buehler decided to build a home on their Orinda property.  Their first acre cost $1,850, the second acre $5,000, and the third, $7,500, as they purchased more land to provide privacy and space for a large garden.  After having admired pictures of Frank Lloyd Wright homes, Katie wrote to ask if Mr. Wright would build for them.  Weeks passed without an acknowledgement, but one day the telephone rang and a voice said, “This is your architect.”  Thus began an interesting and frequently trying relationship.

Mr. Wright came to inspect the property before he began the plans.  His drawings took four months, and the house was completed in one year.    

Mrs. Buehler said that the master always wore his signature wide-brimmed hat, cape, long chain, fob and watch.  In addition, he carried a cane with which he tapped and tested every board in every inch of the building.  His manner could well be described as arrogant.  She said, “he was supremely tickled with his talent; confidence oozed from every pore.”    

Everything had to be the way Mr. Wright decreed, including a small kitchen rather than the larger one Mrs. Buehler suggested.  His comment was, “Madam, you don’t seem to understand that all women have been emancipated from the kitchen.”  As it turned out, he was correct about the size.  The kitchen was well-designed and worked efficiently.  He also told the Buehlers, “You do not build down to please your clients.”

As the building progressed, a Wright representative was on hand every day to monitor the work.  Mr. Wright appeared occasionally.  Katie Buehler remembers another “This is your architect” call from San Francisco.  Wright had taken a suite at the St. Francis Hotel and invited them for a 7:30 Saturday breakfast.  The Buehlers traditionally had a later breakfast on Saturday mornings, so Katie asked, “7:30?”  Wright said, “I can easily make it 6:30.”  They were there at 7:30.  The suite was lovely, and the breakfast good.  Maynard Buehler received the bill for both.

The front door of the handsome redwood house is reached by a walkway under a low overhang.  The beautiful copper roof never leaks.  Once in the entry hall, a turn to the right leads to a large curved living room with a long upholstered banquette against tall windows.   The banquette and coffee tables were designed by Wright as was the dining room furniture visible through the open end of the living room.  The dining table was assembled in triangles, and the chairs have low curved backs to assure an unimpeded view of the garden while seated in the living room.  Gold leaf covers the tall slanted ceiling of the living room, as well as the lower one of the dining room.

 On one occasion the Buehlers drove Mr. Wright to Napa to inspect certain building materials.  Their route took them past the new high school of which the Buehlers and the community were rightfully proud.  Wright’s comment:  “It looks like a shoe factory.  A cheap shoe factory.”

As for the building materials, Mr. Wright saw a pink-toned basalt brick that he decided would be better than the gray bricks already in place.  Maynard Buehler whispered to his wife, “Over my dead body.”  The bricks were not changed.

A hallmark of Wright architecture is the varying heights of rooms and hallways.  When the building was completed, a young county inspector took exception to the low ceilings and called his office.  His superior must have asked who the architect was, because the young man was heard to say, “Some guy by the name of Wright.”  His boss arrived within the hour to grant approval.

The house sits on three and one-half acres of garden landscaped by the gifted Henry Matsutani, who had worked on the renovation of the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park.  Given a free hand, Matsutani designed a Shin garden with bridges, statuary, ponds, and waterfalls.  The sound of water helped to quiet background traffic noise.  A fence on the edge of the property had to be erected to prevent sight-seers from parking on the road and walking down through the garden to view the house.  The Buehlers were disconcerted by critics who found their wish for privacy   inconsiderate, especially because they generously welcomed group tours to their home and garden.

Henry Matsutani and the Buehlers worked together for many years to produce a beautiful garden.  Matsutani was always adding something and never really finished his masterpiece.  He visited frequently, often timing his arrival to join the Buehlers for breakfast on the terrace.  He seemed to enjoy American breakfasts, particularly bacon, eggs, and heavily buttered toast.  Maynard Buehler had to leave for his office, but Katie sat with their guest while he admired his handiwork.  He sometimes said, “I love to look at this, because I did such a good job.”

Frank Lloyd Wright put the stamp of approval on his own work.  When he came back to visit, his comment was, “I am glad to see you are living graciously in my house.”

That Dreaded, Dratted Driver's Test (First Appeared in the Contra Costa Times)

     I just took my driver’s test and as always, it was a horrible experience.  From what I hear, a large percentage of applicants flunk, and it is rumored that the DMV is rethinking their test questions.

     This unpleasant ordeal occurs every five years.  I find the whole thing frightening, and bone up weeks in advance.  I go to the DMV for the latest handbook and pay particular attention to important facts, such as the maximum speed for towing a trailer, how many days I have to register a truck, and what the licensing procedure is for moving here from another state.  It doesn’t matter that I don’t own a trailer, I do not drive a truck, and that I’ve never lived any place but in the Bay Area.  That I know these procedures is evidently important to every driver on the road.

     Friends lend me their old tests, which I duplicate and add to my burgeoning file.  These are actually the most helpful aids to study.  Some questions are repeated in all tests, and by going over them, I can more easily remember the answers. 

My scores matter to me, so it’s comforting to note that few of my friends have perfect papers either.  Once, years ago, I had a test without a single mistake, and the kindly DMV clerk complied with my request to write a large “A” across the top.  I posted it on the refrigerator door when I got home and left it there for months.

     By the time the test day arrives, I’ve crammed for countless hours, so it depresses me to see red checks on my paper.  The problem is that I often envision circumstances that make several answers correct.  I guess you aren’t supposed to think, and to argue your reasoning with officialdom does no good.

     As I drive down the freeway, I see thousands of cars, and in every car, I see a driver.  Taking a bell shaped curve for intelligence, I find it difficult to believe that all those thousands of drivers can be smart enough to pass the test.  I’ll bet that not one in ten thousand knows he must signal 100 feet before a turn, that he must purchase an Ambulance Driver Handbook for five dollars if he wants to drive an ambulance, or that any time he merges with other traffic, he needs a gap of four seconds.

     As a matter of fact, to judge by the way some people drive, they must have failed the test many times over.  Just this morning I saw one guy make a right turn from the middle of the freeway.  He crossed in front of three lanes of traffic, and although I didn’t do it, I was sorely tempted to convey my displeasure in an unladylike manner.

     One of my friends tried to cheat when she took her last driver’s test.  She is the same person who during high school days, would call the night before a book report was due to ask if I had any old ones.  Anyway, she recently went for her driver’s test and discovered that she hadn’t studied enough.  She whispered to the man who stood beside her that she’s like the answer to the first three questions.  He glared at her and moved away.  Although she knew they had different tests, she was quite irritated.  She said it wouldn’t have hurt him to help her out.

     They say pain has no memory, but don’t you believe it.  The other day I skipped happily out of the Walnut Creek DMV, clutching my new temporary license.  My ordeal was over.

      With a light heart, I drove onto the freeway, but I wasn’t halfway home before an ugly thought intruded.  In less than five years I’d have to start studying again and relive this whole miserable experience.

The Speeder and the Judge (First Appeared in the Contra Costa Times)

     I was speeding, but not on purpose—-as I kept trying to tell the officer.  For once there had been no traffic along that San Francisco thoroughfare, and I had zoomed along, making every light with ease.

     The officer said, “Look, ma’am, it took me a mile and half to catch you.  Don’t you ever look in the rear view mirror?”

I gave him my senior lady smile.  “I just love Law and Order,” I told him.

     He grunted and handed me the ticket.  Because I was going 52 M.P.H. in a 25 mile zone, I’d have to appear in court.  So much for my smile.

     Going to court terrified me.  I couldn’t sleep the night before and envisioned barred doors clanging shut behind me.

     Having read somewhere that lavender is a color of vulnerability, I wore my one lavender outfit for my court appearance.  I skipped the jewelry and usual makeup, then practiced looking pathetic.  I didn’t have to work at it.  I felt pathetic.

     At the court house I waited with the other miscreants, all of whom were many years my junior.  They accepted me as an equal and could not understand why I was so nervous.  One experienced speeder advised me to ask for traffic school.  The young woman next to me kept sizing up the male population and asked if I didn’t thing the guy in the next row was adorable.  I told her the judge was more my speed.

     The kids took the ordeal in stride.  I was the only one shaking with fear.

     The judge was tough.  He meted out stiff fines and, in one case, a nasty sentence.  One repeat offender would have to spend a weekend in the county jail.  By the time my turn came, I could hardly walk to the front of the room.

     After the procession of jeans-clad young people, the judge saw me coming and did a double-take.  He consulted his papers to verify that, indeed, I did belong there, then looked up again at the lady in lavender who quaked before him.  His manner changed from gruff to gentle as he leaned forward to question me.  I realized we two were the only gray-haired people in the room.

     My words came out in a jumble.  I tried to assure him that I did not mean to speed, had no idea I had, and promised I would NEVER do it again.

     He said he believed me and almost apologized that certain formalities must be followed.

     I asked about traffic school.  He nodded and allowed that option to clear my record but said that most of the fine had to remain.

     I was so relieved not to be picking up papers along the freeway in an orange jumpsuit that I almost skipped out of the court house. 

     A few minutes later I climbed into my car and after offering a prayer of thanks for that kind elderly judge, I put on my lipstick and stuck on my earrings.  Only then did I begin the drive home—slowly.

Earthquake Memories (First Appeared in the Almanac)

Those of us who grew up in San Francisco remember well the stories of our elders about the terrible earthquake of 1906, although they always referred to it as “the fire”.

My mother’s parents had just built a new home which fortunately withstood the jolting of the quake.  On the morning of April 18^th, 1906, the family was roused from their beds and they ran into the hallway to hold each other in fright.  They could see from their windows that chimneys were toppling and staircases were being knocked askew.  Reports of great devastation in other parts of the city reached them as the fires spread. 

Years later Mother took us children to Golden Gate Park to see the empty marble doorway at Lloyd Lake.  It was all that remained of a beautiful Nob Hill home after the catastrophe of 1906.  She told us her memories of that time and how, because their house had been spared, strangers from other parts of the city came to them for shelter.  They found beds for at least eight or ten people who became life-long friends.  The fires continued in other parts of the once beautiful city, and everyone was afraid of gas explosions and more fire.  The militia ordered all cooking to be done out-of-doors in make-shift shelters in the middle of the street.  The family had plenty of fresh water  to share with neighbors, because Grandfather’s nearby factory was blessed with fine wells.

 We children were horrified by these tales of destruction and conflagration, but Mother smiled.  She said that as an eleven-year old girl, it had been a wonderful time.

My husband’s father remembers being awakened by the quake as a chest of drawers rolled across the room toward him.  He told his children that he just pushed it back and leapt from his bed.  His mother’s family lived on Larkin Street, which stood in the path of the fire.  They were among the unfortunate who had their homes dynamited to form a fire-break.  The militia awakened them in the middle of the night and gave them only a short time to vacate.  Uncle Lester helped his family throw a few necessities into a small wagon, and still in nightclothes, they fled to Fort Mason in the Marina area where they slept out of doors on mattresses.

A friend’s great aunts attended the Caruso concert on the night of April 17^th.  The music was so heavenly that the girl’s decided to sleep together in Aunt Eda’s bedroom to continue their discussion of the evening.  Early the next morning, the earthquake destroyed the fireplace in Aunt Dora’s room, piling bricks and mortar onto the bed where, had it not been for Caruso, she would have died as she slept.

The same friend’s father and his family fled from their destroyed home to camp in nearby Alamo Park.  The day after the quake their spirits rose as Enrique Caruso came to sing to the evacuees.

The father of a present day Woodside storekeeper worked in his family’s market on California Street in 1906.  His own father ordered him to take a wagon to Butcher Town for supplies and not to stop for anyone.  As a grown man he cried at the memory of people throwing money at him and begging to be taken out of the city.

Years later my son chose the Earthquake as his eighth grade project and taped the oral histories of two grandmothers and four great aunts and uncles.  He received an “A” and abundant praise.  Several months later we asked him to play the tape for guests and he looked at us blankly.  A moment later he said, “Oh, I remember.  I recorded over that.