I went to Heaven to see Larry Hagman - 46 By Ivor Davis
The Bower Garage - 80
By Tom Moore
Whitman House - 118
By Mimi Walker
MUSIC & THEATER
Ojai Playwrights Conference - 56
By Mimi Walker
The Ballad of Jackie Lomax - 72
By Paul Stanton
HISTORY
33 Facts About Mira Monte - 64
By Perry Van Houten & Craig Walker
Golf’s 100 Best Players - 112
By Michael Arkush
MINDFULNESS
Affirmation Amulets by Tierra - 88
By Erin LaBelle
CALENDAR OF EVENTS - 95
FOOD & FARM
Community Juice - 98
By Kerstin Kühn
Herbalicious Eating - 106
By Sharon Palmer
On 40 prime East End acres, this unique citrus ranch has fabulous Topa Topa views, four legal houses, a 2800 sqft barn, and 36 acres of organic orchard. One of the best wells in Ojai provides reliable income from 6000 Valencia trees, 2000 Pixie trees and 200 pecan trees. The remodeled 3500sqft, 3bd/2.5ba main house, built in 1917, has beautiful views from nearly every window. The 3 auxiliary houses provide great rental income. Includes extensive water infrastructure, 2 Casitas water meters, 40kw of solar panels, a John Deere tractor and a Gator.
Offered at $8,750,000
SERENE EAST END RETREAT
Old-world charm and modern luxury on a lush, sprawling .82 acre lot. The completely updated 3br/2ba main residence has a clean, airy aesthetic with wood floors and stylish finishes. The modern kitchen flows into a spacious living room with vaulted ceilings and a fireplace. The primary bedroom has high ceilings, clerestory windows, and a renovated bath. A converted garage serves as an entertainment room or office. The grounds include a brick patio with a stone fireplace and a lap pool with a deck. The 2br guest house is a 1934 log cabin, rustic outside, fresh inside with new windows, a fireplace, and a full kitchen. Offered at $3,175,000
cornelis kick william scott louis valtat
april 24 – june 22
ivon hitchens
july 3 – august 24
located in a classic california bungalow a short walk from the arcade, canvas and paper is a small art museum with a focus on 20th century modernism. exhibits change every two months. admission is free.
311 n. montgomery street thursday – sunday noon – 5pm canvasandpaper.org
louis valtat, les tulipes perroquet, c. 1910
ivon hitchens, red, black and white tulips, 1968
Editor’s Note: Summer 2025
Each of us has our own small influence on the contour of Ojai life. As each dips a toe, cannonballs in, or swims underneath the water hole of our daily life, our ripple is felt and adjusted for, and as a town we are shaped. We’ve seen the shape-shifting of the Ventura River — how it eddies, flows, and repositions itself within its banks, as the rainy and dry years cycle, and each drop of water does its topographic work. We at Ojai Magazine sit beside the river, charting our common story, from its great course to its tiny rivulets — the folks and fashions of our town. Each issue samples a core of where we came from and where we’re going.
Half of Ojai Magazine’s Summer issue stories capture some of the legacy moments that have brought shape to Ojai culture: Viva Vaquero, 33 Facts About Mira Monte, I Went to Heaven to See Larry Hagman, The Bower Garage, Jackie Lomax, and Whitman House.
The other half of our story stack is a snapshot into the culture we currently embody: Patagonia Action Works, Ojai Playwrights Conference, Community Juice, Herbalicious Eating, and Earth Affirmation Amulets.
We appreciate the work that you, dear reader, contribute, the energy you bring to our collective motion. By reading — more than information-browsing — you do the work of relating and connecting to our authors and subjects, rather than opting for readily available, predigested machine synopses. Partaking in this authentic communication form slows the chatter, promotes independent thinking, and creates a mindful space to tap into the sweetness of humanity right here at home. Ojai is a beautiful place to be, and perhaps the simplest place in Southern California.
A passerby on a trail recently told me that he was “doing better than he deserved,” which I took to mean, “I’m grateful for this company, this day, and this place.” What elements will we each add to Ojai’s community life? Through Ojai Magazine, we can all listen in along the river of our evolution.
By the time you’re reading this, the legal landscape for environmental protection across the U.S. may be significantly changed. Federal legal protections in place for decades, including the Endangered Species Act signed into law by President Richard Nixon, are slated for review by Congress with the intention to amend or repeal.
If those laws are weakened or repealed, individuals and groups across the country will lose a vital tool for protecting wildlands from development, mineral extraction, and overuse.
Activists are power-building by coming together to protect lands here and abroad that may be threatened as the U.S. domestic and international environmental policy shifts under the administration of President Donald Trump.
In January 2025, Hans Cole, vice president of environmental activism at the Ventura-based outdoor clothing company Patagonia, sat down with Ojai Magazine to discuss the company’s legacy of environmental advocacy, and efforts to support local and global actions to protect human and wildlife habitat.
“Patagonia has this 50-year history of
working to make a positive impact on the environment,” Cole said. “We’re an outdoor company full of climbers and surfers, skiers, snowboarders who love to be out in the outdoors, who want to do something to protect these places and the environment, out of our love for the outdoors. We’re learning about the important and long history of Indigenous protection and existence in these landscapes. … It’s really about us supporting that vision.”
At Utah’s Bears Ears National Monument, for example, “five tribes came together as the Bears Ears Intertribal Coalition. In places like Alaska it’s the
Matilija Dam in the Ojai Valley is slated for removal after 2030
Photo courtesy of Patagonia
Gwich’in and the Gwich’in Steering Committee. Across almost every land and water-protection effort that we’re engaged in there’s a recognition that we need to be connecting with, supporting, and in partnership with Indigenous-led vision for that place.”
Locally, the Ojai Valley is bordered to the north by the Los Padres National Forest, which comprises 1.75 million acres of public land that stretch north through Santa Barbara County.
For 16 years, Cole has led Patagonia’s environmental team, which “focuses on support of grassroots activism by providing grants, resources, and support,” he said. After the 2024 election, Cole said, such support is part of “building deep relationships and gaining understanding to work through moments like this to figure out what we can and should be doing.”
MATILIJA DAM
The Matilija Dam Ecosystem Restoration Project is one of Patagonia’s longest-running efforts, Cole said. The dam, which blocks Matilija Creek from connecting with the Ventura River, is slated for removal after decades of advocacy, education, fundraising, and planning.
“It really is about this entire watershed," Cole said. “We live in this incredible valley and set of areas that are connected by this river that comes down out of these incredible wilderness and wildlife habitats up in the Los Padres National Forest, all the way down through all the communities, Ojai down to Ventura to the coastline.”
Part of the effort is restoring habitat and access for the endangered southern steelhead trout, a salmonid fish that was plentiful in the Ventura River watershed until the mid-1900s. After the dam was built, the species vanished from the Ventura River.
Cole explained the current plan for
removal is to drill two “12-foot diameter holes in the bottom of the dam, leave a plug, and then wait for a storm that’s big enough to push out that sediment.”
He said the first grant Patagonia awarded, 50 years ago, went to the “newly formed Friends of the Ventura River, by Mark Capelli.” The focus then was “about protecting this river, pushing back on unwise development, making sure the river had enough water, and making sure the species that exist in that river, including endangered species like the southern steelhead, had the ability to survive and thrive here.”
Today, local individuals, groups, and government stakeholders are key to the project, now spearheaded by resident Paul Jenkins. “Paul’s the spiritual leader of this effort, a real engineer and activist,” Cole said. “And thinking about the vision of what this could be if it’s completed, it would be one of the biggest dam removals ever to happen in the United States.” Removal of the dam is “the critical piece of finally restoring this watershed to its roots,” Cole said. Matilija Dam, built in 1947, is now completely filled with sediment, and “no longer serves any good purpose.” The trapped sediment would normally be carried down the Ventura River, deposited along the riverbanks, and pushed out to the coast.
“We need that sediment,” Cole said. “That’s our beach. The dam is holding back all that sand and fine sediment that should be down on our coastline.”
He said robust beaches build “resilience in the face of rising ocean levels and erosion on our coastline. But it’s tricky. It’s expensive. It’s complex. I think the good news on Matilija is back in 2016, we were able to come to some real consensus among stakeholders.”
He said the private and public stakeholders included local government
Patagonia’s 50-year mission to protect lands, rivers, and global health
officials, Indigenous Chumash, conservationists, activists, and community members. “We all came to this consensus that we need to see natural transport of that sediment down to the ocean. What we don’t want is to have all that sediment put under concrete or truck to haul out of there to some distant dump site at great expense.” Neighborhoods along the Ventura River need protection, he said, meaning certain parts of the downstream infrastructure should be bolstered for the water and sediment flow. He said two bridges, several levees, and “a high-flow bypass” for the water system needed to be built.
Other dams in the West have been removed, and the results are clear, Cole said With nature allowed to run its course, “very quickly the ecosystem will bounce back, the fish will come back up the river, sediment will flow downstream, and nature will restore a better and more natural state to the river.”
Hans Cole
Photo courtesy of Patagonia
To pay for the project, $44 million has been allocated, raised mainly from California Coastal Commission grants, the state of California, and bond measures. Even with all the support, advocacy is needed to keep the project on track.
“It’s just a matter of how we get those bridges, the levees, the high-flow bypass, the funding, and have it all happen on a timeline that doesn’t stretch another 10 years,” Cole said. “I think Patagonia’s role is to advocate, to organize, to keep pushing.”
If all parts of the plan fall into place, the dam is slated to be removed after 2030.
OPEN-NET PEN FISH FARMING
Patagonia also supports grassroots efforts across the globe, especially causes related to rivers and fish, such as open-net pen fish farming, which Cole described as “the practice of having a pen in a natural body of water — literally an enclosed area where you’re raising farmed fish. The fish are contained, but there’s flow in and out of water.” Waste created in the pen, and chemicals and pharmaceutical products used to raise the fish, pollute the natural ecosystem.
Farmed fish that escape can expose the native fish to a non-native species. Open-net-raised fish generally “are not very healthy when they’re kept in these enclosures,” Cole said. "They often face infestations of sea lice and other diseases.” These fish are generally labeled as “farmed” when sold, but greenwashing happens when they’re “called sustainably farmed. So if you go into most grocery stores …you will encounter farmed fish from open-water-net pen fish farms. There is no kind of open-water net pen fish farming that we have come across in our research that is ecologically sound.”
Patagonia recently had a major win on the issue in Washington state. The company supported a local group called Wild Fish Conservancy to raise awareness.
In January, a local board in Washington, in response to public pressure, voted to prevent open-net pen fishing entirely from Puget Sound. “It’s as close to a permanent solution as you can get for the state of Washington,” Cole said.
PROTECTING ALASKA
Sometimes Patagonia takes its advocacy to places that are “pretty far-flung,” including the landscapes and ecosystems of Alaska. Patagonia helps the Gwich’in people
protect the porcupine caribou herd they rely on for their food and way of life in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, “one of the most incredible ecosystems in the world.” Caribou birth their calves on the coastal plain in the refuge. Cole said the effort in ANWR has been “largely about preventing unwise oil and gas development from encroaching on that really sensitive area, and we’ve been successful. I think that someday we’d love to see permanent protection as a wilderness or
With nature allowed to run its course, ‘very quickly the ecosystem will bounce back, the fish will come back up the river, sediment will flow downstream, and nature will restore a better and more natural state to the river.’
another expanded park area.” Patagonia’s support helps the local groups “push back on oil and gas development in that region that would be incredibly damaging to that whole ecosystem,” Cole said.
Another area in Alaska targeted for oil drilling is the 22-million-acre National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska (NPR-A).
Cole said the biodiverse area offers “a nature-based climate solution, with carbon sequestration. The capability that those lands have is absolutely critical to addressing the climate crisis. … If we don’t push back on development, we’re talking about a carbon bomb that will completely undermine all of the progress that we’ve made on climate through the Biden administration and in the past, regardless of what happens going forward.”
LOS PADRES NATIONAL FOREST
“Los Padres National Forest and Pine Mountain specifically are one of our backyard community gems,” Cole said. Over 755 acres in Los Padres National Forest were approved for a project that the U.S. Forest Service described as fire-fuel reduction, but the Santa Barbara-based nonprofit Los Padres Forest Watch said the project
would open the doors to logging. The project, which allowed for removing trees up to 2 feet in diameter, would have “really significant effects on that old-growth chaparral” across the area, Cole said. Patagonia was involved in legal challenges to the project, and raising awareness in the community. Thousands of public comments were submitted. Such long-haul fights “have their ups and downs,” Cole said. “But we can’t sit by and allow our global ecosystems” to suffer.
Foothills of the Brooks Range in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska
Photo by Austin Siadak
WESTSIDE CLEAN AIR COALITION
Patagonia also supports a grassroots campaign to fend off efforts by the Southern California Gas Company to expand a natural gas-compression facility in West Ventura within the Ventura Oil Fields. Cole said that in a neighborhood across the street from a school, such a facility “is unnecessary and unwise expansion of fossil-fuel infrastructure that also, in the face of climate change, we should be thinking very, very, carefully about.”
Local residents formed the West Side Clean Air Coalition to oppose the project.
“We’ve given grants and used our whole toolkit to push back,” Cole said. “I think it’s a great example of the intersection between climate issues, fossil fuels, community health issues, and environmental justice.”
BLUE HEART OF EUROPE
Save the Blue Heart of Europe was a campaign that had been in motion for a
number of years when Patagonia Europe got involved. One river in the region, called the Vjosa when it flows through Albania, and the Aoös when it flows through Greece, “was threatened by over 30 hydropower projects” along one river, Cole said. For the Save the Blue Heart campaign, Patagonia provided help to local groups including RiverWatch, EuroNatur, and EcoAlbania.
They made a film, Blue Heart, that highlighted the rivers’ value to local
communities, including agriculture and recreation. “It’s unique across a continent as developed as Europe that you still have these wild rivers,” Cole said.
Patagonia’s efforts included building a relationship with the Albanian government, “to try to influence and bring forward the idea of protection in this river.” CEO Ryan Gellert, at that time the general manager of Patagonia Europe, “was heavily involved along with the rest of the team there in Europe.”
Out of that effort, Cole said, came the idea to create the Vjosa Wild River National Park.
Establishing a public land area is just the first step, whether in Europe or the U.S. Developing a management plan is key, Cole said. “You have to find the resources. You have to continue to articulate you know how that park is going to be supported and maintained, and how people are going to be invited in. What uses, what values are you protecting?” In the U.S. such work is generally done through a combination of public support, protection, and private resources.
BEARS EARS
Patagonia supported a local, Indigenous-led effort that brought protection to the sacred landscape of Bears Ears in Utah.
Today, Bears Ears is a National Monument protecting 1.36 million acres.
Bears Ears became a “flashpoint during the first Trump administration,” when the administration basically tried to dramatically reduce the lands protected through the original monument.”
Groups mounted a “huge campaign to push back.” Patagonia, Cole said, played
a “huge role in mobilizing with the entire outdoor industry.” The Biden administration, he said, “restored our confidence” that Bears Ears would remain a protected national monument, but he’s unsure what will happen during the second Trump administration. “The status of it right now," he said, is that it’s “a national monument, and we are committed to seeing it stay that way.”
Left: The Vjosa river in Albania
Photo courtesy of Patagonia
Below: Patagonia ambassador Caroline Gleich at the Utah State Legislature rallying to protect Bears Ears and Grand StaircaseEscalante National Monuments in 2017
Photo: Andrew Burr
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He wasn’t supposed to live, not after thousands of volts of electricity burned through his body in an industrial accident.
Vaquero Bobby Yanez not only lived, but as soon as he left the hospital two months later, he got back on a horse and competed in rodeos for the next 50 years.
In 2015, Bobby, from Oak View, was named Fiesta Honorary Vaquero during Santa Barbara’s Old Spanish Days, an honor he never imagined receiving after the accident that nearly claimed his life. Thirty-five at the time of the accident, Bobby was a cowboy, husband, and father of two boys. “I was in the hospital for two months. I didn’t think I would ever come out of the hospital after I got burned, electrocuted,” he admitted. Bobby, who turns 99 on Aug. 11, confessed, “I thought that was the end.”
He still remembers the life-threatening event when a boom on a cable hit a high line from the truck operated by a co-worker: “I was standing on the ground and it knocked the nails out of the shoes and burnt my hands. My finger was burnt so bad they cut that off. My little toe, they cut that off. I couldn’t eat for two weeks, and a girl come in and fed me because my hands were burned so bad. They would come and cut all the dry skin off my back, my hands, my fingers.
by DAVID LABELLE
“Man, it was a mess and it hurt like hell. The doctor said he don’t know how I lived.”
At the time, he and his wife, Dixie, who had two boys, Jeff and Gary, believed they would not be able to have more children. “In fact, the lawyer thought I would never have kids again because of the heat. But it wasn’t so. That’s when Craig got here. We didn’t expect him,” he said with a high-pitched laugh.
ALWAYS A FIGHTER
“When I came home from the hospital, I told Dixie, ‘Saddle me a horse.’ She said, ‘What are you going to do?’ ‘I am going to ride.’ ‘Foot cut like that?’ I told her, ‘It’s not going to hurt any more on a horse than sitting there in the house.’ I was out eight months from work, and they wanted me to stay out more and I wouldn’t do it. I wanted to go back to work. So, I went back to work as a dispatcher, weighing trucks on the scales.”
Bobby Yanez tries to stay on a bucking bronc. “This is the toughest horse I ever rode, bareback riding on him in Oregon.”
Photo supplied
Vaquero Bobby Yanez, who turns 99 in August
Photo: David LaBelle
Even though he’d lost a finger on his roping hand, as well as a little toe, Bobby was determined to compete in rodeos again. “I’d have my wife saddle a horse and I’d get on. I just kept moving, moving, moving. You’re going to die if you don’t keep moving. You’re going to die. I roped pretty good after that, not too bad,” he remembered. “I roped a lot, and my dad and I roped a lot together. You got to fight. If you don’t fight, you’re sunk. If you don’t fight back, try to live, you know. I think a lot of people give up and want to die. I just fought back. I kept fighting.”
A PIONEER BLOODLINE
Robert Lewis Yanez comes from a historic line of vaqueros — cowboys — in Ventura County. His great-grandfather, Francisco Yanez, born in Mexico, moved to Ventura several years before California became a state in 1850. A vaquero and pioneer of the city, he married Soledad Garcia-Yanez in 1858 and the couple had 21 children. Bobby’s grandfather, Jose Joseph Albert Yanez, was born in Ventura in 1869. He worked for the Hobson ranch in the late 1890s, and later, after the Smith-Hobsons purchased the Aliso Canyon Ranch, became foreman of that ranch, headquarters for the Smith-Hobson ranches, a 6,400-acre ranch in Aliso Canyon in the foothills of Ventura County from Adams Canyon in Santa Paula to Canada Larga and Upper Ojai, the oldest continually operating cattle ranch in Ventura County. When he died in 1926 after a long illness, his son, Joseph Felix Yanez, though only 18, took his father’s place as foreman for the Aliso Ranch and later for the Adams Canyon Ranch as well.
Bobby’s parents, Joseph Felix and Louisa, had six boys: Richard, Robert, Ronald, Rodney, Roland, and Ralph. Robert was soon called Bobby, and all the boys except Ralph, who died before he turned 2, grew up to be capable cowboys who could ride and rope.
“Yanez is a Spanish or Mexican name,” Bobby said. But he doesn’t speak Spanish: “My dad didn’t want us to speak Spanish. He never spoke Spanish. None of us did.”
Bobby is proud, however, that his granddaughter, Jessica, who lives in Columbia, speaks Spanish and teaches Columbian kids to speak English.
A FAMILY OF ACCOMPLISHED COWBOYS
Like his father and grandfather, Bobby grew up around horses, working the ranches, and he helped with cattle roundups and branding at age 8. He rode calves as a kid and entered his first rodeo competition in Santa Paula at age 16, winning third place in the bareback riding competition. At age 17, he entered his first bull-riding competition in Ventura and placed third.
His father, Joe, holds numerous rodeo records. He won a saddle at the Santa Barbara Fiesta seven years in a row and took home more than a dozen handcrafted silver belt buckles and trophies. Joe was grand marshal of the Ventura County Fair Parade in 1972 and Honorary
Vaquero at the Santa Barbara Fiesta in 1976.
“My dad was probably the best horseman in his time, the best horseman in the country,” Bobby noted, and taught him and his brothers how to rope.
All the boys were good ropers, and won silver belt buckles for their prowess on horseback. From the 1930s through the ’60s, Joe and the Yanez boys were constant winners, as were their cousins and other relatives. The list of extended Yanez family accomplishments reads like a who’s who of Southern California rodeo. His cousin, he said, was a world champion team roper. His own boys, Bobby said, “don’t care about riding.”
He keeps a scrapbook filled with photos of himself riding bulls, broncs, and roping at rodeos, mostly in California. He seems to recall most of the animals he rode.
“That horse there, I drew her three times,”
In his younger rodeo days, Bobby, right, with fellow cowboy Art Cook. Photo supplied
he said, pointing to a photo of a bucking bronc. “She didn’t buck too bad the first time, but this time, I was sure I could ride her. And the judge was a friend, so I figured I’d make some money. And I’ll be damned if she didn’t buck me off. I got wild on her and I shouldn’t have,” he said, laughing infectiously like a clucking chicken.
He pointed to another picture. “This is the toughest horse I ever rode, bareback riding on him in Oregon.”
Turning another page, he said: “That was at Salinas. That horse bucked me off hard! My ‘riggin’ come over his head and I was coming over his head, too, with the riggin’.” He added: “There’s a clown coming to get him off of me. A guy by the name of Slim Pickens. Ever heard of him? He was a clown then, before he got in the movies. He had a different name then.”
Above: Bobby Yanez, competing on a bull in Barstow, CA 1949, the same year he was a bull-riding champion.
Below: Bobby ropes the head of a steer while WH Scott takes the back legs at a 1957 Lancaster, CA rodeo.
Photos: R.L. Pound
SAVING FOR HIS OWN RANCH
Though Bobby never earned the big money that rodeo cowboys and cowgirls make today, between working and rodeoing, he saved enough to help him eventually buy his own 15-acre ranch on Creek Road for $48,000.
“When I got out of the Army and went working with my dad, I was only making $150 dollars a month, which is rotten,” he groaned. “You couldn’t live on it. But that’s the way he was. He was real close with the company’s money.
“I followed rodeos, especially up the 101, going up towards San Francisco, and went a couple of times up to Oregon and rode bulls. I was working for my dad, and I was lucky because if I come home 2 o’clock in the morning, it was no big deal. Many mornings I would come home and sleep in the barn a few hours.”
He recalled placing second in bareback
riding. “I probably got $180 for it. Now it would pay big money. Best I got was $433 riding one bull. Now, that same rodeo will probably pay $10,000. I made a little money. I rode every week.” He said his best year was probably 1949, when he was the bull-riding champion.
Bobby quit riding bulls and broncs after his first son was born: “I was afraid if I got hurt I wouldn’t be able to support the family.”
But he continued roping: “My dad and I roped a lot together. He was a great roper. Ninety percent, I took the head.
Usually, my dad took the back end, the heels.”
He sighed. “I loved this. I was a cowboy, but I wasn’t cowboy enough. I liked it, but I wasn’t the best, I’ll guarantee that.”
Bobby was always athletic and stayed in good shape. Though only about a few inches taller than 5 feet, he said he was tough. “I played football for Ventura High School and we never lost a game in two years. And then, just before I went into the Army, I was voted all-around track guy.”
When he was drafted into the Army at 18, he participated in a race that involved running under a pipe and climbing a ladder. Bobby said he outran everyone because he was in such good shape.
He recalled a time he broke his collarbone on a Thursday, and despite the pain, still helped rope and brand calves two days later...
“I got burned, then I got my collar bone broke, I got my leg broke, I got my arm broke,” he said. But he didn’t stop riding.
NO MORE HORSES
Bobby said he roped for the last time at age 91, at the Ventura County Fairgrounds, borrowing a horse for an “old-timer’s” event.
He also volunteered with Search and Rescue for two years.
Though he admitted horses have always been his therapy and he “misses them more than anything,” he doesn’t plan to get another one.
“Once that horse of mine died, I decided to quit,” he said. “If I had my old horse, I’d be riding right now, but I don’t want anybody else’s horse. I want the horse I broke. I always broke my own horses.”.
TIME CATCHES UP WITH ALL COWBOYS
Sitting in a folding chair by his barn with his dog, Abby, waiting for the sun to rise over Sulphur Mountain, Bobby shared: “I used to walk these hills. It was nothing for me to walk the hills for three hours with the dog. Now I walk up the hill every damn morning and go to the barn, the dog and I. It’s a short walk here, but it gets me out of the house.”
His wife, Dixie, died in April 2017 at age 83. They were married 62 years. “I come up here and you get to thinking about what you used to do,” he said. “There are a lot of memories here — walking, riding, swimming.”
His eyes moved to the dog lying close by. “That dog, I got him in Bishop when he was young; he followed me all around.” Now the two are inseparable. When he visited his wife, Dixie, in an Ojai care facility, Abby always accompanied him. At 15 years old, his aging companion is 105 in dog years, seven years older than Bobby. “That dog is getting older every day; I’m not,” he joked.
NEARLY A CENTURY OF LIVING
“The toughest thing,” Bobby said, “is living. There are things I can’t do. My hands are numb. Someone has to help me do a lot of things. The worst thing … is trying to snap my buttons. Sometimes it will take me 20, maybe 30 minutes to get my clothes on. But I am here, I am alive, so what the hell.”
Bobby’s son Gary and his family live nearby on the same property. Years ago, Bobby chose to move into the smaller house and give them the main house.
“They have to put up with me; they fix my supper and bring it up to me, and they come and clean up, wash my clothes,” he said. “I quit driving two years ago. I wish I hadn’t. The kids wanted me to quit driving. I didn’t get in any wrecks or anything. At night, I couldn’t drive. To please them, I just gave it up.”
“You might live another 10 years,” I suggested.
He laughed hard. “I hope not!”
Then he reconsidered.
“Yeah, I might. I am fine. I am happy here as long as I can get around. I’ll fight to my death not to go up where my wife went, to that nursing home. I’d rather jump off the waterfront.” He felt the nursing home took good care of his wife, but he doesn’t want to leave the ranch. “I have had a funny life and I am always happy,” he cackled. “But I have had a sad life in a lot of ways. It’s not bothering me that much; I don’t dwell on it.”
He worries a lot about the future for his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
“It’s a funny world,” he declared. “I think we’ve seen the best parts of it. Things are upsetting, and it don’t look too good right now.”
“I am a worrywart in that respect. Yeah, I worry about it all the time. I watch the television. They say, ‘Oh, forget it.’ But I don’t want to forget it; I want to know what’s going on. I can’t do nothin’ about it,” he whispered, his voice trailing off in surrender. “I hope it’s a better world after I leave here.”
He sighed. “Life goes on. Just hope for the best. I’ve had a good life. I’m not complaining. It’s a good world if you don’t weaken.”
Special thanks to Jeanette Yanez and Jessica Torres-Yanez for their help with compiling a family history.
Nearing 99, Bobby Yanez makes his morning walk to his barn with Abby, who is 105 in dog years.
Photo: David LaBelle
THe dAy I wEnt to HeavEn – To see
L A rry H AgmaN
I went to Heaven to see Larry Hagman. And not surprisingly, it was a real hoot.
Any time spent with the larger-than-life, oft-outrageous son of Broadway star Mary Martin is bound to be memorable, to put it mildly. Although “mildly” is not the appropriate adjective you use when Mr. Hagman, once dubbed “The Mad Monk of Malibu,” comes up in conversations.
And I quickly discovered why.
But before we get to Larry’s Heaven in Upper Ojai, permit me, dear reader, to take you back in time before I recount details of my get-together with the irrepressible Larry (and his wife Maj) at his mountaintop aerie. To an era even before Mr. Hagman evolved into TV’s iconic scheming Texas billionaire who rampaged on our home screens from 1978-1991 as John Ross Ewing (affectionately known as J.R.) in the popular series Dallas.
Close Encounter: Part One
It was the summer of 1969 and Larry was already the star of the comedy series I Dream of Jeannie (1965-1970) opposite Barbara Eden. He played an astronaut stranded on a desert island who finds a bottle, opens it, and up pops a blond genie who says, “Your wish is my command.” Viewers loved it.
Over that long summer of ’69, I and my wife, Sally, found ourselves living with a friend in the exclusive guarded enclave known as the Malibu Colony.
How could I, a hardworking, underpaid foreign correspondent for Britain’s London Daily Express (4 million readers a day) get to live in the legendary “Colony?” Here’s how. My journalist pal Bruce
Russell (Reuters’ bureau chief in Los Angeles) was a friend of the British singer/actor/director Michael Sarne, who had been hired at a ridiculously high salary by Fox movie mogul Daryl F. Zanuck to direct the 1969 movie Myra Breckinridge, based on Gore Vidal’s bestselling book. Fox gave Sarne a beach house in the Colony, but Sarne made a quick getaway back to London once the movie was finished, and kindly offered Bruce the use of his pad until the lease ran out.
Heady stuff. Two doors down the sand lived The Mamas & the Papas (all in full throttle at the time), Jane Fonda, and her then-beau, the French film director Roger Vadim, who had a habit of cohabitating with his leading ladies like Brigitte Bardot. (Apologies for that diversion. I couldn’t resist name-dropping.)
We enjoyed bumping into Cass Elliot or John and Michelle Phillips on the sand. On July Fourth, we spotted a bunch of children marching down the beach. They were part of a raggle-taggle parade led by a scruffy-looking, bare-chested fellow in tatty shorts who was blowing a tin whistle and waving what looked like a Vietnamese flag.
This latter-day Pied Piper of Malibu turned out to be Larry himself, who was one of the high-profile celebrities actively protesting the unpopular Vietnam War. And damn the consequences.
Close Encounter: Part Two
By the ’70s Larry had become a big star. In full J.R. mode, he was king of the TV
hill. And my editors in London wanted me to talk to him about Dallas, which apparently was a favorite of Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, when she retired to her Buckingham Palace quarters to watch “telly.”
Not everyone, it seems, was as impressed by Dallas as Her Royal Highness: The Los Angeles Times’ Pulitzer Prize-winning TV critic Howard Rosenberg noted that Larry’s “performance … is a salute to slime.”
But you know what they say: “You can’t please all of the people — all of the time.”
So, I hied back to the Colony and showed up at his whiter-than-white, two-anda-half story beachfront house that he described as “adobe, Santa Fe-style.” To me it looked like an impressive reject from a French Foreign Legion movie set: towering over the sand, all dazzling white with lots of stained-glass windows stretched deep, and seemingly impossibly squeezed into the narrow beachfront lot. On the deck of the house, a fluttering white and red flag read, “Celebratio Vitae” (Celebration of Life ). It was, I discovered, truly Larry’s motto for living. Moments after he welcomed me, Larry said with a straight face: “Let’s do the interview in my hot tub — so, take your clothes off and get in.”
by IVOR DAVIS
Photo: Paul Harris
I thought it was a joke and complained that my notebook might get soggy. But he was serious: He presented me with an oversize J.R. insignia white bathrobe and baggy shorts! Then I climbed into the tub with him — and our interview began. An open bottle of good French Champagne and two glasses sat on the Jacuzzi edge.
Why, I asked, was it necessary to get me to disrobe and jump into hot water before answering any questions?
Larry carefully explained that he always held business meetings in the tub. That way, he said seriously, any agent who regularly came to his house from Hollywood would not be able to conceal a dagger and stab him in the heart.
“If Julius Caesar had held meetings in the bath,” he explained, “then Brutus and his gang of friendly senators would never have stabbed him to death! So, when you come to my house, you need to take off your robe, your medals, and your rank. Everyone is down to basics. My motive is always, ‘Okay, let’s see how trustworthy people are to each other — especially those who work for and with me.’
“Naked puts you in different dimensions. When you see someone naked and see how they react you can tell a lot about them.”
Ah, I thought. How silly of me. Perfect logic, of course!
Thus we began our interview, which did, tangentially, touch upon death.
Larry said he was upset because, although Dallas was the hot ticket show (400 million viewers worldwide), its popularity came with negatives. He was constantly targeted by the tabloid National Enquirer, which hounded him day and night. And he was not a happy Malibu camper.
“Late the other night a fucking helicopter hovered over our house, shining a bright searchlight into our bedroom window,” Larry said. “It was the Enquirer with a long lens camera.
“If I had a gun under the bed I would have shot them down — and killed those bastards.”
But when his wife, decorator artist Maj Axelsson, intervened, good sense prevailed and no blood was spilled.
Close Encounter: Part Three
It was party time, and Larry, as the producer of Dallas, decided to host the TV critics of America (of which I was a member) to meet J.R. on his home turf. So he tossed a party, and we all wandered around his beachfront house, admiring his awards and family
photos until the master of the house formally welcomed us all to his Colony abode.
All went well until an eagle-eyed TV journalist from the Toronto Globe and Mail burst into the room and interrupted Larry the raconteur in mid-sentence.
“I just looked at the staircase,” said the brave Canadian, “and … er … well, there’s an avalanche of shit moving down the stairs from the upstairs toilet.”
There was shocked silence as we all contemplated evacuation, or the risk of death by feces in tony Malibu. Larry calmly put his drink down and never missed a beat.
He grabbed the phone and quickly dialed.
“Gene,” he said urgently, “my septic tank is overflowing again — and we’re about to drown in shit. We’re in the middle of a party … so get over here. Now.”
Three minutes later a huge truck that belonged to Gene’s Pumping Service pulled up, and
Close Encounter: Part 4
Each time I saw Larry over 40 years, he always came up with a few familiar lines. He had told me in previous interviews when confronted by my English accent that he always loved England, and spent much time working there. He looked like a mischievous schoolboy when he said he dated British actress Joan Collins and her sister, author Jackie Collins, after he joined the Air Force, and entertained the troops in London in the ’50s. (Nudge nudge, wink wink: Know what I mean.)
“They were so beautiful,” he smiled, tossing out a line he had used frequently with British journalists. “Those Collins girls … sooo beautiful … they made Elizabeth Taylor look like a boy.”
And now, welcome to Upper Ojai: Long after the Vietnam War ended, while his political stance was somewhat leavened, Larry continued his life according to Larry. Hardworking matched his hard-living lifestyle, which included lots of booze, hangovers, and too many cigarettes.
He often rode his Harley-Davidson to the grocery store, and survived several bike accidents. Still, he continued his July Fourth parade tradition — once decked out in a chicken suit.
But in 1991 Larry finally abandoned the fabled Colony and sold his house to Sting and his wife, Trudie Styler.
He bought 42 acres high atop Sulphur Mountain some 60 miles from the oceanfront in Malibu. While Maj oversaw construction of their new home, which took just over four years, Larry moved into a penthouse in Santa Monica.
In 1991 they finally made the big move. And they called their new haven Heaven. It had 23,000 feet of livable space, nine bedrooms and bathrooms, three pools — two inside, one outside — plus a few little extras like a gym and a skeet shooting range. Environmentalist Larry made sure
all his power was solar energy.
In 2010 I went along to interview him again with my friend, David Comden, the publisher of Ventana monthly magazine. There had been talk of Larry reprising his J.R. role in a new Dallas series. He was also famous for allowing local charities to use his home.
The Hagmans first came to Ojai several decades ago when they took their two children there to camp. Larry said the town reminded him of New Canaan, Connecticut, where he grew up.
At 79, he was very much still the king of his castle. We winded our way up a series of hairpin bends into Big Sky Ojai country, past massive solar panels, to “the house that Maj built” on 40-plus acres, or as Larry put it, “the house that Dallas built.”
At the front door, classical music played over the intercom as we drank in the magnificent 360-degree view.
“Surely Malibu was great, so why did you leave?” I asked straight off.
From left: With Barbara Eden on the set of I Dream of Jeannie. Photo: Wikimedia CC
Broadway star Mary Martin, Larry’s mother. Photo: Wikimedia CC
The opening titles of Dallas, a fixture on TV screens around the world from 1978 to 1991. Photo: Lorimar Productions
Left: 1980 and around the world, everyone wants to know — who shot J.R.?
“We lived there for 26 years,” Larry said. “Then our old friends started dying off, and it wasn’t the same crowd anymore. Times were changing. People were tearing down $10 million houses and building new ones for $20 million. It was bizarre. I was at our friend Mary Crosby’s house. It was perfect. So, I told Maj: ‘Find us a place like this.’”
Then Larry proudly showed us around. Despite his history of life-threatening ailments, on that sunny day he looked remarkably fit in a crisp, navy shortsleeved shirt worn over white slacks, with blue clogs and no socks. Definitely boss of this particular plantation, he wore a large-brimmed straw hat that seemed to perfectly fit the role of majordomo of all he surveyed. Maj looked cool in a white blouse, blue jeans, matching clogs, and a white floppy hat, but she was strangely quiet. I later learned she was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s.
The Hagman home, with its own helipad, was crammed with an eclectic collection of antique treasures and art the couple had accumulated over a lifetime, from family photos (of two children, Kristina and Preston, and five granddaughters), to an incredible assortment of furnishings and precious mementos of their life together. Photos of the legendary Dallas days were everywhere: Larry with his Dallas co-stars, Patrick Duffy, Howard
Keel, Linda Gray, Charlene Tilton, Barbara Bel Geddes, and Victoria Principal. Taking center stage in the living room was a dazzling silver embossed saddle next to a 6-foot tall rack laden with Stetsons. Artwork included oil paintings of Larry’s famous mother, and paintings and sculpture by such Larry pals as Henry Fonda, Anthony Hopkins, and Janet Gaynor.
In the bathroom was a framed collage that at first glance contained what looked like 50 $10,000 dollar bills. On closer scrutiny, the actual bills contained an illustration of Larry in his Stetson as J.R. Ewing and the inscription “In Hagman We Trust.” Each one contained the Hagman autograph in green marker pen.
“I give them away instead of bothering with autographs,” Larry said, “although some people say, ‘I don’t want your fucking money.’”
His living room had a 28-foot ceiling and retractable roof. The pools, indoor and out, and spa were all connected by a babbling, moat-like, human-made creek. The water attracted the birds Larry loved to watch.
Together the pools and creek held about 200,000 gallons, all of it available to battle occasional wildfires. In exchange for permission to put in a helipad, Larry installed a gravity-flow system that allowed tanker helicopters to quickly land, take
on loads of his water, and leave. The system worked well in 1996, Larry said, when 30-foot flames ringed his property and threatened neighboring homes. He didn’t own a helicopter, but the one he usually hired could whisk him from Heaven to the American Airlines terminal at Los Angeles International Airport in 22 minutes.
His aerie included living quarters for the staff, a family of four: two men who did gardening and maintenance, and two housekeepers.
Outside, an open-air “sleep tower” was suspended from cables 36 feet high, where guests could gaze at the stars and meteor showers in a sky unobstructed by city light.
The Hagmans swapped the Pacific Ocean for the coyotes, mountain lions, bears, rattlesnakes, and wild deer of Ojai, along with a couple of animals of the more
Right: Riding his Harley-Davidson. Photo: Paul Harris
As Gov. Fred Picker in the 1998 movie Primary Colors Photo: Clinica Estetico/ Kanzaman Productions
This was Larry’s Pickfair, only much bigger, better, and roomier with those million-dollar views.
We sat outside under a cooling fan, admiring the sensational vistas below as we nibbled on healthy walnut and apple salad and a freshly warmed baguette. Larry offered wine, but I declined in favor of mineral water as he talked about his passions. Not so about much his life in the movies or “Who Shot J.R.?” — arguably the most cliff-hanging episode in TV history — but about life and death, recycling, and turning a home green.
He waxed passionately about America’s horrendous dependence on oil, and why more people should donate their organs. Organ donations were near and dear to his heart.
His legendary drinking became public in 1995 when he received a liver transplant without lingering on a donor waiting list.
Larry and the late baseball hero Mickey Mantle, who also got a transplant about the same time, were widely criticized for using their wealth to catapult them to the front of the donor line. But delay would have killed him, Larry said.
“They gave me two months to live before they opened me up, then they gave me two weeks to live. It was a close call. So now everything is kind of payback for me … every day of life is precious. Not many guys can have arrived in Heaven … and still be alive and kicking.”
Larry said he drove weekly a few miles to downtown Ojai to the Monday Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, but no longer on his faithful Harley-Davidson.
“I try not to miss them,” he said. “Three guys in our club died in accidents. And I busted a few ribs myself — it was time to quit.”
I couldn’t resist asking him why for years he got into the odd habit of not speaking to anyone for 24 hours. Usually on Sundays.
“I was shooting Jeannie and I would party like crazy at weekends,” he said. “Or I’d go to a rodeo, and with all the dust and horse shit blowing around I kept getting sore throats. So my doctor told me to rest my voice at the weekends. I practiced ‘Silent Sundays’ for 20 years and it worked because people knew not to call me.”
After he moved to Ojai, his movie roles were few and far between, curtailed by declining health.
“But I’m not dead yet,” he wryly noted. His last big-screen movie was the 1998 political thriller Primary Colors. Larry portrayed a Republican ex-governor who gets sucked into the presidential race, competing against a Bill Clinton-like candidate played by John Travolta.
His performance garnered raves, “the best reviews I ever got in my life, and then I never got another job,” he laughed.
In 2011 Larry got another job offer: Turner Network Television wanted to resurrect Dallas, with Larry reprising his beloved character.
Larry shot several episodes and even went to London to promote the show. By then he was pretty sanguine about his illnesses and his life.
“As J.R. I could get away with anything — bribery, blackmail, and adultery — but I got caught by cancer,” he said.
In November 2012, after finishing an episode of Dallas in Texas, he died. He was 81.
In June 2014, Heaven sold for $5 million in cash to the Church of Scientology. And barely two years later, in May 2016, his widow, Maj, died.
I vividly remember one of Larry’s great parting lines as we hugged and made our exit from Heaven. “Ah, J.R.,” he grinned, “he was so wicked — but so much fun. I would have loved to hang out with him.”
Editor’s Note: The Larry Hagman story is an extract from Ivor Davis’ 2025 memoir, My Adventures in Hollywood — and Other Strange Planets, to be published in the fall of 2025.
Ivor Davis is author of: The Devil in My Friend: The Inside Story of a Malibu Murder, The Beatles and Me on Tour: 60th Anniversary Edition, Manson Exposed: A Reporter’s 50-Year Journey into Madness and Murder. IvorDavisBooks.com
With his beloved Maj. Photo: Paul Harris
by MIMI WALKER
OPC 2.0
“Theater is essential to the health of society — it’s like our collective therapy. And, like therapy, this work can’t happen in a vacuum,” said playwright Liza Powel O’Brien, an advisory board member of the Ojai Playwrights Conference, now in its 28th season. “It is a communal art requiring a world of collaborators, and OPC is an ever-evolving galaxy of artists, audience members, and patrons whose work resonates throughout the current canon. OPC doesn’t just develop plays, it builds careers. In fact, every branch of my playwriting career can be traced back to Ojai Playwrights Conference — it’s my ‘Giving Tree.’”
Under the leadership of producing artistic director Jeremy B. Cohen, OPC took steps in 2024 to sow those giving-tree seeds for the community at large. OPC shrank the cost barrier of the conference and its expanded workshops, and widened the submission portal for aspiring playwrights. Cohen dubbed this journey “OPC 2.0.”
“We’ve opened up the selection process, so now anyone can apply. It was an invitation-only process; it’s now a completely open selection process,” said Cohen. “For audiences, we’ve made tickets pay-whatyou-can so that anybody can attend.” At last year’s New Works Festival, Cohen said, approximately 450 individuals opted to pay by donation to watch writers’ works come to life. “And now this second year — this is really where the rubber meets the road, because the first year is sort of a trial, and this year is when we’re going to really put things into deep practice.”
Cohen elaborated: “OPC has always been this two-week, Brigadoon-like pop-up in the summer. With the closure of so many other new play development opportunities around the country, it just felt like we could take a moment and say, ‘Actually, is there a role for us to step forward and grow a bit into more of a
year-round organization?’ … ‘What is the opportunity for us to do more learning and lateral mentorship with professional artists? How do we expose them to that level of craft at an earlier age, giving them the tools to tell their own stories in their own way?’”
One avenue OPC has carved in that endeavor is Taco Tuesdays, a monthly youth-playwriting evening workshop for teenagers to hone their craft. Those Taco Tuesdays, also under pay-what-you-can pricing, are directed by Kim Maxwell,
one of OPC’s cofounders, at her eponymous studio in downtown Ojai.
Ojai Playwrights Conference’s new chapter of equitable access
“Expanding the OPC Youth Workshop to a year-round program is something I have carried deep in my heart all these years — all 28 of them,” Maxwell said. “Growing slowly and wisely, OPC as an organization is finally at a stage where we have the capacity to make this dream come true, and I am upside down with glee and gratitude.” Taco Tuesday Write Night “means more students from more schools throughout the four corners of Ventura County will have the opportunity to be immersed in a development process alongside the finest professional theater artists this country has to offer. More students get to gather, write their guts out, share their work in a room full of mad-passionate, like-minded teenagers, get constructive feedback, and launch themselves and their beautiful words into ‘the big what next’ of their fabulous lives with confidence, community, and joy. In a time when we need art and connection more than ever, it doesn’t get any better than that.”
Left: Fiona Rose Dyer reads CALF SCRAMBLE, written by Libby Carr
Photo: Rob Hoffman Photography
Top: Mfoniso Udofia watching CALF SCRAMBLE
Above: Library reading of CALF SCRAMBLE
Below: Playwright Alex Lin, Writers-in-Residence
Dramaturg Sonia Desai, OPC Intern Lucy Brown
Photos: Brandi Crockett
“What we continue to center (on) is being a hub for developing huge, beautiful, epic, new work that we want to then help find a home ... at producing theaters,” said Cohen. He credited The Thacher School, home to many of the shows at the conference and festival, and managing director Tahnee Freda for supporting the equitable-access vision and execution, as well as Ojai Playhouse owner David Berger. The Playhouse hosted a May 17 OPC benefit concert with Jonatha Brooke and The Indigo Girls’ Emily Saliers, offering 50 free tickets to the pre-concert screening of the Indigo Girls film It’s Only Life After All.
“Community isn’t just a noun,” Cohen said. “It isn’t a thing that you assume. You have to build it, you have to earn trust, you have to activate it. And I think that’s something David and I are both thinking a lot about right now.”
Cohen recalled one aspiring writer who benefited from equitable access. “She was … in the youth workshop in my first summer in ’23 and her father’s a truck driver, and you know, it was not in his practice to go to theater. … But he went that night to support his kid … and to see them come back last summer when his kid was not in youth workshop anymore, because they felt like it was their space to come to — to me, that’s everything. That means the stories we’re choosing matter, the people that we’re welcoming in matter.”
“Ojai Playwrights Conference embodies all that is good in the American Theater,” said playwright Roger Q. Mason, who participated in OPC’s fall 2024 residency. “Jeremy and his team are dedicated unequivocally to artists as people first, then dreamers, then content producers. Such empathetic mentorship feeds our spirits, inspires our imaginations, and builds the stamina necessary to wade through the ebbs and flows of this fickle business of show.”
Actor Patrick J. Adams, a member of OPC’s board of directors, said: “It’s not hyperbole to say that I owe not only my career but also my love and ever-deepening respect for craft and storytelling to OPC. The people I met there and the work that I’ve witnessed in those rooms has made me a better artist and human being. Nothing truly great happens in this world without community, and OPC
Top: Alejandra Jaime in CALF SCRAMBLE tech
reading Photo: Rob Hoffman Photography
Above: OPC Producing Artistic Director Jeremy B. Cohen Photo: Lauren B. Photography
Left: Playwright Alex Lin in tech
Photo: Rob Hoffman Photography
is one of the most profound and beautiful communities I’ve ever had the honor of being a part of.”
Actor Zachary Quinto has been involved with OPC since 2003, first as a participating actor, then as a member of the board of directors and, currently, the advisory board. “There is a kind of magic in the alchemy of the conference — the confluence of artist and process, the spirit of collaboration, the emphasis on relevant social and political themes, the arts education of aspiring young artists and, under the new leadership of Jeremy Cohen, a particular focus on Ojai community outreach and involvement,” Quinto said. “The caliber of work that has come out of Ojai Playwrights Conference in the years since I started coming to this incredible valley has reverberated throughout the American theater with resounding impact. Such valuable and urgent work has both delighted and challenged audiences throughout the country, and at a time when the very existence of the arts is being threatened at every turn, a place as vital and forward-thinking as OPC has never been more significant. I am so honored to be affiliated with the conference, and am so hopeful that it will continue to thrive in such a necessary time.”
“There used to be a whole cohort of these types of programs, but we’ve lost a lot of them and now it’s down to a small handful,” Powel O’Brien said, “which only makes OPC more precious and necessary than ever.”
Cohen concluded: “We are coming together in person, in a space … for a moment in time, and really exchanging emotion and intellect and ideas around the questions of our world right now. … You can buy a festival pass, or you can pay what you can. You can do whatever feels right to you. We just want you there with us.”
ojaiplays.org
28th Annual Ojai Playwrights Conference
OPC Summer Workshop and Performance: July 21-30
OPC New Works Festival: July 31 to Aug. 3
artistic
Bottom: Les Mau in tech
Right: Stephen Adly Guirgis reads The Ceremony
Photo: Rob Hoffman Photography
Below: Playwrights, directors and
staff listen to a brand-new draft of a play in summer 2024. (Left to right) Nicole Watson, Christina Pumariega, Iris McCloughan and Ryan Beaghler
Photo: Brandi Crockett
Photo: Rob Hoffman Photography
The Ojai Trolley Service Continues to Run Serving the Needs of the Ojai Valley ADA, Medicare Card Holders, and Seniors 65-74 are 1/2 price. Seniors 75 and over, children under 45” tall and all students are FREE riders on the Trolley
e Ojai Trolley Service, established in 1989, is owned and operated by the City of Ojai. e Trolley provides daily xed-route transportation to approximately 9,000 riders per month throughout Ojai, Meiners Oaks and Mira Monte.
e Trolley is a well-known feature in the Ojai Valley, and in addition to the daily xed-route services, participates in many local community events, fund raising activities, community service, and educational functions. 408 South Signal Street, Ojai, CA 93023 Phone (805) 272 3883 • E-mail: transit@ojai.ca.gov • www.ojaitrolley.com
1
“Mira Monte” means “mountain view” in Spanish, the mountains being the Santa Ynez range.
2
Mira Monte covers approximately 4.5 square miles, the same as the city of Ojai, with a population nearly as large (6,618).
3
The Mira Monte area was populated by the Chumash Indians when the Spanish arrived in the 1770s, but 5,000 years earlier an even more ancient tribe of Native Americans called the Milling Stone Horizon inhabited the area.
4
Through most of the 1800s, traffic in the Mira Monte area into the tiny town of Nordhoff (now Ojai) followed scenic Creek Road, which had 17 creek crossings, making it an arduous journey, indeed. The only place to stop and rest along the way was Camp Comfort (see Fact #26).
F un-Damenta L
F acts ABouT
M i R a MonT e
Many people know Mira Monte only as the small commercial strip along Highway 33 between Oak View and Ojai. Although no road signs announce the community to locals and travelers, the area has an incredible history dating back centuries.
Former Ojai schoolteacher, historian, author, and Mira Monte resident Craig Walker helped Ojai Magazine take a deeper dive into Mira Monte history.
Right: The Ventura and Ojai Valley Railroad. Photo courtesy of Ojai Valley Museum
5
The Grade Road, built in 1884, was more direct than Creek Road and followed nearly the same route as today’s Highway 33. Today, the road is called Old Grade Road.
after raiding the business and destroying the large collection of wine stored there. The charges were later dropped.
10
During the turn of the century, an enormous woodcutting operation opened where Starbucks is today. The oak wood was cut, stacked, and loaded on the train for shipment to the coast.
11
The Ventura and Ojai Valley Railroad was completed in 1898 and ran next to the Grade Road through Mira Monte. In the 1920s, the distant sound of the train’s whistle could be heard four times a day. The railroad ran until 1969, when the tracks were washed out in a major storm. The right-of-way was acquired by the county in 1980 and became the Ojai Valley Trail.
6
12
Prior to development, there was a large, waist-deep vernal pool in the center of Mira Monte called Mirror Lake. In the 1800s, a real estate developer staked out a 140-acre town site there with lakefront properties, but it never came to be.
7
In 1916, the youth of the Ojai Valley had another Mirror Lake vision, the Mirror Lake Dancing Club. The plan was to hold moonlight dances on a floating barge in the middle of the lake. Whether this floating pavilion ever became a reality is anyone’s guess.
8
Mira Monte’s first business was Dalton’s, a three-acre property that included a market, service station, and campground. It was a popular spot for families to grab a hot dog and play along the banks of Mirror Lake.
9
The owner of Dalton’s was John Dalto, who changed his name to Dalton because of his Italian-Catholic ancestry, which many looked down on at the time. During Prohibition, federal agents arrested him
The train stopped just north of Mirror Lake at Tico Station, named for Fernando Tico, who once owned nearly 18,000 acres of the Upper and Lower Ojai valleys. Tico Road is named for him. Tico was the last person buried in the cemetery at the Ventura Mission.
13
Sometimes, the train would pick up an occasional passenger at a random stop. A few engineers were known to stall the engine at Mirror Lake so they could hunt ducks.
14
Developers drained Mirror Lake in the early 1980s to build houses. The lake had been pumped dry before by rancher Ezra Blackmer, who planted a large walnut orchard nearby and used water from the lake to irrigate his trees. Some of his trees still exist today in the backyards of homes on Woodland, Lake, and Forest avenues.
15
Maricopa Highway (Highway 33) was completed in 1933 as part of a state project to connect Carpinteria with California’s Central Valley. The highway transformed Mira Monte into a traffic hub.
Above: Kentucky Fried Chicken in Mira Monte, circa 1966.
Photo courtesy of Ventura County Planning Division
Below: Don Henderson, who established Henderson Field in Mira Monte.
Photo courtesy of Ojai Valley Museum
16
World War II came to Mira Monte in the early 1940s when the Army Air Corps paid local pilot Don Henderson to run a flight-training school at his private airstrip just north of Mirror Lake. The airstrip went public in January 1945, and Henderson was killed six months later when he crashed his plane in a nearby walnut grove.
17
After the war, several new housing tracts sprang up around Mira Monte, including one along what is now Rice Road, where a 700-car drive-in movie theater was proposed but ultimately defeated by neighbors.
18
Mira Monte’s first shopping center, now the Red Horse Plaza, was built in 1960 and included a grocery store, beauty salon, real estate office, and toy store.
19
Fast food came to Mira Monte in 1966 when a Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet opened. It was followed in the 1980s when the city of Ojai passed strict design review laws that discouraged chain stores. The commercial strip eventually included McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Starbucks (where KFC once stood), and Wendy’s, which closed in 2019 and was replaced five years later by a Habit Burger & Grill.
20
Another Mira Monte business was Mashburn Realty, opened by Clyde Mashburn on the northeast corner of Baldwin Road. The building was later expanded to include a bar.
21
Gus Glazer opened Valley Equipment in 1970, renting construction and landscaping equipment. Three years later, the property became the home of Ojai’s first completely self-service gas station, Freddie Fast Gas. The building, now abandoned, is located just north of Encino Drive.
22
Dundale, a well-known 225-acre ranch in Mira Monte, was the home of Oxnard businessman William L. Dunn, who grew apricots and other crops, though he mainly manufactured oilfield tools. The old ranch house still exists today in a walled compound along Highway 33, just south of Valley Meadow Drive.
23
Another popular ranch in Mira Monte, the 180-acre Derby Ranch, was first owned by Nordhoff constable Andy Van Curen, who sold it to Ventura dentist Dr. A.J. Derby in 1921. The Derbys grew apples on the ranch and invited local families and community groups for picnics and apple-picking parties. Fifty acres of the property would eventually become the County Honor Farm.
24
In 1930, the County of Ventura purchased the Derby property for a county “preventorium,” a facility for people with early symptoms of tuberculosis. The onset of the Great Depression put a stop to the plans. Later, the farm was leased by a nonprofit that hired the unemployed. During World War II, the Army approached the county about building a hospital there, but it never happened. The property became a minimum-security prison in 1955 before closing in 2003. Today, it’s the home of several local nonprofits.
25
The county dump was located across Baldwin Road from the Honor Farm. Neighbors on Rice Road had to deal with the smell, especially when “sundowner” breezes were blowing. In 1954, one county supervisor pushed for replacing the dump with a landfill at Mirror Lake. The dump closed in 1962, but was reopened later as Ojai Valley Organics. The greenwaste mulching operation closed in 2019 but returned in 2025 under new owners.
26
Camp Comfort became the first county park in 1904. It gets its name from Sarah McFarland, the daughter of the Rev. Townshend Taylor, who made the trek to Nordhoff to hold services one or two Sundays a month. To rest and prepare for church, they established a camp along Creek Road, which Sarah named “Camp Comfort.” The park was funded by Ventura philanthropist E.P. Foster, who also funded Dennison Park in Upper Ojai and Foster Park near Casitas Springs.
27
A bridge near Camp Comfort was reputed to be the home of Ojai’s most notorious ghost. “Char-man” started appearing in Ojai lore after he was badly burned in a fire. After dark, he would take revenge by tormenting Ojai teenagers parked near the camp.
28
A few of the teens may have attended Mira Monte’s first school, Villanova Preparatory, a Catholic boys’ school designed by A.C. Martin, who also designed what is now Ventura City Hall. Other Mira Monte schools are Mira Monte Elementary and Valley Oak Charter.
Right: Dalton’s Service Station, established in Mira Monte in 1927.
Photo courtesy of Ojai Valley Museum
29
The Krotona Institute of Theosophy owns half of the scenic open space along Highway 33, between Mira Monte and Ojai, and just south of Krotona Hill. The other half is owned by the Krishnamurti Foundation of America. Both organizations are associated with world-famous philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurti. The land includes a hiking trail that goes from Meiners Oaks to Mira Monte.
30
The Grange, an organization of local farmers, built the Grange Hall on Cruzero Street in 1950. The hall, a war surplus Quonset hut, became a popular meeting hall, classroom, and eventual home of the Ojai Valley Family Shelter.
31
In 1912, St. Thomas Aquinas Cemetery was established by the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, near Villanova Preparatory School. One noted valley resident buried there is Jose Jesus Chino Lopez, who lived in Matilija Canyon and died tragically in a 1918 wagon accident. His funeral was held at the Isis Theater, now the Ojai Playhouse.
32
Country singer Johnny Cash moved to Casitas Springs in 1959 and, seeking a place for his parents to live and manage, built the Johnny Cash Trailer Rancho, now the Country Village Mobile Home Park in Mira Monte.
33
The Man in Black once owned another Mira Monte parcel he sold to Greg Wright, who opened a Christmas tree farm. Greg’s father, Frank, also owned a Christmas tree farm at the north end of Oak View. For years, both businesses sold trees grown right on the farm that Ojai families could pick and cut.
Below: The Ojai Grange Hall
Photo courtesy of Ojai Valley Museum
Mirror Lake
Photo courtesy of Ojai Valley Museum
JAcK iE LoMax THE BALLAD OF
In the nineties, denizens of Ojai might have beheld a sinewy figure, adorned in cowboy attire and crowned with a wide-brimmed Stetson, ambling along East Ojai Avenue with a battered guitar case. This was none other than Jackie Lomax, erstwhile collaborator with rock titans Harrison, McCartney, and Clapton.
Imagine, if you will, the Liverpool of the early sixties. Not the staid port city of Liverpool from your grandma’s sepia-toned postcards, but the Liverpool of The Cavern, a crucible of raw, youthful energy where the air crackled with the electricity of the coming revolution. This was the domain of The Beatles, those mop-topped geniuses who were about to dominate the airwaves. But lurking in the shadows, honing their own brand of sonic fury, were a thousand other bands, each dreaming of escaping the gray monotony of post-war Britain. Among them were The Undertakers, fronted by a rawboned, ambitious young guitarist and singer named Jackie Lomax.
Lomax, a creature of The Cavern, embodied the spirit of the times: rebellious, restless, and utterly consumed by the primal urge to create. He and his bandmates, a motley crew of misfits and mavericks, poured their souls into their music, channeling the raw energy of the city into a potent brew of blues, R&B, and rock ’n’ roll. They were a force of nature, a whirlwind of noise and fury, captivating audiences with their sheer, unadulterated energy.
by PAUL STANTON
The road to fame, however, was treacherous. Hamburg, that legendary breeding ground for rock ’n’ roll rebels, beckoned. The Undertakers, like a thousand other bands before them, made the pilgrimage to Germany, hoping to conquer the Reeperbahn, the notorious strip of bars and brothels where legends were born and dreams shattered.
First signed to Apple Records in 1968, Jackie's collaboration with George Harrison culminated in the release of "Sour Milk Sea" that August.
Photo: Wikimedia CC
Publicity still from 1963.
Photo: Astrid Kirchherr
They signed a deal with Pye Records, a minor label, and released a few singles, but the elusive breakthrough remained tantalizingly out of reach.
Disillusioned, they crossed the Atlantic, seeking their fortune in the promised land of America. The scene there was a different beast altogether: bigger, bolder, more competitive. The Undertakers, adrift in a sea of talent, struggled to make their mark.
The dream, once so vibrant, began to fade, replaced by a gnawing sense of doubt and despair. Then, fate intervened. Brian Epstein, the enigmatic impresario who had guided The Beatles to stardom, took an interest in Lomax and his band. He rebranded them The Lomax Alliance, a name that hinted at a Lomax, surrounded by musical giants — Harrison, Eric Clapton, Nicky Hopkins — recorded an album that was hailed by critics but largely ignored by the public. Is This What You Want? a collection of psychedelic pop gems, was a masterpiece, a testament to Lomax’s talent and Harrison’s visionary production. But the public, it seemed, was not ready for such sonic experimentation.
more sophisticated, theatrical approach.
He secured them a deal with CBS, a major label, and orchestrated a series of high-profile appearances. For a brief, shining moment, it seemed as if Lomax was finally on the verge of breaking through. But tragedy struck when Epstein died of a sleeping pill overdose at age 32.
With the architect of their success gone, The Lomax Alliance was adrift in a sea of uncertainty. Enter Apple Records, The Beatles’ own label, a haven for the avant-garde and experimental. George Harrison, the Beatle himself, took Lomax under his wing, producing his recordings and guiding his artistic vision.
The Apple years were a period of creative exploration but commercial frustration.
The commercial failure of Is This What You Want? was a bitter blow. Lomax, adrift in the swirling currents of the late sixties, felt the pressure to conform and deliver a hit. The music business, once a thrilling adventure, now felt like a suffocating cage. He sought solace in the arms of Heavy Jelly, a band born from a whimsical hoax, a name that seemed to perfectly capture the absurdity of the music industry. But even Heavy Jelly, despite its promising beginnings, proved to be a fleeting affair, plagued by internal strife and contractual disputes. Lomax, a seasoned veteran of the music wars, found himself back in America, chasing that elusive American Dream. He signed with Warner Bros., a major label, but the magic was gone.
The albums Home Is in My Head and Three were met with indifference, their innovative sound lost in the cacophony of the burgeoning rock scene. Disillusioned and disheartened, Lomax returned to England, seeking solace in the familiar embrace of his homeland. He joined Badger, a progressive rock band, and attempted to inject his own brand of soul into their sound. But it was a futile effort, a desperate
The Cavern Club was a pivotal venue for many bands during the early '60s, helping to launch The Undertakers and many others.
"Everybody Loves A Lover," The Undertakers' first single released in 1963
attempt to recapture the magic of the past. The seventies were a period of drift and disillusionment. Lomax, a survivor of the sixties, struggled to find his place in the shifting sands of the music landscape. He played with a diverse crew of musicians, from the legendary Tea Bags to the iconic Drifters, searching for a sense of purpose, a connection to the music that had once ignited his soul.
The eighties were a period of quiet desperation. Lomax, a fading star, retreated from the limelight, content to play small clubs and record demos for unknown art-
“I was doing this album with Brian Epstein when he died. That sort of left me in limbo until George Harrison said, ‘Do you want to make an album?’ What could I say?…’
ists. The music industry, once a vibrant playground, had become a cynical, corporate entity, a far cry from the idealistic world he once knew.
But even in the twilight of his career, Lomax never lost his passion for music. He continued to write songs, to perform, to keep the flame alive. In 2004 he recorded a late-career album, The Ballad of Liverpool Slim, a poignant reflection on a life lived in the fast lane, a testament to the enduring power of his artistry.
In the end, Jackie Lomax, the boy from Liverpool who had dared to dream, faded away, another casualty of the rock ’n’ roll wars. But his music, like a ghost in the machine, continued to resonate, a reminder of a time when music was a force of nature, a raw, untamed expression of the human spirit.
Yet, the ballad doesn’t end there. Lomax’s story, though tinged with melancholy, remains a testament to resilience, a narrative of unwavering dedication to craft. His influence rippled through the music world
like echoes in a cavern. Aspiring musicians found inspiration in his trajectory — a reminder that the path of an artist is often as fraught as it is fulfilling.
Even today, Lomax’s legacy persists in the form of reissues and retrospectives that celebrate his contributions to music. Fans and critics alike have revisited Is This What You Want? often, reevaluating it as a misunderstood masterpiece. Tracks like “Sour Milk Sea” and “The Eagle Laughs at You” have gained cult followings, their lyrical introspection and innovative arrangements resonating with a new generation. Lomax’s collaborations with musical titans continue to intrigue and inspire. The sessions with Harrison and Clapton
are often cited in documentaries and analyses, shining a spotlight on his role as an artist unafraid to push boundaries. His story serves as a prism, refracting the struggles and triumphs of an era defined by its musical audacity.
Lomax’s tale is not just a narrative of missed opportunities but a saga of perseverance. Even as he faded from the mainstream, his spirit endured in intimate performances and impromptu jam sessions in Ojai and elsewhere. Those fortunate enough to witness his later performances speak of a man who, though battle-worn, still wielded music with the fervor of a torchbearer.
As the years rolled on, tributes from
contemporaries and admirers alike reaffirmed his place in the pantheon of artists who shaped the music landscape of the sixties and seventies. They spoke of his grit, indomitable spirit, and ability to transmute personal struggles into timeless art.
Reflecting on the life and music of Lomax is a reminder that the measure of an artist is not solely in chart-topping hits or platinum records. It is in the authenticity of their expression, the courage to innovate, and the willingness to pursue their vision against all odds. Lomax embodied these qualities, and his story, much like his music, continues to resonate with those who dare to listen.
During his last years, Lomax resided in Ojai with his wife, Annie (previously Norma Kessler), mother of fashion photographer Terry Richardson.
Jackie died from cancer in 2013 while in England for the wedding of his daughter. Although his life in Ojai was less publicized, it was deeply meaningful. Our close-knit and eclectic community provided him with a sense of belonging. Known for his warm personality and quick wit, he formed friendships with fellow artists and residents who appreciated his stories of rock ’n’ roll days past.
His presence in the town left an impression on those who knew him — a reminder of the enduring power of music and the quieter joys of life. His Ojai chapter symbolized the essence of a life well-lived: one rooted in creativity, community, and the pursuit of harmony, both musical and personal.
The Bower Garage
1939 Ford pickup truck
Afew years ago, when I regularly attended the monthly Cars and Coffee event in the Westridge Market parking lot, one of the regulars there was Dwayne Bower. We became acquainted, thanks in part to his gracious appreciation for the photos I provided him and the other collectors.
One Fourth of July, we learned Dwayne would be opening the building where he keeps his many brilliant old vehicles. It did not disappoint. He has about 50 cars and trucks on display there, and I gave my camera a good workout documenting this eclectic collection.
Subsequently, I occasionally spoke with other local car guys who knew and admired Dwayne. His name would always come up, and I mentioned how impressed I was with what I had seen in his garage. They almost always replied, “Yes, but have you seen his barn?” The barn is on the property where Dwayne and his wife, Marilyn, live, east of downtown. It turns out this is where the magic occurs: vehicles in varying need of repair are painstakingly restored to their former cosmetic and mechanical condition.
Several months ago, I ran into Dwayne and Marilyn and asked if I might be able to visit the famous barn. Dwayne had free time after recently selling the Bowers’ medical supply company, and said we could meet. We arranged to meet there on July 2.
I arrived to find Dwayne at work with his associate, Rick, who has worked with Dwayne for over 30 years. It was a pleasure seeing them working together as two people can only after years of collaboration.
The first task was to straighten a bent rod in the front suspension, a routine job for Rick to ply his expertise as a metalworker. Dwayne jacked up the car and removed the front wheel so Rick could heat the rod and pound it back into alignment. They showed an intuitive connection in this effort. It was also clear they enjoyed the process.
Poking around in an adjacent space, I saw many interesting items, including a lovely pachinko machine, a nifty homemade (gasoline) motorized bicycle, and a machinist’s lathe, tucked in the corner, which Rick said he used weekly.
Heading outside, I found a cool old Bultaco motorcycle and a 1947 Buick woody, both big weaknesses of mine. The car is a beauty, but in need of extensive work on the wood, right in line for their restoration efforts. In fact, they recently installed its engine after thoroughly restoring it. They are simply undaunted by resurrecting vehicles in states of major deterioration.
When Dwayne excused himself to return to the house to get a haircut from his daughter, Tianna, I checked out more of the vehicles on display. In the barn, I saw an amazing variety, from a
And he seemed more than satisfied with his modest business.
I saw Dwayne with his grandson, Holden, and hoping to get a photo of the family, I agreed to meet them back at the shop. On the way, I had to pause for shots of a couple of Suburban delivery trucks, also a weakness of mine; another Edsel, the second of three that Dwayne owns; another Cadillac; and a great old Ojai tow truck. Then, I noted something that really stood out: a pristine red Porsche 912.
I took a couple of pictures of Holden at the wheel of an old Crosley. His daughter came around to collect Holden, and I took a few photos of them with Dwayne. At the end of my visit, Dwayne graciously agreed to sit for a video interview to fill in his family history.
“I don’t find them; they find me.”
They were working on Dwayne’s newest acquisition, a newish Jeep SUV. Regarding the growth of his collection, Dwayne said, “I don’t go to them; they come to me.” The owner of this car, from Bakersfield, told Dwayne that if he would pay for gas and buy him lunch, that would be the full cost to deliver the car to Ojai.
Birmingham Police paddy wagon, to a newish Cadillac and a 1932 Ford Model B pickup truck.
Dwayne later mentioned that the truck once appeared in a movie or TV program. He noted that many of his vehicles have been used in Hollywood, though he doesn’t actively solicit such work. Once again, “I don’t find them; they find me.”
Story and photos by TOM
MOORE
Dwayne’s parents moved to Ojai in 1939 and he grew up here. When Dwayne’s father, Roscoe “Bud” Bower, served in the Navy U.S. in World War II, his mother moved the family to Redondo Beach for the duration of the war.
Dwayne and Holden sitting on the Camaro bumper.
Above: The Corvette up on a lift.
Below: Dwayne and Rick, arm in arm
Below right: Buick Woody
In 1946, Bud bought his 1942 Chevrolet 2.5-ton truck for $1,600 from a Los Angeles Times ad. He used this truck mainly to bring food from suppliers in Los Angeles. Two or three times a week, he served as a primary provider for all the grocery stores in the valley, in Foster Park, Oak View, Meiners Oaks, and Ojai, including Doug Jordan’s, the downtown Bayless, and Wilson’s Market in Meiners Oaks.
Bud also hauled cattle in his truck and transported livestock to stockyards in Los Angeles. One client was the Brucker family, the owners of Movieland, who had a ranch in Somis. After delivering the cattle, he’d hose out the back of the truck, put down cardboard, and picked up groceries for the return trip to Ojai,
getting paid for both legs of the trip. When Bud bought a new 1948 truck from a Chevy dealer on North Signal Street in Ojai, he started Ojai Van Lines and worked as a mover during the 1950s. He sold this truck after using it in his moving business, but years later, Dwayne bought it back.
On Sundays, Bud hauled bread from Bill Baker’s Bakery in Ojai to Los Angeles-area health food stores. Bill Baker’s reputation got a big boost when he baked the world-champion cake in the competition at the 1939 San Francisco World’s Fair. At that same fair, Bud and his dad, R.E. Bower, won the world-champion Duroc hog competition. R.E. went on to build a thriving hog business shipping offspring from this now-famous champion, named Pilot’s Rival. He used some of the proceeds from this business success to buy a ranch in Mariposa, California. Dwayne’s garage on Bryant Street contains a 1951 Chevy panel truck, owned by his sister, with signage for Bower’s pig business. Bud grew up on a ranch in Chino, California. His location was rural so he maintained the farm equipment, as well as his own vehicles. He mastered agriculture after learning all aspects of farming, including equipment maintenance, from the Future Farmers of America. Dwayne showed an interest and aptitude for these same mechanical skills, mentored by his dad. He also encouraged Dwayne to acquire and restore affordable cars.
Dwayne bought his first car from Pop Soper, who operated a historic boxing training camp in Ojai with clients including heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey. He still owns that car, a 1929 Packard, a brand with a great reputation in its time. The Packard has sentimental meaning because Dwayne and Marilyn drove in it when they first dated.
Dwayne’s belief in restoring old cars reflects an old ad that said, “You only need one car in your life, if you buy a Packard.” Marilyn’s family apparently shared this belief in buying good cars and maintaining them fastidiously. Indeed, a couple of her family’s cars are in the Bower collection. One is their honeymoon car, a 1954 Buick they later drove all over the U.S., and twice up to Canada and back.
Their current homestead is a small citrus ranch—a part of what was once the Soule Ranch, which extended all
the way to Soule Park and the Soule Park Golf Course. They moved from a 1-acre property on Drown Avenue, and Dwayne brought along his collection of 10 cars, for which he had built a barn at the Drown Avenue location. They acquired their ranch after purchasing Zee Medical Supply in 1975. Dwayne sometimes drives his dad’s 1917 White truck in the Ojai Fourth of July Parade. It features butane headlights, which you light with a match, and has no starter, instead requiring a hand crank.
Among Dwayne’s favorites from his collection are the previously mentioned 1929 Packard, a 1953 Ford, and a 1950 Pontiac, an early automatic owned by his Grandfather Bower.
The property also came with some historic Soule family wagons which Dwayne has preserved. In addition to all the cars, the property is devoted to agriculture. Dwayne does much of the work for their crops, including running a disc and handling weed abatement, for which he uses a tractor. Unsurprisingly, his tractors are not contemporary models. He drove his beautiful 1954 Ford Jubilee tractor across town to the July Coffee and Cars meeting. The tractor he uses mainly in tending to his crops spent its early life at Limoneira Ranch in Santa Paula. It was given to a friend as a retirement gift. (Not exactly a gold watch, eh?) After the friend crashed in the tractor, he gave it to Dwayne, who of course fixed it up and gave it a second life working on his ranch.
Cricket Twichell and Dwayne Bower by van.
“I amWhole.”
A concave disk pendant necklace from the Bloom Collection
Through her brand, Tierra, Tatiana Lucia Redin honors the journey to self-love, self-worth, and empowerment with her handmade earth affirmation amulets. She guides others to their inner compassionate resilience, using medicine she discovered when life presented a far greater healing opportunity than she’d ever imagined.
Tatiana emigrated from Ecuador to the United States with her family at age 12. As a girl, she remembers wanting to become a nun, but her creative impulse led to the ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena, followed by a career as an L.A.-based creative director and designer.
“I am a maker,” she said. “I’ve always made things with my hands, but ceramics recently came into my life because I needed to ground. I needed to make contact with the earth.”
found an appealing house, and the moment Tatiana stepped on the land, she knew it was their next home.
“I am complete.”
An open circle pendant necklace from the Bloom Collection
E a Rth A ffi
A mul Ets
In 2020, 12 years after she founded a branding agency and served as its CEO and creative director, Tatiana wanted to focus more on her family, prompting a relocation to Ojai.
“It was time to start a new chapter in my family’s life,” she said. “I was able to sell my business and end that chapter, which had been a defined identity for me. I had employees and three offices, but I made the choice to prioritize my children. As we were moving to a new place and shifting identities, Covid happened.”
Tatiana’s family had visited friends in Ojai for a barbecue, and spent a small window of free time on Zillow. They
by ERIN LABELLE
Upon the advice of friends, Tatiana created space to grieve.
“I screamed and cried; I allowed myself to be in full grief. What happened there inspired the jewelry and notes to self,” she offered.
Tatiana felt called to work with clay, so she went to Firestick Pottery and spent time centering clumps on the wheel.
“I had to find the center point. In my rawness, I was working and the piece of clay began to speak to me. I felt like the raw piece of clay as the wheel was turning, opening up bit by bit,” Tatiana remembered.
As she spent hours with her finger in the center, messages began to emerge, and the clay became her teacher.
“All I had the energy to do was move my finger a little,” she said. “I was caressing the chaos. It felt heavy and grounding. A particular shape emerged,
R maT ioN
Tierra by Tatiana
“Friends said, ‘Get ready. Ojai has a powerful force,’ and we were like, ‘Oh, it’s OK, we’ve done our inner work,’” she said, reflecting on a time before her life unraveled.
Tatiana was thrown into a deep healing journey, and on this side of the experience, she feels Ojai was necessary to emerge from her chrysalis.
“Ojai has the energy to bring stuff up, as well as the energy for healing,” Tatiana said. “This process wouldn’t have been the same in Los Angeles. We want truth to emerge for things to heal. Divorce shifted my past, present, and future.”
Tatiana felt it was important to get centered for her children, whom she describes as her North Star.
“I literally needed to get on my hands and knees, because the ground came out from beneath my feet. My first instinct was to connect with the earth and nature,” she said.
at first becoming ‘The Bowl of Giving and Receiving,’ and eventually a necklace. My identity was always the giver, but I am both giving and receiving.”
After navigating a longtime struggle with self-worth, Tatiana believes the only way a deep wound can heal is for it to emerge in a raw way.
“I had to hold myself worthy,” she said ”I had a successful business, a beautiful family, and a partner; it didn’t come from there. I lost my marriage and my company. I lost my identity. I learned my worth had to come from me.”
Tatiana was wearing one of her creations, and a friend suggested she make the jewelry available to others at the Sunday Ojai Farmers’ Market.
“They were amulets for my own healing inspired by affirmations for myself. They’re wearable love notes to self. Our art is our medicine. We create the medicine that heals us,” she said, adding, “It touches me, and it touches others.”
The entire brand has become a form of self-reflection for Tatiana. While she’s working on pieces from her Ground, Grow, and Bloom collections, she’s also integrating messages like “I Speak My Truth,” “I Am Rebirth,” and “I Honor My Path” into herself.
“It’s reciprocal; it’s a complete circle,” she said. “When others connect, I get the privilege of closing the circle. ‘Honor Thy’ represents the importance of learning to honor oneself and hold oneself worthy.”
According to Tatiana, people connect to her jewelry based on what they’re going through. In her Ojai Farmers’ Market booth, she’s heard the stories of men and women, at times crying with them.
“A woman with a triple bypass scar on her chest chose ‘I Am Whole,’ but my intuition said to show her the long vertical piece,” Tatiana said. “She felt she could never wear it, but I told her that’s why she has to, and she put it on. It’s about honoring the journey a person went through. It’s not about hiding, it’s about celebrating it.”
Learn more about Tatiana and Tierra at iamtierra.com.
“I
Surrounded by the artist and her lovefilled creations, people open up, feeling safe and hearing the invitation to share their stories. Tatiana remembers the day a man who was going through a divorce stepped into her booth with his young daughter.
“He’d recently taken off his wedding ring and needed something to ground himself. And I could feel her sadness from what the family was going through. I found matching pieces, a bracelet for her, a circle, to represent their connection. These moments, these little vignettes that happen in the booth, they move me,” she said.
“I Am.” A solo column pendant necklace from the Ground Collection
Am Possibility.” An open seedlet pendant necklace from the Grow Collection
J une
canvas and paper exhibit: Cornelis Kick, William Scott and Louis Valtat. Three centuries of flower paintings On view through June 22
311 N. Montgomery St.
Open: Thursday – Sunday
noon – 5 p.m. free admission canvasandpaper.org
Ventura County Potters’ Guild Exhibition
Through July 6
Beato Gallery
Beatrice Wood Center for the Arts
8585 Ojai-Santa Paula Road beatricewood.com
“Life Is An Art Fair” Boutique
June 14, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.
Libbey Park
210 S. Signal St. beatricewood.com
Ojai Historical Walking Tours
Ojai Valley Museum
June 14 , 10:30 a.m.
130 W. Ojai Ave.
Tickets: Adults $10; Family $25 ojaivalleymuseum.org.
Learn about Ojai’s unique history on a 90-min. tour led by Docent Mark Lewis.
“Young Frankenstein” at Ojai Art Center Theater
June 20 – July 20
113 S. Montgomery St.
Tickets: ojaiact.org 805-640-8797
Ojai Historical Walking Tours
June 21, 10:30 a.m.
Ojai Valley Museum
130 W. Ojai Ave.
Tickets: Adults $10; Family $25 ojaivalleymuseum.org.
Learn about Ojai’s unique history on a 90-min. tour led by Docent Connie Campbell
37th Ojai Wine Festival
June 21, 12-4 p.m.
Lake Casitas Recreation Area
Wadleigh Arm Event Site 11093 Santa Ana Road Ventura, CA 93001
Tickets: ojaiwinefestival.com
Ojai Historical Walking Tours
June 28, 10:30 a.m.
Ojai Valley Museum
130 W. Ojai Ave.
Tickets: Adult $10; Family $25
Learn about Ojai’s unique history on a 90-min. tour led by Docent Cricket Twichell. ojaivalleymuseum.org.
Beatrice Wood Center For The Arts 8585 Ojai-Santa Paula Road beatricewood.com
Photo: Creative Commons
White Sea Cloud by Ivon Hitchens, 1967, oil on canvas
fIyou’ve been to the Ojai Sunday Farmers’ Market lately, you may have noticed a bright, colorful stand run by a vivacious blond ball of energy, selling juice like she’s hosting the biggest party in town. That’s Misty Zollars, founder of Community Juice — Ojai’s newest and most joyful place to get your daily dose of wellness.
Her colorful organic pressed blends, with names like Disco Juice, Beetastic, and Mr. Goodmorning, are as nourishing as they are fun. Indeed, Community Juice isn’t your average juice brand, and Zollars isn’t the stereotypical face of a fledgling wellness company. Instead of serenely posing in a sun-drenched kitchen squeezing the contents of a picture-perfect fruit bowl for Instagram, she’s running around Ojai dressed in a giant apple costume, wheeling her pink juice cart down the street. For Zollars, health doesn’t have to be rigid, and wellness doesn’t have to be dull. Her mission is to draw people in with her infectious playfulness and whimsy. “I have zero shame,” she laughs. “If being silly makes people smile and try a juice, I’m all in.”
Yet Zollars didn’t come to Ojai to start a juice company. After nearly two decades in the fashion world, she had officially stepped away from entrepreneurship to embrace motherhood. She and her husband, the artist Logan Maxwell Hagege, packed up their life in Los Angeles and moved to Ojai in late 2019, ready for a quieter, more intentional chapter. She envisioned slow mornings with her two little kids, afternoons in the backyard, and a life free from the relentless deadlines and pressures of the fashion industry. For a while, it felt perfect. But then, something shifted. “I thought I’d be totally content just being a full-time mom,” Zollars reflects. “And for a while, I was. But eventually I started thinking: ‘Wait, where did I go?’ Being a mom is fulfilling, but I realized I needed something that was mine — something creative that made me feel like me again.” That something started with a simple morning ritual: juicing.
Zollars lived and breathed fashion. Growing up in the San Fernando Valley, playing dress-up was her jam. “My great-grandmother had this bin of old vintage clothes and costume jewelry, and I would just live in it,” she recalls. “I loved how fashion could be playful; how you could transform yourself just by changing what you wore.” By the time she turned 18, Zollars knew she wanted to work in the fashion industry. While getting there wasn’t straightforward,
the leap by joining a tiny denim startup called True Religion. “My parents thought I was insane to leave a stable job to work for this no-name company,” she says. “But I believed in it.” Within a few years, True Religion exploded. Their signature jeans — with bold stitching and oversized pockets — became a celebrity staple. “It was wild,” Zollars says. “One month, we were five people; the next month, we were hiring our 100th employee.” But rapid growth came with challenges. “The owners were going through a nasty divorce, and it got messy,” she says.
“I was caught in the middle a lot. It was really stressful. But I learned so much, especially about problem-solving.”
After almost a decade at True Religion, Zollars was ready for something new. In 2014, she teamed up with her best friend and colleague, Kelly Urban, to launch AMO, a denim brand built around one simple idea: five perfect pairs of jeans designed by women, for women. “We were designing for real women,” Zollars says. “Not a male exec’s idea of what looked good on a 19-year-old
MistY ZoLLaRs’
CoMMuniTy JuicE
of fabric swatches around L.A., pitching textile designs to brands,” she remembers. One of her stops was at Joie, a high-end contemporary brand that had its heyday in the early 2000s. Zollars immediately clicked with the eponymous founder, Joie Rucker, who hired her as an assistant designer. That’s when her true fashion education began. “You hear these crazy stories about fashion being brutal,” she says. “They’re all true. It was even scarier than The Devil Wears Prada.”
by KERSTIN KÜHN photos by WILL NIELSEN
Before Ojai, before juicing, before Community Juice was even a dream,
Two years into her time at Joie, Rucker left the company, and Zollars took
supermodel. Just effortless, classic denim, driven by how women actually dress and want to feel.” While friends and family again warned Zollars against entering an already saturated market, she trusted her instincts. AMO quickly gained a cult following and grew into a thriving business.
But then motherhood changed everything, and Zollars’ priorities shifted. “Fashion was my identity for so long,” she says. “But once I had a baby, I didn’t care about it in the same way.” Leaving AMO was “terrifying, but moving to Ojai felt right.” At first, she thought she was done. Then the pandemic hit. “I had two little kids and was home all the time with no creative outlet,” she says. “It really affected me.” Juicing became her one small, daily ritual. Before long, she had more juice than she could drink. Friends tried it, then friends of friends. Soon, people were asking to buy it. Starting a juice business felt like the next step, but Zollars hesitated: “I kept thinking, ‘Do I really want to start another business?’” But the idea wouldn’t leave her alone. And when a close confidant said, “You’re not losing anything by trying,” she knew it was time to leap.
For the past few years, Zollars has been building Community Juice from the
ground up, creating vision boards, experimenting with flavors, renting a shared kitchen space, popping up around Ojai with her juice cart, selling at the Sunday Farmers’ Market, and reinvesting everything she’s made back into the business. Now, she’s taking things to the next level by opening her own brick-and-mortar shop in Meiners Oaks.
Tucked into a sunny corner of El Roblar (formerly home to Greater Goods), Community Juice is impossible to miss. Walking in feels like stepping into a bottle of juice: bright, bold, playful, and unmistakably Misty. “I wanted it to be more than just a place to shop; it’s a joyful experience,” she says. The space is vibrant with pink walls and ceilings, giant disco balls, an enormous apple-shaped fridge, and glossy checkered floors with flowers. The vibe? 1950s ice cream parlor meets Pee-wee’s Playhouse. Which of course is the whole idea.
“What I’ve learned through this whole
journey is that children’s health is really important to me,” Zollars explains. “My trick is to make it all really fun and look like an ice cream shop, just to get people through the door. And once they try the juice and it’s delicious, they hopefully realize that being healthy can also be fun.”
The menu at Community Juice features fresh-pressed blends, made with organic ingredients sourced directly from local farms. Bursting with flavor and color, the juices are delicate in texture, balanced in flavor, and packed with nutrients.
Highlights include the deeply pink Super Punch, a sweet strawberry blend with pineapple and beetroot; the vibrant yellow Mr. Goodmorning, with apple, cucumber, lemon, ginger, and mint; and the sunshine-bright Disco Juice, made from apple, carrot, and orange. The lineup of green juices includes the sweet Apple Bottom Greens, the refreshing So Fresh and So Green (just celery and lemon), and the bold and earthy Ging and Juice, which combines cucumber, celery, kale, spinach, lemon, and ginger.
Beyond juice, everything in the shop is focused on health and wellness. “The space is curated with my favorite brands and offers people one place to find everything they need to care for themselves,” says Zollars. “We have supplements, products for new mamas, books, items for the home and kitchen, healthy but fun snacks, and even fruitshaped handbags for kids. There really is no other shop like it.” What’s more, as a certified health coach Zollars has plans to host workshops and wellness discussions in a space adjacent to the store. She lights up when she talks about helping others. “This is what I love,” she says. “Helping people feel better. And I want this to be a place for people to connect.”
What began as a simple act of self-care during the pandemic soon blossomed into a full-blown passion project, then a growing business rooted in health, creativity, and community. For Zollars, Community Juice is more than just a juice shop, more than a company, more than a brand. “It just feels right,” she beams. “I get to create, connect, and help others. And that,” she adds, “is what success is to me now.”
Community Juice
145 W. El Roblar Drive, Ojai, CA 93023 communityjuice.com
IMAGINE falling
into a bed of basil, cilantro, or tarragon!
Oh, those deep verdant hues and scintillating aromas of green herbs offer a feast for the senses. Green culinary herbs — the leaves of plants such as oregano, parsley, mint, thyme, lemon balm, and dill — not only provide amazing sensual rewards, but also strengthen the nutritional benefits of your meals. A source of vitamins such as A, C, and K, and minerals like manganese, as well as antioxidant and anti-inflammatory compounds, green herbs offer potent health rewards. For example, basil has been linked to better blood cholesterol levels, and rosemary has been associated with stress reduction.
No wonder so many cultural food traditions center on fragrant, delicious herbs. Who can think of Italian cuisine without oregano, French cooking sans parsley, and Mexican dishes minus cilantro? In our own California food traditions, influenced by culture, climate, and agriculture, we have a penchant for herbs. Basil with heirloom tomatoes and EVOO, grilled skewers threaded on a sprig of rosemary, and mint floating in sparkling water are just a few reliable ways we love to showcase herbs at the table.
Try these tips for infusing your cooking with green herbs:
Start an herb pot. Save time and money by growing fresh herbs in a pot with easy-to-grow varieties such as basil, cilantro, mint, thyme, oregano, and rosemary. You’ll be surprised how often you use herbs in cooking when you have an herb pot handy!
Don’t be skimpy. Add those herbs by the handfuls — not by the teaspoon — in multiple ways, including salads, pasta dishes, and marinades.
Go with the seasons. In SoCal, sun-seeking herbs include oregano, rosemary, and basil, while cool-loving herbs include dill, parsley, and cilantro.
Blend up a pesto. Put your herbs (think beyond basil to dill, oregano, tarragon, thyme, or a medley) to good use and blend them into pesto to add in pasta, dips, spreads, and dressings.
Get creative. Try to incorporate herbs in unusual ways, such as in cobblers, muffins, and cookies.
A n HeRBALICIOUS COOKING ADVeN t URe
Pesto Fusilli Pasta Salad with Corn and Tomatoes
This vibrant, colorful salad is packed with flavor and nutrition, compliments of an easy homemade basil pesto, fusilli pasta, and grilled corn.
2 ears fresh corn on the cob, shucked (or use 1½ cups frozen fire-roasted corn, thawed)
½ tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1 pound fusilli pasta, uncooked Water
1 cup prepared pesto (see above)
2 cups cherry tomatoes, halved
½ teaspoon red chili flakes
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
½ to 1 cup reserved pasta water
¼ cup ground cashews
Salt, as needed to taste
INSTRUCTIONS:
1. Brush shucked ears of corn with olive oil and place on a hot grill to cook for about 15 to 20 minutes, turning occasionally to cook evenly on all sides, until golden brown and tender. Allow to cool slightly, then cut the corn from the cobs and add to a large salad bowl.
2. While corn is cooking, cook pasta by filling a large pot two-thirds full of water. Cover and bring to a boil. Add fusilli, reduce to medium heat, and cook until al dente according to package directions (about 7 minutes). Drain cooked pasta, reserving 1 cup of pasta water.
3. Add drained, cooked pasta to the bowl with grilled corn and allow to cool slightly.
4. Add the prepared pesto, tomatoes, red chili flakes, and balsamic vinegar to the bowl with corn and pasta. Toss gently to distribute ingredients.
5. Add reserved pasta water as needed to moisten the salad.
6. Stir in ground cashews and season with salt, as desired.
7. Serve immediately or chill until serving time.
Nutrition Information per Serving: 297 calories, 216mg sodium, 6g fat, 1g saturated fat. 54g carbohydrates, 4g fiber, 6g protein
Peach Crisp with Rosemary and Olive Oil
Enjoy this easy, healthy, fragrant peach crisp as a treat you can feel really good about!
Makes 8 servings
Preparation Time: 1 hour
INGREDIENTS:
Peach Filling:
8 fresh medium peaches, peeled, sliced (or 8 cups frozen or canned)
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1½ teaspoons finely chopped fresh rosemary (more for garnish, if desired)
1 lemon (juice and zest)
3 tablespoons orange juice
Crisp Topping:
1 cup old-fashioned oats
¼ cup all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon vanilla
¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
½ teaspoon cinnamon
Pinch salt
1½ tablespoons brown sugar
INSTRUCTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 375 F.
2. To make peach filling: In a 2½-quart baking dish, mix together peaches, brown sugar, rosemary, lemon juice and zest, and orange juice until well-combined.
3. To make crisp topping: In a small bowl, mix together oats, flour, vanilla, olive oil, cinnamon, salt, and brown sugar to make a crumbly topping.
4. Sprinkle topping evenly over the peach mixture in the baking dish.
5. Place peach crisp in the oven, uncovered, and bake 40 to 45 minutes until golden brown and tender.
6. Garnish with fresh rosemary, if desired, and serve immediately.
Nutrition Information per Serving: 222 calories, 100mg sodium, 9g fat, 1g saturated fat, 34g carbohydrates, 5g fiber, 5g protein
Sharon Palmer is a dietitian specializing in plant-based nutrition and sustainability located in Ojai, where she tends to her organic vegetable garden and orchard.
SharonPalmer.com. @sharonpalmerRD
Best Players
“Are you still interested?” Terry Galvin, the editor, asked. Was I ever. I have been writing about this wonderful game ever since. Which leads me to my new book, The Golf 100 (released on April 1), in which I rank the top 100 greatest players of all time, men and women, going all the way back to Scotland’s Old Tom Morris and his son, Young Tom, in the mid-19th century. Young Tom, by the way, won four British Opens, but died, they say, of a broken heart at the age of 24.
I worked on the book for three years. I could have worked on it for another three. I could have made it The Golf 200
In The Golf 100, I mention the 1996 tournament in Ojai, where I first met Gary Player, a nine-time major champion, and the only non-American to capture the career Grand Slam. Player lost in playoff to Walter Morgan, a Vietnam vet, but I couldn’t keep my eyes off the South African known as the Black Knight. Player was 60 at the time and as determined as ever. Over the next four years,
I watched him on numerous occasions, along with such other stars as Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Lee Trevino, Hale Irwin, and Raymond Floyd. Here’s the thing I’ve never been able to quite figure out: They were paying me to do this.
I covered the regular tour, as well. In August 1996, I saw Phil Mickelson win the World Series of Golf at Firestone Country Club in Akron, Ohio. A month later, I was assigned to report on a tournament in Illinois that normally received very little attention.
the summer of 2000, I left the magazine when Pauletta and I moved to Oak View. Our daughter was attending UC Santa Barbara and we wanted to be near her. Besides, nothing against the state of Connecticut, but I missed California. Having lived in Pacific Palisades prior to our move back East — I remain heartbroken by the January fire — we didn’t imagine we could ever find another place that felt like a real community.
We were wrong.
It got attention this time. Tiger Woods, 20, who had turned pro a few weeks earlier, was in the field. And almost won the darn thing.
I worked at Golf World for four years and loved every minute of it. Even so, in
As the years rolled on, I spent more time writing books — I worked with Phil Jackson, Sugar Ray Leonard, Ray Allen, Leigh Steinberg and Scottie Pippen — but stayed involved with golf. The game has meant the world to me.
All photos: Wikimedia CC
Left to right: Tom Weiskopf, Gary Player, Old Tom Morris, Tommy Armour, Rory McIlroy, Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, Gene Sarazen, Arnold Palmer, Kathy Whitworth, Lee Trevino.
When I was 12, my father passed away from ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease). Shortly afterward, my aunt and uncle started taking me to their country club outside Albany, New York, where I lived.
I was hooked. For good.
In late 2021, I started The Golf 100 because I was frustrated reading obituaries that didn’t tell me enough about the players I had followed as a kid. I wanted to know more about what made them so great. And so human.
That wasn’t the only reason. Being on the back nine myself, I wanted to discover how the years had treated the players I got to know in the 1990s. What did they regret? What did they cherish?
From late 2021 to late 2024, I devoted myself to research and writing and little else — well, except for those five Wednesday evenings in the summer when I listened to the Ojai Band. (Memo to Dr. Halverson: If I slip you a few bucks, can you make sure I conduct? Just once. Please! I’ve spent a fortune on those lottery tickets in the last couple of years.)
I had a blast working on the book.
One day, I was in the present, watching Rory McIlroy attempt to break his long drought in major championships. He had an excellent chance to win the 2024 U.S. Open at Pinehurst, but blew it down the stretch when he missed a few short putts.
15th hole in the 1935 Masters that tied him with Craig Wood; Sarazen won it in a playoff the following day. Or at Cherry Hills Country Club outside Denver when Arnold Palmer fired a 65 in the final round to rally from seven shots back to win the 1960 U.S. Open. Or … I could go on and on. Yet, in a way, by working on this book, I felt I was there.
Some of the players started to appear in my dreams. I am not kidding. I hadn’t felt the presence of the dead so viscerally since I visited Gettysburg in 2004 and swore I could hear the yells of the Confederate rebels as they approached the Union lines.
Speaking of war, that was another takeaway for me. I wrote about players who served from the Second Boer War around the turn of the 20th century to
The next, I was immersed in the past, like the 1971 U.S. Open at Merion Golf Club outside Philadelphia, where Lee Trevino outdueled Jack Nicklaus in an 18-hole playoff. It reminded me of The Time Tunnel, one of my favorite TV shows in the late ’60s, in which the characters went back in time.
If only I could have been in the gallery when Gene Sarazen, known as The Squire, pulled off the most famous shot in golf history, the double eagle on the
Vietnam. Such as Tommy Armour (World War I), who lost his sight in one eye, and Lloyd Mangrum, who was at Normandy (shortly after the invasion) and the Battle of the Bulge. And Larry Nelson, a threetime major winner, who spent 90 days in Vietnam.
One night, dozens of North Vietnamese soldiers marched by Nelson and his squad, most of whom were sleeping. Nelson was terrified that it “would be all
over” if any of his other men woke up and made noise.
“We saw the morning,” he told me, “so it was okay.”
As for the 15 women I profiled in the book, attempting to determine who should be in the top 100, and where they belonged, was one of my toughest challenges.
I couldn’t compare their numbers — I placed a heavy emphasis on how players fared in the majors — to what the men racked up. They competed in different tournaments against different fields. Instead, I compared them to each other. Topping the list is Mickey Wright, who starred in the 1950s and ’60s. Annika Sörenstam was remarkable, and so were Babe Didrikson Zaharias and Patty Berg, but there has never been a female golfer on the level of Wright, who won 82 tournaments, including 13 majors.
I also took the opportunity to stress the importance of amateur golf. For many years, the U.S. Amateur and British Amateur were considered major championships, comprising two of the four tournaments that Bobby Jones won when he captured the Grand Slam in 1930. It’s a shame they have lost so much of their luster in recent years.
On the subject of loss, I was devastated when two of the players in the book, Tom Weiskopf and Kathy Whitworth, passed away in 2022. Even though I spoke to both of them only a few times, they were part of a special group I was putting together. I had so many more questions to ask.
As for which player wound up at No. 1 — that’s what most people want to know — it came down to three icons: Jones, Woods, and Nicklaus.
Jones was unbelievable. From 1923 until he retired in 1930 at age 28, he won 13 majors … in his last 21 appearances. While having a day job. (He was a lawyer.)
Woods has been the most dominant. In 2000, he captured the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach by 15 strokes and the British Open at St. Andrews by eight.
Nicklaus has been the biggest winner. Counting the two U.S. Amateurs he won in 1959 and 1961, I am giving him a total of 20 majors.
The envelope, please.
And the winner is …
The author with Jack Nicklaus Photo supplied
Ear TH’s FoRtuNes
ABoUND
by MIMI WALKER
First constructed by Stan Tenpenny, with interior design by Kathleen McMullen- Coady, the home has been redesigned by Whitman, whose plan for expansion started with the front of the house, modeled in the style of “classic Mediterranean, something that you would see in a Montecito estate or Beverly Hills estate,” he said. Extending around and behind the home are panoptic scenes of land and water across multiple vantage points.
“We designed the home to kind of step down the hill and take advantage of the hillside, by creating the maximum amount of space facing out to the view,” Whitman said. Instead of “conquering” or “overcoming” nature, Whitman’s aim with the property was to “bring nature into the home. … You look across the river to the golf course, to Black Mountain … you can walk right down to the creek … looking back the other way, there is a nice view of the Topatopa Mountains.” All this was both intentional and incidental. The home’s upstairs deck, acting as an “outdoor living room … was designed to accommodate a 100-person wedding party” as one of the main incentives for its remodel, Whitman said.
Overall, Whitman said, “It’s one of my favorite compositions … the roof lines, especially when you see that aerial view of the roof, it’s definitely one of my favorite designs I’ve done in that regard.” Whitman said he also took creative liberty “with some of the smaller details, like that curving spiral stair out the back — it’s really sculptural — and some of the beam work and trellises.
Photos: interiors by VIRTOUR MEDIA exteriors by ERIC FOOTE
“The master bathroom, we went way out with detailing, with the covers and curves and arches everywhere. … There’s a barrel vault with arches that run into creating what we call ‘cloister arches,’” creating the effect of earthen cathedral spaces in the home. That might be the influence of Antoni Gaudí seeping into the home. Gaudi became one of Whitman’s idols in architecture after he saw his works in person while backpacking through Europe after graduating from Arizona State University’s architecture program, making a stop at Sagrada Família in Barcelona in 1982.
The house also incorporates interior plastering, a painstaking form of interior sculpting that nowadays “is not seen too much” and is more expensive than drywall, Whitman said. But with drywall, “you can’t get those curves and that handmade, old-fashioned look to it,” Whitman said. “One of the beauties (of interior plastering) is you can impregnate the color into the plaster. So then, you don’t paint it. It feels Old World natural … feels very comforting.” Ocher, a warm, sun-tinged golden brown, is a prominent color choice for this effect. Whitman added: “It’s great solar exposure … you get all the nice southern sun and light coming in through all the windows that are also facing the views. And then we dug it into the hillside, so on the bottom floor, it’s called a daylight basement, where it’s got a retaining wall along the whole hillside there … it’s embedded into the earth. So it’s (got) really good thermal retention there; you get the warmth … that stores into the block wall and also the hillside. … That thermal mass retains your heat in the winter, and retains your coolness in the summer. … So it really helps regulate the temperature of the house, keeps it real moderate. … Your energy costs go way down with all that thermal mass in the house.” Whitman’s general design philosophy is that living spaces “affect us psychologically.” Therefore, the nuclear element of his work is to design “a healing space … that can actually nurture you.” He added, “One of my favorite quotes is (by) Winston Churchill — ‘We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us.’”
For more information, visit: montecito-estate.com.
