Druid Heights - A trip down memory lane (19634353569)

Druid Heights was a bohemian community in

Marin County, California Marin County is a County (United States), county located in the northwestern part of the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 262,231. Its county seat and ...

, USA, founded in 1954 by poet

Elsa Gidlow Elsa Gidlow (29 December 1898 – 8 June 1986) was a British-born, Canadian-American poet, freelance journalist, philosopher and humanitarian. She is best known for writing ''On a Grey Thread'' (1923), the first volume of openly lesbian love ...

, her partner Isabel Quallo, and carpenter Roger Somers. The community was a popular retreat for various countercultural movements and a meeting place for many figures of the

San Francisco Renaissance The term San Francisco Renaissance is used as a global designation for a range of poetic activity centered on San Francisco, which brought it to prominence as a hub of the American poetry avant-garde in the 1950s. However, others (e.g., Alan Watts ...

Mission

Druid Heights - A trip down memory lane (19794771476)

Druid Heights was a bohemian community on the southeast flank of

Mount Tamalpais Mount Tamalpais (; ; Miwok languages, Miwok: ''Támal Pájiṣ''), known locally as Mount Tam, is a mountain, peak in Marin County, California, Marin County, California, United States, often considered symbolic of Marin County. Much of Mount Tama ...

, about a mile from the Pacific Ocean. It was founded by carpenter Roger Somers and poet

, along with their partners, on five acres of a former chicken ranch. Elsa gave the acreage the name Druid Heights in honor of two female writers, the revolutionary and teacher of Irish lore,

Ella Young Ella Young (26 December 1867 – 23 July 1956) was an Irish poet and Celtic mythologist active in the Gaelic and Celtic Revival literary movement of the late 19th and early 20th century. Born in Ireland, Young was an author of poetry and c ...

(the Druid), and

Emily Brontë Emily Jane Brontë (, commonly ; 30 July 1818 – 19 December 1848) was an English novelist and poet who is best known for her only novel, ''Wuthering Heights'', now considered a classic of English literature. She also published a book of poet ...

(author of ''

Wuthering Heights ''Wuthering Heights'' is an 1847 novel by Emily Brontë, initially published under her pen name Ellis Bell. It concerns two families of the landed gentry living on the West Yorkshire moorland, moors, the Earnshaws and the Lintons, and their tur ...

'').Gidlow, Elsa (1986). ''Elsa, I Come With My Songs: The Autobiography of Elsa Gidlow''. San Francisco: Druid Heights Press. . The community was a popular retreat and meeting place for three countercultural movements in the United States, including the

Beat Generation The Beat Generation was a literary subculture movement started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the post-war era. The bulk of their work was published and popularized by Silent Generatio ...

of the 1950s, the

hippie movement The hippie subculture began its development as a youth movement in the United States during the early 1960s and then developed around the world. Its origins may be traced to European social movements in the 19th and early 20th century such as B ...

of the 1960s, and the

women's movement The feminist movement (also known as the women's movement, or feminism) refers to a series of social movements and political campaigns for radical and liberal reforms on women's issues created by the inequality between men and women. Such is ...

of the 1970s. It also, through the efforts of Elsa Gidlow, became a meeting place for many famous figures of the

including her friends

Kenneth Rexroth Kenneth Charles Marion Rexroth (1905–1982) was an American poet, translator, and critical essayist. He is regarded as a central figure in the San Francisco Renaissance, and paved the groundwork for the movement. Although he did not consider h ...

and former resident of the heights, Pulitzer Prize winner

Gary Snyder Gary Snyder (born May 8, 1930) is an American poet, essayist, lecturer, and environmental activist. His early poetry has been associated with the Beat Generation and the San Francisco Renaissance and he has been described as the "poet laureate of ...

. Located above

Muir Woods National Monument Muir Woods National Monument is a United States National Monument managed by the National Park Service, named after naturalist John Muir. It is located on Mount Tamalpais near the Pacific coast, in southwestern Marin County, California. It is ...

, Druid Heights was acquired by the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...

in the 1970sDavis, Erik (May 2005).
Druids and Ferries
". ''Arthur''. 16. and is now on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

.Brown, Patricia Leigh (January 25, 2012).
Oasis for Resisting Status Symbols Just Might Get One
''The New York Times''. A15.

History

Druid Heights - A trip down memory lane (19794786486)

Poet Elsa Gidlow and her partner Isabel Quallo, along with carpenter Roger Somers and his wife Mary, started Druid Heights in 1954. Accessible by a dirt road connected to Muir Woods Road, Druid Heights occupied a five-acre ranch formerly known as the Haapa Property. Somers, a free spirited and hard working craftsman, was influenced by

Japanese architecture has been typified by wooden structures, elevated slightly off the ground, with tiled or thatched roofs. Sliding doors (''fusuma'') and other traditional partitions were used in place of walls, allowing the internal configuration of a space to ...

and American architect

Frank Lloyd Wright Frank Lloyd Wright (June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright played a key role in the architectural movements o ...

. He built many of the structures with the help of organizational skills and common sense from furniture designer Ed Stiles. Gidlow was fond of decorative gardening and

organic agriculture Organic farming, also known as ecological farming or biological farming,Labelling, article 30 o''Regulation (EU) 2018/848 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2018 on organic production and labelling of organic products and re ...

, and she grew vegetables for the people in the community. The Society For Comparative Philosophy, begun in 1962, was established here as a non-profit by

and

Alan Watts Alan Wilson Watts (6 January 1915 – 16 November 1973) was an English writer, speaker and self-styled "philosophical entertainer", known for interpreting and popularising Japanese, Chinese and Indian traditions of Buddhist, Taoist, and Hindu ...

aiming for a broad vision approach to "studies of humanity's relation to nature and the universe." They purchased the converted ferry boat Vallejo to "be headquarters for the Society and site of seminars and other events," and the Heights could therefore be kept a closely guarded secret enjoyed by insiders and invited guests. The Society fell on hard times after the 1973 death of Alan Watts, but in his name and with the help of a solid board of directors, it revived and continued until Gidlow's death in 1987. Gidlow had planned to turn Druid Heights into a retreat for artists, but after the National Park Service acquired the land using

eminent domain Eminent domain (United States, Philippines), land acquisition (India, Malaysia, Singapore), compulsory purchase/acquisition (Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, United Kingdom), resumption (Hong Kong, Uganda), resumption/compulsory acquisition (Austr ...

in 1977, it could no longer host temporary guests, only legal tenants.

Buildings and structures

There are approximately 16 historic buildings and structures in Druid Heights with the most important structure, poet Elsa Gidlow's own house, seriously endangered due to a lack of maintenance. Remaining structures include: Druid Heights - A trip down memory lane (19825809751)

Druid Heights - A trip down memory lane (19825809751)

*Cloud Hidden, a large rock named by Alan Watts. *The Library, constructed in 1972 out of a redwood water tank, initially to house the books and papers of Alan Watts. *Mandala House, a cabin shaped like a lotus flower. It was originally built by Stiles for Elsa Gidlow's sister, then improved and rented to Alan and Jano Watts from 1970 until his death there in 1973. *The Goddess Meditation hut with stained glass windows. *Love Garden, filled with plants brought there by Gidlow from her other house, 'Madrona' in Fairfax, California and tended by Gidlow with the help of countless friends. *Water Tank, installed under the supervision of Edward Stiles to hold water pumped from the creek for the benefit, communally, of the 12 residents. *The Ranch or Twin Peaks House, was originally a small house built in early 1920s by Alfons Haapa. After the purchase of the Haapa property by Gidlow and Roger and Mary Somers in 1954, Somers’ extensive remodeling and additions radically remade this house by incorporating elements of Japanese, Polynesian and Modern Architecture. *The Old Chicken Barn, built to house chickens by Alfons Haapa in 1943, was converted by Roger Somers and his tenant sculptor Jerry Walter into a combination art studio and dwelling in the late 1950s. After the arrival of the Stiles family in 1965, Ed Stiles continued to remodel and add to this building, including the bathroom’s incorporation of a custom redwood tub and shower.Historic American Building Survey, US National Park Service (2016). “Druid Heights, Old Chicken Barn”. Library of Congress HABS CA-2920-C

Residents

Robert Erickson Robert Erickson (March 7, 1917 – April 24, 1997) was an American composer. Education Erickson was born in Marquette, Michigan. He studied with Ernst Krenek from 1936 to 1947: "I had already studied—and abandoned—the twelve tone sy ...

* Echo Heron * Isabel Quallo *

*Roger Somers *Ed Stiles *

Margo St. James Margaret Jean "Margo" St. James (September 12, 1937January 11, 2021) was an American prostitute and sex-positive feminist. In San Francisco, she founded COYOTE (Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics), an organization advocating decriminalization of pro ...

*David Wills

Mission

History

Buildings and structures

Residents

See also

References

Further reading