Elsie Whitaker Martinez
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Use Restrictions
All uses of this manuscript are covered by a legal agreement between the Regents of the University of California and Elsie Whitaker Martinez, dated April 10, 1964. The manuscript is thereby made available for research purposes. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to the Bancroft Library of the University of California at Berkeley. No part of the manuscript may be quoted for publication without the written permission of the Director of The Bancroft Library of the University of California at Berkeley.
Requests for permission to quote for publication should be addressed to the Regional Oral History Office, 486 Library, and should include identification of the specific passages to be quoted, anticipated use of the passages, and identification of the user. The legal agreement with Elsie Whitaker Martinez requires that she be notified of the request and allowed thirty days in which to respond.
Introduction
Some years ago, in search for first-hand reminiscences about Jack London and about early Carmel — I was working on Jack London and the Klondike and The Seacoast of Bohemia concurrently — I went to call on Elsie Martinez and was richly rewarded. In her little house on the corner of 17th and El Carmelo in Carmel she greeted me with enthusiasm. Her blue eyes sparkled and her face lit up with much of the charm that had made her a favorite with the San Francisco and Oakland Bohemians some fifty years before, when she was dubbed "The Blessed Damozel" by one of the early timers, although she had much more fire and spunk than we associate with Rossetti's golden heroine.
During my first visit and later, she helped me most generously, never growing tired of my persistent questioning and freely aiding me not only with her memories but her papers and scrapbooks. At one time, I helped interview her for the Regional Oral History Office at her daughter's home in Piedmont during one of the taped sessions which, with her sedulously made manuscript corrections, created the present document. This is a record in which she has at last accomplished the task she had always set herself — to write a book about her experiences with California writers and artists.
As an accomplished raconteur, Elsie, like Mark Twain, is prone to remember more than what happened. She loves a good story and is fond of giving it color and a dramatic turn; occasionally the story is closer to
As a research worker, I became convinced that she could tell me much that I could not get from newspaper clippings and personal letters. She not only remembered the gossip which did not get written down, but she was remarkably adept in giving me a strong sense of personality — of the warmth of George Sterling's friendship or of the crassness of the behavior of a young Sinclair Lewis. Moreover, she could describe people as they looked and acted, could remember such things as their postures and the timbre of their voices. I was particularly struck with this latter gift; she, unlike many of us, had always noticed voices and could make you hear Jack London pontificate and George Sterling sing with his peculiar wail.
Elsie Whitaker Martinez came of her knowledge of writers early, as her father, Herman or "Jim" Whitaker, was a journalist and writer who was determined to tell effectively of his experiences as a boxing instructor in the British army, of his troubles while farming with a growing family in Manitoba, and of
Later, when George Sterling replaced Herman Whitaker as London's best friend and Elsie married Xavier Martinez at the age of seventeen, she moved to Piedmont, which had become something of a writers' center. Through her San Francisco and Oakland and Piedmont connections she came to know most of the writers of the Bay Area. She also came to know the members of the Carmel colony almost as soon as it was started by Sterling in 1906; after her marriage to Martinez she would go with him to visit the hospitable Sterlings and still later, when he was teaching summer art courses at the Del Monte Hotel in Monterey and in Carmel, she continued to come in contact with writers like Mary Austin and Harry Leon Wilson. At a still later date she moved to Carmel, where she now lives.
Still another contact with the writing world came through her friendship with Harriet Dean, financial manager of the famous Little Review which under Margaret Anderson's leadership in Chicago had been very influential in furthering the renascence of American letters which followed the First World War.
The other string for Elsie's bow was, of course, her contact with local artists. Through her marriage to Martinez, the flamboyant "Aztec" who loved to capitalize on his Mexican-Indian origins and his experiences in Paris at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, she came to know most of the aspiring artists of the region, from Maynard Dixon to Arnold Genthe. These not only included the painters who once had had their studios in the old Montgomery Block, but those who exhibited and taught at Del Monte and Carmel, as well as those associated with the California College of Arts and Crafts, where Xavier Martinez spent years as a teacher. The Martinez's daughter, Micaela or "Kai", is now a well-known painter of religious art; Elsie's son-in-law, Ralph Du Casse, is today one of the leading Bay Area painters and head of the Art Department at Mills College. Thus, Elsie Martinez, perennially young, has kept in touch with writers and artists to the present day.
In helping to record her memories, the Regional Oral History Office staff has, in my opinion, performed a unique service.
Professor of English, Emeritus
School of Humanities
Mills College
Oakland, California
Interview History
Elsie Whitaker Martinez was interviewed for the Regional Oral History Office as a part of a series on San Francisco Bay Area artistic and cultural history. The interview was undertaken at the request of James D. Hart, Professor of English, who served as faculty advisor.
Interviewers: Mrs. Willa Baum, department head, Regional Oral History Office, conducted seven interviews with Mrs. Martinez, with co-interviewer, Franklin D. Walker, sitting in on the last session as one who could bring his own depth of knowledge to the recording. Professor of English, Emeritus, Mills College, Dr. Walker has written a number of works relevant to this interview, among them: Frank Norris (1932), San Francisco's Literary Frontier (1939), Ambrose Bierce (1941), A Literary History of Southern California (1950), The Seacoast of Bohemia (1966), and Jack London and the Klondike (1966). Professor Walker had talked to Mrs. Martinez on other occasions in the process of gathering material for his books on Jack London and on the Carmel writers.
Time and Setting of the Interviews: The seven interviews were held during those times when Mrs. Martinez could leave her home in Carmel, California, and come to stay with her daughter in Piedmont: September 10, 11, 12, and 13, 1962; December 18, 1962; May 8, 1963; and July 9, 1963. The sessions began shortly after noon and were ended when her two granddaughters and their teenage friends arrived home from school.
All of the interviews were held at 324 Scenic Avenue, Piedmont, now the home of Mrs. Martinez's daughter, Mrs. Micaela Martinez Du Casse, but originally the studio of Xavier Martinez which and his friends built from the architectural plans of Frederick Meyer in 1908. The interviewer's first impressions were of much warm redwood; a large living room with a high ceiling in the middle contrasted by low, cozy, built-in places to sit and work around the edges of the room, paintings and art work everywhere; a breathtaking view of Oakland and the Estuary from the dining room table (carved by Herman Whitaker over sixty years ago); a whirl of life as three generations of a very active family bustled about the fairly small house. On the street level the
Mrs. Martinez always came up to Piedmont with her longtime companion, Miss Harriet Dean, and Miss Dean sat across the room from us during the interviewing sessions, playing solitaire and occasionally adding a word when Mrs. Martinez asked her for a comment. At the time of the recordings, Miss Dean had been ill for some time and was no longer able to participate in the vibrant way for which she is remembered by her contemporaries. Mrs. Martinez's devotion to her, and the attention required by her increasing illness and finally her death in September, 1964, was one of the reasons for the long hiatus between the recording sessions and the final completion of the manuscript in 1969.
Conduct of the Interviews: An outline of topics, necessarily complex because it covered not only her own life but that of her father, her husband, and many of her friends, was submitted to Mrs. Martinez prior to the interviews. This had been prepared with the assistance of Professor Hart, and by consulting books in the Bancroft Library and the scrapbooks of Xavier Martinez in the Oakland Art Museum. These are five large scrapbooks containing much material on the literary and artistic life of the Bay Area from 1890 to 1930: photographs, numerous sketches by Martinez, programs, newspaper clippings, and letters from such well-known persons as Arnold Genthe, Gelett Burgess, Jack London, Francis McComas, Charles Rollo Peters, Porter Garnett, Carrie and George Sterling, Jimmy Hopper, Gottardo Piazzoni, José Orozco, Diego Rivera, to mention but a few.
Mrs. Martinez prepared her own notes from the outline and preferred to follow her own line of narration, a course that required few questions from the interviewer. Her reputation as a lively and interesting conversationalist seemed well deserved;
Editing and Completion of the Manuscript: Following transcription, the interviews were edited and chaptered by the interviewer. Because of the conversational character of the recording sessions, considerable reorganization of the various anecdotes was required in order to fit such a wide variety of subjects into a topical-chronological format. In April, 1964, the transcript was sent to Mrs. Martinez for her editing.
It was Mrs. Martinez's wish to go over the transcript very throughly and to add many of the details that she had been collecting in her memory over a lifetime of observation and which she always intended to put into book form. Competing with this self-assignment was the need to care for Harriet Dean in her last months. In this same year Mrs. Martinez became a great-grandmother, and with her customary enthusiasm she took on much of the care and education of her great-grandson, a pleasant task which was doubled by the advent of a second great-grandson before her writing was completed.
In July, 1965, she returned the first chapter of her transcript, and by the end of 1967 all of it had been returned for final typing. True to her intentions, she had gone over the transcript page by page and had rewritten or revised it in great detail. The final draft is essentially her written manuscript, based upon the skeleton of the original outline and the spoken narration as edited by the interviewer.
The final typing and indexing of the manuscript, a demanding job because Mrs. Martinez had no facilities herself to retype her much-revised transcript, was completed by Mrs. Adrienne Fish in 1969. Professor Walker, J.R.K. Kantor, University Archivist, and James Sisson, Bancroft Library, all assisted in checking names and proofreading the manuscript. Professor Walker wrote the introduction. Mrs. Du Casse brought in photographs to be copied for the manuscript.
Interviewer
Regional Oral History Office
486 The Bancroft Library
University of California at Berkeley
Chronology
(As accurate as Mrs. Martinez can recall.)
Herman Whitaker, Xavier Martinez, Elsie Whitaker Martinez
- 1867
- Herman Whitaker born January 19, 1867, Yorkshire, England.
- 1869
- Xavier Martinez born February 7, 1869, Guadalajara, Mexico.
- 1886
- Whitaker emigrated to Canada.
- 1888
- Whitaker married on March 21, 1888, to Margaret Vandecar.
- 1890
- Elsie Whitaker born on March 1, 1890, Manitoba, Canada.
- 1893
- Martinez came to San Francisco to study art.
- 1895-1901
- Martinez studied art in Paris.
- 1895
- Whitaker family moved to Oakland.
- 1902
- Whitaker family moved to Silk Culture House, Piedmont.
- 1902-3
- Whitaker's first trip to Mexico as correspondent for Harper's.
- 1905
- Death of Elsie's mother, September, 1905.
- 1906
- Whitaker married Alyse Hunt
- 1907
- Martinez and Elsie married, October 17, 1907. Martinez exhibiting at Del Monte Gallery in Monterey.
- 1909-42
- Martinez teaching at California School of Arts and Crafts.
- Summers 1909, 1910
- Martinez teaching at Monterey.
- Summers 1911, 1912, 1914
- Martinez teaching at Carmel.
- Summer 1913
- Martinez in Arizona desert with Francis McComas.
- 1913
- Birth of daughter Micaela, August 26, 1913.
- 1914
- Whitaker, second trip to Mexico as newspaper correspondent.
- 1916-17
- Martinez teaching at California School of Fine Arts.
- 1916
- Harriet Dean came to California with the Little Review.
- 1917
- Whitaker, trip to France as war correspondent.
- 1919
- Whitaker died, age 52, on January 19, 1919.
- 1922-23
- Elsie, Harriet Dean, and Micaela in Europe. Moved to Harriet Dean's house after return from Europe.
- 1940
- Elsie and Harriet Dean moved to Carmel.
- 1943
- Martinez died, January 13, 1943, at Carmel after retiring from teaching and going to live with Elsie and Harriet Dean.
Herman Whitaker
Early Life
England
MartinezTo begin with, I will start with my father to whom I owe so much of this material and hope to give a more coherent and accurate study of his varied and interesting life.
He was born in Huddersfield, Yorkshire, England, an industrial town famous for its woolens. The Whitaker woolens were advertised in Vanity Fair and Vogue for many years. Naturally the Whitaker woolens were responsible for the family fortune. The town of Huddersfield, nevertheless, was more proud of its justly famous choir, of which he was a member, and its history — some Roman ruins and a tower of the Norman conquest — that made history a reality in his youth. The Norman Baron who took possession of the white, chalk lands of England owned the serfs, too. So the name originated after the freeing of the serfs from Jane and John of the White Acres to Jane and John Whitaker.
Until our John Whitaker married a Scotch girl, Annie Walton, our family had lived over a thousand years on the same land in England. Herman Whitaker's mother came of the venturesome Scots and from her, he inherited their romanticism, their nostalgia for the unattainable and their restless quest for distant goals. All this fitted neatly into his love and pride of the British Empire, on which the sun never set, as he was so fond of declaring.
His father spent most of his time in the old home in Huddersfield, running the business to keep his beautiful, intelligent and extravagant wife satisfied with her home and life in London. To her home, her uncle, Sidney Grundy, of the trilogy of Pinero, Jones and Grundy, popular playwrights of the Victorian Age, brought the interesting figures of the period. He brought Bret Harte there and father, after sitting at his feet for an evening, formed his resolve to go to California. Many years later, Mrs. Pat Campbell came to San Francisco in one of Grundy's plays. Father went to the matinee and afterwards met her, and they had a pleasant visit together talking of his uncle and her friendship and admiration for him.
His father died when he was sixteen and his mother, putting the business into the hands of the family, lived in London, taking with her her attractive sons Herman and Percy. From the romantic literature of her day, she had culled their names — Herman after the hero of one of Goethe's novels and Percy, whose blondness reminded her of the legendary medieval heroes.
Life ran smoothly until his mother's second marriage to a British Army surgeon who brought from Calcutta his bad liver, his irascible temper and his two Hindu cooks. It was not long before there was an explosion. One morning, the Major's cold eye cast upon them, his towering fury and his big stick sent the two lads scurrying up the stairway to the upper floor. Here they fortified
So with due thought, aided by the Major's concern over the Empire, they decided to heed Canada's heart-breaking appeals for settlers and send Herman and Percy to shore up the Empire in its hour of trial. Out to Canada they went — Herman considering
Baum
Did you ever meet your grandmother Whitaker?
Martinez
No. My grandmother died in 1914 and I did not get to Europe until 1920. However, I saw father's sister Agnes who was living with grandmother until she died. I'm afraid we were not a close family — so often with the English. She told me my father had kept in touch with his mother over the years, sending her his published stories, his books and any publicity he thought would interest or amuse her. On his arrival in England as a war correspondent, he found she had died while he was at sea. The excitement of war and the prospect of seeing father was too much for her. Her heart stopped in the night of her eighty-seventh birthday, four days before his arrival. Aunt Agnes told him of her alarm the night before she died when she talked of the small boy she loved and, when corrected, was disturbed to find he was a grown man.
Baum
What kind of education had he had?
Martinez
By the time father left England, he would have the approximate rating of two years of our junior college. His schooling had been at French's Academy and Crossley's School at Halifax. So much was demanded of an English boy — his education had to cover a broad historical background of the European scene of which England had taken part and he had to be familiar with the tremendous interests of their far-flung empire. Beyond that, on his coming to
Canada
BaumHow did he meet your mother?
Martinez
That was in Ontario, Canada. He was getting farm machinery there.
Baum
He still must have been an exceedingly young man. In 1886 he came over and in 1888 he married Margaret Ann Vandecar.
Martinez
I think he said he was 21 when he married.
Baum
You haven't told me anything about your mother.
Martinez
She was a heroic little person and would go through hell and high water for my father, whom she adored, cheerfully and uncomplainingly. She backed him at the start of his writing career, facing future hardship without a qualm, with the certainty he would be a great man.
She came, through her father, Winchell Vandecar, from Pennsylvania Dutch stock, noted for its fidelity and vitality. On her mother's side they were Scotch, from Boston, which promised an integrity and devotion characteristic of the Scotch. Her mother's name was Christie Ann Davidson, the name of Rockefeller's mother. It was sometimes customary for sisters to name daughters who came
My grandfather, a rigid Methodist, was troubled by the increasing laxness of the time in America and decided to join a Methodist group that had migrated to Canada. So they settled in Ontario to live according to the dictates of their strict and disciplined religion. My father wrote up some of the stories my mother used to tell us of the harsh treatment meted out to "sinners" with fanatical righteousness. Nothing of this fanaticism seemed to have touched my mother. She had a gentle and sunny disposition, a grand sense of humor that took any hardship in her stride, a real intelligence that developed under my father, and a big heart that embraced humanity. I was so much influenced by my father's ironical or satirical bent, I did not realize until many years later my mother had a delightful American sense of the ridiculous and often used pantomime the better to point up our failings. When father was writing stories of this narrow community, she would never let him stray from the truth and reality of their lives. He relied upon her knowledge of her people to keep him from exaggeration or taking out of character the life he was portraying. I remember their arguments over these problems of her people, and she always won.
What drew my father to her was her blonde prettiness — he was very dark, you know — my Uncle Percy told me their grandfather, a Captain Whitaker, an engineer in the British Army, was working on
Baum
Was your mother religious?
Martinez
Yes, until life with father. She so adored him she gave up Methodism without a qualm or a struggle. Besides, she said, it gave her a sense of relief and of freedom to be relieved of the terrors of strict Methodism that weighed upon her during her youth. Father, too, had drifted away from High Episcopalianism when he left England. Though his contact with socialism, natural philosophy, and science made it easier, he never lost his love for traditional liturgies and choirs and I remember, as a child, they so often sang hymns together. Science then was almost a religion and was opposed to the orthodox religions of the world. She accepted whatever father believed in wholeheartedly.
Baum
You were the second child then, born in 1890 when your father was about twenty-three.
Martinez
Yes, and my father was the midwife for the six of us, bringing us into the world. We were snowed in for four months in the winter in Manitoba, and as we all disconcertingly appeared in the wintertime, he would come down from the Hudson Bay Fur Post where he was working
Walker
Do you know what post he was working at?
Martinez
I don't know the posts for which he worked because he did not give exact names, though one could trace them by the locations.
Walker
It wasn't too far away from where you were in Manitoba, though.
Martinez
Not more than two or three hundred miles. That took you up pretty far north, though.
Baum
So during the winter your mother was alone with the children most of the time.
Martinez
She did not mind and was too busy with the care of children to have time to be lonely.
Baum
Do you remember anything of your life up there?
Martinez
Not at all. I was five years old when we left Canada. I remember a vague whiteness, that's all. My first memories really begin in a Seattle hotel, a small hotel in which a strong smell of pea soup pervaded the place!
Baum
Did your father look back on that period as a good period?
Martinez
Well, it was a period to gather material for writing. It was a hard life.
Baum
He wasn't nostalgic about it.
Martinez
Never! He didn't like pioneering, it was only the means to an end—writing. That reminds me of the stark beginning of a friendship in the north.
Father had written what he thought was a commonplace story — an experience of many of the post factors. He picked the most
Father was deeply disturbed — it was the old story of the lonely factor marrying an Indian girl and having a bright son and the inevitable failure of the boy to make good despite all the advantages and the good education given him—-tragic stories, usually with slight differences in the end — suicide, alcoholism, and even murder. Father unwittingly picked the end that fitted the factor's tragedy — murder. My father's heartfelt regrets, explanations, and apologies satisfied the factor and, in gratitude for a real friendship that resulted from their correspondence, sent father a Cree Indian dictionary compiled by a Jesuit priest who lived in the Arctic. The covers of the old book still smelled of campfires and recalled to father the many hours spent in the posts.
Baum
How did your family come to leave Manitoba?
Martinez
He left Manitoba for several reasons — the challenge that set him pioneering died of the defeats inflicted by an inhospitable nature; the monotony of the hard life; and the last and most pressing, the
It seems that an Indian boy, a guide was accused of killing a white man and, justly too, as it turned out later — in self-defense. Our homestead was the closest to the Indian Reservation. Father had picked it because a former settler had done quite a bit to the land, the former settler and his family having been scalped by the Crees who joined the last Indian uprising, the Riel Rebellion, just two years before. No one would settle on the land until father decided there was no longer any danger. My mother used to tell how, in the Fall, the Sheriff used to urge her to cover the windows of the cabin in the month of October when the Crees had their Ghost Dances, in which they invoked the shades of their great warriors and might go on the rampage.
To return to the Indian boy, the Sheriff confided to father that, if he took the boy he would lose the friendship and the confidence of the Indians and would no longer be able to protect the settlers and preserve the peace with the tribe that trusted him. So father rashly said, "I'll get him for you" and with the proper papers given him by the Sheriff in hand, he walked into the reservation and demanded that the boy be turned over to him. The Indians were so thunderstruck by father's dignity and courage, they gave the boy up and father took him into Winnipeg for trial. The day of the trial the whole tribe appeared in war paint and with their weapons and the judge, sufficiently intimidated, decided the evidence was in favor of the Indian boy.
Soon we experienced the wrath of the Indians. No longer did the Indian girls come to work for mother and all Indians who had been so friendly studiously avoided us. The crops were in and only stubble covered the prairies. That was a dry summer and the settlers were warned to be careful of fires. It was the warning of our good friend, the Sheriff, that saved us from a holocaust that would have taken all of us. He directed father to set back-fires around the area enclosing the corrals, barns and cabin and to have a fire guard around the place a day or two before the Indians set fire to the prairie. The enmity of the Indians was the last straw. His enthusiasm for pioneer life slowly ebbed under the implacability of nature and the hard and unrewarding pioneer life in Manitoba becoming a struggle for survival. In turn it chilled his response to the vast spaces that enclosed the Hudson Bay fur posts he loved. The rebellion of a romantic nature set in and revived his dream of California and set him into action.
Noting the sheriff's anxieties on their behalf after the prairie fire, father decided it was time to go. Knowing that no settler could leave the country with debts unpaid because they didn't want to lose a settler, father secretly sold what machinery he could and was able only to raise three hundred dollars — sufficient to carry Margaret and the youngsters down to Bret Harte's country, Oakland. So the old sheriff turned a deaf ear to the gossip about father's plans and hoped he could reach his goal. Dutifully, with a warrant, he accompanied Margaret on the Canadian train to the border, and with relief found that father was not there.
Father found that after eight years of pioneering one couldn't win, at that time, in Manitoba. There would be an average crop of wheat one year, followed by a year of drought and a crop failure, the third year there would be a good crop, yet none of the settlers could break even and get out of debt. Now knowing there was no hope in a country in which one's problem was to survive, at least he figured he had accumulated enough material for a book or two on pioneering that might pay for all the hard work and disappointments.
Reluctant to lose her settlers, Canada had a law that no debtor could leave the country, so the only way out was to skip over the border. So his brother-in-law took him by horse and buggy through the Badlands of the Dakotas while father took notes for future stories, down to the Great Northern train that carried him to Seattle to meet Margaret and the children.
First Years in Oakland
MartinezSo my father on a bright sunny morning landed in Bret Harte's Oakland with my mother, six children and another on the way, and five dollars. A kindly clerk in the 16th Street Station directed my father to a small house for rent a couple of blocks from the station. So, with a three dollar down payment, we took possession. There was no furniture and the pleasant owner managed to dig up for us some odds and ends — a couple of stools, a rough hewn table, and a small one burner coal oil cooking stove — discards down in the cellar. We ran from room to room with delight, amazed at the almost tropic warmth after the snow-bound pioneer cabin. Fortunately our living room and
I was restless and heard a strange sound, so unlike the familiar eerie wind, harbinger of the storm, that whistled and whined about the log cabin. I crept out of bed and found father and mother staring out the window. I had just tucked my chin over the window ledge when a man, his head thrown back and mouth open, screaming, reached our street light. A dark figure, following him, struck him down, swiftly emptied his pockets and disappeared. By the time father, quickly pulling on his pants and thrusting his arms into his coat sleeves, rushed out, the poor victim was surrounded by the neighbors and was past help. The neighbors, finding him a stranger, called the police who took the poor victim away. Then my horrified mother hustled me off to bed tucking me in with the other children. This was our introduction to Bret Harte's Wild West.
The next day our curious neighbors told my father that he had arrived in the midst of the Great Depression with large numbers of men out of work, sitting idly in the parks or drifting aimlessly about the streets. Though life was to prove rugged for a while, father was not dismayed. Looking like a gentleman he tramped the streets and byways getting any job he could — washing windows, cleaning floors, gardening, and, once, digging ditches. So we managed to survive until he was given a steady job, though temporary, in a
Oakland was mostly foreign colonies when I was a child. My father loved the picturesqueness, but due to problems that would come up that I was too young to know, he moved from one neighborhood to another. We lived amongst the Germans and found them kindly, the Scandinavians and Finns we found distant and cold, the Mexicans reserved and fearful of the "gringos", the Irish aggressive with a nationalistic hatred for the English that not even the hours their sons spent having instruction in boxing and gymnastics could dispel. But when we came in contact with the pressures and prejudices and an occasional pathological scandal that would occur in poverty-striken neighborhoods, we moved on to another district. We loved the Italians—gay, irresponsible, always laughing and singing. Unfortunately, a feud developed between two families and by mistake, the corpse was left on our doorstep — that was too much for father — we regretfully left our lovable Italians.
The butchering and grocery businesses were in the hands of the Germans; the fish and wine businesses were Italian; and the vegetable and laundry businesses were taken over by the Chinese. That period in Oakland was very picturesque and no one has taken the trouble to explore its history and write about it. Also, our estuary has a magnificent past that has not been salvaged. From our windows in
Our Italian fisherman, with his Neapolitan hat and bright, shiny horn whose clear notes brought all of us to greet him, to admire his Neapolitan cart with its garland of mermaids in a blue sea and to pat the old white horse. As we were the largest family on his route, he came last to our house. In his broken English he would press the left-overs into our basket with voluble explanations that we would do him a good turn in accepting them.
Our vegetable man was a slim, young Chinese lad with pigtails and a genial smile under his peaked hat. He would drop the swinging baskets from the pole across his shoulders to display the neat trays of prettily arranged carrots, turnips, radishes and vegetables in season. While mother decided on what she could afford, the Chinese lad would give each one of us a carrot or turnip or a couple of radishes, which meant much to us in those rugged days.
We loved our Chinese laundryman, a jolly, fat man who always
Our butcher was an impressive figure with great moustaches and a fierce look that commanded our admiration and respect, though always with trepidation, we stood looking in his window at the big, round baloney that always lay on the chopping block. He would pretend not to see us while cutting thick slices of baloney for us. We loved his great laugh when we mustered up enough courage to go in and watch the twitching of the fierce moustaches that belied his good heart.
Our pharmacist was a dry little man who peeked at us on our rare visits for a prescription, then filled our hands with broken candy from a large jar on his counter. No one seemed too disturbed by the number of us, always five or six, or more, for it was well known that we were the latest comers — the poorest family in the neighborhood.
Father had not too much difficulty finding work, though most of it was poorly paid. An English gentleman, he could get work cleaning windows or working in the gardens of the better homes. And having had experience with tools in pioneering, he got a job digging sewer trenches. However, he had a little trouble in the beginning. A tough Irishman was in front of him and a burly one behind him. They didn't think much of this "gentleman", so they tried the classic trick, to squeeze him out. The front one lagged, the back one shoved and soon he was unable to move in a tight spot between them. Father
Baum
Was he a very big man?
Martinez
Medium, 5' 10 1/2", that's not big and he was rather slight. But he was an expert boxer, fencer, and an outdoor man.
While working for the laundry firm father met his first socialist, a German grocer, Halvor Hauch, to whom he delivered laundry supplies. Hauch listened with interest to his pioneering experiences and he discussed with him the problems of the Great Depression and its inequities, using socialism as the only method of solving the present crisis and its economic problems. He was head of a Socialist cooperative grocery store and offered father a job working with him. In gratitude, father agreed to study socialism and joined the party.
Father had graduated from delivery clerk to collecting bills on a bicycle supplied by the laundry firm. He wrote his first story on the back of these bills while collecting. Halvor Hauch took my father to his first meeting of the Oakland Socialist Party and put him in touch with the group that represented the intelligentsia — three Englishmen, four Germans, several Scandinavians, and three Americans — who were trying to lift the party above its limited point of view of labor. Austin Lewis, an Englishman, was an expert organizer and planned the work for the group. It was there that my father met the young Jack London, a born revolutionary, who always signed his letters "Yours for the Revolution". But my father was
Now, this is an interesting thing about Jack London: he was not a good speaker, as far as socialist theory was concerned. But he was a splendid speaker as far as giving his experiences in life. He was simply superb, vivid, communicating richly and fully the vivid love of life he had. That was his charm and that was his ability. The young Jack had a vast respect for the British Empire. An anglophile, he admired the dignity of the Englishman based on his awareness that England ruled the world and, keeping the balance of power, preserved the peace of the world. On this foundation rested Jack's and my father's early friendship. They chanted Kipling's "Barrack Room Ballads" together, vaunting the imperialism that Marx was out to destroy and, later, when Jack became an ardent Marxist revolutionary, he lost his illusions of its greatness.
My father, with an English background, was a theorist and loved to expatiate on his theories. He also gave lectures on biology for the party. My mother had two linen sheets woven by her hardy pioneer aunts in Canada. They were accustomed to weaving all the materials for their clothing, as well. Father had painted
In the meantime, father had written his first story in the late hours of the night and in moments of spare time while working. Great were the rejoicings over its final acceptance. He desperately wanted to devote his life to writing and start on his career as a writer. Halvor Hauch, the German grocer and member of the Socialist Party, impressed by father's first published story, generously agreed to "grubstake" him to a year's groceries for the family. That was a rugged period, Scotch oats and canned milk for breakfast; flour for mother's bread for lunch and dinner; a slim amount of sugar and, over holidays, a slab of bacon or a small ham. After writing sixteen hours a day for a year, father made Harper's, who wanted a series of stories on pioneer life in Canada and its Hudson Bay fur posts. Then, in 1902 Harper's sent him down to Mexico to investigate the "rubber scandal".
Education of Elsie
BaumWhere did you go to school?
Martinez
I had very little schooling — only four years of grade school and
On my grandfather's side I come from a family of hardy Dutch and Scotch pioneers in Canada, whose average age was 100 to 102 years of age. My grandfather died at 99 and eight months and the family said, "Dear me, he died young, he didn't reach 100." Despite the record of both sides of the family for longevity, my mother died at thirty-seven of appendicitis and my father died of cancer at fifty, although his mother, a witty, charming old lady lived to be 87.
So, believe it or not, I was a sickly child, the only delicate child in the family. I didn't come quickly or graciously, I was a problem from the moment of my arrival. After 15 years of ill health, I reached the peak at 15 contracting pneumonia and diptheria together and survived both thanks to the Dutch stock. Then to break the record, I was ill only six days in the 45 years between 15 and 60 and at that only three days apiece for the big flu epidemic during the war and a minor flu ten years later. My mother's tales recalled the Vandecars as religious fanatics, but I must applaud their longevity, for which I am grateful.
I was too frail to go to school, so my father taught me to read in Charles Dickens' A Child's History of England, that set my love of history. From then on he took over my education and I didn't go to school until I was ten. As my father always said, "Elsie was a formidable child." If I didn't like the teachers of
In the seventh grade I had a remarkable teacher, Mr. Greenwell, who was later head of education in Oakland. He gave us an hour of Shakespeare every day. You couldn't drag me away from there. Greenwell very wisely familiarized the class with the plays by assigning us the parts and having us read them aloud. I stayed four years in the Piedmont grammar school and when I graduated, I went to Oakland High School.
Since I was mostly educated by my father, I found it difficult to fit into the high school curriculum. My father wanted me to go to college, so I had to take high school. However, it proved useful for I took French, Spanish, mathematics, and American history. I loved the colorful pioneer history and was proud that I was born in a log cabin like the great Lincoln I revered. So, I went to high school in the mornings only, attended my classes and went home at noon with my homework.
I had no contact with youth there. I had five brothers and a sister to care for so youth had no attractions for me. There were no distractions in our life — no cars, radios — and no money to buy pleasures. So life was very dull, save the hours spent in the Oakland Library or in my father's study listening to
My oldest brother, Herman, became a prizefighter and was Oakland's lightweight champion for some years; Relf was a mechanic in the Oakland Water Company and later became head of their machine shop; Laurie started as assistant to a kindly railroad engineer and worked up to yardmaster in the Western Pacific; Percy ran away to sea at fifteen, was cabin boy on a ship, transferred to the Navy and wound up a naval officer; John, the youngest, worked in the Water Company, too. Unfortunately none of the boys developed intellectual interests in their youth which was a great disappointment to my father.
My sister Vera, four years younger than I, was a pretty creature with large brown eyes, bronze-colored hair, a wide mouth and bewitching smile, a gay and lovable person. She and I could hardly have been taken for sisters. I was the classic blonde with masses of golden hair, regular features, slim and inclined to be haughty. She married three times and had three uninteresting children. Her last marriage was a happy one, at least, and she died of cancer at sixty years of age. I have an excellent study of her in the manuscript of the Whitaker book I am giving to the library.
I, unfortunately, was the only one of the whole family who loved books. Father once said in annoyance, "You're a beautiful girl, why should you have brains and want knowledge?" But since I had mental interests, he did his best to develop them. Before I was sixteen, I had covered a stiff course in European history, drama and literature and a thorough study of the British Empire. Then I decided to try philosophy. I started with the natural philosophers — Darwin, Spencer, Huxley — then Nietzsche and Schopenhauer. Father would let me stumble through the first chapter then he would go over each chapter with me smoothing out and elucidating the parts that to me proved to be a stumbling block. I dropped Kant because father assured me I would need logic for him. Plato and Aristotle, along with the Arabians, Avicenna and Averroes, were too profound, so I did not attempt to explore them until many years later. Thanks to Voltaire, I became interested in satire and waded through the Greek, Roman, French, Spanish and English satirists, much to my father's amusement, when I quoted them to the discomfit of an occasional friend who took himself too seriously. On becoming a Catholic in middle age, my stumbling block was the difficulty I had in loving humanity due to my satirists.
The one thing I enjoyed with my brothers were jaunts down to the picturesque estuary, wandering about the old wharves and looking at the old ships, wondering what seas they had crossed, the storms they had weathered, or staring at the jaunty clippers and listening to an old sailor who hung nostalgically about the
We had no cars in those days and we could not afford the streetcar, so I walked down the four miles, with my arms full of books, to the Oakland Library once a week. We were all great walkers in those days and thought nothing of walking five, ten or more miles. Each evening, when home, Father took the family for an evening stroll, winding through the canyons and over the hills of Piedmont for five miles or more — to keep us fit, he claimed.
When talking with Professor Walker I mentioned my father having known the celebrated historian Theodore H. Hittell. Mr. Walker exclaimed, "Did you know Hittell?" in a tone that implied a surprising distance into an historical past. Of course, it was in the last years of his life when my father knew him.
The only time I saw him was when his sweet daughter Kitty asked my father to bring me over to dinner at his home in San Francisco. The dinner was given for father. Because Miss Kitty was giving most of her attention to me, I have a clear picture of her. She reminded me of a picture I had of Elizabeth Barrett Browning with her clusters of little curls about her delicate face. Of her brother, I carried away only the impression of a tall, distinguished figure
The Hittell home was large and handsome, with great bay windows. The interior was a Victorian splendor with red velvet curtains and rich upholstery.
Baum
How come you stayed there?
Martinez
When Miss Kitty requested that I stay the week-end with her, I was overcome and a bit frightened. The bedroom with its rich furnishings and great canopied bed, reminded me of the pictures of court scenes with the queens and great ladies of my history books.
Piedmont
The Silk Culture House
BaumI believe you left the many foreign neighborhoods in Oakland and moved up to Piedmont. When was that?
Martinez
In 1902, to the "Silk Culture House" at the end of Mountain Avenue. The picturesque old house had an impressive sign across its front, "Silk Culture Experimental Station", popularly called "the bug house," was on a narrow ridge that dropped down into Hayes Canyon with its trees, heavy shrubbery and babbling creek. It fronted the large expanse of the towns of Oakland, Alameda, and Berkeley, spread out below,
The house was a large, well built eleven room house with high ceilings and six foot double windows. The old house was full of antiques and curiosities. The bedrooms were furnished with real mahogany colonial beds and matching highboys, brought around the Horn by the Sea Captain. The living room, left by the second tenant was tasteless. It had ornate tables and a gaudy lamp with a colored glass shade, ugly rep covered Victorian chairs and couches. The dining room was a jumble of massive Mission furniture and, to add to the confusion, my father's study looked like a museum of pre-Columbian antiquities — an accumulation of treasures from two years in Mexico—including Aztec sculptures, richly colored Mexican pottery, colorful blankets and Mexican silver.
The old house and the property had a clouded title. The government had donated the seven acres of land and the California legislature had appropriated funds for the project. Mrs. Kirkham had built the house on behalf of her nephew who was joint co-worker with the old Sea Captain on the experiment. The nephew, a mining engineer in Mexico, was killed there, so the property reverted to her. For several summers it did duty for a Y.W.C.A. Rest Home for working girls. A relic of their occupancy was the printed rules and regulations with the prize statement we cherished "Young Ladies! Do not empty your
On the seven acres of land was planted a mulberry orchard, on whose leaves the silkworms lived. The small, stubby trees grew quickly, and were soon productive. The silkworms had been imported from China. The project was well on its way to success when, unfortunately, the tariff on Chinese silk was reduced to such a low that the venture could not compete with Chinese labor. So, the silk raising experiment became a lost cause and a conversation piece. The only souvenirs left of the experiment were the beautiful silk culture displays elegantly arranged in massive gold frames.
Early Days of Piedmont
We moved to Piedmont in 1902, a short while before my father took his first trip to Mexico. Piedmont was then cattle country with its golden hills upon which was raised hay for the cattle ranches on the other side of our Skyline. The big event of the summer for us was the round-up and cattle drive whose trails wound over our hills and down into our Hayes Canyon. The big cattle ranches were over the Mt. Diablo area of which the most famous was the Blackhawk Ranch. There was another big ranch whose name I cannot recall who joined up and included their cattle with the Blackhawk herd for the cattle run. Both ranches had mostly Mexican cowboys. For parades and special occasions, like the cattle drive, they had appropriate outfits. The
The cowboys of the other ranch were clad in magenta silk shirts, brown leather jackets and pants and tan flat Spanish hats. These Mexicans sang beautifully, pausing now and then as they prodded and pushed the steers to keep them in line with a flow of curses that sounded musical to me, but delighted my brothers, accompanied by the skillful cracking of whips to keep the cattle moving.
On top of our hill was an old and twisted eucalyptus tree; leaning out on its wide branches we could watch the over twelve hundred cattle stream over the Skyline, weave in and out down the steep Thornhill grade, then pour into our narrow Hayes Canyon with a thunderous roar. They would then file out past the cemetery and fan out into the empty fields on the outskirts of Oakland to the slaughter houses on the edge of the Bay.
Each summer our boys scouted the ranches to find the day for the cattle drive and we never failed to be there to watch this truly beautiful spectacle. And it was with sadness and regret that the year following the earthquake the cattle drives stopped and we lost our greatest thrill of the year. After the earthquake, the sleepy town of Oakland, jolted awake by the earthquake, rapidly developed into a city. And our golden hills, on which was raised the hay to supply the cattle ranches with feed for the cattle and horses, succumbed to progress and homes and tracts crept up the hills and topped
Our Hayes Canyon was named after Captain Jack Hayes, a Texas Ranger, who bought the large Moraga land grant that enclosed our canyon. In his autobiography, his nephew, the celebrated John Hayes Hammond, wrote several delightful pages on the holidays with his brother spent on his uncle's ranch — the glorious and exhilirating hours roaming the hills and exploring the lush canyons and taking part in the many activities of a great cattle ranch.
Hayes Canyon was a favorite spot with the ornithologists of the University of California. In the early days, mushroom-shaped scrub oaks dotted the sunny hillside and, opposite, hazelnut thickets, the tall thimbleberry and thick, low-spreading blackberry bushes clung to the shady hillside providing food and shelter for the migratory birds. And down in the secluded sunlit hollow, law a babbling creek in which they could drink and bathe after a long flight.
Our two favorite birds were the friendly bluejay, with his swooping flight and noisy chatter, and, his contrary, the shy, seldom glimpsed russet-backed thrush, the inimitable songster, whose full throated, fan shaped cascade of clear notes held one spellbound at eventide.
After our return from a year in Europe in 1920, we were shocked to find our ranches were being broken up for building tracts, roads criss-crossing our golden hills and garish tract offices vaunting the values of this ruined land. And our pretty creeks, hidden in the canyons, in which we bathed our tired feet after long, hot walks
When I was young, the business section of Oakland ran from Fourteenth Street down to the Bay where the nickel ferry awaited us to take us to San Francisco. To go to San Francisco took an hour but, if the ferry were stranded on a mudbank at low tide, the trip covered two hours. Then Havens Key Route replaced the nickel ferry and the Key Route Station just below us at Fortieth Street and Piedmont Avenue was the end of the line. The dedication of the Key Route was a memorable affair. The dedication plans included a request for our seventh and eighth grade classes to sing at the dedication. The mayor of Oakland, a couple of prominent businessmen, and the son of Frank C. Havens, who represented him, gave the proper official speeches on acquisition of the Key Route as a fabulous addition and a testimony to the amazing growth of Oakland. The applause for our singing had hardly died down than the first train rumbled into the station. With lusty cheers we pelted it with our now wilted flowers, brought for the occasion. Then the mayor, with a grand gesture, ushered us into the train for our promised reward, the first train trip to the ferry slip, aboard the boat and across the bay to San Francisco and back. You can imagine what a great event this was for us.
Before the Key Route was running, Frank C. Havens had given father a pass to walk out on the pier any time convenient to him.
Frank C. Havens, who was a New Yorker bought a large acreage taking in the hills from Claremont to Joaquin Miller Park. To him this cattle country was barren land and as such had no appeal to him. So to beautify it he planted two million trees — Monterey pines, several varieties of eucalyptus and cypress. We Whitakers used to hop rides on the large wagons carrying the young trees for planting and watched the woodsmen skillfully settle them in the ground. Moreover, he rode the trails of his domain scattering seeds for a ground cover. They sprouted and increased until, a few years later, a dark shadow was cast over much of our golden hills. Twenty years later a tax appraiser told me bluntly, "He planted them as `land improvement' to lower his taxes," so the legend of his love of beauty lost its glamour.
We watched this area grow. From this Scenic Avenue window, which covers the same space as the old Whitaker house. There was a little patch of lights in Oakland, a little patch of lights in Berkeley, and a little patch of lights in Alameda. That was all.
Did you know the Havens family?
Martinez
Yes, we knew Frank and Lila Havens and their son Wickam. It was to their son that we owe the land on which this studio is built — an exchange of a lot for a picture.
My mother died in September, 1905, leaving a gap in our lives that would be hard to fill. Two years later my father married Alyse Hunt. We children had no objection to our father marrying again. However, the day that Alyse stepped into the house she made it plain to all of us that she had no interest in us, would have no part in our lives, and, moreover, wished to have as little to do with us as possible. So far as we were concerned, we reciprocated cordially and lived accordingly, a very difficult situation for my father. So, family life in this discordant and indifferent atmosphere disintegrated rapidly. I soon found I was isolated on the top of the hill with the youngsters and, staying another six months, I put the family in training to get along without me and married Marty.
By the end of the year Alyse showed signs of becoming a mental case, then we understood her attempts to alienate father from his children, a rugged experience for all of us including our poor father who had to combat and survive her insane jealousy and unjustified suspicions.
Baum
There were two years when there was no mother.
Martinez
Yes, two years. I ran the family then.
Mexico
MartinezTo go back to 1904, the "rubber bubble" burst and the worthless stocks left much ruin in their wake, especially to small investors lured by this get rich scheme. Harper's decided to send father down to investigate conditions in the rubber plantations and find the reasons for this disaster. So to Tehuantepec, Mexico he went and his sensational discoveries were the material for "The Planter".
He found that the American plantation was run by an alcoholic incompetent who was the butt of the jokes amongst the planters. The beautiful pictures of the plantation printed in the elaborate brochure were purloined from the only highly successful planter in Tehuantepec. Father also discovered the fraudulent method of obtaining cheap labor for the plantations, and the resulting conditions that defied description. At that time the Mexican government, unknown to Diaz, was rounding up recalcitrant Indians, and, especially the Yaquis who had revolted and put up a fight that did considerable damage to government troops. The prisoners were rounded up, sent down to the tropics and sold at five dollars a head to the planters. When Indians became scarce, the "Jefes" emptied the prisons and sent the prisoners down at the same price.
So father, to get the practical experience he needed for his book, and to carry out a plan to better the conditions for this slave labor, took entire charge — for six months — of the plantation of a young Englishman who wished to return to England for his bride.
Did your father make a living taking care of this plantation and writing?
Martinez
No. From the time he first got into Harper's he made his living entirely by writing. He, of course, published in other magazines.
Baum
Was it possible to make a living doing that?
Martinez
Yes, life was simpler then.
In the spring my father left for Mexico, putting us into the hands of his good friends. We had three stalwart boys, good at fishing and hunting, a vegetable garden, chickens, and nature's bounty in the summer. That casualness might seem odd in these regimented days, but in that period assistance was taken as a matter of course for writers and artists. So we managed to get along comfortably. When father did not return on schedule, we soon heard rumors afloat in Piedmont that he had deserted us. Mother, a gallant little person who had perfect confidence in her erratic husband, blithely denied that there was any such possibility and convinced the kindly neighbors she had no fears or qualms about the matter. However, the wealthy Piedmontese decided to care for us, the first poor family in this section of wealthy estates. So, during the winter, their carriages filled with luxuries rolled up our hill. We were so regally cared for we sometimes expressed the hope, with a sigh, "Maybe it would be just as well if father never came home," amended to " for a long time, of course". A telegram when he reached the border, a card telling her not to worry before he started into the tropics, and no word until a year later a letter announcing that he was on
On reaching home, he looked us over and remarked, with a laugh, "Well you're all fat, but you'll slim down when you live on the scale you once were used to". We all beamed knowing that plain English fare would be seasoned with tales of Mexico, of strange places and wild adventure. So we were glad he had come home.
Baum
You children didn't resent that he went away?
Martinez
No, we admired my father extravagantly.
He had some wild adventures that are not generally known here. To begin with, he had an Indian wife and he said there was a little Whitaker wandering around in the tropics somewhere.
Father told mother and his friends of his unceremonious departure from Tehuantepec owing to his amazement and consternation at finding tacked up to the wall in the railroad station, a mystery to the stationmaster, a Harper's blurb announcing his colorful articles in preparation for their magazine, of the shocking conditions on the rubber plantations and their scandalous treatment of the Indians there. Though the station was some distance from the plantations, father knew what would happen to him if the planters, to whom this would be a serious matter that could start an investigation, were to find this announcement of his revelations. Too many of the planters, expert gunmen, were in the habit of settling all scores in the Wild Western fashion and it might be a matter of life or death to him. So, tearing up the blurb, he hopped the train and started back to Mexico City. His good friend, Mr. Guernsey, editor of the Mexican Herald, advised him to return to California until the uproar, despite father's defense of Diaz, his articles would cause in Mexico, died down.
An echo of the feud caused by father's published articles reached Piedmont a year later. One sunny morning the boys were sawing and splitting wood, save for young Herman who had left for good shortly after father's marriage, and Vera and I were pulling weeds out of our small flower garden that had barely survived the assaults of our pet goat and the predatory chickens, when a tall, lean American loomed up before us and asked, "Does Mr. Whitaker live here?" "Yes, father is out for a walk and will be back soon," I replied. I invited him into the house to wait for father. The youngsters, used to strangers from all parts of the world coming to see father, followed curiously. The stranger looked at me with puzzled expression and asked, "Has Whitaker a family?" After my introducing the youngsters to him he said with a chuckle, "This is a surprise! Whitaker never told us he had a family." With an approving look at us he said, "I'm Gibson, a planter from Tehuantepec." To our excited questions about the tropics he gave our spellbound group tales of life in the tropics, on the plantations, hunting forays in the jungle, and the intricate ways and means of capturing wild animals and the elusive boa constrictor. On the boys' eager demand, he showed them his pistol and, to their questions about the thin notches on the handle, he told with an amused smile, "These are for several bandits, one for an uncooperative petty official and a couple for escaped Indians," and with a chuckle he added, "Your father has a couple of nicks on his gun and you'd better ask him about them!" Just then the door opened and father, a startled look on his face, paused, then greeted Gibson. Rising, Gibson said,
Just before World War One, "The Planter" was made into a movie. Because of the Mexican Revolution raging at that time, the production was transferred to Guatemala, with its jungles and Indians for local color. Of course, lacking the rubber plantations of Tehuantepec, its realism was rather thin, but the shots of the lovely tropical scenery and the vivid shots of rainstorms made up for many lacks. However, today it would be technically poor and the handling of the story unsatisfactory. The part of the planter, the hero, was played by Tyrone Power, Senior, a "heavy," in the theatrical parlance of the day,
After father's death, Twentieth Century Fox bought "Over the Border" from his widow. It is the story of three American derelicts devoting the last of their worthless lives to saving the life of a pretty daughter of an American mining engineer killed by revolutionaries, bringing her through many perils to the American border. Using their rather dubious skills and shady dodges, fighting Indians, outwitting Mexican bandits, and circumventing the Government Rurales who were looking for them, they brought her safely to the border. However, at that time, Mexico was making vigorous protests to Washington about using Mexicans for all their villains in American films. So, Fox transferred the story into the Oklahoma land rush and our heroes became entangled with fighting Indians and coping with the wiles of Western bad men, a typical Western with the title "The Three Bad Men". The production was very elaborate, but I don't remember the cast or the date on which the film came out. My step-mother sold the rights and, as she shared nothing with us, we knew nothing of the transaction until the film appeared in our movie house in Oakland.
The Madera Revolution had happened and its promise was unfulfilled. Diaz was out and Mexico was in a turmoil with Villa still on the move and the central figure in our news of Mexico. Villa created a sensation by sending raiding parties over our border, so father trotted back to Mexico as war correspondent for the Oakland Tribune. He joined up with Villa who welcomed reporters and photographers
Obregon was Villa's lieutenant when father joined him and they had many talks together of the problems with the Indians who wanted the land and with American and European businessmen who owned much of the rich resources of Mexico. Father predicted that Obregon would be President of Mexico some day and years later he proved to be an excellent prophet.
Father used to tell several stories that characterized the man, Villa. He was a strict disciplinarian with his army men and one day at lunch in Villa's quarters the sound of raucous voices rose up to the windows from the yard below. Villa looked black and gave an order to his aide, "Find out what's going on there!" The aide returned to report simply, "A couple of drunken soldiers fighting". Villa rose,
The other story concerned a brilliant young officer whom he was grooming to be a military figure. The lad had fallen in love with a charming young girl — daughter of a haciendado — and she begged him not to go on their next battle for fear of losing him before their marriage, which was soon to be celebrated. To this request Villa merely said, "I want to see this remarkable young lady" and abruptly dismissed the young officer. Later that afternoon he brought his lovely fiancee in the hopes her beauty and charm would win him over. Villa stared at her coldly, shot her dead and turning to the young officer said sharply, "We'll have no problems now," and left the room.
In the meantime, the raids on the border caused much excitement in Washington and as a result of the furor, Pershing was delegated to take a small army to Mexico and chasten Villa. So, father rushed back home and made arrangements to join Pershing as correspondent for the Tribune again. Because father had just returned from campaigning with Villa, he had many talks with Pershing. Father explained that Villa was a desert fox, knew every water hole in the desert because we had no adequate air force then, and was as tricky and fleet as the little animal he emulated. They became friends and Pershing explained the main objective of this troop display was to show Mexico we had an army and, under provocation, would use it. That settled the border
War Correspondent in France, 1917
Father had taken out his first papers for naturalization in 1901 and had not taken out his last ones as there was no need of them until he was going to Europe and had to have a passport. So, through the good offices of Pershing, his last papers were promptly made out and he could go to Europe as an American correspondent.
Father wanted to cover land and sea, so Pershing put him in touch with Admiral Sims, who kindly and generously, gave him every opportunity to cover the Navy activities at sea. As father planned to write a book on submarine warfare, he was given a permit to go on an eight day submarine cruise on duty in the war zone, a thrilling experience but whose mission was kept for the records.
He was privileged, thanks to the generosity of Admiral Sims, to cover every section of the fleet — battleships, destroyers, transports, sub-chasers, mine-layers and sweepers, a cruise on a submarine in the war zone, and especially the palatial yachts of J.P. Morgan. All of this invaluable material which was to be used for writing and lectures was lost by his premature death three weeks after the Armistice. Fortunately the manuscript of "Hunting the German Shark" was in the hands of the publisher already — Century Company.
Then as all recognized that the war was coming to a close he went "over the top" with the American boys in the last big battle, and if luck were with him, he hoped he might die on the battlefield. He had suffered much pain for years and ignored it. But with the increasingly agonizing attacks and the mounting pain that could not be relieved, he felt sure he had cancer, but did not know he was in the last stages of it. My brother Percy, who was on a destroyer, saw father on his last leave in Paris and was alarmed at how badly he looked. When he questioned father about it, he admitted he was taking enough laudanum, as the doctor had told him, to kill a normal person, but that his system had gotten used to it. When drugs and walking no longer controlled the pain he said with a laugh, "I hope to die a hero's death on the battlefield soon," an acknowledgement that he knew how serious a condition he was in. When I saw Bill Irwin in New York in 1920 he told me father was a legend among the newspapermen at the front, not only for his gallant struggle against pain but for his amazing and wide experiences despite his handicap.
So, camera in hand, father followed the soldiers, stumbling over the rough terrain, crawling in and out of a couple of shell holes, and as evidence of a barrage, several bullet holes in his coat sleeve and pants. He emerged from the battlefield without a scratch, much disappointed that instinct over-reached his desire to be a hero. All of this is graphically recorded in the last report from the war zone published in the Oakland Tribune.
In the morning he crossed the bridge taken the night before by our forces only to find the Germans had returned and taken possession of the bridgehead. A couple of German soldiers took him by the arm and very politely ushered him into the temporary headquarters to be interviewed by their captain. The officer, who spoke perfect English, explained, as he looked over father's papers, that he had lived several years in New York. Handing the papers back to him he said, "The armistice is to be declared in an hour, so we can chat about New York in the meantime." At the end of the hour, the announcement was made over the radio, father was released with much courtesy and crossed the bridge back to his own lines where a great celebration was already in swing. So, he could add to his exploits that he was the last prisoner of war of the Germans.
Death January 1919
MartinezAll this time he was dying of cancer.
Baum
He knew that before he went, didn't he?
Martinez
He had a large suspicion. He didn't know how serious it was, but he had a suspicion. His father died of cancer, so he was quite sure he had it. He had all the symptoms for years, but he just ignored them.
I must not forget to put on the record that father was so proud of the honor of representing the American participation in the war for Land and Water, the celebrated English Army and Navy paper. After America's entrance into the war he had met Mr. Foster,
Admiral Sims had made arrangements for my father to return on one of the battleships for the fleet's grand entrance into New York harbor, to be greeted with great pomp and fanfare. While awaiting orders the day before he was to go aboard, he became critically ill. His plans cancelled, he was put to bed on a steamer heading for New York. On its arrival he was transferred to an ambulance, sent to St. Luke's Hospital, and was operated on the next morning and was found to have cancer in the last stages. Three weeks later he died. And so ended a life full of promise, at fifty-one, and with so much to communicate, lost. He had often said, "My best work lies ahead of me".
For the first time in his life he had hoped to have the leisure to write a book in which he planned to cover all of his experiences in the land and sea war — the triumphal entrance into Metz with our troops, etc. — the many unforgettable and heartbreaking incidents, the devastation and tragedy of war and the glory and honors of victory! As he often said, his best work was ahead of him and was now never to be fulfilled. Bill Irwin told me Hearst had asked father to head an information program to bring Europe and America closer together — to go on the radio — and his lecture tour was already planned. Bill felt
In St. Luke's Hospital, Doctor Westerman, Teddy Roosevelt's physician, declared that father was the most remarkable case he had ever handled. The whole of his liver was gone and quite an area of his intestines was eaten away with cancer. He marveled that father had kept on his feet for so long.
So when he died the battle began between my stepmother and the family. Father was separated from my stepmother before he went to Europe. Dr. Westerman said that she had taken about ten years off his life, the nervous strain of putting up with a mentally unbalanced woman. She was a mental case, and was only released from the sanatorium to be with her mother.
Baum
In what year did he marry her?
Martinez
1906.
Baum
And your mother had been dead one year. How did he meet Alyse Hunt?
Martinez
The San Francisco earthquake was responsible for both our marriages. Alyse and her husband, Reggie Bassett, were refugees stranded in Oakland when Marty and father ran across them. On hearing their tale of woe, father brought them up to Piedmont to stay until they could get back to San Francisco where Reggie had a job in a small orchestra. They stayed two months, long enough for Alyse to figure out that Reggie was a"musical bum"and father a"good catch". Actually, Reggie was an excellent musician. He played the piano and several instruments well enough to fill in an orchestra when needed, and was an expert in arranging scores and planning effects.
Father was lonely that first year — so dangerous to widowers —
On her return to San Francisco, Alyse packed her bags and announced she was on her way to get a divorce. Reggie, a quiet and not very communicative fellow, calmly agreed — with a celerity that annoyed and hurt her vanity — however on second thought it eased her conscience and she set about planning her second marriage.
Reggie, now free of his wife, whom he confided to his friends was a "drag," trotted down to Hollywood where his abilities and his prodigious musical memory were appreciated and his talents with instruments flowered until he wound up as head of Paramount's music department. This was in the days of the silent films when music was so important. With his new post he acquired a chateau, a Cadillac, and lived like a king surrounded by adoring sycophants.
The divorce granted, after a brief honeymoon they returned to Piedmont. Her entrance into the family was unique, to say the least. Although she had paid scant attention to any of us while staying with us, we youngsters decided to accept her as cheerfully as possible, since she was now father's wife. At the first dinner at home she came out of father's study — now shared with him — and stated, "Though married to your father, I want you to know that I am not taking on the role of mother," and not seeing the frozen expressions that had taken the place of our smiles went on, "My life here has no connection with your family life." Then, catching my father's shocked expression, she finished lamely, "If we understand each other I know we can get along nicely". In the total silence that followed she chatted on about some new songs she was to work on and the parties to be given for her and father. Then, finishing dinner briskly, picking up the teapot and two tea cups, she took father off to the study.
We sat for a few moments with heavy hearts dimly aware that she was separating our father from us and wondering what our future would be, cleared off the table, washed the dishes as usual and went to bed. I knew that my place as father's hostess, of which I was so proud, was gone and no longer would I accompany him to lectures,
We saw little of Alyse as she spent most of her time between her boudoir and the study, preparing for the whirl she and father were engulfed in. She was 26 years old and I was 16. She was vain as a peacock and often remarked "We could be sisters," which was not complimentary to father and you can imagine how that displeased me. I soon found her dislike of me was active enough to keep me out of everything and to leave me isolated on top of the hill looking after the family. Though I had qualms about leaving the family, I felt sure I could watch over them since I was only going over the hill to Marty's studio to live. So, I married Marty on October 17, 1907.
Father had given orders that his wife, from whom he was separated, was not to be notified of his death. It was already known among his friends that he was going to divorce her on his return home. He was planning to marry a very charming girl named Mary Bourn, who wrote a book called The Geese Fly South.
Alyse made a drama over his death — prostration — though she kept her lawyers busy — and in deep mourning (because it was becoming)
As soon as Dr. Westerman notified Miss Bourn that there was no possibility of father's recovery and he had only a few weeks to live, she wrote Vera her first letter and Vera read it to all of us. Vera telegraphed Miss Bourn that Laurie was on his way to New York and would pick up his brother Percy. They went to the hospital only to find he had died the night before their arrival. So Miss Bourn did for them what she so kindly had done for their father — consoled them with a gentleness and warmth that eased the shock. She kept them close to her during the Episcopalian service held in the mortuary chapel. Afterwards she took them for dinner to her apartment and, later, she carried out father's wishes that Vera should have his personal baggage left in her care. Thanks to her generosity I have all the official papers he had with him and my brother turned them over to me since Vera only wanted the letters of Pershing for her son who was in the R.O.T.C. On being notified officially of my father's death, Alyse had her lawyers pick up his trunks containing all his war souvenirs and we never could find out what became of them.
The head of the mortuary had turned over to Laurie his father's ashes, as it was his wish and plan to have the family scatter them over the hillside on the Skyline Boulevard he loved so much. On Laurie's return, the family gathered together, and getting into the family
We lingered silently, overlooking the view father loved, a soft breeze rippling the already tall grasses on the hillsides; and from the wooded canyons below, came the pungent scent of sage and wild mint; and memory followed the old road that wound up the Thornhill Grade over which the early pioneers traveled and, in the past, after the "round-up," we watched the cattle drive, a weaving, massive thrust into the valley below; beyond lay the Bay of burnished silver and, across it, rose the towers of San Francisco and, encircling the Bay, the expanding towns reaching up into the hills; across the Bay the Golden Gate, outlet to the Orient, was tied to Tamalpais, a beautiful mountain whose outlines, to father, had a curious resemblance to the romantic picture he loved on our wall at
After father left for Europe I had a full and interesting life and I promptly forgot Alyse, that poor, unstable creature who, however, bombarded father with unfounded complaints and accusations that I was persecuting her. I grew tired of his admonitions and suggested we had better forget each other until after the war when we could thrash out the whole matter with some degree of saneness and calmness. I had Marty, a picturesque and popular figure in San Francisco. However, I felt acutely the bitterness and misunderstanding that separated us, caused by Alyse, and the tragedy of the unfulfilled life ahead of him. I had written a letter to him hoping it would arrive before his death, of my regrets for the bitter years and the love that I still had for him. Our sorrow was deepened now that we would not be able to express to him what he had been in our lives and only the loss remained. At the suggestion of Miss Bourn, the letters from the family were put in the coffin with him when he was cremated.
Unfortunately, the lawyer I consulted about father's affairs, took it for granted that we knew we had, at least, the right to some of his personal effects. We did not know anything about the laws, so we got nothing out of the house that rightfully belonged to us. I wanted the old leather box in which he kept all his records, neat notebooks with the record of every manuscript sold, copies of them, letters from his publishers and from other sources, newspaper clippings of the honors and events of his life through the years, and the large correspondence his work brought him. I wanted the old Cree Indian dictionary compiled by a Jesuit and given to him by the old factor in the Hudson Bay Post, photos and mementoes of Canada—the country in which I was born. About five or so years later a friend wrote that he saw a notice in Los Angeles of an auction of my father's possessions — books, paintings, war souvenirs. He rushed to the auction room only to find the auction over and everything scattered and he could get no information for me. I especially regretted a large portfolio of beautiful color drawings Marty made of me, the old house and the many family activities — a delightful and priceless record of our family life while he was with us, after the earthquake.
Soon after his death, while in Los Angeles, Alyse had captivated an old actor who played butlers in the movies and they were married. He was the father of Clara Kimball Young. In six months he pitched her out and she appeared in San Francisco as a newspaperwoman with the name Whitaker. But she soon disappeared from sight again.
My desire, above all, was to have the old leather box in which father kept his account books so neatly inscribed, in which he carefully recorded the revisions and peregrinations of each manuscript. He often retold the tale of the first story sold to the Black Cat, a small magazine at the time, for which he was paid five dollars, which barely covered the expense of its travels to the many magazines of the period. In it were newspaper clippings covering the whole of their socialist activities; of honors and events in his life; of his Mexican journeys; communications from his publishers; book and movie contracts; and many interesting letters from old friends. In his library were autographed books of Jack London and from Ina Coolbrith, autographed letters and books of Bret Harte and a beautiful, complete de luxe edition of Joaquin Miller. She gave him affectionately inscribed writings and poems. Before I forget it, at a lecture she gave in San Francisco, after my father's introduction, Ina Coolbrith stated, "Bret Harte was the love of my youth, but Herman Whitaker is the love of my old age." On his walls were many of Marty's sketches of Paris and Piedmont, and a large portfolio of color drawings and cartoons of the old house and its occupants — a delightful record of the family's life in Piedmont. Last of all was his large collection of war souvenirs and posters, some of them historic and very valuable. When my father died, Alyse's lawyers had his trunks impounded in New York and sent out to her. In a
To fill in, in New York, before going to the front, father found his ideal woman, a charming writer with an understanding mind and a devoted heart. Mary Bourn was a charming, thoughtful and intelligent young woman who had already had a book published. I think
Writing Habits
BaumI'd like to know a little about your father's writing habits. When did he write?
Martinez
In the first two years he wrote sixteen hours a day — until he got into Harper's magazine. They were interested in pioneer life, so he had a good outlet for the pioneer experiences.
He fixed up a study in the house each time we moved and I remember that the decor of the first study in Oakland was Japanesque — bamboo matting and bamboo trim on the walls, a Japanese bamboo receptacle for plants, ferns mostly, that he picked up in the woods. The second study was a sea motif — blue ceiling with stars, fish nets draped on the walls (old ones the fishermen gave him), shells and dried starfish scattered about. After his trip to Mexico, the Piedmont study was Mexican — brilliant colored blankets on the sofas and chairs, Mexican leather work, gorgeous pottery and silver on the bookcases, much of it given to him, and the rest picked up in the "Thieves Market" in Mexico City. The last study in the home he built in Piedmont on our hill was pioneer style — rough wooden interior, many built in bookcases, a fireplace of rough bricks,
To go back to his working habits, when settled in the old Silk Culture House in Piedmont, he rose early, did a couple of hours of typing, then went for a five or ten mile walk in the hills while he worked out his plot and characterizations. His evenings were usually spent giving literary lessons or talks to small groups, or with friends. In the meantime, he first wrote tales of the Hudson Bay fur posts, the hardships of pioneer life, a series on life in a small Scotch community, from his own experiences — winters in the Hudson Bay posts and eight years of pioneering in the Manitoba wheat belt.
Which reminds me, while living in the Irish quarter, their distaste for the English was clearly evident in their caustic comments and criticism of my father as a queer fellow who sat at home all day and apparently did nothing. So when the first $100 check came in from Harper's magazine, the boys decided to show it to the neighborhood gossips. A hundred dollars then is the equal to several hundred now. Properly impressed, they grudgingly accepted us, but with no great enthusiasm, and were relieved when we left because our boys had fought their way into control of the neighborhood group, thereby offending their national pride.
Father's life was a very picturesque one. In the tropics of Mexico one always carried a machete to cut the fast growing jungle growth that obstructed the trails; and your gun was slung over the
At the time of the 1906 earthquake, father had accompanied the scientific expedition that investigated the damage down by the fault in the northern area. He decided to cover the southern area with photographs for his assignment for Harper's Weekly. So, taking me with him, we followed the course of the fault to Mussel Rock, where it dropped into the sea. The fault had opened up large cracks in the earth, a network like a giant spider web that looked somewhat formidable. Father inspected several of them until he found one, that partially caved in, would be safe. So with his help I climbed down and stretched out my arms, touching the rims with my hands to show their width. The photos were published in Harper's Weekly.
Xavier Martinez
Early Life
Mexico
BaumWe are leaving a lot out in between, like your father's friendship with Jack London, but let's talk about your husband now. Then we will come back to the other people you knew. I have read that your husband was born in Mexico on February 7, 1869, and that he was part Indian.
Martinez
Marty was very proud of having been born in Guadalajara, the cultural city of Mexico. He always said, "Guadalajara where I was born", as if he was sharing the distinction of his native city, which was justly celebrated for having the first university in the New World and a flourishing art school. Guadalajara was a conservative stronghold and was little disturbed by the rising tide of discontent that brought about the downfall of the benevolent Diaz and set in motion the revolutionary storms that, later, were to sweep over Mexico. In Marty's youth, conservatism reigned in Guadalajara. The only problem to the Church, was the increasing power of the Masons in their community — subversively battling the Catholic Church and secretly promoting any disturbance that furthered their aims to discredit the Church. Marty's father became a Mason and it was not long before the Bishop warned him that they would withdraw their business were he to continue to flaunt his Masonry by having his shop as their headquarters. So the big business built up by his grandfather was withdrawn, and he soon
Although Marty had absorbed considerable propaganda he was more interested in the growing concept of the "New Race", which was to rise in the future from the revival of the Indian cultures due to a crash program of archaeology. The head of the art school considered Marty a genius, and knowing that Rosalia La Bastida Coney's husband, also a Mason, was now Consul General of Mexico in San Francisco, appealed to her to help Marty. So she sent for Marty, took him into her home, and put him into the Mark Hopkins Art School in San Francisco. Coney also gave him part-time work in the Consulate, so he could feel somewhat independent.
His first year of adjustment was a difficult one. His English was not yet adequate, so when Arthur Mathews, staring at his somber studies of Indian rituals remarked, "rocks", and passed on, Marty did not know what he meant and was too shy to ask questions.
When Marty became discouraged, Rosalia rushed to the defense of her young genius and demanded to see Arthur Mathews. On Mathews calmly assuring her that "If Marty must paint, have him paint carriage wheels", she indignantly recalled his recommendations and honors won in the Guadalajara Art School which Mathews had not seen. Her unshaken belief in the abilities of her protege impressed Mathews and he promised to do what he could to help Marty. Until Marty's English sufficed, he got a student interpreter and gave him
In the meantime Rosalia became his foster mother and she, a Spanish aristocrat whose father was General La Bastida, under Diaz, and whose uncle was Archbishop La Bastida, soon made a hidalgo of her adopted son. She developed the Spanish strain and before he left school, his masters were Velasquez and Goya. It was his Spanish blood that gave him his art talent, a romantic tinge and his love of music. The Indian blood gave him his love and closeness to nature. But the Moorish blood had endowed him with a colorful temperament and a contentious disposition. All of them, save when Marty was imbibing too freely, were held in check by Scotch caution — a strain inherited from his Scotch grandfather, who brought the first printing presses to Mexico.
Oddly enough, he resembled his half Tarascan grandmother and from her he inherited his Indian features, his dark eyes and swarthy complexion. In his youth, Marty was very handsome in a striking way, enhanced by his bright red Windsor tie and his tailored Parisian corduroys. In his later years, after sixty, he looked more Indian and was temperamentally akin to his Tarascan ancestry. He vaunted his Indian blood and proudly boasted of the Tarascan culture that later Mexican authorities claimed was the equal of the Toltec. Both cultures were destroyed after the Spanish conquest. The Mexican
At the time Marty was at the Guadalajara Art School, important archaeological discoveries of the Tarascan culture were featured in the museum near the school. While there he formed a lasting friendship with a fellow student who in later years was to become director of the museum and taking the Tarascan name Dr. Atl, became a fervent advocate of the "new race" — another Indian culture to rise in the future. Proud of his Tarascan ancestry, Marty embraced the "new race" and his work was on Indian themes in a hard and sometimes brilliant technique and somber coloring. It was not the picturesque and colorful life of the Mexican Indians so appealing and popular with Europeans and Americans, depicted later by Rivera; or the revolutionary spirit so powerfully and devastatingly represented by Orozco.
To his teacher, Arthur Mathews, already influenced by Impressionism, Marty's early work, considered powerful by Mexican standards, was not appreciated or understood, which accounted for the misunderstanding of Marty's talent. Marty, immersing himself in the Northern tradition, soon developed a startling facility in reproducing it. And, under the development of his Spanish heritage by the forceful Rosalia, his "masters" were Goya and Velasquez. Once while copying a Velasquez in the Spanish Room of the Louvre, Whistler stopped and remarked, "You have great talent, young man". So, in Marty's work, the effect of diverse strains cancelled each other and negated his original inspiration, Indian culture. So he became a superb painter with an Indian period, their culture obliterated by his Spanish influence. In Paris, the Spanish influence tinged with Impressionism caused Carriere to applaud his work and tell him to remain in Paris as he could become a figure there. There was also the enriching experience of the desert with the Navajo and Hopis — yet he was not inspired by the flat and decorative art of the American Indian. He reproduced nature at its grandest with a richness of color and a depth of feeling.
Later in life, Marty was keenly aware of his loss, regretting the years spent away from the source, Mexico; disturbed that he had not returned to Mexico after Paris to join his compatriots who so
I'd like to fill in here a story that Alexander Coney himself — the husband of Rosalia La Bastida — told me, of the incident in which he saved the life of President Diaz. He was the purser on an American ship plying the Gulf of Mexico between New Orleans and Vera Cruz. At that time, Diaz was campaigning for the Presidency against formidable opposition. The opposition finally decided to eliminate this last runner of the race by capturing him, declaring him a traitor and shooting him. On Diaz's arrival at Vera Cruz, he was warned of the plot and, finding himself in a dangerous situation, decided to take a chance and swim out to the only American boat in the harbor, figuring the Americans would not want to become involved in an incident, and thus threw off his pursuers. Climbing on board, he faced Coney and, noting his Masonic ring, held out his hand displaying his ring, explained his dilemma and asked for refuge. Coney promptly took him into his cabin and hid this brother Mason in a safe place. After the opposition had searched all the Mexican boats in the harbor, they approached the American ship, politely requesting permission to search, with a plausible story, for a traitor. Coney welcomed them aboard,
Art Study in San Francisco and Paris
It is hardly credible now after fifty years of wars, revolutions, and the minor annoyances brought about by the "Cold War" that, in Paris, in nineteen hundred, the battle of the century was over art. On Marty's arrival Paris was in ferment. Helmholtz, with his analysis of color in physiological optics, brought science into art producing Impressionism. Later a chance remark of Cezanne's begot cubism, from which followed a number of fragmented theories that kept Paris in an uproar. However, Impressionism was acceptable after much soul-searching and roaring about the disintegration of the time worn standards of art. However, it was Cezanne - a cause célèbre - about whom whirled the revolt.
When Marty arrived, bands of students were still spitting on the windows of Vollard's inconspicuous gallery which displayed his Cezanne's. Even some of the larger galleries, with temerity enough to face the furies, were exhibiting Van Gogh and Gaugin. All this
Even at the first big show of the "Moderns" at the Louvre, in 1910, one could hear uproarious laughter as soon as you stepped into the building or, in corners, raucous voices in heated argument. As late as 1920, after World War I, when we were in Paris, we were studying the canvasses in the modern room when two Frenchmen, deep in conversation, suddenly looked up, saw the modern show, and spitting out affreux!, rushed out. And when Walter Pach brought the Armory the big modern show in New York, there was much uproar them. At the 1915 Fair in San Francisco, it created the same sensation and one could hear the laughter float down the corridors.
Marty soon became a popular figure in the Latin Quarter - not only for his many talents and ability to entertain them - but he was the possessor of the fabulous sum of $100 a month which, with the low rate of the franc made him, to them, inordinately rich. So they called him "Duke". Most of his friends, students living on a pittance, could count on him to provide them with wine, cigarettes and tickets to the local dance halls. However, he himself spent much time at concerts, museums, galleries, and many official affairs (through
While Marty was in Paris the famous Dreyfus trial came up. Marty went to the trial and made sketches of all the figures in the trial and, especially, of Zola, who, for Dreyfus wrote the famous J'Accuse that brought about the retrial.
He was fortunate to be in Paris in a very picturesque period. Cezanne, Van Gogh and Gaugin were then spectacular figures and he saw their work constantly in Paris. He also saw Huysmans, "the man of the cathedrals", as they called him, riding around Paris on a donkey in a white monk's robe. His books headed the revival of the Gregorian Chant and the lovely polyphonic music of Palestrina and Vittoria, which was the musical sensation in Europe. Whistler was there and he stopped once when Marty was copying a Velasquez picture in the Louvre and said, "You have great talent, young man," and then walked off. He was very proud of the fact that the old poet Paul Verlaine used to love to be with the art students in bistros - small cafés where students congregated. Marty said, "Several times I had the privilege of buying drinks for the famous poet Verlaine." Though feeble, he sometimes recited his poetry for them, and once, losing his voice, asked Marty to continue the poem - to his surprise and pleasure - Marty knew the poem by heart and rendered it with all the
Did he like to tell you about his time in Paris?
Martinez
Oh, he loved to. He loved to reminisce about the Paris days. Paris was very lovable then. He heard the first performance of Charpentier's Louise, and Carmen, La Bohéme swept Paris madly. To him it was the masterpiece which meant so much to the students. He added these to his repertoire of Spanish and Mexican folk songs. It was one of his talents with which he used to entertain his friends in Paris and San Francisco.
His foster mother died shortly after he finished the Beaux-Arts and had left a small legacy to keep him going until he reached the top she dreamed of that the talent promised. So Marty decided to remain in Paris for the four years left. Later, he regretted that he had not returned to Mexico when Rivera, who had left Paris, became a figure in Mexico, and thereafter in Europe—the representative of the "new race". It was significant he considered returning to Mexico, then would go back to San Francisco to decide the issue. His foster father thought he could help a bit around the consulate with enough to keep him going while getting reestablished in San Francisco.
Baum
While we're mentioning Marty's foster father, Alexander Coney, I know he and his wife were both ardent Masons. What were Marty's ideas on Masonry? You mentioned that first Marty's father had done printing for the Church —
Martinez
Yes, and then he became a Mason and they dropped him.
What were Marty's ideas?
Martinez
I was often with him with Coney, who was a 32nd Degree Mason. Marty never joined the Masons. He was only interested in art. Marty was never connected with Masonic affairs but he had ceased practicing his faith and became an agnostic.
Baum
I interrupted your story of Marty's return to San Francisco.
Martinez
In Paris he had met — oh, this is very important! It was while attending the Dreyfus trial, in which the university and art students took such a noisy part, that he attracted the attention of Steinlen conceded the greatest cartoonist in Europe and featured in the celebrated "Lassiette au Beurre". He paused to look over Marty's quick sketches of Zola and the court scenes and praised them highly. Then on Marty's telling him that he was soon returning to San Francisco, Steinlein assured him were he willing to stay in Paris, he could reach satisfying heights in that field. But Marty had neither the temperament nor the willingness to struggle for fame. His Indian blood cancelled out his Spanish and Moorish blood and his cautious Scotch blood added a negative reaction to struggle. So he returned to San Francisco with a vague notion of returning to Mexico where his old friend and fellow student, Dr. Atl, assured him that the rising of the "new race" soon would have standard bearers in Rivera and Orozco in the interests of prestige.
San Francisco, in which he had spent several years as a student, was already familiar and he found here again the environment he loved. The warm and vivid life reminded him of the Latin Quarter in Paris —
Just beyond stretched the picturesque dance halls of the Barbary Coast, with its rowdy and raucous life that he loved to sketch. Then San Francisco itself still had the flavor of the pioneer days — he found congenial their strong individualism, the crudeness muted by a growing cosmopolitanism of the second generation, who applauded colorful personalities and made much of them. Marty's picturesqueness appealed to them and he was soon a popular figure in the Bohemian Club and in the art circles in San Francisco. His only concession to convantion was for official and social affairs — he wore a suit, but along with a bright red Windsor tie. On his return to San Francisco, with his superb baritone voice, he added French revolutionary songs to his Mexican folk songs and arias from Boheme and Pagliacci, rendered
Then, his studio in the Montgomery block formerly occupied by Jules Tavenier, was in the Latin Quarter and reminded him of Paris. Around the corner in a basement was Champro's a tiny coffee house Parisian style and a block away Coppa's Italian restaurant. So he felt at home and settled down to become a popular figure in San Francisco and he loved it.
San Francisco and the Earthquake of 1906
MartinezHis life in San Francisco was one of continuous work — Torrey and Atkins were his dealers, and MacBeth in New York. Everything went smoothly until the earthquake. About two weeks before the earthquake, my father took me to meet Marty at Coppa's. I was a bit shy and as I walked with my father down the long lane between the tables, the hubbub died down and all the patrons stared at me while Marty rose, gave me a hidalgo's greeting — a deep bow and a graceful hand kiss — a delightful compliment to my beauty. I was overwhelmed but managed to be gracious in return and I knew then Marty would play a large role in my life. Now an old lady, I can recall and repeat the impression I made at that time. I had a natural beauty from living outdoors and living in books with a vivid interest in ideas and life and really unconscious of the beauty that meant so little to me. Thanks to my father who permitted me to be in his study from ten years on to listen to his friends — scientists exploring or expounding their theories, writers examining and criticizing each other's work, engineers and entrepeneurs
So, Marty had a chair brought for me next to him at the artist's table. For the rest of the evening he paid his entire attention to me, making sketches of me and planning for a portrait he must do at once. So, though somewhat bewildered by the attention I was getting, I quietly gave Marty a willing listener and was delighted to sit for a portrait when my father agreed I could sit. A week-end later, the day he set for my first sitting, the earthquake had shaken up my plans and interrupted the budding romance.
The night of the earthquake, a cataclysm for San Francisco, Marty had spent the evening at the Bohemian Club and, in a blissful state from much libation, was wending his way, fanned by the cool sea breezes, through the silent streets down into the Latin Quarter. By the time he reached Montgomery Street, his sight had cleared enough to see a light in Champro's coffee shop. He dropped in for an hour of reminiscing of his student days in Paris while consuming another quart of "dago red". By the time he reached his studio, at four o'clock, he was wide awake and, sitting at his desk, was sketching and mulling over the next day's work. Suddenly his Michelangelo cast on the top of his bookcase shot into the middle of the room shattering into pieces and his mirror on casters (for his models) whirled about the remnants in a mad dance. Then, when his chair began to bounce, he muttered, "I can't be as drunk as that!", but the familiar sounds of crunching and cracking of separating brick walls recalled the earthquakes of his youth in Mexico and, instinctively, he shot into the entrance alcove, a safety measure in
Porter Garnett appeared to look for Marty. His head bound up, he related how the quake loosened a large ornamental Chinese platter on
A young officer told them there was a boat that could be reached at the wharf and advised anyone whose friends or relatives had a home in Oakland to take it. His friend, Vail Bakewell, a singer, insisted he come with him and Marty found himself in the charming home of a minister, his father. He was on his way to the Athens Club in Oakland when Marty ran across my father who persuaded him to come up to Piedmont with him. So, fixing him a studio in the old house, he settled down to enjoy life in the country for the week in which he waited for his studio in the Montgomery Block to be emptied and brought the contents to Piedmont.
Marty was a great friend of Willis Polk, the architect, who recounted his experiences of the earthquake to a group of us at the restored Coppa's. He had built the Chronicle Building, then one of the few modern steel supported buildings in San Francisco. While everyone was running about inspecting their buildings for strains, he was called to discover the source of strange sounds coming from the basement of the Chronicle Building. By the time he reached the spot the police had roped off a large area around the building, fearing it might collapse. He scanned the crowd while heading for the basement, found several of his workmen, called to them to follow him declaring, "This building cannot collapse if I get help!" They rushed after him into the basement in which were installed great jacks in case of a slight sinking or shifting, because the land all the way up to his building had been filled in land. As the men dashed about under his hectic directions spinning the wheels of the jacks, gradually the roar subsided,
Marriage and Family
Marriage to Elsie Whitaker, 1907
MartinezAfter three months with us Marty, I think, decided that a poor writer's daughter would make a poor artist's wife and fit nicely into his studio. My father was a little bit disturbed about the age difference. I wasn't a bit, and protested. He said, "Well, if you will wait a year, I'll consider it." He thought I might get over it in a year, but I wasn't going to get over it.
At sixteen I was a blonde beauty, medium height, lithe and slim, with perfect features that our artist friends called classic Greek; and some, inclined to romanticism, declared I resembled the "Blessed Damozel" of Rossetti. But to our Piedmonters and our friends, used to seeing me flitting about the hills with my long golden braids, I was the little Valkyrie. One admirer in whom I was not interested, who had survived a five mile walk with me instead of the tete à tete he hoped to have, called me Artemis and promised to send me a dart as a souvenir of the occasion. When going to the City, I wove my long braids about my head like a crown and with a quiet dignity and gentle detachment, was ready to meet the world. Brought up by an English father, I had a proper respect for age, and having always felt the loss of grandparents, to the elderly I was always smiling and attentive; with youth I was pleasant but indifferent; and with the worldly wise and sophisticated and intellectuals, to them, a good listener and surprisingly intelligent and responsive. At seventeen
At that time, at sixteen years of age, I promised to marry four of my father's friends. I decided to pick out the one who would give me the most interesting life. So, Marty was the most picturesque, so I picked him. One was a young writer who had published a book that had made a hit at the time and was going to South America. One was an engineer. I liked engineers because I had known so many who used to come from Canada to see my father. The third one was an interesting fellow: he was a painter at the time; his father was the lawyer for the "Six Chinese Companies" in San Francisco and Shanghai. My beau was born and spent his youth in China. He was the interpreter for his father and an artist for pleasure.
Baum
They were all older then, all your father's age.
Martinez
Yes, all his age.
Baum
You didn't like young fellows.
Martinez
Oh no, I wasn't interested in youth in the slightest.
So at the end of about nine months, I was seventeen, I'd had
So we were married, and we returned to the studio. I soon found, married to Marty, I had taken on a Mexican Revolution. Marty was a Latin lover — a charming book of poetry exquisitely illustrated — hours of drawing me — singing love songs in the rest periods — tempestuous declarations of love — and jealousy well-controlled, but gently demonstrated until after our marriage — then the passion took over!
I forgot to say that during that nine months my father and friends, pioneer-style, built Marty a studio in the woods over by the old reservoir. He loved the life with us in Piedmont — the closeness to nature that stirred his Indian blood. Often, at sunrise he would go with me to the top of the hill on our ridge, enveloped in the warm sun, and caressed by the soft breezes filled with the fragrance of the Yerba Buena, our wild mint, mingled with the pungent odors released at the touch of the sun, of the stands of redwood and tall eucalyptus trees, recall in the sky, meadows and primeval forests our
The quiet hours of work during the week, and the gay week-ends with his friends from the City staying with us for an outdoor outing. After the first two months with us, Marty expressed the wish to live near us. Father promptly laid the plans for his studio. Wickam Havens gave him a lot for a picture, just over the knoll from our house. Father gathered together several friends who could be counted on to know how to use tools, and with the necessary lumber donated by friends, the studio was soon up and Marty installed
Marty settled happily into his new surroundings, called the studio his "Hogan" and savored the undisturbed beauty to the full. Opposite was the reservoir, a small lake surrounded by young redwoods and pines from which the raucous blue jays whirling and screeching off any intruders in their preserve, and finally would light on the eucalyptus limb near his door to study this strange addition to their landscape. Below him was a small canyon with its tangle of blackberry vines interlaced with the wild thimble berries, the hazel nut thickets and its babbling brook — a shelter for large flocks of quail and a refuge for the many varieties of small birds in migration. Near the study the pretty trails that wound around the hill with its chattering
Pioneer style, the only addition that Marty made to his studio, which was one big room with a porch and a little kitchenette off the porch, was a four-cup coffee pot instead of the two-cup pot he had. That was the only thing he added to the studio beside myself. So I moved into the studio and that seemed perfectly natural to me. None of this modern idea of fancy weddings and fancy preparations and fancy honeymoons and fancy everything. It just never occurred to me. I just took my little suitcase and went over there, settled down in Marty's studio as part of it — nothing was changed in it.
We settled down and had a very amusing and pleasant full life. Marty's friends in San Francisco would come over for the weekends, and then we spent much of the time in San Francisco with them. Sometimes three days and nights a week we'd be over in the city for luncheons, teas, dinners. Marty's marriage created quite a sensation so San Francisco wanted to see this picturesque pair we were. Of course, Coppa was wailing that Marty was going across the Bay and deserting San Francisco. So we promised him we'd be at Coppa's two or three nights a week for dinner. We had so many friends in San Francisco it was part of our life, trotting over there.
How long did it take you to get there?
Martinez
Well, it was five cents on the streetcar right down here to the Key Route, which is at lower Piedmont, 40th; then it was ten cents on the train and boat to go to San Francisco. We walked down to the streetcar, just like we do now. It would take about an hour to go to San Francisco, but what was an hour in those days? And we loved the boat, so that was pleasant. And if we missed the last Key Route, which was 11:45, something like that, we took the newspaper boat at two in the morning, and we walked from Water Street down at the foot of Broadway in Oakland, now Jack London Square, up here to Piedmont. We thought nothing of that. Many is the time we'd stay to a late party and at two o'clock take the newspaper boat which came to the bottom of the Bay there at Jack London Square.
Life ran along. Marty had one very unfortunate habit, he was exceedingly jealous, so life wasn't all a bed of roses, because he was always getting jealous and he was always being troublesome. Arnold Genthe in his book "As I Remember" tells of one episode. I was talking to an old friend in the studio when Arnold arrived. He found Marty with a target on a tree, blazing away at it. He said, "Martinez, what do you think you're doing?" He replied, "I'm going to shoot that fellow who's talking to my wife." Only the language wasn't quite so polite. Genthe did not finish the episode. He said, "Well, now listen, don't you think that's a bit foolish?" So Marty calmed down a little, went inside, and our friend said, "Listen here, Marty, I'll talk to your wife any time I want to because I can assure
Whenever overcome by one of these fits of jealousy he would burst out in song. When he began to sing Pagliacci, which he did beautifully, I began to study the door because I knew the knives and gun were coming out very shortly. Many a time I lit out the door and into the woods, sat on the hillside until he cooled off. In the summer I took refuge in a sweet smelling haycock and in the winter under the wide-spreading oak tree nearby.
That never bothered me. I grew up among boys and men, my father was a two-gun man in the early days and my brothers all had guns, guns were always going off, so they didn't mean much to me. I was not overly disturbed. I was annoyed because I didn't like it. I was quite dignified and I didn't want to have to run like a rabbit out into the bushes. Then I'd wait till he calmed down and came back in again, very dignified and very annoyed. I had tried to be a Spanish lady, but at the end of the first year I'd had enough. I could box — I'd learned to box with my brothers. My father said only one thing to them, "If you break her nose, I'll kill you. So you'd better be careful of her nose." They were very careful. But I learned a skill that came in handy later.
I had spent a year dodging knives and I got kind of tired of it and changed my tactics. So I told him, "This is the end of this period of being a lady." One day, to his complete surprise, I went up to him, took the gun out of his hand and gave him a wallop on the
When Gelett Burgess came up the first time after we were married, he said to me, "I don't approve of this marriage". I wanted to say, "Neither do I", but I wasn't quite so brash in those days. He said, "It's going to ruin Marty as a painter. He's got his mind on you, not on art". I said, "I agree with you." So that sort of startled him.
Anyhow, I had already figured out that marriage was not good for Marty as an artist because he was too obsessed with me and too jealous. It was not good for him. [Laughter] Then my studies irritated him. I was a person full of ideas and was studying madly. He told me I didn't know anything about art. That was a challenge, so I studied all about art and then I'd contradict him with quotations from the greats of the past, and that was worse! After that I was just plain annoying, which
For instance, he didn't want me to learn Spanish. I had taken Spanish in high school and I got to where I could speak it after a fashion with his friends — but he didn't approve of that. He ridiculed my Spanish and made it rather difficult for me. He never would teach Kai Spanish either, though I used to try to make him speak Spanish to Kai, but he never would. It was something that belonged to him, I suppose, and the Indian in him wanted to keep us out of it.
When we were to be married he promised to take me to Mexico, and then after we were married, decided he wouldn't. I was a brilliant blonde, you know, a glamour girl of a kind — not a glamour girl in the sense of a sex symbol, but I was beautiful and intelligent, and that was dangerous enough for Marty. He wouldn't take me to Mexico because he said either he wouldn't come out of Mexico or I wouldn't. Well, I think it's very likely to have happened. (Laughter) I loved the Latins - and they loved blondes, you know — and Marty was a very romantic Latin during the courtship. So we never went to Mexico, and I dropped Spanish. He had conversations with his Spanish friends and I got a great deal more than he ever knew out of it, but I never let him know.
What did you do all day? You didn't do much housework, it doesn't sound like.
Martinez
There was little work to be done in a one-room studio, so now I had the time and opportunity for the studies I longed for. Having been brought up only on the English group singing of folk songs, ballads, carols, madrigals, and hymns, traditionally English, well rendered and touchingly beautiful, my knowledge of music and art was limited. I went in heavily for music — both piano and theory — that is, beginners harmony and counterpoint. For theory I was very fortunate to have an old friend of Marty's in Edward Strickland, professor and later head of the Music Department of the University of California. Strickland often took me to concerts with him. With a score in his lap and a pencil in hand he would guide me through the mysterious intricacies of orchestral technique and several times he had permission to take me to rehearsals of a quartet group — friends of his — working out and analyzing the score with them while they practiced, which greatly enlarged my knowledge of music. To be with them was a sort of musical intimacy in which you followed them, exploring the depths and intensity of the great composers.
For the piano, David Alberto led me patiently through the first steps of piano playing and after he left for Carmel, Robert Tolmis, protégée of Mrs. Hearst. He had just returned from his scholarship in Europe and carried me on to within reach of my goal to play well and with some musicianship.
Brought up by an English father with emphasis on the classics, especially Greek, for whom the English had an adoration — on our walls at home there were large reproductions of the Elgin Marbles and scattered about in the bookcases plaster casts of Greek sculpture; on occasional cursory flights into philosophy; and with a detailed study of England's conquests, I had already covered much ground, but none of it from the standpoint of art.
So, to fill the gap I was pursuing a cultural background with archaeology, anthropology and art books to study to enlarge my knowledge of art — Marty's field — and about which he felt very possessive. I considered it a challenge. Of course, much time was spent in San Francisco for exhibitions and concerts to give my studies vividness and a grasp of the essentials that makes of a composition a creation.
Baum
And Marty would be off in another part of the room painting?
Martinez
Yes, he'd be at school half a day and the rest working at his desk writing, drawing, or painting.
Marty had wide interests and loved poetry, music and philosophy and the great cultures. To him the struggle for fame was not worth giving up the hours he devoted to them. He was not obsessed with art, but quite satisfied to communicate his love of nature in vivid impressions on canvas. In later years he wrote a column on the arts for the Spanish paper in San Francisco, which was reprinted in several Mexican and South American papers. On his trip to the Navajo Country, he acquired much Indian lore, whose humor and pathos he simplified and made visual for his little daughter — and used for his column.
Studio in Piedmont
BaumWhen did you move into this house?
Martinez
We lived in the first studio in Piedmont one year (1907-08) after we were married. Then Wickham Havens found some wealthy people who bought the whole tract and they wanted the piece on which the studio was built, too. He said he'd give us this lot with the view, which we preferred, and would move the studio for us. It was taken apart and brought over here and Frederick Meyer, who ran the art school, the California School of Arts and Crafts, had really a very charming design for the remodeling.
Baum
You took part of the old studio?
Martinez
Yes, it was taken apart and the material used over again. But we brought with us the original design of Meyer's, which was rather attractive. We were going to put just an underpinning under it and a kitchen and so on. Our carpenter, "Booster" Smith had a yen for art, so he agreed to build the studio for a painting. Naturally, he wanted to finish it as fast as he could, so every time he could make a shortcut to save time he would ignore the design, with Marty's approval, and leave something out or switch a door around. So, Meyer's design suffered considerably.
The lot was on a ridge and the studio was built on the side of the hill. My brothers and I dug, out of the solid rock, fourteen piers, to carry the foundation. This house is on solid rock, that's why it's never shifted in the slightest.
"Booster" got the lumber down at an Oakland pier, already creosoted. Thirty years later, when a banker came to inspect the studio before granting a loan for repairs, he exclaimed, "Good Heavens, you could almost put the Bank of England on this foundation!" This material was bought by a $300 check sent to Marty by Arthur B. Davies just after the earthquake, to help a fellow artist.
And then the daily routine began. His friends arrived, prepared to work with gloves and a hammer. First, each day, Marty got out his gallon of wine, declared they would have to start correctly, and they would start with a libation — they would all have a glass of wine. Then they'd work briskly for an hour and then stop for another glass of wine. By the end of the day, the gallon jug was empty. Later, an expert who had to work on one of the windows said it was one of the funniest things he'd ever seen — the difference in the dimensions — each one was just out a little — and wondered how they had gotten it in place. Anyhow, it was built that way, and —
Baum
It seems to have stood up for quite a while.
Martinez
Yes, fifty years — more than that — 1908 to 1967 — now almost sixty years old.
Baum
You had this big studio room with a porch —
Martinez
This room is just as it was, except for the addition of a little powder room later when Kai was married. We had a porch across the front of the studio, around one side. Kai had the large windows put in when remodeling it after her marriage to Ralph DuCasse. The remodeling job was a wedding present from her father-in-law, Ralph
Baum
Then downstairs, originally, you had a kitchenette and a little dining room and the bedroom....
Martinez
And the bathroom under it and below was Marty's studio, designed and built by Billy Knowles. We really have three stories on this place because it is built on the side of a hill.
Billy Knowles was our prominent Oakland architect. When Kai was one year old, Marty told Knowles he couldn't paint because he was afraid the baby would get into his paint. So, Billy Knowles announced, "I'll fix a studio for you." Billy Knowles sent up the materials and carpenters and built the studio so Marty could paint. This room — the old studio — is the same — the old redwood walls which are so characteristic of California.
Baum
You had this high vault in the middle of the ceiling in the studio, too?
Martinez
No, originally the ceiling was open to the rafters. The studio was so hard to heat that Billy Knowles remarked, "It would be better to fill this space in and it'll be easier for you to heat the studio."
Baum
Well, it certainly is charming now.
Martinez
Well, it was very simple then when we built it. Marty's corner held his desk and his table and his little old Victrola, his big easel and his little Bible with his painting materials.
In another corner stood my grand piano on which I diligently practiced and a small set of drawers which held my music and all the materials for my various studies, including art.
We had one couch and a couple of chairs, a built-in window seat under the wide window overlooking the Bay. That comprised the furnishing of the studio — no carpets on the floor save an Indian rug before the couch. Marty's art materials and large easel were moved down to the lower studio after Kai was born.
Baum
Did friends come to spend the night with you?
Martinez
Oh yes. We'd go over to San Francisco on the weekends and we always brought back several guests with us. We used to put the men down in the lower studio with Marty, and the girls I put on army cots on the sleeping porch with me. Even after Kai was born we still had friends coming and going.
I didn't get to the city as much for a while. I hardly left the hill until Kai was two years old. She was a very timid child, so I was never going to let her be frightened. I had an enormous number of studies at that time — anthropology, archaeology, and psychology — so that suited me — combining baby sitting and studies. The weekends were as gay as usual.
The first six years of our marriage we had a very active life — so much of it spent in San Francisco. I remember the celebrated bar in the Montgomery Block where Nicols dispenses his famour Pisco Punches. In those days ladies were not allowed at the bar. That was not done, so I'd have to sit in the little ladies' room, sipping my Pisco Punch, and wait for Marty and his friends.
To Marty the Italian quarter had become the "Latin Quarter" of his student days in Paris and much of our time in San Francisco was spent there. The Barbary Coast branched off the Italian quarter and
We went down the life of the dance halls with him and finally settled on Spider Kelly's Thalia as the most interesting dance hall in the Coast, and we spent most of our time at his place. It was a very large, almost barn-like structure (built at the time of the Gold Rush), and still had an atmosphere reminiscent of that period. On both sides of the hall ran a built-up runway with tables and chairs for those who wanted to drink or watch the dancing on the floor below. It was very picturesque and an ideal spot for sketching. The artists became regular customers of Spider Kelly, which pleased him since he considered it added prestige to have his place popular with artists. At the entrance was a tremendous bar — half a block long. Spider Kelly, the boss of the joint, taught me how to wash glasses correctly. He had immense tiers of beautiful shining glasses. When I admired them he demonstrated his technique for me. "You must wash them in very soapy water and then you rinse the inside, but you never rinse the outside because soap polishes them." He was an ex-prize fighter He had a thick squat body and huge long arms, so he had justly earned his title.
Around 1908 some of the best restaurants and even some of the taverns had singers and performers. One night at the Techau Tavern I saw a huge, blonde, gorgeous female in electric blue satin singing Wagnerian arias. During her performance the waiters were busily
At that time Paul Whiteman had a small orchestra which was playing at the Bella Union. His violinist, a friend of Marty's who had been first violinist with the Boston Symphony and through alcoholism had dropped down to playing in small orchestras on the Barbary Coast, told us that Whiteman was making some experiments. He said it was no use doing good music down here and he started what he thought would be the type of music that would suit the place, which turned out to the be first jazz in California. He said to Whiteman one time, "What do you think you'll call this?" And he replied, with a grimace, "Well, it's not music, it's `jazz"'. The public liked it. The great emphasis was on trombones and horns — a stumbling effort to reach a style. It was nowhere near the cool jazz that we have now.
Baum
This was before your baby was born?
Martinez
Long before. I had six years of having a very interesting time in San Francisco before I got marooned with a baby on the top of our Piedmont hill.
Birth of Micaela, 1913
BaumSo your life changed quite a bit when your daughter was born.
Martinez
Yes, our life as I described it — lectures, concerts, exhibitions, meeting and entertaining celebrities who came to San Francisco; teas, luncheons and dinners at the Palace, St. Francis or Fairmont Hotels with our wealthy friends; affairs put on by the famous patrons of art in San Francisco — it was a whirl.
At the end of the sixth year, we had a surprise. Kai was coming. So when she was about to be born I decided I just couldn't have Marty around, he was too hysterical. So Charley Sutro, the broker in San Francisco, who was one of Marty's patrons, said, "Well, Marty, I'll send you and McComas down to the desert on a sketching trip until the great event occurs."
Marie Sutro — Charles Sutro's wife — was looking after me. She wouldn't let me stay in Piedmont alone, although I still had several weeks to wait. She insisted I come to San Francisco and sit in the German Hospital with a nurse to look after me. When I protested about its being so expensive, she said, "Fiddlesticks, that's nothing to us." So I waited in comfort and, to me, luxury until my papoose arrived.
When I first went in so many of the Bohemian Club members sent flowers that my hospital room was a tremendous bower. At the end of three weeks when nothing happened — the baby was delayed — the bouquets got smaller and smaller and smaller, until only one bouquet of sweet peas greeted the little newcomer.
All was arranged for an Indian runner to carry the momentous news to Marty in the desert and his friends made quite a drama of it in the newspapers. So, thanks to her inherited "manner," the historic announcement was handed to Marty just as he was taking the train for the return journey home. He arrived in San Francisco the day after Kai was born, instead of weeks afterwards as I had planned.
Now, to take up Francis McComas: Just before the trip, McComas got entangled in love with a friend of mine, Jean Baker. She was the daughter of the editor of the Tribune. This romance was budding, and McComas said to Marty, "You start down and I'll meet you there." So Marty spent two weeks waiting for him in a dreary little hotel in Gallup, New Mexico. McComas had written Marty to go on into the desert to Hubble who would take care of him. But Hubble's wife just died before he arrived in Gallup and Marty refused to go on.
By the time McComas arrived Marty was in a towering rage and would not speak to him. McComas said, "Look here, you love the Indians and you're certainly not going to stop now because you're mad at me. Come on, we'll go into the desert." Frank McComas and his friends had been in the desert before, so he knew the ropes of getting settled comfortably. So having made the bargain with Sutro to take Marty with him, he had to get Marty into the desert. So, in they went, though Marty was not an agreeable companion and hot as hell, as Marty wrote to me. Hubble had arranged for a place for them
At that time his first wife had just gotten her divorce. She was one of the Parrotts of San Francisco — one of the "Bonanza" families. Their marriage lasted two years. She took him around the world on their honeymoon. She had contacts with the social elite — many of them her relatives in San Francisco. He remained an artist because his wife had her wealthy friends buy his pictures. So he was doing very well. Charles Rollo Peters also had social connections through his family — prominent Philadelphia socialites. Through Marie Louise Parrott, McComas had social connections. She divorced McComas to marry Putnam Weal, the English diplomat in China who wrote Indiscreet Letters from Peking. She had met him on a trip to the Orient. She went back to Peking to live and left McComas in the hands of her relatives to keep him going.
Marty never recovered from his annoyance and considered the friendship ended.
Baum
You can't blame him.
Martinez
To be fair to Frank McComas, he had written Marty to go on to Hubble's at Ganado, who would look after him and added "I've written to Hubble you are coming." Mr. Cotton, who was the business firm in Gallup
Anyway, Kai made a great change in our lives. Some of his friends called Marty Padonna Martinez, instead of Madonna. Every time the baby cried he'd want to call the doctor. That drove me crazy! Marty would say, "I know Elsie doesn't know what to do for that child." Our doctor was a darling; he'd say, "Now listen, nature gives women instinct. She knows what she is doing for that child and you stop worrying." And in a day or two the baby'd have a little colic or a little fever from overeating — she was overfed most of the time — and he'd call up the doctor. So it was really quite trying. I was thankful when Billy Knowles fixed him the studio downstairs and dumped him down there and kept him away from the crying baby that he was certain was dying on the spot. He had a peculiar sort of possessive feeling about the child. The same with me, too, as far as that goes; we were his possessions and he knew what we ought to do. And of course my interest in studies annoyed him very much. I was an independent Anglo-Saxon and I was used to doing as I pleased and I loved study. I was going right on with what I was accustomed to — books, books, books, and interesting people. The difficulty of the marriage lay in Marty's possessiveness and jealousy, but nothing else bothered me at all.
I remember Marty had one of the first machines — I'll never forget that talking machine — a Victrola. Then we had records. And also Marty decided his daughter should have nothing but pure music. Of course, those days hardly anybody had machines and it was very simple to bring your daughter up on pure music.
He went to a friend of his from the Bohemian Club who worked in Sherman-Clay to get the machine and his friend said, "Well, Marty, I'm going to give you some records to go with it. What'll you have?" And Marty replied, "Well, I want Beethoven, Bach, and Mozart." He said, "Marty, isn't that a little — how old's the child? Eight months old? Well, that's a bit surprising but if that's what you want you can have it." So he got Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart and she never heard anything but Bach, Beethoven and Mozart until she was ten. I took her to symphonies from the time she was eight, so she had this purist musical beginning.
A Two-House Family
MartinezWell, after twelve years I left Marty and moved over to Harriet Dean's house which was just down the street from the studio. She moved here to live near us. It had been a little too hard on Kai because Marty was rather tyrannical. He wasn't well and he was getting old — he was then in his late sixties — so I thought it would be better for Kai and me to be away from him.
However, we took care of him — got his meals and looked after him when he was sick. Separation was not too difficult for him. I think teaching exhausted him quite a bit, and I think he'd grown to
In 1939, when we moved to Carmel, my brother moved into Harriet's house and took care of Marty. Two years later Marty became ill, so we came up to get him and took him to Carmel. He was with us for seven months before he died in 1943. Pal, Kai and I were very devoted to Marty. He always called us "his people".
Baum
You said he drank quite a bit?
Martinez
Yes. It was complicated with that, too. It didn't make any difference if he were up until three in the morning in San Francisco or at home, Marty would be up at five, getting ready for school. He never was late once in the many years he taught there. He loved teaching, therefore it was no difficulty for him at all. He was not yet an alcoholic, but was on the way to alcoholism. The slightest amount of alcohol affected him.
But I think he was much happier with us living nearby. Kai would come every afternoon to be with him after her school hours. And then when tired he'd say, "You go home". So he just went back into the sort of quiet life that he'd had before he married.
Marty never had been able to live with anybody. Several friends tried to live with Marty in San Francisco and it was impossible. Piazzoni was a fellow student of Marty's in Paris — in the same classes. They tried to live together and they separated, too, after the early days in San Francisco.
You haven't spoken about the fact that Marty shared a studio with Maynard Dixon in San Francisco before the earthquake.
Martinez
Well, the only thing I knew about that was that Dixon told me Marty was impossible to get along with, and asked me how I managed to survive him. This happened a couple of years before I knew Marty, when they were in the Montgomery Block. I liked Dixon very much, and agreed with him that Marty was an exceedingly difficult person to get along with.
Baum
After Marty left San Francisco, he didn't see Dixon?
Martinez
No, they lost contact. It was just the early years.
Marty was neat to an annoying degree. It was a mania with him, almost. His friends would be there smoking and he'd jerk the ashtrays right out from under them and go clean them and bring them back. If you took a book out of the bookcase and set it down for a moment to talk, he'd grab the book and put it back in its place. He was trying. I can tell the world he was trying to live with. He had fixed habits and it never occurred to him it was ever necessary to change; so he never changed one habit when I moved into the studio. I was just part of Marty's possessions. Of course, I hadn't conventional ideas and had never lived a conventional life.
However, I was offended because the Bohemian Club gave every one of the prominent members, when they married, a chest of silver. They didn't do it for us since they discussed the possibility and finally agreed the marriage could not last, so they dropped the plan. Marty thought that was terribly funny, but I was furious. I asked Porter
Marty was devoted to her and she loved him. He was picturesque and always had the peanut man or the Indian legends to tell her. So I stayed with Marty until Kai was ten years old. In the meantime he had become quite tyrannical and drink was part of it. He never was an alcoholic in the sodden sense, but he did drink too much quite often. So I decided that that wasn't good for the child to know that side of him.
Harriet Dean took us to Europe in 1922 and we spent a year in France. By the time we returned he'd gotten used to living alone
Baum
Who lived in this house?
Martinez
He lived here at the studio and we lived with Harriet Dean.
Baum
How had you met Harriet Dean?
Martinez
It was in 1916, I think. She was with the Little Review with Margaret Anderson. They were then in Chicago and New York for a while. Finally they came to San Francisco to get new interest and support to keep the Little Review going.
I was not circulating at that time; I had the baby, three and a half, to care for and I was not going out much. Marty had gone over to some celebration at Coppa's. In came this picturesque girl and sat down beside him. She never said a word, just sat there waiting for some friend to come in. She knew who Marty was, of course. Pretty soon he started to quote something from Nietzsche's Zarathustra, and stopped and paused, and she finished the line. So then he turned to her and said, "Well, who are you?" She said, "I'm Harriet Dean, I'm on the Little Review". "Oh," he said, "then we're going to be good friends."
Baum
Were people out here especially eager to have the Little Review come out?
Martinez
San Francisco was so sophisticated... Well, I think Margaret Anderson was somewhat disappointed. They stayed over the summer months, only then returned to New York. Of course, Harriet was floating around all over, going to everything and getting interest and subscriptions, especially, for their magazine.
So he met her at Coppa's and he came back and said, "I met the most wonderful person and Lucy Pierce promised to bring her up Sunday. You've got to meet Harriet Dean, a really remarkable person." That
We entered World War I at that time and Harriet Dean's mother, worried about her daughter's connections with radicals, decided it was an excellent idea to have her tied down with a home near us. So she put up the resources to build. That kept her busy until the war ended. I had met her mother who decided I was a good influence on her, so she came back to Piedmont.
Harriet Dean and Marty were very great friends. Marty was devoted to her and they were very great friends right up until the day he died.
Baum
Did Marty resent the fact that you moved over with her?
Martinez
Not at all. He included her in "his people". From then on things ran along rather smoothly; there were no cataclysms in either of our lives. Then we moved down to Carmel in '39; this old friend of Pal's [Harriet Dean] had this place there and she wanted us to take it over. So we exchanged the two houses. She took our place up here, we took her place down there, and settled down. She was going into a Catholic order at the time so that she wanted us to take the place in Carmel. That's where we've been for 25 years. Marty died in 1943. The doctor had called us up and said, "Marty is really in a quite serious condition, he is getting too frail to go on with his teaching at the college." So we went up to get him and brought him down with us, fixed
Baum
You mention Indian culture along with Marty all the time, but did he really have much of an Indian background?
Martinez
No. I suppose he was about one-eighth Indian, but he was so proud of his Indian blood he made the most of it.
Baum
Did he have any Indian cultural background in his family?
Martinez
He always talked about the great culture of the Tarascans and claimed it was as great as the Toltec. His knowledge of them came from seeing them in Guadalajara and from books about their culture. His father was no admirer of Indians. He had the Spaniard's contempt for them, so Marty could not build up his Indian inheritance until after he came to San Francisco.
But Marty did look quite Indian, really and in later years he wore the traditional leather band around his head. Kai told us when she went to Mexico, the Mexicans always recognized her Indian blood by the shape of her head and some of her features, which are like her father's. They always recognized that she was part Mexican, at least. Her skin was too white. When we were down in Taos and I told Tony Luhan that she was part Indian, he looked her over and said, "Ye-es, but too white." (Laughter)
Which reminds me of one of the most delightful stories about Taos. Harriet Dean was there for the summer dances at Taos Pueblo with Ralph
Harriet wanted to know some details of the symbolism of the dance. She went up to a group of handsome young Indians leaning against a wall and said, "Would you please give me some information on the symbolism of your dances?" And they all just stared. "No speak English," muttered one young Indian. So she turned around and said to Margaret, "You know, I have never in my life been among so many handsome men." They burst out laughing for they all spoke English. They they told her everything she wanted to know.
Painting and Teaching
Teaching
MartinezTo go back to Marty: Marty taught. He didn't do very much painting, but he taught and was a much loved teacher and a very popular figure. Then he had his first physical setback, he had a very severe flu with that famous flu that carried off so many during World War I.
Baum
That must have been a terrible thing.
Martinez
Hundreds died, including a number of his friends. But the susceptibility of his lungs never quite left him. However, he kept on teaching until his seventy - fourth year.
Baum
When did he start teaching at the California School of Arts and Crafts?
In 1909. It was a little, tiny school in an upper floor of an old building in Berkeley. It was on Center Street.
Baum
Before this Marty had made a living —
Martinez
As an artist. He didn't teach until Frederick Meyer, an old friend of his, started his art school, and he begged Marty to come and give prestige to his school. First of all, he started one morning a week and finally it became two mornings and two afternoons a week a couple of years later.
He was a very stimulating teacher. His students just loved Marty. I have some of the letters from the students in the scrapbook. Marty was in some ways a very unconventional teacher. His students, boys, often came up to spend an evening with him, with a bottle of wine, for stimulating sessions exchanging ideas on art. Marty meant much to these young lads — his reminiscences of Guadalajara and art student's life in Paris, his love of music and philosophy, poetry and the arts made him an interesting person to be with.
Baum
I have a note that Marty taught at the California School of Fine Arts from 1916 to 1917.
Martinez
Marty taught there just one year. Marty was a very difficult person to get along with and the head of the school, Pedro Limas, was an authoritarian. He ran that school and Marty didn't fit into his pattern, so Marty left at the end of the year. He and Marty couldn't get along. He was a very quiet little man and Marty's flamboyance disturbed him and the independence he had acquired at Meyer's school offended Limas.
You think Marty's real art work was before he started teaching, and after that he was mainly a teacher?
Martinez
Mainly a teacher. I felt it was a calamity when Marty started to teach. At that time he was forty-three and he was not too strong physically. You can't teach all day — he had classes five days a week — and was too tired to come back and paint. There's only one person I know who can do that and that's Ralph DuCasse.
Baum
He still manages to paint, too?
Martinez
Yes, and he teaches at Mills College.
The Del Monte Gallery, the Monterey Peninsula, and Charles Rollo Peters
MartinezAnother of our activities was the Del Monte Gallerey at Monterey. Sheperd, who was head of the Pacific Improvement Company at that time, wanted a gallery in the old Del Monte Hotel. He asked Arnold Genthe, Marty, Charles Rollo Peters, Francis McComas, Boranda — who lived in Monterey — and Charles Dickman to start it. Marty and I were guests of the hotel for four weekends that year, to get the gallery established and the exhibitions going. That was the first time that we spent any time in Monterey. Later we had many visits with Charles Rollo Peters. We'd get a telegram from Rollo Peters, "So and so from New York's going to be here, bring your wife and two or three pictures." So we would stay with him for two or three days while he gave a big party and sold pictures, including Marty's.
You know, Charles Rollo Peters had the Napoleonic complex. He had a whole roomful of books all on Napoleon. He was a little short
Peters had his home in Monterey. He'd put in a lake and for parties encircled his lake with Japanese lanterns, which was a spectacle in those days. Later he found the water was seeping through the bottom of his lake, so he was advised to put a pump in to supply more water or the water level dropped. The pump was installed and when Peters took his friends down to his lake, the pump had gone into reverse and left only a mud flat there.
Peters lived more or less a full social life. Though an artist, he was more a social figure, really, even as a friend.
Baum
Did he have a private income?
Martinez
No, but he charged tremendously high prices. He entertained his guests regally. The rich bonanza kings and queens thought nothing of paying $4,000 to $6,000 for a picture. He'd sell a dozen of them in a year and lived as a social figure. He had his horses and stables, his tally-ho coach, his lake, his picturesque studio, and his home — and he entertained lavishly. Of course he had connections with all the wealth of San Francisco, so that's why Peters was a little apart from the other artists. But he was a very kindly, friendly person, and I was very proud of the fact that he liked me as well as Marty and often invited us to come and stay with him after the gallery was finished.
How did the gallery there go?
Martinez
Fairly well. Of course we lived in what we today call an "art world". But in the early days it was a profession. After the long training he had to take in early days, an artist was authority. Even then to make a living was a struggle unless you had social connections, like McComas and Peters. So the artist became a teacher.
Baum
And this gallery was to bring culture to the hotel, is that it?
Martinez
It was to be cultural, of course.
Baum
What part did Charles Rollo Peters have in art exhibits and teaching?
Martinez
Rollo Peters never taught.
Baum
Didn't he organize seminars?
Martinez
Not that I ever knew. I never remember him teaching, organizing or lecturing ever. He was a very small, slightly impressive man, but a social type. He could be very charming. He was famous for his parties, then. He never dressed, looked, or acted like an artist. He was always the center of a group of wealthy social people who admired him.
One very interesting thing about Peters. I was very fond of his second wife, a charming Southerner, Constance Easley. I think she left him several years later. Anyhow, they were married and we became great friends. There came out from the East some prominent figure Rollo Peters didn't approve of. On her telling Rollo "I'm going to go have lunch with my friend at Del Monte," he protested. Constance ignored his protest. He was very angry and on her return from the luncheon, found in every room life-size replicas (busts) of
He brought her home and the busts with the pots of flowers had all disappeared. She loved telling me that story and I applauded her for her tact and charm.
The other story is about his first wife. She was a stalwart, handsome Irishwoman, classic type, and very impressive. There were several of these busts of her when I first visited Peters' home. That same bust is still on her tomb in Monterey Cemetery and every year, after her death, Rollo Peters would take a group of his friends to the cemetery to pay homage to her. He would stand there and give a eulogy on the greatness and virtues of this great woman, this wonderful wife of his. The second year there was quite a group of us — his artist friends — with him. They heard him for many years sing her praises. As he talked, one by one they slipped away to look at the many historic old names on the other tombs. He went right on talking, and finally there was no one left but myself, sitting quietly and attentively on the marble bench at the head of the tomb. He came over and said to me, "I appreciate your consideration". From then on he tried in so many ways to make our visits to him interesting
I knew Rollo, his son, too, then seventeen. Young Rollo told of his dreams to be an actor. But his father wanted him to be an artist. So Peters sent him to a famous art school in Glasgow, Scotland. He attended art school in the day and studied acting at night. When we saw each other thirty years later, we didn't recognize each other. (Laughter) We were at a talk given by Una Jeffers. After I came up to tell her how interesting it was, in front of me stood a small plump blond man. When she exclaimed, "Rollo! When did you come in?" I thought, "Don't tell me that's the beautiful young Rollo of thirty years ago!"
Baum
This is the son you're speaking of?
Martinez
Yes. Mr. Jeffers then turned to me, "Oh, Mrs. Martinez," Rollo turned around and stared at me with the same astonishment, then greeted me warmly. We were both middle-aged now and as we talked, he recalled the young glamour girl I was at seventeen and I remembered the handsome young actor to be who, later, played Romeo to one of our most beautiful and celebrated Juliet's.
At that period, also, Marty had summer classes in Monterey and Carmel. He had two in Monterey in 1909 and 1910. Dear old Pop Ernest, a figure in Monterey, loved the artists. He would fix the most wonderful meals for us and Marty's class for next to nothing because we were artists and he was looking after us. He would cook up the most wonderful fish dinners one can imagine, beautifully done and decorated for his bunch of artists.
Marty had summer classes in Carmel in 1913 and 1914.
Baum
Under what auspices were these classes?
Martinez
The California School of Arts and Crafts had their summer classes there.
Baum
He was teaching from about 1907, wasn't he?
Martinez
From 1908, just after we were married. He decided he had a wife to support and a bottle to support — he couldn't live without his wine.
Baum
He felt like he had to settle down a little?
Martinez
I was not much of an expense to him. Carrie Sterling, whose sister Lila Havens had, by that time, reached the top in fashion, went every year to Paris for her clothes. The season's gowns, when discarded, could not fit Carrie, her sister, who was large and buxom, while Lila was small and slim. So I inherited Lila's Paris gowns for several years.
The first time we went to Carmel for the summer class we went from the train station at Monterey to Carmel, over the hill, in an old wagon — it looked like a covered wagon with the top taken off and seats across — and a couple of old horses. Many of the men used to get out and walk up the hill.
I'll never forget the breathtaking view from the top of Ocean Avenue — the sparkling blue sea, the fresh green pines and the white sand that covered the streets of the picturesque little town. I resolved then, some day, to come and live in Carmel. We had stayed with Rollo Peters in picturesque Monterey — which was then the center of interest and art activities — and, strange as this may seem, did
When we reached the bottom of Ocean Avenue, our wagon got stuck in the sand in front of the stable. The horses were taken out and put in the stable and we trotted off to our destination. It was full of sand. There were no sidewalks, only a couple of wooden walks before the grocery store and Slevens and that was all.
Dolores Street was called "Professors' Row". David Starr Jordan had a summer home there and several professors from the University of California and Stanford had cottages along Dolores.
Then when we stayed with the Newberrys in 1908, in Carmel, there was not a thing near us. We dropped right down into the sea from their place — now three blocks from the sea.
Baum
How did you get to Carmel?
Martinez
Train.
Baum
That wasn't too bad a trip, then.
Martinez
No. And Marty also was doing some work for Sunset magazine. We used to get passes, too, which made it very simple. After the earthquake, George Sterling went down and he was crazy about it. He gathered a whole group about him, a large group, and the Newberrys came the next year. So we stayed with the Newberrys. By the time Marty had his classes there Carmel had begun to grow and the art colony to expand.
After the last class in 1914 I didn't see Carmel for fifteen years. Micaela had to be educated and Marty had gotten older and did not like to go away from Piedmont. He had his summer classes from
Baum
I have some questions to ask you about the group of artists and writers who lived in Carmel, but since Professor Walker is going to join us on an interview on that, I'll put off those questions until he is with us.
Painting and Painters
BaumDo you recall Marty working on any special paintings?
Martinez
Yes. He was still painting — from his many sketches — Paris scenes after his return from Europe. After the earthquake deposited him in Piedmont he turned out large numbers of paintings of our beautiful Piedmont hills and view of the Bay. His trip to the desert was responsible for many lovely canvases of the Indians and Indian country. Of course he made many paintings of me, too.
Speaking of portraits, I have a delightful story of the portrait Marty was commissioned to paint of David Starr Jordan. I think Searles was head of the alumni at Stanford at the time and he was to pick the artist to do a portrait of David Starr Jordan. He was a Bohemian Club
Marty was ushered into Dr. Jordan's laboratory at the moment Dr. Jordan was at his big desk studying beautifully colored plates - reproductions of fish for his latest book. He was giving them his careful scrutiny, as the authority on fish he was in the scientific world. Marty was enchanted. He asked Dr. Jordan, "Do you mind if I make a sketch of you sitting here?" He said, "Oh no, not at all. I'd be delighted." So Marty made a very quick drawing and a color sketch of him sitting there looking at this book of gorgeous plates, and back of him, on a shelf, great jars of brilliantly colored fish.
Searles and Dr. Jordan were delighted with the sketches and a "sitting" was planned a few days later. In the meantime, Mrs. Jordan heard of the plan and registered a vehement opposition to the sitting. She insisted on an official portrait of Dr. Jordan in cap and gown, befitting the dignity of a President of Stanford.
Marty was furious and refused to do a conventional portrait. "He's an interesting personality and what a setting - a life time's work in view that gave him his honors in the scientific world! An official portrait with a cap and gown is not in my line and I won't do it." Searles was quite upset and Marty insisted on giving up the commission.
However, he did make a small sketch of Dr. Jordan which I gave
Dr. Fisher had just retired but still kept his office at the Station to carry on scientific work still unfinished. Also, in his leisure time, he painted portraits. We cherish the canvases he painted of Harriet Dean, myself, and Kai, which gave us the opportunity to acquire a good friend. It was through him that we met Dr. Cornelis B. Van Niel whom Dr. Fisher declared was the greatest biologist in the world.
So an excellent academic portrait of Dr. Jordan was done by Mrs. Richarson and Mrs. Jordan was satisfied. Years later Searles told Marty both he and Jordan regretted that Marty had not gone on with the portrait they both liked.
Baum
I've seen the collection of Marty's paintings at the Oakland Art Museum and they represent various periods in his life. What did you think of his paintings?
Martinez
Well, Marty went through three periods; in his Mexican period his colors were colonial Spanish, followed by the Impressionist period in Paris. My favorites were the Impressionist period of Paris with its slightly Spanish coloring. His work was never the vivid, light colors of the French Impressionists. While he loved impressionism, his impressionism still had a slightly Spanish flavor.
In later years, his first canvases of the desert were superb "impressionism" in the warm and rich colors of the desert. The
Baum
I read in a newspaper clipping on different local artists a comment calling Martinez and Keith "tobacco juice painters" because of their dark colors.
Martinez
He never had that period. It was a Spanish period, beautiful grays and neutral greens, like the one he admired so much — Velasquez.
There is no darkness at all in his portrait of himself, which is in his Spanish period — deep grays and rich browns. That picture disappeared for twenty years. It was loaned to the de Young Museum for an exhibition and not returned. Ten years later, after Marty's death, while we were making his album, I ran across a paper stating that the museum had borrowed it. So I got in contact with the new curator there who promised to look into it. They found it and sent it to me, and I put it with Dr. Porter's collection. Now it's in the collection at the Oakland Gallery.
I don't care for Marty's last period except for his cloud drawings — over the Bay, the hills and the desert — in which he captured the elusive moods of nature. Then modernism came in. I think that threw Marty off.
I'll never forget when Gelett Burgess came up to the studio. We'd been married about three months. He'd just come back from Paris and had written the first article on "Les Fauves" for the
Harriet Dean went to the first Armory show in New York, brought by Walter Pach, of "Les Fauves" which caused a big uproar. We knew Walter Pach well, too, and were very fond of him. Walter Pach and Frederick Mortimer Clapp [director of the Frick Collection, New York] were friends of Marty's. I was very fond of Walter Pach's wife, Magda, a charming person. Walter was giving a series of talks at the University of California summer session during the war. While he was giving his lectures Magda and I used to sit out under the trees on the campus and talk about art. She was very intelligent and had an excellent background in the moderns, too. Sometimes she would take care of her little son and Kai while I attended Walter's lecture. Pach, at that time, was making the moderns familiar to Americans. He was one of the first to write on modern art for American periodicals.
Fred Clapp was staying with Edna and Porter Garnett and the three of them spent many Sundays with us in the old studio. He was then lecturing on art for the University of California, Extension Service. We did not miss one of those lectures for Fred had an intensity of feeling and depth of perception that made his
Frederick Clapp was a poet, too, and an excellent one. Marty kept in contact with Fred through letters for many years — following his career until he became curator of the Frick Collection. He lived in New York and we saw Fred and Maud on their summer visits to California.
Porter Garnett was one of Marty's greatest admirers and he and Edna were very close friends.
Baum
Do you recall the squabble in 1927 in the Bohemian Club when the art committee decided to exclude radical modernists and the other artists got angry about it?
Martinez
I just vaguely remember an uproar at that time, but I don't remember anything about it.
Baum
It wasn't clear whether Marty had had a part in this or not.
Martinez
You could count on Marty to take the radicals' side, so he'd be on the offending end.
Baum
Lucien Labaudt was the one who was going to be excluded.
Martinez
Well, Marty wouldn't stand for that. The more radical they were the better. The "modern movement" was well established by this time and
I remember Spencer Macky was at the head of that group that led—the sanity in art group.
Baum
In 1930 Diego Rivera came to San Francisco to do the mural decorations for the new stock exchange. Did Marty meet with him?
Martinez
Marty often used to go over to see Diego Rivera. At that time Rivera was too busy to come to Piedmont, though Orozco did come up to Piedmont on his trip to San Francisco. We used to go over to see Rivera working on his murals at the time of the fair. Occasionally Marty and Rivera had luncheons together and reminisced about Paris. I only saw Rivera's wife, Frieda Kahlo, once. She had come to pick him up and take him home.
There are quite a number of Marty's canvases in private collections. Macbeth handled his work in New York and Marty never bothered to find out who bought them. Many of his best works — the beautiful canvases he painted of the desert — were in Charley Sutro's collection and were lost when his house in Carmel burned down. Fire seemed to be his nemesis. A fine collection of his canvases which were in Dr. Daniel Crosby's home — his doctor in Piedmont — were lost when his Piedmont home burned down. Also, many a private collection was lost in the San Francisco fire. In those three fires, probably one quarter of Marty's work was lost.
Sutro had the best of the desert work — five paintings and many drawings. Dr. William Porter started collecting early in their friendship. He spent much effort and many years gathering a representative
I gave Kai, to eventually give to the Gallery, the beautiful color photograph that Arnold Genthe made of Marty. Genthe also took a number of color photographs of me. I had masses of blonde hair that was the color of polished brass — with a slight green tone in it that he declared he'd never seen before. He exhibited them in New York and many viewers declared hair could not be that color. He promised to send me one of the color plates, but in his busy life in New York the promise was forgotten.
Marty was an excellent cartoonist. The one of Genthe is in his scrapbook in the Oakland Art Museum. The only person Marty said was impossible to catch was Jack London. His features were too regular. He said, "I can't make a good cartoon of you. There's nothing to grasp in your face."
At the New York World's Fair in 1940, there was a bronze plaque with all the names of the foreign born who had added to the culture of America — Padre Sierra, William Keith, and Marty. Of course,
Also, the Legislature of the State of California, on the day Marty's death was announced over the radio, paid him the honor of special recognition. Professor Jones, representing the school teachers of California at the Legislature, announced the death of Marty and requested he be duly honored. They agreed, and after Professor Jones' tribute to Marty, they observed a moment's silence and adjourned an hour ahead of time and the lavishly printed honor was sent to me. It's in Marty's album now in the possession of the Oakland Art Gallery.
Jack London
Socialist Period and the Strunskys
BaumYou've mentioned briefly how your father first met Jack London when they were both interested in socialism. You said there was a small group of socialists who got together to discuss socialism and that your father became one of the group.
Martinez
Father was already a member of the Socialist Party in Oakland when the young Jack London, 20 years old, stopped to listen to a harangue, as the brilliant Englishman Strawn-Hamilton called it, in the city park. Jack met father there and he and Jack became friends. In Joan London's book is an accurate description of their meeting.
Strawn-Hamilton gave Jack and my father their course in dialectics, logic, and public speaking — natural philosophy and Marxian philosophy. While he was putting them through the paces of logic, Jack was pounding on the table exclaiming vehemently, "I cannot take logic. It's a strait-jacket".
Baum
This was about 1896 or 1897?
Martinez
Yes. We were living in Oakland on a little street, over in back of what they call Pill Hill because of the hospitals there.
Baum
How long were your father and London together in the socialist group? The Ruskin Club?
Martinez
I think it was about 1897 to 1901, when my father left the party. Encouraged by Ina Coolbrith, a literary Oakland librarian, some members of the socialist group organized the Ruskin Club.
What did your father think of Jack London's logic, as a socialist?
Martinez
Well, Jack London could project socialism as a way of life, a vivid recreation of his love of life. Darwinism was the key. His pet phrase was Darwin's "The survival of the fittest". When he went to Alaska, wherever he looked was "survival of the fittest".
Baum
It doesn't seem to fit with socialism, though.
Martinez
There has never been anyone whose struggle was such a conflict — trying to fit his rugged individualism into the mold of materialism. He always burst the mold and his love of life outstripped his theory — and ended in disillusionment at forty.
He told us that after he had made his success, I guess he wasn't yet thirty, he was going up Market Street and he looked in all the windows, and remembered as a boy how he'd looked in those same windows and how he had yearned for many of the things that were there. Now that he had all the money he wanted, he didn't want a thing that was there — so he cried.
He radiated vitality and his enthusiasm was contagious. Few people recall his voice. I had a perfect mania for voices, I had studied music and voices I remember clearly. The depth of feeling which he projected with that voice - though not strong or low - carried as much might as if it had been a strong male voice. His His voice was rather husky and it was vital and it was rich in feeling. I used to love to hear him talk.
Now, my father's voice was a typical well-trained English voice, rather a middle register, but clear and it could carry.
My father took me to all the lectures and I had a little blue cap with a red feather in it. He'd forget I was there and he walked off one time and I stayed there. They started to put out the lights and I just sat till he came back and got me. I went to all the lectures as a child.
This story is unknown and I can't understand why. It's not in Joan's book, but I was there and remembered it. There was to be a debate with David Starr Jordan in the old Labor Temple on 12th Street. It was a hideous old place with old wooden benches and sort of a dank, musty smell about it. This night there was terrific excitement because they were to have their debate on socialism with David Starr Jordan. My father was picked to be the opponent of David Starr Jordan. At the end of the debate, Jordan told my father in front of the audience, "You are the most effective opponent I have ever met, and I want to congratulate you."
The debate ended, Jordan left, and my father, Jack, Austin Lewis and some others rushed over to Coffee Dan's, greatly excited and congratulating my father on a job well done.
Baum
Did they have a good audience?
Martinez
Oh yes. David Starr Jordan's name jammed the place. The Socialists
After every lecture, my father, Jack London, Austin Lewis, Strawn-Hamilton, and the Strunskys, when they were in Oakland, and others I do not remember, went over to Coffee Dan's. Here, over big coffee cups that held almost a pint, they discussed the meetings, their successes or failures, and planned future tactics.
One high point in their work was the decision to carry their message to the public in the public square. Unfortunately, the city jail was then attached to the old City Hall across the square. The plan was to cut their lectures into three parts. Strawn-Hamilton would start the talk — he was a good rabble rouser. My father would fill in the second part of it. Then, Jack would carry on the last third of the lecture.
Strawn-Hamilton stood on the soap box quickly, got a good crowd gathered about him, and got a good start before the paddy wagon arrived on the scene and took him off. My father waited until the wagon was out of sight, then took to the soap box. The paddy wagon returned and carted him off. But the young Jack got a rousing finish before he was hustled off and lodged in the city jail. The City of Oakland has planted an oak tree on the spot to commemorate this event in tribute to Jack London.
I'll never forget a lecture of Jack London's that I heard in Santa Cruz. I was spending the summer with an English family, friends of my father's. Our hostess wanted to hear Jack London talk in the
Jack London was the enthusiast with rare depth of feeling and with a wild enthusiasm. He dealt with the facts of life and poverty—he was graphic. He knew. He had this magnificent ability and he had a real love of humanity, but at that time his idea of helping humanity was Marxian economics — the last expression of materialism. But the idealism he had, and the depth of his feeling had an important function in that young party. He was able to make it vivid.
Then there came from Russia - you remember in Russia the persecution of the Jews - the Strunskys - and a whole group with them. Anna's was the burning spirit that matched Jack's - that inner burning spirit of the Jewish people. So these two vivid people met each other. She was a revolutionary Marxist, too.
Baum
She was younger than he was?
Martinez
Not too much. It was her brother Simeon who was the famous liberal, you know, and one time editor of the Masses. She called Simeon "brother", a Jewish custom always to call a first cousin brother. The Strunskys joined the young Jack London and Marxism became an issue.
My father had become interested in Fabian Socialism and Jack embraced, with his usual superb enthusiasm, Marxian Revolutionary Socialism. So a coolness developed between them and they had already
My father often recalled that he had written a pamphlet on socialism to be printed and distributed in Oakland. He had worked it out with care because he wanted it to be read and his friends all applauded this excellent exposition of Fabian Socialism. However, Jack London suggested it should have at the top the Marxian slogan, "Let the capitalists tremble!". My father replied, "I object! I want this pamphlet read and one look at that heading and it will be thrown into the wastebasket." There was an uproar and finally Jack London demanded "We'll vote on it". It came up for the vote and Jack's supporters won. "Let the capitalists tremble" would be put at the top of this pamphlet. My father was upset. He declared "I have written this and I should have the right to say how it should be printed. I object so strenuously that I warn you I'll leave the party." They laughed and said "He'll get over it". Father further refused to sign his name to it. When the pamphlet came out my father left the party for good, telling them he was not interested in or liked Revolutionary Marxism.
Bessie, Jack London's first wife, since father was no longer a Socialist and Jack had no use for him, added fuel to the fire and deepened the feud by telling their friends that Jack had walked through rainstorms and mud to go over to him and review his first manuscripts with him. Father was deeply hurt. What infuriated him was that he was ten years older than Jack London and he had a better
Looking back, I remember when Joan was born - I used to baby sit and rock her in the cradle.
Baum
Tell me a little more about the Strunskys.
Martinez
I'll take Anna separately. The Strunskys went East at the end of two years and the vivid group of which Jack was the heart and soul dissolved and Jack's success filled the gap their absence had given him.
He didn't play as large a part in the Socialist Party, but he wrote their pamphlets. He was away on lecture tours - went to England and as a correspondent to Japan.
Baum
Tell me more about Anna Strunsky. I met her a few years ago and we eventually hope to get her memoirs.
Martinez
I spent a whole day with her in Carmel when she came down with Olive Cowell. Olive Cowell's husband knew me when I was a child; he used to say, "Elsie, I used to dandle you on my knee." I replied, "Now just hold that story, because when you were coming my father used to say, `Margaret, get the kids out of the way. Harry Cowell hates children."' So we all got out of the way when Harry came. I never was dandled on his knee.
Harry's brilliancy became repetitious and boring. His vogue waned, so he deserted the literary societies and Socialists, whom he effectively ridiculed, for the sports world. He became a tennis pro and devoted the later years of his life to teaching classes and developing future tennis champions, though he was no more successful in
However, his ace in the hole was his son Henry with whom, vicariously, he realized his former dreams of success. Henry was really a phenomenon. His mother was a brilliant Jewess who was a pupil of Veblen. She had married Harry in the early days and when then they separated. We, too, followed Henry's meteoric career through the years with Henry, Sr. to keep us in touch with his peregrinations and amazing achievements.
At eight years of age young Henry had taken an intellectually stiff I.Q. examination at Stanford and came out a prodigy. He could play the piano and the violin quite expertly and already reached a mastery in his musical compositions that startled his teachers and set his course in the musical field.
Unhappily, Henry, Sr. did not live to share with him the triumph of young Henry, who, on the fifteenth anniversary of his first concert in San Francisco (He was seventeen then and we were with him and his proud father) repeated the early compositions during the first half of the program and followed these with his mature work.
He had inherited the keen intelligence and shrewdness of his mother, which was colored and enriched by the sentiment and fantasy of his Irish forebears on his father's side. Having excited much attention in San Francisco and being applauded by the critics, the way was paved for his conquest of New York. He was an irresistible lad and before long his compositions were on many concert programs. The next step was Europe.
He had studied Helmholtz's "sensations of tone", the bible of the modern musicians, so his early compositions had a refreshing modernism that was a novelty at the time. He sat on the doorstep of every big critic and every big musician in Europe. His agile mind and his knowledge of modern European music and delicate nuances of sentiment appealed to the Europeans and he returned home with enough praise and commendations to fill a pamphlet which with his flair for publicity he published and sent to music critics, music publishers, musicians, music teachers and music departments in all the colleges — thereby enhancing his reputation.
President Kennedy wired him congratulations during his piano concert, Governor Rockefeller sent felicitations to him when the New York Philharmonic played his last symphony. The Mayor of New York expressed warm good wishes for his lecture. The New York Public Library featured his published compositions, his symphony scores and exhibited the articles on music and the publicity he had accumulated over the years. Moreover, Juilliard, where he taught music, gave him a splendid reception attended by many celebrities of the musical world to do him honor. His stepmother, who had played a sympathetic role in his career, attended the series of concerts, lectures and receptions and gave us a complete account of his triumphs upon her return to California. Moreover, he had printed a handsome brochure to commemorate the event.
Baum
And Olive Cowell is his stepmother. I met Mrs. Cowell.
Martinez
Her specialty is international affairs. I think she's lectured on it, as a matter of fact. She's been everywhere. She just adores Henry.
Baum
She was hosting Mrs. Ann Strunsky Walling - brought her over to Bancroft Library in 1960.
Martinez
She took her down to Carmel, too.
The awful part of it — I must say that I shocked Anna then by telling her a few things. When I told her about the girls Jack had been going to marry she was horribly shocked. I think she was upset; she had an idealization of him.
I remembered, over the many years, the dress Anna wore when I first saw her — a soft smoke-colored material with a red ornament at the neck and a red belt buckle. I was twelve then and when I accompanied my father to the train to see her off for the East, she wore that dress again. I had not seen Anna again until recently when reminiscing I described her dress. "Astonishing!", she exclaimed, "It's the only dress I ever loved and have never forgotten. Only last night I was describing it to Olive!" I suspect it was connected with her romance with Jack London.
She was very much in love with him (Jack London), yet claimed there was no affair, which we all believed. Bessie had told us of the evening when Anna and Jack were working on the Kempton-Wace letters. She found her sitting in Jack's lap. That was enough for Bessie. Very skillfully Charmian implied the "other woman" was Anna Strunsky, and when it came out Anna told me — I hadn't seen her all those intervening years — she said it was a terrible shock to her because she was engaged to William English Walling and she wondered
At the time of the divorce, every one thought Jack would marry Anna. But Jack had once confided to Sterling that he wouldn't marry her because he was pure Anglo-Saxon and she was Semitic, although he loved her. When Anna went East the gossip died down and was forgotten.
Women admired Anna but resented the attraction their men felt for her.
Baum
Was she pretty?
Martinez
Beautiful, I would say. The Israelite woman can be completely irresistible without the taint of a flirt. She was beautiful — fine features, smoldering eyes, a wide, generous mouth, and above all a soft vibrant voice. She had a deep messianic feeling, whether for socialism or woman's rights, that was appealing and compelling and to which even the women responded.
At that time, Marty was engaged to her sister, Rose, who was taking her finals at Stanford. Anna's messianic feeling for socialism was a potent force and Rose was drawn into the whirlpool Anna's enthusiasm created.
All I remember about her is that Marty painted a very lovely portrait of her. Much later, when Kai was married and we needed repairs
The Writers Group
Father had already drifted away from the Socialist group. His closest friends were George Sterling and Mary Austin. Mary Austin was a small, very slim woman, attractive but without beauty save her magnificent hair. She often complained that it was so tiring piled on her head, and among friends took it down and with pride displayed the heavy braid that fell below her knees.
She had just written the Land of Little Rain, parts of which my father read in his lectures. So the bond and the lasting friendship was that of fellow writers.
When Jack moved up to Piedmont, to the banker Henshaw's "summer cottage" (in which he wrote The Call of the Wild), George Sterling brought my father and Jack together again. Success had tempered
Jack London went to the University of California when he was twenty. He decided to try this much vaunted university education. The complete story of this period at the University of California is in Joan London's book.
BaumCould he read rapidly?
Martinez
Amazingly so. He was a tremendous reader. He had a quick analytical mind, keen intuitions, and considerable experience in life
Ambrose Bierce, Sterling's mentor, didn't approve of Jack London. George Sterling was determined to have Bierce and London meet. It happened at the Bohemian Grove summer encampment that Bierce, Sterling and London came together. Marty was there, too. I was staying with Laura and Caret Bierce at the mountain cabin of Caret's father, who was Bierce's brother, at Guerneville, on the Russian River, across the river from the Bohemian Grove.
George was to bring Bierce to the little cabin to see his brother and nephew. We were waiting with considerable anticipation and some trepidation for the great satirist when we heard voices half a mile away. Bierce had slipped down the bank and fallen into the water. He was mad as a hatter and what a vocabulary he had! Jack was laughing and roaring and making jokes all the way up. George was protesting, first to one, then the other. They finally got up to
There was a resentful streak in Jack - his love of practical jokes did duty for a satirical gift he did not possess, nor had the sophistication to acquire it. He admired Bierce, yet considered his satire almost underhanded, since he knew life in the raw where all insults were avenged by battling and often brutally.
His favorite joke was to pick out a newcomer, have him get down on his hands and knees, and push a peanut with his nose across the room. Then just as the victim shoved the peanut over the line, he received a wham on the behind and toppled over. Often these practical jokes were outlets for his contempt of the middle class sycophants that success had brought him. He reveled in reducing their dignity, which he considered only a cloak to cover a vast emptiness, by derision and laughter at their expense.
There was another game he fancied - he had a table covered with bubble pipes from all over the world. Wherever there was an ad for a soap bubble pipe, Jack London sent for it. Some of them were Oriental, too. Everybody was to take a bubble pipe and blow bubbles. Being young, I was about sixteen, I said very contemptuously, "What do you
Jack London also was a friend of Joaquin Miller. Sterling, Caret Bierce, London, and my father were on their way up to Miller's. Caret had brought a shotgun for quail which they were to bring for an impromptu barbecue. Sterling had a gallon of wine, which they tapped vigorously and often. They were having a hilarious time when George, who often had preposterous ideas when drunk, said, "Let's have a shooting match. We'll move back the distance we think safe, then one of you take a shot at our behinds!" The cautious Caret laughed and said, "All right, if you let me shoot first". "Agreed," replied Sterling. Then they argued about distance. Sterling moved back, doubled over, and called out, "I'm not taking any chances on you - ready!" Caret pulled the trigger and George leaped into the air yelling and cursing. Roaring with glee, they inspected him and found a few pellets had broken the skin and it was the sting that made him wild. So Caret dug out the pellets imbedded on the surface with his fingers and rubbed the spots with wine as a safety measure.
Father, Jack and several others were on a ride with the first automobile of our pianist friend Robert Tolmie, who had bought secondhand a huge Locomobile. On the jaunt Jack London was shocked to see the first big signs of outdoor advertising along the road. So they picked the biggest one and tore it down.
Professor Franklin Walker of Mills College was present at one interviewing session. While most of that session is included in the chapters on Piedmont, Carmel, and Monterey, a few comments have been inserted elsewhere when the topic so indicated.
Moving with that set, did you run into a sculptor named Finn Frolich?
Martinez
Oh, yes! He was a wonderful character - an old Swede from the sailing ship days - short and square, who could roar out sea chanties or do an agile horn pipe and always carrying his old parrot whose talent was sailing ship orders and sailors' curses. Jack just loved him.
Walker
His widow wrote to me about him.
Bessie and Charmian
BaumDid you know Bessie London very well?
Martinez
Yes, she was a friend of my mother's and after Jack built the house for Bessie and the girls on our hill, I saw much of her while the girls were growing up.
There were no autos in the early period of the friendship. Jack and my father were expert bicyclists. When the first "bloomer girl" outfits were within reach of Bessie and my mother, Jack and my father bought bicycles for them and planned trips together. So, correctly attired, they agreed to a week-end jaunt to the Observatory on Mt. Hamilton. The first "bloomer girls" in Oakland, they caused much excitement and were conversation pieces for the shocked Victorians until the vogue for bloomers became respectable.
That was quite a trip.
Martinez
Jack was disappointed in Bessie. He had tried to make her an outdoor woman and found he had failed when, on their honeymoon, she complained of the cold water at Santa Cruz and she proved a poor swimmer. Jack was furious. Then, he resigned himself to accepting her as she was until the coming of the babies solved the problem neatly. Still, he held against Bessie her lack of sportsmanship and often ridiculed her, which she ignored despite the hurt she felt.
But Charmian was everything he desired. She'd leap into the Arctic or down into a volcano if he asked her to. She was a good horsewoman and a daring woman.
Baum
Were your mother and Bessie close friends?
Martinez
Yes, they were very close friends for, I guess, three years. I don't think they saw much of each other after my father left socialism. I have photographs of them together on the socialist picnics in the album.
However, Bessie was not a warm person. Curiously enough, Charmian was not a warm personality either. But Charmian was gregarious and gay and fun and loved people in a social sort of a way, and she loved having a house full, which pleased Jack.
Jack was an Anglophile and he hated anything organized - organized religion or organized society. Yet he adored the British Empire because it was power and he ignored the tremendous organization that held it together. He married Bessie because Bessie's father was an
Jack wanted a son desperately and, when Joan was born, he went out and got drunk and wasn't seen for three days. When little Bess was born, the second girl, he left Bessie for good, for not to have a son was humiliating to him. He admired Bessie because he considered her a pure Anglo-Saxon to be the mother of sons. Also, in the beginning of his writing career, she had helped him with his grammar.
But to go back to Jack: I saw nothing of him in the intervening years until, in 1907, I married Marty. He was a close friend of Jack's. Jack was very fond of Marty, a picturesque figure he enjoyed. George Sterling, Jack and Marty, the three of them, were often together. Before long Sterling was dubbed affectionately, "The Greek", Marty, "The Aztec", and Jack "Wolf".
Our rugged individualists - Ambrose Bierce, George Sterling, Jack London- all considered suicide a noble end, solving their problems of disillusionment. Bierce, who lamented the passing of the pioneer age; Sterling, whose Greek hedonism was stifled by the late Victorianism; and London, disgusted with a humanity that would not accept the Marxian panacea for the good of this world, all committed suicide. Marty had ten friends who committed suicide. The newsmen would ask him, since all were friends of his, had not there existed a suicide club.
Ambrose Bierce, Joaquin Miller, Charles Warren Stoddard, and from the next generation, Jack London, George Sterling, and Marty continued the development of the personality cult. Rugged individualism, rooted and developed in the pioneer age, faded out in the age of capitalism and two world wars. We are finding life is fitted into tight patterns now with no place for individualism.
At that time I was with Marty, in the inner circle around Jack, along with the Sterlings. We were friends of Charmian, too.
Jack Partington, the portrait painter, had a beautiful sister, Phyllis, who had graduated from the chorus of the San Francisco Opera Company into the Boston Light Opera Company. She was a handsome, tall, black-eyed girl, and Jack became very enamored of her. So, the Sterlings, especially Carrie, were determined that Jack should marry Phyllis. Finally, after a tender scene, Jack gave her his ultimatum, "I'm going on a lecture tour, and if you'll give up your career, on my return I'll marry you. She was very much tempted, because Jack was irresistible and a career seemed less important.
At that time, I knew a scheming woman whose daughter was a young poetess with green eyes and red hair. The poetess met Jack London and lured him into promising to marry her, too. So Jack was entangled and had promised to marry three women
Jack blithely went to New York to start his lecture tour. The day after he arrived there was splashed all over the New York papers: "Jack London marries Charmian Kittredge of Berkeley, California." Carrie was fit to be tied. The lovely Phyllis wept a little, then
Charmian's uncle had been a sea captain of ferry boats on San Francisco Bay. They were at Glen Ellen at the estate belonging to her aunt and uncle and they were honeymooning up there when they originated the plans for the Snark.
Well, anyhow, Carrie Sterling was never going to speak to Jack again after he married Charmian - she was through with Jack London for good. George brought him back to Carrie and there was a reconciliation. Carrie said to Jack, "Jack, why did you do that? Why did you marry Charmian?" To which he replied, "Now listen Carrie, when I arrived in New York Charmian was there to meet me at the train. If a woman wants you that much, why you marry her! Moreover, I married Charmian because she is courageous and would follow me to the ends of the earth in hell or high water - a woman who could take life in her stride!"
Baum
Did you come to like her better?
Martinez
No. I never liked Charmian. I never saw too much of her, either, after that. I think all of us resented the underhand game she played on Bessie, using Anna as breaking up her marriage. Irving Stone
Baum
Well, would you have liked her otherwise?
Martinez
No, I never would have liked Charmian. She was a man's woman and had little use for her sex, except as a menace to peace of mind in relation to Jack! But she was what Jack wanted and that's all that mattered. She was eight years older, just like Bessie. He wanted a boy desperately. Charmian tried but had a miscarriage and it proved to be a girl. So that ended Charmian trying again to have children.
"Snark" Anecdotes
MartinezOh, I forgot to tell you the story of the "Snark". Jack London had been a chain smoker since he was fifteen, he told us. He declared before he left that he was going to give up the habit since he was a slave to it. He'd wake up a dozen times a night and have to smoke. He gave the order, "I forbid anyone on the "Snark" to bring one cigarette aboard." Dr. Porter talked to Charmian, "Do you know what will happen if he'd been a chain smoker since he was fifteen?" He told Charmian she should secrete a carton, that would be one package a day, "Otherwise you have no idea what you are going to go through." "Jack's word is law", she answered, and so there wasn't a cigarette on board.
In Charmian's diary, she needed someone to confide in so she wrote a daily diary and sent it to Carrie Sterling to keep for her, she wrote from day to day what they suffered. The first day he was
I have just reread The Log of the Snark. Jack, who had such a vivid love of the sea, such a vivid reaction to nature, The Snark proved the dullest thing I've ever read. The only thing he talks about is navigation and the discovery of the boat's defects which would have proved fatal had they been in a storm - anxious moments which brought out out of his miseries and obsession for short periods. There are no descriptions of sunsets, of the sea he loved.
The moment they came into the harbor he yelled for cigarettes. They threw him a carton, he smoked half a carton in thirty minutes. This binge on cigarettes kept him in the hospital three weeks.
Charmian was too vain to ever leave a record of that mistake. Carrie returned it to her. She must have burned the diary. At the beginning of their great adventure Charmian had failed Jack and bitterly regretted this error. There is no mention of this struggle in The Log of the Snark nor any reference to it in her Life of Jack London. So the episode was buried deep in their hearts and memories. All of the "Snark's" crew, as well, recalled the tragic feelings of all of them - of a heartbreaking futility and helplessness in the presence of Jack's physical agonies - they could not alleviate.
Baum
It still sounds like Carrie and Charmian were quite close for a while.
Martinez
They were until Jack died. Carrie rushed up to stay with Charmian fearing she might, while in a state of shock, try to follow Jack. To Carrie's amazement, Charmian was not only not in a state of shock, but slept soundly. Charmian had boasted of her insomnia, her "white nights" she romantically called them. Carrie loved Jack, and to her troubled question, Charmian replied "For the first time since my marriage I can sleep. No one can take him away from me now!" Carrie was shocked and finding that Charmian did not need sympathy or support, left a few days later.
One story connected with the "Snark" is very revealing. Carrie Sterling asked us to come over to her place - Jack was bringing a bundle of letters from the boys who answered his published appeal for a cabin boy for the "Snark", and we were to share the excitement of choosing the winner. It did not take too long to reduce the bundle to two letters - one from Martin Johnson and the other, an intelligent, eager lad whose name I've forgotten because he was turned down.
Carrie, George, Jack and Marty argued back and forth, but I had not declared myself yet. Carrie called out, "Elsie, your turn!" I was scanning the photograph of the husky, beaming young Johnson. I insisted that young Johnson seemed to have all the qualities befitting a cabin boy. Jack agreed. So, Carrie, George and Marty gave in and Martin Johnson was accepted to have the thrilling honor of crossing
When the "Snark" reached Tahiti, in the South Seas, young Johnson ran across an old reporter, now a beachcomber, who encouraged the naive lad to release his enthusiasm about the trip and his adoration of Jack and Charmian. Though he had revealed nothing, his enthusiasm was irresistible and the old reporter, considering it good copy, sent his so-called interview to the New York Times. A few days later, Jack's publishers sent a heated protest. Since Jack had everyone on the "Snark" under contract to give no interviews. He would not hear any explanations and fired the lad on the spot. The young Johnson was desolate and the contrite reporter assured him he had worked out a plan. This will be the beginning of your career my boy," he declared. "There's an anthropological expedition stopping over here in a week and they need a photographer." Johnson replied dubiously, "I don't know too much about photography, but I have my little camera." "Easy," replied his new friend, "we have a wonderful old French photographer here and he's agreed to put you in training." And in three weeks this old photographer trained him thoroughly, loaned him a good camera, and he got the job. That was the beginning of the great Martin Johnson's career. He was deeply hurt by Jack London and I have wondered if he ever had written about London's harsh and summary dismissal of him. Later he wrote his reporter friend that he was grateful to him for having caused his dismissal.
Death
BaumDid you see much of Jack London after he and Charmian got the ranch at the Valley of the Moon?
Martinez
Yes, several times. When he came to see his daughter he always came over to the studio in Piedmont. Then we spent a weekend at the ranch with him three weeks before he died.
As the Socialist Party, winning its battles for labor, deteriorated and had lost the Marxian revolutionary spirit and impetus - to which Jack was wholeheartedly dedicated - he turned to scientific agriculture and animal husbandry. This was a temporary refuge to fill the desperate need he had for action, to project himself into aims and plans for the betterment of humanity through science.
Without the necessary practical background, he started projects that were bound to fail. He put up a beautiful scientific pig pen, a cement silo in the center, out from which radiated the pig pens, each one with its scientific feeder, its automatic water sprinkler, its neat and clean cement area on which his pigs lived. The pigs died mysteriously of cholera despite all his precaution. I remember the creosote mat on which each of us had to rub his feet before entering the farm, which did not protect them.
He sent to England for a $2,000 horse to breed a special stock. It was poisoned. The day after we left, his "Wolf House", on which he had spent so much effort - he'd picked every timber for it - burned down - the day it was finished.
The Socialists did not approve of this luxury and the critics claimed he sold himself to Hearst to support this ranch. He, himself, told us that it cost him $80,000 a year for its upkeep.
His bull pen was unbelievable! In a circle of redwoods, enclosed by a fence of redwood logs, a thick carpet of redwood needles underfoot, in the center a raised ornamental cement basin from which clear, fresh water dripped, and a log cabin for a shelter, was the home of his handsome prize bull.
He showed us, with great pride, the scientific charts of the stock he was breeding and of his plans for scientific farming.
We had a Hawaiian friend in San Francisco who told us of knowing the beautiful half-Hawaiian lady with whom Jack had fallen desperately in love. This lovely creature was beautiful, sensual and mysterious, and Jack had, on his recent trip to the Islands, asked her to marry him.
It was obvious that Jack was bored with Charmian. He called her childish, he was irritable, and he spoke sharply to her. To me it was upsetting to see the fear in her eyes and her attempts to pass off his cruel remarks gaily. He had loved to hear her play Rachmaninoff's Prelude, her one show piece. That evening she had played only a chord or two when Jack loudly proclaimed he loved only Hawaiian music, and she left the piano.
The night he died, Dr. Porter, who was a great friend of Marty's (and his doctor) was there. The Japanese boy, as was his habit to take Jack his medicine, rushed to Charmian babbling that he could not wake the master. Charmian called Dr. Porter, who was spending the weekend with them. They found Jack in a state of coma. On Jack's bed table, he saw a notation of two drugs that put together are deadly. Dr. Porter knew then what had happened. "We've got to keep him alive until we get the antidote," he said. And he called the village pharmacist to get it up there as quickly as possible.
Then began the heartbreaking struggle to bring Jack out of the coma. They pulled him upright, forced coffee down his throat, slapped and rubbed his muscles to keep his circulation going, got him off the bed, and supporting him, tried to make him walk. The pharmacist arrived and Dr. Porter gave him the antidote. Again, they renewed the frantic struggle to keep Jack alive.
Exhausted and hopeless, Dr. Porter was easing him onto the bed when Jack opened his eyes and with the most heartbreaking look Porter had ever seen, he whispered, "You know I have to go, and you can't stop me". He then fell back unconscious and died.
One of the obsessions Jack had, George Sterling told us, was that he was losing his mind like his mother. Sterling used to soothe him by declaring he was merely suffering from exhaustion.
She was one of the most picturesque old girls I have ever known. She was a spiritualist when young and used to hold seances.
She was imaginative and a wild enthusiast, too. I loved her. Often I went to see her. The last time was when I was sixteen. She had a wig and in one of the paroxysms of Lady Macbeth, she made a grand gesture, grabbed her wig and flung it across the porch. Without dropping a word or changing a tone, she inserted, "Child, bring me my wig" and upon retrieving it, clapped it on her head, a bit askew, and finished her part.
Jack's father was a popularizer of science when science and religion were at each other's throats. Jack's love of science came from his father, but he inherited his mother's imagination and enthusiasm.
When ill and exhausted and he couldn't work, he tried to pull himself out of his depressions with drink. Carrie told us after Jack was taken to the mortuary, Charmian noticed the burned remains of a letter in his ashtray. She tried to recover a fragment, but each time she touched it, it dissolved into dust, so her curiosity was never satisfied. But the letter had come that day from this beautiful Hawaiian, as I heard from the Hawaiian family; she turned him down.
Then the bitterest of all, which has never been touched on: he was an Anglophile and he thought World War I would bring about the Revolution. To him, war was heroic, the means of destroying all the decay, all the stagnation. And he was pretty conscious of the stagnation of that Victorian period even in his Socialist Party. He spent his time trying to get people to go to war and he couldn't go.
Then another point: I was in on all the uproar about Joan going up there. Joan was majoring in writing in high school and her father was interested. She wrote the most foolish, silly novel that ever was written and Charmian was malicious enough to get the newspapers to publish it. It was a grave mistake so far as Joan was concerned. It was a silly cloak and dagger thing. This was when she was eighteen that it was published; she was sixteen then. Her mother, Bessie, was just fanatical about that frightful woman - they lived right next to us and I saw her many times - she hated Charmian so. Jack wrote several very fine letters which Bessie had me read; he wanted Joan to come up to visit him on the ranch. The last thing he had left was the father role. He wanted Joan to come up desperately. His letters were appeals. He wrote, "My child, I'll give you every advantage. You want to be a writer and I will do everything I can to develop your talent. Come up to the ranch. I would love to take and develop you."
Well, I was there the day that Bessie won and she showed me, with a fanatical satisfaction, the letter she had Joan write. "I cannot go up to the ranch until that beast of a woman who ruined my mother's life is off it". That's all that was written to Jack London,
In Jack London's beautiful study the last night we were there, three weeks before he died, the only photograph on his desk was a photograph of Joan. He picked it up and looked at it and said sadly, "This child has no idea what she has given up." And bitterly excoriating Bessie he finished, "She has ruined this girl's life. I needed her now."
Speaking of pictures, little Bess came to see me, and that poor little dear. I had an early photograph of Jack in his little studio in Oakland. She studied it for a moment, then cried pathetically. She said, "I have practically nothing of my father's". So, I gave her that photograph, the earliest one of him as a writer.
These two girls, both of them, married YMCA secretaries. When Jack wanted to give a man the last insult, he called him a YMCA secretary. Joan married Park Abbott.
Walker
Did you run into any theories when Jack died that he might have been murdered?
Martinez
No, not the slightest. Dr. Porter came to see us the day after he died and told us the whole story exactly as it happened. They had spent exhausting hours keeping him alive, jerking him around, walking, filling him with coffee, giving him antidotes for the poison. Finally he opened his eyes and looked up at Dr. Porter and said, "Bill, you can't do this to me. I've got to go and you know it!" Porter was so shocked and so exhausted that he just let his hand go, and Jack fell back on the bed and was gone.
There were some friends of London's who were very suspicious of Charmian after his death.
Martinez
Oh, she worshipped the ground that man walked on. That would be the last person I'd pick.
Walker
I've never been satisfied with the story of Jack London's death. I corresponded to some extent with the one doctor who testified. My own theory is that he took an overdose of morphine thinking to ease the terrific pain he was in. I'm not convinced he committed suicide.
Martinez
Well, Dr. Porter was there when he died. He rushed in with Charmian and on the desk was a note, a combination of two drugs that mixed together were quite lethal. And he, Charmian and the houseboy spent two hours frantically trying to keep him alive.
Walker
Dr. Porter signed the death certificate saying it was death from natural causes, uremic poisoning I think he called it, to please Charmian.
Martinez
Yes, he did. He told us. They called it uremic poisoning.
Walker
He had renal colic, he'd been in incredible pain, there's no doubt about that.
Martinez
Yes, he was exhausted, and he had this mania that his mother was cracked and a mental case and he feared, since he had mental exhaustion, he might be losing his mind.
We took Pal (Harriet Dean) up there three weeks before he died. He looked so tired, and he said about Charmian, "She is so childish," with the most tired air.
Baum
Did you feel when you saw him then that he was worn out? Did he
Martinez
No, he wasn't used up. Rather, individualism was dying, that was all. He told us he'd lost his illusions about socialism. He'd sent in his resignation from the party and they wouldn't accept it, they sent it back. They weren't going to let go of the only figure they had. He was also very bitter about the loss of his "Wolf" house and his stock. And the last great love of his life was ended.
Baum
How did Charmian take his death?
Martinez
Well, this is another story about Charmian. Now she's dead and I can tell it. Carrie Sterling went up to stay with Charmian because she felt it was such a horrible tragedy when Jack died and we all expected Charmian to try, at least, to join him. Carrie told us Charmian slept like a log, which shocked her. She had always been the "Lady in the Big House" who couldn't sleep a night for fear of losing him and called them her "White Nights". Carrie asked, "Charmian, how can you sleep after Jack is gone?" Charmian replied, "My dear girl, I want you to understand, this is the first time I've had any sleep in my entire life married to London" and triumphantly added, "because now I can't lose him". So she went right on to live as a kind of shadow of Jack, always trying to furbish up her role as his mate.
Baum
Had Carrie come to like her? Is that why she went up?
Martinez
Oh, Carrie, who loved Jack, was so shocked after that incident that she was through with her. But I thought that was typical of Charmian. She wanted fame, position, and she would do anything to get it. Jack was the center of her universe because he gave her
She was quite homely, but vital and gay. None of Jack's friends could see why Jack had fallen in love with Charmian. She was vain and clever and she had studied him and found just what he wanted in a wife - a good typist, a good sport, a fine horsewoman, and a vital and gay companion. Besides, she adored him. His word was law and she lived accordingly, so she was no problem.
Now, he was completely bored and sick of her. He was ruthless, too. We were really uncomfortable at the cruel things he would say to her and she took them, I'll have to say, gallantly, often with clever twists of his meaning. We were conscious all the time that there was something wrong there.
Piedmont Writers and Artists
George and Carrie Sterling and the Havens Family
BaumIn the years you lived in Piedmont, both as Elsie Whitaker and then as Mrs. Xavier Martinez, you met many of the creative people of the Bay Area. We've discussed your father and your husband and Jack London - now, what do you recall of these other picturesque people?
Martinez
Well, of course the Sterlings were most prominent in that group. George Sterling was a nephew of Frank C. Havens and it was to work as secretary to his uncle that he came out to Piedmont in the first place.
Baum
Did you know Frank Havens very well?
Martinez
I'll never forget Frank C. Havens. He had the cool assurance of a financial genius, an arrogant, but pleasant, easy manner with friends, and he wore an emerald as big as a pigeon egg - the most gorgeous thing I've ever seen.
He was a very interesting personality, but I didn't see too much of him. When they opened their big home in Piedmont we were all invited. I went with Carrie Sterling. Ruth St. Denis was there, sitting, a gilded Buddha in a niche. See Reflections on a Life in the Dance, by Ruth St. Denis, as interviewed by the Oral History Office of the University of California at Los Angeles, 1968. At the appropriate moment she came to life and danced.
Marty, Frank C. Havens and George Sterling, towards the end of the party, having had plenty to drink, with their arms about each other, faced this very middle class audience and sang the revolutionary songs - especially the beautiful ones with a Latin rhythm -
Walker
Jones insists that Sterling's voice was rather querulous and flat when he tried to sing.
Martinez
His voice was a curious, unusual voice. When he read his poetry it was sometimes almost sonorous. Normally it was, as Jones said, querulous, complaining. Often he had a complaining tone when things didn't suit him; or his tone could be startlingly clear-cut, clipped, when he was angry. It was not a low voice, nor was it a high voice. It could range from thin to surprising richness. He was always excessive. When he was affectionate and dear his voice was soft and caressing, especially with women. When he was angry at anyone it really was shrill and as sharp as vinegar. When he read poetry, he read it beautifully. His voice could be mellow and warm when he was inspired.
Walker
Could he sing?
Martinez
Very badly, very badly. Marty had a very good baritone and used to sing a great deal.
Baum
Frank Havens must have been outstanding in this middle class audience at his housewarming.
Martinez
Yes, he was one of those personalities that are outside of class.
You know, he made a big fortune in Piedmont real estate, as well as other ventures. I remember seeing the check he had for a million dollars - the check that he had made out for, I think it was the
For a while he was Borax Smith's partner, you know. But Havens was too imaginative and too reckless to suit Smith, so they parted company. He put in the Key Route system. Later, he became a speculator on a large scale. He was very lucky until he took the fortune he had made in California and went to New York. Wall Street stripped him down to his last dollar. There was only a little land in his wife's name left for the family.
He returned to California to recover or remake another fortune. But the confidence in his genius was lost and he could find no one to back his really brilliant schemes. Soon afterwards he died.
Baum
What was the family relationship of all the Havens? I haven't got it straight in my mind.
Martinez
Well, there was Frank C. Havens; George Sterling was his nephew, and brought him out to be his secretary. He brought out the whole Sterling family. George's mother was Havens' sister. She reminded me of one of the old French marquises. She had a gorgeously decorated bedroom and sitting room and she always received like a court lady there.
I was very much impressed when I was a child and my father took me there. She was handsome, still, in her late seventies, and was interested in everything, with a socially brilliant mind. That's the mother of George Sterling.
They lived at the bottom of Scenic Avenue hill in a big old house. There was Lillian (Rounthwaite), Madeline, Marian, Avis, and
Baum
I have a little note here which says, "Carrie Sterling, a sister of Mrs. Frank Havens."
Martinez
Yes, they were sisters. Mrs. Havens and Carrie - Lila and Carrie Rand - were the first lady secretaries in Oakland. They wore little candy striped blouses with little collars and cuffs and little flat straw hats. Carrie was George's secretary. Lila was Havens's secretary.
Baum
This was before Carrie was married to George?
Martinez
Yes, and before Lila Havens was married to Frank Havens. This is how the two secretaries became part of the family.
Baum
Frank C. Havens was older than George, wasn't he?
Martinez
Oh yes, quite a bit. Havens was his mother's brother. He had had a family already in New York; the wife had died. Then he married Lila Rand, Carrie Rand's sister.
Carrie told me that when she and George went on their honeymoon, they thought they'd take a boat and go to the Islands. That was the romantic thing to do then. It was not a large boat and the season was unseasonable - storms mostly - and the cabins dank and cheerless. They were both seasick and by the time they got off at the Islands, she said romance was almost dead. (Laughter) Carrie said even the Islands had a hard time reviving romance for them.
After Lila married she started to build their beautiful home in Piedmont. It took years to build and it was very beautiful. Lila
At that time Lila had become interested in Theosophy and belonged to a group of Theosophists in Oakland.
When I first met George I think I was about twelve. He was one of the kind of people who, when they become friends, are all-absorbing. He was very kind and very gentle with us. We Whitaker children just loved him because he always brought tremendous amounts of the old-fashioned broken candy for us. He'd come to wheedle my father, who should have been writing at the time, to go to something special - much to the annoyance of my mother.
For about a year or so George and my father were great friends and they saw a great deal of each other. Then my father introduced him to Jack London. I think my father was very hurt because George deserted this friendship and it was Jack who was the center of his universe. He was a little inclined to be that way. He was also a little inclined to carry on feuds. I still have a letter somewhere, I think it's in the album that is in the Oakland Art Museum, "I'm so angry with so-and-so and I'm telling my friends that no one should speak to him. But don't tell this to Elsie." (Laughter) I had always made fun of his feuds.
Baum
What was his mutual interest with your father? What did they do together or talk about?
Martinez
Literature, poetry, the British Empire. Like Jack London, he was a bit of an Anglophile.
Did they go to meetings?
Martinez
Oh no, my father was out of socialism then. His interests became purely literary; he'd already gotten into Harper's Magazine. Socialism was dead as far as he was concerned. He used to give literature classes in Piedmont on writing, and I think it was at that period that he met George. George was beginning to be known as a poet, while still working for his uncle. I think his uncle probably supported him for the rest of his life really.
George left Piedmont right after the earthquake and went down to Carmel. My father and Sterling were really separated then. I didn't come into the picture again until I married Marty and then I was snapped right bang into the center again. It was my father's old group of friends. Marty was my father's friend and he was three years younger than my father. When I was 17 my father was 40 and Marty was 37.
Sterling went to Carmel and gathered about him a new group. Through Harry Lafler he knew Jimmy Hopper. Father was a friend of Harry Lafler. He had gone down the Coast with Lafler to homestead a bit of land, below Big Sur. He hoped to establish his claim with two or three of his boys to work on it. But, by the time he went to San Francisco to make out his claim, he found that Teddy Roosevelt had signed the papers making this land a National Park. Oh, was he upset about it! He was going to send down half of his boys to build a ranch house and they could have been, at least, useful. He had plenty of children to plant there and he would have loved real pioneering.
Joaquin Miller every year used to have Whitaker day because in those days it was phenomenal to have families - imagine seven!
Ambrose Bierce's nephew was Carleton Bierce. Through George Sterling we met Laura and Carleton Bierce and through them we got to know Ambrose Bierce. He came out every year to see his brother Albert, his nephew Carleton and Carleton's wife, to whom he was devoted. They also were great friends of Joaquin Miller's.
Jack London, Carleton, my father, and George often went up to Joaquin Miller's place for barbecues. One time Jack London thought it would be fun to have rattlesnake stew. When we were kids and thought nothing of it - rattlesnakes were common in Piedmont in those days and we'd heard it was good meat - we tried it and found it like immature chicken. So he had this big stew and he told everybody it was a rabbit. I think he had put rabbit in it to disguise it. Anyhow, there were some Easterners at the party, and at the end of the party he said to them, "Well, I hope you'll live. This was a rattlesnake stew." Well, of course they were all ill. He loved to play tricks like that.
Baum
It sounds like George Sterling liked those things, too.
Martinez
Well, not as much as Jack. Jack was always the ringleader and the practical joker in the group. He would do the most wild and reckless things.
As George's poetry became well known, thanks to Ambrose Bierce, who made a great deal of it. Soon he was a popular figure. Then the problems began for Carrie. She had never questioned too much about
Vera Connally's father was an English army officer and she, her mother and brother had come over from the Orient to San Francisco. I met her in Berkeley through a friend of mine there. She was going down to Carmel. I said, "Well, I'll send you to Carrie Sterling and you'll meet George Sterling, the poet". I didn't dream anything would come of it; she was not too attractive. She was a big handsome girl but, I did not know then that when she wanted anything, she went after it. She met George and decided that George was her man.
Anyhow, they had quite a Greek episode. This was old Carmel. She made herself a beautiful Greek, filmy garment and George had a Greek outfit and they used to float through the woods. It was terribly romantic to her. She used to tell me about it. But alack and alas, that romance wound up in San Francisco in a miscarriage - poor thing. That experience cured Vera of men. She went to New York and became a Christian Scientist. She was on one of the women's magazines for years as a sub-editor or something. After Sterling died, she published this book of Poems to Vera, the only memento of her romance.
Walker
Was it the affair with Vera Connally that broke up his marriage to Carrie?
Martinez
Well, it didn't cause the break up with Carrie herself. It was Mrs. Havens, Lila, who had become a society woman and very proper. I
Walker
Was this in the newspapers?
Martinez
Not all of it, no. Some of it came out in a sort of veiled form, for gossip was not as open as now. That's when Carrie went to live on the Havens place in the little house in the oak tree built by the Japanese carvers. It was during that period, while she was there, that I saw so much of her. She was taking care of the art gallery that Havens had.
There was a large collection of Russian paintings in the Custom House, held for custom duties. After the allotted waiting time and no duties forthcoming, the collection was sold at auction. Havens picked it up for a song and built a gallery to house it on his property. And Carrie took care of it. It was simply adorable. There was a beautiful gilded Buddha on a bamboo stand and just beyond that were the doors, or rather, beautiful movable Japanese screens. Lila had bought, Carrie told me, Oriental birds — exquisite Bantam pheasants that wandered in and out of the house. Every day one little female pheasant would come up to where the screen doors were opened, wait until the screen opened, then she'd hop into the lap of Buddha and lay an egg. She laid thirteen eggs before she felt she'd
But Carrie was never happy. She hadn't yet divorced George and George begged her not to divorce him. Finally, Lila decided Carrie should divorce George and start life over again. Carrie didn't want a divorce and George didn't want it, either. In the meantime the affair was over and the scandal had died down. After all the girl was 23 and that's a little bit old to pursue them with Victorian disapproval. Carrie herself was not sure she should go on with the divorce; she talked it over with me at the time. She was seeing George quite often; he wanted her to come back to Carmel; he promised her it would never happen again. She was thinking it over very seriously, but Lila was dead set against it. She said, "You can't trust him. Maybe it's the beginning of a series, because women pursue him. He is too weak, how could he resist?" So finally she persuaded Carrie to get a divorce. So the divorce was granted and Carrie shortly regretted it tragically.
After two years she finally decided she could not adjust herself to the dull single life. She missed the gay, colorful life in Carmel, the swarm of visitors, and sharing the honors with her poet. She realized that she'd made a mistake and that there was nothing to do about it except to take the suicide route.
I saw Carrie the day before her death. She had a photograph taken by a friend and she afterwards gave us the picture. She phoned me on the morning she died to say "Goodbye". I had spent hours with Carrie two or three times a week those last two years. I felt chilled and exclaimed, "Carrie, `Goodbye' sounds rather ominous!" She laughed so heartily that the feeling of tragedy faded out as she talked naturally and gaily. She had a grand sense of humor and I called her "Madame Rabelais". Her humor some Victorian souls called coarse, but we found her very acute and sometimes very witty. (Marty made a very delightful drawing of "Madame Rabelais", which is in his scrapbook.) However, the tone of her voice at that "goodbye" still worried me, so I went down to see her at noon. But she was as gay as usual, so I returned satisfied that all was well with her.
However at four o'clock she carried out her plan to commit suicide as the only way out of her tragic dilemma. She had put on her beautiful dressing gown over a lovely filmy nightgown, arranged her hair elaborately, and on a little record machine beside her bed, put on Chopin's Funeral March. Then she took cyanide and passed away before the record stopped. The old friend who found her in the morning told me how beautiful she looked, peaceful at last. It was a shock to us, we had grown so fond of Carrie and would feel the loss for some time to come.
The funeral service was very simple and only a few old friends were present — Laura Bierce and myself, and several others I did not
Baum
Did George come?
Martinez
No, he was in New York. He was terribly upset about that whole thing. He said he'd always felt that Carrie hadn't wanted the divorce and he blamed Lila for it. At first, of course, he felt himself as part of the guilt for her suicide, and then finally, little by little, he felt that the whole thing had been done by Lila. I guess that eased his conscience considerably. He'd always begged her not to divorce him; Carrie told me that over and over, and he asked her to come back to Carmel. He took it very hard. He returned immediately and was terribly upset. His friends had difficulty trying to make him feel that he was not entirely responsible. Of course the Bierces — Laura and Caret — blamed Lila entirely, because they were very fond of George.
But there was a side of George not generally known. His father, a Catholic convert, persuaded George and his brother to become priests, and they were sent to the Paulist St. Charles Seminary. While he was in the Paulist Seminary, Father Tabb, also a poet, discovered George's poetic talent, developed it, and finally told him he had
George then came to his uncle, Frank C. Havens, in Oakland, or Piedmont, rather, to be his secretary. The Catholic side of George - we only hear the pagan side that's been too much emphasized. There was a compassion in George. He felt very strongly his friends' troubles and woes. He always was helping people, always doing things for people. That side of George I never understood until I was a Catholic convert. George's fine qualities were very Catholic; his gentleness and his compassion for his friends when they were unhappy. They always turned to George because of his gift of understanding.
Cyril Clemens, who was a nephew of Mark Twain . . .
Walker
You should say, a bogus nephew.
Martinez
. . . he was a writer for The Commonweal, and he came out to write an article on George Sterling. After seeing many people who knew him in Carmel, Clemens said, "Mrs. Martinez, what I have heard of the pagan side of Sterling has grown very tiresome. I've met about eight or nine of his friends and I haven't heard one word except all about his paganism." He said, "I'd love to hear something different."
I told him, if you could find the correspondence with the Bierces - Laura Bierce had all the correspondence of Sterling's for twenty years - there are letters in which he talks about his past. Laura had said definitely to me, however, "I am not going to let
I said to Clemens, "The one who knows the Catholic side of George is his sister, Madeline Dimond, you write to her. She lives in the Hawaiian Islands. She was the oldest one of the girls and remained a good Catholic, very orthodox. All the rest of the girls drifted away from the church, but Madeline. She was a very fine person and George loved her very much. She can give you that side of him." I never heard from him after that; an article never came out, so I guess she couldn't give him enough to write about the spiritual side of George, which was what he wanted to write about.
In George Sterling's yard at his home in Carmel, he had a beautiful circle of trees. On all the trees he had placed beautiful animal skulls - deer mostly - whenever he found one, he'd put it on a tree. The legend went around that this was a Greek altar and he used to hold pagan services there. Of course it was most excessive, but he loved the talk and helped develop some of those legends himself. He believed, as Jack London said, "Make them talk about you. Anything is better than nothing."
Baum
Did you see George Sterling again after Carrie's death?
Martinez
Oh yes, a great number of times. We saw him often and I had become
Two days before he committed suicide, he came up to see Marty and brought him the poems of Jeffers. There was a beautiful dedication to George in it. He said, "I'm leaving you this, Marty. I want you to have it." And he said twice, "I want you to give my love to Elsie." He took cyanide two days later.
Baum
Then he was contemplating suicide; I think the general impression is that it was really the immediate events of Mencken's ...
Martinez
No. Before George committed suicide, he often talked of it, so when he did commit suicide we knew it had been brewing for some time. In the same way, London's had been mounting for some time. As far as George was concerned, what brought it to a head was the fact that Mencken hadn't come to see him. As a matter of fact, for quite a while, he'd been talking about how he hated age and loved youth. It disturbed him terribly to grow old. To him, to think of growing old was really terrible; it was part of his pagan philosophy, too. We looked upon that as a temperamental thing, but it was all part of the undercurrent.
Baum
Was he aging rapidly?
Martinez
He was about fifty then, I think.
Baum
Had he changed noticeably?
Martinez
No, but when you reach fifty - thirty is the first time that you begin to look back, at forty you begin to say it's over, at fifty you look into what's coming and see age ahead of you. All of them had the cult
They were all very much concerned with suicide as the noble end, as the proper end of your life when it ceased to be vital. London did it, Bierce did it (though Bierce was a man of seventy), Sterling, and half a dozen others. Somebody asked Marty if there wasn't a suicide club, because eight of his friends committed suicide. But they all had tremendous vanity, and naturally the loss of youth was a painful thing to face.
Bierce had gone before and they were all shocked by Bierce's death, you know. He had meant a tremendous amount to George and had brought George into the public eye, mostly. And Carrie's death upset him, too.
Baum
There'd been a girl named Nora May French much earlier in Sterling's life. Did you know her? She committed suicide about 1907.
Martinez
Yes, Carrie told me that story. Carrie said Nora May had been very despondent and was staying with her while George was away.
Baum
She was a budding author, I think.
Martinez
A poetess. That night, Carrie told me, Nora May talked at great length about her disillusionment of life and everything, especially men. Carrie was somewhat worried but decided she was too young to follow through yet. Carrie woke up suddenly in the night and heard
Baum
I thought Nora May French had been associated with George Sterling.
Martinez
Oh no. Harry Lafler was the one who brought her down to Carmel. He was the one who found her and developed her talent. Oh, yes, George knew her; whether they had an affair or not I never knew. All I knew was that he was very interested in her. But at that time she was disillusioned in men. Carrie said she had been disillusioned for years and there was nothing to live for.
Baum
I read that Carrie carried that little phial of cyanide—
Martinez
Oh, yes. Marty had one, too.
Baum
I mean Nora May French's phial, the remainder of it.
Martinez
Yes; that's what she used.
Baum
That's why I wondered if Nora May French's suicide had anything to do with George Sterling.
Martinez
Oh, no. This cyanide had been given many years before to the group and there was enough for each person.
Baum
Who gave them that? Or maybe there was a suicide club.
I know who gave it to them, yes. (Laura Bierce's sister had one boy — that's the only descendant of that family. I don't know what became of the boy — but I can tell you now.) Well, Carleton Bierce was in the Mint, worked there in the chemical division. His friends had asked why couldn't he bring them some of this because at that time they all believed that if you didn't get what you wanted out of life that poison was the easiest way out. So he was the one who brought it. Marty was given a little phial of it. George had a little phial — Jack London had a phial, but he didn't use it — and George distributed some among his friends, too. It's very potent, it takes just a few drops. Marty had it and he buried it somewhere in our cellar here.
Baum
This was very much a part of the whole group's philosophy, then.
Martinez
Oh, yes. It was a kind of a cult — though Marty was not going to do it [laughing]. He lived his life out.
Baum
Was Carrie your age?
Martinez
No, Carrie was much older. When I married Marty, he and my father and George were all about the same age.
Baum
How did you and Carrie Sterling become friends?
Martinez
Well, the reason we became very close friends was that after she left George I sensed that she was very lonely, and I used to go down to the Havens' art gallery which she looked after, every other day at least, and sit and talk to her for hours. I loved to hear her reminisce about the past. I found a sensibility that I had never dreamed of, and the sadness that had come of her leaving George, and the
Baum
I wondered if these people all accepted you as an equal, since you were Marty's wife, though you were younger, or were you still little Elsie Whitaker?
Martinez
Well, sometimes when I was annoying, I was little Elsie Whitaker. [Laughing] But I also, as I grew older, grew very much mellower. At thirty I had lost a lot of that annoying sharpness that youth has. I'd come closer to a number of them. The last time I saw George he put his arm around me and said, "Elsie, I really love you." And I said, "I know you do, George. In my way, I love you too." I never would have thought that possible years before. Then I was practically thirty and I had learned to understand much about him. He was trying to tell me that he thought that I thought he disliked me, but he wanted to show me he didn't. And the last thing he said to Marty he said twice, "Be sure and say goodbye to Elsie for me." After Carrie's death we had grown very fond of each other.
I'd gotten more mature and he'd mellowed too, but his mellowness was like Carrie's, a kind of sadness and withdrawal from life. He'd lost his pettiness, he no longer had feuds as he'd had in the early years, and I recognized in him that change as he recognized the
Baum
Did she think she'd made a mistake in not stopping George's poetic affairs before?
Martinez
No. She simply felt that she should have understood George. I don't think she thought at all about the affair, except the scandal. That was the reality that hurt; that was the reality for which she was blamed, too.
Baum
Was Carrie as cultured and educated as George was? Was she able to keep up with him on an intellectual basis?
Martinez
No, she never attempted it. Carrie was one of those lovable people who have no particular mental interests. George kept her in contact with the poetical and literary events that were happening; she'd meet people and learn about them, but she had no intellectual interests of any kind. She was a warm, lovable person. I think there was a lot in that warmth that kept them together all those years.
Ambrose Bierce and Carleton and Laura Bierce
BaumLaura and Carleton Bierce seem to figure in this group quite prominently.
Walker
I take it that Carleton and Laura Bierce were both very attractive.
Martinez
No. I was very fond of him, but he was not an attractive man. He had something of the dour Scot about him, which was lightened by a dry sense of humor.
Laura was sweet, one of those people who don't have any brains but they're lovable. And she just adored the Sterlings, because the Sterlings brought them in contact with the art world. I met them through George Sterling. Ambrose Bierce always stayed with Carleton and Laura when they lived in Berkeley. Laura was sweet and dear and lots of fun, and Carleton had a dry Scots sense of humor. He wasn't a particle picturesque.
Walker
Didn't he have any of the bitterness of his uncle?
Martinez
No, Caret was not in the least intellectual. Ambrose Bierce, a distinguished figure, was born in a log cabin in Indiana and he called his parents "unwashed savages". He was charming until you mentioned someone he didn't like, then the flood gates opened. He would drown the hapless victim in a flood of vituperation and disparagement.
Walker
I don't know whether you told the story about Laura and Carrie who, on hearing that Ambrose was coming — they were in bloomers — became panic stricken.
We were camping down at China Cove.
Walker
Is that the one Jack London refers to as Beach in Valley of the Moon?
Martinez
I think so. Jack was there. They were just on the other side of China Cove, and we camped where Jean Kellogg the artist lives now. We were camping on what is now her property. Then it was just wild. Laura and Carleton, Sterling and Carrie, and her sister and the little boy — the one who must have inherited all these letters — and Marty and I.
George came back from Carmel with the mail, a note from Ambrose stated he was coming down to Carmel the next day. Well, there was just panic because Ambrose was terribly strait-laced. Laura began to cry and said, "If he sees me in bloomers he'll never speak to me again as long as I live." She was weeping away and Carrie was just as upset. They said, "Now, we'll have to plan: George, on the way to the train, stop at the house and get our skirts. Elsie can entertain Bierce while we put our skirts on." I was wearing skirts, not because I had anything against bloomers but I just happened to have a skirt on. They decided to get out of sight. If necessary they thought they'd pick a cave and say they were out after abalone. And George went in, and from the time he left everyone was upset. Then he appeared without Bierce. There was rejoicing from the women. Bierce had decided to stay in San Francisco. So the day was saved.
Walker
That must have been 1910. He did get down to Carmel for one or two days.
Yes. He was a very distinguished looking fellow, Bierce was. He had not lived thirty years in Washington for nothing. When he came to California he would always stay a night or two with the Bierces, and they'd call the friends in.
Of course you know about Bierce's death — it was suicide as they found out later. You remember the story about Villa's lieutenant who described this handsome old man who came into their camp? They even gave the description of what he wore, when he went into the Sonora desert. They tried through the Mexican government, the consulates and everything, to find a clue, and finally one of Villa's lieutenants told this story: he said they had been crossing near the American border — they were raiding Columbus at that time; you remember the raid of Columbus [New Mexico] — he remembered this distinguished man had come into their camp. He didn't speak Spanish and they couldn't speak English, but they managed to communicate wonderfully by gestures. They tried to find out why he was there. He made it quite clear that there was no reason at all. Where was he going? Just nowhere. Then they tried to figure out this indifference and they decided to tell him about the dangers of the desert. They told him about the zapolotes, the vultures, and what they would do — graphically, as you can imagine a Mexican can — what happens to a person who falls — the vultures pick them to pieces. That didn't bother him a bit, not a bit. So they talked it over among themselves and decided that the charitable thing to do, since he had no horse and couldn't go with them, was to shoot him. The vultures would have gotten him, so they shot him.
Wouldn't he have loved to have written that wonderful episode! The last story was the best story he ever could have written, the story of his death. They shot him and left him out there in the desert, and that was the end of Bierce.
Joaquin Miller
BaumYou've mentioned that Joaquin Miller seemed to favor the Whitaker family.
Martinez
My father was very fond of Joaquin Miller. My father and I walked up to Miller's, a mere four miles or so, I guess at least every other week, sometimes every week. Joaquin Miller was very fond of our family. He was a picturesque figure even as an old man; he was in his seventies then.
We would go up there every year on the Whitaker day, and in between I'd go up with my father, I guess, two or three times a month. There were often a great many interesting people there and a great many interesting Orientals; I met Yone Noguchi, the famous poet there.
I started to write a book on one year in the Whitaker life, and I had a whole chapter and I'm going to leave the manuscript with the album. In one chapter I had written a complete and perfect description of the Miller place. It was exquisite, with the picturesque little chapel and the little house in which his mother lived. She had just died.
On one of our visits up there the famous old Indiana fiddlers had come to see Joaquin Miller. He was born, you know, in a log cabin
Then all through the trees — the place was beautiful then. The front of the house was enclosed in rose bowers — he loved roses — rose bowers and orange and lemon trees. There was a tiny bridge over the creek at the entrance of the chapel. Beyond the chapel was a little place where he used to demonstrate for his visitors that he could bring rain. He'd lived with the Modocs. So we decided we had to have him make rain for us, and we all — he held a Whitaker day at the Hights every year — because he said it was so unusual in those days to see a family of seven — good pioneer style.
On the first visit all seven of us were marshalled into this little dark room which was sort of rustic looking, beautiful vines and everything over it, and nothing inside except a great buffalo robe on the floor. So he sat down and told us all to sit around him. Then he began to pray for rain in the Modoc language. First of all it was a gentle murmur, soft, put you to sleep almost, and then it got stronger until it was a roar and the whole place reverberated with the tremendous roar. He stopped suddenly: soon we heard a few raindrops, then a heavy downpour. We all sat there just fascinated. He called us out and there was the sun shining but the shrubbery was dripping. We all of us were a little bit astonished, it was a little astounding, but maybe the Indians could do it. When we were on our
Then he had the Japanese and Chinese artists living there. They built their beautiful little Japanese paper houses up through the woods. What beautiful country! It looks like a mess now, but it was beautiful then — a natural and wild landscape — and the Japanese had carefully created a meandering little stream, Japanese style, beautifully arranged with gardens and little rockeries near the poet's. You know their expertness in creating beauty. They'd made this beautiful place where they had their barbecues. At that time the poet's barbecues were always run by his Japanese friends. We'd have raw fish and soy sauce — really delicious. Then, always the particular barbecue for which the poet was famous — he had beautifully peeled willow switches on which were arranged rounds of onions and meat — which you held over the fire until cooked to your taste.
Then we'd go up to a little art colony scattered throughout the woods in their beautiful paper houses. These houses were well made, beautifully constructed, but all the doors and windows except the frames were made of paper. We'd go in, take our shoes off and sit down and we'd watch the artists work, or they'd display work to show us. Some were Chinese, most of them were Japanese. At that time his
My first beau, I was sixteen, was a Japanese poet living there. However, my father, being an Englishman, looked with grave displeasure on the whole thing. My young poet used to come down to our home with reams of beautiful eucalyptus bark on which were inscribed his poem in exquisite Japanese characters.
Those dreadful brothers of mine used to light the fires with them. And it (our friendship) never got beyond the stage of chanting and incense. He'd bring his incense pot, light it, and chant his poems. Of course I didn't know Japanese but I sat quite serenely and listened to them. Finally my father told Miller that he didn't approve and it must stop. Then there was one final parting call from Kugi. He brought his incense pot, and his lyrics must have been heartbreaking from the expressions and the dramatic rendering of them. That was the last time I saw him.
Baum
Did he speak English, too?
Martinez
Oh yes. Many Japanese speak English.
Baum
But he never wrote in English?
Martinez
No. Miller arranged the marriage between Gertrude Boyle, the sculptress, and a Japanese Shinto priest. Later she left the priest and married a young Japanese artist. She was a very talented woman, too, and a very interesting one. He had arranged, I understand, several other marriages before that.
There's the wonderful tale about Joaquin Miller in Europe that Ina Coolbrith told me. There was a tremendous wave of love of the wild West in Europe, England especially. They admired Mark Twain, Bret Harte was feted in London, Stoddard, too, was loved — he brought the South Seas there long before Stevenson did. And the famous Buffalo Bill Cody and his circus had just swept Europe by storm; Cody entertained all the crowned heads and grand dukes of Europe, taking them on hunting trips in Yellowstone when it was a magnificent wilderness. Lord Houghton had the hobby of collecting wild westerners.
Ina Coolbrith told Lord Houghton about the truly picturesque Joaquin Miller — how he had studied law by correspondence and been a judge in Modoc County; he had been a Pony Express rider, was a famous scout, and lastly, a poet. He had, moreover, lived with the Indians and was an expert on Indian lore and customs, and so Houghton demanded to see him. Ina sent for Joaquin.
He arrived in London, if you please, in his picturesque outfit — a tall Mexican hat the hidalgo wears and a suit of white deerskin which the Sioux Indian women work on until it looks like velvet, a Sioux vest beaded in gorgeous colors and designs, with gobs of raw Klondike gold for buttons, and soft black leather boots up to the knees. He was six feet two and he had blue eyes and golden curls. That night they were to see the Queen who was appearing at a special performance in one of the theaters in London. Ina and Joaquin were to meet in the Green Room. On his arrival, Ina Coolbrith looked him over and said, "You know," (she'd been doused in the Rossetti tradition
In this effete Victorian period, the wild West was so refreshing to them. The "mauve decade" was very properly named. He met all the great men of the period. He met the empire builder Disraeli, and Disraeli's staunch opponent Gladstone. He met great poets, writers and painters of England. He was given the velvet carpet treatment there and was the hit of the season. Queen Victoria gave him a large autographed portrait of herself. It was in the place of honor in the center of his wall surrounded by autographed photographs of all the great men of England with personal and many glowing tributes
He went from England to Italy and became a friend of the King of Italy. He was the figure in Europe in that period. The King of Italy told him about the trouble they were having with malaria in Rome from the Pontine Marshes outside of Rome. Miller said, "Well, I'll tell you how to take care of that - I will send you 2,000 eucalyptus seedlings that will dry your marshes up." He sent about 10,000 seedlings - they were planted and, as Miller promised, grew apace and dried up the marshes and helped bring down Rome's malaria considerably.
Ina Coolbrith
BaumDid you know Ina Coolbrith very well?
Martinez
Oh, I loved her. She was really a wonderful and charming person. I went to one of Ina Coolbrith's lectures with my father. She began her talk with an introduction of my father. She said, "The love of my youth was Bret Harte, but the love of my old age is Herman Whitaker," then she went on to tell what he had done for her fundraising project on behalf of our California poet laureate, who was in difficult straits at the time. Over $20,000 was raised, which Gertrude Atherton put into a bond. My father was upset because there were better ways and measures for the money. So he talked with Atherton and explained his project - to build a small duplex apartment in which she could live and still derive an income from the other apartment - with an extra comfortable room for a student. The income
Baum
I know they'd put out a book, and the proceeds went to Ina Coolbrith, which your father had organized.
Martinez
Yes. He was the one who oversaw the actual building of the apartment for her. Gertrude Atherton had taken the money and put it into a bond, which was useless; there wasn't even enough to live on, so he persuaded her to let him build Ina a duplex apartment. They didn't cost then what they do today.
The Partington Family
BaumThe Partingtons seemed to be prominent in Piedmont social life.
Walker
Richard Partington was an artist, but not a great one, rather a portrait painter.
Martinez
That's an interesting family. Partington's father was a cartoonist on the Chronicle or the Bulletin. He was not in the picture when I knew them. Richard started to go on with his father's work, and in the meantime he'd learned to paint. After he left here he settled on portraits and became quite a well known portrait painter in Philadelphia. Partington Ridge was named after him. He took a homestead there with Lofter and sold it before he left Piedmont.
He was not a good cartoonist, so he got out of it and became a painter instead. The oldest of his sisters was a newspaperwoman.
Baum
I have Dick Partington listed as curator of the art gallery.
Martinez
He was. He was in charge of the building of Frank C. Havens' gallery and putting everything in. Then he went to Philadelphia to paint a portrait and married a charming Philadelphia matron and never came back. The oldest of his family, Blanche, became a Christian Science practitioner.
Walker
I noticed in her letters to Perry she discusses Christian Science.
Martinez
Yes.
Baum
Now, Blanche and Dick were brother and sister. And H. G. Partington was the father.
Martinez
Yes, the cartoonist. He was very much liked and a very good one, but Dick failed at it. Then the other girls: Phyllis Partington became a singer — she was the one that Jack London promised to marry. She was a beautiful black-eyed creature. I don't remember her stage name. First of all, she was a chorus girl in the Tivoli when they used to have light operas there. Then she became ambitious, went to Boston and strict training and wound up one of the stars in the Boston light opera company. She came out here on a visit to her family, and she'd been there for several years and looked very impressive and very handsome. Jack got interested in her that summer and was going to marry her.
Baum
Along with the other girls.
Martinez
Along with the other girls.
Baum
Now, Gertrude Partington Albright.
She was a painter.
Baum
She was very active in this group, wasn't she? I keep running into her name.
Martinez
Well, all of them came in and out, except for Partington himself. They were not particularly active in the group in Carmel or up here.
Baum
What age group were they? Were they in your age group?
Martinez
No, Marty's age group.
Baum
So the father was much older then.
Martinez
He died many years before. All the Partingtons, and Marty and Sterling and London (London was younger), were all around their forties.
Other Bay Area Figures
BaumThere are still a few people in Piedmont we haven't mentioned. One was Arthur Putnam.
Martinez
Yes, I knew him, too. Arthur Putnam was our famous sculptor - of magnificent animals. He was one of those vital people with tremendous energy. He looked like a wild puma himself. He loved animals and his work showed a kinship with them. There are quite a number in San Francisco. I think he came from the South. We saw a lot of him, yes. Then when he was 35 or 36, at the height of his career, he was found to have a tumor on the brain.
The operation for removal of the tumor was a disaster for him - it had destroyed his genius and left him half paralyzed. He told me, "You know, Elsie, that brain of mine, the part connected with art is completely gone. I can't draw, even like a child." He had been a magnificent draftsman. "Everything's gone." Mrs. Spreckles took care
He married a fellow student, a pale, blonde delicate person. Apparently they were very happy together until after the operation and then they separated, his life ruined. He had two children, a beautiful daughter and a son. They went up to Oregon to live with relatives; I've tried a number of times to find what became of them. The girl was vivid like her father, and the boy was gentle like his mother, a quiet person and an artist. I hadn't seen too much of them before the operation, perhaps half a dozen times, and I was impressed by her gentleness and fragile beauty and his personality. He loved his work so much. He didn't go out much. He wasn't a bohemian. He'd come to Marty's studio and we saw him then, but he never took part in any of the bohemian parties the artists used to have. But after the operation, of course, the center of his life was gone — a great talent was just reaching fulfillment. He lived ten or twelve years after the operation, but the artist was dead. We were all so thankful when he went to France because he loved France.
Baum
Haig Pattigan?
Martinez
I didn't know him well except generally as a sculptor. I'm afraid I didn't admire his sculpture. He was never connected with any of the bohemian groups. He was a rather conventional person.
Baum
Roi Partridge?
Martinez
I remember him quite distinctly. We admired his wife and we gave him credit for a certain amount of ability, but somehow or other our
Baum
Herbert and Kinnie Bashford?
Martinez
Oh, what a pair of characters! He wrote one very bad play which gave him quite a local reputation; he was a rather conventional little man and ran the literary page on the Bulletin, I remember.
He was a neighbor and once in a while I used to be with Ruth Roberts and I'd see them at her home. He never even came to the studio. I'd see him and his wife at Ruth Roberts' - who had my father's house next door to them.
Baum
Ralph Stackpole?
Martinez
Oh, I liked Ralph. He almost married my sister. He would say we were almost relatives.
Baum
I thought your sister was not interested in art or literature.
Martinez
No, she wasn't interested in art but she flirted with Ralph a bit and then got interested in another artist. That ended their short romance. That was here in Piedmont, after I was married, that's when I met Ralph. I used to have my sister here, with her great brown eyes, very feminine. But it didn't work out. Ralph's an awfully
And Bufano - we've known him for years. We were very fond of him. We knew him from the earliest days here. He was a combination of the shrewdest publicity hunting we'd ever known — there was only one person I know that's superior, and that's Henry Cowell, the musician. He's a master of publicity, and Bufano is too. Everybody thinks he's odd, well, he is odd. But he's clever, and he's a good sculptor.
Baum
I heard that for a long time he didn't tell anyone he had a wife and child.
Martinez
I knew he had a wife. He lived in San Francisco and his wife lived in Marin somewhere. I believe she was Italian, too. Anyway, she lived with her family. We never saw her. That's all we knew about that part of his life. He was a secretive little fellow. He told us many interesting stories about his sojourn in China. He went there to explore a cave that was full of beautiful small Buddhist sculptures. He decided he'd better have a couple so he hid them in his jacket and went home. Then he thought, "Well, I'd better go get two or three more." So he waited a week and then he went back. He thought, "Well, that's funny, this door has been changed a little bit." So he put his head round the door and there was an old cannon, one of the earliest-known cannons, and they had it all full of stuff to shoot him when he arrived and opened the door. [Laughter] He went to the Hankow pottery works. It's the most famous in the whole Orient, exquisite potteries for royalty. For centuries the trade
Sometimes he's gay and talkative and other times he's completely silent. If you get him in a silent mood he won't open his mouth.
Baum
Was he the kind of person who would like you for a while and then change?
Martinez
I don't think he would, no. Some insisted he was a Communist, I don't. He's been among so many kinds of people. Nothing has any effect on him. He accepts everyone as a person and does not question their beliefs.
I was very lucky — when I was ten years of age Sun Yat-sen was sent to this country to be educated. When he finished college, he was in San Francisco on his way home to China and the San Francisco Socialist Party had asked him to give a talk on China. My father showed me this little figure up on the platform and said, "Now, remember that name, because he's going to be a famous figure some day in China." He was a little fellow and he gave his talk in English.
Baum
Another person everyone knew was Albert Bender.
Martinez
Well, he was the man who supported art in San Francisco. Any artist
Walker
Did he come to Carmel for a while?
Martinez
He used to go back and forth once in a while. His cousin was a very fine painter, Anne Bremer.
Baum
Was he an art connoisseur?
Martinez
I think his cousin was the one who had the knowledge. Anne Bremer was a very brilliant woman. They lived together in a big home they had; I went to several dinners there. He was interested in helping artists and getting galleries going. It was a cultural effort with him. He'd put money into cultural activities willingly and generously. Marty was very fond of Bender.
Baum
Did he come up here to the studio, or did you meet them in San Francisco?
Martinez
In San Francisco. He didn't go out very much. He used to entertain at his home.
Orrin Peck was a painter, and a quite good one. He was adopted by Phoebe Hearst to be the brother of William Randolph Hearst. Marty and he were very good friends and we saw him quite often on his rare visits to San Francisco. He had painted colossal portraits of the father and mother of William Randolph Hearst and they were exhibited at the Bohemian Club. It was a big affair, so we went over because Marty was very fond of Orrin Peck. He told us two very interesting things: He said that Willy was not the son of Mrs. Hearst, not her son at all; and the other thing he said was when he used to go around
I saw William Randolph Hearst at the exhibition, a strange character. At that time he came over and sat down beside me — he liked blondes. He stayed with me until Marty hove in sight and he looked him over and then he departed. But we were there about fifteen or twenty minutes discussing the painters.
Baum
Someone described Hearst as having a very high voice.
Martinez
It was. I was so surprised because he was tall, rather large, with a thin high voice. He didn't say much, though, not much more than yes or no. "Yes." "No." And once he made a comment about looking like his father. He liked the portrait of his father the best. I don't believe he ever knew his real mother. Of course, he must have known he wasn't the son of Phoebe.
Orrin Peck told us that before she died, Phoebe begged him to keep the estate, Pleasanton, she loved it so, for a while in her memory. The breath wasn't out of her body before he had twenty appraisers there and it was sold and gone inside of three weeks. There was no love lost there. In the book it says that she dominated him. Well, maybe that's why. But he was a strange character.
Baum
Of course Phoebe is very popular at the University of California.
Martinez
Yes. Well, she's done a great deal for them.
Baum
As a person, people said . . .
Oh, Rollo Peters told me a wonderful story. He knew Mrs. Hearst quite well. He was asked to a luncheon she was giving at Del Monte for about forty guests. At that time, a cause celebre was about a young Jewish fellow named Frank who had a pencil factory in Georgia. He took white women to work and the Southerners lynched him. The Hearst papers in California papers stood up for Frank and the Georgia papers were for killing him. It came out quite a bit about William Randolph Hearst's Georgia paper being responsible for that murder. Mrs. Hearst said, "Oh, I would appreciate so much if someone would really tell me the truth about that whole thing because it upsets me so to think that Willy was accused like that, and probably unfairly!" So Rollo Peters said, "Do you want the truth, Mrs. Hearst?" He knew her well. She said, "Yes, I want the truth." He said, "Your son was responsible for the murder of that man."
She reeled with the shock, then stood up stiffly to her regal height and she said to her guests, "Follow me, please," and they all obeyed and disappeared and Peters was sitting alone at the banquet. That's how Phoebe felt about the truth. He said he sat there in solitary splendor at this big banquet table and laughed and left.
Baum
You had mentioned Jimmy Hopper in connection with Nora May French — that she loathed him.
Martinez
There was a malicious streak in Hopper. The only man who really loved him and cared for him was my father. But he was malicious, especially about women; he hated women. In some ways I couldn't
Baum
He was angry that someone else had had the same idea before him?
Martinez
Not only before him, but his was a stumbling sort of an expression, and I made the mistake of giving the extraordinarily brilliant thing that Voltaire had said on the same subject. He thought he had something new. I knew then and there I'd made a grave mistake with Mr. Hopper; he and I were never friendly at all. He and my father remained great friends to the last. He could be so acrid and so maliciously critical. But everyone felt sorry for him because he had such an unhappy marriage.
Baum
You haven't told us about Frederick Meyer.
Martinez
Well, Meyer was a darling. He had a shop of fine iron work in San Francisco at the time of the earthquake. He was a German. I believe he had classes on ornamental ironwork or something over at his shop. Oh, by the way, that knocker over there was on his shop door and
Baum
What was his claim to be an art teacher? Had he studied art?
Martinez
Oh, he'd studied art, too, and he was a designer. He put up with Marty, and that was heroic.
Baum
You said that Marty was very faithful to his classes.
Martinez
Oh, yes. He never missed a class and he was never five minutes late. He would stay up all night, but he'd get up and get ready and he'd be at that class on the dot.
Walker
Was Ralph DuCasse one of his students?
Martinez
No. Ralph did meet him in Carmel six months after Marty died.
All those years after I married Marty I kept notes of the interesting people and the interesting conversations because Marty's house was an international house then. And when I went to Europe he burned them. He never said a word, I never said a word. I never let on I knew and he never mentioned them. But the thing that's the real loss are all those photos given to Joaquin Miller on his trip to London. I had taken down all those dedications to him on the photos. And now all those photos have disappeared, some say the nephew sold them. I think Miller was the most picturesque of Marty's friends, London was the most lovable, and Sterling the most difficult.
Walker
Why do you say Sterling was the most difficult?
Well, I didn't understand him until after I became a Catholic. He had these moments of great compassion and tenderness. Yet when he got angry he would go out of his way to be disagreeable even in a malicious sort of way.
Walker
I've been reading Carrie's letters from the period when they first went to Carmel, and it's pretty obvious that he was constantly unfaithful to her and she did not realize it.
Martinez
Oh, yes. I'll say this for Carrie, with all her Rabelaisian humor, she was rather naive about his affairs.
Walker
She wasn't naive in her letters. She made it pretty clear she understood what was going on, but did not really believe it.
Martinez
Oh? Well, that was the Vera Connolly affair. You ought to run down the letters Carrie and George wrote to the Bierces. They wrote to them for thirty or forty years.
Monterey and Carmel
BaumYou were down in Monterey and Carmel for several years, when Marty was teaching there.
Martinez
He only had summer classes there; that was the summer school for the California School of Arts and Crafts. He had two in Monterey and two in Carmel. I think Monterey was 1910 and 1911, and 1913 and 1914 was in Carmel.
Baum
Well, shall we discuss Carmel in 1911 or so?
Martinez
Monterey was the art colony in the early days. We first belonged to the Monterey group — Charles Rollo Peters, Francis McComas, Armin Hansen, the one who painted the sea so well, Boranda, who painted early California scenes, Charles Dickman, a genial character, Arnold Genthe—they were the group. They thought nothing of Carmel.
Old Monterey was adorable then. We went down when they put the gallery in at Del Monte in 1907. In the beginning, that's where we went to stay. For a year we went every three months and were guests at the Hotel Del Monte while the gallery was being organized. Miss Blanche was to be the curator.
Walker
Blanche Partington?
Martinez
No, she didn't have anything to do with this. She was in San Francisco. That gallery went on for some years, until the hotel burned down. Our group loved Monterey. The little main street when we first went down there was a combination of little Spanish adobes and old false front pioneer stores. When I saw it again after a fifteen year absence, 1929, I
In the meantime, Carmel which was nothing but a bunch of sand lots grew very fast and an effort was made to keep it unique, while Monterey lost its picturesqueness. After the fire of 1906 Sterling went down and organized the big art colony there. Monterey was ruined by the man who's putting money into it to save it now. He came with a pick and shovel and picked all the adobes out. Now he's putting money into restoring the few of them left.
Baum
He was a developer?
Martinez
No, he was a contractor. He was a pick-and-shovel man who became a contractor in those early days.
Baum
I have Armin Hansen listed as being there.
Martinez
Yes, he was part of the group, Boranda and Dickman also.
Baum
The Bruton sisters?
Martinez
I knew them casually.
Baum
Lucy Pierce?
Martinez
Oh, I knew her well. She was a mediocre talent, a pupil of Marty's, if I may say so.
Baum
I had an idea there was a gathering of people.
Martinez
No, not in the early days, not when we first went down there. Charles Warren Stoddard — everyone loved him.
Baum
He was Monterey, not Carmel?
Martinez
Yes, he was Monterey.
It was when we first went down to stay with Peters that I met
That was the first time I saw him. The second time, almost a year later, was at the house which they now call the Stoddard House, now demolished for the square in Monterey. We went there once. He was still not very well and he was in a sort of monk's costume and sitting up in bed.
We saw him once more in 1909, two years later. Peters took us to see him and though he was in bed, pleaded with Charlie to bring us in. I remember the darkened room. He was so pleased to see visitors. He was a gentle person, there was not an aggressive thing about Stoddard. He was famous for his sweetness and gentleness and charm, and he had it still. He died a few months after we saw him then.
Walker
It's pretty obvious from Stoddard's diaries that he was a homosexual. I wondered if this was well known to the people around him?
Martinez
He was so lovable and gentle we never thought of him as that. A San Francisco paper sent Stoddard down to the South Seas to get material for them. He turned "native" and they had to send someone down to bring him back. Stoddard was the center of the group there in Monterey.
Have you seen the letters between London and Stoddard? Norris of Carmel had those letters — I saw them. I was told he sold them to the University of California. They're really charming, especially London's. He was a young boy then, drawn to Stoddard the writer.
Walker
You said that Stoddard was wearing a monk's robe when you went over to see him. Do you remember what color it was?
Martinez
Oh, sort of a grey thing. He became a Franciscan, they call it "third order", and one can wear the habit. He went to Santa Barbara and tried
Walker
He didn't have a skull on his desk, though?
Martinez
I didn't see that. The room was a bit dark.
Walker
Herbert Heron has stayed in Carmel right up to the present, hasn't he?
Martinez
Oh, yes. He has always lived here and loves to talk of the early days.
Walker
Who is Fladin Heron?
Martinez
I don't know. I knew only Herbert Heron, the poet.
Many years later when I recalled a party given in his honor by George Sterling at the Pine Inn, Heron couldn't remember it. There must have been a feud later to blur his memory, or erase it! He was a young poet then, a blonde boy with curly hair and an adorable little wife with a tiny baby in her arms. She was so petite, with a handful of blonde short curls and a pale blue dress of frills on frills like a pine cone. Quite a crowd was there — Harry Leon Wilson, Helen Green ( she wrote At the Actors' Boarding House), who came with Wilson — John Kenneth Turner and his wife, also a writer, Jimmy Hopper, and others I have forgotten. It was quite a crowd.
Walker
Wilson had had two wives already.
Martinez
Well, Helen Green was one of the most irresistible women I've ever known, a Southerner. Her father was a famous Southerner and had a string of fine race horses. She travelled all over the world with him with his race horses. She was very beautiful, she had one of those deep southern voices, an exquisite accent, and a vast amount of southern charm.
I got the story from the Newberrys. When her father was in England, they used to go to the biggest hotels. Papa was a lovable alcoholic by the way. (This was Helen Green, she married a Dutch engineer named Van Campen in Alaska.) While they were there in the de luxe English hotel, she heard a great uproar in the room next to hers, heard the scurrying of feet, alarmed voices, and thought it sounded familiar. She put her head out. It seems in the room next to hers was a famous duke who was having an alcoholic seizure and was dying. The servants were in a panic, hysterically trying to get a doctor when Helen walked right into the room. She was only sixteen and said with authority, "My father's an alcoholic and I know what to do." She ordered them to put him in the tub of hot water and she brought him out of the seizure, put him back to bed, and when the doctor arrived and the duke came to, the doctor told him the girl had saved his life.
The duke was enchanted with this little blonde beauty. He also loved horses, so a friendship with her father worked out very nicely. Finally one day he said to her, "I'm going to give you an opportunity that you deserve. I'm going to marry you and take you to all the courts of Europe. Then when you're bored I'll release you and you can go back to America." So for two years after they were married she went to all the courts of Europe, got thoroughly bored (Laughter). In the meantime, her father was still alive, running the horses. Of course, with the influence of the Duke, he was amply taken care of. Then, at the end of two years, whe thought she wanted to go back to America because she was bored, courts are stuffy, you know. He gave her the divorce and gave her enough to live on for several years, and
Then she decided she had to do something for her living, so what to do? There was a link there I've forgotten, but she went to a newspaper. She'd often stayed at this famous hotel in New York and she knew the telephone girls and loved to listen to the conversations. So she started a column, on these two telephone girls in this great hotel and the sort of comments they made, and it made a great hit. Then, on top of that, she wrote about this boarding house, a book on an actor's boarding house where she was staying.
In the meantime, she'd met Harry Leon Wilson and he fell madly in love with her. He wanted to marry her and she wouldn't marry him. She was tired of marriage by that time. She'd had two "cocktail marriages" and that was sufficient.
Baum
Who was the duke?
Martinez
I don't know. She didn't tell me the name. That's the only thing she left out. [Laughter] Part of the story I heard from her and the rest from Bertha Newberry. Well, when she was recovering slowly from typhoid fever, Harry Wilson told her she ought to go up into the wilds of Canada where she could really recover, away from the big city, and he would take care of her. She thought it was a grand idea. So they started off. In the meantime her hair had fallen out from typhoid and she had six wigs made. Every month one was sent up to her and the others were sent back to be redone until her hair grew.
So here he was, madly in love with her. She wasn't at all interested in him. They'd been up there about four months and he wanted to take
Walker
She must have been very attractive, because Sinclair Lewis and Arnold Genthe both spoke of being in love with her. Was she somewhat of a flirt?
Martinez
Very much. She gained everything she wanted, trips to New York or Washington by flirting and crying him into line.
Walker
Harry Leon Wilson later fought a duel over her. Do you remember that?
Martinez
Oh! My oldest brother, a prizefighter, was California's lightweight in those early days. When no story came out in the newspapers, my brother wrote to Wilson, "Can I come down and give you a few lessons and that will take care of Mr. Criley for you." Wilson wrote back how much he
Walker
They went out in the early morning to fight it out with fisticuffs on Point Lobos. It hit the New York Times.
Martinez
[Laughter] Wilson was a strange sort of person. He was likable and very unlikable. Our first meeting was very unlikable. I was about eighteen I think. Perry said, "There's a New York writer here and we want to give him a good time." Well, at that time Marty and I used to go down to the Barbary Coast on sketching trips to the dance halls. Perry wanted to show him the Barbary Coast. So Wilson wrote us and invited us to spend the evening in San Francisco. He said he was staying at such and such hotel. We went first to dinner. He didn't know who I was and I didn't know him. I was talking to Fred Bechdolt on the subject of Emile Zola. Well, I didn't think much of Zola and I was very good on airing my opinions. I saw this person opposite me — he had a kind of a florid face, round, sour-looking, and he kept staring at me. This was Wilson. Suddenly he shook his finger at me and he said, "You have a high school mind!" So I stared at him coldly and I said, "That may be your opinion". I still didn't know who he was or that he was our host. So during the evening every once in a while he'd take a sour dig at me, which didn't bother me much.
Newberry and Marty were to take him with us to the Barbary Coast. We went to the Bella Union and wound up at the Thalian. I can tell you a lot about the Barbary Coast. One amusing episode —
Well, to go back to Harry Leon, we were his guests at the hotel, but had to get home early because we had a guest for lunch. I said, "I've got to leave a message, what's the name of that fellow, Marty?" He mumbled, "I don't know." So I put"John Lane Wilson" on this card and said that we expected him with the Newberrys for dinner. We went off home and had a little luncheon for friends and then late in the afternoon Perry appeared with Wilson. He looked at me with complete astonishment — he hadn't known who I was all evening. By that time I had heard who he was. He was considerably surprised after dinner watching the ease with which I had handled numbers of people coming and going during the afternoon. Newberry said,
I made a collection, starting with Nietzsche and Anatole France and several other famous figures of Europe on what they thought of Zola, and seeing him a week later, remarked, "There's only one thing I hold against you, Harry, what you said about my remarks about Zola. I can't resist showing you I'm in good company." He smiled as I went through the list and said, "You are a terrific young person!" (Laughter) "Now we can be friends. I'm feminine to that degree that I do resent the statement of my high school mind."
Walker
Did he live in Carmel before he moved down to the Highlands?
Martinez
Yes. You know where you turn onto Carmelo? There's a brown house on the right hand corner in which he lived. He and Helen Green had it.
Walker
What about Helen Green?
Martinez
She left immediately. They were only there about three months during the summer and then she went back to New York. We didn't see her again.
Walker
Well, tell me about Bertha Newberry.
Martinez
Bertha and Perry came from Saginaw, Michigan. Perry at that time was interested in law enforcement and he had come to join the police force in San Jose. He had lots of hair-raising stories to tell of those early days. He was there for a short while, and then decided he didn't want to be an officer. He was only on probation and could leave if he wanted to. In those days you didn't have officers' schools, he
Newberry was in this firm that got the job for Marquette Whiskey and Marty and he became friends. Bertha was a green-eyed blonde, petite, and with a great sense of humor. She and Marty used to sing La Bohème together, and though she didn't know it, she faked it well enough to create an illusion. We were close friends for years until they moved to Carmel and we often visited them until Kai went into school. We didn't go down for fifteen years and lost contact
Marty and I were in the production of "The Toad," which she wrote. Marty was to be a conspirator and only had one thing to say, "I killed him with my knife." What he said was "Oh Gawd, I keeled heem weeth my knife."
Walker
Was "The Toad" any good?
Martinez
No. Bertha, without any experience in the theatre, wrote the play. No, it was not good. However, we had fun playing in it. Also, there was a feud about the play. It was the only time I came in contact with Michael Williams. The opposition were harassing Williams, a new-comer, who was unaware of the feud to boil up, to accept the role of High Priest. Because he was a Catholic they expected him to lend dignity to the part
Heron practically thought he owned the Forest Theater and was used to using it as his in the summer. But Perry Newberry had gotten into the Pine Cone of Carmel as editor, and he had become first Mayor of Carmel. So, as an official he could take over the theater. There was a woman mayor before him, a Mrs. de Sable. Therefore, he had the say for the Forest Theater and took it over for Bertha's play. We went down to be in the play. I was lady-in -waiting to the queen. Sophie Treadwell McGeehan was the queen. She was on the Bulletin. Her husband, William McGeehan, was the editor of it. He went to New York and became sports editor of one of the big New York papers afterwards. And Helen Cooke was supposed to be the Virgin of the Sun or something or other, who lured the priest away. The priest was
Walker
Who was the toad?
Martinez
I don't remember. (Laughter) However I do remember that I decided to have a real Egyptian headdress. I studied the Egyptian sculpture. I braided all of my long hair into little braids and pressed them with an iron until they looked like an Egyptian headdress. So I was the only one with a correct headdress in the whole cast.
The feud between Heron's backers and the Newberry outfit reached a crisis. At that time Williams was something of a good pal companion and the Heron group decided to get him drunk and ruin the play. At the intermission Newberry said to me, "You go down to the dressing room and watch Williams."
Walker
Had he already become a Catholic?
Martinez
Yes. He was trying to make up his mind whether to marry or to become a monk. That's why he was playing this part. When I read his biography years later I had to laugh, because I was there when he was making his decision.
Walker
I thought he was married before he came West.
Martinez
No. It was after this big decision, whether to be a monk or get him a wife. So, Newberry said to me, "Now, you stay in Williams' dressing room and keep the fellow straight because somebody is trying to slip him a bottle of whiskey."
Michael was drinking pretty heavily at the time. I went in and sat down - he stared at me balefully for a moment, and then said, "What are you doing here?" I said, "I'm ordered to stay here."
So he looked at me coldly for a minute and he said, "Why?" I said, "You know why." He said, "What nonesense!" He went on putting on his make-up and didn't pay any more attention to me. Anyhow, I wouldn't be budged even though, every once in a while, he gave me a cold stare. It took about half an hour before he was ready. I could see he was already about half seas over to begin with and it wouldn't have taken more than a snort or two to topple him over. When they gave him his cue and he went on the stage, Newberry and the cast all sighed with relief.
Later, I saw Williams walking down the beach and he told me he made the big decision. He went East and married.
Walker
Do you know why Bertha was called Butsky? Perhaps because she liked to smoke ...
Martinez
Oh, that rings a bell! She was called Butsky because, the only woman smoker in the group, she was always running out of cigarettes and hunting up the butts in the trays to put in a jar.
Walker
Couldn't she afford to buy cigarettes?
Martinez
Perry didn't approve of her smoking to begin with, so she'd collect the cigarette butts when people weren't looking to use herself. When I was young a woman who smoked was considered a loose female. Victorianism ruled even the art world then.
Baum
Then extracurricular romances were not acceptable to the group.
Martinez
Oh no, they'd get indignant. Of course, Marty had the good Mexican idea, keep your wife under your nose like a squaw and don't ever let her look up.
So many friends said to my father, "Whitaker, how could you let that beautiful child marry that old savage!" He'd reply, "Don't worry about Elsie, you worry about Marty. She'll reform him, I can assure you!" It was a foolish marriage. Marty didn't have a chance. I'd learned all about arguing from my father. Everybody said that the Martinez quarrels were so entertaining. We didn't quarrel like ordinary people about each other. He'd go back and talk about the great Mexican culture when the Britons were in caves, and we'd start off with cultures and come to tracing the annoying ancestral traits in each other, especially those traits we disliked in each other's race. It was wonderful. But poor Marty had a hard time just the same.
Walker
Did Newberry have any artistic talent?
Martinez
Oh, yes. You'll find in Marty's album a number of the little pamphlets he did of Bertha and Marty. And he wrote a little poetry, too.
Walker
But by and large he was a businessman.
Martinez
Yes, otherwise yes. He was a dear, too.
Walker
Bertha remained his only wife — he never married again?
Martinez
No. Oh, yes, he did, one of George Sterling's first flames. Ida Brooks was a school teacher and George brought her up to the studio. She was very nice, very likable. Twenty years later, after Bertha died, Perry Newberry married her in Carmel. She's still there, by the way, in Carmel. A nice little person, too. She was very devoted to Perry. He had a long period of heart trouble before he died. I didn't see the Newberrys after we left Carmel in 1915. We lost contact, but we had been very close.
One Thanksgiving we'd gone over to the Mexican Beanery — whenever we were hard up we went to the Beanery — a plate of beans was ten cents and with it a large glass of wine. You could have a quart for about ten cents more — cheap wine, but not bad. Then we'd go down to the Barbary Coast. Perry was political boss of North Beach. Perry was working for Dan Ryan, the lawyer who was running for mayor on a good government ticket after the Schmidt and Ruef scandals. Perry had North Beach and the Barbary Coast as his area to get support and votes. So he knew all the figures in the Barbary Coast and took us to meet them. Marty and the artists loved sketching there and we wives loved the picturesqueness of the Coast.
Baum
This was before the Perrys went to Carmel?
Martinez
Yes. And that reminds me of another episode. Bill Irwin's wife, Hallie, came up to San Francisco. What a wonderful character! She was always interested in mining and she had brought a wealthy miner with her. She said, "Kids, we're going to have a good time. You can be sure we didn't go to the beanery that night. We went off to the Barbary Coast. Marty was sketching. There was a very pretty entertainer there and she sat beside me. Marty said, "Don't you think it's time we go back pretty soon?" It was one o'clock. She looked at me and she said, "Are you married to him?" I said, "Yes." She said, "Poor kid". (Laughter) That was my first real sympathy.
Walker
Back to Piedmont: When Havens was here in Piedmont, was Harry Lafler working for him? Selling lots?
Yes.
Walker
Lafler was involved in real estate in Carmel, too?
Martinez
Yes, Big Sur and the country down there. He was just one of the minor poetic talents and went into real estate to make a living. I'll never forget Gladys Couvoiser, his bride, whom I knew very well.
He took her to his homestead at Big Sur on their honeymoon. Gladys arrived with her six Borzoi dogs — into the marble palace dug into the raw marble, with terraces and especially a large bath — a Roman tub hewn out of the marble rock with a natural waterfall that slid down the rock into the tub. She said the only thing she enjoyed there was the marble tub.
Walker
Was this his second wife?
Martinez
Oh, second or third. He married a school teacher when he was a young poet, and was divorced just before he came to Carmel. After Gladys, he married a charming girl who committed suicide. Then he married a nice stable woman. You know how Harry died. He was in his car, coming up very fast on the highway on a wet night in a terrific rain. He put his head out the window to see what he could of the highway and a truck passing too close cut off his head. His wife and child were in the back. Harriet Dean remarked, "It wasn't the first time a poet has lost his head."
Walker
You said he was likable.
Martinez
Very likable. That's why he was there so long.
Walker
Was Fred Bechdolt also an attractive person?
We all liked Fred, but he was not part of our group then. I went to his baptism. Of all the large number that we knew in the early days in California he and I were the only ones baptized in Carmel Mission many years later. He was baptized about a year after I was, I in 1937, he in 1938. Una Jeffers came to the baptism and he cried on her shoulder overcome after he had made his profession of faith. When he recovered he said to me, "Isn't it funny that we two old pagans are the only ones of that bunch that landed where we ought to be, in the Catholic Church?" We used to get together often and laugh about that — reminiscences of the early period of art groups and their feuds in Carmel.
Walker
Una didn't join?
Martinez
No.
Walker
Did I understand correctly that the chap who ran the Golden Bough Theater was Una Jeffers' first husband?
Martinez
Custer was her first husband. The three of them were fellow students at Occidental College. Jeffers had asked her to marry him before Custer. She married Custer first. Then, she found marriage to Custer a mistake, and she divorced him and married Jeffers.
Walker
Why did Jeffers come up to Carmel?
Martinez
He came to visit the Custers and fell in love with the landscape and the seascape.
Walker
Not before the separation.
Martinez
No, I think not.
Walker
As I understand it, he didn't come up to Carmel until several years later.
No, I guess that's true. David Alberto, the musician, told me that he and his wife were sleeping on the beach when they came down to get started in Carmel because they didn't have any money and were waiting for a loan. Jeffers was building the tower and he'd come down all day long to get stones for his tower. Mrs. Jeffers was kindly and would often bring them buns and dishes she'd made. They lived on the beach for ten days until he managed to get a loan from his family and they rented a cottage. As a piano teacher he became very successful.
Walker
I was reading Van Wyck Brooks' autobiography and he said he used to see Jeffers go up the hill with rocks and it always reminded him of Sisyphus.
Martinez
[Laughter] Yes. It was said that he was not very well at the time and he regained his health building his home.
Harry Downey gave Una Jeffers a little statuette carved by an Indian because she loved it. She loved the Mission and followed his restoration with great interest. She loved the little primitive Indian statue and once a year, she used to go with Scoobie O'Sullivan a Catholic friend of hers and ours, to the Mission. She would take it out of her bag, set it up on the front seat, sit in back of it and meditate for half an hour. Scoobie told us he had done that for about fifteen years. She kept it in a niche in the tower.
I came closer to them for a short period because they had a little grandson and Pal and I used to take him to the Serra School with Monique who lived with us at the time. They were the same age and went to school together. I was always very careful never to
You didn't know about the time she tried to commit suicide, did you?
Walker
No. I understood that he went to pieces pretty rapidly after she died.
Martinez
Well, I think that he had cancer and was ill. I saw him a number of times after, but he sort of withdrew from everything.
Walker
Why did she try to commit suicide?
Martinez
Well, they were down in Taos, and Mabel Dodge Luhan was one of those people who was never satisfied until she'd broken up families. She had broken up six down there that I knew about. She'd married six times herself. So she brought from New York this beautiful girl as a lure for Jeffers. They went down to visit her and Jeffers happened to look at her a couple of times and that was too much for Una. She shot herself, but didn't succeed. She survived it, and they left and went back to Carmel and never left Carmel after that.
Was Lincoln Steffens there?
Martinez
Oh, he was a delightful person, the best raconteur I ever heard. He told us of his romance with Mary Austin. While he was in Carmel, he got very interested in Mary and she reciprocated. He'd asked her to marry him. Finally, they got to the point where Mary decided they might marry. "Well," she said, "the only thing, Lincoln, is I must go back to New York to finish my book." So they both went back to New York. She returned to her apartment and he to his apartment. They decided they'd spend some time together and see if they really could make a success of marriage. He told us he was certain that Mary was cautious. Mary would say, "I can't see you until four o'clock this afternoon. My work's going well". Or, "I can't see you at all until this evening because my work's going very well." At the end of about two months it began to strike him as funny, and so he said to Mary, "We've got to make a decision now, since this arrangement doesn't suit me at all. I think it's about time that we came to some decision." So she replied, "Well, give me a little more time."
Well, Mary finally decided on her own to find an apartment that would suit both their needs as writers. When she found the perfect apartment, she found Lincoln Steffens and Ella Winter also hunting an apartment. [Laughter] There was a blow-up on the spot and he married Ella Winter instead of Mary. Ella was wasting no time at all, she was all for having her husband on the spot.
Baum
I thought Steffens had to work a long time to persuade Ella to marry him.
Well, he might have known her before that, but they were getting the apartment, going to be married, and settle down in it. And Mary was figuring on getting this apartment for herself and Steffens. He told us the story himself. He laughed, "That's what finished up the romance with Mary."
Walker
Was Steffens in Carmel at all in the early days?
Martinez
I don't think until later, no. He was there during the years we weren't down in Carmel much. But we saw him up in Berkeley and Piedmont.
Walker
My impression was that he didn't settle there until the twenties.
Martinez
I don't think it was until later, no. I never met Ella Winter at all. At the time we saw much of him, he was connected with the University, doing some work for them.
Walker
Did you ever meet Mary Austin's husband?
Martinez
Yes. I felt sorry for him — a gentle creature. They used to call him Mr. Mary — it was awfully cruel. He was a small amiable man who adored her, thought she was the greatest genius who had ever lived and waited on her hand and foot.
Walker
Did the Carmel group like him rather better than Mary?
Martinez
Mary was a kind of difficult person to like, but the joke of it was that he knew her before — I think she had just written The Land of Little Rain and my father wrote and congratulated her on a masterpiece. She came up and stayed with us. She was a little tiny thin thing, as thin as a string with a mass of beautiful hair which she took down to show all of us. She was as large as a tank before she died. Harriet Dean told me of having met her in Santa Fe where she was living.
Did she talk at all about her child? Apparently she had a subnormal child.
Martinez
She talked about that tragedy to my father, but I have just a vague memory of her referring to it as a tragedy. She had two of them, one died at three years of age and the other lived to be sixteen. Their spines were defective.
Baum
Of both children?
Martinez
Both. The spine was soft or something and they couldn't walk. This little sixteen year old never walked.
Walker
She gives the impression in her autobiography that this is one reason she broke up with her husband.
Martinez
Do you know that biography of this old friend of hers, of her life?
Walker
Doyle?
Martinez
I think I have it — about her youth and girlhood. I remember her talking about the tragedy to her of this little girl who died at sixteen.
Walker
Did Mary and Marty ever talk about Indians?
Martinez
Oh, by the hour. At the time of the 1915 Fair she had a backdrop painted for some of her Indian productions and had Marty come over to see the settings and advise the artist. So he saw a good deal of her then. But she had become a rather forbidding character about that time, not noted for her graciousness at all.
Walker
I understand she was called by the group "God's mother-in-law."
Martinez
That's it. [Laughter] She was the voice of authority, let me tell you.
Baum
You mentioned Bill Irwin. Did they call him Will or Bill?
They called him Bill. He married Inez Haynes Irwin. Hallie was his first wife. She was a grand character, but a wild westerner. After the marriage ceremony, they had it all prepared, so when they went into the bedroom at night each had a big sign that they'd taken from the zoo, "Don't tease the animals." They put them at the head of the bed.
Then Bill Irwin married Inez Haynes Irwin who was just the reverse of Hallie because she was an easterner and a writer. She wrote a good but not outstanding novel. She was a dear person and a good friend of Theodore Dreiser. He was the one who encouraged her.
Baum
Did the people down in Carmel work, or did they mostly have fun?
Martinez
Well, they worked considerably. They had to earn their living after all. But some of them played harder than they worked and did not last long there.
Baum
Where did their income come from?
Martinez
That was the question that nobody knew. Sterling had his uncle, Havens, to depend on — the only lucky one.
Baum
It didn't cost too much to live there?
Martinez
Oh, you could get good "dago red" for two bits a gallon, tubs of beans for next to nothing. You could go fishing for abalones, mussels, all free — raid orchards and a few things like that. You could get vegetables very cheaply from the Japanese or Chinese and you could live quite comfortably.
Baum
You did need a house.
Martinez
They were very cheap, too. Some of them camped out, when necessary,
Walker
Did you ever meet Eugene Fenelon.
Martinez
Oh, I knew him well, a character, too. He bought a little piece of property in the orange groves in Pasadena and wound up with an oil well.
Walker
Fenelon was a man of all trades — he worked on the "Snark", and helped build George Sterling's house for him.
Martinez
Fenelon was a friend of Sterling's from his old home in Sag Harbor, New York. Roosevelt Johnson and Fenelon were both from Sag Harbor.
George himself told me that he had left with Mrs. Rounthwaite, his oldest sister, a large amount of poetry which he boasted would burn up the town. We never found out after his death what became of them.
Walker
A great many of his poems are here and there in the Bancroft. One of his sisters sent hers to the Bancroft Library.
Martinez
That must have been the Rounthwaite collection.
Baum
Edwin Markham?
Martinez
I didn't know him at all. I went to Keith's studio when I was about fourteen years old with Charley Keeler, a Berkeley poet. He took my father and me to Keith's studio. Keith was a handsome fellow. At the moment he was enchanted by a fine Chinese gong that had just been given to him. He was on his knees beside the gong and motioned for us to come and join him. We all knelt while he tested his gong, and enchanted, expatiating as to its superior qualities. We did not have
The funniest thing happened. I saw a sign of an exhibition of Keith's work down at the Public Library the other day. I was with a friend and we stopped there. After looking at the canvasses I told the secretary the story about the gong. She said, "Well look behind you", and there it stood — and recalled a pleasant visit.
Walker
We haven't asked you about Jesse Lynch Williams and Ray Stannard Baker.
Martinez
I knew Mrs. Jesse Lynch Williams in Carmel, but I never knew him. Ray Stannard Baker came down there. He has amusing passages about the Sterlings in his book. If you haven't got it, I have the book, Ray Stannard Baker's memoirs. He has quite a chapter on Carmel.
Walker
So many people — writers, painters, theatrical people — went to Carmel, were there for a few weeks or months and then drifted away.
Martinez
Garnet Holme was the name of the English producer who put on "The Toad."
Walker
I meant to ask you what Arnold Genthe was like. Was he a ladies' man?
Martinez
Oh yes, he was a ladies' man all right, but a discreet and sympathetic friend.
Walker
He says in his book, "I'm not going to write about the women in my life."
Martinez
What a magnificent array of beauties he portrayed, with an inner empathy of women's beauty, which he displayed so superbly. He was a very distinguished German, and a very brilliant European.
Walker
Was he likable?
Martinez
Oh very, yes. Women just fell in droves for this handsome German who could realize their dreams of themselves.
He did it with protocol?
Martinez
Very much so, but with his friends he could be natural.
Frederick Clapp was the figure we knew through Porter Garnett. Fred was quite a while in Berkeley, giving lectures on art for the University of California Extension School. I heard his first lecture and went to more of them with Porter Garnett. Porter was in the Bancroft Library cataloguing manuscripts. He and Frederick Clapp became great friends. Then Clapp went to Europe and was in Florence doing research and working on his art book. There he met his wife whom he called the"distillation of civilization" and with whom he fell madly in love. Her father was Ede, the English ambassador to Hungary, and her mother was an Hungarian countess. Her mother died early and she and her father lived in a palace in Florence. Her father died suddenly and Fred was the only one there to keep her through this very difficult and trying time. There were very very difficult problems when one died in Italy, and Mr. Ede wanted to be buried there. So during the long said affair she had fallen in love with Fred. So he married the "distillation of civilization". She was a charming person, gracious and very intelligent and she looked like an aristocrat.
Baum
Is he still alive?
Martinez
I think so. With his wife and Marty dead, we lost contact with him.
His trials and tribulations with the Frick Collection were very amusing. [Laughter] The letters from Clapp, which are in the scrapbook, are often telling about his difficulties in building up the famous Frick Collection in the proper gallery setting.
Did you know Bruce Porter?
Martinez
Quite well, but our contact with Porter was casual. He was a rather conventional person and I think he was so overcome with marrying William James' daughter that he never recovered from the shock. She was a very impressive person, though quite charming the one time I met her.
Walker
What did he do, stain glass windows mostly?
Martinez
Yes, beautiful ones.
Walker
He was a great friend of Frank Norris, I know.
Martinez
Yes, but he was a rather conventional person. When we were several times at parties together, I felt that he didn't like bohemians. So, we didn't see much of him.
Walker
He was quite interested in mysticism; the mystical passages in The Octopus seem to be almost wholly the result of Norris' friendship with Bruce Porter.
And Porter Garnett ...
Martinez
Oh, Porter! [Laughter] He was a southerner, a Virginian. When the southerners were ruined by the Civil War they sent a group of them out to San Francisco to work for the government after we took California. We had just taken California and the group contained Porter Garnett and the famous Colonel Trumbull, and the Holmes's, the Footes, that's Porter Garnett's wife Edna Foote's people, and several others.
Porter had some minor official position in the government. He came into the office, always looking like a fashion plate of a southerner, just walked in and collected his salary and that's about all. Porter told me
Walker
Did you know Gelett Burgess?
Martinez
When I met Gelett Burgess Marty and I had been married about seven months. He took one look at me and he said, "What did you marry Marty for? He should never have married." I replied, "I know that, Marty doesn't." He looked surprised and was quite friendly after his first shot. A little short fellow, he had plenty of personality and a most amazing voice. He used to sing cowboy and French revolutionary songs, bellowing like a bull. You could hear him a block away. He loved jokes.
We had gone to Les Beaux in southern France, a tiny Greek city on top of a plateau that strangely thrust its bulk out of the earth. He had been there and as a joke, he bought an acre of land there for his sister. She of course never would go there, never would see it, but he still bought the acre for her and loved to boast about it.
Walker
He came to Carmel and died here.
Martinez
Yes. He came to see Marty several times but I didn't see him at the time. I know he thought Marty's marriage a disaster and was annoyed that I agreed with him.
Walker
I was going through some Carmel clippings and I ran across a whole folder about the murder by a Japanese artist there.
Martinez
Yes. I had met her at one time. We weren't there when it happened, and friends coming up from Carmel told us the story. It seems that
Walker
You don't know anything about her as an artist.
Martinez
Only that she was a very mediocre one.
Elsie Whitaker Martinez: Student, Mother, and Grandmother
Years of Study with Harriet Dean
BaumWhat direction did your life take after you moved out of Marty's studio and in with Harriet Dean nearby? Oh, before you answer that, could you tell me a little more about Harriet Dean herself?
Martinez
Well, I had to learn all about America from Harriet Dean, whose mother was a Daughter of the American Revolution from New England. I had an English background with my father, and as Oakland was mostly foreign colonies in my childhood, I really grew up amongst foreigners in California. Her two great-grandfathers were Indian commissioners. Her Dean grandfather was in the New York legislature. One of her grandfathers (the commissioner) moved the Oneida Indians from New York State to Wisconsin by portage, by canoe, and he had a diary that's in the historical society in Indiana. One of her forebears was in the treasury under Lincoln. The Silas Dean that went to Europe with Franklin was one of that family. Her family on the French side started New Rochelle, New York. Her mother was related to the Tafts, and also to Silver Dollar Teller of Colorado. She grew up a rockbound Republican, as her father's family were industrialists in the Middle West — Dean Brothers Pumps of Indianapolis.
Harriet was a remarkable pianist; there wasn't anything she couldn't do with a piano. In our studio there'd be eight or nine different foreigners — friends of Marty's from Mexico or Europe — only to have them throw her a theme and she could carry on and improvise and play anything for them. She had a genius for that sort of thing.
Baum
She was trained to be a pianist?
Martinez
She was to be trained to be a pianist — her mother's ambition — but alack and alas, her interest in ideas — gotten at Vassar — interfered with her becoming a pianist.
I forgot to say she first went to May Wright Sewell's Classical School for Girls. Then after her death she went to the Episcopalian High School for Girls. Last of all she had three years at Vassar College. She left Vassar to go on the Little Review.
Baum
How long was she with the Little Review? That magazine was started in 1914.
Martinez
She didn't go on it until 1915. Her job was to raise money. She was a very handsome tailored middle class girl. Her family were "big bourgeois", as the radicals said then.
She looked like a businesswoman, of course, and was very persuasive. She could go into any office in Chicago and would try to convince them of the cultural importance of the Little Review and often the business heads would give her a check for a hundred or a couple hundred dollars. One of the industrialists one day said, "This is for you. Don't send the magazine to us." "Well, your wife might be interested in it." "Oh no, don't send it to us; we'll give you this check to help you out, but don't send it to us." They liked her and she could get them to do anything. That's why they always mentioned her in connection with the money, because she was the money-raiser.
Harriet was big. She weighed 220. She was strong, dynamic, very well-dressed, a tailor's model, and very vibrant, with tremendous enthusiasm. So she could just lure money in any direction. Whenever they got stuck to get the printing bills paid, they sent her out.
Baum
Did she take any part in the editorial work?
Martinez
No, none. But she was a great friend, at that period, of Sherwood Anderson. She brought him into the Little Review. She persuaded him to let them have something. She knew Ben Hecht, too.
Ben Hecht was a newspaper man then, who had green eyes and always was impeccably dressed and always had a white carnation in his button-hole. Can you imagine that? And she also knew Edgar Lee Masters. At one time she had written two satirical poems which were published in the Little Review and he thought she was going to be an excellent satirist. He was quite interested in her at the time.
But as I say, her forte was fund-raising and that was her talent. She could raise money anywhere. The Little Review had very little other support. When Anderson brought Emma Goldman in and, with her, radicalism, then, of course, people wouldn't support it. So she had to raise the money to keep it going. To her it was wonderful to do that; she was glad to be that part of it. And then after about two or three years she left the Little Review.
The Little Review came out to San Francisco. She found this was the place she wanted to live, here in California. The Little Review changed considerably — and settled in New York — so she left it and came back to California.
Baum
Did she have a falling out with Margaret Anderson?
Martinez
No, never with Margaret Anderson. She always admired her. She just knew the Little Review,with Ezra Pound as foreign editor, did not need her. The Little Review became famous and got on its feet. It had a large subscription list and some donors, so they did not need her. But there was no disagreement of any kind.
Baum
How did you and Harriet Dean support yourselves?
Martinez
Harriet had an allowance. Her family were well-to-do industrialists. Her mother built the house for her in Piedmont and sent her enough to live on comfortably. The life we lived was quiet and interesting, except on weekends when we used to go over to Marty's and keep his place going as we had in the early days. Marty had such a wide variety of interesting people from all over that we kept the Sunday studio parties going, although I lived at Harriet Dean's.
Baum
Was this allowance without strings?
Martinez
Yes.
Baum
Or did her family try to control her?
Martinez
Well, I think her mother was rather pleased to have her settle out here, because she had been a friend of Emma Goldman's, flitting around in New York, and she was connected with the radicals. That alarmed her mother.
She was an embarrassment to her family?
Martinez
Oh, my dear! She brought Emma Goldman down to Indianapolis to lecture on free love! The whole town went to hear her, because Harriet had brought this strange creature down there. The lecture was given in a workman's hall — uptown would not accept Emma Goldman. So there was grumbling and growling because the working class couldn't get in because the elite of Indianapolis wanted to see this woman that Harriet had brought down. Oh, Harriet was a sensation in that town.
Harriet started her education with May Wright Sewell, who started the Classical School. Mrs. Sewell was a relative by marriage. Then she went to Vassar, and she left during the last six months of Vassar, didn't even wait to get a degree, to join the Little Review in Chicago.
Just before her mother died, which was some years back, she said to me, "Well, where did she get her queer ideas?" And I said, "You're going to be surprised where she got them, Aunt Nell. She got them at Vassar when liberalism took the field there". It began with liberalism, and then on the Little Review it went into radicalism.
But when the war came, her mother thought, well, if she could get her settled out here that would keep her out of trouble and out of the Little Review. [Laughter] That was the theory. And she supported her very comfortably to keep her out here.
Baum
Were you supposed to be a good influence on her?
Martinez
Yes. I went East with her. Her mother gave us a trip to Europe because I was such a good influence on Harriet and kept her out of that, to her, awful Little Review and the radical bunch that she knew.
We were in the art world. That didn't bother Aunt Nell so much. As long as I was a married woman with a child, who kept her daughter away from the radicals. As a matter of fact the radicals were no danger to Pal, for she never was part of any radical movement. It was ridiculous, really, but it was a specter to her family. The word radical gave them nightmares. She flitted around with Emma Goldman, she met a great many of the famous radicals, she even met Trotsky. Emma Goldman was devoted to her and kept her free of any entanglements, because she knew she was an artistic type like Margaret Anderson, and she didn't belong there. In her biography, she has quite a eulogy on Harriet Dean and Margaret Anderson.
Besides, the radicals are very suspicious of the bourgeois. [Laughter] But she was irresistible, so they accepted her and were fond of her. But she never at any time had the slightest contact with any of their activities. She was one of those irresistible people who skates on all the ice possible and never falls below the surface of it. But Mother looked upon me as the one person who would keep her out of this dreadful atmosphere.
Baum
I believe you and Harriet Dean then devoted yourselves to study.
Martinez
Yes, I loved history especially. When I met Harriet we were both tremendously vital and very tiring, so everybody said, "It's God's mercy that pair got together." From then on we had eighteen years of study, of leisure, a thing that's hard to find today. We did a lot of writing, the both of us. It never amounted to much and we're thankful. Then the two of us together became Catholic converts. I
Baum
Was this the socialist group?
Martinez
Yes. I was already familiar with them and that was a sort of a vague background that existed there. So, as I said, I had to learn to love God, country, and humanity.
Baum
What sorts of things did you study in those years before you became a Catholic convert?
Martinez
I studied anthropology, archeology, paleontology.
Baum
How did you study these?
Martinez
Just general courses; I knew what the general courses were and the people we knew had taken courses, and I'd just take down the whole course, what the books were, and I'd start, and then spread out into anything friends would suggest that came up outside of the orthodox outline. I studied music quite extensively for years, and piano and
Then I wrote quite a bit for a while, and I wanted to write an art book. From the years of study of cultures I decided that the Pacific Basin had certain relations — and do you know, that was carried out in the 1937 fair, the whole idea that I had originally, and in which Harper's was interested. That's why we went to Europe in 1922, so I could go to the great galleries where the great Oriental arts were, to get the background for this entire Pacific Basin that had relations and correlations in art. Harper's was interested in the idea, but by the time I came back Oswald Spengler's great Decline of the West was out, and that magnificent study of cultures had completely fulfilled anything I even dreamed of.
So then I branched off into studying Spengler — several years of thorough study of Spengler. I found he'd brought back into the language again that there's such a thing as a soul in our materialistic century of natural philosophy and science. So we decided to explore metaphysics and spirituality and, of course, that landed us right in the Catholic Church, because that's the source of our culture; Christianity is the source of the great Western culture.
Baum
You started studying Spengler in 1926?
Martinez
Of course I'd heard quite a bit about Spengler. One of Marty's friends was the Minister of Education in Spain, Dr. Bonilla. He was
Prohibition to Bonilla was something astonishing. Marty was the only one Schevill knew with a "wine rorte", as they called it. So they came up every Sunday. He was the one who told us first about Spengler. He was the Minister of Education, a great Arabic scholar and an international lawyer, and a delightful personality.
Baum
You studied Spengler from 1926, for about seventeen years, did you say?
Martinez
Really until 1937. Eleven years of studying the great cultures under Spengler's guidance and writing.
Baum
Where were you living then?
Martinez
Piedmont.
Baum
This was when Harriet Dean built her house?
Martinez
Yes. She built her house just after the war began in 1916.
We were looking after Marty and raising the child. Harriet used to bring over his dinner that I had prepared for him. Well, in those days she was very much slimmer then, she was an athletic type, strong, broad shouldered. She wore tailored clothes then. After she knew Marty I had to make her a Navajo jacket, a beautiful bright red one, and she wore a Chinese handkerchief around her head. She had
Well, a new neighbor came up, a Mrs. Roberts, who was very much interested in Indians, a Mills College girl, whose husband had a cannery up in the Klamath country. She, her son, and her husband spent their summers on the Klamath during the salmon fishing season. The Indians there supplied his cannery with its salmon. Mrs. Roberts had made the Klamath Indians her study for a thesis for Mills. She lived with the Indians during the summer and had many delightful tales to tell of her experiences with Indian life and customs. Her son loved the Indians and we often said, when we knew him, that he had almost become one. When World War I broke out the government made her a guardian of these Klamaths who were permitted to work in Oakland factories during the war.
The Indians had to report to her regularly, so she made an Indian Day. She had bought my father's house and moved in. (Mrs. Ruth Roberts) We used to go down once a month when she had her Indian gatherings. The Indian boys would bring their friends and sometimes there would be as many as seven or eight representatives of tribes there. Well, when Mrs. Roberts came up on the hill, she was dying to meet Marty — this picturesque Indian painter. Shortly after settling into my father's house, she saw Pal running with Marty's dinner from our house to his. She rushed to tell her neighbor, "I saw Mrs. Martinez, that stunning big Indian woman." [Laughter] So Marty used to call Pal his Indian wife.
Baum
Pal is Harriet Dean, is that right?
Martinez
Yes. Kai was the one who named her Pal. Micaela was a very shy child,
Another amusing story: When the famous Dr. Walter Heil came in 1923 to take over the Legion of Honor Museum in San Francisco, he wanted to meet all the local artists and he wanted, especially, to meet Marty. Well, our friend Virginia Hale, whose brother, the artist Gardner Hale, had died, was giving a retrospective exhibition in the Legion of Honor. Virginia saw quite a bit of Dr. Heil while arranging the exhibition. He said, "By the way, I haven't been able to get hold of Martinez. Would you bring him over?" We finally got Marty to go to see him. That day, Marty was in a sort of a surly mood, but anyhow we put him in the car and we hauled him over to the Legion of Honor to see Dr. Heil. Well, when Dr. Heil came in, Virginia Hale and Harriet Dean were with us and my daughter, I did the honors of introduction.
Marty was completely silent. Just like an Indian. So, Dr. Heil didn't quite know how to break the ice. I had started to talk about the famous collection of moderns given to the museum, but still in Paris, that I had read about. Heil hoped to open this first exhibition with éclat and was very excited about it. I was hoping it would arrive and he was telling me how disappointed he was about the delay due to the war. He hoped to make his grand entrance into San Francisco
Then Virginia Hale told about our Kai studying to be a religious painter. His face lit up again and he said, "Oh, in the Spring we're going to have an exhibition of the modern European religious art here." So that opened up the channel for Harriet Dean. We were ardent Spenglerians at that time, so she gave him a very definite talk on civilization and how modern religious art was not cultural. Well, he was so floored he just dropped the subject fast and tried to find some other channel of communication. I was tremendously amused. He got us mixed up; he thought that I was Miss Dean of the Little Review. We decided that since Marty was so uncommunicative, we ought to leave. And we rose to leave.
Virginia Hale had to stop over with Dr. Heil and give him the information he needed for Gardner's exhibition. Suddenly, he turned to her and said, "You know, that big Indian wife of Martinez has strong opinions, hasn't she?" You can imagine how delighted we were and what a laugh Marty got out of that statement. However, Virginia straightened out the tangle and he was astonished to find that the amiable, talkative blonde was Marty's wife and the "Indian wife" was Harriet Dean of the Little Review.
Daughter: Micaela Martinez DuCasse, Religious Artist and Teacher
BaumYou mentioned that your daughter was interested in being a religious painter.
Martinez
Yes, from the time she was in the convent school, as a child of seven, she planned to be a religious painter. Micaela drew from her second year constantly. Her father left her to her own inspirations, so her talent could develop naturally. We have many albums Marty made of the early period of her work, up to ten years of age. I used to teach her her catechism in the studio on Sunday evenings with the Victrola going and often with friends chatting or arguing about art. Culturally, she actually lived in a dream of piety and paint.
When we went to Europe with Harriet Dean in 1922, we met the sculptress Chana Orloff who was a friend of Les Fauves. When she was with us one evening in Paris, Kai did a drawing of fruit through a glass bowl, which attracted Orloff's attention. She was tremendously impressed and said, "You know, I want to show this to Matisse". I did not want to give it up because really it was a masterpiece. I let her take it and also the little water color she liked and a drawing of a rainy day of Paris streets. I thought it wiser to have Matisse's opinion of them. A week later Chana Orloff reported to us what Matisse had said. He looked them over, remarking, "No child could do this!" And to Orloff's answer, "She is a child, ten years old, has a Mexican father who is a well known painter in Mexico." Then he finished, "Then that's possible! But her work is amazing!"
I put her in the art school at fourteen, because most artists don't get started early enough. She made a brilliant record between fourteen and eighteen and she had a thorough training and background under her father and the other very good teachers they had at the California School of Arts and Crafts in Oakland. She also took a year of sculpture under Ralph Stackpole in the California School of Fine Arts in San Francisco. Ralph Stackpole was absolutely certain that he had a great Aztec sculptress on his hands. She just took to sculpture like a duck to water and did some quite remarkable things immediately under him. He tried to make a sculptress out of her. Kai was one of those casual Mexicans. She had a little of the indolent Indian in her, too. So she went back to painting.
After she got out of art school she painted the murals for the library for the Franciscans in San Francisco. She was commissioned to work on the seminarians' library at the San Luis Rey Mission. All the walls are covered with murals done in a fresco style. They were completed, prepared and then sent down to San Luis Rey. And then she's made Stations of the Cross for the San Antonio Mission in oils. And she did a very fine sculptural set of the Stations of the Cross for the cloister of the Franciscan Sisters. The outstanding paper of Catholic art in New York, the Liturgical Arts Society, have reproduced her murals for the Franciscan Library in San Francisco and the painting in the Navy Chapel. It was then, of course, that the seal was set on liturgical artists — when they appeared in this now famous New York Liturgical Art Society. So she was well known by the time
When Orozco came up to visit Marty — both Rivera and Orozco were friends of Marty's — Kai was just finishing her work in art school. They said it was the most incredible thing that she was an absolutely pure type of Mexican colonial painter. She had never been to Mexico, never seen the Mexican colonial art, as there were no books on it then. Of course, later on, she had a more rigorous technique, I think a bit of her Dutch ancestry, on my side, came out. Her first work in art school was typically colonial, but her later work showed Spanish influences and Dutch.
Baum
Your husband's work doesn't look like primitive Mexican work.
Martinez
Not at all. He was an Impressionist, though his Impressionism was tinged with Spanish influences. The primitivism came with Rivera and the glorification of the Indian influence began. Up to that time the painting was colonial, and Rivera himself did some superb religious paintings which belonged to the uncle of a friend of ours in Mexico. Rivera tried desperately to buy those back, but Eduardo's uncle would never give them up. What's become of them I don't know.
Baum
Your husband wasn't a bit religious, is that right?
Martinez
No. He'd broken away completely from it from the time he left Mexico at seventeen.
Baum
Why did he send your daughter to a Catholic convent?
Martinez
Well, he didn't. I was the one who believed in the European traditions, because I was brought up on European traditions — English, under my
Kai came back a few days later and said, "Mother, the little girls tell me I'm a scandal. I haven't been baptized." "Well," I said, "I don't know much about that business but I'll take care of it for you. If you've got to be baptized to be happy I'll attend to it at once." So I called up a Catholic friend and said, "My child's a scandal, she hasn't been baptized and she's not happy at school. She's got to be baptized." She said, "I'll come up tomorrow." On her way over she came to St. Leo's and made all the arrangements for the baptism — plucked up the child, flew down the hill to the streetcar, to St. Leo's — so she was baptized.
Then she lived in this dream of piety and paint until she was thirty. The war, I guess, jolted her out of it and she married Ralph DuCasse. But she's been a religious painter and a devout Catholic all of her life. She's lots of fun, too. She's teaching now. And the
She had two daughters to raise, too, which kind of pinches time for your painting, quite a bit. Every once in a while she gets a commission and gets to work again, but the greater part is spent teaching. Though her hours are rather easy and pleasant, still it's exhausting. When you teach you can't have time for painting — the day is spent. When she retires she may get back to it, which she probably will, early in the sixties, now that they can retire with social security. I think Kai probably will. She hasn't yet reached her fiftieth birthday; she won't be fifty until next year.
One of her daughters has a great deal of talent, Jeanne, the oldest, but the younger one, like myself, none in art.
Conversion to Catholicism
BaumYou moved down to Carmel permanently. When was that?
Martinez
We went to Carmel in 1939. Up until then we lived right here on this hill in Piedmont, except the year we spent in Europe in 1922.
Between 1914 and 1929, we'd never been back to Carmel because of Marty's teaching and Kai's schooling. So when, in 1929, we went to pick Kai up at this friend's house where she was to spend her vacation
We were baptized in Carmel Mission in 1939. Then, after we'd moved to Carmel, Harriet and I became interested in helping the restoration. Our work was to do all the publicity and we were secretaries to Father O'Connell who was running the restoration campaign. During the war, money was very hard to get, so we were eager beavers in running campaigns for funds for the missions. We did a great deal of writing for them and did all the publicity. I had a course in publicity from this very expert woman who was publicity agent in the Pacific Improvement Company.
We spent ten years in Catholic activities connected with the Mission after becoming Catholics. Believe me, becoming a Catholic is a complete reorientation of one's mind. We were formerly relativists and quite cynical. I was brought up on European satirists. In Catholicism we had to learn to love God, love country, and love
And then the great Catholic writers were coming into focus, even in this country; the whole thing was sort of coming up with a new life, a new impetus. We were completely absorbed in that for some years.
Then along came Kai's babies. We lived on the beach until we fried or were frozen, because the children loved to be on the beach. We'd even take them down to Carmel with us for indefinite periods at a time so Kai could paint. When the studio was remodeled, we took the two little ones and put them in school at the Mission.
And when Kai went to Europe and the children were in school, that was a full life, believe me.
Baum
And Harriet Dean worked right in as a second grandmother?
Martinez
Yes. She was co-grandmother and loved it.
In 1950 Pal had a breakdown. She had been a diabetic all her life and didn't know it. In those days we didn't know as much about disease as we do now, and the results of neglect were quite appalling. By the time it took to get diabetes under control and to get all the ill effects out, she'd lost that magnificent enthusiasm she had and that vibrant thing that was in her was sort of muted. People who knew her in the early days were shocked when they saw her without that vividness and warmth that were so much a part of her personality. She was one of those exceptional ones like Jack London.
And then I got to the age — as I said, by the time you reach your sixties, you lose your follies and your ambitions together. [Laughter] So I thought I'd settle down, take care of Harriet who was an invalid, and enjoy life and go on with the studies in which I am interested and take care of grandchildren. Now we have teenagers and I have three months of them in the summer, believe me.
Son-in-Law: Ralph DuCasse, Artist and Teacher
BaumYour son-in-law, Ralph DuCasse, is also an artist, and one with a growing reputation. How did he and your daughter meet?
Martinez
To begin with, Ralph's father wanted to make a doctor of him and he persecuted the life out of him. The boy had every artistic instinct; he was quite a pianist, he had composed quite a bit, he had gone to summer classes in art and the teacher had told the father he was a real artist. He paid the bill, "You can't come here again." So he was thankful when the war went on and released him from his father.
Kai met him out at Fort Ord. At that time they used to send to us the artists and musicians who came to the U.S.O. We were the artistic branch. We got to know Ralph and this brilliant friend of his, who died in Normandy. That's where the romance started. He was in Intelligence, Japanese; they tested him at Stanford and sent him along, and they were engaged and married, and then he went the rounds. He was sent for four months to Denver and then four months in St. Petersburg.
Then he was sent to Warrenton, Virginia to study straight Intelligence there. He had the Japanese language, in the meantime, you know, with that new method which had been originally organized by the Jesuits because they have their missionaries all over the world. So, by the end of the year he was sent to the Philippines and he arrived in the Philippines just after MacArthur took it. Then he went, from there he jumped to Okinawa and then to Tokyo, and he was there after the war. When he came back he said, "Now I'm released and I'm going to be an artist."
Well, he went to the University of California and made a brilliant record there, took a master's degree in art there. Then he started exhibiting. And he's a hard worker. I never saw anyone work so hard as Ralph, but of course he worked so hard that family life couldn't be worked into it. I don't believe artists should marry anyhow. It wasn't possible. I stood up for Ralph with his family and with his friends, because I understood. Marty was the same. I settled into Marty's life when I was young, and when I got older, I couldn't take it. But with Ralph, he was so sensitive, everything upset him. Babies crying upset him. If they were hurt it upset him. If they were unhappy it upset him. So he just couldn't do anything.
And he was making quite a name for himself. Just at that time, Sweeney was sent out from the Guggenheim to pick the fifty young painters in America of the future. And he was one of them picked. And Sweeney came to see him. Of course it was splashed all over our papers and it came out in Time. So his father lived, fortunately, long enough to have that distinction, and he was so pleased. As far as his father was concerned you're in if you get into Time.
And then I said, "Ralph, what do you want?" He said, "Oh, Pelly, I want just one picture — if I can get a picture into the international show." That's the big event, of course, of the world. He not only got his canvas in, he got the fourth prize. Very few Americans have ever gotten any prizes at the international show. And he was young, he was just thirty-nine. And the other three were two old
Baum
He got peace because they separated, is that right?
Martinez
Yes. That released him like a balloon. And he's devoted to Kai, they're devoted to each other, and he loves the children. He plans, spends all the holidays with them, comes up regularly, and plans future things he wants to do for them. He has scholarships at Mills for them if they want to take it. They have to have a B average all through to be able to get the scholarships.
But he's really very remarkable — his sudden rise to fame. John Cunningham of the art institute in Carmel said to me, "You know, Pelly, I'm awfully glad that I knew Ralph. Every once in a while there'll be one of these spectacular rises, and I'd like to see and know the person who did that, and that's Ralph." In less than — I guess about eight years — he went right up to the very top. Then, of course, Mills College wanted him on their faculty, so he's been
Kai, of course, understands it too, but he said he could not have achieved it by trying to adapt himself to a form of life. After all, if you have a home and you have friends and you have this and you have that, you get entangled, you know. I understood him perfectly. His family was shocked and horrified. I sent and told them to come to California. I wanted to sit down and talk to them, and I gave them a good talking-to. Ralph says he doesn't know how he would have survived that period if it hadn't been for my backing. Kai understood, but it was rather a shock and a hardship for her, with two children. She wanted the perfect Catholic marriage, to be the perfect Catholic wife. For artists it isn't possible. I understood that and she understands it, too, and Ralph has made that spectacular success. But he had to have complete — there was nothing to interfere with his work. He's the kind of person who works all hours of the day or night.
Baum
Do you know anything about the Du Casse family background?
Martinez
Oh yes, it's a fascinating family. Ralph's grandfather was a French aristocrat who fled the Revolution and went south. He used to make fine gloves. It was the only thing he could do. He made fine
Walker
Do you think that Ralph DuCasse's accident improved his painting? It changed it very greatly.
Martinez
I haven't seen it just lately. Ralph told me when we talked a while back, he said he'd have to completely reorient himself. He wants to get from complete abstraction into an inbetween, which I think is right.
Walker
It's very interesting, he's developed an entirely new technique of painting since his accident.
Baum
What accident was this?
Walker
He fell through a skylight at the Mills gallery about five years ago and everyone despaired of his life for a long while. He was broken up in so many places.
Martinez
It's absolutely a miracle. Of course, we think we did it because we
Walker
It was horrible! You see, they were preparing for the student show and he and Tony Prieto went up to get something out of the attic and he slipped and went right through one of the panes of glass. It didn't look as if it were big enough for anybody to go through, and he went right through, on his face, with students all around, passing out. It was a traumatic experience.
Martinez
He was so startled he hadn't time to throw his arms out, because he could have stopped himself.
Walker
He has the sweetest temperament, he's cheerful ...
Martinez
And he went through it so superbly. I said, "Ralph, how did you" — he was a social boy — "how did you stand the army for five years?" He said, "Pelly, On my first trip to the Monterey Coast with Marty, I saw my first pelicans. I was excited by these deep sea birds. Then Marty remarked, "Elsie, your long thin nose is like a pelican's beak, so you will be pelican from now on." Harriet Dean shortened it to Pelly after she came to Piedmont. I made up my mind I had to go through this and I never thought about it. I went through it and got five years of art
Walker
Before he came to Mills the thing I heard about him that amused me the most was the story about his putting a canvas outside of his room when he was in San Francisco, and the garbage collectors taking it away. [Laughter]
Martinez
One of those grinder trucks, too. [Laughter] They had a law suit, you know. All these apartments had little doors with their garbage cans back of them, and this man was to pick up this painting for an exhibition. It was six feet tall, at that, and it was set against the wall, so there was no reason to have taken that painting. Well, it was ground up with the rest of the things. So, this lawyer friend says, "Well, you can't let that go, Ralph." Well, Ralph was kind of upset, because it was one of his good ones, so they started this suit. It was just as much of a scream, this suit was.
They had this little suit, and the garbage man said, we - ell, how could he tell anything about art? "It didn't look like anything to me."
Walker
I've got two cans outside my back door, one of which is full of newspapers to be burned, and we always burn every Saturday, and the other is the garbage, and they've taken the papers so often and left the garbage that I have to get up at 5:30 every Friday to protect myself.
Martinez
[Laughter] Ralph said that they couldn't quite understand why, and he said to the judge, "It's only three blocks away, if you'll come
The funniest story is about the time he was coming up from Los Angeles with four of his Ohio River series, exhibited in Santa Barbara. So we stopped on the way down to see the exhibit before Ralph would pick up his pictures. About two weeks later Ralph was bowling up from Santa Barbara, and he had one of those contraptions with suction cups on the top. He'd fastened the canvases securely on the top and was going along annoyed by a strong noisy wind that comes up daily in the Salinas Valley about three o'clock in the spring season. Ralph got so sick of the dull sound he thought, "I'll stop and have a cup of coffee and give my ears a rest." And when he looked out the window over his cup of coffee the top was gone and the canvases had disappeared. He was startled and told the café owner, "I've been sitting here so it didn't happen while I was here." The café owner replied, "I'll call the highway patrol." They talked with Ralph and told him they would look out for the top during their patrol and said, "We'll notify you."
The next morning a farmer reported the contraption and canvases intact on his land. Ralph rushed back and, to his relief, found them undamaged. The incident was reported over the radio. Ralph's mother phoned him that she heard about his mishap over the N.B.C. hook-up in Paducah!
I see our tape is running out. Thank you, Professor Walker, for joining us this afternoon. Mrs. Martinez, I hope this recording can serve as the autobiography of your very interesting life, though you could have added a lot more to it if you had written it.
Martinez
Well, I had planned to be a writer, but I was so interested in life and interested in ideas I never got around to doing too much work. It's hard work to achieve anything. If I had an idea I could chase I was not interested in writing at the moment.
I always said my distinction in life was that I was my father's daughter, I was Marty's wife, I was Micaela Martinez's mother, Harriet Dean's friend, and now I'm a DuCasse's grandmother. [Laughter] That's been the trail that I have traveled along in these up to seventy-two years. Now I'm the McCreary's great-grandmother, the children of Jeanne DuCasse, Bruce McCreary and Kenneth McCreary.
Letter from Mrs. Martinez to Mrs. Baum — 1968
Friday, the 26th, 1968
I am so sorry I did not get to see you when I was up in Piedmont. However Kai had the pleasure of seeing you and your department and was greatly interested in your work—and enjoyed her visit. . .
If my revisions do not fit into the tapes could you include them as in the MSS as afterthoughts where indicated? I did not realize at the time I made th tapes that one has to prepare for them as one does for lectures. . . for I have given several lectures on Liturgical Art. I was greatly disturbed by the shallowness of the tapes and hoped to leaven the superficiality with intelligant inserts. But I realized I was holding up work and sent the MSS in with the hopes that you could include the insert However, I will continue to work on these inserts and when I have enough them will send them in to be added to the MSS later, if possible. I know I could make a book of my reminiscences but do not want to be tied down with a book—it would be a project and I have an aversion to projects it seems. At present I am considerably absorbed in in developing the minds of my little lads and acquiring a Theological background in Catholicism which since the Vatican Councils, is a must for intelligent Catholics.
So will see you on my next trip to Piedmont. . . this last time I was tied down to the schedule of the friend who brought me up with her.
Also, tell your young typist, she will truly be a heroine if she can thread her way thru that maze of corrections and she has my sympathy and any improvements on them she can make I will applaud.
Index
- Abbott, Park (see Joan London), 151
- Alberts, David, 85, 217, 223
- Anderson, Margaret (see Little Review), 101, 231, 232
- Anderson, Sherwood, 231
- Armory Show, New York (see Walter Pach), 117
- Atherton, Gertrude, 184-185
- Atl, Dr. _____, 61, 68
- At the Actors' Boarding House (play), see Helen Green, 202
- Austin, Mary, 133, 219;
- and Lincoln Steffens; The Land of Little Rain, 220-221
- Baker, Jean, 94-95
- Baker, Ray Stannard, 224
- Bakewell, Vail, 74
- Bancroft Library: recipient of Rounthwaite Collection, 223;
- Bashford, Herbert and Kinnie, 189
- Bassett, Reggie, 45-47
- Bechdolt, Fred, 206, 215-216
- Bella Union, San Francisco, 92, 206
- Belloc, Hilaire (as correspondent for Land and Water), 44
- Bender, Albert, 191-192
- Bierce, Ambrose, 77, 134, 139, 140, 161, 175-178;
- death of, 177-178
- Bierce, Carleton (nephew of Ambrose Bierce), 134, 136, 161, 166, 172, 175, 176
- Bierce, Laura, 134, 161, 165, 166, 167-168, 172, 175, 176
- Blackhawk Ranch, 27-28
- Bohemian Club, 71, 93, 97, 99, 113, 118, 192
- Bohemian Grove, 134
- Bonilla y San Martín, Adolfo, 236-237
- Boranda, 106, 198, 199
- Bourn, Mary ( The Geese Fly South), 48, 49, 51, 54-55
- Boyle, Gertrude, 181
- Bremer, Anne, 192
- Brooks, Ida, 213
- Bruton Sisters, 199
- Bufano, Benjamin, 190-191
- Burgess, Gelett, 83, 116, 227
- California School of Arts and Crafts, 111, 113, 198, 242
- Call of the Wild, The 133
- Cameron, (factor on fur post), 9
- Campbell, Mrs. Patrick, 2
- Carmel: beginnings as art colony, 111-113;
- Carrière, Eugène, 65
- Catholic Commonweal (see Michael Williams), 211
- Champro's Coffee House, San Francisco, 71, 71
- China Cove, Valley of the Moon, 176
- Clapp, Frederick Mortimer (curator of Frick Collection), 117-118, 225
- Clemens, Cyril (writer for Commonweal), 167-168
- Cody, William (Buffalo Bill), 182
- Coffee Dan's, Oakland, 124, 125
- Coney, Alexander, 59, 63-64, 67
- Coney, Rosalia, see La Bastida, Rosalia
- Connally, Vera, 162-163, 174; see George Sterling, 197
- Cooke, Helen, 205, 210
- Coolbrith, Ina, 53, 122, 182-183, 184-185
- Coppa's Restaurant, San Francisco, 70, 74, 80, 101
- Couvoiser, Gladys, 215 (see Harry Lafler)
- Cowell, Henry, Jr., 129-131, 190
- Cowell, Henry, Sr., 128-129
- Cowell, Olive, 128-131
- Cree Indians, 9-10,
- Riel Rebellion, 10
- Criley, _____ (duel with Harry Leon Wilson), 205-206
- Crosby, Dr. Daniel, 119
- Davies, Arthur B., 88
- Dean, Harriet, 97-98, 100:
- Del Monte Art Gallery, Monterey, 106, 108, 198
- Del Monte Hotel, 198
- Diaz, General Porfirio, 33, 35, 38, 63-64 (see Alexander Coney)
- Dickman, Charles, 106, 198, 199
- Dixon, Maynard, 99
- Dreyfus Trial, 66, 68
- Du Casse, Jeanne (grandchild of Elsie Martinez), 218, 257
- Du Casse, Monique (grandchild of Elsie Martinez), 217-218
- Du Casse, Micaela, see Martinez, Micaela (Kai)
- Du Casse, Ralph, Jr., 88, 106, 196;
- Du Casse, Ralph, Sr., 88-89, 249
- Dunn, Judge Jesse James, 78
- Easley, Constance, 108-109 (see Charles Rollo Peters)
- Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, 65, 67
- Ede, Mr. and Mrs., 225
- Ernest, Pop, 110
- Fenelon, Eugene, 223
- Fields, Charles, 73
- Fisher, Dr. W.K., 115
- Forest Theatre, Carmel, 210
- French, Nora May: suicide of: 170-171
- Frick Collection (see Fred Clapp), 117-118, 225
- Frolich, Finn, 137
- Garnett, Edna, 117, 118, 226
- Garnett, Porter, 72-73, 99-100, 117, 118, 120, 225, 226-227
- Genthe, Arnold, 81-82, 106, 120, 198, 205, 224-225
- German Hospital, San Francisco, 93
- Gibson, _____ (planter from Mexico), 36-37
- Goldman, Emma: and the Little Review, 231, 232-233, 234
- Great Northern Railroad, 12
- Green, Helen, 202-205, 208
- Greenwell, _____, 21
- Grundy, Sidney, 2
- Guadalajara Art School, 61
- Hale, Gardner, 239-240
- Hale, Margaret, 104
- Hale, Virginia, 239-240
- Hammond, John Hayes, 29
- Hansen, Armin, 198, 199
- Harper's Magazine, 9, 19, 56, 57
- Harte, Bret, 2, 11, 182
- Hauch, Halvor, 17, 19
- Havens, Frank C., 30, 31, 32, 155-158, 214, 222
- Havens, Lila, 32, 111, 158-159, 162-164, 166, 173
- Havens, Wickham, 32, 79, 87
- Hayes Canyon, Oakland, 28, 29
- Hayes, Captain Jack, 29
- Hearst, Phoebe, 192-194
- Hearst, William Randolph, 192-194
- Hecht, Ben, 231
- Heil, Dr. Walter, 239-240
- Heinold, Johnny (owner of First and Last Chance Saloon), 24
- Henshaw, _____ (Piedmont banker), 133
- Henry Art Collection, Portland, Oregon, 120
- Heron, Herbert, 202, 211
- Hittell, Kitty, 24-25
- Hittell, Theodore H., 24-25
- Holme, Garnet, 224
- Hopper, Jimmy, 160, 172, 194-195, 202
- Houghton, Lord, 182-183
- Hubble, _____, 94-96
- Hudson Bay Fur Post, 7-8, 11
- Hunt, Alyse (stepmother of Elsie Martinez), 32, 45-49, 51, 52-53, 54, 55
- Huysmans, Joris Karl, 66
- Impressionism, 64-65, 115-116
- Irwin, Bill, 214, 221-222
- Irwin, Hallie, 214, 222
- Irwin, Inez Haynes, 222
- Jeffers, Robinson, 216-218
- Jeffers, Una, 110, 216-218
- Johnson, Martin:
- as cabin boy and cook on the "Snark", 144-145
- Jones, Professor _____, 121, 156
- Jordan, David Starr, 112, 113-115, 124-125
- Juilliard School of Music, 130
- Kahlo, Frieda (Mrs. Diego Rivera), 119
- Keeler, Charles, 49, 223
- Keith, William, 223-224
- Kelly, Spider, 91, 207
- Kennedy, President John F., 130
- Key Route, 81, 157
- King Victor Emmanuel, Italy (see Joaquin Miller), 184
- Kirkham, Mrs. _____ (built Silk Culture House), 26
- Knowles, Billy, 89, 96
- Kuster, Edward (husband of Una Jeffers), 216
- La Bastida, Rosalia:
- Labaudt, Lucien, 118
- Lafler, Harry, 160, 171, 214-215
- Land and Water, 43-44
- Lewis, Austin, 17, 124-125
- Lewis, Sinclair, 205
- L'Hote, André, 251
- Limas, Pedro, 105
-
Little Review (see Harriet Dean; see Margaret Anderson): 101-102, 230-231, 232, 240;
- from liberalism to radicalism, 233
- Log of the Snark, The, Charmian London, 143
- London, Bess (daughter of Jack London), 139, 151
- London, Bessie (first Mrs. Jack London), 127, 131-132, 137-139, 141-142, 150
- London, Charmian (second Mrs. Jack London), 131, 138, 140, 141-144, 147, 148, 149, 152-154,
- wrote The Book of Jack London, 143
- London, Jack: 5, 53, 120, 122-154, 159, 161, 196;
- Socialist Period and the Strunskys, 122-133;
- as revolutionary, 17-18;
- and the writing group, 133-137;
- and wives, Bessie and Charmian, 137-142;
- and the "Snark", 142-145;
- disillusionment with Socialist Party, 146, 149, 153;
- general depression, 150-151;
- death, 146-154;
- letters to Charles Warren Stoddard, 201
- London, Joan (daughter of Jack London), 124, 128, 134, 139, 150-151
- London, Mrs. Flora (mother of Jack London), 148-149
- London, John (stepfather of Jack London), 149
- Luhan, Mable Dodge, 218
- Luhan, Tony, 103
- MacBeth, art dealer, New York, 70, 119
- McComas, Francis, 93, 94-96, 106, 108, 198, 199
- McGeehan, Sophie Treadwell, 210
- McGeehan, William, editor of San Francisco Bulletin, 210
- Macky, Spencer, 119
- Mark Hopkins Art School, San Francisco, 59
- Martinez, Elsie Whitaker:
- family (see Whitaker family);
- education, 19-25;
- study with Harriet Dean, 229-240;
- conversion to Catholicism, 234-235, 245-248;
- years of study, 235-237;
- daughter: Micaela Martinez Du Casse, religious artist and teacher, 241-245;
- son-in-law: Ralph Du Casse, artist and teacher, 249-257;
- summation of life, 257
- Martinez, Micaela (Mrs. Ralph Du Casse): 61, 88-89, 90;
- birth; 1913: 93-97; 100, 103, 112-113, 120, 132, 238-239, 240;
- religious artist and teacher, 241-245;
- murals for Franciscan Library, 242;
- murals for San Luis Rey Mission, 242;
- Navy Chapel, Treasure Island, 242-243;
- education: at convent, 243-244;
- teacher at San Francisco College for Women, 245;
- children, 247-248;
- marriage to Ralph Du Casse, 249, 252
- Martinez, Xavier: 48, 51, 52;
- early life in Mexico, 58-64;
- masonry in Mexico, 58-59;
- Guadalajara Art School, 61;
- art study in Paris, 64-68;
- art study in San Francisco, 68-70;
- San Francisco earthquake, 70-75;
- marriage to Elsie Whitaker, 76-86;
- life with, 93-104, 213;
- teaching, California School of Arts and Crafts, 104-106;
- Del Monte Gallery, 103-111;
- as painter: painting and painters, 113-121;
- Impressionist Period, 115-116;
- Spanish Period, 116;
- Modernism, 117-118;
- honors and awards, 120-121;
- New York World's Fair (1940) plaque, 120-121;
- California State Legislature Special Recognition, 121;
- engagement to Rose Strunsky, 132-133; 134, 139;
- friendship with Jack London, 140;
- and Frederick Meyer, 196;
- and Carmel artists, 198, 199, 201, 206-207, 209, 212;
- and Gelett Burgess, 227; 238-240, 241, 243
- Masses (see Simeon Strunsky), 126
- Mathews, Arthur, 59, 62
- Matisse, Henri (see Micaela Martinez), 241
- Mencken, H.L., 169
- Mexican Herald, 35
- Mexico: Harper's sent Herman Whitaker to Mexico, 33-35;
- Meyer, Frederick, 87, 105 (see California School of Arts and Crafts), 196
- Miller, Joaquin, 53, 136, 140, 161, 178-184, 196, 201
- Mills College, 251
- Monterey, 106, 107, 110, 111, 198-228
- Montgomery Block, 74, 99
- Museum of the Legion of Honor, 239
- Newberry, Bertha, 203, 204, 207, 208, 209-210, 212, 213
- Newberry, Perry, 91, 112, 203, 204, 207-211, 212, 213;
- as political boss of North Beach, 214
- New York Times, 145, 206
- Noel, Joseph, Footloose in Arcadia, 171
- Norris, Frank, 226 (see Bruce Porter)
- Oakland, California: 11, 12-19;
- Oakland Art Museum, 115, 116, 120, 121
- Oakland High School, 21
- Oakland Library, 21, 24
- Oakland Tribune, 38, 41 (see Herman Whitaker)
- Obregon, General Alvaro, 39
- O'Connell, Father: and restoration of Carmel Mission, 246
- Orloff, Chana, 241
- Orozco, Clemente, 61, 68, 119, 243
- O'Sullivan, Scoobie, 217
- Pach, Magda, 117
- Pach, Walter, 65, 117
- Parrott, Marie Louise, 95
- Partington, Blanche, 186, 198
- Partington, Gertrude (Albright), 186-187
- Partington, H.G., 186
- Partington, Jack, 140
- Partington, Phyllis: and Jack London, 140-141; 186
- Partington, Richard, 185-186
- Partington Ridge, 185
- Partridge, Roi, 188-189
- Pattigan, Haig, 188
- Pearson, Ralph, 103-104
- Peck, Orrin, 192-193 (see Phoebe Hearst)
- Pershing, General John, 40-41, 49
- Peters, Charles Rollo, 95, 106-110, 111, 194, 198, 199-201
- Peters, Charles Rollo, Jr., 110
- Piazzoni, Gottardo, 98
- Piedmont, California: 15, 25-41;
- Piedmont Grammar School, 21
- Piedmont:
- writers and artists, 155-197;
- George and Carrie Sterling and the Havens family, 155-174;
- Ambrose Bierce and Carleton and Laura Bierce, 175-178;
- Joaquin Miller, 178-184;
- Ina Coolbrith, 184-185;
- Partington family, 185-187;
- other Bay Area figures: 187-197;
- Putnam, Arthur, 187-188;
- Pattigan, Haig, 188;
- Partridge, Roi, 188-189;
- Bashford, Herbert and Kinnie, 189;
- Stackpole, Ralph, 189-190;
- Bufano, Benjamin, 190-191;
- Bender, Albert, 191-192;
- Peck, Orrin, 192-193;
- Hopper, Jimmy, 194-195;
- Meyer, Frederick, 195-196
- Pierce, Lucy, 101, 199
- Pine Cone of Carmel (editor, Perry Newberry), 210
- Pinero, Arthur Wing, 2
- Polk, Willis, 74
- Porter, Bruce, 226 (see Frank Norris)
- Porter, Dr. William, 119-120, 142, 148, 151, 152
- Pound, Ezra: as foreign editor of Little Review, 232
- Power, Tyrone, Sr., 37-38
- Prieto, Tony, 254
- Putnam, Arthur, 187-188, 190
- Queen Victoria, 182, 183 (see Joaquin Miller)
- Rand, Carrie and Lila, 158 (see Carrie Sterling and Lila Havens)
- Rivera, Diego, 68, 119, 243
- Roberts, Ruth, 189, 238
- Rockefeller, Governor Nelson, 130
- Roosevelt, Theodore, 45, 160
- Ruskin Club, 122
- San Francisco Bulletin, editor William McGeehan, 210
- San Francisco College for Women, 245
- San Francisco Earthquake, 1906, 70-75
- San Francisco Fair, 1915, 65, 221 (see Mary Austin)
- San Francisco:
- Schevill, Rudolph, 237
- Searles, _____, 113-114, 115
- Serra School, Carmel, 217
- Sheperd, _____, 106
- Sims, Admiral, 41, 44
- Smith, "Booster", 87-88
- Smith, Borax, 157
- Socialist Hall, Oakland, 19
- Socialist Party, 17-19, 122-125, 146, 147, 149-150, 153
- Spreckels, Mrs. Alma, 187-188 (see Arthur Putnam)
- Stackpole, Ralph, 189-190, 242
- St. Luke's Hospital, New York, 44-45
- Steffens, Lincoln, 219-220
- Steinlen, Théophile, 68
- St. Denis, Ruth, 155
- Sterling, Carrie: 111, 140, 142;
- Sterling Family: 157-158 (Lillian, Madeline, Marian, Avis, Alice)
- Sterling, George: 31, 112, 133, 134-136, 139, 140, 148, 155-156, 157, 158, 159-160;
- Stevenson, Robert Louis, 15, 182
- Stoddard, Charles Warren, 140, 182, 199-202
- Stone, Irving ( Sailor on Horseback), 141-142
- Strawn-Hamilton, Frank, 122, 125
- Strickland, Professor Edward, 85
- Strunsky, Anna, 126, 128, 131-133 (see William E. Walling)
- Strunsky, Rose, 132-133
- Strunsky, Simeon, 126
- Suicide as noble end (cult of): 169-170, 171-172; see: George Sterling, Jack London, Ambrose Bierce, Carrie Sterling
- Sun Yat-sen, 191
- Sutro, Charles, 93, 94, 119
- Sutro, Marie, 93
- Sweeney, James J., 250
- Tabb, Father (Paulist Seminary), 166-167
- Taos, New Mexico, 103-104, 218
- Techau Tavern, 90, 91-92
- Thalia, 91, 92, 206 (see Spider Kelly)
- Time Magazine, 250 (see Ralph Du Casse, Jr.)
- "The Toad" (play); feud over, 210, 211, 224 (see Bertha Newberry, Perry Newberry, Michael Williams, Herbert Heron)
- Tolmis, Robert, 85, 136
- Torrey and Atkins, art dealers, San Francisco, 70
- Turner, John Kenneth, 202
- University of California, 134, 250
- Valley of the Moon, 176 (see Jack London)
- Van Campen, _____, 203 (see Helen Green)
- Van Niel, Dr. Cornelis, 115
- Verlaine, Paul, 66-67
- Villa, Pancho, 38-41
- Walker, Professor Franklin D., 24, 113, 137
- Walling, William English, 131 (see Anna Strunsky)
- Weal, Putnam, 95
- Westerfield, Dr. Otto, 120
- Westerman, Dr. _____, 45, 49
- Whistler, James Abbott McNeill, 66 (see Xavier Martinez)
- Whiteman, Paul, 92
- Williams, Mr. and Mrs. Jesse Lynch, 224
- Williams, Michael, 210, 211-212 (see Catholic Commonweal)
- Wilson, Harry Leon, 202, 204-208
- Winter, Ella :
- marriage to Lincoln Steffens, 219-220
- "Wolf House", 146-147, 153 (see Jack London)
- Whitaker Family:
- Whitaker, Agnes, 4;
- Whitaker, Captain _____, 6-7;
- Whitaker, Clara, 3;
- Whitaker, Herman (father) see separate listing;
- Whitaker, Herman Jr., 22, 50;
- Whitaker, Jane, 1;
- Whitaker, John, 1;
- Whitaker, John (brother), 22;
- Whitaker, Laurie (brother), 22, 49;
- Whitaker, Margaret Ann Vandecar (mother) see separate listing;
- Whitaker, Percy (uncle), 2, 3, 4, 6, 9;
- Whitaker, Percy (brother), 49, 205-206;
- Whitaker, Relf (brother), 22;
- Whitaker, Vera (sister), 22, 49
- Whitaker, Herman (father of Elsie Martinez):
- education of, 4;
- life in Huddersfield, England, 1-5;
- life in Canada, 5-12, 57;
- move to California, 12-19; 70-71, 74, 77, 79, 83;
- Fabian Socialist, 18-19;
- teacher to Elsie, 20-22, 23;
- Mexican War correspondent, 38-41;
- war correspondent, France, 1917, 41-43;
- death of, 43-55;
- marriage to Alyse Hunt, 45-49;
- writing habits, 55-57;
- Socialist Party member, 122, 123-124;
- falling out with Jack London, 126-128;
- disillusion with socialism, 133;
- reconciliation with Jack London, 133-134, 136, 137;
- friendship with Jack London and George Sterling, 159-160;
- friendship with Joaquin Miller, 178, 181;
- friendship with Ina Coolbrith, 184-185;
- writings of: "The Planter", 37;
- "Over the Border", 38;
- "Hunting the German Shark", 41;
- Black Cat Magazine, 53
- Whitaker, Margaret Ann Vandecar (mother of Elsie Martinez), 5, 7-8, 11-12, 13, 18-19, 32;
- Zola, Emile, 66, 206, 208
Willa Klug Baum
Grew up in Middle West and Southern California.
B.A., Whittier College, in American history and philosophy; teaching assistant in American history and constitution.
Newspaper reporter.
M.A., Mills College, in American history and political science; teaching fellow in humanities.
Graduate work, University of California at Berkeley, 1949-1954, in American and California history; teaching assistant in American history and recent United States history.
Adult school teacher, Oakland, in English and Americanization, 1948-1967; author of teaching materials for English.
Summer session instructor in English for foreign students, Speech Department, University of California at Berkeley.
Interviewer and then head of Regional Oral History Office, 1954 to present, specializing in water and agricultural history.
Council member of national Oral History Association, 1967-1969.
Courtesy of The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-6000; http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/
http://content.cdlib.org/view?docId=hb6j49p1b8&brand=calisphere
Title: San Francisco Bay Area writers and artists : oral history transcript / Elsie Martinez
By: Martinez, Elsie, 1890-1984, Interviewee, Baum, Willa K, Interviewer, Walker, Franklin Dickerson,, Interviewer
Date: 1962-1969
Contributing Institution: The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-6000; http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/
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