"GREAT IS LA JOLLA; GREAT LITTLE PLACE!"
Follette, Belle Case La
"Great Is La Jolla; Great Little Place!" Expanse Overwhelming of Ocean and Sky, and the Air, With Its Soft Caress, Soothes and Cherishes One Back to Health By BELLE CASE La FOLLET1E TWENTY years...
...Robert, Jr., is the one we brought to La Jolla to get well...
...The parting of the ways will come...
...The thermometer before sunrise may register 40 degrees and r.n hour after the sun is up it will very likely register 80 degrees...
...THE PARTING OF THE WAYS By Grace Isabel Colbron (In The Public) What have we fought for...
...The nights are cold...
...Expanse Overwhelming of Ocean and Sky, and the Air, With Its Soft Caress, Soothes and Cherishes One Back to Health By BELLE CASE La FOLLET1E TWENTY years ago we first visited La Jolla.* At that time we made the trip for Mr...
...Oranges in season, however, of only fair quality and size sell for forty cents a dozen...
...Those Mexicans would rather croak than pawn their beautiful attire for something to eat...
...Mary, our youngest daughter, was not Lorn when we first came to California...
...I am leaving for Washington, leaving La Jolla, a great little place...
...But why this is thus and these things those, Nobody cares and nobody knows, For it's only La Jolla and everything goes But you don't get too hot, and you never get friz— Great little city La Jolla is...
...And I have not mentioned a well equipped new hospital also of her bounty...
...La Follette's and mine at the University of Wisconsin...
...Marsh is not only one of the kindest but one of the most efficient women in the world...
...LA JOLLA has a cosmopolitan and frequently changing population...
...I sincerely appreciate the author's personal permission to publish as a conclusion to my story the unique ode, whose title I have adopted...
...La Follette had seen us settled in La Jolla and gone back to Washington it was a comfort to know he was at home with home folks...
...His father, Will La Follette, has served as congressman from the state of Washington for the past eight years...
...Oh the air...
...A free recital is given on the great outdoor organ every afternoon...
...Although so many Califomians come here for their health, the population appears to maintain its vigor and initiative, and by all the signs I am able to read, the climate makes for rejuvenation and longevity...
...DEAR READERS, have you learned the trick of resting your nerves and gaining repose in the midst of strain by recalling happy scenes you have experienced...
...The larger, better equipped and more favorably located cottages rent all the way from fifty to a hundred dollars a month...
...I had not seen him since graduation but I should have known him if I had met him in Egypt...
...Miss Scripps' home is still the most prominent one is La Jolla...
...When Mr...
...People would no longer need to live in congested districts in the midst of unhealthful surroundings...
...In southern California the domestic service problem has been solved...
...SAN DIEGO, twenty years ago, was a town of about twelve thousand inhabitants as I remember...
...That peace shall reign Secured by mutual understanding...
...Such a leap ahead would almost wipe out distances...
...And yet, when I began looking for a place to live in this La Jolla, I had so long cherished, it seemed so transformed, I might have cried with disappointment...
...houses are built in such curious tangles, And windows jut out at such various angles, And one which for days and months was dark Gleams bright some night with electric spark, And an unintentional glance may glean A glimpse of some "strictly domestic scene," Or, reversing the order, yourself, my boy, May be causing the neighbors unholy joy...
...He could hardly do that now...
...We want to stay, as Cousin Chester said...
...Copyright 1913) JOHN R. E. SUMNER...
...I wonder if it is the climate or that rare inner poise that keeps her so young...
...grateful for the mystic quality of the air—the salt moisture of the ocean, blended with the dry heat of the desert, perfumed with sage and roses, orange blossoms and acacias...
...Already there are voices raised That would belittle all thy high ideals, Make of Democracy a cloak for gain, And launch thee on imperial seas of power By armed force upheld...
...Fola, the eldest daughter, is married to George Middleton, author and playwright...
...He is now playing golf on the mountainside, swimming in the ocean, dancing in the community house and out of doors all the while...
...A few days ago a prominent, successful business man of Escondido, accompanied by his wife and daughter, called to see us...
...They do not cost as much as they would in the Washington markets at the same season of the year, but the price here is what I should call "fancy...
...There have been several crops of strawberries...
...To me the San Diego fair was much more beautiful than the one at San Francisco...
...Flying machines have been almost as common in the air about us as the sea gulls...
...Wohlford is president of the federation of women's clubs of this congressional district...
...This land is full of undeveloped possibilities...
...As I remember it, there was but one large cottage...
...there is a stretch of rocks and the measureless waters beyond for a back yard...
...Clark have been coming to La Jolla a number of years for a few weeks' rest and recreation...
...And that man's law, by sorrow taught, Shall nearer semblance bear To Law Divine...
...Marsh finds time to care for her lovely and interesting home and to meet the obligations incident to her position and besides she is attending Junior College, from which she will graduate with her son in June...
...And however hot the sun, there come stealing down off the beautiful snowcapped mountains at times, currents of air, that like Little Orphant Annie's Gobble-uns "gits you ef you don't watch out...
...I noticed in the morning paper that final arrangements have been made to bring the famous Mission play to San Diego...
...mark me, and not too much of that," Relieving the every day sameness of life, Tho' hinting, I fear me, at conjugal strife, But why this is thus and these things those, Nobody cares and nobody knows, For it's only La Jolla and everything goes, And in spite of its eccentricities Great little city La Jolla is...
...While I was there I read Richard Henry Dana's 'Two Years Before the Mast.' He visited that country about 1835...
...look over his head And see a horizon of glorious spread, Expanse overwhelming of earth and sky Bewildering in its immensity— And the air...
...It now has in the neighborhood of one hundred thousand...
...He has only been here about five years, but he has been district attorney and was chosen judge almost unanimously at the primary and the election...
...A country with a people like that is bound to have a picturesque history, and afford very interesting and worth while material for artists to study and get their inspiration from...
...A new country like that must be irresistibly alluring and free...
...Remember Them that died...
...His description was wonderful...
...San Diego is to have a permanent naval base and a permanent aviation station...
...The electric stoves are most convenient and well adapted to the climate, but the consolidated gas and electric light companies of Southern California live up to their general reputation over the United States...
...And so the desire forever to breathe this atmosphere gets in the blood...
...They are beautiful to look at, but much more perishable than Wisconsin strawberries and not nearly so delicious...
...They eliminate the non-essentials...
...She spent most of the winter with us at La Jolla and loved it...
...The romance of the old Spanish days appeals to me...
...Or may float thro' the window and tickle your ear Some mirth-bringing fragment like this one here: "What I want from you, madam, is silence, that's flat...
...Twenty years of olitical strife;—three terms governor, now the third term in the United States Senate;—always battling for certain ideas and convictions, so often standing alone...
...I had not seen him for years, but little incidents of this nature are so common in La Jolla, they cause no surprise...
...Unusually tall palm trees make fitting sentinels to the doorway...
...I like that," wrote my young friend...
...with its soft caress Of an indescribable tenderness, Like that of a hand that was raised to bless, It soothes and it cherishes back to health The fools that have traded it off for wealth— And the poor rheumatics and cripples and stiffs, Sit and watching the ever-changing cliffs, Their band, the pipe of the mocking bird, The lilt of leaves by breezes stirred, The cooing of the mourning dove, Laughter and shouts from the bathing cove— All sounds that earth and air afford Resolved into a common chord, And swelled to fuller harmony By diapason of the sea— Under the drowsy, subtle charm Down goes your head upon your arm, Your pipe goes out, your paper falls, Unheeded are the supper calls— And waking from a dreamy doze You, too, don't care if nobody knows Why this is thus and these things those, For this is La Jolla where everything goes, And you, too, are going, not back to biz— But to stick right here where La Jolla is...
...That trip to California in company with our family physician and his daughter was about the only vacation Mr...
...There are practically no servants to be had...
...But r.ow it is proposed that this wonderful setting and these buildings of rare architecture shall be transformed into schools and museums for the stimulation and encouragement of every worthy form of art...
...Freedom and Justice and the Natural Law...
...Great is La Jolla, great little place-Where your house is one of a neat of shacks And you look from your front on your neighbor's backs, Dive under their washing to reach the street, Get a swipe in the face from a ragged sheet, Or as a more intimate personal touch Disengage from some feminine garment's clutch, And stagger at night down a goat-track trail To land on your head in the garbage pail...
...Those who have not read Dana's "Two Years Before the Mast" have a treat in store...
...Farther on is the Community House with its wonderful playgrounds...
...They were five cents a pound...
...Judge Marsh, who was a leader in the Wisconsin legislature, when Mr...
...Though he wears the usual concomitants," She added—this in a lower note— As her eye took in his hat and coat...
...You may not require a large amount, but the price is high...
...but when we could spare her she thought she must go on with her work and has returned to Washington for that purpose...
...Those dear grandparents have pa?sed on...
...And I have almost become reconciled to the overcrowding and the queer shapes and places in which the cottages are built, for the reason that they afford more people shelter and happiness at reasonable cost...
...I happened to glance out the window, saw Professor Clark, and hailed him in time to answer the telephone call...
...Nor should you come to California for the winter counting on saving enough fuel to pay for your trip...
...In the next block is the Bishop's School, a school for girls which affords good instruction, but clings to the conventional standards of strict supervision of the girls' conduct which seem unsuited to the spirit of this little place...
...He was too independent and fearless to make his newspaper a commercial success...
...Balboa Park, created as if by magic for the purpose of the world's fair, has grown more wonderful each year...
...How I should like to be down in that country," he wrote...
...The big ranchos must have been great places to live in those days—saddle horses galore, big Mexican saddles with their gay trappings, and, ye gods, an unlimited range to gallop over...
...He will stay here in this rare environment a little longer...
...And yet women who do their own work out here seem to be less worried over domestic affairs and appear to have as much time for public work and self-development as the women I have known in Washington...
...Some lovers of La Jolla fear strangers may be misled by the humor of these verses...
...Jerre Murphy, brilliant paragrapher and editorial writer, who resigned his position as private secretary to the governor to become editor of a newspaper in Montana, is a resident of San Diego...
...That all the peoples, setting first Each its own house in order, shall unite In bonds of brotherhood...
...And so often in the years when the stress was the greatest, it has been a solace and a source of strength just to think we were on the rocks of La Jolla watching the breakers roll in...
...You can imagine—at least you mothers can, the delight it has given me to call members of the family to look at the whales that I discover-ed passing along the coast in sight of our cottage...
...It is as indigenous to the place as the picturesque Tor-rey Pine...
...Think well, my country...
...All these buildings and grounds are the gift of Miss Scripps...
...Since Phil was discharged from the service, he has been at the University of Wisconsin, from which he expects to graduate this year, 1919—just forty years after his father and mother...
...The two little boys are men...
...The most casual observer must sometimes speculate as to what reclamation, scientific agriculture and forestry will do for it...
...ATRUE spirit of freedom and unconvention-ality is La Jolla's most precious possession...
...The family of little girls have all grown up, but Mrs...
...We have been able to get very good fresh vegetables, especially peas and spinach, all winter at moderate cost...
...We shall never forget the Thanksgiving dinner which she cooked and served for ten people all by herself...
...Is it not better we shall know they died That Liberty might live...
...It is great fun to cook and wash dishes and do one's own work in a cottage whose windows are almost washed by the ocean at high tide...
...Of late we have made our home together at 3320 Sixteenth Street...
...Murphy looks just the same...
...Dear readers, I have written this reminiscent sketch in this informal way, just as though we were talking together, in the hope that we may feel acquainted again...
...Next to the church is the Women's Club House with its very pleasing lines...
...Last September when the doctor advised that our son, who had been very ill for the better part of a year, should spend the winter in a warm climate, preferably near the sea level, our thoughts naturally turned to the little place which we had enjoyed more than any other during our previous stay in this beautiful land where the sun rises over the Sierras and sets in the Pacific...
...La Follette's health, which was greatly benefited...
...We were fortunate in finding Wisconsin friends...
...The beautiful buildings referred to in my friend's letter have been preserved...
...Dana tells how he saw Mexicans all decked out, fine saddles and bridles, martingales and chaps—a picture of pride and regal splendor— actually suffering for something to eat...
...But we found what we sought—as I am sure our readers have already guessed— in La Jolla, a great little place...
...A. W. Wohlford, a classmate of Mr...
...The Post Office is a very great center of interest in La Jolla...
...Camp Kearney, located about equally distant from San Diego and La Jolla, at one time had forty thousand men...
...The free, health giving, soul inspiring spirit of La Jolla would spread and grow until it encompassed the whole earth...
...The Sword be turned to ploughshare...
...Is it for this They died Who gave their lives when life is sweetest?, Think well, my country...
...Up at the left is a lovely little Episcopal church, which is very much the center of things here...
...the little children have grown up...
...Now that our boy no longer needs me, I purpose to try and do better...
...Silence...
...They live in New York...
...I found the cost of food, generally speaking, about the same as it had been in Washington...
...We have also read Ramona again...
...It was Chester La Follette...
...Our first near neighbor, Mrs...
...She has been on the stage and the platform and is always at work...
...Dear Cousin May, Chester's mother, is the practical saint who directs the household, sees that everyone has everything they want and insists that it is no trouble for her to get it...
...Given of our best And spilled the precious blood of youth The future's heritage...
...One day when I was in the La Jolla bank, some one at the telephone asked the kindly gentleman who was cashing a check for me if he knew whether Professor S. H. Clark of Chicago University was in town...
...I was there once and the balmy climate got into my blood...
...They were formerly residents from Wisconsin but are now residents of Canada, where they have a thousand acre cattle ranch...
...The problem of heating is to have it quickly adjustable...
...grateful for the sunshine which makes you forget the possibility of cold or clouds or storms...
...La Follette is a successful lawyer in San Diego...
...If you stand in this loorway and look up and down the street, beautiful grounds with harmonious buildings in their midst, meet your view in both directions...
...yes, and plenty of bed covers too...
...The feeling here for Miss Scripps, as I have beard it expressed, is that of democratic good fellowship...
...Long,—one of the most lovable, well-informed, helpful women I have ever met—has her own beautiful home and is a permanent resident and voter—a most conscientious one—in La Jolla...
...What changes had taken place in the twenty years since we had left Wisconsin on that bitter cold day in February...
...On the other side of us was Mrs...
...Quaint is La Jolla, quaint little place— Where you can't deny the chance is fine To study the human form divine, (Not always built on the classic line,) Where a Boston lady got such a jar That she actually used the vernacular, Reverting, however, to Bostonese As closer vision restored her ease— "Great Susan" she shrieked, "he's forgotten his pants...
...At a mixed gathering you will meet representatives from almost as many different states as at an official reception in Washington...
...It is not self conscious nor intrusive...
...And the seals, too, always interest me, as they go barking by, bouncing along in the surf, having such good times...
...Or, it may be that the cheapening of helium gas will cause the dirigible balloon to supplant ships as freight" carriers and that aeroplanes will make the automobile look as old fashioned as the horse and buggy of today...
...One of the buildings in Balboa Park is being fitted for its presentation...
...LA JOLLA is a part of San Diego, which is fourteen miles distant, however, and at present the only means of transportation for the public is an automobile stage service...
...Taken together they express a wisely executed purpose to serve the community, quite free it would seem, from any desire to dominate it...
...LA JOLLA, twenty years ago had only a few cottages...
...Clifford Pease, a U. W. graduate, whose father was a life long friend of Mr...
...You will notice that the title of my sketch is in quotation marks...
...Where the...
...The land sloping to the sea appeared to be covered with cottages, but they were tucked in so close together that I could not see how we should find the rest and freedom for which we longed, in search of which we had crossed the continent from Washington to La Jolla...
...When we came through Chicago, Phil, then in training at Fort Sheridan, met us at the station and carried his sick brother in his arms from one train to another...
...People go long distances to see it...
...Not long ago I had a letter from a young violinist whose spontaneous expression of his feeling for Southern California appealed to me immensely...
...There are three women engaged in the business of renting cottages, all efficient, agreeable women...
...since we came to La Jolla, Robert has gained so much that I believe he is heavier, if not yet quite as strong as his younger brother...
...It is possible to get a furnished cottage with room enough for two persons, which has gas, electricity and bath for twenty dollars a month...
...Cheney, the wife of a Boston physician, a devoted mother, spending the winter here in the interest of her son's health...
...La Follette was governor is now judge of the Superior Court of San Diego...
...Two miles up the coast is the Scripps Institution for Biological Research, her first large public gift...
...It was the home of Ellen Scripps, whose ir.tellcctua power and business ability have largely contributed to the upbuilding of the Scripps newspaper service and incidentally to the making of a great fortune...
...I love the mission urchitecture you see there and the story of the sacrifices and struggles of the old missionary priests beats anything in fiction...
...At night when all these beautiful buildings and grounds, with their palms and evergreen trees and vines and shrubs and flowers, are lighted up and perhaps the band is playing and they are dancing out of doors on the community grounds, the moon rising over Mount Sole-dad, the surf pounding on the rocks, you think it surely must be dreamland...
...It thrills the heart with Joy to take account of all these manifestations of the truth, that picturesque history affords the material and the inspiration for art...
...Cottages large enough for a family of four or five can be had at a rental of from thirty-five to forty-five dollars a month...
...La Jolla has its own post office, chamber of commerce, bank, stores, markets and hotels...
...Every one could have a little home and garden near a community center...
...and the awful world war a part of the long struggle...
...There were exceptions...
...And oh, the sunsets, and the moonlight on the ocean...
...We brought him to La Jolla in a wheeled chair...
...It is one of the best stunts I know...
...Dear is La Jolla, dear little place— Where you sit in the porch of your chosen shack, And your front looks down on your neighbors' back, But don't look down...
...Fox, Kate and I were walking along a high promontory, I had wished aloud that we might see a whale—and there, at that very moment, one came in sight, spouting up a great fountain of spray, and I hardly had time to exclaim my surprise and joy when another whale came following after...
...The little oil stove furnishes the most economical heat...
...Often at night when you suddenly awaken the yellow glow of the moon appears to be softened sunlight...
...Bedford Jones, the rector, is an ideal clergyman, whose smiles and greetings are as common to all as the air and sunshine...
...Steps are also being taken for the preservation and restoration of San Diege's historic mission...
...It has been made a permanent military camp...
...Think well, my country...
...But she has only lived here a few years and is still much attached to Minneapolis where she still keeps a home...
...Is it for this?— Merely that one great nation, Mistaking its true greatness And seeking power through lust of gain And brutal force, shall be put down And in its place another reared...
...He is doing that with his print shop without sacrificing his standards of what constitutes a good job...
...In Wisconsin we should be disposed to talk quite a bit about such a sudden change...
...And what commercial supremacy San Diego harbor ensures when the predicted increase in water transportation and shipping comes...
...And lest you be misled, let me warn you right now, when you come to California to spend the winter, don't forget to bring all your wraps and furs and flannels...
...She had not guessed how far could reach The liberties of the bathing beach, And a bathing suit may excuse a scare If worn on a principal thoroughfare...
...The park and buildings have been used as a naval training station during the period we have been at war...
...The furnishings may be rather plain and scant, but these cottages are for the most part clean and ready for immediate house-keeping...
...Life to them without the beautiful was not worth while...
...Wood sells at the rate of from twenty-five to thirty dollars a cord, and coal accordingly...
...At least we found it delightful reading and most informing besides...
...It was all in the mission architecture, and the natural setting made a picture beyond description...
...But I trust our readers to laugh in the right place and to catch their true poetic inspiration...
...It was Mr...
...and when the tide is low, * La Jolla is pronounced La Ho'-ya...
...Reluctantly we had said good-bye to three little children, although we knew they could have no better care than their grandparents would give them...
...the San Diego chamber of commerce wanted him...
...It was the season of the incomparable Muscat grapes when we arrived...
...I wanted to stay...
...But although built upon the same spot where the other burned down, as I remembered it, it no longer appears to stand on a hill by itsela It is a stately mansion of classic mission architecture fronting on a wide paved street...
...That human rights be guaranteed to Each and All...
...Just below us were the "Huffs" as we learned affectionately to speak of them...
...He has written us a letter every day since we parted...
...Frederick Ward plays the leading part...
...And there are many workers in various fields—artists, writers, musicians, statesmen, who have this La Jolla habit...
...There, I have told you who wrote that letter...
...It has good doctors and dentists and of course it has its own real estate dealers...
...La Follette and I ever found time to take together...
...Whatever the future development in the material world these great stretches of land and sea, so favored with sunshine and tonic air, must always remain the natural resources of creative power and continue to breed freedom of spirit and love of the beautiful...
...And Barbara Worth may be read most profitably a second time for the sake of the vivid reality it lends to the transformation of the great desert waste into an Imperial Valley, and for the better appreciation of the mystic hold of this country upon the imagination of all who once come under its spell...
...This characteristic of the California sunshine is, I must admit, a bit deceptive...
...I learned that Professor and Mrs...
...Probably in a climate so nearly uniform the year around, with only two seasonal changes—winter, the rainy season, summer, the dry season— these daily variations are a constitutional tonic that tends to prevent enervation...
...The presence of the camp has naturally added much to the social and business activities of the communities to which it is tributary...
...This Mission play has been successfully presented for eight seasons at San Gabriel...
...Nor do the women here neglect the things essential to the health and happiness of their families...
...Perpetuating all the wrong, The age-old tyranny by armed force upheld Big with the seeds of future wars...
...IF I overestimate the advantages of La Jolla and overlook its shortcomings, you will understand it is because I am grateful—deeply grateful—for Robert's restored health and for the joy and refreshment we have all gotten out of our six months' life here...
...I trust you understand why I have failed to contribute to the magazine these many months...
...Many times in lieu of a fairy tale, I would tell the children the true story of the whales that I saw at La Jolla;—how one evening just at sunset, when Daddy, Dr...
Vol. 11 • May 1919 • No. 5
