Tor House Newsletter

A Message from the President

Dear Members and Friends of Robinson Jeffers Tor House Foundation,

We have a GREAT Newsletter! Our editor, Fran Vardamis, not only edits this fine publication, Fran also coordinates Foundation membership files and serves as a substitute tour docent. In appreciation of Fran’s dedication and hard work the Foundation awards committee selected Fran for recognition at the National Philanthropy Day luncheon, Nov. 18th, at Spanish Bay Resort. Well Done, Fran!

Docents receiving service awards this year are Mary Aldinger (15 years); Alice Englander (10 years); Marina Romani, Dr. Virginia Meade, and Joyce Snyder (5 years). The exceptional and dedicated volunteer service of docents, trustees, and friends of Tor House is essential to our operations and well-being. Thank you!

Tor House enjoyed a good year with consistent tour attendance and (thankfully) no major property problems. Our Garden Party and Fall Festival were well attended and much appreciated by attendees. Mark your calendars. The 2012 Garden Party is May 6; the 2012 Fall Festival is Oct 5, 6, and 7. 2012 is the 50th anniversary of Jeffers’ death. The theme for the Fall Festival will be “50 years since…” or similar. Watch our web site for other events commemorating this anniversary and for details and updates on our “Reading and Performance Series” programmed by Vice President Elliot Ruchowitz-Roberts. [The preliminary schedule can be found below.] On the horizon we need to replace the East Wing roof. We are gathering bids and seeking funding. Your assistance is welcome.

With all the disquieting financial news in the headlines, who would be brave enough to solicit gifts from good friends? That would be me. Our year-end appeal is a significant and essential source of Foundation operating funds. Memberships are also a necessary source of annual income. The legacy of Robinson Jeffers and the preservation of Tor House and Hawk Tower continue to depend on your participation and generosity. Special THANKS to those who continue or increase their level of membership and are also able to gift the Foundation with funds to insure our continued solvency. Perhaps a gift membership to family or friends would fit your holiday shopping plans. My grandson, Townsend Farnham (8) in New York City, will be a new (youngest?) life member this year. Looking ahead, you may want to include the Foundation in your estate plans.

Your questions, comments and ideas are always welcome. My wife, Ripple, joins me in wishing you and yours a Merry Christmas and blessed 2012.

Vince Huth, President

The Jeffers Estates – About the land Robinson and Una Purchased in Carmel

By Kathleen Sonntag, Tor House Docent

The extraordinary patience of things!

This beautiful place defaced with a crop of surburban houses-

How beautiful when we first beheld it,

Unbroken field of poppy and lupin walled with clean cliffs;

No intrusion but two or three horses pasturing,

Or a few milch cows rubbing their flanks on the outcrop rockheads-

from Carmel Point, Robinson Jeffers

When they first came to Carmel, Robinson and Una found the land they eventually purchased for their home. “In 1919 we built Tor House on a knoll where stones jutting out of the treeless moor reminded us of tors on Dartmoor.” (Una’s article in the Carmel Pine Cone January 10, 1941)

Buying the land

Robinson and Una purchased all of the lots on the west side of Ocean View Avenue between Bay View and Stewart and the land between Scenic Avenue and the ocean from Bay View to Stewart between 1919 and 1930. Where did a “poor poet” get the money for all that land? In The Stone Mason of Tor House Robinson is quoted as follows: “In 1912 I came into possession of a little money..” (pg 59). James Karman explains in a footnote that he learned from Hamilton Jeffers that because he was his grandfather’s (John Robinson) namesake, Robinson received a bequest of $9,600. When his father died in December 1914, Robinson received a trust fund that provided about $2,000 annually (SMOTH, pg 74). The price paid for most of the lots is not documented in the transfer documents located at the Monterey County Recorder’s office in Salinas.

The records show that all but 4 of the 36 lots in “Block B-15” were purchased by Robinson and Una from the Carmel Development Company. These 32 lots were purchased in 3 transactions between 1920 and 1922. The final sale of the initial lots is dated after Tor House was completed, probably after final payment was made. The land on the west side of Scenic (Block B-19) was purchased separately in 1922.

Katholeen Hillis purchased lot 18 from the Carmel Development Company in 1920. In Some Notes on the Building of Tor House by Donnan Jeffers, Donnan explains how lot 18 was purchased from Katholeen Hillis in 1927. Robinson wanted that lot adjacent to their property and told Miss Hillis that he was going to build a horse stable on their border in order to encourage her to sell to him. Miss Hillis agreed to sell the land to Robinson and Una so that she could invest in oil (RJN Newsletters, 1932-1988, edited by Brophy; Chap 14, pg 117).

In her article, Jeffers Family as I Knew Them, Phoebe Barkan states that “Teddy Kuster bought the land between Tor House and his, a square block. Teddy held this property until Robin could gradually buy it from him” (RJN 53, 1979). In order to verify this statement and learn more about Robinson and Una’s purchase of their land, I searched the records at the Monterey County Recorder’s office. This was a follow-up to the extensive research done by Ollie Collins, retired docent, several years ago. The records show that all of the lots except lots 1, 2, 3 and 18 were purchased from the Carmel Development Company. I found no land transactions between Kuster and Jeffers in the land records. However, Edward Kuster purchased lots 1-3 from the Carmel Development Company in March 1927 and sold them to Mary Wilkeson in April 1927.

Robinson and Una purchased lots 1-3 in 1930. The owner, Mary J. Wilkeson, mortgaged the property to the Jeffers. The reason for her selling to Jeffers is unknown. In a letter to Mark Van Doren dated March 14, 1930 Robinson said:

“We beggared ourselves the other day to buy a little more land on our north boundary, because it has a natural granite column on it that we call the “alter-stone” – my wife is as mad about rocks as I am, fortunately, or rather I as she.” (Letter 179, pg 170 Selected Letters edited by Ridgeway)

Una, in a letter to Mabel Luhan dated August 1930, said

“I went over yesterday and gaily paid the remainder on our $9,000 for altar-stone lots.” (RJN 77, Letter 5, page 32)

Selling the Land

In 1939 Una wrote Mabel Luhan that they would probably have to start selling land as the sewer taxes were going to be unaffordable.

“The time has arrived when we fear we must at last put up some of our land for sale. We are to be stuck with a terrific sewer tax. There are 36 lots you know & an entirely new sewer system is being put in - a reduction plant over beyond the artichoke fields on the way to Fish ranch...”

The sewer tax threat prompted Robinson to agree to accept an invitation to speak at the Library of Congress in 1940. The tax bill was expected to be $1,600 for the 36 lots. Other speaking engagements were arranged by friends, and Una and Robinson, accompanied by Noel Sullivan, headed east in their Ford for the first speaking engagement in Pittsburg on February 17. By the time they returned, the Sanitation Board’s proposal to extend the sewer had been defeated. They had come home with a net gain of about $600 after expenses (SMOTH, pages 171, 187).

“Addition No. 7, Block B-15” was created in May 1910. In 1949 Block B-15 was reverted to acreage and designated as “Jeffers Estates,”. The land was subdivided when lots were sold, and lot 21 was deeded to the Tor House Foundation.

Robinson did not sell any lots until after Una died. In an article published in the Peninsula Parade November 5, 1987, Prof. Toro wrote that Jeffers sold some of his land to pay taxes. In a letter to the editor dated November 19, 1987, responding to this statement, Donnan explains that his father received word from friends while the family was traveling in Ireland in 1956 that the Carmel Planning Commission had published a plan for future land use which showed “The Robinson Jeffers Memorial Park and Library” on Robinson’s property. Robinson insisted that they shorten their trip so he could prevent this future use of his land. In order to make his property less desirable, he subdivided the north end into 4 large lots and sold them in 1956. One of those lots was sold to Elizabeth Bradshaw Magee on November 7, 1956 according to the county records. Donnan and Garth deeded the land in Block 19, the west side of Scenic Drive, to the County of Monterey in 1963.

[The Foundation welcomes discussion of this material. Corrections, additions, and queries will be published in future Newsletters, space permitting. Please address material to “Newsletter Editor” THF, PO Box 2713, Carmel, CA 93921.]

[Please note: listings of contributors and new and renewed memberships reflect only those contributions and memberships received since the last issue of the Newsletter. Generally, the Spring Issue lists donations received during December, January, and February. There are no listings in the Summer Issue because of space constraints (Poetry Contest Prize winners are published in the Summer Issue). The Fall Issue contains donations received between March and August of any given year.]

The ever-present rock against another hill,
modern man’s metaphor of monotony.
Backs against the wind, we climbed uphill,
my crazy poet friend, laughing at Camus.
His sardonic Irish grin and Yeats’ pretense
kept him fortified in his modern tower,
a chain of Holiday Inns on the Interstate.
Bourbon eyes and yellow stained fingers,
he swatted big boulders like flies, said drink
against the growing darkness and big rocks.
He smiled in photos with Harry Bonsall
outside Home Savings for greeting cards.
He wrote poems till he slipped beneath the rock.
Told me to remember Rexroth under
Storke Tower at twelve strokes, word weary,
Mr. Renaissance looking for a job.

Once on a pilgrimage to Carmel, we
sat a block away from Jeffers’ Tower.
In a cypress grove, we passed a bottle
and talked about all those words he hauled.
Each day he labored in the fog alone,
up the hill building his granite fortress.
The stonecutter carving his immortal niche.
The tower is still there and Point Lobos
looms around the corner. Man may still be
doomed pushing his boulders uphill but that
night we laughed, wine warmed at our sins and
considered evil much as he had left it.
Later that night we read aloud from Kerouac’s
Mexico City Blues from the point at
Bixby Creek, right where he might have listened
to the breaking waves, rocks churning in song,
the soothing rhythm of time moving on.
The rock’s eternal music, up the hill
beyond the abyss.

Please see our Poetry Prize page for information about entering the 2012 Prize for Poetry.

The Tor House Foundation wishes to express its appreciation for gifts to the library and archives:

to Maeve Jeffers for Jeffers Family heirlooms, including candlesticks, silver spoons and linens.
to Joseph M. Hassett for a copy of “W.B. Yeats and the Muses.”
to Bedrick Ludvik for “Tadeas Mort,” an original play script in Czech, based on “Hungerfield.”

The Tor House Foundation and the Carmel community mourns the passing of Marguerite Downer (1920-2011), an ardent preservationist who, in the early years played a decisive role in saving the home of Robinson Jeffers for future generations.

On the weekend of October 7-9, attendees enjoyed yet another fascinating, illuminating, and fun-filled Fall Festival at the Carmel Woman’s Club. Friday evening’s celebratory words and music, performed by Taelen Thomas, Elise Rotchford and Liyanna Sadowski, accompanied another one of Mother Nature’s virtuoso sunsets. Saturday’s speakers included John Walton, Gere diZerega, James Karman and Joan Hendrickson. Jean Grace and Lindsay Jeffers concluded the festivities with an inspiring Sunday morning Poetry Walk on Monastery Beach.

Susan Shillinglaw, Professor of English at San Jose State and featured speaker at the 2010 Fall Festival will be giving a talk on “Steinbeck and Jeffers” at Sunset Center (Carmel), Carpenter Hall at 7 PM on February 28, 2012. Part of the Harrison Memorial Library’s Local History Lecture Series, the program is free of charge. For further information consult the library’s website at www.hm-lib.org.

Mark your calendars! The Robinson Jeffers Association and its new president, Ron Olowin, announce that the Jeffers’ academic organization’s annual conference, this coming year, will take place in Carmel. Dr. Olowin, professor of Physics and Astronomy at St. Mary’s College in Moraga, has been a speaker at several Fall Festivals. Reserve Memorial Day Weekend, Friday, May 25 thru Monday, May 28 for a special look at Jeffers and Jeffers scholarship in this, the 50th anniversary year after the poet’s death. For further information check the RJA website at www.robinsonjeffersassociation.org.

Note in passing concerning an honored member of the Tor House/Jeffers community: From Leah Garchik’s column, The San Francisco Chronicle, 11/22: “Former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Hass, who is on the faculty at UC Berkeley, wrote in an essay (in the NYT) that appeared on Sunday how he and his wife, Brenda Hillman, had been beaten (she was knocked down, he was whacked) by baton-wielding campus cops at Sproul Plaza [UC, Berkeley].” And so it goes.

Aphrodite speaks on behalf of the gods:
We are not extremely sorry for the woes of men. We laugh in heaven.
We that walk on Olympus and the steep sky,
And under our feet the lightning barks like a dog:
What we desire, we do. I am the power of Love.
In future days men will become so powerful
That they seem to control the heavens and the earth,
They seem to understand the stars and all science –
Let them beware. Something is lurking hidden.
There is always a knife in the flowers. There is always a lion just beyond the firelight.

The editorial staff of the Tor House Newsletter welcomes, for publication consideration, short poems, criticism, and reminiscences related to Robinson Jeffers poetry and/or to Tor House. Please address submissions to Newsletter Editor, Tor House Foundation, PO Box 2713, Carmel, CA 93921. For further information, contact the editor at fdv528@comcast.net.

Robinson Jeffers Tor House Foundation * 26304 Ocean View Ave * Carmel, CA 93923 * 831-624-1813 * Fax 831-624-3696
Carol Dixon, Administrative Assistant for Robinson Jeffers Tor House Foundation