Chapter 1: Arriving in Oz

I grew up in the Inland Empire of Southern California, (San Bernardino, Colton, Riverside, Yucaipa, Mentone, and Redlands). In the 1960’s, this was the tailpipe of Los Angeles. Onshore breezes in the summer blew smog, fog, haze, particulates, dirt and smudge into the basin that was the Empire, and just stopped there. Our eyes teared. We sneezed, hacked, coughed and choked on the foul air. Weeks would go by, you could not see for a block.

It was HOT. Summers baked well into the upper 90’s and 100’s. My twin brother Clark and I worked around the yard and a small old orange grove my parents owned during summers off from school. We worked clearing brush, trimming trees, hauling yard waste to the dump. It was expected of us.

It was no wonder that as teenagers we would jump in some beat pick up, Rambler or Volkswagen pool our change and buy a tanks worth of gas to take us to the beach. Our destination was Corona de Mar, the closest and most direct route to sun, sand and sea. Even though none of us could surf, we wore our hair like surfers, dressed like surfers, talked like surfers and listened to the beach boys.

Everyone talked about moving to the beach in general, and San Diego in particular. Older kids graduated and went off to San Diego State University (Party dude!). It seems like every kid in my High School had plans to move to San Diego as soon as they graduated, got pregnant, or dropped out. The allure and mystique of San Diego remained just that for me, until a family trip to San Diego to visit an old Navy chum of my Dad’s. Turns out the navy buddy had two very cute teenage daughters and my twin brother and I were smitten.

The navy family lived close to the First Street pedestrian bridge, and the girls took us there to show off how they could get the thing swinging back and forth (cool). That trip did it for me. I was convinced that one day I would return, the navy daughter would be my bride, and we would live in a house I would design on a canyon, near the bridge. I was 16.

Five years later, I did return to San Diego, not for a woman, but for a passion. I had enrolled at San Diego State University to study “Environmental Design” in the school of Art and Design. I had been studying Architecture, Art and Music at local community colleges in San Bernardino and Yucaipa. I had also begun playing music in the dark bars and venues of San Bernardino, learning to play by ear and live by the seat of my pants. My relationship with my father had a hit a low and I was ready to get out of Dodge and make the journey to OZ.

I came to San Diego with all my belongings packed into my 1966 Volkswagen bug. Art supplies, a small mechanics tool kit, saxophone, jeans, shorts, corduroy jacket, Amplifier and tuner, about 50 jazz lps and a small pot plant, these were my worldly possessions. It was 1974.

Eugene Ray*, southern architect, story teller, architectural historian, environmental activist and visionary artist had come to San Diego State University to start a new program in environmental design in the School of Art in 1971. My attraction to the school’s program was its broad interpretation of Architecture. More art than engineering, more voodoo than theory, experimental, and just plain weird, I was in heaven.

Gene encouraged new ways of thinking about space, especially in his classes “Synergetics” (creating environments with light and sound) and “Environmental Prototypes”. Gene also introduced us to “mail art” and post card art. His mentoring, vision and genius, continues to influence not only my design process, but also my teaching process.

I met artist Mario Lara* in those first few weeks of new classes in the darkened rooms, illuminated by Gene Ray’s fantastic paintings, that glowed under black light. Mario and I became great friends and eventually worked together to help build Gene Rays “Silver Ship” on Nautilus Avenue in La Jolla, CA. We spent almost two years building that house from the ground up, hand digging the footings on the steep slope, to preserve as much of the native landscape as possible. The learning about building, the physical strain of moving materials, the satisfying exhaustion at the end of a productive day, were lessons not learned in the classroom and lessons never forgotten.

Although I graduated from SDSU with a BA in Art in 1978, the finishing of Gene’s home the next year was a more fitting graduation. I was at the end of an educational journey, unemployed, broke and happy, now a resident of San Diego.



Silver Ship
1699 Nautilus Ave, La Jolla Ca.
Eugene Ray, Architect
Construction: 1978-1980

* Gene retired from SDSU in the mid 1990’s.
* Mario is currently a professor of Art at San Diego Mesa College.