Monthly Archives: July 2019

Duck and Cover-Up: First Nuclear Meltdown in History

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In the 1950’s, the Valley was the world’s actually-existing “City of Tomorrow,” or New Model Community. It was already home to the huge “aerospace” industry that had won the War; now that industry, and the City, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, paved “Victory Boulevard” and the LA River, and re-made the Valley. It was built out wall-to-wall with modest but modern middle class homes, and laced with freeways. Much of the sprawling development to the north and west would be powered by an experimental prototype Sodium Nuclear Reactor, perched high on the Santa Susanna ridge, the Valley’s western rim, near the source of the headwaters of the River.

On July 13, 1959, that reactor partially melted down.

60 years ago today the LARGEST NUCLEAR ACCIDENT IN U.S. HISTORY occurred above the Southern California community of SIMI VALLEY when the Santa Susanna Field Laboratory (SSFL) site suffered a partial nuclear meltdown. That accident, kept secret for two decades, has resulted in ongoing local health effects that persist to this day and has pitted the community health and wellbeing against corporate financial and captured government agencies.

— Robert Dodge, Pres. of Physicians for Social Responsibility, LA

Click on the link below to read about this obscure, yet pivotal, moment in human history. Then take a couple of minutes to refresh your understanding of Pres. Eisenhower’s warning to the nation of January, 1961. The secret disaster at the SSFL, and the in-process cover-up, were fresh and connected events in his mind, if in nobody else’s.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/07/13/60-years-largest-us-nuclear-accident-and-captured-federal-agencies

Bennett at the Bowl — All the Old Favorites

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The oldest things in Hollywood are usually the best — so with Tony Bennett, the Hollywood Bowl, and Larry Freedman.

Excited for a night of Old Favorites

There was no “Stella By Starlight,” but then there was no starlight either, only the glamourous Bowl searchlights crossed in the middle of a wooly marine layer.

Mr. Bennett beamed his warm charisma to every single one of the Bowl’s 30,000 seats. And when he forgot all the words to “They All Laughed” except the title, which begins each phrase, that’s exactly what the crowd did: they all laughed. The man is 93, and Ira Gershwin was prolix.

One Minute of Tranquility: the incomparable Mr. Bennett makes life worthwhile with his Les Ford-style rendition of a Gershwin Old Favorite. Again, Tony drops the letter of Ira’s lyrics, but he delivers the ebullient spirit, in”Who Cares?”

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1WkeG9FSE-8apMBRhcU0WKb03MucFxgLS/view?usp=sharing

The Ancient Dance of Gratitude

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The richness of the urban experience in the Valley fascinates me. Thursday evening, I took an after-dinner stroll down Magnolia Blvd. and caught the sound of distant drumming. Intrigued, I followed the thrum on the breeze all the way into NoHo Park.

A circle of indigenous dancers was …dancing, rather than performing a dance, as I’ve seen folklorico groups do many times for the tourists in Hollywood, or Venice Beach. Here there were no tourists, there was no real audience. The dancers were worshipping in an ancient way; or rather, the worshippers were dancing in an ancient way. Someone said they meet for these ceremonies at different sites all around Southern California. The costumes were all exquisite — hand-tooled hides, real bead work, etc. They appeared a cut above the usual performers’ costumes. Many must have been made by, and for, the dancers themselves.

Click on the link for One Minute of Tranquility — “The Ancient Dance of Gratitude”

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VjOXGyinL0x4ArCCRMPL4UEwiGqOf5OP/view?usp=sharing


Remember, Patient Reader, that for the Ute-Aztecan peoples who settled the Valley, the Tongva and Tataviam, ancient Mexican religious circle-dances like this one were the ancestral basis of both the ?antap cult, and the Chinigchinich cult. Thus, three forms of dance-based worship — three levels of spiritual exploration through dance — were the core of the spiritual life of Achoicomenga before the arrival of the Franciscans. Here, before my eyes, was such a circle-dance.

  • Indians at Mission San Jose
  • “Luiseno” dancers by Pablo Tac



The dancers were ecstatic, meaning, in this case, preternaturally outside of their normal selves, focused intensely on the steps. Their concentration was absorbed by the throbbing tattoo, the cool night air, and the slow, ceaseless circling of the group. Powerful sensual stimulants heightened the occasion — puffs of sweet incense, and the strobe-like flutter of the feathered headdresses in the glaring lights of the basketball court. The drums must have throbbed a good two hours, but the dancers seemed to derive power from the constant shaking of their sweaty limbs. Standing nearby, I could feel the acoustic force of the rattling ornaments on their shins — like hundreds of tiny maracas on each leg.


And there were sacrificial food offerings on tables — plates of sliced fruit and cakes — meant to nourish the gods. Who, as in all rituals, are personated in our world by the sweaty shakers on the dance floor.

The medicine man in front — a homeless denizen of the park, normally twitchy and jerky — sat transfixed by the dance.


A lady was carrying a bowl of smoking incense around the circle. I asked her what I was witnessing. She said they were celebrating the ancient Aztec dance of gratitude. Then she asked me: “Is that English word?” “Yes,” I answered, but remembering it was Thursday night, added “Better, though, is Thanksgiving.” She smiled and remembered. “Gratitude. Thanksgiving.” Then she pushed her censer at my face, and quickly turned away. A cloud from the canyons — sage and juniper — wreathed my scent-drunk head. “Thanks,” I muttered to the gods, and floated back across the dark park, towards Magnolia and home.

“The Book of Beasts” at the Getty Center

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Contemporary California artist Walton Ford had the cheeky inspiration to depict the legendary griffins of Queen Califia in a style reminiscent of a 19th-century ornithology plate. Ford’s California griffin is a monster not of the Old World’s lions and eagles, but of the New World’s cougars and condors. In the Getty’s cuddly new exhibit “The Book of Beasts,” about the medieval bestiary, Ford’s is one of the last pieces you see before exiting to the gift shop. After immersion in the middle ages, the viewer sees this and makes a jarringly comical skip-and-jump to the 16th century, and the 19th, and the 21st.

The scherzo is based on the Spanish comic-book romance Esplandian (1500?) which was either one of the very last medieval books or one of the very first modern books. But in 1522 it was read — and apparently at least partly believed in — by Hernan Cortez. And Cortez, dulled by the conquest of Mexico and yearning for more, launched expeditions from Mexico to find this island of gold ruled by hot babes with that Malibu tan. He thought this land must be behind the headland we know as Cabo San Lucas.

Cortez found no griffins in Baja and gave up, but not before coasting the “Sea of Cortez” (also known as the Gulf of California). And it was Cortez’s name for the land floating in that sea that would stick on Spanish maps; the island of California. Here’s the famous passage that piqued Cortez’s codpiece:

“Know that, on the right hand of the Indies was an island called California, very near to the region of the Terrestrial Paradise, which was populated by black women, without there being any men among them, that almost like the Amazons was their style of living. They were of vigorous bodies and strong and ardent hearts and of great strength; the island itself the strongest in steep rocks and cliff boulders that is found in the world; their arms were all of gold, and also the harnesses of the wild beasts, on which, after having tamed them, they rode; that in all the island there was no other metal whatsoever… On this island, called California there were many griffins … and in the time that they had young these women would — take them to their caves, and there raise them. And … they fattened them on those men and the boys that they had born… Any make that entered the island was killed and eaten by them … There ruled on that island of California, a queen great of body, very beautiful for her race, at a flourishing age, desirous in her thoughts of achieving great things, valiant in strength, cunning in her brave heart, more than any other who had ruled that kingdom before her: Queen Califia.”

Garcia Ordonez de Montalvo, “The Adventures of Esplandian,” @ 1500
At once relic and reliquary, Damien Hirst’s sly zoological phantasm punctuates the theme of the exhibit. With our enlarged understanding of the medieval myth, we can appreciate Mr. Hirst’s 21st-century take on this animal. Naturally, a Unicorn’s skull would be solid gold.

But the star of the exhibit, and the metaphorical darling of our day, is the Unicorn. His evolution in the medieval imagination, along with other fabulous fauna like manticores and dragons, are presented through fine and decorative arts pieces that molded that imagination.

  • Unicorn tapestry — try needlepointing that, Mom!
  • …pelicans and lions and unicorns and elephants
  • More pelicans…Really?
The Legend of the Pelican in gold.

“The symbolism of the mother pelican feeding her little baby pelicans is rooted in an ancient legend which preceded Christianity. The legend was that in time of famine, the mother pelican wounded herself, striking her breast with the beak to feed her young with her blood to prevent starvation. Another version of the legend was that the mother fed her dying young with her blood to revive them from death, but in turn lost her own life.

Given this tradition, one can easily see why the early Christians adapted it to symbolize our Lord, Jesus Christ. The pelican symbolizes Jesus our Redeemer who gave His life for our redemption and the atonement He made through His passion and death. We were dead to sin and have found new life through the Blood of Christ. Moreover, Jesus continues to feed us with His body and blood in the holy Eucharist.

This tradition and others is found in the Physiologus, an early Christian work which appeared in the second century in Alexandria, Egypt. Written by an anonymous author, the Physiologus recorded legends of animals and gave each an allegorical interpretation. For instance the phoenix, which burns itself to death and rises on the third day from the ashes, symbolizes Christ who died for our sins and rose on the third day to give us the promise of everlasting life. The unicorn which only allows itself to be captured in the lap of a pure virgin, symbolizes the incarnation. Here too the legend of the pelican feeding her young is described: “The little pelicans strike their parents, and the parents, striking back, kill them. But on the third day the mother pelican strikes and opens her side and pours blood over her dead young. In this way they are revivified and made well. So Our Lord Jesus Christ says also through the prophet Isaiah: I have brought up children and exalted them, but they have despised me (Is 1:2). We struck God by serving the creature rather than the Creator. Therefore He deigned to ascend the cross, and when His side was pierced, blood and water gushed forth unto our salvation and eternal life.” This work was noted by St. Epiphanius, St. Basil and St. Peter of Alexandria. It was also popular in the Middle Ages and was a source for the symbols used in the various stone carvings and other artwork of that period.”

— Fr. William Saunders, The Catholic Education Resource Center website
  • Unicorns, yes, here marginal
  • …but other heraldic beasts are explored, too