Just A Bookmark

A meandering clickabout led me to the below, which I store here not only so I don't lose it (wanna read more later), but so I can share.

Photographs, poems, and reflections on excursions round the Bay, 1915.

A golden era of sorts, the Panama-Pacific Exhibition being in full swing, the Great War not yet ours, while for sentimental sorts like me, the ways and byways of youth were still in their "original" form, as dirt roads and undeveloped hillsides, the California of our dreams and of the early poets not yet trampled by the rest of the Twentieth Century.

As seen from the hills above Cal ...

The ferryboats from Oakland, Berkeley, Alameda, and Sausalito are plying their ceaseless traffic from mole to mole. White-sailed ships from foreign countries, outward bound with the tide, conveyed by little bustling tugs, look like monster white-winged gulls; and somber-hued gunboats, their portholes bristling with deadly engines of war, strain at their cables. It is an inspiring sight, and, turning away with reluctance, we circle the hill to Cragmont Heights, stopping to rest on the rocky summit that overlooks the valley.

I've grown oddly fond of the horrible writing of amateurs raised on Nineteenth Century magazines. It excites some echo perhaps of days lost amongst my grandparents' books. Also from the influence of these first person narratives from the earlies.

Also of the old spelling. "Wild-cat Cañon" had lost the charm of dash and enye by the time I was hiking about in there.

Gawd, I sound all sentimental. Well, a few thoughts.

I hadn't realized that Meiggs' Wharf used to be where Fisherman's Wharf is now, but I believe it, since a quick search shows me Meiggs built his famous wharf at the bottom of Powell St. Besides, the author writes of "swarthy Italian fishermen."

My grandmother took a ride in the original Glass-bottom Boat, which I hear was associated in some way with John Steinbeck's friend Ed Ricketts. Steinbeck hit up on her sometime in there. They were all about the same age.

Okay, a couple. Now, I'm late for work. I'll excuse myself that it's my birthday and though work-life is fine right now, I'd rather stay home and fix and build for you-know-what.