Confessions from the Killer Mime Cult

Axel Erlandson (1884-1964) was an American arborist who opened a horticultural attraction in 1947 featuring his uniquely shaped trees. The attraction was eventually named "The Tree Circus"

Erlandson was born the son of Swedish immigrants. He married his wife Leona in 1914. He raised beans and other crops in Central California near Turlock. There, inspired by observing a natural inosculation in his hedgerow he began to shape trees. He began his work with trees in 1925. He would create designs on paper first and then plant in the specified patterns; pruning, grafting and bending them. This began as a hobby for the amusement of himself and his family.

In 1945, Erlandson's daughter and wife took a trip to the ocean near Santa Cruz, California. There they saw people lined up to pay to see such oddities as tilted buildings at the Mystery Spot. They returned home and mentioned (off hand) that Axel's trees could draw people who would pay to see them if they were on a well-traveled tourist route. Axel jumped on the idea and bought a small parcel of land in Scotts Valley, California on the main road between the Santa Clara Valley and the ocean; and started the process of transplanting the best of his trees to their new home. The Tree Circus opened in the spring of 1947.

On June 4th 1947 Erlandson wrote to Robert Ripley sending him 2 photos of his trees and inviting him to visit. Erlandson’s trees appeared in the column of Robert Ripley's Believe It or Not! twelve times. To create the "Basket Tree", Erlandson planted six sycamore trees in a circle, topped them all at one foot, then approach-grafted them together one to another to form the diamond patterns. For the first 2.5 meters (8') he left an opening at the top. This specimen today is featured as the centerpiece of Gilroy Gardens.

Erlandson taught himself over a period of decades, how to train the growth of trees into shapes of his own design. When children asked how he got his trees to grow like this, he would reply, "I talk to them." Erlandson considered his methods "trade secrets." Income from admission was scant, in 1955 a relatively good year the Tree Circus brought in $321.20 The opening of Highway 17 took the tourist traffic away. Life Magazine ran a pictorial in the January 14, 1957 issue, improving attendance.

In 1963, Erlandson sold the property for $12,000 and died the following year. The new owners, Larry and Peggy Thompson named the place "The Lost World." They had large fiberglass dinosaurs made to attract the attention of the passing traffic, installed a stream, and prepared to expand the attraction to several times its original size.

Unfortunately, Larry Thompson died before The Lost World could open. Peggy Thompson, left to raise three small children, managed to open the park successfully for a few years. She then tried to sell and the new owners defaulted. Subsequent lease owners went in and out of business.

In 1977 the property was purchased for commercial development by Robert Hogan and the trees were scheduled to be bulldozed. Mark Primack a young architect began documenting the trees and their story and received an art grant to draw and record the them as they were. Joseph Cahill a landscape designer paid Hogan $12,000 for the trees and was given two and a half years to move them. Cahill cleaned up the site, and “Suddenly the good citizens of Santa Cruz and Scotts Valley were upset.” A committee called the Friends of Scotts Valley Tree Circus was formed by Joe Cucchiara to keep the old trees put. Primack and his friends, at times, risked arrest for trespassing in order to water and feed the trees. Primack was quoted as saying “I know of no other single person who has taken ornamental grafting to such an extreme, it is not just an oddity. It demonstrates an intriguing option for improving our environment by creating an absolutely unique space of living sculpture.” Efforts to have the trees declared historical or a cultural resource failed and Cahill’s window for moving the trees closed. Hogan’s plan for development did not materialize.

In 1985, Michael Bonfante, owner of Nob Hill Foods, a grocery store chain and Tree Haven, a tree nursery, in Gilroy, California, bought the trees from Hogan and transplanted 24 of them to his new amusement park, Bonfante Gardens, now called Gilroy Gardens, in Gilroy, California.

Erlandson's "Telephone Booth Tree" is on permanent display at the Baltimore, Maryland American Visionary Art Museum. Erlandson's "Birch Loop" tree is on permanent display in at the Museum of Art History in Santa Cruz, California.

Labels: The Tree Circus

Labels: rainbow boy

So the best site for watching interesting documentaries, has to be Smashing Telly. It has a number of documentaries about a number of different subjects, and I have been able to sample the following this week: Planet of the Arabs (about stereotypes of Arabs in hollywood), Frat House (about fraternities in America, I only could sit through a bit, because I don't really like men), Tales for the Jungle: Magaret Mead (about the famous American anthropologist and the controversy that surrounds her most famous work), My Brillant Brain (about a child piano progidy), Mythbusters Hypnosis (I like these series, it's science for the common man), Laughing with Hitler (about the slow death of humor in Nazi Germany), John Lennon's Jukebox (about the selections of music in his jukebox, but for some reason features sting, who is pretensious, and definitely not on Lennon's Jukebox), the Human Sexes (an examination of biological and social sexual differences), off off broadway (I actually watched this some time ago, but it's an interesting examination of what it takes to be an actor, by louis theroux), monsters of the atomic age (about science fiction in the atom age, great fodder for mst3k), the Persuaders (about the Hare Krishnas mid-eighties attempt to become like Scientology, that is, accepted by celebrities. I stopped watching when their leader, whatever his name did something wrong, and their tried to explain that there was a spiritual reason for it...that's what a real cult looks like),
Jesus Freaks (about Christian rock and christians trying to be cool), people (about homelessness in washington dc, short, direct, and not preachy), Unrepentant:Canada's Genocide (how a former united church minister discovered residential schools were designed to kill natives. It seems obvious now, but it wasn't before he started to publicize this), What makes us human: big heads (about human biology, but it tends to exaggerate the differences between us and other primates, which is dangerous because most people already think we are worlds apart, when in fact, we're much closer than most think), Soviet Animated Propoganda (uh...guess?), Fisher vs Spasky (about the most famous chess match in history) okay, so all that wasn't in one week, thank good. Oh and Tylko mnie kochaj (Just love me) a romantic polish film. (Yep, I'm married)

Labels: movies and films

Books: Those who trespass against us: One woman's war against the Nazis This is another book on the same theme, but from a different perspective. These are the memoirs of Countess Karolina Lanckoronska written in 1946 and covering the years of the war. It is interesting, and a bit troubling. It is troubling because she is (was, I don't know if she's still alive) a Catholic Polish nationalist. So some of her comments are disparaging towards Ukrainians, who are portrayed as the worst ethnic group during the war. And while trying to exonorate herself of the curse of anti-semitism, she proves she possesses this flaw several times. She was in prison for most of the war, and her reason for writing the memoir was to provide evidence against an SS man, Kruger, for the murder of 175 Polish professors. But, he was never charged with this crime because he was serving multiple life sentences for the murder of thousands of jews. That is the problem with the whole book, is that she fails to see it as a human tragedy, she views it as another in the long struggle for Polish freedom. Another interesting thing about the book that I should mention is the fact it talks about the Soviet Invasion of Poland in 1939 which no one ever seems to remember, and shows the affect of the other great tyranny of that age.

Labels: one woman's war against the nazis

Books: The Story of a life. Last week I continued my reading about the holocaust with this thin volume by Aharon Appelfeld. He was a boy of 7, when the Second World War broke out. He lived in what was then Romania, but previously had been part of Poland. His parents spoke German, and his grandparents spoke Yiddish. The book is interesting because it presents the point of view of a kid, living through an extraordinary, and extraordinary dangerous time. If you read the book, you will be amazed by his powers of survival. Another interesting thing about the book, is that it focuses also on what happened to people who survived the holocaust. Unfortunately, most hollywood movies end after the liberation of the camps, but the story kept on going, and keeps on going. An interesting read.

Adam's Weekend Hockey Update

Ottawa lost to....the Maple Leafs? 3-0? I hope that this is just a burp in their continuing domination of the nhl world.

Labels: Adam's Weekend Hockey Update

So Josh and I, of all people were having an argument about physics. I don't think neither one of us understand it to the point where we can have a detailed understanding of it, but I think our conversation was interesting enough to be repeated for posterity (at least my correct point of view hee heee). My point is that alot of people, including, unfortunately scientists submit to what I call, fuzzy science. What that means is that a scientist discovers something, which currently is unexplained. Like you can observe a particle and it appears to be at two different points simultaneously. There are several possible explanations for this, some more mystical than others. The truth is, we really don't know why it does this. The problem enters into the equation, when those scientists make conclusions that aren't supported by the evidence. That, light is conscious, or that because we fundamentally are energy (like everything else in the universe) that this energy is conscious, and so we have souls, or some kind of consciousness that survives death. And of course, mystical new age types latch on to this as proving whatever theory of soul they have. So they replace one set of false beliefs with another theory which they say has the support of the latest science. There are, of course, responsible quantum physicists who say that their work proves nothing supernatural, but unfortunately, they are rare. I guess people like the most imaginative explanation for things, rather than what can be mundanely proved.

Labels: fuzzy science