On the Road: Mill Valley, California

Click on the Thumbnail for Map

Note: First published on Blogger on April 16, 2007

Unfolding the Map

Sorry I haven't posted, but the dissertation took front and center for awhile. However, I will get in a post once in awhile...besides, a slow journey is often better than a fast one! Click the map to see where we are now! Sal makes it here, to "Mill City" where he meets up with Remi Boncoeur at Remi's cabin where Remi lives with his girlfriend. Chapter 11 continues with a description of his time here, which included working as a "special policeman" at barracks for construction workers heading overseas, probably like a security guard. He spent many of his duty hours getting drunk with the workers. Sal also makes numerous trips into San Francisco, and hangs out with Remi on an abandoned freighter in the Bay.

According to a history of the Homestead Valley in Marin County, Kerouac actually lived with Gary Snyder for some months in a cabin on the property at 370 Montford in Mill Valley, where this marker is situated.

Book Quote

"Mill City, where Remi lived, with a collection of shacks in a valley, housing-project shacks built for Navy Yard workers during the war; it was in a canyon, and a deep one, treed profusely on all slopes. There were special stores and barber shops and tailor shops for the people of the project. It was, so they say, the only community in America where whites and Negroes lived together voluntarily; and that was so, and so wild and joyous a place I've never seen since."

On the Road, Chapter 11

Mill Valley

Mill Valley is one of those little Marin communities that to me was only a sign on the road as we zipped by, multiple times, on the way to San Francisco. I never paid much attention to it. I remember that as you got around the area where the Mill Valley sign was, there was a large building that I always liked to look at. It was very large, space-agey in its design, and pink, with a blue roof I think.  I later learned that it was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.  I used to like to look at this building, partly because it meant that we were almost to the Golden Gate Bridge, and traveling over that was always a thrill for me.

We never really had any reason to stop anywhere in Marin County, unless we needed gasoline. We didn't know anybody there, and frankly, my parents were always uncomfortable stopping in places they didn't know very well. It was hilly, which meant that you couldn't always see the signs right away as you curved around the hills and went in and out of the depressions in the landscape.

My brother-in-law and his wife now life in San Anselmo, in Marin County, and now I have more familiarity with the place. Marin County is most likely not like how Kerouac and Sal experienced it in the late 40s. It tends to house a wealthier class of people, and a more environmentally conscious group of people. The people of Marin County that Sal describes -- rustic Italians and raucous construction workers, now most likely live in other, more blue-collar areas of the Bay Area. A recently proposed Habitat for Humanity project caused much consternation in Marin County, because even as the locals agree that housing should be available for low-income families, they worry about those low-income families depressing their own housing and property values.

Sal, however, given the household troubles between Remi and his girlfriend, as well as his job, finds Mill City a place from which he likes to escape. He spends a lot of time in San Francisco. Finally, Sal steals out in the middle of the night, leaving Remi and his girlfriend to their fate. "Remi and I were lost to each other...," he writes. He heads first for Oakland, and then south.

If you want to know more about Mill Valley

City of Mill Valley
Marin County Independent-Journal Mill Valley page
Mill Valley Film Festival
The Mill Valley Historical Society
Wikipedia: Mill Valley

Next Stop: Oakland

On the Road: Sausalito, California

Click on Thumbnail for MapNote: First published on Blogger on October 15, 2006

Unfolding the Map

Sal has made it to San Francisco, and is now on his way to meet his friend Remi Boncoeur in Mill City. We will continue to follow him on his trip. Click on the image to follow along on the map, if you dare!

Book Quote

"I had just come through the little fishing village of Sausalito, and the first thing I said was, 'There must be a lot of Italians in Sausalito.'"

On the Road, Chapter 11

The quote above is presented a little out of order from what happens in On the Road. In the book, Sal gets to Remi Boncoeur's cabin in Mill City, and then recounts going through Sausalito. But, in the interest of keeping the events right chronologically, I have presented his journey through Sausalito first, just as Sal and Jack experienced it.

Sausalito is known for the houseboats upon which rich Marin County dwellers live. These houseboats, however, are the legacy of something that I think Jack would have enjoyed and have been willing to take part in. In the 1950s, perhaps even before, people interested in living alternative lifestyles created these houseboat communities. They squatted on old boats tied together and created entire communities on the bay that existed on the fringes of society. These communities attracted bohemians and artists, and later hippies, as well as the requisite drugs, alcohol and free-wheeling lifestyles.

But in 1949, when Sal travels through, I think that Sausalito was probably just as he described it...a village full of Italian fishermen and their families. Though you have to wonder, for in the next sentence Remi Boncoeur laughs a knowing laugh...and you can almost hear him winking as he repeats Sal's line back to him, "There must be a lot of Italians in Sausalito! Aaaaaaah!".

Of course, Sal would never recognize Sausalito now. The Italian fishing village is gone. Their successors, the bohemians and hippies who moved onto barely-floating junkers, are gone, replaced by dot.com millionaires who pay top dollar for these houseboats. The wild days of grass and booze and protest songs sung by circles of squatters are now replaced by the clinking of cocktail glasses and soft jazz. The sights and smells of an Italian fishing village are replaced by upscale shops that attract tourists with lots of money to burn.

Perhaps it is the circle of life. Everywhere you look, the fringe becomes hip. It doesn't matter what or where. Raw music of the sixties and seventies sells cars and computers today. Food and clothing styles, so common in one era, become the next generation's paragon of unhipness, only to be discovered anew two to three generations down the road and brought back into the limelight again.

Maybe once again, after a really bad economic downturn or social upheaval, the houseboats of Sausalito will once again be the haven of squatters and outcasts. Or maybe not. Perhaps Jack's comment about Sausalito revealed not only his surprise, but his ignorance of what was to come, and perhaps Remi's reply reveals more prescience than we expect.

If you want to know more about Sausalito

City of Sausalito
History of Sausalito
Houseboats of Sausalito
Wikipedia: Sausalito

Next stop: Mill City, California (Mill Valley?)

On the Road: San Francisco, California

Click on Thumbnail to see MapNote:  First published on Blogger on October 2, 2006

Unfolding the Map

Sal has reached his initial destination, Littourati! We are now in San Francisco. Of course, this isn't the end of his travels On the Road, and we'll continue to follow him. As always, a click on the image will get you to the map.

Book Quote

"...I was rudely jolted in the bus station at Market and Fourth into the memory of the fact that I was three thousand two hundred miles from my aunt's house in Paterson, New Jersey. I wandered out like a haggard ghost, and there she was, Frisco -- long, bleak streets with trolley wires all shrouded in fog and whiteness. I stumbled around a few blocks. Weird bums (Mission and Third) asked me for dimes in the dawn. I heard music somewhere."

On the Road, Chapter 11

San Francisco, California

First of all, a warning to anyone heading to San Francisco. Jack and Sal obviously didn't know this little tidbit, but it's true. Native San Franciscans (I know, are there really any? But believe me, there are. One of my best friends is a native!), native San Franciscans HATE the word "Frisco," which Sal and Jack use with abandon in the novel. It's always "San Francisco." Using the word "Frisco" or even "San Fran" marks you as a tourist.

When I lived in San Antonio, natives there felt the same way about the words "San Antone." The words "San Antonio", spoken with a slight inflection of Spanish, carried the rich and vibrant history of the majority Hispanic dwellers there. "San Antone" was an anglicized-Texanized creation that seemed to some to cheapen all that. It's the same with San Francisco -- the name itself rolls musically off the tongue and conveys the history and meaning of California's Spanish past in a way that makes "Frisco" seem almost rough, rude and vulgar. It's funny that there seems to be something about the given name of a place that makes people who live there very protective of its sanctity, much as we individuals get somewhat defensive when someone springs a new and unwelcome nickname on us.

That being said, San Francisco was the largest big city close to where I grew up. It is one of my favorite cities on all the earth, and I consider it one of the few truly unique American cities. My friend who lives in the city has taken me for extensive walks around it, and therefore I've seen the length and breadth of the place. The whole city remains mysterious to me, and no matter how much I walk or ride through it, it yields new mysteries. It's people are friendly, but reserved and often seeking self-enlightenment or empowerment. It always seemed to me like a place where it would be difficult to make friends. But there are so many non-human things to see and do. Situated on the end of a peninsula at the entrance to a beautiful bay, surrounded and penetrated by hills and mountains, it is a nature lover's paradise. San Francisco's quirkiness, from the environmental to the political to the social, never ceases to amaze.

Jack hints at what he will later find in more extensive visits into the city, describing the "weird bums" he encounters in the downtown. Usually one would not describe bums, just call them bums. But Jack has Sal describe them as "weird." Even the panhandlers, so common in cities around the country and I assume in Jack's and Sal's experience in New York, have something different about them in San Francisco.

The fog is another thing that Jack has Sal mention. It is one of the things I love about San Francisco, though the fog can be a point of contention. In summers, the fog shows up usually in the afternoon, pulled into the city by warm air to the east in the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys. When my wife's brother lived on a hill in the Mission District, we used to watch the fog slowly envelop Twin Peaks like a giant claw, spilling over the top and down the slopes like beer suds over the lip of a glass. Sometimes it would only come halfway into the city, leaving the eastern half bathed in a muted sunlight. Other times, it would envelop the whole city, dulling the colors of the buildings and muffling the city sounds. My friend, who lives in the Sunset District close to the Pacific, absolutely hates the month of August, where he might go the entire month without seeing the sun. But for me, the fog is a magical, almost living thing in itself and I feel strangely comfortable within its grasp.

San Francisco is also one of the true melting pot cities. I love the myriads of different types of food you can find there, testifying to all the ethnicities that have made it home. This melting pot does not just extend to ethnicities, however. San Francisco seems to be the place where everyone who feels a little different and a little left out of mainstream America ends up. There are almost as many causes and belief systems as there are people in San Francisco.

Most recently, my wife and I spent part of an afternoon in the North Beach area, where Jack hung out a lot in his visits there. The sun was shining, and as we sat in a little bar and ate sandwiches off a park, I looked out at the extensive numbers of people hanging out in the park despite the fact it was a work day. I'd like to think that the area hasn't changed much since Jack was there. Perhaps the young men are as interested in their skateboards now as in the young women in the park, and now everyone is outfitted with a cell phone, but otherwise, I'm pretty sure that Jack would feel right at home there today. I think that this nature of the city, it's strangeness, eclecticness, and insularity but also its elements that are seemingly impervious to change, are some of the reasons why Jack stayed there so long, and made it the first goal of the main character of his novel. The Beats thrived in San Francisco, and their voices became stronger, more pronounced, and recognizable in the city's unique environment. Later of course, other voices would emerge from San Francisco, but in 1947, this mysterious place must have seemed as alien and exciting to Jack and Sal as any place they had ever been.

If you want to know more about San Francisco

A Beat Tour through San Francisco
The Beat Museum in North Beach
Google Map of Neal Cassady's House in North Beach where Jack stayed briefly
North Beach
San Francisco's Historic North Beach
San Francisco Magazine
SFGate
SFGov
Wikipedia: San Francisco

Next up: Mill City (Mill Valley)

On the Road: Oakland Bay Bridge

Click on Thumbnail for Map

Note: First published on Blogger on September 30, 2006

Unfolding the Map

We are bridging the gap between Sal and San Francisco as we hit the Oakland Bay Bridge, with the lights of San Francisco in our sights. Click on the image if you want to see the map!

Book Quote

"...into the hills again; up, down; and suddenly the vast expanse of a bay (it was just before dawn) with the sleepy lights of Frisco festooned across. Over the Oakland Bay Bridge I slept soundly for the first time since Denver..."

On the Road, Chapter 11

Oakland Bay Bridge

The Oakland Bay Bridge is one of eight large toll bridges in the Bay Area, the others being the Golden Gate, the San Mateo-Hayward Bridge, the Dumbarton Bridge, the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, the Carquinez Bridge, the Benicia-Martinez Bridge, and the Antioch Bridge. Of these bridges, the Antioch is the oldest with the original structure completed in 1926. It is followed by the Dumbarton (1927), the Carquinez (1927), the Oakland Bay (1936), the Golden Gate (1937), the Richmond-San Rafael (1956), the Benicia (1962) and the San Mateo-Hayward (1967).

The Golden Gate is probably the gifted, shining, magnificent middle child of the bridges, gathering the most attention, plastered all over millions of photo albums and books, star of countless home and studio movies, and darling of the press worldwide. Of all the bridges, the Golden Gate is considered an architectural and cultural icon and is the one that most people worry about: Can it survive the big earthquake? Will terrorists strike it? Which is ironic, considering that during the last big earthquake in the 1980s the Oakland Bay Bridge sustained the most damage to its structure out of all the bridges.

None of the other bridges comes really close to the Golden Gate's star power, though the Oakland Bay Bridge has appeared in its share of movies. Dustin Hoffman drives over it in The Graduate toward Berkeley, though the movie shows him actually driving toward San Francisco, and it appears in the Hitchcock thriller Vertigo. Of the other bridges, I vaguely remember a 90s movie called Sneakers in which a character is kidnapped, thrown into a car trunk and taken to an evil guy's headquarters, and his computer genius buddies help him figure out where the evil guy's headquarters are by reconstructing sounds along the route. One of the sounds he identifies is the sound of the car's tires hitting concrete sections, and they are able to determine that he was traveling at 55 miles per hour over either the Dumbarton or San Mateo-Hayward Bridge (I can't exactly remember which one).

However, despite its name, the Golden Gate is oriented in the wrong direction to be considered the true gateway to San Francisco for people traveling by car or bus like Sal or Jack. Especially in modern times, as travel by ship is almost non-existent, replaced by vehicles and aircraft, people either enter into San Francisco by the south from the airport, or across the Oakland Bay Bridge on Interstate 80. Most of the people who use the Golden Gate Bridge are commuters to and from their homes in the North Bay. For the traveler driving, the Oakland Bay Bridge more often provides the first view of San Francisco.

I have been on most of the bridges of the Bay Area, and I love them. I still refer to the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge as the "roller coaster" bridge because of its two dramatic rises and falls over the shipping lanes. I love driving the Golden Gate on a clear day, and seeing clear out to the Farallon Islands in the distance, and the Presidio and Marina District stretched out on my right. However, the view of the San Francisco skyline on the Oakland Bay Bridge after one passes through Yerba Buena Island is unparalleled anwhere that I've been. The bridge enters San Francisco just to the south of the famed waterfront, and the whole of the downtown is laid out to your right as you just marvel. The closest I've come to this type of view is on the Brooklyn Bridge, and to really get a similar perspective there, you must walk it. But on the Oakland Bay Bridge, you can marvel in your car as you drive into the heart of San Francisco. We last drove across this bridge from the Oakland Airport this past summer, and I was struck again with the beauty of the skyline going into San Francisco.

My parents, always very timid city drivers, once found themselves on the onramp to the Oakland Bay Bridge with no escape -- it wasn't where they wanted to go, they were late for an appointment and it meant at least a half-hour of driving time to go across the bridge and come back. As they got to the toll booths, my father explained the situation to the toll collector. In a testament to the community spirit and kindness of a time past, the toll attendant offered to help them. He strode out into traffic and stopped the cars coming the other way in order to allow my father to make a u-turn into the other lanes and get back on the right course. My father always thought that he was the only one to ever stop traffic (other than a traffic jam) on the Oakland Bay Bridge and told that story with pride. I doubt that something similar would happen today.

So, does the bridge make an impression on Sal? True to form and befitting its second wheel status, Sal pays no attention to the poor Oakland Bay Bridge. He sleeps while his bus drives into the heart of San Francisco.

If you want to know more about the bridges of the Bay Area

Bay Area Toll Authority
Bridges in the United States and Canada
Bridging the Bay Department of Transportation: San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge
Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District
San Francisco Museum: Archival construction photos of the Golden Gate and SF-Oakland Bay Bridge
Wikipedia: Golden Gate Bridge
Wikipedia: San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge

Next stop: San Francisco!

On the Road: Sacramento, California

Click on Thumbnail for MapNote:  First published on Blogger on September 24, 2006

We've hit the central valley, Littourati, and are almost within sight of San Francisco. But first, something about California's capitol. Click on the image to see our progress.

Book Quote

"...then down the hills to the flats of Sacramento. I suddenly realized I was in California. Warm, palmy air -- air you can kiss -- and palms. Along the storied Sacramento River on a superhighway..."

On the Road, Chapter 11

Sacramento, California

Sacramento is the capitol of my home state, and a city I really don't know much about, even though my sister currently lives and works there. Why is this? I think that part of it was my upbringing in rural northern California. One thing that becomes apparent upon a visit to California is that the length of the state allows for very different experiences of environment and cultures wherever you are. You can find urban California, rural California, even redneck California. I grew up in "its sometimes scary where you walk in the woods because some bearded solitary pot grower will shoot you" California. And it becomes apparent when you talk to Californians that they live in their own little microcosms.

Besides that, Sacramento is probably the least flashy of California's urban areas. The downtown is nice but not very impressive. It doesn't have the chic- and plasticness of Los Angeles, nor does it have the countercultural flair of San Francisco. Sacramento is probably California's plainest city, almost perfect to house the massive state bureaucracy. It is very uninteresting to those used to more high-profile California places; even the governor, Schwarzenegger, only goes there when he has to.

However, Sacramento, from the reports of my sister, has a lively music scene, and a laid-back kind of urban atmosphere. The heat in the summer, often triple digits, means that there are few venturing outdoors, but in the winters when the temperatures are cooler (and providing it isn't raining cats and dogs) one will see a cross section of California. It is home to Sacramento State University, a large campus that draws from around the state.

Of course, Sacramento does have a storied tradition about it. It grew up in the gold rush, starting at Sutter's Fort, and was the often the first major stop for those who happened to make it across the Sierra Nevada and into the Golden State. During the gold rush, miners spread out from the city into the streams where they hoped to make a big strike. They built Sacramento by spending money there, enriching Sacramento's coffers as they bought supplies for their expeditions.

In the late 1940s, when Sal passes through in On the Road, Sacramento was much smaller, and probably had a kind of big-small town feeling about it. Of course Sal didn't stop, his eyes firmly fixed on San Francisco, and I'm not sure what he would have found there if he did.

My own experiences in Sacramento have been mostly benign affairs. I usually hang out with my sister in her little downtown apartment. Occasionally we go to some of her favorite places to eat. Unfortunately, she's never taken me to her favorite clubs to see her favorite local bands, but that's mostly been because of my schedule. Like Sal and Jack, when I get to Sacramento, my eyes are usually fixed on some other goal -- like getting to my family's house on the coast, or going down to meet some friends in San Francisco. That has left little time and motivation to explore Sacramento myself.

In a sense, that's the history of Sacramento -- individuals who live there who know and value its secrets and are perfectly willing to let others, their eyes fixed on some other goal, pass through unaware of what they may be missing.

If you want to know more about Sacramento

City of Sacramento
Sacramento's Music History
Sacramento State University
Sutter's Fort
Virtual Museum of Sutter's Fort
Wikipedia: Sacramento
Wikipedia: Sacramento River

Next stop: Oakland Bay Bridge