GARGOZO MANUSCRIPT

Art majors in their senior year at Occidental were required to submit plans for what was referred to as their "comprehensives".  The intent was for each student to produce a large scale creative effort that would serve as a culmination of the dozen or so art courses they had completed.  Students submitted a proposal describing their project in terms of concept, medium and exhibit details.  Once approved, you were given some money to help cover the cost of the materials.  The completed work was evaluated by a panel consisting of three members of the Art Department faculty.  This final project was the last hurdle for me to graduate. I had seen Edward Kienholz's work earlier that year (1966) at the Los Angeles County Art Museum.  He was called a "raging satirist" who created massive and dreary assemblages that pointed out just how ugly the truth can be.  He had also come to our college to give a talk to the art majors.  When th...

I had driven up from Los Angeles on Friday for another weekend of madness with my runyonesque friend.  It was now early Sunday morning, I was sitting at Munson's desk with some coffee and the Chronicle.  In five hours, Munson would be up to begin the series of rituals that make up each of his days.  It will start with a trip to the bathroom, physical complaints, a sinus-cleansing cacophony, coffee, cigarette, and turning on TVG to catch the first race.   Early influences include a twelve-year-old Munson home with mom listening to the stretch call on the radio, when The Donut King (a tip from mom's boss), came in to give them their first winner.  Growing up in a home where the family competed at cards and board games like gladiators, and living a stone's throw from Santa Anita, were also factors.   I was looking at a diagram showing the living room and den where I was seated.  It was hand-drawn on yellow legal paper and had been p...

Both of our boys, Michael age 8 and Marc age 4, had been attending a private school for the last ten weeks.  Verdugo Valley School was a winner, an idyllic setting among trees in the foothills, safe and well maintained, colorful and industrious classrooms, filled with cheerful and obedient children who were overseen by a tastefully attired staff.  How could we have been so fortunate?  We had come to the school for a parent-teacher conference and were caught off guard when Ms. Finch, Michael's teacher, expressed grave concern.  She suggested that we give serious consideration to institutionalizing Michael, where hopefully, the necessary skills and experience would be available to properly address his special needs.  Thankful that she had closed the door for our session, we asked what had led her to this conclusion.  She explained that when the class began each morning, all of the children would remove their jackets and sweaters and tak...

My family purchased our first television in 1949 when it was the latest novelty.  The screen was about the size of an iPad with black and white viewing, but we never considered these as limitations.  The initial programming was pretty weak but they at least had the good sense to go off the air when it was time to be in bed.  At the end of the broadcast day, the national anthem played as an American flag with forty-eight stars, filled the screen, flapping in the breeze.  When the anthem was over, the screen would fill with a test pattern featuring a Native American in full headdress, signaling that the station had signed off.  A minute later, the test pattern would disappear as the transmitting engineer cut off all power as required by the FCC.    The ads shown on television at that time contributed to the overall experience.  If you watched TV anywhere in Southern California during the 1950s, there were commercials you could no...

While employed by Blue Cross of Southern California in the early 1970s, Dave and I were sent off to San Francisco to attend a two-day project management seminar.  We reserved rooms at the Mark Hopkins Hotel located on Knob Hill where the seminar was being held.  The Mark Hopkins at that time was among the select landmarks associated with the City of San Francisco.  The hotel was constructed on the former site of the Hopkins Mansion which was destroyed in the 1906 earthquake and fire.  The hotel's restaurant and lounge "The Top of the Mark", was always rated among the city's top five restaurants in a city where you arguably couldn't distinguish between the top fifty.  Celebrated for its views, the restaurant's perch was created in 1939 when the hotel's owner converted eleven penthouse suites, and encircled the 19 th floor with floor-to-ceiling glass.  The lounge offers 100 martini variations while the restaurant is characterized as fine d...

John was teaching at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo in the late 1960s.  He and Nancy were living in a house on the out skirts of a small town called Los Osos.  Someone living in Los Angeles at the time, such as myself, would have described Los Osos as "out in the sticks".  Someone living in Los Osos at the time, would have described their house as out in the sticks.  The house sat on the southern end of Moro Bay and was within twenty yards of the water's edge.  There were a handful of other houses in the same general area, but other than the summer months, they remained vacant for the most part.  We had stayed friends since meeting in college a few years before.  John and Nancy had grown up in Galesburg, Illinois, current population around 30,000, or In other words, out in the sticks.  They planned to go back to Illinois for a couple of weeks during the Christmas holidays and I was to stay at their place while they were away, to kee...