Visit to San Fran - 1925 and beyond, home of Lewis Glessner Family - Layers of history in the Golden City by the Bay

Here is where I have set up "office" at the Church St Cafe' just a 5 min walk from Alter'Nathan's flat on Dolores here in the Mission.  Very colorful mix of people.  I met Rick Borutta here yesterday on our way to visit the City!

Raining a little during my walk up to Greco Cafe in North Beach, seeing the edge of Chinatown, and the bookstore where the "Beat Generation" folks hung out to envision what "On the Road, and Howl" might look like.   An older part of the City where Rick mentioned even the Cockette's got their start back before the Castro was the center of rainbow activity. 

I have been learning some pu tong hua, Mandarin Chinese and here is the Chinatown Branch Library on Powell where we found the cable car to Post Street where Lewis Wm Glessner died at the opulent Elks Club in May of 1964. Happy for the online research through Ancestry.com that I did before this trip!

Nice signs to practice your Chinese reading! 

Rick Borutta waiting for Ken Cottura, Elks Lodge Secretary, and a third generation of Italian SF native family to welcome us here. He found a card showing Lewis W Glessner was a paid member for 1963-64 and that he died May 5, 1964.   The funeral home, Carew and English wrote that he died at 456 Post Street Elks Club on May 5, on May 6, 1964.  Uncle Lewis was mentioned in Peg Weaver's autobiography as leaving Findlay OH suddenly in 1925, and her two cousins, John and Bob left too.  On line I discovered that Uncle Lewis died on May 1964 and his ashes went to a cemetery in Saratoga near San Jose. 

Ken is pointing to the front of the Elks Lodge as it appeared in 1925 along with the collage of black and white photos here in his office. 

Here is Rick as we enjoy a Prohibition Brew, a local nice mellow drink at the bar, perhaps where Lewis and even his son, Robert, of LW Glessner and Sons listed in 1945 at 265 Market Street and his home that year, 940 Union Street.

Our food, Rick a burger and fries, mine a chef special of penne chicken in sauce, with a side salad!

Wonderful to share in the old ambience here!

After seeing the film LINCOLN last weekend, Steven Spielberg's vision of the last 4 years of Lincoln's life.  Others have suggested Lincoln had many men in his life.  Wonder what this Play Bill is referring to.   This was on the stairs in the Elks Buidling as there is theater in the building. 

Rick led me to the City Hall, in the Civic Center Complex. Here is the dome underwhich there were some weddings happening today!

World Tree of Hope, sponsored by some LGBTQ group with origami Cranes.

Rick looking at the tree in the City Hall. 

Rick with the bust of Harvey Milk and the red ribbon next to the tree.

And here I am with Harvey Milk too.  

Grief and Praise on the Prairie and the Woods

When I heard about panels of the AIDS quilt was coming back to the Twin Cities, I knew it was important to visit and honor those I knew from the beginning of the epidemic in Minnesota in the 1980's  Dec 2, was the last day of the exhibit and here, is The Grace House Panel with Keith Gann.  I remember spending time with Perry Tilleraas, from Blooming Prairie MN, The Author of The Color of Light, Daily Meditations of All of Us Living with AIDS, when he was writing his meditation book that still inspires me.   I was a practicing allopathic doctor, MD, and learned from epidemiolgists like Mike Osterholm about the dangers of HIV infection and the hepatitis viruses as well.   Such fear and ignorance of "gay's as other".  Somehow that same "us versus them" dualism keeps people from being aware of the truth of our neighbors as equals and that equal rights is part of our countries traditions.  Like with film Lincoln, how making a law to stop slavery during the war AND at the same time, the Dakota's were left out!  

A new panel at Wilde Roast to honor the partner and lover of my friend Ankha Shamin, who died at age 37.  Ankha passed this year in April at age 61.  His papers and letters as a gay activists have been placed in the Tretter Collection Archives at the U of Minnesota. 

Happy to share this event and talk over Cha, Tea and Kafei, Coffee with my Mandarin Chinese Tutor Dan, AKA Zijun.   He is a very smart young man with dreams of building educational connections for Chinese students to learn English to attend American Universities.   I feel so much hope for the world when I see the spirit in younger people for international understanding.   He has been very patient with my progress in learning tonal Chinese words.  Thanks xie xie ni Zijun! 

Recently historians have been looking more deeply at the roots of the Prairie Conflict in 1862 here in Minnesota.  My good friend Gary Engler sent me the link to the Nov 20 Little War on the Prairie

NOV 23, 2012

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/479/little-war-on-the-prairie?act=0#play

An hour long audio.  Well worth listening to. 

One of my personal journeys back to the Prairie was in June of 2010 with Andy Mickel from my MKP I group and his friend Pam, from Austin Texas who had relatives who lived in New Ulm where the Dakota attacked in 1982.   They did leave the brewery intact as they had good relations with the German brewers I hear.   This is where we ate before walking to the site of the hanging of the 38 men on the day after Christmas in 1862.    Lincoln was president and Sibley and Ramsey did their thing to get the land of the Dakota and the traders like Myrck, did not share the food as they were more interested in gold and riches.  Some things never change. 

Wanda Gag's home in Mankato.  Andy arranged for a personal tour. 

Millions of Cats, one of the children's books I remember reading as a kid.   Note all the languages it is translated into. Cats seem to be a universal human connection for kids of all ages. 

Cement quote on the sidewalk addressing the 38 men who were hung here.  Still the largest mass execution in American History 

This is the white buffalo sculpture at the site of the mass hanging with the Prayer of Amos Owen.  Pam from Austin Texas and I are here in June of 2010.  On a journey to honor the memory of the ancestors who lived on the the prairie and some who died as warriors to try to feed their people and maintain their  ways to connect to the land in a good way. 

Amos Owens' medicine prayer to the directions and honoring the ancestors in a good way.  Translated from the Dakota into English.   Amos sons, Art and Ray have carried on the traditions on Tinte Winte, Prairie Island. 

Fostering Education - Greg Larsen, Shattuck School John Burt Foster and his parents Faribault MN

 1960 photo taken by Paul H Weaver MD, of the building that housed the Shattuck Infirmary when my father, and Walter Rumpf MD were the doctors at Shattuck. Early in my fathers medical career, when he moved to Faribault in the summer of 1939, his practice partner, C Walter Rumpf MD, was associated with Shuttuck School (see below, C Walter was a 1915 Graduate of Shattuck).  He supported my father by sharing daily afternoon sick call on the Shattuck Campus, that I remember was still going strong in the early 1960's. This building has recently been converted into the Inn At Shattuck St Mary's -  http://www.theinnatssm.org/

 
Here in the winter, 1960, is the 1957 Mercury Station Wagon my father drove in front of the Infirmary building.   

 Here in 1952, with a ill shad boy, is my father, Paul H Weaver MD checking his pulse, with two of the staff nurses at his side.  

In this 1942 panorama photo, taken by Young Studio, my father #15, with good friend Ken Agerter #19 in the front row, are in the same photo as one of the most famous students at the school, Marlon Brando, the actor, is #238 in the back row.   My dad, supposedly saw Marlon in the infirmary back in the day.

I was asked by Laurie Larsen to sing an Anglican-Episcopal song, The Call, by Ralph Vaughn Williams during the ceremony of ashes interment at the Cathedral in Faribault in the autumn of 2012.  My green pony, 1998 Dodge Caravan is on the left with the image of the bearded mixed blood, Alexander Faribault, French and Dakota heritage with his full beard and the viaduct bright over the Straight River and the Cathedral Tower on the right.  Henry Benjamin Whipple, (Feb 15, 1822 Adams, NY - Sept 16, 1901 Faribault MN) was elected first Bishop of Minnesota in 1859, according to the author Anne Bieser Allen, in the 2008 book And the Wilderness Shall Blossom, Henry Benjamin Whipple  Churchman  Educator Advocate for the Indians.   On July 16, 1862 according to her research Whipple laid the cornerstone for the Cathdral which was completed in the 1860's.  The Bell Tower here was added after his death in 1902 through the work of his second wife, Evangeline, who stayed in Faribault after his death until 1910, when she moved to Italy to reconnect with Rose Cleveland in the Tuscan town of Bagni di Lucca.   It was through her bequest at the time of her death in London in 1930  that a crypt with a stone altar was constructed in 1934 beneath the Cathedral.   In the mid 1990's according to Dean Jim Zolatis who preformed the ceremony on Saturday, that the niches were added to create a columbarium where the ashes of have been laid to rest. During the short service in the crypt facilitated through Dean Jim Zolatis we were invited to share our  stories about Greg Larsen the music teacher, director and educator, how he entered the hearts and minds of so many over the years. Laurie and Lisa Larsen commented on how many Shattuck Students had entered comments on Greg's Caring Bridge website.   Lisa, Greg's sister came with her husband Ray from Helena Montana where she does ecological restoration.   Greg's youngest son, Joe Larsen was accompanied by Lucy Cosgrove whose grandfather attended Shattuck, and who experienced St Paul YMCA's Camp Widjiwagan.

Here is Gary Fechner who knew Greg from the Tatepaha "Windy Hill" neighborhood of SouthWest Faribault, with Dean Jim Zolatis of wonderful Greek heritage and stories, Laurie Larsen, Ray and Lisa.  Basement under the nave of the Cathedral.

Laurie is serving up the Peter Beck recipe of picnic Chocolate Cake, a Larsen family favorite in the Gipson Cloister area of the Cathedral that has become part of the educational museum for the Cathedral.

Here is one archival print that is one the wall of the Gipson Cloister Room and new entrance to the Cathedral. I have dated this at about 1898 as Bishop Whipple seated, married Evangeline Marrs Simpson in New York in Oct 1896, widow of Michael Simpson, a wealthy textile manufacturer.  He was 74 and she was 38. 

According to the writing of Anne Beiser Allen -   Whipple had met Rose Cleveland who served as President Grover Cleveland's hostess at the White House until the president married in 1886.  Rose Cleveland spent the winters in Maitland Florida with her dear friend, Evangline Simpson where Whipple baptized both women on March 29, 1895 at the Church of the Good Shepard, Maitland FL

see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_the_Good_Shepherd_(Maitland,_Florida)

Gipson room with Dean Zolatis. Laurie Larsen, Joe Larsen, Lucy Cosgrove and Lisa Larsen. 

Redbud Tree as a backdrop to Ray and Lisa from Montana. Gary Fechner from Manitowoc Wisconsin, his brother in law, Fred Neubert in red shirt, from Faribault now living in Sauk Center MN, Tom W in back with hat, and Jason Fechner, Gary and Cheryl Neubert's son, who lives in Manitowoc, Wisconsin.

Ray, Lisa, Gary, Fred, Jason with Tom W in front with my hat. Ready to

sing show tunes to honor Greg Larsen!   Thanks Gregory Searles Larsen for your sense of humor, good heart and many friendships for bringing this crew together to celebrate your life! 

Speaking of education, I do like to write about the redbud, native to Ohio and areas further south in America, that now seems to thrive in our area.  Perhaps a harbinger of the global changes in weather. Hurricane Sandy 

Oct. 30, 07:54 a.m.: It’s estimated that over seven million people in the Northeast are without power.

Read more: http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/10/28/hurricane-sandy-updates/#ixzz2An9JrPbz

The Bell Tower with a cedar wax wing, one of the zinkala oyate, bird nation in D/Lakota, that was a favorite of my mom, Peg Weaver, sitting in the crab apple in the Cathedral Garden. 

Close up of Cedar Wax Wing in Crabapple. 

Louis and Larose Carufel House  Built in  1877

According to the historic website for Faribault Limestone Buildings 

http://faribaulthpc.org/limestone-building-traditions/virtual-tour

"Stone mason Charles O’Brien crafted this rare and striking Gothic Revival home for feed mill owner Louis Carufel. . Following principles espoused by Andrew Jackson Downing, who promoted the style as ideal for gracious home life, the house was situated in a park-like setting on the edge of town. The home was later owned by other prominent Faribault businessmen, including W.E. Shaft, founder of the Shaft-Pierce Shoe Company, and his son, W. Stewart Shaft, who became president of the Nutting Caster Company."

Portrait of Louis Carufel, filed under "d" as the Name was de Carufel from the French Canadian.  Susan Garwood of the Rice County History Museum found this in the archives yesterday, Oct 7, 2014,  and very grateful she scanned a tif file for Jeff Jarvis who is writing a history of the Mills of the Cannon River Valley. 

According to the Margaret Weaver autobiography, Rememberings,   Paul and Margaret Weaver, purchased the home in 1943 from the Timothy Powers Family and sold it in 1976 to the Tom Gagnon Family. 

Lisa and Ray in the front yard of the Carufel House, Built by the French miller in 1877 and stewarded by the Weaver family from 1943 - 1976.   When we lived there, I would mow the lawn with a push Briggs and Stratton, and it would take 5 1/2 hours as it was 5 city lots in size.  The Jazinski family who owned Al's Bar in the back built on the 6th lot I am told that was sold off sometime prior to 1943.   

Gary and Jason Fechner, Lisa Larsen, Joe Larsen and Lucy Cosgrove,

Ray Flaherty and Laurie Larsen on the west side of the Carufel Build home, where Tom W was raised, 1947 - 1965.  Called by the neighbors as "Weaver's Woods" especially during Halloween! 

Gary and Jason Fechner, Lucy Cosgrove, Joe Larsen, Ray Flaherty and Laurie Larsen, among the patio  furnature and garden, viewing the solarium added to the Carufel home by the current owners Tom and Linda Gagnon.  

Ray Flaherty, Joe, Lisa Larsen with Lucy Cosgrove in front of the Larsen cape cod home at 520 SW 4th St.   Fun to learn from Gary Fechner, the street he was raised on Tyman Place, was named by the construction workers. They would meet at the same time and place to build homes and eventually the developer called it that.  It blends into SW 6th Avenue at the corner below this photo. Thanks Gary for the story!

While walking around Shumway Hall of Shattuck School, Lucy found the names of Cosgroves here who had been here before the second world war.  I found here, the names of two scholars who were important in the life of our family.    C Walter Rumpf, here a 1915 Shad, became a doctor and mentor to my father in the medical practice they shared.  My dad and Dr Walter, as he was called shared the sick call for the Shads in the 40's and 50's.  One of my dad's patients was Marlon Brando, who is on a photo with my dad in 1942.   John Burt Foster 1928-29, looks like a 1929 grad of Shattuck was on the 96% academic list for two years.   His parents, John and Bern Foster welcomed my parents into the Episcopal community along with C Walter Rumpf, a clinic partner of my father.   John Burt Foster has been an inspiration to me as he went to China in the 1930's and taught in Wuhan.  His story has been written by Richard Terrill in The Cross and the Red Star, Asian Pacific Foundation c 1994.

 

 I took this photo in 1969 with the tall European large tree on the other side of the house.  Here is the snow of another Minnesota winter.  The narrow porch is now a solarium with more glass as remodeled by the Gagnon Family after my parents sold in 1976.

 

Here is 1868 currency from 1868 when local banks released their own currency. First National Bank of Faribault signed by Thomas S Buckham Cashier and Thomas B Clement President. Perhaps Carufel used this kind of money to pay in 1877 when he build the house.  Comments welcome and appreciated .

   

Sunny Sunday Autumn Biking Minneapolis - Zhongguo Pengyou!

Zijun "Dan" Zhou from Fujian China has been my Mandarin Chinese teacher this fall. A U of M Graduate Student.  He is with Xijing Zhang, his landlord from Wuhan China who has lived in the Twin Cities for 15 years now.  Here we are near the Mississippi River Gorge to start our 20 mile trip west to Uptown and the Minneapolis Lakes via the Greenway.  This was the first time for Zijun to wear the safety helmet here in the US!   Safety first I always say.  

I am following Dan west on the Greenway as the path travels in the old rail bed. 

Arriving in the Uptown Lakes area, we first circled Lake of the Isles, on the trails in Minneapolis reserved only for bicycles.  Again Zijun commented that not many trails just for bicycles in China. 

I led the group of the 3 of us, into the Kenwood neighborhood where the Lytle Family, is restoring a 1920's home on Sheridan near a small section of Franklin by 21st.  As no one was working there at lunch time, we found the beautiful flowers, chrysanthamums here at the corner of Queen and 21st on the way back to Lake of the Isles.  Zijun and Tom W, the author here with our mountain bikes and helmets.   Zijun commented many of the homes look like "castles".  

With Zijun in the lead bike, here is a view of Lake of the Isles in Autumn foliage looking southwest. 

One of the "castles" along Lake of the Isles Parkway on our ride.

After circling Lake of the Isles, we went along the east side of Lake Calhoun and then to Lake Harriet. Here we stopped at the Como-Lake Harriet Street Car Line where we met some of the volunteers who run the historic line that stopped running in 1954.  I remember as a boy looking down at the yellow street cars from the Foshay Tower, then the tallest building in the Twin Cities still in the early 1950's. Fun that inside the building Zijun and I met Bill Graham a volunteer whose son Tony who now lives in Vancouver BC, had studied in China and now works for the famous bank HSBC there.  I hope to follow up with Bill and Tony as my Rosen Method Training likely will led me to Vancouver to the Cascadia Center there.   Happy, Kaixin "open heart" to have all the fun connections. Xie xie ni also for the beautiful day and ride! 

Inside streetcar #1300, decorated for Hallowween with a Volunteer in the isle.

Many families riding the street car on a Sunday in Autumn. 

Fun to see old advertisements.  Remember Gluek's Beer one of the local brews back in the day.

Learned that Ben Gay was from a French Man's name pronouced

Ben Gay and Spelling Dr Bengue when I check it out on line. Fun to 

notice how the English language changes, and even the brand name spelling changes. 

Another product with methyl salicilate. Smells like fresh wild wintergreen in my experience. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengay

And the light golden Grain Belt beer. I wonder how many readers still remember the Stanley and Albert jingle.  I'm Stanley, I'm Albert we hope to bring you cheer.  Been a long long time a brew oo ing, Grain Belt Premium Beer!  

http://www.grainbelt.com/history.php

And here the Zephyr Trains, leaving for Chicago Twice a Day from Both Minneapolis And St Paul. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin_Cities_Zephyr

Zijun here at the end of the ride.  Happy that Dan was so assertive that he asked to have the photos taken!  I enjoy giving tours of the Twin Cities and perhaps Zijun will be my tour guide if and when I return to Shanghai and other places in Zhongguo.  Xie xie ni and Zaijin for a nice Sunday in the Twin Cities, Oct 21 20121

Autumn Bike Riding in Minnesota

Bob from Bloomington near Highland Park, where this photo was taken, has been a great guide and support person for me to get out and ride this year!  This photo was taken on an 8 mile jaunt last Sunday.  The white barked trees were like something from an Impressionist painting recalled Bob. So I was curious about this as it did not have the appearance of any of our native poplars or birch.  

Just to the south on the trail, Bob took this photo of me in front of the extensive prairie at Highland.  Fun to walk and ride the trails any time of year.

Here are the leaves of the White Poplar native to Europe and Asia.  The bright white is on the under side and was so striking on our trip.    Grateful for the continued learnings from Nature and especially the chan oyate, the tree nation who are well rooted and well grounded to Ina Maka, Mother Earth.  Thanks for their give away of oxygen and being such good teachers about how to let go, and the cycle of life.   Mitakuye Oyasin.