Published Occasionally by the Friends of the Bancroft Library University of California, Berkeley, California 94720
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PUBLISHED OCCASIONALLY BY THE FRIENDS OF THE BANCROFT LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA 94720 No. January, i$J() August 30th, has now been documented by the Library's Regional Oral History Office in a recently-completed two-volume com pendium of interviews with architects, land scape architects, contractors, clients, and writers on gardening. Born in Boston in 1902, Church grew up in California's Ojai Valley, graduated in 1922 from the University's College of Agri culture, wherein lay landscape gardening studies at Berkeley, and went east to Har vard's Graduate School of Design. There he was awarded a Sheldon Traveling Fellowship that introduced him to the Italian and Span ish gardens which he considered touchstones in his subsequent career. On his return from abroad he took a job for a year at Ohio State University where he met H. L. "Punk" Vaughan, who soon thereafter came out to Berkeley to revolutionize its landscape de sign teaching. In 1929 Church began his association with the Pasatiempo Estates in Santa Cruz County then being developed by the golfer Marion Hollins; this fostered a vital collaboration with the architect Wil liam W Wurster which continued for several decades. After three years at Pasatiempo, Church opened an office in San Francisco. Of those halcyon days the photographer Roger Stur- Tommy Church, 1974, by Carolyn Caddestevant , talking with Suzanne Riess, who con ducted all of the interviews, says: "We all worked, for too little, but everyone, Gardner ^Gardens A re for People ?? Dailey, Tommy, all the rest of us, worked to produce something that satisfied our souls Thomas D. Church was a landscape archi so to speak. And our clients." And the clients tect who designed beautiful private garden were everything. Speaking at a meeting in spaces for grateful clients as well as major 1971, Tommy Church said: public spaces that are enjoyed by millions Most of my activity has been with a who have never heard his name. His dis personal client who has a private ob tinguished career, ended by his death on jective. This may be contributing [1] nothing to the general well-being of ing of their plans for a trip in 1937 that professional associate Lawrence Halprin says: nada, Tijuana, Tecate, and Mexicali. As they the country as a whole, however this would culminate in an important meeting "He has impressed on the world the notion are filmed an on-going calendar of these ma is what I've been asked to do and this with the Finnish architect Alvar Aalto, that people's lives are enhanced by gardens terials will be prepared in Tijuana. is the way I make my living and it's notes: "Tommy... loved Europe and would and houses which are linked together as a also the way that I get my satisfaction. like to... reach some of these other things unity — as a kind of inevitable living and J. Ross Browne Collection All of his work was not for private consump that were happening that weren't happening aesthetic synergy." tion, for among his public projects were the here, at least in California." Against the ad A remarkable collection of J. Ross Browne master plans for university campuses at Stan vice of a friend who counseled investing sav papers has recently come to the Library in ford, Berkeley, and Santa Cruz, the General ings in PG&E stock, Tommy said he was 18th and 19th Century part as a gift of Mrs. Cochrane Browne of Motors Research Center in Michigan, the going to take the money and "invest it in Kensington and Mrs. Li Browne Caemmerer du Pont family's Longwood Gardens in myself." On this trip he "connected with Baja California of Tenafly, New Jersey, with additional fund ing provided by Mr. Clarence E. Heller Pennsylvania, and the elegant Court of people all over the world that were thinking Four hundred sixty-four reels of microfilm Honor which connects San Francisco's War in the same terms that he was." and The Friends of the Bancroft Library. now available for research in The Bancroft The more than seven hundred letters, written Memorial Opera House with the Veteran's In the 1950's, the rich central decade of Library mark the ending of a four-year proj Building. his work, Church undertook consultations primarily to his wife Lucy during the years ect, begun in 1973, which has copied the from 1843 t0 I^75' are mghly detailed and In the mid-1960's the Regional Oral His away from California, worked with Edward Archivo Historico de Baja California Sur in tory Office first contemplated a memoir with Durrell Stone and Eero Saarinen, and said, descriptive, often enhanced by illustrative La Paz. This rich archive had been relatively sketches, and provide an almost unparalleled Church. Then an active practitioner, he de in 1971: "In the fifties we had enough of a unknown until 1969 when it was reviewed murred; the assumption was that there would reputation, jobs coming in from all over the contemporary account of the pioneer devel by Dr. Miguel Leon-Portilla, Director of the opment of the west by an accurate observer be time later to "pause and reflect." In fact country, I could have had 50 or 60 drafts Instituto de Investigaciones Historicas of the that was not to be. He could not retire, for men; but that didn't interest me then and and participant. The papers also include many Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, of Browne's literary manuscripts, among his drive and his vital commitment to his still doesn't." He had close associations with who recognized its great research potential. clients would not let that happen. When Sunset and later House Beautiful and was them his "Journal of a Whaling Cruise," as All of the Californias prior to 1848 are repre well as scrapbooks and photographs and ROHO, prompted by members of the land encouraged by the editors of these publica sented in the documentation, which further scape architecture profession, approached tions to articulate his garden philosophy. In other family materials. This new collection covers Baja California to the beginning of the greatly augments Bancroft's prior holdings him again in 1976 he was then a victim of 1955 he set down his thoughts in Gardens twentieth century. the disease which would cause his death, and Are For People, and to revise that book, of Browne papers. now out of print, was the principal task of The Government of Baja California has it was apparent that his remaining energies published a limited edition Catalogo for the would go to work in progress. Thus, the in the last months of his life. Walter Doty, a veteran Sunset editor, recalls one revolution first section of the archive, La Colonia, 1744- terviews were done with many of those who 1821, a copy of which is held by the Ban had known him best. ary concept of this period, the "breaking out of the box:" croft. Presently the staff of the Archivo is Robert Royston, an associate of Church's working toward eventual publication of a in 1938 and 1939, says of that time: "The There was a headiness, an extreme sort catalog of the entire collection, and the Li friendship between the architect and the of feeling as if it were a crusade we brary now holds typescript copies of that por landscape architect was very strong and I were on—these guys were not plants- tion covering the period from 1822 through cannot help feeling that a great deal of the men, they were architects, in the sense 1832. Under preparation at the Centro de success of the work came because of that that their landscapes were not 'reme Investigaciones Historicas in Tijuana is a relationship." Clients found in Church a dial' but creative. Tommy was a 'be catalog of land grant documents, while one totally-developed designer who was more havioral' landscaper, to use a modern of maps is in press at La Paz. A listing of Pagoda Hill" Oakland, c.1875 than an adjunct to their architect. He fol term; gardens to live in... Baja Califbrnia imprints is also being pre J. Ross Browne was born in Dublin in 1821 lowed through every aspect of the gardens It was a revolution, and to read this com pared. he was designing in those early days, even pleted oral history is to reflect on the excite and came to the United States with his pa doing his own contracting. Interviewee ment generated by these new concepts then Professor W Michael Mathes of the Uni rents who settled in Louisville, Kentucky in Floyd Gerow, a contractor, recalls: "Every coming from California and from Harvard, versity of San Francisco has directed the 1832. He shipped as a common sailor on a time I go up and down a poorly built set of from the pressures of the Depression and the project, which was noted in Bancroftiana for whaling vessel out of New Bedford in 1842: stairs I think 'Church didn't do these.' " He theorists of the Bauhaus. The ideas that then September, 1975. He recently observed that "A Mutiny occurred at the island of Zan always earned the respect of the workmen, were arguably radical have now become catch "there are virtually unlimited theses, disser zibar, where I sold myself out of the vessel which meant that he knew how to lay bricks phrases of the trade. These two volumes pro tations and publications for research here, for thirty dollars and a chest of old clothes; as the mason did.