Notes: Simeon and Bess moved to Fort Bragg, California, after quiting their hectic life
in Napa where Bess managed the Green Lattern restaurant while Simeon commuted to a job
at the Benecia Army Arsenal. They bought seven undeveloped acres located four
miles south of Fort Bragg. One of the seven acres was ocean-front property; it
was here that they had their new home built. The original house, under
construction in the 1948 photo at the left, had just one bedroom, one bathroom,
a dining room, a kitchen, and a small laundry room.
Clearly, the new house was too small — so Simeon and Bess immediately had a "back
bedroom" added. This room had a bed for Simeon, two twin beds for guests, storage
space for furniture from Napa, and a pot-belly wood stove for heat.
A hanging bedspread separated Simeon's bed from the other two beds.
They added an attached single-car garage that contained Simeon's workbench and shelves
across the back for all of Bess's jars and canned goods. They also built a "wood
shed" out back to hold firewood and their large deep freezer. The photo at the
right shows the resultant house and garage during their first winter — and a
very rare Fort Bragg snowfall.
The other six acres were across the road and were soon fenced in
with an electric fence so Bess could have a cow, Daisy, for
milking. Simon built a small barn for Daisy and the hay she
would need. He also built a rabbit hutch at the East side
of the barn. Dan's rabbit, Fuzzy, produced many generations of
offspring. Simeon and Bess later bred Daisy and raised a
succession of steers for their meat. For a while Bess also
raised two sheep.
Simeon also built a small chicken house between their home and
the ocean so Bess could have some chickens and their eggs — even
though it slightly obscured the view of the ocean from their
house. To block the high North winds he built a board fence from
the back door down to the chicken house. This gave Bess a
protected area for her gardening. In the sandy soil, she
successfully raised potatoes, strawberries, lettuce, radishes,
and other vegetables. Later, Simeon also built her a lath house
against the fence for Bess's fuchias.
They needed more living space, so Simeon added on a large,
step-down, living room with exposed and stained rafters, a large
flagstone wood-burning fireplace, and picture windows on the
west and south sides for viewing the ocean. Their baby-grand
piano and Belgium tapestry occupied the north end of the room.
Low built-in bookcases and a feed-through woodbox were at the
east side next to the fireplace. The photo at the left shows
the newly added living room and fireplace — as well as the
white fence and gate added by Duke Duhig.
The first photo at the right shows their 33601 Pacific Way property in 1954
with mature plants in the front yard, the small chicken house behind the main
house, and the Pacific Ocean in the background. The second photo continues
Northward from the first photo; it begins with the garage at the far left, and
shows Simeon walking in front of the cow barn. Dan climbed the
solitary big pine tree on their property to take these two photographs.
The photo at the left shows Bess with Daisy, two of Daisy's calves,
the wood shed at the left background, and the living room at
the right background, circa 1955.
Later, Simeon added a patio next to the east side of the living room.
He covered it with an attractive light-green corregated fiberglass roof.
Soon they decided to go into chicken egg production in a big way.
Simeon built three, very large, two-section chicken houses, each
of which could hold 500 hens per section (for 3,000 total chickens).
The first photo at the right shows the first two chicken houses —
with one section still under construction.
The second photo at the right shows the third chicken house under construction.
Maintaining the chickens and processing their eggs took a lot of Simeon's time.
The first photo at the left shows the interior of one of the chicken houses.
The second photo shows Simeon operating his egg cleaning machine.
The last building project on the original house converted its laundry room
into a second bathroom.
Eventually, when the bottom dropped out of the price of eggs, Simeon and Bess quit
their chicken and egg business, and burnt down the chicken houses — as shown in
the 1968 photograph as the right. The Fort Bragg fire department had been notified
and used the occasion as a practice training session.
Next they built a new house between the ocean and the original house. They then
sold off the new house, the original house, and six of their seven acres. They
retained only the one acre furthest from the ocean. Here they had
their next house installed. |
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