Come on in and have a visit in the magical home of Loretta — the vibrant, kind-spirited, activist, artist, and animal advocate I had the pleasure of getting to know just a few months ago here in the Haight. I think you’ll be floored by her gorgeous home on Downey, and all the laughter we enjoyed. Loretta came to SF in 1960 with her poet husband from the Bronx, NY. The rest is her-story. Love ya, Loretta!
HSV: What brought you to San Francisco?
LC: We lived in New York and my husband kept talking about San Francisco, San Francisco, San Francisco. In those days, where thou goest, I go. He wanted to come, so I came with him.
The first place we stayed in was the Swiss American Hotel on Broadway. It was pretty magical. I lived in the Bronx, so when I came out here I felt like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz going from Kansas to Oz. I couldn’t get over how incredibly beautiful and wonderful it was. I felt immediately at home. So many I’ve talked to had the same experience. Wherever they came from, it was like, “Ahhh … [relaxed arms gesture] San Francisco…”
HSV: Did you go to the Human Be-In?
LC: I was there.
HSV: Wow! How old were you?
LC: I guess I was maybe 30. It’s interesting because when I was 30 they would say “Don’t trust anyone over 30.” [laughter] So that was kind of funny!
HSV: Fast forward to 1977: How did you guys land this joint?
LC: We were really lucky. We came back after 5 years in Europe pretty broke. No place to live, no jobs, 2 kids, a large Airedale, and 2 cats. [laughs]. First we stayed with these old Beatniks from England. He played the trumpet, worked for the Examiner. She was a housewife, they had 2 boys. I met them because one of my sons went to Sunset nursery school and her kid was there. One of the sons still owns it, an 11-room fantastic house in 1968 for $42,000! [laughs]
So anyway, these friends drifted into real estate in the ‘60s and became very wealthy, owned a lot of property. We wanted to buy a house, we could afford to pay a mortgage. Everything was pretty low then. But we didn’t have a couple thousand dollars for a down payment. It took a few years, but then they found us this house. We were very lucky to get in here.
HSV: On that note, would you give us a tour, Loretta? Are you cool with that?
LC: Absolutely!
FULL TRANSCRIPT
HSV: Okay guys, hello! Here we are at Loretta Chardin’s house. It’s on Downey Street, and we get to go in and meet Loretta. Here we are …
[door opens, dog Hudson barks]
Loretta Chardin: Hello!
HSV: Hello, hi!
LC: That’s Hudson!
HSV: Hi Hudson!
LC: Don’t worry, he’s not hungry!
[laughter]
HSV: Okay! Thanks for having me over!
LC: Oh my pleasure!
HSV: Haight Street Voice is very grateful to you.
LC: Okay, come on in!
HSV: Yay!
LC: My humble abode.
HSV: Wow! This is magical, magical, magical!
LC: Thank you!
HSV: Wow. There’s just so much to take in!
LC: Okay, so where would you like to sit?
HSV: You know, I think I’ll sit over here on the purple chair. Is that okay with you? You okay over there?
LC: Okay! [smiles sitting down]
HSV: Oh that’s gorgeous [about camera view]. You know, we couldn’t have planned it better! [Hudson kisses camera]. Hi Hudson, you wanna be on film too? Okay, we love dogs! [point to HSV Dog Days of Summer edition] Look, we have dogs on the cover over there…
Okay! So, Loretta, thank you!
LC: My pleasure.
HSV: So how long have you lived in this place?
LC: I’ve lived here for 46 years.
HSV: What year is that?
LC: Beginning of ’77.
HSV: And what brought you here, how did it happen?
LC: What brought me to the house?
HSV: What brought you to San Francisco? I think I hear an East Coast accent …
LC: My husband was a poet and an artist and we lived in New York and he kept talking about San Francisco, San Francisco, San Francisco. So, in those days, where thou goest, I go.
HSV: Yeah.
LC: My husband wanted to come, so I came with him.
HSV: And did you immediately get this place?
LC: Oh no. This was 1960. I came to San Francisco in 1960.
HSV: Oh you came to SF in 1960, okay.
LC: The house is ’77, came to SF in ’60.
HSV: Oh! Big difference! The house in ’77.
LC: I wish we bought the house in ’60, however! [laughs]
HSV: Okay, so tell me, so you came here in 1960 from New York …
LC: Yes.
HSV: Okay, and what brought you then?
LC: Well, as I mentioned my husband was a poet …
HSV: He was a poet and he wanted to come out here in 1960. So he was part of the Beatnik thing?
LC: It was kind of the tail end of the Beatnik era. We weren’t Beatniks though. We were just kind of regular people [laughter]
HSV: [laughs] Regular people. So you both had jobs?
LC: I had a baby. I had a 4 month old. And he was working as a graphic artist.
HSV: Okay, wow. So you’re hanging out — and what part of the City did you land in?
LC: The first place we stayed in was the Swiss American Hotel on Broadway. I don’t know what it is now. I think it’s just a residence.
It was pretty magical. I lived in the Bronx, so when I came out here I felt like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz going from Kansas to Oz. I couldn’t get over how incredibly beautiful and wonderful it was. But I felt immediately at home, like so many I’ve talked to had the same experience.
HSV: Yeah.
LC: Wherever they came from, it was like, “Ahhh” [relaxed arms gesture] “San Francisco …”
HSV: That’s funny cuz I’m from here and I did the opposite. I was like, “Screw the hippie shit, I want to go where it’s loud and noisy and rough.” And I got that in New York. But I came back! But enough about me!
So you were here in the ‘60s, so you watched the whole thing, from the beginning to the end of the whole explosion of the counterculture.
LC: Not so much the end. In ’68 we left for a camping trip around Europe and we ended staying 5 years. So we didn’t get back until ’73.
HSV: Where do you go camping for 5 years?
LC: Well we didn’t camp 5 years! [laughter] We camped for a while and then drifted into jobs in Europe.
We came back and it culture shock and future shock. The last year we were living on a farm in Scotland, so it was quite an adjustment.
HSV: Wow, the poet and the … what is your passion? Besides the 4-month-old baby, what’s been the driving force in your life? You know, are you a musician, writer, you know, a …
LC: I can’t say I’ve been one of these people who had a single-minded passion. I’m sort of all over the place [laughs].
HSV: What sign are you?
LC: A Libra!
HSV: Oh yeah, that explains a lot.
LC: Oh really?
HSV: Yeah, Libras want to know a lot about a lot!
Okay, so back to the house, back to what got you here. You said in ’68 you got — no, sorry, ’77 you got this place.
LC: ’77, right. Before that we lived for about a year or so on Carl near Cole in a flat.
HSV: Okay. So you were here for the beginning of the counterculture, going back to that.
LC: ’Til ’68.
HSV: ’Til ’68, yeah. Which is pretty much when the Grateful Dead and everybody said …
LC: Yeah, things started to — as soon as we left, we’d get these letters saying “it’s a good thing you left when you did.” [laughs]
HSV: Yeah, it got ugly.
So did you go to the Human Be-In?
LC: Yes, I was there.
HSV: Wow.
LC: Yeah [laughs]
HSV: Do you know how many people bow-down to you like, “Wow!” How old were you? Sorry I’m bad at math!
LC: Then? I guess I was maybe 30.
HSV: Wow.
LC: It’s interesting cuz when I was 30 they would say “Don’t trust anyone over 30!” [laughter] So that was kind of funny!
But I was teaching school, and I had 2 kids by then.
HSV: Where were you teaching?
LC: Uh … I’ve had a very eclectic career. At that time I was … what was I doing? Oh god … At that time I think I was teaching pre-school. I did everything through the youth [?] college.
HSV: In the neighborhood?
LC: No. First I taught at a private school in the Richmond and then I got involved in Headstart programs on Potrero Hill and in the Mission. Yeah.
I feel funny talking about my life!
HSV: No! It’s okay! We’ll move on to the house. But it’s important to know who this person is!
LC: I feel like an artifact or something! [laughs]
HSV: No! [laughter] Aren’t we all?!
And then we’re going to get a tour, ladies and gentlemen, Haight Street Voice followers and friends and family.
But man! What’s the takeaway from the Summer of Love and the Human Be-In? I mean that was the real one, everybody says. Which this cover [Tribe Vibe: Where Are We in 2023] is an homage to.
LC: Well the Summer of Love was really just a natural outgrowth of San Francisco, I think. It was always a very friendly, wonderful place.
HSV: Even though there were drugs — or because of the drugs? All of that, and you had kids. You felt safe? You never felt like “Oh my god!”
LC: Oh no, no. I always felt very safe here. Coming from New York especially [laughs]
HSV: True, yeah, the Bronx.
LC: But we weren’t into drugs or anything like that.
HSV: But you weren’t anti, clearly….
LC: No, no — not at that time.
HSV: [a silence alludes to drugs being bad today; more on that later] So in ’77, how did you guys land this joint?
LC: We were really lucky. We came back …
HSV: From your castle in Scotland? [laughter]
LC: Well, not a castle! But we came back pretty broke. No place to live, no jobs, 2 kids, a large Airedale, and 2 cats. [laughs]. First we stayed with — we had friends who were originally from England who owned a house on Ashbury. One of their sons still owns it. They bought the house in ’62, a big 11-room fantastic house with a hatch? Catch? Garage. They bought the house, I’m sorry, in ’68 for $42,000 [laughs]!
HSV: Whoa!
LC: Anyway, they were kind of old Beatniks from England. He played the trumpet, I think he worked for the Examiner, she was a housewife, they had 2 boys. I met them because one of my sons went to Sunset nursery school and her kid was there. Incidentally the assistant teacher who then became the director was Joanna McClure, who I’m sure you know.
HSV: Michael McClure’s yeah. His wife?
LC: Pardon?
HSV: His wife?
LC: She’s still around. She’s 92 or something. She’s on Ashbury. They’re divorced for many years.
HSV: Yeah. In fact, he’s in the last magazine.
LC: Really? [laughs]
HSV: Yeah. A picture of him. Anyway, go ahead.
LC: Anyway, she’s a pretty incredible woman. Incidentally my son, many years later, taught at that school, and she was still there! Kind of funny.
HSV: Wow.
LC: So anyway, these friends drifted into real estate in the ‘60s and became very wealthy, owned a lot of property.
We wanted to buy a house, we could afford to pay a mortgage, which was — everything was pretty low then, but we didn’t have a couple thousand dollars for a down payment. So it took a few years, but then they found us this house. So we were very lucky to get in here.
HSV: On that note, why don’t you give us a tour, Loretta! Are you cool with that?
LC: Oh sure!
HSV: Are you open to that? Rich said you’d be open to that.
LC: Absolutely!
HSV: Yay!
LC: Okay .. this is the front room, this is my dog …
HSV: That’s Hudson, y’all.
LC: Watch where you step.
HSV: Okay, here we go guys …
LC: This is what the hippies call the dining room. It’s just another room.
HSV: Gorgeous! Oh my gosh!
LC: That’s my bedroom … I used to be upstairs but then my previous dog got old and was falling down the stairs.
HSV: Do you mind if I just take a little pan of the bedroom?
LC: Sure, go ahead. I’m glad I made the bed! [laughter]
HSV: We wouldn’t care anyway! Ooh, I love the artwork. Gorgeous.
LC: That’s from Mexico. That’s peyote, you know.
HSV: And you’re not into drugs though …
LC: No.
HSV: But you’ve taken them before?
LC: I’ve tried a couple of things, psychedelics, many years ago.
HSV: I should ask you: did you ever go to the Haight Ashbury Free Clinic?
LC: No.
HSV: Cus Dr. Dave …
LC: Yes, I know David.
HSV: He’s a dear friend. We’re doin the Haight Ashbury Psychedelic Center. I’m working with him very closely.
LC: Oh, okay.
So anyway, this is this … [laughter] I don’t know, do you wanna see the bathroom? [kind of unsure]
HSV: Sure, why not, you know, it’s woodwork.
LC: Okay, here’s the bathroom …
HSV: Okay! Come on! Who doesn’t want to see a tie-dye shower curtain! That’s beautiful! That’s fantastic.
LC: Okay, so that’s the bathroom.
HSV: Do you know what year this house was built?
LC: 1893.
HSV: Wow.
LC: The kitchen! [happy voice]
HSV: Ah, the ceilings! [high up] So refreshing!
LC: It’s just a little old-fashioned kitchen.
HSV: Little old-fashioned kitchen! [facetious]
LC: And then I have a … we put the deck on here. There was no deck when I bought the house. And then I built this catio for my cats cuz I didn’t want them to get out.
HSV: Oh that’s so smart. That’s wonderful.
LC: And then I have a little garden downstairs.
HSV: Oh my gosh! So they, do they try — do they get down there?
LC: No. It’s too dangerous now.
HSV: I hear ya. Coyotes.
LC: The raccoons and the coyotes, yeah. So there’s the catio.
HSV: Did you call it a “catio”?
LC: I call it a catio, yes.
HSV: I love it!
LC: It’s not original. I mean that’s the name.
HSV: I like it. I never heard of a catio …
LC: So anyway, here’s the kitchen again. And you wanna go upstairs?
HSV: If you’re open to it, Loretta!
LC: Okay!
HSV: We are very grateful.
LC: I kind of fell in love with this staircase when I saw the house.
HSV: Of course!
LC: It’s kind of romantic.
HSV: And that window was there then — the light!
LC: Oh yeah. Everything was here! I resurfaced some of the wood. A lot of the wood was painted over. The floors were originally painted green or maroon, I don’t know. [inaudible about plants, stairs]
HSV: Kitty cats everywhere [about statuettes on stairwell] Buddha!
LC: [laughs] So here’s one room.
HSV: I love the color! [bright yellow in hallway] Gorgeous!
LC: Here’s one room. Of course I had my kids here, and then I rented out rooms later, but I don’t do that anymore.
HSV: And the color scheme — did you come up with the yellow and the purple?
LC: I came up with it, yeah. I’ve painted the whole house myself several times.
HSV: You’re a painter! Did you paint this right here? [zoom in on framed painting on wall
LC: Huh?
HSV: Did you paint this?
LC: No a friend of mine did this.
HSV: The color scheme is gorgeous.
LC: Yes. And then …
HSV: Ficus. Look at this it’s like a little sun room. [skylight].
LC: And here’s another little room here. I feel like a real estate agent! [laughter]
HSV: [laughing] You’re better than that! You’re showing us your home!
LC: [funny voice, mimics real estate agent] “We have quiet neighbors …”
[in all seriousness]: Actually, Downey Street is fabulous.
HSV: I bet. I mean I walk down it all the time. It’s on my route.
LC: I mean the neighbors are wonderful.
Okay, so this used to be my bedroom, but as I said I moved downstairs because of the dog. So now I just do some exercises here, or just hangout.
HSV: Wow. And this was here?
LC: No, I put the skylight in.
HSV: That was smart.
LC: This used to be a closet and I made it into a half-bath.
HSV: Wow, wow, wow. And that’s where I see the kitty!
LC: There’s another catio so the cat can go have sunlight, yeah!
HSV: Do you mind if I …
LC: Go ahead!
HSV: Don’t want to step on your yoga mats … [view down onto Downey] Oh yeah! That’s where I see him sitting out there! [cool ledge catio] And who is it that sits out there you think?
LC: They both go out there.
HSV: Okay.
LC: But I don’t know where Kali is. [cat walks in] That’s Riccy again.
HSV: Ricochet!
LC: And like I said this used to be a closet but we just made it into a half bathroom.
HSV: That’s fantastic.
LC: Yeah, so that’s that.
HSV: Women Who Run With Wolves — love that book!
LC: It’s really a modest house compared to Haight Ashbury standards, you know.
HSV: It is?
LC: Well, you know, these big fantastic houses.
HSV: Yeah, I guess.
LC: When I moved in there used to be a deck out here, there was a door, but it was getting a lot of leaks. It seemed a weird place to have a deck anyway, so we closed it off. [facing south to next house].
HSV: Yeah. And you’ve always had good neighbors?
LC: The neighbors are fabulous!
HSV: Awesome.
LC: I have these things on the door so the dog doesn’t get in here. One time he had diarrhea and it was the first and last time I let him in those bedrooms.
HSV: [Pointing to window above stairwell] So that’s a little room right there?
LC: That’s a little room, yeah.
HSV: Now wait, why would there be a window right there?
LC: Don’t ask me!
HSV: [laughter] They must have expanded it or something.
LC: It’s San Francisco, you know?
HSV: I love all your art [Buddha, etc] C’mon Hudson! Oh here’s Kali…[cat]
LC: No, that’s Ricochet. I’m concerned about Kali.
HSV: [to cat] Where’s your sister or whatever?
LC: I’m gonna take a look out on the deck again. She might be out on the deck. She may be hanging out on the deck.
HSV: Okay. [checkin’ out the artwork.] Wow. Absolutely beautiful! Thanks so much again.
LC: Oh it’s my pleasure!
HSV: So cool. Kali [calling cat] Kali-Kal. She probably heard me. Sounds like you don’t have people over a lot …
LC: She must be in here somewhere.
HSV: This is beautiful [closeup of beautiful art piece]
LC: Oh that was done by the gal at mentally disabled persons. Do you know Creativity Explored on 16th Street?
HSV: No.
LC: It’s an art workshop for mentally disabled people.
HSV: That’s gorgeous! Wow. And there’s another owl. There seems to be an owl theme around here!
LC: [laughs]
HSV: Alright, we’re gonna come back in here. I’ll pause for now. Okay, that’s the house tour.
LC: I want to know where Kali is! Maybe she’s on my bed? She’s in here somewhere.
HSV: [calling cat] Kali!!!
LC: Oh she’ll show up … hopefully!
So anyway, this is it.
HSV: Well thank you, thank you, thank you!
Now, about living in the neighborhood since …
LC: Since ’76 really cuz like I said we lived on Carl Street before then.
HSV: Yeah, but still, that’s the neighborhood. Were you here when the Other Cafe was here, the Comedy Shop?
LC: Yes, I saw Robin Williams there.
HSV: See! This kind of stuff!
LC: And another guy … Bobby Slayton?
HSV: Yep!
LC: It was a shame that they closed that. And of course they just closed the Reverie.
HSV: I know. That’s tragic. But you said you don’t really [cat and dog] HI! You guys are so adorable. Come on Kali wherever you are.
[chatter about Sword and Rose, owner fire, etc]
HSV: So this interview with you … the next edition, #15, is the Spring 2023 edition. And it’s coming — I never know what they’re gonna be about [she laughs] and it’s coming coming together as “pioneering spirits” and how I believe this neighborhood, let alone San Francisco, it was a bunch of kooky people who came here, the Wild West, the final frontier.
LC: [laughs]
HSV: My grandmother came here a long time ago looking for gold with her family.
LC: No kidding! How exciting to have that background.
HSV: Yeah, from Texas. We’re a bunch of weirdos that came out here! Like you came out here because your husband was a poet.
So looking at what you got into when you came here ’60, to where we are now, and looking forward. My thing is I don’t always just want to be looking at the history and “oh it was great because of the Summer of Love …” all that. We’re here today — it’s 2023.
LC: Yes.
HSV: And looking forward. So if you could sort of reflect upon your first impressions when you first came here, where we are now, and what you would like to see moving forward for the community.
LC: Well the first thing that comes to mind is, even though I’ve been here so many years, there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t thank my lucky stars I live in San Francisco, and reflect on the beauty of the City. I just feel a lot of gratitude.
The way it is now? [shrugs shoulders] Well, you know, it’s got a lot of symptoms of issues that are prevalent everywhere.
HSV: Homelessness …
LC: I remember the first time I saw someone lying on the street on Haight Street back in the … must’ve been the early ‘80s, a young man. And a bunch of people ran over to him to help him. A man took off his jacket to put under his head. Somebody took out a bill and gave him some money, people were very concerned: “Can we get you some help? Do you need anything?” Now we’re stepping over the bodies pretty much. So that’s pretty sad.
Oh! The Grand Piano! Do you remember the Grand Piano?
HSV: On Haight Street?
LC: Yes. Well they closed in ’83.
HSV: I remember! Yes, I think right when I moved here they were just closing down. Cuz I’m a piano player and I went to SF State and lived on the corner there in ’82, so I remember it a teeny bit.
LC: That was the living room of the Haight.
HSV: So people would hang out, somebody would be playing the piano …
LC: That was before we had an influx of tourists, before the homeless. It was the neighborhood hangout.
HSV: Between what years?
LC: Well, I don’t know when it started. Originally I know it was a much smaller place on the other side of Haight Street and they moved into the other location, which is just a clothes shop now. It was really nice because, first of all, they only played classical music when somebody wasn’t playing the piano and it was a very nice atmosphere. There were communal tables, people would go there to play chess, or get a cup of coffee, there was food. And in the back, actually, was a very small, full-service restaurant. And it was just a wonderful place.
There was a group called the San Francisco Saxophone Quartet, and that’s where I met Rock Star, who taught me how to play the flute.
HSV: His nickname was Rock Star?
LC: The first time I saw him they were playing in the Grand Piano, and then they went out onto the sidewalk and were playing on the sidewalk and then they went on into the street and were playing to the cars in the street! [laughs]
HSV: Wow.
LC: It was a very sad day when that place closed and she sold it — the woman who ran it, her name was Lexie Erin (sp). She sold it to Round Table Pizza and the neighborhood boycotted the place. As I said, again, it was just people in the neighborhood, and it closed within a week. And then I’m not sure what it became after that.
HSV: That’s like the Gap on the corner of Haight and Ashbury. It had no chance.
LC: We protested against it. I was part of the protest.
HSV: And then they started smashing the windows …
LC: Also, the — what the heck was it called? [laughs] the place that sold hamburgers …
HSV: McDonald’s!
LC: Yes. We protested against that. They wanted to have a drive-in and we successfully lobbied against that.
But there’s a very strong community spirit here, and in fact all of San Francisco, which I never felt in New York. I think the main difference was you never felt like you owned the city when you were in New York, but in San Francisco, there’s a very strong sense of “This is my city and I care about it, and I own it in a way.” I don’t if I’m being …
HSV: Community? You’re part of a …
LC: Well, it’s like you care, and also you have more agency here. I mean people, there are a lot of neighborhood groups like HANC, and people really care what’s happening in the neighborhood, and they feel more in control here, I think. Of course I’m talking about a New York many years ago. Things may have changed since I lived there.
HSV: Right.
LC: There was something else I wanted to say but I forgot [laughs].
HSV: That’s okay, I do it all the time.
LC: What would I like to see? I don’t know, that’s hard to say.
HSV: I know. It’s a lot. I’ll give you a for instance: So I work with the SF Heritage …
LC: Oh you do?
HSV: They don’t pay me money but I’m under their wing because they love my magazine and I help the community. They have a shop at 1506 Haight. Norm Larsen — did you know Norm Larsen who owned the corner of Haight and Ashbury, a gentleman who passed away in 2018, donated that corner to the SF Heritage, so now it’s a National Treasure.
LC: Oh, I didn’t know that!
HSV: So that whole corner is a National Treasure, and one of the shops is 1506 not right on the corner but it’s an art gallery and they’re making it into a cultural center. But they are now involved in what they call the homeless, the street kids, the punks — the people that are congregating on the corner, getting bigger and bigger, they’ve got chairs, sometimes they’re sitting on the street. And some of the people are saying, “Oh we need to get rid of these homeless kids.”
LC: Oh now I know how I can address your question: What I’d like to see is taking the responsibility for individual cities for the problem of homelessness and make it a more regional issue. In other words, the state should do something holistically rather than individual places. I don’t have expertise to tell you anything more in detail. [laughs]
One thing I should mention since you’re talking about the Haight is the Switchboard. I did some volunteering at the Switchboard when it was still running.
HSV: What years were you there, do you remember?
LC: Probably around … in the early ‘80s.
HSV: Wow. Can you just tell us a little bit about it cuz I know Jimmy Siegel who owns Distractions very well. You know he came here from midwest and was gay and was beat up and then came out here. And the Switchboard, he to this day says that it was a very important place.
LC: It was. And for some reason I’m blanking out on the guy who lived there.
HSV: It’s okay, don’t worry about that. It was across the park wasn’t it?
LC: No it was on Haight.
HSV: Oh, it was here, okay!
LC: Between — might not have been its first location but when I knew it it was on Haight between Masonic and Central. 15-something Haight.
HSV: Okay. So in your words, what was it?
LC: Well, it was the first of its kind in the country. You know there are many places that are like it that imitated it. I think it was started because of the influx of all the kids coming into the Haight, and there were telephones and we took telephone calls. And also kids would come in person. Sometimes they just wanted a place to leave their gear. It was resources and referrals. So we’d tell them where they could crash, or where they could get some food, whatever it was, you know, medical help. Whatever they needed. It was really a great service.
I should tell you the first time I went there [laughs]. I was a little nervous, you know, picked up the phone, phone rang, and this kid’s voice saying he’s in Golden Gate Park and he’s gonna commit suicide. My first phone call.
HSV: Oh my god.
LC: So I started talking to him, and then suddenly the voice changed and it was, “Hi Mom! This is Jay, hahahahah!”
HSV: Oh Jay!!!
LC: My son!
HSV: If you ever see this Jay, bad son! Shame on you!
LC: I coulda killed him!
But yeah, so anyway I did that for awhile.
HSV: And that as volunteer?
LC: It was volunteer, yeah.
And then there were the Diggers. My husband gave an old car to the Diggers. And then I knew a guy who was with the White Panthers but I’ve forgotten his name. A chess player. My kids were chess champions. I forget his name.
HSV: (camera on cat)
LC: Where’s … wait! Is that Kali?
HSV: Yeah, that’s Kali, little stripe.
LC: Yay! [claps]
HSV: And now you’ve scared her away!
LC: [laughter]
HSV: Yah, Kali’s back! When you ignore them they come back.
LC: Yeah, his name is on the tip of my tongue, but … it’s been SO many years!
HSV: So you were there … I interviewed Peter Coyote, love that guy.
LC: Who?
HSV: Peter Coyote, he’s in the last magazine. I went up to his place in Sebastopol and filmed him.
LC: He did the voice on a million documentaries.
HSV: I know. Beautiful.
LC: He’s got to be a multi-millionaire! [laughs]
HSV: He’s doin’ alright, you know.
Alright, so The Switchboard.
LC: And then the Haight Ashbury Fair, Pablo Heisling — all those people. And then Waterfall. Did you know Waterfall?
HSV: No.
LC: He was one of Haight Street’s denizens. He had sort of a gray beard and the often wore leather slacks, like red. Oh! And what about Cosmic Lady?
HSV: No, I’e heard about her though!
LC: Oh Cosmic Lady!
HSV: Is she still alive?
LC: Probably not. Her real name was Janis, which she spelled Janus [laughs]. And she would always wear multicolored bright costumes, and freely give out LSD to anybody who wanted it on Haight Street. [laughter]
HSV: Actually, you know who actually told me about her … did she wear an Alice in Wonderland outfit, or a fairy outfit?
LC: No, she just wore multi-colored clothes.
HSV: Did you know Peggy Caserta, who owned Mnasidika, the clothing store?
LC: I don’t know. The name sounds familiar though.
HSV: She was Janis Joplin’s lover.
LC: Sometimes I know people by sight but I don’t know their name. Or I know their name but I don’t know who it is.
HSV: Speaking of Mnasidika and the Grateful Dead and Janis and Jimi … did you go see all these people?
LC: No.
HSV: That’s amazing.
LC: As I said, we were a little older. We weren’t hippies or anything like that. My husband was about eight and a half years older than I, too.
HSV: Okay.
LC: So he wasn’t really into rock music or anything. But we did have good friends who lived on upper Downey. And they — too bad they’re not alive. They were a very interesting couple. They met in the ‘60s. They were Freedom Riders. They were’t from here. I don’t know. He might’ve been from here but she was from another state. Pennsylvania I think. And they met when they were in jail down South [laughs]. His family were immigrants from Nazi Germany. They were Jews. His name was Alex Weiss, and he played the violin and he wrote poetry. And he became a zookeeper, and the put out a literary publication called “The Keeper’s Voice” which was wonderful.
HSV: Wow.
LC: And Peggy was also very … her daughter still lives in that house: Jessica. Her daughter’s a stockbroker who is into pirates. And I don’t know if she still does it but she used to have jousting out in the street.
LC: Oh, so you mentioned rock shows. We did go to a rock show with them, with Peggy and Alex … interestingly … so this was the early ‘60s when we knew them. Peggy and I belonged to the same babysitting coop and then at a meeting one time it was just casually revealed that Peggy and Alex weren’t married, and they wanted to drop them from the club because of that. That’s how conservative things were up until, like, the mid-‘60s.
So we went to see Country Joe and the Fish at the Fillmore. And I had actually seen them. I used to go to the folk music club with Faith Petric on Clayton Street?
HSV: What was it called?
LC: The San Francisco Folk Music Club. Her name was Faith Petric
… and her daughter still lives in the house … Carol. You should interview Carol!
HSV: Okay.
LC: Because her mother was incredible!
But anyway, that had a weekend camping out in the country that we went to can that’s where I saw Country Joe and the Fish, and they were folk musicians before they got into more rock and roll. So anyway we went to see them at the Fillmore and of course they were wonderful. And then the secondary act came on. It was a comic, and we’d never heard of him before. But when he was performing, and afterwards, we were like this: [makes stunned face]
You know who it was? Lenny Bruce!
HSV: Oh my god!
LC: Lenny Bruce. Unbelievable! And oh! By that time my husband was working as an artist. He had a studio in a print shop on Howard Street: Orbit Graphic Art. And they became Celestial Arts. And they were the ones who printed many of the rock and roll posters — famous, famous posters, which my husband would bring home, and I’d throw them in the corner … whatever! [laughs]
HSV: Oh my god.
LC: We actually threw them out. Famous, famous rock posters.
HSV: Aaaaaah!
LC: So anyway, we saw that rock show with Peggy and Alex. And then we went to see — they had this topless phenomenon on Broadway …
HSV: Yeah. You mean Carol Doda?
LC: Carol Doda! ??/ topless mother of six! There was a creation on a street with a simulated birdcage and there was a topless dancer way up high, dancing in the birdcage.
HSV: Probably on Grant Street?
LC: On Broadway.
So we went to see the Topless Mother of Six, and afterwards Alex wrote a poem about it called “Tits”! [laughter]
HSV: Yes!
LC: And it was really funny.
But when we first lived on Broadway at the Swiss American Hotel it was very charming. Enrico’s Cafe was there …
HSV: Was Tosca’s there? On Columbus.
LC: Yeah, on Columbus. And then also Mike’s Pool Hall across the street, which was famous for its minestrone soup. And then of course Vesuvio’s. And I remember I was just 23 and I got carded and I was insulted.
HSV: And then there was another famous bar that my friend …
LC: Spec’s? The Adler Cafe on the little side street?
HSV: Yeah, I know Spec’s. And then Savoy Tivoli was on Grant.
LC: I still remember my first days in San Francisco. People were so friendly and smiling. People you didn’t know said, “Good Morning!’. You’d go to a little Italian restaurant, they’d put a bottle of wine on the table.
HSV: Charming. Provincial probably compared to the Bronx.
LC: But in a wonderful way [laughs].
HSV: Did you ever go see the poetry? The poets, the Beats? Did you ever see Kerouac or …
LC: In the early ‘80s, middle ‘80s I guess, I became friend with Kathy Goss, the poet, who lived in North Beach, and through her I met Jack Hirschman and Jack Micheline and other well-known poets, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, of course.
There’s a funny story about Lawrence, well it think it’s funny. [laughs] Do we still have time?
HSV: We’re just rolling! Storytellin’!
LC: Shortly after we were married, my husband decided to take a trip to Mexico from New York. But on the way — it was a little bit out of our way — he had a friend who had moved to Dallas, Texas, so we decided to stop there. Anyway … [mimics telescoping …] I’m trying to telescope everything.
HSV: It’s okay! We have time! We’re just rolling tape.
LC: A pseudo beat — this is 1960 — a pseudo beatnik coffeehouse called The Interlude Cafe. It was a big barn-like structure and painted on the side was “Featuring Shelley Riley, Queen of the Beatniks”. [laughs] And she was a rather — I don’t know if you remember Jayne Mansfield?
HSV: Oh yeah.
LC: Kind of a Jane Mansfield lookalike, very sexy blonde …
HSV: Va-va-va-voom!
LC: … 18-year-old girl. And she would read Beat poetry at the coffeehouse with a jazz band behind her: Jimmy Clay and his Jazz Flute???. First time I ever heard jazz flute, it was fantastic. By the way, it was all segregated. Dallas was totally segregated then. That’s another whole story.
And then downstairs was pseudo Calypso singer, Lulabelle, a black woman from New Mexico who played the guitar and sang songs. And then I don’t know how it happened but we became the resident portrait artists. I also studied art. We had these beautiful set of Rembrandt pastels which were given to us as a wedding present by some friends. So we’d sit upstairs and people come in and have their portrait done. So my husband did more finished, full-color portraits, and I did — I was very good at catching likenesses, almost like … kind of cartoonish.
HSV: Like Shel Silverstienish? Line drawing?
LC: Yeah. So he would charge I think $5 and I charged $3 or something like that. And a lot of people came in and had their portrait done. Oh! So the story about Lawrence!
HSV: Yeah!
LC: So … she was too much. She would come I’m a very low-cut sexy black dress or whatever, and the clients, all these young guys. They didn’t come to hear poetry, they came to see her [laughs]. She’d say [southern drawl]: “And now I’m goin’ to read a poem by one of my favorite poets, Mr. Lawrence Ferlinghetti from San Francisco, California. [laughs] And then she’d read the poem and then afterwards she’d toss the poem out into the audience and the guys were all scrambling like in a burlesque show, catching the garter, only they’d catch the poem!
HSV: Oh my god!
LC: It was hilarious! So one day I was at a party here, years later, many years later, and Lawrence was there so I told him that “this girl was fascinated by you!” And I remember his reaction was like, “Ohhh, I should’ve known her! Hahah” [mimicking dumb guy voice] Something like the typical male response, and I was like, “Oh my god.”
HSV: [laughter]
LC: But anyway, I remember reading one of my poems here and he really liked it. So I still remember that as a big compliment.
HSV: Yeah!
LC: So, you know, I’ve lived a pretty conservative life. I mean I’ve never been a hippie or anything like that, or really into the sex, drugs, and rock n roll scene. But I think I’ve had a kind of interesting life anyway! And there’s a lot I haven’t told you! [laughs devilishly]
HSV: Maybe there’s a Part 2 ladies and gentlemen! No I’m just getting to know you really. I mean this is just all — I transcribe it all and then I pull out the nuggets. And then I put the bits in the magazine and if I want to post it I do.
LC: Anyway, Jack Michelin, Jack Hirschman (in Spec’s film!) and I were all from the Bronx and we were all roughly the same age, all 3 of us, which was really interesting. Hirschman just died a few years ago. Michelin had a heart attack on a BART train and he died. And then Kathy moved down to Darwin ??? in the desert. So I lost touch with a lot of those people.
HSV: So how do you keep yourself busy in the Haight these days, Loretta?
LC: Not so much in the Haight! [laughs]
HSV: That’s okay! Where do you frequent?
LC: I spend every morning with my dog, I love my dog, usually Buena Vista Park but sometimes other places. So I’m outdoors a lot and I swim about 3 times a week down at the Bay Club. And I just recently got into ping-pong [laughs] I’ve become a ping-pong fanatic.
HSV: Where?
LC: You know NextDoor? A woman posted on there. She said, “I’m a woman in my ‘80s. I’m a retired teacher of psychoanalysis, and I have a ping pong table in my garage. Does anybody wanna play ping-pong?” That was months ago, and I’ve bee playing with her ever since and I really love it! And just paradoxically I met — he’s an old Haight guy too. I don’t know if you know David the Scottish guy?
HSV: No.
LC: Ohhhh! You need to interview him! He just moved back onto Clayton Street.
HSV: Does he have a ponytail?
LC: No. He’s a Scottish guy, he’s in his early ‘60s and an incredible character. And he’s into everything! One of the things he’s doing now is a couple of days a week he’s down at the tennis courts teaching, as he said, “Teaching old ladies pickle ball.” [laughter] So I’m gonna see him on Thursday cuz he told me they have ping-pong tables.
HSV: Oh yeah, they do. I was gonna say have you been to the ones in Golden Gate Park.
LC: David McFarlane. You have to meet him!
HSV: Okay! He’s in his 60s?
LC: I think he told me today, he said he was gonna be 62 in June.
HSV: He’s my age, basically. I love ping-pong, I don’t know about pickle ball. Never tried it. [laughter]. Big tennis player.
LC: [Pickle ball]’s fun too.
I actually went windsurfing with him in my ‘70s for the first time [laughs] over in Berkeley. That was interesting!
HSV: What is your secret? Cuz you are — do you mind my asking your age?
LC: 86.
HSV: Wow! [laughter]
LC: My secret is good luck!
HSV: And you keep movin’.
LC: Yeah. And, you know, I’m vegetarian most of my life.
HSV: You’re probably not a big druggie person. Definitely not a smoker.
LC: No. I was a casual smoker when I was young. Never very addicted.
HSV: And wine here and there?
LC: Yeah. I’ll have a couple glasses a week or something.
HSV: Were you always a vegetarian or …
LC: Pretty much as an adult, yeah. I tried it when I was a kid but then I was mocked because nobody was a vegetarian so, you know.
HSV: Interesting.
LC: Well, a part of it was my own sensitivity. I used to do all the shopping for my mother and there was this fish market and I remember they had a fish tank and they would take the fish and throw the fish out on the ice and I would see the fish suffocating, gasping for air. I always had a dog too, I always cared a lot about animals. When I was very young I read a book called “Reverence for Life” by Albert Schweitzer who was a world-famous organist and also a doctor. And he went to Africa to minister to the people there and he wrote this autobiography. And definitely inspired me also. And I’m a big animal rights activist now. I support …
HSV: You can pitch ‘em all here!
LC: I don’t know if you saw the sign on my window, “Right to Rescue”? There’s an organization called Direct Action Everywhere, DXE. And the local one is based in Berkeley and I support them. They rescue animals from factory farms and slaughterhouses and places like that.
I think also, more recently — well it’s not recently, it’s several years ago — I read a book called animal liberation by Peter Singer. Anybody reads that book and still eats animals has gotta be … [silence]
HSV: That’s funny because just yesterday I said to a good friend of mine — not that I’m a big beefeater. Four legs for sure — I want to be done with that completely.
LC: Well one of my granddaughters when she was about 3 years old said to me, “Grandma, I don’t eat anything that has a mommy.”
HSV: Oh wow. Well, plants have mommies thought [laughter[
LC: Yeah, but she was talking about animals. I think if you can stomach seeing how animals are abused and tortured in these places you would never eat another one again.
HSV: Well, I don’t want to go too far down that road.
LC: I don’t like to prothelitize, forgive me, but …
HSV: No, no, no, you’re fine. I’m all — 100 percent with you. And the older I get the more, like I said, the animals mean more. I had a horse for 10 years, and people really need to wake up to the fact that …
LC: Well, you know, we’re … what’s the word? [pause] We don’t know what’s going on. I think if there were more people who knew what was going on. There’s the images that you see of bucolic farm settings with cows happily grazing and whatever.
It’s not like that anymore. Billions of animals are tortured and slaughtered. Take pigs for example. You know, pigs are more intelligent than dogs and they’re very friendly. If you keep one as a pet it wags its tail, happy to see you. And the way that they are killed is just so brutal and horrendous.
I find human nature to be very strange because if there’s a story about a dog or a cat being neglected or abused, everybody’s up in arms. But what about all these billions of other animals that have feelings also?
But you know I understand it. We’re evolving towards that. The other reason to be a vegetarian — and here I go proselytizing again — but the other reason is climate change. We’re destroying millions of acres of rainforests for grazing land. The other reason is feeding people — we have a small rich percentage of the world who are eating these animals while so much of the world is going hungry, and if we used that land for growing food, they would have enough to eat. So … [arms defeated; laughs]
HSV: Okay, you’ve spoken for the animals and god bless you for that. I am on your team! I vote yes! [laughter]
On that note though I will say having been through everything you said, you know, you lived through the era when #metoo — oh my god. You grew up in the time when you were the wife and you were the one that took care of the kids while the husband went to work.
LC: I always worked too.
HSV: Right, see. But then you saw the ‘60s happen and women’s lib and that whole arc …
LC: What happened to the women’s movement? [flabbergasted]
HSV: I don’t know!
LC: What happened to the women’s movement?
HSV: Well, it became #metoo and whining, in my opinion, I’ll have to edit that out, but …
LC: Well, just the other day — I mean you see this all this time, but this one was particularly shocking to me. There’s a young teenage girl walking down the street in her underwear and a garter belt … if I had a daughter like that I’d shoot her! [laughter]
HSV: I know.
LC: It’s just horrible! I mean …
HSV: But there are a lot of young, incredibly, you know, on the other end of the spectrum, which is what I wanted to get to, which is what would you like to say to the Haight Ashbury community cuz this is hyper-local with a global perspective.
LC: Okay, I got you.
HSV: What …
LC: Think globally, act locally.
HSV: Yes.
LC: Saying from the ‘60s.
HSV: Which is what I’m trying to do with the magazine as well. What would you like to say having been through everything that you’ve been through and seen! Everything you’ve seen, and the arc of your story, to these young kids that are coming in to the art gallery and they’re getting off their phones, which is what I’m seeing when I’m working down there. Young people wanting to be around art again. Young people are curious about the history of the Haight. Young people want to take care of the planet. So anyways that’s my little proselytizing.
So what would you like to say not only to the kids out there but the community itself in general?
LC: Well, I’m very community oriented. I worked 10 years as a community organizer in the SAFE program.
HSV: What is it?
LC: SAFE. They do neighborhood watches and personal safety. I strongly believe in community and people getting to know one another and when you know one another you care about one another.
I did a lot of neighborhood organizing. Cole … I was responsible for the name “Cole Valley” because one of my groups was on Cole Street and they called themselves the
Cole Valley Neighborhood Watch Group” or something like that, and it kind of stuck. But there was also another group north of the Panhandle associate that got organized because of ???? And misbehavior of a lot of youth in the neighborhood. We helped them embrace these kids instead, and they helped them with a lot of things: finding jobs with the school — whatever. It was very, very successful and they became a very big organization.
So I think, you know, we have to be our brother’s keeper. We have to take responsibility. I don’t think it’s so much saying anything to kids, because what you say to kids doesn’t mean very much. It’s look at what you do, not what you say. But I think it’s a responsibility of the adults to create a healthy community for the kids.
HSV: Yeah. And you said you don’t really walk around the Haight as much. Is that because …?
LC: Well, my dog doesn’t like Haight Street for one thing.
HSV: There’s alotta dogs down there.
LC: Yeah. I mean I’ll go to Haight Street, I’ll go to Gus’s or Whole Foods or, you know, whatever, some of the shops. I love Love of Ganesha!
HSV: Yes I love Nute!
LC: She gave — one of my sons died, and when he was 6 she gave him this rocking chair. She became a very good friend of mine. You should interview her!
HSV: She doesn’t want to be interviewed. I know her daughter Pi though! Pi is amazing. I love Pi! She works at the Psychedelic SF Gallery now, did you know that?
LC: Oh she does? Well that’s how I knew Newt. She had a little shop on Haye’s Street down towards Stanyan when I met her. I had a 3 year old granddaughter and I went in there to buy something for my granddaughter and she had a 3 year old girl too! Pi! So she showed me Pi’s picture and I said — I still remember this — you know what Newt looks like, she’s beautiful.
HSV: I know!
LC: So she showed me a picture and I said, “Oh, she’s beautiful!” She said, “More beautiful than I. Her skin is light.” I still remember that. ??? reversal. So we became friendly and when my son — he was sick for a long time — she … he visited relatives of hers in Thailand and we became very close. So I love her. [sighs all around] She has really interesting stories that she could tell you. I don’t want to talk out of school.
HSV: She’s so humble. “Honey, I don’t want to …” She just wants to spread the love and not talk about herself or her store. She just wants to have love.
LC: Yeah, anyway. There used to be a drugstore on Haight. A pharmacy.
HSV: The Drugstore? That one right there where Magnolia’s is?
LC: Oh no. this is a regular conventional drugstore and there was a guy and his wife and their 2 adult daughters. She was Spanish, and they had a big white cat that lived to be like 20-something. I remember that. Anyway …
HSV: You remember Carlos the cobbler?
LC: Yes!
HSV: The shoe store guy! I loved him!
LC: Yes!
HSV: I posted a picture I took of him back in the ‘80s when I was living here and going to State – and all sorts of people chimed in about how they miss Carlos. But he left, he was done and he moved back to Costa Rica, or where he was from.
LC: Oh really?
I went to State also for my Masters. I got … I did my undergraduate work in New York.
HSV: What was your Masters in?
LC: Well, what happened was that I started it and then we went to Europe and then we came back. So it was kind of like a hodgepodge being called “interdisciplinary studies and education”. I was teaching, you know.
And then I went to Berkeley afterwards, I was working in criminal justice. I started a doctorate there but things were going on in my personal life and everything was crazy so I ended up not continuing that. But when I turned 60, I found out that you could go to State for free.
HSV: Wait a second! I should know this!
LC: I don’t know if they still do it but all that state universities were all free tuition for 60 and over. And so even though I had all this education and I loved school, I decided to go back and just take all the classes that I was interested in. So I took over 40 units. I took them for credit cuz I wanted to do the work in philosophy and creative writing and … what else? Literature. That was really interesting.
HSV: And you told me when I first got here that you worked for a newspaper?
LC: There was a newspaper that was short-lived that was called the Independent.
HSV: Here in the neighborhood?
LC: No. It was a City-wide newspaper.
HSV: Okay.
LC: And I wrote a column called “On the Safe Side” cuz I was working for SAFE then and it was all about … I did columns about homelessness, which was just starting to be rampant. Elder abuse.
HSV: This was in the ‘80s?
LC: Yeah I guess this was in the late ‘80s. Incest. That was one of my best columns. Prisons … I don’t know — a number of them. I did that for a while and then I decided to go on a trek in Nepal [laughs] and when I came back I didn’t feel like doing it anymore.
HSV: Well, thats the thing, not to bring it back to me (but I am!) My magazine — there’s som many things I could write about … the homeless or whatever. It’s not that I’m turning a blind eye, I just don’t … I’m trying to put in more of the creativity, the history, where we’re going, the young the old the animals, dogs on the cover … the culture of the neighborhood, not the crappy shit.
LC: The problem is there’s no such thing as the culture of the neighborhood anymore, because of media. Social media and stuff. I mean, you see these kids coming into the Haight, they’re on their phones [mimics kids on phone]. It’s so different than it was when I was – I hate to sound like an old folky — “when I was growing up…” or much of my adulthood. Um, where you could have this bubble around you in a way. But now, that’s been totally broken down and …
HSV: Well I think I told you, the Gallery 1506, that’s the cultural center, art gallery — lots of younger kids are coming in and wanting to look at the art by Stanley Mouse, the poster artist, we had an exhibit with him. The Haight Street Art Center — have you been down there yet? Haight and Laguna.
LC: No.
HSV: They have Herb Greene, you know the photographer than did all the Grateful Dead and Janis Joplin — they’re having a big show about him. So the art’s coming back around.
LC: I did an art and writing class. I was volunteering for Larkin Street — you know that little storefront on Haight Street? [bet Masonic and Central]. So I was working with those teenagers for awhile.
HSV: That’s beautiful.
LC: I float around, you know? Now I’m doing a couple of other volunteer gigs that have nothing to do with the Haight per se.
HSV: Again, along lines of what would you like to say to the community. What would you like to see happen on the the Haight. Like another piano store — the Grand Piano?
LC: I would like a community center for kids.
HSV: Or people in general, yeah?
LC: Yeah.
HSV: Not that kids aren’t people.
But like the Grand Piano. You said that people were in there, hanging out …
LC: Right. There is no kind of nexus or focus where everybody goes and hangs out. So that would be really nice. But again, it’s not just a neighborhood anymore. You know, it draws so many other people from other places.
One interesting story for your paper is this house on the corner across the street — the one that’s unoccupied since the ‘50s!?
HSV: What?
LC: Yeah! Big house: a storage, 2 huge flats, 3 garages == right across the street.
HSV: What color is it? The yellow? That’s empty?
LC: Empty.
HSV: That’s empty?
LC: It’s been empty since the ‘50s.
HSV: What?
LC: Yep!
HSV: It almost looks like a hotel.
LC: No, it’s just big flats. I know the guy who owns it.
HSV: You know the guy who owns it?!?
LC: Yeah. He’s a firefighter.
HSV: What’s he doing with it?
LC: They don’t wanna rent it out.
HSV: That’s crazy!!!
LC: [laughs] You should interview him!
HSV: Okay! Oh he’s gonna throw you under the bus! [laughter] No, but that’s the whole thing: I don’t want to interview people and throw them under the bus. I want to interview people and let them speak their voice.
LC: Well, it’s not throwing them under the bus necessarily.
HSV: That’s crazy though! I’m not talking about wanting the money but just as far as …
LC: I know. I don’t know if you — this goes back quite a few years but there was a missing child in the neighborhood, Kevin Collins …
HSV: They found his bones, yes.
LC: He was going to St. Agnes … anyways, for a while there was a rumor that he was buried …
HSV: It was on Masonic they found the bones, right?
LC: Oh, they found the bones?
HSV: Oh yeah about 6 years ago. Maybe even 10 years ago now.
LC: Oh no kidding, I didn’t know that. On Masonic?
HSV: On Masonic, yeah, in the basement.
LC: What a house?
HSV: A house. And Rich — I think was working in the building too? — they excavated the bones and they realized it was [Kevin Collins].
LC: And on this block of course, right now there’s the French school but before that it was a school of East-West studies, which, they gave it a new name.
HSV: On Downey?
LC: Yeah right here on Downey. The main entrance is on Ashbury.
HSV: Okay, that’s it.
LC: I remember they use to have Friday night lectures open to the public and I went to hear Ghandi’s grandson speak one time …
HSV: Wow! So what I’m hearing is that you would like to see some community gathering spot or something?
LC: Anything that builds community or that brings people together …
HSV: Be it music, a lecture, or …
LC: Oh absolutely, yeah.
HSV: A class — whatever it is.
LC: Absolutely yes. We have a really strong sense of community on Downey Street. We have block parties. I always have a big party on my birthday. I could show you some photographs.
HSV: Alright!
LC: I went out on the street last September with a piñata and champagne and I’d met some new neighbors who had become really close friends, but you have to work at it. And what I found when I started working at SAFE was there were a lot of concerns about crime. I worked for them from ’83 to ’93. And when I started there were a lot of concerns about crime. It got better, but people didn’t know how to deal with it and they thought in terms of police, guns, locks — all with having their place of course.
But my philosophy was building community what I found was a lot of people didn’t know their neighbors, and sometimes they were afraid of their neighbors because we have a very diverse city. But we would hold meetings in peoples’ homes — and miracles happened [big smile]. People started knowing one another, caring about each other. I could tell you so many wonderful stories. How my first contact there was, “Let’s get guns and kill those people!” … to forming … there was one neighborhood where an older person got mugged. It was a neighborhood with a lot of old-time residents who had their own homes. And then the younger, mostly gay men residents moving in. So the gay men formed a group to escort the older people to doctor appointments and shopping — whatever. And then the older people, cuz they now knew the younger gay people, would watch over their homes. This kind of thing. And it just happened very naturally.
The point I was trying to make was people loved it. People really want to be friendly, they want to connect with other people — they just don’t know how to!
Anyway, sorry, I got on another sidetrack!
HSV: No, no!
Would you want to be — the SF Heritage holds these meetings, not all the time, but they had one where they, you know, residents were saying, “We need to get rid of these kids on the corner of the Haight Ashbury”, these people who live there. And they are loud, and they are letting their dogs shit …
LC: The kids don’t have any place to go!
EDIT THIS OUT!!! Part 3 start at 1:12:09
LC: I’ll let you go!
HSV: I’ll let YOU go! This is great!
LC: For 5 years I was in the sheriffs’ department here. My last gig, if you will, was I ran a women’s jail in San Bruno. And at that time Walden House was trying to get the site on Buena Vista, which was a home for young ladies run by the Catholic Church — in other words, unwed mothers. Horrible! But any way …
HSV: What year is this for frame of reference?
LC: This is approximately … let’s I left the ?? In ’80, so it had to be somewhere toward the end of the ‘70s.
HSV: Okay.
LC: So they had a community meeting — a meeting open to the community, which was very wise. And a lot of people were very upset about the idea of bringing all these drug addicts and …
HSV: Vagrants …
LC: Whatever. Mostly it was substance abuse. Harvey Milk was there. He was our Supervisor.
HSV: Awww.
LC: He was wonderful. He used to walk the streets all the time [waves], “Hi Harvey!” You know, talking to people. When you called his office he picked up the phone. It wasn’t like now, you know. Who’s our supervisor now? I thought it was Dean Preston and then somebody said he’s no longer the Supervisor for Cole Valley.
HSV: Oh he is I hung out with him about a week ago.
LC: What’s your opinion of him?
HSV: Well … we’re on camera [laughter]
LC: Okay!
HSV: He’s a politician, that’s all I’ll say.
LC: Harvey Milk and then Quonon Yen???? — I mean they were just one of a kind.
So I went to that meeting and I was running the jail at that time, and I remember I got up and spoke and I said, “I can tell you from my experience, you’d must rather have people who have issues in a program where they’re being helped than wandering the streets.” Which is common sense. Same thing with the kids as you were speaking about just before. They’re hanging out on the corners, bothering people, and why are they there? Because they have nothing better to do.
CUT!!!!!
HSV: Yes, some of them are … you know, there’s always a bad seed. Some of them are — I don’t really want to go down that road.
LC: The thing is, nobody is a kid who says to himself, “I want to be a teenager who shits on the street and is anti-social.” Nobody wants to be that. Give them alternatives.
HSV: Right.
CUT CUT CUT
LC: There are always the extreme examples of people who are very disturbed or whatever.
HSV: No, but the point is, they want to live this life. There are some that want to live this life.
LC: They’ve gotten so far into something that they can’t get out. I know there are people like that but the majority of human beings can really be helped in some way or another if they’re given something realistic and good.
HSV: Do you know the story about a lot of them that have been sent down to the Tenderloin cuz they have housing in the Tenderloin — and then they’re down in the Tenderloin?!? I’m terrified of the Tenderloin. There are drugs everywhere. You’re sending homeless kids to the Tenderloin for housing. That’s a problem too. We could go on and on about this …
LC: I’m a big believer in prevention. What we’re dealing with now is a long series of events in the lives of people where they end up on the streets or whatever. What we have is — and I [laughs, arms up in air] don’t want to get into politics but rampant capitalistic society, which pits people against each other and survival of the fittest, you know.
HSV: I love your statement about having meetings of where they’re meeting them, and it’s in a home!
LC: Well, you know, the people at Larkin Street might be the people to talk to about it because they have day to day contact with street kids.
But you know, it’s prevention. I mean, we don’t have a very nurturing society. If you compare it most European countries, for example, people fall through the cracks here where they won’t in other countries. I met a man from Denmark, they had an AirBNB a couple doors down [on Downey] and we got into conversation, and it was just when the homeless thing was starting to get really bad. And he shocked seeing these people lying in the streets. And I remember him saying, “Now the difference between your country and mine — and I love America, don’t get me wrong — in my country we think ‘we’ and in your country you think ‘I’.”
[silence] And that’s the thing: If you try to do something to help people, right away you have a lot of people say, “Oh! Communism! Socialism! [dramatic arms].” And ironically of course it’s usually the people who are hurt the most by our system are against any positive change because they’re so brainwashed.
I mean when I worked in the jails, it was a huge education for me. I really learned a lot about why we have jails, who’s in jails, why they keep coming back. And, you know how prisons started in this country?
HSV: [no]
LC: In the late 18th Century, I think 1797, the Quakers were appalled by the way offenders were treated. They had stocks, whippings, all kinds of that. So they this idealistic idea about a penitentiary. When you think penitence, you think monasteries and cells, people having a quiet place, alone time to reflect, so this was the idea that this would be a huge improvement for offenders.
Well, fast-forward [laughs]! Who do you think are the biggest opponents of prisons? They don’t want prison reform, they want abolition of prisons? The Quakers, because they’ve seen the monster that they unwittingly helped create.
HSV: Wow.
LC: Yeah, so we had this idea that if something doesn’t work, just do more. [sarcastic laugh] Just do more of the same thing.
HSV: So you’re saying penitentiary is like penance?
LC: That was the original idea.
HSV: Go sit by yourself, like a timeout. You need to go over there and pay your penance.
LC: I’ve been in a prison. Believe me, it’s no reason the Quakers want to abolish them. They’re horrible places. You take somebody who is for whatever reason is not a “good” contributing member to society, and then you separate him from his family, his career, often his voting rights, but him into an abnormal, disruptive environment. And then after awhile you say, “Okay, he’s rehabilitated, put him back in society.”
HSV: Yeah, I know. It’s outta control.
LC: It’s crazy! It’s insane!
HSV: Let’s leave on a good note, Loretta!
LC: [huge laughter]
HSV: I do have to go to my physical therapy soon! [laughter]
LC: I was wondering if I’d have enough to talk to you about! [laughter]
HSV: This is great. This is fantastic because it’s for real. I mean I know alot of the kids on the corner — I call them kids. Some of them are my age! — they need to respect … we ALL just need to respect each other, first and foremost.
LC: Yeah, but if you haven’t been given respect for so much of your life, it’s very hard to respect anybody else, or give a shit. It really is. I mean, I really understand where they’re coming from.
HSV: Final words for this session …
LC: Hopefully this was enough!
HSV: No! This is not the last one! [laughter] In fact, I’m thinking it’d be really great to have a monthly show or something, you know? [laughter]
Um …
LC: You were saying, about the kids …
HSV: If you had a loudspeaker and you could say to everybody — the shop owners, the people that live there, and the street people, right now, what would you say to them all?
LC: I would say I sympathize, you know, with you. We have a bad situation here. However, look for constructive alternatives rather than lock them away and throw away the key cuz that doesn’t work.
HSV: And maybe we’ll start having some sort of community meeting somewhere, and maybe ya’ll start organizing or, I don’t know. Get together, start talking to one another …
LC: [thoughtfully] A lot of these stores ended up closing. I mean, there’s space here that you could use for activities for kids. You’re bringing up something that I haven’t really thought about at all.
HSV: But I mean do you think that peace — having lived through the whole peace and love era — do you think peace and love is still possible in this community?
LC: Oh! If I didn’t I’d jump off the bridge! [laughter] I mean it’s got … it’s possible worldwide!
HSV: Yeah.
LC: That’s the only solution, is to love one another. Without that, what have you got?
HSV: That’s the ending! Right there! For this session, y’all! [laughter] We love you, Loretta! Thank you! And Hudson, thank you Hudson for being awesome! Everybody! Thank you so much!
LC: Boy you really got me started! [laughter]
HSV: No, it’s good! These are important things! Thank you so much for showing us your house. Bye Hudson!
