AS the Los Gatos Museum Association held its annual membership meeting and election of new board members June 29 at Forbes Mill, an oak speaking lectern was dedicated to a former board member. The lectern plaque reads: "In memory of Frank Treseder, first president of the Forbes Mill Regional Museum, 1983. 'All ways a builder.'" Treseder died Sept. 11, 1995.
Mardi Bennett, reviewing Treseder's architectural career, named some of his achievements, including design of the Santa Clara Valley Water District buildings and 62-acre recreation area; the retrofitting of Los Gatos High School so that it survived the 1989 quake with little damage; and the present high school library. As chairman of the Los Gatos Planning Commission, "Frank was the one we turned to in making our decisions," Bennett said. Treseder's wife, Roberta, and daughter, Ellen, were among those attending.
ELECTED to the museum's board of directors at the June 29 meeting were Evelyn Elkins Miller, Jim Grupp, Fred Oberfelder, Catherine Politopoulos, Elaine Stanley, Natalie Sterba, Glen Shore, Mary Foster and Louise Collins. Ending their terms are Joe Cusick and Emerson Shaw. Fred Carlisle stays on to July, 1997.
Special recognition certificates for service to the two museums were given to Cusick, Foster, treasurer Pat Dunning, Tait curator Ted Glauser, E Clampus Vitus member Paul Cauble, Shaw (cited as "a major benefactor to the museum") and Forbes Mill site manager Jane Holland who, said board prexy Peter Tiernan, "holds the museum together."
PROBATE of the beneficent $600,000 legacy to the Museum Association from the estate of Rosalie Jacobsen Burns will take six or seven months, Tiernan said. He anticipated no hitch in the legalities. Attorney David J. Arata, hired to oversee the gift for the museum, has had wide experience with wills and grants; he formerly handled grants to Santa Clara University.
The money could bring the museum $50,000 a year in interest, Tiernan said. Countering the notion that the museum had been scraping the barrel, he pointed to two successful house tours that brought in some $15,000.
AT the same meeting, board member Roberta Blake, retired Los Gatos High School librarian, who has lived in Los Gatos since 1929, gave a talk on her memories of our town when it had a little over 600 population. Everyone contributed to the pageants held in the open-air amphitheater behind the present Civic Center.
On the train to San Francisco, which Blake's father took daily to his job at the Crocker Bank, Los Gatans rode the last car. "Ladies dressed for the trip with hats and gloves, looking their best. On the return trip you scrambled to find a seat or you stood."
The Blakes lived on Clelland Avenue near the Novitiate Winery. One day there was a fire and a huge vat of wine burst. Wine poured down the hill. "All the winos got out their buckets," Blake said.
She remembered hours spent picking prunes. "You didn't pick them off the tree. You shook the tree and took them off the ground. The pay was 10 cents a bucket." School opened later in the year because of fruit-picking and cannery work.
A familiar citizen was a dog named Chief. "Chief would park himself at the meat-market entrance to the Los Gatos Market. People would give him a wiener on their way out.
Special buses arrived from the city so people could see miles of fruit blossoms around Los Gatos.
"Small carnivals, usually with a carousel or Ferris wheel and some live animal, a tiger or camel, would set up near where the Good Earth restaurant is now," she said.
An orchestra known as the Haywire Orchestra played for dances at the Hotel Lyndon.
A popular game, Blake recalls, was "donkey baseball," played in a pasture near where Los Gatos High is today. "After hitting the ball, a batter had to mount a donkey, which might head for third instead of first," she said.
POET Mary Foster took a third place last year in the National Society of Poets national contest and this year was placed among the top 3 percent. Foster will travel to Washington, D. C., for the society's convention in August. Anyone who wants to contribute to her trip may leave a donation at Forbes Mill Museum.
THERE was a 92nd birthday celebration last weekend for Marie A. Johnson, who lives on Euclid Avenue; she's been a Los Gatos resident since 1943. A party with her five surviving children and their spouses, as well as some of her 21 grandchildren, took place at a cabin near Arnold, Calif., owned by son Gene Johnson of Watsonville. Still very active for her years, Marie Johnson keeps fit at a Ronnie Lott studio and walks to downtown Los Gatos, her son said.
A FORMER U. S. solicitor general under the Eisenhower administration, J. Lee Rankin died June 26 in Santa Cruz after a series of strokes. Rankin and his wife, Gertrude, had a home in Los Gatos, where they spent part of the year. A onetime Lincoln, Neb., lawyer, Rankin joined the Justice Department in 1953 and argued many cases before the U. S. Supreme Court, including the famous Brown v. Board of Education case that overthrew school segregation. He was chief counsel for the Warren Commission that named Lee Harvey Oswald the sole assassin of John F. Kennedy. In 1964 he was appointed New York City corporation counsel, the city's top attorney. Rankin was 88.
OLDEST troop in the Valley, Los Gatos Boy Scout Troop 539 benefited by about $400 at a fundraiser June 10 when the annual High Twelve Area 15 picnic was held at Vasona Park Pavilion. The High Twelve Club is a Masonic group. Scoutmaster Knowlton Shore and Scout chairman Terry Carter cooked hamburgers and hot dogs. The money will help send six boys to the High Sierra camp. The troop has been in existence since 1922.
This article appeared in the Los Gatos Weekly-Times, July 10, 1996.
©1996 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved