Crescent City, CA - Trees of Mystery

We saw this bumper sticker recently:

And, hey, didn't you think that Babe and Paul Bunyan were Minnesota citizens? Then, why are they in California? Did they move? Well, maybe they’re here for the same reason that Gary and I are in California: the weather. Babe and Paul got tired of the cold winters, the snow, the sleet, the ice and the winds and came here to Northern California, with its temperate climate. Besides, the trees here are much larger and need a taller dude to manage them. I hear that Babe has gotten a few tattoos and is now practicing his boogie board skills. Unfortunately, the surf was too high today and I did not get any pictures of this.

This Paul Bunyan is 40’ high and weighs 30,000 lbs. Babe is 35’ to his horn tips and also weighs 30,000 lbs.

Obviously, I’m kidding here but we did find two humongous statues of Babe the Blue Ox and Paul Bunyan on our trip today in Klamath, CA. But, first, we’ve got to get on our way. And that was harder than we had thought it would be. We have these things called ‘levelers’ on our RV which operate on hydraulic fluid and which will help to level our RV when we get to a campground. Before we leave - we have to bring them up - makes sense doesn’t it? Ours came up fine but the indicator lights all said that they were still down. And the beeping alarm was annoyingly loud. Something’s wrong, We spent some time working with them but to no avail. Still the alarm, still the indicator light - still no go. Gary then put on his work clothes, got our his Journey manuals and began to read. He found the hydraulic fluid tank under the front step,

and it was full. His next shot was to look at the indicator inside which was screwed down into the tank. If it touched hydraulic fluid, it knew the levelers were up and all was ok. However, the little indicator was too high (possibly we had had a bit of a leak) and all he did was to screw the little thing down 1/2 turn to touch the fluid and we were good to go. Whew.

Coffee and donuts and gas and we were now off down beautiful rte 101.

Our next stop was Crescent City, CA. with a short stop to visit with Paul and Babe at the Trees of Mystery: heavily advertised and I’m sure it is popular. But is it a ‘roadside attraction’ a ‘tourist trap’ or something else? We stopped, took some pictures of Paul and Babe and then wandered into the store/museum. We had decided that we have taken 2 extensive hikes in Redwoods, had seen two Redwood museums and were going to hike again in the Redwoods so probably did not need to go into the Trees of Mystery to see any more. But, we thought we’d give the museum a chance. And, are we ever glad we did. I never imagined that we would see so much beautiful art work, baskets, kachinas, clothing, history and other artifacts from the Native Americans in America than we saw here. It is actually a private collection of a 92-yr old woman, Marylee Thompson who assembled all these artifacts over 40 years. It is one of the largest privately owned museums in America and the Smithsonian Museum has expressed an interest in buying the entire collection but it is not for sale and is actually in a trust so can’t be sold.

There are 6 rooms devoted to a geographical area of the US: the local room devoted to the Yurok tribe, the Northwest, the Southwest, the Plains, California and the Great Basin and a room devoted to the photography of Edward Curtis. There is also a display of baby carriers from many different tribes. I was stunned at the quantity and quality of the artifacts here. Firstly, I had no idea that there were so many different Native American tribes. I have heard of some (you know, the ones that have made it to old TV shows) and have visited some museums devoted to others that I had never heard of. However I have not even scratched the surface. For example, here is a map of California with all the tribes in it. If there are this many tribes in CA, how many more are there in the US?

On the other hand, I could write for days and we’d all be bored. Why don’t I just show some pictures of what we saw in the museum.

They even had a page from a Bible translated into Cherokee by Chief Chief Sequoyah.

There was also a room devoted to the photography of Edward Curtis.

We had seen some of his photos of Native Americans at the turn of the century when we were in Phoenix at the Capital museum. But, this collection had equally as many as that museum. Curtis spent 30 years traveling and photographing Native Americans before they became enveloped by the steadily advancing white culture. He traveled by mule, by horse and by wagon carrying his heavy photographic equipment, plates and supplies throughout the west. Theodore Roosevelt, believing in the worth of his project, introduced him to JP Morgan who gave $75,000 to continue his work which Curtis would repay by giving Morgan sets of his books and 500 original prints. Curtis also made 10,000 wax cylinder recordings of Indian language and music, he took more than 40,000 photos from over 80 tribes. He recorded lore, history, foods, housing, garments, recreation, ceremonies, etc.

But he is also know to have paid Native Americans to pose in staged scenes, to have retouched photos to remove modern items like clocks from pictures and to have had Native Americans wear historically inaccurate clothing. Oh, well, the picture presented by Curtis is a bit murky: did his work help to preserve a passing culture or to help falsify it for history? Whichever, the photos are stunning in themselves, whether they are a correct picture of history or not.

We spent about 2 hours here but could have spent much more. We had started later than we had planned, had stopped along the way to take in the scenic views along the coast and still had to get to our next campground. Time to go.

By the way, if you ever drive 101 through northern California, do not pass by this amazing museum.