I spent a lot of time alone in the woods at the beginning of my Wheeler's stay. I would sometimes hike way off the path and deep into the woods or the canyons. Maggie would always stay loyally by my side as I sat and contemplated the universe and every ant, butterfly and critter that came my way. Sometimes I would space out to way after darkness, relying on Maggie to find our way and lead us out back to Knoll civilization! I probably would be sitting down there still if it hadn't been for her!

Jodi, just before Mitch's birth in 12/71. "Closest photo I have to Wheeler's days."Maybe someone will remember me"!
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Cats, Slugs and Coyotes
We arrived at the front gate of Wheelers Ranch at long last. Although accustomed to the ancient and beautiful West Virginia landscape, and its deep, dark, dense hills and "hollers", I was not prepared for what met my eyes at Sheep Ridge. Those open rolling vistas, the delicate yet tenacious wildflowers, the ocean-filled clouds, the scent of sweet dry grasses, eucalyptus, acacia, bay laurel and redwood. I was overwhelmed with the magnificent splendor of it all.
We stood in silent reverie at first, Lloyd got down on his knees and kissed the earth, John said, "Welcome to paradise, Jodi." They pointed out landmarks as we walked on down; "This is Gruesome Gulch," a serious rut in the road that swallowed up many unsuspecting folks' vehicles, the more they spun their tires the deeper they sunk in the quagmire! Mostly we strolled in silence, letting the peace and gentleness roll over our city weary bodies. I remember them holding up some barbed wire for me to squeeze under. They warned me about some vigilante dude with a shotgun on horseback I had to be aware of. Something about border wars with Bill. And I did indeed have a run-in with this guy sometime in the future (another story)!
They introduced me to "The Zen Trail." It's called that because you really have to concentrate and be in tune in order to navigate it."
I loved the Zen Trail from the start and eventually memorized every inch of it. I could fly up and down it barefoot, in pitch dark , the soles of my feet caressing the smooth packed dirt.
We met folks along the way down to the knoll, all treated me with warm and open affection. I truly felt I was home at long last. We reached the top of the knoll, a circular levelled-out area, the dirt worn smooth and flat, encircled by houses. On one side was a cabin where an African-American woman named Helene resided, she was very kind, and showed me a strange contraption her mother had just bought for her, a pressure cooker. She said I should stop by any time for some rice pudding. In the center of the circle was a log house originally built to be a schoolhouse for the kids on the land, but to my knowledge was never utilized as such. A roughneck sort of guy also with the name of Bill Wheeler lived in it.
On the other side of the circle were two more houses. A real character lived in one of these, Bowie Bill, named for the ominous-looking bowie knife he kept in a sheath strapped to his side at all times. Bowie was a thuggish Daniel Boone type, many legends and rumors abounded about him. 'He had wrestled a bear with his own bare hands in the out back of Alaska; he was a "survivalist gourmet" known to dine on banana slugs and feral cats, etc. I believed all the stories without a doubt! Although a bit wary of him he mostly proved to be a harmless protector of me. There was one thing about his situation that did trouble me a bit, the young underage girl he had living with him who he kept a very tight rein on. She barely left his cabin, but I would run into her at the one water spigot that existed on the knoll, we would chat as we washed our dishes, and helped each other wash our long dark hair. I knew her only as Diane, but my suspicions proved to be correct. On my last day at Wheeler's, I stopped by to say goodbye to her and she confessed she was a 14 yr. old runaway using an alias, her hair was dyed black, and her picture had been on the evening news as her parents had been desperately searching the Haight Ashbury district for her.
Next door to Bowie lived his bosom buddie partner in crime, a tall gawky cowboy type, blonde and handsome with a gentler kinder disposition than Bill. His name was Maverick. He was always friendly and kind to me. Once we stood together talking, looking out over the knoll canyon, Maverick pointed out a deer looking straight at us. Another time he cut off the finger of an old pair of leather gloves to make a little medicine bag, talisman bundle for me. He wove a leather thong thru it so I could wear it around my neck. "Find a magic stone on the land," he said, "and put it in the pouch for luck." I still amazingly enough have the pouch today, with the little Wheeler's Ranch eucalyptus pod I put in it on that day so long ago, seems like yesterday, and the pouch makes it all a sweet reality. Bless Maverick.
A very funny story about these two characters that happened to me. I passed by their houses on my way to the mainland one day to go on a commodity food run (no foodstamps at that time, only boxes of free USDA food once a month you had to pick up.) I said bye to them as I passed, "I'll see you later this evening."
Well, after hanging out with folks on the top of the land, I decided I didn't want to go on the run after all, which sometimes proved to be rather taxing on my nerves. I headed back down the trail towards my cabin. Alas, who should be inside my cabin ransacking through all of my stuff? You guessed it, Bowie Bill and his cohort, Maverick! Yes, I ran smack into this deadly duo pair of roughneck cowpokes tearing through all of my stuff, assuming I wouldn't be back until way later. Boy, did they wear some pretty big shit-eating grins on their sheepish, mawkish guilt-ridden faces! By this time I had become well inaugurated into the ways of Wheeler's Women. I was a true dyed-in-the-wool Wheeler's Chick (actually the only sorority I ever got into), meaning I took no shit! I let those two slug-sucking, cat-eating mule-skinner cowboys have a piece of my mind as they bowed and kow-towed and stuttered and squirmed their way out of my humble abode.
Bless their hearts, deep down they knew I wasn't really mad. I had absolutely nothing of value to protect, and what was mine was theirs as far as I was concerned. I pretended not to notice my favorite R. Crumb comic book rolled up in Maverick's back pocket as they walked off.
Another guy I was introduced to that lived on the path to the right and further down from this encampment was a guy named Guitar Bob who lived in a little A-frame he called the Hobbit House. On a path to the left was John and Lloyd's cabin. Exhausted, we quickly made our sleeping arrangements for the night, John and Lloyd would crash up in the loft, they tossed down a spare sleeping bag for me to sleep in in the living room. Before the night was over we had two more visitors, Greg Alexander from Kansas, wrapped in a pink wool blanket and his little ugly dog, Martha. And just before I fell asleep, another guy came and stood in the doorway silhouetted by the evening light. That image must have burned itself on my brain, because I can see him as plain as if it were yesterday!
"Hi. I'm Coyote,! Came to say goodbye to Lloyd and John. I'm headin' up to Oregon in the morning."
That was the first (1971) and last time I saw Coyote until my return to Wheeler's for my first May Day reunion 22 years later in 1993, and then again at Lou's Memorial in 1996. How fitting to glimpse the Coyote at my first day on the Ranch, then again at my first reunion and then at Lou's memorial. The trickster appears, disappears and reappears again. We were both cutting a hunk of cake at the same time. I introduced myself and told him of our first encounter in 1971 still clear in my mind. He was silent for a moment, apologized for not remembering me and said, "I used to be quite the ladies' man back then, but all that's changed now. These days I have to wear a raincoat." He looked at me for a moment then tipped back his beer.

Aum Shanti Aum and Maverick's Vest
I began my little forays out into the world at about age 14. It was almost as if I were subconsciously preparing for what lay ahead. I would save up my lunch money until I had $28., the exact amount for a Greyhound ticket from Chas., W. VA. to New York City. I'd tell my mother I'd be late that evening, I was going to the library to study after school. I'd ride the little bus over the Kanawha River to downtown, walk to the depot, purchase a ticket and hop aboard riding through the long dark night. Once arriving in NYC I'd never quite have the nerve to venture out though and would call my immigrant grandmother who lived in Brooklyn. She would tell me which subways to take to get to her apartment. Enraged, my father would show up shortly after to drive me the long way back to W.Va in seething silence.
Come summer they let me stay. Grandmom trusted me and gave me my freedom. She'd send me out with a pocketful of tokens for the subway, and some fresh fruit. I was free to explore! I eventually found my way to the beaches around the Coney Island area; I'd just wander around, collecting shells, playing in the waves, and watching people with boundless curiosity. Quite by accident, or providence, I stumbled upon an intriguing-looking group of people. I must have been staring, gape-mouthed, because they beckoned me over. There was an Haitian man playing a conga drum, a very tanned older man in bikini briefs sitting in full lotus eating a mango, the first I'd ever seen, and who was known as "Joe the Mango Man," a New York City garbage truck driver named Richie Rubin who proudly boasted he made more money than NYC school teachers and furnished his whole apartment to boot from the cities more affluent discards, a tall blonde narcissistic man named Norman Manzon who danced with the NYC ballet and spent hours in exhibitionist fashion doing leaps and plies up and down the beach, and his magnificently beautiful, beatific, moonfaced girlfriend who never took her eyes off of him, Suzanne.
I was immediately incorporated into this group, my education had begun. They turned me on to vegetarianism and shared foods with me I had never seen before, they discussed books and politics, they shared bowls of hashish and they adored and respected me. I went back home to W.VA a changed person, a master plan brewing in the back of my mind.
This is all going to be tied in folks, so please bear with me as we jump ahead once again to my first week on The Ranch.
Being an independent spirit, I did not want to depend on John and Lloyd, I wanted to branch out from them as soon as possible and find my own way at the Ranch. This actually seemed to hurt Lloyd's feelings, he loved me, plus I think he felt I was trying to social climb my way out of the Knoll and get quickly connected with the more prominent folks "up top". The Ranch was stratified along similar societal lines as anywhere. This was truly not the case for me, I loved the Knoll and felt loyal to my Knoll roots and companeros(as). Plus, Lloyd had saved my life, setting himself up at Wheeler's and then coming back for me in Berkeley. What compassion and corazon that young brother possessed! Even so, he had a hurt and somewhat disapproving look in his eye after that. A wedge was somehow driven, although neatly cut and stacked piles of wood later appeared mysteriously by my little cabin door.
I began by exploring the woods and canyons around the Knoll with Magpie by my side until my physical and mental health were renewed and restored, and then slowly worked my way around the Knoll, meeting folks, and then up and down the Zen Trail. One of the first people I met outside of the Knoll precinct was an Native American woman whose name was Lillianna. As you headed up the Trail from the Knoll, her diminutive slope-roofed hut resided on the right side, situated in a green and sunny little glade, facing a little stream. It had nothing inside but a built-in bunk bed, some shelves and a small wood stove. Windchimes tinkled.
We bonded immediately, which was how friendships seemed to happen at the Ranch, and sat in the sun on her little front stoop talking. She was leaving the Ranch in a few days, had met up with some folks of the Bahai faith in Novato, and was going to move in with them. She asked me if I would be there to see her off when they came. I could not understand her wanting to leave her little paradise, but promised I would indeed see her off. I knew nothing about the Bahai faith and I guess I was more than a little surprised when a couple of quaint little old white ladies with permed blue-grey tinted hair came to pick her up! I had expected something far more exotic I guess. As was the pattern at Wheeler's when you left, you gave away your belongings, and passed on your house to someone who seemed deserving. OK folks, here we go, guess who she gifted her house too? Can you guess? Norman and Suzanne whom I had met in Coney Island four years earlier, now magically transformed into Sun and Moonflower and their sweet baby, Shanti! Our paths had crossed again, to all of our delight! Sun was still somewhat arrogant and aloof, but a loyal friend and provider towards me. I learned to practice the Salutation to the Sun (Surya Namaskar) from watching him and still do so each morning. And I loved to listen to him sweetly chanting a lullaby to his daughter, Shanti:

Aum Shanti Aum, Shanti Shanti, Aum Shanti
Aum Shanti Shanti, Shanti Shanti Aum...

Moonflower was still ethereal, with her brown Filipino face like a virgin on a holy card. I loved Shanti, the first little baby I got to know on the land. I secretly envied Moonflower's Earth Mother status and all of the attention it seemed to attract towards her on the land. It also attracted foodstamps and welfare their way, so compared to most they were sitting pretty financially. They were extremely generous towards me, and shared everything.
Lillianna gave me a quilt made by some of her relatives. It was made of pieced-together squares of animal fur, mostly bear, she claimed. "It will keep you warm at night," she said. Sun gave me the tent they had been living in. I found a secluded spot way down on the Knoll with no one else in view, green and shady, mossy and fertile. Things were not yet overgrown as they are today, and you could walk all the way down into the canyon, or you could look straight across to the next mountainside, which I now believe may be Star Mountain. There was only one guy down there just finishing the platform on the log cabin he was planning to build. He was a Nordic-looking fellow named Bruce.
He acknowledged my existence by calling me "man," such as in, "Hey, man, how's it going?" But otherwise, he pretty much ignored me. I found a level spot, and Sun came down naked bearing tent, sleeping bag, kerosene and lantern, matches, cookpots and food -- just about everything I would need to set up housekeeping. He helped me square everything away. Later Moonflower appeared also bearing gifts and a Burpee seed catalogue. We spent hours cutting out colorful pictures of flowers and taping them all over the inside tent walls to brighten things up. She threw in a few pictures of Krishna, and I tacked up my cherished snapshot of my youngest sister, Liz, only aged four at the time.
Sun and Moonflower possessed much knowledge and wisdom of things I was hungry to learn about. When Sun was away, Moonflower and I shared dinners and tea and discussed many things. She offered me much advice on yoga and spirituality, foods and nutrition, shared recipes and vitamins and herbs, taught me to identify medicinal herbs and edible wild plants on the land, upon which I later often subsisted (miner's lettuce, wild mustard, etc.) She told me that using any form of contraception was wrong, that the only birth control allowable was 'divinely induced.'
She was practicing celibacy, and said that the highest spiritual embodiment a woman could hope to achieve in her lifetime was pregnancy and motherhood. I was so awestruck with both Sun and Moonflower and so appreciative of their overwhelming generosity towards me, that anything they said was gospel as far as I was concerned.
So I spent my first night alone, in my nicely decorated green canvas pup tent, sleeping soundly and very warmly under animal skins. The problem was I had adapted vegetarian ways, treading lightly upon the earth, and that damned blanket felt foreboding. I felt too much like Nanuck of the North! I decided to give it away to someone who would really appreciate it. Maverick! Who else? Boy, was he thrilled to get that thing! He quickly went to work cutting and sewing, making himself a vest that he was most proud of. A gift from Jodi to Maverick. A gift from Lillianna to Jodi. A gift from Lillianna's Native American relative to Lillianna. A gift from the Bear to Lillianna's relatives. Now it is a gift to all of you, my Open Land Family. Aum Shanti Aum

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On my dad's farm after leaving Wheeler's. I'm the one in the middle, still pregnant. Bruce from Wheeler's is the blonde guy next to me. Guy on left in derby hat is Donnie Tannenbaum. He often visited Wheeler's, and was there in that 'escaped cons' situation when the land was invaded. The girl next to me with bible is my 16-yr-old sister - 11/71
 

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Tom Lance, 9/7/98: Subject: Lopez Books -- Vietnam & the Sixties: Sixties Literature: Item 39 is of particular interest. Who would have thunk?

History of a Famous Commune, Inscribed 39. (Communes).

"The Morning Star Scrapbook." (Occidental): (Friends of Morning Star) (1973). The history of the most famous/notorious California commune of the Sixties, which was in constant legal trouble from 1966-1973 for being a haven for hippies. Morning Star, located about 50 miles north of San Francisco, was a natural destination for hippies moving out of the city, because of its reputation for openness and welcoming newcomers. Young people from Haight-Ashbury began arriving in November, 1966, and the commune's first bust came in June, 1967, when Diggers from the Bay Area came up. This copy has an autograph note laid in from Louis Gottlieb, longtime owner of Morning Star, and signed "the defendant," to Alvah Bessie, the noted radical author and screenwriter. The note is written on a copy of the court document prepared by Gottlieb, acting as his own lawyer, arguing his right to deed Morning Star Ranch to God. (It was thought, among other things, that it would be harder for the authorities to serve God with summonses for violating county ordinances than it had been to serve Gottlieb.) Quarto, only issued in wrappers. Printed on newsprint that is yellowing with age; a very good copy. The scrapbook reprints numerous photographs of Morning Star residents over the years, as well as various news articles and other items related to the ranch. An important document of the Sixties counterculture, and a unique and excellent association copy, with Gottlieb's own court argument, which is not published elsewhere. A landmark piece of counterculture history. Price: $750