A Visit to Deer Flat Ranch

In the “Further Evidence that Youtube is Awesome” category, we have this home video uploaded by Youtube user carminesmith.  The video primarily consists of footage shot in 1987 of a family visit to Linus Pauling’s ranch on the Pacific coast near Big Sur, California, and it lends the viewer a terrific sense of the remarkable beauty of the property.  While the visit was hosted by Pauling’s grandson Sasha Kamb, the film does include a few shots of a relaxed Pauling welcoming his guests and even recreating with them.  Indeed, this is likely the only video ever shot of Linus Pauling peering out to sea while drinking a beer.

For several decades, Deer Flat Ranch was an important refuge for the Paulings, who increasingly needed to get away from the hectic travel schedules and near constant demands on time that generally defined their lives.  Purchased in 1956, the original dwelling on the Big Sur property had no electricity or telephone.  The second home, built with the cash award that Pauling received from the Nobel Peace Prize and completed in 1966, was larger and more comfortable.  Over time the space truly became a sanctuary for the Paulings, perhaps even moreso for Linus after Ava Helen died.  Today, we are lucky to have this document of a location that was crucial to understanding the Paulings’ story.

The Miller Farmhouse

The Miller House, ca. early 1900s.

Ava Helen Pauling’s childhood residence near Beavercreek, Oregon, now known as “The Miller House,” was built around 1907 and constructed so solidly that it still stands, albeit in a different location and with a different paint job than was originally the case. It has survived more than one-hundred years of weather and use, beginning with its housing of the Miller family, which included twelve children.  Over subsequent generations the house was sold to at least two other families before being rescued in 2004 by Rick and Kassandra Young. Together with friends and family members, the Youngs have spent the last seven years engaged in the gargantuan task of renovating the Miller family home.

Before Ava Helen Pauling married Linus Pauling, she was Ava Helen Miller, a precocious child who grew up in Beavercreek, Canby and Salem, Oregon. Around the time of her parents’ divorce at age nine, the family’s big, beautiful two-story Craftsman style house was built, and Ava Helen lived on their 160-acre farm with her mother and siblings until the family moved to Canby for a time. When Ave Helen was thirteen, she moved away to Salem to attend high school and live with her older sister Blanche, who worked for the Oregon Supreme Court. As a result, Ava Helen did not spend a great deal of her childhood in the house that her family built, but the few years that she did spend there were sure to have been aesthetically pleasing, given the inviting nature of the house and its beautiful, forested surroundings.

The Miller House, 2011.

When the Youngs bought the Miller House in 2004, it was not even habitable and had been condemned after standing empty for fifteen years. The couple purchased the home for one dollar. “I always wanted an old house,” said Kassandra, “but when we got this one everybody said I was crazy!” Crazy though it may have seemed, the Youngs’ one dollar purchase saved an important piece of history from being razed, though the couple did not know it at the time. Indeed, it wasn’t until after they had moved the house to a new parcel of land in 2005 that Rick began looking through the county’s historical records, in the process discovering that Ava Helen Miller had spent part of her childhood in their house.

Moving the Miller House two miles down the road was a challenging task which took eight hours, required the trimming of trees on both sides of the road to make way for the farmhouse, (which likewise entailed obtaining all of the neighbors’ permissions) blocked school bus routes for a little while and necessitated cutting off a few neighbors’ electricity for a short while. Now that it is moved, the house on the small hill looks as though it has always been there, accompanied by an old barn and ten acres of hay fields and trees. From the front porch, one is treated to a slightly elevated view of forested hills and a road winding between trees. To the north, one is sometimes able to see Mt. Hood. The view isn’t identical to that of the house’s original location, but is close enough that the Miller family probably peered out on something similar.

Restoring the house to habitable condition has been quite a journey for the Youngs, who started a blog about it in 2008 to record their progress. The blog, which can be found at http://www.1907millerhouse.com, also includes a photo of the structure as it was being built in the early 1900s, with members of the Miller family perched on a ladder reaching up to the top wraparound balcony. A copy of the photo now sits in a glass cabinet in the dining room of the house. In the photo the house has not yet been painted and looks gray.  Especially in its unfinished form, one is able to see the sturdiness of the structure and the quality of the milled lumber. The Youngs used the original old photo as a guide to their restoration, and also procured copies of other photos from the Pauling Papers that they try to follow in their continuing renovations. They have also spoken with Linus Pauling Jr. and members of both the Pauling and Miller families about the house, and say that the Paulings have expressed a desire to hold a family reunion there in the future.

Today the house is in remarkably good shape given the fact that it is over 100 years old, has been uprooted and moved, and has been subject to generations of use by families with children. This solidity can be partly attributed to the tight, interlocking design of a Craftsman style house, and also to the precision and attention to detail that went into its construction. Kassandra notes that even in its condemned state there was virtually no rot in the frame of the house, and that it was built using 32-foot two-by-fours, while houses today are built using smaller, weaker beams. Features including a carved staircase and pocket doors, which slide into the wall to open, lend the house character.

The Youngs bought the Miller house in 2004, and worked on it for a year, living in a manufactured home behind the house, before moving in in 2005. “There was no electricity,” said Kassandra. “It was all gas lighting.” Rick and Kassandra did all the wiring and plumbing themselves, and installed lighting fixtures that look like lamps. “The plumbing was the hardest,” said Kassandra, though another big obstacle was getting cleared by Pacific Gas and Electric to move the house. They also had to refinance the house in 2009, which required them to speed up the renovation process and hurry to erect a railing on the lower deck and apply a layer of primer to the whole house. Refinancing was complicated, as were all the other obstacles in their way, but, Kassandra says, “I had to prove everybody wrong.” It may have seemed crazy to buy what appeared to be a pile of rubble, but she saw potential in the old house and appreciated the fine craftsmanship, even without knowing its history.

At this point, most rooms in the home are finished, including a spacious kitchen featuring salvaged yellow cabinetry and slate flooring that Kassandra installed. Leftover slate from the kitchen decorates the fireplace, giving the appearance of old brick. Although it has been thoroughly renovated to make it inhabitable, there is little that is new in the house. On the floor in the living room and parlor, old boards salvaged from another house have been installed, and the window in the kitchen is also a salvaged piece as well. Most of the windows, however, are the originals, with storm windows installed on some to make the drafty structure more airtight. The only aspect of the house that looks at all modern is the basement that the Youngs built; but Kassandra noted, “I want to eventually make that look old, too.”

The Young’s goal for this summer is to finish the porch and put up a railing around the top level. The porch was destroyed back in the 1970s when a tree fell on the house during a storm, so the Youngs are reconstructing it from scratch, making sure to follow the pattern depicted in their old photograph. Their biggest incentive for finishing the porch as quickly as possible, according to Kassandra, is that the Historic Registry requires them to restore it before they can submit an application for the Miller House to be added to the Registry list. The primary advantage to being placed on the Registry is a  fifteen-year tax freeze on their property taxes, the only requirement being that they keep the house looking as it always has on the outside, and that they host an open house once per year.

Although the Historic Registry only requires that the outside of the house appear original, the Youngs have done an incredible job of keeping the inside period-appropriate. Every piece of furniture has been procured either from salvage yards like the Rebuild-it Center and Hippo Hardware, or from eBay or Craigslist. (In order to find the perfect pieces, Kassandra says she was “looking on Craigslist daily.”) The solid, carved 1890s mantelpiece in the living room was shipped from Georgia, and was a bright blue color when it arrived, lacquered with some twelve coats of paint that Kassandra painstakingly sanded off. Now only the grain of the wood is on display, complementing the rest of the house, which is replete with original wood paneling.

The Youngs have fully redone the inside of the house to both comply with the period look as well as to reflect their own tastes, but a few vestiges of the Miller family still remain in the space. The house will soon have the same outward appearance that it did when it was inhabited by the Millers (although now it is a greenish blue color trimmed with a deep wine) and a few photos of the Millers reside in the home. Before they moved the structure, the Youngs also found and saved a stepping stone with the names Betty, Lulu and Jack engraved on it: Lulu and Jack were two of Ava Helen’s siblings, Betty was probably a cousin. A few streets in the area are also named after members of the Miller family and Ava Helen’s grandmother is buried in a cemetery up the road. The structure is in a new location with a new coat of paint and a new family living in it, but the Youngs are determined to retain the authenticity of the Miller House, and to keep the memory of the Millers alive.

The Miller women with the family car, 1914. Ava Helen sits far left.

Linus Pauling and the Search for UFOs

Linus Pauling, 1983.

Upon Linus Pauling’s death, the OSU Libraries Special Collections received approximately 500,000 of his and his wife’s personal items. Of this half-million item collection, a significant portion is comprised of his personal books which range from heavily academic texts to science fiction and murder mysteries. Amid the shelves of chemistry texts and genre fiction, however, there is a small subsection of books that has been known to draw attention from the Special Collections staff: the conspiracy texts.

As evidenced by his lifelong devotion to scientific discovery, Linus Pauling possessed a deep interest in mystery and the unknown. It seems that, while most of his research revolved around academically sanctioned scientific problems, he occasionally spent his free time exploring more unorthodox subjects. As he aged and his devotion to pure science was tempered by his growing sense of social responsibility, Pauling began to expand his interests and become engaged in issues he had previously ignored.

Beginning in 1963, Pauling took a position as fellow of the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions, a think tank founded by Robert M. Hutchins as a part of the Fund for the Republic. The Center was known for its unusual and sometimes controversial activities, including proposing a new constitution for the United States and promoting radical political movements among students. For the first time in forty years, Pauling’s primary work had stepped out of the bounds of research-based science. The atmosphere at the Center allowed him to explore problems that his fellow scientists might have considered, at best, unorthodox.

His interest in cover-ups and clandestine activity appears to have begun in the same way it did for many other Americans–with the assassination of President John. F. Kennedy. During the Cold War, Pauling had met and corresponded with Kennedy regarding peace and nuclear disarmament. While the two men did not always agree on matters of foreign policy, Pauling had a great deal of respect for the President and was shaken by his death. Following Kennedy’s assassination, Pauling began reading accounts of the event, taking a marked interest in the numerous conspiracy theories of the day. He followed the subject with some interest through the 1980s, building up a small collection of materials on the “magic bullet” and “multiple shooters” theories. [For more on Pauling's interactions with President Kennedy, see our earlier blog post on the subject.]

The JFK assassination had introduced Pauling to a whole new series of problems, where scientific fact could only go so far and the pitfalls of hoax and disinformation had to be carefully navigated. For years, he had played the role of the armchair gumshoe, reading countless murder mysteries, picking out clues and racing the protagonist to the revelation. As tragic as it was, the assassination had given Pauling a chance to apply his talents as an investigator to a problem beyond the sciences. The world of conspiracy and intrigue held an allure for Pauling that he could not deny.

In the mid-1960s, Pauling began to take an interest in UFOs and extraterrestrial life forms. Between his longtime love of science fiction and the public focus on the development of the U.S. and Soviet space programs, spaceships and aliens seemed to be a logical point of focus for him. He quickly found that, for once, he was not at the forefront of a field of study. While he had been synthesizing proteins and teaching future chemists, the American public had become obsessed with the potential for life in space. The American UFO craze had begun in 1947 with an upswing in reported “flying saucer” sightings which resulted in a series of U.S. Air Force investigations (Projects Blue Book, Sign, and Grudge). In 1952, the term “Unidentified Flying Object” was coined and, by 1956, several civilian research groups had formed, including the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization and the National investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena.

"A Study of Unidentified Flying Objects," by Linus Pauling. Page 1.

In order to understand what was going on in the world of UFO studies, Pauling did what came naturally. He began to read. While the ‘flying saucer’ section of the Pauling personal library is very small, it’s clear he was interested in the big picture, pulling from both scholarly and popular sources. One text, entitled NASA’s Space Science and Applications Program, is a well-worn report on NASA’s long term goals in space exploration and bioscience. Another, The Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects, is billed as “The complete report commissioned by the U.S. Air Force.” This volume, though lacking Pauling’s typical marginalia, sports heavy wear suggesting that it was a favorite.

"A Study of Unidentified Flying Objects," by Linus Pauling. Page 2.

For more sensational reading, Pauling settled on the likes of Brinsley Trench’s The Flying Saucer Story and John G. Fuller’s Incident at Exeter. Pauling’s copy of Trench’s work is speckled with hastily scribbled questions, the word “check” next to underlined passages, and notes to contact a variety of scientists and officials. His margin comments belie a heavy skepticism suggesting that, despite his willingness to explore the unorthodox, Pauling maintained a strict logical outlook. As can be expected, claims that defied conventional science readily drew Pauling’s criticism. At one point, Trench claims “It [a UFO] could easily withstand temperatures at 15,000 degrees Fahrenheit, without showing any traces of melting.” A large question mark sits in the margin next to it as a testament to Pauling’s disbelief.

It’s easy to imagine an aging Linus Pauling reading books about outer space and aliens in his free time, much as others read romance novels or tabloid newspapers. And certainly, his interest in the topic was primarily recreational, but it appears to have evolved over time. Pauling’s interest in UFOs peaked in 1966. He began preparing to formalize his research, going so far as to create a research proposal enumerating the requirements of an in-depth study on UFOs. As he became increasingly involved in the question of extraterrestrial sentience, his research became more and more intensive. When he had exhausted the available literature, he began contacting other academics for aid. Set into his copy of Frank Edward’s Flying Saucers: Serious Business is a 1968 letter from Pauling to Sterling A. Colgate, president of the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology. In the letter, Pauling queries Colgate regarding a recent siting near the New Mexico campus, asking for information on the Institute’s official position regarding UFOs. By involving other researchers in his work, Pauling was taking a big step. He had announced that, despite public and scientific skepticism, he was willing to approach UFOs as a viable research topic and, more importantly, associate his name and reputation with that research.

Unfortunately, Pauling’s UFO work never went very far. Following his receipt of the Nobel Peace Prize, he increased his efforts for nuclear disarmament, eventually pushing aside many of his lesser interests. By the 1970s, he was heavily involved in the promotion of orthomolecular medicine and the movement against the Vietnam War. Though we might imagine his interest in extraterrestrials continued, evidence suggests that his activist lifestyle left no room for further inquiry.

For more information on Linus Pauling, please visit the Linus Pauling Online Portal or the OSU Special Collections website.

Updated:

This letter, posted by request, was written from Linus Pauling to Stirling A. Colgate on June 19, 1968.

A Halloween Tale of Ice Cream and Ethanol

Linus Pauling at a Halloween gathering, 1950s?

In honor of today’s festivities, we’re passing along one of our favorite Pauling notes to self — a ghoulish tale penned shortly after midnight on November 5, 1974.  While the content of the note is surely atypical, its rigorous attention to detail (complete with metric conversions) and unflagging scientific insta-analysis of the data are pure Linus Pauling.

At about 12:28 AM on 5 November I woke, opened my eyes, and was astonished and frightened by a hallucination. Hovering over me was the head of a man, glaring at me, with a diabolical expression and flashing eyes. The face was a coppery red color, with highlights, as though oily. It seemed to be about a foot (25 cm) in diameter, and about five feet (125 cm) above me – not so far away as the ceiling. After about two seconds, or perhaps somewhat more, its aspect changed to that of another face, not menacing, and then to that of another, and another. I had ceased to be frightened in a few seconds, when I decided that I was experiencing a natural phenomenon.

After about two minutes (estimated) I looked at a clock (with red digits, visible at 12 feet distance); it was 12:30 AM. The room was dimly lit by the clock and light from the edges of the drawn curtains (there were electric lights outside).

The faces were surrounded by darkness, extending uniformly to the periphery of my vision. They were not sharply outlined, but faded into the darkness. The solid angle subtended by the red glow may have been somewhat less than stated above.

Without moving (except to move my head) I observed the phenomenon until 12:52 AM. I found that the face moved as I rotated my head. It seemed to be in the center of my visual field at all times. It remained when I closed my eyes and when I put my hands over my eyes. At times it disappeared, but returned in a few seconds. It was always dimmer than it had seemed when I first wakened.

The eyes seemed to shine, but intermittently – that is, they seemed to flash.

Throughout this period of over twenty minutes the face or other vision changed, usually every two or three seconds.

For a while it seemed to be not a face but a red marine invertebrate, such as a [left blank in Pauling's manuscript]. A portion here or there would glow, as though fluorescent, or occasionally flash.

I decided that the red color was caused by the excitation of one of the receptors in the fovea. I had attended a cocktail party, and ingested perhaps 50ml of ethanol (as vodka) and eaten some pretzels, at 5 to 6 PM. At 7:30 PM I had eaten a large ice cream sundae, with hot chocolate sauce. At 9:30 PM I went to bed, but had trouble sleeping. At 11:30 PM I noticed that I was unusually warm, and thought that I was oxidizing the sugar of the ice cream at a high rate. I went to sleep, and then wakened, as described above. I had been dreaming, but could not remember the dream.

After seeing the marine invertebrates I again saw faces, perhaps through an effort of will. The color remained red, as though only the red receptors were being stimulated.

The vision that I first saw seemed real enough to frighten me. I remained somewhat apprehensive for perhaps thirty seconds. If the face had not changed its aspect quickly and if I had not had some understanding of physiology I might have attributed supernatural significance to the phenomenon.

I had taken about two grams of ascorbic acid at 9:30 PM.

Linus Pauling, 12:53 AM, Mon 5 Nov. 1974

These and hundreds of additional Biographical Notes to Self are available in subseries 5 of the Pauling Papers Biographical section, Box 5.018.

Linus Pauling baseball!

As the Phillies and Rays prepare for another rendition of the Fall Classic, we thought it appropriate to share with you one of our favorite pieces of video:  Linus Pauling playing beach baseball at a Caltech chemistry department picnic in 1938.

Author of more than 1,100 published articles and inarguably one of history’s great minds, Pauling’s knowledge of the strike zone was, evidently, a little less authoritative.  And while coaches around the world would surely appreciate Pauling’s hustle on the basepaths, one does fear for the safety of those enlisted to play third for any team opposing the two-time Nobel prizewinner.

The Linus Pauling baseball clip is just a small segment of “The Edward W. Hughes Tapes,” a series of home movies recorded by Hughes, for twenty-five years a colleague of Pauling’s at Caltech.  The Hughes tapes, which run to just under an hour, offer fascinating glimpses of Caltech social gatherings and Pasadena life over the course of five decades.  Along with Linus and Ava Helen Pauling, careful viewers will note the presence of multiple scientific luminaries in the films — Albert Szent-Györgyi, Dorothy Hodgkin, Jerry Donohue, James Watson and Francis Crick, to name a few.

It is worth noting that the tapes also include footage from additional baseball outings at later department picnics.  Pauling — whose general disinclination toward sports was covered here — doesn’t take part in these match-ups.  One who was a bit more interested in tossing it around the diamond was 1976 Nobel chemistry laureate William Lipscomb, who, in 1995, recounted that

[Pauling's] illness from nephritis and his frequent trips meant that we did not see him very often, but he and his family did occasionally attend the Caltech Chemists games of (intermediate) baseball in the local league.

In a footnote, Lipscomb adds a few memorable details of his time roaming the outfield with The Chemists:

Seventy-five feet between bases, softball, but hardball rules and overhand pitching from 57.5 feet. I made the local newspaper for an unassisted triple play while playing center field.

Oregon State University, of course, has become something of a baseball powerhouse, given the Beavers’ back-to-back national championships in 2006 and 2007.  Our colleagues in the University Archives have created a terrific website documenting the evolution of this program through its centenary: Oregon State Baseball: 100 Years to a National Championship, 1907-2006.

Two Linuses in One

From the “Peanuts on Parade/Charlie Brown Around Town” celebrations held in St. Paul, Minnesota in 2003.

Photo by Have Bag Will Travel