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.

A Book Lost to History

The kitchen at the Paulings’ original Deer Flat Ranch cabin, 1958.

During the Second World War, when the children were growing up, I think three of the children were still at home or – I don’t know, perhaps the youngest one was still at home – [Ava Helen Pauling] worked for a couple of years as a chemist on a war job making rubber out of plants that would grow in the Mojave.

She was interested in chemistry and knew a lot of chemistry but it was more an intellectual interest.  She was planning to write a cookbook on the science of cooking, because she knew what happened when things were cooked.  She knew what baking powder is and why you use it.  She used to make her own baking powder, instead of just buying baking powder.  Well, she never got that done.  She was a very good cook, but she never wrote the book on the science of cooking.

… It probably wouldn’t have had much of a sale, because the contents might well have been above the heads of most cooks.

-Linus Pauling, 1990.

Linus and Ava Helen in their kitchen at the new Deer Flat Ranch home, 1977.