Symposium
of Old Cannery Row

Entry 1: 444 Cannery Row
by James Hunolt

Cannery Row long-timers and fine art aficionados will appreciate this memoir...




Jim grew up working his father's famous Berkeley Books on Bancroft Way,
becoming a renowned sculptor among Monterey's greats...

Jim Hunolt sculpting in Big Sur (1971)

Lab member, Frank Wright, with Jim Hunolt & Michael Hemp at the Roadhouse in Big Sur (2014)

And now to his memoir of 444 Cannery Row (location no longer extant...part of the story)

"444 Cannery Row"
by James Hunolt

444 Cannery Row      We each have periods in our life that we remember distinctly.  Some are memories that are difficult or sad.  And others, like this one, are spectacular, splendid and supreme.        It was 1966 and one day as I was engaged in a welding project  in the Carmel Highlands where I was living I looked up to see a man standing in my yard.  And so began an enchanted and epic time of my life. He introduced himself.  His name was Gordon Newell.  He had been visiting his friend Ephraim Doner who lived up the block from me and Ephraim had mentioned that a young beginning sculptor lived nearby.  I was the young sculptor and Gordon had stopped by to introduce himself.      I was stunned.  A few years before while working the summer at Deetjen’s in Big Sur I had followed an upward stretching road during an afternoon of exploration.  It led into a yard amongst towering trees that was filled with stone carvings....some finished, some in progress.  It was an overwhelming discovery.  They were so mysterious, so grand, so extremely beautiful.  I remember wondering with awe how anyone could carve stone into such splendid forms.  Later I learned that this yard was Gordon’s and that those carvings were his.  As I was over time drawn into sculpture myself I heard his name mentioned with such respect and had visited his granite butterfly at Lover’s Point in Pacific Grove. And now he stood in my yard watching me weld steel.      At 60 Gordon was a powerful presence.  He had a distinct and quiet dignity about him.  His voice was deep and resonated with substance.  You immediately sensed his kindness and his strength.  We spoke for a time about the subject we so uniquely shared, sculpture.  His words were so very nourishing as he offered his insights from a position of mastery to the emerging consciousness of a beginner.  His perceptions and gentleness were very compelling.      We struck an immediate friendship.  Upon leaving he told me he was moving into a new studio in an abandoned cannery building tomorrow.  When I asked if he would like a hand moving he simply said, “Yes”.  And so began my association with Gordon, and our fateful period of extreme intensity on Cannery Row.      As arranged I met with him the next morning at 8 a.m.  Our place of meeting was 444 Cannery Row in Monterey.  It was an entirely old structure attached at the back of a dirt yard to the side of an immense deserted factory.  The portion that was to immediately become the Sculpture Center extended on stilts out over the edge of Monterey Bay.  Waves crashed gently against the beach below the back of the building. It was more than astonishing, it was incredibly beautiful, and its vacancy beckoned to us like a siren as we slid open the large door.      We stepped inside.  It needed cleaning but it was to be a work place and after sweeping the floor we began to unload.  Gordon had only a few possessions to bring in, a truck load of tools mainly, and moving in just took minutes.  In his naturally grand way he surveyed the space and said, “Jim, why don’t you take that corner?.”  I felt the excitement of Icarus at that question and agreed at once.  So it began.     Neither Gordon nor I had any anticipation of the incredible hub of creative activity that would develop virtually overnight as this abandoned space was reborn.  A rhythm was established at once encompassed by a love and exhilaration for our shared involvement with sculpture and all related activities.  We established a pecking order between us based simply by who arrived at work first each day.  First one to show up had bragging rights all day.  Each morning the sliding open of the huge front door to the Sculpture Center was equivalent to a new birth,   a brilliant sunrise, a cornucopia of excitement and fresh adventures.  It was such incredible fun, the overwhelming sense of the indelible fusion of work and play.  We were like children in a sandbox and anything seemed possible.      Gordon’s colleagues and friends from the Monterey Peninsula and Big Sur soon discovered our activities and local and began visiting on a regular basis.  Soon we were joined by Arch Garner, one of Gordon’s lifelong friends and a master sculptor.  Other sculptors came to work with us also, including Miles Bates and Doyle Moses, guys about my age who brought their vitality and special sculptural visions to the mix of energy and creativity we had begun.       We soon had a composite of individuals including master sculptors Gordon and Arch, beginners such as myself,  Miles and Doyle,  assorted students learning various specific sculpture techniques, and a few craftsmen who took on projects of their own.  The zero to sixty acceleration of activity happened suddenly and yet in such an easy and gracious way that the changes were scarcely noticed as the Sculpture Center sprang to life.  It all seemed so natural in its unfolding.  Not to understate, it was like being in the center of a flower’s blossoming.  We are talking about a flower somehow composed of excitement, energy, the racket of compressors and air tools, stone dust, laughter and contemplation.  How this all functioned harmoniously and at once I am at a total loss to explain.       It worked with perfection, however, and at its core and center was Gordon, whose spirit and vision were allowing it all to happen.  His benevolent purposes were infectious and we all effortlessly joined him in the creation of a unique society dedicated to progressive ideas,  theories of life,  concepts of beauty,  the integrity of work;  and in the culmination of it all,  the execution of sculptures of every size and description.      Sculpture was our designated central activity, but 444 Cannery Row had no essential limits.  As with any vibrant living system the vitality of life was bounded by no single concept.  It became, in its own way, an alternative cultural center composed of extremely diverse individuals and personalities.  Anyone was welcome to drop by.  Of course this was mainly artists of every medium, poets and writers, musicians, bohemians, hobos and bums.  They were all members of our tribe.  We loved them all and each of them brought something unique.  But, Gordon’s friends also included doctors, lawyers, teachers, politicians, governmental types, the entire spectrum of society’s components.  The blending was electric.  Once again, Gordon was at the center of all this and the nobility of his person was what made it all possible.      So a society was created.  Every imaginable event occurred within our space. During the day it was work, dust, noise.  In the late afternoon there was wine, conversations, laughter.  After dark all those activities the night provides.  I was seldom there for the after dark functions but as I was often the first one to arrive in the morning there was usually evidence......slight disorder, empty bottles, occasionally unconscious partygoers.  No matter, the day brought its fresh energy, and since its essential purposes were creativity and work,  the Sculpture Center powered up each early morning irregardless of what the night had contained and left as residue.      So there was a cycle of life unending, and bounded by the Pacific on one side and the bustle of the Monterey Peninsula on the other, 444 Cannery Row became a hub of culture, creativity, and other events better imagined than discussed.  It was all good, it was all real.      Let loose in a larger space and surrounded by such diverse creative elements my concept of possibilities expanded daily.  After an initial period of continuous welding I began to work more with clay and plaster, modeling my first sculptures containing an enhanced concept of form.  Arch and Gordon taught me refinements of mold making and I also began to dream of carving wood and stone.  Surrounded by such energy and understanding my growth was uncontainable.  I was living and breathing sculpture.  The charge in my soul initiated during the era of the Sculpture Center has sustained me my entire life.  Thirty-six years later it remains a golden thread weaving through and binding together the fabric of my existence.      These were precious days and we were well aware of their significance and purpose.  I went with Gordon to the Raymond Granite Quarry and assisted him with the carving of Silent Company, a monumental group of five black granite blocks, the largest 18’ high,  that was commissioned by the city of Vallejo. This project we executed by harnessing the forces of fire and water.  We had a powerful stone eating torch that as we brushed it against the carving’s surface caused chips to explode off the block.  They soared into the sky and fell back to earth as if it was hailing granite.  It is amazing how precisely directed heat can instantly carve granite into the same gracious forms that water will over epochs of time.         Gordon and I communicated easily and loved working together, either on our own projects individually, or on a larger job that required more than one person.  He was extremely nourishing to be around and had a grand conception not only of sculpture and art, but of life itself, which he effortlessly shared.  In the evenings at Raymond we would examine small stones we had gathered with delight from a tiny beach next to the Monterey Wharf.  These were particularly fine examples of form shaped by the Pacific Ocean waves and the abrasions produced by the beach sands.  They had holes in them carved by a type of aquatic worm.  We studied them for hours at a time, turning each one every possible way and discussing between us what aspects they revealed that were pleasing and insightful to our sense of beauty.       A couple of times a week after work at the Sculpture Center we would buy a bottle of plum wine at a nearby grocery store and consume it with pleasure while watching the Pacific perform magic for us.  Sometimes we exchanged conversation, often we simply enjoyed the silence, the sea,  and our own thoughts.  There was a 55 gallon container where we deposited our empty elixir bottles and when it held all it could Gordon and I would take a .22 caliber Remington pump rifle I had purchased from Miles out onto our tiny porch at the back of the Sculpture Center and tossing the bottles into the Pacific we would target them one at a time sending them into the depths in pieces.  We really relished these shooting episodes.  The idea of utilizing a rifle and gunpowder, punctuated by the slight crack of the round being fired, to extend our will away from ourselves to impact a floating bottle was very appealing.  Even when we missed there was a nice little splash as the missile entered the water.  The pieces of glass eventually washed up onto the sandy beach beneath our studio with the edges softened and the surface frosted by the ocean’s forces, and were found and collected by artisans for craft projects.      One by one sculptures were conceived and executed by us all.  They then went into the world through galleries, commissions, or direct sales from the portion of the Sculpture Center we reserved for finished work.  Any sale was cause for a shared celebration, some wine purchases, and sincere gratitude.      I attempted my first marble and granite carvings with excellent coaching from both Gordon and Arch.  When my confidence and ambition were allowed to grow strong enough,  which was always to soon for Gordon or Arch,  I modeled up a 10’ sculpture in clay,  Reclining Lovers,  which I  made a gigantic plaster mold over and then converted into a cast stone concoction composed of sand from Carmel Beach,  granite pea gravel, and white cement.      Upon completion we placed it in the yard of the Sculpture Center with a boom truck. So while Gordon was executing masterpiece after masterpiece I was day by day learning my craft.  Each day brought its newness and excitement as all these sparkling moments presented an endless vista of growth, progress, and exhilaration.  We were just having the greatest time.      During the carving of a large laminated mahogany block into a sculpture called the Sower,  I was offered a site for my first one-man show.  It would be in the Long Beach Jewish Community Center and I was both thrilled and honored at the opportunity.  I set aside my large carving and added some additional small pieces to the assembly of sculptures that had been selected to take to Long Beach, thirty pieces in all.  As the date for the show approached I rented a trailer to move my work and arranged all the pieces just inside the large sliding front door, and since this was primarily a work place with lots of dust and foot traffic I covered them all with plastic drop cloths.  The next day I planned to load them into the trailer and depart for Long Beach.      Ah, how foolish we are to assume that anything we plan for the future has certainty. Even something scheduled for the very next day.      I was the last to leave the Sculpture Center that evening.  It was about 7:00 P.M. and I was tired.  As I slid the door closed it was on a quiet and peaceful space.  It is with much emotion that I now recall that moment.      Before continuing home I stopped for coffee at a small coffee house a couple of hundred yards down Cannery Row from our studio.  I lingered there for a while engaged in a light conversation with acquaintances that were there frequently.  Then I heard the sirens.  Curious, I stepped out to the street and looked back toward the Sculpture Center.  Fire engines were pulling up near there with the sense of urgency that accompanies them everywhere when their sirens are on.  Not yet alarmed, but increasingly curious, I got into my car and drove directly back to the studio and the fire trucks.       I arrived at a scene of emergency amidst the chaotic activities that occur in the opening moments of a crisis.  I could not believe my eyes..... the immense cannery building that the Sculpture Center was attached to was engulfed in flames!  Firemen scurried in every direction, shouting orders, positioning equipment, laying out hose.       I parked and went directly through the confusion to our studio door, unlocked it, and slid it open.  Smoke was entering through the wall we had in common with the cannery in flames.  My sculpture in progress, the Sower, was just inside on a four wheel dolly.  I pulled it into the yard and re-entered the Sculpture Center.  I went to Gordon’s carvings and immediately realized they were way too heavy to move to safety by myself.  The inferno was now filling our studio with thick smoke and I could hear the building beginning to moan and creak as the forces of destruction began to exert their will on our world.  I went further back through the heat to where some of my larger carvings were and put my hands on a granite carving I called the Prodigal Son.  It weighed about 80 pounds and I was just picking it up when a sensation of intense consciousness caused me to look up.  Our entire building was trembling.  I set the Prodigal Son down and immediately found my way outside.  The exhaustion of my adrenaline was complete.  I crossed the yard back to the street and then turned around to look again.  This was impossible!  How could this be happening?  It was a horrific nightmare.....as I watched, reality, with the blazing speed of lightning, was destroying our world.      The flames were in complete control.  They raced into the sky with fury.  Firefighters and their equipment were helpless.  They turned their attention to other structures in an attempt to prevent the inferno’s advance and let our buildings be transformed violently into ashes and be carried away by powers too absolute to resist.  I later learned that the intense glow of these flames were visible from Salinas.      Gordon soon arrived and, as we stood in a crowd of dumbstruck people, he put his hand on my shoulder and looking me straight in the eye said, “Well, Jim, we had a lot of fun making these sculptures....and we are going to make many more”.  I have always remembered that moment and those words as the ultimate reaffirmation of faith and hope,  plus the indelible realization that disaster always presents us with a new opportunity to renew ourselves.  Gordon realized it all at that very moment and the strength of his character and his resolve carried over to us all.       The cause of the fire was determined to have originated in the adjoining cannery where workers were dismantling old boilers and machinery with torches.  When they left work that day hot metal smoldering amidst sawdust and wooden boxes had ignited and from those flames had emerged the fury that was unstoppable.      At first light the next morning we returned to the ashes of our studio.  Both structures had been entirely consumed.  In the yard of the Sculpture Center was my white cast stone Reclining Lovers, and nearby, slightly blackened on one side was the partially carved Sower on its four wheeled dolly.  Between these sculptures and the Pacific was a site of ash, twisted steel, debris unrecognizable.  The destruction was absolute.       We began to sift, shovel, and rake, looking for any salvageable items.  There was very little to recover.  Granite and marble had exploded. Steel was bent and disfigured. Bronze had been melted into puddles of  molten liquid by the intensity of the zealous inferno,  so intensely delivered by the pyro-demons from Hell,  that had descended upon us the night before.       Gordon’s legacy and the Universe were diminished the most as we realized that extraordinary masterpieces he had created had been lost forever by the conflagration.  Incredible beauty and insight had been transformed from spiritual significance to inert matter in a virtual instant.  My first one-man show was entirely consumed but this was early beginning efforts for me.  Gordon’s sculptures were ones done at the prime of his career, and truly they are Humanities loss.      I did find a piece of mine called Self Portrait that was carved from Mexican tufa stone, and as it was soft and absorbed the heat, had only been partially damaged.  I salvaged it and later re-carved portions into a sculpture I then called Resurrection.      We searched the ashes for hours and became one with them.  We were black and sooty from head to toe.  As we were realizing there was no more to be saved someone stepped forward from the crowd assembled to observe our efforts with a large bottle of wine.  This was offered freely and accepted gratefully.  We all shared in its potential to lighten our mood and soon an almost celebratory feeling was developing amongst us.  The awful burden of despair lifted and perceiving it all with a new vision we began to tell stories of moments spent together we would always cherish.  We knew change had come, swiftly and unexpectedly, altering forever a portion of our lives that we had truly loved.  Our workplace, tools, sculptures finished and in progress, our culture and society, all was now history.  But at that moment we were in celebration for what it all had been.      A stranger we had never seen before, and would never see again, walked into our midst and handed to Gordon something he had just written on a brown paper bag.  As Gordon read it his face took on a new dimension.  He beamed.  By the time he looked for the stranger he had disappeared.  The writing on the bag was a poem and Gordon called for our attention and read it aloud:                                            444 Cannery Row                    They are the creators                    the people who give their souls                    They are the ones who give breath                    form and shape to stone and iron and wood                    Where they once worked is now ashes                     you would think that the ashes would touch their hearts                     and it has                     Standing in the ashes they laugh                     I tell you they laugh and they drink the life of the grape                     They are alive                     and again they will create      We were totally overwhelmed.  This was magic and a direct gift from the spirit world.  A stranger had stepped forward, given us this blessing from his heart, and vanished.      We were never assembled in the same way again.  We each moved forward on our individual paths.  Gordon and I had much more to experience together.  Carvings in Minnesota, Washington D.C., jobs in Big Sur,  Carmel, and Scottsdale.  All the epic times in Darwin culminating in Gordon’s black granite carving, The Fountain of Life, which his son Hal and I executed for him in his ninetieth year.  It was his final commission. There was,  of course,  lots of life left to live,  but this indelible portion containing the Sculpture Center,  444 Cannery Row,  had ended spectacularly and was impossible to duplicate.      As with all living systems, be it individuals, societies, or cultures,  life itself is measured by days of unknown duration.  Some existence is brief, some lengthy.  So it was with the Sculpture Center and all it contained.  Its span was less than two years.  It had a distinct beginning, an intense and beautiful existence, and a specific and sensational end.     Swept into Eternity it will remain forever in my memory as a personal and shared Mythology of the highest order. James Hunolt,  Mariposa,  June 2004

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