On October 15, 1879, four gunmen ambushed a constable's posse in the woods east of Mendocino. Two civilian members of the posse were killed and a third wounded. Evidence at the killers' camp led to…
Posts published in “Essays”
As much as one tries to provide consistent and accurate messaging throughout the past year of this pandemic, it remains a challenge because of sudden policy changes and lots of false starts and sudden stops…
The fascinating account of early 20th Century Mendocino Sheriff Ralph Byrnes in Zack Anderson and Deborah Silva’s history of the Herman Knaesche case brought some praise from several on-line readers, but not everyone in Mendocino…
I’ve been going to work every day in person since May 2020, with the exception of the holidays breaks, and the two separate instances I had COVID – in November 2020, and the instance I’m…
Jeremiah “Doc” Standley was born August 20, 1845 in Andrew County, Missouri, the son of Harrison and Elizabeth Standley. When he was 8 years of age, the family moved from Missouri to settle in California.…
I moved to the Anderson Valley in the fall of 1971 and this fall it will be 50 years I have lived here. I don't know where the time is gone. In the summer of…
After watching Judas and the Black Messiah, I called John Woodford for a reality check. In the summer of 1968 Woodford, then 27, was a staff writer at Ebony magazine in Chicago. His proposals for…
It's time to get down to the biography of Sam and Marguerite Avery's life in Anderson Valley, 1946-77. In preparation I went back to my archives to find a copy of the local monthly newspaper,…
After Dr. John F. Wheeler had been arrested as the suspected ringleader of four other men who ambushed a constable's posse, killing two civilians, the dentist faced an arraignment. Under a second day of questioning,…