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Pasadena Weekly newspaper article
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from the PASADENA WEEKLY, THURSDAY, MAY 31, 2007

A walk in the park:
Second annual Lummis Day Festival celebrates historic Northeast LA and the memory of Charles Fletcher Lummis, the ‘Apostle of the Southwest'

By Susan Compo

If Northeast Los Angeles (NELA to some) has a patron saint — and indeed it merits several — one nominee would certainly be Charles Fletcher Lummis, the poet, preservationist, anthropologist, librarian, photographer, editor and native rights champion who settled in the area at the dawn of the 20th century.

Maybe ‘settled' isn't quite the word: Lummis's many interests reflect those of the area's current residents — only he was just one almost Renaissance man.

Maybe it was the walking. In 1884, the Harvard-educated pioneer and eccentric left Cincinnati to take a job often without a byline at the then fledgling Times newspaper in Los Angeles. Rather than take the train, Lummis walked the 3,500 miles in what he referred to as a “tramp” and reported along the way for the Chillicothe (Ohio) Leader. The Leader's readers ate it up.

What he saw and the experiences he had along the way invigorated and informed his young life to the degree that when he died in 1928, The New York Times labeled him the “Apostle of the Southwest.”

In his unusual clothing — a Spanish style corduroy suit, red Navajo sash and well-worn sombrero — he cut a curious figure. His three failed marriages and numerous affairs, chronicled ably by author Mark Thompson in his biography, “American Character: The Curious Life of Charles Fletcher Lummis and the Rediscovery of the Southwest,” certainly raised a few eyebrows.

Yet his sensibility and sensitivity to the area's people and its landscape made the measure of the man, and his many contributions to the region's well-being justify a good party.

And that's what the second annual Lummis Day Festival, to be held Sunday in two locations joined appropriately by a trek between them, is all about. A panoply of local and national arts groups, as well as Occidental College and radio station KPFK, 90.7-FM, have worked together to put on what promises to be a magical event that has the pleasing side effect of community building.

Even better, the pageantry, puppetry, poetry, music and art can all be taken in free of charge. Only the food — a wide range of Thai, Mexican, Filipino and Italian goodies — will cost.

Last year's festival drew 1,500 people and this year's is likely to do even better. Reflecting the area's diversity, scheduled performers and artists will cut as lively a swath as Lummis ever could. The day begins at 11 a.m. in El Alisol, also known as the Lummis Home at 200 E. Avenue 43, for a poetry reading with cello accompaniment. Sponsored by Poets and Writers and the Historical Society of Los Angeles, highly regarded poets Steve Abee, Lynn Thompson, Charles Harper Webb and Suzanne Lummis (who happens to be Lummis' granddaughter) will greet the morning with verse and strings. If this all sounds very genteel, a word of warning (or reassurance): Steve Abee has been called, by Beck Hansen no less, “The Love Powered Bull Horn blasting down from the altitudes.”

“The old man, as I call him, had gatherings of artists in his house and he always loved poetry,” Lummis said.“This will be the third time a poetry reading has taken place in or around the house since his death.”

Following the mid-morning event at El Alisol, the Arroyo Arts Collective will lead a short walk up the arroyo, celebrating its vegetation along the way, to Sycamore Grove Park at 4900 N. Figueroa St. This won't be any old conga line but will be led by a procession of giant puppets inspired by Tongva-Gabrielino Indian figures and made by local artists and Franklin High School students.

Just after mid-day, entertainment will continue at the large park's purpose-built band shell. Dance troupes include Likas Pilipina Folk Arts, Ballet Coco and Danza Azteca Cuahtlehuanit.

But it isn't a party without music, and acts range from the Greger Walnum Blues Band to the Evangenitals, a local punk/hillbilly band that's recently provided a soundtrack to a one-second movie.

Quetzal caps the day with a performance at around 6 p.m. Formed in the early 1990s by Quetzal Flores, the band's lauded blend of Jazz, Mexican and Afro-Cuban rhythms, mixed with rock and the intense vocals of Martha Gonzalez, are by definition a perfect way to end an eclectic event. Sunday will be a great day to walk — and even to rock — in the park.

“My grandfather had a sizable ego and he would be very pleased that his name was back in action,” Lummis said. “Eliot [event organizer Eliot Sekuler] did something very astute and perceptive in recognizing that a great deal of what Lummis advocated for is now popular again. When he died, he was still famous but his ideas were old-fashioned. Now they're new again. He now seems like he had such foresight. In 1928 people were interested in modernization, so here was this old, doddering guy who believed in preserving the past and the roots of the region. Nobody wanted to at we lost.”