Mark’s remarks:

• He grew up in Los Altos and always loved field trips to this special place, the contribution of the Duveneck family to the town, and to the country.
• The Duvenecks started a summer camp in 1945 as a response to World War II – it was the first multi-cultural summer camp in the country, offering scholarships to inner-city children.  HV also had one of the first youth hostels.  The Duveneck’s goal was to bring people together.
• Liz N’s daughter Amy came to the summer camp as a child, and befriended the first black girl she had ever met.  It was a great opportunity to meet people from different backgrounds. 
• The land was first settled by the Ohlone Indians, then it became part of a Spanish land grant.
• Frank Duveneck was born in 1890, died 1978; Josephine was born in 1886, died 1985 at 99. Frank was a Harvard-trained engineer, who ran the sales office for the Stanley Steamer Co. He  was a blacksmith in his spare time, and created the chandelier in the living room with a leaf design representing the trees on the property. He carried rocks from the creek for the fireplace.
• Josephine was a Whitney from Boston, who grew up in a stuffy family.  She met Frank back east, but the couple came to Carmel in the service, then moved to Palo Alto, where Frank was an engineer. They bought the land of HV as a summer and weekend retreat – they had seen the “hidden” valley during outings on Skyline Drive.  
• HV is now 1600 acres, but the original Duveneck ranch was twice the size.
• The house was finished in November 1929, and is built on 3 floors, with 14 different levels. It is an impressive structure. Charles Sumner was the architect. The house has been fixed and updated over the years, but it is showing its age.
• The rough-hewn beams of old redwood on the living room ceiling are original, and some Newcomers remember it was overgrown with ivy! This room has a history of parties and dances, as well as meetings with social activists like Cesar Chavez, who found safe haven at HV and organized the farm workers here. The local chapter of the Sierra Club was started here in 1933; now it’s the second largest chapter in the country!
• There is a secret door opening to the living room from the upstairs children’s bedroom so they could watch the goings on below.  A portrait of Frank Jr. is on the wall; he’s dressed like a girl.
• The Duveneck House was given to the community as a private non-profit trust. Much of the land has been maintained naturally -- one of Frank’s priorities was to protect the watershed.
• HV now has 30 people on a permanent staff, and many volunteers.  50,000 people come through each year – 30,000 for the different programs, and 20,000 as visitors.

Josephine Duveneck has written an auto-biography, “Life on Two Levels” which some of us bought.  It is a wonderful book, and paints a great portrait of this important local family. Liz recently read it and said it was excellent. Josephine’s life was incredible. She was a militant, socially active woman who helped Native Americans and Japanese-Americans, gave Cesar Chavez his first job, and started the first youth hostel in the west. 

Other books about Hidden Villa that are available: “Hidden Villa Tales” is a compilation of stories (for adults) about the ranch; “Hidden Villa Animal Tales” is written for children.  This book led to the creation of Heifer International, an organization that gives animals to countries around the world that need them.

After the talk, Mark took us on a tour of the grounds where we learned about Hidden Villa’s environmental education program, saw out-buildings like the youth hostel, blacksmith shop, chicken coop, as well as the vegetable garden, the creek, the bay trees. The barn was fun with a dozen newborn piglets. May is definitely a great time to enjoy the many facets of this local treasure.