When Langston Hughes was in Carmel, California in . . .
. . . 1934, working on ``The Ways of White Folks,'' his friends included Robinson and Una Jeffers, Sinclair Lewis and Lincoln Steffens and other members of the rich literary and artists colony. All of those people were white.
Arnold Rampersad, in his brilliant two-volume biography of Hughes, ``The Life of Langston Hughes,'' said there were few other black people in Carmel at that time.
According to Rampersad, a prolific writer and professor of English at Stanford University, if Hughes wanted to talk to another black person, he would sometimes drive several miles across the Monterey Peninsula to Pacific Grove, where there were two or three people of African-American descent.
There might have been several more in nearby Monterey, but that would have been about it. Monterey has much more racial diversity now, but Carmel and Pacific Grove, while a bit more balanced than they had been, have been for some time and still are heavily white.
That's why I was surprised to read that a Pacific Grove native, Benjamin Todd Jealous, is the new president of the NAACP. It struck me as welcome but ironic news. Jealous, at 35, is the youngest president in NAACP history.
A former news executive (he was managing editor of Mississippi's oldest black newspaper, the Jackson Advocate), he was born in Pacific Grove and attended its schools through his years at Pacific Grove Middle School. His high school education came at York School, a fine private school in Monterey.
Jealous' parents still make their home on the Monterey Peninsula. Jealous now lives in San Francisco's East Bay in Alameda, with his wife and daughter.
About Hughes, I've always wondered if he got to know John Steinbeck at all, since Steinbeck was in Pacific Grove in the 1930s. So far, I haven't found a reference to them getting together, though they knew many of the same writers and artists. But Hughes did take a road trip or two from Carmel into California's Central Valley and considered writing something about the migrant field workers and their terrible working conditions.
He decided against it, Steinbeck decided to do it, and won the Pulitzer for ``The Grapes of Wrath.'' Hughes had his hands full with the short stories that make up ``The Ways of White Folks,'' and, likely, was busy turning over ideas for poetry, novels and plays, being, like Steinbeck, an incredibly versatile writer.
He had a decent social life in Carmel in 1934, too. He picnicked with the Jeffers, attended parties, and made many friends. Volume I of Rampersad's work shows him in photographs on Carmel Beach with a woman and a German Shepherd, picnicking in Big Sur with Una Jeffers, each holding a bottle of wine, and posing dramatically for an interior portrait.
He also made enemies, not in any overt way, but just by being himself and for being black. And when it became known the local chapter of the John Reed Club sponsored one of his readings, the Right looked at him suspiciously and a newspaper, the Sun, began attacking him for his politics and for associating with whites.
Interestingly, when I did a piece in February on Steinbeck being armed because of threats to his life, I got a call from a Carmel woman saying those things don't happen. When I said, ``Yes, they do,'' she finally said, a bit angrily,``Well, that wouldn't happen in Carmel.''
It was not long after that I began reading Rampersad's Hughes biography and became particularly interested in Hughes' time in Carmel, quickly discovering that that did ``happen'' in Carmel.
There was unrest and anti-Communist fervor all up and down the coast, and in Carmel, according to Rampersad, a citizens group began drilling, armed with riot guns. Hughes commented that he, ``as a Negro,'' was being singled out.
With a kind of hysteria coming over Carmel, and with the leader of a vigilante group warning Hughes through another local black that he, Hughes, was in physical danger, this very important American writer fled, taking the less popular route of through the Santa Cruz Mountains to reach San Francisco, probably to shake off any possible pursuers.
Steep, winding Highway 17 is a testing drive in the best of times; for Hughes that night, possibly being followed, it must have been frightening and nerve-racking.
I think Langston Hughes would be pleased that the Monterey Peninsula he had to flee from nearly seventy-five years ago has, today, produced the new president of the NAACP.
About Steve
Born and raised in St. Louis. In fourth grade at Mary Queen of Peace, a Catholic school in the suburb of Webster Groves, a Mrs. Vanderbrook gave me a 5 (equivalent to an A in public schools) in English; made me feel good about myself. Wrestled at Kirkwood...
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Thank you, Steve--
Why not a play about a fictional encounter between Hughes and Steinbeck. Imagine the diallogue!
'm just learning about early Carmel, like the tragic deaths of George Sterling, his wife and a lover.
Thanks for the idea . . .
... of Hughes and Steinbeck getting together, maybe meeting by chance on Cannery Row . . . maybe at Wing Chong's! Actually, very intriguing . . . and could be a good study of the danger of labeling people: Both Steinbeck and Hughes believed passionately in people being treated fairly, which is why they were attracted to the theme of the exploitation of field workers. Because of this view, both were labeled as Communists. But while Hughes certainly tilted in this direction for a time, Steinbeck could be rather conservative in some of his views, including the right to bear arms. So they could have this common ground starting point and then . . .
On the Bohemians of Carmel, including Sterling, we sometimes think of it as just a wonderful free spirited time, but it could be and often was very dark. And for every successful artist or writer or poet, there were many others who came up empty or just didn't get the break. Jack London was there, too, in the early days, and he also ended tragically.
It was Kevin Starr who said when Sterling killed himself taking poison that Bohemia's golden age had ``come to a miserable end.''
FRED AND BEN 1970'S
MAREK, SHWARTZ , AND FRED JEALOUS PLAYED PHILISOPHICAL
BASKETBALL TOGETHER WHEN BEN WAS ABOUT FIVE YEARS OLD.
MAREK PONDERED ,PLEASED THAT THE BOY HE SAW THEN BECAME THE MAN IN THE HEADLINES TODAY.
Dear CC . . .
. . . could you please elaborate. Who was Marek? Schwartz? It sounds like an important story. Thanks, Steve
Langston Hughes
Interesting piece on Hughes--did not know he was in Carmel. Have you found a connection yet to Steinbeck??
Mike Gibbs
No, Mike, haven't, but this though struck me. . .
. . . even though I know it's farfetched, and that is Steinbeck and his wife Carol moved to Los Gatos, on the other side of the Santa Cruz Mountains, in 1936, but I would surmise they were well aware of the route through the mountains before then, and if he and Hughes had spoken _ and both had been threatened with violence _ Steinbeck might have recommended 17 to Hughes as an alternate, less traveled route to San Francisco if needed. The third route would be along the coast on Highway 1, which could also be perilous at night. As I say, a stretch . . . but . . .
Highway 17
As a minor-league-level road geek, your idea about Steinbeck suggesting Highway 17 to Hughes grabbed me. According to Wikipedia:
"Highway 17 was opened in 1940, replacing several other modes of transportation, including the old Glenwood Highway from 1919 (which still exists in the sleepy town of Glenwood), and the railroad which went all the way from Santa Cruz to San Francisco and Oakland. The railroad stopped operating in 1940 and the tunnels that it passed through were soon after sealed. Nearly all the tunnel entrances still exist, but are unusable as the tunnels themselves are collapsed. The rise in the use of automobiles made the railroads unprofitable."
History that would have been in the making around the time of this speculative meeting.
Huntington Sharp, Red Room
Huntington, thanks, any day I can learn something . . .
. . . is a good day. So Langston Hughes would have taken the Glenwood Highway that night (though I guess the railroad was possible _ that would be dramatic, very cloak and dagger: ``Who's that guy in the trench coat who got on the car just after I did?''), which might have been even more perilous than 17 is now.
Your information is also interesting because I know Steinbeck and Carol made numerous trips between Pacific Grove and Los Gatos over a several year period, and I often wondered if they didn't get incredibly tired of the trip with all the twists and turns that Highway 17 is heir to. So was the Glenwood Highway less or more taxing a drive? We may never know.
I do think it's too bad the railroad line was removed. A train from Santa Cruz to San Francisco and Oakland would certainly be desireable today, as a green improvement and with the price of you-know-what being what it is.
Glenwood Highway
A good guess would be that the road wasn't nearly as wide or well-paved as 17, and probably had more twists and turns. That probably made a much slower trip, but a safer one overall. A tradeoff.
Belle's right. This is a play or a short story.
Huntington Sharp, Red Room
Yes, it has some possibilities, Huntington, . . .
. . . Steinbeck sympathizing with Hughes and then, a few years later, Steinbeck facing threats to his life. Then they meet again, twenty or so years later, in, say, New York, and philosophize over an evening, first reliving the terror each faced in California, each wondering how the other dealt with that incident, the scars he is carrying . . . . Initially we find that they have in common, in addition to being both quite talented and important American writers, a sympathy and empathy for the working person, be he or she a field worker or a factory laborer. Both believe passionately in fair play. The audience might, at this point, think it is going to enter into a liberal lovefest, that Hughes and Steinbeck are going to spend the evening agreeing with each other. Not so, people aren't so easily pigeon-holed. Hughes is basically liberal, Steinbeck a little more on the conservative side, they begin to disagree, become, even, a bit irritated with each other . . . Steinbeck believes in the right to bear arms . . . Hughes, who like Steinbeck has forged a relationship with Dr. Martin Luther King, sees the devastation guns are creating in the South in the early days of the Civil Rights Movement . . . The sparks begin to fly and . . .