Mountain Grove Community, Part Two

Mountain Grove, Part Two Richard Nichols  2.29.11

In 1969 a short blurb about Mountain Grove in a new age publication, Vocations for Social Change, brought a lot of interest. Many people were looking for alternatives to what they saw as a failed society, Vietnam perhaps being the greatest symbol of failure. Starting in the mid sixties communes and intentional communities were popping up all over the West coast. College students, new graduates and young families were looking for an alternative. 

In the spring of 1970, our little core group of people, Greg and Cindy, Muffy, Billie, Ralph, Dusty and myself, were meeting regularly  to try to bond as a community and to be ready for an influx of people in the summer. We all felt a certain idealism, a feeling that we could do something special. We built several cabins, a covered outdoor kitchen with a wood stove midway up the valley in an attractive stand of trees where people would camp, started a garden, built a workshop in the big hay barn, all in preparation for the 100 or so people who would soon arrive to spend the summer camping and working on building projects.

All seven of us, in our innocence and idealism, would soon find ourselves overwhelmed.

David and the Board of Directors of the non-profit New Education Foundation, the actual owner of the property, had established some rules essential to a spiritual community. No alcohol and drugs allowed, and vegetarianism encouraged. The summer visitors would have to have money for personal expenses, while basic food was provided. Everyone was expected to work on a project. David was a very formal Englishman, a meditator, a follower of Krishnamurti, a teacher at Happy Valley School in Ojai, and a man with a vision of a community of spiritual educators. The very nature of the rules and his personality, and the nature of a bunch of idealistic new age kids, was bound to create conflict.

That summer many people came and went, and a few people became friends. A few people bonded. Heidi Hornberger arrived from UC Santa Barbara, Sharon and Norm came from Illinois. David's son Brian and his wife Margo came for a visit from teaching jobs in the East Bay, but returned home, only to return to live the next year. These are the people I came to know and love. I married Heidi, and we all are still very close to each other, although living far apart.

Steve arrived from Pittsburgh, driving a big truck with a motorcycle in the back, and an attitude, as well as an air of competence. People arrived from all over the country. The place exploded with activity. A big garden was planted, a septic system was hand dug by both sexes. Big burly college guys, and the waiflike and lovely Leslie labored side by side to dig the trenches. We built a sauna, two brothers put up a teepee, and Steve spearheaded the building of the Big House, a place that would serve as the community center, kitchen and classrooms. Although I was looked at as one of the leaders of all this, I was actually quite confused about how any of it would work out. Unknown to David and some of the core group, including me, some spoiled rice was fermented to make a potent hooch, and pot plants were planted in the little hidden meadows next to the springs. But the campers kept on the projects enthusiastically in spite of misgivings about what it was all about.

We had some unique experiences, mostly being city and suburban kids. Some people brought dogs with them, invariably city dogs, and these dogs had encounters with a particular forest critter that caused a lot of pain. The dogs, not knowing what they were in for, came up for a look at the wild porcupines, and found their noses full of deeply embedded quills. Nobody could afford a vet, so I, being the most experienced country dweller (of a whole year), took on the task of removing the quills. We tied the dogs head to a tree and removed the quills with a pliers. I got my first taste of public nudity when Greg and Cynthia coaxed me to undress at the swimming hole, and I ended up enjoying it immensely, especially the well endowed and extremely gorgeous Leslie, and the tall, lithe Heidi.

Meetings around the campfire were held regularly, and David tried to impart the vision of what the community would be. We would be a community of educators and workers, serving students who would pay tuition, as well as the children who lived at the community. But this formalized vision was in contrast to the free living, free love, pot smoking style of many of the communes in the region and our campers. Much of the campfire discussion was taken up with conflict and doubts, questioning David about why in a democracy, he was calling the shots and not the community. Finally, in a fit as frustration and anger, David spoke words that I will not repeat. Those words forever took away any chance that they would respect him or his vision. No amount of apology could heal the damage.

Heidi and I became attracted to each other, we made friends with Anne and Norm, and Brian and Margo, and moved into a little cabin together. I was 28, and it was the first time I actually ever lived with a women. The summer went by quickly, the big house was nearly done, the septic field was done, and A-frame house was being constructed, and a group of about 12 people agreed to stay the winter and make a go of the community.