Celebrating
100 Years…Mendocino Study Club
Story
by Debbie L. Holmer
Mendocino Study Club
Organized Oct. 30, 1908
Mission Statement
The purposes of the Club shall be:
To promote the highest spiritual,
Intellectual and cultural
Opportunities for its members,
To provide for leadership of
Women in the community and
To provide service to the
Community
The Mendocino Study Club began in the fall of 1908 when ten ladies
of the village met at the home of Mrs. Edith Piersol on Covelo Street
on October 30. Mrs. West was the first president and Mrs. Coombs was
the first vice president
Intent on not allowing the village’s isolation to hinder their
educational growth, the group decided to form a study club and as their
first effort they ordered a home study course on the history of Rome,
Italy from the Bay View Reading Circle in Michigan (there were five
hundred Reading Circles by 1914). When I Googled the Bay View Reading
Circle I found out that the Bay View Association was a pioneering institution
in adult education with ambitious home study programs, enrolling men
and women across the nation.
Over the years the Study Club has evolved into a service organization
with over 140 members dedicated to two main philanthropic purposes:
scholarships for young men and women, and the Mendocino Community Library.
According to Ruth Sparks, past-president of the Mendocino Study Club,
the organization began their scholarship program for young women about
sixty-five years ago (1943) by providing a hundred-dollar grant to
a girl to pursue a career in nursing. Later teaching was added. One
of the first scholarships was awarded to Dee Stenback Lemos in 1946.
These days the scholarship program is open to young men and women who
wish to pursue a college education. Need and ability are the only requisites.
Their scholarship funds are raised by selling handmade items by their
members such as jams, jellies, needlework, bakery items, etc., at their
annual Country Christmas sale.
Ladies of the
Afternoon
This
summer (2008) the Kelley House Museum, Inc. has published a Mendocino
Historical Review, Volume XXII entitled Ladies of the Afternoon
1908–2008
The First 100 Years of the Mendocino Study Club by Jean Droz and Janet
Barnes. The summary is truly a celebration of the stamina and vitality
of the Mendocino Study Club on the occasion of its hundredth birthday.
Longtime Study Club member, Jean Droz, who is the Club Historian, spent
years searching through the scrapbooks, minutes, annual reports, quarterly
newsletters, and historic documents. Longtime member Janet Barnes summarized
and edited this work. Their research can be found on-line in its original
form on the Kelley House Website: www.kelleyhousemuseum.org. Click
on Archives to find the details of all the meetings, including dates,
names, program topics and project descriptions.
Excerpts from Ladies
of the Afternoon 1908–2008
The First 100 Years of the Mendocino Study Club
Section 1
1908–1933
In 1908, Mendocino was still recovering from the California earthquake
and fires of 1906. Residents were reconstructing the mills, bridges,
roads, businesses and residences that had been damaged along the Mendocino
Coast. The demand for redwood and fir building materials, especially
in Sacramento and San Francisco, was immense. The old growth redwood
forests of the north coast kept the mills humming. Weekly, ships filled
with lumber and passengers sailed south to San Francisco and returned
with mail, furniture, clothing, food staples, and goods to keep the
isolated coastal communities linked to the greater world.
On October 30, 1908, as the men labored to rebuild the town, Mrs. Stella
West, Miss Olive Brown, Mrs. Grace Fisher, Mrs. Emma Coombs, Mrs. Nellie
Murray and Mrs. Laura Lammers met in the home of Mrs. Edith Peirsol
to organize their club…Those first minutes show Mrs. Lulu Ross,
Mrs. Kate Tindall, and Mrs. Mary Rea also submitted their names for
membership. Stella West was elected president, Emma Coombs Vice President,
and Edith Peirsol Secretary. They would meet every second and fourth
Friday, promptly at 3:00 p.m. in the homes of members, and adopted
The Bay View Reading Course as their study program.…
By 1915, drama and music programs were added to the Club meetings,
and members participated in readings from plays and music presentations.
According to Ladies
of the Afternoon, there
is no record that tells us what drew the women together to form the
Study Club. The original founders were from Caspar, Little River,
and Mendocino. Membership was limited to local women, since travel
was by horse and buggy in those formative years. In 1922, the Study
Club moved toward public service by participating in fund-raising
for numerous causes.
The Club supported
women teachers in India, China, Japan and the Chicago Women’s
Shelter.…
By 1924, the Club had outgrown meeting in members’ homes…found
a new home in the Mendocino Lumber Company buildings, located on the
south side of Main Street—today that area is open park space…
In their first twenty-five years, Study Club members had lived through
a coastal economic expansion, gone from horse and buggy to automobiles,
welcomed the arrival of the telephone and electricity, voted in a social
experiment known as Prohibition, come through World War I, and from
1929 to 1933 experienced a period of worldwide economic depression.
Through it all, Study Club members studied the history of art and social
structure in countries around the world, classic and popular drama
and opera, the US Constitution, current events, poetry, music, American
literature…Along the way their involvement in the state and
county Federation of Women’s Clubs focused their energies on
meeting the needs of their community and the Study Club evolved into
Mendocino’s largest public service organization.
She darned and she made and she mended;
She knew how to bake and to brew;
She sang while she washed up the dishes,
And yet was a Club woman, too.
—Mendocino Study Club Yearbook, 1917–1918
Section 2
1933–1958
On March 4, 1933, the United States banking system collapsed and President
Roosevelt closed the country’s banks.…Throughout the Depression
years the Study Club focus was on local needs. The March 1934 minutes
noted the Fort Bragg Railroad would run a special train to Willits
for $1.00 round trip if there were twenty-five passengers. Study Club
members supplied food and clothing to families and individuals, donated
to the Dental Fund in the Mendocino schools, and sponsored a baby clinic.…
[In 1938], the Mendocino Lumber Company was absorbed by the Union Lumber
Company in Fort Bragg, and the Club lost the use of their meeting rooms.…The
meetings were moved to Mrs. MacCallum’s Hall, originally called
Kaze Hall (renamed Kelliowen Hall in 1950), and owned by Daisy MacCallum,
a member and former president of the Study Club. Rent was $6.00 a month
plus the cost of lights.…
There was a critical shortage of nurses during WW II, and Congress
passed the Bolton-Bailey Bill, a scholarship program for Cadet Nurses.…In
1943, the Mendocino Study Club embarked on a scholarship program that
remains one of the Club’s major projects today.…In 1946
Dolores Stenback (Lemos) was chosen and given $100, but changed her
major from nursing to teaching and returned the money.…Eventually
the Club expanded their scholarship requirements to include teaching
candidates.…
Books had always been part of the Mendocino Study Club. In 1933, they
purchased books for the Girl Scout’s Library, in 1944 members
contributed to buy Bibles for servicemen, and Daisy MacCallum collected
books from members to give to servicemen stationed at Russian Gulch.…Daisy
suggested the Mendocino Study Club have its own lending library, with
each member donating a book. By February of 1947, members began transforming
the narrow bowling alley in Kaze Hall into Mendocino’s
first lending library. The Club budgeted $5.00 a month for new books,
and appointed Helen Thomsen, Aldine Gorman, Evelyn Larkin and Alma
Mendosa to manage the new library.…Helen Thomsen remained the
librarian until her retirement in 1955.…
During this second twenty-five years, Study Club membership increased
from forty-two to sixty-seven…and dues were increased to $3.00
a year.…Silver
teas were held in the summers, plays were produced, and the first Study
Club Recipe Book was compiled to raise funds for scholarships.
Labor with what zeal we will,
Something still remains undone,
Something uncompleted still
Waits the rising of the sun.
—Henry W. Longfellow
(Mendocino Study Club Yearbook,
1950–51, From the May 23 Program)
Section 3
1958–1983
Television changed the world and it changed Mendocino, drawing it out
of relative isolation into the turmoil of the Civil Rights Movement,
Women’s Liberation, and the Cold War between Communism and Western
Democracy. The policy of containment that led to the Vietnam War and
anti-war protest were all a part of the fabric of everyday life. The
drug cult and disenchanted youth were highly evident on the Mendocino
Coast, changing the way members of the Study Club viewed their environment
and their associations.…
Throughout the 1960s and early 1970s, Club members continued to [stress
improvement for Mendocino by repairing] vandalism, placing used telephone
poles strategically to keep off-road vehicles and drivers from further
damaging the fragile headlands environment that surrounds the town.…Through
the perseverance of Study Club member Mildred Benioff and other community
members, terms were arranged for 70 acres of headlands and beach land
along the south side of Mendocino to be transferred to the State of
California from Boise Cascade Company in exchange for a portion of
state-owned Jackson Forest.…
Still located in Kelliowen Hall, the Study Club continued to manage
the town’s only library throughout the 1970s.
However, in 1974, after the sale of Kelliowen Hall, the library was
moved to the old grammar school on School Street, and then moved to
the empty manse at the Presbyterian Church on Main Street.
As the Club
moved into the 1980s, fundraising efforts increased.…Riding
the crest of the arts and crafts movement, members created items all
year for the Christmas sale.…[To this day], the Club relies
on Country Christmas, held annually the Saturday before Thanksgiving,
to fund their library, scholarships and civic projects.…Between
1959 and 1983 membership had increased from 75 to 156.
Warren Zimmer is making rustic redwood markers
which will be placed conspicuously on the old historic
homes in Mendocino.
—January 1966, Mendocino Beacon
Section 4
1983–2008
By 1983, paved roads and improved communications had exposed the Mendocino
coast to the world, and the changes in the village of Mendocino were
dramatic. As older residents died, homes were purchased by people moving
into the area. Homes were remodeled into shops or bed and breakfast
inns, many residences became second homes for people who spent most
of their time elsewhere. As employment opportunities declined, families
had to look elsewhere for jobs, and the school census steadily decreased.
Housing the library continued to be a problem, and in 1987, after ten
years in the Manse, the Club was notified that the church needed the
space for expanding programs.…Jack and Jeanette (Mendosa) Hansen
stepped forward and offered the William Mendosa House on the corner
of Williams and Little Lake streets for no down payment if the Club
would make interest only payments on the existing $30,000 note. The
Club accepted the generous offer, applied for legal status for the
library as a separate organization, and in the summer of 1987, the
Mendocino Commu nity Library took ownership of the building.…
As the Study Club moves into the 21st century and [celebrates] its
100th birthday, the library, scholarships and community service continue
to be its primary focus. The Club also provides support to the convalescent
hospital, drug and alcohol abuse programs, the Food Bank, Senior Lunch
program, the Mendocino soup kitchens, the Commu nity Christmas Dinner,
and battered women’s and homeless shelters.
As part of the 100th birthday celebration, past President Jean Droz
embarked on five years of research to write this Kelley House Review.
A Centennial Committee headed by Past President Ann Krase was formed
and numerous civic projects planned by members to honor the Mendocino
Study Club.…identification plaques for the historic district
have been placed and roses planted in the Heritage Rose section of
the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens…Historic Mendocino Walking
Tour cards are available at Kelley House Museum and the Ford House,
[featuring] buildings and homes from 1908 and a walking map of the
town. A Centennial Quilt, created by Mildred Smith, [is being] displayed
at different venues throughout the year, and the Mendocino Art Center
will display “The World of 1908” featuring artifacts, paintings
and crafts from members’ collections. The Club commissioned nationally
known local artist Sev Ickes to develop a painting of the Founding
Ladies of the Study Club to be auctioned to raise funds for centennial
civic projects and scholarships.…
What is the Mendocino Study Club? In celebration of the Club’s
100th birthday, we can only answer, we are a study in coastal philanthropy
and civic engagement, and we stand hopeful to be an organization that
responds to whatever the future holds.
Serious consideration of any worldly problems will be
set aside for a day … when members assemble for their
once-a-year Fun and Games party.
-—February 1989, Mendocino Beacon
The Committee and Logistics
Centennial Committee members are: Chair, Marilyn LeRoy; MSC President
Robin Wheat; Janet Barnes, Marion Bush, Jean Droz, Joan Eich, Janis
Porter, Ruth Sparks, and Wilma Tucker with special tribute to Ann
Krase who was the Green Ribbon Committee originator.
Members of the Mendocino Study Club come from the entire coastal
area, from Elk to Cleone. The diversity of its members’ backgrounds
offers a great richness to its own fellowship and to its caring presence
in the coastal community.
During fall, winter and spring, meetings are held twice a month on
Fridays at 1:30 p.m. at Preston Hall at the Mendocino Presbyterian
Church with presentations on interesting topics, followed by a social
hour. Residents of the Mendocino Coast are welcome to attend meetings
and many may choose to become members, enjoy the fellowship and help
with the club’s projects.
For more information, please call President Robin Wheat at (707) 616-5231
or send an e-mail to mendocinostudyclub@yahoo.com.
Available at the museum for purchase, Ladies of the Afternoon 1908–2008
The First 100 Years of the Mendocino Study Club by Jean Droz and Janet
Barnes, Mendocino Historical Review, Volume XXII, Summer 2008, is a
copyrighted publication by the Kelley House Museum, Inc. For more information,
go to their Website at
www.kelleyhousemuseum.org.
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