The Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California

Who was Ronald Reagan? My first recollection of him was as the host of the TV anthology series, “Death Valley Days”. In 1967, soon after I began my studies at UCLA, Reagan became governor of California and the de facto head of the University Of California Board Of Regents. Although few governors before or since played such an active role in the governing of the university, Reagan was determined to make his mark.

While the Vietnam War raged, the University of California at Berkeley became “Ground Zero” for opposition, protests and demonstrations. In response to what he perceived as spoiled and unprincipled students and faculty, Reagan forced budget cuts across the entire UC system. Around that time, some unprincipled and spoiled demonstrator threw a rock and broke a large window at UCLA's old English Building. Becoming an icon for both sides of the conflict, there were sufficient funds to board-up the hole, yet there was no replacement glass installed during my tenure at UCLA.

  Watch the video, "Air Force One Departs the Reagan Library"

In the years 1967 – 1970, the war raged higher and tensions increased on campuses all across the country. Ronald Reagan, to his great displeasure, hosted one of the last UC Regents’ meetings openly held on a UC Campus. There, at the UCLA Faculty Center in 1967, Reagan’s attendance brought out one of the largest political demonstrations ever at UCLA. At the time of the meeting, Reagan and the other regents sat behind a glass wall, obscured only by draperies. Outside, unruly students released the parking brakes on several cars and began pushing them around the adjacent parking lot. With only a few campus police on hand, it was all that they could do to prevent mayhem.

In the spirit of the day, someone in the crowd of several hundred started a chant. Knowing just how to rile the tradition-bound and conservative Ronald Reagan, the student demonstrators repeatedly chanted, “F*** Ronald Reagan. F*** Ronald Reagan”. The chant was so loud that it was impossible for the governor and the UC Board of Regents to conduct business. After it was evident that they had adjourned and left the building, campus police regained control and dispersed the crowd. Eventually, the events of that day began a spiral of budget cuts and UC fee increases that continues to this day.

Ronald Reagan, like Bob Hope, John Wayne and a host of other establishment actors came to epitomize the far side of the “generation gap” from the one that I represented. I opposed the Vietnam War, the UC faculty salary cuts and student fee increases. My parents were Eisenhower Republicans. They condoned no form of violence in our home. Out of respect for my upbringing and my parents, I observed the UCLA anti-Reagan protest, but other than joining in the chant, I did nothing more that day. With the perspective of time, I feel that Ronald Reagan represented in a courteous way, a set of political beliefs that were unlike my own. If we students had not breeched the decorum that Reagan expected in his life, would the budget cuts have been as deep and would the fee increases have been as steep?

Now that Ronald Reagan is gone from the scene of life, he lives on in many memories. Some ardent followers see him as the conservative messiah, while for others he was the bane of both the environmental and peace movements. Did Reagan’s funding of the “Peacekeeper”, the multiple-warhead, independently targeted intercontinental ballistic MX-Missile help end, or did it extend the Cold War?

At inception, I felt that the International Space Station (ISS) was yet another Reagan make-work project for the military industrial complex. Although that may have been its original impetus, I have come to believe that with its $160 billion+ in federal government funding, that the ISS was a good investment after all. Keeping an active manned space program keeps our engineering and planning skills sharp. In any event, Ronald Reagan’s funding of both the Peacekeeper and ISS projects takes him into the ranks of the biggest spending presidents in U.S. history. Who says that the government did not create jobs or stimulate the economy, even if it was for questionable purposes?

  Watch the video, "The White House in Miniature"

In December 2010, I made my first visit to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California. Although I did not agree with many of his policies or decisions as either governor or president, I hold no ill feelings for the man. Under the circumstances of the times, he did the best he knew how to do. As I approached the library on foot, I let bygones be bygones. Regardless of my previous feelings about Ronald Reagan, there was enough attraction for me to visit his library, museum and final resting place.

With a traditional Spanish style courtyard at its entrance, and strong touches of California ranch architecture in both its finish and details, I found it a handsome building in a beautiful setting. Sitting at the brow of a hill the site has a commanding view of high chaparral in the Los Padres National Forest. On a clear day, one can also see the Pacific Ocean, near Ventura. Despite the close proximity of cities such as Simi Valley and Moorpark, the view is only slightly changed from what it must have been during the nineteenth century Spanish Rancho era. With Ronald Reagan's love of the ranching lifestyle, this site reflects the man in his most favorable light.

In a remote, yet picturesque corner of the grounds is the Ronald Reagan Crypt. Its inscribed comments are brief, mentioning little more than the bare facts of his life. The Presidential Seal, rendered as a brass plaque is its only adornment. With its spectacular view of Ventura County both around and below, who could stand on that spot and harbor hostility toward the man, or anything else, for that matter?

It was the holiday season at the Reagan Library. Poinsettias adorned the courtyard. Inside, Christmas trees representing each decade of the republic were on display. The gift shop was abuzz, selling Ronald Reagan logo items along with other patriotic souvenirs. Except among the omnipresent security force, there was a festive mood throughout the museum.

Other than the spectacular view, the second most amazing feature at the Ronald Reagan Library is Air Force One. Trucked to the site in pieces, and then assembled to look like new, it stands on pedestals in a custom-designed pavilion. In front of the airplane is a picture window large enough for the plan to fly through, unimpeded. Of course, there is the issue of getting the plane up to speed in such a short distance. Through the wonders of stop-action video-capture, you can watch a YouTube video of Air Force One Departing the Ronald Reagan Library on a clear afternoon.

Email James McGillis

Respecting the Spirit of the Ancients at Kin Klizhin Ruin

In May 2011, I visited one of my favorite places within Chaco Culture Historical Park, which is Kin Klizhin Ruin. On my way from camp to Kin Klizhin, I had already seen an elk herd on the mesa and visited Windmill Hill, where ranchers had installed a new windmill over a dry hole. Now it was late afternoon and time to head for the ruin in time for sunset.
 
From previous visits, I knew that the current road to Kin Klizhin paralleled an ancient pathway, which entered Chaco Canyon from the south. Rather than following the varied terrain, Anasazi visitors to the area tended to travel in alignment with the cardinal points of the compass. Looking east from the road, I could see occasional small mounds that may have been marked the trail for ancient travelers.
 
After stopping to inspect one mound, I walked carefully back to my truck. Once disturbed, the fragile soils of the area are subject to rapid erosion. By following a sandy watercourse, I avoided stepping on the cryptobiotic soils that make up much of the local terrain.  Closer to the road, I found an area scoured by wind and water. Lying among the pebbles on the sandy surface was a number of potsherds.
 
The largest of the fragments was almost pure white; its concave shape indicating that it was a small part of a much larger pottery vessel. When I reached down and turned it over, I could see that it was an elegant piece of black on white pottery. Found as far north as Wilcox Ranch, Utah and as far south as Antelope Mesa, Arizona, the high-contrast decoration of black on white pottery can turn utilitarian objects into great art.
 
On my fragment, three rippled waves of water lay beneath a white cloud, which was rolling across a dark sky. The symbolism left little doubt that the original vessel served to carry water across the dry terrain. According to Author Craig Childs, “archeologists excavate (black on white) painted jars as large as watermelons” from one Chaco Canyon site. Because of its remote location, I assume that someone dropped the water carrier along the trail. However, because of their ubiquity in the environment, early ranchers coined the word “potshot” for target practice using ancient vessels. Either way, this was a potsherd to love and cherish, if only in pictures.
 
After cleaning the fragment and taking several pictures, I returned it to its original spot. Although it would have made a fine artifact under glass, its real home was where I found it. By placing it back, face down in the spot where I had found it, I allowed another to come along and find it in the future. By publishing its image and identifying its native surroundings, I add to the general knowledge of black on white ware.
 
The U.S. Antiquities Act of 1906 made it illegal to remove any ancient artifact from public lands. Over the years, many people have ignored the law, taking whatever they found and placing those objects in private collections. As Craig Child’s argues in his book, “Finders Keepers: A Tale of Archaeological Plunder and Obsession”, once any artifact is removed from its surroundings, its historical context is lost forever.
 
The following day, when I described my discovery to the Gallo Campground host, he was pleased that I had respected the artifact and its context. “When we find a particularly nice potsherd, we dig a hole with our heel and bury it there”, he told me. Although his method may secure the future of the artifact for another century or two, mine left it on the land, where it belonged. I hope that when I visit Kin Klizhin once again, my treasure will still be there, reflecting light like a windmill in the sun. If you find this or other artifacts, I hope that you will respect the spirit of the ancients, allowing them to stay at home in the High Southwest.
 
I was the only human visiting Kin Klizhin that afternoon. Although not as large as other Chaco Canyon great houses, the unusual setting and architecture allows Kin Klizhin to stand out from its peers. Unique in Chaco Culture, Kin Klizhin featured three above-ground circular kivas, each set within a rectilinear outer structure. The inner walls of the largest kiva are more than twice as high as the other two. Looking up from inside the larger Tower Kiva, I felt the grandeur of this ancient place. Perhaps that is what early visitors to Chaco Canyon felt upon arrival at this outlier, or welcome center.
 
The main west-facing wall of Kin Klizhin is its largest bulwark. The remainder of the structure, including a former enclosed courtyard was to the east of there. Although it is massive, there are only two small ventilation holes or Ancestral Puebloan windows on the west wall. One is set low, probably used to draw air to a hearth inside. The other is at eye-level, and is an obvious viewing port. From a relatively small inside hole-in-the-wall, the opening expands as it penetrates toward the exterior. This arrangement allowed someone inside to have a wide field of view, but kept the penetration of the structure as small as possible.
 
As sunset approached, I stayed inside the roofless structure, waiting for the right moment. Any photographer will tell you that catching the right moment requires luck, skill and many shots. Of the dozen portal shots I took that day, the pair pictured here are my favorites. The small image is from the outside, looking into the structure. If you click on that image, you will see the larger picture, looking out towards the sunset at Kin Klizhin, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico.

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Chaco Canyon, New Mexico

Seeking the Miracle of Water Near Kin Klizhin Ruin

The Colorado Plateau Province is a physiographic region roughly centered on the Four Corner States. On its southeastern periphery lies what we call Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. In May 2011, I visited the Kin Klizhin Ruin at Chaco Culture National Historic Park. Kin Klizhin is the southernmost outlier of Chacoan Culture, and some say the ancient welcome center for Chaco Canyon itself.
 
It has been a millennium since the Great Disappearance, or demise of Pre-Puebloan culture on the Colorado Plateau. In the two years since my last visit, I wondered, had anything changed? As I soon discovered, the landscape had changed. In my brief absence, the sands of time had begun their march. The wheel ruts along the access road were a bit deeper, as were the sand drifts at their edges. Some might believe that this is natural evolution here on Earth. Others might see blowing sand as a significant threat to our environment.
 
If there is one defining physical feature on the Colorado Plateau, it is sand. During a visit to the Four Corners, one might see loose sand, quicksand, blowing sand, sand dunes, sandstone and tar sand. Human activities such as road building, motorized sports, cattle grazing and sheep herding all contribute to soil erosion. As frequent regional dust storms stir further soil erosion, we experience a drier, sandier High Southwest. In the two years since my last visit, the approach to Kin Klizhin was scoured of soil in some places and sandier than ever in others. Either way, the sands of the Colorado Plateau were moving once again.
 
Although I did not feel any rain the afternoon of my visit, a large thunderstorm was sweeping majestically away to the northeast. There was a breathtaking contrast between bright sunshine on the land and dark clouds in the sky. Turning from that spectacle, I saw yet another wonder of nature. It was the Chaco Canyon elk herd, or at least seven members of its southern contingent.
 
During my 2008 visit, I had startled an elk herd near Kin Klizhin. At the time, I had taken a picture of five bucks running at top speed. If there was a bull among the 2011 herd, it showed no antlers at all. This led me to believe that there may be more than one Chaco Canyon elk herd. Some visitors have heard their bellows from Gallo Campground, fourteen miles away. Could their voices carry that far, or were there two separate herds? Perhaps there is a greater Chaco Canyon elk herd, with a smaller group at Kin Klizhin. The extent and range of Chaco Canyon elk herds would be a good subject for zoological study.
 
During my previous visit, I had surprised the herd near an open water source, which was on the east side of the double-track. The 2011 herd, however, was on the west side of the road, standing below an old windmill, and its cast iron water tank. After photographing the elk, I drove slowly along the road. At several points, I stopped again to take pictures of the small herd. Wary of both my vehicle and me, they tightened their ranks and then slowly walked away. As long as I could still see them, they continued to look back and observe me, as well.
 
During my 2008 Kin Klizhin tour, I had visited Windmill Hill. At the time, the old Aermotor windmill was ragged and derelict, with barely enough structure remaining to suggest the water pump it once had been. Over the past eighty or more years, it had done its job all too well, sucking dry the aquifer over which it stood. The dry and rusty cast-iron tank, with its poorly patched leak holes told a story of profligate water use in earlier and wetter times. For much of the twentieth century, the Aermotor windmill ran continuously from atop this windy hill. Before seizing up, it pumped the last drop of ancient water from the Kin Klizhin aquifer. In my 2008 story, the old windmill symbolized the drying and disappearance of two cultures at Kin Klizhin.
 
In about 1100 CE, those who had tended the irrigation dam and milpas at Kin Klizhin departed, never to return. The Pre-Puebloan Chaco people had diverted surface runoff, sequestering it behind their hand-built dam. The large amount of ancient water that soaked into the sandy soil later became a

target for twentieth century extraction technologies. After centuries of accumulation and a millennium of rest below the surface, that irreplaceable aquifer disappeared in less than a century. Although leakage from the water tank was extensive, the primary usage was even more wasteful. In the high and dry desert, ranchers piped the water to cattle troughs at the site. Exemplifying a lesson of unsustainability, when the well went dry, the ranchers and cattle herds of Chaco Canyon experienced their own Great Disappearance.
 
As I drove west up the short road to Windmill Hill, sunlight on the Kin Klizhin windmill reflected into my eyes. As if it were a heliostat standing in focused light, the object appeared even brighter than the sun. Before the advent of new energy, all reflected light was weaker than its source. Since the Quantum Leap in energy, reflected light may shine with greater intensity than its light source. Some may pass this phenomenon off as a simple lensing effect. It is, I believe, a local confirmation of Einstein’s larger curved-space theory.
 
With few intact blades, how could the windmill shine with such brilliance? To my amazement, I son discovered a shiny new windmill atop the old steel tower. Its many galvanized steel blades acted like a Fourth Order Fresnel Lens, refracting and concentrating the light. In Miguel Cervantes book, “Don Quixote of La Mancha”, the inept hero does battle with a windmill that he mistakes for an unfriendly giant. Unfriendly or not, Don Quixote’s windmill at least served a literal purpose.
 
Was the new Kin Klizhin windmill a flight of fancy or did someone actually think that there was water down there yet to be pumped? Either way, individuals that are more rational had banked the new windmill, so it could not spin to destruction in the wind. In the future, if anyone sees this windmill pumping water, please let me know. I would consider that a miracle of the desert.

Email James McGillis

A Visit With Lizard Man, The Spirit of Pueblo Bonito

When I arrived at Chaco Canyon in May 2011, it had been two years since my previous visit. That two-year hiatus represented one five-hundredth of the time since the crash of Chaco’s Pre-Puebloan culture. From the perspective of Chaco Canyon history, my time away was insignificant.

Arriving at the park after nightfall, I had searched the visitor’s area for water to fill the tank on my RV. To my chagrin, the old water tap lay capped-off and hidden behind the temporary park headquarters. After searching for a while, I found the new water tap in a far corner of the parking lot. Whoever placed it there was not thinking about RV service. The only way to use the faucet was to fill containers and then transport them by hand. The new manual system encouraged conservation, but mainly through inconvenience.

After investigating Gallo Campground, I visited a large yurt that serves as the temporary visitor’s center. Across the parking lot, the old center had disappeared, almost without a trace. Early that morning, I had seen a large cement truck rolling in. Where the old center had stood, construction workers were busy pouring a concrete slab for the new one. Based on the remoteness of the worksite and progress to date, I estimated summer of 2012 for the opening of the new center.

After paying my park entry fee, I purchased the book, “ Finders Keepers: A Tale of Archaeological Plunder and Obsession”, by author and naturalist Craig Childs. Early twentieth century archeological exploitation at Chaco Canyon had left it barren of in-situ artifacts. In the name of twentieth century archeological science, every human-made object found at Chaco Canyon disappeared into private or institutional collections. Today, many of those treasures linger on dusty shelves at various museums and universities. That void leaves Chaco Canyon as a place with insufficient context. For current visitors, putting the ancient puzzle together from only its architectural ruins can be daunting.

At the northwest end of Chaco Canyon lies Pueblo Bonito, the largest and most elaborate of the park’s great houses. At its zenith, as a gathering place of the ancient world, Pueblo Bonito was still centuries away from European contact. Seeing its similarity to historical Hopi, Zuni and Pueblo Indian dwellings, early Spanish visitors named it as such.

Early European visitors found Chaco Canyon deserted and destroyed by its ancient inhabitants. It was that event, about 1100 CE that we now call the Great Disappearance. Within less than one hundred years, Chaco Canyon, Hovenweep and Mesa Verde all fell to disuse and abandonment. Until the ancestral Navajos arrived centuries later, most of the Colorado Plateau remained uninhabited.

Why did the Pre-Puebloan residents of Chaco Canyon build their grandest structure in the shadow of “Threatening Rock”, or tse biyaa anii'ahi (leaning rock gap) in Navajo? Archeologists say that early reinforcement of that fractured sandstone slab indicates ancient knowledge of its peril. Was their choice of location an example of ancient risk-taking behavior, or was something else involved?

Seeking answers to this ancient mystery, we may wish to look at contemporary human behavior. If you visit Pueblo Bonito in the late afternoon, you will find others awaiting sundown from within its walls. With few exceptions, those pilgrims wait in reverent silence. Was ancient Pueblo Bonito also a place of silence? Once twentieth century archeologists began studying and excavating the ruins at Chaco Canyon, automobile traffic became ubiquitous in that area. Accompanying those vehicles were new and louder sonic vibrations, thus ending one thousand years of silence in that place.

In January 1941, Threatening Rock, which stood 97 feet (30 m) high and weighed approximately 30,000 tons crumbled on to the northern section of Pueblo Bonito. As it fell, the once intact slab broke into untold numbers of jagged boulders, both large and small. Like a flood of stone fragments, the rock fall released its energy over a large part of the great house ruin. Since the fallen rock and the building blocks of the great house are similar in color and texture, only their haphazard angles of repose help an observer to differentiate the natural elements from the constructed ones.

Threatening Rock stood both before, during, and for a millennium after habitation at Pueblo Bonito. Why, within forty years of modern rediscovery did the great stone slab crash down upon the ruin? Did the sound of human voices, the vibrations from their machines, or time alone topple and shatter that monolith?

During my recent visit to Pueblo Bonito, I made a clockwise circuit of the ruins, observing in turn, the south, west, north (rock fall area) and finally the east. Although there is much to see and feel within the walls of the great house, I was intent upon finding and visiting with an old friend that day. With any luck, I would find him hiding among the broken boulders of the rock fall. Was he still there, or had he vanished in the two years since my last visit?

As I walked along the path leading to the rock fall, there was no trace of my friend. Then, at a sharp left turn, I saw him under the overhang of a large boulder. He stood in profile, as if part of a natural frieze, sculpted and then released from ageless bondage in stone. Freed from his bondage in stone after one thousand years of silence, I offered my silent words of greeting to Lizard Man, the spirit of Pueblo Bonito. Although his wise countenance stared back at me, he remained silent.

It was not until I edited the photos that accompany this article that I noticed a vertical slab of stone framed in my first photo of Lizard Man. In the gap between boulders, behind where he stands a tall fin of sandstone stands away from the canyon wall. Was Lizard Man nonchalantly asking us to observe more of this scene than just him? Indirectly, was he pointing to the new Threatening Rock?

After taking several photos of my friend, I continued on my circuit of Pueblo Bonito. While taking the longer, temporary path to the parking area, I turned to look back. From there I could see the wavelike pattern of broken stone left by the 1941 rock fall. Turning my gaze to the canyon wall, I realized that I was now on the far side of the rock fin that Lizard Man had pointed out to me. It was indeed a new Threatening Rock, which had sliced away from the canyon wall. Narrow at the bottom and wide at the top, this slab was far smaller than the original Threatening Rock. How much longer that second Pillar of Hercules might stand, I cannot say. Only Lizard Man knows, but he is not talking.

Email James McGillis