BajaNomad

Campo de Cahuenga Historic Reenactment Jan. 13, 2019 at 12:00 noon

David K - 12-28-2018 at 02:26 PM

Once again, author and El Camino Real bell historian Max Kurillo, and I, will be at the Campo de Cahuenga event in Los Angeles.

We will have a table full of books about Baja and Alta California missions for sale and Max usually has several of his El Camino Real souvenir bells from the early 1900s, too!

This event is right across the street from Universal Studios:

3919 Lankershim Blvd
Studio City, California 91604

Read more about the event and get directions from their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/campodecahuenga/

Also: http://www.campodecahuenga.com/
Specifically: https://campodecahuenga.com/?p=5032

Photos from a previous event:















Pico and Fremont exchange...









Canon was fired twice and every car alarm in the several blocks went off! The crowd was too big for me to get a photo of it being shot.





Mexican uniform...



American uniform...



Max and the colonel...



Inside the museum...


General Andres Pico


Lieutenant Colonel John C. Fremont


Campo de Cahuenga adobe


One of two glass cases containing the bells on loan from Max Kurillo, my co-author










Our table

With every Baja or Camino Real book sold, a copy of 'In the Shadow of the Volcano' by Mike Humfreville will be included, while supplies last!

Come by and say hi... we will probably be there until 3 or 4.

I met Nomads 'Agua Dulce' and 'Mothership' (Mondo) at a previous event.

fishbuck - 12-28-2018 at 02:56 PM

So cool.

David K - 1-9-2019 at 11:45 AM

Concerned about rain predicted but Max is sure it won't hit until 3 pm, so he is still up for the long drive from El Cajon .
The new books we both wrote will be sold at a heavy discount as a thank you for coming. Plus, each customer will be given a copy of Mike Humfreville's book, while supplies last.
I hope the rain waits and that you guys come to this historical reenactment. We will have a table set up, with others, by the front parking lot.

John Harper - 1-9-2019 at 11:59 AM

I had no idea the Mexican/American war in California ended on my birthday! Nice bit of trivia.

John

[Edited on 1-9-2019 by John Harper]

David K - 1-9-2019 at 12:06 PM

Lol, you are old!
The war didn't officially end there on that day, the Alta Californians made a peace deal with the Americans to spare any more losses. Americans were in other parts Mexico and Baja... Much more to the story...

John Harper - 1-9-2019 at 04:46 PM

Quote: Originally posted by David K  
Lol, you are old!
The war didn't officially end there on that day, the Alta Californians made a peace deal with the Americans to spare any more losses. Americans were in other parts Mexico and Baja... Much more to the story...


I was actually born 111 years later. There was an old sycamore tree (just off 126) out by my folks place in Fillmore where there was a plaque commemorating John C. Fremont having been past there on his way to sign a treaty with Pico. Check out this article I found about it:

http://www.weirdca.com/location.php?location=934

It was a huge, beautiful tree when I was a kid, looks like it's almost dead now.

I used to ride by that tree on my bicycle almost every day on my way to school, several miles away. That stretch of road has had many fatal accidents. Several people I knew from Fillmore died on that road.

John

[Edited on 1-9-2019 by John Harper]

David K - 1-9-2019 at 05:30 PM

That is very cool, John!

David K - 1-12-2019 at 09:03 AM

OK, the rain is supposed to stop for Sunday, so we are good to go.
Hope to meet some new L.A. area Nomads there as well as say high to any I have already met.

In the parking lot, tables are set up for some vendors selling historic items and that is where Max and I will be. You will enjoy Max... he was on Huell Howser's TV show a couple of times and is most interesting. Max is the mission bell expert and has been to all the missions.

David K - 1-13-2019 at 05:51 PM

It was a real pleasure to meet and visit with 'DocRey' and Vern 'El Vergel'... thank you both for driving over to the event and chatting with Max and I today.

We were fortunate to have a 1-day break in the rainy weather but the sky was cloudy and the air temps low (for L.A.). The mercury seemed to plunge after 1 o'clock? We left about 2:30.

Seemed like fewer visitors and fewer kids this year. Only a Telemundo TV camera was there, that I saw. Maybe it was the cold weather that kept the crowds less than usual? The cannon was to be fired 5 times this year and did so three times while we were there... the shock wave knocking over our two mission photos on easels... and we were not near the cannon or in the direction it was fired!

Max wants to get to work on finishing the new expanded edition of our 2012 book (The Old Missions of Baja & Alta California 1697-1834) under a newer title, tentatively 'The Old Missions of the Californias'. Max is 88 years old and it is great to see that kind of energy in him.

I will let you know how that next book progresses...

1-13-19

David K - 1-14-2019 at 01:42 PM

Here was our table, just set up, before the event started...



Max brought two full-size bells from Mrs. Forbes foundry. They are for display as they are cast aluminum to keep weight low, they do not ring well. Bronze would weigh a ton but that is what sounds so good. The one on the left is a duplicate of what you see marking El Camino Real through California. The one on the right is a duplicate of an actual mission bell (San Francisco de Asis/ aka Dolores, in San Francisco).

On the table are max's books and the books I brought (Baja California Land of Missions, Baja Book III, Baja Outpost, and In the Shadow of the Volcano. Behind the table are photos of Mission San Luis Rey and Mission San Ignacio.

David K - 1-25-2020 at 09:26 AM

Well, the 2020 event has come and gone. Max Kurillo attended with his lady and reported it as a big disappointment... Very few people, the performance of the reenactment was lackluster compared to the previous years. Max said that someone new was put in charge who knows nothing of California history...

I was asked by Mando (MOTHERSHIP) when it was, the other day, and I said it already happened! Mando came to one a few years ago and that's how we met. Obviously, the event was not promoted well, at all.

It was fun while it lasted, and it was great to meet or revisit with Nomads who went to it, DocRey, Agua Dulce, Mothership, El Vergel, and others I can't recall at the moment.

chippy - 1-25-2020 at 09:49 AM

I´m suprized it ever did well. What a bore!

David K - 1-25-2020 at 11:43 AM

Oh, before this year, all the ones I was at, was pretty big deal. They dress in period uniforms and clothes and have fun. Not only old retired guys, but younger ones too. Civil War reenactments are really popular, and this war was several years earlier.
It does help teach the past when real people are playing it instead of just reading in books.

norte - 1-26-2020 at 08:22 AM

Maybe people are realizing what really happened.

David K - 1-26-2020 at 09:31 AM

That's what it was all about, what happened...
from the website www.campodecahuenga.com:

The Campo is a place of celebrations. Each January, for more than half a century the events of 1847 are celebrated anew. In a reenactment of the signing of a document by representatives of Mexico and the United States that became known as the Treaty of Cahuenga, signatures of General Andres Pico and Lt. Col. John C. Fremont ended hostilities in the state, creating Peace with Honor. In two years, without first becoming a U.S. territory, California was fast-tracked into the Union. Manifest Destiny was realized. We were one nation from sea to shining sea. All Californians became one people-Americans. To this day, Campo de Cahuenga is a place for celebrating our multi-cultural contributions.

norte - 1-26-2020 at 10:04 AM

Quote: Originally posted by David K  
That's what it was all about, what happened...
from the website www.campodecahuenga.com:

The Campo is a place of celebrations. Each January, for more than half a century the events of 1847 are celebrated anew. In a reenactment of the signing of a document by representatives of Mexico and the United States that became known as the Treaty of Cahuenga, signatures of General Andres Pico and Lt. Col. John C. Fremont ended hostilities in the state, creating Peace with Honor. In two years, without first becoming a U.S. territory, California was fast-tracked into the Union. Manifest Destiny was realized. We were one nation from sea to shining sea. All Californians became one people-Americans. To this day, Campo de Cahuenga is a place for celebrating our multi-cultural contributions.


I thought they were Americans before this? There are some that see this as nothing more than continued United States (not all Americas) imperialism and domination. Nothing to celebrate.

David K - 1-26-2020 at 12:20 PM

'Americans' are what citizens of the United States are called in this page. See, you just learned something else!