1 10 4 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/c59f8053d23c1136aee09f68020277ec.pdf 6cb14bd4ab0132b818c6e2422620a6fc PDF Text Text ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 Jake Peirce: I'm speaking today with Mrs. Alexa Clauson from the Adobe Home Tour – among her many accomplishments – and so I would like to start with just a little background information, if you don't mind. Where are you from? What got you to where you could start with the Adobe Home Tour? Alexa Clausen: Well, thank you. And I'm happy to be here since we only have an hour, I'll try to do the mini version. <affirmative> I grew up in Riverside, California. I got my advanced degrees in San Diego, so University of San Diego undergraduate, and then master's degree at San Diego State. At the same time that I was studying, my master's degree took me seven years because I was working full-time for California State Parks. So, I have a career with state parks and essentially doing local regional statewide and contextual related history for projects with state parks. So, when I retired in 2008, we had moved to Escondido in 1993, I think. And I had some friends in the history business, Lucy Burke, who was very active in historic preservation, always nagging me: When are you going to retire? You know, join us and, and all this stuff. So finally, when I did retire, I had our son – I had him late in in life – so he was still in elementary school, high school. So, I wasn't too involved, but I did have the sense that I want to give back to the community of history because when I was working professionally without internet and all this, I was visiting people who were saving history in boxes under their beds. You know, there was some places didn't have historical societies; it was just mom and pop trying to save history. So, you know, I felt like I wanted to give back, and so I started volunteering and then, when my son was at St Mary's in elementary school, there's another student. His name was Sean McCoy. Well, his father, they had a little birthday party. I think they were in fifth grade, so this might go back to maybe 2004 or 2005, and he lived in Valley Center. The house was adobe, and I was really curious, but in their study there were all these houses on craftsman architecture. I looked at Tom, who's just a really gregarious, hardy guy that runs a landscaping business. He's Cal[ifornia] Poly[technic] [State] [University] educated and in landscaping. And I'm like, no, it's not. It must be his wife. <laugh> So eventually at the swim party, the kids were busy and I said, “Hey, you know, Tom who's collection of books here, you're doing craftsmen?” Well, that unleashed Tom, and he found a soulmate in the interest. And as a few years went on, he always said there, “We have to do something. I go to Pasadena to the home tours and they're all rooted in Green and Green Architecture, which was known for the craftsmen, but we have our own, you know, handcrafted Adobes here.” And I'm like, “[O]kay, Tom, let's do a tour.” And he claims that, you know, I kept pushing him to, oh, won't this be fun? And so the two of us kind of started Adobe Home Tour, but we were fortunate that the director Wendy Barker at the historical society wanted to go ahead and take our little idea under her wing. They had been doing garden tours, so they were familiar with parking and talking to homeowners, so we really had a jump there and we were lucky. And of course with the insurance that the Escondido History Center was all behind us. And our very first brochure was a front-to-back 8.5”x11” piece of paper off a copier, and that's kind of where it started. Peirce: Well, you have to start somewhere, right? Clausen: Yeah. It's funny, and of course I was thinking, “[O]h, he'll get over it.” You know, this is one year we had maybe 60 people come and it was word of mouth, mainly his friends and the historical society, people and friends of the homeowners, so it was really grassroots or mom and pop, whatever you want to call it. And our last tour we sold out at 500 tickets. Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 1 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 Peirce: Wow. Clausen: Yeah. So that was the route. I came here through my training, I don't own an adobe home and it was really a feeling to give back to history essentially. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. Going back to your previous stops in your career with the California State Parks, was this something that was kind of in the same realm of what you were doing? Looking at architecture and looking at stuff like that and giving tours, or did you do something different while you were there? Clausen: You know, it really wasn't. The historic preservation and the architecture was handled mainly by specialists, and a lot of that was rooted in the state office of historic preservation, which was like a cousin branch of State Parks and the very highly trained historians specializing in architecture. So, I was really weak and had to do a catch up self-trained. All of my projects were budget driven. For example, if they, maybe the volunteers of the Rangers wanted to do a new booklet for a visitor center and it had a historical element in it, they would budget for hours for that. Or if there's a general plan, they needed a historian to do the cultural. So a lot of my jobs were just skipping around and providing research and history for whatever was budgeted and needed. And generally, if there was like an architectural survey, they were contracted out by specialist, or the state office would contract. So, during my career, for example, they did a thematic statewide survey of the Civilian Conservation Corps buildings that were still in state parks. Now they took their cue from the feds who were doing a survey in national parks and in the forest service, but again, that was handled by specialists. So, you know, while we would exchange, read material, go to the same conferences, it is a specialty that I'm probably not the best at, but I do provide that research for Adobe Home Tour. So, it was a different kind of specialty, yeah. Peirce: Absolutely. It sounds more like you were – in your role with the state parks – you were more of a jack of all trades rather than a master of specifically architecture in that field. Clausen: Oh, absolutely, and in time they umbrellaed all that under cultural resources management and it was the archeologist and the historians and sometimes the landscape architects depending on the project. Peirce: Absolutely. Given that Tom seemed to be your partner in crime in the beginning of this adventure, –and he seemed to have more of the specific knowledge when it came to the adobe tours, based on what you're saying – what would you say that was your biggest contribution to the beginning of it? Was it the organization? Was it your specific knowledge of how to provide background information? What would you say was your biggest contribution in the beginning? Clausen: Well, actually, I think Tom felt like I was just the cheerleader. <laugh> But, you know, I think it helped Tom have the confidence. With his career running a landscape business, he wasn't as free to do some Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 2 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 things, and I think he always saw me as a little bit of the conduit to the history community. He's second generation – grew up in Escondido through his business and his family – they know every nook and cranny in the city, but Tom I think felt like I was the person that can talk to the historical society and get that connection. And then when it came to maybe talking to some families about the history of their homes – although Wendy did a lot of it in the beginning – in time, I took over all of that as eventually she took another job, but, you know, they had the historical society to run. I think Tom just really needed someone who talked a little more of the language to keep connected with the historical society and the history side of it. That's my take, if you ever tape Tom, maybe he'll have a different, <laugh> a different take on it. Peirce: <laugh> No, that's absolutely fair. That takes me into something else I kind of wanted to explore with you if don't mind. I'm very interested in how you and Wendy and Tom and everybody else who was involved – especially in the beginning – how you managed to convince people to take part in this project. Because like you said, a lot of these people, these aren't just like “Oh, I own this random home that is just sitting out here for display.” This is where people live and work and raise their families. How did you manage to convince people to take part in what you were trying to achieve? Especially in the beginning. Clausen: You know, I haven't thought about it. Some of it was Tom's personal contacts and he knows people who know people and he knocked on doors, and then Wendy at the historical society, they also knew people who had adobe homes and was literally making lists, like, “Should we call this one? Should we call that one?” but I have to wonder now that you brought it up if the timing was right. Garden tours were becoming very popular at the time. They were fundraisers for not just historical societies, but you know, maybe natural garden clubs. I think garden clubs maybe had a longer history of that, but history house tours were becoming popular at the time. I think a lot of that starts going backwards to the US bicentennial, where historic preservation was taking off, and I have to wonder if people who buy adobe homes sort of needed a validation. Recently he had a potluck, and I ran into a lady who said, “My friends tell me you're crazy to have bought this home. You know, why would you live in this mud home?” <laugh> so maybe there's just a little twinkle of wanting the validation. You know, I'm really taking a guess at this; I hadn't really thought about it. But I do think people had the confidence –the historical society had been doing an annual home tour and then the old neighborhood in downtown Escondido, they started doing a Mother's Day home tour – so the idea of a home tour maybe wasn't as foreign had we been maybe one of the first to ever do this in Escondido. I think those two projects really made people aware and it wasn't just so scary that other people were opening their houses. In the old neighborhood after COVID, it'll be the first time in a few years, and they will do another Mother's Day home tour, and I think they're on their like 25th anniversary. And the historical society, they partnered with that, so they had the experience also and word of mouth that this isn't kind of some creepy people knocking on the door saying, “Whoa, you know, what you can do is clean up your house and let people in.” So, I really didn't think about it and it's not scientific by any manner, but I think there is an opening and I find that Adobe Home Tours love the validation. They love to know that other people, once they've seen their house, they get it. They really think it's something special. That's just my take on it. Peirce: Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 3 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 Absolutely. I mean, that makes complete sense. One question I did have as well: was there any sort of impetus? Was this just organic? You just happened to bring this up and it just kind of grew up? Or was there any sort of given that some people want that validation, right? A lot of people may not want to live in this kind of home. Was there any sort of preservation or were these houses being torn down or was there any sort of event like that that was kind of like, “Man, maybe we should foster some sort of appreciation within the region to make sure that we keep this history alive a little bit.”? Clausen: You know, I think that became one of our causes or mantras or whatever is as we backed into this – like just a couple of mom and pop <laugh> people with no experience but some dumb luck and some decent connections – is that as these homes aged, and of course, in the history of a lot of the homes, the midcentury, the builders and the real estate developers, they picked out, we call it ‘cherry picked’ the lots. You could go into orange groves and carve out incredible views – and many of the adobe homes have incredible views – and I believe that before property values really started to skyrocket that they were at risk because once you have an incredible view, then you know, we came the era of McMansions. This is happening in cities everywhere: Los Angeles and San Francisco are some of the worst cases where the beautiful Spanish revival homes are gone. They're bulldozed for these – you know, it's probably not polite to call McMansions; someone coined that phrase for overbloated size of houses with great views. I think we all, the core of us that worked on this had the feeling that they were at risk. The other timing of this is many homes are not eligible for Mills Act and historic preservation review unless they've reached 50 years old. Now, many of the adobes that were in the midcentury revival, the boom that started with the edges of Longview Acres and up and down here in the Via Rancho Parkway area around Felicita Park, Adobe homes were starting to be built in the late forties and into the fifties. If the home had not reached 50 years old, it was not eligible for review as a candidate for a higher level of putting out on a register for review and protection. There's no guarantee, but I think that the age started working for us as these homes were turning fifty and the appreciation with the old neighborhood and appreciation everywhere was starting to grow and the concern for being bulldozed. So it's almost like you had a little bit of a perfect storm coming in for the recognition of an adobe home, and they did stop construction by state law in the eighties. So, then another one of our “Gee, you, you're not going to see these again. You have a chance to really see something special.” Peirce: Was there a reason that they stopped the construction at that point? Was it just not feasible for like a, what is it, like an earthquake code or something like that? Clausen: Well, I talked to several builders. George Patterson when he was living and then Mike Burton, whose father and grandfather – Hiram Smith his grandfather and then Don Burton his father – they had no concerns about earthquakes. They were using a lot of rebar and the adobe block by that time had added a petroleum-based product developed in the late thirties and through the war time, so adobe block now was solid construction. I was told it was all about thermal and insulation. Both builders said it was an argument with the state of California with, I don't know, engineering approval people that went down to the county, that an adobe will take in thermal heating, you know, it takes three days to warm up and, you know, on and on, and they refused to approve adobe construction based on that. The other thing the builder said is that the labor became too costly; you had labor, construction workers still willing up to a certain time to take and build these, you know, carry these blocks and do this kind of labor. It was Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 4 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 easier to get a job somewhere else, and it didn't, you know, literally break your back. So between the rise of cost of labor – and then in Escondido, the adobe block yard went out of business; the blocks now had to be shipped from Fresno or elsewhere – and it became just too costly to build. So, it was all those things. Peirce: Yeah. That makes sense. You know, it tends to go when things become cost prohibitive, it definitely will stop people in their tracks and in terms of doing that kind of stuff. Clausen: Right. So that ended adobe construction in California, because of course there still is adobe construction in New Mexico, Arizona, and globally, for that matter, you know, worldwide. The adobe is still a popular way to build a cheap way if you have the labor. Peirce: Yeah, absolutely. Seeing that this isn't the only place where Adobe houses were built – and are built even to this day – as you guys kind of built this program and as it continued to grow, was there any sort of view of trying to expand to a larger area or working with other tours if they existed in places like New Mexico, to try and collaborate in any way? Or was this a very grassroots, “We’re sticking where we are and just kind of making this grow naturally where it is?” Clausen: Well, I think we would've loved to become a bigger, wider organization, but it all comes down to volunteers. And as you know, a lot of this, unless you're a paid staff putting on something like this-Although we were thrilled: we had a tour in Pauma Valley a few years ago, we've been invited to work with Valley Center Historical Society; there's a number of adobes there. We were also invited through Dominic Calarco who supervises the park system in Carlsbad; they would like to feature Leo Carillo and find some adobe homeowners there. So, we do have an interest, very North County interested people, and we'd like to do that, and then it keeps it from being boring Escondido; not boring, but, you know, you do sort of run out of homes or people that are willing. We do have bigger interest, and we know that people have traveled from Los Angeles and from other places to come and see the homes and be on the tour. In an ideal world? Yeah, wouldn’t it be neat to have this grand old, famous tour? You know, some cities do – the Palm Springs mid-century modern tour is just crazy famous, the Pasadena tours are – but we're restricted now by just a small group of volunteers. Peirce: Absolutely. Yeah, it can be difficult even with that outside interest when you don't have the facility to make it happen, whether it's personnel or whatever. There's always a friction, there's always that rub that kind of keeps you from doing more, even if there's the interest. Did you take anything from other tours? Did you learn from them? Or did you go, “We want to do something different. We want to kind of stick to our own program here?” Clausen: You know, the way I think this evolved, with a number of our Adobe homeowners haved jumped in after their home was on the tour to take a role and to help out. And so, for example, our current webmaster, Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 5 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 Don, he took over the website. Intense interest in adobe, and really likes to post a lot of stuff, even adobe homes for sale. And then we had a lady – Mary Del May – she had taken over for Wendy in 2015 I want to say, I'll have to look it up, and professionalized it, and Tom; all of them have been on other home tours. So, I think what they brought to the table was things they liked, like, “Gee, you know, it was nice when we had a booklet, a full booklet and, you know, we could cut costs by having sponsor pages. That'll help the printing if we do a bigger booklet.” So, our homeowners who jumped in, I think they did bring experience from things they liked going on other tours. Then as we planned this, I think some things from other tours come in like don't let people stand too long. “Oh, we were in Tucson. We had to wait 45 minutes, but they sold cocktails.” <laugh> We're like, oh, we can't sell cocktails, but you know, we do have these, yeah. I think that everyone who has participated brings what they like, and they don't like, suggestions, they work, they don't, we've tried some things. So yeah, I'd say that we have benefited from other tours. Peirce: And it also sounds like you've benefited from, as you've done this program, collaborating with some of the people that have owned these homes, right? Like you said earlier-Clausen: Oh, absolutely. Peirce: It sounds like that's really been honestly, and correct me if I'm wrong, kind of the heart of the program as it's moved forward. Clausen: It really was helpful because in order to invite and ask people “Would you have your home on the tour?” They're shaking in their boots and to have other homeowners say, look, here's some information, which they've developed a little “Hello, homeowner, potential homeowner. This is what we did, little hit lists of this is what happens.” And then we also developed a security docent guide and docent stations. And that came out of the feedback from the homeowners to pace our volunteers throughout the home and allow people not to wander through on their own, but in groups as a group tour. And a lot of this came from the feedback of the homeowners wanting a little more security, a little more confidence, and most of the kind of tips for, “Hey, do you want to be on our tour,” came from the other homeowners. Absolutely. You know, lessons learned or could have, should have, would have. It's always a little growing thing. I think you're right. I think that this definitely comes from within. Peirce: Absolutely, and that's incredible, right? To really get that kind of support from people who see what the benefit is of highlighting this stuff, and just kind of doing that because it not only gets people to participate, but it brings their energy and their enthusiasm along with it. Speaking of enthusiasm, I know that there has been concern in some sectors of historians who are worried about people not being interested in history, people being ignorant of history. What efforts, if any, do you guys have to put in to get people interested in this part of history? Was there any sort of education that you had to put out? Did you have to teach people about this stuff? Did you find any struggles in getting people to come at any point? Or was this something that kind of once people heard about it, they were like “I'd like to learn more about that” or did you fight any struggles? Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 6 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 Clausen: You know, we're always amazed at how easy this comes. I think being in the San Diego drivable region, that we're lucky because we are a county where we can still on a Sunday, get somewhere without a lot of trouble, and we do have the support of... like I mentioned, a lot of other historical societies have done garden tours, home tours, many cities have. And so people that love it, we find from our ticket holders, are a very strange combination with flat out “looky loos”: people that want to remodel their kitchen and they want to see others, as realtors are being a little more cautious about appointments and who comes in – for good reason, not to waste their time and security. So we have the people that just love to see other people's homes, and then we have just very hardcore interested – either mid-century modern architecture, maybe even students of architecture, and hobbyists – they are there for the architecture. We have a pretty neat little group of people interested in the garden now. Not every home is going to have a fancy garden – not by any means – but they're there primarily to see the garden and enjoy the garden. And then we do have history buffs; like that's what I'm just labeling people that love the history. Then year by year, we've tried to pick a theme. LIke last year: “The Romance of the Rancho” where we just call it out that maybe some of this is California fantasy, you know, and the places were carved out of orange groves, they're close to the earth. In some cases, the adobe block was made right there, right on the acreage that was formed and bulldozed, lot of use of heavy beams, sort of that romance of the Rancho. So we've brought that up. In Pauma, we had a chance to talk about the Luiseños building the Pauma mission. We had that be one of our stops and made sure that we arranged to include that. A lot of people told us, “You know, we've always heard about Pauma Mission and we've never gone. It was a chance to go out there.” Um, so we always get a very different mix, but always a mix of people. The strong elements that we always bask in is the people interested in the architecture, and of course, in the history. But I think some of this is people come along, they will read our booklet or the docents will tell them something and we feel there's an appreciation for the historic preservation that leaves every tour. Peirce: Absolutely. It's fascinating, right? You really have to find your niche and it sounds like this program really has found it in just a wide spectrum of people who are trying to see what you guys are displaying out there. You brought up how not every home has a garden or anything like that. Is there any sort of prerequisite to being on a tour for any of these houses or is it literally just, “Hey, you're an adobe house, you can be on it.” Are you a little choosy? How does that specifically work where you decide what goes on each tour? Clausen: We do have some levels. We've had some very simple, honest homes and then we've had some just outrageously beautiful homes from adobe. In some cases we've had to turn people down because in the times they were built the driveways and the parking are impossible. There still are a lot of niches around the Escondido area where they were carved out of an old orange or avocado grove and the parking and the in and out is just out of the question. So that's always a consideration, although we've had some pretty narrow tight squeezes. Some homes, once we've talked to the homeowners, they say, you know, we're really not ready. We would like our home to be, uh, a little closer to ready. They often bought the adobe as a fixer upper, but as everyone knows, it takes time and money and planning, and we've had homeowners who've come back and say, you know, now we're ready. In some cases, we had to turn down people because they were just way too out of the way. I'll give you an example: last tour we had on the edge of Rancho Santa Fe the Osuna adobe, and then a home in Del Dios and then across Escondido, just behind the mall, two homes in that general area – that were drivable. I think we had a Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 7 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 house offer way on Deer Springs Road. And so John – our webmaster – sometimes he would take and calculate the mileage, and then if you're 25 minutes one way and the only home out there, we would think that the homeowner would get gypped, you know, people would just say “Let's just go get lunch. We won't drive out there.” So we've tried to save some of the names and the addresses, so we could do a closer cluster of homes and hopefully we haven't missed out on anyone yet, and hanging onto names lets us be able to do that. We've had people who, as they've moved forward, say we just can't do this, you know, family circumstances or everyone just couldn't get on board. You know, a lot of things we expect could happen. We've gotten two thirds of the way and we've had people bail for very legitimate, understandable reasons. In a few cases, we've had previous homes on the tour again. We've had a few homes in that circumstance where an owner stepped up and a lot of times they've made changes. They've learned more about their home and it was enough years for our ticket holders. We have a lot of new ticket holders, so they're not saying, oh, we just saw that home. So yeah, I think there's been a combination of how we get there when the doors open. Peirce: Absolutely. So the individual houses, are the owners responsible for the histography of the tour for those places? Do you guys assist? How does that collaboration work? Clausen: In the last five years, I think I've done the majority of the history. In a lot of cases though, with new owners, sometimes we've gotten really lucky. They're walking their dog, they run into an old timer from the neighborhood, you know, someone who has lived there 40 years, and they'd come back as we're developing the history of their home, or they'd get a lead: a phone number of someone who knew who still own the home. So we've had a combination. I'd say maybe I do easily 70 to 75% of the research, and then 25% comes in from a lot of odd places and on occasion the homeowner themselves. So yeah, I think I've been doing most of it. For the internal side of it, the docent guide, then we lean on the homeowner for their remodel or what they were told about the remodel. If they have a newer kitchen maybe put in in the late eighties – they were told about it by the realtor – the docent on the kitchen stop will let people know what they're looking at. I'd say I've done a good portion of the research. Peirce: Awesome. Has that been a struggle as well, given that some of these houses - I don't wanna say they're not important, right? They are important, they're historical in their own way. But it’s not like Greta Garbo lived there; they're just regular homes in Escondido. Has that been difficult to gather that information? Clausen: You know, I've been stuck on homes for variety of reasons. Sometimes what happens is, let's say the homeowner had the adobe built for themselves and they worked the rest of their career at a conveyor belt as an engineer and retired, and perhaps their spouse was a schoolteacher and, you know, very wonderful everyday people. When we actually go look at the house, we generally will start finding jewels on some of the architecture. I think we've been pretty fortunate to have builders who have included architecture to keep the story going. This will be the treatment of the open beams or the fireplaces. Very often, we've had wonderful surviving fireplaces that were not remodeled; they're still there. We've had homes where the windows were yet not removed; they were still the old aluminum encasement crank windows, really neat, like ribbon style. It would even be the placement of arches, you Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 8 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 know, opening the arch of one room into the next. The unbelievable plate glass windows from floor to ceiling, capturing a style that is brought in from the craftsman era – Cliff May, who has been considered the father of the ranch house style that became mid-century and popularized – how they took the sense of bringing the outdoor to the edge of the indoor. The adobe builders in the mid-century – we’ve found the Weir brothers and others – they will do that plate glass window with the view, right from the bottom, right to the edge of the eaves with phenomenal views, taking advantage and placing the home on that view. Without a doubt, the architecture will jump in and take over. Funky chimney treatments, little touches like a little hut, an opening to put in firewood, right by the fireplace treatment of the mantle or the hearth. Maybe there's some amber inserted glass that's still from the original; once in a while, even the lighting fixtures. So, many homes where the owner isn't recognized as such as a fantastic story, usually the architecture jumps right in; there's something that has survived the floor treatment. We have homes with original flagstone, original tile, you know, goes on and on. So from room to room, as we're giving the tours and highlighting these things, we can keep the audience, the visitor very interested. And that's usually very rewarding to know that these original features are still there. Peirce: Absolutely. Have you had, has there been a home that was just completely original or do they all need work at some point? Clausen: Well, we have had a few that had a remarkable amount of original features left, and that usually gets us going pretty good. Now of course, I think the thing that happens to most houses is the kitchens need updating very badly, and often the bathrooms. But we have homes where even there's been extensive remodeling, we still recognize – I'll just use Weir for example because they're so well-known – some of the weird features are cabinet treatments, maybe even the lintels on the window trim, possibly the addition of a certain shape of a breakfast nook. So, we almost always see these features survive. We haven't really had homes that were entirely gutted. We've had some pretty good luck. Peirce: That's amazing. I mean, just thinking about how homes are now and people just rip them up and then build them back up.... Clausen: They do, and some of us don't even like to watch those shows where they come into a midcentury modern home with a sledgehammer; sometimes it's kind of creepy. Peirce: And a little upsetting, especially for someone who has been doing these kinds of tours, right? Looking at the big picture: do you feel that the tour has been successful in achieving the initial goals of what you were trying to do? Did it kind of mushroom beyond that? And if so, do you feel like there are things that you never thought were possible and things that you kind of wish you could have branched out into? Clausen: No, I think that those of us who started early on are honestly always amazed how this can sustain interest. And we're always thrilled for the feedback; not everyone's happy on our tours, of course not. Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 9 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 But we believe that the awareness of adobe construction and word of mouth and people wanting to see an adobe home, the inside of one, was well beyond our expectations. Absolutely. In terms of getting bigger, there's not enough of us. We think we will always have to limit our ticket sales. I mean, it'd be wonderful to run it two days. It'd be wonderful to raise more money, but there's just not enough of us. Really, I think raising people's understanding of what this construction is and what it was, and then historically its roots, you know, the adobe as construction material in California, I think we've done a pretty good job getting the message across and getting interest. Absolutely. We'd like to keep going. We hope we always have enough people and enough houses, but we think with the invitations to Carlsbad and maybe one day Rancho Santa Fe, and certainly Pauma again, Fallbrook has many adobe homes, Vista does... there are communities we still think we can keep going. Peirce: Absolutely. My last question is, it feels like you've created something here in North County that has really kind of stood the test of time here in terms of creating something from scratch and creating something that people come back to. You have repeat customers, you have all these things. What do you hope your legacy is with Adobe Home Tours and where do you hope to see it moving forward? Clausen: Well, I think for most of us and, you know, I can't speak for everyone, but I think for most of us, the importance of having the homes preserved – this is something that's stopped in time. Of course any development is at risk, no matter what, and that the stronger we stay and the higher the appreciation is the less likely that someone will want to buy the home, and as the prices and their value increase, we feel there's a less likelihood that it would be demolished for yet a bigger investment. Although many have been. But we really, I think we'd all like to know that the core of many of these homes will remain and that they'll go another hundred years. Peirce: Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Is there anything about this program or anything about your career that you feel that we haven't touched on that you'd like to talk about before we start wrapping this up? Clausen: I think we covered it pretty well. And since we have a lot of programs that are a PDF on the Adobe Home Tour website, and Don keeps posting information – he's very good about answering questions people will forward to him and he'll forward to the rest of us so we can help. I think there's a lot out there now that was not available 10 years ago, so I think anyone that's interested has a check to jump on the website and dig around a little more and if needed con to contact any of us and the steering committee small, but we're out there to just keep promoting the adobe heritage. Peirce: Absolutely. And once again, that was adobehometours.com, correct? Clausen: That's correct. Yes. Peirce: Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 10 2022-05-13 �ALEXA CLAUSEN TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW, 2022-04-12 Awesome. Just so just making sure we get that plug out there. Clausen: Okay. Right. Well, Jake, thank you so much. It's been great to talk to you and thanks for taking the interest. Peirce: I appreciate that, absolutely. I want to thank you very much from the bottom of my heart for taking this much time to talk about this. It's been fascinating. Transcribed by Jake Peirce and Sierra Jenkins 11 2022-05-13 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Clausen, Alexa. Interview transcript. April 12, 2022. Description An account of the resource Alexa Clausen is one of the founders of the Adobe Home Tours in North County San Diego, providing much of the historiography of each stop on their yearly tours. She was employed as a historian with California State Parks prior to her involvement with Adobe Home Tours. In this interview, Alexa speaks about how Adobe Home Tours started, the successes and difficulties with running a program like Adobe Home Tours, and how her background with California State Parks helped prepare her for her current role. This oral history was made possible with generous funding from the Ellie Johns Foundation. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Alexa Clausen Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Jacob Peirce Sierra Jenkins Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2022-04-12 Subject The topic of the resource Adobe houses Historic buildings -- Conservation and restoration Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Diego County (Calif.) 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In assuming full responsibility for use of the material, the researcher also understands that the materials they examine may contain Social Security numbers, other personal identifiers, and/or sensitive material on potentially living and identifiable individuals (e.g., medical, evaluative, or personally invasive information). The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC027-15 Community history History Department internship Women's experience https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/ca6f54f3772da765d27df005f357db44.pdf e3319aac7d71629d4dc452c92d58367b PDF Text Text LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 Peirce: Well, I would hope so. Otherwise, this whole thing is caput <laugh>. Okay. <laugh> So, good evening. My name is Jacob Peirce. I am a first year graduate student at Cal State San Marcos in the history program. And this is part of a series documenting historical figures, impactful figures in North County, San Diego. Today I'm speaking with, Lizbeth Ecke. And, thank you for being here. Let's start real general, real broad. Can you tell me a little bit about your background? Where were you were born? Growing up, just general information like that. Ecke: I was born here in San Diego, born raised in Encinitas hold, <cough> pardon me. I grew up in the same house that my father grew up in. I went to the same elementary school and high school that my father went to. So I was friends with the children of the, some of the people that my father went to high school with. So pretty entrenched in Encinitas, California. I did move away for college and work for about 13 years, but other than that, I pretty much lived in Encinitas my entire life. Peirce: That's awesome. And you said that you went to the same the same school, you lived in the same house and your family was pretty established at that point within the community. Was it difficult growing up with the kind of expectations, of being in your family like that? Ecke: There may have been individual instances, but no, not really. I mean, Encinitas was still a pretty small town when, I was growing up. I mean, Interstate 5 didn't even go through till I was about 11 years old. Most people were in flower farming like our family was. And, so I mean, people probably knew my name without knowing me, but, and that probably ended up mostly being good. But, so no, I mean I would say later on there have been challenging times when we, as a family have wanted to do things and we've gotten a lot of bad press. I mean, I know that my mother and grandmother, had a harder time than I ever remember having. Peirce: Absolutely. Ecke: Dealing with, harder in the sense of, people being rude to them or mean, or those kinds of things. But I can't say that I remember much of any of that. Peirce: Was there specific reasons for that treatment that they received? Do you remember them saying anything about that? Ecke: About, well, I know that there was a newspaper in town called The Coast Dispatch, that the man who owned it really, he didn't like our family. And I mean, I've heard various stories about why he didn't, the one that seems to have made the most sense to me, but I don't really know whether it's the real reason or not is because he owned a lot of, real estate right in Downtown Encinitas. And when they were putting through I-5, the original plan was to just run it along, down the coast highway. And, as it ended up being in some other, places farther north of here, and my grandfather was one of the people who fought pretty hard to say, let's not destroy all of the downtowns of all of these, you know, Carlsbad and Solana Beach and Del Mar and Encinitas. Let's put it inland a little ways and keep our downtowns. And my grandfather was on the winning side of that. I mean, it wasn't because my grandfather or grandparents owned any land, particularly in the right of way of where I-5 ended up. They just, he just thought it was made more sense. So he fought for that and again, was on the winning side. And so the guy who owned The Coast Dispatch was pissed off because he was expecting to make all this money from selling all of his right of way in Downtown Encinitas. There may have been other reasons that maybe that, you know, he was a powerful man in town. My grandfather was a powerful man in town Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 1 2022-09-27 �LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 and they maybe just didn't like each other, I don't know. But, you know, I know that my grandmother, was treated poorly at times, by people that, you know, she was somebody who really cared about and, tried to be helpful. And, you know, people that during the depression that needed food, bringing food to the school and doing things like that, and there was any number of people that didn't want her help because she was an Ecke and that was painful for her. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. I can imagine like that's a wild thing to think about. Did you, speaking of your mother and your grandmother, what inspiration, if any, did you take from [th]em, in your personal life going forward as a professional woman, as someone who growing up in this family, did you take any lessons from them? And, and if so, how did you kind of, feel it, that you represented the family in that way? Ecke: Well, you know, my grandmother got married at 19 and had her first kid at 20, so she didn't ever, she didn't have anything more than a high school education. My mother did go to San Diego State and, did have a degree. But both of them, along with, my father, maybe a little less, my grandfather was very big <unintelligible> [into] giving back. And it was always something that my parents talked about, but they also, they didn't just talk about it. They did it. And they, my grandmother was very involved with the Solana Beach Presbyterian Church and did a lot out of help through that, there was an orphanage down in Tijuana that she was, very supportive of. And I remember her when I was a child, her loading up her car and barreling on down to Tijuana to bring them whatever it was that she had in her car that week or month or whatever it was. My mother was very, was involved in lot of things. She was always on the PTA. We were all in 4H growing up and she was a 4H leader. She volunteered for children's hospital. She later on when us kids weren't at home or were, you know, didn't need as much attention all the time she was involved with Planned Parenthood, she was a huge Planned Parenthood supporter. She, I'm trying to think of the other, Neurosciences Institute. I think it was called G <unintelligible> I can't remember the name of it, but she was constantly involved with lots of different organizations, voices for children. She was very involved with San Diego State, which is where she went to school with the library at San Diego State. So I think that what I took away from that was that, it's important to give back and everybody can give back, but if you are somebody of, means and, are known within your community, it's even more important to, to give back that that's a commitment, an obligation really. And, I heard about it growing up and I saw it growing up. And so that's probably what I took from it more than, I mean, took from them more than anything was that they didn't just talk the talk, they walked the walk. Peirce: Yeah. I was about to, I was about to ask you about the, whether that was something that was, verbally taught to you. Like, if it was like, “Hey, this is what we do,” or you just kind of learn from example in regards to that, but you kind of, you kind of answered that. Ecke: Yeah. Peirce: Most of the press that I was able to read, mostly focuses on the men, in your family. Was that frustrating for, <unintelligible> you can go ahead and answer if you got something. Ecke: Well, I mean, I don't know that I think that it's, pretty standard for a, certainly for my grandparent’s generation and for my parent’s generation. That’s what you did, even if a, a wife or whatever was very involved in a business, you generally look to the husband for, you know, and they Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 2 2022-09-27 �LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 were the person that got all the glory and that's just the way our society has been set up. In this generation my brother probably has had more publicity than I have just because he is the one that owned the Poinsettia Business. And so that naturally, I mean, he got a lot of press just from own owning the Poinsettia Business. He's also probably much more, comfortable in front of the camera because he's been doing it for so long. So, when we are both in a situation and somebody wants one of us to speak, I will defer to him.So, so that to some degree would be my fault, for not taking the spotlight when I could all the time. But yes, I mean, I think that just as a woman in society, it is sometimes frustrating, to have grown up and seen all the work that my grandmother and my mother did for the family business. And when you talk about the family business, you don't really hear much about them. I mean, some of that's getting righted a little bit, now, but it's certainly they didn't ever get any, any <unintelligible> whatever they, nobody called them out as doing great things when they were doing them. Peirce: Absolutely, absolutely. Which is, which is a shame, honestly. <Unintelligible> I guess kind of where I want to go with that though, you brought up some of the functions that your grandmother and your mother and that you have supported. Right? How do you decide what to support? Is there any-- is it really up to you? What you support? Do you speak to people in the family just to make sure that the family name is doing kind of-- is there like any collaboration or is it, whatever you decide to kind of support at that time? Ecke: No, I think that, I mean, I, I haven't ever felt like if there was something that I wanted to support that anybody had any issue with it. I mean, maybe just being part of the family, there is a sense of, I suppose if I ever thought that there was something I wanted to get involved with that might create a problem, I would probably have a conversation. My brother and sister and I are pretty close and have good relationships. So, I wouldn't expect that any of us would get involved with something that we thought how had an edge to it without first, at least, telling others. But you know, what I've been involved with has changed over the years when my kids were school age, I was very involved with their schools. I have, you know, I'm involved with, YMCA a that's named after my grandmother. I was involved with it a number of years ago. And there, if you read anything about me, it's probably how I got myself kicked off of the board, but, <laugh> the man that was running the, San Diego, the corporate Y for San Diego, he, didn't renew his contract and now there's somebody new. So then, so now I'm back on the board. <laugh>, I'm all, I mean, I also am very supportive of Planned Parenthood, not to the degree my mother was, my mother was on the board. That might be something I'd be willing to do down the road. So I think that, that what I'm involved with evolves as whatever else is happening in my life or around me. Peirce: Absolutely. And then that makes sense, right? Like, you know, you're not, it's not like you give, give a dollar one day and then you're just, you're guaranteed to give it the rest of your time. Right. It really kind of focuses as your, as your life moves from place to place <affirmative> and from stage to stage, you know, as I, you know, I'm a new dad, I never would've thought about all the things I do with my kid and donating and doing stuff for that kind of stuff that prior to having him right. Every stage, it kind of takes you to a different… Ecke: Well, this isn't, it isn't in your field of vision. Peirce: Absolutely. And that's understandable. Right. We only can see here to here. Right. We can't see the full picture unless you're in it sometimes. Do you mind if I pivot to, to the Poinsettias? I just have a few questions on that. Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 3 2022-09-27 �LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 Ecke: Absolutely. Peirce: I never grew up in a family that had like any sort of a business or anything like that. My parents were teachers. But were you interested in horticulture at all? Were you interested in flower, like any sort of growing flowers? Ecke: Well, yeah. I mean, the house that I grew up in it was right in the middle of the Poinsettia [fields]. Peirce: Absolutely. Ecke: So it was, you know, and I had done a lot of work for, I worked in the tissue culture lab at the ranch. I worked in the greenhouses many summers. I, we, all three of us grew up there was never a family vacation that we took that we didn't go visit greenhouse customers where ever it was in the world. And, when I had studied overseas in Mexico and in Germany, I've gone and visited flower customers on my own. So I was involved with it. But I also knew that wasn't gonna be the career I was going to choose. I mean, and not that anybody said I couldn't, but, you know, my grandfather's name was Paul Ecke Sr. My father was Paul Ecke Jr. and my brother's Pauly III and my name isn't Paul <laugh>. So, and that being said, my sister and I were had ownership interest in the ranch as much as my brother did, but we also made a determination, I don't know, 30 years ago or more that, the ranch really needs to have a singular head of it, it was not a businesses that was gonna get managed very well with a, you know, three people trying to do it. So we sold our interest to my brother and that made sense. I was on the board of directors for the ranch, so I was still involved. And my brother and I, I mean, any time my brother had big decisions to make, he would talk to me. So I may have not had my name on the company, but I did feel very involved with it. And you know there's a Los Angeles flower market where we would sell poinsettias every year. And I did that as did my brother and my sister and now I'm chairman of the board of that flower market. And so I had been involved in the flower business pretty much all my life, one way or another, I wasn't the face of the Poinsettia Ranch. Peirce: But you enjoyed working with the flowers you enjoyed working with your hands? Ecke: Oh yeah, no, absolutely. You know, and now we, as a family have the flower fields in Carlsbad. So I'm still, involved with, well, not growing the flowers, but involved with the floral culture business, and being on the board of the American Forest Exchange. I am attuned to what’s going on within that part of the sector of the world and I like it and I always have. Peirce: Awesome, awesome. I can’t even keep plants alive in my own house, so that just having an entire farm stresses me out just the thought of it. Ecke: <laugh> Oh, well, I've never run a farm. So that, that… Peirce: Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. <laugh> Ecke: I do, I did have a minor in horticulture in undergraduate school, but that was, as far as I went with that. Peirce: What was your major, if you don't mind me asking? Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 4 2022-09-27 �LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 Ecke: It was business. Peirce: Business. Ecke: And then I got an MBA in real estate and finance, so-Peirce: Absolutely. You've mentioned multiple arenas where you are on the board of directors or even the chairman of the board and stuff like that. Have you as a woman faced any pushback, any friction from people when you take these kind of leadership positions? Ecke: Well, most of the things that I've been on, I would say, well, no, I mean, when I was first, went on to the, American Forest Exchange Board, I was the first, I wasn't the very first woman that had ever been on the board, but I was the first woman to be on the board for quite some time. And I would, I will say that it was probably for the other men then that were on the board. My father had just recently passed away and he had been chairman of the board. And then I, took over, I took his seat on the board. So I think that, and I was much younger than the majority of the men on the board that isn't necessarily the case now, but it was then, which is almost 20 years ago now. I think that they initially had, they didn't have an issue with me being on the board, but I think that they were kind of surprised that I had an opinion or, that I took issue with some of the things that they, wanted to do. Or so I wouldn't see, say that I ever felt like they were trying to figure out a way to get me off the board, but I do think that there were some times when they were frustrated that I wasn't just playing along with whatever they wanted to do. Other boards that I'm on the YMCA board there's been women on that board long before I was ever on it. And, so I never felt anything there. We have a family foundation board, that my aunt has been on for as long as I can remember. And, and I've been on it for 40 years. So really no, I mean where I had a lot of pushback when I was first came back and worked for the family, I was doing a lot of leasing and tenant improvement work and construction management. And this was back in the eighties, late eighties. And there were a lot of construction guys that really were not very excited about taking orders from, you know, a short woman or probably a woman in general, but then this little, tiny person with a high squeaky voice, I can't <unintelligible> anybody absolutely wouldn't do what I asked them to do. It may have just taken me be more forceful than I needed to be. Peirce: Absolutely. Ecke: To do that. But you know, my father was to his credit. He really promoted, my sister and myself to do whatever we wanted to, to do. And, when I, I remember one time when I was probably 15 working up in Los Angeles at the flower market over Christmas, [be]cause that's the only time we would've been up there with the poinsettias. And my father put me a in charge of the phone orders. And so I remember, some big customer called and asked for my father and my father said, no, I don't have time, you just deal with them. And I went back and the conversation kind of went on. And then he finally said, I want to speak with a real Ecke. And so, I then went out, I mean, [be]cause again I'm 14 or 15 years old and I go back out and I said, dad, he says, he'll only place this order with a real Ecke. And my father said, you go back in there and said, tell him if he wants to buy poinsettias he is going to buy them from you. And he's gonna give the order to you. And you are just as real of an Ecke as anybody else. And so I went back in there and told the guy and he was none too happy, but he did give me the order. So my father did things like that really, he may not have believed that when he was 20 years old. But I think that my mother did a very good job of convincing him and teaching him that he should be paying attention to his Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 5 2022-09-27 �LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 daughters as much as his son. And he did credit her with that. He would be the first one to say that he had a good relationship with his daughters because my mother taught him how to do that. Peirce: That's amazing. That's really awesome. Especially that, that kind of support, that young, how, how, early did you become, involved in the, in the family business? Like from as long as you can remember, or…? Ecke: Oh, I, well, I mean actually working, getting a paycheck was, you know, probably fifteen dollars. But even before that, when we were little again, our house was right there, the middle of the ranch and we'd go out and my father would put me to work, you know, folding, putting together pieces of different pieces of paper and stapling them and folding them to go in boxes of poinsettias that were being shipped out mostly as a way to keep me busy and out of other people's way. But I mean, I was probably doing that from the time I was seven or eight years old, or he would pay us, like a penny to pick up trash, to walk around the whole ranch and pick up trash and he would pay us, I dunno, 10 cents an hour or something ridiculous to do that. But, so always my parents were big believers in working and knowing the value of money. And my mother had grown up in a fairly poor family. Her family had moved out to California when she was 15 and lived in, government subsidized housing where UCSD [University of California San Diego] is now, they’d moved because my grandmother, I knew that she had, she knew, wanted her children to go to college and California back then had, still does have, a good college system, but it was virtually free. And, you know, my mother had two brothers and a sister and, you know, she went to San Diego State. She had one brother that became a doctor and another brother that became a veterinarian. And they all benefited from the school systems in, in San Diego, but that's why they moved. And my mother worked a lot from whenever. I mean, from the time she could remember, so she went, they lived through being homeless during the depression and other things. So my mother brought that to the table for us in the sense of understanding that you can't be wasteful, you need to think about, you know, how you spend your money. And my parents were on the same page with all of that you know, just because you have money doesn't mean that you need to flaunt it or that you have to spend it all just because you have it. And it, you know, there's other people that might need it more than you do, and it's your responsibility to help out with that. So I feel like I got, fairly grounded in the understanding of that. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. You, you've spoken a couple times about, growing up directly on, on the ranch <affirmative> and when you were a kid, I'm assuming that, Encinitas was a little bit more rural than it is now, not rural, but just less developed. Ecke: Yeah. Peirce: How has it been watching it grow over the years? Do you miss old Encinitas somewhat? Do you, you wish that things were a little bit different? Do you, do you just enjoy seeing time and things progress? Like what, what is your viewpoint on that? Ecke: Well, yeah, I mean, if, if Encinitas could be the Encinitas that I grew up in, I thought that that was fabulous. If I was really living in that would, I think is, is as fabulous, you know, you get nostalgic about things. But I could, when I was growing up and I had my horse, I could ride my horse down Encinitas Blvd. all the way to the beach and ride my horse on the beach with my other friends who had horses. And, it was you… <unintelligible> So, I mean, there's things like that, that I'm nostalgic for. But places change. I mean, you can't expect things to not change. And, for the most part, I think that the way Encinitas has changed is pretty good given, you know, the options. I mean, there wasn't, there isn't a Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 6 2022-09-27 �LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 way that Encinitas was gonna stay the way that it was, but it was a lovely place to grow up. I mean, I, again, I knew there was like two elementary schools and, you know, one high school. And when I went, graduated from high school, there was only one high school from Del Mar to through Encinitas. So we, all went to San Dieguito together. My high school graduating class in 1975 was the last year that we were together, [be]cause then Torrey Pines was built and they opened up Torrey Pines [High School]. So, I mean it was, it was a very close-knit community. And it was, you know, nice to know you go into a grocery store, the drug store and you know, it's, somebody's father that's there or, you know, <affirmative> and that, that was a nice thing. And I, and I do miss that, but I suppose if that was super important to me, I could go find some other very small community that I could have that. Peirce: No, absolutely. I, I mean, I grew up in, I grew up in Riverside and in the, the eighties and nineties and I still remember driving to, to school and, running into, into, shepherds herding sheep across the road. And now every single part of that is, is track housing that they built that are, you know, the cookie cutter houses and, you know, you can get nostalgic for it, but I, I can completely understand like you, you do what you do, what, what you can with what it is. People need to live. People need houses and people need to, things grow and things change, but it was just interesting to, you know, you you've been living in that, you lived in that same house as your, as your, as your father and everything. And it's just like, you know, having it grow around that is, is a interesting perspective for sure. Ecke: Definitely, it definitely is. I mean, it's, it's weird because now I live in that, well, we've redone the house, but I live in what was my grandparents’ house that my grandparents built when my parents got married, they built a house and moved into the house. And then my parents moved into the house that my father grew up in. So I now live in the location, not the house anymore because we did rebuild it about 15 years ago, but to where my grandparents lived and, and it was a very different place then, because when I was growing up from my grandparents’ house, they were half a mile off of any public road in fact when I moved into this house 30 years ago, we were still Leucadia Boulevard, didn't go through. And so I was a half a mile off of any paved road. And, there the view, they had a view to the west, which we still have and a view to the east and there was nothing to the east, nothing at all. I mean, there was one light that you could see out there. And I remember that when I was a kid and now that's all houses. And just, you know, my father, this is totally a, a side note, but my father was also very involved with Cal[ifornia] State [University] San Marcos and getting it started and was very enthusiastic about it, which is, part of the reason that, my brother and I decided that that's what the family papers should, should go. It was, it kind of made sense because we had that connection. Peirce: Absolutely, absolutely. We, we appreciate it. Not that I'm, I have a particular hand in it, but at the same time I, you know, as a, as a budding historian, I do appreciate <affirmative> people putting their things in the, in archives. Is it, I'm trying to figure out how I can word this… right. When you, when you've spoken about like how your grandfather advocated for the, the, the I-5 going where it, it goes and, and your father was, was, a, a large part of, of the, the beginnings of Cal State San Marcos, right? Is it, do you ever sit and think like, oh wow. Like my family has really impacted this, this area in, in many ways, like, you'd sit, be like, wow, like this is here in part because of the way that my family has kind of shaped the area. Do you ever think about that and how it like, is that an interesting thought to you or is that never occurred? Ecke: Yeah, it, no, it is. And I mean, it's something generally. I mean, I would say it's a sense of pride to know that, that the, our, we didn't, we as a family, didn't just come here and do what we did without Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 7 2022-09-27 �LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 wanting to better our community and be involved in our community. I mean, I know that my parents and grandparents, when Encinitas was super tiny when they were here, they, there wasn't anything for anybody to do after work. I mean, there just wasn't anything here. So they figure out how to build a bowling alley in, in Downtown Encinitas. So people had a place to go versus I guess, just going to a bar or something. I mean that there was someplace something else to do. And, those kinds of things, I mean, there's nothing that there's no rules or laws or anything that says that you have to do that, but if you're gonna be part of a community, it's nice to know that your family helped build that community. So it, yeah, it is something that I think about, at times when, you know, there's, and there's enough things named after our family, there's a park in Encinitas. And then there's the YMCA and there's various other things that, remind me and maybe the community of what we've done. I would say that it is very different now than it was even 20 years ago. I mean, 20 years ago, I could, if I said my name was Ecke, pretty much anybody in Encinitas would've heard the name, they would, I mean, they might not know anything, but they would've heard the name. And, that isn't necessarily the case now, and that's not a bad thing, but it is, we are a much, larger and diverse community now. So, our family doesn't play the same kind of role as it used to. I mean, we still are very supportive of the community and we have a family foundation and most of the money, it's not a huge found[ation], but most of the money that comes out of that does get invested in, local charities, things like the YMCA or the community resource center or things like that. So we still are very involved, but again, because the community has grown so much, we're just not as big a, a part of it, which that's a good thing, [be]cause there's a lot more people out there that are also being supportive of things that need to be supported. Peirce: Absolutely. Given, your longstanding, presence in the community, as people have come in, have you. worked with other people who have tried to make a difference in the community? Have you tried to foster those kinds of, any sort of other, like, charitable services or anything like that? Has anyone come to you and been like, how do I start this? How do I do this and kinda look to you and have, have you mentored anyone in that regard? Ecke: No, I don't think that I could say that I've done that. And I don't think that I would certainly know how to tell anybody to start something. I mean, I've been involved with any number of things, like the Community Resource Center and the YMCA and grower school and any number of things. And so I've met a lot of other people within the community and I mean, the people that tend to volunteer and give money is just like almost anything in life. You've got, you know, 20% of the people doing 80% of the work or giving or whatever. I mean, it is, you see the same people over and over again. Peirce: Absolutely. What else do you, where do you see your role in the family moving forward? Where do you see your family moving forward in the community, given that you've said that it, as the community has grown, you've kind of, do you still see your family as a vital part of the community you have going forward? Ecke: No, definitely. My brother lives in Encinitas. I live in Encinitas, you know, we both raised our families in Encinitas. My sister lives in North Carolina, and we both still work in the family business. And I don't see that really changing at some point in the future. Some of the kids, my kids, my brother’s kids, my sister’s kids may wanna come back and be part of the family business. At some points somebody's gonna have to take over things from our, my generation of, people, but pretty much all of those in their twenties. So they're still figuring out what to do with their lives. But, I mean, my father was involved with in the community and pretty much until the day he died and my mother until her Alzheimer's got too bad, was involved with the community. So I never saw my parents just say, okay, I'm done now. And I'm gonna, you know, go just have fun all day every day and not be involved with my community. So, and Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 8 2022-09-27 �LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 my husband grew up in a similar type of in environment. So I don't see us just, you know, retiring and doing, not being involved. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. What would you say has been, your proudest accomplishment? Whether it's in North County or just in general, what, what are you most proud of and in your career, in your life in general? Ecke: Well, I mean the most obvious answer would be my children. I mean, I've raised two children that are self-sufficient and, you know, both graduated from college. My son's getting his PhD now and, you know, they're supporting themselves and that in of itself is an accomplishment as a parent. I don't, I don't know that… There is a given thing that I could say that I would point to. I know I'm happy that I have been able to be part of the family business in a relevant way. It was something that was very important to my mother because she didn't always feel seen. And so she fought very hard for my sister and myself to be seen and to be heard. And I think it was, something that she was very proud of when, she had daughters that were involved and had a say in what was happening. And so I feel accomplished that I fulfilled something that was important to my mother. Peirce: Absolutely. Ecke: But I don't know that there's a specific, or that I can think of a specific thing that I've fought for and won on or something. Peirce: I mean it is a difficult question unless you clambered up Everest or something, it's like, well, you know, like I was just curious if there was anything specifically, you're like, oh yeah. You know, like, I won the World Cup or something, but you know what I mean? Ecke: No, none of those things. Peirce: Same here, so it's, yeah. I had one question I did have about the papers that you donated. Was it important for you and your family to have someplace, public for repository of that nature? Or what was, what was the reasoning behind that and why was that important to you guys? Ecke: Well, my mother was a big history buff. That probably was part of it, but-- It just, there was a hundred years of history of our family. Because you know, my grandfather, my grandparents first came down here in the early 1920s, and bought land. And Encinitas was basically a railroad station at that time. And was really one of the founding families. And there was, lots of records because we lived on the ranch, and we had all these various barns and buildings. I don't think much of anything ever got thrown away because you didn't have to throw it away. So there are, you know, receipt books and things from back in 1926, you know, and, I will say that my brother did a yeoman's job when, after he had sold the ranch property and sold the business, he spent a year going through all of those records and consolidating and organizing, a hundred year’s worth of stuff. And that was a huge job. And during that time we talked about, well, okay. I mean, it didn't seem right to just throw it away. I mean, but what do you do with it? I mean, that is really the question of what are the choices. So, we talked to various people there and I should remember his name, somebody who is a history professor there at Cal State San Marcos that was also on the board of the, historical society here in Encinitas. And we met with him, and I think it may have been his suggestion that we go and talk to the librarian out there. The other thing that we thought about was, San Diego State, because we had a connection there with my mother, Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 9 2022-09-27 �LIZBETH ECKE TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2022-04-13 my father went to Ohio state, so that wasn't gonna make sense. I mean, but, you know, Cal State San Marco was here and in North County and we had a connection with it. And so that seemed to make the most sense because it just didn't feel right to just go rent a warehouse and put it in there who was ever gonna do anything with it. And, you know, I think that there is a wealth of knowledge in history, even if it's just mundane things that, you know, receipt books from back in 1926, and you can see what a bag of flower cost or whatever. I mean, you're a historian. And then those are the kinds of things that people can look back on and get real information about what life was like. And you know Cal State San Marcos was the one that was really venturing into new territory because they didn't have any, we were kind of the first one. We were all kinda learning together as to what this meant. I mean, we didn't, I mean, we knew that families gave papers to various learning institutions. I didn't ever know anybody personally who had, or, you know, what, like that really meant. So it's been a cool learning experience. Peirce: Oh, absolutely. As, like the idea of you were saying, like, we didn't know what to do with it. I was just like, in my head, I'm like, please don't throw it away, even though I know you didn't, like, I was just like, don't do it. <laugh> Well, as we wrap up here, is there anything about you, your life, your family, that you feel like I, we haven't touched on that you kind of wanna talk about today? Ecke: I don't know. There probably is, but nothing that is, jumping, to mind right now. Yeah, I mean, it’s been a fun ride. I don't think it's over. I feel very privileged to have been part of, or to be part of this family. it's nice to have history and grounding within a community. Again, my husband's family’s from New Orleans and he's like third generation on one side and five generations on the other side. So, he has a similar feeling and it's, there is something very grounding about being a part of someplace. And I feel very privileged to be part of Encinitas, [be]cause I do feel like I have a lot of invested in it and I guess has a lot invested in me and that's, that's been nice. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. I don't, I don't think we could end know a better note than that. Lizbeth Ecke, thank you so much for your time. Thank you so much for giving us your perspective about your family and giving it to this project. My name is Jake Peirce and we are signing off now. Ecke: Great. Thank you. Transcribed by Sierra Jenkins 10 2022-09-27 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Ecke, Lizbeth. Interview transcript. April 13, 2022. Description An account of the resource Narrator Lizbeth Ecke is the daughter of San Diego horticulturist Paul Ecke Jr., who contributed to the popularity of the poinsettia plant. Lizbeth Ecke also is on the board for the YMCA and the American Forest Exchange. In this interview, Lizbeth discusses her childhood growing up in Encinitas, CA and working alongside her father in the flower business, and her experience as a women working in a male dominated industry in comparison to her father and brother. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Lizbeth Ecke Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Jacob Peirce Sierra Jenkins Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2022-04-13 Subject The topic of the resource Businesswomen Floriculture Interstate 5 -- California Poinsettias Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Encinitas (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Special Collections Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en</a> Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Lizbeth Ecke License A legal document giving official permission to do something with the resource. Property rights reside with the university. Copyrights are retained by the creators of the records and their heirs. This resource is licensed for noncommercial educational use using CC NC-BY 4.0. Please contact Special Collections at archives@csusm.edu if you have questions regarding usage of this oral history. Please see the related “Preferred Citation note” for language on citing materials from this collection. 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In assuming full responsibility for use of the material, the researcher also understands that the materials they examine may contain Social Security numbers, other personal identifiers, and/or sensitive material on potentially living and identifiable individuals (e.g., medical, evaluative, or personally invasive information). The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC027-12 Community history History Department internship Women's experience Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral Histories Description An account of the resource Video and audio oral histories can be viewed here. Histories are listed alphabetically by last name. Individual histories are indexed and transcribed and can be searched. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <p>Rights to oral histories vary depending on the history. The library owns the copyright to some histories, and has license to reproduce for nonprofit purposes for others. Please contact CSUSM University Library Special Collections at <a href="mailto:%20archives@csusm.edu">archives@csusm.edu</a> with any questions about use.</p> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Jacob Peirce Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Alexa Clausen OHMS Object This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS Viewer) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=ClausenAlexa_PeirceJake_2022-04-12.xml OHMS Object Text This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka 5.4 2022-04-12 Oral history of Alexa Clausen, April 12, 2022 SC027-15 00:51:35 SC027 California State University San Marcos University Library Special Collections Oral History Collection CSUSM This oral history was made possible with the generous funding of the Ellie Johns Scholarship Fund at Rancho Santa Fe Foundation and the Library Guild of Rancho Santa Fe. Adobe houses Historic buildings -- Conservation and restoration. San Diego County (Calif.) Alexa Clausen Jacob Pierce mp3 ClausenAlexa_PeirceJake_2022-04-12.mp3 1:|15(8)|25(3)|36(2)|45(11)|62(1)|84(8)|93(8)|110(2)|126(10)|136(8)|154(6)|164(1)|173(10)|187(6)|201(9)|211(5)|219(1)|235(8)|244(2)|261(1)|273(1)|284(11)|296(6)|308(13)|317(11)|342(5)|351(7)|364(3)|378(6)|388(12)|397(3)|411(1)|423(14)|432(10)|441(7)|457(4)|465(3)|480(11)|488(9)|498(10)|506(8)|520(12)|536(3)|550(4)|559(3)|569(5)|582(5)|597(17) 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/45c2cfd31ca6068f7c1bbef6263d29e6.mp3 Other audio English 17 Background / Starting Adobe Home Tours Alexa Clausen: Well, thank you. And I'm happy to be here since we only have an hour, I'll try to do the mini version. &lt ; affirmative&gt ; I grew up in Riverside, California. I got my advanced degrees in San Diego, so University of San Diego undergraduate, and then master's degree at San Diego State. At the same time that I was studying, my master's degree took me seven years because I was working full-time for California State Parks. So, I have a career with state parks and essentially doing local regional statewide and contextual related history for projects with state parks. So, when I retired in 2008, we had moved to Escondido in 1993, I think. And I had some friends in the history business, Lucy Burke, who was very active in historic preservation, always nagging me: When are you going to retire? You know, join us and, and all this stuff. So finally, when I did retire, I had our son – I had him late in in life – so he was still in elementary school, high school. So, I wasn't too involved, but I did have the sense that I want to give back to the community of history because when I was working professionally without internet and all this, I was visiting people who were saving history in boxes under their beds. You know, there was some places didn't have historical societies ; it was just mom and pop trying to save history. So, you know, I felt like I wanted to give back, and so I started volunteering and then, when my son was at St Mary's in elementary school, there's another student. His name was Sean McCoy. Well, his father, they had a little birthday party. I think they were in fifth grade, so this might go back to maybe 2004 or 2005, and he lived in Valley Center. The house was adobe, and I was really curious, but in their study there were all these houses on craftsman architecture. I looked at Tom, who's just a really gregarious, hardy guy that runs a landscaping business. He's Cal[ifornia] Poly[technic] [State] [University] educated and in landscaping. And I'm like, no, it's not. It must be his wife. &lt ; laugh&gt ; So eventually at the swim party, the kids were busy and I said, “Hey, you know, Tom who's collection of books here, you're doing craftsmen?” Well, that unleashed Tom, and he found a soulmate in the interest. And as a few years went on, he always said there, “We have to do something. I go to Pasadena to the home tours and they're all rooted in Green and Green Architecture, which was known for the craftsmen, but we have our own, you know, handcrafted Adobes here.” And I'm like, “[O]kay, Tom, let's do a tour.” And he claims that, you know, I kept pushing him to, oh, won't this be fun? And so the two of us kind of started Adobe Home Tour, but we were fortunate that the director Wendy Barker at the historical society wanted to go ahead and take our little idea under her wing. They had been doing garden tours, so they were familiar with parking and talking to homeowners, so we really had a jump there and we were lucky. And of course with the insurance that the Escondido History Center was all behind us. And our very first brochure was a front-to-back 8.5”x11” piece of paper off a copier, and that's kind of where it started. Peirce: Well, you have to start somewhere, right? Clausen: Yeah. It's funny, and of course I was thinking, “[O]h, he'll get over it.” You know, this is one year we had maybe 60 people come and it was word of mouth, mainly his friends and the historical society, people and friends of the homeowners, so it was really grassroots or mom and pop, whatever you want to call it. And our last tour we sold out at 500 tickets. Peirce: Wow. Clausen: Yeah. So that was the route. I came here through my training, I don't own an adobe home and it was really a feeling to give back to history essentially. Alexa Clausen talks about her education and career and how that has led to her interest in adobe homes. Furthermore, Alexa Clausen talks about how her background as a historian for the California State Parks led to her interest in leading adobe home tours. Clausen also talks about different home tours in Southern California which influenced her to start Adobe Home Tours. California State Parks ; career ; San Diego State ; University of San Diego ; volunteering Adobe Home Tours ; California State Parks historian ; Education ; Interest in adobe homes ; Working while getting an education 33.9806° N, 117.3755° W 17 Riverside County 336 Previous career with the California State Parks / Contributions to Adobe Home Tours Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. Going back to your previous stops in your career with the California State Parks, was this something that was kind of in the same realm of what you were doing? Looking at architecture and looking at stuff like that and giving tours, or did you do something different while you were there? Clausen: You know, it really wasn't. The historic preservation and the architecture was handled mainly by specialists, and a lot of that was rooted in the state office of historic preservation, which was like a cousin branch of State Parks and the very highly trained historians specializing in architecture. So, I was really weak and had to do a catch up self-trained. All of my projects were budget driven. For example, if they, maybe the volunteers of the Rangers wanted to do a new booklet for a visitor center and it had a historical element in it, they would budget for hours for that. Or if there's a general plan, they needed a historian to do the cultural. So a lot of my jobs were just skipping around and providing research and history for whatever was budgeted and needed. And generally, if there was like an architectural survey, they were contracted out by specialist, or the state office would contract. So, during my career, for example, they did a thematic statewide survey of the Civilian Conservation Corps buildings that were still in state parks. Now they took their cue from the feds who were doing a survey in national parks and in the forest service, but again, that was handled by specialists. So, you know, while we would exchange, read material, go to the same conferences, it is a specialty that I'm probably not the best at, but I do provide that research for Adobe Home Tour. So, it was a different kind of specialty, yeah. Peirce: Absolutely. It sounds more like you were – in your role with the state parks – you were more of a jack of all trades rather than a master of specifically architecture in that field. Clausen: Oh, absolutely, and in time they umbrellaed all that under cultural resources management and it was the archeologist and the historians and sometimes the landscape architects depending on the project. Peirce: Absolutely. Given that Tom seemed to be your partner in crime in the beginning of this adventure, –and he seemed to have more of the specific knowledge when it came to the adobe tours, based on what you're saying – what would you say that was your biggest contribution to the beginning of it? Was it the organization? Was it your specific knowledge of how to provide background information? What would you say was your biggest contribution in the beginning? Clausen: Well, actually, I think Tom felt like I was just the cheerleader. &lt ; laugh&gt ; But, you know, I think it helped Tom have the confidence. With his career running a landscape business, he wasn't as free to do some things, and I think he always saw me as a little bit of the conduit to the history community. He's second generation – grew up in Escondido through his business and his family – they know every nook and cranny in the city, but Tom I think felt like I was the person that can talk to the historical society and get that connection. And then when it came to maybe talking to some families about the history of their homes – although Wendy did a lot of it in the beginning – in time, I took over all of that as eventually she took another job, but, you know, they had the historical society to run. I think Tom just really needed someone who talked a little more of the language to keep connected with the historical society and the history side of it. That's my take, if you ever tape Tom, maybe he'll have a different, &lt ; laugh&gt ; a different take on it. Alexa Clausen gives an overview of her career with the California State Parks and working in historic preservation and architecture. She also talks about her contributions to starting the Adobe Home Tours with Tom. architecture ; Civilian Conservation Corps ; Escondido ; historic preservation ; historical society California State Parks ; Civilian Conservation Corps ; Historic preservation in the California State Parks 33.1192° N, 117.0864° W 17 Escondido, California 619 Getting involved / Why adobe homes? Peirce: &lt ; laugh&gt ; No, that's absolutely fair. That takes me into something else I kind of wanted to explore with you if don't mind. I'm very interested in how you and Wendy and Tom and everybody else who was involved – especially in the beginning – how you managed to convince people to take part in this project. Because like you said, a lot of these people, these aren't just like “Oh, I own this random home that is just sitting out here for display.” This is where people live and work and raise their families. How did you manage to convince people to take part in what you were trying to achieve? Especially in the beginning. Clausen: You know, I haven't thought about it. Some of it was Tom's personal contacts and he knows people who know people and he knocked on doors, and then Wendy at the historical society, they also knew people who had adobe homes and was literally making lists, like, “Should we call this one? Should we call that one?” but I have to wonder now that you brought it up if the timing was right. Garden tours were becoming very popular at the time. They were fundraisers for not just historical societies, but you know, maybe natural garden clubs. I think garden clubs maybe had a longer history of that, but history house tours were becoming popular at the time. I think a lot of that starts going backwards to the US bicentennial, where historic preservation was taking off, and I have to wonder if people who buy adobe homes sort of needed a validation. Recently he had a potluck, and I ran into a lady who said, “My friends tell me you're crazy to have bought this home. You know, why would you live in this mud home?” &lt ; laugh&gt ; so maybe there's just a little twinkle of wanting the validation. You know, I'm really taking a guess at this ; I hadn't really thought about it. But I do think people had the confidence –the historical society had been doing an annual home tour and then the old neighborhood in downtown Escondido, they started doing a Mother's Day home tour – so the idea of a home tour maybe wasn't as foreign had we been maybe one of the first to ever do this in Escondido. I think those two projects really made people aware and it wasn't just so scary that other people were opening their houses. In the old neighborhood after COVID, it'll be the first time in a few years, and they will do another Mother's Day home tour, and I think they're on their like 25th anniversary. And the historical society, they partnered with that, so they had the experience also and word of mouth that this isn't kind of some creepy people knocking on the door saying, “Whoa, you know, what you can do is clean up your house and let people in.” So, I really didn't think about it and it's not scientific by any manner, but I think there is an opening and I find that Adobe Home Tours love the validation. They love to know that other people, once they've seen their house, they get it. They really think it's something special. That's just my take on it. Peirce: Absolutely. I mean, that makes complete sense. One question I did have as well: was there any sort of impetus? Was this just organic? You just happened to bring this up and it just kind of grew up? Or was there any sort of given that some people want that validation, right? A lot of people may not want to live in this kind of home. Was there any sort of preservation or were these houses being torn down or was there any sort of event like that that was kind of like, “Man, maybe we should foster some sort of appreciation within the region to make sure that we keep this history alive a little bit.”? Clausen: You know, I think that became one of our causes or mantras or whatever is as we backed into this – like just a couple of mom and pop &lt ; laugh&gt ; people with no experience but some dumb luck and some decent connections – is that as these homes aged, and of course, in the history of a lot of the homes, the midcentury, the builders and the real estate developers, they picked out, we call it ‘cherry picked’ the lots. You could go into orange groves and carve out incredible views – and many of the adobe homes have incredible views – and I believe that before property values really started to skyrocket that they were at risk because once you have an incredible view, then you know, we came the era of McMansions. This is happening in cities everywhere: Los Angeles and San Francisco are some of the worst cases where the beautiful Spanish revival homes are gone. They're bulldozed for these – you know, it's probably not polite to call McMansions ; someone coined that phrase for overbloated size of houses with great views. I think we all, the core of us that worked on this had the feeling that they were at risk. The other timing of this is many homes are not eligible for Mills Act and historic preservation review unless they've reached 50 years old. Now, many of the adobes that were in the midcentury revival, the boom that started with the edges of Longview Acres and up and down here in the Via Rancho Parkway area around Felicita Park, Adobe homes were starting to be built in the late forties and into the fifties. If the home had not reached 50 years old, it was not eligible for review as a candidate for a higher level of putting out on a register for review and protection. There's no guarantee, but I think that the age started working for us as these homes were turning fifty and the appreciation with the old neighborhood and appreciation everywhere was starting to grow and the concern for being bulldozed. So it's almost like you had a little bit of a perfect storm coming in for the recognition of an adobe home, and they did stop construction by state law in the eighties. So, then another one of our “Gee, you, you're not going to see these again. You have a chance to really see something special.” Peirce: Was there a reason that they stopped the construction at that point? Was it just not feasible for like a, what is it, like an earthquake code or something like that? Clausen: Well, I talked to several builders. George Patterson when he was living and then Mike Burton, whose father and grandfather – Hiram Smith his grandfather and then Don Burton his father – they had no concerns about earthquakes. They were using a lot of rebar and the adobe block by that time had added a petroleum-based product developed in the late thirties and through the war time, so adobe block now was solid construction. I was told it was all about thermal and insulation. Both builders said it was an argument with the state of California with, I don't know, engineering approval people that went down to the county, that an adobe will take in thermal heating, you know, it takes three days to warm up and, you know, on and on, and they refused to approve adobe construction based on that. The other thing the builder said is that the labor became too costly ; you had labor, construction workers still willing up to a certain time to take and build these, you know, carry these blocks and do this kind of labor. It was easier to get a job somewhere else, and it didn't, you know, literally break your back. So between the rise of cost of labor – and then in Escondido, the adobe block yard went out of business ; the blocks now had to be shipped from Fresno or elsewhere – and it became just too costly to build. So, it was all those things. Peirce: Yeah. That makes sense. You know, it tends to go when things become cost prohibitive, it definitely will stop people in their tracks and in terms of doing that kind of stuff. Clausen: Right. So that ended adobe construction in California, because of course there still is adobe construction in New Mexico, Arizona, and globally, for that matter, you know, worldwide. The adobe is still a popular way to build a cheap way if you have the labor. Alexa Clausen talks about how she became interested in wanting to focus on adobe homes and looking for others who had adobe homes for tours. Clausen then gives a historical overview of adobe homes and their significance in society. Furthermore, she talks the logistics of adobe homes and safety and building measures. adobe homes ; developers ; historical society ; neighborhood ; tour Adobe Home Tours ; Appreciation for adobe homes ; History house tours ; Looking for adobe homes for tours ; Scouting adobe homes 33.1192° N, 117.0864° W 17 Escondido, California 1223 Expansion and evolving / Collaboration Peirce: Yeah, absolutely. Seeing that this isn't the only place where Adobe houses were built – and are built even to this day – as you guys kind of built this program and as it continued to grow, was there any sort of view of trying to expand to a larger area or working with other tours if they existed in places like New Mexico, to try and collaborate in any way? Or was this a very grassroots, “We’re sticking where we are and just kind of making this grow naturally where it is?” Clausen: Well, I think we would've loved to become a bigger, wider organization, but it all comes down to volunteers. And as you know, a lot of this, unless you're a paid staff putting on something like this-- Although we were thrilled: we had a tour in Pauma Valley a few years ago, we've been invited to work with Valley Center Historical Society ; there's a number of adobes there. We were also invited through Dominic Calarco who supervises the park system in Carlsbad ; they would like to feature Leo Carillo and find some adobe homeowners there. So, we do have an interest, very North County interested people, and we'd like to do that, and then it keeps it from being boring Escondido ; not boring, but, you know, you do sort of run out of homes or people that are willing. We do have bigger interest, and we know that people have traveled from Los Angeles and from other places to come and see the homes and be on the tour. In an ideal world? Yeah, wouldn’t it be neat to have this grand old, famous tour? You know, some cities do – the Palm Springs mid-century modern tour is just crazy famous, the Pasadena tours are – but we're restricted now by just a small group of volunteers. Peirce: Absolutely. Yeah, it can be difficult even with that outside interest when you don't have the facility to make it happen, whether it's personnel or whatever. There's always a friction, there's always that rub that kind of keeps you from doing more, even if there's the interest. Did you take anything from other tours? Did you learn from them? Or did you go, “We want to do something different. We want to kind of stick to our own program here?” Clausen: You know, the way I think this evolved, with a number of our Adobe homeowners haved jumped in after their home was on the tour to take a role and to help out. And so, for example, our current webmaster, Don, he took over the website. Intense interest in adobe, and really likes to post a lot of stuff, even adobe homes for sale. And then we had a lady – Mary Del May – she had taken over for Wendy in 2015 I want to say, I'll have to look it up, and professionalized it, and Tom ; all of them have been on other home tours. So, I think what they brought to the table was things they liked, like, “Gee, you know, it was nice when we had a booklet, a full booklet and, you know, we could cut costs by having sponsor pages. That'll help the printing if we do a bigger booklet.” So, our homeowners who jumped in, I think they did bring experience from things they liked going on other tours. Then as we planned this, I think some things from other tours come in like don't let people stand too long. “Oh, we were in Tucson. We had to wait 45 minutes, but they sold cocktails.” &lt ; laugh&gt ; We're like, oh, we can't sell cocktails, but you know, we do have these, yeah. I think that everyone who has participated brings what they like, and they don't like, suggestions, they work, they don't, we've tried some things. So yeah, I'd say that we have benefited from other tours. Peirce: And it also sounds like you've benefited from, as you've done this program, collaborating with some of the people that have owned these homes, right? Like you said earlier-- Clausen: Oh, absolutely. Peirce: It sounds like that's really been honestly, and correct me if I'm wrong, kind of the heart of the program as it's moved forward. Clausen: It really was helpful because in order to invite and ask people “Would you have your home on the tour?” They're shaking in their boots and to have other homeowners say, look, here's some information, which they've developed a little “Hello, homeowner, potential homeowner. This is what we did, little hit lists of this is what happens.” And then we also developed a security docent guide and docent stations. And that came out of the feedback from the homeowners to pace our volunteers throughout the home and allow people not to wander through on their own, but in groups as a group tour. And a lot of this came from the feedback of the homeowners wanting a little more security, a little more confidence, and most of the kind of tips for, “Hey, do you want to be on our tour,” came from the other homeowners. Absolutely. You know, lessons learned or could have, should have, would have. It's always a little growing thing. I think you're right. I think that this definitely comes from within. Alexa Clausen provides a look into working with other historical sites and societies for Adobe Home Tours. She highlights volunteers being essential to the business of providing tours for adobe homes. Alexa Clausen also gives input about her thoughts on collaborating with others. adobe homeowners ; docent guide ; homeowner ; North County ; Pauma Valley ; volunteers Appreciation for volunteers and docents ; Collaboration with other homeowners ; Expanding Adobe Home Tours ; Interest in adobe homes 33.1581° N, 117.3506° W 17 Carlsbad, California 1634 Keeping history interesting / Choosing adobe homes Peirce: Absolutely, and that's incredible, right? To really get that kind of support from people who see what the benefit is of highlighting this stuff, and just kind of doing that because it not only gets people to participate, but it brings their energy and their enthusiasm along with it. Speaking of enthusiasm, I know that there has been concern in some sectors of historians who are worried about people not being interested in history, people being ignorant of history. What efforts, if any, do you guys have to put in to get people interested in this part of history? Was there any sort of education that you had to put out? Did you have to teach people about this stuff? Did you find any struggles in getting people to come at any point? Or was this something that kind of once people heard about it, they were like “I'd like to learn more about that” or did you fight any struggles? Clausen: You know, we're always amazed at how easy this comes. I think being in the San Diego drivable region, that we're lucky because we are a county where we can still on a Sunday, get somewhere without a lot of trouble, and we do have the support of....like I mentioned, a lot of other historical societies have done garden tours, home tours, many cities have. And so people that love it, we find from our ticket holders, are a very strange combination with flat out “looky loos”: people that want to remodel their kitchen and they want to see others, as realtors are being a little more cautious about appointments and who comes in – for good reason, not to waste their time and security. So we have the people that just love to see other people's homes, and then we have just very hardcore interested – either mid-century modern architecture, maybe even students of architecture, and hobbyists – they are there for the architecture. We have a pretty neat little group of people interested in the garden now. Not every home is going to have a fancy garden – not by any means – but they're there primarily to see the garden and enjoy the garden. And then we do have history buffs ; like that's what I'm just labeling people that love the history. Then year by year, we've tried to pick a theme. LIke last year: “The Romance of the Rancho” where we just call it out that maybe some of this is California fantasy, you know, and the places were carved out of orange groves, they're close to the earth. In some cases, the adobe block was made right there, right on the acreage that was formed and bulldozed, lot of use of heavy beams, sort of that romance of the Rancho. So we've brought that up. In Pauma, we had a chance to talk about the Luiseños building the Pauma mission. We had that be one of our stops and made sure that we arranged to include that. A lot of people told us, “You know, we've always heard about Pauma Mission and we've never gone. It was a chance to go out there.” Um, so we always get a very different mix, but always a mix of people. The strong elements that we always bask in is the people interested in the architecture, and of course, in the history. But I think some of this is people come along, they will read our booklet or the docents will tell them something and we feel there's an appreciation for the historic preservation that leaves every tour. Peirce: Absolutely. It's fascinating, right? You really have to find your niche and it sounds like this program really has found it in just a wide spectrum of people who are trying to see what you guys are displaying out there. You brought up how not every home has a garden or anything like that. Is there any sort of prerequisite to being on a tour for any of these houses or is it literally just, “Hey, you're an adobe house, you can be on it.” Are you a little choosy? How does that specifically work where you decide what goes on each tour? Clausen: We do have some levels. We've had some very simple, honest homes and then we've had some just outrageously beautiful homes from adobe. In some cases we've had to turn people down because in the times they were built the driveways and the parking are impossible. There still are a lot of niches around the Escondido area where they were carved out of an old orange or avocado grove and the parking and the in and out is just out of the question. So that's always a consideration, although we've had some pretty narrow tight squeezes. Some homes, once we've talked to the homeowners, they say, you know, we're really not ready. We would like our home to be, uh, a little closer to ready. They often bought the adobe as a fixer upper, but as everyone knows, it takes time and money and planning, and we've had homeowners who've come back and say, you know, now we're ready. In some cases, we had to turn down people because they were just way too out of the way. I'll give you an example: last tour we had on the edge of Rancho Santa Fe the Osuna adobe, and then a home in Del Dios and then across Escondido, just behind the mall, two homes in that general area – that were drivable. I think we had a house offer way on Deer Springs Road. And so John – our webmaster – sometimes he would take and calculate the mileage, and then if you're 25 minutes one way and the only home out there, we would think that the homeowner would get gypped, you know, people would just say “Let's just go get lunch. We won't drive out there.” So we've tried to save some of the names and the addresses, so we could do a closer cluster of homes and hopefully we haven't missed out on anyone yet, and hanging onto names lets us be able to do that. We've had people who, as they've moved forward, say we just can't do this, you know, family circumstances or everyone just couldn't get on board. You know, a lot of things we expect could happen. We've gotten two thirds of the way and we've had people bail for very legitimate, understandable reasons. In a few cases, we've had previous homes on the tour again. We've had a few homes in that circumstance where an owner stepped up and a lot of times they've made changes. They've learned more about their home and it was enough years for our ticket holders. We have a lot of new ticket holders, so they're not saying, oh, we just saw that home. So yeah, I think there's been a combination of how we get there when the doors open. Peirce: Absolutely. So the individual houses, are the owners responsible for the histography of the tour for those places? Do you guys assist? How does that collaboration work? Clausen: In the last five years, I think I've done the majority of the history. In a lot of cases though, with new owners, sometimes we've gotten really lucky. They're walking their dog, they run into an old timer from the neighborhood, you know, someone who has lived there 40 years, and they'd come back as we're developing the history of their home, or they'd get a lead: a phone number of someone who knew who still own the home. So we've had a combination. I'd say maybe I do easily 70 to 75% of the research, and then 25% comes in from a lot of odd places and on occasion the homeowner themselves. So yeah, I think I've been doing most of it. For the internal side of it, the docent guide, then we lean on the homeowner for their remodel or what they were told about the remodel. If they have a newer kitchen maybe put in in the late eighties – they were told about it by the realtor – the docent on the kitchen stop will let people know what they're looking at. I'd say I've done a good portion of the research. Alexa Clausen talks about how she keeps the history of the tours interesting while catering to different audiences with different levels of knowledge on adobe homes. She also talks about the process of choosing adobe homes which they use for tours. Del Dios ; historic preservation ; Osuna Adobe ; Pauma Mission ; Rancho Alexa Clausen heading adobe tours ; Audience ; Choosing adobe homes for tours ; Interest in adobe tours ; Keeping the history interesting 33.3034° N, 116.9814° W 17 Pauma Valley 2252 Gathering Information / Adobe Home Conditions Peirce: Awesome. Has that been a struggle as well, given that some of these houses - I don't wanna say they're not important, right? They are important, they're historical in their own way. But it’s not like Greta Garbo lived there ; they're just regular homes in Escondido. Has that been difficult to gather that information? Clausen: You know, I've been stuck on homes for variety of reasons. Sometimes what happens is, let's say the homeowner had the adobe built for themselves and they worked the rest of their career at a conveyor belt as an engineer and retired, and perhaps their spouse was a schoolteacher and, you know, very wonderful everyday people. When we actually go look at the house, we generally will start finding jewels on some of the architecture. I think we've been pretty fortunate to have builders who have included architecture to keep the story going. This will be the treatment of the open beams or the fireplaces. Very often, we've had wonderful surviving fireplaces that were not remodeled ; they're still there. We've had homes where the windows were yet not removed ; they were still the old aluminum encasement crank windows, really neat, like ribbon style. It would even be the placement of arches, you know, opening the arch of one room into the next. The unbelievable plate glass windows from floor to ceiling, capturing a style that is brought in from the craftsman era – Cliff May, who has been considered the father of the ranch house style that became mid-century and popularized – how they took the sense of bringing the outdoor to the edge of the indoor. The adobe builders in the mid-century – we’ve found the Weir brothers and others – they will do that plate glass window with the view, right from the bottom, right to the edge of the eaves with phenomenal views, taking advantage and placing the home on that view. Without a doubt, the architecture will jump in and take over. Funky chimney treatments, little touches like a little hut, an opening to put in firewood, right by the fireplace treatment of the mantle or the hearth. Maybe there's some amber inserted glass that's still from the original ; once in a while, even the lighting fixtures. So, many homes where the owner isn't recognized as such as a fantastic story, usually the architecture jumps right in ; there's something that has survived the floor treatment. We have homes with original flagstone, original tile, you know, goes on and on. So from room to room, as we're giving the tours and highlighting these things, we can keep the audience, the visitor very interested. And that's usually very rewarding to know that these original features are still there. Peirce: Absolutely. Have you had, has there been a home that was just completely original or do they all need work at some point? Clausen: Well, we have had a few that had a remarkable amount of original features left, and that usually gets us going pretty good. Now of course, I think the thing that happens to most houses is the kitchens need updating very badly, and often the bathrooms. But we have homes where even there's been extensive remodeling, we still recognize – I'll just use Weir for example because they're so well-known – some of the weird features are cabinet treatments, maybe even the lintels on the window trim, possibly the addition of a certain shape of a breakfast nook. So, we almost always see these features survive. We haven't really had homes that were entirely gutted. We've had some pretty good luck. Peirce: That's amazing. I mean, just thinking about how homes are now and people just rip them up and then build them back up.... Clausen: They do, and some of us don't even like to watch those shows where they come into a midcentury modern home with a sledgehammer ; sometimes it's kind of creepy. Peirce: And a little upsetting, especially for someone who has been doing these kinds of tours, right? Looking at the big picture: do you feel that the tour has been successful in achieving the initial goals of what you were trying to do? Did it kind of mushroom beyond that? And if so, do you feel like there are things that you never thought were possible and things that you kind of wish you could have branched out into? Clausen: No, I think that those of us who started early on are honestly always amazed how this can sustain interest. And we're always thrilled for the feedback ; not everyone's happy on our tours, of course not. But we believe that the awareness of adobe construction and word of mouth and people wanting to see an adobe home, the inside of one, was well beyond our expectations. Absolutely. In terms of getting bigger, there's not enough of us. We think we will always have to limit our ticket sales. I mean, it'd be wonderful to run it two days. It'd be wonderful to raise more money, but there's just not enough of us. Really, I think raising people's understanding of what this construction is and what it was, and then historically its roots, you know, the adobe as construction material in California, I think we've done a pretty good job getting the message across and getting interest. Absolutely. We'd like to keep going. We hope we always have enough people and enough houses, but we think with the invitations to Carlsbad and maybe one day Rancho Santa Fe, and certainly Pauma again, Fallbrook has many adobe homes, Vista does....there are communities we still think we can keep going. Alexa Clausen discusses the process on gathering information about adobe home builds. She also mentions how they approach original homes and those that have been renovated. adobe ; architecture ; builders ; career ; original features Adobe builders ; Adobe home historical backgrounds ; Craftsman era ; Growing Adobe Home Tours 33.1192° N, 117.0864° W 17 Escondido, California 2735 Adobe Home Tours Legacy Peirce: Absolutely. My last question is, it feels like you've created something here in North County that has really kind of stood the test of time here in terms of creating something from scratch and creating something that people come back to. You have repeat customers, you have all these things. What do you hope your legacy is with Adobe Home Tours and where do you hope to see it moving forward? Clausen: Well, I think for most of us and, you know, I can't speak for everyone, but I think for most of us, the importance of having the homes preserved – this is something that's stopped in time. Of course any development is at risk, no matter what, and that the stronger we stay and the higher the appreciation is the less likely that someone will want to buy the home, and as the prices and their value increase, we feel there's a less likelihood that it would be demolished for yet a bigger investment. Although many have been. But we really, I think we'd all like to know that the core of many of these homes will remain and that they'll go another hundred years. Peirce: Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Is there anything about this program or anything about your career that you feel that we haven't touched on that you'd like to talk about before we start wrapping this up? Clausen: I think we covered it pretty well. And since we have a lot of programs that are a PDF on the Adobe Home Tour website, and Don keeps posting information – he's very good about answering questions people will forward to him and he'll forward to the rest of us so we can help. I think there's a lot out there now that was not available 10 years ago, so I think anyone that's interested has a check to jump on the website and dig around a little more and if needed con to contact any of us and the steering committee small, but we're out there to just keep promoting the adobe heritage. Peirce: Absolutely. And once again, that was adobehometours.com, correct? Clausen: That's correct. Yes. Peirce: Awesome. Just so just making sure we get that plug out there. Clausen: Okay. Right. Well, Jake, thank you so much. It's been great to talk to you and thanks for taking the interest. Peirce: I appreciate that, absolutely. I want to thank you very much from the bottom of my heart for taking this much time to talk about this. It's been fascinating. Alexa Clausen talks about where she hopes to see Adobe Home Tours in ten years. She also speaks on the importance of preserving homes because they allow visitors a look into the past. adobe ; appreciation ; homes ; information ; North County Legacy of Adobe Home Tours 33.1222° N, 117.2911° W 17 North County, San Diego Oral History Alexa Clausen is one of the founders of the Adobe Home Tours in North County San Diego, providing much of the historiography of each stop on their yearly tours. She was employed as a historian with California State Parks prior to her involvement with Adobe Home Tours. In this interview, Alexa speaks about how Adobe Home Tours started, the successes and difficulties with running a program like Adobe Home Tours, and how her background with California State Parks helped prepare her for her current role. This oral history was made possible with generous funding from the Ellie Johns Foundation. Jake Peirce: I&#039 ; m speaking today with Mrs. Alexa Clauson from the Adobe Home Tour -- among her many accomplishments -- and so I would like to start with just a little background information, if you don&#039 ; t mind. Where are you from? What got you to where you could start with the Adobe Home Tour? Alexa Clausen: Well, thank you. And I&#039 ; m happy to be here since we only have an hour, I&#039 ; ll try to do the mini version. &lt ; affirmative&gt ; I grew up in Riverside, California. I got my advanced degrees in San Diego, so University of San Diego undergraduate, and then master&#039 ; s degree at San Diego State. At the same time that I was studying, my master&#039 ; s degree took me seven years because I was working full-time for California State Parks. So, I have a career with state parks and essentially doing local regional statewide and contextual related history for projects with state parks. So, when I retired in 2008, we had moved to Escondido in 1993, I think. And I had some friends in the history business, Lucy Burke, who was very active in historic preservation, always nagging me: When are you going to retire? You know, join us and, and all this stuff. So finally, when I did retire, I had our son -- I had him late in in life -- so he was still in elementary school, high school. So, I wasn&#039 ; t too involved, but I did have the sense that I want to give back to the community of history because when I was working professionally without internet and all this, I was visiting people who were saving history in boxes under their beds. You know, there was some places didn&#039 ; t have historical societies ; it was just mom and pop trying to save history. So, you know, I felt like I wanted to give back, and so I started volunteering and then, when my son was at St Mary&#039 ; s in elementary school, there&#039 ; s another student. His name was Sean McCoy. Well, his father, they had a little birthday party. I think they were in fifth grade, so this might go back to maybe 2004 or 2005, and he lived in Valley Center. The house was adobe, and I was really curious, but in their study there were all these houses on craftsman architecture. I looked at Tom, who&#039 ; s just a really gregarious, hardy guy that runs a landscaping business. He&#039 ; s Cal[ifornia] Poly[technic] [State] [University] educated and in landscaping. And I&#039 ; m like, no, it&#039 ; s not. It must be his wife. &lt ; laugh&gt ; So eventually at the swim party, the kids were busy and I said, &quot ; Hey, you know, Tom who&#039 ; s collection of books here, you&#039 ; re doing craftsmen?&quot ; Well, that unleashed Tom, and he found a soulmate in the interest. And as a few years went on, he always said there, &quot ; We have to do something. I go to Pasadena to the home tours and they&#039 ; re all rooted in Green and Green Architecture, which was known for the craftsmen, but we have our own, you know, handcrafted Adobes here.&quot ; And I&#039 ; m like, &quot ; [O]kay, Tom, let&#039 ; s do a tour.&quot ; And he claims that, you know, I kept pushing him to, oh, won&#039 ; t this be fun? And so the two of us kind of started Adobe Home Tour, but we were fortunate that the director Wendy Barker at the historical society wanted to go ahead and take our little idea under her wing. They had been doing garden tours, so they were familiar with parking and talking to homeowners, so we really had a jump there and we were lucky. And of course with the insurance that the Escondido History Center was all behind us. And our very first brochure was a front-to-back 8.5&quot ; x11&quot ; piece of paper off a copier, and that&#039 ; s kind of where it started. Peirce: Well, you have to start somewhere, right? Clausen: Yeah. It&#039 ; s funny, and of course I was thinking, &quot ; [O]h, he&#039 ; ll get over it.&quot ; You know, this is one year we had maybe 60 people come and it was word of mouth, mainly his friends and the historical society, people and friends of the homeowners, so it was really grassroots or mom and pop, whatever you want to call it. And our last tour we sold out at 500 tickets. Peirce: Wow. Clausen: Yeah. So that was the route. I came here through my training, I don&#039 ; t own an adobe home and it was really a feeling to give back to history essentially. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. Going back to your previous stops in your career with the California State Parks, was this something that was kind of in the same realm of what you were doing? Looking at architecture and looking at stuff like that and giving tours, or did you do something different while you were there? Clausen: You know, it really wasn&#039 ; t. The historic preservation and the architecture was handled mainly by specialists, and a lot of that was rooted in the state office of historic preservation, which was like a cousin branch of State Parks and the very highly trained historians specializing in architecture. So, I was really weak and had to do a catch up self-trained. All of my projects were budget driven. For example, if they, maybe the volunteers of the Rangers wanted to do a new booklet for a visitor center and it had a historical element in it, they would budget for hours for that. Or if there&#039 ; s a general plan, they needed a historian to do the cultural. So a lot of my jobs were just skipping around and providing research and history for whatever was budgeted and needed. And generally, if there was like an architectural survey, they were contracted out by specialist, or the state office would contract. So, during my career, for example, they did a thematic statewide survey of the Civilian Conservation Corps buildings that were still in state parks. Now they took their cue from the feds who were doing a survey in national parks and in the forest service, but again, that was handled by specialists. So, you know, while we would exchange, read material, go to the same conferences, it is a specialty that I&#039 ; m probably not the best at, but I do provide that research for Adobe Home Tour. So, it was a different kind of specialty, yeah. Peirce: Absolutely. It sounds more like you were -- in your role with the state parks -- you were more of a jack of all trades rather than a master of specifically architecture in that field. Clausen: Oh, absolutely, and in time they umbrellaed all that under cultural resources management and it was the archeologist and the historians and sometimes the landscape architects depending on the project. Peirce: Absolutely. Given that Tom seemed to be your partner in crime in the beginning of this adventure, --and he seemed to have more of the specific knowledge when it came to the adobe tours, based on what you&#039 ; re saying -- what would you say that was your biggest contribution to the beginning of it? Was it the organization? Was it your specific knowledge of how to provide background information? What would you say was your biggest contribution in the beginning? Clausen: Well, actually, I think Tom felt like I was just the cheerleader. &lt ; laugh&gt ; But, you know, I think it helped Tom have the confidence. With his career running a landscape business, he wasn&#039 ; t as free to do some things, and I think he always saw me as a little bit of the conduit to the history community. He&#039 ; s second generation -- grew up in Escondido through his business and his family -- they know every nook and cranny in the city, but Tom I think felt like I was the person that can talk to the historical society and get that connection. And then when it came to maybe talking to some families about the history of their homes -- although Wendy did a lot of it in the beginning -- in time, I took over all of that as eventually she took another job, but, you know, they had the historical society to run. I think Tom just really needed someone who talked a little more of the language to keep connected with the historical society and the history side of it. That&#039 ; s my take, if you ever tape Tom, maybe he&#039 ; ll have a different, &lt ; laugh&gt ; a different take on it. Peirce: &lt ; laugh&gt ; No, that&#039 ; s absolutely fair. That takes me into something else I kind of wanted to explore with you if don&#039 ; t mind. I&#039 ; m very interested in how you and Wendy and Tom and everybody else who was involved -- especially in the beginning -- how you managed to convince people to take part in this project. Because like you said, a lot of these people, these aren&#039 ; t just like &quot ; Oh, I own this random home that is just sitting out here for display.&quot ; This is where people live and work and raise their families. How did you manage to convince people to take part in what you were trying to achieve? Especially in the beginning. Clausen: You know, I haven&#039 ; t thought about it. Some of it was Tom&#039 ; s personal contacts and he knows people who know people and he knocked on doors, and then Wendy at the historical society, they also knew people who had adobe homes and was literally making lists, like, &quot ; Should we call this one? Should we call that one?&quot ; but I have to wonder now that you brought it up if the timing was right. Garden tours were becoming very popular at the time. They were fundraisers for not just historical societies, but you know, maybe natural garden clubs. I think garden clubs maybe had a longer history of that, but history house tours were becoming popular at the time. I think a lot of that starts going backwards to the US bicentennial, where historic preservation was taking off, and I have to wonder if people who buy adobe homes sort of needed a validation. Recently he had a potluck, and I ran into a lady who said, &quot ; My friends tell me you&#039 ; re crazy to have bought this home. You know, why would you live in this mud home?&quot ; &lt ; laugh&gt ; so maybe there&#039 ; s just a little twinkle of wanting the validation. You know, I&#039 ; m really taking a guess at this ; I hadn&#039 ; t really thought about it. But I do think people had the confidence --the historical society had been doing an annual home tour and then the old neighborhood in downtown Escondido, they started doing a Mother&#039 ; s Day home tour -- so the idea of a home tour maybe wasn&#039 ; t as foreign had we been maybe one of the first to ever do this in Escondido. I think those two projects really made people aware and it wasn&#039 ; t just so scary that other people were opening their houses. In the old neighborhood after COVID, it&#039 ; ll be the first time in a few years, and they will do another Mother&#039 ; s Day home tour, and I think they&#039 ; re on their like 25th anniversary. And the historical society, they partnered with that, so they had the experience also and word of mouth that this isn&#039 ; t kind of some creepy people knocking on the door saying, &quot ; Whoa, you know, what you can do is clean up your house and let people in.&quot ; So, I really didn&#039 ; t think about it and it&#039 ; s not scientific by any manner, but I think there is an opening and I find that Adobe Home Tours love the validation. They love to know that other people, once they&#039 ; ve seen their house, they get it. They really think it&#039 ; s something special. That&#039 ; s just my take on it. Peirce: Absolutely. I mean, that makes complete sense. One question I did have as well: was there any sort of impetus? Was this just organic? You just happened to bring this up and it just kind of grew up? Or was there any sort of given that some people want that validation, right? A lot of people may not want to live in this kind of home. Was there any sort of preservation or were these houses being torn down or was there any sort of event like that that was kind of like, &quot ; Man, maybe we should foster some sort of appreciation within the region to make sure that we keep this history alive a little bit.&quot ; ? Clausen: You know, I think that became one of our causes or mantras or whatever is as we backed into this -- like just a couple of mom and pop &lt ; laugh&gt ; people with no experience but some dumb luck and some decent connections -- is that as these homes aged, and of course, in the history of a lot of the homes, the midcentury, the builders and the real estate developers, they picked out, we call it &#039 ; cherry picked&#039 ; the lots. You could go into orange groves and carve out incredible views -- and many of the adobe homes have incredible views -- and I believe that before property values really started to skyrocket that they were at risk because once you have an incredible view, then you know, we came the era of McMansions. This is happening in cities everywhere: Los Angeles and San Francisco are some of the worst cases where the beautiful Spanish revival homes are gone. They&#039 ; re bulldozed for these -- you know, it&#039 ; s probably not polite to call McMansions ; someone coined that phrase for overbloated size of houses with great views. I think we all, the core of us that worked on this had the feeling that they were at risk. The other timing of this is many homes are not eligible for Mills Act and historic preservation review unless they&#039 ; ve reached 50 years old. Now, many of the adobes that were in the midcentury revival, the boom that started with the edges of Longview Acres and up and down here in the Via Rancho Parkway area around Felicita Park, Adobe homes were starting to be built in the late forties and into the fifties. If the home had not reached 50 years old, it was not eligible for review as a candidate for a higher level of putting out on a register for review and protection. There&#039 ; s no guarantee, but I think that the age started working for us as these homes were turning fifty and the appreciation with the old neighborhood and appreciation everywhere was starting to grow and the concern for being bulldozed. So it&#039 ; s almost like you had a little bit of a perfect storm coming in for the recognition of an adobe home, and they did stop construction by state law in the eighties. So, then another one of our &quot ; Gee, you, you&#039 ; re not going to see these again. You have a chance to really see something special.&quot ; Peirce: Was there a reason that they stopped the construction at that point? Was it just not feasible for like a, what is it, like an earthquake code or something like that? Clausen: Well, I talked to several builders. George Patterson when he was living and then Mike Burton, whose father and grandfather -- Hiram Smith his grandfather and then Don Burton his father -- they had no concerns about earthquakes. They were using a lot of rebar and the adobe block by that time had added a petroleum-based product developed in the late thirties and through the war time, so adobe block now was solid construction. I was told it was all about thermal and insulation. Both builders said it was an argument with the state of California with, I don&#039 ; t know, engineering approval people that went down to the county, that an adobe will take in thermal heating, you know, it takes three days to warm up and, you know, on and on, and they refused to approve adobe construction based on that. The other thing the builder said is that the labor became too costly ; you had labor, construction workers still willing up to a certain time to take and build these, you know, carry these blocks and do this kind of labor. It was easier to get a job somewhere else, and it didn&#039 ; t, you know, literally break your back. So between the rise of cost of labor -- and then in Escondido, the adobe block yard went out of business ; the blocks now had to be shipped from Fresno or elsewhere -- and it became just too costly to build. So, it was all those things. Peirce: Yeah. That makes sense. You know, it tends to go when things become cost prohibitive, it definitely will stop people in their tracks and in terms of doing that kind of stuff. Clausen: Right. So that ended adobe construction in California, because of course there still is adobe construction in New Mexico, Arizona, and globally, for that matter, you know, worldwide. The adobe is still a popular way to build a cheap way if you have the labor. Peirce: Yeah, absolutely. Seeing that this isn&#039 ; t the only place where Adobe houses were built -- and are built even to this day -- as you guys kind of built this program and as it continued to grow, was there any sort of view of trying to expand to a larger area or working with other tours if they existed in places like New Mexico, to try and collaborate in any way? Or was this a very grassroots, &quot ; We&#039 ; re sticking where we are and just kind of making this grow naturally where it is?&quot ; Clausen: Well, I think we would&#039 ; ve loved to become a bigger, wider organization, but it all comes down to volunteers. And as you know, a lot of this, unless you&#039 ; re a paid staff putting on something like this-- Although we were thrilled: we had a tour in Pauma Valley a few years ago, we&#039 ; ve been invited to work with Valley Center Historical Society ; there&#039 ; s a number of adobes there. We were also invited through Dominic Calarco who supervises the park system in Carlsbad ; they would like to feature Leo Carillo and find some adobe homeowners there. So, we do have an interest, very North County interested people, and we&#039 ; d like to do that, and then it keeps it from being boring Escondido ; not boring, but, you know, you do sort of run out of homes or people that are willing. We do have bigger interest, and we know that people have traveled from Los Angeles and from other places to come and see the homes and be on the tour. In an ideal world? Yeah, wouldn&#039 ; t it be neat to have this grand old, famous tour? You know, some cities do -- the Palm Springs mid-century modern tour is just crazy famous, the Pasadena tours are -- but we&#039 ; re restricted now by just a small group of volunteers. Peirce: Absolutely. Yeah, it can be difficult even with that outside interest when you don&#039 ; t have the facility to make it happen, whether it&#039 ; s personnel or whatever. There&#039 ; s always a friction, there&#039 ; s always that rub that kind of keeps you from doing more, even if there&#039 ; s the interest. Did you take anything from other tours? Did you learn from them? Or did you go, &quot ; We want to do something different. We want to kind of stick to our own program here?&quot ; Clausen: You know, the way I think this evolved, with a number of our Adobe homeowners haved jumped in after their home was on the tour to take a role and to help out. And so, for example, our current webmaster, Don, he took over the website. Intense interest in adobe, and really likes to post a lot of stuff, even adobe homes for sale. And then we had a lady -- Mary Del May -- she had taken over for Wendy in 2015 I want to say, I&#039 ; ll have to look it up, and professionalized it, and Tom ; all of them have been on other home tours. So, I think what they brought to the table was things they liked, like, &quot ; Gee, you know, it was nice when we had a booklet, a full booklet and, you know, we could cut costs by having sponsor pages. That&#039 ; ll help the printing if we do a bigger booklet.&quot ; So, our homeowners who jumped in, I think they did bring experience from things they liked going on other tours. Then as we planned this, I think some things from other tours come in like don&#039 ; t let people stand too long. &quot ; Oh, we were in Tucson. We had to wait 45 minutes, but they sold cocktails.&quot ; &lt ; laugh&gt ; We&#039 ; re like, oh, we can&#039 ; t sell cocktails, but you know, we do have these, yeah. I think that everyone who has participated brings what they like, and they don&#039 ; t like, suggestions, they work, they don&#039 ; t, we&#039 ; ve tried some things. So yeah, I&#039 ; d say that we have benefited from other tours. Peirce: And it also sounds like you&#039 ; ve benefited from, as you&#039 ; ve done this program, collaborating with some of the people that have owned these homes, right? Like you said earlier-- Clausen: Oh, absolutely. Peirce: It sounds like that&#039 ; s really been honestly, and correct me if I&#039 ; m wrong, kind of the heart of the program as it&#039 ; s moved forward. Clausen: It really was helpful because in order to invite and ask people &quot ; Would you have your home on the tour?&quot ; They&#039 ; re shaking in their boots and to have other homeowners say, look, here&#039 ; s some information, which they&#039 ; ve developed a little &quot ; Hello, homeowner, potential homeowner. This is what we did, little hit lists of this is what happens.&quot ; And then we also developed a security docent guide and docent stations. And that came out of the feedback from the homeowners to pace our volunteers throughout the home and allow people not to wander through on their own, but in groups as a group tour. And a lot of this came from the feedback of the homeowners wanting a little more security, a little more confidence, and most of the kind of tips for, &quot ; Hey, do you want to be on our tour,&quot ; came from the other homeowners. Absolutely. You know, lessons learned or could have, should have, would have. It&#039 ; s always a little growing thing. I think you&#039 ; re right. I think that this definitely comes from within. Peirce: Absolutely, and that&#039 ; s incredible, right? To really get that kind of support from people who see what the benefit is of highlighting this stuff, and just kind of doing that because it not only gets people to participate, but it brings their energy and their enthusiasm along with it. Speaking of enthusiasm, I know that there has been concern in some sectors of historians who are worried about people not being interested in history, people being ignorant of history. What efforts, if any, do you guys have to put in to get people interested in this part of history? Was there any sort of education that you had to put out? Did you have to teach people about this stuff? Did you find any struggles in getting people to come at any point? Or was this something that kind of once people heard about it, they were like &quot ; I&#039 ; d like to learn more about that&quot ; or did you fight any struggles? Clausen: You know, we&#039 ; re always amazed at how easy this comes. I think being in the San Diego drivable region, that we&#039 ; re lucky because we are a county where we can still on a Sunday, get somewhere without a lot of trouble, and we do have the support of....like I mentioned, a lot of other historical societies have done garden tours, home tours, many cities have. And so people that love it, we find from our ticket holders, are a very strange combination with flat out &quot ; looky loos&quot ; : people that want to remodel their kitchen and they want to see others, as realtors are being a little more cautious about appointments and who comes in -- for good reason, not to waste their time and security. So we have the people that just love to see other people&#039 ; s homes, and then we have just very hardcore interested -- either mid-century modern architecture, maybe even students of architecture, and hobbyists -- they are there for the architecture. We have a pretty neat little group of people interested in the garden now. Not every home is going to have a fancy garden -- not by any means -- but they&#039 ; re there primarily to see the garden and enjoy the garden. And then we do have history buffs ; like that&#039 ; s what I&#039 ; m just labeling people that love the history. Then year by year, we&#039 ; ve tried to pick a theme. LIke last year: &quot ; The Romance of the Rancho&quot ; where we just call it out that maybe some of this is California fantasy, you know, and the places were carved out of orange groves, they&#039 ; re close to the earth. In some cases, the adobe block was made right there, right on the acreage that was formed and bulldozed, lot of use of heavy beams, sort of that romance of the Rancho. So we&#039 ; ve brought that up. In Pauma, we had a chance to talk about the Luiseños building the Pauma mission. We had that be one of our stops and made sure that we arranged to include that. A lot of people told us, &quot ; You know, we&#039 ; ve always heard about Pauma Mission and we&#039 ; ve never gone. It was a chance to go out there.&quot ; Um, so we always get a very different mix, but always a mix of people. The strong elements that we always bask in is the people interested in the architecture, and of course, in the history. But I think some of this is people come along, they will read our booklet or the docents will tell them something and we feel there&#039 ; s an appreciation for the historic preservation that leaves every tour. Peirce: Absolutely. It&#039 ; s fascinating, right? You really have to find your niche and it sounds like this program really has found it in just a wide spectrum of people who are trying to see what you guys are displaying out there. You brought up how not every home has a garden or anything like that. Is there any sort of prerequisite to being on a tour for any of these houses or is it literally just, &quot ; Hey, you&#039 ; re an adobe house, you can be on it.&quot ; Are you a little choosy? How does that specifically work where you decide what goes on each tour? Clausen: We do have some levels. We&#039 ; ve had some very simple, honest homes and then we&#039 ; ve had some just outrageously beautiful homes from adobe. In some cases we&#039 ; ve had to turn people down because in the times they were built the driveways and the parking are impossible. There still are a lot of niches around the Escondido area where they were carved out of an old orange or avocado grove and the parking and the in and out is just out of the question. So that&#039 ; s always a consideration, although we&#039 ; ve had some pretty narrow tight squeezes. Some homes, once we&#039 ; ve talked to the homeowners, they say, you know, we&#039 ; re really not ready. We would like our home to be, uh, a little closer to ready. They often bought the adobe as a fixer upper, but as everyone knows, it takes time and money and planning, and we&#039 ; ve had homeowners who&#039 ; ve come back and say, you know, now we&#039 ; re ready. In some cases, we had to turn down people because they were just way too out of the way. I&#039 ; ll give you an example: last tour we had on the edge of Rancho Santa Fe the Osuna adobe, and then a home in Del Dios and then across Escondido, just behind the mall, two homes in that general area -- that were drivable. I think we had a house offer way on Deer Springs Road. And so John -- our webmaster -- sometimes he would take and calculate the mileage, and then if you&#039 ; re 25 minutes one way and the only home out there, we would think that the homeowner would get gypped, you know, people would just say &quot ; Let&#039 ; s just go get lunch. We won&#039 ; t drive out there.&quot ; So we&#039 ; ve tried to save some of the names and the addresses, so we could do a closer cluster of homes and hopefully we haven&#039 ; t missed out on anyone yet, and hanging onto names lets us be able to do that. We&#039 ; ve had people who, as they&#039 ; ve moved forward, say we just can&#039 ; t do this, you know, family circumstances or everyone just couldn&#039 ; t get on board. You know, a lot of things we expect could happen. We&#039 ; ve gotten two thirds of the way and we&#039 ; ve had people bail for very legitimate, understandable reasons. In a few cases, we&#039 ; ve had previous homes on the tour again. We&#039 ; ve had a few homes in that circumstance where an owner stepped up and a lot of times they&#039 ; ve made changes. They&#039 ; ve learned more about their home and it was enough years for our ticket holders. We have a lot of new ticket holders, so they&#039 ; re not saying, oh, we just saw that home. So yeah, I think there&#039 ; s been a combination of how we get there when the doors open. Peirce: Absolutely. So the individual houses, are the owners responsible for the histography of the tour for those places? Do you guys assist? How does that collaboration work? Clausen: In the last five years, I think I&#039 ; ve done the majority of the history. In a lot of cases though, with new owners, sometimes we&#039 ; ve gotten really lucky. They&#039 ; re walking their dog, they run into an old timer from the neighborhood, you know, someone who has lived there 40 years, and they&#039 ; d come back as we&#039 ; re developing the history of their home, or they&#039 ; d get a lead: a phone number of someone who knew who still own the home. So we&#039 ; ve had a combination. I&#039 ; d say maybe I do easily 70 to 75% of the research, and then 25% comes in from a lot of odd places and on occasion the homeowner themselves. So yeah, I think I&#039 ; ve been doing most of it. For the internal side of it, the docent guide, then we lean on the homeowner for their remodel or what they were told about the remodel. If they have a newer kitchen maybe put in in the late eighties -- they were told about it by the realtor -- the docent on the kitchen stop will let people know what they&#039 ; re looking at. I&#039 ; d say I&#039 ; ve done a good portion of the research. Peirce: Awesome. Has that been a struggle as well, given that some of these houses - I don&#039 ; t wanna say they&#039 ; re not important, right? They are important, they&#039 ; re historical in their own way. But it&#039 ; s not like Greta Garbo lived there ; they&#039 ; re just regular homes in Escondido. Has that been difficult to gather that information? Clausen: You know, I&#039 ; ve been stuck on homes for variety of reasons. Sometimes what happens is, let&#039 ; s say the homeowner had the adobe built for themselves and they worked the rest of their career at a conveyor belt as an engineer and retired, and perhaps their spouse was a schoolteacher and, you know, very wonderful everyday people. When we actually go look at the house, we generally will start finding jewels on some of the architecture. I think we&#039 ; ve been pretty fortunate to have builders who have included architecture to keep the story going. This will be the treatment of the open beams or the fireplaces. Very often, we&#039 ; ve had wonderful surviving fireplaces that were not remodeled ; they&#039 ; re still there. We&#039 ; ve had homes where the windows were yet not removed ; they were still the old aluminum encasement crank windows, really neat, like ribbon style. It would even be the placement of arches, you know, opening the arch of one room into the next. The unbelievable plate glass windows from floor to ceiling, capturing a style that is brought in from the craftsman era -- Cliff May, who has been considered the father of the ranch house style that became mid-century and popularized -- how they took the sense of bringing the outdoor to the edge of the indoor. The adobe builders in the mid-century -- we&#039 ; ve found the Weir brothers and others -- they will do that plate glass window with the view, right from the bottom, right to the edge of the eaves with phenomenal views, taking advantage and placing the home on that view. Without a doubt, the architecture will jump in and take over. Funky chimney treatments, little touches like a little hut, an opening to put in firewood, right by the fireplace treatment of the mantle or the hearth. Maybe there&#039 ; s some amber inserted glass that&#039 ; s still from the original ; once in a while, even the lighting fixtures. So, many homes where the owner isn&#039 ; t recognized as such as a fantastic story, usually the architecture jumps right in ; there&#039 ; s something that has survived the floor treatment. We have homes with original flagstone, original tile, you know, goes on and on. So from room to room, as we&#039 ; re giving the tours and highlighting these things, we can keep the audience, the visitor very interested. And that&#039 ; s usually very rewarding to know that these original features are still there. Peirce: Absolutely. Have you had, has there been a home that was just completely original or do they all need work at some point? Clausen: Well, we have had a few that had a remarkable amount of original features left, and that usually gets us going pretty good. Now of course, I think the thing that happens to most houses is the kitchens need updating very badly, and often the bathrooms. But we have homes where even there&#039 ; s been extensive remodeling, we still recognize -- I&#039 ; ll just use Weir for example because they&#039 ; re so well-known -- some of the weird features are cabinet treatments, maybe even the lintels on the window trim, possibly the addition of a certain shape of a breakfast nook. So, we almost always see these features survive. We haven&#039 ; t really had homes that were entirely gutted. We&#039 ; ve had some pretty good luck. Peirce: That&#039 ; s amazing. I mean, just thinking about how homes are now and people just rip them up and then build them back up.... Clausen: They do, and some of us don&#039 ; t even like to watch those shows where they come into a midcentury modern home with a sledgehammer ; sometimes it&#039 ; s kind of creepy. Peirce: And a little upsetting, especially for someone who has been doing these kinds of tours, right? Looking at the big picture: do you feel that the tour has been successful in achieving the initial goals of what you were trying to do? Did it kind of mushroom beyond that? And if so, do you feel like there are things that you never thought were possible and things that you kind of wish you could have branched out into? Clausen: No, I think that those of us who started early on are honestly always amazed how this can sustain interest. And we&#039 ; re always thrilled for the feedback ; not everyone&#039 ; s happy on our tours, of course not. But we believe that the awareness of adobe construction and word of mouth and people wanting to see an adobe home, the inside of one, was well beyond our expectations. Absolutely. In terms of getting bigger, there&#039 ; s not enough of us. We think we will always have to limit our ticket sales. I mean, it&#039 ; d be wonderful to run it two days. It&#039 ; d be wonderful to raise more money, but there&#039 ; s just not enough of us. Really, I think raising people&#039 ; s understanding of what this construction is and what it was, and then historically its roots, you know, the adobe as construction material in California, I think we&#039 ; ve done a pretty good job getting the message across and getting interest. Absolutely. We&#039 ; d like to keep going. We hope we always have enough people and enough houses, but we think with the invitations to Carlsbad and maybe one day Rancho Santa Fe, and certainly Pauma again, Fallbrook has many adobe homes, Vista does....there are communities we still think we can keep going. Peirce: Absolutely. My last question is, it feels like you&#039 ; ve created something here in North County that has really kind of stood the test of time here in terms of creating something from scratch and creating something that people come back to. You have repeat customers, you have all these things. What do you hope your legacy is with Adobe Home Tours and where do you hope to see it moving forward? Clausen: Well, I think for most of us and, you know, I can&#039 ; t speak for everyone, but I think for most of us, the importance of having the homes preserved -- this is something that&#039 ; s stopped in time. Of course any development is at risk, no matter what, and that the stronger we stay and the higher the appreciation is the less likely that someone will want to buy the home, and as the prices and their value increase, we feel there&#039 ; s a less likelihood that it would be demolished for yet a bigger investment. Although many have been. But we really, I think we&#039 ; d all like to know that the core of many of these homes will remain and that they&#039 ; ll go another hundred years. Peirce: Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Is there anything about this program or anything about your career that you feel that we haven&#039 ; t touched on that you&#039 ; d like to talk about before we start wrapping this up? Clausen: I think we covered it pretty well. And since we have a lot of programs that are a PDF on the Adobe Home Tour website, and Don keeps posting information -- he&#039 ; s very good about answering questions people will forward to him and he&#039 ; ll forward to the rest of us so we can help. I think there&#039 ; s a lot out there now that was not available 10 years ago, so I think anyone that&#039 ; s interested has a check to jump on the website and dig around a little more and if needed con to contact any of us and the steering committee small, but we&#039 ; re out there to just keep promoting the adobe heritage. Peirce: Absolutely. And once again, that was adobehometours.com, correct? Clausen: That&#039 ; s correct. Yes. Peirce: Awesome. Just so just making sure we get that plug out there. Clausen: Okay. Right. Well, Jake, thank you so much. It&#039 ; s been great to talk to you and thanks for taking the interest. Peirce: I appreciate that, absolutely. I want to thank you very much from the bottom of my heart for taking this much time to talk about this. It&#039 ; s been fascinating. https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en audio Property rights reside with the university. Copyrights are retained by the creators of the records and their heirs. This resource is licensed for noncommercial educational use using CC NC-BY 4.0. Please contact Special Collections at archives csusm.edu if you need reproductions made. Please see the related “Preferred Citation note” for language on citing materials from this collection. Permission to examine Library materials is not authorization to publish or to reproduce the examined material in whole, or in part. Persons wishing to quote, publish, perform, reproduce, or otherwise make use of an item in the Library’s collections must assume all responsibility for identifying and satisfying any claimants of the copyright holder. 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The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=ClausenAlexa_PeirceJake_2022-04-12.xml ClausenAlexa_PeirceJake_2022-04-12.xml Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Clausen, Alexa. Interview April 12, 2022 Description An account of the resource Alexa Clausen is one of the founders of the Adobe Home Tours in North County San Diego, providing much of the historiography of each stop on their yearly tours. She was employed as a historian with California State Parks prior to her involvement with Adobe Home Tours. In this interview, Alexa speaks about how Adobe Home Tours started, the successes and difficulties with running a program like Adobe Home Tours, and how her background with California State Parks helped prepare her for her current role. This oral history was made possible with generous funding from the Ellie Johns Foundation. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC027-15 Subject The topic of the resource Adobe houses Historic buildings -- Conservation and restoration. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2022-04-12 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Diego County (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Alexa Clausen Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Alexa Clausen Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Jacob Peirce Community history History Department internship Women's experience Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral Histories Description An account of the resource Video and audio oral histories can be viewed here. Histories are listed alphabetically by last name. Individual histories are indexed and transcribed and can be searched. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <p>Rights to oral histories vary depending on the history. The library owns the copyright to some histories, and has license to reproduce for nonprofit purposes for others. Please contact CSUSM University Library Special Collections at <a href="mailto:%20archives@csusm.edu">archives@csusm.edu</a> with any questions about use.</p> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Jacob Peirce Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Lizbeth Ecke OHMS Object This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS Viewer) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=EckeLizbeth_PeirceJake_2022-04-13.xml OHMS Object Text This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka 5.4 2022-04-13 Oral history of Lizbeth Ecke, April 13, 2022 SC027-12 00:52:05 SC027 California State University San Marcos University Library Special Collections Oral History Collection CSUSM This oral history was made possible with the generous funding of the Ellie Johns Scholarship Fund at Rancho Santa Fe Foundation and the Library Guild of Rancho Santa Fe. Businesswomen Encinitas (Calif.) Floriculture Interstate 5--California Poinsettias Lizbeth Ecke Jacob Peirce mp4 EckeLizbeth_PeirceJake_2022-04-13.mp4 1:|11(14)|17(11)|23(7)|33(15)|38(54)|40(105)|50(11)|51(68)|51(180)|55(7)|69(11)|74(5)|83(28)|90(58)|90(166)|103(13)|122(2)|128(15)|133(75)|143(7)|162(15)|168(12)|173(56)|173(155)|178(91)|178(233)|186(13)|192(51)|192(185)|195(13)|207(42)|211(37)|215(5)|226(51)|229(7)|238(16)|248(71)|248(188)|248(319)|256(6)|260(15)|267(9)|269(82)|279(3)|281(69)|300(2)|305(40)|305(171)|305(309)|305(433)|316(16)|322(1) 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/20bc80c8465484930147a93d0aa89119.mp4 Other video English 30 Introduction / Growing up and childhood So, good evening. My name is Jacob Pierce. I am a first year graduate student at Cal State San Marcos in the history program. And this is part of a series documenting historical figures, impactful figures in North County, San Diego. Today I'm speaking with, Lizbeth Ecke. And, thank you for being here. Let's start real general, real broad. Can you tell me a little bit about your background? Where were you were born? Growing up, just general information like that. Lizbeth Ecke recounts her childhood experience growing up in Encinitas, CA where her family were important to the development of the small town beach city. In discussing her grandparents role in advocating for Downtown Encinitas, the local history of the small San Diego city and the push back that came with it is revealed. Childhood ; College ; Community ; Downtown Encinitas ; Encinitas ; Family legacy ; Farming ; Flower industry ; Grade school ; Highway ; San Diego ; Small town Downtown Encinitas and early development ; Growing up in Encinitas ; History of Encinitas ; Lizbeth Ecke's experience as a child growing up in the Ecke family ; Local history 33.0370° N, 117.2920° W 17 The general GPS coordinates of Encinitas, CA which is now known for its beautiful beaches and luxury resorts. 385 Inspiration as a woman in business Did you, speaking of your mother and your grandmother, what inspiration, if any, did you take from em’, in your personal life going forward as a professional woman, as someone who growing up in this family, did you take any lessons from them? And, and if so, how did you kind of, feel it, that you represented the family in that way? Lizbeth Ecke describes the work of her mother and grandmother in San Diego along with their accomplishments. Her deep dive into their history explains how she was inspired by their hard work. In addition to this, Lizbeth Ecke introduces the Poinsettia business that her family is well known for. Poinsettia business ; Professional woman ; San Diego State ; Solana Beach Presbyterian Church ; Tijuana ; Volunteer work ; Women in Encinitas Familial bonds ; Family ; Gender roles ; The Ecke family ; The endeavors of the Ecke women ; The experience of women in a family business ; Women in the Ecke family 32.7774° N, 117.0714° W 17 San Diego State University. Lizbeth Ecke mentions the university a few times as this was her mother's alma mater. 612 The Press focuses on the men / Supporting organizations Pierce: Most of the press that I was able to read, mostly focuses on the men, in your family. Was that frustrating for, &lt ; unintelligible&gt ; you can go ahead and answer if you got something. Ecke: Well, I mean, I don't know that I think that it's, pretty standard for a, certainly for my grandparent’s generation and for my parent’s generation. That’s what you did, even if a, a wife or whatever was very involved in a business, you generally look to the husband for, you know, and they were the person that got all the glory and that's just the way our society has been set up. In this generation my brother probably has had more publicity than I have just because he is the one that owned the Poinsettia Business. And so that naturally, I mean, he got a lot of press just from own owning the Poinsettia Business. He's also probably much more, comfortable in front of the camera because he's been doing it for so long. So, when we are both in a situation and somebody wants one of us to speak, I will defer to him. Lizbeth Ecke addresses why the Press focused on the men in her family over the women when highlighting her family's business. The conversation then pivots to focusing on her mother and grandmother again as she explores the organizations they chose to support and why. Business roles ; Family business ; Family roles ; Functions ; Spotlight ; Support Gender disparity in the Press ; Gender roles in family business ; Planned Parenthood ; Women supporting organizations ; YMCA 32.7157° N, 117.1611° W 17 970 Let's talk about Poinsettias Pierce: I never grew up in a family that had like any sort of a business or anything like that. My parents were teachers. But were you interested in horticulture at all? Were you interested in flower, like any sort of growing flowers? Ecke: So, it was, you know, and I had done a lot of work for, I worked in the tissue culture lab at the ranch. I worked in the greenhouses many summers. I, we, all three of us grew up there was never a family vacation that we took that we didn't go visit greenhouse customers wherever it was in the world. And when I had studied overseas in Mexico and in Germany, I've gone and visited flower customers on my own. So, I was involved with it. But I also knew that wasn't gonna be the career I was going to choose. I mean, and not that anybody said I couldn't, but you know, my grandfather's name was Paul Ecke Sr. In this portion, Lizbeth Ecke discusses her involvement and knowledge of horticulture. Her knowledge stems from her family business with the poinsettia's which led to her using her planting skills during her studies in Mexico and Germany. Even though she only has a minor in horticulture, paired with her degree in business she was able to really entrench herself in the family business. Lizbeth Ecke's expertise was useful on different board of directors which was a space mostly occupied by men. Bussiness ; Farming ; Flowers ; Germany ; Greenhouses ; Horticulture ; Mexico ; Paul Ecke Jr. ; Paul Ecke Sr. ; Paule Ecke III ; Plants ; Poinsettia ; Poinsettia Ranch American Forest Exchange ; Floral culture business ; Studying overseas ; Subject of studies ; Women working in horticulture 32.7157° N, 117.1611° W 17 San Diego, CA 1229 Experience on the board of directors Pierce: You've mentioned multiple arenas where you are on the board of directors or even the chairman of the board and stuff like that. Have you &lt ; affirmative&gt ; as a woman faced any pushback, any, any friction, from people when you take these kind of leadership positions? Ecke: Well, most of the things that I've been on, I would say, well, no, I mean, when I was first, went on to the, American Forest Exchange Board, I was the first, I wasn't the very first woman that had ever been on the board, but I was the first woman to be on the board for quite some time. And I would, I will say that it was probably for the other men then that were on the board. My father had just recently passed away and he had been chairman of the board. And then I, took over, I took his seat on the board. So I think that, and I was much younger than the majority of the men on the board that isn't necessarily the case now, but it was then, which is almost 20 years ago now. I think that they initially had, they didn't have an issue with me being on the board, but I think that they were kind of surprised that I had an opinion or, that I took issue with some of the things that they, wanted to do. Lizbeth Ecke recounts her experience when she became chairman of the American Forest Exchange after her father passed away. In comparison, her experience on the board for the YMCA was vastly different since women had occupied this space long before her. Lizbeth Ecke also recounts a time when she was younger working for her family's business where a customer was demanding to work with her father instead of her. American Forest Exchange ; board ; board of directors ; Chairman ; frustrated ; status-quo ; UCSD ; women ; YMCA AFE chairman ; American Forest Exchange ; San Diego local history ; Women in business ; Women's experience in male dominated spaces 1807 Missing old Encinitas Pierce: How has it been watching it grow over the years? Do you miss old Encinitas somewhat? Do you, you wish that things were a little bit different? Do you, do you just enjoy seeing time and things progress? Like what, what is your viewpoint on that? Ecke: Well, yeah, I mean, if, if Encinitas could be the Encinitas that I grew up in, I thought that that was fabulous. If I was really living in that would, I think is, is as fabulous, you know, you get nostalgic about things. But I could, when I was growing up and I had my horse, I could ride my horse down Encinitas Blvd. all the way to the beach and ride my horse on the beach with my other friends who had horses. And, it was you-- &lt ; unintelligible&gt ; So, I mean, there's things like that, that I'm nostalgic for. But places change. I mean, you can't expect things to not change. And, for the most part, I think that the way Encinitas has changed is pretty good given, you know, the options. I mean, there wasn't, there isn't a way that Encinitas was gonna stay the way that it was, but it was a lovely place to grow up. Lizbeth Ecke recounts her experience growing up in Encinitas prior to its current development. Despite her nostalgia, Lizbeth Ecke has fond memories of Encinitas but appreciates how far along the city has come. She also gives more background on how she grew up in the city as well as her siblings and the lasting effect Encinitas had on them all. Community ; Community Resource Center ; Downtown Encinitas ; Encintas Blvd. ; Horse ; Leucadia Blvd. ; Nostalgic ; Riverside ; road ; San Digueto ; Shepards ; YMCA Community ; Developing Encinitas ; Development in Encinitas ; Growing up in Encinitas ; Old Encinitas ; Small town 33.0370° N, 117.2920° W 17 Encinitas, CA 2116 The Ecke Legacy in Encinitas / Going Forward Pierce: Absolutely, absolutely. We, we appreciate it. Not that I'm, I have a particular hand in it, but at the same time I, you know, as a, as a budding historian, I do appreciate &lt ; affirmative&gt ; people putting their things in the, in archives. Is it, I'm trying to figure out how I can word this… right. When you, when you've spoken about like how your grandfather advocated for the, the, the I-5 going where it, it goes and, and your father was, was, a, a large part of, of the, the beginnings of Cal State San Marcos, right? Is it, do you ever sit and think like, oh wow. Like my family has really impacted this, this area in, in many ways, like, you'd sit, be like, wow, like this is here in part because of the way that my family has kind of shaped the area. Do you ever think about that and how it like, is that an interesting thought to you or is that never occurred? The interviewer, Jacob Pierce asks about the Ecke family's direct influence on the I-5 and Downtown Influence. Lizbeth Ecke then answers and goes into more detail about her siblings and their history growing up in Encinitas. Cal State San Marcos ; charity ; community ; community resource center ; difference ; Downtown Encinitas ; Ecke ; Encinitas ; family ; foundation ; I-5 ; name ; park ; press ; YMCA Family influences ; Longstanding presence in the community ; Making a difference ; Sense of community ; The development of Downtown Encinitas 33.0370° N, 117.2920° W 17 Encinitas, CA 2584 Proudest achievement / Closing comments Pierce: Absolutely. Absolutely. What would you say has been, your proudest accomplishment? Whether it's in North County or just in general, what, what are you most proud of and in your career, in your life in general? Ecke: Well, I mean the most obvious answer would be my children. I mean, I've raised two children that are self-sufficient and, you know, both graduated from college. My son's getting his PhD now and, you know, they're supporting themselves and that in of itself is an accomplishment as a parent. I don't, I don't know that-- Ecke: There is a given thing that I could say that I would point to. I know I'm happy that I have been able to be part of the family business in a relevant way. It was something that was very important to my mother because she didn't always feel seen. And so she fought very hard for my sister and myself to be seen and to be heard. And I think it was, something that she was very proud of when, she had daughters that were involved and had a say in what was happening. And so I feel accomplished that I fulfilled something that was important to my mother. As the interview wraps up, Lizbeth Ecke recalls her personal accomplishments as well as her family's. Considering the Ecke influence in Encinitas and San Diego as a whole, she goes into more detail about the papers her parents and grandparents left behind. Although it consists of receipts and lists these small details are important for historical purposes. Lizbeth Ecke also goes further into the process of what the Ecke papers consist of and donating them to Cal State San Marcos. Achievements ; children ; Ecke papers ; family business ; important ; mother ; papers ; proud ; ranch Documenting history ; Family papers ; Pride in their accomplishments ; The legacy of the Ecke family 29.8833° N, 97.9414° W 17 San Marcos, CA Oral History Narrator Lizbeth Ecke is the daughter of San Diego horticulturist Paul Ecke Jr., who contributed to the popularity of the poinsettia plant. Lizbeth Ecke also is on the board for the YMCA and the American Forest Exchange. In this interview, Lizbeth discusses her childhood growing up in Encinitas, CA and working alongside her father in the flower business, and her experience as a women working in a male dominated industry in comparison to her father and brother. Peirce: My name is Jacob Peirce. I am a first year graduate student at Cal State San Marcos in the history program. And this is part of a series documenting historical figures, impactful figures in North County, San Diego. Today I&#039 ; m speaking with, Lizbeth Ecke. And, thank you for being here. Let&#039 ; s start real general, real broad. Can you tell me a little bit about your background? Where were you were born? Growing up, just general information like that. Ecke: I was born here in San Diego, born raised in Encinitas hold, &lt ; cough&gt ; pardon me. I grew up in the same house that my father grew up in. I went to the same elementary school and high school that my father went to. So I was friends with the children of the, some of the people that my father went to high school with. So pretty entrenched in Encinitas, California. I did move away for college and work for about 13 years, but other than that, I pretty much lived in Encinitas my entire life. Peirce: That&#039 ; s awesome. And you said that you went to the same the same school, you lived in the same house and your family was pretty established at that point within the community. Was it difficult growing up with the kind of expectations, of being in your family like that? Ecke: There may have been individual instances, but no, not really. I mean, Encinitas was still a pretty small town when, I was growing up. I mean, Interstate 5 didn&#039 ; t even go through till I was about 11 years old. Most people were in flower farming like our family was. And, so I mean, people probably knew my name without knowing me, but, and that probably ended up mostly being good. But, so no, I mean I would say later on there have been challenging times when we, as a family have wanted to do things and we&#039 ; ve gotten a lot of bad press. I mean, I know that my mother and grandmother, had a harder time than I ever remember having. Peirce: Absolutely. Ecke: Dealing with, harder in the sense of, people being rude to them or mean, or those kinds of things. But I can&#039 ; t say that I remember much of any of that. Peirce: Was there specific reasons for that treatment that they received? Do you remember them saying anything about that? Ecke: About, well, I know that there was a newspaper in town called The Coast Dispatch, that the man who owned it really, he didn&#039 ; t like our family. And I mean, I&#039 ; ve heard various stories about why he didn&#039 ; t, the one that seems to have made the most sense to me, but I don&#039 ; t really know whether it&#039 ; s the real reason or not is because he owned a lot of, real estate right in Downtown Encinitas. And when they were putting through I-5, the original plan was to just run it along, down the coast highway. And, as it ended up being in some other, places farther north of here, and my grandfather was one of the people who fought pretty hard to say, let&#039 ; s not destroy all of the downtowns of all of these, you know, Carlsbad and Solana Beach and Del Mar and Encinitas. Let&#039 ; s put it inland a little ways and keep our downtowns. And my grandfather was on the winning side of that. I mean, it wasn&#039 ; t because my grandfather or grandparents owned any land, particularly in the right of way of where I-5 ended up. They just, he just thought it was made more sense. So he fought for that and again, was on the winning side. And so the guy who owned The Coast Dispatch was pissed off because he was expecting to make all this money from selling all of his right of way in Downtown Encinitas. There may have been other reasons that maybe that, you know, he was a powerful man in town. My grandfather was a powerful man in town and they maybe just didn&#039 ; t like each other, I don&#039 ; t know. But, you know, I know that my grandmother, was treated poorly at times, by people that, you know, she was somebody who really cared about and, tried to be helpful. And, you know, people that during the depression that needed food, bringing food to the school and doing things like that, and there was any number of people that didn&#039 ; t want her help because she was an Ecke and that was painful for her. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. I can imagine like that&#039 ; s a wild thing to think about. Did you, speaking of your mother and your grandmother, what inspiration, if any, did you take from [th]em, in your personal life going forward as a professional woman, as someone who growing up in this family, did you take any lessons from them? And, and if so, how did you kind of, feel it, that you represented the family in that way? Ecke: Well, you know, my grandmother got married at 19 and had her first kid at 20, so she didn&#039 ; t ever, she didn&#039 ; t have anything more than a high school education. My mother did go to San Diego State and, did have a degree. But both of them, along with, my father, maybe a little less, my grandfather was very big &lt ; unintelligible&gt ; [into] giving back. And it was always something that my parents talked about, but they also, they didn&#039 ; t just talk about it. They did it. And they, my grandmother was very involved with the Solana Beach Presbyterian Church and did a lot out of help through that, there was an orphanage down in Tijuana that she was, very supportive of. And I remember her when I was a child, her loading up her car and barreling on down to Tijuana to bring them whatever it was that she had in her car that week or month or whatever it was. My mother was very, was involved in lot of things. She was always on the PTA. We were all in 4H growing up and she was a 4H leader. She volunteered for children&#039 ; s hospital. She later on when us kids weren&#039 ; t at home or were, you know, didn&#039 ; t need as much attention all the time she was involved with Planned Parenthood, she was a huge Planned Parenthood supporter. She, I&#039 ; m trying to think of the other, Neurosciences Institute. I think it was called G &lt ; unintelligible&gt ; I can&#039 ; t remember the name of it, but she was constantly involved with lots of different organizations, voices for children. She was very involved with San Diego State, which is where she went to school with the library at San Diego State. So I think that what I took away from that was that, it&#039 ; s important to give back and everybody can give back, but if you are somebody of, means and, are known within your community, it&#039 ; s even more important to, to give back that that&#039 ; s a commitment, an obligation really. And, I heard about it growing up and I saw it growing up. And so that&#039 ; s probably what I took from it more than, I mean, took from them more than anything was that they didn&#039 ; t just talk the talk, they walked the walk. Peirce: Yeah. I was about to, I was about to ask you about the, whether that was something that was, verbally taught to you. Like, if it was like, &quot ; Hey, this is what we do,&quot ; or you just kind of learn from example in regards to that, but you kind of, you kind of answered that. Ecke: Yeah. Peirce: Most of the press that I was able to read, mostly focuses on the men, in your family. Was that frustrating for, &lt ; unintelligible&gt ; you can go ahead and answer if you got something. Ecke: Well, I mean, I don&#039 ; t know that I think that it&#039 ; s, pretty standard for a, certainly for my grandparent&#039 ; s generation and for my parent&#039 ; s generation. That&#039 ; s what you did, even if a, a wife or whatever was very involved in a business, you generally look to the husband for, you know, and they were the person that got all the glory and that&#039 ; s just the way our society has been set up. In this generation my brother probably has had more publicity than I have just because he is the one that owned the Poinsettia Business. And so that naturally, I mean, he got a lot of press just from own owning the Poinsettia Business. He&#039 ; s also probably much more, comfortable in front of the camera because he&#039 ; s been doing it for so long. So, when we are both in a situation and somebody wants one of us to speak, I will defer to him.So, so that to some degree would be my fault, for not taking the spotlight when I could all the time. But yes, I mean, I think that just as a woman in society, it is sometimes frustrating, to have grown up and seen all the work that my grandmother and my mother did for the family business. And when you talk about the family business, you don&#039 ; t really hear much about them. I mean, some of that&#039 ; s getting righted a little bit, now, but it&#039 ; s certainly they didn&#039 ; t ever get any, any &lt ; unintelligible&gt ; whatever they, nobody called them out as doing great things when they were doing them. Peirce: Absolutely, absolutely. Which is, which is a shame, honestly. &lt ; Unintelligible&gt ; I guess kind of where I want to go with that though, you brought up some of the functions that your grandmother and your mother and that you have supported. Right? How do you decide what to support? Is there any-- is it really up to you? What you support? Do you speak to people in the family just to make sure that the family name is doing kind of-- is there like any collaboration or is it, whatever you decide to kind of support at that time? Ecke: No, I think that, I mean, I, I haven&#039 ; t ever felt like if there was something that I wanted to support that anybody had any issue with it. I mean, maybe just being part of the family, there is a sense of, I suppose if I ever thought that there was something I wanted to get involved with that might create a problem, I would probably have a conversation. My brother and sister and I are pretty close and have good relationships. So, I wouldn&#039 ; t expect that any of us would get involved with something that we thought how had an edge to it without first, at least, telling others. But you know, what I&#039 ; ve been involved with has changed over the years when my kids were school age, I was very involved with their schools. I have, you know, I&#039 ; m involved with, YMCA a that&#039 ; s named after my grandmother. I was involved with it a number of years ago. And there, if you read anything about me, it&#039 ; s probably how I got myself kicked off of the board, but, &lt ; laugh&gt ; the man that was running the, San Diego, the corporate Y for San Diego, he, didn&#039 ; t renew his contract and now there&#039 ; s somebody new. So then, so now I&#039 ; m back on the board. &lt ; laugh&gt ; , I&#039 ; m all, I mean, I also am very supportive of Planned Parenthood, not to the degree my mother was, my mother was on the board. That might be something I&#039 ; d be willing to do down the road. So I think that, that what I&#039 ; m involved with evolves as whatever else is happening in my life or around me. Peirce: Absolutely. And then that makes sense, right? Like, you know, you&#039 ; re not, it&#039 ; s not like you give, give a dollar one day and then you&#039 ; re just, you&#039 ; re guaranteed to give it the rest of your time. Right. It really kind of focuses as your, as your life moves from place to place &lt ; affirmative&gt ; and from stage to stage, you know, as I, you know, I&#039 ; m a new dad, I never would&#039 ; ve thought about all the things I do with my kid and donating and doing stuff for that kind of stuff that prior to having him right. Every stage, it kind of takes you to a different-- Ecke: Well, this isn&#039 ; t, it isn&#039 ; t in your field of vision. Peirce: Absolutely. And that&#039 ; s understandable. Right. We only can see here to here. Right. We can&#039 ; t see the full picture unless you&#039 ; re in it sometimes. Do you mind if I pivot to, to the Poinsettias? I just have a few questions on that. Ecke: Absolutely. Peirce: I never grew up in a family that had like any sort of a business or anything like that. My parents were teachers. But were you interested in horticulture at all? Were you interested in flower, like any sort of growing flowers? Ecke: Well, yeah. I mean, the house that I grew up in it was right in the middle of the Poinsettia [fields]. Peirce: Absolutely. Ecke: So it was, you know, and I had done a lot of work for, I worked in the tissue culture lab at the ranch. I worked in the greenhouses many summers. I, we, all three of us grew up there was never a family vacation that we took that we didn&#039 ; t go visit greenhouse customers where ever it was in the world. And, when I had studied overseas in Mexico and in Germany, I&#039 ; ve gone and visited flower customers on my own. So I was involved with it. But I also knew that wasn&#039 ; t gonna be the career I was going to choose. I mean, and not that anybody said I couldn&#039 ; t, but, you know, my grandfather&#039 ; s name was Paul Ecke Sr. My father was Paul Ecke Jr. and my brother&#039 ; s Pauly III and my name isn&#039 ; t Paul &lt ; laugh&gt ; . So, and that being said, my sister and I were had ownership interest in the ranch as much as my brother did, but we also made a determination, I don&#039 ; t know, 30 years ago or more that, the ranch really needs to have a singular head of it, it was not a businesses that was gonna get managed very well with a, you know, three people trying to do it. So we sold our interest to my brother and that made sense. I was on the board of directors for the ranch, so I was still involved. And my brother and I, I mean, any time my brother had big decisions to make, he would talk to me. So I may have not had my name on the company, but I did feel very involved with it. And you know there&#039 ; s a Los Angeles flower market where we would sell poinsettias every year. And I did that as did my brother and my sister and now I&#039 ; m chairman of the board of that flower market. And so I had been involved in the flower business pretty much all my life, one way or another, I wasn&#039 ; t the face of the Poinsettia Ranch. Peirce: But you enjoyed working with the flowers you enjoyed working with your hands? Ecke: Oh yeah, no, absolutely. You know, and now we, as a family have the flower fields in Carlsbad. So I&#039 ; m still, involved with, well, not growing the flowers, but involved with the floral culture business, and being on the board of the American Forest Exchange. I am attuned to what&#039 ; s going on within that part of the sector of the world and I like it and I always have. Peirce: Awesome, awesome. I can&#039 ; t even keep plants alive in my own house, so that just having an entire farm stresses me out just the thought of it. Ecke: &lt ; laugh&gt ; Oh, well, I&#039 ; ve never run a farm. So that, that-- Peirce: Yeah, that&#039 ; s fair. That&#039 ; s fair. &lt ; laugh&gt ; Ecke: I do, I did have a minor in horticulture in undergraduate school, but that was, as far as I went with that. Peirce: What was your major, if you don&#039 ; t mind me asking? Ecke: It was business. Peirce: Business. Ecke: And then I got an MBA in real estate and finance, so-- Peirce: Absolutely. You&#039 ; ve mentioned multiple arenas where you are on the board of directors or even the chairman of the board and stuff like that. Have you as a woman faced any pushback, any friction from people when you take these kind of leadership positions? Ecke: Well, most of the things that I&#039 ; ve been on, I would say, well, no, I mean, when I was first, went on to the, American Forest Exchange Board, I was the first, I wasn&#039 ; t the very first woman that had ever been on the board, but I was the first woman to be on the board for quite some time. And I would, I will say that it was probably for the other men then that were on the board. My father had just recently passed away and he had been chairman of the board. And then I, took over, I took his seat on the board. So I think that, and I was much younger than the majority of the men on the board that isn&#039 ; t necessarily the case now, but it was then, which is almost 20 years ago now. I think that they initially had, they didn&#039 ; t have an issue with me being on the board, but I think that they were kind of surprised that I had an opinion or, that I took issue with some of the things that they, wanted to do. Or so I wouldn&#039 ; t see, say that I ever felt like they were trying to figure out a way to get me off the board, but I do think that there were some times when they were frustrated that I wasn&#039 ; t just playing along with whatever they wanted to do. Other boards that I&#039 ; m on the YMCA board there&#039 ; s been women on that board long before I was ever on it. And, so I never felt anything there. We have a family foundation board, that my aunt has been on for as long as I can remember. And, and I&#039 ; ve been on it for 40 years. So really no, I mean where I had a lot of pushback when I was first came back and worked for the family, I was doing a lot of leasing and tenant improvement work and construction management. And this was back in the eighties, late eighties. And there were a lot of construction guys that really were not very excited about taking orders from, you know, a short woman or probably a woman in general, but then this little, tiny person with a high squeaky voice, I can&#039 ; t &lt ; unintelligible&gt ; anybody absolutely wouldn&#039 ; t do what I asked them to do. It may have just taken me be more forceful than I needed to be. Peirce: Absolutely. Ecke: To do that. But you know, my father was to his credit. He really promoted, my sister and myself to do whatever we wanted to, to do. And, when I, I remember one time when I was probably 15 working up in Los Angeles at the flower market over Christmas, [be]cause that&#039 ; s the only time we would&#039 ; ve been up there with the poinsettias. And my father put me a in charge of the phone orders. And so I remember, some big customer called and asked for my father and my father said, no, I don&#039 ; t have time, you just deal with them. And I went back and the conversation kind of went on. And then he finally said, I want to speak with a real Ecke. And so, I then went out, I mean, [be]cause again I&#039 ; m 14 or 15 years old and I go back out and I said, dad, he says, he&#039 ; ll only place this order with a real Ecke. And my father said, you go back in there and said, tell him if he wants to buy poinsettias he is going to buy them from you. And he&#039 ; s gonna give the order to you. And you are just as real of an Ecke as anybody else. And so I went back in there and told the guy and he was none too happy, but he did give me the order. So my father did things like that really, he may not have believed that when he was 20 years old. But I think that my mother did a very good job of convincing him and teaching him that he should be paying attention to his daughters as much as his son. And he did credit her with that. He would be the first one to say that he had a good relationship with his daughters because my mother taught him how to do that. Peirce: That&#039 ; s amazing. That&#039 ; s really awesome. Especially that, that kind of support, that young, how, how, early did you become, involved in the, in the family business? Like from as long as you can remember, or--? Ecke: Oh, I, well, I mean actually working, getting a paycheck was, you know, probably fifteen dollars. But even before that, when we were little again, our house was right there, the middle of the ranch and we&#039 ; d go out and my father would put me to work, you know, folding, putting together pieces of different pieces of paper and stapling them and folding them to go in boxes of poinsettias that were being shipped out mostly as a way to keep me busy and out of other people&#039 ; s way. But I mean, I was probably doing that from the time I was seven or eight years old, or he would pay us, like a penny to pick up trash, to walk around the whole ranch and pick up trash and he would pay us, I dunno,, 10 cents an hour or something ridiculous to do that. But, so always my parents were big believers in working and knowing the value of money. And my mother had grown up in a fairly poor family. Her family had moved out to California when she was 15 and lived in, government subsidized housing where UCSD [University of California San Diego] is now, they&#039 ; d moved because my grandmother, I knew that she had, she knew, wanted her children to go to college and California back then had, still does have, a good college system, but it was virtually free. And, you know, my mother had two brothers and a sister and, you know, she went to San Diego State. She had one brother that became a doctor and another brother that became a veterinarian. And they all benefited from the school systems in, in San Diego, but that&#039 ; s why they moved. And my mother worked a lot from whenever. I mean, from the time she could remember, so she went, they lived through being homeless during the depression and other things. So my mother brought that to the table for us in the sense of understanding that you can&#039 ; t be wasteful, you need to think about, you know, how you spend your money. And my parents were on the same page with all of that you know, just because you have money doesn&#039 ; t mean that you need to flaunt it or that you have to spend it all just because you have it. And it, you know, there&#039 ; s other people that might need it more than you do, and it&#039 ; s your responsibility to help out with that. So I feel like I got, fairly grounded in the understanding of that. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. You, you&#039 ; ve spoken a couple times about, growing up directly on, on the ranch &lt ; affirmative&gt ; and when you were a kid, I&#039 ; m assuming that, Encinitas was a little bit more rural than it is now, not rural, but just less developed. Ecke: Yeah. Peirce: How has it been watching it grow over the years? Do you miss old Encinitas somewhat? Do you, you wish that things were a little bit different? Do you, do you just enjoy seeing time and things progress? Like what, what is your viewpoint on that? Ecke: Well, yeah, I mean, if, if Encinitas could be the Encinitas that I grew up in, I thought that that was fabulous. If I was really living in that would, I think is, is as fabulous, you know, you get nostalgic about things. But I could, when I was growing up and I had my horse, I could ride my horse down Encinitas Blvd. all the way to the beach and ride my horse on the beach with my other friends who had horses. And, it was you-- &lt ; unintelligible&gt ; So, I mean, there&#039 ; s things like that, that I&#039 ; m nostalgic for. But places change. I mean, you can&#039 ; t expect things to not change. And, for the most part, I think that the way Encinitas has changed is pretty good given, you know, the options. I mean, there wasn&#039 ; t, there isn&#039 ; t a way that Encinitas was gonna stay the way that it was, but it was a lovely place to grow up. I mean, I, again, I knew there was like two elementary schools and, you know, one high school. And when I went, graduated from high school, there was only one high school from Del Mar to through Encinitas. So we, all went to San Dieguito together. My high school graduating class in 1975 was the last year that we were together, [be]cause then Torrey Pines was built and they opened up Torrey Pines [High School]. So, I mean it was, it was a very close-knit community. And it was, you know, nice to know you go into a grocery store, the drug store and you know, it&#039 ; s, somebody&#039 ; s father that&#039 ; s there or, you know, &lt ; affirmative&gt ; and that, that was a nice thing. And I, and I do miss that, but I suppose if that was super important to me, I could go find some other very small community that I could have that. Peirce: No, absolutely. I, I mean, I grew up in, I grew up in Riverside and in the, the eighties and nineties and I still remember driving to, to school and, running into, into, shepherds herding sheep across the road. And now every single part of that is, is track housing that they built that are, you know, the cookie cutter houses and, you know, you can get nostalgic for it, but I, I can completely understand like you, you do what you do, what, what you can with what it is. People need to live. People need houses and people need to, things grow and things change, but it was just interesting to, you know, you you&#039 ; ve been living in that, you lived in that same house as your, as your, as your father and everything. And it&#039 ; s just like, you know, having it grow around that is, is a interesting perspective for sure. Ecke: Definitely, it definitely is. I mean, it&#039 ; s, it&#039 ; s weird because now I live in that, well, we&#039 ; ve redone the house, but I live in what was my grandparents&#039 ; house that my grandparents built when my parents got married, they built a house and moved into the house. And then my parents moved into the house that my father grew up in. So I now live in the location, not the house anymore because we did rebuild it about 15 years ago, but to where my grandparents lived and, and it was a very different place then, because when I was growing up from my grandparents&#039 ; house, they were half a mile off of any public road in fact when I moved into this house 30 years ago, we were still Leucadia Boulevard, didn&#039 ; t go through. And so I was a half a mile off of any paved road. And, there the view, they had a view to the west, which we still have and a view to the east and there was nothing to the east, nothing at all. I mean, there was one light that you could see out there. And I remember that when I was a kid and now that&#039 ; s all houses. And just, you know, my father, this is totally a, a side note, but my father was also very involved with Cal[ifornia] State [University] San Marcos and getting it started and was very enthusiastic about it, which is, part of the reason that, my brother and I decided that that&#039 ; s what the family papers should, should go. It was, it kind of made sense because we had that connection. Peirce: Absolutely, absolutely. We, we appreciate it. Not that I&#039 ; m, I have a particular hand in it, but at the same time I, you know, as a, as a budding historian, I do appreciate &lt ; affirmative&gt ; people putting their things in the, in archives. Is it, I&#039 ; m trying to figure out how I can word this-- right. When you, when you&#039 ; ve spoken about like how your grandfather advocated for the, the, the I-5 going where it, it goes and, and your father was, was, a, a large part of, of the, the beginnings of Cal State San Marcos, right? Is it, do you ever sit and think like, oh wow. Like my family has really impacted this, this area in, in many ways, like, you&#039 ; d sit, be like, wow, like this is here in part because of the way that my family has kind of shaped the area. Do you ever think about that and how it like, is that an interesting thought to you or is that never occurred? Ecke: Yeah, it, no, it is. And I mean, it&#039 ; s something generally. I mean, I would say it&#039 ; s a sense of pride to know that, that the, our, we didn&#039 ; t, we as a family, didn&#039 ; t just come here and do what we did without wanting to better our community and be involved in our community. I mean, I know that my parents and grandparents, when Encinitas was super tiny when they were here, they, there wasn&#039 ; t anything for anybody to do after work. I mean, there just wasn&#039 ; t anything here. So they figure out how to build a bowling alley in, in Downtown Encinitas. So people had a place to go versus I guess, just going to a bar or something. I mean that there was someplace something else to do. And, those kinds of things, I mean, there&#039 ; s nothing that there&#039 ; s no rules or laws or anything that says that you have to do that, but if you&#039 ; re gonna be part of a community, it&#039 ; s nice to know that your family helped build that community. So it, yeah, it is something that I think about, at times when, you know, there&#039 ; s, and there&#039 ; s enough things named after our family, there&#039 ; s a park in Encinitas. And then there&#039 ; s the YMCA and there&#039 ; s various other things that, remind me and maybe the community of what we&#039 ; ve done. I would say that it is very different now than it was even 20 years ago. I mean, 20 years ago, I could, if I said my name was Ecke, pretty much anybody in Encinitas would&#039 ; ve heard the name, they would, I mean, they might not know anything, but they would&#039 ; ve heard the name. And, that isn&#039 ; t necessarily the case now, and that&#039 ; s not a bad thing, but it is, we are a much, larger and diverse community now. So, our family doesn&#039 ; t play the same kind of role as it used to. I mean, we still are very supportive of the community and we have a family foundation and most of the money, it&#039 ; s not a huge found[ation], but most of the money that comes out of that does get invested in, local charities, things like the YMCA or the community resource center or things like that. So we still are very involved, but again, because the community has grown so much, we&#039 ; re just not as big a, a part of it, which that&#039 ; s a good thing, [be]cause there&#039 ; s a lot more people out there that are also being supportive of things that need to be supported. Peirce: Absolutely. Given, your longstanding, presence in the community, as people have come in, have you. worked with other people who have tried to make a difference in the community? Have you tried to foster those kinds of, any sort of other, like, charitable services or anything like that? Has anyone come to you and been like, how do I start this? How do I do this and kinda look to you and have, have you mentored anyone in that regard? Ecke: No, I don&#039 ; t think that I could say that I&#039 ; ve done that. And I don&#039 ; t think that I would certainly know how to tell anybody to start something. I mean, I&#039 ; ve been involved with any number of things, like the Community Resource Center and the YMCA and grower school and any number of things. And so I&#039 ; ve met a lot of other people within the community and I mean, the people that tend to volunteer and give money is just like almost anything in life. You&#039 ; ve got, you know, 20% of the people doing 80% of the work or giving or whatever. I mean, it is, you see the same people over and over again. Peirce: Absolutely. What else do you, where do you see your role in the family moving forward? Where do you see your family moving forward in the community, given that you&#039 ; ve said that it, as the community has grown, you&#039 ; ve kind of, do you still see your family as a vital part of the community you have going forward? Ecke: No, definitely. My brother lives in Encinitas. I live in Encinitas, you know, we both raised our families in Encinitas. My sister lives in North Carolina, and we both still work in the family business. And I don&#039 ; t see that really changing at some point in the future. Some of the kids, my kids, my brother&#039 ; s kids, my sister&#039 ; s kids may wanna come back and be part of the family business. At some points somebody&#039 ; s gonna have to take over things from our, my generation of, people, but pretty much all of those in their twenties. So they&#039 ; re still figuring out what to do with their lives. But, I mean, my father was involved with in the community and pretty much until the day he died and my mother until her Alzheimer&#039 ; s got too bad, was involved with the community. So I never saw my parents just say, okay, I&#039 ; m done now. And I&#039 ; m gonna, you know, go just have fun all day every day and not be involved with my community. So, and my husband grew up in a similar type of in environment. So I don&#039 ; t see us just, you know, retiring and doing, not being involved. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. What would you say has been, your proudest accomplishment? Whether it&#039 ; s in North County or just in general, what, what are you most proud of and in your career, in your life in general? Ecke: Well, I mean the most obvious answer would be my children. I mean, I&#039 ; ve raised two children that are self-sufficient and, you know, both graduated from college. My son&#039 ; s getting his PhD now and, you know, they&#039 ; re supporting themselves and that in of itself is an accomplishment as a parent. I don&#039 ; t, I don&#039 ; t know that-- There is a given thing that I could say that I would point to. I know I&#039 ; m happy that I have been able to be part of the family business in a relevant way. It was something that was very important to my mother because she didn&#039 ; t always feel seen. And so she fought very hard for my sister and myself to be seen and to be heard. And I think it was, something that she was very proud of when, she had daughters that were involved and had a say in what was happening. And so I feel accomplished that I fulfilled something that was important to my mother. Peirce: Absolutely. Ecke: But I don&#039 ; t know that there&#039 ; s a specific, or that I can think of a specific thing that I&#039 ; ve fought for and won on or something. Peirce: I mean it is a difficult question unless you clambered up Everest or something, it&#039 ; s like, well, you know, like I was just curious if there was anything specifically, you&#039 ; re like, oh yeah. You know, like, I won the World Cup or something, but you know what I mean? Ecke: No, none of those things. Peirce: Same here, so it&#039 ; s, yeah. I had one question I did have about the papers that you donated. Was it important for you and your family to have someplace, public for repository of that nature? Or what was, what was the reasoning behind that and why was that important to you guys? Ecke: Well, my mother was a big history buff. That probably was part of it, but-- It just, there was a hundred years of history of our family. Because you know, my grandfather, my grandparents first came down here in the early 1920s, and bought land. And Encinitas was basically a railroad station at that time. And was really one of the founding families. And there was, lots of records because we lived on the ranch, and we had all these various barns and buildings. I don&#039 ; t think much of anything ever got thrown away because you didn&#039 ; t have to throw it away. So there are, you know, receipt books and things from back in 1926, you know, and, I will say that my brother did a yeoman&#039 ; s job when, after he had sold the ranch property and sold the business, he spent a year going through all of those records and consolidating and organizing, a hundred year&#039 ; s worth of stuff. And that was a huge job. And during that time we talked about, well, okay. I mean, it didn&#039 ; t seem right to just throw it away. I mean, but what do you do with it? I mean, that is really the question of what are the choices. So, we talked to various people there and I should remember his name, somebody who is a history professor there at Cal State San Marcos that was also on the board of the, historical society here in Encinitas. And we met with him, and I think it may have been his suggestion that we go and talk to the librarian out there. The other thing that we thought about was, San Diego State, because we had a connection there with my mother, my father went to Ohio state, so that wasn&#039 ; t gonna make sense. I mean, but, you know, Cal State San Marco was here and in North County and we had a connection with it. And so that seemed to make the most sense because it just didn&#039 ; t feel right to just go rent a warehouse and put it in there who was ever gonna do anything with it. And, you know, I think that there is a wealth of knowledge in history, even if it&#039 ; s just mundane things that, you know, receipt books from back in 1926, and you can see what a bag of flower cost or whatever. I mean, you&#039 ; re a historian. And then those are the kinds of things that people can look back on and get real information about what life was like. And you know Cal State San Marcos was the one that was really venturing into new territory because they didn&#039 ; t have any, we were kind of the first one. We were all kinda learning together as to what this meant. I mean, we didn&#039 ; t, I mean, we knew that families gave papers to various learning institutions. I didn&#039 ; t ever know anybody personally who had, or, you know, what, like that really meant. So it&#039 ; s been a cool learning experience. Peirce: Oh, absolutely. As, like the idea of you were saying, like, we didn&#039 ; t know what to do with it. I was just like, in my head, I&#039 ; m like, please don&#039 ; t throw it away, even though I know you didn&#039 ; t, like, I was just like, don&#039 ; t do it. &lt ; laugh&gt ; Well, as we wrap up here, is there anything about you, your life, your family, that you feel like I, we haven&#039 ; t touched on that you kind of wanna talk about today? Ecke: I don&#039 ; t know. There probably is, but nothing that is, jumping, to mind right now. Yeah, I mean, it&#039 ; s been a fun ride. I don&#039 ; t think it&#039 ; s over. I feel very privileged to have been part of, or to be part of this family. it&#039 ; s nice to have history and grounding within a community. Again, my husband&#039 ; s family&#039 ; s from New Orleans and he&#039 ; s like third generation on one side and five generations on the other side. So, he has a similar feeling and it&#039 ; s, there is something very grounding about being a part of someplace. And I feel very privileged to be part of Encinitas, [be]cause I do feel like I have a lot of invested in it and I guess has a lot invested in me and that&#039 ; s, that&#039 ; s been nice. Peirce: Absolutely. Absolutely. I don&#039 ; t, I don&#039 ; t think we could end know a better note than that. Lizbeth Ecke, thank you so much for your time. Thank you so much for giving us your perspective about your family and giving it to this project. My name is Jake Peirce and we are signing off now. Ecke: Great. Thank you. https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en video Property rights reside with the university. Copyrights are retained by the creators of the records and their heirs. This resource is licensed for noncommercial educational use using CC NC-BY 4.0. Please contact Special Collections at archives csusm.edu if you have questions regarding usage of this oral history. Please see the related “Preferred Citation note” for language on citing materials from this collection. Permission to examine Library materials is not authorization to publish or to reproduce the examined material in whole, or in part. 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The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=EckeLizbeth_PeirceJake_2022-04-13.xml EckeLizbeth_PeirceJake_2022-04-13.xml Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Ecke, Lizbeth. Interview April 13, 2022 Description An account of the resource Narrator Lizbeth Ecke is the daughter of San Diego horticulturist Paul Ecke Jr., who contributed to the popularity of the poinsettia plant. Lizbeth Ecke also is on the board for the YMCA and the American Forest Exchange. In this interview, Lizbeth discusses her childhood growing up in Encinitas, CA and working alongside her father in the flower business, and her experience as a women working in a male dominated industry in comparison to her father and brother. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC027-12 Subject The topic of the resource Businesswomen Floriculture Interstate 5 -- California Poinsettias Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2022-04-13 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Lizbeth Ecke Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Jacob Peirce Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Encinitas (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos Language A language of the resource English Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Lizbeth Ecke Community history History Department internship Women's experience