Eaton Fire, Altadena, California

I don’t really have any known links to people impacted directly as victims of the Palisades Fire or the Eaton Fire in Altadena, except for this string of connection.  In Octavia Butler’s 1993 book “Parable of the Sower,” the story includes how Los Angeles was ravaged by fire in 2025.   Butler, who died in 2006 at 58, is marked by a footstone etched with a quote from “Parable of the Sower,” among her most famous novels: “All that you touch, you change. All that you change, changes you.”  She is buried in the Mountain View Cemetery in Altadena—the same cemetery as my maternal grandparents, Violet and Hiram Rogers. 

https://apnews.com/article/octavia-butler-los-angeles-wildfires-cemetery-eaf2ee7921561355d632d0e381099ed6

 

1959, My First Camping Trip, Big Pine, California

This is the closest I ever made it to climbing Mt. Whitney.  It would be interesting if the "east side" experts here recognize any of the views or locations.  

This was my first camping trip with my parents and I remember my parents saying we were camping at Glacier Lodge.  I believe this site is the Big Pine Creek Campground adjacent to Glacier Lodge, just outside Big Pine, California.  I don't know what the ownership or relationship of the campground to the lodge was in 1959.  I researched it some, and it was interesting to learn the glamorous history of Glacier Lodge, and fate of the lodge and its replacement.     

All-in-all, it was a great trip with some hiccups.  

It rained during this trip, and my WW II Army veteran dad was using a dark green Army surplus canvas tent.  When it started raining hard in the middle of the night, he made me get out and help dig a drainage trench around the tent.  Inside the tent, he told me not to touch the roof of the tent, and then I did, causing a leak inside.   Hence, I learned why not to touch it.  My father was not pleased.  

I don't think this was my mother's style of camping.  She doesn't have her normal happy smile on.  As a family, I don't think we ever tent camped like this again.  We only tent cabins and RVs after this trip.      

I was four years old at the time, and the VW in the photo was our new (white) 1959 Bug.  I remember the car well.  Not long afterward, we moved to Tucson, Arizona.  My parents would drive across the desert at night to visit family in So. Cal. in it while I curled up in the cubby behind the back seat to sleep.  The bright red Coca Cola metal ice chest stayed in family use until the late 1970s.  It was a workhorse of a cooler.        

Some history of Glacier Lodge: 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glacier_Lodge 

David and Dorothy Stone

Our neighbor's campsite.

1959 Volkswagen Bug (white)

1972 Buena High School, Ventura, Calif. Senior Photo

 

I graduated from high school in June 1972, so I presume this photo was taken in the fall of 1971.  

Jeff Holland Photography on East Main Street in Ventura was the place to get the the photos taken.  I went with my mother for the sitting, and later to review the proofs.  As with any set of proofs, some you like and some deserve going into "round file" forever.

This photo was not picked to be my senior photo.  It was supposed to be trashed.  My mother thought it was fine, but I didn't like the way my bottom lip was pushed out as compared to all the other photos.  Yet, this was the final product and the the one that ended up in the yearbook too.  

Fifty plus years later, does it still bother me?  Not as much as before.  But I still remember being very disappointed about it at the time.  

January 4, 2025 Photo Dump

Scanning some photographs today.  Most of these are from Polaroids or matt finished photos, hence the clarity isn't the best.  

Here's what I know about each one.

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Mom, Dorothy Stone, probably mid-late 1970s while in Palm Springs with my father, Raymond Stone.

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Ray and Dottie Stone, at our home at 10876 Galvin, Ventura, CA celebrating something.  Likely my father's birthday on June 6 in the mid to late 1970s.

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Probably the fall of 1975 or winter of early 1976.  Me, crashed out on my bed at our Ventura home with new puppy Sandy.  Jeannette and I had take a quick trip, maybe even a day trip, from Ventura to Morro Bay.  While walking on a mostly empty beach, this puppy came up to us. We asked around a lot for anyone who might know the puppy, and couldn't find anyone who recognized it or any friends who had puppies.  We couldn't find anywhere to leave the puppy, so I took it home to Ventura after leaving information with others on how to find me so I could return it.  On the way home, we named it Sandy (since it was found on the beach).  It was a cocker spaniel mix, heavy on the cocker spaniel.  We never heard from anyone about the dog.  

My mother bonded with it very strongly.  So much so, that 2-3 years later when Jeannette and I bought our first home, my mom didn't want to give it up--and we let her keep it.  

Sandy in the backyard of the Galvin Street home.  

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Looks like my 21st birthday celebration at our home in Ventura.  My mom, me, and girlfriend (future wife) Jeannette Jarvis.  

Is that leftover steak on the table?  

Oh, the shame!  Hahaha!!

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This is Aldine and Ernest "Ern" Sillers.  He came from Nova Scotia, Canada, and if I recall correctly, she was from Boston or close by.  She certainly had the New England accent throughout her life.  They never had children.  He was actually my mother's uncle, Violet's brother.  

"Uncle Ern" was a Father in the Episcopal church, rising to the level of Bishop.  Uncle Ern was fun and funny guy.  A quick, respectful, and quiet wit.  He planted churches that still survive.  The one I remember best is St Marks Episcopal Church, 10354 Downey Ave, Downey, CA 90241, http://stmarksdowney.org . 

We usually went to there home for Thanksgiving (just behind the church at 8355 Bigby Ave, Downey, CA 90241).  After the meal and while Aunt Aldine and my mother would clean up, Uncle Ern would take me for a walk around and through the church telling me interesting and funny stories.  

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The photo below was marked on the back, Thanksgiving 1977.  The two most recognizable people in it for me is my Uncle Ernest "Ern" Sillers, and seated to his left with her hand on her chin is his sister and my maternal grandmother Violet Rodgers (mom's mother).  

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Anna Creelman in front of her home in Camarillo, California.  Her husband was Aubrey Creelman.  They originally owned a number of acres of land in Camarillo for growing avocados.  I don't know how my mother knew them.  I think they were close friends with my grandmother or grandfather.  

We visited them a time or two a year.  By then, they had sold off most of their orchards, and only had an acre or two left.  Dad would get as many avocados as he wanted.  Aubrey was a typical farmer/rancher, smart, witty, and cleverly handy with tools.  I still have and use some of tools that he marked with green paint.  

This one is marked July 4, 1977.  I don't recognize the location.  In it is my mother, Dorothy Stone, Fred Petrasek, and Virginia Petrasek.  My mother and Virginia went to U.C. Santa Barbara together, and were truly like sisters from different parents.   We visited them often at thier home in Sherman Oaks.  Laura was my age.  Allan is a year or two younger.  They are the ones who let me go on most of their summer 1969 vacation in a Winnebago.  We went to the east coast, saw the launch of Apollo 11, and then I eventually flew home from Providence, Rhode Island.  

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Graduation from Buena High School, Ventura, California, June 1972.

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Unknown formal dance or prom in Ventura, California.  "Proud mom" photos.   The scanned photos don't show it well, but my tuxedo was very dark Navy blue in color.  I don't recall who I went with or which dance this was though.  

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One my mother did mark was this photo from May 1974.  The young lady is Karen Grahek.  We dated for a while, and I loved hanging out with her and her family, who were some good pranksters.  I think in another post, I showed an embroidered shirt of my blue 1973 VW Sport Bug that she did for me.  Like people do, we went our separate ways in life, and both became our own.  

Oddly enough, it wasn't until the destructive Thomas Fire Ventura in December 2017 that I learned that her and her husband's home was just a couple houses away from my parent's former home.  Sadly, both homes were lost.  My parent's had passed away by then, but Karen and her husband lost everything.  

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1975 Chevrolet LUV (Light Utility Vehicle) pickup truck.  I bought it new, and very stripped, from the Chevrolet dealer in Ojai, California.  Jeannette was with me.  I ended up modifying it a lot, as you can see.  White spoke rims, and slight lift in the rear, and an awesome BMB Camper Shell (Fillmore, CA).  

I was part of a truck club called Lil Truckers Ltd.  The jacket I'm wearing was the club jacket.  

The wrinkle on the side of the truck in front of the rear wheel well happened in the parking lot of Save-On Drugs, at Victoria/Telegraph Roads in Ventura.  Jeannette had borrowed my truck, and as she backed out of a stall to leave, someone else backed out of their spot and tagged the truck.  I played hell getting the truck fixed by the guy who did it.  It took a while, but finally got it squared away.  

My father's small aluminum fishing boat is in the background.

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Some Polaroid photos my parents (Ray and Dorothy Stone) took of each other on the patio of their home at 10876 Galvin, Ventura, CA.  I'm guessing about 1980.  Sandy, the dog, had aged a few years.  

The patio cover they had installed was large and really nice.  The folding chairs in the background of one of the photos were aluminum framed with redwood slats.  I don't think I've ever sat in a more comfortable folding patio chair.  

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Probably about 1981-1983, my father relaxing at their home at 941 Scenic Way Drive, Ventura (the one that burned down in the Thomas Fire after they sold it and had passed away).  This was in the "den" that was on the south side of the house.  From that vantage, you could look out the back sliding glass door and enjoy a great view of the Santa Clara River Valley with the Pacific Ocean in the distance.  A nice way to fall asleep.  

David Stone, Ventura Police Department

My recent post about an electrical extension cord was rooted in a response to a Facebook post on a Ventura lifestyle page   

One person who replied to my comment originally thought I was a different David Stone   Yeah, it’s a common name and it happens.  We actually had two working at Lumber City for a while.  One was me, and the other was a Ventura Police Officer.

Lumber City hired off duty police officers to work security during anticipated busy times of the week.  He worked there some of the same time I did and was one of the VPD officers who swayed me into a career in law enforcement.  

He and I actually first met and laughed about our common name one night at a crash at Telegraph and Mills, when a DUI he was chasing smashed into the back of my van while I was stopped at a red light.  

Years later when I let him know I was hired in Fresno and was heading to the police academy, he gave me his baton with his/our name scratched on it.  He had quickly scratched his name on it at his academy when he realized the instructors were making the cadets throw their batons in a pile and he wanted to be able to identify his baton.  He thought I might have the same challenge and wanted me to be ready.  I carried it through the academy and patrol until our department switched to the side handle baton (PR-24).

I still have it on display in my workshop.  

And, I just realized these photos are taken on one of two rock solid workbench kits I bought at Lumber City.