Spelunking

and other Vignettes from Drew's Boyhood Days

LOOK BACK IN OJAI with Drew Mashburn Contributed on behalf of the Ojai Valley Museum

Spelunking: There once was a tunnel that ran under the street in downtown Ojai by a creek bed. When I was a young teenager in the mid-1960s, the tunnel ended behind a Pharmacy in the Arcade. What made the tunnel a bit scary was the fact that it doglegs. Why was it scary you ask? Because my buddies and I would gingerly walk through it so as not to stumble over the rocks in the dark until the mid-way point where it bends. Back in those days, the dentist whose practice was next to it didn’t dig us kids using her stairs to get down to the creek. So, we had to be sorta stealth-like. Once we got to the tunnel’s midway point (the dogleg as we called it), light began appearing from the other end. But many times, just before we began to see light, older teenage boys would be hiding in the darkness. As we approached they’d start screaming and scare the pee-waddin’ outta us! We’d take off runnin’ for the opening behind the Arcade, then scamper up the steep, weed-covered creek-bank. Back then, there wasn’t an “Arcade Plaza”. In fact, the back of the Arcade was pretty sucky-looking. We didn’t care though, because we had just survived a cheap thrills adventure.

Frank Ayers’ home was on Grand Avenue close to where the lower end of Park Road joins it. I have no idea how large a spread Mr. Ayers owned, but it was quite a few acres and the west side of it was bordered by a barranca when I was a kid in the 1950s and ‘60s attending Topa Topa Elementary School — go, Gophers! (some fool changed it to the Falcons after I was outta there). The barranca ran from Grand Avenue all the way up to Mountain View Avenue, which is the street in front of Topa Topa, behind the homes on the east side of Grandview Avenue. My buddies and I would sometimes use the barranca like a path to get to and from school rather than Grandview. It was gently sloping so it presented an easy walk and a fun place to explore, especially when it had a little water in it. It had pollywogs and little frogs in it at times, which caught our attention, of course. But, we all knew that Mr. Ayers had a HUGE ranch dog that was meaner than sin. Back in those days, there was only an open agricultural field between his home and the barranca. One time, after school, we used the barranca. When we got to the lower end of it, which was nearest Mr. Ayers home, we often sprinted to keep from getting attacked by the totally imaginary meanest dog on the face of this planet! I was running at full speed behind my dog-avoiding buds one time as they all ran across Grand Avenue and down Park Road. When I was at the end of the barranca, I forgot that there was one strand of barbed-wire that stretched across the barranca. I caught it just under my nose and above my upper lip. My feet kept going, but my head didn’t. My feet went up in the air and I crashed down on my back with a gash below my nose by one of the barbs. Sweat from my exertion went into the cut. Man, did it burn! I couldn’t even roll over. I just laid there in a heap bleeding and quite shaken in the dirt of the barranca. After about five minutes, my buddies came back and got me up. I told them what stupid mistake I had made. Looking back, I sure wish I had improved upon truth and told them Mr. Ayers’ dog had attacked me.

“BEN HUR” starring Charlton Heston was a classic film. Several of us E. Matilija Street boys, including Nick Robertson, walked into town to view it at the Ojai Theater in February of 1962. I was 10 years old. The chariot races were spectacular! So spectacular that Nick (the Brain Trust of us adventure-loving lads) came up with the idea of building and racing chariots. All of us stole some of our fathers’ wood for the construction process. Basically, the chariots were just plywood decks with an axle and wooden wheels. We attached

yokes to the front of them so two dudes could pull the third that was standing on the deck holding on for dear life to a rope that was attached to the deck. Nick’s parents had a wide, grassy front yard that made a perfect coliseum for chariot racing. If I recall correctly, the starting and finish line was the concrete walk to the front door. Nick was a year older than I, so he usually teamed up with Mark McGuire and Larry Wiser who were his age. I usually teamed up with Nick’s little brothers Drew and Win. My little brother usually teamed up (only serious contestants in their own minds) with Dale Cundiff and, I think, Kit Nichols. Other neighborhood boys joined in the fun too. At first, all we did was run as fast as we could around our oval track pulling the chariots. Drivers oftentimes fell off because the chariots lacked sides. We didn’t care. It was a blast! After a few days of racing, we decided the drivers should be fighting one another as they were being wildly pulled. That’s how Charlton did it. There was all kinds of bumping, shoving, punching, and crashing going on. It really got competitive and teams got a bit under one another’s collars. I mean, this was serious business! So serious that we decided to add cutting-blades to the wheels of the chariots like in the film. All we did was drive big ol’ 16d nails through the wooden wheels. I’m surprised nobody got a foot taken off at the ankle. This was about the time that Nick’s father, Jack, shut us down for good. We protested vehemently, but it was no use.

I enjoy hiking at the Ojai Valley Land Conservancy’s “Ventura River Preserve,” but that’s about the closest I get to wandering through barrancas nowadays. My present chariot is my 1986 Suzuki Samurai that can often be seen scooting around the Ojai Valley. I wouldn’t trade to grow up any place else for any amount of money!

by Drew Mashburn