mutual appreciation of the arts and pursued a romantic if hackneyed notion of
the artist as a poverty-stricken garrett dweller
devoted more to his chosen
medium than the mundanities of daily life (although Oscar Wilde was noted to
have remarked upon visiting the Club in 1882, “
I never saw so many well-
dressed, well-fed, business-looking Bohemians in my life
.”) There’s always been
a long-running pretension of artistic patronage among political figures (perhaps
as true today as it was in the 19th century) enamored with the myth of the
starving artist, and it soon became apparent that the meager salaries of a
journalist could be easily bought by both political and industrial funding. The
result being that by the turn of the century, the likes of Ambrose Bierce and
composer Louis Glass were hobnobbing regularly with the likes of Henry
Morgan and WIlliam Randolph Hearst.
Eventually by the 1940s, owing to frequent visits by such prominent entities
as Presidents Herbert Hoover and Calvin Coolidge,
artists represented only a
minute fraction of the Grove’s regular visitors, with Senators, bankers and
prominent diplomats soon came to dominate the booze-soaked discourse and
atmosphere. Alliances of global significance were forged; plans were laid; and
plots were hatched that came to designate Bohemian
Grove as less a relaxing
weekend getaway as some of the most significant blueprints for social
engineering as we know it.
In 1929, a 40 foot statue of an owl, sculpted by noted Armenian-American
sculptor (and Grove president) Haig Patigian, came to serve as a central focus of
Bohemian Grove and has been associated as the most visible emblem of this
secretive clique ever since. Most notably, it serves as the backdrop for the
Grove’s climactic “Cremation of Care”
ceremony, a dramatization intended to
symbolize the sacrifice of the cares, anxieties and worries of day to day
existence (presumably, only of those affecting beleaguered servants of
international finance.) The rite has since been enhanced by advanced electronics
and pyrotechnic displays and, most dramatically for many years, the stentorian
voice of
Grove member Walter Cronkite; with leaked video footage giving the
impression of something between a pagan ritual, an elaborate high school drama
production and a laser light show (one quote regarding the Grove’s penchant for
dramatics has been noted as stating that there are far more cost effective ways to
waste energy budgets than on a fraternity talent show; but then again, the
average American’s tax dollars are typically spent in any number of irrelevant
ways and that politicians need creative expense budgets as much as anyone else.)
It’s worth noting here that the owl has a myriad different meanings from
culture to culture. While for the Greeks, the bird was most strongly associated
with the figure of Athena, goddess of wisdom and learning, for cultures
including the Egyptians and the Celts, the owl represented the underworld; the
overseer of souls through the subterranean hallways of death. And given that
many of the top players over the years at Bohemian Grove have been linked to
not only the shadowy echelons of power and control but assassination and
wholesale murders under the guise of national wars and elaborately pre-staged
“accidents,” it is perhaps more fitting that this latter symbolism be kept in mind.
Of somewhat curious interest are the ‘encampments’ (a term sometimes
found in Masonic and Masonic-derived circles in reference to a gathering of
Masons) found at Bohemian Grove. These are primarily patrilineal
quarters
assigned to participants based on their particular status or field of industry,
typically assigned with a self-effacing or jovial nickname; for example, the “Hill
Billy Camp” is assigned to banking, political or media figures (typically with a
net worth in excess of $15 Million). Others have included the Owl’s Nest (for
presidents and military/defense contractors); Lost Angels (banking and defense
Contractors); Cave Man (education and think-tanks, as well as oil companies and
the media); Uplifters (corporate executives); Stowaway (oil
companies, big
business and Rockefellers); Silverado squatters (big business and defense
contractors); Hideaway (think tanks and military/defense contractors); and
Sempervirens (California corporations). It is in these encampments (in 2007,
there were some 118) that contacts are forged and plans laid in the musk of the
cabins reeking of 18-year old single malt Scotch and smug vainglory.
It is presumably in one of these very cabins in July of 1942 that plans were
initially hatched between Dr. Ernest Lawrence, Dr. Robert Oppenheimer and the
Hungarian-born Edward Teller, as well as various military and defense officials
that would eventually lead to the Manhattan Project; an undertaking costing in
excess of $2 billion dollars that led to the development of the Atomic bomb.
Grove members are understandably proud of an achievement that cost the death
of over 135,000 individuals—the vast majority, innocent civilians—and rarely
miss a chance to regale newcomers to the festivities with countless tales heard
second, third, fourth, and fifth-hand about what
really went on beneath the
whispering of the pines when Standard Oil money met U.C. Berkeley hands to
fund the decisive American victory of WWII.
It should be noted that the Grove even has their own patron saint in the form
of St. John of Nepomuk, a martyred fourteenth century saint who was tortured
and drowned by the Bohemian King Wenceslaus in the Vltava River rather than
reveal the confessional secrets of the Bohemian Queen. Grove members claim
that the figurehead represents the vow of secrecy that each member is sworn to
uphold. Yet in light of the figure’s symbolic placement directly overlooking the
Russian River, one wonders if it serves as a warning to would-be trespassers of
the fate that may occur should they accidentally spill on to the secrets of the
Grove.
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