The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-06-02
A PACIFIC COAST CRANK.
Strange History of a Hygienic Phi
losopher of Los Angeles.
He Builds a Tabernacle in Tree-TOp and
WEEDS a Wife by Telegraph-Released
from a Charge of Insanity.

known in Los Angeles as the Philosopher of
Mountain View, in the Cahuenga mountains,
was brought to the City of Angels on charge
of insanity preferred by one of his neighbors,
ranchman named e. w. Doss. He was de-
clared insane and was ordered to be commit
ted to the Napa Insane Asylum. His coun-
sci obtained rehearing and this week an
other examination took place, which re-
suited in the reversal of the former decision
and the prisoners discharge as sane.
These are the court facts in the case, but
the history of Shaw on this coast covers
twelve years, and is certainly paralleled by
no other within my knowledge, prolific as
California has been in cranks and adventur-
| ers of all kinds, Shaw is relative of the
aged Chief-justice Shaw, of Massachusetts,,
and comes of an excellent Vermont family.
He came out to Los Angeles about twelve
years ago because of weakness of the lungs
Physicians assured him at the East that he
had only ghost of a chance for recovery,
and that that chance lay in an equable eli
mate like Southern California. He came, he
saw, he recovered, and at once, in the ex
uberance of his gratitude to the climate that
had restored him to health, he set about de-
ViSlng sanitary resort Wnere ObneTS inlSHt
be healed He was a physician himself,
which aided him greatly in his plans.
Backed by letters from many wealthy resi-
dents of Los Angeles, he started for
Europe to secure subscribers to
the stock of a hygienic home, where
| colonists were to live on diet of vegetables
and return to the primitive methods of life
recommended in eloquent French but never
| practiced by Jean Jacques Rousseau. In
England he found a few converts but the
| scheme was not a success Distance did not
| lend enchantment to the view when hard
coin was to be invested, and so the philoso
| pher returned, disguised with the effort to
| wean the people of the effete monarc HES
from their bad sanitary customs and their
passion for the conventional ways OF the
| world.
Failure only served to make the enthusi-
asts convictions more deeply rooted. His
wife left him because of his wild talk and his
erratic life; and from that time he shook off
the dust of civilization and the haunts OF
men and put into practice his theories OF the
bought tract of land in the Nichols Canyon,
nine miles west of Los Ange-
les which he had christened Noun
tain View. There he hoped to see rise
the structure of his dreams the sanitary hos
| pital the fame of which would have gone to
the ends of the EARTH Instead he built him
rough scaffolding in the top of a wide
branching tree, and there took up his abode
To guard against any intrusion, he was wont
to haul up the ladder by which he climbed
to his retreat In this aerial home he "loafed
| and invited the soul, !" in a fashion that would
have appealed to the soul of Walt Whitman.
He wrote long dispositions the origin of
the species and the causes which have led
man to decline from his pristine vigor ard
| noble structure. These ne sent to the local
paper they were published over his initials,
| and excited much interest in the community
where the writer's history was known. l
| have seen many of these papers, and can
| truly say that they were no more extrava-
CANT in style or more radical in thought than
| many essays on this subject contributed by
DIR. Felix Oswald, and published in the lead
ing scientific magazines.
The papers also excited comment where
the writer was unknown, and among those
who read and admired them New Jer-
| sew school-mistress named Margaret Carey
Wright. She wrote letters TO the philoso-
| pher, asking further explanation of his
| views and q warm correspondence ensued
| Shaw was affiuent in leisure, and wrote let
tiers that in length and eloquence would
have done no discredit to the famous cor
respondents of last century. Meanwhile
when he began to feel the STRINGS of love,
he came down from his tree-tcp to solid
earth; built HIM a rough shanty under his
| tree but modified it by leaving both ends
| open for the free air of heaven to blow
| through and maintain his sanitary equilib
rum Here he indicted epistles to his fair
! inamoratea across the continent. He mingled
love and hygiene in such skiilful proper
tons that the woman was conquered before
she knew it. He asked her in many varia-
tions of Ossian's serenade to come with him
and be his bride; he demonstrated that the
life OF the world had nothing to compensate
for the delight of two souls living in
| loving communion with nature, feeding on
| the bounty OF the land and vexed by none
of the petty cares that absorb so large a share
| 81. 4 I'm, ha
rung all the variations, and he painted in
such glowing colors his mountain paradise
| within sound of the sea, made ambrosial by
the balsam of pine and musical by the
! drowsy murmuring of the bee that his dis
tant mistress was moved to consent to his
suit.
AS the philosopher was original or moth
| ing, he set about getting married is a style
as far removed from the stereotyped meth
DDS of the world as possible He could not
leave his mountain home, and he desired to
have the union made so firm that not even
the temptations of long overland Journey
| would have power to weaken it. SO lie hit
on the telegraph as his instrument On
June 4, 1879, this message came over the
wires:
NEWARK, N. j., June A. 1879.
To Frederick NJ. Shaw, Los Angeles CAL, in care
of Major Kinley.
Win you take Margaret Carey Wright, of this
city, now present, 60 be your welded wifei
| (Slgnedl REV. @. 8. Corr.
The response of the laconic philosopher
was: II will" There were two witnesses to
this ceremony of the future, and the bride
groom departed for his retreat, flushed with
the JOY of happy and triumphant love- 1t
had been his custom to go about clad in
very scanty wardrobe of red flannel, but OH
this occasion he invested in coat, shoes and
hat, and set about preparing for his bride.
Days heightened into weeks and weeks into
months, but she came not, and the philoso-
pher became more moody and retiring than
ever, more respondent oil the future of the
species At last one day she appeared in the
editorial sanctum of the gallant Major who
| had nfficiated as one of tbs hest men al the