Greasy Kulture #16

Greasy Kulture #16 should have hit you subscribers by now, and is available online for purchase at the GK website.

The cover says it all - coverage on Meatball's "Hell On Wheels" event, Born Free II, and from France - Linkert Attacks. Plus, all the great feature bikes you've come to expect between the covers of GK every issue, and #16 is right there again with 9 very cool rides!

Oh yeah, I have a good column on Harley's frame furnace brazing in the mix, too.

Order online now, or better yet, SUBSCRIBE! You know you want to........
http://www.greasykulture.com/buy/back-issues/

Top 40 Motorcycle Blog Award........

Applied Machete was picked as one of the "Top 40" motorcycle blogs for 2010, by Online Schools.

You can see a list of the Top 40 Motorcycle blog picks, and the criteria they used to decide the winners here:

http://www.onlineschools.org/top_motorcycles/#Applied_Machete

Thank you very much!

1039 Ardmore Ave. followup.....

I just got back from Sturgis, and of course, one of the first "catch up" things I had to do was to sift thru all the Emails I got while I was gone. Not bad, I only had 60 or so to go thru. Among the offers to make my tits bigger, and my penis longer/fatter, I had these additional bits of information sent to me on the Psychedelic Love Temple. Read along, and learn some more..........

I really need to thank Jahluv for finding this for us, and the other information here he's passed on. Jahluv was parusing this book - Black Gold, The Lost Archives of Jimi Hendrix, when he ran across this entry you'll see below. Basically, it's a notation on a filming/music performance that Hendrix filmed inside the Temple. It also says that some of this footage shot has been used in several Hendrix documentarys. Now that you know what the inside of the Temple looks like, has anybody actually seen any of this footage, or where it can be located, or seen online? I've never seen it, so pass on any info to me if you have.

Obviously, for Hendrix to want to shoot this inside the Temple, it must have been a pretty well-known location in all the right hip circles then, and not only to the hippies and the bikers. It also must have been a real trip to have seen Hendrix and The Experience playing in the "concert" area of the Temple, I can only imagine! Most importantly, the archive entry gives us a positive location and address for the Psychedelic Love Temple - it being 1039 SOUTH Ardmore AVENUE......

The archive entry from Black Gold, mentioning the Valentino Mansion, 1039 S. Ardmore Ave, Hendrix, and the demolition of the Temple.

This really surprised me, that in the past, when it was known as the Ardmore Mansion, it was once owned by Rudolph Valentino. This had to have been his first mansion, because he also owned a 2nd mansion later on in the Whitley Heights section of L.A., which was demolished (along with the original Hollywood High, and many other historically significant houses and buildings that people tried to save) when the Hollywood Freeway was originally built, and later, in 1925, built his most famous Falcon Lair at the mouth of Benedict Canyon - also demolished in '06 for an entirely new mansion.

Also, I found out that Harry Houdini's Mom lived on S. Ardmore Ave, a couple blocks North of the Ardmore Mansion/Temple at the same time period as Valentio did. Also, Jahluv said his Grandma lived up until '68 on S. Normandie, just 8 blocks from the Temple, and she said that the neighborhood back then was integrated, but the majority population was still white. I'm thinking that "El Jake" was getting into the "Baron's Punch" when he wrote his story for Choppers Magazine, and said it was close to the center of the Black Area of L.A. See, you can't always believe what you read as fact.

An article, dated Jan. 24, 1967 that Jahluv found snooping around in the L. A. Times database, on a trip to the Long Beach Library. I've highlighted the bust at the Temple in the red block. Read the whole article, it's kinda humorous...

I also recieved an Email from a "scottg", who said that his Mom was sure the Temple was the place she spent time at in the '60's. His Mom grew up in the W. L.A./Beverly Hills area, and knew quite a few of the MC clubs/members from the Hollywood area. She said that the Temple at that time was owned by a guy who went by "The Duke Of Earl"/"Little Earl". He was going to pass on my blog to her, and see if she'd like to send along more info to me. I haven't heard anything from his Mom yet, but we'll see......

I also got an Email from Harpoon, who said that The Psychedelic Love Temple is his favorite Roth/Mann painting, and he almost went to the Brucker Auction at the Peterson Automotive Museum in May of '06 to bid on it. He was sad he didn't, because it went for the least amount of money of all the paintings. Actually, all those original Roth/Mann paintings went for a song at that auction, I think that the highest one went for around 6g's.

Harpoon wants to "hunt down" the Temple's site next trip I make out to L.A. He also related to me that Droopy and he had spoken about the Temple at El Camino last year. Droopy (what a surprise!) said he had been to the Temple back then, and used to (again, what a surprise!) party for days on end there.

A map from Google, showing the present day location of 1039 S. Ardmore Ave. L.A, CA. I had found this location on previous Google serches, but wasn't sure if this was indeed the right address/area where the Temple originally stood. It was.

The Temple was located in what is now the Wilshire Center/Koreatown area of L.A. The major boundry streets are Olympic Blvd. to the N., W. Pico Blvd. to the S., S. Normandie Ave. to the E., and Western Ave. to the W., if you'd like to check it out yourself sometime.

Here's what's there today - 1039 S. Ardmore Ave.

If the Temple was razed in early '70 as the Hendrix Black Gold archive entry states, it must have been a vacant lot for almost 15 years. The real estate development company who built this duplex didn't do so until '86-'88.

In my previous post, I stated that the Temple sat on a piece of property that was elevated above Ardmore Ave. In the Above photo, you can see exactly how high that was. It looks like they dug back into the property's elevation for the parking area, and built the duplex on the back end of the plot. Look how high it is from the blacktop, to the bottom of the duplexes! If that's the case, the Temple was larger in size, and higher in elevation than it appears in photos, and the property it sat on was a pretty good chunk of land in and of itself.

This property is also listed as 1039 S. Ardmore Ave. by the development company who bought the property that The Temple sat on. It's a 54 unit condo that they built (also in the '80's), after the duplex. I can't find out if this building sits on what was part of the original Ardmore Mansion grounds, or not. It may have been adjoining properties that they acquired and razed, as this building extends from the Mansion property, to the end of the block.

In his Emails, Jahluv expressed the same thoughts that I have wondered about all these years as well. If The Temple has had such a famous and storied history, dating back to the late 1800's, why aren't there more photos of its exterior in existence? Surely there have to be photos taken by the "underground press" of the 60's out there, and surely there have to be photos from Valentino's occupation of the mansion. But, as you can see, they appear to be as rare as hen's teeth. I'm not giving up on this one, so as before, any and all information/photos is most appreciated - especially from somebody who "was there". Send them on to:

irishrich@shamrockfabrication.com

and, I'll post it here.

1039 Ardmore Ave.

This is a photo of the original David Mann acrylic on paper Psychedelic Love Temple. Note that the bike is yellow, but the Roth print has an orange bike instead. Also, even though Roth's name is prominent on all of Mann's poster prints, David would always "sneak in" his name somewhere in every painting. In this case, his name is across the front of the rider's jacket, right above his left hand. Sometimes Mann's name was in a really obscure place, you have to look hard sometimes....

I'm sure by now, everybody is familiar with the Ed Roth/David Mann painting The Psychedelic Love Temple. I thought you'd all like to know a little background history on the inspiration for Mann's painting, and see a picture of the actual "Temple".........

....and here it is, The "Psychedelic Love Temple", 1039 Ardmore Ave. Los Angeles, CA.

This is the only image that I know of that shows the Temple, and I pulled the movie still from the 1967 Roger Coreman/American Intl. LSD exploitation movie The Trip, written by Jack Nicholson, and starring Peter Fonda, Bruce Dern, and Susan Strasberg as the main characters. Supposedly, the Temple was used as a backdrop for several other movies of the time, but I can't recall seeing it any other time on film. The Temple appears in the first 5 minutes of the movie, and there were also scenes shot in and around the Temple front exterior area and interior. As a sidenote here, Nicholson originally wrote the screenplay for The Trip with himself in mind for the lead part. It was at Coreman's insistance that Fonda be cast in the lead, and Nicholson finally agreed with that to sell his screenplay.

Here's what I've been able to find out about the history of the Temple. The Temple was built in 1881, at the end of the California Gold Rush. It was known early on as the Ardmore Mansion, then sometime in its history was home to a spiritualist for 33 years, and known as the San Souci Culture Temple then. In the early to late '60's it was still listed in the L.A. phonebook as the Ardmore Arms, so it must have been converted over to apartments at some time. It's during the early '60's when it was finally abandoned.

I remember skipping out of High School at lunch time in '67, for the rest of the afternoon, to go Downtown to see The Trip on the big movie screen. It's an OK '60's timepiece movie, and you can find it on Amazon.com . It also has a good soundtrack done by The Electric Flag, credited in the movie as The American Music Band, who's members included Mike Bloomfield, Buddy Miles, and Nick Gravenites.

A photo from the Choppers article, showing the big LOVE/sEx letters painted in the middle of Ardmore Ave., in front of the house.

Almost a year after seeing The Trip, the April '68 issue of Roth's Choppers Magazine came in the mail, and in it was an article written by "El Jake" (possibly Jake Jacobs?) entitled "Turn On With The Walls". As I went thru the story and accompanying photos, I realized that the "Psychedelic Love Temple" he was talking about was the same place that I had seen in The Trip. I further realized the movie, the article, and the subject of one of David Mann's more recent paintings for Roth's posters were all one one in the same.

Here's a shot I pulled from the movie, of the same LOVE/sEx lettering on the pavement. From this shot, the camera pans from the street up the hill to the front of the house. Notice the movie prop bikes parked in front of the Temple are Suzukis and Hondas, not outlaw choppers.


Now, I'm going to put together both some information from the Choppers article, and some other pieces of the story I've found. It seems that the Barons M/C for some reason left San Diego sometime in '65, and migrated up to L.A. Thru word of mouth, they found out about the Temple, which at that time was abandoned, and already a centerpiece in the "acid tests" going on in L.A. then - LSD being legal at the time. It was also known as a hippie "crash pad" of sorts as well. The Choppers article also pointed out that the Temple was located "...near the center of Los Angeles' black section".

The Barons (later known as the Barons Of The EARTH MC), led by a guy named Rowland, decided to move into the Temple in '65, and managed to run electrical power, and soon after, water into the abandoned building. How they accomplished this is any body's guess. Now, the Barons as far as I can tell, weren't a 1%er outfit, but more "hippie bikers" with a little harder edge. Once the utilities were in place, it became even more of a party central than before. The Temple became a commune of sorts, with everybody from wandering hippies, to artists and musicians, to both local and national MC's all dropping in all hours of the day and night.

Outside of the core residents (the Barons) people stayed for a few days, or a few months. Rowland always had local bands set up in the central round "great room" playing rock & roll almost every night. One of the bands who played there regularly, known as United Gas, then Christopher (their first album Christopher, for Metromedia Records, had the group's album cover shot inside the Temple) recalled that on any given night ".....hundreds of motorcycles would be parked at the curbs" for the partys. The band also recalled the "Baron's Punch" that was always available. It was made from Kool-Ade in a large container, with everybody who attended tossing in whatever various hallucinogens they happened to have with them. From there, the other guests were free to drink from the "punch bowl" as little or as much as they wanted. Sounded like you had to have a pretty good head to handle that mixture. The band also said that the bottom of the container "....looked like mud" at the end of the night, from the resedue of all the caps and tabs that had been tossed in.

This photo also comes from the Choppers article. It shows Baron Rowland, the head of the Barons MC, and the Temple, standing in the "great room" - the big, round, central area of the Temple you see in photo #2 .

There are a lot of holes in the story that I haven't been able to fill in, and there is one thing that I've always wondered about - how the hell were the Barons and their "guests" able to live there, and pull this whole thing off for 3-4 years??? How were they able to go almost non-stop like they did without running afoul of the Police, the City of Los Angeles, the Building Code Dept., the utility companies, and the neighborhood itself (it being soon after the famous Watts riots of '65)? From personal experience back then with the LAPD and the LACO Sheriffs, I can't understand why they didn't raid the place constantly. Both Dept.'s intolerance and subsequent treatment of anybody that was a minority, a hippie, biker, or anybody else they determined not to be an "upstanding citizen" is legendary. They in no uncertain terms delt out their own brand of law enforcement. But, from what I understand about "squatter's rights", unless the actual landowner objects to the presence of people on his property, there isn't much the local law enforcement can do to evict the tenants.

I haven't been able to find out any info after late '68 as to what eventually happened to the Temple, or its residents.When I got to L.A. in '70, I asked around about the Temple, but nobody seemed to know about it anymore, which isn't surprising. By that time the whole counterculture scene in L.A. was on its last legs, and fading fast, mostly due to Police crackdowns and the infusion of heroin,speed, and coke that was replacing the hallucinogens and reefer of the past. The Flower Power Days had long since wilted. Unless I run across somebody who was actually there, I'll probably never know. I guess that's what legends and tales are made of, and I guess that's why I'm writing this for you today.

Here's the same room in another movie still I pulled. The area of the room that Rowland is standing in, in the previous picture is just to the left of this scene. Here Bruce Dern is introducing Peter Fonda to Dennis Hopper (the "guru" of the hippie pad), and their LSD connection. Hopper is in the movie all of 5 minutes. LSD became illegal in Ca. on Oct. 6, 1966.

Now, the Million $ question: Where in L.A. is/was the Temple actually located? You would think that by typing in the address into Google Maps or the like, and going to the "street view" feature, it would pop right up. Not so. It seems every enclave in the L.A. area has an "1039 Ardmore Ave." or a "1039 Ardmore St." - both North and South. Usually when a street is called out by its name, it's usually a "north" street. I've seen some locations in L.A. on Google maps, but the neighborhoods don't look anything in the "street view" like they did in The Trip, or the Roth article, nor are they in the area described in the article.

From the Choppers article, we know it was located "...near the center of Los Angeles' black section", which from the time period I would assume meant some place near Watts. And, if you look at the cryptic Dave Mann's Love Temple painting, and guess that the crossed Freeways he's painted in the lower rt. part of the painting are the 110, and the 10, then with where he's put the signpost for "1039 Ardmore" touching down in L.A., with the searchlights representing Hollywood to the NW, that's about right for it's location. But, I can't find any Ardmore Ave. in that area at all. The closest I came was a N. Ardmore Ave. that ended a couple blocks short of the address at Santa Fe, by the L.A. River.

If anybody has any more real information on the Temple's history, or was there back then in '65-'69, or knows where 1039 Ardmore Ave. actually is, or what's there now at that address, let me know:

irishrich@shamrockfabrication.com
and I'll do a followup and post it here for everyone to see. Somebody out there has got to know more about this.

I'm always surprised at who reads this blog........

....and I always dig getting an Email like this from somebody who does:

" Rich,
I saw the write up you did on Rooster's bike. That same article in Choppers magazine influenced me too. At the time I had been building rigid Harleys for 10 years and trying to get the *right* look.Rooster nailed it."

"I sent an attachment of the 93" Shovel I built the following year. Complete with Big Don spun aluminum oil tank like Roosters.
Today, I'm in the process of building another similar bike. This time I will use an S&S retro Shovel alt/generator style motor. Wet primary and 6 speed Baker trans.
FYI, I own Head Quarters, manufacturer of performance equipment for Harleys. Been in this business for 41 years."
Doug Coffey

Thank you Doug, for taking time out of your busy day to send me this. I truly appreciate it!