Mystery obscures the life of Frederick Shaw (1827-1914), the indigent inventor, health promoter, social crusader and purported naked man of Laurel Canyon.
Did he really attempt to hang-glide from atop a second-story building in downtown Los Angeles, breaking his hip in the process?
Did his mail-order bride really flee his property when she discovered that he lived in a tree?
And was he really insane, as a judicial panel ruled, or just a hermit whose vegetarian diet, clothing-optional lifestyle and boundary disputes annoyed the neighbors?
Did he really attempt to hang-glide from atop a second-story building in downtown Los Angeles, breaking his hip in the process?
Did his mail-order bride really flee his property when she discovered that he lived in a tree?
And was he really insane, as a judicial panel ruled, or just a hermit whose vegetarian diet, clothing-optional lifestyle and boundary disputes annoyed the neighbors?
[...]
Shaw was "among the first to promote Southern California as a refuge for health seekers . . . to actively campaign for a public harbor and to promote public sanitation," said Shaffer, an emeritus history professor at Cal Poly Pomona.
Shaw also inveighed against monopolies long before they were outlawed, pleaded with schools to add nutrition and physical education to the curriculum and advocated fire-prevention measures in brushy and forest areas, just to name a few of his causes.
He was "the first counterculture resident of Laurel Canyon," Shaffer wrote, "an apt forerunner of the Zappas, Mamas and Papas and all the other denizens of the canyon almost a century later."
Shaw also inveighed against monopolies long before they were outlawed, pleaded with schools to add nutrition and physical education to the curriculum and advocated fire-prevention measures in brushy and forest areas, just to name a few of his causes.
He was "the first counterculture resident of Laurel Canyon," Shaffer wrote, "an apt forerunner of the Zappas, Mamas and Papas and all the other denizens of the canyon almost a century later."
[...]
Then there's the matter of Shaw's most colorful marriage. He may have been married up to seven times.
In 1879, he wed an Eastern schoolmistress named Margaret Wright via Western Union. Her "I do" was sent from Newark, N.J. He telegraphed his from Los Angeles. As to whether she later ran away after seeing her hubby's tree abode, we have only the word of some not-so-friendly neighbors in court records.
A contrary account said that the couple "set up housekeeping in a shanty which Shaw had built under the branches of his favorite tree" and that the groom had "succumbed to feminine rule so far as to wear a suit of clothes." Records show that the couple divorced six years later.
In 1879, he wed an Eastern schoolmistress named Margaret Wright via Western Union. Her "I do" was sent from Newark, N.J. He telegraphed his from Los Angeles. As to whether she later ran away after seeing her hubby's tree abode, we have only the word of some not-so-friendly neighbors in court records.
A contrary account said that the couple "set up housekeeping in a shanty which Shaw had built under the branches of his favorite tree" and that the groom had "succumbed to feminine rule so far as to wear a suit of clothes." Records show that the couple divorced six years later.
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