Nature Lover Pointed Out Region’s Beauty
The last time I spoke with the late Allan Edmund Edwards, the first item on his agenda was ducks and the feeding thereof.
The first item on my agenda, meanwhile, was Sherman Oaks and the destruction thereof.
Edwards, you may recall, was the retired research psychologist, amateur historian and free-spirited community volunteer who may forever be remembered as the man who divined the geographic heart of the oddly shaped city of Los Angeles. He found it to be in the bosom of Franklin Canyon, a tranquil oasis of parkland northwest of the corner of Mulholland Drive and Coldwater Canyon Avenue.
Allan appeared, at age 70, to be in excellent health when he suffered a massive stroke that resulted in his death nine days later. Today, I write of him again because the reaction of readers has left me with a vague feeling of unfinished business to be tidied up.
A note from Lily M. Bauer of Encino came on a card that bears the watercolor image of the old De La Ossa Adobe in Los Encinos State Park. She wrote to express her sadness and wanted people to know Allan’s volunteer efforts went beyond the Valley College Historical Museum, Franklin Canyon’s William O. Douglas Outdoor Classroom and the Valley’s Japanese Garden, as I had noted in my March 8 column.
“Allan was also a volunteer at our state park here in Encino and helped with our research material,” she wrote. “He will be terribly missed.”
Her note reminded me of the duck dispute. A few weeks before his stroke, Allan called to explain how the state of California and the National Park Service evidently had contradictory philosophies concerning the feeding of migratory ducks.
At Los Encinos, it seems, docents were raising money by selling bags of stale pieces of bread for visitors to toss to the ducks. Meanwhile, in Franklin Canyon, signs were posted warning that duck feeders could be cited and fined. “They’re the same ducks,” Allan added, laughing.
Although he loved the outdoors, Allan was not exactly a puritan when it came to nature, and in this dispute he was in the pro-feeding camp. “They’re scavengers,” he said. The prohibition at Franklin Canyon amounted to much ado about not much.
“Ducks are wild animals,” a Franklin Canyon ranger protested when I related Allan’s opinion. “You feed them, they start following you. They become domesticated.”
The irony might have interested Allan as much as anything. Franklin Canyon, he pointed out, was ironically spared from full development because it was owned by the Department of Water and Power, the agency that made L.A.’s sprawl possible. And it’s the sprawl that wound up putting Franklin Canyon in the geographic center of the city--or, as Allan Edwards once put it in a more technical mood, “the Point of Balance of the Place of the City of Los Angeles.”
Allan, you may recall, divined this spot by creating a map of the city from lightweight polyurethane and balancing it on the head of a pin. The technique is at least theoretically valid. Whether his execution was flawless is hard to say, but the late Times columnist Jack Smith was satisfied enough to dub it “Edwards’ Point.”
Angelenos who wish to journey to the center of their city can find it frustrating. But part of Franklin Canyon Park’s charm is the fact that it’s tricky to find.
“Unfortunately,” wrote Alfred J. Webber of Sherman Oaks, “I was unable to trace your steps. Exactly what road did you turn down? Was it east or west of Mulholland and Coldwater . . . ?”
There is indeed no sign from Mulholland and Coldwater indicating the way to Franklin Canyon, one reason why this refuge remains a secret even to people who live only a few miles away. The sign you need to look for, in fact, may convince you that it’s the wrong way to go.
That sign indicates a dead end 800 feet ahead. In daylight hours, however, this “dead-end” road leads through an open gate to the 300-acre park. (From Beverly Hills, simply take Franklin Canyon Drive off Beverly Drive.)
Once you’ve found the park, look for the largest building, an educational center staffed by rangers. Ask directions and you may be sent to a trail that leads uphill on the right, or east, side of the canyon. Head up the trail until you come to an overhanging tree branch with a sign pointing to the left. Look closely and you’ll find Edwards’ Point. The reward, of course, is in the journey.
Inasmuch as Alfred J. Webber lives in the lowlands of Sherman Oaks, he might also want to know about Allan Edwards’ doomsday scenario.
Allan also lived in Sherman Oaks, but he felt fortunate to live in the hills. When he called me about the duck dichotomy, El Nino was whipping up record rainfall. Allan had once told me that, when the next 100-year flood hits L.A. and Sepulveda Dam fills to the brim, the floodgates will automatically drop, releasing a wall of water that will devastate everything within several blocks of the overflowing L.A. River.
The Sepulveda Dam, Allan explained to me, had been built when much of the Valley was still wide-open spaces and the idea was to protect communities far down river. The Valley, he suggested, might need a bigger, stronger dam.
An interview with a spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers left me with the impression that the dam operations were flexible enough to avert this kind of a disaster. What Allan portrayed as a clear if not present danger suddenly seemed not clear at all.
The conversation left me unable to say whether Allan Edwards was right in predicting that, someday, a great flood will hit Sherman Oaks, Studio City, Universal City and Toluca Lake.
But I can’t say he was wrong, either.
*
Scott Harris’ column appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays. Readers may write to him at The Times’ Valley Edition, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth, CA 91311, or via e-mail at scott.harris@latimes.com Please include a phone number.
