Muir's House (Hardwear Sessions)

By Cynthia Houng Visit Cynthia's website.

Those who know John Muir largely through his writings on the Sierras and on Yosemite will be surprised to learn that Muir spent the final years of his life in a 3-story Victorian mansion in Martinez, California.

Muir House 1914

Northwestern View, c. 1914, John Muir National Historic Site
The 3-story Victorian mansion, showing the rose bushes and small ornamental trees that surrounded the house. The canary palms that flank the front door were much smaller in Muir's day. They are almost as tall as the house now.

A small town on the edge of the Carquinez Strait, Martinez provides easy access, via the Sacramento River Delta, to both the Central Valley and the San Francisco Bay. During the Gold Rush, Martinez became a center for shipping and for agriculture. Though the first settlers planted wheat on the fertile floodplains, by the late 19th century, most of the land around Martinez had been given over to fruits, nuts, and vineyards. The area supplied San Francisco with fresh produce, and later, with the advent of refrigerated boxcars, it supplied the East as well.

Muir's father-in-law, Dr. John T. Strenzel, held a large and prosperous orchard just outside of the city limits. Strenzel grew apples, cherries, pears, olives, and other fruits. From 1880 until Strentzel's death in 1890, Muir and his wife, Louise (known as "Louie" to her husband and family) lived about a mile from the Strentzel House and helped manage the ranch. After Strentzel's death, Muir moved into the main house, a classic Victorian mansion with gabled roofs and a working bell tower. Muir would occupy this house until his death in 1914.

At the Strentzel ranch, Muir's interest in botany paid off. Under Muir's watch, the ranch flourished, and he became a wealthy man. Muir and his father-in-law both experimented widely with new cultivars. To one side of the house stands a small grove of Santa Rosa plums, the groundbreaking cultivar introduced by Luther Burbank in 1906.

After his father-in-law's death, Muir's wife Louise sold off most of the ranch. The proceeds from this sale, as well as Muir's accumulated savings from 10 years of ranch management, made allowed Muir to retire from ranching and resume traveling and writing. Louie died in 1905, leaving the house and its grounds to their 2 daughters, Helen and Wanda. In 1915, Helen and Wanda sold the house. The John Muir Memorial Association (now known as the John Muir association http://www.johnmuirassociation.org) purchased the Strentzel house and its remaining grounds (including the Martinez Adobe) in 1956. The house and grounds were officially declared a National Historic Site in 1964.

Built by Muir's father-in-law, the Italianate house possesses a strict Victorian formality. Richly furnished with oak paneling, imported onyx fireplaces, and original artwork (including paintings by William Keith and Thomas Hill), the Strentzel House projects wealth and prosperity. Including the furnishings and the indoor plumbing, house cost close to $20,000 in 1882, a rather princely sum for the time.

The floorplan is typical for an upper-class Victorian home, with the formal, public spaces on the ground floor and the private rooms cloistered on the second floor. A long hallway divides the house evenly into two halves. The first floor featured two parlors, a library, dining room, sun porch and conservatory. The back of the house is reserved for the kitchen and the other "service" areas, like the lavatories and the bathroom. The downstairs reception rooms reflected the era's taste for opulence and ornamentation. They feature decorative plasterwork, large, intricate ceiling roses, plaster cornices, and chandeliers. The onyx fireplaces came in shocking colors, like porphyry purple. The parlors sported elaborately patterned wallpaper and colorful Oriental rugs.

ceiling rose

During Muir's lifetime, an oval rose garden fronted the house, and he often commented on the garden's lush, voluptuous appearance.. A pair of Canary Island palms flanked the front door, and more exotic plants could be found scattered around the house. The gardens, like the house, were laid out in the formal Victorian style.

Later, when Muir lived alone in the house, he converted the largest bedroom into a "scribble den," where he wrote most of his late works. He also modified the downstair, enlarging the East Parlor and removing the original marble fireplace, putting, in its place, a large brick fireplace that reminded him of a "real mountain campfire." In 1914, shortly before his death, Muir added electricity to the house. He also planned to transform a second bedroom (known as the "study annex") into a library, but did not live to complete the project.

upstairs study

The upstairs study, with its impressive marble fireplace, c. 1960.

But the house never truly became "Muir's House." Aesthetically, the house remained very much a Victorian creation, whose elegant polish contrasted markedly with Muir's "mountain man" persona and his preferences for the natural and the wild.

Resources: