Regarding an article about Catalina’s buffalo
Recently some of my friends in the Zane Grey’s West Society (www.zgews.org) called my attention to Jim Watson’s story of 9 August 2013 in your newspaper concerning the “buffalo.”
Below is a copy of an excerpt from a 2008 Sedona Monthly magazine article on the same topic by Joe McNeil and Steven Korn.
Regarding an article about Catalina’s buffalo
Recently some of my friends in the Zane Grey’s West Society (www.zgews.org) called my attention to Jim Watson’s story of 9 August 2013 in your newspaper concerning the “buffalo.”
Below is a copy of an excerpt from a 2008 Sedona Monthly magazine article on the same topic by Joe McNeil and Steven Korn.
Another theory that I have heard, but can no longer find the source is that the buffalo were part of a public relations stunt to promote the gala showing of a Hollywood film at Avalon, perhaps even for a showing of the 1925 silent film version of The Vanishing American.
That 1925 silent film is available on Amazon Prime for about a $10 purchase.
It was an epic budget” film in 1925 made on location in Arizona, but differs very significantly from ZG’s story in the 1922/1923 Ladies Home Journal edition, his Harper & Brothers book revised version of 1925, and the paperback reprint in 1982 which contains material thought to have been cut out in 1925 because it was not politically correct then (e.g., severe criticism of Government Indian agents and missionaries and the love affair of the Navajo and the blond haired girl from Philadelphia). In 1925 Paramount introduced in the silent film a US soldier as a completely new character for the love interest of the girl.
There was also a 1925 film version of the story with Audrey Totter and Scott Brady, which also differs from both the earlier film and the Zane Grey’s story. More interestingly, the events and people on which Zane Grey based his story were real.
I hope to visit Catalina soon and enjoy reading your newspaper first hand, with a cup of coffee at one of the local places.
Henry Nardi
St. Petersburg, FL
Support for Auxiliary’s Unloved Gifts Shop
The Catalina Island Medical Center Auxiliary Unloved Gifts Shop Thrift Store was moved some months ago from the Atwater Arcade because of building improvements, to an alley location next to the Humane Society behind the Sheriff’s Station. The new location was off the beaten path but allowed the store to stay open during construction.
On our most recent visit to Avalon last month, we discovered that the Atwater Arcade construction was completed, but that there was no place for the Unloved Gifts Shop there!
We learned that there were no current plans to relocate the shop from its out-of-sight location behind the Sheriff’s Station, and that the Santa Catalina Island Company (landlord) had made rules limiting signs and displays outside the Unloved Gifts Shop that effectively prevented most Avalon visitors from noticing the store.
Our family has shopped at the Unloved Gifts Shop every time we visit Avalon, because all money raised by the store is used for patient care at the Catalina Medical Center, as well as for past improvements to the Medical Center’s Emergency Room and for hospital equipment. In fact, an Associated Press article published in July 2006 noted that the store had raised more than $1 million for the Medical Center during the past 40 years.
Why would the Santa Catalina Island Company take action against a volunteer-run operation like the Unloved Gifts Shop that has benefited the people of Avalon for so many years?
Does the Company intend to increase its financial support of the Medical Center so that the Unloved Gifts Shop is unnecessary?
Dave & Carolyn Nell
Simi Valley
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