By Dave

Biology Department spring field trips were an important part John’s years at Oxy.  In looking through John’s slides recently I found that some of the places we visitedover the years were:  Red Rock Canyon, Alabama Hills, Darwin Falls, Death Valley & Saratoga Springs, Kingston Mountains, Devil's Punchbowl & the Hamilton Preserve, Hastings Reservation & Point Lobos, Figueroa Mountains, Mt. Palomar, Kelso Sand Dunes & Amboy Crater, Pinnacles National Monument (and the Pinnacles near Trona), Thousand Palms, Walker Pass & the Kern River, Salton Sea & Travertine Rock, Borrego Springs, Joshua Tree, Los Osos and of course Angeles National Forest and the cabin in Eaton Canyon.

One of the activities during the field trips was playing the Ann Miller game (she likes grass but she doesn’t like lawn, she likes summer but she doesn’t like winter, she likes floors and walls but doesn’t like ceilings).  It was always fun to see participants figure out what she liked and didn’t like and come up with their own examples.  I remember as if it was yesterday listening to Ann Miller being played inside the Eaton Canyon cabin when I was in my sleeping bag outside.  I didn’t figure it out that night, but woke up the next morning thinking she likes Occidental but doesn’t like Oxy.

On some field trips, we had a contest for who could make up the best verse to “My Bonnie Lies over the Ocean.”  One of John’s favorite verses was:

      My bonnie went into the shark lab
      The wonders of science to see
      She inhaled and then she expired
      Oh bring back my bonnie to me

I think his favorite verse was:

      My bonnie posed for one of Mac’s pictures
      She was young, blonde and pretty to see
      By the time that the camera was focused
      Her hair was as gray as can be

The funny thing is that in thinking about all the field trips, the ones I remember most vividly are the ones where something went wrong.  One of the most memorable ones to me (besides the futile search for the elephant trees) was the time that we camped in Red Rock Canyon and started out the next morning to go up Last Chance Canyon to see the wildflowers.  One of the cars would not start, so we left it in the campground and stuffed everyone into the remaining two cars.  We drove up a bumpy dirt road to the end of Last Chance Canyon, but when we were ready to leave, the second car would not start.  This left only John’s car to get everyone out of the canyon.  However, when he got to his car, John realized that he had lost his keys when he was taking his 20 minute nap earlier in a grassy area.  It took all of us quite a while to find the keys, and John was able to ferry groups out of the canyon.  Hours later when the tow truck arrived at the car that wouldn’t start, it started on its own on the first try.

While picking your favorite field trip is somewhat like picking your favorite child, one of my favorite trips was in 1971, after I had graduated from Oxy.  The trip started slowly for me because my car started overheating the night before we left and I had to get it fixed, and it took a while to get out of L.A. because of the detour around the interchange of the 5 and 14 freeways that had collapsed in the recent Sylmar earthquake.  But the first night was spent in the Alabama Hills, one of my favorite places, which I have driven through and hiked within many times since.  On our way into Death Valley, we stopped at Darwin Falls, a surprise waterfall up an extremely desolate canyon.  In Death Valley itself, we stopped at Badwater, the Devil’s Golf Course and the sand dunes (of course, that’s were Dr. Wells’ had car trouble, but where we also had fun throwing a Frisbee around).  We ended up at Saratoga Springs, an oasis in the middle of nowhere with its lake, pond (with pupfish) and tamarack grove.  What a nice place.

There were 42 of us on this field trip.  I remember this because I knew that with this many people, the probability of two having the same birth month and year was around 90%.  So sitting around the campfire at Saratoga Springs, I bet the group that if this was not the case with this group that I would cook breakfast and clean up after it the next morning.  Guess what.  There were not matches and I ended up cooking for and cleaning up after 41 others.  What fun.

I know these field trips had a great impact on all participants, especially me.  I know that a lot of my love of nature and the outdoors came from visiting all the places we did on the spring field trips.

By John's Graddaughter Sara

It's impossible to think about John without thinking about Addie.  I did a video interview with them in their home on Filucy Bay, Washington, and used it to create a video for their 60th wedding anniversary (available in four parts in the video gallery).  The following is the story of how John and Addie met, using their own words from the video:

Addie: “John and I met in 1935, in fact we have a little tray that tells us it was June 29, 1935.  We were attending a conference at Occidental College the summer between our junior and senior years of high school. The first night while we were waiting on the patio, John lead a group in singing “Follow the Gleam.” The next morning, they had the election for song leader. I was elected song leader and John was elected assistant song leader (he had never led a song in his life). So our first hour of knowing each other was spent sitting up on that stage in Alumni auditorium with me teaching him how to lead songs. After that conference we both decided to attend Occidental College. The next time we saw each other was registration day freshman year. We were good friends all through Occidental College. We would meet out on the bench out on the quad, just as good friends. We had a number of friendly exchanges through the years, but nothing romantic.”

That magic Moment, April 30th 1940:

John: “In April of our senior year, we both went to see a performance at Thorne Hall. After the show was over, Jim Arthur and I came out and we met Adelaide, and the olive trees were mature, and the full moon was rising over the campus hill, and the moonlight was filtering through the olive trees, and suffusing the scene with a silvery glow, and Adelaide’s eyes were flashing in the moonlight. And I then took Adelaide home to the sorority house and then I took Jim Arthur to see the rats I took care of at Dr. Selle’s house. I couldn’t remember what the experiment with the rats was about because all I could see was Adelaide’s flashing eyes and cheerful smile and her laughter.”

After graduation, Addie taught in Ontario, and John went to graduate school at UCLA. Two years later, John was driving Addie home to Ontarioin his yellow and black model A and asked her to marry him. There was some uncertainty whether John would get drafted into the war. John got rejected because of his sinusitis, and took a job in Lancaster. Wanting to move to Lancastert together, they decided to get married before John left—two weeks later. They borrowed dresses, had relatives help out with flowers and the cake. They were married at the Montecito Presbyterian Church. The rest is history.

By Dave

John’s mother, Esther Marie Bockerman, was born in rural Iowa in 1889.  Her father, Frederick, was a train engineer.  Two of John’s most important mementos were a photo of Frederick at the helm of a gigantic train engine, and a picture of the Bockerman family in front of their farmhouse in Iowa.  The photo includes Esther, her brother, sister, aunts, parents, her grandparents.

The Bockerman family eventually moved to Tacoma, Washington, where Esther met and married John’s father Val.  The grandchildren of Esther’s sister still reside in the Tacoma area.  Val, Esther and John moved to Los Angeles in 1924, where Val opened a hat shop.

During the summers, John and Esther returned to Tacoma to help care for John’s grandmother (while Val stayed in Los Angeles making hats).   Much of this time was spent in a beach house across from Tacoma, where John loved to row boats, fish and just “mess around” with his cousins.  These experiences indelibly imprinted Puget Sound on John.  

John and Esther often talked of the drive to and from Tacoma.  At the time, road between Los Angeles and Bakersfield, the Grapevine, was indeed a winding road that looked like a grapevine.  And the road through the Siskiyou Mountains in Oregon was in some places an unpaved, single-lane road.  On several occasions, Esther marveled at how she and John were able to make this drive, especially when she had to back her car up this road to a turnout on the rare occasion that they met a car going in the opposite direction while they were driving downhill.  How things have changed since then.

Following Val’s death in 1951, Esther ran the hat shop for 18 months (with the help of John and Addie), which qualified her to receive Social Security (which had recently been expanded to include small business owners, in addition to their employees). 

In 1958, John, Addie and the family moved from Highland Park to Eagle Rock, and Esther moved from a rented house in Hollywood to the former McMenamin house in Highland Park.  Her main attention there was her backyard garden, which was always full of flowers and vegetables. 

When I was in high school, Esther helped me start a vegetable garden, something I have carried on ever since (in the summer of 2013, I had 64 tomato plants, 30 varieties).  One of my running bets with Esther was that I could always find a multi-pound zucchini when I went over to cut her lawn each week during the summer.  She would always tell me that she was sure that she had found and picked all the zucchini, but I usually managed to find at least one large one hiding.

Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Esther would load the “ladies” (some other retired women in her neighborhood) into her 1950 Plymouth on Sunday mornings and drive them up to the Wooden Shoe restaurant in Highland Park for breakfast.  This was quite an accomplishment, especially since the Plymouth had a manual transmission, and Esther had to stop at the top of a steep hill before making a right turn to get to the restaurant.

Esther lived long enough to see her granddaughter Sara.  She was just thrilled.  Esther is the only one of our grandparents who lived long enough for Stu and I to know as a person.  Addie’s mother died when Addie was in high school, and her father died before Stu was born.  While my first memories in life were of Val, I really didn’t know him because I was so young when he died.  Esther lived until 1975 (at age 85).  Compare that to John and Addie, whose grandchildren are in their 30s and whose great grandchildren range in age from 5 to 12.  Pretty amazing. 

By Dave

John’s father, Valentine Patrick McMenamin, was a hat maker.  Val was born in Philadelphia in 1882.  His father died when Val was young, so Val began working in a factory that made army uniforms to help support the family (often coming home with blue hands and arms from the die used to color the fabric).  From 1899 to 1903, Val was an apprentice for the John B. Stetson company to learn the “art, trade and mystery of felt hat finishing,” earning $2.00 per week.  One of John’s most important possessions was the original indenture paper that Val signed at the beginning of his apprenticeship (the full text of which is below).  Val carried this with him all his life, and when it passed onto John, he had it framed and hung it on his wall.  I have a copy of this on the wall of my office at work, and read it periodically to remind myself of Val what life used to be like.

After his apprenticeship, Val worked for Stetson for several years, then decided to go west, getting himself a six shooter and traveling to Wallace, Idaho as a salesman for Singer sewing machines.  John loved telling the story of how Wallace, being a mining town with mainly bars and bordellos, was not the best place to sell sewing machines, so Val became a miner.  His first day on the job, an unsuspecting Val experienced a free-fall ride on the elevator down into the mine, an initiation ritual that any new miner was subjected to.

Val eventually moved to Tacoma, Washington, and started making hats again.  It was there that he met his wife, Esther Marie Bockerman, and it was there that John was born on April 1, 1917.  In 1924, the family moved to Los Angeles, where Val opened his own hat shop, Valentine the Hatter, which was a fixture near the intersection 9th and Hill Streets for 30 years. 

Val sold his hats both through his hat shop and through an annual catalog (and by advertising in various western-oriented magazines).  During the almost 30 years that Val had the shop, hats were as much a part of business attire as a coat and tie, so many of Val’s customers were business men.  Periodically, for example, Carl F. Braun brought his executive team into the shop for new hats.  In fact, the copy of Val’s indenture that I have hanging on my office wall is one of many copies that were made by Braun, who was fascinated by it when Val showed it to him one year.

Val also sold hats to western-oriented customers, such as country and western singers, rodeo performers, cowboys and cowboy actors (including Tom Mix, Hopalong Cassidy and Gene Autry).   He also made private-label hats sold through other stores.  One week when Addie was helping out in the shop, she got an order from a Beverly Hills boutique for a hat for Dale Evans, and another order from a store in Chicago for Roy Rogers. 

The hat Val was most proud of was the white hat that Gary Cooper wore in the film Saratoga Trunk.  John called me excitedly a few years ago when he found pictures on the internet of Gary Cooper in the hat, and more remarkably a picture of Picasso wearing what John believed was that hat and pointing a six shooter, both gifts to him from Gary Cooper.  After telling me this, he said that he was lucky to have lived into the age of the internet where such pictures could be easily found.

In my last visit with John, he told me a number of stories about his life, and about Val and Esther.  He pointed to one of the hats he had been wearing since probably the 1940s and told me that he was always amazed that Val could take a pair of scissors and trim precisely one fourth of an inch off the brim of any hat without any type of measuring device.

John wore Val’s hats throughout his life, as evidenced by their appearance in many of our family photos.  In one of the photos in the photo gallery, John is wearing a hat (and a suit) while at the beach digging in the sand with my brother.  Val’s hats were an integral part of John’s life (and for all the McMenamins).

Val's Indenture "Contract"

The following is the full text of Val’s indenture document.  My favorite parts are that he couldn’t get married, “play at cards, dice or any other unlawful game,” and that he couldn’t “haunt ale houses, taverns or play houses” while he was an apprentice.  And, of course, he was paid $2.00 per week (“when working”).  Imagine such an emplyoment contract today.    

This Indenture Witnesseth, that Valentine McMenamin, Born Mar 13th AD 1882 by and with the consent of Mrs. Catherine McMenamin His Mother, hath put himself and by these presents doth voluntarily and of his own free will and accord, put himself Apprentice to THE JOHN B. STETSON COMPANY of Philadelphia, to learn the art, trade and mystery of Felt Hat Finishing, and after the manner of an Apprentice to serve the said JOHN B. STETSON COMPANY for and during, and to the full end and term of his Apprenticeship, which will be the 8th day of December AD 1903 next ensuing.

      The said Masters reserving the right to terminate this agreement, if said Apprentice shall refuse to obey their proper commands, or shall be found physically unable to attend to his work.  During all which time the said Apprentice doth covenant and promise that he will serve his Masters faithfully, keep their secrets and obey their lawful commands ; that he will do them no damage himself, not see it done by others without giving them notice thereof ; that he will not waste their goods, nor lend them unlawfully ; that he will not contract matrimony within the said term ; that he will not play at cards, dice, or any other unlawful game, whereby his masters may be injured ; that he will neither buy nor sell, with his own goods or the goods of others, without license from his Masters ; and that he will not absent himself day or night from his Masters’ service without their leave, nor haunt ale houses, taverns, or play houses, but in all things behave himself as a faithful Apprentice ought to do during the said term.  He shall conform to and abide by all rules and regulations now in force, and hereafter adopted by his Masters for the government of their Apprentices.  And the said Masters on their part do covenant and promise, that they will use the upmost of their endeavors to teach, or cause to be taught or instructed, the said Apprentice in the art, trade and mystery of Felt Hat Finishing, and he shall receive as compensation, when working, two dollars ($2.00) per week.

      It appearing upon satisfactory proof furnished to said JOHN B. STETSON COMPANT that said minor has been properly educated in reading, writing and arithmetic, so as to render further schooling unnecessary.

      And for the true performance of all and singular the covenants and agreements aforesaid, the said parties bind themselves each unto the other firmly by these presents.

I Witness Whereof, the said JOHN B. STETSON COMPOANY has hereunto affixed its Corporate seal, and individual parties set their hands and seals, done interchangeably.  Dated the 28th day of December in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and ninety nine.

The document was “sealed and delivered in the presence of” two witnesses, and signed by the President and Secretary of the company and by Val and his mother.

By His Sons Stuart and Dave

John McMenamin was born on April 1, 2017 in Tacoma, Washington, where he spent his first seven years.  His father, Valentine Patrick McMenamin, was a hat maker who had migrated to Tacoma from Philadelphia after his indentureship with the John B. Stetson Company to learn the “art, trade and mystery of felt hat finishing."  John’s mother, Esther Marie Bockerman McMenamin, had moved to Tacoma with her family from Iowa. 

When John was seven, his family moved to Southern California, where his father opened a hat shop, Valentine the Hatter, in downtown Los Angeles.  For nearly 30 years, Val made hats for business men, cowboy stars, country and western singers, rodeo stars and others, sold directly at his hat shop and through a catalog he produced annually.  John continued to wear hats made by his father throughout his life.

One of John’s favorite memories of his early days in Southern California was from the mid-1920s when he was following a roadrunner that was scurrying around vacant land somewhat west of Beverly Hills.  His fascination with this was one of the key influences in his interest in, and love of, biology.

Since the family lived in Hollywood, John attended Le Conte Junior High and Hollywood High School.  He and his mother spent the summers in the Tacoma area where his mother helped her family care for John’s grandmother.  While in Washington, John loved to row boats, fish and just “mess around” with his cousins, experiences that indelibly imprinted Puget Sound on him.

From 1936 to 1940, John attended Occidental College, graduating in 1940 with a degree in biology. While there, he met his future wife, Mary Adelaide Grant.  They had actually met at a conference at Oxy before their senior year in high school, but the spark did not ignite until 1940, a story in itself.   

Upon graduating from Oxy, John continued his education at UCLA, receiving a teaching credential in 1942, his M.A. in 1946 and his Ph.D. in Zoology in 1949.  Little did he know when he was watching the roadrunner a few years earlier that the vacant land would become UCLA, a school from which he would receive his advanced degrees.

John and Addie were married in 1942 and they moved to Lancaster, where John taught from 1942-1945 at Antelope Valley Joint Union High School (and Addie worked in the school’s administration).  A photo in the Gallery shows John teaching physics, about to stick his hand (in a can) into a 5,000 volt current, thus demonstrating that electricity runs on the outside of a conductor.  Since this was during World War II, John and Addie rode bikes to and from the school so they could save their gas ration coupons, which they used for a single trip from Lancaster to Los Angeles each month.   

John then joined the biology department at Occidental in 1946, where he taught until he retired in 1982.  For 12 years of this time, he was chairman of the department, during which time the department expanded significantly.  He had a full and influential career at Oxy during which he impacted the lives of several thousand students, and the impact was strong.

In addition to teaching, “Dr. Mac” organized field trips at spring break for over two decades, providing formative experiences for many students in the deserts, beaches and mountains of California, ranging from Death Valley and Borrego Springs to Point Lobos and Montana de Oro to the Pinnacles National Monument and Angeles National Forest (including the Oxy cabin in Eaton Canyon). 

One real highlight during John and Addie’s years at Oxy was having Ansel Adams for breakfast the day he gave the Oxy commencement address.  They ate on the deck outside the dining room, past which was a pond (in which, naturally, was floating the 8’ sail boat) and which was fed by a waterfall, past which were lawn, trees and flowers.  Not quite Yosemite, but not bad for Los Angeles.

Following retirement, John and Addie moved to Washington and settled in Filuci Bay near Longbranch on the Key Peninsula. They enjoyed 20 peaceful and productive years there. John loved to walk in the forest, tend his garden, pick berries, motor, sail and row around the bay and Puget Sound, and chew the fat with the old timers (while becoming an old timer). There was nothing he liked better than having a few Wheat Thins and cheese, then going out into the bay to watch Mt. Rainier turn pink...then white...as day turned to night, and following this with a freshly-caught salmon dinner.

During this time, both he and Addie were active members in such organizations as the Longbranch Improvement Club and the Key Peninsula Historical Society.  In addition, John organized a project to restore a salmon run in a stream which had not seen salmon in over 60 years.  And, he and Addie also helped the son of their next door neighbor write and print a book on the “Early Days of the Key Peninsula.”

In 2002, John and Addie moved to Oceanside, CA to be closer to family. John never thought he would live in a "country club" but there they were at Ocean Hills.  They were active in the community for many years, and John contributed to the computer club and the photography club.  During this time, one of his favorite projects was macrophotography in which he created a flip book with close-up pictures of ants, flies, dragon flies, grasshoppers and katydids. 

In both retirement homes, John and Addie loved hosting former students, faculty and friends and reminiscing about old times. 

John being John, he requested that we not have a formal memorial service or funeral. He only asked that the family toast him using the roadrunner glasses and napkins that were so dear to him and Addie. On the Saturday following his passing, the family met at John & Addie’s Oceanside home and spent a good part of the day visiting with Addie. We then had appetizers (including, of course, Wheat Thins and cheese) and toasted John, followed by each family member telling their favorite stories and memories of John, and lighting a candle in his memory. This concluded with Mckenna (John and Addie’s youngest granddaughter) playing a short tune on the piano in his memory.  We then appropriately had a wonderful salmon dinner. We think that this is exactly what John would have wanted. 

That Saturday evening, each of us learned things about John that we didn’t know, or remembered things that we had forgotten. We hope that those who visit this site will share their memories about John, especially stories and photos, so that you and we can learn more that we didn’t know, and remember what we have forgotten.

John lived a full and productive live.  Bottom line is that the guy impacted a ton of people and made a difference.  He would argue that he could have done better.  We don't see how. 

You all know it.  He was the best,