guerrilla curatorship

Today, while I was perusing the chatter on Streetsblog, I got to reading this article on FoundSF (new fave concept!) about the Freeway Revolt, which is something I like to always keep in the consciousness, being as it is the only reason I have a Panhandle in which to run. Also, it’s our own private slice of the Death & Life legacy, which is also something I like to keep at the forefront. Because every new moment in a city is a new opportunity for misguided capital to destroy it, and I like things that are guerrilla. Obvs.

So, the Found post got me thinking about “Malvina Reynolds, the famous left-wing folk singer” which reminded me of how much I love that Joan Didion essay about Joan Baez, and perked my interest momentarily in the whole counterculture folksinging thing. Which I’ve never really been at all into, despite living most of my adult life in the Hashbury. Also, most people in my peer group just know Malvina Reynolds, if they know her at all, as the chick who sang the Weeds theme song. Which of course I knew was written about the deco/moderne Doelger houses in Daly City, because, pfffft, any freshman local historian knows THAT. So, I wanted to know more. And in this day and age, that means Wikipedia. (Real talk.) So here it is. And the key info, for those with link fatigue (poor beleaguered Gen-Y. Our attention spans are so short.):

Reynolds’ most famous song, “Little Boxes” (made famous by Pete Seeger), has enjoyed renewed popularity by being featured in Showtime’s TV series Weeds. “Little Boxes” was inspired visually by the houses of Daly City, California. Nancy Reynolds, daughter of Malvina Reynolds, explains:

“My mother and father were driving South from San Francisco through Daly City when my mom got the idea for the song. She asked my dad to take the wheel, and she wrote it on the way to the gathering in La Honda where she was going to sing for the Friends Committee on Legislation. When Time Magazine (I think, maybe Newsweek) wanted a photo of her pointing to the very place, she couldn’t find those houses because so many more had been built around them that the hillsides were totally covered.”[2]

In her later years, Reynolds contributed both songs and material to PBS’s “Sesame Street” program. She occasionally appeared on the show as a character called “Kate.”

What I find notable, as an armchair historian, is how bourgeois the song makes Daly City out to be. I suppose at one point it was a posh suburb (or, trying to create the illusion of such) but in my lifetime, it’s certainly never been a Piedmont or a Ross, full of “doctors and lawyers and business executives” playing on the golf course with their dry martinis. I wonder what the historical context is (if it’s even possible to isolate.) Maybe she was writing the “ticky tacky” part while driving through Daly City and then incorporating the more upscale elements of Atherton & Hillsborough while they drove south? Or, maybe Daly City had a glittering heyday? Or maybe she was just so “alterna” that it seemed that way to her but was really solidly middle class? I’m sure there are plenty of localnerds with opinions on this, so feel free to comment. Also, please someone find a clip of “Kate” on Sesame Street!