When I left my hometown of Oakland, California to attend Chico State College, the calendar read January 1975. Soon after arrival everything about this college town made it feel more like 1955 instead, and I couldn’t have been happier.
You see, after a hiatus of five years I was returning to academia to finish my final two years of a B.A. Degree program. Chico offered me everything I was looking for and more, to complete this task. Cheap housing, cheap eats, few distractions, bicycle friendly, and a brand-new undergrad program called American Studies.
Oh yes, what sweetened the deal was a 48-month scholarship from Uncle Sam called the G.I. Bill. With everything in place and with a total focus on my studies, I was ready to get the job done.
Chico to me was a magical place, a little town that time forgot. Oakland was in the throes of imploding, with its best days behind it. On the other hand, Chico was small enough to wrap one’s arms around yet big enough for a lifetime of exploration.
After spending most of the summer of 1974 in Chico as a tourist/resident, I decided to apply for school as a third-year undergraduate, and was accepted, commencing the spring semester, January 1975. Years earlier, 1967 to be exact, I was introduced to Chico whilst attending brother Jim’s college graduation in May. Then again in July 1968 during a stopover on the way to the annual Trinity River Raft Race.
There are moments in life that are defining, and both Chico and the TRRR immediately struck a chord that paid dividends later in life. Indirectly, a big shout-out is owed to brother Jim, whose personal crossroads fatefully intersected mine, and all it took was a rubber raft and some misinformed basketball gods.
Finding a place to rent had been resolved thankfully only a few days before classes began when I had hit on the idea of calling real estate agents from the telephone yellow pages beginning with the letter “Z” and working backwards. Bingo, within minutes the Viffredo family business gave me a positive reply, saying they had a place, a four-room converted garage for $120 per month, close to school. Although a bit steep for the ole G.I. Bill pocketbook, costing me nearly half of my monthly allotment, finding a place in a college town at this time of year, all to myself mind you, within walking distance to downtown and campus, was close to a miracle, and too good to pass up.
Now that I had this primary concern crossed off my “to do” list I quickly went about furnishing my humble abode. Besides the traditional brick and boards bookcases known to all college students, my interior decorations would be an eclectic lot as well: Formica kitchen table from brother Pat, couch and rocking chair in Western motif thanks to brother Jim’s eagle eyes for garage sales, oak rocking chair via a Sacramento auction house, antique bookcase via a Chico estate sale, homemade side table via a Chico garage sale, and a second-hand, floor length carpet, free of charge due to a certain dumpster acumen, a learned urban survival skill which manifested itself initially in the Bay Area, and then was mercilessly exploited in my new town of residence.
Now that the home front was settled and comfy, it was time to thoroughly explore all there was to this city of trees and undervalued amenities. As time allowed, the services of a small transportation fleet were employed in the form of a new 10-speed Raleigh bicycle (purchased from Hank and Frank’s in Oakland), a 1971 VW Super Beetle, Doug Watson’s vintage pickup truck, and my own two feet.
Experiencing Chico wouldn’t have been half the fun without my pal Doug, a local yokel who shared a passion for old things which naturally grew into a great friendship and partnership in all things involving garage/estate sales, thrift/antique stores, and the old city dumps.
John Brennan is a resident of Chico who graduated from Chico State in 1977. He can be reached at johnmailman2@yahoo.com.