Page 20 RAIN July 1976 jeff Barnes· of Bear Creek Thunder Really, we probably would all learn more than we think ... interviewing our friends. Certainly that was the case when I asked Jeff what he was reading these days, how the solar greenhouse he was building 'was coming along and what he thought was happening in architecture. The first book he mentioned was Rolling Thunder by Doug Boyd (1976, $3.45, Dell Books). It provoked these comments: "incorporates a larger cultural consciousness than Castaneda ... not just Indian culture but also whites now paying attention to old prophecies. R.T. is a shaman who speaks of healing -politics and healing, war and healing, medicine and healing. Where Castaneda was more into personal power, R.T. relates to a broader consciousness of the earth as an organism. R. T. is more in tou·ch with natural.power relationships between earth and mankind, the real basis for the environmental ethic." Discussing the second book, Architecture, Mysticism & Myth by William Letheby (1975, $10, George Braziller Co. Inc.) led to a discussion of the solar greenhouse as symbolic of the kind of society toward which Jeff is working. The book·• covers the period 1830-1930, a time of visionary architecture when art came first. Then it explains the 1890-1910 era of infant infatuation with technology ... when we began to really use steam and lost real values. During th'ose decades, when architecture still put the mythic ahead of the functional aspects, we saw the use of gargoyles, of artful subtlety and esntericism reminiscent of the Parthenon, of attention to the mystical elements in a building. Back then, form still followed function, which followed myth and mysticism." And, according to Jeff, we are beginning to see this again. We now must create, in order to survive in joy, "celestial celebrations on earth ... re-relating ourselves and our works .to the cosmos.'·' Soon, he says, "we'll again build without fat on a building and-that very simplicity will be recognized for the great integrity it has. For example, in the PRAG Farm greenhouse, there are subtle yet understandable relationships between the aperture (i.e. amount of opening to the sun), energy storage in the aquaculture tank and the parabolic reflector. To me, that parabola is equivalent to the Golden Mean and to Stonehenge. For what Howdy (Howard Reichmuth, his partner in Bear Creek Thunder) and I have ·done is to try to recreate a morphology . .. a tiny model of the earth's climate, which is the solar greenhouse we're building. To do that we had to relate, in our minds, to the control systems of the planet. The greenhouse (or Terra), the aquaculture pool (Oceanus), and the Sun, had to be put into correct relationships. And those relationships have been intuitively, comprehended since the earliest u'nderstandings of the universe." "Architecture schools teach these same three elements: 1) the local climate and the landscape at the site; 2) the use of passive solar heating; and 3) the relationship of that place on earth to the sun. Since more people are more willing these· days to take IJ1ore responsibility for their personal environment, willing to invest their time as opposed to just money, we are seeing a re~awakening, a move toward such non-ego relationships wit_h.the planet. It's almost geo-centric yet still heliocentric in that it's our new awareness of the sun (Helios) that.has led us to it." "In terms·of material realities, I've learned a lot trying to build the greenho_use. It's impossible to g_et good tongue & groove cedar. Cedar tree cutting is federally controlled in such a way that only giant lumber 'companies can afford to bid on and have the equipment to remove cedar quickly ... and it's mostly sold on long-term contracts to Japan, the highest bidder. So, in the greenhouse project I had to get into preservatives and finishing details to make poorer lumber work well. We did away with the endwalls in order to let in more light _and, in re-figuring it all, it looks like we won't need the insulating night-time shutters we'd planned." "Well, how's that?-Enough? Tell me about your Montana and California solar workshops." . (Lf) Waste Recycling Confer~nce The Human Waste Recycling Conference in Portland on May 12, 13 and 14 was well attended by more than 300 peoplea stimulating mix of academic res_earchers who have examined the health aspects, public officials who are developing new standards for sewage systems, back-to-the,-land folks who have built compost toilets, and organic gardeners and farmers who well understood the usefulness of composter sewage. One highlight of the conference was the fine organic vegetarian mea\s put on by the new head chef a~ the Sheraton, who convinced everyone's palates that eating low on the food chain can be a delightful and satisfying experience. Another was the clear realization that almost all our sewage problems come from size and speed. It was repeatedly shown that natural processes remove almost any health problem if left alone for six months and that centralization of our sewage systems and the consequent demand for fast treatment to handle the large quantities of wastes have only resulted in need for complex and expensive treatment processes. We also learned that California, Washington, and other states are moving much more rapidly to new procedures than our own Oregon. California, for instance,·has limited all toilet water use to 3 gallons per flush and for state buildings to two quarts, in addition to developing new rural health codes to permit compost toilets. . . For information abo·ut proceedings, contact Rodale Press, 33 E. Minor, Emmaus, PA 18049. Both Farallones and RAIN will probably be publishing updated information on compost privys and waterless toilets over the summer. (TB) .
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