Anderson Canyon in the

Big Sur Big Sur () is a rugged and mountainous section of the Central Coast (California), Central Coast of the U.S. state of California, between Carmel Highlands and San Simeon, where the Santa Lucia Range, Santa Lucia Mountains rise abruptly from th ...

region of California was named after pioneering

homesteaders The Homestead Acts were several laws in the United States by which an applicant could acquire ownership of government land or the public domain, typically called a homestead. In all, more than of public land, or nearly 10 percent of t ...

James and Peter Andersen who were the first European settlers of the area. The canyon, Anderson Creek, and Anderson Peak () are south of

McWay Falls McWay Falls is an waterfall on the coast of Big Sur in central California that flows year-round from McWay Creek in Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park, about south of Carmel, into the Pacific Ocean. During high tide, it is a tidefall, a waterfa ...

and within the boundaries of

Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park is a state park in California, 12 miles south of Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park on California's Pacific coast. A main feature of the park is McWay Falls, which drops over a cliff of into the Pacific Ocean. The ...

. During the construction of Highway One in the 1920s and the 1930s, it was the location of a convict work camp. After the camp closed, literary

bohemians Bohemian or Bohemians may refer to: *Anything of or relating to Bohemia Culture and arts * Bohemianism, an unconventional lifestyle, originally practised by 19th–20th century European and American artists and writers. * Bohemian style, a f ...

Henry Miller Henry Valentine Miller (December 26, 1891 – June 7, 1980) was an American novelist, short story writer and essayist. He broke with existing literary forms and developed a new type of semi-autobiographical novel that blended character study, so ...

rented the shacks, forming what Miller later called the "Anderson Creek Gang". The canyon is within the boundaries of the

Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary (MBNMS) is a federally protected marine area offshore of California's Big Sur and central coast in the United States. It is one of the largest US national marine sanctuaries and has a shoreline length ...

, Sea Otter Refuge, and

California condor The California condor (''Gymnogyps californianus'') is a New World vulture and the largest North American land bird. It became extinct in the wild in 1987 when all remaining wild individuals were captured, but has since been reintroduced to n ...

reintroduction area. The Staude House built in the 1960s sits on a bluff at the mouth of Anderson Canyon above sea level. A parcel on the bluff between the coastal cliff and Highway 1 sold for $31,394,000 in 2010, one of the largest sale prices for residential real estate in Monterey County history.

Early history

Pino Palado Peak, the name given the peak during the Mexican era, is said to refer to a tall Ponderosa pine, “peeled” of its bark by a lightning strike, that at one time grew on the southeastern summit. The creek was named after the peak. The modern name is a corruption of the surname of settlers James Andersen, who emigrated from Denmark in 1874 and homesteaded in the canyon, and his brother Peter, who arrived in 1883. The Andersen family had business ties to many of the early settlers in the region, including the Pfeiffers, Slates, and Danis. In the late 19th century a trail was constructed that connected the coast ridge with the coast at Burns Creek, just south of Anderson Landing.

Saddle Rock landing

Before construction of Highway One, local residents harvested redwood and tanbark, and mined limestone and gold. These resources were shipped out of dog-hole ports located in the region including Saddle Rock Landing at the mouth of Anderson Creek. It was named due to its proximity (.4 miles) to Saddle Rock, a prominent sea shore feature of present-day

. The Anderson Canyon region was homesteaded by Aaron Harlan in the 1880s, located about a mile up the canyon from the mouth of the creek. "Pop" Ernest Doelter, a

Monterey, CA Monterey ( ; ) is a city situated on the southern edge of Monterey Bay, on the Central Coast of California. Located in Monterey County, the city occupies a land area of and recorded a population of 30,218 in the 2020 census. The city was foun ...

restaurateur who created the

abalone Abalone ( or ; via Spanish , from Rumsen language, Rumsen ''aulón'') is a common name for any small to very large marine life, marine gastropod mollusc in the family (biology), family Haliotidae, which once contained six genera but now cont ...

steak owned the Saddle Rock Landing for abalone harvesting. Pop's restaurant was a favorite of

George Sterling George Sterling (December 1, 1869 – November 17, 1926) was an American writer based in the San Francisco, California Bay Area and Carmel-by-the-Sea. He was considered a prominent poet and playwright and proponent of Bohemianism during the fir ...

Jack London John Griffith London (; January 12, 1876 – November 22, 1916), better known as Jack London, was an American novelist, journalist and activist. A pioneer of commercial fiction and American magazines, he was one of the first American authors t ...

, and Andrew Molera.

Highway construction

The section of Highway One between Anderson Canyon and Big Sur was completed in October, 1924. In 1926, construction was halted due to lack of funds. Anderson Canyon was the southern terminus of the road. Construction of the southern portion resumed in 1928, and in 1932, Anderson canyon was selected as the site of the largest

prison labor Penal labour is a term for various kinds of forced labour that prisoners are required to perform, typically manual labour. The work may be light or hard, depending on the context. Forms of sentence involving penal labour have included invo ...

camp on the coast. From the Anderson Canyon camp, the highway was built south to connect with the road at Big Creek. Anderson Canyon was the last labor camp built. The entire highway was completed and opened on June 17, 1937.

Bohemians

After the Highway was complete, many buildings were left standing on the site from its use as a convict camp. During the 1940 and early 1950s, these cabins were rented out to early

Bohemians Bohemian or Bohemians may refer to: *Anything of or relating to Bohemia Culture and arts * Bohemianism, an unconventional lifestyle, originally practised by 19th–20th century European and American artists and writers. * Bohemian style, a f ...

. Henry Miller lived in a shack in Anderson Canyon from 1944 to 1947. Miller wrote " Into the Nightlife" while living there, and he described his fellow artists as the "Anderson Creek Gang" in ''

Big Sur and the Oranges of Hieronymus Bosch ''Big Sur and the Oranges of Hieronymus Bosch'' is a memoir written by Henry Miller, first published in 1957, about his life in Big Sur, California, where he resided for 18 years. History Background In 1939, Miller left France for Greece, where ...

''. Miller paid $5 per month rent for his shack on the property. Other residents included avant-garde musician

Harry Partch Harry Partch (June 24, 1901 – September 3, 1974) was an American composer, music theorist, and creator of unique musical instruments. He composed using scales of unequal intervals in just intonation, and was one of the first 20th-century com ...

, Emil White, and collage artist and painter

Jean Varda Jean "Yanko" Varda (11 September 189310 January 1971) was a Turkish-born American artist, best known for his collage work. Varda was one of the early adopters of the Sausalito houseboat lifestyle that was popular in the 1960s–1970s. He was the ...

. Author

Elizabeth Smart Elizabeth Ann Gilmour (née Smart; born November 3, 1987) is an American child safety activist and commentator for ABC News. She gained national attention at age 14 when she was abducted from her home in Salt Lake City by Brian David Mitchell. ...

also lived at Anderson Canyon. Her novella, ''

By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept ''By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept'' is a 1945 novel in prose poetry by the Canadian author Elizabeth Smart (1913–1986). The work was inspired by Smart's passionate affair with the British poet George Barker (1913–1991). Genes ...

'' (1945) may be the first fiction regarding Big Sur's bohemian residents.

Staude House

In 1965, Tony Staude, former chairman of pharmaceutical wholesaler Bergen Brunswig, and his wife, sculptor Marguerite Brunswig, bought property in Anderson Canyon. They found abandoned cars and remnants of the convict labor camp, including the former infirmary. In 1969, they used reclaimed redwood timbers that had formerly been used as

falsework Falsework consists of temporary structures used in construction to support a permanent structure until its construction is sufficiently advanced to support itself. For arches, this is specifically called centering. Falsework includes temporary ...

in the construction of a coastal bridge to build a two bedroom and two bath circular home on the tip of the bluff overlooking the sea. In 2016, new owners learned from a survey that the caretaker unit on Parcel A extended over the property line into

, which surrounds the property.. They were granted a permit from Monterey County to demolish the building. They also removed an accessory unit visible from Highway 1, which as a result of the passage of the Big Sur Land Use plan, was a violating use. They built a new residence and a new accessory building east of Highway 1, all outside the critical view shed in which new buildings are prohibited.

Ecology and biology

Anderson Peak is the site of a

release site owned by the

Ventana Wildlife Society Ventana Wildlife Society (VWS) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded in 1977 by a group of private citizens to restore endangered species native to central California. VWS has three full-time staff biologists, together with seasonal inter ...

at . In 2006, two condors were discovered nesting in a hollowed out, partially burned redwood tree. These were the first natural birth of a condor in California since 1905. In 2011,

PG&E The Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) is an American investor-owned utility (IOU). The company is headquartered at Kaiser Center, in Oakland, California. PG&E provides natural gas and electricity to 5.2 million households in the norther ...

began a $4.2 million project to bury power lines running from Highway One up Anderson Canyon to Anderson Peak in order to protect condors from potential electrocution. The project involved around of overhead power lines, built in the 1950s, to be removed and installation of an underground replacement line traveling 4,000 feet high. Anderson Canyon is an upland

redwood Sequoioideae, commonly referred to as redwoods, is a subfamily of Pinophyta, coniferous trees within the family (biology), family Cupressaceae, that range in the Northern Hemisphere, northern hemisphere. It includes the List of superlative tree ...

forest. Characteristic species include coastal redwood, California bay, tanbark oak, big-leaf maple, and western sword fern. Wildlife species that may occur in this community include ensatina, Pacific slender salamander, Pacific giant salamander, western-screech owl, Allen's hummingbird, purple martin, acorn woodpecker, Steller's jay, Townsend's western big-eared bat, and pallid bat.

Film credits

Anderson Canyon appears in many films and photoshoots including

National Geographic ''National Geographic'' (formerly ''The National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as ''Nat Geo'') is an American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. The magazine was founded in 1888 as a scholarly journal, nine ...

's ''Big Sur: Wild California'', the

Richard Burton Richard Burton (; born Richard Walter Jenkins Jr.; 10 November 1925 – 5 August 1984) was a Welsh actor. Noted for his mellifluous baritone voice, Burton established himself as a formidable Shakespearean actor in the 1950s and gave a memor ...

and

Liz Taylor Dame Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor (February 27, 1932 – March 23, 2011) was an English and American actress. She began her career as a child actress in the early 1940s and was one of the most popular stars of classical Hollywood cinema in the 19 ...

classic ''

The Sandpiper ''The Sandpiper'' is a 1965 American drama film directed by Vincente Minnelli and starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, the third of eleven films starring the power couple. Plot Laura Reynolds is a free-spirited, unwed single mother liv ...

'', and more recently in a feature film based on

Jack Kerouac Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (; March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian ...

's ''

''. Anderson Canyon also stands in for the

Esalen Institute The Esalen Institute, commonly called Esalen, is a non-profit American Retreat (spiritual), retreat center and intentional community in Big Sur, California, which focuses on humanism, humanistic alternative education. The institute played a ke ...

setting in the series finale of the television show ''

Mad Men ''Mad Men'' is an American historical drama, period drama television series created by Matthew Weiner and produced by Lionsgate Television. It ran on cable network AMC (TV channel), AMC from July 19, 2007, to May 17, 2015, with seven seasons ...

''.

References

{{Big Sur, state=collapsed

External links

Big Sur and the Oranges of Hieronymus Bosch

Anderson Canyon

Photos of Henry Miller at Anderson Canyon

GNIS Detail:Anderson Canyon

GNIS Detail: Anderson Creek

Elmer Staude Obituary
Geography of Monterey County, California Monterey Ranger District, Los Padres National Forest Regions of California Big Sur Canyons and gorges of California