Foothills Sentry November 2021

Foothills Sentry Page 10 November 2021 If a boxcar falls in the forest … At the end of Modjeska Can- yon Road is the 85-acre Modjes- ka Canyon Nature Preserve. For- merly known as “the Fleming Property,” it was purchased by the county in 1987 for limited public use. Just past the entrance is a bridge over Santiago Creek. In 2018, OC Parks proposed repairs to the bridge and creek due to damage and accumulated sedi- ment following the 2007 Santia- go Fire and 2010 rainstorms. The “boxcar bridge” project would involve removing sediment, rein- forcing stream banks, and raising the bridge approximately three feet. (Like some other “boxcar” bridges, the Modjeska bridge was probably constructed from rail- road flatcars.) Now basically completed, this bridge project is reportedly re- ceiving some final touches based on comments from nearby resi- dents. At an Oct. 5 meeting at the preserve, Bill LaBar asked that cinder blocks be covered with stonework to match the old walls nearby. And Jim Sill wondered why some of the newly installed rip rap (large jagged rocks) lin - ing the creek had been left bare, which he said looked out of place in a nature preserve. Later, Geof- frey Sarkissian forwarded a sug- gestion from Rich Pfeiffer: Why not cover the bare rip rap with dirt that had washed downstream elsewhere after the Bond Fire? By Oct. 21, OC Parks was re- portedly interested in the idea of using excess Silverado dirt to cover Modjeska rip rap. Further- more, bids for facing the cinder blocks with cobble were appar- ently already underway. As it happens, there is another Modjeska/bridge connection: This area, of course, is named for the famous Polish actress Hel- ena Modjeska, who settled in the area with her husband in the late 19th century. But her son, Ralph Modjeski, became a civil engi- neer who was famous for design- ing bridges, like the San Francis- co-Oakland Bay Bridge. The Chicago-based design firm that Modjeski founded in 1893, now known as "Modjeski & Mas- ters," is still in business. And ac- cording to Paula LaBar, Modjeski also helped his stepfather Count Bozenta with the Harding dam in Modjeska. Modjeska resident and OC Parks employee John Gannaway formerly lived in the Fleming house, on the other side of the boxcar bridge. He shared some information from the county’s General Development Plan for the preserve: Norman Fleming built his house in 1955, but it was “greatly remodeled” over the years with the addition of a gravity flow wa - ter system, barn, footbridge over the creek and, in 1966, an en- closed pool with its own bridge. In 1957, Fleming was one of the founders of the Santiago County Water District. The Fleming pump station at the mouth of Silverado Canyon is named after him. The Fleming house, though, was built on the site of a previous structure: a “rustic rock cabin” that Fred C. Hathaway built for his family in 1922. Quoting the General Development Plan: “The Hathaways were destined to be remembered by canyon residents for some time. On Oct. 31, 1926, a fire broke out on the Hathaway property during Santa Ana wind conditions causing $20,000 worth of damage and two deaths. Three hundred men battled the blaze which raged over 6,500 acres before being rained out on Nov. 12. In January 1927, Fred C. Hathaway's son, William N. Hathaway, was fined $350 after pleading guilty to causing the Adam Swanson, concert solo- ist and “old-time pianist” will present a program of ragtime, Tin Pan Alley, vintage jazz and classical music, Thurs., Dec. 9 at the Crescendo Chapter’s Celeb- rity Speaker Series. The program begins at 10 a.m. at the Bower’s Museum, 2002 N. Main Street. General admission is $30; mu- seum members may buy one dis- counted ticket for $20. Parking is $6. For student ticket informa- tion, call (714) 544-5549. The Crescendo Chapter of the Guilds of Segerstrom Center rais- es funds to support the center’s community engagement and arts education programs. "Old-time" pianist featured fire.” About the other house on the Fleming Property, built in 1920, the General Development Plan states: “The most notable of these is the Tower residence/ cabin, an excellent example of an early Orange County ‘mountain’ retreat preserved in a practically unaltered state and therefore a potential candidate for listing on the National Register of Historic Places.” The Tower house was rented to John Howard from 1968 to 1988. Gannaway says that John How- ard, Jr., still visits the site and voluntarily maintains the house in which he grew up. Speaking of houses … As part of a requirement to identify locations for additional housing, OC Public Works in- cluded one canyon parcel on its list of potential sites: the storage yard at Silverado Canyon Road and Thisa Way. In combination with zoning code tweaks, this one-acre parcel was judged capa- ble of accommodating 69 rental units. Although there is no require- ment to actually build such units, one wonders where the 69 ad- ditional septic tanks would go. Another impact would be loss of storage space, but perhaps that could be remedied through off- site mitigation. Off-site mitigation is not a new concept. The lot south of Cook’s Corner, for instance, was pur- chased for open space as mitiga- tion for damage caused by some toll road construction. So in the case of this storage yard, perhaps underutilized residential space at homes elsewhere, like spare bedrooms, could be converted to garages, while the lawns of larger estates could hold assorted stor- age sheds, RVs, boats or junk cars. Modjeska boxcar bridge