Anticipating August

I guess this is the time of year when I usually start looking forward to August — when I spend a week in San Francisco, using public transportation to get around and exploring various parts of the city. Part of the fun is photographing some of the views from my window seat on the Amtrak California Corridor train. Empire State […]

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Age of sail

I’ve been fascinated with the history of sailing ships ever since the summer of 1979, when I was at a KOA campground near Victoria, B.C. and found a paperback in their small store written by Alexander Kent. The book was called “Form Line of Battle,” and it sent me on a search for more books by the same author. Actually, […]

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The Adventure Continues… California-China Connection

This episode of California’s Gold, originally aired in August 2001, finds Huell discovering two very different pieces of history relating to California and China. I’ll admit when I read about the bonsai I was confused at first, since I’d always heard that it was Japanese in origin. However, it turns out that the related Chinese art of penjing is just […]

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Tapestry room

Colorful Tudor-era rugs on display as part of the Tapestries and Armor collection at the Legion of Honor Museum of Art, San Francisco — August 2023. b This tapestry is a ceremonial table covering that proclaimed the affluence, influence, and noble lineage of the Luttrell family. It was possibly commissioned by an independent and wealthy nmember of that family, the […]

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Perfect desk

I fell in love with the look of the classic roll-top desk sometime in my teenage years; ever since then I’ve often fantasized about owning my own, with its locking top and proliferation of tiny drawers and shelves. There was never enough money or enough room in my house, and I already had a perfectly good desk, so the fantasy […]

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Three rooms

As much as I enjoyed the many works of art in San Francisco’s Legion of Honor, it felt amazing to walk into a room and find myself standing inside a lavishly decorated and furnished room from pre-Revolution-era France. There are three such exhibit spaces in the museum, covering the 17th and 18th centuries. I shot all but the top photo […]

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