Nude Hippies And The Origin Of An Icon

Perhaps the earliest media report on Charles Manson and his "Family" was the article that appeared in the Los Angeles Herald Examiner on April 23, 1968. That article, headlined "Nine Nude Hippies Arrested; Found Huddled Around Campfire," described the arrest of Manson and eight of his associates in Ventura County, California after law enforcement officials encountered their disabled school bus in a remote canyon.

According to the article, police found the "bus stuck in a deep ditch along Deer Creek Mountain Road, just above Bass Rock, located about five miles south of Point Mugu....  The group was apparently driving back into the canyon when the bus became stuck in the deep ditch along the roadway about a quarter mile east of Highway 1."

Arrested along with Manson in the incident were Mary Brunner, Brenda McCann (Nancy Pittman), Ella Sinder (Ella Jo Bailey), and Mark Damon (Mark Arneson, who would later be involved in the transfer of Gary Hinman's VW bus to the Straight Satans motorcycle club). Other persons detained with driver's licenses reported as being forged were Sadie Mae Glutz (Susan Atikins), Diane Bluestein (Diane Lake), Susan Scott (Stephanie Rowe), and Bruce Van Hall (in fact his real name).

Manson was booked on suspicion of grand theft auto (the bus was supposedly reported stolen from San Francisco on April 12, 1968, but it wasn't) and possession of two driver's licenses. 

This incident, however, is important beyond providing us with an early newspaper account of Charles Manson and his "Family," because the arrest was also the source of the most famous mug shot of all time, namely the "arched eyebrow" picture of Charles Manson that graced the cover of Life magazine on December 19, 1969 and went on to be featured in countless books, magazines, television programs, and all manner of other media presentations in the following decades. 

In 1968 the antics of "hippies" made for good news copy.

Above and Below: Charles Manson's mug shot from the Ventura

County bust and the resulting Life magazine cover. It has become

the icon for the "Icon of Evil."

*      *      *

Many sites related to the Charles Manson saga have been obliterated with the passage of time, but the location of this important arrest is virtually unchanged from the way it was almost fifty years ago.

A few miles north of where California Highway 1 crosses the Ventura County line the Deer Creek Road intersects on the eastern side. About a quarter mile after turning onto the road there is an obvious turnoff on the right side. Shortly down this turnoff is a creek bed where it would have been possible for the bus to get stuck. Since this is the only location in the area where it would be likely for someone to attempt to pull over a large vehicle it is very probably the site of the April 22, 1968 arrest.

Deer Creek Road is as isolated and untamed 

today as it was in April of 1968. The likely location 

of the bus breakdown was in the canyon indicated 

by the green trees in the lower right of the image.

The turnoff about a quarter mile up 

Deer Creek Canyon Road

Down into the turnoff

Did the bus get mired in this creek bed? 

The view west from the turnoff shows the location's

proximity to the Pacific Ocean.

Where's the Manson Bus?

Where is the blue Manson Bus that was photographed at Barker Ranch, today? Patty received permission this week to tell you the story that Paul Dostie told Matt, Liz and her in May, 2012.

The story goes like this:

Susan Atkins told an investigator that she left the Barker Ranch in October, 1969 to get baby Zezo. Two male bikers from Venice, CA accompanied her back to Barker. This story was corroborated by Linda Kasabian's lawyer because Linda picked up baby Tanya in LA at the same time. When Sadie and the bikers arrived at the Goler Wash, Manson and three male Family members asked her to continue up the wash on foot. Supposedly the bikers were "never heard from again."

Buster the wonder dog showed us where, specifically, the bus is supposed to be buried. Do you know the trash can south of Ballarat on Wingate Road that says "Barker Ranch, one mile?" Just beyond this, you come to the intersection of Wingate and Coyote Canyon Roads (the latter takes you all the way up the canyon to Barker Ranch). There's some dirt, rock and scrub brush moguls right there at a somewhat jumbled and undefined turnoff. The location of the well is described as "10 meters off the road."

In the past, there have been rumors that this well was a "mine shaft," but it is not. It goes straight down into the silt, not horizontal into solid rock. It would be a good source of water because the dry lakebed there which often fills in winter is most always wet just a few yards down. The thing is, if you don't maintain your well after a hard rain, the water, dirt and rocks from the wash will fill it in right quick. This is what happened with the well in question. Supposedly after the bikers were dumped there, nature did the rest. There's even greenery growing on top now, so you really cannot see a darned thing from the top.

 A friend of Sgt. Dostie's, "BG," told him that:

"around 1974, BG was visiting a friend ("TO"), who was the caretaker at the Barker Ranch. The caretaker decided to get rid of the Manson bus that was in the front yard because it was attracting too many tourists. The bus was cut up with a torch and they hauled the pieces down to the bottom of the Goler Wash in multiple trips on a flat bed truck.

At the bottom of the Goler Wash, there was an open pit well about 9 feet in diameter and 60 feet deep. There was a lot of junk and trash at the bottom of the well. They threw the pieces of the bus down the well and when they finished, it was 15 feet from the top. Subsequent flash flooding filled the well in and the location is indistinguishable from the surrounding desert...Investigative information indicates that there may be two or more victims at the bottom of the well."

Sgt. Dostie says that satellite tests could reveal a large amount of iron underground in the place that has been identified, but to date, nothing has happened because said tests are very expensive.

Now you know!

Origins of the Black Bus

On page 18 of Ed Sander's latest release of "The Family," he writes that "It was in Sacramento where they seem to have traded the Volkswagen bus as down payment for an old yellow school bus...On October 16, 1967, at the Stewart E. Miller Standard Chevron Station...they outfitted the school bus with a thirty-nine dollar battery and two sets of 825-20 tires costing $216.20." Panamint Patty found an old reverse lookup Sacramento phone directory from 1968 and located the gas station which is now a plain vanilla used car lot at 6401 Stockton Boulevard in the part of town now known as "Little Saigon." This was a surprise, since she expected the gas station would likely be on a freeway on- or off-ramp. However, In 1967, Stockton Boulevard was the main way in and out of town to the south: there was no 99, no 5 connecting Northern and Southern California. And today, there is no Stewart E. Miller Chevron station: So you may say that Patty's adventure was a bust. But then again...So many of these sites are disappearing into the mist forty years later. She hopes that some of you may be inspired to do a little sleuthing of your own and perhaps one of us will find something truly amazing...