Evans-Wentz Incident

HAMBLEN, GILBERT & BROOKE

ATTORNEYS AND COUNSELORS

PAULSEN BUILDING

SPOKANE, WASHINGTON 99201

Cy: Della van Heyst

January 3, 1968

Mr. David S. Jacobson

Secretary to Stanford University

Stanford, California

Dear Mr. Jacobson:

I have read with considerable interest your article in the October Almanac and the numerous responses to the same in the next edition, particularly the one from Wendell W. Ward, '07. According to Mr. Ward, it must have been my brother, R. D. Brooke, '09, of Spokane who saved Walter Yeeling Evans-Wentz by pulling him from his perilous position as he hung from the upper most reaches of Encina Hall. He arrives at this conclusion because the "Bawl-Out" listed R. D. Brooke as rooming with Wentz in room 157, Encina.

I dislike very much to dispel this heroic image of my brother portrayed by Mr. Ward, but I am convinced that at the time of the quake, he was living in the Phi Kappa Psi House, which at the time was either in Palo Alto or in its present location.

I quote from a letter from R. D. Brooke to his mother, written April 19, 1906.

"The big shock occurred at 5:15 yesterday. I woke up and the house was jumping back and forth and plaster falling all over. The chimneys fell over and came crashing through the ceiling. It is a wonder to me that the house didn't topple over. The frame buildings stood the shock pretty well with the exception of the plaster and chimneys but the brick and stone buildings are the ones that caught it."

Bob never mentioned the incident concerning Wentz to me at any time, and I am convinced that while he lived at Encina when he first entered Stanford, he was living in the Phi Kappa Psi House at the time of the quake, notwithstanding the address contained in the "Bawl-Out". A possible explanation is that the "Bawl-Out" may have been published in the fall, and my borther moved to the

Mr. David S. Jacobson -2- January 3, 1968

fraternity house for the spring semester.

While considerable doubt seems to remain as to who saved Wentz from an untimely death, it most certainly has been definitely determined that the alumni read the Almanac.

Sincerely yours,

{signature: "Philip S. Brooke"}

Philip S. Brooke LL.B '16

PSB:ss

cc: Mr. Wendell W. Ward

Xc to Della 1/12

to Leo Stanley 1/26/68

Geo. Ditz 1/16/68

2317 W. 20th St.,

Los Angeles, 1/8/68.

90018

Mr. David S. Jacobson,

Sec'y to the University

Stanford, Cal.

Dear Mr. Jacobson:

"Peccavi-" My sin has found me out. I said "the Bawlout was always right".

Now cometh a copy of a recent letter written to you by Phillip S. Brooke, LLB '16, which proves that the Bawlout was wrong as to the residence of his brother, Bob '09', at the time of the Wentz incident. In a letter to his mother, Bob describes his sensations during the '06 earthquake|in the house, so he couldn't have been in Encina when Wentz was hanging from the roof.

Perhaps Rick Templeton is right in saying that it is all just a good story and nothing more. All we need now is for some good Stanford man to prove that there never was any earthquake in the first place; as San Franciscans say, "it was just the fire". Then how about those "brickpiles of the City", Laup? (Leumeister '07).

If there was no quake|then the Phi Kappa Psi house, which was built in College Terrace in 1892 and later dragged across the wheat fields and relocated near the Palo Alto deepo', may have been shaken to pieces solely by the reverberations of the Southern Pacific trains.

Even some of the "old guard" professors made the mistake of building homes in College Terrace. Professor L.M. Hoskins, ("Bill Nye" to generations of Stanford engineers) once showed me the house that he built there. And by the way, I still have the well-known Hoskins walking-stick with its inscription- "from the Class of '98."

"The First Year at Stanford (English Club 1905) relates that at the opening of the University there was no Palo Alto and who could foretell that it would become the "college town" or even become the home of Patrick's restaurant and Joe Larkin's lunch counter, very important ports-of-call because when the typhoid epidemic ocur{caret:"r"}ed in 1903 the Stanford Inn closed its doors and remained closed until 1007. That's when the eating clubs were born.

Leo Stanley and I were partners in crime in the'06-07 "Stanford University Concert Band". I missed Leo at our 50th Reunion in 1957 (and still miss him), but I know about his books and also those of his collaborat-ress collobatt-ress, Evelyn Wells Podesta. I hear frequently from N.P. (Nick Bryan)- "old pal"of '07. Now calls himself Class of 1908-(ugh).

Well, do not think that I have forgotten having paid 15¢ for that misleading Bawlout! I suppose "limitation" has barred me from recovery but it is worth the money to go ringing down the grooves of fame as the leading liar in the Wentz argument.

Yours for Stanford,

Wendell W. Ward '07

P.S.

Mayfield is no more but it had at least one distinction- those Table Tops. Tell me, Old Timers "was your name written there?"

Carbon Copy to Philip S. Brooke

Hamblen, Gilbert & Brooke

Paulsen Blda - Spokane 99201

143 LaVerne Ave.

Long Beach, Calif.

Jan - 9 - 1968

Xe to Della 1/12

David Jacobson:

Dear Sir – I am writing to confirm the Encina earthquake story. I was there and remember it especially well. Since when Wentz was hanging from the eaves, I jumped from a second-floor window and broke off the extreme lower tip of my backbone, by landing sitting down.

While Wentz was hanging from the eaves, some of the boys on the inside asked him why he was doing it, and he said: "because I wan tto land on top of the heap, when the building goes down, instead beneath it.

Yours very truly

Ralph C. Pollock

Stanford - A.B. '06 A.M. '12

{address label affixed:

"RALPH C. POLLOCK

143 LaVerne Avenue

Long Beach 3, California"}

P.S. - Sorry, but I do not know the name of Wentz' roomate.

R.C.P.

"Seemingly" impossible or not, I was there and know that it happened just as stated in the story, which, by the way, did not say that he jumped.

Xc Della Van Heyst

Almanac file

Great Farm Fairfax, Cal

Jan. 22 1968

Mr. Dave Jacobson,

Stanford,

Dear Dave;

Sunday when I was at Coloma for the opening of the new Marshall Mill, I found, in an antique shop, the two enclosed photos. No mistaking, one is of the Chapel, and not long after the quake. The other is the New Library. It was this building which I saw fall. After the brick and mortar cloud of dust cleared away there was only the "Bird Cage" and a lot of rubble about it. Some of us "dirty shirts" got a summer job cleaning bricks from it.

As I recall, probably mistakenly, when excavations were being made for the present school of Business, some one reported that the old concrete walls and foundations had been found. The account seemed to want to convey that some very ancient ruins had been unearthed, a new archeological discovery! Anyway, Dave, these pictures are yours for whatever purpose.

Yes, I remember "Garf.", He was a wonderful lad. Although he spoke very little english or at least with accent, he entered into athletics and other activities. He became a Big Oil Man in Mexico.

I have just unearthed a letter written to me by Myron Burr, 150 n. Myrtle Ave., Monrovia. I had written Burr inquiring about Ortigoso Cortez whose posad daughter Elena is posadera of Los Quatro Vientos in Puerto Vallarta . He writes,