The story that follows was written by Fletcher Johnson. Fletcher was a junior high school student at the time. The purpose of this report was to fulfill a term writing project of an art class that he was taking in 1991. There were several topics that Fletcher could have chosen, but he selected the option to write about the life and accomplishments of an individual artist. The artist he wanted to write about was his father.
I have decided to share this story because it shows the insight a 12 year old son had of his father.
The Dad I Don’t Know
By Fletcher Johnson
November 1991
Today I know a guy who dresses up in a suit and puts on a tie and goes around selling insurance. He is a financial consultant. Before that he was a person who owned a lifeguard company. But even before that, before I was born, there was a guy who I don’t know, a person who made beautiful pots that I see all over in my family’s home. So here I am today to tell you about this man, my Dad who was a potter and maybe will be again.
It was his junior year at the University of Redlands in California and my Dad was majoring in psychology. One class was doing rat experiments. The students zapped the rats to see how long they lived. He didn’t respect the teacher and almost threw up every session. He hated the class so he took a pottery class to escape the rat experiments. Although he got a psych degree in 1971 he decided after he graduated to get a Master’s in Ceramics.
On the way up to Washington for his interview with the graduate department, he stopped by my Mom’s college in Oregon. That was the year he graduated from Redlands. Mom went overseas to study for a year and two weeks after she got back they married. They have been best friends since the 8th grade. It took Mom and Dad two years to make enough money to be able to move to Washington so he could study ceramics.
He made money throwing pots and coming back to Laguna in the summer to lifeguard for the city. He did this until I was born in 1979.
The year I was born, Dad started his own lifeguard company. For 11 years his company guarded all of the county beaches between Huntington Beach and San Clemente and never had a drowning. He was a dad to the 150 kids who worked for him each season. He didn’t throw pots during this time. He learned to build houses during the winter. Dad says he would throw pots again if he could have his own studio, a place where he could go and not be disturbed and have no money worries.
The Potting Years
The two years he studied ceramics at Redlands, the teacher was Leon Moberg. He taught him the fundamentals of clay work and taught him to recognize and throw in the different styles.
In Washington, Carlton Ball and Ken Stevens were the teachers. Carlton’s motto was, “Throw ‘em big. Throw ‘em tall, throw ‘em just like F.C. Ball.” Ball was an old man and not very active in the department. Ken Stevens was young and had been a chemist. He was an amazing glazer. And Dad learned a lot from him about glazing.
There were 12 kids in my Dad’s graduating class in ceramics at Puget Sound. Curtis Heafer, Jim Williams and Adrian Enriquesare are some of his friends who still throw pots.
They were required to take classes in sculpture, design, art history and glaze chemistry and to teach undergraduates so they could practice their teaching skills. The kilns ran all night. My Dad had to watch the kilns and usually didn’t get home until 2:00 to 4:00 in the morning. Mom says he didn’t mind because he loved the firings. It was wet and cold, but the kilns kept him warm.
Two of Dad’s favorite classes were Chinese History and Japanese History. He knows all the periods and all the different styles of pottery from those countries. He likes a lot of styles, but Chinese porcelain and tea ware, and Japanese brush work and glazes of their utility ware stand out in his mind.
His favorite period of pottery is the Bizen Period. Bizen is the name of a village in the Imbe area of Okayama, and has been a pottery production center in Japan for over 1,000 years. The pottery is a traditional native ware. Two families, Kimura and Kaneshige, were under the protection of the Ikeda clan because the families provided the clan with ceramics. The lords gave the two families a kiln, tools, a house, food and clothing. The two families were not allowed to ever leave or live anywhere but on the Ikeda’s land. Bizen pottery, over the years, has really changed because each clan leader had his own favorite styles and taste and wishes. One of the members of these two old families decided to duplicate the clay, glazes and brush work of the pots thrown so long ago. This was very hard because there was no one living who could describe the kilns or where the clay was found. But after many years he succeeded and is now known as “a Living Art Treasure.” This is the highest honor the Japanese people can give to one of their people.
Because Dad was so interested in Japanese history, culture and in particular pottery, he decided to go to Japan. He and Mom bought tickets and planned the trip. Then the charter was cancelled and rescheduled for 1 month later. They had to pay rent for the month they remained in Laguna. Dad had never traveled out of the country except to Tijuana, but my Mom’s family had traveled a lot. So Mom insisted that he go without her and they cashed in Mom’s ticket so they could pay for the rent. He traveled for a month all over the country to places like: Tokyo, Kyoto, Nagasaki, Nagoya, Osaka, Kamakura, and Kurashiki.
After he finished his thesis on ash glazes and got his Master’s Degree, he took some classes here in Laguna at the Art School, which is now in the canyon. The teacher, Janet Bradley, made it fun because her attitude towards pots was for fun, not for money!
During the time in Washington he made about 3000 pots a year and he says he didn’t make much money. Mom and Dad were married for nine years before I was born and that year he stopped making pots.
How to Make Pots
The Clay
People mine their own clay or buy it. Where does this clay come from? The earth’s crust is 10 miles deep.
Very few oxides make up the bulk of the minerals at the surface of the earth. Silica and Alumina make up about 75% of the crust and these two oxides are the most important elements of clay. 90% of the earth’s crust is made of five minerals.
About 2 billion years ago, the earth’s atmosphere changed from a vapor to condensed water. Torrential rains began and lasted millions of years. Water melted minerals in rocks, rocks ground together, wind and root and ice action all caused erosion and weathering. Clay is the resulting debris, ground very fine. It ends up on the ocean floor and then is pushed up by geologic upheaval to dry land. There it is dug up by potters or people who sell the clay.
Dad bought his clay in San Clemente when he was here in Laguna. In Washington, it was dug up on the islands in Puget Sound.
Potters are very particular about the clay they use. He had access to a pug mill in Washington. It is a big mixer and you can throw your clay in there and it will do the work for you. You still have to knead it to get the air bubbles out. Washington’s weather was good because it was nice and moist. If a pot dries too quickly, it will crack. The thicker the pot, the longer it takes to dry. It was so damp in Washington, they had to use heaters to dry the pots enough to bisque them first. That’s the first firing. Then you take them out and glaze them and fire them in a second firing at a higher temperature.
Cones and Kiln Temperature
They use cones in the kilns. A cone is a thin, triangular piece of clay that has been manufactured to melt at a certain temperature. Each cone has a number on it. You line up the cones in a plaque of fire clay and put it in front of a peek hole. As each cone melts, you will know that the kiln has reached a certain temperature. You have at least 2 rows of cones placed on top and bottom shelves so you know how hot the top and bottom of the kiln is.
When the firing is done, you come to my Dad’s favorite part of the process called “cracking the kiln.” You take out a few bricks in the door so you can peek inside while the kiln is cooling. Sometimes the pots “ting” as they cool. If they cool too quickly, they will crack. Mom says Dad came home with blood-shot eyes from staring at the red interior of the kiln during the firing. The heat coming out of the peep holes is intense.
Designs and Glazes
There are many different aspects of design and I will name a few. Dad loves the shape of pots, the kind of clay used, the thickness of the clay, the finger marks of the potter’s hands on the clay, the brushwork (for his Japanese style brushwork, he has an amazing collection of brushes), incising (which is cutting a design in the clay) and last of all glazes
Dad loves ash, salt and celadon glazes. Most glaze recipes are guarded and prized by their owner, just like some cooks who won’t share their recipes. You have to know a lot of chemistry to be able to predict what chemical mixtures will melt at what temperature and how they will react to the glaze next to it and also to the chemicals of the clay.
Conclusion
Every person works in a different way, but most like the company of other people. So that’s why Laguna was a gathering spot for theater people for a while and then for all kinds of artists. Now it is so expensive to live in Laguna that a lot of those people have moved away. Some of Dad’s friends have gone to Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Colorado.
Maybe if Mom and Dad move to a place where there is peace and space, he will throw pots again. He looks so happy in the pictures in the scrapbooks of those days when he was covered with clay.
