He wrote about the environmentalists and the county supervisor. About the people who wanted to destroy Salvation Mountain and build a primitive campground in its place. The story recalled a test that was conducted at Salvation Mountain indicating that the work was causing massive amounts of lead pollution. County supervisors called the site ‘toxic’ and plans were set to have the place bulldozed.
It's weird how the media picks up on the meaningless and sensationalist environmental stories. There is no doubt that Leonard's painted mountain is the smallest of any possible environmental infractions in the region. It reminded me of the huge amount of resources that went into the campaign against the Makah whale hunt in 1999.
When you know how horrible the real environmental threats around this area are, the attacks on Leonard Knight seemed spiteful and silly. Maybe they were after the message, not the paint.
This same paper – the one that we suppose is the voice of Southern California, the one that from time to time has the largest circulation in the United States, has only written one article on the poisoned river that flows into the Salton Sea. The river that presumably is responsible for a good share of the Salton Sea's poisoning. Its weird, isn't it? You've probably never heard of the New River, but you may have heard of Leonard's lead paint. And yet the New River affects both the health of millions, and the survival of entire species of some of our most treasured animals.
Leonard Knight decided to have his own samples of his mountain drawn and independently tested. He had tests conducted in the same holes drawn by the previous testers. They all came out negative. The point, however, is of degree. There is no doubt that Salvation Mountain does little good for the local environment. But how bad can 10,000 gallons of dried up paint on an old hill be?
Leonard Knight is incredibly fit and healthy. He shows me his in-progress tree sculptures, the new additions, the straw-and-adobe museum he is building. Leonard's projects dictate another thirty years of climbing ladders, hoisting telephone poles and climbing precariously across vast construction sets. At Seventy-three, he'll be one-hundred and three before he's done.
"So how is it living out here? Do you ever have problems with wildlife, or the heat, or the rain, or the cold?"
Leonard lives in a small truck on the premises, painted all crazy.
"I have it too easy here," he says.
"You know, in Vermont it gets to negative twenty, but they like it up there. Here it gets to a hundred and twenty, and that's not so bad."
"How do you survive that heat?" Leonard has no air-conditioning.
"It's hard. But you just deal with it. Most of the year, it's just great weather." Leonard's company is a stray dog who never left the site. When I try to pet him, the dog pulls away. "He was beaten by his former owners."
Where the dog came from is easy to figure out. Slab City. I shake hands with Leonard and go there.
Slab City, like Salvation Mountain, is part of this abandoned World War II military base that nobody seems to own. Because nobody owns the land, an assortment of elderly nutcases, snowbirds and bearded messiahs have descended upon this place in their old busses and trailers.
Most live here in the winter, some are travelers in for a month or two. The place resembles the orderliness of a city, and the hokey wildness of the Burning Man festival. A few stages have been built, for community entertainment. Airline seats and old couches showing their springs make up the audience seats. Hubcaps the decor.
Portrait of Leonard Knight
