It still kept for its nucleus painters, writers, musicians and
actors, amateur and professional. They were a gay group of men, and
hospitality was their avocation. Yet the thing which set this club off
from all others in the world was the midsummer High Jinks.
The club owns a fine tract of redwood forest fifty miles north of San
Francisco on the Russian River. There are two varieties of big trees in
California: the Sequoia gigantea and the Sequoia sempervirens. The great
trees of the Mariposa grove belong to the gigantea species. The
sempervirens, however, reaches the diameter of 16 feet, and some of the
greatest trees of this species are in the Bohemian Club grove. It lies
in a cleft of the mountains: and up one hillside there runs a natural
out of doors stage of remarkable acoustic properties.
In August the whole Bohemian Club, or such as could get away from
business, went up to this grove and camped out for two weeks. On the
last night they put on the Jinks proper, a great spectacle in praise of
the forest with poetic words, music and effects done by the club. In
late years this has been practically a masque or an opera. It cost about
$10,000.
