Q: Chuck, you’re known for several activities and accomplishments, among them as a teacher and a musician. But let’s talk about your background a little bit before we get into what you’ve done as an adult. How long have you lived in San Anselmo?

A: All my life. I was actually born in San Francisco, only because my mother had some difficulties and I had to be cesarean and they had better hospital facilities, so they went over by boat. I came from San Francisco to our home, and only home really, which was right down below us, right next door. It was built in 1924, Mom and Dad were married in 1925, and I was born in 1926. I lived there all my life.

Q: When was this house built?

A: We built this in 1965.

Q: Getting back to your family, where did they come from? What is some of the family background?

A: Mom was born in San Francisco and Dad was born in San Francisco. My mother has an Austrian-German background and my dad an Italian background. Mom’s mother and father were born in Germany. And a sidelight is that she was raised with two brothers who were born in Germany, and in World War went back to Germany to serve in the German Navy, which I find interesting. My father’s family – both my grandmother and my grandfather – were born in Boston and they came to San Francisco and I’m not sure when they came to San Francisco. I know Dad was born in 1895 in San Francisco, as was my mother. The same year about a month apart. And then Dad and the Lavaroni family came over to Yolanda in 1906 and built what they called a farm, or ranch, and it was a property completely surrounded by San Anselmo Avenue, Elm Avenue and Scenic where the old Lansdale School was located. That was their ranch. They had some cows. It was a nice piece of property that was slowly divided up into little pieces.

Q: We just did a little piece for a magazine talking about family life in San Anselmo. It was brought out that prior to World War I most of the people were farmers and had acreage and livestock.

A: Actually, they came over and used it on the weekends. And really didn’t move here permanently until the earthquake. Everything was destroyed so they moved the family over here and then built the grocery store down in Yolanda as their means of livelihood, and as I said, slowly sold off pieces of property in order to survive financially. Pat, you and I both know Marshall Dill, who is pretty famous in relation to his knowledge of history, specifically around Northern California and Marin County. I remember hearing him talk one time about when he grew up and came to Ross. At that time the people who were servants and who were vegetable deliverers and fish mongers were all Italian. The Italians were less than successful on the monetary scale in the early 1900’s here in Marin County, and served as the service people, served as the people who did all of the grunt work. Some of them did very, very well though (laughter) as evidenced by who owns property today in Marin County.

Q: Let’s talk about your youth now. What schools did you attend?

A: I went to Wade Thomas in kindergarten. At that time it was called the San Anselmo Main School, and I flunked out. Out of desperation my folks sent me to St. Anselms. They thought maybe that would be helpful and I lasted about a semester there and I didn’t as much flunk out as I cried my way out of that one. I just hated that, so I was able to go back to Main School with the understanding I had to repeat kindergarten. Maybe that’s why I went into education. I don’t know.

From Wade Thomas to the then Red Hill. I was in the first class to graduate from what is now Drake High School, from that building that is now the Stapleton School of Drama. And so at that time they moved the 7th and 8th grades, and my one claim to fame is I was in the first seventh grade class and eight grade class that missed Valerie Ansel. Interestingly enough, my mom and she were very, very close friends. My mother was a piano teacher of some notoriety, and so she worked at the old Main School helping them put on musicals. That was a time when they couldn’t afford music teachers, so Mom would do that. And the same at the old Red Hill School which is now the Isabel Cook School, which is now Isabel Cook where people live.

So I went from Red Hill to what is now Drake and from there to Tam. The first year was still on the train. I, like all young men and women was allowed to go to the boy’s car and smoke. Go through the tunnel and break….. I’m not sure I ever did it, but I think we all thought we did. We’d take a baseball bat and go through the tunnel and break all the lights that were in the tunnel down by Corte Madera. I do know I was pantsed, which made me feel like I did in fact belong to the group. Learned how to smoke at Tam. Learned how to sneak off to the the old “Canteen.” Some of the people who remember Tamalpais remember the “Canteen.”

I remember when I was in the 8th grade there was a wonderful teacher who I liked a great deal who explained that the worst thing that could happen was to be part of the Axis and the only way to be part of the Axis was to be German and/or Italian and I was German and Italian. I didn’t like that at all. I thought somehow I was a traitor even though I didn’t think I was.

I do know I went to school for one year on the special before we moved to the buses. High school was different for those of us who lived here and had to go to Tam. It was very difficult to participate in the dances and sports and all kinds of things – not that I was athletic, but I was in the school band and the school dance band. It was hard because of gas rationing. I’m not sure of this, but I would guess that that had an influence and I don’t feel as close to Tam as I might have had I lived in Mill Valley or Sausalito. I still think of it as my high school and have some fond memories of it and some laughs. You couldn’t participate in extracurricular activities. The gas cards influenced that a great deal.

Q: When was it you really began to be interested in music? You mentioned being in the school band and the dance band.

A: I’m not sure I ever truly was interested. My mother was a piano teacher who taught lots and lots of young people in San Anselmo, some of whom you’d recognize by name. I did a lot with music because of my mother. I’m an only child, I forgot to mention that. She was active in the Marin Music Chest at the time. I remember going over to the city and picking up a fellow by the name of Pierre Monteau and bringing him to Dominican to play, and a woman by the name of Trudy Shoup who had a dance group. I think I was always influenced by music, but I really didn’t care for it. I became a music major at San Francisco State, and I didn’t like it there.

I think I really got interested in music in the last ten or twelve years when I realized I didn’t have to read music and didn’t have to play the kind of music you’re supposed to play. So now music has become very, very important to me, and I love it, and although it was an integral part of my life, it was not anything I took very seriously. I was in the musicians’ union and played and did all that stuff but I never considered myself as being that interested, but I guess I was.

Q: Do you have any of your friends from your school days that you remember particularly, especially were there any that you still know?

A: You know, that is kind of scary. Even though I was born and raised in this town, I really did not maintain very many friends. One who both Barbara and I maintained all of our lives – who just recently passed away – was a fellow by the name of Ray Greenberg, known by everybody who knew him as Butch. He was the town character when he was 12 years old and when he passed away at age 65 he was the town character. A delightful guy. I still keep in contact with a fellow who lived around the corner by the name of Niel Whitman, who has some notoriety as a modern storyteller. A fellow who was close until he passed away – Gill Slusher who was actually from Corte Madera, the Superintendent of Schools in Larkspur/Corte Madera. Somehow, the war and going on to college, even though I came back here, and going into the education profession up in Novato in 1949, my circle of friends gravitated toward my profession instead of lifelong friendships. I am fortunate enough to be with a group who get together at least once a year from old Tam High days, and none of whom are from San Anselmo. Some are from Sausalito and Mill Valley. I think of them as Tam students.

Q: Can you think of any events – either national events or local events – that really shaped your life, shaped your thinking?

A: Obviously, World War II. I think of that every once in a while. That business of being almost ashamed of my heritage, being German and Italian – and that was my fault, not the community’s fault – but I was ashamed of that for a while. Whenever I go through Ross, I still think of being on a Cub Scout hike, going down toward Phoenix Lake, and then two or three of us dropped off and went into what we thought was an abandoned house and destroyed every window in the building and by the time we got home the Ross police had contacted my folks and I had to go to the police station and I really say how in the world can you get in trouble for doing something you didn’t know was against the law. The building was abandoned so why couldn’t you break all the windows. How old are you when you are a Cub, 9 or 10 years old? I remember hearing the first time ignorance of the law was no excuse. And that sounded very unfair to me in Ross. By the time I came home and talked to my folks it didn’t seem unfair. That had quite an influence on me and I still think of that and I know it influenced my interest in education in working with kids and I know it influenced me in my specific interests in social studies education , and I’ve done several years in the field of law related education, and it really goes back to that. I remember how unfair I thought that was until somehow my folks helped me understand the fairness, or the reality of that.

On the day of Pearl Harbor was the first time I had enough nerve to get on the back of Bob Blackford’s motorcycle. When I came home and found out that two things had occurred, (1) we were at war and (2) I had done something that was real frightening to my mom and dad. Somehow I thought I was responsible for World War II because I had really broken every rule and gotten on the back of his motorcycle and someone had seen us. That was interesting. You couldn’t do anything really bad in San Anselmo without your folks knowing about it.

I remember stealing something from Art Smith’s Ben Franklin five-and-dime, and by the time I got home my dad knew. Art had called Dad. I remember going down this hill here on a bicycle and losing control and shooting out into Sir Francis Drake, which at that time maybe had a car every two minutes. I shot down the hill and didn’t get hurt because there was no traffic. By the time I got back up the hill my mom knew about it. It was a wonderful community.

Everybody knew everybody and everybody protected everybody. I guess its like that whole thing about it takes a village. And it is interesting how that is now in politics, as of last week. But it was true of San Anselmo. People knew everything, both good and bad.

Q: I’m jumping ahead a little bit. Was the same feeling of everyone being in a community and raising the children or at least being interested in them true when your children were growing up and going to school?

A: We did move from San Anselmo in 1952 to Novato, where I became principal. And then left Marin County entirely for four years and went to Kings County where I was Assistant County Superintendent. By the time we were back in this house in 1965 to raise our kids it was a different ball game. I think everybody knew a lot of stuff about everybody, but some place along the line they kept quiet about it, or in a bizarre sort of way almost encouraged it – accepted the fact that kids were drinking when they shouldn’t. I really believe this to be true. I don’t think we did, but we did in a way. We sort of almost joined. I think as a group, as parents we became pretty slovenly in the 60’s. I really believe that, and I think we were part of it as much as anybody.

I remember graduation night at Drake when our daughter graduated in ’67 or ’68 – it must have been something like that – and the thing that was disturbing was that the kids mooned the audience; there were bubbles being blown; there was champagne being drunk on stage; and the speeches had nothing to do with education. It was all anti-government, anti-Vietnam. Maybe all legitimate causes, but in direct answer to your question, was it the same in 1965, as far as I’m concerned no it wasn’t.

Q: Let’s find out something about what you did as an adult now. You mentioned teaching. Tell us something about where you taught, what you taught, why you taught, and who you taught.

A: I started teaching in Novato. I was the 17th teacher in Novato in 1949. I remember that because it was an interesting fact. By now there must have been 700-900.

I remember when I signed up with Miss Smith who was the credentials secretary for Marin County and I signed up and spelled Novato incorrectly. She wondered how in the world I could ever teach when I couldn’t spell the community in which I was going to teach.

Beginning in the year every teacher in Marin County got together at San Rafael High School. They called it a teachers’ institute. And there were that many teachers in Marin County that we could all fit into the building. I remember walking on the steps and seeing at least four of my old teachers at Tam High and almost in unison said: “what in the world are you doing here?” And I didn’t know. It didn’t give me a great deal of confidence.

In three years, I became principal. I was one of the youngest principals in the State of California. But having said that, it was nothing to be too proud of because that was the time they were building schools in Marin County as quickly as they were building anything, and if you were a man, if you were a veteran, and had a credential you got a job. It was that simple. The reason I had a credential was, by using the GI Bill, I could go back and make a little extra money in the summer. I had to go back and get something, so I got my credential.

Q: Where did you go?

A: All at San Francisco State. I did work in a Ph.D. program at Cal Berkeley for a while, just long enough to get kind of excited about that field of education – that’s when I was Assistant Superintendent in Kings County – and planned on commuting every Saturday back to Berkeley and chose not to the first year.

Then something interesting happened to me. What happened to me was the realization that a Ph.D. in Education was for me a very stupid goal. I ran into more and more people who got their doctorates who said in essence “don’t do it” because when you get the doctorate you realize you are still you, and if you got the doctorate just to get some notoriety it isn’t worth it.

 Or even worse, there was a fellow who was the Chairman of the Education Department at Fresno State, Dr. Dick Sparks. A really neat fellow. We were talking one night and he said: “Chuck, if I were walking down the street and there was a doctorate on the ground and all I had to do to earn it was to pick it up, I wouldn’t pick it up.” I said: “Why Dick, you’re in charge of Education at a prestigious University that is turning out lots of teachers?” He said he was an elementary school principal and just loved being with the kids. He worked hard, earned his doctorate and came back to the same school and he felt people were saying: “What’s a man with a doctorate doing teaching in an elementary school?” He did say he wished he hadn’t done it.

Q: What were kids like in 1949 when you went to teach in Novato? How did they dress? Particularly, how did they interact with you? Did they still say sir?

A: Yeah. They really did, even though a couple of them in the seventh grade were 17 and I was 21, literally just barely older than some of them. They really did show some kind of respect. Novato was still pretty much an agrarian community. They came in overalls, some of them. It was really at that time in Novato, in 1949, if you did something to a kid – and even where the teacher was wrong they were right – it was generally speaking right in the eyes of the parents. And I had some times when I know I was wrong and got away with it, which I don’t think would happen anymore. I’m not saying that’s good, but there was that sense of respect. A great sense of fear on the part of kids. The teacher was God-like.

Q: I remember you were a teacher at Dominican.

A: I came back to Novato as Assistant Superintendent. Then I went to Sausalito in 1965. That date I remember: 1965. In August of ’65 when I was appointed as Superintendent I went to the first board meeting. I was 38 or 39 years old at the time. At the first board meting I did a number of things: (1) I created a plan for every kid – every kid in the Sausalito School District was bused; (2) I did away with the phonics program; (3) I did away with testing; (4) I did away with the A-B-C report card. I did about 10 social changes.

Two things occurred as a result of my tenure at Sausalito. One, the district used to have 1,100 kids when I went there and 9 months later it had 600. 500 fled. The other thing that happened in Sausalito in 1965 as a result of my great leadership is I had a nervous breakdown. What I did was socially correct. The first day I went into Marin City as Superintendent, the only thing I could do was cry. I wept. There was a school there called Manzanita School. In the heart of Marin County, it was complete disregard for any human being. That school was filthy. It was rotten. It had broken windows. And that’s where the black kids in Marin City went. And the kind of terrible things that we heard about occurring in the South were occurring in our front yard, not our back yard. The kind of awful things that were happening to the people in Marin City were unbelievable. That’s the truth. The other truth I learned is that you don’t change that by edict.

We changed it all right. All we did was destroy the school district. As I understand today there are still only 500-600 kids in the Sausalito School District. They just left. I don’t blame them in a way. So by solving one problem, we created another one. We didn’t ask for that. But I am ashamed of Marin County in the 1960s. What we as citizens did to that community in the ‘60s. I just find it disheartening, and I find it difficult today to look at Marin City.

Q: That’s certainly something that was unfortunate, even tragic. Let’s go back to San Anselmo, since this is where you live and many of your activities have taken place.

A: After Sausalito I came back and became Principal of the then Isabel Cook School, where I was as a kid. And that was through a fellow by the name of Virgil Hollis. Everyone who knows Virgil has a different picture of what Virgil was. As far as I’m concerned he was a savior. Here I am cracking up and he helped me find the San Anselmo job and convinced the then Superintendent Steve Parodi to hire me.

I went back to the same school I was at as a kid and spent three years there, licking my wounds and becoming sane again. There was a wonderful teacher there by the name of Evelyn Nash. Evelyn Nash was my first grade teacher and she was still on the staff when I came back in 1966. And she came to the office and she said – this won’t mean anything to anyone listening to this – except until I was eighteen I thought my name was Furger. For all my life I was known as Furger Lavaroni until I went into the Navy at age 17. And she came into the office at Isabel Cook School – my first grade teacher who was now on my staff – and said: “Furger, if you don’t tell anybody I was your first grade teacher I won’t.” She stayed for a couple more years before she retired.

And in 1969 that’s when I went to Dominican as Director of Teacher Education and stayed  for several years, and then the last three or four years Sister Samuel asked me to become Dean of Admissions. I retired when I was 55.

Q: How about music now. You said you started enjoying it 10 or 12 years ago. You have a band that plays in all sorts of places.

A: We don’t play as many places as I’d like to play, but I’m pleased with the fact that for about the last four years we’ve played the first Saturday of every month out at Rancho Nicasio and I think we’re into the 19th month that it’s been sold out. If you don’t have reservations on the first Saturday of the month, you don’t get to go there. That’s been fun.

But the most fun has been the last three or four months every Friday and Saturday night at the new Pinocchio restaurant in San Anselmo, which I really, really like. The owner there has been very nice and, because Barbara and I travel a lot, and we’re going to have a trio there every Friday and Saturday night, it takes about twelve musicians to do that depending on who’s in town and who’s doing other things. So I’m sort of entrepreneuring that, which has really been fun to hire better musicians than I to replace me when I’m not there. It’s just fun. It’s really, really, truly fun.

Q: What is your favorite instrument? I notice a bass here.

A: I won’t play piano at all, and the reason I have a bass is that we are kind of a musical family and sometimes we like to sing and play, so anybody who wants to play the bass plays the bass. Barbara plays by ear and we have lots of friends who play a lot better than we do. Sometimes we call it a musical. It is a time when people have a good time. My son Peter plays drums. My son John plays guitar. And lots of friends who come to play and enjoy.

Q: You have how many children?

A: Three, and two grandchildren.

Q: Is this one of your grandchildren? (pointing to painting).

A: Yes, that’s Giuliana.

Q: Tell us a little bit about the painting. I think it’s charming.

A: Both our grandchildren were painted by Elizabeth Boyd. Elizabeth Boyd is an artist from Larkspur. She’s famous in her own right because of her paintings and as a painting teacher. And her husband was very, very famous. He was on the Larkspur-Corte Madera School Board for some 35-40 years. This is Giuliana and Cara at Dillon Beach, which is our favorite place. That was done by Bagwell, who was a student of Elizabeth Boyd. Two were done by Boyd and one is by her student. That’s our shrine to our grandchildren. I say that with some degree of humor, but not really.

Q: You mentioned your wife Barbara. How did you meet her?

A: At San Francisco State. We were in an Ed Psych class together. She taught for three years before we had Kathy, our first child. She was the first kindergarten teacher at Deer Park. That’s interesting. When she quit a young lady who was born and raised here in San Anselmo named Charlene Locatt took over the position and stayed as kindergarten teacher in Deer Park until they closed Deer Park. The whole time at Deer Park School there were only two kindergarten teachers, Charlene Locati and Barbara Lavaroni.

Q: Since your life has been based on education, what do you think of the education your children received?

A: They could have received a better education had Barbara and I been better parents. And I don’t mean that to be demeaning at all. I think we turned it over – we were public school teachers and believe in public schools – and somehow we just trusted that they would do the right thing for them, and I wished now that we had pushed a little bit more, encouraged a little bit more. I know we supported them. I know we supported the school. I know we supported the individual teacher. We didn’t work as hard as we might have. And yet all three are wonderfully successful. I’m not disappointed in anything except I wish I had been a better parent. I think Barbara was very good. I sort of said “aw geese, you’ve got plenty of time to learn.” I think they’re happy. They like me so I guess that’s good.

Q: In closing, have you ever been involved in local politics?

A: Never have. On rare and wonderful times when I got excited about an individual candidate, whether local or Marin County, I would do something. Certainly became enthusiastic about all sorts of issues and worked hard to make sure we didn’t have the death penalty. If I had the opportunity do it again I’d work hard to make sure we have it. So I’ve changed on a lot of stuff. I worked for some individual candidates. Worked hard for Martin Blinder. I thought he was a breath of fresh air. I worked hard for Pete Arrigoni at the county level. It had more to do if there was a personality involved in it. But I can honestly say that I should have taken a greater interest. It was all personality.

Q: The last question I’d like to ask you deals with community life and the town of San Anselmo. Why did you want to be on the San Anselmo Historical Commission?

A: I was born and raised in this town, and I think about it often. The town has been wonderful to me. I’m proud of San Anselmo and yet I was always on the outskirts. Sort of active in the Church when I was a Church goer; sort of active in the schools when I was a kid; sort of active in all sorts of things but never really very active. So about a year and a half ago it dawned on me that this is my home and I love it and I want to do more. I even get up now in the morning on occasion to walk around and find the right place to have coffee and meet other members.

I’ve been told if I go to Hilda’s I’ll run into some people that’ll be there every morning, and that I can begin making those kinds of friendships. Just Friday I walked down the street to find a new lawyer. Nothing wrong with the lawyer I’ve used for many, many years but he’s in San Rafael. I want to find one in San Anselmo. Got my hair cut in San Anselmo Red’s - 53 years he’s been cutting hair in that same barber shop - and started talking with him about the other barbers I’ve known over the years, and the three barber shops. And that was fun.

I think it has to do with a sense of roots, with a sense that this community has been good to me. Certainly good to my mom and dad. Dad was a lot more active when he was alive. Mom was tremendously active. You’d be surprised. To this very day when I say something, they say: did you know Anna Lavaroni? So many people took piano lessons from my mom – and a lot of them are dead – but their children remember hearing about my mom. It’s those kind of connections I didn’t want to lose.

Q: Thank you so much. Does anyone else have a question?

Q: (Laurie) Why did your parents cross the country?

A: It was my grandparents, and I really don’t know. Both my parents were born here and I never asked and if they shared with me I don’t remember. I presume it was economic. That’s a pretty gutsy thing to do, isn’t it, when you stop to think about it.

Q: Chuck, this has been great. You’re wonderful.

A: Thank you for the opportunity.



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