Prankster Clampers get serious about history

After providing support and fellowship during California’s Gold Rush, E Clampus Vitus had no active chapters by the 1920s.

The fraternal organization’s demise was primarily due to mining operations shutting down or moving to other states and the U.S. entry into WWI.

Carl Wheat and George Dane were attorneys who had been friends since their undergraduate days at Pomona College and who shared a love of California history. In 1930. they were exploring small towns in the Sierra foothills and became curious about the group as they conversed with Clampers of the old order.

With their friend Leon Whitsell, they proposed reviving the organization at a Cliff House luncheon the next year. The reaction was favorable, and old-time ECV members provided the words and rites they remembered to begin the revival. New members needed to possess an interest in preserving the history of California and the American West.
Wheat became known as the “revivifier” and eventually became the noble grand humbug of San Francisco Chapter 1 and Los Angeles Chapter 2.

Playing pranks on fellow members has always been a treasured tradition in Clamperdom, but one prank in the 1930s went haywire. Dane and others instigated the prank on Herbert E. Bolton, the director of the Bancroft Library and a professor of American history at UC Berkeley. Bolton had a special interest in finding a brass plate mentioned in the writings of Francis Pretty, who was a member of Sir Francis Drake’s voyage to Alta California in 1579.

The old journal described the details of the plate that was left behind as evidence of Drake’s claiming the land for the British Crown. Bolton always made mention to his students to look for it if they were ever at Drake’s Bay.

In 1933, a chauffeur was waiting while his employer was hunting at Drake’s Bay. He found a brass plate and tossed it into the car for later inspection but threw it out the window near San Quentin several days later – deeming it rubbish. It was found again in 1936 on the side of the road and eventually made its way to an excited Professor Bolton. He believed the plate could be authentic, except for the fact that it was not found near Drake’s Bay.

The chauffeur came forward to tell his tale, metallurgic experts at Columbia University tested the plate and by all indications it seemed to be the real thing. Dane had made several hints to it being fake; for one, the letters ECV could be seen written on the back under a black light. But the plate’s discovery was quickly heralded in newspapers and journals throughout the world, and its true origin was kept a secret to preserve Bolton’s reputation and to hide the perpetrators’ extreme embarrassment.

There had always been a healthy number of historians who doubted the plate’s authenticity. They were vindicated 40 years later, when further testing showed its edges to have been cut with modern machinery and that it contained trace metals consistent with modern American brass. A UC Berkeley press release on Feb. 18, 2003, revealed who did it.

However, it is no joke that E Clampus Vitus is serious about history. Part of the Clamper Creed reads, “… may I never forget the stout-hearted men who settled a great western wilderness and the heritage we have today. May I never fail to appreciate a bit of western lore.”

“Plaquing” is their way of acknowledging people and places significant to our area. ECV Joaquin Murrieta Chapter 13, serving Alameda and Contra Costa counties, has erected eight stone monuments and installed nine plaques in Clayton alone. Many thanks to the gentlemen in the red shirts.

Debbie Eistetter is membership chair of the Clayton Historical Society. Visit claytonhistory.org or come to the museum on Main Street, open 2-4 p.m. Wednesdays and Sundays. Admission is free. Call 925-672-0240.