Atascadero should honor E.G. Lewis with public art

Several months ago I mentioned the single palm tree that marks the entrance to the former 11-acre estate of Atascadero founder E.G. Lewis. The site is currently the Vons center. A reader emailed me shortly after that and said she found a tiny bronze plaque in the median in front of the pizza restaurant in that center.

She wondered why there was no more of a tribute anywhere in the community to Lewis, who eventually founded three American cities.

I remember when the bronze was put in place in the traffic median. A few members of the Atascadero Historical Society gathered there to place the plaque, and then went to the cemetery to place another bronze plaque next to the headstones of Edward and Mabel Lewis.

I don’t have a good answer as to why we haven’t come up with some kind of public art (bronze) for Lewis.

Lewis wrote in a brief autobiography in about 1930 that, “University City now has a population of 45,000 with an assessed value of $50,000,000. The city has just recently named its new high school and park after me.”

He was pleased with that recognition or he wouldn’t have written about it.

Here in Atascadero, there is a street, Lewis Avenue, named for our founder. Then there was Lewis Avenue Elementary School, which eventually became Atascadero Junior High School.

There was a movement several years ago to build support for the creation of a bronze of E.G. Lewis to be placed somewhere in the historic civic center Lewis created.

The prime mover was Chuck Ward, who currently heads a group creating a bronze of zoo founder Chuck Paddock.

Local artist and sculptor Mark Greenaway is creating that bronze piece. Greenaway is the one responsible for the bronze you find at the Faces of Freedom Memorial at Atascadero Lake, a bronze relief in front of the local movie house and other sites throughout San Luis Obispo County.

Bronzes don’t come cheap; the one for Paddock will cost close to $60,000 (and should be dedicated this July 4) and the piece at the wartime memorial more than doubles that.

At the present time, nothing much of any kind of public art pays tribute to Lewis, who created this utopian community in 1913. There, however, is a quote by Lewis cast into the concrete on the City Administration Building side facing the junior high that reads: “Let us keep our faces to the sunshine and we will not see the shadows.”

Among his other talents, Lewis was an optimist.

This story was originally published May 18, 2015 at 3:08 PM with the headline "Atascadero should honor E.G. Lewis with public art."