California Gold: Working with Huell Howser

thank you so much for having me such a this has been an experience that I think fuels paid me back because when we first started can you hear me volume anyway when first started to show you secretary okay everybody here that you're okay in the mic okay anyway the secretary called me and said Louis I don't know how to tell you this he was to come and pick up the car service and I said but I said gimme Hughes phone number so I called you like that - what's this you want me to take the card to take it in and have the service and we had hadn't even started shooting so City yeah well it's our car we'll be driving all over California and you know and so I said fuel I'm the cameraman the sound guy the lighting guy and that's all I do so he gets real quiet and he says okay I'll take it in and I never heard about that again I'm from San Bernardino's born in San Bernardino my parents are from making coke and so my dad was a very very proud of my cards they're not here they work very hard and my dad worked for the machine for the shops and Sammartino railroad and at age 11 my biggest dream I wanted to be a boy scout so bad and my dad decided to lease a store from my camp and uncle in South Pole which was pretty much a segregated community and so I found a Boy Scout Troop down there all of spanic kids and it was the bharatas Boy Scout Troop I have you ever saw do you want to giving us merit badges for fighting we would adopt a nerdfighter but it was a lot of fun it was a great experience and and I worked didn't my dad's market I became I was a little butcher and he loved it years old and I guess I did okay I still have all my fingers and so graduated from Colton high school and went into the Navy because I had gone into Sea Scouts to time I was always in Scouting I went into the Navy and I became a radar man and then that was a sign to a ship in my home port was Pearl Harbor Hawaii so I said somebody had a project right but it was quite an experience a learning experience and then of course when I came out I realized I had to go to college and I went to a junior colleagues used my GI Bill and all that and I was going into a cherry and one day I ran into a friend of mine from my school and she happened to work at the TV station we talked and she offered to give me a tour of the station and so I did I had never been in the TV station and took the tour and I saw the machines I saw the tape machines I saw the mixers I saw all these things and I wouldn't stood behind a camera grabbed it and I don't know what both of like me hit me I fell in love with that camera and I changed my major I said I want to be a cameraman so I changed my major and continued studying and back then you needed an FCC license to work in the stations in Los Angeles not for a camera I'm not mean cameraman anybody that was an engineering needed was required to have an FCC license I got my license and I went to work for a facio P channel 13 remember dick Lane boxing at the Olympic roller derby all these little fun things that he COP he had a remote truck that I mean everybody on the other stations would see coming and they would call it the circus wagon because it was so colorful but we did a lot of stuff and the way it worked there at Kate's kco feet I knew I was only going to be there for about three years so I started at after three years I started looking for jobs out where KBC offered me a job and then the next day KC UT the PBS station called me says we want you to come and work for us as a cameraman but we want you to work in all aspects of engineering which is what I love doing I love moving around doing different things learning different things and I said this is perfect so I went to work for KC T in 1972 and those were great years for the station they were doing a lot of major productions Hollywood television theater they were doing a lot of local programming they were really really busy so as a cameraman I you know I had to start at the bottom and to work on all these big shows I was kind of like dylaney to help weather cameramen with their tables and set up lighting and doing these kind of things which I had loved because I think those were my greatest years in learning about television and people and being a shy quiet person that I'm trying to be and now with this book thing it's like put me in front of the camera and it's like it's scary but it taught me so much about the people and how to work with people you know about lighting and about editing and so I did all these things like became when I had a turn liking the Richard sound engineer and one day I'm in the commissary and I think it was 1989 around there and I'm having lunch and all of a sudden I hear this real southern Viking voice and not being from the south it was kind of new to manian so I looked up and sure enough it's the old outer well after he's done talking to people I go over and introduce myself and so we talked and he tells me she's going to be coming over to the station to do a video log I don't know you recall those there are little short fillers that between programming they were four three four minutes long so I I said well that's great I look forward to hopefully someday we'll get to work together and we said our goodbyes and about a week and a half later I looked at my schedule and lo and behold homicide - she was healed he comes in the day before a nice it's Louie we're gonna be shooting a story about an elephant man I said oh my god how big is this guy said no no no he he trained elephants for the circus and then he retired and he hasn't seen the elephant in for 15 years and he donated the elephant to leave San Diego Zoo so we were gonna go down there and it's true this story on it and we get down there and you comes up and talks may insist Louie just remember we're not doing brain surgery to you and so that kind of tells me a style of shooting that if you want as far as the cameraman it's like said okay we're not doing brain Sarge's you know brain surgery and we start shooting and towards the end of the interview fuel says now do you think this elephant Nita that was her name just gonna remember you after all these years so Charlie Franks goes up to the fence and says well let's find out so he calls the elephant and one of the elements except this trunk starts walking it forward to the fence and go forward to Charlie and puts his trunk around innocent like staining what the hell have you been and so it's went on and it's it was such a touching story and I mean you will have tears in his eyes Charlie was a teary eye I was cherry I but you can see me so we went back and he put this piece together very efficiently very fast and in the station like that they like the way he will work his he was very cost-effective he he just would shoot things very simply and get it put it together and be on the air where with other producers we'd go out and shoot a story and we be shooting shooting shooting and you where they're going with this story and then they come back to edit and then they find out the year of missing some stuff so as far as fuel they loved the way he he worked and like I said very cost-effective to the station they they asked him to come back and do more shows more shoes and pretty soon he was he was working with other camera but not just myself and one day I happened to be working with him and he he says Louie I have this idea for a show called California's gold and he tells me about what it's going to be about what work they would be doing and stuff like that and I said well that sounds fantastic I mean I love history I would love to see more of California things like that he says I haven't got the funding yet but I have to go talk to all the PBA PBS stations in California and see if they'll tear the show he says I talked to other cameramen but I like the way he shoot and so would you be interested I said yeah Luvdisc eventually so uh about a month later he walks into my office and sits down and says looks at me and says he'll believe and I've got the funding and the PBS stations wanna hear the show I said fantastic so now was my turn to do my thing and he had asked me if I would take a leave of absence to work on the show and kind of work our kinks out and kind of get to know each other as to how we would work together and I said okay so I talked to my management people and they say yeah yeah you can take a leave and as long as you're not if you're not working with you that you come back and work with us I said perfectly yes I I had a family to support and so it worked out and that's when I got into that part about before we started shooting they called me about taking the car and they have a service that wasn't gonna work so we got that straightened out and we started shooting and about the third fourth show he looks at me and says well what do you think I said you know what we're still shooting video logs because we would shoot his stories and you little five-minute piece further another story of is San Francisco and somewhere and you would just put them together and call it California well little by little we were kind of working the kinks out of this show and finally we started showing in Sacramento at the Train Festival Museum that they have there in Sacramento a great place I love trains because my dad was a train guy and so we were there for a weekend we shot enough material to actually make an entire show out of one one subject and so we were getting to know each other and it was working out the kinks on the show working out as to his ways my ways and the thing is she'll love being in front of the camera anytime someone was there he was on or in my case I was just the opposite I was quiet shy behind the scenes quiet time didn't want to be in front of that camera and so a lot of people would say well I always think you guys can work together and I think that's what really major work we were so totally opposites and he like I said every time she was friend of somebody he was on and it got to the point where then he started talking to Luke and I said you know I was thinking to myself voice you talking to me you know and pretty soon it kind of created a little monster for him because people wanted to know who he was and we'd be at the airport and people would just buy him and say come to me and say you're Louie and now you could see the expression on his face that sometimes he you know he didn't like it and I look at him I said hey you don't have to talk to me and you see me in Palm Springs and on his day off and stuff like that and people come up and ask him for slowest and he says you know they're not attached at the hip so but you know and we had such great adventures we shot some great stories I know sentro and tissue the story and the people who are gonna interview did show up and still were and he looks at me says the police tank I said well let's go talk to a bartender our tenders always have stories so we did and we got a story I don't know what we call what the story was about it but and then of course there was a time we were shooting the story on the Buffalo Soldiers down south by san san diego and he comes to me and says boy but he's think for a final shot for the credits and i said well it's a beautiful sunset nice valley they had the horses I said well don't I get you guys riding off into the sunset and well frame it in such a way that you can put your credits and you guys a real cool horse so they get on there out of horse they mount the horses and start writing I gave actions start writing off and halfway into the shot fuel falls off the horse so I said you just ruined my shot so he I said well okay let's do it take to Lakers I don't know look I said she has two things you like to brag about this from Tennessee and he was in the Marine Corps and I said whew I just thought you were in the Marine Corps come on let's do another shot no I can't do it I can't do it okay so little stories like that that you know I am kind of the only one that saw and only a few other people we were at the border doing a story a story on the border there and NATO and we were talking to interviewing this Border Patrol agent or supervisor and so we go up to the border in this a line that separates making gold can United States so if you had a tendency have this habit of always repeating himself and so we go up in it yes you mean this line on this side of this line is the United States and the border edges yes during the United States so this side is the United States yes besides United States and that site is that met Mexico yes that's me but this sides the United States yes so then he crosses over the line and the border agents it up you just cross the border legally and he says that's all right Louie Oh watch for me and the border agent let some ESEs Louie will be about for him I said well of defense how much money he is okay come on so little quirky stories like that but you know would happen on some of our adventures and you know we did some adventures where we go up in Heights and like the Golden Gate Bridge domes there they called total Marine base where they have to bake hangars and fuel afraid of heights and so am i but it's like um too busy coming up the top of the Golden Gate Bridge the weights blowing hanging on to the camera or the dogs to the line trying to keep the shot and frame keep everything in focus and it's these little things like that and afterwards I mean at the time I'm too busy thinking of the shock the light was it like coming from the sound is the sound good and it's things like that so I don't have time to be scared and now that I'm retired and night I give these flashbacks that I want the top of the tower Oh guys so a little adventurous like that and so after I was after 12 years which he was determined to get up in age tell us already my 60s and get it tired of carrying that camera around and all that gear and I was thinking about retiring so one day you were coming back from a shoot and I said no I just wanted to let you know that I'm thinking of retiring he's very quiet and his southern playboys Jesus why I said it because up in age and I'm thinking of retired so he's very quiet okay how much time to really give me I said I'll give you six months that should be plenty time to find another camera so four months go by five months go by and almost six months I see no Cameron and I said feel worse your new camera - well I haven't had time making excuses as to why is it so he says can you give me another six months so he gives me a pay raise and I gave him six months so I guess money does talk and so I gave him another six months and for one scope I go wide where is your camera Wow you can see the more excuse okay I said this is it this is your last six months so he gave me another but it was such an adventure wick working with you we had this you know excellent working professional relationship where we didn't hang out together we didn't go to dinner together unless it was kind of an official thing once we finished shooting I go back to my room clean my gear get everything organized get my tapes label everything and have a beer or something and then go get so much and I'd be in bed by nine o'clock for fuel he get back to this room called the office check all his calls and then he'd go out and sometimes he'd like to party and he'd like they'd have a good time and there was a couple of times like he came the next morning and I could tell he'd been up late and I said he'll you don't look good on camera okay take the day off one way to fight get a day off so it was it was quite an adventure and but then at 2004 I would I after I left heel in 2001 and 2004 I retired from the station and I still like shooting and doing that stuff so I had my own gear and I was shooting for different producers different companies and finally yeah but one day we my wife and I went to the Christmas party at the engineers at KCET and that's kind of when I went up to the office to talk to you and wasn't there and talked to his producers and that's when I found out that he was killed and I said well can we get in touch can I get in touch with him so we the lights or something and they've never called me next call I received was from KCET that tool had passed away which totally shocked the heck out fuel was you know big I worked out he was healthy but he did like his hamburgers that he did and made I don't eat red meat I haven't had a steak in 47 years like my vegetables but it was quite a shock and then when Chapman decided to honor him they called me and asked me if I would receive to talk further for you which it was quite an honor and really needed an adventure so if you have any questions I'd be more than happy to answer anything you curious about yes sir the relationship back the relationship that Chapman has with Yul Chapman had been after fuel to shoot a story on their campus and he finally did it and he fell in love with that campus as you know he didn't have a family he has a sister in Texas and that's it he didn't have a family so he donated called his houses money and everything to check the university so they honored him by creating this museum here at the University the library yes sir the music that was used for the same for California gold he actually because we shot things down at East LA and Candela guitars and all that stuff and so he ran into this young man his girlfriend who they played the guitar and they spent so he contracted him to do that write the music for the Kelvin point goal that's how that came about yes sir what do you think of since it's a character called how old they're asleep and I think of cartoons were things on evil and we did bother him he I mean he he was very open to all kinds of different ideas and at different adventures he was a showman and so cartoons and whatever whatever work yes sir the deepest mind or the 16 to the deepest mind that we went into we shot a story up at the 16 to 1 gold mine and we got to know the owner the gentleman and the people there it was an adventure because we went down about 2,000 feet and they were doing some exploding down there I think of one of the shows you appear an explosion that you'll just totally freaks out hey I freaked out too but up behind the camera nobody sees me in the book you mentioned a lot of the you're about the cameraman of the sound engineer physically doing the sound the misadventure stored in she was a hue of the sound engineer the cameraman the lighting director and also being an editor I understood how stories wouldn't have to cut I was challenging but I think all the training and that I had a KCET and working in lighting because I got to work with some great lighting designers from New York Chicago over and that's why I say my utility days were my most greatest days because that's when I learned so much from great people and so it gave me the ability as a one-man band as they call it to shoot fuel and it was cost-effective of course for him and of course he would pay me normal engineer so it worked out well yes a couple of those and the places that we traveled to and stories that we shot of course then he started doing tickles road trip with triple-a is sponsored and I worked with him on maybe four shows before I retired and yeah it was we did it we try to show called the bench and he came to me says we're doing a show on the bench bench so the idea was that we go to a a park that I do bench and wait for somebody to come around and look it up and do an interview well who's walking around in a park in the middle of day somebody that's unemployed not working or whatever so the second show that was shot there was no bench around I said what happens at bench I don't think this show is gonna work so you only did two canceled scary I mean as far as with other shows well-heeled came up with the neat started doing parts the parts Cal go and he was doing visiting with few Houser which was they k CD production and there was the one we're basically the same style same style is just different subject no I believe that la has so much interesting stuff that I mean it's got everything and some of the things that I learned about Los Angeles I mean but I first started working LA is that though I'm not gonna like this okay but as I got to know it and learn what it ballets about and all the different things that they had iconic really exciting with interest [Music] he has very good question to be researched the questions before he would do the interview no we we would in fact a lot of the stories he would go shoot we didn't know very much about it we you know it was going to be maybe about the bridge or it's going to be about a tunnel and the producers would set up people that we would interview and then you always wanted to be surprised he always wanted this oh my god that's not amazing and you know because we didn't know too much about the story the only thing I wanted to know was it just better be hot it's gonna be cool what kind of things am I gonna run into you know that I didn't know very much about the story either I I mean I had to gear yes sir oh that was it Nikki akele Worthington and his dog spot that's when I started working at Casey Opie and yeah one day we would do the commercials in the stages there and he had his cars and then he walked in with tiger or a walk I don't know and it's like oh my god yes but you know you always have a trainer there to handle the animals because - you never know yes sir not rich Christie I never shot this is my first time at rich prison yeah if the shoes were shot after 2001 I wasn't with it and the way you can tell that I wasn't with him if he were says shirk hanging out cullism with it when I was working we were both real fit he was he worked out he went to the gym he was a trill trim guy you know big muscles and all that but after he started wearing a shirt out I was gone yes since the program was so successful why other people come up with actually they had there's people out there that are trying to duplicate the same thing but like I say there's never going to be another huge house Chapman and KCET right now are talking about reviving California gold but and they talk to me I said you have to have the right person in front of the camera and you have to have the right person behind the key and it's like this after when you started working with Cameron the producers would talk to me it says you know they're having problems they're doing I guess I don't know I didn't get involved in that but it has to be the right to people see what happens Pink's hot dogs yeah they actually had an event for me book signing event there it takes hot dogs on as great people really where they have 26 students I took and snacks and we go that wasn't it accent in many of these but it was such a they all say the same part of the educational process as far as the California gold hi I love shooting actual because I was learning so much about this great state of ours the diversity everything its people its terrain everything we have the highest and lowest the driest sometimes wettest things like this that so much that I learned but a lot of teachers do use this show to for their students especially like fourth grade the missions we shot all the missions in California and by the 17th mission fuel turns to me and he says Louis by the time we get done with all these missions I just might become a cat I heal you better give that some serious thought he says why because you're gonna have to go to confession and compass your sins oh my god I could do anything yes do you like to collect a lot of stuff and especially rusty metal I got a chance to visit his home in Twentynine Palms and go to the house and there's all this rusty junk and I said fuel what is all this junk why is it here you know Lily that's heart no it's junk because you went to the house and then he the swimming pool and he had these huge ten by six foot rustic metal panels kind of states all around the pool I said what is that part no it's more jug so we've get around it but all his stuff that you collect know Elvis's art yes ma'am did he tell develop relationships with a lot of people he met yes he he would go back like raids and knock man people like that where we shot and he developed this relationship where he would go back and visit with them and just because the you know fuel was by itself he wasn't very you know and so he would go on his days off go visit a lot of the places where he had we had shot and talked to the people there's see a lot of things were going because once we would shoot a story like at a market or the milkman saying their business would skyrocket their age of and so he would go back and just kind of check with them and he'd have these relations how much warning would I get on a shoot just some day some days day before and for some days maybe a few days or just enough to because I was very I don't know this was my Boy Scout training or what but I was always very prepared very neat ideal what I needed I knew how to pack and it was just always ready sorry I never knew we're not gonna get a call when scared and we'd get into places where it's like you don't know what's up the other end or when you open that ant what's gonna be there in a lot of times I would have to go first because I have to get the shot of fuel coming out of the hatch so I was first I was the guinea pig they send me up first and I come out and I check it out and then I give action and he opened the act oh my god and you know that was her routine some places very hard and like we shot a story in Death Valley and I was expecting it to be hot hot hot well no I wasn't hot hot hot it was cold cold cold and windy and just trying to hold on to the camera and trying to make everything works was and then I was surprised there you know these tour buses out there and these little French ladies with their little pink hats get out of the bus there and that's blowing all over the place and it's just because you know Europeans don't have deserts like we do so Germans and they come out here they want to experience this adventure the book it was I had never even given it a thought until Chapman approached me and says you need to write a book about your adventures because I think when they had the event and they honored him with a doctorate there was a couple of thousand people there and they saw I mean I was even shocked as to how many people wanted to kind of meet this Louie guy and so then they came to me and said you know you need to write a book about this well I know nothing about polka writing I don't have a clue and so I started checking into writers and things like that and then I I did some research and finally took us about three years to get it and we took us a long time to find a publisher also we went through like five publishers and they wanted this and what at that I said you know what it's not worth it and finally we found a Prospect Park books in Altadena and they have been great with us and I've been at the USC LA Times book tires than but I mean I'm doing things that I never thought I'd do in my life so this book has been a real learning experience to challenge an adventure and the nice thing is I've met so many wonderful people like yourself that's what I enjoy how'd the night develop that talent to walk backwards very curly actually there's the because I want to see the people as you want to see so I couldn't stand walking behind him and what you've seen the back of their heads into her ears so I started moving ahead of them walking at an angle so you people see it as they want to see it so I worked on it and then we didn't have like Steadicam or anything like that those kind of cameras that they have today so it was my breathing and walking very you know very carefully and so then we shot an interview in on Broadway on a Saturday and you know how Broadway gets on Saturdays in LA it is busy busy streets everybody shopping so were we had been shooting a show about shows the movie houses are in Broadway and he's going to interview this gentleman and he says Louis let's interview this guy and we'll just walk down the street or maybe a block well half a block turned into three blocks and he's continuing the interview crossing the streets and I'm walking backwards and there's a certain point with a camera where you cross a certain point and you're lost you can't kind of go back so the only way to recover from that because for me to continue going around and going behind them and seek oh yeah there's the street coming up oh there's a trashcan up there and there's a lot of people coming up so and then just continue the shot coming around and going back to where I was well a lot of cameramen in Hollywood saw that they called it the Louie 360 well I said I wasn't doing it to be fancy or you know I was just trying to survive I had a cute interview going so and then interview went on for like 16 minutes under cut and so it was challenging you always let me tell you were able to get most of your shots and one take was I able to get my shots and one tape I'd say 98% of time yes there were times where were following a Hugh and he's walking up a hill something and I'm trying to catch up but with all the deer carrying I'm getting behind so I'm listening to what he's saying and when he completes his sentence I would stop I was stopping him and as I shoot guys to tell he'll I said I was losing you guys so listen to what you were saying and then she says okay I know where to pick it up so I reposition myself is it from a different angle and pick up the shot from there and if make it to look like a two camera shoot or something like that but these little things that you you have to know because an editor to make things work sometimes it's very challenging yeah yes ma'am yeah after shooting a show or something like that did I get to go swimming did I get to go gold mining the bar or something actually once I was done shooting I'd have to get my gear ready for the next day so I have to clean my upper back make sure where everything is that label all my tapes because back then we used tape not like these wonderful cameras they have today and so I'd have to get everything ready for the next day and be organized and be ready once in a while I jump in a pool to cool off or something have a beer but I'd be in bed by 9:00 o'clock he's um I'm tired and then I have to be ready for the next day all appear well the camera alone with 26 pounds fully equipped and that's where the wireless systems and light and the breaks the batteries that we use there are much bigger than they are today and so then I'd have to carry a waste bag with microphones wireless transmitters and other things like that extra batteries for my wireless system so I always had to carry I mean I really never waited on laniel is that the other day I was tired yes sir where'd they do the editing there at the station because he'll did have his office there at kcpt and when we were at sunset a big film studio there it was pretty big for a Turlock we had two big administration building big stages and edit base and we have everything there as though he would his office was there he just walked over to the innovative 270 no I I was then sitting on the entity because once I was finished she was healed and I would be a site to another producer I might be out of the country with somebody else do another thing so I was constantly moving around but he'll that priority with me [Applause] you

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Length: 53min 23sec (3203 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 05 2019