Joyful Low-Energy Living

Altadena:
Heritage of Abundance

Thursday, November 20, 7pm

Altadena Community Center
730 E. Altadena Drive

Admission is free; please RSVP to altadenaheritage@earthlink.net

Altadena Heritage invites you to learn about how low-energy living can help make a difference in the face of global warming. Peter Kalmus, a climate scientist who lives here in Altadena, will share some of the changes he’s made, focusing on how using less fossil fuels has turned out not to be the burden you might expect … in fact, he says it’s made his life happier!

Then Peter will guide you in crunching your own numbers to calculate the size of your personal carbon footprint. To learn the most, bring a pen or pencil, a calculator, and rough estimates of the following:

• annual miles flown on a plane

• annual gallons of gas burned by driving*

• annual household electricity use in kWh**

• annual household natural gas use in therms**

* miles driven in a year divided by mpg of car
** add up your monthly usage amounts or multiply the amount on your current bill by 12

If you can’t get some of this information, don’t worry; Peter will show you how to make educated guesses from average values.

This baseline number will allow you to project (and later validate) how low-energy living can cut your reliance on fossil fuels and their corresponding carbon emissions.

Don’t miss this informative hands-on program! Admission is free; please RSVP to altadenaheritage@earthlink.net

Peter Kalmus has a PhD in physics from Columbia University and is now studying the role of clouds in global warming at JPL. He’s father to two young boys, and an avid bicycler and gardener who aspires to someday win Altadena Heritage’s Golden Poppy Award.

Altadena

Altadena is an unincorporated community of 43,000 sited on an outwash plane beneath the abruptly rising San Gabriel Mountain Range and between the Arroyo Seco and Eaton Canyon.

Altadena is 13 miles northeast of the city of Los Angeles and directly north of the city of Pasadena. Founded at the time of Southern California’s land boom of the 1880s, the town’s uniqueness derives from a distinct history, “live free or die” culture, and stunning physical setting.

Architecturally diverse with significant examples of every style of home from modest Craftsman bungalow to Italianate mansion and Modernist gem–Altadena has also been a racially diverse community since the 1960s.

Why Support Altadena Heritage?

At Altadena Heritage we put on events and programs every year. Our board of directors – a varying group who have joined because they love where we live and want to help Altadena become a more lively and vibrant community – gather once a month and we plot.

We ask ourselves: How can we raise awareness of what we have here in our community? How can we help our citizens become more connected to each other, to this place and to its history? What would make our community better and how can we promote positive change?

Members propose ideas for programs, events, and newsletter articles to address these questions, and our board works together to make things happen. This is the community service we do at Altadena Heritage, we find it enjoyable and deeply gratifying.

The fact is, our unincorporated community needs Heritage; we have no city government – and maybe that’s good – but this means we have to advocate for ourselves, to lobby for the community we want, and to work with others in a positive, constructive way. Because we’ve been active for over 30 years, and incorporated as a non-profit 501(c)3 organization since 1987, we have gained respect and standing. We give Altadena a voice that is heard in town and by the County.

In our office at the Community Center we maintain an archive on most buildings in Altadena, and virtually all built before 1940. Please make an appointment to research the history of your (or any) home. We are currently working to organize and update the archive and to migrate our computer database on to a modern platform.

Member Benefits

• Fabulous annual holiday celebration – every year in a different Altadena gem

• Annual Golden Poppy Garden Awards and garden luncheon in a beautiful Altadena garden

• Tours of local homes and showcase gardens

• Invitations to special events like the Boho-Highbrow event, and our AHA!s – Altadena Heritage Areas where we hold a street party and celebrate special Altadena enclaves and neighborhoods

• Heritage of Abundance – past programs and workshops have included:

Urban homesteading & sustainable living

Restoring your old windows

Starting native plants and produce from seed

Water-wise landscaping

Growing fruit in the shadow of the San Gabriels

• Receive our newsletter

• Get access to our architectural archives and database

• Have a voice in advocating for a better Altadena

Altadena Heritage Events

Altadena Heritage engages the community with a variety of educational and celebratory public events. We have only one general members’ meeting each year --our Annual Members Meeting & Holiday Celebration -- a festive occasion where we also vote in board members. Other events are open to the public, either free or with a member discount.

We hold our Golden Poppy Garden Awards & Garden Party each spring in a different glorious Altadena garden. Other events repeat irregularly when we are inspired. The AHA! (Altadena Heritage Area) Program celebrates special places or neighborhoods around town, and we have dedicated seven since 2000, most recently the “Equestrian Block” (2013) which honored Altadena’s Equestrian Heritage with a lively program at Altadena Stables.

We offer most of our educational events at Altadena Community Center, for free or at nominal cost. Our Heritage of Abundance Sustainability Series has addressed such topics as Growing Fruit Trees in the Shadow of the San Gabriels, a Tomato Workshop demonstrating ways to process home-grown tomatoes, Old Window Restoration, Affordable Gray Water Systems, Make your Home Energy Efficient, and many more. A recurring theme we’ve revisited over the years has been water: how it gets to us, and how we can use it efficiently.

We’ve sponsored a few home/garden/studio tours over the years, and special one-off programs, include such past events as Breakfast at Nuccios, our tour of Homes of Altadena Artists, and our Modernist Homes in Altadena tour and many others.

Board of Directors

Linda World, chair
Jinghuan Liu Tervalon, vice chair
Justin Pinchot, secretary
Martin Zacks, treasurer
David Mosher, assistant treasurer
Gail Casburn
Richard Davies
Camille Dudley
Mabel Duncan
Lili Etezady
Mark Rice
Dick Rubin
Judy Rubin
Michele Zack
Alan Zorthian