A place that comes alive for nine months out of the year. A town that is as quiet as any old farm town in the middle nowhere, whose existence is unevenly sandwiched by giant cities like San Francisco and Sacramento. For drivers on the freeway it would merely be a town that falls in between a commute. Upon entry one may see a couple of communities of housing with bikes on the streets surrounded by flat planes sprawling with fields of corn, barley and wheat. To the uninitiated this is the quintessential boondocks or backcountry. Little do they know that this small town is a home to a million larger than life dreams of around 30,000 aspiring souls that are taking one step into the future with their education.
What I am describing here is the beautiful town of Davis. From its world renowned University to the spanning nature surrounding it, this town is rich in character. A quick search about Davis reveals that the town was a rail depot in 1868, and was later incorporated in 1917. The town has a population of 60,000 not including the student population that calls this city a home for a large portion of the year. The university in this town is renowned for its stellar Veterinary, Agriculture, Biology and Animal Husbandry Programs. It is a town in which a person was once served a citation for snoring too loud and is a place where even if you don’t know what you are doing, someone else surely does.
This character also comes from the subtle, yet meaningful art pieces that have been placed around the town. These pieces are part of the essence of the town and add splashes of color and depth in the scenery. One such piece is the Centennial Seal, which commemorates the hundredth anniversary of the town. I talked to my friend Carson Chiem, who was able to see this piece for the first time with me. He stated, “The bikes and the buses were the first elements I noticed, I assume the artist wanted to commemorate the cool double decker buses that we have and the bike centric streets.” He looked at the outer rings a bit closer and noticed that one of the rings depicts the march to selma. “I think the artist wanted to capture the history of this country in the piece as well, I don’t see what Davis specifically has anything to do with the civil rights movement.” he stated. This left me wondering, who designed this seal and what their intentions were with this work. I also was wondering how much of the art I truly understood. In my research into the Centennial seal I learned that the piece is designed by Susan Shelton, who is a self taught artist and works mainly through commissions. I reached out to her in order to understand the deeper meaning behind this piece, and what is her perspective on it. We were able to meet through a video conference, where I was able to learn more about her work.
Susan came to University Of California Davis as a premed student, initially intending to major in Bacteriology later switching to nutrition science. Along her journey at UC Davis she ended up taking a pottery class which sparked her interest in the art which she later pursued after graduating university. She has a deep passion for ceramic art due to her experience at the university, and has produced various pieces through the years. Her entry into public art was when she made a bronze seal for Spanish Mexican sovereignty that sits on the west steps of the Capitol building in Sacramento today.
Her intent behind the Centennial seal was to tell the history of Davis through images and capture the rich past of the town through symbolism. “The seal intends to explore and represent the history of the city through the exploration of themes. Themes such as Aspiration, leadership, cooperation, engagement and stewardship. Aspiration is a big one” according to Susan. We start off with understanding the central image which, according to Susan, are the “crossroads” that represent the geography that gave birth to this town. The putah creek whose flood waters caused the land to be fertile for agriculture, the historic railroad that connected Davis to Berkeley and Highway 80 are visible in the form of lines at the very center of the seal. There are two large panels that are also part of the crossroads that feature the birds landing in a lake and a hawk, those represent the ancestral lands that the city of Davis was built on and the pacific flyway.
Moving outwards, the rings surrounding the crossroads represent the early history of the city. They illustrate the Natives that lived along the Putah Creek in earth covered domes, and the arrival of white missionaries. The rings bring us the sad but true history of the white missionaries forcibly taking the native children to the Dolores & Sonoma Mission in order to be christianized. It also pays homage to the natural beauty of the land before the settlers arrived.
The ring after that illustrates the history of the time period between the founding to the incorporation of the city and the events that led to that incorporation. In this ring the theme is evident and the artist's message comes across the clearest. “There are themes that tie us to our past but have everything to do with the way we developed as a city.” Susan stated. This ring depicts a fire that happened in 1915 that destroyed most of downtown, which is when the people of the town decided that they needed to be incorporated as a city to have a municipal water supply and a fire department. This ultimately led to the incorporation of the city in 1917, when the population voted to become a city. This represents the theme of cooperation between the people and the aspiration for a better tomorrow.
There are other panels where themes of innovation and stewardship/leadership are symbolized in the form of bike lanes and farmers markets. In 1967, Davis was the first city in America to have bike lanes on city streets which today are an essential part of smart urban planning. The city was also the first one to introduce the ideas of organized farmers markets which changed the food and agriculture law in the country and today is the backbone of the farm to fork movement. Engagement and citizenship of the people is symbolized through a panel that shows people taking a bus. It tells the story of about 50 people that took a bus in response to Martin Luther King Jr. 's letter asking people to come out and support voting rights after Bloody Sunday in 1965. The people took a greyhound bus from the local church to Alabama to march from Selma to Montgomry. Even though these people were primarily white, their skin did not afford them the protection from atrocities as they were siding with the cause for civil rights.
There are two panels that recognize the struggles that the city has dealt with. While commemorating the highlights of the city in the past century, Susan thought that it would be unjust to see history through the lens of highlights. The low points shape the community as much as the highpoints, if not more. One of the panels features a group of kids playing with each other which, according to Susan, represents the educational and social opportunities that kids and young adults have in Davis. On closer inspection of that panel, one will see a girl that is left out from the kids that are playing, seemingly staring at the other kids while not participating. This girl represents the migrant children that do not have the same opportunities as the others in town as they come and work on the farms during the season and have to leave in the fall just when things start to pick up. The girl also represents the native and japanese children that were forcibly removed, depriving them of the opportunities in the town. There is also a panel that depicts awards but one of those awards is named ‘Thong H. Huynh”. This award is given to a person that has made significant contributions to the community in regards to civil rights and public rights issues. This award is in the memory of Thong H. Huynh who was a student at Davis highschool who sadly was a victim of a racially motivated stabbing that took his life.
One iconic panel that I like the most is the one with the double decker bus that memorializes the spirit of aspiration and innovation. In 1968, during the vietnam war an 18 year old could be drafted for the military and yet could not vote: the voting age back then was 21. In the movement to lower the voting age young adults across the country started to take action within their community to show that they too can bring reasonable change in society and are entitled to a say in the politics of the country. In the wake of this movement, the students at UC Davis decided to start a program that would provide public transportation to both the city and the students of the university in time when there was no public transportation in the area. To this day this program is student run and student organized. This panel along with the artwork is the most inspirational to me as we are living in a time where legislators in the governing body of this country do not represent the opinions and beliefs of the masses. I am part of a generation that has unhindered access to the impacts of policy makers through the media. This panel stands as a reminder that change starts with a few actions that add up to a larger impact in the community.
Overall, the seal is a reminder that people can make a difference in society through the portrayal of themes such as aspiration, leadership, cooperation, engagement and stewardship. These themes are what we should learn from Davis’s history, and what better way to learn than through beautiful art.