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Blows from another source probably should have been expected: desert
vandals. In 1938 Aldous Huxley, who lived in a house which had been built
by the Llano settlers, wrote that within 24 hours of the colonists 1 departure
for Louisiana, $500 worth of Llano windows had been broken. Within a week a
large frame hotel and several scores of homes and workshops had been de-
molished and carried off piecemeal by homesteaders who he suggests, precariously,
represented capitalism in the wilderness. Only the silo foundations of the
cow barn remained since they were of concrete and could not be hauled away.
In 1972 an observer reported that a mile south of the old hotel, ruins of
the milking sheds and a silo appeared photogenic. By heading south of 165th
Street and driving into the foothills, one could find a stone limekiln and
a building used by the Llano colony—also photogenic.
Mary Frances Strong, "Spring Splendor in Antelope Valley," Desert Maga-
zine , XXXV(4), April 1972, pp. 22-25, 31-33.

Robert V. Hine , California's Utopian Colonies . New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1966.

Aldous Huxley, "Ozymandias , the Utopia that Failed," California
Historial Quarterly, LI (2), Summer 1972.

70. ALDOUS HUXLEY HOUSE

In 1938 Aldous Huxley moved to the desert at Llano del Rio from
Beverly Hills in order to bring relief to a lung ailment. There with his
wife, Maria, he hosted many famous people: musicians such as Stravinsky,
Edwin Hubble the astronomer, and writer D. H. Lawrence. Several of the
works he wrote while living in Llano relate to the desert. Ape in Essence
was about a man who supposedly lived in this house, and to read it is to
know the house. He discussed the desert buttes and likened them to the
paintings of Goya. He saw witches sitting on them as on the backs of
monsters, and he saw them as representing different cloud formations. Here
he also wrote Time Must Have a Stop, an article entitle "Ozymandias" in
Fortnight about Llano del Rio, and The Art of Seeing about the Bates Met-
hod of Eye Training. He studied eye training while on the desert, improved
his sight, and wrote the book to help defend his teacher, Margaret Corbett,
and claimed it helped her win a lawsuit so that she could resume her teaching.
Palming to relax the eyes, listening to beautiful music, and concentrating on
beautiful thoughts were part of the training, and when his wife Maria lay
dying he spent his last hours with her whispering to her ear the beauties of
the desert which surrounded their home at Llano.

The house itself is a two-story structure built in the time of the
Llano settlement circa 1916. Aldous Huxley had a studio built on the property,
When the present owners, Mr. and Mrs. Caler, bought the property in 1975 the
Ledger-Gazette (may have been the Valley Press) carried a four-page article
on the house. Although the new owners are remodeling, the architectural
style will remain the same. Field assessment should be made, however, and
efforts to register this house as a California State Historical Landmark also
should be made

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