The New Life Center Leads to the Founding of Meher Mount
By Margaret Magnus
LA CRESCENTA VALLEY in the 1920s at the time the Bissel family owned the property which later became the New Life Center. The main north-south street in the valley was Los Angeles Street, now La Crescenta Avenue, heading toward the base of the San Gabriel Mountains. (Photo: Glendale Library)
The founding of Meher Mount starts about 70 miles southeast of Ojai, CA, with the creation of the New Life Center in La Crescenta, an unincorporated area in Los Angeles County, CA.
In the mid-1940s, Alexander Markey and Jean Adriel formed The New Life Foundation, Inc. to spread Avatar Meher Baba’s messages and establish a center in California in Meher Baba’s name. [1]
The New Life Center
In late 1944, the New Life Foundation purchased approximately 500 acres in the La Crescenta Valley for $115,000, naming it the New Life Center. According to news reports, this complex was to “be used as a cultural center and a rehabilitation resort for gifted, underprivileged children and war-hurt veterans.” [2]
The “cultural center promises to be an asset to the Southland [Southern California],” noted the Los Angeles Times. [3]
ALEXANDER MARKEY first met Avatar Meher Baba in London in 1936 and later founded the New Life Center with Jean Adriel in La Crescenta, CA. (Photo: Meher Baba Travels)
Alexander Markey (1891-1958), born in Tét, Hungary, was an American filmmaker, stage producer, director, and founder of Markey Films.
He first met Avatar Meher Baba in London in November 1936. [4]
About that experience, Markey said he found himself “…in the presence of the most sublime embodiment of purity in human form I had ever beheld. I knew and experienced having at last met the One whom I had been searching for.” [5]
Markey was president of The New Life Foundation, Inc. and other members, in addition to Jean, included some of his friends: Dr. Fritz Kunkel, world-famous psychologist and author; Dr. Hugh Teetzel, educator; Helen Freeman, actress; Beulah Bondi, actress; and Dorothea Ramsay. [6]
JEAN ADRIEL at Meher Mount during a month of silence in 1949. (Photo: Meher Mount Archives)
Jean Adriel (nee Robinson) (1892-1984) first met Meher Baba in New York in 1931.
She writes about that meeting in her book, Avatar: The Life Story of the Perfect Master Meher Baba.
"My most outstanding impression of that first meeting is one of peering into bottomless pools of Infinite love and tenderness, as my eyes met his. My heart pounded with tremendous excitement and for a while I could not speak. I felt that in an inexplicable way he was the reason for my very existence; that I have never really lived until this moment; that he was deeply familiar and precious to me, even as I was no stranger and very dear to him." [7]
‘Heaven on Earth’
In speaking of the future of the New Life Center, Markey “made it plain that only people with ideals of unselfish service to man will be invited to live at the Center.” [8]
Entrance qualifications into this “paradise” were to be based entirely upon each individual’s qualifications. “The Center is to be strictly nonsectarian, has no class distinction and will admit those of all nationalities, races and religions,” said Markey. [9]
For those not familiar with the property, the Ledger explained, “it has been aptly described as a bit of ‘heaven on earth.’ There are many trees, a crystal pure spring assures more than ample water supplies, and the property has been planted with many species of ornamental plants and flowers. It has a large and interesting population of wild life.” [10]
THE FORMER BISSELL HOUSE which was part of the New Life Center. This area is reached by exiting Freeway 210 on La Crescenta Avenue (originally Los Angeles Avenue) toward the mountains. This photo was taken in 2012 and the property is a private home. (Photo: Sam Ervin, 2012)
“The old barn and stable, which housed famous thoroughbred horses in the old days,” continued the Ledger, “will be reconverted into a theatre with a seating capacity of about 500. Adjoining the building will be an outdoor Greek theatre which will allow for seating about 1200. It is planned that under the guidance of professional writers, producers and directors, the two model theatres will give a year-round opportunity for expression of devotional and humanitarian programs.” [11]
The New Life Center was to be dedicated on New Year’s Day, January 1, 1945.
Some of the planned projects included “the erection of dwellings and workshops for disabled soldiers who qualify for entrance, small farms on which residents may raise their own food under guidance of soil experts, a frequency modulation radio station that will send out high-type programs, a health clinic and research institute, and schools for development of the latent genius of underprivileged children.” [12]
As an example of the New Life Center’s program, Dr. Künkel was to inaugurate a public roundtable discussion on January 14, 1945, discussing “Character Problems and their Solution,” as the first in a series of talks to be given at 4:30 p.m. Sunday afternoons. [13]
The La Crescenta Property
The 500 acres of the New Life Center was acquired from C.L. Powell and was more commonly known as the Bissell Estate. Harvey Bissell of Bissell Inc. carpets and vacuum cleaners and heir to the family fortune, bought the property around 1913/1914, naming it the High Up Ranch.
He later sold it to an unknown buyer in 1936/1937. It was purchased by The New Life Foundation in 1944, and the group was only there about a year and a half. It was sold to Argenbright and Boyer, developers who built homes on the property. [14]
Interestingly, the property adjoined Ananda Ashrama founded by Swami Paramananda [15] in 1923. Sometime after the New Life Center was established, Agnes Baron — who was destined to become a lifetime caretaker of Meher Mount — moved to the Vedanta ashram.
Because of the adjacency of these two properties, Agnes Baron, who knew nothing about Meher Baba at that time, ended up living at the New Life Center. She was part of the group that located the Meher Mount property in Ojai in 1946 and moved to Meher Mount after it was purchased.
ANANDA ASHRAMA, founded in 1923 by Swami Paramananda, in La Crescenta, CA, is adjacent to the former New Life Center. Through this proximity Agnes Baron, who was staying at the ashram, met Jean Adriel of the New Life Center. They were co-founders of Meher Mount. (Photo: Sam Ervin, 2012)
Footnotes
[1] Bhau Kalchuri, Lord Meher: The Biography of the Avatar of the Age Meher Baba, Online Edition, pg. 2436, accessed July 15, 2021. ©Avatar Meher Baba Perpetual Public Charitable Trust.
[2] James Warnack, “Huge Show Place Purchased for Cultural Center,” Los Angeles Times, December 10, 1944, pg. 10. The article reports the purchase was for a 1500-acre tract. However, review of various other documents and verbal and recorded accounts indicate the property was closer to 500 acres.
[3] Warnack, ibid.
[4] “Alexander ‘Zander’ Markey,” Meher Baba Travels, Online, accessed July 15, 2021.
[5] Bhau Kalchuri, op.cit., pg. 1742.
[6] “New Life Center Officially Opens, Public Programs Scheduled Soon,” La Crescenta Valley Ledger (Montrose, CA), January 1945, courtesy of Mike Lawler, La Crescenta, CA, historian.
[7] Jean Adriel, Avatar: The Life Story of the Perfect Master (Santa Barbara, CA: J.F. Rowny Press, February 1947), pg. 14, Special Author’s Edition. ©Jean Adriel.
[8] La Crescenta Valley Ledger, op.cit.
[9] La Crescenta Valley Ledger, ibid.
[10] Last Crescenta Valley Ledger, ibid.
[11] La Crescenta Valley Ledger, ibid.
[12] Warnack, op.cit.
[13] La Crescenta Valley Ledger, op.cit.
[14] Interview with Mike Lawler, La Crescenta, historian, August 23, 2012.
[15] Warnack, op.cit.