Frequently, on weekday mornings, you can find me either sitting in the front corner of Magnolia’s Upper Crust bakery, looking out the window, holding a steaming cup of coffee in my hand. Or, as summer progresses, moved outside to one of the sidewalk tables, watching the foot traffic pass by.
Most walkers are greeted with an enthusiastic “Good Morning” and a smile. People often accuse me of knowing just about everyone who walks by.
Jinny Kanigel, a most pleasant, red-haired, middle-age and smiling lady who is also a frequent customer of the Upper Crust, has revealed through past conversations that we both share a Southern California beach-town knowledge: she lived in Newport Beach for a couple of years and I surfed the beaches of Orange County during my high school days.
“You know,” she commented to me one morning, as she stopped at my table, “you remind me of the Laguna Beach Greeter, the way you say ‘Hi’ to everyone. Do you remember the Laguna Beach Greeter?”
“I certainly do,” I replied. Anyone and everyone who drove through Laguna Beach during the 1960s had to remember the old man with a cane, red sport jacket, long, gray hair and a long, full beard, yelling “Halloo-ow,” and waving to every passing car as he stood along the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH).
One of the places I surfed was off Brooks Street in Laguna, and The Greeter always stationed himself a few blocks down PCH at Forest Avenue. Laguna, a quirky, artsy seaside town, was the perfect location for him to call home. Seeking more information, I typed “Laguna Greeter” into my computer, and soon, Wikipedia was spitting all sorts of information back at me.
In actuality, the Greeter was Eiler Larsen, who was born in 1890 in Aarus, Denmark, where his father worked as manager of the city’s poorhouse. His younger brother, Svend Larsen, once said that growing up among the poor was “this mixture of tragedy and baroque, macabre comedy” that gave him an early understanding of social problems and the dark sides of society. Svend Larsen went on to become the justice minister of Denmark and served 13 years as mayor of Aarhus.
Eiler left Denmark to pursue what he later described as “my mission of friendliness.” Larsen alternated between a series of odd jobs and wanderlust. According to newspaper accounts, Larsen went to Siberia at just 19 as a representative for a Danish butter exporter. After a short stint of mandatory service in the Danish Army, Larsen traveled to South America and hiked through Argentina and Chile. Larsen first arrived in the United States in 1916 at New Orleans aboard a ship from Chile.
During World War I, Larsen enlisted in 1918 and served with the U.S. Army 8th Infantry. According to Larsen, a leg injury he suffered from an artillery shell in France resulted in his lifelong need of a cane.
After returning to the United States, Larsen worked as a Wall Street messenger during the 1920s boom before wandering the Eastern seaboard. He walked the Appalachian Trail from Maine to Georgia with his dog, Happy.
Early in the Depression, he caught the “greeting bug” and began hailing visitors in Washington, D.C. As Larsen stood waving near the White House, President Hoover, from the back of his limousine, “waved to me when he saw me,” Larsen said.
California’s warmer weather attracted Larsen and, along with many Dust Bowl migrants, he picked fruit in the San Joaquin Valley before heading south to Laguna Beach, a place his artist friends had recommended.
Beginning in 1938, Larsen was cast for several years as Judas in “The Last Supper,” Da Vinci’s painting featured in the Pageant of the Masters, a still-popular annual event where people pose in live tableaux of famous paintings. I remember my mother dragging me off to witness the Pageant as a teenager. I was suitably impressed.
Larsen spoke six languages — English, Danish, Spanish, Russian, German and French — and was a ravenous reader who spent his small Army pension on science and philosophy books, which he bought at a local bookstore and then donated to the library and visitors. He also bought candy to hand out to children.
In 1963, his simple acts of kindness prompted the Laguna Beach City Council to proclaim him the town’s official greeter — an unpaid position with occasional benefits, such as free meals at local restaurants and a low-rent room at the Hotel Laguna.
In 1967, a group of residents who were fond of Larsen raised money to send him home to Denmark for a six-week visit after he suffered a stroke. In Aarhus, where his brother had once been mayor, Larsen said, he was treated like royalty.
But the stroke and emphysema slowed him down significantly. In the next eight years, he was often missing from his post along the highway.
Larsen died at a Capistrano Beach nursing home in 1975, at age 84. He was buried at Los Angeles National Cemetery in Westwood.
He is still well remembered in the artsy beach town of Laguna, and two full-sized statues of him have been erected along PCH — forever waving greetings to those who pass by. Larsen spent 33 years as The Greeter.
I’ve still got a few years to go.
Gary McDaniel lives in Magnolia.