In 1969 Mickey McGowan moved from LA to

Marin with hardly a possession.  Calling himself

the Apple Cobbler, he opened an eclectic shoe-

making business in downtown Mill Valley and

decorated his store with a few knick-knacks

from the Baby Boomer generation -- a cartoon

lunchbox here, a handful of super balls there,

some 1950s-style TV sets in the corner, etc.  

But like a radioactive tumbleweed from outer

space, sucking up every ounce of kitsch in

America, McGowan’s collection took on a life of

its own.   He was soon engulfed by his own

Unknown Museum, regarded by many as one

of the world’s largest collections of pop culture

ephemera spanning the 1950s to the 1980s.   

From 1974 to 1989, The Unknown Museum was

first located in downtown Mill Valley and later

moved to a private home on E. Blithedale.  You

may remember seeing it; the front gate was

constructed almost entirely of snow skis

standing on end.

As a relatively new recruit within the cult of

Nostalgia, I was excited to meet McGowan in

person.  I’d somehow missed his museum

during its heyday and wondered if he might be

able to provide some insight into the nagging

question, “What’s behind this intense drive to

see old stuff?”

Stepping into McGowan’s home is something of

an experience in itself.  While the Mill Valley

museum may have closed its doors to the public

almost 20 years ago, his collection is still intact

(perhaps even larger now) and seemingly fills

every inch and surface of his 4,000 square foot

San Rafael Victorian.  As we sit in his living

room, a literal army of dolls, action figures, and

Mr. Potato Heads watch us from every direction.

McGowan himself is a cross between a

Philosophy professor and The Cat In The Hat. 

While cogitating on the therapeutic benefits of

nostalgia or explaining what he calls the

“Echoes of Time”, he suddenly opens a box of

old matchbooks. 

“You’ve got the Greenbrae Lanes Bowling Alley!”

I say, seeing it,

“Yes I do,” he says, “Right next to Zim’s” and

pulls out the Zim’s matchbook which is laying

beside it.  “It was next to Zim’s (in Greenbrae)

before they tore it down.”

LEWIS: Why was Marin such fertile ground for

your Unknown Museum?

MCGOWAN: Marin just had the Energy. I think

the main reason that I loved being here -- and

when I leave I’ll miss it – is that there are

Echoes here…  So much has gone on here. 

The echoes of the Tides (bookstore in

Sausalito).  The echoes of Quicksilver playing in

the Stolte Grove (near the 2am Club), Village

Music, the Mountain Amphitheater, the

Renaissance Faire in San Rafael, it goes on and

on.  They all have created these echoes that

keep reverberating amongst the valleys and

canyons.

LEWIS: You said the key to the future lies

hidden in the past.  You’ve also said that looking

at this stuff can be sort of therapeutic. If

everyone on the planet received this kind of

therapy (spent some time looking at artifacts

from their collective childhoods) on a daily

basis, how would it change the world?

MCGOWAN: Well, I think it gives them – people

-- an insight into a heritage that they were

letting, for better or for worse, slip away.

LEWIS: And recognizing that does what for

them?

MCGOWAN: It’s a relaxant much like, perhaps,

a mental Xanax.  And that’s therapeutic.  It’s

cheaper and healthier.  You don’t get the drugs

in your system…

LEWIS: And the ‘echoes’ that you talked about

in Marin, they sound almost like Native

American spirits that are still kind of floating

around….

MCGOWAN: Yes.  Very well put, yeah, they

are.  They’re Miwokian.

LEWIS: What sort of nostalgic memories do you

have of Mill Valley?

MCGOWAN:  I remember when I first moved to

Mill Valley, even in ’70, when I permanently

moved there in ’73 from Sausalito, it was a

ghost town at night.  Sweetwater had just

opened.   I thought, how was I going to support

myself (making shoes) there?  Could people

ever find me in Mill Valley?  It was that remote --

even that short time ago.  There was nothing. 

At night, it was all shut down and still.  Some

successful musicians were still around, but they

were keeping pretty much to themselves and

they’d go to the City and play.  There was no no

place to hang out.  Pat and Joe’s had closed. 

So it was scary, kind of.

LEWIS: Are you an artist?

MCGOWAN: I’m an artist, yes.  An artist is one

who creates things.  I create a world of my

interpretation of an American popular culture. 

That’s become my media after experimenting

with all the others, and occasionally I still do

paint, sculpt, and so forth.  But I sculpt with a

common object, create things.  Sometimes I

paint things.  I make things.  But I try not to let

the artistic process get in the way of too much

for the viewer of the true history of what has

gone on into this, what has gone on in this

country.

LEWIS: When did you make your last pair of

shoes?

MCGOWAN: In ’79.

LEWIS: And that was because you no longer

needed to?

MCGOWAN: I was doing other things, and the

glues were getting to me.  And the work was too

much for the, you know, I wasn’t charging

enough.   But it was fun.

LEWIS: Were you a hippie?

MCGOWAN: Some thought so.  I ascribed to

hippie philosophy to some degree.  I didn’t get

into the personal drug use on the level that

many associate with hippies, but I had the

longer hair.  I had the, many of the trademark

hippie things. 

LEWIS: Your patrons of your museum, any well-

known people of the day?

MCGOWAN: Without getting into names, of

course… There were colorful people in colorful

clothing, and fashion people, and artists, and

musicians, and…

LEWIS: You didn’t have a day when a Janis

Joplin came in or something like that?

MCGOWAN: I remember one day I was sitting in

the room to the side with some people and John

Belushi came in.  It was right during the

"Animal House" craze, in the late ‘70s. And he

just came in and sat down right next to us like

he was part of the conversation. I didn’t watch

“Saturday Night Live”.   We just talked.

LEWIS: What did John Belushi want?

MCGOWAN: He just was brought over to visit. 

There was a limousine outside.  People would

come.  They just had heard about the place.   I

mean Marin has this history, but what was there

really to visit?  For some reason, by default, the

Unknown Museum was this place to go on a

Sunday afternoon.

One morning Bill Graham came in.  He lived up

in the canyon and went jogging in his running

clothes.  One time he stopped by and was just

standing there with a dumbfounded, “What’s this

place???” I remember Robert Shields, a great

mime, lived up in the canyon.  He’d stop and

walk in the museum and do a mime, not say

anything, but just interact with people and play

with the things, and then get in his car and drive

up to his house, on his way home from

performing in the City.  It was also a place for

expression.   We had events there.  Concerts

and talent reviews, and things like that.  We had

a casino night, an interplanetary masquerade

ball.  It was an art center and a museum.  But

more than just a museum -- a social scene. 

LEWIS: When was the last day the Unknown

Museum was open to the public? 

MCGOWAN: The last official day of the second

location was April 1989.  So it was open for 15 years straight.

LEWIS: And that location was?

MCGOWAN: 243 East Blithedale, which is now condos.  The house is gone.

LEWIS: Did you originally come to Marin with the collection?

MCGOWAN: No, I came here – possessionless.  I was penniless – living

day to day, are you kidding?

LEWIS: How did you get a spot in Mill Valley?

MCGOWAN: Well the Sausalito Art Center had studio rooms and I rented

one with a friend, Rat Soup.  That was his nickname.  He made clay

sculpture.  Eighty bucks a month, we rented a little room.  We weren’t

supposed to but we’d occasionally sleep in the building.  Or we’d sleep in the

car.  It was kind of a homeless (lifestyle) but it was different then.  We’d go

down and get the .10 cent coffee at the Tides Bookstore in Sausalito. A lot

of us had our first shows there, myself with my drawings.  Rat Soup with his

sculpture.   The Tides was the focus – I mean Sausalito in 1969, you can’t

even imagine the streets at night, like 7:00 to 9:00 at night, just people, like

a parade.  And just voluminous hippies and successful writers,

Richard Brautigan types.  All these people just walking down the street and

beautiful men and women with Afghan dogs.  People have moved to the

cities or have passed, most, many of them.  And musicians, legends, and of

course the Trident was there. I had worked for two months in the kitchen. 

Every night Miles would stroll in and Janis, or Crosby, the mainstays of the

place. 

There are places that have echoes.  Greenwich Village, North Beach, Marin

County has a certain group of echoes from the artists and musicians, I’d

have to say primarily, that they have created a lot of the echoes.  And also

the New Age, Stewart Brand, Larry Brilliant, all these people, the New Age

thinkers.  It’s all echoing here.  And that’s why people remain around here

and revel in Marin County.  You know?  That’s why it’s great here and that’s

why I continue to stay here and want to stay here…

To take a look back at the Unknown Museum during 1974 as well as seen

through the lens of MTV in the '80s, click HERE.

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All of the material

on this website is

copyrighted by

Jason Lewis

unless otherwise

stated.  Those

images not owned

by Jason Lewis

are copyrighted

by their

respective

owners.  If you

are interested in

using material

from these pages,

please contact

Jason Lewis at

jason@marinnost

algia.org prior to

doing so.