With a name fit for a princess and a childhood spent on a winery surrounded by a loving community, Bea Currie might as well have stepped out of a Californian fairy tale. Her father, John Laco, was one of ten surviving children of a French-Basque miller. John left Bustince, France like his brothers to avoid army drafting and joined his sisters in Los Angeles in the early 1900s. Instead of the involuntary draft he dodged, he joined the American army to partake in World War I, which ended before he saw combat. When he was discharged, he moved to Redding and worked for the Gardella Mine in Clear Creek on a dredge. Within the company’s housing encampment he met his wife, Maria Castro. Maria’s father was a tailor who carried a sewing machine on his shoulder all around their village. After her mother’s death, she was raised by her godmother in Ladrido, Spain. She emigrated to Pachuca, Mexico alongside her brother and his wife after he had previously established himself in the new country. They lived here for three years, then relocated to Redding where her brother similarly found work on the Gardella dredge.
She married John in 1924 and they bought a fourteen acre property on South Bonnyview. Their first child, June July, didn’t survive infanthood. Beatrice Laco came along on August 20, 1925 at St. Caroline Hospital. “My mother always insisted that I was of Portuguese Royal blood. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but she always said that.” So it was that Maria gave her daughter a royal name. Bea’s brother, John, was born fifteen months later. For the first eight years of Bea’s life, the family lived in a two room cabin on the property. Without electricity, they depended on Aladdin lamps and a wood stove for light and heat. Her mother did everything from churning homemade butter to pumping water for the washing she did in big tin buckets. Meanwhile, her father built a barn and house for the family. The barn, which came first, still stands today and is used by Charter Communications.
On his fourteen acre property, John planted everything from olives to figs and raised pigeons, horses, ducks, and a cow. He once brought home a peacock, but it only lasted a week before Bea’s mom couldn’t stand it screams and made him return it. His main focus was the ten acres of grapes that dominated his property. Soon an arch stood at the end of their driveway advertising Beauty Winery and drawing Redding to his vineyards. The harvest became not only a family but a community affair, with all of the Laco’s mainly Spanish friends gathering to speed up the process. Bea was involved in everything from picking the grapes to cranking the wine press. She says she vividly remembers crushing grapes with her feet “like Lucy did,” but her brother insists this isn’t true.
When prohibition came, the government informed John that if he wished to continue selling his alcohol it must be watered down. Instead of compromising the integrity of his wine, he moved his 50 gallon barrels and a cot for his daily siesta into the cellar beneath his barn. John continued to sell up to 250 gallons of grape juice per family every year. The cellar was never searched, but the Feds did come once. John gave them each a glass of wine, shared a few minutes of conversation, and they left without any further consequences. Bea says her father still never forgave the dairy farmer he believes to have reported him.
Both children attended Westside School, a two story brick building that used to stand near the old library. They rode the bus from South Bonnyview every day, and on Fridays were dropped off in town to buy candy and explore the budding town. Summers were spent building wooden boats, sliding down the branches of jack pines, walking on homemade stilts, and swimming in everything from Clear Creek to irrigation canals. The exclusive bitter memory Bea shared with me involved her favorite childhood ring which she dropped through the floorboards of the cabin and lost forever. Annual picnics brought together the Spanish community at Clear Creek School in the summer and spring. In the winter and fall this same group would often gather for barn dances that would last until morning, with sleeping children sprawled across blankets on the floor. Gatherings like these highlighted Bea’s life as she grew up, accentuating the seasons and the sense of community surrounding her.
After graduating from Shasta High School in 1943, Bea attended UC Berkeley, which she describes as her gateway to the world at large. In her senior year she married a fellow Reddingite, Bob Currie. When she returned to Redding with her husband, she found a job teaching at the then one room school, North Cow Creek Elementary, with eleven students from 1st through 8th grade her first year. Her face lit up when she recalled for me memories surrounding her work. Fathers would deliver firewood and she would work alongside the children to kindle their only stove. One day snow prevented her from reaching the school and the children decided to teach themselves, a memory that still astounds her. She laughs, “Today I would’ve been sued!”
She and Bob spent sixty-six years together before his death in 2012. They have one daughter, Carole Currie who now teaches in Rhode Island. Bea remains one of the most active members of the Redding community I have yet to meet. She is heavily involved in AAUW, has participated in the Hiawatha Parlor 140 of the Native Daughters of the Golden West, and donates historical pieces to the Behrens-Eaton Museum. She still finds time to pursue her childhood love of birds through her involvement with Wintu Audubon and continues to lead nature walks. All this, and if you see Bea in the coming week you’ll have the special opportunity of wishing her a happy and healthy 89th birthday.
Rudi Yniguez is currently a junior English major at Williams College. She is attending Oxford in the fall to pursue her interest in nineteenth century English literature. She was born and raised in Redding and is an alumna of Shasta High School.
