Electric House

Huell heads south to the small town of Heber to visit Ormat Technologies geothermal plant. From the earliest native peoples to the mud loving “spa" enthusiasts, this area has a rich history in harnessing the “heat” bubbling up from the ground. We’ll get an education in how Ormat is harnessing this energy and using it to power our lives.

Huell travels to the Tehachapi Mountains to visit The Cesar Chavez Foundation. Set on 187 acres, the buildings where once home to a tuberculosis hospital and then it's where Cesar lived and labored during his last quarter century as he fought for better rights for migrant workers. Now the Center is a carrying on Cesar's dream and welcomes visitors to learn about this important chapter in our state's history. Huell gets a very special and personal tour of the Center from Cesar's son Paul.

In 1937, an amazing three-day event took place to celebrate the opening of a new road from Lone Pine to Death Valley. A gourd was filled with water from the highest lake in the U.S. on the side of Mt. Whitney. A trip commenced using all modes of important California transportation--Native American runner, Pony Express, miner and burro, 20-mule team, stagecoach, train, car and plane. With many famous participants, the water finally arrived at the lowest lake in the U.S, Bad Water Death Valley, and was poured in, thus consummating the Wedding of the Waters.

Visit the spa where Elvis soaked, and then walk through the magnificent Indian canyons.

During the years of the detainment in Manzanar War Relocation Center, one of ten camps at which Japanese American citizens were interned during World War II, music provided a rare solace for the internees. Huell visits with Mary Kageyama Nomura known as the "Songbird of Manzanar" who performed there as a teenager.

One of the originals, offering not only Spanish architecture, but amazing views.

In this never-before-seen "lost" episode, Huell visits the home of Los Angeles icon Charles Fletcher Lummis in Highland Park. Lummis, who died in 1928, was the founder of the Southwest Museum of the American Indian, an editor of the Los Angeles Times, and a collector and preservationist of Southwestern culture. The Lummis House, today a historic museum, was built by Lummis in the late nineteenth century.

For 50 years one of the most popular ways to travel up and down the mighty Mississippi River has been aboard the authentic paddlewheel steamboat Delta Queen. To ride on this boat is to step back in time -- in fact, the Delta Queen has been declared a National Historic Landmark and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. But true riverboat buffs will tell you that the Delta Queen was not originally built to travel on the Mississippi River. It's a California boat, built in Stockton in the late 1920's for service on the Sacramento River.

Huell's off to Amador county and the town of Volcano. It was once a thriving, gold mining town in the 1850s and 1860s, but Huell has set off to discover the mysterious cave in this mountain community which served as a Masonic lodge.

Huell interviews Tom Levy of the Coachella Valley Water District and Jim Kenna from the Palm Springs Bureau of Land Management.

Huell visits the gravesites of famous animal stars.

Before Disneyland, Walt Disney's enthusiasm for realistic model trains had evolved into an elaborate backyard live steam railroad. At the heart of his railroad was a quaint red barn, which was his center of operations. Now at home in Griffith Park in Los Angles, the barn is a gem in the collection of the Los Angeles Live Steamers, an organization of train enthusiasts dedicated to educating people in railroad history and lore, and to further the avocation of live steam, gas-mechanical and electronic railroad technology.

Huell travels from Oceanside south to La Jolla on a "Road Trip" that includes stops at the California Surf Museum, Del Mar Racetrack, Torrey Pines State Reserve and the Birch Aquarium at the Scripps Institute.

A visit to the huge polo fields, which have made the Coachella Valley a polo center!

A shout echos through Yosemite ... "let the fire fall," and from 1872 to 1969 that's just what happened. Join Huell at the top of Glacier Point with Nic Fiore who was the last to push a pile of burning embers off the edge, creating the beautiful red hot "waterfall" effect know as Firefall. Then down to the bottom at Camp Curry, the best spot to view Firefall, where Huell talks with Keith and Ginny Bee who for 42 years ran the nightly outdoor theater show which led up to the fiery finale of this now lost California tradition.

In this episode, Huell rides the historic Yosemite Mountain Sugar Pine Railroad in Yosemite.

Huell Howser visits two locations to learn about California's Ice Age history. At the George C. Page Museum in Los Angeles and at Sonoma Coast State Beach the Columbian Mammoths that once roamed our state come to life.

The squeegee was such a simple invention, but like Kleenex and Jell-O, its name has become synonymous with all rubber-bladed window cleaners. Join Huell Howser as he visits the Ettore Corporation in Oakland to learn first-hand about squeegees developed in 1936 by Ettore Steccone.

When most people think of Yosemite, they imagine towering peaks and cascading waterfalls, but there is an amazing human history that is told through some of the many buildings that dot the valley floor. In this adventure, Huell discovers two small buildings that are very historic and very beautiful. He visits the Yosemite Valley Chapel, which was built in 1879 and is the oldest structure in park. The little chapel continues to serve as a place of worship for residents and visitors alike, as it has done for over 125 years.

Huell visits San Pedro Harbor to see what's happened with the old fireboat Ralph J. Scott. He then checks out the brand-new, state-of-the-art fireboat.

The Orange County Dental Society has an impressive collection of vintage dental objects housed in its Dental Museum in Orange. Huell sees firsthand what a visit to the dentist might have been like decades ago as he examines display after display of chairs, tools and other devices. There are items dating back to the 19th century, and even a denture belonging to George Washington by some accounts.

Have you ever spotted some plastic food and been shocked by how realistic it looks? Have you ever wondered how it's made? In this episode, Huell visits Iwasaki Images of America and gets a firsthand look at this fascinating process.

Huell takes a special tour of Forrest Ackerman's home, which was a shrine to and museum of horror memorabilia. The self-described coiner of the term "sci-fi," Dr. Ackula (as he liked to be called) boasted over 300,000 collectibles from books, genre films, and TV shows. He was also a literary agent and editor of numerous fanzines. 

Did you know that America drinks 4.4 billion gallons of bottled water a year? In Los Angeles the company that quenches many of our thirsts is Sparkletts. The company began in 1925 and within three years, they had sold one million bottles of water. Huell gets a wonderful tour of this historic company and even takes a look at its source.

The Gayton family has been making Chicharrones since the early 1900s. Their modern facility was opened in 1935 and still exists in its original location. Chicharrones are pork rinds that have been boiled in oil and seasoned. They are a real treat and Huell learns all you ever wanted to know about “Pork Rinds”.

The Orange Empire Railway Museum in Perris, Calif. is the largest operating railway museum in the Western United States and the third largest in the country. Join Huell as he visits during the annual Autumn Rails Celebration.

Many of us have sat down to a Japanese meal and have been served a brothy soup named “Miso”. In this adventure, Huell visits Miyako Oriental Foods Inc, to find out how this this traditional Japanese staple is made.

At the The Donut Man in Glendora, people aren't salivating over just jelly donuts and crullers. Owner Jim Nakano's specialty is the strawberry donut. Only available for a few months in the spring, these sweets are piled high with fresh, locally grown strawberries and Jim's own glaze. 

If you've ever wondered where old fire trucks go when they retire, this is the episode for you. Retired fireman Joe Ortiz has one of the largest collections of antique and modern fire fighting equipment around. Huell goes to Joe's house in Shadow Hills for a personal tour and a very special ride in the back of a hook and ladder.

Join Huell Howser as he visits the Oasis Senior Center in Newport Beach, CA to meet with the Oasis Ukulele Strummers.

It's off to Santa Monica Beach to the site of the very first Hot Dog On A Stick stand. It all started in 1946 when Dave Barham opened his first stand by Muscle Beach. The company has become a California tradition with Dave's daughter at the helm. We get a behind the scenes look at Hot Dog on a Stick.

Family owned and operated since 1939, this L.A. institution has been serving up some of the best chili cheese hot dogs this side of Coney Island. Huell get the lowdown from Mrs. Pink and a handful of enthusiastic patrons, many whom have been eating at Pink's since their childhood.

Huell travels down to where the streets have no name. There, he sees the world's tallest, oldest, and most peculiar-looking Joshua Trees in an episode devoted to this remarkable desert plant. He later meets a man who grew up on a ranch in the seclusion of what is now Joshua Tree National Park.

Join Huell as he visits the 1997 Long Beach International Beauty Expo for a very exciting and colorful look at the world of beauty care. Huell and 50,000 beauty care professionals share a wild day.

Huell goes to the 1997 Basset Hound Picnic, sponsored by the Basset Hound Club of Southern California. Watch as the dogs are judged on longest ears, best howl, and saddest face.