Sensational Seniors – July 2019

My interview with the July “Sensational Seniors,” Steve and Susan Casaleggio, took place at their Jacksonville home off Third Street. It was emblematic of their high energy, for one would make a statement and then jump up to ponder the next thought while the other took over and then was up to stride around, thinking what next to say. This is exactly how I know these two friends to be… and it turned out to be a delightful and insightful interview!

Susan was born on July 8, 1944 in Antioch, California. Her parents were Bill and Jean Taplin. Her dad was a research chemist for Dow Chemical, who in 2000 was recognized by the American Chemical Society as a “Hero of Chemistry,” a coveted award for chemists. The Taplin family later grew to four when brother Bill was born.

Steve was born on February 23, 1945 in Ventura, California. His parents, Steve and Ethel, met as Navy officers with his mother giving up her career to marry his dad who became a teacher. Steve remembers his dad’s early teaching career, “Dad first taught in a tiny high school, teaching geography and shop and coaching football and baseball and driving the team bus. At that time, if you were a teacher, you did everything.” Like Susan, Steve has a younger brother, Lee, who lives with his wife, Coleen, in Georgetown, Texas.

Steve and Susan were high school sweethearts in Concord, CA, working on a high school drama production with Susan creating stage sets and costumes while Steve handled stage managing and lighting. Upon graduation from high school, Susan started college at the University of California at Santa Barbara intent on following her father’s footsteps and majoring in chemistry, but, after her sophomore year, she transferred to the University of California at Davis. “I decided to switch my major to interior design, and UC Davis had a well-known interior design program. The other compelling reason for the school switch was the fact that Steve was at UC Davis.”

Steve had entered UC Davis on a four-year Regents Scholarship for his undergraduate studies which even allowed him a year studying in Bordeaux, France. Upon returning from France, it was decision time for Steve. “I had to declare a major, and I realized I had enough hours in French to make it work, so I became a French major, but with that major, I had two choices: become a teacher or go to law school. So, I went to law school.”

Steve and Susan married in 1966, and Steve entered the Hastings College of Law while Susan went to work for Pacific Telephone in San Francisco. She was one of eleven women chosen for a management program at Pacific Telephone and, as Susan remembers, “They chose women for the program because they could train them to assume management positions in the company but still pay them one-half the salary of the male managers.” Still, with this pay disparity, Susan spent eight years with the phone company. With a degree in design, she became a trunk engineer, responsible for forecasting equipment and technical needs out ten years. In the meantime, Steve graduated from law school in 1969, passed the bar exam and went to work with the General Counsel of the United States Department of Agriculture based in San Francisco.

After her tenure with Pacific Telephone, Susan made a major career change and became a ceramics artist. She established a pottery studio, complete with a kiln, in their home and sold her pottery for many years, including in three different galleries and at pottery shows around Northern California. When questioned about this rather dramatic career change Susan was quick to clarify, “Remember I minored in chemistry in college and a firm knowledge in chemistry is invaluable in the pottery world.” Her knowledge and reputation in the pottery world led to her chairing the Walnut Creek (CA) Clay Arts Guild as well as serving on the Bay Area Arts Advisory Council.

By 1978 the couple had moved to Lafayette, CA where their son, Stephen, was born. Shortly after Stephen’s arrival, Steve left the USDA and joined a municipal bond law firm in San Francisco where he was to spend the remainder of his legal career. His experience with the USDA General Counsel provided his introduction to the municipal bond business. Working with rural communities issuing bonds to borrow money, he met municipal bond lawyers, and this resulted in receiving an offer to work for them. In describing what he did, Steve reflects, “Basically we were lawyers who assisted public agencies in borrowing money by issuing bonds. Municipal bonds were popular because cities could borrow cheaply and the interest on their bonds was federally tax-exempt.” The municipal bond work was intense and demanding. Susan remembers, “The bond lawyers were working such long hours and on the road… they were called Road Warriors.”

Like so many northern Californians, the Casaleggio’s introduction to Southern Oregon came via the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, attending the Festival with friends but staying at the Orth House BnB in Jacksonville. While the friends were up for two plays a day, that was too much sitting for Steve and Susan, so they spent time prowling Jackson County rural properties. After working with the same local realtor for five years, they bought a five-acre piece of forest property in Jacksonville in 2001 from an eccentric seller who would not take phone calls and would only communicate via fax. Steve laughs, “Our new property was mainly poison oak and wild blackberries, but it was in the city where we could get city utilities and services, and, after cleaning up fallen timber and undergrowth, we found a couple nice building sites.” By this time Steve and Susan had become friends of the Orth House owners, Lee and Marilyn Lewis, who introduced them to local contractor Bruce Silva, who was to become their builder.

After hiring Bruce and securing an architect, the Casaleggios returned to California where Steve continued as a bond lawyer. Construction on their Jacksonville home did not begin until 2004 after a HARC approval delay and the “architect was fired with enthusiasm.” Building a home in another state has its challenges but they both continue to praise their builder. “Bruce would send progress photos; we had a phone conference almost weekly and occasionally we would saddle up for Jacksonville to make some on-site decisions. Working with Bruce was fabulous.”

Steve retired from the law firm in 2005, and they moved to their new home in Jacksonville in September on the annual Yard Sale weekend, leaving them thinking what incredible mistake they had made. With their overloaded moving van delayed at a weigh station, their first night in their new home was without furniture, but Steve remembered, “I called a mattress store asking if we could buy a bed and have it delivered today. They said, ‘If you pay for it today, we will deliver it today.’ I knew then that we had moved to the right place.”

Since their arrival in Jacksonville in 2005 they have become consummate volunteers. Lee Lewis of the Orth House hectored them into joining the Jacksonville Boosters Club, and Steve’s first volunteer activity was painting fence pickets that became part of the Peter Britt Gardens entry fence. Susan’s first Booster Club activity was serving on the Boosters then Cemetery Committee which did an exhaustive inventory of the cemetery blocks and plots. Susan relates, “This inventory effort went on for three years, and it was fascinating. For example, we discovered graves that no one knew about and there were many temporary markers that there was no record of.”

While active in Boosters, Susan really found her niche in the Jacksonville Garden Club, serving as President for two terms from 2009-2013 at the same time that Steve was the President of the Boosters Club. It was during their concurrent terms that the Peter Britt Gardens’ renovation was accomplished with the city, utilizing the Garden Club funds, a State Parks grant and “hands-on” labor from the Boosters and Garden Clubs.

Steve also has taken an active role in our city’s government, having served on the Buildings and Lands, Lodging Tax and Parks committees and, since 2017, has been on the Jacksonville City Council, currently serving as the liaison with the Planning Commission. He remains the Booster semi-official “bench guy,” replacing and repairing downtown benches with the author of this piece. Likewise, in 2017, Susan again assumed the presidency of the Garden Club while still chairing its annual Holiday Greens Sale.

When asked to reflect on their Jacksonville experience since 2005, Steve was the first to reply. “Really, Jacksonville is too good to be true. This is the golden land, except it is green. From the beginning, Jacksonville just felt right. This is the way Lafayette used to be, but by the time we left, it had changed to become pretentious and unwelcoming.” Susan’s thoughts are similar. “Jacksonville is the friendliest place I have ever lived. There is a real sense of community here. People here wave at you as you are walking, and you don’t even know who they are. That is so special.”

Steve and Susan Casaleggio epitomize what it means to be an active and contributing couple and making Jacksonville a better place to live. Lafayette’s loss has been Jacksonville’s gain.