![]() The county occasionally negotiated permission from him to gain access for maintenance crews to an old dirt road at the end of the canyon.īesides a trailhead, the county’s agreement includes an easement giving the county the right to cross the home site to reach the road. Lessin, but he wasn’t interested in their offers. Hansen said the county had repeatedly tried to buy land or an easement from the late John E. But they are essential to increase public access across open space, Kinsey said. They are usually slices of residential lots that pack Marin’s lofty real estate values. Supervisor Steve Kinsey noted that securing trailheads can be expensive. The house is posted on Internet sites devoted to Joplin and road maps of famous rock sites such as the Grateful Dead’s Victorian on San Francisco’s Ashbury Street, Jefferson Airplane’s house on Fulton Street and the Hollywood hotel where Joplin died.Ībout the Larkspur house, a Web site warns: “Please do not disturb current occupants!” Occasionally, he said, visitors would pocket a souvenir, usually one of the pool balls that would go unnoticed until family members would rack the balls for a game and find one or more missing. “Initially, it was kind of silly because it was a pilgrimage site,” Lessin said. Mike Lessin said that after his family moved into the house, Joplin fans would drop by to see the place. Joplin’s pool table still stands in the family room. A bathroom includes a tiled sunken bath and shower below a skylight that looks out into the towering redwoods. There’s also a 4-foot-high dog door next to the front door that Joplin had installed for her St. Nearly 40 years later, there are still remnants of Joplin’s short stay in the house, including a small bar made from redwood burl and wall paneling made by the carpenter who did much of the striking artistic woodwork that was featured in the interior of The Trident restaurant, a popular Sausalito watering hole during the 1970s. Mike Lessin said he remembers hearing about sightings of Doors singer Jim Morrison and rocker Kris Kristofferson, who wrote “Me and Bobby McGee,” which become a Joplin hit after she died. Matt Lessin, one of his brothers, said he remembered cars from large parties lining the roads and Joplin driving her Porsche, painted in a psychedelic design, up and down West Baltimore Avenue. Mike Lessin remembered moving into the house as a kid and finding some walls painted a deep purple. Everyone is pleased that this had worked out.” “I wanted my children to walk through that trail,” he said. Mike Lessin, a Corte Madera resident, said he grew up using the trail to hike into nearby open space, and the sale of the land preserves that access for generations to come. The county plans to create a new trail, steering it away from the house and around a tiny meadow. The trail leads to the Blithedale Ridge Open Space and parts of Mill Valley and Corte Madera. ![]() ![]() Hansen said the purchase legalizes public access to a trail that people have used for years. The house and the rest of the lot, about another half-acre, is for sale with an asking price of about $1.5 million, said Jesse Bradman, whose real estate company, JB Properties of Petaluma, is representing the property. She had lived in the wood-shingled, creekside house less than two years, but it is listed as her “last home” on Internet sites paying tribute to her and to rock landmarks.Ĭounty Open Space Manager Dave Hansen said the price reflects the property’s value. The hard-living rocker died at age 27 from a drug overdose in a Los Angeles hotel room. Baltimore Ave., Joplin’s redwood-studded home at the time of her death in 1970. He said he’s hopeful a combination of private and public contributions can close the gap. “It’s an opening of a major trailhead,” said Supervisor Hal Brown. The Marin Conservation League also has pledged its help in raising money. The county started the funding push on Tuesday by dedicating $50,000 for the purchase. The pricey property will cost the county $411,500, according to a purchase agreement that gives the county until March 28 to raise the money. A half-acre slice of Larkspur’s Baltimore Canyon – land that legendary rocker Janis Joplin once called home – is being purchased by the county Open Space District to open a public trail that could take hikers and joggers to the top of Blithedale Ridge.
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