Fifty years ago, Don Dickenson left a voicemail for California’s attorney general. Then he climbed into his car and drove toward the sea. If what he had heard was true, he had precious little time to save one of the most ambitious artworks in California’s history. 

The artwork in question was “Running Fence,” a 24-mile installation by artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude that wound through Sonoma and Marin counties, weaving across their rolling hills before dropping into the Pacific Ocean. In appearance, it was closer to a curtain than a fence, a series of 18-foot-high nylon sheets suspended between 2,050 steel poles. In its finished form, “Running Fence” looked like a white ribbon laid across the landscape, flapping lazily in the wind. 

The piece stayed up for only two weeks, but it was the culmination of a four-year effort, during which time the artists chased down permits, attended public meetings, rubbed elbows with ranchers and battled local opposition. The artwork had required a 265-page environmental impact report, 300 workers, and more than $2 million in funds to construct. In the process, the artists fielded both a bomb threat and vandalism from disgruntled neighbors. 

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Richard Cole of Environmental Science Associates, Inc., leader of the project’s environmental impact report, explains his procedures and findings at a public hearing of the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors on Dec. 16, 1975.

Through it all, “Running Fence” had prevailed. But just as it was set to be completed, it ran into a crisis that almost derailed the whole project. For the first time, the artists appeared to have violated the law. They had extended their fence into the Pacific Ocean without the approval of the California Coastal Commission. 

Dickenson, who worked at the Marin County Planning Department, had heard rumors that a temporary injunction was on the way. If Christo was served, construction would be stopped, and “Running Fence” would be left unfinished.

When Dickenson arrived at the stretch of coast near Bodega Bay, metal poles held down by weighted anchors had already been dropped into the sea. A hive of workers were busy unfurling the white nylon curtains, and Christo was in the middle of a TV interview. 

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In an interview with SFGATE, Dickenson recalled trying to interrupt the artist’s Q&A. “Christo, you’ve got to get out of here,” he said he told the artist. “You don’t want to be served.”

The end of “Running Fence” ran into the Pacific Ocean.

Dickenson had been the one to report Christo’s violation to the attorney general, as required by his oath of office. But in the months he had worked to get “Running Fence” in compliance with county codes, he had come to respect Christo and his project. He wanted “Running Fence” to succeed. 

The artist took his warning, and drove off to the Sonoma hills, where he hid out for two hours in a eucalyptus grove. No injunction arrived, and “Running Fence” was finished. But for those two hours, Dickenson was prepared to keep a secret.

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“I mean, I knew where he was, but I wasn’t going to tell them,” Dickenson told SFGATE. 

The circus comes to town

By the 1970s, Christo and Jeanne-Claude were stars of the art world. Hailing from Bulgaria and France, respectively, they were born on the same day in 1935. By the time of “Running Fence,” they had dropped their last names and were living in a New York loft. 

Christo in his New York studio with preparatory drawings for “Running Fence.” 

The artists........

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