A History of Esalen Institute

by John Callahan (2012)

Longtime Esalen workshop participant, John Callahan, wrote this brief history of Esalen Institue.

Esalen Institute is a communitarian retreat in Big Sur, California, that focuses upon humanistic values in adult education. Esalen is a nonprofit organization devoted to offering seminars in subjects like psychology, meditation, massage, ecology, and eclectic forms of spirituality. The institute offers more than 400 short-term workshops a year, as well as residential work-study programs and internships.

Esalen is located about 45 miles south of Monterey, California, and 9 miles north of the village of Lucia. Visitors drive to the institute along a scenic stretch of California Highway 1. Esalen is about a 3 hour drive south of San Francisco.

Esalen was built on a large, multi-acre site along the coast of Big Sur, where the Santa Lucia Mountains border the Pacific Ocean. The Esalen property is divided by Hot Springs Canyon, which includes a waterfall fed by Hot Springs Creek. A prominent feature the site is its cliff-side hot springs bath house.

Esalen was founded by Michael Murphy and Dick Price in 1962. Their goal was to explore the emerging field of human potentials in the humanities and sciences. Esalen became source of learning from the wisdom traditions of Eastern and Western civilizations. The many teachers who came to Esalen have included philosophers, scientists, artists, psychologists and religious thinkers from all over the world.

In ancient times, the site was frequented by a native tribe known as the Esselen Indians. Carbon dating tests of artifacts found on Esalen's property indicate a human presence as early as 2600 BC. The Esselen people used the site primarily because of its unique access to the ocean, fresh water and hot springs. Certain areas of the site were used by the Esselen for food gathering and temporary lodging, while other areas were used for burial grounds. After the appearance of Europeans, the Esselen population was largely destroyed by foreign diseases contracted at the Carmel Mission. However, a few people in the area can still trace their ancestry back to the Esselen.

In the 1870s, a man named Thomas Slate visited the Big Sur site in order to bathe in the hot springs. He homesteaded the property in the mid-1880s. A settlement grew up known as Slate’s Hot Springs. In 1910, the land was purchased by Dr. Henry Murphy, a physician from nearby Salinas, California. Dr. Murphy was reputed to be the physician who delivered John Steinbeck. When Dr. Murphy bought the property he intended to operate a health spa, based upon the mineral water baths. But that would have to wait for Highway 1 to be completed, over 25 years later.

During the construction of the highway, the Slate's Hot Springs site was used as a residence by engineers and mechanics. The highway was actually built using convict labor housed in rough cabins a few miles away at Anderson Creek. The highway was complete in 1937. When it was finally opened for public use, the Murphy family started the spa and employed a series of property managers to run the business. A restaurant served visitors, and the hot springs baths were opened for public use. There was a lodge, and motel units were built in the 1950s. The official business name was changed to Big Sur Hot Springs. Henry Miller, who lived a short distance away on Partington Ridge, was a frequent visitor. Joan Baez was a resident, living in one of the cabins. Hunter S. Thompson managed the property, until his problematic behavior caused him to be fired.

By 1960, all the hot springs resorts in California had lost their popularity, and the Murphy’s Big Sur property fell into disuse. However, this presented the next generation of the Murphy family with an opportunity. Michael Murphy and Dick Price both attended Stanford University in the late 1940s and early 1950s, but they did not become friends until later. They met in San Francisco at the suggestion of a Stanford comparative religion professor named Frederic Spiegelberg, with whom both had studied in college. After graduating from Stanford with a psychology degree, Dick Price briefly attended graduate school at Harvard University. Then he joined the Air Force and lived in San Francisco, where he met Alan Watts and experienced a psychotic break. After a horrible experience in a mental hospital, Price returned to San Francisco. Michael Murphy, meanwhile, joined the Army and served in Puerto Rico. When he was discharged, he traveled to India for an extended retreat at Sri Aurodindo’s ashram. Then Murphy also returned to San Francisco.

After they were introduced, Murphy and Price became close friends. In 1961, they traveled down to the Murphy family’s Big Sur property. They began to make plans for an educational forum that would be open to novel ways of thinking. They envisioned a laboratory for experimentation with a wide range of philosophies, religious disciplines and psychological techniques. Henry Murphy’s widow, and Michael’s grandmother, Vinnie, agreed to lease the Big Sur property. The lease was combined with capital that Price had accumulated with the help of his father, who was a successful vice-president at Sears in Chicago. The young men were given support by Frederic Spiegelberg, Alan Watts, Aldous Huxley and his wife Laura, as well as Gerald Heard and Gregory Bateson.

Alan Watts gave the first lecture at Esalen in January 1962. Gai-fu Feng, a Chinese immigrant with a degree from the Warton Business School, joined Price and Murphy as an early Esalen staff member. In the summer of that same year, Abraham Maslow, the famous humanistic psychologist, happened to drive onto the grounds looking for a place to stay, and soon became an important patron of the institute.

Esalen was incorporated as a non-profit institution in 1963. A small catalog was published advertising workshops. In late 1963, Fritz Perls began to offer Gestalt therapy workshops at the institute, and the next year he became a permanent resident. Esalen rapidly gained popularity. The housing facilities were large enough to run multiple programs simultaneously, so Esalen created additional resident teacher positions. Murphy recruited Will Schutz, the well-known encounter group leader, to take up permanent residence at Esalen. Dick Price became one of Fritz Perls’ primary students. After Perls left in 1969, Price developed his own form of practice called Gestalt Practice, which he continued teaching at Esalen until his death in a hiking accident in 1985. Michael Murphy moved back to San Francisco and became a successful author, writing non-fiction books about Esalen related topics, as well as several novels.

Michael Murphy & Dick Price: Photo and copyright by Kathy Thormod Carr 1985
Increased attention came to the institute in 1966, when Esalen started to receive coverage in the news media. George Leonard published an article in Look Magazine about the California scene, that mentioned Esalen and included a picture of Murphy. Time published an article about Esalen in September 1967. The New York Times Magazine published an article by Leo E. Litwack in late December. Then an article about Esalen appeared in Life Magazine. These articles brought Esalen into the awareness of other media outlets. Esalen responded by holding several large-scale conferences at venues like New York City. Then Esalen opened a satellite center in San Francisco that offered extensive programming, but it was closed in the mid-1970s for financial reasons. In fact, Esalen has always been forced to change as it responded to internal and external stressors. Dick Price provided leadership at the institute, and his death in late 1985 brought about many changes in personnel and programming. Steven Donovan became president of the institute, and Brian Lyke served as general manager. Nancy Lunney-Wheeler became the director of programming, and David Price (Dick's son) served as general manager beginning in the mid-1990s. Then the baths were damaged in 1998 by severe weather, only to be rebuilt after great institutional and financial stress. Afterward, Andy Nusbaum developed a plan to put the institute on a sound economic footing. More recently, managerial changes and restructuring have been caused by difficulties in the American economy. Over the years, considerable effort has been devoted to ensuring a future for Esalen.

In the early days, many of the seminars were offered in a standard lecture format. These were presented by people like Arnold Toynbee, Paul Tillich, B. F. Skinner, and Carl Rogers. Esalen also sponsored a series of encounter groups focused upon racial prejudice, both in Big Sur and at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. These racial encounters were led by Price Cobbs, along with George Leonard and Michael Murphy. By the mid-1960s, rather than merely lecturing, many leaders began to experiment with sensory awareness, which included the education of the body, the senses, and the emotions. These "experiential" workshops became the hallmark of the Esalen experience. Leaders of these workshops included people like Charlotte Selver, Gabrielle Roth, and Moshe Feldenkrais. Esalen also sponsored long-term resident scholars, including people like Joseph Campbell, Gregory Bateson, Ida Rolf, and Brother David Steindl-Rast, who conducted ongoing workshops for the community.

Esalen also developed a tradition of sponsoring the arts and music. Joan Baez had a close relationship with Esalen. In 1964 she led a workshop entitled “The New Folk Music.” This was the first of seven “Big Sur Folk Festivals.” The 1969 concert included musicians who had performed at the famous Woodstock Festival. The event staged on the Esalen grounds was featured in the documentary movie called, “Celebration at Big Sur.” Other artists who appeared at Esalen included John Cage and Robert Rauschenberg. Robert Bly, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Michael McClure, Kenneth Rexroth and Gary Snyder were among the many poets who did readings or led workshops at Esalen. In 1994, Esalen created an Artist-in-Residence program. In 1995 and 1996, Esalen hosted two Arts Festivals, which gathered together artists, poets, musicians, photographers and performers. Because of the success of these gatherings, the Arts Festivals became a popular yearly event at Esalen.

Over the years, Esalen Institute has sponsored many research initiatives, educational projects, and invitational conferences. The Big Sur facility has been used for these events, as well as other locations, including international sites. The Schizophrenia Research Project was conducted over a three-year period at Agnews State Hospital in San Jose, California, with the objective of examining the proposition that the wellness of certain patients would improve if their process was not interrupted by antipsychotic drugs. In 1980, Esalen began the Soviet-American Exchange Program (later renamed: Track Two) in order to foster peaceful private exchanges between citizens of the "super powers." In the late 1990s, the Esalen Massage and Bodywork Association was organized to facilitate Esalen Massage practitioners. In 1998, Esalen launched the Center for Theory and Research to conduct ongoing invitational conferences dealing with Esalen related topics.

Community has always been an important feature of the institute. Because of Esalen’s isolated location, most of its staff members have been residential from the beginning, and collectively they have shaped the character of the institute. The community has traditionally practiced a form of Gestalt that colors all aspects of daily life, from the workplace to individual relationships. In 1966, Esalen began year-long residential educational programs that were subsequently replaced by month-long work-study programs and year-long work-oriented extended student programs. And there is a preschool on site, called the Gazebo, which serves the children of staff and some program participants. All of these process related activities add to the intensity of community involvement.

Currently, Esalen Institute is managed by CEO Tricia McEntee, with Gordon Wheeler now serving as President, supervised by a noteworthy Board of Trustees that includes the recent addition of hotel owner and lecturer, Chip Conley. Under their leadership, Esalen has focused upon issues of ecological sustainability. The institute has established ties with the University of California, Santa Cruz, with which it has partnered to develop programs allowing students to test concepts of sustainable agriculture and permaculture on Esalen’s land.

Esalen continues to offer workshops for its visitors throughout the year, focused upon the integration of humanistic psychology, wellness, and community-building. Workshops cover a wide range of subjects including: Gestalt, integral philosophy, massage, dance, somatics, spiritual practice, meditation, t’ai chi chuan, yoga, ecopsychology, permaculture and sustainability. As Esalen enters its fiftieth year of operation, the prospects are excellent that the mission of the institute will last well into the future.