Save Our Garage

One man’s pain in the neck is another man’s state historic landmark. The one-car wood-frame garage in Palo Alto where electronic pioneers William R. Hewlett and David Packard got their start 50 years ago has been so designated by the California Historical Resources Commission.

Hewlett-Packard Co., today one of the world’s premier technology giants, built its first product in the 12-by-18-foot structure in 1939: an audio oscillator that Walt Disney Studios used to develop the sound system for the classic film “Fantasia.”

The garage is so weighted down with Silicon Valley lore that subsequent owners of the home near downtown Palo Alto complained about swarms of tourists snapping photos in the driveway. The owners were also blocked from tearing the thing down.

However, Hewlett-Packard officials describe the latest owner as “a longtime friend of the company who is quite patient about all the hoopla.”

Cure or Cause of Ills?

Futurist Harlan Ellison, a pitchman himself, stunned some in the ad business recently when he told them they share the blame for some of society’s ills. “Your children use drugs, and you told them to do it,” he said in a dinner speech to rather dismayed advertising executives. “You’ve been pushing chemicals on TV for years: ‘Can’t sleep? Take a drug. Not happy? Take a drug.’

“Where in the world did people get the idea that it’s smart to get in a car and go fast? To get in a 4-by-4 and tear up virgin land. You told them to do it.” Ellison, who stars in ads for the Geo line of auto imports from General Motors, was speaking to the spring conference of the Western States Advertising Agencies Assn. in Rancho Mirage and was quoted in the trade publication Advertising Age.

“As much as you’re subject to the whims of your deranged clients, you rule the world,” he said. “You have the reins to the most powerful medium in the world--television. And the only people who can afford to advertise on television are the lowest common denominator of goods . . . stuff like McDonald’s toad burgers.”

Foiling Fax Snoops

If you think hostile agents have tapped the telephone lines on your facsimile transmitter, the spy busters at TRW may have a device to set your mind at ease.

It’s an “encryptor” for fax machines, which allows private messages going over standard telephone lines to be put into a secret code. A second encryptor at the receiving end deciphers the messages.

Asked who might be trying to tap the phone lines of American businesses, TRW spokesman Timothy Dolan demurred, saying: “People who put locks on doors aren’t expected to know who might be jimmying the lock.”

Nonetheless, equipment is sold legally in the United States to electronically intercept fax transmissions. Asked if TRW sells such equipment, Dolan said, “Heavens no.”

The encryptors sell for less than $2,000 each. Interested parties can fax TRW’s Electronic Products at 1-805-541-1724. No encryptor is needed.

Sorry, No Sale

Some of the investor interest in the Hotel Bel-Air seems to have spilled over to a similar-sounding competitor less than two miles away, the Bel-Air Summit Hotel.

A haven for celebrity and royalty alike, the Hotel Bel-Air is being sold to Japanese investors for more than $100 million in a deal that was announced with much fanfare May 1. The successful bidder reportedly beat out about 50 other possible buyers.

Now the Bel-Air Summit, down the road at Sunset and the 405 freeway, says it is getting swamped with telephone calls from potential Japanese buyers, but owner Efrem Harkham insists that his hotel is not for sale, even though its occupancy rate is only 65%. (The average occupancy rate is 90% at the Hotel Bel-Air.) Harkham issued a press release, vowing he “is there to stay.”