Val Zavala>> God is a very personal thing and nothing reveals that more than the work of a desert loner who's built a unique monument to God. His story is part of our "Magical Mystery Tour of California" where we feature the work of student reporters, part of USC's Annenberg School of Journalism. Our reporter today is Allison Louie Garcia who headed to the desert to meet Leonard Knight.
Allie Louie>> Drive two hundred miles east of Los Angeles and you'll reach the edge of the Salton Sea where summer temperatures climb to a hundred twenty degrees. It's a place where few live and little thrives, except here at Salvation Mountain.
Leonard Knight>> And I'd like to give you a tour as you come up here.
Allie Louie>> At first glance, Leonard Knight appears eccentric, but he is also funny, humble and filled with faith.
Leonard Knight>> The truth is, I'm the nothing of nobody. I'm the dumbest little shy thing there ever was, but for some reason, God had me build a mountain.
Allie Louie>> He created his art project on a forgotten government plot, filling it with painted flowers, ceramic figurines and spare parts salvaged from the desert. He used more than a hundred thousand gallons of donated paint and five thousand hay bales covered in adobe. All this to promote one message: God is Love.
Leonard Knight>> I don't want to push God's love on anybody. People used to push me and I don't want to be pushed either, but I let my mountain do my talking.
Allie Louie>> And talk, it does. It speaks of repentance, it speaks of faith, but most of all, it speaks of Knight's personal relationship with God.
Leonard Knight>> So I go right head on to God Almighty and, "Jesus, I love you. Thank you for yesterday. Hello, God, here I am loving you again." I get personal and, when I'm painting sometimes for three or four hours all by myself, that's how I talk.
Allie Louie>> It was named a National Treasure by the United States Congress in 2002. Believers and non-believers alike visit free of charge. They say they're moved by Knight's profound dedication and inspired by his childlike joy.
Rashelle Sundahl>> To see something so God-inspired in the middle of nowhere for nothing because he felt it in his heart one day and just stayed with it, it's amazing.
Christy Loomis>> I mean, you see a lot of large churches and cathedrals and stuff being built, but you don't see something built just by one man that says so much. This is quite an accomplishment and it's something you can see for miles.
Rocky Loomis>> It's pure dedication to faith and everything else, you know.
Allie Louie>> Knight says that his life was a wreck before he found God. Born again, he wanted to spread the word literally.
Leonard Knight>> And in 1971, I saw a hot air balloon fly over Burlington, Vermont and I wanted it to say "God is Love" on it. It said, "Budweiser", of course, and I nagged God for fourteen years. I want a hot air balloon that says, "Jesus, I'm a sinner" and the sinner's prayer, "Jesus, I'm a sinner, please come into my heart."
Allie Louie>> He tried to sew together his own hot air balloon and planned to criss-cross the country with his message, but he could never get his balloon off the ground. In 1984, Knight's truck broke down here in the desert and here he stayed, living in his truck and relying on the kindness of others.
Knight continues to wake at dawn to paint and build. He spends the rest of the day tending to his many visitors, up to a hundred a day in the winter. And he often gives hands-on tours. He makes sure that nobody leaves empty-handed.
Leonard Knight>> "Then you got a flower, see?"
Allie Louie>> For some, the souvenir is tangible like a photograph. For others, it's less tangible, a full spirit, an earful of music, albeit a bit off-tune.
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Allie Louie>> Though Knight says he appreciates the notoriety, he's content being a modern-day hermit cloistered in his technicolor mountain. This is Allie Louie reporting for Life and Times.
