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The Campaign

My 2026 campaign to solve this mystery involves a dual-pronged approach.

(a) Spreading around the links to the New 2025 Recording of Light the Lanterns for definitive singer voice recognition, along with some sort of "album cover notes". I suggest folks copy and attach the "Mystery Song Summary" on the Homepage. 

(b) Popularising a link to this website so seekers can research the full historical, geographical and personal backstories about the song. This will help counteract all the nonsense out there.

But PLEASE ... before you rush off to shoot me an email suggesting "that sounds like ..." please follow the approaches described below. More stab-and-hope suggestions will NOT HELP. If YOU think it sounds like someone, YOU contact them to validate that hunch. Get back to me with their email address and phone number if it actually is. I know some lawyers holding money for them!

Let's Look Nationwide

This campaign need not be limited to just the West Coast. The original players and their descendents might have moved to anywhere in the country. The song is the hook, and reading the full story may be the trigger for locational recall. If lots more people can hear the song nationwide, and read about when and where it originated, someone might come up with some hard facts we can follow back to the singer. I'm hoping someone alive in that era (1962-1970) will email me to say:

• Yeah, I remember a long haired hippie chick, sitting on a stool in a folk club around 1968 playing that very song. Cathy ended up with my best mate and moving to an ashram in India. I'll look him up.

• That innovative fretless bass sound is distinctive. I know one guy who played one of those in the Bay Area around '69. He was always doing session work for singer/songwriters who came from out of town. I'll ask him.

• Hey! My grandma once played me that demo tape of her band! She said it went nowhere. They didn't like it in LA or SF. So she married and moved to Nashville. I see her every Christmas 

• I remember one girl, a guitarist/singer at Fort Bragg Senior High. Bit of a poet. She never fitted in. Dreamed of going to SF, to write her own music, to become a star in LA one day. She'll be in my yearbook.

• Yeah, I remember that song too well. Some college friends at Berkeley were recording it in the dorm next door ... for 2 days. It drove me mad. I still know one of them. He's still playing around.

• I was given that same song to play on radio, back in 1970, in SF. She was a pretty free girl, we traded favours and went out twice! She moved to LA seeking fame and fortune. I sure do remember her name.

Things to Do

• ​Send off a sound-and-info package to radio stations to make it intriguing and playable. A national campaign of Let's-Find-That-Singer may work better than solely a West Coast effort.​
• Send it to West Coast music historians, folk enthusiasts, old hippies, 60s musicians, old radio jocks, retired recording engineers.
• Upload its DSP links and this research website to every YouTube comments section and Lostwave Forum and website mentioning LTL to encourage the many many listeners who want it found to spread it around. Maybe niche Facebook groups have folk music history buffs with long memories. But don't just send me YOUR ideas. Investigate them to validate or invalidate them.

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Profile of the LTL Singer/Songwriter

This profile below tries to synthesize some known facts, some logical deductions, and some outright speculation about the female singer/songwriter responsible for the Light the Lanterns demo, believed to have been penned around 1962-1964 in Fort Bragg or Mendocino and recorded circa 1968–1969, either right up the north of California or in San Francisco itself.

It considers the harsh commercial realities of the 1960s music industry and the psychological profile needed to survive it. I am not judging the artist per se, but using the criteria of the A&R men and talent scouts of the era to understand why she became untraceable, as this dictates how we must now search for her.

Origin and Accent:

• Highly likely a West Coast/California native, born in the state. She possesses a gentle, almost invisible American accent (to this Aussie) consistent with generic or what's linguistically called Western American English of the late 1960s. She was certainly not from the Northeast, the South, Nashville, or Texas! And she sure wasn't influenced by the LA Valley-GIrl talk of mid 70s - mid 80s.

Timeline and Age:

• Belonging to the Baby Boomer generation (born approx 1943 - 1948), she was an estimated 16–21 years old at the time of the song's composition (1963/64) and 20-25 at time of recording (1968–1969). This would align with High School graduating classes of 1961–1965. ​ If still living, she could be 77 - 82 yo now.

Local Presence:

• The believed origin of the LTL story is the Fort Bragg/Mendocino, California area. She was either a native local (Fort Bragg High School cohort approx 1961 - 1965) or a transient "outsider" who settled locally during the North Coast counterculture influx of 1962 - 1970.
• Her local residency up north is more probable than down south as it makes her invitation to Grace's intimate illumination night by Delpha more plausible than if she'd​ lived in San Francisco and they'd both made the 190 miles, 5 to 6 hour trip up and back. And, if she was intending to take over the legacy, she must have had plans to stay around the area for a while.

Social Scene: Mendocino Counterculture

• She was possibly a known figure in the local youth social scene, frequenting or even maybe working at Quong's Riviera Cafe in Fort Bragg (the site of Grace's drinking night), which closed in 1966, further proving that the narrative (but not the recording) was sparked before 1966.
• In the early to mid 60s, Mendocino was the vanguard of the alternative scene outside of San Francisco. It was first settled by alternative types from around 1957, well prior to the "Summer of 67" after which the prevailing hippie spirit in San Francisco crashed and when a second wave of "communards" migrated north to settle around Mendocino. From 1960 on, there were artists and musicians galore, sometimes crossing swords with the conservative, traditionalist, redneck, timber industry types found in Fort Bragg. This would explain the odd mixture of our story's characters. And it will also make identifying our singer-songwriter extremely difficult as just one aspiring musical poet in that growing milieu! But I'm working on it. 
• In addition to Quong's -- which was a hybrid establishment between the straights and the alternatives, the young and the old -- Mendocino also had in those years other places which would have suited our "outsider" singer songwriter, such as:
• The Sea Gull Cellar Den, an imitation opium den;
• The Caspar Inn, served as a community center for the rural population and those living in the woods.

• The Art Center Theater, hosted "Hootenannies" and folk circles. The most "respectable" venue for a young artist and a likely place for someone with an "arty" or college-bound profile to perform.
• The Totem Pole, a performance space for folk music and art;
• The Well, an underground/basement coffeehouse and music venue known for a darker, more intellectual atmosphere, catering to the "beatnik-to-hippie" transition. 
• Pudding Creek Beach / Glass Beach, outdoor gathering spots for Fort Bragg "unconventionals" to have beach fires and play acoustic guitars.
• The Frog & Peach, an alternative deli/cafe hangout, a daytime gathering spot for the "outsider" crowd to discuss philosophy and music.
• The 10-48 (Ukiah), the primary club and music venue for the inland Mendocino County music scene. If she migrated toward the college scene (Mendocino College/Ukiah), this is where she would have seen and potentially opened for touring San Francisco acts.  
• The House of Seven Gables (Ukiah), a coffeehouse and music venue that hosted folk singers and hosted open-mic style gatherings for the local youth and student population.  

Migration Path:

• She may have pursued arts or intellectual interests in addition to her musical bent, possibly migrating to the Ukiah arts/college scene or the San Francisco/Berkeley Bay Area for college after leaving school and to pursue her music career more seriously.

​

Core Persona:

• She fits the perfect image of 60s "hippie chick" and singer/songwriter.
• She was an idealist, mildly ambitious, non-conformist who felt "on the outside" of her conservative, small-town community, ie Fort Bragg, even more so than Mendocino at the time.

Intellectual Engagement:

• The lyric "I wanted to be what I wanted to be" directly echoes the 1960s Humanistic Psychology concept of Self-Actualization, confirming her engagement with the intellectual currents of the pre-counterculture era. ​ This self-described tag may have existed at the time of the meeting, or may be a later lyrical insertion after later SF influences. [Ref: See Humanistic Psychology]

Relationship to the Atkinsons:

• The relationship was far more of a transient acquaintance with Delpha and Grace (lasting only 2 - 3 years), than family or a close friend. The connection seems  somewhat transactional and driven by convenience: Delpha sought to "dump" the legacy (a burden of familial trauma), and the singer used the story as a potential musical vehicle -- athough, her idealistic heart comes through in the song.
• The singer's phrase "crazy ladies in gingerbread houses" is more likely a flippant caricature of the oft-reported, difficult lives that remote island lighthouse women had to endure along America's rocky coastlines. Considering that the singer never visited the Farallons herself, she would have had a romantised and detached perspective of the island women.

Social Access:

• She was specifically chosen by Delpha Atkinson to witness the ceremony and inherit the tradition from Grace. The family must have viewed her as both an outsider and an ally; someone emotionally detached from their deep familial trauma (loss, alcoholism, military history) but still with a ceremonial mindset and respect for their tradition. The singer's own family may have had an indirect military service connection that linked her to the Atkinsons' particularly militarist family tree -- 5 out of 7 boys went into the army, providing a rationale for Delpha's trust/inclusion. ​

Emotional Distance:

• She exhibited emotional detachment from the song's subjects, singing as an idealizing storyteller rather than a close friend. Her perception was of a romanticized "magic island" view, which ignored Grace's reality of a hard life on the Farallons.

Motivation and Intent:

• Her motivations stemmed from her idealism and probably a compassion to help the situation -- dearly wanting to prevent "the lights extinguishing".
• The cryptic lyrics (omitting specific names and locations) were no doubt a conscious artistic choice to protect the family's privacy (Grace's memorial) and to create universality by transforming local history into a broader piece of Californian folk mythology. ​

Genre and Date:

• The song is a simple Folk-Pop / Electric Folk ballad, a generic attempt to emulate the San Francisco Sound of 1968–1969. Its style went quickly out of vogue even before 1972. ​ Her singular musical recording effort was riding the wave of the time. She clearly didn't evolve her musical talents into the emerging musical genres of the 70s.

Vocal Profile:

• She is an alto, with a satisfactory but not outstanding voice. She lacked the bankable X-factor (power, unique tone, range) necessary for commercial stardom. Her harmonies were weak, unsure. She was not a professional duet singer. ​ She had good pitch, and a sincere but not overdone emotionality in her singing. 

Instrumentation:

• She was the primary rhythm acoustic guitarist (steel six-string, open chords, standard tuning, key of D major), suggesting she was the true songwriter who owned the tune. ​ She performed the classic country-folk strumming of the time, with no backbeat.
• See here for the LTL chords >>> https://tabs.ultimate-guitar.com/tab/simon-hill/light-the-lanterns-chords-3347723. Note: They are ALL major chords except one, the F#m. Not even any 7ths. Real basic.
• No dropped bass E to D like Joni Mitchell popularised around 1965. Even Dylan was using a dropped D from 1962. But not our girl here. Why? Hootenanny style 60s guitar chords were nearly always natural tunings. I was taught around 1967 that non-standard guitar tunings were unconventional and muck up your other chords.

Band and Recording Status: 

• Mixed skill levels (higher-quality bass and slide guitar versus mediocre drums and vocals) suggest a college-level ensemble rather than professional session players, as well as the amateur or semi-pro, garage-level recording quality.

Commercial Fate:

• Industry rejection was likely due to a lack of commercial "X-factor" and the generic nature of the song. The LTL demo was probably her only one and only shot at a professional music career.

​Post-Career:

• ​Like so many 60s kids did after the 60s; and like so many aspiring musicians still do today when their artistic aspirations get knocked back by the mainstream gatekeepers, she likely underwent an identity transformation after failing to secure a record deal, by embracing a conventional life (eg, motherhood, "better paid" career). Or maybe she suffered a drug misadventure in the heavier 70s. These would explain her complete untraceability in music records.
• But then, perhaps today she's an active grandmother, blissfully unaware of her musical near-miss. I hope so.

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Where To Go Now?

If you'd like to delve deeper into the nuts and bolts of my Research Archives, please click on these links below:

Page References

Humanistic Psychology

The specific vernacular of the Humanistic Psychology Movement, Maslow’s "Self-Actualization", saturated global counterculture from 1967 onwards. It's peak was 1966 - 1972.  Abraham Maslow: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs