In a town once scorched by wildfire, Albert the white peacock became a symbol of resilience — and loss

When the encroaching flames of the CZU wildfire forced the evacuation of Boulder Creek in August 2020, residents turned to the Boulder Creek Neighbors Facebook page for minute-to-minute information. 

Amid the flurry of updates and messages of distress, resident Ashley Ryder posted a photo, slightly blurry and sepia-toned from the persistent smoky haze, of a white peacock strolling along the sidewalk, its 4-to-5-foot-long tail feathers following like a bridal train. 

“Albert is ok as of this afternoon,” Ryder wrote. The post received nearly 600 likes and a stream of relieved commenters. Over the next few weeks, people continued to post photos of the white peacock, always solo, marching through the empty streets and sidewalks of downtown Boulder Creek. Then came the fan art: paintings of Albert, phoenix-like, lifting out of the flames. More than 700 T-shirts and hoodies were printed showing a cartoon version of the peacock, his plumage in full spread, standing over a fire. In bold, black font, the shirt read: “We Will Rise: Boulder Creek.” 

That image of the bird standing tall and pure against the chaos might have marked Albert’s apotheosis, but his reputation in Boulder Creek stretched back a generation. Before he was Albert the symbol of hope and resilience, he was Albert the neighbor, who lived alone in a redwood tree. He joined the community’s scheduled night howls during the the pandemic lockdown, stunned with his distinctive, white tail feathers, and provided the 5 a.m. alarm call throughout the summer mating season. Most everyone accepted him for what he was: a wild peacock of uncertain origin, somehow making ends meet among the local humans. 

“He was the symbol of Boulder Creek surviving, and beauty, and magic. I think everyone felt that,” resident Beth Stephens, an art professor at UC Santa Cruz, said. “One little girl once said to me, ‘I think Albert is a unicorn stuck in a peacock’s body.’ That sums it up right there.”  

Albert died on Nov. 23, after neighbors say he was attacked by a mountain lion who dragged him from his typical route in Boulder Creek’s Redwood Resort neighborhood toward San Lorenzo River, leaving piles of white feathers in his wake. Neighbors say the death was confirmed by at least one person who witnessed Albert lose his struggle with the predator. 

Albert, allegedly twice widowed and rarely seen with other animals, is survived only by a community mourning one of its own.

“He will be well missed,” resident Dean Bull said. 

Yet, while everybody seems to know Albert by name (and booming mating call), few people know much about this white peacock beyond their own anecdotes. Most agree he’d been in the neighborhood for at least two decades, but struggle to pinpoint his age (between 20 and 36 years old), where he came from, or how he got his name. Like any proper folk hero, Albert’s story of origin often varies from person to person. 

Despite Albert’s vague biographical details, the local fervor for the bird is clear. All anyone can say for certain is that Albert willingly chose to live among the Boulder Creek denizens, represented the rugged individualism of mountain life, and not-so-quietly galvanized the community during its most difficult moments. 

“You want to know about Albert?” teller Victoria Worthington asked from behind her desk at Liberty Bank. “Well, everybody knows about Albert.”

Everyone has a story

Eight days after Albert’s demise, with the sun slanting through the front windows of Joe’s Bar along Highway 9, a few heads perked up as the afternoon bartender, Jessica Daniel, began talking about her interactions with the peacock. 

“I’d be leaving for work in the morning, and he’d be in the middle of the road with all his tail feathers up, looking at me like, ‘What bitch?’” Daniel, who goes by Wing, said as she threw her hands on her hips and struck a mocking pose both sassy and flamboyant. “He was definitely a beast. It sucks he went the way he did after surviving so much.” 

An older, bespectacled gentleman, sporting a thick, gray beard that matched the wooly hair poking out beneath his black beanie, looked up from his pint of amber beer and reflected with disbelief over Albert’s survival during CZU. 

“During the fire people were freaking out, wondering what happened to the white bird, and then all of the sudden, he just popped up out of the ashes, he made it,” said the man, who offered only his first name, Larry. “How and why, we don’t know, but he meant a lot of things to a lot of people who lost a lot of things in the fire. They saw him and it was an inspiration to keep going.” 

Two men toward the other end of the bar nodded in agreement as Bill Withers’ “Lean on Me” played from the bar’s overhead speakers.  

“I’ll miss him strutting around the neighborhood,” one of the men, Martin Westley, said in a thick English accent as he sipped from a shot glass. To his right, a bar patron in a Trump hat nodded with his beer. 

“He was a fixture,” another said. “That’s Albert, man.” 

Down the street at Jenna Sue’s Cafe, owner Jenna Sue Lupertino impersonated Albert’s mating call, a loud, drawn-out “ha-ha” in a soprano tone, a sound she got used to while living right next to Albert for years. 

“My husband and I always joke that Albert should have been listed in the disclosures when we bought our house, but in a good way,” said Lupertino. In the summer, she said Albert would join her by fluttering up and sitting at the edge of her hot tub. “He was like a little staple. During those hot summer nights, mating season, he would be going wild, cooing all the time. And if you cooed to him, he’d always coo back. I’m definitely sad he’s gone.”  

Foggy origins

Despite the many stories and warm feelings, few Boulder Creek residents could say with confidence where Albert got his name, or how he arrived in the mountain community. 

The best guess came one brisk Wednesday morning at the entrance of the Redwood Resort mobile home park, where Albert spent most of his time. Park residents Beth Stephens, the UCSC professor, and Frank Hamer gathered with neighbors Dean Bull and Kevin Foster to talk about the peacock. 

Each had their own intimate relationship with the bird: He would often join Stephens when she and her partner walked their dog, a chocolate Labrador; he would sit next to Hamer’s wife while she gardened; Albert, displaying his full plumage, sometimes reaching 6 feet tall, would greet Bull during the latter’s daily walks; Foster, who returned regularly to Boulder Creek during the CZU evacuation to feed neighbors’ pets, would leave for Albert piles of food and bowls of water around the neighborhood. 

“Someone thought he was an albino, which he’s not, he’s a rare white peacock,” but the name “Albert” derived from that misinterpretation, Stephens said. She then disappeared into her home and returned with a long ivory quill barbed with delicate frills that drooped at the top: one of Albert’s tail feathers. 

Hamer, a longtime resident, stood nearby, smiling with arms folded and a long, white ponytail extending from beneath his cap. He said decades ago someone on the east side of the San Lorenzo River owned a few white peacocks. Hamer always thought Albert escaped and moved into downtown Boulder Creek, though he never confirmed it. 

“Everybody that saw Albert loved him, whether it was little kids or old people like me,” Hamer said. “You see him and you think, wow, there goes walking beautification.” 

Foster, standing in front of a white pickup truck plastered with his construction company’s eponymous name, said everyone in the neighborhood who knew Albert often felt they were the ones who adopted the bird. “Or maybe it’s the other way around.” 

Foster recently led a poll in the Boulder Creek Neighbors Facebook group, asking how the community would prefer the peacock be memorialized; the overwhelming majority of the 544 votes supported a mural. Lupertino said she’s working with the Boulder Creek Business Association to get the mural on the south side of the Jenna Sue’s Cafe building.

In the meantime, a statue of Albert will rotate among the many small businesses along Boulder Creek’s stretch of Highway 9, said Karen Edwards, president of the Boulder Creek Business Association. The statue itself will feature a QR code that leads to Albert’s biography, and information about how to donate to a fundraiser for the permanent mural.  

Stephens is also working on a film to memorialize Albert. 

“In the film, we’re saying he saved this part of the neighborhood during the fire, and people really believe that,” Stephens said. “This bird brought everyone together. It didn’t matter who you were, you loved Albert. He showed the importance of community and overcoming your differences. This bird, man, I’ve never seen a community fall so in love with one animal.” 

What now? I asked. Could Albert be replaced? 

“I wouldn’t have the heart to,” Stephens said. 

“How could we even get another bird to stay in the area if we did?” Bull replied. “Albert kind of picked this area himself.” 

Stephens, twirling the long tailfeather, looked into the distance, and sighed.

“He really did. He was really magical.” 

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