195703 desert magazine 1957 march

8/14/2019 195703 Desert Magazine 1957 March

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Ute Child"Do you mean hold it like this?"asked three-year-old Dru Schavan-augh when Western author NellMurbarger told her to hold that pose.Dru is a member of the Ute-Uncom-paghre tribe and lives at Vernal,Utah. Miss M urbarg er's prize win-ning photo was taken with a Rollei-

cord cam era on Eastman VerichromePan film, 1/60 second at f. 16.

P I C T U R E SO F T H EM O N T HL. D. Schooler of Blythe, California,wins second prize in this month'scontest with this photo of a deserttortoise busily munching off the tip

of a cactus pad. Schooler used a2!/4 x 3V t Graphic Camera, AnscoIsopan sheet film, 1/100 seconds atf. 22.

L u n c h T i m e . . .


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D E S E R T C f l LE nD f i RFeb. 20-Mar 13Brownell McGrewExhibit, Desert Magazine Art Gal-lery, Palm Desert, California.Mar. 2-3Salton Sea Excursion, Si-erra Club. Camp at Finney-RamerLake Game Refuge south of Ni-land, California. Excursions set for1:30 p.m. Saturday; and Sundaymorning.Mar. 3Dons Club Lost Dutchman-Superstition Mountain Gold Trek,from Phoenix, Arizona.Mar. 7Cattle Rustlers Ball, Wicken-burg, Arizona.Mar. 9Desert Museum Field Tripto Carrizo Canyon, from PalmSprings, California.Mar . 9-10 Sierra Club backpackhike to Martinez Peak.Mar. 10Out Wickenburg WayStyleShow, Wickenburg, Arizona.Mar . 10 Eighth Annual AlmondBlossom Festival and Parade,Quartz Hill, California.Mar. 10Western Saddle Club Gym-khana, Phoenix, Arizona.Mar. 11-17 22nd Annual Palm

Springs, California, Men's Invita-tional Golf Tournament.Mar. 13-April 3John Hilton Ex-hibit, Desert Magazine Art Gallery,Palm Desert, California.Mar. 14-17Phoenix, Arizona, Jay-cees World's Championship Rodeo,State Fairgrounds. World's longesthorse-drawn parade opens event on14th.Mar. 16Desert Museum Field Tripto Lost Palm Oasis, from PalmSprings, California.Mar . 16-17 Sierra Club campingtrip to Magnesia Springs Canyon,Rancho Mirage, California.Mar. 17 &31Desert Sun RanchersRodeo, Wickenburg, Arizona.Mar . 19 Ceremonial Dances andFeast Day, Laguna Indian Pueblo,New Mexico.Mar. 22-24Dons Club Travelcadeto Hopi Villages and Petrified For-est, from Phoenix, Arizona.Mar. 24Maricopa County MountedSheriffs Posse Second Annual Na-tional Match Calf Roping Cham-pionship Contest, Phoenix, Ariz.Mar. 24Bandollero Tour to Bor-rego Springs, California, fromYuma, Arizona.Mar. 24Southern Arizona Schoolfor Boys Horse Show, Tucson.Mar. 24-26 New Mexico CattleGrowers Association Convention,Albuquerque.Mar. 26Visitors Club Outing toCave Creek and Balanced Rock,from Phoenix, Ariz., Adult Center.Mar. 27-31Maricopa County Fairand Horse Show, Mesa, Arizona.Mar. 28 Visitors Club outing toCanyon Lake, from Phoenix, Ari-zona, Adult Center.Mar. 29-31NCAA Ski Champion-ships, Snow Basin, Ogden, Utah.Mar. 30Desert Museum Field Tripto 49 Palms Oasis, from PalmSprings, California.Mar. 30-31Flower Show, Woman'sClub, Phoenix, Arizona.Mar . 30-31 Sierra Club campingtrip to Spring Tank Canyon nearDesert Center, California.Mar. 31Dons Club Travelcade to

Ray-Hayden Mines, from Phoenix,Arizona.

V o l u m e 20 M A R C H , 1957 N u m b e r 3

C O V E R

P H O T O G R A P H YCALENDARMEMO RIALFIELD TRIPCLO SE-UP SPOETRYWILDF LO WERSFICTIONLO ST MINEDESERT QUIZP ERSO NALITYNATUREHISTORYEXPERIENCEG A R D E N I N GLETTERSC O N T E S TF O R E C A S TN E W SM I N I N GU R A N I U MLAP IDARYH O BBYB O O K SC O M M E N T

T h e S to n e F a c e in H i d d e n V a l l e y , J o s h u a T r e eN a t i o n a l M o n u m e n t , C a l i f o r n i aB y A R T H U R B. M O O R EP i c t u r e s of the M o n t h 2M a r c h e v e n t s on the d e s e r t 3D e s e r t M e m o r i a l for P a t t o n ' s A r m yB y E L I Z A B E T H W A R D 4J a s p e r T r a i l s in the B a r s t o w B a d l a n d sB y H A R O L D O. W E I G H T 7A b o u t t h o s e wh o w r i t e for D e s e r t 12O l d F o r t C h u r c h i l l and o t h e r p o e m s 13F l o w e r i n g P r e d i c t i o n s for M a r c h 14H a r d R o c k S h o r t y of D e a t h V a l l e y 14P e g l e g ' s M i n e F a c t or F i c t i o n ?

B y J A M E S A. J A S P E R 15A t es t of y o u r d e s e r t k n o w l e d g e 16G h o s t T o w n P r o s p e c t o r , by N E L L M U R B A R G E R 17T h e B u s y W o r l d of D e s e r t A n t sB y E D M U N D C. JAEGER 21I n s c r i p t i o n R o c k

B y J O S E F and J O Y C E M U E N C H 23C a t t l e D r i v e to W i n s l o w , by BILLIE YOST . . 24E x o t i c B l o o m s in the S p r i n g G a r d e n

B y R U T H R E Y N O L D S 25C om m e n t from D e s e r t ' s r e a d e r s . . . . . . 27P i c t u r e - o f - t h e - M o n t h C o n t e s t a n n o u n c e m e n t . . 27S o u t h w e s t r i v e r r u n o f f p r e d i c t i o n s 28F r o m h e r e and t h e r e on the d e s e r t 29C u r r e n t n e w s of d e s e r t m i n e s 33L a t e s t d e v e l o p m e n t s in the i n d u s t r y . . . . 34A m a t e u r Ge m Cut t er , by DR. H. C. D A K E . . . 36G e m s and M i n e r a l s 37R e v i e w s of S o u t h w e s t e r n L i t e r a t u r e 41J u s t B e t w e e n You and Me, by the Edi t o r . . . 42

The Desert Magazine is published monthly by the Desert Press, Inc., Palm Desert,California. Re-entered as second class matter July 17, 1948, at the postoffice at Palm DesertCalifornia, under the Act of March 3, 1879. Title registered No. 358865 in U. S. Patent Officeand contents copyrighted 1957 by the Desert Press, Inc. Permission to reproduce contentsmust be secured from the editor in writing.RANDALL HENDERSON, EditorBESS STACY, Business Manager EUGENE L. CONROTTO, Associate EditorEVONNE RIDDELL, Circulation ManagerUnsolicited manuscripts and photographs submitted cannot be returned or acknowledgedunless full return postage is enclosed. Desert Magazine assumes no responsibility fordamage or loss of manuscripts or photographs although due care will be exercised Sub-scribers should send notice of change of address by the first of the month preceding issue.

SCBSCKIPT1OX R A T E SOne Year $4.00 Two Years $7.00Canadian Subscriptions 25c Extra, Foreign 50c ExtraSubscriptions to Army Personnel Outside U. S. A. Must Be Mailed in Conformity WithP. O. D. Order No. 19687Address Correspondence to Desert Magazine, Palm Desert, California

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Soldiers' altar in the open desert country near Iron M ountain. Man y miles fromcivilian churches, the troops regularly attended services under the desert sky.Photo co urtesy Metropolitan Wa ter District of So uthern California.

But, of them all, the name of Gen-

It was at Patton's headquarters camp

Here they still stand, giving the

The huge relief map at the eamp,R C H , 1 9 5 7

shifting sand, is a reminder of a grimand busy time. It reproduces in nat-ural color the panorama from Yumato Needles, from Salton Sea to theArizona mountains. It was constructedof concrete to exact scale, showingroads, waterholes and mountains, andproved invaluable. Over the now sag-ging ramp, orientation classes wereheld and desert points and plans ofmaneuvers were illustrated. Mechan -ical warfare was new and terrifying.General Patton had a job to do andan over-all picture of the desert gavehim a psychological advantage.

The shrines served a far differentpurpose. Before the rough rock altars,religious services were held regularlyand attendance mounted steadily. Menwho were on their way, division afterdivision, received their final briefingat headquarters camp before sailing

overseas to capture Tunisia, stormSicily or plunge ashore at the Nor-mandy beach. The outdoor churchunder the desert sky smiled a bene-diction, and toughened combat veter-ans did not forget.From far places they sent back newsof their buddiesoften tragic newsand the epitaphs of these men who hadtrained on the desert were engravedin the granite for perpetuity. Somemay have found final resting places onforeign soil, but their memorial is onthe desert.Many hope these altars will standas long as does Iron Mountain tower-ing behind them, and it is here, wherethe Colorado River Aqueduct windsthrough the mountain bringing life toSouthern California, the American Le-gion proposed a memorial park beestablished on approximately two sec-


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This huge relief map was built a few miles west of the Iron Mountain pumpingplant by Army Engineers with Patton's forces in 1942-43. The map measures130 x 160 feet and represents an area of 32,00 0 square miles of Southern Californiadesert country. Photo courtesy Metropolitan Wa ter District of Southern California.tions of government land in honor ofthe doughty general and his men.The Metropolitan Water Districtnow patrols the proposed site, doingwhat it can to keep the shrines in goodrepa ir. Officials of the company haveexpressed their continued interest inthe project and Mrs. George S. Pattonhas given consent that the general'sname might be used, but expressedhope that the boys would be remem-bered, too.The Legion brought the case to theattention of the state senate interimcommittee on public lands, which re-sponded favorably. Public interestmounted and when the veterans' or-ganization requested his considerationof the area as a National Monument,Senator Wm . F . Knowland made aspecial trip to the desert shrine. Con-sidering it worthy of higher notice,Senator Knowland took up the matterwith the Department of Defense andreceived from it endorsement of theproject. Encouraged, he introduced abill to authorize the monument.

Congressman Harry Sheppard sub-mitted a similar bill but both wereblocked by the War Department whichfelt that too many war memorials werebeing rushed through and suggestedaction on the state level. So the propo -sition was whipsawed back to Sacra-mento and here it rests today. There

have been more obstacles and delaysdue mainly to the involved financialaspects of the project.Since the end of the war, manysoldiers have returned to the shrinesto kneel in thanksgiving and in rever-ence to the memory of those not re-turning. The boys who trained herecame from all corners of the nationand on vacation trips to the west coastsome take the off-trail road from Des-ert Cen ter or the new cut-off fromTwentynine Palm s. They show theirfamilies, with more than a little pride,the rugged terrain in which theylearned the bitter art of fighting a des-ert war.To reach the shrine drive 34.7 miles

north of Desert Center on the pavedRice road to the Pumping Plant turn-off and then proceed 2.6 miles up thisroad. A narrow graded road leads fromthis point to the first of the altarsabout three-quarters of a mile distant.There is no entrance fee.A route seasoned desert travelerslike is the new county road leadingeast from Twentynine Palms. Forty-six miles from that lovely desert city,past Dale dry lake, Sheep Hole Moun-tains and Cadiz Valley, the new routejoins the Desert Center-Rice highwayeight miles below the Pumping Plantturn-off.Many of the returning veterans and

other visitors have added their pleasto those of the Legion and other serv-ice clubs, notably the Native Sons ofthe Golden West, in urging the desertmemorial.Actor Leo Carrillo, descendant of apioneer California family as was Pat-ton, enthusiastically supports the mem-orial. Declaring that the state has beenlax in preparing a suitable memorialto one of her most famous native sons,Carrillo pointed out that an appropri-ate memorial rightly could be erectedin this San Bernardino County locationfor the general's grandfather, DonBenito Wilson, was a county pioneer.Don Benito owned a ranch nearColton and discovered and named BigBear Lake after leaving Los Angeleswhere he had served as the old pueblo'sfirst city clerk.While efforts to have the domainset aside as a state park have beenfruitless so far, the granite bouldersstill stand, carved with fading senti-ments attesting to the valor of soldierswho fell in the field of battle.Whether there ever is official recog-nition or not, the symmetrical altars,built by the hands of desert fighte rs,speak for the men who will not as-semble again. The people for whomthe war was fought will not forgetthe desert shrines will remain.

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Jasper Trails in theBarstow Badlands...Here is a field trip for those

who would hike back through thetwisted and torn pages of MojaveDesert geological historyinto th eBarstow Sync l i ne , a vast sedimen-tary bed worn by the relentlessforces of erosion into a fantasticland of deep fissures, strangebuttes and furrowed walls. Col-lectors can find here prized speci-mens of jasper, fossi l bones andlichen-encrusted volcanic rocks.By HAROLD O. WEIGHTPhot ographs by t he au t hor

Map by Norton Al lenUCILE AND I had twin goalsone bright and windy day lastfall when we headed north fromBarstow, California, on the CampIrwin highw ay: to explore the fan-tastic badlands of the Barstow syncline,and to relocate a field in that areawhere I had collected my first gemrock nearly 20 years before.

Our friend Mary Beal of Daggett,famed Mojave Desert botanist, andher friend, Grace Smith, were with us.Mary was going to guide us throughthe badlands, which she first visitedwith the late Dix Van Dyke when theonly approach was by winding, ruttedwag&.i ro?ds.

In those days the ancient down-folded sedimentary beds seldom werevisited except by prospectors or sci-entific fossil-hunting expeditions. Thefossil-diggers still find treasures there,and the uranium excitement brought ina new wave of prosp ectors. But mo stof today's visitors come primarily tomarvel at this wonderland of erosionwhich has become a major scenic, pho-tographic and geologic attraction ofthe Barstow region. And though thescientists named the whole exposurethe Barstow syncline, some of its partsare far more widely known as RainbowBasin, the Fossil Beds and Owl Can-yon.

And now it is far easier to reachthis spectacular corner of the Mojave.Seven miles out on the pavement, weturned left (westerly) onto a goodbladed road with an inconspicuouswhite arrow-sign: "F ossi l Bed ." Threemiles further we turned right (north)where other signs read: "Fossi l Bed"and "One Way ." Minutes later we

were winding up a wash among thewhites, buffs, pale greens, lavendersand reds of tuff, clay-ash and breccia,and through basins and valleys crowdedwith astonishing formations, fantastic

cliffs and weird buttes, weather-sculp-tured from the ancient sediments.This one-way road was narrow andtwisty in places, with abrupt littlegrades, rough stretches and spots thatmight be soft after storms. But forthe most part, as it wound throughRainbow Wash, Rainbow Basin andSteamboat Canyon, it was good desertroad. Any experienced desert driverof any car with reasonable clearancehould be able to negotiate it. Tha twas not true of some of the side trailsalong which Ma ry guided us. Theyare for four-wheel-drive or walking.

Looking out from a deep fissure in the Barstow syncline. In places thisgash can be spanned by the outstretched arms, but the walls tower uphundreds of feet.

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F or full scenic enjoyment of this won-derful country, a lot of hiking shouldbe done, anyhow.One cannot appreciate the height orfantastic erosion of these formationsuntil actually climbing among them.One dark gorge in a great brecciacliff was so narrow it could be spannedwith outstretched arms. Yet the waterhad sheared so sharply down throughthe formation that those walls toweredalmost vertically for hundreds of feetabove us. And the tiny sand-flooredcove at the head of the crevasse wasactually undercut into the cliff. Brac-ing against the wall and looking up thedark curve of the sedimentaries to thesmall far patch of blue sky, we felt asif we were standing in the ruins of anancient cathedral.Returning to the Joshua tree where

we had eaten lunch, Lucile found afine small piece of petrified b on e. Atseveral other places in these badlandswe picked up shattered bits of fossilskeletons. Wh at kind of animals hadthey come from? We wonde red. Whathad this country looked like when thoseanimals were alive?We present-day rovers of the Mo-jave wouldn't have recognized this landback in late Miocene times15,000,-

000 years agowhen these sedimentswere laid down. It wasn't swamp orjungle or heavy forest, according topaleontologists who have made en-lightened guesses about the matter.But there was more water and vegeta-tionrunning streams and lakes, sabalpalms and grasslands. And there wasa great deal of vulcanism that dumpedash and dust into the lakes and streams

and helped seal away the bones of thedead.Some of the creatures that inhab-ited this lost land we would haveknownthe ancestors of rabbits, chip-munks and pocket mice, and somehawks, gulls and ducks. Certainly oneof them would have given a downrighthomey feeling to any desert rat abeaked, horny shelled poke - alongknown as Testudo mohavense. Ourown desert tortoise seems to have dif-fered from this character only in thatGrandpa was about twice as big.

But others among the Barstow faunawould have startled us. F or in thisroster were camels, mastodons, saber-toothed cats, bear-dogs, hyena-dogs,sizeable extinct creatures called oro-donts, and at least three varieties ofprimitive horses.As their story is pieced togetherfrom the debris of the Barstow syn-cline, these creatures apparently didnot perish in some unusual personal

or mass catastrophe. They were notcaught in a La Brea-type tar pit norburied by an ash fall. They died in theusually violent manner which was nat-ural to them, and their bones wereweathered and scattered before beingentombed by the relentless accretionsof time.But the era itself the Miocene(less recent) segment of the Tertiaryageand others since, did know earth-making violence. And these sedimen-tary layers arc folded and twistedaround the sides of an ancient granitemountain as if some incalculable forcehad thrust them up its slope. In placesthey are both under and overlain byflows of volcanic rock.The syncline itself was divided by

TO VICTORVILLESAN BERNAROINO_T0 NEEDLES IDETAIL OF JASPER HILL AREA?

TO CAMP IRWIN HWY,6BARSTOW

B A R S T O W F O S S I L B E D A N DJASPER FIELD LOG

Miles00.0 Barstow (Junction of H ighw ay 66and 91).07.2 Left bran ch to Barstow synclin eand Rainbow Basin (see below).Continue ahead on Camp Irwinh ighway .08.1 Lea ve C am p Irwin hig hw ay forleft branch, marked Superior Valley.10.2 F aint a uto trail, bran chin g right,leads to southwest edge of jasperfield, about .2 of a mile in.10.3 Right bra nch . F ollow il to about10.4 where another right branchends at northeast edge of jasperfield.T O RAI NB O W B AS I NAND FOSSIL BEDS07.2 (From Barsiow) Leav e C am p Irwinhighway for left branch,08.8 Right b ran ch lea ds to mouth ofcolorful Owl Canyon. Continue onmain road to10.2 Take right b ran ch, begin ning ofone-way road into Barstow syn-cline and Rainbow Basin.



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beds . They are, from b ottom toBasal Breccia, rock fragments

Tuff, 500 feet,

Tuff,

The first specimens to beTertiary

University of California Press,the bed s. In 1911 C. L. Bake r of

the syncline. An expedition

ong past on the Mojave. F orAn d since the bones were

But I was certain that more reward-Th at certainty went back to the0s. A t that time I was an addictdeep sea fishing. Bu t each da mp

p Som e of the strange erosionalbeds exposed north of Barstow.

the Mag nificent display oferosion in Owl Canyon. One of the great walls insyncline. Bits of fossil bone,

left. Note figurein left center.: : : . . . : . . . . . . ; , .

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0/ /oji?7 feone of Barstow fauna, found in Rainbow Basin area. Speci-men at right still is cemented in breccia. Those at left were washed outfrom the upper tuff beds. Pictured below are plume, moss and threadjasper specimens.

gray dawn when I would be headingout from some sport fishing dock forthe waters off Catalina, my motherand father would be driving out intothe desert. Wh en I came home withblue fin or yellowtail or white sea bassto carve up, I would find the kitchensink already app ropriate d. Dad wouldbe soaking, scrubbing and gloating overpieces of rock, each of which he treatedas something precious.They were unusual rockspieces ofpinkish chalcedony, I learned later.Still , I was uncertain whether peopleacting that way about rocks were tobe trusted out alone in the desert. Soone weekend I went along, as a sortof guardian.1(

I've never gone back to deep seafishing.That first trip, Dad drove as closeas possibletaking an old mine roadoff the Cave Springs roadto a red-dish-brown buttc north of Barstow.And I found that it was interesting tohun t bits of chalcedony. We wentagain to the same place. On one trip,climbing high into a saddle of themountain, I found pieces of featheryyellow jasper in clear chalcedony withincluded bits of brownish opalite. Soonwe started traveling to collecting fieldsall over the Mojave and Colorado des-erts.After realizing just how good thosepieces of cutting material were, I in-

tended to return to that first field tosee what else was there. Thou gh theroads had changed in the years be-tweenthe Cave Springs route beingreplaced by the Camp Irwin highway,old mining trails washing out, new onesbeing openedI thought I knew themou ntain I wanted. And though itwas much later than we had plannedwhen we came out of the syncline, Idrove back to the paved highway, fol-lowed it another mile toward CampIrwin, then turned left (northerly) on-to the Superior Valley road. A reddish-brown butte I recognized lay just tothe east of this road. It was only twoor three miles away, but the sun wasalmost on the horizon when we fol-lowed a trace of auto trail to its north-western base.Even when 1 climbed swiftly overthe steep slopes in the gathering dusk,I was not certain that I had guessedright. But in a matte r of minutes 1 sawa bright chunk of rock in the small

drainage channe l I was following. Ex -amining it closely, I saw it was a beau-tiful piece of reddish moss jasper ofcutting quality. And in the remainingtwilight I found several more bits ofgem jasper.We had to be back in TwentyninePalms by morning. Obviously, anothertrip was imperative and a week laterwe were heading back. Along withus this time was Elma Marvin, artistfriend of Twentynine Palms. But theweather had changed, fall plungingsuddenly into winter. Leaden clouds

covered more than hall' the sky as weturned off at the reddish mountain,this time following a faint mining trailat its southw estern edge. F rom thistrail we headed into a small cove be-tween the main mass and a greenishspur at the western end.The wind was icy as we hiked upthe wash. But the bits of highgradejasper we commenced to find, almostimmediately, kept our minds from thecold. A little exploration showed thatit was scattered from the wash to thefirst peak of the mountain in an arc

around the northwestern, western andsouthwestern slopes. Most of the pieceswere small, and though we locatedseveral places where the broken anddiscontinuous veins crop out, we didnot find the jasper in large quantitiesanyw here. But there is enough of it.in cabochon sizes and larger, scatteredover a wide enough area to supplyprizes for a good many rockhounds.And it includes a high percentage ofhighgrademoss, plumes, feathers andthreads of reds, yellows and greens inclear chalcedony and sometimes forti-fication agate. Much of the materialclosely resembles that from the Lavicand Cady areas.We were chilled and hungry by the



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time we had collected a good selectionof rock. To hun t shelter, we droveback to the Superior Valley road andaround to the other side of the moun-tain where we had stopped on ourearlier visit. Th e trail ended in a nar-row gulch in which there had beensome quarrying or mining operation.When we had finished lunch, theedge of the cloud bank was almostover us. Shafts of sunlight breakingthrough with increasing frequencymade rockhunting more pleasant .There was more of the jasper on thisside, too, though it did not extend farto the east. But Elma Marvin almostimmediately found rough volcanicrocks which she considered finer prizesthan the jasper. These were piecesfrom pebble to boulder size coveredwith lichens, some with four or fivekinds on one rockexactly what shehad been seeking for her cactus garden.Lucile, exclaiming that they were inthe biggest variety she had ever seen,identified the colors as bright orange,primrose green, lavender, chrome yel-low, sienna, mustard, chartreuse, blue-lavender and black. Some botanistssay lichens occur normally on northor northeast slopes, but Lucile particu-

larly noticed that here those on thewest and southwest slopes were asbright and fresh-looking as the others.Jerry Laudermilk gave a fine reviewof lichens in Desert Magazine (March,'42) in which he described them as "acase of peonage," in which an algaand a microscopic fungus grow in moreor less friendly cooperationwith thealga doing all the hard work.Since it looked as if Elma and Lu-cile were going to take a bit of timeto choose the prettiest and most variedlichen rocks to take home, I hiked upto the ridge of the mountain to exploreit on to the east. It was a rough climb,almost vertical in places, but the mag-nificent panoramas across the Mojaveespecially of Barstow, Calico DryLake, Daggett and on over the OrdMountains where black storm cloudswere boiling made it worth-while.And then, in a saddle near the easternend of the mountain, I came upon aquartz ledge with kidneys of the iden-

tical feathery yellow jasper and brown-ish opalite which I had found in the'30s.Down near the level of the great val-ley slope, as I made my way back tothe car, I stumbled over a little freshly

dug pile of earth. Look ing into thesmall slanting hole above it, I discov-ered a desert tortoise blinking backat me. Apparently fooled by the warmfall into staying out late, he now washastening to dig in for winter hiberna-tion."Hello, oldtimer," I said.He blinked again, doubtfully. The n,in slow motion, he retracted his headinto the shell. Th e feet and absurdlittle pig tail followed. Th ere wassomething so decisive about the actionthat I was certain he wasn't comingout again.Smiling, I looked up to go on myway. The sun was now below thecloud bank and its brilliant shafts werespotlighting some of the eroded bedsof the Barstow syncline in the valleyto the west. My eyes were drawn b ackto the dusty little creature in his shal-low hole. How right I had been to

call him oldtimer! His family pro bablycan claim title as the oldest on theM ojave. Only a few miles away tothe west were the tuff beds from whichthe carapaces of Testudo mohavensehad been dug. He re at my feet wasLooking east at the reddish-brown mountain near Barstow where cutting gradejasper is found in the dark upper area, center and right on out of the picture.Specimens also are found in center and right foreground.

M A R C H , 1 9 5 7 11


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' : . . , . : " . , . . v

Lucile Weight and Elma Marvin dig red and green jasper from a fracturedvein.a bit of life that had bridged 15,000,-000 years almost unchanged.

Today, it would seem, the tortoiseis lacing the severest crisis of his longcareer. Trona rockhounds, recentlyscouting the Mojave from Ridgecrestto Hinkley, reported they did not seea single large specimen, though therewere many up to six inches across.Since it is largely during their earliestyears that these creatures fall victimto such enemies as the coyotewhocan chew through the smaller, softershellsthe big tortoises must be fall-ing victim to Man's destructiveness andthoughtlessness.

In the old days these peaceable rep-tiles supplemented the food suppliesof Indian and prospector, but the racesurvived handily. Tod ay many arekilled ruthlessly and purposelessly bythose whose perverted nature is satis-fied by the destruction of defenselesslife. More are carried off to cities todie in captivity or in attempts to re-turn hom e. I hop e every desert loverwill do his best to reverse this trend.Contempt, boycott and social disap-proval are powerful weapons.I thought about it as I drove backfrom the quiet desert to the world ofever faster and more powerful auto-mobiles, louder entertainment, biggerand more deadly weapons, multiplyingpolitical crises, expanding mental ill-nessesand the little man's helplesssense of shrinking liberties.In the matter of survival, I'm bet-

ting on the tortoise. But should he passfrom the scene, he leaves quite a recordfor Man to attemp t to beat. His familygoes back many, many millions ofyears before the Miocene; his fossilremains have been found in almostevery contine nt. Will Homo sapiensbe around to enjoy life even as muchas the tortoise 15,000,000 years fromnow? We can hope so and we canwork for that end.

Is there a lesson for us in the factthat this cautious and retiring fellow(with a good stout castle to retire into)still is ambling unconcerned on hismeditative way while the infinitelysuperior types from the point of brain,muscle, armament and bulk thesaber-toothed tiger and the mastodon have vanished? It is a curious thingthat of late considerable thought hasbeen turned to the ways of the tortoisewide dispersion, holes in the groundand strong sheltersas last hopes forpreserving our records and our lives.

It may be said that the tortoise hasn'tgotten far in the last 15,000,000 yearsfrom an evolutionary standpoint orin actua l physical distance. But infact as well as fable, he is living evi-dence that the race is not always tothe swift, survival not always to thestrong.And for those of us who can takeadvantage of it , perhaps the tortoise

offers an other lesson : for his longsurvival he had chosen the sunlight,the peace and the wide horizons ofthe desert.

"Desert Memorial for Pattern'sArmy," in this month's magazine, waswritten by Elizabeth Ward who is wellknown to Southwestern readers forher book, No Dudes, Few Women,published in 1951. Currently she ispreparing a second book, South of theGila.Mrs. Ward's early writing careerbegan in New Mexico as a newspaperreporter and magazine editor. M ar-riage to a government range rider tookher to the Navajo Reservation whereshe shared his rugged life among theIndians 90 miles from the nearest post-office. Late r her husban d was trans -ferred to the Papago area in Arizonawhere he supervised a special livestockimprovement program. The Wardsnow live in San Bernardino, California.* * *Until his death in F ebruary , 1 942,James L. Jasper was regarded as oneof the greatest living authorities onthe geography and history of the Colo-rado desert in Southern California. Hehad served as a supervisor in San Di-ego County prior to the time when anew county was formed in the ImperialValley, and since his supervisorial dis-trict included the desert region as fareast as the Colorado River, he madefrequent trip s into the area. Some ofthe old sign posts which he erectedalong the old Butterfield trail were stillin place in recent years. His conclu-sions as to the character of PeglegSmith, published in this issue of DesertMagazine, were based on the hearsayof old-time prospectors whom thesupervisor met in the desert, some ofwhom claimed to have known Peglegperso nally. At the time of his deathJasper was in his late '80s and wasmaking his home in Glendale, Cali-fornia. * * *

"Cattle Drive to Winslow" in thismonth's Desert was written by Ber-netta "Billie" Yost of Flagstaff, Ari-zona, a newspaper woman on the Ari-zona Daily Sun and long-time residentof the northern part of the state.Mrs. Yost's parents were pioneersettlers of Arizona Territory, herfather arriving in 1882 and her motherin 1895. Mrs. Yost's grandfather, JohnP. Williams, built the first trading postin Blue Canyon 100 miles north ofWinslow in 1882 and her father ranthe Keams Canyon Trading Post forT. V. Keams for a while before movingto Red Lake.Mrs. Yost started her newspapercareer at the Winslow Mail in 1927.

a DESERT MAGAZINE


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Old Fort Churchill. Photograph b y Nell MurbargerDON Q. CHAPARRAL

By GRACE PARSONS HARMONDesert Hot Springs, CaliforniaHe was such a young roadrunner bird,Out to explore the place.He "cased" the patio, took a drink,Then looked for a breathing space.The carport had the draft he sought.He hopped on my coupe,Spread out his wings and heaved a sigh:"Best spot I've seen today!"Refreshed, he took his outward way.What ho! His hackles rose!He wagged that tail from side to sideAnd "rushed" the new green hose!

D O W N A DESERT HILLBy JEAN HOGAN DUDLEYCulver City, CaliforniaAs I drove down a desert hillI glimpsed a moon-white flower, grownAgainst the rocks, as pale and stillAs any blossom I had known.I had no time to stop and turnTo see the dream-soft blossom there,To touch its petals, or to learnWhat scent it showered on the air.And yet all day I've wondered whyI didn't wait and gaze my fill . . .It seems we're always rushing byWhite flowers, down some break-neck hill.

THE DESERT IS WHEREM Y H E A R T B E L O N G SBy MARILYN JANE DONAHUEPomona, CaliforniaBack in the east they said to me,"The desert is no place to be.All sand and cactus; just wait, you'll see,The desert is no place to be."

I'm in the west and the east is gone.I know now that the east was wrong.The sand is warm, the mountains are: strong.The desert is where my heart belongs.

OldFortC h u r c h i l lBy K. C. JONESFallon, Nevada

Solitude surroundsYour crumbling 'dobe walls;Across your old rhomboidA long mauve shadow falls.The jangling mule-team bells,The skinner's strident yells,Hoarse camel-criesand smells,Band-music's martial swellsAll stilled.A Pony's flying feetRushing down your street;Cries of "Paiutes at war!"So often heard of yore;The dashing First DragoonsMarching to lively tunesAll these are passed and goneInto oblivion.No one would ever knowYour former pomp and show!Now only crumbling 'dobe walls'Cross which mauve shadow fallsRemain.

By TANYA SOUTHThe old departs. The new comes forth,With promise of a higher worth.The Star of Hope shines bright. NomoreNeed I bewail, decry, deploreThe lack of opportunity.Whatever be Fate's harsh decree,Life showers abundance, too, our way,By giving us Today.

W I L D F L O W E R SBy SARAH ELIZABETH LAMPEGardnerville, Nevada...You picked some wildflowers yesterday, andso did 1,We plucked with ruthless hands in passingby,A gentian blue, a shooting star,Some trilliumswe wandered far,And broke a spray off here and there,That hung o'erhead in perfumed air,And once or twice a whole plant cameUp by the rootsa living flameNext caught our eyeYou didn't stop to thinkno more did I.

We didn't stop to think how many monthswent bySnaring the sunset's gold, the blue of sky,The palely-shimmering rose of a strayingmoonbeam,Some limpid crystal from a wildwoodstream.Too precious, woven in life's fragile strands,To be thus rudely snapped by vandal hands.Nor knew the struggle of each tiny seedJust to keep living and to give heedTo the divine command to blossom forth,To spend its perfume to make glad theearth.And when we saw their stricken little facesLooking up bravely from the polished vases,Then in our inmost hearts, too late, weknewThey had left their greatest beauty wherethey grew.

B L O W E A S T , B L O W W E S TBy GRACE SHATTUCK BAILBeaumont, CaliforniaWhen the wind blew in I used to complain,And close my ears to the song;But my greeting now, is a joyous shout,When I hear the wind come along.

F or I am a child of the sand and sun,And I like the whistling cryOf this airy orchestra of the spheres . . .When wind comes frolicking by!M A R C H , 1 9 5 7 13

The G ift


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D e s e r t S t o r m s S e n d M a r c hW ild flo w e r H o p e s S o a r i n g . . .

Generous amounts of rain and snowfell over most portions of the South-west in two separate January storms,and the prospects for an abundant dis-play of wildflowers were heartening.

Meredith B . Ingham, Jr . , park nat-uralist, reports that Death Valley re-ceived its first good rain in manymonths and that the chances for a fineMarc h display are excellent. Ma rchand April will be the period of peakbloom for evening primrose, phacelia,five-spot, Mojave aster, monkey flower,desert-star, gravel ghost and nemawhile desert gold should reach its peakin March, Ingham said.Lucile Weight reports the high des-ert of California moist and this, to-gether with an unusually mild season,indicates a better flower season thanthe earlier drouth period had led ob-servers to exp ect. Th e lower levels ofthe High Desert were showing greengrowth at roadsides in the last weekof January.Bruce W. Black, park naturalist atJoshua Tree National Monument, saysmoisture is deep and he is hopeful thathis area will see a profusion of bloom.

But rain or shine, the following plantscan be expected to start blooming, orto be in full bloom, during March:desert lavender, desert alyssum, blad-der-pod, chuperosa, chia, creosote,paintbrush, mallow, woolly-marigoldand toward the end of the month, theJoshua tree, nolina and several speciesof cacti.

Jane Pinheiro of Quartz Hill in Cali-fornia's southwestern Mojave desertreports that the last time her area re-ceived the precipitation it did in lateJanuary was in 1948 which resultedin a bumper crop of royal blue desertlupine and Mojave liliesas well aspoppies, thistle sage, birds-eye giliaand pale sand verbena.

From the west-central Mojave Des-ert near Barstow Mary Beal sends wordthat gentle rains have refreshed thedesert there and the wildflower possi-bilities are good, although no plantsare yet in evidence.Nearly two inches of rain was re-ported by Carl Whitefickl, park super-visor at Borrego State Park, who alsosaid a variety of green shoots haveappeared in the desert soil in various

par ts of the pa rk. Ocotillo was cominginto leaf during the first of F ebruaryand some Encelia farinosa is in leafwith scattered specimens in bloomalong Coyote Creek.A. T. Bicknell, superintendent ofCasa Grande National Monument atCoolidge, Arizona, writes that theseplants should bloom during late Marchand early Ap ril: California poppy,brittle-bush, coulter mallow, eveningprimrose, bladder-pod, scorpion weed,fiddleneck and crownbeard.Philip Welles of Lake Mead Na-tional Recreation Area, Boulder City,Nevada, says visitors can count on en-celia and sunray along about the mid-dle of March, and with a little moremoisture, sundrops, evening primrose,desert dandelions and perhaps purplemat and a few pink gilia.The January storms have left well-soaked ground in Southern California'sCoachella Valley, and the best wild-flower display in many years is pre-dicted. This low desert area generallycomes into bloom three to four weeksbefore the high desert areas and warmF ebru ary days may bring a profusionof flowers in early March.

R o c k S h o r t yof Death Valley

"Fishin ' in Death Valley?"Hard Rock Shorty repeated thetourist's question. Then he pulledout his corncob pipe and settledback on the bench in front of theInferno store as his memorytraveled back over the 40 yearshe had lived in the Valley.

"Yep!" he said finally. "Butthat wuz a long time ago. Wehad good fishin' fer a little whileback in '27. That wuz the yearwe had the big cloudburst up inthe Panamints . Water come downoutta the hills and filled that ol'lake bed over in Lost Mule val-ley plumb full."Dunno where the fish come

from, but fer a time the pond

wuz full of 'em. Ket chin ' got sogood 01' Pisgah Bill put up asign in front o' his shack. 'F ISH -I N' T A C K E L F E R R E N T ' ."Bill did purty good fer acouple o' months. Then busi-ness dropped off an' along latein August Bill decided to go overan' ketch some seafood fer his-self."Bill's seein" wuzn't very goodan' he sat on a rock over therefer three days afore he discov-ered that the lake'd dried up an'he wuz fishin' in a mirage. Buthe had a little luck at that.Caught three lizards an' a side-

winder."

N A V A I O S T O U S E O I L M O N E YTO BETTER RESERVATION LIFE

Navajo Tribal Chairman Paul Jonesannounced plans for a program to bet-ter the daily lives of the Navajo Indianpeople. Over the Christmas holidaysthe tribe received $33,000,00 in bo-nus payments for leases of oil landsand Jones said that for the first timein tribal history his people have suffi-cient money to undertake the majorprogram.

Present plans call for improvementof water resources, the developmentof other resources on reservation lands,the establishment of industrial plantssuch as a new sawmill, building ofcommunities, increasing scholarshipsfor Navajo students, the building ofadditional administrative offices anda long-range land purchasing program.Jones said now was the time to planfor utilization of coal, gas and elec-tricity to bring the benefits of modernliving into the homes of his people.Also suggested was a program to im-prove roads on the reservation.

The proposed program also entailsa suggested $5,000,000 trust fund thatwould provide an annual $200,000scholarship fund.Jones reminded his people that themoney required to better the condi-tions of those living on the reservation

belongs not only to the Indians of thisgeneration but to the children and thechildren not yet born. New MexicanI DESERT MAGAZINE


15/44

By JAMES A. JASPERF THERE is one subject whichquickens the pulse of the tender-foot and desert old-timer alike,it is the story of a lost mine.

I have lived on the rim of the des-ert for over 40 years and have hikedover many miles of drifting sandschasing golden pha ntom s. Often mytrail has crossed those of desert ratsgoing to some place in the middle ofnowhereled there by the fairy talesof the Lost Pegleg Mine.This man PeglegThomas L. Smithwas a nat ive of New Hampshire anda brother of Jedediah Strong Smith,the pioneer who blazed the trail fromthe Great Salt Lake Valley to the

Pacific Ocean. Jeded iah was a fear-less adventurer who made two trips toCalifornia, the first in 1826 and thesecond in 1 827 . He was on his thirdtrek when murdered by Comanchesin 1831.Jedediah's adventures were in noway connected with his erratic brother,Pegleg, who never spoke of his earlyNew England days or made mentionof his famous bro ther. So far as Ihave been able to learn, their trailsnever crossed after leaving the paren-tal home.First mention of Pegleg was madein 1825 when he and a man named LeDukes made a trip to the Sevier Riveron a hunting and trapping expedition.They found hostile Indians on theSevier, however, and shifted their baseof operations to the Mojave IndianReservation on the lower ColoradoRiver. But their reception there wasnot pleasant either, so they moved onto the Moqui country where they spentsome profitable years hunting andtrapping before going to the GreatSalt Lake Valley where Pegleg re-mained until 1836.In that year, in the company of

others , Pegleg mad e a trip to California,hunting and trapping on the way. Itwas during this trip that he claimed hefound and lost the rich gold mineaday's journey west of their camp onthe Colorado Riverwhich bore hisname and for which he is rememberedtoday.

It is significant to recall that thisyear of supposed discovery1836was six years prior to the first recordedgold discovery made in California in1842 by Francisco Lopez in a canyonnorth of Los Angeles, and 12 yearsbefore the gold discovery in northernCalifornia by William Marshall whichtouched off the big rush.If Pegleg had been so unfortunateas to have found and lost a gold mine,evidently he was lucky in hunting and

trapping, for he showed up in LosAngeles in 1839 with a valuable lotof fur.After disposing of his pelts he wentto Steamboat Hot Springs in SouthernUtah where he established a permanentcamp, and following the polygamouscustom of the Mormons, took to wifefive Indian women, gathered aroundhim a bunch of their relations and set-tled down to a life of hunting, trappingand rustling stock off the big Mexicanranches. There was an abundance offeed on the open range, Pegleg was anexpert rustler and soon he accumulateda sizeable herd of stock.

I knew two men who were intimatelyacquainted with old Pegleg, and theydescribed him as a notorious "boozefighter" who when drunk was abusiveand made life a veritable hell on earthfor his wives. His skill with a rifle wasknown far and near by the Indiansand his services were in great demandin their num erous tribal wars. He al-ways threw in with the tribe that prom-ised him to greatest percentage of thewar loot.On one such expedition he is saidto have stopped a poison arrow withone of his legs, and knowing promptaction was necessary to save his lifehe exhibited a degree of nerve seldomif ever equalled by amputating thewounded leg with his belt knife anda meat saw with the help of an Indianwom an. When the stump healed, hemade himself a wooden leg and pickedup the name, Pegleg.When word of the gold discoveryat Coloma in 1848 reached him, Peg-leg joined the stampede and spent 18

months putting down prospect holesand alcoholmostly alcohol. In 1851he was mining on the middle fork of

For 121 years men have suf-fered and searched for Pegleg'slost mine on the Colorado Des-ert of California. But th ey seekin vain, believed the late JamesA. Jasper who once representedthis area as a San Diego countysupervisor prior to the forma-tion of Imperial County. Peg legwas a dissipated horse thiefwho had no scruples aboutsending men to their death insearch of non-existant treasure.Jasper mai n t a i ns .

the American River in partnershipwith Silas Gaskill. The two men netted$20,000 in a few months and whentheir claim petered out Pegleg returnedto his Utah hangout and resumed hisformer occupations, adding illicit traf-ficking in stolen horses to the list.F or the customer who brought apint of whiskey, it was said, Pegleggave first pick of the horses he wantedout of the stolen herd; for a plug oftobacco or a bit of spare ammunition,one could take second pick.In the late '50s, Pegleg organized aparty to conduct an extensive searchof the Colorado Desert for his lostmine. But when it reached the lastknown waterhole before entering thedesert interior, the Indian carriers de-camped during the night with all thesupplies. Pegleg led the party to SanBernardino where it disbanded andgave up the search. It was whisperedabout that old Pegleg pulled a fast oneon his partners by employing his wives'relatives as packers and then orderingthem to make off with the winter'ssupply of grub.In 1863 a man in San Francisconamed McGuire claimed he had foundthe lost Pegleg mine and backed thisup with rich quartz specimens. He wasa man of means and not a grafter.With a party of five adventurers heleft San Fran cisco for the mine . Thegroup was last seen alive on the SanFelipe Ranch as it headed into thedesert. A few months later theirbleaching bones were found half bur-ied in the desert sands by a prospector.In the '80s the Breedlove Party ofSan Diego, composed of three men,mad e a try for the lost Pegleg. Theyoutfitted for a month's outing and fail-ing to return at the appointed time a

search party went after them. Therescue team found their lifeless remainsa few miles north of the MexicanM A R C H , 1 9 5 7 15

Pe gle g's M in e - Fac t or Fable ?


16/44

border. The prospectors apparentlyhad lost their way, lost their heads andwandered around incircles, discardingtheir clothing in frenzy before dyingof heat and thirst insight of theYuhaSpring where there was an abundance

of good water. Th at incident aloneshould have provided sufficient warn-ing tothose not familiar with the Colo-rado Desert not to enter it without atrusty guide who was familiar with itsperils andknew itswaterholes.

M l I I I 1 " 7 * This is the hour for themonthly testto seen o w m uch progress you aremaking in youracquaintance with the Southwest. So get apencil andrelax in an easy chair. Don 't make hard work of it for St.Peter doesn't putany black marks against you for thequiz questions youmiss. Anything less than 12correct answers is a tenderfoot score, 13 to15 isgood, 16 to 18excellent, and if you get more than that you are very-smart orvery lucky. The answers are onpage 35.1On a westbound trip across theSouthwest desert, when you crossedthe Colorado River at Topock youwould be enteringUtah . _ .California ._. Nevada . . . . Arizona2The Wasatch Mountains are visible fromTucson, ArizonaLas Vegas, Nevada ... . Salt Lake City... . Albuquerque, NewMexico._._. .3Death Valley was given its name byDeath Valley Scotty .. .Jedediah Smith . . . Pacific Borax Company . Members of theBennett-Arcane party of '49ers4Next toEnglish, thelanguage most commonly spoken in theSouth-west isSpanish . French ... . . Chinese . Portuguese5John Hance wasGovernor of New Mexico . Aguide at GrandCanyon . Discoverer of Carlsbad Caverns . A Mormonmissionary6If you wanted tospend a night in Fred Harvey's LaFonda hotel youwould gotoSouth Rim of Grand Canyon . Ogden, UtahPalm Springs . Santa Fe, New Mexico7Tuzigoot is thename ofA UteIndian reservation in Utah . ANational Monument in Arizona . A river that flows into theGreat Salt Lake . Aweapon used by Indians forkilling smallgame8First name of DcAnza, theSpanish captain who led thefirst colonyof white settlers into California wasJuan Bautista . Juni-per .....Francisco . Marcos9The ingredient most common in thesand found on thefloor of thedesert isQuartz . Hematite . Manganese . Mica . .10Ed. Schiefllin was thename of theman credited with thediscoveryofGold at Goldfieid . Silver at Tombstone . Potash atTrona . Casa Grande Indian ruins .1 1Mesa Verde National Park is best known for itsGeysersWaterfalls Caves . . Indian ruins12The Navajo Indian reservation extends into all but one of thefollow-ing statesArizona . Nevada . . New Mexico. Utah13Javelina is the name commonly used in theSouthwest forA speciesof wild hogfound in Southern Arizona A spear-like weaponused by theCocopah Indians __ . Birds that nest in fissures in therocks. . Members ofthe lizard family .14The astronomical name of the North Star isVenus . . Jupi-

te r . Polaris .. Mars15The famous Mormon Battal ion of 1846 was organized toAid Gen.Kearny in theconquest of California . Help colon ize Utah __._ .Open a newNorthwest trail . Guard the Santa Fe trail16Indians whocall themselves "Dine" meaning "The People" areHopis . Yu mas Navajos _.__.. Ap aches ....17Tallest tree native of theSouthern California desert is JoshuaTree. . . Washington palm__._ . Palo Verde. . Mesquitc18Indians whocome to theTonalea Trading post generally are Paiutes ... Apaches . Hualpais Navajos .19Jojoba is the name of a shrub which grows onlyAt Upper SonoranZone elevations . . On the floor of the drylakes Aroundthe alkali seeps known as cienegas . In canyons where there isrunn ing wa ter ___ ...20Canyon de Chelly National Monument is in ArizonaUtah New Mexico . Nevada. .. ...

But, once feel thepull of the desertan d a man always returns. A prom-inent Riverside resident named Couverbecame interested in thestory of thelost Pegleg andmade numerous tripsinto thedesert insearch of this treas-ure. Like many others hemade onetrip toomany and in 1886 never re-turned . He was last seen inClark Val-ley. A substantial reward was offeredfor the recovery of his remains andnumerous search parties combed thedesert sands farand near but notraceof Couver was ever found.

The tales of tragedy andtoilcon-nected with this mine go on and on,and I am convinced that Pegleg's storyis a delusion and a myth, deliberatelyconcocted bythis man forthe purposeof receiving free drinks in thesaloonswhere a good lost mine tale affordeddiversion andwas worth a treat. Heplayed the game without pretext orcare for consequences, sending manya credulous prospector to his doom.Pegleg Smith entered the historicspotlight in a haze of mystery andmade his exit in the same manner.When on his death bed he gatheredhis wives around him and told themthat all arrangements for thedisposi-tion of his body were made. Whenthe end came, three strangers took hisbody away and noone, noteven theIndian wives, knew who the men wereor what they did with Pegleg's remains.

SCIENTISTS CLAIM GAINS INSALT WATER CONVERSIONProgress in using the sun's energyto convert salt water tofresh water isclaimed by the Interior Department.Research conducted by thedepart-ment's office ofsaline water since 1953shows that use of solar heat to distillsalt water haspromise of economicallarge-scale fresh water production. In-terior Secretary F red A. Seaton saidthis is particularly true in theSouth-west where solar intensities arehigh,provided simple stills can be madecheaply.David S. Jenkins, director of thesaline water office, said multiple-effectdistillation is one way of increasingoutput . In this method, heat absorbedin evaporation is recaptured in con-densation and made toevaporate addi-tional water.Dr. Maria Telkes ofNew York Uni-versity, working under contract withthe department, hasdeveloped a 10-effect solar still which is capable ofproducing about six times as muchfresh water as a single still.The DuPont Co. , under a contractrecently signed with the department,will provide plastic materials for con-

struction of prototype stills forexperi-mental tests on salt water conversion. Salt Lake TribuneDESERT MAGAZINE


17/44

vWW horses and wild burros once roamed the hills and flats near Teel'sMarsh in the background. Only a jew of the little wild jacks remain today.

Gh ost T own Prospe c tor . ..Ed Smith was a successful rancheruntil he began investing inwildcat mi ni ng stocks. Like most humans, he learned the hard way.After he had lost his ranch and everything else he owned, he decidedto seek a new fortune where he lost the old oneand he became aprospector. At 87, he's be en at it 41 years , and h e adm its he hasn'trecovered all he lostbut he has found a healthful and satisfying wayof life on the Nevada desert.By NELL MURBARGERPhotographs by the authorMap by Norton Al len7WIC E B EF OR E I had made the75-mile drive from Tonopah toMarietta, Nevada, in an effortto locate Ed S mith. Ed , however, isabout as elusive as a drop of quick-silver in a goldpan. He 's here, thereand everywhereall at once!With mining claims scattered allover the Excelsior Mountains, incomeproperty at Las Vegas and variousother irons in his busy fire, he hasn'tmuch time to sit around waiting forchance visitors. Naturally, there aremany other folks who own mines inthe Excelsiors and are easy to locate;but not many live in a ghost town 45miles from the nearest postoffice ortelephone, and practically none is 87years old.Such being the case, I'd have drivento Marietta a dozen times, if necessary,to have located Edbut I was lucky!My third trip to that former boraxcamp found an old truck parked in theyard of a cabin I knew to be Ed's, andfrom under that vehicle protruded abrace of men's feet and two shortlengths of trouser legs. Soon as I cut

the ignition and my car's motor died,those feet and legs began wigglingbackward, to be followed, in turn, by

a man's midsection, a pair of grease-smudged hands and a grease and per-spiration-smudged face.Unfolding his long thin length, likea carpenter's rule, the desert man roseto his feet and came forward to meetm e.Introducing myself, I mentioned thatI had made two previous trips toMarietta without finding him at home."That so?" commented Ed Smith,dryly. "Well, you wouldn't have foundme this time, either, except I had tolay off work to make some repairs onthat cussed old track. I oughta be atthe mine. But, now that you've gotme cornered," he grinned crookedly,"what was it you wanted?"When I explained that Jack andGrace Callahan of the neighboringghost town of Columbus had said hewas known as the "Mayor of Mari-etta," and that he could tell me aboutthat place and Teel's Marsh, sceneof an early-day borax development,the old man shook his head, almostcrossly, I thought."Oh , no ," he said, "there 's not muchI can tell you about Marietta. I'velived here 37 years, it 's truebut thecamp was a ghost town long before I

arrived. How ever, come on in thecabin," he invited. "We'll find some-thing to talk about . . ."Ed Smith's home consisted of asingle room, ingeniously fabricatedEd Smith, 87-year-old miner whohas lived in Marietta since 1919.

M A R C H , 1 9 5 7 17


18/44

!,, -' v;;;f* ;"'"'-?- ;p '. . T O H A W T H O R N E ' ; -_

from logs, railroad ties, adobe, flat-tened coal oil cans, corrugated sheet-ing and a few pine boards. Althoughthe place was quite adequate to meetthe needs of a bachelor miner, Ed in-sisted on apologizing for its appear-ance."I don't usually live in a dump likethis, but my other house, up nearermy gold mine, recently was destroyedby fire," he exp lained . "All I savedwas a little bedding and a few clothes."Here " he offered, "take thischair by the doo r. Maybe you'll catcha little breeze, now and then . . ."Ed Smith was born in Alabama dur-ing the chaotic period of reconstructionthat followed the Civil War.Throughout the troubled years whenhe was growing to manhood, he couldvisualize much more opportunity foradvanc eme nt in the F ar West of Buf-falo Bill, Jim Bridger and Wyatt Earpand in 1890, at the age of 21, heleft Ala bam a for the frontier. Esta b-lishing himself near F resno , California,the young Southerner eventually ac-quired a fine ranch on which he farmed160 acres of grain and 100 acres oftable grapes."I had a good house and outbuild-ing, my land was fertile, and I likedfarm ing," said Ed . "But 1 couldn'tlet well enough alone . . ."Nevada was having the greatestmining booms of her history! Closeon the heels of Tonopah came Gold-field, Rhyolite and Rawhide onegreat stampe de after anoth er! Invest-

ors were making millions without eventurning a h and, and 1 got a wild no-tion I had to cut myself in on thatfree-for-all jackp ot. Once I made mywants known, of course, it wasn't longbefore some mining gentlemen cameto oblige me. 1 repeatedly invested inthe stock they ottered, and sat backto wait for the profits, which didn'tcome."In a final desperate effort to holdmy stockjust in case it might proveto be all the company claimed 1mortgaged my California ranch. Tha twas the end. When the mine stillfailed to produce anything more sub-stantial than promises, my creditorsforeclosed and, in 1915, 1 walked offthe place with scarcely more than theclothes on my back."I was 46 years old," reflected EdSmith. "I had worked hard all mylife. All 1 knew was farming. But Ihad lost my money through miningand something seemed to be drivingme to find it where I had lost it.Possibly I felt the only way to regainmy self-respect and self-confidence wasto beat the game that had beaten me,or maybe I had been bitten by themining bug. I don't know. In eithercase, I quit farming forever and headedfor the desert."Broke and a little bewildered, EdSmith passed the winter of 1915-16in an abandoned dugout near BradburyWell in the southern part of DeathValley, and the following spring sawhim tramping restlessly over Nevada.

SILVERPEAK

The trail was a long and weary one.Day after day, month after month, hisprospecting pick delved into the hid-den secrets of the rocky ridges, thesandy washes, the hills, the mountainsand night after night found his lonelycampfire burning amid the crumblingruins of former boomcamps whichtime had changed to ghost towns.In the course of his quest for elu-sive treasure, the erstwhile graperancher one day stumbled upon theold borax-mining town of Marietta onthe north shore of Teel's Marsh.Though the camp, even then, was de-serted, there was something about theplace that appealed to him and twoyears laterin 1919, when he was 50years of ageEd Smith returned toestablish his permanent home."And did you eventually 'find itwhere you'd lost it?' " 1 asked, a trifleinjudiciously, perhaps. Ed Smithgrinned."I haven't found all of it," he ad-mitted . "Bu t I'm still work ing at it!And I'm not even one little bit sorrythat things happened as they did losing the ranch , I me an. I've had agood life, a wonderful life! Duringthe 41 years I've been prospecting,I've discovered more mines than youcan shake a stick at! Gold, silver, lead,copper, uraniumyou name it, I 'vefound it! Some I've developed andworked; others, I've sold outright. Ihaven't become rich, but I 've alwaysbeen self-supporting, I still have myhealth and peace of mindand I still



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"My best silver mine, the Silver

ountainside north of his cabin, "hat's one of my gold mines. Goo dine , too! Plenty of ore in it that 'llgo $12.50 to the tonbut who canpay miners $16 a day to take out$12.50 ore, especially when it 's neces-sary to truck it several hundred milesto a mill? Only way such ore can behandled at a profit is to mill it hereand ship the concentratesbut youcan't run a mill without water."I've got a good lead mine, too,"continued Ed Smith, "and 11 uraniumclaims . . ."I asked if there had been muchuranium excitement around Marietta."Oh, yes!" grinned the old miner."Scads of excitement but no ship-ping! Last summer every hill in theseparts was swarming with prospectorslooking for uran ium . They all stakedclaimsand now, they're all out look-ing for buyers!"

All that remains of the old cemeterythe fence that

Road from Belleville to Marietta, looking northwestward toward the E xcel-sior Mou ntains. White flat in middle distance is Teel's Marsh .Scarcely more than a stone's throwsouth of Ed's cabin, the thin brush ofthe desert gives way to a glaring flat600 0 acres in extent. Unsoftened byblade or leaf, this is a dead white voidwhere every passing breeze awakensa cloud of dust; where heat waves rip-ple crookedly, mirages appear andvanish like images on a screen, andsinuous dust devils wheel and caper,climb and die."So that 's Teel's Marsh," I mused."Ye p. Tha t's where old BoraxSmith got his start."I looked up in surprise. "I thou ght

at Marietta are a few fallen pickets ofonce enclosed it.

* '.'V v r ; ^ f " : ^ i b > ^ * : ; . / " . - ' . -

: ^ '

, . ' ' / : : : V '

Borax Smith got his start at Colum-bus.""N o ." Ed shook his head. "Smith'sfirst borax property was right here atTeel 's Marsh."When F rancis M arion Smith norelation to my new friend, Ed Smitharrived at Columbus in EsmeraldaCounty, Nevada, in the summer of1872, he found the mining and refin-ing of cottonball borax in full swingthere, said Ed. Under the system thenemployed, the white borax crust wascollected from the surface of the marshand shoveled into huge iron tanks tobe boiled, separated and crystallized.Since a great quantity of fuel wasneeded to keep these tanks boiling, andfuel was a scarce article in that desertarea, Francis Smith saw a chance tomake a stake for himself. Locating awood ranch in the hills 10 miles north-west of Columbus Marsh, he built asmall cabin, hired a couple of men tohelp him and began supplying boilerfuel to the primitive refinery at Colum-bus. One day, in that same summer,while scouting about for new sourcesof wood, Smith came upon anotherwhite flatTeel's Marshwhere theencrusted surface had much the sameappearance as that of the flat at Co-lumb us. Gathering a few samples ofthe material, Smith took them to anassayer at Columbus who subsequentlyinformed him that he had brought inspecimens of the richest cottonballborax ever known!

Smith hastened back to Teel's Marshwhere he located the entire flat underthe Saline Laws of the State of Nevadawhich allowed 160 acres to each claim.Almost before the location notices werefiled, however, the state law wasamended to place borax in the mineralcategory, thereby limiting claims to 20

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1Roofless walls of the large general store building at Marietta formerlyowned by Francis Marion "Borax" Smith.

acres each. This meant that all theground Smith had staked out at Teel'sMarsh had to be relocatedtherebygiving potential claim jumpers a mar-velous chan ce to profit. Some of theseopportun ists were run off by F rancisSmith at gun point, others he dispos-sessed through court action or boughtout. In time he came to own the en-tire area of Teel's Marsh, where boraxproduction got under way in the fallof 1872.After operating for a number ofyears under the firm name, "Teel'sMarsh Borax Company," FrancisSmith found he had accumulated suf-ficient capital to purchase 16,000acres of borax lands at Columbus,where he formed the Pacific BoraxSalt and Soda com pany. The newlyacquired property together with hisoriginal holdings at Teel's Marsh madehim the largest producer of borax inthe W est. Both plants continued inactive operation until the 1880s, whenricher deposits of boraxin the formof colemanite were discovered inDeath Valley, said Ed.

Francis Marion Smith by thistime known throughout the nation asBorax Smithcontinued on from hisfirst properties at Teel's Marsh andColumbus to the ownership of otherborax deposits and, eventually, to or-ganization of the Pacific Coast Boraxcompany and ownership of railroadsand other far-flung business interests."I guess you know that he had a biggeneral store here at Marietta?" askedEd . "W ould you like to see it?"We drove down the street a shortdistance to what Ed termed "the mainbusiness section of town," and herehe showed me the roofless walls of alarge stone building, still standing four-square and plumb."Th at 's i t!" said my guide. "Alltha t's left of it. I unders tand it wasa right busy place when Smith wasrunning it back in the '70s . . .

"That adobe ruin over yonder," hecontinued, "is the old Marietta saloon.There used to be a fancy picture onone of the inside walls. Maybe it'sstill there."Floundering over heaps of crumbledadobe and broken lengths of splinteredand heat-twisted boards, we made ourway into what had been the interiorof the building but was now completelyexposed to wind and weather."There she is!" said Ed, noddingtoward the west wall of the buildingwhere remaining remnants of plasterrevealed the painted figure of a womanclad in red, white and blue, with agolden crown on her head. She wasstanding beside a painted vine deckedin blooms of impossible hugeness, andover her hung a painted banner bear-ing the single word. "Marietta.""Th at sign " chuckled Ed. "Youmight call it 'The Last Word in Mari-etta.' "We wandered back up the street,past other stone and adobe ruins whichhad, in their day, housed restaurants,blacksmith shops and all the otherestablishments that men of the frontierdeemed necessary to their well-beingand pleasure.After the breathless heat of midday,

a cooling breeze had sprung up in thesouthwest and the brassy desert sunhad dropped far enough so that Ed'scabin cast a narrow rectangle of wel-com e shade . Seating ourselves on theground in this little shade-island, weleaned back against the rough walls.I asked Ed about his Las Vegas prop-erty and how he had happened to buyit ."Well," he hesitated. "It's sort of along story. You see," he continued,"I've always figured that in this landof wonderful opportunities, it's a dis-grace for a man to die broke . I 'vealways wanted to make a high markin the worldto amount to something.

even if only for a little while. Like Itold you, I have some good miningproperties. The y're worth every bit of$150,000 to any man who can developand work them . Bu t my time's runningout! I do n't know whethe r I'll be ableto sell them in the few years left tome, and I want to leave some moneybehind when I go."It isn't so much that I want toleave it to kinfolkall the kin I haveare nieces and nephews in Alabama,and they're pretty well fixedbut nearthe place where I was born there's ahome for crippled children. They'redoing wonderful work, but they're al-ways short of funds. 1 want to leavethem a fine big legacya lot of moneyso they won't have to scrimp and save,and can buy all the things they needfor awhile, at least, and maybe takecare of a lot more crippled children.It must be terrible," he said, "to becrippled . . ."About 10 years ago I got to think-ing about all this and it seemed to methe b est way 1 could be sure of helpingthose kids was to get hold of somereal estate in a good prosperous townwhere it was certain to increase invalue as time went on."I decided on Las Vegas. I'd beendoing pretty well mining, and hadsaved enough money to buy five resi-dential lots and a five-acre tract inVegas Heights, and I built a modernhouse on one of the parcels. Tha t was10 years ago. Since then, land pricesat Las Vegas have increased by leapsand bound s and still are climbing. I

think 1 mad e a good investment. It'sgoing to be valuable property someday, a right nice legacy!"F or several moments neither of usspoke . Ed Smith's gnarled forefingertraced some circles, cross-lines andtriangles in the dust, and he lookedout across the dry sweep of the desert."When I was a younger man," hewent on, "I always figured I'd liketo retire for a few years before theend. Ma ybe go to some city, get somegood duds and take life easy for awhile.But now, I don' t know.""Huh -uh!" 1 said. "You wouldn'tlike itnot any more than I would!"The 87-year-old Mayor of Mariettanodded thoughtfully. "I don't sup-pose so." A little nest of crinkles ap-peared around each of those keen oldeyes, and a smile stole across thatweathered face. "After I 'd laid aroundtown a couple of weeks, I probablywould be as mean and cantankerousas an old she-wildcat with cubs! I'dhave to come back to Marietta tosweat the meanness out of me, andonce I was here, I'd just naturally

start looking for another mine!"And I'm sure that's how it would be.: DESERT MAGAZINE


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ON DESERT TRAILS WITH A NATURALIST -- XXXV

T h e B u sy W orld of D e se rt A n tsThe observation and close study of ants long has proved a fascin-at ing endeav or to both the scientist and l aymanand for good reason.The high degree of social achievement, cooperative l iving and fulfill-ment of duty by these lowly insects often put to shame man's feebleefforts along these lines.By EDMUND C. JAEGER, D.Sc.Curator of Plants , Rivers ide Munic ipa l MuseumDrawi ng by Morris Van D a m e

elongate leaves of the Sonora PaloVerde. Others carried edgewise leaf-lets of an Acacia. Those traveling theoutward journey, of course, carriednothing.We traced the insects back to theopening of the formicary or nest andfound them entering a finger-size holetwo feet up on the side of an arroyobank, a wisely chosen location whichprotected them against flood waters.Here they were joined by another lineof workers coming from another direc-tion and carrying exclusively the dryleaflets of Acacia.We retraced the first ant columnback to the wide spreading Palo Verde.It was a source of 50 yards away. Justwhy this distant tree was selected mustbe left to conjecture for there wereother Palo Verdes which appeared justas green much nearer the ant nest. Thetiny workers were crawling up the treetrunk to the topmost branchlets to nipoff with their strong jaws the bigger-than-themselves leaves.

Noticeable among these leaf carrierswere a number of giant-headed choco-late colored fellowsreally the mostponderous-headed ants I've ever seen.Very deliberate movers they were,doubtlessly assigned to patrol duty andspaced about every 10 feet along the

MY good camp cora-pardon, Stanley Phair, and Iundertook to compile a recordof the miles I have covered on foot,burro-back, and by automobile duringthe 50 years I have been following thedesert trails. We came up with a fig-ure of 485,000and what good milesthey were. I am glad to report thatmy enthusiasm for the open road andthe by-paths of the arid land has notdiminished with the passing years.In December, when the Christmasholiday came, I packed my long-usedcamp equipment in the station wagonan d was off with two companions on a

1600-mile journey into the small-treedesert of northwestern Sonora, Mexico.The fourth night's camp was in alittle opening among the Organ Pipecactus, brilliantly green-barked SonoraPalo Verde, Ironwood and Tree Oco-tillo. In scouting around for easy-to-break deadwood for our campfire oneof the lads came upon living lines ofthose extraordinary ants called leaf-bearers.Here before us was a path threeinches wide thronged with thousandsof third-inch long reddish ants earnest-

ly crawling back and forth. Most ofthose going toward the nest were car-rying banners over their backs, the

line of living workers. Their dispro-portionately robust heads and elongatejaws indicated that they were soldiers.Not one of them was carrying a leaf.In the same line were a few muchsmaller ants assigned an undeterminedrole. Empty-jawed, they too movedback and forth among their burden-bearing sistersI say sisters becauseall the workers of an ant colony arespecialized modified females.That these ants sleep is an undoubted

fact for as soon as it was dark not onewas to be seen, the last of the leaf-bearing workers having entered thenest soon after sunset; nor did theyappear and reform their lines untilabout a half hour after sunrise.I took leaves from several of thereturning workers and for only a mo-ment did they seem puzzled. Almo stimmediately they turned and in obedi-ence to a long ingrained instinct wentright back along the line to the chosentree where they plucked new leaves.Judging from the number of individ-

uals in the populous ant colony andthe amount of leaf-material, green anddried, these insects were taking intotheir store house, I assumed that theirsubterranean chambers were large andthat the connecting galleries weremany. They probably honeycombedthe soil for considerable depths.Down beneath dwell specializedworkers which never appear aboveground and whose job it is to cut upthe leaves and pack them away in thenest gard ens. These pulverized leavesfurnish the damp material upon which

the ants plant and cultivate specialambrosia fungi which furnish theirfood. These they guard and tend inM A R C H , 1957 21


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a most skillful manner, keeping themfree from mould and bacteria. Theants cause them to produce modifiedforms of growth or "white masses" byan agglomeration of fungal threads ormycelia. Th at these special foodmasses are due to a very special culti-vation is proven by the fact that whentaken from the ants' nest and cultivatedby human experimenters the fungi pro-duce only ordinary conidia or fruitingbodies instead of ant food masses.I have seen other kinds of leaf-car-rying fungus-growing ants in the warm-er southern deserts of Arizona, Cali-fornia and northe rn Mex ico. Some ofthese transport flowers to the nest aswell as leaves. M ost appealing is thesight of these ants carrying the small

bearded ant) with black head andthorax and reddish abdo men . Theyhave specialized combs on their fore-legs which they use to remove dustand sand from their bod ies. To cleanthe combs they pass them through thestrange beards of long hairs on theunderside of the head.On the beautiful grassland-arborealdeserts of mid-Sonora is found a smallHarvester Ant which collects great

quantities of certain grass seeds. Theseare taken underground where the chaffis remov ed. Th e straw-colored chaffis brought up and deposited in unusu-ally large and attractive crater-likemounds about the nest entrance. Some-times the accumulations may containseveral bushels of seed husks, and are

Craters of Harvester A nts found in a sandy wash near the SalternSea in Southern California. Photograp h by the author.elongate trumpet-shaped flowers of Ly-ciuin, the thornbu sh. One could easilythink of them as a host of miniaturebandmen carrying their unusual instru-ments to rehearsal.

Perhaps ants are not more plentifulon deserts than elsewhere but merelymore noticeable because of the usualsparseness of vegetational groundcover. Unusually conspicuous in sandywashes are the crater-like hills of cer-tain Harvester ants. Their sand andgravel mounds often are four or evenup to eight inches high and one to twofeet across and with encircling spacescleared of all vege tation. Often wefind such craters in close groups, eachthe center of activity of a particularant colony. F rom each run long linesof black-bodied workers going to andreturning from the forage fields. Thebig Bearded Harvesters belong to thegenus Pogonomyrmex (Greek for

unusually conspicuous because severalfeet around them the earth is bare ofall vegetation. These an ts, like theleaf-carriers, are day workers only andduring sunny hours they are seenspreading over the land in every direc-tion. How ever, guards with heavy jawsstay on duty during the night justwithin the formicary entrance. It al-ways is interesting to visit these nestsat night with a flashlight and then placea straw within the nest entrance to seethe alert guards quickly move up andseize the offending straw in their jaws.There is a medium-sized amber-colored desert-dwelling ant I alwayscan depend upon being active at night.It has a very special appetite for syrups,jellies and spilled sugar . It is kno wnas the Honey-pot ant and will quicklydiscover any supplies of its favoritefoods, even crawling up on tables oroccasionally into automobiles. The

only evidence of their dwelling is asmall hole in the ground with onlyslight accumulations of excavated sand.Several inches below is the squat ovalchambers where certain individualshang from the roof and are fed nectaror honey until their bodies becomeenormously distended and serve as liv-ing honey jars. Later when the needarises they disgorge this sweet food.Among the most curious things Isee while on my desert wanderings arelarge collections of disjointed or sev-ered body parts of shiny black ants.These always are found close to theopenings of abandoned ant nests.Sometimes the accumulations consistof whole teacupfuls of ant heads or ofheads and torsos, seldom of wholebodies. It is the last evidence ofdreadful carnage accompanying fierceraids and battles where warriors andworkers of the attacked ant colony areslain and the pupa carried off by fero-cious armies of formicine robber ants,to be hatched and reared as workersand fighters for new masters in newhomes of captivity.Some day I will see one of thesebattles between ants. Highly interestingand instructive it will be to observethe tactics of offence on the part ofthe aggressors and to witness the bravefight to the end by the unfortunatevictims whose heads and mutilatedbodies are to be the final evidence oftheir valiant struggle for survival.

Next time you go to the desert tryout the sport of ant watching. If nec-essary get down on your hands andknees and observe the intelligent in-sects with a magnifying glass as wellas with the naked eye and you will beamazed at what new pleasures will beyours . M aybe you will be convincedas was the great American student ofants, Dr. William Morton Wheeler,that next to the human brain the brainof an ant must be among the mostmarvelous bits of material in the uni-verse.Some creatures we learn about, butants we can learn fromlessons of dili-gence, efficiency, pertinacity, sacrifice,loyalty, devotion to the good of thegroup and the great value of teamwork.Indeed it is difficult to avoid the con-clusion that most ants have acquiredthe art of living together more per-fectly than have homo sapiens.

Perhaps like myself you have won-dered what the origin of the word antis . The philologists tell us that it isderived from two Teutonic word ele-ments, the privative a an d maitan, tocut or bite, i.e. the insect is "the biter-off." The Old English word for antwas aemete. This became altered toamete and finally to ant. The wordemmet for ant still is provincially used,I am told, in some parts of England.

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Introducing a new series for DesertMagazine readersH I S T O R I C P A N O R A M A S

in which will be presented out-standing photographic essays of theDesert Southwest's most significanthistorical settings. At these localeswas shaped the destiny of the GreatAmerican Desert. Desert Magazinetakes pride in announcing that thephotographs for this series will besupplied by the distinguished pho-tographer Josef Muench of SantaBarbara, California, and the text byhis wife , Joyce. The first HistoricPanorama in this series tells the storyof

I n s c r i p t i o nR o c k

By JOSEF and JOYCE MUENCHAlong the legendary road of theSpanish Conquistadores to the elusive"Seven Cities of Cibola" is the "auto-graph album"first signed by whitemen in 1605 and now protected asEl Morro National Monument in NewMexico. Th e road led not to the richesthey dreamed, but to battles and

wounds for soldiers and martyr-deathfor some of the Padres. The long story,told in fragments on sandstone wallssheltering a precious water supply, iswithout equal in the colorful historyof our country.In quaint old Spanish language, chis-eled out perhaps with sword or daggerby some literate under-clerk, is theoldest inscription. Passed by here theAdelantado Don Juan de Onate, fromthe discovery of the Sea of the South,the \6th of April of 1605.Names of other pathfinders, DonFrancisco Manuel de Silva Nieto, Gen-eral de Vargas, the Bishop of Durango,Don Feliz Martinez are still decipher-able along with later pioneers, rollingwest after the Spanish flood had sub-sided.Top photograph El Morro Rock.On the lower part of this sandstonecliff is the remarkable record ofpre-historic Indians, Spaniards andpioneer Americans.Bottom photograph InscriptionRock. Visitors examine some of thehundreds of names carved on thisgreat rock face.

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Cattle Drive to Wins lo w . . .LIFE ON THE DESERTA girl of 13 helping her father drive a herd of wild Indian cattle tothe railhead . . . a desert storm . . . stam ped e! From this mem ory-filledwild night the author adds another chapter to the stirring story ofpioneer A rizona . . .

By BILLIE YOSTdrive. Fifteen miles a day is enoughto push animals if you want them toarrive in good condition. The firstnight out everything went fine. Thecattle were rounded up, accounted forand they seemed neither scared noroverly tired. Calves nuzzled theirmothers and my big lazy bull settleddown for a good night's rest.The second day also was withouttrouble. Even I was becoming hard-ened to the job. Long hours in thesaddle did not tire me and after thecattle were settled we sat around thecampfire and ate our supper of dutchoven biscuits, bacon, fried potatoesand coffee.Fa ther was beginning to relax fromthe strain of getting his beef to market.The end was in sight. By the nextnight he would have a nice roll to putin the bank. The cattle representedhis profit for a year of hard work, forthe trading post barely paid our livingexpenses and its own overhead.

After supper it was my turn to ridenight herd with father. As I mountedI noticed thunder clouds boiling upover the San Francisco peaks and dis-tant lightning flashes to the west.Suddenly an extremely violent elec-trical storm broke. The lightningflashes lighted up the countryside andthe air smelled of burned sulphur.Static electricity danced off the catties'horns and down their backs. I wasfrightened. Walter and Little Gamblerrushed into their saddles and soon werecircling the herd with us.Four people to handle a hundred

frightened cattle seemed like poor oddsto me. The storm grew in intensity asit moved over us. When the lightningflashed we could see the cattle movingabout restlessly. Suddenly the wholeheavens split wide open with thunder-ous crashes, rain gushed from theclouds and all hell broke loose.The nervous cattle sprang up andcharged pell-mell in a panicky run,headed for destruction. I raced besidefather in a vain effort to control theterror-stricken animals and I heardthe full tide of his fury burst forth. Itprobably was the last time an Arizonacattleman has cursed rain in thisparched land.

1 WAS a girl of 13 Ihelped my father drive a hun-dred head of wild Navajo cat-tle to market .We lived at Red Lake, an isolatedtrading post in the heart of Navajo-land 45 miles northwest of Winslow,Arizona. This is a country of muchsand, no shade andunbroken horizons.Mother often said I was my father'sshadow. 1 wanted to go everywherehe did and, as I was a tomboy, heusually let me accompany him toplaces where he would not considertaking mother or my sister, Esther.The September I was 13 he askedif I would like to help drive the cattlewe had bought from the Navajos toWinslow for shipping. Mother washorrified, but I was so thrilled withthe prospect of taking part in a cattledriveand father so sure I could doitshe finally consented.Fa ther , my older brother, Walter,our Indian helper, Little Gambler, and1 were to make the trip. Mother, myother brother, Roy, and Esther wereto run the trading post during ourabsence.Herding cattle is an exciting anddramatic experience. Always there istension because the slightest disturb-ance can cause a stampede and nowestern story writer has ever exagger-ated the dread a cowboy feels at thecall, "They're stampeding!"A milling mass of frightened cows,bellowing, snorting, trampling eachother to death and running off preciouspounds of weight, is a fierce and fright-ening sight. F ortunes have been lostan d men killed because a scrap ofpaper has blown across the path of amoving herd.1 was on a tough job. The sun beatdown unmercifully. F ather placed meat the rear of the herd to prod an oldbull who insisted on lagging behind.Also I had to tend the pack horse thatcarried our grub and bedding. I wasin the center of our personally stirred-up dust storm and choked and gaggeduntil I thought I would die. Fa thersaw this and tied his big blue bandanaacross the lower part of my face ban-dit-style. This helped with the dust butincreased the stifling heat.We figured on three days for the

He shouted a warning to me, buthis voice was lost as the ground shookwith the thunder of pounding hooves.There was only one thought in mymind: "Save thecattle!" I forgot com-pletely my personal danger and dis-comfort. I only knew that it was upto father and me to check that runningmass of beef. Walter and Little Gam-bler were lost somewhere in the blacknight."You've got to stop them! Youmust save them!" kept pounding inmy brain. In sudden horror I recalledfather having said that he had bor-rowed the money to buy this bunch."Oh, dear God!" I prayed in teenagefervor, "Help us stop them!"

It seemed hours passed before thefaster animals forged ahead and theherd became less packed. F ather thenclosed in on the lead, and graduallycrowded them from their hell-bentcourse. He swung them into a circlean d the herd started milling. SoonWalter and Little Gambler rode intoview. We were safe and the stampedewas over!At daybreak we found the cattlesplit into small bunches that were scat-tered over a wide area. It took threelong days of hard riding to round themup . A few had been killed and othersmissing, but the loss was not great andfather was audibly relieved when heexclaimed, "that darned banker won'tge t his pound of flesh this time!"As we started the final drive, my oldbull, the steers, cows andcalves movedalong restlessly. It was a noisy, un-happy herd with cows bellowing fortheir lost calves and calves wailing fortheir lost mothers. I felt a great reliefwhen we arrived at theWinslow stock-yards.We corralled thecattle andthen col-lapsed into our beds. But, at dawnwe were up to assist with the

195703 desert magazine 1957 march

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