Month: March 2018

Same Old Bull

Wyatt Earp and his brand new Packard.

— Wyatt had bought a brand new auto and was taking Josie out to visit a friend in Arizona. Somewhere south of Needles, a large bull leapt out from behind a creosote bush. The bull huffed and puffed and stomped and scrapped his hooves, lowered his head and charged the brand-new shiny-clean car. The bull came at the door on Josie’s side. She screamed. She was afraid the bull would kill her. However, she had no reason to fear death as Wyatt, drew his gun and put 3 shots into his thick skull right between its wide-set eyes. This killed the bull instantly. The bull had messed up the door pretty bad. Then all of a sudden some guy jumped out of the creosote yelling and screaming about the “prize bull” Wyatt just killed. An argument ensued. It seemed that Wyatt knew this guy’s boss and was the friend he was taking Josie to visit. It was pretty funny. Sort of. I don’t know who, if anyone, paid to get Wyatt’s door fixed. I imagine they ate the bull.

The End.

March 16, 2018
Springs & Things — Before Time Began

I have heard that the Paiute Indians have a legend–a story they would tell about a giant who crossed the desert with an olla full of water in each arm. With each step he would leave his footprint in the ground, and water would spill from the olla into the hole as he walked on. The giant was so large that these waterholes were one day’s walk between each for a normal-sized man. The Indian learned this and used these waterholes to travel great distances and trade with other Peoples beyond the desert. As time went on and things went the way things do, one such trail became the Mojave Road. — Editor

History of Eastern Mojave & the Mojave Road

Mojave Desert Springs

Salt Lake Road

Mojave Road

Camp Cady

March 12, 2018
Legend of the Hassayampa

Wickenburg, Az.

The legend of the Hassayampa River as it runs through Wickenburg, Arizona, has it that if you drink from the river’s waters you will never tell the truth again. There, of course, are some caveats and loopholes some weak-kneed people may use to claim the curse will not affect them, but it does–they may be lying, however.

Hassayampa River, Wickenburg, Az.

At any rate, it was not people who went into the desert merely to write it up who invented the fabled Hassayampa, of whose waters, if any drink, they can no more see fact as naked fact, but all radiant with the color of romance. I, who must have drunk of it in my twice seven years’ wanderings, am assured that it is worthwhile.

~ Land of Little Rain – Mary Austin
Country of Lost Borders

The legend of the Hassayampa River — The Hassayampa rises in Yavapai county on the northern slope of Mount Union- flows south and enters Gila River at Powers Butte in Maricopa county. It is said to be named by Pauline Weaver and to mean–beautiful waters. One legend says–He who drinks above the trail is ever truthful – While he who drinks below is lost to the truth.

The Hassayampa Legend
-Andrew Downing

There’s a legend centuries old
By the early Spaniards told
Of a sparkling stream that “lies”
Under the Arizona skies
Hassayampa is its name
And the title of its fame
Is a wondrous quality
Known today from sea to sea
Those who drink it’s waters bright
Red man, white man, boor or Knight
Girls, or women, boys or men
Never tell the truth again!

March 10, 2018
Earp, California

Earp, California is an unincorporated community in San Bernardino County in the Sonoran/Mojave Desert transition next to the Colorado River at the California/Arizona state line in Parker Valley.

Welcome to Earp, California

Earp post office at the eastern end of Highway 62, ZIP 92242.

In 1910 the little town was named Drennan. In 1929 Drennan was renamed Earp in 1929 in honor of the nefarious Old West lawman and entrepreneur Wyatt Earp. Wyatt and Josephine Sarah Marcus, his common-law wife, lived in the area seasonally from about 1906 staking more than 100 claims near the base of the Whipple Mountains.

Downtown Vidal, California

Wyatt Earp, the legendary law man, gunfighter, gambler, businessman and miner along with his wife, Josephine, inhabited this “dream-come-true” cottage from 1925 through 1928, winter and spring months, while he worked his “Happy Days” mines in the Whipple Mountains a few miles north of this site. This is the only permanent residence they owned in their long lives.

They bought a small cottage in nearby Vidal and lived there during the fall, winter and spring months of 1925 – 1928, while he worked his “Happy Days” mines in the Whipple Mountains a few miles north. It was the only place they owned the entire time they were married. They spent the winters of his last years working the claims but lived in Los Angeles during the summers, where Wyatt died on January 13, 1929.

Josie & Wyatt and dog at Happy Days mine west of Parker, Az.

Vidal/Parker area map

March 5, 2018