"Echoes from the Thundermug": Creede Boyhood, Part One

The Magic Age Is Five

Two passages below are the same stories John also tells, in slightly different words, in "Once Around the Thunder Mug": the wet-nurse arrangement with Mrs. "Packrat" Jackson, and the rabbit's-hole riddle taught by an uncle (there credited to "Uncle Arthur" alone, and recited to teacher Christine Duncan rather than Miss Marie Birdsey) — see Chapter I and Chapter III. Both versions of each are reproduced here in full, as printed.

Creede was comparatively young when we entered the world to add to its population. We were born at home with the help of Dr. McKibben and a midwife and received our rations from our mother's plumbing equipment, weaned to milk and flour gravy at a tender age. Mom Jo failed to supply enough milk for me and farmed me out to a neighbor for twice daily feedings. Mrs. Packrat Jackson (no relation) was generously endowed with the facilities and fed both her new arrival and myself with little effort.

Potty training came early in life for children of that era. Pansy flour sacks and cast off dish towels served as skin chafing diapers and there was a definite stigma to carrying around a pantsfull after the age of 10 months. I took a little longer to train as the warmth of either number one or two was welcomed for whatever short duration during the winter months. Outside biffies contributed to much constipation in the winter also as each family member waited for another to make the run and warm the seat. Bottles of castor oil were in easy reach of mothers well tuned to the temperaments of their children. Raymond Bucher, who was born with a deep bass voice, could easily have won the Olympic 100-yard dash as his mom was continually flushing him before discovering his voice was natural and not the symptoms of croup or constipation.

Five years was the magic age we all strived to reach and I can't remember aspiring to any year beyond that. At six years came schooling and integration with the female sex which certainly was no incentive for longevity until blonde-haired Jackie Moore arrived from Kansas and awakened an interest in girls heretofore laying dormant within me.

At five years of age we could thread our own worms on our own fishhooks, handle a jackknife and ride a burro by ourselves. At five years we could tag along on rabbit hunting trips, go swimming in ponds or creeks and begin asserting our independence a full year before the tolling of a school bell so effectively removed it. At five years we could help "Ed the barber" grain and rub his horse down when he came to Creede from Spar City in his buggy with the fancy curled springs, his white, walrus mustache a fascination to us and we could hide behind bushes at the north end of the mesa to watch old Dan McCleary stagger home, under a full load of corn, talking and waving to no one.

At five years of age we could run errands down town from our mesa home. It was always a treat to reach main street as the sun came high enough over Mammoth Mountain to shine in the windows of the business houses on the west side. Mr. Eaves would be cranking his red and white striped awning out just before Mr. Owsley skipped out to lower his orange awning. Later in the day the businessmen of the east side would be performing the same task. These were gentle, personable men who always had time to visit with us. Mr. Eaves would steer the conversation around to learn if we were going to church regularly and Mr. Owsley always inquired as to our luck in fishing which gave him an opening for his latest fish story.

Down the street on the east side Mr. Lewis had his grocery store where Edna Miles now has her gift shop and just north of this where the Pick & Shovel Rock Shop resides was the A. H. Major grocery store. Bill Lewis helped everyone in town at some time or other. He could be as easily seen shoveling coal into his old Ford truck for delivery as behind the meat counter and he always had a job for a lad in need of a nickel or dime. He was revered by all the kids who were able to buy their mothers a birthday present from his generosity. Bill and Bessie Lewis also provided scores of depression families with living quarters and food until they could get on their feet again.

At five years of age, we could tolerate girls when they brought us fresh baked cookies with the words "we baked them ourselves," but we knew different. We knew girls were essential in perpetuation of the species because other kids came from their mother's tummies even though we were brought by the stork.

We knew that our fathers were not to be caught entering or leaving a certain residence or a certain cafe after dark or our mothers would skin them alive. Ronnie's father had visited the cafe once when he was drunk and brought home more than he left with. He and Ronnie's mother slept in different beds after that and he made several visits to Dr. McKibben before he could join the family at meals. This was all interconnected and made up the basics of our sex education but there were far more important things to occupy our minds. For one thing, Mr. Major had backed his truck with the overhanging roof and no side windows over the mesa hill scattering coins from his money bag far and wide. When prospects for adventure were slim we would traverse the route the truck had taken and oft times come up with a coin or two.

At five years Claude Larson's garage held many wonders for us. We liked to watch gasoline rise in the glass bowl with the numbers on it when old Wick or one of the others around the garage worked the hand pump. We would wait a full day to grab the steel balls from a cast off bearing to use as marbles and we were there the day they wired up a metal plate where the town dogs stopped to urinate at the doorway causing an infernal smell on warm days. The first dog to strut up and heist his leg was the Allen mongrel. We nearly died laughing when the electrical current coursed up the stream causing him to exit yelping. He was three blocks away before his fourth leg came down. We spent days coaxing Benjie to stand on the metal plate and pee against the nail holding one of the wires but Wick had turned the switch off and we were chased off for our efforts when he saw Benjie wetting things down.

At five years of age uncles and grandfathers became special people. How else could five year olds learn to swear and smoke bull durham tobacco without their help? Uncle Woodie and Uncle Art coached us along the road to many whippings and embarrassing moments. They taught Joey Jackson his first riddle which he tried out on Miss Marie Birdsey his first day in school. He asked her if she knew the best way to find a rabbit's hole. She looked nonplussed, so he offered "look under his tail." As the children cheered this levity, Miss Birdsey promptly wiped the riddle from Joe's memory.

At five years Charles L. Lane was not only my grandfather, he was my best pal. I told him secrets I could never tell anyone else with the assurance they would never be repeated. He gave me my first rifle and was with me when I killed a bull elk at ten years of age to stock the larder at a time, unfortunately, when our game warden, Mr. Goade, would have taken exception to, as it was well into winter. With the wagon loaded on deliveries of stove wood I sat on the spring seat by Grandad and held the reins when he had to crawl off to check rims and harness. On the return trip with the wagon empty, I stood on the floor of the wagon holding tight to the seat as the rough, bouncing ride turned my legs to rubber and I would be unable to either stand or walk by the time we reached the ranch gate.

Five years is a transition period in which sights, sounds and smells are stored in a child's mind for instant recall. We knew that schooling would soon intrude on this carefree life and we savored every moment of visits with bachelors, fishing in Rat Creek and riding home with Gene Groom who delivered coal to the steam boilers of the Moon tunnel at Sunnyside town. Bachelor's cabins had a smell all their own with boots drying behind the stove, diggers (overalls) hanging on a nail smelling of powder smoke and oxidized ores of mines, rancid bacon grease in a coffee can and tobacco smoke that seemed to permeate everything. We longed to hear the sounds of the bagpipes of the gentleman scotsman Alex Duncan who lived where Egolfs now have their summer home but had to settle for one short squeak as he showed us the contraption. It had been rumored that the last time Alex had played the bagpipes, Shorty Heilman's jersey cow cleared a six foot fence and lost her calf shortly after. We were treated to song sessions, however, at Milton "Tex" Allsworth's when Kathleen (Dottie) Turnipseed played the piano and everyone sang along. And there was Fred "Soapy" Birdsey who sang little dittys to us in his barber shop that he had learned in hobo jungles of Illinois with a slow shuffle and fast jig thrown in as a finale.

Dear Lord, if only each five year old could smell fresh baked bread from the oven of Grandma Lane and taste the butt slice dripping of home churned butter or the banana cream pies with graham cracker crusts that Eunice Spillman treated us to or hear horse shoes and steel rims protesting snow packed roads or see the camaraderie of a town in tune when Senator Phipps entertained everyone at his La Garita ranch on his birthday with a baseball game, usually Creede against Del Norte, Tom Drysdale directing his band, first with "Happy Birthday" then onto the marches and all the Nehi soda pop we could drink in tub after tub of ice.

That was real living and nothing since has equaled or even approached that era. The most wonderful thing about being five years old is that your mind records only the pleasant happenings to draw on at nostalgic times like this when you so miss Creede town and it's wonderful people.

Extra Curricular Activities

Mom Jo had given up on the cowlick, the shock of hair on the rear of my head that refused to lay down, made a couple of passes with the comb at the front locks and instructed Joel and Scooter to direct me to Miss Marie Duncan's first grade class. It was like walking the last mile to me and I was determined to escape before the first bell tolled an end to my freedom.

As Marie welcomed the other bright eyed little girls and boys I wandered away and spent the day playing in the boxcars by the depot. On Tuesday I informed Marie I had other things to do and again left. Before I could bid my classmates goodbye on Wednesday, Marie snatched me into the coatroom, soundly blistered by bottom and deposited me in a seat saved especially for my return. I tried her patience again on Thursday and again received the flat of her hand much to the delight of the class. After school I rapped Eddie Cahoon on the kisser a couple of times as he had laughed the hardest during my embarrassment. In spite of the early disagreement, I fell in love with Marie by the end of the school year and was certain I would, one day, marry her. Marie was just as certain she wanted no part of me and passed me, unceremoniously, to the care of Miss Lewis who had the third and fourth grades.

By this time we found school, while not pleasant, could be tolerated. Lee Davis and I found we could circumvent the learning process with various diversions. We became masters at excuses and when we felt we needed a day off we took it. We could always talk Aunt Rosebud into writing a note to the teacher explaining our absence or one or the other of us would get suddenly ill in class, the healthy one having to walk the other home, home being the nearest fishing hole or a ride to Sunnyside on one of the burros claimed by us when sheepherders left them at the Wason rail yards after they were through with the summer's packing jobs.

There were lighter moments too, like when we would pack snow to a depth of several inches on the seats in the girls' toilets, return to class and wait for the first one to raise her hand to be excused, snickering in the certainty she would return and squirm until recess or noon hour. We had Bobby Snow, who liked to bring water snakes to school and leave them for safe keeping in one of the girls' toilets. The reaction, more often than not, was a premature release of the reason of the visit.

The toilets were a constant source of concern for the teachers. As a block they lobbied for new facilities and a bran' new hundred dollar structure, the first duplex in Creede, was erected by Sam Church and Olrich Miller. The girls had the sunny south wing and the boys the shaded north wing. A partition divided two rows of singles and extended 18 inches below the seats. This new tar-papered wonder replaced six two-holers that had been divided equally between the sexes.

Rupert Burns liked this arrangement. Rupert had provided us with much excitement in the past and the duplex was a real challenge to his penchant for getting into trouble. Once, prior to Christmas holidays, Harold and Roger Workman, cousins, had been delegated to sketch scenes, with colored chalk, on the blackboards of three school rooms. Rupert, quite an artist himself, was sorely put out at not having been chosen for these works of art and one night crawled along the roof of the school, dampened the clapper of the bell then lowered himself on the bell rope through the trap door to the seventh and eighth grades' room. From here he could pass through doors north and south to the rooms gracing the Workman boys western style sketches. With considerable skill for the darkness he was in, Rupert provided the animals with extra large reproductive organs.

We thought our introduction to porno art quite beneficial to the drawings and voiced our approval. The more the teacher tried to erase the appendage the better the image and the louder our approval. Unfortunately, Rupert was tried, convicted and lost several weeks of recesses but to prove his spirit wasn't broken he turned his attention to the new duplex toilet. He found he could maneuver a forked spruce limb from the boys side under the partition and rake it along the girls seats on the other side to give them an unforgettable thrill. With a successful performance behind him, Rupert would slide into his seat, hide behind his geography book and point out the red-faced victim.

Because of Rupert and other near disastrous happenings perpetrated by our gang as a whole, I began to like school. My attendance became regular and punctual so as not to miss any of the excitement that so bedeviled the teachers and girls plus relieving the monotony of digesting the three R's. Rupert's game with the spruce bow was short-lived however, when he unwittingly scored on one of the lady teachers. He subsequently lost all privileges for the remainder of the school year.

Stealing Ain't As Easy As It Was In Times Past

It is becoming increasingly hard to maintain my reputation as a liar, thief and reprobate. My relatives and in-laws helped when we lived closer and I appreciated their contribution, but they evidently feel I'm old enough to go it alone.

When I was a little shaver, my dad gave me a Stevens pump .22-caliber rifle. It was an old lead spitter with a broken, taped stock and had been fired far too many times to be safe, but I loved it.

My only problem was keeping it in ammunition for rabbit hunting. I had a friend, a year older, who always got an extra box of shells with his 15 cents at Tomkins Hardware Co. I marveled at this as I had never made a purchase when it was two-for-the-price-of-one day.

I asked Bobby what days I should buy my shells. He carefully explained to me that all you had to do was wear a jacket with loose sleeves, reach up to the pile of ammunition, conveniently head high, nudge one box down the sleeve and take the other to the clerk's window and pay for it.

I followed his instructions to the letter, slipped a box of long rifles in my sleeve and snagged another just as the first box passed through a hole near my elbow. That box hit the floor at my feet, burst and .22 shells began rolling down two aisles. Clifford French, who was nearby, helped me retrieve them and failed to notice the other box which I placed back on the shelf. I never tried such theft again.

Creede once had a grocery store where the Amethyst Emporium now is. A man by the name of Hix ran the business and spent much of his time on an upper level at the rear where he could read yet still see his customers enter.

Several of my little friends managed to pocket a candy bar on trips for their mothers as they passed by the open candy shelves while Mr. Hix was climbing the stairs to his perch. They were good about sharing their loot. However, Jimmy felt I should contribute as well and I felt duty bound to comply.

We shopped, mainly, with the A.H. Major grocery and it took some urging to be sent to the economy store by Mom Jo for a minor item. Mr. Hix sacked my purchase then started his upward journey as I approached the candy rack with my left hand free. With my heart beating like a trip hammer I grabbed two U-NO bars and looked up to be sure I was home free. There, right at the railing, stood Mr. Hix watching me with eyes that bored right through me. I placed the bars back in the box and never again graced his store.

The last larceny of any merit was in the year 1954. I had leased the Holy Moses group of claims two years earlier and went gloriously broke. Just before I buttoned the hole up for good, I blasted into a vein of rich silver/lead ore. I hired Paul Hosselkus to help get two railroad cars loaded for shipment to the smelter in Leadville, but first I had to repair a chute and timber a raise to lower the ore to tunnel level.

Deep in debt and not wishing to go further toward bankruptcy, I chose to strip a bridge at the Solomon Mill for the needed lumber. Paul helped without any undue questioning. We were able to ship two lots of ore but the handwriting was on the wall. I was forced to renege on the lease and return to a job at Emperius Mining Co. to pay off several long-standing bills.

The next spring, Allen Hosselkus took advantage of rising lead prices and arranged to ship several cars of lead/zinc ore from the Solomon/Ridge mines. He found a trucker to haul from the mine to the loading dock near Frank Powell's home then drove to the mines where he found the bridge across Willow Creek had disappeared.

While pondering his loss at the dinner table that evening, Paul piped up "Jackson and I tore it out last fall and used the lumber at the Holy Moses."

Allen later collared me. I told him I had merely borrowed his property until my financial condition improved. We laughed long and hard, but he vowed to blow my butt off if I ever pulled such a stunt again.

Boys Can't Live Down 'Elk' Hunting Escapade

A friend of mine was on guard duty one night near a small German town. He was scared to death, as were all of us 19-year-old soldiers who drew guard duty. Hearing noises in the brush near his post, he strained his ears to pinpoint the location of movement and low, guttural sounds resembling human voices.

"Who goes there?" the sentry cried.

"Einekleine schwein," a pig replied. Two shots rang out, then three, then four.

Alas, the schwein, he vass no more.

Robert eventually lived it down. Not so for a couple of young men who planned to stock the larder with fresh elk meat on a dark night during Depression days of the 1930's.

An old rancher had a barn, corrals and haystack in the mouth of a canyon where elk wintered. When winter's snows became deep and crusted, they often leaped the fences and helped themselves to the rancher's hay which was harvested to feed a milk cow and a team of horses that were his pride and joy.

The two boys lived farther to the west but had seen elk in the haystack many times as they hiked home from a school party or social.

They slipped their Dad's .30-30 lever-action rifle from its resting place one evening, put on extra clothing and walked to the neighbor's haystack. With fading light, they burrowed back into the hay on the end where elk most often fed. They waited, and waited, and waited. Total darkness set in and they dozed.

One woke to the sounds of elk jumping the pole fence and alerted the other. They quietly pushed the gun barrel to the outer edge of the stack and when a dark shape loomed a few feet away, one boy sighted in the general direction and pulled the trigger. There was a terrible thrashing about with sounds of an animal in its death throes that scared the boys into burrowing deeper into the hay. A few feeble kicks and gurgling sigh signaled the end so they crawled out with hunting knife at the ready to bleed and dress their kill.

By this time, the old rancher had pulled on his boots, lit a coal oil lamp and headed up the path to learn the source of the commotion. He found the boys standing over the remains of half of his prized team of horses.

The old rancher has long since gone to his reward. The boys are now well into their 70's, but there isn't a gathering that someone doesn't ask one of them if they pulled the shoes and halter off that elk before they ate it.

Bloomers & Home Runs

Much of what follows — Teddy's home run and Miss Gortney's arrival at the ballgame — is the same story John also tells, in slightly different words, in "Once Around the Thunder Mug," Chapter III, "Soft Boys, Home Runs and Boogers." Both versions are reproduced here in full, as printed.

Today we would be called perverts and very likely we were dubbed perverts in that early year but none of us knew the meaning of the word and would have exercised our powers of vision in the same manner whether cursed, clubbed or ostracized.

Eloise Blackford, a talented musician and singer, taught music and staged musical performances with gifted high school girls that were well received by the citizens of Creede town. She even coaxed Charles Church, our basketball team's center, into playing a major singing part in a cantata.

The plays were staged in the Elks Hall but practice sessions, for the most part, were held in Bryan Beck's theater. Bryan had erected the building from used lumber with the exception of the stage, which was floored with inch-thick boards straight from Hansen's sawmill. The boards were tightly fitted, initially, but over the years shrinkage in drying produced gaps to a half inch in width.

When rehearsals began, five of us lads who lacked musical aptitude faithfully attended each practice session and offered helpful critique from our vantage point under the stage where we hung on the floor joist braces and peered up at the young ladies' underclothes as they flitted from side to side singing and dancing. As could be expected much dirt and sawdust filtered down through the cracks but none of us would have blinked an eye and missed a flicker of pink or white bloomers for anything. At the end of the first week, our teachers thought the school was in the first stages of a pink eye epidemic. Our eyes were redder than Shorty Wheeler's at a spud cellar social.

The third and fourth grade teacher provided us with more hygienic peeping and with less social stigma. Miss Gortney liked to watch our softball games and rooted for all engaged without favoritism. She was a pretty blonde and usually came attired in short skirts or print dresses with very little more to hinder movement.

We were all tied up in a torrid game one evening with brother Joe pitching for our side. Joe had two out when Teddy came to bat. Teddy had muscles on muscles and directed a scowl at the pitcher's mound that would send a shiver down the devil's back but we knew we had an easy out here. Ol' Teddy was muscle-bound and swung a bat like he was splitting wood. All Joe had to do was whip three fast balls by him and their side would be retired.

Just as brother Joe began his contortions signaling the start of his famous, underhand, lightning pitch Miss Gortney plopped down between Elsie Duncan and Edna Ruth VanAkin on the top step of the south wing of Creede Grammar School and spread her skirt with her knees. From my position at short stop, I could see that Joe's eyes had been diverted from the batter and the smoking ball was following his line of vision. There was an audible "plock" as it glanced off the east pole of the backstop and ended its flight square on the nose of Elsie Duncan, toppling her backward with broken cartilage and a gush of blood.

There was a pause in the game as Elsie was carted off. Teddy resumed his batting stance and brother Joe, somewhat shaken, elected to pitch a slow ball over the plate hoping for nothing more than a ground ball with an easy out at first. I didn't hear the crack of the bat and was only faintly aware of a ball zipping between my legs, as Miss Gortney had shifted her position to face me squarely. My devotion to game and teammates was lost in a lurid impression, indelibly engraved on the rear of my eyeballs.

We lost the game to Teddy's first home run ever.

The Magic of Barbershops

The Walt Wilson poker-game story below is the same one John tells, in slightly different words, in "Once Around the Thunder Mug," Chapter II, "Lessons From a Barber's Chair." The Del Norte material that follows it is new to this book.

Some years ago a politician remarked that all America needed was a good five cent cigar. Five cents wouldn't buy the wrapper on a good cigar today but for my part a return to barber shops as the cultural centers of the nation would be a step in the right direction in finding where our values lie.

As lads we learned more about life in our visits to Fred "Soapy" Birdsey's barber shop than we ever did in the classroom or other supposedly mind expanding programs. What a thrill it was to be allowed to sit near the table as Judge Homer Kendall, Walt Wilson, Roy Phillips, Gus Swanson and Soapy stacked chips for an evening of poker. Every subject of national interest was discussed here and the skeletons of every closet in Creede bared. I learned far more about my heritage in these sessions than I learned from my parents.

Soapy took us from the hobo jungles of Chicago to the boom town of Creede; Gus Swanson took us even further from Sweden, across the Atlantic to the United States of America. Gus had been a weight lifting champion in Sweden and on the ship crossing the Atlantic he gave exhibitions, one of which was to hold a 75-pound anvil at arms length by the horn, single handed. In America he was just another immigrant content to live out his life in Creede as a miner.

We learned the bawdy side too by putting two and two together. We learned who was whoring around though Creede was without known sporting houses and through Judge Homer Kendall we knew who was flouting the law in other manners. Much of this we didn't understand and it sent us to the dictionary which oft times didn't inform us with our limited reading ability so we badgered others to learn the meaning of words and terms bantered about the poker table.

Soapy, at the start of one session, asked Walt what the intense discussion was about he was engaged in that afternoon with one of the town's best attired old widows. Walt hemmed and hawed, twitched one shoulder then offered, "Well, there wasn't anything better for either of us to do so I propositioned her."

The cards went around twice before Soapy asked, "What was the verdict?"

"Why the old bat told me," (his voice rising to mock hers), "'I'm so sorry Walt but I'm flowing this week.' Hell she hasn't flowed for 40 years." All of them burst out laughing and so did we though the punch line was lost on us.

Many years later when we were without a barber in Creede we journeyed to Del Norte and Wade Brown's tonsorial parlor where our favorite baseball player, fisherman and butcher, Juan Chavez, was either in attendance or on his way. Juan never failed to greet me with "Hi, there pal, how your daddy, how your mama, how your sister, how your brothers?" All this in one long query, then came his sparring session with Wade.

Wade and Juan vied each week for the largest fish caught in the Rio Grande. If Juan had won that week, Wade would wink at me and ask, "By the way, Jackson, have you met my friend John Chavez?"

Juan would rise to his full five feet and with fire in his eyes say, "Don't you never call me John, Wade Brown, you call me John again and I'll throw you out of this shop." Juan was very proud of his Mexican heritage and was an honorary citizen of Creede having been the catcher for Creede's baseball team as well as 50 percent of the Bill Heller dance band that always drew a crowd in the Elks Hall.

The atmosphere was different in Wade's shop but there was a wealth of information there for a young inquisitive mind. I remember one evening when I was in the chair and John Gjellum brought his son, who couldn't have been over four years old, in for a haircut. Good-natured kidding and yarn swapping had been going on for several minutes when that little boy stood on the bench, wrapped his arms around John's neck and exclaimed, "Daddy, I love you."

Without a trace of embarrassment John returned, "Well, thank you son, I love you, too."

The atmosphere and medium of a barber shop placed that man and his son on the same wave length. Wouldn't it be worth it to turn the television sets to the wall and revive that spirit?

Costs, Salary Statistics Given

While rummaging through old books and papers, my bride came across some interesting statistics she would like to share with you.

Did you know?

The assessed valuation of mules in Mineral County for the year 1923 was $600. It was believed that a commissioner and a county judge were included.

In 1924, Creede had six schools housed in two buildings with an average cost per student per year of $86.95 by enrollment and $98.26 by attendance. In that year, male teachers of three classrooms received salaries of $160 per month and female teachers of three classrooms received salaries of $111.11 per month.

Even that long ago, the powers that be knew that males were worth considerably more than females.

In that same year, persons of school age numbered 158 while only 139 were in attendance. Two of the hooky players were thought to be Gordon Pfeiffer Duncan and H. Heinie Leonard. Gordon said he'd wait a couple of years for the others to catch up, Mr. Leonard was engaged in on-the-job training at Bill Tingley's still in Sawmill Gulch, which proved far more beneficial in later years than his school attendance record.

In 1924, the sheriff of Mineral County was E.S. "Steve" Pollock; treasurer, Theodore Wheeler; clerk, Herbert Barnhart; surveyor, Don LaFont; assessor, John Weaver; coroner, Royal Fisher; judge, C.Y. Butler; superintendent of schools, Mary N. Oates.

We also have a record of crops grown in Mineral County in 1923. There were five acres of potatoes broken further down to three irrigated acres and two unirrigated acres which yielded a total of 510 bushels. No farmer in Rio Grande County considered Mineral County a threat in agriculture.

We had 17.4 miles of railroad in the county with an equal amount of telegraph wires added up to a whopping 230 miles.

There are several more pages but statistics become boring when we aren't mentioned or criminal proceedings are omitted, so we will end with a tidbit from a recent Denver Post issue entitled "Quotes of Note". "I wasn't kissing her, I was whispering in her mouth," said Chico Marx, when his wife caught him kissing a chorus girl.

I had a friend who was discovered in a far more adventurous activity by his wife and as she was loading a revolver, he cried "Honey, I was so drunk, I thought it was you, honest!"

Big Chief Boogers

This is the same story — Hortense, the winking game, the Valentine's Day card, the ink in Bernie's shoe — that John also tells, in slightly different words, in "Once Around the Thunder Mug," Chapter III, "Soft Boys, Home Runs and Boogers." Both versions are reproduced here in full, as printed.

I have often wondered how the ugly duckling of the third grade class always ends up being the shapeliest beauty in school in her sophomore year.

Hortense Burton sat across the aisle from me in her long sleeved dress, cotton stockings hanging in rolls around her ankles and her nose always in need of wiping. Hortense held her pencil firmly by the point with five inches of it waving above her hand like a baton as she wrote. Between sniffs her nose would drip on her Big Chief tablet, she would sop it up with her sleeve then steal quick glances to see if anyone noticed. Everyone within four seats noticed but we all looked away at the proper time to avoid mutual embarrassment.

At a birthday party of one of our class we had gathered in a circle, boys on the outside and girls seated on the inside with one chair vacant playing the winking game. The boy behind the empty chair winked at the girl he wanted to sit there and it went on and on until we got in a fist fight or none of the boys would wink at a girl. I never could wink. I tried mightily but I just couldn't control the muscles necessary for this feat; all I could do was blink fast. My girl was sitting by Hortense and I had the empty chair. To succeed in getting Doris to my chair I had to wander around with my eyes and made a fast blink at Doris so she could move before Bobby could rap her on the head nullifying the act. I looked over the field, carefully avoiding Doris, then pivoted my head fast and blinked squarely where she should have been but my sixth sense had deceived me and Hortense was in my chair like a bullet. She was there for the remainder of the game and by the rules of the house became my partner for the evening.

Hortense always helped the teacher pass out valentines. She was chosen for this special chore because she never received a valentine from a boy and it was easier for the teacher to slip her the two valentines she had placed in the box from "a secret admirer" and "I love you, guess who". On this St. Valentines Day Hortense was racing around the room delivering the little heart shaped cards, pausing long enough to see who each was from when the teacher announced, "To Hortense from Johnny Jackson," then tittered, "Oh, I'm sorry. I'm not supposed to read who the cards are from."

Hortense vaulted 12 feet to snatch the card from the teacher's hand as I rose to protest. The teacher rested one hand on her paddle, looked at me sternly and told me she was sorry again with a dual message that left me seated and mute. Bernie snickered in the seat behind me and Wallie made a heart with his fingers pointing at Hortense and me. As soon as the teacher had her hand in the valentine box and her gaze diverted I dropped my pencil on the floor. In retrieving it I poured a half bottle of blue black ink behind the tongue of Bernie's left shoe. So much for Bernie. Wallie would get his at recess.

So Hortense became a beauty and would have nothing to do with me. I learned how to wink with my left eye and consoled myself in my loss with the knowledge that Hortense still sniffed and her nose dripped.

Going to Church Just Never Was John's Idea of Heaven

This is the same story — the Bible class, and the minister asking each child to describe Heaven — that John also tells, in slightly different words, in "Once Around the Thunder Mug," Chapter III. Both versions are reproduced here in full, as printed.

I never really liked to go to church, not even for the parties staged there with home-baked cookies and lemonade, but then there were houses I never felt comfortable in for many of the same reasons.

Old houses with small windows and curtains that held out light were for old people with rheumatism and poor eyesight. Such houses and occupants demanded silence on entering, leaving and in between.

I never entered a church that I didn't expect to see an open coffin on a bier by the dais with the waxlike nose of a waxlike face sticking up just high enough to be visible to a small boy. The sanctity frightened me and the stern-faced old ladies who glared at me when I rustled the pages of a hymnal or blew my nose loudly made me want to run for the nearest place the sun could find me and yell, "Help!" My idea of a place of worship was a room with wide, tall windows where rays of the sun could chase each other from side to side, and if I saw my pal Benjie on the other side, I could wave and speak to him.

A new minister with a large family moved to Creede from an eastern Colorado town. We were encouraged to make them feel at home and to attend church to assure them we weren't all heathens. We tried. One of the boys was my age, sturdy and rough around the edges. I learned from him that all it took to be one of the congregation was to give up two hours a week, sit very piously on a hard bench for half that time and stand with head bowed for the other half. After that you could chase frogs in the slimy pond at the lower edge of town, tin can a dog or smoke Bull Durham behind someone's woodshed.

We were enrolled in what could be called a Bible class for which we were excused from school early on Fridays. The only trouble was we had an hour of Bible class which actually deprived us of a half hour's free time. We went for it anyway. There were usually more whippings that last half hour of school per week when the teachers were grumpy than all the other days combined.

I can't remember how many classes I endured, but I well remember the last one. We were seated in a half circle before the minister, who had just completed his lesson for the day, when he rose like someone had thumbtacked his chair, pointed his arm at the ceiling and exclaimed, "Today we are going to do something different, something we can all join in." I pictured games of spin the bottle or pin the tail on the donkey. He continued, "Today we will describe what we think Heaven is like and why we want to go there."

Norma looked at me and giggled. For Pete's sake, I thought, I'm only nine years old and this old buzzard thinks I want to go to heaven already.

"We will start with Jimmy, there on the end. If you will Jimmy, tell us what you think Heaven is like." Jimmy stammered through his version of the Promised Land where you didn't have to go to school or eat carrots or spinach and you never got a whipping. My turn was next and I added the .22 rifle each of us would have because Jimmy left that out and there would be chocolate cake and ice cream every day and David could envision nothing but a black stallion with real leather saddle covered with silver conchas on which he would round up the Lord's cattle.

Then we came to little Ellie, the preacher's daughter, who had been squirming for 30 minutes, tipping her head back with her large blue eyes focused on the pearly gates trying to remember all she had been coached to tell. Her enthusiasm got the better of her and she started with the streets and houses that would be "solid gold and silver".

Her father squirmed. She recovered, "And where everything is green and flowers bloom every day."

He caught her eye and smiled. "And no one gets sick anymore and we love our neighbors."

He was beaming and nodding approval. "And, and," she rolled her eyes upward.

"Yes, yes, go on Ellie."

"And all the bushes are loaded with jelly beans and all the springs run soda pop."

We were excused.

Powder Smoke and Sawdust from a Colorful Creede Character

Bill Tingley gets his own section, with different stories, in "Once Around the Thunder Mug," Chapter II, "Bill Tingley — Sawmiller and Moonshiner."

Whiskey Bill Tingley, a sawmiller and moonshiner, kept us supplied with western magazines and ofttimes Sunday excitement. After drinking bouts with friends down the Rio Grande on Saturday nights, Bill found it hard to center on the bridge spanning Willow Creek at the lower end of Creede near our house. We would pile out of bed on Sunday mornings, dress hurriedly, and run to the creek where as often as not Bill's old Chevy truck would be resting nose down with it's front wheels being washed and gathering effluent from the outhouses over the creek further North. It seldom suffered any damage from these slow speed flops but quite often the bridge lost a railing. Depending on his condition at the time Bill either spent the night sleeping it off in the cab of the truck or worked his way out and over the end to groan and hiccough his way home.

Bill had a love affair going with our sister, Pauline, later to be known as Bubbles. His excuse to visit her was invariably to bring the latest western magazines to us boys. He had a terrible hernia and kept it padded with two dirty towels placed in his overalls. Sometimes the padding would slip as he visited with us and with much groaning, moaning and rolling of his bleary eyes, he would push and shove till everything was back in place, the gurgling sounds emanating from the area of the rupture were more than my weak stomach could take and I would excuse myself to run outside trying manfully not to throw up. With the hernia taken care of Bill would work himself into the living room, check to see if Pauline was awake, then hoist her from her crib and return to the kitchen where she would rest against his chest and pull at his beard, perfectly contented and talking to him like she never talked to any of us.

In time Bill moved his sawmill from a gulch West of Marshall Park (then known as Whiskey Park ) to the lower end of Creede where Richard Fairchild's house now sets. This was a steam powered rig and whenever we saw smoke belching from the stack as it was being fired up we halted all other endeavors and raced to the sawdust pile to watch old Bill bark orders to the two helpers and make the adjustments to start the logs through the process of making lumber.

Usually roaring drunk and always attired in several weeks growth of beard, a tattered sheepskin coat that had lost its buttons and a greasy, floppy hat, Bill would ease the throttle to where, by many years practice, he knew the saw was at the proper revolutions then on hands and knees he would adjust the wooden guides that kept the blade true as it zipped through the logs. Next came the part we liked best and we moved to the best vantage point so as not to miss any of it. When all was in order he would stand up, yell something unintelligible and fan the blade with his old floppy hat, weaving back and forth with the tails of the sheepskin coat barely missing the spinning blade. We were sure that someday Whiskey Bill would miscalculate and be drawn and quartered when the teeth caught either the hat or the coat. Even though this meant the end of our western magazines as well as our friend Bill we accepted such an end as inevitable and felt it our duty to witness and report the carnage.

Whiskey Bill survived the many brushes with the blade and went on to other more profitable trades. He owned a Model A Ford pickup when he went into the scrap iron business, loading it unmercifully with stacks of catalogues wired to the universal housing serving as overload springs. Bill tempted fate on all jobs and the new business was no exception. In removing machinery from the old Humphreys Mill for shipment to smelters it was necessary to reduce it to a size he could handle. He used dynamite charges for this and when the fuse was lit he would mosey around till he found a timber or other obstruction to hide behind and await the concussion. In one such situation the timber was much smaller than Bill and dynamite driven cast iron pellets shredded the old sheepskin coat with some penetrating further to lodge in his buttocks. Whiskey Bill had a brief respite from his work while the pellets were removed and the holes healed.

Bill left not long after this and spent his remaining days in Denver. Creede lost one of it's most colorful characters with his departure.

Gentlemen Smoke Pipes

The tobacco-stealing, chokecherry-bush-hideout story below is nearly the same one John tells, in slightly different words, as part of a longer passage in "Once Around the Thunder Mug," Chapter I. The framing here — Charlie Matson's last night, and the pipe itself — is new to this book.

I like it when someone praises me for shunning the nicotine weed but it was not always so. I chewed the pressed leaf and I puffed roll-your-owns with Lee Davis until Charlie Matson, through no conscious effort of his own, cured me of the creeping addiction.

Charlie Matson was laboriously breathing his last share of Creede's high-altitude air in the house now owned by George Ameel. He suffered from various ailments but the latest, old age and pneumonia, would combine to free him of a hard, lonely life and dispatch him to greener pastures where the heathenish Jackson and Davis kids who resided on either side of him could no longer chase Indians from his woodshed or disturb his evening rest.

Dad Bill cared for Charlie in his last days. He fed him, rubbed him with liniment and scorched his chest with mustard plasters to relieve his congestion. On this, his last night, Dad had bathed him in our old tin tub and remained for the death watch afforded all the old timers which he, Kathleen (Dottie) Turnipseed and Gram Lane alternated in service or combined their care so no one would die alone.

We knew Charlie would die this night and we were sorry. We accepted death as the ultimate fate but we feared it and we didn't like to talk about it or hear about it.

These oldtimers had shared stories with us, teased us and, like Charlie, had let us visit their "diggins", see the dynamite and primers that blasted the silver ore loose from waste rock and handle the tools that callused their hands, tightened their muscles and stirred the silica dust that scarred their lungs.

We wanted them to live forever because they were Creede, Colo., and, surely, with each death, part of Creede died, too.

So Charlie died, as expected, and personal effects of no value were consigned to the ash pile that had grown several feet from his south doorway. Such castoffs were treasure toys to us tads and from the housecleaning I retrieved a well used brown pipe with a stem nearly worn through where Charlie had held it with teeth permanently worn down to receive it.

Not only did I have a pipe, but I had a felt lined snap case to protect it and down the hill, just off the railroad tracks, I had a chokecherry bush hideout to conceal this new found prize which certainly was on a par with a two bladed, leather punch jack knife.

After waiting a couple of days to be sure no one of authority knew or suspected I had my own Meerschaum smoker, I borrowed a brown paper bag from Mom Jo's kitchen and trotted to the business section of Creede. I salvaged every cigarette and cigar butt from Phillips' beer parlor to Soapy's pool room, across to the depot and down to Claude Larson's garage, stuffing the bag with a combination of tobaccos that would last through the winter.

On returning to the chokecherry bush hideaway, I dumped the works in a pile and began the tedious job of separating tobacco from paper, carefully saving the foil rings that encircled the most expensive cigars.

With the last shred of tobacco dropped in the sack and a fistful of kitchen matches I had stolen from a box near the courthouse wood heater laid out on a rock, I tamped a charge in the bowl the way I had seen Charlie prepare his pipe and fired it.

I used up half the matches before I could maintain a consistent smoke production. From then on I drew on the red glow like a pro. With the second pipeful I practiced a two-fingered grip with one finger curled under the bowl like Mr. Herbert Barnhart, the English gentleman.

Then I advanced to holding the pipe with my teeth and smoking it upside down like Tommy Eden, the little painter and paperhanger, who always expected wet weather and traveled the least distance with the most steps of anyone I knew.

With the third pipeful I began inhaling and after that I only remember hanging onto the bush as the town revolved around me and the remains of a venison sandwich coupled with green speckles of several sweet pickles splattered the rock where the matches lay and gushed through the dry branches that made up the lower part of my hideout.

Mom Jo could smell tobacco smoke on us from 30 feet away, in a high wind and in skunk season. She took one look at me when I staggered up, glassy eyed and pale complexioned, removed her shoe as she wrinkled her nose then walloped hell out of me as I bent over with no more resistance than a rag doll.

After wearing her arm out and tiring of standing in the path with one bare foot she wagged her finger at me and warned, "Your daddy will use the bullet belt on you when he gets home, too." She could have saved her breath as I was sure I would join Charlie Matson long before Dad came home from work.