"Echoes from the Thundermug": Grown Up in Creede, Part One

A White Cross on Iwo Jima

This story — the duck-hunting trip, the shot-up cap at "The Kansas Club," and Walter Workman's death on Iwo Jima — is also told, in slightly different words, in "Once Around the Thunder Mug," Chapter III, under "Moving Down the Social Ladder." Both versions are reproduced here in full, as printed.

I recently saw Harold Workman's name in an article of the The Miner and Tines. The name jogged memories of a family we lived near in South Creede.

Dorothy, Harold and Walter moved in from the ranch for the school term each year. We were especially fond of this family, which withstood more trials and heartache over a short period in the '30s than most of us will endure in a lifetime.

Harold was built like the proverbial brick outhouse as a youth, heavily muscled and rough as a cob. Teamed with Frankie Davis, Les Turnipseed and Clifton Hudson in boxing matches with Civilian Conservation Corps members of the Creede detachment, he handed out more lumps than he took. All four earned the respect of the motley, pre-Army barracks crew from Eastern cities.

Walter Workman, Scooter and myself teamed up to keep the duck population of Mineral County under control during the years the flight plan south included our lakes and streams. It was common there to see flights of canvasback from the Northern grain fields stopping to rest and check the flavor of feed in our marshes.

Walt was armed with a single-shot 10-gauge that his uncle had once fired with the end of the barrel full of snow. This produced a large bulge behind the brass bead sight that left the sight useless. Scooter used a double-barrel 12-gauge that flew apart with each concussion, reducing it to a single shot. I had a single-shot 12-gauge I bought with a summer's odd jobs' earnings that was as deadly in reverse as spewing shot forward.

The 10-gauge of Walter's was a menace to anything in the skies, including low flying aircraft. The bulge in the barrel modified this artillery piece to a double open choke that insured a 50-yard spread of shot at the same distance.

We had rousted the ducks from both Seepage Creek lakes on one hunting trip, followed them down the creek bagging stragglers and ended up on the big bend by the Kansas Club summer home cabins where the call of nature detoured Walt to an outside biffy boasting an entrance door with a genuine door latch complete with white glass knobs.

Before entering this aging, weathered structure he stood the old 10-gauge against a barbed wire fence nearby and hung his cap over a post. The chauffeur-like black cap was a favorite of Walt's. He wore it to everything but evening meals and constantly dusted and shined the visor.

For no good reason at all I retrieved Walt's ten gauge, stepped back several paces and riddled his black cap with No. 4 chilled shot. Needless to say, the blast scared hell out of Walter along with more tangible things and contributed to a shorter-than-normal reign on the throne.

On emerging and surveying the condition of his prized cap, he grabbed my red checkered hunting cap, hung it on the white knob of the biffy door and promptly blew it to smithereens, leaving a gaping, smoking hole where the latch had once served so efficiently.

Another time when Walter became perturbed with me for a lesser crime, he advised me he was going to knock my teeth down my throat. I didn't believe him until I coughed up a couple and expelled them through bloody lips. I sought out John Pemble, gave him the same advice Walter had given me in hopes of restoring some self esteem. John forthwith bloodied my nose. So much for self esteem.

Years later as Walter and I were shaking hands and saying our goodbyes before he and Clarence "Kayo" Slaght boarded the old rattle trap bus that would carry them a part of the journey to Marine Corps training and the Pacific war zone, he turned around and said: "I'd better take a good look at these hills. I might not see them again."

He was right. Walter M. Workman died on Iwo Jima Island when a Japanese mortar round landed near his squad.

So Long to Ed Snow

Ed was born with faulty vision. He was so near-sighted, in fact, that when his mother said he had his nose in a book she meant it literally. He was born, also with a brilliant mind and a desire to not let his handicap prevent him from reaching any goal he set for himself. I had perfect vision but my thinking processes were all screwed up. I never thought like real people so it was only natural that Ed and I would combine our handicaps and talents to become Creede's sanitary engineers, or, as the positions were known in that era, garbage haulers.

We went to work for Hank McCaulley when the city fathers ordered garbage to be collected and hauled to the dump ground, not strewn over the mesa's edge, in ditches or thrown in the neighbor's yard. When Hank moved on to better things, we used our experience to convince the same council we could handle this civic function and should be granted the franchise. After all, it took little thinking or vision to heft 50-gallon drums of crud onto the bed of a truck.

After that no one said "Well, I see Snow and Jackson coming." Instead it was, "Well, I smell Snow and Jackson coming."

There was little overhead in our business. Used oil from the canyon power plant lubricated pistons and bearings of the Model T truck, someone always had an old tire and tube to donate and white gas retailed at seventeen cents a gallon. The largest tax-deductible item was for tokay wine that served to combat the smells before someone dreamed up deodorants.

The city established a fee of 50 cents per month per family or business. That was not quite equitable when a cafe or grocery might have six or more barrels, but we didn't quibble about that. We didn't quibble about the non-paying customers either. After the second or third month in arrears, the old truck would remove several pickets from a fence or cave in the side of a shed to even the score. Ol' Ed kept the radiator and himself supplied with Tokay and the truck never balked at destructive measures as it whistled wine-scented steam from the small hole in the brass radiator cap.

We made so much money we decided to step up the social ladder and blow our minds with real whiskey. We cornered a former coal miner from Trinidad who said he would invest our $1.65 in a pint of Old Stumblefoot if he could have the first drink, after which he warned us: "At first you're going to be so happy you'll feel like singing, then you'll get so big and tough you'll think you can whip Jack Dempsey. After that you'll want to die. If you're lucky you'll be so sick you'll never want to touch the damned stuff again."

He was right on all but the last count. I can still see Ol' Ed rolling around between the rails by the train depot, unable to stand, afraid to go home and ruining his teeth grinding up cinders because he had heard or read somewhere that eating charcoal would sober you up. It didn't sober him and watching his agony didn't sober me, so we went home to face the music.

Ed volunteered for every branch of service. After several turndowns, he memorized the eye charts but without his glasses he could see neither the medic nor the charts and might be facing 90 degrees off as he faked the readoff. With no possibility of shouldering a rifle in the war, he chose the next best thing in national service where his brilliance, over a period of 40 years, vaulted him from munitions laborer to electronics wizard in guided missiles.

In spite of his accomplishments and dedicated service, Ed harbored a guilty feeling over his status while his buddies were ducking bullets in Europe and the Pacific. In the midst of the Viet Nam conflict he volunteered to join the fray with 20 other fools, as he called his team, in setting up new electronics equipment that would help the foot soldier. They arrived just as the Tet offensive hit and were scattered to the winds. Ed and one technician ended up together in a building, scared as hell and wondering what had possessed them to trade their peaceful surroundings for this corner of hell.

To top it off the technician became violently ill and Ol' Ed had to brave the streets again in search of comrades and medicine. As he returned to the building with the drugs he passed an elderly Vietnamese burning trash and gathering up debris from a recent barrage. Ed said he was barely past the old fellow when he received a jolt in his back, hot searing pain then the sound of gunfire. He was sure he was going to die as he ran, stumbling, up the alley but above all he wanted to be with someone he knew when he breathed his last. Finally locating the building he staggered into the room where the technician lay and gasped, "Get your butt out of bed and help me, I'm shot all to hell." As it turned out he wasn't; he had a smudge on his shirt and a red spot on his back where a rock or other object struck him when some kind of explosive detonated in the fire tended by the old Vietnamese.

We exchanged letters over the years until Ed and wife Lila found time to journey to Creede from El Paso, for a short three days of rekindling the friendship and restoring our youth with walks over ground where memories separated from the dust of each footstep. The chicken coop was gone but Ed remembered the spot it had set and the owners of the brood where we had tried to pick out a couple of fryers, late at night, by the light of a kitchen match he held over my head as the watchdog was shredding my right pants leg in search of meatier flavors.

I begged Ol' Ed to kick his teeth in before he hamstrung me but he just giggled and whispered, "Hell no, he'll start barking again if he stops chewing on you."

We spent an evening at The Muckers Bucket. Ed rolled them in the aisles with his tales of our childhood. After his performance we joined Sheriff John McCaghren and wife Dove and John begged us to "bring that curly haired old rascal back again," as he wiped tears of laughter from his eyes.

We tried. We had made preliminary preparations for another reunion with a fishing trip thrown in when Ed called us and informed us doctors had found a small malignant tumor on his prostate gland. The trip would be postponed but he was confident he would lick this invader with the same determination he had overcome other obstacles. His letters were always optimistic but there was an underlying tone of preparation for departure to another life.

We didn't make the fishing trip and we didn't meet again. Ed called when his case was judged terminal with plans to try one more treatment off the continent. It failed and he died in April.

Mom Jo used to tell me I was feeling sorry for myself when I cried at such a loss. She was right but I cried anyway. I felt sorry for myself and I felt sorry for a world that needs more "curly locks" as Ed was called in his youth, and I'll cry again in remembrance of this gifted friend who made fun of himself and collapsed us in heaps, unable to laugh more, as story followed story from the lips of a proud American and friend of all.

Wet Bags and Dry Flies

We were laundering our throats with lager beer in "The Silver Dollar Bar and Grill", washing away the dust and powder smoke gathered in a day's labor in Amethyst five tunnel.

Generally only two topics, girls and mining, dominate our conversations in Woody Woods' establishment but today, in the company of Clarence "Kayo" Slaght, we veer off on fishing. The Slaght brothers are avid fishermen. Henry is probably the best fisherman to wet a fly in waters near Creede and Kayo runs a close second.

This is Saturday evening and with a day off looming before us it takes little prodding to move us from the bar to gather fishing gear, sleeping bags and groceries enough for a night and day working the shaded eddies of Shallow Creek where pan size trout feed on various winged creatures dropping from the willow branches to the water.

We pick up a bottle of hard liquor and a case of beer before taking the short cut over the hill to Sunnyside in old "T-Bone" roaring to startle anything and everyone within earshot as its four cylinders belch fire and smoke propelling us at a fearsome 20 miles per hour or less. Bob Foster is perched on the sleeping bags sampling the contents of the bottle as Kayo co-pilots us to our destination singing bawdy songs and brawling with Foster for possession of the bottle.

There is a limit to what even T-Bone can overcome and when we come to crossed, windfallen trees by an undercut bank signaling that limit, we roll out the sleeping bags in a clearing, start up a fire and sit back to swap fishing yarns. Bob Foster, newly arrived from St. Louis, isn't as yet acclimated and can't hold his liquor as well as the natives. He props his butt on one of the fallen trees and, with his head between his knees, drops out of the conversation.

We are passing the bottle back and forth, swatting mosquitoes, and reliving various experiences when a loud pop from the fire sends a bright ember skittering onto Bob's sleeping bag. It nearly dies, then fanned by a slight breeze, glows and produces cloth smoke. Kayo props himself up and tells Bob he had better check his sleeping bag, smoke is coming from it. Bob slurs, "Let 'er burn, let 'er burn" without lifting his head now considerably lower than his knees.

We chuckle and continue reminiscing as the smoking ember turns to a bright red ring nearly in the center of the bag and small fingers of flame dance as gusts of wind pass us. Kayo again warns Bob that his bed is afire. Bob raises his head high enough to see the smoke and mumbles, "Let 'er burn, she'll be warm for me when I crawl in."

Kayo and I can stand it no longer. We round up a couple of rusting cans and begin dipping water from the creek to extinguish this now full grown fire. We scatter several cans full over the fire area then as I hold the bag open Kayo sloshes a muddy can full inside. We roll on the ground laughing, picturing old Foster sleeping in this sodden mass then we do it all over again with several more cans full inside. We are holding each other, roaring with laughter, when we see Bob threading his way into one of the other bags. We are ready to pull him out and dump him in the fire-scorched, soaking-wet bag when he jerks up the draw string cover where light from the fire clearly shows "R. Foster" stenciled across the cloth.

I am trying to dry out the still intact upper half of my sleeping bag as Foster snores away in a drunken stupor. This will be a very long night.

Harry, Bernie & the Blond Bomber

This story is also told, in slightly different words, in "Once Around the Thunder Mug," Chapter II, under "Bernie, Harry and the Blond Bomber." Both versions are reproduced here in full, as printed.

I was clickety-clacking out a report to mining investors as Inez peeled potatoes for the evening meal, smarting over some wrong or imagined wrong I had done her.

I believe it was the time I bought a quart of bourbon for her birthday feeling we should buy gifts we could share. She was using my favorite hunting knife and trying to denude a potato with a single peeling as she crabbed at me. I had the old Remington typewriter fairly smoking with fingers that flexed and found the keys with ease long before various accidents transformed them into instruments that could point in four different compass directions at the same time.

I had kept my mouth shut, determined to avoid a blowup that would bring the neighbors to their windows, but when this former Kansan wanted to exchange blows, nothing short of a hurricane could prevent it. She became so angry when I wouldn't volunteer a part of the argument she stormed into the living room with a potato in one hand and the hunting knife in the other.

As she rehashed the dismal performance of her husband over the first three years of married life, she cut figure eights in the air less than a hairs width from my adams apple, with the knife, pausing only at intervals to stick the point in the potato for emphasis. No laxative in the world can relieve the bowels as fast as the sight of a mad female with a sharp knife, but for the time it took to vent her feelings nothing moved in my body and for the next several minutes the only discernible movement was each hair on my head slowly falling back into place.

We should learn from such near fatal happenings but some of us can't help ourselves in tempting fate with the female sex.

Take Harry Larson and Bernie Soward for instance. This was, very likely, the longest lasting and most durable friendship of any duet in Creede ending, only, with the untimely death of Bernie. Harry tells me, however, that he still visits with the old sea dog on nostalgic sojourns to the cemetery and I have no cause to disbelieve him.

Harry and Bernie were two-fisted drinking men in the '30s while doing various jobs around the camp and leasing ground in the "Big Six" tunnel of the Silver Horde Lode in Sunnyside camp. By some act of fate, they pointed a drill in the right direction and made a rich discovery of silver ore.

This news was received with mixed emotions by close relatives. The idea of the mining enterprise was to keep them out of sight and free of the trouble they were prone to propagate with only the faintest hope of it being successful. Their wives were especially fearful of the change the sudden good fortune might bring about in this pair.

Harry, heretofore, had always come out second best in his exchanges with Mary and she wanted to keep it that way. Bernie, on the other hand, held the upper hand over his "Blond Bomber", as he called her. With a deep, gruff voice and his rolling walk left over from a tour with the Navy, he looked and sounded like he could handle a grizzly bear.

They needn't have worried. Success didn't spoil these pals in the least. After outstanding bills had been paid their profits were well received by the various business concerns in and around Creede. They continued to drill, blast and muck the silver ore for shipment and were receiving minimal recognition as pillars of the community.

This possibly could have produced mining tycoons to equal the greats of the 1890's had Bernie not pushed his luck too far. Harry had stopped to pick up his partner in the '30 Chevy they used for transportation to the mine. Waking Bernie on his way to the kitchen Harry started a fire in the range and prepared the coffee pot for brewing as Bernie roused himself from bed.

Once on his feet and nearly awake, Bernie drug the thundermug from under the end of the bed as he groused at Harry, scratched himself and vented gas, generated during the night, through his long handled underwear and in the direction of "The Blond Bomber's" head as was his ritual before urinating. Engrossed, as he was, in his first activity of worth of the day, he was unaware of a stirring in the bed.

Harry, who by now had drawn up a chair to listen in comfort to the groans, belches and other sounds emanating from Bernie, kept his eyes and ears tuned for a rumble from the coffee pot and the accompanying steam signaling the elixir, that would prepare them for the rigors of the day, was ready. He, too, was unaware of imminent catastrophe.

Bernie's nickname for his wife was well conceived. The initial stirring in the bed erupted into a full scale storm of flailing arms and legs that, in its pent up fury, reduced him to a battered hulk and crowned him with the thundermug as a final act of defiance.

Harry's allegiance toward his best pal had reached a crossroad where discretion became the better part of valor. On witnessing the thundermug's journey through the air, he retired from the battle arena, hoping The Blond Bomber would spare enough for a decent burial.

Bernie lived through the fracas and, though it ended in divorce, his love and respect went on for his Blond Bomber.

Minnie Pearl Was a Smart Mining Mule

The runaway-mule-cars incident below is also told, in slightly different words, in "Once Around the Thunder Mug," Chapter III, under "The Trials of Minnie Pearl." Both versions are reproduced here in full, as printed.

In the early 1940's Emperius Mining Company began renovating the old Reynolds Tunnel (Commodore 5 level). The company had successfully explored hanging wall veins in the upper workings using Amethyst 5 tunnel during that period and it became necessary to have lower access to the productive veins for larger tonnage and to lower the cost of transportation.

My dad, Bill Jackson, was foreman of the project; Charles Johnson, carpenter and mechanic; Billy Weaver Mule skinner and Bernie Soward, timberman and alternate skinner; Lyle Alspaugh and Fred Lane, miners. Gene McClure, Harry McClure and John Slater were leasing the Archimedes claim and working part-time for the company. I was general flunky.

A mule named Minnie Pearl had been transferred from Amethyst 5 tunnel for the haulage run. Minnie stood a couple hands too high for the smaller tunnel and drifts of the Amethyst workings and resented her second class status with the two horses of longest tenure there, Teddy and Brownie. The change in scenery and companions suited her well.

We had hand-winched tunnel cars from the Nelson Tunnel area below the Reynolds Tunnel to make up two trains of six cars each. These cars held one and one-quarter tons fully loaded and dumped either endways or from the side. With two trains one could be left inside on sidings to be loaded as the other was pulled out. Each job was hand powered then; the cars were switched by hand, loaded with square point shovels and once outside were unchained one by one and pushed to the end of the track to be dumped. Minnie Pearl had one area where she stepped out of the tracks to be unhitched and waited until all the cars were dumped and chained up before she could again take her place at the end for the return run. The end cars had platforms for the skinner to stand on equipped with a foot brake that seldom worked.

Minnie Pearl learned the routine in short time, handled the chore with ease and became a much-loved partner in the program. She was fed grain in addition to only the best native hay. The skinners used a four-pound coffee can to mete out the oats and barley in a box by the stall where she was quartered in her leisure time.

This was in a two story barn that set just south of the portal. Gene McClure saw to it that Minnie had an extra ration quite often and fed it to her by hand while rubbing her forehead, scratching her ears and telling her how beautiful she was. The old girl loved it and gave Gene special recognition.

The tunnel was cold even in summer due to fast air circulation through the raises and drifts that connected with the Commodore and Last Chance Mines. The skinners would turn their backs to Minnie Pearl when she was safely in the main tunnel, pull their collars up against the breeze and stay this way until emerging to sunlight at the portal. This position also kept their carbide lamps from blowing out.

Gene McClure and I had been working on trestle sets for the waste track one day as Gene was waiting to use the mule and train to pull ore for a smelter shipment from a chute used by him, Harry and John in their lease. We had just come up to track level on our way to the shop for lunch when he spotted his gal, Minnie Pearl, on her way out with a train. Bernie Soward was skinning in relief this day and as usual had his back to Minnie and the portal. Gene ran on high to the barn, grabbed the coffee can and just as Minnie and Bernie cleared the portal he let out a whistle and shook the coffee can at arm's length. Poor old Minnie Pearl had learned her job well and knew she still had a couple hundred feet to go before stepping out of the rail but the thought of rolled oats and barley waiting in that coffee can was more temptation than she could cope with.

She stepped from the tracks, overturned three cars, and was pawing for all she was worth before the combined weight brought her to a halt. Bernie had turned around in time to see her veer off and jumped clear as the lead car overturned. Bernie was a big and powerful man and Gene hadn't fully realized the consequences of his act till the cars started overturning. While Bernie was sorely engaged in venting every swear word he had learned in a navy hitch or two and trying to back Minnie up to release the single tree Gene took a circuitous route back to the shop where I was standing enjoying the show, from there he ran out and was all hands helping Bernie calm Minnie Pearl. Gene led her to the barn as Bernie stood back, puffed up like a bullfrog, still trying to figure out what had gone wrong. He hadn't seen Gene rattle the grain can nor had he heard the whistle but he suspected mule play. He strongly suspected Gene McClure was involved. Bernie ranted and raved through an hour of righting cars and cleaning up the spillage pausing only long enough at intervals to ask Gene where in hell he was when Minnie was sidetracked.

After a couple of weeks Minnie Pearl's tender psyche had healed and gruff old Bernie was bragging about how "his mule" had slid three loaded tunnel cars on their sides and would have taken the rest if he hadn't stopped her. Gene McClure joined in the praise.

Ben's Economy

Letters to the editor of The Miner and Tines from old friends are far too infrequent but they serve to fan the embers of memory and regress us to more pleasant times when apple pies and sweet rolls grew in ovens of wood stoves in little white houses, when mothers gathered for sewing sessions, and fathers told tall tales to short tads as the popcorn bowl was passed around on Saturday nights.

Cora Helmick recently wrote the editor. In reading her words I had an instant playback of a somewhat paunchy fellow with a cigar rolling from side to side of his mouth who was her husband, Ben. Ben looked like a grocer, operating the Economy Grocery that served the people of Creede from the building now housing Quiller's gallery. His apron was bloodstained from wielding knife and saw on the butcher's block, smudged from carrying boxes to restock the shelves and the deflected ashes from the ever present cigar when it was burning.

Ben had a customer who annoyed him like a rock in his shoe. An old maid schoolteacher spent an hour each evening bruising fruit and vegetables before making her 30 to 40 cent purchase. One evening as she started her ritual, Ben offered to squeeze her fruit and select her banana as a time-saving gesture. Miss Young attached an entirely different meaning to his generosity and pranced out in a huff never to return to the Economy Grocery. He lost one of his few cash customers that evening but the fruit and vegetable department profited from the encounter.

Ben hired us school kids from time to time for the various chores we could handle in his business. Gavin Skinner showed an aptitude for clerking and was always polite and neatly dressed so Ben employed him between school terms one year, which proved very beneficial to both until he upgraded Gavin's duties to include preparing hamburger. While stuffing the maw of the grinder, Gavin let his fingers slide low enough to get the ends of a couple of digits entangled with the metal worm and processed a few ounces of pork, beef, human hamburger. Mae Lucette, a widow and permanent fixture of Creede, was very finicky in the food line. After hearing of Gavin's accident she hurried to the store to ask Ben if he had disposed of the hamburger and washed the grinder. Ben advised her through the well chewed remains of his cigar, "Certainly not Mae, Gavin's fingers were clean and he stopped short of the bone. You know I never have bone in my hamburger."

Ben's only trouble was he trusted everyone. No one left without groceries from his store during the depression years and too many forgot their overdue bills, forcing Ben to close the business he loved. He was a very versatile fellow, however, and went on to other endeavors which included serving as city electrician, bulldozer operator and manager of the Solomon Mine and Mill. God bless you Cora and Ben, you are fondly remembered by this house.

Boxers Highlighted Old Traveling Circuses

During the Great Depression, Creede provided a weekend stopover for small circuses eking out a bare living in Western circuits, traveling in junker trucks held together with baling wire and faith.

There would always be a wild animal show consisting of a toothless tiger or lion, an elephant, a couple of monkeys and a python. The tattooed lady was placed among various concession stands, and the prizefighters' ring was in a tent second in size to the wild animal tent.

We were more attracted to the fighters than the wild animal show. A couple of planks were placed on cross-bucks outside the tent and the pug uglies paraded on the planks in boxing trunks, yelling and threatening passersby to draw a crowd.

Creede boasted a fair boxing team at the time. Ernie Thompson, a welterweight, was a skillful boxer and hard puncher; Allen Hosselkus and Kid Caplan carried the lightweight banner; Woodrow Wintz and Tard Wardell were our heavyweights.

Fay Franklin and Pete Bruns sparred, trained and coached the team in their spare time. They journeyed to Monte Vista, Alamosa and other Valley towns to meet the stable of Doc Diaz of Antonito as well as local pugilists.

One boxing card I remember well was staged in a tent next to A.H. Major's grocery store. In the hoopla preceding the bouts, the carnival's champ bounced on the planks, showing off his muscles as he challenged each one in the crowd to swap punches with him. There were no takers, so he jumped down and ran to the sidewalk where Little Joe Vigil from Wagon Wheel Gap was talking with friends.

The pug flattened Little Joe with one roundhouse swing, then ran back and vaulted up on the planks where he told us we were all cowards, that he could whip a dozen Creedites at one time.

Someone took the word to Ernie Thompson and within minutes he was on the planks by the rabble rouser who took one look at him and said he had a fellow on one of the concessions who would take care of him. Shortly after that exchange, Woodrow Wintz joined them and the two main bouts were set.

Ernie Thompson won his bout over the carny hand with a decision, and Woodrow Wintz entered the ring for the main bout. This one had a purse of $5 for anyone who could go three rounds with a heavy who had fought Max Baer, Slapsie Maxie Rosenbloom and Primo Carnera, if we could believe the announcer. From the looks of the fellow, he must have tangled with a few hundred more.

Round one found Woody being butted, gouged, elbowed and wrestled into clinches without getting to throw many punches. The old pug had cauliflower ears, a nose that looked like a squashed toad and walked on his heels, but he was smart enough to know he had to stay in close with Woody after looking at the length of his arms and the muscles that drove them.

In round two, Woody managed to dance outside and clipped the champ a couple of good right crosses. It looked good for the "Silver Haired Kid from the Silver City" as Woodrow was often billed, that is, until near the end of the round when the old ringmaster wrestled his way inside, butted Woody's head straight up, then gave him an uppercut that dumped him on his trunks.

The bell rang. Pete Bruns and Kid Caplan dragged him back to his stool where the Kid waved smelling salts under his nose as Pete asked, "What day is it?"

Woody replied, "It sure isn't my birthday."

Pete held up two fingers, "How many fingers do you see?"

"Two," Woody replied.

Pete held up four fingers, "Now, how many do you see?"

Woody bellowed, "Jeesuscrist, Pete, I'm gettin' the hell beat out of me out there and you want to play school?"

Hard Water

Charles L. Lane, my grandfather and my pal, used to say, "If we can live through January, the rest of the year will be all downhill."

Winter is like the arrival of an unwanted relative for a long visit and January is winter personified. Pipes freeze, cars won't start, expenses go up, the tax man cometh and tempers are shorter than the rise of our thermometers.

Grandad Lane had a couple of wooden barrels for his water supply, which he filled with water from the Rio Grande. His team never failed to start, though it sometimes took a crack or two of a whip to stir the pair, Shorty and Chubby into action.

We never really appreciated Creede's gravity-fed water system during winter. The only insulation I can remember was sawdust filling the space between studs or newspapers stuffed in the cracks. Electrical wiring consisted of two wires in the attic with drop cords from the ceiling and no outlets that might spark a fire cluttered the walls. Real, bonafide insulation didn't make its entry until the water system was installed and then only in the area of the waterworks.

We were tapped in and Dad Bill cursed the improvement daily in winter time but it saved his sons and heirs at least an hour each Monday morning when we loaded the copper boiler and rinse tubs from a faucet on a stand pipe in the kitchen instead of the rocked-in well on the back porch.

We were nearly always able to keep that single pipe from freezing by wrapping it with gunny sacks under the floor while the upper extension was heated by the wood-coal cookstove nearby. It wasn't until Gene Thom installed a water tank by the stove with a water jacket in the firewall and a real, honest to gosh, cabinet sink with dual faucets that we got into trouble.

Our house had settled unevenly over the years leaving air holes in the foundation, each one pointed toward the waterlines, it seemed. When the temperature drifted below zero we could count on being awakened by the sounds of cursing, banging of pipes and the smell of a carbide lamp as Dad worked his way beneath the floor joists heating the exposed pipe. We would all converge on the trap door where he would be turning the air blue as he ran the lamp flame to and fro on the lines.

We had two more carbide lamps we would fire up, plus rolled up newspapers that singed cobwebs and charred the joists. It's a wonder we didn't burn the place down but I believe Dad Bill would have cheered had we reduced it to a pile of ash.

In time, he purchased a gasoline blow torch that John Slater taught him how to operate and from then on the thawing process was a snap. All we needed was several coffee cans full of water to put out the fires behind Dad as he torched and coughed his way from waterline to waterline.

Bill Kolisch was the first person, I believe, to use a direct current generator to thaw waterlines in Creede. I remember Dad advising "It'll blow everything to hell," but it didn't and Bill was kept busy going from house to house until the city bought the equipment.

For Inez and myself, the last freezeup was in the winter of 1966-67 while we were driving a tunnel in Bondholder. We had drained the waterworks of the home in Creede through a gate type stop and waste valve in the cellar and had generously wrapped the entrance pipe to a point above the valve with insulation.

In early winter a pet groundhog of Will and Sandy Dietzel, our neighbors, had departed. They assumed she had gone into hibernation and thought no more about it. She had, indeed, gone into hibernation, in our cellar. For a snug, warm bed, she had clawed the insulation from the pipe and in so doing, had opened the valve slightly.

When we returned in early spring, the mixing faucet of the kitchen sink rested a full two inches from the base on a pedestal of ice. Other faucets and connections were in a similar or worse condition but furry little Henrietta had slept through it.

Mule Skinners of 40-Years Ago Were a Hardy Breed

Today with rubber-tired loaders roaring and growling as they remove 40 or more tons of broken rock from a tunnel face in minutes, it is hard to picture mules and horses pulling eight-ton loads in trains of six cars a short 40 years ago in the mines of Creede.

Mule skinners were a hardy breed. The incoming air in the tunnels in winter chilled them to the bone and the reverse circulation in warm weather carried with it all the smells associated with mining as well as silica-laden dust. A typical working day required four loaded trips out plus pulling loads of supplies on the return trips.

Byron (Pappy) Fairchild, Art Fairchild, Bernie Soward, Foster Elliot, Billy Weaver, Vic Miller, Pete Piloski, Ivan Teems, Bill Mathews, Grover Plunkett and George Kershner were skinners during my first years with Emperius Mining Co. Of the group, Grover had the shortest run at the job.

Erick Nelson, superintendent, knew his men. Anyone with a hangover was either sent home or benched in the dry room to sleep it off. Erick detected unsteadiness in Grover one day as he missed the hook several times trying to hang a carbide lamp on Brownie's harness collar. Taking him out of earshot of the rest of the men, Erick asked him to stay out of the hole for a couple of hours and rest up. Grover insisted that he was okay.

"I'll get a cup of coffee, Erick," he said, "and the first trip in that cold air will be all I'll need."

With misgivings, Erick let him hitch onto his string of tunnel cars and head for the portal. First trip out, Grover was a new man. He and Erick swung the cars over the grizzlies, letting the ore trickle through the bars, with the coarse rock bouncing down to the sorting tables.

"I'll have another cup of coffee and see you around 11," Grover hollered as Erick returned to the cap house that doubled as his office.

At a quarter of 11, Erick felt the vibration of the approaching ore train and as it passed him in the snowshed, he could hear Grover singing "Swanee River" at the top of his lungs as he swayed to and fro on the step of the lead car. When Erick reached the ore bins, Grover had just unhitched his horse, started to step back from the rails and fell flat on his face. With a groan and rustle of his mackinaw, he rolled on his back and began snoring.

Grover was relieved of his duties with Emperius when Erick checked his coffee thermos and found the remains of a pint of 90 proof he had poured into it before coming on shift.

Foster Elliot was one of my favorite people. He had flirted with both wealth and poverty as a rancher several times before settling in Creede to become a "skinner" in the Amethyst 5 tunnel. Foster loved his horseflesh. He was especially fond of his job partners, Teddy and Brownie, the firm-muscled pair that helped the Emperius Mining Company become one of Creede's most stable firms. No horse that Foster worked went to the stables without a rubdown and currying from this stocky ex-rancher.

Foster had a son, Hoot Elliot, who piloted B-17 bombers in World War II. He lived for the day when Hoot would return from battle and they would raise horses on a ranch in Kansas. Hoot returned but the old skinner never realized his dream. A heart attack accomplished what German gunners failed to do and Foster joined his son not long after.

Foster loved poker next to horses, and he was a two-fisted drinker. One night, after a losing streak in Soap's Pool Hall and Barber Shop, where poker was a sideline, he ventured further up the main drag where miners were whooping it up in the bars. During the course of the evening, he met Ty Poxson, who suggested they have a rest period and retire to his house where he would cook them a steak.

Foster hung his denim jacket over a kitchen chair, flipped his Stetson to a space in the corner and settled back with a cup of black coffee as Ty heated bacon grease in a large skillet and seasoned the T-bones.

"How do you like your steaks," Ty asked as he placed one in the skillet to a roar of spattering grease.

"Branded light and still a 'bellerin'," Foster replied. "Flip 'er over quick."

Ty had barely turned the steak when Foster was on his feet, ordering, "Get it out of there! Jeezuscrist, do you want to kill it?"

As Foster worked with knife and fork in a platter of blood, Ty thoroughly killed his own steak.

"A View from the Barroom Floor"

I liked the way Red Johnson announced to us he was through going to bars. "I can't take any more of people stepping on my hands after midnight and," he further stated, "I don't like looking up to people."

I enjoyed my period of drinking. It relieved me mentally and physically, at times it totally relieved my digestive system in whatever manner was most expedient. A snootful of 90 proof also gave me the nerve to make propositions that either got my face slapped or made for an exciting evening.

We had an exceptional drinking crew in the late '40s. We had a philosopher of sorts in Gavin Skinner. We had Les Turnipseed who could settle differences of opinion with a minimum of oratory and we had our poet, thespian and stand up comedian in Herb Hutchinson who usually started a round of socializing with his version of "The Ballad of Dangerous Dan McGrew" and a recitation:

Herb was unpredictable. We had departed the city of Creede one spring day when it became apparent we would be contributing to the street and alley fund if we remained in such an unsocial atmosphere. We were tooling along passing spirits and bits of wisdom back and forth when Herb cleared his throat and shouted, "Halt! Halt this conveyance at once." We all piled out as soon as Gavin braked to a stop clearing a path for Herb who we thought was about to chuck his cookies and none of us wanted to be in his line of fire. He staggered through the churned up dust to an old boot on the roadside. On hands and knees, with one arm extended, he begged, "Give me your hand old fellow, down is not defeated, let me help you to your feet."

It was a sterling performance and I was crying with laughter when Les raised Herb off the ground with one hand and placed a fist within inches of his nose. "If you ever pull a stunt like that again, I'll break your damned neck," he advised. From my prone position, where I could see Herb surveying the size of that fist, I was certain he would never do it again.

None of us will ever forget our old friend and railroad engineer Clyde "Unc" Hood who joined us infrequently. Unc always brought his Big Ben alarm clock and when seated at the bar pulled it from a large pocket of his old army overcoat and placed it by his drink. This perturbed the bartender after it became a ritual and he asked Unc, "Why don't you leave that contraption at home? Anyone of us will be glad to tell you the time."

Unc replied, "Well Irvie, you know I've drank to excess at times and had trouble getting home; now I drink only as long as I can see the hands on my clock."

Having just completed a census questionnaire reminded me that just 30 years ago Gene Dooley and I got all corned up and helped two fellows take census in Monte Vista. Not only did we help in the census but we preceded a fire engine and crew to an emergency and became persona non grata for a period of time. We would have loved to have gotten out of the way of the firefighters but there was no room to negotiate and all we could do was try to outrun them. We were somewhat handicapped in that the driver was drunk and couldn't shift from low.

And there was our married friend, Earl, who with his wife sang duets at many social gatherings. Earl had a wandering eye and at a late hour during an Elks dance he came up missing. His wife inquired around to see if anyone had seen him then feeling he must have become sick she departed for home wherein she found old Earl bedded down with a lass of dubious morals. With lights on and no safe retreat he excused himself with "Oh, honey, I was so drunk I thought it was you."

She threw the lady out, then beat Earl to a bloody pulp. She later said, "I could have forgiven him for anything except saying he thought that little tramp was me."

Of Hell Cats and She Ghosts

Melvin "Red" Johnson emerged from one of the pickups used to haul miners from Creede to Amethyst five tunnel with cuts and bruises on his face, one eye discolored and puffed tightly closed. Superintendent Art Davis caught sight of him and asked, "What in hell happened to you Red? You look like you've been drug through a knothole backwards."

Red replied, "I'll never believe Pug Sutherland again. He said he was going to whip my butt then he hit me square in the face."

Then there was Gene Dooley who decided spontaneously to jump on the rim of a sump bucket being lowered to seven level and visit the miners there. The hoist man, unaware Gene was a passenger, let the bucket free fall sliding down 4" x 6" wooden skids at a fast clip to where the vein changed dip; then a temporary slowing as the bucket swung over and was guided for the rest of its journey on the opposite side. Gene was trying best to hold onto the cable, keep his carbide lamp working and turn with the bucket at the switchover. Unfortunately, he didn't flop fast enough and was left hanging on a protruding nail head. When rescued, Gene was undecided on whether the testimonial should go to CF & I steel for the strength of the nail holding him or Big Smith for the strength of its overalls.

Paul Hosselkus and Norman Birdsey were stoping a block of ground from seven level to five level Amethyst they had blasted the previous evening and were easing up the ladders of the South Manway as frequently rocks would be blown into or dislodged in the Manway where they could fall on the ascending workers if jarred. Norman was in the lead and came to a large rock resting on a ladder rung, he pushed it toward the hoisting slide where it could drop to the bottom causing no damage but unluckily for Paul, it bounced back and struck him squarely on his hard hat. Paul, with hat band broken, one blink from unconsciousness, and his hat rammed as far down his face as it could travel, was holding as tightly to the ladder as was possible in his condition. Norman hearing the "kerwhop" as the rock flattened Paul's hat, looked down and muttered, "Whoops, excuse me fuzzy," started the ascent again and as an afterthought advised, "Better stay a little closer if you can't duck any better than that."

Tom Phillips, our foreman at Amethyst five had lowered Donald Powell to nine level to do some maintenance work. Donald had completed his jobs and belled Tom to hoist him back to five level. On the return journey, which took a few minutes with the old tugger at eight and one half raise, Tom wedged the air feed in position then stationed himself at the square opening where the skip with Donald in it would appear. He turned off his electric hat lamp and prepared to grab Donald and scare him just as he cleared the platform. Donald on the way up, had decided to turn his light off, squeeze back in the skip and let Tom believe he hadn't gotten on at nine level. With no illumination of any kind, a mine is a very black hole and here were all the ingredients of a disaster. In total darkness it is extremely hard to estimate time. Tom was becoming nervous thinking he should be able to see light from Donald's lamp as he approached the platform. Donald was equally as edgy at not being able to discern the shape of the platform above him from Tom's light. Suddenly there was a clatter and bang as the skip left the guides and the cable clamps squealed into the sheave wheel. Both lights came on simultaneously as Tom dove for the hoist to release the air feed and Donald scrambled for a timber in case the whole apparatus pulled out. They laughed themselves silly over the incident, but vowed never to pull such a trick again.

Sweet Beetles

I waved to a Colorado State Trooper the other day while traveling to a project. Through my rear view mirror I saw his brake lights flash as he slowed to turn on a side road, where I'm sure he radioed for identification of my vehicle and to inquire if a mental case had stolen a pickup and was on the loose.

I happen to like law officers. I wave to troopers and patrolmen wherever I travel and they always appear surprised at the gesture but through the years several peace officers have helped me. I respect them and deeply appreciate the service they offer.

One time in Creede, a member of the first order of Courtesy Patrolmen helped us halt a Model A roadster that refused to heed the warnings of a stop sign. Though not driving or aiding and abetting, I paid four days wages divided in $7.50 fine and $2.50 court costs for this service. Lucky for us Patrolman Nash was approaching the intersection just as we ran through or God knows where we would have been now with ten dollars cash and gas at nineteen cents a gallon.

And there was Glen Hunt, marshal of Creede, who pointed me in the right direction late at night and advised, "Better go home Johnny. I can't hurt you any worse then you'll be hurting in a couple of hours." He was right.

Patrolmen have helped my friends, too. One of my dearest friends was driving home from a round of visiting in Del Norte at a moderate speed, as he steered up the barrow ditch vaulting culverts, so as not to impede traffic in any fashion. He was stopped by a resident patrolman who asked if he was intoxicated. Donald answered, "Do you think I'd be riding with myself if I was sober?" He received 10 days free board and room in Rio Grande County as he was brushed up on driving techniques.

One cold winter night, I was practicing pushing 55-gallon barrels through snow banks with a Chevrolet truck when both the truck and my faculties quit simultaneously. Bill Kolisch was Creede's marshal at the time and committed me to the care of my bride, whose detoxification center featured near raw eggs and pancakes browned just enough to keep the batter in.

Through a supreme effort I kept the works down until I was out of her sight. After retching again, deep in the Amethyst mine, I had recovered enough to have my vision restored when George Hatfield, the big "Kentuckian", offered, "Only time I've been that sick was when I ate half a beetle in a bowl of rice and sorghum. Tasted pretty good till I saw the front half of the beetle looking up at me from the rice with one wing still hangin' on." The next round brought up my toenails.