Old Cabin

Most of the families moved away from the Arizona Strip and into town so their kids could have the so called advantages of higher education and socialize with more young people, thereby being able to find a "proper" mate. The Taylor Grazing Bill had come into effect and the Public Domain was divided up between the men on the Grazing Board and their friends. This left the people of Bundyville and the other homesteaders round about with no grazing rights except on their own private property. A square mile section of that country would only sustain about 12 head of animals on an average year, not near enough to support a family. The climate was too dry to raise crops of any kind successfully, therefore it was a matter of economic necessity that they go elsewhere. They sold out their land for a small amount to those who had the grit to hang on.

Dad was interested in things other than raising beef so he was one of the first that left. Dick Bundy, a neighbor, stayed a few years longer and then moved to St. George, but he never did sell his homestead of 640 acres. The vandals who passed by soon had all the window glass broken out in Dick's cabin (which was a pretty good house taking into consideration the times and conditions it was built under).

When Ray and I rode up to the old place the doors sagged on the hinges and it had the sad appearance of an abandoned home and a time where history had told its story of former years. I knew of its history, having visited and played with the kids who lived there. Memories of kids, dogs and chickens as they played and ran across its door-yard, even the big golden eagle, still in his white fluff and new feathers, who was a member of the ranch yard community. Dick also had a flock of bronze turkeys that ranged for miles in search of grasshoppers.

The years when I was 6 and 7 my sister and I often walked over to play with Emer and Ray. They were both older than us, about a year respectively. Dick was in the process of making "dobies" for the building of a chicken coup. He would pour water into a small pond-like depression, then shovel dirt into it while we kids tromped around, having a big time. When the mud was of the correct consistency he put it into molds laid out there on the flat ground. After he got all the "dobies" made that he wanted for that day, us kids would run and jump into the empty mud pit and slide

We were having great fun when Ray's feet slid out from under him and he came down on his butt hard and it knocked out a "poop". His dad was still working nearby and gave him a good talking-to: "You never pull capers like that in front of girls!" So from then on that was its name with us boys, "capers" and we'd laugh thinking it was real funny.

One day I was over there visiting and Dick had a blue mare hitched to a one horse cultivator, working a nice patch of corn, about 2 or 3 acres. Money was scarce so a feller had to utilize the materials at hand and Dick had fenced his corn patch by cutting down cedar trees to make a hard-to-penetrate barrier. The corn was up about 2 or 3 feet high and that cantankerous mare ran away with the cultivator bouncing along behind, raising havoc with the corn. It finally came undone and was busted up some. Dick didn't say much about the mare, but I was thinking he ought to get shed of her. None of them of Bundy boys took any great interest in being good horsemen, compared to some of the other cowboys in that country. Dad was good at making horses gentle and dependable even though his interest was along other lines than raising cows. He was a good hand with horses and had trained horses for the Marine Corps during World War I.

I liked Dick and his family. Dick prospected for gold and was a good trapper. The first time I ever saw a bobcat was in a trap not far from his cabin. It sure spooked me with its mean growling and spitting noise. Ray and Emer also trapped rabbits to feed their young golden eagle (saving the best ones for the family). Yep, I had a lot of fond memories of their house, and now it was old and abandoned like the skeleton of a faithful horse. Sure wasn't the same as when Ray's family had lived there.

We didn't have a pack horse or much camp gear or supplies at all. Just a coat and blanket and the clothes on our body, a gallon bucket to carry water in or boil Brigham Tea and 2 cans for drinking. I've got my single-shot .22 rifle and a box or so of .22 long rifle bullets, maybe some jerky and dried fruit. The rifle is our main source of food. Ever since we left home, several days before, rabbit had been our fare whenever we ate (that sometimes was not as regular as our hunger pangs called for), but rabbit meat roasted over hot coals was pretty good and always kept us from being too hungry.

Ray was riding that old runaway blue mare, older now and not so inclined to run but she's still ornery and not very dependable. I'm riding Cheeko, my tried and true friend and companion of many a long trail. He stays fat and will keep going no matter how long the ride. We unsaddle and put our things inside the ol' house.

There's four rooms: the living room/kitchen, where the cook stove is at; the utility and storage room, and two bedrooms. The house is a mess with debris scattered about over the floor. We clean out one of the bedrooms to sleep in and the kitchen where the wood burning stove is.

The cabin sets up on some big flat rocks, about a foot above the ground. It's getting along toward sundown so with my rifle in hand I walk down through the scattered trees in search of cottontails for supper. Ray takes the Brigham Tea bucket and another old can that will hold water and rides over to the pond to fill them. It's located not far from the road and while he's over there someone comes by and tells him there's gonna be a shindig down at the old church and school that evening. He's about 15 years old and even though he doesn't have any clean Levis or shirt, he wants to go. I'm not interested so after we cook up and eat some rabbit he washes his face and saddles ol' Blue Mare and takes out.

Pretty quick I go to bed and the wind blows through the cabin making them old doors creak and bang and a tattered cloth flaps on an inner doorway. I can hear feet scurrying across the floor as I lay there wrapped in my blanket. I've still got my clothes on (they act as part of the bedding), haven't had them off since we left home except to go swimming in the ponds that we chanced to pass by, which keeps us well washed. Out in this clean fresh country there ain't anything to get a feller dirty like there is in town. I'm having a hard time going to sleep in this spooky house but finally must have dozed off, cause morning comes and I look over there at Ray rolled up in his blanket. Must of had a good time cause he's grinning in his sleep.

The sun's just coming up over the top of the Hurricane Rim so I get my .22 and head out in search of breakfast. That Arizona Strip climate and atmosphere has an exhilarating feel to it that makes a feller want to kick up his heels and buck and play. It makes me glad I'm alive and out there. The grass waving in the gentle breeze and there's enough bushes scattered about to give the rabbits cover from hawks and eagles and makes winter feed for them to chew on.

Within half an hour or maybe a little longer, I've got 2 nice fat cottontails that I gut out an pull the skins off. Back at the cabin I start a fire in the old cook stove and after a bed of coals develops, put part of the rabbit on a heavy wire we had scrounged up the day before, also add more water to the Brigham Tea pot and holler at Ray to get up and we eat roasted rabbit. It's a bit burnt black in a few places and raw in others but when it's chawed all up together it's mighty good eating. Ray tells me about the hoe-down as we eat and who all was there. After breakfast we decide to go run in a bunch of Jack Finley's horses that's been pastured in Dick's place. We figure we need a change of mounts and it won't hurt them none to be rode by us fellers. They're ranging over on the base of the Hurricane Rim about as high up as they can get and when they see us coming they take off down that steep incline like a bunch of mustangs and we're right on their tail. It's a fast and exciting run down to the corral.

After some maneuvering around we get them in. There's about 12 or 13 head of good looking saddle horses. They run back and forth on the far side of the corral, snorting and acting real wild. We climb up on the top pole and size them up, deciding which ones we want to ride. The sun is shining nice and it's an all right summer morning. We're just two would-be cowboys enjoying life to the limit.

There's a nice looking bay horse that takes my eye and I point him out to Ray. He says he's looking at the same one, so I say I'll rope him then we'll draw sticks to see who gets him. I get down off the fence and shake out a loop and them ponies are all trying to be the one on the far side, which creates quite a stir. when he gets over on my side I pitch a loop over his head and dally to the snubbing post. He puts up a real fight and would have choked himself down but I gave him slack before he got clear out of wind.

After playing that old line awhile he remembers how to lead. When I pick up a stick and break it in two Ray says "You can have him, I want that striped face horse." The one he's pointing at has got white saddle marks on his back and looks to be 10 or 12 years old. Ray figures the young bay will buck for sure and I'm thinking that way too, but ain't going to back out on that account.

When I put my blanket on him he stands real good, and the same with my saddle. I pull his head around to me and step up on top. He just moves out like a good horse and we're both surprised so I get on and off a couple more times, then rope that old saddle horse for Ray. He's a good old horse and don't act up any. After we're all mounted up on good horses we've got to go someplace so we head out across the valley to Otto Christman's place. He lives over there to the west by the foot of Poverty Knoll. This is good grassland country with some scattered cedar trees and patches of grease-wood brush. We have to pass through Pat Bundy's homestead and by his old cabin. He doesn't live there anymore. His wife went crazy and Pat took some of his boys and moved up on Trumble Mountain where there's a spring of water. He uses this place to winter his cattle. We stop and inspect the ofl'cabin. The rats have pretty well taken it over. My bay horse is behaving himself real good and I've developed a fond feeling for him. He likes to be petted and fussed over and there seems to be a mutual attraction between kid and horse.

When within a couple of miles of the Christman homestead we spot a rider coming our way. As he gets closer we can see it's Otto riding a big black horse that steps along real frisky. We say our "howdys" an visit a minute while Otto tries to keep that black in place. It's one he's just started to break for somebody. Otto's 3 or 4 years older than us and a top notch bronc stomper. He's blond haired and blue eyed with a body like Tarzan. His folks had immigrated over from Norway and he's their only child. They had come out an laid claim to 640 acres of range land that's too dry for farming.

Otto's been looking at our horses and asks where we got them. We tell him they're borrowed from Jack Finley. Yep, that's what he thought. Not long before he'd broke the bay for Jack. Said he'd been inclined to buck and could do a pretty fair job of it, too. Otto was surprised that he's acting so good but I pet Bay's neck and tell him we're good buddies.

When we ride up to the dugout where the Christmans live we see a woman wandering around. Otto says it's his mother and she went sort of strange in the head for want of her homeland. Otto, he likes it out here where there's plenty of room to turn around in and lots of horses to ride. His mother comes in and feeds us some dinner, then we start talking mustangs and Otto offers to take us over to Ivan Patch Spring to see if we can trap some. Ivan Patch Spring, with a little catch pond is located in the foothills on the east end of Poverty Mountain. There's a high net wire fence that encircles it. All that a mustang trapper has to do is shut the gate after the horses go inside to water. Only thing is that them wild ones generally come in to drink during the night time so a feller has to lay in wait.

We get to the spring awhile before dark and size up the lay of the land. The best place to lay in wait is above the trail behind the roots and stump of a dead cedar tree that's laid out flat. Here we can see the gate to the trap and the incoming trail for a ways. The rising hill provides a gentle slope to lay back on.

After talking for awhile in low tones we decide that Ray will take the first watch, which is the easiest and when he gets sleepy will wake me up and I'll do the midnight watch. The moon's up by now and a feller can see pretty good. With our hats for a pillow and saddle blankets to lay on it's a comfy bed. Course we move any big rocks that might gouge our backs and sort of hollow out our laying spots same as a dog or a buck deer, then settle down to do some snoozing. We're confident that Ray will keep a sharp look-n-listen for them wild horses.

After awhile I dream I can hear horses feet a clicking on the rocks and hear 'em snorting and moving around. The dream persists until I wake up and sure enough I can hear horses down below us on the trail. I take a cautious look-see and there's a lot of horses all right, but they're going in the wrong direction! They've all tanked up and are heading out for a couple of days grazing before having to come to water again.

Ol' Ray's laying there dead to the world. Otto comes awake about the same time I did, but all we could do was watch them go. They didn't even know how close they'd come to being caught, but maybe it really wasn't too tight of a squeeze. We both chew on Ray and I took the next watch and Otto from then to daylight, but no more horses showed up.

Before sun up we're headed back across the valley toward the Hurricane Rim. It begins its course a couple of miles south of Dick's homestead and runs north as far as the eye can see. It raises seven or eight hundred feet above the valley floor, maybe a thousand or more in places and sure is a prominent marker on the ol'Arizona Strip.

When we get close to Pat's homestead a stray sheep jumps up, so we rope and tie it to a tree. That afternoon we return on our own horses to butcher him out and carry the meat back to the cabin. We gorge ourselves on that good mutton. Next morning what we can't eat we cut into strips and boil in some salt water, then hang it on a low down net wire fence on the north side of the cabin. It's the only place handy to hang jerky. There's quite a long line of it too and we're thinking how nice it'll be to chew on some good mutton jerky instead of eating rabbit all the time. That night we go to bed well satisfied with ourselves being able to lay in a supply of real substantial food. In the morning when I go out to check the jerky, three-fourths of it's gone! some varmint has got it during the night. After checking tracks it's plain to tell that the thief is of Van Dyke, a "hound dawg" that lives north a ways at my Uncle Martin's place. His nose picked up the scent of fresh jerky and he came up to help his self. We're in a dog killing rage, but never saw hide nor hair of him.

There's been a skunk smell around the cabin ever since we moved in and this morning it's extra strong, maybe a skunk ate some of our jerky too. So that evening we get a coyote trap and set it, baited with a small piece of jerky. Hadn't been in bed an hour when this awful stench filled the cabin and about chokes us to death. We grab our blankets and run out the back door, gaspin for air. That odor is everywhere and we have to go up the flat about three or four hundred yards to get away from it. Here we bed down for the rest of the night.

The breeze carried the worst of that smell away during the night and next morning we find a big skunk in the trap just under the edge of the cabin. I'm for shooting him with my trusty .22 but Ray says it won't kill him dead enough so he goes over to the old rock chicken coop and rustles around in some junk and comes out with his dad's of 30-40 Kraig. He puts a cartridge in it and takes aim. Kerblowy!!! That big bullet kills him all right and blows the trap all apart, too. Being as how we're young fellers our smellers are still keen and sensitive. That odor is just too strong around the cabin for us to stand it.

One afternoon heavy rain clouds came over and water fell in buckets full. Then we got in the cabin and were glad it still sheds water. All the ponds fill up and the grass made a good summers growth, so the cattle and horses got fat and there's a lot left for next winter. But the skunk smell persists and we never do move back into the cabin. We bed down at night on our saddle blankets under a cedar tree with my jacket as a pillow and my blanket to keep out the night time chill. We go swimming every chance we have during the heat of the day and that old blue mare was a pretty good swimmer, but Cheeko was a dry land horse. He'd sink clear to the bottom, then give a big push with his legs to come to the surface for a breath of air, then sink to the bottom again. That's the way he'd cross a deep pond and I'm afraid maybe he'll drown so I didn't try him anymore after a couple of times. Don't seem like he learned that he had to tread water if he's gonna keep his head above the surface. We'd go swimming 3 or 4 times a week an I'm afraid we'd be so clean that it'd make us anemic and wash all the vitamin D off our hides, but we managed to survive.

Another thing we're prone to do when we're riding around and spot a hawk or eagles nest, was to climb up there in it with the young ones while the parents dive-bombed us. Boy! that'd give you a tingle all the way from your heels to the back of your neck. Them little ones have the clearest light blue eyes when they are young, with a noble proud appearance. Their color changes some as they mature, takin on a piercing amber. They can see small things, such a mice, from high in the sky and are very valuable birds to the environment of the rangeland. We were always careful not to hurt them at all.

Roy Bundy's got a small herd of sheep ranging up on top of the Hurricane Rim. We go up and visit Clarence, who's herding them and living in a tent (Boars Nest) but he doesn't offer to feed us, so we ride away feeling that it's a wasted effort. Most sheep camps are glad to have company and will feed a feller to express their appreciation.

We wander down to visit Uncle Martin Iverson and George, our cousin, but the only ones home are Aunt Lilly and that hateful hound dog, Van Dyke. Aunt Lilly, she's deaf and can't hear worth a hoot even with a big horn stuck in her ear. Van Dyke, he's over there under the edge of the house leering out at us and growling. He knows he's a thief and a robber and he knows we know who got our jerky, so he plays it safe and stays in his den.

Finally we run out of things to do so head back home. We visit with Uncle Lee and Aunt Stella the first night and they filled us up on bread-n-milk. Boy was that good, I ate till my belly about busted but them darn kids of theirs are a pester. Seems there's a jillion of them with wet diapers and snotty noses, trying to climb all over ya, (hadn't learned no manners) but we endure and go down to help Duard and Lee Aaron milk a half dozen range cows that give about a quart of milk each. Duard, he adds a little water to the bucket so it'll look like he's done a good job of stripping them of cows. After all, them kids don't know the difference, they'll drink it as long as it's white.

We take out next morning right after a good breakfast of cracked wheat mush with milk-n-sugar on it. Noontime we stopped by one of the "Circle" outfit's cow camps. All the cowboys are out working but the cook thinks we look hungry, so gives us some fried meat, biscuits, and coffee. I don't want any of that black stuff, but Ray gulps down a cup-full. With this regular eating we're starting to fill out, don't feel so gaunt anymore, but that night it's back to rabbits and Brigham tea and we're mighty thankful that I found one to shoot.

Next morning we ride by Parker's store at Wolf Hole, but know we can't buy any grub without money. About 4PM we water up at Mokeyak Spring. The dog-berry bushes are loaded with little bitter-sweet orange berries but after an hour or so of steady picking and eating I can tell we're slowly starving to death, so go over by the spring and shoot 2 or 3 mourning doves. They're not much bigger than the dog berries and I hate to waste my bullets on them but hunger drives a feller to extreme measures.

After we eat them it's about sundown, but there ain't no feed here for the horses. I don't want my little horse to go hungry if I can help it, so we head on down the road and get home in the wee hours of the night. Mom and Dad are glad to see me and I'm glad to be with them (even if they do live in St George).