The Family at Serpiente

by Raymond Tolman

  This time it was Ken who came to our defense, “Rivers are the veins through which the lifeblood of this continent flows. They were the routes that all ancient people traveled, not only for water but for food and shelter.”

  “Well, that’s true, answered June, “however we still have immediate problems to solve, the running of this ranch and the historical society challenge.”

  For a few days we were worlds apart, thinking of other places, times, and events while all the time spending long hours every day working the ranch. But our thoughts often involved the beauty and complexities of the moving water of rivers. The trial and error method of learning an art like river running could be fatal. You only drown once. All river runners, as a basic requirement of the art, learn that the quickest way to master the art of river running is through the experiences of others.

  For many runners, money is often the bottom line, requiring creative thinking and resulting in research hopefully generating and contributing to the general knowledge pool. Fortunately for us river runners, we really didn’t care, expenses were irrelevant. We knew we could draw upon the financial resources we had accumulated and banked at Serpiente, but preferred not to. It was great insurance but only if things turned bad. We were by nature, frugal, besides we discovered that the only real expense, after we acquired our basic equipment and food was the cost incurred while traveling to and from the river they were exploring.

  Late one day, everyone was relaxing while June and I prepared dinner. I asked everyone what seemed, to me, an innocent question; “Who was the first person who actually used canoes in New Mexico?” No one had the faintest idea except for Aunt June. In her studies as an undergraduate student of archeology she had read just about everything possible regarding New Mexico history. She knew of only one river in New Mexico where canoe use had been documented; the Canadian River located in extreme northeastern New Mexico. In its primal state the Canadian River was actually floated in canoes from parties who were coming and going from what would become Texas and Oklahoma. The river served as a natural route for American Indians who paddled from as far away as Arkansas up to where Conchas Lake is today. From there on up are rapids on the main river which would have been avoided by the Indians. The Indians left their canoes at the confluence of Conchas River and the Canadian River then by following the Conchas River they could find their way into central New Mexico. Given enough water they may have dragged their canoes up the tiny Conchas River. After they did their trading they would float or carry their goods back to the confluence, and ride the Canadian as far to the east as they pleased.

  The tiny Conchas River flows through present day Las Vegas, New Mexico from its headwaters high in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Suddenly we were intrigued over the idea of running the Canadian River but we still had no idea how to spin it into a historical research project.

  Immediately I began to research the practicality of running the Canadian river but quickly discovered that the river of old was simply not the same river as today. Today, only a few sections of the Canadian are run by river runners and then only on high water years. Most of the water that usually runs down the river is now impounded behind dams leaving only certain sections available for the white water enthusiast. Most river runners that we talked to avoided it. Unlike rivers like the Chama, the San Juan, and many other scenic rivers the Canadian is simply too remote and dangerous.

  Many of those dangers had nothing to do with the actual river. There were many practical problems that would need to be solved. There are few places where the river and roads cross. Working with a support vehicle would be difficult. They were faced with survival questions, basic questions, such as; ‘Is it possible to carry that much food, can we eat the local cacti, fried rattlesnake, rabbit, or perhaps fried grasshoppers served on rice.’ If they decided to run that river, deprivation would be the norm. Hidalgo and Corey seriously doubted whether or not I would be up to the job, but I had other ideas. Besides, there were other rivers, particularly in Colorado and Utah which would be more likely great candidates to run but not particularly suited for our historical research involving a New Mexico. Not so secretly, I was investigating the possibility of doing research that involved actually floating down a New Mexico river rather than spending long days searching through dusty history books.

  After several days of pondering and research, no one had come up with an idea for historical research, much less one that involved rivers that a person in a canoe could float. So far their best bet was the Rio Grande which flowed alongside the Journada de Muerto; the journey of death. Surely they could uncover a story there but unfortunately there were few places to run the river until one gets all the way down to the southern end of the state.

  Then after several days June remembered and traced down a footnote she had read years ago in “A History of Arizona and New Mexico by Hubert Howe Bancroft,” The book was first published in 1889 making it an historical item in itself. In that footnote it was stated that Robert Mc Knight held the honor of being the earliest person documented to use a canoe in New Mexico. His story was dramatic and a likely subject for our research. We could retrace and tell the story of Robert Mc Knight’s route up the Canadian River. He was captured by the Spanish and sent in a cart all the way to Chihuahua Mexico where he was dumped into a Mexican jail. After two years he and a friend escaped from the Mexican jail and returned to the Canadian River where he left the state altogether. Everyone would contribute to the writing of the document but Aunt June would be the one who would edit the final manuscript. June had already written several manuscripts and had acquired a world of knowledge about writing for publication. Indeed, as she looked into the oven to see if the rolls were ready, she was already organizing the Robert Mc Knight story in her mind.

  Providence

  Providence, that foreseeing care and guardianship of God over His creatures, the same providence which sends snow in the winter and then allows a hot, spring sun to create rivers which cascade down the continental divide carrying life giving fluids to all creatures dependent upon it for survival, including river runners. But earlier river runners have been indulging on the free ride as far as the Mississippi River, for thousands of years. An ancient route, it has only been recently that Europeans from the east have wanted to travel this route, to reverse this travel pattern, venturing up the river and back into the southwest, then returning back to civilization, all for a profit.

  For newcomers venturing into the southwest, a long and arduous journey up the river was required. Fortunately, a fast retreat was possible with the river flooding on good snowmelt years providing several weeks where a party could ride the flood of river water in a possible escape route back to civilization.

  Because humans, as well as pack animals, require water and food in enormous quantities, which can be found in predictable distances between camps, the ancestral rivers of the desert southwest were the natural routes that all ancient and historical travelers used. We figured that a journey down the river would take us to the same campsites used by travelers from across the centuries. Perhaps traces of earlier travelers could be found. People do have a way of writing their names on surfaces so they can say, I was here.

  On the trails between rivers, deprivation was the norm, but there were exceptional locations where there was fresh water, along with raw materials for shelter and easy access that would eventually become centers of trade, perhaps becoming permanent settlements. These communities now provide place names on maps such as Taos, Santa Fe, and Pecos.

  Pecos Pueblo was a focal point of trade in the distant past with maps showing easy access to the Rio Grande River system flowing south into Mexico or northwest into the San Juan’s. The namesake Pecos River meanders southeast into Texas; and the Canadian River to the Northeast was the natural gateway to the eastern plains. Yet due to many reasons, Pecos Pueblo as well as many other pueblos were becoming ruins even as the first great Spanish Entradas were occurring. After smallpox hit the pueblo it was aban
doned. Providence may provide the necessities of life, but there are no guaranties in this constantly changing world.

  Depravation can provide the keenest and sometimes the cruelest of memories, like inalienable rights and family, belonging exclusively to the psychic of the individual. They are vivid, particularly when experienced by the overindulged, pampered, and civilized. People like us. We have all become accustomed to the material subtleties in life and are hopelessly spoiled. We like it that way but what would our life be like if a dramatic event occurred such as becoming hopelessly separated from our canoe?

  What would you miss the most? Perhaps dry clothes and a warming blanket, that morning coffee with a cinnamon roll or bacon and eggs with cereal on the side. With no way to make a fire, even if you found scraps of food say a bag of rice, cooking would be imposable. It would be a bad hair day. Deprivation creates a situation, which challenges the human spirit, and we are forced to become problem solving creatures, driven to return to a civilization and a cup of hot coffee. But for those who came before us, there was no such thing as a return. They themselves were in their own minds the essence of civilization conquering a barbarian land. They carried with them, on horses, mules or in a canoe everything they needed for survival. A fragile environment lay before them and in time their descendants would be amazed at the changes that would occur in this vast land. Those changes would indeed be dramatic.

  Spanish Explorations

  Pride was the namesake of the Spanish Empire during the days of the conquistadores in New Mexico. They were proud to have conquered a new world which had made the Spanish Empire the envy of all other peoples of the time. They could afford to be arrogant and prideful; they deserved it, conquering a continent of millions with only a handful of very brave men.

  It was true that they had better weapons, and of course horses which made them extremely mobile and then there is the matter of all the biological weapons they brought with them knowingly or not. Many modern people tend to stereotype the Ancient Spanish as a cruel people but all one has to do is consider the age in which they came to power. Nations were determined to acquire gold which was the monetary standard of the day. Any nation that could acquire gold also acquired immense military power. Gold paid the soldiers to expand the Kings influence which usually resulted in conquering and occupying new lands occupied by non-believers or just plain heathens who was anyone who was not a Castilian Spaniard.

  During the golden age of Spanish exploration, all nations that supported an army were considered cruel. They had to be cruel in order to survive. Slavery was a way of life throughout the world and was considered an institution that would never end. It wasn’t so much a consideration of skin color but rather an economic issue, much as it is today. In Africa one tribe raided another tribe for slaves just as in America; one native tribe would enslave members of a conquered tribe as a way of life. Often small children were kidnapped and raised as members of the conquering tribe. All this was considered quite normal so when the Spanish conquered the Southwestern Tribes it was considered quite normal for them to enslave the conquered people. Cruelty, like beauty was in the eye of the beholder. Land acquisition and territory was similarly conducted by the nation with the biggest and fiercest army which was Spain.

  Providence has provided scraps of history in the form of documents surviving the centuries to weave a story which eventually ends along the banks of the Canadian River. June’s manuscript recounted the story. Because Spain managed to explore and then conquer the New World before other nations such as France or England, they were able to steal the gold and precious gems of the great Indian civilizations, and would become a world power with many of their citizens becoming relatively rich.

  As treasure ships crossed the oceans, Mexico City, became capital of the Viceroyalty of New Spain. Prosperity continued, but in time the easy pickings had already occurred and pressure was placed on the Spanish government in New Spain to find more gold in order to finance their constantly ongoing wars. They began to consider persistent rumors of gold and legends of great Indian civilizations. These rumors caused the first Europeans to explore the northern unknown fringes of the New World, into New Mexico and eventually into the Canadian River canyon lands.

  In the spring of 1536, four ragged travelers, Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca, Alonzo de Castillo Maldonado, Andres Dorantes and his Moorish slave Estevan, arrived at the city of Calican, Mexico, the sole survivors of the Narvaez expedition. After their shipwreck near present day Galveston, Texas in 1528, they found themselves washed up on the shore of an alien sea, without water, food or weapons. Cold, desperate and starving within days and without the intervention of the native Indians all would have surely perished.

  The Indians themselves were desperately poor when viewed through the filter of Spanish ethnocentrism. They had no knowledge of gold, its uses, or why the Spanish had such an interest in such a worthless metal, useful only for ornamentation. The Indians, however, lived very well, at least through the filter of their own ethnocentrism.

  The Indians did attempt to cooperate with the Spanish, orating stories about golden cities a long distance to the north. They kept the Spaniards alive long enough for them to regain their health, then with a probable sigh of relief, allowed them to escape making their way by foot from the Gulf of Mexico though western Texas, to northern Mexico. Along the way, the Spaniards heard tales from other local Indians of great riches to be found in the ‘Seven Cities of Cibola,’ inhabited by highly civilized tribes to the north. After a long and arduous hike around the Gulf of Mexico they finally discovered a route and made their way to Mexico City, capital of the Viceroyalty of New Spain. There, they were rewarded for telling their stores to Viceroy Antonio de Mendoza who became enthusiastic about the possibility of adding further wealth and fame to his own position.

  Mendoza was unwilling to risk a large expedition to the north without further confirmation, and in 1539 the Franciscan friar, Marcos de Niza, led a reconnaissance party from Culiacan, with Estevan as guide, northward through present day Arizona. The advance party of Estevan entered the village of Hawikuh, discovering the agricultural villages of the Zuni Pueblo Indians. Estevan managed to get himself killed, after forcing himself upon as many village girls as he could. Several of his party managed to escape the skirmish and carried a description of the disaster to Marcos de Niza who made a fast retreat back to Mexico City.

  Attempting to turn defeat into partial victory, the Franciscan told even more extravagant stories about possible wealth to the north. Along came the aristocratic young Franciso Vasques de Coronado, governor of Neva Galicia, along with 300 soldiers and 800 Indians from Compostela who traveled to Hawikuh in 1540. Again, the agricultural communities of Hawikuh had no intention of submitting to invaders and attacked them, killing several soldiers and wounding Coronado before the superior arms of the Spanish defeated and subdued the natives.

  After capturing the Zuni villages, Coronado sent out various expeditions. Garcia Lopez de Cardennas went west to discover the Grand Canyon. Pedro de Tovar found the seven villages of the Hopis who also resisted, and like the Zuni continued to resist throughout the Spanish period as well as into the present. The Spanish made significant discoveries but found only traces of gold.

  After visiting other pueblos of the Rio Grande valley as far north as Taos, they wintered at Tiquex just north of present day Albuquerque. It was a hard winter. When food and supplies ran short, the Spanish took what they wanted from the thus far friendly Indians who rebelled. After a siege of seven weeks, the natives were defeated and despite their earlier generosity, found their homes and stores looted. Bitterness towards the intruders remained high because all invading armies have a tendency to take advantage of the indigenous peoples, namely lovely young girls.

  Castaneda, a scribe of Coronado provided the first documentation of the Canadian River reaching it at high water and calling it Rio Colorado, which it was to be known as for over two hundred years. In doing so, Castaneda made a place f
or himself in history.

  In the spring of 1541 Coronado and his men marched to Pecos, where they enlisted the help of a guide, the Indian El Turco. They spent an exhausting seventy seven days in search of gold marching into what they coined as Liano Estacando, or the Staked Plains, in search of a golden place called Quivira.

  Many rivers in the southwest maintained the name of Rio Colorado. After rain all rivers in the southwest run blood red and many carried the name of Rio Colorado on historic documents. However the use of that name eventually disappeared for this river to another historic river in another state. Since his journeys took him into western Kansas it can be safely assumed that somewhere in the eastern plains of New Mexico, Coronado and his entourage crossed the Canadian river. Exactly where is of debate but the natural place, that first natural crossing where generations of Indians had crossed before, would have been Stony Forde near present day Taylor Springs. From Stony Forde they could have wondered anywhere until they realized the wild goose chase they were on. Some historians insist that Coronado may have turned southeast at Pecos then overland to Gallinas and again overland to the Conchas on the Canadian River, a natural conduit into Texas. No one really knows what route he took. Along the way they became convinced that their guide, El Turco had lured them there to massacre them and the Spaniards killed their guide.

  Nature may have provided the explorers’ the impetus to return. Somewhere beyond eastern New Mexico, Coronado was set back profoundly, by a baseball size hailstone storm. Inclement weather can cause an extremely dynamic situation in the cap rock country. Tornadoes are common, but evening thunderstorms with lightning storms can make anyone a believer. The winds that accompany them arise suddenly, sometimes with only a moment to recognize the impending wind and tie everything down. It may have been one time the solders, explorers, and priest that accompanied Coronado were glad to have worn the ungainly armor of the time. Lesser hailstorms have left jagged holes in modern trailer houses and automobiles which appear like someone has taken a sledgehammer to them. Many side canyons form a labyrinth of cliffs and badlands that dissect the Cap Rock country. One can only imagine Coronado’s march through the tableland country, but it is certain to have been a perplexing experience for him.