Arizona Legends and Lore
as told by
Dorothy Daniels Anderson
a master storyteller
Cover design by Bruce R. Fischer / The Book Studio
Front cover original artwork by Cameron Daines
Ebook created by Brad Farmer | Many Hats Media
Digital Edition ISBN 978-0-939650-83-5
Copyright © 2011 by Dorothy Daniels Anderson. All rights reserved. This book, or any portion thereof, may not be reproduced in any form, except for review purposes without the written permission of the publisher.
American Traveler Press
5738 North Central Avenue
Phoenix, AZ 85012-1316
800-521-9221
Acknowledgments
I wish to acknowledge my debt of gratitude to some special people who helped and supported me during the creation of this book. A special thanks to Wilhelmina Satina who questioned every trace of inconsistency in the stories and to Cheryl Byers who kept me within the bounds of good grammatical and language usage.
A deep bow of appreciation to all my fellow storytellers in the East Valley Tellers of Tales for their encouragement and positive criticism, with a particular thank you to Mary Wilson.
Thanks as well to all those lovers of history who toil in our museums and historical societies for their patient and good natured assistance, in particular: K. Trimble, Historian with the Phoenix History Project; Margaret Bret-Harte, Head Librarian, Arizona Historical Society, Tucson; Sue Abbey, Archivist, Sharlot Hall Museum; Jackie Engel, Arizona Historical Foundation, Hayden Library, Arizona State University; and Janet Michaelin. Librarian, Central Division, Arizona Historical Society, Phoenix.
Personal thanks to Harvey Leake and the Wetherill family for allowing me a special glimpse into family memorabilia.
A special round of applause to my sons: to Thor for his support and to Christian who gave me many hours of his time and challenged my thinking in every story.
Preface
There is a place that lies between daily routines and eternal truths. It is the place the storyteller comes from.
The task of the storyteller is to reach into the dreams, the knowledge, the thoughts of all who listen and find that thread of gold and spin it into a yarn, a tale that connects the then with the now, a tale that delights the spirit, a tale that lifts the soul.
Based on a quote from “Storyfest Ministry”
Robert Bela Wilhelm, Editor
Contents
Title Page
Introduction
Camels for Arizona
Olive Oatman and a Massacre
No Tame House-Cat Woman
The Saga of the Superstition Mountains
Our Heroine Was No Lady
Yavapai Gold
Vulture Gold
Cyrus Gribble and the Vulture Mine
A Man Named Poston
Slim Woman and the Navajos
The Mystery of the Lady in Blue
The Sheriff Was a Major
Hattie, the Ice-Maker’s Daughter
The Great Desert Automobile Race
A Sheriff Meets the Woodson Brothers
Introduction
To settle in Arizona during the early days of its existence was to challenge life in a very elemental sense. Arizona was a place of extreme contrasts: long droughts, sudden rains, abundance and famine, dreadful heat and chilling cold. Survival was a struggle. Nothing was given, nothing could be assumed; nothing could be accomplished unless the individual found within him / herself the courage, the endurance, the stamina to succeed. Every day brought new hardships; every decision exposed new risks. Yet, like a magnet, Arizona attracted bold and free-thinking pioneers who came to try their luck against all odds.
Often in life, the catalyst of change is people. Pushed from their homes by a gnawing need to overcome the many deficiencies in their existence, pulled by a dream of the future, people changed Arizona through the desire to change their own lives.
The stories I have chosen for this book are about pioneers who came to this new frontier and greeted the harsh reality of the land as a challenge to overcome with enthusiasm. Their unique personalities captured for me the essence and soul of frontier life.
Some were well-educated doctors, lawyers, engineers, teachers. Others were barely literate. They came from every walk of life. Some succeeded, many more failed, but the stories of these pioneers echo the struggles of people throughout history and weave a fascinating tale of human adventure.
Sharlot Hall, Arizona’s first woman historian, felt that “history is much more than a mere record of events, more than an accurate compilation of dates, names and places. True history must be the most vivid picture of past conditions that we can bring to the present and preserve for the future.” 1
Nothing expresses true history more vigorously than the tales of the people who lived it. To merely recount past events results in no more than producing a silhouette of human endeavor. It is the stories and inner thoughts of the pioneers that bring to history that vital aspect of emotion: the hopes, the fears, the triumphs, and the defeats.
Arizona Legends and Lore tells the stories of some of the most interesting and adventuresome pioneers in the early Arizona frontier. Each character is real and the events described are based on years of research through books, old journals, newspapers, magazines, talking with descendants of Arizona pioneers and going into archives of personal papers and memorabilia.
Only the most exciting, vivid and unique characters were chosen to be profiled in this book. Each story is a vignette in the life of one of these characters that provides the reader with an entertaining look at what made the Old West a land of legends.
Camels for Arizona
When a man joins the military, he might expect to encounter circumstances which demand great feats of heroism and bravery. Back in the rugged days of the early 1850s, Lieutenant Edward Fitzgerald Beale and Major Henry Wayne were two soldiers who certainly anticipated such encounters. Instead, what the military gave them was camels.
This is a story of a little-known footnote in history when the United States Army was faced with a perplexing problem. The military wanted to develop a supply route through the Southwest from Texas to California. But the land had scant water and little grass, and crossing the arid desert with mules and horses proved too difficult. What animal, what beast of burden could rapidly, with little water and food, carry large loads over this vast desert area?
In 1855, Jefferson Davis, the head of the War Department, was told by Congress to try a daring new idea. The plan was to import camels to the United States and use them for desert travel. Since camels were so successful in Egypt, Arabia, and Turkey, thought government strategists, surely they could also be used in the deserts of the Southwest. Thirty thousand dollars were appropriated for the project and in 1856 Major Henry Wayne was assigned the task of purchasing camel for the United States. Uncle Sam was in the camel business.
Now, not everyone thought that buying camels for the Army was such a wonderful idea. “Sounds like a hump-dinger of an idea to me,” said one witty observer. “Those boys in Washington must have humps on the brain,” quipped another. Most folks simply shook their heads in disbelief. Camels, those funny-looking humped things you saw in circuses! Could they keep up with horses? Could they carry as much as a mule? Would they need fancy foreign foods to eat? Would they work? The War Department was determined to find out.
Major Wayne’s orders were simple. First, learn all you can about camels, then go to the Middle East and buy the best stock available.
The first place Major Wayne visited was the London Zoo in England. There he learned how camels adapted to living in
captivity. Then he went to France and met with French soldiers who had used camels in North Africa. They told him how camels could be used for travel in harsh terrain. Next, he went off to Florence and Pisa, in Italy, where camels were bred by the royal Dukes of Tuscany. There he was shown that camels were tough beasts of burden who could easily adapt to extreme variations in climate.
When he finally reached the Middle East and started to buy camels, he discovered that most of his learning came from working with the animals themselves. Slick operators tried to sell him diseased, miserable old street-camels at outrageous prices. By necessity, Major Wayne had to learn a lot about camels very quickly and the more he learned, the more excited he became. Not only would camels solve the Army’s problem but here was a wonderful new money-making opportunity for people in the United States.
He could see it all. Camels to carry thousands of pounds over arid desert lands. Camels to backpack cotton for Southern plantations. Camels to swiftly follow attacking Indians. Move over mules and horses; camels are going to revolutionize the American way of life!
The next challenge for Major Wayne was to get the camels to the United States. A Navy ship had been commissioned for the job, but getting thirty-three camels on board wasn’t easy. The big dromedaries didn’t take kindly to being pushed and shoved into strange places. The deck of the ship actually had to be cut away to provide enough head and hump room for them.
In spite of these difficulties and the Navy personnel’s lack of experience, the camels arrived safely in Texas. In fact, a few births had even taken place during the voyage. Now the project was turned over to Lieutenant Edward Fitzgerald Beale. His assignment was to take the camels across the area now known as Texas, New Mexico and Arizona, and on to California through rough terrain and uncharted areas. If the camels could make it successfully, then a series of army posts would be established to relay mail and supplies across the Southwest.
Embarking camels onto U.S. Naval ship bound for Arizona (Courtesy Arizona Historical Society, Tucson, Arizona)
At first things did not go well for Lieutenant Beale. His men did not know how to handle the exotic beasts and the camels were out of shape from their long confinement on board ship. But with the help of two handlers hired for the purpose, the Americans soon began to learn. The handlers were Greek George and a man from Turkey named Hadji Ali. Hadji’s name was much too complicated for the Americans to pronounce and he soon became known as “Hi Jolly,” a name that was to stay with him for the next fifty years.
When Lieutenant Beale first accepted his assignment, he did so with a degree of good-natured humor. What else could he do about the situation in which he found himself? But as the journey progressed across the Southwest, his amusement soon changed to avid enthusiasm.
Camels were docile. Each could carry over a thousand pounds and travel forty miles a day without tiring. They ate anything available and seemed content with greasewood shrubs and cactus, plants no horse or mule would touch. They could also go for days without water and even ended up carrying water and food for the mules and horses when such items became scarce. They could travel faster than horses, swim swollen rivers, climb mountains and survive in conditions of two or three feet of snow. Everywhere Beale went people crowded around his dromedaries, fascinated. He became convinced that camels were the animal answer for the Southwest.
Predictably not everyone agreed. Initially, horses and mules stampeded at the sight of these strange animals. Handlers had to learn a whole different way to deal with them and often didn’t care to learn. Nonetheless, by the end of the journey, the experiment appeared to be a success.
After such a promising beginning, have you begun to wonder why we don’t see camels everywhere? Why are there no camel farms, camel shows and camel races in Arizona? Why are there no cowboys with their faithful companion, the camel? What happened?
Everything changed overnight. The long years of conflict between the Northern States and the South exploded into a Civil War. No longer could the military afford to keep isolated desert outposts for mail and supply service. Troops now needed for the war were withdrawn from the Southwest. Urgent military orders prevented Major Wayne and Lieutenant Beale from continuing to support these fascinating animals. In the confusion of war, camels were forgotten.
In time, a few were sold as pack animals, but the majority were simply allowed to escape into the desert. For many years they could be seen wandering in the foothills around the Gila and Colorado rivers. Eventually some were shot, some were captured, and some just disappeared.
Yet, the legacy of the camel experiment lingered on. About thirty years later, a camel was captured by a man from the Fort Yuma area. Here, he thought, was a way to make a little easy money. His scheme was to take the animal to Phoenix and sell it to the highest bidder. Surely someone would want to buy this exotic beast. But no one wanted to purchase his dromedary. Having invested considerable time and money into his venture, the man became desperate. What was he to do?
He owed money to a man in Phoenix and tried to give him the camel as payment for the loan. Knowing some information the other did not, the Phoenix man happily took the animal. A circus was scheduled to come into town in the next month. The new owner was certain that he could sell the camel to the circus and realize a handsome profit. Now all he had to do was take care of the animal until the circus arrived.
Lt. Edward F. Beale, disguised as a Mexican for his perilous ride across Mexico bearing dispatches telling of the discovery of gold in California and a sample of the gold (Courtesy Arizona Historical Society, Tucson)
That task proved more complicated than anything he had imagined. He asked a friend if he could board his camel in the alfalfa field where the friend kept his mules. The man agreed and that evening the camel was put in the field. The next morning disaster met their eyes. Every mule, frightened by this uncouth alien, had tried to escape. Each was caught up in the barbed wire fence, while the camel was happily eating all the alfalfa in sight. The owner of the field promptly demanded that the camel be removed.
Next, the man decided to leave the camel in his own back yard. But that didn’t work either. Every time the lady next door would attempt to drive by in her horse and buggy, the horse, upon seeing the camel, would rear up and try to jump into the buggy with the lady. She complained to the officials. The camel had to go.
The owner needed to come up with a new plan. Another friend of his owned a popular saloon next to which he kept a stable. Why not put his camel into the barn until the circus arrived? The animal could entertain the saloon’s customers and hopefully stay out of mischief. But the barn door was not tall enough and no amount of pushing and shoving could persuade the camel to go inside. Eventually, the barn door had to be enlarged. None of this helped the disposition of his friend, or of the camel, who stayed sulking in the barn for a week refusing to eat or drink. Then one night, the camel proceeded to eat everything in the barn, including some bailing wire, kick open the door and escape down the street. After all these difficulties, the owner congratulated himself on being relieved of a major nuisance.
But the night had only begun and before it was over, that camel would be remembered in Phoenix for dozens of years.
The first incident occurred in the early morning hours. A rancher was bringing into Phoenix a wagon heavily loaded with hay. He had decided that he would test out a skittish new team of four mules. One moment he was quietly riding along the road, next to the canal, congratulating himself on his smooth handling of the team. The next moment he noticed some strange shambling object coming swiftly down the center of the road. That was the last thing he remembered until he awoke to find his mules hightailing it off in all directions and his wagon in the canal sinking fast.
A few minutes later, a little farther up the road, a butcher was driving a large herd of hogs to market. After months of carefully feeding and fattening his animals, he was dreaming, in the stillness of the early morning, of his impending profits. Suddenly, he caught a fl
eeting glimpse of something coming down the middle of the road like a stampeding tornado. Bare moments later, the butcher was left standing alone on the bank of the canal, viewing a hogless landscape. Distant grunts and terrified squeals came from all directions. For weeks afterward, the local newspapers ran articles of hog sightings from all over Phoenix.
Was it over? Not yet. Before the camel disappeared into the desert, he left a trail of upset buggies, frightened horses and irate citizens. As for the hapless owner, he quickly left town.
Are there any camels still left wandering our vast desert areas? Probably not. But the legend lives on.
Some say their ghosts remain. Occasionally, at twilight, one can see a huge red camel wandering out on the desert. On its back sits the bleached skeleton of a man, who many years before, dying of thirst, strapped himself onto the camel, hoping that even if he became unconscious, the camel would eventually lead him to water.
Others say that the ghost of a crazy old prospector can still be seen roaming the hills with his three faithful camels, loaded with a treasure of gold.
After the Civil War, the army never resumed its experimenting with camels. Railroads eventually solved the transportation problems across the Southwest. Time makes recollections vague, but until his dying day, the Turkish handler, Hi Jolly, swore that there were camels out there. Are some of their descendants still roaming our desert? I don’t know, do you?
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