Final Notes:

At this point in his story, with the tumult brought about by wartime activities permeating thoughts and narrative, I.O. left off writing never to return to it. For that reason there is a rather sketchy quality when it comes to details towards the end of his account, with portions of what took place missing.

The time it took to complete work on the ranch project in Yuma County is almost completely passed over in his narrative in favor of the more fulfilling assignment of running the Tolleson farm project. Other details are passed over without mention as well.

Going on to live a full rich life, loved by family and friends alike, in 1989 heart problems put I.O. in the hospital in Chandler, Arizona where days later he passed away. His story reminds us what it means to truly live, taking life as it comes a day at a time, tackling problems and possibilities with foresight, hard work, faith in yourself and your loved ones, trust in your fellow man, and dogged determination.

During the times in which he lived, from his pioneer ranch childhood and youth near Ranger Lake, New Mexico until his retirement years on the 2 1/2 acre mini-farm that he and my brother John purchased in Gilbert, Arizona, where he hand built the last home he and our mother Mary would live in together prior to his death, I.O. took part in and was witness to some of our nation's most dramatic and tumultuous years and events. His focus on hard work, self reliance, optimistic planning and tough minded tenacity continues to inspire his family as well as those who count themselves as friends.

I.O.'s story rings as true today with home grown personal insights and familiar timeless truths as it did when he lived it, and retains the power to touch many who will read it with a sense of what life amounted to in years now past.

George Sherwood Rasmussen

Part 16

All the frantic effort our country put into the at times unreal world of wartime activity at home and abroad, had it not produced a positive outcome, would have been ultimately meaningless. Such a frenzied atmosphere constantly changes the lives of those caught up in it. The only stable anchor many had to cling to were thoughts of wife and children, family and home, and in no small measure this proved enough to see us through those years.

As our children grew George began to go places with me much of the time. He was a happy, curious, adventuresome little boy, the very traits that sometimes got him into trouble.

One time we stopped to check as freshly baled hay was being stacked at the end of a field, and George quickly climbed to the top of the stack. There he found a bottle of whiskey the workmen had stashed. Removing the cap he took a big gulp, then almost passed out before he could catch his breath.

Another time he found a can of aluminum paint and a brush in the barn. Prying the lid off the paint he started out painting parts on a tractor. Then he removed his shirt and painted his belly. Next he painted his lower body and legs. Mary and my mother worked for the better part of an hour getting the paint off of him with paint thinner and rags, then scrubbed him clean in the tub.

Part 15

Machinery shortages were a problem for everyone, farmers no exception. Parts for most farm equipment were simply no longer available. I was raking hay on 200 acres and found myself with only one rake to windrow the crop after it had been cut. I only had one good rake because I'd used parts from two others to keep it running.

At the end of the season it was clear these old rakes could no longer keep up. I had in mind to build a rake that would last as many years as it was asked to work. It would cost at least three times as much as a new International or John Deere rake, neither of which was available for purchase. I received an OK from Western Farm Management to spend the money necessary to build the new rake I had in mind, so I enlisted a friend who had a welding shop to help me turn my idea into a real machine.

In various ways the final design of our new hay rake was in response to problems that arose during the actual construction of the piece of equipment. Word got around about the new side delivery hay rake we were building, and critics came everyday to view our progress or lack thereof. Some were absolutely convinced the machine would never work.

Our first field trial was in the spring of the year. People came from near and far to watch as we raked hay with our new machine. The Arizona Farmer, a popular journal that kept the farming community informed and in touch, as well as local newspapers had run stories about our project. As a consequence there was a great deal of interest in what we had or had not accomplished.

Just as we had designed our new machine worked perfectly. It was so ruggedly built that our original is still kept by Joe Shelly on the Tolleson farm. Joe purchased that acreage some time later when the French owner decided to sell.

Our new rake design turned the entire farm machinery industry towards better engineered equipment of all kinds. Although modified by each company who built them, the new rake became the standard for what ultimately would become millions of such machines turning hay into windrows world wide.

My partner in building that original side delivery rake went on to design and build the first ever slip form for pouring concrete lined ditches in place. That design also became a standard that's still in use world wide. Neither of us made any money from the ideas and designs we came up with. Johnnie Morgan, my friend and partner in designing and building the rake, died before we could make anything commercial of our effort.

Afterward the big companies simply copied our ideas, modified them as needed, and sold them as their own. We made no attempt to fight them for they were too big and well funded for us to contend with. That our ideas and the effort we put into making them reality helped increase farm production world wide has to be gratification enough.

Part 14

Mary and the children stayed for a time with my parents at their home in Phoenix. While they enjoyed having her and their grand children there with them, Mary was happy to know we'd soon have our own place again. We were to live on and manage a 640 acre farm near Tolleson, ten miles west of downtown Phoenix.

Two new houses were available at the Tolleson farm, neither of which had been lived in. We were to occupy the two bedroom home, with the three bedroom reserved for the owner, a French refugee who escaped Europe with a fortune in cash, jewels and securities as the Nazis overran France. He made his way originally to Mexico, and from there had come to the United States. As a political refugee he was allowed to invest here in the states, and had purchased a farm in Connecticut as well as the acreage in Tolleson.

The French farm owner had contracted with Western Farm Management Co. to run the place, which just happened to be one of the best acreages in the entire Salt River Valley. Once my family was moved to the Tolleson farm I greatly enjoyed my work. The land was extremely productive responding with bountiful crops and good returns.

The owner finally decided he was not going to spend any time on that farm and said we could move into the larger three bedroom home. John had been born shortly before, so it all worked out for the best as far as we were concerned. The bigger house gave us enough room for our family as well as for visitors, friends and relatives that came to visit. This was a time in our lives when we felt we were making progress, living well, and enjoying a life best suited to my abilities and the desire I had to pour myself into agricultural management.

By now our nation had come fully to grips with the war. It permeated life in every way, from food and gasoline rationing to saving every piece of scrap of metal and worn out rubber. Standing in lines at rationing board offices became a way of life. Day and night aircraft from Luke Field and other Valley bases wheeled combat training circles across hot desert skies. Trucks loaded with German prisoners drove out almost daily under heavy guard to clean canals and ditches. An Italian prisoner of war escaped from a nearby POW camp and hid in the tall maize in our fields for several days before being recaptured.

Mary's younger sister Charlotte was an Army Air Force nurse based at Luke Field. She dated a young flight instructor, Lieutenant Leonard I. Wiehrdt. Leonard felt sure he was going to walk in and find Charlotte's sisters and their husbands fighting and quarreling, but he never did. Mary's brother Hubble worked as a civilian engineer at the sanitary facilities plant at Luke Field, and her father William Sherwood worked as a boilerman in the heating plant on base.

Levi Pace, one of Mary's cousins, was a flying officer stationed at Luke. He had trouble finding quarters for his family on base so he and his wife Wanda and their new baby Bonnie moved in with us. Levi's father and three brothers were all servicemen, and our farm home became a crossroads stop for visiting relatives. We were a long way from our nearest neighbors, so no one complained if we were noisy. Mary's meals of plentiful fresh meat, butter, eggs, milk, potatoes and vegetables filled up a lot of "hungry for home cooking" soldiers and airmen during those busy and often hectic years of the war.

Part 13

My mistrust of the Oxnard draft board soon proved accurate. I received a letter headed "Greetings" that advised me to report to my nearest draft board for a physical exam preparatory to induction in the Armed Services of The United States of America.

The notice came before I had time to look for a job. I was disturbed, distressed, and angry, yet once the notice came I was also resigned - even though I was confidant that I'd make a miserable soldier. Several days passed before I was to report for a physical exam. I used that time looking into ways to avoid military service, however not one of these proved honest enough for my taste, so I put them out of mind.

A week later I exercised my choice to enlist instead of being drafted, and chose Machinist's Mate with the Navy as what I'd sign up for. I reported to the Navy recruitment office for exams, and after the written portion of the exam was complete I waited my turn to be called for oral questioning.

My name was called and I went into an office where an Officer said, "I see you've noted a proficiency in flying airplanes. Why waste this skill? We need pilots badly in the Air Transport Command to ferry ships where they are needed. You will have to take six months of schooling and be checked out in the various types of aircraft you would be flying. Would you be interested?" My immediate response was "Yes, I would." "O.K. then," the Officer said. "Be here a week from today at this same time. Goodbye until then."

I left his office somewhat relieved. Nevertheless a nagging feeling that fate was still toying with me as far as a flying career was concerned was tough to shake off. While walking down the hallway away from the Navy recruiting office I suddenly recalled the man Henry had asked me to make contact with in Phoenix. I checked the card in my wallet just to make sure, because I thought the building I was in might be the same building where Henry's friend worked.

Indeed the building was the same, and I figured now was as good a time as any to stop by, if for no other reason than to introduce myself and pass along Henry's regards. Upon locating the suite I read the name "Western Farm Management Co." emblazoned on the door.

On entering the office I asked for the fellow Henry had referred me to, only to be informed by the receptionist that Henry's friend no longer worked for Western Farm Management Co. Then she asked if there might be anyone else I'd like to talk with. On an impulse I said, "Yes, I'd like to talk with someone about employment in your organization."

A few minutes later I was introduced to Mr. Everett Barkley, the man in charge of farming programs on various properties the company managed for out of state and out of country owners. We talked a long time, well over an hour, and I learned he desperately needed experienced help. He offered to hire me on the spot, and put forward a much better opportunity than the Navy ever could have.

Mr. Barkley said that if I agreed to work for him he would immediately arrange for a reinstatement of my agricultural worker deferment status. I said yes, confidant that I could best serve my country by managing the production of crops here at home. Anyone could quickly learn to fly an airplane, but it took years to make a good farmer, and they were a lot scarcer right now than air jockeys. Two hours later things had been fully arranged, and soon I was on my way to the Snyder Ranch in Yuma County to get a behind schedule farming operation back on track.

Working from dawn until dark every day to get the needed work done and the ranch operating as it should, it was not until the first night when I came back home about a month later that I found I had a bleeding ulcer. I'd been pushing way too hard, well beyond any reasonable limits, for a long time, all while eating improperly. A good diet and some overdue rest soon had me well again.

Part 12

As the Sunset Limited rumbled through the darkness towards Arizona my thoughts turned again to Deer Springs. It seemed that we and the whole world had been shaken from happy, adventurous, and seemingly secure lives by the tumult of a war not of our making. I wondered if ever again there might be an opportunity to enjoy the sense of freedom that hard work and focused self sufficiency, as we had experienced it, brought with it.

The train rolled on as I recalled riding Blaze bare back, with no bridle to control him, after the he and the rest of the horses had strayed some three miles away. I walked until I found them in a grassy hollow near the ocean cliffs. Blaze came when I called him, and I hopped on his back and rode him all the way home as he leaped brush and rock following the running herd back to the corrals.

Another time riding Skippy came to mind as well. We were skirting the edge of a brush covered hillside when suddenly he fell with me into a hidden ravine. He landed on my leg in such a way that searing, strength draining pain momentarily overcame me. That fall tore the cartilage in my right knee, and the after effects still cause pain if I turn my knee a certain way.

Another event I thought about that night was climbing a nearly vertical cliff face and coming to a place where I could neither go up or down. I was close to panic when I realized that panic was the sure route to real trouble. The fear I felt was sobering to say the least, yet there was no help to be had. I had to continue on up alone and did so after a lengthy rest to collect my thoughts. A great deal of careful study of the rock face above me, searching out tiny hand and toe holds, provided a pathway that saw me at last to the top of the cliff and out of danger.

Yet another time I drove a bulldozer down a mountain slope so steep and loose that the tracks spun uselessly when I tried backing up. The brush that I had cleared on that long push and slide down the mountain side saved days or weeks of clearing a fence line, and fortunately lady luck riding alongside me that day saw to it there were no vertical drops to contend with before I reached the bottom.

The second time "Old Buck" tried to throw me I was ready for him. Whipping him soundly with the short length of leather lariat that I'd carried looped over the saddle horn ever since the first time when he got the best of me, all the while spurring him mercilessly, he finally grew tired and quit. After that he was well mannered enough that others could also safely ride him - as long as the short length of lariat was in place over the saddle horn.

The colt we called Blaze was responding well to the hair rope reins of the hackamore, and carrying a bit with a cricket. I hoped he was far enough along to respond properly to the leather reins that I knew would be used on his bridle now that I was gone. I was also worried about the tremendous problems the Houstons would have caring for the Angora goats. I felt they would soon find the herd far more work than they really wanted to be involved with.

Fox Movie Studios once used Deer Springs Ranch as the location for a cowboy movie they were making, and that had been an interesting and informative diversion from the daily routine. Mary liked being treated special. Each morning a big car called at the house and took her to whatever location they were filming so she could watch the performers at work, which she greatly enjoyed.

Faces and friends left behind, unfinished projects, things I should have said but did not, letters we needed to write, all these and much more came to mind as the train rumbled through the darkness towards whatever our new life held for us.

Mary, baby Ann and George slept soundly, while thoughts of what was past as well as our possible future competed for my attention. I felt a bit guilty and sad at parting with Henry. He had asked me to move to Burbank and work for Lockheed Aircraft where he could secure a good job for me. He was disappointed when I told him we'd decided to go home to Arizona. Our future at this point was a complete blank, and knowing that was a difficult thing to come to grips with.

I needed work to care for my family. No longer was I secure from the draft now that I'd given up my agricultural worker classification. Draft boards were alert for registrants they could call up, and they seemed to put off drafting established community members in favor of those who were in transition.

I was quite suspicious of the Oxnard board, and dreaded even thinking about the tightly regimented life that armed services personnel led as I observed it all around us. Nothing about military life was attractive to me except for becoming a pilot. I would have plunged into that immediately except I was two years beyond the age limit for Army Air Force pilot recruits.

Exploring my most earnest desires as the train rattled through the night I realized I had no desire to partake of any part of armed forces life. Wondering if I might be a conscientious objector at heart I began to believe I must be. I believed that wars, killing people and destroying homes and the products of man's best efforts, could never prove anything, including wars imposed on us not of our choosing. Before I dozed off the name of a friend Henry told me to look up once we were in Phoenix came to mind, a name I immediately wrote on a card and placed in my wallet.

The early light of a new morning began sweeping away the darkness of the long train ride as the Sunset Limited rolled into the Salt River Valley with me and my little family aboard. It was good to be back home again. Somehow I sensed that everything would turn out alright, but I had no real idea how we'd proceed.

We had been invited to stay at my parent's big house on Culver Street. Once there family and friends stopped to see us and called on the telephone. We went places we had not been to in a long time, and it was good to catch up first hand on family happenings. Being home again was a true joy, and the beginning of a new direction which at that moment we had no clear view of.

Part 11

Managing the goats became a more and more difficult task. War time industries had started hiring everyone they could get their hands on. This left us with experienced and uninterested herders who soon were leaving small bands of goats out on the range, and we began received reports of roaming goats in several areas.

One such band of goats spent the night in William Boyd's driveway eating the flowers he'd planted in big clay pots atop the square stone posts that supported the rail fence along the edge of his drive. Bill and his wife were home, but before they awakened Laurence Houston woke me. We rounded up and penned the goats, swept the drive, then I drove to the valley bought new geraniums for the pots.

Kidding time arrived just as the rainy season began. Each new kid required a shelter of its own. We also had to place a toggle on a hind leg so the young goats could be staked at their shelters and not wander away with their mother who would hide them deep in the brush.

Kidding time was an all day, all night affair that went on for about 10 days. Some mothers dropped their kids in the pen with the main herd. These at times lost track of their own kids and would fail to recognize them later on. Mary cared for a dozen baby goats in boxes and tubs in front of the fireplace on our worst ever rainy night. She fed them with baby bottles so they'd have a chance to reunite with their mothers the next day, nevertheless we lost many of these young animals.

Angora goats often laid down and died in a cold rain, their long thick silky hair unable to protect them from the elements. When shearing time rolled around we were short handed once again and worked hours on end without a hint of a break.

With all the excitement that war time activity generated going on around us we started to feel isolated and out of touch at Deer Springs Ranch deep in the coastal mountains. We'd met some of the pilot instructors at the primary training school in Oxnard, and they stopped by the ranch rather often encouraging me to sell out and come work with them as a flight instructor. Refresher training so I could qualify as an instructor was offered, and the pay was good - $600 a month to start, a handsome sum at that time, far more than I made at Deer Springs Ranch. Mary and I began planning.

I attended some of the flying school socials and met the school commander. He assured me I'd have a chance to show my ability as a pilot, and said there was time enough to qualify as a flight instructor. We arranged for Laurence Houston and his father to take over the goat heard, and I went to the training base for my physical examination and other preliminaries so I could begin as a flight instructor trainee. That however was not to be my fortune, as the flight instructor training program was discontinued before I completed requirements to participate.

Wartime and thoughts of home go hand in hand. We were a long way away from Arizona, and deeply disappointed that our goat raising venture had not panned out as hoped. That, along with flight instructor prospects and working in the pilot training program having fallen through, brought with it an urgent sense of needing to be near family once again.

Saying our goodbyes to Mr. Chamberlain and all concerned, it wasn't long until we boarded the Sunset Limited passenger train at Union Station in Los Angeles. Traveling through the night as our children slept, across mile after mile of mountains and desert back home to Phoenix, with only the vaguest of ideas about what we might encounter on arrival, our young family like many others found itself adrift in the upheaval as well as the opportunities of the times.

Part 10

As Mary and I awaited the birth of our second child my mother came to stay with us so she could help out when the new baby arrived. In the early morning of the 28th of June Mary awoke saying, "I think we should go to the hospital now. I'm having pains and it's a long way." We dressed quietly and told mother not to worry.

Leaving George with my mother we drove away from the ranch. Morning fog was patchy at the ranch but became heavy and solid by the time we reached the coast highway. There was no traffic so we drove the 20 miles through pea soup thick fog with "black out" lights only.

An hour of intense peering as we tried to see the edge of the pavement saw us arrive at last at the Lying In Hospital in Oxnard. We got there about 3:00 AM and checked in. We had arrived with time to spare, for our new baby Ann did not make her appearance until 8:00 AM. She was a little beauty, strong but gentle - not at all a loud, lusty, noisy baby.

Through the hours as we waited for Ann to be born we heard someone in the hospital noisily groaning, complaining of pain and discomfort. After Mary delivered the baby and was resting a nurse came in and asked if I had a Virgil Kendrick working for me. I told her he was one of my herders. She said he was the one making all that noise down the hall. I went to Virgil's room and found him swathed in bandages, head, face, arms and hands, along with one leg and his back.

Virgil told me he had become "lonesome," and rode down from our range camp near Old Boney to ranch headquarters where he located a bottle of whiskey, thinking that would help make him less lonesome. By the time he decided he should go back up the mountain to turn the goats out of their night pen at daylight, and headed to the corral to get his horse, he made the mistake of stopping to pet the young horse I was breaking.

On a whiskey inspired whim he hopped up on that still unbroken horse's back only to be immediately thrown over the rock ledge that served as one side of the corral. Hitting about half way down the slope on the other side he tumbled and slid another 30 feet or so before reaching the bottom. He was lucky to have no broken bones, but was cut up and badly skinned.

Part 9 -- WAR!


SUNDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1942:


Henry and Bill Day came out to the ranch to ride. We were in the stable yard saddling our horses when Marry leaned out the door and called to us from our house on the hill above. "Come and listen," she shouted, "The Japanese are attacking the Hawaiian Islands!" From that moment our lives forever changed, in barely noticeably ways at first, then definitely, permanently, dramatically.


Henry was visibly shocked. As we rode up the mountain trail together that morning, somber in the thick silence between us, Henry spoke. "They were making such progress in tooling up their production of real goods. They were on their way up and now we will have to set them back a hundred years. I have sold them scrap iron and tools for a long time, and they are wonderful people to work with. There was never a hint of such a thing as this. This sneak attack will weld us together into a singleness of purpose that will drive us until Japan is beaten to her knees."


Days, weeks, and months followed as our country dedicated itself to overcoming the painful indignity Japan had imposed upon our nation. Our sense of fairness had been outraged, and we discovered in ourselves a spirit of vindictiveness that had not been our long accustomed manor of acting towards our world neighbors.


A total blackout imposed along the full length of the Pacific coast made night time travel prohibitive except for absolute emergencies. The only lights permitted on cars traveling at night were from small slits peeking through taped over parking lights. Factories were splotched with green, brown and gray paint in irregular patters of camouflage so that from the air they might better blend in with surrounding woodlands.


Reports of Japanese submarines patrolling our coastal waters were often heard from a variety of sources. Such reports were generally received with a suspicion that they were imaginary or alarmist in nature, made for the sake of dramatic effect. However news reports of nuisance shelling in some coastal areas had apparently been authenticated by officials in high positions, so we felt it unwise not to remain thoroughly cautious. Reports of balloons carrying deadly germs and riding the winds across the Pacific from Japan to America came from Oregon and Washington.


One of the first acts our government took was to round up all the Japanese in the United States, both native born U.S. citizens as well as immigrants, and place them in security detention camps. Some of our nations finest farmers were instantly put out of business losing all they had worked for and owned by this wartime act. That however was the mood of our country at the time, and trusting the Japanese was not something we were prepared to do, not even native born American citizens.


Often while riding trail on the high ranges overlooking the Pacific I found myself watching for strange landing craft or shore activity. Never once did any such thing become evident. Daily flights of American planes honed their combat skills overhead, diving and firing on patches of offshore kelp. As time passed following the attack on Pearl Harbor one developed an increasing sense of security should any invader, imaginary or real, seek to do us further damage.

Part 8

Laurence Houston's father and mother lived only a mile from us. Mr. Houston had spent his entire life in these mountains and knew more about hunting deer in this area than anyone I knew. When meat was needed Laurence and I often hunted together and shared the kill.

We had no way to freeze and store quantities of meat so we took only what would last a couple of weeks. If there was more than that we gave the excess to those who worked on the ranches, or to people who came to visit.

Producing all we needed in the way of milk, eggs, meat, nuts and fruit on the ranch, there was little we were ever in want of. There were no power lines in the area, however we had a small electrical plant located in a storeroom in the stable area. It was wired to automatically run whenever a light switch was turned on anywhere on the ranch.

When riding together Henry and I discussed ways to make the ranch pay its own way. We finally decided that if we could secure leases on surrounding lands and several large mountain side grazing areas we'd do well raising Angora goats. These animals were highly prized for their fine silky hair that was used in high end furniture, as well as the clothing and automobile industries.

Henry acquired grazing rights to the additional areas we needed, then together we traveled to New Mexico where we purchased 300 head of Angora goats, most of them young nannies. At the New Mexico State Fair we bought six registered Angora Billys, then contracted for the herd to be trucked to Deer Springs.

After the goats arrived long hard days of labor followed as we cut new trails and built pens and shelters. We moved the herd deep into the brush away from home base to feed every day. At night they were securely penned to protect them from coyotes.

The goats with their long hair could not stand cold rain without a covered shelter to get under. Setting up camps for and hiring herders was not difficult. An ad in the Oxnard paper brought more applicants than we had expected, and sorting out those we wanted from those who were wasting our time as well as theirs was not too big a chore.

Henry brought an old man named Mr. Berleue to the ranch to work for me. A kindhearted person, Mr. Berleue had been sentenced for involuntary manslaughter after running down and killing a pedestrian while driving drunk. The court had subsequently paroled him to Mr. Chamberlain, and he was a lot of help to me in cleaning up around the houses and stables and keeping an eye on things.

Another herder I hired was a Mexican who passed his time in the evenings casting counterfeit 50 cent pieces made from melted aluminum scrap. These were amazingly realistic works, and while he was not much of a counterfeiter when it came to his choice of materials, he was a good goat herder once he understood the terrain we were working in. All told it appeared things were smoothing out and beginning to look promising as far as the ranch supporting itself was concerned.

Part 7

Deer Springs Ranch lay five miles inland at an elevation of 1800 feet above the coast road skirting the Pacific shore. At the junction where our ranch road met the coast highway was a small family operated service station and store that sold various items including fishing equipment. Christenson was the family's name. There was a mother and father and three draft age sons, boys who later would be called up to military service as we found ourselves drawn into the war.

The Christenson family tended lobster traps close by their place. Once they gave us a freshly caught live lobster so we could try cooking one for ourselves. Instructing Mary in how to prepare and serve it, they told her to cook it alive in boiling water.

Mary thought it would be too cruel to drop it into already boiling water, so she put it in a pot of cold water and set it on the stove to heat slowly. As the water started to heat the lobster became agitated, knocking the lid off the pot and splashing water all over the place before flopping onto the floor. We never did cook that lobster. Instead Mary insisted that we take it to the beach and put it back in the ocean.

Nature worked tortuously to create the maze of canyons and ridges, meadows and streams that make up the coastal slopes of the Santa Monica Mountains. Like the backbone of some prehistoric monster a knobby rock escarpment called Old Boney raises to dominate the highest point between the ocean and the inland valley to the east. Ribs of lesser ridges cleave to that rocky backbone as they slope off west to the sea coast or east the inland valley.

Few who lived in Los Angeles, short miles away, even knew about this wild natural world so near by. Mountain sides and coastal slopes were densely covered with sumac, holly, sage, oak, sycamore, grasses and lesser undergrowth. In this wild country trails had to be cut by hand before a man on horseback could move through thickets of verdant growth.

From time to time across the decades great wind driven fires cleaned these rough ridges and canyons, leaping from ridge to ridge leaving unburned pockets in deep canyon bottoms providing refuge for fleeing animals. Black tail deer population at Deer Springs Ranch was around 25 per square mile. Herds of deer came to feed in our fields and orchards at night as well as during the day. The damage they left behind was heavy, and we felt justified and repaid in some small way when we shot and dressed out a young animal for meat.

Our nearest neighbor, "Hopalong Cassidy" lived a half mile away. His was a famous screen name in early cowboy movie making. William Boyd, the man who played Hopalong Cassidy, was a prudent business man to go along with his acting talent. He had constructed a rambling Spanish style home with archway porches and a red tiled roof. His house sat on a ridge point providing a dramatically beautiful view of the Pacific.

Both William Boyd and his wife worked in the movie industry. They were more often away from their ranch than at home. Laurence and Betty Houston lived and worked as caretakers on the Boyd Ranch. Like Mary and myself they too were newly marrieds working their first job together.

Part 6

We were short of water that day. There had been little wind for several days so the windmill pump had not been working. In such an emergency there was a motor driven pump on a well high up on the side of the hill across the valley from our house.

After saddling Old Buck and settling him down (or so I thought) I got some tools and a gallon can of gas to run the pump motor, and decided that rather than climb that high hill myself I would ride that ornery horse up there to work off some of his excess energy. He was a little snorty, but I had him reined up tight and he couldn't do much mischief while climbing that steep hillside trail to the pump site.

The motor proved difficult to start. A half hour later I had it running but not as well as I thought it should. Still concentrating on what might be the problem with the motor, I swung into the saddle aboard Old Buck to head back to the house. True to reports he was just waiting to catch me off guard. Before I could catch the off side stirrup and get solidly set in the saddle he had his head down and was springing in giant leaps straight down the side of that steep hill. Each time he hit the ground he'd slide all four feet positioning himself for the next prodigious leap.

Grabbing at anything and everything as I worked to hang, from my perch I saw Mary and Betty Flo on the front porch waving and jumping up and down. Even the horses in the pastures below came running to get a better look at the contest between Buck and me, a contest that at that moment seemed as if I might not win.

Reaching for my hat with the same hand that held the empty gas can, I banged a knot on my head while losing both my hat and the can. Next went my pocket note book, pencils and pens, and whatever else happened to be in my pockets. Finally I was tossed in an undignified heap and could only watch as Buck ran away head high, looking back up the hill at me as he triumphantly joined the other horses to brag about how easy it was to dump that cowboy.

Mary and Betty Flo laughed, the horses snorted and laughed, and I couldn't help but laugh along with them as I gathered my things and headed down the hill. I caught Old Buck in the pasture and rode him back to the corral saying, "O.K., you caught me napping that time, but I'll be ready with a surprise the next time you try that." From then on I rode him with a short loop of leather lariat on my saddle horn.

We had six other horses on the ranch. Skippy, a big palomino with a flowing white mane and tail was a gentle natured gelding that the ladies liked to ride. Reynolds was a tall, brownish black Tennessee walker. He was Henry's personal horse and had to be dressed in a martingale to hold his head down. Otherwise when he got excited he would dance sideways and toss his head in a maddening rhythm. When he was calm and working on the trail his long swinging stride was a pleasure both to watch as well as to ride. Blaze was a three year old beautifully built sorrel colt that had not yet been broken to the saddle. Part of my job was to train him so he could be safely ridden.

Morgan was a shiny chestnut might mite of a horse that a young man had ridden all the way from Texas to Los Angeles. Henry bought him at auction where he was sold to raise money so the young Texan could enroll at UCLA. He showed his Morgan stock from his conformation to his disposition. I drove to the Los Angeles Hay Barn where the auction was held to pick him up in the ranch trailer. He most likely had never been trailered because it took a long time to calm him enough to coax him in, assuring him that a horse trailer was not something to fear.

For new riders and children there were two slow, gentle natured, indistinct horses, a black and a bay. They were dependable mounts, horses that I put Mary and Betty Flo on with no fear of either of them getting into trouble.

Part 5

Deer Springs Ranch was Henry Chamberlain's hideaway. His "big house" was at the edge of a precipitous drop that slid away to a thickly overgrown canyon. That canyon melded with others before emptying into the blue Pacific ocean in the distance. From the arched openings on his front porch we could see Anacapa Island as well as the other channel islands.

Mr. Chamberlain's house was built in a "T" shape with a huge living area, dining and kitchen in one wing, and a square stone tower a full story taller than the rest of the house dominating the main section. This taller structure supported the windmill that supplied water to the ranch. In the other wing were two bedrooms, and one story below the main level was a double garage. The walls of the house were constructed of native stone painted glistening white. The sloping roof and trim was a pretty shade of blue.

The windmill was white with white blades tipped in blue. The blue and white motif used on the place was striking. Sloping gently away from the patio and yard wall was a vineyard and orchard covering about 10 acres. There were apple, plumb, peach, pear, crab-apple and several hundred walnut trees. This fertile flat area narrowed and dropped away into a canyon below.

300 yards of so along this canyon, on the edge near some high rocky ledges, was the barn and stables. The stables surrounded a center patio corral that had a pigeon cote rising from one corner. Hundreds of white pigeons flew wheeling away to feed in the grain fields planted on the steep slopes on either side of the road from the big house.

Set on a slope above the stable area was a modern block house with two bedrooms, a bath, large living area and kitchen. This was to be our home. All the buildings on the ranch were painted in the blue and white Deer Springs colors.

Mr. Chamberlain's big house was seldom occupied. He used it for occasional visits with guests and family members, however such times were few and far between. As sole owner of The Chamberlain Co., and principal stock holder in L.A. Steel Casting Co., Henry Chamberlain was involved in the production of steel products. A life time resident of Beverly Hills, he and Mrs. Chamberlain had two daughters, the youngest married and the oldest engaged to be married. None of the women in his life particularly enjoyed being at the ranch, nevertheless he took great pride in keeping it in perfect condition for whatever occasion might arise.

On Thursday afternoons, often in the company of his insurance agent Tom Day, Mr. Chamberlain would come to ride horseback. We rode for hours up the rough and winding trail leading to "Old Bony," the highest point in the Santa Monica range. These men were 30 years my senior and possessed of experience and wisdom that I found stimulating and educational. I was pleased that they respected me for the way I managed the ranch and the care and handling of the horses.

My ability to ride "Old Buck," a huge buckskin with a rolling "coyote eye" and a mean streak to go with it, who had everyone scared until I arrived, clearly impressed them. Henry had cautioned me about Old Buck saying, "He'll buck anytime he thinks he has the advantage, and I can't let my friends ride him at all."

I began by saddling Old Buck one morning soon after taking charge of the ranch. As I placed the saddle on his back he stiffened, watching me out of the corner of his eye, then bowed his back and swelled up his belly so I could not tighten the cinch securely. To see what kind of game he wanted to play I tied the reins off to the saddle horn and kicked him a hard blow in his swelled up belly, sending him around the corral on his own to see what he'd do. He went around with his back up, tip-toeing on stiff legs, snorting and blowing, half heartedly bucking a few times, then turned facing me and finally relaxed. I tightened the cinch securely with nothing further from him except a few grunts, then left him standing while I finished other chores.

Part 4

After receiving my letter and corresponding briefly, ranch owner Henry Chamberlain came to Bakersfield to visit with me where I was staying with my cousins. He told me about his ranch, what he wanted accomplished, describing the house, milk cows, chickens, fruit and nut orchards, equipment and transportation, plus the $60 per month income that went with the job.

After driving out to see the ranch, high in the malibu covered Santa Monica Mountains overlooking the blue Pacific and the Channel Islands, I was anxious to get back and tell Mr. Chamberlain that I wanted the responsibility of managing his ranch for him. He was pleased, and we quickly developed a true liking for one another.

Mary and baby George were with my parents at their home at 715 E. Culver Street in Phoenix. George had been desperately ill with diarrhea, but I had no idea how ill until he and Mary arrived at the ranch in California. He'd recovered enough strength to stand with help, but looked like the photos we've all seen of starving children - all eyes, ribs and ears, and I was shocked at his appearance. However I loved Mary for her faith in the long term meaning of our marriage and family, and for her bravery in driving to California with the baby and my youngest sister Betty Flo. They'd made the trip in our old Plymouth to join me and begin a new life on an unknown ranch in a hidden corner of these coastal mountains.

It was a real adventure when we first arrived at Deer Springs Ranch. To get to the ranch Mary had only the scantiest of directions and no map, so she managed to follow another track on past the turnoff to Deer Springs until it ended on a point of a cliff that fell away almost straight down 1,000 feet to churning ocean far below. The little box sided tin shanty that was the lone structure on that windblown and treeless point of land had a dull light seeping through a dingy window, indicating someone was inside. Mary was sure her presence was known for a pack of hungry looking dogs of all sizes and colors set up a racket, and the baby started to cry needing to be changed and fed.

Summoning up all her courage and buoyed by concern for her baby, Mary made her way through the pack of dogs to the door, not certain that somehow this wasn't just a bad dream. Responding at last to her knock an ancient witch like woman came to the door, yelled at the yapping pack, and directed Mary back about three miles to a gate where she'd find round white millstones standing on both sides. When at last Mary and Betty Flo found their way to the ranch they were exhausted from their ordeal, yet comforted knowing their trip was complete. Without beds to sleep on that first night we were all so tired that blankets laid out on the hard floor were enough for us.

Breakfast early the following morning was meager, dry bread and a can of wieners. What was left of the baby food that Mary brought with her was not enough to last more than a day, and between us we had only a few dollars to last until our first payday, money we needed to save for medicine and other essentials. Our assets consisted of a completely empty house to live in, a truck with gasoline to run it, an expected shipment of personal belongings and furniture somewhere in route, and another two weeks until payday. We needed food and medicine enough for two weeks, but how to get it was the real problem.

Oxnard was our nearest supply point. Driving down the mountain ranch road to the coast, then north along the coast road through a broad green farmland valley to Oxnard, we considered what to say when we asked the grocer for two weeks credit on supplies we so desperately needed. We need not have worried. When he saw our starved looking infant in Mary's arms and heard our story he told us to get everything we needed and not cut ourselves short. With grateful hearts and high hopes we drove back to the ranch and our new home, filled with eagerness for our new surroundings and the promise of a brighter future. Betty Flo, my youngest sister, was not yet driving but willingly helped by taking care of the baby while enjoying the adventure of roughing it at our new ranch home.

Part 3

On February 27, 1937 Mary and I were married in the Phoenix LDS Third Ward chapel by Mary's uncle, John J. Udall. He was Bishop of the Phoenix LDS 1st Ward and Mayor of the City of Phoenix. My brother Charles was best man and Mary's sister Charlotte was maid of honor. Family members and close friends attended, and it was a short, simple, and very sweet ceremony.

We enjoyed a wedding reception at the home of Elaine Pace, Mary's sister. On that cold February evening the air was clear and the stars shined more brightly than ever as we drove east on Thomas road in our baby blue 1932 Model A Ford Roadster. The red moon rose in front of us so round and big that it filled the whole of the road, making it seem that all we had to do was keep driving east to get to where it was.

We didn't take a honeymoon at this time, but moved into a small apartment on west Adams street. That was our first home, but soon we found a pretty little cottage in northeast Phoenix with a big yard and a place to grow flowers.

Mary continued her work as secretary for Motor Supply Company, with branches in Holbrook, Tucson and Yuma. The company served as auto parts supplier to those areas with little competition.

Working as a district representative for the Liggett-Meyers Tobacco Company, with its head office in San Francisco, I called on wholesale and retail outlets in Phoenix, Mesa, Tempe, Glendale, Chandler, Buckeye, Tolleson, and occasionally in Prescott. I'd been working for Standard Stations while attending Arizona State Teachers College in Tempe (now Arizona State University) when I first met the district manager for Liggett-Meyers.

Returning often to my station for gasoloine and service, one day the sales manager asked if I'd like to work for his company. He sold me on the idea by pointing out that I would start for more money than beginning teachers were making, reminding me that I still had two years of school to complete before I'd be a licensed teacher. The idea of good pay, regular raises, health insurance and a retirement plan had a lot to do with my decision. Signing on with Liggett-Meyers seemed the right thing to do at the time.

It did not take long however before I was unhappy with the real world of a tobacco salesman. Although I continued to carry out my duties in an acceptable manner, my thoughts were often centered on finding another means of making a living. I spent a lot of time asking questions about farming opportunities whenever I was in Buckeye, Chandler, Glendale or other valley farming communities.

Farming interested me far more than other possibilities since I had grown up knowing the sense of freedom from restraint that comes with being a farmer. More and more I despised the petty regulations that my sales job imposed. To top it off when I took the job I had no idea that something of a moral issue would be involved. However my wife being a Mormon girl from a staunch Mormon family brought that issue to the front.

All of us were products of our upbringing and backgrounds, pressured and molded by the uncertainties of our distressed economic environment. In our local community as well as throughout the country a feeling of having come to a dead end permeated our lives. Along with that there was fear - deep seated and largely unspoken - that something bad was impending. Actions and attitudes of individuals as well as society at large reflected those feelings. We all had little means at our disposal other than simply finding a way to live.

Suspicion, bickering, contesting for every crumb and any kind of job was just the way things were. If you had a job you hung on to it by whatever means necessary, devious, honest, or otherwise - it made no difference. I put up a good front while a tobacco salesman, but doing less than I actually could have - just enough to stay with a job that I hoped one day soon to rid myself of.

Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini were marching their troops while threatening each other and the world around them with destruction. All the while our politicians made speeches assuring us that we had fought our last war for permanent peace, and that under no circumstances would we become involved in Europe's quarrels. Nevertheless as a British ally we converted factory after factory to war production supplying the needs of our English cousins.

Young people, in spite of flowery assurances to the contrary, deeply believed the time was fast approaching when America would be drawn into the war and they'd be drafted and sent overseas, if for no other reason than to save Britain from invasion.

The day came when my mind was made up. I turned in my company car and equipment and put that despised job behind me, not yet sure what I'd do next. This was soon after George was born. Following leads on new work and some tentative starts, I finally went to California to visit my Hodge cousins in Bakersfield. They were in construction and I hoped to find work with there.

While awaiting a job opening in Bakersfield I traveled to Pasadena to visit yet another Hodge cousin who worked as a roofing contractor. However there were no openings on his crew, so each day I read newspaper ads looking for work opportunities. Then one day I found an ad for a ranch foreman's position, so I wrote a letter inquiring after the job and telling about myself.

Part 2

Where Sky Harbor International Airport is now located was at that time a dirt landing strip a half mile long. I first soloed in a small airplane flying from that little field, experiencing great satisfaction in that accomplishment together with a growing love for the fledgling flying business. All this gave rise to second thoughts about marriage. I'd been spending what extra money I had on aircraft rentals, and knew this would have to be put in the background if I asked Mary to marry me.

Those flying from Phoenix's small landing strip, some of whom I became well acquainted with, were exciting and adventuresome characters in my view. One of these, Jimmy Angel, showed up at the Phoenix airfield in a huge old Fokker freight plane. Soon thereafter he began outfitting it to haul coffee from jungle plantations in South America to shipping centers on the west coast.

It didn't take long until I was spending all my spare time with Jimmy helping him with the work on his plane. We became friends and he asked me to go along with him as he filled his coffee hauling contracts, promising good wages and all the flight time I'd ever need for whatever license I might want to secure.

This was an exciting and heady consideration, and I needed to talk to someone about it. Mary was the only one I cared for enough to stay in town if she would consent to marry me. When we were alone one evening I spoke to her about Jimmy's offer saying, "I want to go with him - unless you'll marry me!"

I knew all along that I was going to ask her to marry me, but I wasn't really sure how the question should be asked until suddenly the whole sentence had been voiced. I was surprised and more than a little nervous about the way it happened, but to my great relief Mary smiled, put her arms around my neck saying "Yes," she would love to be my wife.

Mary's parents lived in Holbrook, so we first went to tell my parents and her brother Bill. Father's comment on hearing the news was, "And all this time we thought he had the flu!"

I have few clear memories of the short but hectic time we waited to be married. The guys at the airfield were happy for me and showed it by saying, "There goes another good man lost to the cause!"

Soon after that Jimmy Angel flew off to South America. The next I heard of him was when a picture of what the world would come to know as "Angel Falls" was published in the local paper. Jimmy took this famous photograph from his airplane, providing us our first ever glimpse of the world's highest waterfall, dwarfing all others.

Part 1


Together with the rest of the country our family was greatly impacted by the great depression. As mine production slowed to a crawl father found work on the maintenance crew five days a week at half pay. However that small income was barely sufficient to feed and house his family.

Plans I had to attend the University of Arizona following high school graduation were set aside as I sought work to contribute to our family's welfare. Any job at all was helpful, but steady work was not to be had. Operating a rootbeer and hamburger stand, cutting, hauling and selling firewood, and working as a partsman for the local Ford automobile agency provided low pay and required hours, but at least I was helping.


As the depression worsened Charles and I rode railroad freight cars around the country for about six months, searching for work of any kind. We found day to day jobs in the oil fields in Texas, in peach orchards in Arkansas, and worked construction jobs in Ohio.

Earning just enough to keep going, We saw a great deal of our country from box car doors, and had more than a few challenging and exciting experiences. We were happy when a letter from home caught up with us telling of a possible move from Miami, Arizona to Phoenix. Father had been promised work with the City of Phoenix as an operator at a new sewage treatment plant under construction.

Hurrying home from Cleveland, Ohio we learned on arrival that in order to be employed by the City of Phoenix father had to have an established residence in that city for a period of six months before starting. We decided he should continue his maintenance work at the mine in Miami while I would move to Phoenix, find a job, and establish a family home in preparation for the arrival of the rest of the family.

Once in Phoenix I was fortunate in securing employment with the contractor that was constructing the new sewage treatment plant where father was to work. My wages were sufficient to carry out the family's plan, and in due time father and mother and the rest of the children made the move to our new Phoenix home. Dad began work as an operator at the newly constructed sewage treatment plant for a handsome $90 per month. After he began work with the city I continued to be employed for several months as the last stages of the construction project were finalized and machinery put into place.

My pay had increased from .60 cents an hour to start to .90 cents an hour by the time we finished the project. On completion I was offered additional work with the company on a project in Hawaii at the same high rate of pay. While I knew it would be difficult to find other work at equal pay, and the job in Hawaii in fact sounded great, nevertheless I felt sure that something would happen for the best if I stayed in Phoenix with my family, which turned out to be a happy decision. Charles, Hodge and I secured separate newspaper routes that brought in enough to purchase clothing, books, lunches and entertainment. We enrolled in school, Charles and I attending Phoenix Jr. College, with Hodge in high school and Juanita and Betty in grade school.

Those uncertain, insecure, growing up years during the height of the depression were fertile ground for a variety of things, and the unsettled adventurism of young hearts and minds provided motive and desire that had to be anchored in the context of family and home if the hectic changes of life were to be woven into a framework for a secure approach to living.

In seeking a wife one must become a good judge of young women, developing a positive mental picture of the type of person he'd be best suited with for a lifetime of companionship and love. At the age of 25 I had enjoyed many casual and a few not so casual girlfriends, but none had been precisely right for me.

Then one day Mary Sherwood walked through the front door of our house and into the living room. I was recovering from a severe cold or the flu, and she was accompanied by her brother Hubble. She wore a cute outfit that showed off her petite figure, with nice shoes and stockings revealing pretty legs. She had beautiful red hair, a pretty face with a freckled nose, and an easy laugh that made me smile in spite of how poorly I felt at that moment.

Hubble had been living in a rented room in our home for several months, ever since taking a job with the City of Phoenix working under my father at the sewage treatment plant. To us he was just plain Bill, and he'd told us about his four sisters. Two of them, Marjorie and Elaine, were older than he was, and two, Mary and Charlotte, were younger.

Marjorie and Elaine were each married and had children. Mary worked as the secretary for Phoenix Motor Supply Company, and Charlotte was in training at St. Joseph's Hospital School of Nursing. I recognized in Mary the strong family characteristics that I saw in Bill, and hoped I'd have a chance to know her better.

Bill and I often went out together in the evenings, so it became a thing that we did to stop by Mary's and Lea's shared apartment to visit. Lea Gardner was Mary's roommate and one of her best friends. At times the girls would be washing dishes, ironing, cleaning house, or doing their hair and nails when we arrived, so our visits were short, warm, friendly and comfortable, entirely without pretense or show.

Before long I asked Mary to go out with me. More often than not we ended up visiting her family home or mine. Evenings at home with family and friends served in place of shows or night spots. There was no television, and Phoenix only had two theaters. Lack of money that might allow us to enjoy the better restaurants and dance spots was a large factor. Saturday nights and special occasions were the only times we could afford to go out on the town, even in a limited sense.

Playing family party poker for fun and companionship we kept the stakes low enough so those who lost were usually separated from $2 or less. Seldom were the winners skilled enough to repeat during the next game. Such games were great fun for all of us, and Mary and I found our friendship quickly growing.