Towns near Globe, Arizona

First timer? In this formerly once-a-day blog (and now pretty much a once-a-week blog) I use an app that provides a random latitude and longitude that puts me somewhere in the continental United States (the lower 48).  I call this “landing.”

I keep track of the watersheds I land in, as well as the town or towns I land near.  I do some internet research to hopefully find something of interest about my landing location. 

To find out more about A Landing A Day (like who “Dan” is) please see “About Landing” above.  To check out some relatively recent changes in how I do things, check out “About Landing (Revisited).”

Landing number 2658; A Landing A Day blog post number 1104

Dan:  Today’s lat/long (N33^o 18.182’, W110^o 44.867) puts me in central-southeast Arizona:

Here’s my local landing map:

You can see Globe, just north of my landing. Even though it’s the largest town around, it mysteriously didn’t show up on the above Street Atlas map (so I added it). I’ll switch over to Google Earth (GE) where the Orange Dude could get remarkably close to my landing:

He can see my landing location as well as the valley that carries my runoff:

The OD went several miles to the northeast where he found a spot to check out my drainage further downstream:

And here’s what he sees:

I’ll switch over to a streams-only Street Atlas map (with Gilson Wash added by yours truly):

GE let me know that I landed in the watershed of Gilson Wash; on to the San Carlos River (1^st hit ever!); on to the Gila River (49^th hit); to the Colorado (201^st hit).

Look back up at my local landing map.  See all of those towns?  Every one of them (except Peridot and San Carlos) was founded as a mining town.  Mainly silver and copper, mining has thrived since the late 1800s.  (San Carlos is the administrative seat of the San Carlos Apache Indian reservation,, and Peridot is also on the reservation.)

I’ll start with a town that was entirely wiped off the face of the earth – Ray.  Here’s a back-in-the-day shot of Ray (from the Arizona Memory Project):

Here’s the Ray School:

And Ray in the early 1950s:

From Wiki, here’s a recent shot:

Note that you can see mine workings in the foreground, where Ray should be.  When I typed “Ray” in GE, here’s what came up:

Hmmm.  Note that Teapot Mountain is the peak shown on the two earlier photos.

Ray was a company town built by Arizona Hercules Copper company in 1909.  Through the 1940s, the mining was underground, but then the operation changed to open pit.  And poor old Ray was in the way.  All of the Ray residents (and a couple of other small towns) were moved to Kearny, built from scratch in the 1950s.  Here’s a GE look at Kearny:

Here are a couple of quick-hitters:

From WorldPopulationReview.com, this about Cutter:

Cutter is a city located in Gila County Arizona. Cutter has a 2024 population of 0. Cutter is currently declining at a rate of 0% annually and its population has decreased by __ since the most recent census, which recorded a population of 0 in 2020.

Christmas was so nameda because the nearby mine was staked out and claimed on Christmas day, 1902.

From Winkelman’s website:

Globe was so named because a large spherical (globe-like) silver nugget was found nearby.

Kelvin was named after Kelvin Grove, a park and a neighborhood in Glasgow Scotland. Here’s a picture of the Kelvingrove bandstand and ampitheater (from WhatsOnGlasgow.co.uk):

Peridot is named after a semi-precious gemstone (the August birthstone) found nearby.  Here are a couple of pictures of the mineral.  First, an uncut specimen:

Hayden is on its way to becoming a ghost town, primarily (according to Wiki) because of widespread contamination from the copper smelter around which the town was built.  Here’s a GE shot of the town:

The OD stopped by to get a look at the huge spoil pile just outside of town:

Miami & Globe are next to each other and next to huge copper mine workings:

Miami is the hometown of Manuel Mendoza, a World War II recipient of the Medal of Honor.  Here’s the citation.  It’s really gruesome, but speaks to the reality of warfare:

For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty:

Staff Sergeant Manuel V. Mendoza distinguished himself by acts of gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a Platoon Sergeant with Company B, 350th Infantry, 88th Infantry Division during combat operations against the German army on Mt. Battaglia, Italy on October 4, 1944.

That afternoon, the enemy launched a violent counterattack preceded by a heavy mortar barrage. Staff Sergeant Mendoza, already wounded in the arm and leg, grabbed a Thompson sub-machine gun and ran to the crest of the hill where he saw approximately 200 enemy troops charging up the slopes employing flame-throwers, machine pistols, rifles, and hand grenades.

Staff Sergeant Mendoza immediately began to engage the enemy, firing five clips and killing ten enemy soldiers. After exhausting his ammunition, he picked up a carbine and emptied its magazine at the enemy. By this time, an enemy soldier with a flame-thrower had almost reached the crest, but was quickly eliminated as Staff Sergeant Mendoza drew his pistol and fired.

Seeing that the enemy force continued to advance, Staff Sergeant Mendoza jumped into a machine gun emplacement that had just been abandoned and opened fire. Unable to engage the entire enemy force from his location, he picked up the machinegun and moved forward, firing from his hip and spraying a withering hail of bullets into the oncoming enemy, causing them to break into confusion.

He then set the machine gun on the ground and continued to fire until the gun jammed. Without hesitating, Staff Sergeant Mendoza began throwing hand grenades at the enemy, causing them to flee.

Staff Sergeant Mendoza’s gallant stand resulted in thirty German soldiers killed and the successful defense of the hill.  His extraordinary heroism and selflessness above and beyond the call of duty are in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit and the United States Army.

Phew. 

From Wiki, about Superior:

Like nearby Globe, Ray, and Clifton, Arizona, Superior was once part of a huge Apache reservation, but after silver and copper deposits were discovered, those areas were withdrawn from the reservation and returned to the public domain.

[Sounds familiar.]

In 1872, at the height of the American Indian Wars, a band of raiding Apache horsemen were ambushed by a United States Cavalry force from Picket Post Mountain. After losing 50 men, the Apache retreated up the mountain later named “Apache Leap”. According to local legend, the remaining Apache accepted defeat and leapt to their death rather than being captured by the cavalry, thus giving the mountain its name.

Here’s a GE shot of Superior and vicinity:

And a Wiki shot of Apache Leap:

A couple of mining companies are attempting to develop a huge underground copper mine east and south of Superior, known as the “Resolution Copper” project.  Over a billion dollars have been spent by the mining companies, but the project faces huge hurdles, especially considering that the land above the mine is known as “Oak Flat,” a large federally-protected area considered sacred to the Apaches. 

I’ll close with some Oak Flat pictures posted on GE.  First this one, by Galen Beck:

And then three by Art Brown, beginning with this eerily-human-looking rock:

And these lovely Oak Flat shots:

That’ll do it –

KS

Greg

© 2024 A Landing A Day

Chautauqua and Panama, New York

First timer? In this formerly once-a-day blog (and now pretty much a once-a-week blog) I use an app that provides a random latitude and longitude that puts me somewhere in the continental United States (the lower 48).  I call this “landing.”

I keep track of the watersheds I land in, as well as the town or towns I land near.  I do some internet research to hopefully find something of interest about my landing location. 

To find out more about A Landing A Day (like who “Dan” is) please see “About Landing” above.  To check out some relatively recent changes in how I do things, check out “About Landing (Revisited).”

Landing number 2657; A Landing A Day blog post number 1103

Dan:  Today’s lat/long (N42^o 3.260’, W79^o 21.645) puts me in far western New York:

And my local landing map:

My watershed analysis is unique amongst all of my landings – and not because of any stream or river names.  I’ll start with my local streams-only map:

I landed in the watershed of Cooper Creek; on to Chautauqua Lake. Chautauqua Lake is drained by the Chadakoin River.  So far, so good, but why didn’t I put the number of hits for the Chadakoin River, or say “First Hit Ever!”  Let me continue.

The Chadakoin River discharges to the Cassadaga Creek.  Say what!  A river discharges to a creek?  In my thousands of landings, I’ve never had that happen.  Note that I didn’t say “I don’t recall this ever happening.”  That’s because I’m sure it has never happened.

And it gets worse.  Cassadaga Creek discharges to yet another creek – Conewango Creek!  Let me zoom back:

The Conewango Creek discharges into the Allegheny River (9^th hit); on to the Ohio River (163^rd hit); on to the MM (1034^th hit). 

So one obvious question pops out:  should my landing spreadsheet recognize the Chadakoin River as a river?  Well, there are three reasons that I decided to break what used to be a cardinal rule:  if a waterway is called a river, I treat it as a river.  The first reason is that it’s only 7 miles long, the second reason is that it discharges to a creek (which in turn discharges to another creek). 

The third reason is related to the second:  If I add the Chadakoin as a river, I would be forced to elevate both the Cassadaga Creek and Conewango Creek to river status in the watershed portion of my spreadsheet.

So I decided that my spreadsheet will treat the Chadakoin as if it were a lowly creek. 

And now, for a second item:  I’ve decided to elevate the “lowly” Conewango Creek to the status of a river!  (Sorry, Cassadaga Creek, I’m leaving you out.) It’s 10x longer than the Chadakoin “River” and has a large watershed (900 square miles) that includes Lake Chautauqua. 

And get this:  Wiki lets us know that the Conewango Creek was named Pennsylvania’s “River of the Year” for 2015.

OK.  So here’s a small portion of my spreadsheet, showing the Conewango Creek proudly taking its place amongst ALAD rivers:

Before moving on to Google Earth (GE), here’s a streams-only map showing the nearby continental divide:

As you might suspect (if you thought about it), American Indians had a portage trail to get their canoes over the divide.  From PanamaRocks.com (more about Panama Rocks later in the post):

Early French explorers learned of a portage trail from Lake Erie to Lake Chautauqua. This portage connected the Great Lakes with the Allegheny-Ohio-Mississippi River System. This was an important route connecting the eastern and central parts of the continent.

Moving over to GE.  The Orange Dude could get about a half mile from my landing:

And here’s what he sees:

He headed north to get a look at Cooper Creek before it discharges into Lake Chatauqua:

Hmmm.  I think I’ll zoom in on the sign:

Ashville General Store is quite the local institution.  But what’s that creature at the top of the sign?  Well, it turns out it’s (he’s?) “Fingerhead,” and the store’s Facebook page was hosting a Fingerhead selfie contest.  Here’s one of the entries:

Whatever . . .

I’ve never landed near Lake Chautauqua, but it turns out that I have featured Chautauqua previously on ALAD – in my March 2013 Gladstone Oregon post.  Gladstone Oregon – say what?  It turns out that I landed near “Chautauqua Lake”, a very small lake in Gladstone Park. 

From that post:

Anyway, checking out the “history” section of the City’s website, it turns out that the founder of the City of Gladstone (one Harvey Edward Cross) was heavily involved in the nationwide fad known as the Chautauqua movement (more about that in a minute), and in 1894 he granted a 50-year lease of substantial acreage around a small lake to the Willamette Valley Chautauqua Association for its annual summer assemblies. The property became known as Chautauqua Park and the lake was named Chautauqua Lake.

So, what is Chautauqua?  Here’s some background, which I’ve gleaned from Chautauqua.com (the website for the Colorado Chautauqua Association).

The Chautauqua movement started at Chautauqua Lake, New York back in the 1870s.  Chautauqua is way out in western NY, not far from Erie PA.  Anyway, there was a Methodist church camp there that begin holding a wide range of adult education lectures and seminars, that came to be organized as the Chautauqua Institution.  The whole idea caught on, and began to include cultural as well as educational events.  It became non-denominational (mildly Protestant), and nation-wide.

 Here’s some material from the  Chautauqua website:

Before radio and television, the Chautauqua Movement united millions in common cultural and educational experiences. Orators, performers, and educators traveled a national Chautauqua circuit of more than 12,000 sites bringing lectures, performances, concerts, classes, and exhibitions to thousands of people in small towns and cities. Theodore Roosevelt called Chautauquas, “the most American thing in America.”

As its members and graduates spread the Chautauqua idea, many towns—especially in rural areas where opportunities for secondary education were limited—established “chautauquas.”  “Chautauqua” had a degree of cachet and became short hand for an organized gathering intended to introduce people to the great ideas, new ideas, and issues of public concern. “Independent chautauquas,” those with permanent buildings and staff could be found throughout the US by 1900, with a concentration in the mid-West.

The movement pretty much died out by the mid-1930s. Most historians cite the rise of the car culture, radio, and movies as the causes.

However, Chautauqua lives on – where else – in its origin city, Chautauqua NY.  It’s a big deal, attracting more than 100,000 visitors annually to Chautauqua every summer for a series of lectures, concerts, and other events.

Chautauqua was in the news a couple of years ago, when Salmon Rushdie was attacked by a knife-bearing hater,  just as he was about to present a lecture.

From Wiki:

On August 12, 2022, novelist Salman Rushdie was stabbed multiple times as he was about to give a public lecture at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua, New York.  A 24-year-old suspect, Hadi Matar, was arrested directly and charged the following day with assault and attempted murder. Rushdie was gravely wounded and hospitalized.

Rushdie, an Indian-born British-American, has been threatened with death since 1989, a year after the publication of his novel The Satanic Verses, when the Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa calling for his assassination and set a bounty of $3 million for his death. For years, Rushdie had lived in hiding, taking strict security measures that gradually became more relaxed over time.

In July 1991, the book’s Italian translator Ettore Capriolo was stabbed multiple times at his home in Milan.  Ten days later, Hitoshi Igarashi, who translated The Satanic Verses in Japanese, was stabbed to death in July 1991.

Rushdie’s memoir about the attack, Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder, is scheduled for publication in April 2024.  From Amazon:

From internationally renowned writer and Booker Prize winner Salman Rushdie, a searing, deeply personal account of enduring—and surviving—an attempt on his life thirty years after the fatwa that was ordered against him

Speaking out for the first time, and in unforgettable detail about the traumatic events of August 12, 2022, Salman Rushdie answers violence with art, and reminds us of the power of words to make sense of the unthinkable.

Moving on to Panama.  The town is named after the nearby “Panama Rocks,” which is a very cool bedrock outcropping (now a private park) near the town. From the Panama Rocks website:

The traditional story of how Panama got its name is about “Panama Joe,” a man who had been across the Isthmus of Panama, and said these rocks reminded him of rocks there. Eventually, the rocks became known as Panama Rocks.

It is possible that the person known as Panama Joe (aka Moses Marsh), who operated a trading company in Panama and was Panama’s first postmaster. He had previously had a business in the nation of Cuba and traveled across the Isthmus of Panama.

When the village was to be named, Panama Joe (the postmaster) suggested that they name it after him and his famous rocks.

From the website Only In Your State (in the post entitled “The Undwerrated Wonder Every New Yorker Should See at least Once”), I’m going to close this post with shots of Panama Rocks:

I love it when a photographer sees an opportunity for a great picture, and has the patience & skill to make it so . . .

That’ll do it –

KS

Greg

© 2024 A Landing A Day

Paso Colorado Crossing, Bone Watering and Dryden, Texas

First timer? In this formerly once-a-day blog (and now pretty much a once-a-week blog) I use an app that provides a random latitude and longitude that puts me somewhere in the continental United States (the lower 48).  I call this “landing.”

I keep track of the watersheds I land in, as well as the town or towns I land near.  I do some internet research to hopefully find something of interest about my landing location. 

To find out more about A Landing A Day (like who “Dan” is) please see “About Landing” above.  To check out some relatively recent changes in how I do things, check out “About Landing (Revisited).”

Landing number 2656; A Landing A Day blog post number 1102

Dan:  Today’s lat/long (N29^o 53.555’, W102^o 15.746) puts me southwest Texas, east of Big Bend:

Interesting factoid:  This was my second straight landing with “746” after the decimal point in my landing latitude.  OK so maybe it’s not so interesting . . . 

Here’s my very local landing map:

OK, I’ll back out a little:

Oh, al right.  I’ll back out a little further:

Phew.  We finally can see some towns – although the closest, Dryden is a ghost town, population “about 13.”

Of course, I had to go to Google Earth (GE) to get a look at my local watershed situation:

The Orange Dude hates it when he can’t get a look at my landing, or any of my watershed streams.  OK, he can see the Rio Grade, but the nearest spots with Street View where the OD could get a look at the river were 42 miles downstream (with this lousy view):

And 64 miles upstream – with this much better view (and the OD actually in Mexico):

And near the above location (in Mexico), is this walk-in Street View shot:

Hmmm.  Looks like a really easy spot to cross over from Mexico.  And just who are those folks in the boat?

So, I really wanted to learn if my watershed wash leading to the Rio Grande had a name.  Nothing on Google Earth, but of course I had to check out the USGS map.  It was tricky figuring out which made had the confluence of the wash with the Rio Grande, but I finaly figured out it was the “Panther Gulch East” map.  And no, my wash was no Panther Gulch.  Anyway, here’s’ a close-up:

Hmmm.  Nothing about my wash.  But, I landed near the “Paso Colorado Crossing.”  Definitely worth a Google search; but first, this GE look at the crossing:

My Google search revealed an article from News West 9 (Midland TX) entitled “Border Patro – Fighting the Unseen Enemy.”  Of course, the Paso Colorado Crossing is mentioned.  Here are some excerpts:

SANDERSON – NewsWest 9 followed along as Big Bend Border Patrol Agents were searching Agua Verde, a rough remote region located more than a dozen miles south from the town of Dryden. This time agents are searching for a group who crossed the Rio Grande in the late night hours.

“They’re resting because they walked all night. Got a full moon, so it’s almost like daylight out here at night when we got a full moon. So they can see and navigate and walk. They’ll walk at night because it’s an advantage to them and a disadvantage to us,” Big Bend Sector Public Officer, Rush Carter, said.

Carter along with other agents are trying to incept them. Tracking them footprint by footprint.

“Have to be real careful when we’re cutting here and take our time and look for those kicked over rocks, hopefully a foot print. Something to give us a clue that someone passed through this area,” Carter said.

Border Patrol Agents were able to locate the group deep inside the canyon, they say they crossed near the Paso Colorado crossing in Terrell County. Nine out of the ten Mexican nationals that they were looking for were arrested and processed for removal.

“They convey that they’re trying to get here to better their lives.  But what I convey to them is that we’re out here doing our job to secure the border and when we apprehend people like that, it’s just our job and what we’ve been tasked with,” Carter said.

I also found “Paso Colorado Crossing” in this 1918 book:

The reference to the crossing wasn’t in the geology part of the book; rather the “roads” part of the book.  As you’ll see, they also reference a nearby location known as “Bone Watering.” I encourage you to actually read the following:

Note that it says, “The break in the cliffs of the river is so narrow that it is necessary to lead horses down to the water one at a time.”

The write-up goes on:

If you’re a long-time reader of this blog, you’ll know that I dutifully searched for more information about Bone Watering, with my main objective being a map.  I spent an inordinate amount of time performing said search, but to no avail.   Based on the clues in the write-up, I knew it couldn’t be far from my landing . . .

 OK, OK.  I found a Rio Grande water quality monitoring station called “Upper Bone Watering.”  Here’s a map:

Well, lookee there!  It’s right at the Paso Colorado Crossing!  However, based on the road descriptions, they actually can’t be the same location.  And for the record: I Googled “Middle Bone Watering” and “Lower Bone Watering,” to no avail.

Most people investigating Bone Watering would let it go (and wouldn’t have gone as far as I did). But I’m me, and I felt compelled to at least speculate on Bone Watering’s location. Based on the write-up, I know that it’s west of Paso Colorado Crossing, and I believe that it wouldn’t be outside the big meander that contains the Crossing. It’s a break in the cliff that contains a narrow trail down to the river (wide enough or only one horse at a time). So. Here’s my best shot:

And here’s a close-up of my proposed Bone Watering location:

The more I think about it, the more confident I am that I found it. Case closed!

It’s time for a quick visit to Dryden.  It’s a railroad town, and its population maxed out at something above 100 back in the 1920s.  It had a hotel, a saloon and a school.  It probably had a church (didn’t all ghost towns with a hotel, school and saloon also have a church?), but nothing was said about a church. It’s current population is said to 13. 

From Texas Escapes, here’s a picture of the Purple Sage Saloon:

And the school:

I’ll close with this shot of the Rio Grande a few miles upstream, posted on GE by Greg Anderson:

That’ll do it.

KS

Greg

© 2024 A Landing A Day

A Plethora of Small Towns Near Norfolk, Nebraska

First timer? In this formerly once-a-day blog (and now pretty much a once-a-week blog) I use an app that provides a random latitude and longitude that puts me somewhere in the continental United States (the lower 48).  I call this “landing.”

I keep track of the watersheds I land in, as well as the town or towns I land near.  I do some internet research to hopefully find something of interest about my landing location. 

To find out more about A Landing A Day (like who “Dan” is) please see “About Landing” above.  To check out some relatively recent changes in how I do things, check out “About Landing (Revisited).”

Landing number 2655; A Landing A Day blog post number 1101

Dan:  Today’s lat/long (N41^o 59.380’, W97^o 1.746) puts me in northeast Nebraska:

Here’s my local landing map:

You can see on the above map that I landed adjacent to the Elkhorn River (4^th hit).  Here’s my streams-only map:

The Elkhorn is part of the Platte River watershed (78^th hit); on to the Missouri (470^th hit); on to the MM (1033^rd hit).

The Orange Dude headed to the bridge over the Elkhorn just south of Pilger:

Here’s his upstream (west) view:

He went a few hundred yards south, to a minor crossroads, where he looked east towards my landingm which is situated about a mile and a half down the dirt road:

Here’s where I landed:

The OD and I were totally bummed out that there is no Street View covereage here.

So.  Look at all of those towns on my local landing map.  I checked them all.  EACH AND EVERY ONE.  I could find no hook significant enough to carry the day. And these aren’t all teeny towns.  Nearly all have a fairly substantial system of streets and cross streets (except for Enola).

So anyway, I thought I’d do a grand tour, saying something about each one (after dutifully letting you know the population of each).

I’m going to start with the far-and-away largest town, Norfolk (pop 24,200), which is the hometown of Johnny Carson. 

I enjoyed watching Carson off and on throughout most of his career and I just finished a You Tube tour of Johnny’s greatest moments (which, for the most part, were hilarious).

Stanton (pop 1600) was named after Edwin Stanton.  Hmmm.  Edwin Stanton is a familiar name, but if you’re like me, you can’t put your finger on his identity.  Well, he was Abraham Lincoln’s Secretary of War.  From Wiki:

Edwin Stanton (1814 – 1869) was an American lawyer and politician who served as Secretary of War under the Lincoln Administration during most of the American Civil War. Stanton’s management helped organize the massive military resources of the North and guide the Union to victory.

However, he was criticized by many Union generals, who perceived him as overcautious and micromanaging.  He also organized the manhunt for Abraham Lincoln’s assassin, John Wilkes Booth.

Pilger (pop 350; closest to my landing) was hit by devasting twin tornados on June 16, 2014:

The tornados caused two deaths and 20 injuries.

Wisner (pop 1170) is the hometown of Private Dale Hansen, a Medal of Honor winner for his actions on Okinawa during WW II.  Here’s a portion of his citation:

Cool and courageous in combat, Marine Private Hansen unhesitatingly took the initiative during a critical stage of the action and, armed with a rocket launcher, crawled to an exposed position where he attacked and destroyed a strategically located hostile pillbox. With his weapon subsequently destroyed by enemy fire, he seized a rifle and continued his one-man assault.

Reaching the crest of a ridge, he opened fire on six Japanese and killed four before his rifle jammed. Attacked by the remaining two Japanese, he beat them off with the butt of his rifle and then climbed back to cover.

Promptly returning with another weapon and a supply of grenades, he fearlessly advanced, destroyed a strong mortar position and annihilated eight more of the enemy.

In the forefront of battle throughout this bitterly waged engagement, Private Hansen, by his indomitable determination, bold tactics and complete disregard of all personal danger, contributed greaty to the success of his company’s mission and to the ultimate capture of this fiercely defended outpost of the Japanese Empire.

Private Hansen was killed by Japanese sniper fire three days later . . .

Beemer (pop 680) was named after the German automaker* and is the hometown of sports and political cartoonist Karl Hubenthal.  Here’s a Vietnam-era Hubenthal cartoon (combing sports and current events) showing how North Vietnam’s guerilla tactics were hard to deal with:

* Just kidding . . .

West Point (pop 3,500) was not named after the famous New York state military academy.  It started out as New Philadelphia (yes, named for the reason you’d think), but was called West Point because (according to Wiki) it was the “westernmost outpost along the valley.”  It’s the oldest town in the area, so I guess that makes sense.

Scribner (pop 860) has a familiar ring to it, and in fact it was named after publisher Charles Scribner, founder of the publishing house that eventually became Charles Scribner’s Sons.

Born in New York City and a graduate of Princeton, I have no clue as to why a small town in Nebraska is named after an east coast publisher . . . .

Snyder (pop 300) was named after Conrad Schneider, the original owner of the town site.  I would guess that “Schneider” sounded a little too German for the locals who likely changed the name during WW I (although I could find nothing on the internet about the name change).

Speaking of finding nothing, I could find nothing to say about Dodge (pop 620).  As happens when this is the case, I typically default to a back-in-the-day (turn of the century) shot of Main St.  Here goes:

The town of Howells (pop 560) has a website . . .

. . . that says this about the town’s name:

In 1887, officials of the Fremont Elkhorn and Missouri Valley Railroad designated the name “Howell” to the community. This name honored James Smith Howell, who was a local surveyor, farmer and teacher. The final “s” was added in 1937 making the legal name Howells.

Oh, come on!  Anyone who reads this wants to know WHY the final “s” was added!

Moving on to Clarkson (pop 670) I found this cool 1918 photo from ClarksonHIstory, a WordPress blog with a piece by Glenn Cada entitled “The End of the Good Times?”):

Here’s Glenn’s write-up that follows the photo:

A while back Vickie Obermaier, a descendant of Clarkson’s Kudrna clan, sent me this interesting portrait of a haymaking crew taking a break from their labors.  Mugging for the camera, they stand stock-still in their poses (only the blurred horses’ heads betray the long shutter speeds of the old camera).  Two of the farmers are holding stoneware crocks of… lemonade?  All sorts of little details can be made out from this old photo – steel-wheeled hayracks, fly nets on the draft horse harnesses, some sort of row crop in the background.

Seven wagons bulging with hay, it is a picture of agricultural prosperity – the Promise of the New World.  This was a major reason many came to America in the first place – work hard and get rich.  There is little doubt that the men were enjoying their brief rest before pushing on to the painstaking (and dusty) task of constructing haystacks.  And there is no doubt that they are unaware that the prosperity to which they have been accustomed was about to come to a sudden end.  These happy farmers were on the verge of a two-decade long period of hard times.

Hmmm.  I know about the Depression & Dust Bowl of the 1930s, but I’m not sure about the hard times beginning in the 20s . . .

Leigh (pop 400) is the hometown of Audrey Stevens Niyogi, a biochemist who is the “co-discoverer of RNA polymerase.” 

Wiki has a coo picture of her father with his two daughters at their farm just outside of Leigh.  Audrey is on the right and her twin sister Ardyce on the left.

I won’t go into any details on her discovery, but Wiki lets us know she was a brilliant scientist. Strangely (to me, anyway), Wiki also says this:

Audrey was an early pioneer in balancing a scientific career with family life. In 1964, she married fellow biochemist, Salil Kumar Niyogi. They remained married until their deaths in 2010.

After her second son was born in 1967, to devote more time to parenting, Audrey had her position at Oak Ridge National Laboratories officially changed to half time. Although she continued to work hours that were closer to full-time, this gave her the flexibility to be more available to her children. 

An interesting Wiki tidbit . . .

According to Wiki, Creston (pop 200) was so named because of its “lofty elevation.”  After performing a comprehensive Google Earth survey of elevations in the village and surrounding areas, I unequivocally have this to say:  Creston in no way stands out from surrounding areas due to its elevation. 

I think that Creston, Nebraska was named after Creston, Iowa (featured just a few posts ago).  Creston Iowa is actually appropriately named, as it is located on a major watershed divide.

Humphrey (pop 750) is the hometown of one Max Carl, an accomplished rock-and-roll musician who played with 0.38 Special (1980s) and Grand Funk Railroad (1990s to present).

Madison (pop 2300) is the hometown of writer Artmitage Trail.  Yes, that’s his name, although he was born Maurice Coons.  From Wiki:

As a teenager in New Orleans, Trail developed a passion for writing, quitting school at the age of 16 to devote his time to it. Likewise, his interest in gangsters such as Al Capone began at a young age, and it was stated by Hannibal Coons that his brother Maurice “was interested in gangsters as other men are interested in postage stamps, old coins, or spread-eagled butterflies.”

Throughout the rest of his teens and early twenties, Maurice Coons used a variety of pseudonyms, writing various crime and detective stories for pulp magazines. During this time, he ended up living in the Chicago area, where he wrote his only well-known work, Scarface, a novel about gangster Al Capone.

Not much is known about Trail’s time in Illinois. He lived in Oak Park, Illinois [Hey!  So did I!] a town adjacent to the west side of Chicago, where he worked on composing Scarface daily in his sun-room. He did not live in Oak Park long enough to be recorded by an official U.S. Census.

Trail spent much of his time in Chicago associating with local Sicilian gangs in order to gain ideas for his novel.  Trail published Scarface in 1930.

Here’s Wiki’s plot summary for the novel:

The book’s storyline is heavily inspired by the real life gangster Al Capone whose nickname was also “Scarface”. The novel concerns the rise and fall of Tony “Scarface” Guarino, who after performing a hit on mob leader Al Springola, moves in to take over the illegal alcohol business in Chicago during the Prohibition Era. He is ultimately shot dead by his brother, who fails to recognise him due to the family believing that he died in World War I.

[Wow. Strange plot twist. Could that be true about Al Capone? A quick check on Al Capone shows that he died in 1947 at age 47 after a lengthy illness.]

Producer Howard Hughes [yes, that Howard Hughes] eventually approached Trail about his novel with the interest of adapting it as a movie. Trail sold the rights to Scarface to Hughes for $25,000, relocating to Los Angeles in the process. 

After selling the rights to Scarface, W.R. Burnett, who worked on the screenplay, stated that Trail began to struggle with alcoholism. Trail lived flamboyantly in Hollywood [burning through his new-found fortune] rapidly gaining weight, wearing wide-brimmed Borsalino hats, and hiring a servant named Elijah Ford.

[Strange Wiki detail, about the hats and his servant . . . ]

Trail never lived to see the movie Scarface finished, and died in October 1930 of heart failure while at the Paramount Theatre.

Phew.  I’m ready for my final stop, in Enola.  No population was listed in Wiki; I’m sure it’s less than 20.  Here’s a GE shot of the town:

Maybe 5 or 6 houses? The only “Enola” I know is the U.S. bomber that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima – the Enola Gay – a name that will live in infamy (sorry, Oppie). It was named after Enola Gay Tibbets, mother of pilot Paul Tibbets. 

However, the Nebraska town was named after its founder T. J. Malone.  Look at his last name, and you’ll see where the name came from.  Just forget about the “M.”

Speaking of the Enola Gay, in a March 2017 post, I featured my Mobil Oil work trip to Tinian Island, where the Enola Gay took off loaded with the A-bomb to be dropped on Hiroshima.  I just re-read the portion of my post about Tinian, and it is well worth the read.  Just type “Tinian” in the search bar.

I’ll close with this picture of a church that certainly has seen better days. It is posted on GE by Matt Ellenbergern and taken in the middle of nowhere (i.e., about halfway between Pilger and Howells) . . .

KS

Greg

© 2024 A Landing A Day

Green River, Thompson Springs and Cisco, Utah

First timer? In this formerly once-a-day blog (and now pretty much a once-a-week blog) I use an app that provides a random latitude and longitude that puts me somewhere in the continental United States (the lower 48).  I call this “landing.”

I keep track of the watersheds I land in, as well as the town or towns I land near.  I do some internet research to hopefully find something of interest about my landing location. 

To find out more about A Landing A Day (like who “Dan” is) please see “About Landing” above.  To check out some relatively recent changes in how I do things, check out “About Landing (Revisited).”

Landing number 2654; A Landing A Day blog post number 1099

Dan:  Today’s lat/long (N39^o 9.874’, W89^o 27.514) puts me in Central-east Utah:

Here’s my local landing map:

Note that I landed in the watershed of Green River (39^th hit).  Although not shown, the Green River makes its way to the Colorado River (200^th hit).

I’lll go over to Google Earth (GE) for a look at my local watershed:

You can see that I landed in the watershed of Saleratus Wash.  How did I find out it was the Saleratus Wash?  I had to go to the Green River USGS quadrangle map:

It turns out that “saleratus” is Latin for “aerated salt”, that actually has come to mean sodium bicarbonate, which is actually baking soda.  There’s a naturally-occurring mineral, nahcolite, that contains sodium bicarbonate,  From Wiki:

Naturally occurring deposits of nahcolite (NaHCO3) are found in the Eocene-age Green River Formation.

There you have it.

The Orange Dude positioned himself to get a look at the unnamed tributary of Saleratus Wash:

And here’s his view:

He then went down to Green River to get this lovely look at (what else?) the Green River:

The OD and I headed east on I-70 and got off at Thompson (aka Thompson Springs). 

It turns out that the canyon north of town is the home a an absolutely stunning collection of ancient Native American rock art.  Some of the art may be as old as 8000 BC.  On our way, the OD jumped out in front of me hoping to get a look at some of the art.  Excitedly, he came back to me (while I was still in I-70) to show me this:

Here’s a shot of one of the rock formations with drawings:

Here are some other shots:

I personally commissioned a well-known archeological-restoration artist.  She started out with this:

And ended up with this, her conception of what the art looked like soon after its creation:

The artist?  My wife, Jody.

And here’s another one:

And Jody’s recreation:

I love these figures!  I have no particular insight as to their meaning.  Your guess is as good as mine.  Mythologic?  Hallucinogenic?  Aliens?

Here’s a wonderful panel of figures from another Utah site:

And a close-up of the left-hand panel known as the Holy Ghost panel:

Moving right along (so to speak), I’m going to head further east on I-70, and get off the Cisco exit:

It’s amazing that the “town” has an exit sign, since its population has been zero for decades (note it says “NO SERVICES” on the above sign). The town started off as a railroad servicing center; it had a saloon (of course), restaurants, a hotel and stores.  Oil and gas was discovered, and the town survived long enough into the 20^th century to get its own Zip Code.  Here’s a picture of some of what remains from Wiki:

And a couple posted on GE, first this by Andy Dzierzba:

I wonder how many times he has verbally spelled out his last name . . .

And this, by Dakarzen:

I’ll close with this shot posted on GE by Juli McIntosh of the bluff (the Book Cliffs), north of my landing:

That’ll do it –

KS

Greg

© 2024 A Landing A Day