OUT OF ORDER

I've been working on my computer problem that is eating my posts.

I have determined that it has somthing to do with my computer at home. All of the problems relate to the "Microsoft Works Word Processor". So I'm going to save everything that I can save on my computer at work. Then I'm going to "puke" my home computer. Then start over with re-installed programs and new virus protection.
The problem is when I'm at work, I have to put up some pretence that I'm actually there to work.

This might take awhile!

Arrrgh!!!

Well I've suceded in screwing up two postings in a row. One was some darn good stuff, but I don't have a clue what happened to it. I'm not going to tell you what it was, because I'm just going to start over, Darn!

The next was one that I started at work and decided to finish at home, but the computer at home won't open the files that I need. So I'll just have to go in early to finish it. The problem is, I wanted to finish one before the other. Oh well.

The next time I get a computer I'm going to get one with everything already on it. That must be the plot... To get me to spend a bazillion bucks on a computer.

I always do everything in my word processor because it is less likely to get lost, but when I came home tonight to finish the story that I had started, there was nothing there... Gone, whoosh... Just like I hadn't even been there...

Please tell me that I am not the only one that looses things on a computer.

From the CA. state Archives, Indian Wars. (Revised)

I made a very long post here, which was a direct "Cut an Paste" from the California State Archives. It was tedious to read , and was mostly for students of the early Eel River Valley. It was also hard to load for people with "dial up modems". I apologize, But at least it brought Ekovox out of hiding long enough to give some sage advice.

The following is a link to California Indian Wars.

Sorry!
Ernie

Tried to Twitter...

But, why twitter when you can Blog!

Four years ago most people didn't know what a Blog was, and Twittering wasn't even on the horizon. Nowadays you can stay in touch on an almost constant basis with anybody that has access to a cellphone or a computer. The Blackberry cellphones are Ideal for Twittering. They have a camera, and a "qwerty" keyboard and Internet access. Recently some of you saw Ashton Kutcher challenge Larry King, to see who could be the first one to have one million Twitter followers. Ashton won.

From Twitter:

"Twitter is a social networking and microblogging service that allows you answer the question, "What are you doing?" by sending short text messages 140 characters in length, called "tweets", to your friends, or "followers."

If blogging is poetry, Twitter is Haiku. You only have 140 characters to say whatever it is that you are going to say. You must be very eloquent to make a significant statement with only 140 characters. Especially if you have a boring life! But, once you come up with that short message and tweet it to the net, it goes out to all of the people that follow your tweets. In Ashton Kutchers case that's around a million followers. Links can be added to lead you to other Twitterers, blogsites, or photo albums.

Twitter has some serious applications. An account can be set up by a fire department. All of the people that are working at the scene of an emergency can be tweeted updates from the incident command post, that way everybody can be aware of the progress being made on a real time basis, without tying up other communications systems.

However, I can't imagine giving minute by minute updates on "What am I doing?" I rather do it on a weekly basis...

Besides who wants to be a "Micro-blogger, when you can be a Mega-blogger.

Do you Tweet?

Kind of a guest post by Olmanriver

"Olmanriver" Has been a frequent contributor to this blogsite, He has always conducted himself in a courteous manner, even when he doesn't agree with me, which must be often. Even when he doesn't agree with me, he politely contributes his share. He often emails me tid-bits that he doesn't think is important enough to place on my blog. He sent me a compilation of notes on research that he has done that was very striking in it's detail. I have found many things in his research that he may or may not know connect things for me. I got to thinking about it, and I see many connections for other people also. Olmanriver as he likes to call himself has done some amazing compilation. I'm going to post his research here and footnote a few things that I've noticed about them. Anything written in black will be Olmanriver or his research. Anything in Maroon will be my comments. Anything in blue will be a link that OMR has provided.

The comments that I've made are some thoughts that I have put down for further verification, or to jog the memories of people that know the truth. They should not be taken as fact but mere speculation on my part. The other thing that I should warn people of is that most of these news articles are probably wrong. The ideal of accuracy in reporting was not always followed.

Olmanriver Quote:

dear fellow historians...
attached is a word doc with my paper trail... there is a weird formatting problem on the doc which may come across weird. let me know. as a back up... here is the copy and paste...ernie...note the first one.



For ernie and kym, these were my gleanings from the different papers down south,. Any news from Long Valley, Cahto, or north I think I caught, unless it was a story we had from other sources. As annoying as it may seem, the links for the dates may be found by going to the month and year of those newspapers on the main link.
As I think you have figured, deaths usually start with at or in, …. There is some fun personal interest stuff …ie.. I didn’t know the entire phrase was” trip of the light fantastic toe”. I am too cross eyed to stick the top part into the right chronology.


At Long Valley, Aug. 6, 1872, I.C. GRIME.At Long Valley, Aug. 19, 1872, Clement BEATTIE, aged 52y.

In Healdsburg, June 20, 1872, Wm. H. MIDDLETON, aged 56y.
Died at Cobb Valley, March 15, 1871, Alfred HARBIN, 40y.
Lo" ex Chief of a tribe of Digger Indians, who settled in Green Valley, this county. "Lo" was very old and died full of moons and was said to have been 110 years at the time of his exit to the "Happy Hunting Grounds".
Died Cahto, Mendocino co, July 15, 1871, Benjamin Allen CASE, 73y.Died Cahto, Mendocino co., July 14, 1871, Jessie Bennett CASE, 2y 24d.
Mr. H. OLIVER of Point Arena, was killed by the Indians at Shelter Cove, June 18th.
Mr. JOHNSON, a stage driver on the Humboldt Mail Route, says on Sunday, June 2d, John WOOD and Moses STAFFORD, got into a quarrel about a squaw, on the Upper Mattole, in which WOOD shot STAFFORD through the neck, killing him. WOOD gave himself up.

William MIDDLETON, of Vallejo, was kicked in the head, last Friday, by a colt and so seriously injured that his recovery is despaired for.


********
October 3, 1861 issue:Mr. J.W. HENDERSON, passing through town on Thursday of last week, informed us that about 300 Indians attacked Spruce Grove Station, which is situated about 40 miles north of Long Valley, a station on the mail route between this and Humboldt county, on the morning of the 19th ult. The Indians burned the hay at the station and killed ten horses, they were armed with bows and arrows, and fire-arms. The property destroyed belonged principally to Messrs. HENDERSON and HINKLE, proprietors of the stage-line.
I'm not sure where "Spruce Grove Station" was, but the stage route was over the Bell Springs ridge. Forty miles north of Long Valley (Laytonville) would put it near New Harris.

Born to Mr./Mrs. Robert WHITE, Long Valley, Apr. 10, 1862, son
Removal: Col. HENLEY has removed the remnant of the Yuba Indians, seventy-five in number, to 1856 the Nomee Lackee Reservation.
The owners of the great fighting bull Chihuahua, and a huge grizzly recently caught, have agreed to fight their animals in Shasta, for $8,000 a side.

A.J. HALL has been convicted of cutting out the tongue of a neighbor's horse, in El Dorado county, as a matter of spite. Sentenced to 6 months and fined $500., served him right.... http://www.newspaperabstracts.com/link.php?action=detail&id=7659

A fellow named John MANN, known as "Buckskin Jack," says the Humboldt Times, had his throat cut, at Mattole Valley one night last week, by a squaw with whom he had been living. It appears Jack had been out on an Indian hunt and had killed the brother of his squaw, bringing home the Indians bow and quiver. The property was recognized by the squaw and she determined revenge. After Jack had fallen asleep, she took a large knife and cut his throat, not however, severing the jugular. This had the effect to disturb Jack's repose, and when he arose, he seized the knife and killed the squaw on the spot. http://www.newspaperabstracts.com/link.php?action=detail&id=7683

******
Capt. JARBOE informs the 'Democrat' that, on the 12th ult., while on the trail from Round Valley to Weaverville, he found the charred remains of a man, supposed to be John BLAN. On the same day, Capt. JARBOE, with a body of Rangers, had an engagement with a large number of Indians, killing 20, and capturing 33. They confessed they had murdered BLAN, by tying him to a stake and burning him, during which they had a war dance. They had killed and eaten his horse. http://www.newspaperabstracts.com/link.php?action=detail&id=7712
This was a major incident in the conflict between the White settlers and the Indian natives.

The Humboldt Times, announces the arrival of Hon. E.L. DAVIS, W.A. STEPHENS and J. O'NEIL, from Cloverdale via Long Valley. They were 5 days in making the journey, but say that it can easily be done with good animals in 3.
Aug. 17, 1860We learn from a private note from Ukiah City, dated Aug. 8th, that a man named Abner POTTER, a resident of Potter Valley, was shot and killed by an Indian a few days previous. The Indian has been captured and safely disposed of by suspending him from the limb of a tree. Some difficulty had occurred between POTTER and the Indian, relative to a squaw.

*******
Born in Petaluma, Aug. 7, 1860, to Mr./Mrs. S.C. HAYDON, son. http://www.newspaperabstracts.com/link.php?action=detail&id=7748
This should be of intrest to Becky Haydon.


Married at Cahto Ranch, Mendocino co., Aug. 1, 1860, R. WHITE to Laura A. SIMPSON.
******
George WOODS was drowned in South Eel River, near Armstrong's ranch, about a week since. He jumped from a raft on which he was crossing and attempted to swim to shore. 2/1/61
This incident happened on the river just north of Sprowel Creek, south of Garberville. The Armstrong Ranch is the large flat that has been called the River Ranch or Bonham's place. George Woods was a member of the Pioneer Woods family.

******
Feb. 8, 1861 issue:Mr. J.B. HINKLE, arrived in this city last Wednesday, direct from Hydesville, Humboldt co., bringing the U.S. Mail. He was 7 days making the trip. He reports the route wholly free from snow. He reports the Indians are very troublesome to the settlers along some sections of the route, they, having killed large numbers of stock. A Mr. WARD, of Rattlesnake, has had 14 head killed; ARMSTRONG & Co. of South Eel River, over 70. The Indians committing the depredations upon Mr. WARDS stock, assert that it is in retaliation from the loss of their children, who they state have been stolen from them, taken to the lower valleys and sold. Mr. HINKLE met with no trouble from them. At South Eel River, on the 27th ult., a man named Edward WRIGHT was shot and killed by his companions, they mistaking him for an Indian. Mr. HINKLE informs us that the mail route will probably be changed somewhat and the trip can then be made in 5 days.
I'm thinking that this must have been near where the Spyrock Road takes off from 101. Mr. Woodman from the next canyon south was a famous Indian rustler. He rounded up Indian Children and sold them to the miners in Sacramento.

At Noyo River the boom broke and from 4 to 6 million feet of saw logs went to sea, during a recent freshet, in Mendocino county. At Big River, the logs came into the boom safe, but a man named O'MICHLEN was drowned. At Navarrah River, a boat attempted to cross and four men, Henry CLAY, James CAMPBELL, William WEST and SWARTZ, were drowned. Our correspondent states that "rain only fell for 24 hours."

We have received information here, that 500 Indians have been discharged from the Mendocino Reservation and have with them, some 20 rifles. This, has been done at the recommendation of Lt. Dillon DRIEBELBIS, the Superintendent, taking his advice, instead of Colonel TOBIN'S and two others. The consequence is, that cattle are being killed with impunity. George H. WOODMAN found nine head of cattle dead, last week, and many horses missing. The people here think it is a gross outrage, after being at the great expense of collecting them, to let them go where they please. 11/1/60

*******
Mr. W.F. SHELTON, of Big Bar, a few days since, on the Klamath River, killed 2 white deer. He realized $350. for the 2 skins.
White deer were Totom animals to all of the North Coast Indians. My cousin "Oregon" sent me a photo of one killed in Zenia back in the 60's.

*****
3/8/61
The Indians have been committing depredations in Humboldt Co.; Ketin Chow Valley was sacked by Indians on Friday last, by watching the only settler there, John FULWIDER, until he went for his cow in the evening, they then rushed the house. They shot the dog and fired at FULWIDER on his attempt to return. He went over to Eel River, to the settlement which was abandoned on Sunday last, for the reason that there were too many Indians about. They had killed 300 of their hogs and a great number of stock. On their way in they met the Indians that had robbed LARABEE'S house and killed two of them. They went on to the house and found Indians had burned it and killed Ann QUINN, the cook at the ranch. David KING was plowing a short distance from the house and heard firing and started toward it. The Indians saw him coming and fired at him, but he effected his escape. Another band of Indians killed and drove off a lot of hogs from the settlers on Kneeland's Prairie last week.
Ketten Chow Valley is Hettenshaw Valley today. Larabee is one of the people involved in the "Indian Island Massacre in Eureka". This is a confusing time frame to me. The indian Island Massacre happened in 1860.

June 21, 1861 issue:Mr. JOHNSON, a stage driver on the Humboldt Mail Route, says on Sunday, June 2d, John WOOD and Moses STAFFORD, got into a quarrel about a squaw, on the Upper Mattole, in which WOOD shot STAFFORD through the neck, killing him. WOOD gave himself up.
*******
Born to Mr./Mrs. J.M. BOWMAN, Sebastopol, Jul. 6, 1861, son.
This might interest Joan (Bowman Family)

October 3, 1861 issue:

March 13, 1862Mr. HENDERSON, recently from Humboldt Co., give the following news: The Indians between here and Fort Seward are exceedingly troublesome and are killing stock daily, even in Long Valley. It is the desire of the citizens of Long Valley and the country between them and Fort Seward, that a portion of the soldiers now stationed at the latter place should be quartered at Long Valley.

March 27, 1862The Mendocino 'Herald' of the 21st has the following; "On Sunday last, in Long Valley, by Rev. Mr. Beaumont; Mr. VALLELY, aged 40y, married Miss Elizabeth LAMBERT, aged 11y 8m."

Born to Mr./Mrs. Robert WHITE, Long Valley, Apr. 10, 1862, son.

******
At Soda Springs, Mendocino county, Dec. 31st, Alexander, youngest son of Augustus and Lydia REDMEYER, aged 13m and 15d.
Soda Springs is just north of Longvale. We had some Redemeyers in Laytonville, note the extra "e". I wonder if it could be the same family.

From the Mendocino 'Herald' we learn that the Indians inhabiting the region around Round Valley, in that county, have become unruly and boldly avow their determination, so soon as the grass and grain becomes sufficiently dry, to commit it to flames. On Thursday night last, they attacked a Rancharia on John OWENS farm, killing one squaw and wounding two or three more.

4/24/62
At Ukiah, the other day, a noisy secessionist, named ASBILL, while under the influence of liquor, assaulted with a pistol and fired twice at a Union man named Wm. KERNEY. ASBILL was arrested and lodged in jail.

******
7/7/64
Married in Petaluma, June 1, 1864, at the residence of John TAYLOR; Edward C. HENSHAW to Lou TAYLOR
My grandmother Jane (Taylor) Branscomb was from there. These are probably my relatives.

7/21/64
July 21, 1864 edition:On Tuesday morning last, Miss HALL, a young lady about 16y, residing with her parents in Petaluma, was severely, if not fatally, burned. We understand that she was cleaning a coal-oil lamp near the stove, when the fire was communicated in some way to the oil, causing an explosion and setting her clothes on fire. The poor girl, frightened almost to death, ran out in the yard and continued in a circle until Mr. John TAYLOR, who had two fences to climb and a vacant lot to cross, caught her and extinguished the flames by wrapping his coat around her. Mr. TAYLOR displayed rare presence of mind and probably saved the life of the young lady. She is yet in a very critical condition - her mother is also sick and her father away from home.

Married June 22d, at the Cahto Rancho, Mendocino Co., at the residence of the bride's parents, Isaac P. SMITH, Esq. of Ukiah, to Adelia U. SIMPSON

September 22, 1864 edition:Married in Petaluma, J.P. WALKER, Sebastopol to Mrs. Eveline MIDDLETON.

On March 3, 1868, Richard JEWELL was crossing Salmon Creek with a two-horse team, when his horses d wagon were swept down stream. JEWELL barely escaped with his life

Budd and Plunk HARBIN are suspected of being the footpads that robbed the stage near Windsor, on the 21st. The Officers found their prisoners in Woodland, Yolo Co., last Thursday, where they were already engaged in the 'banking' business, known among sporting men as 'chuck-a-luck.'

A coal mine has been discovered on the ranch of J.H. THOMAS of Round Valley. The coal is of excellent quality and from the indications it is judged that the vein is large and will prove of great value.
Died in Cahto, Jan. 3, 1870, Jennie Isabella, youngest child of Robert and Laura WHITE, aged 2m 6d.

March 24, 1870 edition:Robert WHITE, David TUTTLE, and Benj. FISH, were elected trustees for the new Cahto School district.

Born to Mr./Mrs. George N. GRUBBS, Long Valley, Mar. 6, 1870, daughter.

Born to Mr./Mrs. COOMBS, Little River, Mar. 28, 1870, son.


May 5, 1870 edition:Messrs. WARD and BLOSSOR, brought down from Cahto Station, on Tuesday evening last, an insane man by the name of Elisha RAY. He was lodged in jail for safe keeping.

Died in Cahto, Mendocino co., May 14, 1870, Isaac P. SMITH, aged 36y 6m.
Died in Long Valley, Aug. 26, 1869, Wm. T. WILSON, aged 33y.

September 8, 1870 edition:
Messrs. SIMPSON and WHITE, of Cahto, had a horse stolen on the night of the 26th ult. It was a dark grey horse, about 15 hands and branded "JA" connected. The thiefs name is Ben. FOSTER, of a dark complexion and about 22 years of age. They offer $25. for the recovery of the horse, and $50. for the conviction of the thief.


******
A few days since, John R. SCOTT, of Mendocino co., killed a panther measuring 10 feet from tip to tip.
Newspapers got very little right, this just proves how far wrong they can be.


In Cahto Oct. 23, by J.H. BRADEN JP - J.M. DILL to Miss Margaret M. WILLIAMS.

In Long Valley, November 1, by Rev. Mr. WOODWARD - James D. WARD to Miss Hattie TUTTLE.

Died Cahto, Mendocino co, July 15, 1871, Benjamin Allen CASE, 73y.Died Cahto, Mendocino co., July 14, 1871, Jessie Bennett CASE, 2y 24d.

At Cahto, August 28, 1871, Hosea MEYERS to Emma R. CARR.

At Sanel, Mendocino co. Oct. 9, 1871, John BROWN, aged 68y.

Nov. 23, 1871
At the residence of the bride's parents, Cotta Neva; Henry DEVILBISS, Esq. to Julia Ann LOWELL.

*****
At Little Lake, Jan. 7, 1872, T. C. GRIME to Silvia L. MIDDLETON.
I'm sure that both of these people are relatives, but I don't know the connection

Wm. H. JAMES formerly of Petaluma, drowned in Ten Mile Creek, Mendocino county, 24th of Jan. 1872.

In Healdsburg, June 20, 1872, Wm. H. MIDDLETON, aged 56y.

At Long Valley, Aug. 6, 1872, I.C. GRIME.At Long Valley, Aug. 19, 1872, Clement BEATTIE, aged 52y.

San Francisco, Oct. 28, 1872, Henry M. TAYLOR, of Healdsburg, to Annie F. GILMORE, S.F.

Born in Cahto, May 8, 1873, to Mr./Mrs. J.P. SIMPSON, son.

*******
Round Valley, May 11, 1873, Milo PATTON, to Sarah M.S. KAUBLE.
Spyrock... Who are these people?

At Long Valley, Mendocino co., Nov. 13, 1873, B.F. COATES of Little Lake to Anna Jane TUTTLE of Long Valley.

At Mendocino, Apr. 8, 1874, Geo. BOWMAN, son.

BUCKLEY, Minnie, Oct. 8, 1874 at Long Valley, Mendocino co., aged 3y.

At Long Valley, Jan. 2, 1874, David M. CROPLEY to Olive COOK.At Long Valley, Dec. 11, 1873, Mart McANISH to Allonza J. WILLIAMS.

A few days ago we met George HASLITT, a Cherokee, now ranching near Dry Creek, who was a companion of FREMONT and Kit CARSON in their expedition across the plains in 1846. He is a great hunter and mountaineer; and knows the mountains and valleys of California as well as any man living among us. He imparted to us a piece of philosphy worth knowing, viz: that if a man would preserve health and live to a good age, he should pass his time in the open air, hunting, living on game etc. HASLITT is a good illustration of his own theory, for he still looks like a young man.

TAYLOR - HAGGART, in Round Valley, Mendocino co., Dec. 15, 1874 - Mr. Edward TAYLOR and Miss H.E. HAGGART.

*******
COLE, near Ukiah, Dec. 19th 1874, to Wm. M. COLE and wife, a son.
Kym's relative.

Long Valley, Mendocino co., Feb. 10, 1875, James S. HOLMAN to Dorinda HEALSON.

Marshall HASTINGS, son of Judge S.C. HASTINGS of Napa was thrown from his horse on Sunday in Napa and instantly killed. July 1, 1875 issue

******
Mike BURNS killed Wm. GREENWOOD on the 7th inst., at Garberville, Humboldt county, and was discharged upon examination on grounds of justifiable homicide. Both men formerly of Mendocino county.
I wish that I knew the rest of the story!

One day last week, Chris. WINSAINT, who was supposed to be insane, was detected setting fire to a hay stack in Round Valley. He succeeded in burning one stack; and it is suspected it was he who set fire to SIMMERLEY'S barn. He was afterward found dead in the brush, where he had hidden.

Matthew HAAS of Long Valley in this county, accidently shot and killed himself near his home at that place on the 8th ints.

******
Jackson Valley, Mendocino co., Aug. 6, 1876, Ezra SIMPSON to Margaret CASSIDAY.
Jackson Valley is Branscomb.

July 8, 1880 issue:Yesterday morning at the south fork of the Eel river, Mendocino co., a man named Marshall HOWARD shot and killed two men, named Frank SOUTHARD and Mr. McCOY. A dispute about land claims was the cause. HOWARD will give himself up.
Born to Mr./Mrs. D.B. CUMMINS, Round Valley, Dec. 7, 1880, daughter.



Bill NYE advertises as follows: Owing to ill health I will sell at my residence in town 29, range 18 west, according to the government survey, one crushed raspberry colored cow, aged 6yrs. She is a good milkster and is not afraid of cars - or anything else. She is a cow of undaunted courage and gives milk frequently. To a man who does not fear death in any form, she would be a great boon. She is very much attached to home at present, by means of a trace-chain, but she will be sold to anyone who will agree to treat her right. She is 1/4 shorthorn and 3/4 hyena. Purchaser need not be indentified. I will also throw in a double-barrel shotgun, which goes with her. In May she generally goes away somewhere for a week or two and returns with a tall, red calf with long wobbly legs. Her name is Rose, and I would prefer to sell her to a non-resident. http://www.newspaperabstracts.com/link.php?action=detail&id=8108

September 17, 1887Santa Rosa Laborers:Stonecutters are the best paid artizans in this city, wages are $3.50 and $4. per day, this of course, includes marble and grantie workers.;Blacksmiths wages run from $2.50 to $3., apprentices from $1. to $2. per day.Wheelwrights, Carriage, Sign and House Painters get the same as Blacksmiths.House Carpenters get $2.50 and $3. per day.Salesmen get all prices, a good man is highpriced at the end of the first week, and a poor man is still poor at the end of a years experience, they get from $60. to $125. per month.Telegraph Operators get from $40. to $90., the latter being 1st-class and press operators.Telephone girls get from $15. to $20. per week.Druggists, the poorest paid of all, get from $10. to $15. per week and earn it every 7 days they put in.Draymen and Teamsters get from $40. to $60. per month.Waiters, under the rules of the Cooks and Waiters Union, get $40. to $45. in restaurants; and $30. to $35. in Hotels; Girls are paid from $20. a month.Cigar-makers get $9. to $18. per thousand.Tailors from $18. to $24. per week - Piece-workers making more.The best Harness-makers receive $3., while the workmen doing the coarse work get $2. and $2.50.Butchers receive from $50. to $65. per month.Printers are paid 35 cents per 1,000 ems, averaging about $15. per week. Job Printers $15., Pressmen $18., Apprentices get from $5. to $8.At the Fruit Canneries and Dryers all prices are paid; small children, 50 to 75 cents a day; women, 75 to $2. per day; men, $1.50 to $2.50.Tinsmiths capping cans get $2.50 to $3. per day.In the Woolen Mills, the Spoolers and Bobbin-carriers are children, and get about 75 cents; Weavers about $1.50; Operatives in the Dye-house, $1.75 and $1.80; in the Carding-room $1.50 to $3.; Spinning-room, $1. to $3.

http://www.newspaperabstracts.com/link.php?action=detail&id=8115


November 12, 1887Bernard SHERLE walked into the Sheriff's office, Friday morning, and asked to be taken to the asylum at Napa. His mental condition, he said, was worrying him, and he wanted to be placed where he could have proper treatment. Religion is the subject upon which his mind refuses to be rational. He imagines that he has offended the avenging power by partaking of the forbidden fruit. In compliance with his request, he was examined by Drs. SMITH and BOYCE before Judge RUTLEDGE and was pronounced insane and taken to Napa in the afternoon.

"trip of the light fantastic toe"

I've discovered that the links don't work because they have been moved too many times. If you are seriously interested in going to them, simply cut and paste them into your URL line and punch "enter." (Sorry) Ernie

Reynold's Redwoods???

"you mentioned REYNOLDS REDWOODS!i grew up thinking it was REYNOLDS HIDEAWAY????"

Nope, Reynold's Redwoods, with an "s" at the end. It was located south of Piercy. If you were driving south past Piercy, you would go down the hill, and there are two bridges that cross a bend in the South Fork of the Eel River. As you head up the other side you will see an overpass above highway 101. If you took the exit and stopped at the top, you would be parked in the middle of what was once known as Reynolds Redwoods. It was a resort area, similar to many many others that were built after highway 101 was built up the South Fork of the Eel canyon.

I used to do the Refrigeration there. It was a clean and well kept up little tourist spot. The last thing that I fixed there was a little Frigidaire ice cream freezer. I remember asking if they would want to consider up-grading. They said no, that they weren't sure how the new freeway was going to affect them. I just assumed that they knew that their warranty was void when I saw the freezer being loaded into a dump truck with the other debris that was being hauled off from the flattened buildings.

The Reynold's Redwoods was the original home of “The Old Woman in a Shoe” that is now found at Confusion Hill. It was moved down there before the freeway destroyed it. The shoe was originally built by The Rockport Lumber company in Rockport Ca. It was hauled around the country as a parade float. I believe that it went down the streets of the Garberville Parade complete with the old women and all of her kids that she had so many of the she didn't know what to do. So she put them all in a shoe...

Howard and Betty French and their kids were on the float. Their neighbor played the part of "The Old woman in the Shoe". She would come out every now and then and throw a Chamber Pot full of water at the crowd.




Howard French that now lives in the Spanish style house on the west side of the Benbow Valley helped build it when he worked for The Rockport Lumber Company. He was also with the shoe when they brought it to the Garberville Parade. I forget what the reason was that they didn't get home with it. But I think that they had so much trouble getting it over Highway 1 to Garberville that they just left it at Reynold's and never returned for it, and it became a famous tourist attraction for them.

I am going to get some more credible update on "The Shoe". Betty French is researching it for me. I may add more later.....

Luckier than a four leaf clover!

Kym Kemp took a photo of a poppy the other day, and I mentioned that I make it a quest to find a white poppy every year. She said that she had never seen one and that I had to share. So this is my “Share Post”.

How many people have seen a white poppy? Since I was about ten years old, when I found my first white poppy on my way to school in Laytonville, I have found a white poppy every year. Each year I find at least one of what I would, truly, call a “White Poppy”.

When I found my first one, I remember saying something about it at school. Everybody laughed at me, and I had to show a friend of mine the white poppy as proof. We didn’t have cell phones and digital cameras back then. So the next day we both got laughed at. From that moment on I started to think of the white poppy as something that only I could find. I began to think of it like a person would think of a four leaf clover, and if I didn’t find one at least every year that my normally great luck would go bad.

I have found many of them through the years, sometimes I actually go out and drive around to all of the poppy patches to find one. Last year I almost got skunked. It was getting near the tail end of the great poppy bloom, just like it is now, only maybe a little later. When just like serendipity, I was driving home from Leggett and I looked along side of the road, where Reynolds Redwoods used to be, and right in plain sight on the off ramp was a perfect white poppy plant. It was the one and only white poppy that I saw last year. I took a picture with my cell phone camera, but my cell phone camera doesn’t do well with whites, brightness or high contrast, so the photo was crumby. I went back with my regular camera and the plant was gone.

I usually don’t make a big deal out of finding the plants, because people dig them up and try to plant them in their yards. A friend of mine that I showed a white poppy to, went right home, got his shovel, and had it planted in his yard before the day was over. I don’t know how successfully a poppy can be transplanted mid-bloom but I just didn’t like the idea of taking it from it’s special place.

As you can see from the photos, the white poppies all have a degree of yellow in them, but the one poppy at the bottom was almost pure white. The lighter shade is much lighter than it’s yellow and orange sisters. The one white, white poppy was just about to loose it’s bloom and the wind was blowing stiffly, so I was lucky to get a picture at all. I found quite a few almost white plants around this one pure white poppy, so they were like a landing beacon to find it.

The white poppy is not all that beautiful, and not all that rare, so they are nothing really special to find, but to me I actually choke up a little when I find my lucky little flower.

I’ve always called them Poppies, so if anybody out there calls them something else, and feels like correcting me, JUST FORGET IT!

History is lost when cultures collide.

Many of us try to trace our ancestry. It is exciting to us in ways that none of us fully understand. We have this innate desire to know where we came from. Why? is difficult to understand, we are who we are, nothing will change our ancestry. Maybe we look for great heroes, and we all fear that we are going to run across that monstrous great villain. We wonder what kind of blood courses in our veins. We wonder what “Stuff” we are made of. Could we kill somebody in order to survive? Would we lay down our lives to insure that out children would survive? We look for clues as to who we might really be in our ancestry. Many of us are made to be proud of our ancestry, and others ashamed. But in any family history there are great heroes and great villains. We are here because our ancestors survived long enough to plant the seeds of their future, and we are their progeny.

In history many people were killed over religion. The inquisitions basically asked if a person was a Christian. If the answer was no, the person was killed. Not only were they killed, any record of them having ever existed was expunged. No more record. Godless or heathen people were not even thought of as people.

The Indian people did not even know about the white God, let alone Christ, so they were not thought of as people. The fact that the Indian people were out numbered and outgunned bode poorly on their existence. They were in the way of the White intruders. They were almost completely eliminated before human outrage stopped the slaughter. I can’t really call anybody innocent back in the last half of the 1800’s. Some of the Indian people would have eliminated the White if they had the chance. It was an age of slaughter and of brutality. Thankfully that is all in our past. (Yeah, right…)

The thing that has struck me, many times, is that the record of ancestry among the Indian people was handed down orally. The white people have the great advantage of the church having kept records of when we were born, and when we died, who we married, whether or not we paid our taxes and tithing. Ships kept logs of passengers, the government kept track of land sales. Many records were kept in writing.

Many of us have Indian ancestry. And those records were kept orally back before the 1900’s. With slim few of the Indian people left, many of the records are gone. My family has had many stories that have been passed on orally, that were not written down. I remember some of the stories vividly, and others vaguely. So much of my families own history has been lost to the oral tradition, but sometimes I will run into somebody that knows some of my family stories, and I will be reminded. I am deeply moved on such occasions. I know some stories about where precious artifacts are that I will share only with those that I trust. Some history is going to die with me, as well it should.

So I am touched when somebody comes to me with a request for lost family history and asks me what I know. The following is some email that I recently received:

Hi Ernie
My name is Rebecca Haydon relative to the Haydon's in Covelo, Willits and Ukiah. I have been doing my families history for years and just bought the book "killing for land." I was reading your website which is very informative by the way. However, I do have a couple of questions for you.
1.) Who did the Eel River Rangers consist of?? Were you able to find how many men were in that group and who they were???
2.) Do you have any history on Weaverville? If so, how can I find it??
Here is my lineage:
Weaverville: Great grandmother was named LuBertha Post. She was a teacher for many years at the Red Schoolhouse in Weaverville. Her father (John Storm) ended up marrying LuBertha's mother who was full indian saving her from being killed or captured. She was Wintu Indian.
My great grandmother and her father traveled a lot and in those times they ended up shacking up at different people's houses along the way. They ended up at the Travis Ranch in Covelo where all the Haydon's were living. She then married my great grandfather Frank Haydon.
Frank Haydon's father, Tom Haydon, was quite the feisty one. hahahaha. Not funny but it is. Apparently in Genocide and Vendetta, he actually killed a 14 yr old boy over some land and killed him. I'm assuming it was true due to the fact that Tom Haydon was in San Quentin prison and died there.
Speaking of Genocide and Vendetta. I have a relative that was telling me that book was pulled due to the book not being true and was never approved by families involved. Luckily I just found out my sister has a copy of it. Very expensive. Years ago her and her and my uncle visited Estelle, one of the authors. Anyhow, as I reading Killing for Land, they seem to go back to that book. Your thoughts???
I guess my point is I don't have a whole lot of information on the Wintu indians and Weaverville and wondered if you did or even where I could find the info. I, however, do have the book on Round Valley families and Killing for land.
Thank you so much for reading this email. I look forward to hearing from you.
Rebecca Haydon

Becky
I'm sorry that I took so long to get back to you. I kept thinking that I would run into some folks that has some of that history, but I haven't, so I thought that I would write back to you asking your permission to put your letter up as a post.

I know a young Wintu lady that works in Garberville, but I won't be seeing her until after the second or third of May. She is from up north, but I think that she said she was from Redding.

I have another friend who's (4G?) Grandfather was an Eel River Ranger by the last name of Cole. She is horribly ashamed of her Grandfather, but she has a lot of information, and I'm sure she would be willing to share with you.

My family has always had great good history with the Indian people, so I always been very proud of that fact. But the other day I discovered that my (5G) Grandfather was possibly the Captain of a slave ship that he sunk off of the east coast full of slaves so he wouldn't get caught in the blockade. I've always said that we don't have to look very far back in history before we find someone that we just as soon not have known about. Tom Haydon had a lot of good company, a lot of people were mean and tough back then. They were the survivors!

If I put your letter up as a post, I'm sure you will get a lot of replies. If you don't want to post it, I'll ask around and see if I can find some history for you.

Thanks for writing.
Ernie


Ernie-
You absolutely have my permission. I would love to see if anyone has any information. My cousin worked for the Dept of Education and had to take a trip to Weaverville in regards to some funding reasons. She ended up running into a woman who mother was taught by my great grandmother. But before my cousin and I could make the trip back up there and talk to her, she had passed away.
Thank you so much for responding,
Rebecca

Many of the posts that we have done here have gathered history that was out there that I didn't know about, and we have generated some great history with but a few small leads. Maybe this can be another. Do you know anyone who knows anyone who can tel us some history / ancestry for Rebecca?

"Action Ernie" saves the day!

I came to work this morning about one cup low on coffee. I came in, turned on the lights, unlocked the shop doors, made some coffee, poured myself a cup and sat down at my desk. I turned on my computer to check the local blogs. I clicked on my blog first, because I find it to be the most interesting. It didn't take long because apparently nobody else finds it that interesting. Nobody had left a comment since Suzy Blah Blah at 6:08 last night. Alcoholism must be a dry subject (Pun) either you are one or you aren't.

So, I went over to Eric's place to check what he was up to. I had to chuckle a little bit, because he is not that happy with one of Obama's recent rulings. I took the time to needle him a little bit just to see if his wound was still open or if he had forgiven Obama yet. Then I went over to check Kym's Place to see what she was doing. She is smoking out posts (pun) about marijuana. Sheriff Allman is going to issue serial numbered zip ties to tell legal "215" plants from illegal ones, the ones with no ties. I don't know much about marijuana, so I made a comment about connecting the zip ties to the wristbands at the Reggae events. I get a real kick out of myself sometimes. I was thinking what a great morning that it was starting out to be. The sun was shining, and it was promising to be a warm day.

The coffee started kicking in, and it was time to go to work. I walked into the shop and turned on the radio. Just as I turned it on, I heard screaming outside. I turned the radio back off, because I couldn't believe my ears. Sure enough, I heard very loud, guttural, and very angry screaming. I slid the shop door open to hear better. The screaming was getting louder and more angry. I heard what sounded to me like a diesel pick-up truck roaring away, but the loud angry screaming was still happening. It sounded like a bunch of very angry females screaming about something. I couldn’t make out any words, and had no idea what had just happened. I looked for a pipe or something to use for a weapon, but found nothing, so I jumped off the porch and ran around to Church street were the screaming was coming from. As I rounded the corner with my heart in my mouth, I was prepared for anything, it was a obvious from the loud angry screaming that someone was in grave danger.

Have you ever heard of Primal Scream Therapy? Me neither... But, I can honestly say that the therapy is not that good for the unprepared. Primal Scream Therapy is something that the hippies have discovered to be therapeutic. (for Them) What you do is scream, and shout out all of your anger and rage, then you gently shove if away from you with your hands. As gently as you can to show your true gentle nature. Their gentle nature is not that apparent to the neighbors that they have just put on “Situation Red” terror alert.

Primal Scream Therapy is only to be used as a last resort. If the healing circle doesn‘t work, where you all squat in the dirt, and hold hands in a large circle. You hum until the “Chi” gets right. If that doesn’t work you can try accupuncture. If you are ever angry about something there is nothing much more theraputic that being poked with needles.

One of the effective ways to reduce your anger is by the use homeopathy. It’s not what you think that it is, it has nothing to do with gay rights. It is a medicinal dilution of sometimes ten to one, or sometimes one hundred to one. It’s medicine than takes what you want to get rid of and dilutes it, and takes it back in. Like if you want to give up salt? All you have to do is take a dilution of ten to one and drink it, and it will cure you of salt! So, you could make a dilution of anger and take it and it would calm you.

The other good thing to rid yourself of anger is “‘Holism” --"The tendency in nature to form wholes that are greater than the sum of the parts through creative evolution.”-- So if you're angry, it could be that your wholes are out of Chi, and you need to Feng Shui it until the universe is aliened with the stars. Hey, I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know all that much about this Hippy Bullshit, but I can assure you that I know all about “Primal Scream” in the morning. As they walked away from the park I heard one of them say "God I love a good scream in the morning, it feels like victory!"

It would seem like that the number one rule with scream therapy should be to warn your neighbors. But hell, I just learned how really therapeutic scream therapy can be for the screamer. I know all of these ladies that were outside screaming on church street, so what I’m going to do, is not say a thing, but I’m just going to sneak up behind them and scream out my rage at the top of my lungs… I’m sure they will understand, and forgive me.

I talked to my wife about it, she said that I could call the cops about them disturbing the peace. I said that I thought that you could only disturb the peace at night. She looked disgusted, mumbled something about “men!” and walked off. Now what’s up with her?… I’d better not catch her out in the park screaming.

Alcoholism Cured!!!

Alcoholism Cured... And guess what, it's a pill that you can take, and viola, you're cured. Just when I was really starting to get into the alcoholism thing, they find a cure. Damn.

Next thing that you know they will find a cure for Marijuana. Can sex be far behind? All kidding aside, I am no longer going to feel sorry for the people that claim that they just can't give up alcohol. Nope! Not gonna believe that anymore. Now all of you hopeless alcoholics are just like me. You drink because you enjoy it, and you will have to admit it. You can no longer get by with claiming that you have to drink because it's in your genetic make-up. I'm not gonna believe that you just don't have the willpower. I'm not gonna believe that it's an illness. All of those arguments are out the window. Now you are going to have to admit that you are a hopeless drunk, and you will no longer get the sympathy that you so pathetically crave.

I haven't been so happy since they invented "Rogane for Men". Now I'm not only bald by choice, I am drunk by choice, and all that I have to do to become sober is take one of those magic little pills!

When you come home from work and claim that you need a drink. Instead of your wife meeting you at the door in her nightie and handing you a double martini. She will have her overcoat on and she will be telling you, "Just take your pill, loser! You just aren't any fun any more!" Yep! Thank God they've cured alcoholism!

The new Anti-alcoholism pill is called "Naltrexone" if you don't like pills, they have the injectable cure for alcoholism called "Vivitrol". The cure for alcoholism is brought to you by those friendly folks that brought you Vicodin, Prozac, Viagra, and others.
"There will be a 'Prozac moment,' " (Dr.)Willenbring says, "when primary care doctors start handling functional alcoholics."

As an inveterate alcohol fan I see the flaw in their plan…. All of those other drugs are fun!!! Naltrexone promise to be no fun at all. What’s up with that? Hell, even the stoners get to call their weed “Medicine”. So why do we alcoholics have to give up all our fun?

But, I think that I see another flaw in their plan, and I see my way out. The cure is apparently only for “Functional Alcoholics”. I’m Totally non-functional!!!

Kent State Shooting

Few people today realize what we were doing in Viet Nam. We were fighting "the Great Red Hoard". It was the current thinking at the time of the Viet Nam war that any country that became communist would surely become part of the Soviet Union. The loss of Cuba to the Communist U.S.S.R. was fresh in peoples minds. The United States had a policy of containment:
"Under President Harry Truman, the United States had established a foreign policy doctrine called "containment." Originated by George Kennan, Dean Acheson, and other diplomats and policy advisers, the policy of "containment" aimed not to fight an all out war with the communist Soviet Union, but rather to confine communism and the Soviet Union to their existing boundaries." - Michael O'Malley

We lived in total fear of the Soviet Union, we feared to confront them directly. The fear of Communist expansion was justified, in part by statements from Nikita Khrushchev like: "We will bury you!" and “we will take you over without firing a shot”. The Soviet philosophy was one that kept it's people trembling with fear. We had every reason to fear the Soviet Union. It was well known as a harsh and brutal regime. Khrushchev was much like Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is today. He was openly contemptuous of the United States and was very up front about threatening us. The only difference between Khrushchev and Ahmadinejad is that Khrushchev was the leader of one of the most powerful nations in the world. The soviet military was every much as powerful as the United States military. And… They had nukes… And they were willing to use them if we were to show a chink in our armor.


My great grandmother was a Seventh Day Adventist. She thumped on the Bible and prophesized: “Get yourself right with the lord. The Bible says that the world is going to end in fire” and that, “The end of the world is going to come out of the east”. As far as she was concerned, Russia was east. I knew that there was no doubt that my Great-Grandmother loved us kids, and if she told us that the world was soon going to end, we believed her. Before we went to bed at night she had us recite the Lord’s Prayer and when I got to the part where we said, “and if I die before I wake, I pray the lord my soul to take”. I just knew that was a sign that I might even die that night. She called the atom bomb the “A-Tom bomb”. She knew how terrible the A-Tom bomb was, the two bombs dropped on Japan was still fresh in her old feeble mind. She was just doing what she thought that she needed to do to get us kids into heaven when the Russians dropped the A-tom bomb on us. Some day I'll tell you what I have against religion, but that's a post for another day.

Most of the kids in the fifties were terrified that they might die at any moment. They saw people building bomb shelters, and overheard the old folks talk endlessly about “The Commies” dropping bombs on us. We thought that it might happen at any minute. So, most of the older folks believed that we had to stop communist expansion at all costs.

We were in Viet Nam to make sure that the "commies" didn't take over. The old guard was adamant that we had to win the Viet Nam war no matter what it took to do. Not only did they not want to pull our troupes out, they felt that the war should be scaled up. They felt that we should move into Cambodia and any other place that it looked like the commies wanted to take over. That set the stage for the feelings that people had leading up to the Kent State shootings. The young people and the students didn't see the communist as being that much of a treat, and that we should stay within our borders, and the commies could have the rest of the world if they wanted it. They felt that we should only protect America against any "Direct Aggression". The idea was that, we should remain non-aggressive, and they would not harm us. The old soldiers were offended by such cowardice, and demanded our government do something about the cowards who objected to the Viet Nam war. It was much like the demonstrators of today, thinking that we should only answer direct threats, and that we should have stayed out of Iraq. Bushes actions were a lot like Nixon’s when he expanded the war.

In 1968 the students in Mexico were demonstrating against their government, demanding Democracy from the "Institutional Revolutionary Party" (PRI) had been in power since 1929. The Mexican government fired 15,000 bullets, they shot and killed from 150, to 350 students. The official number that the PRI admitted to was @40-50 students. "The Oct. 2, 1968 massacre of student demonstrators in Tlatelolco square in Mexico City have made it clear that the state was responsible. But not one person has been sentenced, and no one even knows exactly how many young protesters died." Ten days later Mexico City hosted the 1968 summer Olympics, which came off without a hitch. The student demonstrations were quelled, and there were no more demonstrations.

Many of the American Old-Guard pointed to the way that Mexico handled demonstrators, and asked if maybe the traitorous American students should be treated the same way. Some people seriously thought that maybe it would be a good solution to the student demonstrations. Others talked about how lucky Americans were that they were not treated like the Mexican students. At any way of thinking it was all fresh in everyone’s minds that the shooting of Mexican students solved "the problem".

It didn't help that politicians were jumping on the "Get Tough" band wagon and making wildly patriotic and threatening speeches about the demonstrations that were going on at Kent State.

On Thursday April 30th 1970. President Richard M. Nixon announced that the United States had launched an incursion into Cambodia.

On Friday May 1st , about 500 students demonstrated against the Viet Nam war, and Nixon’s incursion into Cambodia, on the grassy knoll at the center of the Kent State campus. One student buried a copy of the U.S. Constitution, another burned his draft card. These days that would go fairly unnoticed, but back then it was wildly unpatriotic and seriously offensive. The demonstration lasted well into the night. By midnight they were breaking windows and starting bonfires in the middle of the streets. Beer bottles were being thrown from bars, breaking windows and damaging cars.

On Saturday, May 2nd, a state of emergency was declared and Governor James A. Rhodes sent in the national Guard. When the guard got there, buildings were burning, and students were throwing rocks and preventing the firemen from putting the fires out. More than a thousand protestors were involved.

Sunday, May 3rd, Governor James A. Rhodes called the protesters un-American and referred to the protesters as revolutionaries set on destroying higher education in Ohio. "They're worse than the brown shirts and the communist element and also the night riders and the vigilantes," Rhodes said. "They're the worst type of people that we harbor in America. I think that we're up against the strongest, well-trained, militant, revolutionary group that has ever assembled in America." Those words were coming from someone with the stature of the Governor of Ohio!

Around 8:00 p.m., another rally was held on the campus Commons. By 8:45 p.m. the Guard used tear gas to disperse the crowd, and the students reassembled at the intersection of Lincoln and Main Streets, holding a sit-in in the hopes of gaining a meeting with Mayor Satrom and President White. At 11:00 p.m., the Guard announced that a curfew had gone into effect and began forcing the students back to their dorms. Ten Guardsmen were injured and a few students were bayoneted by Guardsmen.”

Monday, May 4th, 1970, In spite of the fact that 12,000 leaflets had been passed out canceling the demonstration, 2,000 folks showed up to protest the Viet Nam war, and the incursion into Cambodia.

“Shortly before noon, General Canterbury made the decision to order the demonstrators to disperse. A Kent State police officer standing by the Guard made an announcement using a bullhorn. When this had no effect, the officer was placed in a jeep along with several Guardsmen and driven across the Commons to tell the protestors that the rally was banned and that they must disperse. This was met with angry shouting and rocks, and the jeep retreated. Canterbury then ordered his men to load and lock their weapons, tear gas canisters were fired into the crowd around the Victory Bell, and the Guard began to march across the Commons to disperse the rally. The protestors moved up a steep hill, known as Blanket Hill, and then down the other side of the hill onto the Prentice Hall parking lot as well as an adjoining practice football field. Most of the Guardsmen followed the students directly and soon found themselves somewhat trapped on the practice football field because it was surrounded by a fence. Yelling and rock throwing reached a peak as the Guard remained on the field for about ten minutes. Several Guardsmen could be seen huddling together, and some Guardsmen knelt and pointed their guns, but no weapons were shot at this time. The Guard then began retracing their steps from the practice football field back up Blanket Hill. As they arrived at the top of the hill, twenty-eight of the more than seventy Guardsmen turned suddenly and fired their rifles and pistols. Many guardsmen fired into the air or the ground. However, a small portion fired directly into the crowd. Altogether between 61 and 67 shots were fired in a 13 second period.”

Four people died, Nine people were wounded. Many people feel that shock of the Kent State killings was directly related the ending of the Viet Nam War.

As with everything in America, we will never know why the Guard fired on the students. Was it truly in self defense, as they claim? Did they do it out of some warped sense of patriotism? Were they in anyway justified? We will never know, they details were buried forever in an out of court settlement in the amount of “$675,000 to the wounded students and the parents of the students who had been killed.” it was unclear to me if that was per each or altogether. But, the details will never come out.

Ohio
By Neil Young

Tin soldiers and Nixon's comin'.
We're finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drummin'.
Four dead in Ohio.

Gotta get down to it.
Soldiers are gunning us down.
Should have been done long ago.
What if you knew her and
Found her dead on the ground?
How can you run when you know?
.......
Four dead in Ohio.
Four dead in Ohio.
Four dead in Ohio.
Four dead in Ohio.



Tlatelolco Massacre - 40 Years of Impunity


Kent State Shooting

kent state chronological

Kent state sociology dept

Warmer or Colder? No real science.

Dr. William Gray

I have said many times that scientists who disagree with global warming lose their research grants. Please take the time to read what I have to say about this and make up your own mind. I’m not a scientist, and I have stated that many times. Because I’m not a scientist, I depend heavily on those that I trust to tell me what is going on with the world. I’m not religious, so I don’t think that praying that world gets better is going to do me any good.

First, I apologize to Bunny, who hates science stuff, and just as soon not hear it. She seems to be amongst the trendy nowadays because it appears that nobody wants real science. Real science would include research on both sides of the weather story.

In December of 2004, noted hurricane expert Dr. William Gray, the head of the Tropical Meteorological Project team at Colorado State University funded by NOAA, predicted a number of tropical storms would arise out of the Atlantic Basin, He said that he predicted about fifteen named storms, including eight hurricanes, and four of them will be intense. One of those hurricanes turned out to be Katrina.

“On May 16, 2005, 16 days before the season began, NOAA issued its outlook for the 2005 season, forecasting a 70% chance of above-normal activity. The accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) value for the season was predicted to be 120–190% of the median ACE of 87.5 × 104 kt2. Shortly thereafter, on May 31, the day before the season officially began, Dr. Gray's team revised its April forecast upwards to 15 named storms, 8 hurricanes, and 4 major hurricanes.”

Dr. William Gray is accepted as one of the premier weather scientists in the world! Here is what he said in an interview in Discover magazine in the September 2005 issue.
Question: “Are your funding problems due in part to your views?”

William Gray: “I can’t be sure, but I think that’s a lot of the reason. I have been around for 50 years, so my views on this area are well known. I had NOAA money for 30 some years, and then when the [William] Clinton administration came in and [Al] Gore started directing some of the environmental stuff, I was cut off. I couldn’t get any NOAA money. They turned down 13 straight proposals from me.”

This kind of thing scares the hell out of me, and I am not the only one. But, there are few people that want to hear the whole truth. Dr. Gray expects this warming trend to reverse itself in a few years. (about 2010) Then we are going to have to seriously worry about an ice age.
The following is superfluous information, unless you want to know more about Dr. Gray.

William M. "Bill" Gray (born 1929) is a pioneer in the science of forecasting hurricanes. In 1952 he received a B.S. degree in geography from George Washington University, and in 1959 a M.S. in meteorology from the University of Chicago, where he went on to earn a Ph.D. in geophysical sciences in 1964.

Gray is Emeritus Professor of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University (CSU), and head of the Tropical Meteorology Project at CSU's Department of Atmospheric Sciences. He served as a weather forecaster for the United States Air Force, and as a research assistant in the University of Chicago Department of Meteorology. He joined Colorado State University in 1961. He has been advisor of over 70 Ph.D. and M.S. students.

Gray is noted for his forecasts of Atlantic hurricane season activity. Gray pioneered the concept of "seasonal" hurricane forecasting—predicting months in advance the severity of the coming hurricane season. Gray and his team (including Christopher W. Landsea, Paul W. Mielke Jr., and Kenneth J. Berry, among others) has been issuing seasonal hurricane forecasts since 1984.

After the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season, Gray announced that he was stepping back from the primary authorship of CSU's tropical cyclone probability forecasts, passing the role to Philip J. Klotzbach. Gray indicated that he would be devoting more time to the issue of global warming. He is a controversial figure in the global warming debate, as he does not subscribe to anthropogenic [Man caused] causes for global warming.

Gray is skeptical of current theories of human-induced global warming, which he says is supported by scientists afraid of losing grant funding and promoted by government leaders and environmentalists seeking world government. He believes that humans are not responsible for the warming of the earth and has stated that "We're brainwashing our children." He asked, "How can we trust climate forecasts 50 and 100 years into the future (that can’t be verified in our lifetime) when they are not able to make shorter seasonal or yearly forecasts that could be verified?"

Gray said those who had linked global warming to the increased number of hurricanes in recent years were in error. He cites statistics showing that there were 101 hurricanes from 1900 to 1949, in a period of cooler global temperature, compared to 83 from 1957 to 2006 when the earth warmed.

Gray does not say there has not been any warming, but states "I don't question that. And humans might have caused a very slight amount of this warming. Very slight. But this warming trend is not going to keep on going. My belief is that three, four years from now, the globe will start to cool again, as it did from the middle '40s to the middle '70s."

According to an earlier interview reported by Joel Aschenbach, Gray had similarly said that the current warming in the past decades is a natural cycle, driven by a global ocean circulation that manifests itself in the North Atlantic Ocean as the Gulf Stream.

In a December 2006 interview with David Harsanyi of The Denver Post, Gray said, "They've been brainwashing us for 20 years, starting with the nuclear winter and now with the global warming. This scare will also run its course. In 15–20 years, we'll look back and see what a hoax this was." In this interview, Gray cites the global cooling article in Newsweek from 1975 as evidence that such a scare has happened in the past.

In 2006, Gray predicted a cooling trend by 2009-2010.

No Sheet, Ice...

While the sheet ice around the world is apparently melting, the Antarctic ice is growing! My good friend Ken Forden has cornered me again. The other morning at coffee, I foolishly mentioned that the ice on the South Pole was getting thicker and the scientists are watching it closely to determine what it might mean on a global scale. Just so everyone understands, I do believe that the world thermostat is starting to lose calibration. I don't have the knowledge to put it all together. I also want it to be known that it offends me that seasoned scientists do not get funding to try and disprove Global Warming… What’s up with that?

First when floating ice-sheets melt it does not increase the sea level, only ice melting that rests on land will increase the sea level. If you don’t know why that is, go back to reading your funny books, this is not the post for you. If the floating ice-sheets melt, it will allow more warming sun radiation in, and allow more rapidly warming of the polar oceans, which in turn may warm the land ice to the point of melting, thus raising the global sea level. The other thing that it may do is cause more moisture to be added to the atmosphere causing more polar ice to be formed by increased snow fall thus stabilize the warming trend.

I love this scientific stuff with all the thuses and therefores, but alas, I have no atmospheric scientist degrees, so along with being a “Bullshistorian” I also qualify as “Snow Job technician”. My only area of expertise is that I know how to make ice, and it takes 144 BTUs to melt a pound of ice. I do have a refrigeration contractors license to make snow though!

The following article was published Jan 10th 2008, long before the recent ice sheet dislodging in the Antarctic sea. It is from the Christian Science Monitor:

For decades, the vast expanse of sea ice that surrounds Antarctica each winter, and all but vanishes each austral summer, has languished as the Rodney Dangerfield of Earth's cryosphere.

Antarctic sea ice has gotten little respect, especially compared with its top-of-the-world cousin, or with the enormous ice sheets on Greenland and the Antarctic continent. The sea ice is hard to reach. It has little direct effect on people. And the Southern Ocean was not a cold-war playground for US and Soviet submarines, which amassed a wealth of information on changes in Arctic sea ice before the era of long-term satellite observations.

But as a research target, southern sea ice's stock appears to be rising.

Over the past 20 years, southern sea ice has expanded, in contrast to the Arctic's decline, and researchers want to understand why. Many climate-model experiments show the Arctic responding more rapidly than Antarctica as global warming kicks in. But after looking at the latest projections from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, "Arctic sea ice is well ahead of the models, and Antarctic sea ice is well behind what the models project," says Stephen Ackley, a polar scientist at the University of Texas, San Antonio.

Moreover, recent studies have shown that in key regions off the Antarctic coast, sea ice shows a strong, coherent response to El Niño-La Niña cycles, decade-scale climate swings in the tropical Pacific whose length, strength, and timing may be affected in uncertain ways by global warming. Indeed, outside the tropics, Antarctica boasts the strongest climate response to El Niño of any region on the planet. This suggests strong climate connections and feedbacks among sea, ice, and air in the Southern Ocean that are poorly understood.

Some scientists say trends in sea ice in key spots around the continent may be bellwethers for worrisome changes that could accelerate the melt of nearby land ice, most notably the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.

The overall growth in Antarctica's sea ice over the past two decades masks significant regional declines in the Bellingshausen and Amundsen Seas – the destination for glaciers flowing from the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. Researchers say these glaciers are losing ice to the sea faster than snow is replenishing the ice. Thus, the large regional drops in sea ice could also signal the presence of "a very big threat to glacier ice" on the continent, says Xiaojun Yuan, a polar scientist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y. The leading suspect: relatively warm water upwelling near the coast as a result of global warming's effect on wind patterns in the region.

To address some of these issues during the Interna­tional Polar Year, which ends in March 2009, scientists are installing a network of buoys off Antarctica's coast. The buoys will track changes in sea ice and measure the factors in air and atmosphere that trigger those changes. Last August, 10 international science groups joined forces on a project dubbed SOPHOCLES, which aims to use the latest information on the Southern Ocean and Antarctica's land and sea ice to improve climate models.

For some commentators, the out-of-sync trends in sea ice at the two poles is evidence that warming isn't global and doesn't deserve the international angst it triggers.

Not so fast, many researchers respond. Northern and southern sea ice shouldn't necessarily act in lock-step. "Antarctic sea ice is such a different animal," says Douglas Martinson, another polar-ice specialist at Lamont-Doherty. Geographic and oceanographic differences – a virtually landlocked ocean in the north versus an open ocean in the south – encourage the buildup of thick, long-lasting, multiyear ice in the Arctic Ocean. Antarctica's sea ice, by contrast, is largely thin and seasonal. In winter, Antarctic sea ice covers an area nearly twice the size of Europe. By the end of summer, it shrinks to one-sixth of its winter extent. These wide swings make it difficult to tease out long-term trends in ice cover there.

The first big advance in monitoring Antarctic sea ice came in 1972, when the federal government launched a satellite with a microwave device to monitor ice 24/7, regardless of cloud cover.

The results were eye-opening, says Claire Parkinson, a researcher who tracks sea-ice trends at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. During three of the first four years the instrument gathered data, an enormous open area in the ice, or polynya, appeared in the Weddell Sea – a phenomenon no one has seen there since. (A grocery-store tabloid had the obvious explanation: that scientists had discovered evidence of an undersea base run by space aliens – heat from the alleged facility had melted the ice. "It was one of our images," says a bemused Dr. Parkinson. "But it wasn't our interpretation.")

Since 1978, the satellite record shows that Antarctica's sea ice has expanded by about half a percent a year. Declines in sea ice recorded between 2000 and 2002 have significantly moderated the overall rise.

These long-term data have let scientists tease out relationships between Antarctic sea ice and natural climate variations, such as swings between El Niño and La Niña in the tropical Pacific. Recent modeling work has given scientists a sense that they are on the right track as they explore the processes affecting sea ice. Dr. Yuan, who uncovered Antarctica's coherent response to El Niño, has developed a seasonal sea-ice forecast model for key regions that scientists now use to plan expeditions.

The ice also plays a key ecological role in the region, some of which bears on the exchange of CO2 between the atmosphere, ocean, and ice, and on cloud formation.

Researchers have found that bacteria and algae that live in the ice trigger the production of huge amounts of dimethyl sulfide, a compound that, when exposed to oxygen, reacts to form aerosol particles around which moisture can condense as cloud droplets. In the ocean, algae and plankton produce the compound. But on the ice, researchers find concentrations some 3,000 times higher than in seawater. And where ice was once thought to keep the ocean from taking up CO2 or returning it to the atmosphere, the picture has grown more complex, Dr. Ackely says. Cold ice does seal in CO2. But slightly warm ice or ice under a little bit of snow begins to flush CO2 out of the ice and back into the air.

Antarctic ice may be melting from underneath

Given the complex role sea ice plays directly or indirectly in the biology and climate of the Southern Ocean region and beyond, its future under global-warming scenarios is of keen interest. Currently, models suggest that through the end of the century, Antarctic sea ice will begin an overall decline, although it isn't projected to be as dramatic as the Arctic's. There, some researchers predict summer sea ice will virtually vanish by 2013, 27 years earlier than previously projected.

A key measurement scientists are trying to make beginning this year involves the mass of Antarctica's sea ice. In the Arctic, ice began to melt from underneath before major shifts in its extent appeared. Thus, measurements of the sea ice's overall mass may uncover changes that aren't readily seen in satellite images.

One factor that could complicate this mass balance is snowfall. Researchers have long known that snow builds glaciers. Two years ago, a team of scientists combined snow-thickness measurements with modeling studies and found that, at least in Antarctica, snow also may build Antarctica's sea ice.

As the climate has warmed, more moisture has made its way to high latitudes. "In the Antarctic in particular, we expect more snowfall," says Achim Stoessel, a researcher at Texas A&M University in College Station, who took part in the study. Simulations showed that with increased snowfall, a sufficiently thick snow layer would push the ice underwater. The seawater in the snow-ice boundary would freeze, thickening the floe.

Some researchers suggest that this process may eventually arrest the decline of Arctic sea ice as well.

more interesting reading

sea ice levels

90% of the ice on earth is located in Antarctica. There is so much ice there you could carve up a block of ice the size of the Great Giza pyramid for every human being on the planet! 98% of Antarctica is covered in ice.

The thickest ice found is in Wilkes Land, where it reaches a depth of 15,669 feet (4,776 meters).

Acid Flashback

In the middle of one of Eric Kirk’s political rants, which make no sense to me. Not that Eric doesn’t make sense to me, but politics don’t. Anyway, in the middle of his rant, he dropped this slap on my sixties face:
“Maybe some of you older sixties types can explain all that to me. Then maybe you can explain the lyrics to Desolation Row.[By Bob Dylan] I know, I know…. I had to be there to “feel it.”

In the sixties we looked for the logic and reason in everything. It was an age of mind expansion. We threw off the shackles off our ancestors, we burned our bras, we objected to war. We threw open the doors of the insane asylums. We objected to any form of prejudice. We worried about deep concepts like “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a noise?”

These seemingly unanswerable questions seemed like great mysteries to us, and we felt that there must be some deep knowledge in finding the answers to it all. We knew that whatever was happening that it was our parents fault, and it needed to be corrected.

Great music and art came out of the age of the sixties, and it all had a mind challenging element to it. It was not good, or “deep”, if it didn’t leave you somewhat confused and wondering what it was all about. Some great thinkers suggested that all of these questions could be answered if you just dropped a little acid. It was great to see someone on acid explain something like the lyrics to that song, and many others, “A Horse with no Name” comes to mind.

It seemed to make perfect sense to them while they were in their drug induced stupor. Some realized that their “clarity of insight” came from the drugs, and their great knowledge was just a deception. Others actually believed the lies that drugs induce. The phrase “Turn on, tune in, and drop out.” had great meaning to them, as in this quote from Dr. Timothy Leary:

“Turn on' meant go within to activate your neural and genetic equipment. Become sensitive to the many and various levels of consciousness and the specific triggers that engage them. Drugs were one way to accomplish this end. 'Tune in' meant interact harmoniously with the world around you - externalize, materialize, express your new internal perspectives. Drop out suggested an elective, selective, graceful process of detachment from involuntary or unconscious commitments. 'Drop Out' meant self-reliance, a discovery of one's singularity, a commitment to mobility, choice, and change. Unhappily my explanations of this sequence of personal development were often misinterpreted to mean 'Get stoned and abandon all constructive activity”.

Some people that had great potential, actually dropped out of school, stopped their education, and became vagabonds and hippies. Some of them still defend the great “mind expansion” that they gleaned from dropping acid. Who is to actually say whether they are better, or worse, off for dropping acid. I don’t know, I never have, and never will. I saw too many of my friends and classmates play with drugs of all sorts. Some totally fried their brains, and others actually seem to be better off because of it. But, I am the eternal coward when it comes to drug use. My mind may not be much, but that is all the more reason to not take chances with it by trying to alter it.

Maybe that answers Eric’s Question. Maybe if I dropprd a little acid, politics would make sense to me.

California Mental Hospitals

Robin is picking on me again, and I just have to reply to her. My cousin "Oregon" tells me I should leave her alone, because she is a lot smarter than me, and she is one of those newspaper people that pays attention, and get all of the "5 Ws" Right.

But she taunted me with:
"You mean I'm not the only one who knows it's bullshistory that Reagan closed the mental hospitals in California? Glory be! This is such an oft-repeated tale that most people think it's true!"

No Robin, you are absolutely right. Reagan did NOT close the state mental hospitals. He just made them obsolete, and removed their funding. It was okay with him if they stayed open, but with no funding and no inmates they didn’t last long. Maybe you are not old enough to remember Reagan’s “Mental Illness is a neighborhood problem” speeches like I do.

Living under a bridge is not better than being institutionalized. Granted, there were serious problems with the “Cuckoo’s nest“, but none that could not be fixed better than lost and living on the street.

I’m not a socialist, but I have a problem with thinking someone is better off dieing of exposure, alcohol or drug addiction, than being in a hospital. I see people every day that need somebody to tell then that “No you can’t drink that drink“, or “no you can’t do that drug” Some might even have a chance to be happy.

From the San Francisco Chronicle:
“In 1967, Gov. Ronald Reagan signed the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act (LPS), which went into effect in 1969 and quickly became a national model. Among other things, it prohibited forced medication or extended hospital stays without a judicial hearing.

A mental patient could be held for 72 hours only if he or she engaged in an act of serious violence or demonstrated a likelihood of suicide or an inability to provide their own food, shelter or clothing due to mental illness. But 72 hours was rarely enough time to stabilize someone with medication. Only in extreme cases could someone be held another two weeks for evaluation and treatment.

As a practical matter, involuntary commitment was no longer a plausible option.

The LPS Act emptied out the state's mental hospitals but resulted in an explosion of homelessness. Legislators never provided enough money for community-based programs to provide treatment and shelter. Even the most modest programs encountered local resistance.

'No neighborhood wanted the mentally ill living among them,' recalled former state Sen. Tom Bates.

Lanterman later expressed regret at the way the law was carried out. 'I wanted the law to help the mentally ill,' he said. 'I never meant for it to prevent those who need care from receiving it.'

But that's exactly what happened for three decades."

If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and walks like a duck, It's a duck. Reagan closed the mental hospitals.

Roy Heider Memorial Party Today!

The Roy Hieder Memorial service will be today (Sat. 4th of April) At the Redway fire hall, 155 Empire lane, behind Shop Smart in Redway.

There will be a celebration of Roy's life. Food and beverages will be served. Please consider helping everybody celebrate with us.

Service will start at 2:00pm, Food after.

Thanks to Bunny for this reminder span style="color:#3333ff;">Bunny has left a new comment :

Also of historical significance is the event today celebrating the life of Roy Heider. Redway Fire Dept. is hosting this memorial and Rotary is arranging it. Roy lived in Garberville (actually Redway) since the end of W.W.II. He served in that war and the Korean War. It's a day to note in our local history. See you there Ern.