Chapter 10

“The train pulled into the station at noon. When we had left Texas it was cold and raining, truly a miserable day. Here in the small town of Phoenix, the weather was beautiful; it was warm and sunny, a perfect day for late March.”

‘The weather here is great now, ‘ Garret said, ‘but in a couple of months it gets really hot, and then in a couple more months it gets even hotter. From April to October we’ll live at the high country ranch. We’ll come back to the Valley before the first snows of winter and stay until it gets too hot.’

“Phoenix was like an oasis in the desert. The town had grown because of the railroad and the availability of water from the Salt and Gila Rivers. It was said that the valley in which it sat survived because of the five C’s; cotton, cattle, citrus, copper, and climate. The town was surrounded by acres and acres of cotton fields and citrus groves, all possible because of irrigation. There were large stockyards for cattle and wagons filled with raw cooper. All of which was shipped to customers via rail to the west and the east coasts.”

“It’s hard to believe that Phoenix was ever a small town,” I said, looking out the window at the urban sprawl that had paved over most of the farms and groves and driven out the stockyards and cattle ranches.

“I know; you have no idea how beautiful Phoenix was back then. I miss it; but that’s progress. Getting back to my story; Garret and I spent the night in town because we had to wait for the ranch hands that had met us at the rail station to load our belongings into three covered wagons. Early the next morning, we headed north on a wagon trail that followed the same general route as today’s Interstate 17. Garret and I drove the lead wagon followed by the others. It was a relatively flat ride until we reached the foothills, the beginning of the Rocky Mountains, where we camped for the night. The next morning we began our ascent.

“The average elevation in the valley is about 1,100 feet above sea level. Although I didn’t know it at the time, our ranch’s elevation was nearly 4,500 feet. It took two more days of hard climbing, camping overnight in a small valley, before we finally reached what appeared to be the top. I thought once we reached the top that we would begin a decent back down into a valley; but when we rounded what was the last of many bends in the trail, Garret pulled up on the reigns and said,”

‘Well, was it worth the climb?’

“Before me, to our left, were more mountains and rough terrain; but to my right, as far as the eye could see, were rolling plains of tall grass, yellow brown from the harsh winter which had just ended, which stretched to the foot of a distance chain of peaks.”

‘It’s beautiful, ‘ I said, ‘where’s our land?’

‘You’re looking at it. We own nearly the entire plain; our land begins along that fence line and runs up to the foot of those peaks.’

‘It must have cost you a fortune.’

‘Not at all, it was dirt cheap. Remember, it’s pretty isolated up here; we’re three days ride from Phoenix and a couple days ride from the mining towns of Jerome and Prescott. ‘

‘Where’s the house?’

‘At the northern edge of our land; the previous owners had built the house near the only source of water on the land, a small stream that runs out of the mountain behind it and collects in a small pond before running underground. I had Miguel, our foreman, and the rest of the hands build up the sides of the pond so it could collect more water and dig a small canal to bring water deeper into the valley. Up here as in the valley below, water is the key to survival.’

“I have to admit; when I first saw the house I was a little disappointed. It was half as big as Garret’s Texas house and not nearly as stately. But the inside changed my opinion. Entering the front door, I stood in a large vestibule; to my left was a large, vaulted ceiling, great room with an immense fireplace, which served as a living room and dining room; straight ahead was the winter kitchen, behind that kitchen, outside the house, was the summer kitchen. There were two bedrooms to the right, each had a small fire place and shared a common chimney. One of the bedrooms had been converted into an office. My favorite part of the house, however, was the large covered front porch. On one side of the doorway were two rocking chairs. The view of the entire valley was spectacular.

“It was an idyllic lifestyle. Running a cattle ranch, even with five hired hands, is hard. There’s always work to be done; animals to be cared for, fences to be mended, supplies to be gotten and most of all mouths to be fed. Back in Texas, we had a cook and a housekeeper; here, however, those jobs fell on my shoulders. We ate as a family; three men of Mexican decent, two Apaches, one Englishman, and one Alien, all sitting around the table sharing a simple meal.

“Each fall five of us would drive about 500 head of cattle down out of the mountains and into the valley below. Our winter ranch was located east of Phoenix in what is now Scottsdale. We would spend about a month there, fattening up the herd before bring them to the stockyards. The hands would then return to the mountain ranch, while Garret and I would spend the rest of the winter in the valley, enjoying ‘city life.’ We celebrated the start of twentieth century and the birth of the State of Arizona at the valley ranch.

“I loved Garret with all my heart; things couldn’t have been better between us. Then I almost blew it all. One day, when I thought Garret had left to go into town to get supplies and conduct some business, I was cleaning the house and decided that the rug in our office needed to be taken outside and shaken clean of all the dirt and dust accumulated from the previous summer. The one problem was that upon it sat Garret’s large, eight hundred pound safe. ‘No problem, I thought, I’ll just wrap my arms around it and lift it off the rug.’ At that moment, Garret entered the office, having forgotten to take some documents he needed for his business in town.