Chapter 1

She was short, blond and had her mind on the clouds. How she found her way to my sanctuary was a mystery. She was trudging up my two track ... which by the way, intentionally meanders aimlessly on a winding roundabout course. My ‘drive’ does NOT follow my property line. Far from it. I developed a trapezoidal three mile and a half, plus or minus, area between a pair of metamorphic bluffs. The northwest 30 feet fronts a county road.

The rest of the 640 acres can go hang.

A crack between the bluffs that wasn’t there before the County had federal monies that simply HAD to be spent ‘constructvely.’ If the county want to recieve the same again ‘in perpetuity’ the first bonanza had better be spent on something besides a ‘country club.’ Uncle Sam is watching.

This being after hostilities ceased and a great many engineers were already involved in European reconstruction, finding a company to perform the road magic was getting boring and one of the County Board was now the Reserve Colonel in charge of the local Army Reserve Corps of Engineers. A word or two in D.C. and the colonel was a General and he put the Reserves to work.

I suppose ... alright ... there is no beginning ... as there is no end save the Second Coming. The beginning probably starts in the geologic past ... I am not doing THAT again. This beginning starts about 1901 ... the west is tamed, the restless are on reservations and some luckless prospector had a streak of luck. Rather than traveling to better territory he was present when a terrific rainstorm caused a landslide that dislodged a pretty good sized chunk of cliff and that landfall caused a goldrush the likes of which has seldom been seen.

The canyon to the west of town starts innocuously at the spring the first new town ... conveniently named Newton after the shepard who watered his sheep at the spring ... used for the town drinking water. Newton’s Spring.

A geologic fault years ... nay ... centuries before the Siberians crossed over the land bridge, caused the spring. Said fault was centered on a series of sandstone ridges between two metamorphic plateaus caused by volcanism.

A few millennia the spring was abundant and the sandstone wore away rapidly ... some millennia it was not abundant ... the sand wore softly. It spread out and leveled the land. Alway with a gentle downstream slope

The upper walls of the canyon are likened to a pair of “L’s” one forward the other reversed. The foot of the “L’s” are situated on either side of a narrow “V” ... not a “U.” A “U” is glacially scraped. A “V” is water worn. The mines were near the bottom of the “V.”

AUTHORAnd I’ve done it again ... geology. The only explanation possible ... I have a buddy who wants proof ... written proof ... by mainstream PhD’s ... for every singly thing I write ... or it never happened. I stopped telling him my stories. He’s not been so vocal since my next door neighbor produced photos of the full grown brown bear sleeping in my backyard. The photo’s shut him up ... BUT He didn’t see it ... it never happened. He cannot suspend disbelief.

Forward to the 16th century ... Native Americans camped, hunted and drove buffalo over the edge to the buffalo’s deaths ... but only in the first few hundred yards west of the spring. More than that and the fall produced buffalo burger

Clearing the right of way to the Second World War abandoned gold, silver and coal mines, sounded perfect to the county board.

Mine was among the first of the ‘unofficial’ vehicles to drive the yet to be finished new road ... at night, with the lights off, on the full of the moon ... the light was right and I noticed the split in the cliff ... umh ... bluff.

If a fella was take a notion and meander over to the edge of the canyon he could, barely, make out the railroad right of way where the scrappers, beginning in 1942, encouraged by the government, scrapped the entire narrow gauge mining railroad. Bridges, sidings, watertowers and sundry. By recycling unused or unwanted metal for example, the government could build ships, airplanes, and other equipment needed to win the war. And a guy could pick up spending cash.

During an abundant water season the crick at the bottom of the “V” becomes a raging torrent ... something the mines had never experienced ... there being a reasonable drought for 60 years. In fact ... the heavy rain fall that caused the collapse and gold discovery was the last of a couple hundred years of ‘more than enough.’

Gaia ... Mom Earth has ‘minions.’ One of those is her beautician ... Mother Nature. Gaia was in for her regularly scheduled bi century make over. In the chair, She was reading a magazine, when she heard, “tisk tisk.”

Down went the mag and Gaia is on defence. “Tisk, tisk,” is a pressage to bad news.

“What?”

“It’s nothing ... a little preventative maintainence can’t fix.” Mom Nature was standing hand held mirror resting on her hip and a magnifier in the other hand.

Gaia snatched the magnifying glass and said, “Show me.”