Springerville - Gateway to the White Mountains

Unity grew up to include two general stores, an eating house, and a couple or three saloons-surely big enough to have a name. Henry Springer and the Becker brothers, Julius and Gustav, were the competitive merchants. The story goes that seeing the need for more stock feed, those men most interested in this commodity conceived the idea of raising oats. After rounding up a bunch of Mexican workers with promises of high wages and easy work, the problem of seed oats on credit also became the major consideration. The Beckers shook their heads and told the boys, “cash on the barrel-head,” or its equivalent in those days. While some outlaws were honest in a way, it had to be admitted that it was a hazardous occupation, what with every man going heavily armed, a rope on every saddle, and so many stout tree-limbs handy. And a man's debts died or disappeared with him. Julius Becker came in 1874 while his brother, Gustav, came in 1876. They prospered because they were shrewd merchants.

Henry Springer, so the story continues, was cajoled into feeling differently about seed oats on credit. Through lack of overseeing, the diversions offered by the saloons, and the understandable urge for longer siestas the next day, the Mexican farming effort was unproductive. Henry Springer's seed oats were a total loss.

The consignees, with hands dangling conveniently close to gun-butts, laughed off the indebtedness as a huge joke. Since a community name was taking civic precedence by this time, some wit with an ironic sense of humor slapped his leg and said, “Hell's bells, let's call 'er Springerville!” The idea was accepted unanimously as a commendable gesture under the circumstances. Henry Springer got commemorated with the town name, but his business never fully recovered from the seed oats blow. Today the Becker Mercantile Company and second and third generation Beckers are still there playing an important part in the civic and commercial life of Springerville.

In late 70's and early 80's Mormon pioneers from Utah began trickling into Arizona Territory. With an eye for rich farming soil and irrigation possibilities some of them found Round Valley particularly appealing. They first settled in Springerville. The Eagar brothers took up homesteads a few miles south and established Eagarville, later to become the town of Eagar.

They settled a couple of miles up the valley (a thoughtful geographical advantage for priority on irrigating water from the river) far enough from Springerville to avoid moral contamination, and at the same time close enough to form a quick temporary alliance with the outlaws in the event of Indian trouble. The Eagar brothers, staunch churchmen, personified many of the virtues Springerville seemed to lack.

Springerville has changed greatly since then. As respectability with its attendant laws and quick shooting enforcement officers increased, outlawry became more and more unpopular and got to be downright unhealthy right in their own bailiwick. Federal troops handled the Indian situation in like manner, and things tamed down to where a man could go down town unarmed and a woman could go to the store without an escort.

Not counting Saturday nights and other festive occasions, Springerville settled down to a sedate community zealously trying to live down her lurid past by laudable endeavors, like a youthful harridan who had taken the veil. When the White Mountains were no longer needed as an outlaw hide-out through the decline of qualified tenants, it was discovered they were a recreational paradise; fishing, hunting, scenery, climate.

As automobiles gained popularity and modern highways began interlacing the region, Springerville became the logical supply point and jumping off place for this area. Through the untiring efforts of Julius Becker, son of Gustav, and other civic spirited citizens, these natural advantages were totaled up and Springerville was plugged far and wide as “the gateway to the White Mountains” until the slogan and Springerville became synonymous. There may be future side entrances and french windows and back doors to the White Mountains, but there will be only one “gateway.”

It is definitely that. U. S. Highways 60, from east and west; 260 from northwest; and 666 from north, converge at Springerville. 260, 666, and State 73, with their tributary roads cover the whole White Mountain recreational area. And to accommodate the air-minded, there is a modern landing field a mile from town with hangars, lights, its own well and 4,000 foot runways, long enough to handle multi-engine craft.

The White Mountains, treasure chest for Springerville, cover about 2500 square miles of forest covered mountains and snow covered peaks. The range is included in the Apache National Forest and the great Fort Apache Indian Reservation. The permanent population of the White Mountains, including Indian, logger, rancher, farmer, and those attendant to the travel industry, is estimated at 6,000. Because this range is easily reached by fine roads, the summer population is greater, but never crowded. The smart fisherman, willing to go to the trouble of doing so, can pack in to isolated streams, trout filled, and have a fine fishing time.

Ordinarily, the first snows of the season come to these mountains in November. The summer rainy season starts after the Fourth of July. Showers, which generally come in the late afternoon, are of brief duration, tend to settle the dust and bring out the wild flowers. There are more than 200 miles of trout streams in the White Mountain region, including the White River and its tributaries and the head waters of the Little Colorado. Much of the White River fishing water lies in the Fort Apache Indian reservation. In autumn, when hunting season starts, the Whites attract many hunters. A game study recently made estimates the game population of the White Mountains as follows: 10,000 wild turkeys, 7,000 deer, 600 elk and many mountain lions, coyotes, bobcats, squirrels, porcupines, skunks and smaller animals.

From its unpromising beginning Springerville has developed into a friendly community of 850 population that anyone would be proud to call their home town. It has long been the shopping center for the ranchers, lumbermen, and farmers within a thirty mile radius, but highways and the wisely conceived slogan were what really gave it growing pains. Today five grocers, a feed and seed store, a drugstore, six service stations, a general merchandise store, an automobile agency, two barber shops, a beauty shop, a cleaning plant, and radio shop cater to this additional influx of business. As tourists, vacationists, fishermen and hunters became "gateway-to-the-White-Mountains" conscious, visitors and their needs came in for first priority. A modern 25 room hotel, five auto courts comprising 66 units, six restaurants, three bars and two package goods liquor stores do their best to satisfy the demands for creature comfort. Being a hospitable lot they'd rather have you linger a spell than to hurry away, and their prices are an incentive to do just that. Well appointed hotel rooms may be had from $2.50 to $5.00 per day, the auto courts are up from $2.50, depending on the number in the party and the accommodations desired. Restaurant prices compare favorably with less attractive locales, and the servings are intended to compensate for what the crisp mountain air does to appetites.

The altitude is 6,968 feet above sea-level with an average summer temperature of 80 degrees. The winter average is 40 although at times it drops to zero with plenty of snow. The Springerville climate is nationally famous among doctors and recommended for alergy sufferers; it is above the elevation of obnoxious grass and weed pollens. And apparently it is highly beneficial for dispositions and marital relations, or maybe it just peps up the gals to where they can't be content sitting around twiddling their thumbs. Anyhow an overwhelming percentage of Springerville's businesses are operated by man-and-wife partnerships.

You are impressed with a feeling of substantiality in Springerville. Things seem to be built for keeps and nothing ever torn down. Nineteenth century dwellings of weathered pink brick under graying handmade shingles scowl with proper disdain at plate-glassed business structures and shiny gas pumps that have usurped the lots in between and even encrouched on front lawns. But (let's be practical about the whole thing) good frontage lots of erstwhile free-for-the-taking land are being snapped up at $50.00 a front foot.

Fourth of July rodeo brings out local talent.

Alpine, on Coronado Trail, a neighbor village.

Recent to accessible timber, human nature being what it is. But in the late 1890's, determined there would always be a Springerville and their progeny most likely stay there, the citizenry set up kilns and imported professional brick makers, convinced brick was more permanent, fireproof, and didn't need painting.

Having learned the advantages of co-operative and concerted effort there is a fast functioning Chamber of Commerce and Rotary Club. The V. F. W., American Legion and the P. T. A. take care of those more socially inclined, and of course there is the usual differences of opinion and petty jealousies natural to any democratic community. But after the folks get these little personal matters off their chests they are behind anything that is for the general good of Springerville hundred per cent.

As a consequence there are grade and high schools second to none in the State, the White Mountain Hospital with fifteen beds, operating room, and X-ray facilities, a hydro-electric plant supplemented by Diesel power on the Little Colorado River, Catholic, Baptist and Community Churches (the Mormon Church is in Eagar for those otherwise spiritually inclined), and a new post office building that would do credit to a town several times its size.

When the D. A. R. scout came along hunting a strategic site for one of the "Madonna of the Trail" statues commemorating the pioneer women of the West, Springerville came forward with a hundred good reasons in its favor and cleared a prominent location in front of the post office. This monument was erected by the National Old Trails Highway Association and Daughters of the American Revolution.

Yet, as though to prove there's no intention of being monopolistic, there is no newspaper, no bank, and no communal water system. To keep abreast of the woes of the less fortunately situated balance of the world, the citizenry read the Arizona Republic, Holbrook Tribune, and St. Johns Independent News. They bank in Winslow, Holbrook, Phoenix, and Belin, Albuquerque, Silver City and Gallup. As good water as you ever tried to rust your

innards with is plentiful at a hundred feet or less, so every property has its own well for domestic use.

The climate and soil being ideal for a variety of fruits and vegetables, irrigation was something else again. Joseph Udall, 87-year-old pioneer who was responsible for much of the intricate irrigation project (getting water to land you'd swear was up hill) still lives a vigorous life in Eagar, just an easy rifle shot from Joe Pierce whose contribution was helping keep the peace at a time when keeping the peace developed into quit a little chore occasionally. Joe was one of the original Arizona Rangers, and Apache County Deputy Sheriff, and when the Fort Apache Indian Scouts were reorganized into mounted police, he found his way into that hard riding, pistol-packing outfit.

Aside from the many just everyday cattle ranches, the same livestock conditions that attracted the early day rustlers to Round Valley are now producing thoroughbred white face Herefords that are taking first prizes throughout the country in national livestock shows under the banners of Milky Way, Tal Wi Wi, Staple-X, and White Mountain Hereford Ranches. The shade, sunshine and mountain air seem to do something for these aristocratic bovines, too.

All in all, Springerville is a progressive little community in the easy going, unhurried tradition of the southwest with plenty of time for fun and recreation. Most of the residents are avid hunters and fishermen. In addition to the annual July 4th rodeo and celebration, they stage matched Quarter Horse races most Sundays during the summer, and dances at Eagar Hall Saturday nights and holidays. In fact they'll take time out to throw a whingding on the slightest provocation most any time.

Maybe it's the climate, or come to think of it, it might be the neighborliness, but there is something about the town and surrounding country that just naturally creates enthusiasm, makes you glad you came and sorry to leave -if you don't see one of the many still available opportunities, like many others have, to justify settling down and becoming a dyed-in-the-wool Springervillian.

Or the advice may be—“If you fall off, be sure you keep your eyes open for they tell me the scenery's awful purty on the way down!” This lightness usually relaxes the novice passengers and they start out expecting to have a good trip; and about the third day after they get back most of them will admit that it was a good trip. However, it might be noted in passing that mule trips are the only way to get into the Canyon and get back without getting sore feet!

The dudes themselves are often good for a laugh when the guides get together. Ed Cummings tells about one girl who liked her big straw hat so well that she decided the mule ought to wear it for a while. So she tied it around his indignant brow. A sudden puff of wind blew it down over his eyes, he stopped suddenly, the girl fell off. But nobody was hurt, and it was all a good joke.

Oldtime guides, such as Ed, Sherm Moore, or Shorty Yarberry, reminisce that twenty years ago they learned to watch their lady passengers, as occasionally they got stuck down in the saddle and never knew why. With a pair of pliers, the guide would move around behind the lady and usually find that a corset stay had worked down and gouged into the saddle so that the lady was anchored firmly in place. A quick twist of the pliers and motion would be restored. That problem hasn't been met for over ten years, and probably the present generation of young guides wouldn't even know what to look for, the oldtimers concede. Another trick not needed now was to keep a special watch on girls wearing real tight so-called “choke bore” breeches. Sometimes in fact, often these girls would suddenly find their legs practically paralyzed fromthe knee down, and the guide would simply slit the seam behind the knee to loosen the breeches and start circulation again.

Guides point out that all riders can have more fun on their trips if they will remember a couple of things— just like Jug has to. Let the guide fit the stirrups to throw the feet slightly ahead, get ahold of the reins or the saddle horn or both, keep your mule up with the one ahead— and then relax. No speeders no cross traffic no jaywalkers no need to tromp on the gas or steer the mule will take care of it all. They like to tell about the tubby photographer who hired a special mule to take him down into the Canyon with half a hundred pieces of paraphernalia that he wouldn't let anyone touch but himself. He carried all his truck in his arms, it was all so precious, and when he got to where he wanted to take a picture he tried to get off, dropped the whole works and then fell down right on top of it. Nobody was hurt but the cameras; but the moral, the guides say, is just this let the guide tie your stuff on he'll do the work if you'll let him, and then everybody will have more fun.

John Bradley tells about the rather chunky, heavy set but jolly gal who rushed up to the corral gate one day ready to go, but with a dress on and a pair of overalls rolled up under her arm. John showed her a cabin she might use as a dressing room and she soon reappeared with the clothing exchanged but commenting that she never in her whole life had worn anything as uncomfortable as those overalls. John didn't believe this, so he took time to look the situation over and found that there was a big pair of patch pockets in front. Suddenly he realized she had someway managed to get a pair of bib over-alls on completely backwards. “They sure fit tight, too,” John remembers. After being advised of her errors, she returned to her dressing room and soon was back with them properly faced and much more comfortable, thank you!

One of the Grand Canyon oldtimers who remembers about the mules from almost before the automobile is Shorty Yarberry. A story goes that one day Shorty took two pails of oats and started in beside Liza, a little black mule, to feed her. She didn't like buckets, so she kicked him out of the stall and across the barn into another stall with old Star who also whanged away at him, but missed. “Why, sweetheart, you missed me!” Shorty said to Star as he crawled to his feet and edged out of the stall. One of the other guides ran up.

“Did you have an accident, Shorty?” he asked.

“Hell no!” said Shorty. “It wasn't no accident. Liza done it apurpose. But you know,” he added, “that mule really likes me.”

“How do you figure that out?” asked the other, as Shorty limped out of the barn.

“Why,” said Shorty, “she could've kicked me in the shins and broke my legs. But she didn't want to do that she didn't want to hurt me. So she kicked me in the stomach.”

In the wintertime, Jug and about 25 of his pals are left at Grand Canyon to handle winter packing to Phantom Ranch and the small number of trips to the River or Phantom. The other 75 mules are hauled to a ranch at Del Rio on the upper Verde River for a winter of pasture and rest. If Jug is handled right to begin with, he can expect to make as many as 200 trips a year into the Canyon. If he gets along well and is not overcrowded at

any time, he is good for anything up to twenty years of work, although the average is about six to eight years of use.

Characters all, the Grand Canyon mules, appealing yet solitary, familiar yet strange. To the men who work them, they are as understandable as anybody. To others they appear as some peculiar but attractive critter with all sorts of weird habits. Yet none of these possible peculiarities could match Josh Billings' comments along this same line over eighty years ago:

“Tha weigh more akordin tu their heft than enny other kreetur except a cro-bar . . . Tha kant hear enny quicker nor further than the hoss, yet their ears are big enuff for snow shoes . . . Tha are the strongest kreetures on earth and the heaviest akordin tu their size. I herd tell ov one who fell oph from the tow path on the Eri Kanal, and sunk as soon as he touched bottom, but he kept right on towing the boat tu the nex stashun, breathing thru his ears which stuck out ov the water about 2 feet 6 inches.”

Grand Canyon guides have not yet matched this feat. but doubtless will if they give their thought to the problem!

The Blue River Country

The first time I saw the Blue River Country it lay hushed on a late November pillow of brown leaves covered with a blanket of indigo haze. The sun was tired and low, like golden dust, transparent, suspended. The valley alders and willows were gray design against a hard cerulean sky, etched lines contrasting with the ochre-green stain that was the pines. I remember the red sandstone cliffs, along the river and the road, seemed to leap straight up into the still, cold air from the blond bunch grass. They were stark and raw too much color overpowering braggarts. Yet, they seemed very much to belong there. It all seemed to belong together. It impressed me as looking hard like broken flint and waxy too. like flint. A trace of eeriness seemed to linger as if the late Autumn sun had not quite been able to flush out the black magic of a night lit by full and verdant moon. The day was dreamy, unreal.

Now, the valley wears the cloth of summer-summer near the end of the rainy season. It is billowed in washed greenness and it is the pines that are straight and dark against an ultramarine sky filled with scudding white clouds. No longer do the cliffs leap rather, they peakor seem like stairs upon which some child has left many colored toys. Everything has a green cast as if ground malachite had been dusted. The sun is less mellowhas an echo of glare a brassy touch. The light breeze makes the pines hum softly the aspens rattle like dry seeds in a gourd. The alders and willows sigh as they constantly move their mantillas of shadow. The langour of siesta has an index finger on summer's lips. Time is of little consequence in the Blue River Country. There are no deadlines to meet. It has been a wrinkle on the face of the Earth too long awhile.

The Blue River Country is tucked away deep in the

central portion of the Apache National Forest, close to the Arizona-New Mexico line. The Blue River is formed by the meeting of Campbell-Blue Creek, from the northwest, and Dry Fork Blue Creek, from the northeast, out of New Mexico. Into the Campbell-Blue flow Coleman, Cat, Turkey and Castle Creeks. The Dry Fork Blue empties Pace and Freeburn Creek. At the meeting the valley of the Blue is wide, about 6500 feet in altitude and in the midst of a thick Ponderosa pine forest. From here the valley floor drops about fifty feet a mile in a generally southern direction becoming narrower or wider as the mountains press in or recede. Following this route is a Forest Service road, a continuation of what is locally called "Turkey Creek Road" down from Highway 260 and Alpine, Arizona. Along this road are located the ranches of the Blue Valley, most of which are headquarters or home ranches for the various cattle outfits operating in the vicinity. The mountains rise 2000 feet on the east and well over 3000 on the west of the valley sometimes in a very great hurry, the rest of the time just steeply. Often sheer steps of one-hundred to two-hundred feet occur. Truly, along this road one must "lift his eyes toward Heaven to see the handiwork of God." This road is bridged and graded down stream about ten miles to the Blue Post Office. From the Blue Post Office down stream to what is known as "the box" where the Blue River cuts through the Mogollon Rim there is a road but not suitable for these modern cars that are "wider than they are high." If you have a jeep or a light truck much scenery awaits your wondering eyes, for you will be traveling through the center of the Blue Range Wilderness area, set aside in 1932 to remain as nearly as possible in its natural rugged state. It is along this part of the river and its tributaries that the remains of the ancient cliff and cave dwelling Indians

are situated, indication of flourishing past civilizations. Blue Post Office is located in one room of a three room native stone building. This building was built by the present postmaster, genial, soft-spoken, Slim Joy. Joy also operates a general store and bar in this building and there is a gasoline pump outside, too if perchance you had forgotten. Slim has lived "down on the Blue," as the natives say, for twenty years and knows a great deal about the hunting and fishing potential of the region. Another Forest Service road leaves Blue Post Office to the east and traverses the southern end of the San Francisco mountains into New Mexico to emerge at Highway 260 about eight miles below Luna, New Mexico. This road, through superb mountain scenery, must be taken slowly and carefully but is worth every moment of the necessary time.

There is still another way to get "down on the Blue," if you have steady nerves, newly-lined brakes and are satisfied with fifteen miles an hour. Take the left hand road at Jess Burke's Beaver Head Lodge, off the Coronado Trail, Highway 666, south from Alpine to Clifton, Arizona. But before you make the turn pause a moment at Beaver Head. Jess and Flora Burke are oldtimers in this region and though they do not live "down on the Blue," one can't

"EVENING SHADOWS ON THE BLUE" BY ROY CAPLES-Driving down Blue River Canyon late one evening last October. the photographer had made what he thought to be his last shot for the day as darkness comes quickly in a deep canyon. Suddenly he turned a bend in the road that opened a view on this striking scene the setting sun send ing its last glow of the day on the canyon floor and peaks above, with long shadows reaching far up the river. This shot was made at a point some 35 miles south of Alpine. Arizona and 15 miles off the Coronado Trail to the east. A most difficult place to travel but worth every scenic mile of it. Exposure with 4x5 Crown Graphic---kodachrome film, at 5:30 p.m.-1/5 sec.f.29. Camera on tripod.