THE CACTUS SANDWICH

The CACTUS SANDWICH ON THE WORDS THAT WON THE WEST

The morning after a fierce dust storm, a rancher resumed his patrol of the dunes country near Yuma, Arizona. He spied a handsome cowboy hat by the side of the road. Assuming a fortunate windfall, he picked up the sombrero only to reveal the wideeyed head of a cowboy, who explained he had been caught in the blow the night before. "Wait a minute," said the Samaritan. "I'll fetch a shovel from the truck and dig you out." "Better go back to town and bring a tractor," suggested the cowboy. "I'm a-sittin' on my horse."

In three decades of collecting, that is my favorite Southwestern tall tale. It is, in fact, something of a classic example. Consider:

Nor is all of this just fun. The first organized exploration of the American Southwest by Europeans held faith in the tall tales of Esteban and Fray Marcos de Niza. No less an authority than Ray Allen Billington (Ph.D., Harvard, and Harmsworth Professor of American History at Oxford) advanced the theory that whoppers and windies had such a public relations effect that they amounted to the words that won the West. Billington cited the story of a western miner who found a gold nugget weighing 839 pounds. "Unable to move his treasure, and unwilling to leave it," Billington said, "he was last reported sitting on top, offering 27,000 dollars for a plate of pork and beans."

Today Billington's ideas are expanded upon by Dr. James (Big Jim) Griffith, director of the Southwest Folklore Center at the University of Arizona, and Professor Don L. F. Nilsen of Arizona State University, chairman of Western Humor and Irony Membership (WHIM). Both of these worthies rattle on endlessly about schools of sand trout in the Santa Cruz and cowboy coffee so strong "it will slip the hoof off a boar hog." Griffith and Nilsen carry on the exaggerations of westerners Mark Twain, John A. Lomax, Badger Clark, John Hance, Lewis Nordyke, Frank M. King, Ramon F. Adams, Mody C. Boatright, Neil M. Clark, J. Frank Dobie, Oren Arnold, Stan Hoig, Charlie Pickrell, and C. L. Sonnichsen. Extraordinary liars all, when they choose to be.

Within the better tall tales, of course, reposes a measure of truth. Arizona, for example, truly embraces the superlative called Grand Canyon of the Colorado. Naturally enough, the pioneer guide "Captain" John Hance explained that it was dug by a Scot who had lost a nickel. Where he piled the dirt became the 12,670-foot San Francisco Peaks. Hance, who had lost an index finger in the Civil War, informed tourists he had worn the digit down by pointing out the scenery.

Hance also told how he survived a fall on horseback into the mile-deep Canyon. "When the horse and I were three feet from the bottom, I hauled back on the reins and yelled whoa!"

Arizonans often are asked: How hot does it get in summer?

One August at Gila Bend, swears Harquahala rancher William Howard O'Brien, the sun burned an angry red brand across the high blue sky. Took a week to heal.

But that wasn't the hottest.

Bob Robles points out that before statehood a cavalryman died of sunstroke at Yuma, went to Hell, arid telegraphed back for his overcoat. He was the same one who had shouted from the crematorium, "Shut that door! I can't stand a draft!"

It was General Phil Sheridan who informed Congress, "We fought one war with Mexico to win Arizona. We ought to fight another to make her take it back."

Isabelle Brown recalls that her pioneer Tonto Basin granddaddy, Vi Fuller, once vowed, "Why, it got so hot and dry that when we bought an old sow, we had to soak her in a horse trough for three days before she'd hold swill."

Yet it gets even hotter. Dana Burden tells about the Wickenburg stick lizards which, down through the blazing eons, have evolved a system for traveling across the blistering desert. They carry sticks in their mouths, and when they no longer can bear the searing sand, they jab the sticks into the ground and shinny up the shafts to cool their feet.

And hotter. According to the late Dick Wick Hall, famed Salome humorist, some desert days are so hot that, in races of life and death, the coyotes and jackrabbits agree to walk.

"Too hot to quarrel," Hall wrote one summer. "So the Ladies Aid Society didn't meet this week."

Hall also had the last word on desert: I got a letter from a man yesterday wanting to know Why it was so Dry on the Desert, so I wrote and told him it wouldn't be a Desert if it Wasn't, which was Why it Was." For his desert vegetables, Hall tapped a logical source of moisture: "We plant onions in between the potatoes and then Scratch the onions to make the potato Eyes water enough to irrigate the rest of the garden."

Dry? Listen to Will Rogers, when he followed President Calvin Coolidge to the rostrum at the dedication of Coolidge Dam in 1926. The Gila River for years had shrunk to a trickle, and the new "reservoir" consisted mostly of a grassy meadow. Said Rogers, "If that was my lake, I'd mow it!"

One torrid summer, when the sun stood straight overhead like a burnished plaque, a half-dozen dead mesquite stumps crawled out of their holes to a spot of shade. That was the same year, according to veteran newsman C.R. (Dick) Waters, that a Joshua tree hiked into Bullhead City and impersonated a fireplug. A painted lady from Laughlin, Nevada, put four quarters in it thinking it was a shaggy slot machine.

But even that was not a record hot spell. Douglas native Jack Yelverton tells about a Chiricahua rancher who rode into town one early September to surrender to the sheriff for shooting his new neighbor. The motive? "Hot as it is, water is scarce," said the cowman. "And this new fellow, he sunk a well and threw up a windmill, and sheriff, you know there ain't enough breeze in that little canyon to run two windmills!"

No charges were filed.

Back when Chandler was more famous for growing hot weather cotton than high tech computer chips, an immigrant Iowa farmer incautiously planted a field of popcorn which reached maturity on a 115-degree day. The kernels exploded right off the ears. A flock of Marshall Humphrey's sheep in an adjoining pasture assumed the popcorn was snow and froze to death. Only by packing the butchered carcasses in more popcorn was the mutton kept fresh for market.

An early reporter of the Arizona scene, J. Ross Browne, stated in his Adventures in the Apache Country: "I have even heard complaint made that the temperature failed to show the true heat because the mercury dried up. Everything dries; wagons dry; men dry; chickens dry; there is no juice left in any thing, living or dead, by the close of the summer. Officers and soldiers are supposed to walk about creaking; mules, it is said, can only bray at midnight; and I have heard it hinted that the carcasses of cattle rattle inside their hides, and that snakes find a difficulty in bending their bodies, and horned frogs die of apoplexy. Chickens hatched at this season, as old Fort Yumers say, come out of the shell There's one advantage to the prickly pear cactus sandwich (ABOVE), a delicacy available at Saguaro National Monument, Tucson (OPPOSITE PAGE). WILLARD CLAY already cooked; bacon is eaten with a spoon, and butter must stand an hour in the sun before the flies become dry enough for use...."

Things hadn't been so bad since 1869, when a journalist experienced a summer in Arizona and wrote his editor: "The rabbits have somehow gotten the body of the hare and the ears of the ass; the frogs, the body of the toad, the horns of the stag-beetle, and the tail of the lizard. The trees fall uphill, and the lightning comes out of the ground."

Now that's how hot it got.

To fill out a sampler of Southwestern windies, here's one on homeliness: Jim (officially James E.) Cook quotes Jerry Clower about an old Arizona sodbuster who killed flying game birds with his ugly, ugly grin. One opening day of dove season west of Buckeye, envious hunters watched in awe and commented, "Amazing. Do you know anybody else with such an ugly grin?"

"Yep. My wife."

"Well, why don't you bring her along to hunt, too?"

"Her grin is so ugly, she tears up too much of the meat."

On Southwestern food: My New England brother-in-law, Bill Kovel, thought there was no more perfect finger food than a fried Cape Cod softshelled clam roll. Then I told him about the Carefree Prickly Pear Cactus Sandwich: slabs of prickly pear cactus on plain storebought bread. You can eat your sandwich and pick your teeth at the same time.

On greenhorns: Dude women from the East frequently play a role in cowboy humor. Ignorance of the ways of western livestock provides a familiar theme. As Charlie Pickrell once explained to a Connecticut lady, "I'm hitching this prize bull to the plow. For two years he has been tearing down fences to get to my neighbor's cows. And today I am going to teach the sonofagun there is more to farming than romance."

According to Tom Power, a Back East lady stepped off a Greyhound bus and asked him which side of a cow he was fixing to brand. Tom drawled, "Why, the outside, ma'am."

This lady's husband may have been the reluctant hero of yet another recurring tall tale. Not far from a dude ranch he had taken off his clothes and was about to dive into the Hassayampa River's tiny rivulet during dry season. A passing cowboy asked why, and the dude replied: "Yesterday I tried to hike to those mountains, only to discover they are more than twenty miles away. Now I want to cross this wide river, and I'll not be fooled again!"

That stretcher is remindful of Chet Brantner's definition of a Mohave County two-inch rainfall. One day a New York motorist pulled in to replenish his radiator water and asked if it ever, ever rained. "Shore," said Chet. "Just yesterday. Two inches. Two inches between drops."

On the healthfulness of the desert atmosphere: Another of Charlie Pickrell's yarns has him receiving a telegram while a student at the University of Arizona: YOUR MOTHER HOSPITAL LOS ANGELES STOP RECOVERY NOT EXPECTED STOP COME IMMEDIATELY. Charlie's only means of transportation, in fact his only possession, was his bicycle. So he rode it to L.A., and for safekeeping, he carried it to his mother's hospital room."Unbeknownst to me," Charlie asserted, "a bullhead sticker was in the front tire, and the tube chose that moment to blow out, filling Mom's room with clean, healthy Tucson air. She miraculously recovered so completely, I was able to bring her home on the bike!"

On the ironic swiftness of casual frontier justice: Text continued on page 18

On the slopes of the cattle country near Big Lake (BELOW), visitors from Back East have plenty of questions. WILLARD CLAY (LEFT) "Which side of the cow are you fixing to brand?" asked one.

(LEFT) How far is it to the Hualapai Mountains? KAZ HAGIWARA Judging distance in Arizona's sunny air can be difficult. Swore one dude (BELOW), "I'll not be fooled again."

In Mohave County's high desert near the Hualapais, a cottontail rests in the shade of a tumbleweed, and a Joshua tree reaches toward the sun. JAMES TALLON; TOM DANIELSEN

Old Route 66 has long been the subject of story and song. Often the story has to do with how windy it gets. But, explains a resident, “it blows this way only half the year.” Then—you’re right—it blows the other way. CARLOS ELMER (BELOW) Be sure to ask about the two-inch rainfall.....

(RIGHT) Tucson's fresh air reminds us of the report of a miraculous cure and a long but happy ride home to the land of superlatives where a saguaro cactus (BELOW) can drink a ton of water after one rain. And that's the truth! JERRY JACKA

Sometimes you can't depend on anyone or anything. During the night the horse walked off and left that fellow.....

Where water's scarce and the winds turn calm, there's surely a tall tale in the making. For if a breeze does stir, who has first claim on it? BOTH BY WAYNE DAVIS Pete Kitchen is the Arizona pioneer (although elsewhere it can be Jim Bridger or Pecos Bill) who lost his favorite horse to a band of thieves. Pete followed the trail, recovered the pony, and in the process took a prisoner. In desperate need of sleep on the way home, Pete pitched camp. To prevent the horse thief's escape, Pete left him in the saddle, his neck attached by a rope to a tree limb.

"And you know," Pete would confide, "that damned horse during the night walked off and left that poor fellow hanging there!"

On the wide open spaces, which give Arizona scenery such a special splendor: At Flagstaff the Santa Fe Railroad agent will say, looking down the track, "There's a train due in here in forty minutes. But I can't see it, so it must be running late."

One old Arizona mountaineer rose every morning precisely at 5:00 А.М. Не had no radio, telephone, clock, or rooster. Puzzled neighbors hid out one night to learn his secret. Just before retiring, he lifted his bedroom window and bellowed, "Wake up, you dang old fool!" The voice took all night to bounce off the farthest mountain, arriving back home just in time for reveille.

On unusual pets: Retired Navy Lieutenant Commander Ray Duus used to grieve over a fancy tropical fish he brought back from duty in the South Pacific. Arizona posed an environmental challenge. First Ray weaned the fish onto fresh water, then gradually onto the dry air of the city of Mesa.

My own prize gun dog, a big, black cocker named Sugar, was considered powerful smart in a hunting camp. He would take his place in a circle of quail hunters, slip the cellophane off a new deck of Bicycles, shuffle, ante, offer the cut, and deal a hand of draw.

"Aw, he ain't all that bright," I'd tell the other players. "Whenever he holds threeof-a-kind or better, he wags his tail."

Sugar's noble talents emerged in the field. Arizona quail tend to run, so Ol' Shoog was trained to circle the covey and drive the birds down a convenient gopher hole, which he covered with a paw. Then on signal he would let the birds fly out, one at a time. That is, unless I called for a double.

On weather in the high country: Not all the wind at Winslow was generated by J. Morris Richards when he was publisher of the Mail. As Richards testified, that high, treeless plateau country does seem to attract bodacious breezes. At peak gusts, according to Richards, it takes four men and a small boy to nail a cowhide over a keyhole.

"Does it blow this way all the time?"

"Only half the year," was the reply. "The other half a year it turns around and blows the other way."

In fact, life would be nearly unbearable in all of the Four Corners country (where the borders of four states meet) if it weren't for the weather holes. These are deeply drilled into bedrock. Lengths of drill steel are cemented into the holes. When the wind blows hard enough to bend these steel shafts to a forty-five degree angle, citizens shoo the children

Even the most skilled of Arizona's liars have trouble exaggerating about many of the state's wonders. Take Meteor Crater. If someone decided to stage a football game there, the bowl would accommodate three million fans. TOM TILL indoors. When the rods are blown horizontal, the womenfolks head for the house. And when the rods shear off, the men follow. Only in January may there be a brief respite, when the weather holes are repaired. From Gray Mountain Trading Post on U. S. Route 89 to Navajo Bridge, then up the Colorado River past Page and beyond the sacred Navajo Mountain, there descends a vast envelope of dense fog. The moist air hangs for a week or more, keeping temperatures day and night around freezing. According to James F. Collins of Page, the pea soup plays havoc with communications. Jim says icicles trap telephone talk. Once Jim's office telephoned Phoenix requesting information too confidential to send by radio. But the call did not go through. Jim's engineers calculated the location of the freeze-up. A Navajo line scout was dispatched to the thirty-third telephone pole beyond the Little Colorado bridge, and broke off the seventh icicle south of that pole. The Indian took the icicle into the warm cafe