The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 24, 1905, Page 7

BT it “old settlers.” le things that are not put and the tears— ts life—the intangible things emselves into bonds that e together, and that are kept iden from the searching j except on rare and heaven Accnt eccasions, arc what 1 care most to Laow wha Edwards tells me. E s ha at Tono- very modestly and unsensationally mere as her husband’s wife. NING ount." spahy ride in be- > seeki wn their are as anywhere; and you want in the people, if wywhere kinder or more of viéw that speak, for she can She may conscientiousl ng, “in the ugband Mr to make a all the clui fir Kdw 1ocation, worth nd not b tutime start He b some buildings at Nev Lere we' wére-. liy ing. an came home, pulled .them dows, loaded them on - wagons and hauled to Tonovpah. went in we had to go by ix le drive that. took en hours, heavi 1 tak- , and . every was the o woman nd the men, althousgh I knew did everything they me comfartable. There ein, ke nén of all serts, of course, new in, miners going back, sports, too; but mot id nor one thing done i have annoyed me. veiing w ver rough, the > rolling so that it made me sea- Nothing could huve been. kinder the men then. They wanted to what they could do for me and ted everything they could think though: that iemon juice might good, but no cne had a “lemon. The said that if there was a lemon to be had in Nevada they'd get it for me. “When we got te Crows Station they twenty women as thére were when I got there, they were kept pretty well supplied with partners, *“T'he n didn't come! in their kKahki or minln y wore the best they had, and sometimes that was very good, and the men of course repaid the compliment by wearing as pretty mining camp’s ion for T was., shown at the danees. There was. as 1 suppose thére aly isin every camp, an ob- fectionablc ! , but this was never intrudea into the . A very few times men brought wamen of the other Kind-~not notorious women, but those , but that was Stop- living very quictl ped: “The curious thing about it was that the men who made “the mistake were ytictly tgld by.men who had ne women of their own families at Tono- pa ren who simply wanted to show their respeet for the good women there, nd no man ever-made a mistake twice. s no trdyble and no fuss vas just siopped, and the the dances in arc big affairs, s of pretty dresses r weat hungry or in need ' Mrs. BEdwards tells me ontrast to this ys it apropos of destitution orning paper. ound in need at TONOPAH, with pride, po bigger comm of the story one were people would carry them wouldn't b there for -al room in be given things u ousc rem “During the siege of sickness there—an epide of pneumonta among the m —it was shown how kind and liberal a niining‘camp could be. 1Ip sickness and in desth no one went without care whether he had menns or not. s00n 48 a man was found sick taken care of with- out any waiting ask if he cculd pay tor it. Of course the men belonglng N FRANCISCO SUNDAY CALL. CAMP CHIVAL HELEN DARE AT TON OPAH and homesick, and T suppose that lor makes ‘them fecl kindly o the women that are there, Whether that is the rea- son or mat I know they were very kind to the women ut Tonopah, and that there was never a safer place foy a good woman, or one who appeared to be re- spectable. It ‘was their custom in the early days to mather to meet the stage, and if there was a woman abeard the word always got around somehow and the wholg masculine population would be on hand for her ar- rival--just te look on. That was the way it was when I arrived. Then If it was known that she needed anything to make her comfortable—"" ‘A lemon—or anything?” “Yes,” Mrs. Edwards laughed, “a lemon or anything, they'd see that she got it, Jf it was to be had. “Quite a number of bright, clever young givls came there—typewriters, stenogra- phers, bookkeéepers and girls who could do something and- wanted to get on. They were well paid, three, four and five dol- lars a day, and some gf them Have done well with mining ventures, and not one of them has any unpleasgnt experience to complain_ of. Iiven the roughest men showed them respect. “There is, I suppuse, more or less drunkenness and bad language in every camp, but one thing I noticed was that it I or any other woman walked along the street and approached men who were drunk or swearig or talking loudly and ofiensively they would stop—at least un- til 7 was out of hearing. “As soon as they would See a woman coming one of them: would say, ‘Sh! Here comes a woman,’ and the very drunkest of them would stralghten up and try to look as sober as possible and utter no offensive word until she had passed. iy own daughter came home from school and went into her father's stors for a time, and not once while she was there was she offerded by anv rudeness or famtliarity er unpleasant word. == W\ WAL Mrs. dwards tells me about Tono- pah, although we go no farther into matters of promotional or educational value, Personally, I must shamelessly con- 1 care very little about the sta- history of Tonopah, or any My mind has a shocking e for facts of educational 1 to population, products, output, cte. But of the things I care most to hear about at Tonopah Mrs. Edwards cau tell me, for she has fess tistical other place. bad appe value rel s, LEMON IN NEVADPA — . ANDTHEY GOT IT FORHER 1 went in and found that there was just one lemon there and they brought it out to me. “Perhaps this doesn’t sound like much—but it was the way they did 1t.” There was ONE lemon in Nevada— and they got it for her. “We had no amusements except of our own making at first. Indeed, now, we are dependent on our home talent for entertainment, for the sort of com- panies that come to give us shows are not worth seeing. At first we had only our parties—dances in the Miners' Union Hall, and when there were only ‘%o orders were taken care of by the'r own. orders, but If a ‘man belonged to no order he was cared for just as well and as soon as he needed it. “It was a very sad time, for very often men got sick and dled and were burfed without their own people know- ing anything about it. Men who came there to try their fortunes would tell no one who they were or where they came from. Sometimes there was noth- ing among their belongings to show who they were, and it Seems to me they were all the more kindly cared for on account of that, and when they died, our people saw that they were buried decently and in a way that thelr own people would have wished. “There was no clashing between the different orders and different faiths, At first there were no churches, and only the Miners’ Union Hall for any purpose. I remember one day that three funerals were held there at the same time. one of an Odd Fellow, one of a Mason and one of a Catholic, and the services were read at the same time under the same roof, and no one thought of any objection to such a thing. The people were as liberal in feellng as with their purses. “During thé epidemic strange things happened. T noticed that in one tent near where we lived tiie man did not seem to be gtirring, so I went over and found him down with pneumonia. He thought it was all over with him, but I urged him to go to the hospital, and had him taken, and he is well and strong to-day, “There was another tent. just a little muslin shelter, near us that I could see from my back door, and I noticed one morning there was no life about {t. When my husband came In to breakfast I told him things looked quéer over there, and that I thought something was wrong. I just had a feeling that there was. He went over and found one man dead on his cot, and another beside him, asleep, worn out with watching. “Men in a mining camp, awa¥ from home—sometimes for the first time—get “T think, from what I have seen at Tonopah, that the way a woman Is treated by men depends very much upon herself. I think men want to respect women, that they prefer to think well of them, and that If a woman appears to be a good woman men are glad to treat her as such. It is curious to see how men will gather around respectable womien, just because they are lonely and homesick. “I remember several young men, al- most boys, who were away from home for the first time, who used to come into my husband's store and talk with me Just because they were homesick. They ‘were so unfamiliar with. mining that they didn’t know how to make a location even. To help them out and give them some thing to interest themselves in I sug- Bested that they make locations dt the lower end of town, where none had been made; and I told them as best I could how to go about it. They didn't do it, but went away, and now that property is some of the most valuable to be had. Of course I didn't know that—I only thought it would be better to take a chance than do nothing. ““The first church fdir at Tonopah was an example of the good feeling and lib- « erality of our people. @ (Continued From Page One.) cle, conducted always by the leader with the spreading plumes. The steady drumming of the mecca- sined feet, the deep guttural “O-hoho-ho! E-hehe-he he-he!” mingled with -the shrill high-keyed tenor comes down the scale in a peculiar wave-like movement; it is the cry of the wild things of re- mote desert fastnesses—which these Nav- ajos themselves are. The song rises and falls. Sometimes it is like the grunting of the great bear of the mountains as he grubs between the roots of the juniper—like the rushing of a brook—like the wind— like the mingled cry of vultures or the waiting of coyotes in the darkness—and through it all persists the drumming of the feet on the ground and the steady ch-r-r-! of the gourds like a hundred rat- tlesnakes. The song finisheg in a humming sound “Tt W a Catholic falr, held In the Miners’ Union Hall, and all the twenty women there took part, regardless of dif- ferences. in creed. We made a lot of tancy work and had tables as at an old- time fair. The lemonade, I remember, was something awful, for lemons were scar~e; but we made $2000 in one night. The uall would only hold 500, but every man came who could get.in. They knew no coin less than a quarter, and seldom thought' of change; and we didn‘t have to worry them to buy.” This I put down with pleasure to the credit of Mrs. Edwards' Tonopah, al- though it will seem llke an impossible dream to the good women who put their energy in church fairs here. “The women who have gone to Tono- pah on business or to work have nearly all done well. . “There was one woman who came from Delamar, Nev., to start a boarding house. She was having her furniture hauled and the wagon broke down. BShe came on with what she could bring, leased a lot, put up tents for rooms, a shack for a kitchen and dining-room, and got right to business. In a little while she had a big house, and only the other day she sold out for $9000. “Women who have gone into mining paoa s THOMAS MRS EDPWARDS on their own account have not bee: suo- cesstul, but who have had menm make the ventures for them have nearly all done well. “The girls who came stenographers, etc., have rled, and ma attachments formed t ditions all seem to have been and strong. These halcyon days for vent I find when I inquire for the our girls at home, are almost over. “Now,” Mrs. Edwards tells me a little regretfully, “it is getting different. Thers are more people at Tonopah—nearly 8000, I think, and of course we don’t know each other so well and are not thrown together s0 much and so pleasantly. Cliques are beginning to be formed. “I suppose the Tonopah of to-day is & pleasanter, more convenient place than.it was when I went there, five years ago. It has all the modern conveniences— electric lights, water works, sidewalks, and even a sewer, but T am glad I knew it in its early days, when our water sup- ply was carted around in barrels, T had a tent for a kitchen and our people were so close together and dependent on each other that we got to know each other as real men and women."” those to work there, early all mar- The Ye-Bitchai Dance cf the Navajos§ ROOORERON OO NG IN00SSS and this set files out to be replaced by another, very much the same to the un- practiced eye. But with each seét there are two clowns, dressed very much as the dancers in masks and feathers, each carrying the skin of a small animal, which they put through all manner of queer pantomime. Old Chief Black Horse steps forward and delivers a speech. He is a fine old warrior type, his flery little eyes turn- ing upon his brethren with a command- ing gleam. Then come set after set and song after seng, which seem very much alike to us, 8o we take a walk around the edge of the camp among penies and wagons and cof- fee-pots, sleeping figures curled up in their blankets, head to the fire, Indian fashion. Here we find mnthers nursing their ba- bies—little brown dumplings, wearing only a calico slip. They blink at us sol- emnly in the firelight, and, glancing be- yond them into the dark and frosty hori- zon, we do not wonder that this is a hardy race—those who survive their in- fancy. At the lower end of the camp, near the dancers’ dressing-room, we come upon a set of them standing apart in the gray moonlight getting a breath with their masks off, humming over in a low tone their next song. We speak to some of them, bui they will not answer—they may not speak while they are impersonating gods. We make our way shiveting back to the trading cost and gulp down the bot cup of coffee that has been provided for us— then back to the dance. which goes on till the rale gray of the clear winter dawn lightens the eastern sky, and long line of the mesas stands blackly visible again. The blue smokes of camp rise afresh into the keen morning air. and already gayly blanketed men and women dash-by us on their way to tite store—and wagons and ponies and wives and bables follow— returning to their far-away .. hogang among the juniper hills