Farewell to the Mission Indians

"Pio Pico's nephew was living in part of the old mission, but the church and the rest of it were in bad shape. The Indians who had been living there before secularization, learning useful skills like herding cattle, making tallow and hides, or doing masonry and carpentry, cooking, tending vineyards, making good wine and brandy, and other civilized skills, were now working in the Pueblo of the Angels and elsewhere as dirt-cheap labor during the week, and as hopeless drunks Saturday night and Sunday."

(from Amargosa Ambush)

School Days

"You were my queen in calico;
I was your blushing, barefoot beau.
You wrote on my slate, 'I love you so,"
When we were a couple of kids."

Cobb & Edwards   1907

The Long Trail

A pale gray dawn
Cold and windy,
A thin silver crescent-moon rising
Veiled in a wisp of saffron cloud.
Long-horned black cattle
Rising out of the dark hill
Silhouetted sharply against the brightening sky. 

Ridin' the Rails

"My pocket book is empty,
And my heart is filled with pain.
I'm a thousand miles away from home,
Just waitin' for a train."     

(Jimmie Rodgers)