The quirky ghost town of Nelson, Nevada

 

Years ago, Laureen and I sat down to watch the 2001 film, 3,000 miles to Graceland one evening. Not sure why, but we are fans of Kevin Costner and Kurt Russell and decided to give it a shot.

We like doing that - watching a film on a shot.

Most end up as a 22 caliber plink but some end up as a full blown 44 caliber full-metal-jacket blast. While on the subject, may I mention Top Gun Maverick? That was, in my opinion, a macho-side-winder-missile of a film. But I digress.

The Graceland film was probably, in my ‘Beyer what round would this film rate’ opinion, would be a solid 40 caliber. Enough to do damage but not enough to awaken neighbors three doors down.

I am not sure why I am using such terms to determine the strength of a film but perhaps since I recently went to a legal shooting range with a few friends, the aroma of gunpowder is still circulating through my senses.

Anyway, Laureen and I drove to the film location for one of the scenes in the film - the ghost town of Nelson in Nevada.

This is where Costner, as nasty as his character is, flicks his lit cigarette out of the car and blows up the place, sending a couple of full sized planes right into the air.

Sections of the planes are still there, with one sticking right out of the ground as though it crashed nose first.

Destroyed aircraft from film 3,000 Miles to Graceland in Nelson, Nevada

Really cool.

Unlike most ghost towns I visit, Nelson is a bit different. Not the average ghost town where buildings are there but mostly not. Rumors of past lives are envisioned across desert landscapes or remote mountain valleys. No, Nelson is unique in that aspect.

As we drove through the eleven miles of desert toward Nelson off the 95 and on the 165, there were a lot of Joshua trees, creosote bushes, cacti, and other plants which I cannot possibly name.

“Beautiful area,” Laureen mentioned.

“Some folks think the desert is boring,” I replied. I had actually heard someone say that once, but then again they also did not believe Sasquatches existed.

“Then they have not traveled much,” Laureen said.

Besides being one of the settings for a movie about a bunch of Elvis impersonators about to rob a casino in Las Vegas, the town of Nelson has a fascinating history.

A long detailed history of exploration, riches, murder, and all the other ingredients that make visiting such a place a must.

We suddenly came into view a collection of modular homes, stick built homes and lots with no homes at all. In fact, some of the homes were large and beautiful. 

“Are we there?” I asked.

“We just passed a sign that indicated we had arrived in Nelson,” Laureen replied.

This was not a ghost town at all. Folks walking around, doggies prancing in front yards, people driving modern cars instead of horse and buggies, and not a ruin in sight.

“I think we’ve been bamboozled,” I uttered.

Nope, the ghost town was about another mile or so past the present and very much alive village of Nelson.

In 1775, a group of Spaniards were walking here and there about this locale when they discovered pockets of rich ore containing large amounts of gold.

Immediately they called the area, El Dorado, which in Spanish meant any place where riches, opportunity, or abundance of things can be found. And this, El Dorado, was such a place just west of the rushing Colorado River.

After the Spaniards left, the area was searched now and then, but in 1859 large lodes of both gold and silver were discovered and El Dorado came into full force, creating one of the largest mining booms in Nevada state history.

It seems that every time I conduct research about a mineral strike, it happens to be one of the largest in that particular state.

“We got us another boom,” one old miner may have said to another.

The other miner may have nodded his unkempt bearded head. “Yes, and last week I was at another boom over yonder.”  

Two years later the rush for riches was truly on and a steamboat landing was created at the mouth of Eldorado Canyon at the shore of the Colorado River to transport goods to the quickly forming town and to take the rich ore south along the river.

The ore would be transported nearby on the Colorado River

The first name for this mining bonanza along the Colorado River was Colorado City. Must have taken moments to come up with that name. Then it was changed to simply Eldorado.

It should be noted that this was before any man made dams were along the length of the Colorado River and thus supplies and riches could be transported nearly 350 miles from this location all the way to the Gulf of California.

Try that today. In fact don’t…unless you feel like dragging your boat out of the water in front of Hoover Dam, Davis Dam, and the Dam Dam.

With money rolling in from the various mines in the area, the town of Eldorado continued to grow and one of the richest was the Techatticup Mine which produced millions of dollars from gold, silver, copper, and lead.

One of the canyons leading to riches in Nelson, Nevada

And with all such boom towns, another element came to town - hooligans.

Yes, Tom Hooligan moved to Eldorado in 1897. Okay, I may have made that name up, but bad hombres and bad hombres showed up, making the mining camp a very dangerous place to reside.

Since Eldorado Canyon was so narrow and yet so rich in mineral deposits routine, arguments arose between miners, and murder became a way of life. And, add to that fact that the Civil War hadn’t ended that long ago, deserters from both the Union and Confederate armies migrated there believing the location in Nevada was so isolated they would not be hunted down by the authorities.

Of course, there were no animus feelings between those two factions at all. Did I mention that murder became a fact of life?

A town was eventually built further up the canyon away from the rushing river since that area had seen the building of a stamp mill and docks for the steamships that would visit Eldorado on a routine manner and had become too crowded. 

In 1897, a prospector and camp leader by the name of Charles Nelson was found murdered in his home, along with four other people. The killings were blamed on a Native American by the name of Avote. The town’s name was then changed to Nelson in his honor.

Nelson was a different sort of mining camp, in which the majority see their boom last a few years at most and then dry up. No, this locale produced rich minerals from its founding all the way until 1945.

Around 1901 to 1905, railroads were becoming more and more accessible for the citizens of Nelson to move products and soon there was no longer the need for the steamboats along the Colorado River. It was faster and cheaper to bring goods in or ship out the needs of the mining boomtown by rail.

In 1907, the post office closed in Eldorado and was moved to Nelson.

As we walked around the now eclectic ghost town of Nelson, we marveled at the displays of vintage automobiles and trucks scattered everywhere. Some were parked along the only paved road through town. Some were parked in dirt parking lots in front of original buildings from the heyday of Nelson. Some were just parked as though the owner had just exited the vehicle to carry on some business in a nearby structure.

Some strange looking vehicles in Nelson, Nevada

There are signs indicating that this isn’t just a ghost town but a town where people live. The wording on the signs are clear - ‘Leave before Dark.’ The residents do not want tourists trampling all over private property looking at this or that artifact.

John R Beyer standing in the doorway in Nelson, Nevada

It was a wonderful couple of hours we spent trampling around - it was early in the morning. The gift shop/visitor center was open and we chit-chatted with a woman running the place. She mentioned that mine tours are available and reservations can easily be made by visiting the Eldorado Canyon Mine Tours website. Not only can the guests visit the actual mines in the area which produced the boom, but the tour also incorporates visiting film sites, wedding venues, great photo opportunities, and overall explains the entire history of Nelson.

The main street in Nelson, Nevada

In fact, we watched as three or four small tour buses entered the small town and deposited tourists for their day of adventure.

It was windy, so we decided to pack it in and head west, knowing we would be back to explore much more of this Eldorado Canyon.

For more information: https://www.eldoradocanyonminetours.com/index.html

John can be contacted at: beyersbyways@gmail.com

Amboy Crater

*Editorial note - this blog first appeared in 2018, but this is one of the best times of year to visit Amboy Crater. John traveled there during the middle of summer - don't do that! It is dangerously hot, as is stated in the article. That written, Go Out and Explore this Marvel of Nature.

Amboy Crater, as seen from above

Roughly ten thousand years ago, according to all the scientific types, there was a huge volcanic eruption not far from the city of Barstow. So close, in miles as those crows fly, which anyone living there would have looked up into the eastern sky and scratched their heads in wonder.

What was that? What could that have been? Is there something we should be doing at this time with all that smoke and fire in the sky? I wish we had finished that living trust before all this, don’t you?

Of course, there is no evidence that anyone lived in the Mojave Desert during that time. Then again, this is still up to debate. 

Anyway, that volcanic explosion would have been something to witness - from a distance. Bring out the popcorn and suitable drink for the show of a lifetime. Probably should also have a fire retardant umbrella, just in case of floating fire cinders or something else hot enough to ruin your day or life. 

John R Beyer pointing to the distant Amboy Crater

Actually, according to several scientific resources, the first suspected volcanic activity in the area near the present small town of Amboy, was about 80,000 years ago and it kept burping up magma for thousands of years.

Anyone who has traveled Route 66 eastbound from Barstow knows something catastrophic happened here. Miles and miles of magma fields, giving the landscape an almost out of this world appearance. Driving that lonely stretch of highway, away from the hustle and bustle of Highway 40, gives a person a chance to slow down and take a look around at the gorgeous desert.

And in that middle of the desert is a 250 foot tall and nearly 1500 foot wide ancient volcano named appropriately, the Amboy Crater. 

Amboy Caldera

But what is a volcano? 

Come on, we all know after watching, Dante’s Peak. It was a big Hollywood hit in 1997, and made us all experts in what is really happening down in the bowels of the earth. Who can forget, unless you never watched the film, Harry Dalton – played by Pierce Bronson (enough to go to Netflix now?) stating, after finding two people boiled to death in a seemingly cool pool of mountain water.

It’s really hot down in the earth. Dalton said, as he scratched his two day growth of beard on his handsome face. So hot, that sometimes yucky stuff comes to the surface and really makes a mess of things – including my hair and make-up.

I made those script lines up – literary license provoked.

According to NASA, a pretty decent resource in itself, a volcano is an opening on the surface of a planet or moon that allows material warmer than its surroundings to escape from its interior.

I had a thought about a spicy burrito being the cause of a volcano, but that would be childish.

So, a road trip to the Amboy Crater was in store.

Being summer, Laureen had a comment about that idea of mine.

“You know it is summer.”

“Yes, I looked on my phone – you are correct.”

“It’s not really a great idea to hike in the desert during the summer.”

“When have I ever done anything stupid?”

For the next three hours, Laureen went through an entire litany of the things I have done in my travels which be questionable, as either being stupid or supremely adventurous.  

I went for adventurous.

When hiking in the high desert during the summer, one has to be prepared. A backpack full of yummy snacks, bottles of water, a first aid kit, and a bit of smarts.

It does get hot in the summer months, and it was early

So, I arrived at the Amboy Crater trail around seven in the morning – it was warm but not the melting type of warm. Laureen, being smarter than me, had only shook her hear head as I left our abode for my morning hike to the Amboy Crater.

“Stupid idea.”

“Adventurous.”

The crater is only about two and half miles west of the small town of Amboy along Route 66. Being a national natural landmark, it is well marked with an easy drive across black asphalt to the parking area just at the beginning of the trail.

After a hike, stop by Amboy for a cool drink

There are restrooms, picnic tables, and kiosks telling the visitor what they are viewing in the near distance. The volcano looms up from the desert floor like an impregnable castle from the days when knights controlled the countryside. Well, that would be knights like in ancient Europe and not the United States, but the sight is pretty awesome.

Walkways, tables, and kiosks for the visitor at Amboy Crater

Hardened black flows of ancient volcanic rock covers the entire area, comprising of nearly 24 square miles. When this thing erupted the last time, it sent volcanic debris flying in every direction and also rivers of molten lava covering the desert floor like bugs on road kill. That was gross, sorry. 

That was deep and shallow at the same time.

The trail to the top of the Amboy Crater is an easy stretch of a little over a mile with signs indicating which way to go. The climb to the top of the craters rim is a bit steep, but nothing that sturdy shoes cannot handle.

I was the only one there for the nearly two hours of hiking, and it was a wonderful experience. To look at this crater and realize I was standing on the top of something so powerful was intense. Though I have never been to the moon or any other planet besides the one I currently reside on, I wondered if this is what future explorers will witness. 

Just some of the hiking trails within Amboy Crater

Well actually, I hope if we visit another planet there may be people or beings we can talk with. I don’t want wind up in a cook book. Twilight Zone, get Netflix.  Just a thought.

On a serious note, and I hate those, hiking during the summer in the desert must be well thought out beforehand. If there are signs warning of excessive heat precautions, those I ignored, stating that hiking is not recommended, then heed the signs. I’m a professional – okay, that doesn’t cut it for moving around in the desert when it is four hundred degrees. Take ample precautions, start very early in the morning and be done well before the sun is directly overhead. Otherwise, then any other time of the year is a wonderful time to explore the beautiful Amboy Crater area.

Heed the warnings, may save your life

A Bit of Nostalgia at Peggy's Sue's

An awesome place to stop and visit

As most travelers realize, there are three essential items needed for an adventure: a mode of transportation, fuel for that mode of transportation, and fuel for the travelers themselves.

Transportation comes in many forms but all need fuel - not many folks feel confident if an airline pilot states rather joyfully over the intercom, “Welcome folks to We May Make It Airlines. On today's flight, we may have just enough fuel to make our final destination. My co-pilot already has his rosary beads out, just in case.”

Nope, not booking that airline.

According to the American Automobile Association, most traveling is conducted by driving the highways and byways in personal vehicles - of course, a pair of open eyes when driving anywhere in Southern California will prove that also.

“Doesn’t anyone work?” one driver may ask while sipping on his Mango Dragonfruit Refresher - of course with added coconut milk. “It’s two in the afternoon and we’re at a standstill in the Cajon Pass.”

All conveyances that transport folks from here and there need fuel, no matter which type of energy-producing fuel that may be.

Pull up to a gas station and within minutes the traveling group is back on the road, or pull your EV into one of those plug-in thingies and then take a long lunch and a nap and then you are back on the road again, eventually.

But the inner fuel for the travelers is one of the best parts of getting from point A to point B. There are so many choices along the roadways of America. Small diners, chain restaurants, fast food joints, curbside entrepreneurs, and places that have not seen an ‘A’ in their window since opening day.

There are also those favorite spots that we find ourselves drawn to time and again while traveling familiar territory, and one of those for me and my beautiful wife, Laureen, is Peggy Sue’s along Interstate 15 in the small town of Yermo.

A lot of 'nice' rides show up at Peggy Sue's

Not only is the eclectic eatery a great place to fill up the old stomach, but it is a fun destination to stretch one’s bones while wandering the interior and exterior of the establishment.

My personal history with the iconic restaurant goes back decades. In another life, I taught at the small but academically strong Silver Valley High School. A great place where staff really worked with their students to ensure a good quality education.

One of the programs I was involved with, Peer Counseling, had students interacting with fellow students to resolve various negative issues that may be causing personal angst. And nobody likes angst. It dealt with students talking with their peers on a one-on-one basis which is often more beneficial than an adult trying to make sense out of a teenager's life.

“My parents don’t understand me,” one teenager may say to a Peer Counselor.

“That’s because parents are dolts who often wear mismatched socks,” may have been the reply from my well-trained Peer Counselor. I always thought humor was a great way to get to the root of any issue.

I also used to say, ‘If you have issues, we have tissues.’ The point was, that my students believed in their heart of hearts that they could be the ears and voice for teenagers to listen to without giving advice, unlike adults who always had concrete solid answers for every problem that a fourteen-year-old was dealing with.

Really?

We raised four daughters - I still don’t know half of what the girls said for the entirety of their teenage years. I just nodded or told them to ask Mom.

Besides being a legitimate school class, we also operated a school club so we could hold various fund-raisers in which we could put on events schoolwide for the students at Silver Valley High School. And, that is where I came into contact with Peggy Sue Gabler, the owner, who along with her husband Champ, purchased the establishment in 1987.

Our Peer Counseling Club held its first car wash at the famed restaurant and Peggy Sue herself assisted, so naturally, it was a great success. She was charming and affable and even gave my students a good tip for washing her car in addition to free pizza and soft drinks.

It’s a good memory, and so Peggy Sue’s has been a favorite stopping place whenever we travel north or south along Interstate 15.

But, even without those personal recollections on my part, the joint is a cacophony of sights and sounds - and just a downright fun place to wander, even if putting on the feedbag isn’t the traveler's number one priority.

However, who could turn down anything on a menu that features such sandwiches as the Patti Page Patty Melt, the Mickey Mouse Club Sandwich, the Fabian French Dip, or the Big Bopper BLT?

If it sounds as though the customer may have stepped into a time warp when entering the double doors of Peggy Sue’s, they would be correct.

In fact, the front doors are ensconced below a huge facade of a 1950s jukebox. Don’t ever say Rock and Roll is dead in Yermo!

When Champ and Peggy Sue bought the restaurant, it was small and in need of a major facelift. They did not hesitate to sink hard-earned money from the time Champ spent working at Knott’s Berry Farm and the Hollywood acting career of Peggy Sue. In fact, she was so well-known in those Hollywood circles that as a person wandered through the restaurant, they would spy dozens upon dozens of movie posters and personal photographs showing Peggy Sue sidling up to some of the most notable actors from the silver screen.

On our last stop, there was a photo of Whoopi Goldberg telling the owners what a wonderful place they had going on the wall by our booth.

As posted on their website, Peggy Sue wrote; ‘We wanted good homemade food and great 50s music.’

And that they accomplished. But as the business grew, and more and more customers came in from the bustling Interstate just to the north, the restaurant had to expand to make room for the deluge of customers they were having every day.

The place reminds me of the Winchester House, without the hauntings, just keep adding on until there’s no more room to add onto.

The couple also realized they had a hit on their hands and decided year after year to not only expand in size but to make stopping at the restaurant not only a food fanfare but a true destination all by itself.

‘We opened a 50s style Five & Dime store with curios and memorabilia, soda fountain, ice cream parlor, and a pizza parlor,’ as stated on the website. "We even created our own Dinosaur park.’

Giant gorillas and dinosaurs await the visitor

As Laureen and I toured the exterior, after refueling our innards for the journey northward, we marveled at what had been created at Peggy Sue’s.

There are tall broad trees that give ample shade during the hot summer months with cooling blue water ponds surrounded by large swaths of green grass giving the entire experience a feeling of entering an oasis within the Mojave Desert.

As oasis for pirates, dinosaurs, and visitors

There is a bandstand that is used regularly for the enjoyment of locals and visitors alike - with bands that no one has heard of and those that may be just shy of getting that record label contract to shoot them into the stratosphere.

Get ready to Rock and Roll

As we wandered the park-like grounds, families were marveling at the life-sized metal sculptures of dinosaurs that show the differences between carnivores and herbivores. A paleontologist's dream for their own backyard.

Of course, my favorite is the giant sculpture of King Kong looking down upon us rather hauntingly - as any oversized ultra-intelligent simian would.

But before leaving this rather fanciful world that Champ and Peggy Sue created, a must-see is the gift shop where every piece of the 50s and 60s reside. There are full-sized posters of Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley, and not far off, there are a couple of hardened plastic sculptures of the Blues Brothers.

The Blues Brothers as Peggy Sue's, Yermo, California

The King, Elvis, not Kong, is ever present - in fact, as a person enters the establishment Elvis is offering to tell the future of anyone brave enough to drop a coin into the slot of the fortune-telling machine.

The King awaits

I dropped one in. 

“Viva Las Vegas,” the mechanical Elvis sang to me while nodding his Elvis face with a turban attached to the dark and perfect hair. “I see in your future not a thing worthwhile. Now the pretty lady beside you, yowie!”

It was time to leave. 

Peggy Sue’s is a must-stop for a quick bite or a lingering to take it all in. No traveler will be disappointed. 

For further information; https://www.peggysuesdiner.com/

John can be contacted at; beyersbyways@gmail.com

 

Vidal Junction

John R Beyer at Vidal Junction, California

As I have in written in past articles, there are places we are destined to travel to without even meaning to travel there. 

If I haven’t written that, I should have, sounds almost brilliant. One of those memorable quotes. 

Anyway, when we travel, there are times we are moving toward a final destination, but sometimes on the way to that objective, another stopping-place shows up in front of us that is just as intriguing. 

That is truly adventure.

As a travel writer, I find myself in that realm quite often, and I find it reassuring. Just because I want to end up at one place, doesn’t mean I don’t want to find myself in a totally different locale. That is what makes life so exciting.

Okay, enough philosophy – on with what this article is about.

Growing up in Southern California, I spent a lot of time at the Colorado River. The main route I used was Interstate 10, to Blythe and then north on Highway 95 to the Parker Strip. A friend of mine, Bob, had a place along the river, and we’d spend countless hours boating on that stretch of water and then relaxing after a tiring, but fun filled day with our families.

Good times.

Well, during those trips, I must have driven past Vidal dozens of time, and never gave it a second thought.

A bent sign, along Highway 95, letting the passerby know there may have been something worthwhile there once, but apparently that something was long ago. Slow down, take the railroad tracks carefully at Vidal, especially if towing anything, and then drive on to Parker.

That was the extent of my knowledge of Vidal.

On a recent trip, Laureen and I, again were buzzing south on Highway 95 and passed that bent sign indicating the town of Vidal.

“Wonder what’s there?” Laureen asked.

“Nothing, would be my guess,” I replied.

“Let’s check it out. You never know,” she said.

And we did. I made a legal U-turn and headed back to that tall crooked sign. Getting out of our vehicle, we snapped a few photographs and started walking east on the dirt road, known as the Old Parker Road – not to be confused with the New Parker Road.

Laureen Beyer at the end to the tracks in Vidal Junction, California

Train tracks ran right next to the roadway. They were empty, straight, as if they hadn’t been used in a long time - lonely. I doubted that, since trains seemed to run through this part of the country all the time. None did while we were there, but that didn’t mean they didn’t use these tracks – just not for the thirty minutes we wandered here and there.

“That’s a nice looking little house,” Laureen mentioned, as she pointed to a very well-kept white and blue cottage.

She was correct. The house stood out in the brown desert like an unforgotten jewel. Perhaps a ruby, that has been neglected by a heart broken lover – what?

Man, this is starting to sound like a cheap dime novel.

Turns out, that the nice looking little house was the only permanent abode for Wyatt Earp and his wife, Josephine – who went by Sadie.

John R Beyer in front of the Earp's house, Vidal Junction, California

Yes, probably one of the most famous western lawmen – among other things, who rode a horse through the southwest.

The Wyatt Earp, who became even more famous, or infamous, after that thirty second street battle at the OK Corral in Tombstone, Arizona. Two factions of westerners had had enough with one another, and temperatures boiled over in the afternoon of October 26th, 1881. In a matter of a half a minute, three were dead and three wounded. Tombstone would soon become a household word.

The violence would also go down as the most famous gunfight in the American Wild West. Sorry, Wild Bill Hickok.

There is a cement slab with a plaque, in front of the small house, explaining – ‘The legendary lawman, gun-fighter, gambler, businessman, and miner along with his wife Josephine inhabited this “Dream-Come-True” cottage from 1925 – 1928. During the fall, winter and spring months while he worked his “Happy Days” mines in the Whipple Mountains a few miles north of this site. This is the only permanent residence they owned in their long lives together.’

Long life together, meant forty-seven years. They married – common-law – in 1882, and stayed with each other until Wyatt’s death on January 13, 1929.

That is a long time in anyone’s book, especially for a guy who had been mixed up in more gunplay then I’ve had IRS audits. Did I just write that?

It should be noted, that during Wyatt’s life, he moved around a lot – gambling here and there, looking for minerals in the mountains of Arizona and California, sitting for interviews, and the like. The Earp’s never really settled down, but instead rented hotels and small homes during their married life.

It wasn’t until they purchased the small cottage in Vidal in 1925 that they had true roots. They’d summer in Los Angeles and the rest of the year mainly in Vidal.

An interesting point, that the Earp’s were actually living in Calzona – not far from Vidal – in 1922, when a huge fire destroyed the town, but miraculously the little house didn’t burn.

The house was moved to Vidal, where the Earp’s eventually bought it.

According to a couple of sources online, Morgan Earp (Wyatt’s younger brother) was the original owner of the house in Calzona, but he was murdered in 1882 in Tombstone – revenge killing for the OK Corral gunfight, and I couldn’t find material backing up those suggestions.

The way with history, one person writes this and the other person writes that. It is romantic, in a literary way though, to believe Wyatt and Sadie actually lived in the house that Wyatt’s younger brother had built.

Let’s allow that bit of history go without much further investigation.

So, now that we knew this little burg had a lot more going for it, we decided to explore a bit more.

Over on Main Street, all these towns have a main street, stands a beautiful rock and mortar two story building. On the top, like castles of old, are jagged rocks as though they expected Vikings to storm the building.

Original store in Vidal Junction, California

No Vikings, and really not much on the history of the building. It must have cost a pretty penny – or a lot of pretty pennies – to build such a place.

In a statement on the website, flickeriver.com, the building had various businesses which occupied the building through the years. A barbershop, an assayers office – make sense if Wyatt and others were mining for gold – and other commercial endeavors. There were supposed showers behind the building for cowboys to rinse off the dust of the desert.

In full disclosure, the research on this building did not yield much information. Actually, very little about both Vidal and the surrounding area is very limited online. That is a shame, since this was once the home of an iconic member of the ‘old west’ legend.

Mainly ruins in Vidal Junction

As mentioned earlier, Wyatt and Sadie resided in Vidal during the fall, winter, and spring times, moving back to Los Angeles during the summer. A little bit warm in Vidal during that scorching time of year. Besides, Wyatt did work as a consultant for some film companies assisting in making western movies as accurate as possible.

As mentioned in truewestmagazin.com, the early cowboy star, Tom Mix, and Wyatt became very close friends, so close that Mix served as a pallbearer at Earp’s funeral. 

Rumor has it, Tom Mix cried.

According to justwestofmyheart.blogspot.com, the town of Vidal kept growing with ranchers, miners, traders, and the building of the Los Angeles Aqueduct in the 1930’s. ‘By 1935, the area had no less than 28 liquor establishments, the paper describing them as “hangouts for river toughs and equally tough women.”

But, the great depression played havoc everywhere, and one place hit especially hard was Vidal. Soon people left and the desert began to encroach back on the emptiness left behind by the vanishing citizens. 

A relatively newer structure in Vidal Junction, California

Not much is left to Vidal today. A few deserted houses, Wyatt’s cottage, the remains of the JM Heacock building, and a cemetery across the railroad tracks.

Is it worth a stop along Highway 95? Yes, it is.

“I bet this place has a very intriguing past, I bet,” Laureen stated, as we headed to our vehicle.

“And I’d take that bet,” I replied. I knew that would be a sure wager.

 

Searchlight Museum

Entrance to the Historical Museum in Searchlight, Nevada

As I have mentioned numerous times in my columns, museums have a special place in my heart and I try to visit as many as I can whilst out and about on traveling adventures.

Again, as I have also mentioned numerous times in my columns, our children used to roll their eyes, harrumph, or feign illness whenever I turned into the parking lot of some vault of historical value - namely a museum.

Laureen, my lovely traveling partner, and I tried to instill an appreciation of history and the stories of those who came before us and who made wherever we happened to be traveling what it is today.

It did not matter if it was Amboy, Bullhead City, Randsburg, London, or Paris - each place has a special story to be heard and appreciated. 

The iconic ghost town of Amboy, California

George Santayana, the philosopher is given credit for penning the immortal phrase: ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’

I am the perfect example of Santayana’s statement. How many times Laureen has reminded me that a small taste of Mrs. Renfro’s Carolina Reaper Salsa didn't sit well with me in the past? I generally remember while being rushed to the emergency room by a team of paramedics.

But I digress.

Recently, our daughter Kelly let us know that she was taking our grandson, Eli, to a children’s museum in their town of Meridian, Idaho.

We smiled over the video call but once disconnected, high-fived each other. “It worked,” we stated in unison.

According to Rebecca Carlsson in her article for MuseumNext, published on September 15, 2023, ‘Museums have the power to create unity of both a social and political level and a local one. Local museums can provide a sense of community and place by celebrating a collective heritage, offering a great way to learn about the history of a particular area.’

Carlsson ends her piece with ‘Museums are just as crucial to the future as the future is to museums. Not only can our museums bring history to life, but they can also shine a light on our present and future - a light which can be hard to find elsewhere.’

Great article and a must-read for parents - in addition to my own columns, obviously - to instill a sense of who we are not only as a country, state, or city, but who we are as a whole.

Sometimes those visits may conjure up images we may not want to recall.

It is hard for most right-minded people not to get teared up while visiting the Holocaust Museum in Los Angeles, or walking the acres of land containing Manzanar along Highway 395. Those are gut-wrenching places to wander but at the same time, as Santayana hoped, if we remember the past we may not let those things happen again.

Perhaps the philosopher was not as skeptical of the human condition as many are today.

But I digress.

With my admiration of museums, I visited the small but extremely informative historical center of Searchlight, Nevada.

Searchlight in the bygone days

I wrote about the once bustling mining town during the dark years of the pandemic when I was not able to enter the museum with the mask restrictions, social distancing, and COVID bugs flying non-stop creating havoc, so I made it a point to revisit.

The museum is located in Clark County within the Searchlight Community Center along Cottonwood Cove Road which ultimately leads to the Cottonwood Cove Recreation area on Lake Mohave.

In 1897 a miner by the name of George Frederick Colton was looking for gold in the area when he supposedly said, “It would take a searchlight to find gold ore here.”

Well, gold was found, and thus the name for find, Searchlight Mine, and in 1898 the name of the newly founded gold rush town.

Today, there is not much to view in the town, more of a crossing spot for those traveling to the blue waters at Cottonwood Cove or on their way to Las Vegas along Interstate 95. A casino or two, a gas station or two, and a few places to grab a meal - but the museum is a must-stop since it holds some very interesting pieces of information explaining why the town of Searchlight is a truly hidden treasure of history.

Let us put away the mining history, important as it may be for making a desolate desert landscape come alive with untold riches, but concentrate on who was once involved in this town of now only 278 humans that was once home to nearly 2,000 souls.

As I wandered around the well-displayed kiosks in the museum I was amazed at the photographs, newspaper clippings, tools, books, and other artifacts which made this stop so much worth anyone’s time.

I did not know that John Macready once lived in Searchlight where his father once owned a very rich ore-producing mine. Macready was a famous pilot in the early years of the 20th Century and helped make aviation a household word. He was one of the first pilots to fly non-stop across the United States and the only three-time winner of the Mackay Trophy. 

I did know that Edith Head, the very famous costume designer who still holds the record of receiving eight Academy Awards for Best Costume Design, lived in Searchlight as a young child. Her mother had been married to a mining engineer and called Searchlight home for many years. Edith is considered one of the most influential costume designers in the history of film, working for Paramount Pictures for over four decades.

The history of Edith Head while living in Searchlight, Nevada

I did not know that Clara Gordon Bow, the 1920s film star, used to visit Searchlight on a regular basis from her nearby abode, the Walking Box Ranch - named after a camera connected to a tripod for filming in the early days of Hollywood. The ranch was owned by Bow and her husband, actor Rex Bell, as a respite from the often craziness of the film crowd in Los Angeles. 

Clara Bow's personal trunk on display in Searchlight, Nevada

I did not know that Scot Joplin, the King of Ragtime, once wrote a song entitled Searchlight Rag in 1907, in honor of a couple of friends who had done some prospecting in Searchlight - Tom and Charles Turpin. The song was inspired by the tales the two brothers related to Joplin of their time spent in local bars in the area. Now, who would not like that song?

And, I did not know that a man by the name of William Harrell Nellis spent part of his youth in Searchlight before his family moved to Las Vegas when he was 13 years old. This man then went on to become a fighter pilot during World War II and flew in over 70 combat missions before being fatally shot down on  December 27, 1944, over Luxemburg. On April 30, 1950, the Las Vegas Air Force Base changed its name to Nellis Air Force Base.

Nellis's own story in Searchlight, Nevada

I did know that the late Senator Harry Mason Reid Jr. was born in Searchlight in 1939 but learned that he was one of four sons born to Harry Reid and Inez Orena Reid. The Senator’s father was a rock miner working various mines in the hills around Searchlight and his mother was a laundress for the local brothels in the area.

The things you learn while visiting museums!

Searchlight’s museum may be small but it is jam-packed with interesting tidbits about the history of the mining industry, and the famous folks who were either born there, visited there, or spent some time there during their lives.

There are quite of things to view at the museum in Searchlight, Nevada

I wandered a bit and marveled at the care taken in preserving the memory of this small town, really in the middle of nowhere but actually in the middle of some pretty big stories.

For more information: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obKkQ4U31VA

https://www.clarkcountynv.gov/government/departments/parks___recreation/cultural_division/musuems/searchlight_musuem.php

John can be contacted at: beyersbyways@gmail.com

 

 

Tragedy at Charlestown Peak, Nevada

Looking toward the peak of Mount Charlestown, Nevada

“There was suddenly a clear space in the skies above Mount Charleston and the pilot took advantage of it,” Docent Arlene said. “He pulled back on the controls believing he could make it over the summit despite the terrible winter weather.”

Laureen, my lovely wife, and I were visiting the Spring Mountains Visitor Gateway near Mount Charleston a mere 40 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

The wind was blowing from the west down through the snow-covered valley of the Spring Mountains, leaving both Laureen and me wishing we had brought warmer clothes for this afternoon's venture. Hiking boots, shorts, and thin sweatshirts were no match for the sometimes 50-mile-an-hour gusts howling down upon us with a touch of freezing.

The three of us, Docent Arlene, Laureen and I were gazing at a large bent and misshapen airplane propeller on display outside of the Visitor Center.

That wintery day back on November 17, 1955, proved a bit too tricky for the pilot navigating the C-54 Cargo plane, registered as USAF 9068.

How Mount Charlestown may have appeared at time of crash

“I’ve heard that if he had gained less than fifty feet or so the plane would have made it over the peak and headed toward Las Vegas, their final destination,” Docent Arlene stated. “Unfortunately, that peak in the distance was their final destination, killing all fourteen men aboard.”

Memorial for those lost on Mount Charlestown, Nevada

It was two o’clock in the afternoon and we had just finished a yummy lunch at The Retreat on Charleston Peak a bit earlier - we shared a large burger with a patty made of a mixture of bison, Wagyu beef, elk, and wild boar cooked to perfection. Washing it down with a nice cold Stella, made the meal that much more satisfying.

The Retreat near Charlestown Peak, Nevada

We had stopped by the Visitor Center to learn what we could about this mountain situated less than an hour's drive from Las Vegas and yet worlds away from that hustle and glitter.

There was no way that I could have imagined that we were going to learn about an aircraft that had slammed into Mount Charleston carrying 14 men heading from Burbank, California on its way to the top-secret installation of Area 51.

Yes, the very base in the Nevada Desert that houses intergalactic flying saucers, little skinny gray space aliens, and probably a few Sasquatches for good measure.

All the folks who perished during that winter storm atop Mount Charleston in 1955 on flight USAF 9068 were secretly working on the U-2 project. The plane that would change the way the United States routinely spied on their adversaries around the world, and perhaps allies too - just speculating.

In fact, according to Docent Arlene, the mission was so secret that the military never told the families of those aboard anything about how they died, let alone why their loved ones happened to be flying over Mount Charleston in the first place during a terrible winter storm. The plane was supposed to keep a maximum height of 10 thousand feet to maintain invisibility from radar but with the nasty weather, the pilot got a bit off course and suddenly realized too late that he had to try to make it over the nearly 12,000-foot peak of Mount Charleston.

As history records, George Pappos did his best but those last feet were just out of reach for the seasoned pilot trying to ferry his cargo of scientists to Watertown - codename for the desert area where things were being constructed and tested out of the view of the general public.

When traveling, as I do quite often, there are times when you learn about stories that come as a surprise. This was one of those times.

Not about the shenanigans going on in Area 51 - nothing surprising there. No, that top-secret base is probably one of the best-known top-secret places on this planet. 

I’ve been on the outskirts of Area 51 numerous times and once nearly was detained when a white SUV came barreling toward me on a remote dirt road. I hightailed it, and just caught in the rearview mirror the driver in the truck waving at me with a skinny hand with only three fingers attached. The passenger leaned out of the window yelling something, and I swore he had antennas stuck to his rather large-eyed head.

But, I digress.

We happened to be in Las Vegas to see the band ZZ Top at the Palms when we decided to drive the short forty minutes to Mount Charleston. In all transparency, we have visited the beautiful small town a few times in the past but nearly six years had glided by so we thought it would be a nice outing away from the glitter and hubbub of Sin City.

Little did we know that we would learn so much about the Cold War while talking with Docent Arlene at the Spring Mountains Visitor Gateway.

“For decades the families never truly knew what had happened to their loved ones,” Docent Arlene said. “The government wanted to keep the facts of the incident close to their chest, and they succeeded.”

Laureen and I wandered about the visitor center a bit and picked up a few more details pertaining to the crash. It was sad looking at photographs of what remained of the C-54 on top of Mount Charleston after the horrific crash.

A large debris field showed that the plane had nearly made the peak but instead bellied into the hard snowpack and skidded for dozens of yards before erupting into fire. It took time for responders to reach the peak with the weather and rescue equipment available in 1955, but it would have made no difference. Experts determined later that in all probability those aboard perished almost instantly upon impact. 

When the plane crashed and the military had removed the remains of the 14 men killed, the plane rested in its last landing position for years. The peak is treacherous and not easy to hike to, though people do during the summer and early fall when it is not covered by snow.

Through the decades, souvenir scavengers would scale Mount Charleston for mementos of the tragic airplane crash. It was becoming more and more hazardous, not to mention disrespectful, to allow tourists to venture into the damaged fuselage which was moving a bit more down the mountainside with each winter snowfall, so the US Forest Service had the fuselage blown up for safety reasons.

Some of the original propellers and plane debris still lay twisted and abandoned on the peak today. The engines were removed by the military and later reused in other aircraft.

One propeller is at the Spring Mountains Visitor Gateway and proudly on display at the National Cold War Memorial located on the grounds of the Gateway as a reminder of the once unknown heroes of the nearly 50 year Cold War against the then Soviet Union. 

One engine propeller from atop Mt. Charlestown 

It is the only National Memorial site in the state of Nevada.

We were told that the wind gusts were going to be hitting higher soon and the electricity was being turned off on Mount Charleston at four due to fire hazards in case of a downed power pole.

One more gander around the Cold War Memorial set in the beautiful setting of Spring Mountains and we were on our way back to Las Vegas and the concert.

But, in the parking lot, I stood a moment or two gazing at the snow-covered peak of Mount Charleston in the distance and wondered what it had been like for those 14 men knowing that was indeed their last flight.

I hoped they had not known it was.

For more information: https://www.gomtcharleston.com/

https://retreatoncharlestonpeak.com/

A good read on the topic: Silent Heroes of the Cold War by Kyril D. Plaskon

John can be contacted at: beyersbyways@gmail.com

Seven Magic Mountains, Las Vegas

A virtual rock landscape of colors

My wonderful wife, Laureen, and I were visiting Las Vegas, when a guest at the Venetian asked me if we had stopped along Interstate 15 to check out the Seven Magic Mountains.

“They are a work of art,” the man dressed in puffy sleeves and tights told me. “We stop there every time we come to Las Vegas.”

Magic mushrooms I remembered. A great time to sit back and contemplate the events of the world while studying one’s navel. But magic mountains?

“Dude,” a long haired-hippie-dude may have said. “These shrooms are like opening up the universe to me, dude.”

If I had been there, I may have replied, “Dude, you look like a walrus but with a tighter mustache.”

Of course, the above is just for giggles. I have never delved into the world of drugs. Though there was a time when possibly I ingested something innocently and two days later round up at Machu Picchu in Peru, where a Shaman had tattooed a map of the lost Incan treasure on my hairy back. 

“It’s a map,” I confessed to Laureen.

“They are freckles,” she stated with a roll of the eyes that could be felt in Cuzco,

Sure, then why did I keep getting emails from the History Channel from lost treasure hunters?

So, on the way out of Sin City, we decided to pull off of Interstate 15 and investigate all the hubbub of these Seven Magic Mountains.

“Should have stopped by a CBD store for this experience,” I said to Laureen.

“Put the car in park.”

The free parking lot was full. I had to wait until a family decided they had had enough of the Seven Magic Mushrooms - oops, the Seven Magic Mountains -- before a spot was available,

The father looked at his wife, who was jockeying the horde of kids into the minivan, “I swear I saw Captain Kirk standing by one of the tall rock sculptures. He spoke to me.”

With the last child seatbelt fastened, the wife calmly took the vehicle's keys and instructed her husband there would be no intergalactic travel that day.

Running parallel with Interstate 15, approximately a dozen miles south of Las Vegas,this is a sight to behold. Huge multi-colored boulders stacked on top of each other towering over the flat desert landscape. 

It's not just the juxtaposition of these structures that makes a traveler ponder how this could be created but the gorgeously vivid colors painted on each boulder is an artistic palette.

There were so many folks wandering around the boulder works of art that I lost count.

There were Hindus, Taosists, Shintos, Christians, Islamists, and those with tin foil wrapped around their craniums.

Yes, being a travel writer I asked each person where they were from. I suddenly stopped when a man stated that he had just been released from San Quentin.

“The teardrop tats beneath my eyes,” he said, “Nothing to concern yourself with”

It was a place for all, and all were welcomed,

The creator of this field of creativity was a Swiss artist by the name of Ugo Rondinone. His dream was to explore, ‘a creative expression of human presence in the desert. Seven Magic Mountains punctuates the Mojave with a poetic burst of form and color.’

In the middle of nowhere, Ugo decided to stack boulders, some over 30 feet tall, to allow travelers enroute along Interstate 15 to share in his vision in the Nevada desert.

It should be noted that the work was funded and sponsored by the Nevada Museum of Art, along with other non-profit groups who were very excited to be part of the largest land based art installation in the United States in the last 40 years. 

I really had no idea what a land based art installation was until I asked Mr. Google. But, it is really a cool thing to experience up close and personal.

The process was not easy when the art project began in December of 2015. Huge boulders were brought to the location and then were carefully cut into smaller boulders to Rondinone’s exact specifications.

Once the large boulders were cut into the correct size according to the artist, holes were then cut through to allow each boulder to sit atop another by the use of metal rods and bolts to ensure they would not topple over on visitors.

Nothing worse than having a 40,000 pound neon pink boulder falling on a guy taking a selfie at the bottom of a column of boulders,

“Well, that little incident won’t be staying in Vegas,” a tourist may note after watching a six foot male squashed into the desert floor. 

The project took an entire army of engineers, metal workers, boulder cutters, crane operators and other construction experts to complete Rondinone’s dream.

The motto of how it was all put together was simple - ‘One boulder at a time.’ And with 33 boulders, one weighing nearly 56,000 pounds, that was a lot of combined effort and talent.

What stands out, besides the feeling a person may be looking at a modern day StoneHenge painted in various colors of day-glo paint, is the precarious-appearing boulders stacked on top of each other. They seem to be defying gravity for the onlooker.

Being situated near Jean Dry Lake, within the Ivanpah Valley, winds howl through the flatness of the desert like folks running through the front doors of Walmart on a Black Friday sale.

“Watch out Ethel,” a husband may say to his wife. “The winds are blowing nigh-on three hundred miles per hour. And don’t forget that they have big screens for a buck today.”

The amount of engineering genius it took to ensure those boulders don’t fall over in the extreme desert conditions is amazing. 

A true balancing act

With the backdrop of the Sheep Mountains, the Seven Magic Mountains is the perfect opportunity for both amateur and professional photographers to get out and about for that perfect frame.

Per the Seven Magic Mountains website, ‘the installation creates a dialogue between the natural and the artificial, the rural and the urban. The natural form of the rocks contrasts with their artificial paint, symbolizing the intersection of human culture with the natural world,’

That was cranium deep.

When asked, Rondinone stated, “I just had some time on my hands and a bunch of boulders in the front yard, and I thought - why not?”

Actually, he did not say that.

Situated on Bureau of Land Management land, the artist was allowed just two years to display the brightly painted seven stacked columns of boulder,s but after it was completed in 2016, the response was so positive that the BLM allowed another couple of years to pass, Now, after having nearly 1,000 visitors per day touring the land based art installation, that has been extended through 2027.

As Laureen and I wandered around the luminescent boulder creations, we suspected this timeline may be extended as well. It is free to park, free to enter, and free to experience the wonders of the desert suddenly alive with tall beautifully sculptured pieces of art.

John R Beyer, loving the shades of colors

I took a photo of Laureen near a vivid purple boulder. Laureen took a photo of me standing by a bright blue boulder. Laureen was asked to take photos from strangers as they posed with their families in front of various colored boulders.

Laureen Beyer, holding up a stack of brightly painted rocks

I offered, but with a smile the strangers declined and handed their phones and cameras to Laureen. I wasn’t upset by the slight, since I did not want to take their dumb photos in the first place.

With the hundreds of people walking about the exhibit, it was refreshing to see all the smiles, the wonder in voices, and the joy people felt by just being in the center of this magical art destination.

As I mentioned, every color, every nationality, every creed was on display with the folks visiting and enjoying one man’s vision to bring us all together at the Seven Magic Mountains.

Lots of visitors each and every day

We talked to each other, pointed this and that out to each other, and smiled goodbye when we left. It was an enriching experience and one that should perhaps be duplicated worldwide.

That would be nice.

For more information:  https://sevenmagicmountains.com

John can be contacted at beyersbyways@gmail.com