[Paul Pace:] Got a degree at, uh, at BYU.
[Linda Shelton:] Um-hm.
[PP:] I worked for the Farm Service Agency.
A department, of USDA. Because of that job,
Liz and I moved home. We said, “If it doesn’t
work, in five years we can always leave.”
[LS:] Oh, that’s great.
[PP:] And then we, uh, our family was born
and lived here, and, we’re still here, looking
at the end of a five-year period.
[LS:] That’s terrific! Terrific.
[PP:] But uh, history, as far as growing up
here. The property where we lived was part
of the fields. All of the vacant lots were
held in very strong hands, and Bicknell didn’t
grow at all. The people just, uh, they didn’t
want any growth.
[LS:] Yeah.
[PP:] And, so—those properties, vacant properties—were
held. And Meeks Morrell decided that he would
solve that problem and subdivided the, the
northern part of his field, and uh, my father
bought uh, two lots here—just as soon as
they were for sale. And we moved back, and
he gave us a lot and we built our home here
and—
[LS:] How nice.
[PP:] —and here we are.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] High school, uh, the old building, the
old high school building, why, it was built
in the twenties. Attended there. Elementary
school. Each town, had, uh, historically back
in the forties and fifties, each town had
their elementary school. Then they consolidated
and brought them to two schools, one in Loa
and one in Bicknell. When I was in eighth
grade, the school district put all of the
kids together in one elementary school in
Loa. Created a middle school and then the
high school; the middle school and high school
was here in Bicknell.
[LS:] Oh. That’s good.
[PP:] So, grew up with the—or attended school,
the—my older brother’s, uh, twelve years
older than I am, oldest brother Jeff, next
brother’s David, seven years older than
I am. I remember the day as a senior in high
school, one teacher was a little upset with
some shenanigan I was engaged in, and, she
cussed me that I acted just like my oldest
brother. And I was in trouble for something
my oldest brother had done. Some teacher’s
memory went on a long time!
[LS:] Twelve years! That is a long time.
[PP:] Twelve years. She —something had offended
her.
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] But I grew up on the, eh, working on
the farm, going to school. The work on the
farm was always an adventure for me. I always
enjoyed it. I worked really close with my
father, Ralph Pace.
[LS:] So was it a cattle ranch?
[PP:] Yes, it’s a cattle ranch. My grandfather
had uh, cattle, the markets collapsed, had
a terrible winter, the banks financed him,
he went in the sheep business. This was 1914,
1913.
[LS:] Oh, wow.
[PP:] And when he finished up, he had three
thousand ewes. World War Two rolled around,
was unable to find help, so he pretty much
sold out. Held on to some of the property,
so that when Dad got home from the war, he
was able to go into the cattle business.
[LS:] And what was that grandfather’s name?
[PP:] Vern Willard Pace.
[LS:] Vern Willard Pace.
[PP:] And, uh—
[LS:] So was he also the ancestor of Guy Pace?
And—
[PP:] No. No. It goes back, Guy’s father
and Vern’s father were brothers.
[LS:] Oh, my gosh! So your family has such
strong roots here.
[PP:] Go back a long time.
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] Our, our third great grandmother left
the Silver Reef Mine. Uh, part of Washington,
came to Rabbit Valley, Wayne County. It was
the last of the prop—available land—here
at seven thousand feet. Who wanted to come
here to farm?
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] No one did.
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] Here and the Uinta Basin were the last
areas settled in the state. People came here
to start over, really.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] Uh, burned out, starved out, forced
out. Whatever, they could come here and attempt
to start over.
[LS:] Hmm.
[PP:] I find that that spirit of starting
over still exists.
[LS:] Oh, really?
[PP:] Yes, people come here to start over.
[LS:] Interesting.
[PP:] It’s, yeah, it’s quite a—it’s
a hard place to live.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] But I always say, it’s a hard place
to live, but an incredible place to have trouble.
[LS:]
[PP:] People rally around and they take care
of each other. And that, uh, that spirit of
oneness, of family, exists through all of
the communities. People laugh and joke. If
you ask a native resident of the county, where
are you from? The standard answer is Wayne
County.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] We won’t say the town. Rarely would
you hear someone say Bicknell or Loa or Lyman.
The first they’d say Wayne County. And everyone
gets a big joke out of that and . But we’re
one high school—Wayne High.
[LS:] Yeah.
[PP:] Even—the kids in Hanksville.
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] So the whole county is a unique setting.
We all go to one high school. So through that
process, we blend—
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] —we become one.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] So yes, we’re from Wayne County. Then
the next definition is, that which town are
you from?
[LS:] And Wayne County is a close-knit community?
[PP:] Yes, it is. It is. There are way fewer
residents now than there were in the early
forties.
[LS:] Mm. And why is that?
[PP:] Well, you used to could raise a family
on a forty-acre piece of land. It was a subsistence
existence, but nonetheless you could raise
your family if you had forty acres. Uh, mechanization
came in, horses went out, you had to have
more and more land. There’s only a finite
amount of private land. Two-point-eight percent
of the county is private.
[LS:] It’s that low? I had no idea.
[PP:] It’s that low. Basically it’s a
mile to three-quarters of a mile either side
of the Fremont river—
[LS:] Oh.
[PP:] —as it meanders through.
[LS:] Because that’s the water source?
[PP:] That’s the water. And water’s life.
[LS:] Yeah.
[PP:] We get a total of seven inches of “precip”
annually.
[LS:] Hmm.
[PP:] Very high, high—seven thousand feet,
seven inches of precip. Unusual place. We
live in a storm shadow.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] So, we’re always dry, but we have
an incredible reservoir system.
[LS:] Hmm.
[PP:] Our forefathers understood that. The
reservoirs were constructed and put in place.
Which you couldn’t do now of course.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] But they were put in place and it’s
been a blessing for this valley.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] The—I grew up just as the irrigation
technology of sprinklers was coming in, in
about, about 1964, ‘63, they brought in
the first pressurized sprinkler lines.
[LS:] Ah.
[PP:] At one time there were more acres under
sprinkler irrigation in this valley than anywhere
in the world.
[LS:] Oh my goodness!
[PP:] Now, that— very few of course, but
the High Line Canal sits high above, is about,
oh three or four hundred feet above most of
the fields, so you don’t have to pump the
water.
[LS:] I see.
[PP:] Gravity pressurized sprinkler down,
and because of that advantage, it was a natural
for sprinklers.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] And as that technology took hold, of
course, the application rate exceeded way
our valley, but—so I grew up, um, learning
that technology.
[LS:] Hmm.
[PP:] My older brothers understood the canvas
dams and the shovel and moving the water and—but
I didn’t, I had very—
[LS:] I see.
[PP:] —limited experience with that—I
had the sprinklers.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] So you’d—you’d change pipes at
six in the morning and six at night.
[LS:] Ah. And it looks like that’s what
people still use.
[PP:] And that’s what we have today.
[LS:] Yeah.
[PP:] Yes.
[LS:] And it’s mostly alfalfa that’s grown?
[PP:] Well, at seven thousand feet you have
about forty-eight frost-free days.
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] The early varieties of wheat didn’t
ripen here.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] Wheat would start to ripen just outside
of Bicknell and The Narrows, just before Torrey.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] We have shorter season varieties of
wheat now. But it—it was a hard deal to
ripen wheat, so wheat was a strategic commodity.
You’d trade for it.
[LS:] Ah. Now, I know they had an old mill.
[PP:] The grist mill.
[LS:] Right?
[PP:] It still sits there.
[LS:] And did people grow grain for—and
have it ground there?
[PP:] Sure.
[LS:] And what kind of grain were they able
to grow?
[PP:] Well, wheat.
[LS:] And there—?
[PP:] In the lower regions.
[LS:] And so—
[PP:] And some years, you’d be able to ripen
your wheat here.
[LS:] Okay, but it was risky?
[PP:] Yeah, they just didn’t have long enough
growing season.
[LS:] But in, maybe towards Torrey, that’s
a little lower, is that—
[PP:] Right. Yeah.
[LS:] —where they were able to grow that?
Okay. I see.
[PP:] Even on the Fremont Bench because of
the winds that blow—
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] —the frost stays off of that, so even
at a higher elevation about up to Fremont,
that area—
[LS:] I see.
[PP:] —was able to ripen wheat.
[LS:] Hm.
[PP:] So if you couldn’t grow your own wheat,
you’d trade your beef steers or sheep or
whatever—
[LS:] I see.
[PP:] —and acquire your wheat from the Sevier
and bring it over here and grind it.
[LS:] Wow. So, it’s a lot of hard work to
live here.
[PP:] Oh absolutely.
[LS:] Always has been, huh?
[PP:] Always has been. Still is.
[LS:] But people seem to love it.
[EP:] They do. It’s a great place to raise
a family.
[LS:] That’s— Yeah.
[EP:] Yeah.
[LS:] A strong, strong place for that.
[EP:] It’s hard to keep them here, because
they have to leave to find employment.
[LS:] Right.
[EP:] So our three sons have gone off to college
and graduated, and that’s what—
[LS:] Sure.
[EP:] — we’ve had to see happen.
[LS:] Sure.
[EP:] But at least had the experience of growing
up on a ranch.
[LS:] Um-hm. Now, Liz, what did your dad do
when he came back? When you were fourteen
you came back?
[EP:] Yes, yes. Um, we built a home in Loa
and he would just commute to the jobs. He’d
go and stay a week at a time—
[LS:] Oh, that’s hard!
[EP:] — and then come back. That is hard.
But that’s, that was all he knew. He grew
up, his dad had a ranch and cattle, and he
didn’t love it.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[EP:] He loved heavy equipment and that lifestyle
so that’s what he—that’s what he did
his whole life.
[LS:] Did he work for a private construction
company, then, or—
[EP:] He did.
[LS:] Oh, okay.
[EP:] He and his brother actually started
Brown Brothers Construction in Loa.
[LS:] Oh, uh-huh.
[EP:] And then, family conflicts—he left
and worked all over the state—
[LS:] Oh, wow.
[EP:] —for different companies. And he died
at fifty-four, when he came back. They actually
had him come back and help them with some
road building that they didn’t understand.
And so, he was here, working for them when
he passed away.
[LS:] And only fifty-four?
[EP:] Um-hm.
[LS:] Oh, that’s young.
[EP:] Yeah, that’s young. Heart attack,
so—
[LS:] That’s—yeah.
[EP:] Yeah, so that’s—that’s what I
grew up doing. But got to live places like
Bullfrog, and you know, Ferron when he built
I-70, and here, and—
[PP:] Heber.
[EP:] —Heber and Salina.
[LS:] And so what year was it when he passed,
er, approximately?
[EP:] Eighty-eight, nineteen eighty-eight.
[LS:] Eighty-eight. So your mom has been a
widow all this time—
[EP:] She remarried, briefly, but she—that
didn’t last long, and so, so she’s been
alone.
[LS:] So that is a long time. And how old
is she now?
[EP:] She’ll be eighty this year.
[LS:] Ah, that’s great.
[EP:] Yeah.
[LS:] Well that’s interesting. And so, how
did you two meet?
[PP:] Let’s have you tell the story, hon.
[EP:] You tell it—I want to hear your version.
[PP:] We used to drag Main . Gas was cheap,
and so you’d drive up and down Main Street—
[LS:] Is that right?
[PP:] —and going slow or fast, it didn’t
matter. And there was a turn-around spot at
each end of Main Street. You’d drag main
in Bicknell—because that’s where the movie
theater was.
[LS:] Ah.
[PP:] The high school was here.
[LS:] Now that was Highway 24?
[PP:] Highway 24, Main Street.
[LS:] Okay.
[EP:] Yeah.
[PP:] And if you got tired there, you’d
go up to Loa—
[LS:] Okay.
[PP:] — and drag Main for a while. You didn’t
do it in the smaller towns.
[EP:] No.
[PP:] No, because—
[LS:] Because you only had a few blocks.
[PP:] That’s right.
[LS:] Right, right.
[PP:] I’d returned home from my mission
and was logging out on the Boulder Mountain
when that was a viable industry. Dragged Main
and why, there was a carload of girls and
we stopped and talked and she was barefoot
and drinking a red cream soda.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] And she, I could tease her a little
bit and she didn’t get offended, and we
talked about it. And then I had a date with
your cousin, we went to Fish Lake, and guess
who our waitress was? Liz!
[LS:] Oh my goodness!
[PP:] And it was so much more fun to talk
to her than to the girl I had a date with
and so that was the last I dated that girl,
and we’ve dated, and—
[EP:] Yeah.
[PP:] Was that close to how it happened?
[EP:] Right on. Right on.
[LS:] Oh, that’s true? It’s very nice
that you agree on the same version .
[EP:] Yeah.
[PP:] We were married, I finished a degree
at BYU, and we didn’t think that we’d
come home. That never was in the plan, but
it worked out.
[EP:] We had job offers, he had job offers,
in Michigan and actually had one in Ecuador.
[LS:] Whoa.
[EP:] That’s the one I wanted him to take!
At the Benson Institute, and he said, “No,
you’d never survive down there!” I said,
“You don’t know how tough I am!” And
then he got a job offer here, so, it just
felt natural to come home.
[LS:] That’s terrific. That’s terrific.
So you did ranch work, plus worked for, you
uh—was it a federal or a state job with
the USDA?
[PP:] I still work.
[LS:] Oh, you still—?
[PP:] I’m still a county executive director
for the Farm Service Agency for Sevier County,
Piute County, and Wayne County.
[LS:] Oh, wow.
[PP:] A three-county area.
[LS:] So that’s like two full-time jobs?
[EP:] Um-hm.
[PP:] Oh yes.
[LS:] And you’ve done that for many years?
[PP:] It’s all I know.
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] She’s been so good about it.
[LS:] Ah, wow.
[PP:] She didn’t know how miserable it was
to marry a cowboy. Some months of the year,
it’s bad news, but—
[LS:] It just takes a lot of time.
[PP:] A lot of time. A lot of commitment to
it. And you work for the harshest taskmaster.
[LS:] Hmm.
[PP:] Everybody thinks, “Oh, what a lovely
life it would be to be a farmer or a rancher,”
do whatever you wanted. Well, they don’t
understand that Mother Nature dictates what
you do, and you have to do it within a certain
time frame or you’ve wasted your efforts.
You have to plant grain at a certain time,
or else—
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] why plant it—
[LS:] Um-hm
[PP:] —in our harsh climate here?
[LS:] Because you won’t have time to harvest.
[PP:] You won’t have time to harvest it,
so it has to happen when it has to happen
then.
[LS:] Regardless of how cold it is outside?
[PP:] How cold, or how much wind. And the
water, irrigation water needs to be tended.
And so, Mother Nature—the law of the harvest,
we understand early on in our lives, that
as you sow, so shall ye reap.
[LS:] Yeah—yeah.
[PP:] But it’s been great. I grew up, uh,
the youngest of three boys. I—I soon had
my own horse and saddle and I was just as
big as they were. And when I was six years
old, uh, Dad said, “Well, you can gather
the cattle in the spring”—is the big event
down to Hanksville on—
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] —our desert range, and bring them
into the home place. And after a day or two
of just riding half a day, my mother said,
“Well, Paul needs to go with you all day.”
And Dad said “Why,” and she said, “I
just can’t have him bawling around here
all afternoon, it just isn’t, it isn’t
working,” so— —so I grew up doing that.
[LS:] How old would you have been when you
went all day on the horse?
[PP:] Six years old.
[LS:] Oh my gosh! Wow. That’s very young.
[EP:] This year we took our five-year-old
grandson.
[LS:] Oh, seriously?
[EP:] He didn’t do a full day, he did a
half day, but—
[LS:] Now, do you still do roundups?
[PP:] Yes.
[LS:] On the horse?
[PP:] On the horses on the same range that
my father acquired in 1950.
[LS:] Wow. So they winter down towards Hanksville?
[PP:] They winter on the Hanksville allotment
on—
[LS:] Um-hm, okay.
[PP:] — BLM permit.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] And then, we bring them to the Bicknell
Bottoms here to summer. I had a permit—on
forest permit, uh, I was unable to—to—to
do justice to a mountain permit and a government
job. So I sold that. Potential spotted owl
habitat, and conflicts that I could see arising.
I made the choice to sell that. Time will
tell whether that play was the correct decision
or not.
[LS:] Oh. Okay.
[PP:] But I—
[EP:] We’ve made it work.
[PP:] We’ve made it work.
[EP:] Yeah.
[LS:] So where are they in the summer then?
[PP:] On irrigated pasture in the Bicknell
Bottoms. I’ve taken some hay land, planted
it to grass. The Bicknell Bottoms here at
seven thousand feet, this valley was where
they brought their cattle to spend the summers
from Sevier Valley.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] Went clear up the mountain to Rabbit
Valley.
[LS:] Gee!
[PP:] And so that— this valley’s actually
ideal for grazing.
[LS:] Okay.
[PP:] Grass grows really well here in short
season.
[LS:] Um-hm, um-hm.
[PP:] So, I changed the management somewhat,
but we still have the winter allotment, we
have the—part of the—the—a quarter section
of the Fairview Ranch that Grandad purchased
and then homesteaded that into a—in fact,
on our thirty-fifth wedding anniversary, the
fifth of—the second of May—
[LS:] Aw, how nice.
[PP:] This year, we pulled a cow out of the
quicksand is what we did for our thirty-fifth
wedding anniversary.
[EP:] Yeah.
[LS:] Oh, now where was the quicksand?
[PP:] Well, along the Dirty Devil River. The
Dirty Devil is just below Hanksville.
[LS:] Okay.
[PP:] The Muddy comes from Emery County, the
Fremont from the upper and right just below
the town of Hanksville they combine and become
the Dirty Devil.
[LS:] I didn’t realize that.
[PP:] From there to the Colorado. It was a
significant storm event and the river came
up, and as then it goes down, the quicksand
moves out from this river. I’d ridden the
area two days prior, told a friend of mine,
“This—when that flood goes down, that’ll
be quicksand, that’s bad.” And two days
later, sure enough, there was a cow caught
in the quicksand.
[LS:] How did you know that? Do you go out
and check them? What?
[PP:] Yes, and I’ve grown up with quicksand
since I was six years old.
[LS:] And so you expected it, so you did go
check?
[PP:] Yes. Yes, I’ve had instructions early
on to, uh—when your horse flounders and
gets in the quicksand, you get off behind
it. You don’t ever get in front of a horse
that’s thrashing around—
[LS:] Because it’s—
[PP:] --because he’ll paw you.
[LS:] But it’s not kicking to the rear,
that would hurt you?
[PP:] No, because they’re lunging forward—
[LS:] They’re lunging forward—
[PP:] —so they’re always going forward
so you just get off behind. Sometimes you’ll
make a loop in your lariat so that if it’s
bad conditions as you step off, you can put
that rope over your horse’s neck and then
be far enough away that you can pull that
horse and he won’t lunge on you.
[LS:] Now, how do you pull a horse or how
did you pull the cow out?
[PP:] It’s, it’s quite a process—
[LS:] Ah.
[PP:] —to get a cow out of the quicksand.
And Cameron, our oldest boy was with us and
our youngest Jamison son was there, so I had
incredible men that had also grown up.
[LS:] Okay.
[PP:] But the short answer to get one out
of the quicksand, you—uh—you dig down—they
go down through and they’ll actually punch
a hole in the layers of water that hold the
sand in suspension, and—
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] —as they punch a hole, then that water
goes out, and the sand just holds on—
[LS:] Cements it.
[PP:] It cements right around them.
[LS:] Oh my gosh!
[PP:] So you dig down, get one leg free, and
you tie it up, so you tie all of their legs
up. And then you can roll them over like a
log. And then we put three horses onto her
and pulled her about eight feet. And she was
out of it.
[LS:] Oh my gosh!
[PP:] All of that process that I described
there—three-hour project.
[LS:] Oh. In the mud!
[PP:] In the mud!
[LS:] Now, while you’re digging that cow’s
leg, are you not sinking in this?
[PP:] Oh, sure you are!
[LS:] And how do you keep from you getting
trapped, and—?
[PP:] Well, ‘cause you just keep moving.
[LS:] Okay.
[PP:] You don’t just stand there.
[LS:] And you’re able to think a little
more clearly than the cow is.
[PP:] Absolutely, yeah.
[LS:] You know how to maneuver.
[PP:] Yes. Um-hm.
[LS:] Oh, gosh. How scary, though.
[PP:] So I, I grew up dealing with the quicksand
along the Dirty Devil River—we have a picture
of a horse stuck in the quicksand in here
on the wall—and uh, learning how to handle
those circumstances.
[LS:] Because when animals feel threat—threatened
and panic, that’s really dangerous.
[PP:] Well, that’s why you give a horse
some room. They’ll thrash—
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] — and they’ll try to use you to
come up out of the quicksand.
[LS:] Right. It’s every man for himself.
[PP:] That’s right, and a horse stops thinking
. Sometimes he’ll give up. And just lay
down and die.
[LS:] Mm.
[PP:] Just lay down and drown.
[LS:] Mm.
[PP:] So, it’s quite a process. You never
enter—when you need to cross the river you
make sure that you know where you are going
to get out on the other side. A lot of people
say, Oh this is a trail end, and then they’re
trapped—how do you get out?
[LS:] Um-hm
[PP:] You soon learn that you pick your spot
to come out, then you go into the river.
[LS:] Um-hm. Now what about the cows, are
they pretty dangerous too—
[EP:] She seemed—
[LS:] While you’re tying legs, and—
[EP:] She seemed to really have an understanding
that they were there to help.
[LS:] Oh, that was lucky! That was lucky.
[EP:] Plus, she was exhausted.
[LS:] That helps, too.
[EP:] She’d been there two days.
[PP:] She’d been there two days, so she
was—
[EP:] She was exhausted.
[LS:] Oh.
[EP:] So, too tired to—
[PP:] And she really needed a drink. She was
four feet away from water, but nonetheless
she couldn’t get any water.
[LS:] Oh, so she would have died.
[PP:] Oh, yes.
[LS:] And that was close.
[PP:] Another twelve hours, we wouldn’t
have saved her.
[LS:] Oh my goodness, how scary.
[PP:] That’s—that’s a typical spring
roundup.
[LS:] And what a way to celebrate your anniversary!
[PP:] Yes.
[EP:] I know.
[LS:] My gosh. Now, do they call the area
where you go, the South Desert?
[PP:] No.
[LS:] It’s—
[PP:] No.
[LS:] —further north of Hanksville, and—
[PP:] Right.
[LS:] —west, maybe?
[PP:] Yes.
[LS:] But you’re—?
[PP:] We’re on the Hanksville allotment.
[LS:] Okay. That’s a different spot.
[PP:] That’s a different allotment.
[LS:] And is that Dirty Devil river the water
source for the winter for the cows then?
[PP:] Part of it. A lot of my cows will drink
there.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] We have, uh, s—uh, wells.
[LS:] Oh, okay, you do have—
[PP:] We’ve, we’ve taken the opportunity
and put submersible, solar-powered submersible
pumps in a—in the existing wells. Uh, the
oil companies went through that looking for,
well, they started to look for uranium and
some of them, petroleum.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] So we’ll find the wells that go down
into the Navajo Formation, and then we just
pump the water out.
[LS:] Oh, that’s great! And how great to
have solar-powered pumps.
[PP:] Solar works well.
[LS:] Wonderful!
[PP:] And we have some that—a four-hundred
eighty foot lift, that we still have to power
with a diesel generator.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] But it’s changed the whole dynamic
of the range, we’re able to put cattle and
uh, wildlife are in different, are places
where they never used to be because of the
water we’ve developed.
[LS:] I see. I see. Makes sense, yeah.
[PP:] So it’s—it’s really enhanced the
range management, the operation, and the range
is in a lot better shape.
[EP:] So they benefit the deer, they benefit—
[LS:] That’s great.
[EP:] —there’s antelope on that range.
[LS:] Um-hm. Um-hm.
[EP:] You know, it’s good for all of them.
[LS:] Sure, it makes it more accessible to
all of them.
[EP:] Um-hm.
[LS:] So in your—uh, working adult life,
have you ranched mostly cattle, not sheep?
[PP:] Well, I’ve always had a sheep herd.
[LS:] Oh!
[PP:] I always have fifty to sixty head.
[LS:] Gee!
[PP:] Just so that you know, you don’t want
any more than that . Dad says, “Always keep
a few sheep around.” And—and it’s a
good dynamic, as far as weed control. It also
helps on the cash flow. Uh, you—you sell
lambs earlier in the fall when you need water
for water assessments and land taxes, you
have a lamb crop to sell.
[LS:] I see.
[PP:] So that’s part of the management of
the cash flow.
[LS:] In a sense, you’ve got a diversified
portfolio.
[PP:] That’s right. Yes.
[EP:] Then we sell the wool in the spring.
[PP:] Um-hm.
[LS:] Great! Great system.
[PP:] So in this—in this valley, they used
to have—uh, Nelson Ricks, had the creamery.
And they uh—ha— made cheese.
[LS:] So they had dairy cows?
[PP:] Had dairy cows here. It was perfect
for families to have five or six dairy cows.
You’d milk by hand.
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] But that was just a little bit of cash
coming in ever two weeks. Made a huge difference
in the survival of families in this valley.
[LS:] Lifestyles were very different then.
[PP:] That’s why you could survive raising
a family on forty acres.
[LS:] Yeah. Very simple lifestyle.
[EP:] Very.
[PP:] Yes. Bartered a lot of things.
[LS:] Oh my gosh. But now you have primarily
beef cattle?
[PP:] Correct. Yes.
[LS:] You do. Oh wow. Well, it certainly keeps
you busy then, huh?
[PP:] Well, it does. But it’s a good lifestyle.
Everything has a trade off.
[LS:] Right, right.
[PP:] And—and for the advantages it gives,
you do have to pay a price.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] There’s an entry fee in most contests.
[LS:] Yeah. That’s good. That’s a good
comparison.
[PP:] And—and it’s an addiction. I’ve
grown up doing it. And uh, it was good for
our sons to understand that—
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] —to get the work done first, and then
play.
[LS:] They learned a work ethic, huh?
[PP:] Yes, they did. And in our family, we’ve
learned we have one gear. It’s high gear.
You work hard, and you play hard.
[LS:] That’s great.
[PP:] Whatever you do, you give it all the
energy you’ve got.
[LS:] That’s great, that’s great.
[PP:] And uh—
[EP:] And even though they’re—they don’t
live here, and may not ever, they’ve all
said, “You can’t ever sell the ranch,
Dad.”
[LS:] They love it.
[EP:] They do. They do!
[LS:] They love it.
[EP:] Yeah.
[LS:] Now, most of your married life, have
you been a homemaker, Liz?
[EP:] Um.
[PP:] Oh, tell them all that you have done,
hon!
[LS:] Or have you worked outside the home
also?
[EP:] So I’ve done lots of different things.
[PP:] How many years did you run on the volunteer
ambulance?
[EP:] I was an EMT on a volunteer ambulance
for twenty —
[LS:] Oh, wow.
[EP:] Twenty years. Um—I managed the pool
here for 10 years. All our sons learned to
swim. And whole family got certified SCUBA.
Yeah.
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] Even the old dad that’s—
[LS:] Awesome.
[PP:] —a non-swimmer—I’m certified SCUBA.
[LS:] That’s impressive.
[EP:] Yeah.
[LS:] That’s impressive.
[EP:] I did home health for a few years with
my EMT certification. Um—CNA. Um—I worked
for twelve years for a local wilderness program.
[LS:] Oh.
[PP:] We worked with the—
[LS:] Was it—was it Alpine?
[EP:] Aspen.
[LS:] Aspen. That’s right. That’s right.
[EP:] So I did—I was field medic, and then
I worked in the office, and then, finally,
as an admissions counselor.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[EP:] So I did that for twelve years. I’ve
done lots of things. Currently I’m working
as a pastry chef. And I also do wedding cakes
on the side. I did a little bit of schooling,
too.
[LS:] That is a phenomenal range of talents.
[PP:] She can do anything.
[LS:] I’ll say. That’s terrific.
[EP:] I love to sew. I, I have winters off
so I love to make quilts.
[LS:] Oh, that is great, how great.
[PP:] There’s a story I want to talk about—
[LS:] Okay.
[PP:] — relevant to her, uh, as an EMT.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] We were sitting down for Mother’s
Day dinner. My dad’s birthday and Mother’s
Day occasionally would fall on the same day.
[EP:] May tenth.
[PP:] May tenth. Mother’s birthday and Father’s
Day would fall on the same day.
[EP:] June nineteenth.
[PP:] June nineteenth, so—
[LS:] Oh, wow.
[PP:] We sat down, uh, the pager went off—there
had been a terrible wreck out on the road
going towards the top of the Boulder Mountain.
A suburban had just—was going way too fast
and it rolled and scattered people out, and
Liz left to take care of it. And they brought
in a helicopter? Didn’t you? —
[EP:] Um-hm.
[PP:] —To move people out. And in talking
to these individuals, uh, I asked, uh, why
are you here? And they said, “Well, we are
environmental attorneys—
[LS:] Oh.
[PP:] —and we are here documenting the fact
that this country is overgrazed. That nothing
is growing here.”
[LS:] Oh, dear.
[PP:] And I said, “Well, what elevation
do you think you’re at?”
[EP:] He was a driver, also, on our ambulance
for twelve years so—
[LS:] Oh, okay.
[EP:] As well as an EMT.
[PP:] Yeah I’ve tried to —
[EP:] He’s certified for—
[LS:] Oh wow.
[EP:] —part of that time as well.
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] And they had no idea the elevation they
were at. At eighty-five hundred feet, nothing
grows on the tenth of May. It’s still winter.
[PP:] And, uh, I thought, Wow. This is-This
is what we’re dealing with.
[LS:] Mmm.
[PP:] And I, I asked them—“what’s the
precip zone?” “Oh, well, there, there
at least has to be twenty-five, thirty inches
of rain at this elevation.” I says, “Try
seven-and-a-half inches.”
[LS:] Oh my goodness.
[EP:] And over the last ten years, it’s
more like six-and-a-half.
[LS:] They didn’t understand this area—
[PP:] They didn’t understand.
[LS:] —at all.
[PP:] —But they were here and I, I said,
“Well, it’s an interesting, uh, place
that we’re at right here. All these ranchers
that are gathering up this terrible wreck
that you’ve created, are the very people
that you want to have moved out of here.
[LS:] Um-hm, um-hm.
[PP:] So if we’re not here, who’s going
to help you in your wreck?
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] And there was complete silence. They
did not understand that.
[LS:] They were not in a position to argue.
[PP:] No, no.
[EP:] True, very true.
[LS:] Oh my goodness.
[PP:] And so, it’s uh, people talk about
tourism. That’s fine. We need it. There
aren’t—many— motel rooms full here on
the tenth of January.
[LS:] No.
[PP:] No. It’s non-existent.
[EP:] Everything closes.
[PP:] Everything closes. So, what’s the
industry that’s still feeding money through
this community? It’s agriculture.
[LS:] Um-hm
[PP:] Uh, they don’t understand the multiplier
effect of agriculture dollars.
[LS:] Um-hm
[PP:] Agriculture, and mining, and manufacturing
and are the highest multipliers. Tourism is
very low.
[LS:] Um-hm
[PP:] Service industries are very low: one-point-three
turnover.
[LS:] When you say “multiplier effect,”
give an example of how that —
[PP:] That’s the time that the dollars will
turn over in a community
[LS:] Oh.
[PP:] So, for every agriculture dollar infused
into an economy, it will roll over as many
as two-point-eight times.
[LS:] I see.
[PP:] A tourism dollar that’s infused will
go over one-point-two times.
[LS:] I didn’t realize that.
[PP:] So, in your economies you need to have
a mix. You need to have the variety. It would
be nice to have manufacturing. Mining is the
very best thing that you can have. Agriculture,
tourism. There should be all of it. It doesn’t
have to be mutually exclusive.
[LS:] Um-hm
[PP:] A conflict exists in the valley because
of the limited resource private land. Two-point-eight
percent. The balance belongs to BLM, Forest
Service, Park Service; entities that have
very little skin in a game.
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] I always compare it to two farm animals
talking about breakfast. You have a chicken
and a pig. Who contributes the most?
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] And uh, we are the pig because our life.
[LS:] Yeah.
[PP:] When they take something from us, we
no longer exist.
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] So it’s a tough balance. I love as
they talk about, “Oh. Well we’ve gotta
get all the stake holders around the table
and talk about it.” Okay. Define “stake
holders.”
[LS:] —and degree of stake.
[PP:] That’s right. How much skin you really
have in the game.
[LS:] Yeah, yeah.
[PP:] But it’s incredible. We have a picture
of “Wayne Wonderland.” My grandmother’s
school class, elementary class. As they were
trying to get Capitol Reef on the same status
as Bryce Canyon.
[LS:] Oh.
[PP:] The early county commissioners and individuals
can see what an economic engine Bryce Canyon
was becoming for Garfield County. Capitol
Reef just never really did catch on to that
degree. It’s a different type of a park
and it’s developed completely different.
So, we’ve watched the evolution of Capitol
Reef Park over the years. Keith Durfee, that
we mentioned earlier—
[LS:] Sure.
[PP:] — one day said, “Paul, I have a
picture that I need to show you.” And there
was a large—well, sign about—like that,
and it was yellow paint. You couldn’t see
anything on it, but it was, uh—I under—
I remembered it knowing it that it was a definition—
a park boundary sign. And Keith had taken
a picture of it, and then as he changed the
colors of it, all of a sudden you could see
some writing. As he changed the colors, you
could see writing.
[LS:] Oh, wow.
[PP:] And this was a statement: “Park service
has denied my ability to trail sheep through
here. There will be a problem. Vern Pace.”
[LS:] Oh.
[PP:] My grandfather had written that on the
sign.
[PP:] I would like to have listened to the
confrontation between—
[LS:] Yes.
[PP:] —The park superintendent and Vern
Pace as they talked as to where he was historically
trailed sheep and where the park ranger—
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] —wanted him to trail sheep.
[LS:] Wow. How interesting.
[PP:] So we’ve watched the expansion of
Capitol Reef—
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] —as LBJ created the first land grab—
[LS:] Yeah.
[PP:] — of presidential powers—
[LS:] Yeah.
[PP:] —and increased the size of it. We’ve
watched our neighbors suffer—
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] —under those conditions and Capitol
Reef becomes —it cuts the county completely
in two —
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] — from the north boundary to the south
boundary. You cannot go east—from west to
east without crossing Capitol Reef.
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] It’s impossible. You—so, there are—you
don’t have a utility corridor
How do you get electricity through? It’s,
it’s a difficult thing.
[LS:] Yeah, and—now is it a problem getting
good internet service through?
[PP:] Oh, absolutely.
[LS:] Yeah, I’ve heard people say that.
[PP:] Yes, we, uh, I’m, uh, Chairman of
the Board of the local phone cooperator. And,
uh, we struggle getting authorization to the
right of ways for fiber optic—
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] — which fuels all data transmission.
[LS:] There you go.
[PP:] And, we didn’t have any problem at
all getting—the right of way into Capitol
Reef because they needed it.
[LS:] Oh.
[PP:] It was —
[LS:] So, did they lay fiber optic cable?
[PP:] There is a small fiber optic cable,
the right of ways are in place, and we will
put a significantly larger fiber cable clear
to the visitor center.
[LS:] Oh. Will—will it sort of follow Highway
24?
[PP:] Yes. Yes, as you look, there’s, uh—the
flags are in place. You can soon pick out
where they—and it’s right next to where
the buried phone cable is now.
[LS:] I see.
[PP:] It’s already been disrupted. But uh,
it didn’t take the park very long to get
the right of way in place, when they needed
it.
[LS:] Of course they needed it. Now, will
it have to stop there?
[PP:] Oh, absolutely.
[LS:] Oh, so the people on the east side —
[PP:] Oh, no. No, we couldn’t, no. so—
[LS:] Because it really isn’t that far to
go, because the park is only a f— what?
Few—
[PP:] Pretty narrow—
[LS:] Yeah. Exactly.
[PP:] —Yes.
[EP:] And there’s already a powerline through
it—
[LS:] Right.
[EP:] All the way
[LS:] Right. Right. Right. Well that is an
interesting question.
[PP:] As to the “why” there, yes.
[LS:] Yeah.
[PP:] Most environmentalists already have
their cabin in the hills. That’s why they
want to shut it down so nobody else can have
theirs.
[LS:] Exactly. Exactly.
[PP:] And—forgive me for that: but yeah,
it’s—it’s a little sore spot.
[LS:] No, it’s a good thing to express how
you feel—
[PP:] It’s, it’s hard, and it’s difficult.
[LS:] —in your experience. Yes, yes.
[PP:] Uh, hon—what? You went to high school
here. Yeah, she—
[LS:] To Wayne High, huh?
[EP:] I did. I graduated from Wayne High.
[LS:] Because you came when you were fourteen.
[EP:] Correct. Um-hm.
[LS:] Of course.
[EP:] Yup.
[LS:] And so, a lot of this has been formed—for
many years, in your experience?
[EP:] Sure, it has. My class, my graduating
class was much smaller. It was—thirty kids
[LS:] Isn’t that something?
[EP:] And, you know it, waxes and wanes. It’s
interesting. If you look, historically, at
the population of Wayne County, it never goes
above twenty-two hundred people.
[LS:] Hm.
[EP:] Twenty-two hundred.
[LS:] That’s a small group.
[EP:] Yeah, and then you think about how huge
Wayne County is. Boulder Mountain Top—top
of Boulder is the same size as the state of
Delaware.
[LS:] Wow.
[EP:] It’s—it’s people in the East don’t
even fathom. You know, what it’s like to
live out in the West.
[LS:] The stretches of land.
[EP:] Exactly. Our, our middle son graduated
with forty-three in his class. So, it definitely—but,
but typically, well, right now, you know,
you hear a lot of the news right now about
Garfield County and their schools; even in
Escalante, Escalante, whatever you want to
call it. Escalante to us. Their schools are
getting smaller and smaller; well, they are
here, too. Our high school is down about thirty-five,
forty kids. Our elementary’s down—
[LS:] Total?
[EP:] Yes.
[LS:] The whole high school?
[EP:] The whole high school—
[PP:] No, it’s, it’s re— we have more
than thirty-five kids—That’s—that’s
a reduction. That’s the reduction in one
year.
[EP:] — that’s down. Normally they have
about a hundred and seventy, and they’re
at about one hundred and forty. And same with
the elementary school. They normally have
about a hundred and seventy, and they’re
at about a hundred and thirty.
[LS:] Oh, oh, oh. I see. They’re down thirty-five
kids. So, do you think that’s because people
are having smaller families now?
[EP:] I think that’s one of the factors.
I think people are finding it harder and harder
to stay here and make a living. They have
to leave. Um, Aspen closing took a lot of
families from our community.
[LS:] That was a hard hit, wasn’t it?
[EP:] It was. There were three programs, and
there were two hundred and fifty employees.
And when you talk about not only here, but
there were about fifty people coming from
Sevier County, a day to work over here at
those programs, so, that was a huge hit. So
that—that hurt our county. It did.
[LS:] Um-hm, um-hm. Yeah.
[PP:] The timber industry has disappeared.
[LS:] Right.
[EP:] When we got married and moved to Bicknell,
there were five, um, sawmills in this town.
And now, there is one—and it, it works about
once a month on a Saturday.
[LS:] Wow.
[EP:] People just, you know, the environmental
community has shut timber down to—nothing.
And yet, on your way here today, I am sure
you passed the big fire by Monroe where they
are having—
[LS:] Yes. What are they—what it’s a control
burn.
[EP:] Control burn. They’re having to burn
out some of that dense vegetation because
they are not allowed to cut the timber—
[LS:] Okay.
[EP:] It becomes dangerous.
[LS:] Okay.
[EP:] So, they—the Forest Service has to
burn it out.
[LS:] I see. I see.
[EP:] You know, and I’m hearing that those
aren’t even trees that logging companies
want.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[EP:] These are just—
[LS:] Um-hm.
[EP:] —fir trees that aren’t even—big
timber.
[LS:] Kind of a low growth, dense kind of—maybe—
[EP:] Yes. Yeah.
[PP:] Low grade timber.
PP/[EP:] Yeah.
[LS:] Interesting.
[EP:] Yeah, so we’ve seen—
[LS:] Is there much mining anymore in the
county?
[PP:] You know, mining’s always been a boom
or bust. Uranium was the product that they
were after.
[LS:] Right. Right.
[PP:] Uh, some of the very first uranium that
they, they refined actually came right out
of Capitol Reef.
[LS:] Interesting.
[PP:] Uh, the—richest Uranium find was the
Pick’s Mine on the Muddy River.
[LS:] Oh, is that right?
[PP:] They located that by hanging a Geiger
counter out of an airplane and getting a read.
[LS:] Really?
[PP:] Yeah, the gentleman came to the valley,
and contacted my father, who still had pack-saddles
and horses and mules from the days of the
sheep herd. And wanted Dad to-to take his
equipment—take him into that place so they
could locate the ura—uh, the claim, stake
the claims. And Dad said, “I—I can’t
do it, I’m just starting to cut first crop
hay.” And Pick said, “I’ll pay you,”
and Dad says, “I know you will, but I can’t
leave a crop in the field—it just—”
[LS:] Um-hm, um-hm.
[PP:] Uh, so they—he found someone else,
and they located that that particular uranium
vein yielded a lot of uranium. The Hunt brothers
bought him out, and the vein played out about
six months later.
[LS:] Oh, wow.
[PP:]: Interesting story for another time,
but the Litzenhon Mining Company then came
to my father six weeks later. Well, he got
the—the was crop up, and they contracted
him, and he took them off into the canyons,
and they located a lot of uranium.
[LS:] Now, whereabouts is that?
[PP:] Well he was working—actually towards
the drainages into the Escalante River. Silver
Reef, and, uh, the Rainbow Reef Mine.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] Eventually. They—so, uh, the Burr
Trail—
[LS:] Okay, yeah.
[PP:] Uh, South of the Burr Trail.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[PP:] From there down to the shores of the
Colorado, down to Lake Powell. So that was—
[LS:] That’s rough country.
[PP:] That’s incredibly rough country. Uh,
they got ledged up one time, and they could
see a trail underneath them, and they looked
around, and there were two men—my dad was
fairly small—and little Willard Brinkerhoff
was even smaller, but they decided he was
too old. And so they tied their lariats together—and
lowered my dad over the ledge, down to the
trail, and then he followed it out and rimmed
it out to where—then they could get off
of that particular spot.
[LS:] Oh, my goodness. Whoa.
[PP:] So, adventures like that, we grew up
with.
[LS:] That sounds like the Hole in the Rock
expedition
[PP:] Yeah. Well it was—it was in the vicinity
there.
[LS:] Oh my goodness.
[LS:] Very similar, huh?
[PP:] I grew up handling loco’d cattle.
They would get into the loco weed. Uh, in
the springtime, especially—you learned to
handle those cattle from a distance. If you
got close to them, they—they would attack
you, but you could move back, and handle those
cattle.
[LS:] Is it fatal for them?
[PP:] Yes. The first thing that happens is
they abort your calves, they lose their calves,
and then—unintelligible—it’s fatal.
And they go crazy.
[LS:] Oh.
[PP:] They’ll see a little crack in the—in
the ground, and they’ll jump over it like
it was the Grand Canyon
[LS:] Oh.
[EP:] Hallucinogenic
[PP:] Yeah, it’s—
[LS:] It is a hallucinogenic, huh?
[EP:] It must be.
[PP:] It’s something
[LS:] Yeah, that makes sense.
[PP:] It’s a—it’s a—it’s an end
to fight relationship with the loco weed,
and so, I—I grew up handling those kinds
of cattle—
[LS:] Sure.
[PP:] There was—and those cattle we—some
of ‘em, you don’t gather every year so
a cow might not see a human for a couple of
years. And then you gather her, and she—they’re
on to fight—we rode into the corral, uh,
and, the cow came right at my father, and,
he moved aside. But then that cow went by
him, and they went underneath my oldest brother’s
horse.
[LS:] Mm.
[PP:] And that—Dad said, “That’s it,
we gotta get her outta this corral. We’ve
gotta handle her.” So Dad roped her, and
Jeff heeled her, stretched ‘er out and put
‘er down. And he said, “Now, Paul, you
take your chaps and spurs off—you going
to have to run.” And I says, “Okay.”
I knew better than to ask why, I, uh—it
was all going to play out. Uh, he said—then
my next brother David—he said, “David
will open and close the gate on the truck.”
So, the cow’s stretched out in the corral—
[LS:] Did you have to transport her somewhere?
[PP:] Yes you had to take her to the auction
so she can go to work for McDonald’s.
[LS:] Oh.
[PP:] And—
[LS:] And she had to be transferred out on
the hoof?
[PP:] Right. Yes.
[LS:] Alive.
[PP:] Alive. And she’s on the fight. And
she—her objective is to kill you.
[LS:] Mm.
[PP:] Not just hit you, but a cow that wants
to kill you will push, and then stand on you—
[PP:] Then will push down. It’s interesting
to see if they’re angry, they just want
to butt you out of the way, or if they actually
want to kill you.
[LS:] Oh, my goodness.
[PP:] There’s a difference in how they will
attack you.
[LS:] Just an instinctive behavior?
[PP:] Yes. And you see—you see that transition
in them. You can about see it in their eye
as to what—what they’re going to do. So
Dad said, I— “You run by her, and slap
her with your hat so that she knows—so she’ll
be after you.”
[LS:] You had to do that?
[PP:] Yeah. And Dad said, “Jeff and I will
let go of the ropes and she will come up,
and you run—into the—crowdin’ alley,
and towards the loadin’ chute. You go through
the truck, and up over into the cab rack,
and she’ll follow you in there, and David
will close the gate.
[LS:] You were the bait.
[PP:] Right.
[EP:] Youngest guy.
[PP:] Youngest guy, fleetest of foot.
[LS:] Oh my gosh. And—How old were you then?
[PP:] I would probably have been twelve.
[LS:] Oh, gosh.
[PP:] And so, we—did just what dad said.
[LS:] Mm.
[PP:] I had to laugh—as I went to work for
the Farm Service Agency, they sent me to training
to know how to deal with stress. I’d grown
up with so much stress, for example, when
this old cow chased me, that was stress. When
you could put your hand behind you and she
was blowing snot in the palm of your hand.
[LS:] Oh, gosh.
[PP:] So, I ran by her, Dad turned her lo—Jeff
and Dad turned her loose, up she came; it
worked just like he said; I went in the truck,
up over, David closed the gate, and the cow
was loaded.
[LS:] Ugh. How did your dad know you could
outrun the cow?
[PP:] He didn’t turn—he wouldn’t’ve
turned her loose, until I had a good enough
head start.
[LS:] Sounded like she was pretty close to
ya.
[PP:] Oh, well, I had to get close enough
to her that she would come after me, and not
the other horses.
[LS:] Mm.
[PP:] And so I had to tantalize her to the
point that she wanted me.
[LS:] It’s a good thing you’re sure-footed.
[PP:] Well, it—it all had to happen—it
had to—yes.
[LS:] Oh gosh.
[EP:] You had a prayer that morning, right?
[PP:] Well, yeah.
[PP:] So those were some experiences that
we’ve had.
[LS:] Um-hm.
[EP:] Tell her about the mine on the Henry’s,
currently. There is a mining operation, currently,
on the—
[LS:] Oh.
[EP:] — Henry Mountains.
[PP:] Yes?
[LS:] Oh. What are they mining?
[EP:] Should we turn the light on—
[PP:] Gold.
[EP:] —is it getting a little dark in here?
[LS:] Uh, maybe that’d be good—like, this
one? Is that where?
[EP:] Over on the wall.
[LS:] Okay.
[EP:] First. The very first one.
[PP:] In the Bromide Basin, a company from—South—South
Africa.
[LS:] Oh, really?
[PP:] Mining gold. Actively mining, actively—
[LS:] In the Henry’s?
[PP:] In the Henry’s.
[LS:] Oh, my goodness.
[PP:] Up in what they call the Bromide Basin.
The first gold was brought out of there, I
have no idea if the Spaniards did it, but
in the Roaring Twenties, there was a mill—And
they moved a lot of gold out of that part
of the mountain—
[LS:] I had no idea.
[PP:] —and they’re still mining—yeah—and
they’re still mining there.
[LS:] Whoa.
[PP:] Incredible histories.
[LS:] So, they must be—making it profitable.
[PP:] Well, there’s always more money in
selling wheelbarrows and shovels—
[PP:] —than gold; and I don’t know if
they’re promoting, and have a lot of outside
money come in—
[LS:] Uh-huh
[PP:] Or if they’re actually moving gold.
[LS:] Maybe the price of gold is high enough
now—
[PP:] Right.
[LS:] —that it’s profitable. And if it
were to drop, then—they might not—
[PP:] Well, I—I should show her the old
mail pouch that we have.
[EP:] Tell her about the rabbi that comes
in.
[PP:] No. It—
[LS:] Oh. Tell me about the rabbi that comes
in.
[PP:] They have a rabbi come in and bless
the operation. They fly him in—
[LS:] Seriously?
[PP:] —Yes, they fly him in from Jerusalem.
[LS:] You’re kidding.
[PP:] No, no.
[LS:] And—so this is a Jewish—
[PP:] A Jewish company, it’s Jewish money—
[LS:] —person?
[PP:] —out of South Africa.
[LS:] Oh, my goodness.
[PP:] Yeah, that’s an interesting story.
[LS:] I didn’t know there were many Jewish
companies in South Africa.
[PP:] I know there is a lot of gold mining.
[LS:] There must be now. Oh, wow. That’s
amazing.
[EP:] Isn’t that great?
[LS:] That is great.
[PP:] But we have in our possession the mail
pouch that Stu Wiley carried mail, from Hanksville
to Eagle City, to Hite, and back.
[LS:] So, where was—where is Eagle City?
I haven’t heard of that.
[PP:] Eagle City—is on the Henry Mountains.
It’s below this current mining operation,
about five or six miles. It was a roaring—
[LS:] Okay.
[EP:] On the east face.
[PP:] —mining town—
[LS:] Oh, okay.
[EP:] Directly east.
[PP:] —in the twenties. Uh- Stu-Wiley—carried
that—mail.
[LS:] Wow.
[PP:] Stu Wiley—
[LS:] On horseback?
[PP:] On horseback. Yeah.
[LS:] And what were they mining for?
[PP:] Gold.
[LS:] The same.
[PP:] The same.
[LS:] My goodness.
[PP:] So there was an old gentleman by the
name of Billy Haye. Billy Haye was uh, he
maintained he was an Irishman. I love this
story. And they’d say, “Billy, you’re
not an Irishman, you was born in Chicago.
[PP:] And he’d say, “Now, fellers, now
let me ask you this question.” He said,
“If, if the cat has kittens in the oven,
do you call them biscuits?” And they said,
“Well, we can’t even argue with that Billy.
If you want to be an Irishman, okay, you be
an Irishman.” He was a colorful old character
that lived in Hanksville, worked for my grandad.
And Grandad said, “He would stay with you
until the Spring when you really needed him.
[PP:] Then he’d take the wages he’d made
all winter, and go to prospecting for gold,
and he’d just be gone one morning.
[LS:] Oh. Seriously?
[PP:] Yeah, and that’s, that’s how Billy
Haye—He came to the bishop in Hanksville,
and said, “Bishop, uh, when I die, can I
get buried in the cemetery there?” And the
bishop said, “Well, sure, Billy, you’re
one of us. Uh, sure, we’ll bury you there,
but—are you thinking about dying?” “No,
no,” And he said, “Well, why you asking
that?” And he said, “Well, bishop, in
a Mormon cemetery is the last place the devil’s
going to look for a Catholic Irishman.”
[PP:] I love that story, and Billy Haye is
buried in Hanksville Cemetery.
[LS:] Really?
[PP:] Yes.
[LS:] Now, what year would he have passed,
approximately?
[PP:] Oh, wow—
[LS:] But—I’m just trying to—
[PP:] Any—Whatever I’d say would be wrong—
[LS:] Oh, I’m just trying to get an idea
of—
[EP:] In the forties.
[PP:] In the forties—Early forties is when
he died.
[LS:] Oh, okay. So, the time that he was around?
Was it like the thirties?
[PP:] Yes, yes.
[LS:] Okay. So interesting
[PP:] His grandad was putting that together.
I—so the gentleman that we talked about
to carry the mail Stu Wiley, Stu was the last—I
think he was the last World War I veteran—
[LS:] Oh, wow.
[PP:] —in this valley.
[LS:] Oh, my goodness.
[PP:] And I asked Stu one day—I said, “Stu,
Did you know Billy Haye?” He said, “Oh,
I did. I knew Billy Haye was my friend.”
And then he told me a story that was incredible:
He said, Uh, “As Billy was dying, he turned
to Stu, and said, ‘I’d like to be buried
in some green plaid socks—’”
[PP:] In Hanksville, Utah, he might have just
as well ordered gold slippers, you know.
[PP:] And Stu—thought about it, and Billy
Hayes died shortly thereafter. And Stu said,
“I’m going to Green River to get the socks”—and
they said, “Well, Stu, you’ve got twenty-four
hours to get back here.”
[LS:] Right.
[PP:] It’s hot in Hanksville, you know
[LS:] Yes, and there’s no embalming.
[PP:] Yes, that’s right, and we’re going
to have to put Billy in the ground.
[LS:] Yeah.
[PP:] So, this story, Stu Wiley told me. Stu
left Hanksville on a horse, and leading a
horse. Went as hard and as fast as he dare
go—got to a water hole out there, got off
the horse he was riding, hobbled the horse,
got on the other one, and went into Green
River. Stu says, “I got him the socks.”
He didn’t tell me if they were green plaid,
or green wool socks; he just said, “I got
him the socks.” So, he borrowed a horse
from Green River, and did the same sequence:
rode that horse as hard as he dared, and then
when he unsaddled that horse, it went back
to Green River.
[LS:] Oh, wow.
[PP:] Then he came on with the horse that
was fairly fresh, and got to his horse that
he’d left hobbled, that was fresh, and rode
on into Hanksville, and the other horse come
along in two or three days, and then he got
there in time to put the socks on Billy Haye.
[LS:] Oh. That was—a good friend.
[PP:] Billy Haye died a rich man to have a
friend like that, don’t you think?
[LS:] Yes.
[PP:] Yeah. Stu Wiley told me that story.
[LS:] That’s amazing.
[PP:] And, so, I was quite intrigued with
oral history.
[LS:] Yes.
[PP:] And, some of these I should have written
down. Should I tell ‘er the story that got
me—
[LS:] Yes.
[PP:] —interested in oral history?
[LS:] For sure. Yes.
[EP:] Sure.
[PP:] Liz hears these stories often, I’m
sorry.
[EP:] He used to do, um, a—a talk for Dixie
State College—
[LS:] Oh, that’s great.
[EP:] —called “Ranching with Father.”
[LS:] Oh, that’s great.
[EP:] And they would bring in the Elder Hostel
group that cleans the trails and does things
like that for the park, and then he would
go down and entertain them for an hour with
these factual stories.
[LS:] Fabulous. Fabulous. That is great.
[PP:] And they had—this group got a new
director—and her world is very structured.
[LS:] Ah.
[PP:] And she said, “I can’t have you
giving the lecture to some groups and not
others. So, you’re either going to have
to give it to all of ‘em, or none.” And
I says, “You just made it so easy on me
because I can’t do it, so—
[LS:] Right, right.
