Category: random

The first recorded flood by settlers in Del Norte happened between December 1861 and January 1862. Heavy rains hammered the area with floods following.

At high tide, the breakers forced themselves over “drift-wood, bulk heads, and break water, into the streets of Crescent City.” Huge logs washed up onto the sidewalks, crashing into Front street buildings, breaking windows and doors, and wreaking havoc.

But the losses in Crescent City were slight when compared with the loss suffered at Klamath. Fort Ter-Waw and the Wau-Kell Agency became inundated by flood waters, and most of the buildings swept away or wrecked.

One large officers’ tent from Fort Ter-Waw eventually washed up on the beach near Crescent City. The damage was so great that the post and agency were eventually abandoned.

A professor of Agriculture in the Sheffield Scientific School, William H. Brewer visited the area in 1863. He found the waters had brought down a large measure of wood, much of which ended up on the beaches between Crescent City and the mouth of the Klamath.

He reported there was enough timber along the shore, south of Crescent City, “to make a million cords of wood. It is thrown up in great piles, often a mile long, and the size of some of these logs is tremendous.”

Debris, 200 yards wide and three to eight feet deep, covered the beach for eight miles. Although worn by water and their bark gone, it was not uncommon to find logs 150 feet long and four feet in diameter at the small end.

The last few days one of our local TV news affiliates has been running stories about road kill that crews, rather than move, have either paved over or painted road-stripes on. This same affiliate spoke to the people in charge of such work crews, and they claimed it was simply an over-sight.

I thought it was jus’ more of Nevada’s Senator Harry Reid’s roadside artwork, he generously paid for using our taxpayer money.

It’s completely American to poke fun at politicians of all stripes. Take for instances, rodeo clown Leon Coffee wearing a Hillary Clinton mask during the 59th Annual Stock Show and Rodeo in 2008 at the AT&T Center in San Antonio, Texas.

Now, jump to present day and the fact we have a Black president.

Note, I didn’t say African-American — because to truly qualify for that title, one must have been born in Africa, like say Rabbi Daniel Lapin. Unfortunately, Rabbi Lapin doesn’t fulfill the same-stream media’s bias of what an African-American is — after-all he’s a white guy.

Over the weekend a rodeo clown caused the same-stream media to go nuts once again by wearing a mask resembling President Obama, then asking the audience if they’d like to see him “run down by a bull.” The clown not only has been permanent ban from performing at the Missouri State fair, they voted unanimously to forbid use of ‘Obama masks’ at the venue again in the future.

This is the same same-stream media that tried to paint George Zimmermann as a racist, even after he was found not guilty of murdering Trayvon Martin. It’s also the same same-same stream media that gutted Paula Deen’s career and reputation, only to see all the so-called charges tossed out by a judge.

Oh and lest I forget — take off the Hillary mask and face paint and you’ll learn Leon Coffee is Black.

We get some pretty odd mail at the radio station. This is jus’ one of the many examples.

Inquisitive to see where this might lead, the first thing I did was look up Psalm 37:20, which reads, “But the wicked will perish: Though the Lord’s enemies are like the flowers of the field, they will be consumed, they will go up in smoke.”

So far, so good.

Next I looked for an overlay of “God’s Temple upon America.” Try as I may, I could not find one.

In the end this piece of strange mail remains jus’ that — strange.

Though I have been in the area of Fourth and Valley several times this year taking pictures, I had never seen the large statuary tucked back against the building I was now photographing. It reminded me of some sort of Egyptian god, but I have no idea which one.

So since I was there, I figured I’d snap a shot or two of the thing and head for home. I had to get close to the relief as it was pushed back under the awning of the building.

Though I was in the shade of the building, there was enough light outside at three in the afternoon that I didn’t require my flash. I took a close up of the face, followed by a picture of the entire statue.

Surprisingly, I found ‘light artifacts,’ around the relief in both frames taken. While I’ve no idea where they came from, but do have some idea what it means.

The week continues to get rougher for my wife, Mary. First one childhood friend dies and then another passes, jus’ as sudden.

Anita Zick was 54-years-old and recently diagnosed with a non-operable brain tumor. She lost her battle with the malignant cancer, passing quietly in her sleep.

Mary and Anita graduated from Ramona High together in 1977. My heart aches for my wife’s pain and if I could take it from her, I’d do it in a split-second.

All I can do is remain quiet, offer an ear to listen and a shoulder to cry on.

Now that her public image and livelihood is destroyed, the “Associated Press” reports:

“A federal judge Monday threw out race discrimination claims by a former Savannah restaurant manager whose lawsuit against Paula Deen has already cost the celebrity cook a valuable chunk of her culinary empire.

Lisa Jackson sued Deen and her brother, Bubba Hiers, last year saying she suffered from sexual harassment and racially offensive talk and employment practices that were unfair to black workers during her five years as a manager of Uncle Bubba’s Seafood and Oyster House. Deen is co-owner of the restaurant, which is primarily run by her brother.

But claims of race discrimination by Jackson, who is white, were gutted in the 20-page opinion by U.S. District Court Judge William T. Moore Jr. The judge agreed with lawyers for Deen and Hiers that Jackson has no standing to sue her former employers for what she claims was poor treatment of black workers, regardless of her claims that she was offended and placed under additional stress.”

Too little, too late.

It’s been a difficult and sad couple of days for my wife, Mary as one of her childhood friends has died. Paul Ransom was only 50-years old and battling lung cancer when he passed away.

In fact Paul’s mother, Esther and his sister Janet tossed our wedding rehearsal dinner in January 1987. However, I first met Paul when Mary’s sister, Sarah and her husband Ron tied the knot two years before, at which point I referred to him as “Smilin’ Paul,” because he always seemed to be smiling or laughing.

I found an online posting from the Ramona Vineyard Church:

“Paul Ransom will live on in all the hearts he touched everywhere he went. Paul was a man that never met a stranger; as he touched and still will touch many lives by the kind words he has always so graciously spoken to many.

Paul Ransom was an amazing man of God that that lived a selfless life; serving his wife, his friends and his community in a Christ like manner.

If you didn’t know Paul Ransom (a man that most all in Ramona do) you wouldn’t have known the disease he was battling with this last year that finally took him home to Jesus where his pain finally stopped. Paul was more concerned about what storms of life others were in, RATHER THAN HIS OWN!

He will be missed be all that knew him. There will be a huge hole in Ramona that Paul once occupied as he ministered Christ to many.

However knowing Paul and his sense of humor; I think he would say: ‘Let Christ now fill that hole until we meet again in Glory!’”

There’s not much else than can be said – so I won’t even try.

It surprises me, how much I cleave to the past. I’m not talking about history, but rather my past.

My brother’s 50th birthday, came and went and I promised myself, I wouldn’t allow it to grip me, leaving me sad and heartbroken. He died in 2010 and it still feels like the moment my Aunt Barbara called to tell me of his passing.

Furthermore, I promised myself, I wouldn’t write about it, knowing I’ve spent a lot of time going over Adam’s death, both on paper and in my head. I cannot hold out anymore, especially when I saw my sister, Deirdre’s Facebook post:

“Adam’s Birthday today, August 4, 1963. I sure do miss him. Of every person lost in my life, I have wanted to talk to him the most. Hey Adam, I plan to see in about 54 years. Time passes quickly and it will be like a wink of an eye.”

Yup, it’s exactly how I feel. But I’ll get there sooner than she will.

The Gasquet Toll Road is a corduroy road, with a bed composed of timbers laid across its width and a surface of dirt and gravel. The result is an improvement over impassable mud or dirt roads, yet rough in the best of conditions and a hazard to horses due to shifting loose logs.

A newspaper of the time described it as a “wagon road leading from the forks of the Smith River up the middle fork of said river on the left hand bank thereof about four miles, thence across the same; thence to the mouth of Patrick’s Creek; thence up Patrick’s Creek to Shelly Creek; thence to a point on the state line between California and Oregon, about three miles east of the ‘Robin’s Nest,’ being about twenty miles in length and intended to be a toll road.”

Corduroy roads built of huge logs were the mainstay of local logging practices and called skid roads. These were the origin of the more widespread meaning of ‘skid road’ and its derivative ‘skid row,’ referring to a poor area.

The Gasquet Toll Road was planned by a French immigrant, Horace Gasquet, and was built by Chinese American workers. The road was begun in 1881 and completed in 1886.

On May 15, 1881, petitions were circulated among the citizens of Del Norte County to document their endorsement of the plan and ask for approval by the board of supervisors to build a new road. The May 15, 1881 issue of the Del Norte Record quotes Gasquet: “Understanding this great work, I consider myself the servant of the people interested and a full accounting shall be made of all expenditures and progress.”

Although the road may have been repaired or resurfaced with dirt and gravel in later years, it has largely retained its original composition and construction. It can still be used, but it is narrow and winds through the mountains.