Category: random

For whatever reason, much of the story of Del Norte’s history seems to start with the death of a white settler named “A. French.” Many times his is the next name found in articles right after explorer Jed Smith.

I’ve never been able to learn what the “A” stood for.

As the story goes, in the morning of November 1, 1854, a farmer named A. French set out on a hunting expedition. With him were four other men — all unidentified in the general record.

French was to guide them to an area about 11 miles east of Crescent City. He planned to return to his ranch that evening while the others planned to return in three or four days.

However, the next day Mrs. French came to town worried her husband had not returned as planned. Two days later, November 4, the other men returned and were reportedly alarmed to learn French had never made it home.

A search party was formed and made an intensive search of the area between Mill Creek and the South Fork of the Smith River, but he wasn’t was found. When the search party returned to Crescent City, they found the citizens in a complete state of anxiety.

Many thought the Indians on the South Fork of the Smith River had murdered French. That same evening, a mass meeting was called which resulted in 20 men being appointed to round-up all the Indians in town and the surrounding area for questioning.

An Indian woman living in a village where Battery Point Lighthouse is now located said she had been on her way to the woods in the area where the French party had traveled. She said a Chetco Indian named Narpa, accompanied by his sister, had traveled to a village at the mouth of the Klamath River near Requa.

This is the first hole in the story — remember they were headed east. Klamath is south of Crescent City.

She told authorities that Narpa, his family and tribe had suffered some sort of injury or insult by the whites and he wanted revenge. At Requa he asked another Indian named Black Mahu to kill a white man.

But Black Mahu refused as he was known to be a good friend to the settlers.

The Chetco Indian then offered Black Mahu his sister if he would kill a white man. Supposedly Black Mahu couldn’t refuse the offer of the woman.

Armed with this information white authorities issued a warrant for the arrest of Black Mahu, his son Jim and Narpa. This leads to a second hole in the story — two Indians suddenly becomes three and no explanation is ever given why the increase in suspects.

A new search party was organized and the body of French was found lying under a log, partly covered up. Records indicate French was found jus’ east of the Elk Valley area.

This is the third hole in the story. Elk Valley, for the geographically unknowing is east of the city.

An eight man group of Klamath Mounted Rangers was formed to catch the suspected murderers and the three Indians were captured at the mouth of the Klamath River. They were taken to Crescent City November 17.

The following day many of the citizens of Crescent City assembled at the Eldorado Saloon on Front Street, where a trial date was set. From there a jury of 12 men was selected.

By law the three defendants could not testify on their own behalf or enter any evidence in their favor. After an hour the jury returned with a verdict of “guilty” and sentenced the three to be hanged at noon November 24.

On that day the three were taken to what is now Battery Point, but at the time an Indian village and hanged. It is believed the village was chosen in order to send a message to other Indians’ that this is what would happen to them if they killed a white man.

Unfortunately, the evidence against the three Indians, if there ever was any, has been lost to time. Moreover, when I was kid, many Yurok elders claimed French died of natural causes and was hidden by a scavenging bear bent on having his remains as a meal at a later time.

Whatever, happened — I’ve always thought the three hanged men got a raw deal.

A U.S. Marine with ties to Nevada has been killed in Afghanistan.  Sgt. Joshua Robinson had lived in The Topaz Ranch Estates, south of Carson City, while stationed The Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center at Pickel Meadow. 

Robinson, who grew up near Nelson, Nebraska, died August 7 while on combat operations in Helmand Province. A spokeswoman with the Department of Defense says he was shot twice in the left side of his chest while on patrol.

Robinson was on his first deployment to Afghanistan but had been deployed to Iraq twice before. He enlisted in the Marines in 2003 and had earned a Purple Heart and Combat Action Ribbon during his service.

Robinson was an infantryman assigned to the 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, which is based at Camp Pendleton, California. He is survived by his wife, Rhonda and their two sons who live in Bennington, Nebraska.

In 1992 a movie directed by Penny Marshall, starring Tom Hanks, Geena Davis and Lori Petty hit the big screen. Since, “A League of Their Own,” debuted I have always watched it with the memory of a family doctor we had while growing up.

“What would Dr. Wagner think about this movie?” I nearly always manage to ask myself when it’s on the television and I imagine her saying, “Hogwash.”

However Teresa Goodlin, who worked for Audrey, but now lives in Arcata, believes differently, “I think would have enjoyed the movie.”

Audrey Wagner is one of the sixty original founding members of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. A two-time member of the All-Star Team, she ranks eighth in the all-time list with 29 career home runs while her 55 triples rank second all-time to Eleanor Callow and an outfielder who played from 1943  through 1949  in the League.

She earned Player of the Year honors in 1948, and also led several offensive categories over her seven-year career in the league. Audrey later became an All Star outfielder in each of her four seasons in the competing National Girls Baseball League of Chicago.

Born Genevieve Audrey Wagner, December 27, 1927, she grew up in Bensenville, Illinois and began to play sandlot ball  with the boys of her neighborhood when she was a little girl. At age 15, she attended Bensenville Community High School where she heard about Philip Wrigley and his plans to create a women professional baseball league during World War II.

“Her brother, George, whose my father, was the one who told her about the tryouts at Wrigley,” Forest adds. “He was the one who drove her to the tryouts.”

Wrigley, who was in charge both of the Wrigley Company and the Chicago Cubs, decided to found the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League as a promotional sideline to maintain interest in baseball. The league started its first season in 1943 with the teams Kenosha Comets, Racine Belles , Rockford Peaches and South Bend Blue Sox, and each team was made up of fifteen women.

Audrey was assigned to the Kenosha Comets, where she played her entire career in the circuit. But due to her studies, she saw limited action until graduating in 1946.

She entered the AAGPBL as a pitcher, but Comets manager Josh Billings promptly moved her to the outfield because of her hitting abilities. Audrey moved around center and right field.

In 1943, Audrey hit .230 in 73 games, scoring 30 runs  while driving in  27 more and tied for second in triples and tied for third in home runs. She also appeared in the league’s first All-Star Game during the midseason, which was played under temporary lights at Wrigley Field , between two teams composed of Blue Sox and Peaches players versus Comets and Belles players.

It was also the first night game ever played in the ballpark.

The Comets had the third-best record at 56-52, but had won the second-half title, earning them a berth in the playoffs, only to be swept in three games by Racine. Helen Nicol, who led league pitchers in wins, strikeouts, ERA and shutouts, inexplicably failed in the playoffs after going 0-2 with a 4.50 ERA.

Audrey dropped to .189 with 26 RBI in 1944, but still managing to score 30 runs in 90 games. It was the only time in her AAGPBL career in which she failed to hit a home run.

The Comets again placed third and made the playoffs after win the first half. They took a 3-2 lead over the expansion Milwaukee Chicks  in the Championship Series, but Nicol lost an 11-inning pitching duel with Connie Wisniewski  in Game 7.

Audrey rebounded slightly in 1945, batting .198 with 26 runs and 26 RBI, but she led the league with nine triples and tied for second in home runs in a dominant pitching league. After becoming a full-time player in 1946, Audrey improved her offensive statistics by hitting a .281 average and leading the league with nine home runs and a .413 slugging average .

She also led in total bases and tied for the doubles lead, ending fourth in hits and eighth in RBI, while her average ranked fifth. However the Comets were out of contention in both years.

By 1947 the AAGPBL moved its spring training camp to Havana, Cuba. Audrey did not go to Cuba for Spring Training.  School was still in session during that years’ spring training.

“Audrey would have never missed school for any reason,” writes Forest Wagner, her nephew and God-son.

That season she batted .305 of average and again led the circuit in home runs , doubles, total bases and slugging. She also topped all hitters in RBI and hits and ended second in triples.

Audrey lost the batting crown by a single point to Dorothy Kamenshek. She was however named to the All-Star Team, while Kenosha did not classified for the playoffs this time.

Her hitting stayed about the same in 1948, which was good enough to win the batting title win a .312 average and by leading all-hitters with 130 hits, all career-highs. Besides this, she led all outfielders with a perfect 1.000 fielding average and posted career-numbers in games played, runs, RBI, on-base percentage, walks and triples.

In addition, Audrey tied for fourth in homers and tied for eight in RBI, while hitting a hefty .446 of slugging. She was named Player of the Year and again made the All-Star Team.

The other two All-Star outfielders were Racine’s Edythe Perlick, who averaged .243 with two home runs and 51 RBI, and Grand Rapids’ Wisniewski, who hit .289 with seven homers and 66 RBI. Meanwhile, the Comets advanced to the playoffs but were beaten by Rockford in the first round.

In 1949, Audrey slipped to .233 with 28 runs and 40 RBI in 97 games, but she hit three homers to tie Thelma Eisen  and Inez Voyce for the league lead, giving her three home run titles. For the second consecutive year the Comets gained a playoff berth and were defeated in the start, this time by the expansion Muskegon Lassies .

Audrey moved to the Parichy Bloomer Girls of the National Girls Baseball League in 1950, because she was offered the same salary and no extensive travelling. The games were played in the Chicago area, so she could be home every night closer to school and her studies.

She helped her team to clinch the Championship Title in 1950 and made the All-Star Team in each of her four seasons in the NGBL. Her most productive season came in 1952, when she led the circuit in doubles, triples, home runs and total bases, ending second in the batting crown race with a .364 average.

“I think I have her old baseball card somewhere — she autographed it for me,” Crescent City resident Kay Vail says.

While playing baseball, Audrey attended Elmhurst College where she received her bachelor’s degree  in pre-medicine.  She then went on to the University of Illinois  where she earned her Doctor of Medicine degree and did a major portion of her residency at Cook County Hospital.

Later Audrey would work as a practicing obstetrician and gynecologist in Crescent City, California . There she earned her private pilot license and served on the Crescent City Council.

“Lois and Audrey lived across the street from me for years when I was young,” writes Jennifer Bechtold Merrill, formerly of Crescent City, now living in Arcata, ” They were amazing women and I have lots of fond memories of spending time with them.”

Of course, jus’ living next door isn’t the only way Audrey effected the lives of her neighbors.

Tami Klein Lallo adds, “Dr. Wagner delivered my daughter.”

This is seconded by, Michele Bigler who writes, “Dr. Wagner delivered my daughter in 1983.” She continues, “I had to have a C-section and the last thing I remember before going under was Doc conducting classical music with her scalpel.”

It wasn’t jus’ Audrey who was effecting the community, so was her life partner, Lois Halls, a register nurse and community college instructor who initiated the nursing program for the College of the Redwoods, Del Norte Campus.

“Lois was my nursing instructor in the early 80’s,” says Donna Van Matre Parker, who continues to live in Crescent City, “Ours was her last class, we graduated just before her accident.

Donna concludes, “She was such a wonderful person and great instructor and is greatly missed.”

Audrey and Lois died in a small plane accident near Rock Springs, Wyoming, August 31, 1984. Prior to the fatal crash, the couple suffered the tragic loss of Halls’ teenaged daughter, Tina in a traffic collision just north of the town of Crescent City, August 5, 1983.

“Lois Halls was my mother-in-law,” Kay writes, “I remember and loved them both.”

She adds, “Lois had 4 children — Albert, Peter, Matthew, and Christina. Tina was killed in the accident, Peter, whose my ex-husband, still lives here, Matt is in Seattle, and Albert is in Iowa.”

As for Audrey, she didn’t have children. She did however have a brother, by the name of George living in the Chicago area.

Audrey is part of the AAGPBL permanent display at the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum at Cooperstown, New York which opened in 1988.  She was inducted posthumously in the Elmhurst’s Bluejay Backer Hall of Fame in 2003 and in the Fenton High School Alumni Wall of Fame in 2005.

Josiah Gregg is generally credited with the rediscovery of Humboldt Bay and authoring the book: “Commerce of the Prairies.”  However he should also be given credit for establishing the first overland route that led to Del Norte County.

Gregg died on February 25, 1850, from injuries received after falling from his horse. The location of his grave is not known.

Less than a year after his death, the first incident of open murder recorded by white historians occurred when two men were killed about 18 miles from Union — which is now Arcata.  A second followed shortly after on the forks of the Salmon River when whites took revenge by burning three villages and killing a number of Indians.

The situation worsened the next year, prompting the hiring of Colonel Redick McKee, a U.S. Indian Agent who was summoned to Northern California to negotiate treaties with the tribes. In some cases the arrangement worked out.

Other tribes did not acquiesce so easily. Those included the Chilula and Redwood Creek Indians.

Though most of the Indians accepted the arrangements in good faith, with some minor disagreements, white American settlers continued to push for the removal of indigenous peoples from Northern California. Pressure from both sides resulted in Brigadier General Ethan Allen Hitchcock, commander of the Department of the Pacific, establishing a military post on the Humboldt Coast.

Ground for Fort Humboldt was broken in January 1853 — where future U.S. Civil War General and U.S. President Ulysses Grant would soon be assigned. Following a short war between white settlers and rebellious Red Caps, work soon began on buildings for an Indian Agency.

The first two were weather-boarded houses at Kepel and Wau-Kell, near the Klamath River. Arrangements for the Indian reservation on the Klamath River were finalized in April 1855 by S.G. Whipple, Indian Agent for Klamath County.

The establishment of the reservation system in Del Norte County eventually brought about greater conflict.

When I was a youngster there was only one “World Bank,” I ever had to worry about. It sat on a shelf in my bedroom, where I deposited pennies I found on the play ground, sidewalk, floor or wherever. Don’t you wish things were still that simple? I sure do.

There’s a small body of water called Dead Lake, jus’ southeast of Del Norte High School. Sadly, I became acquainted with this body of water when skipping school.

All I had to do was go west on Washington and turn right just before McNamara Air Field and head northerly a few hundred feet and I’d have a quiet place to hide from truant officers. Back then it wasn’t a maintained fishing area like it is now– its brackish waters paradise for bass.

The lake wasn’t named by Native Americans, but rather white settlers who took the name from a Tolowa story. In the story, a serpent named Li-le-sti, — which means, “to the east he lies” — lives in Lake Earl.

Stories about him are traditionally spoken of him in the wintertime, when his relative, snake, sleeps. Li-le-sti wears a long dentalia shell on his head, which is also used as currency by many coastal tribes.

Tolowa tradition holds that young men would go out onto Lake Earl to earn his dentalia. If Li-le-sti believed the young man’s intentions were good and if proper respect was given, the serpent would let the young man remove the dentalia.

If not, the young man would drown. His body would then somehow mysteriously appear in Dead Lake, miles from Lake Earl.

So far, no one has been able to prove or disprove that an underwater passageway exists between Lake Earl and Dead Lake.

As a youngster, I was vaguely aware of the political undercurrent that was taking shape in Klamath. I only knew what I did because I would lay awake listening to the conversations of those who came to my folks house for a later dinner and drinks.

Many of the people who came by were Native American and deeply involved in making the community a better place for “their people.”  Some of these people were lawyers, doctors and other Yurok tribal leaders.

It was while eavesdropping on adult conversations, that I first learned the Yurok Tribe has a constitution that begins with the tribes origin. It reads: “Our people have always lived on this sacred and wondrous land along the Pacific Coast and inland on the Klamath River, since the Spirit People, Wo-ge’, made things ready for us and the Creator, Ko-won-no-ekc-on Ne-ka-nup-ceo, placed us here.”

Spirits took the form of trees, including the Redwoods, and the fountain of water took the form of woman. The Yurok people would spread along the Klamath River and their constitution recounts thousands of years of the tribe’s trade, transportation, social aspects, currency, economic system and crafts expertise.

I was always certain I was walking among spirits when I was hiking in the forest.

In fourth grade our class was introduced to the history of California. I wasn’t as interested in the state’s history as much as I was the local history of the northern most part of the state.

Fortunately I grew up when there were still enough tribal elders around and willing to share their people’s history. Most of these men and women are gone now, as we all will one day be, but I have managed to recollect their memories.

Luckily I have lived into the computer age, the age of the internet and have been able redress my errors by researching my facts and discovering more history than I knew was available.

According to the Tolowa the land had been settled when the world was created. Just south of the mouth of the Smith River, Yontucket marks the creation point — similar to the way that the Bible celebrates the Garden of Eden as the start of life of earth.

Tolowa elders disagree with theories that their people walked over — or descended from those who walked over, land that once stretched across the Bering Strait between Asia and North America. They believe the creator made people, after the sun, water, earth, animals and the Redwood trees, which marked the center of the earth.

The Tolowa would come to occupy lands from Wilson Creek to Six Rivers and north into the region that would become the Applegate area of Oregon, near Grants Pass. They also would be called Chetco and Tututni.

Long before personal computers, the Internet and blogging, I used to write little one page thoughts about that which interested me. In the mid-90s, I collected up as many of these little vignettes as possible with the hope of publishing them one day in booklet form, entitling it: “Lost Coast of Del Norte.” Instead, what follows is that series.

It was third grade when I learned about not only our Pacific coastline, but about some of the people who lived in Del Norte County and the Klamath area long before me or any Anglo-Saxon. It was strange to be eight-years-old and suddenly mystified by inhabitants that no longer existed in their once natural form.

As a class we were taken by school bus to sites like the Yurok sweathouse that is perched above the Klamath River. The river, Yurok elders told us used to have so many fish in it that a person could walk across the water without getting wet.

We also visited the Tree of Mystery to see the largest privately collected Indian museum in California. It would always amaze me  that I grew up to hold the position of cataloging the entire collection as a summertime job.

Thus my interest in local history grew.

While the bride was away for a family reunion in San Diego, I decided to take matters into my hands and paint the living room — or at least one wall of it. This has been something I’ve been trying to get her on board with for nearly two years.

The color I selected is known as Arizona Sand. It is a bright yellow-orange color meant to lighten and warm the room up and make it feel larger.

Unfortunately, when the bride returned home, she was less than thrilled with the new color. In fact she dislikes it so much, she went to Home Depot and picked out new color to cover the wall.

Here’s the funny thing — it’s a burgundy, a color very close to the brick-red I had wanted to paint the wall in the first place. However the brick-red was poo-poo’d by the bride as being too dark.

Furthermore, I wrote a column recently about painting another wall of our living room a light brown, which went pretty much unnoticed by the bride, until I pointed it out. In that article I bemoaned I should have used red paint instead.

File this under: Me and my big mouth.