A Prussian Paints The Mojaves

February 13, 2019
   I am fascinated by the Prussian artist Baulduin Mollhausen who accompanied the Whipple Railroad Expedition in 1853-4. When the expedition reached the Colorado River, Baulduin executed numerous scenes of the Mojaves and their surroundings. He reported in his diary that Mojave mothers lined up to have him paint their babies [must have this scene in the graphic novel]. 

Daily Whip Out: "Balduin Mollhausen"

    Heinrich Balduin Mollhausen was born in 1825 in Bonn, at that time a town in the kingdom of Prussia (today Germany). When he was 11, his father abandoned the family and fled to America. Balduin's mother, Baroness Elise von Falkenstein died in 1837 and the boy was then sent to live with an unmarried aunt. He left for America in early 1850, landed in New York in July and wandered through the Midwest, working as a sign painter, hunter, trapper and court reporter. In 1851 he met Duke Paul of Wurttemberg near St. Louis and was hired to be an assistant for the seasoned world traveler and amateur naturalist. After lengthy trips together Mollhausen learned the ropes of being an artist, although he was not a very good one.

   In the fall of 1852, the Prussian consul in Saint Louis hired Balduin to accompany a shipment of wild animals destined for the Berlin Zoo, and Mollhausen arrived there in January of 1853. 

   By the time he returned to America in May of 1853, he landed in Washington, D.C., just when Congress was ramping up several scientific expeditions to the Wild West. Through his connections, Mollhausen landed a job as "topographer and draughtsman," with Lieutenant Amiel W. Whipple's Army's Corps of Topographical Engineers who were assigned the task of finding a railroad route to the west coast, along the thirty-fifth parallel. Balduin was paid "$1,200 per annum."

   In mid-June of 1853 Mollhausen met the expedition at Fort Napoleon, at the mouth of the Arkansas River. Whipple's massive crew—12 wagons drawn by six mules—took off from Fort Smith on July 14, 1853 and traveled through present-day Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California. He drew landscapes, camp scenes, river crossings, artifacts and botanical and zoological specimens. He also sketched and painted a number of tribes including the Choctaw, Shawnee, Delaware, Comanche, Waco, Kiowa, Navajo, Apache, Yavapai, Chemehuevi, Mojave and Cahuilla.

   The expedition made a detour in my home country—eventually Mohave County—going south via the Big Sandy to the Santa Maria River (there were rumors of great mineral wealth on this difficult route and, in fact, Whipple ended up leaving all of his wagons about half way to the Colorado River and they made the rest of the trip by horseback and mule).

   So this is how they looked as they approached the Mojave camps along the Colorado River.

______
   Whip Out to Come
____________

   Another illustration I need to do will show the expedition riding up the river bank of the Colorado with Mojaves running along beside them and in the foreground is a crude hut facing us, but away from the soldiers who are advancing on the other side. Inside the hut, hidden in the back, is a very pregnant woman.

Water Lovers

   That pregnant woman is the subject of my graphic novel.

"Dear Diary, today is the first day of the 100 years war."
—A funny take on the absurdity of diaries

The King of Irrigation In Cactusland

February 12, 2019,
   When my grandson Weston is in Cactusland we have a couple things that we do that are mandatory. The first thing we do is make a trek over to the cave to get some power.

Weston gathering Statue Power in the cave that Cave Creek is named for

   We've had quite a bit of rain lately so that means we have to wade across the creek both coming and going.

Weston Wading Across Cave Creek

   Since his shoes are already soaked Weston works on an irrigation project he has initiated in the back yard.

The King of Irrigation

   Then it's back out on the trail.

Weston In Cactusland

   Other times we just go along the creek bottom and admire the crazy shapes of the saguaros.

The Three Stages of Saguaros

 Since these saguaros are in the creek bottom, it gets colder at night and if it freezes, the arms turn downward. Someone said it takes 75 years for saguaros to grow their first arm, but I know this isn't true because I have a saguaro I planted in the front yard and it already has an arm.

First Arm, Thirty Years On

   When we get finished, there's always time for a little sunset celebration.

An A-1 Evening

"Grandpa Ha ha, tell me a nutty story."

—Weston at bedtime

A Lady In Red, A Fly Cowboy & Alamo Praise

February 11, 2019
   Finished another sketchbook and started a new one. Wanted an inspirational first page, so I went home for lunch today and did this portrait of a woman I admire.

Daily Whip Out: "Lady In Red"

   Ever see a photograph that looks like a Frederick Remington waiting to happen? This is a C.S. Fly photo, so it must be from southeastern Arizona back in the day. THIS is how I envision the Cow-boys!

Is that a machete stuck in his chaps?

Feedback:

The current Alamo and Golden Spike issue of True West is simply outstanding. Hats off to you and your entire staff.

—Brian Downes, John Wayne Birth Museum

Winterset, Iowa

Weston Wows Wickenburg

February 10, 2019
   Drove over to Wickenburg yesterday morning with a little guy who has never been in a parade before. The first order of business was to teach him how to stand.

Keep the suspense up, then widen your stance and give us your best cowboy look.

"You talkin' to ME?"

   Then it's time to sit on the hood of the Jeep and load up on donuts.

Two-and-a-half donuts and counting

   At 9:50 we got into parade position and at this time Weston got to meet the horse we were going to be riding with:

Weston meets Concho

   Lee Anderson has ridden Concho with us every year for the past decade. Concho is a rescued race horse and Lee has had him for almost two decades (Concho is 19). The crowds absolutely love him and cheer like crazy when Lee and Concho do their thing: sideways dancing and prancing and even a horsified moonwalk!

Weston Poses With Lee Anderson

aboard Concho just before the start

of the parade.

   I told Weston he had to learn three waves. The regular, "Hi, everybody," then the rodeo-cupped-hand wave, and then, the Yahoo-both-hands-over-your-head wave. Weston basically stuck with the first one:

The Weston Wave: "Hello Everybody!"

   Full disclosure: as the parade went on,  I would walk ahead of the jeep and tell the bystanders on the sidewalk, "This is my grandson coming up in the Jeep and this is his first parade and I want you to make him feel good." Several would ask, "What's his name?" and then the entire sidewalk would erupt with cheers for "Weston! We love you Weston!" The funny thing is, the boy basically thought it was normal and kept up his "Hello everybody" routine all the way through.

   On the ride home he did confess to me he thought the crowd liked him more than me. I couldn't disagree.

Weston Wows Wickenburg

"Everyone loves a parade, especially if they're in it."

—Old Parade Saying

Wild Bill In Smoke and Tom Mix Regrets

February 8, 2019
   I was looking through some old photo reference this morning and found these shots of the late, great Doc Ingalls out at Pioneer Living History Museum north of Phoenix, AZ back in Feb. of 1996. 

Wild Bill In Smoke

   If Wild Bill was advancing and firing both his pistols, what would that look like? This was the effect I was looking for. Thanks to Doc, I got it. He passed last year. Great guy.

   Found an unfinished board in the studio this morning and gave it another go:

Tom Mix Regrets

   Yes, in my opinion, he had a few.

"In Germany, your average theater lobby hasn't been painted since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Why would anyone pay $12 to take your date to a place like that?"

—A frustrated German film distributor, as quoted in The Hollywood Reporter

Seeking Covers And Ridiculous Enemies

February 7, 2019
   Sometimes I find photos that would make good covers, regardless of the subject matter. This is one of those photos:

Publicity shot of Clint Walker

   This is reverse engineering and that is a mighty fine image. So, find the image, then find, or create a story that will pay it off. Here's another one:

Big Hat Cover Up

   And another one:

Apache Scouts

   And now for something close to home but completely ridiculous:

Debating the True in True West

"I have never made but one prayer to God. A very short one: 'Lord, make my enemies ridiculous.' And God granted it!"

—Voltaire

Saguaro Sunset Shots

February 6, 2019
   Big storm blew in last night and I caught these big sweeper clouds on my way home as they rolled in.

Sunset Sweeper Clouds On

North Spur Cross Road

   This next one is looking the other way.

Windmill Clouds

   When I got home the fireworks continued.

Sunset Saguaros Looking East

Over Ratcliff Ridge

"A horse kicked Mrs. Cecil Coger and broke her leg, two days after her baby son stuck a coat hanger through his tongue."
—An item in the Mohave County Miner, 1930s

Olive In Clouds And Honkytonk Sue With Her Head In Her Hands

February 6, 2019
   If you know me at all, you know if there's one thing I can't do very well it is leave well enough alone.

Daily Whip Out: "Olive In Clouds"

   Still not exactly what I want, but stick around for a couple more days and you'll see another one.

   This is a Honkytonk Sue sympathy card I created for the women in my life, back in the day. As you can see from the date, this is almost three decades ago and if you look up the word "prescient" I think this image should be there.

"It's a little embarrassing that after 45 years of research and study, the best advice I can give people is to be a little kinder to each other."
—Aldous Huxley

Olive In Living Color

February 5, 2019
   I have mixed feelings about colorizing Old West photos and most of the time I prefer the old sepia look, but I have to say, this colorization of Olive Oatman is striking!

  Here is a closer look:

   That is simply amazing. She looks like Natalie Portman, to me, and she is quite striking. Evidently, the colorization is by Jecini and you can see his work right here:

Paul Andrew Hutton Nails It
   My good friend Paul certainly has a way of spinning out history and making it live. Hutton has a review of new book in the Washington Post. Here's a taste:

"Treuer wishes to revise the image of the Indian long prevalent in American literature and historiography as the Vanishing American, a race so compromised by disease, war and intermarraige that it is destined to disappear. His perspective is one of Native American resiliency and survival. “This book,” Treuer writes, 'is adamantly, unashamedly, about Indian life rather than Indian death.'"

   Here's a link to the review:

Hutton's Take On In-din History


  When I was a lad, I was a big fan of the drummer Sandy Nelson, who had a hit album, "Let There Be Drums," which I used as my "talent" in the Mohave County Union High School Talent Show in 1964. I actually expanded copied and explored the track, "The History of The World On Drums." In other words, I copied it lick for lick.

   I have often wondered what happened to Mr. Nelson, and, so, my Kingman compadre, Johnny Waters, sent me this autographed poster.

Sandy Nelson gives me a shout out

   Evidently, Sandy Nelson now lives in Boulder City, Nevada, where John lives and Jack's Place had a fund raiser for the skin beater.

  "What do you call a drummer without a girlfriend? Homeless."
—Old Drummer Joke

The Freebee

February 4, 2019
   In December of last year, I made this crazy vow: "I want to create a graphic novel so ridiculous that only my best friends would even consider buying it—and then NOT sell it to them!"

   So, for the past sixty days I have been noodling and working feverishly on a very Frankenstein-ish book, put together in pieces, backed-in, fleshed out, duck-taped, jigsawed and chicken-wired. 

The Old Cut and Paste

   Does it make any sense? Perhaps, if you know me. Does it track? Kind of. Is it a movie? That remains to be seen.

Maynard Dixon painting at Needles, 1900

   Thanks to the boys down at Cattletrack, that would be Mark and Brent, we are only going to print 25 of them. They are not for sale. I didn't do this one for the money.

Maynard Dixon

   My story includes one of my painting heroes, above, who went from selling his paintings for a dollar a piece to, well, let's just say one of his paintings recently sold for $1.25 million. And, regarding sky high prices on paintings, I love this quote:

"There's too much money and too little sense."

—Tony Christensen, art and antique dealer

Seeking The Truth of History

February 3, 2019
   Went to see "The Favourite" yesterday and didn't much like it, but I noticed in the previews for coming attractions that there is a film coming out called "Truth." I leaned over to Kathy and said, "It appears 'Truth' with a capital T is having a bit of a moment, eh?"

   FYI: Yes, I get a bit of an English brogue when I pontificate.

   Yes, it does appears seeking of truth is under the microscope and my take on it is there was always as many multiple interpretations of the truth but we never had all these different microscopes to look so closely at the different angles of the truth.

   Last Thursday night I gave a history talk down at Cattletrack and at the end I was signing books and this woman came up to me and asked me the truth about Olive Oatman and I stated her family was murdered in front of her eyes and she was taken as a slave by the Yavapais and she interrupted me and she got this smirk on her face and said, "Isn't that the 'White' version of what happened?" She made those dramatic and irritating air quotes with her fingers that made it clear she questioned the truth of the tale, or, at least the version I was telling. And, by the way, she was a very white person. I wanted to say, "Well, it may be the White version, but what other version would you come up with? That she got a scholarship as a foreign exchange student to study the lifestyles of the Yavapai Peoples?"

   I get it. As a white person seeking the truth of history I already have a strike against me. Two, if you count being from Kingman.

   But I digress.

   In the arc of discovery, or, rather, in the stages of finding the truth, you will find there are those who have given up on the truth, or at least the official version and so, we get this reaction:

Campfire Callout:"It's all bullshit."

   Let's be honest: Black people have a very sensitive bullshit meter in terms of official "history," and with good reason. And, as for Native Americans, well, I think you know their take on the "truth" about the entire frontier experience:

"Your Version of History Is All Bullshit!"

   But it just isn't a racial or ethnic prejudice.

"I Was Punished For My Version of The Truth"

   Yes, General Crook was a very enlightened person in my estimation, and he basically lost his job for believing in the integrity of Geronimo who got drunk and left him holding the bag.

    Sometimes, people find themselves on the wrong side of history, after having been on the "right side" of history for a century, or so. For example, lawmen in the West were once portrayed as paragons of virtue and the defenders of civilization, but now they are more often as not portrayed as simply the enforcement tools of frontier capitalists.

"Blood On The Badge"

   And the Intrepid Explorers we once celebrated like Kit Carson and Edward Beale are now portrayed as the spear point of an invading army bent on conquest and annihilation.

The Beale Camel Corp Invades Indigenous Peoples' Lands

   One group that kind of gets a by, are these guys:

Cowboy Ground Zero

"Curly Bill's No. 2"

   So I keep seeking the truth and one of these days, I intend to publish my version of it.

"History is a cruel trick played on the dead by the living."

—Old Vaquero Saying

Victorian Head Gear Questions Answered

February 2, 2019
   So, here is a James Montgomery Flagg illustration of a woman at the turn of the Twentieth Century who appears to be going inside with a big hat on. 

  So, my question to my women's fashion expert, Jenny Smith, is, if Sharlot Hall was wearing this headgear to an appointment in an office, would she remove the hat, once inside? It seems like it would be quite complicated, or difficult, to put on and off. Yes? What was the protocol?

   She would have left it on. It was part of her "costume". Hat wouldn't have come off until she got home or when she was done with her errands and home.
—Jenny

    Wow! So what happened when all these costumed women went to a play, or had to sit in church in pews? That had to be a trainwreck in terms of viewing anything?

   Absolutely! You know the Easter bonnet song. Every woman showed off her hat at church and the theater. Most churches required women to have their heads covered.
—Jenny

   And, so the men are doffing their hats to be polite and the women are wearing these big flying saucers on their heads? That's just crazy, but I believe it.

"In your Easter bonnet, with all the frills upon it, You'll be the grandest lady in the Easter parade. I'll be all in clover and when they look you over, I'll be the proudest fellow in the Easter parade."

—Irving Berlin, "Easter Parade"

Truth Be Damned!

February 1, 2019
   I am still haunted by the play, "The Lifespan of A Fact," which Kathy and I saw performed in New York last month. The play challenges our perceptions about what exactly is the truth and, in the end, does it make a difference?

   As someone who loves history, I have to believe it makes a difference and that it is important, but the play challenges that idea down to its very core. 

   Of course, I have been intrigued for some time about all of this, especially as it relates to Sharlot Hall and her seeming about face as it relates to the facts in the Olive Oatman story.

   Just when Sharlot had reached her ultimate goal—finding out the truth about whether Olive had children while she was with the Mojave—she let it go. I believe she had wrestled with brutal, ugly truths and in the end she simply could not add any more pain to Olive's life—or more importantly, to her memory. This goes against everything I stand for, but in the end, perhaps the final truth is:

   Truth be damned!

   I feel it's safe to say there was wild sex and the usual consequences. 

   These were human beings after all. So, when it came time for Sharlot to tell the Olive Oatman story, she left all of that out. I used to blame Sharlot for this, but not anymore.

   In fact, I finally get the lyrics to a song I have heard for over half a century and never really understood what the words meant, until now.

"Half-wracked prejudice leaped forth
Rip down all hate, I screamed
Lies that life is black and white
Spoke from my skull I dreamed
Romantic facts of musketeers
Foundationed deep, somehow
Ah, but I was so much older then
I'm younger than that now."
—Bob Dylan, My Back Pages