The Night I Slept in a Ghost Town

This post is brought to you by Janalyn Voigt. Escape into  Creative Worlds.

I peered out the tall window and across the wide, deserted street to a collection of dilapidated buildings, including one just large enough for a door and window that boldly displayed a weathered sign: Shaniko Bank. Shadows lengthened toward dusk and the horizon bloomed with the colors of sunset, but heat blasted me without mercy and the air did not stir.

My fantasy of sleeping in a ghost town somehow hadn’t included being baked alive in a hotel room without air conditioning. Ah, the joys of reality!

1910 photograph of the Columbia Southern Hotel, now the Shaniko Hotel , Public Domain Image

I’d first discovered Shaniko while on something of a zany ghost-town-hunting vacation in the high desert of eastern Oregon. My family had spent countless hours navigating winding roads through barren hillsides, peering in the windows of locked buildings, worrying about stepping on rattlesnakes, looking for gold near an old mine, and driving onto private property (with the puzzled farmer’s permission) in search of what turned out to be a couple of swaybacked buildings too dangerous to enter. Ghost town hunting has its share of pathos but it also can reward the diligent with unexpected moments where history comes alive.

This was one of those. Daydreaming caught me up. Who else might have looked from this very window, watching the sun go down in a similar heat wave? What stories did the empty rooms tell? No concierge had greeted us when we arrived, and no one was on duty now. Check-in had been through the hotel’s restaurant, which was now closed. From the silence, we were the only guests.

The historic Columbia Southern Hotel (built ca. 1900), located at the corner of 4th and E Streets in Shaniko, Oregon, United States, is listed on the US National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). The hotel, currently named Shaniko Hotel, also lies within the NRHP-listed Shaniko Historic District.


Image by Ian Poellet (User:Werewombat) (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html)], via Wikimedia Commons: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AColumbia_Southern_Hotel_2009_-_Shaniko_Oregon.jpg

Shaniko’s bent toward tourism had come as a surprise on that earlier trip. We’d stopped to eat and learn a little about the town. Shaniko, built on sheep farming, was once the wool capital of the western United States. An interesting fact about the town is that spring water pumped from the Cross Hollows canyon to the south was kept in two wooden tubs in the water tower and distributed to the town through pipes. 

Although I prefer ghost towns in an arrested decay state of preservation, when I discovered you could actually spend the night in the hotel, the idea took hold of me. I promised myself I’d come back someday, and now, years later, I'd returned. 

I reflected on the intervening years. So much had changed in my life since my younger self had entered this hotel. What had happened to the ghost towns we'd visited on that earlier vacation? Was the leaning stamp mill in Susanville still standing or had time erased that remnant of the past? Had the farmer’s canting buildings finally collapsed? 

An awareness of the fleeting nature of time ached through me. Perhaps this was why I’d come back to Shaniko, to reconnect with my own yesterdays in this place of history.

For more of Janalyn's ghost town stories, visit Historical Worlds. 
Note: Shaniko Hotel is currently closed and not available to the public.

Southwestern Indian Detours ~ by Linda Farmer Harris

Even now the old Santa Fe Trail conjures up romance and Western adventure. The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway laid tracks along that trail from Independence, Missouri to Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Map courtesy of Maps and Art.com

My CFHS March 27th post centered around Fred Harvey and the Harvey Girls. He advertised for "young women 18-30 years of age, of good character, attractive and intelligent" as waitresses in his restaurants. He opened the first Harvey House in 1876 in Topeka, Kansas. By 1917, there were 100 Harvey Houses across the United States.

It wasn't long before Mr. Harvey and his staff saw another need and they set out to solve it. Travel in the Southwest was dismal, if not downright dangerous. There were few amenities to attract the wealthy travelers, who now wanted to get off the train and walk amongst the flora and fauna. Crossing the country in a private car was still a rugged undertaking with few surfaced highways.

The Indian Detours were formed to allow travelers to leave the train and take one to three day wilderness territory tours into the Indian Reservations of New Mexico and Arizona. In 1899, the "horseless carriage" was commissioned to be build for addition to the Harvey transportation stable of wagons and buckboards. With luxury ever the hallmark of Fred Harvey, the fleet of Harvey Cars were Cadillacs, Franklins, White Buses, and the Packards, which didn't last more than 30,000 miles on the rough roads. The large vehicles were to be used for sightseers from the Santa Fe station at Flagstaff to the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River. In keeping with the railroad theme, the Harvey Cars were called road pullmans.

Fred Harvey Tour Car, Driver, and Courier at the Little Colorado River Gorge 

Grand Canyon Arizona

Source: My Historic Postcard Collection

Once the El Tovar opened at the Grand Canyon in 1905, the Harvey staff began organizing more extensive entertainment for guests. Tour areas and information on the culture of the Hopi and Navajo peoples were developed. Seven different routes, covering 13 to 66 miles, left from the El Tovar.  For a flat fee of $4, a guest could travel through pine forests, view amazing rock formations, natural springs, wells, waterfalls, and visit area ranches. For $30, a 66 mile round trip included Aztec ruins, dams, lakes, and wildlife.

The Fred Harvey El Tovar Hotel South Rim circa 1910

Grand Canyon Arizona

Source: My Historic Postcard Collection

By 1923, the Grand Canyon - the big gully - was dedicated as a National Park. Brochures advertised four of the most unique tours "in all the word": the Grand Canyon, the Petrified Forest, the Painted Desert, and the Indian Pueblos.

Traveling through these places was one thing, but learning about them was a whole new endeavor. The Indian Detours were organized in the spring of 1926 to conduct travel through oldest America, in the New Mexico Rockies between Las Vegas and Albuquerque.

The Albuquerque Morning Journal, August 20, 1925, carried the announcement. In part it advertised, "The three-day personally conducted educational tour will comprise visits to old Santa Fe, the inhabited Indian pueblos of Tesuque, Santa Clara, San Juan, Santa Domingo, and other points in the picturesque valley of the upper Rio Grande, as well as to the huge communal ruins of Puye, a cliff pueblo 20 centuries old."

This all-expense motor trip would cover nearly 300 miles, and include meals and hotel accommodations to well known, but "little seen places in the Indo-Spanish southwest." According the R. H. Clarkson, Assistant to Ford Harvey, Fred Harvey's son, "There is more of historic, prehistoric, human and scenic interest in New Mexico than in any other similar area in the world, not excepting India, Egypt, Europe, or Asia."

The "personally conducted" feature of the excursions would prove to be the secret of the Indian Detours success. A school for drivers and couriers was conducted by the Santa Fe and Harvey system to give the 'detourists' the ultimate experience.

Erna Fergusson, who had used women guides in her Koshare Tours, was hired to train the first twenty Harvey Detour Couriers.  When interviewed she said, "Couriers are expected to be young women of education and some social grace, able to meet easily and well all kinds of people. They are expected to be intelligent enough to learn many facts about this country and to impart them in a way to interest intelligent travelers. They are selected also with an eye to their knowledge of the southwest, their knowledge of Spanish, and any special knowledge or ability that will assist them in presenting this country properly."

The top training candidates were college graduates, at least 25 years old, and primarily natives of the area. They had to be willing to take a crash course in history, politics, sociology, anthropology, geology and arts. Unlike the Harvey Girls, there was no rule that they remain unmarried in order to continue working. Some of the first applicants were daughters of prominent New Mexicans - senators, secretary of state, judges, ambassadors. In the first group, professional backgrounds varied. Two had been guides for the Fergusson's Koshare Tours; some had been newspaper women; one was a writer; one, a member of an interior decorating establishment. There were teachers, one had taught at the U.S. Indian School at the Tesuque Pueblo, and another from the New Mexico School for the Deaf. Being fluent in other languages was also a plus.

A veritable army of instructors was assembled from all over the nation. The Couriers were expected to know enough Spanish to carry on a basic conversation at the pueblos. The Indians spoke not only their own tribal dialect, but, in many cases, also spoke Spanish. Classes were often conducted on-site at the pueblos, artist colonies and homes, art museums, and in the desert. The Indian Detours with the addition of the Couriers became so popular that new recruits were trained every six months.

Typical test questions might include: "How do Indian women bake bread in outdoor ovens?", "What language do they speak?", "When did the cliff dwellers inhabit Puye?", "How much is an acre of land in New Mexico, and how many crops of alfalfa can be raised in one season?"

They had to have statistics about the area on the tip of their tongues. Knowledge such as mountain heights, population of various pueblos, names of Taos painters and artisans, and explain the features of the desert.

Southwestern Indian Detour Couriers - part of the first group of trainees

They wore uniforms that were attractive, consistent with the theme of the tour, comfortable, and durable.

Detour Courier Outfit, History Room, Bright Angel Lodge, South Rim of Grand Canyon

Winifred Shuler in the patio of Fine Arts Museum, 1930 Indian Detour brochure

courtesy of Journal of the Southwest, University of Arizona,
College of Social & Behavioral Sciences

Couriers were as hearty and talented as their hand-picked counterpart, the HarveyCoach drivers.  They could fix a flat and pump gas, and a myriad of other automobile related chores. One of the Couriers, Anita Rose, was called by the Cleveland Plain Dealer, a "pioneer hostess among cliff dwellers" and an example of the new college woman. Next month we'll talk a bit more about the Couriers and their Drivers.

Have you ever visited the wonders and felt the enchantment of New Mexico?

Leave a comment for a chance to win a book gift certificate. Please include your email address and specify that you would like to be in the drawing. Winner will be posted in the comments on this blog post no later than June 22nd and in the sidebar.

Lin grew up and graduated from Lovington High School, Lovington, New Mexico. The first book in her new Voices in the Desert series, Lost Memories, is set in 1926 and introduces Mariana Forbes and her adventures as a Southwestern Indian Detour Courier. The other four books span the years of the Indian Detour Couriers from 1926-1932.

How the Railroad Helped Shape Texas

Naomi Rawlings here, blogging for you today. I’m a Yankee through and through, just about as northern as a person can get. I live way up north on Lake Superior, where our winters are long and hard. For example, there’s two feet of snow sitting outside as I write this post, and between now and when this post goes live in a few days, we’re supposed to get another foot of snow.

So being the Yankee that I am, I’ve always been fascinated by life in the South. There’s just so much this northerner doesn’t understand about hot summers and dry deserts and the like. And out of all the states south of the Mason Dixon line, one state has always fascinated me more than most:

Texas

There’s something intrinsically inspiring about a state that was its own country for a while and fought its own war with Mexico before it joined the United States. So I’ll happily pick up a book set in Texas anytime. (Though I’d never have the guts to write one. Something tells me this northern girl couldn’t fake enough knowledge of Texas and cowboys to write a believable book.)

But today I’ve invited one of my friends to share some of her knowledge of Texas. Noelle Marchand not only had a series of three novels set in Texas, she’s also lived her whole life there. And she’s going to share with us a few bits about those classic, dusty western towns.

Welcome to Peppin, Texas! Deep in the heart of Texas Hill Country where wind and blue stretches high over the rolling tree covered hills sits a bustling little town where everyone is treated like family. The only entrance into Peppin is through the pages of my books (Unlawfully Wedded Bride, The Runaway Bride and A Texas-Made Match), but the essence of the town’s history and culture are very real. Many Texas towns set their foundations in the ashes of Reconstruction as war-weary families of the South endeavored to create a new life and economy. Most of them were impacted in one way, shape or form by a new addition to the Texas landscape—railroad tracks.

Chartered in 1871, T&P Railroad’s purpose was to build a southern transcontinental railroad to stretch between Marshall, Texas, and San Diego, California. The idea was eventually abandoned and the railroad laid its final westward track in Sierra Blanca, Texas. Some of the towns it bypassed became ghost towns that still sit abandoned to this day. However, those fortunate enough to become a stop on the new railroad flourished into towns very similar to Peppin, Texas.

I think this is so interesting, Noelle, because way up north, where I live, railroads had little to do with shaping towns. In fact, I’m working on a novel set in a real historical town along Lake Superior, and the town didn’t get a railroad until 1907. From its inception in the 1840s until 1907, Eagle Harbor Michigan was accessible only by ship, and only for eight months out of the year. Ice and storms made winter travel impossible from December through March.


Thanks for stopping by to visit, Noelle. Noelle is also a back up blogger here on Christian Fiction Historical Society, so I’m sure you’ll be seeing more of her. In honor of her visit, Noelle is giving away one copy of her newest book, A Texas-Made Match. Please leave a comment below with an email address to be entered in today’s giveaway, and don’t forget about our month-long giveaway for a Kindle Fire. Each comment you leave gives you one chance at winning the grand prize.

A Texas-Made Match: For Ellie O'Brien, finding the perfect partner is easy—as long as it's for other people. Now the townsfolk of Peppin want to return the favor. But how could Lawson Williams be the right choice? The handsome ranch foreman was her childhood friend, but he's the man Ellie deems least likely to court a tomboy with a guilty secret.

Lawson can't help enjoying the town's efforts to push him together with Ellie, though marriage isn't in his plans. Yet Ellie's become a warm, spirited woman who could chase away the clouds of his past. And with a whole town on their side, they could claim a love as big and bold as Texas itself….

Introducing Nancy J. Farrier

Nancy J. Farrier

Dreams That Come True

Growing up in the Midwest had many advantages. Fireflies. Fresh sweet corn. Hay rides. Ice skating on small ponds. Picking berries. Amidst all the wonder and fun was a major disadvantage. Being too far east.

In third grade, yes at nine-years-old, I ran away from home one cold night. You might think I did this because I had a horrible home life, or perhaps a mean family. That wasn’t the case at all. My parents were wonderful and provided a loving home for their three daughters. Even as a young girl, I lived and breathed horses and westerns. I wanted to be a cowgirl and that wasn’t going to happen in Indiana. So a friend and I hatched a scheme. I would sneak away, go to her house, knock on her window, and she would let me in and cut my hair so I looked like a boy. Then I would leave for Texas or parts west and become a cowboy. I could ride horses, chase cows, and eat at the chuckwagon. Between watching Bonanza and reading horse stories, this became my dream.

Well, the best laid plans… When I left in the middle of the night, the door creaked—loudly. I heard my dad getting up, so I had to leave without my clothes and books. (I had to take books. Right?) Needless to say, things went downhill from there. I didn’t make it to Texas and didn’t become a cowgirl, but a few years later my dad bought a horse for me to ride, which did fulfill one desire.

My dreams of the west faded a bit until my family took our first trip to visit family in Colorado, Wyoming and California. I still hear Dad’s voice as he announced we could now see the mountains. I leaned forward to peer through the windshield. There they were in the distance. Majestic. Breath-taking. And, I knew someday I would live where there were mountains.

That goal came true. For more than forty years I’ve lived near the mountains. I still feel the thrill of the majestic vistas, and marvel at the work of God’s hand. Since giving my life to Jesus Christ, my life has become so rich and filled with splendor that surpasses any mountain grandeur.

Most of the stories I write take place in the west because of a love for the beauty and diversity of the terrain, flora and the people. Looking into the history of the Old West has fascinated me for years. I hope to share some interesting historic tidbits with you in the coming months. Check back and see what’s in the news. Maybe there will be something to encourage a dream or two.

My March giveaway is for a tote bag and two of my books, Painted Desert (contemporary), and Grand Canyon Brides, which includes one of my novellas. 

Thank you for stopping by.

Nancy J. Farrier

www.nancyjfarrier.com