A Taste of the American Southwest

 States of the Southwest

            Much of the Southwest is desert. Some of it feels a bit magical.The people of one important Southwestern state have called their state The Land of Enchantment. That state's New Mexico. About half of the territory of each of the states of California, Colorado, and Tevas has been called part of the Southwest. Like New Mexico,Arizona is all in the South West; all of Nevada is probably there too.

Neighbors in Mexico

             Much of the Southwest of the U.S. boarders on the Republic of Mexico. Nearly all of it was lightly settled by the Spanish speaking people of Spain long before the United States became a country, and much of it had been claimed by the countries of Spain and Mexico.

            The Mexico village of Boquillas is across the river from Big Bend National Park in Texas. "The river".is called the Rio Bravo in Mexico and the Rio Grand in the US, I have crossed it often and have seldom need to swim, In the heat of summer it feels nicely cooling and seems neither grand nor bravo, but one can find beauty there, It is important in this land of little surface water. It is also important in marking the political border between Mexico and the United States.

            I seem to remember there being a little unofficial, unguarded wooden walking bridge from the US to Boquillas. There was no immigration officer. The people of Boquillas seem to no longer cross the river to pick up their mail in Texas nor do many

Texans walk walk over to buy food items. Is my memory wrong? It seems that they had made shift to cross without getting wet. The people of the Boquillas area Spoke Spanish, some English a few spoke a couple of indigenous languages. It was much the same with the Texans. Still seems much the same, but it is now harder to hear Indian tongues.

            When I was last across the river from Boquillas it was still possible to call across the river to si if any of the nicely finished walking sticks were available and visitors to the Park did so. They made a deal for the price and when all went well the useful sticks were promptly delivered across the river.  Seems I also remember bathing on the US side in a hot springs coming up from under river water, but that all is now history. I remember some pleasant late evenings there.

            That brings back some other memories not far from a different part of the Southwest along the border. No river marking this part. I remember another hot water spring coming up just below water. This was in Baja California, Mexico not far below the frontier. This kind of natural hot spring is rare.

Native Americans

            There were many different indian tribes in the southwest. There many there still. There may be a donen just in Southern California. Only a few are easy to find. Tribes you may have heard of include Shoshone, uni, Hopi, Navaho, Apache. Hopi and uni were early comers, Navajo were much more recent arrivals. I am not sure of the order of arrival of Shoshone. Please tell us if you know.

            We have called the Hopi and uni Pueblo people. They lived in substantial permanent villages and practiced considerable agriculture. They also kept turkeys. Do you know of any people who have been on the land longer? They are considered a peaceful people, but not so long ago they rose up to drive out Spanish and Mexican settlers from nearly all the Rio Grand river valley. Many of those settlers' retreated to as far as Mexico city and Spain!

            Apache and Navajo arrived to the Southwest in a poorer condition than the pueblo people, but discovered that their bow and arrows were better than those of the Pueblo population. The Pueblo people had a better memory of using the atlatl, but that helped them little against Apache armed with bows. The Navajo and Apache, I believe, spoke Athabaskan languages which were very different from the languages already in the land.

            The Apache that I knew loved their pretty highlands and new pickups. They once joined Spanish and Mexican settlers to defend themselves from Pueblo peoples, but that did not last long. Now they are fond of new technology and enjoy the venison they hunt on their own lands.

            The Navajo early became herders of sheep and weavers of wool. They now have airport, and radio, and TV stations on their own lands. They are a monder people, but on their very extensive lands some choose to live much as their early ancestors did. Their principle land is bigger than many US states and stretches into four large western states.

Spanish speakers

            There are many in the Southwest who speak some Spanish. Some johnny-come-latelies, much like me; some whose ancestors were here from Spain long before the Pilgrims touched Plymouth Rock; many like Indian tribes which dealt with early Spanish explorers and settlers, many like the flow of immigrants from Mexico and a few from many lands from the south. Still Spanish is somewhat eotic to many English speakers.

            Many tribal peoples of the SW speak Spanish, some of anantique sort, some integrated into their language. some near the border speak a fairly modern Spanish, Some speak their own language as well as English and spanish. that's more than most other Americans.

Baja California

            Baja California is definitely a Mexican state, but for some Americas it feels a bit like the US Southwest. Not so very long ago Baja California was a frontier territory a bit removed from the rest of Mexico. Now it has become an important Mexican state. Now it is an important tourist destination for Mexico, the US, and beyond. It now has some agricultural production for Mexico and the US, fishing is still important beyond sport fishing.

            Many from California an beyond find Baja peninsula a romantic, eotic,  and beautiful destination that seems a bit more accessible than do most. Near all know the bustling border city of Tijuana (aunt Jane). A very few wonder if the Sea Gypsies learned much from the Seri Indians. The large Southern California city of San Diego is close to Tijuana, So, Tijuana is close to San Diego, right?

Mojave Desert

            The Mojave desert is an important part of Southwestern USA. But the much smaller Colorado desert of the Salton Sink is important too. It is densely populated in part including Palm Springs. It has some important agriculture near Salton Sea. It also has an intricate and extensive highway and road system and has relatively easy access to the large city of Los Angeles and to the Pacific Ocean. It is also connected to Mojave desert in a couple of ways and both share portions of the Colorado River. The Colorado River has long been an important feature of the American Southwest. I believe that both the Mojave and the Colorado touch on the Sonora desert. The Sonora is a connection between Mexico and the US Southwest. 

Wildlife

            The Southwest has plenty of wild life even in the deserts. Since the 1950s and the control of DDT there is more wildlife than ever. There are certainly more mountain lions and probably coyotes than antes. I have even seen Mexican red wolves for the first time. There are more Mountain  sheep with their great horns. Maybe there are not more of them, but rather we see more of them because we are living closer together. No one has seen a camel in a long time. Some birds have increased in number; I not roadrunners and ravens among them. More quail seem to be being shot.

                 There is a lot of pressure on the wild habitat of the Southwest. Bears are seen, but rarely hunted. They are sometimes removed with little ceremony from some areas. They have been seen in desert foothills which has not been natural for them. Mountain lions have been seen on the desert recently which is not usual. Their feline second cousins, the bobcat, is not completely accustom to the the desert, but seem to get along well there and in many places. The bobcat may be trapped more than any animal except the rat these days, Trappers have found excellent foreign markets. Should you be looking for a different kind of wildlife and still stay in the SW, you can cross over to Nevada and soon be in Las Vegas.

            The little silver grey foe  is more common on the desert, but is seldom seen, It has become more nocturnal than ever, Desert tortists are still around, but sometimes like to travel and are too slow to get across the highways safely.

There are Towns in This SW

            I have mentioned cities, but have not mentioned towns. There are plenty of them in the Southwest of the United States, including on the desert. Nevada is still the least populated state in the American Southwest. It has plenty of towns, big ones, little ones, and ghost towns, mining towns and even more than one cow town. At the end of WWII, Las Vegas could still be called a town. Need I mention that Las Vegas has a large urban area and is certainly one of the world's largest gambling cities. There is another gambling city in Nevada is closer to being a town. It started with the mining boom, mostly silver. It is a charming and interesting city, RENO may be too far north to be considered Southwest.

            Not so very long ago one could take a burro ride from the village of Palm Springs to the agricultural trading of Indio and only pass a couple of houses as you traveled the desert along the base of mountains. Now you would traverse highway traffic through densely packed cities in your car. One could have found the open desert of old beautiful but, those new cities have an attraction of their own. 

            In a past not so ancient, Hollywood, California was a very small Southwestern town. Now, though it is much larger, it is small enough to seem lost in Los Angeles county. Hollywood movie stars would make the trip to the quiet of Palm Springs in shiney cars very different from the cars of today. There in that desert they could already, find quiet rest and recreation. There were Already many lovely swimming pools to cool of in before World War Two, there were pleasant horseback trips, Enough cocktails lounges, good food, and the Racket Club. In the same desert many cowboy films were made.

            In this same Southwest there is sun and snow, mountain and beach, river and wood, and more and more. This little is very far from comprehensive, but I trust that you have encountered a tasty bit or two.

            Thank you for reading.        

                                                                                    RCS 

Archaeology, preHistory, and History From Times Before the U.S.

 A glance, a peek, a little look into the past of one region on Earth

                As there was no United States yet during the times we will look at here it might be better to say that this is a look at pre-Columbian North America. That is the lands now claimed by the people of Canada, the U.S., and Mexico. There is much to learn of and from these times. You may take the following as a brief  introduction to topics which are entertained on this blog which includes essays, videos, archaeology, prehistory and a bit more.

                    In the Americas precolumbian times are those times before around 1492 before Columbus had touched on the american continents. A time that began for us when we began to the many different peoples who were encountered by those arriving soon after Columbus. Archaeology is a quickly growing science which is often actually digging up items from the past doings of humans and analyzing them. Prehistory is the history which comes to us not written. I is not a precise time. In away it is information about the past from before there were historians. With this little review I am ready to move forward.

                    I see now that what I have written here is mostly about what has now become that part of North America, which became the USA. As I am a Gringo, I have a reason, often called an excuse. The name Gringo was originated by Mexicans at one of those times the people north of the Rio Grand chose to fight with those people south of the Rio Bravo and those people chose to fight back. History which is simple is usually best not trusted. The Rio Grand/Grande and the Rio Bravo are both the same river which in my experience is neither grande nor bravo. In English neither big nor fierce. 

                        

                Anyway, when combatants rested from shooting one another they often sang. Often they sang nightly. Those north of the river very much liked a popular song with the refrain, "And green grow the rushes ho." On the south side of the river one asked another what the noise was and the other answered. "It's the Gringos" the plural of how "Green grow" sounded from that side of the river.

                    Now I have simplified the story, but that's history.

                    And now I will go on with short form of the history while being as honest as I can in hopes that you will be the wiser for my telling.

               

                 We have have learned from early post columbian persons(often indirectly) such as the Spaniard Hernando de Soto and his report on his 1540 to 1542 travers of what is now the U.S. southwest and also and also from other early Spanish visitors and colonists. Now that was a long sentences, but it was my effort to shorten and simplify this story of history. I hope you enjoyed my effort on your behalf. You may read it again if  you so wish. That was less than 200 years ago. Religion is part of history. One of the most recent bringer of many hundreds of such bringers came about 2,000 thousand years ago. Now on YouTube we are being told of human doings of  before Noah's flood. Others on You Tube are telling us that we were up and doing 20,000 years ago and probably had experience more than one really big flood and some really big comets, and a lot of parties. Some real experts are tellings that it is very likely humans were up and doing more than 200,000 years ago. Between those times and this there have been some curious happenings and doings.

                    The Spanish were not the first to arrive in the Americas which we once called the New World. Most of those we called Indians  came in waves after the last Ice Age and some before that. Just before the Spanish came the Portuguese had followed the cod here. Before that came the Vikings. It seem that the Dutch followed the Portugues everywhere and got to this New World before the English.

Spanish:

                    The Spanish looked around a lot and did some finding. The next people who came in some numbers and did considerable looking around were the French, French voyageurs. We have learned from those them. They wrote about their doings as did the Spanish. So from them we have some documented stories we can call history. The French came about 100 years after the Spanish and what we have called Native Americans, had already suffered a lot. What we have called Voyageurs,were interested in fur and traveled to where it could be gotten. They learned to trade with the early comers we have called natives, persons born to the land.

French:

                    Many French arrived. They moved up and down the Mississippi drainage basin and elsewhere. They observed the native Americans and found them and their settlements less impressive than the Spaniards had. I the past century the native culture had deteriorated greatly. The great die-off had begun. 

A French visiter, an artist. saw the Indian activity with the eyes of an artist and saw it as curious, but not impressive. A caption on a 1590 painting of his done in what is the northeast Florida read, "Sometimes the deceased king of this province is buried with great solemnity, and his great cup from which he was accustomed to drink is placed on a tumulus with many arrows set about it." His painting may have have been exactm, but his captio is likely to have been written with more humor than understanding.

                    The early Spanish and later the earliest French who traveled up and down the Mississippi river and its large tributaries such as the Missouri and Ohio rivers were privileged to see many mounds and other earth works still in use and cared for.

                After about 1670 priests and others traveling these rivers were finding most of the mounds becoming grown over with grass and some brush. However, some of the sites, like those at what was to become the present of the city of Saint Louis, Were still able to impress them. Avery few, like those at Natchez, were still occupied and French colonists found it necessary to remove Indians by force.

English:

                By 1770 the Indian population east of the Mississippi to the Atlantic coast and all along the Mississippi and its tributaries was greatly diminished. The Dutch, English, were adding to the Spanish, Portugues, and French European arrivals. English were arriving in great numbers and learned little of what the various Indian culture had been 200 years earlier. Still we have gather much information about the mounds, other earthworks, and Indians themselves from the writings of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Samuel Haven, and later Wesley Powell.

     

Us, Now:

                These days, 500 post Columbian years later, archaeologist are digging up a great deal of bone and artifact and providing us with much new information and providing fresh analysis. Since the great die off there is some return of population growth of population of those of Indian background, but many languages have been lost and much culture has been lost too. But a notable number of those named Indians and there culture is still among us; Americans all. Along with the archaeological information the is significant ethnological information available. You can find more prehistorical and historical information here on Mago Bill. Mago Bill history is mostly Irish.

                This example of the relatively new archaeological information available is from the not so new site of Watson Break. Watson Break is located in the present-day Ouachita Parish in the state of Louisiana. It dates from what has been called the North American Archaic Period. What is now Ouachita Parish has been home to many succeeding Native american groups in the thousand years before Europeans began to settle there. People of the Marksville culture, Troyville culture, Coles Creek culture, and Plaquemine culture built villages and earthwork mound sites throughout the area. a notable example is Filohiol Mound site located on a natural levee of the Ouachita river.

                Watson Break earthworks date to about 5,400 BP; which is about 3,500 BC. The arrangements of the mounds at WB was constructed over centuries by what is thought to be a hunter gatherer society. It is located near Watson Bayou in the floodplain of the Ouachita river. By the way, bayous might have been human modifications for communications and agriculture. The Break site consists of eleven mounds connected by ridges and causeways to form a large oval of nearly 900 feet across.Researchers believe the Break site is older than the better known Poverty Point site.

                Watson Break people seem to have planned and organized work forces to accomplish their earthworks.

                The site seems to have been abandoned around 2,800 BC.

                You can find out more about Native Americans on this History With RCS blog site and I hope to add more from time to time.

                When you have corrections, additions, questions, or other comments there is a "comments" app below for you to use.

                Thank you for reading.

                                                                                        Richard Sheehan

        

                 

The City of Mounds: St Louis. Old World Images (1848-1899) Pre Reset / C...

History With RCS: St. Louis City Please add some more history to this video. Use the "comments" section below this post. I am especially interested in pre Civil War history. Also any archaeology from in or around the city would be great. 

 

Pampas and Llanos: Grasslands of South America

History With RCS: In North America there are prairies and plains. In South America there are pampas and llanos. 

 

                There are lots of stories that come from all the American grasslands, but here is offered a taste of history.

                In the south of south America one often hears the the word pampas or la pampa. In the north of that continent, one more often hears the word llanos. These wide grasslands have their history and their prehistory.

                Only 10,000 years ago people were eating doedicurus not far from the present location of the great Argentinian capital of Buenos Aires near the edge of the pampa. In case you are not well acquainted with the doedicurus, they are a kind of glyptodont. You could call those doing that eating, American Indians.

                In the late 1500s, Spanish Americans began to settle in the pampa. By 1833 there were about 40 million head of 'wild' cattle on the Argentinian grasslands. These cattle were offspring of those brought and 'lost' by the earlier explorers and settlers. That sounds reminiscent of happenings in North America to me. During the increase in these herds on the Pampa there was a decrease in the numbers of Native Americans there. Between that increase and decrease one might imagine an interesting story or two, perhaps with mention of a gaucho or two.

                Heading to the North of the continent we could learn about the llaneros, the men and women of the llanos. Llaneros formed much of Bolivars cavalry. That cavalry di much  to overthrow Spanish rule over the continent in the 1920s. Descendants of those llaneros can still be found in the llanos of Colombia and Venezuela. A few of them now resist the dominion of "Yankee capital and imperialism." The attitude might be "Over my horse, only me, over me only my hat."

                Among the early noted horsemen to explore the llanos were German "conquistadors" were men like Nicolas Federman, Nikolaus Federmann, who's patrons had loaned vast sums of money to Spanish royalty in the early 1500s. Makes me wonder what Spanish nobility did with the wealth they gained from there "new world" colonies. Start a European Rebirth? The sponsors of the three German groups sent to South America gained little wealth from their ventures. Still, Spaniards were able to pay debts and Germans profited a bit from the starting and running the first commercial airline in South America.

                About 270 years after the first Germans were allowed to explore the llanos, the Spanish allowed another prominent foreigner into their South American llanos. That person was baron Alexander von Humboldt. I believe at the time he was not yet baron, but does deserve the title. Every educated American and European knows that name; there may be exceptions. The baron was a Prussian naturalist and much more. He became the father of modern geography and --except for Napoleon-- the best known European of his time.

                I believe that Humboldt told this story of his time in the llanos: At one camp his host was so disturbed early one night, that the baron to felt the disturbance. Unknown to either of them, in the dry packed earth directly below the hosts hamaca, a very large alligator-like animal was hibernating through the dry season. Just as his host was composed for sleep, something disturbed the crocodilian. To the surprise of all, it erupted noisily from the earth. However it soon left, with an evident air of disgust, to find a more peaceful resting place. The camp too was soon resting peacefully.

                Thank you for reading.

                                                                            RCS

 

Back to the Adena Culture

History With RCS, archaeology: People of the the Hopewell tradition were ancestral to many modern Indian Nations. 

                They may also represent an important tradition extending back in what seems a continuous line, to a time of the mega Fauna. They may even have used the atlatl as early as that. They had certainly maintained a recognizable way of living extending hundreds of years into the past.

                 The Hopewell people, like many other Native American people, were matrilineal. In such cultures a man and a woman may have joined under the name of the woman's family. The children of such union may have had the responsibilities and privileges of the female line. If I, as a male, were a member of the culture, my "surname" would become that of my wife's mother, grand mother, and great grandmother. My children would bear that name. I might become known for the doings of my wife's family. 

                I am far from sure of the ways matrilineality effected their culture. However even the little we can learn may help us to better consider how Patrilineality may effect a culture. 

                The Hopewell have been called Mound Builders and came from a long line of such builders. They built more than complex mounds; they built a variety of interesting earthworks. They also made tools and artworks of stone, mica, copper, bone, wood, and much else.

                A work of theirs is called the Newark Earthworks and is located near Newark and Heath, Ohio in what is now the U.S.A. Three sections of this work have been identified and called: the Great Circle, the Octagonal, and the Wright Earthworks. As you may guess the complex was built by people we call Hopewell, The work was done between 100 BC and 500 AD. The Hopewell may have begun a decline as early as 400 AD. The Great Circle has called the biggest earthwork circle in the world or in the U.S. It is very big. It is believed to have been used as a place of ceremony, social gatherings, trade, worship, and honoring the dead. 

                Scholars have demonstrated that the Octagonal Earthwork was used as a lunar observatory for tracking the moon's orbit during its 18.6 year cycle.

                Trade: Evidence of their work and commerce has been found from south Florida and near the mouth of the Mississippi to the Great Lakes, and from the Rocky mountains to the Appalachian mountains. and some say, to the Atlantic coast of North America. Much of such evidence is concentrated in the drainage areas of the Mississippi, Ohio, and Missouri rivers.

                After 1492 Europeans were becoming aware of the earthworks of the Hopewell and Adena people. First the Spanish and latter the French commented on some of the mounds being abandoned and over grown with grass, brush, and trees. The English and American colonists became curious of mounds at an even latter date, They dug into them. They found goods; goods of many kinds from pottery to gold. Some of their finds were wonders. Including skeletal remains of persons of a bigger of a size than any of the finders.

                Some of the finders were interested in that which could be sold. Others wondered who the builders could be. Certainly not the few sad Indians they saw around them. The Indians they saw around them were the children who's families had been diseased and cruelly exploited  by Europeans for over 300 years. What you see is what you get. They were not seeing the "noble redman." We are still learning about who those builders were. We still have much to learn. Most of the evidence points tot  the Native people living near us today.

                For now, I will say that it has seemed reasonable to believe that the Hopewell people experienced a peak in their culture from about 200 BC to about 400 AD. They were proceeded by an interesting and long lived culture called the Adena. Like the Hopewell they traded from the Gulf of Mexico to a bit beyond the Great Lakes and all along the Mississippi Drainage system, including the Ohio and Missouri rivers. There is much evidence that the Adena were active from about 1,000 BC to about 200 BC.

                I hope to post about the Adena When I believe there is interest among my readers.

                Experienced ones say that we have much of value to learn from the signs left by our Native predecessors, when we would dig carefully.

RCS

 

Mago Bill: One

 Mago Bill is a nickname I have given my paternal great grandfather

                                

                I have used the name Mago Bill in recent blogs because I believe that it inspires me to give you some unusual and interesting backstories and histories in a variety of posts.

                My sister, the genealogist of our family, introduced me to existence of documentation of the life pf M. William Sheehan. His existence had not been known to us. We had not known his name nor that he had been our paternal great grandfather. As I remember, my sister showed me that he had probably been born in the far south of Ireland and that his parents had brought to the United States when he was very young. We soon discovered that the M in his name probably stood for Mago. to me he promptly became Mago Bill, my inspiration.

                Spanish speaking friend tell me that "mago" means magician. Some of the same friends tell me that the three kings or three wise men of Christmas who brought gifts to the infant Christ were call "magos." I have found that  Mago was an important name among the Carthaginian Phoenicians before Rome came of age. Some of that name knew Hannibal well.

                Carthaginian traders and traders and navigators came to Ireland to trade for tin an other commodities. They brought so much knowledge of the name Mago with them that it impressed some of the people there. So much that they used it. For hundreds of years the name Mago has experienced some on an off popularity in Ireland.

                You may have read before that my paternal great grandfather was named and called Mago William Sheehan and that I have called him Mago Bill. You have even read that he, as many and Irish lad from time to time, was named after a famous Carthaginian. However, have you remembered me writing of Mago Barca?

    

                Barca could have been that famous Carthaginian Phoenician of the late third century BC, or not. Mago Barca was Hannibal's (yes, that Hannibal) brother. He may well have been a navigator and also have fought Roman legions in Iberia accompanied by Irish and Dan. He was the youngest son of Hamilcar of the Barcids.

                The above has prompted my to think of the Balearic Islands and food. The   Balearics seem to have an Irish connection of a sort. On Menorca, Mago Barca lent his name to the port city there which is still called Port Mahon. Mago and Mahon much alike to us today, but the history of language is one of change.

                Does not Mahon seem to have a bit of an Irish ring. I remember seeing  photos of Balearic ladies long ago. They looked very much like my aunt Eleanor and sister Geraldine. My sister would probably agree that she was and is better looking than was my aunt. The Balearic ladies of the photos were all attractive and I was struck by their similarity to Eleanor and Gerry.

                Ah, yes, food! Mahon, the typical Mahon egg sauce of the island, that has conquered the world, is Mayonnaise! On a visit to Ireland, I found mayonnaise still moderately appreciated. Still isn't there another mayo something or other on the old sod. Do not think me capable of a nasty thought. You may have heard of Mayo County, Ireland.

                I seem to be on a bit of a roll. I thought of another couple of miscellaneous bits to add here. Gilli, gilly, ghilli, and ghilly is only one of them. I've searched for each online with no luck. I had a friend who's Irish mother spoke of having a gilli in the family. This was many years ago and I had heard of ghilly long before that. A ghilly is an Irishman, across centuries he has been one of particular talents. He can be one especially familiar with the Irish countryside. He might act as a guide. He might help one to catch a trout or salmon by hand. In amore distant time he may have been the right hand man of noble warrior. He might have been a sort of Irish Ninja and expert in the use of camouflage. He might have been expert in a martial art. He would have the skills and talents of a huntsman. If  you have heard more of ghilly tell us a bit. This is supposed to be an interactive site.

                There are still those in Ireland who know the term and there were those who used it hundreds of years ago. The gilli I speak of is unlikely t have been a Norwegian dancer. I have heard that there may have been a similar word with a similar pronunciation and, perhaps, meaning.

                I may have heard more than I know.

                The Irish whistle comes to mind and reminds me that  there is also an Irish bagpipe. Could the bagpipe have also been a Fir Bolg instrument? I have been told that when it comes to men before a battle, that an Irish whistle can get them on their feet as little else can.. But to keep them moving forward to battle, victory, death, or hell, it takes a good pipe and a good piper, even if it be a Scot.

                I am pleased that you did not miss this addition to this piece. Thanks for reading.

                

                                                                                RCS