Document text
Forms to be Filled out for Each Interview
FORM A
Circumstances of Interview
FOLKLORE
NEW YORK
STATE New York
NAME OF WORKER Earl Bowman
ADDRESS 86 West 12th Street, NYC
DATE January 3, 1939
SUBJECT "HOW SALTON SEA WAS CAUGHT" (An Uncle Steve Robertson story)
1. Date and time c' interview
2. Place of interview
3. Name and address of informant Narrated by Harry Reece, 63 Washington Sq.,So.,NYC
4. Name and address of person, if any, who put you in
toucn with informant. See previous interviews
5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you
6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, for any of the forms, each
bearing the proper heading and the number to which the material refers.)
FORM C
Text of Interview (Unedited)
STATE New York
NE OF wonua Earl Bowman
ADDRESS 86 West 12th St., NYC
DATE January 3, 1939
SUBJECT HOW SALTON SEA WAS CAUGHT
FOLKLORE
NEW YORK
"My Uncle Steve Robertson, who was a great pioneer in
the Far Nest in the very early days indeed, and who had many strange
experiences and performed some remarkable deeds in his time, told me
haw 'Salton Seal happens to be where it is and why it...stays there...
"It would be scandalous for me to doubt any of the beautiful
stories that my Uncle Steve Robertson told me when we used to go on
hunting and fishing trips together, for Uncle Steve was a pioneer of
great integrity and often said that...'there was...one danged human
critter he couldn't endure and that was a cussedixaggerater that
stretches th' truth till she snaps an' flies back an' hits him in his
doggone face...'.
"So, Uncle Steve's yarn about haw the Salton Sea happens to
be where she is and why she stays there is no doubt quite authentic;
at least, who am I, a mere 'tenderfoot' with very little experience as
a IDioneer' in the early days of the Far West, to doubt it?
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"It was one early September in--- I think about 1909--- when
we had journeyed over to Malheur Lake, in Eastern Oregon, to shoot a
couple of ducks, that Uncle Steve told me about Salton Sea.
"In camp after supper one evening I had mentioned to Uncle
Steve that I once shot a duck or two dawn in the Mojave Desert, and
that it was very hot shooting indeed, and that I had shot them on a
very unusual Lake which some people called the 'Salton Sea'....
"'Well, I gosh, now ain't that a cuincident,' Uncle Steve
exclaimed. 'I Gawd, so that's what they call it new, 'th' Salton Seal.
Jest think my own nephew's shot ducks on that lake that I made yeah,
well, that is Bob White an' me made it, or mebbe to be plumb accurate an'
truthful I shouldn't aljatito say we made it, but by gosh we staked th'
damnthing dawn, there ain't no cussed doubt about thatl
"It was that time that Bob and me and 'Mam', that was Bob's
wife, was migratin' from Arizona, that time it got so danged hot and
dry all them forests and even th' doggone buzzards petrified...
"'Yeah, we was gettint out of that district and headin' up
towards Idaho but when we got out in the middle of that doggone Mojave
Desert one of our mules was bit by a gila monster and we had to camp
till he got able to travel again.., an' that was quite a while for them
damned gila monster bites, even on mules, is painful as hell ant it
takes them a long time to heal up an' git normal again.
"'So, we picked out a grove of Joshua trees ant camped in
it... of course we had a pretty good supply of water with us in our
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kegs and then there was quite a lot of them barrel -cactus an' we'd
cut them open to get the water that was in them for the mules while
we was campine there in the desert. We didn't actually suffer for
water but it shore was hell to see all them efloatin, lakes' jest
sparklin' out there on the desert an' never able to go swimardne in
themI It shore was a torment...
"Mebbe I didn't mention it before, but that part of the
old Mojave Desert where we was campin' was noted for efloatine lakes'....
yeah, some people call 'em emirridgese...
"You jest look out across the sand under the blazin'
blisterine dadgummned sun and I gawd there they are. Purtiest
cussed lakes you ever see... You can see trees along their banks an'
/-gosh you can even see the water rippline like the wind was stirrine
it-- like Malheur Lake was this afternoon when them green -heads come
down an' we shot them three. That's the way they looked.
"'They jest teased you to go swimmin' in 'am-- But they was
them damned efloatine lakes' like I said, an' I-Gawd when anybody'd
start toward 'em they'd jest float away, and keep backine up an' backin'
up and back up clean across the desert into the mountains...
"'Bob and me used to try to catch one so we could go swimmine
in it and we'd walk ourselves darned nigh to death but still couldn't
catch it an' finally we'd jest stop an' stand there an' cuss an' cuss
an' cuss...
"Till finally I jest says to bob, 'I-Gawd, Bob, they ain't
no damn use us wastin' our breath cussine an' cussin' them damn lakes.
4
Nobody ever gits nothint by jest cussinl, what anybody's gotta do is
figger th' double -damned thing out and scheme to git ahead of it ant
do some -thin' about it-- 'Besides', I told Bob, 'we ought to be ashamed
of ourselves cussin' so damned much, you know damned well that 'Main'
don't like for us to cuss all th' damned time, I-gawd.'
"'That's what I told Bob we'd have to do about them 'floatin'
lakes' if we ever was goin' to catch one and go swimmini in it ant git
a bath which all of us even th' cussed mules, includin' the one that was
bit by the gila monster (he was Old Yaller...th' one with a black stripe
down his back) needed damn bad...
"Well, Bob, he couldn't figger out how to ketch that cussed
Ifloatin' lake' but I always could figger anything out, if I jest set
my head to it an' figgered long enough and hard enough-- An' that's
the way I figger a man's got to be, especially the way us pioneers of
the Far West in th' early days, if a man sits anywhere.
"'Nobody else ain't goin' to figger nothin' out for a man,
he's gotta figger it out for hisself. So, I-Gawd, that night after
supper I jest set there in that grove of Joshua Trees where we was
camped ant figgered 'haw in hell, now, can anybody git a damned Ifloatin'
lake' to hold still long enough for a man to go swimmin' in it? I-Gawd,
haw can it be done?' I figgered to myself, jest settin' there in that
grove of Joshua Trees while th' moon was shinin' out there on th' desert
and ever' once in a while a coyote would howl out there somehwere and
once in a while that poor cussed mule that had been bit by th' damned
gila monster would kind of groan --although th' bite on his leg was grad
ually gittin' better by then...
5
"'But I figgered an' figgered an' finally, settin' there
after supper that night I got a 'insp'rationl I'd got henl
"'There was a hell of a lot of nice straight, young Joshua
Tree poles in that grove we camped in and them damned poles was my
insplration...
"'So, I called Bob an' said: 'Bob, I'gosh, git your axe
we're goin' to do some choppin'-- Th' moon's light enough for us to
see by, an' I-Gawd, I want to get a lot of these damned young Joshua
tree poles cut down an' sharpened an' have 'am ready for tomorrowl'
"'Bob says, Mat th' hell do you want to do that for?
Anyhow, it's th' first time I've been cool today-- after chasin'
that damned 'floatin' lake' like we did, an' if we do a lot of ohoppin'
we'll git hot as hell again...'
"'But I told Bob to never mind what we was choppin' th'
Joshua Tree poles down and sharpenin"em for. I jest told him to
wait till th' next day ant he'd find out 'cause I'd figgered somethin'
out and when I figgered anything out, I-Gawd, I had her figgered out.
"'So, we chopped dawn and sharpened about twentyfime of them
damned Joshua Tree poles, then we carried 'em out an' strung 'em along
about twenty feet apart, about a hundred yards from camp...
"Then we went to bed.
"Next day when we looked out an' saw that damn 'floatin'
lake' flickerin' out there in the sun, I says to Bob
"'Now Bob, we're goin' to fool that damn thing... You sneak
around on th' other side of that damn floatin' lake-- be shore an'
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don't let her see you comm' till you're plumb around her, then when
you're right square on th' other side of her, start creepin' up on
her like you was goin' to go xwimmin, in her-- An' course when she
sees you comm' she'll start to slippin' an' floatin' back this way
towards camp.
"I'ilawd, I'll be waitin' an' when she gits up to where
we got them damn Joshua Tree poles strung along I'll grab 'em an'
drive 'em down in her an' stake her down...
"Ilgosh it worked! When Bob had driv' th' damn lake
right up to th' poles I grabbed one an' socked it down in her an'
drove it down before she realized what I was doin' an' there she
was Then I yelled at Bob an' he come around ant we drove th' rest
of th' poles down in her and staked her down good-- So, that's the
way it was.
"'We all went swim -in' in her...even 'Nam', that was Bob's
wife, an' the mules went swimmin' in that 'floatint lake' we'd staked
down out there on th' old Mojave Deserts
"'After we'd all had a good bath in her we felt so darned
good we hitched up and migrated on up here to th' Snake River country,
where lakes don't have to be staked down... Yeah, that's th' way it
was, an' as far as I know that's the only lake anybody ever staked
down...'specially in th' Mojave Desert, an' as far as I know also,
she's still staked there an' always will be be...
-7
("There have been other legends as to how 'Salton Sea'
came into being down there in the extremely warm Mojave Desert,
but my Uncle Steve Robertson seemed to be quite certain his version
of the strange body of water that so intrigues duck hunters during SOMB
seasons of the year is the real explanation.., and my Uncle Steve
Robertson 'despised anybody who would stretch the truth till she'd
snap an' fly back an' hit him in his cussed facet")