The Okie Legacy
Oakie's Heart To Heart

16 June 2001, Vol. III, Iss. 24

As the Legend Goes...

During our bus trip from Durango to Silverton, the bus driver/guide told of a legend concerning the nearby vacation spot of the Dalton gang. I don't know if this is fact or fiction, but decided to pass it along anyway because... it made for a great story.

As the legend goes... The legend of the Dalton Ranch in SW Colorado (now a resort and golf course), 6 miles north of Durango was thought to be once owned by relatives of the Dalton gang. The Dalton gang would choose that spot to vacation near the Colorado Rockies like everyone does after a grueling few weeks of work.

You all know the Dalton gang's work took them to places such as Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma where they robbed banks and trains and would head off towards the mountains to visit relatives and lay low. There was this one time that they were up north of Durango near Telluride and ran out of money. To get money to head back east towards Oklahoma, Kansas, and Missouri to continue their normal work of robbing banks, the gang decided to rob the bank in Telluride to get spending money back to Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri.

I'm not sure how the story ended or if it is fact, fiction or whatever, but if someone out there has any little legends to add to that, Email Oakie.

Oakie's NW Corner...

As the wheat dust settled in the northwest, I caught this glimpse of the sun settling in the west earlier this week as the harvesters were rushing with Mother Nature to finish the harvesting before the rain. The wheat dust was still sifting down through the air as the rays of sun reached out and glowed in the distance.

The wheat farmers began their harvest around the time we got back from Colorado and the country thoroughfares were a rural traffice jam of wheat trucks, combines and tractors between fields and grain elevators as they were carrying their bushels of wheat to the elevators in the NW parts of Oklahoma. The farmers were also getting their second cutting of alfalfa and have begun putting it up for hay.

Yep! For a change, Mother Nature was cooperating nicely for most of the week with her hot, sunny winds enabling farmers to get their wheat harvested. Now if they could just get a decent price for the grain to cover the cost of the planting and harvest.

I happened to be driving the country roads around the Dacoma area and snapped this shot as one of many combines blowing the wheat chaff across the road in my direction. Big mistake to stop your vehicle near where the combines blow the wheat chaff. Big mistake to roll down the car window and snap a picture... LOL... It's a wonder that it came out sharp and crisp. I had to shut my eyes to keep the chaff out of my eyes. It did fill the front seat of my pickup truck, but with windows rolled down and driving on down the road afterwards... the wind helped settled the chaff and blow some of it back out the window to some extent.

Remember this Winter when you put out bird seed and sunflower seeds for the birds who wintered here?

Well! Some of those large sunflower seeds began to grow this spring in my backyard. I nutured a few of the healthy stalks (three to be exact) and this is the sunshine surprise I found waiting for me when we arrived back from the mountains of Colorado.

Have you notice this is a shorter newsletter this week. Besides recuperating from vacation and getting wheat dust blown at me, I'm taking it easier this week. Thanks to all who wrote in with notes and encouragement. They are always appreciated.

Thanks, Vernon! I received the WWII POW info in the mail while I was away on vacation. Thanks for sending me the info.

Have a great weekend! Happy Father's Day to all you Fathers out there! See you next week.

-- Linda - "Oakie"

Linda K McGill Wagner
c/o WWW Publishing Co

Thanks! You can also view The OkieLegacy online. Copyrighted © 2008 by WWWPubCo & OkieLegacy.  All Rights Reserved.

Mailbag & Links....

The Raccoon... The World Wide Raccoon Web says, "The Raccoon is the trickster, the sly and crafty one who may appear slow, but who is quick and agile; the opponent who outsmarts his enemies, and who uses his hands like a human. The Raccoon is the survivor, who lives alongside man as if to show him that he cannot truly conquer the land."

Does anyone out there have any Acme ideas how Wylie Coyote could outsmart a Rascally Raccoon and keep the coon from tearing up the bird feeders hanging from the trees? Someone told me pepper (or pepper spray) was a good deterant. If you have a remedy,please Email Oakie and I will pass the ideas along to the other readers out there with this problem.

HENNEPIN CEMETERY, in Hennepin, OK, located in the far northwest part of the county on the Murray-Garvin County line, in the community of Hennepin, Murray County, OK.

"Hi, Linda! I love your photos of Colorado flowers and scenery. Makes me want to vacation there soon! Thanks for all the time and effort you put into your newsletter. I really enjoy reading it, and always look for a name I recognize from my old hometown." -- Sherry

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New Mexico Scenic Marker, US64, Palisades Sill... In the Cimarron Canyon State Park, there are tall cliffs that line both sides of the road. Palisades Sill is a steep cliff that rises 600 feet above the canyon floor. There's no way to get a good picture of it, so here's a few pictures of the roadside marker and Cliffs nearby this rest stop and the Steep Cliffs & stream of Palisades Sill.

The Scenic Marker says, "Palisades Sill - these spetacular cliffs are cut by the Cimarron River through egneous rock known as a sill and composed of the rock type monzonite which was emplaced some 400 million years ago as these southern Rocky mountains were being uplifted. Elevation 8,000 feet."

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"Linda, Magnificent is truly an understatement when it comes to expressing my opinion of this (last) weeks
newsletter. I don't want to say that you out-did you self because you have the talent and potential for many wonderful things. Beautiful photography and a great travelogue. Now quit that blushing !....." -- Ernest

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The Dalton Gang.... The Gunslinger.com has this to say about the Dalton gang, "I guess it would be popular or romantic to say that the Dalton brothers were driven to a life of crime, the fact is they grew up during wild times in a wild place. They were raised on the border of Indian Territory, near Coffeyville, KS. "

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The Lawrence Ranch... Located north of Taos, NM, there is an historcial scenic marker for the Lawrence Ranch.

The marker reads, "The Kiowa Ranch, home of novelist D. H. Lawrence and his wife Frieda in 1924-25, was given to thme by Mabel Dadge Lahan. Frieda continued to live at the ranch after his death, and later married Angelo Ravagle. In 1934 they bult a shrine for Lawrence's ashes. Aldous Huxley as among the many visitors to the ranch." I don't know that much about D. H. Lawrence except that he was an English novelist. If anyone else has any information to add please Email Oakie.

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"Oakie: Re: "Million Dollar Highway" --- some Utopian thinker of the 19th Century was picturing what travelling in the Utopian Future would be like: once the nasty habit of human greed was solved & Mankind started to treat each other like Brothers & Sisters [i.e. robbing & thieving became a thing of the past]: Well, then --- as you came over the hill & looked toward your destination, you would see this golden glow: Towns & Cities Shining on the Hill, every roof sheathed in gold, since it is the perfect material that never oxidizes. Passed down from one generation to the next, in the Utopian Future, families would be safe & warm in homes that would never leak, built of stone to last last forever."-- Eric, Charlotte, NC.

"I too keep sunflower seed in my bird feeder the year around. I buy the black seed which is really much smaller than the regular giant size seed. This year I had volunteer sunflower plants to come up, but when they bloomed they were not so thrifty as yours. Some were very small and others were not wonderful in appearance. One year I bought some of the 'giant' sunflower seed and they produced very large blooms. Ain't it a marvel how the birds scatter the seed, but maybe its a blessing to the critters that can't get the seed from a squirrel proof feeder. The wild sunflower plants that come up in the pasture sometimes get a little too thick and I have to spray them to thin them out. This year I have a problem with my blackberries getting out of their fence rows. So far I have kept them under control by brush-hogging them down (in Mississippi, we call it bush-hogging). This is only a stop-gap solution and eventually I will have to have them sprayed. I always look forward to receiving an interesting tidbit from you." -- Ernest