Reports from the Knowledge Labs about our recent findings, research topics, and interviews with lifestyle leaders who are creating their own futures.
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How to stimulate your own powers of foresight. Consider the following thought provokers. Ask yourself, in these categories what are the brand new trends and forces? Which are the ones growing in importance? Which current forces are loosing their steam? Which have peaked or are reversing themselves? Which are the "wildcards" about to disrupt us in the future? POLITICAL AND TECHNICAL thought for food: Electronics, Materials, Energy, Fossil, Nuclear, Alternative, Other, Manufacturing (techniques), Agriculture, Machinery and Equipment, Distribution, Transportation (Urban, Mass, Personal, Surface, Sea, Subsurface, Space), Communication (Printed, Spoken, Interactive, Media), Computers (Information, Knowledge, Storage & Retrieval, Design, Network Resources), Post-Cold War, Third World, Conflict (Local, Regional, Global), Arms Limitation, Undeclared Wars, Terrorism, Nuclear Proliferation, Weapons of Mass Destruction, Governments (More/Less Power and Larger or Smaller Scale), Taxes, Isms: Nationalism, Regionalism, Protectionism, Populism, Cartels, Multinational Corporations, Balance of Trade, Third Party Payments, Regulations (OSHA, etc.) Environmental Impact, U.S. Prestige Abroad. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC Food for thought:
Labor Movements, Unemployment / Employment Cycles, Recession, Employment Patterns, Work Hours / Schedules, Fringe Benefits, Management Approaches, Accounting Policies, Productivity, Energy Costs, Balance of Payments, Inflation, Taxes, Rates of Real Growth, Distribution of Wealth, Capital Availability and Costs, Reliability of Forecasts, Raw Materials, Availability and Costs, Global versus National Economy, Market versus Planned Economies, Generations: Y, X, Boomers, Elderly, Urban vs. Rural Lifestyles, Affluent vs. Poor, Neighborhoods and Communities, Planned or Organic Growth.
Got Knowledge?
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The Journal of 2020 Foresight
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Saturday, December 31, 2005
A Path of Original Experience: Where Only Fools and Heroes Dare to Tread
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“Earl Green is a painter so he painted the sign, he added two lines. It’s like a cow brand y’know, how they have brands on ranches. The Double L like that and Earl and Edith moved into the place and they were very clever; you know, Earl just added two lines. We talked about how Edith and Earl renamed the Double E and they almost made history. The locals rose up. They were mad as hell ’cause it used to be the Double L. Change comes slowly in the country. I told you that a long time ago.”
Neil Young & Crazy Horse “Greendale”
DOUBLE NICKEL RANCH. Is it only me or is the world making less and less sense? Mixing politics and religion always seems to devolve into never-ending life-draining arguments.
Journal of 2020 Foresight: Isn’t all this talk about religion and myths dangerous today?
Pathfinder: It certainly seems that way. But, you know throughout the history of the world we’ve tried to grapple with the origin of life and our existence in an infinite period of time and space.
J2020F: I know. But, I mean dangerous in the sense that fundamentalism and terrorism and extreme notions about what awaits us in an after life -- as terrorist martyrs or ordinary citizens --seems more urgent.
Pathfinder: Oh, you mean the extreme “us versus them.” Religion against religion -- “Pre-emptive Christianity” taking on all comers major and minor -- against science -- creationism, intelligent design vs. evolution, against humanists and athiests and so on.
J2020F: Exactly. Kind of like the deadly crisis created in the late 1800’s by the Fish-Eating Messiah and the Ghost Dancing Horse?
Pathfinder: Good point. But, at The Rendezvous we chose to focus on the inner dialog and imagery we all – Homo sapiens – experience at an emotional, life-changing or spiritual crossroads
J2020F: When we set out to follow our dreams but fall unprepared into the realm of original experience?
Pathfinder: What, are you reading cue cards or something?
J2020F: My own. What’s the difference between our own dreams and myths?
Pathfinder: My personal hero, Joseph Campbell said dreams are the personal canvas – the background to our conscious lives. Myths are like society’s dreams.
J2020F: So as long as your personal dreams synch with society’s you’re normal, right?
Pathfinder: But, when they aren’t you’re in for what Campbell called an “adventure in the dark forest.” And, if you can’t live outside of that society – as artists, visionaries, leaders and heroes do – you’ll become neurotic.
J2020F: Why?
Pathfinder: Because, the path of original experience hasn’t been interpreted for you.
J2020F: So, you’ve got to work it out all by yourself?
Pathfinder: You bet, over and over again throughout your own life span on this planet.
J2020F: And yet, we are not alone.
Got Knowledge?
Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
7:48 AM
Tuesday, December 20, 2005
Sedona to Manhattan, Same 30,000 Year Old Play Performed in Local Costumes
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“The term ‘rancho’ is Spanish…. ‘El Rancho’ kind of thing. It’s a funny thing in America. Spanish was there a long time ago, but still every once in awhile somebody writes down ‘rancho’ just because it sounds cool. So that’s what they did…. It used to be called the Double L, but now it’s called the Double E. It was a relatively easy change to make.”
Neil Young & Crazy Horse “Greendale”
DOUBLE NICKEL RANCH. During both of Pathfinder’s workshops some very fundamental questions about our life – our personal life story, and everything that has happened before we took our first breath -- commanded center stage in the Joseph Campbell and Geronimo Conference Rooms.
Journal of 2020 Foresight: As a result of your campfire discussions and your workshop dialogues, it sounds like everybody wanted to contribute to something bigger than themselves, to some kind of “Big Picture.”
Pathfinder: Well, once you begin considering the major events in the development of life on planet Earth, you branch off into an almost infinite number of paths.
J2020F: Like?
Pathfinder: Time scale, to begin with – millions of years ago and thousands of years ago. How many years ago did each of the known species of life entered the scene? When were the continents fused into one? Roughly 300 millions of years ago.
J2020F: You knew I was going to ask.
Pathfinder: Well, we were just marveling at the implications of the migration paths, fossilized footprints and land bridges.
J2020F: I imagine the Double Nickel Rendezvous conversations grew heated when some of those with vested interests in opposite worldviews exchanged their opinions.
Pathfinder: Not really. I don’t believe everyday people have polarized themselves into one extreme position or another, as the radical fundamental zealots would have us believe. Anyway, we set the ground rules early on and took a more historical view.
J2020F: For instance?
Pathfinder: We could all pretty much agree that biological evolution was even supported in ancient times. As early as 400 BC the Greeks taught that the sun, earth, life, humans, civilization, and society emerged over eons.
J2020F: So, is it fair to say the spirit of the events had more to do with respecting rather than rejecting each other’s belief system rather than obnoxiously arguing for a specific point of view?
Pathfinder: Yes. In fact, almost everyone agreed we need more venues to explore these kinds of discussions, if for no other reason than to better anticipate paradigm shifts.
J2020F: Well considering that we each only have one life to lead, and as you make one choice, you rule out another – you can’t have and do everything.
Pathfinder: So, it’s good to consider everyone else’s life story for commonalities and opportunities to explore something outside your own base of experience or limited point of view.
J2020F: As you said in Basecamp, since beginningless time people have wanted to know where life will take them.
Pathfinder: Exactly. One of my favorite quotes begins with, “The story of a human life grips us very directly because it is a case history of the condition we all share.”
J2020F: Even as we appear very conventional on the outside to the world.
Pathfinder: Yes. The history of the world, the different flavors of religion, all the scientific schools of thought each help us in one way or another to understand that we have much more in common than we know.
J2020F: And, what it means to be human.
Pathfinder: And, more importantly, to answer their own unique calling -- as an adventure. If I may, I’d like to quote Joseph Campbell from his “The Power of Myth” series of interviews with Bill Moyers:
“CAMBPELL: You've got the same body, with the same organs and energies, that Cro-Magnon man had thirty thousand years ago.
Living a human life in New York City or living a human life in the caves, you go through the same stages of childhood, coming to sexual maturity, transformation of the dependency of childhood into the responsibility of manhood or womanhood, marriage, then failure of the body, gradual loss of its powers, and death.
You have the same body, the same bodily experiences and so you respond to the same images. For example, a constant image is that of the conflict of the eagle and the serpent. The serpent bound to the earth, the eagle in spiritual flight -- isn't that conflict something we all experience?
And then, when the two amalgamate, we get a wonderful dragon, a serpent with wings. All over the earth people recognize these images. Whether I'm reading Polynesian or Iroquois or Egyptian myths, the images are the same and they are talking about the same problems.
MOYERS: They just wear different costumes when they appear at different times?
CAMPBELL: Yes. It's as though the same play were taken from one place to another, and at each place the local players put on local costumes and enact the same old play.
MOYERS: And these mythic images are carried forward from generation to generation, almost unconsciously."
J2020F: So, you’ve got to work it out all by yourself over and over again throughout your own life span.
Got Knowledge?
Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
7:19 AM
Friday, December 09, 2005
Migration Road Trips: 40,000 Year Old Footprints in Mexican Volcano Ash
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“Falling From Above. I’m doing some new songs that I wrote a while ago and this is chapter one. Just didn’t want to confuse you right out of the gate. Gonna see how far I can take you here with this new material, just see what happens. I still remember my old songs…. These songs are about a family that lives in a place called the Double E Rancho, outside of Greendale, just a few miles down a little road up in the hills.“
Neil Young & Crazy Horse “Greendale”
DOUBLE NICKEL RANCH. A few months post- rendezvous. Kicking around mortality, meaning, perspective and road trips. Or, more to the point, reflecting on paths taken or not.
Journal of 2020 Foresight: So, the “double nickel-ers” remembered road trips they had taken when they were just pups – “quarter-ers,” as it were.
Pathfinder: Sure. During one “cross-generation” conversation, the “Jimi Hendrix Experience, Are You Experienced?” popped into my head. The “quarter-ers” (25 year-olds) want to become experienced in their own way, the “double nickel-ers” (55 year olds) have been there and done that – but now it’s time for something else. You’ve even talked about it when you described some of the conversations you’ve had recently with the executives you coach.
J2020F: Now, that would be a concert – Jimi Hendrix and Mick Jagger?
Pathfinder: Some things are better left undone. Still if Hendix had survived his youthful excesses you can’t help but wonder what he’d be like in concert today?
J2020F: But, he didn’t. And, we’re back to our mortality – what almost every “double nickel-er” has experienced all too often – parents, spouses, brothers, or sisters – what baby boomer hasn’t lost someone recently?
Pathfinder: The trick, I suppose is to keep that certainty – that we will, in fact all die – in the forefront of our minds as a source of vitality and passion, instead of as a depressing long slide into oblivion.
J2020F: Most of “my execs” find themselves in midlife transition – but with a long severance package. They can take the time to find meaning in their lives, unlike other victims of downsizing, mergers and acquisitions or outsourcing.
Pathfinder: I believe life stories, the ones our members continue to share -- stories of transition and transformation – have always been with us – at least since the time we homo sapiens realized we all had lit fuses leading to the end of our lives.
J2020F: Speaking of which, I heard a newscast that reported a scientific controversy – 40,000 year old footprints were discovered in Mexico. Or not.
Pathfinder: Or not?
J2020F: They may have been 1 million years older – that’s the controversy.
Pathfinder: Just think, though. If they are indeed footprints and they can be verified to be 40,000 years old, that’s almost 28,000 years earlier than the accepted time frame for when humans crossed the northern land bridge from Asia.
J2020F: And that’s what I find fascinating – the core ancestors from which all of our ancestral tribes descended and migrated out of Africa can now be verified by DNA studies. We’re all one big happy family!
Pathfinder: Talk about road trips – our ancestors made their way through the harshest of conditions across continents -- which were much closer together than they are today, and geographical sub-regions as if they were navigating major migration rivers.
J2020F: On the map you can see how they branched out into their own tribal territories.
Pathfinder: And eventually, they slogged their way here, into the North American Continent as we know it today.
Pathfinder: Hardly anyone lived long enough to experience a midlife crisis. And, yet today a death or another significant disruption in our life bursts our status quo bubble. A significant emotional event opens us up to some very fundamental questions about our life – and for many -- rekindles a fascination with everything that has happened before.
Got Knowledge?
Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
6:49 AM
Saturday, December 03, 2005
The Big Blue Marble Going Up in Smoke While We Eye-Ball a Milky Way
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“There’s a lot going on in Greendale that I don’t know about either. Can you imagine? I mean, I made it up and I don’t know what the hell is goin’ on. So don’t feel bad if you feel a little out of it with this. No one really knows…. “
Neil Young & Crazy Horse “Greendale”
DOUBLE NICKEL RANCH. Somewhere up in the hills on the outskirts of Greendale. We know it’s in the known Universe spinning around on the Big Blue Marble, but exactly where? Those weren’t the only questions on Pathfinder’s mind.
Journal of 2020 Foresight: You described the big picture nature to the story-swapping around the Double Nickel campfires – cross-generational even conversations.
Pathfinder: Letting your eyes follow the trail of smoke and sparks shooting out and up from the bonfires will do that. Looking up to the stars your mind wanders to things like multiverses, the big bang, cosmology and astrophysics, string theory – lot’s of stuff the “double nickel-ers” found interesting coming out of the mouths of the “quarter” generation – having been forced to study the topics in college.
J2020F: I tried to comprehend Brian Greene’s “The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory” one time while laying on my back in a beach chair gazing up at the milky way and witnessing a shooting star extravaganza one camping trip in Big Sur.
Pathfinder: And?
J2020F: And, my mind hurt at first trying to grock the 11-dimensions of M-theory. But, as I let the Milky Way pull me into the night, I felt expansive – I underwent an expansive religious experience.
Pathfinder: I felt the same thing when we visited Bryce and Zion National Parks at the end of our road trip. I’d been reading about the geologic time scale before tripping out while gazing at the hoodoos.
J2020F: Awe inspiring, but I also felt very small and insignificant.
Pathfinder: I believe we all felt the same way around the Double Nickel campfires – especially during lulls in the conversation. You come to appreciate that you’re just a particle of sand in the great expanse of time on planet earth.
J2020F: Stories of transition and transformation – have always been with us and continued.
Got Knowledge?
Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
6:41 PM
Friday, December 02, 2005
What’s It All About? Two Bits for an Adventure on the Way to Greendale
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“If there is a huge map, which there is, that just shows Greendale, very little over here, there’s mountains and farms, over there, there’s an ocean…. Well, Greendale is a nice town, but it has its quirks….“
Neil Young & Crazy Horse “Greendale”
DOUBLE NICKEL RANCH. Closed to all but members and past participants, the first ever 55 Rendezvous continues online. For a brief time the ranch became home to explorers from all walks of life -- and from almost all stages of life.
Journal of 2020 Foresight: I’m going to ask each of you – the road trip members of the Corps of Re-discovery -- the same opening question. Why the Double Nickel Ranch and what do you take away from the experience?
Pathfinder: Well first of all, to me, the Double Nickel represented both the speed limit we never obeyed – this isn't being recorded is it? And, it signifies an age – extended mid-life – pre-retirement, if you will -- when you’ve got enough of life’s experience under your belt that you’ve been there and done just about everything there is to do.
J2020F: So it’s the draw of the open road – the age-old path to finding yourself with no guides or maps telling you or showing you a way. And it marks a time for a generation of 78 million at a crossroads in their life, right?
Pathfinder: Yes, but don’t forget we hosted quite a few from the other huge demographic – “the twenty-somethings” – the 80 million that fit the target demographic for “Road Trip Nation” on PBS.
J2020F: For the “double-nickel” generation, it’s about re-discovering passions buried beneath layers of work and family responsibilities.
Pathfinder: And, for the “quarter” generation, it’s about “discovering their distinct talents, passions, and idiosyncrasies” – and enjoying the freedom of not knowing where life will take them for the time being.
J2020F: So, both are in a life transition. The “quarter” generation experiences life in the prolonged school to work transition, while the “double nickel” generation comes to grip with their own mortality.
Pathfinder: One generation stretched it’s wings to leave the nest and to fly on it’s own and start another nest – renting at first with other “Friends.” The other’s figuring out just what to do about their empty-nest.
J2020F: You know, what I found fascinating was how they traded life stories without resorting to parent-teacher roles. Maybe it was the whole Mountain Man Rendezvous theme – spinning yarns and trying to top one and another?
Pathfinder: Yeah. What struck me – and is my answer to the second part of your question – the conversations turned to big picture topics and I realized a good number of double-nickel-ers wouldn’t mind returning to a university campus experience – while the “quarter-ers” wanted to get out of town ripe for new adventures.
J2020F: Big picture?
Pathfinder: Sure, the-- What’s-It-All-About? -- questions
Got Knowledge?
Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved
4:56 PM
Monday, November 28, 2005
Greendale’s Double Nickel Rendezvous
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“Greendale. We’re going on a little trip, folks…. So these songs are about a place called Greendale and it’s a green dale…. There’s a lot going on in town. It seems to be a pretty mellow place, really. In town there’s about 20 to 25,000 people and it’s not a very big place at all… “
Neil Young & Crazy Horse “Greendale”
DOUBLE NICKEL RANCH. He’s not known for his punctuality. So, while I waited I glanced over the flyer -- "Thirty Days in August 2005 at the Double Nickel Ranch." It didn’t seem that long ago; the event falling on the heels of an adventure covering 3000 miles across five Western states in temperatures ranging from 0 to 115 degrees and climbing from sea level to 12,183 feet – but, eventually ending in a desert – Las Vegas at New York, New York.
Journal of 2020 Foresight: Over here.
Pathfinder: Sorry about that. I was on a long distance call and lost track of time.
J2020F: No problem.
Pathfinder: What’s that in your hand.
J2020F: Oh, this? The “55 Rendezvous.” I was just re-reading how we had described the event and what your two workshops were about. See?
Double Nickel Rendezvous
"Thirty Days in August 2005 at the Double Nickel Ranch"
Welcome to the Double Nickel Ranch
Produced by The Knowledge Labs and the Journal of 2020 Foresight
IS NOW READ ONLY
Thank You To All Participants and Presenters
Rendezvous: Thirty Days in August 2005
Harkening back to Rocky Mountain Fur Trading spirit based on a French word meaning "appointed place of meeting."
We’ve all gone our separate ways since our last gathering.
* What’s out there?
* Where did you explore?
* What did you discover?
We’ll update everyone on what the Corps of Re-Discovery learned and the status of The Field Guide.
Join our tall tales campfire series: It ain’t all “bidness” –
Our outfitters and local guides assured us they’ve penciled in plenty of unstructured time for getting new supplies, renewing acquaintances with old friends, making new friends, story swapping, engaging in contests and games of skills – a perhaps a little drinking, controlled mayhem and general rowdiness.
You’ll enjoy our full ranch experience, including evening activities such as talent night, family dance night, barbecues on the creek, or watching as young foals and yearlings are being gentled.
There is world-class trout fishing.
Home-style meals are served in the dining room in the founder's Victorian ranch house.
You'll stay in comfortable cottages.
Visit the Knowledge Trading Post.
Schedule of Workshops
"FOR MEMBERS ONLY (Opening Day Tracts)"
Check out our Rendezvous Community Central for the schedule of working sessions and presentations in the following
Conference Rooms
Joseph Campbell Conference Room:
LIFE – How to learn from each other’s life stories – our triumphs and failures – to find our mutually enlightened self-interests.
Dialog Leader: Pathfinder
Jedediah Smith Conference Room:
PASSION - How to do what you love, where you want to do it – resort towns offering the right mix of quality of life and community lifestyles.
Dialog Leader: Eagle
Sitting Bull Conference Room:
LEGACY – How to make wise decisions to expand the lifetime value of your career equity.
Dialog Leader: Grey Owl
Sonora Pass Conference Room:
FORESIGHT – How to shift your perspective to anticipate and prevent devastating disruptions to your success
Dialog Leader: Trailblazer
Hudson’s Bay Company Conference Room:
(Members-Only) Meeting: Nominating other remarkable people to be invited to join as thought leader advisors.
Dialog Leader: Grey Owl
Cache Valley Conference Room:
INNOVATION – How to create and capitalize on new opportunities overlooked by your rivals.
Dialog Leader: Explorer
Geronimo Conference Room:
SIGNIFICANT LIFE EVENTS: How to turn a personal crisis into a new adventure.
Dialog Leader: Pathfinder
Green River Conference Room:
How to achieve growth and prosperity the right way – secrets from executive who had the courage to run ethical and profitable businesses
Dialog Leader: Explorer
John C Fremont Conference Room:
Big Bang, Long Fuse Decisions: Scenarios, Implications and Indicators.
Dialog Leader: Trailblazer
Kit Carson Conference Room:
Enlightened Self-Interest: Creating Better Opportunities for those Who Follow.
Dialog Leader: Grey Owl
Crazy Horse Conference Room:
SYNCHRONICITY - Mastering the effortless art of orchestrating passion, persistence and serendipity.
Dialog Leader: Grey Owl
Mark Twain Conference Room:
Closing Panel Discussion: Two Previews of What's Next from the Center for Knowledge Creation and Innovation (CKCI) in the Cross Roads Series:
1. Working for Yourself: Field Guide for forming Mobile KnowCos including business model description, customized business plan outline and five-year exit strategy.
2. Working for Others: Intrepreneur Field Guide --Talent Brands -- moving from a fad to tipping point trend – implications for executives, change sponsors and agents.
Pathfinder: That was fun. I really enjoyed the cross-generation-gap discussions.
Got Knowledge?
Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
1:06 PM
Friday, July 15, 2005
Vegas Reflections on the New American Dream
Chapter Three: The Outpost
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“We understand that your religion is written in a book. If it was intended for us as well, why has not the Great Spirit given it to us? Why did He not give to our forefathers the knowledge of that book, with the means of understanding it rightly?
Brother, you say there is but one way to worship and serve the Great Spirit. If there is but one religion, why do you white people differ so much about it? Why not all agree, as you can all read the book?
Brother, the Great Spirit has made us all. But He has made a great difference between His white and red children. He has given us a different complexion and different customs. Since He has made so great a difference between us in other things, why may we not conclude that He has given us a different religion, according to our understanding?
Brother, we do not wish to destroy your religion or take it from you. We only want to enjoy our own.”
— Chief Red Jacket of the Seneca, 1805
NEW YORK, NEW YORK (LAS VEGAS, Nevada) "What do you mean we don't have a reservation confirmation?" we asked Karla in shock. On the last day of our journey we experienced our only major disconnect. Somewhere along the way we pulled off at a little town that boasted it was the home of the Bun Burger and had the world's largest thermometer. We were impressed, not with the town, but with the 114-degree temperature -- at least we traveled in the late afternoon. Soon on the horizon you could make out Las Vegas. We decided to find the coolest watering hole in the casino while Karla sorted out our lodging. Naturally, we reminisced about how we got here and what we experienced.
Journal 2020 Foresight: When we, at that point in time it was Eagle and Explorer on the beach in Cabo San Lucas, first met, you told me that on an Outpost Expedition we have to figure out how to proceed into the great unknown while creating better opportunities for those individuals and teams who follow us.
Eagle: That’s right.
J2020F: Let me ask all of you, have we done that? Looking back on our journey – covering some 3000 odd miles across five Western states in temperatures ranging from freezing to 115 degrees of sweltering heat and from sea level to 12,183 feet -- what lessons have you learned worth sharing with others?
Pathfinder: Well, for me personally, what attracted me to the trip was your decision to mirror Lewis & Clark’s expedition in reverse – celebrating the 200th year of their voyage of discovery – and yet the purpose was to test some of boom and bust predictions.
J2020F: You mean during the bubble boom between 2005 and 2010 and then the long deflationary – Harry Dent would say depression -- period from 2012 to 2023?
Trailblazer: I joined because anybody concerned about their future is certainly interested in how their careers, investments and lifestyle options will play out.
Eagle: I’d second that. We now know what’s driving two very different future scenarios and how to take advantage of the “last great” boom and of the bust. That’s significant.
Pathfinder: While the Lewis & Clark expedition mapped out unknown territories, we succeeded in mapping out unknown economic “territories.”
J2020F: Explorer, what about you?
Explorer: The story of the Wild West became more real. I hadn’t really considered that the frontier began and ended in the 19th century.
Eagle: Me too. In nine short decades – a little more than a lifetime – it opens with the Lewis and Clark expedition – their “Corps of Discovery” and closes with the death of Sitting Bull and Geronimo.
J2020F: That’s a tremendous amount of change for any one to experience in a lifetime!
Pathfinder: On one level I feel what survives today and what we can celebrate -- are American core values – ingenuity, know-how and the pioneering spirit.
J2020F: But, how does that insight really apply to the process of making sure we don’t outlive our nest eggs -- by managing a portfolio of both tangible and intangible assets over a lifetime – what we set out to discover with this outpost journey?
Trailblazer: Well, for one – we recognize that we don’t live in a vacuum. Our dreams for a better future and a quality of life we can enjoy and all of the plans and goals associated with making the dreams reality unfold in changing economic and political climates.
J2020F: So, while we have your own life cycle and plans, the economy has its life cycle and plans -- and it will affect our life in major ways both positively and negatively?
Pathfinder: Yes, and as we change, our neighborhoods change, our clients and employers change according to life stage events.
J2020F: So if you are a baby boomer at the empty nest life stage and you plan a change -- to move to or invest in a new town, you’ll need inside information to determine how each potential community at a specific life stage fits your criteria, right?
Eagle: And, you have hundreds of possibilities just in the eight western states. You’ll want to consider Resort Towns, Small College and University Towns, Classic Towns, Revitalized Factory Towns, Exurbs, Suburban Villages, Emerging New Cities, Large-Growth Cities, and Urban Villages.
Explorer: You can use the “birds of a feather” approach. First start with your own neighborhood profile, identify a lifestyle that describes you best, and then search the BOF knowledge-base for potential matches across the West.
J2020F: And, then what?
Trailblazer: Let’s just consider the first category, resort towns. You’ll get back a list of potential towns. Armed with their zip codes you can see if, for real estate investment purposes, they include any of the more affluent and trend-setting lifestyles.
Pathfinder: If for instance you liked Colorado as a one of the best places to consider for a lifestyle change, a real estate investment, and or an entrepreneurial venture, you can choose among a range of low-cost to high-cost towns and neighborhoods.
J2020F: So, if I understand the economic cycles influencing events from now until the end of this decade and then shifting into a different pattern over the next decade – how does that help me?
Trailblazer: You can find your own sweet spot by overlapping three other lifecycles.
J2020F: By that you mean?
Trailblazer: You have to ask yourself: What preferences do I have given the current stage in my own lifespan? What do I enjoy about my neighborhood and area given its lifecycle? And, if I choose to work for an organization or consult to an organization – what problems at its current lifespan do I enjoy solving? Is there a fit?
Eagle: For lower cost of living resort towns – innovation or early growth communities – in California you might investigate and visit Pescadero, Oakhurst, North Fork, Healdsburg or Yreka.
J2020F: What if the affordable resort town is too remote, how can you support yourself?
Eagle: As you consider moving to each location, you should keep in mind five types of business offerings – commodities, goods, services, experiences, and transformations for local or global clients and customers – thanks to broadband wired and wireless communications.
Pathfinder: I agree. The history of the real West, in community after community, tells stories of how livelihoods flourished or came to an abrupt end as goods replaced commodities and services replaced goods and now how providing experiences can revitalize towns. One of many ways to reinvent a community is by capitalizing on its core foundation story – its rich heritage made tangible to tourists, visitors and community residents.
J2020F: As we traveled across the five western states we discovered the boom, bust, and boom cycles tied to their heritage. Many of those communities were already overpriced for me, though. Take Lake Tahoe, for example.
Trailblazer: Well if you can’t afford Lake Tahoe property, then you might try either Minden or Gardnerville – early growth Nevada communities, especially Minden if you feel the New Eco-topia lifestyle cluster more effectively fits you interests.
Explorer: Or, you might enjoy Carson City or Virginia City in Nevada – made famous by Mark Twain’s adventures published in “Roughing It.”
Pathfinder: Or, you might try Bass Lake near Oakhurst at the border of Yosemite National Park on the California side of the Sierra Nevada mountain range – my personal favorite.
Trailblazer: Or, you might prefer three-county region: Madera, Douglas & Mono. There you find Esmeralda, Lake Tahoe, Yosemite and Mammoth Mountain recreational areas - the backdrop to Mark Twain's overland journey and his mining adventures.
J2020F: Today’s migration pattern reverses a centuries-old pattern of families moving from the east and Midwest to the west. Now California residents, with real estate equity, look east and south for new communities in which to invest, live, work, play and retire.
Pathfinder: You are right. Before Twain traveled by stagecoach to the region, the exploits of the first generation of American explorers, from 1800 to 1820, focused on routes connecting the rivers to trapping areas and eventually opening and documenting overland trails.
J2020F: For the fur commodity business, they established the outposts of their day -- trading posts and forts throughout the area – where factors representing fur-trading companies oversaw the trading process.
Explorer: The explorer’s stoic lifestyles were fueled by trade and hunting game - living within nature, ever vigilant to the weather, the wild animals, and the original people.
Pathfinder: Easily 1,000 trappers roamed the American West in this manner from 1820 to 1830, the heyday of the Rocky Mountain fur trade. But, settlement was off limits to eastern emigrants in the region now encompassing Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah and California - all claimed by Mexico.
Eagle: But settlement came. Railroad tracks accelerated the migration rate when they were built on the overland trails pioneered by early explorers, fur trappers and traders. Miners and merchants followed by the thousands to California and Nevada.
Explorer: By mid-19th century wagon trains made their way to the Great Salt Lake in Utah, into Oregon, California and Nevada on a frequent basis. Depending upon their dreams and anticipated destination they chose one of six routes from Missouri.
J2020F: Mark Twain wrote about his “Trapped and Permanently Temporary” situation by listing occupation after failed occupation in “Roughing It” while mining in Aurora. Like many other times before, he left Aurora penniless and had to walk hundreds of miles all the way from Aurora to Virginia City.
Pathfinder: Mining for commodity gold and silver, fueled by get rich schemes and tall tales, followed a typical boom and bust pattern. Now the Sierra Nevada area booms again after seven decades of skiing development.
J2020F: Which brings us back to our topic. We traveled to five of the eight Western states to visit the “Best Places” discoveries by previous expeditions. Where is the best place to live, work, invest or retire?
Trailblazer: If California is your state of choice you might want to add mountain resorts (Mammoth, Running Springs, Lake Arrowhead and Big Bear) to the only innovation appreciation town on the list – Pescadero; the early growth towns – Oakhurst, North Fork, Healdsburg and Yreka; the mid-growth towns – Sonoma, Mendocino, Morro Bay; and late-growth – Del Mar, St. Helena, Calistoga and South Lake Tahoe.
Explorer: If Nevada appeals to you and you’re serious about early growth towns, then you might explore Elko, Jackpot and Laughlin in addition to Gardnerville and Minden. Or, if the mid-growth appreciation stage attracts you, then check out Carson City. Or, finally Lake Tahoe and Reno complete the list of late growth and early maturity appreciation locations.
Eagle: Arizona and the Grand Canyon Area attract their fair share of tourists and about to be ex-Californians looking for the next hot real estate deal.
J2020F: We discovered that Arizona and New Mexico, two of the Four Corners states greet travelers to the vast empty space, Indian reservations, mountain ranges, nameless canyons, old volcanoes and rough country where it is easy to get lost.
Pathfinder: Likewise, we discovered that Arizona was not as quickly populated as the other Western territories because of fear of the Apache and Navajo. During the Civil War the Arizona territory was split in half with Prescott, Tucson and finally Phoenix competing for capital of the state.
Trailblazer: Remember, if potential income, wealth, self-sufficiency, and freedom drive you and the” Grand Canyon State” beckons you to Arizona, then you’ll want to investigate and visit Bisbee, Jerome or Page innovation towns; the early growth town of Yuma; or Sonoma in the mid-growth category.
Eagle: But, if the “Land of Enchantment” tugs at you, then consider finding out more about the innovation towns of Silver City, Angel Fire, Red River. Or check out the two early growth resort towns of Ruidoso and Las Cruces. Or, how about Taos on the New Mexico Expedition's mid-growth list and Santa Fe on the early maturity community's list?
Explorer: How about everything that the Rocky Mountains have to offer? Colorado, the third of the Four Corner states, offers the best in winter and summer seasons. In the San Juan Mountain triangle, you might enjoy an innovation town like Pagosa Springs or an early growth town like Durango, or how about a mid-growth town like Telluride?
J2020F: If you don’t like those resort towns, we’ve got a dozen more categorized by growth and real estate potential. In the innovation phase: Pagosa Springs, Redstone, Marble and Basalt. In the early growth category: Durango, Minturn and Red Cliff. For those of you interested in mid-growth investment opportunities: Telluride, Steamboat Springs, Glenwood Springs, Beaver Creek, and Crested Butte. And last, but not least, the list of late growth and early maturity towns: Copper Mountain, Breckenridge, Keystone, Boulder and Snowmass.
Eagle: Don’t forget that it was Gunnison, recognizing that newbie’s have a tough time fitting into the local, rural western community, that published their version of the Code of the West. Our Corps of Re-Discovery had to change plans in route, studying both the map and monitoring the ominous black, lightening spewing thundering. Along the way we visited Telluride, Silverton, Ouray and passed by Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, Gunnison, Blue Mesa Reservoir, Woodland Park, Manitou Springs, Pikes Peak, and Colorado Springs. After a prolonged pit stop in Parker near Castle Rock, we explored Estes Park, the Rocky Mountain National Park and Boulder – all a short distance from Denver.
J2020F: To plan the last leg of our trip we decided to focus on fit. We pooled our preferences and compared our potential list of towns to Parker.
Eagle: By plugging in a resort community’s zip code into Claritas’ PRIZM segmentation window on their public website you can identify which social clusters and lifestyles can be found in the town of your choice. In Parker, Colorado an exurb outside of Denver, the expedition discovers Landed Gentry and Elite Suburbs social groups.
Trailblazer: You’ll see that Elite Suburbs social group represents one of the most affluent and well-educated clusters – high in education attained, investments and spending. The Landed Gentry are the fourth most affluent with multiple incomes from executive, professional and technology-related knowledge workers. They prefer to live in the exurbs – beyond the suburbs and dense urban areas.
Explorer: Both the Country Squires and God’s Country yearn to escape urban stress and prefer to live away from the city. Country Squires have been called “big bucks in the boondocks” by Claritas. God’s Country neighborhoods apply their dual incomes to support an active, outdoor lifestyle.
J2020F: Before we left Colorado we asked ourselves a key question. What investment choices can we find in Utah? Three innovation appreciation opportunities would include Moab, Boulder and Escalante. At the other extreme of the appreciation curve you can choose from two neighboring towns, Park City and Deer Valley.
Eagle: I really enjoyed our swing through Southwestern Utah -- the scenic rolling ranch meadows in the valleys between plateaus and mountains ridges. With almost 2 million acres, the Dixie National forest is the largest in the state and grows Utah's largest trees - primarily ponderosa pines and spruce. The elevations range from just under 3000 feet near St. George to 11,322 feet at Blue Bell Knoll on Boulder Mountain. It borders Bryce and Zion, Capital Reef, Cedar Breaks and Grand Staircase-Escalante national parks and monuments.
Pathfinder: For me it was Bryce and Zion in combination. Geologist Clarence Dutton described the rugged southern country that had been hidden in its remote surrounding. He wrote about the sense of awe, "There is an eloquence to their forms which stirs the imagination with a singular power and kindles in the mind ... a glowing response.... Nothing can exceed the wondrous beauty of Zion... in the nobility and beauty of the sculptures there is no comparison."
J2020F: Especially our experience so far in Las Vegas. I’d better check with Karla on the status of our rooms. You never know what will happen next!
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Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
7:15 AM
Thursday, June 16, 2005
Awe-Inspiring: Stirring the Imagination and Kindling the Mind
Chapter Three: The Outpost
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“(Chief Seattle’s letter) ‘The shining water that moves in the streams and rivers is not just water, but the blood of our ancestors. If we sell you our land, you must remember that it is sacred. Each ghostly reflection in the clear waters of the lakes tells of event and memories in the life of my people."
Joseph Campbell
ST. GEORGE, Utah. As we did when we left Aspen, we back tracked on highway 12, intersected 89 south and veered west on 9 to Zion National Park’s east entrance.
Journal of 2020 Foresight: Less drip-like and more etched canyon and cliff monuments of sandstone – that’s the first thing I noticed.
Pathfinder: According to the National Park Service brochure, geologist Clarence Dutton described the rugged southern country that had been hidden in its remote surrounding.
Explorer: But it was his prose that I enjoyed. He wrote about the sense of awe, "There is an eloquence to their forms which stirs the imagination with a singular power and kindles in the mind ... a glowing response .... Nothing can exceed the wondrous beauty of Zion... in the nobility and beauty of the sculptures there is no comparison."
Pathfinder: Within its borders lie a desert swamp, a petrified forest, springs and waterfalls. At Zion contrast and scale account for everything.
Trailblazer: But, the 2,000 to 3,000 feet canyon walls of grays and light tans differ from than the bright oranges and deep red-browns of Bryce.
Explorer: Zion is so unique that it’s massive rock formations and desert terrain blend in with hanging gardens and waterfalls.
J2020F: To your point. Kolob Canyon is filled with fingerlike red sandstone canyons. Hurricane Fault exposes ancient layers of rock. Kolob Arch is one of the largest freestanding arches in the world, measuring some 310 feet across.
Trailblazer: Zion Canyon itself a spectacular gorge was carved out of multi-colored sandstones and shale by the Virgin River to a depth and width of a half-mile each, narrowing to 300 feet at the Temple of Sinawava.
J2020F: My only issue with the total experience is the roads. Park roads and parking, designed in the 1920s for lighter traffic create restrictions. We waited at the Zion Tunnel for about 10 minutes.
Pathfinder: Some vehicles require an escort if they don't fit the dimensions
J2020F: We know that Zion was established as Mukuntuweap National Monument in 1909 and later expanded in 1919 as Zion National Park.
Pathfinder: Mormons renamed the canyon Zion taken from the Hebrew, meaning a place of safety or refuge.
Explorer: But the name Mukuntuweap was coined by John Wesley Powell and Grove Karl Gilbert thinking it meant canyon in Paiute, in 1872.
Eagle: Those would be the Southern Paiute like other Great Basin tribes who roamed the broad four corner Colorado Plateau, the Great Basin and parts of the Mojave Desert areas overlapping what are now the southern parts of Utah, Nevada and California and the northern part of Arizona.
J2020F: Wavoka, the fish-eating, messiah’s tribe? The one who preached the Ghost Dance that ultimately led to Sitting Bull’s death in 1890?
Eagle: And the event that closed the last chapter on the Old West or the last frontier? No, you’re thinking of the Northern Paiute tribe in and around Pyramid Lake, in Washoe County, Nevada – along the state’s northwest border with California.
J2020F: So the Southern Paiutes were the first to inhabit the canyon?
Eagle: No, they were third. The official human history breaks the periods into four with the first three covering Utah Native American cultures -- pre-Anasazi, Anasazi and Fremont and, then Southern Paiute.
Explorer: The last chronicles the period from 18th century Euro-American exploration to Mormon settlements in the 19th.
J2020F: Wait. Let me guess, the first white men known to visit the area?
I bet the Escalante expedition came through on their way to California, right?
Pathfinder: Padres Dominguez and Escalante passed near what is now the Kolob Canyons Visitor Center three months after the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776.
Explorer: We already know Jedediah Smith explored the area for the same mission – to find a way to California. From the 1820s and lasting several decades, a route connecting New Mexico with California followed the Virgin River for a portion of its length.
J2020F: What about Fremont? He must have figured in the early mix of explorers.
Pathfinder: True. Captain John C. Fremont wrote about his1844 journeys in the region.
Explorer: As more trade routes and emigrant trails multiplied, the settlers arrived. The first whites were from Salt Lake City – Mormon farmers who settled in the Virgin River and Cedar City area.
J2020F: This must have been in the 1850s, then?
Pathfinder: Right. In roughly a decade Mormon farming settlements had expanded 75 miles up the Virgin River and into Zion Canyon area.
J2020F: They must have encroached on the Paiutes.
Pathfinder: Zion was still virtually unknown and unexplored by whites, but a Paiute guided Nephi Johnson a Mormon missionary and translator into the canyon.
Explorer: Word got out. Mormon pioneer Joseph Black became the first white man to build a Zion Canyon cabin and farm.
Trailblazer: But life wasn’t easy because of “catastrophic flooding by the river (especially in the Great Flood of 1861-1862), little arable land, and poor soils made agriculture in the upper Virgin River a risky venture.”
J2020F: What happened to the Paiutes?
Explorer: By controlling and diverting the flow of water, settlers expanded their number of ranch animals -- Cattle and other domesticated animals, however, pushed out wild game and depleted native grasses.
Eagle: As you can imagine things got worse for the Native Americans.
Pathfinder: Ever since the first wave of whites appeared, their numbers had been greatly reduced by disease and slavery under the Spanish in the 18th century.
Eagle: Now as the era of ranching and farming took hold, their numbers decreased to almost zero.
Explorer: For almost 40 years Mormons farmed the canyon until it was protected in 1909 and converted into a national park.
Trailblazer: While consisting predominantly of sandstone sedimentary rock, the rock formations in the park also include limestone, shale, mudstone and conglomerate originating during the Triassic through Jurassic geological periods, some 250 million to 150 million years ago.
Pathfinder: And, today over 800 native plant species inhabit microenvironments created by the differences in elevation, sunlight, water and temperature -- like the hanging gardens, forested side-canyons and isolated mesas.
Eagle: Also, today mule deer, rock squirrels, lizards and rare and endangered Peregrin Falcons and Mexican Spotted Owls can be spotted. In fact, natural history field observations are encouraged to help monitor the health of the park.
Explorer: Sightings of bighorn sheep, owls, falcons, mountain lions, bobcats, bears and anything unusual can be reported on observation cards handed out at trailheads and visitor centers.
J2020F: Speaking of trailheads, while mountain biking is forbidden, backpacking permits are required to camp on a hiking trip – but they are free.
Explorer: But the hiking isn’t for your every day tourist. Moderately strenuous and strenuous trails require hiking long distances uphill. And, extreme summer heat makes any hike more difficult.
Eagle: Truth be told, we only stopped momentarily to snap photos and record video footage at the remaining turnouts.
Explorer: We all became impatient like kids. It’s like we had seen enough natural wonder to become bored.
Pathfinder: I had the similar experience a couple of summers earlier when we were continuously overwhelmed by the shear beauty of Norway --- 5 waterfalls at the same time of equal magnitude to the one show piece in Yosemite.
Trailblazer: Or at the Louvre. On one vacation I took in Paris, France I visited room after room, after room, after room where all four walls were plastered with masterpieces.
Pathfinder: I know. No way you could absorb the beauty and creativity. No way to really appreciate each piece. After awhile they all looked the same and it was time to move on to something entirely different.
J2020F: Feeling guilty for not being worthy, we exited the park and traveled back to St. George where we connected with interstate 15 and hit the trail for the desert and our overnight destination, New York, N.Y. in Las Vegas, Nevada – before going our separate ways.
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Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
7:13 PM
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
Hurtling Through the Universe with the Wild Bunch and the Buffalo Soldiers
Chapter Three: The Outpost
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“(Chief Seattle’s letter) ‘We are part of the earth and it is part of us. The perfumed flowers are our sisters. The bear, the deer, the great eagle, these are our brothers. The rocky crests, the juices in the meadow, the body heat of the pony, and man, all belong to the same family.’”
Joseph Campbell
BRYCE CANYON, Utah. After a series of trip holdups, it is only fitting that signs teased us with images of Butch Cassidy and his Wild Bunch -- the hideouts, cabins and places he held up during his reign of outlaw terror.
Journal of 2020 Foresight: We took the front office manager’s recommended directions route 89 to both Bryce and Zion. What convinced us was when he said a lot of the road would be scenic on both sides -- mostly rolling ranching meadows in the valleys between bordering ridges and mountains.
Explorer: Our original trip plan was to trace Jedediah Smith’s expedition in 1826. In the late summer and early fall he led 17 men to appraise the trapping potential of the region south and west of the Great Salt Lake.
Pathfinder: That’s right. And twenty years later the United States acquired the region in 1848 through the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, and the Territory of Utah was created in 1850 with Brigham Young as governor."
J2020F: Didn’t we discover that in those days Utah also included Nevada?
Pathfinder: True. And things pretty much stayed that way until 1858 when silver lodes were discovered in Carson County. Californians began to flock in, and the non-Mormon element was soon in the majority. A major dispute erupted in what became known as the Utah War from 1857 to 1858.
Explorer: Allegiance to Brigham Young and Utah was renounced, and a temporary territorial government for Washoe was created by its citizens.
J2020F: I recall that the gold and silver rush prompted Congress to move quickly to pass legislation to create the territory of Nevada, and in 1861 the Nevada Territory was carved out of the Utah Territory – with Orion Clemens as governor – Mark Twain’s brother.
Pathfinder: Development accelerated. As a result Utah played a major role in the railroad expansion.
J2020F: How so?
Pathfinder: The Transcontinental Railroad got off to a slow start due to the Civil War and lack of investors but beginning in 1866 the race was on.
Explorer: To accelerate construction progress, the railroads overlapped their surveying and grading crews with the blasting crews – at times a little too close for comfort – covering the last two hundred miles.
Pathfinder: In January of 1869 the government sent a commission of civil engineers to decide where the two Transcontinental Railroads should meet.
J2020F: I know I should know this, but where did they decide?
Pathfinder: The final decision was for Promontory Summit. and Leland Stanford hit the golden spike to join the Transcontinental Western Railroads. Stanford was president of the Southern Pacific Railroad for five years.
J2020F: And where exactly is Promontory Summit?
Pathfinder: It’s 56 miles west of Ogden. There the Union Pacific Railroad engine, No 119 touched the Central Pacific Railroad's Jupiter engine.
Explorer: So, on May 10, 1869, at Promontory Summit in Utah territory, the first of five transcontinental railroads were completed.
Eagle: At the ceremony an interpreter had to cover up what Sitting Bull's really said instead of what he was supposed to, as the token Indian celebrity.
Explorer: I love that story. To further celebrate the big event, Grenville Dodge sent a telegraph to the President of the Union Pacific Railroad, telling Oliver Ames of the Transcontinental Railroad completion.
J2020F: Wait. On his way to the celebration, wasn’t Thomas Durant, the executive responsible for construction, held for ransom until his tie cutters received their back pay?
Pathfinder: Yes. And it was in these surroundings with a tumultuous history that the Mormons chose to settle and where, particularly in southeastern Utah, Zane Grey set many of his Old West novels.
J2020F: Didn’t mining prospects bring many other diverse ethnic groups into Utah?
Pathfinder: That’s correct. Among the largest groups were Greek immigrants.
Trailblazer: In fact they maintain a significant presence today, especially in communities of Bingham Canyon, Price, Helper and Park City.
Eagle: Because we had more than enough interstate driving, we swapped the romance of Jedediah’s expedition along I-15 for some Butch Cassidy the Sundance Kid – and theirWild Bunch.
J2020F: Kind of like the folklore back in Durango, where we discovered that the golf course and guarded community near the Bar D Chuck Wagon Ranch was named after the Dalton brothers.
Pathfinder: Another coincidence.
Explorer: Huh?
Pathfinder: Butch Cassidy’s first bank heist -- San Miguel Valley Bank – in 1889 took place just up the road from there in Telluride.
J2020F: And his partner, Sundance was born where I was, in Plainfield, New Jersey. Go figure!
Eagle: While we didn’t pull over to visit places where Butch roamed we did stop, however, to video a herd of buffalo on our way to Bryce Canyon.
Pathfinder: Speaking of buffalo, didn’t Buffalo Soldiers serve and protect the Utah citizens?
Explorer: The Buffalo Soldiers served in the Indian Wars as members of the US Army black Calvary units, after the Civil War ended.
J2020F: What was their role in Utah?
Pathfinder: They were stationed at Fort Duchesne and they were responsible for patrolling the Ouray and Uintah reservations.
J2020F: For quelling any disturbances?
Eagle: Yup. The Utes frequently returned to Colorado, even after Pickin and Vickers triumphed and had them removed from the state.
Explorer: Chief Colorow jumped the reservation and went hunting in eastern Colorado. In response, the governor, Alva Adams, sent the Colorado militia to punish the Utes.
Eagle: He privately figured that if they were all killed, there wouldn’t be a problem any more.
J2020F: What happened?
Explorer: Lt. George R. Burnett left Fort Duchesne with ten Buffalo Soldiers to keep the peace.
Eagle: Even though Colorow's band returned to Utah, the militia wanted to finish what they had started.
Explorer: The only thing standing in the way of an attack on the reservation was the badly outnumbered Buffalo Soldiers, who managed to stop the militia.
Eagle: Indian Agent T. A. Byrnes commended the Buffalo Soldiers for their exceptional courage, and Colorow and his people gained a new respect for the black cavalrymen who had saved their lives.
J2020F: By the way, how did they get their nickname?
Eagle: When Native Americans first encountered them in the skirmishes around the 1870s they said the soldiers’ wooly heads looked like the matted cushion between the horns of a buffalo.
J2020F: With Colorow’s band under control, what did the Buffalo Soldiers do?
Explorer: They escorted Indian agents when the annual government payment to the Utes arrived on the railroad.
Trailblazer: Which linked them to the Wild Bunch.
J2020F: How so?
Explorer: Rumors spread in March 1898 that Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch was going to rob the $30,000 annuity.
Trailblazer: Somehow their plans leaked out. The location was supposed to be between Price and Helper.
Eagle: But the gang had second thoughts when about forty Buffalo Soldiers accompanied the Indian agent from Price to Fort Duchesne.
.
J2020F: What must have gone through the minds of the Buffalo Soldiers!
Eagle: You mean the irony?
J2020F: Exactly. They were fighting for one reason -- in a campaign to contain, suppress and kill the native peoples of the West.
Pathfinder: You know, you are right. Former slaves found themselves fighting against people who were in the process of being dispossessed of their land and whose culture was misunderstood and under attack from all fronts.
Explorer: The black troops faced prejudice especially from their commander, Major Frederick Benteen.
Trailblazer: But, for the most part white and Afro-American soldiers ate together and fought side-by-side with minimal bigotry.
Explorer: And, Benjamin O. Davis Sr., an officer who served at Fort Duchesne, became the first black general in U.S. military history.
Trailblazer: Speaking of which. Before the climb to Bryce's entrance we passed through Dixie National Forest and the two arches through which travelers passed while admiring the tans, browns, and reds -- mostly reds and oranges.
J2020F: Why was it called Dixie?
Pathfinder: We discovered from the brochures that early Mormon settlers felt the warm climate reminded them of the south, so they named it Dixie.
Trailblazer: Now for some stats: With almost 2 million acres, the forest is the largest in the state and grows Utah's largest trees - primarily ponderosa pines and spruce. The elevations range from just under 3000 feet near St. George to 11,322 feet at Blue Bell Knoll on Boulder Mountain.
Pathfinder: What do you suppose is one of the oldest forms of plant life on Earth?
Trailblazer: Bristlecone Pine found here and accessible by nature trail at Midway Summit.
Pathfinder: Cheater!
J2020F: So, Dixie National Forest is home to or borders Bryce and Zion, Capital Reef, Cedar Breaks and Grand Staircase-Escalante national parks and monuments, right?
Explorer: And two plateaus -- The Paunsaugunt and Sevier– run parallel to SR 89 for 60 miles from Circleville south.
J2020F: Circleville? That’s where Butch grew up after being born, to Mormon pioneers from England, in Beaver, Utah.
Eagle: It’s certainly easy to enjoy the panoramic view and distinctive rock formations in a territory similar in many respects to Colorado as we wound our way to the top.
Trailblazer: And, yet it reminds me of mesa country with open meadows. Sort of like a greener version of the reservations we passed outside of the Grand Canyon, some 200 miles southeast of our location.
J2020F: We tuned into 520 on our AM dial and got the low down before entering Bryce Canyon National Park and paying the fee good for one weeks' stay.
Explorer: I thought it was strange that the ranger cautioned us that no mountain biking was allowed inside the park. They follow long-standing preservation policies he said, so we followed the road stopping periodically at scenic lookouts.
Eagle: We spent less time at each vantage point, after walking around a while at Sunset Point and gazing at the Hoodoos -- the pillar of rocks beginning to form 10 million years ago when the earth created and moved the massive blocks called Table Cliffs and Paunsaugunt plateaus.
Explorer: Those “giant drip-castle” formations amazed me -- made from alternating freezing and thawing erosion forces of nature.
Eagle: While Native American people were present in the region about 12,000 years ago, little remains to describe what the experienced, how they lived, what had happened to them.
Pathfinder: As in Arizona and New Mexico, Paiutesmoved into the region once occupied by the Anasazi and Fremont cultures. They lived there until settlers and explorers arrived in the 1870s when John Wesley Powell and Captain Clarence E. Dutton explored the area.
J2020F: Apparently Ebenezer Bryce, the "discoverer" of the canyon is said to have described it as "a helluva place to lose a cow."
Eagle: The Paiutes described the hoodoos as legend people who had been turned to stone by Coyote.
Pathfinder: You know it takes a while for the natural splendor to sink in.
To realize that as we breathe each breath our planet is hurtling through space and is dynamically changing.
Trailblazer: Being shaped and reshaped by dramatic events we witness like earthquakes, tsunamis, like volcanoes, tropical hurricanes, floods and mudslides which make headlines because they are abrupt and disrupt our lives.
Pathfinder: There are other changes that we don't detect, even in the span of our human lifetime. But their influence is all around us.
J2020F: And it slowly sinks in as you read about the forces of sedimentation, uplift, and erosion that carved out the rocks and created picturesque valleys for as far as the eye can see.
Pathfinder: That’s what I mean. Millions of years -- geological periods-- some 144 million years ago during the Cretaceous Period and lasting for about 60 million years, sediment from a great seaway deposited sediments in the Bryce Canyon area.
Explorer: We found out that by continually extending and retreating, the seaway left sediment several thousands of feet thick and can be seen as the lowest and oldest brown rocks at Bryce Canyon.
Trailblazer: During the Tertiary Period-- between 63 and 40 million years ago, freshwater rivers and streams flowed on top of the sediment, depositing their own layers of iron-rich, limy sediments which can be seen as the reddish-pink layers exposed where the hoodoos are carved.
J2020F: And, the same kind of compression that helped form the Rocky Mountains deformed Bryce Canyon's rocks. Then from the north and west volcanic material deposited layers of black rock.
Pathfinder: About 10 million years ago, with the ripping apart of the earth, layers once connected became displaced vertically by several thousand feet leaving the region with the high plateaus we see today.
Trailblazer: Eventually, the Paria River carved out the Paria Valley by loosening and carrying off the softer Cretaceous rocks.
Eagle: Today, the forest and meadows support diverse animal and wildflower populations. From small mammals and birds to foxes, mountain lions and black bears. Mule deer can be frequently sited in summer mornings and evenings grazing in roadside meadows.
J2020F: While, mountain lions stalk the mule deer and balance the eco-system doing so, roughly 160 species of birds make the park their home during a year.
Pathfinder: And swallows and swifts dart in and out of cliff faces and crevices in search of insects. Coyotes join mule deer and mountain lions at lower elevations during winter.
J2020F: More than 400 species of plants grow in diverse soil and moisture conditions at elevations ranging from 6,000 to 9,000 feet. Ironically, the scarcity of water in southern Utah limits the expansion of human development in the area, while allowing for the park's diversity of wildlife.
Eagle: Looking back on our journey, I’d say we experienced our own unique diversity of wildlife, wouldn’t you?
J2020F: But wait, there's more!
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Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
7:02 AM
Sunday, June 12, 2005
Green River Geo-Rendezvous, Sabbaticals, Bridgers and Dinosaurs
Chapter Three: The Outpost
By Steve Howard, CKO
The Knowledge Labs
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Basecamp
Chapter Two: The Ridge
Chapter Three: The Outpost
Chapter Four: The Tribal Territories
“(Chief Seattle’s letter) 'Every part of this earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every meadow, every humming insect. All are holy in the memory and experience of my people. We know the sap which courses through the trees as we know the blood that courses through our veins.’”
Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth
GLENWOOD SPRINGS, Colorado. When it pours it rains! We even hit rain on our way out of Aspen and we backtracked over state route 82 nearing Glenwood Springs and the junction where we returned to I-70 heading west. But the rain really poured down, so we drove carefully and slowly through our longest stretch of road out of Colorado and into Utah to reach our stopover in Ridgefield. But, we’re getting ahead of ourselves.
J2020F: After a long time on the winding road, we finally make our way to Aspen.
Trailblazer: But Aspen, looks more like what I thought both Vail and Aspen would look like, even though it’s not ski or snowboarding season.
Explorer: Even though it’s summer, even Snowmass looked like what I expected.
J2020F: The roads are a real nuisance -- under repair from the winter season. But, as we neared the town of Aspen we saw a hang glider floating along the air pockets swirling against the mountains.
Explorer: And a harmony festival under way near the Aspen Airport.
Trailblazer: Though not as difficult as in Durango,we found our hotel in a round about way -- actually stumbling on it after trying on the river side of Main Street.
Eagle: Yeah, but we saw an entrance to a bike trail that we would later take the following morning.
Pathfinder: We unloaded and hit the pool. Then they arrived.
J2020F: You mean the Boomer bikers on their Harleys?
Trailblazer: From their boisterous conversations in the pool and rear-end soothing Jacuzzi, they had been on the road for days from the east coast.
Explorer: But they left the pool, went out on the town and that was the last we heard of them until some jerk revved up his motor for a half and hour sometime closer to 5:30 a.m. than 6:00 a.m.
J2020F: Walking around town, bumping into people and reading articles we concluded that Aspen’s story had been riches to rags to riches, again.
Pathfinder: It’s actually the story of the region -- the Roaring Fork Valley including Glenwood Springs Aspen Glen, Carbondale, El Jebel, Basalt, Old Snowmass (home of the Harleywood Café) and Snowmass Village
Trailblazer: Don’t forget about the world-renowned Aspen Institute in the Roaring Fork Valley.
J2020F: Wait, wasn’t The Aspen Institute founded by Walter Paepcke – the same one who formed the Aspen Skiing Company and other resorts?
Pathfinder: The one and the same. In a way he followed in the footsteps of Nathan Meeker and Horace Greeley.
J2020F: What?
Pathfinder: He too wanted to create a utopian community – but not to transform the Utes into god-fearing citizens. He succeeded in transforming the mining-depressed area into a destination for business, thought leaders and recreation enthusiasts.
Explorer: Aspen's mines and mills gave way to condominiums on the hillsides after World War II.
Eagle: It says here, that in 1893, a 1,840-pound and 93% pure silver nugget extracted from Smuggler Mine and displayed at the Chicago Columbian Exposition symbolized the rags-to-riches-to-rags history of sliver mining in the area.
J2020F: How so?
Trailblazer: When supply exceeded demand, prices plummeted in the panic of 1893 and Colorado's economy imploded – in much the same way as the Finnmark’s telecommunications industry did in the dot.com bust.
Pathfinder: But when skiing came to Aspen two decades later, in 1930s, private enterprise jumped on the bandwagon, and the rags turned once more into riches. Aspen turned into a year round resort area.
J2020F: The brochures describe Aspen as having the greatest downhill skiing in the world with unsurpassed Colorado Rocky Mountain vistas.
Explorer: Like in Vail, you can try your hand at hiking, biking horseback riding.
Trailblazer: Personally I like then authentic Victorian town architecture – and restaurants “acclaimed by famous dining critics.” You’ve got all kinds of shops, boutiques and galleries where you can browse your day away.
Eagle: For me I enjoy the “spectacular outdoors as my playground” --snowmobiling and ice-skating in addition to skiing in winter. And the fly-fishing, rafting and hot air balloon rides, tennis and golf in the summer.
Pathfinder: No matter what the season, it’s hard to beat the clear blue skies, fresh clean air for deep relaxation and rejuvenation
J2020F: And, Aspen had a Pearle Street of their own.
Explorer: Yeah, that one juggler said the city didn't pay him for his performance and he'd been doing the entertainment for over 10 years.
J2020F: I think he said 14.
Explorer: I stand corrected. He said he was married and had 4 children, three adopted. Then he said, if only they could get the 4th one adopted, everything would be...
Trailblazer: Another rim shot.
Explorer: What he did which was unique for us was give tips to the most reasonable restaurants, t-shirt shops and other establishments.
J2020F: We wondered what if anything he received from the referrals. Kind of like a US version of the tourist cell network we encountered in Cabo San Lucas, before we left town. Outside of Grand Junction, we stopped at an information center for advice.
Pathfinder: Basically, we wanted to get out of the rain and stretch our legs.
Explorer: What we wanted to know was if after we take I-70 and connect with I-15, should we travel on I-15 and shoot south towards Las Vegas and cut back east to Bryce Canyon and Zion or take another route -- state route 24, a black road on the map, or the red route, 89.
Trailblazer: We didn’t get definitive answer there, but we enjoyed a down home, friendly visit with a senior citizen who gave our dinosaur pins “for the kids back home” -- showcasing the dinosaur museum.
Eagle: He did caution us to fill up within the next 3 exits, because there was nothing from Green River west to Ridgefield, a distance of about 100 miles.
J2020F: You know I had an epiphany when we stopped for gas and beef jerky at an AM PM-like gas market. Gas stations and truck stops are the modern day equivalent of trading posts, forts and outposts.
Trailblazer: Now, that’s a coincidence!
Explorer: Now, what?
Trailblazer: Check it out, out of all the Utah geo-caches, we’re very near Grey Owl’s last geo-cache. Take a right and pull over there, near the plaque honoring John Wesley Powell’s expedition on the Green River in 1869.
J2020F: What do you see? What did he leave us this time?
Trailblazer: Here it is. The Utah Expedition listed the extremes, three resort towns in the innovation stage of appreciation and two in the late growth, early maturity stage.
J2020F: Give us the innovation growth towns on the list.
Trailblazer: Grey Owl lists three – Moab, Boulder and Escalante -- both in the Capitol Reef Area. First, Moab: Zip Code 84532 -- Moab's Times-Independent Newspaper and for a more independent view, the Canyon Country Zephyr and the source for vacation properties and real estate.
Second, Boulder: Zip Code 84716 -- Near Dixie National Forest and Bryce Canyon in Garfield County (where you can find a list of foreclosures and a touch of the local Boulder and Escalante history. And, third, Escalante: Zip Code 84726 – history, business summary and real estate opportunities.
J2020F: How many made the late growth, early maturity list?
Trailblazer: Two next to each other, Park City: Zip Codes: 84060, 68, 98 -- and its news and information source. The second is Deer Valley: Zip Code: 84060 – with its real estate news.
J2020F: Anything else?
Trailblazer: Oh, and two other links for Utah, county real estate listings and
news links.
Pathfinder: You know while looking out the window and letting my mind wander, as soon as I saw the sign to Green River I immediately thought of the great Rendezvous events held upstream in the first four decades of the 19th century.
Explorer: Speaking of Escalante, you don’t mean to overlook the first expedition of Europeans known to have entered Utah -- Fathers Escalante and Dominquez, Franciscan priests, right?
Pathfinder: No not at all. They didn’t pop into my daydreaming mine – that’s all.
Explorer: Good. The fathers may be like Wilkes, who didn’t receive as much publicity for his explorations as did John Fremont. But, heading a party of 10, they left Santa Fe 50 years earlier, in July 1776, to search for a direct route to Monterey, California. After almost dying in Colorado, they entered northeastern Utah and discovered the Green River, crossing it just south of the present entrance to Dinosaur National Monument.
J2020F: Great, now that that’s settled, can we move on?
Pathfinder: Sure, here’s my point.Jedediah Smith and his party of trappers spent the winter of 1823-24 with a band of Crow Indians who told him how to reach the Green River. In mid-March 1824, they rediscovered the South Pass -- a passage to the Northwest through present-day Wyoming -- and descended into the Green River area for the spring hunt.
Explorer: Meanwhile, the Great Salt Lake was discovered in 1824, by trappers James Bridger and Etienne Provost, who mistakenly reported they found an arm of the Pacific Ocean.
J2020F: Isn’t that the same Jim Bridger who guided prospectors overland to the gold mines of Montana and laid out new overland trails for stage routes such as the one for the Central Overland?
Explorer: The one and the same. Through Bridger Pass, now I-80. He also charted the overland route for the Leavenworth Pike's Peak Express Company out of Denver.
Pathfinder: Remember, the American mountain men and fur trappers weren’t the only ones roaming this country.
J2020F: Oh?
Pathfinder: In the period 1824-1829 eventual Hudson's Bay Company trapper Peter Skene Ogden led five trapping expeditions into the "Snake Country" -- the upper reaches of the Columbia.
J2020F: The Hudson’s Bay Companyof course. Which of the five explored Utah – what today is known as Utah?
Pathfinder: The one beginning in 1824 is the first written account of that region of Southeastern Idaho and Northern Utah that includes Cache Valley, Ogden Valley, and the Weber River Valley.
Explorer: Isn’t that one known as a famous confrontation between the HBC and the Americans?
Pathfinder: It is. And what survived from that trip are Ogden's journal and that of his chief clerk, William Kittson.
J2020F: You said 1824 was the first.
Pathfinder: Right. His last expedition, from 1828 to 1829 followed the Humboldt River and explored the region north of Great Salt Lake.
J2020F: So, in the 1820s we find Jedediah Smith, Jim Bridger and Pierre Skene Ogden exploring the same region.
Pathfinder: Right. In 1826, Jedediah Smith led 18 men on an expedition through the Great Salt Lake Valley and through southwest Utah, southeast Nevada, to Needles, California area, and west across California.
J2020F: So Smith’s expedition came to this area -- to appraise the trapping potential of the region south and west of the Great Salt Lake.
Pathfinder: Right. This expedition took him along the route of present-day Interstate 15, the entire length of Utah, to the Virgin River and its eventual confluence with the Colorado River.
J2020F: So in a sense, we’re closing the Jedediah loop with our own expedition.
Pathfinder: Sure. We already traced his route when he followed the Colorado south to the villages of Mojave Indians, then turned his band westward across the Mojave Desert.
Explorer: On that trip, his band reached the Utah-Nevada border near present day Grandy, Utah, continued on to Skull Valley and reached the south tip of the Great Salt Lake two days later.
Trailblazer: What I remember about that expedition was by the time they arrived at the 1827 Mountain Man Rendezvous in present-day Laketown, they had become the first Americans to return from California by an overland route.
J2020F: What I remember, after passing through Needles was party of Mojave Indians, angry with an earlier trapping party, killed ten of Smith's men and scattered his furs and supplies.
Pathfinder: True. That happened later in 1827. Jedediah, with 18 men, retraced his steps from Great Salt Lake to southern California.
Explorer: But this time the Indians attacked his party and captured all the horses. The survivors made their way to California and into the clutches of Mexican officials waiting to incarcerate them.
J2020F: So the fur trapping and trading business was extremely difficult – especially when the mountain men had to haul what they collected to the trading posts and merchant centers.
Trailblazer: Right. All that changed when the merchants and traders came to the trappers on the banks of the Green River, rather than the fur traders coming all the way into town to trade their wares.
Explorer: And, the way stations, forts and trading posts set up along the overland trails from Independence, Missouri.
Eagle: So, the essential supply chain comes to the point of purchase – or trade – as the case may be. It must have revolutionized business models as we know them in the 1800s.
J2020F: And speaking of revolutionizing business models -- in no time at all, the railroads replaced the boat and the wagon train and the stagecoach as the primary transportation vehicle.
Pathfinder: And as the focus for when, how and where commerce was conducted.
Explorer: What do you mean?
Pathfinder: Well, towns sprung up along the railroad lines. Before that, they grew along the riverbanks.
Trailblazer: And as transportation evolved from hiking or riding horseback in combination to river exploration to stage coach and finally to railroad the time it took to connect people from ambition to destination shrunk.
Eagle: And accelerated the sheer volume of easterners who could unload at any particular town along the way.
J2020F: Yeah, there’s something about basic units of economic trade or transaction. And, the location where the transaction took place.
Trailblazer: And establishing the value of transaction – either basic commodity or customized product or service.
J2020F: So, today this wide-open space -- Sevier County, Utah boasted something different that really appealed to me -- adventure tourism.
Pathfinder: You mean -- hunting, fishing, horseback riding, and mountain biking just the beginning of the list of activities. So you might offer more commodity-based units for one adventure unit?
Explorer: I would. I value more experience-based units than price-based units. Remember back at our rest stop. They were selling a newly opened Paiute ATV trail that beckoned as an example of innovative thinking between government agencies at all levels.
J2020F: Together with petroglyphs and pictographs on rock outcrops that attest to the presence of Indians now called Fremont. That is so unique. So customized. You can’t buy that at a local big box retailer. You know what I mean?
Explorer: Exactly. You wonder though, what did they call themselves? What were they like? Where did they go?
Pathfinder: I think we should organize sabbaticals next. We might start with Fremont Indian State Park. It was established in 1985 to preserve a treasure trove of archaeological material excavated from sites in Clear Creek Canyon.
Eagle: I’m with you on that. We should explore the possibilities in Cathedral Valley, Monroe Mountain, Hot Springs, Capitol Reef National Park, Bullion Canyon, Big Rock Candy Mountain or Otter Creek we’ve seen en route to Richfield and on to Bryce and Zion.
J2020F: We had passed from the rainstorms and afternoon showers of mountains, lushly green scenery of Colorado into Utah with its buttes and grays and browns. As we descended from high desert country into desert and then into ranching and farming country we were grateful for our fully functioning air conditioner.
Eagle: When we arrived in Ridgefield I didn’t find it very attractive compared to all the other outposts we established along the way.
Pathfinder: But, what it lacked in charm it more than made up in friendliness -- the Travelodge demonstrated the best customer service so far on our journey by calling to our room after we had checked in to determine if there was anything else they could do to make our stay more enjoyable.
Eagle: But no complimentary breakfast. And our supply of soda and beer, stashed without ice in another cooler was dwindling. So we hit town to find the local market to restock our supplies and discovered they had coffee and donuts, Danishes and muffins at a reasonable price.
Trailblazer: Dinner was as the combination KFC - Taco Bell franchise, where we encountered confused teenagers who managed to screw up our order even though we had gone through it several times.
J2020F: I felt like a kid. All I wanted to do was to hit the outdoor pool and the indoor Jacuzzi to relieve the stress and monotony of the all-day drive. I just didn’t care. I looked forward to the last leg of our journey.
Trailblazer: Me too. Oh, I almost forgot. You asked if there was anything else earlier.
J2020F: There was?
Trailblazer: Here’s Grey Owl’s quote – one Eagle will like because it is taken from Dee Brown’s Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee.
J020F: How does it go?
Trailblazer: "In September, 1805, when Lewis and Clark came down off the Rockies on their westward journey, the entire exploring party was half-famished and ill with dysentery -- too weak to defend themselves. They were in the country of the Nez Perce's, so named by French trappers, who observed some of the Indians wearing dentalium shells in their noses. Had the Nez Perce's chosen to do so, they could have put an end to the Lewis and Clark expedition there on the banks of Clearwater River, and seized their wealth of horses.”
Eagle: You’re right. I found that passage here in my copy of his book about the Nez Perce. “Instead the Nez Perce's welcomed the white Americans, supplied them with food, and looked after the explorers' horses for several months while they continued by canoe to the Pacific shore. Thus began a long friendship between the Nez Perce's and white Americans. For seventy years the tribe boasted that no Nez Perce' had ever killed a white man."
J2020F: I wonder why he didn’t include the famous speech by Chief Joseph?
Eagle: I don’t know. You mean the “I Will Fight No More…” speech?
J2020F: How did it go?
Eagle: “Tell General Howard I know his heart. When he told me before I have in my heart. I am tired of fighting. Our chiefs are killed. Looking Glass is dead. Toohoolhoolzote is dead. The old men are all dead. It is the young men who say yes or no. He who led on the young men (Ollokot) is dead.
It is cold and we have no blankets. The little children are freezing to death. My people, some of them, have run away to the hills, and have no blankets, no food; no one knows where they are -- perhaps freezing to death.
I want to have time to look for my children and see how many of them I can find. Maybe I shall find them among the dead. Hear me, my chiefs! I am tired; my heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands I will fight no more forever.”
J2020F: Which brings us to the brief story of the Buffalo Soldiers.
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Copyright ©2002 - 2006 Aarnaes Howard Associates. All rights reserved worldwide.
2:45 PM
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