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ROGUE RIVER CATTLE DRIVE |
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In the early spring of about 1930, I was working for a cattle rancher and dealer up in the mountains, southwest of Myrtle Point, Oregon. In the latter part of April I was getting restless to move on. The man I was working for said I could not leave until after we'd made a buying trip to the Rogue River country near Agness, approximately 50 miles. There was good road to the little settlement of Powers. From there on, approximately 25 miles was poorly marked with places of unmarked trails, through dense forest country which had never been logged off. This forest land was a dense jungle like the pictures you see of the interiors of Africa. I saw clumps of ferns 15 to 20 feet in diameter and each frond from 10 to 15 feet tall, the likes of which I'd never seen before. Upon arriving at Agness, my boss said it would be easier for him to make a deal with the Indians who lived on the Rogue and Illinois Rivers if he went alone because those Indians knew and trusted him. We stayed about 3 days and nights at Agness while the boss was collecting livestock he had bought. This left me to entertain myself at the old Lucas Lodge at Agness. While there I met an old man who appeared to be almost 100 but was probably nearer 70 years old. This man said he had spent most of his life in this area hunting, trapping, prospecting, and serving as a guide for rich folks who came up the Rogue from Gold Beach for fishing and hunting trips. This man said he had three cabins located about 15 miles apart for overnight lodging for his hunting and fishing parties, making his headquarters at Lucas Lodge. He had a lean-to shed built against the outside of the storage workshop and woodshop of the lodge. He spent much of his time at Lucas Lodge keeping supplies of firewood and doing repair and maintenance on the buildings. The old man told me many stories of his life while living on the Rogue River. He told about the trouble with Indians although later he had much fun with them. Some of his stories sounded 'far fetched', but how could I prove otherwise, so I accepted them as being near the truth, until the last evening I was there. That night he told about the big flood, which if he remembered correctly, was in 1891. In this particular week he was prospecting at his furthest upstream cabin, which was built on a ledge in a canyon 60 feet above the Rogue River. During one rainy night he was awakened by some unknown and unusual sounds. Thinking he'd better investigate, he swung his legs over the edge of the bunk and they landed in several inches of water. Then he realized what those sounds he heard were---severe flood---which scared him so badly that he quickly grabbed his bag of gold dust, his boots, and out the door and further up the hill he went. The next morning at daylight the entire country seemed to have changed location. The place where his cabin had been was under more than 30 feet of water. After hearing this story I was very much convinced that no river could raise over 90 feet in 24 hours and therefore I refused to believe any of the other stories he'd told me. That is, until history repeated itself in 1964. Now I believe some of his other stories may have been true. In the three days I spent at Lucas Lodge I'd done most of the chores for this old man because he was getting sick and feeble. He wanted to repay me for my work and companionship by giving me his old worn out Colt 45 that he'd bought when he was about 20 and kept all these years. He said there was small chance he'd have use for it again. The trip home with about 40 head of wild yearling steers and heifers was fast and dangerous because these animals had never been driven on a trail before and were continually trying to outrun us. A man on horseback cannot outrun the young stock in this mood. My boss had two exceptionally well trained cow dogs. One was a collie named 'Old Sam', who was always noisy and tearing around like a wild bear through the brush so we knew at all times where he was. The other dog was a stray that had drifted up the mountains from where no one knows. This dog seemingly had no definite ancestry and was of a completely different temperament than Old Sam. Quite often a whole day would go by without hearing a bark or noise through the brush from this dog. Regardless of whether it was one or a dozen cattle that took a notion to leave the trail, this stray dog would bring them back quickly and noiselessly. It took us about three twenty hour days to bring these cattle to the home ranch. It was undecided who was the most tired and hungry, the cattle, the dogs, the boss and I, or the two horses we rode, for there was no stopping to prepare meals or rest during the day. We slept with one eye open but we made it back to the home ranch without losing one head.
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Otto and the Oregon Altar Promise Otto sent a poem to his mother, Tillie, in 1952 |
