The San Francisco call. [volume], January 15, 1911, Page 14, Image 14

About The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913

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THE SPORT OF ROPING GRIZZLIES IN CALIFORNIA'S EARLY DAYS
Hamilton Wright
THK upper OJal valley lies between
the oak clad flanks of Sulphur
mountain and tho bare gray cliffs
that line the sides of the Tapo Tapo
raoss In their dizzy ascent of a sheer
3.000 foot. At this time or the year
the, scouts of coming: pigeon flocks are
toklnc note of tne supply of feed, a
fllmy blue haze floats down the OJal
and. In the early dawn before the wind
ta the trees, the shrill of the locust
and the Innumerable voices of the
forest have cotne la with the new dy,
•ue may hear the tinkle of the belled
o*ttle on the distant slopes of Sulphur
mountain and the faint, bleating bark
of the wild foxes. Now and then. In
deed, there may come the shrill whin
ing yell of a mountain lion, calling like
■ child In agony.
Once the upper OJal was the most
famous hunting ground In all Ventura
cO'JMtjr. There, In the early days of
California, came both Indians and
wliite men In quest of game. Here, too,
the four footed hunters, mountain
lions that followed the wandering
bands of deer and huge grizzly bears
that would knock down a heifer on
inge na easily as a cat destroys
tho mouse with which It has been paw-
Ing.
In thp '10s and as late as the early
'70s grizzly bears were a common
sight In the mountains of Ventura
county. They alone of all wild crea
tures became ever bold enough to con
tort the country with mankind, a fact
which rendered these huge creatures
nn easy prey, not to bullets, for a
grizzly may charge a mile or more and
destroy his assailant even If shot In a
dozen vital places, but to the handiest
device employed by the Spanish va
queros (cow punchers), the lasso.
Because grizzly bears could be easily
, lassoed there were held In old Ventura
' town In the early days some of the
! strangest battles ever known— fights
{between hug» grizzly bears, great steer
• killers that never had been weakened
i by captivity, and the lithe, thick necked
'Spanish bulls, sharp of horn, quick of
'foot, always ready for a fight and with
] a charge like that of a catapult.
In the fight between the bulls and
bears Bruin usually came off second
befit. Although a grizzly can easily
knock down the greatest steer when
lie approaches him by a flank attack on
the range, he would "generally be un
able to resist the furious charge of the
' ball In the arena. The old Spanish
bull vu ready to fight at the drop of
HIDDEN MYSTERIES IN MILK AND WHAT CERTIFIED MILK MEANS
r~ OOD sanitarians, one and all, were
f" they to five their opinions upon
cow's milk, after thoroughly going
Into Its methods of production, would
.pronounce It the filthiest food that
comM upon our tables. Rarely would
they even depart from this conclusion,
rspeciaily when referring to the com- with the milking process that wts must
merclal cow's milk entering our cities, sea It illustrated and written up as an
Cow's milk, as a. rule, Is a stable extraordinary performance,
product, the exception occurring only It costs money to produce milk as
■when the milking Is done out In th« It does any manufactured article. The
open. farmer buys his cow, which ia his plant
Every now and then we read of or milk factory, and the raw material
some milk producer having white- Is the feed he raises or buys to keep
washed stables, cement floors, groomed the machine running and the produc-
A MOUNTAIN SCHOOL AND THE LESSONS TAUGHT THE TEACHER
Annie Louise Morrison
NO state In the union according to
Its population spends more money
for its schools nor takes greater
pride In Its children than does this state
of the Golden gate.
That no child shall be deprived of an
opportunity to attend school the law
provides compulsory education until
after 14. and where a dally attendance
of even five and a half can be main
tained In a district for at least six
months the law provides buildings and
ample means. Eight to ten months are
usually taught.
Every teacher must be a graduate of
one of the five state normal schools of
California, of a university, with one
year of pedlgogy to her credit, or pass
a rigorous examination In reading,
penmanship, arithmetic, geography,
grammar, English composition, history
of th« United States, ancient and
modern history, literature, algebra,
geometry, physics, physiology, book
keeping and business forms, drawing,
music methods, school law and spelling.
No teacher can be under 18 years of
age. The state apportions $550 to every
■ r employed. This is known as the
state fund and can only be used for
palaries. Then there is the county fund.
Sixty per cent <tt ttiat must be used for
salaries. In adellrion to these two is. the
fund apportioned on the mean dally at
tendance of each achool, averaging: from
$7 to $10 per capita. No teacher Is sup
posed to receive less than $70 per
month, and often even country schools
• ■) or $!»0 a month, being 20 school
days, including legal holidays.
We have wandered far from my moun
tain school, but now we will go back
to it. Sudden financial changes made
»c the sole supporter of a sick man
«snd four little children. Scarred and
worn with my battle against too great
odds, soul sick of the scramble for bare
existence In the towns, I "turned mine
eyes unto the everlasting hills," and
finally was employed to teach a school
far up among the blue tops of the
Santa Lucias and 20 miles from the
nearest town. Taking only a comfort
able camp outfit, my horse and buggy,
cows and dependent ones, I started on
what proved a four years' camping
(rip. My destination was a four roomed
cabin In "Homestead canyon." The
the hat. He had a thick arched neck,
sharp pointed horns, was light and
quick of foot and could turn a corner
as sharp as a cotton tall rabbit. When
the bull would be loosened Into the
arena—Woof! T'p would go Its tail,
down would go Its head, and like v
Hash it would charge the bear with an
Impact that could not be resisted.
In its attack in the arena the bull
rxhlblted gTeater cunning than the
Lear and a less disregard of conse
quences. The old time Spanish bull
had a way of starting his charge from
the side. His first few steps would be
sideways and this would completely
baffle the bear, which would almost
cows; where the operators wear fresh
clothes at each milking and not only
wipe off the udders and bag of the
cow with a damp cloth, but actually
wash their hands with soap and water
Instead of in the milk pall. And all
this is so wonderful in connection
cabin had been deserted for five years,
and the last five miles of the trip was
over an abandoned mountain road that
shelved and squirmed around one side
of the canyon. About sunset we sighted
our shanty. It stood in a little open
glade. Some big oaks sheltered it, pop
lars and sycamores grew by the spring,
and a line of willows marked the way
always anticipate a Irontal attack and
would plan to break the bull's neck
with a pat of the paw as the bull
charged past. Once In the ring at
Ventura a mighty grizzly lassoed and
brought captive into Ventura but three
days before, started loping toward a
lean. wiry. «nanish hull that. wa» naw-
leg up the dust In a corner of the
arena. In the flash, of a second the
bull charged; the bear rose on its hind
feet, towering so that a man would
have seemed a pigmy beside It. Never
had there been so brutal or thrilling: a
spectacle m Spanish California. In
an Instant the bull struck the bear,
knocking it several feet backwards.
tlon or output of the goods up to
standard.
All the above costs money and the
more care the farmer takes the more
his milk costs to produce per quart.
If the public—say the middleman and
the public—will not pay the farmer for
carefully produced milk, then the pub
lic gets carelessly produced milk.
It was not many years ago when
swill made milk was a staple product
in New York city. Hundreds of cows
were stabled near breweries or dis
tilleries and locked In their stalls, rare
ly, If ever, passing beyond the confines
of their dens (not worthy even of the
name of stables). Pipes containing a
reeking mass of distillery swill flowed
to their stalls, and upon Ufls they lived
and from this the food That #went to
nourish helpless infants and Invalids
came—milk. Such milk gathered In its
harvest of tender Infants during the
hot months In a way appalling.
Enlightenment and sanitation tolled
the passing bell of the swill milk In
dustry. The supply of milk was shifted
where It belonged—to the country farm.
Then the farmer came In for Investi
gation and the fight for sanitary milk
began with the farmer. It first began
against the farmer who wholly or
partially skimmed his milk. The city
inspector, with his lactometer and the
authority to dump deficient milk Into
the gutter, solved the problem of whole,
unwatered milk.
Then came the fight with the farmer
again on the question of sanitary meth
ods, not only as to the stable, but in the
matter of cleanly milk utensils and the
necessity for cooling and storing the
milk.
And here Is where the farmer, to use
a colloquialism, got It where he was in
the habi^o-f giving it to the chicken.
Tes. he was willing to whitewash his
stables twice a year, to cement the
floors, to groom his cows, to see that
his help were cleanly, to carefully cool
the milk and keep It cool until deliv
ered to the cars, etc., but, naturally, the
fanner asked: "Who is to pay for all
this? At 2 to 3 cents per quart for our
milk we certainly can not afford to do
It." And to this protest the middleman
ltent a deaf ear, refusing to advance the
Initial price to the farmer, yet advanc
ing the price to the consumer. And so,
in a haphazard, sanitary way, unworthy
of the name, the milk was produced,
and is generally produced, in the en
virons of every city In the land.
Then again another dreadful cloud
arose to darken the milk horizon—the
cows developed tuberculosis and the
milk from such cows carried the germ
into the delicate intestinal tract of the
Infant, and the percentage of Infant
mortality through tuberculosis In
to a tiny stream. About It rose the
purple, pink and lavender mountain
peaks and the quail scurried from un
der foot. I cooked our supper on a
camp fire, made down beds on the warm
hillside and put my family to rest.
Then I sat down beside the embers and
had it out with myself. Without doubt,
that night I burned all my bridges to
There was a confused struggling mass.
Ttien the dust cleared. The bull lay
dying, the bear was fatally gored and
afterwards shot and sold by a butcher.
This was an exception.
Usually a bull and grizzly would not
engage In the fight with equal vigor.
The Spanish bulls were as wild almost
as the bears themselves, and some
times both would hang around the
edges of the arena, so disturbed by the
Bight of the crowds that each for the
moment was forgetful of the sight of
its traditional enemy.
In the upper Ojal lives Thomas Clark,
a wealthy old timer and widely known,
who came there In 1868 and has lived in
the same spot ever since. It was from
Mr. Clark that the writer gleaned this
story. Clark ] 9 as halp as a well sea
soned oak. When he came to the upper
ojal the sight of a grizzly was a com
mon one to him, and fail young wife
thought no more of a deer loping down
the mountain slopes than would a city
girl who sees a sparrow.
Clark was a companion of former
T'nlted States Senator Thomas R. Bard.
Many a time In the old days the- two
young men tramped through the moun
tains making surveys, and so it hap
pened that the pioneer came to know
the grizzly as one knows his neighbors.
In his first years in Ojal Clark found
that the grizzly regarded man some
times with complete indifference, some
times with hostility and but rarely
with fear. When a bear did slink out
of sight It was generally because the
great animal regarded discretion as the
better part of valor. Once Clark saw
three grizzlies, a huge male, a she bear
and a half grown bear, plan the killing
of a great steer. The killing' took place
in full daylight on an open plain, and
the bears pnid no attention to Clark,
who stood in the open about 150 yards
away. The cattle were grazing: in an
open space, and a few moments before
the attack was made Clark saw the
bears slowly shuffling up a narrow ar
royo. All at once the three bears .sepa
rated. In less than half a minute a
bear rolled out of the fringe of willows
that ran down like a point in the little
plain. The bear was doubled up and
bounded along like a football rolling
toward the cattle, which, instead of
fleeing-, pricked up their ears and slow
ly approached the amazing spectacle.
Suddenly at angles from either side of
the plain the two other bears rushed
forth, and almost before one could t»U
what had happened the larger of the
two bears had reached the great steer
that, engaged in the engrossing diver
sions of .the bears, was unprepared for
the attack, and with a paw heavy as
lead and soft as velvet had felled the
Charles Cristadoro
creased. So the cows are subjected to
the tubercular test, removed from the
herd and thus was the menace seem
ingly met.
Then came the idea of giving the
farmer a fair deal, fair consideration
for his products, and "certified milk,"
milk coming from farms where the
health officers certified to the health of
the cows and the sanitation of the
stables and the cleanly manner of
handling the product and utensils. This
idea of "certified milk" and paying the
farmer an advance for a better product,
because It costs more to make clean
milk than dirty milk, is along the lines
of real progress.
In the process of milking Into _the
standard milkpail, many abominations
fall into the milk. Manure is the main
offender, so much so that this foreign
product falling into the milk excites
no comment on the part of the milker.
Hairs from the hide of the animal,
seeds floating In the air, and dust from
the hay; blood from an Injured udder,
etc.—all these, more or less unclean
things flnfl their way Into the milk
one way and another; but they cer
tainly do get there, especially the ma
nure.
At best, the mllkcan strainer is a
strainer only in name. How do we
know this? Save the residue, the de
posit In your milk bottles, after care
fully pouring off the milk, and putting
the residue in a warm place, say Ua a
sunny window; then watch it ferment.
Examine It carefully and you will find
the bulk of the deposit manure.
But you pasteurize or sterilize the
milk, you will say, and that "kills the
manure." Why not keep the manure
out of the milk to start with; or. If it
does get into the milk, Instantly remove
It at the farm by centrifugal separa
tion or straining?
If filth be present in the milk the
heating up of the milk at 160 degrees
F for an hour or two docs not per se
make that milk clean. The refuse Is
there Just the same; 160 degrees F.
does not evaporate or annihilate It.
Leaving aside the question of plain
cleanliness, let us reflect for a moment
and see what manure in the milk
means.
Repeated tests made with certain
"certified" cows, pronounced free from
tuberculosis, have shown germs of
tuberculosis freely present In their
manure. This manure dries, the dust
gets Into the hay that a healthy cow
eats and also into the milk pall, fresh
or in the form of dust. Let us go a
step further and show what tubercu
losis charged manure means when left
in the milk to develop. When milk is
me past. l saia gooaoy lurever to
many fair, sweet, reasonable hopes. I
mapped a course for the future which
was In substance—Live only from hour
to hour; let health and peace of mind
come first; make no darling plans for
the future so that you shall be saved the
heartbreak of seeing them fall; do
your best, then quit and "fret not thy
self because of evil doers." It took till
long after midnight, and some very bit
ter tears, to come to this conclusion,
but once I reached it, I held steadily
to it, and the outcome has been worth
even those bitter hours.
The next morning I set to work to
clean my cabin, a task most thoroughly
accomplished. Whitewash and cheap
wallpaper, soap and water and lots of
"elbow grease," as one of the neigh
bors afterward remarked, transformed
the hut Into a home. The children kept
It decked with beautiful wild flowers,
the glorious air and sunshine streamed
In at all the shining windows, cracks
and knotholes. Day and night the
winds came with healing on their
wings. Soul and body recuperated and
life began to be sweet once more. The
schoolhouse at first was the old office
building of a surveyor, but in time this
was replaced by a larger, better
equipped building.
Eleven children presented themselves
the first morning. Clean, 'bright,
healthy; gloriously glad to have a
school to go to; alert, as full of
woodcraft and as wise In mountain lore
as the little animals that scampered
over the steep trails ahead of them.
Nona came less than a mile and a half
over a narrow trail; many came four
miles, and one boy rode his little mus
tang nine miles to my school. Study
was a delight and what progress they
made! Never were the national songs
sung with more zest and when they
proudly "saluted the flag," held aloft
by the smallest boy In school, a little
6 year old, I think Uncle Sam wiped
his eyes and enrolled them among his
patriots. We gave "exhibitions' of
oratory and showed beautiful examin
ation papers, had occasional picnics
and got a foot of joy out of every
square inch of school life.
After a time all hands, teacher and
pupils, moved over Into another valley,
where a larger schoolhouse was erect
e* at the "Summit." "Teacher" lived
ia "the long house," bo called because
steer to the earth.
In five minutes from the time Clark
had first seen the grizzlies they had de
voured a large part of the steer.
Clark had traveled to the OJal from
Sonera and Marin counties. In Marin
county he had seen the tracks of old
"Club Foot," a giant grizzly for which
bounties from JSOO to |2,500 were of
fered in different California counties. In
Ventura county ho again met with old
Club Foot's tracks. The huge bear
traveled at night and wandered from
Sonoma and Mendocino counties as far
south as San Bernardino. Always he
crossed the Upper OJal at the same
point, and it was said he bore a hun
separated, strained or purified by the
separating machine, the manure is
precipitated and held In the machine to
be cleaned from the machine after the
run of milk Is through. These ma
chines are hollow bowls of steel that
are revolved many hundreds of times
per minute, the centrifugal force being
so great that the milk Is separated into
three bodies. The filth Is precipitated
Into a compact body by itself, the
skim milk next and then the cream
next, the cream and skim milk run
ning from the machine and leaving the
refuse filth behind.
Tests have been made, In certain
cases, with perfectly healthy pigs by
feeding with this refuse. Invariably
the pigs developed well marked cases
of tuberculosis. It would seem, there
fore, a good sanitary measure to pass
all milk. certified or uncertified,
through milk separators before use.
The chances are that if "certified"
milk were strained through a sepa
rating machine that the refuse wouM
prove a revelation to the user. No
milk can or other perforated strainer
can clean milk as does the separating
process by machinery.
Again, to illustrate the value of this
separating process as a sanitary meas
ure, let two cans of cream be furnished
from the same dairy herd. Let one
can be of cream skimmed by the hand
process, let the other be skimmed by
the centrlfugally separated method.
The cans are placed In an icehouse
and stored and the two cans regularly
examined. Tests have shown that
when the can of hand skimmed cream
has turned sour and bitter the can of
machine separated cream is yet sweet
and fresh. The presence and absence
ofc. foreign fermentable matter Is tho
explanation.
To the ordinary milk drinker all the
above may be Just Greek, but the proof
of the pudding is in the eating, and to
satisfy any doubting- Thomas, let him
visit a creamery where milk Is sepa
rated by machinery and let him be
present when the machines are cleaned
and the -manure removed. If the on
looker has a sensitive stomach he may
from that moment take a fixed dislike
for milk and never drink it again. It
is said that operators in these cream
eries get cured of the milk habit.
All the efforts to Improve our milk
supply are good and commendable in
every way, but there should be one
thing done and Invariably done, and
that is the separation by hand sepa
rating machines of the warm milk,
fresh from the cow, as soon as possi
ble after milking. The sooner germ
laden refuse Is removed from the milk
the better for the milk and the one
who drinks it.
it was jubi a siring or ntue rooms
and not half so cozy as our dearly re
membered cabin in Homestead canyon.
Now the children could come in carts
if need be, fend to see a ramshackle old
vehicle gayly decked with brake,
maidenhair ferns and multicolored
wildflower3 filled with laughing young
sters, come tilting down the grade,
dred bullets. Once Clark met a hunter
with a pack of hounds who was on the
trail of Club Foot. He had followed the
bear from Santa Cruz county, he said,
but had been unable to come up with
the bear." Near Los Angeles the hounds
ran into Club Foot and were all killed
by the huge bear, but the trapper got a
new pack of dogs and, says Mr. Clark,
he finally killed old Club Foot In the
San Bernardino mountains and ob
tained the reward.
The carcass "of Club Foot dressed
more than that of the average' steer.
For years his comings and goings had
been recorded by the print of a hugo
misshapen paw, once caught In a trap.
The milk supply of today and that of
20 years ago are two entirely different
propositions in sanitation. But there is
much room yet for improvement. So,
when we remove the tuberculous cow
fro-n the herd and apply all the modern
methods of stable sanitation, the
cooling and aerating of the milk, wo
are% doing wonders. But there Is one
thing seemingly unthought of today
and but infrequently practiced, and
that ia the clarification, the purifying
by mechanical straining of the milk
as it comes fresh from the cow. It
will not be long before the necessity
for this will be well understood and
put Into universal practice. We then
will not only have certified milk In
drawn by a loping old cattle pony,
while a troop raced whooping behind
and the best fellow "caught on" was a
sight to put life Into a stone.
Wonderful gifts were brought to
teacher—great bunches of lovely flow
ers, curious stones and all sorts of In
dian relics, mortars and pestles, parfect
arrow heads of the finest black or deep
The San Francisco Sunday Call
But back to the fight between the
bulls and bears. v»ix
Bull and bear fights have been »«»
by the Spanish people since first tne
Latin races went to the Pyrenees. Tne
grizzly of California is bulkier, more
powerful and desperate than tn»
brown bears of Europe. It usually too«
four men to lasso a grizzly, and tn»
vaqueros of the Ventura range wars
equal to the Job. The west never had
better cowboys than the Spanish or
Mexican cow hands in early Caiifornlfc
days.
They were daring, certain and dex
trous, and so it happened that the
vaqueros would ride out from Ven
tura to the upper OJal long bo*°™
morning and would have reached tn»
stamping grounds of old Ephriam wtien,
the first dawn came. Almost always.
says Tom Clark, they would get a
bear. Usually the vaqueros separated,
riding on ridge* and overlooking th«
surrounding country and the deep
brush covered arroyos. When bruin
was sighted shrill yells would pro
claim that the quarry had been seen.
Not much lassoins could be done i"».
the brushy spaces, although the va
queros were amazingly expert in get
ting through the brush. The slim lit
tle cow ponies needed room to get
away. But in any ordinary country,
brush or no brush, the vaquero would
ride up within throwing distance of
the grizzly and lasso him as easily as
a rope might be thrown around a steer.
When the rope was first thrown over
the bear's neck, or around one of its
legs it would be no more to the great
creature than a fly. Usually- Old
Ephriam would charge at "the horse
man, who would ride sideways, keeping
the rope taut. Finally the bear would
stand on his hind legs and slowly coil
in the rope with his paws, pulling
both horse and man toward him. Thjs,
of course, would be only possible if
the bear could get some purchase on
the ground. Not one nor even two va
queros on horseback would be a match
for a grizzly bear, because old brulo
generaHy had more pulling power than
a pony on a brushy hillside, and be
cause, too, the country would not al
ways permit two horsemen to pull from
different directions. But after the first
noose had settled over bruin's head a
second would usually come whizzing
and soon the big bear would find ltsel-t
held taut from three or four angles
by as many vaqueros.
After that it would only be the work;
of a tew moments to truss the great
bear up, load him on a wagon and
take him to Ventura, where, for tho
amusement of the crowd who would
gather on a holiday afternoon, he would
be pitted against a Spanish bull.
fact, and, to make assurance flout>ly
sure, if we pasteurize our milk we will
be sure that as far as manure and
physical dirt are concerned we ar«
starting with clean milk.
The one most Interested on this sub
ject is the mother -with the bottlefed
infant. When she, through the Women's
Federation of Clubs really takes up
this subject in earnest, we then will
see the milk purifying reform started
to go on to a finish, which will mean
much not only for those who are now
living, but for those who are to coma
after us.
The day will come when no milk will
come Into our cities that has not been
purified by mechanical clarification.
blue flint and even bones. A grinning
skull, however, was too much for on*
little girl's nerves and had to be pri
vately inspected. »Some of the games
played were unique. One of the moat
daring was "Monkey." Along the little
creek In Homestead canyon grew a row
of willows. Boys and girls formed In
line at the foot of a big tree. Up this
tree shinned the first romp, closely
followed by the next, and so on to the
end of the line. The first fellow swung
far put on the topmost branch that
would hold him, then with a leap and a
yell landed in the next willow, did it
again, and so on for quite a distance
down stream. Sometimes there were
bruises, but so swift and sure were
these little mountaineers that they sel
dom slipped or missed the branch they
aimed for. One little girl oould order
the rest to "See me call quail." The
rest would stand quietly while she ran
up on the hillside. Then she would
drop down in the grass and begin to
call her "Come right home. Sit right
there," when to a whirr of wings, a
flutter of tiny speckled bodies down
dropping, the little girl was soon the
center of a flock of quail. So tame
were they in time that they ate with
the chickens and even hopped about
the doorstep.
Deer were often seen, and mountain
lions, wildcats and rattlers had to be
guarded against. In midwinter the
Ice formed and frost glittered, but no
matter. Everything was interesting
and each day lovely of its kind. The
children read the tracks of the wild
animals as they read print. They were
instructed in simple botany and taught
to look for and love the various aspsota
of the mountains, the beauty of sun
rise, the glory of a sunset, the shimmer
of moonlight and the magnificence or a
star studded night sky in those high
altitudes. "Nature study" became sec
ond self and the beauty and purity of
It was wrought into those young fives
and is bearing fruit in nobVe young
manhood and womanhood. After four
years in my beloved mountains I was
obliged for others to go back to the
towns. Some time If I am freed from
the duties that at present hold me, X
shall return to the mountains, build a
cabin and live "near to Nature's heart."
the kindest, bravest heart la all the
universe.