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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Seaforth News, 1958-10-30, Page 3Marl Who Tamed The Wild West Within a few 'weeks of the close of the bitterly fought Civil War, the sternest military as- signment in the United States was given to tough, chunky little General Patrick E. Connor. On a summer's day he review- ed his three thousand cavalry- men at Fort Laramie, before they started westward to open a road east of the Big Horn Mountains, a road that would reach the great Yellowstone River. As the blue ranks rode past, sun glinting on sabres and the muledrawn wagons, the breeze ruffling red and white pennants, the General turned to the buck- skin -clad figure of his chief scout. "How do they .look to you, Jim?" "Darned green, said the fabu- lous Jim Bridger. "Chiefs like Red Cloud and Man -Afraid -of - His - Horse will make rings around 'em!" Jim Bridger knew his redmen —from the Blackfoot nation in the Rockies to the Sioux in the Black Hills, and the dog warriors of the Cheyenne along the Pave- der awder River—and his words were remembered later when some of Connor's 'best officers and men were massacred.` Jim rode with Colonel Car- rington to Big Piney Creek, and in his hearing Colonel Fetter- man boasted: "Give me 50 men and I'll ride clear through the whole Sioux nation." Brave words, but Red Cloud's warriors wiped out Fetterman and 80 of his "walk -a -heaps", as the Indians contemptuously re- ferred to the U.S. soldiers, Then men remembered Jim Bridger's words once more. They recalled that they had been listening to his words for a good many years, For Jim Bridger was a verit- sale human legend in buckskin. Fie was one of the remaining Mountain Men, that band of in- trepid trappers and hunters who opened up the trails westward before the great gold strikes in the middle of the nineteenth century. Men like Bridger had pioneer- ed the westward surge of em- pire. They were the first West- erners in any real sense. Jim himself was born in the Old Dominion, Virginia. He wasn't 10 when he first set eyes on the Big Muddy, as the old- timers called the Mississippi and Missouri rivers. As a youth he developed his muscles over a blacksmith's anvil, but by 18 ha was wearing buckskin and trap- ping in the foothills of the Rockies. For an incredible seven years he lived hunting and trapping beyond the limits of known civi- lization. This was the Mountain Man period of his amazing life. Over six feet, without a spare ounce of flesh on his well -knit frame, he became a fine marks- man, a great tracker, and one of the few palefaces the red man respected. Jim Bridger, whose adventures are thrillingly told in "Jim Bridger", was a good friend to the families of those early set- tlers who set out along the fam- RESCUE FAILS A British Royal. Navy helicopter lowers a rescuer to a jet fighter which crashed in the English Chan- nel, Moments later the plane slipped beneath the waves, car - eying pilot Cmdr. John b. R'us- eell to his death. ed Oregon Trail in search of their private Eldorado. He helped them with their wagon teams, brewed herbal medicines, guided them across Indian country, brought them hope when despair had them in a tight grip. The story of;-Jim;Bridger be. came the stay- of : the West's development. He married an In- dian woman of 'the Ute tribe. He set up in business as a family man, at a settlement he built himself and named for himself, Fort Bridger, South from the fort ;an the Mormon Trail to Salt Lake City ant the land of Brigham Young's "Saints", Beyond that was the Santa Fe trail, running to New Mexico. North ran the Bozeman trail to Montana and the Cana- dian Border. Fort Bridger be- came a busy hub with many spokes. Up to that time Jim Bridger was a man whose backyard was the entire West. Buthe saw changes shaping. White emi- grants were pushiny the redman farther from his old hunting grounds. Already the day of the Mountain Man had receded into history. It was swept away alto* ,ether 14 years after the fort was opened. A wagon train with supplies , for General Johnston was he,d up by road agents, and the cattle and goods stolen, Atter a week's slogging march on foot the crew, under Lew Simpson, stumbled into the fort built in a grove beside a trout stream. Among them was r keen -eyed teenager, who stared with fas- cination at the pole corral, the heavy stockade, the store build- ings, and the cabin where Jim Bridger lived. That boy's name was Billy Cody. "What are you looking for in the West, son?" Bridger asked, thinking of his two children away being educated in the ways of civilized man in St. Louis. "Buffalo and Indians," said the youngster. "You'll find both a -plenty," Bridger sinned. But, keen a student of his fellow -men as he was, Jim Bridger could not see that a few months away that boy would be cne of the Pony Express riders, who helped to span a continent in days when speed was the new cry, or that the name of Buffalo Bill would surpass even his own. Then gold was found at Pike's Peak, and the Concord stage- coaches and lumbering Conestoga prairie schooners rumbled west- ward with "Pike's Peak or Bust!" scrawled across their sides. Bridger, a king of the plains in his royal garb of buckskin, leased Fort Bridger to a govern- ment which forgot its contract with him as it forgot other con- tracts with the red man, and went back to scouting for the pony soldiers of Uncle Sam, those "Long Knives", as the Sioux warriors dubbed the cav- alry with their sabres. So again the scarred 'veteran in buckskin rode as a scout for white men bent on pushing the wild frontier clear to the Pacific, During spring rains an old wound, caused by a Blackfoot arrowhead, which had remained embedded in his back for three years, ached, to remind him of days when the red man did not fight with white men's weapons. After scouting for Connor and Carrington he joined General Grenville N. Dodge, who was laying the tracks of the great Union Pacific Railroad. The Indians called Dodge "Long Eye", because of his constant use of a surveyor's glass, but the man who gave Long Eye his far-ranging vision was Ji:n Bridger, scouting ahead. But Bridger, still lance -straight in the saddle, was reaching the end of his clays of action. He had buried two Indian wives and lived with a third, a daugh- ter of the Snake tribe. Win n the Union Pacific met and joined the California Central Pacific at a place to be called Cheyenne, Bridger turned his back on a West that was growing unfa- miliar, strung with steel rails and telegraph lines. He settled in the old border country of Missouri, midway between the place of his birth, Richmond, Virginia, and th': West he had helped tame. Five years after the boy - general Custer made this last stand on the Little Big Horn asainst Sitting Bull's fiery Sioux. Jim Bridger cashed his chips. He was buried on farmland south of Westport, Missouri, in his 78th year, an immortal who had given his name to history. Two of three girls who had grown up together married. Thereafter they continually an- noyed their spinster friend with tactless remarks about her single state. She laughed off their comments until one day they went a bit too far. "Now tell us truthfully," they twitted her, "have .you ever re- ceived a proposal of marriage?" With a withering smile she retorted, "S'trppose you ask your husbands.' BAILING OUT — Minor inconveniences like bailing out the "cockpit" are taken in stride by the sports car set: Caught with his tonneau (thus der) cover down, Ed Vorwerk, UPI photographer empties his MG before leaving on assignment. Here is a wonderful recipe for fudge which yoti or some of your "younger set" would be well advised to try, if you have a sweet tooth. This recipe makes two pounds. GOLDEN NUGGET FUDGE 3a cup (small can) undiluted evaporated milk 1 li cups sugar Y teaspoon salt 14 cups (16 medium) diced marshmallows cup caramel chips 1 teaspoon vanilla 3s cup chopped walnuts Mix evaporated milk, sugar, and salt in saucepan over low heat. Heat to boiling, then cook 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat. Add marshmallows, caramel chips, vanilla, and nuts. Stir 1-2 minutes (until marshmallows melt). Drop by teaspoonfuls onto waxed paper. « w P If you and your family are fond of what are called "hot breads" here's a recipe to inter- est you. JOHNNY CAKE (Makes 1 9x5x3-inch loaf) 231 cups sifted all-purpose flour 3 tablespoons baking powder 2 teaspoons salt oup sugar Ii1 cups yellow corn meal lee cups undiluted evaporated n1Ik 2 eggs Tt rup melted butter Sift flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar together. Add corn meal and mix well. Add remain- ing ingredients; mix just until dry ingredients are moistened. Turn into buttered 9x5x3-inch loaf pan. Bake in hot oven (425° F.) 40-45 minutes, or until bread tests done. P P * APPLE BATTER PUDDING 6 large apples 2 eggs, separated 1 cup of white sugar 1 cup of flour 3s teaspoon of salt 1 teaspoon of baking powder 14 cup of water 1 teaspoon of vanilla 3 tablespoons of butter 1? -.i, cups of brown sugar Peel and slice the apples. Beat the egg yolks; add the white sugar. Sift the remaining dry in- gredients and add alternately with water and flavoring. Melt the butter and brown sugar in the bottom of a large fiat cas- serole. Add the silced apples to this, Pour the batter over the apples, and bake at 350 for about 40 minutes, Turn upside down to serve, and serve it warm, with cream. This should serve six. M P P CINNAI%TON APPLES le pound of red cinnamon candy ?c cup of water 1 cup of sugar 4 tart apples, sliced and peeled. Pare and slice the apples into eighths, Combine the sugar, water and candy to make a syrup. Bring to a boil; when the sugar and candy are dissolved, add sliced apples to the syrup. Cook the apples until they are soft. * P a SOUR CREAM PIE 3 cups of tart apples, chopped et cup of sugar 3 tablespoons of flour 1 cup of sour cream 1 teaspoon of cinnamon Pastry for one 9 -inch crust. Combine the sugar, salt and flour, Add the sour cream; beat everything until it's smooth. Add the chopped apples; mix thoroughly. Pour this mixture into an unbelted crust. Mix 13.1 tablespoons of sugar with cinna- mon and sprinkle over the top of the pie. Bake at 375° for 45 minutes. Good eating! WORKS WONDERS Employees of an engineering company in Youngstown were offered an increase in pay re- cently, but the offer was reject- ed by the men after a secret ballot. Their spokesman explained to the boss that they were prepar- ed to carry on with the present rates in an effort to hold down. prices and perhaps enable the firm to obtain more orders. Beginning Of A Travel Agency Thomas Cook was born In England in 1808 and lived to be almost eighty-four years of age. , , Starting work as lad of ten he was a gardener's helper and a wood -turner. At twenty he was a Bible -reader and a lage missionary for the County of Rutland. He became a total abstainer and published in 1840 t h e Children's Temperance Magazine... . A convention was held pres- ently at Loughborough to fur- ther an attack on gin and beer, and Thomas Cook chartered a special train to carry the dele- gates from Leicester at a shill- ing a head. "This is believed," says the Britannica, "to be the first publicly -advertised excur- sion" ever run in England. Its ease of travel was so well liked. that Cook was employed in the next few years to undertake similar tasks; and in 1845 ha "advertised a pleasure -trip On a more extensive scale, from Lei- cester to Liverpool and back„, with opportunities for visiting the Isle of Man, Dublin and Welsh coast" Thomas Cook was the instru- ment by which 165,000 persons attended The Great Exhibition in 1852, Another of his excur- sions eased the path of tourists to an exhibition in Paris in 1855. The next year saw Cook's first circular tour of Europe. He at- tacked Switzerland in 1863 and Italy in 1864. Up to this time his trips had been personally con- ducted, but now he began to be an agent in the sale of English and foreign railway and steam- er tickets; and a traveler might buy in advance at home his gen- eral transportation and journey as he pleased without T. C, aslc- ing him to move up close. Serv- ice to the United States was started in 1866. Presently there was an exhibition in Paris and for the accommodation of his clients Cook leased a hotel. -- the the beginning of the "coupons" for bed and board. ,,.In 1870 he arranged with the Khedive for travel up the Nile. T h e Franco-Prussian War brought with it a demand for his tickets in order that tourists might reach the south of Europe without crossing the countries that were fighting. With the re- turn of peace, a group of Ameri- can Freemasons went to Paris. under Cook's guidance — an ad- vance guard of the vast traffic that would soon be crossing the Atlantic to crowd the funiculars of Europe. From "An Italian Winter," by Charles S. Brooks, Obey the traffic signs — they are placed there for YOUR SAFETY. SPEAKS OUT ON INTEGRATION — In his first news conference in more than a month, President Eisenhower said it is the obligation of officials in Virginia and Arkansas to comply with federal court rulings on school integration. He added that any other course except compliance with the federal courts and the reopening of the public schools would be "fraught with grave consequences" to America. :iiia>lnti{r:q.,mcyary.. "n��vu ..tsrY. .f gF zw2 SEA BATTLE OF THE FUTURE?—Since the advent of atom -powered submarines and sub -launched missiles, many military strat- egists warn. that America's greatest danger lies in a sudden 'nuclear attack from the sea, In order to counter this possibility, a num- ber of antisubmarine weapons have been de- vised. Tracking exercises in both the Atlantic and the Pacific are continuously being carried Out in order to improve their use. Artist's drawing above, with perspectives compressed for clarity, envisions the actions that could take place in an undersea attack, based on information that has been declassi- fied. One of the most important defensive weap- ons is the helicopter. In the scene above (1) It has picked up the sounds of a submarine pack by means of the sonar device trailing from it. Land-based planes (2), a carrier (3) and a destroyer (4) are called to the area. Depth charge explosions can be seen in the wake of the destroyer, while both a conventional tor- pedo and one fired Into the air by rocket seek out a sub. Locating another sub, a tracker plane (5), either from land or from a carrier, drops a homing torpedo which scores' a kill.. But one sub (6) has eluded detection long enough to surface and Are a nuclear -armed- missile, in this case a winged,, nonballistic type. Perfection of a ballistic' missile capable of being fired underwater will greatly increase dangers of ,submarine effectiveness. Also in development are submarine vs. submarine weapons and tactics. In this drawing, one city has been hit. The outcome of battle is still in doubt, although„ as of today, the odds favor the _attacker.