Get Out And Fish On Opening Day - Ahem

 

I know, I know, it's Opening Day but the birds didn't seem to be flying and there was an invite on the phone to fish a new place, nice. You know the drill, put a couple of rods in the truck, head down the road to the country and have at it. 

We found ourselves by a good sized pond, fed by a couple of small streams, and cast off in search of bass. Good call, before you could say "tight lines" they were biting in the shallows; fierce, voracious young fish and everyone was was catching, result.

After a while the bite died down and I swapped out a psychedelic green lure for worms. Lo and behold, up came several blue gill and a junior catfish, not shabby at all, and for a while it was every cast a fish. I love that, but it slowed down again and we were getting ready to call it a day when something big hit young C's blue, sparkly, rubber worm thing, fished deep. Turned out to be a serious catfish, easily the best catch of the day. Well done, young man!

So that was that, great fun. As we were driving back to my church friend's place, I learned that one of the families who settled the area back in the 1850s/60s(?) still lived on their land, which they most very sensibly hadn't sold off, ahem, word to the wise.

Wisdom aside, their original cabin is still in place, on a bluff, not so very far from where we were fishing. "Do not leave this cabin while I'm gone," said the patriarch to his wife or daughter. She did, and was scalped by Comanches, who were active in the county. 

Imagine what it took to settle Texas. It was no small thing, and people from Europe and the UK, perhaps CONUS too, have this "Yee-Haw" comedy cowboy view of our state. Fair enough, cinematic PR has its place, but the reality's different. Those people were tough as nails and that's not gone; friendly with it, mind you.

Fish on,

LSP

Wild West Hero

 

You may not, but I've got an issue with this song, in which our imaginary Wild West Hero is this big friend of the Indians. Nice vision, right? Rock on, ELO, but really? You wanna be friends with the torturing, savage, cruel, demonic Commanche? Hey, even the Apache feared those twisted killers.

So, ELO and confederates, you want to be friends with that kind of people, and I use that word lightly, who would peel the skin off your wife's head and slow roast your husband over a fire? You want to be friends with that?

No. When the War of Northern Aggression settled we were able to turn our Cav to the untamed Comanche, and beat them, utterly. Did they deserve it? They were evil, so yes. Was there a loss involved? Yes, there was. The finest light cavalry in all the world were reduced to welfare status, to say nothing of what's followed. Strip malls, anyone?

Regardless, Wild West Heroes fought in the Indian wars, along with malfeasants, and we honor the former.

Ride On,

LSP

Empire Of The Summer Moon

 

Have you read this book? If not, you should. SC Gwynne tells the story of the war against the Comanche in the western plains, and what a story it is, of ferocious violence, savagery and bravery, in which War Chief Quanah Parker was ultimately defeated by General Ranald Mackenzie.

We're inclined, these days, to decry the Red Indian smackdown, and there's justice in that; how many treaties broken. Still, consider the nature of the adversary:

Seven men were killed in the raid, though that does not begin to describe the horror of what Mackenzie found at the scene... the victims were stripped, scalped and mutilated. Some had been beghaded and others had their brains scooped out. "Their fingers, toes and private parts had been cut off and stuck in their mouths... upon each exposed abdomen had been placed a mass of live coals..."

 

One man, Samuel Elliot, had been "roasted to a crisp" between two wagon wheels, and on. The Comanche, under Quanah, weren't fooling around, and perhaps we forget their ferocity in penance for our own misdoings. But remember this: 

What those heathen savages did to our people moving West, they did to their own people too, to other tribes. Scalping, torture, enslavement, killing children, gang raping and enslaving women, some of whom adopted the lifestyle, not least Quanah's Mother, Cynthia Parker.

After defeat by Mackenzie in 1875 at Palo Duro Canyon, Quanah and his war band were folded into the Rez. He became a friend of Teddy Roosevelt, curiously. And all this happened about 150 years ago, not that that far away, when you think on it.

Read Empire, it's a good book,

LSP