Tag: Edward Abbey

BEFORE TELLURIDE & ASPEN WENT CRAZY: 1950-1980/Photos by Herb Ringer (ZX# 101)

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From Edward Abbey’s “The Journey Home”
“The town of Telluride was actually discovered back in 1957, by me, during a picnic expedition into the San Miguel Mountains of southwestern Colorado. I recognized it at once as something much too good for the general public. For thirteen years I kept the place a secret from all but my closest picnicking cronies. No use: I should have invested everything I had in Telluride real estate. In 1970 a foreigner from California named Joseph T. Zoline moved in with $5 million and began the Californica-tion of Telluride. Formerly an honest, decayed little mining town of about good souls, it is now a bustling whore of a ski resort with a population of 1,500 and many more to come. If all goes badly, as planned… 

… Men weep, men pray and kneel, but money talks. Money walks and talks and gets things done.
— EA

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Arches’ Vintage Wooden Signs (Gone but Not Forgotten) — Jim Stiles (ZX#99)

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For decades, the iconic routed wooden signs, in national parks across America, were a familiar sight to tourists. They were works of art…

But leave it to the government to find one. Someone in the Department of Transportation, his/her identity lost to history, decided to take a look at the park signs and saw red flags everywhere…

“These signs! These signs are NOT in compliance with federal highway safety standards!!!”

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ROCK INSCRIPTIONS: WHEN DOES VANDALISM BECOME HISTORIC? –Jim Stiles (ZX#74)

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But when does a carved name on a rock stop being vandalism and take on a historic value of its own? Where do we draw the line? A century? Fifty years? I struggled with that question a lot when I was a ranger, though over the years, I came to believe that every one of these carvings is too special to be removed.

The above inscription has special meaning for me, because I found it during a backcountry patrol in 1977. It would be fairer to say I “re-found” it, many years after other humans, most likely Basque sheepherders had added their own names and comments (whether the ‘B.S.’ next to Julien’s name was an expression of doubt re: the inscription’s authenticity, of it just happened to be the man’s initials, the Julien inscription had surely been seen. but perhaps decades earlier.

I stumbled upon it purely by accident, toward the far north end of the Devils Garden. I saw the Basque inscriptions first and noticed that it was a perfect campsite. It was at the base of a small natural amphitheater—the sandstone tower and fins blocked the weather coming from the north or east. A fifty foot stabilized dune to the west of the site protected campers from the western winds. It was only after I stood directly in front of these larger inscriptions that I noticed Julien’s name. I had heard it before and thought it was worth writing up a report on my find. I had no idea it would create so much interest…

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TOM ARNOLD: Moab’s VW Mechanic, Philosopher & Ed Abbey’s Pilot (ZX#73)…by Jim Stiles

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Tom Tom’s VW Museum has never been easy to miss. It’s located at the intersection of Mill Creek Drive and Spanish Valley Drive, an intersection known to locals as Chicken Corners. It’s the Gateway to Spanish Valley, where in the last two decades, many of the other junk cars and washing machines and spare tires have vanished — replaced by half million dollar faux adobe second homes and condos.

But TK’s Museum still stands. At its zenith, Arnold managed to squeeze 250 vintage Volkswagens onto a two acre lot that he bought 50 years ago. It was his pride and joy. Others still curse the site and wish some mega-billionaire would fly in, buy the property and scour his collection from the face of the earth. But Tom…or Tom Tom…or TK …always took the criticism in stride and with good cheer. “They just don’t know how to have a good time… I’m having a good time.” He did to his last breath…

For the record, he was born Thomas Arnold, but we knew him by many names— Tom, Tom Tom, TK, or more generically—The Volkswagen Guy. For decades TK serviced VWs of all kinds, with varying degrees of success. As all of us who once owned VWs, the cars were almost born with the intent to drive us crazy, and consequently, we owners were surely cursed with varying degrees of masochism. But Tom loved them all. And he loved to collect the ones that he could not revive.

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MOAB’S OTHER WILD RIDE — CHARLIE STEEN’S 1950s URANIUM BOOM — by Maxine Newell (ZX# 67)

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Uranium fever became a national affliction when Steen announced his strike. Go-for-broke prospectors poured into the little town of Moab by the thousands, lured by the $100 million bait. The town was besieged by a boom which was to surpass the gold rushes of the previous century.

Hopeful investors, loan sharks, and promoters followed the prospectors in. New businesses set up wherever they could find room, on the Main Street drag, in private garages or in tents. One realty firm operated from a tiny log cabin which was the revered historical home of an early-day pioneer. Moab’s new slogan, “Uranium Capitol of the World,” was splashed on store fronts, stationery and souvenirs. The town sported a Uranium Building and a Uranium Days Celebration. The term “uraniumaires” was coined to identify the new mining magnates. Someone finally got around to dubbing Charles A Steen the “Uranium King of the World,” and the title stuck.

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IN DEFENSE OF “TRASHY TRAILERS” …by Jim Stiles (ZX#65)

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One could make the argument that without the invention and development of the travel trailer, Moab’s Uranium Boom of the 1950s would have been even more chaotic than it was. Until Charlie Steen’s life altering discovery of uranium at Big Indian, 30 miles south of town, Moab was a sleepy little village most noted for its orchards. And it’s a good guess that many of those original settlers were appalled by the mass migration to Moab. Others welcomed the excitement and the prospects of a more vibrant economy. Moab has never been a town to agree on much of anything. The debate still rages.
In any case, would-be miners and prospectors flocked to Southeast Utah, only to find a community that was not in any way prepared to handle the Boom.

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Rangers Lloyd Pierson & Lyle Jamison: Remembering Arches, Moab & Ed Abbey in the 50s: from 1989 & 1992 Interviews —w/ Jim Stiles (ZX#58)

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In 1989, my own seasonal ranger “career,” (if you could call it that) had ended, much to the relief of most park managers over the GS-7 pay level. But I still maintained good friendships with some of the older NPS staff, many of whom had retired years earlier but who had decided to live in Moab. I was particularly blessed to call two park veterans, Lloyd Pierson and Lyle Jamison, as dear friends. While newer park personnel loathed my irreverent, outspoken side, Lyle and Lloyd appreciated it. In fact, Lloyd’s humor was somewhat biting, and he was always willing to speak his mind, and let the chips fall where they may. He gave new meaning to the expression “unbridled candor.” It’s why, so many years ago, I concluded that, “When I grow up, I want to be just like Lloyd Pierson.” I’m still working on it.

Lloyd Pierson was the Chief Ranger at Arches from 1956 to 1961. He and Superintendent Bates Wilson oversaw the Mission 66 project during those most tumultuous years. The building of a new road was inevitable, and so both men played a role in determining the new highway alignment in a way that would have the least impact on the park they both loved.
Lyle Jamison worked as the Monument administrative officer from 1959 to 1960, but as they both later explain in this story, his duties in those days were “wide and varied.” . Lyle took another job in the NPS system that year, but a decade later returned to the newly formed Canyonlands National Park. It was Lyle who oversaw the hiring of seasonal rangers at Arches. I had signed on as a volunteer in the winter of 1975-76 but applied for the Arches seasonal campground job and often stopped by the old headquarters office downtown to check on my status. Using every technique possible, I told him that at volunteer pay I could not sustain myself on a diet of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Finally one day in March I poked my head in his office and Lyle looked up and grinned, “Stiley!”

…Lloyd retired from the Park Service a few years before my arrival but was a well-known face in Moab. A historian by trade, Pierson was an active board member of the Moab Museum and his frequent letters to the Moab Times-Independent were legendary. Lyle retired from government service just a few years after my arrival. But like Lloyd, he was hooked on Moab. He and his wonderful wife Lois bought a home in Spanish Valley and stayed active in local issues related to the parks.

When I decided to start The Zephyr, I was anxious to use it as a way of keeping and preserving the history of Southeast Utah. The first two people I sought out were Lloyd and Lyle. One cold morning in January 1989, I coerced both of these guys to take a ride with me through Arches to remember and recall the “good old days,” and observe the changes that have occurred over the years. We all bundled into my 1963 Volvo and I sat a tape recorder on the dashboard. I pushed the record button and off we went.. The overriding theme was: What’s changed? What’s here now that wasn’t here then? How different does this place feel to you? For the next hour and a half, they talked and I mostly listened…

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EDWARD ABBEY: 34 YEARS LATER in a BRAVE NEW WORLD—Jim Stiles (ZX#53)

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He once said, “ If America could be, once again, a nation of self-reliant farmers, craftsmen, hunters, ranchers and artists, then the rich would have little power to dominate others. Neither to serve nor to rule. That was the American Dream.”

Many of the older New Westerners love Ed Abbey but have no idea what that means. They’ve read all his books and they follow and “LIKE” his quotes on Facebook, but they understand far less than they realize. Many of the younger New Westerners are too busy recreating to care. Solitude isn’t even a priority (And please note, in the spirit of Abbey, I’m generalizing here and judging a generation who I know has its own shining stars. If there is any hope to be found, it is in those young people.)

What Abbey always hoped we’d take away from his writing and from his life was a sense of ourselves as individuals, as men and women who could take control of our own lives and our own destinies. Abbey spoke disapprovingly of a “nation of bleating sheep and braying jackasses.” He longed for a people with dignity and courage and he loathed the mindless “bleating” that he found even in his own readers

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REMEMBERING PHILIP HYDE: Revered Photographer & an Honorable Man—by Jim Stiles (ZX#11)

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Two epiphanies would come from that moment. On the back jacket, I read both biographies and realized that Abbey had written the 1956 novel “Brave Cowboy,” upon which the 1962 film, “Lonely are the Brave” was based. I had seen that movie on television, a decade earlier, and it had a profound effect on me and on my future. To this day, it’s one of my favorites. The bios also included photos of both men. I studied them closely and decided to learn more about Mr. Hyde as well.

Eleven years later, when I started The Zephyr, I knew exactly where I had stored Phil’s calling card, so I signed up Phil Hyde as a complimentary Lifetime subscriber. A few months later, to my surprise, I received a card from Phil. He still remembered our encounter from 1978 and wrote to thank me for the complimentary subscription and to wish me well in my endeavors. Over the years, he became a Zephyr supporter and contributed a few letters to the Feedback page.

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