Genny Kercheville
Genny Kercheville
Interview June 2012
Audio: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4
June 5, 2012 – at their home at Sunset Ranch on Nameless Road
Genny & Dick Kercheville Tape 1 (15:00)
Genny: Maynard, uh, and I can’t think of her – I’ll have to look up her last name
Ken: Oh my goodness
Genny: But her dad was a cedar chopper
Ken: Doris Maynard. Now let me – we, the Whitt place
Genny: Yes
Ken: We would come in
Genny: She’s a Whitt too
Ken: Yes you would come in through the Whitt place. We had – in order to get the Whitt place we had to buy the Maynard place. So we bought two hundred-and-sixty acre or hundred-and-eighty acre tracts
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Come in through the Whitt place and go over – there’s a little house that Mrs. Maynard lived in. Would that be the same place?
Genny: Yeah. That would be the
Ken: OK
Genny: Well, that’s some of the fam—her particular mom and dad, she told me, we never owned anything. She said we, dad had a truck and there were like eleven kids. And they – he was, he was at – they were out in the hills of, mainly up in here, cuttin’ cedar. The dad was and they lived in a tent
Ken: In a tent
Genny: And she said sometimes we didn’t even have a tent – we would just sleep under the truck, or if somebody’s, um, chicken house, uh, was not in use – she said, we’d all stay in that house. And, uh, she was telling about one story—one time when it was – her young sister had just been born and there were some older boys and they were rolling one of those tires – ‘cause that’s what – how they were playing. They were rolling tires, you know, just old tires. And it went into the tent and hit the, the, uh, stove that they were using to warm, keep warm and I guess cook on too. And, anyway, it caught everything on fire and so they, but the mother pulled out, got the kids out, but pulled the mattresses out because that was real important. And, uh, and she, they just waited for, she said “we” “we – mother said for us to get up against the cedar tree and we sat up – put our backs against the tree and we waited for daddy to get home. And he didn’t get home all that night but the next day he came in.” And, so everything they had except one mattress had burned up. But, I mean, that’s the kind of life they were living (laugh)
Ken: What year would that have been?
Genny: That would’ve been in the ‘30s. Um, she was saying – or maybe in the ‘40s. I would have to look and see how old Doris is. Um, she lives in, uh, um, I think she lives in Liberty Hill, to tell you the truth. Or, right around in here someplace, but she’s amazing. But she was saying – and they would go to church down at Nameless School – school – Fairview School it was called. And they had church every Sunday and they said Katie would, uh, would get all her, all those kids cleaned up, and, uh, they would look – be spick-and-span and they’d all be at church every Sunday and they, they have a Maynard reunion at the school now once a year. Amazing family. Just, a wonderful sense of family and pride in, you know, and I think that was the story of the cedar choppers. They had a lot – they were just hard working people. Just trying to eke out a living.
Ken: Sure
Genny: Not complaining, and, uh, but, you know, I had never, actually heard somebody that had been a, uh, cedar chopper. We had, uh, um, (pause) who was working for us, Dick?
Dick: J.D.
Genny: J.D. J.D. Simons. They lived right here across Nameless Road up on ____ – he and his dad and they had a truck and they cut cedar on the ranch. And, uh, he started cutting cedar when he was nine years old
Ken: Oh, boy
Genny: And, uh, they’d come out here, you know, with his axe and they’d have maybe a cold potato and, I don’t know, you’d say maybe (to Dick)…
Dick: Little bacon
Genny: A little bacon. But they’d – in a frying pan – that was always important.
Dick: They’d leave a frying pan where they were cuttin’. Just hide it and, uh, get it when they came back.
Ken: And this was in the ‘50s?
Genny: That was in…
Dick: in the ‘40s and the ‘50s
Genny: ‘40s and the ‘50s, yeah. And, uh, um, just a hard, uh, worked hard all his life. And, uh, proud.
Ken: ___ the Simons family
Dick: Well J.D. ended up on in, uh, owning a filling station in Jonestown.
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: I think the Jones’ sold him this, the old filling station – or he ran it for ‘em, different – he finally ended up owning it.
Genny: owning it.
Ken: So, Genny, did you do a, sort of a bunch of interviews for your book?
Genny: Yes. Yes. We, we had been, uh, when I start – went over to Nameless School when I retired from teaching I just wanted to see it. I’d never been in it. All these years I’d seen it but never been in it. And they said, uh, Martha Kutcher said “well come with me – were gonna have a meeting. Some ladies are meeting over there.” So, uh, I went over there and I was just fascinated. For one thing it needed restoring. And the other thing it had so much history that was gonna be – just when they applied for the plaque that made them, it, uh, a historic place, uh, they had written up and interviewed some people who of course were long gone by then. And, so, I decided, well we need to put – make a hard copy of these stories. Well, then if you start you need to go on and interview a few other people ‘cause, uh, all the different families. So, uh, so that’s what I did. And, I just thought it was, you know, truth is stranger than fiction. And, uh, so anyway
Ken: It’s a fascinating book. And, and you just did it a few years ago.
Genny: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ken: How long did it take you to – from start to finish?
Genny: I guess I worked on it about a year.
Ken: That’s great
Genny: Maybe a year and a half. And, this picture right here on the front is Nolan Turner. And he’s the one who built that house that’s right there by the school. He owned that, the Turners owned that property and he had bought it. And this is Nolan.
Ken: I see
Genny: Well, and this was back in 1970 when they did the, uh, the heritage plaque.
Ken: Um-hum
Genny: So, but, but back to my dad in this story – they had all these cedar trees so he decided “well, maybe we ought to be cuttin’ cedar on the ranch.” And the family in Houston wasn’t interested in going into that business. So, he, they said but if you want to go ahead ‘cause it’s good to clear the land anyway. So he and Nolan Turner went in together. And they cut, they, they got, uh, Mexicans and other cedar choppers to be cutting the cedar and they brought it all and they, they, uh, leased the property at 1431 and 183 on the corner where there now is a Tiger, Tiger Mart I think it is
Ken: Yes
Genny: OK. That’s where the cedar yard was. And they had a cedar yard for about ten years. Pullin’ cedar off the ranch and sellin’ it for posts.
Ken: Was this Dick Turner?
Genny: No. Nolan Turner.
Ken: Nolan Turner.
Genny: Nolan Turner.
Ken: There was a D.J. Turner that had cedar yards too
Genny: Could have been, yeah. Yeah there were a number of cedar yards in, in
Ken: Cedar Park
Genny: Cedar Park, yeah. Yeah. And, uh, but I thought the interesting -- I think it’s in here but I can’t remember. Nolan Turner – when he got married, he married a, I think he married a Maynard. And, uh, the grand – the father in law said “I want you to come for dinner because we have something that will help you and (I can’t remember her name but it’s in here), uh, throughout your life to always feed your family and take care of things.” And, so they went for dinner that night, this was right before they got married, and the father in law presented them with a two headed axe. And that was good. And, you know, and many times they both went, went back, went out into the pasture and cut cedar because that was the only cash crop out here.
Ken: That was their main livelihood.
Genny: Yeah, yeah. They were – I mean
Ken: A lot of times ___
Genny: Everybody, all the women were working
Ken: Yes
Genny: as hard as the men. I know it
Dick: Well, and, and, the other thing you’ve got to remember, in 1911 when Genny’s grandfather bought this place – this, he bought twenty-two-thousand acres here. And this was just open range. This was just made up of some old homesteads that had been vacated years before. And there really wasn’t anybody living on it. But all the people that surrounded it came on it and hunted on it. They cut cedar on it. You know, they just used it like it was, it was forest land
Ken: Yes
Dick: And, uh, then after the ranch started, by the ‘30s, I mean it was, uh, the people that had to change their ways a little bit because I think the whole perimeter of the ranch had been fenced by then.
Genny: Because they had sheep and goats on it. So, they, I think they, I think they fenced the ranch in the ‘30s.
Ken: Yes. There was a program in the
Genny: early ‘30s.
Ken: ‘30s too – and maybe into the ‘40s – a government program that paid you to flat cut cedar to eradicate – was that, did they do any of that to it?
Genny: No.
Dick: They flat cut it when they took the posts is what they did. They left it flat cut.
Ken: Oh, OK
Dick: Uh, and they just took all the posts out and made the rest of the, the tree was pretty much dead.
Ken: Yes.
Dick: And then we’ve had had fires that came through, and, uh, like this old pasture right here – there were stumps forever and there’s still some up on the hillsides. You know, those old, they make g—they make a great fire
Ken: they make a wonderful fire.
Dick: Totally dry
Ken: Yes
Dick: But, but, their the, that was the ones that they get the cedar oil out of.
Ken: Yes. Have yall ever had any of that done your place? The cedar oil?
Dick: No.
Genny: Unt-uh
Ken: That’s big around Junction.
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: Yeah. There just wasn’t enough of it at the time.
Genny: But dad would, uh, I, I can’t remember what caused it, but daddy a lot of times would be burning a dead cow and it got away – I know one time it got away from him. So they had a big fire here. But it burned off all – but, that was always sort of a blessing. You know, when they, when there fires came, because it would clear everything off. So, uh,
Ken: Kind of scary last year though, wasn’t it?
Genny: Yeah. It was horrible. Yeah, yeah.
Dick: They had, in the ‘50s, had some guys commiting arson. Some arsonists
Ken: I wonder why?
Genny: Why? Because, I, uh, well the fella that was, that my dad thought was doing it, was a little off. So, you know, but anyway, it stopped after a while. But we can remember with uh wet towsacks fighting the fire
Ken: Um
Genny: all along the road. Because there were houses there at that point, you know, earlier there weren’t many houses around, but
Ken: I was, I was once working manual labor up in Washington and you couldn’t make any money back when we were growing up. And, I was trying to make money to go through college. We were working the fields in Washington and, and, I’ll never forget that someone said, uh, “next month you want to be up in (I forgot where it was) – Minnesota, because there’s gonna be a fire and you can make some money on it.”
Dick: (laugh)
Genny: (laugh)
Ken: And there was. There was. So, you talked to Mrs. Maynard.
Genny: That’s what - I’m trying to look – and find the Maynards and see if I have Doris’ name.
Ken: Now would they call – they wouldn’t call themselves cedar choppers would they? Were they - how
Genny: I think they did call themselves cedar choppers. Yeah, yeah. You know, because there wasn’t – that – that wasn’t a, um, derogatory. I mean that was their living
Ken: yes
Genny: that’s what they did.
Ken: Yes, I know. But sometimes we used it in Austin
Genny: Yes, as a derogatory.
Ken: Yes
Genny: Yes, I know
Ken: And it, and it was also in Junction. And so, that’s one thing I do not – am not doing and do not want to do
Genny: Um-hum
Ken: Of course, I mean, I think that part of, I think they were in a sense confused with, or, or, identified as hillbillies in some sense. But “hillbillies” has got a whole different connotation. They literally could be, uh, living in the hills of Tennessee making moonshine and not working because there wasn’t a whole lot to do – but these guys
Genny: These guys were working hard
Dick: hard.
Genny: (laugh) real hard.
Dick: But you had a, you had a few that weren’t. They were more like hillbillies. So, I mean, you know, just like in any group of society. You had some of ‘em that, uh, worked, did hard work and they’d do – try to scam the system any way they could.
Ken: Did you have some experience with that?
Dick: Yeah, yeah. Uh, you know, we’re talking about J.D. Simons. His, his son, is, uh
Genny: Well, but he was the next generation and he wasn’t choppin’ cedar. He didn’t know the value of work like his dad did.
Dick: Yeah, that was
Genny: I think sometimes that was, that was the shame that earlier generation had worked soooo hard and they didn’t want their kids to have to work that hard.
Dick: And so they – and that’s ___
Genny: So they have the – quite the character that
Dick: And they didn’t know the value of work.
Genny: Yeah. Yeah.
Dick: Uh, but, you know, the same thing occurred with Albert and George
Genny: Albert. Yeah.
Dick: Albert Lunsford who lived and was the manager of the ranch for years. He lived in that house up there. Uh, his son George, he never required anything of him. And George was the nicest guy in the world, but, he was just a complete failure.
Genny: He had no work ethic at all.
Dick: He was smart. Smart as a whip. But he didn’t work.
Ken: That really introduces something interesting. This generation would have been about our age or even a little
Dick: A little older
Ken; A little older. – the, the new generation
Dick: Well
Genny: The lazy generation would be our generation.
Ken: Uh-huh, uh-huh
Genny: Yeah.
Ken: ‘cause what I’m trying to – one other thing I want to think about is sort of what happened…
Genny & Dick Kercheville – Tape 2 (15:00)
Ken: to ‘em
Genny: Yeah
Dick: Well, J.D. Simons is a good example. He was a cedar chopper as a kid and as a young adult. And coming up with cars – Model Ts were, you know, helping ‘em. Uh, cedar brakes took on a whole new, uh, name because when their driving, driving those little cars up and down, loading them with cedar, I mean they had to run into the cedar trees to stop
Ken: (laugh) They didn’t have brakes?
Dick: no – and they were constantly – I’ve heard stories from J.D. of working on those cars, uh, trying to make ‘em, you know, make make ‘em work. And, uh, J.D. became a pretty good mechanic
Ken: uh-huh
Dick: because of that. And he moved into that later. And
Ken: In that service station in Jonestown?
Dick: In Jonestown and just, uh, working for people- J.D. could fix anything. He may not fix it exactly how it should be fixed but he’d fix it.
Ken: Uh-huh
Dick: uh
Ken: Is he still alive?
Dick: No
Genny: no
Dick: he died, uh, about ten – twelve years ago
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Oh
Genny: It was after daddy died. Um,
Ken: So I was
Genny: here it is. Connie and, and Edna’s second child Katie married Zeke Bonnet. That was the one. That’s the one that, who’s Doris’ parents. Uh, Katie and Zeke Bonnet. They were married to the Bonnets. I was saying it was the Maynards, but they, it was the Bonnets
Ken: OK
Genny: it was the Bonnets. Uh
Ken: Zukie Bonnet was the sheriff or the police chief of Bertram for a while before they got a big police department.
Genny: Oh, really?
Ken: And he had a parent – the Bonnet’s were cedar choppers I think
Genny: Yeah. Yes. It was, it was Zeke Bonnet that was the one that was chopping cedar in, that they never owned any property. That was the one. But it’s the Bonnets that have a reunion too. The Maynards and the Bonnets are, you know, I mean they’re great families now.
Ken: Um-hum
Genny: And they’re all still around here. Um, but the, uh, it was the Bonnets. It is a Bonnet that has a big reunion.
Ken: OK
Genny: And, uh, um,
Ken: Is that at Nameless
Genny: Yeah, they have it at Nameless School because they’re all buried
Dick: Nameless school and the cemetery
Genny: At the cemetery. So they have it at the cemetery and they use the school too. So, but a wonderful family.
Ken: What time of year is their reunion?
Genny: Is their reunion? That would be fun for you. That’s in October.
Ken: OK. I’ll be here in October. I will be here.
Genny: I’ll contact you – and let you know.
Ken: That’s be marvelous. Do you, do you know them well enough to introduce
Genny: Oh yeah.
Ken: that would be great.
Genny: Carolyn Bonnet is, in fact, she’s president of the cemetery association and she’s in our little group Friends of Nameless School
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: So, uh, anyway. But, that, they, they would be the people because they remember – you know – and they’ve heard the stories from their, uh, I mean I can get you in touch with them before, if you want
Ken: OK, yes
Genny: because, uh, because that, they experienced it. You know, I was a little city girl. I was in town, but, but uh, but they really lived it.
Ken: That would be marvelous.
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Because that’s, I really want to tell the story of, you know, of their lives and, you know, how they perceived it
Genny: Yeah. Yeah.
Ken: And, you know, yeah. That would be marvelous to talk to them. I – I’m gonna talk to, uh, an old guy tomorrow that is a true cedar chopper and, uh, and, I think they are happy to talk about it. I mean they
Genny: Oh, yeah.
Dick: What is his name?
Ken: just thinking about it – you’ve gonna ask me that, um, Ratliff
Dick: Ratliff.
Ken: Ratliff. Yes. Simon Ratliff.
Genny: Is he right around here?
Ken: Bertram.
Genny: Oh.
Ken: There’s a big Bertram group, Burnet
Genny: Yeah.
Ken: Burnet.
Genny: Yeah
Ken: There’s a lot of them that lived there
Genny: Yeah
Ken: There were six, five or six cedar yards in Burnett. In the 1940s and 50s.
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: Well
Ken: It was a big deal
Dick: Oh yeah, it was
Genny: Well, when you hear about the diff – the people trying on this land to, you know, raise cotton and, you know, when you see, in fact we’ve got an old plow, the kind
Ken: Yes
Genny: you know, that they would have the mule pullin’ and trying to turn up the land
Ken: Was that your family? Doing that?
Genny: Uh, it was, really it was, uh, the, the uh, Albert, um, Luns..
Dick: Luns..
Genny: No, Lohman. Because – uh – there’s a picture in him – here of him, so I knew that was a cash crop.
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: But they were, um, of him plowing. So I knew that, uh – they all did it. I know that, uh, they, the Lunsford’s used those kinds of things because they were trying to raise some cotton in here, which was another cash crop.
Ken: Yes, there was a cotton gin or two in Liberty Hill
Genny: Yeah. Yeah. So that was the other. But we know with our, with our weather, what kind of, you know, you don’t always, always get crops
Ken: Yes
Genny: so, uh, you know. What, they just had to eke out of a living. It was just tough.
Ken: Did he turn, you think, from cotton to cedar?
Genny: I think they did both.
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: You know, they tried this and then, but, you know, they were all just, and they had a garden, and they
Ken: um-hum
Genny: were all doing, uh,
Ken: You know, cotton just collapsed in the depression. The cotton prices. There was cotton in all these little valleys
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: Yeah, this
Genny: right
Dick: I think it crashed in here before that.
Ken: OK
Dick: It doesn’t take that many years of not put – not regenerating the soil __
Ken: That’s right
Dick: With the cotton – cause it takes it out. All it had – the next valley over, we had a few of fields going up this valley and two over
Ken: Sandy Creek?
Dick: Well, this is an arm of Sandy Creek.
Ken: OK, uh-huh
Dick: This is Barn’s Hollow.
Ken: OK
Dick: And, over at Forty Acre Hollow we had forty acres – we had forty acres because it had forty acres of fields.
Ken: That’s a lot.
Dick: All at that bottom
Ken: Um-hum
Dick: And the rocks that they stacked there to
Genny: Yeah
Dick: ___ street over there
Genny: Oh, there he is. See it’s in the book. There he is.
Ken: Yes.
Genny: You know, with the
Ken: That would be the Lohman’s Crossing?
Genny: And he lived, and he lived in, no, he lived just right down here, uh, off of, uh, well it’s in Sandy Creek but it almost adjoins the ranch. It’s really close right there. But it’s on that creek.
Ken: Yes
Genny: So, you know, they had, you know, some small areas
Dick: Forty Acre – Forty Acre Creek
Genny: Yeah. Yeah. Which didn’t always run.
Dick: Yeah.
Genny: But, uh, but they raised nine kids in a, you know, a two room house. But that, you know, he did, he did other things and he, you know, he was a, uh, trustee of the Round Mountain School. And, you know, just, uh, they were just involved. I mean, I, I wonder how they eked out a living. But they uh, they did.
Ken: Would that be German, Lohman?
Genny: Yes. Oh, yeah
Dick: Yeah
Genny: Oh yeah, he came from Germany. And, uh, not his – his dad did. John Henry Lohman came from Germany.
Dick: You talk about an interesting story. John Henry Lohman.
Genny: Yeah. It’s in the book. It’s in the book.
Dick: It’s in the book. You have to read about
Genny: Read that
Dick: Came over from Germany, went to Austin, and then came out, got this piece of land out by Lohman’s Crossing, and then went back to Germany and got his family.
Genny: No, he didn’t get ‘em. He, he came over and then decided yes he was gonna come here – went back, got ‘em, brought his family, they lived at Hornsby’s Bend for a while then they lived in Austin and they had a dairy and raised, they had fourteen cows which supplied – it was right where the University is. And supplied almost all the milk for that little town of Austin. It wasn’t much back then. And, uh, and, then, but they still had an Indian problems. So then he moved out, uh, he lived out off the, before he moved out, I can’t remember, but anyway he ended up buying in the ‘50s – 1850, buying a place on Lohman’s Crossing out on the Colorado and built a number of stone houses. But by that time he had married his second wife because his first one had died. Twenty one children he had.
Ken: Oh my
Genny: (laugh) and Albert Lohman who lived over here – this plow – that was his youngest
Ken: OK
Genny: So, I mean, he goes way back. But, you know, he fought with Napoleon. That guy. He was amazing. Of course, none of them wanted to, wanted to, they didn’t want to secede, they didn’t want any part of the Confederacy, and, because the Germans
Ken: Right
Genny: did not, they’d done their fighting and they didn’t want any more wars. And, uh, so the Germans in this area, most of ‘em were not part of the succession.
Ken: I didn’t even know that there were too many Germans out here in the Hills. Uh, you know, they’re – one of the areas that, I’ve been talking to people in, there was cedar in, was Comal County. New Braunfels
Genny: Yeah
Ken: West of there was where all the cedar
Genny: Yeah, yeah.
Ken: But east of there is that black land. So it’s just – and, uh, I don’t know if you’ve ever visited – it’s a wonderful place to visit.
Genny: I was just there this weekend (laugh)
Ken: The Sophienburg Museum is there. That is a, you know, normally these little museums, these little county museums
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Are nothing. This is a twenty-first century museum.
Genny: Really?
Ken: Absolutely fantastic.
Genny: And it’s in what town?
Ken: It’s in New Braunfels. It’s right in the old part of New Braunfels. And, they, I mean it has probably five or six docents in it and, you know, all this on-line stuff
Genny: Huh.
Ken: And that’s the German side
Genny: We were just, we were saying as we were leaving, we came home Sunday, and Dick wasn’t with me, I was with a bunch of girls, and, said “you know, we would really like to see some of the old things in New Braunfels” because we never did that we were floating the river and enjoying that stuff.
Ken: It’s got a wonderful, uh, little shop in the museum with all sorts of books.
Genny: Huh
Ken: Just fan – wonderful books. I highly recommend it. The Sophienburg Museum. That is the, the wife of the Count that settled New Braunfels.
Genny: Is that right in that, in that circle thing? Is that where it is?
Ken: Uh, did you go to the best little restaurant there, I want to say, something grill?
Genny: Huisatch Grill.
Ken: Huisatch Grill, uh-huh
Genny: Yes, Yes. Friday night we went there.
Ken: Makes me hungry. Uh, it is on the same side of the railroad track as the Huisach Grill probably about two or three blocks away.
Genny: Oh, OK.
Ken: It’s a block over, two blocks up the hill. In that old part of, of New Braunfels.
Genny: Yeah. Alright, I’m gonna have to
Ken: Very, very much worth a visit
Genny: Yeah
Ken: But, hell, I was, I talked to a ninety-six year old German man and, uh, there, named, and used to be the guy who ran the museum. Lorenz Bading, and he said he owned a black land farm just right east of New Braunfels. He said that, that he didn’t know any Germans that were cedar choppers. This, he said there were plenty of cedar choppers around but his father called them dregichen Americana. Which I don’t know how to speak German but you kind-of get the picture.
Genny: (laugh)
Ken: (laugh) And he, and you know, that is, my mom is German – my father is Scots-Irish. So there’s always been that
Genny: Yeah
Ken: sort-of German neat-as-a-pin
Genny: Yeah
Ken: You know, the farms
Genny: Yeah
Ken: You could tell it was a German farm when you drive by.
Genny: Oh, you can, can’t ya.
Ken: (laugh)
Genny: I know it. I know it.
Dick: I love to see it. Out there in, uh, well north of Georgetown, what’s the place? It’s the German town.
Genny: Oh, Wal, um, Walburg.
Ken: Yes
Dick: You know, you’ve gone through all these Czech communities, or Czech houses and it’s all grown up, and everything’s all overgrown, and you get to the, the Germans and it’s just neater
Genny: (laugh)
Ken: Yeah. It’s a, it’s a curse
(all laugh together)
Ken: My mom taught it to me
(all laugh together)
Genny: Well, it’s funny – back, my, my mother, she was German and, uh, Scotch-Irish. And the German was strong in there
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: My sister up there, very neat. I must of gotten more of the Irish
(all laugh together)
Ken: I’m both in the same day (laugh)
Genny: I know. Yeah. But anyway. Doris Reaves is her name. That’s the one who is, who is a Whitt. So you need to ask at
Ken: Yes.
Genny: She can tell you ‘cause she just has great memories of it.
Ken: Dor – she’s in your book?
Genny: Doris Whitt.
Ken: It’s been a year since I
Genny: I haven’t put her, I haven’t put her name in here. I was looking at
Ken: Doris Reaves is a Whitt?
Genny: Doris Reaves is her married name, and, uh, somewhere I’ve got her phone number and I’ll get it to you. She would be a great person too. And I’ll talk to Carolyn Bonnet also because she would, they would be great folks for you
Ken: absolutely
Genny: visit with. People that had – well, Doris, she can remember, you know, she remembers going around and, uh, I, I just am amazed that, it’s the most wonderful family, the Bonnets, you know, the
Ken: Yes. I would like to get a woman’s perspective on all of this too
Genny: Yeah
Ken: because they had to work so hard
Genny: Yeah, yeah.
Dick: Yeah, you know, there’s so many of ‘em, in those, you know, one couple of Bonnets that one time came to this area probably in the late 1890s, uh 1880s, and, you know, they had a dozen kids and then there’s Bonnets everywhere.
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: And, like over in, in Liberty Hill. Uh, I mean there were some Bonnets over there that didn’t have that good a reputation. And they were, one of ‘em was a Deputy Sheriff if I remember right
Ken: That’s the one I’m – yes.
Dick: He got in trouble and, uh, I think he went on to jail
Ken: Oh, OK
Dick: Uh, but some of the Bonnets, you know
Genny: They’re fabulous
Dick: one bad apple
Genny: They’re wonderful. Yeah, don’t, yeah
Ken: No, I know that.
Genny: And, you know, the, but when you start looking into it and you talk, like you interview somebody they go “yeah, that’s my cousin” because they’re all related. But you, you can imagine, this is such a closed community because pretty much people, you know, to get around you went in a wagon and you don’t go, you didn’t go very far. They didn’t go to Austin.
Ken: Yeah
Genny: You know. So, uh, you know, the Maynards and, well all these people they, they’re all intertwined.
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: These families, they’re all cousins.
Ken: Wasn’t it when Round Mountain Road and Nameless Road were paved?
Genny: Uh, well, gosh, ‘cause I can remember as a little girl they, it was not. It was dirt road. When my mother came out here and she, she and dad got married in 1940, to go to Leander there were seven gates they had to open. You know, because there were no cattle guards. That was before it’s time. And so you’d be going through these ranches. And then finally it was just a dirt road
Genny & Dick Kercheville Tape 3 (15:00)
Genny: and then, uh, I can’t remember
Dick: It was sometime in the early fifties I think, that they finally got paved. Because I can remember coming out here, uh, I think I can remember it when it was a dirt road.
Genny: I remember going to the lake over, you know, and it was dirt for a long time.
Ken: Yes
Genny: That wasn’t, that wasn’t paved. That highway wasn’t paved for a long time
Ken: So were you going along Nameless Road when you went to Leander or was that, was that
Genny: Yeah, that’s how we went, yeah. Yeah.
Ken: There were seven gates
Genny: Yeah, of course, I don’t remember that – I was a baby – so I didn’t remember but mother would say “Oh, my gosh!” So it was an ordeal when you would go places, you know
Ken: Um-hum
Genny: going into town was a real ordeal. So, uh, but they had a little store, and they had a doctor, and
Dick: But, your dad, when you’all finally moved into town, were you, before you started school, uh, sometimes when you’d come out here, you’d come along to a
Genny: That was when we were, yeah, opening gates, that’s mainly on a ranch
Dick: Gates on the ranch
Genny: Gates on the ranch, yeah
Dick: There weren’t any gates on
Genny: Unt-uh, no.
Dick: Nameless Road
Genny: no.
Dick: It was probably the late ‘40s when they got rid of those gates and did something else. It was probably when they put the cattle guards
Genny: put the cattle guard in, when the cattle guards came in. That made the difference, yeah. So
Ken: So, did yall meet in, in Austin?
Genny: Who? Dick and I? We’ve known each other since we were kids. Our families were good friends.
Dick: Well, actually, we probably met out here.
Genny: He came out here to visit with his parents, visit my mom
Dick: I was about five years old.
Genny: my mom and dad, yeah. And, uh, but anyway, then we moved to Austin and we saw ‘em all the time. But he was a year younger than I, see. He was in, he was in the class of ’60, so, I didn’t date younger, younger fellas (laugh)
Ken: (laugh)
Genny: So
Ken: Well, I would love to have you introduce me to those people
Genny: OK
Ken: That would just be marvelous.
Genny: I will.
Dick: Where do you, uh, do you teach?
Ken: At Southwestern.
Dick: At Southwestern. OK.
Ken: We came back to, uh, from Mexico, and, uh, in the Whitt house, which was really, about two rooms this size, you know, in fact, back in the old days, I mean, I just, uh, single vertical wall that was kept from warping by having a coffee can nailed on one side
Genny: (laugh)
Ken: and then the other, so that would be separating the rooms. No insulation. I – I just don’t …
Genny: Yeah
Ken: I find it hard to believe that people lived, I mean it was so hot, you know, at seven o’clock in the evening, eight o’clock it was just an oven up there.
Genny: Yeah
Ken: I guess that’s the way everybody, that’s the way good people lived
Genny: Yeah, everybody.
Ken: You had tall windows and
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Yeah
Genny: And you just, uh, we, in fact when we first started in 1980, divided up the ranch and daddy got this part that has the, it had his house and the other house on it. But we, we’ve fixed up this house ‘cause there’d been a hand living here and we would come out, now we had, uh, up in that point you still had the, the tin roof
Ken: Yes
Genny: And, of course, no insulation.
Ken: Right
Genny: anywhere. And, uh, and so, daddy did, we tore off the roof and put on a new roof
Dick: Tore out all the little individual
Genny: individual
Dick: _____,
Ken: on top on another
Dick: And so, and, and, you know, they’d have a little gable roof over here and a flat roof over there, and, originally what it is is all flat roof
Genny: flat roof, yeah
Dick: And we tore everything off and put a big hip roof on the whole thing.
Genny: And put insulation in it. But we still didn’t have air conditioning nor heating. So, uh, we, uh, (laugh) we just loved it out here though. But, you know,
Ken: But you were raised in town, this was
Genny: Yeah, but we’d come out in the summers
Ken: Um-hum
Genny: I mean it was crazy. My sister and I and our families, we just loved it. We did put a little air conditioner back here in that one room because it only had one window.
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: And, and it had bunk beds in there for the kids. And, uh, but we didn’t have any, we had an attic fan
Ken: Yes
Genny: But you just, we’d get out of the house by three because, you know, just stay outside until the sun went down and do whatever (laugh) but we just thought it was great
Ken: Did you have a nice swimming hole along the creek?
Genny: Well, as long as the, as long as the creek’s running, we’d go down to the creek. Yeah. So, uh
Ken: the Springs used to flow back there
Genny: Yeah, there’s still, well now it’s really running. Do you have a creek on your place?
Ken: We do. Well Bingham Creek is the
Dick: ___ Creek
Ken: Is that Little Bingham Creek Road, that’s the road that I live on, that’s on the way, and it is Bingham Creek and it ran from the Maynard place
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Uh, started there and they had a cistern. You know, I guess it really channelled water and then it runs right down through our ranch and that’s where the Whitts put their pecan orchard in and, there was a, at one time, a spring that would flow and we could, you know, about the size of a great big Jacuzzi and we could all get in there
Genny: Yeah, cool off.
Ken: And you could see the water bubbling up and
Genny: Yeah
Ken: It was just a different world back then
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Just twenty five, twenty years ago.
Dick: Now you’ve got all these holes sucking the water out of the aquifer. And the weather pattern has changed
Ken: It has. It really has. So it’s, yeah, we didn’t have air conditioning. Even when we built our new house we didn’t put in air conditioning
Genny: Yeah
Ken: for about six years
Dick: Does your place butt up to Shirly Clark’s place?
Ken: I guess not. I don’t – I guess not
Dick: You don’t know that name?
Ken: Uh, no, I don’t know the name. Is it, where is she?
Dick: OK, she is in Bingham Creek and she has to be below you.
Ken: Yes
Dick: Because, uh
Ken: Does she go all the way to Round Mountain Road?
Dick: Yes
Genny: Yes
Dick: a lot of frontage there.
Ken: I, I think it almost, I think it comes within fifty yards of butting up. There’s a, there’s a little subdivision there, something Oaks, uh, I forgot the,
Dick: Yeah, she, she goes kind-of, wraps around
Ken: Yes
Dick: that subdivision
Ken: Yes, I think it almost butts up to that. I’ve hear. And she’s sort-of got a nature preserve there perhaps, or a
Dick: Well
Genny: She did something
Dick: Yeah.
Ken: Something like that.
Dick: Something like that. Sure, she’s a, she’s a 1920s weirdo.
Ken: Yeah. I’ve heard about her.
Genny: (laugh)
Dick: Reminds me of the Great Gatsby.
Genny: (laugh)
Dick: I mean she, last I heard she was living in New York.
Ken: Um
Dick: Uh, but she is, uh, pretty close to certifiably nuts.
Ken: Yeah, I know the
Genny: her father gave her the property, you know, to get it out of his estate, he gave her the property. And she made him get off (laugh)
(all laugh together)
Ken: Yeah
Genny: God. That’s a story that lawyers should tell people when they’re starting to pass over things.
Ken: Your neighbor, there’s an older … Gonzalo
Genny: Yes, Esquevel
Ken: yeah, Esquevel. Aurora was our, she cleaned our house until, we were spending too long in Colorado and, she didn’t
Genny: Is that his wife?
Ken: Yes, Aurora, she’s wonderful. And, but, that’s Mrs. What’s her
Genny: Kucher
Ken: Kutcher, right, right.
Genny: But, she
Ken: How’s she doing?
Genny: Well, she’s not doing well, and her, her niece that she’s leaving everything with, has, uh, is gotten rid of Gonzalo. It’s real sad
Ken: she fired Gonzalo!
Genny: Yes, she did
Ken: Oh my gosh
Genny: I know, that’s what he said too.
Ken: Oh no. I mean Duchess and I were thinking, well she’s gonna give some,
Genny: Well they did give the house and that, like eleven acres where his house is
Ken: Where Gonzalo lives?
Genny: Yeah, that does belong to him.
Dick: They didn’t give, that was Mr. Kutcher
Genny: That’s Mr. Kutcher gave that.
Dick: Originally gave that to him when he, and was effective when he died. So, so Mrs. Kutcher didn’t give him that.
Ken: Oh no, we were thinking that she would set them up or something like that
Genny: Well, she, they had talked about giving that field that’s behind his house but then I think her brother, who is the father of Katherine that she’s living, leaving everything to, I think they said he’s gotten enough and, uh, so, anyway, he’s not getting that.
Dick: Mrs. Kutcher is at the point now that
Genny: Well now she’s
Dick: She doesn’t, you know, she
Genny: She’s not gonna fight anything.
Dick: She doesn’t remember anything.
Ken: uh-huh
Dick: She doesn’t remember that he was fired The last time we was able to come see her she says “where have you been” and then she forgets it immediately.
Ken: That’s too bad. So he doesn’t have anything to do any more, I guess.
Genny: Well, he does. Well, she, Mrs. Kutcher is ninety seven, so, and, and, uh, but, but, he, he owns a bull dozer and so he’s been working for our brother-in-law clearing a bunch of property. So, so, uh
Ken: Did they replace him with someone? Because he was inefficient? I’m just kind-of
Dick: No, no, no, no. She didn’t like him because he wasn’t subserv, subservient enough, and he would talk, he would, uh, answer, you know, talk, he would give his honest opinion about a situation. He was, Gonzalo was like one of the family. Uh, I mean, he, he used to take Mrs. Kutcher, Mr. and Mrs. Kutcher and, Mrs. Kutcher later, up to Wyoming to their place up there. Uh, every summer he’d drive the motorhome and, I mean, they were just
Ken: Huh. I wonder if Aurora went along?
Genny: No. No. It was just
Ken: Have yall met Aurora’s daughters?
Genny: You know, I really haven’t. I don’t think I’ve ever met her except at,
Ken: Well she’s just
Genny: I guess Mr. Kutcher’s funeral would be the only time.
Ken: she’s a, I mean, she and her, well, whoever is working with her, two of ‘em, I mean she must be late fifties or sixty and, she is a whirlwind. She’ll, I mean she, she works, she cleans, cleans a few houses a day
Genny: Yeah
Ken: And you know, she is just a whirlwind
Genny: Aw
Ken: Just a wonderful person
Dick: Well she’s that first generation that really has a work ethic
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Yes. Now her daughter Dora has been helping her lately, a very attractive woman, and Dora’s kids are at Texas Tech. And so, I mean, they are just a success story
Genny: Yeah
Ken: You know
Genny: Oh, I know. I know it. A wonderful family.
Dick: Dora’s daughter lives, she lives here on the road going to
Ken: Yes,
(talking over each other)
Genny: Spanish style house?
Ken: Yes, big stucco house, that’s right
Dick: What’s her husband’s name?
Ken: I don’t know her husband.
Dick: he’s a concrete contractor
Ken: Um-hum
Dick: But they’ve, they’ve done real well.
Ken: That’s really wonderful isn’t it.
Dick: Yeah
Ken: Yeah. Beautiful little children
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Yeah
Genny: And Gonzalo is the best. Anytime something goes wrong we can call Gonzalo
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: And he’s the best neighbor in the world.
Ken: Uh-huh.I’ll bet
Genny: And he’ll come help ya, and, you know.
Ken: We’ve begged Aurora not to let us go. Because we, what we do is we bought a place in southern Colorado, so that we, we’re having like two, four grandkids and the parents at one time is a little overwhelming so we’ve been rotating them and, and we have two of ‘em coming in a couple of weeks and then the next two the next year. And so, um, we’ve been going up there, you know, now for six years
Genny: What town are you near?
Ken: We are near nothing. The near, the closest town is Alamosa and it’s forty miles away
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Uh, so it
Dick: Are you west or east?
Ken: We’re really right on the border of, if you were Chama if you know where Chama is
Genny: Yeah
Ken: and you drove up that, up that gorgeous pass
Dick: gorgeous drive, gorgeous pass
Ken: right when you get over to the other side is where we are.
Dick: Before you get to the flat land
Ken: That is correct. it’s beautiful country
Genny: it’s beautiful
Dick: We’ve been, we’ve done the, uh, train their
Ken: Yes
Dick: done that route and then we’ve driven it
Ken: Yes, isn’t it gorgeous where they
Genny: Yeah
Ken: If you look down on that river from the train and you saw someone fly fishing that could have been me.
Genny: That’s you! Oh I remember that river.
Dick: (talking over one another)
Ken: Yes
Dick: Straight down So far. I mean that is amazing
Ken: This is the more gentle part. It would be probably, you know, from here down to the bottom of your pasture way down there. Yeah, I’ve often wanted them to pay me as a prop
(all laugh together)
Ken: Or, I’ve got a fish on and I don’t want people to be hiking up there. I’ll hide behind a bush and get that fish after the train passes. that’s my favorite place to fish
Genny: Yeah
Dick: I love Chama
Genny: We love that
Dick: The weather is so nice. Yeah, we stayed there in a RV park
Genny: right on the river for about a week,
Dick: Yeah
Genny: Yeah
Ken: My wife is chomping at the bit to get up there right now.
Genny: I know. When it starts getting hot it’s time to go.
Ken: It is. It really is. And it’s great, I mean, I’ve been, we’ve been loving having a place up there
Genny: Oh, yeah.
Dick: We stayed there and then we stayed in Lake City
Ken: That’s beautiful.
Dick: I really, I like Lake City ‘cause of the tours you can take in the Jeep. Uh, rent a Jeep
Ken: Yeah
Dick: And go around those high mountain roads
Ken: Yes
Dick: It’s incredible.
Ken: It’s just all beautiful country. And, you know, the other part about it is, it’s a little, Austin has changed so much, you know, since we went to school.
Genny: Yeah, really grown up, isn’t it.
Ken: It has grown and it’s modern, and, you know, everything is i-Phones, and, you know, and, you know, you just drive west of here and its just, it’s like stepping back in time.
Genny: Yeah
Dick: It is, you’re right.
Ken: Go to Alamosa and you feel like you’ve stepped back twenty years
Genny: Yeah
Ken: That’s, you know, everybody knows everybody, um, it’s just got a real small town atmosphere. Our nearest town in Antonito. They have a couple of little restaurants there and it’s just very quiet. We just love it (laugh)
Dick: I bet you do.
(stopped recording here)
Genny & Dick Kercheville Tape 1 (15:00)
Genny: Maynard, uh, and I can’t think of her – I’ll have to look up her last name
Ken: Oh my goodness
Genny: But her dad was a cedar chopper
Ken: Doris Maynard. Now let me – we, the Whitt place
Genny: Yes
Ken: We would come in
Genny: She’s a Whitt too
Ken: Yes you would come in through the Whitt place. We had – in order to get the Whitt place we had to buy the Maynard place. So we bought two hundred-and-sixty acre or hundred-and-eighty acre tracts
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Come in through the Whitt place and go over – there’s a little house that Mrs. Maynard lived in. Would that be the same place?
Genny: Yeah. That would be the
Ken: OK
Genny: Well, that’s some of the fam—her particular mom and dad, she told me, we never owned anything. She said we, dad had a truck and there were like eleven kids. And they – he was, he was at – they were out in the hills of, mainly up in here, cuttin’ cedar. The dad was and they lived in a tent
Ken: In a tent
Genny: And she said sometimes we didn’t even have a tent – we would just sleep under the truck, or if somebody’s, um, chicken house, uh, was not in use – she said, we’d all stay in that house. And, uh, she was telling about one story—one time when it was – her young sister had just been born and there were some older boys and they were rolling one of those tires – ‘cause that’s what – how they were playing. They were rolling tires, you know, just old tires. And it went into the tent and hit the, the, uh, stove that they were using to warm, keep warm and I guess cook on too. And, anyway, it caught everything on fire and so they, but the mother pulled out, got the kids out, but pulled the mattresses out because that was real important. And, uh, and she, they just waited for, she said “we” “we – mother said for us to get up against the cedar tree and we sat up – put our backs against the tree and we waited for daddy to get home. And he didn’t get home all that night but the next day he came in.” And, so everything they had except one mattress had burned up. But, I mean, that’s the kind of life they were living (laugh)
Ken: What year would that have been?
Genny: That would’ve been in the ‘30s. Um, she was saying – or maybe in the ‘40s. I would have to look and see how old Doris is. Um, she lives in, uh, um, I think she lives in Liberty Hill, to tell you the truth. Or, right around in here someplace, but she’s amazing. But she was saying – and they would go to church down at Nameless School – school – Fairview School it was called. And they had church every Sunday and they said Katie would, uh, would get all her, all those kids cleaned up, and, uh, they would look – be spick-and-span and they’d all be at church every Sunday and they, they have a Maynard reunion at the school now once a year. Amazing family. Just, a wonderful sense of family and pride in, you know, and I think that was the story of the cedar choppers. They had a lot – they were just hard working people. Just trying to eke out a living.
Ken: Sure
Genny: Not complaining, and, uh, but, you know, I had never, actually heard somebody that had been a, uh, cedar chopper. We had, uh, um, (pause) who was working for us, Dick?
Dick: J.D.
Genny: J.D. J.D. Simons. They lived right here across Nameless Road up on ____ – he and his dad and they had a truck and they cut cedar on the ranch. And, uh, he started cutting cedar when he was nine years old
Ken: Oh, boy
Genny: And, uh, they’d come out here, you know, with his axe and they’d have maybe a cold potato and, I don’t know, you’d say maybe (to Dick)…
Dick: Little bacon
Genny: A little bacon. But they’d – in a frying pan – that was always important.
Dick: They’d leave a frying pan where they were cuttin’. Just hide it and, uh, get it when they came back.
Ken: And this was in the ‘50s?
Genny: That was in…
Dick: in the ‘40s and the ‘50s
Genny: ‘40s and the ‘50s, yeah. And, uh, um, just a hard, uh, worked hard all his life. And, uh, proud.
Ken: ___ the Simons family
Dick: Well J.D. ended up on in, uh, owning a filling station in Jonestown.
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: I think the Jones’ sold him this, the old filling station – or he ran it for ‘em, different – he finally ended up owning it.
Genny: owning it.
Ken: So, Genny, did you do a, sort of a bunch of interviews for your book?
Genny: Yes. Yes. We, we had been, uh, when I start – went over to Nameless School when I retired from teaching I just wanted to see it. I’d never been in it. All these years I’d seen it but never been in it. And they said, uh, Martha Kutcher said “well come with me – were gonna have a meeting. Some ladies are meeting over there.” So, uh, I went over there and I was just fascinated. For one thing it needed restoring. And the other thing it had so much history that was gonna be – just when they applied for the plaque that made them, it, uh, a historic place, uh, they had written up and interviewed some people who of course were long gone by then. And, so, I decided, well we need to put – make a hard copy of these stories. Well, then if you start you need to go on and interview a few other people ‘cause, uh, all the different families. So, uh, so that’s what I did. And, I just thought it was, you know, truth is stranger than fiction. And, uh, so anyway
Ken: It’s a fascinating book. And, and you just did it a few years ago.
Genny: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ken: How long did it take you to – from start to finish?
Genny: I guess I worked on it about a year.
Ken: That’s great
Genny: Maybe a year and a half. And, this picture right here on the front is Nolan Turner. And he’s the one who built that house that’s right there by the school. He owned that, the Turners owned that property and he had bought it. And this is Nolan.
Ken: I see
Genny: Well, and this was back in 1970 when they did the, uh, the heritage plaque.
Ken: Um-hum
Genny: So, but, but back to my dad in this story – they had all these cedar trees so he decided “well, maybe we ought to be cuttin’ cedar on the ranch.” And the family in Houston wasn’t interested in going into that business. So, he, they said but if you want to go ahead ‘cause it’s good to clear the land anyway. So he and Nolan Turner went in together. And they cut, they, they got, uh, Mexicans and other cedar choppers to be cutting the cedar and they brought it all and they, they, uh, leased the property at 1431 and 183 on the corner where there now is a Tiger, Tiger Mart I think it is
Ken: Yes
Genny: OK. That’s where the cedar yard was. And they had a cedar yard for about ten years. Pullin’ cedar off the ranch and sellin’ it for posts.
Ken: Was this Dick Turner?
Genny: No. Nolan Turner.
Ken: Nolan Turner.
Genny: Nolan Turner.
Ken: There was a D.J. Turner that had cedar yards too
Genny: Could have been, yeah. Yeah there were a number of cedar yards in, in
Ken: Cedar Park
Genny: Cedar Park, yeah. Yeah. And, uh, but I thought the interesting -- I think it’s in here but I can’t remember. Nolan Turner – when he got married, he married a, I think he married a Maynard. And, uh, the grand – the father in law said “I want you to come for dinner because we have something that will help you and (I can’t remember her name but it’s in here), uh, throughout your life to always feed your family and take care of things.” And, so they went for dinner that night, this was right before they got married, and the father in law presented them with a two headed axe. And that was good. And, you know, and many times they both went, went back, went out into the pasture and cut cedar because that was the only cash crop out here.
Ken: That was their main livelihood.
Genny: Yeah, yeah. They were – I mean
Ken: A lot of times ___
Genny: Everybody, all the women were working
Ken: Yes
Genny: as hard as the men. I know it
Dick: Well, and, and, the other thing you’ve got to remember, in 1911 when Genny’s grandfather bought this place – this, he bought twenty-two-thousand acres here. And this was just open range. This was just made up of some old homesteads that had been vacated years before. And there really wasn’t anybody living on it. But all the people that surrounded it came on it and hunted on it. They cut cedar on it. You know, they just used it like it was, it was forest land
Ken: Yes
Dick: And, uh, then after the ranch started, by the ‘30s, I mean it was, uh, the people that had to change their ways a little bit because I think the whole perimeter of the ranch had been fenced by then.
Genny: Because they had sheep and goats on it. So, they, I think they, I think they fenced the ranch in the ‘30s.
Ken: Yes. There was a program in the
Genny: early ‘30s.
Ken: ‘30s too – and maybe into the ‘40s – a government program that paid you to flat cut cedar to eradicate – was that, did they do any of that to it?
Genny: No.
Dick: They flat cut it when they took the posts is what they did. They left it flat cut.
Ken: Oh, OK
Dick: Uh, and they just took all the posts out and made the rest of the, the tree was pretty much dead.
Ken: Yes.
Dick: And then we’ve had had fires that came through, and, uh, like this old pasture right here – there were stumps forever and there’s still some up on the hillsides. You know, those old, they make g—they make a great fire
Ken: they make a wonderful fire.
Dick: Totally dry
Ken: Yes
Dick: But, but, their the, that was the ones that they get the cedar oil out of.
Ken: Yes. Have yall ever had any of that done your place? The cedar oil?
Dick: No.
Genny: Unt-uh
Ken: That’s big around Junction.
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: Yeah. There just wasn’t enough of it at the time.
Genny: But dad would, uh, I, I can’t remember what caused it, but daddy a lot of times would be burning a dead cow and it got away – I know one time it got away from him. So they had a big fire here. But it burned off all – but, that was always sort of a blessing. You know, when they, when there fires came, because it would clear everything off. So, uh,
Ken: Kind of scary last year though, wasn’t it?
Genny: Yeah. It was horrible. Yeah, yeah.
Dick: They had, in the ‘50s, had some guys commiting arson. Some arsonists
Ken: I wonder why?
Genny: Why? Because, I, uh, well the fella that was, that my dad thought was doing it, was a little off. So, you know, but anyway, it stopped after a while. But we can remember with uh wet towsacks fighting the fire
Ken: Um
Genny: all along the road. Because there were houses there at that point, you know, earlier there weren’t many houses around, but
Ken: I was, I was once working manual labor up in Washington and you couldn’t make any money back when we were growing up. And, I was trying to make money to go through college. We were working the fields in Washington and, and, I’ll never forget that someone said, uh, “next month you want to be up in (I forgot where it was) – Minnesota, because there’s gonna be a fire and you can make some money on it.”
Dick: (laugh)
Genny: (laugh)
Ken: And there was. There was. So, you talked to Mrs. Maynard.
Genny: That’s what - I’m trying to look – and find the Maynards and see if I have Doris’ name.
Ken: Now would they call – they wouldn’t call themselves cedar choppers would they? Were they - how
Genny: I think they did call themselves cedar choppers. Yeah, yeah. You know, because there wasn’t – that – that wasn’t a, um, derogatory. I mean that was their living
Ken: yes
Genny: that’s what they did.
Ken: Yes, I know. But sometimes we used it in Austin
Genny: Yes, as a derogatory.
Ken: Yes
Genny: Yes, I know
Ken: And it, and it was also in Junction. And so, that’s one thing I do not – am not doing and do not want to do
Genny: Um-hum
Ken: Of course, I mean, I think that part of, I think they were in a sense confused with, or, or, identified as hillbillies in some sense. But “hillbillies” has got a whole different connotation. They literally could be, uh, living in the hills of Tennessee making moonshine and not working because there wasn’t a whole lot to do – but these guys
Genny: These guys were working hard
Dick: hard.
Genny: (laugh) real hard.
Dick: But you had a, you had a few that weren’t. They were more like hillbillies. So, I mean, you know, just like in any group of society. You had some of ‘em that, uh, worked, did hard work and they’d do – try to scam the system any way they could.
Ken: Did you have some experience with that?
Dick: Yeah, yeah. Uh, you know, we’re talking about J.D. Simons. His, his son, is, uh
Genny: Well, but he was the next generation and he wasn’t choppin’ cedar. He didn’t know the value of work like his dad did.
Dick: Yeah, that was
Genny: I think sometimes that was, that was the shame that earlier generation had worked soooo hard and they didn’t want their kids to have to work that hard.
Dick: And so they – and that’s ___
Genny: So they have the – quite the character that
Dick: And they didn’t know the value of work.
Genny: Yeah. Yeah.
Dick: Uh, but, you know, the same thing occurred with Albert and George
Genny: Albert. Yeah.
Dick: Albert Lunsford who lived and was the manager of the ranch for years. He lived in that house up there. Uh, his son George, he never required anything of him. And George was the nicest guy in the world, but, he was just a complete failure.
Genny: He had no work ethic at all.
Dick: He was smart. Smart as a whip. But he didn’t work.
Ken: That really introduces something interesting. This generation would have been about our age or even a little
Dick: A little older
Ken; A little older. – the, the new generation
Dick: Well
Genny: The lazy generation would be our generation.
Ken: Uh-huh, uh-huh
Genny: Yeah.
Ken: ‘cause what I’m trying to – one other thing I want to think about is sort of what happened…
Genny & Dick Kercheville – Tape 2 (15:00)
Ken: to ‘em
Genny: Yeah
Dick: Well, J.D. Simons is a good example. He was a cedar chopper as a kid and as a young adult. And coming up with cars – Model Ts were, you know, helping ‘em. Uh, cedar brakes took on a whole new, uh, name because when their driving, driving those little cars up and down, loading them with cedar, I mean they had to run into the cedar trees to stop
Ken: (laugh) They didn’t have brakes?
Dick: no – and they were constantly – I’ve heard stories from J.D. of working on those cars, uh, trying to make ‘em, you know, make make ‘em work. And, uh, J.D. became a pretty good mechanic
Ken: uh-huh
Dick: because of that. And he moved into that later. And
Ken: In that service station in Jonestown?
Dick: In Jonestown and just, uh, working for people- J.D. could fix anything. He may not fix it exactly how it should be fixed but he’d fix it.
Ken: Uh-huh
Dick: uh
Ken: Is he still alive?
Dick: No
Genny: no
Dick: he died, uh, about ten – twelve years ago
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Oh
Genny: It was after daddy died. Um,
Ken: So I was
Genny: here it is. Connie and, and Edna’s second child Katie married Zeke Bonnet. That was the one. That’s the one that, who’s Doris’ parents. Uh, Katie and Zeke Bonnet. They were married to the Bonnets. I was saying it was the Maynards, but they, it was the Bonnets
Ken: OK
Genny: it was the Bonnets. Uh
Ken: Zukie Bonnet was the sheriff or the police chief of Bertram for a while before they got a big police department.
Genny: Oh, really?
Ken: And he had a parent – the Bonnet’s were cedar choppers I think
Genny: Yeah. Yes. It was, it was Zeke Bonnet that was the one that was chopping cedar in, that they never owned any property. That was the one. But it’s the Bonnets that have a reunion too. The Maynards and the Bonnets are, you know, I mean they’re great families now.
Ken: Um-hum
Genny: And they’re all still around here. Um, but the, uh, it was the Bonnets. It is a Bonnet that has a big reunion.
Ken: OK
Genny: And, uh, um,
Ken: Is that at Nameless
Genny: Yeah, they have it at Nameless School because they’re all buried
Dick: Nameless school and the cemetery
Genny: At the cemetery. So they have it at the cemetery and they use the school too. So, but a wonderful family.
Ken: What time of year is their reunion?
Genny: Is their reunion? That would be fun for you. That’s in October.
Ken: OK. I’ll be here in October. I will be here.
Genny: I’ll contact you – and let you know.
Ken: That’s be marvelous. Do you, do you know them well enough to introduce
Genny: Oh yeah.
Ken: that would be great.
Genny: Carolyn Bonnet is, in fact, she’s president of the cemetery association and she’s in our little group Friends of Nameless School
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: So, uh, anyway. But, that, they, they would be the people because they remember – you know – and they’ve heard the stories from their, uh, I mean I can get you in touch with them before, if you want
Ken: OK, yes
Genny: because, uh, because that, they experienced it. You know, I was a little city girl. I was in town, but, but uh, but they really lived it.
Ken: That would be marvelous.
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Because that’s, I really want to tell the story of, you know, of their lives and, you know, how they perceived it
Genny: Yeah. Yeah.
Ken: And, you know, yeah. That would be marvelous to talk to them. I – I’m gonna talk to, uh, an old guy tomorrow that is a true cedar chopper and, uh, and, I think they are happy to talk about it. I mean they
Genny: Oh, yeah.
Dick: What is his name?
Ken: just thinking about it – you’ve gonna ask me that, um, Ratliff
Dick: Ratliff.
Ken: Ratliff. Yes. Simon Ratliff.
Genny: Is he right around here?
Ken: Bertram.
Genny: Oh.
Ken: There’s a big Bertram group, Burnet
Genny: Yeah.
Ken: Burnet.
Genny: Yeah
Ken: There’s a lot of them that lived there
Genny: Yeah
Ken: There were six, five or six cedar yards in Burnett. In the 1940s and 50s.
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: Well
Ken: It was a big deal
Dick: Oh yeah, it was
Genny: Well, when you hear about the diff – the people trying on this land to, you know, raise cotton and, you know, when you see, in fact we’ve got an old plow, the kind
Ken: Yes
Genny: you know, that they would have the mule pullin’ and trying to turn up the land
Ken: Was that your family? Doing that?
Genny: Uh, it was, really it was, uh, the, the uh, Albert, um, Luns..
Dick: Luns..
Genny: No, Lohman. Because – uh – there’s a picture in him – here of him, so I knew that was a cash crop.
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: But they were, um, of him plowing. So I knew that, uh – they all did it. I know that, uh, they, the Lunsford’s used those kinds of things because they were trying to raise some cotton in here, which was another cash crop.
Ken: Yes, there was a cotton gin or two in Liberty Hill
Genny: Yeah. Yeah. So that was the other. But we know with our, with our weather, what kind of, you know, you don’t always, always get crops
Ken: Yes
Genny: so, uh, you know. What, they just had to eke out of a living. It was just tough.
Ken: Did he turn, you think, from cotton to cedar?
Genny: I think they did both.
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: You know, they tried this and then, but, you know, they were all just, and they had a garden, and they
Ken: um-hum
Genny: were all doing, uh,
Ken: You know, cotton just collapsed in the depression. The cotton prices. There was cotton in all these little valleys
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: Yeah, this
Genny: right
Dick: I think it crashed in here before that.
Ken: OK
Dick: It doesn’t take that many years of not put – not regenerating the soil __
Ken: That’s right
Dick: With the cotton – cause it takes it out. All it had – the next valley over, we had a few of fields going up this valley and two over
Ken: Sandy Creek?
Dick: Well, this is an arm of Sandy Creek.
Ken: OK, uh-huh
Dick: This is Barn’s Hollow.
Ken: OK
Dick: And, over at Forty Acre Hollow we had forty acres – we had forty acres because it had forty acres of fields.
Ken: That’s a lot.
Dick: All at that bottom
Ken: Um-hum
Dick: And the rocks that they stacked there to
Genny: Yeah
Dick: ___ street over there
Genny: Oh, there he is. See it’s in the book. There he is.
Ken: Yes.
Genny: You know, with the
Ken: That would be the Lohman’s Crossing?
Genny: And he lived, and he lived in, no, he lived just right down here, uh, off of, uh, well it’s in Sandy Creek but it almost adjoins the ranch. It’s really close right there. But it’s on that creek.
Ken: Yes
Genny: So, you know, they had, you know, some small areas
Dick: Forty Acre – Forty Acre Creek
Genny: Yeah. Yeah. Which didn’t always run.
Dick: Yeah.
Genny: But, uh, but they raised nine kids in a, you know, a two room house. But that, you know, he did, he did other things and he, you know, he was a, uh, trustee of the Round Mountain School. And, you know, just, uh, they were just involved. I mean, I, I wonder how they eked out a living. But they uh, they did.
Ken: Would that be German, Lohman?
Genny: Yes. Oh, yeah
Dick: Yeah
Genny: Oh yeah, he came from Germany. And, uh, not his – his dad did. John Henry Lohman came from Germany.
Dick: You talk about an interesting story. John Henry Lohman.
Genny: Yeah. It’s in the book. It’s in the book.
Dick: It’s in the book. You have to read about
Genny: Read that
Dick: Came over from Germany, went to Austin, and then came out, got this piece of land out by Lohman’s Crossing, and then went back to Germany and got his family.
Genny: No, he didn’t get ‘em. He, he came over and then decided yes he was gonna come here – went back, got ‘em, brought his family, they lived at Hornsby’s Bend for a while then they lived in Austin and they had a dairy and raised, they had fourteen cows which supplied – it was right where the University is. And supplied almost all the milk for that little town of Austin. It wasn’t much back then. And, uh, and, then, but they still had an Indian problems. So then he moved out, uh, he lived out off the, before he moved out, I can’t remember, but anyway he ended up buying in the ‘50s – 1850, buying a place on Lohman’s Crossing out on the Colorado and built a number of stone houses. But by that time he had married his second wife because his first one had died. Twenty one children he had.
Ken: Oh my
Genny: (laugh) and Albert Lohman who lived over here – this plow – that was his youngest
Ken: OK
Genny: So, I mean, he goes way back. But, you know, he fought with Napoleon. That guy. He was amazing. Of course, none of them wanted to, wanted to, they didn’t want to secede, they didn’t want any part of the Confederacy, and, because the Germans
Ken: Right
Genny: did not, they’d done their fighting and they didn’t want any more wars. And, uh, so the Germans in this area, most of ‘em were not part of the succession.
Ken: I didn’t even know that there were too many Germans out here in the Hills. Uh, you know, they’re – one of the areas that, I’ve been talking to people in, there was cedar in, was Comal County. New Braunfels
Genny: Yeah
Ken: West of there was where all the cedar
Genny: Yeah, yeah.
Ken: But east of there is that black land. So it’s just – and, uh, I don’t know if you’ve ever visited – it’s a wonderful place to visit.
Genny: I was just there this weekend (laugh)
Ken: The Sophienburg Museum is there. That is a, you know, normally these little museums, these little county museums
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Are nothing. This is a twenty-first century museum.
Genny: Really?
Ken: Absolutely fantastic.
Genny: And it’s in what town?
Ken: It’s in New Braunfels. It’s right in the old part of New Braunfels. And, they, I mean it has probably five or six docents in it and, you know, all this on-line stuff
Genny: Huh.
Ken: And that’s the German side
Genny: We were just, we were saying as we were leaving, we came home Sunday, and Dick wasn’t with me, I was with a bunch of girls, and, said “you know, we would really like to see some of the old things in New Braunfels” because we never did that we were floating the river and enjoying that stuff.
Ken: It’s got a wonderful, uh, little shop in the museum with all sorts of books.
Genny: Huh
Ken: Just fan – wonderful books. I highly recommend it. The Sophienburg Museum. That is the, the wife of the Count that settled New Braunfels.
Genny: Is that right in that, in that circle thing? Is that where it is?
Ken: Uh, did you go to the best little restaurant there, I want to say, something grill?
Genny: Huisatch Grill.
Ken: Huisatch Grill, uh-huh
Genny: Yes, Yes. Friday night we went there.
Ken: Makes me hungry. Uh, it is on the same side of the railroad track as the Huisach Grill probably about two or three blocks away.
Genny: Oh, OK.
Ken: It’s a block over, two blocks up the hill. In that old part of, of New Braunfels.
Genny: Yeah. Alright, I’m gonna have to
Ken: Very, very much worth a visit
Genny: Yeah
Ken: But, hell, I was, I talked to a ninety-six year old German man and, uh, there, named, and used to be the guy who ran the museum. Lorenz Bading, and he said he owned a black land farm just right east of New Braunfels. He said that, that he didn’t know any Germans that were cedar choppers. This, he said there were plenty of cedar choppers around but his father called them dregichen Americana. Which I don’t know how to speak German but you kind-of get the picture.
Genny: (laugh)
Ken: (laugh) And he, and you know, that is, my mom is German – my father is Scots-Irish. So there’s always been that
Genny: Yeah
Ken: sort-of German neat-as-a-pin
Genny: Yeah
Ken: You know, the farms
Genny: Yeah
Ken: You could tell it was a German farm when you drive by.
Genny: Oh, you can, can’t ya.
Ken: (laugh)
Genny: I know it. I know it.
Dick: I love to see it. Out there in, uh, well north of Georgetown, what’s the place? It’s the German town.
Genny: Oh, Wal, um, Walburg.
Ken: Yes
Dick: You know, you’ve gone through all these Czech communities, or Czech houses and it’s all grown up, and everything’s all overgrown, and you get to the, the Germans and it’s just neater
Genny: (laugh)
Ken: Yeah. It’s a, it’s a curse
(all laugh together)
Ken: My mom taught it to me
(all laugh together)
Genny: Well, it’s funny – back, my, my mother, she was German and, uh, Scotch-Irish. And the German was strong in there
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: My sister up there, very neat. I must of gotten more of the Irish
(all laugh together)
Ken: I’m both in the same day (laugh)
Genny: I know. Yeah. But anyway. Doris Reaves is her name. That’s the one who is, who is a Whitt. So you need to ask at
Ken: Yes.
Genny: She can tell you ‘cause she just has great memories of it.
Ken: Dor – she’s in your book?
Genny: Doris Whitt.
Ken: It’s been a year since I
Genny: I haven’t put her, I haven’t put her name in here. I was looking at
Ken: Doris Reaves is a Whitt?
Genny: Doris Reaves is her married name, and, uh, somewhere I’ve got her phone number and I’ll get it to you. She would be a great person too. And I’ll talk to Carolyn Bonnet also because she would, they would be great folks for you
Ken: absolutely
Genny: visit with. People that had – well, Doris, she can remember, you know, she remembers going around and, uh, I, I just am amazed that, it’s the most wonderful family, the Bonnets, you know, the
Ken: Yes. I would like to get a woman’s perspective on all of this too
Genny: Yeah
Ken: because they had to work so hard
Genny: Yeah, yeah.
Dick: Yeah, you know, there’s so many of ‘em, in those, you know, one couple of Bonnets that one time came to this area probably in the late 1890s, uh 1880s, and, you know, they had a dozen kids and then there’s Bonnets everywhere.
Genny: Yeah.
Dick: And, like over in, in Liberty Hill. Uh, I mean there were some Bonnets over there that didn’t have that good a reputation. And they were, one of ‘em was a Deputy Sheriff if I remember right
Ken: That’s the one I’m – yes.
Dick: He got in trouble and, uh, I think he went on to jail
Ken: Oh, OK
Dick: Uh, but some of the Bonnets, you know
Genny: They’re fabulous
Dick: one bad apple
Genny: They’re wonderful. Yeah, don’t, yeah
Ken: No, I know that.
Genny: And, you know, the, but when you start looking into it and you talk, like you interview somebody they go “yeah, that’s my cousin” because they’re all related. But you, you can imagine, this is such a closed community because pretty much people, you know, to get around you went in a wagon and you don’t go, you didn’t go very far. They didn’t go to Austin.
Ken: Yeah
Genny: You know. So, uh, you know, the Maynards and, well all these people they, they’re all intertwined.
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: These families, they’re all cousins.
Ken: Wasn’t it when Round Mountain Road and Nameless Road were paved?
Genny: Uh, well, gosh, ‘cause I can remember as a little girl they, it was not. It was dirt road. When my mother came out here and she, she and dad got married in 1940, to go to Leander there were seven gates they had to open. You know, because there were no cattle guards. That was before it’s time. And so you’d be going through these ranches. And then finally it was just a dirt road
Genny & Dick Kercheville Tape 3 (15:00)
Genny: and then, uh, I can’t remember
Dick: It was sometime in the early fifties I think, that they finally got paved. Because I can remember coming out here, uh, I think I can remember it when it was a dirt road.
Genny: I remember going to the lake over, you know, and it was dirt for a long time.
Ken: Yes
Genny: That wasn’t, that wasn’t paved. That highway wasn’t paved for a long time
Ken: So were you going along Nameless Road when you went to Leander or was that, was that
Genny: Yeah, that’s how we went, yeah. Yeah.
Ken: There were seven gates
Genny: Yeah, of course, I don’t remember that – I was a baby – so I didn’t remember but mother would say “Oh, my gosh!” So it was an ordeal when you would go places, you know
Ken: Um-hum
Genny: going into town was a real ordeal. So, uh, but they had a little store, and they had a doctor, and
Dick: But, your dad, when you’all finally moved into town, were you, before you started school, uh, sometimes when you’d come out here, you’d come along to a
Genny: That was when we were, yeah, opening gates, that’s mainly on a ranch
Dick: Gates on the ranch
Genny: Gates on the ranch, yeah
Dick: There weren’t any gates on
Genny: Unt-uh, no.
Dick: Nameless Road
Genny: no.
Dick: It was probably the late ‘40s when they got rid of those gates and did something else. It was probably when they put the cattle guards
Genny: put the cattle guard in, when the cattle guards came in. That made the difference, yeah. So
Ken: So, did yall meet in, in Austin?
Genny: Who? Dick and I? We’ve known each other since we were kids. Our families were good friends.
Dick: Well, actually, we probably met out here.
Genny: He came out here to visit with his parents, visit my mom
Dick: I was about five years old.
Genny: my mom and dad, yeah. And, uh, but anyway, then we moved to Austin and we saw ‘em all the time. But he was a year younger than I, see. He was in, he was in the class of ’60, so, I didn’t date younger, younger fellas (laugh)
Ken: (laugh)
Genny: So
Ken: Well, I would love to have you introduce me to those people
Genny: OK
Ken: That would just be marvelous.
Genny: I will.
Dick: Where do you, uh, do you teach?
Ken: At Southwestern.
Dick: At Southwestern. OK.
Ken: We came back to, uh, from Mexico, and, uh, in the Whitt house, which was really, about two rooms this size, you know, in fact, back in the old days, I mean, I just, uh, single vertical wall that was kept from warping by having a coffee can nailed on one side
Genny: (laugh)
Ken: and then the other, so that would be separating the rooms. No insulation. I – I just don’t …
Genny: Yeah
Ken: I find it hard to believe that people lived, I mean it was so hot, you know, at seven o’clock in the evening, eight o’clock it was just an oven up there.
Genny: Yeah
Ken: I guess that’s the way everybody, that’s the way good people lived
Genny: Yeah, everybody.
Ken: You had tall windows and
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Yeah
Genny: And you just, uh, we, in fact when we first started in 1980, divided up the ranch and daddy got this part that has the, it had his house and the other house on it. But we, we’ve fixed up this house ‘cause there’d been a hand living here and we would come out, now we had, uh, up in that point you still had the, the tin roof
Ken: Yes
Genny: And, of course, no insulation.
Ken: Right
Genny: anywhere. And, uh, and so, daddy did, we tore off the roof and put on a new roof
Dick: Tore out all the little individual
Genny: individual
Dick: _____,
Ken: on top on another
Dick: And so, and, and, you know, they’d have a little gable roof over here and a flat roof over there, and, originally what it is is all flat roof
Genny: flat roof, yeah
Dick: And we tore everything off and put a big hip roof on the whole thing.
Genny: And put insulation in it. But we still didn’t have air conditioning nor heating. So, uh, we, uh, (laugh) we just loved it out here though. But, you know,
Ken: But you were raised in town, this was
Genny: Yeah, but we’d come out in the summers
Ken: Um-hum
Genny: I mean it was crazy. My sister and I and our families, we just loved it. We did put a little air conditioner back here in that one room because it only had one window.
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: And, and it had bunk beds in there for the kids. And, uh, but we didn’t have any, we had an attic fan
Ken: Yes
Genny: But you just, we’d get out of the house by three because, you know, just stay outside until the sun went down and do whatever (laugh) but we just thought it was great
Ken: Did you have a nice swimming hole along the creek?
Genny: Well, as long as the, as long as the creek’s running, we’d go down to the creek. Yeah. So, uh
Ken: the Springs used to flow back there
Genny: Yeah, there’s still, well now it’s really running. Do you have a creek on your place?
Ken: We do. Well Bingham Creek is the
Dick: ___ Creek
Ken: Is that Little Bingham Creek Road, that’s the road that I live on, that’s on the way, and it is Bingham Creek and it ran from the Maynard place
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Uh, started there and they had a cistern. You know, I guess it really channelled water and then it runs right down through our ranch and that’s where the Whitts put their pecan orchard in and, there was a, at one time, a spring that would flow and we could, you know, about the size of a great big Jacuzzi and we could all get in there
Genny: Yeah, cool off.
Ken: And you could see the water bubbling up and
Genny: Yeah
Ken: It was just a different world back then
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Just twenty five, twenty years ago.
Dick: Now you’ve got all these holes sucking the water out of the aquifer. And the weather pattern has changed
Ken: It has. It really has. So it’s, yeah, we didn’t have air conditioning. Even when we built our new house we didn’t put in air conditioning
Genny: Yeah
Ken: for about six years
Dick: Does your place butt up to Shirly Clark’s place?
Ken: I guess not. I don’t – I guess not
Dick: You don’t know that name?
Ken: Uh, no, I don’t know the name. Is it, where is she?
Dick: OK, she is in Bingham Creek and she has to be below you.
Ken: Yes
Dick: Because, uh
Ken: Does she go all the way to Round Mountain Road?
Dick: Yes
Genny: Yes
Dick: a lot of frontage there.
Ken: I, I think it almost, I think it comes within fifty yards of butting up. There’s a, there’s a little subdivision there, something Oaks, uh, I forgot the,
Dick: Yeah, she, she goes kind-of, wraps around
Ken: Yes
Dick: that subdivision
Ken: Yes, I think it almost butts up to that. I’ve hear. And she’s sort-of got a nature preserve there perhaps, or a
Dick: Well
Genny: She did something
Dick: Yeah.
Ken: Something like that.
Dick: Something like that. Sure, she’s a, she’s a 1920s weirdo.
Ken: Yeah. I’ve heard about her.
Genny: (laugh)
Dick: Reminds me of the Great Gatsby.
Genny: (laugh)
Dick: I mean she, last I heard she was living in New York.
Ken: Um
Dick: Uh, but she is, uh, pretty close to certifiably nuts.
Ken: Yeah, I know the
Genny: her father gave her the property, you know, to get it out of his estate, he gave her the property. And she made him get off (laugh)
(all laugh together)
Ken: Yeah
Genny: God. That’s a story that lawyers should tell people when they’re starting to pass over things.
Ken: Your neighbor, there’s an older … Gonzalo
Genny: Yes, Esquevel
Ken: yeah, Esquevel. Aurora was our, she cleaned our house until, we were spending too long in Colorado and, she didn’t
Genny: Is that his wife?
Ken: Yes, Aurora, she’s wonderful. And, but, that’s Mrs. What’s her
Genny: Kucher
Ken: Kutcher, right, right.
Genny: But, she
Ken: How’s she doing?
Genny: Well, she’s not doing well, and her, her niece that she’s leaving everything with, has, uh, is gotten rid of Gonzalo. It’s real sad
Ken: she fired Gonzalo!
Genny: Yes, she did
Ken: Oh my gosh
Genny: I know, that’s what he said too.
Ken: Oh no. I mean Duchess and I were thinking, well she’s gonna give some,
Genny: Well they did give the house and that, like eleven acres where his house is
Ken: Where Gonzalo lives?
Genny: Yeah, that does belong to him.
Dick: They didn’t give, that was Mr. Kutcher
Genny: That’s Mr. Kutcher gave that.
Dick: Originally gave that to him when he, and was effective when he died. So, so Mrs. Kutcher didn’t give him that.
Ken: Oh no, we were thinking that she would set them up or something like that
Genny: Well, she, they had talked about giving that field that’s behind his house but then I think her brother, who is the father of Katherine that she’s living, leaving everything to, I think they said he’s gotten enough and, uh, so, anyway, he’s not getting that.
Dick: Mrs. Kutcher is at the point now that
Genny: Well now she’s
Dick: She doesn’t, you know, she
Genny: She’s not gonna fight anything.
Dick: She doesn’t remember anything.
Ken: uh-huh
Dick: She doesn’t remember that he was fired The last time we was able to come see her she says “where have you been” and then she forgets it immediately.
Ken: That’s too bad. So he doesn’t have anything to do any more, I guess.
Genny: Well, he does. Well, she, Mrs. Kutcher is ninety seven, so, and, and, uh, but, but, he, he owns a bull dozer and so he’s been working for our brother-in-law clearing a bunch of property. So, so, uh
Ken: Did they replace him with someone? Because he was inefficient? I’m just kind-of
Dick: No, no, no, no. She didn’t like him because he wasn’t subserv, subservient enough, and he would talk, he would, uh, answer, you know, talk, he would give his honest opinion about a situation. He was, Gonzalo was like one of the family. Uh, I mean, he, he used to take Mrs. Kutcher, Mr. and Mrs. Kutcher and, Mrs. Kutcher later, up to Wyoming to their place up there. Uh, every summer he’d drive the motorhome and, I mean, they were just
Ken: Huh. I wonder if Aurora went along?
Genny: No. No. It was just
Ken: Have yall met Aurora’s daughters?
Genny: You know, I really haven’t. I don’t think I’ve ever met her except at,
Ken: Well she’s just
Genny: I guess Mr. Kutcher’s funeral would be the only time.
Ken: she’s a, I mean, she and her, well, whoever is working with her, two of ‘em, I mean she must be late fifties or sixty and, she is a whirlwind. She’ll, I mean she, she works, she cleans, cleans a few houses a day
Genny: Yeah
Ken: And you know, she is just a whirlwind
Genny: Aw
Ken: Just a wonderful person
Dick: Well she’s that first generation that really has a work ethic
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Yes. Now her daughter Dora has been helping her lately, a very attractive woman, and Dora’s kids are at Texas Tech. And so, I mean, they are just a success story
Genny: Yeah
Ken: You know
Genny: Oh, I know. I know it. A wonderful family.
Dick: Dora’s daughter lives, she lives here on the road going to
Ken: Yes,
(talking over each other)
Genny: Spanish style house?
Ken: Yes, big stucco house, that’s right
Dick: What’s her husband’s name?
Ken: I don’t know her husband.
Dick: he’s a concrete contractor
Ken: Um-hum
Dick: But they’ve, they’ve done real well.
Ken: That’s really wonderful isn’t it.
Dick: Yeah
Ken: Yeah. Beautiful little children
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Yeah
Genny: And Gonzalo is the best. Anytime something goes wrong we can call Gonzalo
Ken: Uh-huh
Genny: And he’s the best neighbor in the world.
Ken: Uh-huh.I’ll bet
Genny: And he’ll come help ya, and, you know.
Ken: We’ve begged Aurora not to let us go. Because we, what we do is we bought a place in southern Colorado, so that we, we’re having like two, four grandkids and the parents at one time is a little overwhelming so we’ve been rotating them and, and we have two of ‘em coming in a couple of weeks and then the next two the next year. And so, um, we’ve been going up there, you know, now for six years
Genny: What town are you near?
Ken: We are near nothing. The near, the closest town is Alamosa and it’s forty miles away
Genny: Yeah
Ken: Uh, so it
Dick: Are you west or east?
Ken: We’re really right on the border of, if you were Chama if you know where Chama is
Genny: Yeah
Ken: and you drove up that, up that gorgeous pass
Dick: gorgeous drive, gorgeous pass
Ken: right when you get over to the other side is where we are.
Dick: Before you get to the flat land
Ken: That is correct. it’s beautiful country
Genny: it’s beautiful
Dick: We’ve been, we’ve done the, uh, train their
Ken: Yes
Dick: done that route and then we’ve driven it
Ken: Yes, isn’t it gorgeous where they
Genny: Yeah
Ken: If you look down on that river from the train and you saw someone fly fishing that could have been me.
Genny: That’s you! Oh I remember that river.
Dick: (talking over one another)
Ken: Yes
Dick: Straight down So far. I mean that is amazing
Ken: This is the more gentle part. It would be probably, you know, from here down to the bottom of your pasture way down there. Yeah, I’ve often wanted them to pay me as a prop
(all laugh together)
Ken: Or, I’ve got a fish on and I don’t want people to be hiking up there. I’ll hide behind a bush and get that fish after the train passes. that’s my favorite place to fish
Genny: Yeah
Dick: I love Chama
Genny: We love that
Dick: The weather is so nice. Yeah, we stayed there in a RV park
Genny: right on the river for about a week,
Dick: Yeah
Genny: Yeah
Ken: My wife is chomping at the bit to get up there right now.
Genny: I know. When it starts getting hot it’s time to go.
Ken: It is. It really is. And it’s great, I mean, I’ve been, we’ve been loving having a place up there
Genny: Oh, yeah.
Dick: We stayed there and then we stayed in Lake City
Ken: That’s beautiful.
Dick: I really, I like Lake City ‘cause of the tours you can take in the Jeep. Uh, rent a Jeep
Ken: Yeah
Dick: And go around those high mountain roads
Ken: Yes
Dick: It’s incredible.
Ken: It’s just all beautiful country. And, you know, the other part about it is, it’s a little, Austin has changed so much, you know, since we went to school.
Genny: Yeah, really grown up, isn’t it.
Ken: It has grown and it’s modern, and, you know, everything is i-Phones, and, you know, and, you know, you just drive west of here and its just, it’s like stepping back in time.
Genny: Yeah
Dick: It is, you’re right.
Ken: Go to Alamosa and you feel like you’ve stepped back twenty years
Genny: Yeah
Ken: That’s, you know, everybody knows everybody, um, it’s just got a real small town atmosphere. Our nearest town in Antonito. They have a couple of little restaurants there and it’s just very quiet. We just love it (laugh)
Dick: I bet you do.
(stopped recording here)
