Vadarae (I love her name) sent me a Facebook Message —-within it was this beautiful rainbow! ” A rainbow in the western Sky” — for ME!! From Her!
Friendship is what makes everything more peaceful, bright, and delightful.
WOW! I just love Rainbows!!
“It’s summer and time for wandering”— Kellie Elmore (author and Poet)
From my world to your heart,
Linda
It grew too hot to bale hay—Dad only bales hay when the dew is on the hay.
When he came inside he said, “Let’s go for a ride”.
Mom picked me up and got in the pick-up with Dad; off we went–
to the Uncompahgre Plateau where we saw lots of neat things.
At one point— Mom and Dad and I went for a walk so Mom could get a photo
Of the Lone Cone, way over there by Norwood, Nucla, and Naturita.
Boo Berry Betty Brown
(I LOVE my life!)
When over by the equipment (spreading seeds for the wildlife)
I saw the cutest little family
Searching for seeds!
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
Before the rain
That thing called WIND
stirred everything up
Spread the top of the soil
Here and there
And
Everywhere!
After the rain…the ending of a RAINBOW!!!
YAY!
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
A group of Hummingbirds is called 
A Charm.
How cool is that?
Whoever decided to call them a Charm
Picked a perfect word to describe them
The Golden light last night
Seemed to turn all the little Humminbirds
Gold.
Golden Charms.
The Rufus are back. They have been here for a couple of weeks now.
They are early
Usually arriving the first week in August.
The Rufus turned and even Golder
Golden color in that Magic Hour of sun.
As did the sky!
From my heart to your world,
Linda
The last two days we enjoyed rain showers…sometimes the rain rode the sky in the morning
Or kissed the earth on a mid-night wind
At points the rain came in wild and untamed—
Cooling down the earth, so at one point we lived within a cloud
The moisture from the warm earth rising up to meet the cool air…fog –a most glorious and unusual gift in the high mountain desert!
Then yesterday the clouds all scuttered away on high wind, neither seen or felt here on on our little part of the earth
Walking among the flowers I could feel the Magic of the Old Ones
It’s still here, clinging to the earth…
Lifting us up for a heartbeat
(The Red Day-lily is a gift from Marianne )
In the shadows of ancient clouds.
From my world to your heart,
Linda
How often do any of us get a chance to rub elbows with history? I hope that makes sense. I’m referring to the opportunity to meet real historic, but not necessarily famous, people. I had occasion to do just that, when four Tom McCarty descendants descended on the museum for our open house. While the open house was originally for the purpose of allowing the public to see and handle the famous 1874 Sharps rifle with which Ray Simpson shot Tom McCarty’s brother and nephew during their hasty retreat from Delta following their 1893 bank robbery here, it seemed to be more about the McCarty legacy and their family stories of this past century. While the rifle was certainly an attraction, the McCarty descendants were equally in the spotlight.
Tom McCarty was married twice. His second marriage to Christina Christiansen in 1873 resulted in three children; Leonard, Lewis, and Dora. Our four McCarty visitors were all from the Lewis McCarty lineage, Tom McCarty being their great grandfather.
Family history, when it includes historically famous bad guys, is often not passed forward, and our visitors encountered some of their parents / grandparents, etc., who never spoke of this element of their history. Thus, some of our questions to them were also their questions. Nevertheless, they came with numerous photos, pedigree charts (genealogy charts), and oral history to satisfy our interest in the McCarty legacy.
Our thanks go to Kristi (McCarty) Johnson of Sandy, UT for contacting her (McCarty) cousins; Tillma Giesse of Laramie, WY, Jim Whitteker of Logan, UT, and Robert Whitteker of Sweetwater, TX. The occasion was also like a family reunion for the visitors, and we were most honored to be included in some of their discussions. All things considered, they were lots of fun to mingle with, and there was no shortage of laughter among them.
I took the group on a walking tour of the places where the bank robbery events took place, followed by a drive past the residence which used to be the Farmers & Merchants Bank – moved there in 1908, and then a visit to the cemetery and the McCarty grave.
Lots of photos were taken – many from cell phones and ipads, but photos were also taken by a young lady hired for the occasion. Kaylee is a recent graduate of Delta High School and will be studying photography in college. She has a real gift for the art and her work is already of professional quality.
Photographs are the life-blood of documenting history. It is easy to alter history just by telling a story differently, but a photograph captures the moment and preserves it forever. I love Main Street parade photos, not just for the image of the float or key object / person, but for the background; the store front of that time, or a building no longer there, or for many other reasons.
I am reminded of the famous photos of the McCarty outlaws taken against what looked like the side of a barn, where previous historians claimed it was taken in front of a similar structure in the alley behind the museum. While it made sense that the photo could have been taken there, a careful examination of the building compared to the photo showed that it was not the same structure.
Delta’s Main Street as it appeared in 1893. The Farmers and Merchants Bank would have been on the left, out of sight in this photo. Photo courtesy of the Delta County Historical Society Museum.
Jim
MUSEUM DIRECTOR / CURATOR: Jim Wetzel 835-8905
MUSEUM: (970) 874-8721 deltamuseum@aol.com
DELTA COUNTY MUSEUM Delta County Historical Society
Quarterly Newsletter Issue No. 87 July – September, 2016
NEWSLETTER EDITOR: Jim Wetzel
Linda
Despite the heat
The sun spreading warmth
Like warmed honey….
There is always magic
In a place
called
paradise
home.
Your friend,
Linda
The heat here has been exhausting. Part of the reason we are are so hot is the fact we have corn fields all around us…all but the five acres of pinto beans right in front of the house.
Since the humidity is high for us, it seems hotter than normal. I know nothing like those of you who live where there is high humidity all the time. (July and part of August is the monsoon time for the high mountain deserts of the Rocky Mountain mountain range).
Anyway, since the humidity is high, with afternoon thunder and lightening storms complete with rain and living in a much higher humid environment A CORN FIELD we are ‘feeling the heat’!
The corn fields effectively block any slight breezes or tiny winds that flow over the top of the Uncompahgre (Un-come-pah-gray–accent on the `pah) Plateau and onto the surrounding mesa’s including ours–California Mesa.
Corn fields by nature ARE hot and humid! Therefore, we are like tall green corn plants maturing in the July sun. Even the swamp cooler doesn’t help; it produces even more humidity.
Yesterday was a ‘sore trial’ as my beloved maternal Grandmother used to say! Being a child I never really understood that saying…but as a Grandmother myself, having lived many days and then some; I do.
(Anymore my Grandmother’s words seem to sing to me in the breezes, to ride with me over the dirt roads as I help change water, or we rest on the patio in the evening. I hear her spirit moving through my own words and in encounters of weeds and plants in the gardens, which we both love.)
The little grandchildren arrive off and on through the days, staying a short while then getting on their bikes to peddle home creating their own breezes as the fly through the fields between houses. I’m sure they don’t understand the term ‘sore trial’. 🙂
Still it is only the humidity that is hard to manage. Everything else is going nicely.
Last week Terry’s brother ‘dropped by’ on his way back to his home in Gilbert, Arizona. Terry enjoyed their couple of hours visit — after a quick ride in the corvette, Roger was back on the road. He had miles and miles to go from here to Utah, then New Mexico, and on into Arizona.
All the hay is in and stacked and some has already been sold. Terry has started water on the very dry alfalfa field as we begin again preparing for the third cutting.
Today we rest…no hard jobs. Just those things that must be done.
Your friend on a farm in Western Colorado,
Linda
Life on a Colorado Farm 