PART THREE

Part 3 - The Overlooked Anecdotes

Harold Doty as I have stated earlier, was born in 1912 and grew up his entire boyhood and a good part of his adult life in the Upper Valley near the severally occurring Oases there. Originally his family's ranch was across from what is known as the old George Baldwin Place. Apparently the old Doty ranch (If I understand Mr. Doty's direction correctly) is today the ranch of James Hayworth who came to the upper valley at a later date. As earlier mentioned, the Baldwin place became a special retreat to many as a location to kick back, dip in the pool and enjoy the Oasis of Warm Springs. From all the information I have accumulated and stories I have listened to, there appears to be absolutely no reason to believe that the shade around these pools was ever anything but Washingtonia filifera.

The Mormons were very big on "shade trees" as can be attested to by nearly every diary and book from the time. Few regarded the Palm as a potential shade tree. If the early Mormons had originally planted these Oases with Cottonwoods rather than Palms then they would have surely persisted at least into the nineteen-twenties. From the following however, we can surely see that this is not the case.

Given the life span of Cottonwoods as well as the affinity the Mormons showed everywhere for this taxa there arises a very strong argument that had the entire springs originally been planted with "Cottonwoods" it is highly unreasonable and unlikely they would have been cut or otherwise replaced so early in the 1900's . . . (This would almost certainly have had to have been the case in order for the palm stories of Harold Doty to be correct about the large plantings of tall palms covering the areas around the headwaters in 1918 as told below.) It is partly through this improbability that we can safely presume that "Cottonwoods" were not the trees which made the Oases at Warm Springs so inviting to the "weary traveler."

Harold Doty has stated numerous times in personal communications with him over the last three years, that the palms have always been in the Upper Muddy Valley. He has always been quite emphatic about this and has included the following short detail to emphasize his point:

"I moved to the Doty Ranch across from the Baldwin Place just north of the Home Ranch in 1913. I was born in 1912. When I was around six years old (1918), I was at the Home Ranch (Where the Warm Springs resort is today ) At that time there were bunches of tall Palms all around covering the areas where the headwaters came out. A man named "Ross" worked there as a caretaker and he told me then that the Palms in that valley had been there a very long time. He also said that no one knew how long they had been there but that they were very old. At that time there were large palms at Big Springs, The Baldwin Ranch, The Home Ranch, and the Blodale place. Later of course, they cut and removed most of them because they were trying to make a more consistent channel for the river and also they were considered a nuisance by some. They came up everywhere you couldn't seem to kill them. This was in the early twenties sometime. It was probably before Chick Perkins saw it as a kid because his Uncle didn't bring him over there until he bought his first vehicle and he bought his first vehicle from me." (Harold Doty, summer 1994 pers. com.)

Here we not only have the testimony of one who actually lived in the Upper Valley since 1912

(...as opposed to one who may have grown up in the lower valley, and later moved to the upper valley as is the case with most of those old-timers now living in the upper valley...) but in addition to that eyewitness we have the words of someone even more elderly than Mr. Doty (Ross) who insisted that the Palms were very old as early as 1918. For anyone living on the Home Ranch in 1918 such as the man named Ross, it is arguably unlikely he would have harbored any confusion or doubt as to who had planted those palms had they been planted by an early White Settler such as Mendis Cooper or anyone else. This is also born out by the testimony of one of the early Perkins family members to the valley:

According to Ute Perkins (Leavitt) (Overton, pers. comm. 1994), Her father Lawrence Whitney Perkins ran the Home Ranch (the resort at Warm Springs) while Ute V. Perkins was on a mission for the Mormon Church. He was born in 1903 and is reported as having said on several occasions that: "The palms had been here as long as he knew or could remember and that old timers had told him they'd always been there.

An important note here is that this Home Ranch was the future site of what would later become known as the "Warm Springs Resort." It appears that those who have owned this property over the years never harbored doubt as to the notion that these palms were very old. The Brochure of the resort from the 1970's states this fact right on the back, referring to them as: "ancient native palms." Apparently this information was handed down from the early days when the original owners "Beach" owned the property in the late 1800's.

They may also have acquired this information either from observing the Paiutes using the seeds and leaves or from the Native Americans actually telling them this fact. Remember according to Orville Perkins, ALL of the original Perkins men could speak Paiute fluently. The Paiutes apparently were still using the seeds and leaves of Palms until sometime in the 1920's. This is reiterated by their testimonies given later.

The testimonies of the Moapas are eyewitnesses to these uses and date these practices positively as late as the very early nineteen-twenties. The massive removal of palms for flood control which took place in the early or mid twenties as told by Harold Doty may have been the last major factor in the demise of this Moapa practice and if so surely contributed to the widespread loss of the memories of such things among the locals. (Since one would have had to "see" these practices to recall such things...) I have spoken with Moapas for instance who never heard of such things. One Paiute man I spoke with (although there is a chance he was being facetious or sarcastic with me) laughed and wondered if I thought the Moapas were from Hawaii or something. He seemed to think the notion that Paiutes had ever used Palms was ridiculous. This indicated to me that even among the Paiutes, the knowledge of this memory may be dying.

Certainly those settlers who later changed residence from the lower valleys to the upper valleys in the late twenties (as are most of the families who now live in the Upper Moapa) were wont to come to believe that any palms extant by that late date were likely the progeny of the Cooper palms they were more familiar with from the lower Valley. George Maurice Perkins moved to the home ranch area at Warm Springs in 1924 when he was 12 years of age according to Iva Perkins wife of V. Perkins. It is clear that there were Palms there at that time because she comments about camping among the Palms in 1924 at the old Blodale place across the road at that time. (Relief society history) Also Arthur Perkins born April 1908 lived on the Home Ranch in the thirties. His nickname was "Omar the tentmaker" and it may be that part of this nomiker had to do with the "Oasis" environment in which he lived. The date of 1936 in the concrete circumscribing a large palm base at that location testifies solidly to this fact. Yet once again curiously no white written mention is made of this. In all the writing however it should be pointed out that recording baptisms and exactly "who attended meetings" took precedence over reporting things which at the time probably seemed quite obvious and unimportant to most locals.

Still the lack of massive numbers from the early twenties 'removal' spoken of by Doty could have only served to reinforce the notion that the palms extant there were from somewhere else. Furthermore, the whole concept of Palms seems to have been pretty much a "non-issue" for people in either valley and as such, was not really important enough to write about or discuss with relation to cultural importance or antiquity. It is only since they have begun removing the palms that these memories are now being talked about by the oldest of those early settlers and by the Moapas as well.

Larry Brundy showed me photographs of the area around the old home place taken in the late thirties or early forties. Although the photos were clearly pointing away from the main springs area ( which certainly would explain why so few palms are pictured in it,) ...still there were only a few short palms seen around the perimeter edges of the fields. Perhaps the tallest was 7 meters. This was taken on her grandfathers' place after a large fire. The lack of tall palms in photographs so late is perhaps a contributing factor to the continuing persistence of the "fewer or even no palms" stories. However to entertain such a notion is to imply or infer that a lot of very honest and reliable people are either not being truthful or that their memories fail them all in exactly the same degree and in a remarkably uniform fashion. This would be a strange phenomenon indeed and there are too many such stories to accept this idea as plausible.

Those who either remember Large Palms early in this century, or remember Native uses of the Palms earlier in this century as well as those who quote their grandparents and other original Pioneers who had indicated long ago that the palms were either Old, Large or that they had "always been here" lend a great deal more detail and substance to their stories than do the later conjectural hypotheses of those who speculate on the origin of Cooper's palms as being from Phoenix. These other and more substantial anecdotal contributions recall factors and contributing details which make their stories far more weighty and believable than those conjectural stories which loosely imply that the Palm is recently adventive.

In the U. V. Perkins family newsletter Vol VI, No.2 1992 page 5 paragraph 3 regarding the historic events of 1900:

"...one can't help but wish that an itinerant photographer might have wandered into the settlements on the Muddy... Who wouldn't have paid cash? ...What we wouldn't give for such photographs...and what treasures such pictures would be and that we make sure we learn from this lesson well that we leave some photographs behind for others future posterity."

Here it seems appropriate to add another of those early voices to the evidence. This would be the voice of Bill Gann. He was also one of the original children of settlers to the area between Logandale and Overton in the lower Valley. Two interesting anecdotes come to us from him. Mr. Gann cannot himself tell the story to us today since he passed away sometime in the 1950's and apparently was very old...I am told possibly in his 80's or 90's at that time. (Kleon Winsor-1994 -pers. com.) (This has been very difficult to ascertain even with the Mormon's normally meticulous records. Both Kleon Winsor and Harold Doty of Overton stated they believed Bill Gann was close to his 90's when he passed away sometime in the 1950's.) His Father (also Bill Gann settled in the valley and began the Capalapa Ranch (Paiute for bad water), sometime in 1865 or 1868.

Mr. Doty states that on repeated occasions Mr. Bill Gann remarked how:

"...as a young man <he had> always loved going to the Warm Springs to see the tall beautiful Palms there..."

This same story is told by Kleon Winsor. Kleon Winsor was born May 21, 1925. He stated that Bill Gann used to always remark how he " ...had loved to go the warm springs when he was young and how he used to say how he loved the big Palms there."

This is very noteworthy in that if we assume Bill Gann meant "prior to the age of 25" by the terms "young " and "when he was young man" (which seems reasonable since most old timers were well on their way to manhood by 21) and if, (as I was told), Mr. Gann died in the 1950's around the age of ninety then we can reasonably and safely conclude that Bill Gann had been eye-witness to "tall Palms" in the Warm Springs area by 1895 at the latest.

The only solid information I have found is that William Gann came to the area of St. Joseph near Logandale in 1888 with his mother Bertie from Illinois. I was told that Bill Gann's father (Also 'Bill' Gann as was the grandson) started the Capalapa Ranch. One point that is clear is that the Gann referred to by both Harold Doty and Kleon Winsor is the one who died in the 1950's at a very advanced age. The old Mr. Gann died at the turn of the century. It seems reasonable to assume then, that sometime between 1888 and 1890 Mr. Gann apparently made more than one trip to the Warm Springs where he witnessed Large Palms that made a lasting impression on him.

Clearly the least this anecdote accomplishes is that it places tall palms at Warm Springs (almost 56 km from the Cooper homestead ) sometime before or by 1895. (This is because if Mr. Gann was 89 in 1959 he would have been 25 years of age in 1895. This seems reasonable, given the terms "young man" and "young" used by the respondents. Mr. Gann almost certainly had seen the Palms before or by Cooper's arrival in 1893.⁽¹⁾ Either way, tall Palms at any date earlier than 1900 in the upper valley completely invalidates any claim that Cooper could have been responsible and certainly eliminates any question that second generation seeds from Cooper's palms in Overton could be responsible for Warm Springs Palms. The only logical conclusion here is that the palms predated whites in the Moapa Valley.

Other notes I would like to make are that Chick Perkins (one who staunchly upheld the idea that Cooper's original palms were somehow the source of all the other Moapa Palms ) was born in 1915, three years after Maurice Perkins and Harold Doty. The big difference between Harold Doty and the other two men being, (as earlier mentioned,) that Harold Doty was the only one who actually grew up his entire life in the Upper Valley near the several palm Oases while the other two either only first moved to or saw the upper Valley AFTER the 1920's, having spent their earlier childhoods in the lower Valleys. Chick told me (pers. com. 1994) that he first visited the springs when he was about 15 (1930) years of age and noted fewer palms at that time. This would make sense since Mr. Doty said many were destroyed in the twenties.

Chick also visited his uncle Joe Perkins who was at the Picket ranch around 1923 or so (he was about 8 years old.) He said no palms were there at all. He thought this was proof that palms had not existed at that earlier time. He stated in his conversation to me that this is how he knew that palms in the upper valley were non-existent before the late 1920's. However Chick apparently was not aware that there have apparently never been any palms near or around the Picket Ranch. He apparently also did not know that there are still no palms in that area ...nor are any visible at a distance from that area. The Warm Springs Palms are not visible at all for at least a good 8 or 9 kilometer drive through the hidden valley area and the reservation. (It is not known if this was (and still may be), due to ranches cutting or destroying them or whether they simply have never grown there.)

Larry Brundy, ( Daughter of Lawrence W. Perkins in the Upper Valley) pointed out the site of the Picket ranch. I used to have friends (Holliefields) living nearby at the Hidden Valley ranch almost 20 years ago, so I was already familiar with the place well... but I never knew that it was the old Picket ranch until Larry showed it to me. It is actually on the South end of the Moapa reservation and there are no Palms there either ( save a couple of really small juveniles ) and there apparently have never been any on the reservation itself. It is not surprising, therefore that Chick saw no Palms at that location.

Following are more short anecdotes from various sources:

One other story told by Bill Gann comes again through Kleon Winsor. (Kleon is the father of Lori Pederson who lives on the property next to the Warm Springs resort which is now part of the Nevada Moapa Coriacea refuge in the upper Valley.)

Kleon stated:

"When I was a kid, I was standing with Bill Gann out in front of the Store at Logandale. Bill was talking to me and was saying how when he was a young man it used to take a half a day to ride to Mills Ranch by Horse up to where the Sand loading was. He said he would ride his horse there and the mud in the swamps around Logandale would be all the way up to the belly of the horse. He said it was no problem except for the smaller palms. He said the spines on the Palms would make his horse jump. - (Editor's note: this would have had to have been sometime in the 1890's around Logandale.)- In the early days the Ganns owned probably a third of St. Joseph.

Luther was older than my Uncle who was a surveyor on the first grade for the Rail Road. In 1909 they brought the rail into the main line at Moapa. Jack (John) Perkins (Fay's brother) used to say how he used to enjoy working with my uncle on the Rail Road. Amber spur was the name of the rail out at Mills road because they took amber sand from there to make amber glass bottles. That's where Old Bill Gann would ride his horse. Over there to the Amber spur and Mills road. At the turn of the century there was a lot of swamp around Logandale and Overton and it was even too swampy for mesquite but there were palms where ever there was any water. The settlers used to take them out whenever they had a chance because they were a nuisance. The Ganns had the original Capalapa Ranch (Capalapa is a Paiute word for bad water), and Zubia planted the Palms at the Capalapa.⁽²⁾

When I was a kid I used to camp up on the camp at Moapa when we worked there. There were palms there when I was 15 years old and I used to herd cows along a ditch of water at Alkali flats this side of the creek. I had to rope and ride every day and the horse would get tangled in the grape vines. A lot of palms were taken out at that time and you could see them laying there deteriorating. I was born in 1925 but my older brother said there were always wild palms along the creeks."

Bonnie Wilcox, grounds keeper at the Mormon Ranch which is at one of the main springs in the upper valley reports that President Lee Earl told her that as a kid he used to swim in the old pool there and that there were large palms all around in the 1930's. This indicates once more that not all the palms had been taken out at that time although it is said by several sources that later in the thirties CCC camps removed massive numbers of Palms from the area.

Kaye Herron of the Moapa Valley telephone company and a longtime friend of mine told me that one of the Moapa Indians (Juanita Kinlichinie) told her about the Palms at Warm Springs. Kay was aware that I had been trying to get the Moapas to respond to my questions so she took note of what Juanita had said to her. Later Juanita would answer questions again and sign an affidavit which I would obtain. (This is found later in this report.) In this earlier discussion, between her and Kaye however, Kaye reported the following:

"My mother and grandmother used to make baskets almost every day. Sometimes they made baskets using palm parts. These weren't as good as the ones made from the plants from the river. They soaked the long things that hung down from the Palm trees until they turned real white. I never learned to make baskets. They also used to collect the little Black seeds from the Palms and soak them and then pound them. They made a sort of gravy ⁽³⁾ out of it. There used to be a Paiute name they called the gravy but I don't remember what it was. Maybe I could ask Irene, she's older than me and she might remember. The palms have always been here, that's what my father told me. My father also told stories about how 'big' the land was before the whites came. When the Mormons came, we called them "Squatters." Finally the leaders of the Moapas got together and talked about the inevitable time when the whites would take everything from us and they discussed just how much they would be willing to let go of and what they felt they should try to retain."

This remarkable story as well as others from other Moapas will be the subject of another part of this report.

There are also other areas in the Moapa Valleys in which Palms are extant. One is Blue Point Springs out at the Lake Mead Recreation Area where several palms appear in a straight line in typical Mormon fashion. The others are clearly wild palm groves and appear at four small seeps along the shelf at the base of the south-western end of the Mormon Mesa. Rogers' springs is also in the Lake Mead Recreation area and has groups of Palms along it's water ways as well. There are two groves along the Virgin River toward Mesquite, but I have not collected data about those and therefore will not make them a subject of this report except to mention their existence. One is on the old homestead, Juanita Springs Ranch and since this was a very early settlement, it should be assumed that; like Angel Springs ranch, it is an original (but small), palm grove predating white settlement. I have heard of Paiute encampments there in the early days and since the Palms are all in random fashion with none in straight lines and none around the buildings or area which could have been landscaped it is clear these are wild palms. The other palm grove is further up toward the Arizona border and I have no observations to make about it at this time.

Regarding the origins of the Palms at Blue Point springs in the Lake Mead Recreation Area, Kleon had this to say:

"Lyle Macdonald started a fish Hatchery there in the 1950's but at that time the Palms were already there." This is apparently not what the Rangers told James Cornett when he came through in 1986. He was told they had been planted in the 1950's. Clearly the following story from Lowell Leavitt of Overton makes this impossible however.

Lowell Leavitt, (husband of Ute Perkins) of Overton remembers that when his dad died in 1934 "the palms at Blue Point were already large since <they> used to run cattle in the area." (pers. com.)

They were more likely planted during the Slim Creek years spoken of in the Syphus / Everett Family Reunion notes (notes of August 8^th 1958.) Levi Syphus (later a state senator) started the Slim Creek project in 1903 which lasted about seven years. He created a concrete ditch running from Roger's Springs to Blue Point springs and spent a lot of money in an attempt to irrigate some fields down by the River with water from the two springs. During this time heavy disturbance of both springs took place such that both springs likely lost much for any exacting archaeological finds. It was apparently Syphus who planted the palms in the straight line at Blue Point spring in 1903 or soon thereabouts. This would make far more sense since I have photographic evidence which proves that in the last twenty years the palms at blue point have not grown perceptibly at all. Since a date of 1950's would mean that the palms stopped growing sometime around twenty years old and that all of them had reached sexual maturity by that time (according to my photographs) this makes a date in the 1950's highly unreasonable and unlikely. These palms are clearly much older and the only explanation is that they were planted by Syphus. This of course makes them almost contemporary with the Cooper Palms and means that they approach 100 years of age.

Lowell Leavitt's statement is therefore corroborated by my own photographic records. The lack of growth over twenty years supports the anecdotes of both Lowell Leavitt and Kleon Winsor in that it argues these palms were already old in the 1950's. Since the ground is compacted to a very great degree this is very likely. I have noticed many of the palms grow extremely slowly at Blue point unless they are right next to the water and in softer soil. There are palms at blue point which are easily over twenty years old which are only 3 or 4 meters tall.

I have found no historical reports of Palms at Rogers Springs but the presence of a deep bedrock mortar there argues very emphatically for the existence of food seeds of the type that needed soaking just as the Cahuilla and Papago did. The fact that Moapa Elders still living point to this exact type of Bedrock mortar and say they were indeed used to soak and grind Palm seed makes it almost certain that at some point in the past Washingtonia filifera existed at Roger's Springs.

The idea that Cottonwoods may replace the newer palms that have since grown (or more likely RE-grown) at Roger's Springs is disheartening and upsetting to say the least. To me, the idea that aborigines soaked some sort of hard seeds in the mortars at Roger's Springs...and that these were almost certainly Palm seeds is unavoidable when the Moapa's memories are taken into account. Although other hard seeds were soaked in bedrock mortars according to records from the Cahuilla to the south, and not just palm seeds, the memories of the Moapa so far only point to Palm seeds. Several locals have told me that Paiutes could always be found at the Roger's Springs in the early part of this century. Furthermore, two of the other types of seeds soaked by the Cahuilla in deep bedrock mortars such as these (Holly and Acorns) are not found around Moapa, leaving only palms. Other early accounts which speak of soaking mesquite at times refers to different methods.

Further more, Don Reynolds of Las Vegas (born in 1919) states that there used to be several bedrock mortars at Rogers Springs. Now however, there is only one that I am aware of. He said there was also a large working grinding stone about one meter by one meter and about 10 or 12 centimeters deep. This was in the 1930's sometime when he used to go there to 'camp' but at some point this large piece which he states was literally "part of the hill above the spring" was suddenly "gone". Presumably it was vandalized and amazingly chipped out and stolen. His daughter told me that one time he went there and it was just "gone".

There are also three small oases of palms outside of Overton toward and on the old Sanford Angel Homestead. Angel's Homestead was first settled in 1876. On the early archaeology maps of the area, the Angel ranch is quite clearly in the "thick" of the Lost City ruins area.

Chick Perkins stated that when he was very young he first visited there to swim in Angels water tank at the spring. At that time according to Chick, there were seven or eight Large Palms in clumps around the tank. When I asked Chick who planted them he just shrugged and said he had always assumed that Cooper had but that no one had ever said. That Cooper planted them seems highly unlikely since a hundred meters or so from the springs are seven deep bedrock mortars (see photos.) These once again, are identical to the ones used by the Moapas grandparents specifically to grind and soak Palm seeds. Furthermore, since none of the palms were planted in straight lines or on property lines the idea that these were planted by Mormons is highly suspect. One should also note that like the Capalapa, the Sanford Angel place also predates Cooper's arrival to the valley similarly, by almost twenty years.

Angel's Ranch could easily have been the very place where Cooper obtained his seeds (or plants). This is actually the most likely since the Angel place was nearest to the Cooper Place. It was far enough way however that Mendis could plant palms in Overton and still claim to be the first person to do so.

One palm at Angels Ranch appears to be particularly old. It's trunk is very pitted and scarred with extremely deep concave weathered spots and a lot of holes sized about 3 or 4 cm in diameter which one may stick an index finger fairly deeply into. Among the grass is another stump of a Palm which looks very old and is clearly weathered away. It does not appear that it burned down so it is assumed that it died naturally. It does not appear to have been cut by an axe or saw of any kind since the stump is very irregular and ragged. (See photos.) Old clean cut spadices lying on the ground near and around the area indicate that the Wildlife refuge nearby (The Overton Wildlife refuge) has apparently kept the palms to their current numbers for some time by cutting seed spadices.

Kleon said that when he was young he also used to go over to the Angel place and that there were lots of grinding holes in the rocks around where the Palms were. Some of them still had stones in them. These are up on the Rocky bench above the Palms.

Since I only found 7 of these (see photos) It appears there are a number of them which I could not find. These deep bedrock mortars are identical to those in Tahquitz canyon at the Agua Caliente Cahuilla reservation in Palm Springs with respect to proximity to the Palms, depth, circumference and manner in which several may be found together at one place.

There are two last statements which are recorded in the book entitled: The History of the Las Vegas Mission which also should be included in this section.

This comes from a diary of one who visited the Moapa for the first time from Las Vegas in 1857. (before any settlement of the Moapa.) It was wintertime and apparently the Indians were quite sick. The author of the passage wrote: (page 262)

"The natives seemed to subsist on almost nothing. At that season they lived chiefly on a sweet substance which they apparently gathered toward the mountains, which they called "chump."They begged considerably, but the brethren had little or nothing to spare them. Many of the Indians stayed about the mountains subsisting on Chump, and others went across the Colorado river and lived on the kindness and friendship of the Iats who had plenty of squashes and other things..."

I have questioned the Moapas but none can remember what the Paiute word was that referred to Palm gruel. It seems reasonable that if the whole fruit were dried that the resulting mush would be sweet. The fact that the seed is impervious to rodents would make it an excellent storage food to save up for thin rationed winters. The reference to the "mountains" is interesting in that everywhere one looked was "toward the mountains" in all directions. So this is an unintelligible piece of information. It is known however, that few visited the area where the Moapas stayed in the early days, which would have been near Warm Springs. If you point to that area from the Muddy Crossing which is where this meeting took place, it would seem that the Moapas were pointing to an area of either very barren desert or else the "sheep" range of mountains to the West. It is possible they were actually pointing to the area with the Palms and that this "chump" substance may have been Palm food of some sort. Although this is speculation it is clear that whatever this substance was, the settlers had never seen it used by Indians before this time and it is not mentioned to my knowledge among other Southern Paiutes. Therefore, whatever it was is likely to have been a locally found substance and whatever it may have been made from was somewhat sweet. It is significant also that it is not referred to as cakes or flour or any form recognizable but rather as a "substance".

It is also a source of intrigue to me that a lead is given on page 179 of the same book, which I have been unsuccessful in following. Apparently, a Frenchman named Jules Remy a professor at the college of Rollin in Paris was exploring the country around Moapa collecting plant specimens. The date was Friday, Nov. 16^th 1855. It is possible that he came across palms and if so, there is a record somewhere. If there is a written record it just may actually turn out that Moapa will emerge as the real type locality for this plant. An amazing possibility. He was traveling from Salt Lake City in the company of an Englishman by the name of Brenchley. If someone knows how to follow this lead it could turn up some interesting information whether or not they ever encountered the palms.

The following reports from the Moapa Paiute people testifies to the uses and history the Moapa have apparently shared for centuries with palms in the area. These memories, more than anything else said in this report constitute the basis for this entire argument.

Please consider their words carefully.

Memories of Four Moapa Paiutes

Evelyn Samalar

I remember Palm fronds being used to make baskets. The baskets made in this way (from palms) were not the really fine sort which were made from other materials. I never learned to make baskets. I remember my grandmother making them.

I have also seen my grandparents making shelters out of palm fronds from the springs. My grandfather had a place that he took a sweat bath in. It wasn't right by the springs but near where he lived. But he would go to the headwater of the Muddy river at the springs because there was something sacred in the water. He would then talk to the water and bring it back to his sweat hut. He heated rocks then he put the water from the sacred place on the rocks. He hung blankets up just so ...because he couldn't have any light in there.

No one lived in the springs themselves... We drank water out of the ditch and there were many Palms there. Over at the springs was a very sacred place and as children we had to act a certain way whenever we went over there.

When I was young there were a lot more Indians and many older ones. When I was little I was a lookout because the grownups weren't supposed to gamble. So they made us kids play up on the hill to watch for horses or wagons or anything like that in case the whites came.

I also know where the deep stone holes are were grandma used to grind the Palm seeds. I don't know what they used it for now. I was very little. There were caves behind the grinding area with real white earth. As a child I went in and there were people buried in there. I remember seeing baby skeletons. But now the cave is not there because it fell in.

The stones they used to grind the screwbeans and the mesquite were called Maddah. Screwbeans were sweet especially in spring but when dry my mother would grind them into meal and mix water and make paste spread out onto a tea towel ½ inch thick then dry it. We also liked mesquite. There were little red lines on some Mesquite and it is better. We used to gather wild spinach, ragweed, wild rhubarb and wild onions. I don't ever see the rhubarb or onions anymore. I used to gather it but I don't ever see it now. Bottle Stopper, with sweet nectar...we had to pull it out and suck it.

My Elders used to say that the whole area of the springs at west of here was a designated sacred area and very sacred. We know that the Palms have always been there. We Moapas have always known this, that the Palms have always been there.

Question: Can you remember specifically how old you were when you first heard your parents, grandparents or elders mention anything about the palms?

Evelyn: Very Young. I was as young as a person has a memory of their surroundings.

Question: Can you say who and How old was the oldest person which spoke to you about the Palms?

Evelyn: My Grandfather. He was very Old. I don't know my grandfather's age but he was very old and there were other old elders too.

Question: Do you recall if there were a lot of palms at the headwaters when you were very young?

Evelyn: YES.

Question: Did they appear Large or small?

Evelyn: Large. There were large and small ones.

-Evelyn Samalar- Moapa Paiute.

Irene Benn

Kaye Herron: Do you recall your elders ever using Palms for anything such as food, weaving baskets or for shelter?

Irene Benn: Yes ...they used Palms for small huts. I remember my grandparents using Palm leaves for shelters and small huts. I don't remember baskets or food.

Kaye Herron: Have you ever heard your elders say anything about the Palms at Warm Springs?

Irene Benn: Yes. My grandfather said that the Palms have always been there.

-Irene Benn, Moapa Paiute.

Maureen Frank

I remember seeing shelter built with Palm fronds and I remember my grandparents using Palms to build small huts and structures. I also remember by grandmother grinding seed from the Palms but I was very young and I don't remember what they used it for.

My father used to say that the Palms were always here. My grandparents always used to say that too...that the Palms have always been here. There are deep grinding holes in the rocks near my house. (About four of them,...I'll show you) (spoken to Kaye Herron) ...where my grandmother used to grind the seeds of the Palms.

-Maureen Frank, Moapa Paiute.

Juanita Kinlichinie

I remember my grandmother use to take and soak the long things that hang down from the Palm trees. She would soak these in water until it was real white. Then she made baskets out of them. The baskets made this way didn't make the good baskets. The good baskets were made from the reeds which came from the river.

My grandparents said that the palms have always been here. I also saw my grandmother crush and grind the seeds from the palms but I don't remember what she made it into. She used to grind the seeds in some deep stone grinding holes by my house. There used to be a Paiute word for the gravy which was made but I don't remember what it was. We have always known that white men did not bring the palms to the area. Among ourselves we've always known that the palms were here before the white man came.

(Other words and a reiteration of the above testimonial were spoken by Juanita. Kinlichinie to Kaye Herron in another conversation previously mentioned in this report.)

-Juanita Kinlichinie, Moapa Paiute.

The above statements by the four Moapa women make it abundantly clear that not only were the Palms extant in the early twenties at warm springs but that their grandparents all spoke of the Palms as being something they always remember. In fact the recurring statement among the Moapas is that ..."the Palms are always here." This statement carries a very strong inference that the Moapa did not PLANT THE PALM and that this palm was here when their ancestors arrived some nine centuries previously.

In any case it is obvious that the Palms predated the White arrival which was most certainly within life spans of these Moapa Women's grandparents. If you will recall, the upper muddy was the last part of the area to be settled by whites. Even the earliest ranches there were not until around the turn of the century. The grandparents of each of these women were certainly around in the early 1880's and it is unreasonable to believe that these grandparents would have passed on a traditions saying that "the Palms have always been here" such as that repeated by all of these contemporary women if the palm had been introduced after the 1880's. It is even more ludicrous to suggest that they subsequently adapted the palm and it's uses into their culture after the turn of the century when all of these palms would only have existed on private white settler property and probably in small numbers.

Furthermore, who could possibly believe that these Moapa's grandparents would have deliberately misled them about the origins of the Palm? This area was sacred to the Moapas. This is not a tradition which would have sprung up in the last century. People intimately know their sacred places and along with their high regard for such places comes the intimate knowledge of what the environment around those places consists of. These grandparents of the contemporary Moapas are not the first Moapas to believe and hold the Warm Springs as Sacred. No! It was surely their grandparents and theirs before that and on and on into time immemorial.

If the Grandparents of these Moapa women are said by them to have told them that the Palms have always been there, then it is surely the ultimate act of cultural and intellectual robbery for any one who was not here in those days and whose culture's history does not depend on accurate reporting of this area to suggest any different at this late date.

Furthermore, there is strong reason to believe that the Moapas once had a similar tradition of recording their history in long songs just as the Cahuilla did at Palm Springs. In Hookey Beans and Willows by Orville Perkins we read about Peg Leg Joe, Historian.

"It was...in the early nineteen-twenties that the last of the Moa-Pah Paiute historians would let the Moa-Pah history die forever. Historians generally followed family lines. Father's taught sons. Among the Moa-Pah Paiutes only one man remained trained in the Indian lore. He had lost a leg in an accident and, as a result had never married. For years he tried in vain to adopt a boy so he could teach him the secrets of the past. In every case the boy would be taken from him by the government and sent to a far away school.

At last Peg Leg Joe gave up in despair. This, the last of the historians, realized more than any person in the world that he had something very valuable. At last, he turned to whites for help; This man, who had never learned to read or write and had traveled scarcely a hundred miles in all his life, needed help....he reasoned that if a white man could only write a small part of what he had...

There was a little interest shown but not enough to capture a single incident on paper of the vast storehouse of information that was in this man's head. Shortly after, he passed away. We do have little stories passed on to us by the Indians, but the big bonanza is gone forever. The real story can never be told.

...Peg Leg Joe had revealed that it would take three days and nights of continuos recounting to relate the full history of his people. What a prize this would have been! Dead Sea Scrolls would be minor comparing the vast amount of material in three days and nights of reading. Now we can only lament what might have been...."

The period of three days and nights as mentioned in this overwhelmingly sad and tragic story by Orville Perkins relates perfectly to the singing history traditions of the Cahuilla which often last for several straight days and nights.

In "the Cahuilla Indians of the Colorado Desert -Ehtnohistory and Prehistory" (by-Wilke et al published by Ballena Press Anthropological Papers No. 3 edited by Lowell John Bean,) several comments regarding the remarkable accuracy of the Cahuilla oral history as well as the unfortunate traditionally sanctioned deaf ear of many in the early scientific community are duly noted. Among these comments we read: [1975:15-16]

"...It can be thus seen that even though <events transpired> ...perhaps four centuries prior to the first recording of the traditions which describe <them> (cf. Hubbs, Bien, and Suess 1965:89-91), <the events are> recalled with remarkable accuracy...<by Cahuilla oral traditions.>"

"Recent studies of oral traditions, ...enable us to better understand the mechanisms which operate to make it useful and reliable as unwritten historical documentation. These are discussed in detail by Vansina (1965), who show that if the proper mechanisms are operative, oral tradition is one of the best sources available for extending history into prehistory. Among these mechanisms is that of a testimony being in a fixed, poetic form, and thus capable of being transmitted from generation to generation on a word for word basis, even if over time certain words become archaic."...

...Free's allusion to the "notorious untrustworthiness of Indian legends" reflects the attitude of many of his contemporaries, and attitude which was not conducive to the objective collection and analysis of Oral traditions of native Americans. Perhaps the most out-spoken critic <of using oral Native American traditions> was Robert Lowie who stated:

...those who attach an historical value to oral traditions are in the position of the ...inventors of perpetual motion machines, who are still besieging the portals of learned institutions [1917:161]

On page 17 of the above reference we can also see that the "times" related in which the ceremonial institutions were dying among the Cahuilla, like traditions were dying among the Moapa according to Orville Perkins (the early 1920's):

"<by 1925> ...The ceremonial institutions of the Cahuilla were themselves in the throes of death. [Strong 1929:3; Barrows 1900:82]"

The Moapa women who have spoken here say that their grandparents said these things. We must remember that these grandparents are people who lived in the time of Peg Leg Joe and that they were all privy to the ancient songs of the Moapa although they themselves may not have known the songs by heart. What is important is that we know they must have been very familiar with the history traditions of their people. We can be assured that the things they said orally to their granddaughters who have spoken here were very accurate historically.

In light of this there can be no other conclusion except that the Palms in the entire area are not only NATIVE PLANTS but furthermore, they are very ancient.

We know they must be ancient because the Moapa tradition say they "are always here." and the Moapas have been in the area for at least a thousand years and possibly their ancestors were in the area long before that. Man has lived in the Moapa area since 3000 B.C., in fact.

We know from the study of ancient sites in Moapa that the Moapa had a very close association anciently with the peoples of the Lower Colorado. I can attest to the fact that even today one can walk among the ancient ruins of the lost city which are very close to the small palm groves at the south end of the 'Mormon' mesa (as it is called today) and literally view innumerable sherds of Paiute brown-ware with the tell tale finger nail marks, lying exposed in the same strata with white on black ware and Pyramid grey ware all mixed together in quantities sufficient to be quite amazing. Although it is possible these areas are now all disturbed, reports from the turn of the century found the same conditions early on.

We also have very conclusive evidence from Cahuilla oral tradition that the Cahuilla knew of different species of Palms being used by other members of Uto-Aztecan stock although the Cahuilla themselves never used any but the Washingtonia filifera. This is highly indicative that the several tribes were well aware of what each other used as food and supplies. Francisco Patencio a highly regarded elder of the Cahuilla once told of an oral tradition of the Palms and stated:

"...Now the people were settled all about the country in many places, but they all came to Indian Well to eat the fruit of the palm tree. ...The palm trees in every place came from the first palm tree, but, like the people who change in customs and language, the palms often were somewhat different..." (Gathering the Desert- Gary Nabhan -Univ of Az press 1985 page 25)

The above statement makes it abundantly clear that the Cahuilla were anciently aware that other linguistic "kin" were not only using Palms but that some of them were very far away and that some of the palms were somehow "different" than those the Cahuilla generally used.

The tip off that the other users of Palms were known to be linguistic cousins to the Cahuilla is of course the reference that shows they were aware that the customs and language had "changed". This would not appear to be implying that it was a different language but rather one which had originally been known as something else and had since changed or evolved into something different. The implication here that they may have known that the Moapas as well as the Pima and Tohono O'otam were using Palms is quite unmistakable.

The original Cahuilla became a Palm to "benefit" the people. This Cahuilla tradition shows the importance they assigned this plant. The hot springs of the Cahuilla at Palm Springs were sacred to the Agua Caliente and the Warm Springs in Moapa were at one time very sacred to the Moapa. This observation should be taken seriously. There is a chance that the ancient Moapa carried the first seed to the area. According again to Francisco Patencio, It is said that they came from "all about the country in many places to eat the fruit of the palm tree....and that ...they "carried the seed to their homes and palm trees grew from this seed in many places."

Although it is possible that the Moapas anciently brought the seeds to Moapa it would seem that the only memory which persisted was that the Palms "are always Here." which is a stronger implication that the palms were extant on the arrival of the Moapa. This is a better indication that these groves may in fact be relicts which were only occasionally helped or perpetuated by ancient peoples.

The presence of pollen similar to Washingtonia found in late Cretaceous sediments far north of Palm Springs California suggests that Washingtonia filifera or it's predecessors were probably covering these areas as much as 70 million years ago. This is consistent with the idea that the relatively small and scattered oases which comprise the plants range today are more likely to be relict stands which were discovered and cultivated to some degree by aborigines over the last 10,000 years.

Another point is noteworthy when discussing the possibility that the Moapa palms are either anciently or recently adventive.

In the last several years some have hypothesized that the absence of a the palm borer beetle (Dinapate Wrightii) in some groves, is an indication that the groves are either recent or that they are adventive and not relict. The logic here being that the Borer must have evolved with the palms and that therefore any grove which is relict should exhibit evidence of infestations.

This very point has been used to suggest that some cursory examinations revealed that Moapa Valley groves have appeared to lack infestations and that this may suggest that the trees are adventive. (The Occurrence of Desert Fan Palms, Washingtonia filifera in Southern Nevada - James Cornett.)

However the hypothesis has inherent and clear contradictions which in fact more strongly appear to argue that the presence of Dinapate Wrightii in Desert Fan Palm groves is more likely indicative of certain ancient Human presence and Human commerce and not an indicator of whether or not a grove is ancient.

For instance even though the Beetle was first discovered in Washingtonia filifera palms, this is not to say that the beetle evolved with or is exclusive to this tree. Cornett himself has found infestations of Dinapate in Brahea Armata in three specimens in Baja.⁽⁴⁾ The beetle has since been found on Phoenix dactylifera (an introduced palm from the middle east in the early 1900's) indicating the speed at which it adapts to entirely new genera.

Knowing the speed and grace with which this insect adapts to new territory, the subsequent discovery of Dinapate hughleechi farther to the south among other "Palm using indigenous peoples territory" in trunks of Sabal texana suggests the possibility that the Dinapate wrightii descended from infestations migrating northward from other more dense population centers for palms in the south and possibly even from Central America.

Recent intensive studies of finches over the last thirty years in Galapagos Islands show conclusively that birds (and probably other animals and insects) evolve and specialize very rapidly when changes in diet force some characteristics to die out and others to proliferate. These changes involve beak structure, color, food choices and other important characteristics. The most surprising thing about these studies is how profoundly and quickly these changes in species take place. Often they are within two to three years. In this time entire species have become extinct and new ones as yet unknown have taken their place.

We know that plants appear to take longer in their specialization and changes. Washingtonia with it's millions and millions of landscaping plantings worldwide over the last 140 years has yet to make any apparent diversions from it's original species variants, filifera and robusta. This also appears to be evidenced by lack of hybridization between these two accepted varieties, Contrast this to genera such as Brahea which appear to hybridize freely indicating that species changes within that genus may tend to be much more rapid and possible, while Phoenix dactylifera variants may be as numerous as the seeds which are planted from it.

Dinapate on the other hand has adapted to Phoenix palms as food only in the last 90 years, firmly establishing the fact that it can and does adapt to new food sources very quickly.

Three further statements demonstrate the tentative nature of this hypothesis regarding Dinapate.

The first statement comes to us through James Cornett again. On page 32 of the preceding referenced work he says: (quote) "...However, a carved human figure made from a palm log was seven years old when an adult Dinapate emerged from its dime-sized exit hole- thus we know that under certain conditions the larvae may persist for seven years within hewn logs."

Also Cornett notes that the only Groves of Palms which have not shown to have Dinapate infestations are those far from the center of the Palms (currently recognized ) distribution.

At least one of these groves is the KOFA grove which, (even by Cornett), is considered to be possibly one of the only "relict" ⁽⁵⁾ populations of Washingtonia filifera. It is also one of the few which show no great evidence of human disturbance or use while simultaneously being devoid of a source of water and only accessible with some difficulty.

The fact that the preceding testimony of Francisco Patencio shows evidence of contact with other groups of "Palm using Aborigines" especially those who used "palms...somewhat different" (Sabal Uresana and texana?)⁽⁶⁾ added to the fact that "Sabal grows in extensive stands...well within reach where thousands of people have lived for centuries."....and... "Sections of the trunks (of Sabal) served as uprights and crossbeams in houses while whole lengths are stacked up to make corrals."...plus the fact that... "The Sonoran palmetto (Sabal) has been <used>...for centuries." ⁽⁷⁾ All argue almost conclusively for the idea that Dinapate Wrightii cannot be used to judge the age or the antiquity of a grove.

The fact that KOFA palms is devoid of infestations and is at once considered possibly the only relict population of Washingtonia filifera by the same people who ascribe to this hypothesis is very interesting. It would seem that the fact that KOFA is not infested would indicate an entirely antithetical posture should be taken.

If Dinapate were somehow an indicator of the adventive or relict status of a grove this is the first Grove one should look to for substantiating such a hypothesis! Failing that test, the Dinapate cannot be used as an indicator since all the other groves among the Cahuilla are too historically disturbed and are centers for too much interaction with other peoples to the south who used other palm species also infested with Dinapate.

The likelihood that Dinapate was brought to this Washingtonia filifera by human commerce and interaction where it eventually evolved slightly differently than it's Hughleechi cousin to the south is simply enormous from a cursory perspective. This possibility is very distinct since the Indians who used Sabal (which show infestation with Hughleechi) commonly used the trunks of Palms which have been shown positively to harbor live larvae for many years and also since the Cahuilla so clearly had some type of dealings with these people over long periods of time. This possibility is even stronger since the distances between groves of Sabal and Washingtonia are so great. It appears that Dinapate's use as an "origin or relict " indicator becomes far too suspect to be of any reliable use for objective research.

Another interesting footnote is that the foregoing discussion actually suggests that Dinapate is a recent invasive species within the ancient range of Washingtonia. This notion becomes more plausible since it's presence appears most prominent in groves where human interaction with southern Sabal using cultures may have played an important role. On the contrary far outlying groves and those with little evidence of long time human cultural importance (such as KOFA) appear to exhibit no sign of Dinapate suggesting strongly that the advent of Dinapate in Washingtonia palms came well after the groves were decimated to the ranks of relatively small populations scattered far and wide in pockets of favorable conditions. The implication that Cahuilla interactions among themselves may have spread the beetle to all remaining groves within Cahuilla territory is quite ample.

There are many other clues which show that Washingtonia filifera is indeed a relict throughout it's range. This can be found in the report entitled: "The Desert Fan Palm: Evidence supports Relict Status- by- William A Spencer.

With that, I would like to go on to other comments and considerations regarding the palms around Moapa.

The preceding discussion which shows connections between ancient cultures is made even more interesting by some Petroglyphs found in the Valley of Fire and in Arrow Canyon just to the west of the Main oases at Warm Springs in Moapa.

End of Part Three - click below to continue:

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1. Although throughout this report I have used the date of 1893 as the date of Cooper's arrival to the Overton Valley one notation claimed the date was 1896. I am using 1893 to give the widest benefit of the doubt to Cooper's story. (back to text)

2. Editor's note: Capalapa ranch may have been where Cooper obtained his palms. The Ganns apparently loved palms and planted several at the old ranch which are still standing. Although they are not next to the water like the Cooper Palms are, they are several meters taller at 16 to 17 meters. There are 10 which are pretty much the same height. This is a reasonable idea since the Ganns preceded Cooper to the area by almost 20 years. It is also clear that Bill Gann loved the Palms and saw them early on in his time in the valley. It seems likely that he may have been influenced by the plantings at his father's place. The fact that all the Capalapa palms are fairly equal to one another in height just as Cooper's Palms are equal to each other in height ...While the Capalapa trees overall, are several meters taller is an interesting observation. Added together the evidence is overwhelmingly adding up that palms preceded whites to the valley. (back)

3. The statement that a "gravy" was made from the palm fruit is significant. I expected the Moapa Paiutes might say they made a "flour" from the seeds. "Gravy" however relates very well to findings among the Cahuilla of Palm Springs which shows they made a sort of "mush"from the palm fruit. The fact that Ms. Kinlichinie calls it a "gravy" and not "flour" therefore is significant since I don't expect she would have had prior knowledge about the specific nature of the end product used by the Cahuilla. However as of this writing I've not yet had a chance to ask her about this. (back)

4. J. W. Cornett -"Desert Palm Oasis" 1989 Palm Springs desert Museum p.33 (back)

5. [ibid] page 21 (back)

6. Nabhan, Gary -"Gathering the Desert" Univ. of Az 1985 - page 25 (back)

7. [ibid] pages 23 and 24 (back)

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