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Creede: Part III

Richard Barnes

Before the men of El Pao brought their wives and children, the pioneers had to build the camps. 

So the Bethlehem Steel set out to build a camp on the banks of the Orinoco River to receive supplies and materials needed to clear and grade a roughly 40-kilometer road through the thick jungle and also build the administrative and labor camps housing the workforce that was to come later, not to mention the mine itself. 

These efforts required intelligence, strength, determination, and capital to pay for mine development and required facilities such as hoisting and power plants, mine machinery, and so on.

Visiting the Creede mining camp area, I was immediately reminded of the iron mines in Venezuela. The geography and topography, not to mention the latitudes, are nowhere near the same; however, the spirit and type of men and women drawn to such endeavors were certainly so.

The last time I visited El Pao in 2005, it was awfully quiet compared to my childhood and youth there. Nevertheless, it was nowhere near being a ghost town. A number of families still lived in the labor camp while a much smaller number occupied some of the houses in the administrative camp where I used to live.

The temperate climate and green jungle were still ubiquitous as always and the folks remained friendly.

But the dynamiting and the ore crushing and the shouts of miners and the freight movements — truck or train — were gone.

Visiting the Creede mining area provoked similar observations. The spectacular ruggedness which greeted the prospectors and, later, the miners, is still there beckoning hardy souls who dare to trespass; the sites of the numerous mines can be seen and, in some cases, visited; the areas where camps once thrived are there. But all is quiet, even though Creede itself has never become a ghost town to this day.

Many were the men and women who left their mark in this area. Many whose names are known to us and who-knows-how-many whose names remain unknown but to God.

This post seeks to note only a few, which, hopefully, give a glimpse of the many more whom space does not permit to mention.

It is believed that the first settler in the area around Creede and Bachelor was Tom Boggs, brother-in-law to Kit Carson; however, his interest was in fur trading, not mining. Of interest is the fact that Boggs, who was not only Carson’s brother-in-law but a good friend, was present at Carson’s death, when he uttered his last words, “Adiós, compadres [Goodbye, friends].”

Carson’s wife, Josefa, died a month before Carson in 1868, and Boggs became guardian to his children and also executor of his will. 

In learning about the Creede mining area, my attention was immediately drawn to John MacKenzie, a Canadian known as the “father of Bachelor”. He learned the prospecting and mining trade in the gold fields of Nova Scotia in the 1860s. He also successfully prospected for gold on the Essequibo in then British Guiana and also on the Caroní in Venezuela, areas now dominated by Tren de Aragua and other bands of robbers. 

MacKenzie’s health suffered in the damp, hot jungles of Venezuela and British Guiana and he returned to North America after several years. He successfully identified a number of mines in Creede including several in Bachelor, which he believed was perfectly situated for a picturesque town. His health finally gave out and he passed away in 1894. The Creede Candle reported his death:

“[He was] well known to nearly all the people of Creede camp and the mining men of the west…. He left no will …. Was unmarried and the only known relative is a brother in Halifax…. The death of Mr. MacKenzie removes one from the ranks of the old pioneers who was respected by all and held in the highest esteem as a man, a citizen, and a friend.”

Fred Ryden’s early childhood and youth were lived in Bachelor and, after Bachelor’s demise, in Creede where he still lived in 1952 when a Rocky Mountain News reporter found him and spent a day conversing and hearing his accounts of a life long since gone:

“It was the riches of the hills — the Last Chance, Bachelor, Amethyst, Commodore [mines] — that had brought the thousands there to build the stores, drink in the saloons, pray in the churches, learn in the school…. Fred Ryden went to grammar school in Bachelor, from 1893 to 1904 when his family moved down to Creede. And it was a sentimental picture to watch Fred try to find the exact spot where the old school had been. For there was nothing there now at all.”

Until relatively recently, Creede was home to families who first arrived a century before. One of these was John R. Jackson, whose grandfather, William T. Jackson, Sr., came to Creede in the 1890s during the silver boom. He and his house first made a home in a small cabin in Bachelor where he worked in the Last Chance and Amethyst Mines. Later, the family moved to Creede from where he worked the Commodore Mine. He died in his early 50s from silicosis, a common disease among miners of that era.

Jackson, Sr.’s son, “Billy” Jackson was born and spent his early childhood in Bachelor before the family moved to Creede, two and a half miles away. He too worked the mines, with a hiatus for service in WWI. He also contracted silicosis and had to resign his mining activities in the late 50s but remained in Creede, working as undersheriff and eventually as the city clerk. 

His son, John, followed his grandfather’s and father’s footsteps, working the mines, serving in WWII, and returning to the mines afterwards, eventually becoming a successful investor in the business. In the 70s he worked for the Freeport Exploration Company in Nevada as a prospector for precious metals. He retired and returned to Colorado where he wrote of the people he knew in the Creede mining camps and also wrote poetry. 

This multi-generational aspect is quite common in the mining industry. 

In my first post of this series I told about the violence in Creede and Bachelor, while mentioning that the camps were also home to decent, hard working families. One of the incidents could have been violent but was handled creatively and successfully. The account is taken from Boom Town Boy, by Edwin Lewis Bennett, as cited in Bachelor, Colorado by Charles A. Harbett:

“I saw two fights in Bachelor that spring and each was odd in its own way. 

“The first was not between men but between two women, one of them Irish and the other Cornish. They had been quarreling at each other for some time and, coming downtown that day, had run into each other and started jawing.

“Their husbands, fed up with the long feud, agreed that was the time to get it settled so they made the wives fight it out, Marquis de Queensbury, without any scratching or hair-pulling, but man style. Foster’s saloon was at the upper end of town, and the fight took place right out in front, so we had a ring-side seat. Occasionally one of the women would revert back to type and bare a claw or get a handful of hair but her husband would make her back up and start clean again, so it was a nice, respectable battle. 

“There were no rounds. The women were both fairly well padded and short-winded, and the time came when they were panting and taking wild, aimless swings at each other. As one had the makings of a good black eye and the other had a bloody nose, their husbands thought they ought to have it all out of their systems and stopped the fight. The battlers sat down on the bench in front of the saloon to rest and get their breath, and, one of them happening to mention that she had some beer on ice up at the house that might do them both good, they went there, leaving their husbands to get the groceries they originally started after. 

“After that fight each of them had one more friend than she had before and the husbands didn’t have to listen to any more name-calling.”

Children in such camps did not have difficulty finding excitement and adventure. In one example, Fred Foster recalls, he at 15 years old, and a buddy at 16 years old decided to go over the Continental Divide in the dead of winter to Spring Creek where his family had a ranch. They went by skis and it took them two days, and a mountain lion followed them part of the way. Imagine a 15-year-old and a 16-year-old setting out today to cross the Continental Divide in the dead of winter!

Similar to El Pao, both Bachelor and Creede had a Roman Catholic church and also a Protestant church, with a well attended Sunday school. 

Charles Nelson, one of the founders of Creede camp, a friend of Nicholas C. Creede and also of John C. MacKenzie, was known as an honorable and pious man. In the winter of 1890-1891, he built a cabin in Creede. “The first church services in the new camp were held in his cabin by the Reverend Sanderson of Denver in the summer of 1891. Nelson, upon hearing that there was a preacher in camp who could not find a place to preach, insisted that he use his cabin whenever he wished [cited from A Silver Camp Called Creede by Richard C. Huston].” 

After making his fortune in Creede camp mines, Nelson returned to his native Denmark where he died in 1919 after undergoing a major surgery:

“He made few enemies and many friends, to whom he was always loyal, standing by them to the finish. His death marks the passing of another one of those boom-day characters who did so much to make the state of Colorado famous. There are many old timers here yet, in the camp he helped to discover, who remember the things he did, and who will regret to learn of his death [The Creede Candle, February 21, 1920].”

The Protestant church in Bachelor at an altitude of 10,531 feet was known as the “highest church in the country”. 

To be continued.

John MacKenzie, 1838-1904

Ore house and chutes for the Commodore Mine, one of the most productive in the Creede – Bachelor mining camps. The Last Chance and Amethyst were even more productive.

Next to the Commodore Mines ore house.

Five sons further up the Bachelor Loop

Son, Jonathan. Note the ruggedly beautiful yet isolated landscape

Moose, near the Bachelor camp site

View from near Bachelor camp site

Creede: Part II

Richard Barnes

The prior post intended to give an overview of the area around Creede, Colorado, and its colorful (no pun intended) history. Many have found the area fascinating, not least those with an affinity for the outdoors and for spectacular mountain scenery.

The post concluded with an allusion to the majority of the people who constituted the original miners, trappers, and settlers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, most of whom remain unknown to us. Like Nicholas Creede, these folks were “modest, reserved, courageous, and decent.” 

These are the folks George Eliot spoke of in her masterpiece, Middlemarch: “The growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and with me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.”

Our most recent visit to Creede was rather rushed as we had limited time; therefore, as we drove the 17-mile Bachelor Loop, and came to the Creede cemetery, as much as I wanted to stop for a while, we simply could not do so and also arrive at that day’s destination before night. 

However, we have walked the cemetery in prior visits and photos thereof are easily found online. 

I don’t know if this is true, but we were told that people were buried heads to the west and feet to the east so as to face the east on the brightness of Resurrection Day; however, the outlaws that died or were killed in Creede were buried north-south to lie “crosswise” in death as they had lived in life. On my next visit to Creede I’ll look into that to see what truth, if any, there might be in what I was told. 

The names of the people buried there are for the most part unknown to most and they outnumber, by far, the more notorious outlaws that lived in the area in the years of boom. The cemetery also attests to the tough life the pioneers faced in the late 19th Century. It seemed to me that babies and children were overrepresented; however, I cannot state that as a scientific certainty. But we did see a good number of tombs holding children and babies.

Some years back I picked up a book of letters from a homestead in southwest Colorado. These were written in 1902 by, Edith Shaw, the wife and mother of that home and are a good representation of the people who ventured far from their birthplaces to make a living and to prosper as best they could.

In this case, the husband and wife moved from Massachussets and eventually acquired a 160-acre homestead.

The following excerpts from the letters give us an idea of the life of many in that area and era:

“The cattle we bought arrived from New Mexico in a poor condition — weak from lack of food and stunted in size for the same reason…. The very next day [after branding and dividing up from other’s herds] after ours were separated from theirs, one of them got mired, and before we found him he was so exhausted that he died before morning. Hadn’t strength enough to pull himself out.

“Two days after that, they were turned out to another field and when the boys went to bring them in, nine were missing. They finally found them at the foot of a cliff, three with legs broken, one with ribs all broken, one with neck broken, two had their back bones broken, and the rest in such a state that they could not walk at all. Ernest [her husband] killed two of ours immediately for they couldn’t possibly get well and Mr. Stark [owner of another herd] also killed two of his.

“It is a great mystery what should have sent them off that cliff for nothing has ever happened like this in this country. Some say it was a mountain lion, some think it may have been a jealous cattle owner who does not want us to come into this country — we shall probably never know the cause….”

More extracts from her letters that year:

“We came to a pitch … the wagon rolled and the near horse fell, thus wedging her between the wagon and the tree. Whatever saved her neck or her legs from being broken is a mystery …. Well, we went back about a mile to a house and borrowed a wagon, put our stuff in it, and started once more….

“Meanwhile, the cattle had wandered on, joined more cattle, and we had a lot of cutting out to do. We struck a swampy place. The horses had balked several times during the day and of course did it right in the middle of the mud. The wheels sank immediately to the hubs and the bronco was also mired. Nothing to do but unload right there and not one inch would those horses pull to get the wagon out. We tried leading, whipping, and yelling — ’till we were hoarse and not an inch would they move.”

…..

“Please all of you write us. I haven’t been homesick at all, nevertheless I am hungry for home news.”

…..

“I have enclosed a very slight object in remembrance of your birthday. You will know that my heart prompts much more than my hands or pocket book can carry out. But a great deal of love goes with it from both of us.”

The following is an extract from the unpublished memoir of the letter-writer’s brother-in-law:

“She was an eastern city girl who knew nothing about wilderness camping such as this. But she seemed to take it all in stride, as I could see when it was my turn to drive the wagon. But we had many mishaps during that lengthy two-day drive to our homesteads, which must have taxed all her physical and spiritual resources to their utmost, and she met them with as much courage as any of those wives of the early pioneers of our West. 

“She had my real admiration for her inner fortitude, though she never did know it.”

I deeply admire such folks. Throughout the letters their desire to succeed and to do well was matched by their desire to be of assistance to and to serve their neighbors. The extraordinary work and efforts of such folks were truly community affairs. 

The lone wolves were few.

There is a lesser known quote in Middlemarch, which comes to mind as we think about these sturdy folks: “…what do we live for if it is not to make life less difficult to each other?” Paul, speaking in the synagogue in Antioch said similarly concerning David, “… after he had served his own generation by the will of God ….”

To be continued

Creede cemetery

18 years, 5 months, 24 days — allusion to the psalm: “Teach us to number our days….”

The Creede cemetery has folks of all ages; however, the seemingly overrepresented number of children and/or infants has always impressed me

Ernest and Edith Shaw and their two sons, circa 1908. Edith became a crack shot. She died of cancer in 1920 in Montana, age 45. Ernest worked for the US Forest Service and returned to Massachussets where he inaugurated a second career in the cranberry business. He remarried in 1923 and died in 1957. I estimate his age to have been in the early 80s.

Creede: Part 1

Richard Barnes

Never underestimate the childhood experiences you offer your young ones.

Having been born in a mining (iron ore) camp, and having a father who’d take me “to the mine” and a mother who’d participate on “giras” [tours] of historical or natural wonders relatively nearby, I was not only born in what surrounded me, I was purposefully immersed in it. 

I don’t think my parents did this “intentionally” — I’ll have to ask them on Resurrection Day — but I do know they believed in the importance of gratitude. Therefore, they wanted their children to appreciate their birthplace and their heritage — in my case that would be both Venezuela and Spain as well as Massachussets and England. So as we grew up, we learned to respect, if not love, “where we came from”. 

We also learned, albeit intuitively at first, the tremendous capital — human and material — necessary to carve out a mine and camp and to provide sustainable living in the Venezuelan jungle.

So, although we never had much of an interest in engineering or prospecting or related fields, we certainly respected the immense effort and costs and sacrifices entailed in any mining operation.

Early in my career, I was in an economics conference in California where a gentleman spoke of miles of pipeline being laid from Alaska down to the 48 states. 

I do not recall exactly what his involvement in that multi-billion-dollar project was, but I do recall that he told of how he insisted his daughter accompany him on one of his trips to the project. She was in college and into all the trendy activism of the time. 

He wanted her to see the colossal efforts and investments required to enable her to turn on her blow dryer and to successfully turn on her car ignition. And the men working the required 10 to 12-hour days to make her creature comforts happen.

As I listened to him, I felt gratitude in my heart for my parents, who did similarly to that man, only my folks did not wait till I was in college to do so.

Another aspect of mining towns was the colorful nature of some of the men who worked there. This was an aspect that a child did not automatically pick up. Rather, it was something that grew inchoately over the years, in many cases long after the child had moved away from the camp and reflected on certain characters and, if lucky, was able to ask others, still living, about them. 

How many novels yet remain to be written and movies to be filmed!

So mines, any kind of mines, have always drawn my attention. I even once seriously considered accepting a position in mining operations in Senegal! Colleagues and friends advised me to wait on something like that. So decades later I was much better prepared to accept a position in Saudi Arabia.

In 1991 or thereabouts, during a family trip to Southwest Colorado, we were intrigued by a dot on the map, on the Continental Divide, that was labeled as having been a booming silver mining town in the late 19th Century. 

We decided to visit and we’ve been heading back there whenever we have an opportunity to do so, most recently after my son’s wedding last month.

To summarize, Creede is named after a man who was born around Fort Wayne, Indiana circa 1843. In infancy his family moved to Iowa territory and began farming. In his late teens he volunteered with the army and worked as a scout in cavalry campaigns against the Sioux. It was during this time that he traveled through Nebraska, Wyoming, Colorado, and other western areas. He also witnessed the discovery of gold in the Black Hills and that piqued what became his lifelong interest in prospecting.

The man’s birth name was William Harvey. After his service in the army his intention was to return to Iowa to woo a gal he knew “back home”. But he had been gone nearly a decade and upon returning he found that the girl had married his brother and was mother to a young child.

This discovery greatly rattled William Harvey, provoked him to change his name to Nicholas C. Creede, and spurred him in his resolve to become a successful prospector, which is (most of) the rest of the story.

His first strike was near Monarch Pass, on the Continental Divide in Central Colorado. He sold his strike and promptly struck another, which he also sold for a larger sum which he used to tour the areas he considered most promising and, as he went, to study and learn about prospecting and minerals. He clearly had the desire, energy, and intelligence to become a successful entrepreneur.

After several other strikes, Creede discovered what became known as the Holy Moses strike and this drew the attention of David H. Moffat, a well known financier and industrialist, one of the pioneers of Denver, Colorado. He and his partners not only leased the Holy Moses from Creede, but also partnered with him in his further prospecting. This arrangement became very lucrative for all parties and we can only imagine how encouraging this was for Nicholas C. Creede.

And this led to his greatest find: the Amethyst vein, from which several mines were developed, including the Bachelor, which we will see in later posts. The years of study, hard work, and wise dealings and associations finally rewarded Creede, as he was now a millionaire and even lived to see a town named in his honor: Creede, Colorado, sitting on the Amethyst vein. He was described as reserved, modest, and courageous.

The town of Creede was the last silver boom town in Colorado, growing from 600 inhabitants to over 10,000 by end of 1891. The boom was over by 1893; however, Creede was never a ghost town and continued to operate well into the 1960s, relying on other minerals in addition to silver.

While mining in the area was very successful, the town attracted men and women whose primary interest was to relieve the miners of their money while in turn making “easy money”. This unfortunate state of affairs — common throughout history — was, ironically, exacerbated by “reform” activities in Denver which pushed underworld characters and their businesses out of the capital onto Creede where their trades were welcome. 

So Creede (and Bachelor) were known as “having no night” and yet also had churches and, in Bachelor, even an opera house. 

If you visit the Creede Mining Museum, you will learn about Jefferson “Soapy” Smith, known as the king of the Creede underworld, whose brother-in-law happened to be the deputy sheriff. You’ll also be reminded of the notorious Robert “Bob” Ford, the murderer of outlaw Jesse James. Ford moved to Creede where he himself was murdered by Ed O’Kelley whose motive for doing so was never ascertained with certainty. O’Kelley served less than a decade in prison and, after release, moved to Oklahoma where he was killed in a shootout with a policeman.

Another resident of Creede was the famous buffalo hunter, scout, and lawman, Bartholemew William Barclay Masterson, better known as Bat Masterson. In Creede, however, Masterson ran a gambling operation while also betting on prizefighting. He eventually succeeded in journalism in New York City where he died in 1921, a few months after attending his last prize fight, where Jack Dempsey defended his heavyweight title. 

By the way, Jack Dempsey lived in Bachelor as a child. He likely learned how to fight there.

Creede’s population today is just under 300.

As for Nicholas C. Creede, he, sadly, did not marry well. He eventually moved to Los Angeles and died of an accidental morphine overdose in 1897. He suffered from chronic and severe stomach pain and took morphine frequently. The coroner ruled his death accidental, which most at the time considered a reasonable conclusion.

Creede and Bachelor are types of mining towns all over this earth as well as microcosms of society everywhere. Good, pious folks, living among genuinely bad or shady people. 

The names above are well known to us because of so many works of fiction and non-fiction, not to mention movies and television shows. Nevertheless, we must also remember that such were not the majority of these towns. They also had folks, like Mr. Creede, who were modest, reserved, courageous, and decent. 

To be continued.

Downtown Creede, Colorado

Creede, Colorado in 1892

Bachelor, Colorado, late 19th Century

Bachelor, Colorado, today

Nicholas C. Creede, c. 1843-1897

Bat Masterson, 1879-1921

Jack Dempsey, 1895-1983

A War You Likely Never Heard Of

Richard Barnes

Unless you lived near the Orinoco River Delta in late 1969 and early 1970.

I am referring to Murphy’s War, one of the most difficult films Peter O’Toole ever made. And that’s saying something, given his exertions in Lawrence of Arabia and Lord Jim.

Michael Deeley (The Deer Hunter) and Peter Yates (Bullitt), producer and director, respectively, had spent months across the vast, virgin Orinoco River Delta searching and agreeing on location sites. One of the sites selected was Santo Tomé de Guayana, known in my childhood as the Castillos de Guayana. 

Incidentally, this is the area of the incident which led to Sir Walter Raleigh’s execution upon his return to England in the 17th Century.

As a teenager I’d heard rumors about the filming of a movie starring Peter O’Toole, even [eagerly] eavesdropping on a camp worker who spoke with a pilot who flew “someone” looking for filming locations. But no one seemed to know much more than such snippets. 

Then I was gone to school while the actual filming took place and by the time I returned for the summer of 1970, filming had wrapped up and conversations turned to the recently inaugurated Pan American 747 jets, the exploits of Pete Maravich, the Chicago 7 trial, The Beatles‘ release of Let It Be and their break-up, Apollo 13, Vietnam War protests, and, about Midnight Cowboy winning the best picture Oscar.

I did read about the critics dismissing, if not outright despising Murphy’s War; so I suppose I figured it simply had turned out to be a badly made film and forgot about it. 

Or I thought I had forgotten about it.

That film, which I never made a point of seeing, and which slipped from institutional memory almost overnight, kept creeping back into my consciousness every time I visited Venezuela, especially when in Puerto Ordaz and San Félix. 

A few months back, my wife and youngest children indulged me and, over several weeks, we watched Lawrence of Arabia, Lord Jim, The Night of the Generals, and My Favorite Year. Then I decided to risk whatever goodwill I had left with my loved ones by suggesting we watch Murphy’s War. 

From the opening credits I knew I was going to enjoy this film. And I did. Not only that, but my family liked it as well.

Yes: it is an adventure film. But it has three, perhaps four, major characters which you see developing over the course of the film until its shattering climax. These three men, and one woman, who was a Quaker missionary doctor, will stay with the attentive viewer long after “The End” appears on the screen. 

The primary location site was the aforementioned Los Castillos de Guayana, which I had visited at least twice in my childhood.

However, there was one additional character, the fifth character, which almost overwhelms and dominates, yet, counterintuitively, doesn’t get in the way, but without which, the movie would have lost much of its long-lasting impact. That character is The Orinoco River Delta over which O’Toole’s character flies in search of his wartime enemy submarine — the Orinoco River handled a submarine lent by the Venezuelan navy for the picture. Those shots of the river and its meandering tributaries within the vast, interminable Venezuelan vibrant green jungle are unforgettable. They make the movie at least as much as its renowned actors do.

As O’Toole and Pillippe Noiret build and patch back the damaged seaplane the viewer is pulled into the auspicious, tentative friendship building between those two characters. The viewer is also sympathetic with the Quaker doctor who, as she begins to realize the compelling urge to vengeance in Murphy’s heart, urges restraint and pleads with Noiret, who has served her for seven years, to desist his assistance.

But it is the Orinoco which is always in the background and, at times, in the foreground. It is the Orinoco over which Murphy flies and zig-zags; on which Murphy and Noiret sail in their quest; on the shores of which the doctor attends to her patients and looks on in horror as the German submarine crew comes ashore; under which the submarine sails. 

I’ve not seen any CGI coming anywhere near replicating the reality of the cinematography which regales us in Murphy’s War. 

And, watching the picture, one sees that the harshness and great difficulties of the filming are quite obvious, even before reading production notes which state just that. The budget included the purchase of an old Irish ferry boat which was adapted to house the actors and crew but which could not sail to the set, therefore, flat bottom craft were used and the team actually had to row at times every day from the ferry to that day’s set. Eventually, several of the actors hired a plane to fly them to Puerto Ordaz on weekends to stay in more “civilized” quarters for the nights.

One of the crew members spoke for many when he said the filming was like having a picnic on Vesuvius. Boiling hot and humid. However, others also said that it was a “happy” set. They assumed it was because the difficulties made everyone desire to work together and help each other out, etc.

Why was this film so overtly rejected by the literati? Perhaps the timing of its release was unfortunate: anti-war protesters when the war in Vietnam was at its apogee. Maybe the faux intelligentsia’s grip on art had something to do with it. After all, this was the year of Midnight Cowboy, originally an “X” rated release. Whatever Murphy’s War may be, “X” is not one of them. 

I really do not know why it was so ill received. What I do know is that for decades critics have been far from audiences and light years away from Main Street. Had it not been for the trashing of the movie, it would have been better received, I think. Nevertheless, it has become one of those films whose worth is appreciated many years after its premier. After all, It’s A Wonderful Life was also not received well until many years later and it is now a Christmas “classic”. 

One final thing about the star of the movie: he is yet another example of a man succumbing to the lure of Venezuela. 

We’ve noted that Sir Walter Raleigh was attracted to Venezuela, even to the point of his own death. Jimmy Angel, the daredevil discoverer of the fabled Angel Falls, was so struck and pulled by that land that as he lay dying in Panama, he requested his ashes be taken back to Auyantepui, the site of the falls named after him.

And now we have the late actor, Peter O’Toole, who was bitten by “the Venezuelan Bug”, as he put it. He said the southeast section of that country, the section bordered on the north by the location sites of Murphy’s War and towards the south by Angel Falls, is “the most beautiful and exciting place I have ever seen…. There are mountains that are flat and straight-edged, like someone built them. All colours. Some red, some blue, some brown. And rivers, too, rivers of blue and one the natives call Río Coca-Cola because it’s that colour. And the clouds come out of nowhere, and suddenly it is black. And then they open, like a curtain, and there is another mountain you haven’t seen before!”

Well said, Mr. O’Toole.

After filming, Peter O’Toole and his wife, Sián Phillips, who also acted in Murphy’s War, explored the southeast section of Venezuela, eventually taking a helicopter to Angel Falls. Photo from IMDB

Atop Angel Falls. You can see O’Toole as he carefully crawls towards the edge, while his wife picks flowers well away from that edge. Photo from IMDB.

Filming a scene on the Orinoco

Resting between takes; submarine in the background

Sián Phillips on the Castillos de Guayana set; the Orinoco in the background

The Orinoco near where Murphy’s War was filmed

Some of the sites of Murphy’s War on the Orinoco

Puerto Ordaz in the early 1970s

If you’d like to read a blog post from someone who researched the actual filming see link (in Spanish, but good photos): Crónicas de Guayana

The O’Tooles, celebrating with the helicopter pilot in Puerto Ordaz after a successful return from Angel Falls. 

Photo credit: ©Bob Willoughby / mptvimages.com

Caracas To Washington On Foot: 1935-1937

Richard Barnes

“Sleeping high in a tree, they awoke to scratching sounds, as if a large animal were climbing the tree. Frightened and unable to move, they fired their weapons, and almost immediately the sound stopped. They remember spending that night awake, thinking some jungle animal was stalking them, and at dawn they saw the body of a jaguar at the base of the tree.” — Rafael Petit and Juan Carmona

A childhood friend alerted me to a FB post by Luis Waldemar Salazar recognizing the epic feat of two young men in the early part of the 20th Century. I was overwhelmed by what that short post narrated and told my friend that I would seek to confirm and, if true, I’d post about it in my blog, with proper attribution.

Well, it was not difficult to confirm as the internet has several links about this odyssey, easily translated to English. In addition, in the first decade of this century, the late Alberto Álvarez published a book about this event: “La extraordinaria hazaña de Petit y Carmona [The Extraordinary Feat of Petit and Carmona]”; however, the book is not available in Amazon or eBay and although I did find it in a bookstore in Uruguay, I finally desisted in acquiring it after several rebuffs.

Reading the several accounts and watching a brief documentary has left me in awe in the face of the determination and goodwill of these men and the utter selflessness they reflect. For example, the quote above is actually only by Petit, as Carmona had already crossed that jungle alone and, unknown to Petit, was close to losing his leg to gangrene in a Panamanian hospital. The jaguar encounter was Petit’s alone. At least on that occasion. However, during his time alone (over a month) every time he wrote a letter or made entries in his journal, he always used the plural pronoun to recognize his friend. In honor of that trait, I attributed the quote to both of them. Petit would have wanted it that way.

The original team was composed of three young men: the aforementioned two plus Jaime Roll. They embodied the cosmopolitan character of the Venezuela I remember from my childhood as Petit was Venezuelan but Carmona was a Spaniard and Roll, a Lebanese.

It appears the one who promoted this idea was Roll, almost immediately joined by Carmona. The two of them met Petit after the latter had won an 800 meter race in Caracas in 1934. Petit was known for having walked a route of about 900 miles from Maracaibo to Caracas along with two or three others (the accounts differ).

The three were members of the Boy Scouts International and desired to promote scouting in Venezuela but also to promote the recognition of Venezuela scouting abroad. They therefore decided to walk to the first Boy Scouts Jamboree to be held in Washington, D.C., in June, 1937.

With this objective having been determined, the three set off from Caracas on a cold morning on January 11, 1935.

By the time they arrived at the Simón Bolívar International Bridge which crosses the Táchira River between Colombia and Venezuela, there was trouble in the camp. They had walked 79 days and had developed some animosities and, perhaps, rivalries.

Juan Carmona separated and headed towards Bogotá alone, being the first to arrive there, the 12th of May, 1935. By the time the other two reached the capital, Carmona had already headed towards Panama. Alone. Meaning, he was determined to traverse the impassable jungles of El Chocó, now better known as Darién, alone.

In Bogotá, Jaime Roll, who had been named Expedition Chief, abandoned the quest and returned alone to Venezuela. I could not find anything else about him or his life; he seems to have fallen off the map shortly after that departure.

That left Rafael Petit alone in Bogotá. He wrote his commander in Venezuela seeking instructions. The reply was to return to Venezuela. Petit was not about to do that (which makes me wonder why he wrote in the first place!).

However, his reply is instructive as it gives us a portrait of this young man’s determination:

Until now, your advice and orders have been followed to the letter. But on this occasion, the situation is different. At stake is not only my honor, but also that of my family, my country for which I wish to achieve sporting glory, and the Boy Scouts of Venezuela, which, along with the Association of Sports Journalists of Caracas, has placed its trust in me. Therefore, if I die in this audacious undertaking, I will die willingly. Better to die with honor than to live in dishonor.

Both Carmona and Petit, with no money, and little supplies, headed alone into a jungle whose canopy’s shade creates a never-ending penumbra, like a dark cathedral, which receives about 9,000 inches of rain annually, creating miles of swamp and mud and quicksands. Not to mention the dangerous wildlife, including poisonous reptiles and stalking jaguars. That swath of jungle was one of the most hostile territories of the continent. It was forbidding even for experienced explorers. I pause in admiration as I write this.

Petit headed there about 15 days after Carmona, knowing he had to sleep high up in trees for safety and had to be alert to predators during the day as he trudged on and on and on. After numerous mishaps, including being utterly lost, he made it to Colón, Panama, at the end of August, 1935. While there he heard disquieting news: a young man had emerged from the Darién Jungle gravely ill with an infection provoked by a worm bite and the indications were that he would lose his leg. 

Petit rushed to the St. Thomas Hospital, knowing that young man had to be Carmona. It was.

They renewed their pact to walk to Washington or die trying. Carmona recovered and they continued their trek.

They walked into San José, the Costa Rican capital at 8 P.M. one night shortly before Christmas and were treated with great care and empathy. Petit came down with a severe case of malaria which delayed their onward march until March 15, 1936, when they proceeded north.

They were received by the president of Nicaragua in Managua three days later. The president provided some economic assistance which was an encouragement to the young men.

Honduras was undergoing a coup and both Carmona and Petit were arrested, their explanations being ignored and their identifications and travel documents being unread as the soldiers were illiterate. After a few days the man in charge arrived, read the documents, and released them.

Their memories of Mexico were positive overall, although they also suffered some mishaps there as well. However, what they very much appreciated was the official hospitality in Mexico City where both Boy Scout executives and government officials were solicitous towards them and admired their determination. They were official guests in Mexico City for a month of much needed rest and recovery.

Having set foot to large areas of Venezuela and having traversed Colombia, Panamá, Costa Rica, Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Mexico, they finally crossed the Rio Grande from Mexico to Laredo, Texas, on the 27th of January, 1937. However, incredibly, their documents were not in order and they had to return, first to Monterrey and eventually to the Venezuelan embassy in Mexico City where the issues were resolved and they returned to Laredo.

They told of the wonderful roads in the United States which enabled them to cover plenty of ground each day. Among other events, they were greeted and feted by the governor of Texas. 

In Texas they bought a small wagon which they refurbished to facilitate the carrying of their supplies. They pulled that wagon all the way to their destination.

They set foot in Washington, D.C. the 16th of June, 1937, two years and five months after having left Caracas that cold winter day. Their feat was heralded by the Washington Post, “Venezuelan Boy Scouts Arrive in Washington After a 9,000 Mile Walk….”

They were received by the Venezuelan ambassador to the United States to whom the young men gave the Venezuelan flag, having carried it all those hard miles.

On the 30th, at the First National Boy Scouts Jamboree at the National Mall, over 27,000 scouts participated. Petit and Carmona were celebrated as living symbols of the Boy Scouts spirit. They were the only scouts who had walked to that major event. So impressive was their adventure that the president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, greeted them personally.

Pan American Airways ensured they did not have to walk back, but flew them via Mexico, Cuba, and Puerto Rico, back to Venezuela.

Someone somewhere wrote that he could not understand how this has not been made into a movie. I agree. 

Later on, Carmona explored large areas of Guayana, Venezuela, before moving to Chile, where folks lost track of him.

Petit stayed in Venezuela working to promote sports and scouting. He had almost completed a book-length manuscript of their adventures for publishing; however, sadly, it was either stolen or somehow lost, which saddened him deeply. He died prematurely at the age of 51 in Caracas.

Several extracts of the book are available including the following from his introduction:

A daring and risky journey on foot from Caracas, the capital of Venezuela, to Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. Twenty months and five days to unite the three Americas by walking.

At the Jamboree, they greeted the amazed crowds, concluding their remarks thusly:

We, Rafael Ángel Petit and Juan Carmona, Boy Scouts from Venezuela, have walked ten thousand miles to greet you in brotherhood, to give you a round of applause in the spirit of Scout brotherhood. No jungle is impassable, no river wide or mountain high enough, no illness, thirst, or hunger can stop us from achieving the goals of citizenship and international brotherhood of the Scout Movement. All the Scouts we have met along the way join us in greeting you. We have worn out twelve pairs of boots to be with you at the first National Jamboree.

From Left: Jaime Roll, Rafael Petit, Juan Carmona, 1934, after Petit won his track event. 

Costa Rica, 1935

Pulling their wagon somewhere in the USA, 1937

In Washington D.C.

Rafael Petit and Juan Carmona