Julia Robb's Blog, page 10

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                                   THE REAL DEAL     When I was growing up on the Southern Great Plains, in Hamlin, Texas, I had three places to find books.     A school classroom contained three shelves, my father's church had a closet-sized room with five shelves (I couldn't reach high enough to see the titles without standing on a chair) and an elderly lady filled one room of her tiny, wood-framed house with donated volumes. Most of the library books dated from the jazz age.    It didn't take me long to ransack the classroom collection and the town library leaned heavily on Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau: Good writers, but I was too young to appreciate Emerson's advise for living or Thoreau's musings on nature.     I did discover "Gone With The Wind," and read it ten times, splattering the pages with tears each time Rhett left Scarlett.      Rhett don't go, don't go!     The church library, which smelled like paper mold and dust, produced "Cherry Ames, Student Nurse" and a dozen others in the Ames series, but most of the time I pulled a promising tome and found it was "Annals of the Northwest Texas Conference, Methodist Church, 1908."     That was agony.     When dad was transferred to a church in Midland, Texas, my book hunger was better fed. The Midland library was not bad, especially for a cow town plopped in the middle of nowhere.     But finding good books has always been a struggle for me.    Family sagas, pooh, romance, gag, fantasy, oh please (will someone produce a new plot rather than the same old formula).    Give me big characters carrying big themes, written well; a rare combination.    Historical fiction is my favorite, but guess what?    A lot of historical novelists bend the truth.    Imagine my delight when I discovered historical memoir, first-hand accounts of actual events.      First I read books like "Eyewitness To History," a compilation of short accounts, such as "Dinner With Attila the Hun," by Pricus and "The Murder of Thomas Becket," by Edward Grim.     Grim actually saw knights, sent by England's Henry II, splatter Becket's brains on the Canterbury Cathedral floor.     At some point, I got interested in the American Indian Wars and that opened up a treasure chest of reading.     And it taught me something.     No one race is all good, or all bad.     On the American frontier, for every wrong one race committed, the other did the same thing.    Reading about frontier history has often made me want to pull my hair out; so much hurt, so much misunderstanding, so much savagery.    My favorite first-hand memoir is "On The Border With Crook," by Captain John Bourke, Third U.S. Cavalry, published 1891.     Bourke kept journals when he was stationed in Arizona Territory and in the Dakotas, and his memoir is a detailed description of everything he saw.    I loved his account of a man dying from wounds after an encounter with Apaches--"first exhilarated and then excited, petulant and despondent..he manifested a strange aversion to being put in the same vehicle with a dead man."
     I reproduced those stages of death in my novel, "Scalp Mountain."     Then there's the man who crawled away from the scene of an Apache attack. The man wrote his name on a rock, with his own blood, immediately before he was devoured by a panther.     Bourke became sympathetic to the Apache and didn't mind writing his opinions.     As a result, he was never promoted beyond the rank of captain, which was a source of great bitterness to him.    Well, to everyone who wrote a first-hand account and gave me something else to read, I send my thanks, and hope wherever you are, you are resting well.


    Julia can be reached at juliarobbmar@aol.com                   


          

     

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                                   THE REAL DEAL     When I was growing up on the Southern Great Plains, in Hamlin, Texas, I had three places to find books.     A school classroom contained three shelves, my father's church had a closet-sized room with five shelves (I couldn't reach high enough to see the titles without standing on a chair) and an elderly lady filled one room of her tiny, wood-framed house with donated volumes. Most of the library books dated from the jazz age.    It didn't take me long to ransack the classroom collection and the town library leaned heavily on Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau: Good writers, but I was too young to appreciate Emerson's advise for living or Thoreau's musings on nature.     I did discover "Gone With The Wind," and read it ten times, splattering the pages with tears each time Rhett left Scarlett.      Rhett don't go, don't go!     The church library, which smelled like paper mold and dust, produced "Cherry Ames, Student Nurse" and a dozen others in the Ames series, but most of the time I pulled a promising tome and found it was "Annals of the Northwest Texas Conference, Methodist Church, 1908."     That was agony.     When dad was transferred to a church in Midland, Texas, my book hunger was better fed. The Midland library was not bad, especially for a cow town plopped in the middle of nowhere.     But finding good books has always been a struggle for me.    Family sagas, pooh, romance, gag, fantasy, oh please (will someone produce a new plot rather than the same old formula).    Give me big characters carrying big themes, written well; a rare combination.    Historical fiction is my favorite, but guess what?    A lot of historical novelists bend the truth.    Imagine my delight when I discovered historical memoir, first-hand accounts of actual events.      First I read books like "Eyewitness To History," a compilation of short accounts, such as "Dinner With Attila the Hun," by Pricus and "The Murder of Thomas Becket," by Edward Grim.     Grim actually saw knights, sent by England's Henry II, splatter Becket's brains on the Canterbury Cathedral floor.     At some point, I got interested in the American Indian Wars and that opened up a treasure chest of reading.     And it taught me something.     No one race is all good, or all bad.     On the American frontier, for every wrong one race committed, the other did the same thing.    Reading about frontier history has often made me want to pull my hair out; so much hurt, so much misunderstanding, so much savagery.    My favorite first-hand memoir is "On The Border With Crook," by Captain John Bourke, Third U.S. Cavalry, published 1891.     Bourke kept journals when he was stationed in Arizona Territory and in the Dakotas, and his memoir is a detailed description of everything he saw.    I loved his account of a man dying from wounds after an encounter with Apaches--"first exhilarated and then excited, petulant and despondent..he manifested a strange aversion to being put in the same vehicle with a dead man."
     I reproduced those stages of death in my novel, "Scalp Mountain."     Then there's the man who crawled away from the scene of an Apache attack. The man wrote his name on a rock, with his own blood, immediately before he was devoured by a panther.     Bourke became sympathetic to the Apache and didn't mind writing his opinions.     As a result, he was never promoted beyond the rank of captain, which was a source of great bitterness to him.    Well, to everyone who wrote a first-hand account and gave me something else to read, I send my thanks, and hope wherever you are, you are resting well.


    Julia can be reached at juliarobbmar@aol.com                   


          

     

RIDING THE HIGH COUNTRYby Julia Robb The first time ...

RIDING THE HIGH COUNTRYby Julia Robb [image error]
 The first time I saw Colum McNeal, he was standing on a hill in the Davis Mountains, in far West Texas, about 120 miles from the Mexican border.    I was sitting in my living room, here in Marshall, drinking coffee.      You might call it a waking dream.      At first, I didn’t know his name-that came later-but I saw his red hair burning in the sun and had to know why he swept the valley below with restless green eyes.     That’s how all my novels begin, with a vision of somebody I have never seen, doing something I don’t understand.      Then the questions begin and the questions create the story.      It was a lot easier to understand where Colum was, physically, than what he was doing because I know that part of Texas.    The Davis Mountains are not really mountains, but a series of green hills.      The highest peaks rise 8,300-odd feet, squatty in comparison to the Rockies.     It’s strange country. Lush grama grass fattens cattle, but it grows around piles of rocks and surrounds desert plants like prickleypear and ocotillo.      Pinyon and ponderosa pine cover the upper slopes.     I had a good time writing Colum’s story—eventually titled “Scalp Mountain” (now on sale as an ebook, at Amazon).     Readers ask me why I wrote this historical novel and I tell them about seeing Colum.     My answer is a little misleading.      I wrote “Scalp Mountain” because the frontier and its moral complications grip me like a head-on train wreck.      There’s more.     I’m not comfortable with our noisy, entertainment-centered, celebrity-driven, American culture.     Writing is a form of withdrawal.     But, really, the 19th Century was a lot tougher than the 21st.     Dead children were a life-long emotional burden for families, especially mothers.     One out of five children died before they were five years old; almost all families lost at least one  baby, or child, and some lost every child they had.     Abraham Lincoln and his wife Mary lost two children before the president was shot-Eddie, 3, and Willie, 13.     Mary’s grief further unbalanced her already precarious emotions. Mr. Lincoln closed himself in Willie’s room once a week and stayed for hours.     Tad died at 18, several years after the president was assassinated.      It wasn’t just children.      Average life expectancy in the 19th Century was about 48-years-old (and a lot less for young women, who often died in childbirth).     Disease took its toll, but men and women were also maimed in accidents; everything from runaway buggies to mules expressing their displeasure with a kick to the nearest head.       Cutting wood was a daily chore and if an ax slipped and cut a leg or foot, the victim often died from blood poisoning.      Labor saving devises (like washing machines and running water) did not exist.     Women’s washdays included three tubs of water they had to haul from the well or the creek, they had to boil the clothes, slap them around the soapy tub with sticks and hang them on a line.     It took all day.      Physical labor; aching backs.      Toothache tortured almost everybody. Cavities relentlessly decayed most peoples’ teeth and pain meds (even aspirin) were a distant dream.     Although some assume the frontier was romantic, the opposite is true.      Tens of thousands of Americans, red and white, died in the Indian Wars, which raged for 400 years, from Jamestown through Wounded Knee.     Farms, ranches, mail carriers, stagecoaches, soldiers, surveyors, even whole settlements, were attacked, tortured and butchered.      Women and kids were kidnapped and never seen again.     U.S. Cavalry surprised sleeping Indian villages, especially on the plains and especially in winter. Then troopers destroyed the stored food, burned the lodges and buffalo robes, shot the horses.      Tribal people died of starvation. Babies froze to death in their mothers’ arms.     White women captives were raped to death, or brutalized beyond what I want to describe in this space.      Still, the high country of my imagination lures me.      And I don’t really have to live there, do I?     The past is safe because it’s over.     God bless all readers, whether they read my novel or somebody else’s book.     You give writers an excuse to dream. 

RIDING THE HIGH COUNTRYby Julia Robb Thefirst time I...

RIDING THE HIGH COUNTRYby Julia Robb [image error]
 Thefirst time I saw Colum McNeal, he was standing on a hill in the DavisMountains, in far West Texas, about 120 miles from the Mexican border.    I was sitting in my livingroom, here in Marshall, drinking coffee.      Youmight call it a waking dream.      Atfirst, I didn't know his name-that came later-but I saw his red hair burning inthe sun and had to know why he swept the valley below with restless green eyes.     That's howall my novels begin, with a vision of somebody I have never seen, doingsomething I don't understand.      Then thequestions begin and the questions create the story.      It was alot easier to understand where Colum was, physically, than what he was doing becauseI know that part of Texas.    The Davis Mountains arenot really mountains, but a series of green hills.      The highestpeaks rise 8,300-odd feet, squatty in comparison to the Rockies.     It's strangecountry. Lush grama grass fattens cattle, but it grows around piles of rocksand surrounds desert plants like prickleypear and ocotillo.      Pinyonand ponderosa pine cover the upper slopes.     I had agood time writing Colum's story—eventually titled "Scalp Mountain" (now on saleas an ebook, at Amazon).     Readers askme why I wrote this historical novel and I tell them about seeing Colum.     Myanswer is a little misleading.      I wrote"Scalp Mountain" because the frontier and its moral complications grip me likea head-on train wreck.      There'smore.     I'm notcomfortable with our noisy, entertainment-centered, celebrity-driven, American culture.     Writingis a form of withdrawal.     But,really, the 19th Century was a lot tougher than the 21st.     Deadchildren were a life-long emotional burden for families, especially mothers.     One outof five children died before they were five years old; almost all families lostat least one  baby, or child, and somelost every child they had.     AbrahamLincoln and his wife Mary lost two children before the president was shot-Eddie,3, and Willie, 13.     Mary'sgrief further unbalanced her already precarious emotions. Mr. Lincoln closedhimself in Willie's room once a week and stayed for hours.     Tad diedat 18, several years after the president was assassinated.      Itwasn't just children.      Averagelife expectancy in the 19th Century was about 48-years-old (and alot less for young women, who often died in childbirth).     Diseasetook its toll, but men and women were also maimed in accidents; everything fromrunaway buggies to mules expressing their displeasure with a kick to thenearest head.       Cutting wood was a daily chore and if an axslipped and cut a leg or foot, the victim often died from blood poisoning.      Labor saving devises (like washing machinesand running water) did not exist.     Women's washdaysincluded three tubs of water they had to haul from the well or the creek, theyhad to boil the clothes, slap them around the soapy tub with sticks and hangthem on a line.     It tookall day.      Physicallabor; aching backs.      Toothache tortured almost everybody. Cavities relentlesslydecayed most peoples' teeth and pain meds (even aspirin) were a distant dream.     Althoughsome assume the frontier was romantic, the opposite is true.      Tens ofthousands of Americans, red and white, died in the Indian Wars, which raged for400 years, from Jamestown through Wounded Knee.     Farms,ranches, mail carriers, stagecoaches, soldiers, surveyors, even wholesettlements, were attacked, tortured and butchered.      Womenand kids were kidnapped and never seen again.     U.S.Cavalry surprised sleeping Indian villages, especially on the plains andespecially in winter. Then troopers destroyed the stored food, burned thelodges and buffalo robes, shot the horses.      Tribalpeople died of starvation. Babies froze to death in their mothers' arms.     White womencaptives were raped to death, or brutalized beyond what I want to describe inthis space.      Still,the high country of my imagination lures me.      And Idon't really have to live there, do I?     The pastis safe because it's over.     Godbless all readers, whether they read my novel or somebody else's book.     You givewriters an excuse to dream. 

Truth and the American Way

                                                       


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When I was growing up in small-town Texas, in the 1950s', in a country surrounded by sky, mesquite and irrigated wheat fields, I spent my Saturday afternoons at the movies.
   Life was good. We kids walked three blocks, to the town's lone main street, and the lady tending the box office let us in free because we were the preacher's kids; it was pop corn, hot dog  heaven. 
   Best of all, we lived and breathed cowboy and Indian drama with movie stars like James Stewart, Glen Ford, Van Heflin, Kirk Douglas, Burt Lancaster and John Wayne.
   Those movies were about brave men fighting it out with natives, outlaws and each other. Gun smoke filled the streets, bugles carried Charge on the wind, while the good guys (all white) galloped in a determined line toward the enemy (most of whom were white actors painted with some kind of brown gook). 
   But in the 70s', the movies changed. Now the Indians were the good guys and the whites were the bad guys, imperialist, stone-hearted bastards gobbling up Indian land and culture while the Indians sat alone on hill tops, palms to the sky, worshiping the Great Spirit.
   The same thing happened with books, both fiction and non-fiction.
   At some point, I doubted both versions of history and began reading books which chronicle the American frontier.
   On the Border With Crook, by Capt. John Bourke, third cavalry, On the Border With Mackenzie, by Capt. Robert Carter, fourth cavalry, Conquering the Southern Plains, edited by Pete Cozzens, Empire of the Summer Moon, by S.C. Gwynne, and dozens more, were a revelation.
   Here's the truth:
   Everyone was right
   Everyone was wrong
   And everyone got hurt.
   Scalp Mountain, an ebook on sale at Amazon.com, is my attempt to describe this uniquely American tragedy, through the lives of fictional characters.