Welsh Heritage in Idaho

Last Friday, I had the opportunity to participate in the dedication of the Welsh Heritage Square in Samaria, Malad Valley Idaho.

I scored an excellent Welsh cake at the refreshment table.

Let me get my political diatribe out of the way. There is nothing wrong with celebrating any culture as it can be done without denigrating others. This was a community event and Welshness was not a requirement. There was a gentleman who appeared to be an African-American cowboy who was talking to a lot of people and must have been a local. For all I know, he has Welsh ancestry but it is entirely beside the point. All are welcome to celebrate and there is no false superiority of putting down other heritages.

It did seem like a blessing that it did not rain more than a few, sporadic drops. The rain was torrential coming through Odgen that morning. My old Potuguese, now Welsh mentor, Dr. Dennis, was present in his Welsh costume along with his wife.

Preserve the Public Lands!

My hat is off to Field & Stream web edition, and hopefully, the print edition as well for the excellent article on the latest movement to turn over America's public lands to the states and eventually private interests.

Ken Ivory and the Malheur occupiers get special mention as part of the problem, not the solutions. And there's this great quote from the late Western Historian (and Utahn), Bernard DeVoto, who also got it:

“the ultimate objective is to liquidate all public ownership of grazing and forest land in the United States…the plan is to get rid of public lands altogether, turning them over to the states, which can be coerced as the federal government cannot be, and eventually into private ownership.”

Meadow Gold Nostalgia

Went to Dick's Market to buy mayonnaise and came out with a lot of other stuff. I did exercise restraint because I wandered close to the bakery but bought no donuts.

My treat was Meadow Gold Ice Cream which was on sale 2/$5 so I got French Vanilla (fancier than regular and a necessary staple of life - Vanilla is a flavor - not the bland absence of such). Along with that I got Rocky Road which has real miniature marshmallows.

Armed Protesters at Malheur Intend to Void 1846 Treaty with Queen Victoria of Great Britain

Original Treaty of 1846 between the United States and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland,
U.S. National Archives and Records Administration

Here's a great example of the very basic point I'm trying to make in response to the insane claims of the armed protesters at the Malheur Wildlife Refuge. You can't just ignore 230 plus years of actual Constitutional History by plucking a few words out of context that you contort into your own political Jeremiad.

From The Oregonian:

[Armed Occupier] Payne said the group believes the federal government has no constitutional authority to hold vast land tracts. He said any deed transferring land to the federal government should be considered void.

That means they will have to void the 1846 Treaty with Queen Victoria.

Meanwhile, Back at the Occupation of the Malheur Wildlife Refuge . . . .

The Mythic American Cowboy

Without license as I stole another idea from Monty Python:

Overheard around the campfire at Malheur:

"What has the federal government ever done for us?"

"yeah!"

 "Nothin'!"

"Only cause problems!"

"Threatened to take our guns and our cattle away!"

Family Totems - Christmas Edition

When we were young, our dad would set out in December to design and paint his annual Christmas picture on our front window. This is the earliest one I can remember:

Native Earth

We made it up to southwestern Idaho for my dad's 80th b-day celebration tomorrow. The Best Western, Caldwell Inn and Suites, gets good ratings so far. Very large rooms. A pool the grandkids are enjoying. My son is enjoying the hot tub with the Westminster Women's Basketball team here for a tourney. Free internet. It's a win-win-win-win.

My usual travelogue about the pioneer trails and old Highway 30 (particularly with Bliss that used to have cool, cement dinosaurs - kinda like Vernal, UT). And the features on top of Mountain Home mesa (no mountain and not my home). I pointed out to the south and west how we could see to Nevada in the peaks of the Owyhees (I've been to Duck Valley Rez on business) and the far end being in Oregon. As the sun set I tried to explain how the Easterners have it all wrong pronouncing a "gone" at the end of my native state. It hasn't "gone" anywhere. And it has to match the rhyme of the state song, "Land of the Empire Builders/Land of the Golden Sun/Hail to Thee, Land of Freedom/My Oregon."

Vintage Bliss

More Family Totems

A couple of weeks ago, I was at my parents' house. And having delivered to my dad a few framed pieces (he prefers a particular framing shop in Salt Lake City), I followed him around seeing some of his work and attempted a few more photos. I don't know what he thought I was doing, but I share here some important, family totems even if the first two weren't by him:

St. Francis by Ben Ortega

Lightning Pattern, Navajo Rug

Ben Ortega is now deceased, so I think the one I gave to my Mom a while back has probably increased in value. It's not like you should be placing values or buying and selling in St. Francis carvings. It sounds rather disrespectful to me and missing the whole point of the Santo.

On the right, is one of many Navajo rugs my parents own. Price is more invaluable as they seem to belong with my parents ever since they fell in love with Santa Fe in 1966. We earned some points with them for our nine years of residence there.

And now back to my dad's work, back to the very earliest days of his good art work. The first is a piece he did just after graduating from Brigham Young. I would have been about four months old. It hung in our house for all the years I can remember in my youth. It's good to have a photo of this one:

(c) 1957, Larry K. Vaughn

A Descendant of Llewelyn Fawr

As excited as I am to start my Welsh class tomorrow evening, it's making me a bit nervous with the anxieties of an older middle-aged man not sure about starting a college class after 30 some years. The young tend to jump into life-changing ventures like college, missions, and even marriage more excitedly than anxious.

Then I was playing around with BYU's great ancestral connections program (Which Norton seems to think an unsafe site linked as it is to family history information). And I discovered something grand. OK, it's good enough to be a direct descendant of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine even if through the "lacklanded" son. But it was the next few generations that stir my blood - as direct descendant of Llewelyn ap Iorweth - Llewelyn the Great and the Lady Joan, illegitimate daughter of King John. And their daughter Elen who connects to me down through English nobility until, surprisingly, my Welsh Vaughans marry into their descendants in Northern England, Yorkshire and Durham.

Mayor of the Munchkin City STILL Not King of the Senate

Senator (Not King) Mike Lee

Mayor of the Munchkin City

So our old friend, Senator Mike Lee, has been hanging around with a bad crowd. Pretty soon they'll whisk him away to Pleasure Island where he'll be smoking cigars, playing pool, drinking beer, and turning into a donkey. (If only). His best friends from the Senate are Tea-Party Ted Cruz and Ayn-Rand Paul. These guys are getting schooled by the Senate's Elder Statesman,. John McCain. (OK, if that last line is true then we're in big trouble.) But the best part was when Senator Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, said on the Senate Floor this week:

The Gay Way in Fruitland

This posting is not what you think.

Having my piece on Nyssa, Oregon, the Amalgamated Sugar Co., and the maternal side of my family published at Keepapitchinin.org, I woke up with a start this morning and realized I had to write about the Gay Way. In the Keepa piece, I made passing reference to my paternal grandfather running a bowling alley across the Snake River in Idaho. That was the Gay Way Bowl, in Fruitland. It's one of those things you just can't make up. If you still don't believe me, here's a piece about Gayway Junction from Fruitland history:

Warren Dorothy bought a small chunk of land and built the Gayway Dance Hall at the junction. Famous country and western bands played there in the 1930s and 1940s. In 1953 George Vaughn renovated the building - turning it into a large bowling alley. A controversy developed later over the building's color - it was pink. When it faded, the owner painted it a brighter pink much to the dismay of community members. A big windstorm damaged structure in August of 1976. In 1981 it was vacated and in 1990 torn down. A mini-mall now stands in it's place. (From Ron Marlow's Fruitland, Idaho page, First printed in The Independent-Enterprise, Payette, Idaho, November 14, 2001.)

George Vaughn was my grandfather, born in West Ogden, Utah, his father and family were immigrants from Durham, England who had spent a generation there after leaving the Black Mountains of Wales.

The Gay Way Bowl at Gayway Junction, Fruitland, Idaho. Sometime not long after closing

Family History - Piecing the Puzzles of Idaho Indian Rock Art

With my inner child calling me again, I've gone back to the work digitizing photographs and transcribing letters from the earliest years of my memory. In that process I posted on Facebook the following photo for  Mother's Day:

Easter Sunday, April 2, 1961. Birch Creek near Salmon, Idaho