Transcript of interview with Kent "Tim" Hafen by Gregory Hafen, March 4, 1975

UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 1 An Interview with Kent (Tim) Hafen An Oral History Conducted by Gregory T. Hafen Ralph Roske Oral History Project on Early Las Vegas Special Collections and Archives Oral History Research Center University Libraries University of Nevada, Las Vegas UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 2 © Ralph Roske Oral History Project on Early Las Vegas University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 2018 UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 3 The Oral History Research Center (OHRC) was formally established by the Board of Regents of the University of Nevada System in September 2003 as an entity of the UNLV University Libraries’ Special Collections Division. The OHRC conducts oral interviews with individuals who are selected for their ability to provide first-hand observations on a variety of historical topics in Las Vegas and Southern Nevada. The OHRC is also home to legacy oral history interviews conducted prior to its establishment including many conducted by UNLV History Professor Ralph Roske and his students. This legacy interview transcript received minimal editing, such as the elimination of fragments, false starts, and repetitions in order to enhance the reader's understanding of the material. All measures have been taken to preserve the style and language of the narrator. The interviewee/narrator was not involved in the editing process. UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 4 Abstract On March 4, 1975 collector Gregory T. Hafen interviewed his father, Kent (Tim) Hafen (born April 17th, 1932 in St. George, Utah) at his ranch home in Pahrump, Nevada. This interview covers the history and development of Pahrump from 1951 to 1975. Kent relocated to Pahrump, Nevada in 1951, after living in Mesquite, Nevada from 1932 to 1951. Kent was a local farmer. UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 5 This interview is with Mr. Tim Hafen, who is my father and has lived in the Pahrump Valley a number of years, in fact, for twenty-three years, I believe, isn’t it? Yes. And the date is March 4th, 1975, and it’s approximately 8 P.M. The place is his ranch home in Pahrump, Nevada. And I’m Greg Hafen and I live at 248 Spencer in Las Vegas. The project is Local History Project and I’m particularly interested in the growth of the Pahrump Valley. I was—would like a little bit of information, background information from you, and where you were born. Where were you born in? I was born in St. George, Utah, but my folks were living at Mesquite, Nevada, at the time and I was raised in Mesquite, Nevada. Well, what did your dad do for an occupation in Mesquite? My dad was a farmer and a cattle rancher and then later a dairy farm operator. What kind of education did you get? Did you—? I graduated from Virgin Valley High School, attended a quarter at Dixie College and then moved to Pahrump where I started to farm here. In school were you interested in farming? Did you take quite a few agricultural subjects? Or were your interests elsewhere? (Laughs) Well, no, I didn’t take Ag subjects. I started in pre-med and pre-dental. And was going out for that—for science type field when oh, a lot of things changed my mind. But partly this property out here become available and looked like an opportunity and so I switched and came out here and started to farm. Well, when was the first time you visited the valley? And what was the nature of this, you know, first visit? UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 6 Well, my dad was on a (unintelligible) board with the Bureau of Land Management and took a field trip through Goodsprings, Sally Valley, Pahrump Valley, Indian Springs and back into Las Vegas one day and he was telling me about it at—during the Christmas holiday break from school and it was intriguing and he indicated at that time that he had talked with Elmer Bowman and that Elmer had a piece of ground out here for sale that a person could almost name his own terms on and so we came out just to take a look and course in those days to get here you had to travel seventy miles from Las Vegas, northwest toward Tonopah and then take the turnoff over to Johnny Summit down into Pahrump Valley, which was another forty miles. And that forty was all rocks and you couldn’t hardly call it a gravel road. It was very rocky terrain. So we called it a rock road. And that’s our first look at Pahrump Valley and it looked intriguing and my dad said that he could cosign with me for some money to get started and— But at this time what was actually out here? There weren’t very many people out here and— No. What were they—the people out here, what were they particularly—what was their mainstay? Why did they—why were they here? Was it mostly agriculture? Yes. It was all agriculture. There were a few cattle running on the Spring Mountains. The west side of the Spring Mountains by Bowman and his family. But there were probably six or eight ranches here at the time. Maybe somewhere between a hundred, a hundred and fifty people and just recalling the people that were in the valley when I came. I came out here on July 2nd, 1951 to set up living and at that time the north end of the valley, Dale and Dorothy-Dorothy were here. And in fact, Dale’s dad and mother were there also on the ranch with them. Paul and Allen Simkins came from Southern Utah; they were here. Brady brothers who came from central south UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 7 California. Glen and West Brady. Stan Ford was here. The Pahrump Ranch was owned by SB Dickie and his associates from Arvin-Bakersfield area. The Bowman family consisting of Elmer Bowman and his sons and son-in-laws, Perry Bowman, was off by himself on his own piece of ground, as was his son-in-law, AJ Frainer. Joe Frainer, Arlon’s, AJs dad, was also ranching with him. And then, on the main Manse Ranch, Linn Anderson, his son-in-law, and Lyle Christianson, his-son-law, and two minor sons, Merton and Melvin, were all living at the main, working on the main ranch headquarters. And that was about the extent of the people that were here when I first moved out. Well, this valley has always been known to grow cotton and alfalfa, and a little bit of wheat, here and there. At this time, the first years, was cotton—when did it first get started in this valley—cotton? And what was the market for it? Well, Lyon Hughes and his family had come from Porterville, California, and they had grown cotton in California. So, they planted about sixty acres on the Manse Ranch. On a lease arrangement, share arrangement and that was 1949 and it did quite well. So when I moved out here in 1951, they were—most of the ranches were beginning to grow cotton and it looked like a promising crop; cotton, alfalfa, and small grains. It’s interesting to note that you said there weren’t any oiled roads or asphalt roads into this area and there—your market, I imagine, you had to go to California with your product. Could you describe the process of the cotton marketing operation? Well, there was never any handpicking to speak of out here because of the remoteness. Hand labor was not available. So cotton was always harvested by machines, one way or another. Either transported in from California or purchased by the local farmers. And—however, since there was no cotton gin here, cotton was put into an old hay baler. An old hand tie hay baler and what you UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 8 do is build a hopper affair over the top of this old hay baler and dump from the machine into the hopper and then with a pitchfork, screwed it in to the bale chamber, tie it up with three wires, just like you would baled hay. And in this fashion you could get ample weight on a truck to make it profitable, hauling, freighting the cotton to California for ginning. Most of the cotton was ginned in the Arvin, Bakersfield area. There were a few that tried to pack it loose into large trucks with racks and so on. But you never could get enough weight on them. By baling then you could handle it just like baled hay, and it worked out quite well. And there were no problems with quality. In fact, the baling process had no detrimental effect on the lint or the cottonseed as far as quality was concerned. Well, if the population was as small as it was, what kind of public services did you have? What was a post office? Did you have any schools? Well, the school consisted of a little red one room building, which is the typical red schoolhouse. It still sits, today, up on the Pahrump Ranch. And I understand that the Cal- Vada people say they’re going to preserve it. I can remember one person that’s still living in the valley today that attended that little red schoolhouse and that’s Harry Ford. The—there was one store called the Pahrump Trading Post, it’s still here today. It was operated by Guy Cannel. He didn’t have a wife. He operated by himself and at that time one corner of the store building was set out as a post office and mail service, when I first came out here was once a week. Stan Ford would meet the mail truck up on Highway 95 and bring mail down to the post office, wasn’t long afterwards till we had two ton service each week and that changed. Then Stan Ford, here again was the mail hauler and he’d go to Shoshone, California, pick up the mail twice a week, bring it on over and Maurice Spenser was the postmaster. And when Guy Panel was gone from the store, she handled the store and the post office and if she was gone from the post office, well, he’d handle the post UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 9 office, as well. And of course, back in those days, there weren’t much business for either one. Guy I remember would go into Las Vegas probably once every two weeks for supplies. He did have a little grill there and if it was convenient, he would cook sometimes so you could buy a round steak or something like this, occasionally. But it was on occasion. Well, at least first years that you were out here in ’50, ’51, ’52, I understand there was no electricity or telephones. That’s true. In fact. When did you first get these services out here? Well, there were no, besides no roads in the valley, there was no power, nor telephones. Now power didn’t come in until March of 1963, was when the line was energized. Telephones, March of 1965, prior to the—in about 1960s, there was one radio telephone installed here at Nevada Jim and Company office with a line extension over in a booth at the intersection of Highway 16 and 52 and that was extremely unreliable, though. Because the radio signal had to go over Mount Charleston to Angel’s Peak and most of the time there was a lot of weather interference. So it was about one in four times that you could get through to Las Vegas on that telephone. You mentioned the Nevada Jim. Now I understand that the Nevada Cotton Gin here in Pahrump is the only operating gin in the state of Nevada, is that correct? Yes. When? That was built in 1959, by a firm from Phoenix, Arizona. Arizona Cotton says Products Company, and this was incorporated in the state of Nevada and the Nevada Ginning Company as a subsidiary. And so, the fall season of 1959 was the first year that we ginned locally. Now going back just a little further, state highway 16 was brought in from Blue Diamond, Mountain UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 10 Springs, Warner Springs, commonly called into Pahrump in the fall of 1954. So, from 1954 to 1956, we did have the road in from Las Vegas. Then in 1956, the state built a highway west into California and connect it up with a road that California had brought in to the Nevada Line from Shoshone. This was a very twisty, narrow road. And then, in about 1958 or ’59, they rebuilt the road to Shoshone, the California side and made a nice highway out of it. And then, in 1966 the state built the road north out of the valley to connect with Highway 95 over the Johnny Summit. Then we finally had—at that point in time, we had three routes. One north to 95 Highway west to Shoshone, which then would take you down to Baker or North into Death Valley and east into Las Vegas. Up until this time then you were shipping these cotton bales over these gravel roads, trucking them over these gravel roads then to the California Line or over to Baker? That’s—that’s right. And in fact, one winter I remember of, Elmer Bowman and the people that owned the Pahrump Ranch left crawler tractors out on the west edge of the valley. Because we had some little more rainy weather than usual and that gravel didn’t hold up and so the trucks were bogging in the valley floor and they just left the, these crawler tractors over there. So that anytime a truck came in and had trouble than they could fire up the crawler tractors and hook on with a chain and pull themselves across the valley. And this was very common. I mean everybody used the tractor and everybody knew it was there and the chains were left there and— Now when you first came out here you mentioned to me before that the water situation here was very good it—there were artesian springs and could you name a few of these springs that were here in those very first years and what kind of—how much water they were actually flowing? UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 11 Well, the Manse Ranch and the Pahrump Ranch were built in the late 1880s or 1800s because of huge artesian springs that flowed in both ranch areas. Then later in the 1940s and ‘50s with drilling techniques, the other farms came in with drilled wells and most of those came in with artesian wells to begin with. There’s, oh, I’ve seen wells on the Pahrump Ranch on what is now known as the Peck Stein Ranch and the Manse Ranch that would flow fifteen hundred to twenty-five hundred gallons per minute. And they had a lot of pressure too, they would come out under about thirty-five pounds of pressure. Hm. How much over the few past few years has this water level declined? There’s some skepticism about how much population Pahrump Valley could actually handle because of the decline in the water level here in the valley. Could you comment a little bit on that? Well, I’ve been here almost twenty-four years now. And the water table on the eastern fan area, (unintelligible) fan, is dropping at about a foot and a half a year, the water table. And so, it isn’t critical but the valley floor itself appears to be the settling basin, and the recharge from Mount Charleston coming down the east slope of the valley filters in to the valley floor and this is a closed valley so it tends to reservoir underground here. And there has been no drop in the water table on the valley floor at all, period. In fact, some of the wells that dredged a slight increase in the valley floor six feet in the last seven years, it’s actually raised in the valley floor at this point. So, the eastern side of the valley, which is where most of the farming is, at this point, has dropped some. But the valley floor hasn’t dropped any. There’s been quite a bit of controversy over the pupfish situation here in the valley because of this dropping water level. And from my information these pupfish were prehistoric—well, connections to the prehistoric ancestry that’s supposed to unlock the theory of evolution. And they’re quite concerned over this drop in the water level itself for fear that UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 12 these pupfish will go instinct and we will lose the scientific knowledge that we might gain from them. Could you comment on the situation, the actual situation on pupfish? Well, as I understand it, thousands of years ago this was all under the Great Basin area, was all underwater. And as the waters receded these fish, which were all common to the huge lake area, which was most of the state of Nevada and Southern California, the Death Valley area, and as the waters receded, these fish receded back into springs and streams, and from a common ancestry developed into separate species over the years. And they have—they’ve shown to develop quite rapidly into separate species and the pupfish itself, what we call—what we know as the pupfish are found in the Devil’s Hole area of Ash Meadows and in several other areas of Southern California and Southern Nevada. However, in this valley is what is commonly called the Pahrump Killifish, which is a cousin to the pupfish. And, at the present there’s only one known population and that’s in the Manse Spring. Now this Manse Spring, as I mentioned before has been artesian springs there on the ranch and they have been receding. When it’ll dry up, I don’t know, but due to pumping, for agriculture, here in the valley, that spring has been receding for the last, I don’t know how many years, many years. And ultimately, it will dry up and that’s where the concern is, is because it would then endanger these killifish. Now these are— Well, what solutions do they have for this—for persevering the pupfish? Well. What has been their—? I know in the Amargosa Valley, they have actually shut down the pumping of water for agricultural purposes to preserve these fish. Right. In the Devil’s Hole area. Do you think that this could actually happen here in Pahrump also? UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 13 Well, it could but I don’t think it will. That’s the only way you would preserve these fish in the natural habitat, is to stop the pumping. And the other way to preserve the fish, which you could lose some—I’m told, you’d lose some of the scientific value, would be to transplant into an artificial refugium, and this can be done, successfully. There are transplanted killifish and pup fish in a refugium at Boulder Dam or Hoover Dam and also at Corn Creek in the Las Vegas Valley. And they had been successful. However, they don’t like to take ‘em out of their true natural environment because that loses some of the scientific value. But it’s a matter of the spring, and Manse Spring will dry up, in the future. So, it’s a matter than of either curtailing all the pumping in the Manse fan area or transplanting into an artificial refugium, these fish. Now they’re—these killifish were, will get up to about two inches long. They’re a little larger fish than the pupfish are. And there’s a population normally of around two hundred of ‘em here in this Manse Spring. Our attitude has been that they should be transplanted into an artificial refugium otherwise the pumping would have to be shut off, the agriculture curtailed and we think that the agricultures more important than the endangered species of the killifish. Along this land of farming and ranching being the mainstay of this valley, there’s been a, sort of a trend or switch for subdividing, being one of the most important factors in this valley as far as money, and financial—how do I want to say, well, mainstay that keeps this valley going now. What has Cal Vader—I know the Cal Vader Corporation came in and bought the old Pahrump Ranch and what are they doing in here and what is attracting people for this land speculation that’s been occurring in this valley? Well, of course, once we had power and once we had telephones and some highways to get in and out, then you could start to have a community including people that didn’t farm. Prior to that, you either had to have some special business interests or farm interests to live in here. UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 14 Because it was difficult with no power or telephone. So, once we got that, then this area began attracting investors and speculators and land developers because it’s a large area of privately owned land. In fact, it’s the second largest area, Las Vegas Valley is the first, and it’s the only area near Las Vegas where there is any large amount of privately owned land. So, this was the attraction. Everything else is federal government land in the southern half of the state. By and large, very little private land. So, at this point in time, the Pahrump Valley is becoming, fast becoming a better community for Las Vegas. People are commuting to work in Las Vegas. They’re commuting to the test site. There was a survey taken by the University of Nevada just a couple months ago that showed that forty-nine percent of the people worked outside the valley. But a lot of people want space and this is an area where they can get space, live in a rural atmosphere and drive to work. Yes. So the Cal-Vada people, by buying the Pahrump Ranches has—has a large scale development on the way, and that seems to be what is intended for the future of this valley is in residential development. You mentioned the atomic test site at Mercury and people commuting to work there. What impact has the test site had on this valley as far as—have you—you were living here all, most of your life, what has this nuclear blasting done to this area? Anything that you have noticed in particular as far as land movement or anything to that nature? No. We’re about thirty-five miles from the actual testing and of course I remember when they used to have the atmospheric testing, we could see very plainly from here, the mushroom, the flash, a few minutes later hear the rumble, and even since they’ve curtailed the atmospheric testing, we still are aware of the underground testing. We can feel the shockwaves but as far as UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 15 damage there, it’s very light. There’s never been any damage but economically it’s been good for the valley because there are a lot of people living here that work at the test site. We’re only less than forty miles to the Nevada Test Site, Mercury. Mm-hmm. And Las Vegas is seventy miles and it’s closer and a lot of people would rather live in the country. So, it’s had a definite effect on the Pahrump Valley and its growth. Along these lines, I specifically remember in some of the years that I lived here, the testing of the X15 in this area. Now imagine you’ve sighted the X15 a few times. Were—did they use this huge dry lake out here for test, that testing purpose or do you know very much about that (unintelligible)? Well, what they did was, Edwards Air Force Base was the headquarters, of course, for the X15 testing. So they would fly with a mothership into the atmosphere with the X15 attached. And then, after they got to a certain altitude, they would release the X15 and try for speed records and altitude records. And they would usually release it over this—an area here. Watch—we’ve watched the releases many times. And they had these dry lakes spotted around. There was one mud lake in Tonopah. There’s this one here. Several of these dry lakes they had marked out as emergency landing fields in case something went wrong with the X15 they could glide to one of these fields and land it. And there were times when there were problems with it because when it was released from the mothership, if things didn’t fire and go right, they found themselves with a dead airplane, they had to get it down and this dry lake was used as an emergency landing facility. Oh, it was in my understanding that this dry lake was also used during the world war, I believe World War Two, to land bombers and planes on this. It was huge and hard and flat UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 16 and they would actually do some night landing or something. Do you recall any of this or know much about this? Well, I was told that that was the case and then, then after I moved out here, it was used as a practice field for their practice maneuvers. And they would bring the large four engine jets, Air Force planes into here. And just as an exercise, as a possibility in case of a natural disaster, they would have a place to bring their airplanes and store ‘em. I understand that these springs in this valley, these artesian springs were stopping points along a stage line that connected Tonopah and Jean and Southern California, and through this area. Can you elaborate on some of these springs and their names and what purpose they serve for these stage lines? Well, the two main ranches, the Manse Ranch and the Pahrump Ranch was about all there was until, oh, into the 1940, late 1940s. But the old Pahrump Ranch still has the old one building up there today, with the name painted across, “Pahrump Store”. It’s quite a landmark. It’s still standing. It’s a wooden lumber building. And, the Pahrump Ranch commercialized more than the Manse Ranch but it was a stopping over place to rest and feed animals and take on provisions and water and— These stops were run by the stages themselves? Or were these privately owned? Or do you know? I don’t know. I read some of the history. I think they were privately owned and it was more operated by the ranch owners themselves. I’d like to ask you, in your years here and in the developing years of this valley, I’m sure there were some people that were very influential and very important to the growth of this UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 17 valley. Could you give me some of these people’s names? And what they did in this valley? And a little bit on their background. Yes. I can tell you about what the people—about the people that were here when I came and some that came shortly after. To begin with, I think that probably Louie Sharp. Louie Sharp is part Indian. He still lives here. He’s getting elderly now. But Louie has lived all his life right here in the valley. And he’s worked for many of the ranches around and Louie Sharp worked—part of the ranch that we bought when we first came out here was called the Old Kellogg Ranch. And it has some history, in fact I got part of it from Louie Sharp. A woman by the name as Louise Kellogg came out and took up, purchased one way or another some of this land, near next to the Manse Ranch. At that point in time the Manse Ranch was owned by HD Cornell from the San Diego area. And she drilled wells and planted quite a bit of the ground. She was a—had some income from somewhere and I’m not sure—I’m not sure just where it did come from but she was quite an old character, I guess. Very wiry. Always had a lot of dogs with here. She would drive a cattle truck. Her idea was to set up a cattle operation here, feed lot, raise the feed, mill the feed, feed the cattle and so on. But her plans were cut short. In 1942, she was bitten by one of her dogs and, as a result, contracted tularemia. I think her dogs were fighting and she used to have Russian wolfhounds and apparently they had contracted the tularemia from perhaps the rabbits in the area and she died from the tularemia. But Louie is still here, has his own piece of ground down the south end of the valley. I think back, outside of the people I mentioned that were here when I first came, Jim Raycraft was here. Can I interrupt you for a minute here? You bet. UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 18 And—we’re talking about this Kellogg Ranch, now I’ve seen these. She had two large greeneries and a sort of a mill affair set up on your ranch, and—so in other words, she must’ve had some, quite a large operation in process at one time here. Or was this just the beginnings and she never really quite finished the operation? No. this was only the beginning. She planted quite a few acres of ground. She built the mill building. But she never did get the thing operative nor the equipment installed. She drilled quite a few wells. So it was only the beginning. She was here probably not more than about three years. Okay. And—so anyway, to go on, Jim Raycraft was one of the old timers here. He had a piece of ground up in the center of the valley, which he later sold to Larry Bowling. And in fact, Larry’s on it, still occupies it now. Next to him was Frank Boole. Commonly known as Pop Boole. Now he was a brother to Pete Boole, Perter Boole, who was, probably, I think the first mayor of Las Vegas. Frank Boole was an assemblyman from Nye County and Frank Boole then, after he became quite elderly, sold the property, to Dolby Doc Cadel, who is the same Dolby Doc that is known pretty much across the state of Nevada for his gambling adventures and so on. Dolby later sold it to the Binions from the Horseshoe. In fact, the Binions own it now. Well, this is—I’ve seen this place of Dolby Doc’s and it’s quite a large place, quite an elaborate ranch house and set up, housing set up. Why did he invest so much money in a housing project out here? Or was that him? Or was that Binions? No. That was Dolby Doc. What happened there, Dolby Doc made a lot of money in gambling in Elko and Las Vegas area, but—and he was quite an antique collector and he still is. He has many, many antiques and things of value. But he attempted to, started to build a fallout or a UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 19 bomb shelter in Clark County there, just south of the Tropicana Hotel. And he ran into—he wanted to build it like he wanted to build it. And he ran into problems with building permits and building codes. And he had the hole excavated for this bomb shelter and when he ran into these problems it just made him mad and so he bought this property out here and he moved out here and built it. Now this bomb shelter may not be up to code but it’s, one thing about it, it’s strong. He poured concrete walls three feet thick and ventilating system, it’s quite a layout. I’ve been in it. But anyway, that’s how Dolby Doc got involved here. And then, in recent years, he did sell it to Binion’s and moved back into his property on Reno Lane just south of the Tropicana. Another person that was here when I come, when I first come out here was the Turner family, Bill and Dutch. And they had, they were farming here. They had worked on the Pahrump Ranch. Dutch was postmaster then, a few years after I came out here, after Marie Spencer and then—in fact, she’s postmaster at present. They later bought what was known as the Tudor Ranch, Henry Tudor from Boston. I don’t know how he got involved out here. But he had three hundred and twenty acres in farmed. Spent quite a little bit of time himself out here. And some others that came out then along shortly after I did, Lou Hathaway, came in from the San Joaquin Valley. Ernest Peckstein from Vista, California. Lou Vermillion came in from Vista, California. All these people bought land and farm. Then in the—about 1951 and ’52, there was an area here opened up for homesteading. That’s what is commonly—you know we have what we call Homestead Road and an area to the west of Homestead Road was opened up for homesteading. And some of the people that came out here along in the early ‘50s were Kenneth Morehead from Porterville, George Cranmer and Claude Cranmer, I don’t know where they came from but it was California somewhere. Ezra McGowan from (Unintelligible) area. Harlest Wall, his son-in-law from this same area, came over and took up homesteads. Harold Hallman also took up a UNLV University Libraries Kent (Tim) Hafen 20 homestead. Then Bob Rude and his family came over from Madera and Bob is still farming. One of the bigger farmers here now, Frank Warner, who is a brother-in-law of Mrs. Rude, a brother of Mrs. Rude, and his family came over and their still here. Willis Garland came over from California farmed here. Earl Burson came out of Colorado. Earl is still here. Willis Garland is still here, too but he’s—he sold the farm a few years ago when he retired. These people, in other words all came from California area and a few from Colorado and whatnot, for the specific purpose of opening up these homesteads then and—What did they have to do to get these homesteads? Was it just like the regular Homesteading Act? If you lived on it so long, you had to add a property? Or exactly how’d that homestead work? Well, a lot of these people bought private land. But some of them that I mentioned did come over for the specific purpose of homesteading and what they generally had to do was to, to pick out a one hundred and sixty acre parcel and some of the area was open for desert entry, also, which is similar but a little different in that a desert entry you could pick out three hundred and twenty acres of land. And in the homestead, you had to actually live on it, and you had to develop water enough for—I forget the amount of acreage. I think it was forty acres or something like this out of the hundred and sixty. And actually farm it and improve it and fence it. And you could get a patent then from the federal government. In the case of the desert entry, it was a very similar requirement except you didn’t have to live on it. And so that’s how most of that area west of Homestead Road was settled out there. And so