wJ.rr.su She Warren Eecorii
West Texas
Grocery Trip
Miles Long
"We pioneered this
place in 1935," said
Sammie Bramblett,
standing in the dusty
backyard of her blufftcp
ranch, looking across
the broad Rio Grande
valley toward Mexico.
"At age 74 she lives
alone at the end of the
longest dead-end road in
all Texas," writes Grif
fin Smith, Jr., who stood
in her backyard and ob
served, "There was no
other human habitation
as far as the eye could
see."
To reach the nearest
grocery store, Mrs.
Bramblett must drive 86
miles round-trip, and
her ranch still has no
telephone. A two-way
radio is rigged so that
incoming calls make the
car horn blow.
Handy With Pistol
Smith asked her if she
was ever afraid. "I've
got a pistol, and I know
how to use it," she
replied.
in Texas west of the
Pecos River, lots of
people have pistols, and
they know how to use
them. Smith spent
several weeks last fall
exploring the huge area,
and found it to be
"among the last truly
idiosyncratic parts of
the United States, and
its people...a tough, old
fashioned breed, secure
in their convictions and
self-sufficient in their
ways, delighted to be
left alone."
Smith's report is in
the February National
Geographic. In order to
seek out dozens of
"people for whom
solitude is the basic fact
of life," he maneuvered
his four-wheel-drive
vehicle through
canyons, mountains,
and desert flats.
"Spanish explorers
called it the despoblado
—the unpopulated
place," Smith writes.
"Texans who speak
today of the Trans
Pecos or, more loosely,
the Big Bend country,
mean this same rugged
quarter. Though it em
braces nine counties and
part of a tenth, together
the size of South
Carolina, it is home to
just 55,000 inhabitants,
excluding El Paso."
Drawing on his exper
iences in the region,
Smith observes:
Highway-loving cowboys whoop and holler as they take a Sunday trot around
the We Texas town of Van Hom. The only way station of consequence for
By Dan Dry.
1984 National Geographic Society
175 miles on Interstate 10, Van Horn serves long-distance travelers who need
to buy gas, have a drink, or stretch their legs at a bus station.
—"Redford and near
by Presidio are farther
from a commercial air
port than anywhere else
in the lower 48 states."
—"Candelaria.. .is so
small that the church
celebrates Mass only
every other week."
Wasteful Torrents
—"The search for
water is the one abiding
constant of life.. .When
torrents come, water
runs off with wasteful
havoc. The proud Pecos
highway bridge near
Langtry was 50 feet
above the river, but a 20
inch downpour one night
in 1954 obliterated it be
neath an 86-foot-high
wall of water. In the
Trans-Pecos, fortune
smiles with bared
teeth."
—"Fort Davis . . is
the highest town in
Texas at 4,900 feet: con
servative, chilly, a bit
straitlaced. The court
house has turnstiles to
prevent stray cattle
from wandering off the
street and into the halls
of justice."
-"In 1859 John But
terfield's stage traveled
from the Pecos River to
El Paso in 55 hours. Now
sleek buses cover the
same distance in less
than six. But travelers
still stop for fuel and
refreshment at Van
Horn, the only town of
consequence for 175
miles on Interstate 10."
-"Mexican - Ameri
can influence is on the
rise. Six counties now
haye Hispanic
majorities. But the
ethnic transformation is
less a matter of num
bers than of participa
tion-social, political,
and economic-by
people who once stayed
Silkworms
The work of 3.000 silk
worms, which have consumed
35 pounds of mulberry
®8ves, may be needed to fash
on a heavy silk kimono,
t takes 110 cocoons to make
i tie, 630 for a blouse.
on the periphery."
The ghost town of
Terlingua, Smith writes,
has been described as
"the fartherest you can
go without getting any
where." Smith drove
that distance to visit the
annual Wick Fowler
Memorial World Cham
pionship Chili Cook-off.
For two days each
November, a "portable
village" sprouts in the
desert. At what he calls
the "mardi gras of the
country and western
set," Smith joined 8,000
other spectators:
Pungent Aromas Arise
"There were people
dressed as chili peppers,
as monks, as locomo
tives. There were boun
cy women dressed as
Dallas Cowboys and
bearded men in
brassieres as their
cheerleaders. There
was the Best Little Chili
House in Texas. And
from many of the sim
mering caldrons the
smells were, well,
disturbing. Was it chil
or was it herbicide?"
Smith drove away
from Terlingua, east
ward into the wild coun
try of Big Bend National
Park, the scenic heart of
the Trans-Pecos. "As I
drove through its vast
silences, the uproar of
the chili cook-off
receded like a thunder
storm. This was land
scape reduced to its
essentials, surface and
horizon and sky A 'ove
of such land, witii its
solitude and its spare,
sudden beauty, and no
less a love of personal
independence — the
chance for a man to do
as he pleases, unwatch
ed and unbossed—make
the people of the Trans
Pecos what they are."
As early as 1869, church women in America who were
concerned about hunger, poverty, education and medical
care organized to meet the needs of people in these areas.
At a time when the roles of women were extremely rigid,
Methodist women joined others to
i-prpT TArvTCTT found schools, build hospitals,
1V1 h 1 Hv/L/lO 1 J work to abolish child labor, march
Serving God for 200Years gigg
America ^ther things to ma,ce °ur soc>cty m°re
United Methodist Churches In Warren County
Bethlehem Hebron Jerusalem
Macon Norlina Providence
Shady Grove Shocco Zion
Wesley Memorial Warren Plains