[AT] another story about the early days of Oregon

[DAVIESW739 at aol.com]

Brother Joe and Sister Mary had quite a fine  "turn out", a cart made of the 
front wheels of a wagon. Bill Athey was a cabinet  maker and he had built a 
bed for it that was just as fine as one could ask for.  He polished it and 
stained it to what he called Venetian red. The dye stuff came  from a clay bank up 
the river and was about the color of a new  brick.

Brother Joe drove a yoke of Spanish oxen, perfectly matched  and as black as 
crows. They had huge horns that interfered unless they kept them  interlocked 
or their heads tilted. They were trotting oxen and the big cart  swinging 
across the prairie behind them, left a fine cloud of dust in its wake.  I was 
pretty proud when I drove to church with them. They usually stopped for me  as 
they passed our house. Eleanor Beers was my especial friend. The Beers lived  
next door to Brother Joe's and Eleanor most always went to church with them.  
Eleanor and I always sat on the back seat and held on tightly lest we be josted  
out.

Eleanor was fine company and under cover of the rumble of the  big cart, we 
could laugh just as loudly as we pleased, even though Mother  happened to be 
along.

One Sunday we were both terribly excited,  Eleanor wore her new pink shawl, 
it was the most beautiful shawl that I ever  saw, a delicate shell pink silk, 
with deep, deep knotted fringe and raised  figures thrown up in wonderful 
patterns, thick and solid next to the edge and  less so toward the center. Eleanor 
was very fair and I thought her the loveliest  thing I had ever seen.I got 
into the back seat beside Eleanor carefully, lest I  sit on the edge of her shawl 
and crush it. She drew the ends well away from me  and tucked them around her 
on the other side. We were on our way when something  seemed happening to 
Eleanor and Eleanor's shawl, it was almost gone from her.  She clung to the 
vanishing corner of it and screamed. A final violent wrench and  it was gone. 
Brother Joe stopped the oxen and went back to look in the grass and  low bushes, he 
looked everywhere. Eleanor's pink shawl had just completely  vanished. 
finally Joe, wise in the ways of carts, thought to look at the hub.  Sure enough, 
there was the shawl, wound around and around, but you would never  have known 
that it had once been pink, but seeing it, one could readily tell  that it would 
never be pink again. Though Mother worked and worked at it, the  axle grease 
was ground into every fiber of it. It was such a mess, completely  ruined and 
on the first day that she had been allowed to wear it. Our Sunday was  
spoiled. Brother Joe turned back and spent the day at our house.

If Eleanor Beers were alive now and you were to ask her about the greatest  
tragedy of her life, I am sure she would tell you about the pink silk shawl 
with  the brocade figures and the deep, knotted fringe around it.

By Charlotte  Matheny Kirkwwod
(the last known surviving member of the 1843 wagon  train)

Walt Davies
Cooper Hollow Farm
Monmouth, OR 97361
503  623-0460