I.. Soap Creek Road

Charlie Olson: would have them by the other hock.

Bob Zybach: What was the dog's name?

Charlie Olson: Trixie.

Bob Zybach: Trixie, okay.

I. Soap Creek Road

Bob Zybach: Now, we just passed the bridge, the first bridge on the left coming from Sulphur Springs and you said Joe Hansen built that bridge?

Charlie Olson: Yeah, but this has been rebuilt since.

Bob Zybach: Do you remember when Joe Hanson built the bridge though?

Charlie Olson: It would have been pretty close to 1940.

Bob Zybach: 1940, okay. And there was a house where we just passed the bridge and we're looking on the right here.

Charlie Olson: There was no house here at all at that time. There was no house here at all, but the county road came out right back yonder.

Bob Zybach: Where that trailer house is?

Charlie Olson: Yeah, it came out right there.

Bob Zybach: Okay.

Charlie Olson: And it crossed this creek.

Bob Zybach: This one on our left here now.

Charlie Olson: It crossed this creek some where right here, it forded, there was no bridge across it. There is now here, but .

Bob Zybach: There was a ford here, so this. . . we've got an area right down there, Angela can probably see it off to the left and we've got a slope down here in these alder here that looks like a slope to the bank. Yeah, see that right off on our left here could that have been the ford?

Charlie Olson: I can't see, I'll have to turn around.

Bob Zybach: It's kind of subtle.

Charlie Olson: There was no trees in there at that time, but there's where the county road crossed and . .

Bob Zybach: So this is the old county road. .

Charlie Olson: And it got over to the middle of this ridge that goes up here . . . that we saw to our

Charlie Olson: right when we were stopped up yonder.

Bob Zybach: So that's now on our left.

Charlie Olson: It went over here and then went right up that ridge. And it stayed on that ridge until it got up to our place and then it went into our place and went through it.

Bob Zybach: So let's. . . we can't get up there today, so let's say we're on this county road and we're heading west across the ford in this creek. Does this creek have a name here?

Charlie Olson: No. It was just part of Soap Creek.

Bob Zybach: Did any body live down in this area where.

Charlie Olson: Nobody, there was nobody here.

***

Charlie Olson: He [Cook] would have had to have owned this.

Bob Zybach: Okay, so we're at the Cook's place right here, [with the] county road going down the valley, it's crossing on this ford here and this is just kind of open field here then. There's nobody here.

Charlie Olson: There was nobody living . . . we were four miles from our nearest neighbors.

Bob Zybach: Okay. So then coming up towards this ridge here, did the road cut sharp to the right or did it just kind of angle up the ridge?

Charlie Olson: It just angled up that ridge.

Bob Zybach: So maybe it intersected it maybe over there about ten o'clock or something like that? I might be able to find that on the ground, so. . . it went up the ridge and how far up the ridge was your place?

Charlie Olson: That county road stayed on the ridge until it came up to our place and it still stayed on the ridge and went through our place. And went over on what was known as the Longfellow place at that time. And the Longfellow place. . . had some prairies that we called Fern Prairies, there was no trees on it, and it went through there and right down a canyon to Kings Valley.

Bob Zybach: So this ridge line goes all the way through to Kings Valley?

Charlie Olson: That's the county road that went right through to Kings Valley.

Bob Zybach: Okay. Because I think that road's been in there since the 1850's. I think they hauled lumber over that in 1850. That's why I'm real curious about U. Were there an orchards between this point here and your house?

Angela Sondenaa: [ANGELA] [exasperated] Nobody lived here, Bob. They could have had pioneers that lived here before. . . or they could have planted orchards

Charlie Olson: people, most people planted orchards right around their houses, didn't they? They'd be apt to live there, there would have to be a place there at that time, but there wasn't. Right here there could have been a place, because there was some roses right about . . . just a little behind where these cars are was a bunch of roses and some bricks.

Bob Zybach: Oh, okay. And where these cars are, right in front of the Ponderosa pine there, looks like Ponderosa, something like that. There was roses and bricks right in that location and that was. . . was there when you were a kid. Were there any apple trees around here?

Charlie Olson: No.

Bob Zybach: How about up on your place? Did you have apples up there?

Charlie Olson: My father planted some Bismarks and some Baidwins and two or three others, and a sweet apple, and a Royal Ann cherry tree, and a Black Republican cherry tree, and pie cherry tree.

Bob Zybach: Do you know about what year he planted those?

Charlie Olson: Yeah, he built that house when I was newly born in the log cabin right down below it. And he planted those trees soon after he got that house built, he planted those trees.

Bob Zybach: So right around the turn of the centuty, right around 1900.

Charlie Olson: It probably would have been 1901 or 1902 when he planted the trees.

Bob Zybach: Are any of those trees still there?

Charlie Olson: They were the last time I was up there, they were there, but there was stuff growing all around them. He made. . . here's something on this wood again, he made that roof out of this yellow fir, he split shingles, he made shakes out of that and sold shakes to anybody that would want shakes. He would burn the trees down, I told you about that, and when they would fall, he would saw them off, you know, so they wouldn't go on up and burn up completely and then he would make shakes and he would sell those shakes, but when he built that house, he made shingles and he shaved the shingles with a draw shave and those shingles were on that house about ten years ago.