It's Day 215.....it's Also December 7th 2019.......and we are in Bisbee Arizona

It's Day 215.....it's Also December 7th 2019.......and we are in Bisbee Arizona

Bisbee Arizona....a fascinating place....a lot to get to ... a lot to learn......but first.....

some stuff I'd learned along the way......that "way" between a place on Two Cow Road over there in the Sonoran desert....that place we'd learned of Gila Monsters..... and the other natural born killers in the Arizona desert.....and this place we find ourselves in today....with a mining history....as rich as any......a history that broke records....and broke norms. And Bisbee lived through that history and created a personality......and a presence of it's very own. No place else on earth....can make claims to history....that Bisbee can...and does.....

Diggin around on the internet that last night on Two Cow Road...I'd learned of the incredible engineering feats that had enabled an ancient civilization to prosper in the Arizona desert....long before anyone called it "the Arizona desert"...and how modern technology would take water management to another level....and build that piece of the Sonoran desert into one of the largest metropolitan, economic,..... and cultural centers in the country.

But in the middle of all this....I'd also learn of a place called Pearce Arizona...Pearce....is a small rural community south of Phoenix...opposite of where we were on Tow Cow Road...and just 50 miles or so from where we are here in Bisbee.

In many respects, pearce is not unlike any other community....large or small in Arizona. The town was born in 1894 when a guy Named James Pearce discovered gold...and filed a claim for the Commonwealth Mine. A mine that would go on to deliver over 8 million bucks in silver....and 2.5 million dollars worth of gold. After the mining years....the towns future would follow that of many mining towns.....for a time even being considered a ghost town....a legacy it holds on to, and celebrates to this day. Today...it's a community of just over two thousand. Two thousand folks that enjoy a quiet life....a few of them continuing generational traditions of ranching and farming in the area.

So why does a place like Pearce pop up when a guys reading about water management in the desert. For me....it popped up in the form of a video titled "In This town...only the rich get water"

I watched the 8 minute video produced by the YouTube Channel....More perfect union......and would learn that everything I had learned to date about water management in the deserts of Arizona....revolved around surface water assets. Had not given much attention to the importance of groundwater in the region...... or that hundreds of thousands....perhaps millions rely on groundwater for their survival....in the desert. And no dam....or canal....can help...when it comes to groundwater levels in the Wilcox Valley area of Arizona.

I certainly had not considered what it might be like to get up one morning....turn on the faucet to make that first pot of coffee of the day.....only to learn that there was no more water. And learning in the next few hours that you ar not experiencing a broken pump in your well or an electrical issue.....your well is dry.

But then to go on to learn that the reason that your well has dried up.....is not because you exhausted the resource....it was because someone else had......and that someone else is a 500 million dollar a year, large scale dairy operation by the name of Riverview.....

The story of Riverview.....is literally....the American Story. A company born in 1939 in Minnesota.....as a small family owned operation that would evolve over the years into the multi faceted partnership....primarily employee owned company....that it is today... In 2014.....the company would expand it's operations into the Arizona desert. ....purchasing thousands of acres of farmland.

For all it's outward appearance....Riverview appears to work hard...and ethically....respecting the land on which they operate and working to contribute to the communities in which they live. ....but appearances are not always what they seem....

when your operations requires millions of gallons of water each each and every day.......for example....who knew...that the average dairy cow consumes nearly 25 gallons of water each day. And those alfalfa fields they irrigate each day to feed those 70 thousand or so cows.....well they drink a lot of water too.

And these demands.....when placed on the areas groundwater tables for nearly a decade now......leads to .... well...that scenario....that scenario in which a neighboring farmer....or rancher.....or retired veteran turns on their faucet on morning....and gets nothing.

Pretty drastic measure have to be taken....pretty immediately.....the day you learn you don't have access to water....in your home....or on your ranch....anymore.

And hence the title of the video.....in this town....only the rich....get water.

As the water tables in the Arizona desert continue to drop....drilling a well is no cheap proposition......and as the effects of large scale operations like Riverview continue to drive the water tables down.......residents are now faced with a 20 to 50 thousand dollar bill....just to keep water in their well. And believe it or not the costs can go even higher....your charged by the foot ...... so the deeper you have to go....at up to 65 bucks a foot.....yikes......the average depth of a well across the region is nearing 800 feet to reach a reliable source....and in some areas deeper. And just 10 years ago....a well could easily sustain a property at 2 to 400 feet.

It isn't hard to believe that many in the area cannot afford to write that check....option b......buy water storage tanks...at a few thousand bucks a pop....and begin having water trucked in. That doesn't sound cheap either....certainly not convenient.

So it appears that some have resorted to living life out of 5 gallon jugs of water as they try to sort things out....some even faced with the proposition of selling their homes....which essentially means abandoning them ...... because that's what happens when you attempt to sell a property with no running water......doesn't exactly fetch top dollar.

And like always.....if ya keep clicking......keep reading......keep watching videos......you'll learn....there's more....more to every story....

As I read of this....I wondered how there could be no rules....no laws....it's 2019.....how can it be that a large scale operation move into an area and literally steal water from those around it. Simply because they can write checks big enough ...... and dig as deep.....and as often as they want.

Well they can....because according to local residents....and I checked it.....Arizona messed up.....and has yet to fix it. In the early 1980's....Arizona passed legislation that would regulate water consumption.....and protect folks from exactly what is happening in Pearce.....the problem.....the regulations applied only to larger metropolitan areas. In larger cities across the state....large corporations are held to strict usage standards and bear the cost across the region for maintaining a reliable water source for the entire community.

But they left about 80 percent of the state out....of being held accountable to these regulations.....in the large expanses of the state...outside those metro areas....in places like Pearce.....Arizona is still considered the Wild West....literally....when it comes to water rights.....and usage. If you can write the check....you can have it....and you can take as much as you want.....regardless of the impact on those around you....your neighbors.

Reading a little further....and listening a little longer.....I'd learn that Riverview...well their not the only ones to have figured this out....

All across Arizona....big business...has been on a buying spree of sorts.....buying up existing ranches and farms....expanding....and profiting.....While the local, generational ranchers and farmers that either sell off or fail....are being replaced with new owners in the area include a Saudi Prince....New York Investment firms and billion dollar insurance companys are becoming the new face of Arizona's farmer.....

it hurts to read of folks that invested their life in land.....land that would fulfill their dreams of living a quiet life in the desert southwest...building something to leave to their family......or the small rancher...3rd generation.....struggling to keep a 2200 acre ranch afloat.....but slowly watching it slip away as the 55,000 acre operation up the way sucks 2 million gallons of water each and every day.....out of the Arizona desert.

I would read that Arizona as a whole faces significant water management challenges, including groundwater depletion, which can indirectly affect overall water availability and management strategies throughout the state.

I wondered.....how many of the nearly 7.3 million folks that call Arizona home.....even know that their state is facing water management issues. .....and that even today.....they have neighbors....fellow Arizonians that are waking up each morning.....forced to figure out how they're gonna get water.....

A bit more reading and it seems Arizona is working on it.....lets just hope they work fast enough. I'd also hope that companies like Riverview are actually working with them.

And then....there's this place called Bisbee.....

We found a great spot in a little RV park called the Queen Mine RV park....at the top of a hill.....even had a bit of a view.....I think we'll hang out here for a bit....

Bisbee is located near the southeast corner of the state.....

It was 1877, when a reconnaissance detail of army scouts and cavalrymen...led by a civilian tracker....was in the area searching for Apache Renegades.....but instead would discover signs of mineralization in the Mule Mountains.....what they were seeing were indications of lead, copper, and possibly even silver deposits in the area. It wouldn't be long....until the first mining claim would be staked in the area. The original encampment was being referred to as Mule Gulch....but within just three years....in 1880 the town would be founded....and named for a San Francisco attorney and judge....by the name of DeWitt Bisbee....a financial backer of the Copper Queen Mine. It's sort of Ironic that Mr. Bisby would never visit the town....even after all those checks he cashed.

Things kept moving fast for Bisbee...the town quickly became known as "Queen of the Copper Camps. Like many mining towns of the era the community would grow fast.....but Bisbee....would grow faster.....and bigger....than those others.

But just prior to the turn of the century....and before all that growth and prosperity.....Bisbee would actually experience a rough patch....and gain an even rougher reputation. A reputation as a dirty camp....a gross camp even....a smoke filled and crime ridden camp..... The internet is littered with photo's of the trash laden streets of Bisbee.....over 50 saloons meant gambling and prostitution had run rampant ......gunfights were common.....as were the dead carcasses of animals that were just left to rot.....in the streets of Bisby alongside open sewer pits.....adding to the stench of the town.... Frequent flooding would only ad to the challenges faced by the rough and tumble community.

But as the town became the second largest copper mining operation in the country....It would be incorporated on January 9, 1902. By 1910, it was the largest city in the Arizona Territory, with over 25,000 residents....in fact....during this same period of time it was actually the largest city between St. Louis...and San Fransisco.....and with this growth and prosperity the town had begun cleaning up it's act. Sewer systems installed....Fresh water piped in....gambling and prostitution would be outlawed....city charters in place....law enforcement established....and the town continued to grow.

The town's mines would go on to produce over 8 billion pounds of copper, 102 million ounces of silver, and 2.8 million ounces of gold, along with significant amounts of zinc, lead, and manganese.....

It would seem.....the town of Bisbee was off and running......however....Bisbee....still had a rough patch or two....in it's future....

Most notably....A labor strike in 1917....along with a chain of events....that would go onto become known....and go down in history as The Bisbee Deportation.

In 1917,......Open pit mining had been introduced in Bisbee.....and WW1 had driven the price of copper even higher....Copper was now big business....and , as I'd just learned, Bisbee had become the second largest producer of Copper in the nation. Not surprising that some labor issues would come along with such dramatic growth.

The success of the mines had led to miners being required to work harder....and longer hours to meet the need...but often times at the same rate of pay....which drove tensions between the miners and mine owners. Further exacerbating the problem....the influx of new miners into the area....and the continued rapid growth of the town continued to drive the cost of living up....driving frustration even higher.... amongst thousands of hard working miners.

At the time....just some 20% of the towns miners were union members....and in may of 1917 these union members would present a list of demands to the mine owners....but when the demands were rejected....over 3000 miners would begin to strike in June of that same year.

The strikes were peaceful, but relatively ineffective.....even so.... the mine owners became concerned that even though union membership amongst the strikers was low....they could have an impact on the thinking of the miner population in general.

At this point.....some crazy stuff started to happen. The mine owners would implement and unprecedented plan....and begin an actual deportation of striking miners. A trial run of their plan would round up some 70 striking union miners and deport them on July 10th of 1917.

And then....two days later on July 12....the really crazy stuff would happen.....when a posse of over 2200 men, led by the sherrif of Bisbee would hit the streets in the early morning hours and begin rounding up striking miners. They had carefully compiled a list of union members and local business owners....those they felt most influential within the mining community....and thus posing the most significant threat to their operations....

Some 2 thousand men would be rounded up....and arrested. The Sherrif would then offer each....the opportunity to denounce the union....and return to work......talk about my way or the hiway??

Around 700 of the arrested....would accept the offer and quietly return to their families and their jobs....the remaining 1300 would be forced at gun point into cattle cars at the rail station and shipped 170 miles east....to Columbus New Mexico....

The officials in Columbus New Mexico objected ...go figure.... to prospect of over a thousand unemployed miners being dumped in their town.....so the train would be forced to backtrack some 30 miles.....and the miners would indeed be dumped in the desert of Hermanas New Mexico with no food or water. All this.....after 16 hours in a cattle car on the hot Arizona desert.

So....with over 1300 penniless miners.....stranded in the desert. around Hermanas....now New Mexico ..... had a problem.

The governor of New Mexico would reach out to President Wilson and ask for help. The president would send Federal Troops to the New Mexico desert to escort the abandoned miners back to Columbus....where they would be housed in tent communities for over two months......while the feds would launch an intensive investigation into the activity that had led to the miners deportation.

Clearly....the mining operations....along with local officials in Bisbee had acted illegally....and without merit....duh.....in the end several individuals would be arrested.....but no one was ever convicted of a crime ..... in relation to the Bisbee Deportation.

An those miners....would never be allowed to return to Bisbee.....many would transition from those makeshift camps around Columbus New Mexico to neighboring towns......some would find work in other mines in the area...and many would leave the state completely in search of a life elsewhere....

And while no one individual was ever convicted of a crime during these events in 1917 Arizona......it would not only be a pivotal event in Arizona's history......it would have it's impact on Labor laws across the entire country....in the years to come

Hmm....when I hear the term....the wild west....all sorts of images are conjurred up....The indian wars....Cowboys...forging a living on the wide open range...and rough and tumble saloon towns....complete with gun fights and fist fights over a poker game gone wrong.....pioneers sweating in the hot sun behind mules and horses working their newly acquired homestead.....wagon trains....pushing west and chasing gold......

But never....ever....had I conjured up the image of thousands of hard working miners being fored into cattle cars at the railways station.....to be shipped off to....and left for dead in the desert southwest......

Until Now.....

And back in Bisbee.....That Copper Queen Mine......would go on to become legend in the mining industry. Between 1917 and 1934 the mine would produce 20 million tons of copper ore.....and grow to cover over 35 acres...and with over two thousand miles of underground tunnel....the mine ranks to this day...as one of the five largest underground mines in the world. It's clear that the Copper Queen Mine is nearly soley responsible for the town of Bisbee Arizona.....and it continues to hold it's place in history as one of the richest mineral reserves....ever discovered in the world. In a time when a loaf of bread would set ya back two cents.....and a night in the saloon could be covered by a buck.....it's no wonder that Americans came from across the country before....during....and after the great depression....in hopes of landing a job in a mine that could offer them 35 cents an hour.....or nearly 5 bucks a day in wages.

Also interesting to learn that donkeys were introduced to the process around the turn of the century and there were actually stables and a vet on staff in the mines. Some of these donkeys never saw daylight for 3 to 4 years and had to under go a re-introduction to “surface life”…and sunlight…at the end of their service in the mines. They were often times donated to local farmers... but many ended up running wild…in the Arizona desert.....helping to explain the large wild donkey population across the state to this day...many of which we've actually seen......and heard.

Mining in Bisbee would continue until 1974 rolled around.....when ore reserves were depleted, leading to the closure of mining operations. The rapid departure of residents would cause a real estate collapse as the towns population dropped dramatically to around 8000 in the first few years....and then even lower.

In the following years....different ..... segments of the population would become drawn to the area....the extremely cheap real estate....combined with the desirable climate in the area would draw retiree's as well as many from what was termed...at the time.... the "hippie" culture....to the area.

Bisbee has continued to evolve over these past 4 decades or so. Today....the population of just over 4000 is known for it's arts community.....the preservation of that almost unbelievable past.....and welcoming.....over a quarter of a million tourists each year. ......I guess this year.....I'm just one of those tourists.

A tourist that actually dawned a hard hat and safety vest....then hopped into one of those miner cars ..... drove deep into Arizona's mining past....and looked first hand....at the technology....and hard work that dug all that copper out of these mountains. The Copper Queen mine....and it's storied past is a pretty super cool tour....if you ever have the chance .....

We'd also have a bit of an adventure of a different sort during our stay in Bisbee. As we topped that hill on Dart Road , and got situated in our spot in the Queen Mine RV Park ....I noticed a bit of Mushiness in the break petal. It was well after dark....so the next morning I checked things out to learn the indeed.....our brakes were going out. While I was excited to begin exploring this place called Bisbee.....I realized it would have to wait just a bit. A quick check in with the managers office would point us to the Highway 98 Service Center....a well respected local repair shop. And a quick shout out to Oney Crowley and the gang down there at the Service Center....these are some pretty awesome guys....hearing of our situation.....they said no problem....let's get you down here and we'll figure things out. Now...getting down there....remember we're parked atop a hill....with a pretty tricky driveway up into the park....no problem....when you have brakes. Which we .... did not. But Oney was on that too....a phone call to a local towing company and Ol' Vacilando was being carted up on to a flatbed tow truck within a couple hours. Once down the hill and on the parking lot of the Highway 98 Service center....Oney and Ricardo had us up and running in no time. What I had imagined being a big deal....master cylinder...break lines....all sorts of ugliness....turned out to be a simple failure at the passenger side front tire.....which had allowed the system to depressurize. A couple hours later...we were headed back up the hill....to settle in again.....and start our exploring.

But this part of Arizona is more than just Bisbee....the truth is....there is a wide swath of Arizona between Tucson and the Mexican border that has something for nearly everyone. From hat tipping cowboys clanking along the streets of Tombstone in their spur clad boots…straightening their neckerchiefs and checking their pistols…all in preparation for the next “gunfight at the OK corral“…a 30 minute re-enactment of the famouse gunfight that takes place 3 times each day.

To checking out the classic car collection in Lowell…

Or that ... afternoon drive out to the Patagonia-Sonoita Creek Reserve for a hike along the creek on your way out to Sierra Vista, home of US Army Base Fort Huachuca. (waachooka)

Majestic cottonwoods along the creek banks and scattered about the country side are monolithic in comparison to everything in their shadow.

Even a drive down to the the bustling border between the same named cities on either side… Nogales Arizona and Mexico. ....Nogales Arizona....population around 20 thousand.....but Nogales Mexico....well over 200 thousand....making this a pretty busy little stretch of the US Mexico Border....

And driving through the quiet streets of Patagonia just today it’s hard to picture it as a bustling trading and supply hub for the surrounding mines…these days it’s 900 or so residents are content to serve as an art and retirement community.

And ..... the surprise find were the cotton fields in Casa Grande…who knew? Cotton being grown....in Arizona.

And walking the streets of old town Bisbee each evening..... would take a while to get old. A place that holds on to it’s old world charm with both hands, somehow managing to celebrate the wild west, and boom town it once was while welcoming newcomers…and the future.

Driving through a December hail storm watching it roll through the multi colored mountain ranges turning them white…then melting away as if it had never happened…all within minutes. Knowing there is likely so much more to explore makes one certain to return…assuming you ever leave!

Which leads me to that last afternoon in Bisbee.....that last walk that led me into a vintage clothing shop today where I met Nettie. A colorful and super friendly Australian lady who relocated to Bisbee nearly 20 years ago.

As I admired a pair of Lucchese boots…(in my size even)…she explained (in that awesome Australian accent) how she had recently dressed a young man in vintage clothing from head to toe for a Halloween event…and how fun it was. She went on to explain that folks were stopping him in the streets to take a photo with him....in his vintage 20's attire....

She then asked how long I had planned on being in Bisbee. I explained that I had arrived intending to stay a couple nights…but that was 9 days ago…so who knows.

Nettie responded with a knowing grin and called out as I left the shop…”Eh…Bisbee just Happens now doesn’t it”

Yep…Bisbee happened…and yes…I bought those boots

And yup.....Bisbee....we'll back....