The Homesman, Woke Critics, and Oh, Those Landscapes!

 I'm going to depart from my regularly-scheduled programming for a few minutes to opine on the matter of a damned good film from way back in 2014 and its poor reviews. I always hesitate to switch from actual western life and history to the films, unless I can present them in relation to the actual western / historical backdrop that informs them, partly because it galls me that "authentic west!" magazines are now almost exclusively about Hollywood west, but I'm also going to admit it: You almost can't love the historical west, its landscapes and peoples, without loving a considerable amount of Hollywood west. So here goes!

A couple of nights ago (the Phillies game being rained out), I stumbled across a film that, in my cultural cave, I'd never heard of. What? A western, complete with a female lead and sweeping vistas and Tommy Lee Jones, and I'd never heard of it? Thus intrigued and yet bearing the low expectations of unfamiliarity, I dove headfirst into The Homesman. I was surprised to see it based on a novel by an author that meant so much to me as a young reader - Glendon Swarthout, who gave us such gems as Bless the Beasts and the Children and The Shootist. 

As habit dictates, shortly after watching a film that I've thoroughly enjoyed, I hit the internet to read more about it. First I focus on the cast and credits and filming locations, then on reviews, and then I do a deeper dive into the historical premise (if any). Today I reached the "reviews" portion of the process and found this doozy: USA Today Review of The Homesman. The Homesman, the review title announced, is a "bunch of malarkey," because, You SEE, "Malarkey" is so WESTERN and UNSOPHISTICATED. Three paragraphs in, it was clear the review was written by a woman (and so I looked back at the attribution, and yes, it certainly was). Her feminine sensibilities were deeply offended that a story that was "purportedly about pioneer women" actually put Tommy Lee Jones "front and center." Apparently our interepid critic was so busy being affronted, she failed to notice the title was "HomesMAN" (and was directed by Tommy Lee Jones). It features men, and women, in a hostile setting, and the women suffer greatly - as women did, in 1855. As the old saying goes, the American west was "hell on women and horses," and the film aptly depicts that hell. The pioneer men were boorish, rough men, and the women led lonely, physically demanding lives, and they got little respect for rising to the occasion - but rise they did, some of them. Others went mad. Why this injures the feelings of today's "strong feminist" woman, I don't know. I don't know why it ruins the movie for them, either. Hilary Swank turns in an astoundingly solid performance as a pioneer woman, deeply complex and both tough and sensitive in good supply. 

Tommy Lee Jones captures the "accidental hero" character perfectly. He's neither likable, nor unlovable, but a pragmatic, situational hero named Briggs. (Or is he? In a land where people swapped names as quickly as today's youth swap genders, it's clear he's making the name up when he's first asked.) He's not a sympathetic hero; he's distinctly unsympathetic; yet still we sympathize. That's what makes a great western film character, really. The anti-hero who, through pain or travail, matures and becomes a hero against his own nature. It's a trope that never gets tiresome, because it's the "hero journey" character arc and it highlights emotional depth in a genre that traditionally falls short in that arena. But today's critics, who thrive on the cult of victimhood and the need for distaff editions of superhero films or all-estrogen remakes of comedies, aren't happy. Until we have an all-woman  or all-trans-woman version of The Wild Bunch or The Magnificent Seven, the harpies shall not rest. 

Here's what Dall-E3 came up with when I requested an image of an "all female" Magnificent Seven. I'm sure we'll see that unfortunate remake before too long. 

Our fair reviewer also took issue with the way the film's tone changed throughout: Sometimes serious! Sometimes humorous! Sometimes dark and tragic! But that's the way life is, and why that troubles People with Pens who Review Films, I do not understand. Dark humor takes over when life is challenging but people are tough: they see the humor and absurdity in situations, and it carries them through. I fear for today's generations of humorless scolds who are ill-equipped, physically or mentally, to survive life's challenges. Life is short, nasty, and brutish, and it is up to us to find what is joyful, amusing, beautiful, and funny between the big and serious parts.

Now for the film itself, and not the jaded critics: The storyline is unique, unpredictable, and gritty. Tommy Lee Jones, Hilary Swank, Christian Spader, and even Meryl Streep bring the A-list names. The landscapes, though! Filmed in the wide-screen off-center horizons John Ford brought to the western, the daunting settings capture the big skies and bigger challenges the pioneers faced. Although the film is set in Nebraska territory, it was filmed on the stark prairie ranches of New Mexico, postage-stamp flat and windblown. Anyone who has braved the plains of New Mexico on horseback on a windy and cold day will sympathize with forlorn Mary Bee Cuddy, lost on horseback without food nor shelter. The cinematography is stunning and harsh and intimidating, and the land itself is almost as much of a character as the humans trying to survive it. Extra points for the portrayal of mules in the film, too - the creatures who truly did conquer the west.

Now I shall have to order the book, and see if my youthful adoration of Glendon Swarthout's work holds up. Swarthout, by the way, ended his own life in my hometown, just as his iconic character (played by none less than John Wayne) ended in The Shootist - facing cancer, and going out on his own terms. 

I asked Dall-E3 to create an image of The Wild Bunch, but with all-female characters. I had to laugh to see the Sharon Stone depiction at far right - and the creepy beast head on the floor. To be fair, it's not that much stranger than the weird designer purses Hollywood women carry to awards shows, so there's that.

If you're looking for a gripping, visually stunning, non-formulaic western, similar in mood and ambience to Blackthorne, give The Homesman a shot. If you wish to get it on DVD or Blu-Ray so the wokesters can't edit the snot out of it on streaming platforms someday, please consider buying it through this affiliate link so your purchase can help buy hay for my mules: The Homesman DVD. And then, if you're like me, you'll want to read the novel: The Homesman by Glendon Swarthout (affiliate link). 

Here's the trailer, too: The Homesman Trailer. Enjoy!

Copyright (c) 2024 by Marcy J. Miller * All rights reserved * No part of this content may be copied without the express permission of the author * Links, however,  may be freely shared, and are appreciated * Thanks for linking, liking, sharing, emailing, forwarding, or otherwise helping grow my readership * Most of all, thanks for stopping by and sharing my love of the American west!

Benson's "Dynamite Row," the Apache Powder Historic Residential District

One of the Apache Powder bungalows on W. 6th Street. Note the Register of Historic Places placard to the left of the front door.

 Benson, the important railway town between Tucson and Tombstone, is too often a "drive through" town for tourists heading to Tombstone or Bisbee. They probably note the gorgeous murals that punctuate the weary buildings, and the replica of the original railroad depot on the north side of the main drag, but most pass through completely unaware of some of the historic treasures just a couple of streets south. On W. 6th Street, eight houses and a little town park are lovely little footnotes in a history involving things that go boom, a company's generals, and the predominant architectural style of the area in the 1920s. 

After serving in Teddy Roosevelt's Rough Riders unit in the Spanish-American War, and then serving again in DC in World War II, one of the area pioneers and the newly-minted state's most successful businessmen co-founded a company called the Apache Powder Company. Producing dynamite and nitroglycerin at its plant just seven miles down the road from Benson in what was then called Curtiss, the company was referred to simply as "the explosives factory" to the many locals employed there. Incorporated in the state in 1920, the company finished construction of its Curtiss plant in 1922 and was soon producing a million pounds of powder monthly. A narrow-gauge railroad ran from Benson to the plant, and the employees and officials of the plant ran back and forth as well. In 1925, to provide housing for the higher-ups in the company and managerial staff of the plant, the company invested in a number of lots on W. 6th Street in Benson and began constructing houses. Technically, the lots were first purchased by the officials themselves, but after a dispute over the transactions, the company bought out the lots and houses and rented them back to the officials at a subsidized rate. The April 12, 1925 Tucson Citizen announced that a home for the plant's general manager, D. E. Fogg, was erected on the street.  

  

One of the outliers of Powder Row: this Spanish Eclectic house is an Apache Powder Company house, but not in the Craftsman Bungalow style.

The houses were all stucco, and nearly all were of the predominant architectural style of the region during the 1920s - a style called "Craftsman Bungalow." Compact, trim houses, the Craftsman Bungalow were a toned-down reaction to the frothy fondant excess of the Victorian buildings that previously dotted the west. The houses on 6th Street were generally narrow-fronted but surprisingly deep, and each had a detached garage that opened to a back alley. 

Not only did Donald E. Fogg have a newly-built Apache Powder home to occupy with his wife, Hilda, their two children, and an elderly aunt named Maria M. Baker, but quite naturally so did the president himself, Charles E. Mills, whom I mentioned above as the co-founder and successful businessman. A Harvard-educated mining engineer, Mills worked at a number of the territory's-then-state's major mines, including the Copper Queen in Bisbee and Big Bug in Yavapai County. Mills, who remained Apache Powder's president until his death in 1929, lived in his Powder Row home alone, as he never married. Not only a successful mining engineer, he was also an organizer and president of Valley Bank and other enterprises. 

The 1930 census for Bisbee shows dozens of residents in the 6th Street area employed by "explosives factory." Mechanics, engineers, administrators, laborers - Apache Powder populated the neighborhood. Too, there were physicians - also employed by the plant, because in addition to the residences the company built, there was a hospital. Referred to as an "evacuation hospital" it was intended to serve the employees injured at the plant (and injuries there were!) and their families. 

The Mission Revival style house at 209 W. 6th Street, which was the company's "evacuation hospital." 

The region's newspapers carried frequent updates regarding the progress of the street's Apache Powder houses. On June 28, 1925, the Benson happenings column in the Tucson Daily Star announced that a Mr. Wenzel of Douglas was in Benson on matters related to the building of the houses. On August 16, the Tucson Citizen notified the public the houses' construction was "progressing rapidly," and on November 16th the Daily Star commended the tidy exteriors and trim lawns each of seven new $12,000 bungalows on "Dynamite Row" displayed. By January, 1926, eight of the homes had been completed, to the benefit of Valley Lumber in Globe - who reaped a $70,000 contract in the matter, which also included an office building at the plant. Within a month, in February, 1926, the Arizona Republic announced construction on the new hospital was about to begin and in March, a dispensary was added. 

The hospital construction was timely, as April brought a major explosion at the plant. Three thousand pounds of nitroglycerin exploded, totaling the nitrator building (but only damaging the nitrator itself) and its contents, breaking windows in buildings over half a mile away, and making a big-ass boom heard for miles. Surprisingly, no one was injured; the papers raved about the modern features of the plant that made it safe in such instances. When an employee knew the mixture of the nitro was going badly, he ran from the nitrator building, activating a warning whistle that ensured some other workers nearby could run to safety. Despite the damaged acid lines, steam lines, brine lines, and water lines, General Manager Fogg announced the necessary repairs would be made within just five to seven days.

The plant's physicians, such as Dr. Robert C. Kirkwood (who lived on 6th Street) and his trained nurse wife, Laura, remained busy with other injuries, though. Charles Sharp injured his foot badly while operating a foot adz at the plant; plant mechanic William Lewis suffered a severe head wound from a flying chisel, and was sent to the hospital in Tucson. Roy Miller was badly burned on the face by nitric acid, and although the papers reported it as being "bitten" rather than the correct "stung" by a scorpion, the infant son of employee Felix Miller nonetheless was critically ill after the envenomation. 

In addition to the hospital and homes the plant built in Benson, the company bought a 1.75 acre lot on the north-east corner of W. 6th and S. Central to serve as a community park. In the 1960s, that spartan park was transferred to the city and is still called "Apache Park." 

Eight Apache Powder houses remain in Benson today, and in 1994 the houses and neighborhood were given historic designations by the National Register of Historic Places. Look for the placards on the home fronts. The neighborhood itself is the Apache Powder Historic Residential District, and the Dynamite Row houses are all on the south side of the street, across from the little park and the Benson Town Hall.

If you take the time to visit Dynamite Row on your next drive to, or through, Benson, look for these addresses, which span both sides of S. Central:

143 W. 6th Street    Craftsman Bungalow

157 W. 6th Street    Craftsman Bungalow

173 W. 6th Street    Craftsman Bungalow

189 W. 6th Street    Craftsman Bungalow

193 W. 6th Street    Craftsman Bungalow

209 W. 6th Street    (the hospital, Mission Revival style architecture)

243 W. 6th Street    (Spanish Eclectic Style architecture)

255 W. 6th Street    Craftsman Bungalow

To the rear of the houses, many of the original detached carports still stand (in various states of disrepair). Most of the houses look to be structurally in good condition, though the "trim lawns" the papers once boasted about are in short supply. The Craftsman Bungalows all rest on California redwood piers, under which there are crawlspaces, and feature wood floors and tapered front porch support columns of wood. And as you visit, take a minute to reflect on the optimism and pride the new occupants once had in these historic gems, working proudly at a new, important plant that produced explosives to support the state's mining industry while their children played at the Apache Powder park across the road. This, in 1920s Arizona, was the American Dream. 

Copyright (c) 2024 by Marcy J. Miller * All rights reserved * No part of this content, including photographs, may be copied or published without the express permission of the author * Links to this page, however, may be freely shared and are appreciated * Thank you for linking, liking, emailing, commenting, sharing, or otherwise helping grow my readership, and most of all, thank you for stopping by and enjoying Arizona's history with me!

Rambling Around the East Flank of Turquoise Ridge, Dragoon Mountains

 

After a leisurely morning beginning with the $5.99 breakfast special at Sandy's (opt for the side of hash brown casserole; it's damned tasty) and a drive along Turkey Creek near Johnny Ringo's death site, we took Courtland Road back as we neared home. We diverted north onto the Pierce Road and stopped by some lovely stone ruins of what had once been a grand old building. Just west of it is the east flank of Turquoise Ridge, not far from the ghost towns of Courtland or, nearer to home and to the south, Gleeson. 

These are the mountains I look out upon as I sit here at the computer. I see the south face of them, and the traces and slag from the old copper mines at Gleeson. Turquoise Mountain, though, is (shockingly enough) more known for its turquoise mining. 

Today I wanted to see how close I could get to a specific gorge in the mountains, just below the ridge (see the dark "v" almost dead center in the photo above, taken from the ruins). Having not much time to hike back and still get home to give my special pup his meds on time, I figured I'd get as close as I could and then return with more time, a day pack with a sandwich, and my GPS to mark the site. 

My other half, maintaining a comfortable distance as we hiked "together."

Near here, along what was once the stage route that conveyed travelers to Tombstone starting in 1890, was the settlement of Turquois (as they then spelled it) and its multiple saloons, hotels, eating places, and store. There is no "first jail" where one can visit ruins; the "jail" was, in the 1890s, a live-oak tree to which offenders would be shackled by the ankle, as many as three transgressors at a time. Miners produced silver ore from the area (the Turquois Mining District) and freighted it to mills at Soldier's Hole in the valley below and to the east. The glory days didn't last long: In 1894 the demonetization of silver closed the enterprises. Miners abandoned the camp. Just two remained behind to dig for the semi-precious turquoise prevalent in the area that had long been mined by native people. Those two, Silas Bryant and N. C. Rascal, eventually deeded most of their claims to a New Yorker, G. Armeny. Armeny had the enviable fortune of contracting with Tiffany & Co. to provide the turquoise they sold. Despite turquoise selling for less per ounce than gold, Armeny made a greater profit than those digging the precious metal: he sent shipments of the blue-green rocks to New York for up to $500 a pound. Under various owners, the hills produced a great deal of turquoise up through 1936 when the claims, largely exhausted, were sold to Indian traders in New Mexico for jewelry crafting. (Source: The Dragoon Mountains, by Lynn Bailey.)

Some pretty rocks still remain in the Dragoons

But back to the hike. We poked around some mining slag heaps and what appeared to be long-abandoned sites where ore was washed, then headed cross-country up the hillside to the small gorge that incited my curiosity. This time of year, there's not much greenery, but there - in the v of the mountainside - are green trees, what appears to be a small cave, and a field of ocotillo on the slopes. Often, ocotillo-covered slopes are a "tell" of underground caverns. The trees make me think there's a spring there.

Ruins near the slag heap. Note the horizontal pipe extending from the right side. 

There is a mining road, parts of which have long since seen any use, proceeding up to Turquoise Ridge, but the switchbacks built in for the safety of hauling ore make it more direct to just forge through the nasty-ass mesquite and up and down a few steep ravines. The terrain is rough and the loose rocks made my bad ankle turn on a few occasions, but with the assistance of a sotol shaft as a makeshift walking stick, I survived. 

The intended destination. I got this close!

We got as close to the little gorge in the hillside as possible before I decided to head back. So close! Within reach, but not today. Not the ocotillo in the lower right foreground and the vertical sotol shafts scattered across the slope in front of the gorge. 

And so we turned back into the mesquite and the loose rock and made our way to the Jeep by the ruins.

 

The hike back on a stretch of old mining road. Note the two structures in the distance: That's where we parked. The Swisshelm Mountains are in the background, with the snow-covered Chiricahuas at left. 

The ocotillo faded away as we hiked, as did the sotol, leaving red rock, grass, and that blasted nasty-ass thorny mesquite. Plenty of lovely purple-hued antique glass dots various sites along the hike, along with rusted fragments of cans and plenty of cow chips from the herds that still roam the ranches here. 

The path turned the prettiest color of rust for part of the hike. The Chiricahuas are at background right.

 

We knew we were close to the Jeep when we hit this fork in the road.

These mountains - the Dragoons - are filled with fabulous ruins, be they of stone-built buildings or concrete mining structures. I have to laugh reading Yelp reviews of the ghost towns here; a lot of readers are distinctly unimpressed because the ghost towns are "nothing but ruins." Some even put "ghost towns" in scare quotes to drive home the point they doubt that such remnants of the past are, in fact, ghost towns. Dear Reader, please note that a ghost town is, de facto, ruins and remnants and tattered, wind-eaten walls. You will not find cute boutiques here with T-shirts and scorpion-filled resin keychains. You're only 15 miles from Tombstone, though, so have at it. Here, you'll be able to visit the wonderful "living" ghost town at Pierce, the many ruins along the Ghost Town Trail (including at Gleeson, a mile from my home),  and a shop at the privately-owned town of Turquoise, where you can even buy some turquoise. There's plenty to look at if you get out of your car and walk around those crumbling stone walls along the way.

Yours truly, old dog-eared ruins among the ruins.

If you go: I'd call this a moderate hike; short, but with plenty of slope, rough terrain, and the nasty-ass mesquite. During warmer months you'll need water and to be very aware of the rattlesnakes. There are open mines, shafts, and pits throughout these mountains, so watch where your feet will fall at every step. The ravines are steep and slippery. There's often no one around, so be aware and be self-sufficient. No bathrooms. No trail guide. No signs. The way life ought to be. And if you pack it in, pack it out.

For further reading: I love this book by Lynn Bailey that I sourced above. If you buy it through this affiliate link, I thank you for your purchase as I may receive a commission. The Dragoon Mountains

Copyright (c) 2024 by Marcy J. Miller * All rights reserved * No part of this content may be reproduced without the express written or electronic permission of the author * Links, however, may be freely shared and are appreciated * Thank you for linking, liking, forwarding, citing, or otherwise helping grow my audience * Most of all, thank you for stopping by and taking a moment to appreciate this amazing state of Arizona.