Anybody know what's happening in Thatcher?

I'm assuming you do, or you wouldn't have brought it up. Why do you ask?

My family is from there. You wanna elaborate? You looking for community? Or did something happen?

Runaway confesses to murder

2 weeks old

Were any brass plates recovered?

OT: Cold Dodger:

Sorry I started, and disappeared on this post. I thought it might be too OT, and then I lost the whole post. I'll Try again.
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My sister and I were born in Thatcher. My grandfather was kind of like the mayor of the town. As I remember it, the town only had one road in and out of town--and the out of town part petered out after a couple of miles (at least that I knew of).

Twin girls were born into this family, and for the rest of family the children were mixed between males and females. My father and mother were born in this relatively small community, and married there.

My father went to collage while living in Thatcher, which was very much to his advantage, when he got to L.A., where he easily got a mangers job at the "shed" (in the office where his father worked as a policeman). Also, as there were many Mexican's working as laborers there, he could very well speak their lingo, which next to no one could in those days.

Back to Thatcher, my grandfather--in order to help give the town things they wanted and needed--owned the towns only country store. In this store he would order big things someone needed, such as tractors, and so forth. There was also some toys for the children which could be purchased.

My grandfather gave my father his first job in the store (cutting meat). It was with this help, that my parents were finally able to save enough money to leave Thatcher, and landed in Los Angeles County.

One of the most differences from this family, than others, was that my grandfather had home-stead-ed just about 1 mile away, into Mexico. He had two houses built there, across the dirt road from each other.

A problem with this arrangement was a that a pure Indian, named Pancho Via, had very little that he owned, except for his horse, and other items necessary for survival in the dessert. As this was his lot, he decided to get some of the white man's wealth for himself. And to get this, he had to steal things owned by them. His bow and arrows helped him in this regard.

However, Pancho became such a threat that my grandfather sent his wife and children back to Arizona, in a wooded, non-shut-able big windows train--in order for the few people riding in the train to get some fresh air. (Only one car, besides the engine, and this not even half-full). Meanwhile, my grandfather--with his small fortune safely tucked into his backpack, road across the divided dirt line between the two areas, in his car.

Many years later, as a teen, I rode on this same train car--a free ride for me, as my father worked for the railroad in L.A. The only other person on the train was a pure Indian women, who had her baby with her, sitting across the row from me. Her baby was wrapped in a wigwam (sp.?), which she uncovered for me so I could see the baby. She, herself, had on a full length velvet skirt which covered her legs.

As we were the only two on this train--both traveling to Thatcher--I took a glance over my shoulder to where she sat (a row or two on the other side of the train from me). As I glanced at her for a few minutes, she proudly took her baby out of its homemade cradle, in order to show the baby to me. The mother had on a long--velvet home-made dress, which came to her ankles. I smiled at her, and nodded. She also rode free on the train--because it crossed Indian-owned territory--and I rode free as my father worked for the railroad.

A few men (three or four) had their guns ready to shoot any unwanted outside person (riding along side the train on their horses, for if they needed). Indeed, this support was often needed, as often the Indians shot arrows through these open windows, in the hopes they could somehow board the car in order to steal what they wanted.

Nevertheless, the train's speed would soon outrun the much slower horses.

As I was raised in Los Angeles County, I remember my father laughed when he heard me say, regarding the L.A river, when I was about 4 years old, "Oh, look at the lots and lots of agwah", which means water in English.

Thanks for those of you who managed to hang-in to read this history of the old-days. :-)

Forgive me for saying, but that’s like the very oldest days. I guess Mexico didn’t modernize until very recently. Lol.

The college is getting bigger. There’s a temple of our Lord sitting just outside of town on the way to Safford. Mt Graham recently had a devastating forest fire. I don’t know much about the comings and goings of individuals who currently live there. I just know the town is growing by leaps and bounds. There’s sidewalks where there wasn’t before, which is a huge step up for a town. A copper mine, a Walmart, a Home Depot, and federal penitentiary make up the biggest employers now. The little guy is struggling to compete. Shops are closing everywhere. Christmas decor is as beautiful as ever, and I’m almost positive that members of my family knew members of yours at some point or another. My grandmother and some of my aunts and uncles on my mother’s side still live in the valley, so I frequent it quite often, especially around the holidays. We used to go up into the mountains ever Labor Day for the church service held up at, what’s it called, Columbine, but that’s where the fire hit.

Cold-Dodger,

In response to your helpful commentary in the now-closed thread, please bear in mind a few things. First, I don't care whether people like me or not. As brash as this may sound, my sense of self is not dependent on the opinions of others.

Regarding you, a man with a modicum of intelligence but an ineluctable need for affirmation rather than personal growth, I do not want your respect--nor that of the several other men on this board who think women should be seen and not heard. Your esteem would in fact be as discomfiting to me as a statement of approval from Lauren Boebert.

I note that you call me "a grade AAA bbbbbbbbbiiiiiiioootch." (It's cut-and-pasted, so I got the spelling right.) My only remark is that you have once again resorted to the argot of the sixth-grade playground. Many people would feel sheepish about having made such a comment, but in your case I offer my congratulations since it may count as a swish on the eight-foot basket.

I wish you success in your unwittingly misogynistic endeavors and hope for your sake, if not hers, that you find a woman who is willing to think and speak as you deign appropriate. Just stay away from women who have their own sense of identity: they're nothing but trouble.

You do NOT speak for all women, and I am NOT angry because you’re a woman. I’m angry because you’re conceited, you get a ruse out of painting even your male allies as the villains, and you don’t go away. I’m not your enemy as a woman. I’m here on this board because the last thing I ever wanted was a subservient women, but what you do has a name in modern parlance — trolling. You took a post that was pro-your-sex and twisted it to feed your victim narrative and marginalize me. Do not address me henceforth please; I will not respond to you anymore.

Cold-Dodger Wrote:
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> I’m angry because
> you’re conceited, you get a ruse out of painting
> even your male allies as the villains,

I think you mean "rise" rather than "ruse." Anyway, I don't paint my male allies as villains. In fact, we are "allies" because we share views and in some cases friendship. That you consider that "villainous" is projection. You dislike our views, so you conjure up an anti-CD cabal, which, as your therapist will tell you, is not a high-level defense.


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> and you don’t go away.

Haha. You think you have the right to expatiate on your favorite topic--you--without interference from anyone else. You think that once you've pronounced the truth, it is incumbent on women and those men who are "villainous" enough to agree with them to retreat to the kitchen and bake donuts while the manly men sit back and watch the Dallas game on TV.

What you don't understand is that this is not the Mormon church and you do not get to tell others what to do.


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> I’m not your enemy as a woman.

"Enemy" is a bit pretentious isn't it? It suggests that my spat with you has some lasting importance, which it does not.


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> I’m here on this board because the last thing I
> ever wanted was a subservient women,

Your writings belie that assertion. You have the impulses of a boorish and patronizing man, the veritable incarnation of Thatcher, AZ sensibility. Deny that as you will, but when you behave as if women are not at the table when the topic is women's rights, your protestations of egalitarianism and progressivism evaporate like the dew on an Arizona morning.


----------------------
> but what you
> do has a name in modern parlance — trolling.

Violation of the board rules. But rules don't apply to you, do they. Just like your saying to people who disagree with you, "fuck your feelings," and "fuck you" and your unintentionally revealing "bbbbbbbbbiiiiiiioootch." I mean, who over the age of 12 speaks like that?


-----------------
> You
> took a post that was pro-your-sex and twisted it
> to feed your victim narrative and marginalize me.

You whiny little snowflake. What you dislike is that I refused to be a victim; I refused to sit by quietly as you treat women as guests at the table to smile with slightly-disguised admiration for your innate superiority. As for your "marginalization," that's just more of your passive aggression. Disagreement is not "marginalization;" argument is not "cancellation."

With your self-indulgent screeds, your endless threads on how life has treated you unfairly, your constant "I am Victim" ruminations, you render yourself unreadable. "Woe is me" is three words, but for some reason you always need 300.


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> Do not address me henceforth please; I will not
> respond to you anymore.

Ah yes, another post attacking others followed by a conclusion that others should shut up. What was that you said to me? "Fuck your feelings. . . fuck you?" Followed now by "and shut up?"

I was really wrong about you. A couple of years ago when you started posting more frequently, I expressed admiration for your thoughtful posts several times--they were thoughtful, and sometimes insightful--and ignored your almost unparalleled egocentrism. I thought you were capable of growth. But when I now go back to when you started to post seven years ago, a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed little Cougar, even then more than a third of your posts boiled down to, in Goethe's intentionally self-indulgent terms, "The Trials of Young Cold-Dodger."

You haven't changed. You evidently lack the ability to move past your pathological fascination with yourself, which means that your native intelligence will continue to languish uneducated and undisciplined.

That's unfortunate.

I find fault with "...evaporate like the dew on an Arizona morning."

I urge you to amend this to "...evaporate like the dew on a hot Arizona summer morning."  Sometimes explicitness can be a virtue.

Also, any sentence that contains "...on a hot..." immediately sends a signal to my reproductive system, which is entirely composed of Natural Man ingredients.

Thank you.

My great grandfather Mons Larson was sent to the Gila vally by B.Y.
My father was born there in 1902

thedesertratl:

The name "Larson" is familiar to me, even as it moved
from Thatcher, to L.A. county. My family visited them regularly. He was a very tall man.

He became a "plain-close" detective, whom I happened to see in a store in L.A. I stopped to talk with him, but he quickly shooed me away, as he was on a case.

It's corny to say this, but it IS a small world, in so far as our path crossing in the store. :-)

Some of you my be asking yourself, "Won't this Thatcher yarn ever end?"

Well, one more story to add: In the very hot summer, my grandfather sent his sons (via horses) up to the nearest high mountain to cut big stones of ice. This ice was then buried into a big hole, cut into the ground for this purpose, with lots of straw surrounding the ice to keep it "clean".

The results of this labor was that he had a lot of ice preserved, to be used on the hottest of days, and with which he generously shared with every one in town. :-)

PS: My cousin, Maurice, and I played with paper dolls we cut out of the newspaper, and then made cloths for her to wear. Knowing that the boy across the street from us enjoyed such events himself, she generously called him over to "get in" on the fun. (If I remember correctly, her name was 'Brenda Star'.)