Cliven Bundy, the Nevada rancher who … well, you can fill in the blank yourselves … claims part of his entitlement to do what he does through ancestral right, which tends to make the lives of his ancestors relevant to matters of public concern. Not long ago I ran across a sort of autobiography of Cliven Bundy’s grandfather, Roy Bundy, in the Improvement Era of February 1945:
I was born of goodly parents on a homestead in Dawson County, Nebraska, on the 7th day of April, 1885. I came to Utah with my parents, arriving at Bunkerville, Nevada, August 18, 1895, and was baptized there on September 3, 1895, by Bishop Edward Bunker, Jr. We lived there until the spring of 1901 and then moved to Colonia Morelos, Sonora, Mexico – another prairie schooner trip of 740 miles. We arrived at Morelos, October 12.
I was married on September 5, 1907, in the St. George Temple by David H. Cannon to Miss Iverson. After that, life commenced in earnest for me. We went back to Mexico where our first two children were born. then the Mexican Revolution came on. I had the privilege of looking down the barrels of loaded guns in the hands of Mexican “Red Flaggers.” I also had bullets whistle over my head and cut the leaves from the trees. We became refugees. Eleven years of ups and downs, joys and sorrows – the hard earnings of my life went. We went to a refugee camp at Douglas, Arizona, and later to La Grande, Oregon. Finally, we returned to the Moapa Valley, Nevada.
At the invitation of Bishop Tom Jones, I lived there four years and worked harder than I had any other four years of my life to try to make a new home. In 1916 I drove off and left it and took up a homestead at Mt. Trumbull, Arizona, as this territory was open for homesteading that year.
Then World War I came on, and supplies were expensive. We had to buy all of our supplies at St. George, Utah, sixty-five miles northwest over a very rough wagon road. But we were schooled in the university of hard knocks, so we could take it and like it. Others came and we called the place Mt. Trumbull. It became a ward on the 11th day of November, 1928, with myself as bishop.
I had an attack of arthritis on Christmas Day 1928. My eldest living boy was only fifteen; he helped with the cattle and sheep. His elder brother had been
crowneddrowned in the Colorado. Farming stopped largely for the time being for lack of help. Apostle Widtsoe said in the Utah Farmer that where white sage grew, wheat would also grow. I believed it and put it to the test. I heard president Grant one time in conference at Overton, Nevada, stop a speaker when he quoted, “all things come to those who wait.” President Grant said that all things come to those who work and wait. I believed that also and put them together – there was no conflict.[During World War II, when his sons were in the service, Roy Bundy called on the services of his younger children:]
Juanita, who is fifteen, learned to drive the truck. The tractor had no starter, so she pulled it with the car, and I engaged the clutch, no easy task for a cripple. But without that machinery, there would not have been the hogs raised or anything else besides cattle and horses, as it is pretty nearly impossible to have a girl hook up a span of horses. Besides, I could not have driven them as I did the tractor. I knew labor was scarce, so I raised hogs to harvest the corn. Beans were not very good, but we were able to raise enough for ourselves and some for our neighbors.
For whatever all that is worth.
So, can we conclude that the Moapa Paiutes were in the area long before any Bundys?
And were any of those settlements LDS Indian Missions? OK, OK, I’ll do my own dang research.
Drowned? Or is this a euphemism for “scalped”?
(The loss of a child, and the devolution of duties on another reminds me of my grandmother. She was the eldest of 10; her brother, a few years her junior, died in early childhood, and the next four or fives children were girls. So my grandmother became her father’s chief assistant, and gained skills at riding, roping, herding, cutting out, and branding that would put this city slicker grandson to shame.)
Wow – what a fascinating find, Ardis.
That’s a nice part of the story to have. It reminds me of one of my own ancestors who in those same decades and earlier tried mining, ranching, and farming in Arizona, Nevada, California, Idaho, and Oregon. He was never really successful at any of it, and as an old man he was working a mine alone in the Mojave desert not far from Barstow. That’s where he died and was found by his son. It’s a story I like for some reason, a loser in the West who kept trying.
Here’s something to add:
“The Strip’s largest community of this era, Mt. Trumbull (best known as Bundyville) was founded in 1916 by Mormon patriarch Abraham Bundy and his family. At its peak, the town was home to nearly 300 residents.”
http://cpluhna.nau.edu/Places/arizona_strip2.htm
Were any of these Indian missions? Including Bunkerville? Whether or not they retained any of the functions of the earlier Indian missions, the areas mentioned were settled later. I’m not going to check now, but I believe the Bundys have family ties to the Leavitts, and of course the Leavitts were part of the early Southern Indian Mission.
According to my Park Service Friends, “Old Mormon Fort” Las Vegas was an Indian Mission for the Southern Paiutes.
http://www.nps.gov/NR/twhp/wwwlps/lessons/122fort/
And Amy’s right about the later settlements below St. George on the tributaries to the Virgin and the Colorado not being part of the earlier Indian Missions. There is a great report again from the NPS that I found online:
http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/care/mormon.pdf
I’ll have to download and devour (hey, it’s sorta work related!)
Only to add what others have said, “Thank you very much for sharing”. Quite interesting as well as topical.
Ardis, the claim Mr. Bundy frequently makes is that his family has been ranching in Nevada since the 1870s, but the Bundy element didn’t get there until 1895. Was some other branch of his family ranching in Nevada earlier? I read elsewhere that Cliven’s father bought what is now the Bundy Ranch about 1951.
Steve, it seems clear that his mother’s family was in fact in the area at the turn of the 20th century (maybe not the 1870s, as Bundy claims), ranching steadily (unlike Roy, who came and went). Whether they had the rights that Bundy now claims, I don’t know.
Here’s one site setting out his mother’s side of the family: http://www.8newsnow.com/story/25302186/an-abbreviated-look-at-rancher-cliven-bundys-family-history
Fascinating, and certainly interesting. What reason would there have been for publishing it?
The Moapa Valley was known to Mormons in earlier times as “‘The Big Muddy Mission.” It was not an indian mission, but was established for (1) setting up a port on the farthest navigable point o the Colorado River, and (2) grow additional hot weather crops like cotton.
Begun in the 1860s, Mormons gave up the settlements ten years later when the area became part of Nevada.