Legends and Tales of the American West

by Richard Erdoes

  For half a century pilgrims arrived from everywhere to adore the cross and bring back to their homes some of the blessed earth, but then another great miracle occurred. Don Bernardo had a neighbor, Don Severiano Medina, who was also suffering grievously from rheumatism. To this Don Severiano appeared in a dream the Holy Child of Atocha, which has its shrine at Fresnillo, Mexico, indicating that if he turned to it for help he would be cured. Don Severiano began to pray fervently and earnestly to El Santo Niño. One day he was walking in the fields with his little daughter when they both heard church bells ringing somewhere in the ground below. They dug and found the image of the Holy Child sitting in an upright position, with a pilgrim’s hat and staff. They reverently knelt down before El Santo Niño to adore it, and at once Don Severiano’s rheumatism vanished, never to return. Overjoyed, the grateful worshiper built a private chapel to house the miraculous image, which without wasting even a minute began to bestow blessings of many kinds upon those who prayed to it.

  But that was not all. Soon another Santo Niño was found in the same hole from which the holy cross had emerged. This Niño was installed in its own shrine inside a third room of the santuario. Some say that it is the Holy Child of Prague. This image also wears a wide-brimmed pilgrim’s hat surmounted by a golden crown. It also wears out its shoes by going out at night doing good works. It is given gifts, not only of fine little shoes, but also of new clothes, which is why its high-collared silken cape is sometimes red and sometimes white, and his camisa is sometimes white and sometimes blue. This Santo Niño helps barren women to conceive and finds lost children, giving them water to drink and showing them the way home. Some say it is not the little image itself but the faith it inspires that brings about these blessings. There is no end of miracles at the Santuario de Chimayo.

  The Miraculous Staircase

  Bishop Lamy of Santa Fe was a Frenchman. It was his heart’s desire to build a chapel in the City of the Holy Faith that was to be a replica of the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, that wonderful medieval edifice whose slender ribs of stone are merely the frames for the magnificent glowing stained-glass windows, that cause the chapel to be filled with otherwordly multicolored light. Of course, Santa Fe being a much smaller city than Paris, its chapel would be proportionately smaller than the Sainte-Chapelle.

  Another cherished dream of the good bishop was to install a convent where well-educated nuns would teach the boys and girls of the town’s old families comportment, grammar, music, and all the other arts that go into the making of a civilized person. He therefore sent for a group of Sisters of Loretto to come by way of the old Santa Fe Trail. Theirs was a hazardous and exhausting journey, for travelers were still subject to raids by bandidos or hostile Indians. After their harrowing trip the sisters duly arrived, safe and sound, and founded their Academy of the Sisters of Loretto. Logically, the name Bishop Lamy intended to give the future church was the Loretto Chapel. At first, things did not work out as the good bishop had hoped. He had brought over from Europe an architect, Antoine Mouly, who went blind when the building was barely begun. The bishop engaged Antoine’s son, Projectus Mouly, to continue his father’s work of drawing up plans and designs. The problem was that, whereas the father’s eyesight had been bad, the son’s was too good, because his glance fell upon the sultry wife of the bishop’s nephew and he began visiting the lady whenever her husband happened to be absent. The husband did not like this and he sternly forbade Projectus to set foot in his home, likewise forbidding his wife to receive him, whereupon the lady left his bed and board to live with the charming young architect at the Exchange Hotel. The outraged husband got himself a large-caliber Colt, waylaid the seducer as he emerged from the hotel, and shot him dead. In consequence, poor Bishop Lamy found himself without an architect and with a nephew in jail. As one of the sisters wrote in her dairy: “Mr. Lamy prefers to be left alone and brood over the loss of his domestic felicity … my impression is that His Grace knows of the tragic act—but knows nothing of what has caused it.” Which is to be doubted, as His Grace was a Frenchman and intelligent.

  In the absence of skilled local stonecutters and carvers, the bishop had imported a number of craftsmen from Italy. They built everything symmetrically with help from an architect—one door on the left, and an identical one on the right, so and so many windows on one side, and an equal number on the other. They finished the job, but when they took down the scaffolding it was found that there was no stairway leading up to the choir loft. Worse—there was in the whole chapel no room anywhere for a staircase. The Mother Superior, whose name was Madeleine, was very unhappy. After all, what good is a choir loft if there is no way to reach it? And so the black-robed sisters began searching for a skilled artisan to find a way of building the missing staircase. Many carpenters came, looked things over, and shook their heads. All of them said that there was simply not space enough to squeeze in a staircase.

  The sisters of Loretto were desolate. The Mother Superior wept. What were they to do? One of the sisters, Blandina by name, had an idea. She took up her rosary and started praying, and telling her beads, for someone to come and solve the problem. Watching her, Mother Madeleine exclaimed, “Sister Blandina is right. Only prayers can help us. We must make a novena to Saint Joseph who, being a carpenter himself, will sympathize with us. We will get up one hour earlier than usual every morning and assemble in the chapel to pray to him.”

  The sisters held their novena and at its end, on the ninth day, a gaunt, white-bearded man leading a burro knocked on the convent’s door. One of the sisters opened the door just a little bit and asked what he wanted. “I wish to speak to your Mother Superior,” answered the stranger. He was brought to Mother Madeleine, who inquired, “Why have you come?”

  “I have come,” said the man, “because I am a carpenter and I will build the staircase you so badly need.”

  “That is very good of you,” said the Mother Superior. “Let’s see if you can do it.”

  The stranger went to work with a will. At first, the sisters were skeptical, because he had no tools except a hammer, a saw, and an old T-square, but as they observed how quickly and wonderfully the work progressed, they congratulated each other, saying, “This is indeed the right man for the job, whom God has sent us in answer to our prayers.”

  Whenever the sisters came into the chapel to pray, the carpenter discreetly made himself scarce, to return immediately after they had finished. He toiled long hours with a speed and skill that seemed more than human. It was also strange that he always had a good supply of hardwood at hand though nobody ever saw him buying wood of any kind. And no matter how hard and long he labored, he never tired in spite of being obviously a very old man. From time to time, Mother Madeleine brought up the subject of payment, not only for his work, but also for the materials he used, but the stranger always said that money was of no use to him and, please, not to bother him with such mundane matters.

  As the work progressed, the nuns were amazed to discover that their carpenter was making a spiral staircase, something that had never before been done in Nueva Mexico and, being obviously a very pious and God-fearing man, he made the staircase of thirty-three steps—one for every year of our Savior’s earthly life. At last, the work was finished. It was a truly great and splendid work of art, wondrous to behold, soaring in a double spiral upwards to the choir, seemingly without any visible support. Not a single nail or any other thing of metal had been used in its construction. All was held together with wooden pegs.

  Mother Madeleine was at first speechless as she looked upon the finished stairs. “This is perfection,” she exclaimed at last, her eyes filling with tears of joy, “perfection in its whole and in its smallest part.”

  She called for all the sisters to meet with her. “My heart is full of gratitude for this wonderful craftsman,” she told them. “We must prepare a special feast for him as a sign of our appreciation for the wonderful thing he has done. Dear sisters, each and every one of you must prepare your favori
te dish. We will set our best table for this good man, with silverware and candelabra, and, perchance, a bottle of His Grace’s finest would not be amiss.”

  And so the sisters vied with each other roasting, boiling, frying, and braising, but when the meal was ready to be served, the carpenter was nowhere to be found. He was gone, having taken his burro and his tools with him. He had simply disappeared without asking for his pay or saying goodbye. Nobody had seen him leave either the chapel, the convent, or the city. He had gone without leaving a trace.

  “Do not ask who he was, or where he has gone,” said Mother Madeleine, “because he who built this wonderful escalier in answer to our prayers was none other than Saint Joseph himself, and from now on, and evermore, the wonder he has wrought shall be known as the Miraculous Staircase.

  The Hitchhiker

  This story occurs again and again in different places all over the West. The places, names, and details vary, but the plot is always the same.

  Two young men, Eddie and Carl, from the University of Colorado, were driving their old Chevy home to Walsenburg. They were in a good mood, drinking “Purple Jesus,” the collegian’s delight. Vacation had come. The night was pleasantly cool and the stars were out. On both sides of the road the black shapes of towering mountains were silhouetted against the silvery sky. They drove around a bend to a corner dominated by a huge cottonwood seared by lightning. Caught in their headlights was a young, very pretty blonde in an organdy dress, sitting on a rock, a piece of luggage by her side. She was waving frantically for them to stop, and stop they did. She went up to the driver’s side, where Eddie had the wheel, saying with a big smile of relief, “I’m sure glad to see you guys. I’ve been stuck here for hours. Can I hitch a ride with you?”

  “You bet,” said Eddie. “Hop in.”

  The girl pointed to a faded sign with an arrow saying SILVER CITY, and to a narrow dirt road leading off into the mountains: “That way, fellows. Silver City. You can’t miss our place, an old Victorian house, full of turrets and balconies and curlicues. It’s a real landmark.”

  “But we are going to Walsenburg,” Carl objected.

  “Gee, fellows, it’s only twenty miles. You wouldn’t leave me here alone in the middle of the night. Please. Mom will have coffee for you and her own special cherry pie she’s famous for. Please.”

  “Cherry pie sounds real good,” said Eddie while Carl put the blonde’s bag in the trunk. The girl settled down in the backseat.

  “I’m Daisy,” she said. “We even have a pond in case you guys want to go for a swim.”

  “Eddie and Carl, pleased to meet you.”

  They drove on in silence, savoring the scent of pine and sage. The road was steep, winding, and full of potholes.

  “This must be a hell of a drive in winter,” said Eddie over his shoulder. There was no answer.

  “I guess she has fallen asleep,” said Carl. Ahead of them they saw a pole with a bright light. It belonged to a neglected-looking clapboard house whose white paint was peeling—an old-fashioned combined grocery and gas station. In front stood two ancient rusty gas pumps with white glass globes on top. A sign read GAS, ICE, SODA POP. In the window a red and blue neon sign blinked BUDWEISER.

  They drove another mile and came to the imposing ruin of a large wooden house, half burned and half fallen in, with a faint acrid smell of ashes still clinging to it. One gaunt turret was still standing, together with parts of a gingerbread porch showing a lot of scrollwork. From the turret came the hooting of an owl. They drove on for another mile and came to a dead end. Carl leaned over into the backseat, saying, “Daisy, wake up! We need directions. We’re lost.” He stopped abruptly: “Hell, she isn’t there. She’s gone!”

  “That’s insane,” said Eddie. “How could she have gone?”

  “She must have jumped out without us noticing it. Not the first crazy dame we’ve run across. A pothead, probably, stoned out of her mind. Jesus, why us?”

  They backed and filled till they got the car turned around on the narrow path. They stopped back at the gas station and knocked at the door. A sleepy old man in long johns appeared, grumbling, “I’m closed.”

  “We just want to ask directions. We’re lost. We’re looking for Silver City.”

  “This is it.”

  “This is what?”

  “Silver City. My place. That’s all there is to it.”

  “Well, maybe you can give us some advice. We picked up a girl about twenty miles back. She said her name was Daisy and that she lived in Silver City. In a big house. We couldn’t miss it,” said Carl. “She was in the backseat and now she’s gone. We don’t want to get into any trouble about her.”

  “Good nightshirt!” exclaimed the old man, exposing the stumps of his remaining two teeth, “She’s done it agin!”

  “Again? What the hell do you mean, again?” Eddie asked.

  The old-timer scratched his head: “Her name was Daisy Rutter. Died some nine or ten years back in a car wreck at the corner where you picked her up. She was with two young fellers, jest like you. They had been drinking. Crashed into that big cottonwood. Car went up in flames. They were torched. It sure wasn’t pretty. Her folks were well off. Owned a big place a mile further on. Nothing much left of it now. You see, she was their only child. So after she was gone the place soured on them and they left. Never came back. But she does, Daisy does. Once in a while she plays this trick on college boys like you, like the fellers who died with her. Then they come whining to me, asking ‘What shall we do?’ To tell the truth, I’m sick of it.”

  “Her bag is still in the trunk.”

  “I wouldn’t bet on it. Can I sell you fellers some beer, nice and cold?”

  “Thanks, but we must be getting on,” said Eddie, shuddering. “It’s still a long way to Walsenburg.”

  “Suit yourselves, boys.”

  Source Notes

  Foreword

  1. “Professed to give my narrative”: The Life of Colonel David Crockett, the irrepressible backwoodsman, written by himself (Philadelphia: Porter & Coates, 1865), pp. 7–8.

  2. “If it be objected”: D. M. Kelsey, Pioneer Heroes and Daring Deeds (Philadelphia: Scammel & Co., 1882), p. v.

  3. “This is true, us men pursued”: Farley Mowat, West Viking (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1965), p. 270.

  4. “Freydis, big with child”: Ibid., pp. 256–57.

  Chapter 1 OHIO FEVER

  1. “Disowned in an age of scepticism”: Samuel Adams Drake, New England Legends and Folklore (Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1883), p. v.

  2. “I ask you to look”: Emerson Hough, Frontier Omnibus (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1907), pp. 7, 11, 19.

  3. The Devil and Major Stobo: My own rendition of a story told by my wife, Jean, born and raised in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.

  4. The Cheater Cheated: This was told to me by Tom Cook, a Mohawk friend.

  5. “The English manner of carrying on trade”: Lewis Evans, quoted in Frederic May, Jr., The Allegheny (New York: Farrar & Rinehart, 1942), pp. 38–39.

  6. The Wild Hunt: My own version of a story told by my wife’s family.

  7. Dreams: Funny Stories; or, The American Jester (New York: At the shop of Christian Brown, 1804).

  8. The Skeleton Hand: I got this tale from my wife, Jean. This is my own version.

  9. The Wild Hunter of the Juniata: From various sources, such as Augustus Lynch Manson, The Pioneer History of America (San Francisco: Bancroft & Co., 1883), and Charles McKnight, Our Western Border (Philadelphia: McCurdy & Co., 1876), pp. 109–11. The quoted passage is from Manson, pp. 168–69.

  10. The Consequences of Not Letting a Man Have His Drink: My own version of several old tales.

  11. The Laughing Head: My own retelling, inspired by an old Pennsylvania tale told me by my wife.

  Chapter 2 THE LONG HUNTERS

  1. Tarzan Boone: My own version. I coined the name “Tarzan Boone” because of Boone’s propensity for swinging from vines.

  2. Swal
lowing a Scalping Knife: McKnight, Our Western Border, pp. 289–89.

  3. That’s John’s Gun! Ibid., pp. 716–17.

  4. A Clever Runner: My own version.

  5. A Damn Good Jump: My own version. The quoted passage within the text is from Kelsey, Pioneer Heroes and Daring Deeds, pp. 190–91.

  6. The Warrior Woman: Manson, Pioneer History of America, pp. 402–4.

  7. The Corcondyle Head: My own version.

  Chapter 3 BACKWOODSMEN

  1. “The instant I enter on my own land”: Henry Tuckerman, America and Her Commentators (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1864), p. 92.

  2. The Irrepressible Backwoodsman and Original Humorist: All quotations are from The Life of Colonel David Crockett.

  3. Grinning the Bark off a Tree: From Sketches and Eccentricities of Col. David Crockett (New York: J. & J. Harper, 1833), pp. 125–27.

  4. David Crocket on the Stump: Joseph S. Williams, Old Times in West Tennessee (Memphis, Tenn.: W. G. Cheeney, 1873), pp. 175–76.

  5. The Drinks Are on Me, Gentlemen: My own version of this often-told story.

  6. Gouging the Critter: My own version.

  7. Jim Bowie and His Big Knife: My own version, incorporating the following quotations:

  8. “When the oncoming hordes”: Colonel Frank Triplett, Conquering the Wilderness (New York: N. D. Thompson & Co., 1883), p. 698.