OCR Text |
Show GENEALOGY RESEARCH j . OF THE WEST , ) I J0 WvT BY Kerry Ross Boren j ,' 1 Photograph enhances early Vernal history "A picture is worth a thousand words" is an old expression well known, but often a picture hides a thousand stories, an example being the photograph on the interior of an old Vernal saloon which accompanies this article. Reader and Henry J. Erickson, the latter of whom appears in the photo on the far right. In the center of the photo is Jesse Henline, a Texas cowboy and part-time bartender, and on the left is full-time bartender Walter Corless. The photographer who took the picture was C.B. "Bert" Atwood. The names by themselves mean very little, except to those who may remember the men involved, but the old saloon was the hub of early activity in Vernal and the center of many exciting ex-citing events. It was here that Matt Warner supposedly sup-posedly played his legendary game of billiards by "shooting" the balls into the pockets with his six-gun. Here, at the turn of the century, one could find Butch Cassidy, the Sundance Kid, Elza Lay and others of the Wild Bunch "bellied up" to the bar to wash the dust of the Outlaw Trail from their parched throats after dodging the posse of Sheriff John T. Pope. Here in 1898 "Mad-dog" Harry Tracy and Dave Lant hid out after escaping the Utah Penitentiary, posing as gamblers and living at the nearby Blankenship Boarding House, until a shooting fray over a local Vernal girl caused them to leave town "between days". They went to Brown's Park where they were involved in one of the west's greatest manhunts and were eventually captured. The equally notorious Tom Horn spent many hours in the saloon working undercover as a Pinkerton detective to gain information on the whereabouts of a Colorado train robber, whom he arrested shortly thereafter at the Blankenship place with the aid of his friend and associate, Cleophas J. Dowd. Dowd was an enigmatic character who had served undercover with Horn during the infamous Johnson County War in Wyoming in 1892. While a friend of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (Dowd gave Longabaugh his now famous sobriquet of "Sundance Kid"), Dowd was at the same time a deputy sheriff, deputy U.S. Marshal, Pinkerton detective, and Union Pacific Railroad detective. He was murdered 1 on his Canyon Ranch on Sheep Creek in 1898 where his grave is still a landmark. land-mark. He was married to Ella Colton, daughter of Charles Colton of Vernal. It was no coincidence that Dowd spent time at Reader and Erickson's saloon; John H. Reader had married Dowd's younger sister, and at the time of his marriage, Dowd had threatened to kill Reader, but the problem was resolved. Nor was it coincidence that Bert Atwood was the photographer. Bert married, as her third husband, the ex-wife ex-wife of the outlaw Elza Lay, formerly Maud Davis, daughter of Allen Davis of Vernal. Here, too, was the confrontation of Sheriff John T. Pope with the outlaw C.L. "Gunplay" Maxwell, when Maxwell decided disgression was the better part of valor and decided against drawing down on the tough old lawman. Maxwell was married to Ada Slaugh, daughter of John Jacob Slaugh, a Vernal pioneer. There are many other stories connected con-nected with the old saloon that could be retold. Many others have undoubtedly been forgotten. But as long as there are pictures to inspire the memory, thre will bestories to be told, and places like the old Reader and Erickson saloon will not be forgotten. |