A Sweetness to the Soul (60 page)

“When they started toward the house, at dawn, I wasn’t sure what to do. So many …” she said, her voice trailing off.

“Just appreciate it,” he told her. “Your mother would.”

He watched the gift bearers pass before him, nodding their kerchiefed heads at him, acknowledging his loss, their loss, as they left parts of themselves at her feet: a beaded bag, dried salmon, huckleberries, shells and wampum strings, roots, ivory game sticks, a child’s doll. Anne lifted her youngest to lay a dreamcatcher on Jane’s pillow. Some left blankets, fine tanned hides, baskets and mats, treasured family heirlooms all set on the reds and browns and rich plaid greens of the Pendleton blankets Sunmiet had spread like royalty out before Jane’s casket. He smiled through his tears. She would have Pendleton blankets after all.

When the women and children had laid their gifts, they passed back by him, touching his hands like a shadow, looking briefly into his eyes, their faces filled with tenderness, eyes sharing pools of emptiness and loss. The scent of smoked leather lingered on his hands as they passed. Sunmiet and Anne, then Inanucks and her children. They hugged him, their hands free to hold him.

“The eagle has carried her to her place of belonging,” Sunmiet told him, her voice thick with grief.

They offered prayers for him and Ella and Carrie and their husbands. Jane’s brother, George, who was there now too, had joined them as in a receiving line at a wedding.

If only he could see it as rejoicing. Rejoicing because his wife was finally released from the pain of the infection the doctors could not stop. Such a simple thing, a cut that did not heal. He wished he could see it as rejoicing, knowing he would someday see her once again. Yes, he had that to comfort him.

He didn’t want to think now, about not seeing her. He had believed she would survive him. She was the survivor, the strong one. “Men make plans,” she’d always said, “but God directs their paths.”

“He took you on a different path, Janie,” he said out loud, “and you were strong on it, knew when to bend, you did.”

He wanted now to just experience these acts of devotion, take inside of him the wealth of the tributes, fill up with the depth of emotion they settled on him like a wool blanket, settled on him from the people she loved and called her family.

When the women finished, the men followed bringing their gifts: dip nets, a salmon freshly caught; arrow heads and hand-tooled scrapes. They laid pieces of their prized regalia, porcupine necklaces, moccasins, ermine skins, a drum. Peter and George and George’s sons moved up the steps of the hotel, and Joseph saw that Peter’s black hat no longer held his prized eagle feather as he passed by. Instead, he watched the feather appear at Jane’s feet, Peter’s hand lifting in farewell like a butterfly in flight.

Joseph could feel the tears begin again as his nose burned. He swallowed, leaned heavily on his cane, overwhelmed by the magnitude of their tribute to her, the gift her life had been, the depth of his loss.

“They must have loved her so,” Ella said, a film on her eyes.

“They leave no doubt,” Joseph answered.

He let his arm drape around his daughter, pulled her to him and stroked her head at the temple as she put her head on his shoulder. The procession showed no sign of ending.

Watching, Joseph stopped himself each time his thoughts moved too far forward, to when he would have to face the days alone, without her. There would be no one to tell of this moment who would understand as well as she. He shook his head. For now, he would remember this dawn, maybe even write it down as she had. He used to do that, write things in his sketch book. What was that verse he’d taken from his book and shared with her, the one and only poem he’d ever written?
“To be so loved that time stands still when I’m
with you, and does not start again until you’ve gone away, and I am left alone to wonder why the hours move so quickly when you’re with me, and so slowly once you’ve gone.”
With her, time had moved so quickly. He was alone, now, time leaving her memory in its tracks. How she had touched him!

“Was she did the touching,” he said. Ella nodded. The procession going on before him testified to that, to her strength and caring. And the way she had eased into their lives. How had she put it, her description of their beginnings?
Like the slow rising of the river from an early snowmelt in the mountains, almost without notice, flooding, new over old
.

Gus whined. The dog pushed on his hand, panted. “They loved her, too,” Joseph said as he patted the dog. He scratched the setter’s ears and watched the procession make its way back toward the turbulent river. An eagle circled, dipping its wings to the wind.

As the man leaned to quiet the animal, he saw the beaded banners he had missed. Someone had draped them across Jane’s folded hands, the ends of the banners spilling out over her casket to the floor. With Kása’s prized hummingbird designs at the ends, the shiny cut beads spelled out in glorious color:
Mother. Kása. Friend
.

“She was all of those,” Joseph said, remembering gratefully the richness she had given to his life and to so many others. “And oh, so very much more.”

A Sweetness to the Soul
was inspired by an essay written by a young boy back in 1930 and reprinted in 1985 in a Sherman County historical society
For the Record
journal. He’d written of his ancestors, and the story so intrigued me I began to research. What I found was that while much was written about Joseph Sherar, little was written about his wife, Jane. I discovered parallels between the Sherars and my own life. Both Jane and I married men sixteen years older than us. Both our husbands were builders. Like Jane, I never had children of my own. And like them, my husband and I were doing something others thought a little mad: trying to make a life in a remote section of Oregon beside a wild and scenic river. We shared something else as well. The Sherars accomplished their dreams through their relationships with the Wasco, Warm Springs, and Paiute people of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. I happened to be working for those tribes and discovered the unheard stories of the Sherars as told through the eyes of the Indian people who remembered them. I had to tell this story even though I had never written fiction before. It wasn’t my family and I hadn’t lived in the community for a hundred years, but I told the story the best way I knew how and trusted I was not alone in the telling. Your impressions and experiences in reading this novel keep the Sherar story alive, and I thank you for making room in your hearts for it.

—Jane Kirkpatrick, March 2008

Jane and Joseph Sherar came into my soul with Donald von Borstel’s words. Written by a schoolboy as part of a county-wide essay during the Depression, Donald’s words drew me to this frontier couple who lived and worked beside the falls in the mid-1800s.
A Sweetness to the Soul
grew from their lives.

These remarkable people did indeed make their mark beside the narrowest section of the Deschutes River, one of Oregon’s most wild and scenic rivers, in a remote and rugged canyon. For more than thirty years, they operated an inn renowned for its hospitality and care. They ranched, constructed the famous bridge, and returned their profits to improve the roads, portions of which can still be seen and driven on today as part of Oregon Highway 216 between Tygh Valley and Grass Valley. They built their Sherar House in 1893. The Sherars could not have become known as great road builders and hotel managers without the help of Indians and mulehandlers, housekeepers and buckaroos. Their lives intersected with people of color as portrayed: Latinos, Chinese, Native Americans. Theirs was an interdependent life despite its remoteness.

Theirs was also a devoted life. Evidence exists that Jane and Joseph Sherar shared a love that transcended the difference in their ages. Descendants of Carrie treasure Joseph Sherar’s signed valentines and Christmas cards. He did indeed give a gold and amethyst watch to Jane, another gold watch to Carrie.

The characters of Jane Herbert, her parents and siblings are all based on real people. Mr. Herbert lost an eye on the trail and was later elected a Wasco County Commissioner. Elizabeth Herbert was active in the Methodist Church. George Herbert became a sheriff of Baker County in Oregon. The tragedy of Jane’s siblings did happen and there is strong evidence that these deaths affected Jane and her mother in the way portrayed. A brief notation in a Wasco County History published in the 1950s, quotes the daughter of Mrs. C. M. Grimes (Ella’s daughter) as stating that “the Herbert and Sherar families became enemies” over the adoption of Ella which happened many years after it was begun because Mrs. Herbert would not give Ella up.

Joseph Sherar was known as one of the greatest road builders of the west. A remarkable visionary, he could have met Frederic Tudor who did ship ice from the rivers and lakes of Vermont to New Orleans and beyond, a fact reported by J. C. Furnas in his book
The Americans: A Social History of the United States, 1587-1914
. Furnas
also reported the sea slug caper. Someone much like Frederic Tudor very likely influenced the creative genius of Joseph Sherar. Arriving in San Francisco in 1855, Joseph Sherar spent the next years packing with Hispanic handlers and their families into gold fields of California and southern Oregon, ranching and acquiring a fortune. In the 1860s, he arrived in Oregon, packed and farmed again in two different places prior to purchasing the site along the Deschutes. Accounts of his holdings are based on fact.

Several characters did exist and interact with the Sherars. French Louie, “Pretty” Dick Barter, Mr. Crickett, Sam Holmes and Monroe Grimes, John Todd, and O’Brien were all real. Lodenma May and Philamon Lathrope are recorded as witnesses for the Sherar’s wedding, April 26, 1863. Alice M. is listed as a “hskpeer” in the 1880 census of Sherar’s Falls. J. W. Case was indeed a packer though his influence in the Sherar’s lives is strictly fiction. Ella Turner’s family did mine for gold in Canyon City; Carrie Sherar joined the Sherars in 1885; their marriages honor historical information, as does Joseph’s family in New York.

Indian Peter LaHomesh; his wife, Mary; and their son George Peters are an important part of the Sherar story. Margaret Charley, great-granddaughter of Frank Peter, Indian Peter’s grandson, provided information about Mary’s Indian name, the family’s love of learning, and George’s real name. Only non-Indians persisted in calling him “George Washington.”

Tribal member Olney Patt related the story of Mr. Sherar’s difficulty in pronunciation of Indian names and that his great-grandfather was called “Patrick” when he was paid. The family name, “Patt,” shortened from “Patrick,” originated from Mr. Sherar. Several tribal members reported stories about their fondness for the Sherars, their integrity and compassion, and remember him as “a great man among my people.”

The Sahaptin and Wasco languages have only recently been written down thanks to the Culture and Heritage Department of the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation. The words
used by characters are as accurate reflection as was possible for a non-Sahaptin speaker.

The Sherars became affluent. Mr. Sherar was well respected for his integrity and ability to work with people of all races and creeds, though his separate toll charge for Chinese people is also substantiated by family history. He did ship an entire train load of wool to Philadelphia and evidence exists that he made a first fortune shipping a load around the horn to Boston. The Sherars did build the bridge across the Deschutes and did engineer and maintain nearly thirty miles of roads down some of the steepest, most rugged real estate in Oregon. The roads and bridge opened up the vast grasslands for homesteaders in the years ahead. Records of the 1890s show the Sherars collecting thirty thousand dollars one year in tolls at the bridge; they spent over seventy-five thousand dollars on the roads in their lifetimes. Amazingly, the Sherars did give their generous gift to a family at risk of losing their children though their name was not Blivens, and they replaced the Heppner string and the freighter’s outfit as recorded.

Mrs. Sherar was known for her meticulous management, great hotel food and service, her relationship with the Indians, and her compassion. Stories support her request that people don moccasins at the inn. She knew her way around guns, and the incident with the Indian woman and her husband is based on fact, as is the incident with the Chinese cook, the flash flood, and the rescued calf. A news account of her funeral is accurately reflected by the epilogue. As though unable to live without his wife, Joseph Sherar died six months after her.

The John Moore home still stands outside the town of Moro, Oregon. A Sherar-built barn can be seen along The Old Dalles Military Highway at Finnigan. The spelling of Finnigan is taken from handwritten notes of Joseph Sherar. The description of the Sherar House is factual including the ledge orchard and sweetgrape arbor. Photographs of the Sherar House and their family are displayed at the Sherman County Museum in Moro, Oregon.

Still today, the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs is composed of Wasco, Warm Springs, and Paiute peoples who continue to
live together on the reservation in Central Oregon. True to their history of conciliation, Paiute families were invited to join the Confederation well after the Treaty of Middle Oregon, Indians in 1855 and after the Bannock War. Today, the Confederated Tribes operate a number of successful businesses in Oregon, including a lumber mill, resort, radio stations, hydroelectric plant, the Museum at Warm Springs, as well as the departments necessary to operate a small city, including an early childhood education center licensed to serve more than four hundred children and their families. The generally peaceful history with non-Indian peoples is based on fact. Each year on June 25, the tribes honor the treaty signing with
Pi-um-sha
, a powwow of celebration. The site at Sherar’s Falls came back to the care and custody of the Confederated Tribes in 1980.

Today, where the Sherars lived and loved, only the spindly scaffoldings remain. A new, concrete bridge permits crossing. In 1994, because of the decline in the fish population, the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs took the leadership to halt fishing at Sherar’s Falls with the hope the salmon will someday return. Only ceremonial fishing from family fishing sites is currently permitted there.