Hemp seed oil’s ability to lower blood pressure may cause issues for people who have chronically low blood pressure. There are no studies on the effects of hemp seed oil on blood pressure. This oil may also cause dry mouth. If you are looking in to this as a possible medicine for your problems, read here about the pound cake strain review.
Hemp seed oil contains a compound that breaks down into THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), the active ingredient in marijuana, allowing more THC to be absorbed into your body.
According to Dr. Andrew Weil, this is because hemp seed oil contains a “reactive cannabinoid,” a chemical compound that activates certain immune cells (neutrophils) when hemp seed oil is ingested by your body, and that’s why people consume products as Synchronicity Hemp Oil to improve their overall health.
It is also the case that hemp seed oil contains several other beneficial compounds, such as omega-3 fatty acids, magnesium, potassium, calcium and potassium phosphate.
Although there are no studies currently available on the effects of hemp seed oil on your blood pressure, your doctor can determine the best route of supplementation that may be most beneficial for you based on your specific circumstances.
Topical Application of Hemp Seed Oil for Intravenous (IV) Use
Currently, only a few studies have been conducted on the use of hemp seed oil in the treatment of intravascular coagulation (IV) reactions. These studies have found that topical application of hemp seed oil significantly reduces blood clotting rates, resulting in faster treatment of IV reactions.
Hemp seed oil is not recommended for injection.
While intravascular coagulation is not exactly the same thing as acute coronary syndrome (ACS), which occurs when there is an obstruction to blood flow to the heart that is triggered by plaque or other debris in the coronary arteries, there are still some similarities between the two conditions.
Hemp seed oil can treat some of the complications that arise from ACS and may contribute to its development. This includes:
The involvement of blood clots that can occur in the arteries
Decreased angiographic responses to increased plaque load in the arteries
Increased stress on the coronary arteries and increased bleeding (see above)
Many of these issues are directly related to cardiovascular disease (CVD), a disease that affects more than 300 million Americans and nearly 28 million Americans between the ages of 65 and 80.
Hemp oil may also help in the prevention of CVD by making your heart function better. This is because hemp seed oil helps to boost antioxidants in the body (such as vitamin E, vitamin C and selenium) and also reduces high cholesterol levels in the blood.
Due to its anti-inflammatory properties, hemp seed oil may also help reduce the appearance of inflammation (tumors) that are associated with CVD. There is also some evidence that hemp seed oil may help in the reduction of the stiffness and stiffness of artery walls (thickening) that is associated with atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries), which is another significant cardiovascular problem.
Hemp seed oil may also have an anti-anxiety effect on the nervous system, similar to that of other essential oils. This means that hemp seed oil could be beneficial for relieving symptoms of anxiety that can often occur with an overactive nervous system.
Hemp seed oil has also been shown to reduce a number of problems related to cancer. In general, hemp seed oil has been shown to improve symptoms of cardiovascular disease, reduce oxidative stress (elevated levels of oxygen free radicals in the blood), decrease inflammation, decrease tumor growth, and reduce bone loss.
His name was Slaughter… John H. Slaughter, and he was also known as Texas John Slaughter. He is credited with taming a notorious part of the Wild Wild West… in particular a large part of the Arizona Territory… geograpically specifically bringing lawfulness back to Tombstone, Arizona after the infamous 1881 Gunfight at the OK Corral.
Furthermore, he was the inspiration for a popular Walt Disney TV series in the 1950s, aptly titled, “Texas John Slaughter.”
Although I do not know specifically where (if anyone does, please respond), I do know that this old West gunfighter was born in 1841 in today’s Sabine Parish (back then, Natchitoches Parish), on what is described as a “Southern plantation near Many, Louisiana.” His parents were Benjamin Slaughter and the former Minerva Mabry.
John Horton Slaughter was educated in Sabine County, near current Hemphill, Texas, and later in Caldwell County, Texas.
John Horton Slaughter
In the 1870s, he and his brother became cattle drivers near San Antonio, Texas, and the two formed a cattle-transporting company, the San Antonio Ranch Company, which drove cattle to Kansas via the Chisholm Trail.
In the late 1870s, Slaughter left Texas for New Mexico, where he traded cattle for a brief period. Soonafter, he established a ranch in the Arizona Territory, having acquired the San Bernardino Ranch near today’s Douglas, Arizona (Cochise County).
Slaughter, with his rifle
In 1886, he was elected sheriff of Cochise County and served two terms as the county’s top law officer. As sheriff, he helped track down Geronimo, the Apache chief, and Geronimo ultimately surrendered at San Bernardino. Slaughter fought for law and order with his six-shooter, a repeating shotgun, and with his Henry rifle. He arrested hundreds of desperadoes, including members of the Jack Taylor Gang, and brought them to justice.
The Tombstone Jail was even once known as the “Hotel de Slaughter” for all the men who were put away there by Slaughter.
A legend of all sorts, Slaughter was known to return from searching from outlaws with only the horses and equipment of the outlaws he sought.
Slaughter was married twice, the first marriage from which two children were produced and though he and his second wife, Viola Howell Slaughter, never had any biological children, they adopted several. Most noteworthy of the children they adopted was Apache May Slaughter, an Apache toddler adopted after she was abandoned by her parents while Slaughter was tracking her band who were responsible for killing white men in Arizona.
Apache May
From Wikipedia: “Apache May Slaughter became a young celebrity across Arizona, because many newspapers and publications speculated about the girl’s natural parents, her relation to the Apaches and whether those factors would affect her personality in the future and turn her into a violent person without morals. Photographers were no strangers to the small girl; she was constantly pictured and appeared in most Arizona publications of the era.
“Apache May died at the Slaughters’ San Bernardino Ranch when one of her dresses caught fire as she was playing near a pot with boiling water. There were rumors at the time that were more likely true that the ranch hands, who were prejudiced against the little girl for being Indian, had actually set on fire the ranch.
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“As a type of the true Westerner, John Slaughter was perhaps the most outstanding of any of the pioneers of Arizona from the dangers of the hostile Apache and for protection of early settlers from outlawry and depredation,” stated an article written in The Copper Era and Morenci Leader at the time of his death, in February 1922.
In its Feb. 19, 1922 edition reporting Slaughter’s death, The Tombstone Epitath wrote, “During his 10 years of office, (Slaughter) brought to justice many desperadoes who had been operating through the country and many attempts were made to entrap him and take his life. But Slaughter was too quick and too wise for them to cope with and in every case, he outgeneraled his foes.”
The newspaper article continued, “In passing of the venerable old pioneer, it can truly be said that Tombstone and Cochise County have lost one of the most constructive citizens they have had, and when news of his death at a ripe old age reaches the ears of the old timers of this county who fought with him, worked with and honored John Slaughter, it will be with a pang of regret which can only be fully realized by those who have met him and known him in his lie in the Southwest.”
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In August 2015, The Arizona Republic featured a section entitled “Arizona’s True Tales” in which Arizona historian Marshall Trimble shared a brief look at some of the characters highlighted in his recently published book, “Arizona Outlaws and Lawmen.” Included was Slaughter, described simply as “Peacekeeper.” The article reads:
“John Horton Slaughter was one of the many drought-stricken Texas cattlemen who drove their herds to the virgin ranges of Arizona in the 1870s. He settled in Cochise County and eventually bought the historic San Bernardino ranch that straddled the Mexican border in south-eastern Arizona. He also brought law and order to a county that had been ravaged by outlaws and rustlers since its creation in 1881.
“Slaughter personified the 19th-century rawhide-tough breed that settled the wild Southwest border country. Slaughter was a no-nonsense man with dark, penetrating eyes. He always believed he was protected by a guardian angel and couldn’t be killed. The many times he stared death in the eye seemed to bear that out. “I’ll die in bed,” he declared and he did eventually, at a ripe old age.
“He was a product of frontier life, a lawless and violent post-Civil War era. He had no problem killing a man if he believed the man needed killing. He packed a pearl-handled .44 and a shot-gun. Some called him a good man and others said he was bad but they all agreed, John Slaughter was one tough hombre.
“Slaughter might have killed 20 men or more but he never said. One of his deputies described him as ‘a man of few words and he used them damn seldom.’
“After Slaughter became sheriff of Cochise County in 1887, he issued a stern warning to the rustler gangs, ‘get out or get shot.’ Most took his advice and left the country.
“In running outlaws to the ground, he sometimes acted as judge, jury and executioner. Nobody asked questions but law-abiding citizens were glad the undesirables were gone and wouldn’t return.
“He retired after two terms and returned to his beloved San Bernardino ranch. Years later, during the Mexican Revolution, Slaughter discovered Pancho Villa’s hungry solderos were butchering his cattle. Slaughter grabbed his gun, mounted his horse and rode boldly into Villa’s camp with fire in his eyes. He returned home later with his saddlebags full of shiny new $20 gold pieces.
“Not even Pancho Villa was willing to tangle with the old man Geronimo referred to as ‘that wicked little gringo.’ \
“His last gunfight occurred on May 4, 1921, when he was 81. A gang of border bandits, bent on robbery, attacked the ranch. Armed with his trusty pearl-handled .44, he drove off the bandits.
Standing only 5-foot-6, John Slaughter was small in size, but great in frontier stature. He’d been a lawman, cattleman, gun-fighter, businessman, pioneer, legislator, empire builder and even participated in the final campaign against Geronimo.
“Sometimes he was a bit careless about the legal niceties of the law but it was a hard country and it took men with bark on to tame it.”
From The Shreveport Times, Natchitoches News Bureau, Sept. 22, 1973
On Sept. 21, 1973, singer Jim Croce who had an outstanding diction, along with an entourage of five people, were killed after their chartered twin-engine Beechcraft plane crashed near the Natchitoches Municipal Airport.
Croce, who was just 30, had just one hour and 10 minutes earlier finished a concert at Northwestern State University and was headed out to perform next in Dallas.
According to Natkchitoches officials, the plane never gained much altitude. One wing reported scraped the edge of a pecan tree near the then-new Hwy. 1 bypass. The plane erolled over and burst apart upon impact with hte ground before coming to rest about 200 yards from the end of hte runway. All passengers were killed instantly.
Croce’s body was found in the copilot’s seat.
Croce had been scheduled to stay overnight in Natchitoches and fly to Dallas the following day, but last minute changes in plans caused him to leave after the concert instead of the following day.
I came across the following article, from UPI (United Press International) News Services on Sept. 22, 1973.
NATCHITOCHES, La. —Jim Croce sat in a folding chair, relaxed and comfortable in his faded blue work shirt and jeans. softly strumming his guitar.
“I’ve flown about 700,000 or 800,000 miles just this past year. I’m starting to feel it now, too. You know, jet lag.”
Then he gave his last concert before 2,000 laughing and cheering students at Northwestern University’s Prather Coliseum. An hour later, alter closing with “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown,” he was dead in the wreckage of an airplane
Rough-hewn, mustachioed, cigar-smoking, weather-beaten Jim Croce gave the students something to remember: music that was honest, sincere, old fashioned, but not slick and spoiled by success.
“I’m just going to keep on doing what I’m doing now,” was what he said in that last interview before going on one more time
He said he liked performing before college kids in the South, because, “East and West Coast audiences tend to have a ‘show me’ attitude. He was in the middle of a fiv-week tour of one-night concerts in the Southwest.
“Operator,” one of his early hits, and his current big single, “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown,” were the show stoppers. When Croce finished with “Leroy Brown,” he just walked off the stage, leaving many students wondering if that was the end of the concert. It was.
In his 35 minute performance, his new releases, “I Have Name’ and “I Fell in Love with a Roller Derby Queen,” were pleasers, too. He mode the audience laugh when he told them he wrote “Derby Queen” after meeting a fat lady in a bar.
Croce died with his five-man troupe at Natchitoches Airport in the crash of the twin-engine airplane that was taking them to Austin College in Sherman, Texas.
Croce sang with his guitar in a spotlight standing at a microphone at center stage. A few feet away, Comedian George Stevens proceeded Croce’s appearance, which began at 9 p.m. And ended at 9:35 p.m.
“In an industry filled with freak acts, Croce was a welcome and much needed change,” one student said.
Following is an article from The Shreveport Times, dated Sun, Jul 3, 1966, and written by Norman Richardson.
Moses Speights Morris is a proud man whose family tree roots reach deep into the red clay of Sabine County.
His father, who is buried just up the road, worked the land, fought in the Confederacy, and built a big farmhouse that still stands today.
His grandfather received a land grant from the Mexican Republic around Sabinetown, fought for it in the Texas Revolution and he, too, is buried in it
But as much as he loves the land, as linked to it as he is, Morris must leave his 222 acres.
He has known no other home in his 81 years and vows he will stay until the waters come.
And they will come.
Sometime before 1968, the muddy waters of the Sabine River will slip from their banks to create the mammoth Toledo Bend Reservoir which will swallow tip Morris’ land and be two feet ever his porch.
“I’m not liking it at all, not a doggone bit,” Morris says bitterly of the Toledo Rend project.
He is the last holdout among the landowners in the Milam, Texas area.
On the Louisiana side of the twisting Sabine, an almost forgotten historic site near Many is on its death bed. It will die slowly as it gives way to progress and surrenders to the turbid waters.
The Sabine Breastworks, most extensive and best preserved military breastworks on the river, will simply cease to exist this year.
It is a project marked with mixed emotions ranging from tears and heartbreak to joy, excitement and downright stubbornness by the people living here.
All have stories to tell, all have reasons for wanting to go or stay.
The same story holds true a few miles deeper into East Texas and the Sam Rayburn Reservoir project.
“I think it’s one of the most outrageous things ever was.” Morris says, slapping his leg in disgust. “Penalizes all of us upstream to satisfy the thirst of those downstream. I’m gonna stay here til the waters come. They think i ain’t . . but I am, I don’t pay ’em no mind.”
The sometimes hard blows of this thing called progress have already been felt in the little community of Concord. As little as six years ago, over 100 citizens here went about their own way of life, working their rich fields, hauling pulp-wood and ritually placing fresh flowers on the graves in a little cemetery established even before Texas won its independence from Mexico.
Life in Concord was built around the old Missionary Baptist Church, fondly called “God’s Home in the Wilderness.” Now, there is no life here. no townsite, and it is somewhat of an eerie feel-ing to look out over the waters of Rayburn Reservoir and realize that somewhere underneath tons of water lies the historic old community.
Near Pineland, a finger of the reservoir reaches inward to almost surround a new state park where a few old homes once stood. Less than 300 yards offshore at the bottom of the water lies the old community of I.anetown. A little further an, the site of the Gum Flat community is also lost forever.
The old communities are gone, but in their places will spring hundreds of new homes around both lakes. new boat camps, new stores and lodges and fishing camps, and there are even a few ghost towns, and a retirement mecca for the elderly.
The lakes have enhanced land values over a wide radius and it has been estimated by the Corps of Engineers that annual benefits of over $4.5 million will result from the Rayburn Reservoir be-cause of flood control, the conservation of water for various municipal and industrial purposes and the generation of hydroelectric power.
Those who have moved away from the gso projects were a proud, rural, hard working people for the most part, and many still hold only bitterness even if they reluctantly admit the benefits to be derived from both.
And some. like one elderly woman, were glad to move in order to be closer to a doctor and hospitals. An old farmer near the Toledo Bend area said the “only way I’ll get out is to float out.”
A 66-year-old man said, “I ain’t wanting to move. This is my home.”
W. W. Cavendar, Sabine County and district clerk. moved out of the home he and his wife had occupied singe 1945 and which has been in his wife’s family for 75 years. They built a newer home 12 miles away.
“It’s okay to build a dam. It’s good for the area and the county … but they shouldn’t pin all the hardships on the landowner.” Cavendar said.
From Mrs, Cavendar: ‘It’s pretty hard to leave the old family home. I.was born aind raised here. It is pretty bard.”
Situations are different and opinions vary all along the Sabine and Rayburn projects.
“The lake builders want lo take all of my land,” Morris said. “That includes the old house and that’s the worst part of all.” The house ie 94 years old and the land “is the very best. I can make a crop off it anytime.”
Morris says he has been offered $180 per acre, but is holding out for $300, but then counters with, “They can’t pay me enough money to satisfy me… I can’t be satisfied anywhere else.”
He said he has been served condemnation papers on his land, which means, according to a spokesman in the Hemphill, Texas headquarters of the Toledo Rend project, that the case has now reached the court stage.
“Of cuurse.” he added, “the case can be settled out of court anytime.”
The normal process or land acquisition involves an appraisal by an independent contract fee appraiser. On the basis of this an attempt is made to acquire the property. If this eventually fails, the case is presented to a court to decide the outcome.
The areas to be flooded by the two lakes are sparsely settled and wooded. There are no major improvements on land to go under water, but there are a lot of old homes. small churches and stores, roads… and a lot of memories.
But the majority feeling is probably best summed up by 80-year-old Lee Felts whose farm home where be has lived since 1911 is less than 15 feet from the planned shoreline of Toledo Bend:
“You know… sometimes a fellow does things he does not like to do.”.
Words often come very easily for me. Until life happens in a way so unexpected and so difficult to comprehend that my usually trustworthy word-producing mind lets me down, finding a void where words should be plentiful.
But I feel extremely inclined to offer whatever words I can for a long-time close friend of mine who just yesterday lost her beloved father. For words are the least I can offer. And perhaps they are the most I can offer as well.
Gary Bass, a lifetime Sabine Parish resident, passed away suddenly yesterday. I do not know the details… but what I do know is that it was sudden and it was unexpected… From what I understand, he was alive and well just yesterday morning. He was full of life and love and so much good. And now, he is gone from this Earth… I can only imagine for his family, this is barely comprehensible, if at all.
Gary’s daughter, Martha Bass Snider worked with me at the local newspaper for many years, during the 1990s. We watched as local citizens of prominent status… doctors, lawyers, judges, politicians, bankers, and businessmen… were posthumously honored with Page One obituaries and feature articles in the newspaper, detailing their lives on this Earth. As it happens, and quite frankly, as he wanted it, Gary Bass was not a prominent citizen per se… He probably fancied himself a common man but in truth, he was actually quite uncommon. A bit of a rarity in this world we live in.
Gary Bass, in fact, was as honorable of a man as I’ve ever come across in my lifetime. A man who deserves fine mention in any and every manner.
And so with this in mind, I offer to my friend Martha and to her family my heartfelt and sincere words and thoughts about Gary Bass. And by offering these words here, in this forum, I wish to honor Gary Bass and the man that he was to any of 22,933 followers of All Things Sabine who take the time to read this.
Gary Bass was a good man. I say this with seeming simplicity, but it is so very much more than that. In this world we live in, coming across truly good people is the exception rather than the rule. A bit of a rarity, if you will. I guess perhaps because it is not always so simple to be good… I mean to be truly good. It is not so simple to be selfless and it is not so simple to put others first, as Gary did.
It warrants repeating, Gary was an honorable man… one of the good ones… one of the individuals who will never be forgotten by those who knew him in any way beyond just a “Hello.”
He was a family man through and through. A bit of a lost breed. Not to say there aren’t true family men out there, but his devotion to his family was both phenomenal and special. And yes, a bit rare in today’s times.
He was a wonderful husband to Myra… To say devoted doesn’t scratch the surface of who Gary Bass was. I remember thinking many times how strong and evident their mutual love and adoration for each other was. Gary’s relationship with Myra was so simple and pure and yet equally unique and complex… I say with a high degree of confidence that it was apparent to all who knew Gary and Myra knew that they were still truly in love with each other after all their years of marriage. That, too, is rare in this day and time.
Gary was a wonderful father… he doted on his children and they on him. He worked and sacrificed to provide for them. And I could tell that with him, it was not so much a matter of obligation or duty, though both were certainly inside of him, but rather a matter of pure love and adoration and wishes for the happiness and well being of his children as youths and later on as adults.
He was an amazing grandfather… the kind who regularly made moments to be forever remembered and cherished by his grandchildren. The kind who set examples for these youngsters through the way he was and the way he lived.
Gary was a hard worker. Always. Even in times of injury, he never made excuses… work was second nature to him. He did what he had to do… he knew exactly what it was he had to do and he always seemed to make it happen.
Gary was a religious man. He worshiped regularly and celebrated in his faith. His strong faith was evident in his consistent positive attitude… another rarity.
He was an incredibly kind man, who welcomed any one at any time. He had a keen sense of humor, witty sometimes but warm all the same, and he made people laugh. Mostly, he made people smile… there was just that something about him… that something I can’t put my finger on but it was there, in his presence.
Gary was always, always accepting. He was truly interested in others and what they were doing. He asked questions, and he listened, keenly… with genuine interest and caring. He never seemed to judge, for through his strong faith, he knew well that was not his place.
Gary loved his Country, and he loved the country. He was a country man if I ever met one, and I mean that in the nicest way. He loved Sabine Parish and he loved the countryside. He loved open spaces, at home and on the road.
Gary was one of those individuals whose love of life was ever present. You could just sense it in his presence. And from what I saw, he lived life to its fullest… he relished the busy times and the simple times alike. For him, there was a time for all things, and he captured the moments and he lived the full life… honorably and with dignity, purpose, and lots of love. That is a rarity… a bit uncommon by today’s standards.
Gary Bass was a common man in self-declaration who lived an uncommon life and held uncommon values dear. He was a rarity. He was, in more ways than I can count, prominent in his own right… for he stood out indeed, the very definition of prominence when you get right down to it… Gary Bass, in fact, stood well above many men in many ways.
His time came too soon. Certainly too soon for his family and his close friends. I have no place to say, “he’s in a better place,” or “God called him home because he needed another angel”, or any of the things we hear when lose a loved one. What I can say, though, is that Gary Bass was, without a doubt, one of the good ones… a fine man with a thirst for life who made the absolute most of his time on Earth.
And for the life he lived, Gary Bass will be welcomed in Heaven and missed on Earth.
Following was an Associated Press article, originally published I believe in the Longview News-Journal, in September 1965. It relates to a proposed canal between Sam Rayburn Lake in East Texas and Toledo Bend Lake.
$25 Million Tag Placed On Canal Between Lakes
SAN AUGUSTINE — A $25 million price tag has been hung on the proposed interbasin canal linking Sam Rayburn and Toledo Rend reservoirs in East Texas.
The estimate was made in a report by Forrest and Cotton Inc. of Dallas to the Deep East Texas Development Association .
The cost includes $13 million for earth excavation, $8 million for a lock with a 46-foot lift, and $1.6 million for right-of-way and relocations.
The engineers recommended a 17.2 mile canal beginning at Six-Mile Creek on Toledo Bend’s western edge and ending at the confluence of Devil’s Ford and Ponpanaugh creeks on Rayburn’s eastern side.
The single lock would be built a few miles north of Stringtown in Sabine County.
Based on estimates for a 12-foot canal with a bottom width of 150 feet. the engineers estimated 52 million cubic yards of earth wouldhave to be moved.
Relocations would affect the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railroad immediately east of Rayburn, State Hwy. 87, U. S. 96, and several pipelines
Copies of the report were forwarded to the Corps of Engineers. which agreed last month to include a feasibility investigation of the canal in a comprehensive study of water needs and navigation in the Sabine’ River Basin.
The canal, which will be built by a multicounty navigation distnct created by the last Texas Legislature. would connect two of the largest man-made lakes in the South.
Rayburn, on the Angelina River, will cover 115.000 acres when completed next year; Toledo Bend, on the Sabine, will inundate almost 185.000 acres when finished in 1967. East Texas leaders also see the channel as a means of tying the heavily – industrialized Lufkin area into a projected navigation system on the Sabine
One of the readers of All Things Sabine, from Leesville, La., messaged me this morning, asking if I could find something on “an Indian burial site that was excavated back in 1966 or 67.” The reader said he recalled going to the site, which was referred to as “Bison’s Homeplace” and watching the excavations. I found this quite interesting article, which was published in The Sabine Index, Spring of 1966, and written by Index journalist Mary Calcote. The article follows, along with pictures that were published with it:
The was the year 1266. The Sabine River left its banks and rolled over the land in West Louisiana.
It was springtime, and the crops were budding and blooming and trees were green. There was much game to hunt and the fish were plentiful. But in the spring of this year, the Caddo people were burdened with sadness.
The oldest and wisest of the Indian tribe called by the name of Swift River was dying…
The sky was darkening and the amber moon was rising over the trees. It was time to light up the evening fires and begin the chants that would take the sickness out of Swift River.
Death Nears
The time of departure was near for the old Indian and the chants of his followers could not save him. As the sun rose over the hills, Swift River died.
Red Clay, the oldest of his sons, was the one the tribe would turn to today. Swift River was buried that day, along with his eating utensils, drinking vessel, pottery, his arrows and his smoking pipe.
White Man Comes
The years rolled by faster and faster until the white man took over the beautiful country that the Caddos loved so much. Soon, there were cabins built, farms planted, and our ancestors settled in to their new homes in Sabine Parish.
Robert Bison came to own the old Indian Village site, located about eight miles west of Noble. And as he plowed the lands, he would often find the arrowheads and other artifacts left by the Caddos.
Then came the creation of the gigantic Toledo Bend Reservoir, and Bison was among many who had to move out of the Sabine River valley.
In 1963, working under a grant given by the National Science Foundation, a survey was made of Indian Village sites in the Toledo Bend Reservoir area. This initial survey was made by Dan Skarlock of the University of Texas at Austin. He mapped this and other sites in Sabine Parish. Dr. Ed Jelks, a professor of Anthropology at the University of Texas, worked on the project. He later moved to Southern Methodist University.
Digging Starts
About mid-April, anthropologists from SMU in Dallas began digging at the site. Ned Woodall served as archeologist in charge of this, the second of four field seasons by SMU this year in the Reservoir area.
This was the third site in Sabine Parish to be explored and other sites in upper Sabine Parish will be looked at later.
When I arrived at the scene Friday afternoon, May 6, the rain was slowly falling, but archeologists were busy under a tent that had made from a parachute.
I introduced myself to Dave Brown, who served as assistant in charge, while Wodall was in Reno, Nevada to give a speech. Assisting Brown was Hiram Gregory, professor of Anthropology at Northwestern State College in Natchitoches, and several of his students.
700 Years Old
Gregory, who is an authority on the Indian cultures of this area, said these Indians lived about 700 years ago. They were Caddo Indians, so very early that the anthropologists gave them the name “Belcher Focus.” The Caddo tribe was believed to be of the same tribe that has baen discovered in a line running into Arkansas and East Texas.
Gregory told me these people were hunters, fishers and agriculturists.
When I was there, four burials had been found. Three had grave goods which consisted of arrowheads, vessels, pottery, and smoking pipes.
To find a lead as to where the graves might be located, the archeologists dig trenches with back hoes. Gregory said these Indians were buried from five to six feet deep. When the archeologists get near the skeleton, they are very careful not to disturb it or any of the grave goods. They carefully use bamboo knives, trowels, and paint brushes as wisk brooms to uncover their finds.
Skeleton Uncovered
I then saw one of the graves just as they were. uncovering the skeleton and grave goods. It gave me a good feeling to know that I was watching history being made.
Brown told me the digging at this site would definitely go on until Friday, May 13. He said that if other things of significance were uncovered, the exploration may go on longer.
Brown told me the digging at this site would definitely go on until Friday, May 13. He said that if other things of significance were uncov-ered, the exploration may go on longer.
As I left, I looked at Mr. Bison’s old barn still standing a few feet from the grave sites, and wondered if someday archaeologists would be uncovering it. You see, in just a few months it will be covered by about twelve feet of water when the Toledo Bend Reservoir fills.
This was springtime, 1966. I looked at the Sabine River 150 yards from the graves as it rolled by, increased by heavy rains from u north. I looked back at the Indian Village, then again at the river, and left.
Excavation at the 700-year old Caddo Indian village on the Sabine ended a few weeks later. This brought to an end the month of digging at the Robert Bison place, and ended with the uncovering of about 10 grave sites.
Woodall told The Index that his team had found evidence of houses at the old site. He said holes were found in the ground, showing that poles supporting houses were once there. A hearth area was also uncovered.
Woodall said the location was a wonderful place for a village. Clear springs feed the Sabine River about 150 yards from the grave sites. Fishing was good in the river, hunting was good, and the soil was rich.
The anthropologist said that deer bones and mussel shells were uncovered at the site. He said the Indians planted corn and squash.
Those working at the village area said Saturday and Sunday were like carnival days at the site, with steady streams of people coming all the time. They said as many as 500 people were at the site at one time.
Years ago, I came across an article on a quite interesting journalist from East Texas. To say Edward Irwin Kellie, who founded the still operating newspaper of Jasper, Texas, was a “character” seems to be a bit of an understatement. In an August 1967 edition, Shreveport Times writer Norman Richardson compared Kellie to Mark Twain, and in fact, named his editorial piece “East Texas Twain.”
Following is the text of the editorial:
He was a 190-pounder with piercing eyes, a big walrus mustache and a pen of penitence that dug furrows in the conscience of Jasper County citizens.
Once, when his words evoked the wrath of carpetbaggers, they arrested him and tied him to a tree on the courthouse grounds.
Later, when he was dying, he insisted on being buried wrapped in a Confederate flag.
Capt. Edward L. Kellie was the Mark Twain of East Texas, a plucky little publisher who found-ed the Jasper News-Boy in 1865.
Twain dreamed of being a cowboy. So did Kellie, Twain labored in a print shop as a boy, as did Kellie. Twain loved the river and longed to be a steam-boat captain, as did Kellie. And both possessed a biting wit.
Kellie’s parents died of yellow fever in New Orleans in 1856. Three. years later, tired ‘ of walking the streets, he headed for Texas with a body full of the cowboy fever.
In Galveston, looking for work, he was given a job as a printer’s devil, with duties of keeping the office clean, picking up the type dropped on the floor and whatever else he was told to do.
He stayed there a year and then took a steamboat to Sabine Pass and hooked on with a newspaper there in the same capacity.
In 1861 the Civil War broke out and Kellie immediately enlisted in a Confederate company.
“We drilled on the prairie for about six months,” he once wrote. “Seeing no chance to get into a fight, six of us under age who wanted to fight packed our duds without asking anybody and went up to Jasper, where we learned a company was going to war.”
Kellie’s baptism to fire came at Elk Horn in Arkansas but he later wrote that, “I never did know which whipped, as the federals quit and so did we, they going north and we going south.”
In 1865, with the battle flag of his Confederate company hidden under his uniform, Kellie re-turned to Jasper, found a hand press and a box of jumbled type in an old newspaper shop, rented an office and founded the Jasper News-Boy.
Few escaped his pungent scoldings. He wrote on many things, including this note on Masonry:
“We have always thought Masonry was a good thing and we intended to try to join them when we could get money enough. But this stripping a fellow and tearing his undershirt (during initiation rites) all to pieces we don’t like. We ain’t got but two undershirts and blamed if we know what to do if one of them was tored up.”
During his career as publisher—which he left in 1880 to become a steamboat captain on the Sabine River—Kellie left Jasper with somewhat of a mystery.
In 1872 he solemnly reported that the News-Boy had received a cable from Queen Victoria of England, asking that a subscrip-tion be started and sent to Buckingham Palace. “I have been a constant reader of your paper for the past year and find it impossible to live without it. It is, indeed, the life of my household,” the cable reportedly said.
Kellie never did say if the wire was authentic or a hoax.
“The motor that makes it here can make it anywhere.”
Such was a 1973 slogan for Evinrude Motors, in an advertising campaign featuring Toledo Bend Lake. Back then, Toledo Bend was just a half dozen years old and was filled with trees and stumps, making fishing fabulous but navigation a challenge.
“This is Toledo Bend… 80 miles of bass woods and water on the Texas/Louisiana border,” the print in the advertisement reads.
“With trees above water, jungles underneath, and stumps in between– it’s no place for weak-sister motors or tackle.
“Evinrude’s tough new bass boat motors take it in stride.
“On the long runs, their high speed efficiency cuts miles and gallons down to size. Firepower electronic ignition keeps things smooth from top speed to trolling. Tough new motor mountings add strength where you need it most. While balanced trim-tab steering and power shift keeps everything under finger-tip control.
“The tougher the going the more Evinrude has going for you.”
I came across this article from a February 1964 edition of The Houston Chronicle. Very interesting… curious as to what happened to the larger scale plans… As an additional note, I did find other mentions of the dam projects in 1960s newspapers, with particular mentions of the “huge” Bon Wier dam… at least one of the article stated that the dam projects should all be complete by the year 2020… which I’m sure seemed like a life time of years back in the 60s, but now… not so much.
The following Houston Chronicle article was written by Bob Bowman, Chief of the Chronicle’s East Texas Bureau.
CENTER, Texas– For longer than most people care to remember, Sabine River leaders have been hearing towboat whistles in their dreams.
They have envisioned long strings of barges plying the river between Longview and Orange, bringing new prosperity to East Texas.
Today, instead of a bewhiskered vision, navigation on the Sabine– most prolific of Texas’ rivers– looms as an early probability. Construction could begin in 1967 or 1968.
The river’s canalization timetable is geared to a four-year study of the stream by U. S. Corps of Engineers, but Sabine leaders feel the study, when complete in mid-1966, will show that the project is economically feasible.
Biggest reason for thir optimism is the $60 million Toledo Bend dam project, which will create a 70-mile lake spanning more than a third of the distance from Longview to Orange.
“The Toledo Reservoir should enhance greatly the feasibility of natigation on the Sabine,” D. N. Beasley of San Augustine, president of the Sabine River Authority of Texas, said.
“Not only will it create 70 miles of uninterrupted waterway for barge traffic, but its releases will greatly improve the stablized flow of the river below the dam.”
When the twin Sabine River authorities of Texas and Louisiana award a dam contract in mid-March, it will include provisions for future navigation accepted by the Corps of Engineers.
Encouragement for early canalization of the SAbine has also come from a voluminous river study by Forrest and Cotton of Dallas, SRA engineers.
The report shows that navigation is “an engineering possibility” and pinpoints probable locations of three additional dams that would be needed to stablize the river’s flow and depth.
These include a 45-foot dam at Bon Wier, in Newton County, a 40 foot dam at Stateline, near Logansport, La., and a 50-foot dam near Carthage, in Panola County. Beasley calls these “small dams” in comparison with Toledo Bend’s 110 foot height.
The Bon Wier dam, about 100 miles from the Sabine’s mouth, would primarily creat a regulatory reservoir to catch releases from Toledo Bend and stabilize their flow.
Conversion of the Sabine to canalization will be a “simple thing” compared to the enormity of the Trinity River project, Beasley said.
Still another factor in the navigation proposal is the Sabine’s discharge, 6.8 million acre feet.
SRA members will start pushing for early canalization after their Toledo Bend project is past the point of no return.
The authority is completely in accord with navigation,” says Beasley, “but we’ve got to put Toledo Bend first.”
State Sen. Martin Dies Jr. Of Lufkin believes navigation on the Sabine will be the turning point of East Texas’ economy.
The Corps of Engineers study is underway by Corps distrit offices in Fort Worth and Galveston. It began in 1962. The current appropriation by Congress for the study totals $115,000.
The study also embraces water supply, drainage, flood protection, and pollution.
Improvements to a minor segment of the Sabine canal, from Orange to Echo, already have been approved by Congress. Planning for this is underway by the Galveston Distrit Office.
There has also been discussion, but no study authorized, of a canal linking Toledo Bend Reservoir and Sam Rayburn Lake on the Angelina River. Proponents say a 10-mile canal would provide the Lufkin-Nacogdoches area with a vital outlet to the Gulf Coast by way of hte middle Angelina and lower Sabine rivers.
