My best memories of the Arcularius Ranch have to do with horses. My first horse was Rex, a big rangy sorrel who was gentle enough for any number of kids. On Rex I got my first taste of being a cowboy. Rex would get in the middle of the bunch and bite the cows on the rump! I got lots of time riding drag in those early days. So much dust, but I loved every moment.

My second horse was Sierra, a palomino quarter horse type. He was a good cow horse, and I became a pretty good hand then. One time we were out for a ride and a thunder storm came up suddenly. My closest refuge from the rain and lightning was the Thompson Ranch (which later became the Alpers Ranch). Since it was really pouring rain, I tied Sierra up to the hitching rack and ran inside. Not long after that, lightning hit the water tank on top of the building. Pow! Light and sound were tremendous. Then Peggy, the owner, came staggering out of the bedroom that was under the water tank. No one was seriously hurt, and Sierra remained tied to the rack.

Many of the guests became friends of the family. There were very few children around to play with, however. I was never allowed to call any of these guests by their first names. I must have so blocked out first names that to this day I have a hard time remembering first names. I've even called kids at school Miss Someone. One time in a conversation with a guest, I knew the guest was clearly stating a wrong fact and I started to argue. It took a couple of kicks from Mother to get the hint that I was not to argue either, even if I was right.

During one period there were a group of guests who liked to stay at the same time. In the evenings, they would gather around the player piano. Some would play banjo or guitar or spoons and all would sing the old songs from earlier days. Some I remember were "I Want a Girl, Just Like the Girl that Married Dear Old Dad", "Bye, Bye Birdie", "Old Gal Sal". I got sent to bed before these jam sessions ended, but I could still hear Chic Phillips pounding on the keys and the vibrations of his foot tapping time on the floor.

One of the things I heard more than other children was, “My, how you've grown. Last year you were only this tall.” I had many rejoinders ready, but of course, didn't say them. Many of these same people also brought gifts each year, so I just smiled.

We ate our meals around a wooden table with a green linoleum top with a bench along the wall and chairs around the rest of the table. The family was joined by the cook and whatever help was there. Seldom would the family finish a meal without having to get up and wait on someone in the store. This always bothered me, but my folks would not close the store during our meal time, which, by the way, was always on time!

I spent a good deal of time in the kitchen too. Never cooking, because you didn't get in the way of the cook. I learned all about waiting tables and more than I wanted to know about washing dishes. Learning the slang for ordering breakfasts was fun. I still don't mind waiting tables.

Over the years, I met all kinds of cooks. Some were strange, but some were really nice. One Easter, a talented lady taught me the basics of drawing faces on Easter eggs. I still have two paintings in my home by a cook. She had copied the scenes from a magazine. I learned about early country music by visiting one of the Indian girls who worked for us. She lived in a cabin in back of the lodge and had a record player for our listening pleasure.

Another interesting person I remember was Hugh Robertson. He was a cowboy for my grandfather in earlier days. He always stood tall and straight with a large, high-topped cowboy hat. One of his jobs was to chop wood for the big kitchen stove and deliver it to the woodbox there. He would sometimes sit on the wood in the woodbox to pass the time in the evening. He believed that the water from the river was too pure so he would put a handful of gravel in his glass of water to give him minerals! Hugh would stay at the ranch alone all winter to watch over things and to shovel snow off the roof if it became necessary.

I started earning wages early at the ranch. My first salary was 50 cents a day. For this I had to watch the store, selling soda pop, ice cream cones, canned goods, etc. I also had a neat job for a child. We had slot machines, and when a guest left a pay showing on the machine, I was allowed to take money from the cash register to play the machine and take the pay off If I won, I returned the coins I'd taken from the cash register and I could keep the rest. Once or twice the slot machines would disappear to the back bedrooms out of sight. Someone had warned of a government agency hunting illegal slots in California. I didn't understand this well at the time.

I went on to earn 50 cents an hour and $1 an hour. I remember my dad trying to explain to my unhearing ear why he had taken money out of my pay for some dumb thing called Social Security. That was my money!