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hi and welcome to another edition of Mysteries of the Superstition Mountains
and we have a goodie today because we're talking with prominent historian Bob
Boze Bell
here's a question for you was Geronimo ever really in the
superstitions well I think Geronimo arranged far and wide I think he was all
over the state in fact here's a story okay so he's he's deep in the Sierra
Madres and he's 40 years old and he gets up one day and said I've always wanted
to see the ocean and so him and some other warriors start running from the
Sierra Madre to basically where a rocky point is they ran out there and they
looked into another's the ocean and he ran back these guys were amazing the
ground that they covered so when if you that story comes from a kid who was on
What's My Line and he was raised with the Apaches and
lived into the 1950s and he told that story I believe it I think it's true
because they their ability to outrun the US Army see the US Army could do about
22 miles a day on horseback okay well in a patch you can run 75 miles and so what
they would do is the army would be coming down a valley and you could see
him for 10 miles away see the dust and so the Apaches would be
in a valley and they would make a feint to go up one side of the Chiricahua
and if they if the army followed them they just go the other way and run over
the mountain range and be two mountain ranges away by the time the army got to
where they saw them so that Crook was absolutely correct
the only way you can catch an Apache is with another Apache you're not gonna
catch them on horseback you're not gonna catch them with a train you're not gonna
catch them these guys were formidable foes what about the story about the
massacre up in the Superstition Mountains what's the truth to that I'm
not for know over the specifics of it but there's so many massacres in so many
directions it's not even funny I mean there's so many people died I'm watching
Game of Thrones and sometimes I have to grimace and go well this is a fantasy
and it's not really but well read Arizona history because
there's you know scalp hunters wiping out entire villages. the Apaches
themselves in fact Geronimo gets his name because they're attacking a Mexican
village and they're sparing no one they're killing everyone in the village
okay and these soldiers were so afraid after the battle because this one Apache
keeps jumping over the lines and going and cutting people's throats and they
keep invoking San Haram and so late at night this is my theory late at night
they're around the campfire laughing about everybody's dead in the village
okay and they're laughing about the day and how you did this and it and then one
of the Apaches goes who San heram San Heram and they go your San heram
and then the Americans come in and they flatten all the cogs all the vowels
that everything they turned into Geronimo it's hair ronimal is
technically and I'm one of the one of the placards in Washington DC it says
hey ronimo because it hadn't been Americanized yet with the German thing
so he's named for a saint that was invoked while he was killing someone
smoke that in your pipe I get this question all the time so I'm gonna ask
you what do you think about the story of the Dutchman in the Superstition
Mountains and there are legends that coalesce and they almost it's almost
like a dust storm or it's almost like a airborne you know germs or something and
they and they settle on a place and and if it has a great name Weavers Needle
Superstitions I mean it doesn't get any better than that
and I mean especially when you know you you compare that to San Francisco peak
yea... you know wallopies no... know the Wet stones..no,,
Superstition Mountains! are you kidding me yes yes I want to believe that that's
a great story right there the name I... I think the names are 90% of everything
you know that Wyatt Earp, Crazy Horse. General George Armstrong Custer, Geronimo
okay these are these are names that are just magic
now what's amazing is not everybody in the Old West had a great name those are
the names we remember and I for a while was started if I was reading a newspaper
item about something and doing some research and I would find a name of an
outlaw I would write it down and I got a whole list of names of guys who just
thought you know they thought they had the greatest moniker was gonna last for
a century and they were names like bean belly Smith, the pock mark kid,
okay my favorite one and I'm not making this up
bad bladder Allen
[laughter]
you image you are in a bank with him..... wait bad
bladder till we get on the bank it's funny how Fame does that it's Fame
famous misses people are the people and then picks up people you wouldn't even
think of you know what I mean and I'm sure people are thinking about that in
Kingman were grew up with me and they're going that's the guy the guy from
Kingman around the bases backward we called him bozo and they showed it to
bob boze bell he's the guy from Kingman are you kidding we hated that little
twerp you know that's that's how legends happen oh it's legend
[laughter]
well we'd like to
thank True West Magazine's Bob Boze Bell for sharing his thoughts and stories
about the history of the area mysteries of the Superstition Mountains see you
next time
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