THE BARK NOTES on - The Lost Dutchman Mine

[Dirty Dutchman]

Jim,

(laughing) I got off in one spot to "lead" my horse as it was about 300 feet straight down and that sorry sucker "burroed up" on me and wouldnt even LEAD over the trail! Well, we couldnt turn around so i threw a leg over and gave him a little "love tap" with the lead rope and on we went. We made it so fast i waited about 15 minutes for my partners to catch up. When they got there my buddy asked me "Travis, did you look down to your left"? I said "No, i was trying not to look down that CLIFF!" LOL He said that was the "stupidest place anyone would ever try to ride a horse over".

Gotta love horses. Conquered animals my a$$!

thanks,
Travis

[Jim Hatt]

Travis,

About 10 years ago I was leading a group of riders down off the side of Garden Valley along the trail to Hackberry Spring. There is a place along that trail where it gets very narrow and has a steep drop off on the left. Right in the middle of it, there is a sharp turn that is no problem for a hiker on foot or maybe a "wiener" dog to navigate, but it's a little tight for a horse. When we got to that point my horse looked it over real good and started his dancing and snorting routine.

It took me a while but I finally managed to get him to go through it. Once we got past it and safely to the other side. I paused to light a cigarette. I put it in my mouth and reached for my lighter. That is when I noticed that the end of the cig in my mouth was bouncing up and down. I looked down and all four of my horses knees were trembling.

There was a woman following me, and although her horse appeared to be comfortable going through the hazardous area, she didn't look so comfortable with it.

I hollered back to her to trust in her horse, because he didn't want to go over that edge any more than she did. All the other horses came through it fine, after seeing that the horse in front of them had already made it.

Jim

[Armchair]

We would know the original bark notes as the only one written in bark's handwriting?

[AshtonPage]

Hi Armchair,

If we had the original notes that would be one way of validating the ‘original’ version. But I am quite certain that nobody is going to get their hands on the original notes. I believe that Estee Conatser saw the original notes – and if that is the case, then it is my opinion that she wrote whatever clues were relative to the LDM in her book The Sterling Legend. Meaning that I believe there’s nothing of importance in the original Bark notes that we don’t already have.

I have to question how reliable a source Rheinhart is (for a variety of reasons) but primarily because he and Julia started their search in an entirely different location than the route Julia told Sims that Waltz had told them (her and Reiney) he would take them in.

Good Luck,
Ashton

[AshtonPage]

Maybe this is common knowledge and I’m just the last one to figure it out – it wouldn’t be the first time that’s happened. I hope that is not the case and, as always, I welcome your comments and hope to engage in meaningful dialogue.

I realize that I’m going out on a limb in a lot of areas here (so what else is new?). But I believe if you follow my line of thinking without getting sidetracked on peripheral issues (like; Was Sims pressured to omit data – that’s periphery) you might find this interesting. It certainly has implications that are deeper than they first appear. More on that in a later post.

I used to think that if I could just have access to the ‘real’ Barks Notes, they would prove to be the missing link and then I would then be able to solve the riddle. But after researching it out, I now believe that if I had access to the original Barks Notes, the unadulterated a word for word transcription of what Reiney told Jim Bark, that they would actually cause me more confusion than any questions they might answer. Yeah, I know – some of you think I’m confused enough already But here’s my thinking on why I believe Bark’s Notes (even the real ones) are detrimental to the search and where I think we should be looking for directions to the mine.

In reading multiple accounts where Waltz repeatedly scolded Reiney; “you’re not listening, that mine is hard to find. You’re got to pay attention.” It becomes painfully apparent that (for whatever reason) Reiney simply was not grasping the directions to the mine as Waltz was talking to him. Notice that Waltz is not scolding Reiney months or even years after the fact, this is actually during the time Waltz was telling Reiney the directions to the mine –that’s a key point.

Interestingly, I’m not the first one to come to this conclusion. Others have speculated as to why Reiney didn’t understand Waltz’s directions. Some have opined because Waltz’s German was difficult to understand, or that Reiney was uninterested or simply daydreaming at the time. Whatever the reason was is not the important factor. The point here is that others have come to the same conclusion -> that from the get-go; Reiney never did get a handle on the directions that Waltz gave him.

Assuming that I’m correct about all that brings me to the curious issue; I haven’t seen anybody follow this line of thinking to its logical conclusion. Which is – Reiney’s directions are faulty. To whatever degree that may be true, it still leaves us with faulty directions and therefore Barks notes are essentially misleading, even in their original, unadulterated version. If I am right about that, then it’s one more reason why Jim Bark and partner Sims Ely were unable to locate the mine. It also explains, at least in part, why Julia and Reinhart failed to locate the mine. I have often wondered why Julia and Reiney would enter the mountains from the west when Jacob Waltz specifically told them he would point out the trail from board house - meaning Waltz was to lead them into the mountains from the south. I used to think that Reiney knew something that he wasn’t telling but now I believe that he simply never knew.

From reading Sims book I believe that Sims never interviewed Reiney personally. Therefore, Sims information regarding what Waltz said about the LDM would have come from Julia. I’m not trying to prove that I’m right and everyone else is wrong, I’m saying that if Sims (for whatever reason) omitted from his book the conversations Reiney had with Jim Bark, then we are the ones to benefit from that decision. It’s my opinion that Sims account does not contain the errors that Reiney introduced into the episode when he relayed his story to Jim Bark.

Some believe that Sims was pressured to leave out the interviews Jim Bark had with Reiney. That’s speculation beyond where I am willing to go. I don’t know if that’s the case, but if it was then those people requesting that Reiney’s interviews be omitted actually did the rest of us a huge favor by having Sims omit Reiney’s directions - which I believe are faulty from the onset.

Comments?

Ashton

[babymick1]

directions - which I believe are faulty from the onset.

Comments?

Ashton[/quote]


Well if there writting books to sell stories of something they never found
then I,d say it was fiction.

Dad always said believe what you know not what you read.

Babymick1