Mountain Man Rendezvous Keeps Legacy Alive

Low clouds cast a thin veil between the sculptured canyon walls as Highway 58 climbed the southern slope of California’s Sierra Nevada mountain range. A cool wind pushed me up the steep grade toward my destination--the annual Hart Canyon Rendezvous--in an oak-and-pine-studded canyon high above the sprawling San Joaquin Valley.

It was last March and Bakersfield’s fertile fields lay beneath me, and I could see patchworks of grape vineyards and freshly plowed fields reflecting in the early morning sun. The swift-running creek beside the road bubbled loudly, carrying the runoff of early spring snows now replaced by a golden carpet of mustard flowers.

After several minutes of twisting along the dirt road, my quest to find “living history” became reality as I came across a storybook scene straight out of a century past. Sprinkled across the rolling canyon floor were American Indian tepees and white canvas tents amid ancient oak trees--a scene totally out of context with my modern world.

The crack of muzzle-loading rifles echoed through the hills as hundreds of “mountain men” milled about the camp in colorful attire--men in buckskin suits, women in Indian dresses and long, flowing skirts.

This seductive panorama is all part of the Hart Canyon Rendezvous, sponsored by a group called the Breckenridge Buckskinners--a club dedicated to preserving early-19th-Century American history. The Hart Canyon Rendezvous is one of many similar celebrations held throughout the United States, attracting historians, artisans, craftsmen and just plain people interested in the history of the American West.

The 1992 event will be held over nine days, March 28 through April 5, and is open to the public. Anyone can stop by from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., but those wishing to stay overnight on the grounds must be registered as participants and outfitted in period costume. With various special events offered for adults and children, plus trading posts for shopping, this historic spectacle can be a memorable experience for the whole family.

At the Hart Canyon Rendezvous, the pre-1840s period lives in spirited animation, keeping alive the traditions and customs of the mountain men and pathfinders who opened up the Western wilderness for future generations. Hospitality, friendship and camaraderie seem to extend throughout the camp.

Modern-day mountain men, sporting legendary names such as Bridger, Smith, Walker and Colter, walk the grounds. Rendezvous participants adhere to strict rules pertaining to attire, lodging, artifacts and weaponry, and no modern accouterments or luxuries are allowed within the Rendezvous site.

Clothing, cookware, tools and other artifacts--from buckskin suits to wooden water casks--must be made between 1825 and 1840 (or at least be reproductions of items made then). During that era, fur traders held annual gatherings called rendezvous, a kind of combination business and social get together, in the Rocky Mountains.

During a rendezvous, the so-called “free trappers”--independent hunters who worked for themselves--gathered to sell their beaver, otter and mink skins to fur brokers, and resupplied themselves after a long, isolated season of trapping in the mountains. The first documented rendezvous took place in July, 1825, at Henry’s Fork on the Green River, near what is now the Utah-Wyoming border.

In Hart Canyon, people of all ages gather to relive the difficult days of surviving in the wilderness. The common denominator is a love of history.

“It’s getting back to the old times,” said “Jeremiah,” a modern-day mountain man from San Pedro. Jeremiah is a retired stockbroker who vicariously relives history every year at Hart Canyon.

“I was always interested in that time of history, the Lewis and Clark days. That’s what set it off for me,” said Jeremiah as he and his wife, “Kenokua,” sat in full mountain dress in front of their authentic American Indian tepee. She was dressed as asquaw, while he wore the buckskins of a free-trapper.

Jeremiah fingered his carved bone necklace. “I went through the cowboy era, butthat didn’t do it for me. I had to go as far back as possible. I think I was born 150 years too late. This all seems natural to me,” he said.

I accepted the couple’s invitation and stepped inside their spacious lodge, where lush fur robes spread on the ground for sleeping and a small wood-burning stove created a cozy atmosphere.

“We even sleep on the floor at home,” said Kenokua as she poured a cup of coffee from a handmade jug. “We never get cold in here.” I sipped the coffee and began to unwind from my tedious 30-mile journey from Bakersfield into the mountains.

Jeremiah and Kenokua are typical of people who take on fictitious names at the gathering. There’s a reason for that, according to a buckskinner named Leprechaun, who was sitting in front of his tent, fashioning arrow and spear points from obsidian.

“Most of the mountain men wanted to forget their real names because they had been in trouble or wanted to get out of a bad marriage,” he said. “They took to the mountains, and if the word got out that they were up there, the law went looking for them.”

Leprechaun was one of many craftsmen making authentic reproductions of old tools and weapons throughout the camp. “I started doing this in 1985; now I’m getting good at it,” he said as he showed me a perfectly rendered arrowhead. “This would have been used to hunt small game.”

Black-powder firearms are a large part of any rendezvous, and many original and reproduced pre-1840s rifles and handguns can be seen throughout the camp. Daily contests showcase the weaponry and skill of the participants.

Doyle Reed is an 11-year veteran of rendezvous and says his “love of history” draws him to take part in these events. “The one in the Rockies is called the Western Nationals,” Reed said. “Last summer, up in the Big Horns of Wyoming, the final count was about 4,000 and it’s even more primitive than this.”

Reed, in authentic attire, said years are spent in creating the correct look. “Everything you wear, everything you make, is researched. You spend a lot of time in museums, you buy a lot of books,” Reed said. Authenticity by “learning the old skills” is what the participants in period dress strive for, he says.

“We cook over fires. We don’t use matches, we use flint and steel. We don’t use flashlights, we use lanterns and candles. It’s a whole new set of skills.”

At Reed’s camp, his children dressed in early 1800s fashion--young girls in long dresses, and boys in buckskins with wooden muskets on their shoulders marching together in a game of follow-the-leader.

Next to Reed’s camp, Jim Ernest tended his campfire while a pot of coffee steamed. His tepee was painted with bright, Plains Indian designs: moons and lightning bolts. Red ribbons streamed from the lodgepoles.

Ernest is a member of the Breckenridge Buckskinners and acts as adviser to the Hart Canyon Rendezvous. “Fun is the bottom line,” he said about these family-oriented meetings. Although debauchery and recklessness were part of the original Rocky Mountain rendezvous, Ernest pointed out that there have been no such problems at Hart Canyon.

“At night you can let your hair down and do some hell-raising, but we have never had a fight,” he said. “Most everybody up here are friends; it’s like a big family. We are here as a group, reliving history.

“If you weren’t into it, you wouldn’t be here,” he said with a laugh.

Canvas-tent trading posts line the main street where blacksmiths’ hammers ring out on huge anvils, and silversmiths and leather craftsmen sell period trading goods, clothing and hardware. From handmade Indian flutes and flintlock muskets to beads for decorating buckskin clothing, various items representing the fur-trade period are sold, some at bargain prices.

Walking through the tent city, I was enveloped in different cultures and styles of pre-1840s history--from Santa Fe in what used to be Mexico to Scottish tam-o’-shanters and fur hats.

Across from the blacksmith’s tent, I talked with a man who was dressed in Santa Fe garb. His wide sombrero, jingling spurs and silver handworked conches adorning his leather pants depicted the Southwestern U.S. in the pre-1840s.

“I always liked hunting, and I finally started shooting a black-powder rifle, which led me into these rendezvous,” said Dave Berge, a blacksmith from Glorieta, N.M.

Berge was selling saddles, spurs, silver buckles and conches, along with antique firearms.

“Some days you’re eating peanut butter, some days you’re eating steak,” he said. “I’ve been doing this about 11 years. I do reproductions of the old things that pertain to the history of the pre-1840s.”

In back of the Santa Fe trading post, I meet “Lodgepole” Doyle, a member of the American Mountain Men (AMM)--a group of about 800 members who live mostly in the Western states. There are also chapters in Europe. Doyle is a road surveyor and uses rendezvous such as the one at Hart Canyon as a diversion from contemporary life.

“This is my escape,” he said. “I can come to these meetings and get away. I love history, and can be someone else for a few days.”

Behind a colorful tepee, Lodgepole introduced me to Don Fraley, who was roasting a piece of beef over a campfire. As juice dripped from the meat and sizzled on the flames, Fraley, “California commander “ for AMM, explained that the group is “a historical group...not a shooting club. It’s a brotherhood . . . We are teaching the basic skills of survival, the old ways, the Indian ways--the edible plants, trapping the animals to eat and make clothes out of.

“But don’t get me wrong; we are conservationists like everyone else.”

One man who makes his living by recounting the Rocky Mountain fur trade period is teacher and author Raymond Glazner of Simi Valley. Glazner, a large, bearded man, was dressed in period attire--a colorful vest, split-tail coat and wide-brimmed hat shielding the bright sun--and sitting in front of his trading post. He is also the national field representative of the National Muzzle-Loading Rifle Assn. and the National Assn. of Buckskinners.

“Clackatee-clack.”

I heard a strange sound near Glazner’s store. A woman sat intently spinning yarn, her long gingham dress fluttering in the afternoon breeze. Nimble hands twisted red fibers onto an antique, foot-powered spinning wheel.

“This wheel was used in Europe and brought over to the colonies in the 1600s; it’s called a castle wheel,” said Jackie Taylor of Anaheim. “This type was used by peasants sitting on castle stairwells, which gave it the name.”

“I dye my wool with natural bark and bug dyes. It’s richer,” she said. Taylor spins and weaves her own yarn on looms and spinning wheels that she collects; she still has the spinning wheel used by her great-great-grandmother.

“I’ve always been interested in American history; that’s why I’m here,” she added, echoing the sentiments of most of those who attend the Hart Canyon Rendezvous.

GUIDEBOOK

Hart Canyon Rendezvous

Getting there: To reach the Hart Canyon Rendezvous from Los Angeles, take Interstate 5 north to Highway 99, north to Bakersfield. Off Highway 99, take Highway 58 east to Caliente Creek Road. Turn left to the small town of Caliente and continue past the Twin Oaks Store to Handy’s Corner. Turn right at Handy’s Corner (Jay Drive) and follow the signs to the Hart Canyon Rendezvous. Improved dirt road suitable for RVs and passenger cars. Driving time from Los Angeles is about three hours for the approximately 130-mile trip.

Hours and admission: The Hart Canyon Rendezvous will be held March 28 through April 5. The event is open to the public from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is $5 per car. Note: No day visitors will be admitted on the last day of the Rendezvous, April 5.

Visitors not participating in the various “primitive” activities of the Rendezvous can park in the Tin Tipi parking area, where overnight camping will be permitted. Campers must be self-contained with water, food and camping equipment. Consideration for the land is important, and all trash must be removed. Day visitors not spending the night must leave by 5 p.m. The dirt road into the Rendezvous site is not recommended for large RVs or motor homes. Advance reservations are not necessary.

A few fast facts: The Hart Canyon Rendezvous is held at high elevation, so bring warm clothing. Period dress is not required for the general public. There are no eating facilities, so bring your own food and water. Outhouses provided. Pets must be kept on a leash at all times.

For more information: Contact the Breckenridge Buckskinners, P.O. Box 2152, Bakersfield 93301, or Hart Canyon Rendezvous advisers Jim Ernest at (805) 832-4669 or Jay Young at (805) 835-1491.