"Shoeboy's Son" - the story of George McJunkin. After reading in Natural History magazine in the 1990s about the true discoverer of the Paleo-Indian "Folsom Man", I found a new hero and was inspired to write this song. There is much to tell about him, and although much of it is contained within the song, I believe more needs to be known so that this amazing black American cowboy hero may be appreciated and honored.

On the very day that yankee soldiers arrived at the McJunkin ranch in Midway, Texas, to tell the slaves that they had been freed, George McJunkin, the 17-year-old son of "Shoeboy", the blacksmith of the ranch and to whom George was apprenticed, stole away in the night without a word, knowing that his dreams and destiny lay far beyond the drudgery of a blacksmith's life.

Long before the great journey ahead of him, George had begun learning to read (an activity forbidden to slaves), and had trained to be an excellent horseman and all-around cowhand. With these advanced skills, he soon joined up with cattle drives on the Chisholm Trail as a cowboy and cook, heading north and west. The gift of a brass telescope from a soldier Quartermaster, whose life George saved along the way, provided him one more path into the world of knowledge. Along his way, he encountered friendly ranchers' and their wives who occasionally provided him with books and helped with his reading. Through his studies - and with the help of his new telescope - he gained a working knowledge of botany, biology, astronomy, archaeology, Spanish, music, and even surveying,

Seeking a place to settle, he arrived in northeastern New Mexico, in the town of Folsom, which showed some acceptance and friendliness towards ex-slaves - unlike nearby Trinidad, Colorado, which had a reputation of violence towards people of non-white races. He became the first and only black foreman of a white-owned ranch in the state, The Crowfoot Ranch, and established himself as a capable, dependable worker and neighbor. He was so trusted that some white ranchers hired George to settle land disputes because he understood how to survey. They also asked him hold the stakes while they played poker. He had learned enough Spanish to teach it to some of the children. He also played musical instruments. He kept his "museum" of rocks, bones, and other artifacts in his room, which people often visited to hear George talk about them.

After a devastating flash flood in 1908, which nearly destroyed the little town, George found that the rushing water had eroded the ground in Dead Horse Arroyo so badly, beneath a barbed wire fence, that the ranch's cattle had escaped below it. He was able to retrieve most of them with the help of his telescope. While riding in the Arroyo searching for the cattle, George noticed bones that had been exposed by the flood and identified them as belonging to a very large, extinct variety of bison. He also discovered a spear point embedded among the ribs. He protected his discovery (as a true archaeologist would) and, being acquainted with a scientist in nearby Raton, Carl Schwachheim, he dutifully notified him of his find and, with a surveyors preciseness, indicated its exact location. George McJunkin died in the Folsom Hotel, never knowing the importance of his discovery, in the company of dear friends who read to him from his books as he died.

It was a few years after McJunkin's death that Schwachheim and his team finally rode the 60 miles to the Arroyo, found the bones and spear-point, and soon were able to establish the importance of the discovery, which was not credited to George McJunkin until decades later. The find eventually established that primitive North American people occupied this land during the Pleistocine and hunted bison thousands of years before the currently accepted dates.

свернуть