Applegater Spring 2012 23
Negro Ben’s Cabin
Our community choir, Voices of the
Applegate, led by director Blake Weller,
ended its second session this year with
two concerts in April. The first concert
was held at the Old Presbyterian Church
in Jacksonville on the evening of April
13, and the second concert was at the
Applegate River Ranch Lodge on the
afternoon of April 15.
Both programs consisted of a variety
of four-part harmony pieces ranging from
15th- and 16th-century madrigals to Paul
Simon’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water.”
Two pieces from Walt Disney’s “Little
Mermaid” brightened up the performance
as well.
Voices of the Applegate is made up
of about 25 men and women from the
Applegate, Williams and Jacksonville
communities. We always welcome new
members. We meet for rehearsals on
Wednesday evenings in the Applegate
Library meeting room. No auditions
are necessary and the only requirement
for joining the choir is that you love to
sing. A new session will start in early
September.
For more information, call Joan Peterson at 541-846-6988.
The top photo shows all that remains of the cabin—on Bureau of Land Management
lands—of Benjamin Johnson (thought to be his last name), known today as “Negro
Ben.” In the late 1860s, he worked as a skilled blacksmith for Theodoric Cameron at
Uniontown (at the mouth of the Little Applegate River).
Ben prospected for gold at the base of the mountain that bears his name today.
The bottom photo of Negro Ben Mountain was taken from Cantrall Road.
For more photos, go to www.applegater.org. Photos by Barbara Holiday.
tarweed
diet. The Applegate Valley tribes developed
extensive land management practices to
enhance all wild crops they relied upon.
Techniques such as burning, pruning,
tilling, weeding, and selective harvesting
were most likely used. Additionally, the
act of harvesting itself helped spread seeds
for subsequent crops.
In 1841, Titian Ramsay Peale of the
Wilkes Expedition, traveling through
what is now Ashland, wrote in his journal,
“Indian signs were numerous, though we
saw but one, a squaw who was so busy
setting fire to the prairie and mountain
ravines that she seemed to disregard us.…
She had a large funnel shaped basket which
they all [women] carry to collect roots and
seeds in.” It is assumed that this woman
probably was burning to obtain tarweed
or grass seeds, or at least to enhance their
future growing conditions.
George Riddle, who settled in
southern Oregon in 1851, described in
his book, History of early days in Oregon,
tarweed gathering among the Takelma-
Happy Mother’s Day!
from page 15
speaking Cow Creek Indians along the
South Umpqua River: “During the
summer months the squaws gather various
kinds of seeds of which the tar weed was
the most prized…. When the seeds were
ripe the country was burned off. This left
the plant standing with the tar burned off
and the seeds left in the pods. Immediately
after the fire there would be an army of
squaws armed with an implement made of
twigs shaped like a tennis racket with their
basket swung in front they would beat the
seeds from the pods into the basket. This
seed gathering would only last a few days
and every squaw in the tribe seemed to be
doing her level best to make all the noise
she could, beating her racket against the
top of her basket. All seeds were ground
into meal with a mortar and pestle.”
Consider encouraging this wildflower,
whose historical and ecological value could
enhance your own land.
Suzie Savoie
541-890-1483
asarum@wildmail.com
JOB OPPORTUNITY
The Applegater newspaper needs
an advertising salesperson for
Josephine County.
Contact J.D. Rogers, Editor
541-846-7736 or
gater@applegater.org
