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Show CHAPTER XI: MIRACLE ON ALTAR PEAK 1. tortineau, "History of Mission," p. 28. This one of the retrospective entries in tortineau's account which indicates it was written later. 2. Dame, "Journal of Company," p. 14. Entry for 7 toy 1858. 3. tortineau, "Seeking a Refuge in the Desert," p. 299. 4. Ibid., p. 250. 5. tortineau, History of Mission," p. 20. Entry for 7 toy 1858. Wire grass is another name for rushes and sedges. 6. Ibid. 7. William H. Dame to Brigham Young, 26 toy I858, Brigham Young Papers, L.D.S. Archives. 8. This according to interviews with present residents of White River Valley. In June, I979 the author found the creek bed only damp with grass growing in it. 9. Martineau, "History of Mission," p. 20. Entry for 7 toy I858. A part of the White River Valley north of Dame's Desert Swamp is now a migratory bird refuge managed by the Nevada Department of Fish and Game. 10. Ibid., p. 21. This was found in an area known locally as the "Needles./1 11. Dame, "Journal of Company," p. 15. Entry for 7 May I858. The present term . for wibe grass is unknown. Other early historical accounts verify that tall grasses covered parts of this area. One account claims that when white men viewed the White River Valley in the 1860s, "it was an ocean of undulating wheat grass standing as high as a horse's belly." See Effie 0. Read, White Pine Lang Syne, A True History of White Pine County (Denver: Big Mountain Press, 1965), p. 50. This was certainly not true of the entire valley, but from the White Mountain journals it is apparent that parts of this region 365 |