Arizona republican., 1912-08-03
BY MOTOR ID
 BLACK RIVER
Phoenix Party Tells How That County Looks to People Who Never Saw It; Joys of Overland Auto Touring

The trip of the Hageman party to the White mountains has been ex- plotted as an event of some moment in the world of automobile road ad- venture, but compared in strenuosity with the incidents of another tour about to be referred to, it was as mild as a moonlight stroll in Lovers Lane. Reference is made to Jake Miller. Geo. A. Mintz, M l.. Vieux Charles Edmunds and H A Jones' the latter at the wheel the personnel of a party that left here Wednesday morning, July 24, and returned We'd nesday night July 31. Their objec- tive point was the same as that of the Hageman party, Black river, and their purpose was to have good rest lot of fun, some good hunting and fishing, fine mountain air, and an easy jaunt both ways
 Results: They failed to reach Black river by a days journey; it rained every night during their absence from home and they slept in the rain when they did sleep. except one night in Globe and one night in Rice station, when they were permitted to secrete themselves in a warehouse; they ran out of provisions the second day out except a few staples like crackers and pickled tongue, and that was gone before they got back to the white settlement, which they reached we'll night famished; they worked hard ev- cry day building roads and bridges except when they were engaged in repairing their machine and then they worked still harder; and they reached home, tired, sleepy. hungry and sorely 1 in need of a real vacation. It was demonstrated again on this trip that necessity is the mother of invention for had they not been able to make road repairs to their machine that would have been embarras ssing to un- dertake; even in a first class garage they would undoubtedly have starved to death.
 Hard luck haunted the tourists from the very start Two miles beyond the Center Street bridge they en- countered a small bridge that had been broken by a traction engine the day before, and it took them just one hour to repair it so they could get across. This was perhaps a life | saving incident, for it brought them | to the summit of the Fish creek hill in the early afternoon. Only for the | broken bridge, with the shadow of bad luck lowering over them, they would doubtless have reached that 1 point just in time to get under the 1 big landslide. Before the day was 1 over they almost wished that had 1 been their fate.
 | There were ten or fifteen tons of 1 rock piled in the roadway. some of 1 the rocks so big they had to be broken with powder before they could be 1 moved. Also the retaining wall on 1 the outside was carried away and l they found it necessary to rebuild l that as well as to clear the roadway ! before they could get a path wide enough to pass. With half dozen i other travellers similarly caught they
 worked like galley slaves until night l then ran their machine back to a safe 1 place and camped while the govern ment road gang worked until mid
 night and finished the job.
 During the night they were soaked from pedal to dome. Thursday noor 1 they got to Globe and met a mar l from the Black river station. Ht ! told them they could get all the gaso-
 line and all the food supplies they
 wanted there. Acting on this infor
 nation and knowing that they could
 get supplies at Rice also. they saw
 no reason for loading their machine l with a superfluous weight of food
 stuffs and confined themselves tt | crackers and a few canned goods | They were also told that Black river bridge was in good shape which i
 was once, but it did not last long | They set out from Globe at once anC
 made Rice station that night
 And then it rained on them
 The next morning they OutfitteC
 with just grub enough to take then | to Black river, an easy days journey | and hit the trail. At every lttl,
 stream they crossed and owing to tht
 rain there were many of them, they
 stuck in the quicksand or had tc
 build a bridge over. Finally they
 sighted the saw mill on the reserva
 tion, and were bowling along at 8 | miles an hour when the maChin, stopped. They got out, pushed i
 ahead a few feet and picked up sever
 different pieces of the fly wheel
 which had hit stump. Examination
 showed that the crank shaft anC
 clutch also were both bent.
 But they were close to the mill anC
 went there on foot to see what coulC
 be done. The first fact established
 was that for the first time in a yea
 the man at the mill was almost ou
 of food and was dieting himsel
 against the emergency of continued
 rains that would prevent transpOrta
 tion The next cheering news cam
 from man working his way bacl
 from Black river. He said the up
 country demand on the store at tha