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By Georgie Wood ggannwood@yahoo.com
I was told the story that when the Martin Wood family lived at El Capitan in Gila County circa 1918-1920, a man who I will refer to as “Bill” trapped a big lynx cat, tied it behind his saddle, and headed for home on his horse.
After arriving at his home and dismounting, he untied the supposedly-dead lynx from behind his saddle and threw it on the ground, but as he turned around to unsaddle his horse, the lynx revived, jumped on Bill’s back, and proceeded to claw the heck out of him!
Bill jumped and bucked, trying to get the animal off of his back, but when he ran towards his house his wife slamed the door shut when she saw the animal on his back. Luckily, Bill’s brother was there and knocked the lynx off with a pole, afterwhich the lynx ran under the house, and when Bill’s dogs tried to get it under the house, the lynx got the best of the dogs, too.
On the way to Globe, after traveling over the “Pass”, there was a Dutchman named Shadrick who farmed by a running creek, and the Wood family would sometimes buy produce from him.
There were many coyotes that would eat Shadrick’s melons, and after he asked Martin Wood for advice about his problem, Martin suggested that Shadrick put his bed outside at night so he could keep the coyotes away when he wasn’t sleeping.
Shadrick’s funny reply with his accent was, “By, Golly! I’m not going out there to sleep! The coyotes will eat me!”
The Martin Wood’s youngest son, Cliff, enjoyed going to a restaurant in Globe that was named the Richiloo, and Cliff liked to eat soup there that was served with small round crackers. The Chinese man there would tell Cliff that the soup was made with cat meat, and whenever Cliff showed up there, he would ask Cliff if he wanted any cat soup.
Another pleasant memory of Cliff’s was enjoying eating ice cream in the winter that he and his brothers would make out of snow, canned milk, and sugar.
Cliff was so much younger than his brothers that he often found ways to entertain himself, and most of his toys were those he made. He would play as if gourds were his cattle that he would brand with a piece of bailing wire.
Wagons were made from wooden boxes that dried fruit had come in,big beer bottles were horses whose harnesses were made from old string, and his corrals were made from sticks.
No wonder he later ended up being a cowboy and a rancher making do with what he had.
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