Albert Zeigler

Edith L. Crawford. Carrizozo, N. [Mexx?]. 

Words 1617 PIONEER STORY 	Albert Zeigler

I came to America from [Coblens?] Germany, which is situated on the Rhine 
river. I sailed in September, 1884. The boat was the [Furnesia?], of the 
Anchor lines. We were thirteen days crossing the ocean. I landed in New York 
City and left at once by immigrant train for Albuquerque New Mexico, where my 
brother Jake Zeigler was clerking in the store of Jaffa Brothers. Soon after 
my arrival there [?] sent me to San Francisco California where we had some 
relatives living. They got me a job clerking in a store and I went to night 
school and learned to speak, read and write English, as I could not speak a 
word of English when I landed in America. The ways of the people and the 
country seemed very strange to me. After staying in California a year I came 
back to Socorro New Mexico, which was then in Lincoln County. I clerked for 
Price Brothers during the year of 1885 and part of 1886. While I was living in 
Socorro I visited my brother Jake, who was then living in [Manzano?] New 
Mexico. He and a man named Herman Goodman ran a small store there, selling dry 
goods, groceries and liquor. The town of [Manzano?] was a Spanish-American 
town. My brother, Mr. Goodman and a fellow by the name of [Kountas?] were the 
only white men living there at the time. This fellow [Kountas?] ran a 
newspaper which was called the "Gringo and Greaser". He did not like the 
Spanish-Americans and was always making dirty remarks about them in his paper. 
One night while he was eating supper some one shot through a window and killed 
him instantly. That ended the "Gringo and Greaser" newspaper. Another incident 
happened while I was visiting my brother there. A bunch of Spanish American 
men were in the store drinking and a couple of them got drunk. Jake refused

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to sell them any more whiskey so the bunch left the store. Later in that 
evening twelve men came back to the store armed with forty-five Winchester 
rifles, looking for Jake. He had been tipped off and was hiding in the hay 
loft. When they could not find him they left, but the next day they got out a 
warrant for him and had him arrested and taken before a Justice of the Peace 
who was a Spanish American. He fined [JJake?] and made him pay the costs of 
the court, all just because he would not sell the two drunk men more whiskey. 
That was the kind of law and justice we had in those days. I left [Socorro?] 
New Mexico in December 1886, for White Oaks New Mexico. I went by stage coach, 
which was a buck board drawn by two little Spanish mules. We left Socorro 
about ten o'clock in the morning and got to [Osanne's?] ranch, which was about 
half way between Socorro and White Oaks, about six o'clock in the evening. We 
had our supper there at the ranch and changed the team and started on the last 
half of the journey. It was a bitter cold night and we arrived at White Oaks 
about four o'clock in the morning. There were lots of sandy places on the road 
and at times the mules could only make about two miles an hour. It was a very 
cold and tiresome trip. My brother Jake and Herman Goodman had moved to White 
Oaks from [Mansano?], after Jake had the trouble with the Spanish Americans at 
[Mansano?], and put in a dry goods store in a small log cabin. After I got to 
White Oaks I went [into?] the business [with?] them and the store was called 
Goodman, Zeigler Company. The business was small and in order to increase it 
my brother Jake often made trips into the surrounding country and peddled dry 
goods. We had a wagon and a good pair of horses and Jake could take quite a 
load of goods with him on each trip. The country in those days was not any too 
safe and he usually took a 

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man with him to do the driving," as they [?] out at night most of the time. He 
had a man named Ike Smith who was an old timer and knew the country well who 
went with him. Once when they were returning from a trip into the [Penasco?] 
country, they were coming down Nogal hill when a masked bandit stepped up to 
the wagon and drew a gun on them and said, "turn over your money and be quick 
about it." Jake and Smith were so surprised that they were rather slow in 
turning over the money and the bandit shot at them. The bullet grazed Ike 
Smith's forehead. About a year after this hold up Ike Smith died from the 
effects of this wound. This happened at the foot of Nogal Hill, near Nogal New 
Mexico, which is twelve miles southeast of Carrizozo New Mexico. After that 
experience my brother did not make very many more trips selling merchandise.

We freighted all of our merchandise from San Antonio New Mexico by teams and 
mostly ox teams. It took them a week to make the trip from San Antonio to 
White Oats. In one of the shipments of merchandise, I ordered ten gallons of 
very fine wine. When the keg came we were all so anxious to get a good drink, 
but when we opened the keg you can imagine our great disappointment to find it 
filled with water. Some one had taken the wine out and filled the keg up with 
water. There was a man by the name of W.H. Weed, who settled in White Oaks in 
1881. He had a general [merchandise?] business and also sold liquor. His store 
was a log cabin with a lean to shed on the back, with a side door entrance. He 
kept a barrel of whiskey on tap all the time and when the millers quit work 
for the day they would go by Weed's place and go in the side door and get a 
drink of whiskey, or as many drinks as they wished. Old man Weed would charge 
them with up with one drink no matter how many they had. He thought

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in this way he would get all the trade of the miners. White Oaks was a booming 
town in those days, there were about two hundred miners at work in the mines. 
I remember one evening while I was boarding at the Brothers Hotel, a man by 
the name of John E. Wilson came in to supper with a fine specimen of gold. He 
showed it to a man by the name of Sigafus, who was operating the North Home 
stake mine at that time. Wilson asked him what he thought of this kind of ore. 
I remember very well that Sigafus told him, "just one ton of this kind of ore 
and you will never have to work anymore". Mr. Wilson located the South 
Homestake mine which later proved to be very rich in gold. 

The North Homestake mine was located in 1880, by Jack Winters. This mine was 
also very rich in gold. The Old Abe mine was first located in 1881 by 
prospectors but none found the rich vein and they let their leases lapse. In 
the fall of 1890 the rich vein was located by a man named William Watson. The 
Old Abe mine is about thirteen hundred feet deep and is considered the dryest 
mine in the world. It has produced around one and one half million dollars in 
gold. 

The population of White Oaks was about five hundred people when the rich 
strike was made at the Old Abe mine and it jumped up to fifteen hundred 
people, with two hundred miners working in the mines. Although a hundred miles 
from the nearest railroad, the social life compared favorably with cities such 
larger. On March 9th, 1895, came the most drastic of all the Old Abe mine 
fires, in which eight miners lost their lives. The town people worked day and 
night to recover the bodies, the faithful women of the town staying on the job 
all the time, serving hot coffee and sandwiches to the [rescuers, many?] of 
whom would be brought

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to the top overcome by gas fumes. 

When the El Paso, Northeastern Railroad was built from El Paso Texas to 
[Tueumcari?] New Mexico, we had great hopes of it building through White Oaks, 
but it left White Oaks about twelve miles to the east, and now it [is?] just a 
ghost town, but we still have great hopes of the mines opening up again. 

Several funny things happened while I was living in White Oaks. Mrs. Zeigler 
and I were invited to a dinner party at Mrs. John McCourt's, a neighbor of 
ours. Her little son, Ben, about five years old enjoyed the meat course very 
much. The little fellow heard us talking about the kind of meat that we had 
and it happened to be kid. He asked us, "What did they kill the poor little 
fellow for?" 

During the Cleveland administration we had quite a few light grey stove pipe 
hats in the store. A bunch of Apache Indians came over from the Reservation to 
buy some dry goods. My brother Jake sold each buck one of [these?] stove pipe 
hats. With their blankets and moccasins and high hats they were sights to 
behold. Everyone in the town was out watching these Indians parade the 
streets. 

I have lived in Lincoln County fifty years and have been in the general 
merchandise business all these years. 

NARRATOR: Albert Zeigler, [Carrizozo?], New Mexico. Aged 78 years. 

Credit: Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, WPA Federal Writers' Project 
Collection.

Lincoln

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