Tehachapi News

Joe Sola and his little book: the life of a shepherd 105 years ago

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As bands of sheep make their annual spring appearance in the Tehachapi area, watched over carefully by a shepherd and some herd dogs, it is the continuation of a pastoral tradition that began here over 130 years ago.

Up until the about the 1970s, most of those shepherds were Basque men, an ancient ethnic group based in the Pyrenees Mountains that straddle the border between Spain and France. The Basques have their own very old language and culture as well as tending to speak either Spanish or French, depending upon which side of the Pyrenees their homes are located. The bulk of the Basques population, over 2 million people, live in Spain.

At one time Tehachapi was home to a small but prominent Basque population, mostly associated with sheep ranching. There was the French Hotel in Downtown Tehachapi, which was owned by Basques from France, and there was even a handball court where the rugged game of Basque pelota was once played.

One of the Basque shepherds who settled in Tehachapi was an interesting man named Jose “Joe” Sola, who was born in 1880 in Spain and had served for three years in the Spanish army under King Alphonso XIII and then immigrated to the United States in 1903, reportedly because he wasn’t permitted to marry the girl he loved. She apparently later died in a convent.

In 1904, Joe got a job as a sheepherder working for the Miller and Lux farming empire near Buttonwillow. He spoke Basque and Spanish but very little English.

Finding a seashell

One day the young shepherd happened to dig up a large clam shell from a foot-deep in the soil underneath a tamarack (salt cedar)tree near Taft. He put it in his pocket and kept it for many years. Joe glued in a small stone cross that he whittled and added some assorted stones and pebbles that he had picked up.

In 1962, when he was 81 years old, Joe gave the shell to Dr. Vincent Troy and his wife Del, for whom he felt considerable gratitude for the medical care and assistance given to him and his recently deceased wife Ignacia.

Joe also made a curious little book, measuring just one inch wide by three inches tall with 32 pages which described some of his early days in this country as a shepherd in Kern County.

Joe was what is known today as an ESL (English as a Second Language) speaker and his spelling and syntax can be difficult to penetrate but it is a delightful little book about his experiences as a sheepherder over 100 years ago.

A book of memories

He begins by writing “This shell I found in Buena Vista Lake north down of Taft, Calif. 1904 and buried under a tamarack tree, one foot depth - and marked the tree - on the bark the year and my name Jose Sola May 1904. In 1940 I went to see and found again.”

“When I found it it was not Taft - it was a platform called Moron. No Maricopa either, it was an old ranch house. I was herding for Miller and Lux Co. at those times for $25.00 per month, and the lake was half dry — lots of dead fish. There seems to me millions of seagulls every day, even California Condors come to feed on fish. Cats (mountain lions) and cayouts (coyotes) come too.”

He continues: “And cayouts (pronounced Ky-yoats by oldtimers)got 2 of the sheep. I had to build a corral — 8 feet high —  to put the sheep at night to defend for cats and cayouts.”

A troublesome tramp appears

Much of the tiny book is devoted to a single incident: “One day a man roughly dressed come with an old buggy and he try to buy a sheep from me. I thought he was a tramp but I told him I could not sell any sheep as they were not mine. He insisted to buy — offered me up to $5.00 which he already had in the rear box of the buggy. I got pretty mad and I called him many times a tramp.”

“So finally he said ‘Alright, no sell to me’, he tells me or asked me ‘Who’s sheep are they?’ I tell him Miller and Lux Co. He says to me ‘You know them?’ I said no, then he asked me ‘Who is your boss?’I said ‘Manuel Avila in Buttonwillow.’ I always thought I was talking to a tramp.

“So finally he asks me if I have something to eat. I said ‘Sure I have’. I had Dutch oven mutton and potatoes and rice and I told him I go to camp and warm up the food before eat. I told him ‘Why don’t you say you was a hungry tramp?’ We employees of all places we had orders to feed tramps as they were many and if not feed them — consequences bad. They used to burn haystacks for revenge. So therefore feed them food.

Food for the stranger

“Who was he?” I was thinkin and suspicious. A tramp with a buggy, old, and he was rough-dressed. Horse was not shiny either, I had a right to be suspicious, no?

“When I started to go light a fire to warm the food — and with what fuel? Buffalo chips (cow chips) and Tule Elk chips. So he says to me ‘Wait a minute, don’t light the fire.’ He goes to the buggy and gets a gunny sack, and with my large spoon he skims the tallow on top of the food, and puts in the sack and tells me to tell the camp tender to take that tallow to headquarters where it could be rendered for lard.

“I asked him ‘Who are you to give me orders?’ I said ‘Ha ha , you are Mr. Henry Miller, ha.’ First he denied but finally he told me he was the big patron or boss. So I relax very much, so we eat. He started to tell me ‘Why do you build the corrals with willow?’ I said to him ‘to defend my sheep from cats and cayouts and the elks also — they gore the sheep and my sheep dog also.

“He talked good Mexican. Before he just want to pass for a tramp. Sure I told him ‘You try to fool me, ha, Mr. Henry Miller, but you find out I was not so unfaithful to my employer, the Big Patrone.

So after 3 hours of talking, I told him ‘You better tell Mr. Avila to move me with the sheep out of there — no feed, too many cayouts and cats.’

Loyalty has a price

The next day here comes the superintendent. ‘So you fall in favor with the big patrone, big boss,’ he said. ‘He told me to raise your pay to $40 per month.”

So Joe’s steadfast refusal to sell a sheep or betray his employer resulted in a substantial raise.

Joe eventually came to Tehachapi to work at the Jamison Quarry (for limestone) near Monolith and moved to Tehachapi in 1909. He found work in the local pear orchards eventually opened up a barbershop, which he operated for many years.

Joe Sola was well-known and respected in Tehachapi, and he raised a family here, including sons Gene, Joe and Carl and daughter Margaret. His grandsons “Pepsi” Sola and Mike Sola still live in Tehachapi.

And the shell he found over 100 years ago and the little book he assembled, documenting the life of an early Basque shepherd, are still valued possessions belonging to his friend Del Troy.

Have a good week.

Posted May 11, 2009; Volume 110 - No. 5, print edition May 13, 2009.