Page 12 - Sanger Herald 1-18-18 E-edition

Rock. An opera singer roughed it, too.
When Marilyn’s dad was young, he lassoed a bear and dragged it into camp. The story appears as an excerpt from the book “Dead Aim,” by Lee E. Echols. Loren Nord, a manager of a Safeway in Fresno, who got to know the Johnsons, told the story. “One day the cook and I were preparing dinner when I heard the damnedest brush-breaking and hollering I’d ever heard in my life. I looked up at a clearing in the lodgepole pines and here came George riding like Billy Venero (a gunslinger immortalized in a song). Coming up behind him, and on a slack rope, was a
brown bear about the size of a lounging sofa. He was gaining on George on every jump.”
George screamed at his brothers to get another loop on the bear. “George was riding one of the fanciest cutting horses in California, and he cut around the small clearing that was the camp like Bolerophon riding Pegasus, with the bear right on his tail, humped up like a cold sow and madder than a slapped bee.”
They got the bear in an extra lasso and sent it on its way sometime later. Loren said something about George later using fishing line to rope field mice.
Marilyn said lassoing anything that walked by was considered fun, a way
Marilyn Dale photo
Crown Valley's heyday is long past. But decades ago, cowboys told stories around a campfire and a guy named George Johnson lassoed a bear and needed help getting it free.
SANGER HERALD
4B THURSDAY, JANUARY 18, 2018
Valley
Continued from Page 3B
Miller said in her younger days, she’d saddle up. Her family also raised cattle in the region.
Sanger Capt. Kent Matsuzaki said he met Marilyn and her daughter Lisa by happenstance recently, and they began talking of the Johnson family history. “Growing up, she was an accomplished horsewoman who assisted her parents on those cattle drives,” Matsuzaki wrote in an email. “From my deputy years, I knew that several families had developed and ranched thousands of acres in the mountain area in and around Pine Flat Dam. Her family being one of them.
“She has lived a wonderful and idyllic life.” In later years, the log buildings at Crown Valley were used by the family as a dude ranch. Earlier, the family would bring celebrities out to experience the wilderness of Crown Valley, which isn’t far from the John Muir Trail. An aerialist husband and wife from Ringling Bros. Circus made the trip and climbed Tombstone
To get an item into the calendar, email details to nemethfeatures@gmail. com or call Mike or Sharon at 559-875-2511.
For the Blossom Days Festival on March 3, the Sanger Chamber plans to announce the first- ever Blossom Queen. Nominations are currently being accepted. Details, 559-875-4575.
Sanger Apaches Baseball Dinner, Dance & Silent Auction 5 to 11 p.m. Feb. 10 at the Grace Barn, 4219 S. Highland Ave., Del Rey. Event held by Sanger Dugout Boosters for the fifth year. Latin Connection will perform live music. Tickets are $30. Sign up on Facebook at Sanger High Baseball.
Sanger Little/Junior Apaches Basketball League begins Jan. 20 and every following Saturday until Feb. 17 for a total of five sessions for five weeks. Each session features fundamental drills for 20 minutes, and then participants play in games the next 40 minutes. Cost
Marilyn Dale photo
Driving cattle into the high country was a Johnson tradition.
Sanger News & Community Calendar
to blow off steam. “They worked so cotton-pickin’ hard,” she said.
Marilyn stays in touch with one of her friends from that trip in 1950. “Jeannie flew in a year ago,” she said. The pair took a helicopter to Crown Valley, which now has electricity because of power generated by an ingeniously engineered device on the ranch water wheel.
They didn’t ride horses. No road exists to the ranch. Marilyn quit riding horses four or five years ago, but she said she’d be
back in the saddle with the right one. The saddle made for her when she was 13 by craftsman Harold “Slim” Beaver sits in her home on display together with the reins her dad made. It’s the one she always used.
“If I had Midget or a Brownie (another prized horse), I’d still be riding,” she said. “They’d take care of me.”
Marilyn spoke about her late husband, Ken, who died seven years ago. She said they met on a blind date on New Year’s Eve and got married nine months later, neither of them pregnant.
He was a power lineman who took her lead and got into farming, construction and cattle driving after they were married. Marilyn was a grade school teacher for 35 years. The pair had two kids, Lisa and Ken Jr. or KC.
“I’ve had some fun adventures,” she said. “I’ve had a wonderful life.”
The reporter can be contacted by email at nemethfeatures@gmail.com or by phone at the Herald at (559) 875-2511.
workshops, speakers and prizes. Those interested must register at http:// ys2018.eventbrite.com. The event is sponsored by the college, the Lock It Up Project, the California Health Collaborative and Performing Above the High.
Tiny Tot Sports Development for 3- to 5-year-olds is at 5:30 p.m. Friday nights through Feb. 16 at the Sanger Community Center, 730 Recreation Ave. Cost is $45 or $50 after first meeting. Details, recinfo@ci.sanger. ca.us or 559-876-6300 ext. 1430.
Gymnastics for boys and girls 4 to 12 starts at 9 a.m. Saturdays at the Sanger Youth Center, 818 L St. Times are specific to age groups. Cost is $20 per month. Details, recinfo@ ci.sanger.ca.us or 559-876- 6300, ext. 1430.
Karate for all ages is 6 to 7 p.m. Tuesdays and Fridays at the Sanger Youth Center, 818 L St. Cost is $25 per month. Details, recinfo@ci.sanger.ca.us or 559-876-6300, ext. 1430.
Youth Basketball League is for girls and boys kindergarten through eighth grade and will be held December and into February. Games will be played on Thursday or Friday nights or Saturday. Details, 559-876-6300, ext. 1430.
is $70 and $15 for pictures. Session will be at Sanger High’s Dean Nicholson main gym. Kindergarten through eighth grade can participate. Times depend on age and start with kindergarten at 12:30 p.m., finishing with sixth- through eighth-grade starting at 4:15 p.m. Details, Al Alvarado al_alvarado@ sanger.k12.ca.us of 559-618- 0052.
Just to get the season started, the Sanger District Chamber of Commerce plans the 30th Annual Blossom Trail Kick Off for 10 a.m. Feb. 2 at the Sanger Woman’s Club, 1602 Seventh St. Details, 559- 875-4575.
United Health Centers plans to officially open its doors to the public with a ribbon cutting at 11 a.m. Jan. 24 at its newly completed facility at the corner of Seventh and P streets. Details, 559-875- 4575.
AMVETS has brought back its chili dogs from 5 to 8p.m.Jan.24at812KSt. In February, the sequence switches to the first and
third Wednesday of the month. So that will be at the same time Feb. 7 and 21. Everybody who’s anybody will be there. Come early. It’s popular. There will also be kraut dogs, mustard dogs and Frito boats. The meals will be served the second and fourth Wednesdays of every month. Details, George 559-286-5667.
The Sanger branch of the Fresno County Library has a lot going on. The Big Read this year is "The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir" by Kao Kalia Yang. Residents are encouraged to read the book and participate in discussions and special events. Builder's Club for creating Leo masterpieces is 3 p.m. Jan. 24, Feb. 14, Feb. 28. Open Mike of Love for favorite poems or stories from at 6:30 p.m. Feb. 6. Hmong Folktales is 6:30 p.m. March 7. Diabetes Prevention Classes are from6to7p.m.Feb.7 and March 7 (the first Wednesday of the month). Come Play with Me, which caters to children up to 3 years old and they are
read to and participate in different activities, is 10:30 a.m. every Friday. Preschool Story time is at 10:30 a.m. every Thursday. Read to a Dog with Vinny! is every other Saturday. The library is at 1812 Seventh St. Details, 559- 305-7130.
The New Sanger Democratic Club plans to meet at 7 p.m. Feb. 20 at Me-N-Ed's Pizzaria, 2616 Jensen Ave. Details, 559- 977-5956.
Orthodontist K.D. Singh of Sachdeva Orthodontics has opened a Sanger office at 2570 Jensen Ave. Suite 102. Singh and his staff provide braces and Invisalign for children and adults. Singh also has an office in Madera and teaches at UCLA. Details, sachdevaortho.com or 559- 232-3737.
Sanger Adult School Career Night is from 6 to 8 p.m. Jan. 30 at the Sanger High library, 1045 Bethel Ave. Union apprenticeship programs, employment agencies, Lyle's College of Beauty, Fresno City and Reedley colleges, and more.
Details, 559-524-7775.
Big Game Feed this year will be limited to 300 tickets. Last year, the event reached capacity with more than 400 people consuming about 500 pounds of wild game, said organizer Ron Stukey with the Sanger Bible Church. Last year, also raised about $8,000 for HOPE Sanger. But Sanger High's multipurpose room reached capacity. Details, 559-875-3031.
HOPE Sanger seeks donations of coats, scarves and gloves for kids for its Winter Wear Event from 10 a.m. to noon Jan. 27 at 520 L St. Details, 559-875-7677.
The Sanger Eagles' taco nights have resumed. Taco nights are the first and third Mondays of the month. Prime rib dinner is 6 p.m. Jan. 20. Cost is $30. The location is 225 J St. Details, Jim Batten 559- 875-6820 or Denny Noller 559-392-1936.
The Sanger Community Task Force meets at 8:30 a.m. Feb. 6 at the SAM Academy, 750 N St. Details, 559-250-6433.
The 2018 Fresno County Youth Summit this year has been dubbed “Be the Light in the Dark” and will be held from 8:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Feb. 3 at Reedley College’s Forum Hall, 995 N. Reed Ave. in Reedley. The free event is for high school students and will include youth development
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