"Delphine and I are just awakening to the fact that the 62nd anniversary of our marriage is practically upon us. It was the 21st of August, 1889, that we were married in Seattle and that evening boarded the fine old steamer Walla Walla enroute to San Francisco.

That was soon after the great Seattle fire which destroyed a large part of the city and the harbor was full of floating logs and other debris which had not yet been brought under control. Trying to make its way out of the port the Walla Walla struck a mess of floating logs and had quite a hole stove in her bow. However, she went on that night to Victoria, where the next day was devoted to the work of patching up the damage so that she could proceed that evening out through the foggy straight of San Juan de Fuca.

The ship's pumps were working during all that voyage to San Francisco and there was considerable nervousness among the passengers. However, we arrived safely in San Francisco about 10:00 on the morning of August 25, 1889. At the pier we secured one of the old-fashioned (but then at the height of style) hansom cabs with the driver of the old horse sitting up above us. We drove over the cobblestone pavements of Market Street into the great rotunda of the beautiful old Palace Hotel, around the circular drive until the horses stopped right at the desk where, for the first time I proudly registered Mr. and Mrs. Charles P. Squires.

For some years we have every year visited the Palace Hotel on our anniversary, but this year we are just quietly staying at home with a little family party. Oh, no! Not getting old of anything like that! Just taking things easy as we go along. But come to count them over on our fingers, 62 are quite a batch of years for two people to have lived together in peace and contentment.

A year ago (August 5, 1950) I wrote in Fabulous Las Vegas a little story of My Lady of the Grapes just as I had done each year when Mrs. J.T. McWilliams sent us a box of grapes dripping with sweetness, from the trellis in the yard of her lovely little home on the West Side.

This year again we have been remembered by this kindly and friendly lady whom Delphine and I have known and loved for so many years. And the sweet, purple grapes which she grows so well have a finer flavor because of the loving care she gives them.

By the way, I wonder if anybody now in Vegas knows that Vegas grapes took first prize at the Chicago Exposition in 1893, for sugar content? Mrs. Helen J. Stewart, then owner of the Las Vegas Ranch which was afterward bought by Senator Clark as the site of his new Townsite of Las Vegas and division terminal of his new railroad, sent the grape exhibit to Chicago, I understand. After the award was made there were great hopes that Las Vegas might be enriched by extensive vineyards and wineries, but nobody up to now has ever had the patience to do much about it.

Over 40 years ago, Frank Buol, brother of Pete Buol who was elected first mayor of Las Vegas and among the most enterprising of our early citizens, left Las Vegas, buying himself a ranch in Pahrump Valley, in Nye County and going into the wine business. For many years he was engaged in the making of wines in a small way, but never a scale sufficiently large to command a profitable market. But every once in a while I was recipient of a bottle of fine wine from my friend Frank, who, by the way, has been for many years one of the assemblymen from Nye County in the State Legislature.

I recall another little incident about grape growing and wine making in this region. Along in the 1860s Charles W. Towner, traveling with our old friend Sam Yount from Oregon down through Nevada driving a band of horses, was stopped in this part of the country by unfriendly Indians. He came into possession of the Indian Springs Ranch, about five miles northwest of Las Vegas, built him at home and started on the business of making a living out of the soil.

Among other things, Towner took pains to get cuttings of choice wine grapes and planted and cultivated a fine vineyard at Indian Springs.

It happened that among Towner's nearest neighbors were the Kyle Brothers, who owned a ranch three miles north of the Las Vegas Ranch, where they already had a fine vineyard and were making considerable good wine.

Unfortunately for Las Vegas was far from any market for wines, but this defect was partially remedied by Kyle Brothers becoming the best and most enthusiastic consumers of wine from the Kyle Brothers Vineyard.

The outcome of this situation was that there were frequent wild revels on the Kyle Ranch, during one of which the two Kyle Brothers had a violent falling out. One of the brothers with his rifle in hand, had been hunting rabbits, and as he approached the house, his brother, who was on the porch, saw him coming and making threats. He stepped inside the house, seized his rifle, opened the door, aimed and fired, then stepped inside and slammed the door.

The brother out in the yard fell, mortally wounded, but he still had the strength to raise his rifle and fire through the closed door of the little house. As fate would have it his bullet found its mark and the brother in the house was instantly killed. That bullet hole in the door was one of the interesting things shown to newcomers. I wonder if it is still an interest of the Boulderado guest ranch?

It happened that Charles Towner was just then making a journey down from his Indian Springs ranch, arriving at the Kyle Ranch just in time to be called as one of the little group who established themselves as a coroner's jury to inquire into the cause of death of the two Kyle Brothers.

Mr. Towner returned to his Indian Springs Ranch deeply affected by the terrible Kyle Brothers tragedy. Soon after reaching home, he hitched one of his horses to a plow and plowed down the long rows of growing grape vines, uprooting and killing every one. After that, for many years, there was not one single grape vine on the Indian Springs RAnch where Delphine and I pent much time each summer, after the ranch was bought by Mr. and Mrs. Ira MacFarland. Mrs. MacFarland still lives on the ranch quite undisturbed by atomic explosions and jet plane activities, although Mr. MacFarland died about ten years ago.