What's Up with Ellis: Apache Maid Lookout and T-Bar Ranch

Friday, June 3, 2016

Apache Maid Lookout and T-Bar Ranch

Apache Maid Lookout had been on my list of hikes to do since February 2012 when I started a hike on Apache Maid Trail at the foot of the mountain atop which the lookout sits. I noted at the time that the hike up the mountain and back would, if coupled with a visit to nearby Apache Maid Cabin, make a nice day hike for the group.

Much of the following report is predicated on quite detailed notes provided to me by Chris Jensen.

We left Cottonwood at 0700, drove south to Camp Verde on SR 260, turned north on Interstate 17, exited onto Stoneman Lake Road (Forest Road 213) and drove 6.4 miles east, turned right onto FR 229 and drove 5.0 miles, turned right onto FR 620 and drove 1.7 miles to the junction with FR 620D and FR 620E where we parked. Taking FR 620E is also the start of Apache Maid Trail, leading to Bell Trail in the Wet Beaver Wilderness; FR 620D leads to the old T-Bar Ranch site. We took FR 620 (below) straight ahead toward Apache Maid Lookout.

Forest Road 620 as it starts up Apache Maid Mountain

Chris described the road as “gentle but well-graded,” a quite accurate description of its condition. A regular passenger car would have been adequate on any of the roads we drove on today, or the trails we hiked (all roads) for that matter; however, that is not always the case. During wet weather roads in this area can become very muddy and filled with deep ruts.

Today the roads, which included the trails we hiked on, were clear and dry and had been recently graded. Walking along a dirt road meant that we could spend less time attending to our footing and more to the views around us. One such view, a roadside meadow, was covered with reddish-orange Indian paintbrush flowers mixed with the bright yellow blossoms of groundsel (below).

A roadside meadow covered with Indian paintbrush and groundsel

The road twisted and turned as it climbed almost a thousand feet to the top of Apache Maid. The road generally ascended the mountain along its southeast flank, never really circling all the way around the mountain. However, it did loop far enough north, first along the eastern slope and then the western slope, to provide views in all directions. We found gates at two separate points along the way. The first (below left), located 0.7 miles from where we parked was clearly intended for temporary road closures in extreme weather conditions; the second, located 1.3 miles farther along (below right) appeared to be a stock gate.

Gate for temporary Stock gate
closures

We stopped at a wide place in the road for a group photograph.

Left to right: Chris Jensen, Floyd Gardner (kneeling), the author (kneeling), Karl Sink, Betty Wolters, Jim Gibson and Lila Wright – photograph by Name Withheld

We had the road pretty much to ourselves until a couple of ATVs passed us near the top of the mountain. As we approached the lookout tower (below) we saw both parked there along with a jeep. A relatively uncrowded parking area should mean that we would be able to climb the tower and talk to the lookout.

Apache Maid Lookout

Several visitors had already ascended the tower when we arrived and one young kid was climbing as far as he dared up the scary open-air steps and then hesitantly descending. He did this over and over, climbing ever higher, until at last he reached the top of the steps. We stopped to eat a snack at a nearby picnic table while some of us encouraged the kid climbing the tower and others availed themselves of a nearby toilet.

After the youngster had satisfied himself that he really could climb the tower and the rest of his family descended, we decided it was time to do the climb ourselves. That entailed climbing three flights of stairs with a total of 40 steps. The lookout shack, built on a platform atop the tower, had catwalks along three sides and we walked along the south and the east sides to reach the entrance. The first thing I saw was a small protuberance (right) sticking out from the side of the building. It looked to me like something that that could have been installed on the Tardis (Doctor Who's spacecraft/time machine). The protrusion could have easily been a rheostat designed to speed up or slow down travel through time and space. Alas, it turned out to be nothing more than an exhaust-fan motor; we were not in for a Doctor Who adventure after all.

Chris, who spent some time talking to the lookout, provided the following input:

The man working in the tower explained his background with state parks and the forest service and how he passed the time in the tower. He also commented that he had 1100 visitors in the previous year.

I stitched a panorama (below) of the Black Hills from Squaw Peak to Sycamore Gap using several photographs taken from the tower.

The Black Hills from Squaw Peak to Sycamore Gap

The atmosphere was unusually hazy because the Forest Service was allowing three fires to burn in the area in an attempt to reduce underbrush. But the photographs were still usable.

By the time we had descended from the tower and prepared to head back down the trail, the lookout parking area was full. We were lucky not to have arrived any later than we did. A nearby sign (left) indicated that visitors were, after all, limited to 4 at a time.

On the way down the hill traffic was at first quite heavy, with ATVs and other vehicles going back and forth. But by the time we had reached the bottom of the mountain, traffic had declined again to only an occasional vehicle.

Back where we started our hike we stopped for lunch and a quick nap (at least I had a nap). Then we gathered our gear for the rest of our planned hike. I had originally planned the hike to include a trip to Apache Maid Cabin. This cabin was built in 1908 by ranchers Charles Babbitt and Bill Dickison for use as a line cabin.¹ The old cabin was restored in 2008 and is is now rented to the public by the Forest Service.

However, there is an old log house at the T-Bar Ranch site and some of the group had identified that as being the cabin we were visiting. An old log house did sound more interesting than a restored cabin that would very likely be occupied when we arrived; we changed plans and headed for the old T-Bar Ranch site. To reach it we first hiked along FR 620D to an unnamed tank located at an intermittent stream which flows down Rocky Gulch. I suppose that, because of its location, it might be called Rocky Gulch Tank; but none of the maps I referenced gave any name at all. Although FR 620D does go all the way to the old ranch site, we chose to leave the road at the tank and hike directly across the meadow.

On the way along FR 620D we “passed several crowded campsites, filled with ATVs, tents and large campers.”² When we reached the “Rocky Gulch Tank” we found that ATV riders had made an unofficial trail circling it and that several of them were riding noisily round and round the tank. There were two small humps created by construction of the tank and the riders were apparently getting a thrill from the roller coaster-like ride they provided.

We quickly hurried on to leave the RVers behind, soon arriving at the log house. There we found several other visitors who had arrived via ATVs and pickup trucks.

Chris, among the first of our group to reach the house wrote that:

A close observation showed the building was built in stages and there was a broad porch about 8 feet wide encircling three sides of the building. There were several entrances to the building. Upon entering the house we encountered a decaying wood slat floor that flexed and creaked as we walked on it. The first room we entered contained a fireplace and an old time photograph of three grim faced adults with one of the men holding a baby in what appeared to be a long baptismal dress. The photograph showed a shingled roof, instead of the present tin roof. Because of the fireplace and what appeared to be a kitchen adjoining this room, we assumed it be a main living space. Moving through the rest of the house was like exploring a human body with the skin and other soft tissue removed. We could identify different rooms because of the skeletal remains of the walls.

Some of us, approaching, the house from a different direction, saw two iron fixtures that we couldn't identify planted in the ground. The first one (below left) was about hip high and appeared to be an iron inserted inside an iron sheath or pipe. I couldn't tell whether the rod or shaft might once have moved in the sheath. The second fixture (below right), located a few yards away, also an iron rod or shaft in a sheath, was only about 8 or 10 inches tall. It had a key slot as is used to fix a cog or pulley to a shaft and a large gear wheel was half buried in the ground nearby. I wondered whether the objects might be the remains of some sort of well pump, perhaps powered by a windmill.

Buried iron rod or shaft in Iron rod or shaft and
sheath gearwheel

Located about 100 yards east of the above objects was a concrete tank (right) about 12 feet long, 3 feet wide and perhaps 36 inches deep. It reminded me of the sort of water-cooled tanks we used in East Tennessee to keep milk cool before mechanical refrigeration was available. We ran cool water through the tank to keep 5- and 10-gallon containers of milk cool.

By the time we had finished examining the concrete tank, most of the other visitors had departed and we practically had the area to ourselves. As I finally approached the old log house, I noted what appeared to be foundation ruins from two additional buildings that once existed along the slope of the ridge east of the house itself. There were also piles of wire and other scrap material (left) that might have been the remains of old buildings and corrals.

As the house came into view across the shoulder of the ridge (below) it was quite clear that this was not just a simple log cabin. We could see that what had started out as a modest log structure with a chimney at the left end had been expanded by a new addition at its left end, meaning that the chimney was now in about the middle of the house. The jumble of old logs extending to the left of the addition are what remains of the upper part of a root cellar, a room partially dug into the hillside, that would have been used for storing vegetables.

Old T-Bar Ranchhouse

As I came closer to the house, I glanced to the left and saw a strange wooden structure (below Left) built against a cliff wall about a hundred yards up the steep slope behind the house. Then, faintly visible against the silky clouds lying low in the sky, I saw a large metal water tank (below right) sitting atop the cliff.

Structure built Metal water tank beyond the
against cliff trees

Later, Dave Beach and I climbed the hill to the foot of the cliff to investigate more closely. Inside the structure we found that it was held tight against the cliff by a wire cable anchored to an embedded iron rod (below left). About half way between the anchoring rod and the wooden structure is located a twist rod for tensioning the cable, thus holding the structure tight against the cliff. Contained within the wooden structure was what remained of an old galvanized pipe (below right) that must once have provided running water from the tank on the cliff to the ranch headquarters below.

Anchor and wire-cable Pipe within the
tensioning system enclosure

As to the old house itself, it was even larger than we had first assumed when just viewing it from the front. From our vantage point on the hillside behind the house, we could see that another entire wing (below) had been added to the back of the original building, resulting in a spacious L-shaped ranch home.

T-Bar ranchhouse from the hillside above

I returned to the front of the house and started a walk through. One of the details noted by Chris was that the “logs” used to construct the house had been milled. I believe he said they were “railroad tie-like.” For this type of construction, I would still classify them as logs. However, I did note that the root cellar logs appeared to be hand hewn. Both types of log are shown in the photograph (below).

Hand hewn logs at the left; others were milled

Affixed prominently to the wall on the front porch we saw an Archaeological Site notice (right) informing us that the site is protected by Arizona Site Stewards. Someone has scrawled the words “Apache Maid Ranch Homestead” across the top of the notice. A number is provided to report vandalism and, after trying several other sources for information on the site, I called that number. It connected me to Arizona Game and Fish where a representative told me that they have no information on archaeological sites; their only role in the matter is to call the appropriate law enforcement authorities when vandalism is reported.

In the living room was posted two old photographs. As is normal for such old photographs, they were quite faded and the figures in them were indistinct. I did photograph them; but they were encased in plastic which reflected in my photographs reducing the quality even further. Nevertheless, I have included both; a family grouping (below left) and two men branding a calf (below right).

Family group photograph Two men branding a calf

It was suggested that the baby held by the man in the family grouping photograph might be wearing a baptismal dress; however, in my childhood memories of life in the 1930s, children, boys and girls alike, were dressed in long gowns until they were walking. The two men in the calf branding photograph are identified as Ed Thurston and Dutch.

Chris observed that, “...they had running water and toilets as evidenced by the large pipe a toilet would sit over and a number of pipes all in the same small space. Outside we found some piping leading away from the building into what appeared to be a streambed.” I photographed (left) what I took to be a toilet and washroom, Note the large pipe in the floor (lower left of the photograph) and the smaller pipe extending from the wall (upper right). The “streambed” Chris referred to above would be the intermittent stream flowing down Rocky Gulch.

Another, smaller, house of frame construction (right) was situated about 120 yards away, just across the streambed running down Rocky Gulch. The house had been wired for electricity and, as Chris noted, we “speculated as to the source of electricity and concluded that a generator was most likely the source because there was no evidence of power lines or poles.”

This “house across the streambed” was interesting to me because I had spent much of my early childhood in such accommodations. One house in particular was very similar. It was located on the Sharp Farm which was itself located on Pond Creek in McMinn County, Tennessee. The tenant house in which we lived could have been described as the “house across Pond Creek” and up the lane. It consisted of a living and sleeping room and a kitchen. However, unlike this house ,the one in which we lived did not have a porch. Neither did it have running water or electricity. I thought it was just fine because it was close to the woods where we kids spent a lot of our time.

Leaving the small house behind, we walked through an old overgrown apple orchard, crossed the wash (intermittent streambed) which along here was covered with wild irises (below left). Just across the wash from the orchard we came upon the partly buried remains of what I think must have been a small grain thresher (below right).

Wild irises Grain thresher (?)

The map (below) shows the general layout of the old T-Bar Ranch.

The hike to and from Apache Maid Lookout Tower and to and back from T-Bar Ranch was 8.6 miles (total), the highest elevation was 7325 feet and the total ascent was 1116 feet.

The red track on the attached map (below) shows our round-trip hike, the yellow track is part of the route we drove from I-17 to start the hike and the short green track, partly obscured by the labels at T-Bar Ranch, shows a section of FR 644E that we drove for the return trip to I-17. In other words, after finishing our hike, we drove back to T-Bar Ranch and then took FR 644E to reconnect with FR 229 for the return trip.

Layout of the old T-Bar Ranch site

Finally, note that the map shows Apache Maid Cabin (the cabin that the Forest Service now rents out) located just over a mile southeast of T-Bar Ranch.