Postcards - "You are the tallest woman I ever saw.”

My high school classmate, Ron Lawrence, visits once in a while to tell me a story. I think—at least I hope—that he likes to see his memories preserved in a “Postcard.” 

A few weeks ago, he wanted to talk about his grandfather, Charles Lawrence, who was born in Illinois in 1870. In 1908, Charles saw an ad in a local Illinois newspaper informing the public that the Newlands Project in Fallon, Nevada, had opened land to farming and was in need of surveyors. How often can we who live here in Lahontan Valley trace our local roots to a relative who once saw an ad in a newspaper, or nailed to a tree, about the Newlands Project?  I know I can.

Charles Lawrence’s story has “the Newlands Project ad” part in common with the stories of hundreds of others who sought to homestead here, following the lure of bountiful land and water. However, Lawrence succeeded where many others failed. They weren’t meant to farm, or they failed to find domestic happiness, or opportunities took them elsewhere.

Charles’ story, then, is about successful farming. I’ll reach the domestic happiness theme later in the column. He first acquired 80 acres in Stillwater, “west of where Lester DeBraga now farms, but it was too salty.” Ron is not sure whether Charles worked as a surveyor for the Newlands Project to build capital or whether he brought money with him from Illinois. In any case, in 1911, he sold that property and bought 160 acres from Charles Kent for $9000.00 ($307,063 today). Learning that 160 acres was too much for one man to handle, he downsized in 1917 and bought 80 acres from Albert Weishaupt. Ron said that at the time, he also bought a new Buick with the proceeds from selling the 160 acres. He was 47 years old, but he had a purpose, land, and a Buick.

In 1919, he began corresponding with a woman who was a friend of some folks who had visited him in Stillwater. Her name was Eva Edwards, and she was teaching school in Arizona. 

Charles wrote to her, in part: “Through the kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Stiles, I take the liberty of addressing you.   .…they spoke of you while they were visiting in Nev. and no doubt they have told you a good many things about me and this part of Nev.” Eva replied, “My cousins, Mr. and Mrs. Stiles, told me of meeting you during their visit to Nev. last summer and also said they told you of me and that you expressed a desire to correspond with me, which I quite willingly consented to.”

Ron’s sister, Marcia Ernst, wrote about their correspondence in “In Focus,” Volume 9. It was restrained and polite, carefully constructed so as to avoid commitment or suggest yearning. Charles offered to buy Eva a ticket to Nevada so that they might meet, but independent Eva refused, instead buying a ticket herself.  She boarded a train from Arizona to Hazen in May of 1920. When Charles met her, he exclaimed, “You are the tallest woman I ever saw!” According to Marcia Ernst, Eva thought that Charles had the bushiest, most unflattering mustache she had ever seen. However, she liked the Buick.

They were married on July 20, 1920, in Fallon’s Methodist Church. Ron’s father, Dale, was born in 1923. Charles had been financially successful up to that point, but he suffered losses in the crash of 1929. A series of health setbacks led to his death soon after. Dale, from the time of his father’s death, wanted only to stay and work on the farm. Ernst writes, “Mother and son continued running Charlie’s farm and expanding the livestock operation, branching out into pigs and sheep.”

Eva died in 1978 at the age of 83. Her legacy and Charles’ live on in Ron, who carries on the goal of the Newlands Project, to coax green fields from desert soils.  

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