FOR AUGUST....WE TOAST...

CLAUDE DALLAS....

Cold blooded murderer to some....folk hero and an icon to others.....the man who killed two game wardens out on the Owyhee Desert has paid his dues and is a free man now.  Since his release he reputedly stayed for awhile in Elko....and is rumored to be roaming around Washington...or the Owyhee....or....? 

Us?  We like him....hence we raise a toast to his health and happiness and hope he finds peace .  Many of our friends and co-workers either knew where he was and stayed mum or put him up and ferretted him away when he was on the lam dodging the law.  He supposedly spent a night at one ranch where we lived when we were there....in a brief safe haven. 

Did Dean Tobias really fly him out of trouble?  Did Tom Marvel put him up in the barn at the Martin Ranch?  Was he given a haircut by a woman in her salon who knew she was trimming the fugitive and mercifully let him get a head start before she called him in?  Is there a sheriff's officer somewhere who recently saw Dallas, and says nothing to protect his privacy?

Them that know, ain't particularly sayin'.  Them that know, may nod, or scowl, and there may be a glint in their eye, or a faraway look, as they scan horizons for fading memories and fleeting ghosts of a man and a time that was, and that may be about all you ever get.  When it comes to Claude Dallas, chivalry and The Code of Silence - still live.

Claude, if you have an Internet connection and a computer and are reading this, God bless you, where ever you may be.

CLARK MORRIS HAS THE HEAD, BRIAN'S ON THE GROUND, CLAUDE HAS THE HEELS...AND THOSE GREEN WOOLIES....

MUG SHOTS.....THE BOOK "OUTLAW: THE TRUE STORY OF CLAUDE DALLAS" BY JEFF LONG. 

DOING THE PERP WALK WITH THE FEEBS....QUARTER CIRCLE A RANCH OUT OF PARADISE VALLEY, NV.  WADDIE MITCHELL, THE MORRIS BROTHERS BRIAN AND CLARK, AND CLAUDE DURING HIS BUCKAROO PHASE, SIPPING A COLD ONE....PHOTO BY WILLIAM ALLARD, VANISHING BREED...

Claude Dallas by Ian Tyson - click the You Tube icon above to hear Ian sing the song

In a land the Spanish once had called the Northern Mystery,
Where rivers run and disappear the mustang still is free.
By the Devil's wash and coyote hole in the wild Owyhee Range
Somewhere in the sage tonight the wind calls out his name.
Aye,aye,aye.

Come gather 'round me buckaroos and a story I will tell
Of the fugitive Claude Dallas who just broke out of jail.
You might think this tale is history from before the West was won,
But the events that I'll describe took place in nineteen eighty-one.

He was born out in Virginia,left home when school was through;
In the deserts of Nevada he became a buckaroo,
And he learned the ways of cattle,and he learned to sit a horse,
And he always packed a pistol,and he practiced deadly force.

Then Claude he became a trapper,and he dreamed of the bygone days,
And he studied bobcat logic and their wild and silent ways
In the bloody runs near Paradise, in monitors down south
Trapping cats and coyotes,living hand to mouth.
Aye,aye,aye.

Then Claude took to livin' all alone out many miles from town,
A friend--Jim Stevens--brought supplies and he stayed to hang around.
That day two wardens--Pogue and Elms--rode into check Claude out,
They were seeking violations and to see what Claude's about.

Now Claude had hung some venison,he had a bobcat pelt or two;
Pogue claimed they were out of season,he said "Dallas,you're all thru."
But Dallas would not leave his camp.He refused to go to town.
As the wind howled throught the bull-camp they stared each other down.

Its hard to say what happend next,perhaps we'll never know,
They were gonna take Claude in to jail,and he vowed he'd never go.
Jim Stevens heard the gunfire,and when he turned around
Bill Pogue was falling backwards,Conley Elms he fell face down.
Aye,aye,aye.

Jim stevens walked on over;there was a gun near Bill Pogue's hand.
It was hard to say who drawn his first,but Claude had made his stand.
Claude said "I am justified Jim,they were gonna cut me down,
And a man's got a right to hang some meat
When he's livin' this far from town."

It took eighteen men and fifteen months to finally run Claude down.
In the sage outside of Paradise they drove him to the ground.
Convicted up in Idaho--manslaughter by decree--
Thirty years at maximum,but soon Claude would break free.

There's two sides two this story,there may be no right or wrong,
The lawman and the renegade have graced a thousand songs.
The story is an old one.Conclusion's hard to draw,
But Claude's out in the sage tonight he may be the last outlaw.
Aye,aye,aye.

In a land the Spanish once had called the Northern Mystery,
Where rivers run and disappear the mustang still is free.
By the Devil's wash and the coyote hole in the wild Owyhee Range
Somewhere in the sage tonight the wind calls out his name.
Aye,aye,aye