Howdy ya'll. My
name is Dusty. My Pa and Ma headed west across the country with my
younger brothers and me in a
covered wagon lookin' to settle down in the "new land".
When they came to Texas they settled there becuz they figgered a state
that big would never fill up. My dad didn't like livin' too
close to his neighbors. He got tired of the neighbors complainin'
'bout his still. You'd think folks would like to have a local
moonshine supplier, wouldn't you?
Texas was big but our house wuz small and things wuz crowded so I left home at the age of fifteen. After the war I heard that my Pa and Ma had died
when their still blew up.
I wuz just driftin' from town to town, occasionally runnin'
into my brothers cuz they was driftin', too.
I wuz able to turn some coin working at different jobs.
I been a ranch-hand, a blacksmith, a bounty hunter, and store clerk.
I eventually became a Peace Officer.
A young lady, the daughter of
an old miner named Dinky, caught my eye and stole my heart. Missyanne
wuz her name. We took off fer California. We heard there
wuz plenty of gold in every river there. Lookin' back, I feel
kind of foolish believin' that tall tale. I wasted a lot of time
pannin' fer gold in the Santa Ana River.
I ended up working on the roads in the rapidly growing city
of Riverside.
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