California Stories of Pickers, Builders, and Healers

By Anna Marie Hernandez

California Stories of Pickers, Builders, and Healers is a description of pickers, builders, and healers who left their imprint on an old California railroad town from the 1930s to the present century. Each character described contributed to the community in a colorful way that made the town distinctly part of the California legacy.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: May 2, 2013
• ISBN: 9781490808369

Anna Marie Hernandez

Anna Marie Hernandez is a children's writer. She has published children's stories and worked as a bilingual teacher for many years. She resides in Southern California, where she enjoys gardening and hiking.

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CALIFORNIA STORIES OF PICKERS, BUILDERS, AND HEALERS

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Anna Marie Hernandez

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Copyright © 2013 Anna Marie Hernandez.

Author Credits: O Holy Night

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-4497-9022-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-0836-9 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013905973

WestBow Press rev. date: 09/23/2013

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1.   Prologue

2.   Music of the Town

3.   Grandma

4.   The Revelation

5.   The Clouds Are Changing Colors

6.   All The Saints

7.   The Greeter with Many Names

ILLUSTRATIONS

1.   The Broadway Director

2.   Changing Clouds

3.   The Healer

4.   Menorah

DEDICATION

To all the pickers, builders, and healers of California

who enriched all of our lives.

Prologue

C alifornia Stories of Pickers, Builders, and Healers is an assortment of biographical stories that took place in a rural desert town. The chronology of the town spans from the early 1920’s to the present time. This book was written to preserve the flavor and essence of an old railroad town, known to Hollywood celebrities of the 1930’s, and once home to Native American tribes, and later home to Roy Rogers and Dale Evans.

The stories describe uniquely colorful individuals who were pickers, builders, and healers. Each of these individuals left an indelible stamp of service and compassion, which preserved the community for future generations. It has been my intent to honor their contributions in these stories and to help preserve the memory of a once vibrant, fascinating California town.

Music of the Town

I n an old town where the wind whispered at night to cottonwoods and songs slowly faded into dreams, church bells rang from an old mission church. The church had a very high steeple. It was surrounded by towering fir trees where hundreds of birds chirped all day, when the church bells rang.

From the steeple, church bells rang every hour of the day and at noon for the midday Angelus prayer. The church bells could be heard as far as the river that flowed under the cottonwoods, past the park and train depot. It was to this old mission church, that I came often as a child with Grandpa.

It all began in the choir loft, one Sunday morning in early May. Monsignor Van, the old Belgian parish priest, had just started Mass when suddenly the church walls resonated. The church lamps hanging from the rafters swayed. All the twittering