Once Upon a Time There Was a Lonesome Sheepherder ---

And his name was Samuel Wesley Cameron, born Nov. 29, 1856- and died Oct. 13, 1926.

But this is not a fairytale. This is all true.

When Sam Cameron's family came from Canada in the 1860s to the mountains east of San Diego, a land of rocks, live oak trees and chaparral, the government encouraged settlers to raise sheep. After Sam's father, Thomas Cameron, filed on land in Motiquwhat Valley near Campo, he built an adobe house for his large family, bought a herd of sheep, and set his oldest son, Sam, to herding them.

Poor Sam! He was a fine looking lad, stocky, a little on the short side, and only 21 years of age. For approximately five years he spent up to five months at a time away from home as he guarded his father's flock of sheep against mountain lions, packs of coyotes and other predators. He had little human contact. He sorely missed his family, the dances and other social events that happened near the family home in Campo. That was the time in his life he might have found a pretty girl to marry. As it turned out, he remained a bachelor all his life.

He became so lonely he started to keep a diary that began on Jan. 18, 1878 and ended on the day of his mother's death on August 17, 1903. He didn't make entries every day, and even went for several years at a time without making an entry, but he wrote often enough to leave a record of his thoughts and dreams, and what life in general was like in those times on that part of the frontier.

We don't know how much formal education Sam had, but somewhere he had learned some poetry and quotations that he entered into his journal. He also had the ability to figure gains and losses that he needed to know to buy and sell livestock. His spelling is remarkable. Sam had a high regard for how a word sounded to him, and tempered his written words with an imperfect memory of what he thought was correct.

Rights to Sam's diary were acquired by the Mountain Empire Historical Society located at the Gaskill Brother's Stone Store Museum in Campo CA. In 1994 they published it in book form with photographs and an introduction that gives the history of the Cameron family, and early Campo when it was still called by the Indian name, Milquetay. Here are a few samples of Sam's early entries:

"Jan 23 1878 - Camped on the massa, found plenty of good grass and water. Here we make our stopping."

"Jan 25 1878 - Friday. Stood gard all night in the fore part the night. Very comfortable, yes indeed.

"Feb 14 1878 - Valentines Day. I spent it in hunting for a stray horse.

"Mar 6 1878 - Wenesday. I have nothing to read. Am awful lonesome, hardly now what to do with myself.

"Mar 7 1878 - Thursday. Rain to day. Got wet to the skin. Camp life is good for these that like it. I can't say I like it much.

"April 2 1878 - Tousday. To day and yesterday the Tig-E-the-mom-E-ter was about 900,000,000,000,000 above zero. The heat was ter-rar-a-bil. Ther is no shade trees here. The sheep stood in the son the swet drippend of them. This is true every word.

"May 7 1878 - Tousday. I am about sick of sheep camp. I long for some thing new. I have not saw a man or heard a bit of news for a week. If I stay here much longer I will be elected 50 --- mejaritay for the loonitick silam. Eney one with half an eye can see that I was not born to be a hermit. Sheep hearding is pretty much the same as penetenechery. He must be with them day and night. If they ever get out of his site they will not stop this side of kingdom come. Ba ba ba fifty thousand bas may be music for some but it has no charm for me.

"Feb 26 1881 - I feel like a stwed owl. Yes I do. Thair is plenty of grass in this country, but it is all in the ground. And plenty of water but it is all in the ocian. That is the hell of it. And I feel like as stuffed owl. Everybody feels that way if thay live in this country long."

A huge snowstorm hit the area during the winter of 1882. The snow was three feet on the level and up to 20 feet or more in drifts. It killed thousands of sheep, and the Cameron family decided to switch to raising cattle.

Sam neglected his diary from March 6^th 1883 until Oct 27 1885, and when he resumed writing, the family business was cattle. Sam's diary began to record a more interesting life than that of a sheepherder. In addition to tending to cattle and raising crops for his father, he was now involved in buying and selling cattle, helping neighbors, and going to dances. Here are some of his entries about dances:

"July 5^th 99 - I went to a dance at Potrero last night. And it was a pretty good dance. There was lots of girls and we kept it going all night till brode day light. The dance was at Tom Fuquays house. No one started a fight so we got along fine. Alls well that ends well.

"August 15^th 89 - A dance last night at Grigsbys place. It was a surprise dance. We had a pretty good time and all the water melons we could eat. We kept the ball rolling till the rusters crowed in the morning."

Sam staked a claim on land of his own, and had his own cattle, but continued to work for his father. A squatter made the mistake of trying to settle on Sam's land. Here is what Sam had to say:

"July 14^th 88 - I told that squat to hall his frate and he said he would. He said he did not know he was on my land."

Sam continued to make notes about the weather, rain and snowstorms, the high winds, and the extremes of temperature. Campo has great variations in temperature within a 24-hour period. Campo is known as having the 'longest thermometer in the west.' He told of a thunderstorm and a waterspout that happened over the big meadow in Campo.

"August 16^th 91 - There has been an extra amount of thunder and lighting rains this mounth. It rains nearly every day, and it rains hard. A water spout fell close to Campo the other day. The water rushed through Campo at a lighting speed. It worshed the blackmith shop away and tore things down generaly."

During this storm the rain gauge of U.S. Signal Corps officer, Thomas L. Collins, stationed near Campo, recorded 11 ½ inches of rain in 80 minutes before the rain gauge was washed away down Campo Creek.

Sam's diary tells of other natural phenomena.

"Feb 24 92 - Last night heavy earthquakes. Thay were regular old rattlers. The doby milk house has a big crack in the walls. Charles doby house is cracked pretty bad. The first and heavest shock was last night at eleven o clock. The ground has been shaking slitely all day. I went to Moreno Valley to day with a load of willow poles to make the wing on the new correll. I saw one place at the uper end of the Moreno close by the creek where the ground was all cracked open. The cracks was about an inch wide and 30 steps long. From eleven o clock last night till sun up there was 80 or 90 shocks, most of them was heavy enough."

There were wild fires back in Sam's time just as there are today, but judging by Sam's diary, they don't seem to have occurred as often or been as widespread. Arsonists were probably not often the cause of fires, and according to Sam's diary rainfall seems to have been better. Sam wrote about one bad fire that took the life of Pete Hanson, a neighbor.

"October 1th 89 - The fire in Poterero on the 26^th was a holly teror. It burnt horses and cattle, houses and hay stacks. It was so about Pete Hanson. He was burnt to death. He got burnt in brush. He was staying at Tom Fuquays while Fuquay went to town. When the fire came, Hanson got excited and left Toms ranch and run of in the woods where he got burnt to death. Fuquays wife put water on the house and wet every thing good just before the fire came, and so saved her house. The flames burnt nearly all her hair of. She and her children got scorched so bad that their toungs sweled nearly out of thair mouths. As soon as the fire went by she and her children went to Williams place, her father. She was all schorched and burnt, and it excited old man Williams so it made him sick. When she told how Hanson run of in the fire, it made him more excited. McPersons hay stack and two of his horses was burnt up. Thay found what was left of Hansons body the next day and buried it. Old man Williams went to the furnal and got more excited. He was subject to heart disease. He got so excited over the fire and bad luck that he died himself. The fire did not hurt him. He was an old man. Some seventy years old."

There are so many more fascinating things from Sam Cameron's diary that I would like to tell you, that it's hard to decide where to stop. I recommend you read the book, Sam Cameron's Diary, for yourselves. It can be purchased for $12.95 at the Gaskill Brother's Stone Store Museum 31130 Highway 94, Campo Ca, 91906