Dang, Art, who killed this guy?

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MCgunner

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New show on Nat Geo. They had a murder in Terlingua. Wow. :what: LOL! Watched this show after "Life Below Zero" last night. They were talking to all the weirdos that move out there from cities like Austin. Austin pretty much defines "weirdo". Then they move to Terlingua and get really weird. Guess Art ain't weird enough for them, cause I don't think they talked to him. :neener:

I ate at that hotel/restaurant a few years back and think I remember the lady that owns it. Mildly interesting show to me, probably because I've been out there more'n once. Nice place to visit, but.........:) I mean, I could live out there, but I'd sure miss my duck and goose hunting and while I'm probably pretty weird to some folks, not sure I have the weirdness credentials for Terlingua. :)
 
Terlingua. Is. Strange. :D

Basically, the club owner, Glen Felts, was a fairly little guy. The river guide guy was very large. They got drunk. As near as I could tell from police reports and such, they had a squabble near the front door of La Kiva. Big guy hits or throws down little guy. Head on rock. Ruined. "Murderer" was too drunk to really have any clear memory of what happened. IIRC, the verdict was Not Guilty.

If you recall the segment with Archie at Terlingua Auto, he's definitely a good guy. I've known him since he first showed up, some 25 years back.

I always wanted to put up a billboard just north of Study Butte: "Welcome to Terlingua. Enter at own risk. We don't care how you did it back there."

It IS desert. Harsh and unforgiving. Having outdoorsman and blue-collar skills makes life easier. I found it to be easy, and have had some really great years there. Year-round hunting. Bench rest on my porch. 100- and 500-yard bench rests. All manner of critters wandering through the yard.
 
I just find it funny that two murders make a crime wave out there. lol! Well, I guess it was one murder/suicide since they found that guy not guilty. Guess they called it an accident. A weird verdict if you ask me. Where's Judge Roy when you need him? :D Wonder maybe if they over-charged the guy is why he got off?
 
Art
What exactly is in Terlingua, and how do folks make a living.

I looked at it on Google Earth today.
And it looks like a wide spot in the road in the middle of nowhere.
(Like a collection of trailer houses with a population of maybe 100?)

I couldn't ID a Main Street, or business district.
Looks like a ghost town!!

rc
 
RC, not much. Lots of people out there kind of homesteading. Its beautiful country on the other hand. I have some land not too far from there. Sort of a last resort for if things go sideways. There certainly is some appeal to the place. But you're right about the lack of places to make a living. You can work online nowadays though.
 
Ran into a nice Deputy down there, let me by with a warning going 15 over. Thought he'd be a hard ass beings I was on a Harley.
Thought about asking if he knew Art but I figured I better not push it:uhoh:
 
RC, if you think Terlingua is small, don't go to Marfa!

Interesting lifestyle down there-had a stepson that would do seasonal work as a river guide from time to time. It is the kind of place where a person could go and never be heard from again. Not that the folks there are rough-they're friendly but its different.

Can't recall his name, but there used to be an older gentleman who rode a horse into town carrying an American flag on a small pole. Just something he liked to do I guess.
 
Oh you Texas folk crack me up. Want to see off the grid oddballs? Go to Talkeetna AK. In the 70's the state gave away 5 acre plots and the whole Woodstock crew came up here "to get back to the garden."
 
RC, if you think Terlingua is small, don't go to Marfa!
Click to expand...

Marfa is huge by comparison. Marfa is not a ghost town, but is incorporated and has a city hall. They have nearly 2000 people and have an airport. They have several places to stay and several places to dine.
 
Yep, I believe that was him, Art. Nice guy. Sorry that he passed on.

Double Naught, Marfa was an on again off again place. Apparently they are on again.

I was surprised at the growth of Terlingua between the early 90s and 2003, the last time I was there. When I began visiting Big Bend National Park in the 1980s there was no cell phone service at all. That made me smile
 
I was surprised at the growth of Terlingua between the early 90s and 2003, the last time I was there. When I began visiting Big Bend National Park in the 1980s there was no cell phone service at all. That made me smile
Click to expand...

There was no cell when I was out there about 4 years ago. I think Art said the gubment gives him a subsidy or tax write off or something for a sat phone.

And, Art, the view from your porch is beyond beautiful. :D

Was in Marfa on my last trip to the bend and, yeah, compared to Terlingua, it's a megalopolis. LOL!
 
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Double Naught, Marfa was an on again off again place. Apparently they are on again.
Click to expand...

I don't think Marfa has ever been smaller than Terlingua during the last 100 years or so in terms of actual population or infrastructure. Terlingua is currently about 58 folks. Marfa's population is in decline and has been since the 1930s (~3900) despite being the county seat. The last time Terlingua had so many people was in the 1880s when the population was about 2000. It was about 1000 in 1905. Most of the population was totally gone after WWII.

Maybe you mean some other town?
 
Delmar said:
RC, if you think Terlingua is small, don't go to Marfa!
Click to expand...

I bicycle toured the Big Bend area, Marfa was the big city. Ruidosa, was small. Tip, don't ride your touring bicycle down that ranch road between the two. Cracked the rear rim between 28 of 32 spokes.

Balmorhea, with the canal and scuba shop, was a head trip.
 
^ Tip: to ride roads like that, ditch the touring bike and get a bikepacker made for serious road trips. Surly ECR is my choice.

I've been through Terlingua on the way to Big Bend. I was trained as a desert ecologist in NM, and have walked in all US deserts: Chihuahuan, Sonora, Mojave and Great Basin. Probably spent most time in the first and last. But of all, Big Bend is the toughest, most challenging, baddest. Compounded by proximity to Mejico, which is not exactly a bastion of peace. Why would I expect "normal" people to live there? (Rhetorical question.)
 
I've lived in Terlingua since 1984 and shared a property line with Art most of that time. I've also worked for several production companies over the years and can assure you that NOTHING on TV is real. For example, the man in the show with the eye patch is not from here and I suspect is an actor hired to provide a little "color". He's certainly not a local. The women with the bolt-on breasts is there just to provide eye candy. The horse pucky goes on and on.

Here is a link that appeared in the San Antonio Express News several months ago concerning this show and it pretty much mirrors my thoughts.

http://www.expressnews.com/news/loc...-to-paint-Terlingua-as-outpost-of-6222531.php
 
Last time I went thru Marfa, in the mid 90's, I didn't do a headcount, but a lot of the buildings in the town area were boarded up and the town had that "about to be abandoned" look. Apparently there is some renewed interest in the place as the pics show, cleaned up a bit from what I recall and new business too. Good for them!
 
Renewed interest in Marfa as an artsy/craftsy center, along with an increase in tourism. There's even an FM PBS radio station there now. Sail plane and hot-air balloon gatherings at times.

Terlingua is much more an area than it is any sort of town in the usual meaning. Spread out and scattered population. Lajitas on the west, Study Butte village on the southeast and a very few hundred scattered around in the 20- and 40-acre tracts of Terlingua Ranch. By road, it's fifty miles from Terlingua Ranch main office to the tourist trap at Lajitas on the Rio Grande.

Brewster County is four million acres, the size of Delaware, but just under ten thousand population. The northern part has both mountains and grasslands. The southern part, around Terlingua, is the harsh desert. Alpine is the county seat, "way up north" 80 miles from Study Butte.
 
I have enjoyed a few winter camping trip to Texas and other Southwestern states. And area I would like to visit is the Big Bend area. Looks very interesting but I haven't made any trips for a couple years. I might not ever get there but it looks interesting. Enjoy Art.
 
Some years (decades?) ago, I heard stories that Mexican bandits would stand on the south side of that ^ canyon wall and drop boulders onto rafts and boats doing down river, causing them to sink or tump over, spilling their contents so their colleagues could scoop them out of the water downstream.

I know nothing about the validity of the story, details, whether it still happens or not, etc. Art may know.
 
That is my favorite part of the world, the mountains that run from Big Bend up to the Guadalupe Mountains. I remember back in the Late 70s and early 80s when they advertised for Terlingua Ranch on Houston TV stations. I should have bought 40 acres back then but at age 8 I was a little short of cash.

Maybe someday I will be out there being that Deputy running traffic and letting bikers doing 15 over off with a warning :).

Except for Life Below Zero I think most reality tv shows nowadays are not very realistic. Badlands, Texas is just another example.

Just my .02,
LeonCarr
 
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