Parrain: Evangeliste Gastonguay, marraine Émilie Charlebois.

Histoire de chercheurs d’or par Yvonne Charlebois.

My father told the story many times. Two brothers of his father left to look for gold: Abraham and Francois Xavier. Francois Xavier was very young when Abraham went West. Abraham and one of the other older brothers first went west. Maybe Alfred became ill, so they returned home and by this time Francois Xavier was old enough to accompany Abraham when he returned to the West. We are sure that Abraham and Francois Xavier both died in the West. Abraham settled as a farmer in what was the California area. It is also said that Francois Xavier died in a mine, and there was even mention that possibly he was murdered. That was somewhere in British Columbia.


Texte de Ron Charlebois, arrière-petit-fils d’Abraham.

First for definitions. I’ve always viewed a "Farm" as involved with growing crops in the ground, or producing comestibles such as milk. A "Ranch" is more associated with the "crop" being livestock, such as cattle or sheep. At least that’s how I’ve always understood the terms.

In any case, Abraham homesteaded his Ranch on the "East Walker". It was there that Abe, Oral and Frank were born and raised. Each went on to have their own ranches . Abe bought a Ranch at Topaz. My Father went into partnership with Abe and they bought another Ranch nearby. My parents were married in 1941, and in 1942 they moved to the new ranch at Topaz. The house on the ranch was nearly a hundred years old at that time . My mother had been raised with indoor plumbing - so she saw to it that a small storeroom was converted to an indoor bathroom. That was, I’m told, a bone-of-contention with Abe -- he couldn’t understand the need for such a silly thing, nor the expenditures associated with it.

Sometime around the mid forties my folks bought out Abe’s interest in the Ranch. They built a new house in 1950, and this is where my brother and I were raised. . My folks ran the Ranch until they sold it in 1972. The Ranch was an awkward size -- too small to support hired help, but too large to handle alone, especially since my Dad was beginning to have heart problems. Rising property taxes and the cost of equipment exacerbated the whole situation -- but that’s another story.

The "business" of the Ranch was raising cattle. The calves were born in January & February, and were sold in September or so each year. Much of the Ranch was in hay fields which had to be irrigated, and from which hay was put up, during the summer, for feed for the cattle during the winter. There were always things to do year-round and, consequently, only about two weeks out of the year when my folks could leave.

In addition to the cash business of cattle, we had chickens which provided eggs and meat, a small flock of sheep for meat, pigs and one to two milk-cows. . When I was little we separated the milk into cream and skim milk, and my mother made Cottage Cheese, Butter, etc., etc. With all of that, and a big garden in the summer, we were really quite self-sufficient. We were 30 miles from the nearest town, which wasn’t much of a town. My folks went to town at most once a month to shop for the few things they needed. We went the 70 miles to the "big city of Reno" maybe once or twice a year. I often tell people that, in some ways, the style in which my brother and I were raised probably wasn’t too different from that of a hundred and fifty years ago.

My Brother and I went to college and pursued our own careers. I was interested in electronics from the time I was a little kid, so that’s the direction I’ve taken. My brother is a CPA, but remains a rancher at heart. I think he would be very happy if he could somehow slip back in time and live out his life on a ranch. Unfortunately, as with so many other family businesses, small family ranches are, economically, a thing of the past.

As for Frank and Oral. . . Oral had a son, but both he and his son died in a Flu epidemic and are buried together. Frank never married. I don’t remember either of them. There was a sister . Abraham’s wife, Louise Mack, left and is said to have taken the little girl with her. We have no idea of what ever became of them. So -- no Charlebois cousins here.


Texte d’Yvonne Charlebois:

Ron also sent information about "Charlebois Spring" and "Charlebois Canyon" in the Superstition Mts. of Arizona, probably named for a cattleman named Lou Charlebois who was the President of the Arizona Cattlemen’s Association.