This is a work of fiction any similarities between the characters, events, or locations in this story and actual locations, events, or people are purely coincidental.
© 2004 Warlord
We were sitting at the kitchen table, having put our animals in their barn. We had four pads of legal-size writing paper. We were each making notes. The air was thick with our shouting and gesturing, as we reminded each other of items to take along.
We were surprised as the sun peeked in the windows. Jan and Krista started breakfast. No one was tired. We were too excited and focused on our tasks.
Dan began our first task. He called a member of his dojo who had a full-size reproduction Conestoga wagon with a four-horse team. Dan asked to borrow the set up for a ’couple’ days. The owner assumed it was for the round up and was quick to agree.
Dan had driven the wagon during the last Deadwood Days parade. He was familiar with the current team, and they were familiar with him.
This wagon was sixteen feet long by four feet wide and four feet deep, with the billowing white top adding perhaps eight feet. Those four matched dapple-gray Percheron draft horses would be capable of hauling everything we could fit inside. We now had ample room for our ‘first’ load.
As we ate breakfast, we refined our lists, pulling them together. We made one ‘master’ list to be kept by Krista as a guide for our buying and packing. Krista continued our journal in her green book.
Krista and I took a short break to clean our guns. We were shooting Pyrodex powder instead of black, but even so, cleaning them immediately after shooting is a good policy.
Dan had one more task. He called a neighbor, Jerry, who was a contractor. Dan knew he did lots of work in the ‘boonies’ away from electricity. Dan asked him about his solar drill battery charger.
The contractor had built a custom solar photovoltaic charger that kept his truck battery charged, while also charging half dozen batteries for his Rigid drill, hammer drill, circular saw, reciprocating saw and work light. He even had a charger connection for his Streamlight flashlight.
Dan asked him if he could build a solar charger for us. Things were slow in construction right then, and the contractor named a price. Dan told him to include one set of the Rigid tools. Dan also asked for connections charging the battery for tools we already had. Dan’s neighbor Jerry was excited about this ‘fun’ challenge and would have it done today!
Dan and I went to retrieve the wagon. We each took a pickup. One of us would haul the flat bed with the wagon, and the other would be hauling the four big horses.
I met Ben, who owned the wagon and team. With Dan doing the heavy lifting, we had the wagon on a trailer and hooked up to his pickup. The four horses were of pleasant disposition, with excellent trailer manners. They loaded nicely into Krista’s horse trailer, towed by me.
We were soon back at the B&B, where J and K were unloading the four Percherons, while Dan and I unloaded the wagon from the flatbed. Okay, Dan unloaded the wagon, with me staying out of his way.
The pace picked up now, with the wagon waiting to be filled. Dan and I went to the nearest hardware to buy necessary ‘non-electric’ hand tools. We would also be buying fasteners and miscellaneous hardware.
Krista went to visit a local doctor she worked with when she did her RN/EMT gig at Deadwood events. She was going to persuade him to write her some ‘scripts’ for drugs and medical paraphernalia she had to have to be comfortable on the Frontier.
Jan was on her own buying expedition. I’m all for authenticity, but I told her soap and toilet paper were high on my list! She lost a good friend to AIDS, making Jan an advocate of ‘safe sex’. I had no doubt we would see a quantity of modern condoms going back to the Deadwood whorehouse.
We were all back by lunchtime, loading our booty into wooden crates and boxes before it went into the wagon. While we were working Jan said, “Don’t forget to empty out the garden shed, honey.”
To K and I she continued, “Dan’s been buying a shit load of Pyrodex and regular black powder. We’ve got it stored in our garden shed with the C-4 and Dynamite.”
Dan laughed as he admitted that before last night he thought he was ‘overbuying,’ and maybe even ‘crazy,’ but now he knew we would need every bit of our supplies. He added, “I have extra cartridge cases for all our guns and primers, of course. I bought ingots of lead, with lesser amounts of antimony and tin. I’ll take all my reloading and bullet casting equipment. “
He had a question for me. “What did you over-buy, W?”
I had an immediate answer. “Ammunition, empty brass, powder, primers and bullets. I bought far more than we were ever going to use in the matches. I even over-bought for guns that I wasn’t going to use in any match like my 45-70 rolling block. I also brought all my ‘frontier’ guns with us.”
I turned to Krista. She was giggling as she answered our unspoken question. “Like W., I packed too many guns and far too much ammunition. Weird, huh?”
With these reminders, we loaded our guns and ammo into the wagon. Then we loaded Dan’s explosives. The Pyrodex probably didn’t count except in those ‘Dan sized’ quantities. He even had ‘det’ cord to go with his C-4.
The primers, caps, and initiators would be going with me in the buckboard. I was perfectly willing to ‘bend the rules’ to bring along something like C-4 plastic explosive that could definitely even the odds.
Now we turned to Jan for her confession. She answered quickly, “Camping and survivalist supplies. All kinds of weird products we would never use except in frontier Deadwood. I must have the biggest supply of water purifiers and purification chemicals in all the Dakotas.”
We added our confessed ‘guilty pleasures’ to the wagon. I started to worry about our four horses. The wooden wheels, with their steel rims, wouldn’t flatten like rubber tires to warn us of overloading.
Krista consulted her list, informing us that we were nearly complete. She and Jan were in the B&B picking up these loose ends, when Neighbor Jerry showed up, with our solar charger in the back of his pickup.
Jerry said, “I saw you were loading the big wagon to go camping so I added some stuff. I hope that’s OK?”
Jerry added a ‘deep-cycle’ twelve volt battery with some twelve volt fluorescent lights for inside the wagon with two twelve volt headlights and two twelve volt high intensity spotlights for use if we were on the road after dark.
What's more, Jerry added his ‘invention.’ Jerry had converted a kerosene hurricane lamp to electric using the same battery as his drill and other tools.
Jerry said, “I gave you four of my lamps. I threw in a couple of hooks to jab in the ground. The lamps look almost authentic. Just without the kerosene stink or risk of fire around your wagon.” He added, “This twelve volt high amp draw deep-cycle battery is just too friggin’ heavy. I knew Danny would be able to handle it.”
‘Danny’ did handle it just fine. Jerry then showed us the flexible solar photovoltaic panels that could lay right on top of our wagon’s canopy. He had included extra wire to his control box for just that application. The tools and extra tool batteries were in another wood carry case. Jerry gave us the last of our needed ‘bits and pieces’ out of his pick up.
Jerry turned to Dan and apologetically named a number a great deal higher than his morning estimate. Dan laughed, saying, “No problem Jerry, this is some outstanding engineering. It’s just what we need for our camping.”
Dan went inside, returning with an envelope seemingly stuffed with cash. Dan said:
“Sorry Jerry. All small bills, nobody has any big stuff this far into the month.”
Jerry smiled happily waving the envelope saying, “They all spend too fast, big or small. Thank you Dan, you are a good friend. I haven’t been working much and this is a big help.”
After Jerry left, we examined his work. He had built the two twelve volt halogen headlamps into brass coach lamps. The spotlights couldn’t pass for kerosene but they were only for an emergency. Jerry’s workmanship really was outstanding. We would definitely be using his skills later.
Danny quickly had the electric system in the big wagon. J and K were bringing out the last of their supplies.