Читать книгу Sixty Years of California Song - Margaret Blake Alverson - Страница 10

"We followed the coast through Santa Clara and Santa Cruz, crossing over to Livermore and San Joaquin valley, this being the end of the cattle drive. Here we were paid and dismissed and our employer said we were about forty miles from Stockton and about the same distance from the mines. We plodded slowly along, following up the Stanislaus river. The first place we reached having a name was Knight's Ferry. We were out of money and clothes when we arrived at this place. The ferryman took us across without pay and bade us remain all night. Up to this time we wore buckskin trousers. I went out hunting and the rain came down in torrents and my trousers got drenched. They stretched so long I cut them off so I could walk. When they dried they had shrunken above my knees. At this place we met Mr. Dent, a brother-in-law of General Grant. With him also was a Mr. Vantine. When these men saw the unfortunate condition we were in, they gave us each a pair of overalls and a hat. So we were once more a little more civilized and passable. On our way up the coast we encountered a heavy storm. We had prepared to camp under a fine tree, but a large dead limb hung directly over us. I told father that we had better move as there was danger. But he thought it safe to remain where we were. But I insisted that we move, and finally he listened to my pleadings and we each took an end of the bed and lifted it over to the other side of the tree, away from the dead limb. We had hardly gotten settled into the bed before the limb came down with a crash, immediately across the spot from where we took the bed. Had we remained, nothing could have saved us from instant death. The next day we left Knight's Ferry without a dollar and reached the mines that afternoon about 4 o'clock. One of the miners gave me a claim. The next morning I started my first gold mining. Father was obliged to rest after all this dreadful experience of nine or ten months. I bought myself a rocker and began to work my claim. The first day I had washed out $9.50. In eight days I had gotten out $650. After getting the gold father went to Stockton and bought a supply of groceries and started a grocery store at Scorpion Gulch. I took up another claim and in ten days' time I had taken out a collection of nuggets and small gold to the amount of $1,600."

This was sent home to the family in the East with the message for us to come to California as soon as we could get ready.

After father started for California we were obliged to vacate the parsonage for the family of his successor. So the church was raised and a fine story made under the church for our use while we remained there. We were all obliged to work and help mother in some way. The older ones were teaching and we who were but children sewed a certain amount each day before our play hour came. My sister Mary now played the organ in the Presbyterian church and Mr. Aiken was the director of the choir. I was about ten years old at this time, and with the new minister other changes came in our church and we left the choir to others who came after us. Shortly after this I remember going one Sabbath to the church to hear sister play the pipe organ. While in the choir loft Mr. Aiken came in. He came over and asked me how I came there. I told him I had come with my sister. "Who is your sister?" "Miss Kroh, who plays the organ." He looked surprised. Presently I saw them conversing. When sister came to her place she said to me, "When the choir arises to sing you go over and stand with the alto." I demurred and she said, "Go and sing as you have been singing in our choir. You know the music." After that Sunday I sang with the choir five years, until we came to California. I was then fifteen. That is how I became a choir singer when ten years of age. Mr. Aiken used to pick me out from among the children of the public schools and place me in the front row in every school I ever attended while he taught the music.

Mr. Aiken became musical instructor in the schools in 1848. It was then I was selected to join the choral class. There were fifty boys and girls picked from the different schools and we had a fine drilling each Saturday afternoon in the basement of the church. One of the boys had a high soprano voice and we all admired his singing to adoration. He was as courteous as his voice was beautiful—unspoiled by praise. We had one chorus we all loved, of which he was the soloist, and we were not satisfied with the rehearsal until we had sung, and the young master had so beautifully rendered the obbligato to the song, "Shepherd, from your sleep awake, Morning opes her golden eyes, etc." How well I remember the words of the song and the beautiful boy singer that left the impression of his voice in my life, and I can see the picture as plain as if it hung on the wall of my studio today. From that voice and the correct guidance of my sainted sister Mary I have been able to sing and please the many thousands of people who have listened to me in my years of song wherever I strayed—in the East or West.

In speaking of Professor Junkerman's work in the schools of Cincinnati, a coincidence happened in 1906 which recalled my childhood days with all the vivid coloring traced upon my mind fifty-two years ago. In the number of The Musician for May, 1906, I saw two pictures that were familiar and I looked without seeing the names printed beneath them. To my utter astonishment they were the likenesses of Mr. Aiken and Professor Junkerman, whom I had not seen for over fifty years and yet I knew them at sight—the moment my eyes beheld them. In reading the article and what it contained in regard to the music and its development, I was able to go over the whole ground of Mr. Aiken's teaching as if I were once more a school child. All three of these persons were in the schools—Professor Junkerman, in languages, organ and piano; my sister, Mary Kroh, his pupil on both organ and piano, also teacher of English and German, and Mr. Aiken, the teacher in the public schools for voice and the movable "do" system. Was ever such a windfall of good fortune as this proved to me? I had tried to recall the name of the dear old professor to use it in my narrative, but my memory was at fault. We all loved him so well. He was a thorough musician and thoroughly appreciated by all who had the advantage of his knowledge, either in languages or in instrumental music. The Musician contains a complete detail of these two men who were instrumental in promoting the best music in the early years of 1839 and later in 1842 and continued until 1879 for Mr. Aiken, and Professor Junkerman closed his public career in 1900.