1993 Borrego Sun: Congressman Al McCandless Recalls Early Borrego Springs

A firsthand account of the Beaty family's homestead, ranching life, the original Borrego school, General Patton's desert training, and the people who helped shape the Borrego Valley.

Alfred A. McCandless (1927–2017) was a Republican congressman from California who served six terms from 1983 to 1995. A UCLA graduate, Marine Corps captain, automotive dealer, and former Riverside County supervisor, he died in La Quinta at age 90.



RECOLLECTIONS OF ANZA/BORREGO SPRINGS IN THE EARLY DAYS

by Congressman Al McCandless - 1993

My grandparents migrated to the Borrego Valley (now Borrego Springs with two r's) from Azusa in 1910 -- from civilized, orange-grove studded Azusa where my grandfather owned a livery stable and stagecoach -- to the wild and woolly, most uninhabited valley that stretched right up to the badlands. This piece of the California frontier would be home to my grandparents for the next 38 years.

A native of Waco, Texas, my grandfather, "Doc" Beaty (he was considered the local veterinarian), fell in love with Southern California as a young man and put roots down here. When the homesteading bug bit, he acquired 160 acres in Borrego, directly across the road from what is now the airport.

This piece of land, though, had no electricity, paved roads, or most critically, it had no water. After he acquired title, somehow my grandfather learned that he could file for water rights up in Coyote Canyon. So he created an irrigation system up there, including a reservoir which was next to and stored water from the reservoir, and he farmed the area now known as Anza Ranch. He grew row crops, including alfalfa and onions. He also bred mules, and raised donkeys and horses, and he was a hunting guide in the Santa Rosas when he wasn't working 30 hours a day on the ranch. He and my grandmother lived in a canvas house under the mesquite trees -- it was a big tent, really, with a framed door and a wooden floor. They lived in that canvas tent for almost 18 years.

No one gives much thought anymore to what goes into having a well-stocked pantry from the local grocery store. Or to the milk in the refrigerator or the ice cream in the freezer. But growing food, buying food, finding fresh food, and cooking food consumed a huge amount of my grandparents' time. Without electricity, and in a desert climate, keeping food fresh was a major job. They solved part of that problem by bartering canned food and supplies in Brawley, which was 60 miles and two days away by wagon. And every time it rained, all the dirt roads turned into channels of mud. Other times, my grandfather would go out into the sand dunes in the evening and shoot a rabbit for dinner the next day. My grandmother probably knew 40 ways to cook a rabbit -- and I ate a rabbit prepared each one of those 40 ways as a child. I don't eat rabbit anymore.

My grandparents had one child, my mother Fleta. When Fleta was old enough to start school, there was no school in the Borrego Valley. So my grandparents made arrangements with the Hadley family in Brawley, and my mother boarded with them for the next 12 years during school months. She spent Christmas and the summer at home. A year after she graduated from high school, Fleta met my father, Max McCandless, in Brawley where he worked at City Hall. He hailed from Kansas, and they were married the following year in 1926. I came along a year later.

A year or two after I was born, my grandparents sold the Beaty/Anza Ranch in the canyon, took the money and developed the original homestead in the valley. They drilled a well, installed a big old Fairbanks/Morse one-cylinder engine to pump the water out of the ground, and had a regular house built. "Uncle Charley" from Azusa (I never knew whose uncle he was) built the house. I guess there was some concern about Uncle Charley's construction methods in view of the fact that the Borrego Valley was earthquake territory, but my grandfather just shook off the criticism by saying, "there's a stone fireplace at one end to anchor it down, and at the other, Uncle Charley put in enough nails to do the job."

The house itself was just basic shelter by today's standards, but after a canvas house, it was a palace. It had a corrugated steel roof, a front porch, an underground cellar that served as a refrigerator, that huge stone fireplace in the living room, two bedrooms and a utility room, a kitchen, and a two-holer out back. They also had a wooden shower enclosure out front, with a windmill. It was always very important to check the shower for scorpions before using it.

Doc Beaty was going to make his fortune in a new crop, with the help of the University of California's agriculture department. Pecans. Forty acres of pecans. After row crops, this was pretty exciting. He planted shoots on those forty acres, irrigated them, weeded them, and gave them every bit of tender loving care that he could. And every single one of them died.

My grandparents never completely recovered from what was a devastating financial setback. But they tried. They went back to row crops, mostly alfalfa and onions. By then, the Great Depression had set in, and my parents moved from Brawley to Los Angeles. In 1932, I went to live with my grandparents in the valley, so that my parents could concentrate on being the major source of our extended family's income. I started school in the original Borrego wooden school house in a mesquite grove. It was about 2 1/2 miles from my grandparent's house (and a mile east of Eddie DuVall's store on the section line), and I rode my one-eyed pony, Jinx, to school every day. Jinx was terrified of rattle snakes, which we had in abundance, and he was very skittish and hard to mount sometimes. So after being tied to a tree while I was in school, I'd have to get on for the return trip home by climbing the tree and sliding down his neck. One time when one of the Courtney family boys -- the Courtney's farmed up aways, too -- stayed with us and went to school with me, I loaned him Jinx, and I rode one of our burros.

We raced on the way home, but my burro got tired, and threw me into the nearest cactus. My grandmother had some choice words as she pulled cactus spines out of me later that day.

A source of major excitement always happened on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday when Al Mathis went up to Julian (28 miles) and brought the mail back to the DuVall Store. He also brought back fresh fruits and vegetables. About once a month, we would order a block of ice, and for a few days, we'd have fresh food (and iced tea!) at my grandparent's.

The Borrego School had 22 students, from 1st through 8th grade. The older ones helped to teach the younger ones, which was extremely effective. My ability to learn fast and thoroughly was also helped along mightily by my grandfather, who was a stern disciplinarian, and my grandmother, who knew that education was the key to a better life. I spent about two years at that school, until I rejoined my parents in Los Angeles.



We visited often, sometimes sitting on my grandparent’s front porch to watch General Patton train his men in desert tank maneuvers. Patton had set up artillery on the west mountain slope, and would shoot 14 miles across the valley into the badlands. We sat on that same front porch one Christmas watching my father drive in from Los Angeles with his car laden with Christmas presents. As he descended into the valley, blinking the headlights on the car three times to signal us, he disappeared. It had been raining, and he sank into the muddy dirt road up to the tops of the wheels. He walked the rest of the way, and we retrieved the car and the presents in the morning.

My grandparents lived in that house until my grandfather died in the late 1940’s. Years of breaking horses and other four-legged critters had taken their toll on his legs, and his later years were slower and he was often in pain. But even with that, he’d occasionally go out with his y-shaped stick and grab a rattler behind the head, pick him up by the tail, twirl him around, and chuck his head off against a rock or a tree. And that night, they’d have fresh meat for dinner.

After my grandfather died, my grandmother sold the ranch and moved into a little place near Christmas Circle -- with electricity, water, and plumbing. It had been a hard life for her -- I remember her washing clothes in a big tub in the yard, over a mesquite fire -- and then she lived with us for a while before she joined my grandfather in 1957.

My grandfather chased his dreams, but he didn’t realize them. Along the way, though, he managed to be instrumental in establishing the Anza-Borrego State Park in 1936, and he worked hard on the start of the School District. He was also a driving force in the building of the original Truck Haven Road through the badlands to the Salton Sea, so that access to Borrego was easier, and would encourage more trade.

Someone asked me recently what Doc Beaty would think if he could have known that his grandson would one day represent this area in the U.S. Congress. I think he might have said: “What? And have him get mixed up with THAT crew????????”

So, having thrown in my lot with this “crew” here in Washington, my schedule is not my own -- otherwise I would be right there with you to celebrate old Borrego during “Borrego Springs Founders Day.” Please give my best wishes to everyone!