Interview with Roy Wilhelm, February 28, 1993

'''Roy''': Oh, Dick Gibbons was in the sheep business and he was in the cow business.  He was one of the wealthy men of the county and he had gained control of the town of Malpais by then. And there was fifteen families workin' there and livin' there and they all worked for Dick.  Malpai had at one time a post office and in The Post Offices of the West, it says that a man named Phipps was its first and only postmaster and it was only open for 9 months, when they fell below a certain point.  I don't know what was the slump, but anyhow  it operated for nine months.  And they had a school, cause all these people had (kids), so they had a one teacher school and my mother she was a divorced widow she took the county exam and  she wanted to go to work,  got a job a teachin' school, but the Gibbons' wanted her to come out there because they had kids.  They wanted somebody that was competent to teach 'em and then all the Mexican kids  so she went out there and was teachin' school and my Dad he come by and that was just a stoppin' place, ya know, and here's this good lookin' school teacher and he just hung up there for awhile and out of that visit there, I don't know how long afterwards, they were married.   

'''Roy''': yeah.   

'''Roy''': yeah.  The old man had, he was well fixed by then, he was Mr. Wilhelm and he bought a place already built there and then he spent some money fixin' it up.   

''(Ed. Note: according to interview between Doug Singleton and Aunt Maude,  George and Naomi lived in Vernon after they were married- first at Uncle Dick Gibbon's place then George homesteaded and built them a one room log house with a lumber lean-to.  Then they built a lumber house on some land of Clarrissa Wilhelm's at Vernon.  She mentions that they had to haul water from Uncle Haight's while they were living at George's homestead, probably why they moved to his mother's land --  Report from U.S. Dept. Agriculture in June 1908 states that claimant had a wife and three children living on homestead claim with him, Naomi, Maude, Andy and Roy.  It also states that he lived on the land from 1900 to December 1907 and farmed land every year, built a house and dug three wells but could not get deep enough with the means at hand to secure water.  During the entire time he had to haul water for domestic purposes.  Report was signed 5/7/08.  He  would have homesteaded five years before his marriage to Naomi on Jan. 2, 1905.)''   

'''Roy''':  Yeah the two story house, yeah.  That two story house was built adjoining  that ranch cabin we had,  just built up against that for part of one wall.