Gustavia agusta

Melastomataceae

Miconia sp

Insects 688

Allison Jones, continued

As mentioned, I was surprised to learn that Allison Jones and his wife have been living in Alter do Chão (only 30 kilometers from Santarém) for the last two years. I'm also pleased because I'll have a chance to get to know him better. We talked about everything under the sun yesterday at the Belo Alter Hotel, but I'd like to know more about him and the descendants of the American Confederates who settled in Santa Barbara, São Paulo. I know that the Jones family came to Brazil from Texas, right after the Civil War. Allison's mother, Judith McKnight Jones (now 90 years old), is much a celebrity for having written Soldado Descansa, probably the most definitive book on the history of the American Confederates and their descendants in Brazil. She is also aunt to Rita Lee, a famous musician and singer in Brazil. I also know that Allison is an engineer by profession. I look forward to learning more about him and his family. Image, that giraffe is me with Allison at the Belo Alter Hotel. I told him that I would be posting this pix in my Tropical Biodiversity blog. He jokingly remarked that it was okay, but not to put it under the monkey label.

Confederates - Allison Jones

From time to time I divert from plants and trees to report on descendants of the American Confederates, many of whom settled in this part of the world after the American Civil War. I've been neglect in searching out and interviewing many of these individuals. Most of the time I just bump into them by chance, or pick up on local news and events. Such was the case yesterday, when my wife, younger son and I pulled up into the shade of a tree next to the Belo Alter Hotel in Alter do Chão, where we were going to have lunch. A couple in a pickup parked there just seconds before us and we exchanged "good afternoon"as we got out of our vehicles. As I started walking towards the hotel, I noticed a decal of a Confederate flag on the rear window of the pickup. Inside the lobby of the hotel I asked the gentleman if, by chance, he was a Confederate. A big infectious smile appeared on his face as he recognized me from an encounter many years ago. When he identified himself as Allison Jones, it all came back. Well, nearly. His memory is much better than mine and he reminded me that that on that occasion I was touring with a former physician of the Ford Motor Company Hospital in Belterra. To my surprise, Allison and his wife, Eloise, have been living in Alter do Chão for the last two years. What brought them from their native Confederado community in Santa Barbara in the State of São Paulo to Alter do Chão? Well, I didn't ask, but I assume it was retirement. Attached image from left to right: Eloise Jones; my wife, Áurea; me; and Allison Jones. Next image, please.

The Thief at the End of the World

I'm delighted to have received Joe Jackson's book, The Thief at the End of the World. I'm even more pleased to have received it from the author, himself. Joe spent one morning with me at Bosque Santa Lucia in October, 2005, while researching the life of Henry Wickham, the alias "thief", who made off with the rubber tree seeds. Wickham immigrated to the Amazon from England in 1871, and farmed at piquía-tuba, which is at the top of the hill on the way to the Bosque. It can't be more than 3-4 kilometers away, as the vulture flies. Knowing the place and some of the history of rubber, I savored every last word in Joe's book. Image: latex forming from a cut on a rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis) at Bosque Santa Lúcia.

Delano Riker, part 6

In a previous post, I mentioned knowing Joe Riker, who was the last of 14 children fathered by David Bowman Riker. Joe lived in Belém, but came to Santarém quite often. It may have been his sister, Mayflower, who introduced us around 1985. Regardless, he stopped in to see me many times here where we live on Turiano Meira Street. Joe retired precociously as South American Representative for the The Gideons International because of an vehicle accident in Guyana, as I best remember the details. On one of his visits he presented me the book you see in the attached image, O Último Confederado Na Amazônia, written by his brother, David Afton Riker. The translation of the book in English is, The Last Confederate in the Amazon, referring to David Bowman Riker, who came to Brazil with his father, Robert Riker as a young boy. He indeed became the last of the all the American Confederates to die here in the Amazon. There have been other books written about the Confederates in the Amazon, but Afton's book may be the only one written by a blood descendant of one. According to Afton's historical accounts, he and Joe were always very close because they were the youngest of the very large David Bowman Riker family. Joe always invited me to visit him at his home in Belém, but sadly enough, I never did. It's been years since I've seen or heard from him.

Delano Riker, part 5

I find it interesting that not one word was said in the press about Delano Riker being a descendant of Robert Riker, an American Confederate. I may have missed something, but I read many newspaper articles and I also reviewed most internet reports of his death. It just goes to show you how some details of history can get lost fast. The main reason I added these posts to my Tropical Biodiversity blog is that the death of a descendant of an American Confederate is of interest to many people in the world, especially the United States. As a matter of fact, there are an untold number of Rikers who live outside Brazil and many are interested in knowing more about their relatives here. Image: Municipality of Santarém flags were being distributed to the public as the coffin left the Baptist Church.

Delano Riker, part 4

Although I never had an infinity with Delano Riker, I did have the pleasure of knowing his mother, Mayflower Riker, and his uncle, Joe Riker. I don't remember who introduced me to Mayflower (now deceased) back in the early 1980s, but she was quite enthusiastic about taking me to Diamantino to visit her grandfather's grave site. Diamantino is about 10-12 kilometers south of Santarém. It's fairly much suburbia of Santarém today, but back in the 1860s, when Robert Riker settled there with his American family, it was really back country. It was a rather unique location because it connects three different environments, the planalto (highland), tropical savanna and the Amazon floodplain. Robert Riker's grave site was located almost at the bottom of the hill, very close to where the community of Mararu is situated today. I got the impression that the site had almost been abandoned. I don't remember historical details, but it seems that the Riker homestead had been sold around 1910 by Robert's son, David Bowman Riker. It's quite probable that this particular piece of land had changed hands many times over nearly a century. What I saw there was a small farmer's house and a field of corn and manioc. The grave site was right in the middle of the corn and manioc crop. I've not been back to the site since that time, but I heard rumors that the remains of Robert Riker may have been moved to another location, maybe Santarém. I'm negligent in not having researched these details. Image: Delano Riker procession arriving at the Santarém cemetery.

Delano Riker, part 3

My association with Delano Riker was never that great. I remember having consulted with him many years ago about chartering a flight for some group wanting to go up river, but nothing ever came of the tour, so I didn't go back to his office, located only a few meters from where this picture was taken. I remember having talked with him another time about renting his riverboat, El Dorado. As it turned out, the boat wasn't for hire. It was transportation to his ranch downriver and home for him once getting there. The encounter I remember best with Delano was in 2005, when he was Secretary of Agriculture for the Municipality of Santarém, as well as Vice-mayor. He and a couple of other politicians were passing through Bosque Santa Lúcia on the dirt road that connects the Santarém-Cuiabá with the Curuá-Una Highway. I happened to be out on the road, close to the Bosque entrance, because some community people had gotten together to repair a large, nasty hole in the road that was getting out of control. Delano stopped his pickup next to me and asked if I was responsible for the road construction. I guess it all looked impressive because several community people were working and there was a big pile of rocks on the side of the road. I recognized him immediately, but I'm not sure he ever figured out who I was, then or any other time. I explained to him that it was a community project and I introduced him to Professora Inêz, who was community president of Poço Branco at that time. The good professora isn't timid when it comes to asking for help from politicians. The result of the chat was that Delano committed himself to repairing another part of the road closer to the highway, which he did.

Delano Riker, part 2

There are several months of the year in this part of the Amazon when we eat dust and pray for rain. Then there several months of the year when we breath water and pray for sun! The day of Delano Riker's funeral was one of them. It had poured during the night and then started up again early morning. When I got to the Baptist church, where Delano's body was placed for public visitation, it was raining very hard. The burial was scheduled for 10:00, but at approximately 10:15, the rain let up. It's only two blocks up to the cemetery from the church, so the procession got there before wetness set in again. Image, the Military Police Calvary waiting in the rain for the procession to begin. It was impressive to see how horses and riders stood up under more than an hour of heavy rain without hardly batting an eyelash. To be continued.

Delano Riker, in memoriam

I depart from my regular posts on flora and fauna to report the death of Delano Riker Teles de Menezes, 60, vice-mayor of Santarém on March 13, 2008. Delano was much more than a politician in his life. He was a cattle rancher on the Amazon River floodplain; he was a pilot and owner of a regional airline; and Riker was a blood descendant of the American Confederates, called Confederados here. The patriarch was Robert Henry Riker, who ventured off from South Carolina to Santarém with his whole family in 1867. I understand that he was president of a railroad in South Carolina prior to the Civil War and that he was much better off economically than other Confederados coming to Santarém. His American wife, Sarah Elizabeth Hapoldt, died 10 years after arriving in the Amazon. Their six children born in the United States included David Bowman Riker, the last Confederate to die in the Amazon. Robert Riker married again and fathered several more children born here in Santarém. More coming up in the next blog post. Image, Delano Riker's coffin leaving the Baptist Church of Santarém.

Joe Jackson's new book

When I took this picture of the root system of a paricá tree at Bosque Santa Lúcia, I couldn't help remembering the cover of Joe Jackson's new book, Thief at the End of the World. Joe visited the Bosque with me on 19 October 2005, while researching the life of Henry Wickham, the person attributed to smuggling the rubber tree seeds out of the Amazon. The book will be available on 28 February. I know a number of people here in Santarém very anxious to read the book, including myself.

Bromeliad in bloom, continued

After some days of developing tiny buds, the bromeliad broke out in bloom day before yesterday. I can't say I've ever seen more beautiful flowers on a bromeliad. The fragrance competes with the best of perfumes.

Bromeliad in bloom

This bromeliad was given to me by Eliésio Steel, descendant of an American Confederate family that came to Santarém right after the Civil War. Steel died this past year and I never got a chance to ask where he got the plant. I would assume that it's from the tropical savanna, rather than the highlands (Planalto). Regardless, it's in bloom for the first time. Image coming up.

E. Steel, Part IV (American Confederates)

As promised, let me share some of the information on Eliésio Steel's job application, which I discovered just by chance this week when cleaning out a file cabinet containing old outdated receipts and company documents. I'll include only basic data that will hopefully add some historical records to the saga of the approximately one-hundred American Confederate families who immigrated to Santarém in 1867. The application is obviously in Portuguese, the language of Brazil. The translation is mine.

Name: Eliésio Steel do Nascimento
Address: Trav. Portugal, 1.200 - Diamantino - Santarém 68020-150, PA
Date of birth: August 11, 1954
Place of birth: Santarém
Nationality: Brazilian
Marital status: Single
Profession: Professor of English
Name of father: Antenor Luis do Nascimento
Name of mother: Neusa Navarro Steel
High school: Colégio Estadual Prof. Álvaro Adolfo da Silveira - Santarém, 1972-1976
Higher education: Instituto Estadual de Educacão "Carmela Dutra" - Porto Velho, Rondônia; degree in education.
Additional courses: English at Instituto de Idiomas "Yázigi S.C." - Porto Velho
Employment: Professor of English for the State of Rondônia/Department of Education, 1985-1987. Municipality of Porto Velho, Rondônia, Department of Education; professor of English, 1984-1987.

The document was signed by E. Steel here in Santarem on October 23, 1995.

Image: A solid rock vase, created by E. Steel. In use at Bosque Santa Lúcia.

E. Steel, Part III (American Confederates)

In the latter part of June of this year I reported the death of Eliésio Steel do Nascimento, descendant of George Steel, one of first American Confederates to arrive in Santarém in 1867. In the previous two blog posts, I referred to him as E. Steel because I didn't know how to spell his first name. Besides, I had never called him anything other than Steel over the years. I need not repeat what I wrote earlier, other than to say that we didn't get together very often until recent times when he got into the business of selling plants and vases. He would stop by our house occasionally and we would chat in English and, when I could afford it, I'd buy plants and vases from him. The plant arrangement in the attached image was one of his creations. Steel was actually pedaling it around the streets of Santarem on the back of his bicycle the day I bought it. Since his suicide on June 24, 2007, I felt it important that some record be made of this man, his family, his life and the historical link with the American Confederates. Unfortunately, time slipped away without my doing the research. I did encounter his sister, Edilce, once on the street where we live and we promised one another that we would get together in the near future. Then by chance, I met her sister, who now lives in Venezuela. I also had a call from Adilce's brother, who lives in Manaus; he thanked me for my friendship with Eliésio and for the blog posts I had written about his brother. But these were all fast encounters without opportunities to ask the important questions, like how do you spell Steel's first name? I was beginning to think that some of this history would slip into darkness when I came by Eliésio's job application among some old papers in a metal file cabinet that I was cleaning earlier this week. I couldn't believe my eyes. There was his application typed out on some fading bureaucratic-type paper, signed by him personally with both his signature and initials. I nearly threw it into the trash along with outdated receipts and other documents I no longer needed. I honestly don't remember his giving me this document. The fact that he spoke fluent English was good enough reason to apply for a job at a tour agency. Next post: the contents of the application.

E. Steel, Part II (American Confederates)

Returning to my previous E. Steel post, I wish to thank Thom Hiers of Charleston, South Carolina for bringing some historical documents to my attention. It was on the basis of one his references, Confederados em Santarém -saga americana na amazônia, 1987, by Norma Guilhon, that I came by the name of the George Steel, who was in the original group of American Confederates to come to Santarém in 1867. Later, I reconfirmed that fact with another document I found on the internet, Registros de nomes de famílias que entraram no território brasileiro entre 1865 e 1885, by Betty Antunes de Oliveira of the organization, Fraternidade Descendência Americana. One single name appears, George Steele, so it seems that he didn't bring any family members to Brazil. Norma Guidon found some reference to a 1892 document, which mentions "Mr. George Steel, his wife and son, (João Douglas Steele)..." Interesting that at the time of her research, the name Steele didn't appear on public records anymore. Guidon assumed that the family didn't remain in Santarém. I'll be digging up new information on the Steele family in the next few days.

The palm trunk vase in the attached image was created by E. Steel in recent weeks. On one of his last visits, he told me that the mussandra plant needed to be moved to a cooler environment. I took it out to Bosque Santa Lúcia and it's doing much better there.

E. Steel (in memoriam) - American Confederates

An interesting piece of Brazilian/United States history was the immigration of approximately one-hundred confederate families, who came to Santarém in 1867. These families were part of a larger group of North Americans who were recruited by the Brazilian government in an effort to upgrade agricultural skills in the country. Most went to the State of São Paulo and were quite successful in their economical endeavors. Even today there is still a very large community of American descendants, called Confederados, living in Americana, Campinas, and other cities in São Paulo. In the Santarém region, farming proved to be very difficult and, as today, there was a lack of infrastructure to get produce to market. Thus, many of the original families who came didn't do well and returned to the United States within a few years. There were, nevertheless, several families who persevered in Santarém to become involved in ranching, farming and other enterprises. Family names, some of which still exist today, include Hennington, Jennings, Vaughan (now spelled Waughan/or Von), Riker, Rhome and Steel. This particular post is dedicated to E. Steel, who died on June 24, 2007, by a death of his own choosing. I'd known Steele, as I preferred to call him, for more than 20 years. He used to stop by my tourism office from time to time, hungry to speak English and make contacts with cohort Americans. I need to check with his mother and sister but I think it was his great grandfather who had immigrated to Brazil after the American Civil War. Our encounters were always fast ones. He talked like a cross of a tape recorder and a machine gun. He was so anxious to speak English, he didn't take much time for listening or asking questions. I always loaned him books written in English and I'm positive that he devoured every word in them. In more recent years he took up gardening as a way of earning a meager living, selling flowers and plants. Then he came to create vases sculptured out of solid rock and other natural materials. The rock vase in the attached image is one of his artistic creations. The first time I saw one of these vases was on the back of his bicycle. He'd made a stop in front of our house to talk with me and as I remember it, I bought a plant or two he was selling. I couldn't keep my eyes off the rock vase, it was so beautiful. I wanted to ask him how much he was asking for it but I figured I couldn't afford it and I didn't want to create false expectations. I guess he saw me slobbering at the mouth because when we went to visit him and is wife at their modest home in Nova Republica some weeks later, he gave me the one you see in the attached image. Knowing he wasn't in a stable economic situation, I bought another rock vase. He responded by giving another one to my wife. We bought some plants and he gave us others. So it went, he was a very humble person making the most out of what he knew best, plants and flowers. The last time I saw him alive was about 10 days ago. He'd spent most of the day pedaling the streets of Santarem on his bicycle and made a stop in front of our house to return a book I'd loaned him, Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice by Mark Plotkin. I invited him in but he said he was in a rush to get home. I thought to myself that he seemed extremely burned from the sun and very emaciated. His last words to me were something to the effect that I should stop by his home to pick up roses he's saved for me and that I shouldn't worry about paying for them right now. We were friends. At his funeral yesterday, his body was covered with a blanket of roses and other flowers taken from his yard.