Alias Origin

[Holden A. Grudge]

Mine comes from a personality trait.  My wife thinks its appropriate.

[Tommy Moore]

Took mine from "Log of a Cowboy".  Thought it was a good book.  interesting character.

[Green River Powell aka RonC]

As an environmental engineer in profession, and working with the mining and oil industry to clean up contaminated sites, and working for a university that has been tied to the earth sciences and resource industry since its founding in 1874, I wanted a name sourced in the earth sciences and mineral industries. John Wesley Powell, the Western explorer of the Grand Canyon and founder of the U.S. Geological Survey (where I used to work), seemed ideal. Powell was the first to raft the Green River in Wyoming, Colorado and Utah. It has its headwaters in the Wind River Mountains in Wyoming, in the Bridger-Teton National Forest, and is the primary tributary to the Colorado River. What could be more Western than that?

The name, Powell, is humbly taken because I could never live up to the brave level of discovery and adventure tied to the originator - John Wesley Powell.

Ron

[Advertising]

[Pay Dirt Norvelle]

I was racking my brain trying to figure out an alias as the one I wanted was already taken.  I then looked up on my bookshelf and say a bag that had some sand with gold in it that I had bought in Alaska and the name on it was Pay Dirt and I lucked out as the name was not taken. 

[John Smith]

There were so many of me in the old west, figured there should be one here.

[WaddWatsonEllis]

My mother never spoke of her family ... we were kind of overwhelmed by my father's Washington/Waynesburg, PA family Going back to shortly after 1066, they were justifyably proud of their heritage and kind of overwhelmed my mother to where she just kept quiet.

As a result, I am just learning about her family and my great grandfather, Wadd Watson Ellis. As stated below, he came back from the 'War of the Northern Agression'.... he came back and they were offering free land on the Frio River.
 
He gave the land for what would become the first church in the area , Covey Chapel. In fact, he and many of my great uncles are buried in the land he donated.

[Pit Mule]

The name ‘Pit Mule’ is an old Mining Industry term. It was assigned by old time miners to small mules used to pull ore dolly’s and carts from deep inside the coal mines to the lift box or dump chute. These small but strong animals were selected because they fit better in the generally narrow tunnels and cuts. Other small horses, Shetland ponies and large dogs were also used as coal and ore dolly draggers but mules were the preferred choice as they ‘learned the ropes’ fast and their intelligence was useful as they could remember how many shovels to fill a cart, how long it took to fill the dolly as well as the route through dimly lit and sometimes pitch-black tunnels. Even when the tunnels were knee deep in water seepage they stayed the course.

In many mines, the Mules rarely saw daylight as they were stabled underground for months and years on end. Some went blind over time due to the darkness and coal dust, but were still useful as dray animals that ‘new’ the route. In south central Iowa where a low grade of coal was mined in open pits, the ‘Pit Mule’ was used to drag the dolly to the dump chute and then hitched to the freight wagon to haul the coal to the nearest railhead. Some ‘Pit Mules’ were retired or sold to local farmers when the pit closed and served many years as a faithful, yet sometimes stubborn method of transport. Talk about the Great Depression and how it affected everyone in the community that was especially poor, lead to stories that ‘Pit Mules’ sometimes disappeared around Thanksgiving, ending up on several dinner tables and keeping a few bellies full during the bleak winters they suffered through…
   
...so I'm told.

[WaddWatsonEllis]

Pit Mule,

Your comments ran into a bunch of memories here ...

My dad went to a one room schoohouse, passed his eight grade class two years early by listening to other sutdents, faked his age as 16 and worked his first job running mules and ore carts up and down the Washington/Wayesburg PA coal mines.

[Forty Rod]

Where has this been hiding for...5 years or so?

[Pit Mule]

Now you have some fine old history behind you there WaddWatsonEllis. The hard work from days gone by convince me not to complain to hard about working. Great pic to...................

Pit Mule

[WaddWatsonEllis]

I wish I could claim it as my family, but I did a search for 'coal cart and pony pics' ... and it came up on a child labor law page ....

[royal barnes]

Royal Barnes was the outlaw gunfighter in the Louis L'Amour book "The Rider Of Lost Creek". I was left for dead after the fight with Kilkenny but the rumors of my demise were greatly exaggerated.

[Monument Valley Mike]

Love Monument Valley, mainly because of all the John Ford films he made there.  Really fell in love with it when I worked there on Back to the Future III.

So it was an easy alias to come up with!

[Rafe Covington]

Mine is the character Tom Selleck played in the movie "Crossfire Trail", book was a lot better than the movie.

Rafe

[Philly Slim]

I'm originally from the City of Brotherly love.  (Philidelphia, for those of you from Rio Lindo)  And I'm verrrrrrrrrrry skinny. 


(And if you believe that part about being skinny, I've got some land for sale.  )

[Drayton Calhoun]

My mother never spoke of her family ... we were kind of overwhelmed by my father's Washington/Waynesburg, PA family Going back to shortly after 1066, they were justifyably proud of their heritage and kind of overwhelmed my mother to where she just kept quiet.

As a result, I am just learning about her family and my great grandfather, Wadd Watson Ellis. As stated below, he came back from the 'War of the Northern Agression'.... he came back and they were offering free land on the Frio River.
 
He gave the land for what would become the first church in the area , Covey Chapel. In fact, he and many of my great uncles are buried in the land he donated.

Hey, Wadd, just found out that I too had an ancestor in the 2nd Alabama Cavalry, a Thomas Buse. Small world, eh?

[WaddWatsonEllis]

Drayton,

I misspoke (with a little help)...

It turns out that the original Wadd Watson Ellis was in the 2nd Florida Mounted Regiment ....

[Fingers McGee]

Mine is a camp name that was given to me back in my Rendezvous days and is due to a degree of manual dexterity appreciated by women of the female persuasion.

Fingers (Show Me MO smoke) McGee

[Drayton Calhoun]

Drayton,

I misspoke (with a little help)...

It turns out that the original Wadd Watson Ellis was in the 2nd Florida Mounted Regiment ....

Well, at least they were on the same side! LOL!

[WaddWatsonEllis]

Drayton,

Yes, they both fought in the War of the Northern Agression ....