Another Crazy Rex Ranch Weekend
I’ve never felt the power of each minute so profoundly. Every hour that ticks by forces the same questions: did we just make it count? What got done and what’s in motion? Have we done all we can to try and save Rex Ranch? It’s no excuses time, only days left and it’s wheels up Los Angeles.
I literally brainstorm at 30,000 feet. How the hell can we pull this off?
I’d been longing to get back to Arizona since last weekend. I feel differently there, like many people do. It slows me down, makes me pay attention, it gets me fired up. Every day is filled with too much big sky, too many ambitious things to pull off, too many conversations to cram into another short weekend. I can’t believe we only started this journey 34 days ago. It’s a wow moment to think of how many people have become involved since then. I feel great.
Until I walk out of the Tucson airport. I suddenly realize I’ve been so busy this week I forgot entirely to reserve a rental car. I head back to the terminal, get my laptop out, use the free wifi and reserve one online for a discount. Every dollar counts, we’re on a tight budget.
12 minutes later I’m throwing my suitcase in the back of it and heading through Tucson to the University of Arizona. Vicky Westover from the Hanson Film Institute has sent me directions. We’ve only exchanged emails and calls so far after she offered support and ideas on Save Rex Ranch. She texts me she has a red scarf, I text back I have a gray cap. We’re meeting at a restaurant in 20 minutes.
I drive past the Pie Allen neighborhood, past the Arizona Historical Society building on campus, and park. The sun has just started to set and students run, walk, bike, skate and scooter past me in every direction. The place is beautiful and filled with life. I walk past a historical renovation project in the middle of a cul-de-sac, it’s the Old Main Building – the very heart of the campus. They are in the middle of a huge preservation effort. I feel inspired. It can be done.
I spend the night in fantastic company. Vicky (who is awesome to meet) has graciously invited me to tonights’ event where Carlos Sandoval is presenting a special sneak peek of his latest documentary “The State of Arizona” – a controversial and passionate story of a state and a nation torn by immigration policy challenges. The film doesn’t premiere on television until January but there are already a hundred people in the seats who have come out to this lecture hall on a Friday night to see it. It’s free – courtesy of Hanson Film Institute.
It’s powerful stuff and exactly the kind of event we could bring to Rex Ranch someday.
Blackness and applause, the screening is strong and the film truly engages this local and invested crowd. There’s a Q&A with Carlos afterward and then we all walk out into the cold night. Someone asked him what his budget was and because it was publicly funded, he shared it - his film cost $800,000. to make and finish.
I suddenly realize again what a bargain saving Rex Ranch is, for the price of one documentary we could potentially launch a cultural center that could touch hundreds if not thousands of people over the next years.
We have a dinner nearby and I get to hang with Beni Matias, Acting Executive Director of National Association of Latino Independent Producers along with Jacob Britta who edited the famous “Lost in La Mancha” documentary and teaches film at the University of Arizona.
Academy Award Nominee and self-declared “Story Doctor” Fernanda Rossi and I chat while her son plays at my feet under the table. She writes a dedication in her book for me, I’m psyched to meet her and jazzed at all the great conversations, but it’s almost 11 PM and I still have to drive down to Amado tonight. I need to get on the road. I stand up to say my regretful early goodbyes, trade cards with Sebastian Covarrubias from the Mexican Consulate’s office in Tucson, and soon I’m on the I-19 heading South.
Saturday morning brings a breakfast meeting with a potential donor. I explain we’ve already spent $7,800 in our quest, almost a third of what we’ve been able to raise. I’ve put up all the money so far, but as we eat bacon and eggs, I get a text alert from Discover saying I’m close to my limit. It’s a reminder of how urgently this great project needs a new benefactor and someone to fuel and invest in this opportunity in order for it to really happen.
I drive to Rio Rico for an impromptu Board of Directors pow-wow in the garage of Susannah Castro and Jeremy Topp. Their son has agreed to help me today and he jumps in the car. We drive up the frontage road toward Tubac.
He’s 18. He asks me how we’re gonna get rid of all the Save Rex Ranch flyers sitting between us in the front seat. “I dunno,” I tell him honestly. “I guess we’ll just start talking to people.” We stop at the Santa Cruz Chili Company first and hop out. We look like what we are, a little new and nervous at this whole grass roots thing. I give the woman at the counter our quick Save Rex Ranch appeal. She actually lives on a farm off the dirt road that leads to the Ranch. She’s supportive, but she has to ask the owner before the sign goes up. We move on and I try to make a learning moment out of it. “I guess that went well,” I tell him.
We drive another mile and then it’s an honest to God miracle outside the Tumacácori National Historical Park. We look at each other and suddenly we both have the same idea. I pull over.
There are hundreds of cars, vans and trucks all parked in rows along the road. It’s the annual Luminaria Nights Celebration with music, food, art and dancing. It’s a veritable goldmine of prospects for our cause. And they are all in the same place and the same time! We split up the flyers and go for it.
I move swiftly down rows, slipping our flyers under the wipers, looking sideways to see if anyone will object. Wondering if the sheriff directing traffic will bust us. My younger partner does the same. Finally a woman getting out of her car yells, “Hey!” and I freeze. “Can I get another flyer for my friend?” She’s heard all about our mission to save Rex Ranch. She loves our idea and wishes us luck. More cars, more flyers. It’s starting to look like a movement! All our little posters and pleas for help flapping in the wind. We run out but we’ve managed to hit almost 200 cars. We get more well wishes from some folks.
Across the street our amazing artist/volunteer Rebecca Lourdes O’Day, a local photographer who wrote an editorial for us in the local paper just a few days before, has personally set up a Save Rex Ranch art auction in a parking lot. She stumps for supporters, makes friends for 6 hours and raises us more money for the cause. She’s done this all by herself. It’s as humbling as it gets for something that started as just a crazy idea.
I get a call - dear friends from Los Angeles have driven out for our Save Rex Ranch Fundraising Party that night at Abe’s Old Tumacacori Bar to surprise us. It’s a special place and we’re taking it over in a few hours to gather and celebrate what we’ve done. But now I panic, I need a hotel room for them, and it’s one of the biggest weekends in town.
I head over to the Tubac Country Inn and approach the man in the lobby, “Hi there, any chance at all you have a vacancy tonight?” “I’m afraid not,” he answers. I start to walk away and he stops me, “Are you that Rex Ranch guy? I saw your videos online and I posted it to 500 friends on LinkedIn, I hope it all works out.”
I’m floored. I thank him. His name is Ivan Drechsler. His wife comes out, she offers to find my a casita nearby. She does. It’s another miracle. Then she and I drive out together to find the key and talk. She’s done architectural restoration projects in Portland among other fascinating things. Her name is April and she’s just about the nicest person you’ll ever meet. I ask her how she knows about our project and she reminds me … “It’s a small town.” Her above and beyond help is proof of that. It’s all around this community and it’s what will make the difference to Rex Ranch.
More important than dollars will be people. People are what this project has been all about.
One quick stop in Tubac on my way to the party to check our recent arrivals into the casita to rest and change. They’ve driven 8 hours to be there. I upload a video of our flyer-run to our Facebook page using the free casita wifi, and I have to head up the road to Abe’s. Free wifi has been the lifeblood of the Save Rex Ranch project.
Our Board Member Katie Munger is the mastermind behind tonight’s event. And now she’s running around town with her kids, picking up flowers and food, checking on the musicians and hosting it all with such grace and wisdom. I can’t wait to get there and meet people I’ve only known online. It’s going to be great.
Everything is fate, and no sooner than I walk into the door, I meet Cha-Cha Donau. Her father Al and mother Mary owned and operated Rex Ranch from 1958 to 1982 and she grew up there. We’ve been trading calls and trying to connect for weeks. The owner of the bar, Dolores Trujillo tends to the fireplace and then offers to get us drinks. I have a ton of questions for Cha-Cha and I fire away. As we talk and trade stories of what we know, I learn more fascinating tidbits about the history of Rex Ranch:
* Her family bought Rex Ranch in 1958 from Rex Hamaker, an inventor of oil drilling technologies who built up the original Ranch between 1936 and 1939. His name is pronounced “Hah-mock-er” (not “Hay-make-er” as we guessed).
* Her father was a hard-worker. In addition to running Rex Ranch, he and Mary operated summer concessions in Lassen Park, California, Mt. McKinley, Alaska, and Glacier Park. Al Donau was well respected in the tourism industry and was honored by the National Park Hospitality Association and the National Park Service for his years of commitment to visitors.
* Al brought the original Rex Ranch bell from Albuquerque, New Mexico to Arizona, we think it’s still the same one that hangs off the small entrance in the plaza. Cha-Cha and her siblings all lived in the Yaqui House, her grandparents lived in the back rooms.
* Al’s favorite horse was named Joe.
* Caroline Lee Bouvier, Jackie Kennedy Onnasis’ younger sister, stayed at Rex Ranch and Al once hosted John F. Kennedy at his lodge in California, where special phones needed to be installed for the visit.
* 15-25 head of horses were usually stabled at “The Rex” and they had over 75 saddles stored onsite. The metal-roofed barn that sits there today is the very same one that existed there when it was a working dude ranch.
* The horse wranglers also tended bar for the guests at night. They lived and worked on the property along with the Donau Family.
* No one ever came to the Ranch unless they were staying there, folks would come for usually 1-2 weeks but some guests stayed for as long as 3 months. They were expected to help run the ranch and the cattle as part of their experience at the Ranch.
* The only parties at that time that drew folks out from the community were Easter Dinners and an annual party on New Year’s Eve.
We promise to stay in touch, she shows me her iPhone to make sure she has the right cell phone number for me, the contact pops up “Joe The Rex Ranch Guy” – we laugh and she says she’s sorry, she couldn’t remember my last name.
The fire is roaring now and the bar is filling up with people. In the corner musicians Mona Chambers and Sean Rogers of “In the Woods” set up. They’ve come down from Tucson to play for the party. She plays a cello, he plays a bass. It’s all improvisational and fluid – they decide a structure based on drawing out a soundscape in the form of a map, they dedicate the music to the place. Tonight they’re playing just for our benefit – and they don’t do a lot of gigs. They’re almost a little secret and underground, so it’s a honor to have them. Mona admits, “We only play together in weird places, off-beat things we like …”
(End of Part One / Part Two: Coming Soon)
