“When It Rains in the Valley” (William Eddy)
 
The Donner Party survivors quickly learned that rain in the Sacramento Valley meant snow in the Sierra Nevada mountains. William Eddy, after leading the Forlorn Hope group ninety miles, thirty-three days, staggered into Johnson’s Ranch January 17, 1847. When he asked for bread, fifteen-year-old Harriet Ritchie burst into tears after seeing the severely emaciated man. His dreadful condition and persuasive letter reached Sutter’s Fort despite the flooded conditions, thus initiating the First Relief’s rescue of the Donner Party—saving many lives. Unfortunately, Eddy’s entire family died before he returned to Truckee Lake two months later, but he was able to rescue four children, including the three orphaned Donner daughters.

On Saturday, March 13, 1847, the four men of Third Relief reached Truckee Lake. William Eddy and William Foster both hoped that their sons were still alive in the Murphy cabin, but this was not to be. However, the three young Donner daughters were all healthy and ready to travel over the Sierras, along with Simon Murphy, Foster’s eight-year-old brother-in-law. Tamsen Donner, the girls’ mother, arrived at the same time that Eddy and the three other rescuers did. She knew that her girls had not left with the “rescuers” Cady and Stone—instead, Cady and Stone left behind the girls and the family’s keepsakes Mrs. Donner entrusted to them, such as silver spoons and silk dresses, and pocketed Mrs. Donner’s thousand dollars meant to transport the girls to safety. Mrs. Donner left her girls in Eddy’s care, minutes after he found out his own son had died. After a day of travel, the party found the Donner bundles left behind by Cady and Stone. The Third Relief threw the girls’ old dresses into the fire, while Eddy and Thompson, another rescuer who was handy with a sewing needle, fashioned new cloaks out of the former silk dresses.

“Radio Man”

 I’ve always been a big fan of the Twilight Zone and love watching Rod Serling (1924-1974) puffing away on his requisite cigarette at the top of each episode. In World War II, Serling jumped out of airplanes, but he never flew them. He also got his big break in TV by first being a radio staff writer. I wanted to create a spacey feel that poetically pieced fragments of Twilight Zone episodes into a narrative while making the chorus a call to action for artists to keep

“Angels’ Share”

 Did you know there’s more lost whiskey in American rickhouses due to humidity than in Scottish ones? Even the tightest oak barrels can’t prevent this evaporation, which is coined the “angels’ share.” Once I learned about this phenomenon I knew I had a song.

“Old Derelicts”
 

This song was first inspired by a woodcut painting by Pittsboro, North Carolina, artist Forrest Greenslade. I wrote a poem about his piece, which featured an old truck next to a barn, and then imagined what it must feel like from the truck’s point of view, to be abandoned by your owner, who I call “Bob” in the song.

“Are You Men From California Or Do You Come From Heaven?”

“Are You Men From California or Do You Come From Heaven?” filmed at Bella Music NC studio in Wake Forest for Alice Osborn’s “Skirts in the Snow” CD Release party on September 28, 2022, featuring William Woltz on additional guitar. William also provided additional music for this song.

Mrs. Levinah Murphy of the Donner Party asked this question: “Are You Men From California Or Do You Come From Heaven?” when the seven First Relief rescuers reached Truckee Lake (now Donner Lake) the evening of February 18, 1847, four and a half months after the Donner Party became trapped by snow on Halloween night 1846. Very few traveled east to west in the Sierra Nevadas in wintertime. She is known for being the first cannibal at the lake and she is also known for taking care of the many children who were too weak to be rescued. These children included William Foster and William Eddy’s young sons as well as her own son, Simon Murphy. She was also kind to the three Donner girls, Frances, Georgia, and Eliza, when they were dropped in her cabin before William Eddy’s Third Relief party rescued them and Simon in mid-March 1847. Mrs. Murphy was a Mormon widow, who moved her family from Nauvoo, Illinois, West with the dream of having the freedom to practice her religion. The sprawling Murphy clan included children from babies to adults, half of whom survived.