COOLING DOWN THE BEER

When my grandfather was building fences at the La Bonita Ranch, sometimes he had to connect one fence to another fence a mile or so away.  He would send one guy to stand on top of the wire of the other fence, holding a pole with a red cloth on it.  He would also put a pole with a red cloth on the other end.  That way they would check for the alignment of the fence as they moved across.  My grandfather would look thru binoculars to make sure the connecting fence was going to be straight. He would put one or two gates that would connect the two sides.

When he saw a lot of cactus ahead where the fence was going to be built, he would send a couple of guys to burn off the cactus thorns so the cows could eat the cactus. We would pick up the cactus burners from the La Bonita Ranch.  That way they didn’t have to take out the cactus, the cows would do the job.  They would eat the cactus down to the stump   Over a hundred cows would be eating the cactus.  They would have the cactus running down from their mouths.  It was like the cows knew.  When they heard the cactus burner start up, the cows would come, some would come running.  They would stand there waiting for guys to finish burning off the thorns.  When the guys moved on to the next cactus, the cows would move in and eat the cactus.  After they cleared the area for the new fence, then they could start building the fence.  All the guys would have to do is take out the stumps. 

During that time of using the cactus burner, one of the guys had the bright idea of taking beer with him from town.   The beer was hot but he thought, he’d would cool the beer with the butane from the cactus burner.  So they would set several beers on a stump. With the burner off, he would release the butane and that would form ice around the bottom of the beer cans.  They would let it sit a little bit, knock off the ice, clean the can, and they would have a cold beer. 

At that time, Cecilo Jr., who was a second cousin of mine, Ben’s older brother, was working for my grandfather.  He had the idea of holding the can in the left hand and using the burner with the right hand with no gloves.  He got ice on the beer but he also got ice all over his hand.  He couldn’t let go of the beer can, it was stuck to his had.  One of other guys brought the milk can which had drinking water in it and started pouring water over his hand and finally the can dropped from his hand.  They kept pouring water to melt the ice off of his hand. By that time, his hand swelled up.  His fingers were double the size.  One of the guys went and got my grandfather.  He came over real fast, looked at his hand and said, “We need to take you to Cotulla to the doctor right away.”  He couldn’t work for quite awhile until his hand healed. 

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