King of California's Death Valley played all the angles [Photos]

Death Valley, California

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Dining room at Death Valley Ranch that Albert Johnson's wife Bessie filled with crockery after having her husband's books removed, to make it look better - and useful. IAN ROBERTSON PHOTO

Colourized postcard of scam artist Walter Scott and his "castle," that never belonged to him in Death Valley National Park.

A 1933 Packard car on display is part of a fleet of cars Albert Johnson kept on his Death?Valley?Ranch, aka Scotty's Castle. IAN ROBERTSON PHOTO

Visitors near Death Valley Scotty's hillside grave, with his dog's stone cairn to the left of the cross. Walter Scott died in 1954, age 82 - or thereabouts. IAN ROBERTSON PHOTO

A beautiful spiral staircase in guest section opposite the main house at Death Valley Ranch aka Scotty's Castle. IAN ROBERTSON PHOTO

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GRAPEVINE?CANYON, Calif. ? Lauded and wooed by reporters from one side of the United States to the other a century ago, ?Death Valley Scotty? was king of his castle.

Reportedly rich beyond the wildest dreams of folks Walter E. Scott bamboozled with tales of gold waiting to be harvested from his claim ? supposedly staked in the oven-hot desert ? he was instead a silver-tongued scam-artist.

But despite the conman?s unmasking, business tycoon Albert Mussey Johnson backed the likeable rogue.

?Scott has a great appetite for money, and I like to feed it,? Johnson testified at his pal?s 1941 civil trial, which another backer, this one disgruntled, lost. ?He always repaid me ? in laughs.?

Not a bad sentiment from Johnson, who lived with daily pain from a train accident 30 years earlier. The eccentric millionaire from Chicago desperately sought the cowboy life even though the era of cattle drives, bad guys and even badder women had faded away almost as much as the ghost towns near his Death Valley Ranch.

When a group of visitors to the Johnson?s fabulous home heard a National Park ranger explain how a former bronco rider from Kentucky hoodwinked suckers with stories of desert derring-do, everyone was in awe. Costumed circa 1939, the ranger got a chuckle out of telling visitors how the great plainsman and showman Buffalo Bill Cody sacked Scotty ? a rider in Cody?s Wild West show ? for being late for work, by a week.

The setting where the tall tales of the short Kentuckian reigned even had its name embellished. The entrance sign to the sprawling Spanish-style 1920s hacienda reads:??Death Valley Ranch.?

But everyone calls it ?Scotty?s Castle? ? a term coined by a Los Angeles newspaperman ? even though Scott never owned the estate, let alone the dark leather sofas in the two-storey livingroom with chandeliers dangling from wood ceiling beams, the locked rifle-filled cabinet, long wooden dining table, or the kitchen dumb waiter, which supposedly led to the conman?s hidden gold mine.

Nope, Scott owned not even a drop of precious oasis water from the spring that powered the water wheels that provided electricity and refrigeration. It all belonged to Johnson, who lived there with his wife Bessie.

And Johnson?s money was the goldmine that bankrolled the men?s excursions, on horseback or in cars like the 1933 Packard roadster parked beneath the bedrooms and theatre organ-equipped guest lounge across from the main house.

Johnson was a multi-millionaire insurance magnate with a hankering for horses and tall tales ? even when he cottoned onto Scotty?s big lie of losing all his money to gunslinging bandits. The bandits were Death Valley Scotty?s brother and pals, and the staged holdup was a coverup to avoid repaying the rich city slicker!

But the unlikely friendship between conman and tycoon lasted a lifetime for Johnson, who lived in the $1.5-to-$2.5 million ranch house until his death in1948.

Bessie had died in 1943, and Scotty?s benefactor bequeathed the 607-hectare ranch to a religious organization, with a provision for his pal to live there until his dying day.

On that day, in 1954, the 82-year-old huckster insisted staff drive him to a hospital. He died en route.

A cross on a nearby high hill marks Scotty?s burial place, beside his beloved dog.

Did Walter E. Scott ever own a gold mine? If he did, the wily old conman took its secret to his grave.

CASTLE TIP

The National Park Service, which bought the property in 1970, has a store with decent snacks and bottled water ? a necessity even on cool days, like the one in May when I visited ? at 38 C, no sweat compared to 46 C in summers. Mind you, January in the valley native people called ?Tomesha? ? or ground afire ? averages a chilly 19 C! Scotty?s Castle is closed for maintenance and roadwork to Aug. 9.

One-hour house tours are $15 per person; $25 for a two-hour house and underground romp.?Discounts are offered for seniors and youths; children under age 6 are free. With 150,000 annual visitors, reservations are recommended one day ahead.

GETTING?THERE

? Air Canada flies direct to Las Vegas, Nevada, from several Canadian cities. Located on Scottys Castle Road, the ranch is about three hours by road northwest of Las Vegas off Hwy. I95 in north Death Valley National Park via Hwy. 267, or 87 km northwest of Furnace Creek, Calif.

? For more information, see?travelnevada.com

Source: http://www.torontosun.com/2013/07/11/king-of-californias-death-valley-played-all-the-angles

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