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Major John C. Cremony was a Boston newspaperman who served as a Spanish language interpreter for the U.S. Boundary Commission which laid out the Mexican and United States Border between 1849-1851. He went on to serve in a Unit of California Volunteers, eventually achieving the rank of Major. He was the first editor of San Francisco's Weekly Sunday Times newspaper.

An admirer of the Apache people, he was the author of Life Among the Apaches, published in 1869. A first-hand balanced perspective on the Native American tribe. He was the first white man to become fluent in the Apache language, learning it in his role as an interpreter, and publishing the first written compilation of their language as a glossary for the army. As a result, Cremony was often able to resolve numerous issues between the military, reservation authorities and the Apaches.

Not all of Cremony's discourses with the Apache were peaceful, however. He killed one warrior in a grueling knife fight and chronicled a non-stop 21-hour chase when he was pursued by a band of Sierra Blanca Apache (White Mountain Apache) of some 125 miles through the desert of New Mexico while on horseback; 70 miles of which were at a full gallop.

Cremony served most of his military career in the Southwest and personally knew Apache Chiefs Mangas Coloradas and Cochise. After retiring from the army, Cremony settled in San Francisco, becoming a founding member of the Bohemian Club and establishing the club's membership guidelines in 1872. A "Bohemian" meaning to Cremony:“a man of genius who refuses to cramp his life in the Chinese shoe of conventionality, whose purse is ever at the disposal of his friends, and who lives generously, gaily, carefree, and as far from the sordid, scheming world of respectability as the south pole is from the north". These standards are known as the Cremony Standards and are still in use by the club today. Cremony is buried at Cypress Lawn Memorial Park on the Laurel Hill Mound in San Francisco, California.

Bibiliography

• Life Among the Apaches (1869). 322 pages. ISBN 0803263120

References

1. ^ Varner, K.(2007)John Cremony.Cypress Lawn Heritage Newsletter. 5(3)p.6
2. Geronimo (edited by Barrett) Geronimo, His Own Story New York: Ballantine Books 1971. ISBN 0345280369.
3. ^ Nevin, David (1973). The Old West: The Soldiers. New York: Time Life. p. 238. ISBN 9781416124481. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
4. Reinhardt, Richard(1980)The Bohemian Club.American Heritage Magazine 41980

• 1815 births
• 1879 deaths
• American folklore
• Apache people
• People from Boston, Massachusetts
• American memoirists
• Literary collaborators
• People from San Francisco, California
• Bohemian Club members