The Travels of Dr. Rebecca Harper

The Travels of Dr. Rebecca Harper

You’re not gonna believe this…

I grew up watching television Westerns. I always wanted to ride with Matt Dillon, the Bonanza boys, and Jim Hardie from Wells Fargo. So when I found myself on the Cattle Creek Ranch, which was featured in the television series, Comstock, you can imagine my thoughts.

Maybe you can’t? Maybe you don’t remember that series? Sheesh, it was only the most popular television Western series of the 1950s and 60s. Maybe you’re too young? Anyway, I couldn’t believe it either. For the first few years, it was a tragedy. I spent all my waking hours trying to find a way back to my husband, daughter and my 1980s life.

So, this is the story. Well, an abbreviated version. Heck, this could be a book. I doubt you’ll believe this, and frankly, I didn’t either. No one did.

It was 1981, and I’d fallen off my horse and hit my head while caught in a rockslide in the Eastern Sierras. I was sure I was in a dream. After all, I was married and had a child. I’d just graduated from vet school, and I was starting my professional career as a horse doctor near Lake Tahoe.

After the accident, I made my way to Virginia City to get help. My riding partner was missing, and I needed to find her. I walked back to the old set where they filmed Comstock. I was concussed. I needed to wake up—only I was awake. I thought they must be using the set for another television Western series. I was treated by the man dressed as the town doctor. He looked familiar. I also saw actors dressed and looking like the Buchanan boys from the Comstock series—how retro. They must be revising the television series. Or was it a cult? They appeared to be ten years younger. It must be a prequel.

When I was left alone in the doctor’s office, I picked up a newspaper. The date was 1857. After assessing the situation, which I now knew was a cult, I left the town early in the morning when everyone was asleep. I may have borrowed a few things on the way. I needed clothes and food. My plan was to head back into the mountains and get the truck and trailer we’d left in a parking lot. Walking up the steep grades into the Eastern Sierras when you are concussed and disoriented was no small deal.

Along the road, I met the patriarchal character of the Comstock television series and his Chinese cook. Sam Buchanan and Gee Ling asked if I wanted a ride. It was pouring rain, and they insisted I climb up into their buckboard for a trip to the Cattle Creek Ranch!

I spent my youth watching the Buchanans sit around the fireplace, playing checkers and discussing the current dilemma of each episode. Like you, I dreamed of living with the family and becoming a Buchanan. Was the ranch house going to be the same?

Bizarre you say? These people never existed except in the mind of Alex Conrad, the producer and creative genius of the Comstock television series. I was sure I was in a dream. When we arrived and the ranch house, I met all the characters of Comstock, Sam Buchanan and his sons, Clint, Little Danny and even Hank. Gee Ling was the Cattle Creek Ranch cook. He helped Sam Buchanan raise his three boys.

I know you remember them now, but here’s the weird thing. All the characters were ten years younger than the actors you saw on Comstock. The boys were all teenagers and Sam had black hair! I know! The living room was just like the one on the television series, with an enormous fireplace as the most memorable feature.

Long story short, I finally accepted I had time traveled. Then, after years of a futile effort to find a way back to the future, including trips to Sacramento and to San Francisco, with no success in finding a portal back to the future, I had an epiphany. I went back to an Eastern medical school and became a doctor. As a switch hitter, I attended to both humans and animals.

I hadn’t given up on my life in the future. How could I? I was living my Comstock dream. Except there were no Oreos, tampons and I had to practice veterinary medicine without antibiotics or x-rays—­neanderthal.

A monumental argument with Sam Buchanan after my return from San Francisco may have influenced my decision to leave Nevada. Only Sam knew my true origins. He rejected me and my crazy story at first. Sam went ballistic when I said I couldn’t marry him after I showed him the only remnant of my past life. He stared at the colorized picture of my husband and daughter from the future, and knew he had no chance with me­.

Following medical school and training with Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell, the first female graduate from a United States medical school, my skills were far superior to the average doctor. I even worked in the Civil War military field hospitals as a surgeon. I often hummed the M.A.S.H. theme song as I worked as a surgeon. Yep, it’s a little-known fact that women performed surgeries during the war. Of course, I knew how it would end, and I even knew about Lincoln’s assassination. Early on, I realized if I intervened in historically significant events, my life in the future might not exist, and I avoided anything that would change the course of history.

Along the way, I met famous historical characters such as Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. and Jr., Samuel Clemmons, Ulysses S. Grant, and Abraham Lincoln. Okay, the truth is I only saw General Grant and Abraham Lincoln at a distance, but I attended General Grant’s horse, Cincinnati, and I witnessed the Gettysburg Address!

I guess my favorite was Oliver Wendel Holmes Jr. Many years later, he became my attorney when I was accused of murder and saved my life. He and I communicate regularly. As with all the famous people I’ve met, I never let on that I know their future historical significance. Ollie will become the head of the Supreme Court.

Several years after the Civil War, Sam Buchanan found me again. I become emotional remembering the reunion.

When I first met Sam over twenty years ago, instead of the silver-haired father of three almost grown men from Comstock, he was a vulnerable young man trying to build an empire with three growing boys. The man I remembered was a father figure, but the Sam Buchanan I met in the flesh was probably younger than my husband. It was impossible to reconcile. Despite my marriage vows, I had growing feelings for the television character who I’d always thought of as “Pa,”—talk about conflicted and disturbing.

Anyway, I was working as a surgeon in a hospital in Baltimore when I was summoned to the reception area to meet a visitor. I was in the middle of a horrible day with an influenza outbreak and a skeleton crew. I was a mess. I turned the corner to see the gray-haired silver fox of my youth.

Sam Buchanan was now the ‘Pa’ I remembered from the 1960s. Except it was the 1870s. My heart jumped, and a shock ran from my head to my toes. I felt my face redden as I saw the kind, handsome man grin when he saw me. Despite over ten years of denial, I was in love. I had suppressed any notion of romance. I was living my life with no expectations. In a second I was back experiencing the stomach turns and flush of adrenaline.

After an awkward greeting, and me making excuses for my attire and need to return to the wards, we agreed to meet for dinner. I don’t remember time passing so slowly. I knew this meeting wouldn’t amount to much. I knew he must be on a mission of mercy. Was he married again, was there a medical emergency in the family? Why had he come across the vast country to see me? Or was I just a stop on the way?

Sam explained he now knew I was a time traveler, and he accepted me as such. Despite that, he proposed I return to Virginia City to become the town doctor. Was it the town or Sam that compelled me to return? I told myself it didn’t matter. It did, but I desperately wanted it to be both. A few months later, I boarded a train on the first leg of my journey back to Virginia City to take over the town’s medical practice. Sam said he and the town missed and needed me.

My life had taken so many unexpected turns. I’d given up on ever returning to the future. I knew I was not the only time traveler. During a Fourth of July celebration in Baltimore, I heard someone whistling a tune from the Beatles! I Want to Hold Your Hand could be heard in the crowd. I ran toward the music, but there were so many people. I tried to sing the tune, but in my excitement, my mouth was dry, and I couldn’t form the words.

Shortly after my arrival back in Virginia City, Sam proposed marriage. It took me a second to accept. We wanted to wait until Sam’s oldest boy, Clint, returned from his vagabond life. The wedding was scheduled, and to keep the town from gossiping too much, I stayed in town most of the time until the wedding. I was all in for cohabitation, but Sam had a reputation and had not experienced the 1960s, so…

Anyway, when he came to visit me in Virginia City, I heard a familiar tune coming from the Bucket O ’Blood saloon. When I Fall in Love took me back to my youth and Nat King Cole.

Nat King Cole? Sam saw my reaction as we stood on the boardwalk outside the saloon. I saw his face contract as I considered the implications. The saloon door was open and the piano player glanced my way. What was conveyed could not be denied. I’d found a fellow time traveler.

Sam knew I probably had options. He knew how I’d remained faithful to my husband and family, for so many years. Yes, Sam Buchanan was the honorable man many of you remember. He would not hold me to my vow to marry him.

“I won’t marry you knowing you have a past that lies in the future. Rebecca Harper, I hereby release you from any obligations. If it’s possible, you are free to return to your life in the future.”

It was possible…