History

Roy Taylor comes from a very small family with nothing really to their name. They were French refugees seeking a different life and had never known a time without work. Roy is the middle child of six and the first to be born in America. He started as a stable hand, falling in love with the way hard work awarded different outcomes in life, even if that didn’t mean money. In his spare time as a child, he would take the horses out and try to race against the wild ones. It often landed him in trouble with the sheriff of his hometown, but he didn't care. As he got older he managed to get into a little bit more trouble running alongside with a small roughian gang. They wouldn’t do too bad of things, but they did more minor crimes such as cheating in poker games, spiking drinks to trick people out of money etc.

Meeting his wife, a little older than most, she was considered a spinster, him a slooth, but regardless it was love at first sight. Maria Locke had arrived on train with her family; they were a working-class family that worked in houses of higher-class society. Maria changed Roy's look on life; it was like he wanted to be the perfect person just to appease the woman in his life. The two got married a few months after they started courting. Then came the trouble. They tried so hard to conceive. Year after year, they hit duds, nothing happened, and plenty of upsetting occurrences later. Finally, Maria got pregnant, and it was a happy accident. The midwife and the doctor told them that the most likely cause of their being unable to conceive prior was due to the stress of their lifestyle. The doctor had ordered bed rest for most of Maria's term and for Roy to look out for any sign of possible hysteria, explaining the best treatment for such things was a... very hands-on approach. The first of their children was a son, and Roy couldn't be happier. He counted himself lucky by all accounts and would praise their doctor to anyone who asked.

By the time they got around to trying for another, they followed all the doctor's advice. Even the advice that seemed a little out there. Neither of them cared if it meant they would be able to conceive. They both said they wouldn't get their hopes up, having been down the road before, but lo and behold, they had been lucky enough to have another happy and healthy pregnancy. A happy, stress-free wife seemed to be the key; with that, Roy had given her all his attention to help keep the stress at bay. By all accounts, he was the luckiest man in the world and wouldn't have anyone telling him otherwise.

When their daughter finally arrived, he decided they needed something else. Being a cowboy for other people was not the way to raise a family, let alone make enough money to support the people who mattered most in his world.

Roy put together everything they had and packed a wagon. The family was to hit the Oregon Trail with a hope of a better future and opportunities… That did not go so well. Having to cross many rivers turned out to be dangerous, especially as they joined different caravans here and there filled with people who had no actual idea of how to survive in the wild. People didn’t know how to hunt, so Roy set up services for his extra game. It was the things that Roy couldn’t set up services for that gave his family the most trauma. The number of people who couldn’t swim turned deadly, and watching his wife and small children go from ecstatic about their new life to depressed by the horrors made him question his decisions daily.

Regardless, it was the kids who kept them going. He watched the little ones learn many new skills, and his son became more capable with each passing turn.
When illness struck the caravan, things took a turn for the worse. One night, nearly a quarter of their companions had passed, and the numbers dwindled each day to the point that it had even struck his wagon. His wife had gotten ill in New Mexico. Roy was devastated.

Trying to get the kids away from the scene of all the illness, Roy took his children to hunt down someone in the closest camp or town who was medically inclined. He found a medicine woman several hours out, but by the time they all came back, it was too late.

His wife had been found dead outside of camp, several of their companions mentioning that she had gone off not long after he left with the children. Something felt strange in her death as her illness had not been far along, and was still treatable in Roy's mind. This entire moment broke Roy. While others moved on, Roy forced him and his family to stay in place; they made their way to the town closest to them, which just happened to be Never. There, they buried Maria in the town cemetery.

Learning how to be a homemaker and the breadwinner was difficult. Roy had no idea how to raise a 4-year-old and a 7-year-old all by himself. These two miracle children reminded him of his late wife every day, and that drove him to chase the money constantly. He started off doing jobs like he did back home, helping on ranches and the like. Distance slowly etched between him and his kids, his son blaming him a lot for the trauma that happened to him, and he took on that burden if it meant making his son feel better.

Horses have always been his go-to, and it was one thing he went back to when he felt the worst he ever had. He started getting jobs breaking in new horses in town. Eventually, he earned enough money to buy his family land. There was little to no income coming in the first couple of years; instead, he made trades with neighboring tribes, horse swaps, and he even picked up some of their techniques, having gained respect.

The further he made his way in the town, the further he put his family name out there, the weirder things he began to notice. Some people were a little too happy to help; others tried to twist words and make things seem other than what they were. Roy, despite being a man of faith, was slowly starting to doubt God's plan because of how his love had perished. He won't tell anyone, but he is trying to find out what happened, even if it’s now 15 years later.