Songs > Fort Whipple > History


As chapter three begins, we learn that “Eyes Like the Sky” is taken (alongside Yavapai girls) to Fort Whipple, an American settlement run by a man named Willis. Talking to the God Man, they assume that he is either Miguel O’Brien or a part of the Jepson party which had gone missing while heading towards New Mexico. Not knowing his identity, the men name him Jepson O’Brien though others simply call him Blue. While most men refused to get close to him, a fur trapper did and taught him how to speak, read, and write English while allowing him to be part of his team. At only seventeen, he had developed a reputation of being fast and dangerous when he needed to be.
“Fort Whipple” is based on the real site and its people. The fort itself resided in Prescott, Arizona while Willis refers to Major Edward Banker Willis, an officer who was behind the creation of the fort in 1863. In the story of Eyes Like the Sky, Blue was brought to the camp only a year after it had begun being used by the United States Army. While Broderick Smith narrates the track, the band plays a steady spaghetti western-inspired “surf dirge” dominated by reverb-soaked guitars and the sound of wind. In the liner notes for the 2018 reissue of Eyes Like the Sky, Stu wrote that “Fort Whipple” was one of the first tracks made for the album and that it was recorded in his parent’s garage in Anglesea by himself, Cavs, and Lucas. It was released on Eyes Like The Sky on February 22nd, 2013.

“Fort Whipple” has not been played live.

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