PIONEERS

To most of us, the term "pioneer" brings forth a vision of some buckskin-clad individual, hardy and tough, out of the far-distant past, but in reality we are all of us pioneers in our time, wearing the clothes that are most suitable or available, making the best of the present situation and learning to cope with new conditions.

So it was with the people who homesteaded Eastern Montana. Hardy they were, indeed. They had to be. If some of them were tough it was from sheer necessity and not a matter of choice. The rare individual who thought he would like to be tough all too soon got the opportunity and flunked the test. Clothing finally settled down to big overalls and shirt for men and gingham dresses for women, but at first there was a hodgepodge of whatever the people had brought with them. Shoes were whatever the individual had or could afford and hats, for a longer time than anything else, remained what its wearer had been accustomed to in the former home.

The trapper, the hunter, the gold-seeker, the cattleman and the sheepman had all come in rapid succession and there were still a few who had seen and survived all these changes. It was from these early-timers that the settler got his best advice and began to adapt himself to the land.

The land itself was inexorable: The bed of some prehistoric ocean, it had tolerated only the creatures that were best able to survive, resisting even the elements by presenting an ever-harder surface or a more soil-clutching grass to the ravages of erosion.

The Northern Pacific railroad had been builtthrough the central part of the state, following the Yellowstone River and people were beginning to spread out from its little towns but the livestock interests dominated the scene and the settler was more or less ignored. All the correspondence and reports of the earliest comers had brought on a growing interest and awareness of the new territory so by the time the Milwaukee Road approached the area, a flood of people were in the mood to try their luck in a new land.

I believe the Milwaukee Road construction stopped for the winter of 1907-08 at Mowbridge, South Dakota where the line crosses the Missouri River. The bridge was completed and work stopped somewhere near there for the winter. Here was a new route to a new land and any number of people, land-hungry and looking for a place to settle. That they would be settling on land already in use for grazing by established ranches was a matter that few considered. Fewer yet had any idea of the requirements of the land.

As the railroad advanced in the spring of 1908, so did the wave of new people. Each little way-station had its store, hotel of sorts, post office, saloon and maybe even a barbershop. Someone set up as a "locator" to help other newcomers to find land and locate their section corners. I don't know whether there was such a thing as a chamber of commerce in those days, but nobody saw any reason why his town shouldn't grow to a thriving metropolis and promptly set about seeing that it did by encouraging others to settle in that area.

Homesteading, to me, was an adventure only, with none of the cares or hardships experienced by my elders, and my account can be only the recollections of a child or boy, hazy and distorted by time, inaccurate at best: a poor memoir for the hundreds of people who struggled so hard to make their homes.

One should be able to begin a story with the conventional "Once upon a time" and have done with it, but what time? Any one of the factors influencing the advance of settlement would be a story in itself and each settler had some different reason for the move.

My first inkling of a change came somewhere between 1908 and 1910 when we came to Montana. I remember my parents discussing something about "taking up a claim." The imagination and curiosity of a four or five year old boy began to conjure up pictures of some vague object being taken up bodily. This must have been about the same time that the Indians of Dakota were dealt out of some of their Standing Rock Reservation for homestead purposes as I remember Dad saying he "Wouldn't mind taking a shot at Standing Rock" and pictured him shooting at a large stone column. On another evening Mother said "Percy and I could hold down the claim if you had to go somewhere to find work" and I envisioned Mother and myself trying to hold down a huge tarp or canvas in a terrific wind.

Dad and Mother were renting a farm at Madison, South Dakota and early in the spring of 1910 Dad went to Montana to locate the new home. At that time one could file for a homestead of 320 acres, or a half section of land.

We chose a location that had a good spring, its permanence indicated by old buffalo and stock trails converging. There was some land suitable for farming, some for pasture and was near an area which he thought no sensible person would homestead but which would be good summer range for stock: His plan was to farm what was necessary for feed while building up a small ranch. The idea of any open range was soon to fail because all available land, however worthless as a homestead, was taken up as claims.

To the Southwest about ten miles there was a belt of pine timber which could furnish logs and firewood. Later a small community sawmill was set up there and lumber sawed for building construction. About five miles to the East there was a vein of lignite coal and slightly farther was a belt of juniper which was to furnish posts for the whole area.

About the first of September, an auction was held to dispose of items that would not be needed or could not be taken. The average settler could only afford the freight costs of one immigrant car and all stock or equipment must be shipped in it.

Now that we were really committed to the move, we were regaled with stories of fantastic migrations of rattlesnakes to or from their denning places or tales of blizzard and storm where the hero was never found.

Dad had spent ten years as a cowpuncher and horserancher near Dickinson, North Dakota, so he had a fairly good idea of the conditions to be met and what equipment would be needed, but I think the wild tales and misinformation influenced a lot of the newcomers into bringing some odd and ill chosen equipment.

The freight car was loaded with the stock in one end, household goods in the other and a small living space left in the middle. Four horses, two cows, a dismantled wagon and bobsled and some baled hay filled one end of the car. As I remember, there was no regular loading platform available and some sort of ramp was used. The horses were led on docilely enough but the cows were a different matter and a good deal of pulling and tail-twisting ensued before they were tied in their makeshift stall. Some chickens, a dog and two cats in a cage comprised the rest of the livestock.

Dad and my oldest brother, Harold, were to go in the immigrant car, my older brother, Raymond, was to spend the winter with an uncle in Minnesota in order to attend school and Mother and I were to follow a few days later by train when the initial camp was established.

For some reason, I remember the date, September twenty-second, when we arrived in Mildred, Montana. The town consisted of a store, saloon and hotel all one large building, the depot, coal docks stockyard, and a few other buildings. The store was operated by M.M. and L.H. Clark who were to prove mainstays of the community almost as long as the town was active.

The day was chilly, a drizzling rain was falling and a general gloom seemed to have settled over the land. Ten miles by wagon in the rain seems like a long time to a child and I think we passed only one homestead on the way. This was the homestead of Mr. and Mrs. Murphy who must have settled in 1908 as their place was fenced and they had a tall two story house. I can still see the road as it appeared then as at that time the only road went through their place and past their front door. The gateway was marked by high cedar posts which were about fifteen feet tall. This was often done in order that the traveller could recognize the gate at a distance and to act as a landmark in storms. We were greeted by the Murphys in passing and, I think, given some cantaloupes or vegetables.

It was evening when we reached our new home, a tent with a canvas-covered pile of household furniture in front of it. I believe even the cookstove was outside and cooking was done on a campfire. Whatever the arrangements, it was Home, our family was together, a few familiar pieces of furniture were there to be seen even if there wasn't room to use them.

The cats, after the manner of their kind, had taken up their residence among the furniture under the canvas cover. Here was something familiar to use as a base of exploration in a strange land, protection from the rain or imagined enemies and near to their family. We were soon to appreciate their value, for the mice began seeking shelter from the rain or homes for the coming winter. Grain for the horses was also stored under the canvas and there would soon have been little left for the horses without an efficient guard.

I might as well mention the rodent population here as all settlers promptly discovered that quite large quantities of grain could vanish overnight, silverware and trinkets disappeared or were transferred to weird hiding places and stored clothes were used as nesting places. The native grasses furnished excellent cover and food for hordes of mice. There was one little fellow with the instincts of a packrat: Not many of them but one or two would in a night transfer several quarts of grain from its place to an empty boot or a bureau drawer. I suspect that they have gone the way of the prairie dog and the wild ferret. Every sheltering ledge of rocks had its family of packrats or a cottontail rabbit. The patches of buckbrush furnished homes for colonies of the shorttailed meadow or field mice. This was a land of abundance for the small creatures: The coyote, weasel, hawk, owl and ferret maintained a balance.

Few families had had the good sense or foresight to think of bringing old Tabby but now the owner of a family of cats was almost as welcome as Dick Whittington and kittens were spoken for months ahead. Most of the established ranches had one or two sedate and venerable tomcats who had survived years of raids by coyote and owl but ranchers knew the value of their pets and treated them as members of the household.

Chill, rainy weather continued for several days but the dog, Pat, and I amused ourselves exploring the new land. I gathered cow chips for fuel but the dampness had made them temporarily useless. There were still a few piles of buffalo bones to be found and on the nearest knoll or rise of ground where the hunters had concealed themselves I would gather the spent cartridges. Generally they were fairly long cases of forty calibre or larger: One that I remember was 40-82 and I think a 50-90 but cannot recall that for sure. I got a piece of glass and spent much time scraping buffalo horns to polish them but that soon palled as amusement.

The work of hauling lumber from town went on regardless of weather as a house and shelter for the stock had to be put up before winter, hay must be located for the stock and no end of other chores all needing to be done immediately.

Finally the skies cleared, the weather became balmy and we had Indian Summer at its best. Montana smiled its most enticing smile, seeming to assure the unwary that there was no such thing as bad weather. We noticed that the cows would graze for only a short time and then lie down contentedly. They had grazed almost continually in Dakota and at first we thought there was something wrong with them but then realized that there was more nutrition in the grass so that they were quickly satisfied.

CHAPTER TWO

BUILDING OUR HOUSE

One fine afternoon work stopped and Dad and Mother set out to decide for the permanent building site. They chose a site with a nice view about a quarter of a mile from the spring but if they had realized the difficulty of striking good water or any water at all I believe they would have built close to where the water was already available. The absence of water was to be an enduring problem to most of the settlers and many a thirty or forty foot "duster" was dug by hand.

The house-building progressed rapidly as there again Dad's experience paid off; he had worked as a carpenter at various times and seemed to be capable of building or repairing almost anything. The house was two-story with a single large room downstairs and another upstairs, which was divided by curtains and the placing of a large dresser in the middle. As soon as possible we moved into the house and construction of a barn was begun: The house was far from complete but there was always the possibility of bad weather and shelter for the stock must be made before then. The barn was made as a half dugout; that is, a place was dug back into a hill until the bank thus formed could be used as the back wall. Tall posts were set up for the front and shorter ones for the sides as the slope of the hill required. A framework of poles was built on these posts and a layer of poles laid closely together on the top. A thick layer of hay was laid on the roof poles, a layer of dirt then shovelled over the hay and then the front was closed in with lumber. Digging an excavation large enough for a building, even a small one is not a chore to be done with pick and shovel unless one has time and energy to spare. Here again foresight and preparation had paid off as there was a slip scraper brought along with that first carload of goods. A man with a team and scraper can move a lot of dirt in a day.

What is a slip scraper? I'd forgotten that you might not know. They were a large iron scoop with handles so that the operator could tilt it in order to dig into the ground. When full, it was simply allowed to drag until time to empty it, when the handles were raised high enough for the scraper to begin digging. A little more raising caused it to flip over and empty.

There were posts to be cut and hauled from "The Cedars," that belt of juniper some five miles to the East. There were poles to be cut and hauled from "The Pines" ten or more miles to the Southwest and the hay for the roof came from the Alex McDonald ranch about six miles to the Northwest. Each of these trips meant a long day of hard work, and, more especially, a day of precious time.

I often think what a difficult time this must have been for Harold. A large, slow-moving boy, inclined to fat, he had not yet passed the clumsy age or attained full growth but was still expected to perform a man's work with a grown man's skill. Later to be immensely strong and astonishingly quick, he was now clumsy and his budding strength only brought upon him the heavier tasks.

As soon as the barn was built for the horses an addition was started for the cows. Posts were set up for the corners and doorway and the roof frame made. Some of the wall was made by nailing woven wire fencing on each side of the upright posts and packing hay or straw between them but there was a little less hurry about this as the first barn would serve for emergency shelter. Now a lean-to kitchen was added to the West side of the house and a rough storage and coalshed on the north, gravel being spread in the angle thus formed to serve as a walkway until some time when flagstones could be laid.

There were occasional light snows and freezing nights by now but most of the weather was mild, with clear sunny days and quite warm afternoons. I used to see pieces of gypsum or mica glinting on the hillsides but was some time finding it because the angle of the light changed as I approached. We saw long flights of sandhill cranes going south and then finally long vees of geese. On the day that the roof of the cowbarn was finished, we got the first real storm. How thankful we all felt to have been granted time to provide comfortable shelter! We could gather around a warm stove in the evenings. The water bucket might be frozen in the morning but we had no thought of this being any great hardship.

One morning I looked in the barn door and, wonder of wonders, there was a new calf. Trembling, wet and steaming, it had not even gotten to its feet yet and its mother was giving it a bath. I had seen older calves many times before and taken them for granted but here was something different entirely and after the first awestruck gaze I bolted to spread the news. I learned long later that this event had been planned and timed for late Fall in order to furnish a supply of fresh milk and butter during the winter.

CHAPTER THREE

OUR FIRST THANKSGIVING

In common with most growing boys, my memory was connected directly to my stomach: The clearest recollections center around that old lean-to kitchen. The crackle of juniper kindling, the rasp of coffee being ground in the mill, the clink of stove lids, the thump of the reservoir cover when warm water was taken out for washing, and the sizzle of frying bacon. The bacon is something no one is going to believe nowadays. There was only enough fat left after frying it to furnish grease for the pancake griddle. Hickory smoked, solid lean meat with only little streaks of fat interlarding it. Only once, since, in some country-cured bacon have I seen anything even approaching it. What we get as bacon now resembles what was called sowbelly then. That came in wide strips, was heavily salted, smoked very little, if any, and was nearly all fat, as is our bacon nowadays. This was used as `fried salt pork' or to mix with baked beans, boiled cabbage, etc. Lard was sold in five, ten and fifty pound tin containers; you didn't get it when you paid for bacon.

The five-pound lard pail and the two-pound tobacco box served as the standard lunch-pail for school, work lunches and such for several years. The ten-pound pail served as a small water-bucket, storage of beans or dried fruits and as a sort of standard in measure. The fifty-pounder came in a wooden crate which could serve as a stool, packing box or any number of uses. The can itself was prized as a storage container for flour, sugar and the like. I can still see `Swift's Silver Leaf Lard' shining in its crate.

Mother used to often put a small sprig of juniper or the berries or a few leaves of the sagebrush on the hot stove. What fragrance! The woodbox was the favorite roosting place for boy and man alike. The warmth and security of a fire, the smell of good food and the presence of an understanding woman was a magnet to any male and the country woodbox was the seat of more plans, confidence and confessions than any other.

With the coming of Thanksgiving, we began to get acquainted with our nearest neighbors. These were the Docken brothers, Will and Art, who I think must have come in the Spring of 1910 or the year before and Frank and Leigh Roberts. I think the Roberts boys were cousins of the Dockens. Will Docken lived a mile and a half to the East and it was through his yard that Dad and Harold had been going to The Cedars and The Coal Mine. His brother Art had a log cabin on land adjoining his to the Southeast. The Roberts boys lived some two or three miles North of him. Through these connections Dad had become acquainted with them and they were invited to our house for Thanksgiving dinner.

Thanksgiving Day was beautifully clear, with about six inches of snow and just cold enough to make everything sparkle. I remember seeing the four of them come walking up the valley from Will Docken's place where they had gathered. Here were NEW NEIGHBORS whom Mother and I had never seen before. Bachelors all, the Docken boys were probably in their late thirties, the Roberts boys younger. Art Docken had been in the Spanish American War, Leigh Roberts had been in the navy in 1908 when President Teddy Roosevelt sent them around the world. So we began a series of friendships that were to last for years and stand the tests of a good many hardships.

I don't remember any details of the day or the dinner other than seeing these young men arrive in a group and learning some small detail of each one, yet that meeting somehow bound us together as a group or community from that day forward. Probably this same thing was happening all over the area, cementing little groups of individuals into working neighborhood units.

Dr. America
THE LIVES OF THOMAS A. DOOLEY, 1927-1961

By James T. Fisher

University of Massachusetts Press

Copyright © 1997 The University of Massachusetts Press. All rights reserved.
TAILER