Visitors

To me, one of life's great pleasures is welcoming old friends into our home and enjoying each other's company for a long visit. Dick Schroeder and I grew up together and experienced many things together. On Monday, he and his wife Karen arrived to stay the night with us as they journeyed to St. Paul. Their main reason for traveling through was to visit with Karen's aged mother. Coming across Canada they had stayed the previous night in Moosejaw, Sask.

Dick and I have not done much visiting over the last 50 years or so and a lot of reminiscing needed to get done. He retired from an accounting career and Karen from her job as nurse practitioner.


A highlight from most of our visitors' visits is to tour Mary's gardens. Here they inspect an arbor which caught Karen's eye, after which she told Dick she wants one too. His reaction seemed to be, "We haven't got the room in our small yard." Next year I want to remember to ask them who won out on this matter.

When they drove off the house seemed empty, but we had a good time while it lasted.

Twin Towers Burning, 9/11

Ten years ago this happened. I remember very well where I heard about it. Coming in from the road I checked into the office of my part-time job and the receptionist there asked, "Have you heard the news?" I hadn't, and I went to a radio to try to find news and could not wait until my work day ended and I could get home to CNN.

Yesterday was the second of the symposium Impact on the Heartland. Another great lineup of speakers presented their views of the event:

1. Julia Ernst - faculty member of the school of law talked on the U. S. Constitution, the rule of law, and the age of terrorism.

2. Chris Bailey - staff of the National Intelligence University discussed issues in U. S. intelligence.

3. Gerard Jacobs - University of South Dakota, The evolution of mental health in an age of disasters.

4. Master Sergeant Mike Carswell, USAF - He was in the Pentagon when the plane hit and spoke of his post traumatic stress disorder since then.

5. Geoffrey Wawro, author and faculty of Universityof North Texas, the war on terror and its progress and pitfalls.

6. Major General David Sprynczynatyk (spell that without looking) , Adjutant General of the N. D. National Guard, ten years supporting the global war on terror.

7. Manochehr Dorraj, faculty of Texas Christian University, U. S. - Muslim Relations since 2011

8. etc., etc.

To cap the day we laid out some big bucks and donned some nice clothes and attended a symphony performance called A Place of Remembrance with the Bismarck-Mandan Symphony Orchestra, the Bismarck-Mandan Civic Chorus, and the University of Mary Chorus.

Now today I am going to take a nap before my old friend and classmate arrive to spend the evening with us, Dick Schroeder and wife.

Twin Towers on 9/11

Today was the first day of the Impact on the Heartland Symposium held at Bismarck State College. Because of the work of a few scholars and humanities promoters in this community I am able to enjoy many convocations like it in this community. The line-up of speakers today held the audience's attention:

1. General Charles F. Wald, USAF (ret.) - A four star general originally from North Dakota gave his insights on America's response to 9/11.

2. Lt. Col. Dean Eckmann, ND Air National Guard - flew with the three Happy Hooligans in their F-16's when they were the first called upon to fly over the capital preventing any further attacks on 9/11 and for many days after.

3. Jenette Nelson - North Dakota mother of a girl killed in the attack.

4. Marcel Sim - A paramedic who set up the first treatment and triage location at Ground Zero.

5. Chuck Roberts - a broadcast journalist who worked for CNN's Headline News when the attack occurred.

6. Thomas Frank - author and heartland populist who studies propaganda techniques, including how we were led to invade Iraq.

7. A panel of North Dakota Statesmen consisting of Senator Conrad, Senator Hoeven, Governor Dalrymple, Lieutenant Governor Wrigley, and former Congressman Earl Pomeroy.

Now, just having returned from the evening speaker I can finish writing. Peter Bergen spoke about his knowledge of Al-Qaeda. He was the first journalist to be granted an interview with Osama bin Laden. He speaks very knowledgeably and has held positions with CNN and ABC as well as with many professional organizations.

Tomorrow is another full line-up and I will be there.

Pickin' Things

I like this picture. When I developed it the colors came out so bright! Not much going on around the old homestead, mostly thinking things. I finished a short story and have sent it to a few readers for their input. One answered back already with positive remarks so I'm happy for that.
It was about the wagon train of freighters who were stalled in a three day blizzard near Lisbon. I contrived a fictitious narrator to tell the story, so I guess it would be called historical fiction.

I'm ready to start another one. When Fort Ransom was still active it seems they attracted a small village of Indians, maybe half-breeds who camped on the outskirts. One summer after the grass withered and dried, what was probably a lightning strike on the prairie started a huge racing fire. Two young Indian girls had wandered away from the camp. They were driving a pony on a little cart and when they realized a fire cut them off from their camp, they whipped the pony to go as fast as he could to head for the relative safety of a spring of water. They could have made it except for the fact that one of the cart's wheels broke on a rock which threw them out, and by the time they recovered it was too late. Many stories like this exist in the area where I grew up, but they are not common knowledge. They have been forgotten, surviving only in dusty pages that no one reads.

A prominent writer, Frederick Manfred, wrote many interesting books and stories and placed them in the setting he called Siouxland, the region comprising the Dakotas, Minnesota, Iowa, and Nebraska. Maybe I will have to come up with a name for my enterprise. I've got dozens of stories that need to be told that are set in my home area.

Before It Happened

A person can imagine having the paranormal power of predicting the future if he reads old newspaper accounts dated prior to the event. Take the death of Ulysses S. Grant for instance. The February 17, 1885 edition of the Sheldon newspaper carried this: Poor old General Grant, the hero of Shiloh, the Wilderness, and so many other great battles, the boy who used to take pride in riding unbroken colts is now dying; yes, he is dying and in his death the United States loses one of the most honored men who ever lived. He died July 23, 1885.

Some one should have told the Indians I write of next who were reported in early May. Five Indians, well armed and carrying two canoes, were seen making a beeline northward yesterday. Going to join Riel? Only a couple weeks later, May 18, 1885 the paper carried this bit: Riel captured, the rebel leader now in the hands of the Dominion government. Riel was a resistance leader of the Metis people, that is half-breeds, in what is now Manitoba.

An article especially interested me since I've done a lot of reading on this topic: Thousands of head of cattle have been bought in Northwestern Iowa in the last few weeks to be taken to the large ranches in Dakota and Montana for fattening purposes. In a couple of weeks the paper reported this: Theodore Roosevelt, the prominent New York politician, has arrived at his ranch on the Elkhorn in the western part of Dakota where he expects to spend the summer. It was just a year later that history recorded that the harsh winter of 1886-87 killed hundreds of thousands of cattle and marked the end of the open range. The famous picture painted by the western artist Charley Russell was one he painted in a letter to a friend to describe how bad the winter really was.

Butterflies and Other Things

Mary's garden keeps on delivering beautiful sights, and I took my trusty camera out yesterday to shoot some pictures. She has been telling me of these "worms" on her butterfly plant. Lo and behold, they have turned to monarch butterflies. She was surprised; she hadn't noticed yet. The paper published one similar to it today, but I think this one is better.

Speaking of the newspaper, I found a few items of interest:

- George Will's column started with this paragraph - "Beer," said Benjamin Franklin, who knew a thing or two about pleasure, "is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy."
- Jim Cramer's Mad Money show from and about North Dakota last week apparently prompted lots of queries from out-of-state job seekers.
- The proof reader did not catch the spelling error in the headline "Wildfire destroyes dozens of homes."
- The nation is drinking too many sweet drinks.
- Restrictions for boating on the river are lifted. All boat traffic has been banned on the usually busy river, but now they can go out at "idle speed only."
- Squatters who park for long periods in the Bismarck library lot will face a $20 fine from now on. I hope they can enforce that, sometimes when I go there the lot is full and there doesn't seem to be that many people in there.
- Another spelling error popped up: "Prairie Public celbrating 30 years."
- And the weekly bird club column says, "Cormorants are a marvel of adaptation." The last few years as we drive along I-94 we have been noticing the increase in the number of cormorants appearing in dead trees setting in sloughs. It seems like they keep moving further westward.

Gone Gonzo

Sometimes a man's mind goes blank
and his thoughts go to gonzo
wandering. In Medora
I asked, "Do you have cowboys
in Turkey?" and a wry smile
with "No" came back as we stood
in a line. The prairie dogs
barked when Ike stepped from the car
straining at his leash, wanting
to chase the pesky buggers.
The ladies dug crocodile
teeth from the earth which prompted
the man to say, "Hey, good one!"
I roamed the aisles of the best
bookstore this side of New York
and swapped lies with owner Doug
who dressed resplendent in togs
right out of the latest look
in old-time western vestments.
And dig deep we did to eat
in the cafes of that town
making me swear to haul fuel
in my trunk next time we came.
Teddy Roosevelt's legend
still lives on while lots of loot
gets made on his name out here.
There sat the wife of the man
who restored the town, Sheila,
who liked my poem and sent
me the book about the horse,
my hero, Tipperary.
So, my gonzo wandering
comes to an end while I get
back to writing my story
mixed with fact and fiction and
I've forgotten which is which.

A Celebration & A Book

Yesterday we celebrated the 50th anniversary of Mary's brother and his wife, Mike and Sharon, ate lots of good food, and took a few pictures. Here is the happy couple who still live on the ranch south of Raleigh.


Being that all of Mike's sisters were present I thought this would make a good picture grouping for them to get behind Mike and Sharon for this photo. For the life of me I don't know what caused this reaction, but it looks to me as if my wife said something naughty. She will not confess so it is up to our imaginations to guess what it could have been. After they settled down, I was able to take a better one.



The couple still look young, and I told them we are making plans to celebrate their 100th.



I just finished reading a book, a book that I wished would not have ended because I enjoyed it so much - Monte Walsh. by Jack Schaefer. Schaefer also wrote another great story - Shane. A popular movie was based on Shane, but two movies followed Monte Walsh, one with Lee Marvin in the 70's and the other a made for TV movie starring Tom Selleck. I found portions of them on YouTube and enjoyed them; for some reason I never saw either one previously.

Walsh was a real rounder, a cowboy who worked hard but played even harder. As the story progressed through the years his close friend and partner on the range changed with the years, married, and became a successful businessman. Monte would have none of the modern life and rejected inventions such as the motor car that started appearing. The ranch for which he worked so loyally for many years became fenced, his friends began dying or drifting away, and at the end it was just Monte and his horse. Even though the general theme was one of sadness as it followed the character's life, there were some places where I laughed the hardest that I have for a long time.

The Long Count

I read reference to an old sporting event that interested me, the Tunney-Dempsey heavyweight championship boxing match of September, 1927. It was the second meeting of these two boxers, Tunney having won the first bout. The key to this being a historic bout had to do with a new rule instituted just previously to this match: after a knock down, the standing fighter had to retreat to a neutral corner. Dempsey hit Tunney with a flurry of punches to the chin in the seventh round and knocked him down, but then he stood there. The referee did not start his count until he went to the corner, a length of five seconds. Whether or not Tunney needed the extra count is not known, but he waited for the full count before he got up and then went on to win the fight. Some thought Dempsey got cheated, but years later Dempsey said, "I didn't know what I was doing, I guess I was punchy. I didn't get to my corner. Besides Tunney wasn't hurt that bad." I searched YouTube by typing in Tunney-Dempsey and a film of the bout came up. I think I agree with Dempsey, Tunney didn't look hurt.

Some of the "jock strap" writers couldn't quite deal with Tunney without making fun of his love of literature. But he was a legitimate poetry quoting intellectual. After the Dempsey fight he spoke to a Yale Shakespeare class for an hour without notes about Troilus and Cressida. He counted writers like George Bernard Shaw, Thornton Wilder, M. Somerset Maugham, and Ernest Hemingway as friends.

After the fight Tunney and Dempsey became very good friends and Tunney would take his wife to Dempsey's restaurant to dine. To me one of the reasons I like this story is that this athlete didn't get his brains scrambled and become punch drunk. He went on to have a successful business career. Of course, it didn't hurt that he married an heiress to the Andrew Carnegie fortune.

Digging Bones

We took a weekend trip to Medora with our son Brandon and his wife Lindsey. The purpose of the trip was for the ladies to participate in a paleontological dig they had registered for which was sponsored by the State Paleontologist's Office. They both looked forward to getting out there and were just as excited when they came back saying, "We're going to do it again next year."


I thought this was a chance to get a bit artistic. They had climbed down a bit into the canyon to get a view and when I saw them coming up I thought this quirky shot would be interesting.

While the ladies were getting their hands dirty at the dig site Brandon and I went exploring south of town past the Bully Pulpit golf course. In camera class we learned that the elements of near, medium, and far work well in composition so I tried my hand with this one.


Mary took a camera along to the site which was located just a few miles east of Medora. Here she talked someone in to snapping this shot. Three paleontologists accompanied the group so there was a lot of professional help and guidance for these amateurs.

























Lindsey found the prize of the day, a large intact crocodile tooth. The pro told her it showed wear and was one that the croc shed naturally and would have grown a new one to take its place. The group found a variety of teeth, vertebra, scales, and feces, none of which they could keep. It was all official property of the state and was to be taken back to the laboratory at the state heritage center. I know the gals enjoyed their experience because the first thing they said upon returning was, "We're going to do it again next year."

A Teamster Story

A few days ago I set out to delete a long list of emails, but one jumped out at me that I had forgotten about. It was from Mike Knudson of Bismarck who recently published the book Ransom County's Loyal Defenders, compilation of short biographies of World War I veterans which, by the way, includes my Grandpa Sandvig. He knew of my interest in early teamster freighting in my home area and so wrote to alert me to one of the veterans, Herbert Fremont Hickey, the son of John T. Hickey who is the subject of this weblog. I asked Mr. Knudson for the reference he used in gaining knowledge of Hickey wherein his email steered me to The Sheldon Progress dated April 12, 1923. On the front page a large obituary wore this headline: "J. T. Hickey, Reno's Freighter, Died Suddenly Last Friday."


The following paragraph in that obit interested me, "Deceased was one of the old timers in the state, coming to Dakota Territory fifty-two years ago at the age of seventeen. Coming from the east, he was out for adventures and in 1871 entered the employment of the government and freighted with ox teams between Winnipeg, Fargo and Fort Abercrombie. He was a freighter with Major Reno's command at the time of the Custer massacre and often related with much vividness the stirring times of encounters with the savage Indian tribes that roamed over the state. He passed through this section when scarcely any settler was here with the train of government supplies from Fort Abercrombie to Fort Ransom and then on to Fort Lincoln where the troops were quartered."

Hickey started working on the freight trails a few years later than those men who stalled in a three day blizzard near Lisbon, the subject of the story I'm now working on, so Hickey will not be introduced as a character in that drama. But, if he kept Major Reno supplied, that will be the seed for another story. Reno is the controversial commander who did not ride to Custer's aid during the famous battle, but, instead retreated to a defensive position on a hilltop. After the battle he was placed in command of Fort Abercrombie but was called to a court-martial and charged with cowardice at the Little Big Horn. Found not guilty after a long trial, he got into further trouble at Fort Abercrombie for drunkenness, among other things.

Our man Hickey bore witness to much of the happenings in this period which I found to be very interesting. After his freighting career ended he moved to Sheldon, farmed awhile, and then purchased and ran the Sheldon Livery Stable for several years. He is buried in the Sheldon cemetery.

An interesting sidelight is the middle picture of ox shoes. Note they are in two pieces because of the cloven hooves of the bovines.

Hard of Hearing?

It is fun to pester the wife occasionally. Today as we rode along I tickled her bare arm a time or two just to hear her tell me to stop and that I never listen to her when she says quit. She always says that, that I'm not listening. I never heard her say it. She may have, I don't know.

Ole was telling Sven, "I just bought a new hearing aid. It cost me four tousand dollars, but it's state of the art. It's perfect." "Really?" answered Sven, "What kind is it?" Ole replied, "Twelve-turdy."

Then there's the elderly gentleman with serious hearing problems who goes to the doctor who fits him with hearing aids that allow him to hear at 100% for the first time in many years. The elderly man goes back in a month for a check-up. The doctor says, "Your hearing is perfect. Your family must be really pleased that you can hear again." To which the gentleman replies, "Oh, I haven't told my family yet. I just sit around and listen to the conversations. I've changed my will three times."

At the Bohemian Hall

Anyone looking for us on Saturday night would have found us at the Bohemian Hall ten miles south of Mandan. Years back a community of Czech settlers formed in that area and a meeting hall still stands bearing their identity. I don't know what the letters stand for; I'm quite sure they are initials for unpronounceable Czech words, but I do know they represent a Czech fraternal organization.


One of the people keeping the building in use is Chuck Suchy, a local singer and song writing farmer, who lives in the area and celebrates his own Czech heritage with an annual outdoor concert on the site. We have attended five or six times and each time the crowd grows in size.

Saturday night featured a full moon in a clear sky where a few clouds in the west gave beautiful colors as the sun set. Suchy, who holds the official title of State Troubadour, invites others to come each year to perform including his musical family. A singing daughter couldn't be there because she was touring with Garrison Keillor's summer show.



A little camera picture doesn't do justice to the size of the crowd in attendance but a couple of pictures show parts of the crowd. That the attendance was larger than expected was proven when the food ran out. We were early enough to get our piece of juneberry pie, though, and it was a treat.

Attendees are mostly a middle-age crowd so wild concert antics never are a problem. I'm sure we will attend in the future.

No Matter How Tough Times Are...

The pictures are from a trip to Russia that Mary made in 1997, fourteen years ago. I have always remembered this one and how interesting it was to me to see this man using his little car to haul hay. It does not show well but the back seat is packed full, too. The door closed on some of it and stems hang below.


Here a man forks hay off his rack into a ditch where he spreads it spread to dry and later stack in his back yard for winter feed. It would not surprise me if the "horse apples" there on the roadway were gathered, dried, and used for fuel to heat.

Mary came back with other pictures and lots of stories of how primitive certain parts of the culture remained. It could probably be said everything from a hog was used except the squeal.

For some reason all the sniping on the political scene with wild ups and downs in the economy reminded me of these pictures. The latest edition of Newsweek magazine carried several thought-provoking articles; it's the one with the controversial cover picture of Michele Bachmann which some of her supporters say makes her look daffy or spaced out. Hell, I don't see how she looks any different than she ever does.

Alan K. Simpson, retired senator from Wyoming, a man whom I happen to have liked when he was in the Senate, was asked in this issue if he recalled a fiscal battle anything like this one during his time in the Senate? He said, "No, it breaks your heart. It's almost akin to disgust, but it's more than that. It's heartbreaking." (I've never forgotten the time when Senator Simpson invited me and a couple others into his office for a friendly chat.)

Somehow the China thing got away on us before we realized what was happening. Another Newsweek article said that 60 % of China's income comes from exports, while America's export share is just 25 %. Later, it stated that "if - as predicted - India, China, Brazil, South Africa, Mexico, Turkey, South Korea, Indonesia, and Russia, which today buy just 15% of U. S. exports, account for 70% of future global growth, then no American company can afford to stay home."

But there's a huge quandary here stated in another article. About 42,000 factories have closed in the U. S. which furnished 1/3 of all our manufacturing jobs. This article written by a past governor of Michigan said "Here is the tragedy: by insisting on a small-government, tax-cut-only solution to produce jobs, we are living by an outdated map of the economic world. Indeed, we may be accelerating the job losses as our competitors take advantage of our passivity."

On the lighter side I enjoyed an article and paintings of an artist named Lucian Freud who painted some nudes. There in a two-page spread sprawled a nude fat lady on a couch which I told the wife reminded me of her, after which she threw a book at me. With that, I must go.

On This Day

Several historical occurrences of note took place on this day, August 9:

- In 1945 a United States B-29 bomber dropped an atomic bomb nicknamed "Fat Man" on the Japanese city of Nagasaki.

- In 1936 the American track star Jesse Owens won his 4th Olympic gold medal in Berlin.

- In 1974 Richard Nixon's resignation became effective at noon and Vice President Gerald Ford was sworn in as the nation's 38th chief executive.

Some local happenings in the old home town were found to be newsworthy in the "The Progress" 100 years ago:

- Sheldon is a banner auto town with one automobile to every fifteen men, women, and children and we believe there is not another town in the state that can show such a large percentage of buzz wagons.

- A South Dakota farmer and his wife were making a trip from their drought stricken area to their former residence in this state by auto. He had placed his movables on two wheels of a wagon and fastened the contraption to the rear of his automobile as a trailer and were sailing along in great style, quite a novel sight.

- For over fifteen years the presses at "The Progress" printery have been operated by hand. A new gas engine was installed yesterday and this is the first issue in the history of the institution that has not been literally gotten out by the sweat of the brow.

On the Bottom Step

I found some interesting articles in the pages of my hometown paper of 100 years ago. One of them carried this headline: Boes Pilfer Oswald Ihme Farm Residence - The residence of Oswald Ihme on the banks of the Sheyenne River six miles south of Sheldon was entered by hoboes some time Thursday and a quantity of provisions stolen...Their invasion was chiefly to procure the necessities of life that satisfy the wants of the inner man, and everything was untouched with the exception of several quarts of canned fruit. Upon leaving the house they adjourned to the outer buildings where they confiscated several eggs, milked the cows, and dug potatoes from the garden. They carried their plunder to their camp under the railroad bridge and prepared a good meal. The banks of the Sheyenne have been a rendezvous for this class of bums for the past month. ... Another one stated Again Saturday night some hoboes, presumably the same bunch, attempted to purloin some of Roy Helsel's feathery tribe, they were unsuccessful as Mr. Helsel heard the squawking of the chickens and immediately ran out of the house with his gun and fired several shots at the men as they retreated through the bushes. ... And one more said Thieves entered the chicken coop of J. H. Burke about one o'clock last Sunday evening and made a futile attempt to carry off some of the judge's prized cockerels. The judge took an inventory of the flock Sunday morning and found one missing, a bunch of feathers pulled out of one of the old biddies, and an infant chick killed by being stepped on. In the meantime the boes were enjoying a Sunday dinner of chicken at Mr. Burke's expense.

Times were tough for unemployed people back then. If they were going to eat they resorted to the tactics reported on in the paper. Of course, and by right, they were called thieves and would have been thought of as the low class. This line from an article in the New York Times today has little to do with chicken stealing, but here it is anyway, "I did not become a vegetarian for my health, I did it for the health of my chickens."

I guess talking about hoboes and their hard times can be spoken of in the same light as speaking about unemployed people of today. News reports often feature highly capable people looking for work, but there just isn't anywork out there for them. The one thing above all that gripes me in the recent settlement of the debt ceiling question is that the richest of the rich went untouched in getting taxed. The argument, weak as it is, is that the rich are the engines of the economy. I have never bought that argument since they have proven that they take their money to other countries where they can find low priced labor. Furthermore, the argument goes that government should be smaller, but with that will go many of the social programs that support the unfortunate and keep us from having an army of hoboes going about stealing for their living.

Buggies and Blues, # 2

Maybe a bumper sticker or two would fit into a further Buggies and Blues blog entry: If I could have dinner with anyone, alive or dead, I would choose alive.

There were so many nice cars at Sunday's event on main street Mandan that I need to show a few more. This one happens to be owned by the man who lives across the street from my father-in-law so I see it occasionally in the driveway getting polished up. If I remember correctly this model gave lots of trouble because of so many electric motors and joints that went into making this top open or close. I don't think any other car maker tried to make one, either.

Studebakers, there were a few running around in the old days. They always had nice styling, but must have been ahead of their time because it didn't stick around. It is one car I would like to see again.
This Cadillac exudes class. Lots of fun got made of finny styling, but they sure seem desirable as a collectible classic. This one really looked pretty!
Some farm tractors sat on display, too. This one The General intrigued me so I went to the internet to find some information. I believe this model was the one listed as having a 17 horsepower Hercules engine, manufactured by the Cleveland Tractor Company and was distributed by Massey-Harris from 1939-41. World War II obviously interfered with further production and they probably converted over to making tanks or jeeps or something.

Bumper Sticker: Without men civilization would last until the oil needed changing.

Buggies and Blues

Mandan hosts an annual event called "Buggies and Blues" and it draws lots of cars and people. Main street is closed off so classic cars could park in double file for about nine blocks. Plus two or three of the side streets joining main street contain classic cars, too. The estimated number of cars is usually around 500, and just to make it interesting quite a few classic farm tractors sit on display, too. Under the bandshell live bands play and food and drink vendors sell their products. Other vendors set up on the sidewalk selling things such as model cars, services for body work and painting, collectible license plates, etc.

The Fairlane is owned by an old Sheldonite, Larry Strand, who takes a lot of pride in his vehicle. I think he comes every year. Because of the flooding the usual date of the car show had to moved to this July date. I kidded Larry about going through withdrawals when he and his fellow owners couldn't show in June. "Yeah," he said laughing, "I got the shakes!"

I remembered George Bunn when I saw this car. His parents owned one that looked like it - maybe a four-door, though - and I got to ride with him once in awhile on Saturday night. It was one nice riding car! Car lovers are a pretty nostalgic bunch.

How I loved these Mustangs when they came out the summer I graduated from college. I made up my mind to get one and pay monthly payments. Wouldn't you know it, Ford went on strike then and didn't produce them for awhile. So I bought an plain Jane of a '62 Ford. I had to wait until I got married to get a Mustang. Mary brought hers to our union, a '65 fastback model.

The sun beat down pretty hard and shade felt pretty good, but the heat didn't stop the crowd from showing up. I'll just bet there will be another Buggies and Blues next year.

Old Truths

I finally got around to reading the classic western tale of The Ox-Bow Incident by Walter Van Tilburg Clark. It tells of a rush to judgment with the report of a rancher's murder and the rustling of his cattle. As the story progresses rumors fly and the strong hot-heads intimidate others to follow along with their quest to find the wrong-doers and punish them. The sheriff is out of town and the "mob" is all right with that; they will take care of the problem without the backing of the law. After riding several hours in the dark the group finds three men with a small herd of cattle. The leader of the three tries to convince the posse that the seller of these cattle promised to send the bill of sale, but without it no amount of arguing convinces them of their innocence, and they are hung from a tree. Soon the sheriff and the "murdered" rancher show up to tell them of the mistake the mob has made, and the story ends with feelings of guilt and denial of participation in the affair.

I wonder how different is the reaction of the mob in the book from the groups in today's political scene. With so many "experts" spouting wisdom without letting facts get in the way of a good prejudice the mob follows along. It takes work and concentration to ferret out the facts of any case and most people are not willing to put it out.

Minneapolis Weekend

The grandkids keep growing, changing each time we see them. We went to Minneapolis this weekend to spend some time with them while their mother attended a workshop in Ann Arbor, MI. My computer had all kinds of connectivity problems so I never got this posted earlier. We are home now in Mandan, tired, and looking out the windows at hail damage on Mary's flowers.

Lucas is 5 years old and involved with various activities and exhibits much intellectual curiosity. He loves t-ball, swimming, and gymnastics. :)

Lily is 2 1/2 now and talks better than anyone I know with a pacifier in her mouth. She exhibits a great ability to stand up for herself against her older brother. :)

We spent a short time at the arboretum which by the way is a fantastic place. Beautiful gardens
abound and several weddings were being held to take advantage of the scenery. Unfortunately it was hot and humid so it was a bit uncomfortable. The University of Minnesota maintains the facility and in addition to opening the grounds to the public (for a fee) conduct plant experimentation there.

The house constructed from twigs and vines greets visitors first thing. Quite large, an adult does not need to duck down when walking through the entrance.

The World Changes

I started driving a car of this year, make, and model when I was 14 years old. It was the family automobile, and I learned to drive it mostly with my mother sitting beside me since I had begged her to let me do it. Driving a car never proved much of a challenge to farm boys like me who had been sitting on a tractor already for several years. The only real difference - the car went faster.
I still remember taking my driver's test in the county seat of Lisbon. With my permit, I had gotten a small booklet to study which I did, diligently. The day of the test a big, uniformed highway patrolman got in the car with me and we were off. I think he gigged me on one little item, but then, isn't that the way it is with people in power? They need to find a little fault to justify their position.

Cars have changed a great deal since this one. I remember how it rattled on washboard roads, how poor a winter starter it was, and how it leaked dust. Dad liked it, though, because the lip of the trunk was cut low and he could easily lift cream cans in and out, and hauling the cream to town was a very important activity in those days. The cream check, our only steady cash flow, represented grocery money on Saturday night.

After many years, the merchants started promoting a new idea. They wanted more weekend time for themselves, something they didn't have with Saturday night openings. Thus Friday night openings came about, and that little action accompanied the death of the little farm towns, it seems to me. A bit of the nostalgia died then since a Saturday night bath always took us into Sunday leisure activities and then through the rest of the week to the next Saturday. Of course, taking baths in the galvanized washtub is another story.

Getting Reacquainted

Since joining the Western Writers of America, I have been looking at their reading lists to see what they define as good western genre writing. I have read many of them , but some of them I have not, and I am enjoying them now. Something I think is very interesting is that some of these stories are quite short, either in the novella form or the short story form. A River Runs Through It by Norman Maclean and Legends of the Fall by Jim Harrison are both written as novellas. A woman writer, Dorothy M. Johnson, wrote short stories with very familiar titles that earned lots of respect: The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence, and A Man Called Horse. Another famliar short novella is Brokeback Mountain.

An interesting point is that an excellent full-length movie has been made from each of these short works of literature. Put a solid story in the hands of a screen writer and he can work wonders. The Liberty Valence story is quite short, but there is so much packed into it, and in re-reading it I see where the screen writers got their inspiration.

Reading stories based on western themes, both old-time and contemporary, feels very comfortable for me. Too much of the "good stuff" as determined by critics comes from the east coast where all the intellectual snobs congregate.

Sad Day

One day this past week a Bismarck police officer was slain at the scene of a domestic disturbance call. He and his partner approached a car holding a man against whom his girlfriend had called the cops for holding a knife on her. When the police got close the man fired his gun and killed the officer. His partner in turn shot and wounded the killer. It was a sad affair with the policeman having four kids at ho me and had planned to retire in another year.

The funeral was held Thursday in the Bismarck Civic Center so as to accommodate the large crowd which one of the TV stations estimated at 1800. He was buried at the North Dakota Veteran's Cemetery and the mourners passed within one block of our home. I went down to the highway to watch the long cavalcade of cars. It was reported 120 agencies were represented, each having its car lights in full blinking mode. Many of the agencies drove several cars so I can only think there were 200-250 vehicles. I made a mental note of where they came from, and I'm sure most of the communities in the state sent a patrol car, several from Minnesota included Minneapolis, Duluth, Eagan, Moorhead, and a couple of unfamiliar Minnesota counties, several from South Dakota, college campus police, Indian reservations, unmarked cars with their hidden lights in their grilles blinking, etc. It was quite a show for a man who died much too young in an uncalled for situation.

Something from the Old Days

One hundred years ago in the old hometown harvest hands and hoboes started gathering to find work on farms around the community. Apparently a little heavier influx of men came looking to work that year because of a crop failure in South Dakota. They came mostly by train and not with a paid ticket either. They started coming in June as reported in The Progress and were hanging out in the stockyard just west of town. The editor referred to them as "the side door Pullman class," and each man cooked for himself on an open fire.

Now, in July, the editor wrote "Laborers are arriving on every train and those who want to work are finding no difficulty in obtaining employment. There are the usual number of hoboes among them who are not looking for anything that means labor. At Oakes Tuesday seventy-five harvest hands captured a freight train and forced the train officials to take them to Jamestown. The Oakes authorities attempted to arrest the men, but the hoboes were too many for them."

The village of Sheldon must have felt some threat because of this influx of strangers and hired a night watchman. "Jim has a policeman star something less than six inches in diameter but he doesn't wear it where it can be seen. He also carries a gun and is going to get a club. When fitted out he will make a typical Irish cop."

Songs and stories have been written about these workers, itinerant mostly because they had no choice, if they wanted to eat they had to go find it. Seasonal labor offered the only jobs for them. John Steinbeck, Jimmie Rodgers, and Woody Guthrie easily come to mind as being good spokesmen for the times. Jimmie Rodgers, not to be confused with the rock and roll era Jimmie Rodgers, wore several nicknames: The Singing Brakeman, and The Blue Yodeler, and the Father of Country Music. Some lines from his song Waiting for a Train: "All around the water tank/ Waiting for a train/ A thousand miles away from home/ Sleeping in the rain..." It was a hard life for these men.

I couldn't resist finding a picture of an old engine with the steam and smoke pouring out of her. It has been a long time since I've seen one, but I've never forgotten. When a freight train headed southeast of Enderlin it had to climb a grade and the clouds really poured from these engines then when they had to work extra hard.

Monday Morning Pieces

Our yard could be a palette for a painting if I wanted to paint it. Most every kind of color shows up in it, and I get to enjoy it without doing any of the work. That is Mary's hobby, I mow the grass, that's enough.
Speaking of mowing the grass here is a picture of my grandpa with his team hitched to a mower. That's the way it used to be done. When I look at it I think of sweat, flies, hot sun, etc. The physical labor is pretty much removed from the job now, but this year the problem is getting it cut and baled between rain showers. My office wall is covered with pictures like Grandpa's, luckily I was able to find the snapshots in family photo albums. Now with all of our computerized gimmicks we can save, enlarge, post to internet locations like this one, and more.

Friend Garden Cleaner, pictured in the last post, lies at the side of the highway between here and downtown. Roadkill, he got in someone's headlights, I presume, and that's that. However, there's always another to take his place.

A good editorial in yesterday's paper: the editor quoted a California journalist friend who said, "If we report the words but don't scrutinize them, are we public watchdogs or public lapdogs, mere conduits for folks with self-serving messages?" I immediately thought of the blather coming out of the mouths of our state politicians who kept saying how they will bring relief, rain fire and hell down on the Corps of Engineers for letting this happen, and otherwise show how good it is that we trusted them to represent us. (In regards to the flood) Yah, sure, you betcha'.

Garden Interest

It happened again yesterday, two strangers rang the doorbell asking questions about the flowers in Mary's garden. I'm dumb as a fencepost regarding such matters and to answer their question I had to call Mary at her dad's to find out. I walk behind a lawnmower, that's all.


This morning Mary stated, "I went to pick my spinach leaves and something ate them all off." I think the culprit is the fellow below. A little later, she said, "That devil ate off all the blossoms on my potato plants." And this is in the city limits, but then an animal doesn't pay much attention to lines drawn on a map.

I keep busy doing my thing reading and writing. I finally got moving on a project that's been waiting for me for a long time. In 1867 a wagon train returning empty from hauling freight to Fort Ransom was enroute to Fort Abercrombie when it got caught in a December blizzard for three days just southeast of Lisbon. The project format is written as a historical fiction short story. Here is an excerpt from the story:

We had to stop the bull train; the wind drove the snow in brisk gales and enclosed us in a small, white bowl from which we could not see beyond to the next wagon. Our usual task of parking wagons proved next to impossible since we could not see or hear the wagon boss, and by the time he rode back within earshot hollering and screaming, the train sat in muddled disarray. With the oxen needing attention we unhitched but kept them yoked together and tethered to the wagons so they would not drift across the prairie with the wind at their tails.

Hunkering down for the night we tried to light cook fires, but every time a man's shaking hands struck a match or flint to steel the wind snuffed it out. More than anything I wanted to wrap my cold fingers around a cup of hot coffee, but tonight there would be none. Chewing on hardtack I tried to think of other places. By morning we would roll again, so all any of us could do now was to try to get some sleep. But it was no use, the blankets did little to chase the chill, and we had to lay there all night listening to the wind rip and slap the wagon canvas.