Cattle Need a Market

Livestock growers might see only one payday a year when their cattle, hogs, or sheep are loaded in trailers and hauled off to markets.  The marketing story in this country is an interesting, multi-faceted enterprise.  Lovers of the Old West remember stories of the trail drives that brought Longhorns north from Texas where they multiplied and thrived in that vast land.

J. Frank Dobie wrote a classic history of those early cattle called The Longhorns.  He refers to the Chisholm Trail as a “lane opening out of a vast breeding ground swarming with cattle life to a vacant, virgin range of seemingly illimitable expanse.”  Rounding them up and driving the cattle up this trail gave birth to the cowboy mythology and all the books and movies inspired by it.

Abilene, Kansas became an early destination for some of the cattle.  In 1867 the railroad came to the town and strings of cattle cars were loaded with them to ride to the slaughter houses.  Others kept coming northward where we read the story of the Marquis de Mores who tried to establish a packing plant in Medora and ship processed meat east to large cities.  We know his effort failed, but the prairie still filled with the cattle and anyone invested in them suffered great losses during the severe winter of 1886-87.  A simple invention, barbed wire, also came on the scene and closed off the open range that early ranging cattlemen depended upon.

When railroads criss-crossed the country, the old trail drives disappeared.  Railheads developed their cattle handling facilities to hold the herds until they could be loaded onto the slatted cattle cars.  I remember reading once about one such facility in Enderlin on the Soo Line that served as a stopover for the trains to off load their animals and water them.  In my early memories I picture the sun-bleached stockyards in Sheldon still standing alongside the NP tracks.

With the improvement of township and county roads, trucks started replacing cattle cars on the railroad.  A cloud of dust and the sound of a rattling stock rack signaled the arrival of a cattle truck.  In our neighborhood Clark Douglas owned a small fleet of them and answered the calls of farmers who wanted livestock hauled to market at the West Fargo Union Stockyards. 

The stockyards in West Fargo opened on October 1, 1935.  Hiram Drache, the historian of note from Concordia College, motivated Thomas J. Hanson, one of his history students, to research the early history of the facility.  Much of the following information comes from his findings published in the book Through Chutes and Alleys: A Half Century of the West Fargo Union Stockyards.

The West Fargo stockyards were built in cooperation with  the South St. Paul Union Stockyards  and the Central Livestock Association to compete with the Armour packing plant which had been dominating the market.  Armour had established buying stations at Lisbon, Edgeley, Oakes, Mandan, Carrington, Larimore, and Erie as well as visiting individual farmers and buying from them.  Their activity had significantly cut into St. Paul’s business.  They sent a buyer into the countryside, too, who did some buying, but he came back with the recommendation to build an accessible stockyards in the area.

A delegation traveled to Washington, DC to testify before the U. S. Senate Agricultural Committee to secure approval under the auspices of the Packers and Stockyards Act.  It might have been an entertaining meeting to watch because a lawyer from Armour’s attended.  The stockyards officially incorporated on August 29, 1933 under North Dakota law.  The grand opening drew over 25,000 people who were fed 7,000 pounds of barbecued beef from 30 butchered steers.  An aerial photo taken that day shows the huge number of cars parked wherever a spot could be found.

In August 7, 2014, The West Fargo Pioneer stated in a headline “West Fargo Stockyards, a piece of city’s history, still going strong.”  The headline belies the situation somewhat with the quantity of animals passing through.  The paper reported the stockyard’s biggest single-volume day was February 13, 1985 when 6,475 cattle were sold.  The management used to sponsor five sales a week, but now they are down to just one a week.

Local sales barns spread around the state handle large numbers of livestock today.  The communities of Napoleon, Wishek, Jamestown, Mobridge, Lemmon, Sisseton, Mandan, and Rugby come to mind.  It is a common sight on the interstate highways to see large semi-trucks pulling the modern version of cattle cars.  Times have changed and undoubtedly will continue to do so.

Adam Leintz

My father-in-law Adam Leintz passed away this morning.  He lived a long life, 101 years, raised a great family, and believed in God.  He walked through the gates of Heaven today to meet his wife Ella.

In the Land of Sky Blue Water

I remember the time I turned 21 and thought sitting at a bar was a rite of passage.  Since then I’ve concluded it was a waste of time and money.  However, one sight in most any of those bars lingers in my memory: the Hamm’s Beer sign cycling around and around  as it proclaimed its beer came From the Land of Sky Blue Waters.  The scenery revealed a beautiful lake setting, but where was it filmed, maybe The Lake of the Woods or some lake in Canada.  Nope, it was Big Turtle Lake near Bigfork, MN, and we recently spent a weekend there at the Arcadia Resort where it’s a part of their history.  

We didn’t go there because of the advertisement.  It’s where our son’s family rents a cabin for a week, and they wanted us to join them.  The scenery up close and personal surpasses the revolving panorama in those bars.  The owner of the resort told me the resort has been around since 1922 and the photographs for the commercials were done in the late 1950s and early 60s.

To get there we turned a corner at the spot called Talmoon where two businesses stood.  One, a c-store, the other a bar called Hayslips Corner, touted as “an oasis in the north woods.”  Their outdoor sign advertised it being the oldest bar in Minnesota, but a little searching found one in St. Paul also claims the title.

Weekend trips usually uncover some interesting little stories and when we drove to Bigfork Sunday morning to attend church, the name on one road sign caught my eye - Jack the Horse Lake.  Surely somebody had immortalized a favorite horse by naming the lake after him.  It needed further research though, and it turns out my first guess was wrong.  Here’s the story.    

The name derives from that time of heavy logging in the area when the trees standing near this particular lakeside were being cut and skidded to a mill.   What must have  been a Paul Bunyan-esque logger named Jack D. McDonald worked on a crew that pushed themselves and their horses to finish the day’s work before winter darkness set in.  Their loaded sled proved too great a burden to pull for one of the horses which collapsed and died.  The men unharnessed the animal and Jack stepped into the traces to pull a share of the load.  Apparently they made it into camp, whereby the man has become forever known as Jack the Horse.  Tall tales have been known to originate in that part of the country, so I won’t vouch for its veracity.

When our stay ended at the lake, we drove home through Bemidji and stopped at the Bemidji Woolen Mills where the woolen fabrics are very nice but pricey.  Beside it stood a rather nondescript restaurant sporting the name “Minnesota Nice.”  Being the noon hour, we decided to check it out.  We walked into what must be the favorite cafe in town for the middle-aged crowd because it was full of them.  We fit right in.  Passing on the burgers featuring such choices as “Uff Dah Original” and “Uff Dah dats hot,” we settled on a fried chicken special that tasted like Mom used to make.  When they say you can’t judge a book by its cover, neither can you judge a cafe by its storefront.

Back home a half-finished book waited to be read, a biography of William L. Shirer who wrote the Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.  This book by Steve Wick, The Long Night, includes many of Shirer’s thoughts, such as “The number of sincere, intelligent Germans who  take in every lie they’re told is appalling,” and “They never debated moral issues when self-interests were involved,” and the “Nazis had begun an assault on newspapers across the country.”  It was an interesting period of history.  The visit to the lake offered some new perspectives and a brief escape from the dire history I’m reading in that book. 

Bonanzaville, Some Living History

I volunteered a few hours today at Bonanzaville.  The site grows every year and everyone should go at least once to see the huge collection of artifacts and historical information they have collected.  Allan Burke, the publisher of the Emmons County Record has put much time and energy into cleaning up and getting in working order the old newspaper office that once stood in Hunter, ND.  He invited me to help out a bit and I was happy to help.  The Checkered Years house  where a woman lived who kept a good diary about life in Dakota.  Her granddaughter took that diary and wrote the book titled The Checkered Years from it.  I think my mother read it several times.  The Chrysler car brings back many memories for me.  It was a limousine!  

'47 Chrysler just like my 1st car

Hunter Times Building

Allan Burke, Keeping Newspaper History Alive

A Bevy of Beauties

Checkered Years House

 

Custer Lives!

Saddle Up!

So I sez let's saddle up and ride down to Mcleod for your birthday supper at the Silver Prairie Saloon...

A Weekend on the Lake

We spent a couple of days on Big Turtle Lake near Bigfork, MN to loaf on a sandy beach.  The experience will find more words in an article to be written later this week, but some pictures with captions suffice for now.

The Hamm's Beer commercial from years back was filmed on this lake.

Mary enjoys a pontoon cruise

Grandkids surprise Grandma Mary

Clint and Robyn fixing something to eat

Honoring an Ancestor

Willa Cather’s novel O Pioneers! focuses on the main character of Alexandra who one day travels in a wagon with some companions to call on the man called Crazy Ivar.  Ivar’s residence is a dugout that blends so well with the surroundings that they do not spot it until the sun glints off a solitary window set in the front wall.  If not for a rusty stovepipe sticking out, you could have walked over the roof without knowing someone lived below.  In fact a cow had run onto the roof thinking it part of the prairie and one of her legs broke through.

Ivar’s home could well have been the model for the one Kristian Hansen Bjugstad made in the sandhill area southeast of Sheldon in 1881.  In what is now government owned pastureland, descendants of Kristian have searched for and found the site of that first residence he shaped with his hands in a hillside.  Since a depression in the ground is all that remains, family members used other available clues and determined this spot is the one that gave him shelter. 

Maybe Kristian’s life isn’t so different from other people in the 1880s who came to homestead, but it is singular in the minds of those descendants who commemorate him and the fortitude he exhibited by living in such harsh conditions.  He stayed, thrived, and begot generations of relatives, of whom two great-grandsons came to the site this day to place a memorial honoring his memory.  

As sharp lightning ripped through the darkening clouds, Dennis Bjugstad, Lance Bueling, and a USDA forester Cory Enger proceeded to set wooden posts and fasten the memorial to them.  Though he was not present, Jim Winsness, another relative, had sent the display case that they hung to enclose and protect Kristian’s family information.  Enger contributed a metal sign stating, “Ancient ruins, archaeological resources, fossils and historical remnants in the vicinity of this notice are fragile and irreplaceable.  The Antiquities Act of 1906 and Archaeological Resources Protection Act of 1979 protect them for the benefit of all Americans.”

In brief, Kristian left his wife and child in Red Wing, MN after hearing of land to homestead and boarded a train for Fargo, Dakota Territory.  From there he walked to Owego Township and on May 13, 1881, filed on the piece of land where we now stood.  While no picture exists of his residence, we’ll surmise the depression found by the family was a modest room he shoveled out of the hillside, covered with cottonwood branches, blanketed with grass, and then overlaid with sod.  Imagine the spring rains that brought the sod to life and grew swaying grass where, in my mind’s eye, wild animals walked on it as though it were part of the prairie.

Dennis Bjugstad and Lance Bueling

The Memorial Plaque

Antiquities Act Notice

Included as part of the memorial the Bjugstad descendants left on the prairie is a poem called “Speak To Me, Ancestor” where a sampling of its lines say “Help me to know some clues to this mystery that began long ago.”  If old Kristian could sit down with them today, he could tell them plenty.

A Special 50th Anniversary

Most 50th anniversary celebrations are special and Sunday, August 5, we drove to Leonard, ND to celebrate one that we are part of - the annual Sandvig picnic.   Determined family members maintain its yearly occurrence, but this year a large group attended.  It's meant a lot to one special attendee - Helene Sandvig.  She is 107 years old and still gets around quite well.  I doubt she has missed any.  She even fell off her bench seat at a picnic table but with a little help got right up  and continued eating her meal.

One of the family members has seen to making up a grave marker over the original immigrant's heretofore unmarked grave in Jamestown.

Memories and the Moment

Coming off our road trip to the Germans from Russia convention in Pierre, SD leaves a jumble of memories that tends to mix with the following days.  From the convention, a joke sticks with me.  One of the members was moving to Texas.  The MC called him to the front for a presentation and said, “You know there are tornadoes in Texas, and we want to give you a little something to protect yourself.  Here’s a package of wieners.  Keep them in your pocket.  That way the dogs will find you first.”

Claiming German from Russia heritage however is a serious matter to a member.  In my case, one grandmother suffered the indignities of life in Russia until her parents made the decision to come to America.  My wife’s background includes all four grandparents who came to find a better life.  Every member of GR points to similar circumstances and wants to honor their ancestors by keeping the memories alive.  Resources have been developed to uncover this information.  

Journey to the Homeland tours led by Michael M. Miller are a fertile resource for getting in touch with the past.  He has led over 20 trips to their ancestral homes in Russia.  Miller is director and bibliographer of NDSU’s Germans from Russia Heritage Collection and plays a big hand in the production of numerous Prairie Public Television documentary series. 

South Dakota’s Cultural Heritage Center hosts a large archive department that serves as a depository of the state’s history.  They process so much material that they draw on inmates from the South Dakota Women’s Prison to help.  One lady worked at a computer wearing an orange shirt with the word “inmate” printed in large letters on her back.  Their museum is not as large or extensive as North Dakota’s in Bismarck; they display something very unique - the La Verendrye lead plate on which was inscribed proof of their visit to the area in 1742.  A group of boys playing on a hillside in 1913 found it sticking out of the dirt.  They took it to their local newspaper where the editor recognized it as having some significance and turned it over to the state historian.  Fortunately the printer didn’t melt it down to convert into printer’s type.

Immigrants from Russia brought seeds with them, and in one session titled German/Russian Garden, an interesting point came out.  These imported seeds were original stock, not hybrids.  The presenter had been making a practice of donating seeds of this quality to a depository whose role was to protect and insure their preservation.  He expressed disappointment because the facility’s manager recently gave the Monsanto Company access to their vaults.  He now fears for what might become of them.  My wife purchased a packet of his seeds, a variety called Butzen melon. We’ll report if we have success next year.

Besides talking about seeds, the number and variety of sessions keep a conventioneer’s daily schedule filled.  To name a few - Growing Up German from Russia in America, Historic Newspapers, DNA, Researching Your Genealogy in Russian Archives, various cooking demos, various ancestral locations in Russia in today’s world, and more.  Coffee breaks always featured varieties of everyone’s German favorite, kuchen.

It is legitimate to ask what’s the big deal about Germans from Russia.  German farmers were offered enticements to come to Russia by Czarina Catherine the Great thereby raising the quality of farming.  Included in her promise to them were free land, religious freedom, self-administration of community and schools, exemption from Russian military service, and loans and tax exemptions. 

They came in good faith and multiplied, especially in the rich farmlands.  From the original 75,000 immigrants their numbers grew to 3000 colonies totaling 1.8 million people by 1900.  But a new czar, Alexander II, decided these prosperous folk needed Russification whereby Catherine’s privileges were rescinded and a cruel disrespect of them began.  Then Russian governments started suffering upheaval and the Germans started to look for escape from starvation and mistreatment.  The U. S. became one outlet with its Homestead Act.  Again, they came in good faith and have multiplied as witnessed by many communities in North Dakota with predominant German-Russian populations.  Descendants choose to keep the history alive, thus giving a reason for this convention.  Next year Fargo will host, and interested people should know the organization always welcomes new members.  

A bit more about Pierre, their population is only about 14 thousand.  With its small size, a visitor can’t help but notice scattered throughout the city the Trail of Governors consisting of life size bronze statues of each of their past state governors.  In the year 2012 thirty statues were commissioned with plans to continue creating a new one for future governors.  No other state honors past governors this way.

Hard Times in the Old Days

We will attend the 48th annual international convention of the Germans from Russia Heritage Society in Pierre, SD. Accurately termed international in scope, several members from foreign countries travel to these gatherings to share and learn. While some of the information presented deals with the harsh treatment and conditions that forced immigration to this country, some of it features music, success stories, research help, food, and good times.  

I always come away feeling fortunate to live at the present time. My wife delves into ancestral research quite deeply. Her genetic makeup totals 100% German from Russia ancestry, but mine, not so much, 25%. They do let me in the door, though, to participate. She spends a lot of time when at home digging into old relatives’ history. I spend much of my time reading and writing about other topics, lately that of the early history of Ransom County, the area where I was born and raised. 

One of the stories has more than likely never been associated with this history: the Wounded Knee Massacre. However, far removed it is, I still felt surprise over the connection. Let me take it back to the time when Fort Abercrombie provided the source of supply for the newly constructed Fort Ransom, 1867. Freight traveled by wagon pulled by oxen. With the aid of a modern research tool, Google told me the distance is 80 miles taking one hour and 23 minutes to travel. Of course, that route follows paved roadways. As the crow flies, it’s less, probably about 45 miles. One hundred and fifty one years ago, slow-plodding oxen could not travel that distance in one day. 

Pigeon Point was established midway for travelers to overnight at a Sheyenne River ford. Its resident managers were a couple named David Faribault and his Indian wife Nancy McClure, also called by her Indian name Winona. After she separated from Faribault, she took her daughter Mary Jane and moved to Faribault, SD to be with her new husband Charles Huggan. The daughter Mary Jane Faribault married the Reverend John Eastman, an early ordained Presbyterian minister. 

Now we’ve arrived at the crux of this article. Reverend John’s brother was Dr. Charles Eastman who was stationed at Pine Ridge during the Wounded Knee Massacre. He was maybe not the first American Indian medical doctor, but one of the first. The story of his actions in treating the wounded urges the reader onward. The Indians wanted their lands back and a religious leader and prophet told them that performing the Ghost Dance would rid the land of the whites. The army feared this gathering and thought it could develop into something endangering them. On the morning of December 29, 1890, the army moved into the Indian camp to disarm them. It is thought the accidental discharge of a rifle caused the shooting to commence. Dozens were killed, many others wounded, including over 30 soldiers. Given the circumstances, the soldiers were tended first and taken to available hospital beds at the fort. The Indians were left to lie in the open until rescuers came around to carry them in. With the medical beds occupied by wounded soldiers, the Indians had no place for Dr. Eastman to administer medical treatment except for the Episcopal chapel which became the infirmary. To make room for them, workers removed the pews and covered the floor with hay to use as bedding which somewhat softened their pain and sealed drafts from below. 

Well-educated as he was, Eastman went on to write several books, some of which described the aftermath of the battle scene which he toured and helped bury frozen bodies. This quote of his can make a reader wince: “It was a terrible and horrible sight, to see women and children lying in groups, dead… Some of the young girls wrapped their heads with shawls and buried their faces in their hands. I suppose they did that so that they would not see the soldiers come up to shoot them.” 

The very last paragraph Dee Brown wrote in his famous book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee states: “It was the fourth day after Christmas in the Year of Our Lord 1890. When the first torn and bleeding bodies were carried into the candlelit church, those who were conscious could see the Christmas greenery hanging from the open rafters. Across the chancel front above the pulpit was strung a crudely lettered banner: PEACE ON EARTH, GOOD WILL TO MEN.” 

Some can argue this article is a long distance from the subject of Pigeon Point, but it illustrates how the webs of history are interwoven. Noticing the connection, it was an interesting thread to follow.