Idaman

[Idaman]

During one our earlier springs at Empire we were moving our calved out two year old heifers to a small pasture and corral setup that was called the calving barn, It was about three miles from the house so we didn't use it for calving heifers because no one wanted to stay up there in a rat infested barn when his house was only three miles away. We put the heifers there in the small pasture with the gates open to the open range so that they could mother up well before going out.

Several of the workers mentioned that they had seen a bear hanging around that little pasture, just playing with the calves. We figured that was one habit we didn't want to encourage. So every evening my family and I would drive up there and see if we could spot the bear in his antics. One evening we spotted him walking along the road just above the cattle. He was a ways away and we didn't want to spook him until we had a chance for a shot. He turned and started off the edge of the road and I broke a rule I have always had. Don't shoot until you are absolutely sure you are going to hit and kill. I mistakenly took a quick shot as he disappeared over the bank. We were pretty sure the bullet had hit but we didn't know just where. We drove up to the spot where he had been and sure enough there was blood there but no dead bear. There was a fairly large patch of chokecherries at the bottom of the hill that he had probably gone in. There was no sign or noise that the bear was in the bushes.

My wife suggested that maybe I should go down into those bushes and see what had happened to him. It was nearly dark by then and the prospect of crawling through those thick bushes was not all that appealing. Besides we only had one gun and we were having trouble deciding just who was going to have it. She thought that I should leave the gin with her and then she could shoot whatever was chasing me out of the bushes. I argued that this might not be the best plan as the bear might get to me before I could get to where she could shoot at least one of us, depending on how close the bear was and just how much she led him. I was able to keep up the discussion without going down there until it really was dark and we headed home.

Later in the fall of that year we began to notice a very unusual track of a bear that had three normal foot prints but one very rounded and odd shaped track. We figured that this was the bear I had hit earlier in the year. The next spring one of the riders saw a bear in that same area that was missing a major part of his right rear leg and we were sure that was the bear. He lived for several years in that condition but we were never able to get another shot at him. We saw his tracks for several years and then one year they just disappeared so he must have passed on.

We were hunting grizzlies in the fall and staying at our Yodel cow camp and the whole family was there plus one native man. My wife started sleeping at night on a cot along the west wall of the cabin. The first night we were there a rat that had his entrance right under her cot came indoors which we didn't hear but after getting in and stopping he sneezed real loud. My wife raised up off of her cot still in the prone position. She was unable to sleep much that night but we assured her that he surely would have cured his cold by the next night and she would be OK. Right after we were starting to doze off he came in and stopped and sneezed again several times. She repeated the prior nights' performance but this time she got up and moved her sleeping bag to the top of the table where we ate. It was great, high, rat proof and quite large. She became a permanent resident of this table for every night we stayed there for many years. We named the rat "Sneezer" and we tried everything to rid ourselves of him lest we catch his cold.

 

[Idaman]

This is a picture of the Frazer River and of the suspension bridge near Gang Ranch. It was a major bottleneck for the two ranches on the west side. Not only were the approaches very sharp ninety degree turns there was also a 27 ton weight restriction. Normal cattle liners or pots couldn't get onto the bridge from the east and if they could have they couldn't be nearly fully loaded. What we call a truck and pup or actually an a-train could get on the bridge but again it had to be less than half loaded. This made for a lot of shuttling cattle from a corral on the west side, for that purpose, to the waiting trucks on the east side, The truck and pup had to leave the pup on the east side, cross, and go up to the ranch which was about eighteen miles. After loading the truck would take the load back down cross the bridge and then unload the cattle into the pup. Next he would come back to the ranch load again, head back down, cross, hook back up to the pup, and head out. This absolutely took all day. Any feed came in the same way by breaking up a B-train at the bridge and then shuttling the feed up to the ranch. Needless to say when we got a trucker in that had gone through this procedure they never came back.

This is a picture of the trailer we had purchased before moving to Empire to be used just for the purpose of hauling our cattle across this bridge. Here it is pictured going in on the day we first arrived at Empire. All of our furniture, appliances, and personal possessions were on that trailer. The red sides are 4x8 plywood sheets that can be put on the sides to keep dust and water out. When removed the sides are normal open sided slats for cattle hauling.

The reason that this approach to the bridge was so impossible for the liners was the two suspension cables you can see just above the trailer that angled into the bank on the left. When you tried to get around the corner and on to the bridge you had to swing wide and stay as close to the steep bank on the left side as you could. When you did this then the cables were just too low at that angle to allow you enough swing room to be able to get onto the bridge. Our trailer was only a straight trailer that wasn't as high as the liners and the rear wheels were very far ahead making the wheelbase very short and maneuverable. You still had to almost scrape the top of the front of the trailer on the cable to be able to make the swing. Even when this worked you had better have a tractor with an exhaust pipe on the right side or it got bent. There was nothing worse than seeing one of the shuttling truckers come into the ranch yard with the left new, chrome, tall, exhaust pipe bent back. We knew that we were in for a time with a very irate trucker.

In the early days Gang Ranch and Empire had to force their shipping cattle to swim the river to get out to market. They used boats to keep the cattle headed across the river and not turn back to the shore from which they had come.

Even with these problems we felt fortunate to have any kind of bridge as the two ranches next to us down the river had to cross all of their cattle on a small ferry. They had a set of corrals on the west side where they held the shippers. They had an alleyway about 100 feet long out into the river that the ferry docked into. When the ferry stopped they would lower a ramp and the cowboys would force ten or fifteen cattle onto the fence decked ferry, load their horses, and head across. On the other side they would drive them off of the ferry and put them into a holding pen. Then they would ferry back and do it all over again enough times to get 50 to a 100 cattle across. Now in more recent times logging has brought roads into these ranches from Lillooet and they only face a long haul to get the cattle out to market.

 

[alacattleman]

like that 211 bull real well,,,, enjoyin' your stories too idaman ,,,thanks for taking time :cowboy:

 

[Bonsman]

This is such good stuff. I could read these post all day. Thanks Idaman!!

 

[gbrumbelow]

The truck and pup had to leave the pup on the east side, cross, and go up to the ranch which was about eighteen miles.

Like few other 18-mile stretches of road I've ever driven. Sometime you should describe your 18-mile lane and tell us some stories about navigating it.

 

[Idaman]

gbrumbelow, will do. I'm short on time today and I just remembered another local forklore story that happened at Gang Ranch.

There was a native cowboy by the name of Jiggs that was born at Gang Ranch, lived all his life there and rode there for many, many years. Jiggs was pretty short and not very heavy but his most noticeable characteristic was that although a native indian he was extremely light colored. I would venture to say that he looked most like an albino. Every part of him was much more white in color than a caucasian. There was a very slight pink color to his face from the years in the saddle. The other noticeable thing about him was that he had only one eye. When I knew him he was totally missing that eye but I understand that when the eye accident had first happened he wore a glass eye for many years.

He was staying alone in a cow camp cabin at what was called Blue Door Meadow which is quite a few miles from the headquarters. Gang Ranch hired a new young non-native cowboy that was pretty green and was totaly new to the country. The manager told this young cowboy where the cabin was and sent him on his way, horseback. He arrived at the cabin OK and moved in with Jiggs. Jiggs was wearing the glass eye at this time. When they went to bed that night they were in two small cots that were paralell in a small wing of the cabin. So whoever was sleeping in one cot looked right at the other sleeper. No one told the young cowboy about the glass eye but when they went to bed he began to notice that Jiggs while seemingly asleep continued to look at him with one eye. Jiggs was asleep but the glass eye just never closed. This unnerved the younger man not liking to be watched with one eye all night so much that he got up and moved his own cot around the corner to where he couldn't see the staring eye. He still couldn't go to sleep so every few minutes he would get out of bed and go around to see if he was still being watched. Of course he was. The next morning he saddled up, rode the 35 miles back to the headquarters, quit, and left. No one ever told him about Jiggs' condition and he never figured it out.

 

[Idaman]

This is Churn Creek. The Bridge crossing the creek is on the entrance road to Empire. The road going to the left extends for about fifteen miles from the bridge to the headquarters. Along this fifteen miles it gains about 1500 feet in altitude.
This canyon goes about 30 mile to the west, stays this deep and rough, and provides the boundary fence between Empire Valley Ranch and Gang Ranch. It was a very easy fence to maintain and the bulls didn't seem to fight across the fence much. In that distance there were only about three places that had narrow trails down from the plateaus on each side where animals could cross. Occasionally one would but very rarely.

About eight miles up this canyon there is a small gold mine claim that two miners were working during the summer months. There is a cabin on the claim where the miners lived. I don't think they worked very hard at the gold digging or panning but just used this place as a summer getaway. At the cabin they kept a life sized inflatable Playboy Bunny that was pretty scantily clad. The miners left the bunny at the cabin in the winter when they had returned to civilization which was probably the best decision depending on the broadmindedness of their wives. The bunny seemed to fascinate some of the cowboys and they often rode down in there to see if she was still there. On one of those outings the two native cowboys arrived at the cabin only to find the miners in residence there. The miners invited the two in for coffee and they happily obliged. When they entered the cabin the bunny was standing in the corner of the kitchen just looking at them. One of these native cowboys was very much into Indian religion and spiritism. They were served the coffee and as they started enjoying the fresh coffee the Indian religion guy leaped up from his chair, RAN out the door, jumped on his horse and "gave er both sides" up the trail toward home.

The other cowboy visited, enjoyed his coffee and leisurely left back up the trail. When he reached the top he saw the other man sitting on his horse and just looking back down at the cabin. The man that hadn't left in a hurry asked the other man why he had left in such a big and rude hurry. The man who had left in a hurry said "She winked at me." To my knowledge he never went near there again.

This is the confluence of Churn Creek and the Frazer River. In the fall a lot of Humpback salmon swam up Churn Creek to spawn. We tried some for eating but they were way too soft and inedible.

Notice the difference in the color of the water. These were taken in the last week so Churn is still in the spring runoff stage and the Frazer is fairly well cleared up. In all the years I lived there I only saw the Frazer clear twice and that was in the winter through the ice. I guess since it was glacier fed it was always kind of murky.

 

[Txwalt]

The first thing I look for when I log on is a new story from you. I was retelling some of your stories to a friend of mine today, while the cows were munching on some cubes. We have 7 cows. I can live vicariously through you.

Walt

 

[gbrumbelow]

Hey, Txwalt, I'm surprised you have only 7 cows. Didn't you make a lot of money doing that detective show on the TeeVee? ;-)

 

[Idaman]

These are pictures of the Churn Creek grasslands that are an integral part of Empire Valley Ranch. The main reason that I include these is that the government of BC has purchased Empire Valley and declared this grassland a Provincial grassland and has a website for information about it. They chose this site because of what they said were its' pristine qualities. I think that even though a grassland like this can be grazed annually for 150 years it still can be called pristine. We used this pasture for November and December grazing every year we were there. Two years we were able to stay out here until mid February.

This is looking down Churn Creek from the eastern end of the pasture. The bridge crossing the creek on the entrance road to Empire that I pictured before is on down this canyon to where it meets the Frazer. To the right is what was called dry lakes and at the lower end of them was an area called Chickensh$t pass. I'll let you guess how that pass got its' name.

Looking off directly into the Churn Creek canyon from the same point as the upper picture. You can see why this canyon made an excellent border fence and why cattle almost never crossed. This canyon and the hills on both sides is the home to a fantastic band of bighorn sheep. Almost exactly on the spot where the cameraman is standing I saw five of the biggest rams ever. All were 1 ¼ to 1 ½ curl and absolutely beautiful. That was in late November and at that time they weren't too wild. The local guide said that they were only wild from late July through the middle of November. I know he was correct because he and I rode right in among a band of about 20 in May when we after the grizz. They were no wilder than cattle at that time. My wife went for a walk through this same area a few days later and walked right up on the same band. She and the boys watched them graze and the lambs play for a long time. She said that she even saw some of the lambs jump up and stand on their mothers' back.

Looking north across the junction of little Churn and big Churn. Where these two creeks come together is where the cabin is, that was the residence of the rubber Playboy bunny. Last we knew she was hanging in a tree along the trail. Probably put there by one of the wives of one of the miners when they discovered just who their husband was spending his summers with.


Looking up and west along Big Churn.

Looking across the grasslands toward Gang Ranch. It was down on this lower flat where I saw bighorn sheep digging up the grass out of the snow and then our steers taking it away from them to exist. Also down there I witnessed bighorn sheep and cattle licking the same salt block at the same time. We are standing on almost the exact spot where I saw my first wolf track in the snow.

One more of the upper grasslands.

 

[Angus Cowman]

Beautiful country

 

[regenwether]

What type of grass did you have up there? Cool or warm season grass? You might of metioned it before but did you graze year round? Make any hay or buy it? If there is any crops up there what type were there and what was the typical growing season? Thank you.

 

[Idaman]

What type of grass did you have up there? Cool or warm season grass? You might of metioned it before but did you graze year round? Make any hay or buy it? If there is any crops up there what type were there and what was the typical growing season? Thank you.

The most famous grass for this lower country was the native blue bunch grass or Idaho Fesque. It was uniquely suited for winter grazing as its' feed value increased when it matured and dried. When it was growing the feed value was pretty low. This article outlines the characteristics of the grass very well.

http://jas.fass.org/cgi/reprint/1933/1/95.pdf

There was also a lot of needle and thread grass but almost no planted or improved grasses. The provincial BC government had a big program to no-till in crested wheat grass and at first it looked very good but within 5 years it was totally gone. That was a very big disappointment to everyone and I never heard the scientific reason why it failed so completely. We didn't have any of this done as most of our lower country looked like the Churn Creek Flats grass or was just too steep and rough to plant mechanically.

The higher elevation grasses were mountain brome, pine grass but mostly native short season summer grasses. The pine grass was almost totally unusable except when cattle were starved to it in the snow. The mountain brome was great and grew mostly around the birch tree meadows. The down side to the mountain brome was that wherever it grew there seemed to also be a lot of timber milk vetch. Timber milk vetch was pretty lethal to milking cows but their calves were unaffected.

We were able to graze out between 9 and 10 months of the year. Gang had a winter pasture on the other side of the river that would graze 800 cows all winter but our side was just enough higher and more snow covered during January and February to require some feeding. We put up about 1500 tons of hay that was mostly alfalfa with some brome and timothy mixed in. Maytags had purchased a lot of hay there but the problem was always the trucking to that side of the river. Whenever we were short we sent the weaned calves out to Kamloops or Armstrong to back grounding lots. This way they were already out and available for shipping if the market cooperated.

You could grow corn, for silage, there as some of the neighbors did for a while but they didn't keep it up very long, because it was a bit dicey. The gardens would grow everything but melons. There was even an abandoned tomato processing plant near Kamloops. The growing season was pretty short in the 70 day range but you must remember that in the frost free period the days were very long so that made up some for the short season. There were some apricot trees planted there but one six week -55F degree winter spell wiped them out. There were a lot of grapes grown around Kamloops and now a lot of ginseng is grown there.

 

[Idaman]

Evening in the Owyhees.

Owyhee was the original spelling for Hawaii.

 

[Idaman]

When you live in the "outback" as is the case with Empire you never know just what or who you're going to run into. We had been warned to never take a photograph of anyone without their permission as it might even be dangerous. It seems that many people who are trying to hide from the law or someone think that if they can just disappear away from civilization they will never be found. Actually that is the worst place in the world to try to hide. There are so few people out there that if anyone new shows up they stick out like a sore thumb. If any new person came into the area it would immediately trigger the moccasin network and within a very short time everyone out there would be informed of a newcomer.

We always needed employees but most especially experienced men that could live in the back country and somewhat off of the land. They were away from having a car by about a 1 or 2 days' ride and needed to stay out at least a month at a time. Several of the local men who weren't the best themselves were famous for being hired for their dog. The dogs as well as the men became known and often the dog was the best part of the team.

For several years we had a standing order for experienced cowboys with Employment Canada. Over the years we sure interviewed some interesting individuals but actually never did hire anyone from this source.

A fairly young Frenchman with a small family and a wife that spoke no English showed up one day to interview for the job. The wife went into our house to visit my wife and the man and I went into the cookhouse for the interview. I still don't know just what the two ladies talked about for two hours with neither one knowing one word of the others' language.

This tall lanky applicant looked the part to maybe take care of himself in our setting so we had a fairly long visit about his experience etc. I noticed that he was a very intense and somewhat nervous individual and that he sure liked the sound of his own voice. I was feeling fairly positive about him as we went along. Later in the interview he said "I maust tell you thet I shoot zee man!" I thought that it might be a good idea for him to elaborate on that some and so he did. He said that he had been down in the states and gotten involved with a local girl. She must have had another admirer and the man challenged this Frenchman to a shootout much like the old west. The Frenchman then said "He shoot me en zee foot, and I shoot heem en zee head." He then headed back to Canada in some haste and planned to never return south of the border. He said that he was wanted down here but since he hadn't been identified he was OK back in Canada. After this exchange I told him that I would contact him if he had gotten the job. I didn't give him the job after focusing on his nervousness, intenseness, and excitability. This all occurred in May and in November of that year I heard that he had gotten a job with a guide out in the Chilcotin. At some time when he was working out there he got into an argument with his employer and shot him. Since then I have always been relieved that he told me about shooting "zee man". One less hole in my hide.

Two other men that worked at Empire for quite some time allowed that they had killed someone in their past and at least one was wanted down here. The latter man was on a reserve down in Arizona and got involved in some kind of spiritism ritual and killed another participant. This man may still be in federal prison over another incident he was in with the RCMP. The last of the three died of natural causes.

There was a small very dilapidated cabin down near the confluence of Churn Creek and the Frazer River that was a magnet for wayward fleeing individuals. There was a young man that took up residence there for a while and while he was there I got a call from the RCMP asking me if I had seen him there and if so would I keep an eye on him for them. I asked them just what it was that I would be watching for. They said that he was wanted because he had been a witness to or involved in a murder over in Alberta. They felt as long as he stayed put that was the best place for him until the trial. I said "THANKS" but remember you owe me one.

Often an officer from the RCMP would stop at the ranch and ask if we had seen some native individual that they were looking for. One young officer said that the man he was looking for was dark complected, about 150 lbs., 5'8"and native. He said "Now who in the world out here doesn't fit that description."

I worked for a man many years ago who had been a former Mounty and as such was sent after a wanted individual in northern Alberta. As he was preparing for the long horse pack trip he hired an Indian guide to show him the way and do some translation. They went to several villages over several months but no one knew the man they were after. Finally they were sent to an old chief that would surely know the man they were after. When they found the chief and asked him he said "You brought him with you." pointing at his guide. Monty, the RCMP, was devastated and asked his guide why he hadn't told him just who he was. The guide replied that Monty had never asked him. Monty said that the hard part was not relaying the story to his superiors but telling them that the RCMP owed the wanted man two months of wages for looking for himself. Montys' great story is all told in a book called "North to Adventure". He was noted for being the first RCMP officer to make it to the North Pole. That adventure took him two years of living in igloos and traveling with dogsleds. The trip to the pole didn't take too long but the entrance to Baffin Bay never thawed out the next summer so the ship that was to pick them up was delayed for a year. When he returned to his home town they had erected a statue of him as they thought he had been lost in the north.

 

[Idaman]

It just hit me today that if anyone is interested in some fantastic books along the lines of cowboy life in western BC they should get--- Grass Beyond the Mountains----Breaking Smith's Quarterhorse---- and--- Smith and Other Events.

The last two will absolutely blow you away with the humor and the first will amaze you at the ruggedness of the individuals.

If I remember correctly I met the author of "Grass Beyond the Mountains" one time.

These books are all available on Amazon and are priced from 1 to 4 dollars. GET EM!!! :cowboy:

 

[LazyARanch]

Idaman,

I think we're all kinda waitin' on YOUR book....

you've certainly given us some awesome stories, and I can't wait to read more! :tiphat:



edit: would also love to see a book from Franklin Nash's family

 

[Idaman]

Nobody I know likes to be awakened in the middle of the night to face some major problem but living at Empire or almost anywhere in the Chilcotin adds another whole dimension to that experience. When you are the responsible people on the ranch with several people living there you have to become sheriff, judge, sewer plumber, counselor, bouncer, arbitrator, and all around fool. It takes a sense of humor more than anything because if you ain't laughing you be crying.

At about two one morning as my wife and I were soundly and peacefully sleeping there came a voice into our room that sounded like someone was standing right by our bed. The voice said "Philyss water broke!" My wife and I sat right up straight in bed in a split second without coming anywhere near consciousness. I turned to my wife still in a stupor and said "It's summer, water don't broke in summer." The voice continued again "Phyliss water broke." Finally we clicked on to what the noise was. We jumped out of bed and headed downstairs to see what was happening. A young cowboy and friend had been sleeping downstairs in our house and he heard the frantic knocking on the back door and went to answer. Whoever was there was in a state of panic and yelled at him just what he had relayed to us. We decided that this could be serious and that we had better go down to the house where the pregnant girl lived. I said as my wife rushed out the door "She's not a first calfer so you won't need the puller and the chains." She said in sarcasm "I sure hope not."

When she arrived down at the employees' house she soon observed that the girl really did need to get to a doctor or hospital VERY soon. They had left me at our house to try to arrange for an ambulance and some EMTs to head out our way and tell them we would meet them on a certain road. We sure didn't want them coming out one road while the maternity party was going in another. The matter was complicated by the phone being out so I had to use the radio phone.

When my wife came back to the house to take all the towels, we parted knowing that this was going to be one h-lluva ride in that old native car. We offered our 4x4 but the driver said he was more familiar with that old car. Just the week before when the driver was testing this old car he had been "mechanicing on" he went across a cattle guard just a little too fast and as the car leaped over the guard the motor jumped up and turned partially sideways under the hood. He had forgotten to "tie er" down again. This was a very bad sign that this would be a trip of some haste and minor heart stops. They put the calving girl in the back seat of an old beat up station wagon and threw gravel all over everything as they raced toward town. My wife was riding in the front seat next to the driver, facing back over the seat back to help the girl who was moaning loudly and screaming occasionally. Each scream just prodded the driver to go even faster. The car bounced off of both banks several times as they sped on to meet the ambulance or their fate.

After an hour at this pace they spotted the ambulance coming out and they slid to a stop. The EMTs hurriedly loaded the girl into the ambulance and then they headed back to Williams Lake. After my wife got home she said that it really was a good thing that she was facing backwards or she might have opened her eyes and panicked watching the winding road racing at them ahead.

The girl didn't calve until later that day so all went well but my wife dropped in total exhaustion.
A year or so later the same thing happened again but this time it was winter and the roads were very icy. They still raced in at break neck speed but slid around the corners and my wife knew not to look ahead to see just where they would surely die. This time the delivery was much closer as when they met the ambulance the lady had the baby as they were lifting her into the ambulance. That was just too close and from then on I begged the pregnant one to stay in town during that time. Of course they totally ignored me as usual until I finally got smart enough to stand a calf puller complete with chains and a cable saw by their front door. This seemed to speak louder that all the pleading that had gone on before. I received quite a few dirty looks but it was worth that and I just grinned real wide.

 

[DOC HARRIS]

You gotta' love it, or you wouldn't do it! You have an option: Do it - or don't do it!

DOC HARRIS

 

[Idaman]

On each ranch there are people involved and some of these people can be real characters. At Empire we seemed to have way more than our share of the latter. Maybe it was because we lived in such a small community and were involved in each others lives like no other place of employment or maybe the isolation attracted a certain kind of person and they tended to be real characters. Of course we weren't oddballs ourselves. :cowboy:

It took a special kind of person to live in that much isolation and remoteness and of course some could handle that lifestyle and some could not. The native people were local so they were accustomed to the remoteness but that didn't mean that there weren't characters among them.

Since we hired everyone that wanted a job and had come out that far to get a job we passed through a fairly large number of people, at least for us. Some of them stayed as long as twelve years and others didn't last twelve hours. Most of these short timers were potential riders and various things got to them real quick.

One young man showed up as a horse breaker which we were always in need of. Our goal was to have at least 30 horses ready to go by early March at the beginning of the riding season. If we didn't start with this many in the spring then by the late summer we would be nearly out of horses to finish the year. There were always lots of problems with the horses in that rough country where they put on so many miles each day. Cinch sores, saddle blanket scalds, rock bruises, and back bites were the worst. Each cowboy had a favorite string of at least four horses that were for their exclusive use as long as they were working on the ranch. We usually had lots of young unbroken horses or could get our hands on some quickly if the need and a horse breaker showed up.

This man showed up at the back door late in the evening and asked for the horse breaking job. He said that he and his girlfriend had been living in an old Pontiac car for over a year and really needed work. We gave him some food and pointed him to an empty house where he and company could move in. I told him to show up at the barn in the morning and we would show him what was expected. First thing the next morning the cowboys brought the unbroken horses in and were anxious to see just what would happen. The young nan started with the first horse that wasn't even halter broken and quite an audience arrived. He was starting out real good and it was apparent that he had been around this type of horses.

After a couple of hours the audience dissipated but I stayed for a while to watch. About this time his girlfriend showed up out in the corral. I hadn't seen her before but she was dressed in spike heels, a leather mini-skirt, and what my wife called a halter top. She had quite a time negotiating the corral in the springtime in those shoes. She came over to me and wanted a cigarette. I was not a smoker so I told her to ask around. She told me that she had to have one right now and wanted to know where she could buy some. I told her that there was a small store on the Indian reservation about an hour to the north and that I would draw her a map of how to get there. I also told her that we could order some with next weeks' groceries but that would be the soonest. She kind of went into a small nicotine fit and mumbled as she walked off. I told her that some of the cowboys might have some rollins if that would help. It was about noon then and we broke for lunch. Right at one the young man came to the door and said that they just had to get closer to cigarettes even if it meant living in that car. I shook my head over that for several days.

Others came and went with just about the same haste and it took me a long time to figure out just what was happening. When I would send a new man to the barn to get acquainted and get some horses assigned the Indian riders would tell the new man all about how very dangerous it was working there since you probably would be chased by a grizzly bear nearly every day. They also relayed stories of having a big foot jump right on the horse behind them. Many times the wide eyed new man would hasten back to his house pack and leave. Most never gave a reason for the sudden decision and I had to figure it out. Only later when a somewhat veteran cowboy fired right back at the Indians that he wrestled grizzlies and had a girlfriend that looked like a Bigfoot did it become clear what was happening. The other men who had left must not have wanted to seem chicken or something.