We've Got The County Covered
We've Got The County Covered
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More than 90% of the country's residents are under "stay at home" directives and all of us are being cautioned to stay "socially distant" to help minimize COVID-19 spread. We hear the directives will likely be extended further in to the future. Millions are separated from their jobs, either temporarily or permanently. We see images on the news of major metropolitan areas in the U.S. with streets vacant of people or vehicles. Many businesses are shuttered and schools are closed. In the past few...
Reporter's note: Sitting up here in Whitlash under Montana's 'stay at home directive.' My thoughts have turned to 'signs of spring.' My wife and I lived in eight states and 23 different places within those states during our 50+ years of marriage. I got to thinking about the different signs of spring we experienced at those 23 places. A writer for an eastern North Dakota newspaper wrote, "We're each afforded our own perspective on the beginning of spring." Another way to say it might be, "Signs...
During early March my wife and I spent 11 days on the island of Oahu in Hawaii. Oahu is the most populated of the state's islands and is the home to 1.2 million people, most of whom live in Honolulu. It was our first trip to Hawaii. I wanted to write about our visit without doing a standard travelogue. Oh, we visited many of the popular sites like Pearl Harbor, the Polynesian Cultural Center and with a friend, hiked to the rim of Diamond Head Crater. We did other tourist activities: a whale...
Experts in electronic data storage, systems engineers, architects and site developers have been scouring the Sweet Grass Hills looking for a site for a place to build a mega data/colocation facility. It's part of a trend for businesses to construct data centers to house network computers and data storage off-site in rural areas. The new facility will employee highly trained specialists and support staff to operate its computing and storage capabilities. At this stage of the project the name of...
Pol Haldeman has lived on a ranch south of Cleveland in the Bear Paws since his family moved west from the Chicago area in 1954. He shared a story he thought readers might find interesting about his mother buying a Geiger counter. The federal government started using the Nevada Test Site (about 60 miles northwest of Las Vegas) in 1951 for research about atomic energy and weapons. Pol's mother figured with the up-tick in research there would be an increased demand for uranium. She ordered a...
Columnist's note: A couple of years ago I read about the annual March 16 celebration of St. Urho's Day in Butte. St. Urho Day celebrations occur in regions of the U.S. where Finnish immigrants live. The fact that it is celebrated the day before St. Patrick's Day is not coincidental. The idea of a St. Urho's Day celebration began when a Finnish American was chided by a friend of Irish descent who said, "Too bad the Finns don't have a saint they can celebrate." That remark resulted in Richard...
Dale Mailand, from Harlem, asked me for a digital photo of the Whitlash church's steeple and belfry. I sent the photo and shortly received a poem Dale wrote about the building and installing of the steeple, an event that happened in 1973. Dale Mailand is an original member of the Montana Country Poets and Pickers, a group that has gathered for 25 years, meeting in Chinook for the last several winters. Dale's also a retired teacher, a former postal employee, a gunsmith and a self-described "Mr. F...
My wife joined a local home demonstration club after we moved to the Sweet Grass Hills. I had not thought about those clubs since I was a kid. When I was growing up in southern Illinois my mom was active in what was called a 'home extension club.' The ladies met regularly and extension agents presented topics on food safety and cooking, sewing, child rearing and topics related to running a successful household. I was interested to learn about the homemakers clubs in Blaine County (the clubs...
Correspondent's note: A fellow Chinook senior coffee drinker, Larry Wisch, asked me a few weeks ago if I'd ever heard about the weird event that happened to Ray Reid at the end of World War II. I finally connected with Ray on one of our trips back from Whitlash and he shared a remarkable story. Ray admitted, "I've forgotten some of the specifics, like the time of year and some other details. I wrote an essay about the experience for a class I took at teachers' college after the war. Now I can't...
Columnist's note: Alert readers may recall my request for information about snow planes in our area in a June, 2017 article in the "Journal." I got a few rumors from that appeal but if snow planes were ever used in Blaine County, they were scarce at best. Snow planes, also called 'snow cars' or 'air-sleds,' don't fly. They are lightweight enclosed conveyances for one to four passengers powered by a rear mounted engine that drives a propeller. Most snow plane bodies sit atop a front ski and two...
Columnist's note: When Sherry (my wife) and I moved to Whitlash mid-December of last year our plan was to leave about this time (December, 2019) when Sherry's year of pastor-in-residence to the Whitlash Presbyterian Church would be completed. She and the congregation decided to extend the arrangement until next fall. That gave us a second Christmas at Whitlash. Our first Christmas here was very sad and neither my wife nor I have a clear recollection of our first Christmas in the Sweet Grass...
South of the Border, Column No. 39 Columnist's note. The postmaster in Whitlash pointed me to a poster in the post office. The poster shows a photo of a young woman posing with a copy of a small book. The book is the first novel she wrote, "The Wild West," and published in the winter of 2017. Mariah Eide lives on a ranch outside Whitlash. The postmaster said, "I think you'll find an interesting story if you visit with Mariah and her family." I contacted Eileen Eide, Mariah's mother, and spent...
Vicki Kultgen is the Postmaster in Whitlash. She's also a ranch wife, a mom and a volunteer with a variety of community groups. And, she owns and operates Broken Mountains Signs, an online business that makes and sells "western and rustic styled home décor." Three years ago this busy lady started her sign business and has sold 1000+ of her personally designed signs that include scripture, quotes and sayings. The start of the business might be described as the 'perfect storm.' Vicki and her husba...
Senior friends in Harlem recently invited my wife and me to come for a visit and "help tell others about what is going on at the Harlem Senior Center." Being seniors ourselves, my wife and I always enjoy interacting and fellowshipping with others. We headed over to Harlem for lunch and "some visiting." As a senior I've become more aware of the pitfalls of retirement. Oh, it's nice to have more control of your time and maybe no longer have a full time job. But there's also a downside, it's easy t...
Columnist's note: I'd heard of cattle mutilations but when we moved to the Sweet Grass Hills (about this time a year ago) I began to learn about the specifics of these mysterious happenings. Bob Thompson and his family operate the 3U Cattle Ranch south of Whitlash. As we got to know the family our conversations turned to a cattle mutilation on their ranch in the summer of 2018. They had photos to document the carcass of a yearling left in one of their pastures. The photos were, well, weird and...
The Indian National Finals Rodeo, Inc. (INFR) held its 44th championship event the end of October in Las Vegas. At the latest Finals Eddie Hawley and his team roping partner, Myles John, won their second consecutive world title. No stranger to this international competition, it was Eddie's thirteenth time to qualify to compete at the INFR and his fourth time to win a team roping championship. Eddie grew up in Hays and graduated from Dodson High School in 2002. He and his family now live in...
Columnist's note: In the past three weeks two community gatherings were held at Liberty Hall in Whitlash. The Hall is a 103-year old community meeting place, the first building completed when more than a century ago the old town site was abandoned and moved to the current location. The hall was built before a permanent church building, though a congregation was already functioning. Early settlers recognized the need for community-wide gatherings and built a suitable place for them to happen....
Columnist's note: In prior columns I've written about folks making interesting contributions from their homes in the Sweet Grass Hills. Lauren Lauder Brown came to the Hills from Canada. She married B.J. Brown who grew up on a ranch in the east shadow of West Butte. The couple lives in the Oilmont area where B.J. does ranch work, Lauren works at Marias Veterinary Clinic in Shelby and does osteopathic work in both Canada and the U.S. Together the couple has a beef cattle herd. I met Lauren at a...
Columnist's note: Travelers in north central Montana are used to seeing pumpjacks (oil wells) dotting the region. Around Oilmont on the way from Whitlash to the I-15 access north of Shelby (on S-343) we pass a sizeable area of small, older-looking oil wells. Some are pumping, others seem to be idle. There's also a lot of abandoned buildings and equipment that were used to produce oil and gas. East of the town of Oilmont, about two and a half miles on the north side of the highway, there's a...
Many locals know Ken Finley as "the guy who gives away pumpkins for Halloween from his garden." For the last few years Finley has invited anyone, especially elementary school students and their families, to come out to his pumpkin patch and pick a pumpkin for Halloween. The pumpkin patch is part of a large garden Ken has each year along Cleveland Road next to the Chinook Water Plant. He said this year he even had a volleyball team from Hays-Lodgepole that stopped and picked pumpkins on their way...
Columnist's note: Forty-seven Hi-Line Travelers recently visited the Land of Enchantment with extended time in Santa Fe and Albuquerque, New Mexico. This was the third coach trip for the group made up of travelers from Glasgow to Chester and south to Polson and Chouteau. We even picked up a couple of new folks from Wyoming and Washington state. New Mexico was the 47th state, joining the U.S. in January, 1912. Interestingly, much of the state was already settled when the east coast of the U.S. wa...
Columnist's note: A few weeks ago a neighbor asked me to attend a meeting in Sweet Grass about feral swine. The invasive critters are also called feral pigs, wild hogs, razorbacks, Eurasian boars and a lot of expletives by farmers, ranchers, hunters and others. Any pig not penned or under human control is generally regarded as feral. The meeting was attended by 60-70 folks mostly from the U.S. They gathered to hear regional and national experts explain the challenges of dealing with feral pigs...
This is the seventh year that four local congregations in Chinook have hosted young adult volunteers. The Young Adult Volunteer program (YAV's) places volunteers at nine sites in the U.S. and six in foreign countries. Emily Osborn, from La Porte, Indiana, and Sophie Schreiber, from Sandy, Utah, arrived the end of August to begin their year of service in Chinook. They will work with various community and youth groups as well as church-related organizations. The local Presbyterian, Methodist,...
Columnist's note: In 2000, when my wife graduated from seminary and started a new career as a Presbyterian minister, we made an agreement: she had followed me and my career locations for about 30 years, now I would follow her and her career. While she pastored churches the arrangement has allowed me to try some interesting jobs in some far flung places-working on a grain farm in North Dakota, at a sugar beet plant in Minnesota, being a "toilet ranger" for the Forest Service in the Kootenai...
Columnist's note: The Sweet Grass Hills are blessed with some very talented individuals. Not only are there ranchers and oil/gas operators, there are teachers, nurses, bureaucrats, writers and artists, even a former engineer on the B-2 stealth bomber. Jesse Thompson who lives on a ranch south of Whitlash, is a spokesperson for both the Montana Wool Growers and the Montana Angus Associations. I was curious how Jesse balances helping her husband, Chance, on their commercial Black Angus cow/calf...
