Vintage Photo, January 30, 2012

By Donna Poulton

This vintage photograph of my grandmother is one of the images of which I am most proud.  Wearing a flapper dress in the early 1920s, she is sporting a pistol and sitting sidesaddle.  She was spirited and even though she lived on a Montana ranch 40 miles from the nearest town, she had style.

Credit: My-West.com © All rights reserved

Vintage Photo, January 25, 2012

Horse, Buggy and Fence. A vernacular photograph of the West, circa 1890s. From My-West.com's photograph collection.

© My-West.com Photography Collection. All rights reserved.

Vintage Photo, January 18, 2012

Cowboy with gun. A vernacular photograph of the West, circa 1920s. From My-West.com's photograph collection.

© My-West.com Photography Collection. All rights reserved.

One-room Cabins in the West

By Donna Poulton

Small get-away homes in the West are the perfect answer for a real vacation. One of my best friends has a small cabin, 12 x 13 square ft., and she invited 16 people to Thanksgiving dinner one year ... it is one of my best memories, but I'm not that ambitious or brave. For me the allure of a small cabin means less cleaning and upkeep and that translates to more time for me to do things .  Here's a list of things I'd rather be doing if I could spend time in any one of these one-room houses: 

1. Wade in a creek ... every day

2. Collect a big bouquet of wild flowers for the single table in my one-room house

3. Rev up my Patsy Cline CDs

4. Read Swedish detective novels

5. Photograph flowers and rainstorms

6. Lay in the grass and listen to the Aspen leaves rustle

7. Cook something new every day and invite a few friends to dinner 

8. Read a biography

9. Garden and I'd plant lots of artichokes

10. Did I mention reading a book?

Credit: My-West.com

Credit: My-West.com

Credit: My-West.com

Credit: My-West.com

Credit: My-West.com

Credit: My-West.com

Credit: My-West.com

Credit: My-West.com

Credit: My-West.com

Ten Tips for the Hayfield: The Race Against Summer, Part 2

By Bennett Owen

Big Hole Valley, Beaverhead County, Montana. Haying hand, Credit: Library of Congress

It’s one of my favorite sayings and comes from football legend Johnny Unitas: “It’s what you learn AFTER you know it all that counts.”  For us kids, a lot of that learning took place in the hayfield.  Good judgment comes from having lots of bad judgment. And I had that in spades:

• We learned quickly that bailing wire and a little ingenuity can fix just about anything. My grandfather once repaired a cracked engine block with a willow twig. It held all summer long.

Big Hole Valley, Beaverhead County, Montana. Haying hands. Credit: Library of Congress

• We also learned that liberal application of oil and grease keeps machinery running. And that was a good thing because a breakdown usually came with a sentence of cutting willows along the creeks and irrigation ditches – a fate worse than stacking.

• Come quitting time we’d put tin cans on the exhaust pipes of the tractors in case of rain. In the morning, if you fired up the engine without removing it, the can would fly about 20 feet into the air. We “forgot” a lot.

Big Hole Valley, Beaverhead County, Montana. Credit: Library of Congress

• ‘Weather’ was the only way to get a day off, so after a couple of weeks straight haying, we’d be down in the meadows after work doing our best imitations of Indian medicine men. As the old saying goes, “timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance.”

Hot coffee is always on the kitchen stove. Quarter Circle 'U' Ranch, Montana, Credit: Library of Congress

• To relieve the monotony while raking, I would always sing. Loudly. Because nobody could hear me over the roar of the tractor. Could they? 

• One of the proudest achievements of my young life was mowing all season long without a breakdown. That following a year of constant breakdowns because I was too lazy to pick up an oil can.

Big Hole Valley, Beaverhead County, Montana. Credit: Library of Congress

• The one redeeming value of stacking hay was the view from about 30 feet up but getting there was nothing but tough work.  Once as we were topping out a stack my Uncle Robert looked around and said, “I challenge anyone to come out here and do this 10 hours a day without some beef in their belly.”  For that moment I felt we were masters of all we surveyed. One of us actually was.

Beaverhead County, Montana. Hay meadow in the Big Hole Basin, Credit: Library of Congress

• Never get to the dinner table last.

Big Hole Valley, Beaverhead County, Montana. Haying hands eating dinner at the C-D ranch, Credit: Library of Congress

• There is no sweeter smell on God’s earth than mowing through a patch of spearmint along Grasshopper Creek.

Big Hole Valley. Beaverhead County, Montana, Credit: Library of Congress

And finally, a maxim to live by -

• Grandma was always right. Her admonition to be careful with the pitchfork fell on the deaf ears of an eight year-old hay digger eager to join the crew and clear hay from the side of the stack. About one minute after said warning, I jabbed a tooth of that pitchfork right through my toe leaving a neat hole in one of my new tennis shoes and turning its canvas color instantly from white to crimson.  I swore she’d never find out but … Grandmas know everything. And they’re always right.

Big Hole Valley, Beaverhead County, Montana. Stacking hay, Credit: Library of Congress