THE STORY OF MY LIFE
David E. Stephens
I was born at Pencader, Carmarthenshire, South Wales, July 31, 1850. I was the eighteth [sic] child of my parents. They were married quite young. Father was 22 and mother 19 when they were married. Their ancesters were quite noted authors. On fathers side there were quite noted ministers of the Independent Church as well as noted writers. And on mothers side there were noted writers too who nearly always took first prise [sic] at the Eisteddfod. They joined the Mormon church before I was born, about 1848. Father was made president of the Pencader branch of the Mormon church.
I was a good healthy child and started to work in the garden when I was three years old. I lived at home, as most children do, until I was 9 years old just doing chores, then I was put to work in the Carding Mill for two years, was paid 36 cents per week for my work. I lost my job there on account of the Civil War. The reason was that no cotton could be shipped from the Southern States, from where England got its supply, thereby throwing all the men engaged in weaving out of work and many starved to death.
The next job I got was on a farm, herding sheep through the summer and went to school for about four months in the winter, for only one winter, which was all the schooling I ever had in Wales. Welch [sic] was not taught as they were trying to wipe out the Welch [sic] language.
The next summer I got my same job back herding sheep and dry cattle. I brought the milch [sic] cows home at night and helped with the chores. I was 12 years old at this time.
When I was 13 I took a job of general hand on the farm, hired out for the whole year. I worked on that farm for the biggest part of four years. The whole family were Mormons and their main belief was that they should all emigrate to Utah to get away from the bad times that were coming to the world.
My sister Ann came to Utah in 1863. And my brother Tom in 1864. They sent enough money back to bring my father, mother and youngest brother, Evan, out in 1866. Mother felt very bad because she'd have to leave me behind, so she borrowed enough money from a friend to bring me along with them.
We left Old Wales about the last of May, 1866, were on the ocean 38 days in a sailing vessel, getting into New York on the 4th of July. We had to stay on the boat in the bay over night. A storm came up in the evening and that combined with the fireworks was one of the prettiest sights I ever saw.
Then we took a boat form New York to New Haven, Conn., and from New Haven to Montreal, Canada. The reason we had to go around through Canada was that the Mormon Church had contracted with the railroad to bring all the emigrants and they had to go there to connect up with the Grand Trunk Railroad. From Chicago to St. Joe, Missouri, we took the Illinois Central Railroad and went from there up the Missouri River on a boat to meet the ox teams at a point seven miles north of Nebraska City.
We had to wait at this point ten days for a company of Danes to come to make up the train which would cross the Plains.
We started witht he ox teams across the plains on the first of August. All the emigrants were supposed to walk unless they were sick or unable to walk.
We had a nice trip, no excitement to sepak of until we were crossing the South Platte. The river at the ford was 2 1/2 miles wide. They had to double the teams on account of the river bed being so sandy. All that were able had to ford the river. I walked across the river and in places the water was up to my arm pits. We were all ordered to keep above the teams so that if we should strike deep water we would float down against the teams. It took us all day to get all the wagons and people across the river but we had good luck and no bad accidents.
That night some folks from a near by camp came and stole some of our oxen. The three night herders went after the other camp and made them bring the oxen back.
The next day we had to cross the prairie, 20 miles, to the North Platte. That night on the North Platte they tried again to steal the cattle. The night herder gave the signal of trouble, which was three shots, and half of the teamsters, according to rules, went out to help, while the other half and all the emigrants were to stay and guard the camp. There was one little Danishman who didn't understand the rules and when he saw the boys rushing out he grabbed a hatchet, the only instrument of war he could find and went out to help. This gave the rest of the crowd a good laugh.
That was the only trouble we had during the whole trip. We had good weather and a good time. There were fifty wagons with which they formed a circle every night. The emigrants were supposed to stay inside of the circle. For amusement we had a dance nearly every night.
It was a rule that no one should go ahead of the Captain, who rode ahead on horseback to look for Indians, and no one should get behind the train.
We got to Laramie, Wyoming, the 26th of August, that being about half way. The next day we camped about ten miles from Laramie and I sneaked away from camp to climb the side hills to look for choke cherries and wild currants. I took a sample of them down to camp and the captain had the train lay over that afternoon to pick fruit. That was also where we saw the first sage brush.
It took us about fifteen days from there to the Green River over a high level country. That night after crossing the Green River we had about four inches of snow. We used to sleep under the wagons and we had to shovel the snow away before we could make our beds.
The country from there to Salt Lake was very mountainous. We went through Echo canyon. The sound echos so that the noise of one wagon sounds like a dozen. From Echo Canyon we went up to Weaver River, up the Weaver River to Coleville, the only settlement we passed through until we got to Salt Lake City.
When we got to Salt Lake we drove into what was called the tithing yeard, the teams were all released to go home, and our names were all taken. We were supposed to pay our emigration fee to the Emigration fund, which was a church fund used to help more emigrants to come to this country. Those who could not pay at the time were to pay 10% interest until it was paid. I paid mine three years later and it amounted $72.00.
Some of the folks from the Old Country came and took us to their homes, from the tithing yards, to stay a few days. My brother Tom came and took us to Willard City, Utah where he had a place engaged for father to runnin [sic] shares. Father stayed there four years. He had a job for me making molasses.
Sugar was about $2.00 per pound and most of the people there uses molasses for sweetening. Nearly all the settlers had a patch of cane. They took their cane to the mill and gave one third of the sorgum, or molasses for having it made. The way the molasses was made was by putting the cane through big rollers which pressed the juice out, the juice ran from the rollers into a big vat about ten feet long by five feet wide, and was divided into four compartments. The juice was heated to boiling in the first compartment and formed a thick skum which had to be skimmed off clean. Then it was moved into the next compartment where it still boiled and formed another skim not so dark as in the first vat. After it was boiled and skimmed in the second vat we moved it to the third. The skimmings in the third vat were nearly as good as the molasses. Children used to come and get it to make candy. The fourth vat was saved for preserving fruit.
People who had brought their cane to the mill also brought their fruit to have it preserved and I tended that too while watching the molasses. Some families put up as high as 40 gallons of peaches. My job was to tend the fires, keep them going, and skim the juice and after it had gone through the third vat to put it in the cooler to cool before it was put into barrels for the winter. I couldn't talk a bit of English so the man I was working for got Mrs. Tovey, a great grandmother of Dannie Tovey, to tell me what my job would be.
The man I was working for was a cabinet maker and wished to work at his trade so wanted some one he trusted to take care of the making of the molasses. When ever a batch was ready to take off I was to go to him and say "molasses ready" and he'd come and help me take it off. My job there lasted about fifty days and I was paid a gallon of molasses a day which was considered worth $2.00. I traded about twenty-five gallons of my molasses for a city lot in Willard. The balance father and mother used in the winter.
That winter I worked for the same man, helping him in his carpenter shop. I was not paid for my work in the winter just got my board. The next spring he wanted me to stay with him and learn the trade of cabinet maker, he offered me $12 a month and board to stay and learn the trade. All the other boys who learned the trade had to work four years for nothing and pay their instructors. I had rather work outside so turned the offer down and hired out to a farmer and went to work on his farm.
There people were all Mormons and I think they had more enjoyments out of life than any class of people I have ever known.
Most of their amusements were dances and literary societies. We used to have a dance once a week during the winter. The dances were run by the church and were opened and closed with a prayer. They were held from eight o'clock to twelve, never later and the price of a ticket was a peck of wheat, which was paid to the Bishop of the Ward who appointed a manager to run the dances. In these days there was no one who lived out side of what was called the Fort. The Fort was a section of ground set apart for the settlement, with a dirt wall built around it to protect the people from the Indians. The last time I was there, in 1914, I went to see parts of the old wall which were still standing.
Living in a Fort that way made it handy for people to get together for singing school or any other amusement. There was also what they called the Public Square, where the school house was and the children gathered there in the evening to play games and have good times in general. On the 4th of July 1867 was my first big time at the Public Square. The boys and girls were all togged up in their best but nine of them had shoes or stockings. I was awfully proud of my shirt. I was the only one who sported a brand new calico shirt. I had paid $65 a yard for it and the lady where I worked made it for me.
The man I was working for couldn't pay me any money. I was wanting money badly to send back to Wales to the man from whom Mother had borrowed the money, to pay my way to this country. So he gave me a steer, charging me $40 for him, which I took to Salt Lake, sixty miles, driving him all the way afoot. When I told them in Salt Lake knowing how badly I needed the money they took advantage of me and would offer me only $30 for him.
So I drove my little steer back home. On the way back I got very hungry, I didn't have anything to eat for about thirty-six hours. When I got through Ogden I saw a little cabin off the road and thought I'd go and beg something to eat. In those days I was very bashful on account of not being able to talk any English and tried to keep away from any place where I thought there might be any girls. I didn't think it likely there'd be any girls in the little cabin in the grove so I walked over and knocked on the door which was answered by two big girls. I came near fainting but was so hungry that I stood my ground and told them I was hungry and would like to get a piece of bread. The mother of the girls invited me to sit up to the table, they had just finished supper and take a good meal but I told her I had a little steer on the road and dared not leave him so to please give me a piece in my hand to eat on the road. So she took a great big griddle cake, split it and plastered it good with butter and handed me the whole cake. I took it and ate it very slowly as I walked along. It lasted me about an hour. I was afraid to eat it fast on account of being so hungry. I got home to Willard about 12 o'clock in the night, having been about 36 hours on the road from Salt Lake.
I wrote the man in the Old Country that I couldn't get the money for him and he wrote back to never mind that he was coming over to this country with the next emigration that came and he'd need the things I had and couldn't sell for money, such as wheat and molasses.
That fall I again worked at the molasses mill and when I was through there I went to school to a crippled teacher who was running a private school. He had 12 pupils, only three of whom are living now. (1932) So far as I know, they are Dan Tovey, Mrs. Bill Jardine and myself. I went to school four months at that time.
The next spring, 1868, I went to work for my brother Tom. He took up a place in the Promentory and hired me to work for him. There were three other, Louis Dischamp, Tom Davis and Zathenal Jones, went in with Tom and put in a crop of grain in order to hold their land.
Then I went back to Willard and worked the rest of the summer for Richard Davis on the farm. When we were harvesting the wheat the grasshoppers came so thick one day that they almost darkened the sun. The next morning the trees were all bare of leaves and the oats and barley were all cut down, they had eaten the silk and the leaves off of the corn and left the stalks standing like sticks. The wheat was the only crop that was saved from being damaged.
That fall there wasn't much sugar cane to be made into molasses, on account of the damage from grasshoppers, but I worked at the mill as long as there was anything to do. Then in the winter of 1868 and 1869 I worked at the Central Pacific Railroad. They were paying $2.00 cash per day and board. The government had given the railroad company the right to make greenbacks to carry the cost of the railroad, the railroad to pay the money back to the government. All the money was in greenbacks even to five cents [sic] pieces. It was only valued at 45 cents on the dollar of either gold or silver. Yet some of the men made a fortune. They'd buy eggs and butter at 15 cents and bring it to Bannock and Virginia City and other mining camps and sell it for a dollar a dozen and per pound and get gold dust in payment. They'd take the gold dust to the bank and get greenbacks. For one dollar in gold dust they'd get $2.00 in greenbacks. Then they'd use the greenbacks to buy their butter and eggs.
In the summer of 1870 after the railroad was there. [sic] Henry Jones, a cousin of mine, my brother Tom, and my brother-in-law, Louie Deschamp and I made up our minds to go to Malad and take up ranches and put up a crop of wheat together and then divide it in the fall. When fall came we had nothing to divide, the grasshoppers had cleaned it out. That fall and winter I went back to Willard and went to school again.
In the spring of 1871 I went back to Malad and took up land myself. I built a house for father and made my home with them that summer. Then in the srping of 1872 I hired out to old Lady Morgan, who had a bunch of milk cows. I worked for her twelve months. Then in 1873 went back to Malad and took up the homestead where I had staked on the land in 1871. The land wasn't surveyed in 1871 so we could not take it up at that time. We just had squatters rights and when the land was surveyed and opened up to the public, father and I were the first to file on our homesteads.
During the summer I went back and worked for old Lady Morgan again, and worked there until the spring of 1874. By that time it was necessrary [sic] for me to live on my homestead in order to hold it. I then went back to work for the old Lady Morgan again three hayings. It was there I met the girl whom afterward married. She was the grand-daughter of the man in the Old Country who had loaned mother the money to bring me to this country.
I told my girl, Margaret Myria Jones, I was looking for a wife to help make a home on my homestead and she said that just suited her. So we made it up to get married and take the old lady's place on shares so as to get a start but that winter my wife, we were married the 8th of December, 1874 found out she and the old lady Morgan couldn't get along together and we would have to live in her house if we took the place, so we didn't take it. We went up to work on the homestead and lived with father until I had our own house built.
The first baby was born March 15th, 1876. The baby was a boy which we named David Jones. He couldn't say Dave when he was little but called himself Dade and he has gone by that name ever since.
The next baby was a girl born October 4, 1877, she lived only a little over two months. She passed away December 24, [sic] Her name was Jane. Eliza Jane was the baby born February 18, 1882. Margaret was next, born February 6, 1884. Then Charlotte, born June 23, 1886. Mary Ann was born July 10, 1889. Nellie was born on December 23, 1891 then Alice, August 6, 1895.
In 1875 I took a contract of hauling logs to the saw mill. I was to get half and he was to furnish the oxen and the wagon. The mill was only about two miles from my home, so I could always be home nights to help with the milking.
I had six milk cows and a good team of horses, the best in the country at that time. They weighed about 1000 pounds each. The distance to go for the logs was about eight miles making sixteen miles a day. When the road was good I was able to haul 100 feet and they were paying $10.00 per thousand, which left me $5.00 per day. I worked part of the time at that and part of the time fencing twenty acres of my land on which to raise grain the next spring.
The grasshopers were awful bad that summer so I had to spend most of my time fighting them in order to save my grain. I had an irrigating ditch around the grain in which I put dams every little ways to keep the water still. Then I poured coal oil on top of the water and drove the grasshoppers into it. As soon as they hit the water the coal oil killed them. They finally became so thick in the ditch I had to clean it out so the water could run through. About the 20th of June the grasshoppers got wings and fly [sic] so the ditch didn't do me any good them [sic]. I had to get a new plan to get rid of them. The only way I found to keep them off the grain was by smoke. I put piles of brush around the grain and put green grass on top of the brush to make smoke. The hoppers always landed about four o'clock in the afternoon so at that time I would light the brush on the side from which the wind came and the wind would blow the smoke across the grain. The grasshoppers would not land in smoke. In this way I managed to raise about 250 bushels of wheat.
For the next five years about all I did was to raise a little grain and fight grasshoppers.
In 1881 I gave the place on shares to Dave Williams and I took a contract to cut cord wood for Fort Hall at $3.00 per cord. Then I went back to ranching again and fenced in about an acre of ground for a garden, set out apple and plum trees and started a small orchard there. By that time most of the grasshoppers had been killed by a small fly which laid their eggs under the grasshoppers wing and when the eggs hatched the worms ate the grasshoppers so that there was only a shell left. They were so thick that a heavy wind came up and blew them into drifts or piles. Then the seagulls came by the millions and cleaned up the crickets and what were left of the grasshoppers. There were so many seagulls that the East bench from Cherry Creek to Malad, about eight miles, and the only part I could see, was a solid patch of white. They ate so many hoppers and crickets that they'd go down on the barrens (an alkali strik where nothing grew) and spit them back out in piles.
In 1884 I put in quite a larger garden. I put in a crop of alfalfa joining the garden. And had a nice patch of water melons that year.
My neighbors [sic] boys were having fun comming [sic] in the night and stealing my melons. So I thought I'd have a share of the fun. The place they came into the garden they had to jump over the irrigating ditch to get in. So I drove stakes about two rods apart, across the path where they were jumping and strung a wire from one stake to the other to catch their foot when they jumped over.
Owen Ellis was telling me in after years how he caught his foot in the wire and fell on his back in the ditch, then he thought I was there with some kind of a hook grabing him so he started to run back and caught his foot again and fell into the water the second time. As soon as he got out of the water he ran up the road as fast as he could for about half a mile humping up his back and expecting a stick to land on it every jump. He thought I was after him with a stick.
At another time three brothers-in-law who lived above my place, with their mother-in-law, had a foot path down by my place that they used to take when they went to St. John. They would help themselves to melons sometimes. So I dug a hole about four feet square and four feet deep in the path to the garden. I filled it with water and threw some alfalfa on it so they wouldn't notice it (it wasn't noticeable even in the day time) and put coal oil on the water.
My two nephews Dave and Tom Thomas were the only ones who knew about these traps. Two of the brother's-in-law [sic] were working on the thrashing crew at St. John and they'd always use the path by my place. Merg Jones, one of the brother-in-laws got to bragging about how he could get some melons. Dave Thomas offered to bet him $5.00 he couldn't get a sack full out of my patch. So that evening they came over to try to get the melons. Two of them came and told me they had come to get a melon, the rest were hiding out behind the hill. I suspected that some of the boys were outside trying to steal some melons, so I took a shovel, a coat and hat and stuck the shovel up with the coat and hat on it right by the corn patch so the shoulders and hat showed about the corn. Then I sneaked around a patch of melons and back to the house with a melon for the two boys in the house. In a little while they came around the hill with their sack, into the garden, but seeing what they thought was me in the corn patch they were afraid to come to the melon patch. When the boys got ready to go I went out with them, telling them I was going to watch that melon patch tonight as there had been some bad boys coming there and kicking the melons around and breaking them up. So I went around again through the brush and back to the house and to bed. They kept peeking over the hill and watching the garden, all the time seeing the shovel with the coat and hat on it and
thinking it was me. They stayed there till day light, till I got up, without getting any melons, so lost the $5.00.
The next morning when they went by on their way home from thrashing, my wife and I were milking in the corral just around the hill out of sight of the garden. Morgan Jones told Tom, his brother-in-law to "Watch now for Dave and I'll go in and get some melons." He jumped over the fence into the garden and picked two big melons and had one under each arm coming out on the run and fell full length into the hole I had dug in the path. The next day when he went to work Dave Thomas smelled the coal oil on Merg's clothes so the crew got to know about it and Tom told the whole story how Merg went out of sight in the hole and they had a lot of fun over it. After that I was never troubled again and I raised melons for several years.
The years of 1885 and 1886 were very good years for crops, the grasshoppers having been cleaned up by the gulls.
In 1867 there was big excitement about the Big Bend country in Washington. The railroad, Northern Pacific, has just gone there. The government had given the railroad company every other section of land on both sides of the track for 40 miles clear across the country. The railroad company was boosting the land to get settlers to go out there and take up land. So my neighbor, Matthew Hill, my nephew, Tom Thomas and I went out to explore the country.
We started from Malad September 21, 1887, traveled on the old Montana freight road. We had to go through Western Montana and the Coeur d'Alene country because there was no road through the mountains.
At Red Rock we took the wrong road, after we had gone about 15 miles we found out we were on the Salmon City road so the next morning we started back to get on the Dillon road. When we had gone about four miles we stopped on the Dave Metlen's ranch to buy some oats for our horses. Dave Metlen was one of the old pioneers, one of the first settlers in the country. We got to talking with him about the country and where we intended to go and he told us we better not go on the old freight road, which went by Dillon and Deer Lodge and on to Missoula, as that country was all settled up and we'd have to pay for pasture or horse feed. He said we could go through the Big Hole, which was sixty miles nearer, and lots of grass for the horses. So we took the Big Hole road, went by Bannock and over the Grasshopper Divide to Big Hole. When we got to the top of the Grassopper Divide and looked down into the Basin I thought it was the prettiest country I ever saw. The Basin is about 65 miles long, North and South, and about 20 miles wide, East and West.
That night we camped at what is now called Jackson Hot Springs, there we got to talking to Fornier, he had been in Jackson since 1862. He tended horses for the stage company.
He gave us the history of the country all through the Big Hole. There were quite a few ranches taken up at that time, but not many fenced. He took up the ranch where the spring is. It is a fine spring, flowing about 40 inches of boiling hot water. Clark, on his return trip from the Pacific Ocean, camped at the Spring and hung a piece of meat in there to cook. It was done in 25 minutes.
The next day we came from the Hot Springs to Al Note's place. He was the first man to take up a ranch in the Big Hole. That afternoon we wrote letters and took them to Jim Geerys to the Post Office and went from there up Moose Creek and about three miles and camped for the night. The next morning Frank Dixon came along the road with us for about ten miles and was telling us what a good stick country the Big Hole was. Gibbonsville was a good sized mining camp in those days and was about 25 miles West. Anaconda about 78 miles North and Butte, the biggest mining camp in the world, about 90 miles Northeast, made good market for butter and eggs. So he got us quite enthuased [sic] over the country, expecially [sic] Tom Thomas who had quite a bunch of cattle and this was just the kind of a place he was looking for.
That night we camped on Trail Creek almost on top of the Divide. We had a big talk as to whether we'd come back and locate or go on and see Washinton. Matthew Hill and Tom both wanted to come back and take up land but I was in favor of going on. So after we had hitched up the horses, to settle the thing I promised to toss up a dollar, if it was head we'd go on, if tails, we'd come back.
Heads came, I won, and we went on. We went down through the Bitter Root to Missoula, reaching there the 9th of October. From Misosula we took the St. Regis road which goes through Frenchtown, Walla and Cour d'Alene. Got to Spokane on the 20th of October, went from then on West to Davenport forty miles west of Spokane. We found it wasn't safe to go into the Big Bend country on account of no water. There was good land around Daven port [sic]. There was a kind of grass grew there [sic] called Niggerwool which was so tough it took from 8 to 10 horses to plow it. The land around there had nearly all been taken up, but the people couldn't get crops in in time to pay their debts so all that was to be seen was little deserted cabins. They had borrowed money from the banks to buy farm implements and the banks had sold them out.
Since We [sic] couldn't go on to the Big Bend country we decided to turn back. We came back to the Northern Pacific railroad at Sprague and had to follow along the railroad on account of water. We had to get our water from the railroad tanks. The railroad had to put wells down through solid lava about 1000 feet. We travelled along the railroad for a hundred and ten miles to Pasco. West of Pasco is a big country called the Poluce country which is very silly. There was an old fellow telling us about the country. He said they started plowing at the bottom of a hill and plowed round and round tell [sic] they got on top, and then they had to get a block and tackle to let the team down.
From Pasco we went to Walla Walla. Walla Walla valley was very hilly but they raised good wheat there, some raised as high as 60 bushels to the acre. Wheat was very cheap there, selling for 40 cents per bushel sacked, at the railroad. So we decided we didn't want to go to that country and started for our homes in Malad.
We went from Walla Walla to Union City, Oregon and from Union City to Baker City, from Baker City, we came down the Burnt River, we were four days from Baker to Weiser, Idaho. From Weiser to Payette, Idaho and from there to Boise, Idaho. At Boise they had a curious way of dividing the water for irrigating. They had a water wheel they called an undershot, it had cups arranged on the side to dip the water out of the ditch and empty it into spouts. As the wheel came up the cups filled with water and as it went on over it emptied it into the spouts.
From Boise we started home to Malad. We took what was called the Old Kelton freight road.
About half way to Malad was the greatest curiosity I ever saw. It was the great lava field. It crosses about four thousand square miles. All the rivers on the north side were covered with lava. There was a place called Hagerman where all the rivers came out from under the lave [sic] and were called Big Springs. The Snake River seemed to be large a stream for the lava to cover. It formed into big banks and formed a series of Falls in the Snake River. The lowest down is called Salmon Falls, they have a drop of fifteen feet. Next is Twin Falls, they have a drop of about ten feet, the next is Shoneshone Falls with a drop of about two hundred feet. Next is American Falls, it has a drop of ten feet. The upper falls are called Idaho Falls with a drop of about ten feet also.
We got back to Malad November 20th, making just two months for our travels.
Tom Thomas and I thought it would be a good plan to go back to the Big Hole on account of shortage of water and dairy product and eggs being so cheap in Malad. Eggs were selling three dozen for
.............................................
out in trade. You couldn't get money for it.
So under these circumstances I thought it better to take my cows to the Big Hole where dairy products were valued three times as much as in Malad.
Tom Thomas and his brother were partners and had quite a bunch of cattle which they wnated to get into a good range. So in the spring of 1888 the Thomas boys moved up to the Big Hole. I couldn't get ready then so didn't move up till the spring of 1889.
There were Dan Tovey, George Tovey, and Jim Shivers and their families and myself and Tom Thomas who had gone back after a bunch of cattle. The rest of use had our cattle too. There were about 250 head of cattle all together in the bunch. I was cook for our bunch. We got there the 28th of April having left Malad the 6th.
My family, my wife, Eliza, Maggie and Charlotte and Mrs. Dan Tovey and little Dannie, six years old, came on the train and we met them in Dillon on the 19th of May. Dade came with the rest of us when we brought the cattle. Also Geroge Anderson and his brother, Joe. Dade, age 13, stayed home, and milked the cows and tended the chickens while I went to Dillon after the folks.
I hauled the timber and put up a two roomed house and calf pens before I went to Dillon. I had to haul the lumber for the floor of the house from Grandpa Francis' mill.
That summer turned out to be the driest ever known in the Big Hole making a very short hay crop. I didn't have my ranch fenced so so [sic] couldn't put up any hay and couldn't get the machines and managed to cut enough hay to pull through the winter.
The next spring, 1890, Dade and I dug a hole in the ground and threw the dirt out thinly over the snow to make it melt, so the cattle could eat the greass [sic] and by so doing saved out cattle from starving. The cattle got to know what we were doing and when they saw us digging a dole they'd came [sic] wading through the snow to us. I got the mail-carrier to bring me two sacks of wheat, we ground the wheat up in a coffee mill and spread it on wet hay, so as not to waste the wheat and fed it to the cattle. On April the 20 a chinnock wind came and melted the snow. By the first of May the hills were all green.
That summer Frank Pendleton, one of my neighbors, and I made a contract with the mining camp at Gibbonsville. They wanted to get all the butter we could make and would pay us 27 1/2 cents per pound for it. We were to deliver the butter to them every two weeks. Pendleton took it one trip and I the other so that we each had to make but one trip a month. They took our butter for two or three years, until the mill burned down. After that we used our hay for feeding beef cattle for the spring market.
I lived on the ranch until 1919 when I sold it to Charlie Priutt and give [sic] eight years to pay, taking a mortgage on the ranch for security. He went broke and wasn't able to pay so I had to take the ranch back in 1926. I then sold it to my son and gave him five years to pay. I again took a mortgage on the ranch and he pays 4% interest until it is paid.
