The HPR For Sale!

In mid December of 2008, our family decided to list our beloved HPR for sale with Hall and Hall Real Estate, the people (Dave Johnson) through whom we purchased the original HPR in the summer of 1995. Our family thoroughly enjoys our time at the HPR but our individual circumstances do not allow us to be at the ranch very often. We are feeling like we are paying for assets (e.g. LakeSide) that are not being “worked”, and not generating income or even sufficient family experiences to justify the cost.

Our family situations are such that we cannot resume the guest operation. We enjoyed hosting some of the finest people in the world over a period of a decade. To each of you who ever visited our ranch, we thank you for being such nice guests. Our lives are richer for having met you and shared with you a world-class Western experience on an authentic Montana working cattle ranch. We hope that you too cherish your memories of summers at the HPR. We wish you health, happiness, and success in all your endeavors.

Ken and Marie Duncan and Family

Blocking the HPR

Over a period of 12 years we purchased and assembled, i.e. “blocked”, 6 ranches (actually 7 but we couldn’t hold on to one of them) in southwest Montana. The initial lynchpin ranch was the historic Horse Prairie Ranch, owned and developed by tough homesteaders, including three generations of the Hughes family (George, Emerson and Denton). We first saw the HPR on President’s weekend in 1995. It was a cool, beautiful day that didn’t seem to know whether it wanted to be one of the last days of winter or one of the first days of spring. The snow was spitting but there was purity in the air and the feeling of new life, with baby calves in several pastures and corrals. We purchased the HPR that summer and improved it substantially, especially the LakeSide guest area, so that we could supplement our income by hosting guests and so that we could “work our assets” and turn them into income.

One of the most satisfying and frustrating aspects of owning a working cattle ranch in southwest Montana is that you have this deep desire to only own that land that borders you! It’s fortunate that there is a patchwork of public and private lands in the West or the task of blocking one’s ranch would be very frustrating, i.e. more land than money to buy it. In other words, public lands function as barriers to unbridled expansion! Blocking a ranch has several benefits, including obtaining privacy, ease of management (e.g. pasture rotations, access to USFS pastures, etc.), gaining borders with public lands, and marshalling water rights.

Within a year of purchasing the HPR the Old Prohosky Place became available. Gaylon Zonner, who managed the small (714 acres) ranch, had tipped off our manager at the time, Eldon Ayers, of the owner’s interest in selling and Eldon immediately informed me. The neighbor, Donny Hilger, would have liked to acquire the ranch also. I moved quickly and through our very able attorney, Carl Davis, got in contact with Temple Sloan, owner of the Bar Double T (which owned the Old Prohosky Place), and purchased the ranch with a down payment and a note back to Sloan. The Old Prohosky Place was strategic to the HPR for its hay and lush meadows. It also bordered the HPR and had a BLM allotment with two pastures. At one time the ranch also had a nice Cow Camp, just north of the HPR, bordering USFS lands and with a 175 Cow/Calf USFS grazing permit. The late Ruby Prohosky once told me that she lost the Cow Camp to some slick real estate maneuvering by a couple of local real estate agents who somehow sold off the Cow Camp to some out-of-state hunters, who then constructed a hunting lodge (e.g. small bedrooms, inadequate restrooms, and small windows). Then somehow when Bill Wellborn was running the Prohosky Place the 175 Cow/Calf permit was lost. Due to the real estate maneuvering the Prohosky Place was bifurcated and it would take another 12 years before the old Prohosky Cow Camp and original deeded lands would once again be under common ownership. One of the keys to the Old Prohosky Place is the Prohosky-Mansfield Ditch or Canal, which diverts water from Horse Prairie Creek, in the canal, through the old Pierce place, and to the Old Prohosky Place and southeast areas of the Cross Ranch (e.g. Mansfields). The water is a late right but as Ruby Prohosky used to say, “Get that damn water on early before the neighbors need it and you will have one of the greenest, most productive ranches in the valley”. We named the Old Prohosky Place Lower Horse Prairie Ranch or LHPR. LHPR also has its own barn, shop and two homes. Although a big bite financially, following on the heels of the purchase of the HPR, the LHPR has proven to be very valuable to the overall operation of the HPR.

One of the next, very strategic purchases (actually a lease with an option to purchase) was the Old Pierce Place. A Dr. Robert Biddle from Kentucky had purchased the ranch and it was not to his liking so he put it up for sale. The ranch is one of the best hay ranches in Beaverhead County, and included more than 2,000 deeded acres plus very nice BLM and USFS allotments. I negotiated the lease and option right under the noses of two large and aggressive ranchers in the valley, Bill Staudenmeyer and Roger Peters. We signed the deal and stocked up. In three years, when we had to exercise our option, I could not come up with the required million dollars. I had been hit with too many legal bills and our fledgling technology company was still not on track. I approached both of the neighbors. Roger gave me a $20,000 non-refundable check (which I later returned to him) but then couldn’t get the million himself. Bill also couldn’t come up with the million but he had recently sold his Dillon place to Parmenter, who briefly owned the HPR at one time, and had plenty of trade dollars in the bank. I sold my lease with option to purchase to Bill. Biddle didn’t want to sell to Bill and I had been able, right up to the time of closing, to keep the information from Biddle (the option agreement did not require that I inform him of the name of an assignee). Biddle drove his motor home to the ranch the day before it was to close and saw at the ranch Will Staudenmeyer, Bill’s son. He became incensed and said that he would not pay the nearly $230,000 equipment credit. I was able to settle him down but I had to eat the $230,000………thanks a lot Will! The Pierce Ranch, which we called South Horse Prairie Ranch or SHPR, would have been invaluable to the HPR. But it was simply not to be so Staudenmeyers, who couldn’t negotiate a purchase themselves and who also didn’t have the cash but had trade dollars thanks to Bill’s dad, Les, assembling a tremendous amount of property in Beaverhead County, got the Biddle ranch.

One of the next ranches that became available was Dick Robert’s Brown Canyon Ranch, just northeast of the Old Prohosky Cow Camp, which is now called Elk Haven (we now refer to it as Forest Lodge). Dick’s place was small but had several miles of USFS boundary, a head gate on Brown’s Canyon Creek that predates the organization of the USFS (so they cannot dictate what we do with it), and good spring range. I found out about the Robert’s place from Gary Love at State Bank & Trust in Dillon. State Bank & Trust financed the acquisition of the Robert’s place and it has worked very well with the rest of our ranch.

Within a year we learned of the death of Ruby Prohosky, our old friend who lived on 9 acres and a home and several nicely kept outbuildings within the LHPR. We worked with Ruby’s daughter to consummate the acquisition of Ruby’s Place. Ruby’s home is a lovely home and it was an inholding that needed to be back with the LHPR. Ruby you rascal, you left a lot of work for me to do but I am happy to put your original ranch back together!

The other third of the Robert’s place (the Bill and Virginia Wellborn Place) that Dick Roberts never purchased from Ned Wellborn, remained in Bill and his daughter Virginia’s hands. Virginia was fond of diverting the water from Brown’s Canyon Creek to her property, just below UHPR. I had worked with Bill and finally got him to persuade Virginia to sell me their place. It is a nice place that borders the UHPR and our North Seeding BLM pasture.

The most difficult purchase was the last one………isn’t that just the way it goes! The Old Prohosky Cow Camp, known as “Elk Haven” (now known as “Forest Lodge”) ever since the real estate agents and developers built the hunting lodge and split it away from the LHPR, was owned by two businessmen from Arizona and Washington (Leon Gale and Phil Boshaw). I made an overture in 1995 to purchase Elk Haven for several hundred thousand dollars. In early 2000 I made an additional overture for approximately three quarters of a million dollars. My offers were turned down but then in about 2003 the owners started contacting me. They had had the property listed for years for $1.5MM. Elk Haven was on the market until late 2006, when I was informed that a U.S. Government firearms contractor wanted to purchase the property because of its remoteness, to test firearms for the government! The owners contacted me and said that I should have first crack at the purchase and that they would sell it to me for $100K less than they would sell to the other buyer. I had to refinance our entire two MetLife loans to acquire this property. It is, however, nice to know that we got the old Prohosky Place back together again. Ruby should be smiling on the other side!

I love activities that kind of turn back the history clock, to make things more like they used to be. Blocking a ranch in the Horse Prairie Valley has been such an activity. Usually, one gets only one opportunity in a life time to acquire a neighbor’s ranch. Our family has been blessed to experience this many times.

Men of the HPR

In recent blog entries I have paid tribute to women of the HPR and Horse Prairie Valley. Now I want to pay tribute to some of the men who have worked at the HPR. I wouldn’t presume to speak for any former employees of the HPR but I think that our times at the HPR were so rich, fun, and rewarding that we would all like to just freeze time and spend forever at the HPR. This is one of the unique challenges of being an absentee rancher. Of all our family and employees of the HPR I have probably spent the least amount of time at the ranch. Yet, it has always and will always be my goal to get in a situation where I can spend more time at the ranch. Some absentee ranchers may be absentee by choice……I am an absentee rancher by circumstances. I have had to be disciplined to not lose my head and prematurely spend more time at the ranch. Our small technology company has too much potential for me to turn my back on it.

Some of the great guys we have worked with over the years include the following:

· Mackey Hedges --- Mac was our first manager of the HPR. Mac was hired from the huge Deseret Ranch in northeast Utah. Mac was of the old school. He was smart and a hard worker. He rose early and was good at keeping in contact via email. Mac was an accomplished author, having written and published the book “The Last Buckaroo”. Mac could really spin a yarn; tell a story or a joke. He had a great sense of humor too. Mac was given the responsibility to help us develop our guest operation and he had a good attitude about the challenge. Mac was up for almost anything. I remember when he took our team of draft horses pulling a chuck wagon to the top of the ridge above our LakeSide guest area. Marie was in the wagon and the view was great but Marie could imagine the horses spooking and running down the ridge (mountain). Marie’s imagination along with some sound judgment caused us to get the team and their cargo and wagon off the mountain ASAP. On another occasion I was driving around the ranch with Mac and saw some expensive, precious mineral in a pile on the ground. I asked Mac why it was not in a container and off the road a bit. He said that that’s the way all ranchers do it! At this moment I knew that we were due for an upgrade in our manager.

· Urs Schmidlin --- I will never forget riding off the U.S. Forest Service lands in the Beaverhead Mountains one summer evening with Urs Schmidlin. It was getting dark in the thick timber but we made it out onto the foothills before it got too dark to see. It was a beautiful evening. Urs had been recently hired by Mac (he had also worked at the Deseret ranch). As we emerged from the forest I popped the question to Urs as to whether or not he would like to be the manager of the HPR. Urs was stunned. I assured him that he had my complete confidence, that I knew that he could do the job. Mac eventually relocated to another ranch in Nevada and Urs dove into the manager’s job and has never looked back. I have worked with Urs and watched him learn to AI Heifers, raise Bred Heifers, adopt the raising of natural Beef, buy Bulls, host guests, become an outfitter and Big Game guide, learn about managing the nutrition of livestock, etc. etc. Urs can learn anything and will do the tasks well. I trust Urs with virtually anything to do with the ranch. He knows technology and manages the HPR with as much professionalism as any ranch manager in the western U.S. In addition to being a great ranch manager, Urs is a great father and a loving husband. Urs’s wife is Laurie and they have a daughter, Allison, and three sons: Jared, Brian, and David. We are pleased that the Schmidlins were able to recently move into the RanchView home at the HPR (above Headquarters).

· Elias Cervantes --- Elias, who is in charge of irrigating, fencing, feeding and many other duties at the ranch, had worked at the HPR for a few years when we arrived. Elias knows every foot of the HPR. He is a master irrigator, the envy of all ranchers in the Valley. Elias, which is nearly the rule with his culture, is always willing to do whatever is asked of him. He works hard……always, and is loyal to the HPR. Although he does not ride much now, I have seen Elias ride a horse and he is very good. I think that he prefers to work on the ground. Elias lives in a home at Headquarters with his wife, Maria, their two daughters Marianna and Annamaria, and their son Rudolpho.

· Jacob (Jake) Bingham --- Jake was a college student when he first came to work at the HPR. Jake was so good that we had him back for several summers and eventually hired him as an Assistant Manager of the HPR. Jake soon got an opportunity to ranch in Oregon with his family. Jake was one of the John Wayne’s of the HPR. He could do anything and do it with class. Jake was good looking and very photogenic. Guests, especially the women, loved to be photographed with Jake. Jake fell in love with Wendy Wooten, also a long-time wrangler at the HPR, and they now have two children and their own ranching operation.

· Devon Thompson --- Jake directed us to Devon, a fellow rancher and cowboy from Oregon. Devon not only worked as a wrangler for years at the HPR but also as a Big Game hunting guide. Devon was another modern John Wayne. So bold, so daring, and so competent at everything. Devon was an excellent athlete, on or off a horse. Devon married Kathy Carnahan, also one of our former summer wranglers (but they didn’t meet at the HPR). Devon was a great help to Urs. He was an amazing mechanic………..that’s when you’ve got a good hand, when they can both ride and fix equipment!

Other great guys who helped us build the HPR are our sons, Matt and Marc, and our sons-in-law, Nick Efstratis and Marriott Murdock. We also had a lot of help from our friends and extended family. Lucky are the men who have worked at the HPR!

I pay tribute to these wonderful guys who did so much for the HPR.

HPR in Winter 2007

Sorry about the hiatus from blogging. One of the characteristics of an absentee ranch owner is that he is absent from the ranch much of the time……in my case tending technology in Utah. We have been very busy at NetDocuments (netdocuments.com) and I have not been able to spend the time at the ranch that I would like to.

Marie and I finally got to the ranch on Christmas day (actually about 10:30 p.m. that evening). As we turned left off Mansfield Lane onto Bachelor Mountain Road we saw several Elk in the lane, between the two fences, along both sides of the road. Looking off to the east with the light of a full moon, into our Upper Mailbox field, we could see hundreds of Elk. It’s always nice to see Elk on the ranch and to contribute to the coffers of the Montana Department of Natural Resources budget by feeding the Elk. The Elk feed on deeded pastures in the evenings, and then they return to Bachelor Mountain for the day. I got up early the next morning hoping to catch them with my camera but I was too late. I did see several hundred Antelope, also availing themselves, as they do year round, of our precious HPR forage.

Following a day in Dillon (always required), I was able to spend the next day helping Urs and Elias chute-brand and ear tag 100 Bred Heifers. In the early morning when we got started it was zero degrees. By late afternoon it had warmed up to the low teens. We were so busy that we really didn’t notice the cold temperatures, especially when the sun shone, which was most of the day. It was also fun to see the next generation, Jared Schmidlin and Rudolpho Cervantes, learning to do ranch work. They worked and played together well.

I love to work Heifers…….they are so cute, curious and full of spunk. If they are lucky (e.g. healthy) they will get to enjoy the HPR for 10-12 years. The photos show some of the last Heifers to get clipped (we do this before we brand them, in case they have another brand beneath their think winter coat of hair), have all ear tags removed and get a nice royal blue HPR ear tag. Notice Elias applying the electric brand and the Heifers all leaving the working corrals to return to the Lower Lane field where they can forage on HPR grass.

While Elias was feeding and Urs was doing other winter jobs (e.g. breaking ice, feeding grain to the horses, etc.), Marc, Lindsay, Marie and I drove to Elk Haven to start some winter games, which included snowmobiling, cross-country skiing, ice skating, and snow shoeing. The weather was sunny with intermittent snow flurries. Marc spent hours clearing the snow off a portion of the lake so that people could ice skate……….it worked!

I also took Marc and their dog, Sundance, on a 4-wheeler ride to the Antelope and Scobey pastures to see the new jackleg fence that Elias and Urs completed to fence off Painter Creek. This project will not only preserve the Westslope Cutthroat Trout habitat in Painter Creek, where some of Montana’s purest strain of Westslope live, but also help us to more effectively and efficiently graze the portion of our large Scobey pasture that is west of Painter Creek. Cows are no different than other undulates, including wildlife, i.e. given the opportunity on a hot summer day they will graze under the trees along Painter Creek, where the grass if very green and easy to get to.

Speaking of wildlife, the first evening that we were at the ranch this trip, just as I was climbing into bed, I looked out the window and saw a Moose right outside our bedroom window. As he slowly made his way around the cabin, walking a few feet, then putting his snoot into the snow, and repeating this as he walked around the cabin, then towards our SUV, stopping to smell and listen, I could not help but think of his thoughts of sharing LakeSide with the human species. I know that animals think and feel. On an earlier trip to the HPR as we drove up to the ElkView cabin we saw two large Moose in the light of our headlamps. One slowly lumbered over the jackleg fence, then watched from the other side as the second one followed suit. The second one got over with his two front legs but then couldn’t quite complete the jump with both back legs. Seeing the second Moose apparently caught, the first Moose started back to help his companion. Just as the first Moose started toward the second Moose the second Moose broke loose and pulled himself across the top rail of the jackleg fence and onto the ground.

Our work and play at the HPR just before the end of 2007 was glorious. We didn’t get cold outside working and playing, enjoyed a full moon, and had great meals prepared by Marie, including candle light dinners featuring HPR natural tenderloin Beef steaks cooked on an outside BBQ. Oh how sweet is RanchLife!

As for hosting guests during the summer of 2008, we won’t be doing it a second summer. We have decided to continue to “rest” the ranch, our staff, and our family.

Pearls of the Prairie

• In a recent Blog I wrote about Ruby Prohosky, a “Ruby in the Rough” who enriched our lives in the Horse Prairie Valley. In addition to Ruby, there have been numerous other “Pearls of the Prairie”, many of whom predated our family’s connection to the Horse Prairie Valley. These women, in their own way and time, have been as shining as Ruby.
  
  The first “pearl” of the Valley that I would like to praise is my wife, Marie, who with our manager, Urs Schmidlin, developed a world class guest business and ran it for more than 10 years, missing her family and all typical summer activities, such as family reunions and vacations. Pitching the ranch and taking reservations all year long, worrying about every detail of serving meals, ensuring that cabins were clean, etc. was all consuming to Marie. Marie did not grow up dreaming of working on a cattle and guest ranch in Montana! She was also not a natural outdoor person. She also was not a gourmet cook, although she raised and fed 5 children. When I purchased the HPR Marie had no idea what she was in for. But she dutifully went along. At first she was reluctant, and then her enthusiasm grew over the years. She dressed Western, she rose long before dawn, she managed difficult guests, and always kept an eye on the wranglers. Marie saw more camping and Dutch oven cooking in the first few years of managing the guest operation at the HPR than she saw all her life growing up in an all-girl family in southeastern Idaho. Marie learned to supervise, to praise, to constructively criticize, to motivate, and to reprimand. She became a world-class chef, hostess, and manager. I will always love Marie for being such a great partner in every way, including putting the HPR on the international map of world-class guest ranches.
  
  In addition to Marie I pay tribute below to other women of the Horse Prairie Valley who are tough, yet feminine, and who have left their fingerprints on the Valley and our lives:
  
  · Sabine Hagedorn Duncan --- Bine is the only person I know who ever purchased an airline ticket from Frankfurt, Germany to Butte, Montana (“Buttie” as she first pronounced the name). One evening while at our home in Utah I received an email from a young, 19-year old girl from Bavaria, Germany, who wanted to work for a summer on a Montana working cattle ranch. I told Marie that it might be nice to allow such a young lady to fulfill her dream. We called Bine and also visited with her parents, Siggi and Doris Hagedorn. We were convinced that Bine would be a great addition to the ranch and her parents were comfortable with allowing her to have the adventure. When it came time to pick up the German girl from the Butte airport our son, Matt, was the first volunteer. My he looked good all dressed up as a Cowboy! They first met at the airport, had a wonderful and romantic summer at the ranch, got married, and today live in Utah with their beautiful daughter, Lisa. Bine was a good wrangler and employee. She is fond of relating to us her first day on the ranch when she, along with the rest of us, learned that our cook, Jeannie Beirny, and her husband, had been brutally murdered on their ranch by their son, who was that day at large in the area. As Bine watched these events played out, with wranglers carrying guns, a manhunt, and us all looking for a new cook, she thought that she really had come to the wild, wild West.

• Wendy Wooten (Bingham) --- Wendy from Oregon was one of our finest wranglers. Wendy always had a cool head and was so helpful to guests. She also knew cattle and livestock and could ride with the best of them. Marie really relied a lot on Wendy for nearly every aspect of the guest operation. There was nothing that we could not trust Wendy to do at the HPR. Wendy was so cute that she caught the eye of a male wrangler named "Jake", also from Oregon. Jake and Wendy are one of today's finest ranching couples and we are delighted that they are able to be ranchers in Oregon, as tough as it is.
  
  · Jeannie Beirny --- Our first professional chef. Jeannie would show up at the HPR in the early morning hours to ensure that all of the meals for the day were prepared and ready for the guests and staff. She lived at the “Bierny Place” with her husband, whose father was a miner from Butte and who had homesteaded their ranch across the Valley, digging one of the ranch’s main ditches by hand. Then one morning Jeannie didn’t show up for work. We didn’t know Jeannie well but we knew that she was punctual and could cook and that she was dependable. We had heard about her son’s troubled life and were saddened to learn that this son wiped out his entire family, including eventually himself. He tied up his parents in the basement of their home, and then set the home on fire. We soon saw the plume of fire towards the Beirny ranch on that dreadful morning and knew that something really bad had happened at the Beirny place.
  
  · Karen Morrow --- Our second chef, who came to the ranch with her friend, Rick Morrow, and who married Rick in the Old Red Barn at the HPR. Karen was a former Miss Idaho and graced the HPR with a touch of class. Karen knew how to dress up and had a charming and calming disposition. She was a good friend to Marie. She taught us how to professionally host.
  
  · Sherrie Brown--- Sherrie was a chef and then continued to clean cabins at the HPR. She always worked hard and was always willing to do any chore we asked her to do. Sherrie also drives the mail in the Horse Prairie Valley. Sherrie grew up in the Ennis area, on a ranch. She has always worked hard………always.
  
  
  · Sherrie Moseley --- Sherrie grew up in Kansas and always loved horses and the West. Sherrie worked for us for two years, living at the ranch through the fall of 2006. Sherrie was selling women’s clothing in San Diego when we found her. Sherrie is as good at customer service as anyone we have ever worked with. Sherrie was also as good at giving arena riding instructions as anyone we have known. She was tough, feminine, and refined.
  
  · Laura Schmutz --- One of the first and most talented woman wranglers we ever hired was Laura from Louisiana. Laura sent us a very impressive video of her roping and handling a horse. Laura returned to the HPR for several summers and also to get married to another HPR wrangler. I saw Laura once man (woman) handle a Bull as well as anyone. Laura was smooth and elegant on a horse. She had that southern Bell beauty and manners and made a great contribution to our ranch.
  
  There are, of course, others, including another daughter in law, two daughters, and a mother-in-law. There are also Laurie Schmidlin and Marie Cervantes, who have supported their respective husbands at the HPR for more than a decade. We also enjoyed the very professional services of the Carnahan girls, Cory and Kathy, from Oregon (Kathy will soon marry one of our male wranglers, Devon Thompson).
  
  The ranch would have never succeeded and the Valley would not be the same if it were not for the “Pearls” in the Valley. I honor them for their contributions to the HPR and the Valley.
  
  In another blog entry I will write about some of the outstanding "Men of the Horse Prairie Valley"!

"Resting" The HPR

I will never forget the day I first saw the HPR. It was a spring day on the second weekend in February of 1995. There was no snow on the ground but it was spitting in the air in that warm “devil beating his wife” snow and sunshine weather. I remember seeing baby calves with their proud and caring mothers feeding on the windrows in the expansive pastures, which seemed to want to burst forth for the spring season. It was like a contest between the spring sunshine and winter’s last snow flakes. Spring was winning the contest. The beautiful Old Red Barn at the headquarters was standing stall and still, like a huge mother looking after her young ones. It was quiet, yet there was a hustle and bustle in the air because of calving season.

We then drove north from headquarters for 2 ½ miles to what is now known as the LakeSide guest area. I was amazed by the quality and quantity of the improvements. The only human being we saw at LakeSide was a young Idaho Cowboy and his wife who lived in the ElkView cabin. The Cowboy was laid up and on crutches from a horse mishap. As a business person who could not afford to purchase assets that didn’t contribute income to the ranch operations, my mind began to consider options.

As I contemplated what we might do with LakeSide, it didn’t take long to think of the lone cabin we passed near today’s HPR entrance gate and wonder how much it could contribute to the ascetics of the beautiful LakeSide area that was between the headquarters of the ranch and the Forest Service pastures, and how it could complement the other cabins at LakeSide and produce income.. I inquired of the then manager of the HPR if anyone had thought of moving the cabin (today’s AspenView cabin) to the LakeSide area. The manager responded that such a project would cost more than $10,000………I could see that he didn’t have the vision. I called around and found the Pesanti moving group in Butte. I could tell from my phone call to Pesanti that he was up for the challenge. We moved the cabin a few months later at a cost of $6,000! It was quite a site to see that cabin being pulled across the prairie for more than 3 miles to a place where it would look so natural and become a “working asset”.

We then had to replace the previous owner’s woodworking area of the three-car garage with an office, store, and pantry. Then we removed the screening (we love the bugs in Montana) from the back deck of the LakeView cabin and remodeled the cabin. One of the next projects was to outline a loop, a gravel road that would allow us to connect all the cabins, barn and lodge together in a compound. I remember taking the 4-wheelers and outlining the road. Our sons thought that it was great that I would outline the path of a future road and allow them to ride 4-wheelers on it.

We then planned for a lodge. At first, I thought we would just build a pavilion, enclosed on three sides. How naïve of me to not consider the weather in Montana. We soon enclosed the lodge and my family has enjoyed teasing me about that idea for years. The lodge turned out to be very functional and efficient for hosting meals for guests. Much of our planning was just lucky. We had never designed a commercial kitchen or dining area. The credit goes to Marie for successfully finishing off the lodge. We even constructed a studio apartment above the Lodge.

Now, where would we house wranglers and kitchen staff, who needed to be onsite at LakeSide? Our predecessor owner had constructed a very nice guest barn with a loft above. We would feed our horses with large round bales and would not need the loft. What a wonderful place to build a couple of apartments. The stairs were steep but they kept the wranglers in shape!

Our predecessor also constructed and stocked a 2 ½ acre fishing pond with Rainbow trout but the two streams on our ranch (Browns and Painter) contain some of the purest strains of Montana’s native Westslope Cutthroat. We worked with Montana’s Fish and Game Department and soon obtained approval to have the first recreation lake in Montana authorized to be stocked with a pure strain of Westslope Cutthroat Trout.

We converted small storage sheds to laundry and freezer buildings and a wood and boat house. We drilled wells and planted thousands of square feet of grass. We returned a small stream to its original location and diverted spring water to flow through it to the lake. We planted wild flowers, graded roads, cleaned up timber, etc.

We hope that we made LakeSide an area where summer guests could come and enjoy an authentic RanchLife adventure. Over the past 10 years we have hosted hundreds of people for one-week RanchLife adventures. I recall the first guests we ever had…….a honeymoon couple from Virginia, with whom we still have contact. Through the blinds of the LakeView cabin we watched intently and nervously as the couple emerged from the AspenView cabin on the very first day of the HPR ever hosting guests. We wondered what we would do with them. We were so green at this dude ranch business. It seemed like such a difficult thing to do compared with raising Cows! From that first moment of guests stepping out of their cabin into an adventure of their lifetimes, we have never looked back. We have hosted the nicest people on earth at the HPR. We stuck with it and broke our necks to host people for more than 10 years and it is now time to give us and the HPR a rest, at least for 2007.

We have decided to “rest” the ranch from our guest operation for the 2007 season. Our primary reason for “resting” the ranch from our guest business is to give Marie and the ranch back to our family during the summer months. The most painful aspects of running the guest operation were to see Marie distracted from hosting our family who visited the ranch and to have our family feel like strangers at the ranch. In addition to our own rest, we want to focus on weed control, pasture development and utilization, jackleg fence improvements, flower boxes, fencing blinds around utilities, and many other projects that have been on our project list for more than 10 years. We will see how things go during 2007 then make a decision on what we do in the future.

For those of you who have enjoyed the HPR over the past 10 years, we thank you so much for coming and getting to know us and helping us do our ranch work. We will miss you and know that you will miss the HPR.

During the past 10 years our family and the HPR have truly survived draughts, earthquakes, mortgage payments, grasshopper infestations, the federal government, environmentalists, lawsuits (plural, unfortunately), absence from family, lots of driving in dangerous conditions, deaths, low cattle prices, energy crises, and a struggling technology business. It is truly miraculous that we have been able to keep the HPR. It is a jewel in the Prairie and we will love it forever. Our lives are changing, we hope, generally, for the better.

We will maintain our web site so that you can virtually visit us at your convenience. You will also want to monitor our site for announcements about future plans. We also hope to hear from you as to how your lives are going.

I thought it might be of interest to you on what we will miss and what we will not miss hosting guests at the HPR. We will miss greeting, hosting, and RanchLife adventuring with the finest people on earth; we will miss working with a great staff of wranglers and kitchen staff; we will miss evenings of Cowboy poetry, singing country songs, and listening to our neighbors Ron and Megan play and sing and, yes, even Megan’s dancing! We will miss the good food.

We will not miss filling out government forms and government audits of our small operation. We will not miss Montana’s business-unfriendly taxes, such as unemployment and worker’s comp. We will not miss frequent traffic on dirt roads and the associated wear and tear on vehicles, safety, and the dispersion of weeds.

Again, thank you for your friendship and business……it’s not often that these two can mix so nicely. All the best to you and your families in 2007.

Regards,

Ken & Marie Duncan
Urs & Laurie Schmidlin
Elias & Marie Cervantes

A Shining Ruby in the Horse Prairie Valley

In our twelve years of owning the Horse Prairie Ranch in the Horse Prairie Valley there have been a number of outstanding, strong, and beautiful women whose lives have graced the Valley. These women have in common a love for and experience with the Valley. They didn’t all have the same skills but they were incredible performers, in many ways outdoing their fellow gender. Not only was the Valley graced by these women but their lives were also touched by the Valley. No matter what circumstance it was that brought these ladies to the Valley, they survived and, today, must have the fondest of memories about their lives in the Horse Prairie Valley.

I want to spotlight one of the women of the Horse Prairie Valley. She was one of the Valley’s oldest and toughest women. Her name was Ruby Prohosky. Within a year of purchasing the HPR, we had the opportunity to purchase another contiguous ranch, which had been mostly homesteaded by Jim (and John) and Ruby Prohosky. Jim and his brother John arrived in Dillon on the Immigrant Train with their friend George Geesa. These three men homesteaded in the Horse Prairie Valley, specifically George on the Old Hughes Place (the HPR) and Jim and John on the Prohosky Place. Ruby used to call Jim “Pa” and Jim would call Ruby “Sis”. Ruby and the Prohosky’s ran 415 Cows on their two places --- the lower place off Mansfield Lane and the summer Cow Camp, known today as Elk Haven. Jim had passed away many years before we arrived and his widow, Ruby, lived alone in the ranch house and outbuildings on 9 acres. I’ve always had a respect for older people and I wanted to make friends with Ruby early on. Ruby told me once that I was the first newcomer to the Valley to “come over and talk with me”. On the 28th of March, 1996, I invited Ruby to join our ranch manager, Mackey Hedges, and I for a tour of the Old Prohosky Place, which we had just purchased from Temple Sloan who owned the Bar Double T ranch across the Valley (and used the Prohosky place for calving). I got a tape recorder and jumped in my pickup with Ruby and Mac. I made sure that Ruby was in the front passenger seat (quite a contrast with the practice on the Indian Reservation in northern Arizona where I grew up and where the Indian women rode in the back of the pickup). We started out to tour the 714 deeded acres of what we would come to call the “Lower Horse Prairie Ranch” or LHPR.

Ruby loved to talk, was enthusiastic, and was always spinning a yarn or reconstructing an historical event. She was fond of telling me about all the good ideas she had for the ranch. I can hear her now almost yelling “God damn, Ken, if you get water in that Prohosky ditch on March 1, before any other user wants it or even thinks about it and are still iced over, you can have the greenest pastures in the Valley”. Ruby said that the old Prohosky Canal always had water in it. Speaking of irrigation and water Ruby told us of the sheet of ice that came off the southwest slope of Bachelor Mountain, onto the Prohosky Place, on March 28, 1958 --- exactly 38 years to the day of our tour of the LHPR.

Ruby was meticulous in taking care of her place. She had records for everything. She could tell you how many feet the septic tank was from the house (we once looked for years for the septic tank that serviced one of the cabins at LakeSide). Ruby’s garden was the largest and most beautiful in the Valley. She had every beautiful flower, plant, shrub, and tree that would grow in southwest Montana. She cared for them as if they were her children. I would often sit with Ruby at her kitchen table and we would have “conversation” (e.g. I was a good listener) for hours. When I left Marie at our RanchView home near headquarters to drive to Ruby’s house I would know that it might take a half day. I got up enough nerve on a few occasions to ask Ruby her age but she guarded that secret very well. I think that I once pieced together that she might be on the shady side of her eighties.

Ruby was very traditional and of the old school. She could swear with the best of them. She lived in a Valley dominated by men but held her own on many occasions. One summer she spent much of the day transplanting some of her beautiful flowers from her place to our LakeSide guest area, near the CreekSide Lodge. I wasn’t that impressed with where she was planting the flowers but I wasn’t about to throw cold water on her Daisies! It was an honor to see her put her fingerprints on our place.

Ruby was pretty opinionated about her neighbors. She either really liked someone or really didn’t like them. I remember once when she told me about her encounters with Bill Wellborn, a neighbor who at one time leased her place from another predecessor owner. Once, as part of a dispute, Bill Wellborn dropped a dead Cow just beneath Ruby’s kitchen window. I know Bill and I can see him doing that. I am not sure what Ruby did with the dead Cow. Amazing behavior for a couple of old ranchers working through a dispute……..maybe better than alternatives.

Ruby owned an old blue Cadillac. She kept it clean and always in the garage. It’s always been interesting to me that old ranchers buy sedan cars to go to town while those of us in town buy pickups to go to the country! Ruby also owned a nice old green pickup truck which she hardly ever used.

One day Ruby told me about their original ranch. It was comprised of more than 700 acres of mostly irrigated pastures with late water rights, two BLM pastures, and several hundred acres of a summer “Cow Camp” next to the Forest boundary, where they also ran 175 Pairs on 4 pastures, the same pastures that the HPR has today (the Prohosky Forest Service lease was lost by successors to the Prohosky, due most likely to poor management; the Hughes ranch also lost 325 of their original 500 capacity). Ruby told me one day about how a real estate person, and his father, had messed up the sale of their ranch by selling off the Cow Camp, separate from the rest of the ranch. Viable ranches need leased lands, deeded lands, pastures close to the Forest Service pastures, and a hay base. If one of the components of a viable ranch is sold off then the rest of the ranch is not viable, i.e. not complete or whole. In a future blog entry I will tell you more about what eventually happened to Jim and Ruby’s ranch.

One day Marie and I left the ranch on a cold fall day. After driving for awhile we realized that we had not seen Ruby on this trip. We wondered if she was okay. We called Rick and Karen, who worked for us at the time, and asked them to go to Ruby’s house and check on her. Rick and Karen could not get Ruby to answer her door. They broke into the house and found Ruby peacefully lying on her bed, deceased. It was the end of an era. The Ruby would never shine again in the Horse Prairie Valley. For years I felt Ruby’s spirit in the Valley but missed her shine.

We worked with Ruby’s daughter to purchase her ranch……..all 9 acres with numerous outbuildings. Ruby’s daughter got the old pickup and gave the old Cadillac to Rick and Karen. It was an honor for me that Ruby would sell the last 9 acres of their ranch to our family.

Missing the Drive

By definition an absentee rancher needs to travel to his ranch. When early fall comes I start missing my weekend summer travel to the ranch. My ranch is 6 hours and two States away from our suburban home --- whether I drive or fly. When I fly I can go into either the Idaho Falls or Butte airports. The itinerary is something like the following: 1) Drive 1 hour to the Salt Lake airport; 2) wait at least 1 hour for the SkyWest plane to board; 3) fly for 1 ½ hours to either Idaho Falls or Butte; and 4) drive for 2 hours from either airport to the HPR. Another 30 minutes can be consumed just waiting for luggage or sitting on the tarmac. So, for a lot of money and the sacrifice of squeezing into those small seats I can get to the ranch in 6 hours flying in a commercial aircraft. One positive aspect of flying is that the people on the planes are always excited in anticipation of their western adventure (e.g. skiing, fishing, hunting, dude ranching, etc.) or telling everyone about it on their way home.

If I drive my old blue Ford F-350 pickup with nearly 140,000 miles, then my 6 hour trip is much different. Our son, Matt, is fond of reminding me that I have driven around the world several times to get to our ranch in Montana. During the summer months, when I spend every weekend at the ranch, I usually get out of the Provo/Orem metropolitan area in mid afternoon on a Thursday or Friday. If I am driving the most dangerous and boring route, I-15, I try to get through Salt Lake City before rush hour (e.g. 4pm). My preferred route is to leave our home on Canyon Road in Provo and avoid I-15 by traveling north to beautiful Heber Valley. I enjoy Provo Canyon and I especially enjoy reviewing the current construction work to widen and improve the road. I only wish that the State of Utah would find a way to eliminate long-haul semi-trailer trucks in the canyon. They are taking a short cut from I-80 to I-15 and pose a safety hazard and are noisy and contribute to smog in the canyon.

When I get to Heber Valley and approach Heber City I survey the Heber airport to see how many corporate jets are parked there and, yes, I dream just a little of what a nice flight it would be from Heber Valley to the Horse Prairie Valley, via a private jet. I have noticed over the last few years how many more jets are at the Heber Airport……..still not as many as Hailey, Idaho (Sun Valley) or Aspen, but at least a growing crowd. After leaving Heber Valley the next private jet I will see will be Leon Hirsch’s Falcon at the old Dell, Montana airport, about 45 minutes from our ranch.

My drive continues from Heber Valley over the mountains, past Park City, and on to I-80 East, toward Evanston, Wyoming (if I am going to Idaho or Jackson Hole sometimes I stay on I-80 to Evanston, then on to Ririe, Idaho or Jackson Hole). At Echo Reservoir I turn onto I-84 West. I like this route because I get to see the long UP Railroad trains slowly winding their way over the mountains toward Wyoming. In honor of my father, who was a locomotive engineer on the Atchison Topeka & Santa Fe railroad out of Winslow, Arizona, and my own experiences working as a brakeman on the Santa Fe, I roll down the window to hear the noise of the diesel engines pulling those heavy trains. As I watch the train huff and puff up the mountains my mind conjures up a thousand thoughts about growing up on Route 66 and on the Santa Fe route from Chicago to LA. I think of the beautiful and romantic scenery in the high plateau country of northern New Mexico (my father’s “Run” was from Winslow, Arizona to Gallup, New Mexico). I also think of climbing the Great Divide, west of Flagstaff, where I worked as a brakeman for two summers while in college. I guess us Duncan boys thought we knew trains.

Memories are a great way to pass the time and stay awake while driving. As I continue west on I-84 and watch the trains climbing east, my mind takes me back to when my older brother, Stu, talked me into jumping a freight train in Salt Lake City headed south for either Las Vegas or Denver, we knew not which! We jumped the wrong railroad car and ended up on a gondola (like half a box car, used to haul grain, etc.) holding on for our dear lives at 60 miles an hour on a full moon, very cold night. I will never forget how cold it was and how hard it was to “hold on”. After hours in the desert the train finally pulled into Milford, Utah and we knew that we were on our way to Las Vegas. We jumped off the train at Milford and walked up to the head engine and told the engineer that we had been on the train since Salt Lake City, our father was a locomotive engineer, and could we please have permission to ride in one of the train’s many empty engines. The kind engineer said that he could not give us permission but that if we did it anyway we would sure get a warm ride into Las Vegas! We jumped in the engines, quickly fell asleep, and awoke as the train was making its way down a canyon north of Las Vegas. When we arrived in Las Vegas, looking like anything but Las Vegas tourists, we got a bite to eat and walked to the highway to Kingman, Arizona……hitch hiking (it must have been our goal to not spend any money on transportation). We soon caught a ride to Kingman but the driver’s car (while I was driving because the driver was stone drunk!) dropped its transmission on the way up the Divide, somewhere west of Williams. I don’t recall how but we got to Williams and I remember the driver, who was a soldier, calling is wife in Oklahoma and informing her that he would not make it home on his leave. We left this poor, drunk soldier on Route 66 and hitch hiked again to Winslow, where we purchased a ticket on a Trailways bus and ended up knocking on the front door of our homestead, waking our sweet mother at 2am for our Easter weekend at home! Yes I love those trains and I do get along fine as long and I am moving. Trains are a great way to move along.

I continue my drive through the Wasatch Front and into Ogden Valley, where I-84 merges into I-80. By now the traffic is not too congested and I point my pickup north. As I get in north Ogden the traffic begins to thin. I pass the “Almosta Ranch” property and notice that it has no animals this year. Maybe the owner is now too old to care for animals. Without any livestock, it really is only “almost a ranch”. One of my next favorite places is when I pass the Smith & Edwards store. I dream of having a gift certificate for that store, in an amount of about $100,000! I could buy everything in the store………and would have so much fun using it all. On occasion I have stopped by the store to pick up some Ferrier supplies for the ranch. Smith & Edwards is a regional combination of a co-op and army surplus store.

I continue north toward Tremonton where I-84 continues to Boise, Idaho and I-15 forks off toward Pocatello, Idaho. Now I can finally relax and set the cruise control, given how sparse the traffic is. It’s time to turn up the country music and settle in for 5 more hours of driving. I feel like a semi truck driver who makes daily runs on I-15. I make the time go by fast as I think about who the HPR guests are this week. I also think about the steak dinner that awaits me if I can get to the ranch by 6:30 p.m.

On I-15 I pass families traveling to or returning from summer vacations to Yellowstone, Teton National Park, Glacier National Park, Waterton Lakes in Canada, Jackson Hole, Driggs, Idaho and all the other beautiful places in the area. I remember all the great family vacations we had to those and many more locations, including Alaska and the Yukon Territory. I love to see families touring and enjoying the west.

I cross the Utah Idaho border on my way to Malad, Idaho. Between the rest stop and Malad I see the two small crosses along the Interstate. This summer someone put small hard hats and flowers on the crosses. I remember when Jaun, who used to work for us at the ranch, returned from Mexico three summers ago and came through the Malad area about the time of the accident. He said that two little boys from California were killed in the accident.

I always enjoy the Malad Pass. There is especially one nice little hay ranch on the east side of the Interstate. The ranch always seems to be taken care of and reaches back to the head of a creek and valley……an apparent “end of road; head of stream” ranch. As I cross the Pass I am reminded that it isn’t always safer to fly. I scan the mountains and landscape, wondering just where it was that my friend, Brad, who was an executive with a soft drink distributor in Salt Lake City, had his plane ice up one cold winter day and flew right into the ground killing all 3 or 4 occupants. Some times I like to fly and sometimes I like to drive. At least at the wheel I feel that I am in control of my destiny and not at the hands of another.

From Malad Pass there is a kind of boring stretch to Pocatello, except for the old white ranch headquarters home at the bottom of the Pass, west of the Interstate. It is a two story white frame ranch home that overlooks the Valley, facing northeast. I always think of the great lives that must have lived in that old ranch house. It must have also been nice years ago, before the Interstate, when it had more privacy in the valley.

In about thirty minutes I come to Pocatello, which goes forever along I-15, it seems. Pocatello is a railroad town and my thoughts often wander again to my father and his railroading times on the Santa Fe in Arizona. The real significance of arriving in Pocatello is that I am halfway to the ranch, having traveled approximately 3 hours. I know that the best 3 hours of the drive are ahead of me.

As I climb out of the Pocatello Valley and toward Blackfoot I cannot pass the Blackfoot exit without recalling nearly 40 years ago when my sweet Mother left her family and husband to drive me to Rexburg, Idaho to attend then Ricks College. For some reason I recall that Mom exited at Blackfoot to get to Shelley where she was going to look up a relative. Mom was such a good sport to drive all the way from Arizona to Idaho to take me to my freshman year of college.

The stretch between Blackfoot and Idaho Falls is not that far but it sure seems like a long way! The farms of southeast Idaho and all the lava rock between these two cities just aren’t that exciting to me. As I arrive in Idaho Falls my thoughts turn to 1969 when I returned from an L.D.S. mission to northern California (imagine Mormon missionaries trying to pitch the love of Christ amidst all that Flower Power and Love in San Francisco!) to resume my schooling at Ricks. This was the spring, on the first day of spring, that I was to go to a girl’s choice prom --- dance, having been invited by Marie Anthony from Ririe, Idaho, just 15 miles from Rexburg. Marie was persuaded by an old mission buddy’s sister to ask me out. We immediately fell in love and have been in that state for the past 37 years!

I also think a lot when I pass through Idaho Falls about Marie’s father, Fay Anthony. Fay was a very astute small business person having developed a nice bulk oil distributorship in Ririe and Idaho Falls. I think of all the farms and ranches where Fay delivered oil and fuel. He seems to know everyone in the area.

I now turn more due north on I-15. Nearly all traffic exits I-15 at Idaho Falls to travel to West Yellowstone, Jackson Hole, Teton National Park and other beautiful areas of Idaho and Montana. For years our little family exited I-15 to spend Thanksgiving at grandpa and Grandma Anthonys and to do our first skiing of the season, usually at Grand Targhee.

I now point my Ford F-350 right toward the Great Divide ahead. The outline of the mountains of the Great Divide beckons to me to come home. I pass the Sage Junction interchange and interstate inspection station and think of a few years ago when one cold winter two great horse people who lived on the Great Divide lost their lives on horses. One was a rancher from Dillon who was gathering cattle on horseback and something went wrong and he got thrown to his death. The other was a young cowboy on the Idaho side of the Great Divide who was rounding up rodeo stock horses and got thrown to his death. Not surprising that lives would be lost on the Great Divide doing cattle work, that’s about all that is done at this point on the Great Divide.

I now come to an area that I have watched develop over the years from sagebrush range lands to irrigated alfalfa pastures. An entrepreneur named Wayne Larsen realized that beneath all that sagebrush was the mighty Snake River aquifer, in other words a virtually underground river that could be tapped with wells and used to irrigate the land with wheel lines. It worked, and Mr. Larsen put thousands of acres under irrigation and has developed one of the largest agriculture businesses in southeast Idaho. This is the last area where I will see farming.

As I pass Dubois I ascend the Great Divide with my country music turned up and my cruise control on again. The traffic is now very sparse, especially after August. I now see herds of Cows and sometimes Sheep. I love this part of the drive. I squint to look ahead to the year-round flashing yellow light at the steep curve just south of Spencer, Idaho. Depending upon what time I got off I may now see the short local run of the Union Pacific running from Dillon, Montana to Idaho Falls, Idaho. I always think of what a great run these guys have. Of course, I also lower my window if I am close to the train.

I made the sharp turn and drive through Spencer, the last small town in Idaho. I have been watching over the years a couple of small cabins built in Spencer. It looks fun. As I leave Spencer I see the beacon light just east of the Interstate that will signal that I am exactly one hour from the ranch. The drive now is much more interesting. I think of the ranches I see along the road as neighbors or kin. I think of their challenges over the years……mortgages, droughts, grasshoppers, harsh winters, low cattle prices, etc. I contemplate my respect for those who have held on in adversity. I think of how miraculously we have held on for 10 years. It never seems to get easier. Soon I know that the clock I watch in my pickup will not pass another hour before I am at the HPR. I pass a lot of white crosses in Idaho and Montana but the largest group of white crosses, eight of them, is near the old steel bridge just on the Idaho side of the Divide. I think of the country song (“three wooden crosses”, Trace Atkins, I believe) and try to imagine what kind of an accident on the Divide would kill so many people and what it did to upset so many lives.

As I approach the summit of the Great Divide I realize that when I was eight years old my father drove over the old, second steel bridge with our family on our way to Montana. I wish so much that I could recreate, just for a few moments, that first trip over the Great Divide. I ascend the summit of the Divide at 75-85 miles an hour, speeding on my way to the HPR. This is Monida Pass (Montana + Idaho), where the MDOT has a web cam which I often view from my office in Utah, wishing that I was in the view of the camera. I look to the east and see the old highway winding its way naturally along the terrain of the Great Divide. I see the remnants of the old “Welcome to Montana” sign and realize that it was probably the same sign that greeted our family when I was a child. Again, I wish so much that I could recreate that experience and ask Dad, again, where we were. “This is Montana, Son” rings in my ears. Then I think of how lucky I am to own a ranch in Montana today.

Soon I begin to see the Italian peaks to the east and the Snowline ranch in the foreground. My family tells me that every time I pass the Snowline exit I say out loud “there’s the Snowline ranch”……it is a check on whether or not we are all awake (like we used to call out the block signals in the engines on the railroad --- “Green Block”, just to assure that the engineer was awake!). The Snowline is the first large Montana ranch on the Montana side of the Great Divide. It is a beautiful ranch.

I am now descending into Lima (pronounced like the bean and not like the city in Peru). If it’s before 10:00 p.m. you can get fuel at Lima; otherwise, you need to drive another hour to Dillon. I pass the state inspection building just north of Lima on my way to Dell. Before I see Dell I see Leon Hirsch’s Falcon jet at the old Dell (WWII) airport. I am reminded that Leon possibly could have left the same time I did from Hawaii or London and beat me to Dell!

Now it’s just the old rest stops, the Kitt exit, and the Red Rock River ahead of me before the exit off I-15. Just before I cross the Red Rock River I see old Ned Wellborn’s reservoir next to the freeway and his pump pumping irrigation water to his large alfalfa field. What a brilliant move on Ned’s part. The state of Montana needed his material to build the Interstate and old Ned knew that the area was close enough to the Red Rock river that the ground water would be quite shallow so he had them build a reservoir from which he could claim rights and irrigate his land up the foothills…….brilliant. Every time I see Ned’s property I am inspired to do a better job of utilizing our precious and limited water at the HPR.

Now, finally, I travel on to Exit 44, at the Clark Canyon reservoir exit. The reservoir is beautiful but I would also like to have seen the small town of Armstead, which was covered up by the reservoir in the early 1960s. I read once that Armstead used to ship more cattle than any other place in America. It must have been quite the town with its Bucket O’Blood bar and railway station. It used to be a transportation hub for the Horse Prairie, Grasshopper, and Big Hole valleys. For awhile there was another small railway that came from Corrine, Utah to Armstead, from the west, it was the old Pittsburgh & Gilmore railway (the P&G also known as the Push and Grunt, which is what passengers had to do on the Bannack Pass to keep the told train rolling along). I think of what a trip it would have been from Corrine, Utah to nearly the front doorstep of the Horse Prairie Ranch.

I glance up at the Buffalo Lodge on my right as I exit on exit 44, then turn left and cross over I-15 and then the dam. I am now heading west and need to keep a sharp eye out for big game, mostly pronghorn or antelope. I soon come to the old LC or today’s Draggin Y ranch headquarters. Roger Peters owns the sprawling Draggin Y and several other ranches in the Horse Prairie Valley and other parts of Montana. In about 12 ½ miles I see the Old Bannack highway, a dirt road from Montana State Highway 324 to the Ghost town of Bannack. Down the Bannack highway about a mile is the headquarters of the Centennial Ranch, formerly known as the Cross and Hairpin ranches. Then, just beyond the Bannack turn off is the town of Grant, including its small school house, which I understand from one of our employees, is down to 5 Hispanic students.

In another couple of miles I turn right on Mansfield Lane, a dirt County road. I pass the old Joe Mansfield white home, now occupied by our neighbors at the Centennial, and onto the mailboxes. If I go straight at the mailboxes I will end up at our Lower Horse Prairie Ranch where our manager, Urs Schmidlin, and his family live. If I turn left at the mailboxes and drive another few miles I will pass Ron and Megan’s 160 acre outfit, an island in the HPR. Past Ron and Megan’s place a few miles is our entrance gate, the Headquarters of the HPR. As I close and fasten the entrance gate shut, I see our home on the hill behind Headquarters and feel a sense of being home and safe.

Now you see what it is like to drive around the world several times just to get to the HPR. The more my mind races the more alert I am and the faster the drive seems. It is a long way and might have frightened some absentee owners off but not me. Every time I drive to the ranch it is like reliving my dream. I would drive a 10 hour drive to be at the ranch, where I feel safe, independent, free, and where “seldom is heard a discouraging word”!