John Steinbeck's Montana, in The Montana Quarterly
"We go to press tomorrow," the editor emailed me
at ten minutes to 5:00 that night. "And I have one question. Did Steinbeck
travel over Homestake Pass or Pipestone Pass?" I'd written that the author
John Steinbeck, in Travels with Charley,
stopped at Montana's Continental Divide, "presumably on Pipestone Pass near Butte." But Interstate 90 travels
over Homestake Pass. Almost nobody goes over Pipestone Pass, five miles south.
"It's a small
item, but I don't want some Buttian calling up pissed off," the editor
said. Let me say here how much I love writing for the Montana Quarterly. They notice things like this. Because they have
readers who notice things like this. Some of those readers live in Butte, which
has a reputation for directness.
There was a moment of
panic because I didn't have proof handy. Steinbeck just called it the
Continental Divide. Bill Steigerwald, whose wonderful book Dogging Steinbeck I quoted, didn't mention the pass. "I
believe I saw a map," I emailed back right away. "Let me see if I can
find it."
It took a while to
find. But I did. And I was glad. Because it makes a difference.
One of the main points
of my article is that road-tripping was different in 1960, when Steinbeck and
Charley crossed the country. There were very few Interstate highways. And so on
back roads, Steinbeck got a different, richer feel for the landscape and
culture he was traveling through. Today the Interstate catapults you over
Homestake Pass as fast as your transmission will allow.
But soon after
arriving in Montana, I made a point of driving over Pipestone Pass. It was a Blue
Highways
kind
of experience, one I've never forgotten. It helped me envision what Steinbeck
had seen, that we don't see today. That's what I tried to capture in the
article, and maybe by mentioning the backwater pass I could inspire one or two
of our readers to go have that experience themselves.
kind
of experience, one I've never forgotten. It helped me envision what Steinbeck
had seen, that we don't see today. That's what I tried to capture in the
article, and maybe by mentioning the backwater pass I could inspire one or two
of our readers to go have that experience themselves. Labels: articles
Lavina in the Montana Quarterly
I have some friends in Lavina, the town of 180 people about 45 miles northwest of Billings. So for the latest Rural Route for The Montana Quarterly magazine -- the column where they send a writer and photographer to hang out in a small town and tell stories about its characters -- I figured if nothing else I could write about my friends. But Lavina was so full of fascinating people that I didn't even mention them!
I did this assignment with photographer John Warner. In addition to running in the magazine, his shot of the little-seen interior of the Adams Hotel was recently highlighted by National Geographic.
Here's an excerpt from the article:
Gerard Peters, 86, seems to have a permanent twinkle in his eye. He’s not a cattle baron, he doesn’t have much acreage, he doesn’t live on a blue-ribbon trout stream. But his pleasures are simpler. “I like being around family and cattle,” he says.
Raised on a ranch north of Lewistown, Gerard has spent his whole life in Montana, except for a four-year stint in the Air Force where he met his wife Jeanine. They raised 10 sons and a daughter. His jobs involved livestock, land, and people: ranching, guiding, mining. Once he managed a 43,000-acre ranch for a committee of 25 owners. Now it’s just a few acres with his son John, John’s wife Mary, and their family. But to Gerard this land east of Lavina is a little slice of heaven.It's not available online, so to read the whole thing, you’ll have to subscribe.
Labels: articles
Millenials and the New West in Magic
When Magic (formerly Magic City, the magazine of Billings,
Montana) was developing a package on the millennial generation, the editor
asked if I could contribute some thoughts from a historical perspective. And as
she talked about potential conflict among generations, I thought of the 1990s
fad of talking about the New West. Wasn't that, beneath the hype, merely a
previous generational clash?
Labels: articles, Montana's Enduring Frontier
Philipsburg in Montana Quarterly
When the editor tossed out an idle question -- "Do you know
anything about Philipsburg? I'm thinking of doing it for a Rural Route" -- my
response was immediate.
"Oh please please please let me write it! I love
Philipsburg!"
He did let me write it, and my love grew. This small old
mining town has so many classic Montana qualities: historic downtown
architecture, outdoor recreation, great scenery, interesting artistic
connections, a great microbrewery, and fascinating friendly people.
Labels: articles
Medicine Lake in Montana Quarterly
For many years my favorite section of my favorite magazine
has been the “Rural Route” feature in the Montana Quarterly. There’s no plot:
they just send some writer and photographer to a small Montana town. In his
five-year tenure, Jeff Hull continually got me to love these towns I’d never
been to. Jeff has recently moved on to new challenges, and this quarter, I got
to write one of the columns. It’s a tremendous honor and great thrill.
Furthermore, the town of Medicine Lake (waaaaay up in the northeast corner of the
state) was far more fun than I could have imagined. I hope the piece captured at
least some of the pleasure I had at Lake's Homecoming weekend.
Labels: articles
The story of Mossmain in Montana Magazine
“The story of the ’20’s, Montana’s disastrous decade,” wrote beloved historian Joseph Kinsey Howard, was told by “the derelict privy, the boarded-up schoolhouse, the dust-drifted, weed-grown road, and the rotting, rusted fence.” This was how the homestead boom of 1900–1917 crashed: year-to-year grain yields could drop by a factor of 10, the average value per acre of farmland fell by 50 percent and 11,000 farms (one-fifth of the state total) disappeared entirely.
The tale of the forlorn honyockers, betrayed by rain that failed to follow the plow, has been often and well told. The realization that Montana’s spectacular landscapes could not become a small farmer’s paradise has often been seen as a turning point, or even an end point, in the state’s history.
But when history focuses solely on the homesteader, we miss the scale of the devastation to the state’s image of itself. One way to reveal that scale is to visit the metropolis of Mossmain. Shall we start downtown? Maybe at the Municipal (farmers’) Market, next to the Civic Center and City Hall, at one end of the grassy promenade that leads down past the Publishing House to the railroad tracks? From downtown, streets diverge in a fan pattern, and we can stroll down Gardenvale, past schools and play fields toward the tree-lined Institution.Unfortunately the entire text isn't available online, but here's where to subscribe.
The story is excerpted from my book "Stories from Montana's Enduring Frontier." It's basically the same text in both places. The magazine has more (and color!) pictures. The book has 26 other essays about Montana history. I'd be honored if you chose to read in either or both places.
Labels: articles
“Hope and Bacon” in the Montana Quarterly
I have a story out in the Summer 2013 edition of the Montana Quarterly magazine. It’s an expanded version of an essay that appears in Stories from Montana’s Enduring Frontier. Here’s how it begins:
“We live in an ant hill, and the world outside is very big and very far away.”
So wrote “Suzette,” the celebrity journalist from Philadelphia, during her weeklong sojourn in the Montana mining camp of Altyn in 1901. Also known as Swift Current, Altyn was two days’ ride from the nearest railroad stop. Thus, as Suzette put it, “The Boers might invade England and the news would not awaken a hundredth part of the interest that would the story that Old Man Harris has jumped French Pete’s claim.”
Located not far from what is now Many Glacier Hotel in Glacier National Park, Altyn was one of the last gasps of old-fashioned prospecting fever in most of the continental United States...
It's not available online, so to read the whole thing, you’ll have to subscribe. Subscribing to this magazine -- purchased last autumn by one of its editors -- is worthwhile for more than just my story. It effectively captures life in Montana through great writing and photography.
Labels: articles
Horses that Buck
RED LODGE, Mont. -- When Bearcreek native Bill Smith first gained national attention for his rodeo skills, he recalled in a program last Thursday, a reporter approached him. Shy and nervous (“a lot less windy than I am now”), the young Smith responded to the reporter that what he liked about rodeos was “horses that buck.”
The phrase became something of a slogan for Smith’s career, as he went on to become a three-time world champion saddle bronc rider. It also became the title of a 2008 book chronicling his life. Margot Kahn, author of Horses that Buck
: The Story of Champion Bronc Rider Bill Smith, joined Smith for a lively discussion in front of a capacity crowd at the Carbon County Historical Society Museum on May 28.
When Kahn, who now lives in Seattle, first met Smith, she had never been to a rodeo. “I did not know how many miles he traveled for a chance to ride a horse that bucked,” she said, reading from the book’s preface, “or what it felt like, or how the road could make you feel free.” But after seven years of interviews and research, as well as rewrites as she pursued a Master of Fine Arts in Nonfiction at Columbia University in New York, Horses that Buck was published by the University of Oklahoma Press. It is now in its third printing.
“It’s her book,” Smith said with typical humility Thursday, “I just helped. I didn’t realize the talent this girl had—and she didn’t either. Everybody I talk to tells me what an easy read this book is, a page-turner.”
Smith now lives in Thermopolis, Wyoming, where he raises and sells horses at the WYO Quarter Horse Ranch. But the crowd Thursday was filled with relatives and old friends from the Red Lodge area, including the family of Bill’s nephew Jack Wipplinger.
The intimacy of the crowd led to both tender reminiscences and teasing.“My first girlfriend is here,” Smith announced, claiming their sixth-grade relationship faltered when she accused him of liking his horse more than her. After Kahn read an excerpt describing Smith competing in a rodeo in Filer, Idaho, on a broken leg in the early 1960s, Smith claimed that the other competitors had exaggerated his toughness: “I get a hangnail, it hurts.”
Since retiring from rodeo in 1979, Smith has built a nationwide reputation for his handling of horses. (The musician Lyle Lovett, in his Billings concert the previous week, called Smith “a role model, not just for cowboys but for anyone.”) Kahn said she was attracted to his story because it had ups and downs, with rodeo success followed by a period of struggle and a change in mindset, then “ending on a high note” with the current successes of his horsemanship career.
That career leads him all over the country. Smith came to the Red Lodge event direct from Minneapolis, where he’d been looking at horses. “Good horses are hard to find,” he said, noting that he had to look for not only what he liked in a horse, but also what his customers would like. “I couldn’t stay in business selling horses for what they’re worth,” he said. “Nobody needs a horse any more. They’re a luxury item, a plaything.”
But he expressed satisfaction with his career, noting that he truly loved horses, especially those that buck.
As the program made clear, Smith also makes a great subject for a book because of his incredible storytelling. In a give-and-take with friends in the audience, he kept the crowd laughing with stories including his worst accident, an avalanche in the Thorofare, the best bucking horse he’d ever seen, and cowboy pranks involving the overtipping of occupied Porta-Potties.
“My life has been filled with luck,” he said. “I’ve kept on trying to screw it up, and always come out smelling like a rose.”
Kahn said it was the first book event she’d done together with Smith, and the first with an audience that knew so much about Smith and rodeo in general. The two had an easy rapport on stage, and mingled with the crowd at a reception and signing before and after the talk.
Autographed copies of the book, which was announced this week as a finalist for a High Plains Book Award, are available at the museum and Red Lodge Books.
(cross-posted from the Carbon County News)
I'm always interested in feedback, via info at johnclaytonbooks dot com
The phrase became something of a slogan for Smith’s career, as he went on to become a three-time world champion saddle bronc rider. It also became the title of a 2008 book chronicling his life. Margot Kahn, author of Horses that Buck
: The Story of Champion Bronc Rider Bill Smith, joined Smith for a lively discussion in front of a capacity crowd at the Carbon County Historical Society Museum on May 28.When Kahn, who now lives in Seattle, first met Smith, she had never been to a rodeo. “I did not know how many miles he traveled for a chance to ride a horse that bucked,” she said, reading from the book’s preface, “or what it felt like, or how the road could make you feel free.” But after seven years of interviews and research, as well as rewrites as she pursued a Master of Fine Arts in Nonfiction at Columbia University in New York, Horses that Buck was published by the University of Oklahoma Press. It is now in its third printing.
“It’s her book,” Smith said with typical humility Thursday, “I just helped. I didn’t realize the talent this girl had—and she didn’t either. Everybody I talk to tells me what an easy read this book is, a page-turner.”
Smith now lives in Thermopolis, Wyoming, where he raises and sells horses at the WYO Quarter Horse Ranch. But the crowd Thursday was filled with relatives and old friends from the Red Lodge area, including the family of Bill’s nephew Jack Wipplinger.
The intimacy of the crowd led to both tender reminiscences and teasing.“My first girlfriend is here,” Smith announced, claiming their sixth-grade relationship faltered when she accused him of liking his horse more than her. After Kahn read an excerpt describing Smith competing in a rodeo in Filer, Idaho, on a broken leg in the early 1960s, Smith claimed that the other competitors had exaggerated his toughness: “I get a hangnail, it hurts.”
Since retiring from rodeo in 1979, Smith has built a nationwide reputation for his handling of horses. (The musician Lyle Lovett, in his Billings concert the previous week, called Smith “a role model, not just for cowboys but for anyone.”) Kahn said she was attracted to his story because it had ups and downs, with rodeo success followed by a period of struggle and a change in mindset, then “ending on a high note” with the current successes of his horsemanship career.
That career leads him all over the country. Smith came to the Red Lodge event direct from Minneapolis, where he’d been looking at horses. “Good horses are hard to find,” he said, noting that he had to look for not only what he liked in a horse, but also what his customers would like. “I couldn’t stay in business selling horses for what they’re worth,” he said. “Nobody needs a horse any more. They’re a luxury item, a plaything.”
But he expressed satisfaction with his career, noting that he truly loved horses, especially those that buck.
As the program made clear, Smith also makes a great subject for a book because of his incredible storytelling. In a give-and-take with friends in the audience, he kept the crowd laughing with stories including his worst accident, an avalanche in the Thorofare, the best bucking horse he’d ever seen, and cowboy pranks involving the overtipping of occupied Porta-Potties.
“My life has been filled with luck,” he said. “I’ve kept on trying to screw it up, and always come out smelling like a rose.”
Kahn said it was the first book event she’d done together with Smith, and the first with an audience that knew so much about Smith and rodeo in general. The two had an easy rapport on stage, and mingled with the crowd at a reception and signing before and after the talk.
Autographed copies of the book, which was announced this week as a finalist for a High Plains Book Award, are available at the museum and Red Lodge Books.
(cross-posted from the Carbon County News)
I'm always interested in feedback, via info at johnclaytonbooks dot com
Labels: articles, history, narrative
In the March/April Montana Magazine
For 19 years I’ve been walking through a library door under the word “Carnegie.” At some recent point I realized that 16 other Montana communities have Carnegie libraries, and I wondered what they were like.
Butch Larcombe, my editor at Montana Magazine, encouraged me to dig around, and my survey revealed diversity: art museums, office buildings, and community gathering-places. More importantly, I got to further explore what I think is a key time period in Montana history: 1900-1925, as the state gained enough residents to move out of its frontier phase and build some sort of society. The choices those society-builders made have far-more-significant ramifications for life today than do the choices made by their predecessors, if only because those choices were often made in brick and stone. So the institutions those folks built, such as Carnegie Libraries, are often still in use today.
In the period since I began the investigation, economic hard times have in some places (not, to my knowledge, in Montana) curtailed public funding for libraries. I hope that my article (an excerpt is available here) can serve as a partial reminder of the tremendous good accomplished by these community treasures.
(For research geeks: Good sources on Carnegie Libraries include: George Bobinski’s Carnegie Libraries: Their History and Impact on American Public Library Development; Molly Skeen’s “How America's Carnegie Libraries Adapt to Survive”; Theodore Jones’ Carnegie Libraries Across America: A Public Legacy; and the Montana state library directory at http://msl.state.mt.us/for_librarians/Library_Directory/Browse_Path/default.asp )
I'm always interested in feedback, via info at johnclaytonbooks dot com
Butch Larcombe, my editor at Montana Magazine, encouraged me to dig around, and my survey revealed diversity: art museums, office buildings, and community gathering-places. More importantly, I got to further explore what I think is a key time period in Montana history: 1900-1925, as the state gained enough residents to move out of its frontier phase and build some sort of society. The choices those society-builders made have far-more-significant ramifications for life today than do the choices made by their predecessors, if only because those choices were often made in brick and stone. So the institutions those folks built, such as Carnegie Libraries, are often still in use today.
In the period since I began the investigation, economic hard times have in some places (not, to my knowledge, in Montana) curtailed public funding for libraries. I hope that my article (an excerpt is available here) can serve as a partial reminder of the tremendous good accomplished by these community treasures.
(For research geeks: Good sources on Carnegie Libraries include: George Bobinski’s Carnegie Libraries: Their History and Impact on American Public Library Development; Molly Skeen’s “How America's Carnegie Libraries Adapt to Survive”; Theodore Jones’ Carnegie Libraries Across America: A Public Legacy; and the Montana state library directory at http://msl.state.mt.us/for_librarians/Library_Directory/Browse_Path/default.asp )
I'm always interested in feedback, via info at johnclaytonbooks dot com
