September 1977 Community
9-2-77 mission
I saw Fiddles this morning. He was cleaning the new gym. This is part of his job from the Manpower program. He said that there was a fire last night at the café. It is an empty trailer near the store. No one was using it. An evangelist had a revival meeting there last weekend. The fire started in a propane tank next to the stove. It must have exploded. It is all burned up inside.
9-2-77 trailer
Mike said that Sonny moved in with his sister, Vera Buckman.
9-3-77 mission school
I was talking to Davey Hawley at the mission school board meeting. I told him that the Whitecow Canyon Road was really bad and dangerous to go up there in the school bus. Davey is a tribal councilman. He said that he didn’t have the trucks now to do much road work. The trucks are at Poplar. Davey suggested that I bring it up at the council meeting next Saturday and they might change their priority. “We’re working on the LP-Dodson Road now. The grader won’t work because it is down to rock.” Davey is also on the road crew. “HUD will build their homes, but they don’t build the roads. They don’t worry about the roads at all. They just put these homes anywhere and don’t worry about how people will get in or out. We bootlegged the Whitecow Canyon Road. It wasn’t supposed to be built with HUD money, but we got it bootlegged and we were able to build it through HUD and Tribal Housing.
Davey said that he just cut and is ready to store and sell his wheat and barley. “With the prices now for grain there’s really no money in it, but it keeps my kids busy. Our wheat is very high in protein. If it stands in the fields too long, it gets bleached and loses protein and if it gets too wet, it will start to sprout and rot.
9-4-77 Hays
The weather in Hays has been very unusual this year. For the past three weeks it has rained almost every day, and the temperatures have been unseasonably cold. During the day, the temperatures have been in the high 60s to low 80s and at night, it has been in the 40s and 50s. It has also been raining pretty often over the past three weeks, and it has also been overcast for most of the day. The trees, mostly aspens and a few cottonwoods have begun to change to fall colors (yellow). This weather is unusual for the end of August which is usually very hot and dry. This weather has caused some problems for farmers in the area and on the reservation. JJ cut the hay in the mission’s northeastern field about three weeks ago, and it has been raining so often that the hay hasn’t been able to dry out. And there is a chance that it will rot in the field. Davey said that the hay or wheat can’t be stored and picked up for storage until it is below 13% moisture. JJ has had the prayer group pray for dry weather so that the hay can be dried and picked up from the field. The hay is still out in the field in bails, and he is still waiting to pick it up.
Both of these photographs were taken on the same day.
9-4-77 Hays
Tomorrow is Labor Day and it is being observed by the reservation community. The BIA employees, the tribal employees, the public schools and mission schools have the day off. Most of the people are either going to the Blaine County Fair and Rodeo or just enjoying the extra weekend day at home.
A typical fall day in the neighborhood
9-5-77 mission
At 11:30 I was talking to Bill Chambers in front of the rectory. Joe Blackcrow rode by the church on his horse. He had a piece of cardboard tied to the horse and was pulling it in the wind. The horse was running fast and the big piece of cardboard was flapping in the wind. He rode out toward the bridge and cattle guard. About a minute later, Tom Doney rode up to us on Johnny Shambo’s motorcycle. In an upset and hurried voice he said, you guys better get some help. Joe just fell off his horse and he’s lying unconscious in front of the chapel. I drove Bill up to the chapel and dropped him off there. Tom and Dopey, John Shambo, Faye and Gerard and Al Wayne were there. I asked Dopey who was driving the ambulance and she said to get Virgil McConnel. I drove off. I drove down to the store and Allen was walking out, I told him that Joe was unconscious in front of the chapel and had fallen off his horse. I told Allen that they needed the ambulance. He said, oh, no, I was just getting about to leave for Alaska. He was picking up his wife. He told me to get Virgil. Kenny was working in the store. I told him I didn’t know where Virgil lived and I asked Kenny to go with me and show me. He wasn’t at Della’s so I drove back to the store. Virgil and his son live behind the store. Allen took the ambulance to the mission.
When we got to the mission, Joe was in the back seat of Fiddles and Mary Agne’s car. Allen was putting a splint on Joe’s leg and Joe was groaning. They got Joe into the ambulance. A man I didn’t know drove the ambulance and Allen and Mary Agenes went into the back with Joe. Then Fiddles took the kids and then asked Father if he could get gas to get to the hospital. Then Fiddles headed to the Agency.
9-6-77 Fiddles and Mary Agnes’
On my bus route this morning, Fiddles and Mary Agnes were outside with the kids. I asked how Joe was doing. Fiddles said that Joe had only sprained his leg. It wasn’t broken. But he did have a concussion. They’re going to keep him up at the hospital (PHS) for a few days. I’m going to come up to the mission to call up there and find out how he’s doing. I told Fiddles that is good news.
9-6-77 trailer KOJM Havre
Jack announced that Minerva Allen, director of the headstart program, was accepting applications for the program which begins on October 10th. The program will be for four and five year olds. She is also taking applications for three and a half year olds, but they will not be accepted until they see the numbers for the four and five year olds.
Jack announced that parents of children with speech and language problems could meet with the speech therapists so that their children could get special help during school hours. See Joan Doney in Harlem or Kathy Cott in Hays and Lodge Pole.
He announced that he attended an Indian Education Conference with students and teachers in Bozeman this past April. He announced some of the programs that were introduced. Starting cultural programs in the schools and he encouraged the Hays area to set an example with all the Indian teachers in the school, including beadwork, traditional cooking. Bilingual programs like Rocky Boy. Instituting courses concerning drug abuse and sex education. He stressed the importance of communication between parents, the schools and the children.
Jack announced that the Ft. Belknap Agency had a lumbermill and people looking for lumber should give them consideration. The mill is in the Little Rockies. If you need good lumber, call the tribal office, the land services department. They’re selling the lumber for $170 per 100 board foot.
Then Jack ended the program by reading the list of people who were currently patients in the Havre and Ft. Belknap Hospitals.
9-7-77 mission kitchen
Jim came into the kitchen around lunchtime, and he sat at the table to talk to Beatrice. He told her that he figured out what the workers were doing at Jeb’s new house. REA was putting up poles at the house for his electricity. It’s taking them a long time. They’ve been working on it for two days. Beatrice said, maybe they hit rock or they found oil. She and Jim really laughed.
Mary told Susie that she would really like to start a bakery here in Hays. She would do it from her home. Susie encouraged her because she said that there was a great need for a bakery here and it would do really well, including for weddings, birthdays and anniversaries. Allen might buy baked goods for the store, and everyone here loves baked goods. Mary said that she really wanted to do it.
Fiddles walked through the mission kitchen this morning while I was talking to Mary and Beatrice. I asked him how Joe was doing. He said that he came home from the hospital yesterday, but they want him to stay home and rest for a week because of the concussion. After Fiddles left, Beatrice said, you know, kids do the darndest things sometimes. “Joe pulling the cardboard behind the horse was a fool thing to do. If you rattle a small piece of paper next to a horse, it will spook them and he knew that. And he was flapping a big piece of cardboard. I don’t know why he’d do that. He must have had a hard fall on that cement.”
9-7-77 mission
BJ said that he was really tired tonight because he had been digging potatoes today. “I got one row done which was about as wide as the gym. I’m digging them with a shovel. My red potatoes are as big as a fist and the white ones are even bigger. He also has blue and yellow ones. I have fifteen rows of potatoes. I can’t use a plow because the garden is fenced in and it would be difficult to get a plow in there. And I would have to go through Mary’s flower garden.”
BJ, Mary and Ben came up to the gym to play basketball with Susie and I. We played for about an hour and then quit because there was prayer meeting in the all-purpose room. We’ve decided to play regularly for the exercise. Ben is playing on the football team this year. This is his senior year in high school.
9-8-77 mission kitchen
Mary asked me when the holiday was where we eat special foods. I told her it was Passover. She said that she would really be interested in seeing that. We told her we would try to do it next spring and invite the community. She said she would like that.
9-8-77 rectory
Mike was talking about the old coffins and bones he found above Bazoo’s house just west of the highway and I told him about the sand rock graves near LP. Clemence said that the Indians didn’t used to bury the dead. “They put the people in coffins and then put the coffins on top of the ground. That is what the graves were before, just the coffin on top of the ground.” Then Clemence said that there were other graves like this around Hays and LP. “The Ghost Pines near the LP cutoff before Babe Allen’s house, on the highway just off the Hays road up on top, there is sandstone up there, and you can see the bones up on the hill. And there are other graves above Johnny McMeels in the field up in back above his house.”
9-9-77 mission kitchen
Mary said that she and BJ don’t like going to the bar in Zortman because the owner’s son treats Indians funny. He’s prejudiced. Mary said that it has happened to her before too. She and BJ were at a school board business meeting in Miami Beach and we went to a restaurant and they wouldn’t serve us. We waited for a long time and no one waited on us, so we got up and left.
9-9-77 trailer
This afternoon a woman came up to the trailer. We invited her in and she introduced herself. Her name is Marilyn Bentz and she’s a graduate student at the University of Washington in Seattle. She teaches in the sociology and social work program and is switching over to get her degree in anthropology. She said that she was from Ft. Belknap and is a Gros Ventre. “My father was white and we left the reservation when I was pretty young. My mother is still here. She lives up in Harlem (Agency) and her maiden name is Ereaux.” She said that she applied for grants to do a study here comparing three families from the area since the 1880s. “I would compare three families through the generations and comparing characters of the families, an Indian family, a mixed family – one white and one Indian spouse and a white family. I would be looking at mental health, and through life histories would be looking at major events in their lives that would have affected mental health. I’m going to reconstruct the early life histories by talking to the old people. It will be easy for me to get information from the old people because they remember me from when I was a kid here. I’ll probably have trouble though with people my age. They’ll probably say, where has she been all these years, and why is she coming back now.”
She’s taking her exams this fall and plans to begin her research here in January or in the spring. She thinks she might live with her mother. She complained that she works harder than anyone else in her department and she has three children. She took out a photograph of an old log house that she used to live in. I told her that I would help her in any way that I could. I gave her some references on the Gros Ventre that she never heard of. Jack Plumage told her about us.
She said that one man on her committee didn’t want her to do the study here because it was her own culture. She said that he was old-fashioned. She said if she wasn’t funded she didn’t care, that she would do her dissertation on MOD or a paper on the history of anthropology. She said that she would love to study MOD and really put them on the spot. Her mother was at the senior citizen center and Janette Warrior drove her here. She left to go home with her mother and said that she would see us tomorrow at the council meeting.
Beatrice said that she remembers her from when she was a kid. She’s Monica’s age, around 49 and they used to play together when they were kids. She left here years ago and moved to Seattle when she was a young girl. She’s Mary’s oldest daughter.
9-9-77 mission
Mary said that her father used to be a shoemaker – he used to repair shoes. That is why people today call him Jim Shoe.
9-9-77 mission
Beatrice said that she and Jim were going to a party tonight. “My aunt and uncle are celebrating their 55th wedding anniversary. Jim Snell and his wife, Zelia. Zelia was my mother’s sister. Zelia’s brothers are Davey Hawley and Byard Hawley. Byard died when he was 41 years old. His wife was Tootsie Hawley. I call Tootsie, ‘auntie’ and we both think it is funny because she’s only six months older than me.”
9-9-77 mission
When Mary Ereaux came up to the mission to pick up her daughter to take her home (to the Agency) she brought Janette Warrior with her. They came from the Senior Citizens Center in Hays. I said hello to Janette, and I told her that I heard that Rosey Connors had left Hays. Janette said that she moved up to the Agency. She got a nice home up there. She hasn’t been well, and she has to be close to the hospital. That’s why she moved up there. I told Janette that was too bad. She said, yeah, we’re going to miss her at the senior center. She was so good there. We have a new girl now at the senior citizen center in Hays. She and Irene Doney work at the center now.
9-10-77 trailer
Mike said that he found seven old graves above Bazoo’s place. They’re across the road and up the hill from Bruce’s sign on the road. They’re surrounded with rocks, and they’re old because the rocks are sunk down into the ground. They have crosses. There’s also an old burial ground out there. The coffins are all busted up and weathered and the bones are just lying on the ground. And there’s pots and pans and leather stuff and things like that all over. The burial is about at the same spot and also on the other side of the road. It goes all the way above the Shambos. Mike asked Frank about the burials. Frank said that they put the road (Rt. 376) right through the burial ground. The old timers warned that there would be a lot of accidents on this road and there have been. (This is the road from the DY Bar to Hays, and there are lots of steep hills and twists and turns). The right turn onto the Hays road is hazardous because the turn is banked the other way. This is a dangerous turn when sober, but worse when drunk and in the winter, it is even worse.
This is the turn that Susie made in the truck during the winter and we ended up high centered in the barrow pit.
9-10-77 trailer
Irene and Lindey came over to visit after mass this evening. They were introducing themselves to Mary. We sat at the kitchen table and had coffee.
Lindey said that there were an awful lot of Doneys around. There are four Doney ‘outfits’. There were four Doneys – Gregory, Lolly, John and Joe and these four brothers brought all of these Doneys here. There was a bunch from Gregory. They were from Zortman and that’s Matt and Charles’ outfit. Then Lolly’s outfit stayed up in Malta. Then I’m from John’s outfit; that’s most of us from around here – Clifford, Richard, Chinky and this group. Tom Doney from Poplar (Ft. Peck) also came from John. Then Tootsie and her outfit came from Joe. She’s about the only one from her outfit who is around here.
Lindey and Irene have 14 kids.
Lindey said that he was in the army. I was in the states the whole time, in North Carolina. I was in 1947 and 1948. I missed WWII and before the Korean War.
Irene said that her boys were in the Blacklodge Singers. They started it and at one time we had four of our boys in the group. But they’re breaking up now. With almost all of the pow wows, they have to travel and they’d be gone almost every weekend in the summer. Their wives started to complain about it so they decided not to travel. But their grandfather (Ira Talks Different) got them started and he was so proud of them. I talked to the boys, and I told them so long as their grandfather was alive, why didn’t they just sing at pow wows on the reservation. That’s what they did. Now their grandfather has died, and the singing group is going to break up.
Lindey said that he was a half breed. Some people use that as a derogatory word, but that’s what I am and I’m proud of it. I’m half white and half Indian.
9-10-77 trailer
Wilma said that there may not be a day care center this year because they can’t find anywhere to hold it. It used to be at the Christian Missionary Alliance Church. The Rolands left and the church is run by some Indians from Minnesota. They couldn’t get permission to use the church from them.
Wilma said that she had scarlet fever when she was five years old. Only her parents, the doctors and the priests were allowed to come to the house. They were quarantined. No one else could come in. If people brought food, they had to leave it by the door and they had to visit through the window. It was really tough back then. They didn’t have any medicine yet and she almost died. She said that someone recently had it on the reservation, but they now have medicine for it and the person is fine.
9-11-77 trailer
Mike said that a couple of years ago, some guys blew up the jail in Hays. They stole some dynamite and blew up the police station and jail. Then they went to the BLM office in Zortman, and they blew up their helicopter.
Mike said that Sonny is living back in his old house. He moved out of Vera’s place.
9-12-77 mission kitchen
For the past few weeks I have been collecting the government commodity food packaging and Beatrice and Mary have been helping me with what they have from the lunch program. They were curious as to why I was doing this. I explained to them my purpose. I told them that I wanted to look at the breakfast and lunch programs and to see what people in the community are getting from the commodity program. I was going to look at the nutritional information as a part of my research. Beatrice said that for some people the commodity food was their whole diet. I know this. There was a woman in Lodge Pole who asked a friend of mine if she could borrow some commodity flour and shortening and some meat if she could spare it. This was all they got, the commodity food. You sure couldn’t cook much with just the commodity foods they give you. There aren’t any spices or sugar. You sure couldn’t bake a cake. What we get, too, changes all the time. We get different foods all the time.
9-12-77 mission kitchen
I was talking to Mary after lunch. The kids were misbehaving at lunch, and I told Mary I didn’t know what kind of parent I was going to be because I didn’t have much patience. Mary said, you sure do need patience. But raising kids is really a lot of fun, especially when the kids are real young. And when they’re older, they’re still a lot of fun. They’re always doing things that you tell them they can’t possibly do, but they try anyway. Even when they’re older, raising kids is a lot of fun. Mary was a wonderful parent and a wonderful person! If you didn’t love Mary, you likely weren’t right in the head.
9-12-77 rectory kitchen Susie
When Clemence answers Father, she always says, ‘yes, Father.’ Never just yes.
Clemence told us that she only spoke French until she started school. She can understand Cree, but she can’t speak it.
Clemence said that she used to go out and pick peppermint and still does. It is good for fevers and colic (in babies). She uses peppermint all the time. You pick and then dry the leaves real well, and then you can make tea from it. It works really well.
She said that alfalfa is good for arthritis. She said that they also used to go out and pick bitter root. During the 1918s when everyone was dying from the flu so bad, they used to use bitter root to cure the flu. They scrape the root. It has quinine in it, so you have to be careful. People were dying so fast. They sure kept the old man up the hill busy; he was the coffin maker.
9-13-77 trailer
At 4:30 this afternoon Don Addy came over. He is the extension agent on the reservation. He lives in Harlem and is married to Teresa Walker’s daughter. He said he was looking for Father. Susie told him that Father was in Lodge Pole. Don came in and sat down. He said he wanted to make arrangements about the meeting they were going to have here on September 26 and 27. We’re going to have a financial management meeting at the mission. The extension office and the BIA are putting it on, and the tribe is also offering some financial support. Susie said that she heard it announced on the radio on Jack Quincy’s program. Don said that they could have about 40 people there. He decided to have the meeting at the mission because most of the operators were down on the southern part of the reservation. There are some operators along the River, mostly in the Dodson area. Also the mission is such a convenient place to have it. I want the cooks to prepare a lunch for us. We’ll supply the food and we’ll pay Father for the use of the mission facility. The financial meeting will be about how our reservation farmers and ranchers can get loans for their operations. It’s tough for them now and it’s been really tough in the past. I’ve invited lending institutions to come from all over the area, from Harlem, Chinook and Havre. We’re going to try to set it up so that the operators on the reservation can get loans more easily. These lending institutions don’t like to deal with the operators here. All of the land here is trust land and the lending institutions don’t like to give loans or deal with the trust land. They have to go through so much red tape to deal with these trust lands. It’s incredible how much red tape there is. What we’re going to do at this meeting is try to cut through this red tape so that the operators here can get loans. Also the operators will be able to ask questions about financial management of their farms and ranches.
I asked Don how many operators there were on the reservation.
We have 85 operators on the reservation and most of them are ranchers. But no one can make a living now at raising cattle these days with the price of beef. The price of beef is so cheap, so low, that no one can make a living at it. So most of the operators are getting involved in split operations. They’re diversifying in cattle and raising some kind of grain and hay. I think that most of the operators are raising cattle because they enjoy it, and really that’s what it is all about. If I include the small operations on the reservation, and some of the guys who are doing it part time, there are more than 85 operators.
Susie asked Don if anyone on the reservation was getting into the earthworm business. Don said that there was a man in Lodge Pole who was raising earth worms. He was the only one that he knew of so far.
Don Addy is very involved in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. He and Edio Doney started a group up at the Agency and Harlem. He told us that they were planning on building three churches at the Agency. There is a Catholic Church in Harlem and Father Moran in Harlem serves the Agency along with Father Retzel. Don said that they’ve been planning a Catholic Church at the Agency for a about a year. There’s going to be an Assembly of God Church at the Agency, too. This has been a denomination that’s been on the reservation for a long time. There’s an Assembly of God Church in Lodge Pole. It’s an old denomination. It started in the early 1900s. And another protestant denomination is building a church at the Agency as well.
9-15-77 senior citizens center
The hunting safety course meeting was held tonight. Tennyson Doney, Don Addy and Stuart Rowe sat in the front of the hall. Don asked Lou Shambo to go round up some adults in the community. They want to certify some instructors. Tennyson is a certified hunting safety instructor. He can also teach first aid. Don was there as the extension agent. Stewart organized the meeting and is also a certified hunting safety instructor. He’s teaching the course at the Agency. He lives in Harlem and he’s been there for 20 years. He works for the BIA, he’s a soil conservationist and is also an expert on range lands. He is white. Lou Shambo, Matt Gone and Fiddles were also at the meeting. There were about 20 kids there from about 4th to 8th grade.
Stuart said that he wanted to have some community people certified as hunting safety instructors. He gave qualifying exams to Matt, Fiddles and Lou and he asked them to take the exam and to send it back to him. Then the certification is done through the district warden and the Montana Fish and Game Department. He also asked Mike and I to take the exam for certification. He said that he would send us the exams to take.
He set up the course for October 3rd through October 8th. Each class is two hours and then there is a two-hour exam. He told the kids that to be certified they weren’t allowed to miss a single night of the course and they would also have to pass the exam. Tennyson and Stuart both said that they would come down to Hays to help on the first night. Mike and I said that we would ask Father if we could use the mission to teach the course.
Stuart said that the hunting safety course was started in the 1950s in Montana because of the high accident rate in the field. The course became mandatory for any kids who wanted to hunt and were between the ages of 12-18. They had to take the course to use firearms. Under 12 years of age, you are not allowed to use firearms in the state of Montana. Between 12-14 years of age, you aren’t allowed to hunt without the supervision of a parent or guardian. Each student will receive a booklet to take the Montana Fish and Game Department course. He reviewed the topics of the five lessons of the course. He said that conduct and behavior were as important as the ability to handle a gun. And they would have to demonstrate a good attitude before they could be certified. He passed around a piece of paper for the kids to sign and their address if they were going to take the course.
9-17-77 Havre
I was in Western Drug and was writing a check at the counter for the things I bought. There was a young boy, about 16 years old, at the register. When he saw the address on the check, he told me that he used to live in Hays with his parents. He is white. He said that his parents used to own a store in Hays near where the other store is now. It was the same kind of general store with food and all sorts of other things. They had it from about the time he was born, and we lived in Hays for about a year and a half. It was about 15 years ago. When the store burned down, we moved up to Havre.
9-19-77 Hays
Susie and I drove Lindey home from the mission at 10:45 this evening. We got to the Hays turnoff. I looked both ways on the highway and didn’t see any cars coming. So, I rolled through the stop. A car was behind me about 100 feet from the turn, and he turned on his red and yellow flashers. I pulled over and got out of the truck. The tribal policeman came up to me with a flashlight and looked at my license plate. He asked me if I saw the stop sign. I answered yes, but I really hadn’t seen it. I never stop at this corner unless a car is coming. Half of the time, the stop sign isn’t even there because someone has knocked it down or stolen it. He said that he wasn’t going to ticket me. He said I have to stop at this sign and so do you. I said, ok. He got back in his car and he followed me for a little while. I was going 50 in a 55 mph zone and he passed. He never asked me for my driver’s license and he saw that I had Ohio plates. I actually didn’t have my license. I wasn’t worried when I saw him because we played baseball at the mission together a few times this summer. I knew there wouldn’t be any trouble.
9-19-77 mission kitchen
Beatrice asked Mary if she would help her father and uncles because they are going to try to hold a feed on Memorial Day. Traditionally, it is a day they set aside to clean up the graves, and then there is a potluck dinner. Beatrice said that they used to hold this all the time, but they haven’t for quite a while. Jim and his brothers are going to try to bring it back. Mary said she would love to help them.
9-19-77 mission
Father said that Kathleen and Laura were invited to Jenny Gray’s handgame this weekend. Part of the ceremony was the passing of the berries and fish in a bowl. Father asked Jenny what the meaning of that was, and she said it was kind of like ‘our’ eucharist. The eucharist was bread and wine which in the days of Palestine was the common food. And berries and fish here are common food.
9-20-77 mission
On the KOJM news it was announced that Governor Judge proclaimed the last Friday in September to be Native American Indian Day in the state of Montana. The Indian Education Committee in Havre, Jack Quincy chairman, held contests in the Havre schools. There were awards for Indian art projects and special films and programs will be held on Friday. The mission school is also planning special projects and a program on Friday afternoon.
Vera drove up to the mission this afternoon. I was standing by the rectory, and she stopped to talk to me. I walked up to her window. She said that she wanted me to meet her daughter, Jill, who was visiting from Ronan.
Vera told me that she had just finished school for the summer and that Urban Rural wouldn’t be starting again until October 3rd. She said that the program got funded for the next three years. It will be Title IV money. Vera told her daughter that I was the best teacher in the school. (Thank you, Vera!) I told Vera I wouldn’t be teaching this year because it would interfere with my driving the school bus.
9-20-77 mission kitchen
Beatrice said that there are no terms of endearment, such as honey, dear, sweetheart, in Gros Ventre.
9-21-77 mission kitchen
Mary said that her kids have a trace of red hair from BJ. BJ’s mother, Ruby, is half Irish. Her mother was Sioux and her father was an Irishman. BJ’s father was a Chippewa from Minnesota. BJ is part Gros Ventre. He is down for about 1/8th Gros Ventre. Mary is 7/8th Gros Ventre. With Beatrice and Jim as her parents, I can’t even imagine where 1/8th of something else could come from.
9-21-77 rectory
Don was going to hold the financial management meeting on September 26 and 27. Mary and Beatrice are going to prepare lunch for the meeting after they serve the kids at lunch. Don said that the meeting was being financed through the BIA and the funds would be used to buy the food for lunch and to pay Mary and Beatrice and to pay the mission for the use of the facility. The BIA is paying the tribe, so the money will come through the tribe. They get money from so many different places and for so many different things that they sometimes lose track of what money is supposed to be used for. I’m going to keep on them about this money so they keep track of it. This financial management meeting should be very good. We’ve invited all of the Ag-lenders from the area and almost all of them are coming to the two-day conference. We’re going to try to work it out so that the operators on the reservation can get loans for their operations. Right now the Ag lenders don’t like to deal with these trust lands. They have no hold on the lands because they’re all trust. But we’re going to try to work around all of this red tape. Don gave me an agenda of the two-day seminar. He expected between 30-40 operators from the reservation to be at the meetings. Don said that he and Grace Miller, the other extension agent on the reservation, were also planning some social activities for the operators. There are so many bad feelings between people, and we’d like to bring everyone together for a good time and try to improve people’s attitudes and feelings here. We’re going to try to have four of these social events a year, and we want to have these at the mission. We’d have all of the operators and their wives. There would be a half hour of business with some kind of lecture or discussion on a certain topic and then we would have dinner and an old-fashioned dance. We really believe that these social activities would improve the feeling between people. I’m having a meeting with Grace Miller and six operators and their wives to organize the first social night. I wished Don luck with the project, and I told him it was a good idea.
9-21-77 rectory
Don Addy came to the mission this evening and brought two exams to have Mike and I certified as hunting safety instructors. Stuart Rowe from the BIA asked us to be instructors. He is also an instructor and is giving the course at the Agency this week. He is also trying to get Fiddles, Lou Shambo and Matt Gone to be hunting safety instructors. He gave them the exams at the meeting last week and the materials to sign up. The course will be offered to the kids in Hays on October 3rd – 8th. Each class is two hours and there are about 25 kids from Hays signed up to take the course. It will be held at the mission. The kids are required by state law to take and pass this course if they are 18 years old or younger and want a hunting license.
Mike and I took the exam which was prepared by the NRA. It concerned the knowledge of a rifle, shotguns and handguns, hunting safety, courtesy and conservation. Mike took our exams up to the Agency and gave them to Stuart at the BIA office. If we passed the exam, our scores and Stuart’s recommendation will be given to the game warden in the area. Then we will be certified as hunting safety instructors through the Montana Fish and Game Department. The course that will be offered at the mission is prepared through the Montana Fish and Game Department and the National Rifle Association.
I think Mike and I taught the one course at the mission and if memory serves me, Jr. was in this class. Before I came to the reservation, I had never held a gun or rifle. Neither were remotely related to anything in my life. I handled this hunting safety gig in precisely the same way I dealt with my bowling class my freshman year in college. Just as I was an excellent bowler, theoretically speaking, I was an exceptional hunter and gun handler, theoretically speaking. I read the materials carefully, learned them and then taught the information to the kids – all of whom had handled guns and gone hunting with their families from the time they were little children. Hunting was an integral part of their culture. While we lived on the reservation, I did purchase two rifles, so that I could go out hunting with the people in the community. They were beautiful rifles. A .22 Remington bird rifle and a lever action Winchester 30-30. I don’t know that I pulled the trigger on either of them more than a few times. They sat in my basement for decades after we returned. I never purchased shells for either of them. If anyone ever tried to break into my home, I would have had to use them like a baseball bat. I have since given them to my nephew who lives on the family farm and is an avid hunter.
9-24-77 trailer
Matt said that while he was in Great Falls he stopped at the hospital to see Roseann. She was still in intensive care. Charles was there with her. She has a broken leg and hip – her pelvis is broken in two places. Her head was also smashed too. It really swelled up. She was thrown from the car. It must have rolled for about 40 feet. She had been drinking. It was about 2:00 in the morning and she was driving home from the Agency. She fell asleep, the car hit a turn off and flipped twice. Then it threw her. Then it rolled and landed on the top. She was lucky that she was thrown out of the car. She crawled about 40 yards up to the road and laid there for about four hours until 6:00 when a trucker found her lying there.
9-25-77 trailer
Tom Jones came over for a visit. He said that he and Tuffy were going to be doing a lot of trapping. We set up trap lines separately and we do some together. We’ll set up trap lines all the way to Dodson. I set my traps about a mile or two apart. We put most of our traps in creek beds and in coulees. We trap off the reservation, too. There’s a problem around here with people who take our pelts and some people take our traps, too. I know that off the reservation, this is a federal offense, but I don’t know what it is on the reservation. We set our traps in rocks or in brush or trees. You set them so that the only way they can get across to the bait is by crossing the trap. Animals hate to step on anything, so you have to make them step on it. We mostly get young animals and by the first year it seems they get real smart. I’m not sure what it is. We do get some older animals, but we mostly get the young ones, the foolish ones. If they get scratched by a trap or if there is a near miss, they get smart real fast. You won’t get them. We set the traps about six inches from the bait. You have to make them pass the trap and step on it. Then when they do, they get caught in it, either by the head or the leg. An animal usually gets down low to the ground and they crawl to the trap slowly to sniff the bait. That’s how they get caught. Then I have to shoot them when I check out the traps. I shoot them in the head. We use coyote or fox urine or skunk as bait. The animals love it. Tuffy orders the stuff; he ordered a gallon of it. We mix glycerin with it. It makes the smell stronger, and it makes it last longer. Tuffy and I made about $6,000 on trapping last year. We get mostly coyotes and we get on average about $80 a pelt. We also get fox, badger, mink and muskrat. You don’t need a license for these. It’s open because they’re varmints. The only ones you need a license for are the cats, bobcats and lynx. You are allowed either one of each or two of one kind. So Tuffy and I get four all together. Last year we got two bob cats. We got $110 for a small one, only a kitten. And we caught an adult and got $300 for that pelt. We only hunt deer on the side because it is really a waste of time for us. You have to take out time to skin it and gut it out, and we can be checking and setting traps with this time. We spend the whole day out. But if we run across a deer, we’ll try for one. It does take too much time. Tuffy only tans deer hides.
Tom said, I’m going to get enough meat for the winter, one elk, one deer and I’m going to buy a beef from my grandmother.
Tom said that he and Tuffy got 50 freshwater clams yesterday. We steamed about 25 and when the shells open, we cut open the shell and take out the meat. We fried and ate all 25 of them.
9-26-77 mission arts and crafts Susie
Clayton came down to arts and crafts. He said that pretty soon it would be snowing, it will be an early winter. I said that the only thing I don’t like about it is that you couldn’t go anywhere because it made traveling difficult. Clayton said, well the best thing to do on a cold snowy night is to get into bed, relax and stay warm. Tootsie said, she liked to do that – she reads in bed or watches tv. I said, Clayton, is that what you meant? He looked at me and laughed. So did everyone else. He said that he was the kind of person who wouldn’t settle down. He said that he doesn’t even sleep at home anymore. He’s in his car. I don’t even get cold in the car anymore.
9-27-77 mission
I asked Lou if he turned in his hunting safety exams. He said that he couldn’t teach the course because he was headed to the Flathead Reservation. He’s taking a course on tree planting. We’re going to be planting trees in the Little Rockies. Mike and I were the only ones who turned in the exam.
9-27-77 mission
During lunch at the mission, Inez Brock came up to talk to Mike. She told him that Sonny could go up to the home for the handicapped up at the Agency. He can go there every weekday from the morning to the evening. Then he’d have a place to go every day. We’d have to arrange for someone to take him up there and then back home. It could be on their way to work, and we’d pay them six cents a mile for doing it. She asked Mike to talk to Sonny about it. Mike said that he would. After Inez left Mike said that he didn’t think that Sonny would go for it. I don’t think he’ll want to go to the home. He probably won’t be interested.
9-26-77 mission kitchen
Beatrice was cleaning potatoes. She said that her grandparents used to pick potatoes for people so that they could get their winter money. She said that they really knew how to save money in those days. They would save their money for Christmas. Now, she can’t seem to save anything.
Beatrice said that she is hanging her corn and letting it dry to keep it for the winter. She said it tastes good.
9-27-77 trailer KOJM Radio
On Jack Quincy’s program he said that he was talking to some people and they are under the impression that the people on Ft. Belknap get free homes. These people pay for their homes like everyone else. They buy or they rent their homes and their payments are based on their incomes. Some people are under the impression that the people on the reservation get a check every month. Some people get welfare and some get a pension, like everyone else. Some people get lease payments once or twice a year. The only thing that the Indian gets for free is their health benefits. We should get these misconceptions cleared up. I invite people to come to the reservation to see for yourself.
9-30-77 Hays Store
I went into the Hays Store this morning to buy cigarettes. I was the only one in the store and George Laroque was working behind the counter. There were only a few brands. I asked George where all of the cigarettes went; it was just about empty. He said that Allen forgot to order. He usually orders on Saturdays. So there was no delivery on Tuesday. We didn’t get any food either. Most of the shelves were pretty empty.
In the fall, Mission Canyon and the Little Rockies were spectacular. We spent as much time in the canyon and mountains as we were able. The images speak for themselves.
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