Cowgirl Sass & Savvy

 The Hired Hand

by Julie Carter

The cowboy world is full of hired hands. Most who have lived that life have either been one or had one – or both. And, like everything else in the world, there are good ones, bad ones and those that fall somewhere in a category of “all the above.”

Skeet Horner was a bad cat cowboy with a reputation or two he’d sure enough earned. He was always available for day work, but only those desperate for help or who didn't know better would give him a call.

Skeet had been married any number of times -- both formally and informally. Even he didn't know for sure how many of either. If you ever happened to run into Skeet when he was all dressed up - that is, he had on a clean silk wild rag, he likely was on his way to get married.

He traditionally bought one pair of Wranglers and wore them until they were worn out. He didn't own a washing machine and didn't have time to go to a washateria. The other punchers knew to stay upwind from him when they worked cattle in the same vicinity.

Handling cattle slowly wasn’t in his resume. He liked to stir up the occasional wreck with the cattle so he could do some strategic roping. Known to drink a little, he mostly settled discussions with his fists and was known to be a dirty fighter.

One of his many wives had previously been married to a very well-known professional boxer and she’d gotten a ranch in the divorce. This place had a swimming pool but no pens that were handy for the horses.

Skeet kept up a jingle horse that he’d use to drive his riding horses into the swimming pool beginning at the shallow end. Holding them in the deep end, he’d throw a houlihan over whichever horse he wanted at the time and lead it on out of the pool.

When he got tired of that wife, he threw her out of her own ranch and lived there forevermore. She was happy to get out alive and no one, including the pro-fighter, was brave enough to evict Skeet. He put his brand up over the entrance gate and that was the end of it.

One guy told me that working with people like that is why they made cowboys quit wearing guns. I’ve often thought the same about working some particularly stupid cattle, but I can see his point.

Being on the boss end of the hired hand business can also be a little tricky.

One time the head honcho at a big feed yard, full of cattle at the time, had his entire cowboy crew come to work severely hung over. It was a cold, miserable Amarillo winter morning and the cowboys were lingering in the break room, hunkered down next to the stove.

Finally on his last nerve, he told them, “All you S.O.B.s either get out of here and go to work, or else go home.” Directly he found himself with 50,000 head of cattle standing in pens and not a cowboy in sight..

“Last man standing” was thinking he might have to rephrase his orders next time.

 

Julie can be reached for comment at jcarternm@live.com.

Sacaton Mesa Run

Nana’s Influence

Sacaton Mesa Run

The Secret Divulged

By Stephen L. Wilmeth

             The Gila Valley at Cliff, New Mexico is one of the great places on Earth.

 The best place to take it all in is at the Mesa Cemetery.  There, against the backdrop of the Mogollons, the Valley can be viewed.

Starting on the northeastern horizon is Tadpole Ridge and the western extension of the Pinos Altos Range.  Dipping further east and south in succession are Hell’s Half Acre, LS Mesa and the Treasure Mountains. Bear Mountain is the sentinel on the northern thrust of the Treasures. 

Next come the Greenwood, Cottonwood, Cane, McKeefer, and Mangus drainages. To the west from there is School House Mountain.   Then there is Brushy and then Bald Knoll. 

On northward is Black Mountain.  Then there is the Duck Creek drainage.  The LC’s contemplated an empire there only to be derailed by a ball peen hammer murder in McKelligon Canyon in El Paso.

Dominating the northern horizon, the Mogollons are magnificent.  Sacaton and Whitewater bow to Mogollon Baldy that dominates the center of the ridgeline.  Haystack, 74, Shelley, and Watson lay in the forefront of that big, beautiful mountain. 

Before we leave the cemetery and the magnificence of its view, though, we always visit with the residents.  Their names are as familiar as the memories they left with us . . .

The High Mesa

Sacaton Mesa lies southward from the Mogollon ridgeline.  It is a benched alluvium cut with canyons.  It is the historical homeland of the Shelleys and the Rices.  Peter McKindree Shelley first settled there on the edge of Mogollon Creek in 1884. 

Four years later in 1888 Peter’s eventual son-in-law, Lee Rice, arrived with cattle from Texas.  The cowboy who rode with Lee was Boze Ikard, the black cowboy who was characterized in the western series, Lonesome Dove.  Mr. Ikard would go home to Texas, and Lee would settle on Sacaton Creek.

For nearly 50 years the area was accessed only by horseback and primitive two tracked road.  The road off the ridge into Mogollon Creek was so treacherous that even brave men would get out of the first motor cars and walk.  Riding a horse off the ridge was one thing, but riding a car was something much different.

All of the Peter Shelley grandkids remembered the early road.  Two of Lee’s sons, Blue and my grandfather, Carl, told me how they hated it.  It wasn’t because of where it led, it was because they had to walk along in front to the wagon or car for years and throw rocks out of it.  The road constantly ‘grew’ rocks!

From the High Mesa

Sacaton Mesa has two dominating features.  The first is the high mesa.  Several miles from the edge of the Gila Valley the road descends to the lower mesa.  That winding descent holds nearly as many memories as do the conversations with the residents of the Mesa Cemetery!

Every descendent of Peter Shelley who spent any measure of their youth in or around that area has a memory of that descent from the upper to the lower mesa.  At issue are the unwritten and largely classified attempts to set world record coasting records off that precipitous ridgeline!

The practice in those black operations, though, was not promulgated by the unwary and innocent youth of the family.  It was introduced and perpetuated by those who should know better . . . the elders of the family.

My first memory of those ‘runs’ was in our family car.  My parents, upon returning from ‘the ranch’ at Blue and Minnie Rice’s, were prone to run at the decline and shut the engine off and let the car coast.  The experience was always associated with first merriment and then ‘English’ as we all tried to help the car make a few more feet before it came to a stop on the lower mesa. 

I guess I thought we were the only ones to experience such sport until one day I was about to go over the drop off with my grandmother, Leona Rice.  I warily divulged the story to ‘Nana’ and she first scolded me for my mother’s recklessness.  “How dare her for doing such a thing with my grandchildren!” I seem to recall her saying.

  She then asked me how far we had coasted.  She was quite interested and I tried to tell her.  She didn’t seem to be very impressed with my account of the episode and, after a pause, inquired if I would like to see how it should really be done.

 “Sure, Nana . . .”

It was surprisingly apparent she knew what she was doing.  She gunned the car but didn’t really get after it until she navigated the first two curves in the decline.  After that and we were flying off the hill.  She then shut the car off.  Wow, what a ride!

Nana’s expertise put us well beyond the point of any previous success I knew.  In fact, Nana’s technique was far superior and it continued to be perfected when I rode alone with her.  It never failed, though, that when we finally coasted to a stop she would always remind me not to tell my mother. 

Interestingly, it was the same warning that I got from my grandfather, Uncle Bill, Sam Reed, Betty Reed, Frank and Clyde, and even Grandma Lewis.  How Grandma Lewis ever knew of such things remains a mystery to me.  She wouldn’t put up with any nonsense.

The Hallmarks

My cousins, Hugh and Jim Reed, were as good as or better than any competitors in the clandestine coasting derby.  I’m not sure where they perfected the craft because it surely wasn’t from their Gramp or Granny, Blue and Minnie Rice.  I couldn’t imagine divulging such frivolity to Blue.  There was no way he would indulge in such hoodlumism . . . or at least I thought for the longest time.

 It was even more so with Minnie.  She was so straight-laced that we couldn’t even think of something bad around her.   They must have learned the whole thing from somebody else.  Maybe Frank or Clyde or some other hooligan, but they were well taught! 

I am one of the few living souls who know of their trip off the hill on Blue’s John Deere A.  Jimmy was driving and Hugh was standing on the draw bar.  They had discussed it as they discussed so many things.  Hugh was telling Jimmy that ‘Mama’ was gonna’ find out when Jim just couldn’t stand the temptation.  Off the hill he gunned that old piece of iron.

Hugh relived the story through the first two corners, but neither would discuss anything after that.  Both of them got real quiet  . . . and pale at that point.  Hugh described how the tractor was bouncing like an uncontrollable jumping bean from one side of the road to the other.

I do know that when they got the old tractor stopped at the bottom of the hill neither had to remind the other not to tell ‘Mama’.  In fact, neither could say anything for several minutes.  Jim quietly started the tractor and carefully drove on home.  After a while, Hugh noticed his hands were cramping.  They were as white as Jim’s face and had the marks of the seat springs where he continued to hold a death grip.

The Truth

My grandfather and I took a run off the hill another day and set what I was told was a record.  The mark was compared to a point that he and Blue had reached in a Model T Ford. 

“Blue, knows about this?” I had asked, incredulously.

It seems they had come off the hill and were about have to crank the Ford when Blue spotted a herd of wild horses.  Boppy was in the back when Blue got the truck in gear and popped the clutch.  Off they went across the flat.  They hadn’t gone a hundred yards and Blue hit a bump that threw Boppy out.  The story ended with Blue yelling for his brother to “shoot, shoot!”  Of course he couldn’t because he was sitting on his saddle in the middle of the empty flat where he and the saddle had landed.

“How do you know it is a record, Boppy?” was my next question.

“Because this is beyond the spot we left the road to chase the wild horses and we always thought that was the best mark ever,” was his calculated response.

I was happy and perplexed at the same time.  A world’s record was one thing . . . but Blue Rice indulging in nonsense was another . . . the world was never quite the same again.

Stephen L. Wilmeth is a rancher from southern New Mexico. “I am suggesting strongly that any reader never . . . ever attempt this foolhardy nonsense!  Ride a pitching mule off it, but do not coast a vehicle off that mountain!”

Intelligence Analysis: How Dangerous Is Citizen Dataveillance

by Bill Rounds

    I have been fascinated recently with the Washington Post intelligence analysis by William Arkin and Dana Priest. Both are well known journalists who have covered the military and intelligence communities for many years. Realizing that something had changed after 9/11, they dedicated two years to investigating what the intelligence community had evolved into.
    They first dug up the location of as many Top Secret facilities, both government and private, as possible. Then took somewhat of a guided tour, gaining access to several high ranking officials inside the Top Secret intelligence community to explain and clarify what each agency does and how they do it.
What They Discovered
    Almost everyone is amazed when they see the creatures the government had created not only in size and scope, but in the amount of waste, redundancy, cost and ineffectiveness. There are 45 different government agencies with 1,271 subdivisions, all involved with intelligence. More than 2,000 private companies with government contracts provide some service to Top Secret agencies. In total, there are over 850,000 people nationwide who have Top Secret clearance working on intelligence gathering, analysis, support, implementation, etc. The massive size and scope of the intelligence community is larger than it ever was during the cold war and is directed as much at targets within the US as at targets abroad for the first time. They really have spared no expense. The US intelligence community has effectively become the “fourth branch of government.”
    The Post is clearly more shocked about the size and inefficiency of the creatures which have been created. I am more concerned with how dangerous these creatures inherently are and how difficult they are to control by their very nature.
The Real Danger Of The Intelligence Community
    The Washington Post fails to point out the most dangerous part of this scientific marvel that has been created. The judicial branch cannot act as a check on the intelligence community because judicial review is not required for almost any intelligence operations. Subsequent prosecution for any illegal conduct is nearly impossible because of the Top Secret nature of the evidence. The legislative branch requires no accountability or measures of success to check and balance the intelligence community with funding restrictions. The directors of these agencies, appointed by the executive branch and confirmed by the legislative branch, have admitted that the system is beyond their control. Like a more dangerous version of Jurassic Park, these intelligence agencies are vicious creatures which have been animated, have escaped from their cages, and are taking over the park.
    The intelligence community was so preoccupied with whether or not they could build such a surveillance system, they didn’t stop to think if they should. The fourth branch of government is the most dangerous branch regardless of whether this surveillance and dataveillance of citizens is justified or not and whether it is effective or not. The sheer power and scope of this system allows unprecedented power over the lives of individuals. Should someone in any of these agencies want to exert control, no matter what the reason, the lack of accountability and lack of supervision makes it possible...

READ THE REST OF THE ARTICLE

USDA Warns of Fraudulent Letters

WASHINGTON, March 16, 2012--USDA officials learned late Friday afternoon, March 16th, 2012, that fraudulent letters are being sent by FAX to individuals and businesses in at least four states. The letters purportedly come from a USDA procurement officer and seek personal information. These letters are false and in no case should a recipient respond with personal and financial information. The fraudulent letters bear USDA's logo and seal and are signed by an individual identified as "Frank Rutenberg" using a title of "Senior Procurement Officer". Letters have been received by FAX in Alabama, Nebraska, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, but may have also been sent to other states. Recipients should not respond and should not supply the requested information. USDA is investigating this matter through the Office of the Inspector General.

If you suspect you have received such a letter or have questions please contact USDA at: procurement.policy@dm.usda.gov or call 202-720-9448.

Song Of The Day #795

Ranch Radio's Gospel tune this morning is Living The Right Life Now by Bill Clifton & The Dixie Mountain Boys.

The tune is on his Starday LP album Mountain Folk Songs.

The Westerner's Radio Theater #24

 Some, including me, like the old country music programs. Others, like Jerry Schickedanz, like the old western radio programs.  So I'll try to bring you both.  Give them time to download, as these are three times larger than the song files.

Grand Ol' Opry November 22, 1952



Gunsmoke May 10, 1952.

Pro-pipeline group presses EPA for Keystone XL documents

The Institute for Energy Research is seeking internal Obama administration documents about the proposed Keystone XL oil sands pipeline to determine whether President Obama’s rejection of the project was a political decision. The group, which supports the Alberta-to-Texas pipeline and frequently bashes White House energy policy, already believes the answer is yes. But on Friday it filed a broad Freedom of Information Act request with the Environmental Protection Agency. The group is seeking EPA communications about the project with the State Department (which has led federal review of Keystone), the White House, several environmental groups, and Nebraska lawmakers. “One troubling aspect of the President’s decision is that it appears to have been influenced by political factors and not whether the pipeline is in the national interest,” the nonprofit group’s request states, pointing to major anti-pipeline demonstrations that environmental groups staged last year...more

EIB repeals greenhouse gas rule in New Mexico

A little more than a month after repealing New Mexico’s cap and trade program, the Environmental Improvement Board (EIB) on Friday (March 16) repealed the second of two climate regulations passed in the final weeks of the administration of former Gov. Bill Richardson – this one calling for a limit on greenhouse gas emissions. “We examined the rule thoroughly,” EIB chairwoman Deborah Peacock told reporters moments after the board voted 5-0 to repeal what’s commonly called Rule 100, that mandated that generating facilities in the state could not emit more than 25,000 metric tons of CO2. “I think we had the benefit of information that the previous board didn’t have in order to repeal it.” Members of the board listed a number of reasons for repealing the regulation, ranging from questions about whether it would have any effect on improving air quality to the economic burdens the rule might have on industries to what the board called its vague language to whether the regulation has been superseded by federal action by the Environmental Protection Agency that went into effect in January of 2011. It didn’t take long for environmentalists to blast the decision. “Polluters have spent so much money tying this carbon reduction rule in legal knots,” said Mariel Nanasi, the executive director of New Energy Economy. “And they finally succeeded in orchestrating a sham process that has them profiting at the expense of New Mexican families and businesses.” The original rule was adopted by a board appointed by Gov. Richardson and critics called it stacked with environmentalists determined to institute sweeping regulations...more

Green bullies upend Campbell’s Soup

Recently, the news came out that Campbell's Soup Co. will “phase out” bisphenol A (BPA) in its soup cans despite the company’s faith that the packaging is perfectly safe for its consumers. So why did Campbell's make that decision? Green activists have been bullying companies that use BPA, creating a controversy about its safety. Like any good company, Campbell's has a desire to maintain the trust of its consumers. That consumer trust was jeopardized, not by Campbell's, but by left-wing anti-BPA activist groups and the liberal news media, which have campaigned against the chemical for more than a decade. As recently as September 2011, Campbell's was targeted by a “report” from the liberal anti-chemical group the Breast Cancer Fund (BCF), which had come up with the obvious conclusion that BPA was in several canned goods, including a “Disney Princess” soup from Campbell's. Stop the presses. There is BPA in canned soups? Bisphenol A has been used in can liners since the 1950s to preserve food and protect consumers from food-borne illness, such as botulism. And it has done a fine job of protecting them. So this wasn’t news, nor was it reason for great concern, as BCF claimed...more

While portrayed as a cancer group, Seymour found:

An examination of BCF’s goals, partners and propaganda makes it clear that it’s just another extreme eco-group cloaked in pink. The current president is left-wing activist Jeanne Rizzo, who also sued to overturn California’s ban on homosexual marriage a few years ago. The major alliances of the group are with other green organizations, including Earthjustice, National Resources Defense Council and the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, which calls itself CHE, reminiscent of the Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara. CHE actually was founded by Ms. Rizzo.

Feds: Kill the lions to save the fish

Oregon, Washington and Idaho will be allowed to resume killing California sea lions at Bonneville Dam this spring, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said today. The agency authorized removal of up to 92 sea lions annually through May 2016 but estimates that 25 to 30 will be taken each year. The authorization allows taking only sea lions having a "significant negative impact" on salmon and steelhead...more

Well, how 'bout those wolves that are having a "significant negative impact" on ranchers?

Evidence hidden in Sen. Stevens' corruption case

Ted Stevens

Many will recall the criminal charges brought by the Justice Dept. against former Senator Ted Stevens.  He was found guilty and within days lost his bid for re-election.  The Justice Dept. later dropped all charges citing prosecutor misconduct and the judge in the case appointed an investigator whose report was just released.  Check this out for another glaring example of federal law enforcement being out of control:

° The 525-page report, the fullest review yet of the government's actions, described a rogue team of prosecutors and federal agents who allegedly concealed critical information from the senator's lawyers and allowed its star witness to give false testimony before a jury, which later found Stevens guilty of seven counts of lying on Senate financial disclosure statements.

° Schuelke's report, ordered by federal Judge Emmet Sullivan, who threw out the charges in 2009, found that the prosecution was "permeated by the systematic concealment" of evidence favorable to the defense. The evidence prosecutors failed to disclose, the report concluded, "seriously damaged the testimony and credibility of the government's key witness."

° The report found that federal prosecutors made "astonishing misstatements" to Stevens' attorneys in an attempt to conceal information suggesting that Allen had pressured a former child prostitute to sign a false declaration that he never had sex with her when she was underage. Prosecutors worried this information might undermine his credibility in the case against Stevens and never disclosed it to Stevens' attorneys, the report says.

So I'm sure the prosecutors will be prosecuted. Nope.

Schuelke's report said the prosecutors could not be charged with criminal contempt of court for their conduct because Sullivan had never given them a "clear and unequivocal" order that they "follow the law."

Think of that.  They have to be told to follow the law or they are immune from the law.  This makes me sick. 

Song Of The Day #794

Ranch Radio today will conclude our week of songs about "Ol Boys Julie Carter Has Known."

At first I thought you can't do this without at least one rodeo song. So I was going to select one of my favorites, Jerry Ambler by Ian Tyson.

Then I thought, no, he was a pro and Julie usually writes about those of us a little lower on the rodeo rung. And usually ropers.

She also writes about our tendency to get in wrecks and how our western sense of right and wrong can sometimes result in a humorous outcome.

So here's a tune about a cowboy with a rope in his hand, a sense of justice in his heart and all told with a Julie Carter type sense of humor.

The tune is The Fireman Cowboy by Rex Allen and is available on his Voice Of The West CD.

And let's hope Julie Carter keeps ropin' in new fans and to hell with the bystanders.

Occupy This

Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel

Wheels are the archetype of a primitive, caveman-level technology. But in fact, they're so ingenious that it took until 3500 B.C. for someone to invent them. By that time — it was the Bronze Age — humans were already casting metal alloys, constructing canals and sailboats, and even designing complex musical instruments such as harps.The tricky thing about the wheel is not conceiving of a cylinder rolling on its edge. It's figuring out how to connect a stable, stationary platform to that cylinder."The stroke of brilliance was the wheel-and-axle concept," said David Anthony, a professor of anthropology at Hartwick College and author of "The Horse, the Wheel, and Language" (Princeton, 2007). "But then making it was also difficult."To make a fixed axle with revolving wheels, Anthony explained, the ends of the axle had to be nearly perfectly smooth and round, as did the holes in the center of the wheels; otherwise, there would be too much friction for the wheels to turn. Furthermore, the axles had to fit snugly inside the wheels' holes, but not too snugly — they had to be free to rotate.The success of the whole structure was extremely sensitive to the size of the axle. While a narrow one would reduce the amount of friction, it would also be too weak to support a load. Meanwhile, a thick axle would hugely increase the amount of friction. "They solved this problem by making the earliest wagons quite narrow, so they could have short axles, which made it possible to have an axle that wasn't very thick," Anthony told Life's Little Mysteries.The sensitivity of the wheel-and-axle system to all these factors meant that it could not have been developed in phases, he said. It was an all-or-nothing structure.Whoever invented it must have had access to wide slabs of wood from thick-trunked trees in order to carve large, round wheels. They also needed metal tools to chisel fine-fitted holes and axles. And they must have had a need for hauling heavy burdens over land. According to Anthony, "It was the carpentry that probably delayed the invention until 3500 B.C. or so, because it was only after about 4000 B.C. that cast copper chisels and gouges became common in the Near East."The invention of the wheel was so challenging that it probably happened only once, in one place. However, from that place, it seems to have spread so rapidly across Eurasia and the Middle East that experts cannot say for sure where it originated. The earliest images of wheeled carts have been excavated in Poland and elsewhere in the Eurasian steppes, and this region is overtaking Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq) as the wheel's most likely birthplace. According to Asko Parpola, an Indologist at the University of Helsinki in Finland, there are linguistic reasons to believe the wheel originated with the Tripolye people of modern-day Ukraine. That is, the words associated with wheels and wagons derive from the language of that culture...more

Three thousand years and they had no EPA, OSHA, etc. to put up with.  No telling how long it would take today.

Cutting the Army Corps of Engineers

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is a federal agency that constructs and maintains a wide range of infrastructure for military and civilian purposes.1 This essay concerns the civilian part of the agency, which employs about 23,000 people and will spend about $9.2 billion in fiscal 2012.2 The civilian part of the Corps—called "civil works"—builds and operates locks, channels, and other navigation infrastructure on river systems. It also builds flood control structures, dredges seaports, manages thousands of recreation sites, and owns and operates hydroelectric power plants across the country. While the Army Corps has built some impressive infrastructure, many of its projects have been economically or environmentally dubious. The agency's activities have often subsidized private interests at the expense of federal taxpayers. Furthermore, the Corps has a history of distorting its cost-benefit analyses in order to justify its projects. The civilian side of the Corps grew out of the engineering expertise gained by the agency's military activities early in the nation's history. In mid-19th century, Congress began adding civilian missions to the Corps in response to political demands and various natural disasters. Today we are left with an agency involved in far flung activities such as beach replenishment, upgrades to city water systems, agriculture irrigation, clean-up of hazardous waste sites, and efforts to revive the Florida Everglades. The Corps has been greatly mismanaged over the decades, with problems ranging from frequent cost overruns on projects to the major engineering failures that contributed to the disaster of Hurricane Katrina. In addition, the dominance of special-interest politics on the agency's activities has resulted in it supporting many wasteful projects. Fortunately, most of the Corps' activities do not need to be carried out by the federal government. Some of its activities—such as flood control and the management of recreational areas—should be turned over to state and local governments. Other activities—such as seaport dredging and hydropower generation—should be turned over to the private sector. This essay focuses on cutting the Corps' spending activities, and does not address the calls for reforming the agency's regulatory functions.3...more