Was, Some Gave All: Chuck Ward Cabin. Big Horns, Public Lands, and some recollections.

Some Gave All: Chuck Ward Cabin, Big Horns.: I'd seen this cabin before, but I'd never walked up on it.  It's a Wyoming Game and Fish cabin, from the days when the wardens s...

The reason to post this is probably obvious, and not. The obvious part is that it fits in with the blog's theme.

Chuck Ward Cabin, Big Horns.

I'd seen this cabin before, but I'd never walked up on it.  It's a Wyoming Game and Fish cabin, from the days when the wardens stayed in remote areas during some parts of the year, with a dedication to long time Warden Chuck Ward.

Ward was probably best known during his life time for giving the KTWO Game & Fish report, which occurred periodically, probably weekly.

 

The less obvious one is the bit of a recollection, vicarious though it be, of Mr. Ward.

This cabin is located on a tributary of the Middle Fork of the Powder River.  It's always been a popular spot for fisherman.  A neighbor of mine, whom I dearly miss, held it as his favorite fishing spot, and its a favorite of mine as well.  Oddly enough, it's one that I didn't fish until I was in my adulthood, probably my 30s.

That's an interesting recollection as well, as I'm a pretty wide ranging fellow.  I'll travel a long ways in a day to hunt or fish, but my range now is much larger than it was back in my teens and twenties.  I started driving in my teens, of course, and at that time I'd range, by myself, or with my cohorts, far to the west to the neighboring county, and somewhat to the east to the neighboring one.  Going north, into the Big Horns, was something I didn't do all that much, although I did a little.  For that matter, I can recall going into the foothills of the Southern Big Horns with my father.  We must have been hunting.

Going deep into the Southern Big Horns, however, is something I didn't really do very much until I came back from law school, but I very much did then.  Odd thing to recall, however, is that my father had routinely done that with a a friend and uncle of his before I was born, and a little afterwards.  Since that time, I've expanded into what was his range, reaching some of it only within the last couple of years, but I've also greatly expanded on it and was starting to do so when he died, which is now something like 30 years ago.

On Ward, my father did not hold him in high regard.

The reason is connected to this location.  My father went fishing with my Godfather, a good friend of his throughout his life, and on the way out, they were stopped by Ward.  Ward thought they'd taken more than their limit of fish.  He must have been watching them from a distance or something. Ward was wrong, but he demanded to search the truck, and did.  He completely unloaded it.

When he was done, he found that in fact they had not taken over their limit.  He then said something like, "well, I guess you can load it back up".  

My Godfather made Ward load it back up.

***************************************************

I called outback law enforcement this past week.

I actually emailed the BLM law enforcement branch, for the first time ever.  I knew they had Rangers, but I've had no occasion to call them and indeed I've never spoken to one before.

The reason was that some months ago, August I think, I went out to a place that I often to to in order to hunt and fish.  It's a parcel of BLM land.  I'm often the only guy who hunts or fishes there, although there are some others who do occasionally.

On that occasion, and I can't quite recall which I was doing, as I started to walk in I discovered a large camping ten was pitched in a cottonwood stand, to my enormous surprise.  I've never seen anyone camped there before, but it's not illegal.  It was the opening weekend of antelope bow season and my assumption was that it must be a bow hunter.  Given that, I backed out and left that spot.

Not all that long after that, but still at least a couple of weeks, I was back out and saw that the tent was still there, and a guy sitting in a camp chair in his camp.  It's not my antelope area so I assumed that antelope season must still be on.  Again, I left.

Some weeks after that I went back dove and duck hunting.  Given that, I approached the spot from a different direction entirely.  I did see doves land in some cottonwoods in the cottonwood grove and almost took a shot, but it didn't quite work out, so I walked towards the grove.  I was clean up on it when I suddenly walked right up on the camp.  It was very well camouflaged.  At that point, a man was out, and as I was carrying a firearm, I rapidly changed directions, but he saw me and called to me.  I apologized for walking up on the camp but he started to close the ground to talk to me. 

My dog is an American Retriever and he's still a puppy, but a giant puppy.  He's friendly with everyone. . . but not on this occasion.  He rapidly closed the ground from where he had been to where this fellow was and it was not friendly at all.  I was afraid my do would attack him.

One thing I've learned over the years, and it will sound odd, is to trust the instinct of friendly dogs and cats.  The first mixed breed of this general type I had loved everyone save for a couple of people, and they proved to be very sketchy.  This one had never reacted negatively to anyone before, but it now was, and it clearly regarded the man as a danger and seemingly as one who had to be taken out.  Most of the time he's a giant goofy fellow, but at this moment he was a Chesapeake Bay Retriever and I was his charge.  

I called him back with some difficulty.

Just as I did that, the man said "I like dogs" and started to rapidly close the ground with my now withdrawing dog.  That caused the dog to explode with self defense.  I  got him called off, but I had to resort to a my collar to do it.  

This from the same big goofy dog that only a month or two prior had closed the ground with a young man and his children near this spot as he wanted to be petted.

I briefly spoke to the man, apologizing for the dog.  He didn't seem to be quite right.  I also apologized for walking up on his camp, noting that I knew it had been there but that I assumed he'd be gone.  He denied that he'd been camping there.

Over the weekend I want back out for doves and chukars.  I was very careful this time about the camp, and yes, it was still there.

Now, my assumption, and I'll be frank, is that the camper is homeless, although the tent was a large one and he had an electric bicycle.  But at this point he's living on the public domain and driving off the wildlife.  I emailed the BLM.

Yesterday they went out. They called me from the camp.  They were there at the time, but the camper wasn't (my wife later noted that the camper probably had a job in town, which is probably correct).  They asked if I had a photograph of the camp, which I didn't, as they were trying to place the date he showed up there.  I related what I knew.  They told me they tagged the tent with a warning that it needed to be gone in fourteen days, the longest you can camp on the public domain.

They also asked me if there had been a lot of trash located there.  I honestly told them that I hadn't noticed it, but then, I wasn't really in a position to.  They told me the spot was trashed up.

What I didn't note, and perhaps I should have, is that when you cross a fence to enter into this area there are now piles of toilet paper from somebody shitting on the public domain.  Okay, I know that nature calls, but this was just dirty.  Most professional campers, if you will, dedicated hikers, stockmen, etc., just don't shit near a road an leave the toilet paper all over.

Anyhow, a Ranger called me back late in the day.  He'd been back out and had engaged the campers, it turned out there was more than one, in conversation. They told him they were pulling out today.  

My guess is that they'll just move to a new location on the public domain.

This isn't something I noticed much until just recently.  Last year there was a camper on a BLM spot near the river for weeks, clearly camping out of his SUV.  And I saw a Game Warden confront a guy living in his car some distance downstream from there.

I'm not sure what to make of all of this.  Homelessness is a horrible tragedy in our country and I'll tolerate a lot of urban and even urban/wilderness interface camping.  This is, I'm sure, what that was. The Rangers referred to it as a "vagrant camp", which I'm sure is a term they didn't just start using yesterday.  But this also has an aspect of the Tragedy of the Commons to it.  At least the guy in an established BLM campsite I noted above was in a developed campsite.  These guys were trashing the public land.  There's not a bird to be seen in there now.

Wyoming corner-crossing pioneer Brad Cape dies at 55

Terrible news:

Wyoming corner-crossing pioneer Brad Cape dies at 55

May the perpetual light shine upon him.

Casper Hunter Has Chased Lions, Rhinos, Elephants & Crocodiles Around The World

 

Casper Hunter Has Chased Lions, Rhinos, Elephants & Crocodiles Around The World

Lex Anteinternet: Sunday, July 23, 1911. The passing of Scotty Philip.

Lex Anteinternet: Sunday, July 23, 1911. The passing of Scotty Philip.: Scottish born South Dakota rancher James "Scotty" Philip died at age 53.  He is remembered for his personal pioneering efforts to ...

Sunday, July 23, 1911. The passing of Scotty Philip.

Scottish born South Dakota rancher James "Scotty" Philip died at age 53.  He is remembered for his personal pioneering efforts to save the Bison from extinction, his own heard having grown from five to over 1,000 by the time of his death.

Philip was a member of South Dakota's legislature.

Famed Mountaineer's Hidden Notes Still Being Found In Wyoming Wind River Range

Scott Talbott, 63, pushed Wyoming Game and Fish colleagues to be wildlife advocates

Scott Talbott, 63, pushed Wyoming Game and Fish colleagues to be wildlife advocates: Beloved warden rose through the ranks to become second-longest-tenured director in the state agency’s history.

Blog Mirror: Rod Miller: Recollecting Doug !@#%ing Crowe

Rod Miller: Recollecting Doug !@#%ing Crowe

Related thread:

Subsitance Hunter/Fisherman of the Week. Douglas Crowe

Labels: Doug Crowe, Personalities, Subsistence hunter/fisherman of the week, Subsistence Hunting

Lex Anteinternet: Friday, May 16, 1924. Harry Yount.

Lex Anteinternet: Friday, May 16, 1924. Harry Yount.: 

Friday, May 16, 1924. Harry Yount.

Harry Yount, sometimes erroneously referred to as Wyoming's first game warden (he wasn't), passed away in Wheatland at age 85.

Yount was from Missouri in 1839 and joined the Union Army during the Civil War, being taken prisoner by the Confederates from whom he escaped.  His escaped from captivity was barefoot and lead to a condition of rheumatism, which left him eligible for benefits for the same when they were first passed in 1890.  After the war, he headed West and engaged in a classic series of Frontier occupations, including bull whacking and buffalo hunting.

In the 1870s he was engaged by the Smithsonian in order to collect taxidermy specimens, and he became a regular member of the Hayden expeditions throughout the decade. During this period, he also took up prospecting.  He was well known enough to be the subject of a newspaper profile in 1877.  Around this time he became a commercial hunter in Wyoming, that still being legal until Wyoming took efforts to outlaw it early in the 20th Century.

In 1880, he was hired at the impressive salary of $1,000 per year to become Yellowstone National Park's first game warden, gamekeeper, or "park ranger" at a time at which the law was enforced in Yellowstone by the U.S. Army.  He occupied the high paying job for fourteen months.  Upon resigning he noted:

I do not think that any one man appointed by the honorable Secretary, and specifically designated as a gamekeeper, is what is needed or can prove effective for certain necessary purposes, but a small and reliable police force of men, employed when needed, during good behavior, and dischargeable for cause by the superintendent of the park, is what is really the most practicable way of seeing that the game is protected from wanton slaughter, the forests from careless use of fire, and the enforcement of all the other laws, rules, and regulations for the protection and improvement of the park.

His resignation seems to have come over a disagreement with the park superintendent, who wanted him to spend more time building roads.

After leaving the Park, he prospected, after a short and unsuccessful stint as a homesteader, in the Laramie Range for almost forty years, a remarkable stint at that occupation.  He took out a marble mining claim and spent his later years there, working also at prospecting right up to the day he died.  He collapsed near the Lutheran Church in Wheatland after walking into town, something he did daily.  He was 85 years old.

Younts Peak near Yellowstone is named after him.  The Park Service gives out the Harry Yount Award, established in 1994, annually to an outstanding ranger employee.

The Agrarian's Lament: Our Only Home.

The Agrarian's Lament: Our Only Home.: 

Our Only Home.

Last year, I had a life-changing experience at 90 years old. I went to space, after decades of playing an iconic science-fiction character who was exploring the universe. I thought I would experience a deep connection with the immensity around us, a deep call for endless exploration.

I was absolutely wrong. The strongest feeling, that dominated everything else by far, was the deepest grief that I had ever experienced.

I understood, in the clearest possible way, that we were living on a tiny oasis of life, surrounded by an immensity of death. I didn’t see infinite possibilities of worlds to explore, of adventures to have, or living creatures to connect with. I saw the deepest darkness I could have ever imagined, contrasting so starkly with the welcoming warmth of our nurturing home planet.

This was an immensely powerful awakening for me. It filled me with sadness. I realized that we had spent decades, if not centuries, being obsessed with looking away, with looking outside. I did my share in popularizing the idea that space was the final frontier. But I had to get to space to understand that Earth is and will stay our only home. And that we have been ravaging it, relentlessly, making it uninhabitable.

William Shatner, actor.

Subsitance Hunter/Fisherman of the Week. Douglas Crowe

You probably have to be a lifelong, or at least a long time, resident of Wyoming to remember Crow now, but he was a great man.

Born in 1939, and passing away four years ago on Thanksgiving Day, Crowe was a local character who authored a slightly fictionalized account of his early years in the book A Growing Season. Born in Kansas, he came to Wyoming as a teenager with his family and was shipped off to the UC Ranch for summer work in an event which would end up defining the rest of his life, a fairly typical Wyoming story, really.

Crowe served in the U.S. Army, married upon his return, and the went to Casper College and UW to earn a PhD in Zoology in 1974.  From there he became a very significant wildlife manger for hte Wyoming Game and Fish, and ultimately served in the U.S. Fish & Wildlife and a host of southern African fish and game organizations.  He was dedicated to wildlife.

He was also a great author, although it only expressed itself in a handful of books.  A column in The Wyoming Wildlife, while he worked for the Wyoming Game and Fish, was the first thing I read it in every time it arrived.

Crowe was outspoken and folksy, but hugely intelligent and dedicated.  He epitomized wildlife management in Wyoming of his era and is greatly missed.

Subsistance Hunter/Fisherman of the Week: Dick Proenneke

Dick Proenneke may be the ultimate modern subsistence hunter and fisherman in so far as the Western World is concerned.

Proenneke was born in Iowa in 1916.  His father was sort of a jack of all trades laborer, which is and was common to rural areas.  His father was also a veteran of World War One.  Dick followed in his father's footsteps prior to World War Two, leaving high school before graduation, something extremely common in that era (less than 50% of males graduated from high school prior to World War Two  He joined the Navy in World War Two and took up hiking around San Francisco while recovering from rheumatic fever contracted in the service.  Having the disease was life altering for him, as he became focused on his health.  He received a medical discharge from the Navy in 1945.

After the war he became a diesel mechanic, but his love of nature caused him to move to Oregon to work on a sheep ranch, and then to Shuyark Island, Alaska, in 1950.  From 1950 to 1968 he worked for a variety of employers, including the Navy and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.  He moved to the wilderness in 1968, at age 52, the year that in many ways gave us the Post Post World War Two World we are now seeing collapse.  He lived there, as a single man, until 1999, when old age forced him out of the woods and to his brother's home in California.  He died in there in 2003, at age 86.  His cabin now belongs to the Park Service.

Proenneke loved photography and left an extensive filmed record of his life in Alaska.

There's a lot that can be gleaned from his life, some of which would probably be unwarranted, as every person's life is their own.  Having noted that, however, it should be noted that Proenneke is not the only person to live in this manner in Alaska's back wood, including up to the present.  So he's not fully unique, but rather his high intelligence and filmed record has made him known.

It's also notable, fwiw, that he was a single man.  Basically, if looked at carefully, his retreat to the woods came in his retirement, as he had very low expenses up until 1968, and had worked for the government for many years.  He never married, so he never had a family or responsibilities of that type.  Many of the men who live in wild Alaska have married into native families, so their circumstances are different.

Probably every young man who loves the outdoors has contemplated doing something like what Proenneke actually did, while omitted the decades of skilled labor as a single man that came before it.  And in reality, Proenneke, had lived over half his life as a working man with strong outdoor interests, rather than in the wilderness.  People really aren't meant to live the way he lived, in extreme isolation, save for a few.

Related Threads:

Dick Proenneke in Alone in the Wilderness

Dick Proenneke in Alone in the Wilderness part II

Subsistence Hunter of the Week: Jack O'Connor

Arizona born writer/professor/big game hunter Jack O'Connor was, in my opinion, the best firearms author the country has ever produced, and certainly the best one on the topic of North American big game rifles.

Born in Arizona in 1902, he was partially raised by a bird hunting maternal grandfather, due to his parent's divorce when he was five years old, which influenced him heavily.  His paternal grandfather was a judge who also ranched, which also influenced him a great deal.  His mother became a university professor after that, at the University of Arizona, which he ultimately would as well.  As a very young man, he'd briefly worked as a market hunter for an uncle's saw mill.

O'Connor served in the military twice.  He joined the Army at age 15 during World War One, but was discharged due to tuberculosis.  He later joined the Navy in 1919, serving as a hospital corpsman until discharged in 1921.

He took to big game early on.  By profession, he was a writer, as noted first being a college professor.  He was the first journalism professor at the University of Arizona, a position he left to write in sporting journals full time in 1945.  In that role, he became famously associated with the .270 Winchester and Mountain Sheep hunting.  Not too surprisingly, he moved to Idaho in 1948, where sheep are indigenous, although he stated that this was in part as he felt Arizona had become overpopulated following World War Two.

While associated particularly with sheep, O'Connor was the class western North American hunter, and hunted every big game animal native to the region, frequently with his wife.  He was a noted conservationist as well.

Subsistence hunter/fisherman of the week. Townsend Whelen

By occupation, Townsend Whelen was an Army officer who came into the Army through the National Guard, having first served in the nation's oldest military branch from 1895, and then having served in the Army from 1902 to 1936, leaving the service at the rank of Colonel.

At first an infantry officer, and then later an ordnance officer, Whelen had grown up outdoors in New York's Adirondack's and then moved to Pennsylvania, where he first served in the National Guard.  Joining the Army in 1902 as a commissioned officer, Whelen enjoyed military service at a time at which being a career officer tended to leave abundant free time for other pursuits, which in Whelen's case amounted to rigorous outdoor pursuits, including, and indeed principally, consisting of backwoods and wilderness hunting.  Indeed, his Army service included this as it took him to remote locations which remained very wild at the time.

A dedicated hunter, Whelen is in part remembered today for his association with the .30-06 military round in a hunting application, principally chambered in sporting variants of the M1903 Springfield rifle.  His name today is attached to the .35 Whelen cartridge, which was a wildcat cartridge based on the .30-06 during the time at which he was the superintendent of Frankfurt Arsenal.  It followed the development of the .400 Whelen which was also based on the .30-06, and about it Whelen recounted:

About the time we completed development of this cartridge (the .400 Whelen), I went on a long hunting trip in the Northwest, and when I returned, Mr. Howe showed me another cartridge he had developed. The .30-06 case was necked to .35 caliber to use existing .35-caliber bullets. Mr. Howe asked my permission to call this cartridge the .35 Whelen, but he alone deserves credit for its development.[ 

35 Whelen 

The 35 Whelen was designed by James Howe, of Griffin and Howe, partially in response to letters from Leslie Simpson and Stewart Edward White, suggesting that a good all-round rifle for African use would be one of 333 to 350 caliber, with a bullet of 250- to 300 grains (ideally 275 at 2500 fps. Both men (along with Roy Chapman Andrews and the Rev. Dr. Harry Caldwell, who were active in Asia,) perhaps the finest big game shots our country has produced, were aware of the outstanding performance of the 318 Westley-Richards with a 250-grain bullet, the 333 Jeffrey with a 300-grain bullet and the 350 Rigby with a 310-grain bullet on thin-skinned dangerous and non-dangerous game in Africa. It is of passing interest that the bullet for the old British 333 Jeffery is much like the 300-grain copper tube bullet which Winchester introduced for the 338 Magnum. The 35 Whelen was the first of 3 (three) efforts by Griffin and Howe to produce a cartridge that would meet this ideal. All were in 35 caliber. The 35 Whelen is simply the 30-06 necked up to 35 caliber and it’s about as easy to form from '06 brass as is the 270. Later, an "improved" version of the 35 Whelen, with venturi shoulders like Weatherby cartridges, was made up, but it never caught on. The 35 Whelen, now available in several factory rounds, and factory chambered in several different rifles (although some gunsmiths still sell properly formed brass for it) has racked up a tremendous record all over the world, rivaling the 375 Holland and Holland in its effectiveness. It was originally designed, partially, as a substitute for the 375 H & H, since rifles for it could be made up using inexpensive 30-06 actions rather than costly magnum-length Mauser Actions. It has killed, with aplomb and efficiency, all of the trophy animals in the world, with the possible exception of the “Big Three” (elephant, rhinoceros, and cape buffalo.) It can be loaded down to 35 Remington speeds for light recoil and pot-shooting, or loaded up to provide terrific stopping power--more than should ever be needed by a competent rifleman facing American big game. Although not legal in certain parts of Africa for dangerous game (some countries require that rifles of at least 375 or 400 caliber be used,) solid nose bullets are available so that, in a pinch, it would probably serve. It is easy to rebarrel an action to this cartridge-- it does not even require opening up the bolt face or free-boring; the rimless brass for it, as with the 358, is cheaper and easier to manufacture than the belted brass necessary for the 350 Remington, 35 Griffin and Howe (or Holland and Holland, as it is sometimes known) and 358 Norma Magnum. There is still a great future awaiting the 35 Whelen and, now that the 22-250 has been legitimized, perhaps we can hope that the 35 Whelen will meet the same good fortune.

Whelen, in addition to being a prolific hunter, was very active in shooting sports, and a prolific author as well. 

Last prior edition:

Subsistence hunter/fisherman of the week, and Agrarian of the Week, Tom Bell.

Subsistence hunter/fisherman of the week. Albert Nelson

He was Wyoming's first game warden, hired in.1899.

While contrary to what is sometimes suggested, he occasionally had deputy game wardens in his three-year stint, his statewide, hands on, role was a monumental task.  He received funding at the amount of $1,200 per year, from which he had to pay himself and deputies who received $3.00 per day.

Last edition:

Subsistence hunter/fisherman of the week. Theodore Roosevelt

Subsistence hunter/fisherman of the week. Aldo Leopold

Famous for his writings and the creation of "The Land Ethic", Leopold came to his views on nature and philosophy because he was an avid lifelong hunter.

Leopold bow hunting in New Mexico, 1938.

The passing of James G. Watt.

Controversial Wyoming native, James G. Watt, has passed away at age 85.

Watt was the highly controversial and very pro development Secretary of the Interior under Ronald Reagan.  He was born in Lusk where his father was a lawyer and rancher.  He was a graduate of the University of Wyoming College of Law.

I had the odd experience of witnessing an automobile accident involving Watt that took place in slushy conditions just outside of Dubois.

Lex Anteinternet: Tuesday, March 30, 1943. Kenny Sailors

Lex Anteinternet: Tuesday, March 30, 1943. The Martyrdom of Sister ...: 

Sailors in 1950.

Today In Wyoming's History: March 30: 1943  Led by legendary UW basketball player Kenny Sailors, UW beat Georgetown 46 to 34 in Madison Square Gardens.  Sailors would enter the Marine Corps as an officer at the conclusion of that year.  UW would suspend basketball due to the war after that year.  Sailors eventually became a hunting guide in  Alaska, but returned to Wyoming in his old age, where he still lives, following the death of his wife.

Note: that item was originally penned, Sailors was in fact alive.  However, he subsequently passed on January 30, 2016, in Laramie, Wyoming.  Sailors remains a Wyoming basketball legend.

Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources to receive $1,000,000 Grant.

Wyoming's Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources received an $1,000,000 to establish an Intentional Wildlife Conservation Chair.  The purpose is to boost the pursuit of careers in that area.

The fund will be named for John L. Koprowski , Dean of the school, following his retirement.