REMEMBER WHEN ?

[Dean Romig]

Delivering my morning newspapers just after first light to the staccato sounds of gunfire from the October 20 opening of pheasant season all the way through the end of the waterfowl seasons in December.

Walking to school with that wonderful smell of burnt nitro powder on the air knowing I would only get an hour or so of hunting after school before legal shooting light ended.

Some of my favorite memories of those days.

[Twice Shooter]

Bill, I can easily believe you have forgotten the 50's. The older you get the more you forget. Cheers, Tom

[ch]

Whats the name of the small town is KS Steve?

[Stepmac]

Originally Posted by calvin humburg

Whats the name of the small town is KS Steve?

Bucklin, 27 miles ESE of Dodge City.

[charlie cleveland]

nicely said steve...i bet calvin can relate to this storey.... charlie

[Grantham Forester]

Steve, did I understand you correctly in your post? You recently wrote about your growing up in Kansas? The Prairie Queen was the name of the church, the area was settled by Swedes and Norwegians, Haavik, Skofer, Eggebrotten- it was all the same in "The Prairie Queen". I'm not critic, but I think Jack Curtis captured the rural American farmer spirit very well in his writing-- "Ya, we get the Monkey Ward Catalog, and when it shows- Good, Better, best- we always order best-- Nice gun, have to watch that safety though- me, I just got an old Nitro Marvel, but they all shoot the birds-- lines like that paint a picture of Sivert Haavik like Van Gogh did with "The Starry night"- IMO anyway. Like to see your story, the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Montana, Idaho-- truly our "Heartland" even if you are not a hunter!

[Stepmac]

Originally Posted by Grantham Forester

Steve, did I understand you correctly in your post? You recently wrote about your growing up in Kansas? The Prairie Queen was the name of the church, the area was settled by Swedes and Norwegians, Haavik, Skofer, Eggebrotten- it was all the same in "The Prairie Queen". I'm not critic, but I think Jack Curtis captured the rural American farmer spirit very well in his writing-- "Ya, we get the Monkey Ward Catalog, and when it shows- Good, Better, best- we always order best-- Nice gun, have to watch that safety though- me, I just got an old Nitro Marvel, but they all shoot the birds-- lines like that paint a picture of Sivert Haavik like Van Gogh did with "The Starry night"- IMO anyway. Like to see your story, the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Montana, Idaho-- truly our "Heartland" even if you are not a hunter!

Whew! Grantham, I didn't even have to duck and you just went way over my head! There was a nice little book entitled Byrd, or Bird; Kansas. It captured the unique qualities of growing up in those dusty little farm towns. The town I grew up in, Bucklin, Kansas, was the birthplace of both of my parents, so their parents, my grandparents, lived there too and I was related to a bunch of the folks who lived in that little burg.

I did not spend most of my youth there, but living there made the biggest impact upon me and I recall the experience as the most important and memorable of my young life. I also adored my grandparents.

There were many Swedes in Kansas. Tall blond haired farm boys. We lived on Pawnee land and my grandfather showed me Indian camp sites and the hollows left by collapsed pioneer dugouts. I met men who had known Bat Masterson, who was the Ford County sheriff for a term, leaving there after Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday left. Bat did show up in Tombstone, but he didn't stay long. I also knew men who had lived in Dodge in the 1870's and not a single one of them recalled either the Earps or Holliday. Come to find out Doc Holliday was only in town for three months and Wyatt spent most of his time in dives and saloons. He didn't come in contact with the "normal" people in town. Wyatt was in his late 20's and didn't show up in Tombstone until he turned 31.

My great grandmother lived in a little farmhouse on the north edge of town. Here name was Eva. She kept chickens and still had an egg business and she made cakes and pies for the hotel (it burned) until she went to the "Hill House" when she was 97. She made a grape pie! She was born in 1887 and in 1900 lived with my great grandfather in a dugout on the prairie. She was bitter about how hard they worked and suffered and chagrined that her husband died so young, at 63. She lived to 99.

[Stepmac]

Originally Posted by Grantham Forester

Steve, did I understand you correctly in your post? You recently wrote about your growing up in Kansas? The Prairie Queen was the name of the church, the area was settled by Swedes and Norwegians, Haavik, Skofer, Eggebrotten- it was all the same in "The Prairie Queen". I'm not critic, but I think Jack Curtis captured the rural American farmer spirit very well in his writing-- "Ya, we get the Monkey Ward Catalog, and when it shows- Good, Better, best- we always order best-- Nice gun, have to watch that safety though- me, I just got an old Nitro Marvel, but they all shoot the birds-- lines like that paint a picture of Sivert Haavik like Van Gogh did with "The Starry night"- IMO anyway. Like to see your story, the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Montana, Idaho-- truly our "Heartland" even if you are not a hunter!

LOL; just re-read this post and NOW I understand it. Oh, well; too many martini's I guess.

Of course we all had the Monkey Wards Catalogue, and the Herter's one too. I used to love paging through it dreaming of owning the guns, but I never bought one. Lee Harvey Oswald put them out of business.

An Amazing thing about Bucklin was that while it only housed about 800 souls it sported a complex social structure, with well established cliques that did not talk. Oh, the men did, but the women pretty much kept to their own group. And gossip! The people in that town took it to a high order! My wife tells the story of sitting in those iron chairs on the front porch along with my grandmother, mother, aunt and cousin, all women. Pat didn't say a word, she just sat amazed at the skill and depth of the gossip. y grandmother was 90 and my cousin 25, but that did not matter. They were equals on that gossipy front porch. There were no secrets in that little town.

In the 50's after we returned home after a trip my other grandmother would pick up the phone, there was no dial; the operator would answer, (she worked at the telephone switchboard just down the street), and say, "Hi Melinda, say I've been gone for two weeks (Melinda already knew this.) and was wondering what is going on in town?" Melinda would fill her in. Nope, no secrets at all.

The town was located where it was because of an artesian well. They used to have a water trough right in the middle of main street. The city fathers decided to provide water to the citizens for free. The result was the place looked like a little oasis with large emerald green lawns, mature cottonwoods and spritely flowers, all this surrounded by the vast, empty prairie.

[Dean Romig]

Originally Posted by charlie cleveland

nicely said steve...i bet calvin can relate to this storey.... charlie

I'm certain of it Charlie. He couldn't be any closer to the earth.

[Blind Dog]

I believe Oswald got his shootin' iron from Klien's of Chicago, the same place I got a Webley .455 with case of ammo for $12 when I was 14.