Note:
The following was written in response to a request for stories from descendants of homesteaders for the 1986 reunion of the Elmdale community in NE Montana.
The purpose of the second paragraph is to tie the story to the community.
The following was written in response to a request for stories from descendants of homesteaders for the 1986 reunion of the Elmdale community in NE Montana.
The purpose of the second paragraph is to tie the story to the community.
Elsie's Story
An Incident in the Lives of Art and Esther Turner
By their daughter, Helen
Just in case any of you may have heard rumors of a scandal involving our Dad, Art Turner, and a vixen named Elsie,
I’m here to straighten that out! But first a little background.
Art Turner and Esther Goss were married in Sidney, March 5, 1924. They lived in the Elmdale community for a few years, then north of the Missouri River before moving on to western Montana, northern Idaho, and finally Portland, Oregon.
It was while we lived near Poplar that Elsie came to our place and upset us with her outrageous behavior. It was obvious she had a crush on Art, our Dad, and she didn’t care who knew it. Oh, she earned her keep and did all that was expected of her, but it was plain she had no use for anyone in the family except Dad and she made a total fool of herself over him. Elsie was our milk cow. We never had another milk cow like her!
Dad walked two miles to work in Poplar every morning. Elsie would follow him to the fence then stand there and bawl for half an hour after he’d disappeared from sight. We could always tell when it was time for him to come home by the sound of her thundering hoof beats heading for the fence. She’d wait at the fence until she spied him, then she’d get so excited, bawling and running back and forth, cowbell clanging, until he came through the gate.
She not only had no use for the rest of the family, she carried out a vicious vendetta against us. If we had to feed or water her or bring her in from pasture, we went armed with a substantial club. And no one but Dad would even think of trying to milk her!
We had to keep toddlers Donald and David away from her because she tried to gore each of them into the ground before we could beat her off. Once when eight-year-old Helen, armed with her club, brought Elsie in from pasture to the barn, all went well until Helen had to go ahead of Elsie to open the barn door. Suddenly here was that familiar sound of thundering hoof beats, but this time Helen turned with her back against the closed door to see Elsie charging head down and full speed ahead determined to push a Helen-shaped hole right through that barn door. Elsie was deterred at the last instant by a flying apple box aimed at the cow’s head by Esther who had seen her daughter’s plight in the nick of time.
Oh, that cow was a case! We never knew what she’d try next! But Elsie finally got her comeuppance. During one of those bad dust storms when you couldn’t see your hand before your face, poor Elsie was trying to find cover in the blinding dust and somehow managed to back herself into our outhouse, even though the door seemed slightly narrower than Elsie. When we found her, she was jammed in tight.
Even so, Elsie had the last laugh. When we finally pried her loose, we discovered to our dismay that she’d been in our outhouse just a little too long. You could say we had the only housebroken cow around.
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1986 update:
Toddler David in the previous story is a grown man now with his own grown up family. Even in modern times he’s made a grand effort to keep homesteading days of the Old West alive. He and his family live on a farm in an 1865 house they’ve restored. Recently he went to retrieve some of his cows that had wandered into a neighbor’s pasture, and there Dave wound up on the horns of a dilemma in the form of a real live buffalo bull – part of the neighbor’s herd of buffalo! That bull caught him from behind and sent six-foot-six Dave sailing through the air into a steel gate. After that, Dave was faced with trying to explain, not always successfully, that YES it really was a BUFFALO that caused the fifteen-stitch gash on his face, the broken teeth and glasses (not to mention the discomfort where he connected with the buffalo’s horns)!
The Old West is still alive. So is Dave* we’re thankful to report!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Update in memoriam:
Our brother, David Lowell Turner, died 7/21/94, age 61,
survived by wife, Patricia, three children,
(and by 2000) six grandchildren, including
son, David Lowell Turner, and
grandson, David Lowell Turner.
Just in case any of you may have heard rumors of a scandal involving our Dad, Art Turner, and a vixen named Elsie,
I’m here to straighten that out! But first a little background.
Art Turner and Esther Goss were married in Sidney, March 5, 1924. They lived in the Elmdale community for a few years, then north of the Missouri River before moving on to western Montana, northern Idaho, and finally Portland, Oregon.
It was while we lived near Poplar that Elsie came to our place and upset us with her outrageous behavior. It was obvious she had a crush on Art, our Dad, and she didn’t care who knew it. Oh, she earned her keep and did all that was expected of her, but it was plain she had no use for anyone in the family except Dad and she made a total fool of herself over him. Elsie was our milk cow. We never had another milk cow like her!
Dad walked two miles to work in Poplar every morning. Elsie would follow him to the fence then stand there and bawl for half an hour after he’d disappeared from sight. We could always tell when it was time for him to come home by the sound of her thundering hoof beats heading for the fence. She’d wait at the fence until she spied him, then she’d get so excited, bawling and running back and forth, cowbell clanging, until he came through the gate.
She not only had no use for the rest of the family, she carried out a vicious vendetta against us. If we had to feed or water her or bring her in from pasture, we went armed with a substantial club. And no one but Dad would even think of trying to milk her!
We had to keep toddlers Donald and David away from her because she tried to gore each of them into the ground before we could beat her off. Once when eight-year-old Helen, armed with her club, brought Elsie in from pasture to the barn, all went well until Helen had to go ahead of Elsie to open the barn door. Suddenly here was that familiar sound of thundering hoof beats, but this time Helen turned with her back against the closed door to see Elsie charging head down and full speed ahead determined to push a Helen-shaped hole right through that barn door. Elsie was deterred at the last instant by a flying apple box aimed at the cow’s head by Esther who had seen her daughter’s plight in the nick of time.
Oh, that cow was a case! We never knew what she’d try next! But Elsie finally got her comeuppance. During one of those bad dust storms when you couldn’t see your hand before your face, poor Elsie was trying to find cover in the blinding dust and somehow managed to back herself into our outhouse, even though the door seemed slightly narrower than Elsie. When we found her, she was jammed in tight.
Even so, Elsie had the last laugh. When we finally pried her loose, we discovered to our dismay that she’d been in our outhouse just a little too long. You could say we had the only housebroken cow around.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1986 update:
Toddler David in the previous story is a grown man now with his own grown up family. Even in modern times he’s made a grand effort to keep homesteading days of the Old West alive. He and his family live on a farm in an 1865 house they’ve restored. Recently he went to retrieve some of his cows that had wandered into a neighbor’s pasture, and there Dave wound up on the horns of a dilemma in the form of a real live buffalo bull – part of the neighbor’s herd of buffalo! That bull caught him from behind and sent six-foot-six Dave sailing through the air into a steel gate. After that, Dave was faced with trying to explain, not always successfully, that YES it really was a BUFFALO that caused the fifteen-stitch gash on his face, the broken teeth and glasses (not to mention the discomfort where he connected with the buffalo’s horns)!
The Old West is still alive. So is Dave* we’re thankful to report!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Update in memoriam:
Our brother, David Lowell Turner, died 7/21/94, age 61,
survived by wife, Patricia, three children,
(and by 2000) six grandchildren, including
son, David Lowell Turner, and
grandson, David Lowell Turner.