Serving Southern Jefferson County in the Great State of Montana
Serving Southern Jefferson County in the Great State of Montana
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The year was 1918. The Armistice had just been signed and it was Frannie's birthday, her 18th, to be exact. Frannie, or more correctly, Francoise de Bordeaux, was born in the relatively small community known as Lemonweir Mills, on November the 11th, in the year 1900. Being one of the very few French inhabitants of that part of the territory, Frannie was proud of her heritage. Less than 150 years earlier, of course, her ancestors had been rousted from these shores. Her family had been among the...
Dear Editor, It’s that time of year again; the time for New Year’s Resolutions. Time for all the “New Year, new me” promises we make to ourselves. It IS that time of year. Yes, in fact, what better time to make those promises, those resolutions? Aren’t we basically starting with a clean slate, in this new year that’s opening before us? Isn’t that what we’ve been told from day one? Looking at it like we’re getting a fresh start is not altogether a bad thing, I guess, but is it really a fresh start?! Can it truly be said that we’re writing on...
Barbara Jo Stafford, or Barbie as she was commonly known, was an only child. The circumstances of her emergence into this world were quite miraculous; some might even say magical and mysterious. Jo Ann and Jacob, Barbie's parents, had been trying for some time to have a child, but with no luck. Having exhausted all the standard, doctor-approved means, the Staffords decided to try some rather unconventional ones. A friend of a friend of a friend told Jo Ann, over a quilt one Tuesday morning on a...
Dear Editor, I’m not what most people would call a patriot. Don’t get me wrong, I love where I live, but I’m not willing to die for the American Way. I certainly don’t view this country as my Fatherland or Motherland, for that matter. However, I DO appreciate the relative freedom we still enjoy in this nation compared to other countries. It would seem that we still enjoy more personal freedom than other areas of the so-called Third World. Even what personal freedoms we have seem to be fading fast, but we can still freely exercise them, to what...
At 102 (103 February next) Granny Hotchkins, as everyone back home called her, not only looked really good for her exalted age; she was also, without doubt, the oldest person to ever dare The Falls in a barrel! Coming from the small mid-west township of Ludlow, Iowa, just five miles from neighboring Waukon, Granny was fairly famous in her little hometown for her herbal remedies and botanical medicines. In 1872, less than a decade after Lee officially surrendered to future president Ulysses...
Dear Editor, This may be controversial. This might cause a bit of a stir. It could even be esteemed to be a bit negative; but when, if ever, is it okay to lie? Much less, to our kids? For example, one of our kids comes up to us, asking what we think of their artwork. If it’s poorly done and even ugly as sin, do we lie and tell them what a beautiful picture it is? Sure, it might boost their psyche for the moment, but what happens when one of their peers, who are usually more brutally honest than most adults, tells them it sucks? They come c...
Josaphyna De Villiers was born on May 21, 1894, to Willem and Dominique De Villiers. Although she entered this world in these United States of America, Josaphyna was of French ancestry, with both sets of grandparents having migrated to these shores from the South of France, in the foothills of the Pyrenees. Her grandparents, both paternal and maternal, had kept a certain part of their heritage a secret, as they had, in a manner of speaking, been forced to leave the land of their nativity. They...
John F. Stoddard entered the Armed Services in 1917. John Frank ( his middle name was actually Francis) was immediately shipped off, via New York Harbor, in early June of that same year, along with thousands of other boys from this great nation. Born in neighboring Waterloo in 1901, John Frank, having grown up in rural Iowa, had never even thought about joining the Army before. He was used to rising early, working the family farm from sunup to sundown, and going to bed when it got dark. The begi...
Dear Editor, Let me start by saying that corn used to be my most favored vegetable when it came to canned veggies, anyway. When I had good teeth, I would devour corn-on-the-cob like it was going out of style back in the day. Even to this day, I like my cornbread made with...you guessed it...creamed corn. But here’s where we come to the crux of the matter. It’s no big secret that corn, the delicious vegetable that saved our Pilgrim forefathers from starvation, has little to no nutritional value! Furthermore, studies have shown that the ind...
Understandably, Charlotte was proud to wear her new dress for the nice man holding the camera. It was her birthday trip after all! She and her parents, Russian immigrants Andrei and Alina Semenov, moved to Chicago from Kazan, Russia. They had begun homesteading a small parcel of land just west of the big city about three years previous. Charlotte was used to hardship, so when she stepped onto the boat headed east, down the Volga to the North Sea, she was prepared for the long, arduous journey,...
Dear Editor, I realize that this is a rather touchy and perhaps even volatile issue, but it needs to be addressed if only to further educate people. This letter is in response to last week’s Letter to the Editor, co-authored by Timothy Bennett and Sally Erickson, regarding both the safety and wisdom of the push to vaccinate our children. Before I go too far, though, I DO want to reiterate that I don’t disagree with much of what they wrote. Maybe they could have exhibited a bit more kindness and understanding, however, although I ack...
Danette Jocelynn Holding was born on January 18th, 1899 at the office of Adolf Gundersen in La Crosse, Wisconsin. The hospital which would be known as Lutheran Hospital was not built until about three years later. Danette's parents, Robert and Ida Holding, had recently relocated to the big city across the Mighty Miss'ipp four years earlier, after having heard the reports about this famous European doctor, who had jumped the pond to share his blessings with this fledgling country. Coming from a s...
Adell Peregrine Huffman emerged into this cold, cruel world on a warm fall day in 1852. On September the 22nd of that year, the day after her parent's first anniversary, she set the stage for her life by singing her lungs out! As heiress to the family business, Adell married the Barnard half of the equation on the 6th of September, 1871. The picture included was taken on the occasion of her 19th birthday, just over two weeks after she married her partner in business, Alonzo Barnard. This was...
Dear Editor, As far as conspiracy theories go, one might note that the the subject of climate change has been growing in popularity over the past few years, maybe as much as a decade. I’m not a scientist, so I’m not even going to try to convince anyone either way as to whether there’s something to it, or even if it’s as bad as they say. I’m definitely not going to say either, that it’s all just a bunch of hogwash, because I know there’s SOMETHING to it, if only that it’s as simple as our Mother Earth protesting being raped (a comment that I’ve...
Dear Editor, I would like to lead out with several paragraphs from an article I penned almost 6 years ago. To quote; “What passes for religion today is largely what drives the political engine of this nation! What people believe about a certain thing motivates them to, say, vote for the lesser of two evils, follow a certain party line, or throw their support behind a certain candidate that promises change. In order to preserve their way of life (as they see it), people will attack, with all their fervor, anything that they view as a threat t...
The tornado came, it saw, and it conquered! When the Donner twins were born, the Great Whirlwind which heralded their coming also signaled the course that their lives would forever take. With the meager means at his disposal, Robert Donner prepared his twins for the hard, often rough and tumble life of the early 1900s West. It could well be argued that Butte, Montana, especially in this early era, was even more rough and tumble than most. After his primary means of employment, the Parrot...
Dear Editor, Having just read approximately the first half of The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, as posted on the United Nations website (https://sdgs.un.org/2030agenda) I can affirm, with all the positivity I can muster, it SOUNDS pretty good, at least to some extent. Gender Equality: YES! Ending Poverty: YES! Protect the planet: YES! Promote peace: YES! All these are lofty goals, but do we really need governmental assistance in these matters? In this agenda, “the rule of law” and “universal law” come up frequently. With all conspir...
Mary and Jane Donner were born exactly one full minute apart, during a tornado on May 27th, 1896, in St. Louis, Missouri. For their parents, Robert and Miriam, their unique entrance into this life was merely a harbinger of what was to follow! Though the Donner's property was scarcely affected by the fury of the enormous "dust devil", they quickly decided to join the Westward Expansion and, uprooting from Missouri, took the Frisco from St. Louis to Kansas City. There they boarded the Kansas Pacif...
Dear Editor, First of all, kudos to Leonard Wortman! In response to his letter from last week, I would like to say that I find myself in almost full agreement with the majority of what he wrote. However, I must say that his comments about the new variant(s) are somewhat lacking. If this new Delta variant is as dangerous as he seems to have found it to be, there is definitely cause for concern. As you may recall, I am somewhat of a conspiracy theorist... What if “they” figured out the whole COVID thing wasn’t having the desired (lasting) effec...
This is in regard to the Whitehall Master Plan meeting, which was held October 6, 2021. I am by no means a politician or even much of a reporter, but I’ll be honest, I really didn’t take much home from said meeting. However, as the meeting progressed, one thing I did notice was talk about growing our community. Exactly what that growth should look like is the real question! The question asked by Downey, as mentioned in the article: “Do we want to become Bozeman? No. But do we want to grow? Probably, but to what extent?” is the gist of my own...
For many years, Frank and Harriet Jester had tried, God knows they had! In the late Spring of 1923, their patience was finally rewarded when little Charlotte Mae came into this world with hardly a peep. In fact, both Mother and Father would say that little Maisie was the best baby they'd ever had (ironic since she was their only child.) Frank and Harriet were from opposite ends of the country. Harriet a New Jersey lady, while Frank was born into one of the original gold rush families, out of...
Dear Editor, I’m not one to complain, because it is what it is, but what is being done about the drug problem in our normally peaceful little town? At least on the surface, Whitehall has been a thriving little community in the past and even to this day enjoys the reputation for being a quiet, but strong and lively little community. Soon after moving here, coming up on 11 years ago, I heard someone say that our peaceful little town had been a “drug hub” since the 50s. Apparently, we are positioned almost perfectly, being right off the inter...
In turn of the century New England, short hair on women, even shoulder-length, brought the offending female under more than a bit of suspicion. Josaphyna Dundarsen was such a female! Not only did she wear her hair uncomfortably short, she wore her heart on her sleeve, so to speak, showing off a star-shaped pendant on a choker around her neck. One might say Jo, as she was affectionately known to those few who truly knew and loved her, didn't care what people thought of her. However, coming from...
Dear Editor, Here in Jefferson County, particularly in our little burg of Whitehall, we have been pretty lucky when it comes to the mask mandate. Although health officials are still strongly recommending that we “mask up”, even those few businesses in town that were following the guidelines very stringently have dropped their requirement. One may note the occasional mask-wearer in certain businesses around town, but for most people, pure common sense seems to have prevailed. In essence, if you’re sick, stay home; if you’re worried about g...
Dear Editor, The cost of living seems to be increasing at an almost unthinkable rate! High as those costs climb though, Americans rise above it, because life must go on. Right?! The price of lumber, while it has fluctuated somewhat, is ridiculous. But construction goes on, seemingly unperturbed. Gas prices, while not too crazy yet, in our neck of the woods anyway, are rising. Related to that, food prices are on the rise. It seems that the best option for many of us is to shop out of town, rather than at our local store. Either that or shop...
