Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1909-03-26
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A GOOD PARTNER.

In a little pamphlet recently is
sued there is food for thought as to
the share the railroad in creating
opportunity. The pamphlet is from
an article by Cnas. D. Trueman in
TIE Railway World, and part of it
follows:
Among the passengers carried out
of Cheyenne one morning in the
early eighties was a broad chinned,
bright eyed young man from Monroe
county in Ohio, who was bound for
the Yellowstone country in Montana.
His entire worldly asset was a stage
ticket and about twenty dollars in
money. plus full quota of integrity
and nerve. The tangible part of his
asset was the result of self-denial
and many weeks of hard work in
blacksmith shop in Ohio, and his
presence on the Big Horn trail in
Wyoming was accounted for by his
desire to emulate the example of one
of Monroe county's full fledged black
smiths, an older man, who had gone
to Billings; and by the further fact
that the Union Pacific railway to
Cheyenne, thence three hundred
miles north by stage, was the best
way at that time to get to this Mon
tana settlement.
His destination, which was reached
in due time, was nominally a trad
ing point in the primitive sheep
country, very few stores; several
saloons, a blacksmith shop and a
cluster Of ttshacks.'' That was all
all save the brown, rugged line of
bluffs standing their silent watch ov-
er the clear blue Yellowstone, and
the bare silent country rolling away
to the east, west and north. The
country was void Of inspiration, and,
indeed, promised lean, hard future,
but it was the destination of this
young mans journey, so he found
work to do and went at it with a
will. But with the approach of win
ter work ceased, and trapping, which
afforded the only means of liveli-
hood, became his occupation. Thus
one, two, almost three winters were
spent in the open country; the days
devoted to hunting hides, the nights
spent in blanket on the ground,
while the summer months were de-
voted to. securing title to a quarter
section homesteader's claim which he
had entered, the value of which
seemed quite limited, even when Sc
cured and improved. Then some
thing happened. The Northern Pa
cific construction gang which had
been working slowly westward,
rounded the bluff just east of the
settlement, crossed the river, shov-
eled and dug their way through the
place and on toward the divide.
Presently the wing of the spike
mauls echoed through the gap, and
died away in the level country to the
west, and Billings was a railway sta
ton. Business carried on over the
Cheyenne trail was of course inter-
fered with. and land values had an
upward tendency. The markets of
the east were now available in a true
sense; settlers came in more rapidly,
the price of necessaries decreased,
luxuries appeared in stores, and the
settlement grew and became a pros
porous and important little city.
Last fall I stood with this same
Monroe county blacksmith's helper
under the shadow of a new and mod
ern beet sugar factory in the city of
Billings when he priced the quarter
section homestead claim now under
sugar beet cultivation at SIPS per
! acre in the days of the trail, at one
hundred and fifty dollars per acre!
(? Later i was shown two splendid
properties and four city lots, all we'll
located, which were his, but when 7
. learned he owned another quarter
section Of land upon which were sew
! eral thousand head Of sheep and that
re leased another quarter section
ranch upon which were more than 9
hundred head Of hor5es owned by
himself, asked il Amusement,
.sHow in the world did You manage