Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1912-05-24
THE PASSING
!. OF. BEN Be C0RbIN
(By w. A. Stickley in

(6y w. "A. Stickley IN
Grand Forks Times)
In the death of Ben Corb:m which
occurred at the jamestown asylum
few days ago, there is removed from
the peculiar characters of this state,
one which was of more than passing
interest.
Ben Corbin was an old timer i'm
Iowa when he moved to North Dakota,
and at the same time he arrived here
early enough to become a pioneer in
this state. He lived down i'm the wild
and unsettled part of Emmons county
and gained considerable notoriety as
wolf hunter He always liked hunt
country he got into the hunting OF
wolves for two reasons: first they
were committing depredations among
the sheep and CATTLE and second it
paid pretty WELL Ben was not large
man; he wore Russian cactus-like
whiskers and loved to talk. One
thing which he did great deal to
make him prominent in this state,
was his deep interest i'm the wolf
bounty law, which said law was I'M
doubtedly amended, punctured, re-
paired, dented and balled up and bat
tered as thoroughly as any on our
statutes in the early history of this
state. In fact 1t was somewhat in the
same plight as the game law. i'm that
it was changed SO frequently and so
radically, and had 80 many conflicting
appendages that it was impossible for
the lawyers to keep track of it's re-
quirements, to say nothing of the lay
men. Being thus interested, Ben at
tended every legislative session, and
did what he could to lobby some good
bill through in the interest of the
wolf bounty business, for he was long
ON that subject.
On sleepy afternoon when the men,
bers of the legislature were looking
around for something to do, and their
minds ran more to fun than business,
it was decided to extend the cour:es-
les of the floor to Mr.. Corbn in order
that he might enlighten them on the
question of wolf bounty. Ben took
the floor and proceeded to tell al; lie
knew with foot notes. About the
time he began to warm up, the teas
ing members began firing hot and
pointed questions into him, but your
Uncle Benjamin was there on every
point. FINALLY someone fired this
question into him:
''Mr. Corbin. isn't it fact that you
are interested in this bounty law
purely for pecuniary gain?"
"You hit it the first pop says Ben,
"Only you are not half as wise as you
think you are. wish you would
come down to my wolf farm an see
how l work hit. farm wolves and
farm them right. L breed them as
fast as possible, and see that they are
taken care Off When a cub gets large
enough scalp him Then I have a
powerful salve which l rub on his
head and grow a new scalp in six
weeks. Every cub is good for six
scalps, hence you can see that l keep
business good all the year around.
BY the time the cub has become full
grown it has reached the limit of its
scalp bearing qualities and tnen use
the animal for breeding purposes.
Now don't think gentlemen, thai l
don't know what / ann talking about,
for I think you will agree that l know
enough about this game for yon to
listen to me and act on my Judgment
All acquiesced in Ben's statement
and he closed his remarks without
interruption.
Each evening during the session
Ben was the center of attraction about
the hotel lobbes and always had some
subject of interest upon which he
would discourse. He was congenial
and a long way from being in the
Rube class
The old characters of this state are
passing one by one and as best serves
our memory, there are only about
three left. They are Denny Hannaf1n,
Budd Reeve and Bill Gokey, and is
seems that it is up to Ben Whitehead,
state historian, to gather what data he
can of the old-timers and pace it in
the archives of the State Historical
society.