The producers news. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1918-1937, 1934-08-23

The spring after the war when
Flint Sherman left the farm the
other Shermans began their fight
to get light up on he hill. Fhe
company was installing electricity
in the village. Ore of the COM
pany men guessed it would cost
about $500 to put lights into the
house and barn. Ida wrote to Flint
that milk, pota' oes and apples were
still high, but didn't he think $500
was a heap of money. Flint wrote
back yes. What were the other
farmers like Tom Lucy and Steve
Titus, tha4 old shagbark hickory,
doing about it?
But what the other farmers were
doing didn't cut any ice with Ike.
He would wait and then the cost
would go down. It always did.
That winter most of the cows
we've calving. Ida had to spend a
couple of nights pulling calves out
with young Jesse and Ike. Little
Essie was left watching the baby.
Somehow or other she knocked the
kerosene lamp over. Bob children
were burned to sticks of ash.
The insurance company found all
sorts of excuses to give them only
one third of the insurance. This
clause said this, the other clause
said that. Steve Titus came down
to see if he could help. Claws,
he cried and S alked from the tool
shed where the Shermans were liv-
my hawking his hate.
The bank wouldn't lend Ike any
money. Instead of building a new
house, he had the old one patched
up. After wrs sitting for a month
of Sundays, he went down to the
town to find out about the lights
again. He talked to Pie Johnson,
rich farmer, electrical contractor,
and chief politician of the county.
johnson was called Pie by some
farmers because he had his finger
in every pie, by others because he
had a perpetual smile as if some
one were cutting pie for him. He
told Ike the company couldn't af-
ford to run wires UP to Gun Hill
without a deposit of $1,000.
Ike told Johnson to string him
self up to a light pole.
But it was hard facing Ida. She
woke up nights moaning, brooding
over young Jesse. She padded
from room to room to see that no
lamps were burning. She could not
eat, saying everything tasted of
kerosene. And so Ike stormed to
the company town office, his great
fist working over the hogshead of
his belly.
The little manager said that they
couldn't come down a cent because
CT the terrible lot of poles that
would have to be run along the
poor road and the risks the COM
pany would be taking. Why in
hell didn't they make better roads
for the poor farmers. Ike shook
the manager till he must have had
the jacks and then threw him over
the desk. The two wasp-waited
stenographers were pinned to their
! seats, their faces pulsing in fright.
! Ike broke out of the office with
out being arrested.
Ike decided to get himself gen
orator and make his own electricity
But he couldn't get 8 permit.
The company had all the local
poll icians feeding off It. One mite
! Ike stormed down Gun Hill with
his axe on his shoulder. When the
village woke up next morning a
dozen poles were smashed down
across the pike. No one could nail
it on Ike. The company put up
new poles and still had Ike where
the hair was short.
Ida had written Flint about the
fire. No answer. She wTote again.
A telegram from Flint working on
a steam shovel in the mountains.
He sent money. Let her keep her
tail up. Let Ike stop being one
goddamned fool, but get together
with the neighbors to fight the
company.
Ike was sure if the company
could be handled, he could do it
alone. A tremendous man with
muscles on his neck like the bulg-
ing bags of boar hog, he had no
use for the farmers round about
him. Some of them we're tenants
who couldn't do the work with both
hands he could do with one thumb.
All they could think about was
cars and burning up the road. AS
for Steve Titus, he was an irish
man. To Ike who hadn't been
away from the farm more than a
day since he had been dropped,
there was no difference between an
Irishman and niger. Only a
niger was an Irishman turned IN
side out.
"The same old Flint" he snorted.
''The same fly-by-night. Every
thin's a gang. The farmers got to
gang together like he done with
Steve and the rest gambling. The
farmers got to get together like
he and the others when they went
to town to bet their horns scraped."
There was no way out for Ida
/ but % swallow and be patient. She
could wait, but let Jesse get
married and there would be lights
blooming in his bedroom.
Jesse was a quiet rawhide whip
of a boy. He was built like Flint,
.