Butch and Sundance. Harry: Blame it on the WeathersteemCreated with Sketch.

in #history5 years ago

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Howdy folks and greetings from the Great Plains of North Texas! I'm doing a series about 2 of our most famous outlaws, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

I'm telling their complete stories so you can know what their backgrounds were, how they were raised and what in the world made them turn into outlaws.

Recap

We first delved into Bob(Butch) and his past and discovered that he was raised to be a fine, upstanding citizen with natural gifts that could have been a significant benefit to society. Instead, he turned his back on everything he knew to be good and righteous and chose lawlessness.

Now we're talking about Harry(Sundance) who had a remarkably similar background based on honesty and hard work with Biblical principles drilled into his head by his wonderful mother.

Today's story

In yesterday's post Harry had joined up with a huge cattle drive heading North from New Mexico to Montana owned buy the N Bar N ranch. This was one of the cattle barons who owned about 60,000 head of cattle on their vast Montana ranch.

The ranching business was similar to farming in that they both could be drastically affected by weather. The Montana drought of 1886 probably got Harry laid off from the N Bar N ranch as hundreds of cowboys got the same treatment, especially new hands.

Scorching heat and wild grass fires had destroyed hundreds of thousands of grazing land for the cattle that summer so herds were reduced in size.

Records are sketchy as far as exactly where Harry was in this time period, he may have gotten hired on at another spread but that ended the next winter for certain.

The worst winter on record

They called it The Great Die Off. It was a series of blizzards which struck the Great Plains from Canada to North Texas.. record snow falls combined with record low temperatures but Montana and Wyoming were the hardest hit.

In November the arctic winds blew in with temperatures lowered to twenty below, which would be -29 C, and 6 inches of snow. Three weeks after that another similar blizzard hit. A few days after that yet another blizzard hit dumping an inch of snow per hour for 16 hours!

The temperatures plummeted to 68 degrees below zero in some places! That's -55 C. When cattle are out in the pastures and it snows they can normally dig down with their hoofs and get to some grass but if the snow gets too deep they can't do that.

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About a week after the third blizzard hit the temperatures were at minus 46 degrees in most of Montana and it started snowing again and continued for 72 hours, this was at the end of January.

With snow measured in feet instead of inches there was no way to get hay to the herds whether they were out in a pasture or in the backyard. Humans were just trying to survive. In some places the snow drifts were 100 feet high!

Finally by March 1st warm winds began to blow and the countryside thawed out. The pastures were littered with thousands of dead cattle. Losses were estimated at 90% in most cases, 95% in some herds.

It was a nightmare

Records are scarce but many cowboys lost their lives trying to get cattle to shelter. With temperatures that low many cattle had frozen standing up.

With these devastating losses many of the Cattle Barons went out of business and thousands of smaller ranches declared bankruptcy.

Desperate to survive, many cowboys turned to rustling and taking the cattle to the nearest railroad towns for sale.

It was in these desperate times that Harry stole a horse, saddle and six shooter from another cowboy when he was passing through one of the ranches just North of Sundance, Wyoming. He was only 20 years old.

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Here's a bit of history has nothing to do with Harry but I thought it was interesting. The trains had a heck of a time with all that snow and this was a time before they had big snowplows and removal equipment, the tracks were cleared by hand!

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Harry's story continues tomorrow. Is this an anomaly or the start of a criminal lifestyle? Dang, you shouldn't have watched the movie! lol.

Thanks for reading folks, God bless you all!
-jonboy Texas
the gentleman redneck

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PS- ya know...you might just be a redneck if:

Your bicycle has a gun rack!

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You just received a 100% upvote from @rewards-pool. Thank You for being apart of the @rewards-pool community

Howdy there rewards-pool! thank you so much for the upvote and for helping so many people!

History always fascinates me. I wrote a story set in the past during a big unexpected snow storm a couple of days ago... it would fit right in here! I can't imagine trying to eek out my survival in those days. Something like this, not knowing when it is going to end or if there is another storm coming with no way to know? That has to be devastating. Great write up!

howdy today Byn! yes, with no radio and no weather forecasts? oh man! Not knowing what to plan for..but then back then they had more storage food like canned goods, grains and dried meat but still! Out on the plains with no woods to go to cut for heat..no wonder so many died.

Are you going to post that story you wrote about the snow storm?

Yeah, can you imagine just having to wait and see?!

I did post it, but I think you missed it. The Storm

yes I remember seeing that one! but I don't know what happened lol. thank you, I'll read this today!

Oh wow! I bet they had a hard time opening path for the train!

howdy blacklux! well what they needed was a bunch of Puerto Ricans to come and shovel snow, the snow would just melt from all those hot Islanders working! that's my theory anyway. I think it would work that way. lol.

That was a tough winter to be sure. I like how you give us a different look at the life and times of these famous cowboys.

You know you're a redneck if you try to BBQ a standing frozen cow.

haha! oh no! that's a great one rebeccabe lol. that put's a comical spin on that sad story. Yeah, I like our modern times thank you. lol. I like luxuries like snow plows and snow blowers.

Wow! That is a lot of snow! I have seen the big rotary plows that the railroads used to clear snow from the tracks these days. They're massive pieces of equipment. I did look through my photos to see if I had a picture of one but I don't seem to. I've been to Sundance Wyoming but never really put two and two together that the name of the town had any connection to the Sundance Kid.

Howdy tonight Melinda! how has your day been? I've had several hours offline today so now I'm kind of catching up. Is there any place you haven't been? lol. That's wonderful though. Yes, that's how he got his nick name because he was hanging out there so much and kind of got famous there.

We were traveling in Wyoming and I had a bad cold and it turned into an ear infection and I went into the clinic in Sundance to get an antibiotic! That was my Sundance experience...

I have not got much accomplished here today. Stressing over this stupid furnace and the $3000 I'm going to have to come up with to replace it.

Well at least that cold and ear infection made you remember Sundance. ha..too bad you had to go through that though, I hope it was cleared up fast.
I already asked the furnace question in another comment so I won't repeat it here.

Back in the days when you could afford to walk into a clinic and then pay for the Rx and the doctors bill . when you walked out the door. I was on top of it because I didn't want it to ruin my vacation and I remember it clearing up very quickly

yay for that! Clearing up quickly. oh and yay for being able to go into a place that you could afford. Now it would be 5 or 10 times more money I imagine.

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Howdy steemitboard and thank you for this, I didn't know this number but I like it. the next level looks even better!

Really loving this series and all the info you are giving us so Interesting, but my brain got stuck on 58 Below zero dang thats so cold how does anyone or anything cope in that

Howdy tonight JJ! I have no idea, I was wondering that too but I did see an old photo of ranchers wearing great big, long, fur coats so I guess that helped. Otherwise I don't know, no wonder many people died. they don't know how many but it had to be many hundreds, maybe thousands. and millions of head of cattle, horses and sheep. And back then with no modern insulation or windows? I'll like our modern luxuries!

I will take our modern luxuries as well, living through those harsh conditions is something most of us these days could neve rhandle

This reminds me of what I read on the mini ice age during the eighteen century! The Chinese dynasty also went down because of harvest failure.

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howdy sir kaminchan! Oh really? And if the Chinese dynasty went down that had to mean thousands of people died I think, right? Nature can be devastating!

That is really something! I never heard of this "Great Die-Off" winter, that is truly remarkable. I can't imagine much could have survived through those kinds of storms! Great photos you found for this post - I love the trains too. Good job!

thank you sir Keith, I really appreciate that. I think you're one of the few who liked it but I sure thought it was interesting, both the fact that probably thousands died, millions of livestock died. And then I thought about how they didn't have modern insulation in buildings, terrible windows if they have glass at all! wow.
Then all that man power to clear the railroad tracks!

The temperatures you mention are just crazy - I wouldn't expect that unless you went to the south pole! Hundred-foot snow drifts? Wow! When I was very young my family lived for one year in St. John's, Newfoundland. They can get very serious snowfall. The winter we lived there, snow drifts almost covered the telephone poles. You would see two feet of pole sticking out the top of a snow drift. I believe the city closed for a week. The first floor of the house we lived in was completely buried and you could not open a door. My uncle had to lean out a second-floor window and sweep or shovel snow away from the front door - then jump down into the snow which was still chin-deep and tunnel out to the road. As a child I loved it!

wow! haha! that's totally wild. I remember as a kid getting snowed in during blizzards in Kansas and it would be many days before we could go anywhere but that's days, not months! but yeah as a kid that was a great time!

Snow can be fun, but I'm happy it doesn't come here often. The last serious snowfall in Victoria is still referred to as the Blizzard of '96. Twenty-two years ago. I doubt it was more than three feet but it completely shut down the city for quite a while. Apparently, the city keeps TWO snow plows in working condition for a city of 350,000 people. If a blizzard ever came back here we'd be in real trouble I guess! :-)

haha! oh man, 2 snowplows for a city that size, amazing. lol. Yeah if you ever have another blizzard those 2 plows couldn't keep up, maybe they could keep the main road and to the hospital and police station open. If you have supplies it might be kinda fun to get snowed in, I used to love that.

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