Part i - Montana

part i

Hard Times

LC-USF34-058368-D

Marion Post Wolcott ? Indians going to Crow Fair, Vicinity of Crow Agency,

September 1941. In 1941 Wolcott accompanied a group of dudes from the Quarter

Circle U Ranch to Crow Fair and en route met this family, including the two dogs,

one under the seat and one under the wagon. Notice the tepee poles lashed inside

the wagon. (overleaf ) John Vachon ? Sheep ranch of Charles McKenzie, Garfield

County, March 1942.

LC-USF34-064965-D

Human history is work history. -- Meridel LeSueur

O n M ay 31, 1937, James Womble, a farmer from Jordan, Montana, sat down and wrote a letter to Senator James E. Murray. After describing the desolate state of Garfield County, he concluded with an account of his own situation: "I have only 6 work horses left, have 1280 acres of land but there is not enough grass on it for the 6 horses. I have nothing to live on, have not made a good crop since 1928. I believe it would be best for the Government to buy our land and help me get started someplace where I could make a living or at least make a garden when I planted it. All of Garfield County people need help. This never was a farming country."1

In a few short lines James Womble laid bare the attitude of many rural Montanans in the late 1930s. They had taken up land offered by the various federal land acts believing it to be fertile --why else would the government have encouraged people to file on it? They had labored hard, often for decades, fueled by the dream of self-sufficiency and agricultural success, only to learn that "this never was a farming country." Indeed,

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