70 Years Ago

February 18, 1949

County, State and Federal Agencies Cooperate in Effort to Get Roads Open to Ranches but Losses Will Be Extremely Heavy

Persistent efforts on the part of the county, state and federal agencies interested in opening the roads in Powder River county has paid off. H.L. Whiting, chairman of the board of county commissioners, said that practically every road in the county had been opened at least once.

The federal government working through the office of Tom Dudley, district grazier, has made funds available for the storm emergency to open roads to isolated ranches and farmers. Dudley has employed Al Pikkula and his tow tracklaying tractors with bulldozers to clear highways and roads into isolated ranches.

County snowplows have been on the job constantly since the first week in January and have opened hundreds of miles of county roads that have been blocked by the huge snowdrifts. While all of the county has suffered from the severe winter weather, the southern part of the county has the most snow and the deepest drifts.

Monday afternoon for the second time, the county road up the east side of Powder river to the H.R. Cook ranch was opened so that a convoy of trucks could get hay. Ten trucks made up the convoy and the hay was taken to the Sonnette community, hardest hit of any community in the county. Cook has sold 200 tons of alfalfa hay during the past two weeks to ranchers needing feed. The Cook ranch having irrigated bottoms along Powder river is one of the few places in the county where surplus hay was available.

County snowplows and later the Pikkula bulldozers opened a road into the Albert Jesse place at Olive where hay was available for sale. Another convoy of trucks hauled hay to the Kingsley section where ranchers were short of feed. They also hauled hay from the Wm. Broaddus ranch on Powder River to this community.

In the Powderville section, Tom Dudley employed the Jurica Bros. with their tractor and bulldozer to open roads so that feed, fuel and supplies could be hauled into ranches isolated by snowdrifts.

Claude Davis of Miles City, district highway engineer, has had Harold Liming employed to open roads in the western part of the county with his dirt moving outfit. Davis took over the task of keeping open the Ashland-Sheridan road where it passes through three counties. The forest service has cooperated with the other agencies in keeping roads open on the forest reserve.

Continuously blowing winds have hampered the efforts of the snow removal units. One road will be opened up and the residents of that community supplied when during the night it will be blown full of snow again. Below zero temperatures have assisted in making this winter historic in its severity.

One family on Camp creek between Loesch and Coalwood ran out of food and Bob Kellog came to the rescue by flying supplies in with his plane. This is the only known case where the more spectacular type of assistance has been given.

The farm plane come into its own during this siege of winter weather. Equipped with skis the farmers and ranchers who own planes have been able to get out of their places at will. Tom Dudley has flown over most of southern Carter County making a survey of the needs of the ranchers in that area and taking order for supplies.

Government experts have made flying trips to the western blizzard area and have taken back word to Washington that livestock losses in the area would not be over 3 percent. Local ranchers who know and understand the country say that the losses will probably be ten times that amount. While losses up until the present time may not have been heavy, the winter is not over and cattle are in deplorable, weakened condition.