Voices from the Past

November 2, 1923

Rowed Down Powder River in Quest of Honey

Fred Durst landed at Broadus Tuesday afternoon after a nautical trip down the river from Moorhead, a road course of 46 miles but half again farther by water. Mr. Durst was five days in making the trip.

A boat, 12 feet in length, was made at Moorhead especially for such a trip as was taking. Using this boat, Mr. Durst was hopeful of salvaging at least a portion of the honey that was lost in a recent flood. While discovering many of the hive bodies along the river’s banks, Mr. Durst was disappointed in not being able to salvage much honey for coyotes and insects had already preceded him and tasted of the sweets to their hearts’ content.

The bees and honey were owned by Frank T. Kelsey and Durst was at his ranch during the flood, learning the bee business. In justice to Durst it is said he expressed a wish to move the bees to higher ground but was dissuaded by others who believed the crest of the flood had passed with the first raise so that when the second higher raise came in the early hours of the morning there was no preparation to meet it and there was not sufficient time to rescue the bees and they all perished. A tank, eight feet in diameter and six feet high, containing 4,000 pounds of honey, was lifted by the flood water and floated downstream 100 yards until it met some obstruction where it held until after the high water had passed. The honey in this tank was not injured by water or sediment. On an island below Moorhead, 1,000 pounds of honey were found and salvaged from the hives.

Out of a total of 450 hive bodies, only about four stands remain of the extensive bee business that had been developed over a course of several years by Mr. Kelsey and this remnant happened to be standing on a bench of table above the high water mark. There was no honey in fifty of the hives but in the others the average was 100 pounds of honey to the stand so that Mr. Kelsey estimates the total at 20,000 pounds that were in the stands. Of this vast amount of honey only a small part was recovered.

Steer Lost Four Years, Shipped to Market

Mrs. Harry Lunn a few days ago received word that a steer, owned by her and believed to have been lost, has been found on Blume Creek by Will Thoet, her son-in-law, while he was rounding up cattle for W.H. Peays. The steer was sent to market along with other cattle from the Moorhead vicinity and was to have been marketed at Omaha the first of the week. The steer was two years old when it strayed from its range on Bay Horse four years ago and the supposition is that it wandered down Butte Creek, crossed the river and over to the head of Bloom Creek, either to the Custer forest reserve or in that vicinity.

October 29, 1948

Garage and Barn Burn at Zuehlsdorff Place

Children playing with matches in a haystack at the John Zuehlsdorff place in Crane Acres late Tuesday afternoon set fire to the haystack and it spread to the garage and barn which were completely destroyed by the flames. An alarm was sounded in Broadus and members of the local Volunteer Fire department responded to the alarm with the county fire truck. The fire was kept from spreading to adjacent buildings but nothing could be done to save the barn and garage. Mr. Zuehlsdorff lost a fine set of tools in addition to much valuable building material that was stored in the barn.