Travel on the Gravel

Old John set this up, on account of his avid interest in railroading, and I was happy to be included, on account of my interest in anything having to do with the patterns of life on the northern plains. And short line railroads are important threads in those patterns. So, yesterday morning, John and I were on board an engine of the Red River Valley & Western Railroad for a short run from Breckenridge to Colfax. I'll be doing some writing about this in Plains Folk, but for now, let me express thanks not only to John for setting this up but also to the people at the RRVW who hosted us so graciously: in the Breckenridge offices, Cynthia Olson and Dan Keogh, who shared their knowledge and experiences in short-line railroad management; Dan Zink, who kindly joined us for lunch to sketch in some of the larger managerial considerations of the operation; the train crew, comprising Jared Thiele, Alex Hunger, and Dan Erickson, who tolerated our fool questions; and electrician Jeff "Spark" Kriz, who readily got us rolling again when a cable had to be replaced on the way out of town. Also, I've posted a short video, "Riding the RRVW," at Plains Folk Video.

Last week we spent several days with custom harvesters from Saskatchewan who were working in North Dakota. I needed to gather some update information for a book chapter I was working on, which deals with the history of the international harvest exchange between the U.S. and Canada, and so I just started ringing up harvesters from the Association of Canadian Custom Harvesters and learned that several outfits were at work in central North Dakota. In the field near Pingree we visited with the Loren and Florence Brownridge crew; in camp at Sterling and in the field near McKenzie we saw the Jerry and Lynn Prevost crew; and in camp at Menoken and later in the field at Tuttle we talked with Al and Marilyn Kuntz. Everyone was wonderfully hospitable and tolerant of a lot of fool questions. I'll be doing some writing about our conversations in Plains Folk. In the meantime I've posted video of the Brownridge, Prevost, and Kuntz outfits at Plains Folk Video. Also photos below.

We're awash in garden produce, which is a burden but more a joy. Last night at midnight we finished canning 13 pints of pickled beets. Tonight, I think, it will be applesauce, made from the fruit of our Centennial crab. Over the weekend we tried ways of using up the berries and vegetables, including: sourdough juneberry pancakes, Ukrainian stir-fry (sausage, garlic, cabbage, perogies, and a few other garden things), borscht (we have lots of beets), minestrone (heavy on summer squash, with some kohlrabi, a few peppers, some corn), cucumber and tomato salads, and last night, ratatouille. Already I'm looking ahead to next year. I've ordered sets for garlic and shallots, also some asparagus roots, all of which I'll put in this fall. We've hauled in some railroad ties to build raised beds for asparagus, strawberries, and horseradish, hoping to lift them up out of the wet in the back of the garden. And last night I hauled home a load of sheep manure from the experiment station; that went into the compost heap, to be spread a year from now. Now, I'm thinking back on last week, when we were chasing Canadian custom harvesters across central North Dakota. Knowing that one of them, Al Kuntz, was of German-Russian ancestry, we stopped in at the Tuttle Community Store to pick up some Kuchen. Sure enough, Charlotte the baker was there, turning out a fresh batch. She is pictured here at right. For fresh video from the bakery, visit Plains Folk Video.

There are a lot of fish being taken in North Dakota this late summer; some are trophies, whereas others are less exalted. Last Saturday the 4th the Barnes County Wildlife Federation pulled off its 16th Annual Bullhead Derby at Kelly's Crossing of Lake Ashtabula. Records were set for number of participants (173, in 53 teams) and for total pounds taken (1822). The photo at right depicts the weigh-in. Most everyone was fishing with nightcrawlers and bobbers. That includes the derby champion, Gregory Dick, of Valley City, who fished all day with two poles from a dock about thirty feet from the weigh station. For video of the champ in action, as well as other scenes from the Bullhead Derby, visit Plains Folk Video, the new video annex for Plains Folk enterprises. Meanwhile, in the lower reaches of the Sheyenne, the channel cats are biting. I suspect the high water of early summer brought a lot of big ones up into the tributaries of the Red. The cat pictured below (30 inches, 13.5 pounds) was taken from (and returned to) the Sheyenne this afternoon.