Dear family,
Curt has requested that he would like memories of growing up in the newsletter this year. My memories have a lot to do with horses. My memory is going to be about experiences with horses.
All of us kids knew Goldie and the kind of horse he was. His breeding was 7/8 thoroughbred and 1/8 American saddler. I have never ridden a better horse. He was athletic, I never lost a race on him; best horse I ever rode in the mountains. He was a very good cow horse. I could go on and on about his good qualities. My particular memory I want to tell about has to do with roping another horse off Goldie, but first I have to tell you about the rope. My good friend, Frank Hoopes, gave me a lariat that was called a waxed Italian hemp rope. The rope had a very good feel to it because of the waxing proceedure and was very fast. All ropes today and then came with a leather or rawhide burner sewn into end of the honda. This particular rope had a leather burner sewn into it. Because I carried that rope everywhere I went, I would rope anything that moved: dogs, chickens, goats, big steers, little brothers! From use, the leather burner would wear out and would weaken the end of the honda. So when I would rope a big steer or calf, sometimes the rope would break in th end of the honda; so I would have to tie a new honda. A new rope comes in 21 to 35 ft. in length. I had broken the rope so many times and retied the honda that the length was only about 18 feet.
Now this is the point of my memory. I was riding Goldie and my rope was tied onto the saddle horn hard and fast. I was planning on roping Buster who was considerably bigger than Goldie. I drove the horses into the lane that went up to the big pasture. About 100 yards up the lane, we had built a gate across the lane. There was Buster and five or six other horses with him. When they got to the gate, they turned and ran back toward me. When Buster came by, I reached out and roped him around the neck. As I was turning Goldie around, Buster hit the end of the rope and jerked me sideways. Goldie was such an athlete. He scrambled to get his feet under him, jumped in the air and landed facing the rope and Buster. I know that if I had been riding any other horse, I would have been jerked clear down.
I have pondered this situation many times throughout my life. We have all had experiences in our lives that jerk us around or jerk us down, sometimes even to our knees. I am thankful for growing up on a ranch that taught me many of life's lessons. I am thankful for my brothers and sisters, for my mom and dad, for my wife and our children. I hope that when we get jerked sideways, we will just get up, dust ourselves off, and keep on riding good horses.
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