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Tales of the Ranch

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  • Biographies,  North Dakota History,  North Dakota Horizons magazine

    The Cowboy Doctor

    December 22, 2020 /

    Printed in North Dakota Horizons Magazine Winter 2020 https://www.ndhorizons.com/articles/88/the-cowboy-doctor.aspx On a warm day in late July 1927, all of Dickinson shut down.  Stores and businesses were empty, their doors closed. There was no heart to carry on business as usual.  Crowding the cemetery people were saying goodbye to their beloved “Cowboy Doctor.”  He didn’t just heal and console, he was a friend to almost every family in the region. He was remembered with overwhelming gratitude for his gift of love and 44 years of dedicated service to the people he came to cherish. The “Cowboy Doctor,” Victor Hugo Stickney, was born April 13, 1855. He was raised on the family…

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    Biography of George W. Nohle

    March 1, 2015

    The Wandering Man

    June 4, 2019

    Lydia Langer: The Unexpected Candidate Amid 1930’s Political Scandal and Intrigue

    October 27, 2016
  • Native Americans,  The Cowboy Chronicle,  Western History

    Returning Home: the Tragedy and Triumph of the Great American Buffalo

    November 13, 2020 /

    Published in: The Cowboy Chronicle Volume 24 Issue 6 November 2020 Publication of the North Dakota Cowboy Hall of Fame With profound joy and a great sense of a spiritual connection they watched the animals step out of the trucks and onto Tribal lands once again, greeting them with traditional welcoming ceremonies. The buffalo and their way of life had been gone for generations, but the longing remained in the people’s souls. The relationship between the buffalo and native people is deep, personal, and ethereal. While the stories and sacred ceremonies had been retained, the youth could not completely understand the kindred relationship because they had not been able to…

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    Necessities for a Nomadic Life

    August 18, 2019

    The Legacy of the Horse in the Lives of the Great Plains People

    August 25, 2016

    War Bonnet!

    August 13, 2018
  • Ghost Towns,  History,  North Dakota History,  The Cowboy Chronicle

    “Little Misery”: The Rise and Fall of a Forgotten Badlands Town

    October 18, 2020 /

    Published in the Cowboy Chronicle Publication of the North Dakota Cowboy Hall of Fame Volume 24 Issue 5 Newspapers from New York to Paris and London in the late 1870’s and early 1880’s were abuzz about the Dakota cattle boom on the northern plains of America.  Books, such as James Brisbin’s The Beef Bonanza or How to get Rich on the Plains (1871) and Trans Missouri Stock Raising; the Pasture Lands of North America by Hiram Latham ( 1881), fueled the excitement for the expanding cattle industry.  In 1879 The Bismarck Tribune proclaimed that that western North Dakota possessed “the best grazing lands in the world”.  A writer for the…

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    Booming Settlement to Ghost Town: Whispers of the Living History of Charbonneau

    January 29, 2015
  • The Cowboy Chronicle,  Western History

    Just a Bit About the Bit

    June 14, 2020 /

    A good relationship between the horse and his rider is all about communication.  A horse can sense fear, anger and competence, and will react accordingly. However, a good ride whether for work or pleasure, requires effective communication between the horse and rider.  Since ancient times the bit, in one form or another, has been the instrument to help send these messages.   The horse is the only animal we control by putting something inside their mouth. The ancient man’s experience of controlling a pack or riding animal before the domestication of the horse, was by various forms of nose pressure. This method would not work for the equine as its…

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    Straight to the Horse’s Mouth

    April 30, 2019

    Booming Settlement to Ghost Town: Whispers of the Living History of Charbonneau

    January 29, 2015

    Lydia Langer: The Unexpected Candidate Amid 1930’s Political Scandal and Intrigue

    October 27, 2016
  • North Dakota History,  North Dakota Horizons magazine,  North Dakota Today

    North Dakota Cowboy Hall of Fame Celebrates Twenty-five Years

    June 13, 2020 /

    The North Dakota Horizons magazine published a shorter version of “Sentinel on the Prairie” in their Summer 2020 edition and online. https://www.ndhorizons.com/articles/86/north-dakota-cowboy-hall-of-fame-celebrates-25-years.aspx The North Dakota Cowboy Hall of fame is celebrating its 25th anniversary. One man’s dream of preserving the stories and character of the state’s forebears has become a renowned center of western culture. Phil Baird thought about this for a long time. So many stories and moments were passing through time, drifting like the wind across the prairies. Countless hours were spent embracing all the memories and history he could. He hated the thought these stories would be lost to time. Those moments wove together the fabric of…

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    Lydia Langer: The Unexpected Candidate Amid 1930’s Political Scandal and Intrigue

    October 27, 2016

    The Wild Horses of Roosevelt’s Badlands for The Cowboy Chronicle

    November 10, 2017

    The True Facts

    July 3, 2017
  • The Cowboy Chronicle,  Western History

    Branding Across Time

    November 4, 2019 /

    When thinking of the American West the image of a laconic individual with the requisite boots, chaps, and hat comes to mind. We envision him on long cattle drives, riding along miles and miles of fences or on a great roundup. In our minds we can see the cowboy chasing down a hapless calf, roping and wrestling it to the ground by a campfire with branding irons in the flames. Another cowboy grabs it and burns the owners mark on its hip. It’s all part of the mystique of the cowboy, some of it romanticized in art and the movies; all of it based on reality and much of it…

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    The Railroad and Settlement in Early North Dakota

    April 9, 2015

    Who was Benjamin Henry?

    October 10, 2018

    War Bonnet!

    August 13, 2018
  • History,  Native Americans,  The Cowboy Chronicle

    Necessities for a Nomadic Life

    August 18, 2019 /

    It was time to move. The young woman took down their tepee and secured the poles to the horses, building the travois’ that would carry the rest of their home and other worldly possessions.

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    The Railroad and Settlement in Early North Dakota

    April 9, 2015

    Straight to the Horse’s Mouth

    April 30, 2019

    Just One More Ride

    December 9, 2018
  • Biographies,  North Dakota History,  Western History

    The Wandering Man

    June 4, 2019 /

    This love affair lasted a lifetime; whether consuming, creating, or collecting, the written word permeated his life. He bragged that between 1928 and 1942 he read more than 150 books a year. He built a personal library of over 10,000 books, journals, and periodicals; a varied collection that surprised and delighted visitors. He was one of the world’s most prolific authors writing poetry, over 400 short stories, screenplays and more than 100 books. Sitting in his sick bed, Louis L’Amour was editing his final book the day he died in 1988. Some discounted his writing as just simple westerns, but his stories perfectly expressed the romance and authenticities of Western…

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    Charles Franklin Martell: Pre-1940’s Ranching Division nominee 2019

    February 13, 2019

    The Cowboy Doctor

    December 22, 2020

    Biography of Charles Franklin Martell

    February 28, 2015
  • History,  Tales of the Ranch

    The Battle at Guilford Courthouse

    May 1, 2019 /

    On a recent trip to North Carolina I visited the Guilford Courthouse National Military Park with my sister and niece. There is a great deal I don’t know about this time in our nation’s history! So much of our revolutionary war education centers on the north, yet the battles in the south were of tremendous importance. Somewhere in the fight for Independence two centuries ago are two ancestors of mine, Moses Hill and John Gould who was an ancestor of my Grandmother Martell (Lila Vanderhoof). There is also a Morgan on Don’s side who may very well have been in one of these battles since the Morgan’s at that time…

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    The Railroad and Settlement in Early North Dakota

    April 9, 2015

    Just One More Ride

    December 9, 2018

    A Century Since the Great War; Family Ties

    November 12, 2018
  • History,  The Cowboy Chronicle,  Western History

    Straight to the Horse’s Mouth

    April 30, 2019 /

    At first glance, especially to those unfamiliar with all that is involved in horse care, the new exhibit at the North Dakota Cowboy Hall of Fame might look like medieval tools of torture.  No need to worry, these old malicious looking implements are just a set of equine dentistry tools from 1904, donated to the hall by the Theodore Roosevelt Medora Foundation. It is believed that equine dentistry practices began about 2000 years ago on the steppes of northeastern Asia and Mongolia by ancient nomads. The horse has the distinction of being the most significant domesticated animal of the past 5000 years, playing a critical role in the development, growth…

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    Mary Patricia Martell Jones 0 Comments

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    A Century Since the Great War; Family Ties

    November 12, 2018

    The Battle at Guilford Courthouse

    May 1, 2019

    Necessities for a Nomadic Life

    August 18, 2019
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  • History (7)
  • Native Americans (4)
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  • Western History (14)
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