Helen Olive Belknap

“ Everything tastes good because it is made at home. Afterwards, the tireless feet continue the intricate, graceful measures. But outside the brightly lighted hall, and beyond the sound of laughter and music broods the silent, mysterious night of a spacious country. How many city dancers know the homeward drive through a big country, the moon perhaps lighting the river, the contours of plain and butte, and the sleeping hamlets? ”

“ Yet these young people and children are the great hope of the church. No more wide-awake, vigorous young people are to be found. “If only the Church could work out something that would last through the week,” said one of them, “it would seem more real.” But in many communities the women’s organization is not only the sole organization in the church, outside the Sunday school, but the only one in the community.
The work has been haphazard. Home Mission aid has been spent out of all proportion to fitness. The same amount now received would go further, eventually, if spent in fewer places. ”

“ The most popular forms of outdoor recreation are the community barbecues, frontier days and pow-wows. Only those who live this free, healthy life in the heart of nature have appetites worthy of a barbecue. At noon the delicious beef, roasted all night over a deep trough of coals, and basted with real butter, is a social meal that many of us envy. There are frontier field [Pg 53] days with sports belonging to ranch life, such as horse racing and broncho busting. The day usually ends with a big dance. ”

“ In one of the mining camps, the Ladies’ Aid of the Mission church sent out invitations for an afternoon tea to raise money for a new piano for the Kindergarten. It turned out to be a great social event attended by women, many of them foreign, from all the camps in the vicinity. Here is another Ladies’ Aid, the only organization in all that part of a sparsely settled country, and many miles from town which holds eight socials a year and every social is a supper. Those suppers bring out whole families, and are the biggest annual events. ”

“ Until the comparatively recent development of county agent services and the Farm Bureau, he has had to work for everything he got with very little help from any one.
An intense economic struggle is behind the homesteaders. They begin from the bottom up. Some are just now beginning, but for the majority the difficulty of getting a start is over. But the last few years have been hard for every farmer and rancher on the Range, old settler and new alike. No part of the country can afford to have the men on the land as hard pressed as these men have been. ”

“ A live church organization should have a building of its own. It is hard, indeed, to preach the reality of religion without a visible house of God. Yet nearly one-third of the organizations have no buildings and must depend on school houses, homes or depots. Some of these churches, located in strategic places, acutely need buildings and equipment if they are to hold their own in the future. For others, however, the possession of buildings would be a tragedy, since they would thus become assured of a permanency which is not justified. ”

“ One lonely family, a forlorn row of claim shacks along the horizon, are all that is left of a real social life that existed only a few years before. A woman standing at the door of the only habitation in a round of sky and stretch of plain, tells how “all the good neighbors are gone and us left grieving for the fine times we once had.” ”

“ The Range, our last real frontier, has grown up. Round-ups are miniature and staged. All the land is fenced. The cowboy is passing, if not gone. Even “chaps” and a sombrero are rare, unless worn by a “Dude” from the East. The last 100 years have seen a remarkable growth and change in this country. The cattleman and the cowboy have largely given way to the homesteader, and he in turn has become a regular farmer or, as he prefers it, “rancher.” ”

“ The minister is no less a preacher and man of God because he is a community builder. His measure of “success” is his ability to work out with his people a genuine program of rural and social service.
With its community church and program, the Larger Parish plan seeks to make the church both a religious and a social center. Under its own roof, if necessary, or better, with an adjoining community house, it has equipment which provides for ideal worship, a modern church school and well-supervised social and recreational activities. ”

“ This would seem a strange story to some one not versed in church ethics and denominational procedure. But giving and serving is one of the fundamental ideas of the Christian religion, and money given for missions and benevolences is good training as well as definitely a service to humanity.
The Range has always been Home Mission territory; justifiably too, because homesteaders have not been able to pay for religious ministry. A homesteader’s “bit” is hard earned enough, and seldom adequate to his needs. Nevertheless, the problem of financial aid is always a serious one. ”

“ Every one of these counties is fortunate in having some splendid county-wide leaders who are devoting themselves to their county’s progress. Wherever a county has a Farm Bureau, leadership is developed by that organization. But in rural sections where distances prevent people from coming together, leadership is wanting. Each ranch is a small isolated world and by the very nature of things there are few community undertakings. The development of local leadership, especially in remote sections, should become the concern of this country. ”

“ Through their organizations and Civic Leagues of business men, these centers are just waking up to the fact that the towns are dependent upon them. As one farmer in Union County said, “There is no permanent prosperity except that based on the farmer. If our town is big and top-heavy and the farmers are taxed heavily to keep the town up, it is killing the goose that laid the golden eggs. The 1,000 farmers tributary to Clayton must pay the bills of everything brought in because, ultimately, the products of the farm have to pay for everything. ”

“ A new social spirit is developing. The Church has counted for a great deal on the Range and has done some good, fundamental work. But in order to keep abreast of the new development and to help bring to the Range a “satisfying community life which is profitable, sociable, healthful and full of culture and charm and, above all, full of God,” the Church must make its ministry broader, steadier and more available. ”

“ The next landmark in the county’s history is the “gold strike” on Grasshopper Creek, in 1862. News of the find spread like wild-fire. Miners rushed to the creek and set up their tents, shacks and log cabins. Unlike Rome, this first town of Montana, called Bannock, was built in a single night. Soon after the gold seekers had settled down to work in earnest, the road agents, a well-organized gang of “roughs” from all over the West, began to rob the stage-coaches travelling between Bannock and Virginia City. ”

“ There are country homes near to villages or towns into which no minister or church visitor goes from one year’s end to another. Within reach of almost any church on the Range, and over great stretches of country, children may be found who are growing up without any religious training. In the face of this need and its challenge, the Larger Parish plan need not wait for people to come into the Church. By means of a well-equipped extension program the Church, and everything it stands for, is taken to all who need its ministrations. ”

“ Considering that nearly half the churches raise their money haphazardly, the average contribution per church and per member, in these four counties on the Range, is most encouraging. Of course, it must be borne in mind that 1919-1920 came at the end of the fat years, and hard upon this prosperous period followed the lean one of high freight rates and low prices for farm products. Church finances depend in part upon the practical presentation of the financial needs of the Church, and upon education in Christian stewardship—i.e., in learning the value of church work at home and abroad. ”

“ School systems are becoming better. People realize the advantages of education. More and more young people are being sent to college. But as distances are gradually being overcome, schools should be administered wholly from the county seat. The County Unit plan does away with the local school district boards. This system equalizes burdens and advantages, minimizes dissension, and conduces to economy and efficiency. The average school board has no standards by which to judge an applicant for teaching. One disadvantage of the district system is that so often daughters are put in as teachers. ”

“ Along the railroad are trade centers which serve the entire county. The majority of these communities are of small population and large area, with a small trading center containing stores, hotel, school, possibly a church or two and some houses huddled together. The county seat largely centralizes the life of each county.
Outside the trade centers and the open country area included within their community boundaries, the counties fall into certain social groupings. Where the land is good, and is being intensively developed, there are well-defined permanent communities. ”

“ There are some New Americans in each county, but they are in larger numbers in Sheridan and Beaverhead. A large number of the Spanish-Americans in Union are not provided for by the Catholic church, and the only Protestant work for them in the county, a Spanish American Mission in Clayton, has been given up. In Sheridan County there is great need of a comprehensive program that shall include all six mines. There should be at least two community houses built with organized social activities and evening classes; the staff to include a domestic science teacher. ”

“ Other great needs are a better organized social life and more recreational activities. Outside the larger center, there is a great lack of social life. Social organizations are fairly abundant, but they are almost all city or town affairs. Living on the land is a more solitary affair for women than for men. The men drive to town, but the women stay home week in and week out with few diversions. A postmistress in Montana told about two women living on large cattle ranches about six miles apart, a small distance in that country. ”

“ About half of the schools have programs for special days, especially for Children’s Day, Christmas and Easter. One Union school has an Easter picnic and egg-hunt. Nineteen schools have mixed socials, such as parties, indoor picnics, ice cream suppers and entertainments. One town school has a weekly social. The only special Sunday school organizations are a Choir Association and Sunday school athletic teams in three town churches which play competitive games. Twenty report no social life of any sort in connection with their schools. They do not even have a picnic to liven things up. ”

“ The very presence of real farm-houses on dry farming land and mesas speaks in itself of a small world conquered. Of course, there are farm-houses in the valleys. But sheer grit is all that achieves a house and a barn and a wind-shield of trees out on the mesa. Lumber is expensive and must be hauled from the nearest market. Trees, so wary of growing there, must be watched, watered and carefully tended every day for the first five years. A home on the plains means more sweat and toil and effort than a home anywhere else in our country. ”

“ Illinois has 115.7 people per square mile, but Montana has an average density of only 3.8, Wyoming of 2, New Mexico of 2.9 and South Dakota of 8.3 persons.
Much of the Range has never had the chance to go to church, and one result of the lack of church facilities in the past is that it is difficult now to create a church spirit. Homesteading is no fun. It means being away from doctors and comforts, getting ahead little by little, facing set-backs, discouragements and loneliness. Of course, a homesteader is absorbed by his place. ”