The West Old & New Vol. III Issue III March 2014 | Page 23

Life on the Hi-Line of Montana in the 1960s
In the 1960s we were living the American dream on the high prairie of Montana. Life in general was still based on survival,
but already the future was imprinting this landscape. In the Sunburst/Kevin area of Montana giant mechanical grasshoppers dotted
the hills, their heavy metal legs pumping rich crude out of the shale of the hi-line like synchronized clocks. I never asked or even
considered who owned those oil fields or where it went. They were part of my existence as much as their small natural counter
parts were.
Life on the hi-line was constant work. We horded the goods produced from one season to get through the next. We hauled our
own water and put it in a cistern. It came from nature, and was sweet and clean. We planted a huge garden of beans, peas and carrots. We had half an acre of potatoes.
Early spring was messy, the usual wished for commodity of water now rampant and flooding everywhere. Water standing in
the fields was good, it meant the ground would soak it up and then give it back to the roots of the crops. Late spring brought planting, then summer weeding and watering, and then the fall harvest.
Winter was vicious, coming on the wind first as frigid temperatures and then blowing snow. The carpet of prairie in moon
light glistened like precious gems. A beautiful silence came as well, as if everything was in a long sleep.
Life on the hi-line was an abundance of nature, our survival built around its rhythms and the movement of the water, wind and
sunlight. Our basement a holding area for all the jars canned at the end of summer, the kitchen becoming a processing plant in fall
for meat. White packages labeled and stacked into the freezer. Whole days were relegated to specific tasks. There were beans to be
picked, carrots and potatoes to dig up and put in burlap sack. The basement pantry would be the grocery store in winter.
My mother was a sewer, she could make a coat from an old blanket, and it would be done with flair. We passed a jar around
while watching television at night, churning fresh butter.
We lived in the middle of nature, dependent and subsisting off of the abundance and sometimes the lack there of. Life was
constant planning. I never considered what wonderful food I was given, until now. Vitamins were in the food, our meat was not
adulterated with penicillin, or growth hormones. I watched the entire process, assisted in that process and appreciated it.
Sculpture and photograph by Alan Howes
The West Old & New Page 23