GREAT RANCHES OF THE WEST

like wild horses run we're gonna find some space there aren't many let my girl yeah [Music] is no listen to the wind [Music] so [Music] that's why that's why they call vanish you breathe hi I'm Michael Martin Murphy that song vanishing breed is about being independent and living off the land and not many people can do that anymore one place that still happens is on family owned working ranches and that's what this program is about you know people think of a ranch as just a place where you raise livestock but a ranch is really about the men and women who worked the land grow the crops and care for the animals ranching is a way of life with its own values and traditions even its own style of dress the American cowboy is known all over the world his methods and machines have changed but the jobs to be done are the same ones Cowboys have been doing since ranching started in this country and the mid-1800s ranching was and still is an unpredictable business nothing is for sure a rancher is always gambling on the weather the water the livestock and the prices no break a few family ranchers have gotten rich beyond their wildest dreams others most others scratch out a living working sunup to sundown seven days a week a lot more ranches have gone under and have survived well visit with four of the survivors the families on some of the oldest largest and most famous ranches in the West it's a life for folks who are tough and independent that spirit of Independence has been handed down from generation to generation on some of the great ranches of the West [Music] [Music] [Music] it's fall on the grassy plain of New Mexico just outside of Cimarron New Mexico is the CS French it was started in 1873 by Frank Springer who came out from Iowa and bought a small piece of land where the CS headquarters is still located the C S stands for Charles Springer the founders breton today the CS is owned by Les Davis and the founders grandson and his wife Linda [Music] lineage of these cows go back to it to a little bunch of Hereford my grandfather brought here in 1881 we've never bought any heifers since the cs has about three thousand cattle spread out on two hundred and twenty thousand acres of prairie grassland the ranch is a cow calf operation they keep a herd of cows that have a calf every year then sell the calves to feed lines or other Ranchers the CES ranch is unique it's a family ranch if there ever was one the Davises have six grown children who have all chosen to come home they live and work on the ranch today most of the family is on horseback it's fall roundup time [Music] I think our situation is unusual I don't know of another ranch that of this size that's being operated just almost totally by the family and it's a very it's a great feeling of satisfaction to me to see them all having different jobs on the ranch with their own responsibilities and enjoying it in growing up they all like to ride and help them ranch jobs and when we brand it and move cattle children are right there helping right from the start and as soon as they could write or says my wife Linda who is a fine cowgirl and they're all a tremendous help [Music] [Music] les Davis seems a kind of Renaissance rancher he grew up in the East went to college at Dartmouth he was a World War 2 artillery officer he went west to his uncle's ranch fairly late in life but he came to stay he has a passion for opera acquired in Europe during the war and raises racehorses as a hobby some horses you know you get really attached to and like that big brown mare on the right she's a champion and no telling how valuable she'd be back in Kentucky but we're gonna keep it right here I am delighted the way it's turned out now with all six of the children involved they're all owners of the ranch I'm a very minor stockholder now Linda and the six children are or hit-and with their children coming on it's hard to project just what will happen well that whether they'll have the same feeling that I did one of you know the historical challenge of keeping it going but who knows maybe we'll be celebrating the 200th anniversary of the Cs Cattle Company [Music] one of the children working to keep the CS going is Warren the oldest son dad always instilled in us kids the sense of tradition to keep the ranch going and and I don't know if I wanted to come back one thing but then I figured also that if I didn't come back maybe drilling wouldn't you know I'd started a chain reaction to where none of us would come back so I figured the lease fight come back there'd be one of us back and I made my own decision that way every day is different one day I might be hauling hay the next day working cattle next day fixing fence it's all just kind of what needs to be done it's no set routine as kind of the thing that I enjoy about it it's always kind of kind of an adventure [Music] the second son Randy is a pilot and operates a hunting guide and outfitting service on CS Ram the big target right now we're in the elk hunting season have for huntin month of October H lasts about five days and so far we had eight people and we've shot in seven bull elk [Music] I've graduated down from Las Cruces the agriculture poly gene stayed down there and worked at an airport did more more flying than anything than working that that's the only thing besides coming back here I haven't been anywhere else I don't really desire to go anywhere else [Music] from the air the New Mexico landscape can look pretty dry but when the irrigation water is very productive farmland the third side kirk takes care of the csr in the arid Southwest water is water is real important we we just couldn't dry land farm anything around here the water is the rain or precipitation isn't very reliable and pretty much all the farming is your gaming there's a reservoir Eagle Nest reservoir is located about 30 miles from here and it's upriver in the mountains the dam was built by my great-grandfather and it's a privately owned dam and owned by CS category i I feel real fortunate I I know the history of family businesses aren't good that they they they don't last very long but Arts has been going for a hundred and fourteen years and I feel a responsibility to them to sort of live up to their standards with water rights land titles and cattle contracts a ranch has a lot of legal work so it's nice to have a lawyer in the family the CES has an office in town run by the oldest daughter attorney Julia Linda I think for me probably the question of whether I'm going to be practicing full-time is one that that comes up a lot because I'm right now involved a lot more with the day-to-day ranch work and I'll be the business of the ranch and actually just the horse and cattle work a lot I'm a lot more involved with that than any sort of legal work which I miss I miss trial work and I miss having a straight practice but when I was practicing full-time I really missed the ranch and so it's it's kind of a damned if you do damned if you don't but it'd be hard to leave the ranch leisure Lots 1867 A through G all consigned by the CS ranch with slick video presentations and satellite cattle auctions selling cows just isn't what it used to be Bruce Davis is the youngest son his job is marketing the CS cap our basic goal is to it's pretty fundamental business just sort of cut cost increase income and let get our debt liquidated and weird we've done pretty decent job of that ranching is a long-term business our responsibility is to to make this ground more productive as we go along and hopefully more productive for you know for when our our children come on the youngest of the Davis children is Kim she studied veterinary medicine and does everything in the CS from training horses to inoculating young bulls I'm not one to be inside and I've always kind of liked it be out and be with the animals I have always loved it I was tiny I was a dog freak and all the older so being the youngest all the rest of the kids were involved in 4h already and so I was help them with their steers and my folks have just really been helpful and they've been an inspiration I think to all of us you know what they've done for us six kids and I just think they're they're amazing Linda Davis grew up on a ranch herself whether it's working cattle or doctoring horses she just knows what to do Linda is a cowgirl got it right at the bottom here you see this the swelling was all up in here and when we opened him up we got it at the bottom you if you opened it at the top it wouldn't drain out if you hit it at the bottom it drains down and you whenever you doctor an abscess on any animal you want to be sure it's able to and unfortunately it occurs right when you need the horses the most one of the times a year that we really need our horses is when we're getting the full work done well we love the land I guess that's one reason that we've always stayed with it I wouldn't trade it for anywhere else I have blesses always said that northeastern New Mexico is the best kept secret in the world perhaps it is we can grow everything from pistachios to cotton - very good cattle how are you doing you getting all hot and bothered aren't you we have five grandchildren but it's a wonderful place to raise a family because they learn responsibilities from the animals I think I told all of you that each of the children took a horse to high school with them and then on to college and I always gave the horse half the credit for the diploma [Music] it's a satisfying way of life and one that we all like it's a challenge to me to keep the land in use and to improve everything we can both of the cattle and horses have run on it the farming we're doing and I just hope that it doesn't boil down to just a few big corporations run running these ranchers now we see right here neighbors of ours a big companies that own them and there's not the feeling of on those ranches that we have I mean a personal pride and drive to improve I just hope that things work out for to find young people interested in farming and ranching can get a toehold and get started they want to do it and I I just hope that economics will allow them to [Music] when it snows and temperatures drop below zero on a ranch it's hard to know who suffers more the animals or the Cowboys everything takes twice as long seems twice as hard and things just break there's a lot of physical abuse that goes along with ranching especially in the winter the weathered skin and calloused hands are earned but you rarely hear a complaint it's just not the cowboy way [Music] on the Spanish ranch just north of Tuscarora Nevada a minus 20 degree temperature on a January morning means feeding cattle a cow can survive just about any cold weather if it has enough to eat and water to drink the Spanish ranch is one of the few ranches left where they still use horse to pull hay wagons loaded with vital winter food we still use a lot of teams especially for feeding and irrigating one thing about a team is you because you'll notice they always start horses are neat you know it's a it's almost a thing that passed to find it a good set of workhorses a team pulls with their mouths if you just go loose line there they don't know what to do but if you take a hole and put a little pressure on them they'll really bear down and pull for you [Music] Deloitte's Satterthwaite manages the spanish ranch and six other ranches all owned by the Ellison ranching company Deloitte's father-in-law Stanley Ellison ran the ranches for over 50 years before him Deloitte's wife Connie one of Stanley's three daughters grew up on the Spanish Ridge the ranches are all connected and cover over a million acres stretching 300 miles south from the Idaho border making it one of the largest operations in the West it's just like you and I we like to eat every day and these guys like to do the same we kind of a rule of thumb you might say is it cows going to eat about 20 pounds a day but on the other hand the colder it is the more she's gonna eat that's how she generates her energy is by by consuming this hay so what I like to do is if I come down and check this group of cattle this afternoon at 3 o'clock I want to see some hay left on the ground I would rather waste a little hay than I would rather have them cut these cattle short a cow won't eat snow she'll lick snow but they can't get water from snow and not maintain themselves available usually wherever you see the Willows there's a Creek the Cowboys will come through or there's Scott sometimes we'll go over there and make sure that water is open because it'll freeze and it freezes neat but you open that water daily so that these cattle get a drink I've been here right around 26 years it doesn't seem to change the only thing that changes is more snow less snow it's colder warmer the cow changed a little bit but the system is basically the same [Music] with seven ridges to manage Deloitte is a kind of modern-day circuit writer traveling from ranch to ranch dealing with problems delivering supplies and just keeping an eye on really okay guys okay who feeds those your boy I'd like to get to these ranches just to make sure that everything goes the way that we like it to go the cows are getting fed that the water holes are getting chopped that the sick ones are getting doctored that we're getting the hay I've been the summer that the air gate is getting completed and unless you check these things you just never know whenever I go somewhere I want to take what's necessary for those ranches to keep them going with this much machinery and moving equipment that we've got well you know there's always a breakdown there's always parts to pick up for groceries to take care of personal supplies for employees so we never go anywhere empty [Music] what's your sudden getting kicked [Music] [Applause] since most of the Cowboys work is done in the saddle just about every working day it starts with trying to catch a horse they think there's always one the Cowboys say just don't want to be rode [Music] [Music] a cowboy has to love his work why else work six and a half days a week for four hundred dollars a month and room and board he's supposed to be tough but his job really is caring for mama cows and their babies there's a lot of stress on these calves they're weaned off their mothers it's 20 below they don't like to drink the water and the stress that they go through is is enough to make them sick the cows will make it you know but these calves they need some care this is the difference right here between profit and loss every calf that you lose is something that you can't market this fall [Music] [Music] the Spanish ranch is also a sheep operation they might have 8,000 sheep at any one time constantly moving to be grazing around the ranch contracts with Peruvian Shepherds to watch their flocks well you've probably heard the saying that you have sheep for money and cattle for respectability sheeps Bennett our family's always had sheep it's just a way that we felt was a good way to diversify this country that we have a lot of this country you can't run cows on it because you have no water it's not hardly profitable to haul water to cattle sheep you can haul water to a sheep will only have to drink every other day the Sheep is is kind of a scavenger and you know they can pick out a living where you wouldn't think that they could that that they can pick out a living on these hillsides you'll notice that we run from black sheep we use him as markers Seimone will I'm sure daily he'll get in a position where he can count these black sheep and he have also count the Sheep with the bells on clintus companions if he's got all the black sheep and he's got all the bells chances are he's got all his sheep to be in the sheep business I think it takes a a different special type of an individual not that I'm special or anything but there's not everybody that can be in the Sheep business and get along with sheep you have to like sheep you have to learn to work with them you have to enjoy enjoy sheep in order to to be a good sheep [Music] [Music] [Applause] I'll Drive many many miles to see 15 minutes of basketball we follow our children were involved in 4h were involved in the church anything that that our family is involved in I'm involved in that's what's important Connie and I I think our recreation I think is kind of based around our family interests there has been while we've had children at home yeah right now it is sometimes you'll say how about a weekend in Twin Falls where will you take the big truck and he had a load of grain and all the parts and you stay overnight and he gives you one good meal and it's come home and that's it but it's fun like in the West they say that a ranchers daughter makes the best ranchers wife Connie and Deloitte have two children at the ranch Shana a high school student and Scott the Spanish ranch foreman I have a lot of pride that our family has been involved in this ranching operation for a lot of years my folks been here for 52 years my grandfather and his father before him were involved and I'm proud to be a part of it now proud that my children are interested in it and involved in it and when else and ranching company name is mentioned I'm I'm proud to be an Ellison part of it I would hope that the Spanish ranch would always continue in family I would hope that if if my children desire this is their way of life that they have the opportunity to follow my footsteps it doesn't come easy I was here for four 20 years before I got into management type positions it takes a lot of hard working and lots of sweat but the rewards are there [Music] somewhere toward the end of winter a rancher starts asking himself why am I doing this well it's sure not the money but then he remembers probably his greatest fear it's having to give it all up and take a job in town along about April when the weather starts to let up the grass is growing the calves are all on the ground and everybody feels great about being outside again a rancher just can't imagine doing anything else [Music] Cowboys in Hawaii sounds about as likely as servers in Cheyenne but in fact Hawaiians have been raising horses and punching cows since the early 1800s [Music] there are some 400 cattle ranches on the islands including the 225 thousand acre Parker ranch the largest ranch in the United States owned by one individual breaking horses for cattle work is still the same dusty bone jarring time-consuming work it's always been this is Eric Lindsey working a three-year-old that's only been ridden twice Parker ranch raises all their own workhorses a combination of thoroughbred Morgan crossed with four doors eric is a fourth-generation paniolo the Hawaiian word for cowboy derived from the word Espanola many of the first Hawaiian Cowboys were in Spanish the sin I'm proud to be a funny old room for parents because you know he started back from my great-grandfather to my grandfather my my dad my uncle even down to my brother we all work on [ __ ] rents I don't know I I feel something good inside you know working on [ __ ] ranch knowing that I had you know my dad my grandfather you know down the line working off of butter and I know I feel [Music] John Palmer Parker the ranch founder arrived in Hawaii from Massachusetts in 1809 legend says he became friends with the Hawaiian King Kamehameha and then married a Hawaiian Prince's Parker began to tame the wild offspring of cattle left on the island in 1793 by captain George Vancouver from a small tool acre plot of land Parker began the great ranch and a lasting part of a wild history today Parker ranch is owned by the great-great-great grandson of John Palmer Parker Richard smart I hope that I've succeeded in keeping it going because it was a going thing when I first inherited it and I hope it'll be a going thing when I move on to the next world Richard Smart is not a hands-on Rancher his parents died when he was a child and he was raised by his grandmother on the mainland the ranch was run by trustees for many years while smart pursued a career in the theater he inherited the ranch in 1943 I don't think of myself as as a rancher completely and I don't think of myself as a theater person completely I enjoy both and I'm interested in both Richard smart is an avid collector of art which is displayed in the family home and is open to the public I feel very honored and very fortunate very lucky to have this type of heritage much of the Parker branch is open for visitors there's a shopping center restaurant a museum in range too but despite all the tourism Parker branch is still a huge working cattle ranch they have over 50,000 cattle on the ranch and produce over 10 million pounds of table even here one third of Hawaii's total production [Music] we're trying to get more efficient more cost-conscious here in hawaii our costs are you know three four times what they are on the mainland our cattle prices are almost 1/3 less than what the mainland is so it really puts you in a real economically stressful situation and we used to have at one point in the ranch's history about 400 employees and that's when people were working for $1 a day robbie hind is the livestock manager at Parker ranch he's responsible for everything related to raising cattle water braiding the horses and the employees today we've got 73 employees that are related strictly with the cattle operations secretaries and all and we're beginning to work more as a team every every day we have to you can't be separate like we used to be we've got some some employees here that our sons of fathers who have worked on the ranch and they still have to produce though yes if a grandson is not producing he's not gonna work for us you know I don't care if he's had four generations here but we try to give the local people first crack at work I really enjoyed the cowboy humor the the and their character it makes my day to go out and work with these guys and really and they're a special group of people once the calves are separated from the cows springtime at the Parker ranch meeting the brain with 17,000 calves to brand earmark castrate and inoculate it's pretty intense [Music] cowboy work is so tough not many men can do it for a lifetime but at Parker ranch the paniolo tradition dies hard zero Yamaguchi is about to retire after 50 years as a paniolo well my father was born here in I don't know what he his parents came but my mother from Japan age of 16 she came for a while September be 64 the free generation panels father myself my son was out there too or no alumina was this massage my father got killed by reading teaching worship of this mountain appeared as for along with him precision he died at the age of 41 I like to keep on working where all of the ever ruled at 65 we have to retire even every time you are keep on going Iraqi for greater [Music] in the old days cattle were trailed down to the beach and then towed out diverges for transport to Honolulu feedlots cowboys and cattle still follow some of the same trails today but the transportation methods have changed a lot [Music] Parker ranch is such a history it's great to be part of that history and be part of making that history I believe ranching will be here for a long time we'll have our our problems like everybody else but I think with with the attitude of Management today it has to be one of change and open-mindedness and I think that'll a branching survive for a long time to come [Music] there are places in the West where you can stand and just feel the history where the voices and gunshots and hoofbeats of yesterday can still be heard you know without being told the land is rich with bones of Buffalo and Indians and cowboys if you've never been on a horse or loafed around a barn or had a cowboy for a friend one way to get a taste of the West is a summer vacation on a dude ranch [Music] even campfire fitters this was how the West was won I'm a cowboy wannabe never thought I could be [Music] I want to be a cowboy and I mean yo-yo Hume idea of a dude which is based on sharing the pleasures of the Western Way of life Eden's ranch is the original dude ranch it's 7,000 acres is located on the eastern slopes of the Bighorn Mountains in northern Wyoming just outside of Sheridan the story of Eaton's goes back to 1879 when Howard Eaton left Pittsburgh and went west to the Dakota Territory his two brothers Alden and Willis soon joined him they struggled to make a go of it but even so they wrote glowing letters to their friends in the east including Theodore Roosevelt soon they had more visitors than they could handle and found they were paying out more than that we're taking in one of the friends told him he didn't want to go home he had some money and would consider it a real favor if they let him stay and pay a little each week Howard Eaton said they felt like robbers when they first took the money but it was fair and became the customer didn't ranching was born the Eaton brothers moved their operation to Wyoming in 1904 where it's been ever since [Music] every morning at Eden's begins with rang the Wranglers and may be a lucky Deuter to ride out it's sunrise to gather the horses turned out the night before and mountain canyon pastures for the Cowboys it's just the start of another day but for the dudes who get to come along it's a lifetime memory it's the beginning of a new week it evens ranch that means a new group of guests Frank Eaton and Bill Ferguson are the fourth generation running the relation they know every one of their 200 horses and match them up with the dudes riding skills some dudes are expert writers [Music] others just claim when new guests arrive they get a saddle fitting from one of the Rings and Eaton's the Wranglers usually are college students they saddle horses lead trail rides and just help the dudes it's a great summer job I've done some regular cowboy stuff it's not near as glamorous as this the enthusiasm level is so high the dudes are come here and they are ready to get Western the people out here are the best mostly it's just a kind of a chuckle let me see somebody get on the rock side of the horse or something like that [Music] paints and pentose blacks and whites Appaloosas and Palomino the horses and Eaton's are all ex cow horses they've traveled many a mile with the cowboy Bill Ferguson handled the horses the perfect dude horse of the people final old ranch horse it's not that's gentle but still has enough coal and responds well with the working ranch you are mainly trying to make your money on either cattle or sheep or whatever you are crops or whatever it is that you're trying to raise while here we are trying to please the people whether our dudes that are coming to it there is quite a difference Frank Eaton heads Eaton's ranch he has to be a good rancher and a gracious host we really feel that a lot of the people here are family they've been coming so many years and it's just like family to you I think the main reason that they come is that they enjoy the outdoors and they enjoy doing the riding and we have an awful lot of nice people another reason people keep coming to Eton's is because it hasn't changed much since the golden days of dude ranching in the 1920s electricity and indoor plumbing and banana otherwise it's pretty much the same as it's always been when out to the real world to see the Cowboys rope around I got excited i watch the show can I jump up and down [Music] I'd like to be scared [Music] there are so many activities going on and aydin's you can be as busy or as lazy as you like no one forces you to participate but with so much to do it's hard not to feel your day and your night [Music] [Music] all the extracurricular action is fun but the writing is what makes Eaton's a great branch and a special place for families parents and children can share a Western adventure that will always be part of their family memories [Music] it's a wonderful place for friends and family great American Life one of the unique things I think is the age spread that's represented here from 80 year olds down to eight-month olders and everybody's so nice the little kids all say hello good morning how are you and it's a nice feeling to be with the young people I've been coming since 1936 my father started coming in 1922 now my children come and now my grandchildren come so we're fourth generation we're gonna come back and bring our family and their families and start a tradition and be part of it we want to say that we're gonna bring our five Jim next five generations here this is your ending keeps me going I star around ten months at home and then that come out here two months in the summer and get ready for the next year [Music] a highlight of every summer at Eton this is the annual cap root content eden's cowboys and they bring ranchers gather to drink a little beer that a little money and rope lot [Music] for the family that runs Eaton's sharing the Western ways with visitors enriches their own lives they wouldn't trade ranch life for anything I like the idea of giving people a good vacation we've made a lot of friends over the years from all over the country well we even had people this summer that were here when they were 12 years old they said it hasn't changed a bit so it's I like it that way I hope it stays that way forever the feeling that you are part of it that you have a real bearing on what is going to happen that you can control great aspects of your life that perhaps other people don't have that feeling it's your own independence and you know not have to be so programmed to a nine-to-five job and also that being able to live in this part of the country it's a real privilege feels like you're your own boss you're out riding you're out no one's telling you what to do you feel at one with the country but I would say is what I like about that there's nothing nicer than seeing the Sun Rise come up be not moving the horses just out on your own when we have this beautiful country did live in and be in it really makes you appreciate it [Music] whether it's dudes and wild sheep and Nevada or cattle in New Mexico or Hawaii ranching today is a living breathing legacy of the century of dust and sweat there's no other character in American history as firmly fixed in our imagination as the cowboy today he's just as likely to wear a baseball cap as a Stetson and might spend more time in a pickup truck than on a horse but our strong belief in doing what's right helping your neighbor keeping your word are all rooted in the code of the West Ranchers today are preserving that way of life as well as producing a product that helps to feed us all [Music] in a world where most of our lives are spent in the rat race of traffic jams and office politics life on a ranch is still a place where only the basics matter family hard work respect for the land and nature are just everyday things those values won't completely disappear as long as the family ranch can survive let's hope there'll always be great ranches in the West I'm Michael Martin Murphy so long partner [Music]

Channel: Bill Fast

Views: 140,513

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Id: JXi3Ar9uAk0

Length: 50min 11sec (3011 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 27 2019