Wisdom & Grace: The Pony Ring

Times were hard in the late '50s for my family. My dad had lost the battle to save his leg after three years in the Great Falls hospital including 21 operations. He not only lost his leg but also all the farm machinery and all the cows ... all the cows except for the milk cow that my mother begged the banker to be able to keep.

If I could memorialize my mother with one word it would be: entrepreneur. She was always looking for ways to make a little extra money while still being a hard-working farm wife and mother. She sold eggs for 50 cents a dozen. Every Sunday, on our way to church, we had an "egg route." We would drop off the eggs to her regular customers and pick up the empty cartons and the money. She also sold cream to Buttrey's and/or the Glacier Creamery.

In later years she sold "Diabetic Apple Pie" recipes through the mail. This was before there were anywhere near the diabetic recipes that we have today. She also sold Sunbonnet Sue embroidery patterns that she copied off a pillow that her mother had made for her when she was a baby. (I still have that pillow. It is framed and hangs in our living room.)

Even when I went away to college in Nebraska, I often received one or two dollar bills in the weekly letter she wrote. Certainly, they came from her mail order business of selling recipes and patterns or from our friends in the hen house.

After Dad returned home, they began to rebuild the farm and cattle herd. Dad had lifelong friends, Earl and Elva Knapp, who lived north us near Simpson. We kids loved to visit them and their Shetland ponies. Elva would let us help feed the ponies dried bread scraps that she got from Eddy's Bakery.

We soon had Shetlands, too. Dad had bought Midge from Norma Dell Cox for $100 as a pony for my older sister Myrna. Midge had Black Beauty and one year they each had foals that we named Sugar and Honey. Dad said Black Beauty was mine but I always preferred to ride Midge. He also bought some Shetland ponies from Milton Mann in Simms, Montana. And that's how mom's entrepreneur ideas continued ... a Pony Ring! Charge children to ride round and round and round on the Shetland ponies.

A pony ring was bought, I believe it was from Milton Mann. Some old used kids saddles were bought at the local pawn shop. And away we went.

Most of the summer we were in an open lot north of the present day Subway and next to the present day Bearly Square Quilt Shop. Before Subway was there, there was an A & W Diner. It was a wonderful location for our pony ring. As families came to enjoy a mug of root beer they would come over and treat their children to a pony ride.

That's not all they were offered. Dad brought along his pinto team Roxie and Rosie and gave buggy rides in his democrat wagon. The wagon had two seats and was big enough for a whole family to squeeze in and go for a ride. This cost 50 cents.

At the end of the day, we would ride the buggy and trail the ponies over to my Grandpa Whaley's. He lived on the North Side on Farley Avenue and had some acreage so he could pasture the horses until the next day. The best part of the trip was following the road between the railroad tracks and the river when we traveled through Hobo Jungle. Camps were made by those that were waiting for another train to take them to where they were going. They'd wave and greet us as we passed by. We had a destination, I'm not sure they did.

Other places that we went the summer of 1961 were to Tiber Dam and Fort Benton (near the Tastee Freeze!) It was the Tiber Dam trip that I would just as soon forget. All day we operated the pony ring. When darkness came, we loaded up the ponies and headed for home. My mother and brother left ahead of us to go home in the car. My sister and I stayed to ride home with dad in the truck. But the old truck lights wouldn't come on and it was impossible to see the road ahead, let alone legally and safely drive on the highway.

Somehow, we made it to Chester. Dad was unsure of how he would make it back to Havre. He went to the bus depot in Chester and put Myrna and me on the bus headed for Havre. I can't remember where we got off the bus in Havre but I do remember the scary walk we had along First Street, passing all the bars on our way to Heltne's. Thank goodness Heltne's was still open. We called my mother and she made the half hour trip into town from the north country to pick up me and Myrna. It was nice to be home but we worried about dad and our horses.

The next morning when we woke up and to our surprise, dad was at the kitchen table drinking coffee. "Dad, you made it home!" my sister and I exclaimed.

"Yes, I'm home. I took the back roads home, following the section lines. There was just enough moonlight for me to barely see where I was going. But Ila, I have some sad news for you."

"What dad?" I asked.

"The road was bumpy, real bumpy. The tail gate from the stock truck came loose and fell off. Your horse Black Beauty slipped out. She died. I'm so sorry."

Dad was always the kind of man that tried to make things right. Rosie, my sister's pinto mare, had a foal a couple of months ago. "She will be your new horse to replace Beauty."

As terrible and sad as it was to lose my beloved Beauty, I was touched, even at that young age, of dad's own sadness and his desire to make things right. We named my new horse "Lady."

That was the only year we operated the pony ring. Most of the ponies were sold. The saddles and gears were sold. The pony ring was dismantled and stored behind the chicken coop.

Great memories. We probably didn't make much money but it provided what we need the most: a hope and a future.

"Your word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light on my path." Psalms 119:105 NIV

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Ila McClenahan is a retired chaplain and activity director living on the farm where she was raised in the Amos community north of Havre