Memories

Alice, daughter of Fred and Eva Townsend, gives more information on the early day family that homesteaded in the Tie Creek area with the home buildings being just one mile west of the Padden Ranch.

She wrote: "My dad got itchy feet again and in 1919 started to Canada-you guessed it-in a covered wagon! They landed in Leslieville, British Columbia, Canada. They stayed there two years and then went back to the old ranch in Tie Creek country."

After reading about those individuals who took two days by team and wagon to go from Ekalaka to Baker, I can't imagine a trip to Canada and back.

One of Alice's early memories of living in Montana was at the Tipps place when George and Will visited a blind lady who had filed on a homestead nearby. She was a sister of Zebb Volin, another neighbor on the Little Missouri River.

The Buttes south of the land had fossils and Grandad became interested in them. With horses and "slip," he helped uncover and preserve them. In the late 1920s or early 1930s, a man and wife came from New York state to spend the summer digging out fossils with Grandad. They dug out a large fossil and it was packaged and shipped to the Smithsonian Institute. I believe the Carter County Museum later received a replica.

Alice remembers that Mr. and Mrs. Walter Peck spent part of several summers hunting and digging out fossils in those mud buttes. They were eventually prepared and placed in the Carter County Museum. As a grade school boy I remember a couple living in a tent on the hill above Grandad's house while collecting fossils. It seems they were from New Jersey.

Alice reports: "The Townsend children, with the exception of Dorothea and James, grew to adulthood and attended school at Tie Creek. Dorothea and James passed away during the winter of 1918 with complications of whooping cough and pneumonia. They went to high school at Camp Crook, South Dakota."

I have no idea or information on who attended high school in Camp Crook, or for how long. My dad (George) never talked about the family education.

Well, what happened to the Townsend family?

Bill married Verda Turbiville of Camp Crook and they had four children. They owned a couple of businesses and later a cafe which they operated for many years.

George (my dad) married Jessie Brewer and they had four children living in Ekalaka and Baker.

Alice married Roy Wright and they had two boys. She later married Steve Sheldon and they made their home in Monterey, California.

Fred Jr. (Fritz) married Lucy Wiggins in Canada. Two boys were born there. After returning to the U.S. they had six more children and lived mostly in Big Timber, MT.

Abe married Rose Stuart and they had three children, some living at Tie Creek and in Ekalaka.

Earl married Mescal Burch of Ridgeway and had one son, Carl Godfrey (Pat). Later, Earl married Inez May of Ennis, MT and had five children. They lived in Three Forks, MT.

Aunt Alice has more information on each family which readers may find interesting by reading her article in Shifting Scenes Vol. III, pages 256-57.

Fred and Eva Townsend lived on the ranch in the Tie Creek Community until 1943, when they moved to Ekalaka. Grandad passed away at the age of 88 in 1960 and Grandmother at the age of 88 in 1966. The old ranch buildings tumbled down and are gone. There is nothing left but a few trees that Grandmother planted many years ago.

Jody Padden took me to the home place many years ago and I found it as described. Precious memories.