Greatest athletes in Carter County history

The January 3rd issue of the Eagle had an article about the Montana Greats Project which was recently published in the Billings Gazette. This article invited Ekalaka people to give their opinions on the greatest athletes from Carter County.

I contend that this would be very difficult to do correctly because of the different sports and the time differences, I was in Carter County High School from 1952 to 1956. If I had to pick the best five athletes of my era, I would pick, Bob Lasater, Tom McCamish, Buddy Morrison, Milton Markuson and either Herb McCamish or Harlen Wash.

There were two others that come to mind for me that I saw play football when I was in grade school. Ross Caton or Catron is one, what a great fullback. Then there was Billy Jo Ludwick; he was one of the best defensive players I ever saw. When I read that he had died, I thought, but he was superman, how could he die.

Another one that comes to mind is Loyd Townsend. I honestly don’t know how good he was but he played for a long time on town teams etc. after high school. I saw him play many times. He was a basketball player. Now I am sure that there have been many fine athletes in all sports since then but I don’t know anything about them. If you pick, naturally you will pick someone from your own era unless you have been there all along and have seen them all. Maybe some of you are in that category. I have heard rumors or rather have read on Facebook that Sherry Farwell was a real good athlete, where does he fit in on this?

This uncertainty is true for other counties in the state as well. When I was in school there was a guy from Circle who was a wonderful basketball player. His name was Jim Kjelgard or something like that. I don’t know if he went on to college or not. Then there is Jim Grasky who went to Sacred Heart High School. It was said at the time that he had never lost a track meet and that he was the only guy on the team. He always won the 100, 220, long jump and placed high in other events. When we played Sacred Heart in 6 man football during the Championship year our coaches scouted him. They said, You have to catch him in the backfield if you let him get out of the backfield nobody can get him. We did all right, we beat them 56-6. Grasky went on to a great career in football at MSU Missoula but does anyone know about him now.

Then there are the great Native American basketball players, Larry Pretty Weasel at Hardin and George Yellow Eyes at State School. I saw both of them play and they were great. Then there was a great Jim Owens from Wibaux. What a basketball player he was and probably nobody knows about him now.

Now we come to maybe the greatest athlete from Montana, Dave McNally from Billings. I saw him pitch for Billings American Legion against Miles City. He was a great pitcher and a real good hitter at that time. He went on to become a great pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles and is in their hall of fame. Now he probably would be voted on as one of the greatest athletes from Billings if not from the state.

The Eagle promised the results of the top five athletes sometime in February. I will be looking forward eagerly to that. The article states that the Montana Greats Project lists Alzada’s Larry Sandvick in rodeo and Ekalaka’s Pat Hansen in football. I have never heard of either one of them but that doesn't reflect on them and actually illustrates my point.