Is Carter County growing?

When I saw the news that a meat processing plant is being built in Belltower, I was happy, but somewhat perplexed. My first thought was, is Carter County growing? I mean growing in population, of course. Now when I ask that question several things come to mind. The first one is what it used to be like.

I was born near Belltower in 1938. The first six years of my life was spent at various places around Ekalaka, although we did go to Washington very briefly when I was too young to remember. In 1944, we moved into Ekalaka and I left just after my high school graduation in 1956. Not that much time I know, but Ekalaka and Carter County are implanted in my brain and heart with no hope of ever being removed or modified.

When I was there in the forties and fifties there were a lot more people. In the 1950 census, I think that Ekalaka had 902 people and Carter County had something over 3300. What do they have now, Ekalaka less than than 400 and the county somewhere around 1300? And it is a huge county too. There were a lot more sheep in the county then. Almost everybody had sheep. Tom McCamish recently told me that the number of sheep are way down. Every year Mexican sheep shearing crews came through and sheared our sheep. It was really fun to see them.

Many ranchers up and down the county used to milk cows. You would see in front of the mail box a cream can. The cream was taken to a creamery in Ekalaka and the clean can was returned by the same mailman. Yes, there was a creamery in Ekalaka, a large building near where the fairgrounds are now. They made and sold butter and I suppose other products. That doesn't seem like a very safe practice does it, the way that the cream was sent in. I never heard of anyone getting sick from it.

So the question was, is Carter County growing? First, is Ekalaka growing? I have heard of new houses being built. Are these new houses or they just replacing the old ones? There were and probably are some old ones that needed to be replaced. The last time I heard that tiny little house that we thought was adequate where we first lived in Ekalaka was still standing but not inhabited. It was down by the back side of the cemetery. We moved there in 1944 and it was old then. I am happy when I hear that a new house is built or that someone moved there.

I haven't heard anything about Carter County growing except for the new meat processing plant. It would be nice to see small family farms all up and down the county. There does seem to be some areas that are thriving.

Ekalaka and Carter County are wonderful places. I am very happy to have grown up there. If it wasn't for moving away from my kids and putting up with the cold weather, I would be back there in an instant. Love you all and wish you the best.