This is the only picture I
have of my dad taken with his dad. If Dad’s memory is correct this
picture was taken eighty seven years ago this month. It's hard to see but,
Grandfather George Tomlinson is wearing a long sleeved shirt and tie and Dad
has hot looking wooly chaps on. Also, Dad's hat is not worn like a cowboy
would wear a hat he has it more on the back of his head and not forward like a
real cowboy. I wonder if his Dad
coaxed him to pull his hat down to look more like a rugged cowboy. The picture’s caption is in Dad’s own handwriting. The
Newspaper article featured here was in the
Ogden Examiner of the evening of 31 March, 1926 that I just recently found. I was so pleased to find it because if verifies
just what Dad writes about this in his personal history only he remembers
it happening in 1928. It would be a few years later [1931] when his
parents separated. At that time they were living in Stockton, California.
Dad moved with his mother and sister to live with his grandparents
in Albion, Idaho. Dad would never see him or hear from him
again. His father George died in 1959 while living in Fresno,
California.
This is what Dad wrote
about raising a Hereford Steer:
My Dad’s business was managing or owning a livestock commission
company. He bought and sold cattle, sheep and hogs to others on a
commission basis. In January 1928, [1926] Dad noticed that a calf
had been born to a young cow Herford, that was a part of a carload of fat
cattle entered in the Ogden Livestock Show. Dad bought the calf for
$25.00. He also found a Guernsey cow ready to freshen in a day or
so. In two days the Guernsey cow did freshen and both calves were
put with her to feed on rich Guernsey milk. I was declared the owner
of the Hereford calf and the other calf was converted to veal after a couple of
months. Dad found a fine pasture with plenty of grass in the
Huntsville area and the Hereford calf with his adopted mother spent the entire
summer growing and getting fat. In September the cow and calf were
brought to Dad’s place in the Ogden Stockyards, put in a more confined corral,
and fed grain, chopped hay as well as the rich cow’s milk. In
January the calf, nearing eight hundred pounds, was entered in the Ogden Stock
Show where he won first place in the junior division. Since the Salt
Lake Stock show was in early March it was decided that the steer should be
entered in that show. He was, and he won the prize for the open
class, and also he was declared “Grand Champion” of the show. He was
sold at the stock show action for fifty one cents a pound. Over
$500.00 of the money was deposited in the Utah Savings and Loan. All
of the money was to have been used to pay my tuition at Utah State Agriculture
College in Logan. Unfortunately, this period of time was the
beginning of the “Great Depression” and the Utah Savings and Loan soon folded
its doors. All of the money for my college education was lost. I
received a great experience but no money.
It makes me wonder if the money had not been lost and Dad did go
to college at Logan, what he would have set his sights on; the livestock
business or a school teacher. I can't imagine Dad being
anything but just what he did; a schoolteacher/ administrator.
Renée
.
