On North Fork curmudgeons

Earlier in November, it looked like it was going to be a long winter. Snow was getting deeper and deeper, temperatures dropped below zero, and Lynn Ogle was getting grumpier by the hour.

He was almost like Wilke Hastings, who used to live in a small cabin on Trail Creek. His cabin is still there, now owned by Denis and Sue Moris, but Wilke is long gone.

He traded his 160 acres for an old Buick and headed south. Unfortunately, the Buick threw a rod by Trail Creek Bridge and was towed back to his cabin, where it remained for many years, but Wilke was never seen on the North Fork again.

Anyway, old Wilke hated winter. He would look out his south window and swear, then turn, look out the north window and swear again. The cabin was so small he didn't get much exercise going back and forth from window to window, but he did develop a magnificent vocabulary of swear words.

I figure if Lynn Ogle spends another 10 years on the North Fork, he may develop a similar vocabulary - if Bonny doesn't wash his mouth out with soap.

This winter started out like it was going to be a vocabulary builder, but it warmed up, rained, and the snow melted and the road got slick. Now we have something else to swear about.

Seeing the picture of President Truman and Mike Mansfield in last weeks Hungry Horse News brought back a lot of memories. I was in Flathead High School at the time, and after school I took pictures for the Kalispell News, a weekly paper.

The editor, Frank Trippet, managed to get press credentials for me to shoot the event, as Truman was in the Flathead to throw the switches that brought Hungry Horse Dam on line. The president even commented that I was the youngest press photographer he had ever seen.

The caption last week identified Mike Mansfield as a U.S. Senator. If my memory is correct he was not our senator at that time but a congressman. In the next election, he defeated Zales Ecton and became a senator for Montana. Later of course, he became the longest serving Senate Majority Leader in U.S. history, then our longest serving ambassador to Japan. After retirement, he continued working in his office will into his 90s.

I met him several times. We exchanged numerous letters, and I consider him an outstanding American who was also a fine man who never forgot his roots. I wish there were a few like him in Congress today. What do you think?

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Editor's note: Larry Wilson is correct. Mike Mansfield served in the U.S. House from 1943 through 1952 and in the U.S. Senate from 1953 through 1976. Mansfield was a representative, not a senator, when he accompanied President Harry Truman to the Flathead in October 1952.