BH: Did the Baca move their cattle in the summer?
Glen: No—they kept 'em there on the ranch.
BH: Kept 'em right there.
Glen: Yeah—six thousand head.
BH: And how did they work that with — did each cowboy have a certain amount of cattle he had to take care of?
Glen: Yeah—they had these camps—like I told you. And there was generally a cowboy at each one of them. And he had so many cattle he had to take care of, and that's the way they did that. And when I was just—I wasn't very old—I went with dad on the round—up, they called it. And we'd go round 'em all up in one pasture, and go to this one camp, and brand 'em, and do everything. And then the next day, we'd go—or the next—whenever we got done—we'd go to the next one. And ah. . . dad had an old bed with a tarp over it, and we'd just throw that on some hay, and that's where we slept. And, the cows would bawl all night, and you'd think, "Oh, if they'd just stop a minute."
BH: Keep you awake.
Glen: Yeah. And we went through all them camps and did all those cows.
BH: Ah huh. How old were you when you were doing that?
Glen: Oh—I wasn't very old—I don't know. About nine or ten.
BH: Did you like the life of a cowboy?
Glen: Yeah—I did then.
BH: I did then. Till after I got sick.
Glen: After I got sick, I said, "I don't believe anymore of that." So that's when I—well, I did go back to work there afterwards, but I went to work at the mine, and worked down there till it closed down. And after it closed down, there wasn't anything to do—but I had to go back to work at the Grant—so I went to the Purebred Ranch.
BH: And what was the purebred ranch?
Glen: Well, they used purebreds, strictly. I got a picture of 'em right up there on the wall.
BH: And where was that at? Or what part of the ranch was it on?
Glen: It was just down this way from Crestone a ways—purebred ranch was.
BH: What'd you do there?
Glen: I hauled hay.
BH: Is that better for your health, or. . .
Glen: No, it was worse. And ah. . . like I said, why I would go—I never got to see my family. Go home after dark, and leave before light in the morning. So that's when I told the foreman I was leaving, and rented this place over here.
BH: And you managed to make this work, I guess?
Glen: Yeah—we started with those two guys. We built that herd up to two hundred cattle.
BH: Wow.
Glen: We had a place over here on the gunbarrel—four quarters—five quarters. And we had this place. And we run two hundred cows—wife and I. Those sheds out there—I spent many a night out there in there calving.