Grant-Kohrs Ranch Historic Resource Study/Historic Structures Report/Cultural Resources Statement

TO SELL OR LET ON SHARES. Owing to being overstocked on our limited home range, we will sell or let on shares, on favorable terms, to a responsible person or persons,

About 40 head of cross-bred Polled Angus and Short Horn Heifers. Also a lot of cross-bred Hereford and Short Horn Heifers.

It being a condition of such lease that the leasee shall have good range, sufficient hay and facilities to keep the breeds distinct.

Kohrs & Bielenberg,
Deer Lodge, Mont [1]

Kohrs and Bielenberg would recover from the bad winter. For them and their fellow stock growers, however, the recovery process would bring great change. For the home ranch, the post-1887 period meant expansion, which reflected, in part, the metamorphosis of the range cattle industry from the earlier freewheeling open-range days to the more careful and solid approach of the late eighties and early nineties.

For the ranchers who stayed following the bad winter, there could be no return to normalcy. Instead, the practice of allowing cattle to range for themselves, to "rustle" for the grass beneath the snow, was replaced by increasingly more careful range herd management, by supplemental feeding, and by careful observation of the range to avoid overgrazing. K. Ross Toole, in his wide-ranging review of Montana history, summed up the change nicely:

A new and different kind of cattle industry arose from these ruins. The days of the "open range" were gone. They had, in truth, been doomed from the beginning. The boom of 1880-1886 had been speculative. . . . The rancher was no longer a nomad. He could not overgraze and then move on. Barbed wire forced him not only to become more self-contained, to husband his resources, but made him into something of a conservationist. He was forced also, to improve his blood lines. [2]

Ranchers began to add new skills to their work, recognizing that changes had to come. Bloodlines, the heritage of good breeding cattle, became more important than before, and those ranchers who had a base of registered cattle to use in upgrading the quality of their herds—to produce animals yielding more meat, and with the ability to withstand the winters—stood to gain in the buying and selling of top grade animals. So stock growers became stock breeders more than ever before. Along with concerns for the quality of the cattle came the recognition that winter feeding would now be a major activity. Montana ranchers began to grow hay, and many began to buy the lands they planted. Planting hayfields meant fencing more land than ever before; the necessity for hayfields and river bottom pastures forced ranchers to purchase large blocks of railroad lands because the lands available under homestead and similar laws would not begin to fill the need. The process began slowly, but it continued over the decade of the nineties as the range cattle industry transformed itself from an informal arrangement based on plenteous open range to a more methodical business, a more carefully considered system of producing beef for market. The winter had been

a hard lesson, but it had its compensations. Methods would change -- were changing. The big companies bought large blocks of railroad land. They planted hay—redtop, timothy, alfalfa— and irrigated it. In 1880 there were 56,800 acres of Montana land in hay; by 1900 there were 712,000. And by the same token, there were 6000 brands recorded in 1889 and 16,000 in l900. [3]

At the home ranch of Kohrs and Bielenberg just on the north edge of the town of Deer Lodge, these changes came in the decade of the nineties and during the early years of the new century. The pastures grew bigger through purchase, much of it of railroad lands. And, though the range operations continued, the size of the home ranch grew. This complex, for so long merely a base of operations and a home for registered cattle that would be shipped out to the range for herd improvement, continued to serve the range herds, but added hundreds of grazing animals to its rich benchlands as its holdings climbed towards their greatest size -- over 25,000 acres.

Kohrs and Bielenberg bought little in 1887, but began stock purchases in the early spring of 1888. With the threat of foreclosure on the losses of 1886 and 1887 erased by Rosenbaum's gracious—and financially wise—action, and with the promise of support in the form of a $100,000 loan from A. J. Davis, Con began the recovery process carefully. It would require the purchase of large numbers of animals. In January 1881, accompanied by another well-known Montana cattle-grower named Henry Sieben, Kohrs made a reconnaissance toward the west, examining cattle in Idaho. He bought none on that trip, but utilizing the Davis loan, he picked up large numbers of cattle that summer in Washington, Oregon, and especially in Idaho. [4] The purchasing "began in the Boise Valley, and then went to Payette, Ontario, and up to the Malheur. Contracted all stock to be delivered for shipment on certain days, paying $10.00 for yearlings, $14.00 for two and $18.00 for three year olds." [5]

Most of the 9,000 cattle bought that early summer of 1888 went to CK herds and "were shipped and unloaded at Big Sandy and taken in charge of D. J. Hogan. Those for the Pioneer Company were shipped to Bowdoin." [6] This began the recovery process, which in 1888 meant increasing the number of cattle in the herds. But creating the quantity needed for the large-scale operation that Kohrs and Bielenberg had enjoyed before the bad winter would require even more than the 9,000 cattle he picked up that early summer of 1888. In an article in the Breeder's Gazette many years after the fact, Kohrs outlined his strategy in rebuilding:

I restocked my herds with steers from Idaho, Oregon, and Washington, and others adopted the same method of recuperating. A year or two later, steers as well as female stock were brought up from Texas and the progeny graded up by use of good bulls. [7]

But in 1888, with the recovery and herd rebuilding just beginning, the numbers of cattle shipped remained small. Con and John shipped about "400 CK's and about 600 Pioneers" that fall. [8]

Along with the effort of assembling herds came the beginnings of growth for the home ranch, as the brothers began to purchase lands near the ranch house complex. While the 16.75 acres involved in the first such land transaction were only a small addition of some of the richly grassed rolling bench lands in the Deer Lodge Valley, they presaged much more significant additions to come in the next dozen or so years. [9]

Early in 1889 (the year Montana entered the Union) Kohrs again travelled to central and western Idaho and adjacent portions of Oregon and Washington to buy cattle. In mid-spring he gathered and shipped the herds he had acquired. Having been elected to the State's Constitutional Convention just prior to this, he returned from a second cattle-buying trip west to participate in the convention proceedings at Helena. Following the adjournment late in August, Con picked up even more cattle in Idaho and Oregon, mostly for the CK herds. In this transaction Kohrs's recovery from the 1887-88 blow can be seen most clearly. He recalled:

In trading and buying I found there were many fine four year old steers at Wood River, Camas Prairie, Payette, and Weiser and even toward the Salmon River [all in the western Idaho eastern Oregon area]. Stockmen there had never shipped east and were timid about undertaking it: were anxious to sell at $25.00 per head. I counseled with Mr. Davis, told him I thought there would be a nice profit in the trade and that the money would not be invested long. He advised me to go ahead and check on him. I have forgotten the number I purchased. Picked out those that were not good and sent them to the range and the balance to Chicago. They netted a profit of $15.00 per head.

He had caught the market at the right moment, and he and Davis had netted a cool $15.00 profit per head. With deals such as these, Kohrs and Bielenberg would find the cattle business more than usually profitable. [10]

But it was not always this rewarding. While the grass remained thick now that the range suffered much less from overgrazing, 1890 did not permit a repeat of the heavy profits of the year before. Many eastern cattle were forced onto the market, evidently due to a drought, thereby depressing prices, so that "Kohrs and Bielenberg shipped very little that fall." They sold enough cattle to cover expenses and interest on borrowed money, allowing the remainder of the herds to range on the grass of Montana, and awaited next year's hopefully better prices. Kohrs recalled that "fine smooth cattle were turned back." [11] Possibly the money for "expenses" from the CK and DHS herds that year went, in part at least, for 8.92 acres added to the home ranch on 27 March 1890, which was added to the 17 plus acres in the same area purchased years before. [12]

The summer of 1890 witnessed the major addition to the home ranch house, the east-west oriented, brick, two-story "T" with a full basement, a first story with the living and dining rooms, kitchen, and pantry, and a second floor containing bedrooms. The addition brought "a great comfort" to the lives of Con, Augusta, John, and the Kohrs children. A furnace provided more steady and fulsome heat during the long, cold Montana winters, and a hydraulic ram brought in running water. The "gasplant" (a carbide gas generator) allowed gaslights to displace kerosene lamps in the home. The logistics of running what had by now become a prosperous cattleman's large home were eased somewhat, and in his autobiography Con Kohrs remarks that the gas and running water "gave us all the conveniences of the city and lightened the burdens of the housekeeper perceptibly—no carrying wood for six or seven stoves and the filling of lamps." [13]

With the house addition came the beginnings of major land growth for the home ranch. The purchase in March of 8.92 acres had been just the tiniest hint of things to come. The first big chunk of land added to the home ranch came on 13 May as Con Kohrs bought a 640-acre section of public lands under the Desert Land Act. [14] This property lay about a mile north of the ranch house and on the west side of the Deer Lodge River. Sixteen days later John Bielenberg and Con jointly acquired a section west of the ranch house about two miles from Charley Bielenberg. [15] In September John Bielenberg took his portion of land under the Desert Land Act, adding "635 20/100 acres" to the home ranch pastures. [16] Then, in December, Augusta exercised her option to purchase (again under the Desert Land Act) a little over a half section of land just north of the house. [17] Roughly figured, the three of them had added over 2,200 acres of land to the home ranch in 1890.

Funds to acquire the land were not insignificant, so it would seem that by 1890 Kohrs and Bielenberg had pretty well recovered financially. No doubt they recognized that every day brought new settlers into the public lands on which the great cattle herds ranged, and that every day more and more ranchers, sheep-growers, stockmen, breeders, and feeders of cattle would have to own land in order to use it. Realizing this by 1890, Con, John, and Augusta acted with characteristic promptness.

In April 1891 came the wedding of the oldest Kohrs daughter, Anna, to John Boardman. The event highlighted the social year for Deer Lodge. It rated a front page story in The New Northwest, which emblazoned a column head with "HAPPILY MARRIED," with a subordinate headline underneath reading "Hon. J. M. Boardman and Miss Anna Kohrs Join Hands and Hearts." The local press characterized the occasion as "one of the most brilliant weddings ever celebrated in Montana." The small Presbyterian church in Deer Lodge (attended by Mrs. Kohrs) revelled "from aisle to ceiling" in flowered decorations, including a huge horseshoe and an "arch of green dotted with roses" that spanned the altar. On the sides of the arch shone a harp and lyre of flowers. Five hundred Montana citizens had received invitations to the wedding and to the reception that followed at the home, and apparently the crowd was almost that large. The bride, Anna Kohrs, "decked in a heavy white faille silk en trains without trimmings, wearing a wreath of myrtle and carrying white roses was in truth loveliness," matched in beauty by her sister "Miss Katie" (Katherine Kohrs) and by Mrs. Kohrs, "attired in black silk velvet" and who wore "Diamond Ornaments." Augusta Kohrs had been ill earlier in the year, and because of that the wedding had been delayed. But with the beauty of the occasion highlighted by what must have been a virtual forest of flowers and greenery, no doubt all appreciated the delay until the spring flowers were available and the nurseries and greenhouses could produce the thousands of blossoms necessary for the event. Following the ceremony the celebrants and guests retired to the "paternal home."

Here again the florists have been heavily drawn upon and festoons of evergreen and smilax hung from doors and chandeliers and cut flowers in profusion were in vases and jars, shedding fragrant perfume everywhere. . . . The wedding dinner was served in the large dining room, brilliantly lighted, and the tables were trimmed in smilax and flowers. [18]

Not only did the splendor of the occasion bring a moment of warmth and happiness to the Kohrs family but the union added an acting participant in the family business. The Kohrses liked John Boardman, the first son-in-law to join them, a great deal. Con and John obviously approved of his managerial abilities because they brought him into the cattle business, where he ran more and more of the range operations during the 1890s and into the new century.

The wedding in April seemed to presage a good year, at least for a while. Con recalled it as "a prosperous year, there was an abundance of grass, cattle were fat and owing to the shortage of corn fed cattle, prices good." The first shipment of the spring, gathered and loaded at Chinook, mostly "fine five year olds," averaged 1,585 pounds and brought $5.25 (per hundredweight) for Kohrs and Bielenberg. The Pioneer Cattle Company animals also sold well, averaging $62.50 per head. Total sales that year came to $190,000. [19] It is safe to assume that both the CK and DHS cattle operations had pretty well recovered by 1891. Kohrs's reminiscence of that year is a typical stock grower's view on the business and merits quotation at some length:

The spring was early on the range. In May the grass was six or seven inches high and the cattle fat. Beef in the markets was so scarce that feeders could not secure enough to supply their markets. Carier, of Butte, Kauffman & Stadler, of Helena, and a Great Falls feeder accompanied me to Malta. They were so pleased with the cattle that we sold a large train load to Helena and Butte parties. They accepted them as they had been rounded up with a cut. The cows brought $45.00 per head and the steers, $65.00. . . .

The fall market was not good. We received more for the cattle sold in the spring than those shipped to Chicago. [20]

The autobiography goes no further in describing the fall market. It could not have been too bad, since Kohrs and Bielenberg executed a major land transaction in early December that added the biggest single chunk of pastureland to the home ranch to date. The deal involved land owned by the Northern Pacific Railroad. The smallest parcel included 520 acres, comprising two pieces of land west of the Deer Lodge River but roughly parallel to it, about a section and a half north of the ranch house. [21] At the bargain rate of $1,400 for 520 acres, Con and John acquired some nicely grassed benchlands within sight of the ranch house. The second deal of the day also included both John and Con on the deed but took in six full sections of land and portions of others. This purchase—"5190 acres more or less, less 3.00 acres right of way"—cost the partners $8,739.18. As they had many times before and would many times in the future, the brothers bought good lands at low prices. [22]

These 1891 purchases brought the "upper ranch" to its fullest size save for two quarter sections, one added in 1893 and the other in 1895. These land deals comprised almost four full sections added to the fields near the ranch headquarters complex just north of Deer Lodge. Oddly enough, Kohrs does not mention this large growth at the home ranch in the early 1890s in his autobiography. Thus there exists no firm knowledge of the motives behind acquisition of the land. By inference, however, they used it as pasture in their fast growing business of raising and selling thoroughbred horses and registered cattle -- Herefords and Short Horns. The bulk of the cattle being raised for sale remained on the open range in the DHS and CK herds east of the divide. Local markets no doubt bought beef on the hoof from the home ranch pastures and the lands there furnished stock such as beef, sheep, and poultry for home consumption. But the major reason for the growth of the home ranch was probably the development of the business of raising and selling fine blooded stock. An additional motive could have been that the brothers, who were witnessing the continual growth of southwestern Montana, decided to invest in land that could be sold in the future while serving in the present to support cattle.

The next year Con and John imported yearlings from the south, probably Texas, only to expose them to the severe winter of 1892-93. They lost about half the animals, but "the remainder proved profitable and even with the heavy loss we made a profit in the investment." [23] The Kohrs and Bielenberg landholdings had, by this time, grown enough to add to their property tax bill. Their 1892 taxes totalled over $2,000. In Deer Lodge County the bill was $799.51, representing the lands of the home ranch and the buildings at the home ranch and upper ranch. For Dawson County (probably lands carrying CK herds) the bill was $673.17. While this was less than Deer Lodge, it was in unsettled eastern Montana—against the North Dakota border—and no doubt represented a good piece of land there, but one with a lower level of assessment than property in Deer Lodge County. Likewise, the property tax for Choteau County (central Montana, near the big bend of the Missouri, and no doubt representing DHS lands) was $635.80. [24] Since Kohrs does not formally address the question of real property other than the DHS and home ranch holdings, it can be assumed that the taxes represented landholdings he felt to be a normal part of range operations. He had no major ranch in eastern Montana until later in the decade.

That summer Kohrs and Bielenberg picked up forty acres for the upper ranch. Purchased from an absentee owner (S. H. Bathkin of Minneapolis, Minnesota) for $300 it was the only land added that year. [25]

With the yearlings brought in from the south at half the number they had been prior to the 1892-93 winter, the task of bringing the herds to proper strength again faced the brothers in the spring of 1893. They acted as they had in 1888, buying Idaho cattle and some from nearby Oregon to replenish the herds. [26] Also, they moved some of the herds east of the divide that year. The changes show in the tax bills. Con's taxes rose appreciably in Deer Lodge County, to $944.48 from the previous year's $799.51, an increase of $145. This increase probably resulted from improvements on the land, such as barns, cowsheds, squeeze chutes, and corrals. For Dawson County, however, there are no 1893 taxes. Presumably, then, the herds there had moved or else the range of CK cattle ended in extreme eastern Montana in 1893. Two other counties, however, did assess taxes on Kohrs. Valley County, in northeast Montana, levied $993.90 on Kohrs property, while Choteau County only demanded $348 for DHS grazing herds.

Stock growing and mining gave way briefly to politics in 1893, but with somewhat less than cheering results for Con. Deer Lodge County was divided, much against Kohrs's strenuous lobbying efforts, and school legislation also passed despite his opposition to it. Kohrs's comment on the two defeats he suffered in the legislature explained the results: "But these were the days of [Montana copper king] Marcus Daly's power and buying of votes and little could be accomplished." [28]

The next year, 1894, marks a major turning point in the Kohrs and Bielenberg range cattle business. Con was fifty-nine years old that year and possibly the strain of the hard work and strenuous life of the past few years began to manifest itself. An accident in the spring -- Con fell from a horse into water, hitting the pommel of the saddle on the way down, and "received an injury from which I have never recovered" -- laid him up, and John Boardman, his son-in-law of but three years, took over much of the range cattle management. [29]

Boardman and Dick Williams "did the contracting and receiving" of the Utah cattle that year. Kohrs and Bielenberg "continued to buy every spring," but "aside from planning I [Con] took no part in the purchases." Boardman ran the range cattle herds and John Bielenberg the home ranch. This established routine continued for the next few years. [30]

During the remainder of the decade a few misadventures inevitably enlivened the routine of spring buying, roundup, and branding. In the fall another roundup was held, culling out those cattle to be sold, which were then shipped east to the markets of Chicago, Kansas City, and Omaha. One of the herds brought in from Idaho in 1894 had to be unloaded from the cattle train far west of its destination because the track was washed out. "Horses were bought and they were driven along the old government road from Medicine Tree Hill, reloaded at Cascade, and shipped to Malta for branding and release onto the range." [31]

Another problem arose from time to time when cattle drifted across the Canadian line. Once this involved 1,200 head, which the Canadians seized, "and it was necessary to make a trip to Ottawa to have them released." Con's negotiations eased the problem, and from that time on the Canadians and the Americans with the CK and DHS herds worked together. The CK line riders "were permitted to stay with the Mounted Police and we furnished them beef in exchange for grain and hay for our horses." [32]

The remainder of the decade continued to be a period of large-scale range cattle grazing east of the mountains, and, toward the end of the 1890s, of major land acquisitions for the home ranch. In 1894 the Kohrs and Bielenberg account books show taxes paid in Deer Lodge, Choteau, and Valley counties, and the next year the addition of Teton County (just north of the Sun River). In 1896 the list of counties in which Kohrs paid taxes had expanded to six, with Ravalli County (near the Idaho line in the Bitterroot Range of mountains of southwestern Montana) and Granite County (between Deer Lodge and Missoula) added. By 1897 the list had shrunk to five counties again. Thus the herds of cattle and the Kohrs and Bielenberg mining ventures grew and changed, [33] with the attendant land and equipment supporting these activities being bought and sold.

The home ranch grew larger all the while, as the herds moved from range to range, and as Con Kohrs, often in company with John Bielenberg, but often with others as partners, opened and closed various mining claims and purchased and sold various pieces of city property in Butte, Helena, and Missoula. John Bielenberg picked up 160 acres under the Timber Culture Act of 1873 in January 1895. [34] Then he and Con jointly bought 40 more acres in July. [35] In 1896 another 160 acres for the upper ranch came under Kohrs and Bielenberg ownership. [36] No land was bought in 1897, but then, as if to make up for lost time, land purchases began in earnest in 1898, and the home ranch took on some major pieces of property. Late in the year -- the deal being recorded on 10 October 1898— Con and John paid the Northern Pacific Railroad $2,370.60 for "All of fractional Section Seven (7), And all of Sections No. Thirteen (13) and Twenty Three (23) in Township Eight (8) North of Range Ten (10) West . . . (1896.48) Acres." [37] A month and a half later they added another two sections (1,280 acres) of Northern Pacific land, west of the ranch house complex and across the Deer Lodge River. [38] The brothers ended their land acquisitions that year with a 200-acre chunk of pasture, for which they paid $800. This land was added to some already purchased east of the ranch headquarters where the grasslands slope gently up ward toward the Continental Divide. [39]

Far to the east of the home ranch, and along Prairie Elk Creek in Dawson County, northeastern Montana, the partners bought out the N-N (N Bar N) Ranch that year. With this ranch added to the Kohrs and Bielenberg cattle and land holdings, the business became one of the largest in the State and among the grandest in western America. The home ranch, the DHS, and now the N-N ranch were all under one ownership. The combination proved to be a profitable one in the years to come, as Con Kohrs's grandson notes:

In 1898 they acquired the N-N . . . on Prairie Elk Creek in Dawson County. Using scrip they took up the water that controlled a million acres of range on the Big Dry and moved their range cattle. Three hundred and sixty-five carloads were shipped from Baltic and Galata in the fall of '99. The cattle were worked and the steers were left on the Peck reservation. The cows and calves swam the river and were driven to the new range. A contract in Texas brought a yearly supply of light southern yearlings to the new range and the range cattle business went on for another fifteen years, the most lucrative years for Kohrs and Bielenberg and the Pioneer Cattle Company. Over the years the beef were shipped to Rosenbaum Bros. in Chicago. A well bred native year old steer weighted from 1,300 to l,350#. Kohrs and Bielenberg shipped on the average between 8,000 to 10,000 cattle per year from 1888 to 1913. Prices ranged from 5 1/2 to 7 cents per pound. The big three and four year old steers almost invariably went as slaughter cattle and some found their way into the export trade aboard ship for England. Arthur Leonard, President of the Union Stock Yard Company, made the statement in the late '20's that Kohrs had shipped more cattle to Chicago than any other individual in the business and had truly earned the accolade "King of the Cattlemen." [40]

Along with land buying on a grand scale, Conrad, Augusta, William (now nearing twenty), and the girls made a grand tour of Europe and the Middle East in 1898, returning to Deer Lodge in late summer.

The next year, 1899, Augusta amd Con moved to Helena, while John remained at the home ranch. The move from Deer Lodge came for personal not business reasons:

Deer Lodge had changed so much, so many of our acquaintances had moved or passed away that there was little to hold us there, so in the fall of 1899 I concluded that we would go to Helena for the winter and then if we liked it take up our residence there. We rented the D'Archeul house for six months and took possession November 1st. My wife was very much pleased with the house and having made many pleasing acquaintances said she would like to live in Helena. So without her knowledge I telegraphed to Mr. D'Archeul and bought the house presenting it to her on our wedding anniversary.

Despite moving to Helena, Conrad continued buying land for the home ranch. In 1899 more big parcels of land were acquired. In January Con and John paid $3,103.85 to the Northern Pacific Railroad for 2,481.08 acres, over four full sections. [42] Then in August they added a quarter section of land, [43] followed the next day by another big purchase—1,920 acres—from the Northern Pacific. [44] A final buy that year from the railroad, 1,894 acres for $2,521.88, came on the last day of October. [45]

The thirteen years since the disaster of 1886-87 had been active ones for the CK and DHS herds and their owners. Recovering from the loss of about one half to two thirds of their stock in 1887, the brothers took advantage of the quickly offered financial support from investors who retained faith in their stock-growing abilities, and soon surpassed their record size herds of 1886. By the mid-1890s they had begun a large expansion of the home ranch and of their considerable holdings east of the divide. At the close of the century they owned three ranches—the home ranch, the DHS (at least partially), and the recently acquired N-N. Their mining business thrived as did their cattle. Yet in 1900 they stood on the verge of even more growth in landholdings in the Deer Lodge Valley.

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