'With No Companion but Her Horse'
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‘With no companion but her horse’ The Rocky Mountain Husbandman’s Traveling Correspondents Anna Kline and Carolyn A. Murphy, 1889–1904 by FRANK R. GRANT As a correspondent for the Rocky Mountain Husbandman, Anna Kline and her successor Carolyn A. Murphy traveled the state to report on the experiments and experiences of Montana’s rural families and to promote the progressive agricultural practices they believed would secure a bright future for the state’s rural population. Each woman routinely described the pride Montana farmers and ranchers took in their operations. This view, simply stamped “Canyon Ferry No. 1,” reveals little about the ranch or the individuals’ identities but much about the value ascribed to the house and livestock on display. MHS Photograph Archives, Helena 60 MONTANA THE MAGAZINE OF WESTERN HISTORY “We have employed Miss J. A. Kline to travel for this paper and she leaves to-day on a tour of the territory and will endeavor to visit every farmer, stockgrower and fine stock breeder in Montana. Miss Kline is a lady of fine ability, a good writer, an excellent judge of fine stock; is always jolly and lighthearted; and her ‘Notes by the Way’ will provide an interesting feature of our paper,” wrote Robert Sutherlin, editor of the Rocky Mountain Husbandman, on April 11, 1889.1 FRANK R. GRANT | SPRING 2011 61 and Murphy also showed rural women as active participants in developing Montana’s agricultural resources—the women they described enthusiasti- cally managed livestock, owned their own brands and businesses, marketed produce, organized community institutions, nurtured families, and promoted cultural interests.4 Anna Kline’s and Carolyn Murphy’s columns paint a portrait of rural Montana quite different from that in traditional histories, which identify nineteenth- century Montana agriculture with the range-cattle industry and its tragic climax in the hard winter of 1886–87. These works associate the farming frontier Meagher County: An Early-Day Pictorial History, 1867–1967 Pictorial History, Meagher County: An Early-Day with the ill-fated dryland homesteading experiment lasting from 1906 to the mid-1920s. As a result, they provide only a superficial understanding of the farm- ers and ranchers who experimented with irrigation, varied crops, new cultivation methods, and diverse breeds of cattle, horses, and sheep prior to 1900. In Meagher County Historical Society, Meagher County Historical Society, (White Sulphur Springs, Mont., 1968), 99 contrast, the writings of Anna Kline and Carolyn Anna Kline (above, circa 1887) Murphy show the gradual, adaptive, and experimen- tal efforts of the state’s agriculturalists, revealing the origins of progressive agriculture at the end of the Since the Husbandman’s beginnings in 1875, nineteenth century.5 Sutherlin had sent representatives, usually his brother, William H. Sutherlin, across Montana Territory to sell subscriptions and to report on farming, ranching, Born in 1859, Anna Kline left her home in mining, and commercial ventures for the pioneering Ohio and settled in the Townsend-Radersburg area agricultural journal. This strategy had been success- in the early 1880s, staying for some time in Bedford ful. Although located in White Sulphur Springs in with a Mrs. Birch, “a mother to several of us girls who sparsely settled Meagher County, the Husbandman have come to the country and stopped at this point was one of the most highly circulated weeklies in and have been very hospitably received by her.”6 Montana Territory. Julia Anna Kline, who went by Unconventional, small in stature, and quick witted, “Anna,” would be Montana’s first traveling female Kline lived with a sense of adventure and curiosity. We newspaper representative, covering the territory as do not know what inspired her to move to Montana, far as Fort Benton to the north, Flathead Lake to the but her enthusiasm for the state indicates she thought west, Dillon to the south, and Lewistown in 1889, it to be a land of opportunity. 1890, and 1892. A decade later, Sutherlin employed Exploring the possibilities in her new home, Kline Carolyn A. Murphy, Kline’s close friend, to represent tried several jobs. She lived on a ranch near Raders- the newspaper. Each summer between 1899 and burg, where she learned to work with livestock, espe- 1904, Murphy extended the Husbandman’s contacts, cially horses. By the fall of 1885, she had moved to visiting farms and ranches from the Tongue River to White Sulphur Springs, where she taught school at a Flathead Lake and from the Bitterroot Valley to the salary of seventy-five dollars a month. She later taught Milk River.2 Enthusiastic advocates of rural life, Kline at Fort Logan and other country schools in Meagher and Murphy chronicled the experiments and expe- County. In addition to teaching, Kline operated a riences of Montana’s rural families and promoted fruit and confectionary business with H. H. Barnes agricultural practices they believed would secure a in White Sulphur Springs. As “a popular business bright future for the state’s rural population.3 Kline woman in our town,” Kline was, in Robert Sutherlin’s 62 MONTANA THE MAGAZINE OF WESTERN HISTORY Meagher County: An Early-Day Meagher County: An Early-Day (White Sulphur Springs, Mont., 1968), 27 Meagher County Historical Society, Meagher County Historical Society, Pictorial History, 1867–1967 Pictorial History, Robert Sutherlin and his brother William started the Rocky Mountain Husbandman in Diamond City in 1875 and moved offices to White Sulphur Springs four years later. The newspaper became one of the most highly circulated weeklies in Montana Territory. Its staff, posed here in 1886, included (from left to right) compositor “Tar Heel” Jim Stephens, printer’s devil Albert Hunt, associate editor William H. Sutherlin, compositors Ben D. Gardner and Alex Wright, and editor Robert N. Sutherlin. MHS Photograph Archives, Helena, 951-692 Kline came to Montana in the 1880s and by fall 1885 had moved to White Sulphur Springs to teach school for a salary of seventy-five dollars per month. White Sulphur Springs teachers and their pupils posed in 1886 for this photograph with their newly built schoolhouse. Kline is the teacher standing third from the right. FRANK R. GRANT | SPRING 2011 63 MHS Photograph Archives, Helena, PAc 82-19 F9 MHS Photograph Archives, Helena, PAc Kline’s job with the Husbandman took her to the agricultural communities throughout the valleys of western Montana. One visit was with the Barrows family at the Ubet stage stop in June 1890, where Mrs. Barrows had “fitted up splendid hen houses with modern conveniences for running the business properly.” Ubet is pictured above on July 4, 1886. estimation, an ideal candidate for the position of hope that “farming is going to be the leading industry newspaper representative. He hired her in 1889.7 of Montana by and by.” In particular, she sought evi- As Anna Kline visited farms, ranches, and towns dence that ranchers were taking measures to prevent beginning that spring, she recorded her observations stock losses like those incurred during the hard winter and sent them to the Husbandman office. The “Notes of 1886–87. When Kline noted small creeks of central by the Way,” which Sutherlin published with minimal Montana had run dry due to a “raging drouth” in editing, constitute a farm-by-farm account of Mon- 1889, she cautioned livestock owners: “Better sell and tana agriculture, as illustrated by Kline’s first visit to take half of what [the cattle] are worth than have them the Missouri Valley in 1889. There she noted Thomas starve to death in winter, as they did three years ago.” Neld planting oats and wheat, Joseph Patterson set- Hayfields of timothy and alfalfa,irrigation works, ting out trees, and that James Jobb had built a mill fenced range, up-to-date farm homes, winter feeding, at Bedford to grind local wheat. Farther south, the and purebred cattle, horses, and sheep were signs Sherlock brothers were cutting a ditch to take water of improved farming methods and indicated people from Crow Creek, and Huntley and Clark raised fine were “fixin to stay in the country.” Kline seconded horses at their ranch near Toston. Kline continued editor Sutherlin’s position that it was a mistake to the detailed descriptions as she traveled through the encourage the settlement of homesteads without Boulder, Jefferson, Madison, and Gallatin valleys. irriga tion. When J. A. MacKnight, editor of the Great Her witty personality showed from the first. In her Falls Leader, asked her if the Husbandman was con- June 6 column, Kline wrote she had seen plowing, verted to the nonirrigating system, Kline responded: harrowing, rolling, and irrigating in “monstrous fields “No. Non-irrigation has proved a detriment to the where the men are at work, but I managed first rate country this year and if those who raised twenty to get over, through and under the barb wire fences bushels of wheat to the acre could have irrigated, they to [reach] where they are and in many places leave would have reaped a harvest of two-thirds more.”9 samples of my dress and coat.”8 Kline included many descriptions of women who Kline was not an impartial observer, and in keep- worked alongside men in building farms and ranches, ing with Sutherlin’s editorial policies she held out and she made a point of identifying women who were 64 MONTANA THE MAGAZINE OF WESTERN HISTORY successful doing what was considered a man’s job. a rustler. When she wants her team for a day’s outing Mrs. S. D. Molton, “a lady of excellent ability and she goes and gets it. [Miss Elliott] says: ‘if I had to judgment,” and O. M. Sweet managed their own depend on the men I never would have any fun.’ ”11 ranches near Sheridan.