Montana 1948 Read Online Free PDF

climbed onto a picnic table.
    He didn’t call for silence. That wasn’t his way. He simply stood there, his feet planted wide, his hands on his hips. He was wearing his long buckskin jacket, the one so tanned and aged that it was almost white. He assumed that once people saw him, they would give him their attention. And they did.
    He said a few words honoring all the men who served (no one from Mercer County was killed in action—not such an improbability when you consider the county’s small population—though we had our share of wounded, the worst of whom, Harold Branch, came back without his legs). Then
after a long, reverent pause, Grandfather announced, “Now I’d like to bring my son up here.”
    My father was standing next to me when Grandfather said that. My father did not move. Grandfather did not say, “my son the veteran,” or “my son the war hero,” or “my son the soldier.” He simply said, “my son.” And why wouldn’t the county sheriff be called on to make a small speech?
    But my father didn’t move. He just stood there, like every other man in the crowd, smiling and applauding, while his brother stepped up on the table. Uncle Frank had not hesitated either; he knew immediately that Grandfather was referring to him.
    Uncle Frank made a suitably brief and modest speech, saying that the war could not have been won without the sacrifices of both soldiers and those who remained at home.
    At one point I looked up to see how my father was reacting to his brother’s speech. My father was not there. He had drifted back through the crowd and was picking up scraps of paper from the grass. With his bad leg, bending was difficult. He had to keep the leg stiff and bend from the waist. Then he carried these bits of paper, a piece at a time, to the fire-blackened incinerator barrel.
    Uncle Frank’s talk must not have been enough for my grandfather. He climbed back up on the table and, after urging the crowd on to another minute of applause, held up his hands for silence again. “This man could have gone anywhere,” he said. “With his war record he could be practicing in Billings. In Denver. In Los Angeles. There’s not a community
in the country that wouldn’t be proud to have him. But he came back to us. My son. Came back to us.”
    My father kept searching for paper to pick up.

    Uncle Frank put his black bag on the kitchen table. “How about something to drink, Wes? I was digging postholes this morning and I’ve been dry all day.”
    My father opened the refrigerator. “Postholes? Not exactly the kind of surgery I thought you’d be doing.”
    â€œI’m going to fence off the backyard. We’ve got two more houses going up out there. Figured a fence might help us keep what little privacy we’ve got.”
    I wondered what Grandpa Hayden would say about that. Though his land was fenced with barbed wire as most ranchers’ were, he still had the nineteenth-century cattleman’s open range mentality and hatred of fences. Our backyard bordered a railroad track (trains passed at least four times a day), but my father refused to put up a fence—as all our neighbors had—separating our property from the tracks.
    â€œI’ve got cold beer in here,” said my father. “It’s old man Norgaard’s brew.” Ole Norgaard lived in a tar-paper shack on the edge of town. He had a huge garden and sold vegetables through the summer and early fall. His true specialty, however, and the business he conducted throughout the year, was brewing and selling beer. My father swore by everything Ole Norgaard produced.
    Uncle Frank made a face. “I’ll pass.”

    My father brought out a bottle with a rubber stopper and a wire holding it in place. “You can’t buy a better beer.” He held out the bottle.
    Uncle Frank laughed and waved my father away. “Just