Exist & Survive - You Do What You Have To Do

Grace, James, and Frank Lambert head west, west to dreams of new beginnings, happier times.

Grace desperately needing to find somewhere to live, takes some advice and heads to Northern California.  She was told that the agriculture needs were high and she could get a job easily there.

The boys, compared to most ranchers, were pretty well off, however life was still hard on the ranch filled with lots of physical and mental challenges. These challenges served only to be a preparation for what was to come with life in California.  The boys, in a strange land, with no money, food, or house have found their lives turned upside down.  Survival and existence is the name of the game.

California was being inundated
with unemployed workers looking
for a  job in the dream land.

Grace, faces the grim reality - life in California is a vicious cycle that one is unable to leave.  The number of people pouring into California, based on a hope and dream, were more then the state could handle.  Grace saw Mexican immigrants willingly head back to Mexico, where life was better off.

The family learn that the sell of the ranch has fallen through.  Dad, Frank Morrison, will not be able to join the family in California as early as they thought.  He stays behind to care for the ranch in hopes of selling it soon.

As Grace gets a bit more accustom to California, she learns that small family farms don't last here.  The competition with large-scale agriculture businesses causes family farms to fail.  Another 'dream' crushed in the wake of the Great Depression.  She had to succumb to the conclusion that their only hope for their imminent survival was to work as crop picker, following the harvests from the north to the southern part of California.

This is a sample of what some
families had to live in during
the Great Depression

In order to be as mobile as possible the Houser family lived in a tent, most likely with other poor white migrant families in the same situation.  These tent 'cities' became known as ditch cities.  To help ensure their survival, all three had to help harvest the crops.  Yes, that included young Frank.

Frank, being between the ages of 9-11, works side by side with his mother, Grace, and brother, James.  He's surrounded by other women, men, and children picking hops in the north and working their way down the state and ending with the picking of cotton.  Frank was use to hard work, however even on the ranch he could still sneak away and play, here he was expected to work from sun up to sun down.  He was too young, way too young to live the life of child labor.

Migrant Mother: Dorothea Lange's
famous photograph from the Great
Depression features Florence
Owens Thompson, 32, a
mother-of-three who had just
sold the family's tent to buy food

Around 1937, life began to change for the 3 Houser's in California.  James Buster found a 'real' job working as a janitor at Smith Jones Smiths and College in Southern California (I couldn't understand the college name).  It was during this time that they were able to find a real place to live, settle down, and have James attend college for free (as long as he worked as a janitor there). His college dream took several years to come true, but it's finally time.

Life was finally turning around, getting a bit easier, more stable, secure, and calm.

Taming the West

When one describes Montana, visions of panoramic wide open spaces, miles and miles of tree lined mountains, roaming flora and fauna come to mind.   Predators claiming prey, highlighting the circle of life - all helping man succumb to the reality that he is a part of nature, not separate from it.  We find that when man attempts to control and deter nature, he inadvertently tempts it with docile, tame, domestic, and carefully maintained plots of ranches and farms.

Growing up in Montana, Frank Lambert Houser, came to know first hand the trials and results in taming the wild west:

"Beauty" Pack horse 1930 from Houser Ranch

The Houser ranch was a section of several acres with tall, old growth timber growing along the edges. The timber was harvested and used to heat the house throughout the bitter-cold-wind-blowing winter months.  This same old growth wood was used to cook every meal over the wood stove.

One such family favorite meal was, mutton.  Frank Morrison Houser would slaughter one of their older sheep for Grace to cook her new england style family recipe of mutton.  The left over meat was canned over the wood stove and used throughout the season for various other meals.

Young Frank Lambert was quite often seen playing with one of the lambs on the ranch that followed him.  Yes, where ever Frank went, the lamb was sure to go!  However one couldn't guarantee that this lamb didn't become next season's dinner.

During this era family dogs were not required to be kept on a leash, in their yard, or to be quiet. When one has a pet rabbit, the neighbor dog can quickly turn into one of the wild Montana predators.  Frank Lambert owned Peter the rabbit as a pet, who ultimately succumbed to the predator drive of the neighbor's dog.
 
Every well ran ranch had a working dog, including the Houser ranch.  Cotton, a collie,would work alongside Frank Morrison herding the livestock and sheep on the ranch.  One of Cotton's most challenging jobs was in keeping the ranch safe from Montana's predators.  When the coyotes would come around looking for an easy meal, Cotton would work beside Frank Morrison in addressing and getting rid of these nuisances.

One such nuisance situation that was too much for even Cotton to handle.  Topsy, Grace's pet horse was found one morning mauled, but still alive.  The Houser family believes Topsy was most likely mauled by a grizzly bear, one of Montana top predators, besides man.  Frank Morrison had to put Topsy down and out of her misery.

Life in Montana wasn't easy, but carving out a part of history and taming the wild west was what the Houser family did.   The joy in facing the native beauty, the calm amidst the wilderness.  The sheer winter snow, like a blanket tucking the landscape to sleep, waking to blooms and blossoms in full succession.  Yes, the Montana mountains are calling, and overcoming those challenges is what our ancestors did.


The pictures below are from Betty Calkins' childhood, Frank Lambert's wife.  Note the differences between the Houser and the Calkins horses.

Unknown Calkin Children
on Horse.
Picture from Betty Margaret
Houser's memories

Unknown Calkin relatives riding horses
Picture from Betty Margaret Houser's memories