CHASIN THE “ROOSHIN” THISTLES

By Shelley Ridings Reed

The sun was just flinging its last dying rays down the slopes of the Big Horn Mountains. Orphy stood at the window watching the glorious reds and purples sparkle across the snow. Her granddaughter Shelley was driving over from Newcastle that afternoon to interview her about her early life on the prairie. Had it really been eighty years since she’d played among the trees in Kansas? It didn’t seem that long ago, almost like yesterday.

Orphy was a little nervous about sharing that part of her life. It brought back so many bittersweet memories. She’d just have to try to recall those times so long ago.

She’d been born to Mary Hancock Nelson and Nels Nelson on November 11, 1909, in Tescott, Kansas. Oprhy Marie was the first born of nine children.

Orphy remembered the farm six miles north of Tescott. It’s beautiful trees and the crystal clear brook that ran through the meadow always brought back her childhood. She used to take twine and run it around the tree trunks to form rooms for her playhouses. She and her brothers and sisters would play for hours in amongst the green sunshine of the imaginary rooms. Every Sunday and on all religious holidays, her Dad would load the whole family into the two-seated surrey and take them to church.

She remembered the pretty wool dresses her Grandmother made for her. The dresses always had to be worn with a pinafore so only the pinafores got dirty. After washing those pinafores out on the washboard, she tried even harder not to get them dirty. Thank goodness for modern washing machines, they save hours of back breaking agony. Her favorite memory was that lovely glade of trees and the beautiful green of Kansas. The world held so much promise.

When Orphy was eight, her Dad announced to the family that he’d purchased a farm in eastern Colorado. Unknown to the family, the farm was purchased sight unseen. She could remember even now the bawl of the cattle and the excited chatter of the poultry, as they were loaded on a boxcar to be moved to Wild Horse. The furniture and the family were loaded on another car and off they went.

Dad had gone on ahead of the family to Colorado and when the train stopped at the siding, no one was there to meet them. One look at the dry, rolling prairie and the wind moving the grass in unending waves across the land and Mama sat down on the suitcases and bawled. She was so disappointed. Orphy didn’t know what to do. Torn between her mother’s grief and her own eagerness to see what was out there, Orphy didn’t know which way to turn. She was filled with the excited wonder of a child wanting to experience everything that was in this strange lonely place with the wind that moaned with sadness.

Wild Horse, Colorado, consisted of a general store; a hotel, a blacksmith’s shop and a little church just down the road a bit. A few years earlier the whole town had burned to the ground and everything smelled like new lumber. People went about their business, generally ignoring the newcomers and the bright-eyed eight year old watching it all closely so she wouldn’t miss a thing. After all, wasn’t this the “most excitin” thing that had ever happened to her?

Orphy saw her Dad’s bright smile once again as he pulled up to the siding with the big farm wagons. He chattered with his wife to cheer her up and told them all about the place north of town.

After gathering all their worldly possessions, they headed out, the kids chasing the “Rooshin” thistles as they rolled past in the wind. What fun! They helped to keep the livestock in place as they traveled toward their new home. They giggled and laughed all the way up the hill overlooking the new place. There below sat a two-story house with a little wash room off to one side and the outhouse out back. The well sat next to the back door with a bucket attached to a fresh new rope. There were only two bedrooms in the new house, but they all spread out on the floor and the first day in Colorado passed into history.

What an exciting time and so much to do. Orphy missed her glade of trees and the sparkling brook. This new land had a “crik”, but it only had water in it when it rained and there were no trees at all. The fuel for the fire was the dried cow chips gathered off the prairie by the kids. The vast prairie seemed to go on forever. No fence or tree marked the land and always, the eternal wind blow across the country.

Shortly after getting there, her Dad and Uncle George (an excellent carpenter, even though he’d lost one arm) added on a huge kitchen and dining room with a big living room to one side. The rest of the original house was converted to bedrooms to accommodate the Nelson brood.

Thinking back, Orphy remembered the great parties and get-togethers at the Nelson place. All the Nelson girls were pretty and the word soon got around the countryside. That fact and the big rooms added onto the house made a combination for a party or dance. Orphy smiled as she thought about the day in 1918 that World War I was officially over. All the neighbors for miles around came over with food, beverages and their musical instruments. The dancing and laughter lasted most of the night. Yes sir, the Nelson’s was a popular gathering place.

As clear as her memories were, it was hard to believe it was really that long ago that she gotten up early in the morning and rushed downstairs to stand with her brothers and sisters by the kitchen stove to get dressed as fast as they could ‘cause the house was so cold. She could remember helping out around the house, but Dad never let the girls out in the barn. There were certain things that went on out there weren’t meant for young ladies eyes. Let’s face it, There were plenty of boys for that work anyway.

Orphy still remembered the spongy earth in the spring and the smells of the prairie as it blossomed into summer. She remembered, too, the cold biting wind blowing snow in her face as she walked two miles across the prairie to the one room schoolhouse. Her mom used to tell her that being a schoolteacher herself, she wanted her kids to be educated. Short of a raging blizzard, the Nelson kids went to school. There were about eight kids in the school and most of them were Orphy’s brothers and sisters.

Orphy remembered the year she finished school and graduated from eighth grade. She was thirteen years old and now that she was a grown woman, it was time for her to get on with her life. Her first job was to take care of a schoolteacher’s three children, but it was her first experience cooking, cleaning and washing for four people all on her own. When summer came, she went with the schoolteacher and her kids over to the sheep ranch that the schoolteacher’s husband owned. Now that was hard work! On the ranch, she did all the baking and cooking for the family and the Mexican sheepherders on the place. Orphy remembered working as a hired girl on several other places and she worked one summer cooking for a railroad crew. Even now, she had trouble cooking for just herself.

The next episode in her life was after Dad lost his place and the family moved into Cheyenne Wells, CO. He’d mortgaged everything to buy that farm at Wild Horse and through hard times and bad luck he lost it.

About that time, Grandpa Nelson back in Tescott, KS, became very ill and Orphy went back to help her Grandma out. Neither of her grandparents spoke English and she didn’t speak Danish. Orphy couldn’t remember a time that she ever really spoke it, but she did come to understand it. What a sad, strange time that was. Grandpa died a few days after Orphy arrived and she stayed on to be there for her Grandma.

While she was in Kansas, her grandmother took her to church all the time. The Nelsons were very religious Lutherans and while she was there, Orphy met and fell for a nice young man that was superintendent of the Sunday School. His name was Ernest Rankin and shortly thereafter, they were engaged to be married. Ernest went on to college and Orphy went back to Cheyenne Wells to work and wait for Ernest.

The sights and smells of the Blue Royal Café and Bakery in Cheyenne Wells still lingered at the back of Orphy’s mind. She started her shift at six in the morning, baking the bread and other goods, then she worked all day, finally helping to close up at nine in the evening.

Her whole life changed one day when a tall, good looking cowboy walked into the café. He had a hank of hair that kinda fell down over one side of his forehead and walked with a slight limp. That cowboy stole her heart and from then on, there was no other man for her. He said his name was Dewey Compher, his friends called him “Dude.” He’d been born and raised there in Cheyenne Wells and everybody that knew him liked him. Orphy and Dewey had such fun together, they laughed, they danced and soon they shared a hope for a future together.

Well this sure put Orphy’s life into a spin. She was totally swept away by this quiet cowboy, but Ernest and her were engaged. She wrote Ernest a “Dear John” letter. Through all their years together, Dewey proved to be well worth the minor agony of that letter.

Orphy and Dewey were married in Burlington, CO on April 11, 1928. Their parents weren’t able to be there, her Mom was with Francis, Orphy’s older sister. Francis’s baby was due any day, and her Dad had to stay with the rest of the kids to look after things.

Orphy laughed as she thought of her wedding. Her Dad sent them off with his blessing, “As long as Dewey made sure it was legal, it was OK with him. Along with their two best friends as witnesses and Joe Ross, a cowboy pal, they set off for the Justice of the Peace. Orphy secretly wanted a church wedding, but being with Dewey made it seem unimportant. Joe sat on a couch during the whole ceremony with the woe-be-gone look on his face, and his head hanging down like this was absolutely the saddest thing he’d ever seen; his best friend Dude finally getting roped and tied to a woman. On top of all that, after getting married and having a nice dinner, there wasn’t anything going on in town that night so Dewey took his new bride to a prizefight. He had a great time, but Orphy sat there in her new lace dress wondering what she really knew about her new partner.

Late the next night the whole community showed up to “chivaree” the newlyweds. They thought Dewey and Orphy had fallen asleep, but to everybody’s surprise, the new bride and groom were one step ahead of them. They good naturally invited everybody in to hand out cigars and candy. Secretly, Orphy and Dewey hoped the crowd would leave real soon. They had other things in mind besides a one-way ticket on the train or a ride down the lane in a wheelbarrow for the bride. Maybe the cigars and candy paid off, because the crowd finally left and the bride stayed.

What a happy memory, how bright the future seemed. She and Dewey moved into their little house across the street from the high school in Cheyenne Wells and started their family. The first child Dorla Maxine was born there in September 1929. She was Shelley’s Mom.

The next move was onto a farm they rented two miles south of Cheyenne Wells. There, they had a hired man and girl to help with all the work. The years on that place sure held some memories.

A blizzard blew in one day resulting in the loss of livestock and people alike. It caught everyone late in the afternoon just after school let out. One bus full of kids got caught in the storm and several children died. When the bus driver’s own daughter died in his arms, he knew it was time to go for help. He left an older boy in charge of the children and gave his instructions not to let anyone fall asleep. “ Keep them singing or talking or playing games but above all else don’t let them fall asleep.” Hours later, help was finally led back to the bus and the kids were rescued.

Orphy remembered how cold it got that day. Caught by the blizzard without any fuel, they’d been real lucky. The potato cave in the yard had railroad ties that were used to support the roof. The hired man and Dewey struggled in the storm for hours to pull those ties out and cut them up for fuel. The shed for the cattle had just been completed and somehow, instead of going into the storm, the cattle sensed it and came back to the shed. Only one head was lost. Unfortunately, or maybe by chicken standards, fortunately, the chicken shed filled up with snow and Orphy had to put them in the upstairs bedroom. She still remembered the chicken clucking and singing up there while the storm raged on.

Orphy remembered her most frightening ordeal while they lived on that farm. She was alone except for the hired girl because Dude was taking a consignment of “killer horses” to the railroad at Westcott, Kansas. (These were wild horses that were old and skinny and they were used to feed foxes on fur farms back east.) Dewey took all the saddle horses to help move the herd so Orphy and the hired girl, Lillian, had been left without transportation. Orphy was pregnant.

She felt her first labor pains early in the day and knew she needed help. There wasn’t anything else to do so she sent Lily into town on foot to get Orphy’s Mom and Dad. Lillian set off across the prairie to fetch help. Orphy told her to call the doctor. Orphy set up her bed the way the county nurse had shown her, but when she realized no help was coming and she was alone with just the little two year old Dorla to help, both of them started to cry. It seemed so hopeless and Orphy didn’t know much about what to do – her Dad pretty much sheltered the girls from that. Well, she set Dorla down in front of the bedroom door with a sack of bananas and Orphy went to bed. She could see Dorla eating bananas and as the labor pains came closer and closer, Orphy concentrated on the job she had to do. Time dragged by like it had lead on its feet, Dorla cried and ate bananas and still help didn’t come. The sun was starting to set (just like it was tonight) only she wasn’t sure the red was in her mind or in the sunset. As the baby was being born, Dewey came home. He burst into the room just in time to greet his new daughter, Colleen. He wasn’t much help though; it was pretty overwhelming for a simple cowboy. She told him to tied the cord off, but they didn’t move the baby. Finally, after waiting as long as they could, they tied the cord off further down and severed it. Everybody was doing just fine even if Dewey looked like he’d rather be in Kansas. When the doctor got there, he was really upset with the new parents. At that time, it was against the law to cut the cord without a doctor present. How times change. Orphy wondered how a woman would do today if no one was around when a baby came; probably be just as scared as she was.

While they lived there, too, the awesome dust storms of the thirties caught them. She covered the babies’ faces at night so the dust wouldn’t choke them. She get up in the morning and use a brush and a pan to clean up the dust off the sills, and anything else left uncovered. They didn’t have vacuum cleaners then. By noon the dust clouds would roll back in and cover everything all over again. Dust built up on the haystacks so a person could walk to the top and some buildings were completely covered. Cattle were buried with their tails to the wind and ranchers and farmers all over the prairie lost their stock.

All in all, the time they lived on that farm was a happy time. The dust storms and the blizzards didn’t seem to diminish their spirits.

On Sundays, folks from all around would gather together in a designated spot for a rodeo and picnic. People parked their cars and wagons in a circle to form an arena and the rodeo began. Dude was a cowboy from the top of his head to his boots. Some cowboy would grab the ear on a bronco with his teeth to get the horse’s attention, and Dude would mount up for the ride. Away Dude and the horse would go. A whirl of dust. Horse and man with everybody yelling and spooking the horse even more. Sometimes the broncos ‘got away’ and carried the rider into the prairie for a few special twists and turns, maybe even a toss into the sage. Orphy’s heart was in her throat every time he took off, but she had to admit, she was almost as excited as he was.

There were rabbit drives, too. Rabbits doing what rabbits seemed to do best; the prairie was covered with the varmints. The men would set up a length of rabbit-proof fencing into a three-sided closure, then men would form a drive line about a mile away. They stood about ten feet apart and started toward the closure, stomping and making noise to drive the rabbits ahead of them. When they got to the closure, there were usually hundreds of rabbits trapped. The men didn’t even shoot them; they just clubbed them in the heads. Rabbit was a delicacy back East, so the men cleaned them, wrapped them in newspaper and shipped them off.

Yes, Orphy thought, there’d been some good times and some bad times in those early years, but she always had Dewey’s love and strength to see her through. As she stood there waiting for the sun to go down, she saw Shelley’s truck coming up the drive. Again, she wondered what Shelley could possibly want to know about an old woman’s life. It hadn’t been anything unusual, had it?

Afterward

Dewey and Orphy Compher had five children; Dorla Maxine was the oldest, with Hazel Colleen, Robert Dewey, Winifred Marie and William Nelson following in that order.

The Comphers lived on various ranches and farms in Eastern Colorado all their lives. In 1969, Dewey was diagnosed with cancer. They sold their ranch and moved into a small house in Calhan, Colorado. After fighting his cancer for almost four years, the brave old cowboy died in November 1973. Orphy buried him at Cheyenne Wells on that lonely prairie that he loved so well.

Orphy bought a little mobile home in Mesa, AZ, in 1975. She alternates her time between Arizona in the winter and Colorado Springs in the summer.

September of 1978 saw Orphy remarry, but 18 months later she lost her second husband, Joseph Martin Everson to a heart attack.

This brave, wonderful pioneer celebrated her 80th birthday on November 22, 1989. She received over 50 birthday cards, including one from President George Bush and his wife Barbara. A special surprise was a card from Orphy’s fifth grade teacher, Ida Thompson, who now lives in Kit Carson, CO.

Orphy Compher Everson, the grandmother of fifteen grand children and eighteen great grand children still sparkles with life. She always has a hug for her “kids” and plenty of love for everyone in general. God bless her, I bet she could still chase a “Rooshin thistle across the prairie.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

I received this story from Shelley while gathering information on the Compher family. After I read it I knew that if at any point I could put my information in a book form this story would be included. Thank you, for such a wonderful story.

Shelly wrote this story for a Frontier Literature course on December 14, 1989. I have not changed a single word. The only corrections were few typo errors.

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