Boulder Creek Rendezvous: The Wilson Brothers Protect Their Brand

By Paul Michael Crips

The young Wilson boys learn the ropes and become true cowboys in spite of Mother Nature's challenges, including encounters with a grizzly bear that nearly kills them. Facing summer snowstorms, coyotes and bears, the boys fill their father's shoes after he dies in a freak thunderstorm. Throughout the book, the young cowboys face the extremes of nature, overcome their fears, and learn to respect their differences as they survive their first summer range and fall roundup. Their efforts sustain the 53 Bar Ranch for another season.
Boulder Creek Rendezvous is set against the backdrop of the majestic Absaraka Range and the banks of the South Fork of the Shoshone River, forty miles as the eagle flies from Yellowstone National Park. The Wilson Brothers come of age in later 1930's near the small town of Cody, Wyoming.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Paul Michael Crips
• Release date: Oct 20, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370555666

Paul Michael Crips

Paul Crips' family owned and operated the 53 Bar Ranch, near Cody, Wyoming. He retired from teaching Industrial Arts and Science in Cheyenne, Wyoming, after 36 years. During his career he was honored with various awards, including The Milken Family Foundation Teacher Award and the Wyoming Arch Coal Teacher of Wyoming. He added, "The best reward is knowing hundreds of young cowgirls and cowboys."

Book preview

Chapter 1

Nature's Fury

The bright lightning of an early morning thunderstorm illuminated Leroy Wilson's bedroom. He and Sadie awoke to the sound of a large branch from a cottonwood tree crashing on the front porch roof.

Leroy jumped out of bed and shouted to Sadie over the noise of the thunder, This is some storm! Gotta make sure the young calves are tended. He pulled up his jeans and tugged on his boots.

Sadie pushed herself off the bed and put her arms into her robe. She peered worriedly out the bedroom window. Honey, wait a bit till the worst of it passes. This lightning looks dangerous.

Leroy ignored her urging. Those calves are just days old. If this cold rain turns to snow, we could lose some. Leroy clattered down the stairs, cinching his belt. Sadie followed. In the kitchen, she fanned the embers of the wood stove while Leroy stretched his rain slicker over his broad shoulders, jammed on his cowboy hat and charged outside, not pausing for coffee or breakfast.

Turning his face away from the slashing rain, Leroy ran to the bunkhouse, splashing through puddles that soaked his jeans. He knew Cy Sanders, his hired hand and old friend, would already be awake and dressed, ready to brave the storm to save the calves.

Cy opened the door just as Leroy reached it. He looked out at the hot lightning slashing the dark sky. This is one crazy storm, he said. Wanna wait the worst of it out? Cy had to yell above the noise of pounding rain on the tin roof and crashing thunder. He already knew what Leroy's answer would be. His boss would risk life and limb to save his herd, the life blood of the ranch.

Bull-headed and determined, Leroy ignored Cy's warning. He shook the water off his hat and yanked up the collar of his yellow slicker. The two men glanced at each other before diving outside into a solid wall of rain and wind. A gust knocked Leroy into a puddle of mud and horse manure.

Let’s give up and go back inside, Cy barked. Again, Leroy shook off the advice. He was already up and racing to the horse barn.

The men saddled their horses. By the time they mounted, the morning sun began to lift the darkness, but the storm raged on. Sheets of heavy rain nearly swept them off their horses. Undaunted, they galloped toward the winter range to check the livestock. As they rode, another powerful wind gust knocked down the giant limbs from the old cottonwood trees. The Shoshone River threatened to overflow its banks.

As they struggled against the storm and their jittery horses, Leroy recollected a cattle drive a few years back when a quick-moving thunderstorm caused the steers on a neighboring ranch to spook and stampede. Dozens of livestock drowned in the swollen river. The loss was too much to sustain and the rancher lost his ranch to the bank. Above all, Leroy knew he had to save his herd and his family's legacy.

The cowboys rode on, braving rain, thunder and lightning. They mounted a hill, the horses struggling to keep their footing in the mud. Leroy and his mount crested the hill first, with Cy close behind.

Suddenly, a blinding light and instant explosion of sound frightened Cy's horse. She bucked. Stunned by the noise and the horse's violent reaction, Cy, landed hard on the ground. He lay in the mud, dazed for a moment. When he finally could stand again, he squinted through the dark rain to find his partner. Cy's horse scrambled to her feet and stood, her head hanging low.

Hey, Leroy, Cy called. Where you at, buddy? He wiped the rain from his face and peered through the dark. Ahead on the ground, he made out two bulges, one large and one small.

Oh, God. No. Cy shouted into the weeping sky. He stumbled through the mud to Leroy and his horse lying motionless next to each other. Steam rose off their bodies. Cy knew they'd been struck by a jolt of electricity. Cy fell to his knees by Leroy's body and put his head against the rain-soaked chest of his friend. He could detect no heartbeat. He shook the lifeless body in hopes of reviving his friend and felt the large vein on his neck. No pulse. In his heart he knew that no one could survive a billion volts of electricity from a lightning strike. The direct hit would kill anyone, man or horse. It caused Leroy's instant death.

Cy covered Leroy’s lifeless body the best he could with his own rain slicker and stood, the rain falling off the brim of his cowboy hat. Slowly, he regained his hearing deafened by the thunder clap that frightened his horse. The thunder echoed from mountain to mountain with the heart-pounding sound that only Mother Nature could make. As often happens in the spring in high country, the rain turned to sleet and then to snow. The lightning and accompanying thunder eased up, ushering in cold air.

Cy knew he had the sorrowful task of riding back to the ranch to inform Leroy's family of the terrible fate that left the veteran cowboy and respected rancher dead. Even more than facing the deadly power of the storm, Cy dreaded relaying the news to Sadie and Leroy’s two teenage sons, Billie and Gil.

With Leroy's horse dead, too, Cy had no way of getting the body back to the ranch. He mounted his own horse and stood still for a long moment by his fallen friend. Right then and there, he made a promise to Leroy's spirit. I won't let you down. I won't let Sadie and the boys down, old friend.

Cy turned his horse back to the home place. The snow fell harder. Cy couldn't see the way, but the horse knew where to go. Finally, through the driving sleet, Cy made out the outline of the barn. He approached the ranch house and stepped around the cottonwood limb that awoke Leroy and Sadie only two hours before. He dismounted and tied off the reins on the porch rail. In the kitchen, he found Sadie standing, still and pale, between her two boys. Their grim faces anticipated his bad news. Cy took off his wet hat and shook it. He bowed his head.

Give it to me straight. What happened to Leroy? Sadie glared at Cy, her steely blue eyes daring him to hold back the truth.

Cy held her eyes for a moment and then glanced pointedly at the boys. When Sadie made no move to dismiss them, he went ahead. He died fast. A bolt of lightning. Killed his horse, too. Those few words seemed to wring Cy dry. I had no way to bring him back here. His throat clogged up and he looked at the toes of his wet cowboy boots.

After a long silence, Sadie turned to the kitchen stove. Well, she said. "Let's get word to the sheriff and the undertaker in Cody. He'll have to be declared dead. I don't want the scavengers to get to him first out there. The boys glanced at one another and shuffled their feet, but no one moved.

Get a horse saddled up for me. Sadie suddenly wanted action. With her back to the others, she announced, I’m riding out there. Then for a moment, Sadie's stoic resolve crumbled.

Cy shook himself. No, you’re not. I let one bull-headed Wilson go off halfcocked and look what happened. Stay here with the boys, Cy said. I'll bring him to you.

Why was he so stubborn? Sadie stamped her small foot. I pleaded with him to wait out the storm. He wouldn't. Her blue eyes seemed electrified. She held back her tears.

Cy fingered his hat brim and nodded toward Gil and Billie to calm and comfort their mother.

He always took chances, said Cy. I told him we should wait, but he was stubborn as a mule. I guess he ran out of luck. With those final words, Cy lunged for the door and headed to the barn to hitch up a wagon.

The spring snow lasted only a few more hours, covering the valley and the mountains on either side with a layer of white. The sun came out and just as quickly as the snow struck the ground, it melted. The abrupt change in weather provided some measure of hope that the Wilson calves would survive.

Cy got word to a neighbor who went into town to the sheriff. His hired hand helped bring Leroy’s body back from the hill.

The ranch families on the South Fork of the Shoshone River Valley were a close-knit community. Leroy’s funeral and burial were attended by all of them. In May 1926, Leroy was put to rest next to his parents at the valley cemetery next to the white clapboard church. As the men lowered the wood casket into the ground, Leroy's boys exchanged glanced as they silently and solemnly promised to keep their dad's legacy alive.

They were only boys, after all. Born in 1915, Billie was the oldest, only fourteen years old on that spring morning. Gil was two years younger. They were born and raised on the ranch and ranching was the only life they knew. Leroy was a good teacher, spending his life living the cowboy way, a daily diet of hard work and steady problem-solving. The boys took to heart the words of their dad. You gotta work hard, boys, to hold this place together. Little did they know of all the challenges before them.

Chapter 2

The Wilson Way

Every day since their dad died, work started when the sun came up and ended well after it set. The boys understood their land and their mission, and they couldn't afford to shirk the responsibility to take care of both.

The Rocky Mountains in northwest Wyoming are some of the most rugged and steep in the lower forty-eight states. The south fork of the Shoshone River carves a path through their valley. Some elevations in the valley are only 4,000 feet above sea level while mountains on both sides rise to over 12,000 feet.

These mountains were formed by a geological event called the Laramide Orogeny during the late Cretaceous period some eighty million years ago, when deep under the surface of the earth, the Kula and Farallon tectonic plates moved under the North American plate. Over time, erosion and weathering provided sharp inclines resembling wolf’s teeth. The beauty of the place never failed to impress the Wilson ranchers who took up land in the valley around 1890.

When Billie and Gil were born, they were christened William and Gilbert. Billie was a tow-head, taking after his mom. His green eyes sparkled with fun and devilment. Gil, a red-head, was the studious one. They were known around the valley as the Carter Mountain Boys because their home place, the 53 Bar Ranch, was located in the valley near Carter Mountain on the South Fork of the Shoshone River. The nearest town was Cody, Wyoming, twenty-three miles away.

Hard work was a way of life for all the ranch families in the valley. Folks used all their resources and their inexhaustible common sense to maintain and grow their cattle operations. The herd was money on the hoof, the life blood of the ranches, the income that paid the bills and the taxes.

The death of their dad brought Billie and Gil both grief and resolve. They knew they had to put aside their loss and get to work using the skills their dad taught them. The burden of surviving on the 53 Bar Ranch was up to them. The worst fate was to give up, sell out and move to town.

Billie and Gil worked together as their dad taught them, but they had their differences. Billie, two years older, was like his dad, rugged and sometimes reckless.

Sadie often scolded Billie for taking chances. Think! she admonished