Page 4 - MWC 2-3-2022s
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The Midwest Cattleman · February 3, 2022 · P4
didn’t know a single soul tle. If there was ever a rea-
in the whole state of Mon- son for trouble between our
tana. Most people in that families, it was my dad’s
small community probably Angus bull. Somehow that
thought, and rightly so, that never became a problem –
those ‘new kids’ who moved my dad offered to buy any
down into the ‘breaks’, onto ‘black-baldy’ heifer. Years
the ‘Heller place’, in the mid- later, after we used some
dle of December, during one imported Simmental bulls,
of the coldest winters on some Tuss Simmental cross
record, probably wouldn’t cattle started getting a ‘lazy’
make it through that first T X bar brand as well. Some
There's a popular steak- winter – let alone through of those are probably still
house that has western the first year. But they there today.
décor throughout. did make it. They made it But growing up in Mon-
There are ropes, spurs, through ten winters. Part- tana was not all work. It was
saddles, chaps, and old boots. ly because of their tenacity, Joe Tuss who taught me how
Most of it looks authentic… there was no ‘quit’ in them, to hold an ‘open-face’ fishing
like right out of an old work- and partly because some rod and reel. Joe always
ing ranch tack room. Among neighbors ‘adopted’ them - loved to fish. Whether on
those items, somewhere on a befriended them and treated the banks of Stafford Lake, Of course, Arthur Chap-
wall, is often found a quote them like their own family. I or down on the banks of the man never met Joe Tuss, but
from Arthur Chapman: will never forget that – I will Missouri, Joe was the one he sure said it right.
Hand clasps and smiles
never forget them. who took the time to show a can make or break you –
“Out where the hand We shared meals, brand- young boy how it should be
clasp's a little stronger, ings, hunting, trapping, fish- done. I seldom hold a pole they can save you!
Out where the smile ing, working, playing… we in hand that I do not think They are sure not the same
dwells a little longer, shared it all. It was a hard of him. I bet right now he’s everywhere. I hope you get
That's where the West country – it still is. The ter- watching a line beside a to live ‘out west’ every day.
begins.” rain, the temperatures, even beautiful lake or stream. KwC
the rattlesnakes are all out
I pass by that quote often to shorten your ‘stay’. The
and every time I do, the Tuss family was from Yu-
memory of a man's smile goslavia. Joe and Johnny’s
and his calloused handclasp parents came here from the
always come to mind. His ‘old country’. In their youth,
name was Joe Tuss. they had mined coal from
a hole on their ranch and
Why do I remember his hauled it to town in a wagon
smile? From the time I was to help feed their family and
five until I was fourteen, Joe keep other people warm.
and his wife Jean were the Joe and Johnny Tuss were
closest I had to grandpar- twins, but they couldn’t have
ents. My other grandparents been more different. Johnny
were special people, but they also had an unforgettable
lived 1500 miles away and I smile, but his was a little or-
only got to see them a couple nerier and a little crooked...
times a year. usually holding a Swisher
Joe and his twin brother Sweet cigar. His hand clasp
Johnny lived a quarter of was different too... his fin-
a mile apart… on the road gers were crooked as could
that went to our house. We be because his sister had
called them our ‘neighbors’, carried him out in the cold
but the Tusses were more when he was a baby and his
like family to all of us than fingers had been frostbitten.
real family. Maybe that is When he wasn’t smoking a
the reason why, for over sixty cigar, he was holding one be-
years, that the word ‘neigh- tween those crooked fingers
bors’ has always meant a - sometimes with reins, as he
great deal to me. rode his American Saddler
In 1964, my parents at 28 old ‘Drifter’, or with a hand
and 22 years old had their of pinochle.
own children, and when In those days, the Tuss
they moved 1500 miles family had some amazing
north, they were not only straight-bred Hereford cat-
the ‘new kids’ in town – they
