Articles from the 'Red Shale Reflections' series
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The Remount Program and The Tragedy of Heathermoon
The word "remount" as a modern word is a verb, meaning "to get back on [something] and ride it again." But if the term was heard during any period before the 1950's, another meaning would likely be...
A Solemn Promise Made On The Little Powder
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com Where it happened was (reportedly) at the mouth of the Little Powder River just Northeast of Broadus. Why it happened is disputed. When it happened was lat...
The Journey Of The Verendryes
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com Until recently, if I were to put together a list of the events important to the history of Eastern Montana, I doubt that list would include the Treaty of...
The Plainsman Comes To Birney
It was the summer of 1936 when Hollywood disrupted the usual tranquility of Montana's lower Tongue River. Paramount Pictures was filming an epic western, "The Plainsman," and legendary director Cecil...
The Deputy And The Deadly Dugout
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com Rosebud County Special Deputy Jack Arnold knew the horse when he saw it. It belonged to the Brown Land and Cattle Company's 4D Ranch near Birney and had...
Moorhead: A Divided Montana Loses
In two previous columns, I described the unsuccessful effort to build a dam on the Powder River three miles south of Moorhead during the 1940s. My first column outlined the general history of the...
In Defense of the Mantelpiece
One holiday tradition I remember as a youngster was going to my grandmother's house for Christmas in Big Horn, Wyoming. These occasions usually gathered a host of aunts, uncles, cousins, and family...
Two Powder Kegs and a Spark
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com According to the precise definition, Rosebud County Sheriff Billy Moses died in the line of duty. On January 14, 1914, Sheriff Moses arrived at the...
The Last Of The Boer War Horses
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com A year ago, my cousin showed me an old, sepia-colored family photograph of several cowboys in a corral. The picture's owner (my cousin) challenged me to...
The Moorhead Opposition Flexes Its Muscle
By Shane Dunning In my most recent column, I described the attempt in the late 1940s and 1950s to construct a dam on the Powder River south of Moorhead, Montana, just north of the border with...
Death At The Birney Post Office
In 1886. the town of Birney was not located at its present location at the mouth of Hanging Woman Creek. The Birney post office was then located several miles south of present-day Ashland, which was...
The Mystery of Soaring Hawk
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com Deep into a dry creek valley in southern Rosebud County is a structure whose origins are mysterious. A small hill on the south side of the valley commands...
The Race was On...75 Years Ago
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com The Race was On...75 Years Ago This June will mark the 75th anniversary of a most extraordinary Montana horse race. In 1947, the Range Riders Rodeo...
Rankin's Barn Burner In Broadus
My previous column described the violent back-and-forth between stock inspectors and a gang of livestock rustlers in southeast Montana. Much of the excitement was instigated by stock detective Billy...
Billy Richardson vs. Poker Jim Roberts
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com Last month the good people at the Powder River Examiner asked me to follow up on an item they discovered in their regular review of past issues. The...
The Ghost of Bob Ferguson
Find more from Shane at www.redshalereflections.com (Ed: A ghostly article presented by history columnist Shane Dunning for our Halloween week edition. Enjoy.) In January 1903, "a gentleman who has lo...
The Unsolved Murder of John L. Tucker
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com My great-great-uncle John L. Tucker was murdered on Otter Creek in 1911. His murder was, and remains, officially unsolved. Florence Shy, in Echoing Footste...
He Wanted to Eat a Piece of a White Man's Heart
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com During the summer of 1897, talk of war between the Northern Cheyenne and local settlers was seemingly on every tongue. John Hoover, a white sheepherder...
The Curious End of Powderville's Deadwood Dick
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com The term "Boot Hill" was commonly used for the cemeteries utilized when the deceased were violent criminals who "died with their boots on." The most...
When Levi Took Command
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com In late May of 1897, John Hoover was found dead. The young sheepherder, employed on Fred Barringer's ranch north of Ashland, had been missing for several...
The Final Bow of Regina Geddes
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com Last December, I presented an article on "the blackest crime to ever disgrace eastern Montana." That crime, the murder of Clemence "Winnie" Brown,...
"High-Powered" Williams and the Custer Wolf
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com "The Custer Wolf is Dead." So began a remarkable press release dated January 17, 1921, by the US Department of Agriculture Press Service. This incredible...
The Manhunt for Arthur Ross Brown
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com Sheridan County (WY) sheriff Willard Marshall entered the Rex Hotel in Sheridan on September 1, 1955, to question a transient ex-convict regarding a recent...
When Sitting Bull Kicks Your Butt and the Perils of Oral History
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com Sometimes a story seems too good to be true, and history is often an inexact science. Because of this, using oral history is often like handling a lit fire...
One of the Blackest Crimes to Ever Disgrace Eastern Montana
By Shane Dunning www.redshalereflections.com One of the most sordid events in Montana history took place a few miles north of Ashland on November 4th in the year 1897. Two teens, Clemence “Winnie” Brown and his brother Clarence Brown were hauling a l...
