2006 Schedule of Shoots and Events

Report from the Rendezvous………

 The Western of course.  The Rocky Mountain National Rendezvous to be more specific.  Held on a private ranch six miles south of Creede, Colorado, 385 camps dotted the grassy rolling hills.  While those folks who didn’t attend suffered through high ninety and hundred something degree weather we luxuriated in the cool high mountain air.  We awoke each morning to low and mid thirty degree temps.  Only one morning could we not see our breath as we shivered to get into the buckskins and throw on a capote for that Mersey mission run to the hooters.   By mid afternoon, temps were in the mid 70’s.

 Only Millie and I, and the Hubenka clan drove down from Wyoming this year.  Rumors and opinions ran rampant right up until our departure south, that the rendezvous site was a veritable barren wasteland with no trees for shade.  Some people made it clear that they weren’t going to bother going.  All I can say, and I know Terry, Jan, Matt, and Terra would agree, you missed one helluva a rendezvous. 

It didn’t start out all that swell though.  We left Casper to overcast skies and by Laramie, there was rain.  Showers continued as we wound our way down through Walden, Leadville and into Salida where we met up with daughter Susan and her boyfriend Bryan for the night.  It poured rain until about 9:00 PM and we all hoped the site would receive some moisture to lessen the fire danger.  There had been a statewide fire ban in effect with the site receiving an exemption as long as any fires were contained in above ground enclosures.  We came prepared with both an above ground stove I bummed off Jim & Trish Miller as well as an 1839 vintage Coleman camp stove. 

We woke on Sunday to cloudy skies and light rain most of the way from Salida into Creede and when we arrived at the gate into the rendezvous site, we are advised not to attempt the entry road up a hill into camp unless we had four-wheel drive and to wait until any trucks ahead had cleared the hill before attempting our ascent.  It had been raining for three days there which was both the good news and the bad news.  The good news was all fire restrictions had been lifted.  The bad news was that a real juicy mud hole confronted us.  We wondered what the camp itself would look like.  

 I stuck old green into low range and headed up the hill, watching hopefully in the rear view mirror that Susan’s Honda CRV wouldn’t get swallowed  by the brown monster.  Both of our vehicles made it up the hill with no problem and at the top, we parked to walk about and find a camp spot rather try to drive around on the gooey rutted roads any more than we had to.  We found flat grassy ground and as luck would have it, our camp for the week was very near the Hubenkas who were already set up and kickin’ back. 

 We unloaded gear for two camps about like we were tossing garbage at the city landfill as the sky threatened to dump liquid sunshine at any moment and we wanted to get at least one camp set up.  As it turned out, the rain failed to materialize until early evening.  I staked out two camps for my brother Jim and his wife Peg and their two kids, Sena and David.  As it turned out, I couldn’t have done better by David as we were set up less than 35 yds from the practice hawk blocks and the hawk/knife course, his cup of tea.  it had been set up by a couple of old friends, Rich McBride from Billings and his friend Windy from Arkansas.  With fifteen stationary blocks set up throughout the willows by the stream, and a bonus moving target that resembled a running elk, (or Bryan Youngberg in a breechclout) the course was superb; both challenging and fun.  Millie, fresh off her Wyoming state championship hawk performance, found some challenging throws later in the week.

 Brother Jim and his family showed up about an hour later and with lots of extra hands their camps went up faster than political signs in late July.  Sitting dry under the awnings we took a look around us.  The canon range was set up across a boundary fence pointed towards some hay bales up in the hills.  The stream was less than fifty yards behind us offering plenty of clear cool water for washing up, the nearest bank of hooters was another 75 yards downwind.  The shooting range was through horse camp up into a ravine about 400 yards from our camp.  Far enough away for the sound of gunfire not to be bothersome and close enough we could get there in a short stroll.  It looked just about perfect.  The parking was on mostly flat ground just over the hill from short term camp which boasted a nice little pond which had been stocked with 300 trout and would later in the week host canoe games and “alligator” wrestling.  In fact I have to say that this site was the best laid out site of any rendezvous I have attended in 16 years! 

 The views were spectacular to say the least.  From any direction one looked there were mountains and trees.  The photographs on the the RMNR website failed to do justice to the stunning views at hand, and for many that didn’t attend, I’m guessing this is why they stayed home.   The ranch has been in the family for over one hundred years and is managed as both a cattle operation and a guest ranch.  The landowner himself participated in parts of the rendezvous, enjoyed the doin’s and welcomed us back. 

 The shoot program was as well planned as the hawk and knife course.  There were two courses to burn powder on.  The main course had targets set up for rifle, pistol and smoothbore enthusiasts.  Shooting into the pine trees an assortment of gongs and spinners challenged most of us.  Rabbit scored a second in smoothbore his last day, while the best I could muster was third my second day with my rifle.  Daughter Susan outshot all of us each day and posted a 20/22 for women’s first places her last day of shooting. 

I fail to understand how it is possible to pick up a rifle once a year and shoot like she had been shooting every month; young eyes and reflexes maybe.

Or perhaps she had a good instructor……….

 On Monday four young girls started making ice cream in their camp and carried it about from camp to camp for two bucks a scoop.  Despite the cool temperatures, they seemed to be making a killing.   On Tuesday, one of the rendezvous participants most generously bought a young bull bison on the hoof from a nearby ranch.  It was trailered in, humanely dispatched, then butchered 150 yards from our camps by a couple of the mountain men.  People lined up to carry off what they wanted of the fresh meat and it was entirely free of charge!  We spearheaded a couple of delicious pot luck dinners with the Huebenkas and the neighbors camped around us and agreed with Rich McBride when he remarked; “ I wonder what the poor people are doing?”   

 The canoe games involved a timed contest where three persons would launch a canoe from shore then loose three arrows each into a target in the pond as well as into one on shore.  Later in the week a group of knuckleheads in kilts entertained the camp with some Scottish games which included a caber toss and spear throwing.   

Despite there being only 385 camps, it was a grand rendezvous.  It didn’t seem to me like there were as many traders as there have been in the past, but I spent my allowance and more as it was so I didn’t miss anything I didn’t want or need. 

 The Rendezvous council voted to rotate states for all future Westerns, just as the High Plains Rendezvous has done with success.  New Mexico was added to the states to be included in the Western rotation.  Next year’s site is in Vipond Park Montana, past Butte and near Dillon.  The Western was held there in 1991 and again in 1997.  I’ve been to both and loved the site which is on National Forest land.  The 2008 rendezvous is being planned for either a Wyoming site near South Pass or failing that, a site near or in Elk Park, Utah; also very scenic National Forest country.   Terry Hubenka was asked to Boushway the shooting program for that one so you know it is going to be a good one.  

 If you haven’t guessed it by now, I for one would like to see more WSMLA members attend and support future Rocky Mountain National Rendezvous’.  If you haven’t attended a national rendezvous at all and would like more information about how to begin, give me a call.  If you’ve attended in past, but haven’t in awhile, you have been missing, as they say, some shinin’ times. 

 Stands-in-Ants     (stands_in_ants@yahoo.com)    

Looking down on the 2006 RMNR opening ceremony – Creede, CO.

Assaulting the Hawk & Knife Course; Terra Hubenka, Peggy Nissen, Jan

Hubenka, Kelsie from Phoenix, Millie Nissen, and Matt Hubenka

Wyoming State Muzzle loading 2006 State Shoot Results:  I attended the State Shoot in June and it was fine doin's, as it always is when put on by the experienced group that make up the Deer Creek Muzzle Loaders.  The weather cooperated just fine and the only wind I had to shoot in was when the clay birds were up for the Trade Gun match.  That's my excuse for shooting so lousy anyway, you'll have to make up your own.  Many thanks to the Deer Creek bunch, it was another fine one! Ed.

Food for Thought

            Some interesting items taken from various manifests during the fur trade era.  Jedediah Smith’s trade goods that were cached after his death on the Ocate River, July 11, 1831.

 Chest #1          2 gross glass buttons

                        4 dozen table knives

                        7 dozen table knives

                        2 gross small spoons

                        4 gross marble buttons

 Chest #2          1 dozen table knives

                        6 dozen knives and forks

                        4 gross small spoons

                        ½ gross table spoons

                        2 dozen glass buttons 

Barrel #129      4 sets of China with 33 pieces each

                        4 dozen chocolate cups 

Chest #144      1 dozen umbrellas 

Invoice of Sundry Merchandise furnished Rocky Mountain Outfit 1837 under charge of Fontenelle, Fitzpatrick & Co.:

 200 Red Flannel Shirts

25 duck trousers

30 Blue Blanket Capots

41 Green Blanket Capots

48 bunches Seed Beads

10 Hawken's Rifles (@$24)

 Invoice of Sundry Merchandise sold and delivered to the Missouri Company by Frs. Regnier at St. Louis, dated 3^rd May, 1809. 

130 pr. Suspenders (listed prices at $.75, $1.00, $1.25 and $.62-1/2)

9 Umbrellas

5 pr. Boots

2 straw hats

4 woman's hats

44 pr Woman’s shoes

6 doz. pr. Men’s Shoes

18 pr. Spurs

 42 pr. Men’s gloves

37 pr. Woman’s gloves

7 pr. Black worsted gloves

15 pr. Black cotton gloves

11 pr. Men’s silk stockings

9 pr. Women’s silk stockings

109 Tooth Brushes

17 boxes tooth powder

3 coffee pots

18 sets cups and saucers

1 pr. Scales and 3 spoons

 Trade list of John McKight, partner of General Thomas James, 1822.  They erected a fort in present day Blaine county Oklahoma and this was their merchandise.  Purchased of the American Fur Company, St. Louis.

 10 calico shirts

24 fine cotton shirts

5 red flannel shirts

7 white flannel shirts

10 N.W. guns

6 prs Course shoes

5 prs 3^rd quality shoes

18 pr. Russia sheeting trousers

1 dozen table spoons

6 swans down vests

 Inventory of Goods available at the 1825 Rendezvous on Henry’s Fork of the Green River (cached goods listed in Ashley’s diary).

 200 lbs coffee

130 lbs bale and bag sugar

10 lbs salt

 The following as some items from Ashley’s notebook listing various transactions while at the 1825 Rendezvous:

 Fish hooks

Gun locks, first quality

Spurs

Breech cloth

Pistol (@ $20)

20 fusils @ $20

________________________________________________________________________________________

Items from the account books of the Columbia River Fishing and Trading Company at Fort Hall.  This is from the invoice of goods remaining at Fort Hall in store un-cashed in 1834:

 11 ft. gold chain

3-1/2 doz. Cakes Windsor soap

3 velvet vests

20 plain fusils @ $4.50

10 twisted fusils @ $3.75

14 rifles @ $10

1 rifle @ $13

Some goods left at Fort Hall in 1834:

5 pr. Indian Rubber shoes

½ doz. Pewter tumblers

2 doz. Large sized buckles

Invoice of goods Cached at Ft. Hall by Capt. N. J. Wyeth in 1834:

1 doz. Brass mounted powder horns

16 doz. Red Handled Indian Knives

3.5 doz. cakes of Windsor soap

Some goods taken down to the Columbia by Capt. N. J. Wyeth on his voyage to the Columbia:

100 rifle flints

 Some goods sold to O’Fallon and Vandeburgh by Robert Campbell on the Teton Fork of the Columbia River and under the three Teton mountain, July 25^th, 1832:

 57 cakes of shaving soap

12 pr. Goggles

4 Gun Locks

27 bunches of seed beads

1 pr pistols & holsters (@ $40)

5 rifle guns (@ $30)

A list like this creates more questions than it answers, doesn’t it?  But it does give you an ideal about the diverse kind of goods that were brought to the Fur Trade west of St. Louis.

Wyoming State Muzzle Loading Association offers a video library for member of the WSMLA.  Please contact Tony Larvie, P.O. Box 697, Lander WY  82520  307-332-4718 about viewing tapes.  We are still looking to add videos to update our library.

Contact: Tony Larvie, P.O. Box 697, Lander WY  82520  307-332-4718 about viewing tapes.

Travis Bennett

P.O. Box 1205

Riverton, WY  82501  

trbennet@wyoming.com