Last week we took a couple of days and went over to Burns. Was nice to not be in a rush and have time to wander around. We stayed with Will and Toni. Their place out is near the fair grounds.
A while back on another trip to Burns, I had taken Ansel to the Harney County Museum to poke around and he showed me the custom made "Centennial Saddle" displayed there, It was made in honor of the 100th birthday of Harney County. Ansel was the 1989 Grand Marshall of the Harney County Fair that year, and he used the special saddle for all of the fair events that he rode in. When I saw the saddle sitting there by it's self, I decided it would be neat if there was a framed photo of Ansel riding the saddle to go with the display in the museum. So one of my "to do's" while we were in Burns this trip, was to go by Ruthie's Jewelry (Ruthie Miller is the unofficial official Harney County photographer) and see if she could go back to her archives of 1989 and come up with a picture that would work for my idear.
Her advice was to go to the Fair Grounds and see which picture of Ansel was on display and get the id number off of the back of it, and that would make her digging through files a lot easier.
So out to the Fairgrounds we went. We found Donnie Slone, long time Fair Manager in the rodeo office and he was thrilled to see Ansel and visit with him. Ansel had been involved with the race meets at the Fair for most of the 48 years they lived in Harney County. He served as Fair Board President back in the 60's, and was the Race Meet Director for 20 years. Don was eager to tell him about the improvements that had been made, a new Vet Barn and two new horse barns.
Then he let us into the Exhibit building so that we could find the photo of Ansel when he was Grand Marshall. Don told us that he remembered when Ansel served as Grand Marshall that Ansel told everyone "I've been just a Marshall all my life... but this if the first time I've been known as a Grand Marshall !"
Don and Ansel check out the "Who's Who Wall" of past Grand Marshalls of the Harney County Fair. That looks like Conly Marshall (no relation) of Drewsey in the center in the white shirt and bolo tie.
HC Fair Court Pictures: Don is showing Ansel the 1951 Fair Court picture of Hilda (Wilkes) Sahlberg (Martina's sister) That was the biggest fair court, they had a queen and four princesses that year. He remembers that the Carlon girls, Betty and Doris were on the court. He thought he remembered that Doris was the Queen. (I didn't look at the picture, when I was there, he was recollecting in the car later) Ansel told us that, Hilda was mounted on their favorite thoroughbred stallion Baggage Chex. I wonder how many fair court gals have been mounted on a stallion? In the picture directly to the right of that one, is Queen Nita (Wilkes) Russell with her 1959 HC Fair Court. (Granita is Martina's niece, her father Sonny, was Martina's brother) Ansel and Martina chaperoned both Hilda and Nita's fair courts. Ansel was telling us of their outfitting Nita to ride in the Rose Parade in Portland, OR on a beautiful palomino complete with a black silver studded saddle, with matching headstall and breast collar. He recalled he and Martina buying her a special $150.00 fringed white western show suit to wear especially for the Rose Parade. I think I have picture of it that I'll find and scan in. Ansel said she was stunning with her long red hair and get up on that handsomely appointed palomino.
Catching up with old friends:
Carol (Otley) Temple is a "life long" friend of Ansel and Martina. The Marshall's purchased the first acreage of their Lawen ranch property in 1946. It was a couple of miles south and a little east of the Lawen store and the south fence line of the Marshall property was shared with the Homer Otley family. Ansel has wanted to catch up to Carol for the last few times we've been in Burns, but she was out of town, until this trip it worked out. So Carol treated us to a nice ranch breakfast, with the most delicious date muffins I've ever tasted. 
Carol and Ansel July 18, 2008
Carol and Ansel reminisce while looking at the watercolor painting of the Otley Ranch
Otley Ranch at Lawen, Oregon original watercolor by Frank Tuning
Ansel pointed to the fence line in the left corner of the picture and told us that that was the boundary fence between the Marshalls and the Otleys. He got teary eyed remembering Carol's dad Homer and what a great neighbor he had been. He said the winds could be down right vicious out there on the flat north of the lake. Their 160 acres which was a long skinny parcel was mostly meadow hay, the homestead was on the north fenceline.(so there was almost a 1/2 mile between the houses) The second year they owned it, he had cut all the meadow hay and worked very hard to rake it into windrows for baling the next morning. Late in the evening a fierce wind storm came up and blew like crazy. When the dust settled, the windrowed hay was a horrible mess, and you couldn't tell that it had ever been raked. Ansel was just sick and didn't know how he'd clean it up and get it baled. A crew of neighbors headed up by Carol's dad showed up unannounced with several rakes and made short order of re-windrowing the hay for Ansel to start baling. Ansel was very choked up thinking about how honored he was to be surrounded by such caring neighbors.
Carol noted that the artist added the two trees in the foreground, they really didn't exist. Carol said that Ansel and Martina had the only tree in sight on their property to the north. She said her mother, Hazel tried and tried to get trees to grow out there, but was never successful.
Sadly this Harney County homestead, along with Ansel and Martina's to the north, were casualties of the Malheur Lake flooding of 1985-86.
Two years ago Ansel and I took a ride out to Lawen to look at the property he and Martina had first purchased when they moved to Harney County in 1946. The well casings were there, and there was some cement debris where there had once been a shop building. Other than that, there was no sign there had ever been a ranch headquarters there.
2006 - Ansel on the Marshall Lawen property in front of the skelton of the tree that Carol referred to.
NOTE: We definitely need to write more about the Marshall homestead at Lawen in more depth at another time. I understand that they lived there from 1946 to 1965 with out electricity or running water. They had kerosene lamps, a pitcher pump in the kitchen sink and an outhouse.
