Just Like Snakes: Settlers of Sanders County Montana: Vignette Vol.3 No.4

Vignette Vol.3 No.4
[Resource: BEHIND THESE MOUNTAINS

Anthony Wayne Saint
Noxon. 1920. Excerpt-Anthony Wayne Saint sold his ranch on Pilgrim Creek for $6,000.00 to H.J. Beal, who came with his two sons, Tom and Johnny.19. Beal worked as a smoke chaser for the forest service. Tom Beal had a little old Ford Roadster. He put a top on it, and squeezed his girlfriend into the car.

The log house north of Katie and Earl Engle was Mrs. Saint's house. Mr. Fulk lived there with her in their old age.

Clifford Weare said, "Old John Fulk, the eighty-year-old ferry operator said, 'You know, Cliff, I've always been pretty good. I never had many bad habits. And what I did have, prohibition's got one, and old age got the other one.'"

"Old lady Fulk, she always thought I was just right," Clifford said. "I was nice to her, you know. She was old. One day I said to her, 'Why don't you and the old man get together?'"

"'He's a livin' down there with that old woman,"' she said. '"And he never comes near me!"'

"Mr. Fulk was living across town with Grandma Saint. Mrs. Fulks lived next door to the Noxon school. "'Oh'," I said, "'You're just jealous. Just forget it. He's got to have a place to stay and why don't you get together?'"

"'Ahhh," she said, "I know you damned men! You're just like snakes! The last thing dies about you is your tail!"' 

Weare laughed heartily as he said, "I never forgot that! You'd have to know the old lady to appreciate the joke, you know. Hahaha."

Bob Saint said, "The last few years that Grandmother (Saint) lived there Grandpa Fulk lived with her. He and Grandma Fulks never could get along so when Grandma Saint moved in to the west end of town he just simply moved down and lived with her. And Grandma Fulk stayed on her own place up there next to the school.

"Yeah, Grandpa Fulk told me that he was extremely well educated as a country gentleman in Missouri. He'd also been given a course in child delivery.

"He always told me, 'It's [Noxon] the hardest place to make a living but the nicest place to live that anybody ever saw.' That was his sentiments on Noxon. They knew it wasn't any place to make a living. Unless you worked for the forest service or the railroad you just didn't have any money to pay your taxes. You could probably grow a living on the place. What you could eat. But you couldn't grow enough to sell to pay taxes.

"Nobody ever went hungry in Noxon, to the best of my knowledge. It's just a nice, friendly, comfortable town to live in. We were fortunate, I suppose. My dad was employed as the Ranger. Year 'round. In those days it would have been good money. So, theoretically, I suppose we were almost wealthy, at that time, as compared to the rest of the people in Noxon," Bob Saint said.

Ira Bartholomew?

"In fact, most people never knew that he had any other name but Strawberry," Bob Saint said. "And Ethel for years had been known as Mrs. Strawberry. If you spoke about Bartholomew, people would look at you blank. Nobody knew any Bartholomews, they were all Strawberrys, Ben Saint said.

"Ethel Bartholomew was very secretive. She didn't want to tell anybody anything! She was very close mouthed. Strawberry would talk.

"My sister, Ethel," Golda Fulk said, "was the one everyone called whenever they got sick. I thought she was the only doctor in Noxon. She was good at it. She was good at everything she did. My sister, Jude (Julia) and Ethel lived at Noxon at the same time. Julia married Bert Johnson and then LeGault, then Christianson.

"Strawberry sang with the San Francisco Philharmonic previous to coming to Noxon," Bob Saint said. (San Francisco Sympony History.)

"He had a wonderful voice. You'd hear him singing. My God you could hear him for miles. He had a fantastic voice. When he was working you'd always hear him singing. And he had this ST Vitus dance, or whatever it was.

"Paul Nanny worked for the railroad. He ate at Ethel's, in the Cafe. Paul Nanny put every cent he could get into slot machines. Ethel always had one at the counter in her cafe. That's no doubt why Marion [Larson] took care of Paul Nanny's check after Nanny retired."

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