Ghost Ranches Sidney
Sylvia’s Church
2012 Oil on Canvas 14″ x 11″ unframed Sold The Four Mile Scandinavian Lutheran Church, located outside Fairview, Montana, was originally constructed in 1910, though the inside was not completed until 1917. Services were held in Norwegian every other week with their minister’s handling two other churches as well. It burned to the ground in 1926 and was immediately rebuilt. This painting is of the second church. As the years passed and fewer of the parishioners understood Norwegian, the services were held in English. One parishioner, Sylvia Kjos, remembers being taught the native songs, which she proudly sang in a […]
Little School on the Prairie
2012 Oil on Canvas 16″ x 12″ framed in Old Barn Wood Sold Located about a mile north of the Kjos farm outside of Fairview, Montana, the Church School – though not affiliated with any church – was a typical, tiny, one-room country school, having been moved to this location around 1950. The attached lean-to was added as living quarters for the teacher. It consisted of a tiny bedroom and living room with cooking facilities. If the students were especially good the teacher would allow them to bring potatoes from home which she would bake in her teacherage. In the […]
School Days, 1913
2012 Oil on Canvas 24″ x 18″ framed in old frame found in a ‘ghost ranch’ $1300 Contact to Purchase Why or where this picture was taken is not known – except it was early spring, 1913, and the little chap at the far right of the painting was Sigurd Rudie. The children were dressed to the hilt, so all knew the box camera would take their photo. Perhaps it was the first known school bus in the Sidney area, perhaps in all of Montana, where getting children to and from school was not easy in difficult winters. In the […]
Rock of Ages
2012 Oil on Canvas 11″ x 14″ unframed $500 Contact to Purchase Pierre Wibaux arrived in Montana from France in 1883 and became a successful rancher even through the horrible year of 1886 by feeding his cattle cottonwood branches. He then bought up at rock bottom prices the cattle of other ranchers who went belly-side-up and by the mid 1890s supposedly had 65,000 head. At that point he persuaded the Northern Pacific to change the name of the area from Mingusville to Wibaux. Coming from a devout Normandy-French Catholic family, his father in 1884 sent him the capital needed to […]
The Prairie Princess
2012 Oil on Old Barn Wood 24″ x 23″ unframed Sold On Christmas day, 1889, Gunda Mellumbraaten was born in Norway. Losing her mother while still a baby, she was raised by her aunt and uncle. At sixteen she fell in love with Lars Borg, they married a year later, and eight children were soon born in the house built by Lars. In 1911, when just 22 years old, she, Lars, and the six surviving children embarked on a small cattle boat for Liverpool, England. They would then take a passenger ship to America, where her brother and two of […]
Nohly Store and Bridge
2013 Oil on Old Saw Sold
Nohly Bridge
2013 Oil on Old Saw 30″ x 6.25″ Sold This was a commissioned work. The house over the bridge is where the person, who would operate the bridge, lived. The two towers are where the two sections of the four-section bridge were lifted into the air so a ship would continue its trip down the Yellowstone River. River travel chained considerably since it was built, and locals think it was only raised twice in its history. However, trains still use the bridge daily. The Great Northern railroad used it extensively while it was in existence.
The Ice Saw
2013 Oil on Old Saw 5.25 ft x 3 to 5″ Sold This was a commissioned work. Please view of the details, including the house, barn, farm animals, etc.
Feeding Time
2012 Oil on Old Barn Wood 15″ x 17.5″ unframed $1300 Contact to Purchase The Rudie farm, located near Fairview, Montana, celebrated its centennial in 2006. In this painting, Sigurd Jr. was helping his dad store the hay in the barn, and that shiny truck is much prized and still in use. The Rudie brothers brought their agricultural traditions from Norway, filed seven homesteads at first, and added even more as other brothers and Sigurd Jr.’s grandmother sailed to the United States and became citizens. The prosperous and well-kept farm raises wheat, malt barley, oats, angus cattle and sheep and […]
A Farmer’s Necessities
2012 Oil on Canvas 16″ x 12″ unframed $750 Contact to Purchase The Fischers bought this interesting ranch in 1971. Its history dates back to the turn of the century when the railroad owned the property and mineral rights as part of their five mile of clearance to either side of their track. Early owners include the Bouchards in 1905, the Gauthiers in 1927, and the Christiansens who owned it when Viola Fischer was in grade school. When they moved in there were no trees, just open plains for as far as one could see. Figuring that at retirement he […]
Bringing Home His Bride
2012 Oil on Old Barn Wood 28″ x 12″ unframed $1300 Contact to Purchase Joe Klasna was born in Nebraska, and in 1911 or1912 he headed northwest to claim his homestead in the Sidney, Montana area. His first home, made of sod, sufficed as a beginning. On a nearby ranch lived the Goss family, who numbered many children, and Joe met their eldest, a dark-haired beauty named Helen. Love blossomed, but one could not move a true love into a sod house. To rectify this in 1918 he hand-built a popular style, single-story house. It really wasn’t much of a […]
Yesterday’s Treasures
2012 Oil on Canvas 14″ x 11″ unframed $500 Contact to Purchase The original homestead living quarters have been used for many different functions during its more than a century of existence. It was moved to this site over a hundred years ago and was home to the Rudi family after they arrived from Norway in 1905. Looking into the tiny structure it is almost impossible to believe anyone could live there. Then, many years later, and after larger and finer homes were built, it was given a concrete floor, and used to store grain. Siding and a metal roof […]