Good Old Days: Truly Feisty

By Mildred Olson

She was an elderly widow. She had a heart problem that no one would consider debilitating, had high blood pressure, and other less serious health problems. But, boy, she was feisty. Truly feisty! And that, coupled with ESP, she taught a few dishonest men not to cross her.

She owned a small herd of sheep that, with a permit, were summer grazing in the mountains. When it came time to bring them down, most of them were missing. She contacted the sheriff and directed him to another herd, where he would find her missing sheep. The thief—call him what he was—was confronted and denied having any of her sheep. She considered him truly stupid and so did the sheriff. The fellow had sloppily put his brand over hers. Her brand was quite visible. She got all of her sheep back.

Another day. Another time.

Her hired workers had cut the hay and loaded it on the wagon. Being late afternoon, they unhitched the horses and just left the loaded wagon in the field. Early the next morning, they harnessed the team and went to unload the hay. The wagon was gone. So was the hay.

They hurriedly reported to her the hay was missing. She advised them to jump in her old Model T Ford and, holding the harnessed work horses on on each side of the Ford, they were off. She drove directly to a farm, where her loaded hay wagon sat near the farmer's barn. They hitched the horses to her wagon with the freshly cut hay and returned it to her farm. She chuckled all the way back.

Recalling these experiences, and there were many others, she decided that a man who would lie and steal from a widow wasn't much of a man.

As years crawled by, she related some of these experiences to her grandchildren, always adding, they were good old days when you didn't have to hire expensive attorneys or detectives. You just did it on your own.