Similar antique cowgirls on similar ranches

I’ll never forget the first time Will and I visited the historic Chase Ranch in New Mexico. A far cry from the subterranean soddy the ranch founders spent their first winter in, it was three-story and spacious. The furniture was solid wood of fine antique design and construction, in pristine condition. Period gas lamps with gorgeous painted globes stood on dressers, dressing tables and bedside tables. Drapes and bedspreads in each room matched, the finest imported Damask. Cedar chests nestled comfortably into the mix.

“Ruby will have sausage and scrambled eggs and biscuits under way, so we can’t take too long,” our hostess Gretchen Sammis said, grinning. We were in the long, long dining/conference room, staring at the magnificent solid wood table, with eight to 10 matching chairs down both sides. The table edges were scalloped and inlaid with mother-of-pearl. The linen runner down the center was accented by beautiful vases displaying pheasant feathers.

“That’s one of the later additions, as you might guess,” our 80-year-old hostess said. “My grandfather went back to Mexico to get their peons and came up the Mississippi River on a big boat. He saw the table in New Orleans and bought it, because he never planned to go back.”

Will admired the woodwork more closely, and I had to touch that linen before the cook’s triangle summoned us back to breakfast at the old wood stove near the front door. The other ranch woman who lived there had fresh, hot scrambled eggs with sausage in one big iron skillet on the Majestic range. Golden-brown biscuits filled the one beside it.

Chile salsa was on the kitchen table, along with silverware, napkins and plates waiting to be filled. Fresh churned butter that had been kept cold down in the well joined jellies in crystal bowls.

“Is this beautiful jelly made from some of the ranch apples?” I asked, knowing a variety developed by her grandfather had won the World’s Fair in New York.

“Yep, that one is. This one is wild plum — the bushes were native here and grow all up and down the creeks on the ranch,” Ruby responded.

I don’t have to tell you that justice was done to a fine meal, and there weren’t many leftovers! I think Ruby put the lid on the few surviving biscuits after they cooled, and both Will and I sneaked one after we’d been given a walking tour of the corrals, barn, apple shed, cellar, well house and many other parts of that beautiful old ranch headquarters.

The oldest sheds were dug down in a solid bank on two sides (three, if possible), shored up on the inside with stacked-up rocks and roofed with poles and 2-inch lumber. The crowning glory was a big, red barn, built on high, level ground, well back from the creek. It was two-story with hayloft above, sturdy stalls and a strong wood plank floor.

After our great night’s rest in an antique sleigh bed upstairs and that fine breakfast, we had to hit the highway toward home. We both mentioned how Chase Ranch reminded us of the Durnal Ranch our tough rancher friend Judy Durnal owns and runs near Chimney Rock in Nebraska.

Old Jules Sandoz* and her grandfather were friends, and settled about the same time. Durnal first built a small sod house and log cabin. Later they built a lovely home. Like the one in New Mexico, narrow stairs lead you up to beautiful bedrooms. She’s kept fine dining sets and buffets, silver, china and crystal of the highest quality.

Judy cooks great breakfasts in cast iron skillets, sharing warm hospitality into the third generation — as with Gretchen and Ruby.
She was raised to know and observe the decorum of ladies, yet she’d rather be raising or riding or breaking or training a horse — or several of them.

She’s the same kind of hand as those in New Mexico, except they’ve now retired. We wonder if Judy ever will.

She loves relating the history of the original sod house where her great-grandparents lived. One of two original log cabins is not far from the big house. Their original barn was dug in and rocked up, with a red frame top like the one on the Chase Ranch. Sheltering and saving the lives of cattle and horses. And a newer, larger red one was built when they could afford it.

Judy can still pull calves, drag a longhorn out of a bog or doctor any kind of livestock ailment as effectively as any top cowboy. How bles’t I am to know those three talented, smart, opinionated women — great cowboys on their own ranches!

Oh yes, I must not leave out my favorite thing about those cowgirls: they were awesome hands at breaking and training horses! I hope to be just like them, whenever I grow up!

* Read about Jules Sandoz, famed pioneer of the Nebraska Sandhills, at nhaa.unl.edu/1931-jules-sandoz.