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In reference to most anybody in the world Jim would say, "He's an
ol'friend of mine."
Before addressing a bunch of fresh new faces TRCP had just hired, Jim
looked at Mo Bates and said, "Mo...please tell'em that's the way I talk,
I just cain't help it."
Upon introducing me to his assistant Sharon years ago, "Sharon this here
is that Mutherfuckin' Communist I was tellin' ya about."
"Boy!" Pronounced with three syllables and used to address males from
age 16 through 70!
Jim's advice at the first meeting of the TRCP staff in 2003. "If you
boys are willin' to work harder than everybody else, and then give all
the credit to dem other sonsabitches, I promise you we'll get a hellava
lot done."
"We gotta save this thing we love cause ain't nobody else gonna do it."
And perhaps the best one, the one that made you feel you were part of
something important and Jim's confidant, "I need your help... ya gotta
help me with this."
To clean up or delete any of Jim's language would be disingenuous in my
opinion. The man used motherfuckers, damn, goddamn, sonsabitches, etc.
more effectively than any man I've ever known.
One short story if I may... When Jim and I were in Africa a few years
back the PH's and staff of the lodge, where we were staying, exhibited
the prim and proper manners and decorum of an earlier age, especially at
the dinner table in the evening. Very English, very formal. Jim on the
other hand was just being himself using his usual descriptive language.
On the third night when one of the PH's said, "Please pass the goddamn
pepper and motherfuckin' salt, the entire table of guests broke up
laughing, and turned toward Jim, who pretended to be at a loss.
God, I'm gonna miss my friend somethin' terrible. Ken
One story I heard Jim tell on at least three occasions and which he
swore was true...
Describing Pete Cardinal as the best fishing guide he knew he start down
one road, then switch to another and finally he say, "Hell, that goddamn
Pete is a fuckin'fish!" He then went on to tell about a time he was
floating with Pete and they came upon a rock sticking out of the river.
Pete told Jim to lay his fly just ahead of the rock and a fish would eat
it before it drifted two feet.
Jim did as instructed and nothing happened. Pete was astonished and said
to Jim, "That trout must be blind," while he rowed back-up river telling
Jim that he should cast again, but this time he ought to lay the fly
more toward the bank, on the inside."
This time a nice trout rose and took the fly. Jim swore that when he
landed the fish that its right eye had been put out, probably by a hook,
and in fact he couldn't see Jim's fly on the first cast. He'd always
ended the story with, "That boy knows every trout in this river by
name."
One more...
Not only was Jim quick on the draw, he was Speedy Gonzalez when it came
to covering the uplands. Jim, George and I were hunting sage grouse and
climbing a pretty good size hill where we'd seen a group of birds go
down. George and I were moving along at a pretty good clip, nearing the
spot we'd marked them, when Jim went flying by us, gun at ready. Son of
a bitch, I thought to myself, and I took off literally running to get
ahead of Ole' Speedy. As I passed him I looked over and saw Jim stop. A
perplexed look spread across his face. "Well goddamnit," I said, "The
only way I can keep up is to run." He just laughed and on my next step
birds got up all around us and we watched with delight as George took
the first one...his first sage grouse ever.
- Ken
Having spent many a blustery winter morning during the past 18
years gazing over a diver spread with Jim tucked in the Southeast corner
of the blind, it has brought a tear to my eye to read your accounts of
our boy's duck hunting exploits. Jim's announcement of incoming "cans"
still rings in my ears -- "dems da boys!" Like so much in Jim's life,
this announcement rang with joy, like he was 18 and a bus load of
cheerleaders had just arrived -- "dems da girls!" Our boy Jim was
always a quick shot and a slow talker. In fact, I always heard both
barrels of Jim's OU before I heard him yell "take em."
- Jeff
Several hunting stories with Jim center stage. After years of laboring
in Foggy Bottom & having dabbled some in competitive shot gunning as a
young man I don't think that anyone would disagree with me when I state
that Jim was quite competitive when it came to wing shooting. He had
sharp elbows in a duck blind; in all manner of wing shooting he was
reminiscent of Mickey Spillane's hero Mike Hammer in "My Gun is Quick".
Not long ago I invited Jim to hunt ducks with Dr. Charlie Safley and me.
Charlie like Jim is an extraordinary wing shot & like JR he has his
throttle stuck on full. Doc is no stranger to Jim or TRCP. Jim came to
morning in their blind in
mallards; they like to work at getting the greenheads committed with
feet down before shooting. They closely adjudge the suitability of a
shot and bark out the command to "Shoot" when they feel it is
appropriate. The cool morning air was filled with whistling wings &
dawn's light had just began to facilitate recognition of species &
gender as a handsome pair of drake widgeon flew by. Well, they tried to
fly by but our hero conditioned by decades of gunning in spite of being
in a strange blind, in the company of several strangers, shooting with a
strange gun & in contravention of the sternly lectured blind protocol
Jim simply couldn't restrain himself & crisply dropped the two drakes to
the flabbergasted astonishment of Charlie's thunder struck partner.
Jim's pride quickly swelled in having made such a dandy double
especially in front of an audience that clearly should appreciate such
good gunning. He had a rapidly growing & glowing self satisfied grin on
his face. It quickly became clear however that Charlie's red faced
stammering partner was not going to high five him so Jim down shifted
into his "challenged hearing mode" which allowed him to ignore Sam's
railing about the egregious breach of protocol. I know that you will
probably think I'm exaggerating when I tell you that in no more than
three minutes "Little Jimmy Dickens" as if he was a programmed inanimate
player in a video game or didn't understand the King's English popped up
again right on cue & deftly downed a hen gadwall. At this juncture
Safley & I snickered & giggled uncontrollably into our gloves & nearly
warmed our waders as Charlie's perplexed partner morphed into a state of
terminal disbelief & almost had the big one.
The following fall; Jim & I are the guests of one of our favorite
people: Ken Hofmann at his remarkable Spanish King's grant estancia
Rancho Esquon at the fabulous Butte Sink of the
We are in one of Ken's many outstanding blinds with then TRCP board
member Bill LeWarre. I've borrowed one of Ken's Beretta semi automatics
& a make a silent vow to myself that for once I will try to beat my long
time blind mate to the punch. At Hofmann's there is never a lull and we
are soon assaulted by ducks & each time they come in range emboldened by
Ken's magical Extrema I'm like a jack in box & ducks fall. After the
fourth time; Jim says to Bill; "The Redhead has a bug up his ass today".
I say "Jim, after all these years I just wanted to see what it was like
to be first in the buffet line." His response was no surprise ---- "You
f---ker!". Last tale with a radical change of
venue & quarry; we are hunting perdez in
mindless day of high volume shooting of doves we ask if we can take a
bird dog out on our own in the farmland next to the estancia hacienda &
hunt several species of wily tinamou. The gracious Argentines oblige and
just Jim & I set off on our own & have some truly splendid hunting. As
we search in some tall grass for a downed perdiz the grass suddenly
parts with a great commotion and much to our astonishment two ostrich
sized rheas flush in a sprint. We are both speechless & so amazed we
instinctively point our lowered guns in a defensive position with our
mouths a gap. Regaining his composure Jim looks at me as if to explain
why he didn't shoot & says as the master of the understatement "Hell,
those f---kers will never fit in our game bags!". He was truly one of a
kind! Matt C
Hearing these wonderful stories about Ranger reminds me that he
loved telling stories about others, and would tell them over and over,
usually followed by a cackle. There were stories about his younger
outlaw days on the
stove, about the big goose "swim in" while A.B. slept in the blind,
about the sandwiches
at Danny's place, about many adventures. I'd like to hear some if folks
can remember them. Here is my favorite.
The Raccoon Creek Gunnin' Club bunch was down on the shore. It
was the coldest and windiest day anyone has ever seen in the history of
the world. A.B. and Walpole had gone to the offshore blind, but hadn't
returned when they were due back. Ranger was very worried, given the
conditions, and set out in a boat to check on them. Part way to the
blind, Jim found their boat adrift and feared the worst. He towed their
boat on toward the blind, and as he approached Jim could see
sitting in the door of the blind with his feet hanging over the edge.
As he got near,
got a boat just like the one those river pirates stole from us!"
Can't you just hear the cackle?
Recently an occurrence in Jim's life triggered his repeated vitriolic &
intense diatribes. They were rightly directed at those scabrous putrid
yellow metal intrusions placed by the Burlington Northern Santa Fee
Railroad end to end across the breadth of his ranch. Curiously the
largest & rustiest of the most dilapidated rail cars seemed to have
serendipitously been parked in front of the Flyway Ranch. Needless to
say Jim didn't, with just cause, believe this to a mere coincidence
especially when they conveniently stopped just short of Sen. Max Baccus'
ranch. During these outbursts the Laird of Craig was much like the actor
Darren McGavin's character, the father of Ralphie the central character
in the classic film adaptation of Jean Shepherd's wonderful heartland
novel, "The Christmas Story" when the winner of the infamous gam lamp
frustratingly encountered "clinkers" in the coal burning basement
furnace and would "weave a tapestry of curses". Our hero was also a
gifted artisan when weaving his vituporous contempt directed toward
BNSF; the patterns of his words were ever changing albeit for the
dependable consistency in his generous use of a certain colloquialism
associated with copulation. He used this amazing word which has meanings
that range from love to hate with great versatility; it might be a noun,
verb or gerund & at times even a form of punctuation. In the much
deserved case of BNSF he would include the mention of certain body parts
of man and other animals during his incantations of vengeful fury. I'd
be quite surprised if any BNFS executive in their
sires another child & I'm confident the Oracle of Omaha's recent decline
in the value of his vaunted Berkshire Hathaway is a result of his 20%
share of BNFS being cursed by our Cherokee shaman while looking out for
the interests of his Blackfeet brothers. Ever the pragmatist he examined
whether there might any benefit from the rail cars persistent presence
as for a short time migrating urban mourning doves rested on these cars
while their more sensible local cousins perched on the pivot irrigator.
It became quickly apparent however that this unwanted giant segmented
worm was like all vile parasites taking its nourishment at the expense
of its unwilling host. The tragedy is that Jim was plotting some
unfinished fascinating schemes that had been ever mindful of just how
long these cars had been parked without ever putting a dime in the
meter. He had long ago crossed the bridge from being mad & his strategy
for getting even was indeed to be a dish of revenge to be better served
cold. If there is any one thing that I could do to please him it would
be to rid the
capabilities are confined to installing a Spyware to delete worms & I do
not possess Jim's gift for outflanking & outmaneuvering those who use
the body politic selfishly. If there is any way to for the collective
might of his many mentored prodigies to enjoin & expunge the atrocity of
these rascals from the majestic travel corridor of the First People &
Lewis & Clark and "Kick the no good SOB's f-ing asses all the way back
to their f-ing offices in
would bring to that boyish face. Perhaps someone in our midst might be
able to prevail upon Secretary LaHood & the Surface Transportation Board
to get BNSF to move their 30 miles of rolling stock to an appropriate
rail yard rather than persist in defiling one of our nation's crown
jewels. MBC
Jim Poach!
Here's a good example. So we're sitting around Jim's place up in Craig,
with five or six of us at the first staff meeting of TRCP and Jim say's
to me, "what's with all these nick names? Most of the names he's
hearing: Kenny Bob (me), Corn Pone (Fred), Brother Brasher (Rick) and
Father Joe are the creations of Fred. Then I ask Jim, "Where you from
again, is it
"No," he says, I'm from
"That's close enough," I say," You're the Colonel," while thinking to
myself Kentucky Colonel, Tennessee Colonel, what's the difference.
Well we can see Jim likes that and Fred chimes right in and calls him
the Colonel, which by the way was TR's favorite moniker.
Fast forward a few years and Fred is sitting with Jim at some big dinner
and somebody asks where he got the name "The Colonel," and Jim goes into
this long song and dance about a relative that fought in the Civil War,
while Fred sits there smilin' like the proverbial
Like my old friend Tex Garry used to say, "All stories are true, some
are just truer than others." And I might add, no good one is worth
spoilin' with truthful details.
- Ken
Jim's Soft Side
I had known Jim in the Senate as a skillful and ardent advocate, brash and brusque, impatient, impetuous, and sometimes stubborn. But it was not until I joined the government affairs office of Waste Management, which he led, that I saw his best side, his soft side as a deeply caring person who was generous and kind to the many he loved.
Not surprisingly, the occasion for this insight involved his dog, Tigger. She was a yellow lab of legendary prowess in the hunting world, raised with his daughters and trained by his mother. She was also the most intelligent, devoted, and all round wonderful dog that I've ever known.
In those days of the early 90s, Jim brought Tigger and her son, Plague, to the office with him every day. Jim's personal life was turbulent and he was staying with friends around town and asking many of them to take the dogs overnight. Plague was untroubled by the disruption in routine, but Tigger was clearly disturbed. She moped, went off her feed, and manifested all the symptoms of unhappiness. Jim and I talked and agreed that I would take care of her temporarily until his situation stabilized. Tigger soon responded favorably to the restored stability and returned to her old self. All went well and Jim's life stabilized as well. One day Jim came into my office, sat down and looked at Tigger lying asleep at my feet. Then he spoke, but with no curses, snakes on a flat rock, or other of his familiar jargon. This was plain and simple, with tears in his eyes and straight from the heart. Bobby, he said, I love that dog.. I've hunted with her all over the world as a valued companion. But she's happy with you. She follows you around this office wherever you go and waits in the lobby for you to return when you leave. She's best off with you and I want you to keep her. I ask only that you let the girls see her now and then if they like.
Some people might consider all this trivial. But those of you us who have loved a good dog will know that Jim's gift to me was a profound act. He was giving up Tigger voluntarily for her own good (and mine) in a selfless act of enormous generosity by which I was inspired and for which I will remain forever grateful. Years later, when Tigger failed in old age, I told him I would put her down to spare her anymore suffering. He agreed. Afterwards, I met with Jim and told him that she had died peacefully and with dignity, and we cried together remembering the good times.
Tight lines, Jim! I hope you and Tigger are together again in a better place.
Bob Eisenbud
Thanks for the memory, Bob. I’ll tell some more chapters in that story.
From Tigger’s first litter, Jim gave me the runt, a yellow male I named Sunny. Jim and I spent much time training and hunting Sunny and Plague together. One time, Jim brought Plague to my house to leave him for a few days while he travelled, and I put both dogs in Sunny’s run behind the house before I dressed for work. After I dressed, I went out front to leave, and found both dogs sitting atop the dog box in my truck – the old green metal one Jim had given me. Sunny had been in that run a long time without figuring out how to climb out, but Plague had done it in 15 minutes. I had to go to the lumber yard, buy boards and make the run higher before going to work. Jim later refused to pay for the boards, saying I should have known his dog was smarter than mine – and me.
After Sunny died, Jim gave me Zeke – this time the largest yellow male in the litter. A lot of you probably know Zeke. When Zeke was several years old and fairly well trained (and had fairly well chewed up my house and yard), Jim asked to borrow Zeke for a big hunt he had planned at the ranch, since Jim’s dog (I think it was a Jambo) had been injured on a fence. Jim took Zeke to
Jim decided Zeke was way too good a dog for me, so he just kept him. It worked out well for all concerned. I know
As long as we’re mining this vein (I have dozens of Range dog stories swirling around in my head) I wanted to offer a very fresh tale that follows nicely on Bob’s. I will mention Jim Banks that on my first trip to the Flyway I got there just ahead of Jim and was just about jumping out of my skin I was so anxious to go out and get some birds up. He told me over the phone to take Zeke out. I don’t think Jim really wanted me messing with the home covey of huns – he either had gotten that message through to Zeke somehow or just knew that Zeke was already semi-retired. Zeke proceeded to lay down in a field and fall sound asleep about 15 minutes after we’d set out. Zeke had a nice nap in the sun on a cool October day and the birds went unharmed and I went back and cooled my jets and waited for Range who took me on my first hunt with him in
I went on many a hunt after that with Jim and Tench, young Plague and eventually Sky. Plague actually accompanied me on ruffed grouse hunts in
But back to my original story which is fresh. Bob your story about Tigger crossed just after I had been on the phone and in communications with Jim’s family about where his gorgeous young star of a wirehair Sky would end up. He’s only a few years old. He had one hell of a fine season in
At any rate many of us loved Sky but Jim’s great friend Dusan Smetana, a Slovak photographer many of you know (cc’d on this email) who lives in
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