Grant-Kohrs Ranch National Historic Site Historic Structure Report CHAPTER VII: ASPECTS OF THE HOME RANCH

F. John Bielenberg (Born 1 May 1846, Hamburg, Germany; Died 16 June 1922. Helena, Montana)

John Bielenberg's fine penmanship frequently graces the letterbooks among the ranch documents, and in its controlled and measured form seems to illuminate a personality that otherwise eludes description. In the old family pictures John stares directly at the camera. He betrays no strong emotion, his calm and neutral look effectively hiding the feelings of the inner man. His dress is always rough work clothes, somewhat carelessly fitted onto a considerable frame. Yet he is remembered today as a major presence in the life of the home ranch, and as the one brother most closely involved with its operations, (He was also a full brother in emotional ties to Con and Augusta.) Bielenberg managed the ranch while Con ranged far and wide in pursuit of profits for the partnership. He served as the home ranch portion of a symbiotic Kohrs-Bielenberg enterprise that spanned much of early Montana's economic life. Con Warren spent many years with his Uncle John and remembers the way Conrad Kohrs and John Bielenberg worked together:

They were very devoted, and apparently they had considerable mutual admiration. And grandfather needed a man like John, because John was the one who stayed home and looked after the business, particularly the range cattle part of it. But whenever they needed a man real bad, like when the DHS sold those cattle to the Army and agreed to deliver them to Dickinson, North Dakota, grandfather sent John and Nick down to see that the cattle got there safely. And John trouble-shot for him, time and time again. [42]

John is remembered today as a pleasant enough man, but a taciturn one who never spoke an unnecessary word. When the occasion required he would employ a quiet and noncommittal "Oh my God," or "me too." [43] The longest sentence most can recall from Bielenberg was the laconic one that has been heard before in the American West: "Anything you can't do on a horse isn't worth doing." [44]

From the earliest days in Montana, John and Con worked together as partners. The mutual trust in each other that they felt is verified time and time again in the legal documents on file at the county courthouse. In one deal John buys the land, in another Con does. But they use it jointly. When John remains at the ranch while Con and Augusta go to Germany for a visit, he receives the full power of attorney.

John's closeness to the family included the children as well. Apparently they wrote to Uncle Johnny as faithfully as they did to their father in 1881 when both Con and John remained in Montana while the girls, Willy, and their mother lived in Hamburg. One of Con's letters to Anna notes that "Onkle Johney got letters from all of you, I had forgotten about his birthday and Onkel Johney says he had not thought of it himself." [45] John and Con and Augusta were the adults in the family, and as the girls grew older and married they retained their closeness to John as well as to their parents.

Yet John remains little known outside the ranch area, except as the Bielenberg of "Kohrs and Bielenberg." But around Deer Lodge the memory of John Bielenberg is still strong. Stories of his ranch management are legion. Of the many, two will suffice.

One involves John's approach to breaking the yearling colts at the ranch to the harness. John's considerable size, about 6 feet in height and perhaps 240 pounds in weight, was an asset in the process. On the more recalcitrant animals Bielenberg would

grab one out, [and] pull it out of the corral. If it gave [him] too much trouble he would grab an ear and lip and twist it to the ground. It would kick and thrash and John would sit on its head, pull out a cigar, bite off the end and light up for as long as it took to get them settled down. Usually [he] had them mowing in a field the first day. [The] best way to break them is [to] team them up and work them. [46]

Con Warren recalled an incident in 1918 when Uncle John enquired if young Warren had ever butchered beef. No, Con replied, he had not. Bielenberg's exact reply is now lost in mists of the past. But the resulting event began within minutes, as young Warren found himself facing a freshly slaughtered bovine hanging on the Beef Hoist (Historic Structure 40) with a sharpened butcher's knife in his hand. Uncle John pulled the everpresent cigar from his pocket. As he bit off the end, he mounted a nearby fence and settled down for a prolonged stay. Step by step he directed the young man's first experience in cleaning, skinning, and butchering a cow. Con Warren has not forgotten that day. [47]

John remained at the ranch after Con and Augusta moved to Helena, but Augusta continued to look after her bachelor brother-in-law. Not the kind to remember to pick up new clothes when he needed them, he was the recipient of Augusta Kohrs's watchful care in such matters. She would come over and sort through the clothes, deciding what should be discarded, what repaired, and what replaced. She did it until he died in 1922.

As he sickened in the late spring of 1922, the family gathered, and when he died, Augusta Kohrs and the surviving Kohrs children, Anna Boardman and Katherine Warren, were with him. His closeness to them then was as apparent as it had been soon after he came to Montana to join Conrad Kohrs in 1865. [48]

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Chapter 7 continued