In those days we had prohibition and the Feds had found a still and were in the process of breaking up the multiple gallon barrels of whiskey. After the Feds left, along with the Lemire boys, they slipped into the coulee where the whiskey was running like a littel creek. Doug remembered having his fill and then toppling into a pool of whiskey that was forming. He always figured if Fred hadn't pulled him out by his heels he would have drowned! Hattie, of course, was not happy when her boys came home sick as dogs.

Depression years meant lots of hard times. Because there were many coyotes in the area, the brothers decided to start acquiring com hounds they could hunt with. They chased coyes on horseback and managed to make spending money. Finally they graduated to a Model A with large tires and a crate on the back to carry the hounds. During ghos years of the depression, many of the homesteaders had gone broke an dmoved out of the country, so there were lots of wide open spaces for coyote chasing. They had many wild experiences. Fred did the driving and he said Doug was a "dead shot", so Doug did the shooting. I have always thought that his ability to nail a target is what kept him alive in World War II. After high school he workded for the Carmichael Ranch near Augusta. He broke horses, tended sheep camp and helped hay. Many bands of shweep were trailed back to what we now know as the Bob Marshall Wilderness. One time the herder lost a bunch of sheep. The sheep shaded up early in the morning in the tress so finding them was mighty difficult. The foreman got Les Barrett to fly early in the morning, taking Doug and the herder to locate the sheep. They found the sheep, but Doug got deathly air sick! He never forgot that!

In December of 1940, the military caught up with Doug and he was among the first 100 that were taken in the "draft" out of Great Falls. His division was sent to Fort Lewis, Washington, for training to go the the South Pacific. Originally they were supposed to get out the end of December 1941, but that didn't happen because of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Everybody was in the Army for good then! Doug was among those given a faulty yellow jaundice shot. Due to the delay caused by so many being ill, Dough's division ended up going to the European theater. He sailed from Newport News, Viriginia, for 14 days, zig zagging to dodge submarines. There were 2,800 men on the ship and the food was atrocious. Doug was able to find a raw potato or onion now an dthen that were kept up on the top deck of the ship. They ate meals below, but the smell from the engines was so bad they could hardly stand to eat. They landed on the west coat of Africa, near Casablana. On foot, they fought their way across North Africa. They were called an amphibious group as well as foot soldiers, so they were tested on their seafaring skills crossing to Sicily. After the horrifying landing, the survivors made their way across Sicily on foot to make a second landing at Anzio in Italy. Those were the toughtest days of the war according to Doug. He was in reconnaissance and intelligence. One day an officer told Doug and two others to take a jeep out "until you draw fire". They returned OK, but that was typical of the nerve-racking life they lived. A good share of the fighting was on foot in the mountains of Italy. He told me one time, "In the night I decided to slip into a foxhole full of water because it was warmer to sleep there than out on the ground." One of the big problems the "boys" had was that they were not allowed to bomb buildings like monasteries. This was a nice gesture, but it delayed progress because that is where the Germans holed up. The Germans would pin them down and there was no way to get out but wait until dark. It was a hard and dangerous life. One time Doug and a friend were on top of a mountain. Doug went down to camp to get supplies and came back to find his buddy ahd been captured by the Germans. It was two years before Doug knew if the buddy had lived or died. He survived having been shipped in a cattle car to a camp as a prisoner of war. This kind of experience was repeated on a daily basis. Finally, after four grueling years, Doug became ill and was shipped out to a hospital ship. There were two such ships - the other one was sunk. Doug was a survivor of a group of men that had deteriorated considerably. In late 1945, he arrived back in the States and was discharged from the Army.

Doug and Nancy Diehl married in 1947 and began ranching as a family enterprise. Ranching in the late 40s and 50s was quite different than nowadays. We used saddle horses and moved cattle that way rather than with trailers. We usually did not have help to haul a horse home form the end of the move, so horses got lots of miles put on them. It made good horses. We rode lots of young horses; we rode horses that the girls used in the arena. I remember using Matinee, the barrel horse Dee won the Calgary Stampede on, to mount a hired man who did not ride very well. She was so well trained, gentle and "cowy" that he was able to ride her. One time we had about 250 yearlings in the lane and decided to sort the heifers from the steers. By the time this was done, if you had a young horse, you would be surprised how well they were handling because they had to turn around a lot of times, back up, stop - all thing you would want them to do in any arene if you were training them to do some event. However, at the ranch, the natural way, it all made sense to the horse. Turn the cow, stop, back well, etc and the horses soon learned it saved them tons of steps and energy to listen to and accept the rider's cues.

While Doug was in the army, he had a broodmare that foaled every year. By the time he got home he had foals with a little age on them. One was a pretty sorrel horse. Doug never did want his horses to buck, but this one liked to. He bucked Dough off about three times, so Curt Diehl, my dad offered his advice. They decided to put a choke-rope around hime to "encourage" him to to put his head down! It helped bu the "buck" wa pretty well established in his mind, being a four-year-old. Doug rode him with that rope around his neck for about a year. Doug was an exceptional roper of horses. It was an overhand swing, so the horse never say or heard the rope coming and Doug was extremely accurate. They also roped and dragged calves to the fire for branding. In the fall, if they were buying yearlings, they just roped for sport. They had a chute but it was more fun to rope. You could put a bunch of colts into a corral if a potential buyer was there to take a closer look. Doug would toss hi loop, catch the colt with no fuss and sure impressed a lot of folks.

We still had the ranch at Beaver Creek in Meagher County where I was raised and we always trailed cattle there each spring. It was about a three day trip. We had a chuck wagon along, crossed the bridge in Cascade and headed up through the Milligan area. You can't do that today withough major problems with the traffic. We summered 300 yearlings. We always kept four or five saddle horses at Beaver Creek to ride for keepin an eye on the cattle, then we used them in the fall to round-up. Quite a lot of cattle were summered on the forest reserve which was wide open. There were no drift-fences then. The cattle could get a pretty good scatter on them if they were not regularly pushed back into a common area. This involved lots of riding with a purpose and this made for good saddle horses.

We started using a truck to haul horses but finding a place to load and unload was always a special place for swearing to break out. In those days, before four wheel drive, it seemed we wre always stuck. Doug said, "I sure as hell would like to have a dollar for every pair of chains I've put on!" On the ranch we liked good horses. We never really intended to be in the Quarter Horse business. However, the next thing we knew, the girls wanted to barrel race, show and high school rodeo. Better horses were a sensible way to become more competitive. Sometimes Doug would take Barb or Dee to the high school rodeos and I would stay home or vice-versa. The year Dee was queen they watched the first men walk on the moon while at the State High School Rodeo in Roundup. They'll never forget that.

We always used to tease Dough about his tight gates that no woman on earth could get through. "Gotta have a tight gate if you want to have good fences," he would respond. If he put a chain around a gate, the lock or snap always hooked into the very last link. There was no waste if Doug had a say. Use new barbed wire? Never! "We can patch with that old stuff an it'll do just as well." These were just a few of his conservative way of doing things.

Doug always liked his dogs. In the early 50s, we ahd a border collie/shepherd cross named Casey. He was a really smart ole boy. We bough a couple of hundred yearling steers from Jim Shortridge in Augusta. I helped Doug get a cross the road and into the field going toward the Birdtail. He had his dog and his saddle horse and he brought those steers through gates, etc. Casey would bring up the rear of the heard and go wherever Doug pointed. Doug would get the cattle headed through the gate, Casey would watch Doug to see waht to do next, but he never left far from behind the heard. Doug's next dog was a Weimaraner, Sandy, that wouild dive into our irrigation ditch here at the house and go clear under to get a rock or whatever was thrown into the water. Doug laughed his head off at that dog. Then one day we go a Blue Heeler pup at the rodeo in Dillon. Doug named him Cisco and he taught that dog to do just aobut everything but talk. He was a smart dog and he was sort of defensive of Doug. One day he went after a battery at the gas station. I guess he went through a stop sign. Anyway a cop stopped him. The cop approached the jeep and Cisco was right there across Doug's lap ready to put that cop out of the country! Another thing Cisco didn't like was smoke. If someone got in the jeep and lit up a cigarette, Cisco would get such a miserable look on his face that soon the person smoking would feel guilty and put it out. One day we were helping Doug's brother move yearlings from one pasture across the road to another. As we approached the gate, Doug told Cisco to "stay" up on the siede of the hill. We finished the job some time later, loaded the horses and headed home. Someone asked,"Where's Cisco?" Doug said, "I bet he's sittin up on that hill!" Sure enough, he had not moved an inch.

Our girls were always a big part of the ranch. They were good help, learning to ride when they were no bigger'n a minute. They were better help thatn most of the men you could get to help. Here is what Dee want to add about her Dad. "From the time I figured out my name, I realized I had three. I was Diehla Dee when Mom was mad and I was Dee Dee when I was good. I was Buster to Dad. I remember the time an dplace when I told Dad that I was a young lady and I did not want to be called Buster any longer. I was about seven. As I grew up and looked back on this monumental moment, I began to realize that because Dad called me Buster, I grew up knowing I equaled any boy he could have raised. He always expected me to be a lady, but whatever I wanted to try - maybe it was running the mower or the rake - he NEVER said I couldn't do it because I was a girl. He always taught me whatever I wanted to learn and, of course, many things I really didn't care if I ever learned! Whean thinking back about my growing up years, I was very fortunate to have parents who believed my potential was limitless. Most girls my age were never encouraged to do the things I did. As a child, I also learned to swear a blue streak from my dad. At about seven, I also swore off swearing. Unfortunately, when I came back to the ranch at age 26 and started dealing with the bovine and equine species on a daily basis, the ability to swear returned. Now, my swearing just makes me grin and think of Dad. Dad loved to sing ballads about cowboys and horses as we drove to the ranch to cake cows. He also had an ability to concoct a story as he drove. Why would any little girl not want to go everywhere her dad went when the excitement of the next episode might be missed? Dad also loved to play a good pronk. He made me laugh and taught me to laugh. Th man giving the eulogy at Dad's funeral, a childhood friend of mine, said that Dad would get a twinkle in his eye when he was about to tell a good story or tease someone. He said that he saw that sme twinkle in my ey from time to time. I realized that special inherited characteristics are a gift that cannot be taken away. "Thanks, Dad."

Barb wanted to add what her Dad meant to her also. Dad was a true friend. When I needed an answer, Dad's words were ture words and thoughts that came from his soul. I needed no words when I won barrel races for Dad's look in his eyes greeted me with such pride. A real sense of humor ran in his veins as he told the stor of "Little Joe, The Wrangler." He could make me cry every time. Dad never punished me but the look on his face told me I better no cross that line. The amazement of his soul touched me. "Thank you, Dad, for keeping me in touch with my soul every moment of time."

Granddaugher Jamie adds: Papa Doug, as he was known to us grandkids as well as our friends, had to be the greatest stor teller ever. I never knew a person who could make a true story become the biggest wild westie you could ever imagine. He certainly had a great imagination, although I think that some of the things I though were fake were probably real, knowing Papa Doug. As a kid, growing up with Papa Doug and two male cousins, I was totally subjected to the male way of life. Papa Doug loved to teach us about trapping beaver and hunting thos little varmint gophers. The gophers had to be the most fun. He loved to go them with the .22, but eventually he decided we would trap them, too. So, he found traps that were like mini beaver traps and we would set them outside the gopher holes and wait for them. Along with the traps, Papa Doug also taught us how to snare a gopher with baling twine, which could always be found in the back of hsi pickup with the wire, wire pliers, staples, nails, a hammer and the wire stretchers, just in case we found a piece of fence that might need fixing. Oh, and we can't forget the 3-in-1 oil. He had a knack at always finding that darned padlock that needed oil. Papa Doug was a great supporter of us grandkids. I know he never missed a State Fair to watch me show my steers or heifers. "Thank you, Papa Doug, for all your support and for teaching me about the things in life that keep us laughing."

From Grandson Matt: Papa Doug was a person whom I loved and idolized for the last nineteen years. I have countless memories following alongside him throught the years and wondering how his footsteps ever got so deep. Papa Dough showed me the happiness is achieved by caring for your family, animals and the land (but he hated those damned beavers, skunks and porcupines along the way!) On top of this, he indirectly gave me a philosophy to life. Pap Doug never said these words but they are what he lived by - literally and figuratively: Life is a fence. Put extra effort into building it and it will remain sturdy if constantly maintained. Slack off and it becomes harder and harder to repair. Circumstances can tear part of it down, but never so much that a little sweat can't get standing straight and tight again.

From Grandson Traver: Never quite knowing where we were or where we would end up, I loved to plod aldong behind Papa Doug on his routine trap-check. Sometimes I was lucky enough to carry a trap, or unlucky enough to carry the little glass jar of that greasy bait which "stunk to high heaven" as Grandma would say, but for the most part I just focused in on Pap Doug's big, black rubber overshoes. I rememeber the exact imprint they made in the mud. I was supposed to be observing all the other tracks around us either because Papa Doug would be making up some wild story about how they got there, or quizzing me on what animal they belonged to. But the only ones I was really concerned about were his. I knew that no matter how lost I thought we were, I knew that as long as I kept my little boots following in his footprints... well, I had a clever ending, but all I really have to say is that nothing else has ever felt more comforting.

Doug was a judge for 20 years, traveling nationwide for the American Quarter Horse Association and the American Horse Show Association. He was the first AQHA National Director from Montana and served in that organization, primarily on the Youth Committee, for several decades. Doug was one of the first organizers of the Montana High School Rodeo Association, headquartered in Augusta, Montana, in the early 1950s and served as director for many years. He was a longtime member of the American Farm Bureau, serving as President of the Cascade County Farm Bureau at one time. He also belonged to the American and Montana Angus Associations, the Montana Stockgrowers and served as President of the Sun River Valley Senior Citizens. Douglas was dedicated to the 4-H Program and initiated the first horse project in Cascade County, which has grown to be one of the largest 4-H projects nationwide.

We dedicate this story to the memory of you, Doug, Dad.
Caretaker of you county your land, your livestock.