Another commodity forfeited to trucks.    A special Northern Pacific Railway train loaded with sheep, leaving Blatchford, Montana over 90 years ago.  Blatchford is on the mainline between Glendive and Miles City. Most railroads got out of the livestock shipments in the 70s. Part of the problem was those thousands of stock cars were unusable for anything else about eleven months out of the year.

That passenger car is a “drover” car, transporting the owners and handlers of the stock. There was a requirement that stock must be off-loaded, fed and watered, if the transport time exceeded 36 hours. Thus, the owners and shepherds on board.

When we were in Butte, MT., in the late 60s the cattle trains loaded in SW Montana could make the trip to slaughter houses in Omaha, just under the 36 hours, with little time to spare. There still was a drover car as the stock needed to be off-loaded, and sorted at the slaughter houses.  One year I had the opportunity to ride along, invited by an owner. This train from Dillon, MT was a joint effort by about a dozen stockman owners and their cowboy handlers.  After some thought about:  being confined in a drover’s car or a string of cabooses, uncertain dietary sources, undoubtedly too much booze, and I don’t need to tell you about what’s on their boots….  Then, how do we get home?, a charter bus. uh uh.  – Gary