Received a letter today from Dalene, she wrote a very good poem about Don and his cabin,by coincidence, I came across these pictures this evening. The picture of all of us were taken several years ago on our first visit to the cabin. I re-visited it a second time the summer I went out for a class reunion. That was the year that Pat and Brandy were also there and the story of the "Black Bra" was started. He, with some assistance from my mother, built this cabin. It is located on the Little Cimmeron River, east of Montrose. It is located just a couple of miles from the location that the movie "True Grit" was filmed with John Wayne. Don worked for many years with the Nicholas brothers. They were the largest of the sheep ranchers in the area. They own several thousand acres of land in this area. Don lived and worked with them for many years, they were his second family. They told him to select five acres of land, anywhere he wanted on their property and they would deed the property to him. He counter offered that there was no need to subdivide a piece of land out of the middle, that he would prefer to just lease it for 99 years or until he passed way. That is the way it remained. It is located a couple of miles off the road, most times you will need to have four wheel drive to get to the cabin. He cut all the trees, mother would peel the bark and the two of them built the cabin. It is quite nice and a regular museum to his life. He developed a small lake behind the property and stocked it with brook trout. Each year since, he was hunted elk from his cabin, normally getting his elk on opening morning. The cabin brought him and his son Donnie back together, each fall Donnie would travel from Phoenix to go elk hunting and play dominoes with his dad at the cabin. I had breakfast with Auggie Nicholas the morning following the memorial service, although the agreement between them and Don has legally terminated, he assured me that it would always remain as "Don's Cabin" and we would be welcome to visit it anytime we desired. It was Don's last wish that his ashes be spread at the cabin, the family will gather at the cabin in July to carry out this wish. It should be a great party.
Don took this picture of your mother and I when he was showing us his lake, he later installed "plastic" pink flamingo's along the edge of the lake as a practical joke on Donnie.