10/11/07 Pick and Pat

Wages aren't always paid in money. I'm Jeff Keane; I'll be back right after this to tell you about some different wages. Money is usually the standard payment for work completed and who doesn't like a little money? Well, sometimes payment for your labor isn't money, but turns out to be worth more in the end than a little quick cash. When Dad was about twenty years old he worked as a pick-up man for a neighbor that put on rodeos in towns on both sides of the Cascades in Washington. Dad and Granddad also supplied some snakey, ill-tempered cows for the rodeo's cow riding events before bull riding became popular. Dad worked for two years during the summer rodeo season and enjoyed every minute of the time, which to Dad was payment in itself. In those years, it seemed no one had much money, but it didn't take much then and the neighbor always paid for the crew's meals and hotel rooms. Dad's payment came at the end of two years when he was told he could use the Thoroughbred stallion the rodeo producer owned to breed to Dad's mares. Granddad picked out two mares that were actually used in the work teams and had Hamiltonian breeding in them to mate to the Thoroughbred stallion. The next year Maude and Jane produced two nice stud colts for Dad that were given the names Pick and Pat. These two had the run of the place and were still only halter broke by the time they were four or five years old. Were two young strong willed colts worth the wages of two years work? I'll tell you more about them tomorrow. I'm Jeff Keane.