by Cyndy Coleman Marshall
Believe it or not... Porter A. Willis was also a "humble" man. While he had an ego as big as the Columbia River, he really didn't know how good he was.
From the first day I met him, I was like a sponge trying to learn and absorb everything I could about cattle and horses Porter Willis style. Of course I thought the sun rose and set on Big Port, I followed him around like a puppy dog. I was willing to do anything... even going underneath the cattle scales... (looking back... I can't believe I did that) I was very happy to be asked to do the yuckiest of jobs. And then they had a hay shed that the trusses were a few inches too low for the harrow bed to unload in. So he took the upper bar off the front of the harrow, the one that holds the hangy down teeth/tines that keep each row of hay bales that are added from falling forward on the table. The problem with this solution, was that the hay fields were all corrugated for flood irrigation... (I'm laughing as write this, remembering how it must have looked to the passer by) While he was driving around the field picking up bales of hay, I would stand on the harrow table, facing the hay bales, with my arms extended over my head (I'm only 5'1" tall at the time weighed about 110lbs) to push/hold the bales in place to keep them from falling forward until the harrow bed was full, and he could put the table up to secure it for the trip to the shed where it was going to be stacked. I was just happy as a clam, riding around on the harrow table in the hot sun all day in this position.
Believe it or not... Porter A. Willis was also a "humble" man. While he had an ego as big as the Columbia River, he really didn't know how good he was.
From the first day I met him, I was like a sponge trying to learn and absorb everything I could about cattle and horses Porter Willis style. Of course I thought the sun rose and set on Big Port, I followed him around like a puppy dog. I was willing to do anything... even going underneath the cattle scales... (looking back... I can't believe I did that) I was very happy to be asked to do the yuckiest of jobs. And then they had a hay shed that the trusses were a few inches too low for the harrow bed to unload in. So he took the upper bar off the front of the harrow, the one that holds the hangy down teeth/tines that keep each row of hay bales that are added from falling forward on the table. The problem with this solution, was that the hay fields were all corrugated for flood irrigation... (I'm laughing as write this, remembering how it must have looked to the passer by) While he was driving around the field picking up bales of hay, I would stand on the harrow table, facing the hay bales, with my arms extended over my head (I'm only 5'1" tall at the time weighed about 110lbs) to push/hold the bales in place to keep them from falling forward until the harrow bed was full, and he could put the table up to secure it for the trip to the shed where it was going to be stacked. I was just happy as a clam, riding around on the harrow table in the hot sun all day in this position.
FYI - this is a harrow bed or bale wagon, You can see the forks at the top that are what holds the hay bales in place.Ok, I've digressed from my original story, but that was another example of how eager I was (or perhaps deranged) to help at anything.
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Over the years, I would learn that working with Big Port then (80-85), I was only seeing the tip of the iceberg of the cattleman that he really was. You see, by the time I came on the scene, they were ranching on a much smaller scale. Except for Dean who was a senior in high school and soon to be going off on his own, the boys were grown and gone with ranch interests and families of their own. Big Port and Averyel were running a small bunch of black/black bally cows and feeding a few head in the Feedlot on a shoe-string budget.
I showed up that summer and was free help... willing to do anything, working for room and board and soaring on cloud nine feeling like I was part of a real life movie. For the next five years, I studied and absorbed and listened and tried to do everything on the ranch and in the feedlot that Port would let me do. He helped me start my first colts, and kept me from killing myself... or was it that the Driftwood/Bras D'or horses that he raised were just plain gentle and level headed enough that any gunsel could start 'em?
Eventually I grew up and left the safety of the shadow of Big Port... I married a rancher from Ironside and moved to Burns. I began showing working cowhorses, and dabbling in amateur cutting horse contests. I eventually bought this beautiful 5 year old mare called Bucky Chex that I was extremely proud of. I showed her in cutting and working cow horse events. I had won a few buckles and really enjoyed the heck out of her.
It was probably in 1993 when I had to take some cattle to the Vale Sale, and decided I'd take some time to go up and say hello to Port and Averyel. They were still living up on the Oregon Slope and it was lunch time when I stopped by... Imagine that, I timed it just right !
I can remember like it was yesterday... Averyel was fussing over the stove and Port was sitting in "his" place at the head of that huge antique dining room table with the window behind him. Was the table mahogany or cherry wood?
"Well, well well, look what the wind blew in... Cyndy girl, what brings you to these parts?"
I had brought a little show and tell with me, a framed 8"x10" photo of Bucky Chex and I working a cow. Feeling like I had reached a worthy milestone with this horse, I wanted to show him what he had made, the fruits of his work so to speak. I wanted to thank Port for all he had taught me. Beaming I handed him the photo. He studied it for a long time and was real quiet... then he said " Cyndy this is fantastic, where'd you learn to do this?"
.
Over the years, I would learn that working with Big Port then (80-85), I was only seeing the tip of the iceberg of the cattleman that he really was. You see, by the time I came on the scene, they were ranching on a much smaller scale. Except for Dean who was a senior in high school and soon to be going off on his own, the boys were grown and gone with ranch interests and families of their own. Big Port and Averyel were running a small bunch of black/black bally cows and feeding a few head in the Feedlot on a shoe-string budget.
I showed up that summer and was free help... willing to do anything, working for room and board and soaring on cloud nine feeling like I was part of a real life movie. For the next five years, I studied and absorbed and listened and tried to do everything on the ranch and in the feedlot that Port would let me do. He helped me start my first colts, and kept me from killing myself... or was it that the Driftwood/Bras D'or horses that he raised were just plain gentle and level headed enough that any gunsel could start 'em?
Eventually I grew up and left the safety of the shadow of Big Port... I married a rancher from Ironside and moved to Burns. I began showing working cowhorses, and dabbling in amateur cutting horse contests. I eventually bought this beautiful 5 year old mare called Bucky Chex that I was extremely proud of. I showed her in cutting and working cow horse events. I had won a few buckles and really enjoyed the heck out of her.
It was probably in 1993 when I had to take some cattle to the Vale Sale, and decided I'd take some time to go up and say hello to Port and Averyel. They were still living up on the Oregon Slope and it was lunch time when I stopped by... Imagine that, I timed it just right !
I can remember like it was yesterday... Averyel was fussing over the stove and Port was sitting in "his" place at the head of that huge antique dining room table with the window behind him. Was the table mahogany or cherry wood?
"Well, well well, look what the wind blew in... Cyndy girl, what brings you to these parts?"
I had brought a little show and tell with me, a framed 8"x10" photo of Bucky Chex and I working a cow. Feeling like I had reached a worthy milestone with this horse, I wanted to show him what he had made, the fruits of his work so to speak. I wanted to thank Port for all he had taught me. Beaming I handed him the photo. He studied it for a long time and was real quiet... then he said " Cyndy this is fantastic, where'd you learn to do this?"
1992 Bucky Chex HDC Open Champion
Truly I thought he was pulling my leg, that he was kidding me... and that he knew darn right well it was he that had taught me, and he was just building up for his own pat on the back.
I said something sarcastically along the lines of: "Ya right, like you don't know ?!"
He said "No, no I'm serious I want to know who'd you learn this from?" and I said, You, I learned it from you!" and he said "no you didn't..." I said "yes I did..." Noooo, I didn't teach you anything like this." And then I realized that he was dead serious, that he didn't realize he had in fact taught me.
I told him that I had come there that day to "Thank Him" for all he had taught me and I wanted him to know how grateful I was. "But I didn't teach you this" he insisted... I told him, "yes you did, you taught me everything I knew about reading cattle and starting colts on cattle and the rest just came from the foundation you had built. When anyone asked where I learned to read cattle, I told them you were my mentor, you were the one person responsible for my ability to read cattle, it was you Porter Willis.
I can remember shaking my head, thinking to myself he really doesn't know how good he is.
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I can still remember the butt chewing I got the first time I turned my horses butt to a cow to get where I thought I was supposed to be... I also remember the many times of him telling me to slow down... give the horse time to think... wait on the horse to read the cow, and the one most important thing he drilled into me "the horse had to be stopped - before you turned it with the cow". No turning the front end until the hind end was stopped.
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I remember times just sitting horseback with him watching different herds... hearing his soft low voice -"now watch the ears, the ears will tell you everything - which one is going to break and which way she'll go... first you look 'em in the eye and stare them down, ... and then if you need to you, just step this way or that... till they step back... if you sit and do nothing until they're already running you are way too late and the wreck is on. He taught me about a cows comfort zone... others would subsequently call it a bubble. Then there were his words of wisdom about sorting pairs, like just watching the body language and ears to show you where her calf was. I could go on and on, but you get the point.
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There might have been others who have coached me over the years... but I got my foundation as a student of the University of Big Port.
Thank you Porter
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The other vivid memory I have of that day, sitting there at their dining room table, was how proud he was to be helping the "little girl" next door with her horse. And talking of how she had watched his horses over the fence since she was "really" little, and that now as a 13ish young lady, she was totally horse crazy ready to learn, she had begged him to help her. It was so obvious that he was thoroughly enjoying having someone to mentor again. It was obvious that helping her at that time in his life was the highlight his days.
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