Trego's Mountain Ear

"Serving North Lincoln County"

Tag: Books

  • What Ph.D. Means

    I can, and occasionally do, put the letters Ph.D. behind my name. I know what the letters signify – and I just saw a commentary that Canada and Mexico have both elected leaders with Ph.D. behind their names, while the US has Trump.

    So let’s look at what the letters Ph.D. actually imply – that I have done original research in a satisfactory manner while supervised by a Ph.D. holding faculty member. That’s all the title actually tells of what I, or anyone else who holds the Ph.D. has accomplished. I take some quiet pride in the fact that current researchers are still citing my dissertation – but that isn’t a necessary part of getting the letters behind your name. And, despite the fact I feel good about those citations, there aren’t nearly so many people citing the dissertation as read this blog. Most dissertations are filed away and never cited.

    Einstein’s dissertation was “A New Determination of Molecular Dimensions.” In his thesis, he developed a methodology for calculating Avogadro’s number from the Brownian motion in sugar water. It was original research – which means that nobody had done it before. It was good quality research. But when we associate Einstein with research, we tend to recall his later research – the spot where he quantified Energy as equal to mass times the square of light speed. The point being, we don’t recall Einstein because of his first piece of original research.

    Generally speaking, whenever someone tells you “If you want to know about X you should read my dissertation.” you probably don’t want to read it. The document represents several years work, and we tend to think of our dissertations as important – but most are not.

    Research for a Master’s degree doesn’t need to be original. It doesn’t even need to be done – a Master’s can be awarded just for coursework. If there’s no thesis, the degree is called a terminal masters, not qualifying for admission into a Ph.D. program. (My M.Ed. was a non-thesis masters, so I had to research and write a separate thesis to make up for the lack of a thesis.)

    Jill Biden’s Ed.D. thesis is available online (all 137 pages) at https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/20407101-jill-jacobsbiden_dissertation/ and can be downloaded without cost – the title is Student Retention at the Community College: Meeting Students’ Needs. It is nice to have this available to help people understand what can go into a doctorate.

    We (the United States) elected a guy with a Ph.D. to the office of President once – well, actually twice, over a century ago. Woodrow Wilson, Ph.D. Once he was elected, he segregated the federal work force. I don’t have any evidence that he belonged to the KKK – but they missed a great prospect if they didn’t recruit him. His dissertation – from back in 1885 – it titled “Congressional Government” and describes the government of the United States. There is nothing in Woodrow Wilson’s dissertation that you can’t get out of a high school government text.

  • Starting Montana

    There are many spots in history where you can start Montana’s story – I’m looking for the spot where the Montana Attitude starts. Leslie Fiedler, in his 1949 essay about the Montana Face touched around it – but missed the moment and the incident.

    Our origin includes Meriwether Lewis (whose Apron resides with Montana’s Grand Lodge in Helena) and Colter’s Run – John Colter, who mustered out from the Corps of Discovery early, who stayed in the mountains to begin the beaver trade, and who left Montana in 1810 and died a couple of years after returning to civilization (well, St. Louis, Missouri).

    Even in grade school, I learned that the Custer legend didn’t pan out – but Custer barely made it into Montana before screwing up at the Little Big Horn. But his poor decision occurred after the Montana perspective began to develop.

    Go back in history – and remember that Lewis and Clark passed through, Colter expanded on what they had mapped, but in the middle of the War Between the States, men from both North and South moved to Montana. And, in 1863, men from both sides came together for the funeral of William Bell. Bell, dying of natural causes, asked that he might receive a Masonic funeral. Seventy-six of his lodge brothers showed up for that funeral, and the realization hit, that while the criminals held the Sheriff’s office, they had the organization with a group of fraternity brothers that they could trust. (The seventy-six attending the funeral, plus the deceased William Bell totaled 77 – the final number of the Vigilantes 3-7-77. The blending of North and South wasn’t free of strain – Bozeman still has two separate Masonic Lodges, one originally formed of Confederates, the second Unionists.)

    At any rate, the Montana Attitude begins with the organization of the Vigilantes – who, in a couple of months, organized, hanged the crooked sheriff, and restored law and order. With an origin like that, a fundamental mistrust of government – as personified by Sheriff Henry Plummer – and the willingness to confront that government, is kind of engrained in the collective psyche of Montana.

    The next incident occur with Montana’s Acting Territorial Governor – Thomas Francis Meagher. Before President Andrew Johnson sent him to Montana, Meagher had used a horsewhip on an editor who criticized him (in New York, as I recall). As Montana’s acting governor, he threatened to repeat that behavior on the editor of the Virginia City paper. The editor responded with the invitation “Pistols for two and coffee for one?” I’m not real certain as to the date, but obviously it was before July 1, 1867, when Meagher disappeared from the deck of a steamboat at Fort Benton.

    While Meagher, who was appointed Territorial Secretary, filled the position of Governor, he also ran up the territory’s debt to pay the militia – I recall reading of that debt being recently paid off shortly before I graduated grade school (though I may have been reading an old book).

    In those three formative years, Henry Plummer set an example that made Montanans skeptical about trusting local government, while Governor Meagher showed us that state government was willing to incur a debt that would take most of the next century to pay off, as well as attempting to censor the press. I still kind of like Meagher, but if he was pushed off the steamboat, the perp may have had the idea that he deserved it. There’s a reason why Montanans tend to mistrust government – though I’m not sure today’s journalists would be ready to send the “Pistols for two and coffee for one?” response to the governor.

  • Sick as Christmas Approaches

    It’s an unpleasant lung and sinus infection. It goes well with asthma to cut down what I can do – yet this time, the disease vector was my grandson. Somehow, the sickness is kind of mitigated by that – it didn’t come from some anonymous student passing through the hallway in an unseen cloud of microbes.

    This time, I got Remi while I was working on the old service station – and despite the illness, I had the joy of giving him the rolling magnet to pick up nails. I may feel a bit crummy – hell, I do feel crummy – but I have the memory of the toddler rolling the magnet, and smiling with every click as a nail was pulled up and magnetism overpowered gravity. He doesn’t have the words yet – but in another ten or twelve years, there’s going to be a discussion about physics with his mother. I may or may not be there to see the interest in physics develop – but I was there when he discovered that magnetism can overpower gravity. It is enough to make the illness an insignificant cost.

    As my daughter took an interest in physics, and moved into quantum, I checked out books on the topic – studying to stay along with her for the next conversation, often in the car as we would drive home. It brought home thoughts to me – the realization that the power of probability combined with chemistry to make elegant experiments, while some atoms manage to stay out of the reaction. 99.9% purity is close enough for what we need – and things happen consistently.

    So I look forward to the next lessons, as the little guy discovers that pieces of copper, aluminum and lead are immune to the power of his magnet. I look forward to his learning of the special aspects of ferrous metals – and possibly moving on to the relationship of a compass to the planet he inhabits. A stuffy nose, sore throat, and congested lungs are a small price to pay for being the grandfather that sets the lessons in motion.

  • Second-hand Information

    Most of my information, my knowledge, is second hand. I know Venezuela exists because I have been there – but my knowledge of Viet Nam comes from other people, their spoken stories and written ones. The world is too big to have a preponderance of experience.

    I’m looking at the photographs and videos posted on the internet about the flooding in south Lincoln County. My first-hand information is from floods down Libby way in the 70’s and 80’s when I worked for the Soil Conservation Service. My second-hand information is from people taking pictures with cell phones and drones yesterday and today. It’s a lot more relevant than my first-hand information. The change in technology though – that is impressive. I recall driving down to Libby with my 35mm camera, and vividly recall calling Oly Euland at the state, to fund a flight to get photos of the flood before it receded, the weather turned cold again, and snow covered all the damage.

    My first-hand knowledge won’t do anyone any good. Although there may be a chuckle at the expense of a landowner on Callahan Creek, who saw my government truck as I was photographing the flood, came up to me, said something nice about the government doing well to get there so quickly, then cursed me when I responded to his question of “You have a check for me, right?” with “No.” It was interesting to meet a man who went so quickly from compliments to curses.

    For the folks who are looking at Lincoln County being declared an emergency – up a Trego, we’re a little damp, but fine. Down Libby way, they’re at about 2,100 feet above sea level. Troy is about 1900 feet. We’re at 3,100 feet. The general rule is that you lose 5.2 degrees Fahrenheit for every 1000 feet of elevation increase. (That’s second-hand information, too – someone better than I did the calculations) Troy (well, actually where the Kootenai leaves Montana for Idaho) is the lowest point in Montana. That low elevation makes Libby and Troy very susceptible to flooding during winter thaws. On the other hand, there’s a big advantage in having Libby Dam, where the Corps of Engineers can crank the flow down and minimize the Kootenai’s impact on the flooding.

  • School District 53 — Older Than Lincoln County

    School District 53 – Trego School – started in September of 1905.  I finally understand why it’s District 53 – it started when the community was still in Flathead County.  Matter of fact, Flathead County had only split from Missoula County in 1904. Lincoln County began in 1909 – 5 years later.  The lower numbers – such as Troy’s District 1 – are Lincoln County numbers. A lot was happening in 1904 – and the map of School District 53 showed another thing I hadn’t realized.  In 1905, there was no Fortine Creek.  The map clearly reads Edna Creek.  The dam running logs down to Eureka Lumber was built in 1904, and 1904 was the year for the first railroad mainline relocation.  The first main line, running back of Marion to Libby was replaced by a line running from Stryker, through Trego, Fortine and Eureka, then dropping into the Kootenai valley to run down to Libby.  (The second mainline relocation occurred along with Libby Dam).The map shows that railroad – and the predecessor of highway 93 – both running to the west of Dickie Lake.  No road shows where the highway now is to the east of the lake. Thinking on it, School District 53 was there before either Fortine or Trego received the communities names. Trego was a nameless construction boom town for the first time.  1904 brought the railroad relocation,  a new dam being built (on Edna Creek, before it was named Fortine Creek) and a new Ranger station was under construction at Ant Flat.  Small wonder that Flathead County got news of a new community that needed a school district ASAP.  It would be over sixty more years before the second railroad relocation and new dam (this one on the Kootenai) would repeat the situation to build a new school for District 53. When we get the copies of those old maps ready, we’ll add them to an article – but for now, it’s kind of neat to realize that School District 53 means that Trego school was created before Lincoln County – and the higher district number means that it was a Flathead County district and got the number from Kalispell.

  • Trego History – 1945 to 1965 Modernizing The Community

    Around 1945, the Edna Creek School closed. The period between 1945 and 1960 saw Trego reduced from four schools – Swamp Creek, Edna Creek and Stryker closed, leaving District 53 with only Trego School. The technologic transition that consolidated the bantam community’s schools was gravel. The original roads were dirt – but in the Forties the addition of gravel made the roads all season. By 1948, Lincoln Electric was moving and shaking – and, with the addition of gravel roads and electricity, it was no longer necessary to build schools close to the students. The era of school buses and electric lights had replaced the time of four one-room schools in a single school district.

    Again, it is a time of social changes rather than impressive individuals – the end of the Forties showed the cooperative effort of clearing land for the powerlines – and that cooperative effort moved into adding the Trego Community Hall to the new 3-classroom school that replaced the log school that had burned. Three classrooms, electricity, an electric stove, and running water that replaced the outhouses (though the school board kept the outhouses until 1965, probably making sure that electricity and pumped water wasn’t just a fad). The homes were electrified – sometimes just wires stapled to wall studs, supporting switches and light bulbs – but the time of kerosene lamps was past. Dances at the Trego Community Hall brought in folks from a wide area.

    The mid-thirties had brought in a new group of settlers – many from around Great Falls. This time saw an end to the logging camps as timber transportation moved to trucks – another change brought by the technology of gravel roads. Balers – wire tie – came to the small ranches, making them more able to cope with winters. The Trego Mercantile combined a general store with the contract post office – and electricity brought refrigeration and cold beer. A later influx of people brought in a World War II veteran population cohort – some immediately after the war, some showing up as military retirees in the early sixties. The Forest Service at Ant Flat grew – yet this classic time of cooperative community building was really just a pause before Trego’s second boom would occur.