The actual formation of the Back Country Horsemen took place in Montana’s Flathead Valley in January of 1973. Growth of the BCH as an organization continued with the formation of additional clubs in Montana. In 1977, the Back Country Horsemen of Washington was incorporated and developed an informal liaison with the Montana and newly formed Idaho Back Country Horsemen. In 1981, a California organization known as the High Sierra Stock Users was formed and after several years of discussion, the four groups decided to merge. They would call themselves the Back Country Horsemen of America. A constitution was drafted in 1985 and accepted in 1986. A board of directors elected from each of the four units became the governing body of the new organization, thus uniting the Montana, Idaho, California, and Washington Back Country Horsemen into one organization, the Back Country Horsemen of America. Since that time, there has been steady growth within the four founding state organizations. In addition, new Back Country Horsemen units have also formed in Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Utah, and Wyoming. There are also affiliated units in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada.

THE BEGINNING

by Ken Ausk                              April 20, 1995

I’ve been asked many times over the years to write a history about the formation of the first Back Country Horseman Club.  I’m sure that wasn’t because of my writing ability but merely because I was there.  The importance of these events has finally prompted me to attempt this through memory, newsletters and other writings.

Perhaps the reason that Back Country Horsemen started in the Flathead Valley of western Montana has more to do with geography than with the individuals involved.  Our proximity to the Bob Marshall Wilderness has given us many opportunities and some far-reaching problems.  The Bob Marshall was one of the nation’s first designated Wildernesses and the first to have a Wilderness Management Plan.  It was the first to have the LAC concept of land management applied as a management regulation.  Regulations developed here have had widespread application in many areas.  Flathead Back Country Horsemen have been both blessed and damned because the advantage of early input has mandated very careful responsible comment.

The names of the people involved are important only for historical purposes.  What is important is the spirit and determination of that charter group.  That spirit and determination are what formed the foundation philosophy of BCH and that is the strength of all of our BCH groups regardless of location.

In the late 1960’s, America was becoming more environmentally and health conscience.  There was a shift in recreational pursuits with more emphasis on primitive camping and backpacking.  The sporting goods manufacturers responded with new lightweight and technical equipment that allowed deeper penetration into back country areas.  In many cases there emerged a new type of wilderness traveler with limited experience and a narrow viewpoint of wilderness values.  Many visitors at that time, especially horsemen, were not using methods that we would view as acceptable today or easy on the land.  The situation was on a collision course and the horsemen didn’t have the numbers to compete politically with the growing number of new users.  The same circumstances that had caused an increase in backpackers had generated new horse users who were also inexperienced.  Another problem was the attitude of the “old time” horse users.  They’d been using the same areas and methods for years and thought that they had a propriety right.

Roland Cheek, Dennis Swift and Ken Ausk hunted together in almost the exact center of the Bob Marshall Wilderness.  They could easily see that if the situation didn’t improve, their children would probably never again see the Bob from the back of a horse.  Nights are long in the Bob in the latter part of September and their evenings weren’t filled with the usual hunting camp lies, but in trying to find a solution to the horse users problem.  The situation was talked about the fall of 1971 but it was 1972 before they finally decided that their only hope was to form an organization.  Cheek was the Safety Director for Plum Creek Lumber, Swift a Forester and Planer Mill Foreman for Stoltz Land and Lumber, and Ausk worked for the Federal government and traveled considerably.  They needed someone who was available during the day so they twisted the arm of Dulane Fulton, a fellow horseman who had recently retired.  Many evenings were spent building the framework for an organization that would be both supportive and critical of Forest Service land management proposals, by it’s very nature.

In October of 1972 they arranged a meeting in the Supervisor’s office of the Flathead National Forest with the District Rangers of all four Ranger Districts, Glacier National Park personnel, and people from the Forest Service staff.  They explained their concept of the organization, education before regulation, review and comment on management plans and regulations, providing a sounding board for necessary regulation and help for low funded projects.  We also volunteered to help reach other horsemen with easier on the land horse handling methods.  No punches were pulled, the managing agencies were advised that we were critical of many of their regulations and alarmed at the very “pure” direction that seemed to be developing for Wilderness management.  To the agencies credit, they endorsed our concept and encouraged us.  I’m sure that many of them had the same feelings for the back of a horse that we did.

The four now had to deal with the problem of forming the new organization.  Over the next two months they arranged to speak to every club in the area where they thought there might be potential membership, always explaining that our group would not be in competition with them.  Our scope would be narrow, the use of horses in backcountry.  Little did we realize that this narrow field of endeavor would be such a large activity.  In almost all of these meetings the same situation developed, someone responded with a story about how their horse or string had been spooked by a hiker or motorcycle rider.  Some were militant and most had the impression that if you were “for” something you were automatically “against” the other forms of recreational use.  Some of these people joined, but few remained long unless they changed their former attitude.  What we considered a well thought out responsible approach seemed too slow for them.  By early January 1973, we had invited all of our potential support, developed our concept and an interim constitution, and secured all of the local publicity we could for our new organization.

On January 17, 1973, they rented a room in a local school and announced an organizational meeting.  The meeting was well attended and all four spoke on their concept of the club.  The interim constitution was adopted and Roland Cheek was elected the first President of BCH, with Dulane Fulton as Vice-President.  BCH was born.

The mechanics of forming a completely new organization can be staggering; ours was almost overwhelming.  There were no organizations like ours in existence, we had no guidelines, no one to ask for advice, and no one to ask for help but our charter members.  We were fortunate that this was a talented group and the development and adaptation of the basic structure moved swiftly.  By summer we had a work projects committee headed by Dennis Swift and an Information and Education committee headed by Ken Ausk.  We had written and printed 5,000 copies of the original Back Country Horseman’s Guidebook and were publishing a newsletter several times a year.

We began to focus our attention on the Bob Marshall Wilderness Plan.  The draft had been released in 1971 and the response had been about 90% negative to the Forest Service proposal.  Horse users were especially critical because they felt that much of the proposal was biased against horse use in the Wilderness that had become almost synonymous with horse use.  Despite heavy criticism by the public, the final plan was almost verbatim to the draft.  The more traditional conservation groups of our area were strangely silent.  Apparently they were too busy promoting new Wilderness Candidate Study Areas to concern themselves with the management of those already existing.  Horse users were faced with restrictions that would make their activities almost unfeasible.  Some of the most important were:

1. Elimination of hitch rails necessary to help mitigate horse impact as not compatible with Wilderness.
2. Elimination of sanitation facilities in concentrated use areas as not compatible with Wilderness.
3. Deteriorating trail system.
4. Elimination of bridges as not compatible with Wilderness.
5. Permit system for horse users only.
6. Elimination of Forest Service cabins as not compatible with Wilderness.
7. Rigid interpretation of the ratio of horses per people, regardless of trip duration or supplemental feed requirements of the area.
8. Elimination of trail signs as not compatible with Wilderness.

They also had:

1. Large administration sites that are no longer needed and in competition with opportunities for public recreational use.

We built arguments countering these regulations that were all defensible from a resource protection standpoint except for the one that discriminated against one type of user by requiring a permit.  After a long battle, all nine of the objections were decided in BCH’s favor and our growing reputation as responsible users was strengthened.

Kalispell’s Daily Interlake of December 13, 1973, read:

The members of the Back Country Horseman’s Association have put a living meaning into the Forest Service’s concept of multiple-use.  The recently formed group has been in existence only a few months.

They organized because of a concern and they drew comments from those individuals opposed to seeing too many horses in the backcountry.  They’ve proved they were needed.  They put their muscles and skills to work completing projects for which the Forest Service did not have the funds or personnel to carry out this year.  The backcountry is the better for these individuals.  We wish them continued success, intent to complete those tasks which they assign themselves and the time to follow their favorite trails through their favorite terrain.

The Daily Interlake Progress Edition of 1975 editorialized:

A service organization second to none is the Back Country Horsemen.  A dedicated group of persons of all ages, Back Country Horsemen has time and again demonstrated its responsibility to work for quality wilderness management.

While we’re on the subject, let’s jump ahead to the November 1982 issue of the Western Horseman where we also had some credits.

In Montana there is a dedicated group called the Back Country Horsemen, and as their name implies, they like to ride the backcountry.  Currently there are nine clubs with names like Mission, Missoula, Flathead, Cabinet, Swan Valley, East Slope, Last Chance, Bitterroot and Salmon.  They all nestle in fairly close to the Bob Marshall Wilderness Area, and “Saving the Bob” is one of their big projects.  They work with local rangers in individual districts, with the Forest Service, and each club takes on projects that help make the backcountry a great place to ride.  They work on trails, construct road-end facilities, clean up campgrounds, build bridges, roll up old wire, build hitch racks, put up trail markers and signs, lay in corduroy – and just about anything else that needs to be done.  This is all volunteer work, and work that could not be done with the limited personnel of the Forest Service.

But back to 1974 when differences began to focus on a Forest Service decision to remove a bridge spanning a dangerous creek-crossing deep within the Bob Marshall.  Horsemen pointed to the agency’s listed rationalization that bridges were not appropriate in designated Wilderness as justification for removal.  Other groups and individuals joined the charge led by Back Country Horsemen and after a tough battle the agency reversed its decision.

Immediately, the Horsemen offered their help in rebuilding the deteriorating structure.  All told, the group packed over thirteen thousand pounds of cement and bridge planking nearly 20 miles into the Bob Marshall.  Other members helped disassemble the rotten portions of the bridge and cut and peeled on-site material for the bridge’s reconstruction.

The Flathead BCH contributed a total of over thirteen hundred man hours and eighteen hundred horse hours into the Salmon Fork’s Bridge reconstruction.

It would be easy to rationalize that our early successes in Back Country Horsemen had a lot to do with luck.  I offer two articles from old issues of Flathead’s newsletter to disprove that.  One article states that philosophy and the other details how that philosophy was developed.

To those of you with a high tolerance for pain, I have also included a picture of the four founders that was taken at our tenth anniversary celebration in 1983.  Bear in mind that the winter of 1982-1983 was tough!

From the November 1973 issue of Flathead’s newsletter under the Editor’s Opinion:

Until the Wilderness Act of 1964, our primitive areas owed their existence largely to remoteness, lack of economic opportunity, and in some cases, the hostility of the land itself.  Modern transportation and an increased population have altered these conditions.  Areas that many modern day Americans view almost with reverence were once regarded with apprehension.

The fortunes of the nomadic tribes, mountain men, and cattlemen of the open range were directly subject to the whims of nature.  Their life was free and unfettered, but their impact on the land was lessened more through a lack of technical advances than it was from environmental concern.  In the broad sense, environmental concerns are a fairly recent development.  In past years when the buffalo or beaver were depleted, the land desecrated by poor mining practices, or the grass became scarce, people moved on to another area.  We no longer have the luxury of this abundance of land, and must use the knowledge and experience of the years to protect what remains.

Contrary to many of our modern day teachings, I believe the first true conservationists were the men with deeded land.  Their land use practices were the barometer of their economic stability and well being.  With the responsibility of ownership came the realization that they could only reap what they sowed and save only what they rotated.

People from other areas and many of our transplanted residents tend to regard our wild lands with more “mystique” than most Montanans do.  Although Montanans have an equal or even greater love for these areas, their regard for the land is either hereditary or acquired through years of experience with people having first hand knowledge.  They view these areas with a more realistic attitude than some of our well meaning but “starry eyed” friends, much of whose knowledge has been gained by reading Aldo Luopold, Henry Thoreau or Bob Marshall.

These men were far seeing and eminent in their fields, they should certainly be respected, but not revered.  Their writings expressed their personal philosophies, but a person’s “Wilderness Ethic” is a matter of his own personal convictions.  A portion of the knowledge required for the formation of his beliefs can be gained through books; they are certainly one of our best teachers.  In the field of the sciences they state hard cold facts, which are used worldwide in different and often opposing philosophies.  Philosophy is largely a matter of judgment rather than fact, and a person’s knowledge, experience, environment, and mental attitude are all prime factors in shaping his reasoning power and judgment.

In the cold gray light of the dawn of the application of the Wilderness Act, all the hard cold facts relative to its management should be used in determining that management.  Science and logic are as viable a determining factor, or perhaps even more so, than is philosophy.

I have sat in discussion groups and have also talked with many knowledgeable individuals about the different aspects of Wilderness, many of who were members of other conservation groups.  Very often their chief concern has been the approval of other Wilderness Candidate Study Areas.  I have always been of the opinion that the American people needed these last remaining areas to remain primitive, but in my mind the management of designated Wilderness is paramount in my assessment of the value of more Wilderness.  It is almost like signing a contract without reading the fine print.  Only in this case, we are the lending agency and the consequences of a bad decision are irrevocable.  We have no collateral once designation is made unless public input is given proper consideration in the formation of the plan under which the area is to be managed.  If cooperation is to be achieved, the views of local people and prior use must be integral parts of management’s decision.

The views of these people helped protect the Wilderness in the past.  Local opinion blocked the construction of dams that would have backed water into the Wilderness and cloud seeding to alter weather patterns within the Wilderness.  Shouldn’t these people have a voice in the management plan for an area that they both know and love?  Ken Ausk

Also from the November 1973 issue of Hoof Beats.  The President’s Corner.

From the outset, the most important recognized force bringing together our Club’s variety of people from Whitefish, Kalispell, Columbia Falls (and points between and beyond) into a cohesive, active, dedicated group was the real fear for the future of continued horse in our National Parks, Wilderness areas, etc.

The fear that brought us together should still be present in each of us, since little has changed to allay those suspicions . . . and yet we want to be responsible in our approach to the problem – even if we suspect that others are not.  We don’t want to rush out and tilt with windmills . . . and yet we would like to know that our people’s needs, desires and ideas are considered before the fact rather than after, as happens so many times.

It was in the hope that our club could arrive at an educated responsible policy toward agency management of back country lands and public use of those lands, that we’ve planned a series of meeting programs designed to cover the range of options (open and closed) to Wilderness management and use.  We began the series in April with a program by Bill Worf, Chief of the U.S. Forest Service’s Region 1 Department of Natural Resources, accompanied by Bill Holman, Special Areas Specialist for Region 1.  Mr. Worf’s program pretty well outlined the constraints on their (Forest Service) operations, as well as public use, as imposed by Congressional intent.  The second in the series of programs covering back country use and management was conducted during our June meeting by Cal Tassanari, Wilderness Ranger for the Flathead National Forest, who presented a program entitled “Hiker and Horseman, Friend or Foe?”  Cal, who is a noted backpacker in his own right zeroed in on the burgeoning conflict between the two and ideas were exchanged for problem solving.  The third in the series saw Robert C. Lucas, Project Leader for Wilderness Management Research from the Intermountain Forest and Range Experiment Station, headquartered in Ogden, Utah, but stationed in Missoula, Montana, make a presentation entitled “Research Related to Wilderness Carrying Capacities” in our August meeting.  Bob’s program offered no conclusions but rather did give us the benefit of their own research in coming to our own conclusions – research that has covered many years in many wilderness areas.

Two more programs will conclude this series; the first – during our October meeting – will be a presentation by Robert Miller, Associate Professor of Range and Animal Sciences at Montana State University, presenting a program entitled “Why Horses Belong in the Wilderness.”  November will see a couple of long-time wilderness horsemen speak on their views of Wilderness Management.  Pat Timmons, a long-time Outfitter and Guide, and Monty Kennedy, ex-Forest Service Packer, will present a program entitled “Horses and Wilderness – Two of a Kind.”

Upon completion of our November program, we are hoping to have a “rap” session among our members – probably the December meeting – prior to our organization taking a position, hopefully at our January meeting.

After addressing ourselves to The Bob Marshall Wilderness Management Plan we would like to turn our attention to Glacier Park’s management of recreational horse use and arrive at some responsible suggestions to present to Glacier’s administration for the implementation of that horse use.

We hope to sandwich in a couple of entertaining programs between these necessary educational programs, all of which should take us till mid-summer 1974.

All in all, the coming year holds promise of being an exciting, educational and profitable year for the Back Country Horsemen.  We would hope that at the completion of this series, our Club – you and me – will have the information necessary to enable us to take a responsible position regarding Glacier Park and National Forest Wilderness Management.  There are two other courses open to us.  One, we could adopt a position hastily and probably irresponsibly.  Two, we could fail to take any position, thereby running the risk of losing by default our heritage and our recreation.  Both latter options are unacceptable, aren’t they?  Roland Cheek

Now, so that you can put a face with a name, from our June 1983 newsletter.

In 1979 the Back Country Horsemen Clubs in Montana joined with Salmon, Idaho, in creating the original Back Country Horsemen of America.  Our present Back Country Horsemen replaced this organization in 1985 with an amalgamation of the High Sierra Stock Users of California and Back Country Horsemen of Washington.  At that time Montana and Idaho formed state Back Country Horsemen groups.  The present Back Country Horsemen has been well documented through newsletters since their organization, so my task has been accomplished.

I would like to state again that my main purpose in writing this article is to emphasize the importance of our foundation philosophy.  There is a world of difference between a special interest group and a “selfish special interest group.”  A commitment to both the horse and the resource is our strength.

Memorial for Loyd Fagerland by Ken and Phyllis Ausk.

The first President and BCH founder, Roland Cheek, created a video titled “The Beginning of Back Country Horsemen: The Most Influential Trail Riding Group in America”. It is available in two formats:

https://youtu.be/m27V3z8Bid8
or
https://vimeo.com/209591920