Fossil Posts and Lawyers
Terry Gottschalk
Logan, Kansas
This week on RiverEarth.com, Kansas fence builder Terry Gottschalk explains two-wire Angus cattle, car crash lawyers and fossil-embedded fenceposts. Confused? Click here to listen why you should consider five-strand fence in this country….
Terry Gottschalk
Logan, Kansas
Terry Gottschalk owns a fence building company in Logan, Kansas. When I told him I was traveling the Great Plains by mule wagon looking for marine fossils from the Western Interior Sea, the great inland sea that covered the Great Plains millions of years ago, he told me I should take a look at his fence.
His fence?
Seems Terry had built a fence using limestone fenceposts from Hays, Kansas, 60 miles south of Logan.
Terry’s fence
Terry explained that when the homesteaders arrived in this part of Kansas in the late 19th century, they found lots of grass and limestone outcrops but few trees. Because they needed to fence their claims, they turned to the rocks for their fence posts.
Land of the lime stone post
North of Hays, Kansas
The early Kansas homesteaders turned their newfound, brutal winters to their advantage. The lime stone they needed for posts was found in layered outcroppings. Using hand augers, the farmers drilled rows of holes into the stone, filled them with water and waited for the water to freeze. When the water froze and expanded, it split the stone into fence post size chunks.
These they erected in lieu of wood posts.
Fence post and soap weed
Logan, Kansas
100 years after the homesteaders split their posts with water, Terry Gottschalk gathered up ½ mile’s worth of them and re-erected them on his property. Big deal, right? Well, it really wouldn’t be except for one detail. Many of these 300-plus pound fence posts contained fossilized shells. According to Terry, of his posts, “about every third one has a fossil in it.”
Fossil shell in Terry’s fence
Nice. Traces of the Lost Sea right in an every day fence post.
A few evenings ago, while mule Polly and I were parked behind the abandoned Brown Country School, I spoke with Terry about his fence. No, we didn’t talk about the fossils. Rather, we talked barbed wire,lawyers and the size of Angus cattle. Until the 1960s they were short and fat (the cattle, that is…).
Terry explains
To listen to Terry, click on the audio player below. Terry picks up the discussion by saying how Angus cattle have only gotten taller in the past few decades.
Good evening, my name is John Ninemire. You are going to find this strange, but I am a fence builder also. I am actually the fence builder that got Terry started in the business. I was driving home from Norton, Ks today and passed Terry on the road. Have not heard from him in 12 years. I looked him up on the internet just to see how old he was getting to be. BTW, I’m 61. I started fencing when I was 21. I came across your article when I googled Terry and couldn’t help but respond. We moved from Hill City to 20 miles south of Russell KS (heart of limestone fence posts) and we bought a 1915 two story limestone home and restored it. We sold our business in 2012 and bought the 300 acres of land, the original homestead from 1887. I know and understand your following the great Midwestern Sea. We have so many fossils in the stones they constructed our house from and the limestone posts on our property. I just wanted byo touch base with you and tell you some of our story. God bless,
Terrific hearing from you John! Marvelous that you know Terry. I just re-listened to that interview I did all those years ago with Terry about 2-wire fences, Angus cattle and lawyers. I really did enjoy my time with him. Some of his fossils made it in to the “Lost Sea Expedition” series. Too bad we didn’t have enough room to fit him in. Great man with great stories. Fun to know that his fossils will live on in the series.
Amazing to hear you got Terry started in the fence building business.
It was so cool hearing you lived on one of those Kansas homesteads. I made my way from Hill City to Hays via mule and sure appreciated the changing landscape. Lovely terrain. Just hard to homestead….
I still think of my Kansas friends whenever I look at that fence post I hauled home from Hays. At the very top, of course, a fossilized shell.
I hope all’s well with you out Kansas-way.
Be sure to say hi to Terry if you run across him.
Bernie / RiverEarth.com
Bernie