guns
In the toughest of times, the women of the west had to participate in the work force since families had to make ends meet any way they could. But the work was demanding, often outdoors and with physical labor and lots of hours doing agricultural and other large-scale jobs. By the end of the day, they were exhausted…just like their men. It’s not that women aren’t capable of hard work, because they absolutely are. Nevertheless, their bodies aren’t built for the same kind of work as the men…or at least it isn’t as easy as for the men.
During World War I and World War II, when so many men were called to duty, and so many were killed, the workforce at home was dramatically shrinking. So, like they always did, the women stepped up. It’s not that the men weren’t stepping up too, 
because going to war is most certainly stepping up. Really, everyone was doing a job that was not in their normal wheelhouse. Times were tough and tough times called for tough people. It the war was going to be won, the military had to be supplied with the necessary materials to fight with. Things like ammunition, uniforms, boots, tanks, planes, bombs, guns, and much more were vital; and without the help of the women back home, the men would not have the things they needed to win the war.
The thing about these particular women was that at that time in history, most women were stay-at-home moms, and at that time that really meant cleaning the house, cooking, and caring for the children. These were not times of going to the gym to work out, and the main exercise was the daily chores. Don’t get me wrong, because the chores 
were hard work, and that did keep the women in shape, but they weren’t miners or factory workers. This necessary work was all new to them. The endeavor to bring these women into the workforce was no small undertaking. The had to be trained and trained quickly. There was no time to waste. The women, for their part, jumped at the chance to help their men and the men of the nation. They learned their new jobs quickly and did their jobs efficiently. They were loyal to their men and their country, and they were willing to take on the exhausting jobs they were asked to take on. In fact, I don’t think the wars could have been won, without both parts…the men and the women, and the necessary work they did.
My nephew, Steve Spethman is a great husband and dad. Steve joined our family when he married my niece, Jenny Spethman on September 21, 2002. Their marriage has been blessed with five children, Xander, Zack, Isaac, Laila (who lives in Heaven), and Aleesia. They have such a strong bond, and I think much of that is due to the fact that Steve is a romantic and a protector. He loves Jenny so much, and no matter what happens in life, he is there to show her how much he loves her. He recently took Jenny to a 311 concert just so he could listen to one song that he plays to her all the time, called “Love Song.”
Steve loves to cook and many of us in the family have had the wonderful opportunity to eat some of the great dishes he makes. He also has his own forge, and he has made lots of wonderful knives…all of which he has sold for a very nice profit. Steve also does metal art, but he rarely sells any of that, because he pretty much does that for Jenny, as a labor of love. He is such a hard worker. He works all day and the comes home to work in the forge, making knives and such for extra money. Really, it’s because he loves to make things and he’s very good at it.
Steve is an avid gun owner and loves to go out shooting. He has trained all their kids to shoot, and the boys have all passed their hunter safety classes and go hunting with Steve to help provide meat for the family. The children have also been taught the value of life and to respect life. A big part of gun safety is to teach the gun user that to use the gun in deadly force against another human being must be carefully thought out and used only to protect from attack. The children have been taught these important values.
Steve loves to take his family places and show them the many great things this country has to offer. They love to go to Rapid City and the Black Hills area, especially the water parks. They also love the things that the Casper area has to offer, often going to the summer “Rock the Block” programs and other things that are held at David Street Station. But they also love to go to the Alcova Lake and to Casper Mountain, where they enjoy hiking. Steve also loves to take everyone for rides on his motorcycle, but of course, his favorite riding partner is the love of his life, his wife, Jenny. Steve has made the lives of his family so blessed, and they all love him so much. Today is Steve’s birthday. Happy birthday Steve!! Have a great day!! We all love you!!
When a nation has a weapon that is so deadly to its enemy nations, those nations have no choice but to find a new way to beat that weapon. The German U-Boat was just such a weapon. Gliding along silently beneath the sea, the U-Boat put the ships of the Allied nations in constant and grave danger. That was one of the reasons that the British developed a fixation on their presence at sea. They depended on seaborne trade, and during World War I, the Germans were terrorizing that trade.
For much of Great Britain’s history, they enjoyed the luxury of having more battleships than the next two powers combined. For that reason, the Germans knew that they would have to concentrate their efforts on attacking vulnerable shipping lanes to disrupt the British war effort. They didn’t care if there were passengers on those ships. They didn’t care about loss of life or supplies. They had one plan…to dominate the seas. German submarines became a menace to the merchant navy. Something had to change, so the British came up with a plan to counter the U-boat threat. The plan involved disguising armed vessels as harmless trawlers to 
lure the submarines in and then wipe them out. The answer to the U-boat were disguised vessels…decoys, known as Q-ships.
Knowing that the U-Boats were under orders to attack just about anything. The Q-ships hid naval guns behind pivoting panels. It was the Sun Tzu tenet of “hold out baits to entice the enemy.” The Q-ships pretended to be disabled and when the U-Boats show up for the kill, the Q-ships went into action. Guns and additional crew had been concealed by hinges that could be dropped at a moment’s notice. The U-boats of World War I had limited range and carrying capacity, so the captains were nervous about wasting their torpedoes. Also, while the U-Boats of World War II were more capable of lang periods of time submerged, the U-Boats of World War I, had limited capability, so they preferred to use the submarine’s main gun to subdue ships whenever possible.
As the U-Boats came into sight of the Q-ship, the Q-ship’s crew would pretend to panic and abandon the ship to 
draw the submarine in close. The U-Boats, once lured in, were at the mercy of the Q-ships. The Q-ships began to drop their depth charges as soon as the submarine tried to escape. It was a dangerous game to play and required a brave crew to pull off the ruse, and it was not always successful. Some Q-ships were lost, but because of their efforts the threat of submarines in World War I were lessened. The plan was to try the tactic again in World War II, but ships were in very short supply. The tactic of using decoy ships was much more limited but was also used by the Germans and Americans. While it wasn’t a major tactical warfare practice during the two wars, it was effective while it was used.
It’s said that there is nothing more dangerous than a humiliated man, and I suppose that could be true, but in the case of Andrew Kehoe, I think there was more to it than just one humiliation. Kehoe had shown violent tendencies since he was a child. Now, I’m not saying that every angry child will grow up to be a monster, but it might be something to monitor. If the violence becomes worse with age, there could be something wrong that needs to be addressed.
Andrew Philip Kehoe was born on February 1, 1872 in Tecumseh, Michigan. He was part of a large family. Kehoe showed violent tendencies early on. He tended to blame others for his troubles, which I think is also a common trait in troubled people. Kehoe was notified in June 1926 that his mortgage was going into foreclosure. Andrew Kehoe had been on the school board as treasurer. After his defeat in the April 5, 1926, election for the township clerk Kehoe lost it. Because of his association with the school board, Kehoe set his sights on the Bath School as a target to voice his frustrations. It was the last straw. Kehoe began secretly buying explosives. He hid them on 
his father’s farm and under the school. On May 18, 1927, Kehoe murdered his wife Nellie Price Kehoe. He then blew up his farm, saying to the firemen as he drove away that they should go to the school instead. Then Kehoe drove off.
Kehoe made a sign and hung it on the fence at his farm, saying “Criminals are made, not born.” It was typical of his belief that all of his troubles could logically be blamed on other people, or even on chance events. He never took the blame for his problems himself. Following the bombing of his farm, Kehoe went on to set off the bombs that he hoped would completely destroy the Bath school, and kill everyone in it. Kehoe was disappointed to see that an additional 500 pounds of dynamite that had been set to go off at the same time as the other explosions, failed to detonate. Only a section of the front of the school blew up. Nevertheless, it was enough to kill 38 students and 6 teachers. To this day, the Bath School Massacre remains the deadliest school disaster in history, and it came long before the recent school disasters that so many blame on guns. No guns were used, except maybe to kill his wife, but there is no mention of that in the stories of this disaster either. After the bombing of his farm and the Bath School, Kehoe detonated more explosives in his truck killing himself and four other bystanders. Andrew P Kehoe was a local farmer and school board treasurer. Kehoe was well educated, respected, 
and was an accommodating neighbor and friend. But behind his ordinary demeanor was a narcissistic sadist seething with rage, resentment, and paranoia. To say that something in his life was to blame for his rage is really far fetched. To say that he was mentally ill might be more accurate. It’s hard to say if counseling could have helped either. It is something we will never know.
My uncle, Bill Spencer has always been a very interesting man, and I mean that in the very best sense of the word. I don’t know what kind of a student Uncle Bill was in school, but he has always loved learning, probably more so on his own than in a classroom. Somehow he doesn’t strike me as a kid who would have loved being in class, but I could be wrong. His passion was, of course, the family history, but Uncle Bill likes history to go along with his family history, and that is where my uncle and I are the most alike. My Uncle Bill worked meticulously and tirelessly on the family history, someday hoping to get it into the hands of the younger generation, which ended up being me and a few others who cared about it the same way he did…and for his hard work, I will be forever grateful.
Much of my uncle’s knowledge about things was self-taught. He learned about antiques, guns, stamps, and 
coins; and then he incorporated his knowledge into businesses he owned and ran. And he would pass his knowledge along to anyone who wanted to listen. It was Uncle bill who got me interested in stamps and coins, and while I don’t have large collections, I have a few that I like. I think it might have been his love of stamps, coins, and guns that sparked Uncle Bill’s interest in antiques, but I don’t know that for sure. His knowledge of family history and his Dad, Allen Luther Spencer’s ability to make furniture, might have had a part in that too. In addition, the era that my Uncle Bill was born into, did not have the ability to mass produce furniture like we have today, so the beautiful furniture pieces became one-of-a-kind works of art, and not just the useful, but cookie-cutter furniture on our day.
Uncle Bill is getting older now, and some of his recent memory escapes him, but the past remains vivid, at least 
on his good days. The last time I saw him was a good day, and that made my sister, Cheryl Masterson, my cousin, Pam Wendling, and me very happy. His stories about the old days were vivid and full of knowledge, and any slips in his memory, were humorous and sweet, and still tied to people of the past. His advancing years, make me feel the urgent need to visit as often as I can, and my sisters, Cheryl, Caryl Reed, Alena Stevens, and I hope to make the trip late this upcoming summer for another visit. With each passing year, we just never know if Uncle Bill will still be with us. He isn’t the oldest sibling in his family, but he has lived the longest. Nevertheless, one day, he will no longer be with us. I pray that day is a long way off. Today in Uncle Bill’s 98th birthday. Happy birthday Uncle Bill!! Have a great day!! We love you very much!!
Since the 17th century, Texas, or Tejas as the Mexicans called it, had technically been a part of the Spanish empire. However, there were only about 3,000 Spanish-Mexican settlers in Texas, even as late as the 1820s, and Mexico City’s hold on the territory was very weak. Tensions were growing between Mexico and Texas, and on October 2, 1835, the area erupted into violence when Mexican soldiers attempted to disarm the people of Gonzales. People just don’t take kindly to having their guns taken away in any era, I guess. The citizens of Texas chose a war for independence of allowing the government to take their guns.
Mexico had just won it’s own independence from Spain in 1821. At this point, Mexico welcomed large numbers of Anglo-American immigrants into Texas. They were hoping that these citizens would become loyal Mexican citizens, thereby keeping the territory from falling into the hands of the United States. During the next decade men like Stephen Austin brought more than 25,000 people to Texas, most of them Americans. But while these emigrants legally became Mexican citizens, they continued to speak English, formed their own schools, and had closer trading ties to the United States than to Mexico.
The situation exacerbated in 1835, the president of Mexico, Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, overthrew the constitution and appointed himself dictator. Recognizing that the “American” Texans were likely to use his rise to power as an excuse to secede, Santa Anna ordered the Mexican military to begin disarming the Texans whenever possible. He underestimated the people. His attempt to disarm proved more difficult than he could have ever imagined, and the situation exploded on that October day in 1835.
That day, the Mexican soldiers were attempting to take a small cannon from the village of Gonzales. To their surprise, they encountered much stiffer resistance than they ever thought possible from a hastily assembled militia of Texans. After a rather brief fight, the Mexicans retreated and the Texans kept their cannon. The determined Texans would continue to battle Santa Ana and his army for another year and a half before winning their independence and establishing the Republic of Texas. This truly goes to show that a nation, whose citizens are armed, is much more likely to be able to fend off their enemies…even if that enemy is a tyrannous government; than an nation of disarmed citizens. Yes, the ensuing war lasted for another year and a half, but 
the people won their independence in the end. They later went on to become a part of the United States, and they continue to carry their guns to this day. The people of Texas are just as adamant about their right to bear arms today as they were in 1835, as are a good number of their fellow Americans. It’s a fight that would not likely be won by the government today either. The American people won’t accept the loss of guns without a fight of epic proportions!!
In any war, when soldiers are killed or wounded in battle, their guns, grenades, and bullets were left behind…forgotten. Those who assisted the wounded and carried off the dead, had more important things to attend to than the soldier’s weapons and such, which were simply left behind…discarded. As the front lines shifted from one area to another, battlefields were deserted, and in the absence of the trampling footsteps of the soldiers, the grass and low plants began to grow again. As the months and years passed, trees continued to grow. The littered items somehow became embedded in the bark of the growing trees. That phenomena has always amazed me. How could the tree bark accept this odd foreign object into itself…and yet it did. Of course, it was not without scars that the odd pair would coexist. The foreign items would be wrapped with a knotted looking bulge, or would appear to eat up portions of the foreign object, while completely ignoring another part, as if it was simply laying beside it.
Like the weapons of war, the soldiers’ helmets were often discarded in an injury or more likely death situation. The likelihood of survival for the owner of a helmet that contained a bullet hole, was slim to none. The helmet was not likely to be needed by its owner again, so the helmet lay on the battlefield where it had been discarded. As time went on, the little sapling trees growing up after the end of the war started up under the helmet. In order for the tree to grow up, it had to make its way, somehow through the helmet or to topple it in order to survive. A bullet hole provided the perfect way to get through the heavy helmet. The tiny tree peeked through the hole to find the sunlight necessary for the tree’s survival. As the tree grew, the corroding helmet allowed the hole to be expanded, and the tree became larger. Soon the helmet became a part of the growing tree. There was not a knotted wrapping of the tree around the helmet, but rather the helmet took on a mushroom like appearance. It looked like an odd sort of umbrella to anyone who might come across this odd marriage of nature and the man-made helmet. Only on occasion did the tree protest the marriage, or the helmet refuse to allow the expansion of the hole, thereby creating the knot that was so often seen as the tree 
absorbed the foreign object. Even then, the tree could not fully absorb the helmet, and so it looked almost like the tree was wearing the helmet on its knotted head…and the branches protruding from the knot looked like messy hair. The strange looking trees, were a lingering reminder of a war that was long over, but somehow not forgotten…and nature prevails.
When I asked his dad what was new with my grand-nephew, Zack Spethman, the first thing he said was, “He’s tall.” And that is the truth. Zack has literally shot up in height in the past couple of years. It shocks me every time I see him. I pretty much have to stand on my tip toes just to give him a hug. While Zack is the second son of my niece, Jenny Spethman and her husband, Steve, I have a feeling that he might be the tallest person in his family. It’s hard to say, because the boys still have some growing to do, but at this point, Zack is most definitely in the lead.
Zack is such a loving, sweet natured young man, and he is never afraid to show people that he loves them. Many teenagers…especially boys are worried about the hit their “image” might take, if they are seen hugging their mom, dad, or aunts and uncles in public, but Zack doesn’t care about all that. Zack’s sweet nature doesn’t make him a wimp, just the opposite in fact. Zack is great in sports, and a great protector of those he cares about. Zack knows how to shoot a gun, and after passing hunter safety a year or so ago, he is also a great hunter. Zack and his brothers, Xander and Isaac, love to do 
the same things their dad is doing. From guns to snowmobiles to swimming to hiking, they are all in!!
Of course, these boys aren’t too proud to play with their little sister, Aleesia, and help he with anything she needs. They treat her like a princess, and she loves each and every one of them. Zack is also a perfect gentleman at school, and his teachers all think the world of him. He is never on to get into trouble, and rather is the first one to offer assistance whenever it is needed. He makes his parents, and the rest of the family, very proud of him, and I know that he will continue to turn into a wonderful young man. Today is Zack’s 14th birthday. Happy birthday Zack!! Have a great day!! We love you!!
My grandnephew, Zack Spethman is a great kid, but he is quickly growing up and is hardly a kid anymore. Today he became a teenager, and is just about to finish his first year of middle school. That put him back at the same school and his brother and good friend, Xander. The share many activities, likes and dislikes, and their similar personalities. Football is the sport above all sports for them. They love to watch and play. It is a family tradition. The three Spethman brothers, Xander, Zack, and Isaac rising up through the ranks of school football. It keeps their parents busy with all the games.
Of course, football isn’t everything in their lives. Zack loves to climb mountains, play pool, and shoot guns…everything from air guns, to paintball guns, to real guns. He is a good shot and goes to practice with his family often, but he also knows about gun safety, and has passed the hunter safety course, so he can go hunting. 
Still, while hunting is a great adventure, the boys love combat competitions. They love to strategize the ways to dominate and “take out” the other team. Zack and Xander tend to pool their strategic resources to obtain the victory.
Zack’s dad, Steve Spethman decided to remodel the family kitchen earlier this year, and the boys got to learn about construction by helping their dad do the work. They were very attentive and meticulous about the work, and they learned a lot about the construction business. Their dad is a great carpenter, and a great teacher, so they learned from the best. They often work with their dad, and he is teaching them the value of hard work. Their parents have also taught the kids to be responsible for each other and for their little sister, and this is a job Zack takes seriously. He can often be seen encouraging his siblings and assisting his little sister, Aleesia. They are all very close.
Zack is such a sweet, kind young man, and we are all proud of him. He is loyal and loving to his family, and helpful to all in need. He is always there to give a hug or a word of encouragement. He is a good student, and is responsible. When he says he will be somewhere, he is. That was never more clear that when he was given an award for the best attendance in football last year. With his winning attitude and awesome personality, I know Zach will go far. He is a blessing to those who know him. Today is Zack’s 13th birthday. Happy birthday Zack!! Have a great day!! We love you!!
My grand nephew, Jake Collett is an electrician for H.I. Power. He really loves his work and that is a big plus, but of course his work is not his life. Like most of us, Jake’s career is a means to a better life. Jake is married to my grand niece, Katy, and they are very well suited to each other. They like the same activities, so they are going the same direction in their lives. That makes for great compatability in life.
Like many Wyoming boys, Jake’s free time is spent doing all the boy stuff. He loves to target practice with his guns, and from what I hear, he’s pretty accurate. That’s what you want. Guns are not too much good if you can’t hit anything, and these days you never know when you will need to protect yourself and your family. And of course, living in Wyoming usually means that you like to hunt, and you can’t bag your game if you can’t hit it.
Jake also loves dirt bikes and 4-wheelers and loves to go riding with his wife Katy, and his dogs Bubba and 
Sheiba. The dogs are somewhat like kids, in that they are what to go riding with daddy whenever he will take them…which is most of the time. Jake and Katy bought a piece of land in the country where they and their dogs can roam free. They don’t have to take a long drive to get to a place where they can ride their 4-wheelers. They just go outside, and they are set to go. Of course, they also love riding and hiking in the many beautiful places that Wyoming has to offer, because it gives them a chance to enjoy the beautiful scenery we have here. Katy and Jake are building a beautiful life for themselves, and I know that there are many good things to come. They are totally happy together. Today is Jake’s birthday. Happy birthday Jake!! Have a great day!! We love you!!
