Sugarbeet Production
In The Milk River Valley

By John Overcast

As the time draws near for the Sugarbeet Festival,
we need to reflect on the industry that did so much
for Chinook and the Milk River Valley. The Utah-
Idaho Sugar Company built the factory in Chinook in
1925 and I was born on a beet farm in the valley in
1926, so I have many memories of growing
sugarbeets as I grew up in the depression years.
The Great Western Sugar Company contracted the
beets from 1952 until 1978, so there are some
farms that raised beets for 53 years. I believe it
would be appropriate to select a king and queen
from the farms that raised beets until 1978; we
stopped in 1965 as we increased our cattle and
raised corn and alfalfa on the land.

During the first years the factory was here, all of the
machinery was pulled by horses, even the wagons
to deliver the beets to the beet dumps located every
few miles along the railroad. By 1930, trucks started
replacing the wagons and more of the beets were
hauled directly to the factory. I can remember the first
new truck my father purchased when I was seven.

The first step in raising beets is preparing the fields
for planting. During the early years, there was no
commercial nitrogen to buy, a plant food that was
needed. Every bit of barnyard of feedlot manure
available would be spread on the land before it was
plowed. Some would plant sweet clover the year
before and plow it under for green manure. Next, the
fields would be disked, harrowed and leveled.
Leveling the land was very important, since a firm
seedbed was needed and irrigation would be
needed, sometimes to get the seed to germinate.
Before the days of steel levelers, the farmers had to
build what they called a "float." This was made
usually out of wooden 2x12 blanks held together
with steel rods. It would be about ten feet wide and
sixteen feet long, with a platform for the man driving
the horses to stand on. This would be pulled across
the field in different directions to level and compact
the soil. Next, the beets would be planted in rows,
usually 22 inches apart. The first planters seeded
four rows and later some would seed six. The
planters would also apply the phosphate needed by
the beets. This came in paper bags and would be
poured into a separate box on the drill. A long steel
rod attached to the planter would mark the center of
the next four rows.

The beets were usually planted in April with the
farmers always hoping for enough rain to germinate
the seed; if not, the fields would have to be irrigated
to get the plants up. This created a problem since
irrigation could cause a crust, which made it difficult
for the seedlings to emerge. Heavy steel rollers
would be pulled across the field to break up the
crust. Sandy and sandy loam soils were better for
beets because of this; the heavy clay soils would
cause problems with the mud sticking to the beets
and clods forming, which made the harvest difficult.
The only seed available until about 1950 was in a
round pod that often produced two or more plants
which would wrap around each other and not form a
good beet. Weather conditions could reduce the
percentage of plants surviving, so it was best to
plant seed enough to fill the row with seedlings. As
soon as the row was visible, a cultivator was used to
prepare the field for the hand laborers to thin the
rows of beets. Before the days of Farmall tractors,
this was done with a horse-drawn cultivator. The
driver would sit on the machine, try to walk the team
between the rows and use his feet to push on a
mechanism to more closely keep the cultivator on
the row. Tools fastened to the bars on the cultivator
were a rotating disc set at a slight angle to leave a
small furrow on each side of the row, knives that
would cut off any weeds or grass growing between
the rows, shanks with a diamond point to dig deeply
and loosen the soil and shanks with a "duckfoot" or
triangle-shaped blade to complete the removal of
anything growing between the rows.

The beets were now ready for hand laborers to thin
them by crawling down the rows. Using a short-
handled hoe in their right hand, they would chop out
all but one beet every 10 or 12 inches, plucking out
the doubles with their left hand. The beets would
then be cultivated again to remove everything
starting to grow between the rows. The laborers
would use a long-handled hoe to remove any weeds
growing in the row, going over the field two more
times. The field would be cultivated one more time to
make furrows between the rows for the irrigation
water to run between the rows. Several irrigations
would be needed to keep the beets growing until
harvest, which was usually in October.

In late September, the factory would accept just
enough beets to keep the refinery going, waiting for
the air to cool enough to prevent spoilage in the
large piles. As soon as they would accept an
unlimited tonnage, the farmers worked long hours to
harvest as many tons as they could each day. There
was always the possibility of a fall storm and an
early freeze-up. In 1958, many acres froze into the
ground and were never harvested.

Before 1946, all the beets were topped by hand.
Each worker would use a knife about 18 inches long
with a pointed hook on the end. A beet lifter pulled by
horses and later mounted on a tractor would loosen
the beets, leaving them in place in the row. A man
would cut the tops off of three rows at a time so that
the tops would be in a row to his right and the beets
to his left. Another worker topping the next three rows
would throw the beets to his right, the end result
being alternate rows of beets and tops, with room for
a truck to straddle the row of tops without driving on
either. There were usually four to six men in a crew,
and they were paid by the tons harvested, so there
was no loitering. When the truck pulled between two
rows of topped beets, they would be there to throw
them into the back of the truck box.

Some areas used a large fork to scoop up the beets,
but all I ever saw was picking up two or three by
hand and tossing them over the side of the box. The
truck driver would pull up about 20 feet at a time and
often get out and help. It was really amazing how fast
they could have five or six tons loaded. The workers
would then pick up their knives and try to have
another load ready when the truck returned from the
beet dump.

When the beet dump opened each morning, there
would be a long line of trucks that had been loaded
the night before, waiting to get weighed and
unloaded. Each farmer had a number that would be
displayed on both sides of the truck. The scale lady
would record the number and the gross weight on a
ticket and lay it aside until the empty truck returned
and was weighed again. The truck would pull up a
ramp either on the left or right of a hopper where the
load would be dumped. Every truck had a hinged
side door on both sides held shut by two short
chains. The factory employee would hook a cable
hoist to rings in the box and jerk the chain holding
the back end of the side door. As the load began to
tip, the truck driver would jerk the front chain and the
load would fall into the hopper. As this was done,
another truck would be pulling up the ramp on the
other side. A belt would carry the beets up to where
they would be bounced around to remove as much
dirt as possible, which would fall onto another belt.
The truck driver would stop under the end of the belt
and the dirt would fall into the truck. A sample of the
load going into the pile would be taken, cleaned with
stiff brushes, weighed before and after cleaning, and
that percentage deducted from the net weight; this
was called the tare. The truck driver would usually
shovel the dirt off into a low spot when he returned to
the field.

As soon as some of the fields were harvested, large
bands of sheep would be trailed in to consume the
beet crowns and tops left in the fields. After the feed
in the fields was gone, the sheep would be placed in
pens and fattened on a ration which was mostly wet
beet pulp. This was what was left of the beets after
the sweet juice was removed at the factory, and was
too heavy and bulky to be shipped long distances.
The company would sell it at a very low price, so this
made it an economical livestock feed. Another by-
product of the factory used for livestock feed was a
black molasses, which was what was left from the
beet juice after the sugar was removed. This was
transported to the farms in barrels. The beet pulp
was shoveled onto trucks and off again along the
sheep pens. In later years, the factory put in a
dehydrator and bagged the pulp blended with
molasses. This made it more expensive since it
could be shipped to a dairy many miles away. This
curbed the sheep feeding business, but for years fat
lambs were shipped east from Chinook by the
trainload.

During the first years that the beets were raised
here, most of the hand laborers were Mexicans from
California. They were migrant workers who would
thin beets in California, drive to Montana for the
spring work, ten back home to top beets and return
for the harvest here. In the depression years, with a
national unemployment rate of 25%, we started
getting people from everywhere who wanted any
kind of work. Over the years, in addition to these, we
have had Filipinos, Indians, Afro-Americans, Mexican
nationals, Japanese Americans relocated during
wold War II and German war prisoners.

Financing sugarbeet production involved a contract
between the company and the farmers that gave the
producers the right to pick up their seed and fertilizer
in the spring and have it deducted from their initial
payment in November. On the other hand, the
farmers agreed to wait until the sugar was sold to
receive all of their money; the final payment came
more than a year after the beets were delivered. This
was not so bad at a time when grain and livestock
producers were shipping their products to market
and the price was too low to cover the freight bill. The
beet growers also received a payment from money
derived from a tariff on foreign sugar. This was the
only way we could compete with American-owned
sugar plantations in Cuba and elsewhere where the
workers received nothing but room and board for
their labor. Today, the farmers in the Yellowstone
Valley, who have a huge investment in equipment,
may soon join us as ex-beet farmers because of
recent trade agreements.

The first machines to replace some of the back-
breaking labor came in 1944. The Diamond beet
loader (there is one on display down by the highway)
would pick up the beets and elevate them onto the
trucks. The only bad part of this was that untopped
beets had to be moved to clear a path for a v-shaped
drag to smooth the ground. The first successful beet
harvester was built by the International Company in
1946. This machine topped the beets with a whirling
disk ahead of the digger, bounced them around to
remove dirt and elevated them onto a cart pulled
behind the topper tractor. On soils that had clods of
dirt, a picking table was mounted on top of the cart.
Two workers would pick the beats and drop them
into the cart and the dirt would be conveyed to fall
behind the cart. Later, the Marbeet Company
produced a harvester that did not require workers on
the cart. It dug the beets first, then had a large wheel
with spikes that carried the beets to the top, where
they ran between two whirling disks. The tops fell
onto the tumbling drums that carried them beyond
the path of the tractor wheel and the beets were
conveyed into a cart. Since then, machines have
gotten bigger and better. While visiting in Michigan, I
rode on a harvester where a semi truck and trailer
drove beside the harvester and was loaded in a
matter of minutes.

The era of the short-handled hoe did not end until
the 1950s, after the factory had closed. A segmented
or single plant seed was developed and the Milton
Company sold a planter that spaced the seed more
evenly in the row. Hand laborers had become very
scarce, so we began experimenting with a thinning
machine. The Chinook area farmers were possibly
the first in the nation to use these machines to thin
beets since they were originally built to thin cotton
plants. The machine had miniature hoes on spokes
that whirled and cut out different percentages of the
beets. We had always thought that it was necessary
to have one plant about ever foot of row. The
machine might cut out all the plants in four feet of
row with the rows on each side of it having several
plants a few inches apart. It didn’t look good, but by
fall the thicker plants had used the plant food from
the blank spots and tons per acre did not change.
With better seed and the use of chemicals, very little
hand labor is now needed.

With modern technology, the farmers in the Billings
area kept increasing their acreage, and in 1978 the
sugar company said they would no longer pay freight
on beets from our area; thus, the curtain was drawn
on sugarbeet production in the Milk River Valley.












The Blaine County Journal would like to thank John
Overcast very much for taking the time to relate his
memories and experiences in the sugarbeet
industry. If you have some memories or experiences
of your own to share from this time and place in
Chinook’s history, give Ron a call or send it to him by
snail or email. The email address is
bcj_fischer@yahoo.com.

SUGARBEET MEMORIES

 

The Millard G. Gilbert Family

By Elsie Gilbert Nelson

 

Our father heard about the U and I Sugar factory in Chinook; that motivated a trip to Chinook to spend some time to study soil composition and yields per acre for raising sugarbeets. He also wanted to check the kinds of fur-bearing animals for trapping, as that was his method to provide winter livelihood for his large family.

 

Papa and two teen-aged sons, Charles and Andrew, came to Chinook from Charlo, Montana to do spring beet work. They earned enough to buy a new Model T Ford.

 

When they returned to Charlo they had pamphlets extolling Chinook and the U and I Sugar factory. My brother, Lewis, and I rode around on horseback to distribute those pamphlets to farmers in the area.

 

Since the Chinook area passed muster with Papa, we loaded up for the move. We used our older car, a Willys-Knight with two jump seats behind the front seat, and the new Model T; one car would not hold all of us.

 

Papa drove the Model T and Andrew drove the Willys-Knight. We older ones rode with Andrew. Andrew would stop and let Papa get ahead so he could speed to catch up. We called him "The Speeder" after that. We could save gas with both cars as one could turn off the motors and coast down hills.

 

Charles rode our saddle horse, Ranger, from Charlo. Papa kept Ranger to use on his trap-line.

 

We took our time on the road. Some of us slept in the cars and the others slept in a tent. The campground I remember best was Fort Benton. The nice park was enjoyable and the old fort was interesting.

 

When we reached Chinook there was a campground there. We set up our tent to stay in until Papa arranged for a home. We increased the population of Chinook by 13. A girl who later became a school-mate told my sister she thought we were gypsies as we filed out of two cars and we girls wore such bright-colored clothes.

 

Papa contracted fall beet work from John Brummer. He furnished a small house for his workers. Besides, East Chinook School was in walking distance,

 

When beet harvest was over we went to East Chinook School. Our teacher was Gladys E. Smith. She has always been my favorite teacher. There were 36 pupils, some in every grade. She had a son, Vernon Smith. My friends were Blanch Brandon, Alice Pridgeon and Mary Flynn. I was in 7th grade.

 

The next year Papa contracted spring and fall beet work for Henry Bosch. His property was closer to the Milk River and he, too, furnished a "beet house." We again attended East Chinook School and Gladys E. Smith was again our teacher,

 

Finally, Papa was able to rent land to raise beets for himself. Some of us were, by then, in high school. We had to rent a place in town for us kids in high school. There was no bus and we lived too far away to walk.

 

In buying fur, Papa found that the King place on Fort Belknap was for rent. He rented it for a long time. It was a long walk to the Agency to catch the school bus, but those living at home did it. My sister said Papa took them to school in severe weather.

 

Four family members graduated from Harlem High School: Lewis, Louisa, Quentin and Lilly.

 

The U and I Sugar factory must have been a stabilizing influence as three family members were born in Chinook: Iris, Kenneth and Gaylord. They were number 12, 13 and 14. Gaylord was called "The Caboose."

 

All but four of the fourteen Gilbert children have been Montana residents since maturity. They reside in Blaine, Hills Cascade and Liberty County. Gaylord recently moved to Silver Bow County.

 

Lilly and I attended NMC, now MSU-Northern College. Most of our nieces and nephews have graduated from Montana colleges. Now some of the great nieces and nephews are attending Montana colleges.

 

All but three of we Gilberts, both male and female, found our mates in the Milk River Valley and on the plains of Montana.

 

Of the original fourteen six are now living. Elsie Nelson, Lilly Kretchmer, Havre; Quentin Gilbert, Acworth, Georgia; Iris Hay, Hood River, Oregon; Kenneth Gilbert, Chester, Montana; Gaylord Gilbert, Butte, Montana.

 

Our parents, John, Andrew and Charles are interred in Kuper Memorial Cemetery, Chinook, Montana.

 

Sugarbeets Are Tasty Vegetables

 

We ate cooked sugarbeets, about fist size, pickled and sometimes with butter. With butter they rival fresh sweet corn.

 

We ate tops from small beets seasoned with vinegar; we preferred them to spinach.

 

Mother put some sugarbeets in the bowl with pickled red beets making pink beets for us, otherwise we preferred sugarbeets. They were especially good by adding sliced onion.

 

A U and I Sugar Valentine

 

A lady friend of mine sent her husband who was in WWII a unique valentine. She filled a syrup bottle with Walker’s Deluxe whiskey, then wrapped it in a small U and I Sugar sack tied with a red, white and blue ribbon and a bow. He received his Valentine and he understood her message.

 

Elsie Gilbert Nelson

Havre, Montana

 

 

 

Sugarbeet Memories

 

Sue Ann Bales

Reno, Nevada

 

As a little girl, I can remember going down to the valley where Overcasts grew sugarbeets. My brothers used to work in the fields hoeing the rows and rows of beets. It was hard work hoeing those weeds, fighting the mosquitoes and tolerating the sun. Billy and LeVeda Overcast employed many high school students, who needed a little spending money, throughout the sugarbeet years.

 

Walline M. Campbell

 

This is a little information on Lucille Nash.

 

Lucille Nash weighed sugarbeets in the 1950s. she was a very hard worker, kept those truck drivers in line and was well-liked by all.

 

My dad, Wallace Nash, worked in the fields till dark during beet harvest like everyone else. My sister, Diana, did the cooking, my brother, Bill, and I did the evening milking if Bill wasn’t at football practice. My mom, Lucille, was at the beet factory weighing the trucks as they came to unload.

 

In October of 1957, we moved to town. I remember walking down to the beet factory with my dog and sitting with my mother. It was interesting, watching all the things she had to do.

 

It is great to see the factory area being remodeled and the spirit of the Sugarbeet Festival taking place; also, it is wonderful when the Chinook all-class reunion has smoke coming out of the stack. These are great memories!

Pickled Sugarbeets

Submitted by Elsie Gilbert Nelson and Iris Evangeline Gilbert Hay

 

Boil about 6 fist-sized beets, then put in cold water and peel.

Cover with boiled pickling liquid:

 

·        1/2 cup sugar

·        2 cups water

·        2 cups apple cider vinegar

·        1 tsp. cloves

·        1 tsp. allspice

·        1 Tablespoon cinnamon

 

Leave set, preferably overnight.

 

Slices of onion may be added for those who like onions.

 

Mother mixed sugarbeets and red beets to make pink beets. Use enough sugar to taste if red beets are used.

 

Sugarbeets are also delicious when prepared and buttered like sweet corn.