Small Town News

Sternberg family farm reaches 100 year milestone along Missouri

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"The Mountaineer" celebrates its one hundredth anniversary this summer. Because of that, from time to time, "The Mountaineer" is honoring area one hundred year old farms and ranches. This week, we honor the Sternberg farm just three miles north of the Missouri River.

Imagine this. A lady from Germany speaks not a word of English, and travels across the Atlantic to the United States. Then, armed with just a note affixed to her clothes telling her destination, she strikes out westward to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Herman Osterman. Mrs. Osterman was her sister. The lady described was Julia Jarmuth. That was in 1901

Meanwhile Nick Sternberg had come to the United States from Germany in 1889. After spending six years in Iowa, he struck out for Montana, coming to Great Falls, then traveling to the country south of the Bear Paw Mountains also to the Herman Osterman ranch. Sternberg had known some Ostermans' back home in Germany. Nick and Julia met, and were married in 1902. Before you know it Sternberg's and Osterman's had large sheep herds and were running them in mostly uninhabited lands south of the mountains and north of the Missouri. Honeymoon hotels for the Sternberg's were various sheep camps on the south side of the Bear Paws mostly between Eagle Creek and the Missouri Breaks.

With the explosion of the Homestead Act in 1911 that all changed. Sternberg realized free grazing land was not to be seen again so sold much of his sheep herd around 1912.

So, off the sheep went to Chicago. Whatever plans Nick Sternberg had for spending money received from the sale of his sheep were dashed when in Chicago those sheep went to market for so little that the sale did not even pay for transporting the sheep to market.

Morris Sternberg, third generation on the Sternberg farm, says that even before that time the family had moved right down to the banks of the Missouri where they squatted. Nick Sternberg was gone frequently still tending to what sheep were left. That left Julia alone on the river. To some, that section of

the river is still called Sternberg Bottoms. Unsettling was life there, with all kinds of unsavory people coming up and down stream at that time. Another move was necessary.

An aside. A few years later Ruby King was living on the same land by the Missouri and running the Lidstone Ferry at that point. During bootlegging days there was so much activity in that area that frequently King slept with a rifle by her side. At times she had to fight off cowboys grazing off her land. Must have been an unsettling place for years, Sternberg's Bottoms.

"I think that Nick and Julia started what was called a desert claim at that time," related Morris Sternberg. "Probably they moved there around 1905. Also in 1905, they had filed on a desert claim part of which was building a dam and being able to irrigate 40 acres."

The desert claim consisted of 350 acres about three miles from the Missouri River. The family raised sheep and cattle but had to farm too. That was the purpose of the dam and irrigation.

Homesteaders were each and every canyon and coulee in the Bear Paw Mountains along with the Missouri Breaks during those years.

Henry Osterman told Morris Sternberg that at Osterman's Grove on Eagle Creek for a Fourth of July Celebration in 1914 there were over a thousand people in attendance.

Homesteading on tiny acreages didn't work for many. By 1917 most were gone but at its heyday, homesteaders were living on every quarter or half section that would sustain them.

Well, to get us to the present, Nick Sternberg was on the farm until his death in 1949. Julia Sternberg died in 1965. Son Herbert was born in the original cabin on the farm in 1908 and lived there virtually all of his life until his death in 1996. Morris took over the farm in 1973 and is farming there to this day. Morris' son Matt, fourth generation, is a natural born farmer and is as at home on the farm as any of the Sternberg's ever have been.

Chelle and Morris Sternberg have another child Carey who lives in Helena along with six grandchildren in Helena and Big Sandy.

The first hundred years seemed like lots of work and unsettling times. How would the second hundred years go we asked Morris Sternberg? "Who knows? It is interesting how things change. Not long after I started expanding I thought there would never be any land changing hands in my lifetime. That has all changed."

Morris Sternberg also wonders about the people on the land.

"It is really remarkable how the population of rural Montana has shrunk," said Sternberg. "Who knows, in the future, what dynamic will be in play. Maybe someday we will have more folks on the land. Sure doesn't look that way today."

Whether it is farming three miles from the Missouri or farming in the Spring Coulee area, it is best not to look forward too far. It is fine to know that conditions look pretty good for this year and that next year will probably be better.

However, when thinking of history, when enjoying the luxury of looking back, what a history one family has had on the land in this part of Montana filling



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© 2010 The Mountaineer Big Sandy, Montana. All Rights Reserved. This content, including derivations, may not be stored or distributed in any manner, disseminated, published, broadcast, rewritten or reproduced without express, written consent from DAS.

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