About a friend

I have never questioned it, I just took it for granted as a natural part of my life. Do not know exactly why or how it happened, but 75 years ago when I came down from the Hog Heaven Hills to attend Flathead High I met a boy being raised by his grandmother, Freda. He got me into a Boy Scout troop, and my life friendship began with Ivan O’Neil.

One of the first things that happened was he got shot in the back while walking near a friend’s home in West Valley. The bullet came from a .22 shot up in the air far away. Ivan fell down thinking a bee had stung him. Hospital treatment showed the slug stopped just short of his heart. It is still in him. At least it was last Friday.

I’m writing about our friendship because I consider it far beyond the usual. In high school, he became the team manager in sports and I got in a few games. He was restricted by that bullet and I was restricted by small size and no experience.

We lied about our age to work for the Forest Service during the war and manned Pioneer and Battery lookouts in the South Fork wilderness. A test of our friendship was manifest by him listening to me practice my trumpet over the telephone. When the war ended in summer of 1945 he got the news over his radio and we were allowed to hike out to the remote Elk Park Station for a quick trip to Kalispell to celebrate. He got to Elk Park first via a downriver bridge then stood on the far bank with a lantern to guide me across. Could have been bad for me because I didn’t know about a deep hole I barely avoided that washed my little dog away in the dark. Luckily he made it across and showed up at the station an hour later.

Someone going up to Spotted Bear gave us two beers and I had seven cigarettes left in my pack of Luckys so we smoked one before catching a ride out to Coram. Remembering that lets me recall that Ivan saved my life when I was swimming across Lake Blaine, showing off for a couple of girls that fall.

Guys our age were being drafted after high school to occupy Japan and Germany so I quit school early and went to Germany. Ivan had the bullet so he went to the University of Montana. When I returned in spring of 1949, Ivan conspired with my dad and made me go down, and somewhat reluctantly, enroll at the U, and later got me into his fraternity, Theta Chai. He graduated two years ahead of me and got married. Then the Army decided to take him, bullet and all, so he put in time during the Korean War.

Desire to start his own business brought him home and horrendous parachute injuries brought me back in 1954. I got a job with KOFI radio by talking the owners into firing a guy whom I told them, “Couldn’t read very well.”

The following 63 years have been good for Ivan and me. He built the largest most successful string of retail lumber businesses in Montana, “The Western Business Centers.” I consider Ivan one of the most hard-working and knowledgeable businessmen ever produced in this valley and along the way was a leader in community affairs helping found the first professional retirement home for older people, “The Lutheran Home Complex,” plus super modern “Glacier International Airport,” a couple of banks, etcetera. Got the chamber’s “Great Chief Award.”

In our personal lives, Ivan’s wife Marian and my wife Iris became close friends and formed a wonderful sewing club that led us to travel extensively over much of the world from Yukon’s frozen ice fields to the steaming jungles of Belize. We both were blessed with fine children who achieved success.

Ivan and I figure conservatively we’ve hiked near 10,000 miles in Glacier Park and climbed over half of its 200 major peaks. Also did wondrous hikes in places like Jamaica, Central America, Canada, and Hawaii.

Ivan and I with a few close pals have had several partnerships for real estate developments including a mile of shoreline at Crystal Lake, and smaller operations around Glacier Park, Flathead, Bailey, and Echo Lakes, plus our fly-in hideaway at Moose City. No big contracts and agreements, just a page or two of facts and a handshake. Can’t remember a single instance of anger or serious disagreement. Ivan and I acquired publishing rights on my “Glacier’s Secrets” books, including the last one with his picture on the cover, which is still selling.

The most important part of any man’s life beyond his family is a friend who shares the good times and the bad with full commitment. Ivan and I each have one.

G. George Ostrom is a national award-winning columnist for Hungry Horse News. He lives in Kalispell.