Sheep Industry News November 2023

Mexico to graze there instead, he ended up buying a Piggly Wiggly franchise in Mexico, which included six stores. The sheep transport idea proved a bust. He quipped that he not only had to hire sheepherders there, he had to hire men to watch the sheepherders and then other men to watch the men watching the sheepherders. He ended up selling his flock at a loss. But the Piggly Wiggly stores were a big win, and more than made up for that loss. Okie also had an impressive list of firsts to his name. He brought the first steam sheep-shearing plant to the United States in 1894. “Right across the creek over here, there’s an old sweat shed,” Fross said. “What they would do is they’d bring the sheep in and put them under the shed overnight. That would pull the lanolin out into the wool. You could increase the weight of that fleece 10, 15, 20 percent by putting them in that shed overnight.” Okie also built a warehouse to store his wool, noticing that sheepmen all tended to sell their wool at the same time, depressing the prices. He would hold onto his wool and sell it later, when the price had improved. Okie tried to talk his fellow sheep ranchers into building a $10,000 wool-scouring plant in Casper, which would have increased the value of wool before it went to market. Reducing the debris in the wool would have also lowered the wool’s weight, saving COMPLETELY UPDATED Sheep Production Handbook Fully Searchable USB

money in shipping costs. The wool-scouring plant didn’t catch on. But, when the tariff on foreign wool was revoked in 1913, Okie built an Australian shearing shed, which is still stand ing in Moneta, to better compete on the world market. He also hired Basque sheepherders, recognized as the best sheepherders in the world, to run his flocks. They were in such great demand, only the best operations could afford them. Okie had a big advantage because he was a world traveler and could afford to bring Basques in directly from northern Spain. He also spoke several languages, so he could talk to his herders directly. Okie recognized the value of learning foreign languages. His children – who were all homeschooled – had to learn a foreign language. He would then send them to the country of their chosen language for at least six months, to ensure they were fluent. HE HAD A CAR Okie had the first car in central Wyoming. When he built his mansion, it had a carbide-based electric system, likely also a first for central Wyoming, if not the state. A little moisture on the carbide produced acetylene gas, which would burn clean and produce lights for the mansion. In one of the living room areas, there are green-fringed glass beads original to the house, along with the original green paint, Fross said. “Imagine having that light send the glow of green through those beads,” he said. “The ambiance in this room must have been kind of incredible.” Incredible, too, is the mansion itself, built in the high plains desert with running water in the year 1901. Okie was the home’s architect, Fross said, but employed French masons to cut the stone for his mansion and carpenters who framed the home using pine wood he had hauled in by freight train. “Some people said he was crooked,” Fross said. “But I re ally don’t see that. To work for J.B. Okie was a coveted thing. He had that bunkhouse that looked like a depot. He had a pool table there for all the people to play pool. And they had beds in there that didn’t have bugs. That was a big plus. To work for Okie was a valued thing, a treasured thing.” So, too, is the chance to keep up Okie’s mansion, Fross told Cowboy State Daily. “I love this old girl,” he said. “She’s definitely worthy of our respect. What Okie did here was phenomenal really. And for Wyoming and the time period, way ahead of his time.” Republished with permission from Cowboy State Daily.

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