Response Letters
May 17 - 1927
Dear Mr. Rickmeyer.
Answering your letter I cannot recall the reason why the City of Hardin, Montana was named Hardin. That was may years ago and I am now 85. I have doubts about the town being named for Mr. Hardin of Bridger. I was at that time President of the Lincoln L. and Co. The owners of the land on which Hardin is located. His story may be true but I never heard it before. If you will write to F.N. Pearson - Burlington, Iowa - who is Assistant to the President of said company he can give you correct information as per your request. He was the active representative of the company at that time. Send him this letter and the letter or statement made by Mr. Hardin.
Yours,
CH Morrill
January 15, 1928
Union Pacific Ry Co.
Omaha
Gentlemen:
Are you able to give me the present address of Mr. H.C. Nutt, who was connected with the Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad before the war and who was overseas in some capacity during the war?
I will thank you for the information.
Very truly yours,
Clarence Reckmeyer
Mr. H.C. Nutt,
Pest. & Gen. Mgr. Monongahela R'y Co.,
1202 Century Bldg., Pittsburgh, Pa.
March 29, 1928
Dear Sir:-
I received your letter of March 24th enclosing a story of one George C. Hardin concerning an episode which he claims have participated in while employed by the Burlington road as a Fireman in the month of June 1906.
I ceased to be Superintendent of the Burlington road at Sheridan in the spring of 1900, and consequently have no personal knowledge of what might have happened as related by Mr. Hardin during his trip as a Fireman in June 1906, and do not now recollect who was Superintendent of the Burlington at Sheridan at that time.
When I was Superintendent at Sheridan this station, now called Hardin, Montana, had a different name, but I cannot recollect what the name of it was, though I was under the impression when the name of Hardin was given to this station that it was so named as a compliment to Mr. S.H. Hardin, who at that time lived at Ranchester, Wyoming, and in connection with his partner Mr. A.B. Campbell, had a large herd of cattle ranging on the the Crow Reservation.
To be frank with you I think this story of Mr. George Hardin is entirely without foundation in fact, and I would judge that if his claim to be 1/16 Comanche Indian is correct, 15/16 of his character is that of a romancer.
I return the copy of Mr. Hardin's romance thinking it may be of some interest to you, and in case you should chance to see or communicate with Mr. Shickley I wish you would give him my compliments and best regards, and tell him that I have never ceased to remember with satisfaction our association of many years ago when he was living at Geneva, Nebraska.
Yours very truly,
H.C. Nutt
April 13, 1928
Dear Mr. Reckmeyer;
I am very much obliged for your favor of the first inst and return herewith Mr. Nutt's letter. I will be pleased to write H.C.N. and get in touch with him again.
In regard to the Hardin matter I think it quite probable that Nutt has George C. Hardin sized up about right, especially in view of the facts with which I am personally familiar.
My son G. N. Shickley is Time Keeper of the Sheridan Division of the Q and I had him investigate the matter of succession in the office, and it seems that Edward Gillette (now of Sheridan) succeeded Nutt as Superintendent from 1900 to 1905. Mr. Sandusky, still on the division, was road master at the time and says that the station of Wakely, Wyo. was first named Hardin and when the change was made he had the name boards changed and that it was generally understood that it was changed to the more promising location in honor of Col S. H. Hardin.
With very best regards. I am,
Sincerely yours,
V. C. Shickley
March 13, 1975
Here's another version of the how Hardin got its name
Dear Editor:
It was with considerable interest that I read Lorna Thanckeray's story in the Herald dated Feb.27, 1975, concerning the naming of Hardin and of the two men having claim to that honor.
Well, I can lay that problem to rest ass to who has the authentic right to that distinction. In fact, I have two sound and factual reasons (as often related to me in an interview printed in the old Hardin Tribune-Herald in 1948). Both involve my father, Carl Rankin, who was selected by the Lincoln Land Co. to become their suveyor in a new town to be located somewhere between Billings and Sheridan.
The site determination was made in the fall of 1906, but then there arose the question of what to name the new town. At first the townsite company toyed with several Indian names, it even considered naming the new town Fort Custer, but nothing was really settled on for some months.
However, since the plat of the townsite, filing thereof and other related legal aspects required a name, Mr. C. H. Morrall, president of the Lincoln Land Co., decided to name the new town after a close personal friend, Samuel B. Hardin, a Wyoming citizen and cattleman.
Obviously, the George C. Hardin story is an interesting and amusing relating of a figment of a fertile imagination. On the other hand, I cannot dispute factually or otherwise the comments of Shickley and Sandusky. The moving of the name board from Wyoming to Montana, in view of Mr. Morrall's actions, seems a logical aftermath.
Well, so much about an interesting controversy, but "facts" win out in the end.
John Knox Rankin - San Mateo, California
P.S. Do I not detect a flaw in the George C. Hardin story? Note the fourth paragraph, third column about seeing #41 etc. If memory serves me correctly, it was not possible, wayback when, to see a train approaching the Big Horn River from the south side, before or from the area of the then site of the Hardin depot (west across center from its present location).
The tracks curve, or rather they form a slight arc, to the right as they approach the west side of the river.
Or am I not seeing too clearly?