Ira E. Perkins, 94, retired rancher, nationally recognized teacher dies
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Retired rancher Ira E. Perkins - known for his story telling, his fiery
opposition to reintroducing grizzly bears and his 53-year-long stint as
a teacher at Bynum Elementary School - died Jan. 19, 2007, at Peace
Hospice in Great Falls shortly after being diagnosed with lymphoma. He
was 94.
A graveside service is Wednesday at 11:30 a.m. at Bynum Cemetery
followed by a memorial service at 1 p.m. at the Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints in Choteau.
When Perkins retired from Bynum Elementary School, he had worked there
for 53 consecutive school years, setting a national record for the
longest tenure at the same school.
During his years at Bynum, from 1933-1986, Perkins created a school
program that garnered statewide and national praise. His curriculum was
a unique blend of academic, physical and social education. Perkins
emphasized reading, writing and arithmetic with a dash of history and
literature. He maintained that if a child mastered the basics of
reading, writing and math, he could learn any of the other disciplines
without difficulty.
Bynum's physical education program included football, basketball, track
and a stellar gymnastics program.
Retired Choteau Elementary School Principal Stan Rathman says Perkins
was dedicated to teaching the basics and to making sure that students
were physically fit too.
"He tried about everything out there," Rathman said. "I was very
appreciative of the fact that every student ... who came in from Bynum
was very well versed in math, in language arts, definitely in music."
The Bynum School Christmas programs, which Perkins wrote and directed,
were major community events that drew a packed house and were known far
and wide for entertaining, rural-life stories, occasional political
satire, and carols sung in harmony.
Perkins also created an outstanding band program, which he began in
1939 with a $10 budget. Everyone who attended Bynum learned to play a
musical instrument, to sing in four-part harmony and to dance waltzes,
polkas, two-steps and schottisches. Perkins showcased his students'
music and dance skills each spring at the eighth-grade graduation
program.
Recalling Perkins' years as a teacher and band leader, former Choteau
High School band director Lloyd Reynolds of Bozeman said he would never
forget the wonderful music at the spring programs.
Reynolds said a teacher, staying at the same school for 53 years, could
"make it a hide out." Perkins did not do that. "Every year he made
everything that could happen happen. Right up to his last years, he
never let up," Reynolds said.
Through the years, Perkins' educational program was featured in
newspapers and on Norma Ashby's "Today in Montana" show, on the "20/20"
television news magazine and in an "On the Road with Charles Kuralt"
segment. In 1980, Western Montana College honored Perkins with its
Distinguished Alumni Award, and in 1999, the Great Falls Tribune
included him as one of the "100 Montanans of the 20th Century: The
Famous, Notorious and Unsung."
Ashby, who featured Perkins in a book about her broadcast career, said
of him, "Those kids came out of that school so well rounded because of
him. ... He was just an amazing man. We'll never see the likes of him
again in education."
Susan Luinstra of Choteau, who teaches at Bynum school, started her
career there under Perkins' tutelage. "The core of what this school is
are the values and traditions that he established," she said. One of
the most important lessons he taught her, she said, is that "each child
is much more than just academic skills."
Perkins was born on May 29, 1912, to Annie (Vance) and Burl Perkins in
his grandparents' log home near Otto, Wyo. His very early years were
spent on family ranches in the Otto and Meteetsee, Wyo., areas and at
Hoosac, Mont. As youngsters, he and his brother moved several times
with their mother, who worked in Denton and later on Moccasin-area
ranches and on the Burnett Ranch near Giltedge. On the Burnett Ranch,
hearing stories from Teddy "Blue" Abbott and others, Perkins first
began dreaming of becoming a cowboy and rancher.
He spent the majority of his high school years south of Stanford, on
the farm of his aunt and uncle Emma and John Harris. A mediocre student
at first, by 11th grade at Stanford High School, Perkins was starting
to shine academically, played on the football and basketball teams and
learned the bass horn to play in band.
After graduating from high school, he attended the State Normal School
at Dillon between 1931 and 1933. When his grandmother told him that the
Bynum School Board was looking for a male teacher, he applied for and
received his first teaching - and only - teaching job. He started there
in the fall of 1933, teaching three grades for $75 a month.
In the fall of 1935, he married fellow Bynum school teacher (and then
school principal) Evelyn Francis Campbell and they had four children,
Earl, Victor, Suzanne and Stanley.
In 1939 Perkins embarked on his goal to become a rancher, leasing 80
acres near Bynum. Through hard work, he and his family built a farm and
ranch operation that eventually included 17,000 acres in three
counties, a flock of 1,000 sheep and 900-plus head of cattle.
Browning rancher Bernard St. Goddard said Perkins and his family had a
business relationship for years through sheep and cattle leases.
St. Goddard said, "He was pretty handy with a horse, especially if the
horse went to bucking with him ... He came from that old breed of
people, that a handshake was just like a covenant."
During the early 1980s, Perkins became involved in the movement to
oppose reintroduction of the grizzly bear on federal lands west of
Choteau. He and celebrated Western author A.B. Guthrie Jr. sparred in
the letters-to-the-editor columns of the Choteau Acantha, each
eloquently arguing different sides of the issue. Perkins consistently
defended the right of the rancher to protect his livestock from attack
by predators.
Retired U.S. Forest Service Rocky Mountain District Ranger Lloyd
Swanger of Chewelah, Wash., remembers the years he worked with Perkins
on a federal sheep grazing lease on the national forest west of Heart
Butte and the conflict between the rancher and the grizzly bear.
"I had the greatest admiration for him - he was one of the best
permittees I ever worked for," Swanger said.
Retired U.S. Rep. Ron Marlenee of Bozeman went to bat for Perkins when
the Forest Service threatened to prohibit him or his sheepherder from
carrying firearms on federal lands and says he still talks about
Perkins at speaking engagements.
"The state of Montana has lost a very, very wonderful, caring and
contributing citizen," Marlenee said.
Perkins' interests were many and varied. As a young man, he enjoyed
boxing, riding bucking horses and playing hockey with a Bynum team. He
was a fine horseman, an avid reader and a journal keeper. Through the
years, he played his trumpet with the Elks Club Drum and Bugle Corps
and for many years he directed the 4th of July community band in
Choteau.
He was a member of the Choteau Lions Club, and from 1947 to 1987 he
served as secretary of the Teton Cooperative Reservoir Co. and the
Bynum Irrigation District.
In his later years, he traveled to Europe with family members and
enjoyed following the sporting events of his grandchildren and
great-grandchildren. He and his dance partner, Helen, were regulars on
the dance floor at the Great Falls Elks Club up until his
hospitalization in December.
He published a series of his life stories in the Acantha and those
stories are collected in the booklet titled, "Mr. Perkins, Tell Us a
Story."
His wife died on Oct. 14, 1993, at their home on the family ranch. He
was also preceded in death by his brother, Charles Perkins, and a
great-granddaughter, Kelly Baker.
His survivors include his longtime companion, Helen Malatare of Great
Falls; sons, Earl (Dorothy) Perkins and Victor (Phyllis) Perkins, of
Bynum, and Stanley (Gloria) Perkins of Great Falls; a daughter, Suzanne
(Bruce) Miller of Columbia Falls; grandchildren, Vicki Baker of Bynum,
Rock Perkins of Great Falls, Chass Perkins of Great Falls, Melody
Martinsen of Choteau, Leslee Fonner-Smith of Vancouver, Wash., Lori
Salmond of Forsyth, U.S. Air Force Major Ira Perkins of Kaneohe,
Hawaii, presently deployed to Iraq, Laira Fonner of Whitefish, and
Natalie Stern of Missoula; great-grandchildren: Stephanie Frick, Loni
Judisch, Whitney Perkins, Lee Perkins, Mary Baker-Youderian, Matt
Baker, Chance Wachholz, Katarina and Connor Tarr, Tommy, Alexa and
Azlan Holliday, Madison Martinsen, Emmet and Elliot Salmond, Ainsley,
Alissa and Briana Perkins, and Tristan and Phoenix Perkins; and one
great-great-granddaughter, Keely Frick.
Memorials are suggested to the Great Falls Elks Club, Bynum Elementary
School or Peace Hospice in Great Falls.
Croxford Funeral Home of Great Falls handled arrangements.