Tales of Swan Valley outfitters - Lloyd Hahn

SEELEY LAKE – Lloyd Hahn was not present at the Aug. 3 Upper Swan Valley Historical Society (USVHS) program, Outfitters and Guides in the Swan Valley. Nevertheless, his reputation as a long-time outfitter earned him a place. Ellie Greenough, who had previously conducted an extensive interview with him for USVHS, recounted a few of his stories.

Greenough related how Hahn wound up in Montana. She said he was living in Wisconsin but had done some hunting in Idaho. In 1975 he decided he wanted to move to Idaho and get into the outfitting business. A stop in Missoula changed his mind. A Missoula realtor told him about a ranch named "Funny Farm" that was for sale in Condon off Kauffman Road. Hahn looked it over, liked what he saw, bought it, and began an outfitting business in Montana instead of Idaho.

He initially operated out of Birch Creek and later bought the Big Salmon outfit. Managing both proved to be too difficult and after two years he sold Birch Creek and concentrated all his outfitting out of the Big Salmon camp.

Ole Bill Anderson was one of the men who worked for Hahn, sometimes as a guide and a cook in a pinch. Greenough said, though Anderson was a good cook, "he had little or no experience with horses. One time he cinched up his horse too tight and when he got in the saddle the horse bucked him right off."

According to Greenough, Anderson had some choice words to say, the most repeatable of which were, "I didn't hire on to be a bronc buster!"

Another incident related by Greenough concerned a porcupine. It was a summer trip and the weather so nice that many of the crew opted to sleep out under the stars rather than set up tents. While they were sleeping, a porcupine came by and ate the sweatband out of Bill Johnson's straw hat. According to Greenough, Hahn found the incident extremely funny. He kept saying,, "He was wearin' a beanie the rest of the trip – a straw beanie!"

Greenough said Hahn had some good bear stories, too. One was about noted Billings photographer Mike Sample. Sample went on a summer pack trip to take pictures in the Bob Marshall Wilderness. According to the interview transcript, there had recently been an accident where one of the horses had broken his back and had to be shot and Hahn thought it likely there would be a bear eating off the carcass. He invited Sample to check it out with him. When they rode up, they saw a grizzly cracking the horse bones and sucking out the marrow. Greenough said it sounded like gunshots. Sample set up his camera equipment and was taking picture after picture when the bear got wind of them and started coming in their direction. Hahn and Sample ran up the slope.

As Greenough related the story, "Mike ran to a tree and was trying to climb but he was on his knees on the ground. He couldn't get his feet under him. Hahn went to draw his pistol but it was in a cloth holster that had gotten wet so he couldn't get it drawn. The bear was just watching all of this, and then he turned and ran off."

Greenough also related a fun bear story that happened on the Fourth of July. According to the interview notes, Hahn and three friends left right after the Swan Valley parade, riding to Turquoise Lake. They looked across Glacier Lake and saw a sow with two cubs climbing up the side of a gully. The gully was deep enough to still have snow in it. Hahn estimated it was three or four hundred yards long.

The transcription reads, "We watched them climb up on the edge of the snow slide, and they'd get up to the top and they'd walk out to the middle. They'd jump in the air, land on their rump and just come blasting down that snow slide."

And they repeated the action over and over. Hahn said, "They were just having some fun in a snow slide."

Greenough said Hahn's outfit often ran into bears when they came back to haul out an elk shot by one of the guests. On several occasions there wouldn't be a lot of elk meat left to haul back out. Nevertheless, Hahn was one of the more successful outfitters. He advertised a hunt success rate of over 50 percent when the statewide average was 10-12 percent.

Greenough concluded, "Coming from flatland Wisconsin to a career here in the valley, he did quite well for himself."