Lost Springs Asks Census to Count 2 More

The mayor of Lost Springs, on the high plains of eastern Wyoming, says two-thirds of her town’s residents were missed in last year’s census. Their names are Bob and Clara Stringham, and Mayor Leda Price wants them counted.

“It will get resolved,” Price said. “The census people have been very nice, very helpful. They’re going to assist us, but they’ve got a lot of other towns that were undercounted too.”

Setting the record straight could result in $111 more in state funding. That may not be much by most standards, but in Lost Springs--one of the smallest incorporated towns in the 2000 census--every dollar counts.

Named because railroad construction workers in the 1880s could not find the intermittent springs depicted on survey maps, Lost Springs peaked in population around 150 in the 1920s, just before the coal mines began to close. The class of ’28 was the last at Lost Springs High.

A few years later, drought starved out many homesteaders and businesses. Stockyards, lumber mills, blacksmiths, banks and mercantile stores closed.

By 1950 only nine people remained. They doggedly resisted becoming another ghost town and clung to incorporation, which means extra money from the state and a guaranteed spot on the map.

Now the nearest groceries, hospitals and high schools are in Douglas or Lusk, both 30 miles away across the semiarid rolling hills of east-central Wyoming. The closest filling station and restaurant are in Manville, 20 miles east.

Today, Lost Springs consists of three main buildings, a handful of mobile homes, some outbuildings and several sagebrush-strewn vacant lots just north of the railroad tracks and U.S. 18-20.

The Lost Springs Antique Store and the post office occupy one of those buildings.

The owners, the Stringhams, are retiring. Their son, Art, 43, who grew up in Lost Springs and was recently laid off by a rail car repair company in Douglas, was more than happy to move back to operate the store. He has become the town’s fourth resident, earning immediate appointment by Price to the town council, where he serves with his parents.

“I’ve been to a lot of the big cities, Los Angeles and Chicago and others,” he said. “This is so quiet.”

Tourists headed to Yellowstone National Park or Mt. Rushmore, rail workers and seasonal hunters are Stringham’s main customers. They stop for snacks or browse through old farm equipment manuals, rows of decanters and stacks of books and dishes.

Price, mayor since 1972, attends to most governmental matters. But Art also has been helping out with snow removal, mowing, routine maintenance and other tasks.

“There’s quite a bit of work to do around here,” he said.

The town hall is the community magnet. The simple white building draws from Lost Springs’ wider community--about 25 rural ranching families--who come for weddings, receptions, gospel meetings and other events.

It rents for $10--”payable in advance, and it better be all cleaned up when you’re done with it,” Price said.

One of the big events is the town auction each June. It draws hundreds of bidders and sellers from all over the region.

Price, who also runs a catering business, rates the auction as a “55-pie sale,” and she will provide plenty of roast beef as well.

“We have a lot of ranches around here, and we need to promote the beef,” she said. “That’s their income.”

Over coffee at the Wrights’ ranch a mile east of town, Wilbur and Ada Wright worried about media coverage of European cattle diseases and environmental groups that routinely disparage the industry.

“It seems to me like everybody is after the rural people,” Wright, 93, said. “Any way they can gouge the rural people, they do.”

Some area residents have augmented their unpredictable ranching income by taking advantage of technological advances.

Mary Engebretsen has established an e-commerce venture. She paints pictures on leather clothes and rodeo gear and sells them on the Internet at www.westernmall .com.

“Sitting here in Lost Springs, it’s hard to reach people,” she said. “That’s why we decided to try the Internet.”

Despite Lost Springs’ remoteness, residents wouldn’t have it any other way.

“We prefer this lifestyle and have a deep love of the land, the animals and Western history,” Engebretsen said.