There may be life off the ranch, but any Fremont County farmer or rancher will tell you – The #aglife is “the good life!” #Aglife is a County 10 series, brought to you by Wyoming Community Bank, that pulls the curtain back on farm and ranch life in Fremont County.
It started with a text.
“Bring the skid steer, we can’t load this pump into the back of the truck,” Traci Helton said.
Then the next text came a few minutes later.
“I almost broke my leg,” Traci said.
Traci’s late husband, Justin, and two of their workers, Austin Rico and Cameron Eder, were out working on a broken pivot when they tried to load a pivot pump by hand.
“Turns out it was a little more than they could handle, just the three of them,” Traci said.
The pump fell on Justin’s leg.
“It looked like he had a purple sock on his lower leg. A couple of weeks later, I got him to go to the doctor to make sure it was not broken,” Traci said. “He was retaining a lot of fluid in the injury.” Which made his labs totally out of whack.”
Justin’s condition didn’t improve.
“On July 15th, his health had worsened and gotten to the point where I told our daughter Payton, I needed to take him to the emergency room,” Traci said.
Justin was flown via Life Flight to Banner Wyoming Medical Center in Casper. He was in Casper for two weeks.
“We were one day from being discharged. It was a Thursday at 10 PM; he spiked a fever, his blood pressure tanked,” Traci said. “They put him back into the ICU. He’d been in the ICU for the first two or three days we were there.”
Justin had an infection, and it started to compromise his health.
“The liver helps heal bruises, and he had a bad one from the pivot pump,” Traci said. “He had to be on an antibiotic that didn’t process through the liver, so we were there another week.”
They returned home to the farm on the last day of the Fremont County Fair.
“He was doing ok, but not great that week after the county fair,” Traci said. “I told him, you’re going with me to the state fair, because I want to make sure you’re going to be ok, and I know you want to watch Payton’s show. The day we got to the state fair, he had gotten worse. We were back to the emergency room. After blood was taken, they revealed he had another infection. He had an infection that even a healthy person has a hard time coming back from, let alone someone who was already compromised.”
While Traci and Justin were in the hospital, things were happening back home. The Heltons have a large, extended operation.
“We custom baled and did the custom farming for Garic Martin at the Carney Ranch and Mike Donaldson’s old farm, the Sweat Place,” Traci said. “The Carney is roughly 700 acres, the Sweat about 400.”
Their home place is 400 acres and they were farming another almost 400 acres for Bob Pingetzer.
They had 223 acres in sugar beets, and 180 in corn, and the rest was alfalfa.
“I slowly started finding out that farmers we’ve known forever were asking Jaxon (their son) what they can do to help,” Traci said. “Brett Weber is where it started, Brett started reaching out to Anderson’s, Pince’s, Jenning’s, and all the beet guys.”
Weber wanted to get Justin and Traci’s beets harvested.
Fremont County’s ag community extends far beyond the confines of the county and even to those who don’t farm.
“I was getting phone calls from 4H leaders who were checking on us daily. It was cool,” Traci said. “Still now, even though we’re done with the beet harvest and wrapping up for the year, people are still calling to ask what we need.”
With Traci caring for Justin 120 miles away, it came down to Jaxon, Austin, Cameron, Payton, and Morgan Neil to carry the load, and with four of them being around the operation, they knew what mostly needed to be done without direction.
“Cameron had just started working for us and stepped up to continue to help like he’d been around it his entire life,” Traci shared. “If it was not for these five showing up and working so hard in such a heavy time, our crops and land would have suffered. Jaxon was employed with Ernie Fisher when all this happened. Ernie said, ‘Go be with your family, do what you have to do.'”
Jaxon was already busy, doing flow testing in Douglas and Rock Springs and farming on 8 Mile for Fisher.
“Between Jaxon, Rico, and the others, with me chewing them out occasionally when I needed to, they took care of the place,” Traci said. “Me from afar, I guided them. The majority of the time, they already knew what to do; none of this was new except for the fact that their leaders were gone.”
Unbeknownst to Traci, a benefit was being planned by Rich Pingetzer.
“Brett was there for advice for Jaxon,” Traci said. “Brett and I graduated together, Brett, Justin, and I have known each other for a very long time, and he’s one we would consider a close friend.”
As anyone in agriculture knows, there are two types of equipment: those that are broken down, and those that are about to be. The center pivot the Heltons used to irrigate corn broke down.
“J.J. Pingetzer owns Pingetzer Pivot & Irrigation. J.J., Charlie Dewitt, Nick Hoffman, and Rich spent four days getting this pivot back up and running,” Traci said. “I was on the phone with them. Justin would tell them things. Betts Electric helped, too. We pulled Charlie in because Betts was out of town, and Charlie was available to do the wiring. We had corn under the pivot, and the timing was crucial.”
Sugar beets were another extraordinary effort by friends and neighbors.
“Brett called all the beet farmers Pince, Anderson, Christianson, etc.,” Traci said. “I want to get Helton’s beets out, depending on how long Justin is in the hospital.”
“Dennis Pince and Brett were willing to bring their six row-diggers; everyone put in a truck, I found out later,” Traci said. “Tom and Jen Severude offered help, bypassing me directly to Jaxon and Rico.”
Adding to the dilemma was the Midvale Irrigation District shutting off water early this year.
“Justin passed away on August 15. I knew the help was there, I guess for me I knew I could do it, I knew I had to do it, it was what Justin would have wanted me to do,” Traci said. “After he passed away, people were offering to come cut our hay, since we were still out at the Carney doing second cutting, which was late for us.”
They ended up borrowing the Severude’s windrower.
“The guys were able to cut it without Tom running it,” Traci said.
Then the unpredictability of farming came again.
“The skid steer caught on fire,” Traci said. “They blew it off an hour before, they were stacking hay, it sparked, and there was no saving it. Tyrell Lawrence comes bebopping down the road with his Bobcat and helped us get what we needed done finished.”
Behind the scenes, friends were stepping up all over the valley.
“Beet farmers we’ve known forever, Dennis and Lyn Pince,” Traci said. “Dennis was watching our pivots on the Pingetzer place, communicating with me, making sure I knew water was being shut off. He offered to help me get our beets out.”
Trucks began to show up to haul beets.
“Sean Christiansen said if you need an extra truck, let me know. Turns out we had a truck go down, so he brought his over, his semi and live bottom,” Traci said.
Then another truck failed, with a broken driveline.
“Garrett Klein let us use one of his,” Traci said.
Throughout the ordeal, a theme came through.
“The best thing about this is Justin was respected, very much so in the ag community,” Traci said. ”Tyler Foxworthy told me, ‘Don’t downgrade yourself, you worked as hard as he did.’ All these people were friends of ours. I want people to know Justin’s story.”
Friends had their own operations to run, but they made sacrifices to help someone else. That’s the magic of rural America and Fremont County.
“When we got home and we were getting the digger and defoliator ready, Rich, Tim Sullivan, and Brett looked things over. Brett showed them what needed to be adjusted and fixed. They came and helped, got everything ready,” Traci said. “I didn’t know some of the things. I don’t know a lot about the beet digger, I do now.”
Every piece of equipment, every field, every vehicle, and each room in their home reminds Traci of Justin.
“Justin loved the combine, sitting in the cab watching that augur fill, it is cool, there’s something about it,” Traci said. “I may have to have to cut back a little. We’ll keep farming the Carney and our place for sure.”
When a young, energetic friend and neighbor passes away suddenly, it has an effect on those left behind.
“Justin’s death has enlightened people; it made people realize how short life can be. It really affected this community,” Traci said. “The amount of people even in the 4H and FFA families that reached out were amazing. We had meals for three weeks. We’re still eating the frozen meals they prepared for us. We had so much, it was crazy. Gift cards to Domino’s, Papa Murphy’s.”
The help extended to the trucking community.
“Ty Thompson, from Lusk, Warren Thompson etc. They have been good friends for a long time,” Traci said. “Eldon Jennings took days off to ride with Jaxon and take a couple loads of hay to Dubois. Ty and Justin met hauling cows out of the Torrington Sale Barn.”
Even at the State Fair, people stepped up to help.
“Sam Linden helped with our golf cart, after we got a flat tire while I was in Casper with Justin,” Traci said. “He let us use his big Cat loader when the skid steer burned up.”
Cole Horton is a good friend and classmate of Justin’s.
“He helped get the digger ready. He took a week off from work to finish hauling beets. He’s been friends with Justin for a long time, almost like an uncle to the kids,” Traci said.
There is a Helton Family Memorial Fund, with the proceeds being used to help Jaxon get a CDL and Payton with college tuition.
Traci has a third cutting of alfalfa down, the corn is combined, they still have some plowing to do, and they’re waiting for Bill Jennings’ corn to dry down a little more so they can combine it.
It truly takes a community, a marvelous community, for this kind of support.
“If anyone helped us and weren’t mentioned, it wasn’t intentional,” Traci said. “I can’t thank people enough. I know people don’t expect anything from me, but I’m so grateful for all of it. I don’t know how to thank them other than saying it and paying it forward.”