02/01/2023
This was posted on Facebook by a dear friend of mine. The photo on the left was my dad, the right was my godfather.
T. A. wrote: I commented earlier to my friend, Jacob Fowler, that since the two guys seen in this post, Terry Fowler and John Cole Armstrong, are gone, the world is a far duller place.
John Cole and my Dad were partners back in the 1970s. They had one group of cows pastured at the High Lonesome ranch west of Pecos. One of the windmills quit pumping, and the storage tank was getting very low. The windmill needed to be fixed immediately so the cows wouldn’t run out of water. Dad was busy and couldn’t help, so John Cole pulled the rods and re-leathered the top check himself. (No easy thing to do by yourself, I’ve done it….it’s not fun).
When John Cole finished, he sat down in the shade of a little mesquite tree to cool out and to see if the windmill would pump. From behind him came a voice “About time you got that windmill fixed”. John Cole nearly had a heart attack because he THOUGHT he was at South Mill alone!! Unbeknownst to him…about the time he was finishing working on the windmill….Terry Fowler had ridden up on his horse. Terry also had some cows at the High Lonesome ranch in the next pasture to the east, which also had a watering at South Mill. Terry had decided to pull a prank on John Cole when he least expected it!
They barely knew each other prior to the rendezvous at South Mill, but became the best of friends, and remained so until the day Terry passed away. I sure miss them both.
