Lake County >> Jane Lambert’s father lost his right arm in a hunting accident in 1944. It was a warm August day like any other, and he’d taken his horse, a dark chestnut named Pal, up the Glen Eden trail in Northwest Scotts Valley. As he pulled out his rifle to aim for a buck, it accidentally discharged. The bullet punched through his upper arm, severing the brachial artery.
Even when the gun went off, Pal never left his side.
Fortunately Lambert’s father managed to staunch the flow of blood, and it wasn’t long before his two cousins found him. One mounted Pal, riding off in search of a phone. He alerted a local doctor, who rode eight miles up the Glen Eden trail head atop a white mule, bringing along plasma for Lambert’s father, which would save his life. It took five hours for the doctor to reach him, administer the plasma and bring him down from the mountain.
Lambert’s father wasn’t the only one to nearly lose his life that day. Pal was run ragged, without rest or water. He galloped five miles to a telephone and five miles back, then the horse still had to make the trip down the trail.
A lesser animal wouldn’t have survived. But Pal did.
This story marks the beginning of “Makin’ Tracks,” Lambert’s upcoming memoir about a lifetime spent around horses and mules. The book is split evenly between Lake County, where Lambert was raised, and western Montana, where she currently resides.
Lambert never set out to write a book. Her daughter requested that she document her experiences with horses, and so she did. As she began to put her stories down on paper, more and more memories surfaced, until Lambert realized that she had to beginnings of a book on her hands.
She reached out to her sister, who Lambert readily admitted has a far better memory, and the two collaborated. While Lambert wrote the entirety of Makin’ Tracks, many of the stories in the book are there because of her sister’s ability to recall them. And that was Lambert’s favorite part of writing this book: taking a stroll down memory lane with her sister, remembering the adventures they had and the horses they were raised with.
Lambert got her first pony when she was just six years old, but she’s had a love for horses since the age of two. “If you have an affinity for horses it’s like a spiritual bond that happens. You kind of become more than just yourself if you ride a good horse,” she said. “You and the horse become more together than either one of you are alone.”
Considering that she’s now 73, and her enthusiasm for the animals has never waned, it’s no surprise that Lambert has enough anecdotes to fill a book. “Every horse has a story to offer or a lesson that you can learn from them,” she said.
Although Makin’ Tracks will mostly appeal to horse enthusiasts, the book also addresses childhood and growing up, and explores Lake County as it was in days gone by. Once could definitely say that Lambert has a history with the area. Her family homesteaded here in 1854. Hendricks Road is named after them. Many of her relatives still live in the area.
Lambert taught at Kelseyville High School for a number of years, and even started the agriculture program during her tenure.
Thanks to blistering Montana winters, Lambert was able to pen her memoir in just a few short months — she started writing Makin’ Tracks in January, and the book will be released in the next month.
Not only did Lambert unintentionally pen a memoir, she never wanted to write another book in the first place, not after “Charlie Russell, The Cowboy Years,” a book about the life of the Old American West figure. Similar to Makin’ Tracks, Lambert didn’t mean to write a book then, either. She was only going to whip up an article for a western horse magazine.
But as she immersed herself in research she realized how much misinformation about Russell was circulating. She began to gather more and more facts, and then suddenly she found herself with the workings of a book.
It took ten years and a tremendous amount of research, as well as complying with copyright laws for any photos Lambert wanted to include. After that difficult experience, she thought she was done with any long form writing.
But then her daughter asked for those horse stories, and she found herself doing it all over again.
Thankfully, Makin’ Tracks was significantly easier to write than Charlie Russell, The Cowboy Years, since the whole thing was crafted from memory, and the 130 photographs included in the memoir belong to Lambert and her sister. When it came down to it, the most difficult thing was accurately remembering all the details. Since neither sister kept a diary, they had to recall incidents that occurred decades prior.
Lambert is self publishing Makin’ Tracks, and the book can be purchased directly from her for $20 plus $4 for shipping and handling. Contact Lambert at 406-777-5988 or jane44@cybernet1.com.
Jennifer Gruenke can be reached at 900-2019.
