The South Cariboo community is mourning the passing of a long-time friend and mentor while his family grieves for their own huge loss after the passing of Wendell Monical on April 13.
Some of Wendell’s loved ones share their stories and reminisce about this family patriarch of three sons, a daughter, and an abundance of grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
From the Monical home site at 105 Mile Ranch, Wendell was an icon of the ranching community from riding and rodeos to rounding and roping cattle. He was a mentor to many for his humane handling of horses and livestock, who dedicated support to the region’s rodeo circuits for decades with his stock and feed donations.
From Wendell’s nonstop cattle minding to his amazing sense of humour, his children’s experiences all affirm the incredible skills they learned from their father, in far too many tales to recount in one story.
A small subset of these memories range from his daughter, Rita Greenall, recollecting being awakened by her father to help herd five calves into the world - born by caesarean sections during a single night (whew!) to his son, Ed, reminiscing about the legions of lessons their dad had given them all on staying in the saddle on a bucking bronc, and then later finding burrs Wendell had hidden underneath the blanket.
In his own earliest memories, his son, Marvin, describes those days as being Wendell’s ranch crew, just as his own children are now, right from a young age.
“He taught us how to ride a horse before we learned how to ride a bike, and to chase cows … as his usual ‘family time’.”
All Marvin’s memories seem to surround work, to being shorthanded – the norm on any large, busy ranch – and how any family gathering was always organized around cattle drives.
“We’d all get on horses and go down the valley usually, at the 108’, and a lot of times move fairly large herds, as a family event – a family cattle drive. With grandkids, great-grandkids, all of us would be out there doing this, so it was a fairly enjoyable time.”
Ed also attests to Wendell’s mentorship, from learning his ranching ropes to his expert horsemanship, and shares these family memories he says are “all about chasing cows”.
He attributes this strict training to why both he and his brother have remained in area cattle ranching, both well established in Lac la Hache.
Today, these Monical ranchers are well-known in the beef industry and across the wider community, as is their sister, and most of their other family members in the South Cariboo.
Ed recalls clearly one life-long lesson he learned growing up was to never demand the same performance from different horses, after being chewed out by his dad on a long cattle drive for pushing a horse that had already “given you all it can give.”
Born May 11, 1932, Wendell arrived at the 105 Mile Ranch with his entire family in 1962, from the Oregon high country.
In an interview with the simplymastery a few years ago, for a 2011 Cariboo Calling story, Wendell described some of his own experiences upon settling in the Cariboo with his parents, Bob and Leatha, his wife, Lois, his married brothers Robert (Louise) and Leonard (Barb), and all their children.
(Lois and Robert predeceased him.)
In that story, Wendell noted his and Lois’ children were just youngsters back then, with Rita, 3, Ed, just “a yearlin’,” and Marvin born a few months after the Monical’s arrival.
The whole family group - three generations of pioneers - lived together in an old red house (now a main heritage attraction at the 108 Historical Site) on the 105 Mile Ranch, where the original, circa-1900 barn still stands proudly at Back Valley Road and Highway 97.
In later years, after his parents moved to town, Wendell carried on raising cattle with Lois and their children on the family ranch.
Now, Rita, Ed, Marvin all express some relief that when the years caught up a bit, Wendell finally saw more to life than livestock, and relaxed a bit. He even found his own special fishing lake to enjoy outings to “catch the big one” with them (all portaging their car-top boat through the bush), or very often, fished with his brother, Len.
After selling the ranch to businessmen in Japan, Ed says his father leased it back the next day, jumped back on his horse and continued to run a cattle operation for several more years, until he sold his cow herd in 2011 – their last family cattle drive.
However, despite disabilities, which some might rate as debilitating, Wendell still refused to give up his cows, and ran yearlings with his granddaughters, Amber Malm and Amanda Monical, until hip cancer and a stroke he’d suffered took their toll during his last years of life.
Like any tenacious ol’ cowboy, ageing left Wendell somewhat sadder out of the saddle, he notes.
Wendell’s daughter, Rita Greenall, worked so closely with her father for so many decades, she struggles to find a few words to sum up his impact and huge mentorship to her.
“Cows and riding,” she decides. “He was a hell of a cowman and a hell of a horseman. I don’t think any of us kids learned as much as he knew.”
(Ed notes his wife, Cheryl, describes Wendell’s training of his own ranch skills as “a damn fine job.”)
The Monical family members joining in this discussion, including his granddaughter, Amber Malm, who also rode many, many roundups with him, agree Wendell set the bar high and was obstinate in having his ways followed to the letter, resulting in a tightly run ranch.
Brian Hodgkin, one of his oldest and closest friends, shares a few of the great many things he admired about Wendell, noting he taught a tremendous amount to anyone lucky enough to get to know him.
“There are a lot of things I admired about him. One was his dedication to his family, his profession and his community.”
Another skill he admired was that his buddy was so observant (important to Brian, as a 30-year RCMP veteran), as well as Wendell’s remarkable way of dealing with people.
Whether it was hitting the trail from dawn until dark or his extreme people skills, Brian agrees Wendell led by example – and “not just about ranching, but about life.”
Wendell joined the ranks of ranching legends long ago and was inducted into the Cowboy Hall of Fame in 2005.
Wendell Monical’s life will remain in the hearts and memories of many in the community and beyond, and his ranch methods are sure to be seen on Cariboo cattle drives for decades to come.
A Celebration of Life will be held at the 100 Mile Community Hall on May 9 at 1 p.m.
The 2011 Cariboo Calling story, Monical family a Cariboo cornerstone by Carole Rooney, is online at http://www.bclocalnews.com/lifestyles/tourism/126334128.html.
