Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
On this date ...
1972: A rancher 5 miles north of Melrose lost 58 head of cattle in a Sunday night storm.
“There’s no way to figure the cost of this to me,” Deon Dodd said as he replaced fencing removed to allow trucks to haul carcasses away.
He estimated the animals’ value at $10,000 “at the least.” The cost of replacing the herd was unknown.
Dodd told a reporter the cattle were near a lake on his property when they were likely killed by lightning “either while they stood bunched together in water around the lake or while they were crowded against a barbed wire fence that runs through the lake,” the Clovis News-Journal reported.
But he said some of the cattle might have died from drowning, rushing into the water after being stunned by the bolt of lightning.
“We’ll never know for sure,” he said.
The storm dumped 3.2 inches of rain on Dodd’s ranch and left large drifts of hail across the region.
Dodd spent much of his night and early the next morning using his tractor to help motorists get through an area of State Road 88 that was covered by several feet of water.
He said he did not know how many cattle he’d lost until after sunup. He said 11 head of livestock in the same pasture survived the storm.
“After word of his loss spread through the Melrose community, help started coming from friends and neighbors,” the Clovis News-Journal reported. “Mrs. Mary Lou Bagwell at the First National Bank branch in Melrose said people were contributing money and in many cases were giving calves to help Dodd replenish his herd.”
Dodd said he was deeply moved by the help.
“Be sure and express my thanks,” he told a reporter. “My neighbors have sure been nice.”
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