Bio

History of the Kimmel Ranch

Around the time of the turn of the 20th century a young Talbert Shaw boarded a west-bound train with his mother to leave New Hampshire. After unloading their belongings in Harlem, Montana, they rode a freighter north across 26 miles of wild prairie land to an area of Montana nicknamed "The Big Flat", so called for its high elevation and mostly flat landscape (save for some wildlife-rich coulees).  

As an adult in the 1920s, after purchasing the ranch next to his mother's homestead, he married Ms. Lydia Kimmel, a young widow with four very young sons. He "added on" a couple homestead shacks to a Sears-Roebuck house, and the couple farmed and ranched together until Talby's untimely death.  

Lydia's youngest son Pat M. Kimmel assumed operation of the ranch at the tender age of 16. After a stint in the Army, Pat returned home and continued the family business, eventually swooned and married a little Wisconsin girl named Jenny, and had four children of their own. Pat passed away in an accident in 1991, leaving his high school-age boys to pick up where he left off. 

Today, the ranch is owned and operated by Pat's oldest son, Patrick J "PJ" , his wife Tricia, and their two sons Shane and Trever...just three Cowboys and a Cowgirl. They purchased the ranch from PJ's mother in 2001, and have continued to improve and change and build the operation.  

In 2017, the ranch did a slight pivot in its management practices to become more soil health conscious and regenerative than it already was. We look forward to sharing what we're doing to leave a lasting legacy for generations to come.