North Dakota Rednecks
By David Marks

Petty-Ray had disbanded one of its portable crews in Red Lodge in the winter of 1981, and many of us landed in South Dakota for some "nice" duty on the prairie.  I can remember Jim Howard and I talked Gary Nelson into joining us at the Red Dog Saloon which was attached to a liquor store.

You could tell the locals were not friendly and didn't take to hippies or doodlebuggers ['cause we always steal their daughters away, for a night or forever].  Gary asked the bartender for a few bottles of the best champagne he had, and the dude went into the liquor store and doubled the price on us.  Gary said that's okay, but where's the glasses?

Well, the bartender was pissed and brought us a bunch of plastic parts we had to assemble.  I don't remember what all was said, but I do know this - Gary spent his entire hotshot check every other week on the crew as a habit.  When this dude started being rude to us, I told him, "You don't know who Gary Nelson is - he could have made you rich this winter!"

We smashed the plastic cups on the table and whooped it up and left and never came back.  Gary et al went on to make the next bartender happy for a few months!