Donald Scheer

Donald Gene Scheer was born February 8, 1936 on a farm near Center, Nebraska the oldest of six children. His parents moved to a ranch in Lingle when Don was just a toddler. He learned to sit a horse before he could walk, rode a horse several miles to and from school at the age of seven and was breaking, training, and selling ponies before his teens. After an elk hunting trip near Dubois around 1950, the family decided to move west. When Don was just 14 years old, he, went to work on the historic Cross Ranch. In 1957, while working at the Cross Ranch, Don married Sally Black. Together they also worked at several other large ranches in the area, to include the Rocker A Ranch, the CM Ranch, and the Cross Mill Iron Ranch near Crowheart where Don was the manager. Don founded, organized, and then competed in Dubois Pack Horse Races race for 20 years. The race is now dubbed the Don Scheer Memorial Pack Horse Race and a life-size bronze of Don and his pack horse in downtown Duboios memorializes the races.