Pincher Creek Colony

The Pincher Creek Colony is located only a few minutes out of town. Most people have the same last name of Gross. The men will live in the colony all of their lives, but the women always move to the man's colony who they marry.



Kathleen Gross is four and watches the women of the week cook dinner. Everyone eats communally and the womens jobs change weekly. At 48 the women are no longer expected to cook, clean and garden. At 48 all women become kindergarden teachers. Currently at the Pincher Creek Colony there are seven kindergarden teachers.



Little Diane Gross shows me with her fingers that she is four, but she is only three and a half. In the colony they speak three languages, German in church, English in school and Austrian for conversation.



A group of Hutterite women help dry and prepare the 1,500 "slaughtered" (thier word not mine) chickens from the morning. The slaughtering took only 3 hours including a coffeee break for the 40 people. on these days everyone in the communtiy is expected to help.



Katherine Hofe and her sister Christine, both from Montana, help bag up the chickens for sale. Because the chickens are for sale a government inspector is on site when the chickens are slaughtered and inspects them to make sure that they are up to standards.



With the chickens they try to save the hearts and gizzards, but today they were short a few ladies so thier was more waste than usual. The discarded chicken parts sit in a trailer out back waiting to be brought to the landfill in Lundbrick.

There is more slaughtering tommarrow so I am going to make my way their bright and early to get the before shots.