Viking Magazine - Mar/Apr 2023 - 16

John Hoiland,
the last
cowboy, lives
in Big Timber,
Montana.
The Cowboy Who Rejected Brooke Shields
Meet the Norwegian-American rancher who inspired a critically acclaimed documentary.
STORY AND PHOTOS BY FREDRIK KALSTVEIT
J
ohn Hoiland might be
the last living cowboy in
Big Timber, Montana.
But his fi lm career has
just gotten started.
" Look at those clouds up
there. Do you see the one right
in the middle almost resembling
a dragon chasing a balloon? "
The sun has just crept over
the Crazy Mountains in Montana,
as a 94-year-old John
Hoiland crawls out of bed. He
has taken the night's mousetrap
catch out into the yard and
dumped them in front of the
tips of his boots. He squints up
at the clouds rolling over the
blue-capped mountains.
" That dragon will pop the
balloon, " he says as he points
to the cloud formation. " It will
rain at noon. I have to cut the
grass and stack the hay bales
before that. "
LIVING LEGEND
As he shuffl es into the house, he
mutters that the mousetrap has
been productive since he transi16
Mar/Apr
2023
tioned from cheese to lemon
cookies with peanut butter.
The interior refl ects that
Hoiland spends most of his life
outside. The kitchen counter is
stacked high with tools, and the
workshop atmosphere continues
well into the living room,
where there are mountains of
hammers, saws and wrenches,
in addition to piles of clothes
and instruments.
" I have a lot of things, but I
know exactly where everything
is, " he says as he places another
lemon cookie in the mouse trap.
In the corner of the living
room, above a box of discarded
accordions, there is a picture
of Hoiland posing with actress
Patricia Arquette. She holds a
cigarette in femme fatale fashion
while he plays the accordion.
The photo was taken back in
the '90s by fashion photographer
Bruce Weber, who has a
cabin a few lasso throws away
from the Hoiland ranch.
Now, almost 30 years later,
Hoiland recalls that Arquette
didn't so much as take a puff
of the cigarette, as she was just
" twisting it between her fi ngers
to look interesting. "
" She neither smoked nor
drank, just like me. I regret not
inviting her for a pop down at
the Roadkill Saloon afterwards.
It could have gotten interesting,
you know. "
The encounter with Patricia
Arquette wasn't Hoiland's last
taste of celebrity fame. In the
'90s, he was also discovered on
the side of the road by a Hollywood
producer scouting for
locations. A few months later,
he appeared in a Chevrolet
commercial.
Hoiland's career peaked in
the fall of 2021, when he was
featured in the critically
acclaimed Norwegian fi lm,
" John: The Last Cowboy. "
The 90-minute documentary
is a tender portrayal of an
aging rancher, but also a
unique account of NorwegianAmerican
emigration.
SCAN THE
QR CODE TO
WATCH!
The critically
acclaimed
documentary
" John: The
Last Cowboy "
premiered in
Norway in 2021,
and is now available
on Vimeo.
The 90-minute
documentary is
directed by
Frode Fimland,
known from
" Siblings are
Forever, " which
won the Big Sky
Documentary
Film Festival in
Missoula in 2015.
sonsofnorway.com
http://www.sonsofnorway.com
Viking Magazine - Mar/Apr 2023

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