episode 11: Twisselman Ranch
CARRISA PLAINS, CALIFORNIA
Twisselman ranch
is located in the high desert of eastern San Luis Obispo County and sits on some of the last land to be developed in the state of California. After the Homestead Act was enacted during the Civil War in the late 1800s, citizens could claim 160 acres of government land if they were to improve their plot by cultivating the land. Until around 1900, Carrisa Plains where Twisselman Ranch sits today was almost entirely government owned until homesteaders began acquiring the land.
Darrell Twisselman’s
grandfather homesteaded and helped develop most of the water for relatives, hired hands, and neighbors in the area. With control of most of the water, the family was able to buy a homestead or two every year for a hundred years, growing the ranch to what it is today.
In order to afford to purchase land from homesteaders, Darrell said his relatives had to work off the ranch in order to make enough money. The cattle they raised only made enough for them to pay the taxes on their existing property. The same is still true for the family today seven generations later.
“There’s something magical about the romance of the old west. There’s a lot of sweat, blood, and tears. I think you acquire that from being out in the boondocks like we are and still being close to civilization so you can see both sides. You know, being able to see both sides is a real important thing.”
For 13 years, the Twisselman family hosted a cattle drive across the ranch. They invited people from all walks of life to drive a herd of 800 head of cattle across the high desert range and experience the wild west first hand. With about 150 people involved, they had a cross section of society from corporate heads in Los Angeles to local news crews. They’d drive the cattle across the Temblor Mountain Range during the day and in the evenings they’d gather around the camp for a ranch dinner and evening entertainment.
“It was a lasting remembrance, you might say, for an awful lot of people.”
“Be damn careful who you marry because that’s a tough one. I think marriages only last about 8 or 10 years now and if it’s all it's going to last, you don’t even want to fool with it. That’s like buying a house that’s going to fall down in about 8 or 10 years. That’s kind of silly.”
Darrell and his wife Nola were married 69 years before he passed away in October 2022. Together they raised eight kids and had 21 grandchildren and 20 great grandchildren.
Looking back at growing their family on the ranch, Nola shared, “I wouldn’t raise eight kids anywhere else but right here on the ranch, especially in town. I’d go nuts.”
Living an hour from the nearest town or civilization of any kind, the kids were free to roam. With such a large family, it was common for the older kids to help take care of the little ones.
Joel Twisselman,
Kiah’s father, is the middle of eight kids and the fifth generation on Twisselman Ranch. Growing up their family did all things ranching together, but he never personally got into the horses as much as his siblings did. In high school, he decided he wanted to go into ag mechanics instead and went on to junior college to learn ag engineering.
He wanted to be a metal fabricator more than anything, but necessity on the ranch made him learn a lot more than that. From electrical to plumbing to automotive repair, he learned to do it all. While he went to school for ag mechanics, Joel said most of what he learned was working alongside his father’s mechanic and other people that he apprenticed under at the ranch.
The family would all agree that without Joel on the ranch, nothing else would work. While he may not be the one horseback working cattle, he is the one responsible for maintaining all the machinery on the ranch from water wells, to tractors, to trucks, and everything in between.
Joel and his wife Debbie are now getting to see their own grandchildren grow up on the ranch which is truly their dream come true.
“Seeing my kids and my grandkids on the ranch is the one thing that you hope for. All of my kids are doing something different than I did. When you live on a ranch you have to branch out and do things other than ranch just to be able to survive on the ranch.”
Ever since Kiah was a little girl, her grandpa always told her she needed to do something with people. Her love of people and storytelling took her far off the ranch to become a life coach, speaker, and now co-host of the Backroad Cowgirls TV show.
Growing up, she always struggled with seeing how she fit in with the ranch. When she asked her Grandpa Darrell what he thought, he said,
“I think for one thing, the ranch is like growing a crop. It gives you roots, so that’s your roots. Wherever you go, whatever you do, that’s your roots. And so you just feed those roots. Protect the idea of the ranch and the romance of the old west.”
Darrell had many business ventures on the ranch from raising cattle, breeding bucking bulls, mining gravel, guided hunting, and more. No matter which direction his big ideas took him, one thing that always stayed constant was his love for what he did.
“I always advise everybody, don’t get into a job you don’t love to do, even if it’s paying ten times as much as one that you do love to do… You go out and you look through society and the most successful and happiest, content people are the people who are doing something they love to do. You can’t beat that.”
— Darrell Twisselman
The BACKROAD COWGIRLS
are so grateful for the opportunity to visit Kiah’s home turf and share the Twisselman family story. Later in the year after filming, Kiah’s Grandpa Darrell passed away at the age of 90 leaving a lasting legacy for his family and all those who knew him. The interviews and photos captured will be treasured by the family for generations to come.
IN LOVING MEMORY
DARRELL LOUIS TWISSELMAN
September 4, 1932 - October 23, 2022
Brought to you in partnership with:
Photography by Shelby Caitlin Photography