Flathead women featured at U.N. conference

Two Flathead Valley women shared their personal stories of Montana ingenuity and entrepreneurship to a worldwide audience this month as part of the U.N. Commission’s Status of Women meetings in New York.

Nancy Gaynor of Whitefish and Geraldine Hewankorn of Big Arm, both descendants of Chief Eneas Paul Big Knife of the Kootenai Nation, participated in a panel on “Rural Women, Technology and Access to Education, Training and Employment.”

They focused on cultural tourism and how women can use existing assets to gain income.

“At a time when jobs are very hard to find, we both believe it’s important for women to consider creating their own access to employment by creating their own jobs,” said Gaynor, who is vice president of Gaynor Ranch near Whitefish. “Part of the process is seeing your assets from the outside and realizing that outsiders would appreciate them.”

When Gaynor and her husband, Don, decided they needed to add value to their ranch, they turned a space in the basement of their house into a guest suite. It wasn’t fancy, but with bright decor and furniture picked up at garage sales, it became popular, so they started building cabins.

“People kept wanting to come because it was like stepping back in time,” she said. “They loved the Old West hospitality.”

The Gaynors offer simple but effective features for their guests: sharing a meal with their family, serving s’mores around a campfire and positioning a rope swing for a splash in the river. Visitors can play in the hay, feed the horses and play with the dogs. In short, they create a ranch home away from home for their guests.

Today, the resort Don Gaynor started in 1995 features two facilities — eight cabins and a house on Farm-to-Market Road that’s “its own little village” plus three cabins and a horseback riding operation on KM Ranch Road.

“We’re ahead of last year with bookings,” Gaynor noted.

Hewankorn is employed at KwaTaqNuk Resort in Polson, where she offers guests insight into the culture of the Salish and Kootenai tribes with a tour to the People’s Center tribal museum in Pablo.

She often takes them to the art department at Salish and Kootenai College where they can buy artwork from the instructors, and shows guests the National Bison Range. During the summer, area powwows are promoted as a way of learning about tribal culture.

“What we are saying is that in rural areas it takes just a little imagination to make what is popular today as a ‘staycation,’” Hewankorn shared during their U.N. presentation that representatives from more than 60 countries attended.

Staycation is a term that became popular during the recession as citizens on tight budgets found ways to enjoy amenities close to home.

It doesn’t take a lot of money to convert an extra bedroom into a guest room and bring in some extra money, Gaynor said. She shared a story she heard at an economic development conference about how Ireland boosted itself out of an economic downturn several years ago by allowing every fifth house to be licensed as a bed and breakfast facility.

With an average of $6,000 annually per home from that extra income, the country was lifted onto the road to recovery.

The two women also shared their experience with an economic development meeting on the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation, where they stayed in a comfortable bed and breakfast home in a very rural area.

It was brightly decorated with homemade quilts. Because the owners of the home worked at other jobs, they left breakfast waiting for their guests, along with a can for lodging payments “on the honor system.”

“We know that our model could be used in any country,” Gaynor told the audience. “We know that what people are looking for are real experiences where they can learn something.”

Gaynor has spent much of her life as an entrepreneur. She started her first business, Mobile Home Marketplace, in Kalispell when she was 28. Later she started Insty Prints. She currently sells real estate through her company, Westward Bound Real Estate, in addition to helping run the resorts.

She has been involved with the Rural Development Leadership Network, which organized the recent U.N. conference in New York, since 1999. Gaynor earned her master’s degree in rural community development from Antioch University as a participant in the Rural Development Leadership Network.

While she was working on her master’s degree, she helped several people start businesses such as building tepees, and helped Indian artists find outlets for their work.

Gaynor encouraged small business owners to establish an online presence.

“That is how we found people in the Himalayas to buy tepees,” she said. “People from Germany and England come to the ranch and the resort off the Internet.”

Her ability to tap into resources and help others create their own access to employment has earned her numerous awards, including the Small Business Administration Minority Advocate of the Year award for the state and region in 2007.

Gaynor said the opportunity to speak on the topic of access for rural women at the U.N. session was “an incredible experience.” Because of her longtime connection with the Rural Development Leadership Network, she’s often tapped as a presenter.

Next year they will focus on rural communities, she said, adding “We’ll fit right in.”

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by email at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.