In August 1941, a stockmen's picnic and barbecue was held at Spear's Siding near Wyola in Big Horn County, Montana. Photographer Marion Post Wolcott documented people waiting in line for barbecued beef.
The Library of Congress record establishes the object of the wait, location, month and photographer. It does not establish the number of people, quantity of food, waiting time or detailed serving procedure. The catalogue also preserves a correction: earlier records mistakenly placed Wyola in Wyoming, an error corrected in 2000.
This queue was defined not by scarcity but by distributing a communal meal in sequence. A livestock region's gathering around beef produced a small order over who received a plate next, and that ordinary arrangement entered the federal photographic record.