The writer has in his possession an old map of the North American continent published in London in 1796, twelve years after the close of the American Revolution, whereon the region now comprising the state of Nebraska is shown as a part of Quivera; that supposed kingdom of fabulous riches in quest of which Coronado pursued his tedious wanderings more than three hundred years ago. At the time this map was published the French had visited Indian tribes as far west as the Missouri, and it must have been from French and Spanish sources that the geographer and map-maker gathered the information that enabled him to compile that part of his map covering the vast unknown regions of the west. Guess-work and supposition resulted in elongations and abbreviations of territory and rivers that made it possible for him to show our own Blue river as emptying into the Gulf of California, and the great kingdoms of Quivera and Teguayo as extending from the Missouri river to the Pacific coast. The greater part of what is now Mexico is shown as "New Biscay" and "New Navarre," while Mexico or "New Spain" is crowded down towards Central America. The existence of the Rocky Mountains, at the time this map was made, was unknown; and the whole region covered by them is shown as a vast plain. While spending leisure hours among some rare old books in the library of the Union League of Philadelphia, I came across the chronicles of Coronado's wanderings and adventures, as detailed by his monkish chaplain and preserved in the Spanish archives. A careful perusal of these fully convinced me that the route traversed was through eastern Nebraska as far northward as the present site of Lincoln, and possibly as far as the Platte. The great salt marsh was referred to, and the particulars of a disastrous encounter with the warlike Otoes are given. Mention is made of the Missouri nation and its bold warriors, as well as of other tribes whose habitat and hunting grounds were the plains or prairies of eastern Nebraska.In prehistoric times the Indian trails led along the level river bottoms where both wood and water could be obtained and where game was usually most abundant, and also in the direction of salt springs or licks where salt might be obtainable and the larger kinds of game be more plentiful. At the time of its settlement by white people the bottom lands of the Blue were threaded by many deeply worn trails that had evidently been traveled for centuries and a careful consideration of happenings, as recorded by the monkish chronicler, and the fact I have just stated in regard to the prehistoric routes of travel, forces the conclusion that Coronado's weary cavalcade must undoubtedly have followed the course of the Blue river to a point where the well worn trail diverged towards the great salt basin. Possibly the party may have encamped on the site of Beatrice and there can be little doubt that one of the Indian cities mentioned by the faithful monkish historian, occupied the present site of Blue Springs, where evidences of an ancient Indian town can still be seen, and the outlines of ancient fortifications be traced. Fragments of Indian pottery and stone knives and implements, of both the paleolithic and the neolithic ages, are frequently turned up by the plowshare in that vicinity, all indicating a long established occupancy that must have continued for centuries. As late as the early part of the last century the Pawnees occupied the site; and when the writer as United States government agent took charge of the Otoes and Missouris, in the summer of 1869, there were still old warriors living who remembered hearing their fathers tell of deeds of bloody warfare done in this very vicinity, and who pointed out to the writer the very spot, in a deep draw or ravine on the prairie a few miles east of Blue Springs, where a war party of thirty Otoes met a well-deserved, but terrible death. At the time of this occurrence the Otoes were living at the mouth of the Nemaha and were on very bad terms with the Pawnees, many of whose scalps the writer has seen adorning Otoe medicine bags or hanging in their wigwams. The Pawnees had started on a buffalo hunt, leaving at home only the old and decrepit and a few children, and the Otoes, knowing that the defenders of the village had started on the hunt, made an attack at daybreak the next morning, murdering and scalping old and young alike and after loading themselves with plunder, hastened on their homeward trip.Unfortunately for the Otoes the Pawnee hunters had encamped only eight miles up Indian creek and one of them that morning had returned to the village on some errand and arrived just in time to discover what was going on. The Otoes wounded him severely, but he succeeded in escaping to the Pawnee camp and giving the alarm. The enraged Pawnee warriors, mounted on their freshest and fastest ponies, were not long in reaching the village, nor were they long in discovering the trail of the Otoe war party, which they followed until they overtook it at the place pointed out to the writer. Here a fierce battle took place which resulted in the complete extermination of the Otoe party; the tall slough grass, in which they took shelter, having been set on fire, the wounded all perished in the conflagration. This is probably one of the most tragic incidents of which we have any knowledge as having happened within the limits of Gage county.
The first store established within the county was located in a log house on Plum creek near the present site of the village of Liberty. It was established, primarily as an Indian trading place, by a Mr. MacDonald, of St. Joseph, Missouri, but was under the management of Mrs. Palmer, who with her husband, David, were the first white settlers within the limits of the county, having arrived in 1857 a few weeks prior to the coming of the founders of Beatrice. David was drowned a few years ago while bathing in the Blue. The store on Plum creek, on one occasion, was raided by a party of Pawnees who, loaded with plunder, were pursued by a large party of Otoes, who overtook them on the Little Blue some distance above the present site of Fairbury, and killed them all. The site of this battle was pointed out to the writer by the Otoes while accompanying them on a buffalo hunt in 1870. The skulls and bones of the slain were still in evidence at that time, being concealed in the dense thicket in which the battle had taken place.
About the year 1868 a war party of Osages made a raid on the aboriginal inhabitants of the county and murdered and scalped several squaws who were chopping wood near the Blue. The trail of the Osages was followed, by a war party of Otoes, to the reservation of the former and satisfaction exacted in the shape of a gift of forty head of ponies. On their way back the Otoes concluded that they had settled too cheaply and fearedthey might be censured by the kindred of the murdered women. They halted, and leaving the forty head of ponies under guard, made a flying raid on the Osage pony herds and succeeded in stealing and getting safely away with another forty head. In due time, with eighty head of Osage ponies, they made a triumphal daylight entry into their home village. If they had been unsuccessful they would have stolen in one by one during the darkness of the night.
The last Indian war party to traverse the soil of Gage county consisted of thirty naked and painted Omahas. It transpired that a party of Kickapoos had raided the pony herds of the Omahas and stolen thirty head of ponies, and in order to throw suspicion on the Otoes, had cunningly directed their trail towards the Otoe reservation, passing in the night as near to the Otoe village as possible without being discovered. The Otoes at this time were expecting, and trying to guard against, a raid from the Osages, whom they had great reason to fear, as it was fully expected that they would exact satisfaction, sooner or later, for that extra forty head of ponies that the Otoes had stolen. As a protection from the Osages, the Otoes had constructed a sort of a stockade of poles tied together with withes and strips of bark, in front of each wigwam, where they kept their nearly eight hundred head of ponies under careful watch every night. The Omaha war party stealthily approached under cover of the darkness and finding sentinels posted and watching, they hid in the tall weeds and sunflowers as close to the stockades as they could safely get, until daybreak, when the sleepy sentinels, thinking all danger over, entered the wigwams for something to eat and a nap, then emerging from their hiding places the Omahas made quick work of cutting the lashings that bound the poles and selecting thirty of the best ponies they could get hold of. The noise of the ponies' hoof-beats, as the Omahas rode swiftly away, aroused the Otoes, and in a very few minutes the whole village was in a commotion. Fierce war whoops resounded; the heralds went about calling the braves into action and soon there was mounting in hot haste. The writer, awakened by the tumult, stepped out upon a balcony in front of the agency building and beheld a sight such as no historian of the county will ever again record. In the far distance the naked Omahas were riding for their very lives, while perhaps a hundred or more Otoes werelashing their ponies in a wild frenzy of pursuit. In the village the greatest commotion prevailed, the women wailed, the heralds shouted, and the dogs barked; scores of women stood on the tops of their wigwams shrieking and gesticulating and the temper of the community closely resembled that of a nest of hornets when aroused by the rude thrust of a pole. It was nearly noon when the distant war whoops, announcing the return of the pursuers, were heard; as they drew near it was apparent that they were wildly triumphant and were bringing with them the thirty hideously painted Omahas. The prisoners were delivered to the agent who directed his police to disarm them, and cause them to be seated on the floor of the council room where they formed a dejected looking group with their naked bodies and shaved and vermillion painted heads. It was then that their leader explained that their seizure of ponies was honestly intended as a reprisal for ponies which they had lost. Old Medicine Horse, an Otoe chief, assured them that his braves would have killed every one of them if the agent had not talked so much about the wickedness of killing, and it was only their fear of displeasing him that caused them to take prisoners instead of scalps. After much speech-making, the agent adjourned the council and suggested that the Otoes take the Omahas to their wigwams, feed them, and allow them to depart in peace; and this was done. The only blood shed during the campaign was in the shooting of one of Elijah Filley's hogs by the Omahas. The first notification I had of this atrocious and bloody affair was when Elijah, then quite a young man, came to see me and file a complaint, bringing with him the blood-stained arrow that had pierced the vitals of his innocent hog.
Perhaps one of the saddest tragedies of those early days occurred in 1870 when two homesteaders, returning to their families from a trip to Brownville for provisions, were brutally murdered by a half-breed named Jim Whitewater. Jim was just returning from a buffalo hunt and had secured a supply of whiskey from a man named Wehn, at Fairbury. Being more than half drunk, he conceived the idea that the bravest thing he could do would be to kill some white people; and it happened that he came across the poor homesteaders just at that time. It was about dusk and the poor fellows had halted for the night, by the side of a draw where the grass was tall enough to cut fortheir horses. They had unharnessed their teams, tied them to the wagons and were in the act of mowing grass for them when a pistol shot rang out and one of them fell mortally wounded; the other, being attacked, and though mortally hurt, tried to defend himself with the scythe that he had been using, and in doing so cut the Indian's hand, almost severing the thumb. The scene of this terrible affair was just over the Gage county line in Jefferson county and consequently it devolved on the sheriff of that county to discover and arrest the murderer. As Whitewater had been seen in the vicinity, suspicion pointed to him and his arrest followed. He soon escaped from the officers and was hidden for two weeks, when the Indian police discovered his place of concealment in the timber on Wolf creek. His own brother, assisted by other Indians, captured him by strategy, bound him securely with their lariats and delivered him at the agency. The writer had gone to Beatrice on business and was not expected back until the next day, but in his absence his wife, then a young woman of about twenty, took energetic measures to insure the safety of the prisoner by ordering him placed in irons, and kept under a strong guard until the agent's return. In the meantime, having finished the business at Beatrice and there being a full moon, the writer decided to drive the twenty miles to the agency between sundown and midnight, which he did, arriving there shortly after midnight. Of course, until his arrival, he had no intimation that Whitewater had been captured. Before leaving home the Indians had reported that they had reason to believe that he was hiding somewhere on Wolf creek, as his wife had taken dried buffalo meat to that locality, and as the writer, in returning, had to drive for about forty rods through the heavy timber bordering that creek and cross it at a deep and rather dangerous ford, and knowing that Whitewater had declared that he would take both the agent and the sheriff with him to the other world, and that he was heavily armed, the writer is not ashamed to confess to a feeling of nervousness almost akin to fear, as he was about to enter that stretch of timber shaded road dimly lighted by the full moon. He first carefully let down the curtains of the carriage and then made his team dash at full speed through the long stretch of timber, plunge and flounder through the ford, and out once more upon the open prairie, the driver expecting at almost anymoment to hear the crack of a pistol. On arriving within sight of the agency building, instead of finding it dark and silent as he had expected, the writer was greatly surprised to see it well lighted and many Indian police standing about it as if on guard. The next morning the writer with several Indian chiefs and the Indian police started for Fairbury with the prisoner; the Indians riding two abreast and carrying a large United States flag at the head of the procession. The trip was made via Beatrice and the distance traveled was about fifty miles. The Indians feared an attack from the Rose creek settlers; neighbors and friends of the murdered men, and as they approached Fairbury the entire line of Indians commenced a melodious chant which the interpreter explained as nothing less than an appeal to the Great Spirit asking him to incline the hearts of the people to treat the Indians kindly and fairly. On arriving at Fairbury the cavalcade halted in the public square and was soon surrounded by the entire population of the hamlet. It was nearly dark, but the good ladies of the place set about preparing a bountiful meal for the hungry Indians, to which they did ample justice. There being no jail in the place, we waived a hearing and started the next morning for Pawnee City, where prison accommodations could be had. Shortly after leaving Fairbury the interpreter told the Indians that evidently the Great Spirit had heard their appeal, to which they all vociferously assented. Jim was kept at Pawnee City until his trial, which took place at Fairbury before Judge O. P. Mason, who sentenced him to imprisonment for life. Whitewater was one of three individuals among the Otoes who could read and write, the other two being Battiste Barneby and Battiste Deroin, both of whom were very capable interpreters. Polygamy being allowable among the Otoes, Deroin was one who had availed himself of its privileges, his two wives being sisters. On learning that Whitewater had been imprisoned for life, his wife soon found another husband, greatly to his sorrow and chagrin. It was during Whitewater's imprisonment that the reservation was sold and the Indians removed. Eighteen years after his conviction he received a pardon and left the penitentiary to rejoin the tribe. What retribution he meted out to those who aided in his capture or to his wife's second husband, the writer has never learned.
A year before the writer took charge of the Otoes and Missouris, a delegation of their chiefs had accompanied their agent Major Smith, to Washington and made a treaty under which the whole reservation of 160,000 acres was to be sold at $1.50 per acre. The writer was informed by Major Smith that a railroad company would become the ultimate beneficiary, provided the treaty was ratified by the senate, and that he had been promised a section of land if the scheme proved successful. Smith urged the writer to use all the influence possible to secure the ratification of the treaty and before the writer had taken any steps to secure its defeat, he also received an intimation, if not an absolute promise, from interested parties, that in the event of its ratification, he should have his choice of any section of land on the domain. Believing that such a treaty was adverse to the interests and welfare of the Indians, the writer at once set about to accomplish its defeat, in which, through the aid of eastern friends, he was finally successful.
Coronado's chronicler mentions, among other nations with whom the expedition came in contact, theMissouriasas being very fierce and warlike, and it may be a matter of local historical interest to state that the Missouri "nation" with which Coronado became acquainted, and from which one of the world's largest rivers and one of the largest and richest states take their names, reduced to a remnant of less than one hundred individuals, found an abiding place within the limits of Gage county for more than a generation. Placed on a reservation with the Otoes and under the care of the same agent, they still retained their own chief and their own language, though circumstances gradually induced the adoption of the Otoe tongue. The old chief of the Missouris was called Eagle and was known as a war chief. It was his province to command and direct all hunting operations. He was a man of very striking appearance, over six feet in height, straight as an arrow, with fine features and apparently about seventy-five years of age in 1869. He was an hereditary chief, and probably a lineal descendant of one of the kings of the Missouri nation that Coronado and his followers met. Old Eagle was the only chief of the Missouris, and was respected and highly esteemed by both the Missouris and the Otoes. During a buffalo hunt, in which the writer participated with the Indians, Eagle chief was the highest authority in regard to all matters pertaining to the chase and attack on the herd. In 1869 the head chief of the Otoes was Arkeketah who was said to have been appointed to that position by Major Daily. He was a polygamist and very much opposed to the ways of the white man. In fact he was such a reactionary and stumbling-block to the progress of the tribe that the writer finally deposed him and advanced Medicine Horse to the position of head chief.
The number of Indians living within the borders of Gage county in 1869 was probably not far from eight hundred. The reservation, comprising two hundred and fifty square miles, extended some distance into Kansas and also took in a part of Jefferson county in this state, but the Indians were all domiciled in Gage county. Their principal village was situated close to the site now occupied by the town of Barnston and where a fine spring afforded an ample supply of water. The wigwams were of a type adopted by the Indians long before the discovery of America, and most of them were large enough to accommodate several families. It was a custom of the Otoes to vacate the wigwams and live during the winter in tipis which were pitched in the timber where fuel was close at hand. In 1869 only three persons in the confederated tribes wore citizens clothes, the rest were all blanket Indians, who, during warm weather, went almost naked, and habitually painted their faces and shaved heads, with vermillion and indigo.
The principal burial place of the Otoes was on a bluff overlooking the river bottoms, and within a short distance of where Barnston now stands. For years it was visited, as one of the curiosities of the reservation, by the white settlers and strangers, chiefly on account of the weird and ghostly funeral oaks that stood on the brink of the bluff, bearing, lashed to their gnarled and crooked limbs, gruesome burdens of dead Indians, wrapped in bark and partly mummified by the sun and wind; there was probably a score of these interesting objects resting peacefully on the boughs of these three oaks; they had been there for many years, and might possibly have remained to this day had not a great prairie fire during the summer of 1871 destroyed the oaks and their ghastly burden, leaving only an assortment of charred bones and skulls to mark the site.
A strange and pathetic tragedy, in connection with this oldburial place, transpired shortly before the writer took charge of the agency and its affairs; and it was from the interpreter, Battiste Deroin, that the particulars were obtained. The incident may be worth preserving by the local historian, as illustrating the absolute faith of the Indians in a continued existence of the spirit beyond the grave. Dogs were frequently strangled at children's funerals in order that the dog's spirit might accompany that of the child, and it was a common sight to see a dog's body sitting upright with its back to a stake and securely tied in that position, in the vicinity of the old burial place. The man who figured in this tragedy was very aged and feeble, and the little child was very dear to him; he doubtless knew that he had not long to live and that he very soon would have to travel over the same lonely trail that the little child was about to take. Doubtless he realized fully what a comfort it would be to each, if they could take the long journey together. The Otoes always buried their dead in a sitting posture; and the old man, when seated in the grave, held the body of the child in his arms. The relatives took a last farewell of both the dead child and its living caretaker; the grave was covered with a buffalo robe supported on poles or heavy sticks, and the mass of earth taken from the grave was piled thereon; this being their usual mode of burial.
The custom of strangling a horse or pony at the burial of an Indian brave was a common occurrence among the Otoes prior to 1870 and the old burial place on the bluff was somewhat decorated with horses' skulls laid upon the graves of warriors who are supposed to have gone to heaven on horseback. The tail of the horse sacrificed was usually fastened to a pole that stood at the head of the grave.
The first school established within the limits of the county was a mission school under the care of the Rev. Mr. Murdock, and the old stone building, built for it on Mission creek, was the first stone building in the county. It was a ruin in 1869.
In 1869 there were still some beavers to be found along the Blue; and at that time the river abounded with large gars, some of which were three or four feet in length; a fish which has since become entirely extinct in the Blue, probably because the water is no longer clear. The gar was one of the primitive fishes of the silurian age; it was very destructive of all other fish.White people never ate it, but the Indians thought it fairly good. The Indians obtained most of their fish by shooting with arrows from the river banks. They often succeeded in shooting very large fish owing to the clearness of the water. This could not be done now that the prairies have been put into cultivation, as that has destroyed the clearness of the water.
As late as 1869 there were some wild deer in the county and little spotted fawns were occasionally caught. The writer procured two of the latter from the Indians and gave them to Ford Roper's family in Beatrice; they became very tame and were frequently seen on the streets of the town. In 1870 the writer, while driving from Blue Springs to Beatrice, met a large buck with antlers, as it emerged from an opening in the bluffs.
Among the first settlers of the county were some families from Tennessee who settled near the present town of Liberty on Plum creek. They did their own spinning and weaving, and having been accustomed to raising cotton and mixing it with the wool for spinning, they undertook to raise it here. The writer remembers seeing their cotton patches, but never saw them gathering cotton.
The first bridge built in the county to cross the river, was built on Market street, Beatrice, about the year 1870. It was a very narrow wooden structure, only wide enough for one wagon at a time to pass over. The firm of Peavy and Curtiss of Pawnee City were the contractors and the contract price was $4,000. It was regarded as a public improvement of very great importance to the town.
I came to Beatrice, Nebraska, in 1874, after having been through Minnesota, Dakota, and Kansas, looking for a place where a settlement of our people, the Mennonites, could be established. Of all the land I had looked over, I liked southeastern Nebraska best, and the little town of Beatrice on the banks of the Big Blue, then consisting of maybe fifty dwellings and a few stores on lower Court street, seemed very picturesque and attractive. After forty years I have not changed my opinion. We found a suitable tract of prairie just across the line in Jefferson county, which we bought of the Burlington and Missouri River railroad at $3.50 per acre on easy payments. Beatrice remained our chief place of business. Smith Brothers had just started a banking business in one-half of a little shack, the other half being occupied by a watchmaker carrying a small stock of jewelry. Klein & Lang had a general store on the corner of Second and Court streets, and here we did nearly all of our trading. The "Pacific House" on Second street was the only hotel. Here I made headquarters for some time. Mr. and Mrs. Randall, the hosts, were very kind to me. The latter died a few years later in the prime of her life.
We soon commenced to build up what was for years known as "Jansen's Ranch," about twenty miles southwest of Beatrice, and stock it with sheep, which we brought from Wisconsin. The first summer I had a temporary sheep corral about where the West Side schoolhouse now stands. We used to drive from the ranch to Beatrice diagonally across the prairie; very few section lines had been established, and there was only one house between the two points.
Major Wheeler, of stage route fame, lived at the Pacific house and took a kindly interest in the young emigrant boy. I remember on one occasion I had brought in a carload of valuable breeding sheep and quartered them for the night in the corral of the livery stable across the street from the hotel, run thenby S. P. Lester. I was afraid of strange dogs attacking them, and sat up all night on the porch watching. In the morning, while washing up in the primitive wash-room, I overheard the major telling Mr. Randall about it. He concluded by saying: "That young fellow is all right; a boy who sits up all night with a few sheep will certainly succeed." I felt proud over the praise, and it encouraged me very much.
We were told by the few settlers who had preceded us that the upland prairie would not grow anything and that the bottom land was the only place where crops could be raised with any assurance of success. However, we were going to try farming, anyway. I bought a yoke of young oxen and a breaking plow and started in. The oxen were not well broken, and the plow was new and would not scour. Besides, I did not know anything about breaking prairie or driving oxen. The latter finally became impatient and ran away, dragging the plow with them. It was a hot day in May, and they headed for a nearby slough, going into the water up to their sides. I had by that time discarded my shoes and followed them as fast as I could. When I reached the slough, quite out of breath and thoroughly disgusted, I sat down and nearly cried and wished I were back in Russia where I did not have to drive oxen myself. About this time the nearest neighbor, a Mr. Babcock, living four miles away, happened along driving a team of old, well broken oxen. He asked what my trouble was, and after I told him in broken English, he said: "Well, Pete, take off your trousers and go in and get your oxen and plow out, and I will help you lay off the land and get your plow agoing," which he did, and so started me farming.
My younger brother, John, and I bached it for two years. One of us would herd the sheep and the other stay at home and do the chores and cooking. We took turns about every week. We had a room partitioned off in the end of the sheep shed, where we lived.
Game was plentiful those days, and during the fall and winter we never lacked for meat.
I had by that time, I regret to say, acquired the filthy American habit of chewing (I have quit it long since), and enjoyed it very much while doing the lonely stunt of herding the flock.
One day we had gotten a new supply of groceries and also abig plug of what was known as "Star" chewing tobacco. Next morning I started out on my pony with the sheep, the plug in my pocket, and anticipating a good time. Soon a severe thunder storm came up, and lightning was striking all around me. I felt sure I would be hit and they would find me dead with the big plug of tobacco in my pocket. My mother knew nothing of my bad habit, and I also knew that it would nearly kill her to find out, so I threw the plug far away and felt better—for awhile. The clouds soon passed away, however, and the sun came out brightly and soon found me hunting for that plug, which, to my great disappointment, I never recovered.
Those early winters, seems to me, were severer than they are now, and the snow storms or blizzards much fiercer, probably because the wind had an unrestricted sweep over the vast prairies.
In a few years our flocks had increased, so that we built a corral and shed a mile and a half away, where we kept our band of wethers and a herder.
About Christmas, I think it was in 1880, a blizzard started, as they usually did, with a gentle fall of snow, which lasted the first day. During the night the wind veered to the north, and in the morning we could not see three rods; it seemed like a sea of milk! We were very anxious to know the fate of our herder and his band of sheep, and towards noon I attempted to reach them, hitching a pair of horses to a sleigh and taking a man along. We soon got lost and drove around in a circle, blinded by the snow, for hours, my companion giving up and resigning himself to death. We probably would have both perished had it not been for the sagacity of my near horse, to which I finally gave the reins, beingbenummedmyself. He brought us home, and you may believe the barking of the shepherd dogs sounded very musical to me as we neared the barn.
We got our fuel from the Indian reservation about eight miles south of us on the creek, where now stands the thriving town of Diller. The Indians were not allowed to sell any timber, but a generous gift of tobacco was too tempting to them to resist.
Rattlesnakes were found frequently in those days, and their venomous bites caused great agony and sometimes death. One Sunday afternoon, wife and myself were sitting on the porch of our small frame house, while our baby was playing a fewfeet away in a pile of sand. Our attention was attracted by her loud and gleeful crooning. Looking up, we saw her poking a stick at a big rattler, coiled, ready to spring, about three feet away. I have always detested snakes and would give even a harmless bull-snake a wide berth. However, I took one big jump and landed on Mr. Rattler with both feet, while my wife snatched the baby out of harm's way.
The next ten years made a great change. We had proven that farming on the tablelands could be made a success, railroads had been built, and towns and villages had sprung up like mushrooms. We even got a telephone. The wilderness had been conquered.
When I look back upon those first years of early settlement, with their privations and hardships, I cannot refrain from thinking they were the happiest ones of my life, especially after I got married in 1877 and my dear wife came to share joy and sorrow with me. To her I attribute to a very large extent what little I may have achieved in the way of helping to build up this great commonwealth.
Mrs. Frances Avery Haggard Third State Regent, Nebraska Society, Daughters of the American Revolution. 1898Mrs. Frances Avery Haggard Third State Regent, Nebraska Society, Daughters of the American Revolution. 1898
Emerson aptly said, "America is another word for opportunity." We realize this most truly when we compare present prosperity with early day living in the middle West.
In 1878 my brother, A. M. McMaster, and family, arrived in Nebraska City. They came overland to Gage county and settled on section 15, two and a half miles northeast of Filley and one mile south of what was then known as Melroy postoffice, so-called in honor of two little boys born the same year the postoffice was established, Mell Gale and Roy Tinklepaugh, whose parents were among the earliest settlers in this neighborhood.
My brother built his house of lumber he had shipped to Nebraska City. Beatrice was our market place. We sold all our grain, hogs, and produce there. Eggs were five cents a dozen and butter six cents a pound. The first year we came we bought five hundred bushels of corn at twelve cents a bushel delivered, and cribbed it.
There was an Indian trail across the farm, and often the Indians would pass going from the Omaha reservation to the Otoe reservation at Barnston; the children would become frightened and hide under the bed; the Indians would often call and ask for flour and meat.
There was not a house between Elijah Filley's stone barn and Beatrice on the Scott street road, and no bridges. The trail we followed going to Beatrice led us north to Melroy, making the traveling distance one and a half miles farther than in these times of well preserved section lines and graded country roads. This stone barn of Elijah Filley's was an early landmark. I have heard Mr. Filley tell interesting anecdotes of his early years here, one of an Indian battle near the present site of Virginia.
Before the town of Filley was in existence, there was a postoffice called "Cottage Hill," which is shown on old time maps of the state.
One of the curiosities of the early times was a cow with a wooden leg, running with a herd of cattle. The hind leg was off at the knee joint. She was furnishing milk for the family of her owner, a Mr. Scott living on Mud creek, near the town of Filley.
Mr. Scott often told of pounding their corn to pulverize it. The nearest mill was at Nebraska City. This difficult traffic continued until 1883, when the Burlington came through Filley.
Two or three years after we had located here, two young men came along from Kansas looking for work. My brother was away from home, working at carpentry, and his wife, fearing to be alone, would lock the stair door after they retired and unlock it in the morning before they appeared. They gathered the corn and then remained and worked for their board. One day, one of the young men was taken sick. The other was sent for Dr. Boggs. He lost his way in a raging blizzard and came out five miles north of where he intended to, but reached the doctor and secured medicine, the doctor not being able to go. The next day Dr. Boggs, with his son to shovel through the drifts, succeeded in getting there. The young man grew worse, they sent for his mother, and she came by stage. The storm was so fierce the stage was left there for a week; the horses were taken to Melroy postoffice. The young man died and was taken in the stage to Beatrice to be shipped home, men going with shovels to dig a road. Arriving there it was found that the railroad was blocked. As they could not ship the body, they secured a casket and the next day brought it back to our house. My brother was not at home, and they took the corpse to a neighbor's house. The next day they buried him four miles east, at what is now known as Crab Orchard.
True, life in those days tended to make our people sturdy, independent and ingenious, but for real comfort it is not strange that we prefer present day living, with good mail service, easy modes of transportation, modern houses, and well equipped educational institutions.
As my father, Ford Lewis, was one of the pioneer land owners in Nebraska and assisted actively in settling the southeast part of the state, I have been requested to give a brief sketch of his life and early experiences in this state. My only regret in writing this is that he is not here to speak for himself. Ford Lewis was born in Deckertown, New Jersey, July 25, 1829, son of Phoebe and Levi Lewis, the latter engaged in mercantile business both in Hamburg and Hackettstown, New Jersey.
After finishing his education at William Rankin's Classical School and studying under Chris Marsh, author of double entry bookkeeping, he assisted his father in the mercantile business for some time. However, he preferred other pursuits and after a successful test of his judgment in real estate, started west. At Syracuse, New York, he was induced to engage in partnership under the name of Chapman & Lewis, watch case manufacturers and importers of watch movements; keeping standard time for the New York Central and other roads and supplying railroad officials, conductors, and engineers with the highest grade of watches.
Selling his interest in 1856, he accepted the general agency of the Morse Publishing House, New York, making his headquarters at Charleston, South Carolina, in winter and at Cleveland, Ohio, in summer, until 1859, when he went to Jerseyville, Illinois, with his parents and sister, buying and selling real estate in that city and Jersey county until 1867, when, with Congressman Robert M. Knapp, he visited Nebraska, and made his first investment in government land, many of his United States patents being signed by Presidents Grant and Johnson.
Ford Lewis was in pioneer days one of the largest owners of farm lands in Nebraska, his holdings being chiefly in Pawnee, Otoe, Gage, Johnson, and Lancaster counties. On one of his advertising cards he states that, "occupied for eighteen years past in the purchase and sale of over 80,000 acres of other lands,these, on account of their well known intrinsic value have been reserved intact."
Mr. Lewis founded the towns of Lewiston in Pawnee county and Virginia in Gage county, naming the latter in honor of his daughter.
At a meeting of the Nebraska legislature held at Omaha in 1867, Mr. Lewis was an interested spectator, and before the capital of the state was changed he predicted its location in the salt basin, almost on the spot where Lincoln now stands. He accordingly purchased property in the vicinity of what is now Beatrice, making a comfortable fortune as the result of his wisdom and foresight. By Ford Lewis' liberality to those purchasing land from him, in selling at reasonable prices, and extending their contracts during hard times, instead of making purchasers forfeit their land because of inability to meet their payments, he encouraged and assisted many settlers who are now some of Nebraska's most prosperous farmers to keep their land, which is now the source of their prosperity. During the period when he was borrowing money for his investments in Nebraska land, many Illinois people remarked that Ford Lewis was "land crazy," but have since wished they had had his vision, and courage to hold their purchases through the crop failures and drouths which are sometimes the portion of every community: those who followed his advice now "rise up and call him blessed."
That he was not alone in his judgment is evidenced by the large land holdings of the late Lord Scully of England and the late John W. Bookwalter of Springfield, Ohio, who recently died in Italy, and was a warm personal friend of my father's, having purchased some of his land from him.
Mr. Lewis married Miss Elizabeth Davis of Jerseyville, Illinois, in 1864. She was the first girl baby born in that town, her parents being among the earliest pioneers there from New Jersey; so her childhood memories of bears, Indians, and slave refugees during the civil war, and roaming the woods surrounding their home prepared her to be a capable and sympathetic helpmate for my father during his many pioneer trips to Nebraska.
In the fall of 1866, about the last of October, a party of nine men, myself included, started out from Rose creek for a buffalo hunt. At Whiterock, Kansas, we were joined by another party of four men with "Old Martin Fisher," an early Whiterock settler, as official guide. Our equipment consisted of four wagons, one of which was drawn by a double ox team. There were numerous firearms and plenty of provisions for the trip. The party was much elated over the first day's experiences as night found us in possession of four fine buffalo. That evening while we were riding out after one of the buffalo our ears were greeted by the Indian yell. Looking back up a draw we saw five redmen galloping toward us. At the time we did not know they were friendly, but that was proven later. They came up to us and wanted powder or "bullet" and also wanted to swap guns. All they succeeded in getting was a necktie which one of the men gave them. After a short parley among themselves they left, going back to our camp where we had left one man to guard the camp and prepare supper. There they helped themselves to the loaf of bread the guard had just baked, a $12 coat, a $22 revolver, and one good bridle; away they went and that was the last seen of them. The night was passed in safety and the next day we hunted without any exciting experiences. The following day we met with only fair success so thought we had better start for home. In the morning the party divided, our guide, Fisher, and two men going on and leaving the rest of us to hunt as we went along. We succeeded in getting only one buffalo, but Fisher's men had done better and were ready to make tracks for home. That night they had suspicions that there were Indians near so built no fire and in the morning soon after breaking camp a party of Indians came upon them. There was considerable parleying about a number of things which the Indians wanted but the men were unwilling to make any bargains whatever. All the Indians but one started off andthis one still wanted to parley and suddenly drew his revolver and shot Fisher in the shoulder. The Indian then rode off at breakneck speed and that was the last seen of them. Fisher warned the men not to shoot as he was uncertain as to how many redmen might be in their vicinity and he did not want to take any great risk of them all being killed. Our party did not know of the accident until we returned home and we had no encounter with the party of Indians. We were thankful to be safely home after a ten days hunt.
Perhaps children who live in a pioneer country remember incidents in their early life better than children living in older settled countries. These impressions stand out clearly and in prominence all the rest of their lives.
At least there are several things which happened before I was six years old that are as vivid in my memory as if they had happened but yesterday. Such was the coming of the grasshoppers in 1874, when I was two years old.
My father, Judge Boyle, then owned the block on the north side of Fifth street between I and J streets, in the village of Fairbury. Our house stood where J. A. Westling's house now stands. Near our place passed the stage road to Beatrice. A common remark then was, "We are almost to Fairbury, there is Boyle's house."
Father always had a big garden of sweet corn, tomatoes, cabbage, etc., and that year it was especially fine.
One day he came rushing home from his office saying, "The grasshoppers are coming." Mother and he hurried to the garden to save all the vegetables possible before the grasshoppers arrived. I put on a little pink sunbonnet of which I was very proud, and went out to watch my parents gather the garden truck as fast as they could and run to the cellar door and toss it down. I jumped up and down thoroughly enjoying the excitement. Finally, the grasshoppers, which were coming from the northwest like a dark cloud, seeming so close, father shut the cellar door before he and mother returned to the garden for another load. They had just filled their arms when the grasshoppers began to drop and not wishing to let any down cellar they threw what vegetables they had on the ground and turned a big wooden wash tub over them. By this time my little pink sunbonnet was covered with big grasshoppers. Mother picked me up in her arms and we hurried into the house. Fromthe north kitchen window we watched every stalk of that garden disappear, even the onions were eaten from the ground.
When father went to get the vegetables from under the wooden tub there wasn't a thing there. The grasshoppers had managed to crawl and dig their way under the edge of that tub.
The only time an Indian ever frightened me was in the fall of 1875. I was used to having the Otoe Indians come to our house. Mother was not afraid of them so of course I was not. Among them was a big fellow called John Little Pipe. The door in the hall of our house had glass in the upper half. One afternoon mother being nearly sick was lying down on the couch and I took my doll trying to keep quiet playing in the hall. Looking up suddenly I saw John stooping and looking in through the glass in the door. I screamed and ran to mother. He didn't like my screaming but followed me into the sitting room and upon seeing mother lying down said, "White lady sick?" Mother was on her feet in a moment. He sat down and after grumbling a while about my screaming he began to beg for a suit of clothes. Mother said, "John, you know well enough you are too large to wear my husband's clothes." Then he wanted something for his squaw and children. Finally mother gave him an old dress of hers. He looked it over critically and asked for goods to patch it where it was worn thin. Grabbing his blanket where it lay across his knees he shook it saying, "Wind, whew, whew." After receiving the patches, he wanted food but mother told him he could not have a thing more and for him to go. He started, but toward the closet he had seen her take the dress from. She said, "You know better than to go to that door. You go out the way you came in." He meekly obeyed. I had seen him many times before and saw him several times afterward but that was the only time I was frightened.
In March, 1868, I left Fairbury, Illinois, with my two brothers and a boy friend in a covered wagon drawn by two mules. We landed at Nebraska City after swimming the mules to get to the ferry on which we crossed the Big Muddy. We then drove to Lincoln the first week in April. My father had purchased a home there on the site where the Capital hotel now stands. Lincoln then was but a hamlet of a few hundred people. There were no shade trees nor sidewalks and no railroad. Later father built a larger house, out a considerable distance in those days, but today it faces the capitol building. The house is a brick structure, and all the bricks were hauled from Nebraska City. Afterwards father sold the home to Chancellor Fairfield of the State University.
The year before we came father had come to Nebraska and had bought a large body of land, about ten thousand acres, in Pawnee county. I being the oldest boy in our family, it devolved upon me to go to Pawnee county to look after the land, which was upland and considered by the older inhabitants of little value; but the tract is now worth about a million dollars. Among other duties I superintended the opening up of the lines and plowing out fifty-two miles of hedge rows around and through this land. I am sorry to say that most of the money and labor were lost for prairie fires almost completely destroyed the hedge.
I had many experiences during my two years' sojourn in Pawnee county. The work was hard and tedious. Shelter and drinking-water were scarce—we drank water from the buffalo wallows or went thirsty, and at times had to brave the storms in the open. The people were poor and many lived in sod houses or "dugouts," and the living was very plain. Meat and fruit were rarities. The good people I lived with did their best to provide, but they were up against it. Grasshoppers and the drouth were things they had to contend with. At times ourmeals consisted of bread and butter and pumpkin, with pumpkin pie for Sunday dinner. The barn we usually carried with us. It consisted of a rope from sixty to a hundred feet long for each mule or horse and was called the lariat. I put the pony one night in the barn across the ravine, I well remember, and in the morning I found a river between the barn and me. A rain had fallen in the night and I had to wait nearly a day before I could get to the pony.
Our only amusement was running down young deer and rabbits and killing rattlesnakes.
We often met the red man with his paint and feathers. He was ever ready to greet you with "How!" and also ready to trade ponies, and never backward about asking for "tobac." As I was neither brave nor well acquainted with the Indians I was always ready to divide my "tobac." Later I found out I was easy, for the boys told me whenever they met the beggar Indian they told him to "puckachee," which they said meant for him to move on.
We had no banks, and we cashed our drafts with the merchants. David Butler was governor at that time. He was a merchant as well, and made his home in Pawnee, so he was my banker. On two occasions I had the pleasure of riding with him in his buggy from Pawnee to Lincoln. It was indeed a privilege to ride in a buggy, for we all rode ponies those days, and I think I was envied by most of the boys and girls of Pawnee. On one of my return trips with the governor my good mother had baked a nice cake for me to take with me, which I put under the seat along with a lot of wines of several kinds and grades which the governor's friends had given him. Of course mother didn't know about the liquids. I'll never forget that trip. We grew very sociable and the Nemaha valley grew wider and wider as we drove along; and when we arrived at Pawnee the next day the cake was all gone, our faces were like full moons, and it was fully a week before I had any feeling in my flesh.
I also well remember the first train which ran between Lincoln and Plattsmouth. That was a great day, and the Burlington excursion was made up of box cars and flat cars with ties for seats. Crowds of young people took advantage of the excursion and we enjoyed it much more than we would today in a well-equipped pullman.
Along in the seventies, when everyone was interested in the project of the erection of a United Brethren college in Fairbury, the leading promoter of that enterprise held a revival in the Baptist church. The weather was warm and as his zeal in expounding the gospel increased he would remove his coat, vest, and collar, keeping up meantime a vigorous chewing of tobacco. The house was usually crowded and among the late-comers one night was W. A. Gould, who was obliged to take a seat in front close to the pulpit. The next day some one offered congratulations at seeing him in church, as it was the first time he had ever been seen at such a place in Fairbury. "Yes," said Gould, "I used to attend church, but that was the first time I ever sat under the actual drippings of the sanctuary, for the minister spit all over me."
The most closely contested election ever held in Jefferson county was that in 1879 on the question of voting bonds to the Burlington and Missouri railroad to secure the passing through Fairbury of the line being built east from Red Cloud. The proposition was virtually to indirectly relieve the road from taxation for ten years. As bonding propositions were submitted in those days this was considered a very liberal one, as the taxes were supposed to offset the bonds and if the road was not built there would be neither bonds nor taxes. It required a two-thirds vote to carry the bonds and as the northern and southern portions of the county were always jealous of Fairbury the contest was a bitter one. Some of the stakes of the old Brownville & Ft. Kearny survey were yet standing and some still hoped that road would be built. The people of Fairbury resorted to all known devices to gain votes, some of which have not yet been revealed. It was long before the days of the Australian ballot and more or less bogus tickets were in circulation at every election. On this occasion a few tickets containing a double negative were secretly circulated in a precinct bitterly opposed to thebonds. Several of these were found in the ballot box and of course rejected, which left on the face of the returns a majority of one in favor of the bonds. It has always been believed that Fairbury lost the road because the officials of the road, who also comprised the townsite company, thought they could make more by building up new towns of their own.