USA > Iowa > Adair County > History of Adair County, Iowa, and its people, Volume I > Part 18
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The town in question at the time referred to was very thinly set- tled, the number of houses perhaps not exceeding twenty, and placed at long distances from each other.
The block north of the present public square is block 16, and near its southeast corner stood the public house kept by J. C. Gibbs, and in the same block a few feet west of Mr. Gibbs' residence was the dwelling of Cal Ballard. Near the northwest corner of block 20, which lies immediately west of the square, was a store originally built by J. K. Valentine, but at the time referred to was used by Ballard as a storeroom. The public square at that time was treeless and unenclosed and a liberty pole stood in its center.
On the site of the present residence (Frank Sears, 1915) of E. H. Fuller (this was written in 1873), D. Mulford Valentine, now chief justice of Kansas, lived, and the lots being then unfenced, he had his stable near the spot where Isaac Cade's stable afterwards stood.
Colonel Nichols, at that time, lived in a residence afterward occu- pied by Mr. Drake about one-quarter of a mile from Ballard's store. Gibbs' Hotel was about eighty rods from the store.
On the afternoon of a cold winter day A. B. Smith, now of Win- terset; James Minert of Eureka Township; Joe Clary, now in Wash- ington Territory; J. S. Ellis, Marion Ammon and Colonel Nichols and several others dropped into Ballard's store and whiled the after- noon away in conversation, jokes and story telling. In the middle of the afternoon the breeze from the northeast which had been blow- ing all day grew into a heavy storm accompanied by a heavy snow. The wind and snow had become so dense as to darken the air, and as no business could be done Ballard proceeded to close his store. The mud and snow beating with great force on his front door, which faced the east, made it necessary for the company to retire through the back door at the west end of the building. The company, including Mr. Ballard, left the building together and all but Nichols proceeded in the direction of Gibb's Hotel, where most of them boarded.
Having to face the cutting wind and the blinding snow that pre- vented one seeing an object even at a distance of a few feet, they had proceeded but a few steps when they became separated and realized that they were lost and helpless. This conviction, to which was added the suffering of several of them who lost their hats or scarfs which had been carried away by the wind, induced a fright which took away their presence of mind. They at once began calling to each other for help and were finally rallied around the liberty pole in the center of
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the public square by one who happened to reach it first. When once congregated here various plans were suggested for reaching Mr. Gibbs', which they knew to be distant not more than fifty yards, among others the plan of separating short distances within sight of each other and swinging around the pole; but the panic they had already experienced prevented this or any other plan from being adopted.
In the meantime Joe Clary and two or three others had succeeded in retracing their steps to Ballard's door and breaking in a window entered the building, where they remained all night, suffering con- siderably with the cold.
A. B. Smith, however, retained his presence of mind, and being able to keep the location of the various houses, took charge of the party. He first took Ballard to his residence a few yards from the pole. Ballard was so bewildered that when he reached his home he failed to recognize it and was only convinced when Smith, opening the door, pushed him into the house. Smith then taking charge of Colonel Nichols, whose house was a fourth of a mile distant, safely piloted him home.
On his return from this duty he came across D. M. Valentine. On the approach of evening this gentleman had left his house to go to his stable, which situation has been described. In going the dis- tance of eighty rods he had lost his direction and could not find his stable or regain his house and he had wandered off in the face of the storm about a half-mile from his residence and would probably have perished but for the timely assistance of Mr. Smith, who conducted him home. After all the party were safely housed except Clary and his companions, who had found their way back to the store, Mr. Smith hunted them up, but they were fearful of entrusting them- selves to his guidance, preferring to remain where they were for the night.
WILD GAME
The rich rolling lands of Western Iowa, less than three-quarters of a century ago, supported immense herds of buffalo, deer and elk. The first of these to disappear was the buffalo, for within the recol- lection of the earliest settlers none of these ruminants were found in Adair County when they came here.
It is generally believed that the last wapiti, or elk, was killed in Adair County by John Loucks in the winter of 1856. The facts as given by John B. Wilson are as follows: The elk was discovered by Vol. I-13
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Mr. Louck in Mr. Wilson's cornfield. There had been a heavy fall of snow which had become coated with a heavy crust. Pursuit was made by Messrs. Wilson, Loucks and P. Glunt and after an exciting chase of two hours, during which time much powder was burned and the elk lost much blood by the snow crust lacerating his legs, the game was finally brought down by Mr. Loucks, which went far towards establishing his reputation as a marksman, from the fact that he never used the hind sights and shut both eyes when he pulled the trigger. The elk was very poor and exceedingly tough.
PRIVATIONS
The privations to which the early settlers of our county were subjected to and the dangers which they encountered are but faintly realized by us who enjoy the benefits of their labors and sufferings. One of the early settlers of Adair County was John Cears. Of course every old settler in the county knew Mr. Cears and every person in the vicinity of Fontanelle, which was his trading point, and near which was his home for many years. Mr. Cears came to Adair County at a very early date and settled in Jackson Township. As many of the old settlers will remember, the winter of 1856-57 was one of uncommon severity, with heavy falls of snow. At this time Mr. Cears was keeping a stage station upon the stage road running from Des Moines to Council Bluffs by Winterset, Greenfield, Sum- merset and Lewis. In the latter part of December it became neces- sary for him to go to David Thompson's for the purpose of obtaining a supply of meat. Thompson lived two miles east of Pearson's mill, which was situated four miles north of Stuart. Having obtained his supplies, he left Mr. Thompson early on the morning of Tuesday, December 20th. At the time he started it was snowing heavily and there was a stiff breeze from the southwest. Thompson remonstrated with Cears for starting in such a storm, but he was anxious to reach home, as he had left his three young children in charge of strangers. Besides, it was his intention to stop at Jacob Bruce's on Middle River, which was twelve or fourteen miles distant. In going from Thomp- son's to Bruce's he would have the wind directly in his face. The storm increased in fury after Mr. Cears started and he was unable to see 200 yards on account of the heavy fall and drifting of the snow. The road even in summer was not very well marked and was entirely obliterated by the snow in a very short time. The ordinary landmarks could not be seen for the storm and the only guide left for Mr. Cears
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was the course of the wind, which was blowing from the southwest. Before reaching Mr. Bruce's the wind changed to the northwest and imperceptibly the course of Mr. Cears was changed also. After the lapse of a few hours Mr. Cears knew he was lost and realized fully the danger of his position, but his anxiety for himself was much less than that for his little children at home. He had reason to believe that, like persons lost in the snow, he sometimes crossed his own track, but from the fact that he continued to face the storm he finally found himself so far from his starting point that his course was quite direct. The storm raged with fury and without cessation. Day and night from Tuesday morning until Friday noon following and during the entire time there was no landmark visible by day nor stars at night to reveal to him his course or position. During the daytime he con- tinued to travel as well as he could, but the weakness of his horse, his own fatigue, as well as the excessive darkness, rendered traveling impossible. When he left Thompson's he had one bushel of corn for his horses. Of course this small amount was soon consumed, and as neither browsing or dry grass could be had, the horses soon showed signs of weakness. After the corn was gone the horses ate the entire sides of the wagon made of yellow poplar. During this entire time Mr. Cears had no food whatever. He had fortunately supplied him- self with a pint of whiskey before leaving Mr. Thompson's, which was his only support during this time. Mr. Cears was for many years a stage driver and a hard drinker, but he said this was the only time in his life when whiskey proved of any benefit to him whatever, and from that day until his death never drank a drop of intoxicating liquor. Mr. Cears knew that his only hope lay in keeping his horses alive, and to do this they must be exercised. Each horse had a blanket. During most of the nights Mr. Cears kept his horses moving, leading them to and fro. While not engaged in this occupation he sat wrapped in his only protection from the storm, his buffalo robe, and listened to the wolves howling upon all sides of him. At such times, although it was "blue" cold, yet the anxiety for his children would often induce a profuse perspiration. As the snow was at times accompanied by rain, before long the wheels of the wagon became a solid mass of ice, not a single spoke being visible, and long icicles hung from the horses' bellies and from the wagon. As the horses became weaker and weaker they often stumbled and fell while cross- ing the gullies which could not be seen and avoided on account of being filled with snow. From the first time that Mr. Cears discov- ered that he was misled by the wind and lost he had no notion as to
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where he was, but felt that his only safety was in moving on. As he afterward discovered, he had changed his course and had traveled northwest parallel with Middle River, but never so near it as to see the timber on account of the snow. As he had matches with him, he could have made himself comfortable had he reached the timber, but where he was on the divide he was not able even to light a pipe. At about 2 o'clock on Friday afternoon the storm had ceased to rage and the sun came out. Mr. Cears saw at some distance a high hill crowned with a single tree. Hitching the one horse to the wagon, he mounted the other and rode to this point. From here he saw a shang- hai fence, which was a very certain indication that a house was not far distant. Going back for the other horse, he left his wagon and made his way to the enclosure. Here he found a turf house, well known at that time as Gopher Station. It was one of the stage stations on the line from Des Moines to Council Bluffs and was kept by a Quaker named Betts. It was situated on Bear Grove, near the headwaters of Middle River, about twelve miles north of Adair County. Mr. Betts brought the wagon to the station. Of course, after such privations both Mr. Cears and his horses were prostrated. Mr. Cears had an awful appetite, but could retain no food upon his stomach for some time. One of his horses recovered, but the other died within a few days after reaching the station. Mr. Cears froze several of his fingers and both of his heels. On Monday morning fol- lowing, with a stage horse kindly lent to him by Mr. Betts, and his stronger horse, he took the mail route to Anita and reached home Tuesday afternoon. On Wednesday he returned to Gopher Station, to return the borrowed horse, expecting to return on the one he left, but in the meantime the horse had died. On Thursday Mr. Cears returned home on foot, coming by way of Jacob Johnson's near Casey and taking dinner at Mr. Ray's, who lived where Mr. West- man later lived. No one but a person of imperturbability, bravery and indomitable resolution would have escaped from such peril with his life.
PANTHER
In the spring of 1864 the eastern part of Adair County was much excited by the inroad of a wild animal whose presence was first made known by its depredations upon domestic animals of the farmers of Harrison and Jefferson townships. It first made its appearance upon Middle River in Harrison Township. The groves bordering the river were at that time much denser than now, and afforded it
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an excellent shelter and place of retreat from whence it sallied in search of something to devour. The report of its depredations extended to the settlers upon the river, creating considerable uneasi- ness. Before long the animal removed its quarters to Jefferson Township and at once, made its presence known by the destruction . of colts, calves, sheep and hogs. Not long after its arrival it was seen and reported to be of a red color and as large as a small mule. The animal was again seen by some women who were gathering some gooseberries. It was lying stretched upon the dead limb of a tree about twenty feet from the ground. The person who first discovered it gave the alarm and the party retreated. She described him as larger than the largest dog she had ever seen. Previous to this time, in addition to his numerous attacks on domestic animals, he had made the settlers aware of his presence by cries at night, which, except that they were louder, resembled the cries of a cat. Doubtless it belonged to the same family of animals. A hunting party at once sallied forth in search of the animal, accompanied by the young lady who had seen him, but without success. Traces of him were evident in the remains of ten shoats which were discovered partly devoured. Besides these another gentleman lost about forty pigs, some of them large enough to weigh 100 pounds. The excitement aroused by the presence of such a dangerous neighbor having become universal, a grand hunt was organized to rid the country of his presence. All the men, arms and dogs were in requisition. After beating the bush for a consid- erable time the animal soon started from his lair, but breaking through the lines he reached the dense timber and escaped. As he passed through the lines he was plainly seen, but was enabled to escape unhurt. After this he was seen no more, nor, we believe, heard from, but the fear that he might be still lurking in the timber was for a long time the cause of alarm and annoyance and deprived the good people of Middle River country of many a gooseberry pie.
The animal was probably what is known as the American panther. It is rarely found, and especially in the parts of the country so sparsely wooded as Adair County.
REMINISCENCES OF S. W. PRYOR
On the 1st day of August, 1856, I arrived at a small settlement in the eastern part of Adair County, one among the numerous paper towns in Western Iowa at that time. This was the summer preceding the winter still remembered by the old settlers as the hard winter of
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1856-57. The seasons had been and were still very dry; crops of all kinds were very light, prairie grass was exceedingly light, and still it was about all the chance a newcomer had out of which to make feed to winter his stock. The first thing for a man of a family to do was to get a house to live in. Having done this I thought, as land seemed to be on the rise, I would secure a piece of land on which to make a home. Although I had before leaving Missouri, where I had lived fourteen years, bought of different parties military land war- rants amounting in all to 420 acres, intending to locate them on the public domain in Iowa, unfortunately for me, when I arrived here the land offices were closed with little or no hopes of being opened soon. thus I was forced to pay my money for land instead of keeping it for other uses. By the time I had selected and purchased what land I wanted haymaking was well advanced. With scythe and pitchfork I commenced making hay for between thirty-five and forty head of stock, three head of which were only horses. Winter setting in rather early, found me still unprepared in the way for shelter for my stock, and on the very first day of December the stormy weather began. My cattle were only partially sheltered from the storm by my hay- rick and they began to freeze to death. The weather continued exceedingly cold and stormy all winter. On the coming of grass in the spring I had only two head of cattle living out of about thirty-six, the others dying mostly for the want of shelter. That spring corn sold for $1.50 per bushel and during the summer following flour for $7.50 per hundred. Some time during the summer, I think it was June, I wanted to see a man living in the southwestern part of the county and knowing that he lived somewhere near Nevin, a small colony from New England, accordingly one morning I struck out on foot for that village. I knew I could get there some time on foot and thought best not to start on horseback, knowing that the streams were bad to cross with a horse, and I had also found it to be very hard to find grain to feed an animal. I had no guide but a pocket compass which I used to keep myself in the proper bearing when no house or grove could be seen, which would answer the same purpose, which was nearly all the time, however. After I had gone some ten or twelve miles I could see Greenfield, or a barn and one house per- haps all told, which was a very good guide, as I knew that Nevin lay directly south from that town at a distance of about eleven miles. Late in the evening, after wading several streams, and traveling without a road, sometimes through grass and weeds higher than my
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head, hungry and tired, I reached the colony where I remained until the next day.
I could relate similar incidents enough to fill a volume, but I shall relate but one more. In the latter part of June, 1858, I was called upon to survey a road from Schweer's mill, now Hebron, in Grand River Township, north to the line between Adair and Guthrie coun- ties. I ran the road through by the second evening without any unusual occurrence. We stopped with a widow just across the line in the edge of Guthrie County, in quite a small log cabin, and I thought that I never heard it thunder harder or rain more than it did that night. In the morning, after waiting for the water to run down, for some of the sloughs would swim a horse, we started homeward, but in a few miles we came to North River, which had overflowed its banks and spread from hill to hill. Seeing that we could not pos- sibly cross there, a man living near by informed us that a man some miles below owned a canoe. So we started with very little hope of getting across to hunt the man with the canoe. Sure enough, when we got there the canoe was gone. We got our dinner and after fur- ther consultation I proposed to construct a raft that I thought we could cross on if we could find a dead tree of sufficient size and very dry and light, which would float well. We soon found a tree which suited us and after cutting it down, cut off four lengths and placing them together side by side, fastened them together by pinning four pieces of a sapling, cut and split, laying flat side down upon the logs, holding them securely together. We all took hold, drew it into the water until it would float, then with one of the men at a time with a pole about ten feet long I began ferrying our company across, until all were carried over but the teamster, who was to follow as soon as the stream became fordable. This sketch illustrates but a part of my experiences for the first few years in Adair County.
EARLY SETTLEMENT IN NORTH PART OF ADAIR COUNTY
It is claimed and probably correct that William Alcorn and John Gilson were the first settlers in the north part of the county, Alcorn making a claim and building a house on section 27 and Gilson making a claim and putting up a house on section 35, situated in what is now known as Jefferson Township. About the same time or soon there- after Benjamin Alcorn claimed and built a cabin on section 33, same township. William Alcorn remained upon his claim for several years, while Gilson, who had a child die, became discouraged and sold
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out to Daniel Vancil. At the time that Alcorn and Gaston settled on Middle River in Adair County, their nearest neighbors were twenty-five miles distant. We give the names of those settlers in the township previous to 1855 in their order: William Alcorn, John Gil- son, Benjamin Alcorn, - Crow, John Phebus, - Pettus, Collins, William Hollingsworth, George M. Holaday, Mahundra Hollingsworth, Samuel Minert and Jacob Bruce.
The pioneers as a class of people were generous and accommo- dating, although deprived of many of the privileges and blessings of an older settled country, yet their hearts were warm and sympathetic, which was made manifest in sickness or in trouble. They also kept the latch string hanging out to the wayfarer, that he might find shelter and food. It was a custom of the early settlers when one went to the nearest trading point to send word the day before to his neighbors so that they might send for what they needed. The same in milling. One would do the milling for several. At that day there was no class distinction-all were on the same level. None rich, but all poor. Though living twenty miles away they were our friends and neigh- bors. Intemperance, profanity and Sabbath breaking was the excep- tion. The young men of that day were not walking arsenals, with their pockets loaded down with revolvers, slung shots and brass knuckles as at the present time, but they grew to be sturdy, indus- trious, self-reliant young men, the pride of their parents, esteemed by their neighbors and respected by all who came to know them.
While it may be said truthfully that the pioneers of Adair County were a generous and hospitable people, it cannot be said that they always made the best of their straitened circumstances in the matter of cleanliness, as the following incidents will substantiate. Two young attorneys stopping with mine host of the - House, after retiring for the night, heard the hostess making inquiry of her daughters, who were in the kitchen, if they had "turned those chick- ens," which gave those young disciples of Blackstone visions of nice baked chicken for breakfast, which thought was transporting them to the land of dreams when their repose was disturbed by the mother making a loud call and the inquiry the second time, which elicited an answer in the negative. They were then told to balance those chickens with that part which is last getting in over the fence, farthest from the flour in the barrel. The announcement caused a cessation of saliva in the mouths of the young attorneys, which could be only started again by the frequent use of a pint flask. On another occa- sion at the same place the travelers were awakened by the landlady
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pulling the children out of the trundle bed to get the sheet to do service as a table cloth. And to show their down East friends how biscuits were manufactured in the West they carried a biscuit home, and the tenacity with which it hung together was due to the fact that a yellow dog had lost considerable of his hair whilst keeping watch over the flour barrel and meal box. The reader must remember that this was before the days of patent flour and meal chests and when the family occupied one room of the house and dogs, cats and chickens the other.
We will relate one or two incidents which will show the spirit of accommodation that pervaded the hearts of the early settlers. On a certain time when it was very disagreeable in traveling, when houses were few and far between, and mine host had stowed away to the best advantage all the humanity that beds and bedding would admit, the landlord was heard to exclaim: "No room for another unless he bunk with wife and me." Hardly had the words been uttered when "Halloa!" was heard and a horseman claimed shelter and food. The conditions were made known and accepted. The belated traveler was fed and his clothes dried and then told to turn in, the host telling his wife to lay over next to the wall and telling the traveler to pile in, "but I swear you shan't sleep in the middle."
On another occasion, to show that where there is a will a way can be found to do good to others, in a room less than fourteen feet square sleeping room was had, although a little crowded, for ten full grown men, two women and three children, by the good wife putting the men, chairs and table outside, then spreading bedding on the floor from wall to door; the men being admitted one at a time, were stowed away spoon fashion, which necessitated all turning at once when they wished to change positions, which caused considerable merriment which lasted well into the morning hours.
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