USA > Kansas > Wabaunsee County > Early history of Wabaunsee County, Kansas, with stories of pioneer days and glimpses of our western border.. > Part 5
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Forty years ago the log cabin was the rule and teams of oxen furnished the only means of travel and freight transportation.
From necessity the ways of the people were primitive; from neces- sity they were compelled to resort to expedients that were not any the more agreeable for the reason that their adoption was not a matter of choice.
But that adversity that marked the beginning has served to render the homes of our people doubly dear to those with whose lives that adversity is entwined.
The dark hours of the past are illumined by the brightness of future promise. Now and then there may be a halt. Short crops may in the future as in the past cause anxious borebodings, but the dark clouds will disappear and the failing heart will be imbued with new life by the silver lining that lay hidden beyond.
With the past we have successfully battled. That a bright future is in store for us we may rest assured.
January 4th being Saturday. Mr. Oliver Smith, teaching in the Thoes district concluded to go to Alma and as it was very cold he thought it would be a good time to break in his new skates. Being asked as to the thickness of the ice, he said he found one place where it was about a quarter of an inch thick, but from the temperature of the water below the prospect for four foot ice was good. As he didn't break through any place where the ice was thick he could give no information that would be of value to a man going into the ice busi- ness. The point where he broke through was two miles from town and the weather being of the zero variety, his clothes were imme- diately frozen stiff, but he said he wasn't a bit cold till he got to the tire and the water began dripping from his wearing apparel.
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
A Cheyenne Raid.
*June 3. 1868, 400 Cheyennes with their war paint on came swooping down on Council Grove. There was a big seare but the Cheyennes were after the Kaws instead of the whites. A short time before a Kaw Indian was herding the ponies belonging to the tribe when 8 Cheyennes put in their appearance and after killing the lone Indian drove off the ponies he was herding.
The Cheyennes then attempted to drive the ponies by a cirenitous route into their camp, but the Kaws had witnessed the killing from the top of a hill and collecting a number of their warriors they killed 7 of the S Cheyennes and captured 40 ponies besides retaking their own herd.
The Cheyennes wanted 7 Kaw scalps and 40 ponies but after skir- mishing awhile among the hills about the Grove they left postponing the settlement of the scalp account to some future time.
The same year the Cheyennes raided the farms in Marion county, driving off some stock but killing none of the settlers. But by reason of their presence many families slept for weeks in the corn fields, fearing that during the night their houses would be burned to the ground.
Signal, March 19, 1892: A few years ago a bright young fellow was working as a farm hand for Uncle Henry Schmitz. But his aspirations were in another direction. He attended the Agricultural college at Manhattan and afterwards entered the ministry. Among the appoint- ments made at the M. E. Conference we notice that of Rev. Dan. Brummitt, Maple Hill. Rev. Brummitt aud the young farm hand are one and the same, and our knowledge of the young fellow induces the belief on our part that the people of Maple Hill will have no cause to regret his coming among them by reason of his having followed the
*One of our youngest county officers, Mr. D. U. Millison, distinctly remembers this raid. His parents resided in Council Grove at the time, and though but a boy of six years he remembers being crowded into a place of safety with the other children and their mothers till the scare was over.
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
plow. Roger Sherman was a cobbler and yet a few years later he was an honored representative of the people at the National capital; the poet, Whittier, was a farmer's boy, and nothing grieved him so much on leaving the old homestead as the parting from a pair of favorite oxen of his own raising; Henry Clay was a farmer's boy and with his rope bridle and sack of corn was known as the "Mill boy of the Slashes;" Daniel Webster was another farmer's boy, who received his education from the proceeds of a mortgage on the home that sheltered his aged parents, but in after years when he electrified the nation with his eloquence, no one honored him the less by reason of his former humble avocation.
"Wooh!"
It was a terrible night in the winter of '61. The winds howled without and the fine particles of snow sifted through the clap-board roof of the Michael Fix home on West branch. The war was going on and Robert was away in the army-having enlisted in an Indiana regiment, while one of the brothers was with Kit Carson, in New Mexico.
In the Fix home there was but one room below and a half story above, but the one room was 14x22-a big house in those days. There was a stove at one end and a huge fireplace at the other. In cold weather it was the custom to replenish the fire one or more times during the night and when Mother Fix awoke the smoldering embers and the chilly atmosphere suggested to her that the duty of rebuild- ing the fire had been too long delayed.
There was a pile of wood in the corner nearby and she would get up and throw on a few sticks. Michael was sound asleep and it would be cruel to wake him. But when that piercing "Wooh!" broke the stillness of the night Michael's snoring ceased and he sat bolt upright in bed, asking in a tone of anxiety: "What's the matter?"
But the faint, flickering light from the burning embers told the story. Prone on the floor lay a score of Indians-of all ages and both sexes. On one of these the feet of Mrs. Fix had rested in getting up to rebuild the fire. But a familiar voice answered Mr. Fix's question. "No hurtee. Indians cold. Heap storm outside."
A band of twenty Pottawatomies had been camped down by the creek (where the mill was built in 1872) and the storm of wind and
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
snow had driven them ont of their hastily constructed wigwams. Many cold nights before they had enjoyed a good nap, wrapped in their blankets before the huge fireplace in the Fix cabin and when the Storm burst upon them they didn't wait for an invitation to call again -even at an unseemly hour. There was no lock on the door and the latch-string was ont-why awaken their pale-face friends from their slumber:
Thus the Indians had reasoned. They had for years looked upon the old mill-site almost as their own. With each returning winter came the same band of Indians, always camping near the spot where the mill stood later on.
The Indians had many times eaten a hearty meal in the Fix home, but they were not beggars, by any means. Many a saddle of venison had been brought to the Fix cabin to partly compensate their friends for the many kindnesses shown.
In the hills on West branch there were many deer in those days and Mr. Fix was the owner of one of the best rifles in the country -- that the visiting Indians never failed to borrow on their annual return to their favorite hunting grounds. In the breech of the rifle was a compass-that greatly enhanced its value in the eyes of the Indian hunters and sometimes when the Pottawatomies would go on a raid in the Pawnee country for ponies, or on a buffalo hunt, the gun- hooks in the Fix home would be unused for months in succession. But the gun was always returned-and with it a goodly supply of buffalo meat for the owner.
That band of Pottawatomies long ago encamped for the last time on the old mill-site but the incident of that stormy night in the winter of 1861 will long be remembered by the Fix family-the time when Grosmutter said-"Wooh!"'
No history of Wabaunsee county written and published at this time would be complete without mention of the fact that the researches and explorations of the eminent explorer and archaeologist. J. V. Brower, now definitely locates the province of Quivira, which Coronado with his thirty horsemen explored in 1541 between Walnut creek village site in Barton county and the village sites on Deep creek and at the heads of the West branch of Mill creek in Riley and Wabaunsee counties. Mr. Brower has published two works, "Quivira" and "Harahey" in which the earliest history of part of Wabaunsee county has been written, and has placed in the Minnesota Historical Society Museum such conclusive evidence from an archaeologic and historical view that his conclusions are likely to be accepted by the Scientific World.
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
No Iron Horse, Then.
But there were meals at all hours, nevertheless. At least, so it seemed, to Mr. S. H. Fairfield in 1860-the first night he ever slept on the present site of McFarland. He was the guest of Old She-Kah-Za, a big chief of the Pottawatomies.
The old chief made him a comfortable bed of mats and soft-tanned buffalo robes served as covering. But Mr. Fairfield's sleep wasn't as sound as it might have been. Plumed warriors in their war paint and feathers were passing all night and She-Kah-Za, being one of the head councilmen of the Pottawatomies, had a right to know the outcome of their raid against their old-time enemies-the Pawnees-from which the war parties were just returning.
If the number of extra ponies they had brought back and the gen- eral good feeling that prevailed were indications of that success attendant on the expedition then no further evidence was wanting. The old chief would get up and smoke with every party that called and in every case, refreshments, consisting of jerked buffalo meat, dried venison and boiled pumpkin were set before the nocturnal visitors.
With much gesticulation the warriors would relate the stirring events that transpired while raiding the Pawnee villages, and the newly kindled fire in the old chief's eyes plainly indicated that old- time reminiscences were recalled and that, in spirit at least, he was fighting over again the battles wherein the tomahawk and scalping knife played a prominent part.
Although Old She-Kah-Za lived in a bark wigwam he was well fixed and one of the most influential members of the Pottawatomie nation. But the old warrior was long ago laid to rest, and though miraculous were the many changes time had wrought in his eventful career he never dreamed that in less than half a century the shrill neigh of the iron horse would be heard where the tom-tom had so often called together the warriors of his tribe.
The thousands of travelers who daily pass through on the Rock Island could hardly be convinced that less than half a century ago the bark wigwam of an Indian chief was the most conspicuous object, and the most frequented resort, of all the country around about the pres- ent city of McFarland.
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
Odds and Ends.
Dr. E. B. Allen, who was afterwards secretary of state once lived at Wabaunsee. Ile bought school land at $3.00 an acre on long time, and planted the grove on the Jos. LaFontaine place. Like his neighbors he was poor in everything but hope and future prospects. He used a box for a table, tin plates for dishes, and three legged stools served the purpose of chairs. But Miss Mary Garrison, who taught the first term of school in Dist. No. 5, in 1860, took pity on his lonely condition and shared with him his log cabin home at Wabaunsee. They afterwards moved to Wichita, where fortune and official honors smiled on one of our old citizens of pioneer days.
Old residents of Wabaunsee township have a vivid recollection of one of their number, who, in 1859, took all his belongings and with his estimable wife, journeyed to Pike's Peak in a wagon drawn by oxen. But the wagon was a neighbor's, who went with him to share his fortunes in the placer diggings of California Gulch. A fork of a tree with standards fitted into two-inch augur holes answered the purpose of a wagon. This would glide over the prairie grass as smoothly as a sled over the snow-a fact that could be attested to by many of the old settlers, no better fixed, financially, than the man who afterwards went to the U. S. Senate from Colorado. Mount Tabor was named for the man who selected his claim near the base of that old land mark. ITis old time friends regret their former neighbor's action in casting aside the wife of former years-whose bounty his straightened cir- cuinstances compelled him to accept later on, but the incident is valuable to those who might otherwise envy the lot of one to whom fickle fortune proved a delusion and a snare. The lesson of the old pioneer's life serves a good purpose-teaching those who may be envious of others holding official place, or, seemingly more fortunate financially, that a senatorial toga or the possession of riches, isn't an essential element in insuring one of the most desirable of earthly con- ditions-that of unalloyed happiness. Though that grub-stake may
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
have brought millions to the owner of that little store in the moun- tains of Colorado the poor miner left with but a pittance to send home to wife and family saw more of true happiness in a day than was enjoyed by Senator Tabor in a life time-an excellent argument to induce the wayward boys to "stick to the farm."
In 1858, Mr. Robert Fix followed the example of many of his neighbors by going on a buffalo hunt. He found plenty of buffalo on the Smoky Hill, twenty miles west of Salina. The pioneers may have seen hard times but there are scores of boys living in Wabaunsee county today who would risk being scalped by the Indians for the privilege of going on a buffalo hunt. But in those days there were some drawbacks for those who were absent for several weeks that the larder might be replenished. The married man of the hunting party couldn't call up the young wife by telephone and ask: "How is the baby." And the young men of today with the bare suspicion of a mustache shading the upper lip might have enjoyed the trip, but to be completely cut off from all communication with the girl he left behind him might have altered the case. Then, there was the danger of his esteemed rival's taking advantage of the situation during his three weeks absence. These are the fellows, who, today, more than others realize the fact that the hard times said to have been experienced by the old settlers were not all a myth.
The value of the work of our local photographers as an auxiliary factor in presenting our readers and those who will come after us with true and life like representations of scenes and faces cannot be over- estimated. But the photographer of the present can well afford to divide the honors with the traveling artist of the past. With un- bounded delight do we scan the lineaments of those most dear to us- made possible by the old time photographers advent among us even in advance of other civilizing influences. While crossing the plains in 1862 we distinctly remember that at the crossing of the Little Arkau- sas, on the Old Santa Fe Trail, one of these traveling artists was encamped-going where, it is hard to tell, but maybe he knew. Be- sides being of an adventurous spirit he was accomodating as well. With what patience did he upset the contents of box after box in his search for-well, it doesn't matter. Suffice it to say that when we returned to our camp we were well satisfied with our trip. That was forty years ago next July and we have often wondered where on earth that clever old man was going with his tripod and camera, and what
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
he was doing away out there on the Little Arkansas. But it doesn't seem so far away now. Maybe he was taking sketches of the immense herds of buffalo that were never out of sight in the sixties, or of the bands of Indians, whose presence wasn't always agreeable to the men and boys who always enjoyed life on the plains better when the red- skins were out of sight. It was a case wherein distance lent enchant- ment to the view.
Coronado's Expedition.
Although Wabaunsee county doesn't claim the honor of being directly on the line of march taken by the adventurous Spaniard, but, undoubtedly, hunting parties belonging to the expedition in search of game traversed the fertile valleys of Mill Creek.
The route of the expedition lay through the counties of Barber, Kingman, Reno, Harvey, McPherson, Marion, Dickinson, Davis, Riley. Pottawatomie, Nemaha, and Atchison, to the Missouri river, thence down the Missouri to the mouth of the Kaw, thence westerly on the northern bank to the North fork of the Smoky Hill, up the Smoky Hill to Big Creek, and thence South to the Arkansas.
It is just 362 years since Coronado with 300 Spaniards and 800 natives started from a point in the Northern part of Mexico to find the famed seven cities of Cibola.
After traveling 700 miles in a north-east direction from the Rio Grande they arrived at the Arkansas. Their supply of provisions running short, the main army, commanded by a subordinate officer re- turned to the Rio Grande, while Coronado with 30 horsemen and 6 foot- soldiers marched further on.
When a half million dollars had been expended the Indian guide confessed, at the cost of his life, that the fabulous stories told of the wealth of the great country of Quivira were conceived in order to lure the Spaniards to destruction, that their people might live in the enjoyment of life and happiness in their homes in the Land of the Aztec.
EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
Our Schools.
DISTRICT ORGANIZATION.
District 1 was formed October 4, 1859; comprised the whole of Wabaunsee township. First board of directors; Joshua Sniith, Geo. A. Dibble and Enoch Platt. Formed by J. E. Platt, county superin- tendent.
District 2 was formed October 15, 1859, with the following board of directors: S. A. Baldwin, W. F. Cotton and Joshua Smith-the latter resigning in district 1 on account of change of boundaries. L. A. Parker was appointed to till the vacancy in district, 1. Formed by J. E. Platt, county superintendent.
District 3 was formed February 17, 1862, with A. C. Tucker, A. W. Gregory and T D. Rose, directors. J. H. Gould, county superinten- dent. First meeting March 4 at Volney Love's.
NOTE. Prior to August 19, 1862, school districts were numbered by townships. On that date the districts were rennmbered as follows: District 1 was district 1, Wabaunsee township: district 2 was district 2, Wabaunsee township, district 3 was district 3, Wabaunsee township: district 4 was district 1, Mission Creek township; district 5 was district 2, Mission Creek township: district 6 was district 1, Zeandale township: district 7 was district 2, Zeandale township: district 8 was districts 1 and 2, Alma township; district 9 was district 3, Alma township; dis- trict 10 was in Alma township: district 11 was district 1. Wilming- ton township; district 12 was district 2, Wilmington township; district 13 was district 1, Elm Creek; district 14 was in Alma township; district 15 was in Mission Creek (Dover) township.
District 4 was organized by J. E. Platt, county superintendent. S. E. Beach was elected clerk and D. M. Johnston treasurer. (No director named in record.)
District 5, organized March, 1860, with S. E. Beach, W. K. Beach and H. J. Loomis, as directors; J. H. Gould, county superintendent.
District 6 was district 15 (the original No. 6 being in Zeandale township). The number was changed to 6 in 1871. S. F Ross, Anson
EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
Eddy and Orson Frizzle first district board. J. H. Gould was county superintendent.
District 7 was organized March 7. 1874. (The original No. 7 was detached with Zeandale township. ) The first meeting was held at the house of John Shaw, March 26. W. S McCormick was county super- intendent.
District. 8 was formed by uniting Nos. 1 and 2. Alma township. Number changed August 19, 1862. No. 1 was formed November 9. 1860: C Zwanziger, elerk, and Franz Schmidt, treasurer; JJ. H Gould, county superintendent.
District 2 was formed November 14. 1860, with John Spieker, director, Anton Schewe, clerk, and Wm Drebing, treasurer; J. II Gould, county superintendent.
District 9 (No. 3, Alma township) was formed April 23, 1862; J. II. Gould, county superintendent. Edward Hoffman was director, Henry Volland, treasurer, and E. L. Lewis, clerk.
District 10 was formed in 1862 by J. H. Gould, county superinten- dent. First officers: Rudolph Arndt, director, Chas. Lehmberg, clerk: Karl Kopke, treasurer.
District 11 was formed June 11, 1861. (This was district I, of Wilmington township.) H. S. Faunce, director, H. D. Shepard, clerk. and Samuel Cripps, treasurer; J. H. Gould, county superintendent.
District 12 was formed by J. H. Gould, county superintendent, September 4, 1861. John Garringer was director, Isaiah Harris, clerk and James E. Johnson, treasurer.
District 13 (No. 1, Elm Creek), organized by J. II. Gould, county superintendent, February 3, 1862; Wm. Eldred, director, P. A. Green, clerk, and Uriah Sanner, treasurer.
District 14, organized November 8, 1862, by J. Il. Gould, county superintendent; Joseph Truc, director, John Hess, treasurer, and John Copp, clerk; first meeting November 8, 1862.
District 15-March 10, 1872; W. F. Cotton, county superintendent: first meeting March 28.
District 15 (joint), organized by J. H. Gould, county superinten- dent, April 23, 1863; John Sage, director, Henry Read, treasurer, and Jacob Haskell, clerk.
District 16, formed January 19, 1865, of parts of districts 3, 8, 9, by Isaiah Harris, county superintendent; John Mahan, director, Franz Schmidt, treasurer, G, Zwanziger, clerk. The children of school age numbered 14, as follows: G. Zwanziger, 3, John Mahan, 2, Franz Schmidt, 1, Phillip Litz, 4, Fred Palenske, 4. In the distribution of school property the new districts were assessed in amounts as follows: From district 9, $1.12}: from district 3, $5.80; from district 8, $70.87.
District 17, formed March 30, 1874. " First meeting was held at the
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABA UNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
home of Francis Meier, April 11; W. S. McCormick, county superin- tendent.
NOTE. A district numbered 17 was formed by Isaiah Harris, county superintendent, August 23, 1856, of territory in the northern part of Mission Creek township (now Maple Hill). First directors were Renben Haas, James L. Wightman and R. H. Waterman.
District 18, formed in 1867 by Isaiah Harris, county superinten- dent: Geo. Schade, Wm. Horne and Samuel Thackery, first board of directors.
District 19, formed April 16, 1874; first meeting at house of J. L. Muehlenbacher, May 7: W. S. McCormick, county superintendent.
District 20: date of petition December 23, 1867: first officers, Win. McCormick, C. D. Carpenter and W. H. Earle: Isaiah Harris, county superintendent: first meeting March 31, 1863.
District 21, date of petition, December 27, 1867: first officers, Thos. Barker, John Nevins, E. K. Drake; Isaiah Harris, county superinten- dent.
District 22, formed January, 1868, by Isaiah Harris, county super- intendent: first officers, J. M. Bisbey, H. A. Stiles, L. C. Keyes.
District 23, formed May 3, 1867; first officers, J. C. Goldsberry, Wm. Exon and Geo. Vannatta; Isaiah Harris, county superintendent.
( District 24 in Zeandale township, by Isaiah Harris, county super- intendent.)
District 24, organized in 1869; Isaiah Harris, county superinten- dent.
District 25 was formed April 18, 1874: first meeting held at house of M. K. Anderson: W. S. McCormick, county superintendent.
District 27, organized February 17, 1860; W. D. Ely, Joseph Hughes and Enoch Colton, first officers: T. M. Allen, county superintendent. District 28. formed in 1870: Robert McMaster, Chas Owen and John Barnell, first officers: T. M. Allen, county superintendent.
District 29, organized 1870 by T. M. Allen, county superintendent; first officers, Win. Ely, C. D. Carpenter and Samuel Gunsalus.
District 30, organized 1870: T. W. Allen, county superintendent: J. H. Stubbs, Elizabeth Stubbs and Ephraim Elliott, first board.
District 31, formed June 20, 1870; first meeting at C. C. Stalker's, July 7, 1870: T. W. Allen, county superintendent.
District 32, 1870, T. M. Allen, county superintendent; James Bur- goyne, Sam Sutton and Thos. C. Finney first district board
District 33, organized January 27, 1871, by R. M. Tunnell, county superintendent; M. McWilliams, J. R. Gross and Geo. F Duroy, first district board.
District 34, organized March 7, 1871, by R M. Tunnell, county superintendent; first board, J. C P. Malone, Thos. Paxton and Geo.
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EARLY HISTORY OF WABAUNSEE COUNTY, KAN.
Raine.
District 35, organized April 7, 1871; first meeting April 22; by R. M. Tunnell, county superintendent: C. S. Nicely, C. Keunzli and H. Hanson, first board.
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