USA > Nebraska > Collection of Nebraska pioneer reminiscences > Part 21
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I spent the winter of 1885 on the ranch of Hall & Evans, near North Platte, and one of the pleasantest acquaintanceships of my life has been that of John Evans, now registrar of the land office at North Platte.
In the spring of '86 the constant stream of emigrant wagons going west gave one an impression that in a little time the entire West would be filled, and I grew impatient to be upon my way and secure selections. In May I arrived at Sidney and from there rode in a box car to Cheyenne. When we topped the divide east of Cheyenne, I saw the snow-capped peaks of the Rockies for the first time.
During the summer I "skinned mules," aiding in the con- struction of the Cheyenne & Northern, now a part of the Hill system that connects Denver with the Big Horn basin and Puget sound.
Returning to Sidney in the autumn, I fell in with George Hendricks, who had been in the mines for twenty years and finally gave it up. We shoveled coal for the Union Pacific until we had a grub stake for the winter. I purchased a broncho, and upon him we packed our belongings - beds, blankets, tarpaulin,
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provisions, cooking utensils, tools, and clothing, and started north over the divide for "Pumpkin creek," our promised land. In a little over a day's travel, one leading the horse and the other walking behind to prod it along, we reached Hackberry cañon, and here, in a grove by a spring, we built our first cabin.
Three sides were log, the cracks filled with small pieces of wood and plastered with mud from the spring, and the back of the cabin was against a rock, and up this rock we improvised a fireplace, with loose stones and mud.
When we had rigged a bunk of native red cedar along the side of this rude shelter, and the fire was burning in our fire- place, the coffee steaming, the bread baking in the skillet, the odor of bacon frying, and the wind whistling through the tree- tops, that cabin seemed a mighty cozy place.
We could sometimes hear the coyotes and the grey wolves howl at night, but a sense of security prevailed, and our sleep was sound. Out of the elements at hand, we had made the rudiments of a home on land that was to become ours- our very own - forever.
EARLY DAYS IN STANTON COUNTY Statement by Andrew J. Bottorff
I came to Nebraska at the close of the civil war, having served during the entire campaign with the Seventeenth Indiana regiment. I came west with oxen and wagon in the fall of 1866, bringing my family. We wintered at Rockport, but as soon as spring opened went to Stanton county, where I took a homestead. Here we had few neighbors and our share of hard- ships, but thrived and were happy.
One day I heard my dogs barking and found them down in a ravine, near the Elkhorn river, with an elk at bay, and killed him with my axe.
The first year I was appointed county surveyor. Having no instruments at hand, I walked to Omaha, over a hundred miles distant, and led a fat cow to market there. I sold the cow but found no instruments. I was told of a man at Fort Calhoun who had an outfit I might get, so wended my way there. I found E. H. Clark, who would sell me the necessary supplies, and I bought them; then carried them, with some other home necessi- ties obtained in Omaha, back to Stanton, as I had come, on foot.
I am now seventy-five years old, and have raised a large fam- ily; yet wife and I are as happy and spry as if we had never worked, and are enjoying life in sunny California, where we have lived for the last ten years.
Statement by Sven Johanson
With my wife and two small children I reached Omaha, Ne- braska, June 26, 1868. We came direct from Norway, having crossed the stormy Atlantic in a small sailboat, the voyage tak- ing eight weeks.
A brother who had settled in Stanton county, 107 miles from Omaha, had planned to meet us in that city. After being there a few days this brother, together with two other men, arrived and we were very happy. With two yoke of oxen and one team of horses, each hitched to a load of lumber, we journeyed from
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Omaha to Stanton county. Arriving there, we found shelter in a small dugout with our brother and family, where we remained until we filed on a homestead and had built a dugout of our own.
We had plenty of clothing, a good lot of linens and homespun materials, but these and ten dollars in money were all we pos- sessed.
The land office was at Omaha and it was necessary for me to walk there to make a filing. I had to stop along the way wher- ever I could secure work, and in that way got some food, and occasionally earned a few cents, and this enabled me to to pur- chase groceries to carry back to my family. There were no bridges across rivers or creeks and we were compelled to swim; at one time in particular I was very thankful I was a good swimmer. A brother-in-law and myself had gone to Fremont, Nebraska, for employment, and on our return we found the Elk- horn river almost out of its banks. This frightened my com- panion, who could not swim, but I told him to be calm, we would come to no harm. I took our few groceries and our clothing and swam across, then going back for my companion, who was a very large man, I took him on my back and swam safely to the other shore.
While I was away, my family would be holding down our claim and taking care of our one cow. We were surrounded by Indians, and there were no white people west of where we lived.
In the fall of 1869 we secured a yoke of oxen, and the follow- ing spring hauled home logs from along the river and creek and soon had a comfortable log house erected.
Thus we labored and saved little by little until we were able to erect a frame house, not hewn by hand, but made from real lumber, and by this time we felt well repaid for the many hard- ships we had endured. The old "homestead" is still our home, but the dear, faithful, loving mother who so bravely bore all the hardships of early days was called to her rich reward January 28, 1912. She was born June 15, 1844, and I was born October 14, 1837.
FRED E. ROPER, PIONEER BY ERNEST E. CORRELL
Fred E. Roper, a pioneer of Hebron, Nebraska, was eighty years old on October 10, 1915. Sixty-one years ago Mr. Roper "crossed the plains," going from New York state to California.
Eleven years more than a half-century - and to look back upon the then barren stretch of the country in comparison with the present fertile region of prosperous homes and populous cities, takes a vivid stretch of imagination to realize the dream- like transformation. At that time San Francisco was a village of about five hundred persons living in adobe huts surrounded by a mud wall for a fortified protection from the marauding Indians.
Fred E. Roper was born in Candor Hill, New York, October 10, 1835. When three years old he moved with his parents to Canton, Bradford county, Pennsylvania, and later moved with his brother to Baraboo, Wisconsin. Then he shipped as a "hand" on a raft going down the Wisconsin and Mississippi rivers to St. Louis, getting one dollar a day and board. He re- turned north on a steamer, stopping at Burlington, Iowa, where his sister resided.
In 1854, when he was nineteen years of age, Mr. Roper "start- ed west." His sister walked to the edge of the town with him as he led his one-horned cow, which was to furnish milk for coffee on the camp-out trip, which was to last three months, enroute to the Pacific coast.
There were three outfits - a horse train, mule train, and ox train. Mr. Roper traveled in an ox train of twenty-five teams. The travelers elected officers from among those who had made the trip before, and military discipline prevailed.
At nights the men took turns at guard duty in relays - from dark to midnight and from midnight to dawn, when the herder was called to turn the cattle out to browse. One man herded them until breakfast was ready, and another man herded them until time to yoke up. This overland train was never molested
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SALLESTON. GREGON TRÀL ·CROSSING
OREGON TRAIL
FROM INDEFENDICE AND WESTPORT
COLUMBIA RIVER ROUTE AF HE | HSi GALLON COLONIST., THE TRAD OF TRAPPERS AND TRADERS AS EARLY AS ATG WESTERN MILITARY PORIS THE PATH DE THE PONY EXPRESS AND OVERLAND STAGE GRADUALLY SUPERieTERRY RAILRUMEL, TIOROLIGHOUT IT . DAEL
OREGON TRAIL MONUMENT, TWO MILES NORTH OF HEBRON Erected by the citizens of Hebron and Thayer county, and Oregon Trail Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution, dedicated May 24, 1915. Cost $400
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FRED E. ROPER, PIONEER
by the Indians, although one night some spying Cheyennes were made prisoners under guard over night until the oxen were yoked up and ready to start.
The prospectors crossed the Missouri river at Omaha, which at that time had no residences or business buildings. Enroute to Salt Lake City, the South Platte route was followed, aver- aging about twenty miles a day. Enough provisions were car- ried to last through the journey and as they had some provisions left when they reached Salt Lake City, they were sold to the half-starved Mormons at big prices.
Some perplexing difficulties were encountered on the journey. At one point in the mountains, beyond Salt Lake City, the trail was so narrow that the oxen were unhitched and led single file around the cliff, while the wagons were taken apart and lowered down the precipice with ropes.
When crossing the desert, additional water had to be carried in extra kegs and canteens. When the tired cattle got near enough to the river to smell the fresh water, they pricked up their ears, stiffened their necks, and made a rush for the stream, so the men had to stand in front of them until the chains were loosened to prevent their crazily dashing into the water with the wagons.
Mr. Roper worked by the day for three months in the mines northeast of San Francisco. While placer mining, he one day picked up a gold nugget, from which his engagement ring was made by a jeweler in San Francisco, and worn by Mrs. Roper until her death, October 28, 1908. The ring was engraved with two hearts with the initials M. E. R., and is now in the posses- sion of their son Maun, whose initials are the same.
Mr. Roper was one of a company of three men who worked a claim that had been once worked over, on a report that there was a crevasse that had not been bottomed. The first workers did not have "quicksilver," which is necessary to catch fine gold, but Mr. Roper's company had a jug shipped from San Fran- cisco. Nothing less than a fifty-pound jug of quicksilver would be sold, at fifty cents a pound. This was used in sluice-boxes as "quicksilver riffles," to catch the fine float gold, when it would instantly sink to the bottom of the quicksilver, while the dirt and stones would wash over; the coarse rock would be first tossed out with a sluice-fork (similar to a flat-tined pitchfork). In three
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years the three men worked the mine out, making about fifteen hundred dollars apiece.
With his share carried in buckskin sacks belted around his waist under his clothes, Mr. Roper started in a sailing vessel up north along the coast on a trip, hunting for richer diggings. Then he went on a steamer to the Isthmus of Panama, which he crossed with a hired horse team, then by steamer to New York and by railroad to Philadelphia to get his gold minted.
After his marriage in 1861 Mr. Roper returned to the West and in '64 ran a hotel at Beatrice called "Pat's Cabin." When Nebraska voted on the question of admission to statehood, Mr. Roper's ballot was vote No. 3.
Desiring to get a home of his own, Fred Roper came on west into what is now Thayer county, and about six miles north west of the present site of Hebron up the Little Blue, he bought out the preemption rights of Bill and Walt Hackney, who had "squatted" there with the expectation of paying the government the customary $1.25 per acre. In certain localities those claims afterwards doubled to $2.50 per acre. Mr. Roper paid only the value of the log cabin and log stables, and came into possession of the eighty acres, which he homesteaded, and later bought ad- joining land for $1.25 per acre.
Occasionally he made trips to St. Joe and Nebraska City for supplies, which he freighted overland to Hackney ranch. At that time Mr. Roper knew every man on the trail from the Mis- souri river to Kearney. On these trips he used to stop with Bill McCandles, who was shot with three other victims by "Wild Bill" on Rock creek in Jefferson county.
The first house at Hackney ranch was burned by the Chey- enne Indians in their great raid of 1864, at which time Miss Laura Roper (daughter of Joe B. Roper) and Mrs. Eubanks were captured by the Indians near Fox Ford in Nuckolls county and kept in captivity until ransomed by Colonel Wyncoop of the U. S. army for $1,000. Si Alexander of Meridian (south- east of the present town of Alexandria), was with the govern- ment troops at the time of Miss Roper's release near Denver. Her parents, believing her dead, had meanwhile moved back to New York state. (Laura Roper is still alive, being now Mrs. Laura Vance, at Skiatook, Oklahoma.) At the time of the above-mentioned raid, the Indians at Hackney ranch threw the
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charred cottonwood logs of the house into the well, to prevent travelers from getting water. Fred Roper was then at Beatrice, having just a few days before sold Hackney ranch to an over- land traveler. After the raid the new owner deserted the place, in the fall of 1869, and in a few months Mr. Roper returned from Beatrice and again preempted the same place.
In 1876 Mr. and Mrs. Roper moved to Meridian and ran a tavern for about a year, then moved back to Hackney, where they resided until the fall of 1893, when they moved into He- bron to make their permanent home. Mr. Roper was postmaster at Hebron for four years under Cleveland's last administration.
THE LURE OF THE PRAIRIES BY LUCY L. CORRELL
The memories of the long hot days of August, 1874, are burned into the seared recollection of the pioneers of Nebraska. For weeks the sun had poured its relentless rays upon the hopeful, patient people, until the very atmosphere seemed vibrant with the pulsing heat waves.
One day a young attorney of Hebron was called to Nuckolls county to "try a case" before a justice of the peace, near a postoffice known as Henrietta. Having a light spring wagon and two ponies he invited his wife and little baby to accompany him for the drive of twenty-five miles. Anything was better than the monotony of staying at home, and the boundless free- dom of the prairies was always enticing. An hour's drive and the heat of the sun became oppressively intense. The barren distance far ahead was unbroken by tree, or house, or field. There was no sound but the steady patter of the ponies' feet over the prairie grass; no moving object but an occasional flying hawk; no road but a trail through the rich prairie grass, and one seemed lost in a wilderness of unvarying green. The heat- waves seemed to rise from the ground and quiver in the air. Soon a wind, soft at first, came from the southwest, but ere long became a hot blast, and reminded one of the heated air from an opened oven door. Added to other inconveniences came the in- tense thirst produced from the sun and dry atmosphere - and one might have cried "My kingdom for a drink!"- but there was no "kingdom."
After riding about nine miles there came into view the home- stead of Teddy McGovern - the only evidence of life seen on that long day's drive. Here was a deep well of cold water. Cheery words of greeting and hearty handclasps evidenced that all were neighbors in those days. Again turning westward a corner of the homestead was passed where were several little graves among young growing trees -"Heartache corner" it
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might have been called. The sun shone as relentless there as upon all Nebraska, that scorching summer.
As the afternoon wore on, looking across the prairies the heat- waves seemed to pulse and beckon us on; the lure of the prairies was upon us, and had we chosen we could not but have obeyed. Only the pioneers knew how to endure, to close their eyes to ex- clude the burning light, and close the lips to the withering heat.
At last our destination was reached at the homestead of the justice of the peace. We were gladly seated to a good supper with the host and family of growing boys. After the meal the "Justice Court" was held out of doors in the shade of the east side of the house, there being more room and "more air" out- side. The constable, the offender, the witness and attorney and a few neighbors constituted the prairie court, and doubtless the decisions were as legal and as lasting as those of more imposing surroundings of later days.
But the joy of the day had only just begun, for as the sun went down, so did even the hot wind, leaving the air so heavy and motionless and oppressive one felt his lungs closing up. The boys of the family sought sleep out of doors, the others under the low roof of a two-roomed log house. Sleep was im- possible, rest unknown until about midnight, when mighty peals of thunder and brilliant lightning majestically announced the oncoming Nebraska storm. No lights were needed, as nature's electricity was illuminatingly sufficient. The very logs quivered with the thunder's reverberations, and soon a terrific wind load- ed with hail beat against the little house until one wondered whether it were better to be roasted alive by nature's consuming heat, or torn asunder by the warring elements. But the storm beat out its fury, and with daylight Old Sol peeped over the prairies with a drenched but smiling face.
Adieus were made and the party started homeward. After a few miles' travel the unusual number of grasshoppers was com- mented upon, and soon the air was filled with their white bodies and beating wings; then the alarming fact dawned upon the travelers that this was a grasshopper raid. The pioneers had lived through the terrors of Indian raids, but this assault from an enemy outside of the human realm was a new experience. The ponies were urged eastward, but the hoppers cheerfully kept pace and were seen to be outdistancing the travelers. They
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filled the air and sky and obliterated even the horizon. Heat, thirst, distance were all submerged in the appalling dread of what awaited.
As the sun went down the myriads of grasshoppers "went to roost." Every vegetable, every weed and blade of grass bore its burden. On the clothes-line the hoppers were seated two and three deep; and upon the windlass rope which drew the bucket from the well they clung and entwined their bodies.
The following morning the hungry millions raised in the air, saluted the barren landscape and proceeded to set an emulating pace for even the busy bee. They flew and beat about, impu- dently slapping their wings against the upturned, anxious faces, and weary eyes, trying to penetrate through the apparent snow- storm - the air filled with the white bodies of the ravenous hordes. This appalling sight furnished diversion sufficient to the inhabitants of the little community for that day.
People moved quietly about, in subdued tones wondering what the outcome would be. How long would the hoppers remain ? Would they deposit their eggs to hatch the following spring and thus perpetuate their species? Would the old progenitors re- turn ?
But, true to the old Persian proverb, "this too, passed away." The unwelcome intruders departed leaving us with an occasional old boot-leg, or leather strap, or dried rubber, from which the cormorants had sucked the "juice."
The opening of the next spring was cold and rainy. Not many of the grasshopper eggs hatched. Beautiful Nebraska was herself again and "blossomed as the rose."
SUFFRAGE IN NEBRASKA Statement by Mrs. Gertrude M. McDowell
When I was requested to write a short article in regard to woman's suffrage in Nebraska I thought it would be an easy task. As the days passed and my thoughts became confusedly spread over the whole question from its incipiency, it proved to be not an easy task but a most difficult one. There was so much of interest that one hardly knew where to begin and what to leave unsaid.
This question has been of life-long interest to me and I have always been in full sympathy with the movement. When the legislature in 1882 submitted the suffrage amendment to the people of the state of Nebraska for their decision, we were ex- ceedingly anxious concerning the outcome.
A state suffrage association was formed. Mrs. Brooks of Omaha was elected president; Mrs. Bittenbender of Lincoln, recording secretary; Gertrude M. McDowell of Fairbury, cor- responding secretary.
There were many enthusiastic workers throughout the state. Among them, I remember Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby, of Beatrice, whom we considered our general; Mrs. Lucinda Russell and Mrs. Mary Holmes of Tecumseh, Mrs. Annie M. Steele of Fair- bury, Mrs. A. J. Sawyer, Mrs. A. J. Caldwell, and Mrs. Deborah King of Lincoln, Mrs. E. M. Correll of Hebron and many more that I do not now recall.
There were many enthusiastic men over the state who gave the cause ardent support. Senator E. M. Correll of Hebron was ever on the alert to aid in convention work and to speak a word which might carry conviction to some unbeliever.
Some years previous to our campaign, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucy Stone on one of their lecture tours in the West were so impressed with the enthusiasm and good work of Hon. E. M. Correll that they elected him president of the National Suffrage Association, for one year. I also recall Judge Ben S. Baker, now of Omaha, and C. F. Steele of Fairbury, as staunch sup-
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porters of the measure. During the campaign, many national workers were sent into the state, among them Susan B. Anthony, Phoebe Couzens, Elizabeth Saxon of New Orleans, and others. They directed and did valiant work in the cause. We failed to carry the measure in the state, but we are glad to note that it carried in our own town of Fairbury.
Thanks to the indomitable personality of our Nebraska women, they began immediately to plan for another campaign. In 1914, our legislature again submitted an amendment and it was again defeated. Since then I have been more than ever in favor of making the amendment a national one, President Wilson to the contrary notwithstanding - not because we think the educa- tional work is being entirely lost, but because so much time and money are being wasted on account of our foreign population and their attitude towards reform. It is a grave and a great question. One thing we are assured of, viz: that we will never give up our belief in the final triumph of our great cause.
It is a far cry from the first woman's suffrage convention in 1850, brought about by the women who were excluded from act- ing as delegates at the anti-slavery convention in London in 1840.
Thus a missionary work was begun then and there for the emancipation of women in "the land of the free and the home of the brave." We can never be grateful enough to Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and other noble, self-sacrificing women who did so much pioneer work in order to bring about better laws for women and in order to change the moth-eaten thought of the world.
Many felt somewhat discouraged when the election returns from New Jersey, Massachusetts, and New York announced the defeat of the measure, but really when we remember the long list of states that have equal suffrage we have reason to rejoice and to take new courage. We now have Wyoming, Kansas, Utah, Idaho, Colorado, California, Oregon, Washington, Nevada, Montana, Arizona, New Mexico, Alaska, and Illinois, besides the countries of Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Finland, New Zealand, Australia, Nova Scotia, and some parts of England.
In the future when the cobwebs have all been swept from the mind of the world and everyone is enjoying the new atmosphere of equal rights only a very few will realize the struggle these
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brave women endured in order to bring about better conditions for the world.
Statement by Lucy L. Correll
Hebron, Thayer county, Nebraska, was the cradle of the Ne- braska woman suffrage movement, as this was the first com- munity in the state to organize a permanent woman's suffrage association.
Previous to this organization the subject had been agitated through editorials in the Hebron Journal, and by a band of pro- gressive, thinking women. Upon their request the editor of the Journal, E. M. Correll, prepared an address upon "Woman and Citizenship." Enthusiasm was aroused, and a column of the Journal was devoted to the interests of women, and was ably edited by the coterie of ladies having the advancement of the legal status of women at heart.
Through the efforts of Mr. Correll, Susan B. Anthony was in- duced to come to Hebron and give her lecture on "Bread versus the Ballot," on October 30, 1877. Previous to this time many self-satisfied women believed they had all the "rights" they wanted, but they were soon awakened to a new consciousness of their true status wherein they discovered their "rights" were only "privileges."
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