USA > Nebraska > York County > York County, Nebraska and its people : together with a condensed history of the state, Vol. I > Part 49
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I used to have to carry water to the kitchen and to the barn. Now my wife turns a faucet in the kitchen, and I have piped water to the barn. and the feed lot. I often hear my neighbors who came to the community after we had given it a
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big start, complaining about this or that imposition, as they call it. And I often wonder what would have happened to them if they had been forced to undergo what we suffered during our pioneer days. It used to cost me about the price of one steer to get two of them to market, but now the price of one steer practically pays for hauling a car load of them to market. Besides I get more for one steer now than I used to get for two or even three. The "shrink" I had to stand thirty years ago, and which I escape now, is mighty near enough to pay for shipping my live stock to South Omaha.
Some special incidents of my pioneer days? Well, I could fill a book with them. Take the first visitation of grasshoppers, for instance. I woke up one morn- ing with as fine a erop prospect as any man could wish. Before the sun set that evening the only green thing on the place was a window curtain at the front window of our sod house. The "hoppers" came in clouds that fairly obliterated the light of the sun. They left not a trace of vegetation behind them.
We had an Indian scare or two, also. I was plowing one June day in 1876 or '77 when I heard my wife frantically ealling me and looked to see her running like a deer in my direction .. I ran to meet her and she gasped out that a whole tribe of Indians was approaching to the house. I made her lie down in the corn rows while I scouted a bit. We had not heard of any Indian uprising. I saw a white man among the Indians, and he seemed to be in charge. The Indians, about forty or fifty in number, including the squaws, were watering their ponies at my well. They did not look warlike, so I ven- tured to show myself. It developed that they were Pawnees en route north in charge of a government agent. They came up from Kansas to visit. They took nothing save the water from the well, and the white man in charge thanked me for that. An occasional Indian passed by our place, but they never bothered us any. We saw a few buffalo during our first year or two here. but they had been driven further west.
I came near losing my life one winter. I went to York on horseback and while there a blizzard started. Thinking I could reach home before the storm really broke I started out. Before I had gone half the distance I became lost. The wind was blowing a gale, and as I had to face it I soon chilled to the bone and the driving snow fairly smothered and blinded me. Fortunately my horse knew a thing or two that I did not, and just as I was about to give up in despair the animal carried me to a sod house. My cries soon caused the homesteader to open his door, and I managed to stagger in. My host tied a rope to his body and managed to get the horse to the barn a few yards away, then followed the rope back to safety. I froze both ears and both feet, and for several weeks I feared that it would be necessary to amputate my right foot. But I managed to save it.
We had practically no amusement at night. We were too tired to do much running around. We had to work like slaves during daylight hours. Occa- sionally we would make a visit to a neighbor on Sunday, but that meant either a walk of six or ten miles or foreing a tired team to haul us. We never lost an opportunity to attend divine services and my wife and I have often driven fifteen' to twenty-five miles and back again, just to hear a sermon, and help sing some of the familiar old songs. The preachers we heard in those days did not content themselves with short sermons. If one didn't preach an hour and a half we felt cheated. And what they laeked in education they more than made
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up for in religious fervor, although I never heard one of them use slang in his sermons or talk to God as if he were talking to some boon companion on the street corner. A large proportion of my neighbors were old soldiers-although they were not old then. When we got together our chief entertainment was in fighting our battles over again and telling how much better our respective regi- ments and brigades were than any others.
We took our politics very seriously for twenty years or more. I for several years was about the only democrat in our neighborhood, and at times I felt that I was being ostracized on account of it. But when trouble came. or help was needed, we forgot political differences. I joined the Alliance movement in the late '80s, and many of my republican neighbors did likewise. After that our political dif- ferences were slight. and today York County is not nearly so one-sided as it was twenty-five years ago. During the uncertain days following the election in 1876 I could have got into a fight almost any time I went to town. A lot of my republican friends could not understand how 1, an ex-soldier, could be a democrat and a Tilden man.
The first democratic county convention we held in York County was a mighty slim affair. We could hardly muster up enough democrats to fill a county ticket, and our republican friends guyed us unmereifully. But what we lacked in num- bers we made up in enthusiasm, and we stuck to it.
In 1884 we celebrated the election of Cleveland, and the republicans didn't do any guying that night. They felt as blue as we felt good, and they acted like men who believed that the world was about to come to an end.
We had real Fourth of July celebrations in those days. We heard some real orators and we had pienie dinners together. I sometimes think that we have for- gotten how to celebrate that anniversary.
I am now approaching my seventy-second year, and God has been good to me and mine. I still own my original homestead and the quarter next to it, but the farm doesn't look much like it did forty years ago. Neither do I. My time is approaching, I know, but I expect to live in Nebraska until the end comes. Wife and I have traveled all over the United States during the last twelve or fifteen years, but as yet we have not found a state we like as well as we like Nebraska, nor a county that can come anywhere near approaching good old York. Our greatest pleasure is sitting on our front porch on pleasant evenings, with our children and grandchildren around us. and telling over and over again the story of our pioneer experiences. I reckon I've fought my army battles over a thousand times for the little folk. We have a right to be proud of what we of York County have done. We found it a barren wilderness, and today it is about as near Para- dise as man can make a country.
After the'reunion I accepted an invitation to spend the night at the home of this splendid old pioneer and his wife. The home would grace any city in the land. It was modern in every respect-furnace. hot and cold water, gas light. It was filled with books. The huge barn was well lighted and as convenient as a pocket in a shirt. On every side were well tilled fields, huge stacks of grain, fat cattle and sleek horses. A quarter of a mile away was the little cottage of the hired man and his wife, and the hired man seemed to be taking as much interesi in
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things as his employer. In the morning the pioneer took me back to York in his big seven-passenger automobile, and my last recollection of the beautiful farmi home was that of a pleasant faced little grandmother standing on the front porch and waving us a farewell.
Our journey lay past splendid farms teeming with crops, and on every side were evidences of abundant prosperity. I looked at the ruddy faced and grayhaired old gentleman at the steering wheel, and wondered at the magnificent work that he and his neighbors had wrought in the short span of less than half a century. My newspaper work has called me to many states, and I have been permitted to study and investigate in many different sections of the country. And every time I take a trip ont into interior Nebraska I am more than ever convinced that there is not another state in the Union that can compare with it in fertility, productivity and citizenship. A mighty sturdy lot of men and women were those who crossed the Missouri River in the days when the land was new and braving the hardships of the frontier wrested prosperity from the soil. And I rejoice every time I am privileged to meet one of those old pioneers who struggled through those early days and has at last reached the safe harbor of rest and plenty.
THEIR FIRST CHRISTMAS IN YORK
Many of York County's old pioneers are old only in the sense that they were among the first to settle in the county. Many of these "old settlers" are yet to be numbered among the young. We no longer count a man old at sixty ; on the other hand we deem him to be in the zenith of his power. So, while we are talking about pioneer Christmas days do not be seized with the idea that the men mentioned in this article published in 1918 are all old men. They are not. They came while young to a land that was young.
"E. A. Gilbert's first Christmas in York County was that of 1884. He arrived in . York several months before, straight from Carlinville, Macoupin County, Il. "I came at the earnest solicitation of the late George Woods," said Mr. Gilbert. "He had been here several years, and he had always shown an interest in me. It took mne several years to make up my mind to make the plunge, but finally I made it. I have never regretted the move, either. Our first Christmas was not marked by any especial incident that impresses it upon my memory. I guess we had the usual Christmas dinner, and of course our three children hung up their stockings and found therein the usual assortment of nuts and candy. York was already a thriving little city of about fifteen hundred or two thousand people, and had passed the 'pioneer stage.'"
O. S. Gilmore, county attorney, does not remember anything about his first Christmas in York County. It was in 1878. His inability to recall any of the inci- dents of that first Christmas is not due to lack of memory. He was born in York County in that year. Some of these days he may be president, too, for he was born in a log house. His father was one of the first settlers. Perhaps one other man came ahead of him. But as they came together and county boundary lines were very faint, neither could recall which crossed into the county first.
C. A. MeCloud's first Christmas in York County was spent in Waco, and that was in 1878. He had worked on a farm during the previous summer, but that winter he was working in a hardware emporium at Waco. It was called an
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"emporium" because the stock would invoice about four hundred dollars. The owner of the store had a peculiar system of keeping books. After every name thereon he would write some descriptive phrase, such as "dead beat." "d-n slow pay." "no good," ete. He was absent one day when a man came in and asked Charley to look up his account. Charley spread the book out and finally found the name. After it was the description, "d-n slow pay." And the customer saw it first. "I can still hear the yell that man let out. and I'll never forget the burning remarks he made," said Charley. "But I don't remember anything particular about that Christmas. I guess we pitched horseshoes or went out chasing jaek- rabbits. That was abont all the amusements we had in those days."
George W. Shreck's first Christmas in York County was spent at Waco in 1828. He had arrived from Indiana a few months before and opened a black- smith shop. He admits that he was then a typical Hoosier, and about all he reinem- bers of that particular Christmas is that he was all-fired lonesome, and filled with longing for a sight of the folks back in that dear ol' Indeany.
Dennis Meehan's first Christmas in York County was that of 1888. He remem- bers it quite well. "I spent most of the day writing to a girl back in Breeds. Ill., in which I tried to ask her if she would come out to York with me if I went back after her. It wasn't a very long letter, but it took me a long time to write it. It was a pretty lonesome day for me, but when I got her reply I marked that date as a mighty happy one. I went back after her a year later, and every day since I got her has been even happier than the day on which I received the reply to my Christmas letter."
James Kildow's first Christmas in York County was that of 1885. He had come from Wisconsin a few months before. He "lit" at Lushton, but on Christmas day he came to York, the metropolis, to spend the day. "I remember that it was a very warm day, and I drove over from Lushton in my shirt sleeves. It had been an unusually mild winter up to that date, and I thought I had struck the finest. climate in the world. And I am rather fond of it yet, by the way. That par- ticular Christmas day was uneventful. All my Christmas days have been of that sort. however."
E. B. Woods' first Christmas in York was that of 1878. lle and his brother had come on ahead of their father, who was headed for York to engage in the clothing business. "T have no particular recollection of anything unusual that happened on that Christmas," said Mr. Woods. "There were only three amuse- ments for us young fellows in those days-chasing jackrabbits, racing horses and playing penny ante. I never did like to chase jackrabbits and we didn't have any horse races on Christmas."
Charles A. Gilbert's first Christmas in York County was that of 1892. He came up from Kansas City, where he had spent a couple of years in the practice of law, and entered into a partnership with his brother. E. A. Gilbert. "I don't remember anything unusual about that first Christmas in York County," said Mr. Gilbert. "I guess it was very much like all that have followed. We had plenty to eat. my wife and 1, and we exchanged presents and spent the day very quietly with relatives."
F. A. Ilannis' first Christmas in York County was in 1886. He came here from Chicago. "It was a pretty lonesome Christmas for me," said Mr. llannis. "I was only a boy, and it was the first time I had been away from home. To me
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the West was even at that late day a 'wild and woolly' section. I boarded with relatives after I came here, so it was not quite so lonesome as it might have been. But I believe it was the most dreary Christmas in my life."
Joseph Hoover of Benedict is an old-timer in York County. He came here in the summer of 1875, and that fall began teaching school in the southeast corner of the county. "My first Christmas in Nebraska was uneventful. It was the year after the grasshopper raids and we were much poorer than Job's turkey, which had to lean up against the fence to gobble. My salary as teacher was small to the vanishing point, but every dollar was bigger'n a wagonwheel. We did not have any Christmas feasts that year. The only thing we spent was the day."
A. G. Johnson is an old-timer in Nebraska but a comparatively newcomer in York County. He arrived in York in 1901. "My first Christmas in York was about like all of them before and since. I spent the day as usual with my family, where I have always had my best times."
Ed S. Felton came over from lowa and located in York County in 1891. "My first Christmas in York County was spent in Bradshaw, mostly behind the counter and prescription case of the local drug store. 1 guess we had a big Christmas dinner but I don't remember any of the particulars."
Russell Williams' first Christmas in York County was that of 1893. His memory of it is very dim, however. He arrived in York County the previous July, and had never lived anywhere else before. "I guess I spent it dairying," mused Russ.
County Judge Hopkins left that dear old Lucas County, la., in 1887 and lit in York County in 1887. Benedict was his first landing place. "I taught school there that winter and spent my first York County Christmas at Benedict. We had a jolly bunch of young folks there. The town was new, and we had some merry times. There was nothing particular to set that Christmas apart from many others, but we certainly did have a good time."
W. L. Kirkpatrick landed in York in 1895, coming here from Tennessee, although he is an Illinoisan by birth. "My first Christmas in York was a happy one. I boarded at a home filled with jolly young people and we made merry all the time. On this particular Christmas we had a dance. But the dinner-say. I'll never forget it. We young folks made a day of it, I tell you."
Wade H. Read came to York County in 1883. He has no recollection of his coming, nor of his first Christmas in the county. He was born in a sod house up on Lincoln Creek. So far as he knows he spent that first Christmas like most babies of the same age. The first Christmas he remembers was to him an unusually happy one, for after a separation of many months he was again with his mother. It was spent at the farm home of Mr. Houston, and Mr. Read remembers the good dinner, the happy play and the delight of being again in the arms of one from whom he had long been separated. "We didn't spend our Christmas days then like we do now." observed Mr. Read, "but after all } think we really enjoyed the old kind most."
Joshua Cox brought his young bride from Illinois to Hamilton County in 1829. Hle bought a quarter section of Hamilton County land for $? an acre and proceeded to make a home with the help of his good wife. "Our first Christmas in Nebraska was a happy one," said Mr. Cox with a reminiscent smile. "We were building a home of our own, and the joy of ultimate possession was ours. There was a sod house on the place, but we built a granary 18x20 and lived in that. We didn't have much that first Christmas, but we had a plenty. We have never been any happier
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than we were during those pioneer days, although we have always been happy. We came to York County in 1899. but I couldn't tell you of any particular incident that set out the Christmas of that year. It was like most of them that have come during the last quarter of a century."
W. G. Boyer never came to York County. He was brought. It happened in the year 1821, when his parents bundled him and other possessions up and headed west- ward from Illinois. "I was only a year old then," remarked Mr. Boyer. "and I do not remember anything about my first Christmas in York County. I only know from hearsay that it was spent on a homestead nine miles northwest of the present good city of York, and I have spent most of my Christmas days right here in York, and I hope to spend a hundred or two more of them in the same place."
C. N. Carpenter really landed in York in 1881, but he didn't land to stay until 1883. In the meantime he attended the University of Nebraska and graduated in a class that numbered many notables in addition to himself. One of the number was Charley Magoon. When he came to York he conducted his father's lumber yard for a couple of years, then had it thrust upon him for his very own. "I do not recall any remarkable incident about my first Christmas in York," remarked "Karp." "I guess we spent it joyously in or about the old 'New York Store' in North York. That was the big trading center in the old days. And we had a pretty lively bunch that made headquarters there, too. While I do not remember that particular Christ- mas day I am pretty certain I had a good time."
Jeff B. Foster came to York County from Illinois in 1883, and located on a farm east of Benedict. "I do not recall anything particular about my first Christmas in the county," said Mr. Foster. "I was married the spring before and my wife and I were trying to build a home 'way out here on the prairies. I guess we were too busy working on that home to give much time to celebrating Christmas. If I wasn't happy that day it was the only Christmas I can remember when I wasn't happy. What's the use of being any other way, Christmas day or any other day?"
CHAPTER IV
SETTLEMENT BY TOWNSHIPS
YORK PRECINCT-WEST BLUE PRECINCT-BEAVER CREEK PRECINCT-BAKER PRE- CINCT-NORTII BLUE PRECINCT-HENDERSON PRECINCT-DAVID HENDERSON- STEWART PRECINCT- -GRESIIAM (11. C. LANPIIERE ) -WOODRUFF PRECINCT- HOUSTON PRECINCT-LEE MORTON.
YORK PRECINCT
York Precinet occupies the geographical center of the county and lies in the valley of Beaver Creek. On the 3rd of August, 1864, David Baker pitched his tent on the banks of Beaver Creek, under the spreading branches of a friendly old elm that stood on section 10, township 10, range 3. Mr. Baker and his family made this their home for a period of three months, during which he ereeted the first frame house in the precinct, hanling the lumber from Nebraska City. His settlement is the first it is our pleasure to record. The next settlers who arrived, were Isaac C'rable and Ex-Sheriff J. P. Miller. Isaac Baker and Bates took up claims on section 8, Sheriff Miller on section 12, Thomas Myers on section 2. In 1820 a large number of settlers came into the preeinet and nearly all of the valuable claims were taken up, and before the elose of 1871 all the government land was exhausted. Among the first who came in 1820, Lorenzo D. Brakeman, F. M. Connelly and D. A. Ritner made settlements on section 4, township 10, range ? ; Charles F. Day and A. J. Day on section 18, Nathan Johnson on section 20, Thomas Porter, section 24, and David Graham and J. S. Shaw also on section 24; H. M. Detrick and J. W. Andrews on section 30, and R. C. Shipman and John Murphy on section 10.
WEST BLUE PRECINCT
West Blue Precinct is situated in the southeast corner of the county, and derives its name from the West Blue River that courses through it. The general character of the surface is that of a gently rolling valley except the uplands, or "divides." which are somewhat rolling.
John Anderson and his son William Anderson, the first settlers of this precinct, are honored as the pioneers and first settlers of York County. They took up the first claims under the homestead act made in the county, on section 2, township 9, range 1, and plowed the first furrows. Their settlement dates back to the year 1865, in the month of February.
Three months later, in May, George Stubblefield made the third settlement in the county, on section 3, adjoining the one taken up by the Andersons. The follow-
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ing December three other settlers arrived. and their settlements include all that were made during this year. These came in the person of Henry Chatterton, who located on section 8, Mill Sophonisba Fouse on section 9, and Nerva Fouse on section 10. Early in the month of January, 1866, they were followed by Win. Taylor, who estab- lished his farm on section 8; Elias Gilmore, locating on section ?, and Jackson Gil- more, on section 12.
When the spring of 1866 opened up it found David Bussard settled on section 10, Levi Deems on section 12, and during the summer Christian Holoch also settled on section 12, Albert Deems on section 10. and Nicholas Noigh on the same section. Two years later, in the fall of 1868, W. H. Armstrong and George Vance arrived and were followed in 1869 by Wm. Hathaway and Reuben Manning.
In April, 1869, Rev. William Worley preached the first sermon ever listened to by the pioneers of York County, at the residence of John Anderson, and during the following months organized the first class of the M. E. Church at the Bussard school house. In 1870 the West Blue Mission was formed and Rey. Mr. Oliver was ap- pointed to the charge.
In the winter of 1869-10 Elias Gilmore erected the first frame house in the precinct. hauling the lumber from Nebraska City. All of the settlements mentioned were made on the Blue among the timber groves that fringed its banks. And a fur- ther settlement of the precinct did not occur until the emigration of 1870 came pour- ing into the county.
In the spring of 1870 George Hannah, V. Shelley, and John Wallace took up claims on section 12 and began tilling the soil. In November, Mrs. L. Parsons, Elmer Parsons, and A. II. Chesebro made the first settlement on Lincoln Creek, all locating on section 26. In 1871 and 1822 the precinct settled up very rapidly and nearly all the government land was taken up. Among the first settlers in this general emigration are P. L. Rubattal, section 34, Isaiah Smith, section 28, Calvin Smith, section 32 and Anthony Smith, section 28.
In the winter of 1865-66, at the time Uncle Elias Gilmore took up his claim, nine hundred Pawnee Indians were camped on the Blue, engaged in hunting. Mr. Gilmore harvested the first wheat raised in York County in 1867, and the total crop throughout the county for 1868 amounted to five hundred bushels.
Miss Lizzie May. daughter of A. J. Gilmore, has the honor of being the first white child born in the precinct and also in York County, the date being January 1866. The first marriage ceremony occurred at the residence of Unele Elias Gilmore, February 14, 1867. Daniel Millspaugh, a justice of the peace for Seward County, tied the knot, and the contracting parties were Mr. N. J. Dixon and Miss Lydia Gilmore.
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