©Copyright 2000 -2016 by Peggy Struwe
Permission was granted by Chief John L. Moore, United States Navy Retired to use this on the Logan County Web Site 14 January 2000.
In the early 80's antelope and deer were plentiful and 300 wild horses were running in small bands in Logan County, and I am told that in '83 a herd of 22 buffalo wandered into the lakes for water where the Homer Anderson and Ambler farms are and as late as the year of '84, Keiths (a ranchman) men brought into the ranch, one buffalo calf.
Judge Hogeboom made the first filing for a homestead in Logan County and says he lived for six weeks without seeing or speaking to anyone. Later a man by the name of Thompson drifted in and lived for awhile with the judge. Once they heard that the Little Cheyenne Indians were crossing the country, so they made their sleeping quarters in the ditch near where our house now is, for protection, should the Indians roam through here. But the Indians failed to come this way, much to their relief.
The pioneers lived in sod houses. Some houses had floors and some had not. One or two rooms housed the family. Many experienced the hardship incidental to early pioneer days, with prairie fires, grasshoppers, scarcity of food at times and the handicap in performing labor of any and all kinds in the lack of proper equipment and utensils.
Mrs. Hogeboom, one of the very first settlers, often told me of their first home, which was far from anything but pleasing to her, as she was an Eastern woman before coming here. Their house was made of sod, the walls were three foot thick and there were two rooms. The partition between the two rooms was a wall of sod three foot thick. The door between rooms was so low she had to stoop to enter. There was no flooring. The furniture and home equipment were very crude. Not being used to house work and disliking particularly to churn she tried to devise a way to lighten this task. Among her possessions was a silk parasol. A bright idea came to her. Why not set the old dash churn out of doors, fasten the parasol handle to the dasher handle, open the parasol and let the Nebraska wind do the churning by raising the dasher up and down, while she attended other duties? You can imagine her feelings when later she found her parasol torn to rags and the churning not completed.
She also spoke of the scarcity of food at times. Remember that to purchase anything one had to make a two day trip to North Platte in a wagon over roads that were merely trails. One day when the Judge invited some travelers to stay for dinner she didn't know what she could serve them as food supplies were getting low. True, Mr. Hogeboom and she could manage nicely on what they had left but guests were different. In order to think it out she left the house and walked about and to her joy she noticed that a grouse had flown against a barbed wire fence and was crippled. She made sure of her game pretty quickly. The Lord had answered her prayer and they had meat for their guests. Scarcity of fuel was another handicap. Some of the wood for Winter fuel was hauled from the timber near Arnold and the Dismal River, but the festive cow chip was the principle source of fuel and some burned hay and trash. One man went to the Dismal for wood. In getting it out and loading, he tore his trousers nearly off of him. He didn't mind the ride through the hills in this condition but what was he to do when he reached the more settled community? Seeing so many soap weeds with their sharp pointed blades gave him an idea. He could use these blades as pins and so patched his trousers in this manner. What a sight he must have been.
Prairie fires were beautiful sights. The whole world seemed to be lit up with brightness from their reflections but they were very harmful to the development of the country and many lost their feed and a few their homes. Men, women and children attended these fires. Some women fought the fire with the men, others drove for the fire fighters. Sometimes we were out many hours. One gang would go until they would meet another outfit. One very bad fire, burning over a large area of land, came unannounced in the early morning hours. The brightness had partly wakened me and I found myself on the window sill of the sod house looking out. I cried to my husband, "The world is a fire." He hastily dressed, ran to the windmill (our look-out) and climbed the tower, to see just where it was. Coming down, he hurried to the barn, saddled his pony and was ready to be off as soon as the flames had passed the danger point of our house. That morning was a hard one for he rode to several homes, awakening the sleepers and when at last the fire had been reached some buildings on one farm, the housewife took his pony and rode on, sounding the alarm, while the rest followed fighting the fire. This woman now lives in North Platte. In this fire Wm. Ross who lived near Myrtle school house was severely burned and carried the scars for the rest of his life.
Some of these incidents happened before my time and others after my coming here. By this time those who had been more fortunate in making ends meet had more comfortable surroundings, there were schools, churches, and Sunday schools. Those who had become discouraged in the long fight through five years to prove up on their homesteads were selling out, others were coming in, going farther into the hills to meet the same experiences that the older ones leaving the country had struggled through.
As a member of the Advisory Board and State President of the International Sunshine Society, I came in touch with many of these less fortunate ones. Our Society was a charity organization only in the true meaning of "Love" and the practical help given was made in the name of "Sunshine". So I have looked over some of the earliest reports and gathered a few to add to the picture of the homes and the activities of the pioneers at my coming into this community.
We had some unlawful people in our communities, as all communities seem to have. One family seemed to derive their pleasure from setting these prairie fires out and after enduring it for a year or two, the homesteaders got up in arms and the family thought it best to leave the county. Another family, since they are long since gone, I'll use their name, Roosher's, was the terror of the county for their thieving. They always rode in wagons, several along and people would let them steal grain from their granaries, hay etc., rather than try to stop them, but after a while, some of the homesteaders became courageous enough to tell them what was best for them to do and they too left the country. A family from Ohio had settled on a homestead. They were an elderly couple and through sickness, the mother was helpless. Not having the means to provide a wheel chair for her they would tip a common kitchen chair against the wall at a proper angle for her comfort and here she would pass her days. As a shut-in, her condition was reported to us, so on her 73rd birthday we made her acquaintance, taking some fruit, some sweet potatoes and best of all, a supply of reading material. On seeing the sweet potatoes she exclaimed "Oh how I shall enjoy these, for they are the first I have seen or tasted in twelve years." I think if I remember the location correctly she lived where the Grover Weedman home now is. Later nickels and dimes and pennies from the Lincoln and Logan county club members bought a wheel chair which was given to her. When she no longer needed the chair, it was sent to Tryon to a shut-in but was lost finally in a fire in one of the homes where it was loaned. There was a Doctor at Gandy, a number of doctors in North Platte but we had no means other than horseback messenger to reach one and his coming was so slow that he hadn't many calls from distance to help those in sickness. My children came into the world without a doctor's care. Some neighbor woman, sort of a practical nurse, taking care of these cases. Mr. E. R. Smith put in the first telephone from North Platte to Gandy. We had several places we could call from and this was a great stride in advancing quicker services for doctors and help and no one only those having these phones realized how much it really meant to the community. Near the Stone School House on the road to North Platte, we heard from neighbors passing that a man was very ill. Others going to North Platte reported the case to Rev. Beecher, new Bishop Beecher of Omaha and Hastings. We arrived about the same time at this home and found the man critically ill. Bishop Beecher said if we could only make a warm pack we might relieve the pain in his chest. Nothing but a few potatoes could be found so the Bishop suggested cooking these saying they would hold the heat quite a while but the man passed away before medical aid reached him.
We were called on not only to nurse in cases of sickness but to act as undertakers. I recall that several little caskets were made for families, in our own neighborhood one little casket was made. It was padded with cotton and one woman had some suitable material for lining it. A little box was made ready by the men and it was quite pleasing to the family when finished. As soon as the telephone came these little acts were of course given to the proper ones to look after.
We used to enjoy our winter months by visiting more or less with each other. These were all day visits. No one knew you were coming and what a lot could be said while cooking the dinner together. They were real "get together times".
Then we had our circulating libraries, to help pass the evenings, besides our crocheting, knitting and quilt making. Our library started with 58 books given to us much the same as your library was started. As the numbers increased, these books were divided into groups, where the school teachers were really glad to look after them.
Then the first Rest Room was established and sponsored by the Sunshine Society of North Platte, for the benefit of Logan and Lincoln County women who would have a place to freshen up after their long and tiresome trip into town, riding in lumber wagons and buggies. The North Platte business men paid for the rent of the building and the Women's Relief Corp paid for the hire of a woman to look after the room from 8 AM until 6 PM. Baby buggies were loaned to the mothers needing them. Tables were provided so that families could eat their lunch there. Did the merchants object to them eating their lunches there? Not a bit! They knew many could not go to the restaurants with their families and they were only too pleased to have people come to town. The rest room was a comfort to all of us and made our trips to North Platte more agreeable. When the Commercial Club was organized at North Platte it took over the rest room work and we had a modern room in the Building and Loan Building.
From these humble homes, children have grown into manhood and womanhood and have gone into different fields of labor, as lawyers, doctors, teachers, ministers and bankers and we have lived to see the country develop from the raw prairie stage to the present highly cultivated and improved section that it is, with all the conveniences known to our age.
Anna E. Moore, Stapleton, Nebraska
Notes added by her Grandson, John L. Moore
Adam E. Moore and Anna E. Vickroy were married on December 22nd 1893 and lived on a homestead SW 1/4 Section 4-16-29 Lincoln County near the town of Myrtle, which no longer exists. All their children were born here in the original "soddy" that Adam had built prior to their marriage and added on to as the family grew in size. They moved to Maxwell, Nebraska in 1908 to take advantage of the improved educational opportunities. Later they moved to the F. R. Hogeboom Ranch west of the then new town of Stapleton, Logan County, in March 1916.
Grandmother was christened Martha Anna Vickroy but as a teenager started using Anna as her name and was so listed on her marriage certificate. On her marriage certificate she just used "Anna" and started using the initial "E." at a later date. Adam and Anna were married by Adam's older brother who was a Methodist Minister.
This paper was probably written around nineteen thirty but definitely prior to 1940. The original hand written pages were in very poor condition so her youngest son, Robert A. Moore, typed this out in about 1980 and I put it into digital format in 1998.
Chief John L. Moore, United States Navy Retired
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