The McCain Cemetery in Logan County has been the final resting place for many of my ancestors. Probably the first burial of the family there was Elmore Johnson. He died Feb. 20, 1898, and his wife, Elizabeth Johnson died Sept. 16, 1899. I have sensed the worth of these brave, sturdy pioneer relatives while standing beside the tombstone marking their graves.
Elmore and Elizabeth Johnson came by railroad car to North Platte, NE., in March 1887. They came because their son-in-law, Dick Hoagland, urged them to get some of the cheap land available in the South Loup area and because their daughter Emily had tuberculosis. They hoped higher, drier climate would help her to regain her health. She lived to be 78 years of age so the move must have helped her. With these Johnson's came their family and their children's families.
My Maternal grandfather, samuel Bennett Johnson, second son of Elmore and Elizabeth Johnson, had married Lucy Annie Latham in 1875 in Illinois. Three children, Maud, Fred and Elmore came with them to central Nebraska. Ben, as he was commonly called, was a tall and stalwart man. He made his first Logan County home north of the beautiful, winding South Loup near Hoagland. Later, the family moved to the Gandy vicinity where they spent their remaining years. Five more children were born during the next twenty years.
My mother, Maud Johnson, first child of Ben and lucy Johnson was a delightful person. Her siblings admired and trusted her. She tended many sick relatives and was a very unselfish and caring individual. Maud became a bright and influential teacher in the southeast rural Logan County area. She married my father, Earnest Coen at the Johnson home south of Gandy, Nov. 1902.
Earnest Coen was the third and youngest son of John and Annetta Coen, 1888 pioneers of Logan County. Their former home was near Albia, Iowa. Their first home in Nebraska was just west of Stapleton on the south side of the road near the Lambert home. They soon moved to their own land about 3 miles east of Gandy. It was near the family home, but south of the road that Earnest took Kinkaid land and built a home for his bride. He later had an adjoining tree claim. Maud and Earnest Coen had four children. The first two died in infancy. I am their third child and my brother 2 years younger now lives in Arnold, NE. Lee married Shirley Adams, daughter of Lane and Maud, also a pioneer family.
Always interested in promoting education and knowing their children should be closer to a school in order to attend regularly, the Coens built a 4-room sod house in 1914 on a school section two miles south of Hoagland. There Lee and I attended grade school. The teachers I remember were Minnie Foster, Ruth Cleveland and Lucy Wemple.
Many fine families composed the Hoagland community. Of course, the social life centered around the school. I especially remember the Smee, Peden, Brown and Connely families. Lee and I are graduates of Logan County High School of Gandy. The teachers whom I recall from there were Carl Wipperman, A.C. Loshbaugh, Miss Matzick, Mrs. Lesky and the most influential of all, Alice Hill.
I began teaching in rural southeast Logan County the fall of 1925 at eighteen years of age. I taught the home school at Hoagland in 1926 and 1927. 1929 found me at Kearney College. It was there I met Ivan Troyer whom I married in June 1930. We were married at the Coen Home by Rev. J.B. Roe. Dorothy Stockall Smee played the wedding march and W.E. Hill sang, "I Love You Truly." Fifty years later at our Golden Wedding Anniversary, Ivan's sister and my brother, our attendants, were present. My parents served a bountiful dinner to the wedding guests, close friends and relatives.
Ivan began barbering for Dale Shaw in Arnold the spring of 1929. He bought the barber shop at Gandy in 1931 from a Mr. Holmes. A bad case of arthritis caused him to leave the shop for some time. It was run by Lyle Pense, a brother of Mrs. Andy Comer of Arnold and Ruth Tunnell of Stapleton. He began barbering for Orlo Jenkins at Stapleton in April of 1936. Having lived in and having taught in Gandy grade school for two years and having lived in Stapleton from 1936 to 1943, we feel like Logan County people.
As I recall good times as a child, I find my thoughts centering around school. I think my first school, called the Gill school, is where I did my best teaching, I've been so very proud of the "country kids" from there. Nearly 20 of the most willing learners a teacher ever had came from these homes; Nielsen, Srausburg, Morrison, Christensen and Gill. I believe I was paid $50.00 per month.
I recall anticipating Memorial Day celebrations. There I could see my grandad, John Coen, marching in his Civil War uniform. He was a very patriotic Republican, had served with the Second Iowa Infantry in Company K. He had re-enlisted when his first term expired. Mother, Lee and I picked wild flowers to decorate the graves. The wild sweet peas and sourdock smelled most fragrant. Then all of us put on our best clothes and attended the program in the big courtroom in the county courthouse in Gandy. What a thrill it was to climb the winding stairway and to find seats in the crowded room!! W.E. Hill sang a solo and someone always spoke too long to suit me, but Lee could sit very quietly.
I will remember the cold rides to Gandy in an open spring wagon. My first car ride was with Mr. and Mrs. Dan Fowler. Mrs. Fowler told me to sway with the motions of the car. If the car turned a corner, I must lean that way. It was at Stapleton in 1939 that Ivan and I took our 3 year old son and daughter , 2 months for their first airplane ride. The pilot was a young girl and claimed to the be youngest licensee in the U.S.A. I believe her name was Evalyn Sharp. My first train ride was on a Union Pacific motor from Stapleton to Hoagland.
My cousins play an important part in the reminiscence of good times. Our parents often exchanged Sunday dinners and the children became ford of each other. There were the Fred Johnson, Kent Haskell, George Adams and John Witt families.
See why my "heart strings" pull toward home of my ancestors, Logan County?
by Elsie Coen Troyer
