with the threshing on the John Thornburrow farm, when it rained and
stopped the work. Three of the threshing crew—Irve Hudson, Ice Gentry,
and “Zip” Bean—with Teddy, came to town in a spring wagon. On the way in
they saw a skunk by the roadside. One of the men told Teddy to jump out
and catch it—that skunks made fine pets. He carried the skunk to town in
his hat. Someone told Masters that Dr. John W. Graham would pay well for
that skunk. “Er, rippin’,” said the diminutive Englishman. “A chawnset
to grab a little lunch, rine or shine, eh? Could do myself well wiv a
bob now.”

Dr. J. W. Graham owned a drugstore on the south side of the street. He
also owned a fine bird-dog named York. They were nearly always together.
With the skunk still in his hat, Teddy found Graham’s door locked.
Someone across the street told him to throw the skunk in at an open
window. He did so. A little later, on entering the store, Dr. John W.
sat himself down to work out some materia medica puzzles, sniffing a
little on the side, while York was nosing about a bit. When the dog
found the object of his search, a rising young physician literally
exploded.

Teddy did not wait to collect his bob.

Though John Stowell, the boy member of the original influx of Colonists,
did command me—I was in his employ at the time—to go out on a chicken
foraging expedition one bright moonlight night, neither he nor I was
troubled with conscientious scruples. We were both quite sure that we
would never have to answer to God or man for our actions — I hasten to
say, in this particular instance.

Also, if Will Gill and Augustus Anderson were here they would tell you
that they not only saw me enter a closed but unlocked chicken house
and come out with six chickens, two at a time, and that they themselves
helped me carry those chickens to the rendezvous where they were to be
roasted — innards, feathers and all.

In explanation, John Stowell “burned” the brick for his two-story
building across the street from the Worthy lumber office—the present
location of the Catholic recreation hall. The brickyard was on Stowell’s
land south of the creek just west of the town bridge. Old Hagen, an
experienced brick-maker, was brought here to burn brick for the John
Spencer building—with Masonic hall above—on the alley south of second
street, facing on Kansas Avenue; and the Ed Vilott building on the alley
south of the present McDaniel picture show location, also facing on
Kansas Avenue. For these two buildings, Hagen burned two kilns of brick
on the north side of the creek, west from the mineral spring, on the
present Don Cole land.

My brother Sam and I worked on the Hagen brickyard — and learned a few
tricks. John Stowell said he believed we could do the brick-making
as well as Hagen, and if we were willing to tackle the job he would
“chawnsit.” Sam did the moulding, and I did the off-bearing, carried the
green brick to the drying yard—the same positions we held on the
Hagen yard. Together we set the brick in the kiln for burning. And we
plastered the kiln, top and sides, with mud before starting the fires.

The material used in both yards was common top-soil mixed with
sand—ground in a horse-propelled mill. Sand for the Hagen yard came from
a pit about where Frank White’s barn-lot is, across the street from his
residence. Sand for the Stowell yard came from a pit on the north
side of the quarter section at the northeast corner of town. It was
a treacherous pit. It caved in one time between loads when I was
hauling—and it frightened me so badly that I drove back empty. And never
again did I go into that pit.

Incidentally, I may say that it was claimed later a good brick-clay was
found on the John Thomas farm, a half mile east of town. A promoter made
the discovery. He planned to build a brick manufacturing plant at the
point of discovery, and have a railroad spur run out from town—provided,
however, that the town people foot the bill. Also he wanted to sell his
expert knowledge at a ridiculously high figure. When it was pointed out
to him that a couple of “greenhorn” boys had made fairly good brick from
ordinary dirt, without financial sweetening, he gave up the venture.

At the Stowell yard I had the day shift and Sam headed the night shift
during the burning procedure. For fuel we used old fence rails—mostly.
And it took a lot of them. Rails fed into the five 16-foot fire tunnels
to better advantage than any other wood that could be had. Wherever so
many rails came from I do not recall. Likely from farms whose owners
were making the change over from the old worm-fence to barbed wire,
which came along about that time. Besides the firemen—three to the
12-hour shift — there were always crowds of spectators at the yard, in
the early evenings.

Stowell was feeling pretty good over the splendid progress we were
making, and he said to me one evening, out loud so that all could hear,
“I think we ought to give the boys a chicken roast tonight.” Then, to
the crowd, “Wot you say, fellows? ‘Ere two of you boys go along with
John and bring back a ‘alf dozen chicks—I command John to go.”

Will Gill and Gus Anderson fell in with me. The boys named a place in
the north part of town where they thought we might get the chickens
without incurring too much risk of being caught. We were now passing
John Stowell’s home on the corner where Cleve Battin lives. I said,
“Oh, that’s too far. Why not see what Laura (Stowell’s wife) has in
her chicken house here on the alley?” Will Gill said, “Why, this is
Stowell’s place. We ought not steal his chickens. He might recognize
them—and that would spoil all the fun.”

And, by-golly, those two boys refused to put foot on the Stowell lot—and
I had to do all the dirty work. I couldn’t blame them though, because it
was bright moonlight and the door of the chicken house faced the Stowell
residence only a few rods to the south. But it was, probably, just as
well. They wouldn’t have known where to find the choice chicks, anyway.
And besides, I knew that, let ‘em squawk, Laura and the children were
going to stay put. Back at the yard, the word got around that we had
stolen Stowell’s chickens — and the whole gang broke into a “Chessy-cat”
grin which didn’t come off during the whole evening. Stowell busied
himself with the roasting, without outward signs of recognizing a chick.

John Stowell was very methodical and punctual in the conduct of his
newspaper. He was reasonable in his demands of his help—and mighty fine
fellow to work for. He often paid me extra when particularly pleased
with our accomplishment. He insisted only that the forms be closed by
six o’clock on press days. We usually printed the paper after supper, so
that Stowell might address the papers for mailing—and then, too, in the
winter, we could get a better print while the office was warm.

One time Stowell brought a roving printer upstairs to the composing
room, having promised the fellow $5 to show me how to print in two
colors from a solid cut. I told John that I thought I knew how it
was done. He said, “By-jingo, maybe you can learn something, anyway.”
Turning to the two-color man, he said, “Show ‘im, Mister.” But it was I
who did the showing.

I looked up a cut of our then new frame school house — a carry over from
another ownership—and explained how I had printed the building in
brown, the yard in green, and the sky in blue, with a fleecy white cloud
overhead in the background, all done with three impressions, from the
solid cut. Stowell said, ‘“Ere, Mister, ‘ere’s your five dollars.” The
fellow said, “I think you ought to give this to your printer—he’s gone
me one better in the matter of colors.” Stowell said, “‘Ere John, I’ll
give you $5 too. It’s been worth it to me.” And I said, “I think you
ought to give this one to my brother Sam. He engraved the wood cut,
showed me how to mix colors, and was helpful in figuring out a way to
print it in three colors.” Sam was the artist in our family. Stowell
said, “By-jingo, I’ll give ‘im $5 too. ‘Ow’s our supply of boxwood?” He
had another three-color print in mind.

At the time of this episode, I had only one helper — Stowell’s
sixteen-year-old daughter, Alice. Alex Hamel and John Kenoyer, part time
type-setters, were not working that week. Alice was that sort of girl
who would do pretty much as she pleased so long as her papa would
stay downstairs and attend strictly to his editorial, and his hardware
business.

This day Stowell stayed downstairs until the thing happened—then he
rushed from the editorial office on the first floor in front, eighty
feet back to the rear, then up the stairs to the second floor, and back
again eighty feet to the composing room. Alice, who knew her father
better than I did, whispered, “Oh, Lordy, he’s mad as a wet hen. Don’t
give me away, please!”

John wanted to know, “Oo was it that ‘ad offended little Miss ‘Utch?”
Neither of us had the answer. Coral Hutchison, a frequent and I may say
most welcome caller—preferably on any day but Thursday—and Alice had
put in a couple of hours visiting, as young girls will. And this was
Thursday afternoon, our press day. I asked Alice to speed up her work a
little so that we might make the deadline before six o’clock. It did no
good. I had to speak to Alice a second time, not harshly, however—and
Coral, apparently understanding the situation, left. But when she passed
the editorial office downstairs, Stowell said she was crying.

After John Stowell had gone downstairs that day, Alice said, “If he asks
you again—and I know he will—tell him what you told me about Coral
after she had been up here last week. That would tickle him, and he will
forget all about her tears.”

Well, John Stowell did ask me again. He really wanted to know. And I
told him, shielding Alice as much as I could. He said, “I understand.
You did right. Make ‘er pay attention to ‘er work. But I just didn’t
like to see a nice girl like little Miss ‘Utch leaving my place of
business, crying.”

I squared myself with John by saying—and meaning — that it would be a
grievously short-sighted thing for any young fellow to knowingly offend
“Little Miss ‘Utch. Besides being “some” girl, she would likely some day
be an heiress. But, then, even so, this fact was something less than
a comforting thought to one very fine young local merchant who fancied
himself well entrenched in her future matrimonial plans. When he began
talking about what they could accomplish with her papa’s wealth—she quit
him, cold.

“Little Miss ‘Utch” was the daughter of Charley Hutchison, but everybody
except Stowell called him “Hutch.” I knew Charley quite intimately for a
dozen years before I learned that his name was really Hutchison.

What I had told Alice about Coral that day is not in itself worth
repeating here. But it offers a chance to introduce an outstanding
success story—a success in the redemption of waning manhood, as well
as in a financial way. Also, this injection does not strictly belong
in this story — but, in line with my adopted hop, skip, and jump
reminiscing technique, I shall try to make it fit.

I told Alice that Coral was the only girl who had ever asked me to come
and see her sometime when her papa wasn’t around. And I might say she
was in deadly earnest about this. Her papa would not permit her
to entertain me in the manner she had in mind. It was not that he
disapproved of me. In fact, it was on his invitation that I was in the
presence of the girl at the moment. Also, her papa was at the time just
outside the hearing of the conspirators.

My brother Charley, Clifford Ashton, and I, were cutting sumac for my
father’s tanyard on the Hutchison land south of the big barn. Charley
Hutchison had followed his four-year-old daughter out to the barn that
day to prevent her from going through her stunt—the thing she wanted me
to witness. Charley saw us in the sumac patch, and came out, bringing
Coral with him. He said he had a big watermelon patch close to the barn,
and invited us to help ourselves to the melons—then, and thereafter
whenever working in the vicinity. He also said he had to watch Coral
closely — that whenever she would get the chance she’d climb up to the
beams in the big barn and jump off into the hay. Hay hands were bringing
in the harvest at that time — and of course the barn was opened up.

Bees were buzzing around broken melons in the patch, and the little
girl, apparently frightened of them, tried to hide her face against my
legs. Charley said that while they — the father, mother, and child—were
visiting his people in Ohio, after having attended the Centennial (1876)
in Philadelphia, Coral had sat down on a “live” beehive and got stung so
badly as to make her very sick; the swelling in her face almost closing
her eyes.

Charley Hutchison’s father was a wealthy brewer back in Ohio. Charley
acquired the drink habit. When his family thought they had him shut off
from the liquor supply, he would sneak into the storage cellar, bore a
hole in a whisky barrel, and suck the stuff out through a straw.

Charley was sent out here, in the hope of curing him of the drink habit.
He was given a section of land on Wolfley creek, three miles northwest
of Wetmore—and supplied with money to improve the land. I think he was
then left wholly on his own. I do not recall ever seeing any of his
people out here.

Charley Hutchison came here in 1870, and was about 21 years old—a
modest, likeable young man. He spent most of his first year here, in
town. He lived at the Hugh Fortner Hotel—and while rooming there, lost
$500, which he had placed under his pillow. There was no bank here then.

When Charley loafed downtown—which was much of the time that first
year—he made my father’s shoeshop his headquarters. The shop was on the
north side of the main street, opposite John Clifton’s saloon on the
south side. Charley was really trying to taper off in his drinking,
and seldom entered the saloon. He tried to avoid the amenities of the
drinking gentry. He would sometimes, when alone, take one drink, and
then come across to the shoeshop.

Though not a relative of ours, John Clifton was the step-son of my Uncle
Nick Bristow, and he often dropped in at the shoeshop. My mother worked
with my father in the shop. She asked John Clifton to not encourage
Charley in his drinking. Clifton said “Hutch” was really doing fine, and
that he would help the boy all that he could.

Then a girl came down from the prairie country in the neighborhood of
what is now Goff—”Pucker Brush” it was called then—to work in Peter
Shuemaker’s new hotel. Anna Mackey was a nice looking girl—too nice
looking, Charley said, to go out with the landlord’s “drunken” son. It
really worried Charley. He said one day, “I believe I’ll try to stop
it.” He did. He married Anna. And never again did he take a drink. My
mother and Clifton both took credit for helping him over the hump. But I
suspect it was the girl from the prairie country who had transformed him
short off into an abstainer.

Charley Hutchison was the only one of several whom I knew that were sent
out here from the east, when this country was new, for a like purpose,
that made good. There was no finer man than Charley Hutchison—a
conscientious, upright Christian gentleman. Compared to “Jersey”
Campbell, a New Jersey drinking boy, located on the best half section of
land south of Goff, Charley Hutchison’s performance was phenomenal.
But then, maybe there never was an “Anna” in Jersey’s life. Charley
Hutchison sold his land to Fred Shumaker, and moved to Wetmore in the
early eighties. He built the home now owned by Mrs. James Grubb.

Let me say here that Alice Stowell was an attentive little type-setter
when she worked for me after I had bought The Spectator—and that Coral
Hutchison still was a frequent and most welcome caller. Also, they had
learned that it was important that visitors be seen and not heard on
press days. Coral continued her visits to the office long after Alice
Stowell had married Marsh Younkman, and moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma—and
after Myrtle Mercer had taken Alice’s place in the printing office.
Coral seemed to like the smell of printer’s ink—and she continued her
regular visits long after she married Charley Locknane.

While still quite young, Coral Hutchison was the town’s top pianist and
singer, a distinction she held throughout the years against all comers.
She even competed favorably, in song, with the girls from the Colony,
whose reputation as singers was widespread. The younger generation of
Colonists were superb entertainers, anxious at all times to compete
against or team up with the young people from town, at their lyceums
held in the Wolfley school house. Wetmore had a “literary” society,
which gave entertainments, usually charging twenty-five cents
admission—while the Colonists always gave their shows for free.

Then, the time came when they combined in one big show, an epochal
achievement, at Wetmore—drawing two of the cast from the Colony. Ted
Fish was a specialty man, singing comical songs. His favorite rendition
had to do with the loan of a friend’s girl, the refrain running, “Hand
‘e wounted me to tike ‘is plice and do the best I cooud.” I’d heard him
sing it several times before at their lyceums. Coral Hutchison was also
a specialty singer—on a much higher and more pleasing musical plane,
however. John Stowell, long removed from the Colony, blacked his face,
rattled the bones—and played the concertina.

Bill Dutch, of the Colony, was leading man — and a mighty good one too.
Our own Miss Jane Thomas was leading lady—equally good. The play was
a “heavy” drama. I might say the whole cast except myself, was
exceptionally good. As to my own part, you shall be the judge. It was
not a speaking part. Months before this, I had blundered in a speaking
part on the stage—carelessly called a word what, by all the ethics
of decency, it should not have been called. It provoked uproarious
laughter—at my expense. And on a subsequent appearance upon the literary
stage I drew a concerted giggle before I even had time to open my mouth.
It completely unnerved me—for all time. I was so “befuddled” that I
couldn’t say a word, and I didn’t have the gumption to graciously bow
myself off the stage. I bolted off. And that’s how I became a writer.
It’s safest, anyhow.

When you blunder, you can always—if smart enough to detect it—scratch it
out. But spoken words, once said, can never be recalled.

The director, “Lord” Richard Bingham, was an Englishman — not related,
and unknown to the Colonists—who had dropped in here from, nobody knew
where, or why. He seemed to have a perpetual thirst for strong drink—and
the money with which to provide it. He was a remittance man — which is
to say he was a scion of a wealthy old country family, sent over here on
a monthly allowance, as riddance of a costly nuisance.

Director Bingham was apparently well educated, did not talk the
“Cockney” language of the Colonists — and had some dramatic ability. He
directed this home-talent show without pay—and did a pretty good job
of it. All he asked was a “little more McBriar,” his favorite brand
of whisky. And after he had “steamed up” on a generous quantity of the
nameless stuff from the local “speak-easy”—licensed saloons were out
here then—anything and everything was “good old McBriar.”

The show went over so well in Wetmore that the management decided to
repeat it at Capioma—and maybe go on the road with it. But, in the nick
of time, it was recalled that Henry Clinkenbeard, our photographer—or
rather our taker of daguerreotypes—had sponsored an all home-talent
minstrel show which also had gone over big here, but when tried out on
the road, proved a financial failure—and the road idea was written off.

All due to an outburst of alcoholic conviviality, Mr. Bingham saluted
Miss Jane on the takeoff for Capioma, assuring her that she would not
fail to “knock ‘em cold.” He did not go with the show. The management
willed that he remain in Wetmore where he could have ready access to
Charley McCarthy’s “blind-tiger” and enjoy to the full “a little more”
of his favorite “McBriar.”

The day of our Capioma appearance was cold. There was bright sunshine,
with a foot of snow on the ground. The whole cast—including Henry
Clinkenbeard and his brass band—went in several lumber wagons, arriving
in Capioma in time for supper at the Van Brunt farm home. I believe his
name was Jerry. Anyway, he was the father of Tunis and Teeny. The show
was held in the hall over the Van Pelt store, in town, diagonally across
the road west from the Van Brunt farm home.

I was taken along as assistant property man — and doubled in brass
(b-flat cornet)—but the cramped space for stage and dressing rooms in
the rather small Van Pelt hall developed a better spot for me. I was
made the custodian of the leading lady’s train—carried it in my two
hands just so from dressing room around sharp turns to the stage, and
paid out its many folds, at entrance, in a manner to avoid entanglement.

The twelve mile ride in open wagon, with bright sunshine bearing down on
the reflecting white snow, had done things to the girls’ faces. However,
the wise ones had fetched along cosmetics to make themselves presentable
— but our leading lady said she never had, and by the eternal bonds of
respectability, she never would use make-up. Although conceded to be the
privilege of stage-women, nice girls didn’t paint their faces in that
period. And although our Jane did eventually make Hollywood, I suspect
the day never came when she would use make-up.

Though a native of Wales, with maybe a dozen years in this country at
that time, Jane Thomas did not retain, markedly, the old country manner
of speech. She was endowed with a delightful little twist, all her
own—that is, something apart from that of other members of her family,
which was neither Welsh nor pure English. Jane was a pretty girl. Her
slight elegant body, draped in silk with something like six feet of the
train trailing in the wake as she moved majestically across the stage,
gave her a queenly quality. And she still looked lovely despite her
shiny nose. She was, or rather had been before his demise, my brother
Charley’s girl.

HAPPY DAZE Published in Wetmore Spectator and

Seneca Courier-Tribune — October 11, 1935

By John T. Bristow

In glancing over the current issue of The Courier-Tribune I notice that
the good citizens of Seneca are putting on a Biblical show this week.
That’s fine. Whenever I hear of home talent aspiring to portray those
ancient characters on the stage I become interested right away. It
recalls to mind the time when I myself was, briefly, in the cast of a
local entertainment of that sort held in the old school house here in
Wetmore many, many years ago.

It was a show the likes of which Wetmore had never had before, nor
since—a show that stands out in memory as the one classic of the times—a
show that rocked the whole countryside, rocked it with near volcanic
convulsions.

Considering the extraordinary performers and the conduct of an audience
which ran wild, this little review is not offered as something worthy
of emulation. Nor is it to be construed as criticism. Rather, it
is something to be contrasted with the newer interpretations and
renditions, something to be compared with present-day reactions as
against old-time unbridled responses.

As aforesaid, with other local talent—grownups, and some lesser lights,
including an injection of members of “that tanyard gang”—I was cast
for a minor part in that show. To give you the right slant on this last
mentioned group of my theatrical co-workers, I should say here that my
father operated a tannery in the old days, and “the gang” — frequenters
of the yard—included just about all the happy-go-lucky youth of
the town, vividly alive, and callow. Collectively, we made quite a
record—something short of enviable, it now pains me to relate.

It was my dear old Sunday School superintendent who had selected me for
one of her characters in this Biblical show. I had been marvelous—so
she said—in her Sunday School, committing and reciting as many as twenty
Bible verses on a Sunday morning, for which I would sometimes be given a
little up-lift card. She said that my good work in her Sunday School
was guarantee enough for her that I would handle the part assigned me
creditably. I would not need to attend rehearsals. All that I should do
was to have my good mother make for me a heterogeneous coat according
to specifications. She would instruct me at the last minute so that I
wouldn’t forget.

I was to take the part of Joseph—Joseph, the boy. And, although a
bit irregular, and I might say diabolically devised, to save the
stage-carpenter the trouble of making a pit to cast me into, one of my
Hebrew brothers—I think it would have been Judah, who, off stage, was
a big Swede — was to have batted me on the “bean” so that I couldn’t
protest when he and my other naughty brothers would sell me to the
Egyptians, and thus banish me to the Land of Bondage. I wouldn’t need to
rehearse? Oh, no, of course not! And as it turned out I didn’t perform,
either.

The show was going strong. The audience applauded and yelled itself
hoarse. After a particularly exciting scene, Rolland Van Amburg, the
town clown, jumped up from his seat and yelled, “It’s the best thing
Wetmore ever had—I’ve had my money’s worth already! Come and get another
quarter!” Van was ably assisted in this demonstration by one William
Morris, leading merchant.

The sponsoring lady was in high glee—happy daze. She said to her
puppets, “It’s taking! Oh, dear children, we must give them this one
again!” She flitted about from one to another, saying, “Oh, girls,
please do hurry!”

The scene which had so excited Van was a tableau draped in naught but
thin mosquito bar and set off by the best soft mellowing light effect
that could be had with the oil-burning lamps, depicting some
Biblical event with strictly private and as time goes quite modern
interpretations. Embroidered beyond the original concept, it exhibited
in silhouette some of Wetmore’s fairest damsels—some who will read
this and blush—in an amazing state of dishabille. I should like to—and
probably will—hear from Montana and Idaho, and even faraway Hollywood,
on this statement.

A wag in the audience who was not man enough to show himself, like Van,
yelled, “Take down the bars!” The audience roared! The sponsoring lady
beamed! Things got to going so good for the director that she began
pulling surprises on the performers. Wholly without warning, she ordered
Clifford Ashton to take off his shirt. That young Englishman, ever
obliging and obedient, had about completed the job when Dr. Thomas
Milam cried out in his most dramatic voice, “Put that shirt back on, you
idiot!”

The woman, who was my Sunday School superintendent, overhearing the
Doctor’s remark, forthwith gave another curt command: “Off with that
shirt, Clifford—off with that shirt!” The voice carried, full and
resonant, through the calico partitions to the rear of the auditorium.
That command became a phrase which was hurled at Clifford as long as he
lived here. He is now in Seattle, Washington.

As already stated, I was to have taken the part of Joseph. I had a sort
of vague idea that my beautiful coat of variegated hues was to have been
torn from my person by my brothers to show to my old man as evidence of
a lie they were going to tell him. And not knowing what turn of mind the
now deliriously happy director would take next, I beat it—went outside
and thought I would see the show through the green shutters which
covered the old school house windows.

Outside, I found that other deserters had preceded me. Bill McVay, a
grown young man, bewhiskered for the occasion, with a flowing white
beard the likes of which has seldom been seen on this earth since the
days of Moses, said, in his drawling voice, “I could drink all the
whisky the old town’s got and it wouldn’t faze me—but that thing has
bumped me off my feet. She’ll have to get someone else to take my part.”

Actually, I was afraid to remain in the cast, fearing, the way things
were happening, fast and furious like, that I might be persuaded against
my will to appear before that hilariously responsive audience with
greatly reduced apparel. I really was in a dangerous spot. The plot
called for partial forced disrobement. Knowing the hyenas who posed as
my brothers, and knowing also that those brothers had caught the spirit
of the producer in a large way, I had the feeling that when they would
have finished with me, working in that free atmosphere, that it would
have been sans pants for little Johnny.

It should be borne in mind that the director of this very extraordinary
show was an extremely odd woman, very religious, and sincere—and, having
ideas of her own, she had the courage to mirror them bounteously in her
work.

The show was all right, of course. Biblical, and all that. And, viewed
with an eye for the beautiful, it was all that Van said it was.
But coming as it did in an age of many clothes for women, it was a
revelation.

ODD CHARACTERS — COLORFUL, PICTURESQUE Not Hitherto Published—1947.

By John T. Bristow

The discussion of odd characters was going strong when I entered the
corner grocery store one evening. I did not join in the discussion for
the simple reason that the range of observations did not go far enough
back to take in the really odd ones—as I knew them. Had I told what I’m
going to tell now, without supporting evidence it would, perhaps, have
branded me as a prevaricator, and I wouldn’t have liked that. But I’m
taking no chances now. Supporting evidence is at hand.

Speaking of odd characters, Wetmore had ‘em in the old days—in numbers.
In truth, this assertion takes in just about everyone, except of course
Thee and Me—that is, if Thee are still living. The odd characters
dominating this story were Mr. O. Bates, Mr. Peter Shuemaker, and Mr.
Jim Riley.

But first, an opening paragraph introducing a fourth character that
shall be nameless—that is, in spelled out letters. I think I shall call
my man Mr. June, and guarantee that I have not missed his real name
more than thirty days. Also, he had a brother in the business, and the
firm-name was June Bros.—only this is one month away from it, in the
springtime.

Mr. June came into my printing office to arrange for some
advertising—and also to get a load of fire insurance. I wrote fire
insurance on the side. He was bringing a stock of clothing from his
store in Atchison, and putting it in the Bates grocery store below the
printing office, in the Bleisener block.

Mr. June inquired of me about our fire fighting facilities, and as to
whether or not we had waterworks. When I told him we had no waterworks
and practically no fire protection, he almost let his portly Jewish
self fall off the chair. He promised, “The first thing you should have
waterworks when I come.”

I told Mr. June that he was moving in with a man who had the agency for
a sure-shot fire fighting hand grenade. This seemed to hit him a little
off guard—but he rallied, and said he would investigate. It is presumed
that his investigation was satisfactory. He moved in right away. Also,
he might have heard about Mr. O. Bates’ ineffective demonstration with
his hand grenades. They had “fizzled” on him a while back.

The clothing stock had been in the building only about sixty days when a
mysterious fire occurred at 11:45, in the night—old time. It started
in the oil room under the stairs leading up to my office. I was working
late that night, with a shaded coal oil lamp on my desk. When I looked
away from my work, I was startled by a solid wall of smoke which had
come up through a stovepipe hole in the rear end of the room and stood
only a few feet away from my desk. Alex Hamel had been working with me,
but he had left the office some time before that. Also, Myrtle Mercer
had been working that night, and I had gone out to take her home—leaving
the office in total darkness while I was away.

Alex Hamel and Bill McAlester, a barber, were first to show up after
I had rushed out and yelled “Fire!” It was not long before a crowd had
assembled. Some gave their attention to the fire in the building, while
others rushed up stairs to my office, against my protest. There was no
fire in the printing office. “Chuck” Cawood dashed a bucket of water on
my shaded coal-oil lamp, and rushed out of the room, yelling, “I put it
out—I’ve put it out!” Chuck’s water had also ruined an order of printed
stationery ready for delivery. Others milled about in the dark and
“pied” several galleys of type we had set for the paper which was to
come out the next day. The clothing stock was carried to the street—and
the fire was put out before it had done much damage. Since there were
two occupants of the store room, no one could say with certainty whose
fire it might have been.

The Jew’s insurance was canceled in due course. He said, “If I don’t
got insurance, I’ll not stay in a town which don’t got waterworks.” I
reminded him that he still had Mr. O. Bates, with his hand grenades. It
was but a short while before this that Mr. O. Bates had acquired the
agency for his hand grenades. He planned a demonstration in the public
square, by making a pyramid of wooden boxes, about ten feet high, early
in the afternoon as a sort of advertisement for the event to take
place after dark. This advertising stunt brought him humiliating
repercussions.

The square was filled with people. Mr. O. Bates, a gabby auctioneer who
really knew how to make a spiel, gave them a good one. He said, “Ladies
and gentlemen. I have here the greatest fire extinguisher ever devised!
But you don’t have to take my word for this! You shall see with your own
eyes! Why, my friends, I wouldn’t hesitate one moment about building my
bonfire right up against my own home.”

Then he backed off a few paces from the burning boxes and threw a
grenade at the fire—but it failed to connect with the solid bumpboard,
which had been placed in the center to break the glass bottles, and
passed through the mass as a dud. He then tried again, hitting the
bumpboard, but instead of quenching the fire, it made a decided spurt
upwards. Then, with a huge grunt, Bates, threw them in as fast as he
could, resulting in further spurts of blaze upward — up, up, and up!

It was then boos for Mr. O. Bates. He was a sadly confused man, numb
with bewilderment. He stammered, “I’ll fetch a man here who’ll show
you that they will do the trick.” At a lesser publicized exhibition,
Bates—and his man—had extinguished the fire quickly. Rumor had it that
“Frosty” and “Cooney” had emptied the chemicals out of his grenades, and
had filled them with coal oil.

Mr. O. Bates had unbounded faith in his grenades. He actually wanted
to build his bonfire almost smack-up against the frame hotel building
on the corner where Harry Cawood’s store is now. But “Uncle” Peter
Shuemaker wouldn’t stand for that. “Uncle” Peter was a wiry little man
of Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry—much set in his ways, with a quick tongue
with which to defend himself. He was always on the defense.

“Frosty” Shuemaker had said, with reason, “Granddad, don’t you let that
old windjammer light his fire near the hotel. You don’t know what might
happen,” and “Uncle” Peter had snapped, “Goway, Forrest—who’s asking you
for advice?” But, I think, “Uncle” Peter had “smelled a mouse.”

Mr. O. Bates — pompous, windy, and positive — told “Uncle” Peter that
the proposed demonstration would do his hotel no more harm than for him
to allow Jim Riley to ride his horse in and out of the hotel office—an
occurrence that still rankled. “Uncle” Peter flew off the handle, so to
speak, and spluttered, “It’s no-sicha-na-thing! I never permitted that
lousy drunken pie-stealing galoot to ride into my hotel! And just
who would pay me for my hotel if it should burn down? By-GODDIES, you
couldn’t do it—Mr. Bates!”

Since I have quoted Peter Shuemaker detrimental to the character of
one Jim Riley, I shall now explain. Never like to leave any of the old
fellows out on a limb. Then, too, there is still another reason for this
elaboration. It is to keep the record straight. Some, I now learn, are
inclined to question if I have quoted “Uncle” Peter verbatim. That I
have you may be sure. I make no inventions. You can always bank on that.
Why, I ask, should I want to feed you figments of fiction, when memory
is stocked with so much of the real thing—spoken words by the old
fellows, a thousand times better than anything an antiquated mind could
conjure up now? And then there is always the little matter of accuracy
to be considered. “No-sicha-na-thing” and “by-goddies” were his exact
utterances.

Not to be confused with the Soldier creek Jim Reilly, who built a house
in town on the site where E. W. Thornburrow’s home is now, this Irishman
owned land up in the Capioma neighborhood—a half section north of the
Patrick Hand land. Jim Riley was a substantial farmer and cattleman. He
was not married. Jim bached on the farm—but spent much of his spare time
in Wetmore, always pretty close to the dram shops. He was a periodical
hard drinker. And a prankster of the first order.

But as time went on—and as he prospered—Jim decided that he could change
the baching situation for the better if his sister, whom he had left in
Ireland years before, were here to keep house for him. He made the trip
back to Ireland, but when he got there he learned that his sister was
married and lived in California. He then made a hurried trip to the west
coast—and in due time the sister, with her husband and several little
Ketchums, became members of the Jim Riley household on the farm here.
And through the hand of Fate title to the Riley lands later passed to
the Ketchums.

As Bates had said, Jim Riley did ride his horse into Shuemaker’s hotel.
And as “Uncle” Peter had spluttered, Jim did swipe his pies—baked for a
big dance supper. Riley carted them out on the street in a wheelbarrow,
and passed them out to anyone who would take them. But he paid. Jim
always paid. His reputation for doing that was well established. Like
the time when someone went into Rising’s general store and said Jim
Riley was out in front smashing up a consignment of crockery that had
just been unloaded on the high front porch, giving a war-whoop every
time as the crocks he was throwing crashed in the street, Don Rising
said, “Let him have his fun. He’ll pay.”

Also, Jim Riley did deliberately back his wagon up to the post
supporting Shuemaker’s prized birdhouse, hurriedly threw a logchain
around the post—and drove off, giving one of his famous war-whoops.
“Jim’s on another bender,” the oldtimers said—but I knew he was just
plain drunk.

Jim Riley dearly loved to torment Peter Shuemaker. And he liked to play
hide-and-seek with the town marshal. But most of all, Jim loved his
drink. And it was while burdened with a mixture of the two that he met
his death — in 1887. While making a hurried getaway from the marshal his
team of mules, under lash, turned a street corner too quickly, threw Jim
out his spring-wagon—and broke his neck.

And that bird-house—it was a three-decker, about a yard square, with
entrances on all four sides, perched on top of a 10-foot post out in
front of the hotel. Here the martins of that day nested and multiplied
in such numbers as to greatly overcrowd their living quarters. In the
late summer months the new broods would have to take to the roof.

Jim’s log chain, applied at the height of the nesting season, broke up
all too many bird-nests to suit “Uncle” Peter—and it just about caused
his to lose his religion. “Uncle” Peter took his newly-found religion
seriously enough, but when suddenly angered he was a mite
forgetful. Lapsing back into pre-conversion times, his overworked
byword—by-goddies—was shortened up a bit, and with it went a blast of
other sulphurous words telling the world what he meant to do to that
scoundrel when and if he could ever lay hands on him.

Peter Shuemaker was practically the sole support of the Baptist Church
here for a time, in the old days. The Church membership was poor, and
there came a lean time when the members wanted to close up shop—but
“Uncle” Peter said no, “By-goddies,” he’d pay the preacher himself.

Having lost his wife, Shuemaker, in his late eighties, and always a bit
on the contrary side, was now, with descendents in his home, a little
hard to get along with. But he hit it off fine with his preacher. Then,
one Sunday morning, when a beautiful camaraderie between preacher and
parishioner was running high, the Reverend announced something special,
a surprise, for the evening services. That surprise proved to be “Uncle”
Peter going shakily down the aisle, altarward, with a feeble old woman,
an octogenarian from God only knew where, clinging to his arm. She was
an “importation.” Thus, one perceives, that in casting his bread upon
the waters it had indeed been returned to “Uncle” Peter manifold. And
for his descendents, who were keeping a watchful eye on his modest
savings, it was as a devastating bombshell topping a most disturbing
surprise. Son-in-law Don Rising “swore” the old gentleman had been “sold
down the river.”

The marriage did not endure.

But, at that, “Uncle” Peter fared better, spiritually, “than did the
preacher who showed him the way. The Reverend George Graham, evangelist,
had pitched his gospel tent on the triangular spot of vacant ground
across the street east of the Catholic Church in Wetmore back in the
middle 80’s. With him was a buxom woman, with rosy cheeks — who sang
quite well. And what with her good singing and George’s impassioned
pleas for repentance they garnered a good harvest—very good, indeed.

The Reverend Graham invoked, with the wrath of Jehovah of old, all the
terrors of hell upon unbelievers. Together, they slew the sinners. Even
some quite good people were swayed into the belief that they ought to
make amends and strive to measure up to the high plane of this super
exhorter—and thus make sure of following through to the Great Beyond.
There were among them converts with Methodist leanings, and converts
with Baptist leanings — even one young lady was possessed of the gift
of tongues. When it was all over here, the converts went their several
ways, as the preacher had advised—or rather they began to map a course
by which they might make the takeoff for the long journey. Then, with
the second stand away from here — somewhere down around Lawrence — the
preacher and the lady were publicly exposed for unholy conduct.

And yea, verily, the Reverend had a family somewhere abroad in the land.

Repercussions hit hard back here. The one great wrong done our converts
was, as you might expect, heaped upon them by the unbelievers who had
been consigned to the everlasting fire of brimstone by the now fallen
preacher. As is usual with emotionally recruited converts there was some
immediate backsliding, or cooling off, but when “twitted”—that’s what
they called it then—by the ungodly, the stampede back to normal got
under way and was, in the days that followed, made complete—save one.
“Uncle” Peter was seemingly the only one of the many who could bring
himself to believe that religion was religion—something pure, and worth
keeping, even though it had been delivered to him through the channels
of a dirty carrier.

There is an old saying that “one should give the devil his due.” I’m
sure that, regardless, the magnetic George did a power of good in
his revivals here. While, it is true, his converts did not choose to
“join-up” after the crash, until the backwash of that scandal had become
tempered by time, they did, however, accept the opportunity to come
into the fold under another standard bearer. And, unfortunately for
the Baptists, the Methodists were first to hold a revival—and reap the
harvest. And the girl who was “called” upon to babble in tongues, gave
up the pursuit when it was evident that she was fooling no one but
herself.

At the time of the exposure, I was temporarily working for Bill Granger
on his Centralia Journal, and boarding at the old McCubbin House, down
by the tracks. Ed Murray — later, Mo. Pacific agent in Wetmore for
many years—was clerk at the hotel. Professor Roberts, principal of the
Centralia Public Schools, was the third person present when the Evening
Daily newspaper was brought in. After reading the exposure article,
I passed the paper to Mr. Roberts, with comment that I had attended
Graham’s revival meetings in Wetmore. Mr. Murray had his say about
preachers in general, and about one Reverend Locke in particular—of the
latter, quite complimentary, however.

As he read, Mr. Roberts said, “Say—you, a newspaperman—here’s something
you ought to commit, for future use.” For future use? He meant, let us
hope, only as a model for phrase building to be used on occasion. That
Mr. Roberts, he was a mighty clever young man—quite young, then. It was
a long time ago, sixty-one years to be exact — but I still remember.

The newspaper report was vague as to the exact nature of the preacher’s
misstep, and I shall not attempt to state it here lest I might do
someone an injustice. So, then, let’s let George do it. The paper
quoted him, thus:

“I have the consolation, small though it be, of knowing that though my
bark goes down amid the turbid waters of Illicit love the shores of Time
are marked with many such wrecks.”

Prettily phrased. But no further comment.

NOTE — This is okayed, “No-sicha-na-thing.” “By-Goddies,” and all, by
Hettie Shuemaker-Kroulik, (70), granddaughter; and by Peter Cassity,
(80), grandson. And they go further, saying: The $1,000 he paid to rid
himself of the woman, plus what it had cost him to get her (preacher’s
reward) just about cleaned “Uncle” Peter. And Cassity says the pies
swiped by Riley numbered exactly forty. Jim paid double, as always—and
liked it.

And now wouldn’t it be nice if I could say here that Cassity was one of
those converts? I’d say it, anyway—if I weren’t afraid Peter would tell
on me.

MY BEST INVESTMENT Not Hitherto Published — 1947

By John T. Bristow

Girls — Girls — Girls

After mulling the old thing over, I know now that the boy who sat with
me in the reserved section at Evangelist George Graham’s meetings, as
intimated in the foregoing article, was not Peter Cassity. It was his
brother Bill. Pete tells me that he was farming at the time over on
Wolfley creek and did not attend the meetings regular—but don’t ever
think Pete did not remember his raising, when he did get in.

Bill Cassity had the nerve and the Biblical knowledge to stand up in a
big way for his Maker. That boy had an almost irresistible line, and it
was, at times, questionable whether the minister, or the converts—with
Bill well out in the lead — were doing most in the matter of gathering
in the prospects.

When my uncle, the Rev. Thomas S. Cullom, minister of a Methodist Church
in Nashville, Tennessee, with his wife Irene, and two daughters,
Lora and Clevie, paid a visit to their Wetmore relatives in 1908, the
Reverend told me that in his Church, and throughout the south, it
was customary during revivals to have “exhorters” stationed in the
congregation to give supplementary support to the minister’s pleas for
the redemption of lukewarm and tottering souls.

I asked him if his exhorters ever broke in on his impassioned pleas in
a discordant manner—that is, a little off key? “Cert’nly,” he said,
with fine southern accent. “My exhorters are very devout workers for the
Lord, and sometimes when filled to overflowing with the Holy Ghost, they
say their lines and then keep right on exhorting and sometimes steal
the whole show.” This ungodly reference to his Church as a show was made
with a wink and a grin.

And so, with the old time revivals here, the minister’s exhorters, under
another name of course, sometimes ran away with the show. This brings us
back to Bill Cassity, first born of Newton and Anne Shuemaker-Cassity.
Bill did just that on at least two occasions in the Evangelist’s revival
here. He had the Christian training to do it courageously.

While still a young man, Bill Cassity went to Colorado, worked in the
mines and smelters, at high wages, and ordered the Spectator sent to him
there — and later to Los Angeles. Bill came home once, told me he liked
his work in Colorado, or rather the big wages—but he did not like the
characters he had to associate with. In California, still on the
right side of the laws of God and man, Bill pushed his penchant for
righteousness a little too far for his own good. As a detective,
self-appointed or otherwise, he learned much of the ways of the Los
Angeles underworld—and, it was said, the boys took him for a ride and
failed to bring him back.

And again, some twenty-odd years ago, Than Gustafson, a former Wetmore
man, older brother of our Fred Gustafson — and in a legal way Fred’s
brother was also his brother-in-law, the two Gustafson boys having
married sisters, Adelia and Ophelia, daughters of S. M. Hawkins—is
supposed to have been taken for a one-way ride by the Rocky Mountain
crooks. He left his home in Denver, a wife and two children, one evening
in line of his duties — and was never heard of again. Than Gustafson
evidently knew too much for his own good.

When in gangdom, it is wise to be dumb.

Under the old system, in revivals, the first converts either appointed
themselves or were delegated to work among the congregation as boosters
for the minister—something like Uncle Tom’s “exhorters.” They would
go out in the audience, usually in pairs, and plead with you, cry, and
sniffle over you—an actual fact—in a manner that would - make you
feel mighty cheap. The boy who respected them, loved them through long
associations, was struck dumb.

One particularly sanctified woman—no one could ever doubt her sincerity;
I had known her for years, and she was always so—with redoubled
sniffling tendencies as of the moment, accompanied by the prettiest girl
that ever walked down a church aisle or any other avenue in Wetmore, a
girl whom I had just about given up as lost to a certain rich man’s
son, on account of her papa’s preference for the other boy, and because
“papa” said I played poker, made a firm stand in front of me one night.
I knew before the old girl began to sniffle that, on account of the
young girl, I would, sooner or later, find myself in a front row. More
than one boy went forward in that meeting because he did not have the
heart to disappoint them—and maybe there was also the attraction of a
girl. Girls were more susceptible to the worker’s pleas.

The older woman talked rapidly, between sniffles, in terms only partly
understood by me—but the girl’s radiant smile told me much. I would not
permit them to march me up to the front, as other workers were doing
with prospects, but I promised to sit with the young girl in the
reserved corner on the following night—and see what would happen.

I hope the good people will pardon me for mixing my worldly activities
with the more decent church sittings — but this seems the opportune time
for me to ‘fess up. In this story I mean to come clean—tell everything,
and have as little of the old hero stuff in it as is consistent with the
making of a good story.

I had been to church—Methodist protracted meeting — and then dropped in
on the boys in the DeForest store at the virtual close of a little poker
game. Even now I hate to think what Henry DeForest would have done to
us had he known his dry goods counter was serving as a poker table. One
man, Willard Lynch, dropped out while the deal was in progress, and said
I might play his hand.

This was to be my first poker game. Also, it should have been my
last—but it wasn’t. Not that it ever became an obsession with me. But,
in general, it is not an elevating attainment—and it is something which
any self-respecting young man can very well do without. It was, however,
my last game in Mr. Henry’s store. I wanted to retain, at all costs, his
respectful opinion of me. And the other boys finally saw the error of
their ways — and changed their meeting place. On the cleaner side, I
will say that I never learned to shoot craps, never bet on elections,
ball games, or the horses; never drank or caroused, wouldn’t feel “at
“home” at the popular cocktail party; was never in court as complainant
or defendant—and was only once in my whole life in court as a witness,
at which time, had I told the Whole Truth as I was sworn to do, I could
have been jailed for my ignorance. I was an untutored member of the
Kansas Grain Dealers Association, which was under investigation. Also, I
want to say in the outset that this poker stigma was not the thing
which had lowered me in the opinion of “Papa.” It was the more powerful
evil—money—of which I had none. But there was one bright spot in the
clouded picture. The rich man’s son looked a lot better to “Papa” than
he did to the girl.

Well, in this, my first poker game, I picked up four natural aces, and
if you know only as much as I knew then, you would consider it a top
hand. No one had told me they were playing the joker wild, “cut and
slash.” I bet a nickel. Alfred Anderson called, and raised me a dime.
Two of the other boys called Alfred’s fifteen-cent bet—and the dealer,
Sidney Loop, (clerk in the store), dropped out of the play. I thought my
four aces were good for ten cents more, and not possessing a loose dime,
I dug up a five-dollar bill. Alfred was up on his toes, and said, “You
aiming to bet all that?” I replied, “No—only aiming to call your
dime raise.” Still upon his toes, a little higher now, he said rather
anxiously, “If you want to bet it all, I’ll call it—you can’t bluff me.”
I took one more look at my hand—and not one of the aces had gotten away.
And then I said, “All right, I’ll just bet it all.”

Now, if you know the game, you are maybe expecting to hear that he had
a set of fives, including the joker of course. But it was not Alfred who
held them. His four kings were not good. It was the dealer, the man who
had dropped out because I had dropped in, who had five fives.

But this I did not know until two days later, not until after I had gone
to church again and contributed $5.00 to Mrs. Draper’s fund for buying
Christmas candies for her Sunday School kiddies. Alfred’s sister Phoeba,
as personal representative of our dear old Sunday School Superintendent,
took my contribution with gracious acknowledgment, as though it were
not tainted money. And Mrs. Draper—the less chivalrous boys called
her “Mother Corkscrew” because she wore her gray hair in ringlets at
shoulder length—came to me on the double quick, shrieking her praise of
me, and intimated that this generous gift might get me places.

Alfred said that inasmuch as he surmised he had been cold-decked out of
the five—thankfully with no aspersion attachment—that I should have at
least given the donation in both our names. But that would have been
risky. Alfred was a rather white “black sheep” in a very religious
family, and Sis would most likely have wanted to know how come? The fact
that Sidney and Willard were keeping company with sisters at that time
may have had nothing to do with the introduction of that cold deck. And
then again it might have. Sidney said the fellow needed “taking down” a
bit — and that it was planned to give the losers back their money. A fat
chance they would have of getting their money back now.

Until now I had only stood, by and watched a penny-ante game in the new
opera house over the Morris store, where the clerks — Dave Clements,
Bill McKibbon, George and Chuck Cawood, Bob Graham—and some younger fry,
congregated on Sundays. And then, too, as a kid, I had been present on
several occasions at a somewhat bigger game in the Neville residence on
this same corner. But here I did not have a chance to closely observe
the technique of the game—for I was under the table most of the time.
The men played altogether then with “shinplaster” money — undersized
ten, twenty-five, and fifty cent pieces of U. S. paper currency, and the
breeze caused from shuffling the cards would sometimes blow the money
off the table. Mr. Jim Neville said I might keep all I could get my
hands on — and I think it was a sort of house rule that the players were
not to contend roughly with me for the fluttering pieces. Still I think
I got more kicks than the law allowed.

Also, I once saw the women playing poker in this same home—and they were
using “shinplaster” too—but they were not generous enough to invite me
to go down under. I do not wish to name them. Nor would I have mentioned
the boys’ names but for the fact all of them have now gone to their
reward. And, besides, despite the undercurrent that it was not
considered strictly genteel, everybody, more or less, played poker
then—even, it was said, Father Bagley, our first High Priest, would take
a hand occasionally. There was a regular fellow. For him it was Mass
of a Sunday morning, then base ball or horse-racing in the afternoon,
without fail.

With this slow and awkward beginning it was a long, long time before I
got nerve enough to sit in a private poker game as guest of a friend, in
Kansas City, with a player who afterwards became President of the United
States. He did not impress me as likely timber then. But, may I say,
that when once in the running, he showed ‘em that he was truly from
Missouri—and that, surprisingly, he could, in a pinch, run like a scared
rabbit. Politics was his forte.

In explanation of the Girl-Papa-Richboy incident: I had sent a boy with
a note asking the girl for her company for a dance, a private dance to
be given by our select crowd, of which she was a favorite. The boy came
back without a written reply—but he said she told him to tell me that
she would go with me. This being rather unusual, I asked the -boy if
that was all she said? “Well,” he said, “her mother said, ‘Now, girlie,
you know what your father will say’ — and the girl said, ‘I don’t care,
I’m going with him anyway’.” I had not known about the rich man’s son
trying to edge in, and this indicated slap by her papa was a grievous
blow to my ego.

I sent the girl another note, telling her in simple words—I always made
‘em simple now since having once, to no avail, slopped over ridiculously
— that I had wormed out of the boy the remarks between mother and
daughter, and that in consequence thereof I deemed it wise for me to
cancel the date, until I could find out what it was all about. I may say
I never sent but one formally phrased note to a girl in all my life—and
that got me exactly nothing. That literary boy, Ecky Hamel, dictated
it for me, and to make matters worse, it was to his girl. And he
really wanted it to click—to ward off, in his absence, some dangerous
competition.

However, I once got a neatly written acceptance to an ultra-formal and
gorgeously phrased note bearing my name, which I didn’t write. I was a
new boy in Seneca at the time. I met a lot of girls at the skating rink
in the old Armory building on upper Main Street. Ena Burbery, pretty
and agreeably alert, was good on roller skates. Ena and four other girls
worked as trimmers in the millinery department of the Cohen store. Ena
talked. And the girls, all but one, joined in mailing her a note bearing
my forged signature requesting her company for a swank party three days
hence. Ella Murphy, one of the five, boarded and roomed at the Theodore
Wolfley home, same as I did while working on Wolfley’s newspaper, The
Tribune. Ella said the note was formal and softly silly, and so did Ena
say it was awful — but, she giggled, “I was not going to let that spoil
a date, especially for a party like that.” Now, the ridiculous part of
it all is, that it was an exclusive party to be given by Seneca’s upper
crust, to which I had no invitation. But, even so, it gave me elevated
status for a little while, in a limited way. We compromised on the rink.
And the girls, whom I never did meet, sent me an apology, through Ella
Murphy, for recklessly abusing my name—and getting the girl a date. Ena
was the section foreman’s daughter, but that was no handicap. I myself
married a section foreman’s daughter, picked her for a winner from a
sizable field of promising prospects.

Naturally, I wanted to know more about the status of the rich man’s
son—and I got it too, back at the gospel tent the next night. The girl
said nothing at all about my poker-playing proclivities. She was too
sensible to try to reform a boy. Her idea was to pick ‘em as suited her
fancy—and trust to luck. Indeed, she said in rebuttal of her father’s
expressed opinion of me, that if her mamma only could have kept her
mouth shut everything would have been all right, and that I would have
never known. “And besides,” she said, “You don’t drink, and papa does—a
little; and you don’t smoke, and papa does, though he does not smoke
cigarettes.” A cigarette smoker in those days was considered cheap. How
times have changed. The girl had overlooked one of “Papa’s” weaknesses,
but for me to have mentioned it to her then would have got me nothing
that I was not now likely to get anyway.

This exchange of ideas took place in the reserved corner of the arena in
advance of the regular session while other congregated young people were
likely thinking of an afar off haven having streets paved with jasper
and gold. Something about streets and jasper and gold ran in the lines
of the old song books. Also, I dare say, some of the converts might have
cringed a little at the thought of an everlasting fire of brimstone—this
idea emanating from George, the Evangelist—which the wayward and
lukewarm alike might, if they didn’t watch out, fall into in a
last-minute rush for that afar off haven.

Every evening during his meetings Reverend Graham would institute a
two-minute session of silent prayer. In - view of George’s admitted
downfall at a later stand, I trust it will not now be considered
sacrilegious for me to hazard an opinion that those silent periods
offered the preacher an excellent opportunity to pray for grace.

It was not required by custom then for those seeking salvation to come
clear down to earth, and some merely bowed their heads, rested them on
the backs of deserted chairs, and whispered when so inclined. The girl
and I, we did not desecrate the hallowed moment. We didn’t have to.
Silence was golden. I was conceited enough just then to believe that
this beautiful girl, thoroughly repentant or no, would have gone through
George’s pictured purgatory for me.

And nothing happened that could be chalked up as material gain for the
better life. Well, I ask you, how in the name of high heaven, could it?
I’m not particularly proud of it, though. But, you know, if your chariot
does not come along, you can’t take a ride. I certainly do not wish
to cast reflection on the Church. The Church, as a Church, is really a
grand institution. I should hate to think where we would be in a world
without it. Henry DeForest, Yale graduate, said the tent doings was
proselytizing.

Perhaps you would like to know how I fared in the days to come with this
renewed lease on life which the Evangelist’s revival had brought me?
Well, “Papa” shelved his dislike of my poker-playing, and both he and
“mama” greeted me as a friend ever after. They were really fine people—I
might say the very BEST, with capitals.

“Papa” had played a little poker himself—and that too, by-gosh, in
our penny-ante game—and his wish for a switch in the matter of his
daughter’s company was based on too slim premise to set store by, now
that the girl had told him with flat-footed finality that it would not
work.

And the girl? Well, I had to go away, first to Centralia, then to Seneca
to help Theodore Wolfley print his newly purchased Tribune, and I turned
her over to my best poker-playing friend to keep for me against the time
when I might return.

Now, to do me this small favor my friend had to drop another girl with
whom he had been keeping company steadily for two years. He probably
saw possibilities in the change, but he was really too fine—and too ably
assisted by the girl—to take advantage of a friend’s absence.

As my trusted friend and my girl in escrow were already lined up for the
party that first night after my return, it was mutually agreed that—just
for once—I should line up with my friend’s discarded girl, who was still
free. It worked out all right—and it was wonderful to be back with the
old crowd again.

Now, don’t jump at conclusions. Though she was a mighty fine girl, and
good looking too, I did not find her preferable to the other girl. Just
why I made it a regular habit for nearly a year, was quite a different
matter.

We all belonged to an exclusive clique known as The Silver Stockings.
Why so named I never learned. One unalterable requirement for the men
was that each had to bring a girl—or a wife. No “stags” were permitted
at our parties. This was because a certain unwanted young man had the
disturbing habit of sneaking in at public gatherings and monopolizing
our girls.

The thoughtful young man of that period did not think of marriage the
first time he went out with a girl. In our community none but the rich
man’s four sons were financially (in prospect) able to indulge in such
dreams. And, besides, by this time I had had a change of heart—resolved
to consider the future of the girl. After all “Papa” might have had the
right idea. I figured that an attractive girl like she, would not be
justified in playing along with me until I could make my stake.

And again, were I to pursue my chances—which at this time were, I
flattered myself, in a high bracket—who could say with certainty that
“Papa” would not someday become afflicted with a recurrent attack of
that silly notion the first time that the favored son, or maybe another
of the RM’s sons might strut his stuff in the presence of the girl.
Then, too, something fine—alas, something very fine, was now gone out of
the picture that could never be returned. I reluctantly decided to let
matters drift along as temporarily planned the first night back home—and
see what would happen. It was my hardest decision.

I had seen too many people trying to make a stake and raise a family
at the same time. My father made more money than most—but with ten
children, it was slavery for him. He worked sixteen hours a day at his
trade as shoemaker—and even then he had to skimp, and work and skimp.
But he took a philosophical view of matters, and on the whole his was
a rather contented life. One time when he was complaining about the
difficulty of getting ahead, I suggested that maybe he had erred in
first taking on the responsibility of raising a big family.

He said, “Well, they kept coming and I couldn’t knock ‘em in the head.”

I said, “They didn’t start coming until after you were married—”

He yelped, as if something had stung him, “Of course not, you young
upstart!” That was a time when he would have been justified in applying
the kneestrap, his ever ready implement of correction, to my posterior.
But my father was a forbearing man.

I said, “Gosh, Dad—I only meant to say if you had waited until after you
had made your stake, you would not now be bothered with this burdensome
load.”

He said, quickly, “If I had waited longer where do you think you’d be
now, young man?”

Well, that was something to think about. It might have upset the whole
continuity. I think we older boys reminded him too often of the excess
baggage he was struggling along with—only, however, when he would begin
his lamenting, usually about the high tariff.

I can think of nothing more disturbing than to be caught short-handed
(otherwise broke) in a community marked by a dearth of opportunity to
earn a living—-With dependents to care for. Such was our country in the
early days. My parents had rubbed up against this situation on numerous
occasions. However, unlike some of our neighbors, the time never came
when we did not have enough to eat. But that “hand to mouth” rule of
living could not rub out the anxiety.

It was an era when the ambitious young fellow was of necessity compelled
early in life to begin laying-by for the “rainy day” if he did not wish
to run the risk of becoming an object of charity—and who did in the old
days? It was then considered about the last straw. It took a long time
to lay-by a competence in the old days. The average wage-earner gets as
much per hour now as was paid for a whole day’s work then—when ten hours
was a day. This is not to say the young “sprout” could not marry before
he had a competence. He did—recklessly. And paid the price.

It was to avoid such conditions as this that I made a firm resolve to
defer marriage until I could make a stake.

I set my goal at $10,000, and when things got going good I kept right
on going until this goal was more than doubled — and in subsequent years
learned that it was none too much:

However, in strict honesty, I think this cautious streak was inherited
rather than instilled in me by observations. My father had entertained
the same cautious notions. Orphaned early in life, he made his own
way—saved, and had what he called a nice nest-egg at the age of 25. He
went from Kentucky over into Tennessee to visit relatives, met my mother
while there—and married her the next time he came into her back-woods
community. And had it not been for the cruel Civil War—and the
guerillas—I am pretty sure: that I would have had a rich Dad regardless
of his super-abundance of kids.

However, conditions changed for the better for father. When his boys got
big enough to lessen the burden, and then in time lift it altogether, he
had an easy life. My brother Frank worked with him in the shoeshop,
and at the same time conducted a shoe store in the front end of the
building, with our sister Nannie in charge. When Frank decided to go to
California to join his brother Dave in business, he gave them the shoe
stock. I had written insurance in the sum of $1,000 for Frank, and when
the assigned policy was about to expire I mentioned the matter one day
at the dinner table. Father said, “Oh, I don’t need any insurance.”

I renewed the policy anyway, paid the premium myself, and said no more
about it. Then, some months later, a fire destroyed the old Logue frame
store building across the street, in early evening—and the town was out
in numbers. There was little chance of the blaze reaching my father’s
shop, but he and several excited volunteers were making ready to remove
the shoe stock to the street. I told him that he better just get his
books and records where he could put his hands on them in case of need,
and to leave the stock in the building for a while, at least. Thinking
to ease his fears, I said, “You’ve got a thousand dollar insurance
policy on the stock.” He exclaimed, excitedly, “Oh, that’s not enough!”

By this time—we are now back again on the matter of girls, mostly — the
girl’s papa had been elevated to the Mayorality, and the family was now
operating the Wetmore hotel. On one of my trips home from Seneca, after
spending a pleasant hour with the girl, I dropped in on the poker
game, just to greet the boys, and watch the play. I had reformed then
— mostly, I think, on account of the girl. Incidentally, I may say I
reformed more times than a backslider ever confessed his sins—every
time, I think, on account of a girl—before finally realizing that it was
not the way to build character.

The game then was in the Billy Buzan residence—af ter his wife’s
death—on the corner where Bob Cress’ residence is now, west of the
telephone office. It was the original William Cawood location, with
the west portion of the high fence (seven-foot up and down pine boards)
still standing. That high fence had enclosed four lots, and held in
captivity a “pet” deer for several years. When the Mayor and a guest of
the hotel came in at the front door, I slipped out the back door, as I
thought unobserved by His Honor, and streaked it, in bright moonlight,
to the fence and went over almost without touching. The next day the
Mayor said to me, “Young fellow, I saw your shirt-tail going over that
high board fence last night.” But he hadn’t. It was before the young
sports had begun to wear their shirt-tails on the outside of their
pants. And then again I never was guilty of that slovenly habit.

About that deer. It finally jumped over the gate at the southeast corner
of the enclosed grounds—and was gone for several days. But it came back
and jumped in again. Then, it made a game of jumping out and jumping in
— with periodic trips to the country. Then, one morning there were
two deer in the enclosure. I think the “pet” deer tried its best to
domesticate the visitor — but after three days, the call of the wilds
claimed them both.

Some years later—after he had spent a couple of years in Arkansas, and
was now back in the hotel again, in Wetmore—”Papa” was in a tight spot
at Enid, Oklahoma, the third day after the opening of the Cherokee
Strip, September 16,1893. He had made the run, staked a claim, and was
in line—a very long line—at the Land Office, waiting his turn to file.
I had already filed on my claim. While in line, I observed soldiers, who
were supposed to be on hand to see that everyone would get a fair deal,
were running in people ahead of me—and a little later, a man I shall
simply call Eddie—apparently in the role of chief grafter—whom I had
known in Wetmore, approached me with a proposition to advance me in line
for $5. I was too near the door to be interested—and besides, my brother
Dave who held a filing number next to mine, promised to “wipe the earth
up” with Ed if we should be delayed further. Might say here that the
gang followed this remunerative activity with another dirty practice.
They filed contests on claims, so that the rightful locators would, in
many instances, buy them off rather than stand the expense of fighting
the case. Then Dave had to give Mr. Ed that promised thrashing. It got
Dave a prompt withdrawal of the contest. I was the only one of our
party of four who did not have to fight a contest. My friendship, or
co-operation with the crooks, whichever way you choose to look at it,
had, I presume, saved me.

After I had filed on my claim, I carried the “good” news of Mr. Eddie’s
activities to “Papa.” I knew he was anxious to get back home to his
hotel business, where he was trying hard to re-establish himself after
returning from Arkansas. He asked me to contact Mr. Eddie for him—and
said, “I’ll be your uncle.”

The soldiers advanced him to near the door—and there the line became
static once more, as other advancements were being pushed in ahead
of him. Then Ed told me that for $10 more the soldiers would put him
through the door without delay. “Papa” dug up the $10, and said, “Do
this for me Son, and I’ll dance at your wedding.” Now he could call me
“Son” and offer to dance at my wedding.

There are three girls prominently featured in this story, whose names I
do not wish to divulge. Substituting, I maybe should call the first one
Miss Beautiful, for she was all that. But from here on, until further
notice, I shall refer to them as My Best Girl, The Old Girl, and The
Kid.

In all too short time my nemesis, in the person of a certain rich man’s
son, an older brother of that other boy, got on my trail. I do not think
it was to avenge his disappointed brother, but it could have been that.
He told the boys it was to prove that he was “man enough” to “bump” me.

Well, just for once, it was not a bad guess. He would be working on
fertile ground. I didn’t care too much for the Old Girl anyway. She was
my senior by four or five years, and naturally she would welcome a
good “catch.” It was understood between us that she was only filling a
vacancy, and thereby providing a way to keep us in the Silver Stocking
circle. The thing I didn’t like was to be “bumped” just for the fun of
it, as viewed by the RM’s son.

Mike Norton, clerk in the DeForest store, saw the rich man’s son write
a letter to the Old Girl, and he thought this would be the time when the
RM’s son would try to make good his boast. Three days hence there was to
be a picnic in a grove south of Netawaka, and the Silver Stocking boys
and girls were lining up to go in a body. Mike and other members of the
circle put in two hours looking for me. The boys, and the girls too,
were all for me, in this instance — but not even the King’s Horses
could have stopped that boy in his purpose. The postmaster showed me the
letter with the OG’s name spelled out in bold relief—and I was off at
once, thinking I would now show this RM’s son that he could not do this
to me.

The Old Girl said she was awfully sorry—that she had promised another,
naming the rich man’s son. I said, in substance—though really not
sore at the OG, I think I was not in a frame of mind to phrase it just
so—”Let’s see where we stand. The way things are shaped up now, I’m
out—that is, barred from the Silver Stocking crowd by the rules of my
own helpful making.”

She suggested that I go back to the girl I have designated as My Best
Girl—said, “I KNOW you can, if you will just spunk up a little.” I had
never “spunked” much with the OG.

“But,” I said, “if I should succeed in dating her, someone else would
be out, and that someone is your old beau. Likely timber maybe. Then, in
case your date does not choose to repeat, you might still have a chance
to get back with the old crowd.”

She laughed — the OG was feeling pretty good, just then—and said, “I
hadn’t thought of it that way.” Now she giggled, “But, you know, I could
always be a hanger-on, maybe even go with you and your girl—just in
case.” A boy was permitted to take more than one girl—even a flock of
them if he were unlucky enough.

Now the atmosphere around the OG’s home had changed, with exultant
spirits taking a nose-dive. That letter was for the purpose of calling
off a date. She was really too nice a girl to be buffed around like that
— but please note that I did not hold with any such buffings. She had
forfeited her chance to go with the crowd to the picnic. Now, more than
ever, she wanted to go. She first took her troubles to her bosom friend,
Bessie Campfield, wife of Judge Elwin Campfield. She wanted to know how
could she, with propriety, get word to me that after all she would be
free to go with me to the picnic. Bessie had spent some anxious moments
trying to round up a courier to apprise me of that letter. She said to
the OG, “I don’t know about that now. I could have told you about that
fellow’s egotistical designs.”

The Old Girl lived with her aged parents, and when they would go away
for the night, as they often did to visit another daughter in the
country, she would have a young neighbor girl—not too young, but much
younger than she-stay the night with her. The old folks were away now,
and the young girl had been called in for the night.

The Old Girl was still worried. I’m now almost sorry that I ever started
this “Old Girl” differential, as it smacks of disrespect — and I do not
want the reader to form any such ideas. The OG first asked the young
girl to come up town with her—then, remembering that her best friend had
dropped a hint that the ground upon which she now stood was insecure,
she decided that she was not constitutionally able to face me just then
with her problem. She sent the young girl, alone.

But the Kid—that’s what they called her when we went together to the
picnic, and thereafter as a member of the Silver Stocking crowd—said,
“If you go with her now, you will be the biggest fool in the world. All
she wants to go with you for, is to see who he takes,” naming the RM’s
son.

The Kid was smart.

But please do not think the so-called Kid was betraying a trust. She was
really a woman now. And, besides, she had reason to believe that, to
use a homely expression, she were very soon going to get the OG’s goat,
anyway.

And moreover, the Old Girl later told the “Kid,” perhaps in a gesture of
discouragement, that I had gone with her steadily for nearly a year, and
had never tried to kiss her. Had that not been the truth it would have
been libel. -In the old days, the prudent young man did not dare kiss an
old girl who was only filling a vacancy.

Prior to this, the “Kid” and I had “starred” in a local entertainment
entitled “Beauty and Beelzebub” — and mutual admiration had blossomed
then. She was the Angel and I was the Devil. In the tableau, the Devil,
encased in a tight-fitting black sateen cover-all, with horns and a
four-foot forked tail, was suspended on wires about four feet off the
floor when the curtain went up. Then the Angel, up in the clouds, began
the descent with song, the singing increasing in volume as she came
down bare feet first, with outstretched wings, settling in front of the
Devil. The “Kid” made a pretty picture, with her abundant dark hair —
which, I happen to know, came down nearly to her ankles — spread over
the white flowing covering whose traditional folds parted in front just
enough to indicate that she dwelt in a place where shoes and stockings
were taboo. The Angel departed by the same route—wire and windlass
mechanism—went up into the clouds from whence she had come, with more
singing, at first in full voice, then fading, fading, fading away in a
manner denoting distance. In her young budding womanhood the “Kid” made
a beautiful Angel — and the clear, sweet singing was out of this world.

Coral Hutchison was at first considered for the Angel. She was a
beautiful girl, and a beautiful singer—and while she had a wonderful
head of hair, quite as long as the “Kid’s,” its rather too blonde shade
ruled her out. So the “Kid,” with the requisite dark hair, was given a
place in the spot-light—and Coral did the singing behind the scenes.

Sorry, I can’t tell you what event or setting that tableau portrayed.
There was much more to the show, speaking parts and superb acting. And
though clearly the “Kid” and I were “it,” the whole show was titled
“Beauty and Beelzebub.”

At the picnic, my adversary, the rich man’s son, said to me, “I see
you’ve got a new girl. How come?” I said, “Yeah—likewise you. Thanks
for the assist.” After I had started to walk on, he called, “Hey, John,
whatsha mean by that?”

He was with Lou Kern. Hattie and Lou Kern, and Nina and Emma Bolman,
were four Netawaka girls that were popular with our Silver Stocking
crowd; as were also Caroline Emery, living in the country northeast of
Wetmore, and her visiting friend, Mamie Blakeslee, a former neighbor
whose home was now in Savannah, Mo.

Mamie Blakeslee was a strikingly pretty girl.

I shall now dwell a bit on a personal incident in connection with this
beautiful girl. It was away back in 1884. I don’t think the girl was
on my mind that day when I went to St. Joe. But, in St. Joe, I ran onto
Bill (Hickorynut) Bradley who was on his way to Savannah, and he asked
me to go along with him. One Oliver Bateman was to be hanged for the
murder of two little girls who had caught him in an embarrassing act.
The railroad was offering excursion rates, and the sleepy old Missouri
town was decked out in celebration colors, with refreshment stands all
along the lane from the jail to the gallows in an amphitheater in the
nearby woods—everybody on the make.

Unlike Hickorynut, the hanging did not interest me, but the thought of
seeing Mamie did. I called at the Blakeslee home on the outskirts of
Savannah — it was a farm traded by G. N. Paige for the Blakeslee farm
near Wetmore—on the pretense of wanting to see Mamie’s brother Edwin,
who had been my schoolmate in Wetmore. He was not at home. I remained
a reasonable time with Mamie, aiming to work up a little courage, and
maybe ask her to go places with me—but lost my nerve.

Two hours later I met Mamie, with another girl, on a downtown street
near the St. Charles hotel. Mamie said there was to be skating at the
rink that night, and would I like to go? I certainly would. So now,
after all, we would be going places together.

I called at the Blakeslee home for the two girls, and the ‘skating was
going fine. Then, of a sudden, Miss West told me that Mamie was in a
jam. Her steady, a traveling salesman, had unexpectedly dropped in on
her — and, for some reason, likely well founded, Mamie had not intended
to let him know about her going out with another fellow.

I told Miss West that we could fix that all right, if she herself did
not have a steady sticking around somewhere. Miss West laughed, and
assured me she did not have a steady. “If agreeable,” I said, “you
shall now be my company, and, to all appearances, Mamie shall be the
hanger-on, free to desert me for her steady.” Miss West laughed again,
though she looked as if she were a little concerned about my reference
to Mamie as the new hanger-on. Well, it was a slip. It was a term often
applied to the extra girls in our Silver Stocking circle.

While visiting in Wetmore before this, Mamie had gone to a dance in
Netawaka with a local man who proved to be not to her liking, and she
had quit him cold at the dance hall door. Though it would hardly cause
a ripple now, it was then considered about the worst thing that could
happen to a young fellow’s social standing. I do not wish to identify
him—yet I must give him a name to be used in Mamie’s pay-off to me for
liberating her at the Savannah rink.

In the substitution of names, one is liable to innocently hit upon
somebody’s real name, and to avoid the possibility of making this error,
I shall give him the surname of his business partner, and go through
the customary formality of saying that any similarity in names is purely
coincidental. The man was half-owner of the livery stable from which
we all got our “rigs” that night. And, anyway, the partners left here
together for the state of Washington many, many years ago, and there
should be no chance for repercussions now.

Mamie knew that I was familiar with the Netawaka incident—in fact, it
was I who did the shifting with Sidney Loop to get her back home. When
Miss West had delivered my message, Mamie broke away from her steady,
rolled gracefully around the hall, and plumped herself down by my side,
saying, “Thank you so much! It gets me out of an awful jam! And I want
you to know that this is no Dr. Fisher deal!” I wondered? You know a
girl, in competition with other girls, might strive for long to vamp a
certain good catch—which is always a girl’s privilege—and then when the
chance offers, find herself tied up for the time being with someone that
right away stinks.

The Blakeslee family formerly lived on a farm four miles northeast of
Wetmore, directly north of the old Ham Lynn farm. Mamie’s father, Nelson
Blakeslee, often called at my father’s shoeshop for a visit. One time
they planned on chartering a car together and shipping to California. I
did not know Mamie then—but have since wondered what might have happened
had they gone through with their plans.

Evidently Mamie did not make the most of the opportunity afforded her
that night back in Savannah. She married Frank Schilling, of Hiawatha.
There were some dark surmises that she stole Caroline Emery’s beau.
“Stole” is an ugly word to be written in connection with this sweet,
conscientious girl—as I knew her then. I would rather believe that Miss
Emery’s beau was a man of rare good judgment. I have not seen Mamie
since that night at the skating rink in Savannah. Now widowed, she lives
in Fairview — thirty minutes away from Wetmore.

Back again on the main theme: In the days which followed, I said to
myself—thought it with vengeance, anyway—that I would like to see the
color of the hair of any d—d RM’s son that could make me give up this
one, meaning the “Kid,” of course. And may I say that for once I now
believed I had my girl matters well in hand.

But, believe it or not, still another son of that same rich man tried
his darndest to edge in. At this time the younger boys had the habit of
lining up on the outside of the church, at Epworth League meetings, and
grab themselves a girl, with a polite, and sometimes not so polite, “May
I “see you home?” After the third “No, thank you,” from the “Kid,” the
RM’s son told her to go to that place which is sometimes politely called
hades.

Mrs. Pheme Wood, a well meaning soul who had been an intimate friend of
our family since the first day we came here in 1869, and who apparently
took a special interest in my welfare, stopped me one day while passing
her home, and said, “There’s something I want to ask you. Of course I
don’t believe it, but I’ll ask anyway. Were you out sleigh-riding with
Myrtle Mercer the day her father lay dead in the home?”

Myrtle was the afore-mentioned “Kid.”

I had not intended to name her just yet, but her identity would have to
come out soon anyway, as she figures in this story to the end. And then
some.

“Well,” I said—but got no further. Pheme broke in, “It came to me pretty
straight, and one would think—” I stopped her with a promise to ‘fess
up, if she would not run to my mother with it. “Oh that,” she laughed,
remembering a kindred incident, “was for your own good.” She had gone
to my mother on an errand of mercy. That she had her wires badly crossed
did not deter her. She said she had it on good authority that I was
about to marry the aforesaid Old Girl, who was much too old for me; and
that my mother ought to use her influence to prevent it.

Myrtle’s father, John W. Mercer, section foreman, aged 39, had died
suddenly of a heart attack while milking his cow one morning in
February, 1888. And naturally, the family—the mother and five girls—had
to make preparations for the funeral. Myrtle had a badly sprained ankle
— acquired while ice-skating with George Peters on the creek near her
home—but she managed to hobble up town, taking her baby sister Jessie
with her. I followed them into the store, told Myrtle that I would get
a sleigh from the livery stable and take them home. After driving the
girls three blocks directly to their home, I picked up the Old Girl and
we drove for an hour or more. I knew that Frank Fisher would charge me
$2.00 anyway, and I wanted to get my money’s worth. I was seen picking
up the “Kid” at the store and later seen driving with the Old Girl,
and someone had imagined that the two girls were one and the same — and
that’s how the story got started.

When explained, Pheme could have no criticism of Myrtle, nor of me
either for driving her home. But, being a woman of the old school, she
was bound to have her say. She said, “It looks like you should have had
more respect for Myrtle than to go joy-riding with that other girl at a
time like that.” I was not sure that she didn’t have something there. I
said, “Remember, not a word to my mother.”

“Ah, go on,” she laughed.

I might say here, before passing this incident, that after the family
had split up a few years later, Myrtle was sister and mother too,
as well as guardian, for Jessie. And speaking of pretty girls, this
attractive little one had the makings of a real beauty that in later
years just about topped them all.

The rich man’s sons were all fine boys—I think—but in view of their
penchant for camping on my trail, the only compliment I wish to pay them
now is to say: They did not play poker.

My trusted friend did not marry the girl I loaned him. She went with
her parents and three brothers to Arkansas — and married down there. The
trusted friend went to the Far West, made his stake, and married into a
quite well-to-do family—and lived at Yakima, Washington.

The Old Girl got her man too—an out-of-town man — after she had quit
fooling around with the younger fry, and went with Davey Todd to
Kansas City to live. She became a helpless invalid—and then, not
having prepared himself in a financial way for such eventuality, Davey
literally and figuratively had his hands full. But, to the best of his
ability, he was good to her—carried her around as if she were a baby.
How do I know? Well, the “Kid’s” sisters, -Jennie and Kathy, neighbors
while here, helped him a lot in giving her needed attention.

And now Euphema Wood speaks again. Commenting on this unfortunate
affair, she said to me, “Now you can maybe appreciate all the grief I
saved you.”

Many years later, I met the mother of the girl whom I designated for
this writing as My Best Girl, on the train out of Kansas City going to
Atchison, her home at that time. I knew the girl had married a man whom
the family were pleased to call a Southern aristocrat, living at Bald
Knob, Arkansas. He was a merchant who carried the sharecroppers—mostly
descendants of Ham—on his books until harvest time, virtually owning
them. This gave him status in his home community, particularly with
the colored folk — and in traveling North this mark of distinction was
greatly exaggerated. From what the girl told me, while on a visit
back home, I think Mr. Walker was a worthy man—but that aristocracy
appendage, I liked it even less than I liked the means that had been
employed to push me out of the picture. It is a word that should never
have been coined. I was pleased that the girl herself made no use of it.

In the course of our talking over old times in Wetmore, the mother said,
“I never could understand why those two did not marry,” meaning her
daughter and the boy who had succeeded me. I said, “If you really want
to know,- I can tell you why. He just didn’t have the money to do it the
way she insisted on having it done, an expensive wedding, and all that.”
She, the mother, already knew why I had first gracefully tapered off,
and then backed away from it all—for the girl had told me that her
penitent mother had wanted to kick herself for speaking out of turn.

And the “Kid?” Well, wait and see. Might have to skip a few years,
though. I had not yet made that stake. In reminiscing, one is permitted
to wander about over all creation—provided, always, that he carries
along for blending purposes at least one principal character already
introduced: and makes sure to come back “home” before becoming
hopelessly entangled in a wilderness of clearly unrelated matter.

The “Kid” figures prominently in this episode.

While in Kansas City, I ran onto a street hawker selling fake “diamonds”
for one dollar each. Just for the fun of it, I bought one of the things,
brought it home and presented it to Myrtle Mercer, who was now working
in my printing office, merely to see how a diamond would affect a girl.

After showing me that her heart was in the right place, she darted out
the door before I could stop her, ran down the steps to the Means store,
and showed it to Lizzie Means; then beat it out the back door and ran
across to show it to Mamma Alma. This lady was the wife of Dr. J. W.
Graham.

Mamma Alma was sharp as all getout. Lizzie Means was a shrewd business
woman, but she had a less inquisitive mind. And I guess Myrtle was
pretty sharp too, after the first ecstatic shock had passed.

Myrtle came bounding back up to the office, and bawled me out: “Mr.
Smartie, that is going to cost you a real diamond—and a good one, too!
And I want it right now!” She had reason to believe I was holding out on
her.

I said, “All right, all right—but you can’t have it now.”

Cloy Weaver, my printer, who had been out on an errand, had come into
the office by this time. He stood there with his mouth open, wondering
what it was all about. Cloy had a girl in Stockton, California, and was
aiming to leave the next day for California to marry her. As I needed
him, and as he had told me he had a wife in the Philippines — he was a
veteran of the Spanish American War—I tried to show him that this would
be a bigamous trick. He agreed. Cloy was always agreeable. He remained
with me a while longer—and married Edna Hudson.

Lizzie told me later in the day that the bogus diamond had her fooled,
too. She laughed, “By golly, it did sparkle real prettily, didn’t it?
But it’s going to cost you a real diamond—don’t forget that. Mamma Alma
and I are not going to let Myrtle forget it either, Ough,” she shrugged,
- “that was about the dirtiest trick imaginable. And Myrtle was so
pleased! It was a shame!” And Mamma Alma had told Myrtle that it was
high time anyway for me to be giving her a “real” diamond.

The next morning Coral Locknane—Myrtle’s best friend — came to the
office, and I don’t know what all passed between the two, but it is
pretty certain they didn’t discuss trifles. The three of us went to
Kansas City on the noon train. I said to the girls, “Shall we go to
Cady & Olmstead’s or to Jaccard’s?” I had been to both places on my last
trip, and I knew they had just the right quality of sparklers to tickle
a girl’s heart—now that I knew how a girl would react. But Myrtle,
feeling pretty sure of herself, and in high good humor, said quite
emphatically, “Neither.” She looked down the street and said, “We are
going to Mercer’s on Petticoat Lane. It’s a name I believe I can trust.
You don’t think I’d let you steer me to a place like where you got that
other thing?”

When we went into the Mercer Store, Mr. Waddington, the diamond
salesman, as it happened, pushed his portly self forward, and asked,
“What will it be, please?”

I said, pretty loudly, “A diamond ring for Miss Mercer!” That claimed
the attention of the whole house—the proprietor included.

Coral had several pretty good diamonds of her own. She took a seat with
Myrtle at the salestable in the little black velvet-lined cubby corner,
while I stood back and looked on. When Mr. Waddington told them the
price of the one they had selected, Myrtle exclaimed, “Whe-e-ew!”

Then she looked to me for approval. The modest, one carat blue white
stone was in good taste, plenty big enough for a girl. Coral’s largest
diamond—at that time—was also an even carat, and she was a great help to
Myrtle in making the selection. Coral said, “It’s not good taste to have
them too big.” Later, Myrtle said earnestly and very softly, as if the
thing had taken her breath away, “Do you really think you want to stand
that much?” Mercer’s was the highest priced shop in Kansas City—but in a
case of this kind I figured that a girl must have what she wants.

Then we separated, and I went over to the Cady & Olmstead store on the
corner of 11th and Walnut, and bought for myself—or rather paid for what
I had already bought — the beautiful blue white diamond, nearly twice as
large, which Myrtle’s sister Jennie had helped me select only three days
before. Jennie had warned me not to spring that fake diamond on Myrtle.
Said it might not set just right with her. But I knew that Myrtle was
too smart a girl to let anything make her mad at me for long.

Mr. Cady said, “You are a day early—where’s the lady?” “Yes,” I said,
“I’m early. Got pushed around a little. Never mind the lady now. Though
you may still make it a Tiffany setting, but make it for this hand right
here.” He gave me a sympathetic look. Mr. Cady was such a nice man that
I felt duty bound to tell him, as nearly as I could, what had happened
to the lady.

Sometimes even quality folk didn’t get to see Mr. Cady, in person. Well,
I did—just like I said. I still have the sales ticket, dated May 12,
1903, bearing his notation, “Will exchange Tif. Belcher mounting without
cost—or diamond for other goods any time without discount.” Signed,
“Cady.”

All this was too much for Coral. A woman with money of her own can
stand only so much. She went over to Norton’s—and bought herself another
diamond, nearly twice as big as Myrtle’s. The satisfied expression on
her lovely face was something to behold. My first thoughts were
that this might call for me to do some swapping with Myrtle. But, no
sir—she’d not part with hers. If pressed, she’d claim them both. Trust a
woman!

We had to stay the night in Kansas City with Myrtle’s sisters, Jennie
and Kathy. When she got the chance, Jennie asked me, “How did it work?”
meaning the bogus diamond.

“Well,” I replied, “it looks like it hasn’t blown the top off anything
yet.” She said, “It surely does look that way now, but I wouldn’t be so
sure of it after she sees the beauty we picked out for her.”

The two country girls had talked nothing but diamonds from the time they
had entered the apartment.

The next morning the three of us started out three ways to get our
diamonds—only we didn’t do it just that way. We went the rounds in
a group. Mr. Mercer told Miss Mercer that she had selected the best
one-carat blue-white flawless diamond in his store. And he wondered if
they might not be related. Myrtle came home pretty pleased for keeps
that time.

I’ve always counted it my best investment.

THE VIGILANTES Published in Wetmore Spectator,

August 28, 1931

By John T. Bristow

There was, assuredly, need for the vigilantes at one time in the Far
West, where the idea originated and here there were no laws and no
courts other than “miner’s courts”—impromptu courts set up by the
people on the spot. But, with all the machinery of organized government
functioning normally and in most instances efficiently there in Nemaha
County, there was, seemingly, no call here for the vigilantes when they
hanged Charley Manley.

The courier-tribune

(Semi-weekly)

Geo. C. Adriance Dora Adriance

SENECA KANSAS

Aug. 28, 1931

Mr. John T. Bristow, Wetmore, Kansas.

My dear Mr. Bristow:

We have just read with a great deal of interest your article in the
Wetmore Spectator dealing with the hanging of Charley Manley. This is
the first time I have ever heard of this act of the vigilantes. We are
going to check through our files of April 1877 and see if we can find
anything relating to it. In any event, I write to ask permission to
reproduce this article in a much special issue of the Tribune we are
putting out next year to celebrate Seneca’s 75th anniversary.

The article is so well written and deals with so early history of our
county that I consider it admirably adapted to our purpose. The
next time you are in ‘Seneca I should like to have you call at The
Courier-Tribune office. I have no doubt you have a fund of other stories
that would be just as interesting.

Sincerely yours,

Geo. C. Adriance

It is a tragic story — the hanging of Manley by the vigilantes. It was
Mar. 31, 1877. I was a small boy when I first knew Charley Manley, just
about big enough to turn a grindstone, with effort. There is purpose in
this reference to the grindstone.

I remember the time very distinctly. And, with all due respect to the
memory of my departed elders—the vigilantes—if, after so many years,
I may be permitted to express myself freely and fully, I would say God
seemed to be terribly far away from the scene that night. Before going
into the details of the hanging, let us have a look into the workings of
the vigilantes—that organization of men who set itself up as judge and
jury and executioner. There was tactful veiling of the identity of the
individual members, and little is known of the inside workings of the
local vigilantes.

This much is known, however. There was one little slip — a bungle—that
was, in time, the means of disclosing the identity of the local
operators, but that secret was also carefully guarded until practically
the last one of the vigilantes has passed on to another world beyond the
reach of wagging tongues and the strong arm of organized law. There is
now only one—possibly two—of the originals left.

The vigilante organization or “Committee,” as it was called, had its
birth in the Far West, for the specific purpose of dealing with “road
agents”—banded highwaymen and murderers. The idea traveled East and the
farther it got away from the home of its origin the farther it seems to
have gotten away from its original purpose.

In the sixties and seventies vigilante committees were in evidence the
full length of the old Overland Trail, from California to Kansas, and
the fact that Wetmore and Granada had as residents a half dozen or so of
the old stage-drivers, express messengers, and pony express riders, may
account, in some measure, for the local organization of vigilantes.
And, if so, by the irony of fate, it was in the home of a former express
messenger that the vigilantes claimed their first and only victim. It is
known that at least two of the old stage employees were vigilantes.

Without question, the idea filtered in from the West. The almost
constant stream of returning gold-seekers passing through Granada over
the Old Trail at a time when the vigilantes were very active in the West
— particularly in Montana—may have scattered the seed.

While I was out in the western mining district, a quarter of a century
ago, chasing fickle fortune—which was always just a few jumps ahead of
me—I heard much about the exploits of road agents, and the work of the
vigilantes.

In the Old West, at Bannack, Virginia City, and Nevada, in the Alder
Gulch section of Montana, where a hundred million dollars in placer gold
was recovered in the early sixties, road agents plundered and killed,
without mercy.

Placer gold, as many know, is free gold that has been eroded from
exposed gold-bearing ledges and deposited in the sands and gravel along
the water courses. It was the first form of gold-mining in the West—the
lure that caused the great stampede to California in 1849. It has
rightfully been called “the poor man’s gold,” because of the comparative
ease in which it is recovered.

The flush times in the Alder Gulch section, which contained about twenty
thousand eager gold diggers, made rich pickings for the road agents.
They preyed upon individual miners, on express companies, on anyone,
anywhere they could grab gold-dust, or minted gold, the money of the
times. And they were killers, every one of them.

The Montana vigilantes, sworn to secrecy and loyalty, with a by-law
boldly asserting, “The only punishment that shall be inflicted by this
committee is Death,” undertook the job of exterminating the road agents.
And in one month’s time twenty-one of the notorious Henry Plummer gang
were hung. The job was pepped up a bit when the first victims squealed
on the others. This is history of the Montana vigilantes. They patterned
after the California vigilantes. And it is to be assumed that vigilantes
everywhere were organized along the same lines.

There was a vigilante committee in Nemaha County at least nine years
prior to the hanging of Manley. In September, 1868, Melvin Baughn, a
horse-thief, was legally hanged at Seneca for killing Jesse Dennis, one
of the deputized men who helped capture him. In writing of that hanging
George Adriance said there was a vigilante committee at the time, and it
wanted the officers to turn Baughn over to the committee.

Charley Manley and Joe Brown were charged with being implicated in
stealing John O’Brien’s horse. O’Brien lived on the Dave Ralston place
west of Granada and Brown lived on a quarter section of land west of the
Charley Green farm in the Granada neighborhood, about two miles from the
O’Brien farm. Charley Manley lived with the family of W. W. Letson at
Netawaka. He had lived with the Letsons at Granada and at Wetmore before
they moved to Netawaka. Letson and Spencer kept a general store here in
the old corner building now owned by Cawood Brothers, originally built
by Rising and Son.

At one of their meetings, it appears, the vigilantes decided to hang
Manley and Brown. One member who lived close to Brown pleaded for
the life of his neighbor. Brown had a family of small children. The
discussion waxed hot — and there was a great rift in the personnel of
the organization. They did not agree in the matter. The determined ones,
however, went ahead with their plans for the hanging. And on the night
of the execution some of the vigilantes, not in accord with the
plan, spent the night at the homes of their neighbors so as to clear
themselves of suspected participation in the hanging.

Charley Manley was arrested at Netawaka and was to have been given a
preliminary trial in Justice H. J. Crist’s court at Granada. He was
brought to Wetmore early the day of his execution and held under
guard in the office of the old Wetmore House until evening. The delay
supposedly was occasioned in order to bring Joe Brown to the bar of
“justice” at the same time. Later it appeared the proceedings had been
delayed, waiting for nightfall.

Robert Sewell, constable, liveryman, ex-stage driver and Indian fighter,
was the arresting officer. On the plains, and here, he was known as “Bob
Ridley.” George G. Gill was deputized as assistant constable. Dr. J.
W. Graham, a Justice of the Peace in Wetmore at the time, was appointed
special prosecutor by County Attorney Simon Conwell. Sewell, Gill, and
Graham, with Manley, drove to Granada in a spring wagon.

On the way to Granada, all unconscious of what was in the air, Dr.
Graham, seeing a tree by the roadside with a large overhanging limb,
jokingly said, “Whoa, stop the team, Bob—-we might just as well hang
Charley right here.” Manley laughed and said, “Oh, no—let’s all have a
drink.” He passed his bottle.

Court was to have been held in the Hudson hotel at Granada. But before
proceedings had started, the vigilantes, in black-face, with coats
turned insideout, appeared upon the scene and began shooting up the
place — with blanks. They seized Manley and rushed him away—to his
doom. Pandemonium reigned, and in the excitement the president of the
vigilante committee, it is said, raised a window and told Brown to “beat
it.” So, it would seem, the neighbor’s plea for Brown’s life, while very
costly to himself, as you shall see later, had made its impression.

Earlier in the evening, one high up in vigilantic officialdom, had
taken the precaution to relieve the three constables and the prosecuting
attorney of their revolvers—borrowed them “for a few minutes.” Dr.
Graham says he never did get his back.

Charley Manley was taken to a big tree down on the creek west of
Granada, and strung up. The tree was on the old Terrill place, now owned
by the Achtens. Monoah H. Terrill, a store-keeper at Granada, was a
brother-in-law of Manley. Terrill had died a long time before the Manley
hanging.

Manley was buried on the Terrill place—or rather what afterwards proved
to be the roadside—by the grave of his brother-in-law. Later the bodies
were removed. Terrill was placed in the Letson lot in the Netawaka
cemetery. Some say the body of Manley was also taken there. The Letson
lot has no such marker. Others say he was re-buried in the northeast
corner of the Granada cemetery. There is no marker or other visible
evidence of his grave there. His grave now seems to be as irredeemably
lost as was his life on that fatal March night fifty-four years ago.

It is said by those who were in a position to speak at the time, that
Manley made no protest, spoke not a word when the mob took him from the
room. Whether it was sheer shock that robbed him of all power to speak,
to think, to feel, no one knows. Dr. Graham says that after they started
away with the prisoner someone fired a gun, and he heard Manley say,
“Don’t do that boys, it’s not fair.” Just what happened after that was
never made public. The knowing ones didn’t seem to want to talk. There
were, however, many conflicting rumors afloat—sub rosa reports, you
understand. One rumor was that Manley was dead before they left the main
street with him—died from fright and rough handling.

On the way out one of the vigilantes lost his cap. Someone picked it up.
The same man who had “borrowed” the officers guns, acting as rear guard,
rode back and took the cap. He said to the people who had followed from
the court room, “We don’t want to hurt anyone—but keep back.”

Some of the men in that mob were recognized, but, as one old timer
aptly puts it, no one at that time seemed to care a “helluva” lot about
knowing who they were. However, as the veiling gradually lifted, it
became known that the major portion of the respectable adult male
citizens — and a few bad eggs—were numbered among the vigilantes. They
were, mostly, fair-minded and just men. But, even fair-minded men, under
stress, can sometimes be auto-hypnotized into doing strange things—and
it would seem some of the vigilantes got terribly out of hand that
night. From all accounts the performance was a rather disgusting
exhibition of mob passion. Later criticism of the vigilantes was based
very largely on the inexcusable savage demonstration attending the
Manley hanging. And mistake not, there was criticism—criticism that
stirred the whole countryside.

Vigilantes did not tell their wives everything. It might have been
better if they had. And if the Manley demonstration had met with the
approval of the good wives and mothers of the participating vigilantes,
the women might have taken a hand in the general clean-up and scrubbed
the burnt-cork, or whatever it was that blackened their faces, from back
of the men’s ears and thus obliterated the telltale marks that lingered,
like the itch, with some of the boys for several days. The women
generally deprecated the hanging.

Just what evidence the vigilantes had against Charley Manley, and how
authentic or damaging it was, never was made public. Nor will it ever
be. Had the vigilantes permitted the trial to progress far enough to
establish the prisoner’s guilt, their actions would, no doubt, have
received less criticism. The friends of the vigilantes—the vigilantes
themselves never talked, as vigilantes—said that it would have been
difficult to produce convicting evidence as Manley was too good at
“covering up.” He was credited with being the “brains” of the gang.

Two business men in Netawaka were also suspected. They evaporated. In
fact, there were a dozen or more men scattered about over the country
who were under suspicion.

It was rather a hard proposition to handle. The farmers—the vigilantes
and the farmers, with a sprinkling of town people, were practically the
same—were terribly incensed because of the thefts of their horses, and
they were determined, at any cost, to put a stop to it. And while the
convicted horse-thief did not draw a death sentence, the courts were
efficient enough and willing enough to impose ample punishment on
offenders. But the real trouble was in getting convicting evidence. And
the courts could not, of course, play “hunches” in so serious a matter.

And where convicting evidence was lacking, it would seem about the
best—or worst—the vigilantes could do, was to make an example of some
one of those under suspicion, and hope that they had hanged the right
man — a rather dangerous procedure, and hardly sufficient excuse for
taking a life.

But one thing that worked then against bringing suspects into court was,
that in case of failure to convict, the court costs were assessed to
the complaining witness, and that meant a lot to the pioneer
farmer—especially to one who had just lost his horses. At least, that is
the way the John O’Brien complaint was handled.

The old court record shows that Constable Sewell traveled twenty-four
miles in making the arrest of Manley, for which he received $2.40.
George G. Gill, as deputy, received a like sum. The attorney received
$7.50. There was also a charge of $1.00 for the keep of the prisoner,
and another $1.00 for guarding him. Isaiah Hudson traveled only six
miles, three miles out and three miles back, in making the arrest of
Joseph Brown, for which he received $1.20. One witness, J. W. Duvall,
was subpoenaed in the Brown case. None in the Manley case. And,
presumably, because of the disrupted court proceedings and the loss of
the prisoners, it was “considered and adjudged” by the court that the
costs in both cases be charged to John O’Brien, the complaining witness.

Then, after the hanging of Manley, someone made a mistake—a very serious
mistake—which, coupled with the previous disagreement, came very close
to disrupting the vigilante organization. A letter, purporting to come
from the vigilantes, was sent to the rebellious member. It gave the man
ten days to leave the country, and warned him that if he failed to do so
he would be given the same treatment as was meted out to Manley.

This was a hard jolt to the obstreperous member. And it was a harder
jolt for the man’s wife. The woman opened and read the letter first, and
only for that she might never have known what it was that caused her man
to so suddenly develop a bad case of ague. Then, every day, for weeks,
as the gathering shades of night began to fall upon his home, this man,
with his wife and three small children, trailed off through the woods,
across lots, to the home of a relative to spend the night.

That letter was the cause of much mental and even physical misery for
the woman. She suffered heart attacks at the time: And in the weeks that
followed she suffered the mental torments of the damned. In relating the
matter to me very recently, she said, “Every time the dog barked I would
have a fit.” According to her version of it, those were the blackest
days of her life. And, like a scar, she will carry its horrors to her
dying day—to the grave. She knew what a crazed mob was capable of
doing. As a matter of fact, she knew what a guerilla mob had done to my
father’s family.

Many, many were the times that my mother—sweet, patient, administering
angel—was called upon to be with that woman in her hours of great
distress. And once, when the insidious thing was about to consume her,
my mother brought the woman home with her for a week.

The marked member finally took the matter up with other vigilantes, and
to save the sanity of the man’s wife — and no doubt to appease the man’s
fears also — after all denying knowledge of the letter, the vigilantes
signed a paper pledging protection to the man. The marked man — and his
friends in the organization—however, had a pretty good idea who wrote
that letter.

With such a document in evidence the identity of the vigilantes, which
had been so closely guarded up to this time, was no longer cloaked. At
least the veil of secrecy now had a big rip in it.

The hanging of Manley had a tendency to slow up activities, but it did
not stop the horse-stealing. And once more the Committee set out to make
an example of an accused man. Frank Gage, charged with stealing a horse
from Washie Lynn, was being tried in a Justice court somewhere over
in the Powhattan neighborhood — probably Charley Smith’s court. The
vigilantes were in readiness to “storm” the court and take the prisoner,
as they had done in the Manley case at Granada, but the plan was
abandoned at the last minute.

Two horsemen, young and daring, with a whiff of what was in the air,
made a hurried run to the scene. They told the vigilantes that they were
about to make a mistake—that they, the informers, knew positively
that Gage was elsewhere the night the Lynn horse was stolen. The
high-stepping modern Paul Revere of that heroic dash still lives. The
other has gone to his reward.

Gage, of course, was acquitted, for lack of evidence. Later, the real
thief, convicted for stealing wheat, confessed to stealing the Lynn
horse, and told where it was. Washie reclaimed the animal.

The man who was credited with being the president of the vigilante
committee afterwards became a very popular and efficient peace officer
of Nemaha county. And, if I understood the man rightly, I think he would
have fought forty wildcats, and maybe a buzz-saw or two, before he would
have surrendered, for unlawful handling, a charge of his to any set of
men—vigilantes, clan, mob extraordinary, or even a regiment of soldiers.

Soon after the Manley hanging a branch of the Kansas Peoples Detective
Association was organized here. Unlike the vigilantes, its purpose was
not to override the law, but to assist it in capturing and convicting
horse-thieves. W. D. Frazey was president and E. J. Woodman was
secretary.

Now a line about the Old Overland Trail. Besides carrying a faint flavor
of Manley handiwork, it was the avenue by which I myself came into this
country. But I did not ride the old Concord coach drawn by its four
spirited horses. I came by the slower mode of the ox-team.

The Old Overland Trail, or military road, as it was sometimes called,
was vastly different from the good roads of the present time—very, very
much different from the elaborate specifications for Number Nine, now
building through Wetmore. It was little more than a wide rut worn deep
by the constant movement of horse-drawn vehicles, including, of course,
mules and oxen. There were stage-lines, pony-express riders, and heavy
freighting outfits. The commerce of the West was handled over the Old
Trail.

Starting at Atchison, the Old Trail came into the Pow~ hattan ridge
settlement at the southwest corner of the Kickapoo Indian reservation,
and, keeping to the high ridges as much as practical, it passed
through Granada, Log Chain and Seneca, and on westward to Oroville and
Sacramento, in California. The stage company maintained a change station
on the old Collingwood C. Grubb farm—called Powhattan. Noble H. Rising
was in charge of the station after it had been moved three miles
north, and the name changed to Kickapoo. His son, Don C. Rising, was a
pony-express rider. W. W. Letson was express messenger. Bill Evans, Lon
Huff, and Bob Sewell, oldtimers here, were stage drivers.

The road made a sharp turn to the north before reaching Granada. Peter
Shuemaker lived on the farm now owned and occupied by Charley Zabel,
west of the turn. Shuemaker wanted the road to pass by his farm, and,
at his own expense, built a cut-off in the hope that traffic would be
diverted that way.

Roads in those days were built, mostly, by the simple process of going
out with a plow and running a couple of parallel furrows, with the
proper spacing to accommodate all anticipated traffic. Peter Shuemaker’s
cut-off veered off to the northwest, across the prairies just anywhere
the going seemed to be good, until it intersected the Old Trail again.
And though as simple as that, road building in those days was not
without difficulties. Some would want the road and some wouldn’t want
it.

“Uncle” Peter’s road bumped into a circumstance when his engineer
projected the cut-off across the farm of a certain female importation
from the Emerald Isle. And right there Irish wit and Missouri temper
mixed. William Porter, not so very long removed from the Rushville
hills, was chief engineer and contractor for the prairie division of
“Uncle” Peter’s cut-off. Mrs. Flannigan met the Missourian head-on, with
an old horse-pistol wrapped in her apron. “Off with you, I’ll not have
the place torn up,” she commanded.

Entirely unaware of the ominous clouds rolling up in the sky of his
destiny, the wily William squared himself in an attitude of defiance,
squinted his eyes in the peculiar manner of his people, spat out his
tobacco, and said, “I carkilate I’m running this road.” Whereupon Mrs.
Flannigan unbound her pistol, and replied, “It’s a fine young man you
are, but I’m sorry to tell you that you’ll never see your old mother
again.”

Contractor Porter decided to take fate in his own hands and change the
plans of destiny as decreed by Mrs. Flannigan. He took another chew of
tobacco and then meekly backtracked for a mile over the perfectly good
road he had just built—and ran some more furrows. You couldn’t block
a road project with a horse-pistol, or even with injunctions, in those
days. There was too much open land.

The generous spacings and fine appointments of Peter Shuemaker’s
cut-off—it had a corduroy bridge, over Muddy Creek, with nigger-head
trimmings—were out of all proportion to the scanty travel that passed
his way. And when “Uncle” Peter found that he couldn’t bring the
traffic to him, he, like Mahomet, went to it. Shuemaker built a hotel in
Granada.

Recollections are now about as dim as the Old Trail itself, but there
is one oldtimer who asserts that it is his belief that Ice Gentry
and Charley Manley were credited with being the axe-men who made the
slashings on the timber division of “Uncle” Peter’s cut-off. But, says
another, that may have been before Manley came into the neighborhood.
Nothing certain about that, though. So many of the old fellows have
their biographies so scrambled that it is hard to get at the truth. The
suggestion was, nevertheless, timely. And, anyway, Charley Manley spent
his last day on earth in Peter Shuemaker’s hotel at Wetmore.

As I remember him, Charley Manley was a rather quiet, pleasant mannered
man. And, although a matured man himself — he was about forty, and
unmarried — he made friends of the youngsters about town and seemed to
enjoy their company. He could always find a way to help a boy with a few
dimes.

Early in his career here in Wetmore it was settled that I was to have
the job of turning the grindstone for Charley Manley whenever he needed
help to grind his axe. Since that time I have often wondered why he
had so much axe-grinding to do. But I thoroughly enjoyed, with all the
thankfulness of a growing young boy’s” healthy heart, the dimes and
quarters he gave me. And sometimes I have thought that maybe he ran in a
few extra and needless grindings solely to gladden my heart.

Then came the time when Charley Manley fitted his grindstone with foot
pedals. I used to sit by and watch him do the grinding without my help,
and long for the dime I was being cheated out of by the introduction of
that new labor-saving device. One time Charley Manley let me pour water
on the grindstone while he ran it with foot-power. He said the tin can
suspended over the stone, which was releasing a steady stream of water
where it was needed, did not do the work so satisfactorily. He gave me a
quarter for that.

With all his axe-grinding, I never knew Charley Manley to do more than
chop wood on the Letson wood-pile. No coal was burned here in that
axe-grinding period. Wood was brought in from the timber, a wagon-load
at a time, in the pole, or in cord-wood lengths. It was chopped into
stove lengths as needed, enough to cook a meal at a time. And sometimes
the chopper would make the supply very scanty, or even renege on the job
altogether. Then the cook would have to go out and scrape up chips. How
well I know that. Aside from my axe-grinding activities I spent some
time on the Bristow wood-pile in my younger days. And I am now sorry to
say there were times when my patient mother would have to gather in the
chips.

The last words Charley Manley ever said to me were, “Come over to
Netawaka and see me sometimes, Johnny, and I’ll let you turn the
grindstone for me.” He smiled pleasantly. That was while he was held
in custody here the day of his execution. Poor fellow, he did not then
suspect what was to be his fate. Naturally, I felt badly about the
hanging—and the loss of my opportunity to make another honest dime. And
the worst that I could now wish for the shades of his executioners, is
that they be compelled to take turns in turning Manley’s grindstone,
over there in the vast beyond, until his axe is made sharp, sharp,
sharp—and then, that Charley’s ghost be licensed by Him who judges
all things, to use it—provided, of course, that he didn’t steal their
horses.

MOUNT ERICKSON Published in Wetmore Spectator—

March 27, 1936

By John T. Bristow

It was sixty-two years ago. Our quiet little village, surrounded by
almost continuous open country, with grazing herds all bedded down for
the night, slumbered. A gentle rain was falling.

The night train brought to Wetmore a man bent upon a desperate
undertaking. Jim Erickson was a resident of these parts, but had been
absent for some time. He did not seek lodgings in town. Under cover
of the night he walked west on the railroad track for two miles, then
turned off to the timber on the south. He spent the remainder of the