HISTORY AND STORIES 2F NEBRASKA SHELDON H~ $ti ;^ ;*- -yj. ',f\i\if%1: vii..Mi^iii.<:^^xl^3tM*litSMi^i^x Pictured Rocks near Blackbird Hill . ... 22 Lewis and Clark .... . . 24 The Lewis and Clark Monument at Fort Calhoun, Nebraska 26 The Clark Monument at St. Louis . . . 28 Blackfoot Warriors . . . . . . .31 (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio) Manuel Lisa . . .34 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) British Flag "on Nebraska Rocks, 1907 .36 "Aunt Manuel," First Known White Woman in Nebraska 38 Rosalie Lisa Ely .... .... 39 Monument to the Astorians at Bellevue, Nebraska 43, Council with Otoes by Major Long's Expedition 46 (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio) Map of the Great American Desert as Made by Major Long, 1820 48 (Drawing hy Miss Martha Turner) Plan of Fort Atkinson, Nebraska, 1819-1827 . 60 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) Flint Lock and Cannon Ball from Fort Atkinson . 63 A Fort Atkinson Graviistone . . 63 The First School Kept in Nebraska .... 64 Bellevue in 1833 . . 56 (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio) Bellevue Woods as Seen To-day. Top of Child's Point, Look ing East ... ..... .57 The Steamer Yellowstone 60 (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio) Missouri, Oto and Puncah Indians, 1833 .... 66 (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio) Scott's Bluff .... ... . . 68 Tttf. Building of an Earth Lodge . . 71 Old Otoe Mission ... 75 ix X ILLUSTRATIONS Father De Smet . . 77 (From Chittenden & Richardson's "Life, Letters & Travels of Father De Smet." Francis P. Harper, New York) Indian Welcome to Father De Smet 80 (From Chittenden & Richardson's "Life, Letters & Travels of Father De Smet." Francis P. Harper, New York) John C. Fremont ... .... 82 Map of Overland Trails and Historical Places in Nebraska . 84 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) Old Fort Hall on the Oregon Trail ... 86 Emigrant Train Crossing the Plains . . . . 88 Ezra Meeker and His Oregon Trail Wagon 89 Oregon Trail Monument at Kearney . . . .¦ . .89 Stone Marking Oregon Trail in Nebraska . ... 91 Lone Tree Monument ... .... 92 Logan Fontenelle . 94 Site of Fontenelle's Grave near Bellevue 95 Mound Marking the Burial Place of Lieutenant Grattan ant) HIS Men 99 Act Abolishing Slavery in Nebraska . . IDl (Photo from original in Statehouse) Map Showing First Plan for Nebraska Survey, 1854 . . . 103 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) Nebraska-Kansas Monument, Starting Point of NebraskaS ukveys 105 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) Map Showing Progress op Surveys in Eastern Nebraska, 1S56 106 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) Robert Harvey, an Early Surveyor, and Outfit . 108 Daniel Freeman, First Homesteader in the United States 111 The First Homestead 112 Pawnee Earth Lodge . . ... 114 Ancient Pawnee Pottery . 115 Court House Rock and Jail Rock 120 Major Frank North 122 Surviving Pawnee Scouts, 1911 ... . . 124 Rock Bluffs House where Election Was Held in 1866 . 130 Lieutenant George A. Forsyth .... . 131 Arickaree or Beecher Island Battlefield, 1910 .... 134 Union Pacific Railroad Train Crossing Missouri River at Omaha, 1866 . . . . 137 Stage Coach ...... . 139 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) Monument Marking Site of the Stage Coach Race . 141 An Early Prairie Fire . 143 (From Catlin) Red Cloud . 147 Spotted Tail 151 Ruins of Old Red Cloud Agency, 1911 152 Fort Robinson, Sioux County, Nebraska. Site of Red Cloud Agency and Scene of Important Incidents in Sioux Indian War 154 Red Cloud's Tent at Pine Ridge, 1904 156 Pioneer Seeking Shelter ... . . 163 Old Fort Kearny Block House at Nebraska City 165 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) . ILLUSTRATIONS xi Old Earthworks at Fort Kearny, 1907 .... 165 Fallen Cottonwood Tree on Site of Headquarters, 1st Nebraska Regiment at Fort Kearny, 1864, as Seen in 1907 166 Fort Laramie in 1848 .... . . 167 Ruins of Army Hospital at Fort Lar.\mie . . 168 PoNCA Land as Painted for Maximilian, 1833 . ... 169 (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio) Standing Bear and Family in 1904 . . 172 Bright Eyes (Instha Theamba), Mrs. T. H. Tibbles .... 175 Heed Law Act of 1870 ... 179 (Photo from original in Statehouse). Two Crows (Cahae Numba) ... ... 181 Wajepa ¦ . . .... ... 182 In Grasshopper Days . . . ... 184 The Sand Hills 187 A Typical Frontier Well and House . 196 Fort McPherson Military Cemetery 200 Nebraska Territorial Seal 203 Nebraska State Seal . 203 The Goldbnrod, Nebraska's Flower 204 First Arbor Day Proclamation 207 (Photo from original in Statehouse) J. Sterling Morton and Robert W. Furnas .... 209 A Typical Pioneer Nebraska Tree . . . 210 Ancient Nebraska Tools . ... .... 215 (Courtesy of R. F. Gilder, Omaha, Nebraska) Ancient Nebraska House . ... 216 (Courtesy of R. F. Gilder, Omaha, Nebraska) Spanish, French and English Flags . . ... 218 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) Map Showing Grants by the English King and their Relation TO Nebraska .... . . 222 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) American Flag . . ... 223 Map Showing Land Ceded by Indian Tribes in Nebraska . . 226 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) Map Showing Country Known to the Omahas . . . 226 The Buffalo Hunt .... 227 (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio) Omaha Mission Building in Thurston County, Built 1856 . . 228 An Omaha Indian Village in 1860 229 Stephen A. Douglas . . . .... 233 Nebraska-Kansas Bill . . 235 (From original at Washington, D. C.) Map op Nebraska Territory, 1854 237 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) Governor Francis Burt . . 238 Nebraska Ferry Across Elkhorn River, 1854 ... . . 239 Acting Governor Thomas B. Cuming 239 First Territorial Capital, 1856 240 First Claim Cabin in Nebraska 241 Peta Leshaku — Chief of the Pawnee Nation 242 xu ILLUSTRATIONS Mormons Setting out from Florence, Nebraska, to Cross the Plains 244 First County Map op Nebraska, 1864 . .... 245 (Dravring by Miss Martha Turner) County Map op Nebraska in 1856 . ¦ 247 (Drawing by Miss Martha 'Turner) Nebraska Wildcat Currency ¦ • 248 Second Territorial Capital, Afterward Omaha High School 250 Governor William A. Richardson . . • 251 Governor Samuel W. Black ... . 253 Pawnee Council Rock . ¦ ¦ 254 Governor Alvin Saunders. ..... 257 Outline Map of Nebraska in 1863 258 (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner) First State Capital at Lincoln, 1869 .... . 260 The Three Founders op Lincoln . . . . 261 First Log House in Lincoln . . . • 261 A Pioneer Dugout . . ... 262 Governor David Butler . . . . 262 Governor William H. James 263 Governor Robert W. Furnas . . . 264 Governor Silas W. Garber . . . 265 Constitution of 1875 with Signatures . ... 267 (Photo from original in Statehouse) Governor Albinus Nance . . 268 Governor James W. Dawes . . 270 A Western Cattle Range . . . 271 A Frontier Nebraska Granger . . . 272 Governor John M. Thayer . . 272 Nebraska State Capitol in 1889 . 273 A Farmers' Alliance Convention 275 Congressman O. M. Kem op Custer County at Home (First Con gressman IN United States Elected prom a Sod House) 276 Governor James E. Boyd ... . . . 277 Governor Lorenzo Crounse . .... 278 Governor Silas A. Holcomb . .... ... 279 William Jennings Bryan in 1896 . . . 280 Governor William A. Poynter . . . 281 Governor Charles H. Dietrich . . . 282 Governor Ezra P. Savage . . . . 282 Governor John H. Mickey . . .... 283 A Nebraska Corn Crop . 284 Threshing Winter Wheat . 284 In Line for a Homestead . . . . ... 286 Governor George L. Sheldon . . . ... 287 Governor A. C. Shallenbbrger .... 287 Governor Chester H. Aldrich 288 Governor John H. Morehead .... 289 Map op Nebraska, 1911 .... facing page 290 Governor Keith Neville . 291 Governor Samuel R. McKelvie 297 Monument to Abraham Lincoln on Statehouse Grounds, Lincoln, Nebraska, 1912 304 (Courtesy of Roy Hindmarsh, Lincoln, Nebraska) PART I Stories of Nebraska History THE STORY OF CORONADO FRANCISCO VASQUEZ CORONADO and his soldiers were the first white men to visit the Nebraska-Kansas plains. Coronado was a Spanish general who came to Mexico to seek his fortune in the New World. While there wonderful stories were brought by Fray Marcos, a monk, who had traveled a thousand miles north, into the country now called Arizona. In that land it was said were the Seven Cities of Cibola, with houses built of stone many stories high, and great abundance of gold and silver, turquoises, cloth, sheep, cows, and tame partridges. All the Spaniards in Mexico were eager to take possession of such a wonderful land and to seize its riches. Coronado was the lucky man who was made general of the army which was sent out to conquer these famous seven cities. Three hundred Spaniards on horseback and a thousand Indians, with a long train of horses and cattle carrying food and ammunition, started in February, 1540, on this fine errand. After a long and hard journey across the desert the army arrived at the towns of the Zuni and Hopi Indians in Arizona. They found there what one finds to-day — a desert with houses made of sun-baked mud, the homes of poor and peaceful Indians who make pottery and weave a little cloth and raise corn and beans and fowls. The riches and splendor of the wonderful Seven Cities of Cibola were a dream of the desert. Like many other things in 1 2 STORIES OF NEBRASKA life, the farther off, the more wonderful — the nearer, the more common. The Spaniards were very much disappointed. They had come so far to conquer a people who were hardly worth conquering. It would never do to go back to Mexico with nothing to show for their long journey. So Coronado marched eastward across New Mexico into the valley of the Rio Grande. Stretched along this valley for many miles were villages of the Pueblo Indians. They also were poor and peaceful, irrigating little patches of the valley in order to raise corn and beans, making cloth and pottery, and living in sun-baked mud houses. These Pueblo Indians treated the Spaniards kindly and fumished them food. The army camped there for the winter. Quarrels arose between the soldiers and the Indians. The soldiers stormed the villages, killed many of the Indians, and burned some whom they took prisoners. The Spaniards then tried to conciliate the Indians so that they would go on raising food for them, but up and down the fair valley of the Rio Grande there were fear and hatred of the white men. At this time Coronado heard for the first time the story of the land of Quivira, far to the northeast. An Indian slave whom the Spaniards called the Turk, because they said he looked like a Turk, told the story. His home was far out on the plains, but he had been captured by the Pueblo Indians and held as a slave. It is supposed that he was a Pawnee Indian, for the Pawnees wore their hair in a peculiar way so that they resembled Turks. The story of Quivira told by the Indian slave was of a wonder ful land far across the plains. There was a river six mUes wide, and in it were fishes as big as horses, and upon it floated many great canoes with twenty rowers on a side. Some of these canoes carried sails, and the lords sat under awnings upon them, while the prows bore golden eagles. The king of Quivira, Tatarrax, slept under a great tree with golden bells on the branches. These bells swung to THE STORY OF CORONADO The First Printed Picture OP A Buffalo and fro in the winds which always blew, and their music lulled the king to sleep. The common people _ in Quivira had dishes of plated ware and the jugs and bowls were of gold. The king of Quivira worshiped a cross of gold and an image of a woman, the goddess of heaven. , Stories hke these filled the hearts of the Spaniards with longing to reach the land of Quivira and to help the people there to take care of its riches. On the 23d of April, 1541, Coro nado and his army marched away from the Rio Grande valley, guid ed by the Turk and by another Indian from the same region, whom they called Isopete. For thirty-five days they traveled out upon the high plains. These were so nearly level they could look as far as the eye would pierce and see no hill. They found great herds of buffalo, or "humpbacked cows" as they called them, on these plains, and Indians who traveled around among these cows, killing them for their flesh and skins — eating the flesh raw and making the skins into tents and clothing. The Indians had dogs to pull their tents from place to place, and had never seen horses until the Spaniards came. The Spanish army saw for the first time the American buffalo. None of these Indians who hunted the cows had ever heard of the rich land of Quivira with its gold and silver, its great canoes, and its king. Here the two guides began to tell dif ferent stories, and confessed that the houses in Quivira were not quite so large as they had said, and the people not so rich. Coronado and his army had eaten all the corn they had brought with them for food. The land of Quivira was still said to be far to the north. A council was held and it was determined to send the army back to the Rio Grande, while Coronado with thirty horsemen and two guides pushed on STORIES OF NEBRASKA to find Quivira. So the army went back, and Coronado with his thirty men traveled on, eating nothing but raw buffalo meat. After crossing a great river, supposed to be the Arkansas, they came to the country of Quivira, forty-two days after parting from the army, or seventy- seven days after leaving the Rio Grande. Coronado says in his letter to the King of Spain, "Where I reached Quivira it was in the fortieth degree (of latitude)." The fortieth degree forms the state line between Nebraska and Kansas. This would make Quivira in the Repubhcan valley. Coronado found no gold, no silver, no bells tinkling from the trees, no fishes big as horses, and no boats with golden prows. He found Indians living in grass huts, grow ing corn and beans and melons, eating raw buffalo meat and cutting it with stone knives. There were twenty-five of these grass hut villages, and the only metal seen in them was a piece of copper worn by a chief around his neck. Coronado went on for seventy-five miles through the vil lages of Quivira and came to the country called Harahey. The chief of Harahey met them with two himdred men, all naked, with bows and arrows and "some sort of things on their heads," which probably means the way they put up their hair, and suggests that they were Pawnees. Here the Turk confessed he had lied to the Spaniards about the riches of Quivira in order to lead the army off on the trackless plains where it would perish. "We strangled him that night so that he never waked up," is the way one of the Spaniards tells the story of what happened to the Turk. A Quivira Grass Hut. (Courtesy R. Brower, St. Cloud, Minn.) B. THE STORY OF CORONADO Coronado spent a month in Quivira and Harahey. He ivrote that the country was the best he had seen since leaving Spain, for the land was very fat and black, and well watered with rivulets and springs and rivers. He found nuts and plums and very good sweet grapes and mulberries to eat, and plenty of grass and wild flax and sumach. The Spaniards held a council and resolved to go back to Mexico, for they , feared trying to winter in the country so far from the rest of the army. So Coronado raised a great cross, and at the foot of it he made some letters with a chisel, which said that Fran cisco Vasquez de Coro nado, general of the army, had arrived there. Quivira Tomahawks (From photograph rm c . 1 ,, by A. 'E. Sheldon.) Ihe Spaniards then- marched away, in the month of August, 1541, almost four hun dred years ago, and left the land of Quivira, with its fat, black soil, its beautiful rivulets and springs and rivers, its great prairies of grass and its nuts, plums, good sweet grapes and mulberries, its queer cows with humped backs and its Indians living in grass huts and eating raw buffalo meat. And no one has yet found the great cross the Spaniards raised with the name of Coronado upon it. Nor has any one yet found the tree covered with golden bells under which Tatarrax, the great king of Quivira, sleeps, lulled by the music of the bells. QUESTIONS 1. Are you sorry that Coronado and his army did not find the seven cities of Cibola, as Fray Marcos had described them? Why? 2. Are the people whom you know as ready to beheve big stories as were Coronado and his army? Account for any difference. 3. Do you know any person who has seen the buffalo roaming over our Nebraska plains? If so, tell what you have heard him say about them. 4. What are the chief differences between the land of Quivira as described by Coronado and the part of Nebraska in which you live? DON DIEGO DE PENALOSA OUT of the musty old Spanish documents of two hundred years ago comes to us the strange story of Don Diego de Penalosa and his wonderful expedition across the plains to the kingdom of Quivira. It was in the year 1660, so runs the tale, that Don Diego came to Santa Fe to be govemor and captain general of New Mexico. He drove back the fierce Apaches who raided the peaceful Pueblos along the Rio Grande, but his heart was restless and unsatisfied. He longed to make a great name for himself as did Cortez in Mexico and Pizarro in Peru. It was a hundred and twenty years since Coronado marched to Quivira and found there nothing but straw houses and naked savages. StiU the old story of a kingdom full of gold and silver beyond the great plains persisted. Still the mystery of the great unknown region in the north stirred the Spanish love of conquest. It was on March 6, 1662, that Don Diego de Penalosa left the province of New Mexico to find and conquer this fabled land of riches. With him there marched eighty Spanish knights and a thousand Indian allies, whUe six cannon, eight hundred horses, three hundred mules and thirty-six wagons bore their baggage. Like Coronado, Penalosa marched north two himdred leagues, nearly seven hundred miles. On his way he found the great Indian nation of the Escanzaques with 3,000 warriors starting for war with the people of Quivira. These joined the Spaniards. Together they traveled northeast im- til they came to a broad river flowing east. They followed its southern bank for a day, when the river made a great bend and flowed from the north. Signal fires blazed from the hills telling that their approach was seen. They kept on untU they saw another fine river of clear water flowing from 6 DON DIEGO DE PENALOSA the north to join the one along whose banks they marched. Westward of this was a great city in a vast level plain. There were thousands of houses, some two, some three, some four stories high, well built of hard wood resembling walnut. The city extended for leagues westward along the plain to where another clear flowing stream came from the north to join the broad river along which they marched. Seventy chiefs came from this city to greet Penalosa, bringing rich presents of fur robes, pumpkins, corn and beans and fresh fish for food. A great council was held and peace proposed. That night the warriors Of the Escanzaque tribe stole away from the Spanish camp and raided the city of Quivira, kill ing, plundering, and burning. In the moming it was in ashes and thousands of its peaceful people dead or dying. Among its blackened ruins the Spanish commander sought in vain for chiefs who met him in friendly council the day be fore. The great city was destroyed never to be rebu.lt and its few survivors scattered never to return. On June 11, 1662, Don Diego de Penalosa with his great train marched sadly back to the Rio Grande there to relate the destruction of the great city of Quivira. A Nebraska author. Judge Savage, of Oma ha, has traced the route of Penalosa upon the map, has measured the miles marched from Santa Fe and found that Penalosa reached the Platte near Louisville. He believes that, Penalosa marched one day west to the site of Ashland where the Platte makes a bend and flows from the north, that the Elkhorn was the first river A Spanish Stirrup Found in Nebraska. (From photograph colleciion of A . E.Sheldon.) 8 STORIES OF NEBRASKA flowing from the north to join the Platte and the Loup the second river, and that between the Loup and the Elkhorn rivers not far from the present town of Columbus was the city of Quivira destroyed by the Escanzaques, who were the Kanzas tribe. The numerous sites between the Loup and Elkhorn rivers where fragments of pottery and other Indian relics are found to-day are remains of the great city of Quivira destroyed two hundred and fifty years ago. The legend of Penalosa is too wonderful to be true. It is now known to be a fiction. There was a Governor Don Diego de Penalosa of New Mexico but no such army as re lated was led by him across the plains and there certainly was no great city of Quivira with houses three and four stories high covering the plain between the Loup and Elkhorn rivers. We must part with Penalosa 's expedition as an historical event, but bid it welcome and give it place in the realm of romance with other wonder stories of the time when people knew but very little of the land where we now hve and used their imagination instead of their eyes in describing it. QUESTIONS 1. Why were wonderful stories about this country so long believed wliich have since been found to be untrue? 2. Can you tell how to write an untrue story so that all the people shall always believe it? BARON LA HONTAN AND MATHIEU SAGEAN NEBRASKA remained an unknown land to white men for many years after Coronado marched back to the valley of the Rio Grande. The earliest Frenchmen who explored the Mississippi Valley did not reach this country. They heard of it from afar by report of the Indians living near the mouth of the Missouri. Far to the north and west stretched the land and the rivers and tribes, they said. No one knew how far. This unknown land where Nebraska now is became a fine field for romantic writers. Two of them. Baron La Hon tan and Mathieu Sagean, deserve mention for their books were for many years taken as true narratives of travels in this region. ¦ Baron La Hontan was a soldier who came from France to Canada. In his book, printed at The Hague in 1704, he tells of a long journey made with companions in a canoe west of the Mississippi. He tells of a tribe which he calls Essanapes, who worshiped the sun, the moon, and the stars. Beyond the Essanapes lived the Gnascitares, who lived on the shore of a great lake. Upon this lake were canoes rowed by 200 oarsmen. They had buildings three stories high and fought battles with the Spaniards in New Mexico. The great king of this country lived in a royal palace waited upon by hun dreds of servants. To make this romantic story seem true La Hontan's book has a map of the region where are now Nebraska and South Dakota. He gives pictures of the Indians who lived there and many words from their lan guages. None of these had any existence except in his imagination. Mathieu Sagean 's story was written by another man. It tells that Sagean was born in the isle of Montreal in Canada, 9 10 STORIES OF NEBRASKA that his father and mother were faithful members of the Roman Catholic Church, that he could read a Uttle but not write, and that twenty years before he told his story he left Montreal in a bark canoe for the lakes and rivers of the great West. With a party of eleven Frenchmen and several Indians he journeyed west of the Mississippi untU he came to the country of the Acaanibas, a great nation occupying a region six hundred miles long. There he foimd cities with forts and a king who claimed to be a descendant of Monte zuma who went clothed every day in a beautiful robe of La Hontan's Map op the Nebraska Region ermine. In front of the king 's palace were great idols many feet high. Every moming the king and his people wor shiped before these idols, chantingsongs from daybreak to the rising of the sun. The king's palace was three stories high and built of blocks of solid gold. He had 100,000 soldiers, three-fourths of them horsemen, who camped around the city. The women were as white and beautiful as those of Europe. The people carried on commerce with another people so far to the west that a journey there required six months of travel. ' Sagean saw a caravan of three thousand cattle loaded with gold and rich furs start on its journey. These stories of La Hontan and Sagean are not history. BARON LA HONTAN AND MATHIEU SAGEAN 11 They are wonder stories of imaginary countries supposed to, have been located in the Nebraska region. They show how little was really known of our country at the time these stories were printed and believed. QUESTIONS 1 . What things in these stories seem now to be true? 2. What things seem untrue? 3. When a story is partly truth and partly falsehood, how can you separate one from the other? THE SPANISH CARAVAN ONE of the oldest stories of white men on the Nebraska- Kansas plains is that known as the story of the Spanish Caravan. This story has always been wrapped in mystery. The early French writers on the Missouri coimtry tell it in different forms. It has been handed down in various tribes of Missouri and Nebraska Indians. The Spanish histories of New Mexico do not mention it, but the great American- Spanish scholar, Adolf T. Bandelier, says he found record of it in the archives of the Franciscan monks and retells it in his book "The GUded Man." There is great variation in the versions of the Spanish Caravan story, but they agree in the main features, which are these: In the year 1720, a Spanish army marched out of Santa Fe to conquer the Missouri valley country. There were several hundred armed men besides women, chUdren, a Franciscan monk and a great number of horses and cattle. Comanche Indians went along as guides and aUies. Their plan was to conquer the Missourias, the Otoes, the Pawnees, and other Indians living near the Missouri River and to col onize the country for Spain. Somewhere in the region of the Republican or Kansas River the Spanish Caravan was attacked by the united nations whom they came to destroy. All of the Spaniards were kiUed except the Franciscan monk who was captured and held prisoner. He afterward escaped to the French forts near St. Louis where he told the story of his comrades ' fate. Some of the stories of the Caravan say that the Spanish commander intended to get the help of the Osage tribe, which was at war with the Missourias and Otoes. By mistake he reached first a village of the Missourias, whom he thought to be Osages. He told them of his plan to conquer the Mis- 12 THE SPANISH CARAVAN 13 souria tribe, to make their women and children slaves and to settle in their country. The Missouria chief understood the mistake. He thanked the Spaniards and told them he would join the war. Great feasts followed. The Missouria chief sent messengers to all the friends of the Missouria tribe. Over two thousand warriors came. After a night of feasting the Indians fell upon the Spaniards just at daybreak and in a few minutes kiUed all except the monk. All the Spanish horses were captured. As the Indians did not then know how to use horses, they made the Franciscan mount every day and show them how to ride. While the Indians were trying to imitate him, he mounted the best horse and rode away into the wilderness, finally reaching the French forts. Afterwards, says one of the French chroniclers, the Missouri River Indians came to the French forts with the sacred vestments and chalices of the church which they had taken from the friar. Other accounts tell about the plunder of the Spanish camp, the rich garments, the books, and a map which was seen in the camps of the Ne braska Indians in the years that followed. Charlevoix, a noted Jesuit father who trav eled in this region and wrote an account of it, tells the story of the Spanish Caravan and says that he bought the spurs which the Spanish monk wore when he escaped from the Indians to the French. At a great councU held by the French commander Bourgmont with the Indians of this region in 1724 one of the chiefs boasted how the Missourias, Otoes and Pawnees had entirely destroyed the great Spanish army which had come to con quer the Missouri River country. These are some of the stories of the Spanish Caravan, wrapped partly in mystery and dispute, but with a core of A Spanish Sword AND A Basket Hilted Cavalry Saber Found in Nebraska. (From photograph collec tion of A. E. Shel don.) 14 STORIES OF NEBRASKA agreement and truth. The truth is that an attempt was made by the Spaniards at Santa Fe to conquer and settle the rich land of Nebraska and Kansas, which had been discov ered by Coronado nearly two centuries before ; and that their expedition was defeated by the Nebraska Indians. We know that the Indians of the Nebraska country kept the Spanish settlements in New Mexico in fear for many years. And in the year 1824, a hundred years after the time of the Spanish Caravan, the city of Santa Fe sent an em bassy to Fort Atkinson, in our state, to make peace with the Pawnees and bring to an end the raiding of the Rio Grande valley by their war parties. QUESTIONS I. What reasons are there for thinking this story of the Spanish Caravan not wholly a myth? 2. Is a tale apt to grow larger or smaller when retold a number of times? Why? THE MALLET BROTHERS IT was almost two hundred years after Coronado and his thirty Spanish horsemen rode away from the valley of the Rio Grande to the kingdom of Quivira, and then rode back again, before we have a sure record of any other white men in this region. This time Frenchmen came. They crossed the entire state of Nebraska, from northeast to southwest, and wrote the • story of their travels in French. This story, which has only recently been translated into English, is the first certain account we have of the land that is now Nebraska. The men who made this journey were Pierre Mallet and Paul Mallet, brothers, and with them were six other French men. All of these except one were from Canada. They started from the French settlements in Illinois, not far from where St. Louis now is. In their story they say that they found it was 100 leagues up the Missouri River to the villages of the Missouri Indians. From there it was 80 leagues to the Kanzes Indians who lived not far from where Kansas City now is. From the Kanzes Indians to the Octotatoes or Otoes, who lived at the mouth of the Platte, was 100 leagues. From the Otoe village to the river of the Panimahas, where they found the Indian tribe of that name, it was 60 leagues farther up the Missouri. The earliest explorers called the Skidi Pawnees, Panimahas. This fact together with the distance given from the mouth of the Platte to the Pani- maha River makes it probable that these first explorers of Nebraska found the Panimaha Indians in what is now Dakota County. From this place the Mallet brothers and their company set out oii May 29, 1739, for the city of Santa Fe. They had 15 16 STORIES OF NEBRASKA The Platte River. (From photograph by A. E. Sheldon.) with them a band of horses laden with goods to trade with the Spaniards and Indians of the Rio Grande region. In the two hundred years since Coronado had crossed the plains the Spanish had settled in New Mexico and built cities, chief among them Santa Fe. So httle was then known about the great plains country that all the other Frenchmen who had tried to reach Santa Fe had gone up the Missouri River into the Dakotas. The Mallet brothers, up on the advice of some Indians, took a different direction and set out southwest from the Pan imaha Indian viUages. June 2d they reached a river which they named the Platte, and, seeing that it took a direction not much different from the one they had in mind, they foUowed it, going up its left bank seventy leagues. Here they found that it made a fork with the river of the Padoucas. On June 13th they crossed to the right bank of the river they were following, and, traveling over a tongue of land, they camped on the 14th on the south bank of the river of the hills which here falls into the Platte. From this point they traveled south three days across high plains, during which time they found no wood, not even for fire. These high plains they said extended as far as the mountains near Santa Fe. After crossing sev eral smaUer streams they reached the Arkansas River on June 20th and lost seven horses loaded with goods in getting over the river. On July 22d they arrived at Santa Fe, having traveled 962 leagues from the Panimaha villages. We have only a very short story of their travels, but it is full of first things. They named the Platte River. They THE MALLET BROTHERS 17 were no doubt the first white men to see the forks of the Platte. They were the first white men to travel over the entire length of Nebraska and the first traders to bring the Missouri vaUey and the mountains together. QUESTIONS 1. Trace on a map of Nebraska the route these men traveled. 2. Did they take the shortest route from St. Louis to Santa Fe? 3. Is any river or town or county in Nebraska called Mallet? Has any, monument been erected to these men? How do you account for this? BLACKBIRD (Wazhinga-sah-ba) THE first Nebraska Indian whose name we know is Blackbird. He was head chief of the Omaha tribe and lived more than one hundred years ago in the Omaha coun try, which then extended on both sides of the Missouri River from Bow River in Cedar County to PapUhon Creek in Sarpy County. Blackbird died about the year 1800, before there were any white settlements in Nebraska. He left behind him a fame so fierce and cruel among the Indians that it endures to this day. During Blackbird 's life Nebraska belonged to France and Spain and French and Spanish traders came up the river to deal with the Indians for furs. Blackbird was one of the flrst Indian chiefs on the Missouri to do business ¦R-ith the white traders. He was very shrewd in his deahng. ^Tien a trader came to his viUage he had him bring all his goods into the chief 's lodge and spread them out. Blackbird then selected the things he wished, — blankets, tobacco, whisky, powder, bullets, beads and red paint, — and laid them to one side, not offering any pay for them. Then, calling his herald, he ordered him to climb to the top of the lodge and summon all the tribe to bring in their furs and trade with the white man. In a few minutes the lodge would be crowded with Indians bearing beaver, buffalo, otter and other skins. No one was allowed to dispute the prices fixed by the white trader, who was careful to put them high enough to pay five times over for all the goods taken by the chief. Thus Blackbird and the traders grew rich together, but his people grew poor and began to complain. A wicked trader noticed this and gave Blackbird a secret by which he 18 BLACKBIRD 19 could maintain his power. He taught him the use of arsenic and gave him a large supply of that deadly poison. After that the terror of Blackbird and his mysterious power grew in the tribe. He became a prophet as well as a chief. When anyone opposed him Blackbird foretold his death within a certain time and within that time a sudden and violent dis ease carried the victim off in great agony. Before long all his rivals disappeared and the people agreed to everything Blackbird wished. Blackbird was also a great warrior. When a boy he was captured by the Sioux, but escaped and fought them after ward until they feared his name. He led his warriors against the Pawnees and burned one of their large towns. He took scalps from the Otoes and from the Kanzas tribes. To his ability as a fighter he added the mysterious art of "making medicine" which would overcome his enemies. Once when following the trail of a hostile war party across the prairies he fired his rifle often into the hoofprints of their horses, telling his bajid it would cripple them so that they would be over taken. He did overtake and kill them all and his tribe looked upon the fact as proof of the wonderful effect of his "medicine." The Ponca Indians lived at the mouth of the Niobrara River, in what is now Boyd and Knox counties, and were neighbors of the Omahas. The two tribes were related and spoke languages much alike. A party of Ponca young men made a raid on the Omahas and stole a number of horses and women. Blackbird gathered all his fighting men and started to "eat up the Poncas." He drove them into a rude fort made by throwing up a wall of dirt. The Omahas greatly outnumbered the Poncas and were about to kill them all. The Poncas sent a herald carrying a peace pipe. Blackbird shot him down. Another herald was treated in the same way. Then the head chief of the Poncas sent his daughter, a young girl, in her finest Indian suit of white buckskin, with the peace pipe. Blackbird relented, took the pipe from the 20 STORIES OF NEBRASKA girl's hand, smoked it and there was peace between the tribes. The Ponca maiden became the favorite wife of Blackbird. She had great influence over him, but in one of his violent fits of anger he drew a knife and struck her dead. When he knew what he had done his rage ended in violent grief. He covered his head with a buffalo robe and sat down by the dead body, refusing to eat or sleep. He answered no one. The tribe feared that he would starve to death. One of them brought a child and, laying it on the ground, put Blackbird's foot upon its neck. This touched the chief's heari. He threw off his buffalo robe, forgot his deep sorrow and resumed his duties. At last an enemy came against the Omahas which not even Blackbird with all his medicine and mystery could withstand. This was the smaUpox, the white man 's disease which the Indians had never known. It came among them like a curse. They could not understand how it traveled from lodge to lodge and from viUage to viUage. The fever and the fearful blotches drove them wild. Some of them left their villages and rushed out on the prairies to die alone. Others set fire to their houses and kUled their wives and children. Two thirds of the Omaha tribe perished and it never after recovered its old strength and power. Blackbird, the great chief, was finally stricken. His friends gathered about his dying bed to hear his last word. He ordered them to bury him on the top of the great hUl which rose several hundred feet above the INIissouri and from which one could see up and down the river for thirty mUes. Here the Indians watched for the coming of the white traders, and the latter as they toiled against the current saw its sumniit with joy, for they knew great springs of cold water gushed from the sandstone rock at the foot of the hiU and there were rest and food and friendship for the white man in the lodges of the Omaha village. On the top of this hill Blackbird desired to be buried, seated on his favorite horse BLACKBIRD 21 so that his spirit might overlook the entire Omaha country and first see the boats of the white men as they came up the river. The dying chief's command was carried out. The horse was led to the summit of the hUl with the dead chief firmly fastened upon his back. Then the sod and dirt were pUed about them in a great mound until both were buried from sight. A pole was set in the mound and upon it were hung Blackbird Hill. (From Thwaites's "Early Western Travels.'' Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio.) scalps Blackbird had taken in battle. From time to time food for the spirit of the dead was placed upon the mound by the few Omahas who survived the smallpox scourge of 1800. When Lewis and Clark came up the river in 1804 the mound and pole were yet there. All the other early writers mention the mound. It was the great landmark of the Nebraska shore. In 1832 George Catlin, the painter and traveler who spent years among the western Indians paint ing their pictures and learning their life, came down the 22 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Pictured Rocks near Blackbird Hill (From photograph by A. E. Sheldon.) Missouri and chmbed up on Blackbird HiU. There was a gopher hole in the side of the mound. He dug into it and a skull dropped down. He quickly wrapped it in a blanket and carried it to Wash ington where it was placed in the Smithson ian Museum. These are some of the stories told about Black bird by the old Indians and early white men; told around the camp- fires in the long cold winter nights or in the circle of story tellers which sits on hot July days beneath the shade of a great tree in the Omaha country. Stories told in this way are often changed in the telling. We cannot say how far they are changed, but whether much or httle, they seemed to be all that we were ever hkely to know of the hfe of the first noted Nebraska Indian. In the year 1914, however, there was given to the world new and important information about Blackbird. In Seville, Spain, an American historian, Roscoe R. Hill, found an original diary kept in Nebraska by Jean Baptiste Truteau in the years 1794 and 1795. Truteau was a French fur trader who left St. Louis, June 7, 1794. He was stopped on his way by Chief Blackbird who robbed him of most of his goods. This is what he says of Blackbird: "This grand chief of the Mahas is the most cunning, the most wily, and the greatest rascal of all the nations which Uve on the Missouri. He is feared and respected and in great renown with the stronger nations who do not dare oppose him openly nor agitate against his wiU. He aUows no movement, either in war or in hunting, to which he has not given his consent. His name is quoted in all BLACKBIRD 23 the assemblies and councils held in his absence in places the most remote where people gather. If some one of his people acquire beautiful goods or fine horses which he seems to desire, they hasten to give them to him. He never travels on foot; he is always mounted on one of the most beautiful horses which is in his viUage. He has slaves to wait upon him, or rather one would say, they are all his slaves; for if he wishes to sleep he has one or two attend ants who softly rub his legs and his feet while he slumbers. If his ordinary servants are absent, the most eminent and the bravest of his tribe perform equally this office. "If it is necessary to waken him it must be done with caution, taking great care not to call in his ear nor to rub his hand. In sleep they wave feathers lightly over his face or softly tickle certain parts of his body. In a word, he is a man who by his spirit and his strategems is elevated to such a high place of authority among the nations that there is no other example hke him among all the other savage people of the continent. He is able to do and to cause to have done good or ill whenever it pleases him. For it is not only his deeds in war which have given him so much power, as he has always been inchned to peace, but by the fear which his people and his neighbors have of certain poisons which he uses, so they say, to cause those to die who displease him." Blackbird Hill stands close by the side of the great river to-day as it did a hundred years ago. Great springs gush from the sandstone cliffs at its base. Upon the walls of these chffs are deeply cut pictures of wild animals and strange Indian signs mingled with the names of early explorers. QUESTIONS 1. Was Blackbird a good chief? ^i'^hy? 2. Why was the smallpox more deadly to the Indians than to white men? 3. Do you think the Omaha Indians obeyed Blackbird's djdng request? LEWIS AND CLARK IN the year 1803, Nebraska was sold by Napoleon Bona parte, Emperor of France, to Thomas Jefferson, President of the United States. It was sold as part of the great coun try between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains, Lewis and Clark all of which was then called Louisiana and owned by France. The price paid was $15,000,000, which was about three cents an acre. As soon as the United States had bought this country, President Jefferson sent Captain Meriwether Lewis and Captain WiUiam Clark with forty-five other men to explore it. They were to go up the Missouri River as far as they could, then cross the Rocky Mountains and reach the Pacific Ocean. They were to make maps, bring back reports of the 24 LEWIS AND CLARK 25 land and make friends with the tribes with which they came in contact. It was a wild land of which white men knew very httle. Indians and wild animals had their homes there. No one knew the way across the mountains to the Pacific. Lewis and Clark started from Wood River near the mouth of the Missouri on May 14, 1804. They had one large boat with a sail and twenty-two oars, and two smaller boats with oars only. They had powder, lead, tools and trink ets to trade with the Indians. They had two horses for their hunters to ride to help them carry the game which they killed. The Lewis and Clark party made about fifteen miles a day up the Missouri River. Part of the time they used the saU and part of the time the oars and a great part of the time they pulled the boats with long ropes which the men held whUe they walked along the shore. It was two months be fore they reached Nebraska, at the mouth of the Nemaha River, not far from the village of Rulo, in Richardson County. Here they found Indians, wild plums, cherries and grapes. On July 15th they were at the mouth of the little Nemaha River and on July 20th they were at the mouth of the Weep ing Water in Cass County, where they killed a large yellow wolf. The next day they reached the mouth of the Platte River and camped a little way above it. They sent out runners to the village of the Otoes near the place where the Elkhorn flows into the Platte. After resting and repairing their boats they went on past the site of Omaha and on July 30th reached a high bluff near the present town of Fort Calhoun in Washington County. Here they camped. The hunters brought in deer, wild turkeys and geese. Catfish were caught in the river and the men tamed a beaver. Here on August 3d they held the first council ever held by the United States with the Nebraska Indians. Fourteen Otoe and Missouri Indians came to the council. The principal chiefs were Little Thief, Big Horse and White Horse. They promised to keep peace with the United States and were given medals and presents of paint, 26 STORIES OF NEBRASKA powder and cloth. They gave the white men presents of watermelons. The place where this councU was held was named Council-bluff and is now a part of the town of Fort Calhoun. A hundred years after this a large rock was placed on the schoolhouse grounds in memory of this first councU held with the Indians west of the Mississippi River. On August 11th the party reached Blackbird HUl in Thurston County, where it found the grave of the great The Lewis and Clark Monument at Fort Calhoun, Nebraska. (From photograph by A . E. Sheldon.) Omaha chief who died of smaUpox about four years before. On August 16th the party was at the mouth of Omaha Creek in Dakota County. Here the men made a net of wU- lows and with it pulled out over eleven hundred fish from a beaver pond in the creek. Sergeant Charles Floyd, a member of the party, died on August 20th and was buried on a high bluff on the Iowa side of the river near Sioux City. This is caUed Floyd's Bluff LEWIS AND CLARK 27 to this day. It is a landiriark which may be seen for many miles across the Missouri valley in Nebraska. On the 28th of August they camped at Calumet Bluff in Cedar County, where they held a great council with the Sioux Indians under a large oak tree. First the pipe of peace was smoked. Then Chief Shake Hand said: "I see before me my father 's two sons. You see me and the rest of our chiefs. We are very poor. We have no powder nor ball nor knives and our women and children at the vUlage have no clothes. I went formerly to the English and they gave me a medal and some clothes. When I went to the Spanish they gave me a medal, but nothing to keep it from my skin; but now you give me a medal and clothes. Still we are poor and I wish, brothers, you would give us something for our squaws." Then White Crane and Struck-by-the-Pawnee spoke, approving what the old chief had said, and asked for some of the great father's milk, wliich was their name for whisky. Presents were given these Sioux and peace was made between them and the United States. On September 4th Lewis and Clark camped just above the mouth of the Niobrara River. Here for the first time they met the Ponca Indians, who had long made their home in this part of Nebraska. A little beyond, they saw great herds of buffalo and also elk, deer and vUlages of prairie dogs. Soon after they crossed the Nebraska line into South Dakota. Two years later, in September, 1806, Lewis and Clark came back from the Pacific Ocean to Nebraska. They had suffered great hardships on the journey. Many times they had nearly lost their lives from hunger and thirst, from war like Indians and wUd animals, from rocks in the rivers and from pathless woods and mountains. But they had lived through them all and carried the flag of the United States for the first time across the mountains and plains to the great ocean on the other side. And now they came back with honor and glory for they had found a way to the Pacific Ocean and they had written the story of their travels in a book 28 STORIES OF NEBRASKA which they kept every day, teUing aU about the tribes of Indians they had seen and the rivers and mountains and the land they had crossed. They made a path for white men into the great West and after them came hunters, trappers, traders and em igrants until the West was explored and settled. Captain Clark for many years Uved at St. Louis and was govemor 'of the great West which he explored. He was taU, very strongly built, with piercing gray eyes and red hair. His appearance made a deep impression on the Indians, who had never before seen a red-haired man. The Omaha Indians to this day call St. Louis the town of red-haired men. Here the Indians came to hold councUs with him. Here he met the traders, trappers and early emigrants, and here he died in September, 1838, beloved by all who knew him. Captain Lewis lived only three years after the return of the expedition, dying in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1809. The names of Lewis and Clark are forever linked together in the history of the West. The Clark Monument at St. Louis. (From photograph by A. E. Sheldon.) QUESTIONS 1. With what tribes of Nebraska Indians did Lewis and Clark meet? 2. Show on the map the location of each place mentioned in this story. 3. Why did Chief Shake Hand say his people were very poor? 4. Which did more for Nebraska, the Mallet Brothers or Lewis and Clark? 5. How much of Nebraska did Lewis and Clark explore? 6. What do the pictures of these two men tell you of their characters? HOW THE SPANISH FLAG CAME DOWN ON July 15, 1806, Lieutenant Zebulon M. Pike with twenty-two men left St. Louis on an expedition to explore the plains and find a road to Santa Fe. After a long march across Missouri and Kansas he arrived, September 25th, in the Republican valley near the border of Nebraska. Here he found the great village of the Pawnee republic num bering nearly two thousand people. He also found that a party of three hundred Spanish cavalry from Santa Fe had visited the village three or four weeks before. The Spanish commander had given the Pawnees presents, had promised to open a road for trade and had left with them a Spanish flag, which was flying from a pole in front of the Pawnee chief 's lodge. Lieutenant Pike held a grand council with the Pawnees on September 29th, and told them that they must haul down the Spanish flag and in its place raise the Stars and Stripes, for their land no longer belonged to Spain but was a part of the United States. The chiefs were silent, for the Spaniards had come with a great force on horseback bringing many presents, while the American lieutenant had only twenty-two men on foot. All around were hundreds of Pawnee warriors ready for battle. The young American lieutenant, pointing at the Spanish flag, said that the Pawnee nation could not have two fathers, they must either be the children of the Spanish king or acknowledge their American father. After a long silence an old Indian rose, went to the door of the lodge, took down the Spanish flag, brought it to Lieu tenant Pike and laid it at his feet. He then took the Ameri can flag and raised it on the staff where the Spanish flag had floated. It is believed by some that the place where this took place 29 30 STORIES OF NEBRASKA is about eight mUes southeast of Hardy, Nebraska, just across the Nebraska hne in Kansas. Here is the site of a large Pawnee village, stretching for several miles along the banks of the Repubhcan River, and here in September, 1906, the state of Kansas raised a flag and erected a monument to mark the spot where, one hundred years before, the Spanish flag came down and the Stars and Stripes were raised. There are others who believe that the Spanish flag came down in what is now Nebraska, and that the site of an ancient Pawnee village some miles farther up the Republican river is the place where Lieutenant Pike and his httle com pany of soldiers saw the American flag raised over the Pawnee nation. Whether the spot where the Spanish flag came down is in Kansas or in Nebraska is not important. The Spanish flag came down forever and in its place rose the Stars and Stripes. This brave deed of the young lieutenant and his men deserves to be honored in history. QUESTIONS 1. When did the Stars and Stripes become the flag of this nation? 2. What was especially brave in Lieutenant Pike's action here? 3. Why might not the Spanish flag continue to wave over the Pawnee village? JOHN COLTER'S ESCAPE NEBRASKA, when first made on the map, included all the country from the present Nebraska-Kansas line north to Canada. In this first Nebraska of the early days, in the part that is now Montana, there occurred the remarkable escape of John Colter. John Colter was a trapper who crossed the continent to the Pacific Ocean with Lewis and Clark. On their way back, in 1806, Colter saw so many signs of beaver on the head waters of the Missouri that he got leave of Captain Lewis to stay there and trap. This was in the heart of the country of the terrible Blackfoot Indians. Captain Lewis had killed a Blackfoot warrior who was trying to steal horses and from that time the tribe hated white men and killed them without mercy. Colter knew all this, but he loved to trap and with another hunter named Potts he plunged into the wilds of the best beaver streams of the Blackfoot hunting grounds. The two men knew the great risk they ran and they knew also the ways of the Indians. They set their traps at night, took them up early in the moming, and hid during the day. Early one morning they were softly pad dling up a small creek in their canoe to take in some traps when they heard a trampling on the bank. Colter said, "Indians," and wanted 31 Blackpoot Warriors. (From Thwaites's "Early Western Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio.) 32 STORIES OF NEBRASKA to go back. Potts said, "Buffalo," and kept on. A few more strokes of the paddle and they were surrounded on both shores by hundreds of Blackfoot warriors who made signs to the trappers to come to them. Since they could not escape. Colter tumed the canoe toward shore. As they came to land an Indian seized Potts' rifle, but Colter, who was a very strong man, wrested it from him and handed it to Potts. The latter killed an Indian with it, but was himself shot full of arrows. The Indians now took Colter, stripped him, and began to talk about how they would kill him. At first they were go ing to put him up as a mark to be shot at, but the chief, desiring to have greater sport, asked Colter if he could run fast. Colter understood enough of their language to tell him that he was a very poor runner, although he was one of the swiftest runners among the hunters . Then the chief took him out on the prairie a few hundred yards and tumed him loose to run for his life. The Indians gave their war-whoop and started after him. Colter ran straight across an open plain toward the Jefferson River six miles away. The plain was covered with cactus, and at every jump the bare feet of the naked man were filled with cactus thorns. On Colter ran, swifter than he had ever before run in his life, with those hun dreds of Blackfoot warriors after him. He ran nearly haU way across the plain before he dared to look back over his shoulder. He saw that he had far outrun all the Indians except one who carried a spear and was not more than a hun dred yards behind him. A faint hope now rose in Colter's heart, but he had run so hard that blood gushed from his nose and covered his body. He ran on until within a mile of the river, when he heard the steps of the Indian with the spear close behind him and, turning his head, saw he was not more than twenty yards away. Colter stopped suddenly, turned around and spread out his arms. The Indian, surprised, tried to stop also, but was so exhausted that he fell to the ground and broke his JOHN COLTER'S ESCAPE 33 spear. Colter at once picked up the point of the spear and with it pinned the Indian to the earth. He then ran on while the other Indians came "up to their dead comrade and yelled horribly over his body. Colter, using every moment, soon gained the shelter of the trees on the bank and plunged into the river. A little below was an island, at the upper end of which was a great raft of driftwood in the water. Colter dived under this raft and after some trouble got his head above the water between large logs which screened him from view. He had hardly done this when the Indians came down the river bank yelling like fiends. They hunted the shores, walked out on the raft of driftwood over Colter's head, pulling the logs and peering among them for hours. Once Colter thought they were about to set the raft on fire. Not until after dark, when the Indians were no longer heard, did Colter dare to venture from his hiding place. He swam down the river a long distance, then came out on the bank. He was alone in the wUderness, naked, without a weapon and with his feet torn to pieces by the sharp cactus thorns. He was hundreds of miles from the nearest trading post on the Yellowstone, in a country of hostile savages. But he was alive and fear less and strong. A week later he reached the trading post, sunburnt and starving, but saved. QUESTIONS 1. What knowledge of Indian ways did John Colter show? 2. Describe the man who would be a successful trapper. 3. What is the most striking incident of this story? MANUEL LISA MANUEL LISA was the founder of Old Nebraska. Old Nebraska was the Nebraska of one hundred years ago. It was, first of all, a narrow strip of country along the Missouri River where the white men came to trade with the Indians and where they built log cabins in which to live and store their goods. Back of this narrow strip were the great plains and vaUeys of Nebraska with herds of buf falo, elk, deer and antelope, whose skins the Indians brought in from their summer and winter hunting trips. In the streams and lakes were plenty of beaver, mink and otter and their pelts were taken by the Indians and .^BM ^ i£fJUff//F( /Ik. ^^S^^^y bought by the trader. jf^^H^m^^^KKn^//v//jmS All the traders in Old Nebraska r W^Sslf///////-L^ ///I '// came up the river from St. Louis in open boats. Some times these boats were canoes hollowed out of a great tree and sometimes they were made out of plank. These boats had oars and sometimes a mast and small saU. It was easy to go down the river in them, but to come up against the swift current was very hard and slow. Each boat was puUed up the river by a long rope called a cordelle, the men walking along the bank or splashmg across the sand bars and shallows with the rope over their shoul- 34 Manuel Lisa. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) MANUEL LISA 35 ders. It took them fifty days to drag a boat from St. Louis to the mouth of the Platte. The trip down was made in ten days. The men who pulled these boats and those who traded with the Nebraska Indians in those days were nearly all Frenchmen, but the greatest leader among them was Manuel Lisa, a Spaniard. He was born in New Orleans, came to St. Louis when a very young man and at once began trading with Indians. When the exploring party of Lewis and Clark came back in 1806 from its two years' trip to the Pacific Ocean with news of the rich fur country it had seen, Manuel Lisa was the first man to act. Early in 1807 he went far up ¦ the Missouri River and established trading posts. The next year he came down to St. Louis. Every year for the next twelve years he made long journeys with his men and boats up and down the river. He carried the white man 's goods to Indian tribes which had never dealt with traders before. He made friends everywhere and gathered great cargoes of fur which he sent down to St. Louis every summer. All the hardships and dangers of the frontier were nothing to him, helping his men to pull the boats, sleeping on the ground, going without food. In the twelve years he traveled over twenty-five thousand miles and spent three solid years on the Missouri River. In all Nebraska and far up the river ' ' Man uel" was most widely known as the great white man and leader. Trouble was brewing between the United States and Great Britain. The Hudson 's Bay Company wished to get all the furs from the Missouri River. It sent agents from its posts to all the tribes on the Missouri and the Mississippi stirring them up to attack the American settlers and making them presents of rifles and powder and lead. Tecumseh, the great Indian war chief of the west, was going from tribe to tribe urging all the Indians to forget their quarrels with each other and before it was too late to join in driving the white men from the country. Most of the tribes on the Mississippi 36 STORIES OF NEBRASKA River joined the league of Tecumseh and fought with the British against the United States. The tribes beyond the Missouri were four times as numerous as those on the Missis sippi. If they had joined the British and poured their thousands of warriors against the white settlements it is likely that St. Louis would have been taken and the frontier driven back five hundred miles. But though every effort British Flag on Nebraska Rocks, 1906. Sheldon.) (From photograph by A. E. was made to have them do so the Indians beyond the ]\Iis- souri remained true to the United States. On the chffs of Blackbird HiU deeply cut in the rock is a British flag. It was covered with moss when found and photographed in 1906. It was probably cut there a hundred years ago and may have marked a councU held between the British and the Omaha Indians, whose viUage was close by. It is the only place in Nebraska where the British flag is displayed. MANUEL LISA 37 Manuel Lisa was given chief credit for holding the Indians of the west at peace with our country. He was made sub- agent of the United States for all the tribes above the mouth of the Kansas River. He buUt Fort Lisa on the Missouri River ten miles above where Omaha now stands. Under his care all the great tribes of the plains, the Pawnee, Sioux, Omaha, Otoe, Ponca, Cheyenne, Mandan, Crow and Arikara, kept faith with the United States. Not only did they remain friends, but the Nebraska Indians crossed the Missouri River and attacked the loways, who were helping the British. Fort Lisa was the great trading post for all the plains region. Its influence was felt as far away as the moun tains. When the war ended Lisa had made a league of forty chiefs and was preparing to lead them the next year against the British and their Indian allies on the upper Mississippi. Manuel Lisa was the first white farmer in Nebraska. He had a hundred men in his employ and around each of his posts he had a small farm with cabins for the helpers. He had hundreds of horses, cattle, hogs and fowls. He brought to Nebraska the seed of the great squash, the lima bean, the potato and the turnip and gave them to the Indian tribes. Ever since that time these vegetables have been grown by the Nebraska Indians, and the great field squash, which Lisa said he had seen weighing 160 pounds, grown from the seed he brought here, has always been a favorite in the Indian gardens. There is a story of romance and sorrow connected with Lisa's family. When he first came to Nebraska he had a white wife in St. Louis. After a while he married an Omaha Indian girl, telling her people he had another wife down the river. Among the Indians it was common for a man to have more than one wife and the early Indian traders very often married a wife in each tribe where they traded in order to make friends and help their business. While Lisa was gone to St. Louis a daughter was born to him in Nebraska. The Indian mother was very proud of her little girl, and when the 38 STORIES OF NEBRASKA 'Aunt Manuel," First Known White Woman in Nebraska. (From photo graph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) time came for Lisa to return she took her baby every day down to the river and watched aU day long for her husband's boat in order to be the first to meet hun and show him their child. When he came the baby was named RosaUe. The next year a son was born to Lisa and his Indian wife. He was named Raymond. When Rosalie was two years old her father wished to take her with him to St. Louis to be brought up and to go to school among the white people. The mother was very un wUling to let her go and was wUd with grief when the boat with the httle girl and her father passed out of sight down the river. This was in the summer of 1817. That faU Lisa's first wife died, and on August 5, 1818, he was married in St. Louis to Mary Hempstead Keeney. She was a charm ing woman, very much loved by aU who knew her. At this time the United States was about to send an exploring party with soldiers up the Missouri on the first steamboats ever used on that river. The soldiers were to winter in Nebraska. When Lisa knew this he planned to have his white wife go up the river and spend the winter at Fort Lisa, helping to entertain the officers and making friends to secure trade, for Lisa was always thinking of more trade. She did so and was the first white woman to come into Nebraska, with the possible exception of Madam Lajoie in 1770. Lisa sent word to Fort Lisa to have his Indian wife given presents and told to keep away from the fort whUe his white wife was there. Mitain, as the Indian wife was called, did so for a time, but at last came in with her little boy Rajmiond. During Lisa's long stay in St. Louis the Indian mother was working one day, with other squaws, in a garden near the fort. The Sioux came suddenly upon them. The other MANUEL LISA 39 women ran at once. Little Raymond was strapped to his cradle board resting against a tree. His mother rushed through the Sioux, seized her baby and ran for the fort. The Sioux were close upon her when near the fort, so she threw baby, board and all, over the wall, receiving a wound and risking her own life to save her child. When Lisa heard her story he praised the mother, petted the boy and gave them both presents, telling the mother to go back to her people. The next year, 1820, Lisa prepared to go down the river to St. Louis. He sent for Mitain and told her that Raymond, who was then four years old, must go with him to be educated. The mother quickly seized her boy, ran to the river, sprang in a boat and rowed to the other side. She stayed out in the woods that night. In the morning she came back and gave the chUd to his father, saying that she knew it was better for him to learn the white man 's way. She begged Lisa to take her with him. She would live in any little corner that he would provide for her and make no trouble if only she might see her children now and then. Lisa would not agree to this, but offered her many presents if she would return to her tribe. The poor Indian mother broke into tears, saying that their marriage was for life, that she could not marry now among her own people and that Lisa was about to ruin her life and break her heart by taking both her children from her. Her tears and appeals did not move Lisa. He did not seem to know that an Indian mother loves her children even as does a white mother and that no presents can pay her for the loss of them. He prepared to take Ray mond, when the United States officers interfered and made him give the child to its mother. Lisa went on his way down the river with his white wife. Rosalie Lisa Ely. [From photograph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) 40 STORIES OF NEBRASKA He never saw Nebraska again, for he died, August 12, 1820, at St. Louis. He is buried in Bellefontaine Cemetery there, and by his side lies his wife who lived nearly fifty years after his death. She was a friend of the fur traders and of the Indians all her life and was called by everyone "Aunt Man uel." It is the name cut on her tombstone. In his will Lisa left money for the education of his two Indian children and two thousand dollars for each of them when they should be of age. Raymond died while yet a young man. Rosalie grew to womanhood, and was well educated, married and lived happily with Mr. Madison Ely, a white man. She died at Trenton, Illinois, December 21, 1904, leaving several children who are stiU hving. The mother of Rosalie and Raymond was seen at BeUevue by Prince Maximilian in 1833. She wore a deep scar where the Sioux struck her when she saved the Ufe of her boy. Her story was told to all the travelers who came up the river. When she died and where she is buried no one knows. Some where an unmarked mound of Nebraska soil holds the dust of the Nebraska Indian woman who proved her mother love by sacrifice and sorrow. QUESTIONS 1. What products were shipped from Nebraska in Manuel Lisa's time? 2. What good things did Manuel Lisa do? 3. What things did he do that you do not like? 4. What kind of a man did the early fur trader need to be? 5. What do you think of the first known white woman in Nebraska as judged by her picture? 6. What do you imagine Rosalie and Raymond did for a good time in those early Nebraska days? THE RETURN OF THE ASTORIANS IN the last week of March of the year 1813 seven men might have been seen leading an old horse down the val ley of the North Platte. They were white men who had come all the way from the mouth of the Columbia River in Oregon and had walked all the way from the Snake River in Idaho where the Crow Indians had robbed them of their horses. Their one poor old horse they had got from the Snake Indians, trading them a pistol, a knife and an ax for him. The names of these men were Robert Stuart, Ramsay Crooks, Robert McLellan, Ben Jones, Andri Valla, Francis LeClerc and Joseph Miller. Almost three years before, on October 21, 1810, a party under Wilson Price Hunt had left St. Louis intending to cross the mountains and build a fort for the American Fur Company in Oregon. On their way up the Missouri River the Hunt party had the most remarkable keel boat race in history. This was with Manuel Lisa, who left St. Louis nineteen days later and wished to overtake them. The race was a thousand miles long and lasted sixty days. It was won by Lisa who overtook Hunt a little beyond where Fort Pierre, South Dakota, now is. At the Arikara vUlages near the mouth of Grand River, Hunt left his boats, traded for horses, and set out to find a shorter way to Oregon than the one taken by Lewis and Clark. Their new route took them over very rough coun try in the Black Hills and Big Horn Mountains. After great losses and hardships they reached the mouth of the Columbia River, where they built a fort which they named Astoria, after John Jacob Astor, of New York, the president of the fur company. From Astoria, on the 29th of June, 1812, the little party of seven men set out to return to the United States in order to 41 42 STORIES OF NEBRASKA carry word to Mr. Astor in New York. All the summer and fall they had marched across the deserts and mountains. To avoid the fierce Blackfoot Indians they kept to the south of the route by which they went out. By so doing they met a party of Crows who stole all of their horses. The seven men were thus left afoot in a wild country without roads and more than a thousand miles from any white settlement. They burned their baggage to keep the Indians from getting any of it, and with their rifles and such things as they coiold carry on their backs began their long tramp toward the Missouri River. One of their number became sick and they were obliged to carry him for several days and then to camp and •give him "Indian sweat" until he got weU. Soon after they began to climb the Rocky Mountains and game became so scarce that they nearly starved. They fished in a mountain stream but caught no fish. For three days they went hungry. One of them, crazed for want of food, said that they must draw lots and one of them be kiUed to feed the rest. The others took away his gun, and the next day. they killed an old buffalo, which saved their lives. A few days later they found a camp of Snake Indians and traded with them for an old horse. With this old horse to carry their things they kept on through the mountains until they found a way to the eastern slope, not far from where the South Pass was later found. They were the first white men to cross the mountains at this point and find their way to the vaUey eastward which afterward became the route for the Oregon and California trail. On October 26th they reached the upper waters of the Platte River. They did not know what stream it was or where it would lead them, but they foUowed it untU the 2nd of November, when they made a winter camp where there was timber and game, and not far from where Casper, Wyoming, is now. In three days they kUled forty-seven buffalo. They built a log cabin, used the buffalo skins to cover it, dried the buffalo meat and had made themselves comfortable for the winter when a band of THE RETURN OF THE ASTORIANS 43 twenty-three Arapahoes on the warpath against the Crows came to their cabin nearly starved. The Astorians fed them all night with dried buffalo meat. The next day as soon as the Arapahoes had left in pursuit of the Crows the Astorians packed their faithful old horse with what he could carry and hurried away from their snug cabin in the mountains, leav ing all the rest to the Indians. It was the 13th of December when the Astorians left their winter quarters. The snow was two feet deep in the moun tains. Their feet became sore from breaking through the hard crust. Their old horse had nothing to eat but willow twigs and cottonwood bark, but they struggled on for four teen days in which time they made about 330 miles. The country began to change. The mountains gave place to hiUs and the hills to plains. There was no wood and the snow lay deep on the ground. They feared they would freeze to death so they went back three days' march (about seventy-seven miles) and on December 30th made camp again where there was wood and buffalo. This camp was in Nebraska not far from where Bridgeport is now. Here they stayed until March and made two large canoes to travel with on the river, but the North Platte (for it was that stream) was so shallow that they were obliged to leave their canoes after all their hard work in making them and start again on foot accompanied by their faithful old horse. So it was that on March 20, 1813, they left their last camp and joumeyed down the North Platte valley. They saw a herd of sixty-five wild horses and longed to be mounted on Monument TO the Astorians at Bellevue, Nebraska. (From photograph by A. E. Sheldon.) 44 STORIES OF NEBRASKA them as they galloped away. Day after day they marched along leading their old horse with his burden. On either side of the wide North Platte valley the great prairie stretched away covered with buffalo, but no human being was in sight. They passed great swamps where they saw thousands of wild swan, geese and ducks. They were probably in what is now Garden County. ' There were no trees and they made their only fires with dry refuse on the prairies. In the early days of April they reached a great island, about seventy miles long, in the Platte River. When they saw this island, now called Grand Island, they were for the first time sure that they were in the Platte River vaUey, for hunters had already brought word of this island in the Platte. Three days later they met an Otoe Indian who took them to his viUage. Here they met two white traders from St. Louis to whom they traded their old horse for a canoe, and on the 18th of April they floated into the Missouri River and down to St. Louis. To these seven men and their old horse belongs the honor of first exploring the North Platte valley and first finding a central route through the Rocky Mountains. They were real path-finders of the great West. QUESTIONS 1. How did the Astorian party find its way across the deserts and mountains with no road and no guide? 2. Where did the wild horses come from which they saw in the North Platte valley? 3. What part of Nebraska did this partj- explore? MAJOR LONG'S EXPEDITION IN 1819, the United States government sent an expedition under Major Stephen H. Long to explore the Platte River and the mountain region beyond. This expedition is famous because it brought the first steamboat to the Nebraska shores and placed the great American Desert on the map. The steamboat was named the Western Engineer, and left Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, May 5, 1819, for the long journey down the Ohio, then up the Mississippi to St. Louis, and thence up the Missouri River to the old Council Bluff of Lewis and Clark. The Western Engineer was well calculated to strike terror into the hearts of the western Indians who had never seen a steamboat. The bow of the boat rose in the form of a huge, black, scaly serpent with open mouth, from which poured smoke and steam when the boat was under way. The Indians who saw this boat said, "White man, bad man, keep Great Spirit chained, build fire under him to make him paddle the boat." This serpent steamboat arrived at Fort Lisa, ten miles above the present site of Omaha, on September 17th. The party under Major Long at once began to prepare cabins for winter quarters. The spot they chose, with plenty of wood and stone near at hand for building and for fuel, may still be found between the high bluff and the Missouri River. There were twenty people in Major Long's party, some of them engineers, some scientists in botany, geology and zoology, and one artist. The fall and winter were spent in study of the animals, plants and rocks, in holding councils with the Indians, learning their language and customs, and in keeping record of the weather. There were many meetings with the Indians, and many very interesting speeches made. On October 4th one hun- 45 46 STORIES OF NEBRASKA dred Otoes, seventy Missourias and sixty loways gave a dance. On October 9th seventy Pawnees did the same. On October 14th four hundred Omahas assembled and a great speech was made by their chief. Big Elk, who said, among other things : "Here I am, my Father; all these young people you see around here are yours; although they are poor and httle, yet they are your children. All my nation loves the whites and always have loved them. Some think, my Father, that you Council with Otoes by Major Long's Expedition. (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio.) have brought all these soldiers here to take om- land from us but I do not believe it. For although I am a poor simple Indian, I know that this land wUl not suit your farmers. If I even thought your hearts bad enough to take this land, I would not fear it, as I know there is not wood enough on it for the use of the whites." White Cow, another Omaha chief, said: "Look at me, my Father, look at my hands. I am a wUd man born on the prairie. Look at me and see if there is any blood of your people upon me. Some whose hands are red with blood, try to wash it off, but it still remains." In the council with the Pawnees, speeches were made by MAJOR LONG'S EXPEDITION 47 Long Hair, Knife Chief, Fool-Robes-Son, Petalesharu. This last one was father of the famous chief of the same name. He spoke thus: "Father, I am not afraid of these people, these Pawnees you see here. I have seen people travel in blood, I have traveled in blood myself, but it was the blood of redskins, no others. Father I have no longer a desire for war, I desire to eat in peace. I am glad to see you write down all that has been said. When a man dies his actions are forgotten; but when they are written down it is not so. When I have seen a person poor and I had a horse to spare, or a blanket, I have given it to them. From this time I undergo a change. I am now an American and you shall hear that this is true." On June 6, 1820, Major Long with twenty-one men mounted on horses left the winter quarters on the banks of the Missouri for the head of the Platte River. They followed the Indian traU across the prairie to PapiUion Creek, where they made their first camp. Keeping on the north side of the Platte, the party crossed the Elkhorn River, Shell Creek, and Beaver Creek, arriving on June 11th at the Pawnee villages on the Loup. The villages stretched along the Loup for a distance of ten miles and held about six thousand Pawnees. Eight thousand Indian ponies fed on the grass of the Loup valley about the viUages. The Pawnees tried to persuade Major Long to go no farther, teUing him that the fierce tribes of the upper Platte would eat up his little band. Major Long se cured as guides two French trappers who were living with the Pawnees, and pushed on. June 21st the Long expedition arrived at the junction of the North Platte and South Platte. Crossing both streams the party continued for several days up the south bank of the South Platte, making its last stop in what is now Nebraska on the 26th of June near the corner of Deuel and Keith counties. The expedition marched to where the South Platte issues from its canyon in the Rocky Mountains, then 48 STORIES OF NEBRASKA turned south and returned to the Mississippi River by way of the Arkansas. There were two principal results from Major Long's expedition. The first was a very accurate description of Indian customs and Indian life as they existed among the Map op the Great American Desert as made by Major Long, 1820. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) Omahas, Otoes, and Pawnees a hundred years ago. This series of stories of Indian life covers several hundred pages of his report. They were obtained through Indian traders and interpreters who had spent their lives with these tribes, and are to-day one of the best sources of information upon them. The other result of Major Long's expedition was that aU the country west of the Missouri River got a bad name, which stuck to it for fifty years. Upon the map prepared for Ma jor Long appears the words "Great Desert" stretching from the Platte valley to the Red River in Texas. In his report MAJOR LONG'S EXPEDITION 49 upon the country. Major Long said: "It is almost wholly unfit for cultivation and of course uninhabitable for people depending upon agriculture for their subsistence." QUESTIONS 1. Was Big Elk's reasoning correct in regard to the white men and the Indian land? 2. What do you think of Petalesharu's character from his speech? 3. What did Major Long's expedition do for Nebraska? OLD FORT ATKINSON ON the site of the CouncU Bluff where Lewis and Clark first held councU with the Indians, once stood Old Fort Atkinson, built in the year 1819, the first United States fort in Nebraska. The Rifle regiment and the Sixth Infantry were here. It was a large, strong fort with fifteen cannon and several hundred soldiers. Besides the soldiers there were teamsters, laborers, traders, hunters, trappers and Plan op Fort Atkinson, Nebraska, 1819-1S2 Martha Turner.) (Draicing by Miss Indians, making a town of nearly a thousand people. They had a brick yard and a lime kiln. Rock was quarried from the ledges along the river. A saw mill and a grist mill were kept busy. Hundreds of acres of rich Nebraska land were farmed and thousands of bushels of grain raised. Roads ran in all directions from this fort on the Council Bluff. Indians came to it from all parts of the West for it was the most western army post in the United States. From far-off 50 OLD FORT ATKINSON 51 Santa Fe Mexicans came here to meet the Pawnee Indians and make peace with them. White women were here. There were marriages and births. ChUdren played about the bluff and the first school in Nebraska was taught here. Fort Atkinson was the largest town of early Nebraska and the only town in Nebraska at that time. To this fort in the summer of 1823 came the news that a party of American trappers had been fired upon by the Arikara Indians and about twenty of them kUled. The Arikaras were related to the Pawnees. They lived on the Missouri river, in what is now South Dakota, five hundred miles above Fort Atkinson. They were different from the wild Indians on the plains for they lived in villages sur rounded with walls of dirt and fenced with timbers set on end in the ground. An Arikara had stolen horses from the trappers. He was horsewhipped by them. This led to the attack on the trappers. There were very busy times in the old fort on the Council Bluff when the news came. The bugles rang out calling the soldiers to their colors. Cannon and powder and shot were loaded into keel boats. The hunters and trappers at the fort seized their rifles. General Leavenworth started with over two hundred soldiers. He was joined by four hundred Sioux warriors, who were enemies of the Arikaras, and by several parties of hunters and rivermen. It was a month's march along the shores of the Missouri to reach the Arikara viUages. The keel boats with the cannon, powder and food were puUed up the river with ropes. Never before had such an army been seen on the North Nebraska prairies. On August 8th they arrived at the Arikara villages. The can non were placed on a hill and their heavy balls fired into the vUlage while the Sioux under their chief White Bear fought with the Arikara warriors outside the walls. Gray Eyes, chief of the Arikaras, and about forty of his people were killed. The tribe sued for peace and a treaty was made whUe the white soldiers and the Sioux feasted on roasting 52 STORIES OF NEBRASKA ears from the Arikara cornfields. No white soldiers were kiUed and the army returned to Fort Atkinson. This is called the Arikara war of 1823 and is the first war on the Nebraska frontier. There was quiet for a long time at Fort Atkinson. We know that in the summer the fur traders came up the river and keel boats from St. Louis brought stores and news from the world below. In the winter sleds traveled across the snow to other posts. Hunting parties from the fort went out to kill game for the soldiers. So many elk and deer were kUled in this way that the Omaha tribe could find no food on their old hunting grounds. Big Elk, chief of the tribe, came to the fort for help, saying that his people were starving while the soldiers killed and drove away the game. In 1827 Fort Atkinson was abandoned by the United States. All the soldiers were sent down the Missouri River. They drove away a great herd of cattle which supplied them with beef. They left the plowed fields to grow up with grass and weeds. All that was of use and could be carried was taken away. The buUdings were left. The traders and hunters went to BeUevue and other posts down the river. It was said that the Indians burned the buUdings after the soldiers were gone. Six years later MaximUian, the great German traveler, found the fort in ruins. The great stone chimneys were standing and a brick storehouse was stiU under roof. Rat tlesnakes made the place their home. When the early settlers came to this part of Nebraska in 1854 and 1855, they were glad to find that the United States had provided them with such a supply of brick and stone ready to use for their chimneys and cellars. They tore down the ruins and carried them away to their farms. To-day the little village of Fort Calhoun, sixteen miles .north of Omaha, adjoins the site of Old Fort Atkinson. On the summit of the Council Bluff may still be traced the parade ground, the place where the flagstaff stood, the rows OLD FORT ATKINSON 53 of cellars where once were the officers' quarters and the bar racks where the soldiers lived. The ashes and broken brick where the great fireplaces were may still be found, as also the powder vault and the road running down Hook's Hollow to the boat landing on the river. Every spring when the people make gardens they plow up bullets and buttons with the name "Rifles" or the figure "6" for the Sixth In fantry, on them. Gold and silver coins are also found ^.m Flint Lock and Cannon Ball prom Fort Atkinson. (From photograph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) Most of them are Spanish coins with far away dates upon them, telling of the time when Spain ruled the greater part of America and her coins were in commerce everywhere. Such is the story of the CouncU Bluff and Old Fort Atkin son, the scene of the first council with Nebraska Indians, the site of the first fort, and the first impor tant town in the state. It was the center of busy life one hundred years ago. To-day the Missouri River is three miles away from the old landing beneath the bluff. The fort and its soldiers are gone. The Indian trader and hunter come no more. The Mexican no longer crosses the plains to make peace with the Pawnee. The very name of the old fort is forgotten. Yet here is one of the historic spots of early A Fort Atkinson Gravestone. (From pho tograph colleciion of A. E. Sheldon.) 54 STORIES OF NEBRASKA , y / - .- . -^ -' -^ "¦~^ : - . , . "".-.¦ ^ --' ¦ ' • ¦f _.-QL\ •¦-¦'/¦ . , -¦ .-...- -.. ^ „ .'A -'J • ' - ¦ <« - // . '¦ . . .- ' . . / ¦.../.<;- ¦'¦'¦•' ^. ¦ ,,. . . . ¦• r. .L ...... .^ ^ ' 1 .- '-..-^.- - - c ¦ \' y - ¦ -' ¦ ._ : _. ,- / :^ i -^ ^ , *"' ^ V ' .^- - ¦ • ^ - - " ~ ¦ ' ¦ ¦ ¦ v.. ' - ¦ ' ( 'i /^r^^:..... 4 . - ^- - --— ' -^t ¦ _ t The First School Kept in Nebraska. Orderly Book No. 18, Head quarters 6th Infantry, Fort Atkinson, Feb. 4, 1822 Nebraska whose memories should be cherished and whose story deserves to be told. QUESTIONS 1. Why did not white settlers come into Nebraska and farm as soon as the soldiers at Fort Atkinson found that fine crops could be grown on its rich land? 2. Why should the Omaha Indians be in danger of starving in such a rich land as Nebraska? 3. What does Fort Atkinson stand for in the "first things" of Nebraska? 4. What should be done with the site of old Fort Atkinson? BELLEVUE NO one living knows just when the first white men settled at Bellevue. The story has many times been told how Manuel Lisa climbed the sloping hills from the riverside where his boat lay moored and as his eye swept that wonder ful panorama of forest, hill and river he exclaimed in French, "Belle vue;" that he then staked out his fur trader's cabin in the valley below and thus began the first white settlement in our state. This was in the year 1810, so the story goes. Manuel Lisa himself left no writing to prove it and we know that Fort Lisa, his chief fur trading post, was twenty miles farther up the Missouri River. The old fur traders died long ago and the trees and hills about Bellevue which looked down upon their boats in the river tell no tales of these early "voyageurs." The Astorians who passed up the river in 1811 made no mention of the trading post of Bellevue and the soldiers who built Fort Atkinson in 1819 on the Council Bluff twenty-five miles above are equally silent in regard to it.The fur trading records first tell of Bellevue in 1823. There was then a fur trading post and an Indian agency, caUed the Council Bluffs Indian Agency, at Bellevue. The Omahas, Otoes and Pawnees came there to trade. It was easier for the fur traders and Indians to meet at Bellevue than at any other post on the river. The smooth valley of the Platte made a natural pathway; the rock foundation of the hills sloping to the riverside made a natural landing place for boats; wood and water were at hand; and the beautiful view down the valley where the Platte and Missouri mingle their waters among forested islands added to the other attractions. When the soldiers abandoned Fort Atkinson in 1827 and marched away, Bellevue became the chief post and the oldest 55 56 STORIES OF NEBRASKA town in fact as well as in story of the Nebraska country. The first of these honors she retained through all the fur trading years and the second remains hers to-day. BeUevue was the stopping place of the early adventurers, trappers, travelers, missionaries and soldiers who came to this region. The early names in our annals cluster about BeUevue. Peter A. Sarpy, Henry FonteneUe, Prince Maxi mihan, George Cathn, John C. Fremont, Professor Hayden, J. Sterling Morton, Brigham Young, each halted at this Bellevue in 1833. (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio.) Arthur H. hospitable lodge in the wilderness. The Indians of the Platte valley brought hither their furs. Missionaries made here their first attempt to civilize and Christiardze Nebraska. When steamboats began to make regular trips up the Missouri, Bellevue was one of the principal landing places. In 1846 the Presbyterian Church fixed on Bellevue as the site of its principal mission to the western Indians and in BELLEVUE 57 1848 the old mission building standing to-day was built. Here came the first governor to the Nebraska territory in 1854 and here the first newspaper, the Nebraska Palladium, was printed. All the signs then pointed to Bellevue as a future great metropolis of the Platte valley. Then came disaster after disaster to Bellevue 's fond hopes Bellevue Woods as Seen To-dat. Top op Child's Point, Looking East. {From phoio collection of A. E. Sheldon.) and aspirations. The capital was located at Omaha. The Pacific RaUroad left a natural crossing at Bellevue and a natural roadway up the valley of the Platte to find a more difficult crossing and longer route through Omaha. Sarpy county was created with Bellevue as the county seat, but even this distinction was carried off by the new town of PapiUion in 1875. 58 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Bellevue still stands by the riverside, the oldest town in Nebraska. Her early ambitions have been blighted but a wonderful compensation for their loss is hers. Hers is still the most beautiful site upon the river. No noise of factories or warehouses, no crowding of jealous poverty and sordid wealth within her borders, no ugly skyscrapers blot out her landscape. No clamor and rivalry of the market place dis turb her visions. She is still Old Bellevue, with all the glory and romance and early dreams of old Nebraska gathered within her borders. She is now and forever wiU remain the center of interest for all those who love the story of Nebras ka 's early days, and the keeper of Nebraska's earhest mem ories and traditions for all time. QUESTIONS 1. What reasons can you give why Bellevue did not become the largest city in Nebraska? 2. What reasons for believing that Bellevue was not founded in 1810? 3. In what sense is BeUevue Nebraska's oldest town? 4. What has determined the location of Nebraska towns and cities, judging from those you know? 5. Of what use to the state are historic places and old towns? GEORGE CATLIN GEORGE CATLIN was the first painter of Nebraska scenery and Nebraska Indians. Before him Thomas Seymour, one of the members of Major Long's expedition, made a few sketches, but the real first honors belong to Catlin. He was born in Pennsylvania in 1796, educated to be a lawyer, but became a portrait painter instead. A dele gation of Indians from the far West came to Philadelphia where he had his art studio. He resolved to become the painter of Indians and Indian life. He forsook the studio, came to St. Louis and took passage on the steamer Yellow stone on her first voyage to the upper waters of the Missouri River. This was in the year 1832. He stayed that winter with the Mandan Indians and came down the Missouri the next year, visiting all the tribes and painting pictures at every stopping place. Along Nebraska shores Catlin painted pictures of Black bird HUl, of Bellevue, of the junction of the Platte and Missouri rivers, of prairie fires, buffalo hunting, Indian weapons, games, customs and portraits of prominent Indians. There were no cameras in those days and Catlin 's oil paint ings make our first picture gallery. Catlin saw the fertility as well as the beauty of Nebraska. This description written by him of the country near Black bird Hill is true to-day as it was then : "There is no more beautiful prairie country in the world than that which is to be seen here. In looking back from this bluff toward the west there is one of the most beautiful scenes imaginable. The surface of the country is gracefully and slightly undulating, like the swells of the ocean after a heavy storm, and everywhere covered with a beautiful green turf and with occasional patches and clusters of trees. The 69 60 STORIES OF NEBRASKA soil in this region is also rich and capable of making one of the most beautiful and productive countries in the world. From this enchanting spot there is nothing to arrest the eye from ranging over the waters of the Missouri for the distance of twenty or thirty miles, where it quietly glides between its barriers formed of thousands of green and gracefuUy sloping The Steamer Yellowstone. (From Thwaites's "Early Westem Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio.) hills, with its rich alluvial meadows and woodlands — and its hundred islands covered with stately cottonwood." Catlin was the first white man to visit and describe the great Red Pipestone quarry on the border of South Dakota and Minnesota from which come the smoking pipes used by Indians far and near. In his honor this rock is called cat- Unite. As related elsewhere, Catlin carried away from Ne braska the skull from the burial mound of the Omaha chief Blackbird. GEORGE CATLIN 61 In 1840 Catlin visited Europe with a company of Ameri can Indians and gave entertainments in the principal coun tries. In 1857 he published his book on North American Indians with over 400 illustrations made from his oil paint ings. He died in New Jersey in 1872, having visited forty- eight Indian tribes and made over five hundred paintings of Indian life. These paintings are now in the National Museum at Washington, forming what is known as "Catlin 's North American Indian GaUery." QUESTIONS 1. In what respects was Catlin's work different from that of the other early explorers? 2. Wherein is his work of special interest and value? 3. What other artists have made pictures and statues of the American Indian'; 4. Why has the Indian been so interesting to writers and artists? PRINCE MAXIMILIAN PRINCE MAXIMILIAN was born in Germany m 1782. His full title was Maximilian, Prince von Wied. He was born with a fortune as well as a noble title and might have wasted his life in idleness and luxury like many other princes. But Prince Maximilian from chUdhood loved study. More than anything else he loved the study of nature. The new world across the ocean, with its unex plored wilderness, drew him to its wilds. He spent two years in the forests of Brazil and wrote several volumes upon that then unknown region. In 1833, Prince Maximilian made his famous journey up the Missouri River on the second voyage of the steamer Yel lowstone. With him were skiUed artists and scientists from Europe who gathered specimens and painted pictures of the country through which they traveled. The next year Prince Maximilian returned to Europe and four years later published at Coblentz, Germany, a story of his travels in North America in three volumes, one of which is an art portfolio filled with sketches and pictures of western life. Nebraska owes a great deal to Prince Maximilian. He made our country and its people known in Europe. Of all the writers on early Nebraska he seems the most charming. He had the trained eye of the German scientist and the imagination of a poet. Reading his stories and looking at his pictures the Nebraska of 1833 rises before us. The steamer Yellowstone comes again from St. Louis, beating its way up the Missouri River against the swift yellow current in late AprU and early May. The leaf buds break, the birds salute the sUences, the flowers bloom, all the way along the Nebraska coast. He names each of them in both the Ger man and Latin tongues with loving attention and praise. 62 PRINCE MAXIMILIAN 63 He saw and felt the spirit of the West. The eagle's nest above the river, the ruined cabin in a dark valley, the angry wind storm, the moonlight on the Missouri, the faces and manners of the Indians and fur traders, the rich soil, the flowing streams, the forests where the steamer stopped to cut wood for its furnace, are all fresh and real in his stories and in his pictures. Some of the things which he saw in Nebras ka are best given in his own words: " In a dark valley of the forest we saw a long Indian cabin which reached nearly across the vale and must have been built for a large number of men. The location was wild and beautiful. The bald-headed eagles nest everywhere in the top of the high trees along the shore. One of them was shot with a rifle. In places smoke rose out of the depths of the forest, in others the wood and the ground were black from fires. Sometimes the Indians start these fires in order to destroy their trail when followed by enemies, at other times they arise from campfires of fur traders on the river banks. We saw wild geese with their downy young goslings. The old birds would not desert their children even when our people shot among them. ***** In a beautiful wild region we reached the mouth of the great Nemaha River. The hunting huts of the Indians stood in the forest, but nowhere was man to be seen. One travels hundreds of miles on this river without seeing one human being. ***** In the evening the sun, as it sank below the treetops, gave the region a glow of parting light. We enjoyed a view of the violet, red and purple tinted hiUs whUe the wide mirror of the Missouri and surrounding forests glowed as though on fire. Quiet reigned in this remote scene of nature for the 64 STORIES OF NEBRASKA wind had lulled and only the puffing and rushing of the steamboat broke the sublime silence. At night we lay by near Morgan's Island. The whip- poor-wills, one of the birds we had not met before, here filled all the forests with their voices. 'P •!• T* T* "l* On the left bank where the wide prairie clasped a wood in its embrace the little Nemaha River broke through. At its mouth the Missouri is very shallow. A great wind blew our steamer upon the sand. One of our smoke stacks was blown down. Crows flew over us screaming and a sand piper with dark red legs ran about on the sandbar near the ship. We saw the different kinds of grackle (blackbirds) flying together, the beautiful yellow-headed ones, the red- shouldered ones, and the bronze variety. ***** Toward night a grfeat flight of more than 100 pehcans went over us in a northerly direction. Their formation was wedge shaped, at times a half circle. We could clearly see the black wing feathers, the pouch of the throat and the long slanting bills. Our hunters killed some wild turkeys in the twilight. A beautiful flower (phlox) colors great flelds with blue and the blue-birds ' quiet little song was heard. Our hunters brought on board a raccoon, a rattlesnake and black snake, and found a wild goose nest with three eggs. Near by we saw traUs of Indians, great wolf tracks in the sand, and on the trees the places where the stags had rubbed their growing antlers. A hunter broke off a poison vine. His hands and face are badly swollen to-day. PRINCE MAXIMILIAN 65 We reached the mouth of Weeping Water creek. In the bushes above us the birds sang a little soft song or twittering. The fox-colored thrush (brown thrasher) trilled in the tops of the cottonwoods where he loves to sit. Here were many plants such as c:olumbine, maiden-hair fern, red mulberry, blue-eyed grass, puccoon and purple vetch. At two o'clock in the afternoon of May 3rd we reached Mr. Fontenelle's house at Bellevue. The land is here very fruitful and a poorly cultivated acre yields one hundred bushels of Indian corn. It would return much more if care fully worked. Cattle also succeed here splendidly, give much milk but require salt from time to time. Mr. Fonte nelle thought he would have five thousand head of swine in a few years if the Indians did not steal too many from him. We lay by for the night a few miles above Bellevue (probr ably near where Omaha now is). Ducks and shore birds covered the banks about us. Stillness reigned in the wide wilderness. Only the whip-poor-will's voice was heard while the moon mirrored itself in the river where some of our young people were bathing. In the morning our ship, like a smoke- vomiting monster, frightened all hving creatures. Geese and ducks flew in all directions. We landed at Mr. Cabanne's trading post (ten miles above Omaha) and to our joy we saw a crowd of Otoe and Omaha Indians. Many of them were marked with small pox, some had only one eye or a film over the other eye. Their faces were striped with red. Their hair was hanging disorderly down to the neck. A small brook with steep banks flows down to the river from a pleasant little side val ley in which are the corn plantations. Mr. Cabanne had 66 STORIES OF NEBRASKA planted here fifteen acres of maize which produces yearly two thousand bushels of this grain, for the yield is very great. Sitting upon the balcony of Mr. Cabanne 's house we en joyed a wonderful evening. The proud Missouri gUstened with splendor in the glory of the full moon. Quiet reigned about us, only the frogs croaked and the whip- poor-wUls called contin uaUy in the forest near by. Twenty Omahas appeared before us. The chief dancer, a large tall man, wore on his head a high feather hehnet, made of the long taU and wing feathers of owls and eagles. In his hand he carried a bow and ar- MissouRi, Oto and Puncah Indians, 1833. (From Thwaites's "Early Western Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleve land, Ohio.) rows. The upper half of his body was naked except for a white skin which hung over his right shoulder and was decorated with tufts of feathers. He was painted with white spots and stripes and looked wild and warlike. Another younger man with him bore in his hand a war club with white stripes and a skunk skin at the handle. They formed a line while in front of them a drum was beaten with rapid stroke. Several men beat time with war clubs and all of them sang "Hei, hei, hei," or else "Heh, heh, heh," be tween times shouting loud yeUs. The dance was like this: springing with both feet, a short leap into the air, with the body bent forward while the drum was struck a sharp blow and their weapons were lifted and shaken. In this manner they jumped about with great force for over an hour, the sweat flowing from their bodies. A clear moonlight lit up the wide stiU wilderness; the savage tumult of the Indian PRINCE MAXIMILIAN 67 bands and the call of the night birds made this a scene to be long remembered. ***** In December, 1918, the castle of Prince Maximilian at Neu Wied, on the Rhine, was the headquarters of an American general and his staff. The library of Prince MaximiUan was stiU in the castle. Many paintings of him and souvenirs of his travels in America were also there. The Missouri region Indian material which he gathered in 1833 had been sent as a gift to Brazil, along with material from South America, by the present Prince of Wied, about twenty years ago. A picture and a bust of Prince Maxi mihan are now in the rooms of the Nebraska State Histori cal Society. Prince Maximihan died at Neu Wied, Germany, Febru ary 3, 1867, less than a month before this part of the wilder ness he so well described became a state. He left a^great museum to his home city. To the world he left the recbrd of a busy life well spent and to Nebraska the best stories and the best pictures of her early days. His name deserves to be better known in our state where now live nearly two hundred thousand people of German descent, rejoicing in the traditions and memories of the old country, rejoicing no less in their homes and in the freedom and prosperity found in the West, whose great fortune Prince Maximilian foretold. QUESTIONS 1. Make a list of the birds which Prince Maximilian found here. Make a list of the flowers. On each list place a check (X) after those which you know. 2. Just why was it that Prince Maximilian saw so much here which other explorers did not notice? 3. John Burroughs says that we cannot see a bird on the bush unless we have a bird in our heart. What does he mean? 4. Did Prince Maximilian love nature? What tells? 5. Which sees life most truly, the scientist or the poet? 6. What tells that Prince Maximilian was both scientist and poet? SCOTT'S BLUFF IN the early fur trading days, about the year 1830, a party of trappers came down the North Platte River in canoes. A little way above where Laramie River joins the Platte their canoes were upset in the rapids and their supply of powder and food was lost. One of their number named Scott was taken sick and could not travel. At the same time his com rades found the fresh traU of another party of trappers. r ' , .. ^ ..,,. ...... .^. lasg^ ~ ..«*^- k. ¦ .»*Si "'""' d k ¦¦-¦<¦ ¦^:^,.* ^,1 ,,,*-,,. ¦» ¦|^.^PI| k^WSw m/' ¦¦'""Mmf "'"¦'¦:":"'¦"'¦¦¦ ""] . ,; ,»rt» -¦ , ^„. ,..v..,;.-««aiii^l5y ^mr-" 'Tr^- - ^ ,....-.; •:fli^..i-''^--'^''^^'^SS^'" ,^^'^wBm ^;- W^ 1 Scott's Blupp. {From photo coUection of A. E. Sheldon). They left Scott alone at the mouth of the Laramie River, promising to return for him as soon as they had secured supplies from the other trappers. Instead of returning they reported that he had died on the Laramie River and continued their journey down the North Platte. The next year trappers on their way to the moun tains found the skeleton of Scott near a spring by the great bluff which now bears his name. Sick and starving he had 68 SCOTT'S BLUFF 69 dragged himself before dying forty miles down the river from the point where his comrades had deserted him. His name survives in the great headland which rises eight hundred feet above the river, the inost prominent landmark in the North Platte valley, while the names of his treacherous companions are lost. QUESTIONS 1. Why did Scott's companions desert him? 2. How was their story proven untrue? 3. Which would you rather have been, Scott or one of his companions? THE FIRST NEBRASKA MISSIONARIES AFTER the explorer and the fur trader the missionary came to Nebraska. Rev. Moses Merrill and his wife, Eliza Wilcox, were the first to come. They were sent out in 1833 to the Otoe Indians by the Baptist Missionary Union. At that time the Otoe tribe hved along the Platte as far west as the mouth of the Elkhorn. Their largest vUlage was in Saunders County about ten miles north of the place where Ashland now is. They hunted south and west along Salt Creek, Weeping Water and the Nemaha. Mr. Merrill and his wife drove an ox team from Missouri to Bellevue. Here was an Indian trading post where the Otoe, Omaha and Pawnee Indians came to trade furs and skins for white man's goods. At first very few Indians attended the missionary meet ings and those who came begged for com, potatoes and whisky. Mr. Merrill began to study the Otoe language in order that he might talk to the Indians without an interpre ter and translate the Bible and hymns into their tongue. In this way he spent the first winter. The next spring Mr. MerriU rode on horseback, fording two rivers, to the Otoe village on the south bank of the Platte near Ashland. He was received by Itan, the great chief of the Otoes, in one of his lodges which was made by setting large trunks of trees in the ground, laj-ing poles on them and covering the whole with grass and dirt. This lodge of Itan was circular in form and measured a hundred and twenty feet in circumference. Itan gave Mr. Merrill a feast of boiled buffalo meat served in a wooden bowl. It was to be eaten with the fingers, the guest eating first. All the rest waited until he had finished. Itan was a great chief. He had five wives and four houses 70 THE FIRST NEBRASKA MISSIONARIES 71 for them to live in. The town of Yutan in Saunders County is named for him. It is only three miles from where his lodge stood. On Sunday, the next day, Mr. Merrill was invited out to eat four times before noon. He went, and after eating, read to the Indians part of his translation of the Bible. He showed the children some pictures and began to teach them to sing the scale. The children were deeply interested and tried hard to sound the notes as the white man did. At the end of a week two of the children could sing the scale correctly and knew twenty- two letters of the alphabet. One day Mr. Merrill learned that fifty Otoes had gone to the white trading post with fifty bea ver skins, worth five hundred dol lars, to trade for whisky. Chief Itan spoke in strong words to the missionary against the curse of the white man's strong water. On the very next day he and another Otoe chief were drunk and talked very loud against whisky, saying that it was bad, the Indians did not make it, the white man was to blame. Mr. Merrill kept on trying to teach them better, reading verses from the Bible and praying for them. One Indian was sick and the Otoe medicine men came to cure him. The sick man was stretched out naked in his lodge. The medicine men beat their drums, shook their rat tles and danced around him, each stopping to take a mouthful of water from time to time and to spurt it on the sick man 's head. It is to be hoped that he survived this treatment. The Building op an Earth Lodge 72 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Then the Otoes went away for their summer hunt. When they came back in the faU they brought skins and began to trade them for whisky. Mr. MerrUl wrote from a trading post where whisky was sold as follows: "This is not the house of God, nor the gate of heaven. It is rather the house of Satan and the gate of hell. Two kegs of whisky were carried from the house this morning by Indians. They will trade their horses, their guns and even their blankets for this poisonous drink." It was against the law then, as now, to sell Uquor to Indians, but Nebraska was far out on the frontier and the white traders could make greater profit by selling whisky than in any other way. In September, 1835, Mr. Merrill moved his family to the Otoe Mission on the Platte River, about eight mUes west of Bellevue. Here the government built a log cabin and a schoolhouse which enabled him to carry on his mission work away from the evils of the trading post. It was a beautiful site with an open prairie sloping to the Platte, with rich meadow for stock and gardening and a large body of timber close by. Half of the Otoe tribe moved there and made their viUage at the mission. The Otoes were very poor these years and became poorer. They hunted deer, elk and buffalo in the summer of 1836 and brought home very little meat. Their appetite for whisky was greater than before and the more bad luck they had the more whisky they wanted. Many were sick with fever this summer and Mr. Merrill gave them food and medicine, cared for them and tried hard to have them give up Uquor and look after their crops and families. He urged them to keep away from the places where whisky was sold and this stirred up the traders against him, as the whisky trade was their best busi ness. For a single tin cup full of whisky the trader would often get ten dollars' worth of furs. When the people became sick and began to die the traders told them that God was angry with the Otoes for having the THE FIRST NEBRASKA MISSIONARIES 73 missionaries among them. Two pupUs in Mr. MerriU 's school died in the faU and the traders said that they were kUled for learnhig to read. As the whisky habit grew in the tribe the men became miserable and quarrelsome. The United States had sent a farmer and a blacksmith to teach the Indians how to farm and to make tools for them. These men and their families lived near the Mission. Drunken Otoes shot at the farmer and both he and the blacksmith moved their famUies back to BeUevue, leaving Mr. and Mrs. MerriU alone among the Indians at the vUlage. Two of Itan 's wives ran away with two Otoe young men. Itan was in a very great rage and said that he would kiU the young men when they came back. News was brought that these braves were in the village and Itan took his gun and pistol to kill them. When he passed the mission house Mr. and Mrs. Merrill went out and begged him not to begin a bloody fight. He was wild for revenge and went on. The ¦two young men came out to meet Chief Itan singing their war song. The chief fired his musket at one of the young men and missed him. Then one of the chief 's friends fired at the same young man and he fell. He rose, however, and shot the chief through the body. A brother of this young man then shot Itan the second time. One of Itan's friends shot the brother. A third young man shot Itan again and was at once shot himself. The three young men and Chief Itan died that evening. Two of them were Mr. Merrill's pupils. This happened on April 28, 1837. The whole Otoe tribe was torn into factions by this tragedy. Some wanted to kill the friends of the young men, others to avenge their death. The bloody feud over the fight lasted for many years. After Itan 's death Melhunca, the second chief in the tribe, came to take breakfast with Mr. Merrill. He wanted pres ents and said that the traders told him it was bad for the teacher to live near him and never give the Indians presents or fine clothes, and sugar and coffee as the traders did. Mr. and Mrs. Merrill tried to show him that they were poor and 74 STORIES OF NEBRASKA had no means of making great profits, as the traders had seUing whisky. They urged him to keep away from hquor. He soon became angry and said he was going at once to the trading post to trade horses for whisky. On the next day the school children who were given bread for lunch every day they came to read began to complain loudly and said that they would not read any more unless they were given a full dinner every day. In August, 1837, a band of fifty loway Indians came over from the Weeping Water to trade with the Otoes. They brought fifteen kegs of whisky. Mr. MerrUl held a great temperance meeting that day. The next day the whole Otoe village was drinking whisky. One Otoe had his ears cut off and another was stabbed and died. The loways left, taking with them six Otoe ponies, paid for in whisky. In 1838 Mr. Merrill went with the Otoes on theh buffalo hunt. By this time he had learned to speak their language and had translated portions of the Bible and several hymns into Otoe. The Otoe hymns had been printed ia a book with the name : Wdtwhtl Wdwdklha Eva Wdhonetl and was the first Nebraska book ever made. In spite of all Mr. Merrill could do the Otoe men cared more for whisky and less for good things every year. They no longer loved their old time games and exercises. They longed for the white man's fire-water and the visions that danced before their brains when they drank it more than for all the gospel messages and Christian hymns brought by the missionary. All they could get was spent for hquor and food was begged from the mission. The young men became impudent and pretended to be Sioux in order to frighten the missionary family. It was six years since Mr. Merrill and his wife came to give their lives in teaching and saving one tribe of Nebraska Indians. A baby boy, Samuel Pearce, had been born to them in 1835. He became a Baptist minister and was until THE FIRST NEBRASKA MISSIONARIES 75 Old Otoe Mission (From y A. E. Sheldon.) photograph his death the second oldest white person born in Nebraska, the oldest being Major WiUiam Clark Kennerly, of St. Louis, Mo., who was born at Ft. Atkinson, Nov. 2, 1824. They had built a large log mission house with a great stone chimney which could be seen for many miles. In this they held school on week days for the Otoe chil dren and here they held their Sunday services. A new and deadly enemy to the mission appeared. Mr. Merrill became the Arictim of consumption. Exposure, overwork and grief has tened its ravages. He was deeply discouraged and wrote in his diary at this time: "Formerly Mrs. Merrill felt perfectly safe day or night, but it is not so now. The Otoes trample upon my property and rights unre- proved. They occupy my pasture with their cattle and horses when it suits their convenience, often leaving the fence thrown down. They steal my potatoes, pumpkins and corn by night. As we are alone it would not be prudent to resist these thefts. How long we shall be able to live quietly in our own habitation is uncertain. Indeed we are disturbed often now. My family fear these vagrant Otoes. These Indians do not feel friendly toward white people. They are ungrateful for favors received." Mr. Merrill grew worse rapidly. He died on February 6, 1840, and was buried on the east bank of the Missouri River opposite Bellevue. The Otoes called him "The- One-Who-Always-Speaks-The-Tmth". Near Richland Station in Sarpy County, sloping gently to the Platte River, is a grove of giant cottonwoods over eighty years old. In their midst stands an old building with a great 76 STORIES OF NEBRASKA stone chimney. This is the monument and witness to-day of the life and labors of the first missionaries to Nebraska. QUESTIONS 1. What two rivers did Moses Merrill ford in going from Bellevue to the Otoe village? 2. Why did the Nebraska Indians build their lodges out of earth? 3. Why did the Indians wait until Mr. Merrill finished before they ate? 4. Could Indians sing before Mr. Merrill taught them the scale? Why? 5. Who was to blame for the ruin caused by whisky, the white man or the Indian? 6. What do you know of Itan's character from this story? 7. Explain the action of the Otoe school children in demanding a full dinner and tell what you think of it. 8. Was Mr. Merrill's mission to the Otoes a success? T\Tiy? FATHER De SMET ONE of the most honored names in Nebraska annals is that of Father Pierre Jean De Smet, first Catholic mis sionary to the Indians of the Platte and upper Missouri region. He was born in Belgium January 30, 1801, came to St. Louis in 1823, and in 1838 reached Council Bluffs, Iowa, as missionary to the Pottawatomie In dians who had just removed from their old home in Illinois to the borders of Nebraska. For the next thirty years Father De Smet was the most active mis sionary in the western world. He explored the plains and mountains, crossed the continent several times to the Pacific Ocean, founded mis sions wherever he went and gained the confidence of the Indians every where. He also made many visits to Europe to secure funds for mission work. Only a small part of Father De Smet's active life was spent in the region which is now Nebraska, but he was known and loved by all the tribes of Nebraska Indians and probably had more influence over them than had any other man at any time. Four times he crossed Nebraska over the Oregon Trail, and seventeen times on steamboat, skiff or canoe he followed the waters of the Missouri River past the Nebraska shores. The beauty of early Nebraska Father De Smet was quick to see and appreciate. No better picture of our own Platte River has ever been given than this by him in 1840: 77 Father De Smet. (From Chittenden & Richardson's "Life, Letters &f Travels of Father De Smet." Francis P. Harper, N. Y.) 78 STORIES OF NEBRASKA "I was often struck with admiration at the sight of the picturesque scenes which we enjoyed all the way up the Platte. Think of the big ponds that you have seen in the parks of European noblemen, dotted with little wooded islands. The Platte offers you these by thousands and of all shapes. I have seen groups of islands that one might easily take, from a distance, for fleets under sail, garlanded with verdure and festooned with flowers; and the rapid flow of the river past them made them seem to be fljdng over the water." The future of this region was clearly foreseen by this great missionary. The vacant plains stirred within him mem ories of the crowded peoples of Europe when he wrote: "In my visits to the Indian tribes I have several times traversed the immense plains of the West. Every time I have found myself amid a painful void. Europe 's thousands of poor who cry for bread and wander without shelter or hope often occur to my thoughts. 'Unhappy poor,' I often cry, 'why are ye not here? Your industry and toU would end your sorrows. Here you might rear a smUing home and reap in plenty the fruit of your toil.' The sound of the axe and hammer will echo in this wilderness; broad farms with or chard and vineyard, alive with domestic animals and poultry, will cover these desert plains to provide for thick-coming cities which will rise as if by enchantment with dome and tower, church and college, school and house, hospital and asylums." Father De Smet was present and took an active part in the first Fort Laramie council of 1851, which resulted in the treaty of that year. He wrote the best account of this great event in Indian history. Although called ' ' The Fort Lara mie Treaty" the council was held and the treaty made forty miles ea«t of Fort Laramie in what is now Scotts Bluff Coun ty, Nebraska. Here, on a vast plain where the waters of Horse Creek unite with those of the Platte, the tribes of the plains and the mountains met and for the first time made a FATHER DeSMET 79 treaty with the United States, peace with each other and a division of the land among the tribes. This council lasted for eighteen days and was attended by over 10,000 Indians. Here Father De Smet was greeted by thousands whose homes he had visited; his advice was eagerly sought on the great questions before them and the rite of baptism was adminis tered by him to 1586 Indians. The Sioux were always near the heart of Father De Smet. He admired their courage and independence. He sought to abate their cruelty. In a great speech to them he told how the Indians at the head of the Missouri had buried the hatchet and forsaken the white man 's firewater. He asked them to do the same. The head chief replied: "Black-robe, I speak in the name of the chiefs and braves. The words you bring from the Master of Life are fair. We love them. We hear them to-day for the first time. . "Black-robe, you are only passing by our land. To morrow we will hear your voice no more. We shall be, as we have been, hke the Wishtonwish (prairie dogs) who have their lodges in the ground and know nothing. "Black-robe, come and set up your lodge with us. We have bad hearts, but those who bring the good word have never got as far as to us. Come and we will listen and our young men will learn to have sense." Father De Smet's greatest service to Nebraska and the West occurred in 1868. For several years a bloody war had raged along the Sioux border. A peace commission had been sent from Washington to Fort Laramie with General Sher man at its head. Red Cloud, Sitting Bull and other hostile chiefs had gone with several thousand followers into the wild region northwest of the Black Hills. At the request of the United States Father De Smet left his home at St. Louis and journeyed by steamboat up the Missouri River to Fort Rice near the mouth of Cannonball River in North Dakota. From here he set out alone with an interpreter and escort of Indi- 80 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Indian Welcome to Father De Smet. (From Chittenden & Richardson's "Life, Letters & Travels of Father De Smet." Francis P. Harper, N. Y.) ans for the camp of the hostiles. He found these near the junction of the Powder and Yellowstone rivers. He was received joyfuUy by them and here on June 21st he held a great councU with 5,000 hostUe Sioux. Father De Smet was given a seat in the center near the two head chiefs. Four Horns and Black Moon. . His large white banner of peace was placed beside him. His own accoimt says: "The council was opened with songs and dances, noisy, joyful and very wild, in which the warriors alone took part. Then Four Horns hghted his calumet of peace ; he presented it first solemnly to the Great Spirit, imploring his light and favor, and then offered it to the four cardinal points, to the sun and the earth, as wit nesses to the action of the council. Then he himseff passed the calumet from mouth to mouth. I was the first to receive it, with my interpreter, and every chief was placed according to the rank that he held in the tribe. Each one took a few puffs. When the ceremony of the calumet was finished, the head chief addressed me, saying, ' Speak, Black- robe, my ears are open to hear your words." The white haired missionary was then sixty-seven years old, with a face calm, mild and peaceful, which all loved to look upon. He spoke to the fierce Indians as to children, told them the terms of peace he brought them and pointed out the danger and foUy of fighting the white man. At the close of his speech Chief Black JNIoon said: "We understand the words the Black-robe has spoken. They are good and full of truth. This land is ours. Here FATHER DeSMET 81 our fathers were born and are buried. We wish, like them, to live and to be buried here. We have been forced to hate the whites. Let them treat us like brothers and the war will cease. Let them stay at home. We will never go to trouble them. Thou, Messenger of Peace, hast given us a glimpse of a better future. Let us throw a veil over the past and let it be forgotten. Some of our warriors will go with you to Fort Rice to hear the words of the Great Father's commis sioners. If they are acceptable peace shall be made." The other chiefs spoke in the same spirit and the second great treaty of Fort Laramie, that of 1868, was concluded. Father De Smet died May 23, 1873, at St. Louis. In his death the West lost a great missionary and explorer, and the Indians lost their best friend. QUESTIONS 1. How far has Father De Smet's prophecy, regarding Europe's poor, become true in Nebraska? ' 2. Explain why Father De Smet had so much influence over the Indians. 3. Did Chief Black Moon tell the truth in his speech? JOHN C. FREMONT ONE of the most noted names in the story of the West is that of John C. Fremont. He was sometimes called "The Pathfinder." Many years of his life were spent in exploring the plains and the mountains. He first became famous as leader of an exploring expedition which crossed Nebraska in 1842. Starting June 10th from the mouth of the Kansas River, he followed the Oregon TraU to the forks of the Platte. Here his party divided, one party going by way of the North Platte, the other by way of the South Platte, both meeting at Fort Laramie. From there Fremont fol lowed the Oregon TraU to the South Pass and on August 15th climbed to the top of what has since been called Fremont 's Peak at the sum mit of the Rocky Mountains. Coming down the Platte river in boats, Fremont 's party was wrecked in the great canyon of the Platte near where Cas per, Wyoming, is located. Saving what they could they followed the Platte valley and reached the trading post of Peter A. Sarpy at Bellevue on October 1st. The next year on May 29th Fremont left the mouth of the Kansas River and took a more southerly route throughnorth- ern Kansas, and on June 25th crossed into Nebraska in what is now Hitchcock County. After following the Republican valley for some days, he crossed to the South Platte and thence over the mountains to Salt Lake and California. Fremont saw the great future of the West more clearly than other explorers. He saw in Nebraska the rich soU, the 82 John C. Fremont JOHN C. FREMONT 83 abundant grass and the beautiful wUd flowers. To his eyes this region looked like a garden, instead of a desert, as it had been represented by many. Nebraska probably owes its name to Fremont. In his report to the secretary of war, he calls our great central river by its Indian name Nebraska, or Flat Water, and the secre tary of war afterwards suggested Nebraska as a good name for the new territory. Fremont believed in the future Pacific Railroad and tried to find an easy, natural route on which it might be built. He became senator from the new state of California in 1850, and candidate for President in 1856. He died July 13, 1890, hav ing lived to see the western wilderness which he had explored filled with milhons of people, great cities built on the plains and in the mountains and several Pacific railroads where he had dreamed of one. One of the most thriving cities of Nebraska proudly bears Fremont's name. The great United States dam at the can yon of the Platte River where Fremont and his party were wrecked in 1842 is called "The Pathfinder, " and great canals from its mighty reservoir carry the waters from the Rocky Mountains far out on the plains of western Nebraska, making them blossom everywhere in memory of this great explorer who had confidence in the development of the West. QUESTIONS 1. What did Fremont do for Nebraska? 2. Why did he see the future of this region more truly than other explorers? 3. Can you show that what we see in things reveals what we ourselves are? 4. Are you glad that our State was named Nebraska? Why? ^u'Vl ~„ i__3>Winiic>>M» BeetVitr ii\i.na, ''% BikH«.tie\d..Ser'"'-'?'i'"°1 %S Map of Overland Trails and Historical Places in Nebraska. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) THE OVERLAND TRAILS EACH of the old overland trails which crosses Nebraska from the Missouri River to the mountains has a story. It is a story written deep in the lives of men and women, and in the record of the westward march of the American people. The story of these overland trails was also written in broad deep furrows across our prairies. Along these trails j ourneyed thousands of men, women and children with ox teams, carts, wheelbarrows, and on foot, to settle the great country be yond. Over them marched the soldiers who built forts to protect the settlers. Then the long freighting trains loaded with food, tools and clothing passed that way. So there came to be great beaten thoroughfares one or two hundred feet wide, deeply cut in the earth by the wheels of wagons and the feet of pilgrims. The Oregon Trail was the first and most famous of these in Nebraska. It started from the Missouri River at Independ ence, Missouri, ran across the northeast corner of Kansas and entered Nebraska near the point where Gage and Jeffer son counties meet on the Nebraska-Kansas line. It followed the course of the Little Blue River across Jefferson, Thayer, Nuckolls, Clay and Adams counties, then across the divide to the Platte near the head of Grand Island in HaU County, then along the south side of the Platte through Kearney, Phelps, Gosper, and Dawson, to a point in Keith county about seven miles east of Big Springs, where it crossed the South Platte and continued up the south side of the North Platte through Keith, Garden, MorriU and Scotts Bluff counties, where it passed out of Nebraska into Wyoming. The beginnings of the Oregon Trail in Nebraska were made in 1813 by the little band of returning Astorians as they, leading their one poor horse, tramped their weary way 85 86 STORIES OF NEBRASKA down the Platte valley to the Otoe vUlage where they took canoes for their journey down the river. These first Oregon TraUers left no track deep enough to be followed. They simply made known the way. After them fur traders on horseback and afoot followed nearly the same route. On April 10, 1830, Milton Sublette with ten wagons and one milch cow left St. Louis, and arrived at the Wind River Mountains on July 16th. They retumed to St. Louis the same summer, bringing back ten wagons loaded with furs and the faithful cow which furnished milk all the way. Theirs were the first wagon wheels on the Oregon TraU across Ne braska. The track they made from the mouth of the Kansas river up the valley of the Little Blue and up the south side of the Platte and North Platte was foUowed by others, and thus became the historic trail. Their famous cow, and the old horse which seventeen years before carried the burdens for the Astorians are entitled to a high place among the pioneers of the West. In 1832, Captain Bonneville, whose story is told by Wash ington Irving, followed over Sublette's traU from the Mis souri River to the mountains. In the same year Nathaniel J. Wyeth foUowing the same trail pushed through the South Pass in the mountains and on to Oregon, thus mak ing an open road from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean. With slight changes, this road remained the Oregon TraU through the years of overland travel. Every spring in May the long emigrant wagon trams left the Missouri River and arrived on the Pacific coast in November. It was a won derful trip. Every day the train moved fifteen or twenty miles. Every night it camped. Every day there were new Old Fort Hall on the Oregon Trail THE OVERLAND TRAILS 87 scenes and events. New friends were found among the travelers. Children were born on the way. There were weddings and funerals. It was a great traveling city mov ing two thousand miles, from the river to the ocean. There are five periods in the story of the Oregon Trail. The first was the period of finding the way and breaking the trail and extends from the return of the Astorians in 1813 to the Wyeth wagons in 1832. The second period was that of the early Oregon migration and extends from 1832 to the discovery of gold in California in 1849. The third period was that of the rush for gold and extends from 1849 to 1860. During this period the Oregon TraU became the greatest traveled highway in the world, wider and more beaten than a city street and hundreds of thousands passed over it. The fourth period is that of the decline of the Oregon Trail and extends from 1860 to 1869. The fifth period, from 1869 to the present day, is witnessing its gradual effacement. 'The best brief description of the Oregon Trail is that of Father De Smet, who knew it well and tells of its appearance when first seen by him and his party of Indians from the Upper Missouri in 1851 : "Our Indian companions, who had never seen but the narrow hunting paths by which they transport themselves and their lodges, were filled with admiration on seeing this noble highway, which is as smooth as a barn floor swept by the winds, and not a blade of grass can shoot up on it on account of the continual passing. They conceived a high idea of the countless white nations. They fancied that all had gone over that road and that an immense void must exist in the land of the rising sun. They styled the route the 'Great Medicine Road of the Whites.' " In another place Father De Smet teUs of the great govern ment wagon trains he met on the Oregon TraU in 1858: "Each train consisted of twenty-six wagons, each wagon drawn by six yoke of oxen. The trains made a line fifty mUes long. Each wagon is marked with a name as in the 88 STORIES OF NEBRASKA case of ships, and these names served to fumish amusement to the passers-by. Such names as The Constitution, The President, The Great Repubhc, The King of Bavaria, Louis Napoleon, Dan O'ConneU, Old Ken tuck, were daubed in great letters on each side of the carriage. On the plains the wagoner assumes the style of Captain, being placed in com mand of his wagon and twelve oxen. The master wagoner is admiral of this little land fleet of 26 captains and 312 oxen. At a distance the white awnings of the wagons have the effect of a fleet of vessels with all canvas spread." The second important trail across Nebraska is the one Emigrant Train Crossing the Plains which started from the banks of the Missouri River near Bellevue and Florence, followed up the north side of the Platte and North Platte to Fort Laramie, where it joined the older Oregon Trail. This was the route across Nebraska of the returning Astorians in 1813 and some of the early fur traders. The Mormons made this a wagon road in 1847 when their great company which wintered at Florence and Bellevue took this way to the valley of the Great Salt Lake. It was often called the Mormon TraU. Some of the immi grants to Oregon and California went over this route and hence it is sometimes called the Oregon Trail or California Trail. There was less travel on this trail than on the one THE OVERLAND TRAILS 89 Trail south of the Platte because there was more sand here. This north side traU ran through the counties of Douglas, Sarpy, Dodge, Colfax, Platte, Merrick, HaU, Buffalo, Dawson, Lincoln, Garden, MorrUl and Scotts Bluff. The third celebrated traU across Nebraska was from the Missouri River to Denver and was called the Denver Trail. It had many branches between the Missouri River and Fort Kearny. Near this point they united and foUowed up the south bank of the Platte to Denver. The route from Omaha to Denver was up the north bank of the Platte to Shinn 's ferry in Butler County where it crossed to the south side and continued up the river to Fort Kearny. There was also a road from Nebraska City up the south bank of the Platte, which was joined, by the Omaha road after it crossed the river. It was called the Fort Kearny and Nebraska City Road. A new and more direct road was laid out in 1860 from Ne braska City west through the counties of Otoe, Lancaster, Seward, York, Hall and Kearney. This was the shortest and best road to Denver. It was called the Nebraska City Cut-off. It became very popular and during the years from 1862 to 1869 was trav eled by thousands of immigrants and freighters. Over the Oregon T'eail Monument at Kearney 90 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Denver Trail went the Pike's Peak immigrants and the supplies and machinery for opening the mines in Colorado. After a few years the maU and stage coach and pony ex press followed the immigrant and freight wagons along the Overland Trails. In 1850 the first monthly mail coaches began running from the Missouri River to Salt Lake and California. The hard winter of 1856-57 blocked this route for several months. The California maU coach was then placed on a southern route through Arizona but with the breaking out of the Civil War it was brought north again and in 1861 the first daUy overland maU began running from the Missouri River to California. This maU at first started from St. Joseph. After a few months it ran from Atchison, join ing the Oregon Trail a few miles south of the Nebraska state line and following it as far as the crossing of the South Platte near Julesburg, where it diverged making a new road, caUed the Central Route, through the mountaitis to Salt Lake City. This was said to be the greatest stage hne in the world. From 1861 to 1866 daily coaches ran both ways except for a few months during the Indian war in 1864. Over this line also ran the pony express beginning AprU 3, 1860, aud con tinuing for eighteen months until the completion of the tele graph line to San Francisco. The pony express was a man on horseback carrying a mail bag and riding as fast as the horse could run. As the horse and man, covered with dust and foam, dashed into a station another man on horseback snatched the bag and raced to the next station. So the bag of letters and dis patches rushed day and night across the plains and moun tains from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean. The quickest time ever made by the pony express was in March, 1861, when President Lincoln's inaugural address was car ried from St. Joseph to Sacramento, 1980 miles, in seven days and seventeen hours. The old overland trails fell out of use with the comple tion of the Union Pacific Railroad in 1869. Short stretches THE OVERLAND TRAILS 91 from one settlement to another were used as roads but they were no longer the great highways of travel. The sunflower and tumble weed settled in their furrows and for many years these trails could be traced across Nebraska prairies by a wide ribbon. With passing years the break ing plow ran its furrows across the furrows of the wagon wheels and the harrow and cultivator smoothed away their wrinkles until over a large part of our state the old. overland trails can be traced only by the records of the early surveyors and the recollec tions of the few old-timers. In the far western part of Nebraska, and especially along the course of '¦.he Ore gon Trail on the south side of the North Platte, the old wagon tracks stiU remain and the long ribbons of sunflowers still trace the routes of the old trails across our country. Stone Marking Oregon Trail in Nebraska. (From photograph by Roy Hindmarsh.) QUESTIONS 1. How is the best route for a road in a new country found? Will it keep near the streams or on the high land? What differences in crossing from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean in the days of the Oregon trail and now? Do the lines of railroad follow the overland trails in Nebraska? Why? Can you find any traces of the early roads in your county? LONE TREE LONE TREE was a solitary cottonwood standing on the north side of J the Platte river about three miles south west from where Central City now is. Its massive trunk, ten or twelve feet in circumference at the base, rose hke a column fifty feet in the air and was crowned with spreading branches which in summer cast a grateful shade. It was a landmark which could be seen for twenty mUes across the level Platte valley, and the early traveler, viewing it afar off, hastened to enjoy its protection and shade. The Indians knew the tree and named it long before the white men came. The legend is that their chiefs held coun cil within its shade. The first white traveler up the Platte must have noticed it. The overland trail on the north side of the Platte ran within a few yards of the tree. The great emigrant trains made a camping ground near it and hundreds of those who passed that way carved their names in its tough bark, climb ing higher each year to find room for new names and initials, untU its rug ged trunk was covered to the height of thirty feet with these inscrip tions. Lone Tree ranch was established in 1858 Lone Tree Monument. (From photo- at a little distance from graph by A.E.Sheldon.) the tree. Later the post office there and the Union Pacific station three mUes away each bore its name. In 1865 a great storm laid the old landmark low, its strength having been sapped by 92 LONE TREE 93 the hundreds of sharp knives which carved its bark. Part of its trunk was taken to Lone Tree station, now called Central City. Here it stood on the depot platform until it was nearly all carried away in fragments by tourists. Thousands of travelers from the East and the West who crossed the plains in the early days keep the old tree in their memories, and the early pioneers in the Platte valley remem ber it as a rare old friend. Though the old tree decayed un tU even its stump is gone, it still remains in the minds and hearts of the people who were gladdened by it as it stood, solitary and majestic, by the long, hard, lonely trail in those far away days. In the year 1911 the people of Merrick County, through their county board, voted the money to place a stone monu ment made in the likeness of a cottonwood stump in the place where the Lone Tree once stood. There it stands to-day in perpetual witness to the worth of a tree. QUESTIONS 1. Do you know any lone tree? Are you fond of it? Why? 2. What makes us like especially well the lone tree of this story? • 3. Were those who cut names in its bark kind to this splendid tree? Why? LOGAN FONTENELLE WHEN the white men first came to Nebraska to live, a hundred years ago, they found Indians everywhere. The Omaha Indians hved a little way from where the city of Omaha is located. One of the white men named Lucien Fontenelle, who came up the river from St. Louis to hunt and trade with the Indians for furs, built a log cabin on the bank of the Missouri River near the Omaha Indian vUlage. He hunted and traded many years. He visited with the Omaha Indians very often and after a time he took an Omaha girl for his wife. They lived for many years more in the log cabin near the river bank. They had four children, who grew up tall and strong and spoke two languages — one the Indian language which their mother knew and the other the French language, for their father was a Frenchman. They played aU the summer long under the shade of the great trees which grew on the bank of the big river. Sometimes they went with their mother 's Indian people away across the prairies to hunt buffalo. Such sport as they had on these hunts ! In the fall they always came back to their home in the log cabin bj'' the big river. One of the boys was named Logan by his father. He grew to be a very brave and handsome boy. He learned to speak English besides French and Omaha. ^Yhen one of the old chiefs died, Logan, who was then a very young man, S4 Logan Fontenelle LOGAN FONTENELLE 95 was made chief in his place. He was the first Indian chief in our state who could talk with the white men just as well as a white man and with the Indians just as well as an Indian. In 1854 when more white men began to come across the big river and wanted to buy part of the Indian land, Logan went to Washington with the other Indian chiefs, who were not able to talk in the white man 's tongue, and helped them to get as much for their land as they could. The Omaha Indians and the white men were always at peace, but there was war between the Sioux and the Omahas. In the summer of 1855 the Omaha Indians left their vil lage by the big river to go out west to hunt buffalo. They went along the Elkhorn River for two or three days and then crossed the prairie toward the. Platte. They were in what is now Boone County when the Sioux Indians suddenly came over the hiUs to fight. Then the Omaha women and chUdren ran back to the camp as fast as they could, while Logan and several other Omaha Indians went out to fight the Sioux. Logan had a fine, new double-barreled rifie of which he was very proud. It would shoot a great deal farther than any other gun in the Omaha tribe. The Sioux had not seen a rifle that shot twice without loading and so were much sur prised when they found what Logan 's gun would do. Perhaps this is what cost Logan his life. He rode boldly out to ward the Sioux and when they charged him he did not retreat but kept on shooting. Five or six of them mounted on their ponies made a rush at him. He kiUed three but the others came on and shot and scalped him. Then there was great sorrow in the camp of the Omahas. Site of Fontenelle's Grave near Belle vue. (From photograph by A. E. Sheldon.) 96 STORIES OF NEBRASKA They gave up their buffalo hunt and sewed the body of Lo gan in an elk skin and brought it on two ponies all the way back to the Missouri River. On the top of a little hiU be tween Omaha and Bellevue, from which one can look a long way up and down the river, they dug a grave and buried him. All the white men came to the funeral and were sad. All the Indians cried and mourned for many days. His grave is near the little tree which you can see in the picture. QUESTIONS 1 . Can you find any part of Logan Fontenelle's name on the map of Nebraska? 2. Do you think Logan Fontenelle was more white man than Indian? Why? 3. Should the grave of Logan Fontenelle have a monument? THE MORMON COW IN the early days the Sioux Indians of the plains were firm friends of the white people. The first traders among them were welcomed as brothers. They left their goods pUed in the open air in Sioux villages and found them safe on their return. The white men who made the first trails across Nebraska often found food and shelter with the Sioux. The early emigrant trail wound for four hundred miles through the heart of the Sioux country. Over it went white men, singly and in companies, with ox-wagons, on foot, and pushing wheelbarrows and no harm came to them from the Sioux. All this was changed in a single day. The Sioux became the fierce and bloody foes of the white men. War with the Sioux nation lasted thirty years. It cost thousands of lives and millions of dollars. The beginning of this bloody war was caused by a lame Mormon cow. On the 17th of August, 1854, a party of Mormon emi grants on their way to Great Salt Lake were toiling along the Oregon TraU in the valley of the North Platte. They were in what was then Nebraska Territory, but is how about forty miles beyond the Nebraska state line and eight miles east of Fort Laramie, Wyoming. A great camp of thousands of Indians stretched for mUes along the overland traU. They were the Brule, Oglala and Minneconjou bands — the whole Sioux nation on the plains — and were gathered to receive the goods which the United States had promised to pay them for the road through their land. Behind the train of Mormon wagons lagged a lame cow driven by a man. When near the Bmle Sioux camp some thing scared the cow. She left the road and ran directly into the Sioux camp. The man ran after her, but stopped 97 98 STORIES OF NEBRASKA after a few steps, fearing to follow her alone into a camp of so many Indians. He turned back to the overland trail and followed after the wagons, leaving the lame cow to visit the Sioux. In the Brule camp was a young Sioux from the Minnecon jou, or Shooters-in-the-Mist, band. These were wilder than the other Sioux. The young Minneconjou killed the lame cow and his friends helped to eat her. The next day the Mormon emigrants stopped at Fort Laramie and complained to the commander there that they had lost their cow. On the morning of August 19th, Lieu tenant Grattan and twenty-nine men with two cannon were sent from the fort to the Brule camp after the young Indian who had killed the cow. Lieutenant Grattan was a young man from Vermont, barely twenty-one years old, who had no experience with Indians. The great chief among the Sioux at that time was named The Bear. He had a talk with the Ueutenant and said he would try to get the young Minneconjou to give himself up. It was a great disgrace for a free Indian of the plains to be taken to prison and the friends of the cow-killer would not let him go. The Bear then tried to have Lieutenant Grattan go back to the fort and let him bring in the young jNIinnecon- jou later. The lieutenant ordered his soldiers to run the two cannon to the top of a little mound, to point them on the Brule camp and told The Bear that he would open fire if the cow-killer was not given up at once. Pointing to the thou sands of Indians, men, women and chUdren, who were spread over the valley as far as eye could see. The Bear said, "These are all my people. Young man you must be crazy, " and walked toward his lodge, while his warriors began to get their guns and bows. A moment later the two cannon and a voUey of muskets were fired at the Sioux camp. The Bear was kiUed. A storm of Sioux bullets and arrows cut down Lieutenant Grattan and his men before they had time to reload their guns. THE MORMON COW 99 The Sioux camp went wild. The death of The Bear, the taste of white man's blood, set them crazy. Warriors mount ed their ponies and rode about the field. The squaws tore down the tepees and packed them for flight. Some one called out to the Indians to take their goods which were in a storehouse near a trader's post waiting for the United States Mound Marking the Burial Place of Lieutenant Grattan and His Men officer who was coming to distribute them. The Sioux burst into the storehouse, tumbled the goods from the shelves, piled them on their ponies. Before sundown the Indians were riding over the northern ridges by thousands, carrying away their plunder. They buried The Bear wrapped in richest buffalo robes in a high pine tree near the Niobrara River. From this burial the bands scattered over Nebraska, Wyoming and Dakota, urging Indians everywhere to kill the white men and to drive them from the country. Thus the Sioux war began. QUESTIONS 1. Ought the Indians to have given up the cow-killer? 2. What should Lieutenant Grattan have done? 3. Were the Indians or the white men to blame for the Sioux war? SLAVERY IN NEBRASKA THE South and North fell out over slavery in the new land of the West. The people of the South wanted the right to go west and take their slaves with them. The people of the North wanted none but free people in the West. In 1820 the North and South agreed that Missouri might be a slave state, but that there should be no slaves in what is now Nebraska and Kansas. This was called the Missouri Compromise. No one then lived in Nebraska but Indians and a few traders, trappers and soldiers. When it was time for Nebraska to be settled and to have a govemment there was another fierce falling out between the South and the North over slavery. This time a law was passed to the effect that the new land should be slave or free as the settlers voted. In Nebraska the people never voted for slavery, but people coming here from the South brought slaves with them. In 1855 there were thirteen slaves in Nebraska and in 1860 there were ten. Most of these were held at Nebraska City. Across the Missouri River at Tabor, Iowa, was a settle ment of people called abolitionists, because they wished to abolish slavery. The "Underground RaUroad" was the name given to the road taken by slaves from the South on their way through the North to Canada, where they were free. One branch of this road ran from Missouri through the cor ner of Nebraska by way of FaUs City, Little Nemaha, Camp Creek and Nebraska City to Tabor. The runaway slaves traveled at night along this road and were fed and hidden during the day by friends. . At Falls City they were kept in a barn. John Brown came through this corner of Nebraska very often with slaves from Missouri whom he was helping to set free. He is the man of whom we sing 100 SLAVERY IN NEBRASKA 101 'John Brown's body lies a-mould'ring in the grave. His soul is marching on!" In November, 1858, Eliza, a slave girl owned by Mr.- S. F. Nuckolls at Nebraska City, ran away, and with her another slave girl. Mr. Nuckolls (after whom Nuckolls County was If J.i./ ¦¦— ¦¦'¦' ..., ,-. g,.:/:-- .f y/f^'.y, «»¦<* A ^'"¦' i /^..../^ a,.^7^ y^.J /...^!f'^,..j, ^Z.^A'A^-^ ^- "' "7 •/4. .- ¦>^«!gi fft.. Act Abolishing Slavery in Nebraska. (Photo from original in Statehouse.) named) was very angry and offered $200 reward. With the aid of the United States marshal he began a search of the houses at Tabor for his slaves. The girls were not there, but one man whose house was being searched was stmck on the head by an officer and badly wounded. For this Mr. NuckoUs had to pay $10,000 damages. EUza escaped to 102 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Chicago, where she was arrested the next year and was about to be returned to her master when a mob rescued her and she was hurried over to Canada. Mr. NuckoUs sued sixteen Iowa people for helping Eliza to escape, but the war soon came on and he did not win his suit. The few slaves in Nebraska were hard to hold. On June 30, 1860, six slaves owned by Alexander Majors at Nebraska City ran away and never came back. On December 5, 1860, the sheriff of Otoe County sold at auction in the streets of Nebraska City one negro man and one negro woman, known as Hercules and Martha. This was the last of slavery in Nebraska, for in January, 1861, the legislature passed an act abolishing slavery in the territory and President Abraham Lincoln made proclamation, January 1, 1863, that all slaves in the United States were free. 1. If the land in Nebraska belonged equaUy to aU the United States which was right regarding its use, the South or the North? 2. Was it right for the northern people to help slaves to run away from their masters? 3. Would Nebraska to-day be a slave state if the southern people had been freely allowed to bring slaves here? THE SURVEYORS THE first settlers in Nebraska found no corners nor lines marking the limits of their land. The early Indian traders, like Manuel Lisa and Henry Fontenelle, built their cabins and put in their crops wherever it pleased them, for all land lay open to their use. The early territorial pioneer of 1854 and 1855 staked out his own land, claiming what suited him best, and put up signs telling all who came that way what he claimed. The first Nebraska surveyor was Rev. Isaac McCoy, a Baptist mis sionary who, in 1837, surveyed a line across the southeast corner of the state from the Little Nemaha River to the Great Nemaha River in what is now Richardson County. The land be tween this line and the Missouri River was called the Half Breed Strip. It was to be the home of those who were part white and part In dian. In later years there were many disputes over the location of this first Nebraska survey. Surveyors were needed as soon as Nebraska became a territory to divide the land into blocks marked with perma- 103 Map Showing First Plan for Nebraska Survey 1854. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner?) 104 STORIES OF NEBRASKA nent corners, so that each settler might know just where his land lay and the whole country might be made easy to map and easy to describe. The regular permanent survey of Nebraska into square blocks of land for people 's homes be gan in November, 1854. First a base line was measured west from the Missouri River 108 miles, with comer posts marking each mile. This line was ordered to be exactly on the 40th degree of latitude north from the equator, the diAdd- ing line between Nebraska and Kansas, but the first surveyor did not know his business and the line was crooked, some times on one side of the 40th degree and sometimes on the other. So the next year this base line had to be re-surveyed, the first comers torn out and new ones put in. This new survey was made by Mr. Charles A. Manners. With the help of Captain Thomas J. Lee of the United States Army and the best instruments obtainable, very careful observations were made of the sun and the stars in order to find where the 40th degree of latitude fell on the west bank of the Missouri River. On this spot, on May 8, 1855, the surveyors put up a taU iron monument with the word "Nebraska" on one side and "Kansas " on the opposite side. This monument stands to day on a high bluff overlooking the Missouri vaUey and is the starting point of all the Nebraska surveys. From this iron monument the base line was surveyed due west 108 miles. At this point another monument was put up. The line surveyed due north from here is called the sixth principal meridian of the United States surveys and is the "naming line" of aU the land in Nebraska, for aU deeds and patents to Nebraska land mention it. This line forms the westem boundary of Jefferson, Saline, Seward, Butler, Colfax, Stanton and Wayne counties and extends through Cedar County to the northern boundary of the state. The orders for the survey of Nebraska called for a division of the land into blocks six miles square called townships. Each township was divided into blocks one mile square called sections. All the townships in Nebraska are numbered, be- THE SURVEYORS 105 ginning with number one at the base Une and ending with number thirty-five at the northern boundary. Each row of townships stretching across the state from south to north is caUed a range. The ranges are counted from the sixth principal meridian, the first range of townships east being called range one east, the first range west being called range one west and so on. There are nine teen ranges east and fifty-nine ranges west in Nebraska. At distances forty-eight miles east and west frpm the sixth principal meridian guide meridians were laid off. This was necessary because the surface of the earth is curved in stead of flat. If you will take a ball and lay off its surface into square blocks of uniform size, as the survey ors laid off the surface of the earth, you will see why these guide merid ians were needed. In a similar way standard parallels were run at each interval of twenty-four miles north from the base line. The surveyors made the survey by running a line due north from the base hne twenty-four miles, then due east forty- eight miles to the meridian. The block of land thus laid off was subdivided into townships and sections by marking the corners of each township and each section with stakes or stones set in a mound of earth and four holes dug so as to form a square figure with the mound in the center. In pioneer times, the gray wolf or the coyote sitting upon one of these mounds would howl through the long hours of the night. On the section line half-way between the section corners was placed what is called a "Quarter Stake." Beginning thus in the southeast corner of the state, the Nebraska-Kansas Monu ment, Starting Point of Nebraska Surveys. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) S'ltSlandardParaUd }/. 32 29 K StuTidardParallel Iff 28 251 tiiPStandard Parallel N. 24 SfSlandatdParalltr K 20] BASE LINE 106 THE SURVEYORS 107 surveys were each year pushed a little farther west and north, Ul the direction most likely to be taken by the settlers as they came in, untU all the state was surveyed. The last survey thus made was the "Gates of Sheridan" reservation in Sheridan County, which was finished in 1910, fifty-six years after the first survey was made. Each surveying party kept a book called a field notebook in which was to be written down each day the distances measured, a description of the surface of the country, all prominent natural objects seen, the quality of the land, the corners marked and how they were marked, in a word the entire story of things done and seen each day. From these field notes maps were made, showing all the streams, hills, valleys, smooth and rough land, and copies of these maps were kept at the land offices where the 'settlers went to file their claims upon land. Some of the surveys were dishonestly made, the corners not marked as required by law and the field notes not truthfully kept, so that settlers in some cases lost their homes or located on the wrong piece of land or were unable to find the government corners. Great dangers and hardships were braved by the pioneer surveyors. The Indians everywhere understood when they saw the surveying parties making mounds, driving stakes and digging holes, that the white men were coming to take tbeir land. In many cases they pulled up their stakes, tore down the mounds and drove off the surveyors. Great storms swept down upon the surveyors living in tents, and men and horses were frozen to death. Fever and ague was common in the surveying camps. In surveying the islands , of the Platte River the men waded through water for weeks. Upon the high plains of western Nebraska they were tortured with thirst. Mosquitoes, gnats and green-headed flies pursued them, eager for blood by day and by night. Some times the Indians set fire to the prairie and drove the survey ing parties in because their horses found no grass to eat. The saddest day in aU the surveys of Nebraska was August 108 STORIES OF NEBRASKA 20, 1869, when a band of Sioux Indians under Pawnee KiUer and Whistler attacked the Nelson Buck surveying party of ten men in the Republican Valley and killed the entire party. There was not a single season from 1863 un til 1877 when the surveyors did not have to fight the Indians, and for many years later all surveying parties carried rifles along with their instruments and often saved their hves thereby. The United States sur veys of Nebraska are ended. All the field notebooks and the township maps of the surveys are turned over to the State of Nebraska and kept in a fireproof vault by the state surveyor in the Capitol buUding. The let ters written by the survey ors in the field, teUing the story of their trials and dan gers are there bound in vol umes for future Nebraskans to read. All the titles to aU the lands and lots in Nebraska rest finally upon the record of these surveys. Land in Nebraska grows more valuable from year to year and these records are caUed for so that surveyors to-day may follow the field notes of these first surveyors, re trace their lines and locate the true corners where land is in dispute. So long as men live and occupy the land, so long will the surveys of Nebraska and their records be of vital importance. Robert Harvey, an Early Surveyor, AND Outfit. (From photograph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) THE SURVEYORS 109 QUESTIONS 1. What are the numbers of the land where you live and how do you know? 2. Find all the government corners in the section where you Hve and tell how they are marked? Are the marks you find the ones put there by the United States surveyors? 3. How do surveyors to-day retrace the work of the first United States sur veyors and settle disputes over land? THE FIRST HOMESTEAD THE free homestead law has been called the most impor- . tant act for the weUare of the people ever passed in the United States. Under this law any man or woman twenty- one years old or the head of a family can have 160 acres of land by hving on it five years and paying about eighteen dollars in fees. For the first eighty years of United States history there were no free homesteads. The settlers were obliged to buy their land. The price was low but they were often very poor and in many cases lost their land after hvuig upon and improving it because they had no money to pay for it. In 1852 a party, called the Free Soil party, demanded free homesteads for the people. In 1854 the first free homestead bill was introduced in Congress by Congressman Galusha A. Grow of Pennsylvania. The people of the West and poor people everywhere were in favor of the bUl. There was strong opposition to it, however. The first homestead act required the settler to pay twenty-five cents an acre for his land and was passed in 1860. This bill was vetoed by Presi dent Buchanan. It was not untU May 20, 1862, that the free homestead act was finally passed and signed by Presi dent Abraham Lincoln. The law took effect on January 1, 1863. The first free homestead in the United States was taken by Daniel Freeman on Cub Creek in Gage County, Nebras ka, about five miles northwest of Beatrice. Daniel Freeman was born in Ohio in 1826, and moved with his parents to Illinois in 1835. He was intensely interested in the free homestead bill from the time it was first introduced in Con gress. Year after year he watched its progress and hoped for its passage and many times said that he wished to be the 110 THE FIRST HOMESTEAD 111 first man to take a homestead. When the free homestead bUl was signed Daniel Freeman was a soldier in the Union army. A few months later he was given a brief furlough and came to Nebraska to look over the beautiful country, then lying va cant, for a home. He found the place that suited him and started for the nearest United States land office, which was then at Brown- ville, Nebraska, arriving there De cember 31, 1862. The little town was thronged with settlers who had come there to take land. That night there was a New Year's Eve party at the hotel, which was attended by all. The new homestead act was to go into effect the next day but as New Year's was a holiday the land office would not be open until Jan uary 2d. Mr. Freeman was under orders to join his regiment and expected to leave the next day. He told his story and his great desire to be the first homesteader in the United States. All the others agreed that he should have the first chance and with him per suaded a clerk in the land office to open the office a few minutes past midnight on January 1st for Daniel Freeman alone. Thus it came that Daniel Freeman made homestead entry number one and afterwards received homestead patent num ber one for 160 acres on Cub Creek near Beatrice. Thus Nebraska has the honor of having the first homestead in the United States. Since that time over 1,000,000 homesteaders have followed Daniel Freeman's example, receiving over 120,000,000 acres of land as a free gift from our government. Of these homesteaders over 100,000 have Hved in Nebraska. Nothing has helped so much in the settlement of the West as Daniel Freeman, First Homesteader in Unit ed States 112 STORIES OF NEBRASKA its free lands. One of the songs sung everywhere after the passage of the homestead act had for its refrain these words: "Come along, come along, make no delay, Come from every nation, come from every way, Our lands they are broad enough, have no alarm For Uncle Sam is rich enough to give us aU a farm." Daniel Freeman served his country in the Union army until the close of the Civil War, in 1865. Then he brought The First Homestead. (From photograph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) his bride and settled on his Nebraska homestead. This has remained ever since the family home. Here their seven children grew to manhood and womanhood and here Mrs. Freeman lives with children and grandchildren. Mr. Freeman died December 30, 1908. This first home stead is a beautiful farm in the valley where the prairie and timber land join. The old log cabin with sod roof, which was the first home of the Freeman family, has long since disap peared. There is a brick house and orchard, and an old freighting road, from Missouri River to the mountains runs for nearly a mile through the place, with rows of giant cotton woods planted by Mr. Freeman on either side. On the hiU at one corner of the farm, overlooking the vaUey and the THE FIRST HOMESTEAD 113 freighting road, is the grave of Daniel Freeman. It is pro posed that the United States shall purchase this first home stead from the Freeman family and make it a pubUc park to commemorate what is regarded as the most important law passed by the United States and the place where that law was first applied. QUESTIONS 1. Why is the free homestead law called the best law for the people in the United States? 2. What was the reason Daniel Freeman got the first homestead? 3. What is it worth to Nebraska to have tKe first homestead within itr borders? THE PAWNEES THE Pawnee nation lived in Nebraska for many years before the first white men came. Their traditions say that a long time ago they came from the Southwest, perhaps from the borders of Mexico. Through hundreds of years they were. slowly moving northward. When the first white men found them, over two hundred years ago, what is now the Nebraska country was their home. The Pawnee nation was divided into four tribes, each of which had an Indian name and a white man 's name : Chau-i, Grand; Kitke-hahk-i, RepubUcan; Pita-hau-erat, Noisy; Ski-di, WoU. These tribes were divided into bands, each of which Uved in a group of houses and kept together on the march and in the village. The Pawnees were the most advanced in culture of any of the Nebraska Indians. In farming, in handiwork, in medi cine, in music and religion they had made remarkable prog ress and were imitated .' ~ ^Ss-. by the other Indians. They built large circular houses, called earth lodges, \^dth waUs of dirt and a roof supported by trunks of large trees set upright inside of the walls, the whole covered with poles , grass and sod. Pawnee Earth Lodge. (From photograph ^"^ the east side was a by A.E. Sheldon.) Covered entrance and on the west were the sacred bundle and buffalo skull. There was a hole in the center of the roof to let out the smoke. The people slept around the edge of the circle made by the walls 114 THE PAWNEES 115 Ancient Pawnee Pottery and gathered about the lodge fire in the center to eat and talk. Such houses were warm in the coldest weather. The sod houses of the early white settlers were like them in struc ture, but not in shape. In some places Pawnees built sod walls around their village to protect it from enemies. In the rich, moist valleys near the rivers, the Pawnee women raised crops of corn, beans, pump kins, squashes and melons. They gathered roots from the prairie and wild fruit from the bushes and dried them for winter use. Twice a year the tribe went on buffalo hunts, leaving their viUages de serted except for the men and women too old to go on the hunt. Thus they made part of their living by the chase and part by farming, very much as did the Germans and the Celts in the time of Julius Caesar. Before the white men came the Pawnees made their own tools and weapons out of wood, flint and stone, chipping the flint into sharp points for their arrow and spear heads and making hammers and axes out of stones. For hoes they tied, with strings of rawhide, the sharp shoulder blades of buffa loes to sticks. They also made many kinds of pottery and thousands of pieces are found on the sites of their old towns in our state. The rulers of the Pawnees were chiefs. Sometimes a man came to be chief because his father was chief, and sometimes the son of a common man who proved to be wise, brave and fortunate in war and in hunting became chief. A chief who did not have these qualities soon lost his power. There was a head chief of the tribe, a council composed of other chiefs, and besides these an assembly of the whole people', as there were among the early Germans, to decide what should be done in important matters. 116 STORIES OF NEBRASKA The Pawnees were a very religious people. They be lieved in spirits, ghosts, fairies, and enchanted animals and in magical places where strange things were done. Above all these they believed in Tirawa, the father, who Uved in the sky, who made all the people and who sent the corn, the buffalo, the rain, the sunshine and all other good things. If the people did as he wished they had good fortune and were happy. To gain the good will of the spirits there were dances, ceremonies, songs and sacrifices. There were special ceremonies and songs to secure the favor of Tirawa for every important event in the life of the Pawnees, the first thunder in the spring, the planting of corn, the start on a buffalo hunt, the return of a war party. Sacred bundles were kept in the lodges which held magical feathers and bones and other mysterious things. These were brought out for the great ceremonies. Singers made many songs ior their special occasions. Story-tellers told many stories of the deeds of their young men and of ghosts and spirits and animals. In all these things the Pawnees were very skifful and their songs and stories were famous among Indians everywhere. These were handed down from the old to the young untU there were very many of them. Other tribes have borrowed and copied a great deal from the Pawnee stories and songs. Medicine men had great power and influence among the Pawnees. Wonderful tales are told of the things done by them, such as raising in a few hours a full grown stalk of corn from a dry kernel, shaking a live fawn from a deerskin, mak ing plums and cherries grow out of twigs, striking people dead with tomahawks and restoring them to life in a few minutes. White people who saw some of these wonderful feats were unable to explain them. Among the Indians themselves the mystery and magic of the Pawnee medicine men made them both courted and feared. The Skidi tribe of the Pawnee nation was the largest and most warlike. It kept up the old customs longer than any THE PAWNEES 117 other tribe, among them the custom of offering human sacri fice to the morning star. Prisoners taken in war were offered in these sacrifices in order to gain the favor of the god and bring good luck to the tribe. The last sacrifice of this kind known took place sixty or seventy years ago. There are old Pawnees who say that they saw it. The Pawnees often kept prisoners as slaves and other tribes held captured Pawnees as their slaves. There was also a custom among the Pawnees by which young men and boys who had as yet made no name for themselves by their deeds, lived as servants in the families of chiefs. Here they were fed and lodged and in their turn did all kinds of errands, such as caring for the horses and carrying messages. Older men who had not made a success in life lived in the same way, receiving support and protec tion from the chief in payment for their services. In all this the Pawnee custom was very much like that of the feudal system in Europe when the common people served the lords and knights. The Pawnee nation as a whole was never at war with the white people. At times some of the young Pawnees had trouble with the settlers over stock. The so-called Pawnee war of 1859 was to punish a few such thieves. Pawnee men, women and children were frequent visitors in the homes of early Nebraska settlers and a Pawnee camp near a ranch served as a protection against hostile Sioux and Cheyenne. All the other Indian tribes of the plains were at war with the Pawnees. Sometimes peace would be made for a short time, but through the years the larger tribes of the plains, the Comanches, the Cheyennes, the Utes, the Arapahoes and especially the Sioux, were the constant and bitter enemies of the Pawnees. Always at war with these great tribes about them, it is little wonder that the Pawnees became fewer in number. One hundred years ago the Pawnee people were estimated to number 10,000. The RepubUcan, or Kitkehahki tribe had villages on the Republican River near Hardy, and near 118 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Red Cloud. The other three tribes lived in the valleys of the Platte and Loups. Graves and lodge circles extend for many miles near Linwood, in Butler County, Osceola in Polk County and Leshara in Saunders County, marking the sites of Pawnee villages south of the Platte. In the North Platte region the valleys of the Loups and of Shell Creek in Coffax, Platte, Merrick, Nance and Howard counties are thickly dotted with remains of Pawnee villages. By a treaty with the United States in 1833 the Pawnee nation ceded all its country south of the Platte and agreed to move up on the Loups. A part went, but in 1846 the Sioux burned one of their villages there and the Pawnees came down the Platte, making their homes near BeUevue and Fremont. In 1849, the cholera swept away nearly 1200 Pawnees and every year their enemies, the Sioux, made raids upon them, so that their women hardly dared to hoe in the fields of com. In 1857, the Pawnee nation ceded to the United States aU its country north of the Platte except a reservation, now Nance County, on the Loup, and in 1859 the entire nation, then numbering between 3,000 and 4,000 people, moved there. For the next fourteen years the once proud Pawnees led a hfe of misfortune and disaster. The Sioux raided their villages. The white men coveted their beautiful tract of land and urged the government to remove them. Grass hoppers and drought ruined their crops. Buffalo became scarce and could be found only by long journeys to the Re publican River, in the country of their enemies, the Sioux. FinaUy in 1873, a party of Pawnees hunting buffalo were surprised by the Sioux near Culbertson in Hitchcock County and eighty-six were killed. Many of the Pawnees now desired to move to the Indian Territory and live near the Wichita tribe, who are near rel atives. In 1873 a party of 300 went south and wintered. In 1874, 1,500 men, women and chUdren left Nebraska and THE PAWNEES 119 reached the Indian Territory in February, 1875. In Novem ber, 1875, those left in Nebraska joined them, making a total of 2,200, all that remained of the Pawnee nation. For a number of years after this the Pawnees died very rapidly. They had left a land of clear flowing rivers, bright skies and cool dry climate. They went to a land where the climate was hot and damp, biting insects of all kinds abound ed, and the water in the streams flowed red as blood from the red soil through which it passed. For a time it seemed that the whole nation would quickly disappear. The Pawnee reservation is now a part of Oklahoma and the remainder of the nation living there number 653. They never cease telling stories of the old times and the old home in Nebraska. To their children Nebraska is a wonderland, full of magical places, the scenes of heroic battles and strange events in their history, some of which are related in the pages of this book. QUESTIONS 1. How long and how accurately are stories of old times kept by people who do not know how to write and read? 2. Why were the sod houses of the early settlers different in shape from the Indian earth lodge? 3. Do white men in Nebraska select their chiefs in the same way as the Pawnees did? 4. How did the medicine men learn their art? S. Which Pawnee customs and beliefs were different from those of white men? Which were Kke the white men's customs? 6. Why do you think the other tribes fought the Pawnees? 7. Do you wish the Pawnees had stayed in Nebraska? COURT HOUSE ROCK Court House Rock and Jail Rock. IN the North Platte valley near the town of Bridgeport in Morrill County stands Court House Rock, rising three hundred and forty feet above the level of the vaUey, grand and massive in form. It is a landmark noted in aU the West, which may be seen at a distance of fifty miles. Upon its summit is a small table land. Upon three sides its walls are vertical, with no crevice or point where hand or foot may cling. There is one dif ficult path on the re maining side up which a man can climb with toil and danger to the summit. Many years ago a small party of Skidi Pawnees camping near Court House Rock were surprised by the Sioux. They climbed the rock for safety while the Sioux camped at the foot where they waited for the Pawnees to starve or to come down and fight. The Pawnees suffered terribly from lack of food and water. Their leader was overcome with grief, for he saw the death of all his brave men near at hand. At night he went away from the others and looking up to the stars from the top of the rock, he prayed to Tirawa for help. As he prayed a voice spoke to him and said, " Look for a place where you may get down from this rock and save both your men and yourself." All night he kept on praying and in the morning he looked along the edge of the rock for a crevice where one might get down. Near the edge of the cliff he found a point 120 COURT HOUSE ROCK 121 of rock rising above the steep waU below. With his sharp knife he cut a deep groove around the base of this point where it was no larger around than a man's body. Then he tied together all the pony lariats which the Pawnees had, let them down and found they were long enough to reach the ground below. He tied one end of the long lariat around the point of rock, made a running loop in it for his foot and slowly let himself down pushing his back against the wall for support until he reached the bottom. Then with great strength and steadiness he climbed up by the same rope. The next night he called the Pawnees together and told them the way of escape. One by one, beginning with the youngest, the Paw nees let themselves down by the rope to the bottom of the waU. The last one to go down was the leader. Then they softly crept through the camp of the Sioux and by morning were miles away on their journey to the Pawnee villages upon the Loup. No one knows how long the Sioux camped at the foot of the great high cliffs waiting for the Pawnees to starve or to surrender. But tradition says that if one will go to the top of Court House Rock and camp there all night he can hear the whisper of the Sioux sentinels far below him as they watch at the base of the cliff for their old enemies to come down. QUESTIONS 1. Was the Pawnee leader a wise man? What tells? 2. Why let the youngest down first? 3. Why did the Sioux not hear the Pawnees as they made their escape? 4. Should you like to camp on the top of Court House Rock over night? Why? MAJOR FRANK NORTH AND THE PAWNEE SCOUTS THE pioneers of Nebraska owe a great debt of gratitude to the Pawnee scouts and their gaUant white leader. Major Frank North. During the Sioux and Cheyenne wars on the Nebraska frontier, from 1864 to 1877, these brave Indians, by their courage and vigilance, defended our border, saving the hves of hundreds of settlers. In aU the campaigns the Pawnee scouts were at the front. They knew the country through years of buffalo hunting. They knew the ways and the camp ing grounds of their old enemies, the Sioux, Cheyennes and Arapa hoes. In their memories were the old wars of their fathers, and the blood of friends kiUed by a cmel foe. Spurred by these memories they led the way to the hostile camps. They stampeded the enemy's ponies, fought bravely in every battle and never stopped at hunger or hardship in the long hard rides. The story of the Pawnee scouts and their service to the people of Nebraska is one never to be forgotten. Wlien the sudden storm of the Sioux and Cheyenne war broke on the Nebraska border in the summer of 1864, the white people were taken by surprise. This was during the war between the North and the South, when many of the settlers had enlisted and left their famihes without protec tion. Hundreds of settlers and emigrants were killed, ranches and wagon trains burned, stock run off and butch ered. As the story of the murders and burnings was brought 122 Major Frank North MAJOR NORTH AND THE PAWNEE SCOUTS 123 in, there was terror in all the settlements. Everywhere the Indians were reported as being just at hand. Many settlers left their homes and fled to the Missouri River while others gathered at central ranches and hastily threw up intrench ments. The few United States soldiers on our frontier were not experienced in fighting Indians. A call was made for Paw nee scouts. Frank North was then twenty-four years old and a clerk at the Pawnee agency in what is now Nance County. He had settled at Columbus in 1858, lived among the Pawnees, learned their language and gained their confi dence. He was made first lieutenant of the first company of Pawnee scouts, and soon after became captain, then major and remained their leader until they were mustered out of service. Their first important achievement was in General Con nor's campaign in 1865. On August 22d, Captain North with forty scouts struck the trail of twenty-seven Sioux of Red Cloud's band, who had just killed a party of fifteen sol diers. He followed the trail all day and all night, overtook the Sioux at daybreak and scalped every warrior, bringing back the horses and mules they had stolen. This was the first victory over the Sioux in this war. A few days later the Pawnee scouts led General Connor's army to a great camp of fifteen hundred hostile Arapahoes under Chief Black Bear. A complete victory was won, in which over two hundred Arapahoes were slain, and seven hundred ponies and all the tepees captured. The village with all its goods was burned and the destitute Arapahoes were glad to come in to Fort Laramie and make peace. In 1867 Captain North was made major of a battaUon of four companies of Pawnees, fifty Indians in each company. They were armed with the new Spencer repeating rifles or "seven shooters" and their special duty was to protect the workmen in buUding the Union Pacific Railroad. The hostUe Indians had nearly stopped its construction by killing men, burning stations and running off stock. 124 STORIES OF NEBRASKA The Pawnee battahon took up this work with dehght. It had 300 miles of road from Plum Creek (now Lexington), in Dawson County to the Laramie Plains, to protect. The Sioux were completely surprised when they found their old 3 4 5 6 n H ^^m-^9^^B^^ ^^^^^^^Hi '^2l mg^ i / '^^^/BBk'^ ffl ^^HH'^ ^^^^^1 ^HL,^HHBH ^¦FiH ¦n V^flr 1 m^^g 3 UL --^ Sm m LJ IH ¦ -' a^^KL -S^B^Kt" P '-r- )¦*¦ ^^^^^^1 ¦ a ^^i^B 't^B^S^^Ti ai~^Mm K --« - jM ^^^^^^^^1 wi'' m lyj ,i/A ^A 1 ^^ i« ^^^^^^^H m m ¦ ^^I^K^^^^,> m Kyj^^^H t,^V|H Wj^/j' ^1 2 1 7 Surviving Pawnee Scouts, 1911 1. James R. Murie. Interpreter and student of Pawnee folk-lore. Son of Captain Murie of Major North's battalion. 2. Captain Jim. His name under North was Koot-tah-wi-kootz-tah-kah (White Hawk). He served several times, is a medicine man and chipf of Peta-hau-rata band. 3. John Buffalo. His name under North was Ree-tit-ka-wi (Feather in scalp-lock). He served several times, is a Skidi and a medicine man, and served as Friar in a company. 4. John Box, whose name when serving as a scout was Kee-wah-koo-pa-hat (Red Fox). He is a progressive Indian and one of the leading men among the Skidis. 5. High Eagle, whose name was Lay-tah-cots-si-ti-tu-hu-rey-ri-ku-kak-kit-ka-hoc. He was very young when scouting. 6. Seeing Eagle, a Skidi, and a warrior who served under North each time. His name when scouting was Lay-tah-cots-si-ti-ti-rit (They saw an eagle). 7. Belly Osborne, a Skidi who waa with North every time. He was a sergeant in Com pany A. His name under North was Koot-tah-wi-koots-rah-rah-he-coots (Brave Hawk). enemy the Pawnees on their trail, with good horses and rifles and the United States back of them. After one or two sharp skirmishes, in which they were chased long distances with loss, their raids on the railroad became rare. MAJOR NORTH AND THE PAWNEE SCOUTS 125 August 1, 1867, the Cheyenne chief "Turkey Leg" with his band tore up a culvert four mUes west of Plum Creek and ditched a Union Pacific freight train. They killed the train men, broke open the cars, stole everything they could take and burned the train. Captain Murie with one company of Pawnee scouts, chased old Turkey Leg out of the state, kilhng fifteen warriors and capturing the chief's nephew and a squaw. This discouraged Turkey Leg so much that he came into North Platte, gave up the six white prisoners he had in exchange for his nephew and the squaw, made peace, and became a good Indian. The Sioux Chief Tall BuU with a hostile band roamed over western Kansas and Nebraska for a long time, murder ing, robbing, burning and dodging the soldiers sent after him. On July 12, 1869, Major North and the Pawnee scouts guided General Carr with the Fifth Cavalry to Tall Bull's camp hidden in the sandhills between the Platte and the French man 's Fork, just west of the Nebraska state line. The bat tle of Summit Springs which followed completely wiped out Tall Bull and his band. Fifty-two warriors were killed, and the camp with over four hundred horses and mules captured. Two white women prisoners were in Tall Bull 's tent. When he found the soldiers were upon him he killed one and wound ed the other. The one wounded was a German woman whose husband had been murdered in Kansas. In the captured camp was a great deal of rich plunder taken from white people, including jewelry and over $1,500 in twenty- dollar gold pieces. This fell into the hands of soldiers and Pawnee scouts. Later when it was found that much of this gold had been taken from the dead husband of the wounded woman the white soldiers brought in $300 and the Pawnee scouts $600 and placed this sum in her hands on the battle field. The defeat of Tall Bull's band was one of the greatest blessings to the Nebraska border. The Nebraska legisla ture passed a vote of thanks to General Carr's com- 126 STORIES OF NEBRASKA mand, especially mentioning Major North and the Pawnee scouts. For two years the Pawnee scouts continued to guard and patrol the Union Pacific Raihoad, making it possible to run regular trains to the Pacific Ocean. In January, 1871, the scouts were mustered out of service while Major North re mained as scout and guide. In the summer of 1876 the Sioux under Sitting BuU and Crazy Horse were again on the warpath. General Custer and all his command were killed on the Little Big Horn in Montana. There were seven or eight thousand Sioux under Red Cloud and Spotted Tail in what is now Dawes and Sioux counties, Nebraska, near Fort Robinson. It was feared that they would break away and join the hostUe Indians. General Sheridan ordered Major North to go to Indian Terri tory, where the Pawnee tribe now hved, and to enUst one hundred scouts to serve against the Sioux. There was great excitement on the Pawnee reserve when Major North came. He found the Pawnees very poor. AU of them wanted to go with him. He picked out his one hundred men and was followed for eighty miles by others begging to enlist. With these one hundred scouts Major North reached Fort Robinson, October 22, 1876, and without resting was ordered to march forty miles with a regiment of cavahy. After an all night march they surprised Red Cloud's camp near Chadron at daybreak and captured it without a shot. All the ponies of Red Cloud 's band, over 700, were taken by the Pawnees to Fort Laramie and sold, while the Indians were marched on foot to Fort Robinson and kept to the end of the war. It was a bitter disgrace for the proud Sioux to have their ponies taken away from them by their old Pawnee enemies and Red Cloud never forgot it. In November, General Crook ordered ]\Iajor North and the Pawnee scouts to march north for a winter campaign against the Sioux and Cheyennes. The Indian scouts brought news that they had found a large Cheyenne camp in MAJOR NORTH AND THE PAWNEE SCOUTS 127 a pocket of the Big Horn mountains so weU concealed that it would be impossible to approach it in daylight. General McKenzie was ordered by General Crook to make a night march with 800 white cavahy and 70 Pawnee scouts. All night the soldiers rode over a terribly rough and dangerous region with their Pawnee guides at the head. Toward morn ing they heard the sound of Indian drums. The Cheyennes were dancing a scalp dance over the re turn of a successful war party. About daybreak the warriors, thed with dancing, went to sleep. A little later the Pawnees and soldiers burst into their camp. The Cheyennes fought desperately, for they were fighting for their homes and their winter Uving. Most of them escaped to the rough ground from which they fired on the troops. AU the Cheyenne ponies, 650 in number, were taken by the Paw nees. General McKenzie ordered all the Cheyenne lodges, all their rich buffalo robes and winter provisions to be piled and burned to ashes, and the Cheyennes saw them burn. A heavy snowstorm came on and General McKenzie marched back, taking with him the Indian ponies and leaving the band destitute. The miserable Cheyennes with their women and children made their way on foot to the camp of Crazy Horse on Pow der River. Over forty of their number died from exposure and starvation on the way. Stern Crazy Horse shut his doors in their face. He was so angry because they had per mitted themselves to be outwitted and surprised that he would give them no help. There was nothing for the Cheyennes to do but to drag themselves across the cold plalins to Fort Robinson and surrender to the whites. All the cold winter the war went on. General Crook never rested nor gave the enemy rest. There was no chance for the Sioux that winter to hunt buffalo or elk. The terri ble cavalry and the Pawnee scouts, their old enemies, were on their trail. In the spring the starving and ragged rem nants of the once proud Sioux of the plains came in and 128 STORIES OF NEBRASKA surrendered on Nebraska soil at Fort Robinson. It was a great day for the Pawnee scouts when they were mustered out of service May 1, 1877, and returned to Indian Territory to tell the story of Red Cloud's ponies and Crazy Horse's surrender. After the war was over Major North engaged with W. F. Cody (Buffalo Bill) in cattle ranching on the Dismal River in western Nebraska. Thousands of their cattle ranged the sand hUls. Their ranch door was open wide without price to all honest travelers, but cattle and horse thieves, white or red, soon learned to dread the fearless spirits and ready rifles waiting for them there. Many are the stirring and true stories told of Frank North in those ranching days. In 1882 the people of Platte County elected Major North to the Nebraska legislature. He died at Columbus March 14, 1885, aged forty-five years, leaving a wife and daughter. All the people of Nebraska mourned his loss, for he was not only a brave soldier but kind and just and true in aU his life. Only a few of the famous Pawnee scouts who followed Major North and kept the Nebraska border in the stormy years of war and frontiering now survive. Those whom I saw on their reservation in Oklahoma were a fine group of sturdy men with strong fearless faces. Their eyes hght up when the name of Major North is mentioned, and looking up into the sky they speak with deepest love and admiration his Pawnee name, "Pani-LeShar." QUESTIONS 1. Why were the Pawnees and white men together able to defeat the hostile Indians when neither one alone could make headway against them? 2. Why did the hostile Indians try to prevent the building of the Union Pacific Railroad? 3. Did General Crook do right in taking away all their ponies from Red Cloud's band? Ought the United .States to pay for them? 4. What qualities do you think a white man must have to become a leader among Indians? THE ROCK BLUFFS DINNER PARTY ROCK BLUFFS is a quiet little viUage in Cass County on the Missouri River. It is one of the earliest settle ments in the state. Its name will always be joined to an important event in Nebraska history, for on the counting of its vote depended whether Nebraska should come into the union a Republican or a Democratic state. And the counting of its vote was made to depend on the ballot box going to dinner. At the election in June, 1866, the people of Nebraska voted upon the question whether Nebraska should become a state. At the same time they voted for state officers whom they would have provided it became a state. The Republi cans were in favor of making Nebraska a state at once and named David Butler of Pawnee County as candidate for governor. The Democrats opposed making Nebraska a state at once, and named J. Sterling Morton of Otoe County as candidate for governor. The people were nearly evenly divided and there was great excitement. There were no telephones and very few telegraph lines in Nebraska in those days. The settlements were scattered and it took a long time to find out how the people had voted. When the returns came in it was found that about one hun dred more had voted to have Nebraska become a state at once than had voted against it. A legislature also was voted for at this time, which was to choose two United States Senators. In Rock Bluffs pre cinct there were cast 107 votes for the Democrats and 49 for the Repubhcans. With these votes counted the Democrats would elect six members of the legislature from Cass County. Without them the Republicans would elect all six members. It was found that the election officers who had charge of the 129 130 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Rock Bluffs House where Election WAS Held in 1866 baUot box in Rock Bluffs precinct had gone at noon from the house where the election was held to a house a mile away to eat dinner and had taken the ballot box with them. The law said that the ballot box should be in sight of the voters on election day from nine o'clock in the morning until six o 'clock at night. The county clerk and the men who helped him to canvass the votes at Plattsmouth threw out aU the votes from Rock Bluffs precinct because the baUot box went to dinner instead of staying at the polls. This gave the six Republican candidates a majority in Cass County. When the legislature met to elect two United States Senators the two RepubUcan candidates, John M. Thayer and T. W. Tipton, each received 29 votes and the two Demo cratic candidates, J. Sterling Morton and A. J. Poppleton, each received 21 votes. If the Rock Bluffs vote had been counted the two Democrats would have been elected. There was a great outcry by the Democrats at the time and in the records and newspapers of those early days you may still read the hot words spoken and written about this affair. The men who fought each other in those fierce early political battles have nearly all passed away. Little now remains of the village of Rock Bluffs. A few old houses only exist on the old site near the Missouri River, six mUes from a railroad and only a few of the people there now know the story of the ballot box that went to dinner and changed the politics of a state. QUESTIONS 1. Do you think the vote of Rock Bluffs precinct should have been thrown out? 2. Was Nebraska mado permanently a Kepublican instead of a Democratic state by this action? THE BATTLE OF ARICKAREE FORK OR BEECHER ISLAND /r^N the 17th of September, 1869, was fought the hardest Vv' battle between the white men and the plains Indians in the annals of the West. It was fought on the Arickaree fork of the Republican River, a few miles from the southwest corner of Nebraska and not far from the present town of Wray, Colorado, on the Denver line of the Burhngton road. Fifty-one scouts and frontiersmen under the command of Lieutenant Geo. A. Forsyth stood off, on a little sand bar in the river, the combined forces of the Northern Cheyennes, Arapa hoes and Oglala Sioux for nine days. They lost more than one third their own number in killed and wounded, while the Indian loss was many times as great. For months these Indians had been murdering the settlers and travelers in western Nebraska and Kansas. Soldiers were sent to pursue them but always arrived on the scene of their action after the Indians were gone, finding nothing but the melancholy duty of burying the murdered citizens. Lieutenant Forsyth raised a com pany of fifty frontiersmen. Many of them had lost their dearest friends and relatives by the Indians. Some of them were noted scouts. AU of them enlisted to fight. Early in September this little command started from the place of the latest Indian murder near Fort Wallace, Kansas. They struck a trail leading to the Republican River. Follow- 131 Lieut. Geo. A. Forsyth 132 STORIES OF NEBRASKA ing the trail up the Republican River in Nebraska it was joined by other trails and stiU others until the little party of fifty men was traveling a great beaten road, as wide as the Oregon Trail, made by thousands of Indians and ponies, and with hundreds of camp fires where they stopped at night. It seemed a crazy act to follow so great a traU with so smaU a party, but the little band had started out to find and fight Indians and kept on. On the afternoon of September 16th, the Indian signs were very fresh and Lieutenant Forsyth resolved to go into camp early, rest his men and be ready to strike the Indians the next day. An extra number of men were posted on picket duty to prevent surprise. In the earhest gray of the next morning, the men were up and saddling their horses when there came a volley of shots from the pickets followed by the yell and rush of Indians. The savages had expected to find the soldiers asleep and their horses out feeding. Their plan was to stampede the horses and leave the soldiers on foot in the open prairie where they could easily surround them and cut them off. They found their horses saddled, every scout ready with his rifle, and soon retreated out of reach of the white men 's bullets. As daylight broke, Grover, the head scout, exclaimed, ' ' Look at the Indians !" The hiUs on both sides of the little valley swarmed with them. None of the scouts had ever before seen so many hostile Indians in one body. Lieutenant Forsyth saw the situation at a glance. A few hundred yards away in the middle of the river was a sandbar island having one cottonwood tree and a growth of willows. It was the only cover in the valley. At the word of com mand the scouts dashed forward through the water to the island. Every man tied his horse strongly to a wiUow bush and dropping on his knee held his rifle in one hand and dug a hole in the sand with the other. This move was a com plete surprise to the Indians. They had expected to eat up the little band at one mouthful. They now saw them mak- THE BATTLE OF ARICKAREE FORK 133 ing a fort out of the httle island. The Indians crowded up to the bank on both sides of the river and filled the air with a storm of bullets and arrows. A number of the scouts were kUled and wounded, while the poor horses plunged and struggled in misery until they fell in death. The fire of the Indians was very hot and accurate. Lieutenant Forsyth had his leg broken by a bullet and his second in command, Lieutenant Frederick H. Beecher, a nephew of Henry Ward Beecher, was killed. Forsyth cut the bullet fromhisleg, whichhebandaged with his own hands, telhng his men to be steady, to help each other and to make every shot count. In the course of an hour the men became calmer. They were getting a good cover with sand and dead horses. Every time an Indian showed himself within range a bullet went after him. This discouraged the Indians so much that they drew back, while the scouts took the time to care for the wounded and to throw up more sand. About noon there was a great gathering of Indians on the hill in sight of the scouts. Warriors came riding in from all parts of the field. Among them was one whom every scout knew at long distance. He was Roman Nose, over six feet tall, the tallest Indian on the plains, and one of their greatest chiefs. It was evident a big plan was under way. The council broke up and the plan appeared. Roman Nose led a body of mounted young men out into the vaUey. Others joined them. They drew together in a hne facing the island with Roman Nose at the head. The plan was now clear. This chosen body of two or three hundred was to charge straight on the island while the rest of the Indians crept up through the grass and fired as fast as they could at the scouts in their sand pits to distract their attention. Roman Nose gave the signal and his horsemen started for the island. Lieutenant Forsyth had ordered his men not to fire until the first pony reached the river's edge. The scouts were armed with a new gun, the Spencer Seven- shooter Carbine. The Indians knew what a one-shot rifle 134 STORIES OF NEBRASKA was, but had never seen one that shot seven times without loading. On came the line of Indians, yelhng and whipping their horses. Just at the river 's bank the rifles of the scouts flashed from the sand pits and groups of riders fell from their ponies. On they came. Another volley and more Indians fell. Another, and another and another and another, with a steady aim and terrible effect. Roman Nose himself feU dead from his horse and the Indian hne broke and scattered. Lieutenant Forsyth turned anxiously to his scout Grover. "Can they do any better than that?" he asked. "I have been on these plains, boy and man, for twenty years and I never saw anything like it," answered the scout. "Then we have got them," replied Forsyth. The battle now changed to a siege, while from the hills arose that most harrowing of all sorrowful cries, the wail of the Indian women for their dead. Through many hours this haunted the ears of the men on the island. There were no more attempts to take the island by storm. Starvation was the Indian plan. At the first of the fight the scouts had lost their pack mules with all their provisions. They had nothing but river water and dead horse. Attempts were made after dark to creep through the Indian lines and carry word to the railroad a hundred mUes away. One attempt failed. The Indians were too watchful. Another attempt was made, two scouts crept out in the darkness and did not re tum. Those left on the island could not know whether their messengers were dead or not. They could only hope and watch the line where the sky and prairie met. For a whole week they lay in then" sand pits, drank river Arickaree or Beecher Island Battle field, 1910 THE BATTLE OF ARICKAREE FORK 135. water and ate horse meat. The hot sun glared from the sky, the smell of the dead filled the air, the files buzzed and the Indians glided stealthily about the hUls. A little charge would have captured the island now, but the Indians had suffered too much to try again. They preferred to starve the scouts. It was in the forenoon of September 25th, when a dark moving patch appeared far off on the prairie. It grew larger until the watchers saw that it was an ambulance and a column of cavalry. They knew then that the battle and the siege of Beecher Island were over. The Indians fled as the soldiers came near, and soon the starving and wounded were being cared for. General Custer said that the Arickaree fight was the greatest battle on the plains. At Wounded Knee, South Dakota, lived a tall wise Sioux named Fire Lightning. He was in the Arickaree fight and told me this story one summer afternoon sitting in the shadow of his log house and looking out upon his garden. He said the Indians lost nearly a hundred men in the fight and showed by gestures with his hands how fast the white men fired from their sand pits and how Roman Nose fell from his horse. QUESTIONS 1. Did Lieutenant Forsyth act the part of a wise commander in following such an Indian trail with his small force? 2. Was it courage or skill or .accident which saved his soldiers from destruc tion? 3. Was Roman Nose's plan a good one? Why did it fail? 4. Which would you rather have done — stayed on the island or crept out to get help? THE FIRST RAILROAD AFTER Lewis and Clark had found a way to the Pacific Ocean, and the early emigrants to Oregon, Cahfornia and Utah had made the great overland wagon roads across Nebraska and on to the western coast, the people began to want a railroad to the Pacific. The first raUroad in the United States was built in 1829 at Baltimore. Soon after that a few people began to talk about a raihoad to the Pacific Ocean. It was a far-off dream at first. Nowhere in the world had a railroad ever been built for so great a distance or over such high mountains. Then there were no white people living along the way, but instead there were tribes of wild Indians. So those who spoke of buUding a raihoad to the Pacific were called dreamers. Very few thought it was possible to build such a road and still fewer beUeved that they would ever live to see it buUt. In 1850 Senator Benton, of Missouri, introduced a biU in Congress to buUd a Pacific railroad. By it the United States was to give a strip of land a mUe wide from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean and the railroad was to be built in the center of the mile strip. More people began to believe it was possible to build a railroad to the Pacific. They began to dispute where it should be built . Some want ed it built in the south and some in the north and some in the central part of the United States. The dispute was so fierce it seemed that no road would be built because the people would never agree upon its route. War broke out between the South and the North in 1861. There was more need than ever for a railroad to unite the East with the West. Many surveys had been made to find the best route across the mountains. The Nebraska way, up the broad level valley of the Platte, was chosen as the best 136 THE FIRST RAILROAD 137 approach to them. On the first day of July, 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed the bill which provided for building the first raihoad to the Pacific Ocean and the first railroad in Nebraska. To help buUd the road the United States gave each alternate section of land for twenty miles on each side of the track, and besides this loaned the company $16,000 for each mile across the prairie and $48,000 for each mile in the .... -j.j^..'- \^ J§SS£^ Union Pacific Railroad Train Crossing Missouri River at Omaha, 1866 mountains. The road was called the Union Pacific and the first shovel of dirt for its track was thrown in Omaha on December 2, 1863. There were very great hindrances to be overcome in building the road. A great war was going on and it was hard to get men. All the iron and most of the other material had to be shipped long distances. The Indians on the plains kUled many of the workmen, drove off the horses and cattle and burned the stations. It was July 13, 1865, before the 138 STORIES OF NEBRASKA first rails were laid at Omaha. On March 13, 1866, the first sixty miles as far as North Bend were completed. During that year the first trains began running to Kearney. It took nineteen hours to go from Omaha to Kearney, now Buda, and the fare was nineteen. dollars. By June, 1867, the track had been laid as far as the west line of Nebraska, and on May 10, 1869, the builders of the Union Pacific from Nebraska met the builders of the Central Pacific from Califomia at Promontory Point on the shore of the Great Salt Lake in Utah and drove a golden spike which completed the railroad and made a continuous line from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. Since that time seven other lines have been built across the mountains to the western coast, but to Nebraska belongs the honor of determining the route for the first Pacific raU road. Every night and every day great trains fly along the Platte valley crowded with passengers for the mountauis, the Pacific coast and the world which hes beyond, passing on their way the trains loaded with the teas, the silks and the wonderful handiwork of Japan, India and China, the fruit of California and Oregon, and the cattle, sheep and minerals from the mountains. Never a pause in this wonderful pro cession as it hurries over the Nebraska plains, making them the highway of the greatest commerce east and west which the world has ever known. QUESTIONS 1. What are dreamers good for? 2. Why was the first Pacific railroad built across Nebraska? 3. Of what good to Nebraska is it to have the world's commerce and world's travelers passing over our railroads? A STAGE COACH HERO OF THE LITTLE BLUE ON the morning of August 9, 1864, the overland stage coach left Big Sandy station on the Little Blue River in Jefferson County, Nebraska. There were seven men and two women passengers. Robert Emery was the driver. Two days before this the Sioux had attacked the travelers and stations on the overland traU from the Platte to the Little Blue. About forty white people were killed, scalped and cut to pieces, ranches and wagon trains were burned and all the stock run off. Rumors of the Indian attack had reached Big Sandy, but no one knew the truth, — that butchered men and burned wagons hned the road for two hundred miles. No signs of Indians were seen by the stage driver until eleven o'clock. The stage was not far from "the Narrows," a long ridge lead ing to the valley of the Little Blue with deep gullies on either Stage Coach. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) side, when the driver saw, about two hundred yards ahead, a band of fifty Indians waiting for him. Quick as he saw them he wheeled his four horses and stage coach right about and started back, — ten yards farther on and he could not have done this. It was a race for hfe. The Indians gave their yell and dashed after them in pursuit. The driver laid the lash on 139 140 STORIES OF NEBRASKA the horses' backs and the stage flew over the road. The passengers sprang to their feet wild with fright. "Keep your seats or we are lost!" commanded the driver and they obeyed. Arrows flew thick. Some stuck in the stage coach, some grazed the driver's cheek and one cut the rosette from the bridle of a wheel horse. The driver kept a cool head. There were two sharp turns in the road. As he neared them he pulled up the horses, made the turns carefully and then whipped ahead again. The passengers held their breath in terror at these turns as they watched the Indians gain on them, but the splendid speed and mettle of the stage horses carried them on. Three miles the race lasted. Far ahead a swaying Une in the road showed an ox train of twenty-five wagons coining west. A mile away the master of the train saw the Indians and stage coach. He quickly made a corral of his wagons with an opening toward the west. Into this gap Emery drove his stage while the rifles of the wagon train began to bark at the Indians. The passengers were saved and could hardly express their joy. They hugged and kissed the driver and threw their arms about the necks of the noble horses that had brought them through in safety. :{: 4: H: * :(: A year later the stage driver lay dying with a fever. Just before his death, Mrs. Randolph, one of the passengers in the stage coach that day, placed upon his finger a beautUiU gold ring with these words engraved upon it : E. Umphry, G. C. Randolph and Hattie P. Randolph to ROBERT EMERY in remembrance of what we owe to his cool conduct and good driving on Tuesday, August 9, 1864. A STAGE COACH HERO OF THE LITTLE BLUE 141 Monument Marking Site op the Stage Coach Race. John Gilbert (right), James Comstock (left). Gilbert was on Top op the Stage Coach During the Racf, And, looking at the ring, this stage coach hero of the Little Blue gave up the lines at the end of his last drive. QUESTIONS 1. Have you ever seen a stage coach? Have you ridden in one? 2. In what respects is a stage coach journey better fun than a joumey by railroad? 3. Was Robert Emery just the kind of a man to drive a stage coach? Why? 4. What are such men as Robert Emery doing to-day? THE PRAIRIE FIRE ALL Nebraska was one great field of wild grass in the early days. A few trees grew along the streams and in the ravines. All the rest was grass. In the heat of summer the short grass dried on its roots. When the frosts of early fall came the tall, green grasses were killed. Then the au tumn winds blew and the grass everywhere was dead and very dry. Prairie fires burned in this great ocean of dry grass every fall and spring. Indians or white hunters or campers started them. Once started a fire spread on and on until a rain fell or until it reached a river too wide for it to jump. One of the great dangers to the early settlers was from the prairie fire. To protect their homes and stacks from its ravages they broke a narrow strip of sod around them, then, at some distance inside of that, another narrow strip and burned the grass between. This was called a "fireguard." It was usually from four to eight rods wide. It would stop any common fire and keep the settler's house and stables and haystacks safe. Early every fall the children on the farm helped then- father to burn fireguards around the place. This was done on the first quiet evening after the grass was dry. It was great fun for the children, who loved to take long wisps of lighted grass and carry the fire along the inside of the fire guard with shouts and laughter, while the dark prairie was lighted until their moving figures made shadows upon the fields. A little later the prairie fires appeared. Every night a red glow against the sky was the sign of distant fires. The days were smoky and the smell of burning grass was upon the air. Sometimes there came a high wind driving the 142 THE PRAIRIE FIRE 143 flames faster than a horse could run. Blazing tumble weeds and sunflower heads were caught up in the gale and whirled hundreds of yards, starting new flres wherever they fell. The front of such a flre was called a "headflre." It ran with the wind across mUes of prairie, with its long red tongues hcking at every object, jumping fireguards and even rivers in its path. Behind it the prairie roared and crackled, for ¦ .y '¦-- • /,:— - ..:~^s:srt: .."-^ ¦I'M 1 ¦• An Early Prairie Fire. (From Catlin.) the headflre had no time to burn the grass in its course. It touched it with the torch and rushed on to find fresh fuel. The level prairie looked hke a lake of fire with a lurid cloud of smoke rising above it. It was a grand sight, but terrible to the settler whose farm lay in its path. The only way to protect against a high headfire was to start a backfire some distance ahead of it which would burn away the grass and leave nothing to feed it. The backfire 144 STORIES OF NEBRASKA was set at the edge of a fireguard facing the wind, or it was set on the open prairie by carrying a Une of fire along a few feet at a time and whipping out the side of the fire away from the wind. In either case the backfire burned slowly against the wind until it met the headfire. In a furious gale a back fire was hard to control for it would get away from the men. In October, 1871, great fires burned along the Nebraska frontier. There had been no rain for weeks. The grass was so dry that it seemed to explode when touched with flame. A great wind from the west drove the fires from the unsettled open prairie upon the settlements. Fireguards faUed to stop the flames. The Blue River was jumped by the fire in many places. Thick smoke hung over the region. Hundreds of homesteaders lost their houses and crops and some lost their lives. In other years there were also great losses. In spite of all these dangers every year new fields were plowed and the settlements pushed farther west untU the fires could no longer range across the country. The days of the great prairie fires which swept the whole state are past forever. The children of to-day and of the future wiW. never see in Nebraska the miles on miles of blazing prairie with headfires rushing fiercely down upon their homes hke those seen by their parents when they were children, and thus they will miss one of the grandest and most thriUing sights so familiar to the children of the pioneers. QUESTIONS 1. Do you enjoy an outdoor fire? When do you enjoy it most and why? 2. How do you think a great prairie fire driven by a head wind was regarded by the pioneer children? By their parents? 3. What effect had the great prairie fires of the early days upon Nebraska? 4. Should you rather live in a pioneer or a long settled country? Why? THE ARROW THAT PINNED TWO BOYS TOGETHER TWO boys, Nathaniel and Robert, were helping their father, George Martin, in the hayfield one day in Au gust, 1864. Their ranch was in the broad valley of the Platte in Hall County, about eighteen miles southwest of Grand Island. Suddenly the hills along the valley were covered with Sioux and Cheyenne Indians. It was the time of the great Indian raid of 1864. The father and boys started for the shelter of the log house and barns at the ranch. The two boys were mounted on one pony while the father drove a team hauling a load of hay. Before they could reach the buildings the Indians, shooting a shower of arrows, circled about the boys. One of the arrows struck Nathaniel in the arm and buried itself in Robert 's back, pinning the two boys together. Both fell from the pony. Two or three Indians rode up. One drew his knife to take their scalps. Another Indian said in Enghsh, "Let the boys alone," and they were left there for dead. Shots were fired from the ranch and the Indians rode away, taking with them some of Mr. Martin 's stock. After they had gone the boys were brought in, the arrow was cut from their bodies and their mother cared for them. Both of them lived to be grown men and the story of the two boys who were pinned together by an Indian arrow is one of the stories told many times on the frontier. QUESTIONS 1. Why did the Indians not scalp these boys? 2. What difference between farm and ranch life in these early years and now? 145 TWO SIOUX CHIEFS THE Sioux nation was the strongest Indian nation in the West. Its people roamed the country from the forests and lakes of northern Minnesota across the plains of North and South Dakota to the mountains of Wyoming and south ward over the plains of western Nebraska as far as the Repubhcan River. There were many tribes and bands of the Sioux nation. Two of these tribes, the Brule and Oglala, among the most warlike of the Sioux nation, claimed westem Nebraska as their hunting ground and home. They also claimed western South Dakota and eastern Wyoming. Each of these tribes numbered about seven or eight thou sand. In the summer they hunted buffalo in the vaUeys of the Platte and the Repubhcan rivers and in the winter they found shelter, fuel and game in the region of the Black Hills and Big Horn Mountains. Two great chiefs. Red Cloud and Spotted Tail, of the Oglala and Brule tribes, stand out above all others in the history of the Sioux nation. Their names are forever famous .in the story of Nebraska. Their lives covered the critical periods in the annals of their people, from early contact T\ith fur traders, through the great wars to the final settlement of the Sioux nation in its present home. Red Cloud was born at Blue Creek in what is now Garden county, Nebraska, in May, 1821. Spotted Tail was born in 1823, in Wyoming. Red Cloud's family belonged to the Bad Face band of the Oglala tribe. Spotted TaU was a member of the Brule tribe. Both began life as common warriors and became chiefs through superior quahties of mind and body. The history of the Oglala and Brule Sioux since they were first known to white men may be divided into three periods. 146 TWO SIOUX CHIEFS 147 Red Cloud The first period extends from the earhest exploration of their country by the white men to their first treaty with the United States at Fort Laramie in 1851, and covers the child hood' and youth of Red Cloud and of Spotted Tail. The second period extends from the Fort Laramie treaty of 1851, to the Fort Laramie treaty of 1868, and covers the ma ture manhood of each of these two great chiefs. The third period reaches from the Fort Laramie treaty of 1868, to the death of Red Cloud December 10, 1909, and covers the old age of each of these noted Indians. During the first period the Oglalas and Brules were at peace with the white people but were at war with nearly all the Indian tribes around them. The Sioux were new-comers in that beautiful region where the mountains and plains meet and were driving out the earher inhabitants, the Crows, the Snakes, the Utes and the Pawnees. In these early wars with their Indian neighbors Red Cloud and Spotted Tail became leaders. At the age of sixteen Red Cloud went on his first war party and came back victorious. During the next ten years both young men made names for themselves not only for daring, but for good luck, which counts for much more in an Indian camp. Two events of this period gave Red Cloud fame in the camps of the Sioux. The first was in 1849, when he crossed the Rocky Mountains, as Caesar and Napoleon crossed the Alps, leading a war party into the heart of the Shoshoni country and bringing back many scalps and ponies. The other was in 1850, when an old quarrel broke out anew in the Bad Face band and Red Cloud, who was a leader of the younger men, shot and kiUed BuU Bear, then the most noted chief in the band. 148 STORIES OF NEBRASKA At this time a new and strange experience came into the Uves of the Brule and Oglala Sioux, overshadowing all their future and filling the minds of their wisest chiefs with anxious concern. This was the great migration over the Oregon Trail to Oregon, California, and Utah. At first there were only occasional trains of a few wagons each. After the dis covery of gold in California the trail became crowded with thousands of wagons, and with men, women and children. These emigrants shot the buffalo and other game •without asking leave of the Indians. It was evident that if the white men kept coining, the game after a time would be gone and the Sioux, who hved entirely by hunting, would starve. To prevent trouble the first coimcil ¦with the Oglalas, Brules, and other plains tribes was held on Horse Creek near Fort Laramie in 1851. A treaty was made by which the United States confirmed to each tribe the land occupied by it. AU the tribes agreed to the division of the land made by this treaty, so that for the first time in the history of the plains Indians aU the great hunting ground between the Mis souri River and the Rocky Mountains was divided among them. All the Indians agreed that "The Great Road" along the Platte and across the mountains should be free and open for the white people, and the United States agreed to pay to the Indians fifty thousand doUars in goods each year for fifty years for the use of this road through their country. The Indians agreed not to rob or attack the white people upon this road, and the United States agreed to keep the white people from going elsewhere in the Indian country without permission of the Indians. When the treaty was sent to Washington the United States Senate changed the payments of the fifty thousand doUars from fifty years to ten years. The Indians never agreed to the change. The white people continued to use the great road and the United States sent out each year the fifty thousand dollars in goods to pay the Indians for the use of it. Neither Red Cloud nor TWO SIOUX CHIEFS 149 Spotted TaU signed this first treaty with the Oglalas and Brules. They had not yet become chiefs. The fhst goods to pay for the use of the Oregon TraU under this treaty arrived near Fort Laramie in the summer of 1854. All the plains Sioux assembled to receive their portion. Before the agent came from St. Louis to distribute the goods, peace between the white people and the Sioux was broken by the affair of the Mormon cow and the killing of Lieutenant Grattan and party, the story of which is told elsewhere in this book. Red Cloud and Spotted Tail were in the great Sioux camp at that time and shared in the general feeling of indignation among the Oglalas and Brules at the kiUing of their great chief. The Bear, by Lieutenant Grattan. In later years Red Cloud often referred to this in cident, saying that the white men made The Bear chief of all the Sioux and then kiUed him, hence it was not safe for any one to hold that office. General Harney punished the Brule Sioux severely at the battle of Ash Hollow or Blue Water in what is now Garden County, September 3, 1855, for the killing of Lieutenant Grattan and his party. Quiet was restored on the frontier. Emigrant travel went on over the Oregon Trail and the goods to pay for its use were sent each year to Fort Laramie and there given out to the Indians. The Sioux continued the wars against their Indian enemies, especially the Paw nees on the east and the Crows on the west. Red Cloud and Spotted Tail both grew in reputation as leaders. Gold was found near Pike's Peak in 1859. Soon thou sands of gold hunters filled the foothills of the Rocky Moun tains, driving out the game. All the Indians were restless at the invasion of their hunting grounds. In 1862 came the great Sioux uprising in Minnesota. The Oglala and Brule Sioux were hundreds of miles away, but their hearts were with their kinsmen in the north. They knew that a great war was going on between the white men of the North and the white men of the South. They were urged by messengers to 150 STORIES OF NEBRASKA go on the warpath and drive all the white men out of their country before they became too strong to be driven out. Councils of all the plains Indians were held in 1862 and 1863. The greatest of these was held May 1, 1863, on the old council ground at the mouth of Horse creek near the Ne braska-Wyoming line. There were plenty of Indians who favored a general massacre of the whites, but the plan was postponed for another year. In August, 1864, the Sioux and Cheyenne war broke out all along the frontier of Nebraska and Kansas. AU of the plains tribes were in sympathy with the war, but not all were active in it. While this war was going on a new gold field was found in Montana. The most direct route to the new gold mines was over the Oregon Trail to Fort Laramie and from Fort Laramie north through the Powder River country to the mines. A commission came from Washington to Fort Laramie in the summer of 1866, to make a bargain with the Sioux for this new road. Spotted Tail and the Brules were wilhng to make the agreement. They did not hunt in that region. Red Cloud and the Oglalas refused because the Powder River country was their best buffalo hunting ground. They had conquered it from the Crows. They had seen the white people pouring in everywhere, the Union Pacific RaU road was being buUt, the buffalo were being killed off and even whUe they were holding the councU at Fort Laramie regiments of soldiers arrived there who were to make the new forts on the new road. The Oglala chiefs rose to leave the council. As they did so Red Cloud placed his hand upon his rifle and said, ' ' In this and in the Great Spirit I put my trust." The new roads were opened and the forts were built hi the summer of 1866. Red Cloud became the leader of the war against the whites. Every day came news of fighting on the road to the Montana mines. December 21, 1866, Red Cloud and his warriors drew Colonel Fetterman and ninety- six soldiers into an ambuscade near Fort Phil Kearny in Wyoming, and every white man was kUled. TWO SIOUX CHIEFS 151 There was an outcry in the country against the invasion of Red Cloud's country without his consent. A great peace commission was named at Washington with General Sher man at its head. This commission came to Fort Laramie in 1868, and made the treaty called "The Great Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868." For more than forty years this treaty was regarded by the Sioux as the great charter of their rights. The Sioux orators knew it in 'their own language by heart and repeated it in all their speeches in the great councils or around the tepee fire. It has been to them what the Declara tion of Independence and the Constitution are to the Ameri can people. The treaty of 1868 provided that every Sioux over four years of age should receive from the United States every year one suit of clothes, ten dollars in money, and rations at the rate of one pound of meat and one pound of flour for each day. To every Indian who began farming, the United States would issue one cow, one yoke of oxen, and twenty dollars in money. The new road through the Pow der River hunting grounds was to be given up and all the soldiers from there 'withdra'wn. The Sioux were to have the right to hunt upon the Platte and Repubhcan as long as buffalo were there. Schools were to be established for all the Sioux children. On their part the Sioux agreed to keep peace with the whites and to permit the Union Pacific road to be built. The treaty of 1868 was regarded as a great victory for Red Cloud. He had beaten the white men in battle. They had abandoned their forts and left him his hunting grounds. Yet Red Cloud was one of the last of the Indians to sign the treaty. Spotted Tail and other Brule chiefs "touched the pen," as the Indians caU it, on April 29, 1868. May 25th many of the Oglala Spotted Tail. (From photo colleciion of A. E. Sheldon.) 152 STORIES OF NEBRASKA chiefs, including Sitting Bull, Man-Afraid-of-His-Horses and American Horse, signed. Red Cloud sent word that he would not sign untU the soldiers were sent away. In August, the forts were aban doned and on Novem ber 6, 1868, Red Cloud signed the treaty ¦with Father De Smet as a ¦witness. The signing of the treaty of 1868 ended the Sioux wars for Red Cloud and Spotted TaU. From that time each of these chiefs tried to Ruins at Old Red Cloud Agency, 1911. (From photograph by A.E. Sheldon.) secure the rights of his people in councU rather than in war. Since the two tribes were now to be fed and clothed by the government, a place was to be selected where this should be done. The chiefs visited Washington in 1870, and met President Grant. In 1871 the old Red Cloud Agency was located on the north bank of the North Platte River near the Nebraska-Wyoming line about a mUe from where Henry, Nebraska, now is. Here the Oglalas and Brules were fed in 1872. In 1873 the Sioux Indians moved from the valley of the North Platte to the beautiful White River vaUey in north western Nebraska. Here two agencies were established, one called Red Cloud Agency near the present site of Fort Robinson, the other called Spotted TaU Agency about forty miles northeast, near the junction of Beaver Creek ¦with the White River. For the next five years the vaUey about these two frontier posts was the scene of more exciting events than was any other part of Nebraska. Gold was found in the Black HiUs in 1875. By the treaty of 1868 the Black Hills belonged to the Sioux and white men were to be kept out. White men would not be TWO SIOUX CHIEFS 153 kept out after gold had been discovered. Many of the Sioux under Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse went on the warpath again. The Sioux under Red Cloud and Spotted Tail were fed by the United States. The two old chiefs remained at peace, but hundreds of their young men took rations from the United States and then slipped away under cover of night to join the hostUe Sioux in the north. In 1875, Congress voted not to feed the Sioux according to the Fort Laramie treaty of 1868 unless they remained north of the Niobrara River. In May of that year. Red Cloud and Spotted Tail went to Washington again and made an agreement for $50,000 a year to give up their hunting privilege south of the Niobrara. Only half of this sum was paid. Red Cloud was urged many times by the warriors who had fought under him ten years before to lead them again against the whites. He steadily refused. He had been in the East and seen the cities full of white people. He had sent his young men over all the hunting grounds and he knew that there were not enough buffalo to feed his people through another campaign. June 25, 1876, was the date of the greatest victory over the whites in the history of the Sioux nation. General Custer, the boldest Indian fighter in the country, with 260 men was cut off at the battle of the Little Big Horn in Montana. The news was brought into the Red Cloud and Spotted Tail agencies by Indian runners. There was in tense excitement among the Oglalas and Brules and it was feared that all would join the hostile Sioux. Commissioners came from Washington. A great council was held in the White River valley in August and September. A new treaty was made September 23, 1876, signed by Red Cloud and Spotted TaU and the other chiefs. The Black HiUs were sold to the white people and the United States agreed to issue the Indians more beef, more flour and coffee, sugar and beans, until they were able to support themselves. The Sioux agreed to give up all their claims to Nebraska and to remove to South Dakota, where new agencies would be 154 STORIES OF NEBRASKA established. In spite of the signing of this new treaty by Red Cloud, General Crook ordered the camp of Red Cloud on Chadron Creek to be taken by surprise on October 24th. All the ponies of Red Cloud's band were taken and driven away where the owners never saw them again. This was the hardest blow Red Cloud received in his long career. It was an act of war in violation of agreements by the govern- Ft. Robinson, Sioux County, Nebraska. Site of Red Cloud Agency and Scene op Important Incidents in Sioux Indian W.\r. (From photograph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) ment. Its object was to keep Red Cloud's warriors from helping the hostile Indians. The Sioux soon had reason to see Red Cloud 's wisdom in refusing to go again on the warpath. General Crook gave the hostile Sioux no time to hunt, eat or sleep. In March, 1877, Spotted TaU went on a mission to the camp of the hostile Sioux and over 2,200 of them came in and surrendered at Red Cloud and Spotted Tail agencies. In May of the TWO SIOUX CHIEFS 155 same year Crazy Horse, with his band of 889 ragged and starving followers, joined them. Crazy Horse was killed on September 5th, by a bayonet- thrust while resisting an attempt to put him into prison. Red Cloud and Spotted Tail made their third trip to Wash ington in the same month to arrange for the future welfare of their people. On October 27, 1877, the Sioux bade a flnal fareweU to Nebraska as their home. A great caravan of over 5,000 Indians, ¦with 2,000 cattle and two companies of cavalry started, on its march down the White River valley for its winter camp on the Missouri River in South Dakota. WhUe on the march 2,000 of the hostile Sioux who had surrendered, carrying the corpse of Crazy Horse in a buffalo robe, broke into the line and tried in vain to stampede the Oglalas and Brules. The new Brule agency established in 1878 was named Rosebud, and that for the Oglalas established in 1879 was named Pine Ridge. It was signiflcant that they were not named for the chiefs, as the old agencies had been. A new era began which was one of struggle between the Indian agents and the old chiefs. It was the agents' aim to break down the power and authority of the chief and to deal di rectly with each Indian. This struggle lasted for twenty- five years. Spotted Tail saw its end sooner than did his great fellow chief, for on August 5, 1881, he was killed by Crow Dog, an Indian of his own tribe. The agent at Rose bud, who had just been engaged in a contest with Spotted Tail, wrote of him these words: "Spotted Tail was a true friend to the whites. His influence was always on the side of law and order, and to him is greatly due the peace which now exists." Red Cloud survived his old comrade for many years. He was never reconciled to the new system which broke down the authority of the chief. He opposed many of the new ways and the little frame house a mile from the Pine Ridge 156 STORIES OF NEBRASKA agency buildings was the scene of many earnest councils during the years which followed. He lived to see his people throw off the blanket and adopt the white men's clothes. He lived to see the Sioux sun dance abolished in 1884. He lived to see the Oglalas and Brules settled in log and frame houses, each family on its own land. He lived to see all the Sioux children going to school, speaking both the English and Sioux languages. He lived to take part in 1889 in another great councU ¦with the United States and to sign a new agreement, which gave cattle, tools and seed to all Indians who would farm. He lived long enough to receive, in 1889, $28,000 for the ponies taken from his band in 1876 by General Crook. He hved to see the ghost dancing of 1890 and to hear the echoes of the last Sioux battle at Wounded Knee in December of that year. He lived to see an order sent out in January, 1902, stopping the rations of all able-bodied Sioux men and requiring them to go to work on the roads and irrigation ditches at .$1.25 for an eight-hour day. He lived to see this order enforced in spite of the orators who pointed to the Fort Laramie treaty of 1868. He lived to see the great Sioux reservation sur veyed and separate farms of 320 acres each chosen by heads of Indian famihes, ¦with 160 acres for each child over 18 and 80 acres for each chUd under 18. He lived long enough to have his eyesight fade away, leav ing him in total darkness. He li\-ed long enough to know that nearly all of the friends of his youth and early manhood were gone before, to know that the old ways were changed. He reached the end of his long earthly sojourn December 10, 1909, the last of the long hne of famous Indian chiefs wl^n, in council and on the war- Red Cloud's Tent at Pine Ridge, 1904 TWO SIOUX CHIEFS 157 path, had struggled bravely against the inevitable advance of the white man upon this continent. QUESTIONS 1. What right had each tribe of Indians to the land it claimed? 2. What is "good luck" and why did the Indians believe so strongly in it? 3. Why did the Sioux oppose the settlement of their country by the white men? Why they more than the Pawnee or Omaha? 4. How could the white men and the Sioux have lived at peace with each other? 5. What do you think of the Fort Laramie treaty of 1868? Was it fair to both Indians and white men? 6. Which do you more admire, Spotted Tail or Red Cloud? Why? Compare them. 7. Did the United States keep its treaties with the Sioux? 8. Why did the government try to break the power of the chiefs and deal directly with each Indian? 9. In what sense are the Sioux Nebraska Indians? GREAT STORMS NOTHING is more terrible during the settlement of a new country than a great storm. A long severe whiter is full of danger even to the bravest and hardiest pioneers. Thousands have died of cold and starvation in the settle ment of this country. Every state has its stories of great storms and the hardships and suffering which they brought to the people. Three great storms stand out above all other storms in the history of Nebraska. The first of these began December 1, 1856, with rain from the southwest, but soon the ¦wind changed to the northwest and became fiercely cold. The snow fall which followed was the deepest ever known since the settlement of Nebraska. It was five feet on the level, and in drifts far deeper. This first storm lasted three days. Storm after storm foUowed during the winter. As one writer of that time says: "A terrible cold ¦winter set in December 1, 1856, freezing into ninety solid blocks of ice all the days of December, January and February." There were very few settlers in Nebraska in those days. Most of them were in the counties near the ]Missouri River. Every one of these counties has its old settlers ' stories of the "hard winter" of 1857. In Richardson County the first December storm drove twenty head of cattle into a valley and walled them in with drifting snow. "\Alien they were found by their owner in February most of them were dead, the few survivors having fed on the branches of trees. In Otoe County deer ran through the streets of Nebraska City pursued by the hungry wolves and many settlers lost their lives. In Dodge County the sun failed to show his face for two months. The ravines, thirty feet deep, were filled with 158 GREAT STORMS 159 snow. A settler was lost in the December storm. His funeral was held in April, after the snow had melted. In Burt County snow fell for six days and nights without stop ping. Settlers would have starved were it not for the game which they caught in the snowdrifts. In Cuming County the creeks and rivers were buried by the snow. The set tlers traveled on foot to the Missouri River and hauled back upon hand sleds goods to keep their families from perishing. All the ravines and hollows were drifted full. The timber along the streams was filled with deer, elk and antelope, driven in from the prairie. One settler killed over seventy with an axe. The crust of snow would bear the weight of a man, but these animals with their sharp feet cut through and were helpless. On the Oregon trail the snow lay two feet deep from October to May between Fort Kearney and Fort Laramie and the valleys were filled with the drifts. The general testimony of all the old settlers and the records in dicate that the title "hard winter" belongs to the winter of 1856-57. In no winter since has the snow been so deep, so badly drifted, or remained so long as in that winter. The second great Nebraska storm came at the end of winter, instead of the beginning. It had been raining on Easter Sunday, April 13, 1873. Just before dark the wind changed from the southwest to the northwest, the rain changed to sleet, and the sleet to fine snow. At daybreak on the 14th, the air was filled with what seemed solid snow. It was so wet and driven so swiftly before the wind that it was impossible to face it. All day Monday, and Monday night, Tuesday, and Tuesday night, the storm increased in fury. Dugouts, sod houses, and stables were buried in snow drifts. Nearly all of the stock in some counties was frozen to death. There were many cases where settlers took horses, cows, pigs and chickens into their houses, where all lived to gether until the storm passed. One settler remembers that the snow was as fine as flour and was driven so fiercely before the wind that it found every crevice and filled the stables un- 160 STORIES OF NEBRASKA til the cattle, tramping to keep it do^wn, had their backs forced up through the roofs. Many settlers perished in this storm. How many we do not know, for no perfect record was kept ; but nearly every county had its ¦victims. One of the true stories of this storm is that of the Cooper family, then living about ten miles from St. Paul, Howard County. The mother and two daughters, Lizzie and Emma, were the only ones at home Sunday when the storm came, the father and son being away. Mrs. Cooper was not well and went to bed early. The two girls sat up keeping fire in the fireplace. The wind blew fiercer every hour, sifting the fine snow into the house. Then came a furious blast which blew the door open, scattered the live coals about the room and set the house on fire. While the two girls were putting out the fire another fierce gust tore off the roof and left them in darkness with the snow filling the room. The two girls piled a feather tick on their mother's bed and crept under it, one on each side, with their shoes and clothing on. When daylight came the storm was still raging and snow drifting deep in the room. The two girls decided to go to a neighbor 's house a mile away and get help for their mother. Telling their mother to have courage and keep quiet, the girls put on what scanty wraps they could find and climbed over the wall of the house, for the snow had filled the door way. As soon as they left the house they lost their way. The fierce cold wind had no mercy. The snow cut theu faces. Lizzie, the older girl, threw her arms around Emma crying, "Let us pray, " and in the snow the two children knelt and asked God to guide them. Then Emma said, ' ' Come on. We must go and get help for mother. This is the way." All the day these two girls wandered in the storm. Once they found a dugout where potatoes were kept and beat upon its locked door, but could not get in. Only a few yards away was the house, but when they tried to reach it they lost their way and again wandered on. That night they GREAT STORMS 161 scooped a hole in the snow and held each other close to keep from freezing. In the morning Emma tried to encourage her sister to push on. She rubbed her hands and beat her face to rouse her. Lizzie started, but fell exhausted and died in the snow with her sister watching over her. When she knew her sister was dead, Emma pushed on to find help for her mother. She kept saying to herself, "I must not go to sleep. I must not go to sleep;" for she had heard that when one was freezing to go to sleep was to die. So she kept ino^ving on all through that day and the next. Her feet became frozen and her clothes were torn, but she stumbled on and fought for life. On Wednesday the sun came out and she saw at a little distance the neighbor's house she had tried so long to reach. The people in the house saw her, brought her in and cared for her. Her first words to them were for her mother. Searchers found the mother lying frozen to death a short distance from her home. Emma lived to womanhood and became Mrs. Adolph Goebel of New York. The third and last great storm came January 12, 1888. The day had been so mild that men went about in their shirt-sleeves and cattle grazed in the fields. The air was as soft and hazy as in Indian summer. All over the state men and stock were abroad in the fields and the school-children played out of doors. Suddenly the wind changed to the north, blo^wing rnore furiously each minute thick blinding snow, first in large flakes and later in smaller ones fierce as bullets from a gun. There seemed no limit to the fury of the wind, nor the increasing density of the driven snow. Men driving their teams could not see the horses' heads. The roads were blotted out and travelers staggered blindly on not knowing where they were going. The storm, and the intense cold which followed lasted three days, and was almost imme diately followed by another fierce storm. It was two weeks before the news from the farms and ranches began slowly 162 STORIES OF NEBRASKA to come into the newspaper offices. Then it was learned that the loss of life was the greatest ever known in the West. In Dakota over one thousand persons were reported frozen to death, and in Nebraska over one hundred. The wind blew at the rate of fifty-six miles an hour and the mercury feU to thirty-four degrees below zero. In Holt County alone more than twenty people lost their lives and one half of the live stock in the county perished. This great storm of 1888 is known as the school-children 's storm. Over a great part of Nebraska it came between three and four o'clock, just as the children were starting from the schoolhouses for home. Many stories of heroism in the storm are recorded. One school-teacher, Mrs. WUson, of Runningwater, South Dakota, started from the school- house with nine children. All were found frozen to death on the prairie when the storm was over. In Dodge County, Nebraska, two sisters, thirteen and eight years old, daughters of Mrs. Peter Westphalen, started from the schoolhouse together. Their widowed mother watched anxiously for them but they never came. Their bodies were foimd lying close together in an open field drifted over ¦with snow. The older girl had taken off her wraps and put them on her httle sister. The story of their death told in the newspapers at the time was full of pathos. These verses were written to their memory : "I can walk no further, sister, I am weary, cold and worn; You go on, for you are stronger; they will find me in the morn." And she sank, benumbed and weary, with a sobbing cry of woe, Dying in the night and tempest; dj-ing in the cruel snow. "Try to walk a little farther, soon we'll see the gleaming light, Let me fold my cloak around you," but her sister cold and white With the snowdrift for a pillow, fell in dying sleep 's repose, \Miile the snow came whirling, sifting, till above her form it rose. Search in western song and story, and discover if you can, Braver, grander, nobler action in the history of man; Than the silent heroism of the child who, in her woe. Wrapped her cloak about her sister, as she struggled through the snow. GREAT STORMS 163 Pioneer Seeking Shelter Three young women school-teachers became famous as Nebraska heroines of this storm. They were Miss Louise Royce of Plainview, Pierce County, Miss Etta Shattuck of Inman, Holt County, and Miss Minnie Free man of Mira VaUey, Valley County. Miss Royce started from her schoolhouse with three children to go to a house only a few yards distant. They lost their way and the children were frozen to death. Miss Royce after being out all night was rescued the next day so badly frozen that one of her limbs was taken off. Miss Shattuck sent her children safely home at the first signs of the storm, but lost her own way and wan dered to a haystack. She crept into the hay and lay there three days before she was discovered by a farmer, coming to get hay for his stock. Two of her limbs were frozen and had to be taken off. She wa-s removed to her home at Seward, where she died a few weeks later. Miss Minnie Freeman tied her school-children together in single file with herself at the head of the hne, and thus guided them through the storm to the nearest farm-house where all were sheltered. People everywhere read with deep interest the story of the heroism of these school-teachers. Thousands of dollars were raised by the newspapers to reward them and to care for the other victims. In the annals of Nebraska will always be remembered the "Hard Wmter" of '57, the "Easter Storm" of '73 and the "Great Blizzard" of '88. 164 STORIES OF NEBRASKA QUESTIONS 1. What difference between these storms and the storm described by Whittier in "Snowbound?" 2. Where is a snowstorm more beautiful, in city or country? Why? 3. Where is it more dangerous? Why? 4. Why are children so fond of the snow? 5. How have conditions in a great snowstorm been changed since the pioneer days? OLD FORT KEARNY OLD FORT KEARNY was built in 1847 at Nebraska City. Its log blockhouse overlooked the Missouri River. Soldiers returning across the plains from the war ¦with Mexico ¦wintered at the fort. The very next year its name was taken away and given to the new fort called at first. Fort Childs, two hundred miles west in the Platte vaUey. The new Fort Kear ny soon came to be the old Fort Kearny in the minds of travelers across the plains. It was the one fort between the Missouri River and the mountains in the early years. It was the place where other roads united ¦with the Oregon Trail. The wide Platte valley about the fort was the camping ground of thou sands of wagons every summer. Some days over five hundred ox teams passed the fort. The overland stage and pony express stations were here. When the Indian war of 1864 broke out Fort Kearny became the central point for the army. The First Nebraska cavalry was placed there. The wagon trains going west were not allowed to proceed until there were 165 Old Fort Kearny Block House at Nebraska City. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) Old Earthworks at Fort Kearny, 1907 166 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Fallen Cottonwood Tree on Site or Headquarters 1st. Nebraska Regi ment AT Ft. Kearny, 1864, as Seen in 1907. (From photograph by A. E. Sheldon.) fifty wagons or more. Then they went on together through the wild country beyond. Just west of the fort there grew up a viUage called Doby- town. It was a wild, rough place where all kinds of bad characters lived. When General Sherman rode through Dobytown dur ing the Sioux war he was hissed by some of these people who fa vored the South. The old general remembered the insult and soon after an order came from Washington to abandon the fort. On May 17, 1871, the last soldiers departed and with them went the last support of Dobytown. Fort Kearny is fallen into ruins. Mounds of earth now mark the place where its buildings stood. Low ridges and trenches almost fiUed are all that now remain' of its outer works. The deep furrows of the old trails are blotted out by the plow and harrow. About the old parade ground giant cottonwood trees planted in 1848 stand like soldiers on guard. At one corner of the parade ground a fallen cottonwood marks the site of the First Nebraska headquarters. Five miles away the city of Kearney, full of life and bustle, looks across the Platte River at its namesake the deserted fort. So long as the story of early Nebraska and the memory of the Oregon Trail endure, the name of Fort Kearny ¦will be r'^merrbprod. QUESTIONS 1. Locate the first and the second Fort Kearny on the map. 2. Why was the village near Fort Kearny called Dobytown? 3. Why is Fort Kearny on the south side of the Platte and the present city of Kearney on the north side? FORT lara:mie Fort Laramie in 1848 FORT LARAMIE, Nebraska Territory, was the most noted name on the map of the West from 1842 to 1863. Although now the old fort is in Wyoming forty miles be yond the Nebraska state line, the memories of its early days belong to Nebraska history. The early fur traders founded Fort Laramie. One of them, indeed, died to give his name to the Laramie River from which the fort was named. As far back as 1834 the first fur trader's post, caUed Fort WiUiam, was built in the forks of the Laramie and North Platte rivers. By the year 1846 the name Fort Laramie was in common use. It was a new fort with walls twenty feet high built of sunbaked clay bricks. It stood on a little hill near the Laramie River about a mile above where that river joined the Platte. Here the hunters and trappers for the American Fur Company brought their furs and here Indians came to trade. About 1849 the United States bought the fort from the fur company and it soon became the chief post in the Indian country. All the travelers on the Oregon Trail longed for sight of Fort Laramie. It was 667 miles from the Missouri River. Here the plains and the mountains met. Here the* wagon trains rested and refitted before starting on their journey through the mountains. Near here the great councils were held with the Indians, and the historic treaties of 1851 and 1868 were made. Great buildings were 167 168 STORIES OF NEBRASKA built here by the government to shelter soldiers and suppUes. From this fort the regiments marched to the Indian wars and here were brought many of the dead from those cam paigns. It was the great station on the world's great highway. Ruins op Army Hospital at Fort Laramie In 1891 Fort Laramie was abandoned. To-day its ruins cover forty acres of land. Roofless buildings and crum bling walls are everywhere. Deep gulhes over the hills mark the route of the Oregon TraU. A tiny white school- house stands near the corner of the old parade ground, now grown over "with grass, and a dozen school-chUdren now laugh and play where once the soldiers marched at command. The bodies of the dead are removed from the graves on the hiUside to rest in the cemetery at Fort McPherson. The old life of the Oregon Trail and the Indian wars is gone never to return, but the name of Fort Laramie ¦will always remain in the history of early Nebraska. QUESTIONS What was there in the location of Fort Laramie which made it become the chief army post in the Indian country? Why did the travelers on the Oregon Trail rest and refit at Fort Laramie? Why are the soldiers no longer kept in forts like Kearny and Laramie? THE STORY OF THE PONCAS WHEN the first white men came up the Missouri River they found a httle tribe of Indians living in that beautiful part of Nebraska by the mouth of the Niobrara which is now Knox and Boyd counties. They found clear flo^wing streams, wooded hills, grassy vaUeys and back of them the buffalo prairies. There were less than a thousand Ponca Land as Painted for Maximilian, 1833. (From Thwaites's "Early Western Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio.) people in the httle tribe. They were taU and fine looking and from the first were friendly to the white men and were never at war ¦with them. Their land lay between the Sioux country on the west and the Pawnee and Omaha country on the south and east. The language they spoke was related to the Sioux language but more hke that of the Omahas. They were often at war with the Sioux, but generaUy at peace with the Omahas, so much so that a great many of their 169 170 STORIES OF NEBRASKA young men and women were intermarried with the Omahas. Although such a little tribe, they had their own name. Punka or Ponca; their own traditions; and they had hved so long in that part of Nebraska where the first white men found them that they had no other home, only stories of a far-off time when their fathers had come up the Missouri and settled at the mouth of the Niobrara. After a time white settlers began to come into the Ponca country, to take land and kill off the game. In 1858 the United States made a treaty ¦with the Poncas by the terms of which the Poncas gave up all their land except that part be tween the Niobrara River and Ponca Creek. The richest of their land below the mouth of the Niobrara was opened to the white settlers. The part which the Poncas were to keep was on the border of the Sioux, their old enemies ' country, but the United States promised in the treaty to protect the Poncas, to pay them money every year, to build them houses and give them schools for their children. Two years after this treaty the Sioux made a raid on the Poncas and stole more than half of their horses. The Ponca hunting ground, where they used to kiU buffalo, was covered with Sioux hunting parties and the Poncas could not get their winter supply of meat. In 1863 a drouth came on the land and their patches of corn were a failure. Even the wild plums dried on the trees and the Poncas hunted over the plains for ¦wild turnips and ate cornstalks to keep from starving. Then a party of Poncas went to visit their friends, the Omahas. There were four men, six women, three boys and two girls. Some drunken white soldiers killed three women and one girl, burned their tents and drove away their six ponies. Still the Poncas remained at peace with the white people. In 1868 the United States made a great treaty with the Sioux Indians at Fort Laramie. In that treaty by some mistake all of the Ponca land was given to the Sioux, the THE STORY OF THE PONCAS 171 bitter and lifelong enemies of the Poncas. This was done ¦without the consent or knowledge of the Poncas. It took away from them their homes, their gardens and the graves of their fathers, which they had defended against the Sioux for hundreds of years, and made a present of them to their deadly foes, the Sioux. Nothing so cruel or unjust was ever done by the United States to another tribe of Indians. And this was done to a tribe which was always the friend of the white men. General Sherman, one of the commissioners who made the treaty at Fort Laramie, said he did not know that this had been done until long afterward. The Poncas did not know that it had been done until the Sioux warriors raided them and tauntingly shouted, "This land belongs to us. Get off." The Poncas had no place to go and remained upontheir old reserve even though in daily danger from the Sioux. During the two years, 1869 and 1870, they built sixty log cabins and put out crops. Then the Missouri River rose and washed away their village site. They had to tear down their cabins and carry them back half a mile to make a new ¦village. The next year after this the tribe put three hundred acres into crops. The grasshoppers came that year and the next and ate the crops. The year 1876 was a year of great excitement on the Nebraska border. Gold had been found in the Black Hills and the white men wanted to go there after it. The Sioux were fighting to keep the white men put. The order was given to remove the Ponca Indians "with their consent" from their old home to the Indian Territory. An agent came to the Poncas and told them that they must send their chiefs with him to the new place to pick out a home. Standing Bear and nine other chiefs went. They did not like the land and would not select a place. They said to him: "The water is bad. We cannot live here." The agent told them that they must pick out a place for the tribe or he would not take them home. They refused. He 172 STORIES OF NEBRASKA left them there a thousand miles from their Nebraska home in the winter with no money. Standing Bear told this story : "We started for home on foot. At night we slept in haystacks. We hardly lived until morning, it was so cold. We had nothing but our blankets. We took the ears of corn that had dried in the fields. We ate it raw. The soles of our moccasins were out. We were barefoot in the snow. We were nearly dead when we reached the Otoe reservation in Nebraska. It had been fifty days. We stayed there ten days to get strong and the Otoes gave each of us a pony. The agent for the Otoes said he had a telegram that the chiefs had run away, not to give us food or shelter or any help." The Otoe agent afterward said when the Ponca chiefs came into his office that they left the prints of their feet in blood upon the floor. When the chiefs reached their own homes at the mouth of the Niobrara they found there the agent who had left them in the Indian Territory. He had sol diers with him and was making the Ponca peo ple pack up their goods in order to start for the new country. The sol diers put the women and children into wagons with what few things they could carry and started the teams for Standing Bear and Family in 1904. Indian Territory This (From photograph by A. E. Sheldon.) ^^^ ^^ ^^^^ 21, 1877. It was very rainy that spring. The Poncas were sad and heart-broken at leaving their old Nebraska homes. Some of them were sick. Prairie Flower, a daughter of Standing Bear and wife of Shines White, died of consumption at Mil- THE STORY OF THE PONCAS 173 ford, Nebraska, and was buried there. The women of the ¦village dressed the body for the grave and brought flowers. The Indians were deeply affected by this kindness. Many children died as the tribe moved south across Nebraska and Kansas. A tornado upset their wagons. Part of the time they were out of food. One Indian became insane and tried to kill White Eagle, a chief, for letting so much trouble come upon his people. At the end of a three months' journey the tribe reached the Indian Territory. They had left dry log cabin homes, their own plowed fields and beautiful clear flowing streams and springs. In the new land they were set down on un broken prairies ¦with nothing but their wagons and tents. The water was very bad. All their cattle and many of their horses died. The people were homesick and their hearts were breaking. They talked all the time of their beautiful home in Nebraska. The first winter one hundred and fifty- eight out of seven hundred and sixty-eight died. Standing Bear's son was among those who died. Before his death he begged his father to take his body to Nebraska and bury it there. In mid^winter Standing Bear and thirty of his band broke away from the Indian Territory and set out for Nebraska carrying the body of the dead young man. They had a long, hard journey of three months and reached the reservation of their friends, the Omahas, in the early spring. The Omahas gave them some land to put into crops. While they were plo^wing it the United States soldiers came and put them under arrest. They had orders to carry them back to the Indian Territory. The story of their arrest was printed in the newspapers and friends in Omaha came to their aid. Dr. George L, Miller, editor of the Herald took up their cause. Two lead ing lawyers, — John L. Webster and Andrew J. Poppleton, — defended them without pay. There was a trial in the United States court at Omaha. Standing Bear made a speech to the court through an interpreter, which touched 174 STORIES OF NEBRASKA all hearts. Judge Dundy decided that Standing Bear and his band should be set free. There was great rejoicing in the hearts of the Indians and their friends. After they were set free by Judge Dundy, Standing Bear and his party settled on an island in the Niobrara River which was part of their old reservation and had been overlooked when the United States gave their old country to the Sioux. Here they were joined by others from the Indian Territory until they numbered a hundred and thirty. White friends furnished them tools and they began to farm agaui. Stand ing Bear was called to go east and teU the Indians ' story to great audiences. In 1890 peace was made between the Sioux and the Ponca tribes and the Sioux gave back to the Poncas part of their old lands on the Niobrara. About one third the tribe came back, the remainder staying in the Indian Territory. Standing Bear lived to an old age and died at his home on the Niobrara on September 3, 1908. QUESTIONS 1. What right had the United States to give the Ponca land to the Sioux? 2. Would you be willing to have the Poncas taken from their old homes in this way in order to get a home for yourself? 3. Which would be better — -to submit hke the Poncas or to figh' hke the Sioux? 4. Tell what you think of Standing B'ear from this story. 5. Ought an Indian to have the same rights in this country as a white man? Why? 6. What should the people of Nebraska do for the Indian tribes whose old homes were in our state? BRIGHT EYES (Instha Theamba) BRIGHT EYES was an Omaha Indian girl, who became widely known through her efforts to help her people. She was born at Belle^vue in 1854, the daughter of Joseph and Mary LaFlesche, and united in her person the blood of the Indian, the French and the American settlers of Ne braska. Her father was a chief of the Omaha tribe, the son of a French man and a Ponca Indian woman. Her mother was daughter of Nicomi, an Indian woman of the loway tribe, and Dr. John Gale, a surgeon of the United States army. When Bright Eyes was born she was named Yosette or Susette by her parents. It was not until years later she received her second name. Her father's Indian name was Esta-maza or "Iron Eyes." Some one who knew this looked at the daughter and said, "Her name should be Bright Eyes, or in Omaha language, Instha Theamba." So she came to be known by the name "Bright Eyes" and to sign it to her writings. Bright Eyes grew up on the Omaha Indian reservation ¦with the other Indian children. She spoke nothing but the Omaha language until she was eight years old. Then she went to the mission school on the reservation. She learned EngUsh faster than any other child in the school and was- soon able to read and write. Every one loved her because she was so bright and cheerful and winning in her ways. When 175 Bright Eyes. (Instha Theamba) Mrs. T. H. Tibbles 176 STORIES OF NEBRASKA she was fifteen she was asked what she most wished for a Christmas present and replied, a good education. This was told to the president of a woman's seminary at Ehzabeth, New Jersey. Very soon Bright Eyes was invited to attend school there, and became at once one of the best students, beloved by her teachers and by the young white women who were her schoolmates. At the end of four years she graduat ed and came back to the Omaha reservation. The Omaha Indians were very poor. Grasshoppers came and ate their crops. Part of the tribe lived in the old Indian way and kept up the old Indian customs. There were no pleasant rooms and beautiful books and pictures and educat ed girl companions as there were at the school at EUzabeth, New Jersey. The wild game was fast going. The Indians had not yet learned how to farm as the white men did. Idleness and its bad results were seen in the tribe. There was little to make life happy for a bright girl fresh from study in an eastern school. One day Bright Eyes found out that there was a law which said that any Indian quahfied to teach school should have the preference in schools on the reservation. She at once set out to get leave to teach school near her home. After great obstacles had been overcome, she began teaching in a httle cabin at twenty dollars a month. This gave her a chance to help the people of her tribe in many ways toward a better way of li^vdng. She was very busy in this work when Standing Bear and the Ponca Indians who had escaped from Oklahoma came to the Omaha tribe for help in 1879. Bright Eyes at once became the champion of the poor Poncas. She wrote to the newspapers the story of their wrongs. She visited Omaha in their behalf. "WhUe thus engaged she became acquainted with Mr. T. H. Tibbies, an editorial writer on the Omaha Herald, and later, in 1882, "became his wife. The next year she was asked by people interested in the Indians to go east and tell the story of Nebraska Indians and their needs. For the next five years. BRIGHT EYES 177 accompanied by her husband and Chief Standing Bear, she spoke to great audiences in the eastern states and in Europe. Everywhere the people were charmed with her presence and interested in her story. The poet Longfellow asked to meet her and when he saw her said, "This is Minnehaha." Lead ing men took up the cause of the Indian and their rights were better protected. At the end of her years of lecturing Bright Eyes returned to Nebraska. Her summers usually were spent on the Omaha reservation among her own people. During the remainder of the year she lived in Omaha or Lincoln, where Mr. Tibbies was engaged in editorial work. She wrote much herself and had the most constant interest in the progress of the Omahas and other tribes of Indians. During the last Sioux war in 1890 she was at Pine Ridge. She died May 26, 1903, at her own home on the Omaha reservation in sight of the beautiful Logan River and the hills where her people had hunted in the early days, leaving the memory of a good and true life spent in making all life which she touched brighter and better. QUESTIONS 1. 'What inspiration is there in this story for any Nebraska girl? 2. What do you admire most in Bright Eyes' character? Why? 3. Did she belong more to the Indian or to the white race? THE HERD LAW WHEN the first settlers came to Nebraska they settled along the streams where there was timber and water. They farmed very small fields and fenced them, turning their horses, cattle and other stock loose to go where they pleased and find food, water and shelter. It was a very easy way to raise stock and the longer one raised it in that way the more he thought it was the only way. All about the early settlers ' cabins were miles upon mUes of grass-land free for everybody. Cattle, sheep and horses would find the best places to feed and stay there as long as they liked. When they were thirsty they would go to the running water to drink. Often they would lie down in the shade of trees and rest during the heat of the day. AU the owner had to do was to ride around them once in a while to see that all were there. Hogs also ran loose and hved chiefly on acorns. Where there were no acorns they ate rushes which grew thickly in the valleys and their ready noses found roots to dig everywhere. A good many of the early settlers liked to hunt. There was plenty of game. After a settler had his crop in he could go hunting and after he had it gathered he could go hunting again. His stock would take care of itself whUe he was gone. After a while all the land with wood and water in each neighborhood was taken. Settlers kept on coming. Some of them went on farther west to get land with wood and wa ter. Some of them took the rich grass land which the first settlers had passed by. They had no timber to fence with and they did not wish to fence. They broke out larger fields and began to farm on a larger scale. When the stock running loose got into their crops there was trouble. The settlers on the prairie said that every man should take care ITS THE HERD LAW 179 of his own stock and keep them out of the crops. The set tlers along the streams said that every man should fence his crop and all should let their stock run. So they disputed and sometimes fought. More settlers came in and the settlements spread rapidly west from the Missouri River and away from the timber along '¦¦'¦ •¦'•'/¦ ', ¦/ ¦ '¦¦ ! ,/ ,. ¦•¦ '.; ¦ ¦ )'r..-i.^ <.. - ^/. y ', ,/(' /. ' "'/' • ¦ . . . . . /r- . . Herd L\w Act op 1870. (Photo from original in Statehouse^, the streams. There were some settlements where everyone wanted the stock kept up and some where all wanted the crops fenced. Laws began to be passed that sheep and hogs should not run at large. A little later laws were passed that horses and cattle should not run at large in the night. Then laws were passed making owners of stock hable for damages done by it in certain counties only. The people divided into two parties, those who wished to raise crops and those who 180 STORIES OF NEBRASKA wished to raise stock. The dispute grew warm in all the settlements. Finally in the year 1870 so many thousand settlers were coming that the legislature met in special session at the call of Governor Butler and passed the first general herd law. Under it everyone had to keep his stock from the crops of other people or pay damages and anyone finding stock in his crop might take it up and hold it untU the damages were paid. This was called the "herd law," because the best way found to keep stock from the crops was to herd it. Some parts of the state were excepted from this law. The next year the law was changed so that all the state came under the herd law unless the people of a county voted to have a fence law in that county. This has been the law of Nebraska since 1871. It has made it possible for poor people who could not fence to raise crops and make homes on the prairie. With this law the settler could plant a crop anywhere and harvest all he could raise. Without it he could harvest only what he could pro tect from roaming stock. No law has helped more than this one in the settlement of our state and although the need of it is no longer felt, the good that it has done abides ¦with us, giving each man the right to reap where he sows. QUESTIONS 1. 'What differences between farming in the early days and now? 2. Who has better right to use of the land, the stockman or the farmer? Why? 3. How has the herd law helped Nebraska? 4. Do we need it now? Why? TWO CROWS (Cahae Numba) TWO CROWS was for many years a leading chief of the Omaha tribe. He was tall, strong and very active even when he became an old man. He was born about the year 1820, and died at his home among the Blackbird HiUs about the year 1895. He was a firm friend of the white people during all his long life. He fought in many battles with the Sioux and the Pawnees and good fortune kept him safe through many great dangers. Two Crows was famed in the tribe for his wit and shrewdness of speech. This became more and more marked as years went on and in the councils all the Indians lis tened eagerly to hear what Two Crows would say, for they knew that he would give some sharp, keen point to the talk. After the Omahas had settled on their land where they now live, many white men who had married Indian wives came and settled there too. Other persons who had both white and Indian blood also had settled there, because the land was very black and rich, and there were many beautiful springs and clear streams of water flowing through it, and plenty of timber for fuel and for building purposes. The old- fashioned Indians became very jealous of these "white Indi ans" and at last called a great council of the tribe to talk it over. One chief after another rose and told the council how much trouble the white people made them. They said the 181 Two Crows (Cahae Numba) 182 STORIES OF NEBRASKA Great Father gave the land to the Indians and the white people had no right to be there. They aU said what a shame it was for the Omahas to marry ¦vnth any other people, and that none but the pure blood Oma ha Indians had any right to the land. After they had all talked until they were tired and the In dians had agreed to all they said. Two Crows, who was then a very old man, rose slowly and said : "My friends, I agree "with all that you say to-day. You have said it very wisely and very weU. None but the pure blood Omahas have any right to this land. AU the others ought to move off at once. Now, you aU know that my family and Wajepa 's family are the only two famUies of pure Omaha blood in the tribe. All the rest of you have got a little Ponca blood, or a little Sioux blood, or a httle loway or Otoe blood mixed in. So now all of you move off the land and Wajepa and I will keep it for the pure Omahas." This unexpected turn broke up the councU. What Two Crows said was true. In the Omaha tribe, a very smaU tribe, it had been the custom for many years for some of the young men to take their wives from the neighboring tribes. The result was that in time all the famihes but two had in termarried. This was very well known to aU the Indians and as no one could deny what Two Crows said the dis contented Indians were very glad to drop the matter. Wajepa. (From photograph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) 3. QUESTIONS Was the idea that none but pure blood Omahas should have the land a good one? Why did the other Omaha Indians who spoke for this idea refuse to accept it after Two Crows favored it? Who arc Americans in this country? THE GRASSHOPPERS GRASSHOPPERS were among the worst enemies of the early settlers of Nebraska. They were not the common green or yellow kind which you see jumping in the flelds to day, nor yet the red, yellow and black winged "dusty road- ers" which boys chase down the lane. These were the Rocky Mountain grasshoppers, with slender bodies, light gray ¦wings and enormous appetites. Their home was on the high plains and among the hills at the foot of the great mountains of the West. Here they lived and raised their families. In dry years there were more children and less food at home. Then they assembled and flew away in great swarms to the east and south. They traveled hundreds of miles. Sometimes in clear, warm moonlight they flew all night. More often they settled down late in the afternoon to rest and feed, and pursued their journey on the morrow. It was a sad day for the settlers where the grasshoppers lighted. Eight times between 1857 and 1875 some parts of our state were visited by them, but the great grasshopper raid came on July 20th, 21st and 22d, 1874. Suddenly, along the entire frontier of Nebraska, Kansas, Dakota and Minnesota, the air was filled with grasshoppers. There were billions of them in the great clouds which darkened the sun. The vibration of their wings filled the ear with a roar ing sound like a rushing storm, followed by a deep hush as they dropped to the earth and began to devour the crops. AU the corn was eaten in a single day. Where green fields stood at sunrise nothing remained at night but stumps of stalks swarming with hungry hoppers strugghng for the last bite. They stripped the garden patches bare. They gnawed great holes in carpets and rugs put out to save favorite plants. The buds and bark of fruit trees were consumed. 183 184 STORIES OF NEBRASKA They foUowed potatoes and onions into the earth. When they had finished the gardens and green crops they attacked the wheat and oats in the shock and the ¦wild grass in the unplowed fields. Only two green crops escaped them, broomcorn and sorghum cane. They did not seem to have a sweet eyetooth. Everywhere the earth was covered with In Grasshopper Days. (From photograph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) a gray mass of struggling, biting grasshoppers. Turkeys and chickens feasted on them. Dogs and pigs learned to eat them. It was hard to drive a team across a field because the swarm of grasshoppers flew up in front and struck the horses in the face with such force. We thought when they were filled they would fly away. Not at all. They liked us so well they concluded to leave their children with us. The mother grasshoppers began to pierce the earth with holes and fill the holes with eggs. Each THE GRASSHOPPERS 185 one laid about one hundred eggs. Then they died and the ground was covered with their dead bodies. Most of the people on the frontier were very poor. It was "hard times" even before the grasshoppers came. There was a great panic in the land. Many settlers had nothing to live on during the winter but their sod corn and garden. These were gone. It looked like starvation. The future held no hope, for the very soU was filled with eggs which would hatch a hundred times as many grasshoppers the next sprmg. Those were the darkest days for the Ne braska pioneers. Some sold or gave away their claims and went east. Their covered wagons used to pass with this painted on the canvas : "eaten out by GRASSHOPPERS. GOING BACK EAST TO LIVE WITH WIFE 's FOLKS." During the fall and winter those men brave enough to stay took their teams and worked wherever they could get a job in the older settlements. Some hunted game and lived as the Indians did on dried buffalo meat, trading the robes for other suppUes. Relief funds were raised farther east and food, seed and clothing distributed to those not too proud to apply for them. Thus the dark winter of 1874-75 was lived through. In the spring the settlers sowed their small grain and mUlions of young grasshoppers hatched to eat it. These httle fellows could not fly. They could only hop short hops. So the settlers made ditches and drove them in. Windrows of straw were laid across the fields. The young grasshoppers crawled into the straw to get warm and the settlers set it on fire. Bushels of them were caught in wide shallow pans with kerosene in the bottom which were set low and drawn across the fields. Nature helped the settlers. It was a cold rainy spring which froze the young brood. Little. parasites bored holes in the eggs and in the little fellows. The birds, then 186 STORIES OF NEBRASKA as now the farmer 's best friends, came from the south and joined in the good work of fighting grasshoppers. For the next two or three years there were some grass hoppers and the fear of more along the frontier. Then the Rocky Mountain grasshoppers disappeared from the settle ments. They have never been seen in such vast numbers since and the hard times they brought on the land ¦will prob ably never again return. Those who left their claims have wished many times that they had stayed by their farms, which seemed so worthless in those early years. Those who held on to their land through hardship and suffering, ¦with hearts strong and faith firm in the future of Nebraska, have hved to see their later years made glad by generous crops and hap py homes where children asking for stories of the long ago are told the story of the dark days when the grasshoppers came. QUESTIONS 1. In what respects are the migrations of grasshoppers like those of men? 2. Is there room enough in the world for all the insects and aU the people? Why? 3. Who in your neighborhood can tell true stories of the grasshopper days? What have you heard of them? 4. Why do we beheve the grasshoppers will never again come in such vast numbers? LOST IN THE SAND HILLS THE great Sand HiUs section of western Nebraska is in the shape of an open fan. The handle of the fan is in Hayes and Dundy counties near the southwest corner of the state, the broad wings of the fan extend into parts of Cherry, Sher idan, Holt, Rock, Antelope and Pierce counties, reaching the northern border of the state. The center of this sand hills fan is in southern Cherry and Thomas counties. Here extend for many miles The Sand Hills. (From photograph by Dr. G. E. Condra.) in every direction great billows of sandy soil. Until closely studied all of the landscapes look alike, for each sand hill seems Uke each other sand hill, and the little vales which lie between are all sisters of the same age. The sand drifts and slides about with each gust of wind. There are no great landmarks to serve as guides. If one climbs to the top of the highest hill in sight, everywhere is a confused medley of hills and hollows extending as far as eye can see. It is as though in an ocean tossed by a great storm the waves suddenly had been changed to sand. In the early years of exploration and settlement the sand hills were regarded as a dangerous region. Many stories are .told of hunters and explorers who were lost among these hills. In more than one place human skeletons have been found, telling their mute story of a losing struggle with hun ger and thirst in these treacherous wUds. 187 188 STORIES OF NEBRASKA One of the most thriUing incidents of frontier days oc curred in the sand hills of Thomas County in 1891. In March of that year a German family named Haumann set tled near Thedford. There were nine or ten chUdren in the famUy. The eldest girl, Hannah, went to work for Mr. Gil- son, a neighbor who lived about a mile and a half away. It was her custom to come home on Sunday and spend a happy day with her brothers and sisters. On Sunday, May 10th, she did not come home as usual, because Mr. Gilson was away and Mrs. Gilson wished Hannah to stay with her for company. This made the other children unhappy, and Tillie and Retta coaxed their mother to let them go over to the Gilson home to visit their sister. TiUie was eight years old and Retta was four. After dinner ]\Irs. Haumann let them go, telling them to stay an hour and then come straight home. They reached Mr. Gilson 's safely and about four o'clock started, hand in hand, to return home. At this season the sand hills are beautiful with grasses and wUd flowers, and the two children left their path and ran eagerly to gather those near by. They saw others stiU more beauti ful a little farther off, so they laughed and ran on and on to gather them until the path was lost and the great sea of sand hiUs stretched before them wave upon wave. Lost upon this sea, they wandered on. Night came and brought no children to the Haumann home. At daybreak the next morning the neighbors were searching the hills. Word had been sent to Thedford and from there to the surrounding country. Although it was the busy season of the year, men left their fields and herds and tramped or rode over' the hills and hollows looking every where for the two little girls. Monday afternoon just be fore sundown they found their trail. That night Mr. Stacey with a party of searchers camped on the trail. As soon as it was light they followed the children's tracks, sometimes rapidlj^, often more slowly and not infrequently upon their hands and knees. The story of the children's LOST IN THE SAND HILLS 189 wanderings and weariness was written in the prints made on the sand and grass along the way. Here TiUie had carried Retta — here they had walked side by side — here they had sat down to rest — here they were up again and pushing bravely on to find their home. Tuesday night the searchers camped again by the side of the trail. They did not know until too late that they and the children were only a little distance apart that night. Wednesday morning they found where TiUie and Retta had passed the night lying close by each other on the sand. Here the trail grew hard to follow and much time was lost. Meanwhile the women at Thedford were helping in their homes, preparing food and coffee which they sent to the men on the trail. The searchers found the work anxious and nerve-racking. At times the little footprints were plain and clear and they hastened to overtake the children. A little farther on the light sand had sifted across and left no trace to follow. The poor mother could not join in the search, for she had two children younger than Retta, one a baby, so she waited at home from hour to hour for news of her lost children. While the searchers followed, the two children wandered on, traveling when awake almost constantly. If they had only waited they would soon have been found, but their minds were filled with the thought of home while their feet carried them ever farther away with each weary step. On Wednesday morning Tillie told Retta to wait at the foot of a big hill while she went to the top to see if there was a house in sight. When she reached the top she seems to have seen a larger hill, a common impression as one looks out over that country, and went on to get the wider view from that. Retta thought that she would meet her sister more quickly by going around the hill, and so started on. Thus they were separated, neveir to meet again. About noon of this day the searching party, which included Mr. Haumann, Mr. Stacey, Mr. Maseburg and Dr. Edmunds, found Retta carrying one 190 STORIES OF NEBRASKA little shoe with its sole worn through, while the other had been dropped on the traU. Both of the girls had worn new shoes when they left home that Sunday. Very tenderly the little girl was cared for by the doctor and the others. She had wandered so long without food or water that her mind was affected for many days. She said that they saw a prairie fire and went to it in hope of finding some one, but no one was there. The search for Tillie went on. From Dunning, thirty miles east of Thedford, a party of searchers started on Wednesday, the day on which Retta was found. They formed in a long line across the hills to intercept her, for the children had wandered east. On Sunday, May 17th, the Dunning party found the lost girl. She had taken off her apron, spread it over some rose bushes, laid herself on the sand beneath and died. Her body was placed on a hand car and taken to Thedford. Her parents did not recognize their child except by her clothing. She was wasted to skin and bones and her fair tender flesh was burned black by exposure. All the neighborhood came to her funeral and wept ¦with her family as the womout httle body was laid to rest. That country is settled now and fences stretch every where across the hills. One has only to foUow a fence and he will reach a ranch or a road. The Haumann family stiU live on their ranch near Thedford. Retta has grown to womanhood and has a httle daughter of her own. She hves at Broken Bow and often ¦visits the old home. You may be sure they do not forget their lost sister, Tillie, nor do the early settlers fail to recall with deep feeling the days when they followed a fading trail while far ahead of them toiled the figure of a brave little girl carrying her younger sister in her arms to ease her weariness as they struggled on in search of home. LOST IN THE SAND HILLS 191 QUESTIONS 1. What is the sand hills country in Nebraska good for? 2. What to you is the saddest part of this story? 3. Have you known of any child being lost? Tell about it. 4. Notice how very kind all the neighbors were. What acts of kindness have you known neighbors to show in times of deep trouble? 5. TeU wnat you think is fine about Tillie Haumann. AN OPEN WELL IT was a long distance to water for the settlers on the table lands of Nebraska. If they went straight down it was from one hundred to three hundred feet of hard digging. If they went across country it was sometimes five or six miles to a running stream. Frequently they hauled water in barrels from the streams during the first year, putting in a sod crop to live on and digging in the well every hour they could spare. As they could not afford machineiy these early wells were dug by hand. A stout rope and bucket with a home made crank and ¦windlass brought the dirt up from the bottom. Sometimes this was turned by the mother and children while the father pounded away at the bottom with pick and spade. Sometimes the weU went through layers of soft and sandy soil which would cave in and bury the digger below. To prevent this a box or curbing was made with boards strongly braced inside and just large enough to fit the well. This held the wall of the soft layers firmly in place. Where the wall was hard it did not need curbing. Digging a deep well was slow, painful and dangerous work. Months passed while the family dug and turned the windlass and wondered how much deeper the water lay. What a day of celebration when the digger struck the final blow and water flowed in about his feet! How glad the children were! All the neighbors came to taste the water and rejoice at the family's good luck. Water, common water, which people throw carelessly away seemed to them as precious as gold. When the well was very deep, pulling the water up by hand was too slow work, so a large wooden drum and tackle was built alongside the well. Horses or oxen were hitched 192 AN OPEN WELL 193 to a pole fastened to the drum and driven around it in a cir cle. As the drum turned it wound up a long stout rope and at the other end of the rope was a barrel of water coming slowly to the top from the cool depths of the deep well. During the drought of 1890 to 1895 many settlers on the high plains of western Nebraska left the claims where they had worked so hard and the wells they had toiled so hard to dig because they had no crops. The grass and weeds grew up about the wells, the frame and ¦windlass disappeared and there wa? a hidden open hole hundreds of feet deep. Such an open well in Custer County was the scene of a thrilling experience. The story of it was told in the Custer County Beacon of September 5, 1895, by the man who lived through it, Mr. F. W. Carlin. It is given for the most part in his own words : "While driving through the country about fifteen miles northwest of Broken Bow on the evening of August 14th, I found I had taken the wrong track and driven up to some old sod buildings. I tumed my team around and started to ward what looked like a good road, when one of my horses seemed to step into a place. I got out of my wagon and started alongside the team to be sure that the road was all right when, without a moment's notice, I became aware of the fact that I had stepped into an old weU and was going down like a shot out of a gun. "I placed my feet close together, stretched my arms straight over my head and said, " O God, have mercy on me," and I honestly believe that saved my hfe; but I went down, down, and it seemed to me I would never reach the bottom. The farther I went, the faster I went, and never seemed to touch the sides at all. "I supposed, of course, it would kiU me when I struck the bottom, but God had heard my prayer. I stmck in the mud and water, which completely covered me over. I was con siderably stunned, but was able to straighten up and get my head above water. I scrambled around and finally pulled 194 STORIES OF NEBRASKA my legs from the mud at the bottom and stood on my feet in the water, which came just up to my arms. I was very cold and I tried a number of times to get out of the water, only to fall back. The curbing was somewhat shmy. I finally managed to break off a little piece of board and found a crack in which I managed to fasten it and perched myself upon it until morning. "While sitting there I heard my team running away. In its remaining by the well was my only hope of rescue, for I was aware of the fact that I was at least a mile and a half from the nearest house and that no one knew that I was there. "There I sat until morning. It was about nine o'clock when I fell in and I was drenched and plastered ¦nith mud. The only serious injury I received was a badly sprained ankle which gave me great pain. I also had a sore place in my back, which I found a number of daj^s afterwards was a broken rih. "As soon as daylight appeared I began to look around and take in the situation. In looking up it seemed to be at least one hundred feet to the top. I learned afterwards that it was exactly 143 feet. It was curbed in places with a curb about three feet square. There would be a place curbed for about six to sixteen feet and then there would be a place not curbed at all. The curbing was perfectly tight, not a crack between the boards that I could get my fingers into, and covered with a slimy mud. I at once concluded that my only chance for rescue was my knife, if it had not fallen out of my pocket while floundering in the mud. So, thrusting my hand into my pocket, — there it was and a good one, too. I took it and began cutting footholes in the sides of the curbing. It was very slow, but sure. I never went back a foot after I had gained it. WTien I would get to the top of a curbing I took the board that I had cut out and made me a seat in one corner and in this way I think I got up about fifty feet the first day. AN OPEN WELL 195 "Some time in the afternoon I came to a curbing which I thought I could not get through. It was of sohd one by six inch boards, closely fitted together and not less than sixteen feet to the top of it. I made myself a good seat, fixing my self as comfortable as possible, and concluded that I must stay there and await assistance or die there. I stayed there aU the next night and slept half of the time, for the night did not seem very long. I would have been quite comfortable had I not been so wet and cold and my feet pained me terribly. The greatest drawback was that I had to do most of my climbing on one foot. "I remained at that point the greater part of the next forenoon, calling often for help. One thing was in my favor. I was neither hungry nor thirsty. I began to give up all hopes. I thought of my wife and little boy, who were al ways so glad to see me when I came home from a trip. I thought how the little fellow would never see his papa or run to meet him when he returned home again. "That was too much. I made up my mind to get out or die in the attempt. So I took a piece of board, put some sand on it, and got the point of my knife good and sharp on the sand. Then I began cutting away the curbing and mak ing one foothole after another. I cut, climbing higher and higher, and was at last on the top of the curbing. From there I would have been comfortable if my feet had not hurt me so badly. But I cut holes in the clay for my hands and feet with my knife, and finally got within sixteen feet of the top. "Right there I had the worst obstacle I had met yet. It was a round curbing four feet high, perfectly smooth inside. The earth was washed out around it until the curb was only held from dropping by a little peg on one side. I knew if I tried to go up through it, it was pretty sure to break loose and go to the bottom with me. So my only chance was to go between the curb and the wall. This I was fortunate in doing. By going to work and digging away the wall in half 196 STORIES OF NEBRASKA an hour I had a hole large enough to let me pass through. After that it was but a short job to reach the top, which I did, and. lay for some tune exhausted. "Then I knelt down and thanked Almighty God for spar ing my life, as I prayed for him to do, time and again during the two days and nights that I had been in the weU. "But my troubles were not yet at an end. I was a mile A Typical Frontier Well and House. (From photograph colleciion of A. E. Sheldon.) and a half from a house with a foot which I could not step on. I cut some large weeds and made out to hobble and crawl to the road about forty rods distant, and there I lay until near ly sundown looking for a team that never came. At last I gave up looking for anyone and started to crawl on my hands and knees to the house, but I soon gave out and had to lie out another night. "In the morning I felt somewhat better. Starting out again I finaUy arrived at the home of Charles Francis just at AN OPEN WELL 197 daylight. -I was given food and drink, after being without them two days and three nights. "My team was found the next day after I fell in the well. The man who found them took them to a justice of the peace, filed an estray notice, and turned them into his pasture. He thus complied with the law and by so doing took away the last chance for me to be found." The story of this escape from an open well was told in the Nebraska legislature of 1897 by Senator Beal, of Custer County. The result was that an act was passed compelling land-o^wners to fill such wells on their property to the top with dirt or the county would do it at their expense. This law has remained on our statute books ever since. QUESTIONS 1. Have you ever seen a well dug? Tell about it. 2. How much water is underground and why is it harder to get in some places than in others? 3. 'What do you think helped Mr. Carhn most in getting out of the well? FORT Mcpherson military cemetery HUNDREDS of soldiers and pioneers died on the Ne braska frontier. Some were killed by Indians, some were drowned, some were frozen to death in great storms, some died of disease. Some of these were buried where they died. Many were buried in the cemeteries belonging to the United States forts. One such cemetery, Fort McPherson Military Cemetery, was chosen by the United States for the final resting place of the bodies of the brave men and women from all the plains and the mountains. It is in Lincoln County, Nebraska, on the south side of the Platte, about six miles from MaxweU on the Union Pacific Railroad. There are six acres in the ceme tery, enclosed by a brick wall. Within are tall, beautUul cottonwood trees. Beneath the shade of the trees are long rows of graves, each grave with a white stone at the head. Some are large handsome monuments ¦with the story of the dead cut upon them. Others are only small white slabs bearing the one word "Unknown." There are 361 of these unknown graves. Within the wall is a house belonging to the cemetery in which lives the officer in charge ¦with his family. Every thing about the place shows loving care and attention. From a tall flagstaff a large United States flag floats from sun rise to sunset above the graves. Birds nest and rear their young in the trees. All is quiet and restful as befits the place. The officer keeps a book wherein are recorded names of the dead so far as they are known,, where they died and where they were first buried. Their bodies have been brought here from eighteen different graveyards near the old forts which have been abandoned since the frontier days are 198 FORT McPHERSON MILITARY CEMETERY 199 gone. From the plains of Colorado to the mountains of far-off Idaho, and even from the Philippines, the buried heroes of the frontier have been tenderly brought and laid away in Nebraska soil. One walks for hours and reads the stories written upon the headstones. Here are the bodies of the soldiers killed with Lieutenant Grattan on August 18, 1854, in the beginning of the war with the Sioux. Here are the graves of women and little children who died on the frontier. Here are the dead of Fort Kearny and Fort Laramie. Here lies Spotted Horse, a brave Pawnee scout. Here rest the heroes of the Sioux and Cheyenne wars. From all the well-known forts the dead are here — as shown by the record books. From Fort Hall. Idaho H From Fort Bridger, Wyoming *. . 23 From Fort Fetterman, Wyoming 30 From Fort Laramie, Wyoming 133 From Fort Crawford, Colorado 25 From Fort Halleck, Wyoming 28 From Fort Lewis, Colorado 41 From Fort Kearny, Nebraska 198 From Fort Saunders, Wyoming 51 From Fort Sidney, Nebraska 4 From Fort Steele, Wyoming 49 From Fort Hartsuff, Nebraska 3 From Fort McPherson, Nebraska 125 From Fort Independence Rock, Wyoming 3 From Fort White River Camp, Colorado 2 From Fort Gothenburg, Nebraska 1 From Fort Farnam, Nebraska 1 From Fort La Bonte, Wyoming 8 From Fort Manila, Phihppine Islands 1 Total .^ There is room now for but a few more graves. Only soldiers and their wives may be buried here, and the wife only if her husband is already interred here, and then above him in the same grave. It is the plan of the United States to gather the bodies of those who died for the nation into national cemeteries where their graves wiU be cared for so 200 STORIES OF NEBRASKA 5L'?!!J,i^U'w"!i.a..ai£&'^ Fort McPherson Military Cemetery (From photograph by A. E. Sheldon.) long as the nation lives. There are more than eighty of these. This is the only one in Nebraska. The spot chosen for this cemetery is rich in memories of ~ the early days. The Oregon Trail runs within a few yards of the wall, the deep lines made by its wagon wheels stiU plain in the unbroken sod. Here was the place where the wagon trains were most often attacked, since here the traU runs close to the bluffs where the Indians could hide. Fort McPherson itself stood near the bluff and about a mile southeast of the cemetery. It was buUt in 1863 and abandoned in 1891. Many visitors come each year and hnger among these monuments which recall the border days. The frontier is gone, the old forts are puUed down, the soldiers have marched away, the overland traUs are gro^wn over with grass or turned under by the plow. But the memories of the early years will always abide here. Gathered from all the forts and battlefields of the frontier West the bodies of these brave men and women here sleep their last sleep in quiet repose in Nebraska soU. At the entrance are these words: On Fame's eternal camping ground, Their silent tents are spread; While Glory guards ¦with solemn round The bivouac of the dead. QUESTIONS 1. Find Fort McPherson on the map. How far is it from where you Uve? 2. What reason for bringing the frontier dead hundreds of miles to Fort McPherson Cemetery? 3. What influence does such a cemetery have upon the minds of those who visit it or read about it? 4. From what poem are the lines at the entrance? A RAILROAD FIREMAN'S JUMP ON September 29, 1907, the three older chUdren of the Dixon family, living about one mile from Seward, started for school. Baby Gladys Dixon, who was only nineteen months old, went with them a little distance. Away the children ran, and Gladys was soon left behind. Still she followed on until she came to the Burlington Rail road track. It was nearly time for a train to pass, but Gladys did not know that. She stood close to the rails and waved her hands as the great black engine came in sight. The engineer tried to stop the train. Fireman Lux looked out and saw the child upon the track. He ran out on the foot-board and reached the pilot just as the engine was close upon the little one. There was no time to lose. He sprang from the pilot and while in the air, caught Gladys in his arms, and they rolled together down the high embankment. What followed is told by Mrs. Dixon: "As soon as the children started for school, I began to do the morning 's work in the house. Just as I was washing the dishes, I heard the train and the engine gave a strange scream. I thought of Gladys, and my heart gave a big jump. I started out, and just as I reached the door, the train stopped and Mr. Lux was bringing the baby up to the house." The railroad people gave Mr. Lux a gold watch for his bravery. The parents of Gladys gave him a handsome diamond charm to wear with the .watch, and little Gladys received a ring with a blue sapphire from the man who saved her hfe. QUESTIONS 1. What other story similar to this have you heard? 2. Was it a part of the fireman's duty to do what he did? "Why? 3. When ought one to risk his own life trying to save another? 201 NEBRASKA'S GREAT SEAL THE great seal of a state is an iron or steel instrument which stamps an imprint upon important papers and documents. The imprint is itself often caUed the great seal of the state, for it is the sign of the state 's power and authori ty. The first great seal of Nebraska was made when Nebraska was a territory. Its picture is shown on page 203. Its im print is found only on the old documents. When Nebraska became a state in 1867 the legislature passed an act providing for the making of a new great seal. The act prescribed the design for the new great seal as fol lows: The eastern part of the circle to be represented by a steamboat as cending the Missouri River; the mechanic arts to be represented by a smith with a hammer and an\dl; in the foreground, agriculture to be represented by a settler 's cabin, sheaves of wheat, and stalks of gro'ning corn; in the background a train of cars heading towards the Rocky Mountains, and on the extreme west, the Rocky Mountains to be plainly in view; around the top of this circle, to be in capital letters, the motto, "Equality Before the Law," and the circle to be surrounded with the words, "Great Seal of the State of Nebraska, March 1, 1867." The great seal was made as ordered and is now kept by the Secretary of State in the Capitol at Lincoln. The pic ture of the imprint given here is the exact size of the great seal. QUESTIONS 1. Compare these two seals and tell which one you prefer and why? 2. Why does a State have a seal? 3. In which direction are you looking in the picture of the State Seal. 4. What river between you and the Rocky Mountains? 20'J Nebraska Territorial Seal Nebraska State Seal. (From photograph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) 203 NEBRASKA'S FLOWER FOR many years Nebraska had no official state flower. The people were too busy making homes to give the selection of a state flower much thought and too thankful for every flower which grew on the prairies and along the streams to choose from among the anemones and violets, the roses, the amorphas or shoestrings, the spiderworts, the puccoons or Indian paint brushes, the goldenrods and sunflowers, one flower which should be pre ferred before all the others. As the years went on the feehng grew that Nebraska should have a state flower and the people set about choosing one. It was agreed that the flower chosen should be in it self a fit emblem of Nebraska and that it should be found gro^wing abundantly in aU parts of the state. So they looked over the prairies, the plains, the woods, the valleys and the sandhiUs. Everywhere they found the bright, graceful, cheery goldenrod, beautUul not only in the tender green leaf and bud of springtime, in the golden glory of summer and autumn, but also in its quaker colored garb in our winter landscapes. And they said, "The goldenrod shall be Ne braska's flower." This choice was made in 1895, when the 204 The Golden Rod, Nebraska's Flower NEBRASKA'S FLOWER 205 Nebraska legislature passed an act making the goldenrod the official flower of our state. There is never a time when the goldenrod cannot be found in our landscape. QUESTIONS 1. Have you found the goldenrod in Nebraska in spring? In summer? In autumn? In winter? 2. Why is it especially well fitted to be Nebraska's flower? ARBOR DAY NEBRASKA has given many good ideas to the world, but none better than the idea of Arbor Day. The early settlers of Nebraska looked out from the little fringe of woods along the streams upon a treeless prairie. Natural prairie groves like those of Iowa and Illinois were lacking. The far-sighted fathers of this state studied and thought much upon this question. All the early speeches and the early newspapers are filled with the thought that the prairie must be plowed and trees must be planted and made to grow be fore the people would have homes where they would like to live and bring up their children. Out of these plans and thinking came the idea of Arbor Day. The first record of this idea is so interesting and important that it is here given infuU: Lincoln, Nebr., Januarv 4, 1872, 83^0'clock A. M. State Board of Agriculture met. J. Sterling Morton offered the following resolution, which was unan imously adopted: Resolved, That, Wednesday, the 10th day of April, 1S72, be and the same is hereby especially set apart and consecrated for tree planting in the State of Nebraska, and the State Board of Agriculture hereby name it "Arbor Day," and to urge upon the people of the State, the vital impor tance of tree planting, hereby offer a special premium of one hundred dol lars to the county agricultural society of that county in Nebraska, which shall upon that day, plant properlj^, the largest number of trees; and a farm library of twenty-five dollars' worth of books to that person who, on that day, shall plant properly, in Nebraska the greatest number of trees. Upon this first Arbor Day millions of trees were planted in Nebraska. Nature had kindly provided the young trees by sowing the seed of the Nebraska trees, especially the cottonwood, soft maple, box elder, ash and elm upon the sandbars and along the edges of the belt of timber which 206 ' ' >//^/ ' y.y 1 /- / y //y /y ,'. /-//y// y / ,¦ , ¦ ^,, . ' y' ,¦ ' . ..V/^'-i '/ y'(/-rr.-y'r /,...;¦. ».,,.- ¦ :v„' v.'/r,....- ^,.,. .•.: V ¦. ¦ '<¦ ^ '¦;-. .- •--.- ,„ ¦ y. ¦ .. :y.^.,^.:y... ;7^>v,,-.' -' ' . -yy. ,.-... ^- ¦¦ .-¦ .,• ^/.-,. i .-,, ...¦..¦y,.y y.-- ' , . ' . y ..':,.,.,..-,¦ ;..:.. y-y.,. , .¦,¦', ¦•",;^.; . ',y.-,. .. ¦..y..'/y y.yyy:.... .,- . y- . . -,,, ¦;. '' , ... ./,-.-<:..- --/ .'.,yyy':y.-,. r. ...y ¦ ',.¦¦¦ Y'-. ¦ ¦ rl- ¦¦;,¦,¦¦,¦¦ ¦ . . . -.^ .'y .-^.y-. y',;'< ^'y/, jL.'.- '.¦ r, -:¦,:„¦ -' -:.--,:^ -¦¦¦¦¦ - '-. ,^ ,- . ¦¦ /\y ..^ . .. - ..' .>'f^.' ,., ' ^ . .. ,.„.../. , ".¦¦¦ -'--y 'y ';':.,^..'..fy.y-yi./y ¦ ^'^'¦¦•¦¦'''" ^- ¦'¦-,/¦ ,y; ... , X ,yyy -¦'¦¦. '-y- f;!,'^<', / ^,//<,yyy,. y:- -•> ¦ - '' z/.^.-' '¦yy (J^. ',¦'.' .'^ aSfcii .. ;J First Arbor Day Proclamation. (Photo from Original in Statehouse.) 207 208 STORIES OF NEBRASKA bordered the rivers. In the morning a multitude of the early settlers left their work and gathered thousands of young trees to plant in groves along the fire guards about their claims. The young cottonwood was the most plentiful and easUy obtained. Every strip of sandbar along the streams was a dense nursery for this tree whose seeds had drifted there upon the high water and had been covered with a thin layer of mud and sand. One could gather them as fast as he could pull them up and tie them into bundles. This is one reason why the older groves of trees upon Ne braska prairies were mostly cottonwood. The early fathers of Nebraska were not content with the great success of the first Arbor Day. They saw in the future long lines of immigrants coming here to make their homes. Before there could be homes ¦with gardens and orchards there must be ¦windbreaks. To secure these they planned that every farm should have a forest and every year in Nebraska annals an Arbor Day. The record of that plan in the reports of the state board of agriculture reads thus : January 8, 1874, 9 A. M. C. H. Walker offered the following resolution, which was, on motion, unanimously adopted: Resolved, That, the Second Wednesday of April of each year be, and the same is hereby designated, dedicated, and set apart as Arbor Day, for the State of Nebraska, and that the Agriculturists of Nebraska, be re quested to petition the Legislature to make said "Arbor Day" a legal holiday; that until so made a holiday, the Governor be requested to call attention to said "Arbor Day" by proclamation, and request the people of the State to observe it by planting Forest, Fruit, and Ornamental Trees. Robert W. Furnas of Brownville was governor of Ne braska in this year. The first Arbor Day proclamation was made by him. You may see on page 207 a picture of it as it appears in the old records of the governor's office in Lincoln. After this first Arbor Daj' proclamation other governors of Nebraska made similar proclamations, and the planting of trees and the observance of Arbor Day went on ARBOR DAY 209 from year to year. In 1885 the Nebraska legislature fixed April 22d, the birthday of J. Sterling Morton, as the date for Arbor Day and made it a legal holiday. Another inducement for the early settlers to plant trees was an act of the Nebraska legislature in 1869 under which for every acre of forest trees planted by a settler $100 worth J. Sterling Morton and Robert W. Fuenas. (From photograph collec tion of A. E. Sheldon.) of his property was exempt from taxation. Money was very scarce in those days. Here was a chance for the settlers to pay their taxes by planting trees on their own claims. As a result of this law nearly all the claims soon had enough trees growing on them to exempt the settlers from paying any taxes. Consequently so little money came into the state treasury that there was not enough to pay expenses and the state was compeUed to borrow. The law was repealed in 1877, but thousands of groves on the prairies of eastern Nebraska stand to-day as witnesses to its benefits. Since our first Arbor Day all the other states except three 210 STORIES OF NEBRASKA and many foreign countries have followed the good example of Nebraska by establishing Arbor Days. In 1895 the people of Nebraska were so much in love with the Arbor Day idea that both houses of the legislature passed a joint resolution, which was signed on April 4th by Governor Holcomb, as follows'. Whereas, the state of Nebraska has heretofore, in a popular sense, been designated by names not in harmony with its history, industry, or ambi tion; and. Whereas, the state is pre-eminently a tree-planting state; and "where as, numerous and honorable state organizations have by resolution, designated Nebraska as the 'Tree Planter's State;" therefore be it re solved, by the legislature of the State of Nebraska, that Nebra.ska shall hereafter in a popular sense, be kno^svn and referred to as the ' Tree Plant er 's State." Hence it is that children born in Nebraska are no longer called "bugeaters," but "tree planters." It has well been said thataU other holidays look backward to some great event in human his tory. Arbor Day alone looks for ward. It looks forward to a future ¦ when all the desert places of the earth shaU be made glad ¦with shade of trees, the songs of buds, the laughter of chUdren and the happiness of homes smTOimded by groves and gardens planted and cared for by the hand of man. Other lands have given to the world ideas, and days to be kept in memory. Arbor Day is Ne braska's gift to the world, destined through all ages and in all lands to grow in meaning and always to be kept by the planting of trees. A Typical Pioneer Ne braska Thee, ARBOR DAY 211 QUESTIONS 1. Why did the world wait so long for the idea of Arbor Day? 2. What have trees done for Nebraska? 3. Why have other states and countries adopted the Nebraska idea of Arbor Day? 4. Have you planted a tree? Tell about it. PART II A Short History of Nebraska CHAPTER I EARLIEST NEBRASKA A Land under Water. — Earliest Nebraska was a land under water in the bottom of a great inland sea. Great fishes swam in the water. Shell fish lived in the shallows and died and left their skeletons in the soft mud. Corals grew and lily-like sea plants lifted their heads above the waves and died. Slowly the sea filled up. The skeletons of millions of dead animals and plants hardened into rock and became the limestone whose edges now appear on the sides of ravines and along the streams of eastern Ne braska. The sea bottom slowly rose and land appeared, a land of marshes and forests in which grew great ferns and trees which are now found only far south. In this swampy land lived great lizards, some of them taller than elephants and much longer, with many other strange animals. After many-thousand years there was more dry land, and trees of all kinds grew in Nebraska, splendid oaks, maples, beeches and willows among them. We find their leaves today pressed and printed in the red sandstone rocks. A Land of Camels, Tigers and Little Horses. — Then the sea came again and covered the land. New kinds of shells and fish Uved in the sea and left their skeletons on the bottom. Again the land rose, was covered with grass and trees and Nebraska became the home of camels, tapirs, 213 214 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA monkeys, tigers and little horses, some of them no larger than dogs. The rhinoceros, elephant and other large animals lived here. The bones of all these are found to-day beneath our soil. A Land of Ice. — Then came moving fields of ice from the north plowing across eastern Nebraska and leaving, when they melted, deep beds of clay and the large pink boulders seen on the hillsides. Two or three times these ice fields covered the land. The climate of Nebraska became so cold that the warm country plants and animals died. Other plants and animals came in. The grassy plains appeared. The climate became drier. The rivers began to cut out their present valleys. Nebraska as we know it to-day came into being. The First Nebraska People. — A long time before the white men came, men and women and children hved in Nebraska. They lived in earth houses built upon the rounded tops of the hills not more than half a mUe from the springs and streams where there was water. They hved upon the tops of the hills because they were afraid to hve in the valleys for there were enemies all about seeking to kill and to rob them. From the hill tops they could see the enemies before they arrived. How They Lived. — These men and women had a very hard life, although their home was in a land that was beauti ful and rich. Their life was hard because they had to make out of trees, bone or stone all the tools they used. Arrows and spears to kill game, knives to cut it into meat, axes to chop trees and hammers to drive stakes and to fight their enemies, — all these tools and many more were made from stone. They made also out of bone curious httle needles, gimlets and pinchers with which to sew their clothing and to aid them in doing their other work. It took a great deal of time to make these tools, so the men and women who EARLIEST NEBRASKA 215 dwelt in Nebraska in these prehistoric days were kept busy from one year's end to the other trying to get a living of the very simplest kind. They lived so much in fear of enemies that every family made a hiding place for its food and tools in the earth floor of its house. These hiding places were holes shaped hke a bottle and were six or eight feet long, with a narrow neck coming up to the dirt floor. They covered this narrow neck with sticks and ¦with clay and sometimes built fires on top of it so that strangers would never suspect that it was there. Their Graves. — These people buried their dead in mounds. They sometimes covered the bodies with piles of rock, placing alongside the bodies stone axes, arrows, spears and many other useful things which the living would gladly have kept but which they laid in the grave because they believed the spirit of the dead would some day need these things and be able to use them. How We Know about Them. — All that we know of these early people we have learned from their graves and from the floors and fireplaces of their houses, deeply covered now with several feet of Nebraska soil, and from the curious bottle-shaped holes beneath their houses in which they hid their food and tools. Yet from these we know what they ate, what kinds of animals they killed, how they sewed their clothing together and how they cut down large trees and used them for posts in building their houses. We also know some things which they believed about a spirit world and about the life beyond the grave. They made pottery, moulding the clay, when they Ancient Nebraska Tools. (Courtesy R. F. Gilder, Omaha, Nebraska.) a, b, c, d, fish hooks; f, buckle; g, h, j, needles; i, shuttle; k, bone implement. 216 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA found some that was plastic and strong, into cups, jugs, pitchers and wide-mouthed vessels which they could use in cooking their food. There were several kinds of pottery made by these people, some yellow, some red, some black, some with pounded clam shells mixed with the clay to make it tough and strong, some with sand and pounded rocks for the same purpose. Their Homes. — Most of the homes of these people were in the eastern part of Nebraska along the bluffs of the Missouri River and on the hills near the small streams flo^wing into the Missouri. Then- buried fireplaces have also been found in the Bad Lands of north western Nebraska and South Dakota. They never lived far from wood and water. They had no horses and could not easUy cross the great plains. They were different from any of the Indian tribes found in Nebraska by the first white people who came. Faces found upon stone and clay images in their houses resemble some of those found in Mexico and Central America, but we do not know where these earliest people of Nebraska came from or what became of them. How We Know Their Story. — Their houses have long since disappeared. Several feet of soil cover the sites. In many cases trees two or three hundred years old stand above them. You could hardly tell to-day that houses had ever been there or that the chUdren had ever played upon their earth floors and gathered about the fireplaces in the center, eager for the evening meal and for the stories of hunting and long journeys made on foot which the older people told. But just as if your house should be destroyed Ancient Nebraska House. (Courtesy R. F. Gilder, Omaha, Nebraska.) EARLIEST NEBRASKA 217 and the toys and tools within it should be buried beneath several feet of soil for hundreds of years, until some future man, digging with a spade, should find these things, which you now use in your daily life, and from them know how you hved and what you thought; so to-day from these relics and from these gifts laid away in the mound-covered graves upon the hills, we know the story of these earliest people in Nebraska. QUESTIONS 1. How do we know that earliest Nebraska was under water, later the home of camels, monkeys and elephants, later covered with ice? 2. What difference, if any, in the house sites of the prehistoric people and of the first white settlers? Why? 3. What became of the little horses no larger than dogs which lived in Ne braska in early ages? 4. What was the belief of the prehistoric Nebraska people regarding another life and how do we know? 5. How much land did a prehistoric family need to get its living? Why? 6. How far from a stream or lake eould these people live? Why? 7. What schools had the children of these people and what did they study? 8. Is there anything in your locality which tells about earliest Nebraska and, if so, what does it tell? CHAPTER II NEBRASKA UNDER THREE FLAGS The First White Men. The Spanish. — Columbus saUed from Spain across the ocean and found a new world. After him came the men and ships of many nations to claim part of the new world. First, the Spamards came to Florida in 1513, and then to Mexico in 1520. All the vast country north they called Florida, so that Nebraska was a part of Florida upon their maps. In 1541, the Spaniards, imder Cor onado, crossed the plains from New Mexico to the Kansas-Nebraska country. In the same year Span iards under De Soto crossed the Mississippi River into Arkansas and marched northwest nearly to Kansas. These Spaniards did not remain, but afterwards Spain claimed all the country because Spaniards were the first white men to find it. The French. — The French came to this region more than a hundred years after the Spaniards. From Quebec, where they first settled in 1608, their missionaries and fur traders pushed west and southwest to Lake Superior and Lake Michigan. Here they first heard of a great river to the west. Father Marquette, one of these missionary ex plorers, wrote a letter from his Mission on Lake Su perior in 1670, in which he says: "Six or seven days below the Illinois Indians is another river on which are some great nations who use wooden canoes. Of these 218 Spanish, French and Eng lish Flags. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) NEBRASKA UNDER THREE FLAGS 219 we cannot speak until next year, if God bestows the grace upon us to lead us there." Father Marquette and Louis Joliet, his companion, paddled in a birch bark canoe from Lake Michigan up the Fox River, carried their canoe two miles across the land to the Wisconsin River, floated down the Wisconsin and on June 17, 1673, first saw the Mississippi River near Prairie du Chien in Wisconsin. They paddled their canoe down the Mississippi for many days. The country was all new and strange. In one place they saw a great monster painted upon the rocks. The next day they came to the mouth of the Missouri river and this is what they say: The Pekitanoui or Missouri River. — "As we were gently sailing do^wn the still clear water, we heard a noise of a rapid into which we were about to fall. I have seen nothing more frightful. A mass of large trees entire with branches, a real floating island came from Pekitanoui, so impetuous that we could not, without great danger, expose ourselves to pass across. The agitation was so great that the water was all muddy, and could not get clear. The Pekitanoui is a considerable river coming from the northwest, which empties into the Mississippi. Many towns are located on this river and I hope by it to make the discovery of the Vermillion or California Sea." The river they called the Pekitanoui we now call the Missouri. The First Maps. — From the Indians who lived at the mouth of the Missouri they first heard of the Indians who lived in Nebraska and leamed their names. Thus the first maps of the Mississippi River made by the French have upon them the names of the Indian tribes living up the Missouri or Pekitanoui River — the Panis (Pawnees), Octotatoes (Otoes) and Mahas (Omahas). In 1699 French sea ships under commanders named Bien- ¦vdlle and d'Iberville found the mouth of the Mississippi River, and began a settlement where afterward was built the city 220 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA of New Orleans. Under these discoveries and those made by LaSalle in 1682 France claimed all the land whose waters ran into the Mississippi River. This claim was based on a law of nations which gave all the country, drained by any river, to the nation first settling upon it. French fur traders came up the Missouri and talked and traded with the Indian tribes. On their return to the mouth of the Mississippi some of them told such stories as these about the Nebraska country: Country Finest in the World. — "Among the Canadians who have arrived, are two who went for two years on the Missouri from village to village. They report that they were near the mines of the Spaniards. They stopped at a village of savages to whom the Spaniards only come to trade for buffalo hides, of which they make harnesses for their mules. They report that the Spaniards are at war with three or four large nations, which obhges them to go with breastplates and helmets as a protection against arrows. This they do in order that the savages may take them for spirits. These men said that this country is the finest in the world and that on the Missouri live nations who have horses." Horses and WUd Cattle. — "In ascending the Missouri River, there is found an abundance of oxen and cows beyond imagination. These beasts have hair and wool according to the season. This river is fine and grand. It is beUeved that great discoveries can be made there. Those who have ascended the Missouri say that it is the real source of the Mississippi. The country they have seen along this stream surpasses in beauty and riches that of the rest of the colony. It is situated in a pleasant climate which produces every thing in the greatest abundance without cultivation. The air is salubrious, the seasons are regular and well tempered. The land is covered with all kinds of wood. The immense prairies are abounding in ¦wild cattle, and all other kinds of wUd animals. Salt is in abundance although far from the sea." NEBRASKA UNDER THREE FLAGS 221 Thus it came that France and Spain each claimed Nebraska. Spain claimed it because Spaniards first dis covered Florida and they considered Nebraska a part of Florida. Besides this Coronado had visited the Nebraska region one hundred and fifty years before any other white man. France claimed it because she had first settled at the mouth of the Mississippi River and the waters of the Ne braska region flowed into the Mississippi. Further than this French fur traders were trading and living with the Nebras ka Indians, while the Spaniards had visited the country once and left it. France, Spain and Nebraska Indians. — France and Spain each tried to get the good will of the Nebraska Indians. The nearest Spanish settlements were in the Rio Grande vaUey in what is now New Mexico, while the nearest French settlements were along the Mississippi in Illinois and Missouri. It was far easier for the French to come up the river in boats to Nebraska than it was for the Spanish to reach it by the long journey across the plains. There were wars between the Indians in the Nebraska and Kansas country, with the French helping one side and the Spanish the other. To aid in one of these wars, Spain sent an expedition which is caUed the Spanish Caravan. The English Claim to Nebraska. — England also claimed the Nebraska country. The King of England gave grants of land to the first English settlers along the Atlantic coast. Each grant was a number of miles wide to the north and to the south and stretched from the Atlantic Ocean to the "South Sea," as the Pacific Ocean was then called. The Nebraska region was thus thrown within the boundaries of the grants given to Massachusetts and Connecticut. But the settlers in these early English colonies were kept so busy making homes and fighting Indians on the Atlantic coast that they did not cross the AUegheny Mountains and never saw the Mississippi and Missouri rivers nor the beautiful prairies of Nebraska which the King of England 222 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA had given to them. But, although they never saw them, they and their King still claimed them. Thus in those far away early years each of three great nations, Spain, France and England, strove to bring Ne braska under its flag. The Indian people who Uved in Nebraska hunted the buffalo, planted corn and knew very httle about all this. They had never seen the Enghsh. Map Showing Grants by the English King and their Rel.\tiox to Nebraska. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) They did not care for the Spaniards. They knew and liked the French. Then came the great war between the French and English colonies in America. It is kno^wn as the French and Indian war, and control of the JNIississippi river together with land whose waters flowed into it, was fought for in it. In this war Washington, then a young man, fought with the Enghsh against the French. The struggle lasted seven years. France was defeated and in 1763 gave up all the land she had claimed; that east of the Mississippi to- England; that west of the Mississippi, including the Nebraska region, to Spain. Nebraska a Spanish Pro^vince. — Nebraska thus became Spanish. There was a Spanish governor at New Orleans NEBRASKA UNDER THREE FLAGS 223 and another at St. Louis. The Spanish flag now floated over this whole region. But the people who came up the Missouri River to Nebraska were still French, although they had a Spanish governor. They spoke the French language, they gave French names to to^wns and rivers, they married Indian women and their children, half French and half Indian, grew up to become leaders in the Nebraska tribes. Napoleon SeUs Nebraska to the United States. — While Spain was ruling over the Nebraska country, the people of France rose against their king and nobles in the great revolution of 1789. Napoleon Bonaparte soon became the leader of that revolution and later became emperor of France. , He planned to regain the new world colonies which France had lost, and bought back from Spain all the land, including the Nebraska country, that France once had held west of the Mississippi River. Napoleon began to make a great French province here, in which thousands of emigrants from France were to find homes. But war was coming on between France and England. England had the strongest navy in the world. Napoleon knew that the Enghsh ships would saU to the mouth of the Mississippi and that the French colonists could not resist them. In order to save Louisiana from sur render to England, he resolved to sell it at once to the United States. This was done in 1803 and is kno^wn in our history as "The Louisiana Purchase." Our Flag. — Three flags of three great nations, Spain, France and England, sought to wave over the beautiful prairies of Nebraska. None of them prevailed. In their stead the Stars and Stripes became our emblem. Under its folds Nebraska has become one of the United States of America. Instead of dark-haired Spaniards from Mexico, American Flag 224 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA or quick-eyed emigrants from sunny France, Americans settled Nebraska. To her prairies have since come settlers from all parts of Europe, speaking many tongues when they came, but all in good time becoming Americans and Ne braskans with one common language and one common hope, the hope of making their state "the best and most beauti ful land in all the world," as the early French and early Spaniards reported it to be. QUESTIONS 1. Which country had the better right to Nebraska, Spain or France? Why? 2. Was what the early French fur traders said of this region true? 3. What right had the King of England to Nebraska? 4. Did the Indians need an European flag over this country? 'V\Tiy? 5. What French or Spanish names do you find on the map of Nebraska? 6. Why is our flag the Stars and Stripes? 225 CHAPTER III NEBRASKA INDIANS AS THE WHITE MEN FOUND THEM The first white men who came to this region found several tribes and nations of Indians living here and claim ing Nebraska as their home. The Otoe. — In the southeast lived the Otoe tribe, hunt-' ing as far east as the Mississippi River and claiming Nebraska as far west as the Blue rivers. The Omaha. — On both sides of the Missouri River from the mouth of the Platte as far north as Little Bow River, in Cedar County, hved the Omaha tribe. They claimed Nebraska westward as far as the Elkhorn River and Shell Creek. Their great chief Blackbird was the first Indian of this region whose name is kno'wn to white men. The Ponca. — Near the mouth of the Nio brara River Uved the Ponca tribe, claiming the country westward along that river and the streams flowing into it. These three tribes, Otoe, Omaha and Ponca were closely related and spoke languages much alike. Their traditions tell that they came from the southeast up the Missouri and had been in this region only a few hundred years. All three belonged to the great Sioux family of Indians and were relatives of 226 Map Showing CotrNTRT Known to the ¦Omaha (Shaded Area) NEBRASKA INDIANS 227 the Sioux nation Uving northwest of them. The Otoe and Omaha tribes numbered about 3,000 each and the Ponca between 1,000 and 2,000. The Pa^wnee. — Just west of the country claimed by the Otoe and Omaha tribes Uved the Pawnee nation. Its principal viUages were in the valleys of the Platte, Loup The Buffalo Hunt. (From Thwaites's "Early Western Travels." Arthur H. Clark Co., Cleveland, Ohio.) and Repubhcan rivers. It numbered in the early years about 10,000 people and spoke a language entirely different from that of any other Nebraska tribe. The Sioux. — The Sioux nation roamed the whole coun try north and west of the regions claimed by the Otoe, Omaha, Ponca and Pawnee tribes. In what is now Nebraska it numbered from 10,000 to 20,000 people. It had no per manent -viUages, but foUowed the buffalo herds. About the time the first white men came, the Sioux were driving the Crows westward into the Rocky Mountains. 228 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA The Cheyenne and Arapahoe. — Cheyenne and Arapa hoe tribes, numbering about 3,000 persons, claimed the upper valleys of the North and South Plattes and hunted the western plains in common with the Sioux. They belonged to the great Algonquin family which hved in Canada and New England, and which had been the first Indians met by the Pilgrims when they landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620. The Algonquin language is entirely different from either the Pa^wnee or the Siouan language. How this Uttle company of Cheyennes and Arapahoes came to be so far away from their relatives is not kno-wn. Probably they followed the buffalo westward from their older home. Indian BeUefs, Art and Music. — These Indians beUeved in good and bad spirits which brought good and bad luck. They thought that certain charms and certain words drove away the bad spirits and brought the good spirits. They believed also in a Great Spirit, not always very clear to their minds, who gave the Indians the earth, the rain, the buffalo, and other good things. Their art was chiefly of two kinds, music and painting. For music they had drums, made of hollow logs cov ered ¦with skins, rattles made of gourds or bladders fiUed ¦with peb bles, and whistles or flutes made from wood or bone. Their songs and dances were a large part of their rehgion. For painting they had colored clay and soft rock and pencils made of bone. Their paintings were made upon skins or upon their own bodies. Indian Languages and Homes. — Thus seven different tribes of Indians, Otoe, Omaha, Ponca, Pawnee, Sioux, Omaha Mission Building in Thurston County, Built 1856 NEBRASKA INDIANS 229 Cheyenne and Arapahoe, numbering about 40,000 people and speaking three entirely distinct languages, lived in what is now Nebraska, when the white men first came here. The Sioux, the Cheyennes and the Arapahoes dwelt in skin tents, or tepees, and hunted for a living. The Omahas, Otoes, Poncas and Pa^wnees built large houses, caUed earth lodges, out of sod and poles, but also used tepees. They An Omaha Indian Village in 1860 raised crops duruig certain seasons and hunted at other times. Wars between Tribes.^ All these Indians, at first, were friendly to the white men, especially to the French. There was almost constant war between the Indians who had houses and gardens and the wUd hunting tribes farther west. How these wars would have ended if the white men had not come cannot be told, but the wild Indians were gaining ground at that time. 230 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA QUESTIONS 1. Make a map showing where the Indian tribes lived in Nebraska when the white men came. 2. How many languages were spoken in Nebraska when the white men came? How many now? 3. What do you know of the religion of the Nebraska Indians? 4. Did the Indians live more by farming or by hunting? Why? 5. Why were these Indian tribes at war with each other? CHAPTER IV MAKING AND NAMING NEBRASKA The Name of Nebraska. — Nebraska had no name for many years. To the early fur traders it was either the "Missouri country" or the "Platte country," stretching westward to the headwaters of the Platte in the Rocky Mountains. It was the land of the Omaha, Otoe, Ponca, Pawnee and Sioux Indians, for these were the tribes along the Missouri and Platte rivers whom the fur traders met and with whom they traded. The most common way of describing this region a hundred years ago was as "The Council Bluffs," by which name the fur traders meant the shores of the Missouri above the mouth of the Platte. A little later, when the first emigrants to Oregon and pioneers to the Rocky Mountains began to cross this countryj it was "The Great Buffalo Plains," for the animal most seen and most sought for, by both Indians and white men, gave its name to the country. It was also called "The Great American Desert" and is so named on some of the early maps. Fifty years were needed for the making and naming of Nebraska. A WUd Region CaUed the Indian Country. — From October 1, 1804, to July 4, 1805, it was part of the territory of Indiana and its capital the to^wn of Vincennes. From July 4, 1805, until December 7, 1812, it was part of the territory of Lomsiana with its capital at St. Louis. It then became a part of the territory of Missouri until the year 1821, when Missouri was made a state and Nebraska was cut off and left outside the control of any state or territorial government. In this wild region, under no government, a great deal of trouble was made by fur traders who sold 231 232 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA whisky to the Indians, cheated them, and killed their game. Quarrels and wars became frequent. To end these troubles, all the land west of the Missouri River then belonging to the United States and outside of the states of Missouri and Louisiana and the territory of Arkansas was, on June 30, 1834, called "The Indian Country," and placed under strict laws. All white men were forbidden to hunt, trap, or settle in the Indian country without special permission from the government. It was made a crime to take Uquor there. The Indian Superintendent at St. Louis was made the governor over the Indian country. Nebraska and Oregon. — In these early days the United States claimed all of the Oregon country westward across the Rocky Mountains from Nebraska to the Pacific Ocean. England claimed it, too, as did also Spain and Russia. The English Hudson's Bay Company, in order to get the Indian fur trade, had built forts in the Rocky Mountains and upon the Pacific coast. These English forts and fur traders tried to keep out American settlers. This made danger of war between England and the United States. The United States had only a very few pioneer settlers in Oregon. Be tween these and the Mississippi valley lay the Rocky Moun tains and the great Indian country where no white people lived. To protect and help the Americans who wanted to make Oregon their home, a plan was made at Washing ton to open the Indian country west of the Missouri and to bring in settlers who should raise crops to feed the soldiers and the emigrants on their way to Oregon. To prepare the way. Lieutenant John C. Fremont was sent in 1842 by the United States to explore the plains and the Rocky Mountains. Now, for the first time, the name "Nebraska" appears. Fremont's account speaks of the "Nebraska River." The secretary of war, WiUiam Wilkins, in his report of November 30, 1844, says, "The Platte or Nebras ka River being tbe central stream would very properly furnish a name to the territory. Troops and supplies from MAKING AND NAMING NEBRASKA 233 the projected Nebraska territory would be able to contend for Oregon with any force coming from the sea." " Nebrath- ka," meaning "flat water," was the Otoe Indian name for the Platte. The First Nebraska BiU. — The first bill to make a land called Nebraska was introduced in Congress on December 17, 1844. This first Nebraska in cluded the states of Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota and parts of Colorado, Wyoming and Montana. For the next ten years there was a great struggle in Congress over the mak ing of Nebraska Territory. Stephen A. Douglas, of Illinois, was the champion of the Nebraska idea. Many obstacles were in the way. Obstacles to Nebraska Terri tory: Indians, Railroad Question, Slavery. — The Indian question was one. Indian tribes east of the Miss issippi were being moved west in order to make room for the white people. To open Nebraska territory for white settlement would crowd the Indians south. The southern people did not ¦wish so many Indians on their frontier. There was the Pacific railroad question. The South wished a raihoad to be built to the Pacific Ocean through the southern country, while the North wished it to be built by way of the Platte valley in the Nebraska country. Both wished to get the Indians out of the way. The making of Nebraska would aid the northern project, therefore the South opposed it. There was the slavery question. In the year 1820, a fierce dispute had risen between the North and the South over whether Missouri should be admitted as a slave state Stephen A. Douglas 234 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA or a free state. It was at last agreed that Missouri might come in as a slave state, but that the rest of the country west and north of Missouri should be forever free. Th^ was caUed the " Missouri Compromise. ' ' Under it Nebraska would have come in free. Now the South feared making more free states. That was another reason why it opposed the making of Nebraska. The Nebraska-Kansas Bill. — This first Nebraska biU failed to pass. In 1848, Senator Douglas introduced a second bill. This also failed. In 1853 a third biU was defeated. In 1854 a fourth Nebraska biU came up ia Congress. It was now called the "Nebraska-Kansas BiU" and made two new territories out of the Indian country. It also provided that the settlers in each territory should say by their votes whether it should be slave or free. This made a fierce fight over the Nebraska-Kansas bUl. The South said that Nebraska and Kansas belonged to the whole country, that all people should be allowed to go there and take their property with them and that the settler from the South had the same right to take his slaves there, that the settler from the North had to take his horses and cattle. The North said that Nebraska and Kansas had been made free by the Missouri Compromise, that slavery was wrong and that there should be no more slave territory, but that both South and North should keep their agreement made in 1820 and make the West a home for free men and women and not for slaves. All the country was ablaze ¦with excite ment over Nebraska and Kansas. The South and the North Quarrel over Nebraska. — The old parties — Whig and Democratic • — were broken up over this question. The churches were broken into northern and southern factions. For months nothing was talked of but the Nebraska-Kansas bill. Feeling grew more and more bitter and it began to appear that there might be war be tween the South and the North. 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Il„,l„l il„l..,„,l„ //„;<„/,„„ i/,:,,,.h.,,,i.,..,f.,. i.„,i, ¦„.....,.„„,,/„¦,/,'¦,„ ii...„,fi. .«..:„ I, .:„/„:„„,, „.„l ,;,„li,,r,„'.,:.., I. „ol,„,h.,l„,„l,.„!„,;!l:,, „,,.,.,, I,.,. „,y., /',,„,/,„.',/ h.„l f:., ¦J,J,:,.,,..i.,r„.u„„/.,„,. „,!/,„./.„,„[,,¦:. ,„/ L,l,„„.,l.,,-n,l,:,„„l .r(/l li,i .I,,;; >,.,.: ,.„„„l ,f„ /,,.' „-!„; /:„,, .„¦,:¦ J, „.^„,.../ /.,,/„„.,,, „,>/ h„l IJ:. P,....:!,.-!',. I:\. Il:„l„l i,l.,l,.,,„„„„l l:,..J,....,l,,„ ,.-i,,„„ ll,/l,,„l„.. 4n..,,;...J,,„..,,„.,,.,f. y, L I ll I I 'ilf,„Ai, ¦¦^l!„f:ih:.« ,:' 'till,-....,,.!,,'- If I ' f'. ,.l .¦'¦ y-H- 'Mr,,.,i,„i a a, .y.iioitri,.../;,-, .,. -, ¦7'/' yiy,t/n,..jy./^... Nebraska-Kansas Bill. (From original at Washington, D. C.) 236 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA two new territories of Nebraska and Kansas, was passed and signed by President Pierce on May 30, 1854. Thus was Nebraska named and made into a territory. QUESTIONS 1. How did the Nebraska region get its different names? 2. Would the fur traders gain more in the long run by trading liquor to the Indians? Why? 3. How many bills in Congress for making and naming Nebraska and what obstacles did they meet? 4. What had Nebraska to do with bringing on the war between the South and the North? 5. Why were the churches and political parties broken up over the Nebraska question? CHAPTER V NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY Nebraska Territory Five Times as Large as Nebraska State. — Nebraska Territory, in 1854, was five times as large as the state of Nebraska is now. All the way from Kansas to Canada, from the top of the Rocky Mountains to Minnesota and Iowa was Nebraska. Very few white Br Map of Nebraska Territory, 1854. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) people then lived in the land. Fur traders had built log cabins in a few places along the rivers. Every summer thousands of emigrants to Oregon and California traveled the great Oregon Trail across the territory. At Fort Kearny and Fort Laramie on the Oregon Trail were 238 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA companies of soldiers. At BeUe-vne was a Uttle viUage of fur traders and missionaries. AU the rest of Nebraska was ¦wild plains and mountains, the home of Indians, buffalo and beaver. The First Settlers. — Soon after Nebraska was named and made, people began to settle there. Most of the first settlers came from Iowa. Some came from Missouri, Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, New York, Massachusetts. All they had to do was to cross the river and choose the most beautiful land for their homes. In March, 1854, the Omaha and Otoe Indians ceded to the United States their country along the Missouri River. No surveys had been made. All the land was open to the first comers. Most of those who came from Iowa picked out the land that suited them, built log cabins to hold it and went back to Iowa to make their living. The First Govemor, Francis Burt. — Francis Burt, Demo crat, of South Carolina was the first govemor of Nebraska. He and the other first officers of Nebraska were appointed by Pres ident Franklin Pierce and were paid by the United States. He was a slender, handsome man who loved books and was not used to frontier life. The long journey from his home, part of it by stage and steamboat, brought him worn out to Nebraska City. Nebraska City had then one house and one wagon. In the wagon Governor Burt was driven to . BeUe^'ue, where he arrived October 7, 1854. He grew worse and died on October 18th. His body was taken back to the old home in South Carolina. There was great sorrow in the httle -village of BeUe-vne over the death of the first governor, for all who met him learned to love him. Gov. Francis Burt NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 239 ^¦fF Nebraska Febrt Across Elkhorn River, 1854 Acting Govemor Cuming. — The secretary of state, Thos. B. Cuming of Michigan, became acting governor. He was very different in mind and person from Governor Burt. His eyes were dark, his hair straight and black, his mind bold and shrewd. Old BeUevue. — Bellevue was the oldest town in Nebraska, for Fort Atkinson had been abandoned. It was in fact the only town. Here was the old fur trading post. Here' the Indian agent having charge of the Nebraska Indians lived. Here the first Christian missionaries came and built the only mission house then in Nebraska. It was expected that Bellevue would be the capital of Nebraska. Thomas B. Cuming 240 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA First Territorial Capital, 1855 New Omaha.— Eight miles above Belle-vue, in the woods fronting the Missouri river, men from CouncU Bluffs, Iowa, had started a to-wn which they named Omaha. There they built a two-story brick buUding which they of fered to give for a Cap itol. Acting -governor Cuming called the first legislature to meet there on January 16, 1855. Very bitter were the . quarrels which foUowed this act. The first cen sus of white settlers taken by order of the acting-governor showed 2,732 people. It was claimed that many persons counted did not live in Nebraska at all, and that some came over from Iowa, voted and went back and did not settle in Nebraska. The First Legislature. — The first Nebraska legislature was the only part of the government elected by the settlers. It had a council of thirteen members and a house of repre sentatives of twenty-six members. Twenty-one members came from the North Platte and eighteen from the South Platte. By the count of the first census there were nearly twice as many settlers in the South Platte region as in the North Platte. The Dividing Platte. — The Platte River cut the scattered settlements of early Nebraska sharply into two parts. The people were too poor to build bridges, the river was too wide and shallow for ferries and its sandy bottom was too soft to make good fords. The fight between the North and South sections began at the first session of the legislature and continued through the years. Iowa Law Becomes Nebraska Law. — There was much for the first legislature to do. First there was a contest NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 241 for permanent location of the capital. In this Omaha won. A body of laws was needed to govern the territory. The legislature met this need by taking a book of Iowa laws and enacting them for Nebraska. In this way most of the Iowa law was made Nebraska law. The eastern end of the country between the Niobrara River and Kansas was divided into counties by the governor and the legislature. .AU the rest of the great territory was an undi-?ided wildemess. Laws were passed for making roads and ferries. PubUc roads were made sixty-six feet wide and continue to be so at this day. A law was passed prohibiting any one from sellmg or giving away hquor. Whisky had made much trouble with the Indians in Nebraska while it was stiU the Indian country and in 1834, the United States had for bidden its sale here. Land and Claun Clubs. — The first settlers of Nebraska were not satisfied with the land laws. The United States law aUowed a man to take 160 acres of land and after hving on it for six months to buy it by paying to the United States $1.25 per acre. The settlers said that the first pioneers should have 320 instead of 160 acres. In order to hold this land "Claim Clubs" were organized. Each man in a claim club promised to defend every other member in holding his 320 acres. When the later settlers began to come they were warned that they would be driven off by force if they tried to settle on the land held by members of the claim clubs. The first legislature passed a law gi-ving each meinber of a claim club 320 acres. This was contrary to United States law and was therefore illegal. First Claim Cabin in Nebraska 242 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA For several years there were quarrels and wars between the claim clubs and the later settlers. In the end the claim clubs disbanded. Govemor Izard Arrives. — The second govemor of Nebraska, Mark W. Izard, Democrat, of Arkansas arrived at Omaha February 20, 1855, and acting-governor Cuming became again secretary of state. The Council -with the Paw nees. — In the spring of 1855, Indians stole cattle from the settlers on the Elkhorn River near Fremont. Governor Izard sent John M. Thayer and O. D. Richardson to hold a coun cil -with the Pawnee tribe. With them went Rev. Samuel AUis who had been missionary to the Pawnees for many years and spoke their language. A councU was held with Petale sharu, the great chief of the Pawnees, at his -village on the high bluff four miles southeast of Fremont. The Pawnees said that the Poncas kUled the cattle. They promised, however, to keep the peace. This was the first council held by the territory with Nebraska Indians. Fiftyyears afterward, a monument was placed on the site of this council and General John M. Thayer, standing for the second time on this bluff, made the speech of dedication. Petalesharu — Chief of the Pawnee Nation NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 243 The First General — John M. Thayer.— Soon after the council with the Pawnees, John M. Thayer was made general of the Nebraska mUitia composed of settlers who were armed to protect the frontier. The militia were first called out in July, 1855, when Sioux Indians made a raid into the Elkhorn valley. The soldiers made a camp on the river. They saw no Indians but caught many catfish. This is sometimes, in jest, called the "Catfish War." The Rival Cities — Omaha and Nebraska City. — Dur ing the year 1855 settlers came slowly into the new territory. The census in October of that year found 4,494, of whom 1,549 were in the North Platte section, 2,945 in the South Platte section. Nebraska City had become the largest town in the territory, the leader of the South Platte section and the chief rival of Omaha. The First Schools. — The first schools in this region were held in very early days. At Fort Atkinson there were schools for the children of the garrison during the period from 1820 to 1827. The next schools were for the Indian and half- breed children. Such schools were taught at Bellevue by the first iffissionaries, Mr. and Mrs. Merrill, in 1833 for the Otoes, and soon after for the Pawnees by Rev. Samuel AlUs and Rev. John Dunbar. The Mormon schools came next. Thousands of Mormons -wintered in log cabins and sod houses where Florence now is and also near BeUe-vue in 1846-47 while on their way across the plains to Utah. Schools for their chUdren were held during the -winter. Free schools came to Nebraska -with her first govern ment. The terms were short and the schoolhouses made of rough logs, but wherever there were children schools were started. Sometimes the first school was taught in a log cabin home by the mother, the children sitting on benches spht out of trees. One of the acts of the first territorial legislature, dated March 16, 1855, was to pro-vide free common schools. Each school district could vote what 244 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA studies should be taught in the district. Teachers were very hard to get. The district school board examined those wishing to teach and the subjects in which they must pass examination were reading, -writing, speUing, arithmetic, grammar, geography and United States history. These examinations were oral. Mormons Setting out from Florence, Nebraska, to Cross the Plains The School Boards and Teachers. — -Frontier school boards were often good hunters and trappers, having Uttle knowledge of books, and many amusing stories are told of the examinations given by them. Sometimes the school board and teacher got into an argument over what was the right answer to a question. The law provided for a county superintendent, but the salary allowed was so smaU that few cared for the office and in some counties there was none. So these first Nebraska schools were run very much as each neighborhood wished. There was so little money to pay the teacher, that she often "boarded round" the district, NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 245 a week at each house. The schoolhouses were rough, the books few and the term only a few weeks in the winter. All the children were eager to go. The grown-up boys and girls recited and studied in the same room with the little ones and made one big family in their studies, in their outdoor play, and at noon when they ate their lunches together seated about their home-made desks. The First Churches. — In the social life and in the forma tion of the public sentiment of early Nebraska, religion had its part. Missionaries taught the first schools and pioneer First County Map of Nebraska, 1854. (Dravring hy Miss Martha Turner.) preachers were among the earliest settlers in the territory. Nearly all of the churches in Nebraska of to-day trace their beginnings here to Uttle groups of settlers inspired by a common faith who gathered in the cabins and sod-houses to hold their first meetings and sometimes in summer in groves for the larger assemblies. There was great warmth of good feeling in the pioneer churches as in other pioneer associations. The members were nearly equal in riches and in poverty and rarely did any misfortune come to one which was not shared by all. The pioneer preachers were a peculiar class, fervent and untiring in spirit, always poor 246 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA and always welcome in every settlement where they brought messages of good will and the friendly news from settlements at a distance. To found schools, colleges, and Ubraries was the dream of many of these early missionaries. In some cases the dream was realized. Many Nebraska to-wns and country neighborhoods to-day bear the impress in their social ideals of these early preachers and the churches and the schools which they founded. BeUe-vne, BrownviUe, Fremont and Fontanelle are examples. 1856 was a year of promise to Nebraska settlers. Timely rains had fallen. The few little fields of wheat and corn had borne good crops. Gardens of plenty smUed by the side of log cabins. Elk, deer, antelope, grouse and -wild turkeys were everywhere. Buffalo were abundant just west of the settlements. The Sioux had been badly beaten at Ash Hollow by General Harney and desired peace. Fifty thousand dollars had been voted by Congress to buUd a new capitol at Omaha and fifty thousand more to make a good road from Omaha to Fort Kearney. The joy of living in a new country and faith in its bright future were in every heart. The Hard Winter. — Then came the severe -svinter of 1856-57. It began with a great storm on the first of December and grew fiercer with each month. The ra-vines were filled with snow. Elk and deer perished. Roads were blocked. Hardly could the pioneers venture from their cabins to chop the wood which kept their famihes from freezing. This was always known among the early settlers as the "Hard Winter." Dreams of the Pioneers. — Most of the pioneers were poor in pocket but they were rich in hope. They saw how black and fertUe was the soil, how thick and tall the grass in the valleys, how smooth and level lay the land ready for the plow. Much they thought and dreamed and foretold about this beautiful land in which they had come to Uve. There were dreams of the great Pacific raihoad, of mills 247 248 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA and factories by the riversides, of farms and orchards and homes and schools where then waved only prairie grass. Money was what was needed, everybody said. They thought if only they had money to start things, to hire men, to buy goods, to let the world know how good the country was, people would cojne rushing in, the lands would be settled, towns be quickly built and all wotdd easily get rich together. There were such splendid sites for towns and cities, at the ferry crossings upon the Missouri, where creeks and rivers came together and on the beautiful slopes where the woodland and prairie met. Many of these were staked off into to-wn lots. Each one's dream was a Uttle more certain to him than his neighbor's dream. Money was needed. There was very httle of it in Nebraska for the settlers as yet raised ahnost nothing to sell. Each man grew a little patch of garden and grain, killed a little game and swapped the little surplus with his neighbors. How to Make Money. — When the second legislature met in 1856, some of the men who wished to make things go faster said: "Pass a law that wUl let us join together in a company and start a bank. Let the bank issue bank notes. Everyone can use these notes for money and we wUl grow rich together." So the legislature ©'¦•W JflQWRiaBaii* made such a law. Only a few , ;* '" *1^- ''"8^' ' brave men, among them J . Sterling Morton and Dr. George L. MUler, opposed it. The Good Times. — Five men could then start a bank. They did not need to put in any money at the beginning. Each one promised to pay money at a certain future time. Then the bank opened. Thousands of doUars of bright beau tiful bank notes were printed by each bank and loaned NEBRASKA WILDCAT CURKENCT NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 249 to those who wished to borrow. This was the money which the banks promised to make. Everyone soon had plenty of this kind of money. Everybody was wiUing to buy. Town lots rose rapidly in price. Business was booming. Population doubled, the census of that year showed 10,716 people. Everyone seemed to be getting rich. More banks were started in order to make more money. To-wns of only two or three log cabins had a bank. In one year over $400,000 of these bank notes were issued in Nebraska. Since the bank money was so plentiful and so easy to get, everyone freely bought with it, and those who sold things for a high price at once sought to buy other things. So the market was always lively. The Great Panic. — These good times lasted a little over a year. Then came the great panic of 1857. AU over the West banks broke and closed their doors. People who had beautiful, bright bank notes could buy nothing with them. People who thought they were rich, found that they had nothing. Those in debt, found that they could not pay their debts, for no one would take the bank notes. There was great distress and poverty and suffering for a number of years. The WUd Cat Days. — Then the people ceased to dream of getting rich in a few months and began to plow up their town sites, plant crops, and live in a quiet and modest way according to their means. The years 1856 and 1857 are called to this time, the "Wild Cat Days" of Nebraska because the bank notes used were known as wild cat money. The Effort to Move the Capital to Salt Creek.— WhUe the -wild cat bank note fever was high, the third Nebraska legislature met on January 5, 1857. It is noted for two acts. It passed a bill to remove the capital from Omaha to Douglas in Lancaster county by a vote of nine to four in the council, and twenty-three to twelve in the house. Douglas was a "paper town," somewhere near Salt Creek, no one knew just where, as no one lived there. As Governor 2G0 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA Izard vetoed the biU, Douglas never started to grow and no one knows to this day where the capital would be if it had been moved from Omaha in 1857. The legislature of 1857 also repealed the criminal code, that part of the law which provides for punishment of those who commit crunes. It was said this was done to keep a certam man, a murderer, Second Territorial Capitol, Afterward Omaha High 3chool. (From photograph collection of A. E. Sheldon.) from being punished. The law was restored at the next session. The War between North and South Platte.— The fourth legislature which met in Omaha, December 8, 1857, is kno-wn as that of the "Florence Secession." The war between the North Platte and South Platte sections had become fierce and bitter. There were twice as many settlers in the South Platte country as in the North. A majority of both houses of the legislature were from the South Platte. The North Platte by Governor Izard's veto had been able to hold the capital at Omaha. The South Platte was determined to take it across the river. A bill for that purpose was introduced. A fist fight on the floor followed between members from Omaha and members from the South Platte. The next day, January 8, 1858, a NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 25] majority of both house and council adjourned to the town of Florence six miles above Omaha. There they met and passed laws, while the other members met in Omaha. Among the acts passed at Florence was one providing for the removal of the capital to NeapoUs. This was another paper town on the south bank of the Platte, near where Cedar Bluffs, Saunders County, is now located. Govemor Richardson Comes to Nebraska. — Nebraska's third governor, WiUiam A. Richardson, Democrat, of Illi nois, arrived at Omaha January 12, 1858, in the midst of the Flor ence secession. He refused to re cognize the members at Florence or to sign the laws passed there, because that was not the capital. So both the Florence and the Oma ha legislatures went home, at the end of forty days, with nothing done. Soon after this Secretary of State Cuming died and J. Sterhng Morton, leader of the South Platte section, was appointed by President Buchanan to fiU the place. The Early Colonies. — In these territorial days, settle ment by colonies began. These were groups of people with some common bond, sometimes that of the same neighbor hood in an older state, sometimes that of a common language or religion. Usually the first comers in these colonies wrote back for others and the colony spread, so that the county where they settled became known as the home of a certain class of people. In this way Germans settled in Hall, Cuming and Otoe counties in 1857, both French and Ger mans in Richardson County, and an Irish colony in Dakota County in 1856. The Republican Party. — In the year 1858, party politics appeared in Nebraska. At first all the settlers were Demo- Gov. Wm. A. Richardson 252 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA crats because they. came from states where that party was strong. When the Nebraska-Kansas biU was passed in 1854, the new RepubUcan party was born. But although the Nebraska-Kansas bill was the cause of the birth of the Republican party there were at first no Repubhcans in Nebraska. The Democratic party in the North and the South was dividing into two camps on the subject of slavery. The southern camp said, "A man has the right to take and hold his slaves anywhere in the Union." The northern camp said, "Let the people in each state decide whether that state shall have slaves or not." The Repubhcan party said, "No more slave territory anywhere." Slavery and the PoUtical Parlies.^ — Most of the people in Nebraska were opposed to slavery. As the Democratic party -was di-vided on the question there was a call to organize the Repubhcan party, and on January 18, 1858, the first meeting for that purpose was held in Omaha. Only a few were present. They were called "Black Repub licans" and not looked upon as quite respectable. In some counties they combined with Dernocrats and called their ticket "people's ticket" to avoid using the unpopular name "Repubhcan." Prohibition Repealed. — The fifth session of the legis lature was caUed by Governor Richardson to meet on September 21, 1858. Its most noted act was to repeal the prohibition law and in its stead pro-vide a hcense for the sale of liquor. Republicans were the leaders in making this change. The First Surplus Crop and First Territorial Fair.- 1859 was an eventful year in Nebraska history, for in that year the first corn was shipped to market. Through all the season, steamboats were carrying the golden grain from the towns along the Missouri River, where it had been hauled in wagons by the settlers. From that year there was no longer doubt that Nebraska was a farming country. In September of that year, the settlers' victory over the NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 253 great American desert was celebrated at Nebraska City by the first territorial fair. Robert W. Furnas was presi dent. J. Sterling Morton, the orator of the occasion, made an historic speech recounting the hardships which the settlers had endured and foretelhng Nebraska's great future. Gold in Nebraska. — Gold was found in Nebraska, in 1859, at the foot of the Rocky Mountains, in the sands of the streams, at the headwaters of the South Platte. Soon there was a rush of thousands across the plains eager to dig for this gold in Nebraska sands. The new gold mines were in sight of Pike's Peak and the gold seekers painted "Pike's Peak or Bust" on the canvas covers of their wagons. The Steam Wagon Road. — Nebraska City laid out a new short road to the gold mines, crossing the prairies along the Blue rivers. It was sometimes called "The Steam Wa gon Road" because a steam wagon, which soon broke down, was made to travel it. This new road was very popular and helped to develop Nebraska City and the South Platte very much. The new territory of Colorado was organized in 1861, taking away from Nebraska her gold mines at the foot of the mountains, but never, either then or since, has so much wealth been dug from the Rocky Mountains as has been pro duced from the prairies of our state. Govemor Black. — The fourth governor of the territory, Samuel W. Black, Democrat, of Pennsyl vania arrived at Omaha, May 2, 1859. The feud between the North and South Platte regions had now become so bitter, the South Platte people resolved that they would no longer live in Nebraska. The South Platte Tries to Secede. — They determined to secede and join Kansas, taking the entire South Platte country -with them. To this end they sent delegates to Gov. Samuel W. Black 254 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA Kansas and to Washington asking Congress to separate the South Platte region from Nebraska and to join it to Kansas. This attempt failed, but the quarrel between the North and South Platte regions went on. The Pa-wnee War of 1859. — WTiat is known as the Pawnee war occurred in 1859. For many years, a Pawnee viUage was upon the bluff above the Platte near Fremont, where General Thayer held the first Indian councU hi 1855. White settlers were coming in, and the Indians had agreed to give up their land there and move to the valley of the Loup. In July, they gathered their ponies, packed their goods upon them, and started up the vaUey of the Elkhorn, under their great chief Petalesharu. But they had a "bad heart," as Indians say when they are angry. On their way they robbed the settlers and shot and wounded a man near West Point. When the news reached Omaha, Secre tary Morton ordered General John M. Thayer to get together as many soldiers as possible, foUow the Pa-wnees and punish them. About 200 men -with guns and horses and one cannon joined General Thayer. They came from Omaha, Fontanelle, Fremont and Columbus. Govemor Black overtook and joined the command. For four days they fol lowed the wide traU of the Pawnees up the Elk horn River. At daybreak on the morning of July 12th they surprised the Pa-wnees in camp on a Uttle creek, ten miles Pawnee Council Rock^ (From photo- .^^.gst of where NorfoUi graph by A. h. Sheldon.) . now IS. General Thayer, at the head of his 200 soldiers, charged upon the camp at once. The Pawnees, men, women and chUdren, came rush ing out of their tepees in great terror. Their chief seized an NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 255 American flag and mshed toward General Thayer caUing out, "Good Indian! No shoot!" General Thayer halted his soldiers and after a parley agreed that the Pawnees should surrender six men who had attacked the settlers, should pay for aU damage they had done, and should march overland with the soldiers to their future home upon the Loup. Battle Creek. — Thus the Pawnee war ended without a battle, but the little creek where this took place was named Battle Creek and is so called to this day. The Furst Attempt to Make Nebraska a State. — The year 1860 is noted in Nebraska annals for the first attempt to make the territory a state. The people voted upon the question with the result that there were 2,094 votes in favor, and 2,372 against and so statehood was postponed. Slavery Prohibited. — The sixth Nebraska legislature passed a bill to prohibit holding slaves in Nebraska. Gov ernor Black vetoed the bill, claiming that there were so few slaves in Nebraska it was not worth while to pass such a bill and that the people could settle the question when Nebraska became a state. The legislature repassed the bill over his veto. Settlers' Hardships. The Free Homestead BUl.— The land question was still one of great interest in Nebraska. In 1859 Nebraska lands were first offered for sale by the United States. Settlers living on these lands had to pay $1.25 per acre for their claims or see them sold to specula tors. Many of the settlers were so poor that they had to borrow the money at 25 to 100 per cent interest or lose their homes. For this they blamed the govemment at Wash ington. The West wished for a free homestead law, giving to each settler 160 acres of land for a home, if he would live on it for five years. The Republican party favored a free homestead law, as did also a part of the Democratic party. AU the people of Nebraska, both Democrats and Republicans, were in favor of such a law because they wished to have 256 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA more settlers come in, make homes here and help to develop the country. In 1860, Congress passed a homestead law, giving to each settler 160 acres of land, if he would live five years upon it and pay twenty-five cents an acre. Presi dent Buchanan vetoed the act. The Furst Telegram.— On August 29, 1860, the first Nebraska telegraph line was completed between St. Joseph, Missouri, and Brownville, and the first telegram sent was as follows : Brownville, Xeb., Aug. 29, 1860. Nebraska sends greeting to the states. The telegraph line was completed to this place to-day and the first office in Nebraska formally opened. "Westward the star of empire takes its way." Citizens. Nebraska Changes from Democratic to RepubUcan. — At the election in 1860, Nebraska became Repubhcan and remained so for thirty years. The veto of the homestead bill by President Buchanan probably, did more than any other one thing to bring this about. Covernor Black's veto of the anti-slavery bill also helped. A third cause was the split in the Democratic party between the North and the South. Nebraska Soldiers in the CivU War. — Abraham Lincoln was chosen President in 1860. Soon after came the seces sion of the South from the Union. President Lincoln called for soldiers. Republicans and Democrats in the North answered the call. Governor Black raised a regiment of soldiers in Pennsylvania, was made their colonel and was killed in Virginia. The people of Nebraska were poor and scattered, but they raised the First Nebraska regiment of 1,000 men which marched to the front under Colonel John M. Thayer and fought under General Grant at Fort Donel son, Shiloh and in other battles. NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 257 Govemor Alvin Saunders. — President Lincoln appointed Alvin Saunders of Omaha governor of Nebraska territory. He was our fifth governor, the first Republican governor, and held the office until 1867 when Nebraska became a state. The Free Homestead Law. — In 1862 Congress passed the free homestead law, giving every settler 160 acres of land. President Lin coln signed the act. The first homestead in the United States was taken by Daniel Freeman on Cub Creek in Gage county, a few miles from Beatrice. The home stead law became one of the most popular laws ever enacted. Under it Nebraska and all the great West were settled by thousands of hardy pioneers eager to get free homes their children. The Sioux and Cheyenne Indian War. — The war at the South went on. More soldiers were called for and came from Nebraska as from other parts of the Union. Suddenly while the soldiers from Nebraska were absent in the South in August, 1864, the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians, living on the plains of western Nebraska, raided the settlements along the Blue and Platte rivers, killing men, women and chUdren, burning houses and driving off stock. At the same time the Sioux in Dakota and Minnesota were on the warpath and the whole frontier was in danger. The men of the First Nebraska regiment were recalled from the South and sent to Fort Kearney to protect the settlers. A second Nebraska regiment was enlisted under Colonel Robert W. Furnas and sent up the Missouri River where it helped to win a great -victory over the Sioux at the battle of Whitestone HUls. Governor Alvin Saunders for themselves and 2.j8 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA Nebraska Becomes a State. — At this time the people of Nebraska thought much of becoming a state. The boun daries of Nebraska had been changed several times since it was first marked out in 1854. . Between 1861 and 1863 Colorado and Idaho had been cut off on the west and Dakota on the north. For a time in 1863, Nebraska was extended west of the Rocky Mountains, but by 1864 it had nearly its present size and shape. In 1864 Congress passed an act permitting Nebraska to become a state when the people there were ready. The people were not ready until 1866, when the question was voted upon in a very hotly Outline Map of Nebraska in 1863. (Drawing by Miss Martha Turner.) contested election and carried by a majority of about 100. The members of the legislature framed a constitution, which Congress would not accept because it permitted only white men to vote. Congress required the Nebraska legislature to meet again and declare that no one should be deprived of the right to vote on account of his color. When this was done. President Andrew Johnson issued a proclamation making Nebraska a state on March 1, 1867. QUESTIONS 1. Make a inap of Nebraska Territory in lSo4. 2. Where were there white people in Nebraska in 1854 and what did they do? 3. What effects had the Platte River on Nebraska Territory? 4. What difference between getting land in lSo4 and now? NEBRASKA AS A TERRITORY 259 5. In what respects are Nebraska schools better than in territorial days and in what not so good? 6. Why did not the "good times" of 1856 last? 7. -What was accomphshed by the "Florence Secession?" 8. When and why was the RepubUcan party organized in Nebraska? 9. Would it have been better if the South Platte region had been made a part of Kansas? Why? 10. Why did the people of all parties in Nebraska desire a homestead law? 11. Why did the Democrats help President Lincoln to put down the rebellion? 12. What had to be done before Nebraska became a State? CHAPTER VI NEBRASKA AS A STATE Lincoln, the New State Capital. — The new state Nebras ka had a new capital. During the long fight between the North and South Platte sections, the South Platte, being nearer to the settled states and farther from the hostile Indians, had outgro-wn the North Platte. Thus it had more votes in the leg islature of 1866 which passed an act to re move the capital from Omaha. The new capital was named for Presi dent Abraham Lincoln, and thename was given by its enemies. Otoe county had led the fight for removal of the capital from Oma ha. Its members of First State Capitol at Lincoln, 1869. (From photograph collection of A.E. Sheldon.) the legislature had been opposed to President Lincoln. The North Platte members who wished to keep the capital at Omaha moved to make the name Lincoln, thinking that the Otoe county legislators would refuse to vote for a capital so named. But the ruse failed; their votes were cast for the bill and Lincoln became the name of our capital, instead of Douglas as was suggested in the removal biU of 1857. Three men. Governor David Butler, Secretary Thomas P. Kennard and Auditor John J. Gillespie, were appointed to locate the new capital, which was to be at some point 260 NEBRASKA AS A STATE 261 DAVID BUTLER T. P. KENNAHD JOHN J. GILLESPIE The Three Founders op Lincoln. (Cour tesy of Nebraska State Journal.) within the counties of Saunders, Butler, Seward and Lancas ter. On July 29, 1867, they selected the present site be tween Salt and Antelope creeks, which was then open prairie -with only two or three log cabins. The Great Iminigra- tion. — When Nebraska became a state, the war between the North and South was over, the hos tile Indians had been de feated along the frontier and thousands of immi grants poured west in search of free homes. They came in all possible ways, some up the Missouri River in steamboats, some on the raihoads across Iowa, but more came in covered wagons, or "prairie schooners" as they were called, drawn by horses, mules or oxen. In these came the pioneers with their children; often with a box of chickens tied on behind, while a few cattle and the family dog brought up the rear. All the roads leading into and across Nebras ka were white with these land ships, and soon the valleys and prairies of the eastern half of the state were dotted with dark spots, where they had anchored and the men and women in them had begun to break the prairies andbuildhomes. Log Cabins, Sod Houses and Dugouts. — The houses of those days were very different from the houses you see in Nebraska to-day. The very earUest pioneers settled First Log House in Lincoln. early painting.) (From 262 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA A Pioneer Dugout. (From S. D. Butcher collection.) along the streams where there were trees and built log. houses. Those who came later and settled upon the prairie had only one material -with which to build and that was prairie sod. They cut the tough sod and piled it into waUs, covering the top -with poles, grass, sod and clay, leaving openings for the -win dows and door. There were more of these sod houses than of any other kind and they were very comfortable, being warm in -winter and cool in summer. They were often called "dobies." Others made their houses by digging into a hUlside, covering the top of the hole with poles, grass and earth, lea-\dng a space in one end, usually toward the south, open for a door. These were called "dug-outs." The floors were often of the bare ground. These early settlers worked very hard to break land and plant seeds, build houses and dig wells. All they had was the good Nebraska soU. Of it they made their houses and barns and from it they raised all that they had to eat and sell. Very kind to these pioneers was this good, warm, rich Nebraska soil, for out of it blossomed the splendid farms and homes and children, and all that makes Nebraska so fair and prosperous to-day. Govemor David Butler Im peached. — In 1868 David Butler was re-elected governor and again in 1870. He was very popular with the old-time pioneers whose many hard- Governor David Butler. (E. G. Clements collection.) NEBRASKA AS A STATE 263 ships he himself had shared. On the other hand he made some enemies by his bold aggressive way of doing things. In 1871, the charge of using state money for his own pur poses was brought against him. He was tried before the State Senate, impeached and removed from office and in his place, the Secretary of State, Wm. H. James, became the governor. Governor Butler tumed over land to the State which more than paid what he owed it. His trial caused great bitterness at the time and for many years after. He still retained the confidence of his friends and years after was elected to the legislature by the people of Pa-wnee County, his home. Railroad BuUding and Railroad Aid. — There were no railroads in the South Platte region when the capital was moved there, and only the Union Pacific was building north of the Platte. In order to encourage railroad companies to build. Congress granted half the land on either side of the track for a number of miles to the company building through it. The other half was left for the settlers, but the home steads inside of this land grant were cut down from 160 to 80 acres. In addition the Nebraska legislature in 1869 gave 2,000 acres of state lands for each mile of railroad. Many towns and counties also voted to give money to roads which would build to them. There was quick response to these hberal offers. The BurUngton crossed the Missouri River at Plattsmouth in July, 1869. It was the first raUroad to reach Lincoln a year later, and in 1872 it built its line to a junction -with the Union Pacific at Kearney. The Mid land Pacific was built in 1871 from Nebraska City to Lincoln and later built west through Seward, York and Aurora to Gov. William H. James. (E.G. Clements collection.) 264 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA Central City. It now belongs to the Burlington. The St. Joseph and Denver road entered Nebraska in 1870 and reached Hastings in 1872. AU these Imes were in the South Platte region. In the North Platte the Omaha & Northwestern road was built to Blair, the Sioux City & Pacific road was built from Missouri VaUey to Fremont and branches of the Union Pacific were begun. Govemor Robert W. Furnas.— In 1872 Robert W. Furnas, Repub lican, of Bro-wn-viUe was elected govemor. He served two years, years of hard times and distress, and then returned to his farm and orchard at Bro-wn-dlle, there to become a leader in Nebraska agri culture during the forty years of his hfe which followed. The Hard Times of 1873. — Many hardships and dis couragements were met by the new-comers. There were prairie fires, grasshoppers, droughts and Indian raids. Then hard times, called the panic of 1873, came to the whole country. Nearly all -the Nebraskans were farmers. The prices of everything the farmer had to sell went do-wn very low, so low that it would hardly pay to haiU to market. As railroads were very few and far between most of the Nebraska farmers had to haul their produce a long distance, some of them fifty to a hundred miles, to reach a market at a railroad town. Wheat sold as low as forty cents a bushel, corn as low as eight cents, eggs five cents a dozen, butter eight cents a pound, cattle and hogs two cents a pound. For several years the settlers burned t-wisted hay and corn for fuel. Some grew discouraged and moved back east, but others stayed, worked harder, saved, and kept their homes. Gov. Robert W. Furnas NEBRASKA AS A STATE 265 Gov. Silas W. Gabber. (From Clements collection.) Governor SUas Garber. — In the four or five years following 1870, pioneers pushed out and settled the Repub hcan VaUey region in the southwestern part of the state. Prominent among these pioneers was Silas Garber, RepubU can, of Red Cloud, who was elected governor in 1874 and re-elected in 1876. During his term the present state constitution was adopted and the larger part of the Indians removed from the state. The Removal of Sioux, Pawnee and Ponca Indians. — In 1876 war with the Sioux Indians broke out on the Nebraska border. The chief cause of this war was the rush of white men into the Black HiUs, the Indian country, for gold. The roads most traveled to the Black Hills led from the Union Pacific raUroad across northwestern Nebraska, crossing the North Platte at Camp Clark bridge. Thousands of people traveled these roads and had frequent fights with the Sioux Indians who claimed all the country north of the Platte. When peace was made, the Sioux ceded all their land in western Nebraska and removed to South Dakota: The Pawnee and Ponca tribes were removed to Oklahoma in 1875 and 1877, and thus nearly all of northern Nebraska was opened for settlers. The Grange in Nebraska. — During these hard times, the farmer's movement took form in Nebraska. Too many middlemen, too little money, too high railroad rates and unfair taxes were among the complaints of the farmers. In the granges, which were secret societies meeting in the country schoolhouses, they discussed the e-vils of the times and plans to remove them. Open meetings to which aU were invited were held. There was deep and earnest debate on hard problems. Women also took part in these meet- 266 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA ings and in them the foundations of future farmers' move ments were laid. The Good Templars, Red Ribbon Clubs and Crusaders. — The temperance movement also became active at this time and spread through a secret society, the Good Templars. It grew rapidly for a number of years and was aided by Red Ribbon Clubs and by the Crusaders, bands of women who prayed and sang in saloons and on the sidewalk in order to induce people to stop drinking. There was intense feeling for and against both the grangers and the temperance agitators. The effect of the debates held by them during the hard times was apparent through after years. Irish, German, Swede, Bohemian, Russian, Danish, PoUsh and French Colomes. — From 1870 to 1880 many colomes of settlers came to the state. Irish colomes settled Holt County in 1874 and Greeley County in 1877. Germans settled in Platte, Dodge, Madison, Stanton and Thayer counties in 1867-1870. The Swedes settled in Polk and Saunders counties about 1870 and in Phelps and Burt counties about 1880. Bohemians founded colomes in Knox, Colfax, Saunders and Saline counties about 1870. Russian Germans began to settle Jefferson County about 1874 and .extended their settlements into Clay and HamUton counties. Danish, Swedish, Bohemian and Pohsh colonies found homes in Howard and VaUey counties. French settlements were made in Richardson, Nemaha, Antelope and other counties. Each of these nationahties added a new element to Nebraska life, making our popiUation more varied and inter esting. Each has done weU its part in buUding a great state. The New Constitution. — There was a caU, as the state grew, for a new constitution. The first one had been framed in haste by the legislature in 1866. A convention met at Lincoln in June, 1871, and made a new constitution in forty-seven days. In its most important parts it was modeled on the Illinois Constitution of 1870. When the people voted on the new constitution the vote stood 7,986 /v. .//.//' rt— // ^ '- ' ^ , , /y/.r- / - .yyr f/ .yu////y ¦' ¦ '¦¦''. ' / i^--l '-¦.-...- . .^ y <•' .'.y:..iy. y, .,..,. ..«.' ";• ^' \ v; "^'- ^p ' « ¦^ -: ¦ .^^^^.-^I^U'^ fe^' iiK A Nebraska Corn Crop. (From S. D Butcher coUeaion.) Threshing Winter Wheat. (From S. D. Butcher collection.) 2S4 NEBRASKA AS A STATE 285 Alfalfa, Wmter Wheat, Sugar Beets. — Three new crops, alfalfa, winter wheat and sugar beets began to be largely grown in Nebraska about the year 1890. All three had been experimented with for many years in a small way. The state became awake to their value at this time, and their cultivation spread from farm to farm and from county to county. Since then they have brought millions of dollars to the people of the state, and have greatly changed methods of farming. Their infiuence has only just begun. The Cream Separator. — Another great change which has come into Nebraska farming, in the past twenty years, has been brought about largely by the cream separator, by which the milk fresh from the cows is separated into cream and skimmed milk, the cream going to butter factories, while the milk is fed upon the farm. Dairy farming, which was ahnost unknown in the early years of Nebraska settlement, is thus becoming one of the chief industries of Nebraska farming. Rise in Price of Land. — During this period, land has risen very rapidly in price, in eastern Nebraska from $25 and $30 an acre to $100 and $150 an acre, and in western Nebraska from $1.25 an acre to $10, $20 and even $50 an acre. Towns everywhere have grown rapidly. New rail roads have been built and for the first time in Nebraska history, there has been a large and constant development of factories. Irrigation and Dry Farming. — Two new methods of farming were followed which greatly helped the state. These were irrigation and dry farming, or summer tillage as the latter is sometimes called. Under the former, ditches were dug to carry the water from the streams and spread it out upon the fields. Under this system the waters of the Platte, the Republican, the Loups, the Niobrara and other streams were led out upon the land, making great fields of grass and grain where before little had been raised. By the dry farming method it was found that plowing and 286 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA In Line for a Hoaiestead. (From S. D. Butcher collection.) cultivating the land without a crop one year would insure a fair crop the next year, even though the seasons were dry. The Kinkaid Homestead Act. — On June 29, 1904, a new homestead act took effect in Nebraska, called the Kinkaid act from Congressman Kinkaid of O'Neill who introduced it in Con gress. This act gave settlers on certain parts of the remaining pubhc land in Nebraska, a homestead of 640 acres by h-ving on the same for five years and plac ing improvements to the extent of $1,000 upon it. About 8,000,000 acres of sandy and rough land remained to be taken under this act. At many land-offices, there was a great rush for this last United States land in Nebraska, and in 1919 there were only 80,000 acres to be taken. Reclamation Act. — In 1906 the Reclamation Act, cham pioned by President Roosevelt, made an important change affecting western Nebraska. Under this act, a dam was buUt across the rocky canyon of the North Platte River near Casper, Wyoming, making a great lake. The surplus water from this lake is brought down across the tablelands of western Nebraska. Already about 200,000 acres have been placed under irrigation by settlers under this act. Taxes and State Expenses. — For many years, the state of Nebraska had been ranning in debt to pay its expenses. This was because state expenses were constantly growing larger and the grand assessment roll was becoming smaUer. (The grand assessment roU is the Ust of all the property in the state made by the assessors on which taxes are le-vied) . During the hard times, after the panic of 1893, the value of property went down. Many people, in order to avoid NEBRASKA AS A STATE 287 paying taxes, did not give in to the assessor all that they had. Many taxes were unpaid. To pay its expenses, the state had issued more than a mU lion doUars in warrants beyond its income from taxes. To pro-vide more money, the legislature of 1903 passed a new revenue law the aim of which was to compel everyone to give in all his property for taxa tion and to raise more money for state expenses. In 1905 the legis lature passed another act, laying a special tax to pay off the million dollars of warrants which the state owed. This has now all been paid. Govemor George L. Sheldon. Railroad Regulation. Durect Pri- Gov. George L. Sheldon. maries. — George L. Sheldon, Re- (From Clements collection.) pubUcan, of Nehawka, -was elected governor in 1906, and held the office two years. During his term, the thirty years' railroad struggle in Nebraska reached some definite results. Free passes on the rail roads were abolished, passenger fare reduced to two cents a mile, and a commission of three persons created to regulate the relations of the peo ple to the railroads in the state. A direct primary law was also passed, under which candidates for office must be named by all the voters instead of being selected by delegates in conventions. Govemor Ashton C. ShaUenberger. Bank Guaranty. DayUght Saloons. — In 1908 Ashton C. Shallenberger, Gov. a. C. Shallenberger (From Clements collection.) 288 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA Democrat, of Alma, was elected governor. During his two- year term, the legislature passed an act providing for a bank guaranty fund to insure people depositing money in banks from losses by bank faUure. An act called the "Daylight Saloon Act," requiring liquor seUers to close their places from 8 p. m. to 7 a. m., an act requiring corporations to pay an annual tax, an act to value all the raUroad property in the state and an act pro-viduig for the election of the peoples' choice for United States Senator, were also passed. County Option. — The question of county option, or permitting all the voters of each county to deter mine whether they would have saloons in .that county or not, became the exciting political issue at this time. Govemor Chester H. Aldrich. — In 1910 Chester H. Aldrich, Republican, of David City, was elected governor. County option was the battleground of the campaign and the result was the election of a- governor in favor of county option and a legislature opposed tb it. Initiative and Referendtmi. — -Among the important acts of the legislature of 1911 were the fpUo-wing: An act pro viding for the initiative and referendum permitting the voters to adopt or reject laws; an act providing for the commission form of government of cities; an act to forbid the selling of seed of any kind ha-ving weed seeds therein; an act stopping the taxation of real estate mortgages; an act to protect the water in Nebraska rivers and lakes ; and an act to secure hbraries for the country districts. Govemor John H. Morehead.^ The Campaign of 1912. At the election November 5, 1912, John H. Morehead, Gov. Chester H. Aldrich. (From Clements collection.) NEBRASKA AS A STATE 289 Democrat, of FaUs City, was chosen governor. The chief feature of the campaign was the spectacular split in the RepubUcan party between the supporters of President Taft and of Ex-president Roosevelt. A new party, named the Progressive party, was organized, which sup ported Mr. Roosevelt. In Nebras ka the Progressive party and the RepubUcan party united on most of their candidates, but there was much strife and contention in bringing this about and Woodrow WUson, Democratic candidate for president, carried the state by a plurality of 37,000 over Theodore Roosevelt and a still larger plu- rahty over President Taft. The new legislature chosen, which met January 6, 1913, had 55 Demo crats and 45 Republicans in the House, 18 Republicans and 15 Democrats in the Senate. At this election five important amendments were made to the state consti tution, making the greatest changes in that document since it was framed in 1875. The new amendments pro-vide for enactment of laws by the people through the initiative and referendum, for elections once in two years instead of every year, for a board of control to manage the state prison, asylums and other institutions, for home rule by cities, for increasing the salaries of members of the legisla ture from $300 to $600 and limiting the time for introducing bills to the first twenty days of each session. Legislation in 1913. — Among the important matters en acted by the legislature of 1913, were: The Mockett law, pro-viding for instruction in foreign languages of children in grade schools; a workman's compensation law, under which persons injured at their work are paid for the loss; a Blue Gov. John H. Morehead 290 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA Sky law to prevent fraud in the sale of stocks, bonds, and land. In addition, three important commissions were pro vided to investigate public questions, one to report upon systems of taxation, another upon Nebraska water power, and the third upon reform in legislative procedure and government. Election of 1914, Woman Suffrage Defeated. — At the election in 1914, Governor Morehead (Democrat) received 120,206 votes, R. B. HoweU (Repubhcan) 101,229 and H. E. Sackett (Progressive) 8,655. Thus the election in dicated the return of the Progressives to the Republican party. An exciting feature of this election was the vote upon the woman suffrage amendment to the constitution. This amendment was defeated by a vote of 90,738 for and 100,842 against. Legislature of 1915, Reform in Govemment. — The legislature of 1915 adopted a large part of the report of the commission on reform in legislative procedure and gov ernment, thereby saving the state many thousands of dollars and securing a better mode of enacting laws. Since then similar reforms, based upon Nebraska's experience, have been enacted in other states. The principal issues before the legislature were the creation of a better road system, the use of water power, pubhc ownership of pubhc utilities, such as water works, gas and electric light, tele phones, and street railw&ys. Changes in Farming. — Important changes in farming during this period include the discovery that sweet clover, for many years regarded as a weed, was a plant which could be used for pasture and hay, and in addition, like alfalfa, to enrich the soil. A systematic effort was made to estabhsh county agricultural agents for the purpose of securing better agriculture and co-operation among farmers. In some counties there was a very strong opposition to this plan among the farmers, while in other counties it was generally supported. NEBRASKA AS A STATE 291 The Farmers' Educational and Industrial Union, usually called The Farmers' Union, began organization in Nebraska in 1913. Its principal purpose was to unite the farmers in co-operative associations for buying and selling. It has grown very rapidly until it numbers at present in the state about 50,000 members. The United States Supreme court rendered an im portant decision for Nebraska -winter wheat growers, permitting the use of the bleaching process in the manu facture of white flour from dark red winter wheat. Election of 1916, Prohibition Wins, Democratic Ticket Elected. — The great issue in the election of 1916 was prohibition of the sale and manufacture of liquor. The prohibition amendment to the con stitution carried by the vote of 146,574 for to 117,532 against, after a heated campaign. The party contest at the same election turned chiefly upon the support of President Woodrow Wilson for re election. "He kept us out of war" was the campaign slogan of the Democrats. The Republicans and Progressives united upon Charles E. Hughes as their candidate for president. Woodrow Wilson carried Nebraska by 41,000 majority. Keith Ne-ville, Democratic candidate for governor, was elected over A. L. Sutton, Republican and Progressive candidate, by a majority of 6,000. The Democrats elected their entire state ticket and a majority in both houses of the legislature. The World War. — The great war in Europe, which began in August, 1914, drew nearer to America and Nebraska as the years went by. In Nebraska, as in America, the Gov. Keith Neville 292 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA prevailing public opinion was -with the Allies and against Germany. After the German invasion of Belgium this sentiment grew stronger and large sums of money were given in our state for the relief of the starving Belgians. Hundreds of French orphan children were adopted by our people, who sent money to support them at their homes. In Nebraska there were over 200,000 persons bom in Germany or whose parents were born there. There was a German-American league and over forty newspapers printed in the German language. Many thousands of these Nebraskans spoke German in their homes and their children attended schools taught in German. A strong effort was made by the German government to control the sjonpathy of these people for Germany in the war and through them to influence the govemment of the United States and of Nebraska for Germany. On the other hand there was a large Bohemian and Polish population in Nebraska bitterly opposed to Germany because their pro-vinces in Europe were held in subjection by the German and Austrian empires. Relations of United States and Germany. — As the war went on the relations between the United States and Germany grew strained. Especially was this true when Germany, -with her submarines, began to sink ships carry ing Americans. When the Lusitania was sunk May 7, 1915, and 114 Americans were lost, there was a great wave of popular feeling against Germany. Some began to demand that the United States join the Allies in the war. The Republicans fiercely criticised President WUson for tolerat ing Germany's affronts, yet neither the Republicans nor the Democrats put a demand for war in their party platform. United States Joins the AlUes Against Germany. — After many sharp letters between the United States -and Germany, the latter promised to comply -with the demands of the United States in regard to sinking merchant ships with submarines. On January 31, 1917, Germany notified NEBRASKA AS A STATE 293 our country that her promise was withdrawn and that unrestricted submarine warfare would begin at once. On February 3, the German Ambassador at Washington was given his passports. Everyone knew we were very near entering the war. There was a dramatic scene that day in the Nebraska legislature when a resolution pledging Presi dent Wilson the support of the state in the great crisis was passed unanimously by a rising vote. On March 16 German submarines sank three American ships. On April 6 Congress declared that a state of war existed between the United States and Germany. Nebraska in the War. — Preparations to sustain the government began immediately in Nebraska as in other states. The legislature passed an act creating a State Council of Defense and granting it extraordinary powers to make all the resources of the state available for carry ing on the war. The Fourth, Fifth and Sixth regiments of the Nebraska National Guard were called out and went into United States training camps. Committees were formed to raise money for all the war enterprises. Thou sands of young men volunteered for service in the United States Army and Navy. Young women entered the hos pital and Red Cross ser-vice. In a few cases individuals and neighborhoods expressed opposition, but as the months went by more and more the mind of Nebraska was made up to see the war through and to make it, as far as human wisdom might do so, the end of war for all time. Special War Session of Legislature. — A special war session of the legislature was called by Govemor Ne-ville to meet March 26, 1918. It enacted laws permitting the Nebraska soldiers to vote at their army camps; a sedition act to punish persons who opposed the government; a law to develop the potash industry; a law establishing Home Guards to preserve order at home. It repealed the Mockett law for teaching foreign languages to children in the grade public schools. 294 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA War Time Events in Nebraska. — A great thriU fiUed the hearts of Nebraska people when General John J. Pershing was appointed Commander-in-Chief of aU United States forces in Europe. « General Pershing Uved at Lincoln from 1891 to 1895 and his two sisters and only son, Warren, still hve there. He was commandant of the miUtary de partment of the University of Nebraska in those years,' and a graduate of our law college. A body of student cadets at the University stiU bear the name "Pershing Rifles" in his honor. Nebraska Food Supply. — The food supply was the first necessity for the war. Before a soldier could march or fight he must be fed. Nebraska was near the center of the great food producing section of the United States. Her contribution of first importance was therefore to produce the largest possible supply of food and to consume the smallest possible amount of what coidd be shipped abroad. Corn, wheat, meat and sugar are all produced in Nebraska. The State Food Administration was organized to secure the largest possible surplus of these products. In order to do this the people at home were asked to eat substitutes for flour, meat, and sugar. Each person was limited to two pounds of sugar a month, or about six level teaspoonfuls a day; to two slices of bread at a meal; and as to beef, to only three meals a week. It was forbidden to sell hens in the pubhc markets, for hens laid eggs and eggs would take the place of meat shipped abroad. Patriotic War Work in Nebraska. — The newspapers of Nebraska were filled every day and every week -with columns of patriotic appeals. The women of the state were enrolled by thousands, each gi-ving her training and pledging her ser-vices to the govemment where she could be most helpful. The moving picture theaters not only showed patriotic films, but gave time at each performance to four-minute speakers who stirred the audience -with patriotic argument and enthusiasm. NEBRASKA AS A STATE 295 War Prices Fixed to Protect the People. — Since there was so much demand for food, coal and other necessaries of Ufe and since so many men were going to war who had produced these things, prices tended upward. To protect the people a schedule of retail prices was prepared and pubUshed by the Food and Coal administrations. All dealers in these articles were required to take out licenses. Any dealer who disregarded the price scheduled or who sold to one person more than the prescribed allotment, had his license revoked and he was permitted to subscribe liberally to the Red Cross, or he was even kept out of busi ness for a time. How Money Was Raised for the War. — An enormous amount of money was needed by the government to carry on the war. The United States was called upon, not only to pay her own expenses in the war, but to loan vast sums to the Allies with which they could pay for the food and munitions they bought in America. Never before in the history of the world had such great sums, amounting alto gether to more than $30,000,000,000, been raised by any nation. In order to get this money. United States Bonds and War Sa-vings Stamps were sold to the people. Each state, city and county was assigned its share. Committees were formed which secured volunteers who should see each person and sell a proper amount of the bonds. In this way everybody could purchase his share. Money was also raised for the Red Cross, the Young Men's Christian Asso ciation, the Young Women's Christian Association, the Knights of Columbus, the Salvation Army, the Je-wish Welfare Board and the War Library Ser-vice. Nebraska's Share of the Money Raised. — Nebraska's share of the- bond purchases was $240,000,000 and her people purchased more than they were assigned. In sales of War Sa-vings Stamps, Nebraska not only exceeded her quota but took more according to her population than any other state in the Union. 296 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA Nebraska Soldiers in the War. — Nebraska furnished 47,801 men for the war. Her soldiers were scattered through out the entire United States Army and Na-vy. Many of them took part in the great battles overseas. The largest body of Nebraska soldiers in any one command was in the 355th Infantry, 89th Division. This regiment, taken from the farms, offices, shops and stores, -with only a few months training did brave fighting in the battles of the Argonne Forest and Meuse River, and lost about one-third of its memJbers. Afterwards the regiment marched into Germany and spent the -winter at Saarburg, near the Rhine. The list of Nebraska soldiers who died in the war is not yet complete, but when completed -wiU number about one thousand men. Nebraska Base Hospital 49 consisted of four hundred men and women. It was stationed at AUereye, France, and cared for the wounded and sick from the battlefields in the Argonne. It made the best record for saving life of all the American hospitals in Europe. More than two milhon American soldiers were taken across the ocean. Two million more were in training in camps in America eager to cross. Although most of these men, and nearly all of those from Nebraska, had no pre-\ious mihtary training, yet they met and defeated the veteran soldiers of the German army. They arrived in France just in time to hurl back the advancing German armies at Chateau Thierry, -within a few miles of Paris. On November 11, the German government signed an armistice which ended the war. The German Kaiser fled from his country to Holland and most of the kings and princes of Europe were driven from their thrones by then- Q-wn people. With in a few weeks the American soldiers began to come back from the training camps in the United States and from overseas. Enthusiastic celebrations were held in Nebraska for her soldiers when they returned, took off their uniforms and began their work again as peaceful citizens. NEBRASKA AS A STATE 297 The People Who Helped at Home. — The war for freedom and the world's peace was won at home as much as on the field of battle. The soldier risked his life and de serves honor for his daring. Back of him were the people at home, providing the food, munitions and supplies of all kinds, -without which the war would not have been won. In Nebraska men, women and children of all classes worked in the fields to save the crops, cheerfully gave their money to war enterprises, denied themselves food and responded to aU the calls to sustain the government.. Out of the sacrifices and experiences of the war a new spirit has arisen. It demands better and more American education for every boy and girl, better homes and equality for all who work. We did not go into the war to conquer land or trade, but to bring democracy and order and peace and justice to the whole world. Election of 1918, Governor S. R. McKelvie, Repub lican Wins. — At the election in November, 1918, Samuel R. McKel-vie " was elected governor over Keith Ne-viUe by over 20,000 majority. The Repubhcans elected the entire Republican state ticket and a large majority of both houses of the legislature. In the legisla tive session of 1919 the principal measure presented by the new administration was the administra tive code biU which pro-vided that about twenty separate branches of the state government should be placed under six heads appointed by the governor. After a fierce contest, this bill passed both houses and became a law. Those opposed to the biU immediately invoked the referendum against it. The matter is now before Gov. Samuel R. McKelvie 298 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA the courts, but Governor McKel-vie appointed the heads of departments and placed the system in operation. Other measures of importance passed by the legislature of 1919 are: An act which pro-vides for the redistricting of all counties of the state into school districts, so that better schools may be provided; an act appropriating $5,000,000 for the erection of a new capitol; an act pro-viding for a public highway system partly paid for by the United States and for expending $6,000,000 thereon during the next two years; an act placing all schools (both parochial and public) under supervision of the state, county and city superintendents; an act requiring all subjects taught children in the first eight grades to be given in the Enghsh language only; an act changing the direct primary law of 1907. The last act has been held up by a referendum peti tion and -will be voted on by the people at the election of 1920. Nebraska Ratifies Woman Suffrage. — A special session of the Nebraska legislature was called by Governor McKel-vie July 27, 1919, to ratify an amendment to the United States constitution gi-ving women in aU the states the same voting rights as men. On July 31, both houses of the Nebraska legislature ratified this amendment unanimously. Nebraska was the fourteenth state to ratify. When thirty-six states have ratified the amendment, universal woman suffrage will prevail throughout the United States. A New Constitution for Nebraska. — The people of Nebraska at the election of 1918 voted to have a new constitution. The legislature of 1919 passed an act provid ing for a convention to frame such a constitution. One hundred delegates to the convention were elected on Novem ber 4, 1919. They met in Lincoln, December 2, 1919, to frame a constitution which -wiU be submitted to the voters of the state at the election in November, 1920. The Nebraska Indians To-day. — There have been great changes in the Indian tribes which once called Nebraska their home. The Pawnees, reduced in number to 653, NEBRASKA AS A STATE 299 Uve on their reservation in Oklahoma. Next to the Pa-wnees on the west is the reserve of the Otoes and Missouris, living together as one tribe now numbering only 411. They have a beautiful rich prairie bordered -vrith timber for their home. Joining the Otoe reserve on the north is the land of the Poncas. Here live the part of the Poncas, 583 in number, who did not return to Nebraska. Thus side by side in the heart of Oklahoma Uve three tribes of Nebraska Indians. They "visit each other and keep alive the memory of the land in the north where they once lived. They stiU think of Nebraska as their old home and their children grow up hearing, from the lips of the older men and women, many wonderful stories of the old times. The former Nebraska Sioux, who number about 12,000 people, live on their great reservation in South Dakota. They are often seen in the Nebraska towns along the border. Part of the Cheyennes and Arapahoes who once roamed western Nebraska are now in Oklahoma and number about 2,000. The remainder are in Wyoming. There are at the present time 41,087 Indians in Nebraska. Of these the Omaha and Ponca are the only native Nebraska tribes. The Omaha number 1,377 and live in Thurston County. The Nebraska band of the Poncas has about 338 members and lives at its old home near the mouth of the Niobrara River. The Indians now U-ving in Nebraska who were moved here by the United States are as follows : The Winnebagos, 1,086 in number, live neighbors to the Omahas. Their former home was in Wisconsin and Minnesota. They came to Nebraska in 1865. The Santee Sioux were moved from Minnesota in 1863, and settled in what is now Knox County along the Missouri River. There are 1,193 of them. The Sauk and Fox Indians of Missouri were located in 1861 on. a reserve in southeast Nebraska and northeast Kansas. They number about 93. Rights of Indians. — ^All the Indians now li-ving in Nebraska are citizens and have the same right to vote and 300 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA to hold office that white people have. They own some of the very best land in the state, much of it rented to white farmers. Some of these Indians work hard and are learning the white man's way of U-ving, while others cUng to the old life and love to spend their time -visiting each other and telUng stories of the days before the white men came. Their children go to school and leam the Enghsh language, although the Indian languages are still spoken in their homes. Passing of the Old Life. — In a few years the old lan guages and the old Indian ways -will be gone forever and nothing -will remain of Indian Ufe in Nebraska but its story. Shipping Nebraska Grain. — In recent years, a great change has come in the route over which Nebraska grain is shipped to market. In the early years nearly aU Nebraska products were shipped east over the railroads to Chicago and the Atlantic ocean. With the buUding of north and south raUroads, a large part is now shipped to the southern states and another large part is sent to the mountain states over the westem Unes of road. Free Libraries. — About 1899 there began in Nebraska a movement to secure free public Ubraries and reading rooms. In a few of our towns and cities these had been estabhshed for many years. The new effort was to make at least one strong Ubrary in each county. This movement is stiU going on and acts of the legislature of 1911 are expected to bring good libraries well cared for within reach of every citizen. The Women's Clubs. — In the period between 1890 and 1900 the woman's club movement in Nebraska took an active form. A number of clubs had been organized in earher years. Ih 1894 these were brought together in a state federation, new clubs were organized and state con ventions held with great interest and enthusiasm. These women's clubs aim to inspire and promote the interests of women and to bring their influence to bear for better schools, better books, better homes, better govemment and a happier and more beautiful state. NEBRASKA AS A STATE 30l Retrospect. — This story of Nebraska as a state closes with the year 1919. It is one hundred and eight years since the Astorians and Manuel Lisa ran their famous boat race for a thousand miles up the Missouri River past our shores. It is fUty-eight years since the outbreak of the great civil war between the North and the South, starting from the contest between slavery and freedom in the Nebraska country. The story of our state extends backward and reaches forward and in either direction a child of Nebraska finds it fUled -with interest and inspiration. Nebraska a Century Ago.— Wonderful is the story of the world in these last one hundred years and nowhere more wonderful than here in Nebraska. A hundred years ago, our state was an unknown wildemess caUed a desert. Upon it roamed 40,000 Indians and miUions of buffalo, elk and deer. Wild geese, swans, ducks and other waterfowl made their nests undisturbed. The -wild grass grew every where, the sod unbroken by the plow. The waters of its streams ran unchecked to the sea. The mind and hand of man have transformed Nebraska in the past fifty years. A milhon and a quarter of white people live in a land which supported only one-thirtieth as many Indians. Nearly 10,000,000 domestic animals find their food where once were herds of buffalo, elk and deer. Nebraska To-day. — If a boy should spend one day only of his hfe in -visiting each Nebraska farm, he would need to live more than five hundred years before he had seen them aU. Five hundred cities and -villages in our own state are fed from these farms, and the surplus food which we ship to the people of other states and countries every year would fiU a million farm wagons or make a railroad train of freight cars long enough to reach from Chicago to Denver. Nebraska Herds. — Our herds of horses, cattle, sheep and s-wine, if driven as fast as a man can walk across a bridge over the Platte River, would make a column 10,000 302 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA miles long and be four months in crossing the bridge, -with out stopping to feed or water. Nebraska Crops. — ^Men and women are stiU U-ving in Nebraska who have seen aU these changes. They have seen all the counties, cities, -villages and farms of Nebraska created. They have seen the number of bushels of wheat grown in this state increase from 147,000 in 1859, when we shipped our first surplus, to 65,000,000 in 1919, and the number of bushels of com from about 1,000,000 in 1859 to over 223,000,000 in 1917. Nebraska to-day coiUd give every man, woman and child in the United States two bushels of corn and one-half bushel of wheat and stiU have enough for bread and seed for the people -within our state. The Old Way of Travel and the New. — Instead of the Indian squaw leading a pony over a dim trail across the sunbaked plains one hundred years ago, -with the poles of her tepee dragging at the pony's side; instead of the slowly crawling freight wagon with its twelve yoke of oxen of fifty years ago; we now travel daily in Nebraska by means of a thousand passenger trains, thirty thousand automobUes and, still unsatisfied, are just learning to spread our -wings and fly through the air faster than even automobUe or express train can travel. The Telephone. — ^When our fathers, the pioneers, settled these prairies, to talk five minutes -with the nearest neighbor meant sometimes a day's drive -with the fastest team. Now their children and grandchildren sit in their homes and talk -with their friends in every county of the "state, and U they -wish, -with friends far away by the lakes or the shore of either great ocean, kno-wing their voices and even feel ing their presence. Nebraska Schools. — The schools of Nebraska are famed around the world, for our state has had for many years the largest percentage of any state in the Union of its people able to read and write, and is thus the most inteUigent state of the most intelligent nation in the world. NEBRASKA AS A STATE 303 Most of the progress in the Nebraska schools has been made in the past forty years. In that time the number of schoolhouses in the state has grown from about 300 to 7,000 and the number of children in school from 12,000 to 300,000. The rough logs and sod walls of the schoolhouses forty years ago have nearly all been replaced by neat wooden and brick buildings. Instead of the split log seats of the earliest schoolhouses -with their home-made desks there are con venient desks of polished wood and metal. In place of the few school books of many different kinds bought by the parents in many different states and brought to Nebraska, each child in the Nebraska schools to-day has free books fumished by the district in which he lives, -with maps and charts and apparatus for making experiments never dreamed of by those other children who attended the Nebraska schools in the early days. Besides these great improvements in the common schools, our state has resolved that her people shall, in the future, excel even more than in the past. For their training in all the arts and trades of life she has added free normal schools for training the teachers, and a free university and agricultural college where a boy or girl may study and practice the best that may be learned for the life of a farmer or engineer or mechanic or any of the callings by which men and women may hope to earn their li-ving and make them selves useful to the state in which- they dwell. How Nebraska ShaU be Prosperous and Free. — Nebras ka is a rich, great and beautiful state. She cannot stop where she now is. It is the law of life that states must grow stronger and -wiser and better, or they must decay. It is the people who make a state, and the children to-day make the people of to-morrow. Our fathers first of all made this state free. Then they made it prosperous. They made it thus -with labor of muscle and of brain. They did the rough work, they built the bridges, dug the wells and broke the sod. They did not ask an easy time. If :^04 A SHORT HISTORY OF NEBRASKA they had, Nebraska would never have been buUt. For us is left to do the fmer work, to use the improved ways, to develop the better knowledge. This requu-es greater skUl and finer training and persistent labor. ]\Ionument to Abraham Lincoln ON State House Grounds, Lincoln, Nebraska, 1912. (Courtesy of Roy Hindmarsh, LiiKoln, Nebraska.) Hard work and neighborly Idndness made Ufe happy for our fathers even in the sod houses and dugouts of the early days. As they grew strong, the state grew strong with them because every man earned his li-ving. No one lived in NEBRASKA AS A STATE 305 idleness upon the work of his neighbor. Their children will make a richer and better and greater Nebraska by practice of the two chief virtues which have made the Nebraska of to-day — ^honest labor and neighborly kindness. QUESTIONS 1. Why was the new capital located where it now is and how did it get its name? 2. Which would you prefer for a home, a dobie or a dugout, and why? 3. Why were raihoads built so rapidly in Nebraska? 4. What were the results of the grange movement in Nebraska? 5. Why was a new constitution made? 6. What caused hard times and good times in Nebraska between 18"3 and 1888? 7. Was it better for each settler to have 160 or 480 acres under tb 3 land laws? Why? 8. What difference in the action of farmers and of railroad men whe a they ¦wished more pay for their work? Why? 9. Why are fewer horses stolen now than in 1880-90? 10. Did the Farmers' Alliance do -wisely in starting a new political party? 11. Is it better for the state to rent or sell the school lands? Why? 12. -What made Nebraska prominent in national affairs in 1854? In 1869? In 1896? To-day? 13. Ought the state to pay its expenses or go in debt? Why? 14. What is needed to enable the state to pay its expenses? 15. What are the most important measures passed by recent legislatures? 16. Tell briefly of Nebraska's part in the great war. 17. Contrast the Nebraska Territory of a hundred years ago with Nebraska of to-day. 18. What do you think is the most important thing to be done in order to make Nebraska a better state? GLOSSARY (Note: The spelling of certain names connected with Nebraska has varied in different periods. In some cases the speUing used in this book varies according to the period; e.g., Kanzas, Kanzes, Kansas.) AcaanibasApachesArkansas . BourgmontBrule . Cabann^CharlevoixChaui . Cibola . Comanche . ... Coronado, Francisco Vasquez de De Smet . EscanzaqueEssanapes GnascitaresHaraheyHopiIsopete ... . . Itan — Sometimes spelled letan. ah-kan-nee'-basay-pach'-eesar'-kan-saw boor-mon'broo-lay' kah-ban-nay' shar-lay-vwah' chow-ee' see-bo'-lah ko-man'-chee kor-oh-nah'-do vass'-keth day-smett'ess-kan-zak'ess-san-ah'-pesnas-si-tah'-reeshay-ray'-hayho'-pee ee-so'-pee-tee This word is not found in any of the pronouncing dictionaries. It seems to have been pro nounced it'tan or yit'tan, from which we get the name of the present village of -futan. La Hontan LaJoieLeClerc Lisa Mallet, Pierre Mitain NicomiPawneePekatanouiPenalosa, don Diego de PetahaueratPitalesharuPizarroPueblo . QuiviraSagean, Mathieu. Santa Fe . Sarpy . ShoshoneSkidi . TatarraxTirawaValee, Andri Voyageurs Zuni la-on-ton'lah-zhwa'lay-cler'lee'-sa mal-lay' pee-air' me-tan' nee-ko'-mee pah-nee'pek-a-tan'-oo-ee pen-ya-lo-sa dee-ay-go pee-tah-how'-eratpee-tah-lee-shar'-roo pi-zar'-ro pu-eb'-loke-vee'-rahsa-zhan' mah-tee-you' sahn-ta-fay'sar-pee'sho-sho'-neeskee-dee'tah-tar-rash'tee-rah-wah'val-lay' an-dree' vwa-ya-zher'zoo'-nyee INDEX Acaanibas, 10. Adams County, 85. Aldrich, Governor Chester H., 288. Alfalfa, 285. Algonquin Indians, 228. AUis, Rev. Samuel, 242, 243. Alma, 288. American Fur Company, 41, 167. American Horse, 152. Antelope County, 187, 266. Antelope Creek, 261. Apache Indians, 6. Arapahoe Indians, 43, 117, 131, 228, 299 Arbor Day, 206. Arikara Indians, 37, 41. Arikaree, 51. Arickaree Fork, 131. Ash Hollow, 149, 246. Ashland, 7. Assessment Grand Roll, 286. Astor, John Jacob, 41. • Astoria, 41. Astorians, 41, 65, 85, 301. Atchison, 90. Aunt Manuel, 38. Aurora, 263. Australian ballot, 277. Bad Face Band, 146. Bad Lands, 216. . Bandelier, Adolf T., 12. Bank Guaranty, 287. Baptist Missionary Union, 70. Bartley, J. S., 279, 282. Bassett, 273. Battle Creek, 255. Beal, Senator C. W., 197. Bear, The, 98, 149. Beatrice, 110, 257. Beaver Creek, 47, 152. Beecher, Frederick H., 133. Beecher Island, 131. Bellefontaine Cemetery, 40. Bellevue, 52, 55, 59, 65, 88, 96, 118, 175, 238, 239, 243, 246. Benton, Senator, 136. BienvUle, 219. Big Elk, 46, 52. Big Foot, 278. Big Horn Mountains, 41, 146. Big Horse, 25. Big Sandy Station, 139. Big Springs, 85. BiUs, Colonel C. J., 281. Birds, Early Nebraska, 64, 65. Black, Governor S. W., 253, 256. Black Bear, 123. Black Hills, 41, 79, 146, 152, 171, 265. Black Moon, 80. Black Republicans, 252. Black Robe, 79. Blackbird, 18, 26, 60, 226. Blackbird Hill, 22, 26, 36, 59. Blackbird Hills, 181. Blackfoot Indians, 31, 42. Blair, 264. Blue Creek, 146. Blue Rivers, 226. Blue Sky Law, 289. Bonneville, Captain, 86. Boone County, 95, 281. Bourgmont, 13. Bow River, 18. Boyd County, 19, 169. Boyd, Governor James E., 276. Branding Cattle, 271. Bridgeport, 43, 120. Bright Eyes, 175. Broken Bow, 190, 193, 278. Brown, John, 100. Brownville, 111, 208, 246, 256, 264. Brule Sioux, 97, 146. Bryan, WUham J., 280, 281. Buchanan, President James, 110,251. Buck, Nelson, 108. Buffalo Bill, 128. Buffalo County, 89. Buffalo, First Mention of, 3. Bugeaters, 210. BuU Bear, 147. Burlington Railroad, 263, 269. Burlmgton Strike, 273. Burt, Governor Francis, 238. 307 308 INDEX Burt County, 159, 266. Butler, Govemor David, 129, 180, 260, 262. Butler County, 89, 104, 118, 261. Cabanne's Trading Post, 65. California Trail, 42, 88. Calumet Bluff, 27. Camp Clark Bridge, 265. Camp Creek, 100. Camp Dump, 270. Carhn, F. W., 193. Carr, General, 125. Casper, Wyoming, 42, 82, 286. Cass County, 129. Catfish War, 243. Catlin, George, 21, 56, 59. Catlin's North American Indian Gallery, 61. Catlinite, 60. Cattlemen, 270. Cedar Bluffs, 251. Cedar County, 18, 27, 104, 226. Census, First, 240. Census, Second, 243. Central City, 92, 264. Central Pacific, 138. Central Route, 90. Chadron, 126. Chadron Creek, 154. Charlevoix, 13. Chaui, 114. Cherry County, 187. Cheyenne Indians, 37, 117, 122, 131, 145, 228, 299. Cheyenne War, 199. Cibola, Seven Cities of, 1. Claim Clubs, 241. Clay County 85, 266. Code BiU, Adnunistrative, 297. Cody, W. F.. 128. Colfax County, 89, 118, 266. Colonies in Nebraska, 251, 266. Colter, John, 31. Columbus, 8, 123, 254. Comanche Indians, 12, 117. Compensation Law, Workman's, 289. Connor, General, 123. Constitutional Convention, 298. Constitutions of Nebraska, 266, 289. Co-operative Farmers' Union, 283. Cooper Family, 160. Coronado, Francisco Vasquez de, 1, 218. Cortez, 6. Council-bluff. 26. Council Bluff, 55. CouncU Bluffs, 231. Council Bluffs Indian Agency, 55. Council Bluffs, Iowa, 77, 240. Councils with Indians, 25, 27, 36, 45, 78, 80, 81, 148, 150, 151. 153, 156, 170, 181, 242. County Option, 288. Court House Rock, 120. Crazy Horse, 126, 153, 155. Cream Separator, 285. Crete, 270. Crook, General George, 126, 154. Crooks, Ramsay, 41. Crounse, Goveimor Lorenzo, 278. Crow Dog, 155. Crow Indians, 37, 41, 147, 227. Crusaders. 266. Cub Creek, 110, 257. Culbertson, 118. Cummg, Thomas B., 239, 251. Cuming County, 159, 250. Custer, General George A., 126, 153. Custer County, 193. Dairy Farming, 285. Dakota County, 15, 26, 251. David City, 288. Dawes, Govemor J. W., 270. Dawes Countv, 126. Dawson Coim'ty, 85, 89, 124. Daylight Saloon Act, 287. Democratic Party, 234, 251, 280. Denver Trail, 89. De Smet, Father Pierre Jean, 77, 87, 152. De Soto, 218. Deuel County, 47. D'Iberville, 219. Dietrich, Govemor Chas. H., 282. Direct Primaries, 287. Dismal River, 128. Dixon, Gladys, 201. Dixon Countv, 269. Dobies, 262. " Dobytown, 166. Dodge County, 89, 158. 162. Douglas, Stephen A., 233. Douglas (Lancaster County), 249, 260. Douglas Bill, 235. Douglas County, PO. INDEX 309 Drought, Great, 274. Dry Farming, 285. Dugouts, 261. Dunbar, Rev. John, 243 Dundy, Judge, 174. Dundy County, 187 Dunning, 190. Earliest Nebraska, 213. Edmunds, Doctor, 189. Eliza, slave, 101. Elkhorn River, 25, 47, 95, 226, 242, 254, 269. Emery, Robert, 139. Ely, Rosalie (Lisa), 40. Escanzaque Indians, 6, 7. Essenapes, 9. Bsta Maza, 175. Falls City, 100, 289. Farmers' Alliance, 275. Farmers' Union, 291. Fetterman, Colonel, 150. Fifth Cavalry, 125. Fire Fighting, 135. First Nebraska Book, 74. First Nebraska Missionaries, 70. First Nebraska Regiment, 256, 267. First Schools, 243. First Settlers, 238. First Survey of Nebraska, 104. Flood, Great of 1881, 269. Florence, 88, 243. Florence Secession, 250. Flowers, Early Nebraska, 66, 82. Floyd, Sergeant Charles, 26. Fontanelle, 246, 264. Fontenelle, Henry, 66. Fontenelle, Logan, 94. Fontenelle, Lucien, 94. Fool-Robes-Son, 47. Forestry, 283. ' Forsyth, Colonel George A., 131, 278 Fort Atkmson, 14, 50, 56, 239. Fort Bridger, 199. Fort Calhoun, 25, 52, 278. Fort Childs, 166. Fort Crawford, 199. Fort Farnam, 199. Fort Fetterman, 199. Fort Gothenburg, 199. Fort HaU, 199. Fort Halleck, 199. Fort Hartsuff, 199. Fort Independence Rock, 199. Fort Kearny, 89, 159, 199, 246, 257. Fort Kearny, New, 166. Fort Kearny, Old, 165. Fort LaBonte, 199. Fort Laramie, 81, 88, 97, 98, 123, 126, 147, 169 167, 199, 237. Fort Laramie, Council of 1851, 78. Fort Laramie, Treaty, 81, 148, 151. Fort Lewis, 199. Fort Lisa, 37, 56. Fort McPherson, 168. Fort McPherson Military Cemetery, 198. Fort Mamla, 199. Fort Pierre, 41. Fort Robinson, 126, 162. Fort Saunders, 199. Fort Sidney, 199. Fort Steele, 199. Fort Wallace, 131. Fort White River Camp, 199. Fort William, 167. Four Horns, 80. Fox Indians, 299. Francis, Charles, 196. Fray Marcos, 1. Free Silver, 279. Free Soil Party, 110. Freeman, Daniel, 110, 257. Freeman, Miss Minnie, 163. Fremont, John C, 56, 82, 232. Fremont, 83, 118, 242, 246, 254, 264. French and Indian War, 222. Frenchman's Fork, 125. Furnas, Governor Robert W., 208, 253, 257, 264. Gage County, 85, 110, 257. Gale, Dr. John, 175. Garber, Governor Silas, 265. Garden County, 44, 85, 89, 146. Gates of Sheridan, 107. Germans in Nebraska, 67. Ghost Dance, 156, 277. GiUespie, John G., 260. Gilson, Mr., 188. Goebel, Mrs. Adolph, 161. Gold in Nebraska, 253. Good Templars, 266. Gosper County, 85. Grain Shipments, 300. Grand Island, 44, 85, 145, 272. Grange, 265. 310 INDEX Grangers, 270. Grant, President U. S., 152, 256. Gnascitares, 9. Grasshopper Constitution, 268. Grasshoppers, 183. Grattan, Lieutenant, 98, 149, 199. Gray Eyes, 51. Great American Desert, 46, 231, 253. Great Buffalo Plams, 231. Greeley County, 266. Grover, head scout, 132. Grow, Galusha A., 110. Half Breed Strip, 103. HaU County, 85, 89, 146, 251. Hamilton County, 266. Harahey, 4. Hard Winter, 246. Hardy, 30, 117. Harney, General, 149, 246. Hastings, 264, 282. Haumann, Hannah, 188. Haumann, Retta, 188. Haumann, TUlie, 188. Hayden, Professor, 56. Hayes County, 187. Henry, 162. Hercules, slave, 102. Herd Law, The, 178. Highways, Public, 298. Hitchcock County, 82, 118. Holcomb, Governor SUas A., 210, 278. Holt County, 162, 163, 187, 266. Homestead, First, 110. Homestead, Free, 265, 267. Homesteads, 270. Hopi Indians, 1. Horse Creek, 78, 148. Horse Stealing, 273. Hot Wind of 1894, 274. Howard County, 118, 160, 266. Hudson's Bay Company, 35, 232. Hunt, WUson Price, 41. Illinois Indians, 218. Impeachment Trial, 278. Indian Chiefs: American Horse, 152. Bear. The, 98, 149. Big Elk, 4, 6, 52. Big Foot, 278. Big Horse, 25. Black Bear, 123. Black Moon, 80. Indian Chiefs — continued: Black Robe, 79. Blackbu'd, 18, 26, 60, 226. Bull Bear, 147. Crazy Horse, 126, 153, 155. Crow Dog, 166. Esta Maza, 175. Fontenelle, Logan, 94. Fool-Robes-Son, 47. Four Horns, 80. Gray Eyes, 61. Iron Eyes, 175. Itan, 70. Knife Chief, 47. Little Thief, 25. Long Hair, 47. Man-Afraid-of-His-Horses, 162. Melhunca, 73. Pani LeShar, 128. Pawnee KUler, 108. Red Cloud, 79, 123, 126, 146, 265 Roman Nose, i33. Shake Hand, 27. Shines -White, 172. Sittmg BuU, 79, 126, 162. Spotted Horse, 199. Spotted TaU, 126, 146, 151. Standing Bear, 171, 176. Struck-by-the-Pawnee, 27. TaU BuU, 125. Tecumseh, 35. Turkey Leg, 125. Two Crows, 181. Wajepa, 182. Whistler, 108. -White Bear, 51. White Cow, 46. -White Crane, 27. -White Eagle, 173. -White Horse, 25. Indian Council at Horsecreek, 150. Indian Rights, 300. Indian War at Pme Ridge, 277. Initiative and Referendum, 288. Inman, 163. Iowa Settlers, First, 238. loway Indians, 37, 46, 74, 75. Iron Eyes, 175. Irrigation, 285. Isopete, 3. Itan, 70. Izard, Governor Mark W., 242, 250. James, Governor W. H., 263. INDEX 311 Jefferson, Thomas, 24. Jefferson County, 85, 104, 139, 266. Johnson, President Ajidxew, 258. Joliet, Louis, 219. Jones, Ben, 41. Julesburg, 90. Kansas City, 16. Kanzes Indians, 15. Kearney, 138. Kearney County, 85, 89. Keamy, Fort Phil, 150. Keith County, 47, 86. Kennard, Thos. P., 260. Kennerly, Major -WUham Clark, 75. Kinkaid, Congressman M. P., 286. Kinkaid Homestead Act, 286. Kit-ke-hahk-i, 114. Knife Chief, 47. Knox County, 19, 169, 266. La Flesche, Joseph, 176. La Flesche, Mary, 176. La Flesche, Susette, 175. Lancaster County, 89, 261. Land, Rise in Price, 285. Land Grants, 263. Land Laws, 241, 270. Language Law, 298. La Hontan, 9. La Joie, Madam, 38. Laramie Plains, 124. Laramie River, 68 Leavenworth, General, 51. LeClerc, Francis, 41. Lee, Captain Thomas J., 104. Legislature, First, 240. Lewis & Clark. 21, 24, 31, 36. Lexington, 124. Libraries, Free, 300. Lincoln, President Abraham, 110, 137, 256, 260. Lincoln, 89, 177, 260, 263, 266, 276. Lincoln County, 198. Linwood, 118. Liquor License, 252. Lisa, Manuel, 34, 41, 65, 103, 301. Lisa, Raymond, 38. Lisa, Rosalie, 38. Little Big Horn Battle, 126, 153. Little Bow River, 226. Little Blue, 139. LeShara, 118. Little Thief, 25. Logan River, 177 Log Cabins, 261. Lone Tree, 92. Long Major Stephen H., 45. Long Hair, 47. Loup River, 47, 227. Louisiana, 24. Louisiana Purchase, 223. Louisville, 7. Lusitania, 292. Lux, Fireman, 201. McCoy, Rev. Isaac, 103. McKelvie, Govemor Samuel R.j^297. McKenzie, General, 127. McKinley, President WUliam, 280. McLeUan, Robert, 41. Madison County, 266. Mahas or Omahas, 219. Majors, Alexander, 102. Mallet, Brothers, 15. Man-Afraid-of-his-Horses, 152. Mandan Indians, 37, 59. Manners, Charles A., 104. Marquette, Father, 218. Martha, slave, 102. Martin, George, 145. Martin, Nathaniel, 145. Martin, Robert, 145. Maseburg, Mr., 189. Maximilian, Prince, 40, 52, 56, 62. Melhunca, 73. Merrick County, 89, 93, 118. MerrUl, Moses, 70. MerrUl, Mr. & Mrs., 243. Merrill, Samuel Pearce, 74. Mickey, Governor John H., 283. Middleton, "Doc," 273. Midland Pacific Railroad, 263 Milford, 172. Militia, State, 270. MiUard, J. H., 282. Miller, Dr. George L., 173, 248. MUler, Joseph, 41. Minneconjou Sioux, 97. Mira Valley, 163. Missiouris Indians, 299. Missouria Indians, 12, 13, 19, 46. Mssouri Compromise, 100, 234. Missouri Pacific Railroad, 269. Missouri River (numerous references) Mitam, 38. Mockett Law, 289-293. Morgan's Island, 64. 312 INDEX Mormon Cow, 97. Mormon Trail, 88. Morning Star Sacrifice, 117. MorriU County, 89, 120. Morehead, Governor John H., 289. Morton, J. Sterling, 56, 129, 206, 248. Murie, Captain, 125. Nance, Governor Albinus, 268 Nance County, 118, 123. Napoleon Bonaparte, 24, 223. Narrows, The, 139. Neapolis, 251. Nebraska, First Account of, 15, 24 Nebraska, Naming of, 83, 231, 232. Nebraska churches. First, 245. Nebraska City, 89, 100, 165, 238, 243, 263, 263. Nebraska City Cut-off, 89. Nebraska, First BUl, 233. Nebraska, First Code, 241. Nebraska, First Counties, 241. Nebraska Indians, 226. Nebraska, State Flower, 204. Nebraska Territory, 237. Nebraska, the Indian Country, 232. Nebraska Under Three Flags, 218. Nebraska, Great Seal, 202. Nebraska-Kansas BUl, 234. Nebrathka, 233. Nemaha River, Great, 63, 103. Nemaha River, Little, 25, 64, 100, 103. Nemaha County, 266. NevUle, Govemor Keith, 291. Nicomi, 176. Niobrara River, 19, 27, 99, 153, 169, 172, 226. Niobrara, 269. NorfoUi, 254. North, Major Frank, 122 North Bend, 138. North Platte, 41, 125. Northwestern RaUroad, 269. Nuckolls, S. F., 101. Nuckolls County, 85. Octotatoes or Otoes, 15, 219. Oglala Sioux, 97, 131, 146. Oklahoma, 299. Omaha, 25, 45, 57, 65, 89, 94, 137, 177, 240, 243, 246, 254, 281, 282. Omaha Creek, 26. Omaha Herald, 176, Omaha Indian Council, 181. Omaha Indian Dance, 66. Omaha Indians, 18, 46, 56, 65, 70, 94, 175, 226, 238, 299. Omaha & North -Western Railroad, 264 O'Neill, 286. Open WeU, 192. Oregon TraU, 42, 77, 82, 85, 97, 148, 159, 165, 167, 200, 237. Osage Indians, 12. Osceola, 118, 268, 283. Otoe County, 89, 102, 129, 158, 2tl , 260. Otoe Indians, 12, 13, 19, 25, 37, 4f,, 55, 66, 70, 226, 238, 299. Otoe Missions, 72. Otoe Reservation in Nebraska, 172. Overland MaU, 90. Overland TraUs, 85, 92, 139. Pacific RaUroad, 57. Padoucas, River of, 16. — PaUadium, Nebraska's Firrt News paper, 67. Panimahas, 16. Pani LeShar, 128. Panic of 1867, 249. Panic of 1873, 264. Panic of 1893, 274. Panis or Pawnees, 219. PapUhon, 47, 57. PapUUon Creek, 18, 47 Pathfinder Dam, 83. Pawnee Agency, 123. Pawnee CouncU, 242. Pawnee Countv, 129, 263. Pawnee Indians, 2, 4, 13, 19, 37, 46, 61, 55, 70, 114, 147, 181, 199, 227, 243, 254, 266, 299. Pawnee KUler, 108. Pawnee Scouts, 122. Pawnee, Wars of, 117. Pekatanoui or Missouri River, 219. Penalosa, Don Diego de, 6. People's Independent Partv, 279. People's Ticket, 252. Pershing, General John J., 294. Petahauerat, 114. Petalesharu, 47, 242, 254 Phelps County, 85, 266. Pierce, President Franklin, 236. Pierce County, 163, 187. Pike, Lieutenant Zebulon M., 29. INDEX 313 PUce's Peak, 149, 253. Pme Ridge, 177. Pine Ridge Agency, 155. Pine Ridge Indian War, 277. Pioneer Preachers, 245. Pizarro, 6. Plainview, 163. Platte County, 89, 118, 128. Platte River (numerous references). Plattsmouth, 130, 263. Plum Creek, 124. Political Revolution of 1890, 275. Polk County, 118, 266. Ponca Creek, 170. Ponca Indians, 12, 19, 37, 169, 226, 265, 299. Ponca Treaty, 170. Pony Express, 90. Poppleton, A. J., 130, 173. Populist Party, 279. Pottawatomie Indians, 77. Potts, 31. Powder River, 127. Powder River Country, 150. Poynter, Governor WUliam A., 281. Prairie Fire, 142. Prairie Flower, 172. Prairie Schooner, 261. ¦¦' Pre-emption, 270. Presbyterian Church Mission, 66. Prison Rebellion, 268. Prohibition repealed, 252. Prohibition ratified, 291. Progressive Party, 289. Promontory Point, 138. Pueblo Indians, 2. Quarter Stake, 105. Quivira Land, 2. RaUroad Building, 263. RaUroad Regulation, 287. RainfaU, Return, 283. Randolph, G. C, 140. Randolph, Hattie P., 140. Reclamation Act, 286. Red Cloud, 79, 123, 126, 146, 265. Red Cloud Agency, New, 162. Red Cloud Agency, Old, 152. Red Cloud City, 118. Red Ribbon Clubs, 266. Red Pipestone Quarry, 60. Relief for drought, 274. Republican Party, 250, 256, 280. Republican Party returns to power: 282. RepubUcan River, 4, 12, 30, 117, 131, 146, 227. Republican Valley, 108, 265. Richardson, O. D., 242. Richardson, Governor W. A., 251. Richardson County, 25, 103, 158, 251, 266. Rock Bluffs, 129. Rock County, 187. Rock Island Railroad, 269. Roman Nose, 133. Roosevelt, President Theodore, 286, 289. Rosebud Agency, 155. Royce, Miss louise, 16o. Rulo, 26. Rustler War, 273. Sagean, Mathieu, 9. Saint Joseph, 90. Saint Joseph & Denver RaUroad, 264. Saint Louis, 35, 37. St. Paul, Nebraska, 160. Saline County, 104, 266. Salt Creek, 249, 261. Sand Hills, 187. Santa Fe, 14, 16, 29, 51. Santee Sioux Indians, 299. Sarpy, Peter A., 56, 82. Sarpy County, 18, 67, 89. Sauk Indians, 299. Saunders, Governor Alvin, 257. Saunders County, 70, 118, 251, 261 266. Savage, Governor Ezra P., 282. School, redistricting, 298. School lands, 279. School Money Stolen, 278. Scott's Bluff, 68, 89. Scott's Bluff County, 78, 86, 89. Second Nebraska Regiment, 257. Seward, 89, 104, 163, 201, 261, 263. Seymour, Thomas, 69. Shake Hand, 27. Shallenberger, Governor A. C, 287. Shattuck, Miss Etta, 163. Sheldon, Governor George L., 287. Shell Creek, 47, 118, 226. Sheridan, General Philip A., 126. Sheridan County, 107, 187. Sherman, General W. T., 79, 151 166, 171. 314 INDEX Shinn's Ferrv, 89. Shines White, 172. Shoshone, 147. Sittmg Bull, 79, 126, 152. Sioux City & Pacific RaUroad, 264. Sioux County, 126. Sioux Indians, 19, 27, 37, 38, 61, 74, 79, 96, 97, 108, 117, 120, 122, 145, 146, 169, 181, 227, 243, 246, 265, 277. Sioux Indian Council, 1889, 156. Sioux Treaty near Chadron, 153. Sioux Wars, 149, 156, 166, 199, 257. Sixth Principal Meridian. i05. Skidi Pawnees, 15, 114, 116, 170. Slavery among Pawnees, 117. Slavery in Nebraska, 100. Slavery Prohibited, 265. SmaU Pox, 20. Smithsonian Museum, 22. Snake Indians, 41, 147. Sod Houses, 261. Soldiers, Nebraska, 296. Spanish Caravan, The, 12, 221. Spanish War, 281. South Pass, 42, 82, 86. South Platte Secession, 263. Spencer Seven Shooter Rifles, 123, 133 Spotted Horse, 199. Spotted TaU, 126, 146, 151. Spotted TaU Agency, 162. Stacey, Mr., 188. Stage Coach, 90. Standing Bear, 171, 176. Stanton County, 104, 266. Statehood, first attempt, 265. Statehood, attained, 258. Steam wagon road, 263. Stuart, Robert, 41. Stotsenberg, Colonel, 281. Storms, Great, 158. StrUie at Omaha, 270. StrUie, Great "Q", 273. Struok-by-the-Pawnee, 27. Sublette, MUton, 86. Sugar beets, 285. Summer TUlage, 286. Summit Springs, 125. Sun Dance, 156. Surveyors, 103. Tabor, Iowa, 100. Taft, President WiUiam H., 289. TaU BuU, 125. Tatarrax, 2. Taxes, 286. Tecumseh, 35. Telegram, First, 266. Telephones, 302. Thayer, Governor John M., 130, 242, 243, 254, 256, 272. Thayer County, 85, 266. Thedford, 188. Thomas County, 187. Thurston County, 26. Tibbies, T. H., 176. Tunber Clauns, 270. Tipton, T. W., 130. Tu'awa, 116, 120. Trans-Mississippi Exposition, 281. Tree Planter's State, 210. Turkey Leg, 125. Turk, The, 2. Two-cent raUroad fare, 287. Two Crows, 181. Umphrey, E., 140. Underground Railroad, 100. Union Pacific RaUroad, 90, 123, 126, 136. Ute Indians, 117, 147. VaUa, Andri, 41. Valley County, 266. VigUance Committees, 273 Wade, Kid, 273. Wajepa, 182. Wa&er, C. H., 208. War Bonds and Stamps, 295 Washmgton County, 25. Wayne County, 104. Webster, John L., 173. Weeping Water River, 25, 65, 74. Western Engineer Steamboat, 45. Western Nebraska, 269. Westphalen, Mrs. Peter, 162. West Point, 264. Whig Partv, 234. Whistler, 108. White Bear, 51. White Cow, 46. White Crane, 27. White Eagle, 173. White Horse, 25. White River A'allev, 152. White Stone HUls,' 257. INDEX 315 Wicmta maians, 118. Wilcox, (MerriU) Eliza, 70. WUd Cat Days, 249. WUkins, WUham, 232. Wilson, President Woodrow, 289. Wilson, Mrs. 162. Winnebago Indians, 299. Winter Wheat, 285. Women's Clubs, 300. Woman Suffrage, 290, 298. Woodhurst, Mrs., 268. Workman's Compensation Law, 289. World War, 291. Wounded Knee, 135, 156, 278 Wyeth, Nathaniel J., 86. Yellowstone, Steamer, 59, 62. York, 263. York County, 89. Young, Brigham, 56. Yutan; 71 Zuni Indians, 1 9^