End the Drama with an Exchange Program

Recently, Ag Daily posted an article by Missouri farmer Blake Hurst that explores why the media doesn’t understand “flyover country.” It takes a while to read his essay, but the points he makes are worth weighing and deciding whether the mainstream news over-dramatizes lives of those from small towns in middle America.  Reading his article made me thankful that I’ve spent my life living in villages with less than 2,000 population, even if it that means a long drive to Walmart. It also makes me want to correct some misconceptions.

Even for those without children to raise, small communities in the middle of America offer plentiful reasons to call them home. You’ll know your neighbors. That doesn’t mean you’ll never have conflicts, but odds increase that you won’t worry about them belonging to terrorist organizations or holding 13 children hostage in filthy conditions. Rural living means you have an idea regarding who lives on your street and know their family history as well. So much awareness typically helps folks get along. Ever noticed how lawn mowing, flower planting, and putting up Christmas decorations appears infectious? When everyone on the street tidies yards or hangs festive lights, it’s like a germ—in no time, everyone’s got it.

On that note, if there’s a resident who can’t manage yardwork or maintenance, small town neighbors help. Now days, school kids join in the volunteering. On an established date, you’ll find entire classes alongside teachers and principals raking, painting, washing windows, or whatever needs done. Many youngsters continue helping older or disabled neighbors long after the assigned event. It’s part of their culture.

At workshops I’ve attended, urban teachers are curious about rural schools’ technology. They have the misconception that our facilities don’t compare to theirs. Imagine the surprise when they learn our students often have one on one access to computers or I-Pads. They’re more intrigued by rural youngsters’ savvy at designing web pages and computer programs, mastering CAD skills, or printing 3-D designs.

Because of technology, those who live in the hinterlands can access the world. We may have to drive an hour to shop at a big box store, but nothing stops us from placing a cyber order that’s delivered to our doorstep or from making reservations to travel wherever necessary to achieve our goals.  Due to such access, rural regions house an increasing number of ex-urbanites who’ve given up gridlock to work online.

Recent arrivals mention missing familiar restaurants, entertainment venues, and shopping. However, I’ve heard these same newcomers share how nice it is to visit with neighbors at the market or on the front porch. Almost all appreciate drivers who wave at everyone they meet. No one misses the honking and rude gestures they left behind.

Granted, folks in little towns give up some privacy, but the trade-off is genuine concern from people where you live and do business. I’d like to think Mr. Hurst’s article encourages rural dweller to share the truth about their communities—that these are places where residents want what humans everywhere want—love, community, safety, job satisfaction, and accomplishment. Maybe it’s time to start an exchange program to encourage Americans to see the reality of one another’s lives, rather than manufactured drama.

Getting Used to Country Noises

Those who’ve grown up in urban areas get used to round the clock mechanized sounds. Hearing lawn mowers, leaf blowers, drivers gunning engines, or jets roaring overhead causes no panic. In fact, car alarms, sirens, and even crashes at nearby intersections generate only short-term interest. Move that same population to the country and note how their eyes widen at every noise.

No matter a sound’s origin, imagination multiplies it.  A squeak or scritch in the wall is a rodent infestation. Coyotes howling alarms pets and humans alike. You’d think werewolves had invaded. A rabbit shrieking its death cry is enough to send former city dwellers into a catatonic state. Knowing this about my former big city neighbors, I wondered how I’d handle living a mile from our nearest neighbor when we moved from the edge of Ellis to an isolated hilltop in Trego County.

It didn’t take long to find out. We moved in December, and resident wild canines serenaded us to sleep on wintry nights. In short time, I looked forward to these rural lullabies. We also had nesting owls in a tree outside our bedroom. Again, once I recognized the source of those sleep inducing hoots and murmurs, I nodded off quickly. The occasional death cries of expiring cottontails raised my heart rate, but once I identified the source, I knew another hilltop inhabitant had dined well.

What I wasn’t prepared for were unexpected and repetitive tap, tap, tappings of woodpeckers. All those trees lining nearby Big Creek and the cedar siding on our house turned the area into a battle of feathered percussionists. Because we fed black oil sunflower seeds and suet to resident birds, we regularly enjoyed watching the unique flight pattern of sapsuckers, flickers, redheaded, hairy, and downy woodpeckers. They joined a myriad of other species at our feeders. All our guests were delightful, but the hard-headed, sharp-beaked creatures especially charmed us.

That is until they decided to drill for insects in our cedar siding. The first time this happened, it was early morning and our resident game warden was on duty checking hunters. A sharp and continual rapping on the north side of the house awakened me and our young daughters from deep sleep.

After peering out windows, expecting to see someone parked in the drive and pounding unceasingly on the outside wall, I was surprised to find no vehicle in sight. When we couldn’t identify the source of the intense and unending tapping, the girls’ and my imaginations went into over drive. We’d watched one too many scary movies.

For just a while, had someone been recording, the three of us would have qualified for America’s Funniest Home Videos. Pajama clad, we crept about looking for our tormentor and trying to decide whether this situation required a 911 call. Thank God, we identified our intruder before we punched that button.

Upon further inspection, I found a pair of flickers wildly attacking our siding. Intent on a tasty meal, they hammered til my presence drove them from their perch.

Recalling that incident and my response still makes me blush. After years of hearing only nature’s noises, I’m a country convert. A few hours in a metropolis and my brain reels from so much man-made sound.

Old Stories About New Beginnings

Fresh beginnings make people reflect as well as anticipate. I’m no different as I behold the clean canvas of a brand-new year. Like many of you, genealogy and ancestry sites have captured my interest, and I’m intrigued by ancestors who migrated to begin fresh lives and kept on traveling.  I’m curious about why so many kin made it to Kansas and stayed. As I explore their stories over the next few months, I hope your families examine your sunflower roots as well.

Our first Kansas ancestors arrived by train from Devizes, Ontario, Canada, in 1872. Although former brickmakers, they homesteaded along the Kansas/Nebraska border in Norton County, KS. While they exchanged longitudes, latitudes, and occupations, they maintained familiarity with their previous home by naming their new home Devizes, Kansas. According to family records, they donated land for a school, post office, and cemetery. Only the cemetery remains. Like so many start ups at the end of the 1800s, this little community withered til little except headstones remain to remind us of hopes that once existed in this isolated place.

This particular group of immigrants came not only to claim land, but also souls. Though Grandpa Reuben missed the Second Great Awakening of the earlier 1800s, he discovered a deep faith and committed himself and his family to the demands of a prairie Methodist Circuit rider. This meant he frequently left wife, children, and parents to develop the homestead while he and his pony traveled drainages with names of Beaver, Sappa, Prairie Dog, Solomon, Deer, and more. No matter the weather, he crisscrossed mostly empty miles, holding services for those settled far from town.

His tiny wife Hannah grew up as a daughter of ship captain who navigated Lake Michigan. Marrying Grandpa meant exchanging her predictable life for the exact opposite. I’m certain she surprised to herself by starting a family in a sod house far from any large body of water.

She made do in those first homes, offered bread and coffee to roaming Cheyenne, hid children in native grass to protect them from hostile natives, lived off missionary barrel goods sent by established eastern congregations, buried children, and in-laws, and lived to ripe old age before dying in Ford, Kansas.

Grandpa writes about arriving soon after the Rebellion when Kansans still reeled from the border wars. He detailed insect and weather-related devastation and expressed his satisfaction that many settlers hungered to hear the Lord’s message.

As I read his memoirs, I note town names have changed. Lenora was once Spring City while Glade was Marvin. He shared his frustrations with getting actual church buildings constructed. In Kensington, he and the Baptist preacher held services in the local saloon Sundays when it closed for regular business. He and the Methodists of Agra raised funds to build a sanctuary that was soon destroyed by a tornado. They didn’t give up. The community rallied and rebuilt their church.

With a love of history and so many roots in Kansas, I’ve stories to share. Perhaps our tales intersect with yours. I’m eager to hear from those with details to fill empty blanks in our saga.