Staying Sturdy through Hard Times

Last week, I explained our family’s arrival in Kansas. In short time, those hardy ancestors faced more than isolation in Northwest Kansas. After surviving that first winter in their new country, they learned firsthand about plagues of Biblical proportion.

Grandpa didn’t spend much time whining in his memoir, but he explains how grasshoppers in numbers large enough to qualify as an Old Testament pestilence arrived. He says they devoured “everything that was green.” He’d traveled to what he termed Saline County, Nebraska where he saw insects “come down like snow until they were 2 inches thick on the ground.” According to him, “70 acres of fine corn just in the blister disappeared in 3 hours.” All that remained was stalks.  In addition to devouring corn, grasshoppers wiped out wheat and oat crops as well. I recall articles in old Ellis Headlights that verified this invasion. As a result, settlers depended on charity from churches and families still living in the East to help them survive those first years.  You know stomachs grumbled with hunger and growing kids wore hand-me-down clothing during such hard times.

Unfortunately, life didn’t improve the following year. According to Grandpa, grasshoppers came again in 1875 but “took the crops only in spots.” He explains that he and 3 neighbors lost their fields, but the hoppers left corn standing nearby. Despite, dire circumstances, he had a sense of humor, saying, “We had the sympathy of our neighbors which they lavished upon us. When I told them we were better off than we were the year before, they asked how that could be.” Tongue in cheek, I’m sure, this farmer/circuit rider explained, “We had a chance to steal. The year before there was no corn west of the Missouri River.”

Bad events come in threes, which held true for the insect invasions our ancestors experienced. A third year in a row, ravenous jaws zeroed in on Northwest Kansas. Grandpa Reuben says, “There were grasshoppers by the billions.” He tells a story about his brother-in-law accompanying him on church business. The two rode near Spring City, which is now called Lenora. They stayed at a church member’s home on Saturday night and awoke to “hoppers hung on the willow trees until they looked like weeping willows.” After the sermon and dinner, the two set out for grandpa’s evening appointment in a distant community.

Heading northeast, one thought he saw fire while the other claimed it was a dust storm. In short time, grandpa reports, “A hail storm struck us from the southwest and grasshoppers came down by the bucket full.” After battling their runaway team, they made it to church in time for Grandfather to preach. Shivering, he delivered his message in dripping clothes. The storm hadn’t hit this area, so the congregation found their preacher more than a tad curious.

Before evening ended, a passing traveler confirmed Grandpa’s experience, stating, “There were 2 feet of ice and hoppers in places and dead antelope on the prairie.” These difficulties didn’t dim Grandpa’s determination to preach and farm in Northwest Kansas. He did, however, say he never left home afterwards without his overcoat.

Again, vintage journalism verifies my relatives’ experiences. Such tales remind those whose families settled Kansas that we’ve particularly determined DNA pulsing through our bodies.