An Informative Daytrip

We recently drove to my wife’s home area west of the Missouri River to find and visit a few isolated cemeteries where some of her ancestors are buried. She was born and raised on a farm in the Raleigh area, a rugged but beautiful area with an uneven skyline full of buttes, plentiful pastureland, and cropland where farmers can raise good corn and small grain with adequate rainfall.

Many of the early settlers were Germans from Russia, a group who had been invited to farm in Russia but later on had to escape the hardships which were placed upon them. Some of them settled in this area to begin wresting a living from their new land.

The cemeteries were named Holy Infant, St. Gabriel, and St. Vincent. None had remaining church buildings, all having gone the way of little country schoolhouses that used to dot the countryside. One of the graveyards wasn’t being maintained so we had to walk through tall thick prairie grass while keeping a watchful eye for rattlesnakes. Holy Infant was near what used to be the little town of Brisbane. 

We were in Brisbane once over thirty years ago and saw a building standing along with a couple other signs of past life. Now that building had disappeared; I saw no sign of prior habitation whatever except for the railroad grade that runs past the village site. My brother-in-law remembered a large stockyards and grain elevators that once stood beside the railroad.

Most of the graves in these cemeteries were marked with an iron cross fashioned by local blacksmiths. Sadly, many small crosses marked an unnamed grave, probably an infant already forgotten. 

With my brother-in-law driving, I was able to look the countryside over and notice that  hundreds of acres of  unharvested wheat still stood in the field. He said he’d never seen so much rainfall as they’d had this year and with the ground remaining wet, machines couldn’t drive in the fields. Now the straw in those fields has started breaking down and the kernels are starting to sprout. One curious farmer did combine some and took it to the elevator to see if they would take it. No, they rejected it. It must have been disappointing after having watched the lush stand grow through the season.

One year, 1962, we experienced frequent downpours and very wet ground on our farm. I was away at college and Dad waited until the ground froze in November before he could combine it. It still yielded well, but that’s the only harvest they brought in. Luckily it hadn’t sprouted.

Crop failures have occurred in the past, worldwide, many times over. We still hear stories about the drought in the 1930s and topsoil blown and piled like snowdrifts. It caused the huge migration of farmers emigrating to California as portrayed in Steinbeck’s “Grapes of Wrath.” Grasshoppers? Old-timers said they were so thick that they ate fenceposts and fork handles.

Nebraska was hit with heavy flooding this spring from the melting deep, late snows. Scientists tell us flooding will grow worse in the future. Glaciers and the icecap are melting which will raise sea levels and endanger coastal cities. A trip down Highway 46 reveals hundreds of acres that were never worked this spring because of our late and heavy snowfall. And not to sound amusing, the birds and the bees are disappearing. Some won’t accept the fact of climate change and its effect on weather patterns and our environment. This is in spite of an overwhelming percentage of scientists who say it’s so. I’m afraid the scientists are correct and hope it isn’t the new normal. 

Grandkids

With grandkids. They're growing like weeds.

Thoughts of a Slower World

The fires burning in Brazil’s Amazon forest attracted a good deal of attention that brought some shame-fingers pointed at that country’s president for not doing anything to stop them. The latest mass killings with an AR-15 rifle, a hurricane, Hong Kong riots, Britain’s Brexit, plus whatever else creates headlines has displaced it, so the fires burn on. 

Competing cable news organizations along with internet sites deal with events as a 24 hour news cycle, work the devil out of all the angles, and then move on to the next exciting story.  Bigwigs and fatcats recognize this fact and sometimes make controversial announcements on a late Friday afternoon when people want to get away for the weekend.

Most news of the day depresses me, even though it can be addictive. News junkies revel in it, but personally I enjoy reading history where news travelled at the speed of oxen or maybe saddle horses. I’ve come on a story I’d like to relate that is set in those slow days. The countryside where some of my early ancestors settled is dotted with small cemeteries. In the Owego Lutheran Church cemetery lies the grave of one of my great-grandfathers. 

We like to pay respects to our ancestors and occasionally visit this graveyard, among others.

Not many headstones are here, maybe a couple dozen, but a solitary white marble marker on the west side attracted me to walk over and read the inscription: “James M. Kinney. Wagoner. Co. B. 10 Minn. Inf.”  The stone mason did not carve the years of birth and death, leaving questions my inquisitive nature wanted answered. 

History books tell us that the 10th Minnesota Infantry led by General H.H. Sibley marched across what is now North Dakota in 1863 in search of Indians who had attacked and killed many white settlers in Minnesota. I remembered reading once in an old hometown newspaper the headline, “Remarkable Feat Performed by Seventy-seven Year Old Man,” and thought I’d read mention of his marching with Sibley. When I dug it up, it was an aha moment because this was the one and same James M. Kinney.

The editor related some of Kinney’s biography. At the outbreak of the Civil War, he was driving a stagecoach in Minnesota but wanting adventure joined the 10th Minnesota Infantry as a wagoner. In other words, he would be a teamster driving mules pulling supply wagons for the army. The “remarkable feat” the editor wrote about was Kinney’s walking into Sheldon through snow for sixteen miles. He spent the night in Sheldon and next morning boarded the train to Lisbon where he’d spend that winter of 1911at the Veteran’s Home. He died in 1917.

It’s fun to continue hunting for information. How many soldiers, how many wagons, teamsters, horses, mules, butcher beef were included on Sibley’s march into North Dakota? Stephen E. Osman, a historian with the Minnesota Historical Society, tells us. A manpower total of 4,075 included 400 teamsters who marched with 225 six-mule teams pulling the supply wagons. That means 1350 mules were in harness, with an unknown number of replacement draft animals accompanying them. When on the move wagons rolled four abreast to shorten the line, mainly for protection by the outriders and rear guards.

A massive effort of rounding up men, equipment, and supplies took place before Sibley’s army could even move. Remember our man Kinney was involved in all of this. Massive purchases of animals were needed and manpower shortages due to the Civil War existed. Men, many of them freed slaves, came north on the Mississippi River from St. Louis to join and hundreds of  unbroke Missouri mules were shipped north by riverboat.  Twenty-three pounds of grain and hay per animal per day needed to be gathered.

Besides Kinney marching through with Sibley, Ransom County lays claim to hosting this army with two campsites established in July. Many stories like Kinney’s were experienced by area residents, but sadly, were never recorded or even talked about much over supper tables. Their stories have followed them into the grave. An old proverb states, “When an old man dies, a library burns to the ground.”

Old Cemeteries

We had a big day yesterday, Tuesday, September 17 with finding and touring through old cemeteries in the Raleigh and Brisbane area. Mary claims some of her ancestry with people buried there. Five of us included sister Sharon, sister-in-law Sharon, brother Mike, Mary, and me. Obviously, the blacksmith used the same pattern in making the signs.- - - As an aside, we saw hundreds of acres of unharvested wheat. Unusually heavy rains stalled harvesting it in that area, now it is breaking down and sprouting. We learned one farmer combined some to see if an elevator would take it, but he came home with it after the elevator rejected it.

Denmark Plants Trees

“A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in.” - an old Greek proverb.

     

I’ve always thought it a great quote. Now it’s finding life in the country of Denmark that has chosen to take an active approach in fighting global warming. They have sponsored a telethon to raise money to fund planting a million trees to reduce the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere. It’s a small effort as these kind of things go, but it’s a positive one.

General Ransom & John Wesley Powell

Ransom County in North Dakota, the military installation called Fort Ransom, and the nearby village of Fort Ransom all take their name from the Civil War general, T. E. G. Ransom. General Ransom commanded a brigade at the Battle of Vicksburg where control of the Mississippi River was fought for. I recently learned of a man destined for greatness in his own right who served under Ransom as a commander of an artillery unit, John Wesley Powell. He went on to explore the entire length of the Grand Canyon, the first white man to do so. After earning national recognition as a conservationist and naturalist, he was invited to address the North Dakota Constitutional Convention in 1889. He urged the delegates to “Fix it in your constitution that no corporation - no body of men - no capital can get possessions and right to your waters. Hold the waters in the hands of the people.”

Sheldon School Falls

It happened unexpectedly, so when I saw a video of it posted on Facebook, I needed to go see for myself. I’m speaking of the demolition of the brick schoolhouse in Sheldon, the place where I had attended school for twelve years and then returned a couple of times to work. Even though the venerable old building built in 1923 lately had stood abandoned and in disrepair, it commanded respectability that alumni held dear. 

As the video had shown, a large machine with a long boom punched through the walls and pulled the structure down in a few hours on August 30. Curiosity led me and the wife to drive down from Fargo the next day to look at the scene. We came upon a void in the skyline where I had grown accustomed to seeing a building stand. A large heap of bricks  and wood remain with no shape or form, leaving it to memory to reassemble them into what they once were. When the roof opened up I imagined a large flock of memories must have flown free to hover and search for the open minds of those who remembered.

The school district sold the property some years back to a company whose plans for it never materialized, was abandoned, and now has been purchased by the Fraedrich family from Enderlin. While I walked around the rubble taking photos, I saw a car pull into the lot and park near my wife who’d chosen to wait there for me. A young mother with her two daughters had gotten out and stood visiting with Mary. When I joined them, I was happy to make the acquaintance of the lady who with her family is responsible for the purchase, demolition, and future development of the site. 

This personable young lady and her girls engaged us with pleasant conversation, talking of hopes and plans for the project and what has transpired. The school building had become a hazardous ruin that required leveling, but the gymnasium still stands. It is the subject of their attention for refurbishing into something that will serve the public as an event center. There is a lot of work ahead  and money to raise to transform it to a suitable condition that will pass any and all future inspections that law requires. Undeterred, she has confidence it will come to fruition.

Upon ending our conversation, I mentioned that my class graduated in what was the brand new gym in 1960, the first event ever held in it, a little bragging point that a few of us claim.  As Mrs. Fraedrich and her girls drove off, I thought too late to recite my class motto to her, “One goal reached, many beyond.” Oh well, she’ll walk through the development phases and realize similar mottoes by herself. She and her girls were off to Fargo to buy more orange security fencing to finish enclosing the area. Mary turned to me and said, “If she gets it done we’ll celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary in it.” I can hear music playing four and one-half years from now.

Down She Came!

And as for the Sheldon schoolhouse, that's all folks! Down she came on Friday, August 30, 2019. The young ladies stopped in today ( the 31st) as we walked around, and they turned out to be the ones in charge of the demolition with the dreams of remodeling the gym into an event center. She has a very positive attitude about its future. Mary said good, then we'll be able to celebrate our 50th anniversary in there 4 1/2 years hence.