Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1888-12-05
BUFFALO SKULLS VOTED

Kansas CITY Star: "A seven line
dispatch from Topeka, printed in the
Star the other day, will loosen many
reminiscent tongue among pioneer
Kansans. The dispatch stated that
an Indiana man has brought suit
In the United States court against the
commissioners of Harper county to re-
cover $4,000 and interest on bonds IS
sued i'm 1873. Payment has been re-
fused on the ground that the bonds
were fraudulently issued.
There was probably not white man
in Harper county at the beginning of
1873. Some time in the spring OF sum-
mer of that year, however, three or
tour men found their way over the I'M
inhabited prairie and built low one
room hut out of lumber brought with
them, very close to the exact center of
the county. They were perhaps the
only white men within forty miles or
more. Probably they caught an Occa-
sional glimpse of buffalo. Certainly
the smaller wild animals of the plains
were their near and numerous neigh
bors. The face of the earth around
them was covered with the fine, soft
buffalo grass which seemed to be as
wild as the animals that roamed over
1t for it disappeared almost as quickly
as the antelope and the wildcat, upon
the incoming Of civilization. Scattered
over the prairie, thickly enough to fur
nish fuel for the inhabitants for years
afterward, were those strangest of ma
terials that man ever used to kindle his
lires-buffalo chips. The white bones
of one time prairie monarchs were so
plentiful that the people who first set
tied i'm the county found a profitable
business in gathering them by the
wagon load and hauling them about a
hundred miles to sell them.
THE three OF four men who built
their hut on Bluff creek fifteen years
ago made profitable use of these bones.
They populated the county with them
Strange, unique, audacious as 1t was.
suggestive OF graveyards and of walk
ing skeletons, they literally peopled the
county with skulls, made a legal mu-
nicipality, with all the officials and
fOrmalities requisite, and had the audi
tor of the state declare it well done.
They gathered 300 or 400 buffalo skulls.
set them up in row and gave TO each
a name from an old Cincinnati direc-
tory, which they brought out for the
purpose. Whether they were partlcu.
lar to choose dead mems names is not
known; but dead OF not, they became
citizens Of this new county, with a vote
to be cast as the political bosses of the
county dictated. And they all voted tC
make the new and enterprising town
of one hut four men and Cincinnati
directory, the county seat. This done
the necessary officers were CHOSEN in
due manner and another election was
called. This was to vote on the cues
ton of bonding the county for interna
improvements. The records say thai
the bonding proposition was carried b,
a large majority. This done. the -four
creators,of counties at once had bond,
printed I'm the proper form. and signet
by the proper officers, some Of whom, i
Is to be presumed, were Cincinnati di
rectory-named buffalo skulls. The en-
dorsement of the auditor of state was
secured and the bonds actually sold il
the east. II Is these bonds, or part Of
them, which the county now refuses L
pay.
zone such audaclous job was moi
enough for these pioneers. As soon as
the organization and the bond issuing
in Harper county were completed, they
moved on to Comanche county, leaving
the buffalo skulls in supreme control In
Harper. Bonds were afterward issued