Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1890-08-02
WHERE rRAMPs FlNp A 4AvEN
welcome for Ar who Come In Need to
Farmer Rsokenbach's Barn.

and abundance of this worlds goods.
His hospitality to the houseless and
homeless wanderers the world call
tramps is known from Maine to New
Orleans and from ocean to ocean. On
the Beckenbach place is big barn.
In this barn, in winter and In summer,
and on any day of the year, whether it
be Christmas, New Year, or the Fourth
of July, can be found women with chill
dren In their arms, q shiftless fisher.
man with q ragged suit on him and q
shillalah In his hands, or some sturdy
and homeless German outcast, perhaps
with trunk on his shoulder trudging
over from the railway station to the
Beckenbach barn, which, by some fine
freemasonry among the tramps of
America, Is known as Saints Rest"
for the homeless wanderer thousand
miles away, seeking rest or idIeness, or,
it may be, days work with Pilgrim
schoon and scallop she'll"
If the stranger sits on the porch of
any one of the farm houses on the main
road leading to Morrisville he will be
greeted at any hour of the day with the
inquiry:
as this the way to Beckenbach's
barn?"
And you can tell with your ewes shut
that the inquirer, be he man or q wo-
man, is seeking q temporary refuge IN
der the caves of Beckenbach's barn.
Now it will be frowsy-looking wo-
man, with draggled skirts, half bon
net, and an old shawl, In one corner Of
which is wrapped a baby, not old
enough to walk or talk. If it is q warm
day, she may sit down on the grass,
after getting her bearings and distances
to the barn, with her back up against a
tree, and she may pause long enough to
take nap, with her head hanging over
one shoulder, while her prattling babe,
unconscious of its shabby personal sur
roundings, crawls through the high
grass or plucks, with tiny fingers, the
daffy-downdillies which dot the sward
like day stars.
Next it may be great hulking Ger
man, with a military air, as if he had
fought with Won Moltke, or in better
days taken schooner" with Bismarck.
This man wears high-topped boots, with
great box like sailors chest which
is strapped on his shoulders, and
the Teutonic traveller with big pipe in
his mouth pauses long enough to say
We're vos dot Beckenbach's barn ?"
There will be a score or more along to-
day, looking like Fslstaff's ragged regi-
ment, all kings and queens in shreds,
tatters, and patches. And it is a sub
stantive fact that tramp in Texas
made an engagement in midwinter with
3 fellow nomad at Ell Paso, saying:
yah! Jacob, 1 meets you again when
dose pesse all must be pick't down by
dot Beckenbach barn in jersey" And
when the voice of the turtle dove was
heard in the land, the two tramps drank
bottled beer together in Beckenbach's
barn after an honest days toll in the
generous Germans pea patch at Morris
vile.
Most of these picturesque tramps al
lege that they are seeking work. Some
of them are, and none go away empty
handed from the honest Germans plan
tation who are willing to do fair days
work for good wages.
They begin by picking peas. Becken-
bach's barn is sort of agricultural ex-
change when the Belair' farmers come
to get field hands, male and female, for
the busy season. After the pea season
is over they struggle through the straw
berry furry only to tackle the tomato
vines, which yield the nomad workers a
financial harvest of no mean measure.
Then come the red raspberry, the cult
waited blackberry, cherries, and currants,
down t. the peach season, citrons,
canteloupes, and watermelons, and
when Jack Frost comes the colony of
tramps seek softer climate and milder
skies.
There is boss even among tramps.
Spanish Dick is boss of the Becken-
bach barn. DR.. Dunbar Hylton says
that Spanish Dick is descended from q
Spanish hidalgo, with bar sinister.
He speaks six languages, and was once
an impresario in Jenny Lind's time at
Castle Garden, but has now descended
to be a boss among the pea-pickers on
the old Germans farm. There are
traces of dignity and erudition in the
way Hidalgo Dick issues his orders in a
patch.
Amused at the novel sight of this red
painted barn sheltering so numerous a
family of seemingly contented tramps.
1 sought the comfortable mansion of
the German farmer to get from him the
true inwardness of his hospitality to the
transforming nomand.
Beckenbach is a typical German
farmer. Short, even stumpy, In stature, !
blue-eyed and with gray hair, well fed,
and evidently a scholar and practical
philosopher.
When asked him the true history Of
his tramp colony, he said:
Il comes to dot place ten years ago |
when no Beckenbach barn was now al |
ready on desc places. In summer time
and In de wedder ven it Is d-n cold /
come dose trsmps, mems and women,
JUS like small army In Alsace. It was
IN December month when first dey
reach my blaze, and mine frow find q
Ieetle stove up in dose barns already.
De dramps make no music wild DER
fists; makes no salts and batteries be-
fore de courts In Campden. De flies
not NIT my PEBBLES or in dose barns NIT
lemselves, so / leaves dem alone One
day his own PEBBLES buries him In my
hack 1odt. and say nodinks. Tramps