The Ohio Democrat. (Logan, O. [Ohio]) 1886-1906, 1893-04-15
FIFTY YEARS AGO.
what Pioneer LIfe was In the Early Days
out West.

out west
Going west fifty years ago meant
travelling in n farm wagon by weary
stages into tho wilderness OF far Illi-
nois Living on the frontier involved a
life of hardship of which there is now
no counterpart, life whose heroism
must be nourishcd by year-long round
Of salt pork, turnips and potatoes in
land of hard water, lyc soap and bare,
wind-racked cabins Lincoln spent
year Of his boyhood in the west in
shed with one side open TO the weather.
To the colonists who came from the
east from n civilization in all essen
tials rs far advanced as that OF to-day,
1t is almost inconceivnble what must
have been this plunge into barbarism.
They suddenly found themselves con-
fronted with the alternative of making
shoes or going barefoot; of wearing i'll
tanned buckskin jenkins or fig leaves;
of living upon earthen floors in win
dowless huts or dying in the underbrush
these were the vital questions OF that
day. The possession of money gave 70
man little advantage over his neigh
bors where there was nothing to buy,
and the possession of goods but in
volved him the more deeply in tho
hopeless dilemma of transportation.
The bride with dover was but en-
numbered, for did not the young hus-
band who swan six rivers with fifty
pounds of feather bed upon his bacls
with threat of desertion from his
bride if he refused, sounding from the
| l. Al. Asx1
of the embarrassment of riches.
Then when the Eldorado was at last
reached, the cabin built Of rough hewn
logs and plastered with mud, when
furniture was shaped out with an AK,
and on the draughty walls were
pegged n few hcart-piercing relics
from 'homc" to add swords
thrust of memory to the daily
grind of labor-when all this was
achieved, conceive the life which fol-
lowed: For the men, the work of clear
ing away forest trees, grubbing up the
stumps plowing the new land and
shooting game for food. The life of
the women was even more laborious,
with the carrying of frewood, prepara-
tion of food, fashioning of garments,
first Of bucksiin and later the spin
ming, weaving, dyeing and sewing of
coarse fabrics tending of the children
and those sick of the malarial fever
common in the cabins of the ill-fed
colonist. 1t is not strange that q man
of forty-five was an ''old man" or that
he outlived four wives. This life came
not to the labor-sodden women of a
J M hat 70
women, gently born and daintily
reared, who followed an adventurous
husband into the new west. She
brought with her, unfortunately, not
the ideals of the carpenters wife and
| the German housefrau, but those ira
ditions Of refinement and gentle living
so precious to u woman that she often
sacrificed life itself to what she
considered "only decent ways" The
truism that woman is more adaptive
than man is only half true; it is to i'm
proved surroundings that she so readily
adjusts herself. Man is the first to fit
his nature to harsh and primitive con.
ditions. In the sordid struggle for eX.
istence even self-education was impos.
sible, family often lost trace of its
origin, the name itself emerged from
the rough usage of Il generation or two
of people who could neither read nor
write in an almost unrecognizable con-
dition. But by far the worst feature oi
the life was it's utter isolation from
everything that could stimulate thought
or nurture ambition; neither books nor
mail penetrated TO this outer fringe OF
civilization, and the mental stagnation
was complete. The excitement of a
hanging would draw people from fifty
miles away, and the scarcely more
moral dissipation of a lurid reviva!sl
wrought violently upon their deudened
minds. s.-Northwest Magazine