The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1895-03-01

were fighting the fight which the
pioneers had fought on the eastern
line of the state in go. They had nc
reserve force. There were no bank &C
counts, no leftover crops, nothing but
debts and new land and hopes and a
pluck that could not understand de-
feat any more than Columbus knew
the meaning of the word. The race
instinct for rowing westward had
driven them there. 1t forgot to teach
them the way back. So the grasshop
pers came, and the hot winds blew in
the latter part of the summer, and
when the insects lifted their wings tc
fly away in the fall, it was to look fol-
something to eat. They left nothing
not even the grass. For few months
Kansas tried to care for her own needy
The jewellers on the eastern boundary
and in the counties 100 miles west OF
the Missouri line, remembered Their
suffering fourteen years before, and
they were generous beyond theil
ability. They had money in the
bank. They had few debts. They
thought they could take care OF
quarter of a million sufferers.
But the task was too great. In the
winter of 1874 the laid rooms moved
west. They were no longer at Atchi-
son, Topeka and Leavenworth, but
at Abilene, Eldorado, Wichita and
Winfield. To these towns the suffer
ers came in greatest numbers. The
suffering among these poor people was
terrible. Many and many family has
broken the family bureau-the last
relic of the old home "baclS yonder'-
for fire wood before coming to the laid
room" for help. They were proud PEG.
pie, who had been people of parts and
consequence in the central states, and
begging came hard with them. 1t is a
"touchy" subject even now, and some
of them will deny that they ever took
laid" during the ''grasshopper year"
but most of them did. 1t was "aid' or
starve, and very few people chose that
alternative. 1t is safe to say that 1000
people died of malaria and ague in the
states of Indiana, Ohio and Illinois
from the effects of too much water
where one has died from the effects of
too little water in Kansas.
After the ''grasshopper year" Kansas
went on fourteen-year boom. There
was a little local drought in eastern
Kansas in 's1-droughts come every
seven years in Kansas-but that did
not impede the growth of the state. In
those fourteen years the tide flowed
westward $50 miles. There was, in
deed, a floating population in towns
clear to the Colorado line. The last
Kansas county was organized by Gov.
Martin seven years ago. In 1857 the
population of Kansas might be said to
be staple as far west as Hutchinson.
From Hutchinson in to the Missouri
river the people had been on their
farms and in their towns long enough
to make some Roadway against the
desert. They had paid for their houses
and the implements and their farms.
There was a little residue left over
every year after harvesting the crops.
But in the boom years of 1SS5-6-7 spec
ulation had driven the tide of
humanity further west. The land
was settled, after a fashion, along
the railroads built in those
years, as far as Scott City. Tree claims,
which to-day do not bear a tree, were
taken. The soil was plowed. The
water which pours in floods over this
country was caught in the breaking"
But in the three years of the new set
Element nothing had accumulated so
rapidly as debts in the new country
beyond the big bend of the Arkansas.
Then the drought of 1857 came-which
swept over the entire state of kansas
only the frontiersmen felt it. The
greater part of Kansas, which had been
sending train loads of provisions to
Ohio and Mississippi flood sufferers
in the early SOS, came to the rescue
of the people out on the high prairie.
A special session of the legislature was
called, and Kansas took care of her own
needy. A few cars of laid" came from
outsiders. But they were
The eastern three-fourths,
fat and prosperous for all the drought,
living on the savings of other years of
plenty, took care of the needy and the
western fourth was saved. The laid
room" moved out to Dighton, to Stock
ton, to Hill City, to Garden City, to
Medicine Lodge. Cars loaded with
laid" started from Eldorado, Winfield
and Wichita and Abilene, and in many
cases in the very courthouses where
the laid" was distributed in 1874, it
was gathered to ship west in 1877. Yet
the drought had been as severe in the
central part of Kansas as it had been
in the west. But the water remained
in the ground in central and eastern
Kansas, and there was money in the
bank, and fewer pressing debts
The drought which came last year
came on time. 1t was seven years
after the one before. According to the
weather records at the state university
last year was the driest on the twenty
five years record. Yet Kansas did not
feel it The state of Kansas, from Ar
gentine to Garden City, is in better
condition than any of the western
states. Seven years ago there was an
aid room at Garden City. This year
the people there are getting up relief
committees to help their neighbors
still west. 1t is the western fifth of
Kansas this time which is suffering. In
another seven years it will be the east
ern Colorado. Year by year the tide
moves on. 1t will not stop. Il has
a desert, literally made it
blossom as the rose. Nothing car
stop it.
In the old days there were all sort.
Of people at the laid room" One
in Junction City in ''grasshop.
per year." after looking over the cloth
no ON tho counter in the said room, -