The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1901-12-03
A JUDICIAL TORNADO
1T SETTLED THE OWNERSHIP OF A
DISPUTED LAND CLAIM.

why One of the Contestants Had No
Further Interest In the Quarter
Section After the Blow Was over.
A Sudden Change of Venue.
"Back in the early summer of 1893 two
men were sitting on one claim in western
Oklahoma" says Earl W. Mayo in Aims
lees "They had been sitting there for
| some months-in fact, even since the
opening of that particular part of the
territory. In the rush that had attended
the opening one man had staked out the
section. The other had been first at the
lard Office and filed a claim to the same
piece of land before attempting to occupy
it. Thus arose a controversy such as was
matched by hundreds of others in differ
ent parts of the territory.
1.-The two men had intrenched them
selves and watched each other with shot
guns in their hands for the first few days.
Then one hoisted a flag of truce and pro-
posed a temporary compromise. Inc
terms of this compromise were that q
line was to be drawn across the quarter
section and that each was to keep to MS
respective side of the line. Each was TO
build himself temporary shack and put
in crops with the understanding that
both crops and shacks should revert to
the legal owner of the section when the
case came to be decided by the processes
of the slow going courts of law. Inc tact
that each permitted the other to do this
was not to prejudice the case OF eltner
when it finally came up in court, and 1t
hot off
tured over the dividing line the other was
at liberty to have recourse to the shot
| gun.
"Thus the matter stood for some
months. and each man kept sharp eye
on the shack of his neighbor and left his
loaded shotgun within easy reach. Then
one day when the sun beat down with
scalding heat that made blowing impossi-
ble a strong wind blew up, a wind that
seemed to blow out of the very mouth of
| inferno.
"Great masses of clouds, swiftly shift
ing and changing hue, now black, now
purple, now greenish yellow, rolled up in
the southwest. The farmers that had
come from Kansas and Missouri retired
to their cellars if they possessed such lux
uries, and the tenderfeet got out their
cameras and prepared to photograph the
wonderful cloud effects. The clouds shut
out the sun, and there arose a subdued
murmur that developed first into tremu-
lous buzzing and then into sullen roar
"Then out of the dark cloud masses
came a wonderful pillar, dusty gray
| column that looked like the lower end of
a gigantic balloon. The column was in
distinct at first but it advanced across
the prairies with the speed of an express
train, and as it came nearer and nearer
the buzzing sound increased to a roar
that was like hundred Niagaras.
Smith, the man who occupied one side
of the dead line on the disputed quarter
section, was from northern Missouri.
When he saw the shape of the yellow
balloon tail, he called to his wife, and
they made a run for a little hole he had
dug in his front yard. They let them
selves in and closed the trapdoor that
covered it, and then both lay low, wait
ing for the shock they knew was coming.
"Jones, on the other side of the line,
saw these maneuvers; but, being from
eastern Tennessee, he thought only that
his neighbor might be intending to re-
open hostilities, and so he took down his
shotgun and sat in his shack, with his
| aiming eye and his trigger cooked toward
the dead line.
"The roaring that came from the APP
preaching column increased in intensity.
The earth trembled, the air sang with a
kissing noise Suddenly day was blotted
out, and hades was let loose. Smith and
his wife could neither see nor think, but
they nstinctively tried to hold on to the
very earth beneath them, which seemed to
be hurled up into the air and whirled
about like a scrap of paper.
"In a few minutes the roaring sound
began to lessen, the reeling earth became
still again. and the swift patter of pour
ing rain was heard falling on the trap
door, After fifteen minutes of suspense
Smith cautiously raised the door ana
peered out. The rain had slackened, and
the sun was shining.
Smith looked about him. There stood
his shack unnjured. His cotton and corn
had suffered only in the loss of a rev
leaves. Then he looked over beyond the
dead line and gave great shout. Jones
had disappeared; so had his shack; so had
his wagons and tools and the shed where
he had kept his team.
"There was a broad smooth track
across the prairie where these mad stooo'
track from which the grass was gone
/
Kansas grasshoppers had passed over it.
"Some men would have sat down to
think over such a remarkable occurrence,
but Smith did not. He hurried out his
mules. hitched up his pillow, while his wife
stood guard with the gun to await Jones
return. Smith was going to establish his
claim to that quarter section then and
there, but he might have spared his haste,
| nothing
was heard of him for several weeks.
Then Smith received letter dated from
a town forty miles away in an adjoining
county. The letter read:
''Dear sir-I write to let you know that you can
have that blank farm all to yourself, for | will
! never come back to that blank country or make
any fight in the court When the cyclone came
along that day, | felt as though | was flying up
and apart like bag of feathers, and that was the
last knew until | to about SIX miles from
here with part Of my own front porch heaped on
| top of me- fellow came along and dug me out,
and | found had nothing broken except one rib
found one of my mules close by, still tied to the
| scantling to which he had been hitched, and the
other one l heard OF the next day about three
| miles away They weren't hurt, so ! have my
team and myself, and there is claim here whose
owner was blown away and hasn't been heard OIL
| 20 have taken that. I'll stay here unless another
cyclone comes along Then you may hear from
me in Arkansas or back in Tennessee. Hoping
you are still there respectfully, A. JONES'
''This is cyclone story that can be
verified, for Smith filed the letter with
the court in establishing his title to the
quarter section. For that reason the sto-
ry is worth repeating, but of course it is
not one that would attract much -atten-
ton out in the cyclone country except
that it is the only case on record where
IL of