The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1906-11-26
Younger Mennonites Are Nov
ing Farther West.
Going From Marion County Into
Territory About Syracuse.
ARE GOOD CITIZENS.
Will Conquer the Wilderness as
Their Fathers Did.
Bringing Them to Kansas One
Of Santa FEES Good Moves.

Syracuse, kan. Nov. 26.-Fifty or
more Mennonite families from Marion
county, lately have come to Hamilton
county, on the Santa E'e, and pre-empt-
Cd homesteads. They are established
in all parts of the county, but the most
OF them have their farms on the upland
adjacent TO Bear creek valley, in the
southeastern part.
They are well established. as Men
uonites always begin with co1nfortab Die,
although not pretentfoas. habitations
and their stock is equally well sheltered
They are young married people just
beginning life, and they have come to
this region because the government BY
its homestead law, invited them to take
free homes in the public domain
They are the second genera ton, some
Of them perhaps the third, of a race OF
German Russians who were brought to
this country by the Atchison, Topeka
q Santa Ee Railway company In 1874
and 1875. About that time there was a
great exodus of the cars German sub
3ects out OF Russta-81ennon1tes 1uth-
Grams and Catholics-aLI1d the toe was
set toward western America The Unit
cd States public domain and the rail-
road land grants especially was invif-
ing Kansas received a vast army of
these immigrants, and for two years
they were on the move across the Mis-
souri, river. They temporarily camped
at Topeka and other land office and
land grant towns. For many months
these towns. until the newcomers were
located on homesteadS, abounded with
eheeDskin coats, roomy trousers, now
ing petticoats and cooking utensils pc
culfarly Russian.
Finally they chose their homes. and
the Atchison. Topeka & Santa F'e. with
its usual good luck got the most OF
than The I.utherans and the Catholics
chose adjoining counties IN the upper
valleys of the Smoky, and the. Men
nonites, who outnumbered the others
about four to one, followed the Old san
"a Fe trail and took lands in the val
leys Of the Cottonwood and the Arkan-
sas IN the counties Of Marion, McPher-
son, Harvey, Reno and Barton They
began with sod houses but soon they
substituted wood, brick or stone, and
now by thrift and good farming, they
have become among the first citizens
Of the communities in which they 1--we,
and besides farming do much or the
banking, merchandising and milling
These people brought with them seed
Enr gardens and field, especially wheat
seed, and by it they wrought COM
plete change in the wheat crop
They also brought the mulberry tree
and the silk worm. expecting to nitro
6uce here silk culture, as they had
learned it in Russia. But the silk worm
IN Kansas has been a faIHIre.F and for
the present at least has been abandon
ed The mulberry tree, however, has
come to stay, and from the original
over the southwest, making shelter and
food for birds. shade for children and
drewood for the family
In addition, they brought from Rus
STA their religion, and in the generation
or more that has elapsed, they have
no departed from it one jot or title,
they nor their children. nor their chill
dren's children. Never has a more God
fearing and industrious pBople come TO
kansas to make dutiful and thrifty cit
1zens.
these excellent people have departed from
the homes Of their Immediate rasners ana
moved westward 70 new ana = Solal-
paratively untried region. which they.
Taught by and following the methods OF
their fathers, will make nreHtuctive ana
habitable Already. they -hav harvested
crops of milo maize. kaffir and sorghum,
and next they will harvest their rrsL
crop of wheat, which always is the big
crop for these Russians. It was their
big crop in Russia and 50 It i In
orchards. broom corn. small fields OF IN
dian corn. and the Inevitable garden
patch Except the garden stun and the
fruit trees, all will grow without artificial
IRRIGATION For the garden "a and the or
and a windmill two will do the rest.
The writer of this has seen grown on
the upland by Will and Robert Austin,
II miles south Of Syracuse, this season.
wheat that viii thresh out thirty bushels
shuck forty The same land grows all
the other cereals in abundance.
Carl Kaesler, on the farm adjoining. has
a garden patch. watered by two wind
mills, which produce. in great abundance
this year. cabbage. tomatoes. parnips,
carrots, gherkfns, beans, caulifOWer, pea
nuts, pumpkins, squash, watermelons.
canteloupes and so on to the end of the
garden kingdom In this garden. a
square Of one-tenth Of an acre produced
forty bushels of Irish potatoes. The same
soil. properly cultivated, would produce
celery. The orchards bore apples peach
es. cherries. etc, and surrounding the
house IS thrifty growth of locust, box
eI7 and f1Ff tree lfer-~ -
tHde, where 200 or 100 hens find shell
The Austin boys began eight years ago