Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1907-02-06
Emigrants to the Northwest
Caught in Predicament in
st. Paul
CARS CAN'T GET TO DESTINATION
Snow Embargo Ties Up Train Loads
of Settlers Who Are Undergoing Try
ing Experiences-Temporary Homes
in Heated Box Cars, With Pigs,
Horses and Cows as Companions.

St Paul, Feb. 6-To sleep iii box
car on bed of hay beside hot coal
stove may not be altogether uncom-
Portable when the temperature outside
has dropped to 20 below zero. But IL
there's grunting pig in crate near
the hot stove; if there's score of
cluckling chickens in additional crates
next to the pigs; II there are five paw
ing. snorting horses at the end of the
same car; and the doors of this win
dowless apartment are tightly closed
one might. without being hard to
please. describe the staution as a bit
too cozy
Yet it is thus that fifteen American
farmers and young boy, the son OF
farmer, have been living, during the
recent severe weather, in the stock
yards at Minnesota Transfer. Some of
the men have been sleeping with their
horses COWS, chickens or pigs for three
weeks: some for two weeks, some for
ten days. All have been trying to take
care of their live stock and to exist as
economically as possible during this
long and unexpected delay In transit
while on their way to new homes in
North Dakota, Montana and western
Canada. Had weather conditions re-
NAMED normal the homeseekers would
have gone west long ago over the Great
Northern. the 500. or the Northern Pa
cific roads. The snow blockade Of
branch lines along the three railroads
has made necessary an indefinite halt
at ST. Paul. None of the companies
would undertake to transport live
stock in trains that might be stalled
for weeks upon the blizzard swept
prairies.
The sufferers from peculiar phase
of the present Arctic environment are
by no means European peasants from
unprogressive regions where cattle and
poultry are intimate friends of the
family. adopted relatives to share one S
fireside
The prospective pioneers at the
Transfer are intelligent farmers who
have lived comfortably and have gath
GTGu SOult properly d. lAlSM PAOS'Ou'
homes in Michigan Indiana, Iowa. IL
linois. Missouri, and other western
states. None of the men expected to
sleep in their impromptu stable cars"
longer than the week or ten days nee
essary to complete the thru journey
without stopping. But now they can
proceed neither forward nor backward.
They must. in nearly every case, make
the best of their barnyard hotels until
stock can be shipped northward. That
may not be possible for three weeks.
Malcolm Mcintyre, of Battle AK,
Mich is going to Wetaskiwin, Alberta
province He arrived at the Transfer
two weeks ago last Saturday.
Mcintyre. his live stock, his goods
and chattels occupy box car No. 643S6
of the Wabash railway. At one end of
the car are piled his household goods
and farm implements. At the other
end are stalled five horses. In the mid
die, opposite the single door, the single
aperture indeed, that is ever opened,
stove.
Hay and blankets intermingled upon
| the floor, provide the bed room for the
human guest Within a couple of yards
dwell the pig or two pigs-you could
MT we'll make out, thru the Stats of the
crate, the exact source of the resonant
grunts. Just back of the portable stye
a chicken house of several stories is
made of other crates piled high. The
chickens inside are numerous, no
doubt. Between the Stats undulates an
uncertain composite of cramped and
speckled feathers. How the wretched
fowl survive their long imprisonment
is not easily understood. They have
sufficient food and water, however, and
they suffer less from cold that they
would in their Michigan. hen-house.
Possibly they are proud to cultivate, in
luxurious inactivity, the swollen, aris-
tocratic livers of pate-de-fois, gras
geese.
Dozens of others, are in like pre-
dicamant