Audubon County journal. (Exira, Iowa) 1884-1993, 1916-06-15
How the Town of
Ladybird Was
Depopulated
An Episode of May Day
By F. a. mitchell
o 9 o 9 e.e Q . . 9 8 9 9

What we now call the middle west
was settled up in spots BY very differ
ent peoples, and these spots, now cities
or towns, show the differences to this
day. One place will have been settled
by refined people, and their descend
ants are refined; another will have
been settled by a rough class, and its
population will be rough today.
When one of these spots was in en-
bryo-we will call it Eaglebird-its in
habitants We're not naturally rough,
but they were all men, and men with
out women will in time degenerate into
wild beasts. No woman would go to
Eaglebird because there were no wo-
men there. One or two of the men
went east at different times to marry
sweetheart, but came back alone. When
the girls learned that Eaglebird was
exclusively man town they invaria-
bly, declined to exchange refined sur
roundings for den.
There was a town not far distant
from Eaglebird that we will call Lady
bird. When the former was settled the
latter had been town for two dec
AIDES. True, the Lady birdians had run
out the Indians, but they had all come
to the region, men and women togeth-
er, from Connecticut, where there was
a college, and there was not a poorly
educated person among them. But
Ladyblrd had not been favorably To-
Gated for trade, and its young men
when grown sought buster fields of la
Dor, while their sisters remained where
they were. Instead of manufactures.
there were libraries, and the old folks
and the girls We're very Intellectual
Eaglebird had been settled for land
speculation. Ten men with money had
purchased a tract for song and Sc
cured others to join them in settling it
by offering share in the property In
this way some forty men, mostly Young
and all unmarried. We're secured as
emigrants for the enterprise. They
built town, but no more men came
and owing to the absence of women
there were no children.
T. -OBrien, who was the originator of
the scheme, one day called a meeting
in the town hall, building - by is,
used principally for poker parties, and
thus addressed the gathering:
Gentlemen, if we can't get some wo-
men for wives we'll have to give up
this scheme and go somewhere else
I've proposition to make. There are
more than fifty single women in Lady
bird. Efforts have been made to in
duce some of them to marry our fell
lows but they have turned up their
noses at us. What do you say to
swooping down on 'em and carrying
'em off,"
The idea took like wildfire. Natu-
rally. the Youngest men We're the most
enthusiastic. Thirty men agreed to join
the abductors. and no one of them was
over thirty years old. while the great
majority were not twenty-five This
looked well for the scheme for the
girls they were to run off had nearly
all been born since the settlement of
Ladybird and were therefore young.
The very next day after the proposal
of the abduction scheme lady and her
husband who were driving through the
country with view to establishing an
bird and asked for entertainment for
the night. They were accommodated
and so long had it been since the men
had seen woman that they treated
the lady as though she We're queen
Every man in the town offered to serve
her. In the evening they asked if she
would not talk to them. 1t didn't mat
ter what she said; they only wished ia
listen to the sweet, soft voice of u
woman. She consented, and all ad.
journed to the town hall, where the
lady was given a seat on platform at
one end of the room. This is what she
said to them:
Gentlemen. don't wonder you wish
to listen to Il woman's voice. You are
all refined men. roughened by living
without woman's quoting influence
What you need is wives''-
There was Il howl of response to this
that broke in upon the address. One
gave away the scheme to abduct the
young Ladybirds. He was howled
down for doing so, since it was to be
expected that he had rendered it abor-
tive. When some sort of order was re.
stored the lady spoke again:
II am not sure but what your plan
may be advisable"
This drew forth a burst of applause.
Perhaps many of YOU the lady
continued, who are educated men
may call to mind how those men who
settled Rome as you have settled
Eaglebild invited their neighbors, the
Sabines to feast and carried off
their daughters. The women became
attached to their husbands, and when
their fathers and brothers attacked the
Romans the women interposed and
stopped the fight"
After another howl of approval the
lady went on:
at yyDlIl1p't aIyica ca traonharo,,e, a,