The Hays free press. [volume] (Hays, Kan.) 1908-1924, 1922-01-12
mustered out next November
Washington National Republican, u,
II, p.
PETER ROBIDOUX ON EARLY
DAYS
In Letter to The Real Westerner of
Norton Peter Relates Many In
teresting Pioneer Facts
Says He Has Quit
Working


/ hear what have to say both regard
] ing the past and future. I could say
much more of the past than of the
future, it is a good deal of a puzzle
and a guess and we have to meet it
with hope and smile. You see
am seventy-one and I feel lucky and
thankful that have been spared that
long.
don't know whether it is luck or
just happening but anyway feel
glad and lucky and thankful. have
| lived in this section of the country
fifty-three years, or ffty-four if I
live till August goth. Some time,
some doings, it is somewhat amusing
to me when sometimes sitting and
resting, to listen to some so-called
pioneers of thirty years in Western
Kansas tell of their experiences, hard
ships and privatiOns. Of course 1t IS
interesting for there have been some
wonderful changes in Kansas in the
last thirty years, but just double that
time and if you have any idea of
what Kansas was fifty-four years ago
YOU will have something to talk about.
What little know and have witnessed
could fill many pages, so will not IN
dertake to tell it all for some of it
might not interest the present gener-
alton. Some of US will never receive
any credit or thanks for what has
happened to US and think none of
the old gang expect any favors or
thanks, for we have alreay received
both. What I am trying to tell is the
wonderful changes and progress of
Western Kansas, I mean the extreme
western part, say one hundred and
fifty mills east of the Colorado line.
This is where / came fifty-four years
ago and where 1 have lived, I will not
say live but where l stayed Yes
some times, some changes, some hap
penings. I am a Canadian born,
born in the province of Quebec about
fifty miles from Montreal.
Somehow I happened to be lucky
enough to read and take Horace
Greeley's advice, Go west young
man and grow up with the country"
There was more wisdom in the words
than truth for some grow very little
and the most grow up but slow. I am
| one that grew slow but grew up just
the same. For many years l gazed
at the mirage and the stunted buffalo
grass and the pig; the pig never re-
vived and grew but the stunted buff
falo grass revived and with the help
of moisture became the grass eternal
the best grass on earth. That
change alone was we'll worth the price
to live for. God gave everyone the
strength, health and power to meet,
resist the adversities of life so it was
with majority of those who took
Horace Greeley's advice. Perhaps if
walked myself to death trying to find
something better than good old West
ern Kansas. I am glad that I didn't
take the walk; but say, imagine a
mere kid of seventeen about the size
of two-by-four, five foot long
! thousand miles from. home-unable
to speak the nice English language
and dead broke-not a sou, landing
at Hays City, August IT, 1868, tired
and hungry, without a friend or any
/ one to talk to. Not much choice. 1t
was work or starve. 1t was get in
the collar and pull or join the gang,
so I chose the collar and until three
years ago I have kept up a continu-
Gus pull. managed to live and
would have kept at work only for the
/ flu.
1t is the only obstacle that I have
met that has compelled me to stop.
The old flu surely did the work. Per
haps the fifty years that had lived
and worked in Kansas was considered
work enough, anyway had to bow
to order. But getting back TO the
past the changes from barren plain,
no habitations, no production, just
Indians, buffalo grass, wild beasts
with Just Heaven above and He'll be-
low. There we were, instead of rail
roads, autos and airplanes we had
walking, riding and ox-driving. In
stead of Swift's Premium, fresh vege-
tables, ice cream and cake, we had
rabbits, antelope and buffalo and
little salt and pepper in our shirt
pockets. How nice it was after day
or two to shoot buffalo or antelope,
cut out a piece of rump, the sweetest
meat that ever was, build up a little
buffalo chip fire, brol the meat,