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About The Loup City northwestern. (Loup City, Neb.) 189?-1917 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 23, 1909)
Loop City Northwestern J. W. I3URLEIGH, Publisher. LOUP CITY - V NEBRASKA A NEW SCHOOL NEEDED. The Wright brothers are quoted as saying that they will build an aero plane for |7,500 for anybody who wants one. Now that they have dem onstrated so thoroughly the fine quali ties of their machine—its great speed and its birdlike ability to rise and sink while sweeping over hills and valleys, there must be a number of adventur ous spirits who would like to own one. The automobilists, whose recreation is interfered with by bad roads and by other vehicles would like to try the smooth and vacant pathways of the i air, to fly as the bird flies, and float over the ponds or lakes instead of having to travel around them. There ■ is a practical difficulty as yet, says the j Chicago Tribune. No one can buy with the machine the skill to operate it, and there are no aeroplane chauffeurs nor is there any one to teach them. Orville Wright is going abroad to in terest foreign governments in the American invention. His brother will teach some army officers how to han dle the aeroplane the government has i bought of him. After having attended to that he will devote himself to the business of aeroplane construction. Along with that should go the estab lishment of a school where a capable aviator could give instruction to eager pupiis. And now come dispatches from Winnipeg announcing that the yield of wheat in the prairie provinces of Can ada this year will reach 130,000,000 bushels. In the World Almanac for 1909 the whole wheat crop of Canada for 1907 is stated to have been 96, 606,000 bushels. This caused some doubt to be expressed as to the au thenticity of extracts from a United State's consul’s reports as to the in crease of wheat production in the northwest provinces which were pub lished during the excitement attend ing the recent wheat corner. The in crease of wheat production in the Canadian northwest has been almost sufficient to stagger belief. It will be a great blessing to the crowded cities of the earth whose cry goes up for bread. The Russian ministry of commerce has prepared an elaborate plan provid ing for the general improvement of all the seaports of the empire at a cost of $110,896,237. The amounts which it is planned to expend at Baltic ports ag gregate $14,011,862. This is a large amount of money, but Russia will get more in return for it than if she were to spend it all in the race for naval supremacy. Navies can be obtained fast enough when nations are prosper ous; and the only way in which pros perity can be secured is by enterprise such as that indicated in the deter mination to give Russia seaports that will accommodate the commerce of the world. The announcement from Norway that an electrician of that country has devised a storage battery which solves the problem that Thomas A. Edison has been attacking assiduously for some years past may compel Mr. Edi son to bring out the battery whose invention he announced a short time ago. Inventive genius is working along the same lines, and it would not be surprising were the storage bat ter to come out with several promo ters, as did the telephone. The other day a Pennsylvania man bought a despised mongrel for one dol lar, and his friends made great sport of him for the investment. The sec ond night the dog was in the house it awakened the family and saved four persons from being burned to death, and the man has collected $1,200 in surance. Not so bad a cur. The gay and festive mosquito is holding high carnival with his family and friends over the failure of his proposed extermination. And it is a gory carnival, in which the best blood of Baltimore has attested the fact of human sacrifices as a part •** U;o cele bration. They are holding a national roque tournament at Norwich, Conn. Of course you know what roque is. No? Well, roque is croquet revised up ward. That lady who shot her husband be cause he overworked the graphophone is not without sympathizers. Los Angeles is kicking about aero nauts who scatter things about on roofs and beads. Peevish town, that. A Baltimore shoemaker has just married his seventh wife. Here’s hop ing that he may stick to his last. One of the funniest things is the lat ter-day doubt of Britannia whether she really does rule the waves. France will start at once growing heroes to get tlie money. The balloon, the airship, the aero plane and now the gyroscope show that by any other name man has not yet fully succeeded in flying. There is no punishment too severe for a miscreant who attempts to wreck a trolley car loaded with pleas ure-seekers on a holiday. Public opinion is moving so rapidly that Persia's new shah may have to get along with one wife when he mar ries. W/V/Afe cA GA/IVS 7 , __. COPYR./cmt, 1009. -- iv.a Mrr£«Jo/v _^_ ASHINGTOX.—In the war de partment in Washington is a letter written by Lieut. Gen. Nelson A. Miles in praise of the deeds of five enlisted men. Gen. .Miles’ letter is written as sim ply as becomes a soldier, but it is a pulse-stirring epistle. It is probable that no where else in authen tic- history can there be found an ac count of a battle won by a force of men when the odds against them were 25 to 1. In no story which can be told concerning the people of the plains is there to be found a tale of greater heroism than that shown by a little contingent of enlisted men of the Sixth United States cavalry down near the Red river in Texas, in the summer of the year 1S74. The Sixth cavalry has-had a fighting history, but this particular story shines blight in its pages. The Comanches, the Cheyennes and the Kiowas were on the warpath and were leaving a red trail all along the borders of western Kansas. General, then colonel. Nelson A. Miles, was or dered to take the field against the sav ages. His expedition fitted out at Fort Dodge and then struck for the far frontier. The combined bands of Indians learned that the troops were on their trail and they fled south to the Red river, of Texas, hotly pursued by two troops of the Sixth cavalry, commanded by Captains Biddle and Compton. On the bluffs ot the Tule river the allied braves made a stand. There were GOO war riors, all told, and they were the finest of the mounted plains Indians. The meager forces of the Sixth, under the leadership of their officers, charged straight at the heart of a force that should have been overwhelming. The reds broke and fled "over the bluffs and through the deep precipitous canyons and out on to the staked plain of Texas.” It became imperatively necessary that couriers should be sent from the detachment of the Sixth to Camp Supply in the Indian Territory. Rein bicod. There is no doubt that they killed more than double their number, besides those they wounded. The sim ple recital of the deeds of the five soldiers and the; mention of the odds against which they fought, how the wound: ed defended the dying and the dying aided the wounded by exposure to fresh wounds after the power of action was gone—these alone present a scene of cool courage, heroism and self-sacrifice which du ty as well as inclina they were the besieged, and subse quent events proved that he was not in error. Suddenly the Utes took to shel ter behind the rocks which were scattered in the open. They had lost one man from the fire of the besieged. They were afraid to charge, knowing that to sweep up that slope, even with only two rifles covering it, meant death for several of their band. Hall led his men to a position on the flank of the savages and sent in four shots. The bullets were the first notice that the reds had that they had two parties to deal with. They changed their position again in a twinkling, and located them selves so that they were under cov er from both directions, but they sent a volley in the face of the lit tle detachment that had ridden in to the rescue. To charge the enemy with his three men meant certain death to Hall and his troopers. The lieuten forcements were needed and it was necessary as ■well, to inform the troops at a distance that bands of hostiles had broken away from the main body and must be met and cheeked. The whole country was swarming with Indians and the trip to Camp Supply was one that was deemed almost certain death for the couriers who would attempt to make the ride. The command ing officer of the forces in the field asked for volunteers and Sergt. Zacharias T. Woodall of I Troop stepped forward and said that he was ready to go. His example was followed by every man in the two troops, and that day cowardice hung its head. The ranking captain chose Woodall, and then picked out four men to accompany him on the ride across the Indian-infested wilderness. The five cavalrymen went northward under the star light. At the dawn of the first day they pitched their dog tents in a little hollow and started to make the morning cup of coffee. When full day was come they saw circling on the horizon a swarm of Cheyennes. The eye of the sergeant told him from the movements of the Indians that they knew' of the presence of the troopers and that their circle formation was for the purpose ot gradually closing in to the killing. Sergt. Woodall and his tour men chose a place near their bivouac which offered some slight ad vantage for the purposes of defense. There they waited with carbines advanced, while the red cor don closed in its lines. The Cheyennes charged, and while charging sent a volley into the little prairie stronghold. Five carbines made answer, and five Cheyenne ponies carried their dead or wounded riders out of range, tor in that day mounted Indians went into battle tied to their horses. Behind the little rampart Sergt. iVoodall lay sorely wounded and one man was dying. Let. the letter of C.en. Miles tell the rest of the story. "From early morning to dark, outnumbered 2d to l, under an almost constant fire and at such a short range that they sometimes used their pis tols, retaining the last charge to prevent capture and torture, this little party of five defended their lives and the person of their dying comrade, with out food, and their only drink the rainwater that they collected in a pool, mingled with their own tion prompt us to recognize, but which we cannot fitly hon or.” When night came down over the Texas prairie the Chey ennes counted their dead and their wounded and then fled terror-stricken, overcome by the val or oi live Auiciiuau soldiers. Heroism was the order in the old plains’ days. In the White River valley of Colorado a de tachment of troops was surrounded by Utes, and for four days the soldiers, starving and thirsting, made a heroic defense against the swarming reds. Relief came from Fort D. A. Russell, whence Col. Wesley Merritt led a force to the rescue in one of the greatest and quickest rides of army his tory. After Merritt’s legion had thrashed and scat tered the Utes it was supposed that none of the savages was left in the valley. Lieut. Weir of the Ordnance corps, a son of the professor of draw ing at the Military academy, was on a visit to the west, and was in the camp of the Fifth cavalry. A tenderfoot named Paul Hume had wandered out to the camp to look over the scene of the great light. He knew Weir and he suggested a deer hunt. 1 The ordnance officer agreed to accompany him and off they started after having received a warn ing not to wander too far afield. The hunters, eager for the chase, went farther than they thought, and soon they changed from hunters to hunted. A young lieutenant of the Fifth cavalry, Will iam H. Hall, now stationed in Washington with the rank of brigadier general, was ordered to take a party of three men with him and to make a reconnoissance, for it suddenly became the thought of the commanding officer that there might be savages lurking about. Hall and his men struck into the foothills and circled the coun- . try for miles. In the middle of the afternoon they heard firing to the right and front. It was rap id and sharp, and Hall led his men straight whence it came. Rounding a point of rocks the troopers saw at a little distance across an open place in the hills a band of Utes in war paint and feathers. There were 35 of the reds, all told, and they were firing as fast as they could load and pull trigger in the direction of a small natural fortification of boul ders a quarter way up the face of a cliff. From the rocks came a return fire so feeble that Hall knew there could not be more than two men behind the place of defense. In a trice he thought cf Weir and Hume, and he believed that ant thought quickly. He believed that if Weir and ■ Hume could reach him,#that the party of six, to gether, might make a retreat back to the camp, holding the pursuing reds in check. It was a des perate chance, but better than staying where they were to starve and thirst or to be surprised and killed in a night rush of the savages. Weir and Hume heard the shots of the troopers and knew that help, though it was feeble, was at hand. They saw the hovering smoke of the car bines, and thus located exactly the position of the troops. They started to do what Hall thought they would do. They made a dash for some rocks 20 yards nearer their comrades than were those be hind which they were hiding. The cavalry lieutenant knew that the path of Weir and Hume would be bullet spattered all the way, and that if they escaped being killed it would be because of a miracle. Then this stripling lieu tenant did something besides think. The instant that Weir and his comrade made their break from cover, Hall stood straight up and presented himself a fair and shining mark for the Ute bullets. The reds crashed a volley at him, ignoring Weir and Hume. The shots struck all around Hall, ma king a framework of spatters on the rock at his back, but he was unhurt, and Weir and his comrade were behind shelter at the end of the first stage of their journey. Hall dropped back to shelter and then in a mo ment, after Weir and Hume had a chance to draw breath for their second dash, he stood up once more, daring the death that seemed certain. The hunted ones struck for the next spot that offered shelter the instant that the Ute rifles spat their volley at the man who was willing to make of him self a sacrifice that others might live. Hall came through the second ordeal of fire unhurt, and once more he dropped back to shelter to prepare for the third trial with fate. The Ute chieftain was alive by this time to the situation. He ordered his braves to fire, the one half at Hall and the other half at the two who were now to run death’s gantlet. Hall stood up. Weir and Hume dashed out. The reds divided their fire. Hall stood unhurt. Weir and Hume dropped dead within ten yards of the man who would have died for them. Hall led his men back over the track that they had come, holding the Utes at bay. Aid came near the end of the perilous trail. Lieut. Hall is now in the military secretary’s department at Washing ton with the rank of a brigadier general. His men told the story of that day in the White River val ley, and a bit of bronze representing the medal ol honor is worn by the veteran in recognition of a deed done for his fellows. A woman never gets old enough not to think it isn't a shame for a woman who is as old as somebody else to dress the youthful way she does.—New York Press. WESTERN SOD HOUSES A Feature of Canadian Prairie Life Which Does Not Always Mean Poverty. If you read that a family lives in a sod house you may conclude that pov erty compels it. But this is not true on the Canadian prairies, where sod houses are the advance agent or pros perity. The homesteader who obtains a slice of that rich wheat land doesn’t wait to build a regular house before starting to grab riches from the soil. Even if he were minded to build one, he would have difficulty in doing it, for there is no timber handy. So it is better to wait until the locomotive catches up. If you start out from any of the towns which are springing up almost over night in the fertile stretches of Saskatchewan or Alberta you will strike, first, well-ordered farms and substantial houses. But if you get away ten miles or more the sod houses will begin to appear. It is not unusual to see signs of luxury about these sod houses. They are comfortable abiding places, cool in summer and warm in winter. How to Make a Farmer. The foundation stone of a nation’s success is revealed in an article in All Ireland Review. A friend of the author was in Denmark, and was as tonished at the amount of wealth got out of so poor a country by dairies and by farming. "So doubt," said he to ? well-edu cated Dane, "the children are in structed in the schools as to dairying and farming.’’ "They are not," said the Dane, "but they are taught the old Danish po ems (sagas) in the schools. That makes good Danes of the children, and then they become good farmers.” —Youth's Companion. » WESTERN CANADA During the early days in the pe riod of the growth of the grain crop in Western Canada, as well as throughout the ripening and garnering period, there is yearly growing an increasing interest throughout the United States, as to the results when harvest is com pleted. These mean much to the thou sands of Americans who have made their homes in some of the three Prov inces that form that vast agricultural domain, and are of considerable interest to the friends they have left behind. The year 1909 is no disappointment The crops of wheat, oats and barley have been harvested and it is now safe to speak of results. Careful es timates place the yield of spring wheat parts of the world the production or wheat is diminishing today; but as it diminishes Canada's will increase; therefore, is safe to predict that in a few' years from now a large part of th* world will be looking to western Car: ada for its wheat supply, and esp. • cially will the United States. In many parts of western Canada it is possible to have a hundred-mile square ot wheat, without a break. A w riter says: “We were driven west and north of Moose Jaw through 20 miles of dead ripe wheat, acres of stocks and weil worked summer-fallows. One of these fields would yield 40 bushel- to the acre, and another man had oats that would yield 90 or 100 bushels to the acre. In this district wheat will aver age 30 to 35 bushels. The conditions A Central Canada Farmer Finishing Cutting His 70-Acre Field of Wheat at 50 bushels per acre, winter wheat at over 40 bushels, and oats exceed 50 bushels per acre. Barley also has proved an abundant yield. What will attract the reading public mere than volumes of figures will be the fact that those who have been induced through the influence of the Government to ac cept of 160 acres of free grant land; or, by the persuasion of friends to ieave their home State of Dakota, Min nesota, Iowa, Illinois, Michigan, In diana, Ohio, Nebraska or the other States from which people have gone, have done well. Financially, they are in a better position than many of them ever expected to be, and in the mat ter of health, in social conditions, they have lost nothing. One person who has just returned were never better and throughout the district the people are assured of a most prosperous year.” It would be unfair to close this ar ticle without quoting trom an expert crop-correspondent regarding the tv. o Battlefords in Central Saskatchewan, j on the line of the Canadian Northern j Railway. Writing on August ISth of this year, he says: ‘•It is necessary to drive about six or seven miles out of the town of North ; Battleford in order to see the best 1 crops of the district This morning I was driven about 20 miles to th» north and west of the town and in all ! the drive did not see a poor crop. I : saw one wheat crop which the owner : estimates will yield 40 bushels per j acre, and I believe it.” from a trip through the Lethbridge Dis trict, where winter wheat has a strong hold with farmers, says: "We saw some mag nificent sights. The crops were, in fact, all that could be desired.” In a few years from now these great plains over whose breadth for years roved hundreds of Town thousands of School herds of cat- House County School House City Church in Central Canada He then crossed the Sas katchewan river to the South town, or Battieford proper, and continues his report: “Conditions around the old town are as good if not bet ter than those to the north tie, following the millions of buffalo that once grazed their grasses, will be a solid grain, field covering a territory of over 30.000 square miles, and very little of it but what will yet be worth from $40 to $G0 per acre. Al ready the homestead and pre emption lands are being well filled. In the district of Calgary, south, east and north, which comprises Nanton, High River and other equally impor tant districts, a correspondent of the Winnipeg (Manitoba) Free Press says: (Aug. 21) "The grain in this district is going to make some money for the fanners this year. All the crop is now crowding along and is good on both irrigated and unirrigated lands.” There are to be found those who speak of a "pioneering” life in west ern Canada, but as one man said, “if ot the river. This district has much the best wheat crop prospect of any I have inspected this year, consid ering sample and yield. The weath er conditions for the whole season have been ideal and the result is what might easily be termed a bumper crop. A sample sheaf brought in from the farm of George Truscott was shown to me which spoke for itself. This farmer is said to have sixty acres which will yield 45 bushels per acre In stating an average for the dis trict of South Battleford I would say that the wheat will yield 36 bushels per acre. The oats will yield about 45 and barley 35 bushels per acre.” A correspondent summing up a trip over the Canadian Northern Railway, from Dauphin to Battleford, says: "As I inspected the crops in the va A Specimen Group of Elevators That May Be Seen in Many Towns in Central Canada mis is pioneering 1 aon t lor me me of me see what our forefathers had to complain of." He didn't know, though, for the pioneering of iis fore fathers was discomfort and hardship. The opening up and development of western Canada, with its railroad lines to carry one to almost the uttermost part of it, the telegraph line to flash the news to the outside world, the tel ephone to talk to one's neighbor, the daily and weekly mail service which brings and carries letters to the friends in distant parts; the schools headed by college-bred and highly cer tificated teachers; the churches manned by brilliant divines; the clubs; the social and festive life; what is there about any of this to give to the man who goes there to make his home the credit of being a pioneer ? Noth ing! He might as* well be in any of the old middle-west States. In other | nous aisiricis i iounu tne larmers and other citizens without exceptior filled with expectant enthusiasm over this year’s prospects. Xo district was found which could not boast of fields of 35 bushels per acre wheat, or 50 tc 60 bushels per acre oats, and of 40 bushels per acre of barley.' It is not an unusual thing in many parts of western Canada for a farmer to have 10,000 to 30,000 bushels of wheat. In the Rouleau district it is said that there are several farmers who will have 20,000 bushels of oats any many fields will return one hun dred bushels to the acre. It takes an army of men to handle theWestern Canada crop, and it is es timated that 30,000 people have been brought in this year to assist in the great undertaking; there being excur sions from the outside world nearly I every day for the past six weeks. Too Rapid. She—Why do you call your chauf feur a leaky vessel? Does he gossip about the fun you have on your mo toring parties? He—No; but I am always bailing the fellow out. A Contrary Course. "Here's Jimmy’s doctor said he must get away from business and have more fresh air.” “Well?” “How is he going to get fresh air in a salt sea trip?” csig Price for an Orchid. Three hundred dollars was recently paid in Colombia for a single plant of a rare orchid. The natives, in order to expedite the collection of these or chids, fell the trees on which they grow, and then strip them of these floral parasites. Reassurance. “Look here! Didn’t I tell you not to come around here begging again?’’ “Yes’m; but I thought dat I’d drop around an’ ask you if you reallv meant it.’’ *