Thus the years sped rapidly on. Some brought good crops, others bitter disappointment. The lean years always outnumbered the fat ones. At one time three very lean years came in succession, which tried our patience, resourcefulness and staying powers to the very utmost. That was the critical period, when so many Kansans mortgaged their homes and later on were sold out by the sheriff. Quite early in life I had made it a strict rule to always live within my income, and above all never to venture into any hazardous undertakings, and I suppose that is why we weathered all the storms that beset us. ’Tis true that our living was rather plain in the early years, but we always had enough, and there never was a time when we or our children went hungry. And so we went along, step by step, slow but sure, always getting a little farther ahead each year, raising a numerous family in the meantime. When our youngest child was born, in 1893, we had one girl and six boys. all of them hearty and healthy children. It is undeniable that this circumstance was much in our favor.
In 1889 I built a commodious dwelling house one story and a half high, and four years later built the most substantial and roomy stone basement barn in this vicinity. Several years after I added a large, well-built and convenient granary; also fenced and cross-fenced the entire farm with stone posts and wire, never going a dollar’s worth in debt for the improvements. As a matter of fact, debts were always an abomination in my eyes. As my sons grew older and more capable, I enlarged my farming operations, until now we farm five hundred and sixty acres. Seven years ago, when the older boys expressed a desire to go into the threshing business, I procured for them a small steam outfit, and when I saw that they made good at it, I exchanged it for a large modern up-to-date steam threshing outfit, and also an engine gang plow, and we have made a decided success of both threshing and plowing. I have invested in a small portable gasoline engine to elevate grain into the granary. I use it also to shell corn with power self-feed sheller; to run a fanning mill and feed grinder; to saw firewood, for our timber claim has developed into a fine grove; to run a drill, lathe and grindstone in the blacksmith shop; it runs a washing machine with wringer, and a churn and cream separator in a separate washhouse. Along with the threshing business the boys have picked up a large amount of knowledge about machinery and blacksmithing, so now we do all our own machine repairing and general blacksmithing. Just before we engaged in threshing I had bought a fine partly improved farm of half a section in Gove county, but the boys do not seem inclined to farm it at present, so I presume it will have to wait a while yet.
I have never been an office seeker, but I have held minor offices of trust continuously since I first came here, and have always endeavored to administer them faithfully and conscientiously, using the Golden Rule for my guide. What I consider my crowning achievement was when I, with two other successful farmers, resurrected a defunct Farmers Coöperative Elevator Company after the members had all lost faith in it. It was started eighteen years ago to remedy the flagrant abuses practiced upon the farmers by the combined elevator and mill men. Through ignorance, mismanagement, and other causes, the stockholders lost all faith and confidence in it, so in a few years' time it had passed into the hands of three town residents who held the majority of stock, and the abuses were as bad as ever. When the time was ripe for it we three stepped in and made a thorough canvass of
