Lincoln County

Builders: Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Hurlock

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By Thelma J. McMullen
Lincoln Sentinel-Republican, December 14, 1939

We enjoyed the privilege of visiting with a very hospitable couple, Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Hurlock, in their pleasant home one block west of the Catholic church on a recent occasion. While reconnoitering about the past on the Kansas prairie, Mr. Hurlock contributed the following stories concerning incidents of human interest.

Mr. Hurlock recalls seeing many of the early settlers come west in covered wagons � his parents, included. Bridges were very scarce. When coming to a swollen stream, travelers were usually obliged to camp nearby until the water receded enough to enable a wagon to cross the stream safely. Under favorable conditions, a team of horses was expected to pull a load about twenty miles a day while traveling steady over an extended period of time; under similar circumstances a team of oxen usually progressed at the rate of ten miles a day.

Horse thieves were constantly menacing the settlers. It was, therefore, customary to chain and padlock the horses to the brace on the side of the wagon while camping along the road. Much to his personal chagrin, one particular party realized his error too late on one occasion after having chained his horse to a wagon wheel instead of the brace. He awoke the next morning to discover his wagon resting on a box and the wheel to which he had chained a horse the previous evening was lying some distance away from the overturned wagon; the chain had been filed in two and the horse had disappeared.

It was the duty of women or children to follow the plow when sod was being broken for planting and to cut slits in the sod with axes or hatchets. Grains of corn were dropped into the slits. The grains were covered by pressed the earth down with one�s foot each time he or she took a step forward in the progress of planting by hand.

It was customary in the pioneer days of Kansas to cut grain with a machine called a "dropper." The grain was cut and dropped in piles large enough to make a bundle. When binding the grain by hand, bands were formed from the grain itself and twisted around the bundle in such a manner as to hold it intact. Five men could bind fast enough to keep up with one "dropper" machine. Because rattlesnakes were a constant danger to those working in the fields it was a custom of the harvesters to kick each bundle a foot or more before picking it up so as to ascertain their personal safety.

On one occasion a boy living six miles south of the present site of Lincoln center went to the corn field for roasting ears. The corn had been planted in sod and it was no unusual for the sod to curl up after being broken, thus leaving a tent-like mound. This boy had the misfortune to be struck by a rattlesnake, which was coiled under one such mound. Although the snake had struck his foot, the boy had the presence of mind to hang his sack on a cornstalk designating the place so that his father could kill the snake. The doctor could not be reached for several hours and the unfortunate lad died of the poisonous snakebite a few days later.

While herding cattle on one occasion, Mr. Hurlock encountered a rattlesnake. In an attempt to kill the venomous reptile, Mr. Hurlock threw his shoes at the snake. Having failed in his initial efforts to destroy the reptile which had crossed his path, Oscar was obliged to take the only recourse open to him if he were to retrieve his shoes, against which the snake had curled itself. Taking the bridle off of his horse for a weapon, Oscar killed the snake and walked home.

Horses were frequently bitten by snakes. A common remedy used by the settlers was the boiling of ash leaves in milk to be applied in the form of a poultice. Whether or not the crude remedy was responsible for healing such wounds is not definitely known, but Mr. Hurlock recalls that in most instances the horses that suffered from snake bite and were treated accordingly usually recovered.

A sick person in the olden days was truly in an unfortunate predicament. It was frequently necessary to hunt down a horse before starting after the doctor; if the nearby streams were not swollen, one could ride or drive to town for a doctor. Sometimes several hours were wasted in trying to locate a practitioner; or it he was found immediately, he sometimes had trouble finding a livery rig to get him to his destination. If the patient were quite some distance from town, it was not unusual for four to ten hours to lapse before any doctor arrived at his bedside. Even after a doctor arrived he found it difficult oftentimes to make a correct diagnosis. When the actual cause of the complaint was not visible or easily located, the usual verdict was "inflammation of the bowels."

Few families possessed more than one wagon each. The wagon was equipped with a grain bed in the summer months and with a hay-rack in the winter time. Mr. Hurlock recalls that on one winter evening when the family was enroute to a country schoolhouse to attend church services, a skunk disputed the "right-of-way" of the Hurlock conveyance, a flat bottom hayrack. Oscar and the others, notwithstanding all annoyances, continued to church. Mr. Hurlock recollects that as soon as his family entered the school house, "the congregation really sat up and took notice!" In fact, Mr. Hurlock suspects that they aroused a few "snoozers" from their peaceful dozing.

A man by the name of Pat Keyhoe who lived in a dugout south of town returned home one evening to discover the presence of a skunk family in his house. He tried in vain to chase the unwelcome visitors out of his home. In his own words, Pat once summed up the situation thus, "Where should they go but into the oven on me!" It is told Pat closed the oven door and "fired up," it is also remembered that Pat said he didn�t use the cabin for three or four weeks thereafter.

The buffalo herds were practically extinct after the Hurlocks settled in Lincoln County, Kansas, in the early �70s. Mr. Hurlock remembers one occasion, however, when a stray buffalo passed by the Hurlock homestead within 300 yards of the house. Oscar himself, a small child then, and two other small children were the only ones at home at the time. Duly frightened by the strange sight, the three small children hastened to close all the windows and doors before hiding themselves under a bed. The youngest of the three, concerned about the safety of his pet chickens, rushed into the open long enough to gather the chickens into his arms before hiding himself. Insofar as the buffalo probably didn�t so much as notice the house or the three frightened children, Mr. Hurlock has enjoyed a chuckle while reminiscing about his childhood experience.

Many settlers earned a few dollars by selling buffalo bones which were shipped to the East to be ground into fertilizer. It took about a day for one person to gather a wagon load of bones, and two days were necessary to make the round trip to and from Ellsworth where the bones were sold for shipment. Two dollars was usually the maximum amount received for the three days� work. The money was nearly always spent for provisions before returning home. Two dollars purchased flour, sugar, and bacon for a pioneer family. Because coffee was considered a luxury by the old-timers they would use in its place, some rye which had been browned in the oven. For tea, the settlers supplemented a plant commonly known as "shoe string" which grew in abundance around here at that time and which can be found growing in scattered places over the county yet. Meat was one provision which could usually be obtained for a small sum of money. Hindquarters sometimes sold for as little as three cents per pound. Although the settlers could but guess at the source from which cheap meat was available, they considered themselves "healthier" by maintaining a strict policy of minding personal affairs and never seeming inquisitive in public.

Oscar Hurlock accompanied his parents and two other children and an uncle from Clay County, Illinois, to Lincoln County, Kansas, in a covered wagon in 1872. His father, A.J. Hurlock, settled four miles south of Lincoln where Ernest Lebien now resides. Oscar�s father died in 1874, only two years after having brought his little family west. The widow, who later married a Mr. Ryan, passed away in 1905. Oscar Hurlock worked for the railroad in Colorado and Utah from 1887 to 1899. While living in the west Oscar met and married the amiable lady who became Mrs. Oscar Hurlock. Mr. and Mrs. Hurlock are the parents of two daughters, both married, one of whom lives in Beaumont, Texas, and the other residing at Logan, Kansas. Mr. Hurlock has one sister, Mrs. Harry Porter, and a half-brother, Charles Ryan, who lives near Lincoln.

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