CRAWFORD, JAMES M. AND MARY M.(HARMON)

by Grandson, Alvo Crawford

Entry F101 from the History of Hooker County Nebraska
with permission of the Hooker County Historical Society

James Crawford was born on an Island in
the Mississippi River, near Burlington, Iowa
January 9, 1835 to parents John Crawford,
born in Orange County, North Carolina,
February 10, 1809 and Polly McCoy of North
Carolina, born July 24, 1812. James was the
2nd child of a family of 9 children. The family
settled near Winterset, Iowa. Mary Melvina
was born March 17, 1848, the oldest of the
John Harmon and Sarah Gobel (married
November 7, 1846), family of ten children.
John's birth, December 11, 1816 and Sarah's
April 12, 1830. James Malachi and Mary
Melvina were married August 25, 1867 at
Winterset, Iowa. Their children were Albert
O., born June 17, 1868; Arminda Clara, born
May 6, 1874; Ida Myrtle, December 16, 1882.
Each girl died suddenly about 2 years of age.

Albert did not have a gun or steel traps but
he learned to make traps and snares to catch
scarce game in Iowa, to supplement the
meager meat supply.

Husking bees and quilting parties were
social events. Three people worked at the
same wagon, one man picked and removed
shucks on the left of the wagon, one down the
row the wagon straddled and the third
worked on the right side. Some farmers who
didn't have that much help available would
harvest their corn with the husks on and later
a husking bee would be held with neighbors
husking the corn. Shucks probably would be
saved and used to make mattress for beds.

In 1883 the James Crawford family moved
to Boone County, Nebraska where they lived
for 5 years. Albert liked it better there for
there was game to hunt and trap and he was
fortunate enough to get a muzzle loading
shotgun. While living in this area, they
became acquainted with the LeLaCheur
family, who soon moved to a homestead north
of Mullen, Nebraska. LeLaCheurs liked the
Sandhills and persuaded the Crawfords to
have a look at it. So in the fall of 1887 James
and Albert started out with a team and wagon
for the Sandhills. They followed the Cedar
River to a point east of Burwell, then to
Burwell, following the North Loup River west
through Kent, Taylor, Brewster, Purdum and
west to where Calf Creek enters the North
Loup, then to a point north of Seneca, about
two miles north of the Middle Loup River,
north of Kelso, a siding on the railroad. At
that time Hooker County had not been
organized, which previously had been the
western part of Thomas territory. Arrangem-
ents were made to file on the land as a Tree
Claim of 160 acres. Then they started on the
long trip home ot Boone County, where they
had to pick corn, get fuel for winter and get
ready for the move to Hooker County next
spring. Getting ready for the moved required
much careful planning for they would have
to bring everything they would need for all
summer for there would be no place to buy
it after they got there, also enough trees to
plant ten acres, was a must.

The family arrived at the new claim April
20, 1888. This was their "free land" they had
been so anxious to have for so long, a real
treasure to have their own land. They lived
in a tent all summer while they planted
cottonwood, ash and walnut trees and broke
prairie with a sod plow and planted corn on
it. They were bothered terribly with flying
gnats any day the weather was warm and the
wind not blowing. They used bacon grease on
their ears and neck for a repellent and
sometimes would tie a handkerchief over
their nose and mouth to keep from inhaling
them. All the water used was hauled from the
river, two miles south. There was nothing to
fence with so the three horses and two cows
had to be picketed out with ropes so they
could graze. Steve James, about six miles
northwest, was the nearest neighbor at the
time.

Late that summer they moved to the
homestead in Thomas County, adjoining the
Hooker County line and due east of the tree
claim. They secured the services of John
Carney, who lived about a mile east of Seneca,
to help them locate the boundaries of this
homestead. John knew where a section corner
was at Rutland, the new railroad siding on the
Hooker-Thomas county line. They measured
north to where the southwest corner of the
homestead would be.

A sod house, sod barn and sod corrals were
built in time for use that winter. Corn fodder
was hauled from the tree claim four miles
west, to feed the stock and the few chickens.
Corn fodder had to be used for hay the first
2 years, then a mower was obtained and
Albert cut and hauled hay from the deserted
Bar Seven Bull Ranch on the river 2 miles
east of Norway. It is most difficult for people
of today to realize at that time there was grass
only in the valleys and small pockets in the
hills and the hills themselves were all but
bare of vegetation, which the early explorers
before called the Sandhills "The Great
American Desert". The growth of grass on the
hills did improve rapidly the next 15 years as
did the number of different kinds of grasses.

Albert became old enough to be eligible to
file on a homestead about 2 years after he and
his folks came. He took land across the line
in Hooker County, and built a sod house
about 100 yards from his parents home. After
the Kinkaid Act in 1904 he took land
adjoining on the east and built a sod house
a 1/2 mile northeast of his claim soddy making
him 640 acres. He later built frame improv-
ements there.

The railroad opened all freight trains for
people needing to go to the north side of
Seneca by footbridge. On December 2, 1905,
at noon as James was passing between the
cars, an engine pushed the cars together to
make up a train, pinning him between the
couplings. Death came soon afterwards. Mary
lived in her home till her death in 1918,
August 9th. Her many friends called her
"Aunt Vine", or Vine, short for Melvina.
During WWI she knitted many pair of sox,
mittens, and sweaters for the Red Cross, also
did quilting for a hobby.