PHILLIPS, CLARENCE AND JESSICA BROTT

by Joellen Phillips

Entry F338 from the History of Hooker County Nebraska
with permission of the Hooker County Historical Society

Jessica and Clarence Phillips.

Clarence Albert Phillips was the youngest
of 14 children born to Frank and Margaret
Fox Phillips. He was born November 19, 1901
on his father's homestead nine miles south of
Alliance, Nebraska, and spent the first 10
years of his life there, attending rural school.
Among his earliest memories are of the
United States Cavalry moving from Fort
Hayes, Kansas to Fort Robinson, Nebraska
twice a year, and stopping to water their
horses at his father's tank. In the spring
Clarence was 10 his parents moved from
Alliance to a relinquished homestead in
Cherry County where nine of his brothers and
sisters already had homesteads. Clarence
rode a horse and helped herd the livestock on
the eight day trip to their new location 40
miles north of Whitman, Nebraska. Their
new home was a sod house, and the family
lived in this same sod house until leaving the
ranch. Clarence attended school here at Dist.
#170 and grew to manhood. When in his
teens he made his spending money playing
the fiddle at the neighborhood dances. In
1918 Clarence took a job as rural mail carrier,
and carried the mail from Trouble, Nebr. to
Pullman, Nebr. for three years, making three
trips a week using a team and buggy.
Jessica Noble Brott, born July 22, 1900,
was the tenth of thirteen children born to
Edwin and Margaret Inman Brott at their
home near Bucklan in Linn County, Mis-
souri. When she was six her father sold his
place in Missouri and moved the family to a
homestead on the Middle Loup River nine
miles north of Hecla, and here Jessica grew
up. She attended the Eddie school, walking
the two miles to school with her brothers and
sisters. In the summer of 1919 Jessica
attended college at Chadron and returned to
teach Dist. #170 north of Whitman the
following winter.

On January 10, 1921 Clarence Phillips and
Jessica Brott were married in Mullen, Nebr.
As his father, Frank, was seriously ill, Clar-
ence purchased his father's cattle and leased
his land and the elder Phillipses moved to
Mullen, while the young Mr. and Mrs.
Phillips moved into the sod house. Here they
lived for the next 15 years. While living here
their three children - Jacqueline (Mrs. Ray
Lange of North Platte, NE), Clarence Albert
Jr., or Bud who is now deceased, and Lynn
Phillips of Mullen, Nebraska were born.

In the 1920's Clarence contracted to do
custom haying for the Carver Ranch and
continued this until the 1940's. Haying was
done with teams of horses, and often it
required teams of 32 head of horses to move
the stacks from the meadows to high ground
in the fall. In 1933 he bought a tractor and
trail mower to do the mowing. This was the
first tractor used on the Carver Ranch.
Jessica accompanied the hay crew, cooking
for the men and driving the stacker team in
the afternoon. For several winters Clarence
also rode his horse to the Carver feed grounds
and fed the stacks of hay to the Carver cattle.
This was an all day chore, and he returned
home to feed and care for his own cattle after
dark.

In 1936 the family moved to the old John
Jacobson place 13 miles northeast of Mullen.
Clarence would winter his cattle at Mullen,
and drive them to the old home place north
of Whitman to summer them for the next 2
years. In the spring of 1938 Clarence and
Jessica purchased the Loy and Pearl James
homesteads 10 miles northeast of Mullen.
During the 1940's Clarence purchased a
combine and corn sheller and traveled
through the country doing custom harvesting
work for the neighbors.

After her children were grown, Jessica
continued her education by correspondence
courses, and obtained her high school diplo-
ma in this way. She also enrolled in several
news reporting and writing courses, and was
a news reporter for the Mullen and Valentine
papers for several years. She was a firm
believer in furthering education and encoura-
ged and often helped the younger generation
with their schooling.

Jessica Phillips passed away January 4,
1968 in the Pioneer Memorial Hospital at
Mullen, and was laid to rest in the Cedar View
Cemetery beside her younger sister, Saddie
Cook. Clarence Phillips sold his cattle to his
younger son, Lynn, in 1971 and in 1974 he
purchased a small acreage on the outskirts of
Hemingford, Nebraska. He spent a couple
years in the Good Samaritan Village in
Alliance, and is currently residing in Cha-
dron, Nebraska.