STEVENSON, WALTER L. AND ALICE M. (PESCH)

by Marie Stevenson

Entry F408 from the History of Hooker County Nebraska
with permission of the Hooker County Historical Society

Walter Leonard Stevenson was born Au-
gust 14, 1882, near Thornburg, Kansas, the
son of Arthur and Eva May (Pounds) Steven-
son. Walter came by train in an immigrant car
to Colorado from Smith County, Kansas, in
1907, and homesteaded north of Yuma. Alice
May Pesch was born May 9, 1884, near
Bertrand, Nebraska, the daughter of John
Peter and Mary Luhetty (Strain) Pesch.
Through purchasing a relinquishment, Alice
acquired her own land north of Yuma,
Colorado, in 1889. She taught school for two
or three years. She and Walter met and were
married at Yuma on June 3, 1908.

The family lived for a time on Walter's
homestead, then built a new house on Alice's
land and lived there. In 1925 the family
moved to Fort Morgan, Colorado. They were
parents of seven daughters and one son:
Luhetty Cecil (Mrs. Ed) Goedert, Susie Ruth
(Mrs. Carl) Zimmerman, Ella May (Mrs.
Clarence) Green, Margaret Elma (Mrs. Mel-
vin) Newtson, Robert Louis, Clarice Faye
(Mrs. Malvin) Rosentrater, Jessie June (Mrs.
Lawrence) Powers, and Betty Jean (Mrs.
Allen) Shimmin. All were born in Colorado
and with the exception of Ella living near
Fort Morgan, all later moved to Nebraska.

From Fort Morgan the family moved in
1935 to a farm south of Sutherland, Nebras-
ka. A later moved took them into the
sandhills northeast of North Platte (Salis-
bury place), then in 1943 to a place in the
valley near the North Platter River (Seyboldt
place).

Liking the sandhills, they decided that was
where they wished to live, and together with
their son Robert and wife, Marie, bought land
in northern McPherson and southern Hooker
counties, from Hugh and Louelva Priest,
moving there in the spring of 1945. Both
families lived in the large sod house on the
place, dividing the long room across the
middle, with Bob and Marie living in the east
end. During the summer of 1946 a new sod
house for Walter and Alice was constructed
with the help of Marie's brother, Clarence
Jackson. Building materials were quite scarce
because of the war and defense needs, so it
took some ingenuity to finish the house, but
it proved to be a pleasant home, where all the
children enjoyed visiting with their parents,
and where grandchildren delighted in coming
to spend some time with "Gram and Pop".
One of their favorite pastimes was hunting
arrowheads in the many sand blowouts.

During the first few years of living on the
place, the road to Tryon was quite difficult
to travel at times, especially during the
winter when the snow drifted into it. It was
necessary to open and shut wire gates, several
of them, before reaching the regular road to
Tryon, which in itself was a series of humps
and hollows. Mail service was a bit irregular
at times, involving a series of sandhill trails
from the Shimmin Ranch to the Musser
Ranch, to find our mailbox nearly two and a
half miles from the house. It was later moved
to within a mile, then eventually the route
was changed to follow up the valley past the
place, from east to west - a huge improv-
ement! During the time following the blizzard
of 1949, the mail was dropped from an
airplane hired by Bob Cotton, to provide us
with our much desired papers and letters.

In order to meet expenses during the first
several years, we milked a big herd of cows,
shipping the cream at the North Platte depot
to a creamery in Minnesota. Together with
keeping laying hens for eggs to trade for
groceries in North Platte, raising gardens and
potatoes, and using native fruits (sand-
cherries, plums, chokecherries), and butch-
ering our own beef and sometimes pork (and
always chickens), we began to feel more
financially secure. At first we rented frozen
food lockers in North Platte, but eventually
acquired our own freezers and refrigerators
after REA lines were built into the country.
Prior to REA we had a battery operated light
plant for lighting the houses and a few small
appliances. Electricity has made moderniz-
ation possible.

Walter and Alice celebrated their 50th
anniversary in June, 1948, in the Shimmin
home, welcoming old friends, relatives and
many neighbors. After several years of poor
health, Walter passed away on October 18,
1958, at a North Platte hospital. Alice
continued living alternately in her sandhills
home and with her daughter Susie and family
near Paxton, until her death on November 5,
1975, at the Tryon home. Both are buried at
Yuma, Colorado.