Part 31

The storm grew in intensity. It had filled the woods with voices. If you turned your imagination loose you could hear a cry, a laugh—anything you chose. Then suddenly, astonishingly, there it was. A woman’s scream. Or was it?

Thuse said, “It’s Bill’s panther.” Bill was my Dad. Old Drum raised his voice. He made sound enough, in the tree-walled confines of that hunters’ paradise, to raise the dead.

Bob Graham said, “I feel spooky. Think I need a bracer.” He uncorked his bottle and took a good one.

Well, whatever it might have been, that thing had the men baffled. Albeit the storm raged fiercely in the tree-tops and upon the hillside from whence the sound came, a deadly calm settled around the bonfire. The men looked at one another in complete silence for a tense moment. I believe everyone was wondering if maybe Thuse had not named it.

By this time everyone was, shall I say, panther-conscious. I would not want to say that the men actually were waiting in expectancy for the appearance of that killer. You know how it is. After a menacing thing has been discussed in your presence for hours, without realizing it, you just don’t forget.

Then suddenly, miraculously, there it was again—something very like a woman’s voice coming in swells above the howl of the storm. Van, who had repeatedly urged the men to break up camp and make a try for home, said, “It’s the voice of an angel—an angel come to tell us to get the hell out of here while the going is still possible.” Dad scoffed, “An angel out here in the woods on a night like this—man, you must be crazy!”

Jim Scanlan said, “Well, anybody who don’t believe in ghosts is maybe going to pretty soon.”

We had along a sharp axe and several good woodchoppers. At first fuel for the fire was gleaned from old dead tree tops lying on the ground—tops of blackoaks my father had cut some years before for the tanbark to be used in his tannery. But as the snow became deeper, and the puzzling voices in the woods persisted, the men—including yours truly — somehow did not seem to want to venture beyond the circle of light. They fetched fuel from a close-in rick of cordwood—four-foot lengths. Without leave, we burned Anna Buzan’s wood, a full cord, that night. It was wood my brother and I had cut on shares. Adjustment could be—and was—made later.

Back there on the ridge high above us, in the thick of that blizzard, a woman was singing, as it were, for her life.

Let me explain. Three people—a woman and two men enroute to the old English colony, from somewhere farther south, had bogged down in the storm two miles from home, and were desperately in need of help.

The old road in those days, coming in from the prairie lands on the south, followed the ridge approximately on the line between the John Wolfley timber on the east and the Anna Buzan timber on the west, to a crossing on Spring creek. The road was first used in bringing out cross-ties for use in building the railroad which now skirts the woods on the north side of the creek. Back on the ridge several old wagon trails led into the forest. The team those Colonists were driving, to a ramshackle old spring wagon, had wandered off the road and had floundered in one of those side leads, upsetting the wagon. This had been the cause of that first scream.

Having broken harness which they could not repair in the dark, they had started on foot to where, in passing, they had seen the light of our bonfire, hoping it would lead them to the home of a settler. But when close enough to see it was only a bonfire, misgivings began to assail them. What if it should prove to be an Indian camp, or maybe horse-thieves in hiding? These facts were made known to us after they had reached our fire.

When Van’s “Angel” had come in the flesh—her long skirt, held up in front, trailing atop the snow as she moved in—we could see that she was not garbed in the traditional folds of flowing gauze-like fabric, as becomes an angel. It would have been all out of place on a night like that. As it was, I thought she was dressed rather too thinly.

Bob Graham said, “If you wouldn’t be offended, young lady, I’d offer you a swig of my whisky.”

“Liquor,” she said, “I can take it,” Bob passed the bottle to her. “O-oo, so little,” she complained. “I ‘opes it will ‘elp.”

Their names were Bill and Teddy and Minerva. Bill led off as spokesman. He said, “When we sawer men walking around the fire we knew there would be no ‘ouse ‘ere. And I asked Teddy wot shall we do now?”

“Ted ‘e said,” continued Bill, “Blast me ‘ide if I know wot would be best. Wot you think, Minerva? Want to chawncit?” Teddy spoke for Minerva. He said, “Minerva ‘ere,” pointing to the girl, “said to us—Now you just ‘old your ‘orses, men I got it. I’ll sing ‘em a song.”

Let me remind you here that it was their ability and their willingness to sing on any and all occasions that made those Colonists extremely popular at the country school-house lyceum of that age.

Bill talked again. He said, “Then I said Hindians or ‘orse-theives, whichever they are, would know that ‘appy, singing folks bode nobody ‘arm.” For the purpose intended, Bill’s idea was not bad—but Minerva challenged it promptly. She said, “You can just drop that ‘appy part of it, Mr. Bill.”

Their reasoning was logical. And their manner in coping with the situation was unique. For them to have burst in upon a band of horse-thieves in those days would, most likely, have been suicidal. But with Indians of the times, it is my belief, they would have had no trouble at all.

When they had thawed out, after Minerva had obliged us with more songs—and believe me, that girl could sing — Teddy said he would fetch his concertina from the wrecked wagon. It maybe was a good thing he didn’t know anything about all that panther discussion.

However, after Ted had returned, Van, who, as a boy, had lived in a panther country back east, told the newcomers about the Elk creek incident and other periodical panther scares elaborating on the dangers of same. He told those people they could count themselves lucky in finding our fire. “Wild animals,” he said, “won’t go near a fire.” I knew that this was not news to any of our party. And I knew, too, we would keep our visitors for the duration.

Van started it. When he had guessed the hour of midnight had arrived, he yelled so that all could hear above the roar of the storm—”Merry Christmas!” Our English visitors returned the greeting—though, enveloped in swirling snow, they didn’t seem to put much heart in it.

Looking up toward the high heavens in readiness to speak, Dad was caught full in the face with a gob of dislodged snow from the treetops. He said, clawing the snow out of his whiskers at the same time, “It didn’t look like this could happen when we started out yesterday afternoon — it was so warm, almost like spring. But then maybe this snow is a godsend.” He clawed again at his whiskers, saying “Dammit!” He probably would have quoted the old saying, “A green Christmas presages a fat graveyard” — but old Drum raised his voice again, bringing everyone to rigid attention. The dog ran out a few paces, turned around and came back. He had not gone beyond the circle of light.

Together, or rather alternately, Minerva and Teddy made music against the howl of the storm until morning. They could not team together. This nightingale who had come to us out of the storm, was from another colony—perhaps English Ridge, south of Havensville. Bill sang some, in a comical way. Our improvised shelter, hardly worth mentioning, and our fire had kept them from freezing. They were grateful.

They were of the old English Colony folk—Bill and Ted. This is not to say they were scions of the favored six families who occupied Llewellyn Castle on section 25, in Harrison township. They might have been from any one—or two — of the dugouts scattered about over the prairies outside the Colony-owned section. But they were decidedly English, and none the less Colonists.

When at last morning had come, and we had seen our visitors off, we drove out onto a vast prairie covered with snow, homeward bound. We would be doing well if we reached home in time for dinner. Deep drifts lay ahead of us and there was a sea of white on all sides as far as one could look.

Incidentally, I might say here that the streets in Wetmore were completely blocked by that storm. The main street in the business section was drifted so deeply in snow that to facilitate traffic a cut was made down the center of the street, and one standing up in a wagon had to look up to see the top of the cut.

Van stroked old Drum’s head. He said, “Too bad, old boy, you didn’t get a chance to show Bill how good you are. Skunked this time, but maybe better luck next time. Wish you could tell us what kind of a varmint you saw, heard, or scented, when you made all that commotion back there. You wouldn’t lie to a fellow, old longears, and you are not afraid of the dark—are you?”

Dad said, in a tone that indicated his great disappointment over the bogged down coon-hunt, with maybe, also apologies to his guests, “Well, damn it, men—it wasn’t a complete waterhaul. We’ve got a white Christmas.”

UNCLE NICK’S BOOMERANG Published in Wetmore Spectator

March 5, 1943

By John T. Bristow

The hunt was staged in Uncle Nick Bristow’s timber — way back in the 70’s. It was on the home place over on the Rose branch, the farm now owned by Bill Mast. The trail of the hunters would range down stream, overlapping into the Jim Hyde and Bill Rose woods, and on down to the junction with Wolfley creek. Ostensibly, it was to have been a coon-hunt, but it soon developed into something bigger and better. ‘

There was a good moon—but to attract the hunters, a big bonfire was built in the woods, and the men flocked in from all directions. The interesting part of it was that three of them were from the old English Colony, two miles west of my uncle’s farm — ”Green Englishmen,” the Wolfley creekers said they were. Couldn’t name them now—and be sure. One of them was a stocky little man, very talkative, very agreeable.

Then there were the Porters, the Pickets, the Piatts, the Snows, the Mayers, the Barnes boys, and others—not aiming to overlook my Uncle Nick and his son, Burrel. The elder Mayers, Gus and Noah, were Pennsylvania Dutch, with Holland ancestry. Gus liked his fun while Noah liked to stay at home and mind his own business. But some of Noah’s boys were in the gathering, as was also Peter Metzdorf, who had a while back married Gus Mayer’s daughter, Anna. Peter was German—the real thing. He lived in Wetmore.

Of the five Porter brothers, Ambrose was the only one that I can now positively say was present. But John and Tom and their brothers-in-law, Bill Evans and Ben Summers, were probably around somewhere. Bill Porter had just married my Aunt Nancy, late of Tennessee, and he couldn’t come. And Ben Porter—well, they said he was too contrary to appreciate a good thing like this. Ambrose wore his red hair—it was really red—at shoulder length. He wore gold earrings, too, and three gutta-percha rings on one finger, rings he himself had made from old coat buttons.

It was good to have Roland Van Amburg with us. Roland was a grand old sport. Moreover, Roland Van Amburg had much in common with my Uncle Nick Bristow. They had both suffered, or were due to suffer, heavy losses in large herds of Texas cattle they had bought from Dr. W. L. Challis, of Atchison. It is barely possible that those cattle might have been milling about on the western part of Uncle Nick’s farm that night.

The bonfire was built on the edge of a small clearing, with a large tree backed up by a clump of small growth on the right. In the distance—not too distant—was a big log lying on the edge of a ravine, with a 10-foot bank at this point. A small tree with good height stood at the top end of the log on the left side of the clearing. One approaching from the north would see the log only after advancing so far, and even then only if not otherwise attracted. Had it been a plant for a modern movie scene it could not have been a more perfect setting for the thing that actually happened.

While yet around the bonfire the talk turned to panthers. One had reportedly been seen, or heard, in the woods a couple of miles away—up in the Rube Wolfley neighborhood. The men would be careful not to hunt that timber because they didn’t want their dogs to be torn to pieces. Uncle Nick owned a timber lot over in the panther country.

The natives saw in this hunt a chance to have some fun at the expense of the Englishmen. Also, they wanted to impress those Colonists in a way that might be the means of keeping them on their own reservation, so to speak. A lot of timber-stealing had been going on and the Colonists were suspicioned. As a matter of fact, timber-stealing in those days was widespread. But in that business the Colonists were no worse than the natives, but the Colonists were always sure to get the blame.

While people generally scoffed at the idea of panthers roaming the woods, there were some who said it was not altogether improbable—that one might have escaped from a menagerie. You must understand that practically all the older men here at that time had come from panther states back East—and, I might say, the rising generation had more or less been steeped in panther talk.

It is written in the family records, and was generally known here then, that the grandmother of Bill and Ben Porter was killed and partly devoured by a panther back in Indiana. She would have been the great-grandmother of Jim and Bill Porter, and Zada Shumaker and Harry Porter.

Also, there is one man now living in Wetmore—G. C. Swecker—who would tell you how one of those ferocious beasts hopped upon the roof of his father’s hunting lodge, while occupied, back in Virginia and ripped the clapboards off. He also declares that panthers do scream like a woman. And, as one old fellow around the fire had said, they do sometimes migrate. I myself recall that during a severe winter in the Rocky mountains nearly a half century ago, that those killers actually came right down into Colorado Springs.

At that time panthers were quite numerous in the Missouri hills across the river from Atchison—and with the Missouri river frozen in the severe winters of the old days, it would have been an easy matter for them to cross on the ice to this side; and then only a distance of forty miles to get out here. And supposing—just supposing—that, perchance, they might have come over in pairs, and carried on in the usual cat tradition, there was the bare possibility of our coon-hunters even running into a “family” of them. The panther’s young stay with the mother until grown.

Let’s say, then, that there was just enough to it to keep timid people on edge. I doubt if there ever was a night coon-hunt in those days when some of the hunters didn’t give some thought to that killer. The thought seemed to hit one the moment he was in the deep woods. And on moonlight nights that thought was simply unshakeable. A shadow in the wood—a shadow that was somehow alive—could be highly disquieting.

Uncle Nick and the men, with the dogs on leash, took a turn about the woods while waiting for my father and the inevitable Thuse Peters to arrive. They would be coming out from town. I had gone out earlier that evening with my cousin, Burrel.

Uncle Nick bade me remain at the fire so as to direct Dad and Thuse when, and if, they should come while the hunters were away. Ambrose Porter said, “Nick, you’re not going to leave that boy all alone out here. I’ll- stay with him.” Uncle Nick said, quietly, “Oh no, you won’t.” Uncle knew that Ambrose never liked to exert himself needlessly.

If not inclined to discount my statements — and you really should not—you are now maybe thinking what I thought that night—that it was a darned shame to leave a boy all alone out there in the woods like that.

The hunters were now coming in from the north. Uncle Nick and the Englishmen well in front. Uncle Nick called out, “Johnny my boy, where are you?”

I had climbed the small tree at the end of the log—as far up as I could go. I called back, “Up here in this tree, Uncle Nick. Look on the log—quick!”

The hunters had now advanced a couple of steps, bringing the log into view. I glanced back in time to see them shift their gaze from my tree-perch to the log—and I took one more look at the log myself, just as Uncle Nick fired his rifle. In that split second I could see two eyes shining brightly in the glare of the bonfire—and I saw the yellowish form of the ugly thing fall off the log.

Uncle Nick was a sure shot with a rifle. And quick too. As told in one of my former articles, he had killed a mountain lion in the Rockies while placer mining in Colorado in 1858. The great beast was shot in the nick of time—in midair, after that 200 pounds of destruction had made the spring for my uncle from an overhanging limb of a great pine.

Addressing Uncle Nick, the little Englishman said, “I say, my good man, let’s ‘ave another one soon. Over in the big woods. Beard the lion in ‘is den, so to speak.” In high good humor, he shook a pudgy fist at my uncle, saying, “Hand mind you, if I am h ignored I shall be disappointed.”

The one mistake of the whole evening—if one can be sure there was a mistake—was when the hunters, after they had “impressed” the Englishmen with the danger of the panther to their dogs, turned the dogs loose on the trail of the pet coon they had brought into the woods at the right movement to make a “hot trail.”

It had taken four yoke of oxen to plant the log—and my Aunt Hulda gave the men a spirited tongue-lashing for making use of one of her hens to bloody the trail.

Now, imagine if you can, my uncle’s surprise when the next time he went over to his cherished timber lot he discovered that someone had robbed him of valuable post and rail trees. Not being present at the time, I have no way of knowing what his immediate reactions were. But had it been my Dad instead of my uncle, who never swore, I’m darned sure I could name more’n half of the irreverent words he would have employed in taking the epidermis off that stocky little Englishman.

SHORT CHANGED Not Hitherto Published — 1950

By John T. Bristow

You can never tell by the caption of one of my stories what all is going to be in it—the caption might well have been something else—but the line that inspired the heading is sure to be apparent to the careful reader; if he, or she, will look for it.

The oil strike on the Oreon Strahm land one mile south of the Sabetha hospital, in August, 1950, and the two producers previously brought in on the Mamie Strahm land three and one-half miles to the southwest, refreshes my memory of an earlier try for oil in Nemaha County—and some of my own experiences in this greatest of all “get-rich-quick” opportunities.

In 1904 Dr. Joseph Haigh and Dr. A. P. Lapham secured a block of oil leases around Wetmore, and contracted with a driller, W. H. Hardenburg, of Oklahoma, to drill a well to the depth of 2,000 feet—or to the Mississippi lime—for $5,000. The site was on land owned by Dr. J. W. Graham in the west part of town; later owned by Mr. Mathews.

The drillers struck a little gas at 1700 feet, which spurted water over the 80-foot derrick. This caused a great deal of excitement—but after “pulling” the fire in the coal-burning power plant and quickly taking other precautionary measures, the drillers said “there was nothing to it.”

Gas had previously been encountered in two water wells in the north part of town—on the Cyrus Clinkenbeard property west of the school grounds, now owned by the Thorn-burrow girls; and on the J. W. Luce property near the cemetery, now owned by Gene Cromwell. The flow in the Luce well was the stronger, agitating the water in a way to produce a bubbling sound. It created a lot of excitement. But the State Geologist said it was helium gas, which, rather than burn, would extinguish fire.

In the oil test on the Graham lot, at about 1800 feet, a hard formation was encountered, which the drillers pronounced the Mississippi lime—but State Geologist Haworth said it was not. Then the drillers completed the contract at 2,000 feet. Mr. Hardenburg had a drilling contract coming up in Oklahoma, but he remained on the job here about a week longer, at $40 a day—and the hole was put down to 2225 feet. It was planned to have Mr. Hardenburg come back and drill the test deeper, but he got rich in his “share-the-profits” contract in the Tulsa oil field—and retired to a home on “easy street” (Morningside Drive) in Kansas City.

When Hart Eyman was getting up a block of oil leases here in 1934, I called up Mr. Hardenburg, while in Kansas City, and told him of the activity out here. He asked me to let him know when the first test was to be spudded in here, saying he would drive out. He said he still had faith in this section and that he would have been glad to have finished our test. I believe our people failed to raise the necessary funds. The money for the original test was raised by selling stock. And it was a clean promotion—but that is more than I can say for some of the outside oil promotions in which our Wetmore group dipped.

In view of the recent strikes in the Strahm field, with a 30-barrel producer in the Hunton lime at around 2800 feet; and the Mamie Strahm number 2, rated at 1440 barrels in the Viola lime at approximately 3600 feet; and the Oreon Strahm test, with even greater potential production in the Hunton and Viola and still another producing sand topping the granite at around 3900 feet, it looks as though we Wetmore “investors” might better have kept our speculative eggs all in one basket, so to speak, contrary to high-powered promotion advice—and completed the Haigh-Lapham oil test. And I still believe we overlooked our best bet right here at home.

But then we had no data to enlighten us. The nearest and only drilling at that time was ten miles south of us. It was not deep enough to prove or disprove anything. In the heyday of his great financial flight—in the 1880’s—Green Campbell drilled a test to the depth of 1,000 feet on the east edge of Circleville. I believe the incentive was a reported seepage of oil in the creek south of the town.

Then, some twenty years after the Wetmore try, a couple of promoters came out of Kansas City, with a plan to rejuvenate interests in the Haigh-Lapham test—and “feather their own nests.” Joe Searles’ drugstore in the east room of what is now the First National Bank building, was the unofficial headquarters for oil hungry “investors”—local and transient. With Joe and the two promoters, I went over to the Matthews lot, now owned by Bert Gilbert. Mr. Hardenburg had left the top 100 feet of casing in the well to prevent cave-ins against the time when he might return to finish the well. Measurements to the exhaustion of the string available showed the well open for fifteen hundred feet—and likely all the way down to the bottom.

Excitement began to mount again.

Dr. A. P. Lapham presided over a packed gathering in the opera house—and appointed a committee of five to confer with the promoters. The committee met in the Thorn-burrow bank. The promoters came up with a contract whereby they would undertake to raise the funds for the completion of the well, against numerous and assorted requirements by “the people” of Wetmore.