Interest Letter From Kansas – From Thomas A. Walton
Ironton Register, February 5, 1891
Deerhead, Kan. Jan. 22, ’91 Editor Register,
We have had some snow here, but it was not a real blizzard. I think there were about 16 inches of snow that fell during the week, but it drifted a great
deal and in some places was 5 feet, while in the canyons, it was many more. Cattle and horses were doing well on the prairie until the snow fell. Wheat and oats were looking well. There are many thousand acres of it in this county. The sugar mill made a good run this year, but the season was too dry to make a large crop. He only had a few thousand tons of beets, and the sorghum crop was light.
One store in the Lodge advertises “20 pounds of medium Lodge sugar for $1.” Isn’t that cheap enough for sugar? It is dark but makes good syrup – some think it equals maple syrup.
If Aunt Nelly Justice, near Arabia, is alive, ask her if she knows of anybody during the last seventy years in Lawrence county dying from copperhead or rattlesnake bite? If she says no, there may be something in the doctor’s assertion, but one thing is certain, there has been many an animal killed in Kansas and Indian Territory from a rattlesnake bite. Two years ago, a valuable mule was killed by a rattler’s bite about three miles from here, and several horses and mules in this and adjoining counties. The rattlesnakes near the Cimmaron river in Indian territory are about twice as large as they are here. Bro. Brown’s snake story can be beaten here by many people. A snake here called the bull snake is marked and looks very much like the boa constrictor. In fact, it is the largest snake I ever saw, except the one in the Cincinnati Zoo. Gardens. They never harm a person but are dead on rattlers, gophers, ground squirrels, and other “varmints.”
I do not see why some people don’t make fire clay fence posts. When they have been tested, there will be a growing demand for them, and Lawrence county could furnish lots of them and save timber. I see you are still working the roads and the people grumbling about bad roads as they used to do. There has not been a day’s work done by the road overseer in this township on the roads, and still they are better than any roads I ever saw in the same space (8 miles square) in Ohio.
Lawrence county ought to use all the hill land for fruit and sheep; both will pay well if properly attended to. Kiefer peas, dwarf plums,
orange quinces, dewberries, and pawpaws should be on the list of fruits, and all other fruits should be increased.
Thos. A. Walton.
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