Pioneer poem recalls Hayes County history

The pioneer spirit of Hayes County had its roots in the sod-busting days of the 1880s.

Merita Holmes Lawson of McCook has proof in the poetic writings of her grandfather, George H. Stratton, who homesteaded in Hayes County in 1887.

Like many of this area's original settlers, Mr. Stratton's crops were bountiful in the first few years. The virgin soil, combined with decent rains, had the pioneers thinking they had found the promised land. This is how Mr. Stratton put it in his poem: "In the first years we stayed, we were all very well paid; For the labor and time that we spent."

But, then, in 1890, the drought hit, causing many settlers to pull up stakes. "Some went to the east and some went to the west and some to the land where there is no rest," said George in his pioneer poem.

Mr. Stratton was one of the homesteaders who stayed. In the years which followed, he was alternately glad and sad that he did. The next year, 1891, brought a change in the settlers' fortunes. Poetically, Mr. Stratton explains: "The few who had pluck, They stayed and had luck, in the year of 1891; For the wheat was immense and tall as a fence, And threshed out thirty to one."

The crops weren't too bad in 1892, either. "This was a bright year," George wrote, "For the corn it was good and wheat, it was fair; And we all had cobs to throw in the air."

Then, as now, however, Mother Nature proved fickle. "In 1893 how we wished we were free From the toil and sorrow and care," Mr. Stratton wrote. "The soil it was dry and how we would sigh, For the want of some rain in the air."

The next year also brought problems. "In 1894 was the awful uproar, For the soil was all in the air. It rolled in big heaps and darkened the streets, And the people looked down in despair," the pioneer poet exclaimed.

The years 1895 and 1896 brought other problems. "It did make us wonder to never hear thunder" in 1895, George said, and in 1896, he observed, "Our wheat it looked forlorn; And the cutworms had our corn; And grasshoppers were as thick as they could be."

As Mr. Stratton looked ahead to another year, he saw another burnout in sight. "Oh, it makes me feel so sad, When I think of the luck I've had, While holding down a claim of Uncle Sam's. One crop out of five makes me think how I'm alive, After all these years of famine in the land."

As we look back on Mr. Stratton's writings 110 years later, we are struck by how he captured the ebb and flow of farming in Southwest Nebraska. There are good years, but there are also the persistent problems that he described: drought, wind, cutworms and washouts. Despite the challenges, George stuck it out, raising nine children after his wife died in 1905 when the youngest child was two years old.

Mrs. Larson, who submitted the poem, is the daughter of Edward and Ethel (Stratton) Holmes. Edward and Ethel were married April 25, 1912. In the wedding write-up, Ethel is described in the Hayes Center newspaper as "a Hayes County product pure and simple, having spent most of her life with her parents, Mr. and Mrs. G.H. Stratton, formerly of Fairfield precinct."

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