News, Events & County History

Built in simpler times, rural one-room schoolhouses once dotted the Kearny County landscape. These quaint and often crowded schools served the families who lived too far out in the country to attend school in town, and a single teacher taught grades first through eighth. These school buildings were often moved as populations shifted.

Columbia School was one of these schools. Now on the Kearny County Museum grounds, the school house was built north of Lakin in 1893 on the southwest corner of section 34-22-36. It was the first school built in what was then known as District 7, and Willard Miller was hired as the first teacher.  Miller suggested the name “Columbian” as that was the year of the Columbian Exposition, the world’s fair held in Chicago which celebrated the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s voyage to America.

Columbian would go through a succession of teachers as well as students in the coming years as families moved in and out of the neighborhood. There was no school taught there during some terms, and other terms were shortened to as little as four months. According to former student and teacher Maybelle James Gropp, the schoolhouse was moved about 1912 to the NE quarter section of 9-22-36 to accommodate the shifting population, and the “n” was dropped from the name. One-room schools were also often referred to by the surname of the family whose ground the school was located on or by the families whose children made up the majority of the attendance. Columbia was known at times as the James and Bruner school as well as the Greeson school.

Church services, Sunday School, revivals and social programs were also held in the little school building. Pie socials and other fundraisers helped with purchasing supplies and equipment for the school, and books were regularly exchanged with other rural schools to provide pupils with a variety of reading materials. After receiving their eighth-grade education, students took the rural school examination in Lakin. Some went on to attend high school after that while others joined the work force. A few, like Maybelle, returned to teach at Columbia.

Mildred Linder taught at Columbia during the 1930s and recalled how a blizzard made it impossible for parents to pick up their children from school that awful winter day. Students stayed all night in the school house, and to keep everyone warm, Lindner had to make several trips throughout the night to retrieve coal from the outside coal shed. “We weathered the storm, and the children didn’t cause any trouble, but we were glad when the roads were opened about 10 a.m. and their parents came to take them home.”

In 1951, Columbia was consolidated into District 23. A new school building, North Kearny School, opened in January of 1952 to accommodate District 23 students. Columbia went up on the auction block that year, and Maybelle and her husband, Rudy Gropp, purchased the building. Maybelle would later transfer ownership to the Kearny County Historical Society for the whole sum of $1.

Columbia was moved from its location about 15 miles north of Lakin to the museum grounds in 1977, and Lynn Cannon and Harold P. Walker, both long-time Kearny County residents, donated considerable time and labor to restore the building both inside and out. Several others also helped with the repairs and with furnishing the one-room school, and many donated graciously to the project. A grand opening was held May 10, 1980, along with an open house for the Kearny County Museum’s main building. Maybelle was no longer living in Lakin at that time so her sister, Sula James Mace, cut the ribbon to the school. Sula too had not only attended but taught at Columbia. Since that celebratory day in 1980, school children and museum visitors have delighted in learning lessons “of old” while visiting this preserved classroom of the pioneers.

SOURCES: History of Kearny County Vol. I & II; Museum archives; and archives of the Advocate, Lakin Independent, and Garden City Telegram.

The sign in the window of the building at 109 N. Main Street announced “Rotary meets on Monday night at Scotty’s.” I don’t know why I mention the street address because no one knew what it was nor did they pay any attention. The building is currently the location of Golden Plains Credit Union.

Before I get too far, let me introduce myself. My name is Arnold Kash and I was raised on a farm 12 miles west of Lakin. My first contact with the Davis family was when I entered high school in 1946. There I encountered the eldest Davis daughter, the cute and clever Barbara. I was smitten.

Scotty’s Café opened for business in 1947 as a partnership between Glenn and Della Anschutz and Leon (Scotty) and Leona Davis. The Davis’s were the operating partners and the Anschutz’s, who operated Glenn’s Grocery, obviously had visions of the joint venture consuming large amounts of groceries. The café was conveniently and strategically located directly across the street from Rosel’s Recreation (pool hall). The restaurant building had earlier been occupied by the Nash & Davis Hardware & Furniture Store. (On a personal note, while I was gathering information, I learned that this building had even earlier served as a movie house where my parents, Clarence Kash and Viola Miller, first met during Christmas vacation in 1929).

The restaurant served a lot of what today would be termed “comfort food.” Menu staples were meat loaf with potatoes and gravy, macaroni and cheese, roast beef and trimmings, chicken fried steak, pork chops and, of course, cheeseburgers and fries. Every meal came complete with a salad, dessert and a beverage.  Lunch prices were $1.50 or thereabouts. One of the main things that kept customers coming back was Linda McCort’s mastery in the kitchen. Linda could turn out homemade yeast dinner rolls that knew no equal. The rolls were served with most meals, except when Linda wasn’t in the mood to make them, and contributed to many a bloated midsection of the town.

Scotty and Leona were well suited for the rigors of operating the café. Both were in their early 40s at the time and were active contributors to the community. Scotty was a humorous and very likeable man who was the operating partner in the Nash & Davis Funeral Home concurrently while owning the café. Scotty was averse to stressful situations and such matters were routine in the operation of a restaurant. When things got hot at the café, Scotty usually sought the peace and quiet and on occasion, has been known to create it. Leona was an energetic and enthusiastic woman with a talent for organizing and getting things done.

The secret weapon of the restaurant business was four teen-age children – Barbara, Richard, John and Diana, ages 17, 16, 15 and 14 (true Irish quadruplets) and a built-in labor pool. The nubile Barbara waited tables and ran the register. Richard bussed dishes and washed them, later claiming that he washed enough dishes at “Scotty’s” to last a lifetime. John was also pressed into service doing pots and pans, mopping floors and stacking chairs. Diana’s specialty was running the register and chatting up the customers. Another source of conscripted labor was any high school friend of the family who was caught hanging around. You might be there with social matters in mind and soon find yourself with a mop in your hands.

The following is John Davis’s remembrances of the restaurant years. John was around the café longer than any of the others…

“After a year of eating restaurant meals, I really looked forward to the Saturday evening meal. A home cooked meal – regardless of what was placed on the table – to me it was a gastronomical delight! Thanks, Mom, for being such a good homestyle cook.

“One of my staple menu items during the café years was grilled chicken fried steaks. Alas too much of a good thing can have long-term adverse consequences. I apparently used up my lifetime allotment for enjoying chicken fried steaks during the café years.  I attempted to eat no more than three chicken fried steaks in the intervening years. As I recall in all three instances, after one or two bites I regretted my entrée selection.

“Saturday mornings were the bane of my week. My chore – a thorough mopping of the restaurant floor. Stack the chairs, move the tables to one end of the floor, soapy water generously applied to floor, clean water rinsing until all the streaks were eliminated, allow to dry, move chairs to other end of floor and repeat the sequence on the still dirty half of the floor.  My Dad helped me get started but soon found some other high priority chore to occupy his time.

“My Sunday chore was only slightly better than the Saturday chore because it only took about an hour and one-half each week. First challenge, wrestle the dirty commercial –sized pots and pans without getting the front of my clothes wet. The next challenge was to unload the dirty dish containers, scrape the debris into the garbage disposal, pre-rinse the china, glasses and plate ware. I would place the items in soapy water, dive in and grab an item, give a swipe or two with the dishcloth, place item in hot rinse bath, rescue the item without sustaining a burn injury, then place the item in the drying rack. I would then sort/stack the clean dishes, sort glasses, separate the plate ware into four or five groups, deliver items to their assigned places in the kitchen or serving room and with luck get released from assignment before the next group of dirty pans showed up.

“The one positive aspect to that time of my life involves the café employees. To this day I carry a huge number of pleasant memories regarding those individuals. They must have spoiled me as I cannot recall any one of them I don’t think the world of even to this day.

“Life has its advantages to being restaurant dependent for meals. When I got hungry, I ate, and I was hungry a couple of times during the afternoon. Like most children, I had this thing about cheeseburgers, but I wouldn’t slight hot roast beef sandwiches. I got to eat all the French fries I wanted plus fill up on ice cream – make that pie ala mode. Oh yes – pop was always available. Occasionally a steak would show up that was too small to serve to a customer, so I would be offered the opportunity to taste that steak on my taste buds.”

All in all, the restaurant was a cheerful place that became a community gathering spot during the time it was in operation. There were few Kearny County residents who didn’t enjoy a working day lunch, family supper, or Sunday dinner. And it all came from hard work and good eats.

Mike Weber had a serious and somber demeanor and was not known to smile much. Yet, the brother-in-law of Lakin’s founding father was one of the most esteemed citizens in Kearny County. Michael A. Weber was born in Pennsylvania in 1856. He came west to Kansas in June of 1885, settling on a claim near Lakin. In 1895, he married Jennie Farrell at the home of Jennie’s older sister and husband, Mary and John O’Loughlin.

After five years of serving as bookkeeper and clerk at O’Loughlin’s store, Mike went into partnership with John in 1890. All of Lakin was pleased to learn that Mike had become a proprietor of the business. “We feel assured that if the experience and fair dealing are any advantage to purchasers, the new firm  will continue to maintain the old prestige of reliability so carefully built up by John O’Loughlin.” Weber remained in partnership with his brother-in-law for 20 years.

In 1910, Mike had a two-story, 100’ long building built at 109 N. Main, and on Dec. 30^th of that year, The Lakin Investigator announced that Weber was going into business for himself with the dissolvement of O’Loughlin and Weber. Weber’s shelves were stocked with groceries, dry goods, dishes, clothing, shoes and more. While he did a profitable business for himself, Mike sold out his stock of goods in 1916 and retired from the mercantile business.

Known for his honesty, politeness and conscientiousness, Mike Weber served on the school board, as city treasurer, and was involved with the Kearny County Bank as a stockholder, director and president. Influential in the formation of the Catholic Church here, Mike was one of its most faithful congregants. Jennie was active in the church throughout her life and was a charter member of the Altar Society. Mike and Jennie lived a block away from the church, and they were in charge of ringing the church’s bell three times a day.

Mike passed away in 1929, and Jennie died in 1948. They were survived by two children, Frank Weber and Katherine McBee. Their three other children had died either in infancy or early childhood.

After Mike’s closing-out sale, the interior of his mercantile building was remodeled. A five-foot incline and opera chairs were installed, a new piano was purchased, and a machine booth was ordered to make a first-class picture show. A stage and dressing room were also incorporated to accommodate vaudeville acts, wrestlers, and other live performers. Balcony seats were installed in the facility the following year. The Electric Theatre was in operation by July 4, 1916 and operated by the Weber’s son.

In the beginning, silent moving pictures flickered while Miss Nina Yohn sat at the piano providing background music. With a five-cent admission, the Electric was advertised as the “home of the best pictures” and gave four entertainments per week. In 1924, a fire occurred in the room where the picture machine was situated. Started by an oil heater that was used to warm the room, the blaze was quickly exterminated. Though not much damage was done to the building, the picture machine sustained damage and was replaced with another. By 1931, movie-loving people could take in the best “talkie” pictures, but the theatre ceased to operate year-round, and ads stopped appearing in the local papers. The theatre was still operating at the end of 1932, but we could not conclusively determine when it closed its doors. The Lakin Independent reported that the building was sold for unpaid taxes at a sheriff’s sale in 1940 after standing idle for a good time. Leon Davis was the lucky bidder, acquiring the building for $525. J.J. Nash and Davis moved their hardware/furniture business into the building after the upper story was taken off, the roof lowered, and upstairs windows removed and filled in with brick.

In 1947, Mr. and Mrs. Leon Davis and the Glenn Anschutzs opened Scotty’s Café in the building, but then Leon moved his furniture store back into the building in 1956 after the café closed down. After a bond issue to build a new library failed in 1964, the building was rented to house the county library and museum. In the summer of 1979, Carol Cramer and DiAnne Jaeger opened The County Emporium featuring home furnishings and decorations. It became home to Wheatbelt Credit Union in 1983 and has been a branch office for Golden Plains Credit Union since 1992.

SOURCES: History of Kearny County Vol. 1; Diggin’ Up Bones by Betty Barnes; Museum archives; and archives of the Lakin Investigator, Advocate and Independent.

When Ira “Big Mac” McConaughey died in 1936, news of the famed flier’s death was carried in major newspapers across the country from New York City to San Francisco. Born at Deerfield to James C. and Emma McConaughey, Ira had made a habit of making headlines.

Ira was in the automobile repair business at Deerfield with Bill Bechtel prior to entering the Navy in 1918. McConaughey served aboard the U.S.S. Cacique, a freighter leased by the United States Navy to transport Allied personnel and cargo to France in support of the European fighting front during World War I. After his honorable discharge in 1919, he returned to Kearny County and once again engaged in the garage business with Bechtel. Their Santa Fe Garage opened in 1920, and in addition to repairing vehicles, the proprietors also sold automobiles, gas, parts, and tires. The business was located on the east side of Deerfield’s Main Street and later became the sight of Santa Fe Motors.

Even before he was a pilot, Ira made the local news for his prowess behind the wheel. In June of 1920, the Advocate reported that he was a speed king, “eating breakfast in Kansas City, dinner in Wichita and supper in Deerfield. What is the need of an airplane, when a Ford makes these things possible?”

But Ira soon caught flying fever. The Angel Flying Circus was the main attraction each day of the 1923 Kearny County Fair, and less than a month later, Ira and Fred Fulton purchased their own plane from Jimmy Angel who taught them how to pilot it. Before long, Ira was performing with the flying circus at fairs and air shows. His name was consistently in the local papers from that time on.

In March of 1924, Ira was piloting when a crippled Angel plane crashed into a willow tree break near Dermott, Arkansas. Ira and passenger “Sailor Jack” Lewis were only injured, but star acrobat Mildred Bennett was killed instantly. Bennett, 18-year-old Hardtner, Kansas native, was the first woman to transfer from one plane to another while in mid-air, a feat she first accomplished at Kearny County’s 1923 fair.

In May of 1924, the Advocate reported that, “Ira McConaughey was here Tuesday visiting his parents and his arrival was out of the ordinary way, having arrived in his air plane, the first bird man ever to visit relatives and friends in Lakin, by this kind of conveyance.”

By July 1924, Ira was at Texarkana, Texas, and in charge of the flying field there. That October, the Advocate carried the news that he had flown from Texarkana to Dayton, OH, in nine hours, “a most remarkable record” for that time.

Before long, McConaughey was making the national papers. In 1928, he won the free-for-all event at the Newton, Kansas air races with an experimental plane developed by Walter H. Beech of Travel Air Manufacturing (later Beechcraft). In 1929, Ira flew the mystery ship to a world’s speed record of 235 miles per hour for land planes. When Big Mac performed at the Kansas City air races in 1929, the Kansas City Star said he “has traveled faster than any man who ever percolated through the upper reaches of the stockyards.” According to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Ira’s speed record was not broken until about a month before his death.

McConaughey also worked for Swallow Company, Riesser Company, Travel Air and Universal Airlines, and he was chief pilot and operations manager at Central Airlines where he flew a regular run between Wichita and Tulsa. In 1931, he moved to Dallas and became a pilot for American Airlines.

In September of 1932 when three army airplanes failed to locate a crashed airplane in the Guadalupe Mountains, it was Ira who located the wreckage. McConaughey was dispatched from Dallas to hunt the plane and sighted it; then, he landed at the emergency field and returned to the downed plane in a borrowed automobile. Again, Ira’s name made national news.

Ira died in a Dallas hospital on September 26, 1936, after a brief illness. He was 41 years old and left behind his wife of five years, Mary Francis; his mother, two brothers and two sisters. Ira “Big Mac” McConaughey had logged more than 12,000 hours in the air, or approximately 1,500,000 flying miles.

SOURCES: History of Kearny County Vol. II; archives of The Advocate, Wichita Evening Eagle, Wichita Eagle, Sylvia Sun, Kansas City Post, Tulsa Daily World, Atlanta Journal, Washington D.C. Evening Star, New York Daily News, San Francisco Examiner, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, and Dallas Morning Star; Ancestry.Com; Wikipedia; and Museum archives.

Free and cheap land enticed more than one million people into Kansas by 1890. The Homestead Act allowed settlers to claim 160 acres of public land by paying a small filing fee, building a residence, growing crops and living on the land for five continuous years. Filers could also purchase government-owned land for $1.25 per acre after living on it for six months, building a home and planting crops. The head of the household or any citizen or person intending to become a citizen was eligible to claim land. An 1864 amendment allowed a soldier with two years of service to acquire the land after a one-year residency.

Over 80 million acres of public land were distributed through the Homestead Act by 1900. Under pre-emption law, no more than 160 acres could be obtained by one person, but that changed in 1873 with The Timber Act which allowed homesteaders to get an additional 160 acres if they set aside 40 to grow trees. The intent was to solve the lack of wood on the Great Plains. After planting the trees, the land could only be completely obtained if it was occupied by the same family for at least five years.

Many other settlers came to Kansas by way of Railroad Land Grants or School Land Grants. Desiring a transcontinental railroad, the U.S. Government gave public lands to railroad companies in exchange for building tracks in specific locations. Railroads were then able to sell their excess land to settlers looking for new homes. From the late 18th century through the middle of the 20th century, the federal government granted control of millions of acres of federal land to each state as it entered the Union with the stipulation that proceeds from the sale or lease of the land be used to support various public institutions—most notably, public elementary and secondary schools and universities. Persons over 21 years of age could settle on a quarter section of school land, live on it for six weeks, and pay just $3 per acre. That cost was later lowered to $1.25.

Kearny County experienced its first real surge in land seekers between 1885 and 1888. When settlers arrived here, they found it drastically different from the ‘civilized’ areas they were accustomed to. Survival generally took the physical efforts of every member of a family, and only the most resilient souls succeeded in making their “home sweet home” on the Kansas plains.

As lumber was not readily available, resourceful pioneers turned to the earth to build their homes. Dug-outs were made by digging into a dirt bank, and sod houses were built from the abundant supply of thickly rooted prairie grass. Adobe bricks made of a mixture of mud, sand, clay, and straw or grass were also used. Some settlers were fortunate to have access to limestone to build their abodes, but many “settled” for tents, boxcars, small shacks or shanties.

The late Dave Grusing recalled moving to Kansas in September of 1908 with his parents, John and Anna. “We arrived about midnight in Leoti. Put our dogs and our baggage in the depot, then walked to the Jones Hotel about in the middle of Leoti. Herman and Grace and I walked. Dad carried Helen, and Mom carried Martha. We kids were barefooted and no sidewalks, just a plain path with plenty of stickers.”

The next morning after breakfast, Dave and his father walked downtown and “looked all around and saw nothing but open country. I asked Dad where the town is. Dad said, “You are in it now.” All I knew about a town was Salem (Oregon) and didn’t know what a small town like Leoti was like.”

The family’s first home in Kansas was a two-room sod house that belonged to a man who was away herding sheep. They were told they could stay there until he returned.

“Our new life on the prairie was exciting. The pasture north of this sod house had quite a lot of cow chips so Mom, Herman and I would pick a batch every day. Mom would bake the best of bread.” John Grusing purchased a cow for milk and butter. He also bought a shot gun. “He would shoot rabbits and we would eat them. Mother could make the best brown rabbit gravy to put on our bread.”

Then a man by the name of Krohm told Dave’s father that he was going to relinquish his homestead in the extreme northern part of Kearny County, and John Grusing could file on it. The legal papers went through the Dodge City land office about two weeks later. Krohm sold his belongings to John for $1,200. This consisted of four horses, four cows and calves, three hogs, 40 chickens, a wagon, a spring wagon, harnesses and some farm machinery, a well with a hand pump on it, a two-room sod house, a sod hen house, and a pasture fence.

Twenty years after the land surge, some places in Kansas still hadn’t changed much. Dave wrote, “When we moved onto the homestead, it was about as bare as anything could be – no trees, only three hollyhocks close to the dugout and four cucumber vines.”

SOURCES: Kansas State Historical Society; A Case Study of Kearny County, Kansas in the Populist Era by Harold R. Smith; A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans by William E. Connelley; History of Kearny County Vols. I & II; Hartland Herald and Advocate archives; Wikipedia; Center on Education Policy and Museum archives.

William Barringer Logan was living in Missouri and enlisted in the Lyon Home Guard when the Civil War broke out. General Nathaniel Lyon had created the Home Guard in the summer of 1861 to defend innocent civilians in their home regions from guerrillas and pro-South Missourians. Home Guard enlistees were armed by the Union government, but only 10,000 of the estimated 15,000 actually received weapons. They had no uniforms and received no pay unless on active duty. William B. Logan took part in various skirmishes with rebels during his service with the Home Guard.

In February of 1862, Logan enlisted in Company B of the 6^th Missouri Cavalry. This regiment was sent on campaigns to Fort Smith and Fort Gibson and through Indian Territory and Arkansas. After capturing Fort Smith, the regiment then went into Eastern Missouri around Cape Girardeau to prevent General Sterling Price from reaching St. Louis. They assisted in turning the confederates on this invasion up the Missouri River and followed closely after them to Kansas City where Price’s army again turned south. They continued to fight him into Arkansas.

Logan served until the end of the Civil War and was mustered out with the rank of captain. He returned to his farm in Clinton County, MO, but even after the war, hard circumstances beset the farmers in Missouri for many years. Captain Logan was called upon again to fight guerrillas. He organized a band of loyal men to put an end to Ol’ Sheppard and his gang, Missourians who fled to the rugged backcountry and forests to live in hiding and resist the Union occupation of the border counties. These bushwhackers fought Union patrols, typically by ambush, in countless small skirmishes and hit-and-run engagements, but Logan’s group opened the way for permanent peace in that locality.

In 1886, Captain Logan moved to Kansas with his wife, Hannah, and his children, Calvin, Minnie and Kate. Eldest son, William Monroe, had arrived in Kearny County six months earlier. William B. Logan’s years had enabled him to accumulate some possessions and capital so that he did not come to Kansas as poor as many other early settlers. He shipped a carload of goods containing among other things two spans of mules and two cows, household utensils, and about a year’s provisions. He brought with him $1,200 and filed on a homestead in the northern part of the county. There he erected a 34×20-foot soddie with nine-foot ceilings and a 16×16 sod kitchen. All was plastered inside, and a coat of stucco was put on the outside front which gave the Logans the warmest, coolest and roomiest of pioneer homes.

According to A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans, Capt. Logan cut the first crop of wheat and the first crop of rye in the north end of Kearny County. He kept his table supplied with roasting ears, melons and other foods that he grew in his garden. The year 1888 was very dry and with general economic conditions deeply depressed, settlers had very little financial backing and left in large numbers. Nearly all the other settlers had left the school district by the time Logan had proved up on his claim, so he exchanged his homestead for a timber claim relinquishment one and a half miles northwest of Deerfield. He proved that up and continued to be identified with farming in Kearny County and with cattle ranching. When the Garden City Sugar Company acquired title for the site of Lake McKinney which included Captain Logan’s tree claim, he purchased a homestead west of Lakin and moved his family there.

Logan was appointed probate judge by Governor John Martin in 1888, serving out an unexpired term. He was then twice elected to this post. In 1903, he ran again and filled the office for another two terms. His principal duties were looking after the filing and proofs of claims, issuing marriage licenses and performing wedding ceremonies. He also served a stint as editor of The Advocate in 1890. After leaving the office of probate judge, Logan devoted himself to the real estate and insurance business, continuing in that work until failing eyesight forced him into retirement.

The building known as the Logan-Otto building was completed in 1908 on the east side of Main Street, Lakin. Logan moved his insurance and real estate business into the north side of the building in June, and the post office moved into Charles Otto’s side in August. Eventually, Logan’s son Will moved his Arkansas Valley Seed House into the back of the building. There was a common stairway between Logan’s side of the building and Otto’s. The upstairs of both buildings were used for social events and as lodges for such groups as the Odd Fellows, Rebekahs, and Knights and Ladies of Security.

Captain Logan was very influential in local politics and served as chairman of the Republican Central Committee in Kearny County for many years. He joined the Presbyterian Church and almost continuously held the office of elder, and he and his wife were regular attendees at Sunday School as long as they were physically able. William served as a school board member, director for the Kearny County Bank, and held membership and offices in other organizations such as the Odd Fellows, Grand Army of the Republic, Sugar Beet Growers of Kearny County, and Masons.

Captain William B. Logan was the last surviving member of the Lakin post of the GAR and was considered one of the most intensely patriotic men in Kearny County. He died at the age of 90 in 1926, and flags were placed at half-mast in recognition of Logan’s service to his country.

SOURCES: “A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans” compiled by William E. Connelley; History of Kearny County Vol. I; National Park Service; Civil War on the Western Border.com; civilwarmo.org; archives of the Advocate and Lakin Independent; and museum archives.

Summertime is synonymous with fishing trips, fireworks, baseball, homemade ice cream AND watermelon. Who wouldn’t want to sink their teeth into a juicy red Black Diamond when the temps are sweltering? Did you know that Kearny County farmers once grew some of the best watermelon in the nation, and instead of being used for human consumption, a large percentage of the melons were harvested for their seeds?

Vine crops like watermelon, cantaloupe and several varieties of musk melons were some of the first crops grown in the county, particularly on the South Side. They were irrigated with a windmill or a small ditch from the river.  As neither of these two means could supply a large amount of water, only small acreages were planted.  Before long, the need for larger irrigation ditches to supply water to larger fields was recognized.

Water from irrigation ditches fueled by the Arkansas was plentiful, and melon raising became a very important industry all along the Arkansas River Valley. Immense vine crops were grown in the 1890s for the D.M. Ferry Seed Company of Detroit, and it was not unusual for farmers to have 50 to 80 acres apiece planted to melons.

The land was carefully prepared for melon planting with seeds planted in rows some four or five feet apart giving adequate room for the vines to grow and produce the delicious fruit.

Harvesting came in the latter part of August and September. Melons were pulled from the vines and piled in the field waiting for the “melon grinder.” The grinder was an ordinary lumber wagon rigged with a wire-covered reel running the long way of the wagon box. A crank was fastened on the end of the reel at the back end of the wagon, and a knife was attached upright to the reel up front. There was a large box kept full of over-ripe melons under the knife. The man standing behind the box would throw a melon into the turning reel allowing the seed to fall through the mesh wire into the wagon box. The melon halves rolled out the back end of the reels into piles. These melons were fed to both hogs and cattle.

When the wagon box had the desired amount of seed in it, a gate under the crank was opened and the seed drained out into a tank to sour. This souring process allowed the seed to be easily separated from the pulp, making washing the seed easier.

On mornings during melon season in Deerfield, the road would be lined with as many as 25 to 50 wagons loaded with barrels of melon on their way to the Arkansas River to wash seeds. After the washing process, seeds were placed on screened wire frames to dry. The frames were several feet off the ground allowing air to circulate and dry the seeds. Once dried, the seeds were ran through a fan mill to clean them from any foreign substance that might remain on them. The next step was to sack the seed for shipping.

In May of 1896, local papers reported that several farmers had filed suit against D.M. Ferry & Co. After receiving all of the previous year’s crop, Ferry & Co. claimed the seed was worthless and refused to pay the contract price. The farmers, in desperate need of their money, decided to do some investigating of their own and sent a seed buyer back to the company to buy a bunch of seed. George H. Tate of Lakin was chosen to do the job. On Tate’s arrival in Detroit, he made known his wants, stating that he would like to buy a large amount of seed grown in Western Kansas, preferably Kearny County. The seed company told Tate they had just what he wanted, the germination was near perfect and grown in Kearny County. He purchased seed and returned with the evidence in hand. In December that year, the Index reported that all the court cases against D.M. Ferry & Co. had been tried and that the farmers had won every time.

In 1909, 50,000 pounds of melon seed valued at 18¢ per pound were shipped from Lakin. One year later, the price had risen to 20¢ per pound. In 1910, William Logan’s Arkansas Valley Seed House was doing so much business that it had to move to a larger location. According to the Advocate, “the three establishments dealing in seeds and grain have had to enlarge their capacity every year for three years past.”

Although sugar beets soon surpassed melons as the main money crop grown in the area, the Advocate reported in 1920 that big, fine watermelons were being brought to town daily by the growers who found a ready sale for them. In the 29th Biennial Report of the State Board of Agriculture, G.W. Pepoon who lived on the South Side reported that melons in irrigated fields yielded 300 pounds of seed per acre in the early 30s. Both melons and sugar beets took a large amount of water to grow and eventually lost their dominance to feed and grain crops.

SOURCES: 29th Biennial Report of the Kansas State Board of Agriculture; Kansas State Historical Society; History of Kearny County Vol. I; History of Farming in Kearny County by Joyce Kopfman; and archives of The Advocate, Lakin Index and Garden City Sentinel.

John Grusing became a naturalized citizen of the United States on November 16, 1914. He was born in Germany in 1873 and came to the U.S. at the age of 19, settling in Franklin County, Nebraska where he met Anna deVries who was also German-born. They married in 1899, and in 1901, the family moved to Oregon. John suffered severely from poor health which had been brought on by spinal meningitis so they moved back to Kansas, arriving in Leoti in September 1908. After a few weeks, the Grusings moved to their homestead 23 miles north of Lakin where they made a cozy home for their growing family, farmed and raised stock. John’s health improved greatly.

Neither John nor Anna came from ministerial families, but they were instrumental in organizing the Lydia Methodist Church and were both very active workers in its various departments with John serving as a trustee for 52 years and superintendent of the Sunday School for more than 20. The Grusings were respected by their neighbors and were characterized by their fervent faith and devotion. Education was also important to John and Anna. They were determined that their children have a better education than they had and insisted on regular school attendance. John was a director of the Eureka School that their children attended about two miles west of their home.

John played the organ, and the Grusing family loved music and singing. Not only did they sing around the organ or piano, but also while at work. On winter evenings, their big barn echoed with hymns and school songs which were sung from memory while doing chores.

John and Anna had 14 children. The oldest, Gracy, died before she was a month old. Of the remaining 13, four became ordained ministers and three of those served as missionaries in one or another corner of the globe. The other nine served their communities as teachers, church or Sunday School officers, or organists. Their children included sons David, Herman, William, Ed, Henry, Ben and Wesley. Their daughters were Grace Grusing, Helen Kysar, Martha Brown, Alice Geyer, Clara Warrington, and Edith Litton. Many of John and Anna’s descendants still reside in Kearny County.

“We were a happy, contented family enjoying our comfortable home and each other. There was a feeling of security and well-being,” recalled some of the Grusing children in Volume I of Kearny County’s history. Daughter Martha, a missionary in Africa, said her parents “taught us to trust the Lord Jesus for salvation, and to live lives of usefulness.”

Both Anna and John died at their home north of Lakin, Anna in January of 1959 and John in March of 1961. They are buried at the Lydia Methodist Cemetery.

His family and his church were John’s life, and with Father’s Day approaching, we pay tribute to John Grusing and all other fathers who have sacrificed unselfishly to provide for their families and raise their children to be respectful and contributing citizens. One of John’s neighbors once said, “If every man in the world were like John Grusing, we would need no armies and no policemen.”

SOURCES: History of Kearny County Vols. I & II; Diggin’ Up Bones by Betty Barnes; Ancestry.com; archives of the Lakin Independent and Methodist Life; and Museum archives.