The Lone Black Pioneer: Oscar Micheaux Boxed Set. Micheaux Oscar

These people had not made a dollar in the two years spent on their homesteads. At Pierre, it was said, seven hundred crossed the the Missouri in a single day, headed east; while in the settlements they had left, the few remaining settlers went from one truck patch to another, digging up the potatoes that had been planted in the spring, for food.

      One day I crossed the White river and went to visit the Wisenbergers, who lived seventeen miles to the north. On the way, out of forty-seven houses I passed, only one had an occupant. The land in that county is underlaid with a hardpan about four inches from the surface, and had not raised a crop for two years. The settlers had left the country to keep from starving. As I drove along the dusty road and gazed into the empty houses through the front doors that banged to and fro with a monotonous tone, from the force of the hot south winds, I felt lonely and faraway; the only living thing in sight being an occasional dog that had not left with his master, or had returned, but on seeing me, ran, with tucked tail, like a frightened coyote.

      Merchants were being pressed by the wholesale houses. The recent years had been prosperous, and it is said prosperity breeds contempt and recklessness. The townspeople and many farmers had indulged lavishly in chug-chug cars. Bankers and wholesale houses, who had always criticised so much automobilism, were now making some wish they had never heard the exhaust of a motor. In addition to this the speculators were loaded to the guards, with lands carrying as heavy mortgage as could be had—which was large—for prosperity had caused loan companies to increase the amount of their loans. No one wanted to buy. Every one wanted to sell. The echo of the drouth seventeen years before and the disaster which followed, rang through the country and had the effect of causing prices to slump from five to fifteen dollars per acre less than a year before.

      Now what made it worse for Tipp county was, that it had been opened when prosperity was at its zenith. The people were money mad. Reckless from the prosperity which had caused them to dispense with caution and good judgment, they were brought suddenly to a realization of a changed condition. The new settlers, all from eastern points, came into Tipp county, seeing Tipp county claims worth, not six dollars per acre, the price charged by the Government, but finding ready sales at prices ranging from twenty-five to forty-five dollars, and even fifty dollars per acre. They had spent money accordingly. And now, when the parched fields frowned, and old Jupiter Pluvius refused to speak, the community faced a genuine panic.

      * * * * *

      Came a day, sultry and stifling with excessive heat, when I drove back to the claims. Everywhere along the way were visible the effects of the drouth. Vegetation had withered, and the trails gave forth clouds of dust.

      Late in the afternoon clouds appeared in the northwest and the earth trembled with the resounding peals of thunder. The lightning played dangerously near, and then, like the artillery of a mighty battle, the storm broke loose and the rain fell in torrents, filling the draws and ravines, and overflowing the creeks, which ran for days after. All over the north country the drouth was broken and plant life began anew.

      My wheat threshed about eight hundred bushels, and when marketed, the money received was not sufficient to pay current expenses. Therefore, I could not afford the outlay of another trip to Chicago, but wrote many letters to Orlean, imploring her to return, but all in vain.

      During the summer I had received many letters from people in Chicago and southern Illinois, denouncing the action of the Elder, in preventing my wife from returning home. The contents of these letters referred to the matter as an infamous outrage, and sympathized with me, by hoping my wife would have courage to stand up for the right. I rather anticipated, that with so much criticism of his action by the people belonging to the churches in his circuit, he would relent and let her return home; but he remained obstinate, the months continued to roll by, and my wife stayed on.

      I had not written her concerning the drouth, which had so badly impaired crops. I knew her people read all the letters she received, and felt that with the knowledge in their possession that my crop had been cut short, along with the rest, would not help my standing. They would be sure to say to her, "I told you so." The last letter that I received from my wife, that year, was written early in the fall, in answer to a letter that I wrote her, and in which I had sent her some money, with which to buy some things for my grandmother. When Orlean had been in Dakota, she had been very fond of my grandmother, and had asked about her in every letter, whether the letter was kind or abusive, as regarded me. My wife's letter, stated that she had received the money, and thanked me also stated that she would get the things for "Grandma" that day. Neither grandmother or I received the things.

      I was so wrought up over it all, yet saw no place where I could get justice. In order to show the Reverend that he was being criticized by friends of the family, I gathered up some half dozen or more letters, including the last one from Claves and one from Mrs. Ewis, and sent them to him. The one from Mrs. Ewis related how he had written to her, just before he took my wife away, saying that she was in dire need, and wanted to borrow twenty-five dollars to bring her home. Needless to say, she had not sent it, nor assisted him in any other way, in helping to break up the home. As a result, she said, he had not spoken to her since.

      I learned later that the letters I had sent had made him terribly angry. I received a letter from him, the contents of which were about the same as his conversation had been, excepting, that he did not profess any love for me, which at least was a relief; but, from the contents, I derived that he had expected his act to give him immortality, and expressed surprise that he should be criticized for coming to Dakota and saving the life of his child—as he put it—from the heartless man, that was killing her in his efforts to get rich.

      He seemed to forget to mention any of the facts which had occurred during his last trip, namely; his many declarations of undying love for us; of how glad he was that we were doing so much toward the development of the great west; and his remarks that if he was twenty-five years younger it was where he would be. He also suggested that he would try to be transferred to the Omaha District, so that he might be nearer us.

      CHAPTER XLII

       A YEAR OF COINCIDENCES

       Table of Contents

      Although the drouth had been broken all over the north, it lingered on, to the south. My parents wrote me from Kansas, that thousands of acres of wheat, sown early in the fall, had failed to sprout. It had been so dry. The ground was as dry as powder, and the winds were blowing the grain out of the sandy soil, which was drifting in great piles along the fences and in the road

      The government's final estimated yield of all crops was the smallest it had been for ten years. As a result, loan companies who had allowed interest to accumulate for one and two years, in the hope that the farmers and other investors would be able to sell, such having been the conditions of the past, now began to threaten foreclosure and money became hard to get.

      From the south came reports that many counties in Oklahoma, that were loaded with debt, had defaulted for two years on the interest, and County warrants, that had always brought a premium, sold at a discount.

      The rain that had followed the drouth, in the north, as the winter months set in, began to move south, and about Christmas came the heaviest snows the south had known for years. With the snows came low temperatures that lasted for weeks. As far south as Oklahoma city, zero weather gripped the country, and to the west the cattle left on the ranges froze to death by the thousands. A large part of those that lived—few were fit for the market, they were so thin—were sold to eastern speculators at gift prices, due to the fact that rough feed was not to be had.

      The heavy snows that covered the entire country, from the Rocky Mountains to the Atlantic, and the bitter cold weather that followed, made shipping hazardous. Therefore, the rural districts suffered in every way. Snow continued to fall and the cold weather held forth, until it was to be seen, when warm weather arrived, the change would be sudden, and floods would result, such was the case.

      It was a year of coincidences; the greatest drouth known for years, followed by the coldest winter and the heaviest snows, and these in turn by disastrous floods, will live long