Franklin County, Nebraska

For Another Day

There are many source books I use for researching Franklin County history. One of my favorites is called The Biographical Souvenir. It was printed in 1890 and is one of the oldest books that make reference to our county and area. It lists many of the prominent and representative citizens and has biographical sketches of many of the early settles families of these counties, Buffalo, Kearney, Phelps, Harlan and Franklin. The Nebraska Genealogical Society reprinted this thick book of 860 pages in 1983. Among its pages are 52 pioneers of Franklin County. This week’s article features a Biographical Souvenir of Elbert S. Phelps:

“Elbert S. Phelps was born in Portage County, OH. June 6, 1847, and came to Franklin County on April 25, 1872, being one of the first to take a homestead in the northern part of the county. There was no settlement then, and there were no neighbors nearer than ten miles, but there was plenty of Buffalo and other wild game. He has stood in his own door and shot buffalo while they were passing. Lowell, thirty-five miles distance, was the nearest trading point. Indians were plenty, often passing his house, and he has cooked many meals for red men. He passed through the grasshopper period and saw some very hard times, but gallantly overcame them. He was married in the fall of 1879 to Miss Ellen Chisholm, a native of New York State, and to this union have been born four children, viz-Carrie, Ray, Guy and Edgar. Mr. Phelps owned one hundred and sixty acres of improved land as good as can be found in the county. He was a democrat in politics, and was well posted in the principles of his party.”

The authors of the Biographical Souvenir write with different expressions than we use today. I often ponder over these frequently used expressions and realize that this must have been the way they wrote during that time period, for I see the same type of language used in the old newspapers.

When Elbert Phelps came here in 1872, at the age of 25, why did he choose the land he did, for he could have had any of the surrounding land? Notice in the 1905 Atlas Map of Ash Grove Township that he took 40 acres in four separate sections, to make up the 160 acres he was allowed by the government. A very reliable source told me Elbert’s home was on the 40 acres in section 11. No doubt he first lived in a dugout or sod house, or both. There is a draw to the south of the present home of Randall Lienemann, which would have made a nice cozy warm place for a dugout.

In 1879, Elbert would have lived in that lonely valley for seven years. When just down the way (I can’t say ‘down the road’ for there was probably no road), to the south on Section 15, was John Chisholm Sr. from Syracuse, NY. With him were his children: John, Anna, Ellen, James, William and Samuel. Elbert married Ellen that same year. John Chisholm Sr.’s other daughter Anna married Newton Phelps who lived just to the north of Elbert Phelps. John Chisholm and his children also lived in a sod house on the site of the now present home of Elmer Adam.

From an obituary card at the Franklin Library, I found a card with two babies listed as being buried in Moline Cemetery. Walter N. Phelps died in 1883 at the age of 9 months, and Herbie Phelps died July 3, 1896 at the age of 8 months, 26 days. The card says that E. S. Phelps was the parent of Herbie. So life wasn’t easy for them and there would have been on celebration on July 4, 1896. Ellen J. Phelps died the following year September 29, 1897 at the age of 38. Fate had them married for 18 years. What a sad time period for Elbert.

I found this statement at the courthouse in a history book that was written for District 22 school saying, “ the remains of old Indian houses on the Sage Phelps estate where Indian dwelt in many years ago. They made their houses by putting many posts in the ground so it made a circle. The posts were about one foot apart. They wove strips of grass and mud in and out between the posts. Then they put a thatched roof on top. They swept by putting sand on the floor.”

An Indian Story

The same school history book says: “A few neighboring Indians came in. The Indians were not unfriendly, merely poorly fed. After standing there a few minutes one of the Indians slipped a plate of biscuits from the table under his blanket and carried them away with him. Many Indian relics have been found on the creek on the old Sage Phelps place. Arrowheads are the most common Indian find, and an old clay pipe has also been found. There are indications that this was a home of Indians for quite a number of years because of the different kinds of Indian relics found here.”

This site of the Indian home is west about * mile west of the black dot that represents a house, in Section 10, the south 180 acres owned in 1905 by S. S. Phelps situated on the creek (note the above map). My source also told me that about four years ago Jack Shively came from Hastings, to this site and searched for keepsakes on the hill above the creek. He had once lived on this section and knew all about this Indian site. Jack is now deceased.

Elbert began to accumulate more land at several points in his life. It is interesting that in 1898 he bought 80 acres in the southwest * on a sheriff’s sale, paying $500.00. Every landowner I talk to in Ash Grove area says the ground is all chopped up into little pieces making it hard to figure who owns what. If I wait until I know everything about a person, I would never get any history reported. So I have many unanswered questions about the early pioneer. Did the baby buried in Moline named Walter N. Phelps belong to Elbert and Ellen Phelps? Were Newton and Elbert Phelps brothers? What happened to Elbert Phelps? When did he die? Did he live out his life in Ash Grove? By 1923, Andrew Petersen owned the Elbert Phelps land. Veda Clements, one of the county’s historians, says we have no obituary to tell us about the end of his life. Maybe it’s yet to be found? Maybe he has a tombstone in Moline this reporter missed. Sometimes we have to take comfort in what we do know and let the future scholars harvest the rest.

If it weren’t for books like The Biographical Souvenir we wouldn’t know this much about Elbert Phelps, or other settlers of our county. This book is good reading and, who knows; maybe one of your ancestors is listed among the 52 people that took the time to talk to the traveling author. It can be read at the local Franklin Library.

“There the hillside slopes down to a dell,
Whence a streamlet has start,
There are wood and sweet grass on the swell,
And the south winds and west know it well;
There’s the home of my heart. Francis Bourdillon

Rena Donovan, For Another Day.

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