Pioneer Czechs
In Colfax County
Written in 1926.
CHAPTER 10
(Continued from last week.)
hard, the Nebraska prairies being much easier to cultivate. Therefore, we went to Nebraska, and crossed the Missouri to Omaha over the Union Pacific bridge then nearing completion. Mr. Svacina and his wife came too and suddenly Mrs. Svacina cried out: “My, my, my, there is our Martin!” Her four sons, Martin, John, Jacob and Peter, were Omaha pioneers and well known to the Bohemians there. Martin was employed on the bridge work, he welcomed us and took.us to Thirteenth and Williams, where Bohemians lived in a settlement called Bohemian Town, and we refreshed ourselves. Mr. Svacina found us a place to stay. On Sunday we met with a large number of our countrymen, one advised to go to Butler county, another to Saunders county, but Mr. Svacina thought it would be best for us to go to Colfax county and said he would go with us, if we would pay him two dollars per day for his time and expenses. On Monday morning we set out, but we could not find any claims. For four days we walked about in all directions and at least came to the settlement Tabor. But all the better lands were taken, although there was enough vacant land. However, that was being held by people for their relatives. We returned to Schuyler and Mr. Svacina to Omaha. People advised us to employ a surveyor to show us railroad lands and this was done. He surveyed for us 80 acres seven and three fourths mile north and a mile east of Schuyler, on Dry Creek. Mr. Frank Polak also bought 80 acres, each paying five dollars per acre, ten years’ time to pay at 6 percent. We bought lumber from Mr. Frank Folda and each built a house 14x18 feet. The lumber cost $200.00 and the carpenters charged $35.00 each. Mr. Polak’s house was erected first, for his old parents and his children needed shelter badly. We lay down on a pile of lumber, covered ourselves with a quilt to protect ourselves from the falling dew, and slept sweetly during our first night on the Nebraska prairie. However, by midnight a bad storm came up, each gathered what he could and ran to Mr. Polak’s house, where we spent the rest of the night on the floor. There were fourteen of us in all. By July 4th, we had broken sixteen acres. I was seventeen years old, so I worked for a farmer, father worked on the farm and my sisters were in household service in Omaha. I came home in the fall and we made a sod barn, hauling the timber from the Platte river, sixteen miles distant. We paid $2.00 per load. In the spring I again worked for a farmer, for $13,00 per month and father sowed the sixteen broken acres to wheat. When it was about an inch high, a severe dust storm raged for three days and three nights. That was in the latter half of April and the wheat froze to the ground. Favorable weather ensued and it grew again, but when it was again about an inch high, the grasshoppers destroyed it. That was in 1873. However, we got about ten bushels to the acre anyway. That was the way it went until 1879, when the grasshoppers came the last time. In the meantime, one year we sowed forty acres of broken land, the grasshoppers began to hatch and destroyed the entire crop, we had not left so much as a stalk. In 1873 I bought 80 acres of railroad land at $5.00 per acre, ten years to pay. July 17, 1876 I married and that fall bought 40 more acres from the railroad company, at $6.00 per acre and in the spring of 1877, 40 more at $7.50 per acre.
As stated before, we came with Polaks and poor old Mr. Polak met with a sad death. It happened after harvest in 1678. The weather had been damp, the grass grew high in the stubble and the fall was windy, The grass dried and when farmers wanted to plow, they had to burn off the grass first. On October 14 of that year we were threshing on Mr. Roupets’ place. The afternoon was unfavorable as to weather, so we could not continue. About six in the evening the wind died down. My neighbor Mr. Benes (I do not recollect his first name) plowed around his field to the depth of six furrows and set fire to the stubble. The wind arose from the southwest, jumped over the furrows and raced along in a northeasterly direction. Mr. Polak’s father, John Polak, seventy-eight years old, was herding cattle in the path of the fire. His son Frank was not at home, nor were any of the neighbors, all were away earning necessary money. The woman could not cope with the flames and all of the buildings on Mr. Polak’s farm were destroyed. His father, blinded by the smoke, tried to save himself. He ran to the plowed place, but before he arrived within thirty feet of it, the flames leaped upon him and he perished. His wife was badly burned. The next morning, October 15, they found his corpse, the clothing being entirely burned away, except, the high leather boots. Frank Polak saved a horse and a spring colt, but the latter’s eyes were destroyed, it had to be killed. Old Mrs. Polak was severely burned about the hands, she lay in our house a long time. We lost twenty-two stacks of wheat and the corn as it stood. The ears fell off the stalks and were so badly burned that the hogs would not eat it. We had to buy wheat for seed and food. Times improved later but 1894 was a terrible year for drouth. The wheat had just blossomed when cruel hot winds blew for three days I had 85 acres of wheat and got about 200 bushels in all. The year was a notable one all over Nebraska, a special session of the legislature convened to provide financial aid for the sufferers. In 1905 I moved to Schuyler. Frank Polak was born in Kardašova Recice in 1841, died May 26, 1911 and is buried in Schuyler. His family lives near Hartington, Cedar county, Nebraska.
In 1873 the following came:
Matej Bartunek and sons Joseph, John and Frank, John Cech, Frank Cech, Pankrac Husak, Matej Kopac, Jan Koliha and Vaclav Sinkula.
MATEJ BARTUNEK was born in Oparany near Tabor in 1838, his wife Mary Kocourek in 1836, in Cunkov, near Tabor. He died in 1894, she in 1919, both buried in Heun. There were also three daughters: Mary, (Mrs. Frank Molacek); Julia, (Mrs. Emil Dvorak and Emma, (Mrs. Joseph Smatlan.) All except Emma were born in Bohemia. They came to Chicago in 1872 and a year later to Nebraska and bought 80 acres in Colfax county, for $400.00, six miles west and north of Schuyler. After paying for the land only enough was left to buy a yoke of oxen, but they went to work with a will and were rewarded, for they were able to buy 40 more acres. Mr. Bartunek gave his son the farm and moved to another farm of 200 acres, bought from the railroad at $8.00 per acre, where he died.
JOHN CECH was born in Okresice near Trebic, Moravia, in 1850. He came to this country with brother Frank and family and settled on a homestead near the present town of Clarkson. Later he exchanged it for another ten miles from Schuyler, on Dry Creek. He was a carpenter and therefore much sought after in those days of much building of homes on farms and in town. Having proved up his claim, he moved to Schuyler, where in 1879 he married Marie Balata, who was born in Sobehrady near Tabor in 1756 and came to America in 1876. They had ten children of whom five are living: Emma, (Mrs. Gust. Miller,) Matilda, (Mrs. Jos. Kopac,) Eleanor, Marie, (Mrs. Chas. Sindelar) and Helena. John Cech died October 14, 1917 and is buried in Schuyler. He gave his children a good education and two daughters live in the beautiful home he built.
(To be continued.)
