Franklin County, Nebraska

For Another Day

Just as I was about to end last week’s report on the obituaries, I found one of great interest to me and I didn’t remember writing it down. This one more obituary will tell you about a person who is special to me and I know through the memory of Henry Carney.

Ellis Coburn: Born west Randolph, Orange County Vermont September 3, 1858. Married October 1, 1883 to Ella Middleton of Fort Wayne, Indiana. They had one daughter. The Coburns came to south of Bloomington May 15, 1886, and later to the town of Franklin. Ellis died in 1931.

Henry Carney lived south of Bloomington when he was a little boy and he has told me so much about Ellis I feel I knew him. My imagination thinks of a nice man who lived in a sod house, over by the current Bach Rock Quarry. In my mind, Ellis had dark hair and was tall and stout. He wore overalls of a dark blue and brogans brown lace up boots. Ellis rode in a wagon pulled by two non-matching horses, except when he went to Bloomington to run errands, and then he only used one of them. I really don’t know how or wheat he looked like, since I have never seen a picture of Ellis. But those are my thoughts, unless you know better and can tell me so. I can picture him as entering his one room house from the south door. Ellis lived alone on a farm of 80 acres. The old road that used to be ran east of his sod house. Ellis could see that old road from his front door, as it came down the hill from the south, turned westerly and then straightened out back to the north again just east of his house. I am sure this was how he got to his home after going to dinner at the neighbors. Ellis Colburn lived in the east 80 acres of S.E.1/4 of Section 22 of Oak Grove Township. This is close to where Wayne Bach now lives.

Last Spring, I went to this area on an outing with the Frerichs family. We took sandwiches, chips, and sodas. It was a cool day, but after a long winter it was nice to be out in the country. I don’t think a plain lunchmeat sandwich ever tasted so good as it did that cloudy day on the tailgate of the pickup.

The pickup was full of people and children who squealed at our finding the old Bradshaw place. We tramped around the old foundation and dug for treasure. All the time I was reminded by looking just up the hill a few feet how close we came to not ever seeing these cement squares, porches and steps again. While in the process of blowing up the rock for the refinishing of our Harlan Co. Dam the dynamite had thrown the rock to with in feet of the old homestead.

Up toward the pickup we headed, but I wasn’t completely happy, for I hadn’t found Ellis Colburn’s house, and I wouldn’t be happy until if walked every draw. I wasn’t leaving until I at least looked, so off I went, while the children played on the hillsides. I walked from the Bradshaw ruins east all the way to the east fence where the old abandoned road divided the sections. I was happy to lay my eyes on the road and to walk on it where many a buggy and old cars had made deep tracts in its surface. I was happy to know this old road will be here for all to see in the future because this remote land is pasture and not likely to be destroyed. But I was still not happy because I could not see any sign of Ellis’ house.

Henry had been there to that sod house as a small child and he described its placement to me from a child’s mind, for he had not been there as an adult. The spring day was growing short and the sun was setting and I heard voices calling me “Are you ready?” One voice in particular, the voice of one who knew that land well said, “Rena, Look around you! If the sod house was here it’s now covered with rock. The whole 80 has been mostly disturbed.” So, I gave it up to never be seen, and we headed north on Lost Creek road to our warm homes and a hot cup of coffee.

But, it was just my luck, for the very next Monday I was in Right way grocery and saw Wayne Bach. I told him I had been over in his area and that we had found the Bradshaw place and I supposed he knew where it was all along since he owned this land. He did and also said; “there’s a dug out sod house on the east 80.” So…Ellis’ house was still there and not covered with rock. He told me about it and where to look for it, and don’t you know, I had walked right on top of the hill above it and didn’t see it. Several months later, in late September, I still hadn’t been back to see Ellis Colburn’s sod house. Unless I want to walk a long ways I need a four-wheel drive vehicle to get where I want to go. Perhaps I might see it in snow cover or maybe next spring. So, deep down Lost Creek lying in a draw since the spring of 1886 is the remnants of a sod house of a nice man who loved to be with people and loved the food the Lord provides for us. Ellis’ house is still waiting for me to see it, and I will get there, even if I have to walk.

Someday I will also tell you more about Ellis Colburn, recalled from the memory of Henry Carney.

It is always easier to believe then to deny.
Our minds are naturally affirmative. John Burroughs.

Rena Donovan, For Another Day.

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