Franklin County, Nebraska

For Another Day

Researching the founders of our Franklin County is my favorite thing to do. It is especially fun when there is a happy ending as the one I am going to tell you. From the Biographical souvenir, printed in 1890, there is a first hand view of what it was like to live in Franklin County in the 1870’s and 80’s. I will cover the life of Levi D. Hager in the next two columns, and in the third column I will tell you how his legacy will be protected for future generations.

“Levi D. Hager is one of the very best farmers and one of the very earliest pioneer settlers of Franklin County, and is one of the men, who by their enterprise and industry have made the country what it is today. He is one of the few whose lives are full of good lessons, which should not be lost, but preserved as an example worthy of imitation of the coming generations.

“He was born June 10, 1844, at Wallingford, Rutland County, Vermont and comes of good old New England ancestry, being one of a family of twelve children born to Steadman and Sylvia (Davis) Hager, both of whom were natives of Vermont, the former having been born in the year 1809, the latter in 1812. His parents left Vermont and moved to Outagamie County, Wisconsin, when he was but one-year-old, and there the father preempted a quarter section of timberland on which the family settled. On this place our subject resided, attending school and choring about his father’s farm until twelve-years-old (1856), when he emigrated with the family still farther West and settled in Dodge County, Nebraska, eight miles west of where the city of Fremont now stands. His father’s claim was located near a Pawnee Indian Village, and for a long time the family was troubled by the thievishness of the natives. The winter of 1856 was one of the severest ever experienced within the memory of the oldest settlers of Nebraska: and it was during one of those driving, blinding snowstorms, known as the Nebraska Blizzard, that the father of our subject perished. It seems that the was snow overtook him, and not being able—as anyone having experienced a Nebraska blizzard well knows—to find his way home, he wandered about until overcome by the elements and compelled to lie down and die. His remains were not found until six months later, when his skeleton and pieces of his clothing, sufficient for identification, were found lying in the forks of a tree, which had blown down. A small pile of brush nearby indicated that he had attempted to kindle fire, but probably owing to the driving wind was unable to do so. The family being thus deprived of the father, one of whom it had always depended for guidance and support, and the boys being young and inexperienced and the country new and sparsely settled, naturally were compelled to endure hardships and privations which doubtless would have otherwise been averted.

“Our subject remained at home doing what he could to alleviate the wants of the family until twenty-one years of age, when, the balance of the family having grown well up to maturity, he left home to begin life on his own account. He came to Franklin County, June 3, 1871, and preempted a claim on Center Creek, four miles north of where the town of Franklin is now located, in Section 15, Township 2, Range 15 West. Few persons had attempted to settle in the country up to this time, and the few that had taken claims were to be found along the river and creeks. Wood and water were among the first essentials for permanent settlement, and for this reason Mr. Hager settled on Center Creek. His Claim was about half-timber and half prairie, and later, when the country became more thickly populated, he divided his woodland into small lots and disposed of it to other settlers having no timber. His first house was a 16 ft x 18 ft two story log house, in which he lived for seven years. The country was full of wild game (buffalo, deer, antelope and wild turkey) and he had killed many of the former, died the meat and carried it with him to eat, while on long trips or in the field at work. He used to cut up the hides of buffalo into straps which he sewed to lariat his oxen. It was customary among the early pioneers to divide the meat of a buffalo killed by one of them; with all his neighbors, and in this manner the little neighborhood was kept well supplied with meat. For the first few years, Mr. Hager’s nearest trading point was at Lowell, fifty miles to the north, and thither he would go with his oxen over the broad prairie, making the trip to that place and back in four days. There being no water on the vast space of prairie lying between the Republican and Platte rivers known as the “divide” and over which he had to pass, he carried pumpkins along, on which to feed the oxen, thus quenching, in a measure their thirst. In making one of these four-day trips to and from Lowell, he was obliged to camp and spend the night on the open prairie. Let the reader imagine, if he can, a night thus spent on the broad open prairie, with nothing but the dome of heaven for his shelter and the radiance of the stars for his light; with no sound to greet his ears save the munching of the oxen and the occasional bark of a hungry coyote in his swift flight over the prairie in search of food.”

Levi’s first home in our county was three miles north of Franklin and two miles west. Next week we will continue with the special story of Levi D. Hager and follow his next move to higher ground.

The poetry of the dead is never dead. John Keats

Rena Donovan, For Another Day.

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