Printed in the "History of chase County' By The chase County Historical Society December 1938

"Early Experiences in chase County, Nebraska of George Banks, Sr."

"I came to chase County on March 3, 1886, along with quite a few other settlers. Most of them later went back to where they came from, except the Gardners and Val and Angelo Hill, who still live in this County. There were two brothers of the Gardners. We came from Iowa to Holdrege on the train, shipping by frieght our horses and farm machinery, wagons and so on. The minister who preached at our church in Iowa told us about this part of the country. He thought it was wonderful, and he was responsible for quite a number of families from there coming out here. It was at Holdrege that we met Val and Angelo Hill and as they said they were coming to chase County too, we traveled together. Most of us who settled in Canby Precinct were Scotch."

"In Iowa I was a coal miner, but had a farm and a man to work it for me. I had never plowed a furrow before coming to this country. I sold my farm in Iowa and used the money to settle here."

"When we arrived in Holdrege there was a very bad snow storm and blizzard, and we had to stay there several days before we could come on. The snow was from six to eight inches deep. The storm finally stopped and we came on the rest of way in covered wagons. We did not have our families with us when we first came out but sent for them later after we were settled a little."

"When we first got here we thought it was a wonderful country. There were many lakes and lagoons and little creeks, as there had been much rain and snow that winter, and just thousands of wild ducks, geese and all kinds of wild game. We thought it wold be like that all the time, but later the water holes and lagoons and creeks dried up, and when it didn't rain the drouths were as bad or worse than now. I have seen cane and corn that didn't grow over three feet tall for lack of moisture."

"A man by the name of Cap Hayes located me and most of the fellows who came in the same bunch with me. We had to go to McCook to file our claims. There were three different kinds of claims we could take at that time. The Pre-emption claim, Tree claim and a homestead."

"A lot of us including Tom and John McGinnis, Old Mr. Holstead, who is the father of Mrs. Angelo Hill, John Alexander, Judge McCawley, Val and Angelo Hill and the Gardners got our homesteads and settled in what is now Canby Precinct. About the first thing we did was get together and build a school house. It was made of sod and is where District #22 now stands. We also organized a Sunday School and held the meetings in the schoolhouse. It was one of the first Sunday Schools organized in chase County. This same Sunday School is still in existence out in Canby Precinct, except that those attending now are the children and grandchildren of the organizers."

"We sent for our families then and built sod houses to livein. Our barns, chicken houses, cow sheds and all out buildings were made of sod. The first houses had nothing but dirt floors and then later we put in wood floors. We plastered them on the inside and many were papered also. I was a plasterer and did a lot of that kind of work. One time I plastered for a family living near Lamar, and when I had finished they said they could not pay me. They had just killed their winter's supply of meat, about five or six deer, which were hanging out in the yard, so I asked them to give me one of the deer for my pay and they gladly did so. There were quite a few deer here then and many antelope, but we didn't often kill any, so it was quite a treat for us, and a surprise to my family when I came riding home with a big deer across my horse. We gave our neighbors some of it , too."

"There were only a few houses in Imperial when we first came. Mr. C. N. Cottrell was here, and Mr. Fliesbaugh. Thomas Mercer had the post office and one of the fist houses in town. Mrs. Cottrell used to bake bread for some of us who hadn't gotten our families out here yet. She was a good cook and a very nice young lady."

"The first house built in Canby Precinct was for a man by the name of John Alexander and was made of sod. It stood about where the Adam Jaeger place is now. The first election held in Canby Precinct was about 1888 and was held in the farm house of a man called Judge McCawley. His place was about where the Casebeer place now is."

"I helped dig the first well in Canby Precinct. Before that we had to drink water out of the creeks and lagoons and we didn't like that very well. After the well was dug the people living around there hauled the water in barrels to their homes. There were no roads then, and when we went from one place to another we just set out across the prairie. There were many buffalo trails, and we sometimes followed them from one place to another."

"All of the supplies here, like lumber, food supplies, wagons, hardware and so on, had to be hauled by wagon. I had some very good horses and did a lot of hauling from Ogallala, Benkelman and Stratton. We got about $15.00 a trip. I hauled some of the first loads of supplies to Mr. Cottrell and Mr. Fliesbaugh. It took a day to get there and two days to come back loaded. We would stop at night about half way back and feed our horses and eat a little supper and stay the night. After our fire went down a little the wolves and coyotes would start howling and would keep us awake a lot. They wanted to get to our horses."

"There were no fences from here to Colorado then, and we had to lariat our horses to keep them from running away. There were many bands of wild horses here then and our horses wanted to join them whenever a bunch came near. We had to go out and simply hold them as much as we could to keep them from breaking their ropes and running away. I have seen bunches of wild horses over a mile long, with a leader at the head of the column."

"After the first year or so times got hard, much harder than any since and I would hate to see anyone have to go through what we went through then. I have hauled corn from here to Grant and then got 10 cents a bushel for it, and have sold hogs for 2 1/2 cents a pound at Wauneta. However all of us early settlers went through the same hard times. There was nothing but prairie and all we had was what we brough with uss"
------December 7, 1938