IN THE CENTER OF THE COUNTRY.
The Geographical Center of the United States and its Location West of
the Mississippi River--The Center of Population--History of Fort
Riley--The Gallant "Seventh"--Early Troubles of Kansas--Extermination of
the Buffalo--But a Few Survivors out of Many Millions.
Kansas is included by most people in the list of Western States; by many
it is regarded as in the extreme West. If the Pilgrim Fathers had been
told that the haven of refuge they had selected would, within two or
three hundred years, be part of a great English-speaking nation with
some 70,000,000 of inhabitants, and with its center some 1,500 miles
westward, they would have listened to the story with pardonable
incredulity, and would have felt like invoking condemnation upon the
head of the reckless prophet who was addressing them.
Yet Kansas is to-day in the very center of the United States. This is
not a printer's error, nor a play upon words, much as the New Englander
may suspect the one or the other. There was a time when the word "West"
was used to apply to any section of the country a day's journey on
horseback from the Atlantic Coast. For years, and even generations,
everything west of the Allegheny Mountains or of the Ohio River was "Out
West." Even to-day it is probable that a majority of the residents in
the strictly Eastern States regard anything west of the Mississippi
River as strictly Western.
There is no doubt that when Horace Greeley told the young men of the
country to "Go West and grow up with the country," he used the term in
its common and not its strictly geographical sense, and many thousand
youths, who took the advice of the philosopher and statesman, stopped
close to the banks of the Mississippi River, and have grown rich in
their new homes. It cannot be too generally realized, however, that the
Mississippi River slowly wends its way down to the Gulf of Mexico well
within the eastern half of the greatest nation in the world. At several
points in the circuitous course of the Father of Waters, the distance
between the river and the Atlantic Ocean is about 1,000 miles. In an
equal number of points the distance to the Pacific Ocean is 2,000 miles,
showing that whatever may be said of the tributaries of the Mississippi
River, and especially of its gigantic tributary the Missouri, the
Mississippi is an Eastern and not a Western river.
We give an illustration of the point which competent surveyors and
engineers tell us is the exact geographical center of the United States
proper. The monument standing in the center of this great country is
surrounded by an iron railing, and is visited again and again by
tourists, who find it difficult to believe the fact that a point
apparently so far western is really central. The center of the United
States has gone west with the absorption of territory, and the Louisiana
purchase, the centenary of which we shall shortly celebrate, had a great
effect on the location.
The center of population has moved less spasmodically, but with great
regularity. A hundred years ago the City of Baltimore was the center of
population, and it was not until the middle of the century that Ohio
boasted of owning the population center. For some twenty years it
remained near Cincinnati, but during the '80s it went as far as
Columbus, Indiana, where it was at the last Government census. At the
present time it is probably twenty or thirty miles west of Columbus, and
in the near future Fort Riley will be the population, as well as the
geographical, center.
Fort Riley is an interesting spot for civilian and soldier alike. Having
been selected by the Government as the permanent training school for the
two mounted branches of the service--the cavalry and light
artillery--its 21,000 acres have been improved at lavish expense. It
seems really remarkable that so metropolitan a bit of ground could be
found out on the plains, where, though civilization is making rapid
strides, and the luxuries of wealth are being acquired by the advancing
population, it is unusual to find macadamized streets and buildings that
can harbor a regiment and still not be crowded. Yet such are some of the
characteristics of Fort Riley Reservation, and the newness of it all is
the best evidence of the interest the War Department has taken in its
development. Many of the recently erected buildings would grace the
capital itself. Nearly $1,000,000 have been expended in the past four
years in new structures, all of magnesia limestone, and built along the
lines of the most approved modern architecture, and of a character which
insures scores of years of usefulness.
The fort is situated on the left bank of the Kansas River, near the
junction of the Republican and Smoky Hill Forks. It was first laid out
in 1852, and has ever since been one of the leading Western posts.
Located, though it is, far out on the Kansas prairies, it has,
particularly in late years, been fully in touch with the social life of
the East, through the addition of new officers and the interchange of
post courtesies.
The post, as it stands to-day, consists of officers' quarters, artillery
and cavalry barracks, administration buildings, sheds, hospital,
dispensary, etc., scattered over 150 acres of ground. The Kansas River
is formed just southwest of it by the union of the Smoky Hill and
Republican Forks, and the topography for practice and sightseeing could
not be surpassed in the State. Five miles of macadamized streets,
150,000 feet of stone and gravel walks, six miles of sewers, four miles
of water and steam heating pipes, leading to every room of each of the
sixty buildings, make up the equipment, which is, of course, of the
highest quality throughout. All the stone is quarried on the
reservation, and is of lasting variety, and makes buildings which bear a
truly substantial appearance. The Government has an idea toward
permanency in its improvements.
The history of Fort Riley has been one of vicissitudes. When it was laid
out in 1852, it was at first called Camp Center, but was changed to its
present name by order of the War Department in honor of General B. C.
Riley. In 1855, the fort suffered from Asiatic cholera, and Major E. A.
Ogden, one of the original commissioners who laid out the reservation,
who was staying there, nursed the soldiers with a heroic attachment to
duty, and himself fell a victim to the disease. A handsome monument
marks his resting place. He was a true soldier hero, and his name is
still spoken in reverence by the attaches of the post.
Another notable feature of the reservation is the dismantled rock wall
to the east of the fort, which is all that now remains of the once
ambitious capitol building of the State of Kansas. It has a strange
history, being the "Pawnee House," in which the Territorial Legislature
met in the early ante-bellum days, confident of protection by the
soldiers from the roaming Indian bands infesting the prairies.
A famous dweller at the fort for two decades was old Comanche, the only
living creature to escape from the Custer massacre on the side of the
Government. He was the horse ridden by an officer in that memorable
fight, and by miracle escaped, after having seven balls fired into him.
He was found roaming over the prairie, after the massacre, and was
ordered put on the retired list, and stationed at Fort Riley, where for
twenty years he was petted and cared for, but never ridden. His only
service was to be led in processions of ceremony, draped in mourning.
Now that he is dead, his body has been preserved with the taxidermist's
best skill, and is one of the State's most noted relics.
The fort has been of unusual interest of late. In addition to the
maneuvers of the school for mounted service, in which the soldiers have
been regularly drilled, engaging in sham battles, throwing up mimic
fortifications, fording the rivers, etc., the War Signal Service has
been conducting some interesting experiments. The Signal Service has had
its huge balloon, which was exhibited at the World's Fair, at the post,
and its ascensions and the operations put in practice have proved very
attractive and instructive.
The new riding hall, or cavalry practice building, makes it possible for
the training school to go on the year round, regardless of the weather.
It has an open floor space 300 feet long and 100 feet wide, making it an
admirable room for the purpose.
The Fort Riley troops are always called on when there is trouble in the
West. They have put down a dozen Indian uprisings on the plains, and
only a few months ago were sent for to keep order in Chicago during the
railway strikes. From this trip, four old members of the post were
brought back dead, having met their fate in the bursting of a caisson,
while marching along a paved street.
The fort is the great pleasure resort of Kansas. The late commanding
officer, Colonel Forsyth, now General Forsyth, is much given to
hospitality, and the people of the State take great pride in the post's
advancement and its victories. During the summer, on several occasions,
the national holidays especially, the soldiers "receive," and excursion
trains bring hundreds of visitors from every direction, who are
delighted to feast their eyes on real cannon, uniforms and shoulder
straps. They are entertained royally. Drills, salutes, sham battles and
parades, occupy every hour of the day, and in the evening the drill
floor becomes a dancing place for all who enjoy the delights of a
military ball.
The history of the fort has been, in a measure, that of the Seventh
Cavalry, which for nearly two decades has had its residence there, and
become identified with the spot. The Seventh Cavalry dates its glory
from before the days of the intrepid Custer, whose memory it cherishes.
It has taken part in scores of Indian battles--indeed, there has not,
for years, been an uprising in the West in which it has not done duty.
Its last considerable encounter was at Wounded Knee and Drexel Mission,
where the Custer massacre was in a degree avenged. Here it lost
twenty-four of its members, and a magnificent granite monument has been
erected at the fort to their memory. It bears the names of those who
fell, and tells briefly the story of their bravery.
In the Wounded Knee battle, on the plains of Dakota, during the closing
days of 1891, the four troops of the regiment were treacherously
surprised by the Sioux, and because, after the attack, Colonel Forsyth
ordered a charge, resulting in the killing of many of the savages, he
was suspended by his superior officer, General Miles, for disobedience
of orders, which were not to fire on the enemy. An investigation,
however, amply justified his action, and he was reinstated in charge of
his post as before. Early in November, 1894, on the promotion of General
McCook to be Major General, Colonel Forsyth stepped up to the Brigadier
Generalship, and his place at Fort Riley will be taken by Colonel
Sumner. There is a rumor, however, in army circles, that the old Seventh
will be stationed in the far Northwest, and the Fifth Cavalry will
succeed it as resident regiment here. The post has become so closely
identified with the fortunes of the former regiment that it will seem
strange to have any other troops call it home.
There are usually at the fort three squadrons of cavalry, of four troops
each, and five batteries of light artillery, engaged in the maneuvers of
the school for mounted service, which has its headquarters for the
entire army here. The principal object of this school is instruction in
the combined operations of the cavalry and light artillery, and this
object is kept steadily in view. The troops of each arm form a
sub-school, and are instructed nine months in the year in their own arm,
preparatory to the three months of combined operations. Thus the
batteries are frequently practiced in road marching in rapid gaits; the
Kansas River is often forded; rough hills are climbed at "double quick,"
and guns are brought to action on all sorts of difficult ground, with
the result that, when the combined operations begin, the batteries may
be maneuvered over all kinds of obstacles.
Among the plans of the future is one, which was a favorite with General
Sheridan, of making Fort Riley the horse-furnishing headquarters for the
entire army. The location being so central, it insures the nearest
approach to perfect acclimation of animals sent to any part of the
Union. Two plans are being contemplated for the accomplishment of this
object. One is to make it a breeding station; the other is to simply
make it a purchasing station, which shall buy of the farmers of the West
the horses needed by the army, and train the animals for regular use
before sending them to the various posts.
Present plans also include an increase in the number of soldiers
stationed at Fort Riley to 3,000. If the proposed increase in the
standing army is carried out, there may be more than that. The
Government evidently has faith in the location of the fort. While it has
abandoned and consolidated other stations, it has all the time been
increasing its expenditures here, and the estimates for the next year
aggregate expenditures of over $500,000, provided the Appropriation
Committee does its duty. There are plans of still further beautifying
the grounds, and the addition of more turnpikes and macadamized roads.
The State of Kansas, and especially Geary and Riley Counties, in which
the fort is situated, reap a considerable benefit from its location. The
perishable produce of the commissary department comes from the country
around. Hundreds of horses are bought at round prices, while the soldier
trade has sent Junction City, four miles west, ahead of all competitors
in Central Kansas for volume of business and population. Naturally,
Kansas is glad to see Fort Riley a permanency, and hopes that it may be
made the Government's chief Western post.
Kansas has been spoken of as the most wonderful State in the Union, and
in many respects it is fully entitled to its reputation in this respect.
It has had enough discouragements and drawbacks to ruin half a dozen
States, and nothing but the phenomenal fertility of the soil, and the
push and go of the pioneers who claim the State as their own, has
enabled Kansas to withstand difficulties and to sail buoyantly through
waves of danger into harbors of refuge. In its early days, border
warfare hindered development and drove many most desirable settlers to
more peaceful spots. Since then the prefix "Bleeding" has again been
used repeatedly in connection with the State, because of the succession
of droughts and plagues of grasshoppers and chinch bugs, which have
imperiled its credit and fair name. But Kansas remains to-day a great
State, with a magnificent future before it. The fertility of the soil is
more than phenomenal. Kansas corn is known throughout the world for its
excellency, and at the World's Fair in 1893 it took highest awards for
both the white and yellow varieties. In addition to this, it secured the
gold medal for the best corn in the world, as well as the highest awards
for red winter wheat flour, sorghum sugar and apples. Indeed, Kansas
soil produces almost anything to perfection, and the State, thanks
largely to works of irrigation in the extreme western section, is
producing larger quantities of indispensable agricultural products every
year.
The very motto of the State indicates the early troubles through which
it went, the literal interpretation being "To the stars (and stripes)
through difficulties." The State is generally known now as the
"Sunflower State," and for many years the sword has given place to the
plowshare. But the very existence of Fort Riley shows that t his was not
always the condition of affairs. Early in the Eighteenth Century, French
fur-traders crossed over into Kansas, and, later on, Spanish explorers
were struck with the possibilities of the fertile plains. Local Indian
tribes were then at war, but a sense of common danger caused the
antagonistic red men to unite, and the white immigrants were massacred
in a body. After the famous Missouri Compromise of 1820, and the
Kansas-Nebraska Act of thirty years later, the slave issue became a very
live one in Kansas, and for some time the State was in a condition
bordering upon civil war. The convention of 1859, at Wyandotte, settled
this difficulty, and placed Kansas in the list of anti-slavery States.
Some ten years ago, after Kansas had enjoyed a period of the most unique
prosperity, from an agricultural standpoint, the general impression
began to prevail that the State was destined to become almost
immediately the greatest in the nation. Corn fields were platted out
into town sites, and additions to existing cities were arranged in every
direction. For a time it appeared as though there was little
exaggeration in the extravagant forecast of future greatness. Town lots
sold in a most remarkable manner, many valuable corners increasing in
value ten and twenty-fold in a single night. The era of railroad
building was coincident with the town boom craze, and Eastern people
were so anxious to obtain a share of the enormous profits to be made by
speculating in Kansas town lots, that money was telegraphed to agents
and banks all over the State, and options on real estate were sold very
much on the plan adopted by traders in stocks and bonds in Wall Street.
The greed of some, if not most, of the speculators, soon killed the
goose which laid the golden egg. The boom burst in a most pronounced
manner. People who had lost their heads found them again, and many a
farmer who had abandoned agriculture in order to get rich by trading in
lots, went back to his plow and his chores, a sadder and wiser, although
generally poorer, man. Many hundreds of thousands of dollars changed
hands during the boom. Exactly who "beat the game," to use the gambler's
expression, has never been known. Certain it is, that for every man in
Kansas who admits that he made money out of the excitement and
inflation, there are at least fifty who say that the boom well-nigh
ruined them.
Kansas is as large as Great Britain, larger than the whole of New
England combined, and a veritable empire in itself. It is a State of
magnificent proportions, and of the most unique and delightful history.
Three and a half centuries ago, Coronado, the great pioneer prospector
and adventurer, hunted Kansas from end to end in search of the precious
metals which he had been told could be found there in abundance. He
wandered over the immense stretch of prairies and searched along the
creek bottoms without finding what he sought. He speaks in his records
of "mighty plains and sandy heaths, smooth and wearisome and bare of
wood. All the way the plains are as full of crooked-back oxen as the
mountain Serena in Spain is of sheep."
These crooked-back oxen were of course buffaloes, or, more correctly
speaking, species of the American bison. No other continent was ever
blessed with a more magnificent and varied selection of beasts and birds
in forests and prairies than was North America. Kansas in particular was
fortunate in the possession of thousands of herds of buffaloes. Now it
has none, except a few in a domesticated state, with their old regal
glory departed forever. When we read the reports of travelers and
trappers, written little more than half a century ago, and treating of
the enormous buffalo herds that covered the prairies as far as the eye
could reach, we wonder whether these descriptions can be real, or
whether they are not more in the line of fables and the outgrowth of a
too vivid imagination.
If, thirty years ago, some wiseacre had come forward and predicted that
it would become necessary to devise means for the protection of this
enormous amount of game, he would have been laughed out of countenance.
Yet this extraordinary condition of affairs has actually come to pass.
Entire species of animals which belonged to the magnificent fauna of
North America are already extinct or are rapidly becoming so. The
sea-cow is one of these animals; the last specimens of which were seen
in 1767 and 1768. The Californian sea-elephant and the sea-dog of the
West Indies have shared a like fate. Not a trace of these animals has
been found for a long time. The extinction of the Labrador duck and the
great auk have often been deplored. Both of these birds may be regarded
as practically extinct. The last skeleton of the great auk was sold for
$600, the last skin for $650, and the last egg brought the fabulous sum
of $1,500.
Last, not least, the American bison is a thing of the past!
It has been historically proven that at the time of the discovery of
America, the buffalo herds covered the entire enormous territory from
Pennsylvania to Oregon and Nevada, and down to Mexico, and thirty years
ago the large emigrant caravans which traveled from the Eastern States
across the Mississippi to the gold fields of California, met with herds
of buffaloes, not numbering thousands, but hundreds of thousands. The
construction trains of the first Pacific Railroad were frequently
interrupted and delayed by wandering buffalo herds.
Today the United States may be traversed from end to end, and not a
single buffalo will be seen, and nothing remains to even indicate their
presence but the deep, well-trodden paths which they made years ago.
Rain has not been able to wash away these traces, and they are counted
among the "features" of the prairies, where the bisons once roamed in
undisturbed glory. It was a difficult task for the Government to gather
the last remnants, about 150 to 200 head, to stock Yellowstone Park with
them, and to prevent their complete extinction.
Undoubtedly, the buffalo was the most stupid animal of the prairies. In
small flocks, he eluded the hunter well enough; but in herds of
thousands, he cared not a whit for the shooting at the flanks of his
army. Any Indian or trapper, stationed behind some shrubs or earth hill,
could kill dozens of buffalo without disturbing the herd by the swish of
the arrow, the report of the rifle, or the dying groans of the wounded
animals. A general stampede ensued at times, which often led the herd
into morasses, or the quick-sand of the rivers, where they perished
miserably. The destruction was still greater when the leader of the herd
came upon some yawning abyss. Those behind drove him down into the deep,
and the entire herd followed blindly, only to be dashed to death.
The very stupidity of the bison helped to exterminate the race, where
human agency would have seemed well nigh inadequate.
Among the large game of the continent, the bison was the most important,
and furnished the numerous Indian tribes not only with abundant food,
but other things as well. They covered their tents with the thick skins,
and made saddles, boats, lassoes and shoes from them. Folded up, they
used them as beds, and wore them around their shoulders as a protection
against the winter's cold. Spoons and other utensils for the household
could be made from their hoofs and horns, and their bones were shaped
into all kinds of arms and weapons. The life and existence of the
prairie Indian depended almost entirely upon that of the buffalo. There
is no doubt that the Indians killed many buffaloes, but while the damage
may have been great, there was not much of a reduction noticeable in
their numbers, for the buffalo cow is an enormous breeder.
Conditions were changed, however, when the white man arrived with his
rifle, settled down on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean, and began to
drive the aborigines of the American continent further and further West.
With this crowding back of the Indians began that also of the buffalo,
and the destruction of the latter was far more rapid than that of the
former.
It was about the middle of the Seventeenth Century when the first
English colonists climbed the summits of the Allegheny Mountains.
Enormous herds of buffalo grazed then in Western Pennsylvania, Ohio,
Indiana, Illinois, Tennessee, and in the famous blue grass regions of
Kentucky. How fast the buffaloes became exterminated may best be
illustrated by the fact that, at the beginning of the present century,
the bison had entirely disappeared from the eastern banks of the
Mississippi. A few isolated herds could be found in Kentucky in 1792. In
1814 the animal had disappeared in Indiana and Illinois. When the white
settlers crossed the Mississippi, to seek connection with the
territories on the Pacific coast, the buffalo dominion, once so vast,
decreased from year to year, and finally it was split in two and divided
into a northern and southern strip. The cause of this division was the
California overland emigration, the route of which followed the Kansas
and Platte Rivers, cutting through the center of the buffalo regions.
These emigrants killed hundreds of thousands of animals, and the
division became still greater after the completion of the Union Pacific
line and the settlement of the adjacent districts.
The buffaloes of the southern strip were the first to be exterminated,
particularly when the building of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe
Railroad facilitated entrance to the southern range.
Aside from the pleasure and excitement from a buffalo hunt, the yield
was a rich one, and troops of hunters swarmed over the Western prairies;
buffalo hunting became an industry which gave employment to thousands of
people. But human avarice knew no bounds, and massacred senselessly the
finest game with which this continent was stocked. The dimensions to
which this industry grew may best be guessed when it is stated that in
1872 more than 100,000 buffaloes were killed near Fort Dodge in three
months. During the summer of 1874, an expedition composed of sixteen
hunters killed 2,800 buffaloes, and during that same season one young
trapper boasted of having killed 3,000 animals. The sight of such a
slaughter scene was gruesome to behold. Colonel Dodge writes of it:
"During the fall of 1873 I rode across the prairie, where a year ago I
had hunted several herds. At the time we enjoyed the aspect of a myriad
of buffaloes, which were grazing peacefully over the prairies. Now we
rode past myriads of decaying cadavers and skeletons, which filled the
air with an insufferable stench. The broad plain which, a year ago, had
teemed with animals, was nothing more than a dead, foul desert."
Mr. Blackmore, another traveler, who went through Kansas at about the
same time, says that he counted, on four acres of ground, no less than
sixty-seven buffalo carcasses. As was to be expected, this wholesale
and, indeed, wanton slaughter brought its own reward and condemnation.
The price of buffalo skins dropped to 50 cents, although as much as
$3.00 had been paid regularly for them. Moreover, as the number of
animals killed was greater than could be removed, the decaying carcasses
attracted wolves, and even worse foes, to the farmyard, and terrible
damage to cattle resulted.
The Indians also were disturbed. "Poor Lo" complained of the wanton and
senseless killing of the principal means of his sustenance, and when the
white man with a laugh ignored these complaints, the Indians got on the
war-path, attacked settlements, killed cattle and stole provisions, thus
giving rise to conflicts, which devoured not only enormous sums of
money, but cost the lives of thousands of people. When the locust plague
swept over the fields of Kansas and destroyed the entire crop, the
settlers themselves hungered for the buffalo meat of which they had
robbed themselves, and vengeance came in more ways than one.
The extermination of the buffalo of the southern range was completed
about 1875; to the bisons of the northern range were given a few years'
grace. But the same scenes which were enacted in the South, repeated
themselves in the North, and the white barbarians were not satisfied
until they had killed the last of the noble game in 1885. When the
massacre was nearly over, a few isolated herds were collected and
transported to Yellowstone Park, where they have increased to about 400
during the last few years, protected by the hunting laws, which are
strictly enforced. With the exception of a very few specimens, tenderly
nursed by some cattle raisers in Kansas and Texas, and in some remote
parts of British America, these are the last animals of a species, which
two decades ago wandered in millions over the vast prairies of the West.