Another item off the bucket list

Returning to Nebraska from our Air Force career some years ago, Grannie Annie placed an item on our bucket list. That goal was to drive all the numbered highways in Nebraska. No hurry to complete, just take the back roads when time and destination permits.

This week we completed another segment, Highway 2 from Hyannis to Crawford. The Sandhills through which State 2 runs are a favorite part of Nebraska though it is yet a bit early to be colorful as the grass is just breaking winter dormancy. In a few weeks it will be a treeless sea of green accented by myriad wild flowers. The close in calving pastures are populated by hundreds of mama cows and their babies.

Birds are busy in the marshes with geese paired off and starting to nest. We spotted deer, coyotes and turkeys. Many many rooster pheasants, in beautiful plumage, populate the roadsides though their multiple "wives" remain mostly out of sight. A pair of wannabe daddy birds was fighting in the opposite lane of traffic as we passed with horn blaring. Reminded me of teenage boys with other than traffic safety on their minds.

North from Marsland the landscape flattens and the hard ground is farmed. Then on the horizon comes a line of pine trees through which the road winds over the escarpment, known as the Wildcat Hills, down into the White River valley and into the railroad town of Crawford.

Our destination was Fort Robinson, just six miles west of Crawford for the ninth biennial Nebraska History Conference. For me, Fort Rob is a national treasure. It exemplifies the Wild West that we grew up on, the real McCoy, not the Hollywood version.

Fort Robinson was an actual Calvary post built sturdy and strong around a parade ground large enough to play polo. All is now wonderfully preserved by the Nebraska Park Service. We lodged in one of the adobe duplexes on officer's row, and oh, the stories that that structure could tell. One of the Commander's wives commented that the quarters were as "fine as the big city and that she even had running water for the first time ever."

Of course the buildings are now updated with all modern conveniences, even several made ADA compliant.

Almost all the post headquarters, barracks, officer and non-commissioned officer housing, the huge brick structures that were the horse stables, veterinarian and more are intact and could be functional today if only the horses were added back.

We didn't see a single horse on post but understand that summer offers trail rides and more so the herd must return.

The chosen historians gave their lectures centered on the very last of the U.S. Army and Indian skirmishes. The main emphasis was on the battle of Wounded Knee and a bus trip to the actual battleground was included.

The buffalo were mostly killed off by late December 1890. The Indians were getting hungry on their too small and too infertile reservations then the U.S. Government cut their welfare payments. The Lakota Sioux gathered to demonstrate their frustrations. History gives a hint what might happen today when our government is forced to cut payments to the horde that are presently living on welfare.

Military Intelligence misjudged the Indians' restlessness. Incompetence by the troop commander on the field allowed the body of Indians to mix in too closely to the edgy troops.

Somehow a rifle shot rang out and immediately gunfire erupted everywhere!

Indian men women and children died. Hostile and friendly fire also killed 30 cavalrymen and wounded another 29 more. (Usually the statistics count a few killed in action and many more wounded as in the recent Boston bombing and the West Texas disaster).

Some 150 Indians, estimates range to 300, were killed plus another 50 wounded. It was a massacre, an unnecessary misjudgment as we see now with perfect hindsight. Anyway it was the last Indian battle.

For me, a lecture of particular interest was the subject of Buffalo Soldiers. That is, black troops led mainly by white officers. No political correctness there. In reality there were three West Point trained black officers and all stationed at Fort Robinson. Our lecturer claimed that the black units "didn't have to be better than their white peers; they just had to be as good."

Actually, for the blacks of that day, the late 1800s, the Army was about the only place that they could get equal pay, benefits and respect for doing the same job as whites. Their retention rates were spectacularly better than the whites where desertion was rampant.

Surprising the Indians seemed to especially fear the black troops though it was the Indians that gave them the "Buffalo Soldier" name. That sobriquet stems from relating the curly hair and darker color of the blacks to similar hair and color of their revered buffalo. The Indians feared them because they felt that the army was out to destroy their way of life. That observation was pretty much true.

Those of us in the audience for the lecture series were mostly members of the Nebraska State Historical Society though I visited with others coming from as far as Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts and New Orleans, Louisiana. One of the lecturers was from Canada. McCook resident former Judge Cloyd Clark, Society board member, accompanied by his brother Judge Carlton, was present. Introduced at the concluding formal banquet was Mr. Ed Beganski former enlisted man serving at Fort Robinson from 1938 to 1940. Ed is the father of former Community Hospital administrator Gary. Corporal Ed states that he spent considerable time with a pitchfork in his hand in those days tending to both ends of horses!

What a treat. Storied Nebraska history coupled with a leisurely trip along scenic byways. It is great to be alive.

That is how I saw it.

Dick Trail