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1882 beyond McCook
Monday, February 17, 2014
For some time we have been looking at McCook, from its beginning in 1882. Starting from scratch, those early settlers had to provide everything -- wooden structures to replace the soddies and creek bank caves that were the first homes.
Businesses were either hauled in from Indianola or built from the ground up. Churches were built and a social life took form. And above all, a railroad was built, which provided the spark that the people of Fairview needed to make a new town, a town that served the settlers. Those settlers prevailed by bringing a new industry -- farming -- to what was at that time raw prairie land. The people accomplished this, defying long odds. The weather didn't always cooperate. The Indians were not at all happy with the white man taking their land and livelihood. The cattlemen resented the fences and the disappearance of open land for cattle, to the ever increasing farms of the area.
1882 -- Those were rough times in Southwest Nebraska. Not everyone who came west stayed. Even while admiring those folks who stayed here to make McCook a huge success, one can understand why the western frontier would not have appealed to everyone, and we can understand why some might have preferred the problems of eastern "civilization" to the problems of harnessing a new frontier. Today we thought that it might be interesting to look at what was going on in the rest of America and world at that time.
On the world stage Great Britain was busy consolidating its Empire ("The sun never sets on the British Empire") on continents across the globe, notably in Africa. 1. In March British gunboats shelled Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, demanding that disputed territory be turned over to the British colony of Sierra Leone. 2. In Egypt the British Navy bombarded Alexandria, leading to a capture of that city by British forces, securing the Suez Canal for the British. 3. In September British Forces occupied Cairo, making Egypt a British Protectorate. 4. In November, to quell attacks on British held Nigeria, British warships steamed up the Niger River, shelled, and totally destroyed an Aban village in Niger (Niger is one of the largest countries in Africa -- however most of its land mass is a part of the great Sahara Desert, a most inhospitable land.)
The British flexing of their international muscle did not go unnoticed. In May, the countries of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy formed a Triple Alliance ("for the betterment of the three nations".) This Alliance ultimately led to the start of World War I some 32 years later.
Of course, the weather, as in all years, was in the news. In June a "cyclone" hit the Arabian Sea, causing a massive flood in Bombay Harbor, India, leaving 100,000 dead.
Sports were much in the news in 1882. In baseball, The American League was born, the brainchild of Horace Phillips and Opie Caylor (that is correct, Opie Caylor, not to be confused with Opie Taylor, the son of Mayberry Sheriff, Andy Taylor.) Phillips wanted baseball returned to Philadelphia, and Caylor wanted baseball to be returned to Cincinnati. Teams from both of those cities had been expelled from the parent National League the year before. The AL founders wanted something to give their new league an advantage. What they came up with was a complete departure from rules of the NL. a. Sunday baseball was born, and b. the sale of beer and whiskey at the games, leading to its nickname of "The Beer and Whiskey League."
In May Buffalo Bison slugger, Charles Foley became the first player to hit for the cycle -- a single, a double, a triple and a home run, all in the same game. In September the Worcester Worcesters played the Providence Grays in the game's first Double Header. The promotion was a desperate attempt to beef up sagging attendance. It didn't work for Worcester. The Worcesters played their last two games of the season against the equally woeful Troy Trojans. The two teams split the series, before a combined "crowd" of 31 paying customers. Mercifully, the two teams dropped (or were dropped) from the league after this season.
Cincinnati and Chicago met at the end of the season for the 1st World Series. Each team won one game. A third game was not scheduled "due to other obligations by the teams."
In boxing, bare knuckle bouts were the venue of the day. In February, John L. Sullivan knocked out Paddy Ryan in nine rounds in Mississippi to become the Heavyweight Champion of America. This was the last major bout to be fought under the London Prize Ring Rules of bareknuckle fighting. After this John L. put of the gloves and went on, in 1885, to become the first generally recognized World Heavyweight Champion.
Yale became the first National Champion of College football. Granted, there were not so many schools playing American football in 1882 -- notables, Massachusetts, Navy, Fordham, Richmond, and Yale -- "but the game made up in spirit for what it may have lacked in finesse."
Notable firsts: The Knights of Columbus fraternal service organization of the Catholic Church was organized in March, in New Haven, Connecticut. In September the first Labor Day Parade was staged in New York City. In July, Richard Wagner's opera debuted in Bavaria. In August Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture was first heard in Moscow.
In the world of high finance -- The Standard Oil Co., first organized in 1871 became a secret monopoly in 1882 by combining some 32 separate companies owned by John D. Rockefeller, making him the richest man in the world.
Later, in 1911 that monopoly was broken up into separate, competing companies. In October The NY Chicago St. Louis Railroad (The Nickle plate Line) first ran its trains over its entire system. Evidently, that must have proved something, since nine day later the railroad sold out to Wm. Henry Vanderbilt for $7.2 million.
In August the King of England OK'd "The Married Women's Property Act of 1882, enabling women to buy, sell, and own property in their own name and to keep their earnings. The US Congress was busy. In March, Polygamy was declared illegal by the Edmonds Act, passed by the United States Congress. In May Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, the first (of many) laws governing immigration.
In April Jessee James, the colorful badman of the Old West was shot in the back of the head by Robert Ford, giving rise to the ballad of Jessee James ("The dirty little coward, who put poor Jessee in his grave.")
In February master showman, P.T. Barnum bought the elephant, Jumbo, from the London Zoo and brought him to America. Jumbo had a celebrated career with Barnum's circus, becoming the most famous elephant of all time. Jumbo was large, 11and a half feet tall, weighing in at 6 and a half tons.
Showman that P.T. Barnum was, of course he claimed that his Jumbo was the largest elephant in the world, just as he had billed General Tom Thumb as the "smallest man in the world" a few years before. Tom Thumb and Jumbo became great public favorites, and helped cement Barnum's reputation as "The Greatest Showman on Earth."
From the name of Mr. Barnum's famous pachyderm, the word "Jumbo" began to mean "Gigantic" in popular speech. Later in 1882 Thomas A. Edison turned on the lights in New York City. That was certainly a gigantic undertaking, since Edison needed to invent the long burning light bulb, fuses, fuses, etc. He had to invent the infrastructure to carry power for the lights to various parts of the city.
He had to invent the business model to make the whole project work. To provide the power for the lights Edison built six giant dynamos, each weighing 27 tons. They were driven by steam and each could light 1,400 light bulbs. These big dynamos were affectionately named "Jumbos."
Just a few of the things that were going on in the world in 1882 -- events of great interest to the Settlers in the "New Frontier" of Southwest Nebraska. How these settlers heard of these events is the subject of a later column.