This story was published in the Kokomo Daily Dispatch on June 29, 1903. It's interesting on so many levels... social norms, agricultural practices, gender expectations, language, politics, and history, to name a few. The story is transcribed exactly as it was written. For more stories on this blog about other homes in Howard Township (Howard Co., IN) click here
Peace and Plenty and the Spirit of Progress
Mark the Meanderings of Rural Route No. 7 --
Some Stories of the Yeager Neighborhood
Rural route No. 7 from the Kokomo postoffice is as full of crooks and abrupt turns as the life of a professional politician. It doesn't exactly cross itself anywhere, but the man would attempt to follow it without a guide or the friendly direction of the accommodating people along the route would find more difficulties than the department at Washington is bumping into just now in an effort at locating the looters who been doing things in official life which do not conform in any particular to either the spirit or letter of that commandment which forbids stealing, no odds if it be done on a gigantic scale.
But crooked as the route is, it meanders around through some excellent farm lands, picturesque scenery and by the homes of some of Howard county's most prosperous and up-to-date farmers. One would look a long time before a prettier stretch of farm lands and more comfortable homes and cosy surroundings would be found than are in evidence on every hand in the Yeager neighborhood. The homes are modern -- many of them are slate roofs -- and the lawns about them are neatly kept, and many of them as tastefully dotted with flowers and ornamental shrubbery as the best kept premises in the city, where some people imagine that culture and tidy-ness can only reach their broadest possibility.
Modern methods in farming are to be seen on every hand and every one seems to understand that work -- earnest, hard endeavor -- is the saving clause, and that God blessed the world with work rather than having cursed it when He informed our fore-parent that loafing in Eden was prohibited. Every one works and there appears to be no age limit. A few days ago one of the patriarchs of that locality, "Uncle" Jesse Yeager, accompanied by his cob pipe, was assisting in putting away clober hay, and at another farm a handsome young woman whose modest demeanor, hazel eyes and winsome ways are enough to give a young man a pain about the heart, was driving a horse that was drawing hay in great bunches into the mow, and there was no outward evidence that she was ashamed of her effort or considered labor humiliating.
On the Jesse Yeager farm there is a flowing well -- obtained while boring for gas -- that has been flowing constantly for the past ten years or more with a maximum pressure of about thirty pounds. In addition to supplying water on the Yeager farm it has been piped across the road and about one-eighth of a mile westward to the home of A. T. Hutson, furnishing water for stock. In the language of those who bore for gas or oil this well is a "duster." So far it has not been worked to its capacity or all its possibilities harnessed. It has been suggested that it might be made to drive a water moter that would run a dynamo large enough to furnish electric lights to several houses in the immediate vicinity. However, the practicability of this remains to be tried.
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| Jesse C. Yeager home |
On this route are many who, while very busy during the working season, do not neglect to keep pace with the times and are well posted on current events. Few men are better up with the times or have looked deeper into literature than S. S. Lovejoy. He is considered a thinker who can dig below the surface. Recently he has purchased forty acres of land joining his home farm on the west and has just finished inclosing it with a substantial wire fence. In building a home with comfortable surroundings he has an assistant in his wife* that insures success. It is said of her, that in addition to knowing all the details of domestic economy as practiced in a country home, she is a fine judge of stock, and could, if necessary direct the affairs of a farm successfully.
In the Yeager neighborhood, in addition to "Uncle" Jesse and his son, L. M. Yeager, there are John R. Trich, who has a pleasant home with outward surroundings giving evidence of a high order of rural life; Enos Wheeler, recently located there; A. J. Hutson, whose home is a model of neatness and convenience; H. H. Cole, who drives the business of an eighty-acre farm in a business way; W. T. Templin, a thoroughgoing farmer who has the reputation of being quite handy with all kinds of machinery. A long stretch of flower beds in the garden at Mr. Templin's home indicates that there is some one about the place who loves the beautiful -- those splashes of color and that delicate fragrance found only in flowers. While the writer did not make inquiry he suspects that Mrs. Templin is responsible for the pleasing variety of flowers about the place.
To mention all that is deserving on rural route 7 in one article would tax the reader. Some of the many things that might be mentioned are reserved for another notice of this route. Later route 2 will be due for mention in the Daily Dispatch, when we expect to refer to a number of others in the immediate neighborhood where routes 2 and 7 elbow for room at a cross roads in the Yeager neighborhood.
*This references Bessie (Touby) Lovejoy.
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| *Bessie (Touby) Lovejoy |
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| The winding road near the Touby home. |
