When Papa came to Kansas, he worked for ranchers; after marriage, they 
  lived in the Mumford Community.
     In 1895 he helped organize a Lutheran Church in Nashville, where we
  children attended confirmation instruction, staying with friends or
  relatives. A church at Isable was started, later disbanded because families
  moved away.
     In 1902 Papa bought 2 qyarters of land, improving them with a one room
  house, a horse and a cow barn, later a silo near the cow barn. Then a
  four room house, adding five more rooms later, utilizing the one room
  house as a chickenhouse. Another barn with stalls for 8 or 9 teams replaced 
  the small one. It was used for grain bins. He purchased another quarter -
  Blake Place.
     He cut wheat with a binder, shocking or stacking the bundles until he
  bought a header and two barges - he had a built-in crew - his sons. Henry
  ran the header, George, Julius, and Walter ran the barges, Dad stacked the
  wheat. Then the treshing crews threashed the grain.
     Kaffir corn was bound, shocked, topped with a cutter attacked to the
  hayrack. This kaffir was fed to chickens, ducks, and geese. Some corn and
  cane were ensiled. Some corn left standing, shucked, shelled and ground as
  was oats, for cowfeed and horses. A cement silo still stands as a silent
  sentinal of a bygone era. Many meals were prepared and served to threshing
  and silo crews.
     Mama's project was a few milk cows. We kids helped milk, separate, and
  churn butter to sell to buy dry goods. Mama sewed dresses and undergarments
  for us girls and shirts for Papa and the boys. Flour and sugar sacks made
  sheets and pillow cases.
     We had laying hens, raised fryers, ducks and geese. We set eggs under hens
  or in incubators, using the young poultry for food - and feathers for pillows
  and featherbeds.
     We canned about 200 quarts of fruit in 1.2 gallon jars, made sand plum
  jelly and apple and peache butter. We carried all water - for poultry, laundry,
  jouse use; if no wind to turn the windmill, we pumped it by hand. We washed
  on the board, boiling the whites, then ironed with irons heated on a wood-
  burning stove.
     There were literaries, box suppers, "Square" and "round" barn dances, and
  party games outside. Mrs. Bently organized Sunday School in North Eldred
  schoolhouse.
     In 1914 Walter took measles after he took 8th grade exams in Isabel, where 
  there was an outbreak - and of course, we all followed suit, 9 of us at one
  time, in bed upstairs. Mama was expecting, so her sister "helped out". None
  of the stairs wore out from the use!
     In 1915 Henry took a claim in Harlem, Montana, and lived in a one room
  shanty. He nearly froze walking for supplies. George joined him later.
     In WWI Henry reported to Walla Walla, Washington - and George to Ft. Sill,
  Oklahoma, with the expeditionary forces of the 35th. He served in France in
  the battle of Verdun. Herman served in WWII in Las Vegas, New Mexico.
     Papa wasn't inclined to use motorized vehicles for conveyance or tilling
  soil. The Lord saved him embarassment by taking him until Himself in 1925.
     We were 1st. generation Americans by our parents.
                
     Source:Chosen Land - Barber County, Kansas,  pg. 165  
     Submitted by: Aurelia Lehner.