Another Move
Why did the Abraham Schmidt family sell their farm and move from Nebraska to Oklahoma in 1900?
Well, they weren't the only ones who moved. During the fourteen years that they were living in Hamilton county near Henderson, Nebraska, people were moving away. Like many other frontier people in the 1880's the members of the Henderson Mennonite Brethren community were always looking elsewhere for land in order to develop greater farming possibilities. There was the constant appeal of ads and salesmen promoting cheaper land elsewhere. Prices were falling everywhere.
One Mennonite Brethren reporter wrote in 1888:
A quarter of land which sold for $4000 four years ago is now priced at $2500. A horse formerly sold for $150 and now sells for $75...A cow once worth...$50 is now worth only...$20. The reason for this is the shortage of feed for the cattle. Henderson Mennonites: From Holland to Henderson, Stanley E. Voth, 1982.Katharina's uncle Peter Regier explored Oklahoma in 1892. Two years later he reported that four families were planning to move to Enid, Oklahoma, because of the widespread drought in Nebraska.
"There are others who would go if they could only sell what they have in Henderson," reported the Rundschau paper.In Oklahoma, land was cheap. "The land is being sold for $1.25 per acre, the price paid to the Indians for the land," reported the Rundschau newspaper. In the fall of 1893 the U.S. government opened the Cherokee Strip in Oklahoma for settlement. The desire for land prompted many to leave their home and family. Mennonite Life, Oct. 1954.
The majority of the settlers of the Oklahoma Strip were poor, and the harvests of the early years were meager. Many settlers lost courage and sold their homesteads very cheaply or left without the formality of selling. The Oklahoma Land Rush was over but others who had not participated in the rush, including Katharina's uncles Bernhardt M. Regier, Isaak Regier, Gerhard Regier and Heinrich Nickels, were able to buy land cheaply from those discouraged settlers.
But Oklahoma experienced droughts, too. From 1893-1896 the lack of rain produced poor crops, causing many farmers to sell even though free seed was supplied by the railroad. Then in 1897, rains were plentiful, the harvest was good and wheat prices shot up to $1 a bushel.
In celebration of the good harvest, the city of Enid invited the Ringling Brothers Circus to town on September 25, 1897. There were thirty thousand paid admissions.
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| A Circus Act that year |
Enid, Okla. Ter. Saturday, September 25th.(click on the colored type to go to the source) Clear and pleasant. Business tremendous. This is the first big show Enid has ever had. The town is four years and nine days old and is wild about the circus. The afternoon audience was another surprise like that at Beloit, Kan. A good-natured multitude of noisy, yelling Westerners yelled themselves hoarse with enjoyment at the rare treat the big show afforded them.
If you have been paying attention to dates, you will know that the Abraham Schmidts had not yet moved to Enid when the circus came through that year. But I thought that this bit of trivia gave us some insight into Enid. The following story about Enid is also interesting.
Enid 1893-1900
According to Oklahoma by the Federal Writers Project, University Of Oklahoma, WPA 1941: "Enid" was named by a Rock Island Railroad official after a queen in an Alfred Lord Tennyson story. Enid was the site of the railroad station and a government land office set up in advance of the opening of the Cherokee Strip to the "land rush". When the government found out that some Indians (sic) already held choice allotments of the land, they moved the government office, courthouse and post office three miles south, leaving the Rock Island Railroad station behind. Thus a rivalry between "North Enid" with the railroad station and "South Enid" with the government offices began.
Every day the train ran right through South Enid without stopping, until July 13, 1894 when a freight train went off the tracks and into a ditch. It was discovered that the bridge supports had been weakened by sawing. This crisis brought about a presidential proclamation declaring that the railroad would stop at South Enid. On September 16, 1894, a freight and ticket office was established in South Enid, which became the present city of Enid.
Pranks continued even after the government ultimatum. One time "a finely-dressed liveryman was extolling the virtues of North Enid while he was in South Enid. The 'egg committee' greeted him with an ample supply of overripe ammunition. The North Enidian fled under the well-aimed barrage." ibid.At this time the Mennonites that were already in Enid felt the need for a church building. In 1897, they invited Katharina's uncle Peter Regier, to move from Nebraska to North Enid. He became the leading elder of the MB Church with its 30 members. Peter and Isaak Regier and Gerhard Gaede served as the church building committee. Absalom Martens donated a three-acre plot of land. With money from Henderson, their mother church, they erected a meeting house in 1898, about 2 miles north of North Enid and west of the Chisholm Trail (Hwy 81). Two year later Abraham and Katharina Schmidt and their children moved to caddy-corner across the road.
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| Abraham's diary (click on the picture to make it larger) |
Enid 1900-1918
"We left Nebraska on the 11th of June, arrived in North Enid on the 13th," says Abraham's diary. They settled on some land near the Abilene Cattle Trail also called the Chisholm Trail which paralleled the railroad. Eventually, the highway US 81 ran along the edge of the Schmidt property.
Abraham bought 160 acres from Frank Tercell in June 1900. The Tercells held part of the $2500 price as a mortgage. Abraham paid them off in September 1901 by taking out a loan for $650 from the Thorne Brothers Mortgage Col. He paid off the mortgage in March 1905. Then later he purchased another 160 acres from Jacob Friesen.
Between 1897 and 1903 two railroads, the Santa Fe and the Frisco, connected with the Rock Island in Enid. This connection provided the transportation needed to turn the area into the wheat and milling center for northwestern Oklahoma and helped the population to grow from 3,000 to 14,000 between the years of 1900 and 1910.
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| County Courthouse, Enid, Oklahoma |
It was a time of prosperity, and eventually the Schmidts "owned their own threshing machine, matched set of horses and spring wagon, (a) two-story house and large red barn with a hayloft," wrote Abraham's oldest grandson Walter Karber in 1979."He (Abraham) taught his family to be thrifty and work hard...(he) was a very stable man, very sure of his salvation in Christ, much concerned about the spiritual and financial welfare of his family."Changes
The children were older now and were moving out on their own. First to marry was Mary in 1903. She married Jacob J. Hiebert. The following year her older half-sister Tena (Katharina) married Peter Karber. In 1905, before the children scattered to their own lives, Abraham had a picture taken of all nine children with two sons-in-law and a grandchild, the baby, Walter Karber.
| Back row: Peter Karber, Jacob Hiebert, A.A., John, Henry | Next row standing: Elizabeth, Peter, Jack | Sitting: Tena, Mary, Nick, Katharina, Abraham |
On the 12th of June 1914, Abraham became a U.S. citizen. It took him many years to attain citizenship. He first declared his intention and renounced allegiance to the Czar of Russia in September 1881 at Albion, the county seat of Boone County, Nebraska. Thirty-two years later, September 1913, he petitioned for naturalization in Enid. He returned to court to finish the process in February 1914 but was given a continuance until June due to an absence of witnesses. Finally, he received his citizenship the month before the outbreak of WWI in Europe. His children, of course, were citizens by right of birth.
As part of the World War I Draft, four of Abraham's children, Henry, John, Jacob and Peter, registered for service with the government. The four brothers went to draft board together on June 5, 1917. A.A. was exempt from service since he was a minister by then. And Nikolaus went to Canada to work on a relative's farm during this time. Thinking that he might be called up, Jacob sold his farm and moved with his wife Anna Thesman to "town" where he started into business. None of the boys ever had to serve.
America was only involved in the war for nineteen months. However, there was a strong anti-German feeling in the country, and many did not distinguish between Mennonites and Germans. This was especially true if they failed to go to war due to their religious convictions. Our relatives were somewhat insulated in their community, although those who left the community felt the impact of this conflict.
The move to Enid was an important one for the Abraham Schmidt family. They left behind some a good community in Henderson, Nebraska as well as Abraham's brother Heinrich Schmidt. Remember that Heinrich came over to America a couple of years after Abraham. Heinrich was married with children when he arrived in 1878. Heinrich's descendants still live in Nebraska although many have moved away. I am trying to get in touch just to see what memories and feelings that they have.
But Abraham and Katharina weren't finished with their wanderings. They moved from Molotschna, South Russia to the Kuban, South Asia, to Nebraska and to Enid. Where will they go next?
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