37Q PHILLIPS COUNTY, KANSAS. 



ENOCH W. POOR, 



MYRTLE, PHILLIPS COUNTY. 



Started only with Brains — Yoke of Texas Steers — Sod Barn — 

 Cut Millet Recommended as Excellent Food for Young Hogs. 



Myrtle is of itself but a cross-roads post office, in the very 

 northerly center of Phillips county, Kansas, only one and a lialf 

 miles from the State line between Nebraska and Kansas. It is 

 really in the Great Republican valley, being but seven miles 

 from Republican city, the largest village and market in Harlan 

 county, and situated on the Republican Valley railroad, while 

 it is sixteen and a half miles from Phillipsburg, the county- 

 seat of Phillips county. Our soil is a light, deep loam, 

 containing sand enough to keep it dry and warm, and lime 

 enougli to make it extremely fertile. Walnut creek, a small 

 stream fecj by living springs, runs across the west forty acres 

 of the farm, affording splendid water for all stock purposes, 

 while wood enough grows on the banks to afford fuel, all that 

 is or will be needed for years to come. 



In 1873 we landed here, my wife, three children and my- 

 self, with no team, no stock, no farming tools, but a solitary 

 two dollar bill for a capital with which to begin farming. 

 No, I will not put it that way, as both my wife and myself had a 

 large capital of Old Granite State yankee brains and muscle 

 to begin with ; in fact, though without money, Vv'e were 

 chuck full of day's work, which we made available the first 

 year as we had no team to use. However, by dint of cutting 

 hay with a hand scythe, and wood with a hand axe, by the 

 next Spring (1874), I had captured a yoke of Texas steers, a 

 yoke chain and breaking plow. With these I began break- 

 ing sod, and by the last day of June, had twenty-five acres 

 of sod corn all up and looking well, togetlier with a good 

 kitchen garden, so that we flattered ourselves that we were 



