g28 HAMILTON COUNTY, NEBRASKA. 



E. S. PHELPS, 



AURORA, HAMILTON COUNTY. 



Stock Farm — Drainage — Fencing — A Comfortable Souse — 

 Stock Raising — Poultry — Wheat on New Land — Prairie 

 Land — Plenty of Water. 



A STOCK FARM. 



I came to this section in February, 1879, from Bureau 

 county, Illinois, where I had a fruit farm, which I sold, as I 

 desired a stock farm. I bought eighty acres on the east half, 

 southeast quarter of section twelve, town of Aurora. I took 

 •the west eighty of the same quarter as a timber, claim, then 

 purchased the northeast quarter, section thirteen, of the Union 

 Pacific railroad, thus giving me a half section of good, rolling 

 land. Beaver creek runs across section twelve, thus affording 

 me water for my stock, while «the grass is several weeks earlier 

 in the Spring, and lasts much longer in the Fall than on high 

 land. As stock raising was my main desire, this creek was 

 ^quite an object. 



FENCES. 



I have enclosed a pasture of about sixty acres, taking in 

 the creek and its banks, with ravines, using red cedar posts, 

 costing fifteen cents at Grand Island, and two wires of the 

 American Barb wire, with a smooth wire between. The cost 

 of the pasture fence, besides labor, was about one hundred and 

 sixty dollars. On the northeast of section twelve I have laid 

 off about four acres for orchard, running forty rods south, with 

 a double row of forest trees on the west ; rows eight feet apart, 

 and trees nearly eight feet in the rows ; trees half way between 

 in the row for windbreak. Willows are on the north and east 

 lines. South of this, ten rods back from the road — as every 

 section line here is a road — is my house, eighteen by twenty- 



