Misc. Notes
1900 Census: Burton Pct., Keya Paha Co., NE (with John H. Myers).
1910 & 1920 Census: Holt Pct., Keya Paha Co., NE.
Has bio in "Pioneer Stories of Brown, Keya Paha and Rock Counties in
Nebraska" -- Brown County Historical Society (1980). (It has mistakes in it.)
Ed developed the IVI Ranch in Keya Paha County, which he ran until poor health
forced his retirement in 1929. He moved to Ainsworth that year and later
served one term on the Ainsworth City Council.
3The book listed the person whom contributed this story at Edwin but I think it was Edward Heineman III.
Edwin Heineman, Ainsworth:
It was in the spring of 1884 that my father moved his family from Ransom, Illinois, to what is now Keya Paha county. He filed on a claim on Jewett Creek. It was on this homestead that my mother, sister and myself were living at the time of the storm, my father having passed away two years before.
My grandparents, the Kondidus Ruther family were living on a homestead joining ours - their house being about a quarter of a mile up the creek. Jewett Creek ran through a canyon which was heavily covered with timber and underbrush.
I was a small boy at the time but I well remember the morning of January 12, which dawned clear and warm. Aside from the barn-yard sounds there was a death-like stillness in the air. Then, without warning, a cold wind arose and the storm was on, filling the air with whirling snow.
Mother realized at once that she had made a mistake in turning her four milch (milk) cows out to graze, as it would be impossible to find them in the canyons in such a storm.
A young man by the name of William Switzer from Illinois was spending the winter at my grandfather's home. Soon after the storm struck they began to feel concerned about the welfare of my mother and her two children in the log cabin on the east bank of the creek. Switzer volunteered to come down the canyon through the timber and see how we were faring as to fuel, care of stock, etc.
When he arrived he found us well prepared, but as for the cows, they were gone.
William Switzer insisted that he go to look for the cows but mother tried to warn him of the danger of getting lost in the storm. However, he was determined and he started out about ten in the forenoon.
It was two days later that we heard of his whereabouts. He wandered about the country for more than eight hours, saying to himself; "I'm freezing. I know I can't last much longer, but I must keep moving as long as I can." He had traveled all that day and part of the night when he wandered into the yard of Clint Van Houten, about five miles from our house. Of course he had traveled many more miles than that, being lost.
The light from the lamp in Van Houten's window attracted his attention and saved his life.
He worked his way toward it, reached the door and stumbled in, exhausted. They rubbed his frozen face, hands and feet with snow and cared for him until the storm abated. Then he was moved to grandfather's house where the best the country afforded was given him. Eventually he was able to go back to his home in Illinois. When he left he said: "The West! Never again for me!" and as far as I know he never came west again.
A few days later our cows were located in a deep canyon where they had found protection. They were gaunt and dazed but otherwise unhurt except that their backs were crusted over with an inch or more of ice.
About five miles from us occurred another tragedy. A Mrs. Chandler had been helping in a family where there was sickness. On the 12th, when the storm was its worst, she became uneasy about her, own family and insisted upon going home, a distance of about a mile and a half.
They begged her not to venture out, but she did. She started on foot and alone. She never reached her home and her body was not found until the following April when the snow melted.
96