News Articles - Hooker County, Nebraska -- presented by Genealogy Trails

In the arrest of R. W. Mahaffey, a ranchman, of Hooker county, Nebraska, made by the United States marshal's office, the complaint against him made by the other land fraud cases. It is alleged that he swore falsely when he had various entrymen make final proof upon their homesteads within his enclosure.

Mahaffey was one of the witnesses summoned by the defense of Rev. George G. Ware, convicted and sentenced for conspiracy to defraud the government by means of fictions homestead entries. Mahaffey was not used during the trial, but has written a number of communications to the newspapers in defense of the cattlemen and their methods of securing title to land.

In an article published March 3 in one Omaha paper he had this to say:

"For many years but little land was entered in this county. Then a few men established herds and the homesteaders sold their surplus feed to the cattlemen; other homesteaders coming in did the same, some leaving the country after making final proof, but since the coming of the secret service brigade, even a friendly feeling between the cattle owner and the homesteader is sufficient to lose the land for the homesteader and the prosecution of the cattleman."

The Mahaffey enclosure is on the west side of the range of the U.B.I. Cattle company of which Ware is president. The Mahaffey ranch is nine miles long and six miles wide.

He is the father of eleven children, twenty-five grandchildren and eight great grandchildren. In 1835 he married Rachel Walter, who is still living.

In 1846 he removed to Maumee County, Ohio; thence in 1851 to Dallas County, Iowa; thence in 1857 to Lyons County, Kansas, thence in 1868 to Dallas County, Iowa; thence in 1878 to Pottawattamie County, Kansas, thence in 1897 to Idaho, and in the same year to Hooker County, Nebraska, near Mullen, where he now resides.

In 1881 he was apprenticed to a miller and followed that business for forty six years, or until 1878.

On his removal to Hooker County, Nebraska, in 1887, he entered a quarter section of government land, on which he now resides. He is hale and hearty and better qualified for a good day's work than many a younger man.

If there is enough land in the U. R. I. enclosure in Hooker County, when the fraudulent homestead

titles are canceled, a colony of Hungarians from Omaha, men who for the most part have been employed at the smelter and the Union Pacific shops, will take claims and settled upon the land.

The men who for the most part have been employed at the smelter and the Union Pacific shops, will take claims, and settle upon the land. These Men __becoming land owners came to these____ ___ Rev. George G. Ware, president of the U. B. I. ranch was on trial for conspiracy to defraud the government by means of fictitious homestead fillings.

If the colony can not get the sort of land they want in Hooker County. Most of the men who contemplate taking homesteads have been in the United States from eight to ten years, but a number of them did not know their intentions of becoming citizens until Thursday afternoon. At that time, sixteen out of the twenty five members of the Hungarian Society which holds weekly meeting at Lincoln Hall, went to the office of the Clerk of the federal circuit court, and there formerly declared their intentions of becoming citizens of the United States.

A year ago the writer removed from Hooker County, Nebraska, to Carter County, Missouri, hoping to secure a milder climit, a more fertile soil, a healthy county--the best water in the world--a fine fruit growing region "the land of the big red apples" and the "juscious peach;" a longer growing season, and all-in-all a veritable Garden of Eden.

On my arrival I was much disappointed, but was told that a man needed to remain here a year to judge fairly of the true state of affairs. This was reasonable, and I therefore remained quiet as I could the stated time, only to become more and more disappointed as the months went by.

The thermometer went to 15 degrees below zero early in January, and the moist atmosphere caused me to suffer more with the cold than we ever had done in Nebraska with 40 degrees below. With more and heavier clothing, we could not keep warm. We had plenty of wood, a good heating stove and a fairly warm house, too. We could work out of doors "with our coat off" less days than we could in Nebraska. In fact, nearly all of January and February was lost time. We sawed up a good quantity of summer wood and did just what we could be one without wading around in the damp snow or mud and slush. During five full months our horses and one poor cow were eating their heads off on 75 cent corn and $10 hay---the noted "winter blue grass" proving to be somewhere further on over in Kentucky. The wells were dry, the stock ponds (hog wallows) were also dry, and the "everlasting creeks" and the "living springs" are few and far between. Happy is the man who has one!

In the spring we got in our corn, April 1 to 10 and our early potatoes about March 20, to have them all cut down by frost about May 18, the very same that destroyed the Nebraska crops. Here it was worse because much of the crop had the freeze. And in the fall our fist killer frost came just one week later then the frost in Hooker County, Nebraska. We had two rainy seasons, one in June, when it rained constantly for two weeks, giving us much to much water, and one about the lst of July when much damage was done by overflowes and water spouts. Before, between and after these periods the skies were as breezy as they ever were in Nebraska, and in consequence our one "long growing season" was cut into two very short ones and another of the late potato, turnip, or late cabbage kind had any show.

On half the ground planted to corn we had a good crop, which cost--at 26 cents a day for the man, and for the team, more than the corn could not be bought for in the open market. Our potatoes yielded about three potatoes to the hill; our cow peas, six bushels from a bushel's sowing; our garden stuff was not one-sixth the crop of the same in Nebraska. But we got a fair crop of sweet potatoes and a tolerable one of early cabbage, which would not kraut nor keep. We also had a long season but a small crop of tomatoes.

We have no desire to prevent immigration, but we wish no one to come here by our influence hoping to better themselves.