LETTERS OF JOHN D. MOLER, Letter to his sister, dated 28 May 1860 Transcribed and submitted by Marysue Eulitz, (c) 1999 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- KSGENWEB INTERNET GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY COPYRIGHT NOTICE: In keeping with the KSGenWeb policy of providing free information on the Internet, this data may be used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material. These electronic pages cannot be reproduced in any format for profit or other gain. Copying of the files within by non-commercial individuals and libraries is encouraged. Any other use, including publication, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission by electronic, mechanical, or other means requires the written approval of the file's author. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Mineral Point, Anderson County, Kansas T. 28 May 1860 Dear Sister: I know proceed to address you from this far off land. I will try to state things as they appear to me. When people first arrive here they are not generally satisfied. Some stay a few days and then start for there old homes. I can assign no other cause than an excited immagination before the start for this country. Everything appears so strange. There is no mill near here, no good stores, no good school houses, churches not very numerous, no railroads, no canals and nearly all the people strangers to you - no good taverns - In fact everything is in a state of nature or nearly so. We have the wild man and their wild horses not very far off, and then about a hundred miles west of here there is any number of wild cattle and wild dogs and wild cats, wild chickens in great numbers, and all over the prairies we see the elk and deer horns lay around and near the streams we see that the hills have been tramped down by the Buffaloes. In fact there are but a few things in a domestic state that has not its counterpart in these western wilds. A person can see more good land in a days travel here than is to be seen in the same amount of travel probably any other place, in fact I have not seen an acre of ground that would not produce seventy bushels of corn with proper cultivation. Some of our neighbors get fifty bushels to the acre without any cultivation, but our best land with proper work will certainly produce from eighty to a hundred bushels to the acre and other things in proportion. I suppose you understand that this is a Prairie country, in fact the great draw back is the great lack of timber. At least so it appears to me, but the inhabitants of this country say there is timber enough. There is stone coal sticking around among the hills and there is an unlimited amount of lime stone as well as free stone which are used for building houses and fencing, the cost entire for making stone fence is from one dollar up to one dollar seventy five cents a rod, which is only about twice as much as a common rail fence costs in Ohio, and a stone fence is a permanent affair. Iron is used to some extent for fencing, it is used in the shape of wire using wooden poasts (posts). I am building some wire fence at a cost of about 37 1/2 cts. per rod. There is a law to prevent hogs from running at large, which is a great advantage when timber is scarce, as all we have to do is to make a fence to turn cattle. In fact all the fence we need is just enough to preserve our crops as our stock runs out on the Prairie. this is emphically a stock growing country as the country is so well addapted to that purpose, the country is well supplyed with stock water and there is no limit to the grass and the climate is so favorable that stock does well all winter nearly. Sheep does remarkably well, the climate is peculiarly favorable to sheep as it is so high and dry. I was not expecting to see so fine a country. I supposed it was a rather a level country. But is is entirely the contrary, the country is remarkable high and the streams have considerable fall and in many places run over solid rock bottoms. It reminds me of the neighborhood of Brownsville, Ohio, though the springs are not so good as they are there, though the water is as good here as it is any place. It is my opinion that this will be as healthy a country as there is in the world as the country is brought under cultivation and the superabundant vegetation is eat off by the different kinds of stock. In fact there is nothing to make sickness now. I have not seen a swamp or wet place in the territory. Thought the people do occasionally have the ague some and probably we may have it some. There is almost always a gentle breeze from the south which makes the summer delightful and it is the most agreeable place to sleep in the world as the night are just cool enough to make it comfortable with covering on our bed. The people are generally more intelligent than in any of the States that I have been in. I know of but one person in the Territory that cannot read. The people are kind and obliging and during the time that our little ones had the measles there was some of them here every day. There is plenty of good intelligent phisicians but they most all have to go to farming as there is so little sickness they cannot live by there profession. Now if you know any person in you country that are not afraid to leave the place of the nativity and are willing to undergo some privations for a short time and only for a short time, and are not satisfied with making five hundred dollars a year and want to live with a generaous and whole souled people, tell them to come to Kansas to live. They will need some capital, for the land does not flow with milk and honey without preparing for it. In fact I did not calculate to make a living for three years. But people doe well here without much capital. Improved land can be bought all over this territory at from two to five dollars an acre. We bought 160 acres of verry good land for four hundred dollars. There is on it a good hewed log house and there is ten acres planted in corn. Land in a state of nature can be bought for from 78 cents to one dollar 25 cts per acre. In a verry few years this land will be all worth 20 and 25 dollars and acre. So that a person that will invest a small amount of money in lands will certainly be worth five times as much as they invest in a few years. I expect to engage in raising horses and sheep and wool. If I suceed in making a liveing at that, we will do well enough eventually. Your brother John Moler.