The Nebraska Farmer turns 165 years old this October, and I think we don’t look a day over 160. That said, it is interesting to look back to old issues of the magazine, particularly our centennial special issue from Jan. 17, 1959, for insights into the history of the magazine and, really, the history of Nebraska agriculture.

On page 70 of that special issue, we found a three-page “Letter to the Editor” written by Clayt Radcliffe of Sidney, Neb., talking about his early days on the family cattle ranch near the Cedar Creek, not far from Broadwater. Radcliffe went on to graduate from the University of Nebraska Law College, but his formative days at the ranch were on his mind when he penned his letter in 1959.

The ranch story

Radcliffe’s parents moved from the ranch to Sidney, 40 miles away, in 1893, so he and his sisters could attend school. “I could hardly wait each spring until school let out, at which time I would return to the ranch and stay there all summer until school started again,” Radcliffe wrote. “I also spent two winters there between the time I finished high school and entered the university.”

He describes their ranch at the time. “The ranch consisted of approximately 10,000 acres, part of which was government land under fence,” he wrote. “The livestock consisted of approximately 1,000 cattle and 100 head of horses, broken and unbroken, from colts on up. The general improvements were a large stone barn about 30 feet by 100 feet, [and] also a most interesting log house, which was built in 1870.”

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Radcliffe wrote that the ranch maintained a large pack of wolf hounds, kept for the purpose of running down coyotes and wolves. “In order to feed these ravenous animals, I remember the cook each day made several large pans of cornbread and sourdough, which were thrown out to the pack,” he chronicled. “My father had a special large whistle made for the purpose of calling the hounds when we went hunting wolves.”

He also described the bunkhouse, with a large pot-bellied cast iron stove that was made for burning cow chips. “The large hole with a lid on top was where the chips were put in, and there was an equally large hole in the bottom where the ashes were pulled out,” Radcliffe said. “It kept one man busy in the winter, pouring in chips and pulling out the ashes. The cooking, however, was well done over wood fires, as there was plenty of timber on the ranch.”

REMEMBERING: This photo of Clayt Radcliffe playing his harmonica in his later days was run with his letter to the editor in the centennial issue of the Nebraska Farmer from 1959.

Tough winter days

We think today of harsh winter weather and how it affects feeding livestock, especially on stalks or winter range, but in those days, it was a much harder task.

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“There were usually only two hired men in the winter,” he wrote. “Each man had a team of horses, which was used for the purpose of hauling hay. These two teams were always quartered in the same stalls,” Radcliffe wrote.

Loose cattle were fed on open ground along what they called the “hay line.” Two hay racks loaded with hay out of stacks from the meadows would pass up and down the hay line. “The reins of the team would be tied to the front end of the wagon, and the man on the rack would be madly pushing the hay out to the cattle as the team kept in motion,” Radcliffe said. “These men would haul several loads of hay each and every day.”

He closed out his three-page letter by saying, “I shall always be thankful that I lived there when I did, under those early, colorful conditions, instead of now, when everything is so delightfully, disgustingly modern.”