Wild West Podcast
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Wild West Podcast
The Soddy, the Storm, and the Stubborn Will: Life on the Kansas Frontier in 1867
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Wild West Podcast +
Exclusive access to premium content!Get ready to saddle up and dive into the Wild West like never before! Introducing the dynamic duo, Sam Bass and Calamity Jane, your thrilling new hosts for the extended content of the Wild West Podcast. Adventure awaits as they bring the legendary tales of the frontier to life! Step back in time to the vast, untamed expanse of 1867 Kansas, where the nearest neighbor might be half a day's ride away and survival demanded extraordinary grit. Through the eyes of Civil War veteran Elias Thorne, we uncover the raw, unfiltered reality of frontier life that exists beyond the romantic myths and simplified histories.
The Kansas prairie tested human endurance to its limits. From carving homes literally from the earth—the legendary "soddy" with its mud-dripping ceilings and unwelcome snake visitors—to the backbreaking labor of breaking virgin prairie soil with primitive tools, nothing came easy. We explore how settlers like Elias faced relentless environmental challenges: howling blizzards that imprisoned homesteaders for days, devastating prairie fires that could destroy everything in minutes, and the constant psychological weight of profound isolation.
What makes this journey particularly compelling is witnessing how Thorne's personal struggle unfolded against the backdrop of momentous historical shifts. The Kansas Pacific Railway pushed westward, forever altering the landscape. The Medicine Lodge Treaty negotiations attempted to reshape relationships with Plains tribes like the Cheyenne and Comanche, whose entire way of life faced existential threat. These weren't distant headlines for frontier settlers but immediate realities that shaped their daily existence.
The heart of this story isn't about conquest or heroics, but about quiet endurance—the day-by-day perseverance required to transform "free land" into a sustainable home through ingenious adaptation and stubborn determination. Whether it's rationing dwindling firewood during a multi-day blizzard or carefully preserving every scrap of food for the lean months ahead, we witness the extraordinary resourcefulness that frontier survival demanded.
What modern frontiers do we face today that require similar resilience? Where do we need that same adaptability and grit in our own lives? Join us for this immersive journey into America's past that reveals timeless truths about human endurance against seemingly impossible odds.
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So let's try and picture this you step off a wagon onto land so vast, so untouched that your nearest neighbor well, they're maybe a half days right away.
Speaker 3:That's Kansas in 1867, a place of just immense promise, absolutely, but also shattered by some really brutal hardship.
Speaker 2:And today we're doing a deep dive into what that life was really like. We're looking through the lens of one man, elias Thorne, during his sort of make-or-break year on those plains.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and we've got this fascinating collection of historical sources that really sets the scene. You have to remember the context the aftermath of bleeding. Kansas. That whole violent struggle over slavery Still fresh wounds there. Absolutely yeah, and the Civil War itself only just ended. Then there's the huge pull of the Homestead Act, you know, offering land to people willing to work it.
Speaker 2:Right, the promise of free land, exactly.
Speaker 3:Plus you've got the Kansas Pacific Railway pushing west, changing everything, and then this incredibly complex, difficult relationship between the US government and the Plains tribes.
Speaker 2:The Cheyenne, Arapaho, Kiowa, Comanche, Plains, Apache. Their whole world is being upended.
Speaker 3:Precisely so. Our mission here is to get past the big historical headlines and really understand the day-to-day grind. What was it like for someone like Elias in that specific year, 1867?
Speaker 2:Yeah, If you've ever wondered what it actually took, you know, forget the romantic myths to build a life out there, facing the unknown with pretty much just your own hands, and well hope.
Speaker 3:Then this is for you.
Speaker 2:Get ready, we're going to unpack the surprising realities, the constant challenges and just the incredible resilience needed to survive on that frontier.
Speaker 3:It was demanding, no question.
Speaker 2:Okay, let's dive in Elias Thorne. Our sources suggest he was a Civil War veteran. Union side looking for a fresh start right.
Speaker 3:That's right. And crucially, he wasn't some you know seasoned mountain man or frontiersman.
Speaker 2:He was more of an ordinary person seeking independence using that Homestead Act we mentioned. That's a really important point. He's learning as he goes essentially Very much so.
Speaker 3:He might have had some farming background, maybe a trade, but Kansas in 1867, that environment would test anyone to their absolute limit.
Speaker 2:And just getting there sounds like an epic in itself. Riverboat, then a long, hard wagon journey.
Speaker 3:Grueling and the descriptions of the prairie. They call it a sea of land.
Speaker 2:You can almost picture it Just endless grass, that huge sky and the wind, always the wind.
Speaker 3:That constant wind comes up again and again in the accounts. It must have been both awe-inspiring and, frankly, deeply unsettling. Just sheer scale, dwarfing everything.
Speaker 2:Finding his actual claim must have been tough too. Just an unmarked patch in that huge expanse.
Speaker 3:And then boom. Immediate, profound isolation.
Speaker 2:Right, your nearest neighbor half a day away, that kind of solitude.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's hard for us to even conceive of now.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the psychological impact shouldn't be underestimated. It's one thing to choose solitude, quite another to have it thrust upon you when you're also fighting for survival.
Speaker 2:So, first things first, shelter, not much timber, no stone. So the sod house, the soddy, was basically the only option.
Speaker 3:Necessity, but building it incredibly hard labor. You're cutting these prairie bricks from tough topsoil packed with dense grass roots.
Speaker 2:Can you imagine lifting those? Stacking them hour after hour?
Speaker 3:It demanded immense stamina, real persistence. This is where that idea of free land starts to look different, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. The price wasn't money.
Speaker 3:It was sheer physical exertion just to get a roof over your head, very basic roof at that.
Speaker 2:The accounts describe rough cottonwood poles for the frame, layers of brush and more sod on top A packed earth floor, maybe one window covered in greased paper, a door made from old wagon boards.
Speaker 3:Exactly Ingenious in a way, but far from comfortable. It offered protection from the worst of the wind, and sun, sure.
Speaker 2:But porous right Rain meant mud dripping from the ceiling, constant fine dust everywhere oh yes, and unwelcome visitors, snakes, insects.
Speaker 3:They found their way in easily.
Speaker 2:So this free land really demanded everything up front Incredible labor, ingenuity and just the tolerance for conditions most of us would find unbearable.
Speaker 3:That's the reality. The Homestead Act opened a door, but walking through it required immense personal investment physical strength, resilience, adaptability. That was the real currency.
Speaker 2:Okay, so he's got this rudimentary shelter. Now the next huge task food sustenance.
Speaker 3:And that starts with breaking the sod for farming Another monumental challenge.
Speaker 2:Trying to plow that virgin prairie. The roots all tangled together with just one ox. It sounds almost impossible.
Speaker 3:Incredibly difficult. That sod was tough, developed over centuries. Elias would have needed all his strength just guiding the plow, pushing the ox, slow, exhausting work. The land fought back.
Speaker 2:And then planting he tried corn, spring wheat, maybe a small garden patch beans squash.
Speaker 3:Things like that, yes, but there was always this anxiety Settlers knew about past failures in the region.
Speaker 2:Drought was a constant fear, and they were learning about this new environment right. What worked back east might not work here at all.
Speaker 3:Precisely. There was no guarantee of a harvest. You were experimenting really. Yeah, One bad season drought, pests like grasshoppers could mean disaster. They were living right on the edge.
Speaker 2:That's a key takeaway, isn't it? This wasn't about guaranteed abundance, it was precarious.
Speaker 3:Very. And speaking of anxieties, 1867 was apparently a very wet summer. You'd think that's good.
Speaker 2:But maybe not entirely. Damp conditions could mean sickness right. The sources mentioned fevers ague, maybe malaria.
Speaker 3:That's a real possibility. Mosquitoes breeding and standing water. So even good rain had a downside, and always in the back of their minds was the memory of drought like the terrible one in 1860.
Speaker 2:And grasshoppers. Huge swarms mentioned between 66 and 68 that could just wipe out everything.
Speaker 3:A terrifying prospect. The weather was extreme unpredictable Drought, floods, hail, those grasshopper plagues, constant threats.
Speaker 2:So the daily grind sounds relentless, Tending the crops, fetching water which might not even be clean.
Speaker 3:Intamination was a real risk.
Speaker 2:Mending tools that must have broken constantly and just watching being vigilant.
Speaker 3:Exactly no room for complacency. Every single day was a struggle against the elements, the land, the potential for disaster.
Speaker 2:And getting enough food wasn't simple. The sources say cornbread and bacon, with the occasional game and wild fruits, were the usual foods, so hunting wasn't a sport.
Speaker 3:Absolutely essential, especially bison, though the herds were already feeling the pressure from westward expansion.
Speaker 2:But a successful bison hunt.
Speaker 3:That meant hundreds of pounds of meat, a lifesaver, a huge boost yes, Provided meat hides for various uses, but as bison numbers declined, settlers had to rely more on smaller game.
Speaker 2:Pronghorn, antelope, jackrabbits, prairie chickens, maybe ducks or geese if near water.
Speaker 3:Things like that, and foraging too. We shouldn't forget that the prairie offered hidden resources.
Speaker 2:Wild plums, grapes, chokecherries I read Native Americans used chokecherries for pemmican.
Speaker 3:They did. They had incredible knowledge of the local plants. Settlers likely learned a lot out of necessity Things like prairie, turnips, lamb's quarter. They could supplement the diet.
Speaker 2:And preserving food was crucial, especially for winter. Jerking meat, drying it in the sun, smoking it if you could find enough wood, which wasn't always easy.
Speaker 3:Preservation was key to survival through the lean months Absolutely critical.
Speaker 2:Then autumn arrives, the prairie changes color, the air gets crisp, maybe the smell of wood smoke from a distant neighbor, if you were lucky migrating birds overhead.
Speaker 3:A beautiful time, but also a time of reckoning. How did the harvest turn out?
Speaker 2:For Elias it sounds like it was meager. Maybe the corn did okay. Wheat not so much, not enough surplus to trade, barely enough to get through winter.
Speaker 3:Which likely prompted the journey to Fort Larned.
Speaker 2:Right, a vital supply point on the Santa Fe Trail, but also an important Indian agency.
Speaker 3:A real crossroads, military outpost, trading hub center for government dealings with the tribes. For Elias it was a link to the wider world, a place to get essentials he couldn't make or grow Salt, coffee, powder, lead.
Speaker 2:And what a scene it must have been there, especially in autumn Soldiers, freighters hauling goods and delegations from the Cheyenne, arapaho, kiowa, comanche Plains, apache.
Speaker 3:All gathered for the government. Annuity distributions Bacon, flour, sugar, blankets, tools. Part of the treaty agreements.
Speaker 2:And this was right after the Medicine Launch Treaty was concluded, October 67. Talk of new reservations, talk of peace.
Speaker 3:But also deep skepticism. That quote from Captain Barnett's is telling. He apparently said the treaty wouldn't amount to much, that more conflict was inevitable.
Speaker 2:It shows how fragile everything felt. There was hope for peace, but also this undercurrent of mistrust, awareness of past broken promises. Elias likely saw all this firsthand.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. His personal struggle was happening right alongside these huge, turbulent historical shifts. He wasn't separate from it.
Speaker 2:So he trades whatever he has. Maybe some pelts gets his vital supplies and heads back.
Speaker 3:Then it's a race against winter, chinking the soddy walls, sealing every crack against the wind, reinforcing the roof.
Speaker 2:And desperately gathering firewood. Every dry branch, any driftwood Fuel was life. You can feel the pressure building.
Speaker 3:Those preparations were everything. Every small task was a step toward surviving what was coming.
Speaker 2:And what was coming could be brutal. The sources really emphasize the constant dangers, culminating in winter Prairie fires, for instance, a recurring nightmare.
Speaker 3:Started by lightning or carelessness, they could sweep across the plains incredibly fast. Terrifying Settlers plowed fire guards, but often they weren't enough.
Speaker 2:And drought. Even after a wet summer, the fear of drought remembering 1860, was always there, Soil turning to dust.
Speaker 3:A relentless enemy. Then the storms Sudden violent thunderstorms, torrential rain, hail that could shatter crops, even tornadoes.
Speaker 2:But the blizzards, they sound like the ultimate trial, howling whiteouts lasting for days, burying everything, obliterating trails.
Speaker 3:The cold was lethal, temperatures plummeting, that 1859 account from Isaac Moffat Fearful peals of thunder with snow, rain turning roads to mud, unimaginable storms.
Speaker 2:Just the raw power of nature. And it wasn't just weather. Sickness was a constant threat.
Speaker 3:Fevers, dysentery, cholera was around in 66, 67.
Speaker 2:Smallpox outbreaks and no doctors, you relied on home remedies. Maybe some folk knowledge an accident, a broken bone that could be fatal in isolation.
Speaker 3:Absolutely Lack of medical care made everything more dangerous. Even minor issues could spiral.
Speaker 2:And wildlife wasn't just for hunting Gray wolves. The buffalo wolves were a threat to livestock coyotes, a nuisance.
Speaker 3:Rabid wolves were a documented danger too. Rattlesnakes, always a silent menace. Insect swarms in summer.
Speaker 2:It sounds like a constant battle on all fronts, but maybe the hardest part, as the sources suggest, was the isolation.
Speaker 3:I think that's often overlooked. The sheer loneliness, miles and miles between neighbors, infrequent visits, the silence.
Speaker 2:It must have weighed heavily especially on women. The sources mention Homesickness, discouragement, anxiety.
Speaker 3:It's understandable why many people just couldn't take it. They abandoned their claims. The psychological toll was immense.
Speaker 2:Yet even in that isolation, echoes of the wider world reached Elias News and rumors about the Medicine Lodge Treaty.
Speaker 3:Government policy trying to confine tribes to reservations, supposedly for peace, but also clearly to open up more land for settlers. Like Elias, he saw the annuity distribution at Fort Launded.
Speaker 2:It puts him right in the middle of that complex, fraught situation. Skepticism about the treaty's success was widespread, wasn't it? Why the lack of trust?
Speaker 3:Well, there was a long history there Broken promises from the government side, continued friction over land and resources, fundamental conflicts that treaties often papered over rather than solved. Captain Barnitz wasn't alone in his doubts.
Speaker 2:And direct encounters with Native Americans Sounds like they were rare. On his secluded claim, maybe seeing distant hunting parties?
Speaker 3:Cautious watchfulness would be key Potential for trade maybe, but always the fear of hostility fueled by settler anxieties and reports of conflict elsewhere.
Speaker 2:And the awareness that tribes weren't monolithic. The Pawnee sometimes scouted for the army, for instance. It complicates the simple us versus them narrative.
Speaker 3:Definitely it was a complex web of interactions, fear, necessity and competing claims to the land. Elias was navigating all of that.
Speaker 2:Then there were the rare contacts with other settlers, travelers. Chance meetings must have been incredibly welcome. A chance for news, maybe, barter.
Speaker 3:Vital moments of human connection and reminders of the outside world, like the trails Santa Fe Trail to the south, the dangerous Smoky Hill Trail to the Colorado goldfields.
Speaker 2:Seeing distant wagon trains, maybe a stagecoach, reminders that people were moving, that there was a bigger world, and letters from home, precious Months old.
Speaker 3:Those connections, however tenuous were lifelines. They anchored you, reminded you weren't completely alone in the vastness.
Speaker 2:And the biggest reminder of change coming the railroad, the Kansas Pacific, reaching Salina by autumn 67, pushing west.
Speaker 3:That was the game changer. Rumors of its progress would travel fast. It symbolized connection easier supplies, more settlers.
Speaker 2:But it also cut through grazing lands, disrupted bison, intensified conflict with tribes whose way of life depended on that land and those animals.
Speaker 3:A double-edged sword absolutely. Elias stood to benefit from easier access to goods, potentially, but he was also witnessing the displacement and disruption it caused. His claim was part of that contested story.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the railway was speeding up the very transformation that made his life possible, but also made the older ways impossible.
Speaker 3:Exactly, and that table of events from 1867 in the sources really ties it together. Hancock's War earlier that year, the railways advance the treaty, the homesteading rush, even the cholera outbreak in the wet summer.
Speaker 2:It all connects. These weren't isolated incidents. They were all part of the environment. Elias was navigating forces, shaping his daily struggle.
Speaker 3:Forces often far beyond his control.
Speaker 2:Which brings us to the ultimate test, winter 1867-68. The sources describe a fierce blizzard hitting suddenly.
Speaker 3:A multi-day siege Wind, snow, erasing landmarks, imprisoning him in that sod.
Speaker 2:A wind described as howling, penetrating the sod walls, snowdrifts sealing the door.
Speaker 3:And the cold bone-chilling. Keeping a fire going becomes the absolute priority, but fuel is scarce.
Speaker 2:He's fighting to keep that meager fire alive, rationing his dwindling firewood.
Speaker 3:Imagine that monotonous cycle Feed the fire, ration the dried meat, the cornmeal. Listen to the storm rage outside, dim light, long shadows inside.
Speaker 2:Worrying about his ox, about food running out, starvation feeling like a real possibility.
Speaker 3:The psychological pressure must have been immense isolated, helpless against the storm, facing the very real prospect of not surviving.
Speaker 2:Then a brief lull, he makes this desperate decision to go outside.
Speaker 3:Into that blinding white landscape, everything looks alien, landmarks gone.
Speaker 2:The cold, burning his lungs, trying to dig out buried brush for fuel with numb fingers Sheer desperation.
Speaker 3:It shows that incredible will to survive, risking freezing just to get a little more fuel. Maybe check on the ox.
Speaker 2:And the isolation hits hardest, then maybe no chance of help. It's all on him.
Speaker 3:He'd have known the stories. Travelers lost in blizzards, families freezing.
Speaker 2:He must have questioned his whole venture, wondered if he'd made a terrible mistake coming here. But then something else kicks in that survival instinct, maybe memories of surviving the war, that refusal to just give up.
Speaker 3:Exactly, drawing on past endurance, finding some inner strength, some stubbornness to keep going.
Speaker 2:And then eventually the thaw, slow, reluctant. Maybe some warming, then another freeze, but the days get longer. Chinook winds start eating at the snow.
Speaker 3:Finally revealing the sodden earth. Elias has survived Exhausted gaunt supplies dangerously low. His ox made it too, but just barely.
Speaker 2:He's changed, though Physically leaner, maybe spiritually tempered, hardened.
Speaker 3:He's endured something profound. He understands the prairie and himself in a way he couldn't have before.
Speaker 2:And there's that first hint of renewal. The smell of damp earth, the first green shoots, but also reflection.
Speaker 3:On the lessons learned, the beauty and the brutality, the ceaseless labor, the need for vigilance. He faced isolation, hunger, the elements and survived.
Speaker 2:But the question remains continue. He knows many others gave up. The thought must have crossed his mind.
Speaker 3:Likely many times during that winter. The thought must have crossed his mind Likely many times during that winter.
Speaker 2:But seeing the land again, his soddy still standing. Maybe a stubbornness takes root, a different kind of resolve than the initial hopeful optimism. More seasoned, more determined, he prepares for another planting, another cycle.
Speaker 3:That tenacity, that refusal to quit despite the immense hardship, that's the core of it for those who stayed.
Speaker 2:And the wider world keeps changing around him More news of the railway, more settlements appearing, more homesteaders arriving.
Speaker 3:And the peace from Medicine Lodge still uncertain. The later news about Black Kettle's village being attacked by Custer in November 68, that underscores how fragile it all was Ongoing conflict.
Speaker 2:So Elias's story. As we wrap this up, it isn't really about conquest is it?
Speaker 3:It's more about quiet, endurance, about adaptation, about carving out a life day by day in an incredibly demanding land. It's about that quiet resolve to face the next dawn, whatever it brings.
Speaker 2:That feels right. It's the story of survival against the odds on those vast indifferent slowly changing Kansas plains.
Speaker 3:A testament to resilience.
Speaker 2:So to quickly summarize our deep dive, then we've really walked a year in the shoes of Elias Thorne, 1867, Kansas.
Speaker 3:We've seen the the often brutal reality behind the frontier myth from building a home out of Earth literally to facing prairie fires, blizzards, disease and that crushing loneliness.
Speaker 2:It gives you a visceral sense of what that life demanded. It feels distant, yet it's a past that profoundly shaped the present.
Speaker 3:It really makes you appreciate the sheer grit required back then, the determination just to survive day to day under those conditions. It puts our modern comforts into perspective, doesn't it?
Speaker 2:It absolutely does. So. Think about that for a moment. That sheer grit what part of Elias's experience really struck you the most? What resonates?
Speaker 3:For me it's probably that constant tension, the hope that brought him there, versus the constant grinding, hardship and danger that knife edge existence.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's powerful, which leads us to a final thought for you listening the physical frontiers like Elias faced are mostly gone for us.
Speaker 3:But it makes you wonder what are our modern frontiers? Where do we need that same kind of resilience, that adaptability today?
Speaker 2:Are we still carving out our existence in challenging landscapes, maybe technological ones, social ones or even personal ones, Something to maybe mull over?
Speaker 1:At the Wild West Podcast, we are on an inspiring mission to revive the spirit of the classic dime novel, reimagining it for a modern audience while accounting for inflation in both price and narrative depth. Our goal is to invigorate these captivating stories, ensuring that they not only echo the charm of their predecessors but also resonate with contemporary themes and characters. In doing so, we create a literary experience that honors the rich tradition of storytelling. Literary experience that honors the rich tradition of storytelling, allowing these tales to thrive and evolve, captivating readers for generations to come. If you are interested in purchasing one or more of these fully illustrated dime novel publications, you can click on the link provided on the description page of this podcast.
