My Genealogy Hound

STEPHEN S. HILL. This gentleman is one of the few remaining settlers who came to Buffalo county in 1872, and braved the storms, droughts and grasshopper raids of those early days. He is a native of New England and was born at Sharon, Vt., February 21, 1822. His parents were Benjamin and Sarah (Scales) Hill. The former was a native of Massachusetts, born in the year 1789; the latter was a native of New Hampshire and born in 1779. He has little recollection of his ancestry back of this, farther than that one Ickaber Hill, his paternal grandfather, was a native of Massachusetts and a farmer by occupation.

Stephen S. Hill resided in Vermont State until 1872, during which time he engaged in farming, buying and selling cattle, and the practice of veterinary surgery. In 1872, although fifty years of age, he decided to emigrate West, and acting upon this decision he came to Buffalo county in the fall of 1872 and pre-empted a quarter section in Riverdale township, nine miles northwest of Kearney. The country was new and settlers were few and far between. A few native Indians still remained and an occasional buffalo was to be seen grazing on the plains. Deer and antelope roamed at will and furnished the principal meat for the few settlers at that time. Mr. Hill frequently saw as high as fifty antelope grazing in a single bunch. April 15, 1873, occurred the worst wind, sleet and snow storm that this section of Nebraska had experienced within the memory of the oldest settlers. The storm began on Sunday and for three days the wind and sleet came with such terrific force as to render it unsafe for anyone to leave his door. So fierce was the storm that Mrs. Hill was obliged to tie the clothes-line about her husband in order that he might find his way back to the house when he went to the wood-pile, which was distant only thirty feet, for an armful of wood. A great many head of stock perished during this storm. One of Mr. Hill’s neighbors was only able to save three out of thirty-six head of cattle.

In 1873 the crops, on account of excessive drought, were almost a total failure. From ten acres of sod-corn Mr. Hill harvested but thirty bushels of grain. In 1874 the grasshoppers came and destroyed nearly everything. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon of August 8th, when Mr. Hill heard a noise like the distant rumbling of a train of cars and noticed a dark object rising like a thunder-cloud in the distant northwest. His curiosity, which was aroused, was soon satisfied. It was the grasshoppers. They fell like lava thrown from the crater of old Vesuvius, and in less than two hours, destroyed everything green on his place. This so discouraged Mr. Hill that he sold his quarter section of land that fall for $150. This money, a team, one cow and a hog, were all of his worldy possessions left at that time. Those were discouraging times and many settlers left the country. There was no corn in the county and Mr. Hill, Samuel Thornton and some others, hauled corn from Kansas, a distance of thirty miles. In 1875 he homesteaded a quarter section and began farming again. For several years thereafter he had about the same experience with drought and grasshoppers as before, but after 1877, had good average crops. In 1882 his wheat yielded twenty-five bushels to the acre, oats thirty-five bushels to the acre, and he raised five hundred and fifty bushels of rye from twenty-five acres.

In March, 1883, he retired from farming and moved to Kearney, where he now resides. He keeps a barn and practices veterinary surgery, having followed this profession for over forty years. He has treated over five hundred sick horses and has never lost a case of colic.

Mr. Hill has been married twice. He was first married, September 5, 1840, to Adaline Hicks, by whom he had three children. He married Martha Dockrel, his present wife, October 23, 1870.

In religious belief, Mr. Hill is a Universalist. Politically, he is a democrat, having voted for every democratic nominee for president from Buchanan down, with the exception of Horace Greeley.