CHARLES JENCKS COMES TO ROGER MILLS COUNTY
by GWEN (Jencks) PASBY
Charles Abel Jencks came from Illinois with his brother and three sisters to Oklahoma Territory. They traveled by covered wagons to Guthrie, Oklahoma in the conquest for land. At Guthrie, they met J.A. Hallberg and his sister Hulda who were also from Illinois seeking land. The men journeyed to Day County in the Cheyenne Arapahoe Country of western Oklahoma in the year 1899. Finding land they wished to settle, they returned to Guthrie to file their claims. Charles filed on Section twelve, Township twelve, Range twenty-four west of the Indian Meridian; his promising one hundred sixty acres. The other one filed on the adjoining quarters. After Oklahoma became a state in 1907, the land where they had filed became Roger Mills County. Charles’ father, H.H. Jencks, came in 1901 to Oklahoma Territory filing a claim in western Oklahoma. He was one of the first to sell fruit trees to the setters in western Oklahoma for the Stark Brothers.
In December 1900, Charles Jencks and Hulda Hallberg were married. Then in January, 1901, the Jencks’ and J.A. Hallberg left Guthrie for their new homes in western Oklahoma. Charles and Hulda came in a Hack, (double seated buggy), to their homestead, five and a half miles south of Cheyenne, Oklahoma. The trip took two weeks. They brought with them a change of clothes, breaking plow, hen, rooster, and a dog. Hulda said, “they had two dollars, their four bare hands, and their team to start farming.” On the Journey they were amazed because there were no trees growing except along the creeks or rivers. Crossing the Canadian River was dangerous, but the horses know how to avoid deep water and quicksand, therefore, keeping them safe. The western Oklahoma land looked flourishing, as the grass was so tall that when riding a horse the grass brushed the feet. Rabbits and prairie chickens were plentiful for food. Hulda said, “you have never eaten until you have had prairie chicken.” The over populated rattlesnake was a real hazard to the homesteader.
Upon arriving at their destination, they camped by the creek until their dugout was built. During this time the creek rose and carried away the hen and rooster. Hulda hatched the eggs the hen was setting, by heating flat irons on the camp fire every hour day and night, thus saving her chicken business. For their home they dug into the side of a hill a small distance from the creek. Timber from the creek was used to support the dogwood brush and sod roof. The sod was laid in foot square pieces to form the front of the dugout. The sod was the grass they had plowed with the breaking plow and then out into pieces. The dugout was furnished with a stove that cost seven dollars, two plates, two knives, two forks, and a table made of foot-board. They had a wooden bed with a mattress made from cloth filled with hay. Their first source of water was a well dug by hand. Four children, (Carrie, Monroe, Ross, and Hazel) were born in the dugout. Monroe died as an infant from whooping cough. Carrie, Ross, and Hazel attended school in a dugout called “Spring Creek.” They walked one and a half miles to school six months out of the year starting in October.
When they first came to this area, Weatherford was the only town to purchase lumber or farm supplies. The trip to Weatherford from their homestead would take a week in the wagon. Hulda said, “Elk City was not a town and Charles helped build the first house in Sayre.” They went to Berlin to pick up their mail. Cheyenne was where they did their trading. Cheyenne consisted of a Bank, a General Store, and nine Saloons. Charles went to Cheyenne one day with seventeen bales of the grass he had bailed for hay. He traded fifteen bales for a mare with a broken back; Hulda said, “she was ugly but worked hard and had a good personality.” Charles also traded one bale for a baby pig, that he carried home in his pocket for Hulda. Hulda named the pig “Peggy” who had seven litters, thus starting their hog business. Some of the hogs and cattle were driven to market and some were home butchered for food. At one time they had approximately thirty horses, twenty-two of them were work horses. They accumulated during the years some two thousand acres.
Charles, the other Jencks men and J.A. Hallberg worked together, hiring out with a Thrashing Machine to earn money. H.H. Jencks had brought to Oklahoma a Syrup Mill, and they all worked together raising ribbon cane to make syrup. The cane had to be cut and striped before frost. The cane was then carried to the mill and put into the press and ground into juice. This juice had to be cooked at the right temperature or it would burn. The processed syrup was used by the families helping and also sold in gallon buckets to the neighbors. They also sold broom corn, butter, and eggs in Cheyenne. All the equipment they used was either operated by walking or by using horses to do the work.
Hulda worked hard pioneering the way for a better life for her family. She would go to the fields during harvest, going in at ten o’clock to cook dinner on her wood stove. After she had cleaned the kitchen, she would go back to the field. She would help haul feed to storage, gather corn and then return to fix supper. Hulda would help milk as many as forty cows at night.
Twice a week she would make bread from friendship yeast or sometimes called everlasting yeast. At night during the bad winter storms she would piece quilts and quilt them for the beds. Hulda would buy her piece goods, pans, patient medicines, and other household wares from a “Drummer” who came to her house every two or three months. Hulda was a midwife, and considered the doctor of the community. She would have to walk miles because she never could ride a horse very well and the men were always too busy with the crops to take her places. She would leave home saying, “I am going fishing”, and when she returned she would say, “I found a seven pound boy”, or girl, whatever the situation.
They were harassed by the cattlemen every year. The cattlemen did not want settlers in western Oklahoma and would try to burn them out. In late fall or early winter when everything was dried up and feed was stored in “Ricks” (called stacks in 1970) with hay put over the ricks to shed water. The cattlemen would set the grass afire, maybe ten or fifteen miles away with a high wind in the right direction. In order to save what they could, they would plow a fire break with the walking plow around their property. Sometimes the wind would be so high, the fire would jump the fire break. Then they would take wash tubs and anything that would hold water out to the fire and beat the flames with wet toe sacks. Only when the land became so populated that the cattlemen had to have only their own hundred sixty acres were the settlers safe.
In 1908 they sold sixty hogs and six hundred bushels of wheat to build a two room house. Several years later two more rooms were added to the house. During the passing years the dugout was cemented and a wooden roof added to provide grain storage for livestock and farming. Also, a storm cellar, a hay barn, a milk barn, and a garage for tractor and car were built on the homestead. Four more children (Verne, Mildred, Esther, and Oren) were born to Charles and Hulda. They also partially raised five boys who came from the Baptist Orphanage (Johnny and Frankie Watson plus J.G. and Duard Harrington) and Durland Miller from the Oklahoma Children’s Home Society. These children attended school at Needmore, a dugout when they first began. Later a one room wooden school was built and the dugout was cemented, making a storm cellar. The younger children graduated from Cheyenne High School after Needmore closed.
In 1918, Charles and Hulda bought their first car, (a Dodge). Charles just got in and drove the car home. The roads were all dirt until 1931 when Highway 283 was built through Cheyenne. In 1919, they took a trip to Oregon in the new Dodge. The trip took twenty-three days and was slowed up due to car trouble as no one knew how to work on this new machine. They stopped every night to cook, eat, and sleep by the side of the road. The roads were all dirt and only one way, up and down mountains. If they met a car, one car would have to back up to a “passing zone” (cut out place in side of mountain) letting the other car pass. Sometimes they would drive for ten miles or more without meeting another car. They paid fifty cents for a gallon-of gas and fifteen cents for a gallon of water for the radiator across the desert.
In 1929, a cattle buyer from Elk city came out to the farm to buy cattle from Charles. Charles thought the price too cheap and told the salesman he would eat them first before he would take that price. The buyer said “Mr. Jencks, you better start nibbling then.” The buyer came back in 1930, and offered still a cheaper price and Charles still refused to sell his cattle. Then the next year, 1931, Charles sold to the buyer at a cheaper price than he was offered in 1929, selling the cattle at four cents a pound. Due to the surplus of cattle in 1934 and the dry land, the government came into the area and bought cattle. The cattle were shot and drug to creeks or were given to the needy families. The government did this to raise the market for cattle.
To maintain friendship with the Cheyenne Arapahoe Indians, the area settlers would have a free barbecue and festivities each year. This practice has changed through the years, but Cheyenne, Elk City, Cordell, and Clinton still observe the tradition with rodeos, carnivals, parades, and contests. These towns rotate and are host every five years.
The telephone was the first of the modern conveniences. The telephone wire was strung around the area on the tallest trees and fence posts. Their central office was at Berlin, Oklahoma. In 1941, they purchased a tractor which was an even greater invention than the two bottom riding plow of 1910. Electricity came in about 1948 to the homestead, because Cheyenne was running a line to operate their water wells about a mile from Charles’ place.
Charles became ill in 1947 and they moved to Elk City to establish a home. After moving, Charles and Hulda’s greatest joy was to visit their home place and reminisce. They also loved to have some fresh well water brought to them because it was difficult for them to drink city water. Together they worked hard to raise a Christian family, always showing genuine interest in their children, grandchildren, great grandchildren, friends, and other relatives.
A daughter (Mildred) preceded Charles in death and several years later another daughter (Hazel). Charles passed away in 1953 after a lengthy illness. Hulda continued to make her home in Elk City until she became ill in 1969. She now (1970) lives with a daughter (Carrie) and husband in Cheyenne.
She has two sons (Ross and Verne) and wives, who make their homes in Beckham County. A daughter (Esther), and a son (Oren) and spouses reside in Roger Mills County. Hulda was eighty-nine years of age March 16, 1970.
Written By Gwen Pasby