Across the Continent by the Lincoln Highway

by Effie Price Gladding

CHAPTER X

Leaving Denver in the afternoon, we drove to Boulder; from Boulder to Plattville and from Plattville due north to Greeley. All along to the left, between Plattville and Greeley, we had fine views of the whole line of mountains, and particularly of Long's Peak. Again we were impressed by the fertility of the Colorado alfalfa fields and by the rich green of its meadows. Greeley is a very attractive town with wide streets and with pretty homes set in green lawns. It is well shaded, stands high, and looks off to the noble line of mountains to the south. Early on July 15th we left Greeley, taking a last look at the glorious mountains to the south. We passed through fields upon fields of alfalfa and of grain. Great stacks of alfalfa everywhere dotted the country. The greenness of the land was refreshing. Then we came into more rolling country, less cultivated. We were plainly in a new part of the country, in this northwest corner of the State. The houses were new, and often small. In some places new houses stood alongside the old ones, the earlier ones being made of tar paper and looking like little cigar boxes. Some houses had tents erected near them for use as barns. Some houses were made of sod. There were very few trees, most ranch houses looking bare and bald. We passed quantities of a beautiful blue flower, growing sometimes in great patches. Its bell-shaped flowers, sometimes rose, sometimes lavender, grew on tall green stalks. We also saw a beautiful starry white flower growing along the roadside. At Sterling we had a particularly good luncheon at the Southern Hotel on the main street. We exhorted our host and hostess to put out a Lincoln Highway sign, so that none should miss their excellent table.

We saw our old friends, the Matilija poppies, growing along the roadside as we went along in the hot afternoon. This was one of the hottest days of driving that we had in all our tour, and in it we made our longest run, two hundred and eight miles. We took early supper at the Commercial Hotel at Julesburg. Not long after leaving Julesburg we came upon a flamboyant sign which announced that we were nineteen miles from Ogallala, Nebraska. The sign also informed us with particular emphasis that Ogallala was "a wet town." We had crossed the State line and had left behind us Colorado with its mountains, its green meadows, its wild yuccas, its Matilija poppies, and its dark masses of pine trees.

As we drove along in the dusky twilight, little owls kept flying low in front of our car, attracted by its lights. Sometimes a rabbit sat in the middle of the road, blinking and bewildered. We always gave him time to recover himself and leap into the shadows of the roadside. We had had another exquisite sunset with the same soft pastel shades that I had seen at Boulder. During the day we had seen many meadow larks, red-winged blackbirds, and doves. We had seen, too, many sparrow hawks, sitting silent on the fence posts, waiting for the approach of evening. In one place we saw a poor young meadow lark, hanging dead from a barbed wire fence. He had evidently in flying struck his throat full against one of the barbs and had hung there, impaled to death. At Ogallala we found a very comfortable lodging house, The Hollingsworth, built over a garage. We had a good room there, although it was impossible to find a cool spot on that broiling night.

The next morning, as we took breakfast at a nearby restaurant, we learned that Ogallala had had a grand contest and had "gone dry" two weeks before. An enthusiastic gentleman who had taken part in the conflict told us that already the town was wonderfully changed. We congratulated him and urged him to see to it that the sign nineteen miles to the west heralded Ogallala as a dry town rather than a wet one.

The next day was cooler. The mountains had disappeared, and only wide rolling fields, sometimes as level as a floor, lay before us. We were crossing Nebraska. We came by a rather poor road, really a grassy trail, to North Platte, where we had luncheon at the Vienna Café. As we were driving along between Ogallala and North Platte, the grass growing high in the road tracks, we came suddenly upon a bevy of fat quail walking in the road. As they flew somewhat heavily, I felt sure that our wheel had struck some of them. So I went back to see. Three of them lay dead in the road, having been unable to fly in time to avoid the wheels. The noise of our machine had been muffled by the fact that that we were driving over a grassy road and they had not heard us until we were on them. We were sorry indeed to have killed the beautiful little brown creatures. All through California and Colorado we had seen them, as they were constantly flying up in front of the machine and running off to cover. All along, the killdeer were darting about, calling loudly and piercingly.

Beyond North Platte we came upon a country house which had been pre-empted by a jolly house party of girls from town. They had put out some facetious signs: "Fried Chicken Wanted" and "Votes for Women." We stopped to call upon them and told them of our trip across the country, while they insisted upon serving us with cake and lemonade.

Late in the day we passed some groups of movers, their horses and cattle with them. We saw glorious fields of corn and of alfalfa, and we saw fields dotted with little mounds or cocks of wheat and of millet. Four miles before coming into Kearney, we passed the famous sign which marks the distance half-way between San Francisco and Boston. We had seen a print of this sign, pointing 1,733 miles West to Frisco and East 1,733 miles to Boston, on the cover of our Lincoln Highway guide, issued by the Packard Motor Car Company. We stopped now to take a photograph of it. A woman living in a farmhouse across the road was much interested in our halt. She said that almost every motor party passing stopped to photograph the sign.

We heard from her of two young women who were walking from coast to coast, enjoying the country and its adventures. Somehow we missed them in making the detour from Laramie to Denver. We had seen their photographs on postcards which they were selling to help meet their expenses. They were sisters, and looked very striking and romantic in their walking dress. They wore broad-brimmed hats, loose blouses with rolling collars, and wide trousers, tucked into high laced boots such as engineers wear. Each carried a small revolver at her belt. We were sorry to have missed seeing them against the picturesque background of the Wyoming plains.

At Kearney we had supper at "Jack's Place," and went on in the twilight to Minden, where we proposed stopping at "The Humphrey." We passed through long fields of corn and over lonely rolling prairies. The cornfields with their rows of tasseled stalks were like the dark, silent ranks of a waiting army, caped and hooded, standing motionless until marching orders came. The air was clear and fine, and the electric lights of Minden shone from afar with the brilliance of stars.