April Gleanings: The Poor Farm, Hostettler's Bitters, and Electric Lights

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If you read any of the other “ Gleanings,” posts, you might recall that these “seen-around-town” sort of items were a regular column in the Coffeyville newspapers, and many newspapers, in the 1870s and 1880s. I am compiling samples for each month. 


1 April 1876


Streams are full. There are seven paupers at the poor farm. 

Prairie chickens chant their morning melodies.

Farmers are coming in with their plows for repairs.

How about that wood, flour, potatoes, etc. promised this office?

Seven loads of merchandise to the Osage and one to the Pawnee this week.

Bob Harper this week made the trip to the Pawnee Agency and returned, 227 miles in 27 hours, actual riding time. 

The Supreme Court of Kansas has decided that a druggist cannot lawfully sell intoxicating liquors, even for medicinal purposes, without a license.


     Poor farms were a way Americans attempted to deal with the most desperately poor: disabled, aged, mothers of illegitimate children, children unable to work, mentally disabled. It was what it sounded like; in the Midwest, the county purchased a farm and the “inmates,” as they were called, worked the farm as they were able. The idea was to make the poor farm as self-supporting as possible, with as little tax expenditure as possible. Nothing was considered more shameful, or was feared more, than ending up at a poor farm.

     The first poor farms in Kansas were established in 1866 in Leavenworth and Douglas Counties. By 1899, 80 of the state’s 105 counties had one. Montgomery County’s was 12 miles outside of Coffeyville.

     The question the newspaper editor asked about that wood, flour, and potatoes promised to the office was because he negotiated subscription payments in goods as well as cash. Newspaper editors in this era not infrequently published thanks to those who came in and paid in cash. Both of my great-great-grandfathers, Enos Patchett and Myron C. Barbour were thanked at various times for this. 


2 April 1881


 The children enjoyed themselves Sunday last by running about over the prairies picking flowers.

Strangers are so numerous here, lately we can’t keep track of them. 

The city schools closed yesterday. The afternoon was spent in select readings, essays, etc. All the teachers have done credit to themselves for their efforts in the students’ behalf, for which they have the thanks of all the parents in the district.

About the first of May, the demand for Hostettler’s bitters will be greatly increased. 


     The sentence, “About the first of May the demand for Hostettler’s Bitters…” would have been immediately understood by the 1881 Coffeyville reader. On May 1st, a law prohibiting the manufacture of alcohol took effect.

     Hostettler’s Celebrated Stomach Bitters was a popular patent medicine. Its manufacturer said it was good for dyspepsia, liver complaint, indigestion, intermittent fevers, fever ‘n ague (malaria), a good anti-bilious treatment and mildly cathartic. Like so many patent medicines, it was, in its original formula, 47 percent alcohol (later 25 percent). During the Civil War it was given to soldiers to ward off “the fatal maladies of the Southern swamp.” Marketed as a health tonic, it was also served by the glass in saloons. 


14 April 1881


The mumps are prevalent again, and we have seen a number of “Kansas sufferers” lately with their throats bandaged on that account.

The Coffeyville Brass Band is furnishing some fine music these pleasant evenings.

The white wings of the prairie schooner are glistening  on every highway, and the current of immigration pouring into this section flows on in ever-increasing volume. 

The first Spring Beauties (claytonia) or wildflowers of any kind that we saw in bloom here we gathered on the 25th of March.

Splendid roads. 


21 April 1888


Farmers busy.

Pie plant in market.

Wheat never looked better.

There is talk on the council of increasing to a considerable extent the number of electric lights for the city.

Several fishing parties spent Sunday in the Territory. 

The new drink, milk shake, as prepared by A.L. Ingraham, is something delicious and refreshing. 


     July 1886 Coffeyville passed Ordinance 146 granting the Sperry Light, Motor and Car Break Company a 20-year contract to provide electric lights for the city. The company had 120 days to have everything up and running. I can imagine my great-great grandparents staying late in town to witness this wonder: the streets of the city illuminated with electric light. 

Pie plant is rhubarb.

     Milk shakes were advertised in the Carolinas in 1885, and one Indiana newspaper mentioned them in 1884. They really did seem to be a “new drink” in the 1880s in Kansas. 


Copyright Andrea Auclair © 2023

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