May 25, 1998

This Memorial Day is particularly special to me and I'd like to share something with you.

My father, Casimir Herman Schulz was born May 25, 1894 in Jacksonville, Illinois and would be 104 today. He joined the Navy in 1913 and served for 33 years. He was actively engaged in both World Wars and retired in 1946. He died in Massachusetts in 1976 at the age of 82 years. When he retired he was a Chief Warrant Officer, Electrician. His military papers, memorabilia, pictures and memories are his legacy to his grandchildren.

I'd like to share a letter he wrote to my son, Michael, in 1971. He wrote the letter because Michael's 2nd grade class was studying our country's westward movement and covered wagons. Michael raised his hand in class and announced his Grandpa traveled to Oklahoma in a covered wagon. Poor kid came home practically in tears because no one believed him including the teacher. I called Dad in California and asked if he would write about that journey from Springfield, Illinois to Oklahoma.

I hope you enjoy it.

Mary Floy

"Lakewood, California
20 March 1971

Dear Michael,

Am sorry my last letter, in which I described the overland trip in a covered wagon we took when I was a boy, was lost in the mail. Well, here goes again. Like I said in my last letter, I think I'd better write it to all of you children because it may be of interest to all of you.

Our trip began in Springfield, Illinois. We had moved there from Jacksonville where I was born, when I was three years old. I must have been seven years old when we started. My father had a memo book that he kept in his pocket and it had the date on it - 1903. I remember asking him what it meant and he explained it to me.

A friend of my father's had a lot to do with us taking the trip. We bought a wagon and made a cover for it. We bent hickory sticks to use as a support for the canvas. We bought a gasoline stove and a lantern, as well as a tent. My father, the other man and myself slept in the tent. Mother and my two sisters slept in the wagon. We would come to a good camping place and then we would pitch the tent. Mother would cook the evening meal. We were usually quite tired so we would go to bed early.

We were quite proud of our wagon. It had springs - most covered wagons didn't. We had three horses so that every third day one got to rest. It would walk along behind the wagon. One of the horses was blind. Her name was Daisy.

We left Springfield early one morning and went to Jacksonville to tell my grandparents goodbye. We stayed there overnight and started early the next morning. That night we camped at Beardstown on the bank of the Illinois River. The mosquitoes were terrible. After that we never camped on a river bank.

We crossed the Mississippi River at Hannibal, Missouri. We camped next to a house in Hannibal. Their little girl, about four years old, drank a can of lye and was in pretty bad shape. My mother helped her mother until she was out of danger, then we started on. We followed the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railroad out of Hannibal. We went thru Maberly and Sedalia and a lot of other towns. I remember Maberly because they had horses pulling the street cars.

Usually my sisters and I and whichever man was not driving, would get out and walk, especially if the road was sandy or uphill. There were not any highways like we have now - just wagon trails off through the fields. We would get lost quite often. Then we would stop at a farm house and ask directions to the next town. I remember walking thru immense fields of sunflowers. We would pick sunflowers and pull the petals off one at a time, saying, "she loves me, she loves me not".

We ran into a lot of rain just before we got to Arkansas City, Kansas. We stopped there at a wagon yard and dried out. A wagon yard was where the farmers would camp when they came to town. Maybe it would take days to get there from their farms. Wagon yards would be called motels today.

We crossed the stateline into Oklahoma and were trying to get to Ponca City, Oklahoma, but we got lost out on the prairie. We came to a house and Father went in to ask directions. We had come to a fork in the road and didn't know which way to go. Two Indian men came out with Father. They seemed more interested in the horses than anything, but after looking the horses over one pointed to one of the roads and said "Ponca City".

Our trip ended in Guthrie, which then was the capital of the state. My father and the other man went to work there. My father was a cigar maker and he never had any trouble finding a job. We stayed in Guthrie for about a month, then my father went to Shawnee and sent for us after he got a job there.

I'll never forget the trip. It took us three months. Today in a car it would probably take a day, but we didn't rush.

I hope you will find this interesting.

Love to you all,

Grandpa"

Warmest regards,
Mary Floy Katzman
Framingham, Massachusetts

Return to Johnson County Homepage

Return to Letters Page

Copyright © 1998 Mary Floy Katzman All rights reserved