It was arranged that if Mother needed Father when he was working in the field, she was to tie a red flag on a pole. One day on our pioneer homestead (where our taxes the first year were 47 cents), a sudden illness struck one of the four small children.
When Father saw the red flag, he rushed to the house and started on horseback for the doctor. He was gone nearly all day. When Father and the doctor got back, the baby had been dead for six hours.
My mother felt so alone in a strange land that day as she sat by the body of her baby. Such were the ways our pioneer trails were blazed. Thanks to the tenacity of our parents, we are here to tell the stories.
Mrs. Henry M. Price
Lawrence, Kansas
Back in 1955 a call went out from the editors of the then CAPPER’s WEEKLY asking for readers to send in articles on true pioneers. Hundreds of letters came pouring in from early settlers and their children, many now in their 80s and 90s, and from grandchildren of settlers, all with tales to tell. So many articles were received that a decision was made to create a book, and in 1956, the first My Folks title – My Folks Came in a Covered Wagon – hit the shelves. Nine other books have since been published in the My Folks series, all filled to the brim with true tales from CAPPER’s readers, and we are proud to make those stories available to our growing online community.
