Chapter XV Building the Sod House
The Peniman family spent that evening sitting on the banks of the Minne-to-wauk-pala, feeling no longer like homeless wanderers, but as those who after long tribulation have come into their own.
The whole family were in high spirits, and their camp that night was made with more comfort and permanence than any camp they had yet had.
Four young saplings were dragged out of the dead timber along the stream, and cut into lengths of the proper height for a table, and these were driven firmly into the ground. Upon them Joe nailed a few saplings crosswise, and over these was fastened a strong piece of canvas. Upon this canvas the children piled wet sand from the river bottom, patting it down and making a firm, level surface. When it was dry the oil-cloth was tacked over it, making an excellent substitute for a “boughten” table. Stakes were driven into the ground on either side of the table and more fallen saplings nailed upon them, and when the family sat down to their evening meal it was once more at a table with comfortable seats and a place to enjoy their meal without the discomfort of cramped legs or the disturbing inroads of bugs and ants.
In the shade near by they drove stakes in the ground (always taking care to select only dead and broken timber, for a tree had become too rare and precious a thing for them to sacrifice willingly), and over it they stretched a tarpaulin, making a shelter to serve as a kitchen. Joe and Lige constructed a fireplace and oven near by of small round stones from the bed of the stream, and fixed a firm and level place on a rock to set up the stove. Around it they nailed small boxes and receptacles for the cooking utensils, and set two packing-cases on end with a calico curtain before them to serve as a china-closet, and Mrs. Peniman speedily emptied a packing-case and set it up in the improvised kitchen to use as a kitchen table.
“It will take some time to build our house,” she said brightly as she hurried about getting her new cooking-place in order, “and we might as well be as comfortable as we can until it is done.”
The family, tired enough of living in the cramped space of the wagons, readily agreed to this, and the next day was spent unloading the wagons, unpacking boxes, and making their temporary home as comfortable and convenient as possible.
When the comfort of the family had been looked after Mr. Peniman turned his attention to the animals.
The little pigs had grown and thriven so, even under the hard conditions that had beset the rest of the travelers, that they were now entirely too big for their box, and squealed their protest continually.
They had long ago outgrown the necessity of bottle-feeding and took their sustenance out of a pan like regular porkers.
Joe and Lige found their father, late in the afternoon, standing beside the box looking down at the little squealers with a speculative expression.
“I was thinking,” he said as they approached him, “that we must provide better quarters for Romeo and Juliet. They’ve outgrown their box, and I don’t see that we can spare them another. They ought to have more room.”
“Couldn’t we build them a pen out of logs?” asked Joe.
“Can’t spare any of our precious timber for pigs,” said Mr. Peniman. Then with a sudden smile breaking over his face, “Now I have it! Come along, boys, get your spades, and I’ll soon show you how we can make Romeo and Juliet a fine home.”
The boys had learned long since that the humorous little twinkle in the corner of their father’s eye always meant fun ahead, so grabbing up their spades they followed him to a spot some distance back of the spot they had marked out for their future home on the river bank.
With a few quick strokes of his boot-heel Mr. Peniman described a circle on the ground. Then, throwing off his coat, he fell to digging.
Somewhat puzzled as to how a pig-pen was to be constructed with shovels, the boys followed his example.
“But I can’t see,” puffed Lige, “how this is going to make a place for live pigs. If they were dead ones, and we were going to bury them——”
Suddenly Joe burst out laughing.
“Oh, I know,” he cried. “Why, of course! It’s a bully idea! Don’t you see that we can dig a pen for them? A mighty good kind of a pen, too, that they can’t break down or squeeze through or get out of.”
Mr. Peniman stopped digging long enough to mop his face.
“Surely! We’ll make a pit about three feet deep, and big enough around so that the little fellows will have a chance to chase around and grow. This pair,” he smiled, casting a smiling glance at the little porkers, “may be the beginning of our stock-farm.” After a moment he continued, digging busily, “People who come out to the plains in wagons can’t carry much with them, so they have to use everything they have at hand. There’s not much of anything to work with on the prairies but dirt and grass, and we not only have to make them furnish our stock a home but ourselves as well.”
Lige stopped and leaned on his spade.
“We aren’t going to dig a hole like this for us to live in, are we?” he demanded in a tone of horror.
The shout of laughter with which his father and brother received this remark caused him to resume digging hastily. Mr. Peniman hastened to reassure him.
“Don’t fear, Lige, we won’t do that, but I’ll show you a better way, and yet the prairies will have to furnish the material.”
Lige was still unconvinced that the plan for the pig-pen was a good one, until when it was finished, a fine round pit of about twelve feet in circumference and three feet deep, the whole family came in a body to see Romeo and Juliet established in their new home.
This was accomplished after a good deal of squealing and struggling on the part of the tenants, but when they were finally established, with a roof across one end covered with a thatch of prairie grass to keep off the sun, they ran about and about in an ecstasy of glee, nosing the walls, rooting in the dirt, and expressing their pleasure with skips and grunts of delight.
“Well,” admitted Lige a bit reluctantly, “I’ll agree that that’s an all-right pig-pen, but I don’t see yet how you’re ever going to make a house for us to live in out of dirt!”
“Wait for a few days and I’ll show you,” said his father cheerfully.
It was not even that long before his curiosity was gratified. The very next morning they were roused by their father’s voice calling them.
“Come along, my lads,” he cried, “we have much to do, and no time to sleep while there is daylight to work in these days! The fall will soon be upon us, and we must have our house ready before the rains come.”
They saw that the plow that had been so long packed away in the bottom of the wagon had been taken out and Jim and Charley hitched to it.
“Now, Lige, I’ll show you how to build a house out of dirt,” he laughed, as, followed by the whole family, they set out toward the spot where the site for the house had been marked off on the grass.
“You don’t do it with a plow, do you?” asked Lige, much puzzled.
“Yes,—partly,” replied his father laughing. They all felt in high spirits this morning. The long, tedious, wearisome journey was over, the goal reached, and life lay before them like a clean new slate, upon which it was theirs to inscribe what they would.
Mrs. Peniman, much concerned about her new domicile, was carefully measuring off the ground and computing the space, while the children danced about as excitedly as if building a new home in the wilderness, miles upon miles from any other habitation, was the greatest joy imaginable.
When the plow was set upon the line and Jim and Charley started with a cheerful word of command it cut through the grass and turned over what was probably the first sod ever turned in that county.
The tough prairie sod was plowed about three inches thick in long furrows twelve to sixteen feet long. Joe, Lige, and Sam were then set to work with their sharp spades to cut it up into the required blocks.
“What are these for, Father?” asked Sam.
“These are the bricks of which we are going to build our house, my son,” answered his father with a twinkle in his eye.
“But why don’t we build our house of logs, Father?” asked Joe. “It seems to me it would be a lot nicer, and a lot less work. We have plenty of timber here. I think it would be much better.”
“Which shows that you don’t know anything about it, my boy. In the first place, we can’t spare the timber. There is none too much of it at best, and what there is we want to save for fuel and shelter. In the second place, there is no house that is better for the hard weather of the prairies than a sod house. It is warm in winter, cool in summer, and about the only thing that will withstand the Nebraska blizzards and cyclones. Just wait until it is finished and you’ll see. Don’t you remember what a nice home the Wards had? Now take your spades and cut the sod as I am doing. Keep your squares even, and the edges of the sod straight and true. When we have the sod taken off this field it will be in fine condition to plow up, and perhaps we can get in a small crop of sod-corn yet this year.”
The boys seized their spades and set to work manfully, and before noon had a good-sized pile of “Nebraska marble” piled up ready for use. After dinner, when they all felt somewhat refreshed, Mr. Peniman began laying the sods, which were about twelve inches square and three inches thick. They were piled one upon another, leaving open spaces for the places where the doors and windows were to go. When the walls were up to about the thickness of a couple of sods above the frames, lintels were laid across and the sod laid over them, continuing the walls right through. The vacant space above the frames was necessary to provide for the settling of the walls. When the walls were high enough, about seven feet, the gable ends were built up a few inches or a foot higher, for, to prevent the earth from washing off the sods by heavy rains, the roof was made almost flat. As the sods were laid Mr. Peniman trimmed down the walls with a sharp spade, to keep them square and trim. He shaved the top surface off each layer with a sharp hoe, and filled in the chinks between the sods with a kind of a cement made from the prairie clay and sand from the bed of the river.
All this, however, was not accomplished in one day. The work of cutting and laying the sods was hard and heavy labor, and before the day was over both the boys and their father were glad to quit for the night and go to their supper.
Here they found a glad and cheerful surprise awaiting them.
The open space between the semicircle of cottonwood trees had been cleared, and already was beginning to assume a homelike aspect. Mrs. Peniman and the girls, with Paul and little David to help them, had put in as busy a day at the camp as the boys and their father had on the sod house. When they arrived they found the table set, looking extremely neat and festive with its cloth of bright red, its dishes and silver, with a vase of wild-flowers in the centre of the table, and a great dish of fried prairie-chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy and hot biscuits steaming upon it, and Mrs. Peniman flying about in a big kitchen apron unpacking cooking utensils, getting out furniture, and making a cozy resting-place under the trees.
At their exclamations of delight she laughed happily.
“There’s no use waiting until the house is finished before we begin to live,” she greeted them cheerily; “we’re all tired of hardships, and I, for one, want some kind of comforts around me again. Wait till you come home to-morrow night, you’ll see what we have done then, won’t they, girls?”
Ruth and Nina, busy as bees getting the supper on the table, answered with gleeful and mysterious nods. The place already seemed so pleasant and inviting that they were loath to go to bed when the time came, but pioneer boys and girls, as well as pioneer men and women, soon found out that it was not what they wanted to do, but what they had to do that was to be considered.
With grim determination Mr. Peniman and the boys returned to the building of the sod house the next morning. They all realized that while gypsying under the trees might be very delightful now, stormy weather would materially change its aspect, and that in the unprotected wilderness in which they were living the sooner they were sheltered behind thick walls and barred doors at night the greater would be their safety.
It was hard, slow work, and many days passed, while the piles of sod grew steadily and the walls went up higher and higher. The boys worked manfully, and Mr. Peniman, like the wise father he was, did not work them too hard or too long, but often sent them off for a walk or a swim, sometimes urging them to go and catch a mess of fish for dinner, sometimes pretending that he was hungry for meat and sending them off into the woods or out on the prairies to hunt for game. They found any number of wild turkeys about the place, some quail, and plenty of prairie-chickens, and once in a while a deer or an antelope was killed, although neither of the boys liked to shoot the pretty, graceful creatures, that seemed utterly without fear, and often came up quite close about their camp.
It took a month to build the sod house, during which time the family lived in the woods, sleeping in their beds in the wagons as they had done on their journey, and eating in the open under the spreading cottonwood trees.
The weather continued fine, and the family, in spite of their isolation, were very happy. They were busy all day long, and had always been one of those happy and united families who find their greatest happiness in one another.
Nina had come to be quite one of themselves now, and she and Ruth were seldom apart, while for Joe and Sam and Lige the girl showed a warm and grateful affection. She was devoted to Mrs. Peniman, and often sat at her feet or on the arm of the old rocking-chair with her arm about her neck, calling her “Mother Peniman,” and showering upon her the love and tenderness she had always shown for her own unfortunate young mother.
When the walls of the sod house were completed the hardest part of the work was to come, and Joshua Peniman puzzled long as to how he was going to get the ridgepole in place without another man to help him. He felled a strong, straight young tree, about fifteen inches through, and carefully stripped the bark from it. To raise the pole the aid of the whole family was required. As there were no neighbors within many miles to call upon, the difficult and dangerous feat must be performed with what help was at hand. He first made skids and rolled the tree upon it. These skids he placed with one end resting on the wall, the other on the ground. Ropes were then fastened to it, and while Mrs. Peniman, Ruth, Nina, and Sam stood on the top of the wall and pulled the ropes, Joe, Lige, and their father, on the ground, lifted and pushed the pole from below.
Fortunately for the success of the operation life in the open air, constant exercise and hard work had hardened the muscles of all and made them equal to the exertion. It was a strenuous piece of work, but with much puffing and panting and laughter they kept doggedly at it, and before dusk had come they got the ridgepole in place, and the most difficult part of building the house was accomplished.
Next came the rafters, which were poles of young trees from four to six inches through, placed about fifteen inches apart. Over these were laid boughs, cut from the willow thicket, and these thickly overlaid with the dry prairie grass. When a thick, deep covering of this straw had been laid in place and carefully packed down, dirt to the depth of about a foot was piled upon it and beaten down hard with the spade.
Now they were ready for the doors and windows!
The proud architects of this mansion of “Nebraska marble”—consisting of every member of the family except little Mary and David—stood about and surveyed it with admiring eyes. Even Lige was converted and was now willing to admit that it was a great idea. The walls were even, straight, and true, its corners square, its whole appearance neat and workman-like.
Greatly to the boys’ astonishment they found packed away on the very bottoms of the two wagons three sets of window-casings and two stout wooden doors.
“I never knew those were there!” cried Joe, as he saw his father haul them out. “How did you ever come to think of them?”
“It would be a poor sort of a pioneer that did not think about providing shelter for his family, my lad,” he answered. “I knew, of course, that we should have to build a sod house, and knew also that though the house might grow out of the prairie itself that glass windows and wooden doors wouldn’t, so I brought them along.”
It was a sharp, snappy morning in September when the last window was in, the last door screwed to its hinges, and Joshua Peniman, with a great sigh of relief, laid down his hammer and turned over the new house to his wife.
“There!” he ejaculated, “there is thy house, now thee and the girls can do what thee please with it. The boys and I have done our part. We must get at the barn now, for if I don’t miss my guess there is some stormy weather coming.”
There was not much time for loafing in the little colony these days. The whole family felt the impending change in the weather, and while Mr. Peniman and the boys, profiting by their experience in building the house, started on the barn, Mrs. Peniman with Ruth, Nina, Sam and Paul, plastered the walls of the new “soddy” with a medium made of one-third clay and two-thirds sand, which, when dry, they covered with a neat coat of whitewash.
The “soddy” when completed was eighteen by twenty-two feet inside, and though it had no partitions, was divided into three rooms by means of curtains, which Mrs. Peniman had brought in her trunk.
The last coat of whitewash was applied late in the evening, and the next morning Mrs. Peniman could scarcely wait to get breakfast over before she began to move into her new house.
The boys and their father were off and away early, for they were straining every nerve to get in a crop of sod-corn before the coming of the fall rains. But with the help of the girls and little Paul, she went at it with a will, determined to make their home in the wilderness as pleasant and comfortable as it could be under the circumstances.
They had brought with them from Ohio a carpet, a cook-stove, two bedsteads and several cots, some chairs, among which were two comfortable old-fashioned rockers, a table, a great roll of matting, and books, pictures, and knickknacks, and when these were in place, with packing-cases converted into dressing-tables, cupboards made out of boxes, and a couple of roughly constructed benches placed against the walls covered with bright-colored chintz, the place assumed a cheery and homelike appearance that one would never have deemed possible from its exterior. The window ledges were wide and deep, and in the windows she hung pretty white curtains, covered the packing-cases and boxes with chintz, laid the matting over the dirt floors and covered it with the carpet, and when the pictures were hung on the walls, the books and knick-knacks on the table, with a vase of gorgeous goldenrod from the prairies, the little “soddy” looked like a real home.
The front part of the house, into which the door opened, was the living-room, with cot-beds covered in the daytime like couches furnished the sleeping accommodations for the girls. Curtained off from this the second part of the interior was divided in two, with the sleeping quarters of the boys on one side of the curtain and those of Mr. and Mrs. Peniman on the other. The back third, from which the back door opened out into the outdoor kitchen, contained the cook-stove, dishes and cooking utensils, provisions, and a table at which the family took their meals in stormy weather.
Profiting by his remembrance of the Wards’ dugout, Mr. Peniman had decided to make a dugout for the shelter of his stock. He selected a spot where the steep incline of a ravine made a high embankment; he set to work digging back into it, and was gratified to find that the earth sloped downward under a wide ledge of rock, so that by extending the dugout for about twenty-five feet back under the ledge he could take advantage of it and convert it into an excellent natural roof. This plan lightened the labors of building the barn considerably. When a large square chamber had been dug they evened it up, built a strong sod wall in front and at the sides where they met the slope of the embankment, put in three stalls on each side, made of dead timber they found along the river bank, constructed feed-racks out of old boxes, and built in the back end a sort of attic or loft, for grain and hay.
As no door had been brought for the barn they were obliged to make one, using small saplings closely nailed together on a strong pine frame. This made a heavy and rather cumbersome door, but an exceedingly strong one.
“I guess no Indian will break through that to steal our horses,” remarked Joe, regarding it proudly.
“No, I think not. We’ll put a good strong lock on it, and then I think our horses will be safe. It behooves us to keep them so,” went on Mr. Peniman, “for a settler’s wealth is in his horses, and we are better off than most. Most of the movers we have met were driving oxen, while we have three good teams.”
When the dugout was completed it was indeed a strong and safe shelter for the stock. Protected from above by the ledge of rock, and on both sides by the stout sod wall and the rocky sides of the embankment, with the sturdy log door across its entrance, it was a shelter that would have stood a long siege.
As the family stood about it viewing it with pride they did not dream how well it would serve them, or how glad they would be of its protection in the days to come.