The Sheridan implement company began selling Allis-Chalmers round balers in 1947

Round baler technology got its start in Sutton, way back...

The June 12, 1947 issue of The Sutton News carried this item.

William Sheridan was touting his new Allis Chalmers roto baler and side delivery rake. Old timers in Sutton were recalling 40-some years earlier when a local fellow invented the first round baler. The Sutton News editor came close to getting the story right. He credited the invention to “Luben” saying he was a “banker in our town.” Most accounts, and the Sutton Museum credit the banker’s son, Ummo Luebben for designing and building the world’s first round baler. The basic design survives in today’s machines. The Luebben’s patent for the machine was issued on October 18, 1910, interestingly enough, the day my father was born. Ummo Luebben manufactured his baler in Beatrice and Lincoln before selling the rights to the machine to Allis Chalmers in 1940.

This photo of the folks at Wm. Sheridan & Sons appears on page 125 of “Along the County Line.” In the front row are Roger, William, John, and William Sheridan, Sr. The caption identified the back row as “Those who helped the Sheridans.” Let's have a quiz. Comment below if you know who those back row folks might be.

The background story of Sutton's role in the invention of the round baler was detailed in this year's ago post, linked here.

https://suttonhistoricalsociety.blogspot.com/2008/12/sutton-home-of-round-baler.html

 

Ads in The Sutton Register & the Advertiser-News - January 1900

The Sutton Register and the Advertiser-News were competing Sutton Newspapers beginning in September 1895 (it appears based on newspaper.com copies. The Register began publication in 1880 and was purchased by F.M. Brown in 1886. E.P. Burnett started the Advertiser-News which became The Sutton News later. Those two papers merged and the ensuing paper became The Clay County News.

And the second Sutton newspaper during this era was The Advertiser-News:

The First Sutton News after the World War Ended - 11/15/1918

This issue of The Sutton News came four days after the armistice on November 11, 1918. The editor of the paper could not pass up the opportunity to take a jab at his cross-town rival in the story's first paragraph.

City and County Officers - 1899

 These were the Clay County and Sutton city officers at the beginning of 1899.

Sutton in Review - 1898

This brief snapshop of Sutton appeared in this 1898 newspaper.

J.M. Gray added a second story to his residence in 1892?

This excerpt from the Sutton newspapaer The Advertiser-News in 1892 indicates that J.W. Gray added a second story to his residence. Gray owned the house on North Way Avenue that houses part of the Sutton Historical Society. This is evidence that the house began as a one-story building. A surprise to us.

1922 Citizenship Applications for 20 County Men

The Clay County Sun newspaper of November 30, 1922 listed these gentlemen as candidates for citizenship in Clay County.

Sutton Ads in The Advertiser-News

The Advertiser-News was an early Sutton newspaper. This collage of local ads appeared in that paper in November 1897.

1922 Sutton Golf Club Tournament

100 Years Ago - The Sutton Golf Club held their second golf tournament.

Notice that the winning lady receives a box of bon-bons for a prize while all the other prizes are golf balls. Question: Is that a good thing or a bad thing?

This item appeared in The Sutton News on November 3, 1922.

1947 Fairfield Neighborhood Corn Picking Crew

Neighborhood crews helping in harvest and other farm work for neighbors in some kind of stress was a common story throughout the history of the county.

This item, a reprint from the Hastings Tribune, appeared in The Fairfield Auxiliary newspaper on November 11, 1947.

Sutton''s First Bicycle Party - 1897

The Sutton News reported the first bicycle party in Sutton in their October 15, 1897 issue:

Ong Methodist Church 75th Anniversary - 1947

The Ong Methodist Church celebrated its 75th anniversary in October 1947. This article appeared in The Edgar Sun newspaper.

 

Harvard Banker Visited Inflation-Plagued Germany in 1922

Herman Wellensiek, Harvard banker, visited relatives in Germany in 1922 and observed the economic climate in the early months of Germany's inflation crisis. About a year after this article appeared in The Harvard Courier, the U.S. dollar was worth more than 4 trillion marks. Prices were doubling in less than every four days.

This article was in The Harvard Courier on August 10, 1922.

1947 Problems with Long Distance Telephone Service

Issues with phones in 1947 did not involve display resolution, apps, camera quality, etc. Lincoln Telephone & Telegraph was busy beefing up circuits between numerous towns to increase their capacity for long distance calls.

And remember, young folk, long distance calls, those out of town, were metered and you paid based on distance and time connected. A half hour call to an uncle in California might impact your monthly budget. Birthdays could be handled with a card and a three cent stamp. People cringed when told they had a long distance call. A high percentage of long distance calls involved death notices. 

LT&T posted this notice in newspapers in July 1947.

 

Flying Saucers Over Sutton - 1947

 

Sutton did not miss out on the huge Flying Saucer stories of 1947

Henry Fuehrer stepped up first in town to report seeing stuff in the air. By the next week, two more Sutton men came forward to tell their story - Marshal Henry Trautman and Doc Ochsner, one of the two dentists in town.

This article ran the same week in The York Daily News

The hotbed of flying saucers was in New Mexico, Roswell for instance. This article made the Albuquerque newspaper.

And here is the report in the Hastings Daily Tribune.

March 1947 - End of WWII Draft Program

The Selective Service Program - the DRAFT - for World War II ended on March 31, 1947. This is the recap of the draft in Clay County during WWII.

This article appeared in The Clay County News on June 5, 1947.

State Newspapers Described Nebraska's New Capitol in May 1922

This article about Nebraska's new capitol building appeared in The Edgar Sun on May 12, 1922 as well as papers across the county and the state, likely nationally.

Camp Fire Girls Mark French Dugout - 1922

Sutton Camp Fire girls celebrated the 50th anniversary of Arbor Day by planting a tree on the site of Luther French's dugout on the banks of School Creek.

The story appeared on Page 1 of the April 28, 1922 issue of The Sutton News.

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A couple of things:

Marking the anniversary of the founding of Arbor Day offers some choices. J. Sterling Morton suggested such a thing in January 1872. The day was first celebrated later in the year - a couple of dates show up in accounts. The day was officially named a Nebraska holiday in 1874.

Secondly, this account places the French dugout on the south bank of School Creek. I've had seen references that it was on the north bank. Several of my contemporaries, town kids, tell of working their way through tall weeds to visit, and play in the dugout. Us farm kids were spending our time on tractor seats so weren't involved. Anyhow, I've had fellows tell me the dugout was on the north side, others say the south, not a few can't remember. 

The article begins by referring to "April Day." I'm guessing the editor meant Arbor Day and used that reference in my account of the article for the column in the April 27 issue of The Clay County News. I wonder if that was accurate.

1932 Burlington Rail Pass Found Blowing Around Town

This 1932 Burlington rail pass was found in a plastic zip-lock bag blown up against the fence of a dog run in Sutton this week (early April 2022). 

Among the fun consequences of being associated with a local historical society is that this kind of thing finds its way to our attention. Our learned,  and developed curiosity then kicks into gear.

William Chandler was born in Smith County, Kansas on 24 Oct 1904 and died in Harvard on 27 Nov 1969. He is buried in the Harvard cemetery.

William Joseph Chandler appears in the 1920 census as the 16-year old son of Vern and Rosa Chandler in Clay Center. He was in Harvard in 1940 with his wife Lottie and two children. He identified himself as an assistant welder for the Burlington railroad. 

The rail pass has been well preserved and from all appearances, has been kept for almost 90 years as some kind of memorabilia. So how did it come to be blowing loose on the streets of Sutton in 2022?

I dunno. Contact us if you lost this item, or have information about how or why it is still around.

The 1947 County Assessors Go To Work

The April 3, 1947 issue of The Clay County News described the work and the guidelines for the county assessors as they prepared to evaluate county property.