Sunday afternoon, as part of the annual meeting of the Nuckolls County Historical Society held in the museum complex’s Pioneer Hall, those attending were asked to participate in a Nuckolls County Trivia game. I got four and a half answers right. How many can you get?
1. What was the name of the lumber company that had a lumber yard in Superior and Nelson in the early 1900s? (While not part of the question, I think the firm also had yards at Bostwick, Hardy and Edgar.)
2. What did the Fuller family of Angus produce before their first automobile?
3. Most have heard of the Old Trusty incubator company at Clay Center, Nebraska. Nelson also had factory that manufactured incubators. What was the name of the company? (They didn’t ask but Superior also had an incubator factory on East Second Street and a plow factory on Commercial Street)
4. Hardy had a factory that was very “handy.” What did the factory make?
5. What was the age of Evelene Brodstone when she was the highest paid woman executive in the world?
6.What was the name of the one-room school house now located on the museum grounds? What school district did it serve? What year was the building built?
7. What are the call letters for the radio station that began on Feb. 16, 1923, at Oak?
The answers are: 1. Day & Frees. 2. Buggies 3. Lindsay, Inc. 4. Gloves. 5. 41. 6. Beach, District 44, Constructed 1884. 7 KFEQ.
For the last question, those present were asked to identify and explain the use of a long handled tack hammer. The hammer had a multi-section handle which extended the head several feet. The handle had spring clips and the head was magnetized.
I thought it might have been used by a one-room school teacher to keep order. The teacher could remain at her desk, or at least out of the reach of a student, and thump her students on the head when they misbehaved.
When no one in the audience answered the question, Steve Renz explained it was a poster hammer and demonstrated how it worked. It had clips to hold the posters and a magnet to hold the tacks. With the long handle, it was a tool used to hang posters out of the reach of vandals.
Advance men hanging multicolored circus posters used that style of hammer.
While not on display at the Nuckolls County Museum, this week I read about a unique pair of boots worn by a cow-thief in the 1920s. The boots earned him the moniker of Crazy Text Hazelwood. The boots are now on display in the Northeastern Nevada Museum in Elko, Nevada.
The thief rigged his boots with boards and two hoofs and wore them while stealing cattle. Ranch hands realized their herd was thinning about two head at a time but they were confused because there were never any human tracks left by a rustler.
Finally, a couple hands followed a pair of “cow” tracks and discovered Hazelwood, wearing his hoof boots while leading a stolen cow.
According to an article by Howard Hickson published in the Nevada Magazine, Hazelwood bragged he had practiced taking long strides with the foot-long 6-inch tall shoes and had been stealing cattle for six months.
Farm Show magazine reports that after a couple years in prison, Hazlewood moved back to northeast Nevada and “remained a nuisance for several more years.” In 1953, a feuding neighbor shot Hazelewood, 72, who was sitting in his pickup.
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