TX BIOS:  Reminiscences of Mark Banta
   Selected and converted.American Memory, Library of Congress.
   
   Washington, 1994.
   
   Preceding element provides place and date of transcription only.
   
   This transcription intended to be 99.95% accurate.
   
   For more information about this text and this American Memory
   collection, refer to accompanying matter.
   
   U.S. Work Projects Administration, Federal Writers' Project (Folklore
   Project, Life Histories, 1936-39); Manuscript Division, Library of
   Congress.Copyright status not determined.
   
   0001
   
   Memoir
   
   REMINISCENCES OF MART BANTA
   
   Mr. Mart Banta lives in the Beaver Creek community on Beaver creek in
   the northwestern part of [DEL: the :DEL] Wichita county, and has lived
   there continuously since 1877, where his father settled with his
   family when Mart was a very small child. Mr. Banta is an outstanding
   citizen in his community. His "Reminiscences" are on file in the
   [Kemo?] Public Library.
   
   "My father, J.H.Banta, was born and reared in Missouri, and after the
   war he came back home and he was never at ease. The state was so torn
   up after the war, so he decided to migrate. He first went to Colorado.
   After he stayed there in Colorado for six or seven years, he decided
   that it was too cold. He wanted a warmer climate. So, he sold his
   cattle, put his family in the wagon and started out. All he had in the
   world was his family, his wagon and team, and $600. So, then he
   started for Texas. Instead of coming directly he had to go back east
   through Kansas and then go through the Indian Territory, via of Fort
   Sill, and then into Texas. He went on down as far as San Saba county,
   in south Texas. But he wasn't satisfied, and turned back north and
   came to Henrietta. There he met a man by the name of C.B.Patterson. He
   told him that he was disappointed, that he had not found what suited
   him, and Mr. Patterson asked him what he was looking for. He replied
   that he wanted wood, water, grass and game all at one place. Mr.
   Patterson promised that he could show him where to find that kind of a
   country; so he left his family and went with Mr. Patterson up on
   Beaver creek. There he found all the things he had been looking for,
   and there he settled in 1877.
   
     NOTE: C. [md;] 12. Tex.
     
   "Father hauled the lumber to build his house from Sherman, and
   finished it in the fall of 1877. The next morning he started on the
   two-day trip to Henrietta to get the family. I was then four years
   old, having been born in Colorado. [DEL: the :DEL] The next day after
   we got to our new home [DEL: Fahter :DEL] Father went down to the
   creek and killed a buffalo. Our / full diet of meat for the next four
   00022years was made up of wild turkey, deer, antelope, and buffalo. We
   used the buffalo tallow for lard. We also used lots of jerky, which is
   dried meat, usually deer or buffalo.
   
   "There were no settlers near us when my father come here.. The nearest
   neighbors I can remember were two men who were working for Burk
   Burnett, and lived in a little log house on his place. They were Tom
   W. Roberts and Dick Sparks. They lived three miles down the creek from
   where we lived, where is now located the Texas Company dam. We got our
   mail from Henrietta through the Ikard Ranch. They would bring our mail
   and supplies from Henrietta whenever they were going, something like
   once a month. There was nothing in Wichita Falls at that time. There
   was a crossing at the falls in the Wichita river. The falls, for which
   the city was named, were about six feet high and were located about
   two hundred feet above the rail road bridge. There was a solid rock
   bottom at the falls, and you could cross the river there when you
   could not cross at any other place.
   
   "My father was desirous of entering the cattle business and went to
   see Burnett, Waggoner, and Ikard and asked them if they would
   cooperate with him by giving him part time work if he had a herd of
   cattle, and they replied, 'No'. They didn't want anything to do with
   him if he owned cattle of his own, so my father went into the sheep
   business.
   
   "The first man that moved in was a Baptist preacher named John W.
   Campbell. My father, when he moved in, had settled on a parcel of land
   known as the scrap lnad, about 251 acres. He got the idea in his head
   that he could only hold one hundred sixty acres on account of the
   homestead law. So, when this preacher came along he deeded him the
   ninety acres, and retained the claim to one hundred sixty acres, now
   known as the John W. Campbell survey. 00033"The next settler that I
   remember was Jno W. Carter, who was known as 'Pap ' Carter. [The?]
   next neighbor was T. G. Stearns. About 1880 the Powells came. He was a
   local Methodist preacher. We had services around at the home's for two
   or three years. These two preachers would preach around at the houses
   of whoever [DEL: wnated :DEL] wanted them. There were very few parties
   or entertainments; once in a while there was an old fashioned dance.
   
   "There were no fences--all free range. We ran sheep there until 1888.
   At that time the country began to close up; people began to settle on
   the land, and Father had to quit the sheep business on account of not
   having enough land enclosed to take care of them.
   
   "Our mother and father had school for us in the evenings at home
   before we could [DEL: got :DEL] go to school. Our text books were the
   Blue Back Speller, Ray's [DEL: Arighmetic :DEL] Arithmetic in three
   parts, and McGuffy's Readers, which went up to the sixth grade.
   Whenever we wanted something to read our mother would say, 'There is
   the Bible'. We had all read it through before we started to school.
   One day one of the boys got a hold of Gulliver's Travels, and could
   not read it in peace for all the rest of us wanting him to read it
   aloud--or let us have the book.
   
   "The first school on Beaver Creek, and the [DEL: firs :DEL] first in
   the county, was taught by T.B. Sparks, of Clinton, Missouri, an uncle
   of mine, who was then about eighteen years old. The school was located
   on the north side of the creek on the land now owned by George B.
   Amcell. The tuition was 75¢ per month per scholar, and they had about
   ten scholars.
   
   "The next school was the public school organized at Beaver Creek in
   1884. It now stands on the same plot of ground where it was organized.
   I am a trustee in this school where [DEL: i :DEL] I went to school
   myself fifty years ago.
   
   "We had a teacher there at Beaver Creek in the early days by the name
   of 00044L.H. Rosser, who was an ex-college president from Alabama. He
   handled them all and had plenty of time to spare. He taught us for
   four years. His hobby was math. He was my first teacher in the public
   school. I was in about the sixth grade when I entered school.
   
   "There was a prep. school at Vernon, organized in about 1894 o4 1895,
   where scholars prepared for college. Six of my classmates went. Prof.
   Morris, who taught this school, said he could pick out every scholar
   from Mr. Rosser's school by his work.
   
   "The first suit of ready made clothes I ever had I bought from J.A.
   Kemp here in Wichita. His store was located on the east side of Ohio
   Avenue, about where Nick's Hat Shop now is.
   
   "One day when the creek was low my father caught a cat fish that
   weighed seventy-two pounds. He put it in a wagon, and put wet clothes
   over it, and hauled it to Henrietta alive.
   
   "I now own the old home place where my father originally settled, and
   have lived there during all the intervening years. Our house stands
   now on the same plot where Father erected his first house, and ours is
   the fourth to stand on this spot. It is in a grove of Chinaberry
   trees.

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