The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 59, July 1955 - April, 1956 Page: 25
587 p. : ill., maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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A Trip to Texas in 1855
One of them admitted that the corn along the Mississippi grew
"kindly and readily," but he pointed out that the ears were not
so long as the ears of Indiana corn. He declared that more corn
per acre was raised along the Scioto and Great Miami rivers in
Ohio than in any part of the whole world. In fact, this yellow-
trousered, uncouth Hoosier knew a man who raised 187 bushels
of shelled corn to the measured acre on the Scioto River. His
yellow trousers indicated that he was from Indiana. John remem-
bered that when he made his first trip to New Orleans in 1822,
on the Vulcan, his father's first steamboat, the upcountry men
were identified by the color of the linsey trousers they wore. Ohio
men wore indigo blue, the Indiana men a bright yellow; men from
another state wore butternut brown. This loquacious, one-eyed
Hoosier was taking a large number of turkeys, in coops, to Texas.
According to John's diary, this fellow was only one of several
"queer specimens of humanity" on board.
When the boat put to, above the mouth of the Ohio, in answer
to a flag waving opposite Cave-in-Rock, a young man in a peaked
hat and blanket poncho with a waterproof over it, came down the
embankment leading a stout gray horse. Man and horse were taken
aboard, the negro hands delighting in the management of the
horse. One led the animal, two others pushed at his haunches,
and a fourth twisted his tail. The man and his horse were going
to Texas. The young man, about twenty-six years old, said he had
"cropped" in Texas some years before. He had not done well, but
he would try again. Then he would go on West. Someone asked,
"What do you mean by West?" "Why, farther out in Texas," was
the firm rejoinder.
There was an old woman on board who looked as if she had just
"stepped out of the backwoods of Virginia." She scorned a change
of frock or cap. Her daughter was "remarkable for a measured
swing in her walk and in her dignified mode of spitting in the
Stove hearth." The daughter usually wore black silk or crimson
merino. One night, when dancing seemed imminent, she came
out in white shoes. On a Sunday night she favored the passengers
with a rendition of "Lilly Dale," and other favorite tunes. Back
and forth she rocked, singing song after song, in a loud cracked
voice, with "not a very strict adherence to the tune." To vary the
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 59, July 1955 - April, 1956, periodical, 1956; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101162/m1/37/?rotate=90: accessed April 26, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.