STORY - BURGER, Chris

BURGER, FRY, MCINTEE

Posted By: Administrator
Date: 2/6/2006 at 16:20:00

The Fairfield Daily Ledger, Nov. 7, 1962, Page 4, col. 1.

EDITORIAL: IT’S THE KIND OF STORY THE KIDS DON’T HEAR.

Are natives of Jefferson County a special breed of independent and self-reliant Americans? ….. There are many of them who still believe they should do for themselves. That thought comes to us as we read in the Daily Oklahoman of Oklahoma City a feature story about Chris BURGER who was born near Libertyville. He went to Oklahoma 69 years ago and staked out a homestead on the Cherokee strip. He has lived on the farm since that time. His title is a single sheet of paper – a certificate which says he had met the requirements of the Homestead Act. There has never been a mortgage on the farm. Now, at the age of 95, he still drives his car about the farm but has given up driving it to town. His reason, “I had a little bout with a tractor several years ago; only broke two toes but I seem to have rheumatism in my knees since then so I don’t drive far.” He can’t quite understand why he should have been injured “because it was just a little tractor.”

After he had improved upon his homestead he came back to Iowa and married his childhood sweetheart, Minnie FRY of the Libertyville neighborhood. Not many years ago he came back to try to locate the house in which he was born. He did. It is in Des Moines township, now occupied by Warren McINTEE.

It is a heart warming story. But his is only half the story. His father before him had come to Iowa and wrested a farm out of the timber and prairie. His is the kind of story young folks don’t hear in these latter days. What they read is that farmers can no longer make a good living. Which, of course, raises some questions about what is a good living. Perhaps Chris Burger found the answer.