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Reuben Gaines' memoir, undated
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I,Reuben Gaines,at 90 years of age,of Albia,Iowa, being of sound mind (He says so) is hereby prompted to write the undocumented History of the Ghost Town of Buxton,Iowa in its entirety from 1900 to 1923. To commemorate these events that cover all facets of life which laid dormant for the last 80 years may take more than one electric soch to bring those idea into focus. Buxton the town of enchantment; events and incidents, populated with ethical races had a sociality in dreams and ideals that created a memory that lived forever.it was not too much unlike the old western towns of long ago; but the change came with transportation and a different view on civilization and was somewhat removed from frontier justice.In 1900 life was not considered important as it was in later years. Although we had trials but justice rendered was tempered with too much mercy. "The Forest Primevil" was a novel that transcend back to evolution;and while we are not that primitive but we did have an akward way of doing things in relation to the year 1900. B.F. Cooper was the Pharmacist that owned a drug store and also belong to the Gun Club, consisting of 10 or 12 members; He was on the porch of his store and saw a flock of Prairie Chickens land on the very spot where the No.1 house was soon to be built so he crossed over the county line for a few yards and had only time to fire one shot which killed one prairie chicken that was the first one I had ever seen but as time passed on in going to the 40 acres that was a mile west of where we lived I saw 10 or 12 different flocks from 1900 to 1905 but not one flock or single prairie chicken have I seen since. The Gun Club could not have selected a better place for their Trap Shooting because the South and East were high ridges of 20 or 30 feet and the west was 8 to 10 foot grading up to the top of the railroad where anyone could or any thing could be seen immediently from the South where the score was kept.Most of the betting and shooting was done from clay pigeons by having two trappers behind barricades and would let pigeons fly at different angles; then at times they would agree to have a live shooting match at which time they would order a few hundred pigeons and when this would begin because of the escaped birds it would sound as if we had started the first world war for a dozen more people with guns (including me) was firing at any range trying to bring a bird down it was next to impossible to tell who was the owner.When the bird escaped entirely they made a straight flight to our barn; since it was the largest and only one to be seen,I would count 35 or 40 escapes @ .15 or .20 cents each so I lowered the window and blocked it out for it was a of 25 feet high from the barn loft and then I nailed a netting over my lowered window and when they were all inside I fastened the outside netting to the wall with a big bulge in it and all I had to do then was to care them and pick them out and lower them to some one to place in the coop.I repeated this many times
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I,Reuben Gaines,at 90 years of age,of Albia,Iowa, being of sound mind (He says so) is hereby prompted to write the undocumented History of the Ghost Town of Buxton,Iowa in its entirety from 1900 to 1923. To commemorate these events that cover all facets of life which laid dormant for the last 80 years may take more than one electric soch to bring those idea into focus. Buxton the town of enchantment; events and incidents, populated with ethical races had a sociality in dreams and ideals that created a memory that lived forever.it was not too much unlike the old western towns of long ago; but the change came with transportation and a different view on civilization and was somewhat removed from frontier justice.In 1900 life was not considered important as it was in later years. Although we had trials but justice rendered was tempered with too much mercy. "The Forest Primevil" was a novel that transcend back to evolution;and while we are not that primitive but we did have an akward way of doing things in relation to the year 1900. B.F. Cooper was the Pharmacist that owned a drug store and also belong to the Gun Club, consisting of 10 or 12 members; He was on the porch of his store and saw a flock of Prairie Chickens land on the very spot where the No.1 house was soon to be built so he crossed over the county line for a few yards and had only time to fire one shot which killed one prairie chicken that was the first one I had ever seen but as time passed on in going to the 40 acres that was a mile west of where we lived I saw 10 or 12 different flocks from 1900 to 1905 but not one flock or single prairie chicken have I seen since. The Gun Club could not have selected a better place for their Trap Shooting because the South and East were high ridges of 20 or 30 feet and the west was 8 to 10 foot grading up to the top of the railroad where anyone could or any thing could be seen immediently from the South where the score was kept.Most of the betting and shooting was done from clay pigeons by having two trappers behind barricades and would let pigeons fly at different angles; then at times they would agree to have a live shooting match at which time they would order a few hundred pigeons and when this would begin because of the escaped birds it would sound as if we had started the first world war for a dozen more people with guns (including me) was firing at any range trying to bring a bird down it was next to impossible to tell who was the owner.When the bird escaped entirely they made a straight flight to our barn; since it was the largest and only one to be seen,I would count 35 or 40 escapes @ .15 or .20 cents each so I lowered the window and blocked it out for it was a of 25 feet high from the barn loft and then I nailed a netting over my lowered window and when they were all inside I fastened the outside netting to the wall with a big bulge in it and all I had to do then was to care them and pick them out and lower them to some one to place in the coop.I repeated this many times
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