Former Exiran Recalls Events of Interest
1522 Bluffs Avenue
Fort Smith, Ark.
April 26th, 1957
Dear friends:
Several months ago I received a letter concerning a big celebration Exira will hold in July observing the 100th birthday anniversary of the western Iowa town, which my grandfather Daniel Harris along with David Edgerton, I believe, established, soliciting a letter relating interesting incidents that occurred in Exira while I lived there.
Interesting incidents were plentiful, one such being a revolver-knife fight between Dell Anderson and Roll Strahl which took place in the public square near the northwest corner. Strahl was critically knifed, but the fight might have ended differently if his revolver had not misfired.
I did not see that one, but I'm probably the only living eyewitness of the gunfight between Dee Burns and Roll Strahl that was staged in the street just west of the square. I'm not sure of the date but surmise the battle occurred about 1880-81, for I wasn't more than seven or eight years of age. Just why a little boy happened to be crossing Exira's Main street from north to south at that particular time I do not know, but there I was, watching two men blasting away at each other, with bullets from Dee's gun lifting gobs of mud and water high into the air about 15 ft. away. The shooting was fast, the marksmanship poor, and when Dee's gun was emptied he ducked between two business buildings, one a brick, with Roll's last bullet creasing the south wall of the brick.
Then Roll cut back hoping to meet Dee on the vacant lot farther north but met instead a brother of Dee's, a giant of a man, who bested Roll in the fist fight that ended the fracas, partly because Burns clamped down on one of Roll's fingers when the latter hit him in the mouth. I caught glimpses of the fist fight by peeking between the bystanders' legs.
The above are two such incidents of many. I wonder if anyone now residing there realizes what a wild rip-roaring town Exira was up until the early 80's. A town of about 700 inhabitants, the home of a constable and at times a deputy sheriff, whose citizens thought it prudent to employ, in addition to a day marshall, and a night watchman who patrolled the streets with a double barrel shotgun in the crook of his arm.
Merchants whose homes were quite a distance from their place of business would leave their stores late at night carrying their cash in one hand and a loaded revolver in the other, especially if on their way home they passed through the public square.
That sounds unbelievable now, but I can name one merchant who always did just that, "Billy" Sickles whose home was in the southeast part of town.
I'm making this epistle too long , but it's hard to stop for wondering if there is even one old timer up there with whom I used to skate on the Montgomery, Bush or Hensley or Horseshoe pond, or swim with in a David's Creek 10 ft. hole. Probably not, and I'm sure that no one remembers when the road that passes through Main Street and straight on west originally made a right hand turn at the foot of the hill and across the creek on a much shorter bridge located 100 yds north of the present bridge, putting West Exira's main street a block north of the present location, with saloons and business establishments. At one of the stores I once bought when a little fellow, a broad brimmed straw hat for nickel. Also wonder if there is anyone now there who was a member of Exira's first fire department. I still have my certificate of membership.
I presume the "history" has already gone to press, which is just as well so far as this letter is concerned for, re-reading it, I discover that it is probably a bit silly and of no historical value, except possibly the account of the two fights.
I also vividly remember the free-for-all in front of Charles Bartlett's livery stable in which Roll Strahl was killed, and also the gunfight in Isaac Hallock's feed lot when Carl or Colbert Strahl, Roll's father, and Jess Millhollin cornered and tried to kill George Hallock, whose 44 had killed Roll. In this last fight Strahl was killed and Millhollin got a 32 bullet in his skull which he carried the rest of his life.
I have been a printer most of my life serving my apprenticeships on the Journal, Audubon Advocate and Missouri Valley Times. I left Exira on April 2nd, 1892, after Guernsey fired me because I insisted that he pay me weekly wages-$2.50 every Saturday night. I have worked as a hand compositor in Nebraska, on daily papers in Trinidad, Colorado, and Fayetteville, Arkansas. As a linotype operator for 42 years in four Illinois cities including Chicago, and on the Des Moines Tribune, Omaha World Herald, Dallas Times Herald, Grand Junction , Colorado, and Breckenridge, Texas dailies and over 30 years in Fort Smith.
And that's not all indicating that I'm probably Exira's most traveled son. I also worked for the C. and N. W. railroad in the freighthouse and in switch yards, as a bill clerk in the railroad department at Swift's in South Omaha, as a boiler makers helper in the Santa Fe shop in Raton, New Mexico and as an assistant storekeeper in the company's store in an Arkansas coal camp. Almost forgot-a short hitch in a Missouri brick yard. Been married twice, five children of whom three survive, six grandchildren.
Ed Milliman and I were close friends. Went to school, skating, swimming, played "bear in the square" and "Yolloway" together, and on one of my visits to Exira he, Bill Brinkerhoff ink myself sort of painted the town red. I sure apologize for the length of this letter, acknowledging that I'm an extremely garrulous old man-and old windbag.
D. H. "Harry" Crane
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The article above was taken from a clipping
compiled by Iva Milliman, Exira. The main article came from a
scrapbook in the Exira Courthouse Historical Museum reading room.