\ great many people passing along that valley, on the < )verland trains, or the Lincoln 1 lighway, have admired a green oasis near the pretty village of Lodgepole, which is the Oberfelder ranch. < >berfelder Brothers are pioneer merchants al Sidney, and this ranch was a side issue. I [ere was where a demonstration of what hogs would do, if properly handled in alfalfa fields, proved of great value to the owners, a- well as to western Nebraska at large. id "Bob" l >berfelder have done splendidly their part in western development.

Permanent ranching at the mouth of the

Blue Water and west along the North Platte valley is marked by the names of old timers in the present limits of Garden county. Here we find foremost among them several persons still living, and of distinguished interest.

Reuben Lisco still holds the famous ranch heretofore mentioned in detail.

Samuel P. DeLatour still has a ranch in "Cheyenne Canyon" on the Blue, which he established before 1885.

H. C. Gumaer came up from Howard county and permanently settled here about 1885, with headquarters in section thirty-five. Township

HISTORY OF WESTERN NEBRASKA

seventeen, north of Range forty-four west. He organized the Oshkosh Land & Cattle Company.

D. C. Hooper arrived and went into ranching about the same time. Previously, Knowles- Baldwin Company, the Ogallala Company,, Adams, Redington & Company, and the LJsco ranch were in practical control of the range, the Ogallala having taken over many of the _ other ranches. This company had a "camp" at the mouth of the Blue, when the latter day ranchmen began to arrive.