Shortly after "Sailor Joe" Hansen, built a log cabin in Mitchell valley, but he left after a short time, when he lost his boy, who was dragged to his death by a runaway horse. "Sandy" Ingraham caught the horses, but the boy was dead.

Then William R. Akers, John Coy, and Virgil Grout came up from the Greeley district, and started the work of the Lucerne canal, the story of which is told elsewhere. Then came the Tabor or Minatare settlement.

First Plowing

The first in this locality was A. W. Mills, who died in Omaha some few years ago, but whose home was here for so many years. Mills arrived from Sidney, unloaded his grass-hopper plow and began to plow sod on his claim which was about half-way between the present municipalities of Scottsbluff and Minatare. He was the first granger to set a plow in the sod of Scotts Bluff county. He and a friend were engaged in putting up a sod house, when George Baltes walked in from Camp Clarke. George came up to where the men were working near the top of the sod walls. It was evening and the sod were seemingly very heavy, so heavy that Mills and his assistant had improvised a slide from the wagon to the top of the wall, by using the endgate. George was asked to wait until they finished unloading the sod and they said they would get supper and he could bunk with them for the night.