William S. Hart was the most popular cowboy screen star in Hollywood during the second decade of the 20th Century.
Born in Newburgh, New York, on December 6, 1864, Hart portrayed the first rough-hewn “Good/Bad Man,” said Steve Hulett, cowboy movie historian.
However, Hart didn’t begin his acting career as a flinty, Western hero. He started on stage reciting Shakespeare.
After two years, he moved on portraying the evil cattle rustler Cash Hawkins in the stage play titled “The Squaw Man, Hulett said.
Cash Hawkins was the first presentation of a real American cowboy that Broadway had ever seen, Hulett noted.
Hart remained with the production until he accepted the title role in Owen Wister’s “The Virginian.” Hart developed a name for himself playing “authentic” Westerners on the Broadway stage.
Yet even with favorable reviews, the actor often led a hand-to-mouth existence and supplemented his income with detective work.
In 1914, Hart’s fortune changed. He moved to Hollywood, California, and played support in a handful of two-reel Western movies. Within a year, he was top-lining feature films, Hulett said.
Fascinated by the Old West, Hart acquired Billy the Kid’s “pistols.” He was a friend of legendary lawmen Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson. Hart was particularly interested in making realistic Western films.
In 1915 and 1916, Hart was the top money-making star in the United States, Hulett said.
In the films. Hart rode a brown and white pinto he called Fritz. The horse was forerunner to later famous movie horses like Tom Mix’s Tony, Roy Rogers’s Trigger and Clayton Moore’s Silver.
Hart also volunteered from 1917 to 1918 with the Four Minute Men program to give short pro-war speeches, Hulett said.
Hart was always close to his sister Mary, and when he moved to California, she came with him.
In his autobiography “My Life East and West,” Hart called Mary “my constant advisor.” She took care of his fan mail, Hulett said.
Mary is listed as cowriter for two of his published books, “Pinto Ben and Other Stories,” 1919, and “And All Points West.” 1940.
When Winifred Westover was about to sign a new five-year film contract, Hart sent her a telegram her not to sign anything. He then proposed marriage to her in a letter, and she telegraphed her acceptance.
On December 7, 1921, Hart married Winifred Westover in Los Angeles. She was 22 years old, and Hart was 57. The only guests were the bride’s mother, Hart’s sister Mary, and his attorney. On the day of her wedding Westover signed an agreement to retire from acting.
The couple’s son, William S. Hart, Jr., was born on September 22, 1922. Hart’s son lived with his mother and spent little time with his father.
When Hart’s sister Mary died in 1943, a “tall, erect cowboy” attended the funeral “leaning on the arm of his son.” William S. Hart died on June 23, 1946, at age 81.
For his contribution to the motion picture industry, William S. Hart has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 1975, he was inducted into the National Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
Original Silver Screen Western Hero William S. Hart More Actor Than Cowboy
Reintroduction Of Buffalo to Flints Hills Could Improve Pasture Quality
Buffalo could again be prominently roaming Kansas’ prairielands.
While buffalo grazed Midwestern grasslands two centuries ago serving as multisource livelihood of Native Americans, they became extinct.
Settlers intruded on the native habitat and slayed buffalo by the ultra-thousands. Buffalo hunting became a profession as well as a sport. Hides were valuable as carcasses were left to rot. Mounted trophy heads were boasted on office walls of eastern rich men.
Soon buffalo were not roaming rangeland. Native Americans were without their main source of food, clothing other means of livelihood that buffalo provided.
Buffalo are now being seen in certain locales as producers are finding niche demands for the meat.
Tours of buffalo operations are appealing weekend road trips and viewing by vacationers again from the East and West as well. Even buffalo bull hunts garner profit for certain entrepreneurs.
Yet processing of buffalo is a major ordeal with limited plant operations nationwide. Locally, buffalo are slain in the field and brought to processing facilities ready for skinning and cutting into eatable meat.
High nutrient level of buffalo meat has been promoted by certain specialists as well as enthusiastic promoters.
Actual benefits of buffalo to native rangelands were of little consideration until recent times. Researchers have now many decades later determined many values of buffalo to the natural habitat.
Kansas State University scientists’ research indicates reintroducing buffalo to the tallgrass prairie gradually doubled plant diversity and improved drought resilience.
More than 30 years of data was collected at the Konza Prairie Biological Station near Manhattan.
Removal of nearly all bison, scientific name for buffalo, from the prairie occurred before establishment of quantitative records. That meant effects of removing the dominant grazer were largely unknown.
“Bison were an integral part of North American grasslands before removed from 99 percent of the Great Plains,” research indicates.
Plant composition and diversity on sections of Flint Hills land with no mega-grazers present were studied. Bison were grazed throughout the year and with domestic cattle grazing during the growing season.
Great Plains grasslands have substantially lower plant biodiversity than would have occurred before bison were wiped out, study results indicate.
Thus, returning or ‘rewilding’ native buffalo could help to restore grassland biodiversity.
The study confirmed cattle had a positive impact on plant diversity, compared to having no large grazers present. Increases with cattle in terms of plant species richness were significantly smaller than those related to bison.
Along with addressing land use, researchers sought to understand how bison influenced plant resilience to climate extremes.
Due to duration of the study, researchers captured one of the most extreme droughts since the 1930s Dust Bowl.
Resilience found in the bison grasslands is also consistent with the idea that diversity promotes ecological resilience. And this resilience will only become more important if the climate becomes more extreme, it is predicted.
CUTLINE
A bison herd grazes on the Konza Prairie Biological Station near Manhattan. A new study by Kansas State University researchers shows reintroducing bison to grasslands increases plant diversity and drought resilience.
A PERFECT KITCHEN and BATH
When we built our house I knew nothing about what I needed to tell the carpenters to get my perfect kitchen when it was finished. The carpenter built the cabinets in place but I didn’t know what the height should have been. As I have gotten older I can see several things that I should have thought about and asked about.
When I talked to our carpenter about the kitchen I told him I wanted a baking area in the corner of the kitchen. Our kitchen is an L shape with another turn to the right with more cabinets and then the fridge. The long part of the kitchen runs N-S and then the left turn towards the west, and then a short turn to the north where the fridge sets at the end of the cabinets.
I wanted the baking area in the corner where it made the right turn back to the north where there are more cabinets and then the fridge. The baking corner where the cabinet makes the turn back to the north would have been the perfect place to drop the counter down a few inches for stirring at a comfortable height. Even dropping it 6 inches would have been great for a woman’s height.
I remember telling the carpenter that I wanted the baking area cabinets and counter to be lower so it is easier to stir things in a bowl and pour them into the pans. I am 5’6″ tall, but even the normal cabinet height is a little too tall for me. Our counter tops hit me at the waist and to be comfortable to mix things they should be a little lower. The carpenter just put them all the same height and they are perfect for my husband but not for me.
But the carpenter didn’t bother to check on that or ask me along the way, he just kept doing things like he always did. Since they were not already built it was a perfect opportunity to get it right for my height.
So every time I bake and don’t want to use the Kitchen Aid mixer, I have to take the bowl over to the kitchen sink, on the other side of the kitchen, to mix all the ingredients together. It is an inconvenience because all my ingredients I bake with are on the other side of the room if I need something.
When I came out one night to check on the progress the carpenter was still in the house working and there was a space between the lower cabinet doors and the lazy Susan door in the corner of the baking area. I asked him what he was going to do with that space. He said he was going to put another pull out towel rack there since it was about the same width.
I asked him why would I want a towel rack clear across the room from the sink? All I got was a blank look from him. Then I told him what I wanted in that space and showed him a picture. I wanted three little shallow pull out drawers that went clear back to the back of the cabinet to put spices and baking items in.
I could see the light bulb come on as he thought about that idea. I bet the three little shallow drawers showed up in a lot of the houses out here after that. Those three little drawers were the best part of the kitchen when we moved in. The little narrow and shallow drawers are the perfect place to keep the vanilla and all the little containers and bottles of ingredients you use for baking.
The corner where those three little drawers are is the spot I wanted the cabinet lowered for a baking area. The higher kitchen cabinets didn’t bother me too much when I was younger even though I would have liked them lower. I just learned to mix things at a height that was about 4-6 inches higher than I would have liked. But now with arthritis in my shoulders and elbows it sure would be nice if the counters were lower especially for hand mixing.
The three little drawers were the best part of the kitchen until my husband built pull out drawers to house the items that usually reside under the counters by the stove and I love them. All my pots and pans are on those pull out drawers. They work great and I love having the pots and pans on them.
He built some for the baking area also for the cookie sheets and the sugar and flour containers or anything heavy that I don’t want in the higher cabinets. Now I don’t have to get on my knees and dig in the back of the shelf for something I need to cook or bake with.
The electrician asked me one night, when I stopped in to look things over in the kitchen: where do you want the lights over the vanity in the bathroom. This was the vanity that my husband who is 6′ tall would use for shaving. I told him about eye level would be perfect to shine light on his face. I am sure he had met my husband but I reminded him that he was 6 ‘tall.
The electrician must have been about 6’6″. He put the lights at his eye level. When I stopped in the next night he happened to be working in the kitchen. I went into the bathroom and looked at where the lights were. Then I went and got him.
I told him again my husband was 6’ and that those lights would be at the top of his head and casting shadows onto his face when he shaved. Yes, they were eye level for the electrician but way to high for my husband. So I told him they had to come down about 6 inches so they would be right for my husband when he shaved. He moved the lights down to the level we needed the next day.
It might be fun to build another house now that I know you have to stay on top of the details everyday to get things like you want them. But I am not sure I could handle dealing with the aggravation at my age to get a perfect kitchen and bath. To contact Sandy: therapy [email protected]
Emma Jean Eck
Emma Jean Eck, 87, of Andale, KS, and formerly of London, Ontario, Canada, and McPherson, KS, passed away Thursday, Sept. 15, 2022, at Wesley Medical Center, Wichita. Funeral arrangements are with Stockham Family Funeral Home, McPherson. (website: www.stockhamfamily.com)
A PERFECT KITCHEN and BATH
When we built our house I knew nothing about what I needed to tell the carpenters to get my perfect kitchen when it was finished. The carpenter built the cabinets in place but I didn’t know what the height should have been. As I have gotten older I can see several things that I should have thought about and asked about.
When I talked to our carpenter about the kitchen I told him I wanted a baking area in the corner of the kitchen. Our kitchen is an L shape with another turn to the right with more cabinets and then the fridge. The long part of the kitchen runs N-S and then the left turn towards the west, and then a short turn to the north where the fridge sets at the end of the cabinets.
I wanted the baking area in the corner where it made the right turn back to the north where there are more cabinets and then the fridge. The baking corner where the cabinet makes the turn back to the north would have been the perfect place to drop the counter down a few inches for stirring at a comfortable height. Even dropping it 6 inches would have been great for a woman’s height.
I remember telling the carpenter that I wanted the baking area cabinets and counter to be lower so it is easier to stir things in a bowl and pour them into the pans. I am 5’6″ tall, but even the normal cabinet height is a little too tall for me. Our counter tops hit me at the waist and to be comfortable to mix things they should be a little lower. The carpenter just put them all the same height and they are perfect for my husband but not for me.
But the carpenter didn’t bother to check on that or ask me along the way, he just kept doing things like he always did. Since they were not already built it was a perfect opportunity to get it right for my height.
So every time I bake and don’t want to use the Kitchen Aid mixer, I have to take the bowl over to the kitchen sink, on the other side of the kitchen, to mix all the ingredients together. It is an inconvenience because all my ingredients I bake with are on the other side of the room if I need something.
When I came out one night to check on the progress the carpenter was still in the house working and there was a space between the lower cabinet doors and the lazy Susan door in the corner of the baking area. I asked him what he was going to do with that space. He said he was going to put another pull out towel rack there since it was about the same width.
I asked him why would I want a towel rack clear across the room from the sink? All I got was a blank look from him. Then I told him what I wanted in that space and showed him a picture. I wanted three little shallow pull out drawers that went clear back to the back of the cabinet to put spices and baking items in.
I could see the light bulb come on as he thought about that idea. I bet the three little shallow drawers showed up in a lot of the houses out here after that. Those three little drawers were the best part of the kitchen when we moved in. The little narrow and shallow drawers are the perfect place to keep the vanilla and all the little containers and bottles of ingredients you use for baking.
The corner where those three little drawers are is the spot I wanted the cabinet lowered for a baking area. The higher kitchen cabinets didn’t bother me too much when I was younger even though I would have liked them lower. I just learned to mix things at a height that was about 4-6 inches higher than I would have liked. But now with arthritis in my shoulders and elbows it sure would be nice if the counters were lower especially for hand mixing.
The three little drawers were the best part of the kitchen until my husband built pull out drawers to house the items that usually reside under the counters by the stove and I love them. All my pots and pans are on those pull out drawers. They work great and I love having the pots and pans on them.
He built some for the baking area also for the cookie sheets and the sugar and flour containers or anything heavy that I don’t want in the higher cabinets. Now I don’t have to get on my knees and dig in the back of the shelf for something I need to cook or bake with.
The electrician asked me one night, when I stopped in to look things over in the kitchen: where do you want the lights over the vanity in the bathroom. This was the vanity that my husband who is 6′ tall would use for shaving. I told him about eye level would be perfect to shine light on his face. I am sure he had met my husband but I reminded him that he was 6 ‘tall.
The electrician must have been about 6’6″. He put the lights at his eye level. When I stopped in the next night he happened to be working in the kitchen. I went into the bathroom and looked at where the lights were. Then I went and got him.
I told him again my husband was 6’ and that those lights would be at the top of his head and casting shadows onto his face when he shaved. Yes, they were eye level for the electrician but way to high for my husband. So I told him they had to come down about 6 inches so they would be right for my husband when he shaved. He moved the lights down to the level we needed the next day.
It might be fun to build another house now that I know you have to stay on top of the details everyday to get things like you want them. But I am not sure I could handle dealing with the aggravation at my age to get a perfect kitchen and bath. To contact Sandy: therapy [email protected]
