POST CARD

Enlarge Image Image Gallery Steam on the Burlington and Quincy Railroad, north of Yorkville in the early 1920's. Courtesy of Walter C. Bieritz, Route 2, Box 168, Yorkville, Illinois 60560. Walter C. Bieritz

 The farmers divided into two groups and proceeded to minimize the population explosion of the species by driving two wagons; one on each lateral side of a field of grass or pasture, stubble or corn stalks, having a wire attached between them and dragging it over the field while hunters walked behind the wire and shot the Jack Rabbits as they jumped out of their hiding places.

The group that had the most killed rabbits was served a supper by the losing group. Some of the rabbits were sent to markets in the cities.

 Incidentally, a Jack Rabbit travels faster than a traction engine. Courtesy of Diedrick L. Dalke, 14 D Auburn Court, Alexandria, Virginia 22305.

 The farmers divided into two groups and proceeded to minimize the population explosion of the species by driving two wagons; one on each lateral side of a field of grass or pasture, stubble or corn stalks, having a wire attached between them and dragging it over the field while hunters walked behind the wire and shot the Jack Rabbits as they jumped out of their hiding places.

The group that had the most killed rabbits was served a supper by the losing group. Some of the rabbits were sent to markets in the cities.

 Incidentally, a Jack Rabbit travels faster than a traction engine. Courtesy of Diedrick L. Dalke, 14 D Auburn Court, Alexandria, Virginia 22305.

 The only other way out was up an extremely steep hill. We started to pull this hill with the firebox full of slab wood. When it came to the steepest part of this hill, the fire door would fall open of its own accord. We had to put a block of wood in front of it and stand on the block to keep it shut. Boy, I'll tell you that Reeves was sounding off and pushing coals out of the stack. When a drive wheel would latch onto a good root for a bite, you could see red in the exhaust.

We made the hill without any trouble except that we had the leaves burning all around us in the woods and the fire was about all pulled out through the stack. We pulled the front end of the engine up on a little bank to bring the water over the crown sheet, started the injector and then put the fires out in the woods. I'll never forget that pull as long as I live. There are a lot of good hill climbing engines but the Reeves isn't bad at it.

Incidentally, some of your readers may know this engine. It was bought by my father, Ben Jansen, in 1933 or '34 from Jake Marner at Arthur, Illinois. Courtesy of Virgil Jansen, Sigel, Illinois 62462.

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