=Conditions of Living During the ’50’s.= Frontier life is always hard, but it was made many times harder in Kansas by the years of strife and warfare. The inconveniences and hardships were especially severe outside the towns. In these days of railways and good roads, of the telegraph and the telephone, it is difficult to realize what life on the prairies meant in the ’50’s. Post offices and mail routes came slowly, and for many of the settlers a trip for mail and provisions meant a journey of two or three days, or even longer, with an ox team. Neighbors were often many miles apart. Nearly every one’s supply of farming implements was scanty, and to replace a broken ax might require a trip of from twenty-five to fifty miles. In the winter these journeys were often accompanied with danger and suffering. Streams were without bridges and many of the fords were deep and treacherous. Fences were few and roads were mere trails over the prairies, so when the blizzard swept across the country, piling its drifts of snow and obliterating every landmark, the unfortunate traveler was in great danger of losing his way. Getting a farm under cultivation was slow work at best. Since most of the settlers brought but little money with them they had to trust to raising a crop, and if sickness or drouth or raids made it impossible to raise the crop, want and suffering followed. The privations, the sacrifices, and the loneliness of pioneer life fell most heavily on the women. Business and necessity brought the men together occasionally, but the pioneer woman in the isolation of her prairie home often saw no friendly face for months at a time. There was much sickness and death, especially among women and children, resulting from the combination of poor food, uncomfortable houses, homesickness, and excitement arising from the many dangers. The cost of transportation was so great that only the most necessary articles were brought from the East. Most furniture was home-made and cooking was done over an open fireplace. Corn bread and bacon with occasional game and wild fruits were the usual foods. In wet seasons there was much fever and ague. Sometimes a whole family would be sick at the same time, with no neighbors near enough to help and no physician within many miles.