Harry Wallace

                                                      East Bolton Township.

Harry Wallace came to East Bolton township in 1871. He was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1850. The family moved to Illinois in 1855, and came to Kansas in August 1870.
“My parents came to Kansas in the summer of 1870 from Illinois. We stopped at Fredonia, in Wilson County. Another fellow and myself walked to Arkansas City. I was twenty years old then. We came through Winfield, which was quite a town, with box houses built with native lumber. I don’t remember seeing a house between Winfield and Arkansas City.
“In the first store I saw here (Arkansas City), kept by a man named Boan (Bowen ?), we went to buy some crackers and cheese, as we were very hungry. There were two fellows in there playing checkers. One of them said he would wait on us when the game was over.
“There was a Frenchman here who carried us across the Arkansas River on a ferry boat. We could not pay him so he left us on the other side.
“I landed where Arkansas City now is in March 1871, at the age of 21 years. About the tenth day of that month I crossed the Arkan­sas river south of the town in a row boat and took the claim which is still (in 1929) my home. The land there was then called the ‘Cherokee Outlet’ and it had not been surveyed. It was not even on the market at that time. However that fall the state line was sur­veyed and we were left on the Kansas side, with Indian Territory to the south. A little later the land was opened to settlement and I remained there.
“I taught the first school in that locality, in a log cabin and with desks and seats made of native lumber. I had 25 scholars at that time, several of whom still live here. At present I can remember only five of the old timers. They are W. H. Gassaway and C. C. Tubbe, now of east Bolton; Belle Buzzi, now Mrs. Thomas McAdam, of Arkansas City; Katherine Anderson, now Mrs. Gilgis, of Arkansas City, and Mary Lewis, whose name after she was married I do not recall, also of Arkansas City.”
Mr. Wallace had seven children, three girls and four boys.
Kansas 1875 Census Bolton Township, Cowley County, March 1, 1875.
Name                     age sex color   Place/birth     Where from
Henry Wallace  24  m     w      Illinois               Illinois           
Bolton Township 1878: Harry Wallace, 26; spouse, Alice, 24.
Bolton Township 1880: Harry Wallace, 29; spouse, A. C., 26.
Bolton Township 1882: Harry Wallace, 31; spouse, Alice C., 26.
                                               FROM THE NEWSPAPERS.
Arkansas City Republican, August 23, 1884.
The following is a list of teachers granted certificates at the late examination.
The name of H. S. Wallace was included on this list.
Arkansas City Traveler, February 4, 1885.
BIRTHS. Dee Wright and Sparks have been reaping a harvest the last week, as follows. Early West, Sunday, boy; average weight. Jas. McQuairk, Sunday, boy, usual size. Mr. Wallace, across Arkansas River, girl, Saturday night.

Note: The above newspaper items are the only ones that I could find on Harry Wallace. MAW