Benter/Jones Families

by Inez Jones

Christ and Lena Benter were busy young farmers, raising a family of six near Osage, NE, in Otoe County, which is near Lincoln, NE, when they heard of the Rosebud
land opening in South Dakota.

Christ Benter, with horses and a wagon as his transportation, headed for South Dakota to look over the land. He liked what he saw and filed a number at the homestead office in
Bonesteel, and when the drawing was held that summer of 1904, his number was drawn. The 160 acres that he received were the NE 1/4 Section 14 in Township 98 (Lucas
Township) in Gregory County.

Christ Benter was born on December 29, 1867, in Garnerville, IA to Dedrick and Elizabeth Knullenburg Benter, immigrants from Hanover, Germany and died on his homestead on
January 13, 1931. Lena Benter was born on January 2, 1870, near Cottage Grove, WI to Chris and Anna Stemerman Holscher, also immigrants from Hanover, Germany, and died
January 27, 1963 in Burke.

The Holscher family migrated from Wisconsin to Burr, NE. Christ and Lena were married on May 27, 1889, at Osage, NE, and it was here that they began farming and rearing a
family. Two of Lena's sisters married men who became Gregory County homesteaders. Sophia married Herman Benter, a brother of Christ, and Sarah married Steven Genzlinger.

The children of Christ and Lena Benter were Leona (Lloyd Truesdell) 1891-1979; Hulda (Henry Bausch) 1892-1913; Mabel (Harold Mellville) 1895-1934; Delgia (Hugh Jones) 1898-
1976; Harvey (Esther Carlson) 1900-1953; Floyd (Helen Diekmann) 1903-1975; all were born at Burr, NE. Their youngest son, Dale (Lula Overton) 1905-1998, was born after the
family arrived in South Dakota. They also raised a grandson, Floyd Bausch, known as Floydie, after the death of his mother, Hulda.

After the drawing for land was held, Christ built a two room shanty on his homestead before returning to his home and family in Nebraska. In March 1905, the family
loaded their belongings and livestock on an emigrant railroad car, which brought them to Bonesteel, where the railroad ended.

Their possessions were loaded on wagons pulled by horses to continue the journey to their new home. They did not cut across country to the Sully Flats, but went by way of the
little town of Burke, where they bought groceries at the newly opened Connell & Madole Store and ate at the Frost Cafe, which was across the street.

As they travelled, they saw the results of prairie fires, some of which were still burning. They feared that their claim shanty may have been destroyed, but were happy to see it
standing, saved by the spring fed creek that encircled the farmstead.

Christ and Lena were hard working, industrious people who set about breaking the sod to plant corn, grain and huge gardens. The native grass was cut for hay. They planted many trees, an apple orchard and plum bushes. They also raised chickens, geese, sheep, hogs and milk cows.
Two more rooms were added to the shanty. Soon they began adding buildings to the farmstead, a barn, a hog house, and a chicken house.

The children attended the Smith School, which was one mile north of their home. Among their teachers were Ladie Boyd Thomas, Bonnie Reynolds Crakes and Martha Mertzke
Faust. The family espoused the Lutheran faith.

Construction of a 28 x 26, two story, five bedroom house began in 1918 and was completed in 1919. The house was built by Christ's brother, Herman. Some of the
innovations that were included in this home were a wind generated electric plant, to provide lights; a wood and coal burning furnace in the basement with a large grate on the first
floor and ceiling vents to heat the upstairs; hot and cold running water made possible by building a cistern at the top of the hill and filling it with water pumped from a well powered
by a windmill with gravity water flow to the house; a water tank was attached to the wood burning cook stove; a bathroom; a full basement; a large attic; an enclosed back porch
and an open front porch. The Lucas Telephone Company provided service to the home.
Lena Benter, with the help of family members and several children of large neighboring families who stayed with the Benters for room and board, baked bread and churned
butter, which was taken to Lucas to be sold. They picked feathers from fowl to make pillows and featherbeds, sheared the sheep and had the wool cleaned and carded to make
comforters, had a loom in the basement on which rugs were made, picked and sold apples, preserved produce from the large gardens and canned meat. Lena was a seamstress
and sewed clothing for her family, as well as for others and in her later years, many hours were spent at the sewing machine. She also did hand needlework.

Old photos indicate that Christ was the owner of an early automobile and tractor. His son, Floyd, ran a John Deere business in Lucas from 1928-1929, selling it in 1930 to
Gus Wilson of Burke. Another son, Harvey, and his family lived nearby and worked with his father. His death came at the age of 63, the result of a heart attack, one morning as he
was outside tending to chores.

When Christ died in 1931, the family thought that Lena, at the age of 61, was too old to live alone and so the eldest daughter, Leona and her husband, Lloyd Truesdell and sons
Carlye and Leland, who were farming in the Dixon area moved to the Benter farm. They remained there for only a short time as Lloyd's interests were in public service and
business.

Hugh Jones

In 1934, another Benter daughter, Delgia, and her husband, Hugh Jones moved to the farmstead.

They were there until 1952, when they moved to Burke. Delgia was the fourth
child of Christ and Lena Benter and was born at Burr, NE, on January 29, 1898. After completing her education, Delgia worked at the Bill Davison Store in Lucas and later in the
offices of the Gregory County Treasurer, Auditor and Register of Deeds. When the women of South Dakota gained the right to vote, she was among the first to do so and always
valued this opportunity.

Hugh Jones, the son of Michael and Mary Jones, was born on February 23, 1892 at Platte Center, NE. He was their third child and had three brothers and five sisters. He came to
South Dakota with his parents who homesteaded 80 acres of Section 26 in Township 99 (Landing Creek).

As a young man, he helped his father with farm work and worked as a carpenter and painter until enlisting in the Army in 1917. His training took place in Fort Riley, KS
and from there he was sent to England and France, as a medic. He was honorably discharged in 1919, a veteran of World War I.

He told of the times when he and his buddies would raid the gardens of the Frenchmen to eat fresh turnips. He retained his love of turnips!

He was elected Gregory County Register of Deeds and served from 1924 to 1928. He and Deliga, who had been friends for many years and who had exchanged letters during
his absence, were married on January 28, 1925.

They were the first couple to be married in the newly organized Grace Lutheran Church in Burke. In 1929, they moved to a farm near her parents, which is now the
Woodrow Roggow farm. Their son, Marvin Hugh, was born on February 16, 1931. They became foster parents to Calvin, age 10, and Anna Mae, age 3, after the death of their
mother, Mabel Mellville, in January of 1934. Mabel and Delgia were sisters.

Hugh and Delgia did not milk cows but raised stock cows and fed and sold the steers as fattened livestock. They also raised many chickens and sold eggs. During World War II,
many of their eggs were shipped by rail to special markets.

The first tractor that Hugh bought for his farming operation was a B John Deere. He had purchased some equipment from the Christ Benter estate sale.

In 1938, he bought a new Chevrolet Sedan from Harder Motor Company in Burke for $823.00. The license plate number was 27-1272 and the fee was $17.00.

For a more secure abundance of running water, the windmill, which pumped the water to the cistern, was replaced with a gasoline engine.

The farm grew by 160 acres, in 1942, when Hugh and Delgia purchased the SE 1/4 of Section 11 of Township 98, which was homesteaded by Henry Wehage. A farm truck was
added to the equipment lineup in 1947 and the rural electrification program brought power to the farm in 1948.

A certificate from the Lucas Telephone Company shows that Hugh owned a share at the cost of $305.00 in 1949.

Delgia, like her mother, enjoyed raising large vegetable and flower gardens. Winter snowstorms presented travel problems as most side roads were not opened, thus many farm
women with small children were home for weeks at a time.

Hugh and Delgia were avid bookkeepers and many of their records are still in the possession of the family, as are the letters that they exchanged with one another, and the
homestead patent certificate with Theodore Roosevelt's name signed by an assistant.
When Hugh's father, Mike Jones died in 1938, his mother, Mary Jane, came to live with them and they became a household of seven.

Both Lena and Mary Jane spent time in the homes of their other children, but their main home was with the Joneses. As Calvin and Anna Mae grew to young adulthood, each in
turn, went to Wisconsin, where their father, Harold Mellville was living.

Hugh and Delgia were members of the First Baptist Church in Lucas and later the Union Baptist Church in Burke.

In the late 1940's, Hugh began building a new home in Burke and upon completion in 1952, he Delgia, and their mothers moved to their new location.

Hugh returned to carpentry and painting, and Delgia, was once again employed in the treasurer's office. She was deputy to John Smizer and later to Arnold Opbroek.

When Mr. Opbroek resigned to pursue other interests, Delgia was named by the county commissioners to fill the term. She then ran for the office and served two terms, 1960-
1964. She retired from public service in January 1965. Mary Jane died in 1961, and Lena Benter in 1963. Both were buried next to their husbands in the Lucas Cemetery. Hugh
died in October of 1973 and Delgia in November of 1976 and are buried at Graceland Cemetery at Burke. They were active members of the American Legion and Auxiliary.

Marvin Jones

Marvin Jones, the son of Hugh and Delgia, was born on February 16, 1931, at Burke. He attended the Smith School, as did his mother, and among his teachers were Gene
Scott, Vyrle Swift Johnson, Florence Moore Greer and Leah Jane Genzlinger. Because of improper bone development of his hip, at age 12, he spent several weeks in the Sioux
Valley Hospital in Sioux Falls and lost a year of school. He was left with a very noticeable limp.
He had a venturesome spirit which led him to try new things such as taking flying lessons as a youth and new farming and building techniques as an adult.

He graduated from Burke High School in 1950, after which he began taking over the farming operation on his grandparent's homestead. He also drove a gravel truck.

When his parents and grandmothers moved to Burke in 1952, he had a big house all to himself, but he already had plans for marriage and children. He always said that he wanted
a large family and this did, indeed, did come true.

Inez Willuweit, the daughter of Rudolph (1889-1953) and Bertha Ring Willuweit (1897-1987), was born December 11, 1934, on the homestead of her grandfather, August
Willuweit (1841-1918) in Spring Valley Township near Jamison, NE. She was the youngest in the family of six. Elsie (1921) (Henry Kortmeyer); Ervin (1922-1998) (Ilah-Lee
Staack); Lena (1924) (Delbert Miller); Vera (1925) (Louie Papousek); Doris (1933) (Lew Bailey) and Inez were the first American born generation of this family because their
parents, as children, had immigrated with their families to this country from Russia.

Rudolph and Bertha purchased the nearby Otto Staack farm and moved the family there in 1938. Inez attended Klug School and in the spring of 1949, she, along with her parents
and her sister, Doris, moved into Burke. Inez graduated from Burke High School in 1952 and worked at the Burke Gazette for a year.

On June 14, 1953, she and Marvin were married at the Grace Lutheran Church in Burke. Marvin began farming with his father's equipment, but soon added more and when he
retired from farming he had a full lineup. His first tractor was a newer model B John Deere, then a regular Farmall with a loader. Over the years, he owned John Deere models 50,
630 and 720 D. His first IHC was a 660 and the last was a 1486, with several in between.

One tractor in particular, an 806 IHC, purchased new in the 1960's, was used more hours moving snow than for farm work that year! He had a John Deere and Heston
windrowers, the last one being a 6455 Hesston. Other implements included silage cutters, a Bobcat loader, a Farmhand hay sled, New Holland baler, corn and grain planters and
cultivators, a Michigan payloader, John Deere combine, and a fully equipped farm shop.

The greatest changes came to the farmstead in the late 1960's and early 1970's when some of the original buildings were dismantled, and new ones were added. The
hog house and the chicken house were removed and the one building that remains is the barn which has been surrounded on three sides by a 45 x 105 loafing barn, a milking
parlor with milk room and a shed. A 75 foot concrete stave silo was erected, a steel machine building was constructed, a self-contained calf nursery was put into place and a two
car garage was built. New wells were dug and water lines to all buildings were laid. More trees were planted, ground was terraced to prevent erosion and new fences were
built.

By 1966, the 1919 built house was in need of repairs and renovation, as the concrete walls of the basement had cracked and shifted, causing damage to the interior of the home.

The Klein House Moving Company of Gregory lifted the house from the foundation and set it aside. The old basement walls and floor were removed, and the area was
enlarged. Once the walls and floor were ready, the house was given a half turn and moved onto a new basement.

With Hugh Jones as main carpenter, construction began on additions to both ends of the house. Upon completion, the house now had a big utility room, a larger downstairs
bedroom, a new bathroom and a spacious kitchen and dining area with glass doors leading to the patio. Electric heat was installed. Otto Kruhn was hired to do the interior work
and build all the cabinets. He didn't think he would ever get done! And during this time, a new baby was born.

This third generation of farmers had gradually turned the place into a dairy farm. They started by milking a few Shorthorn crosses, separating the milk and selling the
cream. In 1956, four Brown Swiss heifers were bought from Harvey Willoughby and a few Holstein heifers were purchased from other dairy farmers. It was in 1960 when Marvin
made a trip to Salem, where he picked up a milking machine and two Surge buckets complete with belts from a dairy equipment supplier by the name of Richard Kneip, who later
became the Governor of South Dakota.

The cows were milked in stanchions, the milk was separated, the cream was sold and the skim milk was fed to calves and pigs.

In 1964, Marvin and Inez purchased Glen Wiedemann's Holstein herd and bulk milk tank. The milk was poured through a strainer into a milk/cream can equipped with a nozzle that
transferred the milk to the cooling tank.

The first milk was sold to Armour of Mitchell, then to the Rosebud Cheese plant in Burke when it opened for business in 1966.It was in the mid 1960's when the first
glass pipeline was installed, which carried the milk to the bulk tank. This was installed by Bob Kruse and John Wallace, dairy equipment suppliers in Gregory.

In 1972 a new parlor and 20 x 24 milkroom built by Howard Benter, were connected to the existing barn and the new loafing barn. Once again, Bob Kruse was on hand to install
the double six Clay herringbone parlor, the DeLaval milking units and pipeline and the automatic feeding system. They now sold grade 'A' milk to Mid-American Farms.
The greatest number of cows milked at any time was in the nineties. Milk truck drivers included Truman Young, Denny Deffenbaugh, Denny Hoffman, Gary Shaffer and
Don Young. This was truly a family operation and all the Jones children, boys and girls alike, knew how to prepare for milking, do the milking and clean up after the milking on this all
electric farm.

Another facet of this operation was the flock of sheep. Marvin and Inez started with 25 ewes purchased from Sandford Schaefer in 1956. The size of the flock increased as
ewe lambs were kept for breeding. The main crops were corn, which was cut for silage, alfalfa and small grain. All crops grown were fed to the livestock.

Marvin also performed custom silage cutting.

The herd was on DHIA testing from the time that testing began in this area. The farm was connected to the Tripp County Rural Water System in 1986.

All of the children were baptized and confirmed at Grace Lutheran Church and four were married there. They were active in 4-H, and all are graduates of Burke High School.

There are twelve grandchildren and one great-grandchild. All the children and the oldest grandchild, Mike Jones, were actively employed on the farm at some time.

The size of the farm increased in 1972 with the purchase of the Habeger farm which was 240 acres in Section 14, and again in 1996, with the purchase of the remaining acres in
Section 14 and twenty acres in Section 13 from Derald and Joann Vaughn for a total of 820 acres, plus renting the NE 1/4 of Section 8 Burke Civil Township, owned by Mary Ellen
Hogarth. The land then owned by Marvin and Inez had been homesteaded by Christ Benter, Henry Wehage, Rufus Leik, Tillie Habeger, Jens Jensen, Emma Lind and Herman
Holscher.

Marvin and Inez were involved in activities for their church, soil conservation and farm organizations. Marvin served on the school board for ten years, including the years when
the Lucas School was built. He was elected to the board of the Rosebud Electric Cooperative in 1974 and held that position for for seventeen years, representing Rosebud Electric
on the statewide board in Pierre for several years.

He was a substitute mail carrier for Gene Scott until Gene's death in 1969. He continued to substitute for other carriers in Burke after the Lucas Post Office closed. He was
appointed to a route in 1991. He retired from the postal service in 1994.

On March 29, 1991, Marvin and Inez left the farm where he had lived for fifty-seven years and moved into the house in Burke that his father had built and that was now
remodeled and updated, the work having been completed by their son, David.

A farm sale was held on April 1, 1995. Marvin kept going strong as long as he could, in spite of the heath problems of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). He died on
November 19, 2002 and is buried at Graceland Cemetery in Burke. Inez continues to live in their home.

David Jones is the fourth generation to operate this family farm and is the great-grandson of Christ and Lena Benter.

The past 100 years have been interesting and there is so much more that could be written if space allowed. The Jones family feels privilged to have been a part of this heritage
and look forward to what the future may bring.