Home, home on the range

By Phil Cobb | October 11, 2017 |

Andrew McCrea

Most folks have never heard of Dr. Brewster Higley. Yet everyone has heard of the home he built in north central Kansas.

El Dean Holthus is one of the trustees who cares for the old Higley homestead. It’s just a simple cabin on the banks of Beaver creek a few miles northwest of Smith Center. When I drove up to the cabin to meet El Dean his son was helping him with some upkeep. El Dean’s son happens to be Mitch Holthus, the “voice” of the Kansas City Cheifs.

El Dean says, “Higley was a very talented doctor and surgeon. In fact, he taught surgery back in Indiana.” But in 1871 he headed west, homesteading this quarter section of land. “The reason he came here is a mystery,” he says.

The doctors’ cabin was isolated. He was far from any town or any person for that matter. He found comfort in the loneliness of the prairie. In his spare time he wrote poetry, often penning verses about the world he saw around him.

After completing one such poem, he simply put it between the pages of a book and never touched it again for over a year. It was by pure chance that the most popular cowboy song of all time was uncovered.

Neighbor, Trube Reese, brought a patient to the cabin in 1873. While there, the poem, “My Western Home,” fell out of the book and onto the floor. Reese read it and told Higley it was his best work. In fact, he should set the poem to music.

Later that year, the newspaper in Smith Center printed the words,

Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam,

Where the deer and the antelope play;

Where never is heard a discouraging word

And the sky is not clouded all day.

Local musician, Dan Kelley, put the words to music.

El Dean and local volunteers worked to restore the cabin to its original appearance. “Artists can now sing the most popular cowboy song – sing it on site, in the cabin where it was written by the author,” he says.

In 1933, President Roosevelt proclaimed, “Home on the Range is my favorite song.” The tune began to get lots of radio air time. It later became the state song of Kansas.

You can’t help but be drawn to the site yet today. No, you won’t find any “buffalo roaming” or “antelope playing,” but many still find their way down a gravel road to the old cabin. No fees are charged and you might just find El Dean or Mitch or another of the volunteers sitting under a shade tree greeting visitors and answering questions.

One hundred forty years later some things “on the range” have changed, yet many remain the same. The wide-open spaces are still a thing of beauty. The friendly neighbors who take pride in this location still love to share the story. It’s a place that should make all of us appreciate the people and places we call “home, home on the range.”

Andrew McCrea travels the countryside as host of the radio and TV feature, “American Countryside.” Follow his travels at AmericanCountryside.com and by following the show on Facebook. Reprinted with permission from Farm Journal.