other repair wagons, doubling teams for hard pulls and building rafts for river crossings. The young boys hunted along the way and provided small game for the evening stew pot. Beans and hominy were soaked in buckets of water carried in the wagon to soften them for faster cooking at the evening meal. They camped on the Sedalia plain for a time until John located a place to homestead near the confluence of Shaver and Muddy creeks. John chose this spot because of the abundance of large timber, and with the help of his sons a sixteen foot square log cabin was erected before winter. The cabin had one door, one window and a stick and mud chimney for the fireplace. The first years were difficult ones with all members of the family trapping small game for the stew pot and using the furs to make their own foot ware. Coon skins brought fifty cents in trade at the store Pests, varmints and even deer were a constant threat to their garden and corn crops since no wire fences or pesticides were in use at that time. Although John was probably as religious as his average neighbors, he used a portion of his corn crop to produce corn liquor which served both for social amenities and for medicinal purposes. Although lawlessness and bushwhackings abounded during these times, John's family seemed to be spared. John was said to be a man to avoid in an altercation, and one time when the sheriff tried to deputize two men to help him bring in John, they declined whereupon the sheriff also gave up the idea. John and Nancy were said to be good hosts, Nancy setting a bountiful table and John liberally serving his corn liquor and cider. John and his sons built a larger and more comfortable cabin with a stone chimney a few years later. Pettis County records show that John paid three hundred dollars for forty acres of land just six months prior to his death. John died on January 6, 1873 at the relatively early age of fifty years. John had been an honest, hard working man and a good provider for his family. Nancy Ann Aldrich was born on April 22, 1831 in Indiana. She was the daughter of Jacob and Sarah Aldrich. She married John on January 25, 1849. Nancy bore John eleven children including four sons. She was remembered as a hard working and generous mother who contributed liberally in support of the large family of Milton and Florence in the form of cured meat and dried and preserved fruits and vegetables. She died at her home three miles north of Beaman on February 18, 1914, and was buried in the Gris Lee Cemetery two miles east of Beaman. This writer conjectures that Nancy's funeral may have been the stimulus for the Milton and Florence Fall family photograph also taken in the year 1914.
Milton Calvin Fall was the fourth child and eldest son born to John R. Fall and Nancy Ann Aldrich. He was born on August 4, 1855 in Boone County, Indiana. Milton apparently attended school in Indiana as a young boy since he could read and write. In 1857 John Fall moved his family to St. Clair County, Missouri about fifty miles southwest of Sedalia. John was probably motivated in