The Teske house stood vacant. It was about a quarter-mile south of the store, and on the west side of the road. Otto Teske and family had moved out and the place seemed deserted. It looked like an excellent place to play.
I was probably seven at the time of this incident, and I was playing with Eldon Pearson who lived on the first place north of Center. He was the son of Henry and Louise Pearson and at this point in time he was only five or so. We played together quite a lot and this one day we were playing cowboys and Indians. Somehow, we wandered up to the Teske place and found are way into the house which was quite empty.
The house had a second floor in it and it made a first-class fort from which to fend off those pesky Indians that were circling the house. We both had shiny metal capguns and in order to shoot better, we calmly used the butt of our six-shooters to bust out a window or two This made it much easier to drive off those pesky Indians, but we had made one bad error in judgment.
Driving by on the road at this time was another neighbor, John T. Anderson. He happened to look over toward the house and saw the broken windows and the two Indian-fighters and our shiny six-shooters and he knew what had transpired. He felt compelled to pass this information on to my parents and Eldon’s parents and frontier justice was swift and painful. Restitution was made by our parents and Eldon and I never ever played at the Teske farm again.
I do believe I must have been the instigator of the whole thing because I was a year or so older than Eldon and the more-experienced Indian Fighter. I hope he forgave me for getting him into so much trouble.
By Allan Anderson, 2005.
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Anderson Family History 