tead and
appointed Ida Mary postmistress. She was the only woman ever to run a
post office on an Indian reservation, the data gatherers said. The
government named it Ammons.

So we had a postmistress and a post office, with its tiers of empty,
homemade pigeonholes ready to receive the mail.

And we discovered there was no way to get any mail in or out!

[Illustration]

VII

BUILDING EMPIRES OVERNIGHT

That spring I saw a country grow. Perhaps Rome wasn't built in a day,
but the Brule was--almost. The incredible speed of the transformation of
the untouched plains; the invasion of the settlers in droves, lighting
on the prairies like grasshoppers; the appearance, morning after
morning, of new shacks, as though they had sprung up overnight; the
sound of hammers echoing through the clear, light air; plows at last
tearing at the unbroken ground--the wonder of it leaves me staggered
now, but then I was caught up in the breathless rush, the mad activity
to get things done. The Lucky Numbers were coming, coming.

A few weeks before, we had set up our shack in a wilderness. Now there
were shacks everywhere and frantic activity. The plains had come to
life. Over them, where there had been bleak emptiness, loomed tents,
white against the green background, where the settlers could sleep until
they were able to build houses. There was no time to rest, no time to
pause--here where there had been nothing but time.

Late one evening a wagon loaded with immigrant goods and a shabby car
loaded with children passed our place. The drivers stopped on a nearby
claim, threw their bedding on the ground, and slept there. Their
deadline for establishing residence was up that night. All over the
plains that intensive race went on, the hurried arrival of settlers
before their time should expire, the hasty throwing up of shelter
against the weather, the race to plant crops in the untamed soil so that
there would be food later on.

A land where one must begin at the beginning! Everything to be done, and
things crying to be done all at once. Those three basic needs, food,
fuel, water--problems which must be solved without delay.

Moving in a network, criss-cross in every direction, wagons and teams
hauled in immigrant goods, lumber and machinery, fence posts and fuel;
post holes supplemented those dug by the prairie dogs; strings of
barb-wire ran threadlike over the unbroken stretch.

From day to day we saw the prairie change, s