Inside the Peoh Point loop lies the ranch of one of the district's covered wagon settlers, that of Felix PAYS, who trekked overland from 
Keokuk, Iowa, in 1897.
   With him was his wife, two sons, Lee and John, and two daughters.  It took three months to make the trip, the hardships were plenty.
When attempting to cross the Elgate river in Montana three of the horses were drowned, John 12 years old rafted down stream for a mile and a
half on a side-board of the wagon before he was rescued, while one of the sisters floated for three miles on a feather bed before she was
picked off.  They then waited three weeks for the river to go down to salvage some of their outfit.
   After arriving in Cle Elum, the father bought 160 acres of timber land from the railroads.  He died in 1911 and Lee and John operated the
farm jointly until 1918.
   They built the barn in the dead of winter (1916) when the snow stood six feet on the level. One day they started to shovel out a road but
after the first half day's shoveling the measured the distance and computed that at that rate of progress it would take them exactly three
months to clear the way to the main highway.  After that they snaked the lumber in from the road in good old logger's style.  That was
before the days of the PAYS cut-off which now  brings them fairly close to all the year round open loop.
   John PAYS took the farm over in 1918 and has 72 acres under cultivation.  Thirty-five more are slashed, potential acreage when normal
demand for farm produces warrants turning the sod under.
   Conspicuous about the barnyard is a herd of 11 milk cows, a registered Guernsey bull and three power house draft horses.  One of those
Percherons bought from HARRELL's at Ellensburg weighs over a ton.  He has held his own in horse pulling contests at Yakima, Ellensburg, and
Portland Fairs; and he pulled out without half trying, the editor's car which had nose dived into the snowbank on that off-shoot road.
   The PAYS children are Elmer, 17, Cle Elum High, Phyllis and Lois, twins and eighth graders in the Peoh Point School, and Miss Roberta,
six years old.

© Kittitas County Genealogical Society 2006