USA > Iowa > An illustrated history of the state of Iowa, being a complete civil, political, and military history of the state, from its first exploration down to 1875; > Part 41
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GREELEY is on the Davenport and St. Paul railroad, north of Delaware center. The village contains five liun- dred inhabitants, and has a good school well sustained and admirably tauglit. The chief support of the place is the facility which it offers for the shipment of produce from the large farming dis- trict around.
MASONVILLE is on the Illinois Cen- tral railroad, seven miles west of Mau- chester. The Dubuque and Pacific Railroad Company laid out the town in the spring of 1858. The population is not large, about two hundred in all, but the village will still increase. The amount of business transacted is satis- factory. There is very good prairie country to sustain the interests of Ma- sonville.
COLESBURG is in the northeast of Delaware county near the Turkey river valley, in an excellent farming section and within easy distance of good tim- ber in large quantities. The village was founded in 1848, and it possesses a good graded school well taught by first class professors, male and female.
DELAWARE CENTER is very near the center, bearing toward the cast. The Illinois Central railroad crosses the Davenport and St. Paul road at this point, giving unrivalled facilities for shipment to any part of the continent, or indeed to any part of the world. The town stands well on high rolling prairie, from which it draws the major part of its support, as it is gradually taken up in farms. The town is new, but it has some very good buildings.
EARLVILLE is a town on the Iowa division of the Illinois Central Rail- road, five miles east of the center of the county. There is a fine grove al- most adjoining the town, and Plum creek, which runs past the border, has some excellent water powers which have been improved, but not to the Des Moines County is on the river Mississippi, and contains four hundred and seventy-five square miles. Missis- sippi river is the eastearn boundary, Skunk river is the malodorous name of the southern boundary line, and there are many streams which traverse the county, draining and watering the soil in a manner highly conducive to its prosperity. Flint creek runs from full extent. Situated in the center of a good farming country, to which it is the nearest place of shipment, with the other advantages named, have se- cured for the town a very considerable prosperity. There is good society in the neighborhood, and the schools and church organizations are first-class. From the earliest days of the settle- ment, Earlville had an ambition for a | northwest to southeast, and with its
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tributaries, is a valuable system of wat- er supply. Some of the streams give unrivalled water powers, available for heavy machinery.
Prairie and well timbered lands ap- pear to divide the territory, nearly the whole of the streams being bordered by well wooded lands and groves, some of which are of great extent.
Building materials are abundant, quarries are numerous and very many exposures of good stone show where unlimited supplies of first class and beautiful materials, unsurpassed in the state, can be procured. Brick making may casily become an important indus- try here, as all the requisites can be ob- tained with little trouble in any sec- tion of the county.
From Flint creek, to the county bor- der, along the Mississippi, there are very fertile bottom lands which will grow almost any kind of produce in any quantity, and these lands vary in breadth from one to six miles. Some of the bottoms are heavily timbered. There are other districts in which simi- lar bottom lands occur and in some cases they are liable to inundation, but generally they stand above high water mark and are dry at all seasons of the year. There is no better agricultural land in the state than can be found in Des Moines county. Orchards and vineyards have given a special reputa- tion to this section of country, and im- mense quantities of fruits are shipped every season to distant but good mar- kets.
Burlington was the site of the earli- est settlement in Des Moines county ; to that place a family came in 1832, and the second settlement followed im- mediately, almost in the same locali- ty. The Indian title was not extinct, nor did it become so until the follow- ing year, when the " Black Hawk Pur- chase " was effected and the property was vested in the general government. The settlers mentioned were driven off the ground by dragoons from Rock Is- land, that winter, but one of them re- turned to the same spot on which his cabin had been burned, as soon as the title of the Indians to the territory had expired. A. mill was erected on Flint creek in 1834, and in 1837 another mill was built. The progress of the coun- ty has been stcady from that time.
BURLINGTON is on the bank of the Mississippi, occupying the vallies and
slopes of Hawk Eye creek. The town was incorporated in 1837, and under every form which administration has assumed in the territory and the state, Burlington has been marked out by position and importance as the seat of justice and administration. There is now at Burlington an admirable bridge spanning the "Father of Waters," which alone must secure to the town an euviable expansion. The railroads radi- ate from Burlington in almost every direction, certainly to four points of the compass, and a rich agricultural country back of the town finds in its rapidly extending business the best market or the most desirable shipment for every kind of produce. The pre- sent population of Burlington is esti- mated at over twenty-five thousand, but the manufacturing and commercial growth of this center of industry and enterprise will soon leave such small figures far behind. The whole growth of the county will be dwarfed in years to come by comparison with the expanding power of this city, with the Mississippi flowing past its wharves, and the iron horse panting for new burdens upon a dozen lines of road, while the farmers and stock raisers of Iowa will pour their surplus into the elevators and warehouses daily being built to meet the exigencies ot the oc- casion.
There are good schools in Burling- ton under experienced and accom- plished management, which secures the best available talent in every de- partment. The Burlington University is also located here and although sec- tarian somewhat in religious aim, the culture of its management and the suc- cess which its curriculum has obtained make it an honor to the locality. The city is well supplied with newspapers, which adequately represent the enter- prise and push of the metropolitan city, for metropolitan the city already is, in its views and in the scope of its exertions.
Other towns and villages are many in this county, hut they are dwarfed by Burlington. Their names will con- vey to our readers nearly all that is known concerning these several loca- tions, except among residents. Dan- ville and Middleton are on the Bur- lington and Missouri railroad. Latz, Sperry, Mediapolis and Linton are on the Burlington, Cedar Rapids and
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Minnesota railroad. Northfield, Dodge- ville, Pleasant Grove, Kingston, Kos- suth, Huron, Amity, Le Vega, Frank- lin, Mills, South Flint and Patterson Station, complete the list of the ac. commodations for settlement and civ- ilization which Des Moines county can offer; but it would be vain to sup- pose that any mere catalogue can pre- sent an adequate idea of the conditions for success which have been showered down by nature upon this favored sec- tion.
Dickinson County embraces an area of four hundred and eight square miles. It is the most elevated land in the state lying on the great watershed, and the county is drained by the Little Sioux river. There are two large lakes, the largest in the state, located in Dickinson county. Spirit lake, called by the Dakotas " Minne Wau- kon," has a surface of twelve square miles, and is a very beautiful sheet of water. The north of the lake rests upon the northern boundary of the state. There are large bodies of tim- her on the north and west banks of the lake, and the shores and bottom are of gravel. South from Spirit lake, with which it is connected hy an outlet which drains the higher into the lower body of water, is Okoboji lake, six feet before the level of the other. This lake is fifteen miles in length, running five miles south from its junction with Spirit lake, then westward about as far, then to the north about an equal distance. At some points the lake is very narrow, but the westward bend is the largest body, that being called hy the Indians, "Minnetonka," signify- ing, in the dialect of the Sioux, "Great water." Iowa has no lake more beau- tiful than Okoboji; and the surround- ings are such as to make the scene from almost every point of view, charm- ing. There are fine groves of timber bordering this sheet of water; and many smaller lakes tell of the time be- fore the upheaval had proceeded so far, when there must have been an immense volume of water covering the prai- ries here for hundreds, perhaps thous- ands, of miles. Near this point there are small eminences, one of which is said to be the highest point of land in Iowa. Lake Okoboji sends a stream with some very fine powers, which are partially waiting improvement, down
into the Little Sioux river, a distance of five miles.
The surface of the county is gener- ally undulating and very largely prai- rie, having good soil, usually of dark loam, with an exhaustless fertility which will grow all the average pro- ductions of northern Iowa. Good grasses, good water, good shelter in the numerous groves, combine to make Dickinson county suitable for stock raising. Building stone has not been found in situ in this county, but boulders are numerous, and some of them are very valuable as well as very large. The drift contains masses of red quartzite, granite and, occasional- ly, magnesian limestone. The groves are largely resorted to for fuel. Water can be found at a little depth wherever wells are put down; and the lakes are well supplied with fish.
The lakes were very attractive to the first white settlers who, in 1856, had located themselves there with their families in considerable numbers, as well as near the head waters of the Little Sioux river. There were roving hands of Indians in the country, Sioux for the most part, by whom petty thefts and acts of destruction were perpetrated ; but hy some process of exasperation, which cannot easily he understood in the absence of evidence, the culminating horror in the history of Iowa occurred in March, 1854. The whole of the white settlers near the lakes, men, women and children, were exterminated or carried away with fiendish excesses and malignant torments, which make the event ap- pear to have been simply devilish. Springfield was visited at the same time, and the work of slaughter was effected there also with terrible com- pleteness. A small military force, dispatched from Fort Dodge as soon as the news of the Spirit lake massacre arrived, could do nothing, save bury the dead, upon their reaching the scene of the disaster ; and of these, two were frozen to death on their way back. The Sioux made good their es- cape, and some of their captives were, at a late date, recovered 'by the pay ment of ransom. This event tended to prevent settlement, on a large scale, in Dickinson county; but the places of the murdered families were filled almost immediately.
SPIRIT LAKE is the county seat, and
CROSSCUP & WEST-SC.PHIL A.
Charles B. Lasseller,
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is situated between the two principal lakes, comanding a fine view of both. When the county was organized in 1857, this site was chosen for the honor which it now enjoys. The village stands on fine prairie land, and the surrounding country is very fertile. The lake country will become a resort for pleasure seekers, and it cannot fail to reward the enterprise of its visitors.
MILFORD is built upon the outlet from lake Okoboji, where the waters of the lower lake descend toward the Little Sioux river. The surrounding country is good, and the water powers upon the stream mentioned are among the most reliable in the state.
Dubuque County lies on the Mis- sissippi bank, in the third tier of counties from the Minnesota boundary. It is about six hundred and twelve square miles in area, and contains 391,680 acres. The north and central townships are watered and drained by the Little Maquoketa and its branches, and the southern, southeastern and western sections owe the same ser- vices to the Big Maquoketa and its tributaries. These streams give nu- merous and considerable water powers. The configuration of the county and the nature of the soil vary largely in different parts. The townships to the northwest have their river beds deeply cut into the strata through which they run, and consequently the surface is broken and declivitous; much timber grows there, and the wood generally is of good quality. Sandy soil pre- vails in those localities except in the fertile river bottoms. Near Dubuqe, high rolling prairie, slightly wooded, except on the bluffs, is the common characteristic. The bluffs are an out- crop of Niagara limestone, and they mark the approach to the Mississippi. The next township west is declivitous, being cut up into deep ravines, almost covered with wood of every variety and large growth. Still more to the west, the country rises to a greater ele- vation and is less broken. Here the proportion of timbered land rapidly increases. The southern part of the county reproduces similar transitions from a very broken country, well wooded, to high rolling prairie. Ex- cept where the Maquoketa river has cut down into its rocky but yielding bed, the central and western portion
of Dubuqe county is almost entirely prairie.
Limestone of various formations, from the Niagara and Trenton to Ga- lena, can be found in this county, and St. Peter sandstone is also exposed in some places. Cincinnati shales are found in conjunction with the beds of limestone mentioned. Lead is largely mined in Dubuque, having a share in the immense bed of that mineral which occupies four thousand square miles in the great nothwest, stretching through Iowa, Illinois, and under the Mississippi into Wisconsin. In some places the mines are worked under rich agricultural land, which gives a point blank contradiction to the com- mon belief, that a country rich in minerals must be beggarly in soil. The same fact has been noticed else- where, but the popular misapprehen- sion is adhered to still. The civilized world can procure lead from this vast deposit until the anticipations of the Millerites have been fulfilled, unless the consumption becomes vastly ac- celerated. The Indians, or yet more likely, their predecessors, the Mound Builders, who had a much higher type of intellect and culture, probably knew of these areas of metal, but little or nothing resulted from their knowl- edge. When, in 1689, after the change of dynasty of the English throne from James the bigot to William III, an expedition was sent by the French governor of Canada, De le Barn, to establish friendly relations with the red men, and to claim the northwest in the name of the Grand Monarque, Louis XIV, his master. The Indians appear to have mentioned the lead mines to the emissaries of the Cana- dian government. Other discoveries followed before the end of that cen- tury, and if the French had ever becu a colonizing people, that was their opportunity to possess a vast empire, much more valuable than all the con- quests which culminated in the defeat at Ramilies. Mining has been carried on in a desultory way since that era. Soon after the independence of this country had been vindicated against the insane rage of the English King George III and his unworthy govern- ment, mining was commenced on the site of the city of Dubuque. The be- ginning was made in 1788 by a French- man, who gave his own name to both
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city and county, and he remained on | of inmates for the year 1874 was only the spot until his death, twenty-two fifty-two. The industrial status and the wealth of the community diffused through many bands could not be better illustrated than by comparing that fact with the statistics of pauper- ism in Great Britain, the home of the very rich and the very poor. years afterwards. The lead mines of Du- buque are, therefore, well on for ninety years old, and have been vastly profit- able. There is no reason to anticipate an early exhaustion of this mineral, which is valued in the market beyond the production of almost any other mine for its softness and freedom from admixtures.
This county, then much more ex- tensive, was organized under the Wis- consin territorial legislature, and the district was entitled to eight represen- tatives in the house and council. This commenced in 1836. The territorial government of Iowa commenced its jurisdiction soon afterwards, as under the new regime, the first election oc- curred in 1839, and since that time the growth of the county in numbers and importance has kept pace with its diminution in territorial extent.
A court house of hewed logs was the first investment in gubernatorial dignity, made by the citizens of Du- buque, and the dimensions and par- ticulars have been set down with more wealth of detail than has been pre- served in the case of "Cheops, his pyramid." The court house, so called, was used as a jail, and the judges, avoiding bad company as much as possible, held their sessions in the several churches until 1843, when the court house, now in use, was erected, being subsequently enlarged. The jail now used in Dubuque county cost in several outlays, over $47,000. Perhaps that fact is a commentary upon the low moral tone incidental to lead min- ing.
THE CITY OF DUBUQUE is on the Mis- sissippi river bank, 475 miles above St. Louis. The city is the oldest center of population in Iowa. The site is beautiful and it is in a business sense a very desirable location. The table land on which the city was platted rises back from the town into a range of bluffs of almost a semicircle almost two hundred and fifty feet above the level of the vast stream. The plateau about half a mile wide is now mainly given up to business premises, the bluffs are made attractive by elegant residences which seem to rise toward mid air with their gardens and shade trees reminding one of the hanging gardens of Babylon. The plateau has been laid out in broad, well graded streets which are kept in good order, and the business site has been extended in the process by increasing the eleva- tion of otherwise low, unprofitable and ill drained lands. Different railroad companies have found it to their inter- est to undertake works of the kind in- dicated to procure eligible sites for the transaction of their momentous traffic and other affairs. The river running south at this point, the streets have been laid out true to the points of the compass.
Dubuque has now a population of twenty-five thousand intelligent per- sons, for whom all the appliances for civilization are available. There are schools for the young, libraries for the middle aged, comforts and lux- uries for the aged, and for all classes, intellectual amusements, the people being wise enough in the hurry and bustle of their prosperity to remember the old adage, that " all work and no play makes John a dull boy."
The county agricultural society was organized in 1854, and fairs were con- tinued until 1870, when that institu- tion merged into its worthy successor, the Dubuque agricultural and manu- facturing exposition, which will prove very valuable to every industrial in- terest in the northwest. There is a farmer's club in the county which has been in operation since 1860. The In the general sketch of the county history we have given a brief but suf- ficient indication of its early settle- ment and it would be tiresome to re- hearse the story, dealing in painful minuteness, with the details of individ. ual action. The permission to work the mines in the land now known as early settlers' association is a very use- ful institution, designed to preserve old records and reliable traditions concerning the "rude forefathers of the hamlet," and the work is in good hands. The county poor house is a well administered charity, and it is satisfactory to know that the number | part of the state of Iowa, was obtained
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from the chiefs of the Fox tribe of In- dians living in the territory then form- ing part of the Spanish province of Louisiana. Some day, it may be hoped before long, the successors of Cortez and Pizarro will be relegated to their own misgoverned country, and no longer be allowed to meddle with and mar the affairs of this continent and its immediate surroundings. The Spanish government never confirmed Dubuque's license to mine, but the lead was won without official sanction. The French miners who worked with Dubuque were driven off at last by In- dian troubles, and red men became miners, fighting the warlike Sioux oc- casionally for the retention of their valuable possessions.
The first setting of the tide of emi- gration toward Iowa seems to have commenced in 1830, when permission was obtained from the Indians to ex- plore the lead mines around Dubuque, from whence the red men were de- parting westward, leaving few signs which could not be effaced of the pa- tient industry which had once flour- ished there. Cornfields waved and tall grass grew rank over the deserted area of the present city. Natives had left their villages to crumble into ruin, and the white man found none to dis- pute his right of requisition for a time. Unfortunately no trace remains of the scene, except such as can be gathered from the chance conversations of old settlers, as the village with all its ap- purtenances for councils and feasting during peace or war was burned down in the first summer after this expedi- tion arrived.
The land was not yet the property of the United States, the title of the aborigines being yet in force, there- fore the settlers being on a kind of no man's land, made their own laws and enforced obedience as they best might. The work of legislation be- gan in 1830, and the first act was sim- ple and effective, providing for the land to be held by each miner, the amount of work to be done and the means by which disputes arising among the holders should be settled by arbitration.
Mining operations were soon after this time arrested by military orders. Col. Zachary Taylor, afterwards fam- ous, who was then in command of Prairie du Chien post was instructed
to disperse the intruders, as that course was thought necessary by the war de- partment in order to preserve peace on the frontier. 'The Black Hills maneu- ver was thus preenacted in Iowa, and it remained to be seen that wherever the metals are or any other quality which makes a territory desirable, there can be no device found which will prevent the superior race becom- ing possessed of the land, which they only can turn to its best account. Col. Taylor did not resort to force at first, but after remonstrance had failed, he sent a detachment of troops across the Mississippi to compel obedience. Many of the miners had already aban- doned the ground before the arrival of the troops and the others were allowed to leave unmolested. From that time a detachment remained at Dubuque to prevent the white miners resuming their work, and the Indians came back to enter into the labors of their more skillful coadjutors, thus dispossessed after having reopened the work. From one mine more than a million pounds of ore was removed thus while the men who had prepared the way for that operation were forced to remain on the other side of the river.
Military possession of Dubuque was continued until 1832, when the troops were called off to fight the Indians in Wisconsin and Illinois, the war end- ing in 1832 with the surrender of Black Hawk. The attempt to regain by treachery and slaughter the territory, which had been conveyed by actual sale, ended in a still further transfer of land by what is known as the "Black Hawk Purchase." General Scott was one of the high contracting parties to the treaty, and the result so far as we are presently concerned was the cession of the eastern portion of the state of Iowa.
Some of the miners now came back to their old location, nearly all the In- dians having left Dubuque. All the appliances for successful lead mining were speedily provided, but once more the sons of toil were dispossessed by military order because the treaty would not come into operation until some months had passed away. The officer entrusted with the execution of that command was needlessly severe in his action, and much property was destroyed arbitrarily, and for that line of conduct Col. Zachary Taylor su-
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perseded him, nevertheless the miners were driven off across the Mississippi once more and many of them never re- turned. Some of the miners had accu- mulated three hundred thousand pounds of lead in the brief interval which had elapsed. The military ac- tion ordered by the war department may have been necessary uuder all the circumstances, but the miners could not help hard feelings, and there must have been a difficulty in avoiding the conclusion that red tape had much more to do with the literal exactness of the execution than simple justice. Under such difficulties the mines of Dubuque were reopened at last to the labors of the white mining popu- lation.
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