USA > Iowa > Black Hawk County > History of Black Hawk County, Iowa, and its people, Volume I > Part 10
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There was a peculiar mixup in the elections of this township and that of Big Creek. Both townships were organized on the same date. The Cedar election was held at the house of J. Wasson, in Big Creek, and the election of Big Creek was held at the home of T. R. Points in Cedar Township. This mistake did not matter, however, in the elections : it was simply an error of the County Court in making the deal.
Abraham Turner, now deceased, was nearly the first settler in Cedar Town- ship. He came to Black Hawk County in the spring of 1853, and entered land in section 18 in the fall of the same year. Jacob Koch came in the fall of 1852. llis pioneer story is interesting. He drove from Rockford, Illinois, fourteen miles from which place he had been living. He had heard stories of the Far West and taking a map had figured out that the railroad, which then terminated at Rockford would be soon built westward to Dubuque and ultimately would be projected still farther west. He decided that the railroad would undoubtedly follow closely along the correction line. This led him to take up land near this same correction line, in what afterward became Cedar Township.
"The first night I spent in Black Hawk County," once said Mr. Turner, "I slept in a tent near Charles Mullan's place. The next morning Mr. Mullan came to where I was and I told him that I had left Illinois on account of the difficulty of getting water, and would like to settle some place where there was a living stream or an inexhaustible spring. Mr. Mullan told me that he could direct me to just the place I was looking for. I followed instructions and sure enough found a beautiful spring with water bubbling up, pure and cool, near Miller's Creek. It was far out and so lonesome that I decided to enter land where I made my home so many years. The county seat was then at Cedar Falls, but the people tried to make me believe that it would be in Waterloo some day and if I had acted on their advice I would just as well have taken up land where West Waterloo now stands.
"We came here from Ogle County, Illinois, with two yoke of oxen. The journey was long and tedious. The first year that I had broken my land I raised forty-five bushels of wheat to the acre and sold it at home for seed at $1.75 per bushel. The first year I was here I heard of a man at Marion who had some
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HISTORY OF BLACK HAWK COUNTY
seed wheat to sell and so I hitched up, went to the present site of Waterloo, forded the river, came down on the east side, reaching the present site of Gil- bertville late in the afternoon. Looking across the beautiful Cedar I could see my own home, nestling alongside the timber.
"Indians? Oh, yes, we had quite a little experience with the Indians during the early days. One day the story came from up the river that the Indians were on the war path and that they were massacreing all of the settlers. We had one little babe then and my wife and I took it, hitched up our oxen, and started . down the river to seek a place of safety. When we reached Miller's Creek we came across a man who had built a little cabin and he induced us to stay all night with him. The next day we returned home and I found that the story of the Indians had originated from a stampeded drove of ponies which had been frightened by a charivari for James Virden."
John Ash was another of the early settlers of this township. He served as township clerk for a number of years. Horner Brown, a farmer, came to the township in 1856; William Bown in 1850; John Dobshire in 1852; Thomas B. Doxey came to the county in 1855 and to Cedar Township in 1870; Peter Foulk in 1855; George Eastman in 1856; Nelson Mckellar in 1857. A. McNaughton came in the late '6os. Hubbard Frost was another of the old pioneers.
The first postoffice in the township was established at the home of John Forbes, a little log house standing on the bank of Mud Creek, near the point now crossed by the bridge. This office was called Eliza.
CEDAR FALLS TOWNSHIP
On petition of Joseph R. Cameron and others Cedar Falls Township was organized by order of the County Court on February 6, 1854. The first Monday in the following April was set as the date of holding the first election and Andrew Mullarky's house was named as the polling place and J. R. Cameron, Henry Mellen and Luther L. Pease were designated as judges of election. Henry Mellen and George Philpot were elected justices of the peace; Elias Overman, Andrew Mullarky and C. F. Jaquith, trustees ; E. D. Adams, clerk; J. R. Cam- eron, assessor, and J. W. Maggert and T. M. Taylor, constables.
The first white men who stopped long enough in the township to build cabins were W. Chambers and two brothers by name of Williams. They built their homes near the river west of Fourth Street in the present city of Cedar Falls. They remained for a season only, spending the time fishing and hunting. These men were wanderers and can hardly be called pioneers. They lived off the land, without any serious intentions of settling down and helping to build up a com- munity. - These men spent the spring and summer of 1844 and most of the following winter in Cedar Falls Township and then left, traveling towards the setting sun. The following early settlement history of this township corre- sponds very closely, if not exactly, with the early history of the county as a whole, for it was in this section of Black Hawk that pioneer life had its beginning.
The next men to come within the bounds of the township were of an entirely different type. They came to build their homes and community. William Sturgis and E. D. Adams came in March, 1845, with their families. They named the spot where they settled Sturgis Falls. The claim of Sturgis included the falls
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HISTORY OF BLACK HAWK COUNTY
in the river. upon which site was the first saw and grist mill in the county. Adams had a claim farther down the river, but adjoining that of Sturgis. In 1846 Jack- son Taylor, wife and two children came, the Taylor family settling near the two former named men. Jessie Sturgis, born October 1, 1846, was the first white child born in the county. Henry Adams was born three days later. being the first male child in the county. John T. Barrick and J. M. and D. C. Overman came in December, 1847, and in February, 1848. the two Overmans and Edwin Brown moved their families to Sturgis Falls. They dug a race, built a dam and a mill. In 1849. D. C. Overman became the first postmaster in the county. An attorney, Samuel Wick, settled in the township in 1850. He was the first lawyer ever in the county. AAt this time there were twenty-six families in the county. In April, 1850, Black Hawk County became a voting precinct and the Overmans platted the Town of Cedar Falls.
So long as the history of Cedar Falls Township is coincident with the history of the early settlement more detailed information may be found in that chapter, also the history of the Town of Cedar Falls.
EAGLE TOWNSHIP
Eagle Township was organized on March 1, 1858, on petition of Owen Mc- Manus and others. The first election was held on the first Monday in April following at the house of Calvin Eighmey. The warrant was issued to Owen McManus. N. P. Camp. C. W. Eighmey and Michael Mitchell were judges and Owen McManus was the clerk. N. P. Camp and Michael Mitchell were elected justices of the peace ; Owen McManus, clerk ; James Sheen and Joseph Millage, constables. There were eight votes cast, four republican and four democrat.
The first settlers of Eagle Township were C. W. Eighmey and wife. He came with his parents to the state in 1845 and settled first in Van Buren County near the Des Moines River, between Bonaparte and Farmington. He was then about ten or eleven years of age. After living there for a short time the family moved to Dubuque in 1847. There Mr. Eighmey worked for a short time in the lead mines. On April 19, 1854, he was married to Catherine Penne, in La Salle County, Illinois. In the early part of 1856, Mr. and Mrs. Eighmey set out west- ward from Dubuque in a wagon drawn by a yoke of oxen. They followed the trail used by many pioneers before them, yet it was a long and difficult road they had to travel. The streams had to be forded and the path was not chosen by advantageous points of the country. It was likely to run up the steep side of a hill rather than skirt the base.
Arriving in Waterloo the young couple were obliged to tarry for some time until rough lumber could be hauled out in order to afford a habitation. A modest home was constructed by placing the boards on end and nailing them fast to horizontal studdings. At that time the Eagle Center road had been staked out, but there was no track and the township was in its primitive wildness. During the same spring Owen McManus came to the southern part of the township and a woman by name of Mitchell also came that spring and located in the township. No land had yet been broken and there was scarcely a house in sight. Wheat composed the first crop raised in the township and, although there was a mill in Waterloo, most of the flour was bought or gristed at Cedar Rapids.
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The winter of 1858 was the coldest ever known in the state. It was a winter of heavy snows, of intense cold and driving blizzards. The family spent the winter in their crude home, with its many crevices and cracks.
The young people were poor, as were most of the pioneers, and the only heat they had was from a small kitchen stove. At night the family covered up their heads with the blankets the same as the rest of the body, for the biting cold would freeze their noses, ears and even the rest of the face. It was not unusual to wake up in the morning and discover a bank of snow on top of the bed covers.
During the winters of that decade the snow became thickly incrusted with a coating of ice and it is said that hundreds of deer broke their legs by breaking through this crust while crossing a snow bank. This accounted for the unusual scarcity of deer and elk during the following several seasons. An elk left his trail of blood one-fourth of a mile north of Mr. Eighmey's home one winter morning and by the blood the animal was tracked to Hudson where it had been killed by some hunters from that place.
Mr. Eighmey states that none of the homes in the township during these days was built of logs, because the timber was so remote. It was cheaper and more convenient to haul sawed lumber from Waterloo.
Indians were not very numerous then in this township. This is accounted for by the absence of any main streams and tracts of timber, the favorite haunts of the dusky men. Occasionally they would pass the Eighmey home on their jour- neys. They invariably stopped for a few moments and begged for food, which Mrs. Eighmey was very careful to give.
Another trait of the pioneer, related by Mr. Eighmey, was their generous hospitality. One day he and his wife perceived a wagon pulled by oxen and driven by a man and a woman approaching in the distance. When the outfit got within a few hundred feet of the house the man stood up in the box, took off his hat, waved it, and yelled lustily. The Eighmeys had never seen such a perform- ance before, but it was explained when the stranger said that he was so glad to find someone else living in that section of the county that he could not restrain himself.
On another occasion an elderly man and woman and their daughter came to the Eighmey home one afternoon and stated that they had traveled a long distance and that they must stay all night. Mr. and Mrs. Eighmey had only one bed and trundle bed for their child, so it was a question how six people were going to sleep. The visitors being old people Mr. Eighmey induced them to sleep in their one bed and Eighmey and his wife climbed up into the small garret, taking their child with them. They could not sleep there, so stayed awake all night. At 3 o'clock in the morning they arose and breakfast was prepared.
Other early settlers of Eagle Township were: Mr. Regan, James Shean, James Taggart, W. H. Steimel and John Penne. Most of these came in the spring of 1856. The first land entry was probably made on January 3, 1854, by J. H. Meade and Cicero Close. In June of the same year Lemen Eighmey, father of H. B. Eighmey, entered 1,000 acres two miles north of Eagle Center.
The first male child born within the limits of Eagle Township was Joseph McManus and the first girl was Nettie Eighmey, afterward Mrs. H. F. Miller of Waterloo. The first wedding was that of Michael Mitchell, the second that of W. H. Steimel and Elizabeth Penne. The first death was that of Mrs. Nathan .
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Camp, who was thrown from a reaper and run over by the machine. The first and only blacksmith shop was constructed by Isaac Humphrey who ran it for several years and then sold out to Peter Rosauer. Doctor O'Keefe was the first physician in the township.
It has been written that the first Fourth of July celebration ever held in the county was in Eagle Township, in C. W. Eighmey's grove. The year is sup- posed to have been 1866. A committee had been selected to invite all of the people in the township and about a hundred were present. Rev. William L. Huntley delivered the oration and the Declaration of Independence was read by William P. Thompson. After the exercises a big picnic dinner was held.
After the year 1860 the following men were among those who came to the township: William MeGarvey, Damon Mott, Charles Strubel, H. B. Eighmey, William Bomber. M. Bateman. . A. Bronson, Joe Easher. O. Eighmey. P. P. Eighmey, Jacob Fike, A. W. Gardner, William Schrader, Nick Beck, P. W. Kline, T. J. Humphrey. Joseph Kerr.
EAST WATERLOO TOWNSHIP
A petition dated May 5. 1858, signed by S. P. Brainard and others, asked for a division of Waterloo Township running along the channel of the Cedar River and from the eastern part thereof be organized as a new township to be named Wellington Township. The County Court laid the matter on the table until the next July when they ordered an election to be held in August, 1858, to vote upon the question of the division. There arose much opposition and the electors on the east side of the river who were promoting the new scheme were fearful that the west side would out-vote them. The election was ordered held in the courthouse, which house was on the east side of the river. The election happened to come during the very wet season, when the river was booming. Not a west side voter could reach the polls and the result was 60 to o in favor of the division. The township was given the name of East Waterloo, instead of Wellington. The clection judges were O. E. Shipman, Myron Smith and Isaac Young : Charles D. Young and Morrison Bailey were the clerks. William Arm- strong and William P. Bunn were elected justices of the peace.
In the year 1846 the first settlement was made in East Waterloo Township by James Virden, who passed through this section and went on to Cedar Falls where a few settlers then lived and where he assisted Sturgis build a dam across the river at that point.
In the spring of 1846, Mr. Virden left his home in Wayne County, Illinois, and from there began his experiences leading up to his settlement in Black Hawk County. A detailed account of this trip and his settlement here may be found in the chapter on "Reminiscences."
FOX TOWNSHIP
Fox Township was set off from Spring Creek Township by the County Court on May 3. 1858, in answer to the petition of A. B. Mather and others, being con- gressional township 88 north, range 11 west, and the place of holding the first election was the house of Theodore Williams and the time was at the usual April
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EAST WATERLOO TOWNSHIP HOUSE, MAIN STRUCTURE OF WHICH WAS ERECTED IN 1856 BY JAMES EGGERS; WING BY JOHN MESICK IN 1859; HOUSE NOW DESTROYED
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HISTORY OF BLACK HAWK COUNTY
election, afterwards changed to October, 1858. At the first election the judges were Andrew Murphy, Aaron L. Burgess and C. W. Corwin, and the clerks were A. B. Mather and Silas I. Pettit. Mather and M. S. Oxley were elected justices of the peace; Lewis Shroyer and C. W. Corwin, constable; C. W. Corwin, clerk ; S. I. Pettit, assessor.
It is said that Stephen Howell, of Indiana, was the first white man to settle in the township, locating in the southeastern part. His son, James, was the first white child born in the township. The first land entered was by Frederick E. Bissell on September 29, 1852, and John Dunham entered a part of section 19 on November 19, 1852. The first breaking was done on the southeast quarter of the southeast quarter of section 36, which is the extreme southeast corner of the township, in the fall of 1852. It was done by Henry Gray, Stephen Howell and Peter Cox, who used their three yokes of oxen to do the work. The first house was built by Stephen Howell in '49. David Lizer and Anna Lide were the first couple married, in 1853. Naomi Gray, daughter of Henry Gray, was the first girl born in the township, in 1853. The first deaths were those of Mary and William Hibner and their son, Francis, in 1852. E. M. Buechele built the first store in 1888. L. Hubbert built the first bridge across Spring Creek about 1858.
A list of old settlers in the township from 1850 to 1870 follows: Fred Huck, Charles Huck, G. W. Orth, Charles F. and William M. Robe, Jacob Buechele, Jacob L. and Eli M. Buechele, William and Henry Koob, Nick Bloes, John Frost. Jacob Loeb, Hiram Beeter, John Tennant, John, Ed and George Corton, T. H. and C. A. High, Baltis Wiser, Andrew Sauerbrie, Andrew Klackeman, Theodore Klackeman, H. J. McCord, O. G. Young, John Byers, Henry Rickert, William Bernardy, Henry Bernardy, John H. Krantze, Mr. Arthur, A. L. Dickerson, Ellis Byres, A. M. Bingham, Andrew Hueblein, William Reinsche, Ernest Koob, L. B. Hubbard, William Byres, Norman Hyde, R. S. Wooster, A. F. Bingham, John Cooley, F. Benorden, Charles Lichtenberg, Isaac Boomhower, John Weber, Jacob) Schmitz, M. Erehart, Sam Taylor, John Arnold, E. Huseman, John Rue High, D. Wehland, John Hauton, O. R. Perry, W. M. Joung, E. Beckley, A. Broche. By far the greater number of these men came from Germany, others from Penn- sylvania, Wisconsin, Ohio and Indiana. The last four named came from France.
JUBILEE
This is the only postoffice in the township. It is located in the four corners of sections 26, 27, 34 and 35. It has several small stores and a cooperative creamery.
LESTER TOWNSHIP
Lester Township was organized on February 7, 1854. There is no authentic record of the date of the first election, but it is probable that it was held in April. 1854. Thomas W. Barber, Thomas Wilson and E. S. Wheeler were elected trustees ; E. S. Wheeler, clerk; Jonathan R. Owen and James Barclay, justices of the peace, were the officers chosen at this election.
One of the first settlers in the territory now known as Lester Township was Henry Owen. He came to the township in 1853. In the party were Mr. Owen's father and mother, J. R. Owen and wife, A. W. Barber, P. S. Canfield and Eli
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HISTORY OF BLACK HAWK COUNTY
Owen, who settled in the same neighborhood. At that time there was a small building where Mr. Dunkerton later lived and a log building occupied by Logan Bright, where Littleton is now situated. Mr. Barber, who was a carpenter by trade, erected the first frame house in the township, on section 4. Canfield built on section 9 and Owen on section 5.
Henry Owen was married in 1857 in Osage and he brought his bride imme- diately to this township, where they were to make their future home. His brother, Eli, was married in March, 1855, in Lester Township. They were the first in the civil division to seek a license. The groom's father, who was justice of the peace, married them.
A great amount of difficulty was experienced by these men in traveling. The nearest postoffice was Littletown, and most of their grain was taken to a mill at Quasqueton, ten miles south of Independence. Eli Owen built a granary in 1857 and in that crude building, also, the first school was taught.
The first Fourth of July celebration was held in 1854 at the home of J. R. Owen. The only difference of this celebration from the others held in the county was that sports and games were substituted for the orations and inevitable read- ing of the Declaration of Independence.
An experience in traveling across country was at one time related by Mr. Owen. It was during the hard rains of 1858 and the consequent floods when he started to Fairbank to mill and while he was gone the "Wapsie," or Wapsipinicon River, rose out of its banks, inundating all of the land. When the time came for his return he was met by a thick darkness and flood waters. The problem was the crossing of the river with his load of flour. He secured some boards which he laid across the back of the wagon-bed and lifting his flour high upon these and standing near the back end gate he urged his oxen into the river at the usual fording place. Soon the animals were swimming and the wagon became a boat. After a time the outfit reached the west bank, having drifted several rods below the landing place, where the bank was steep. But the river had risen to a point even with the bank and the cattle were thus floated upon high land. When the wagon started to make the rise the box was almost perpendicular and Mr. Owen had to hold his grist upon his shoulders. If the flour had started to slide and he with it, both would have been carried into the turbulent stream, and been swal- lowed up by the angry torrent.
James Dunkerton, with his wife, came to the township in 1854. The Town of Dunkerton was named for him and was located on his farm.
Other pioneers of Lester Township were: Mrs. Benjamin Adams, John Carn- cross and wife, E. P. French and wife, Mrs. Harriet Wood Canfield, Mrs. Mar- garet Carnes, James Harn, Sr., and wife, Mrs. Finch-Saco. Mrs. Maria Owen, II. W. Bucher, Mrs. A. J. Mackintosh and John Potts.
11. W. Bucher came to the township in 1858 with A. R. Dickey from Stephen- son County, Illinois. With two yoke of oxen, Bucher began breaking the soil in 1860 for Thomas Titus. He continued this breaking for a period of two years and then bought a threshing outfit of Chris Brubacher of Waterloo. A year later the threshing outfit was burned, horses and all, and the owner was com- pelled to purchase new.
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HISTORY OF BLACK HAWK COUNTY
LINCOLN TOWNSHIP
The County Board of Supervisors, on June 6, 1861, set off congressional township 87 north, range 14 west, from Black Hawk Township, as a new civil division of the county, to be called Lincoln Township. The first election was held on the second Tuesday in the following October. At this election Samuel B. Roberts, Samuel Gibson and H. Beckwith were judges, and Samuel Marsden and William Wrought were clerks of election. Wrought, Gibson and Joseph Huckler were chosen as trustees. There were eleven votes cast in the presidential election of 1860, all of them for Abraham Lincoln, hence the name of the township.
There is good authority to prove that Samuel Gibson was the first permanent settler in this township. Adam Shigley has been accredited with honor by some people, but the most reliable sources of information point to Gibson. The United States land office records show that the first entries of land in the township were made by Madison E. Hollister and Watson V. Coe on July 5, 1854. But this does not prove that they made permanent settlements, but it does show that neither the Shigleys or Gibsons made entries on their first settlements. However, this was generally the case among the pioneers. William Seeley and his brother were living in a shanty when Robert Gibson came, also there was another family here, evidently the Shigleys according to Robert Gibson's statement. Byron Sargeant, the oldest living settler perhaps in the county, gives the title to Gibson and also claims he built the first house in Lincoln. Mr. Sargeant also is quoted as saying that Horace Beckwith, who removed to the southwest quarter of section 24. was the second permanent settler, coming in the year 1855.
Lutie Humphreys, daughter of George W. Humphreys, born April 25, 1866, was the first child born in Lincoln Township. On April 10, 1865, occurred the first marriage, between Charlotte Amelia Jameson and Ransom P. Wright, the nuptials occurring in the bride's home on section 24. Reverend Beach, a Metho- dist minister of the Six-Mile Grove, officiated. Mrs. John McCullough was the first person to die in the township. During the same night her husband died. These deaths occurred during the latter weeks of August, 1854. A little over a year later John Gibson, aged sixteen, died. All were buried in the Hudson Cemetery.
In the writings of William P. Thompson, of Lincoln Township, is the following :
"The reader may ask why those who came to Lincoln Township first for homes did not buy large tracts of land, in view of the fact that land at some day would be worth a good price.
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