USA > Iowa > Franklin County > History of Franklin County, Iowa, a record of settlement, organization, progress and achievement, Volume I > Part 17
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All around Hansell is the finest of land. It is well drained and yet it is not too broken. Charles and W. H. Harrison each own a fine farm north of town and have splendid improvements. W. H. last year finished a modern house that would be considered a good city residence. There's a lot of fine farms over there. Sam Mc- Dowell owns two, N. B. Claypool, J. W. Boots, G. W. Hooker, J. E. Gibson, Frank Barry and G. Linde, each one, and all have splen- did improvements.
Hansell is still on the map, although with the drug store and S. E. Preston's general store closed, it narrows down the business some- what. R. M. Harrison, H. O. Horner, G. N. Hartgraves and O. B. Berry, however, keep things alive there and seem to be pros- pering.
The road from Hansell to Hampton, passing the Wolf and Mes- selheiser farms, leads one still through a country of fine farms and rich fields. I thought though if that sand and some of the sticky black soil north and west and south of town had been a little more ju- diciously mixed in the making, it might have been better for both sections.
I left Hampton by the east road, and, while I was charmed with the beauty and elegance of the suburban homes of George Artley, George Pease, Ben White and K. H. Kaus, I need not enter into a
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description of them for they are almost as well known as are the best homes in town. If you are out that way though, just take a look at those thoroughbred hogs of Mr. White's. Judging by the appearance of things around the place, there is nothing too good for Mr. White.
Upon turning the first corner, one gets a fine view of some splen- did farm land and the Dirst place in the distance. One cannot help noticing the vast quantities of hay in the stack this year. This county has seldom had so valuable a tame hay crop, for while it may have been heavier, say last year, the weather was not so favorable for har- vesting it, and the quality was inferior. One noticeable thing about the hay and small grain fields this year is their freedom from weeds. Some things seem to come and go, and this must be dogfennel year. I never saw such rank crops as those grown in some pasture lots and feed yards, and a viler weed can scarcely be found anywhere.
Speaking of weeds, a good farmer who had read my letter of last week, accosted me on the street Saturday and told me to touch up the town fellows on the subject of weeds. He averred that there were burdocks and sweet clover within the city limits of Hampton as high as an elephant's back, I think it was. And now, whoever owns those weeds, will please consider himself touched up.
I noticed at Orson Reeve's place, great new straw stacks, and, upon inquiry, learned that his oats went 41 bushels, machine meas- ure, and his barley 40. Quite a number have threshed down in there and I saw three threshing outfits at work within a mile. And how they do up that threshing business nowadays! When a lad on the farm twenty years ago, I was an artist at cutting bands, and have swallowed many a bushel of dust and chaff at the "tail end" of the machine, but it's different now. Should I climb up to cut bands, I would do well to count the sheaves as they rush in, much less to cut every band with a separate slash of a knife; and if I got at the "tail end" I should probably be blown clear over into the next field by that powerful cyclone stacker. And we don't see ten horses tug- ging and sweating to furnish the power, but a busy little steam en- gine snorting away and having the best kind of a time. Yes, it's dif- ferent-quite different.
What interesting stories one can read as he rides along, if he is observant. The fences, for instance; why, one might write a very interesting article upon the subject "The Evolution of the Fence in Franklin County." In one place I noticed upon the one hand an Osage hedge fence-there's a story in the rise and fall of the hedge Vol. 1-12
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fence-and upon the other side, the old posts of a post and rail fence, the posts with three oblong holes cut through in which to fix the ends of the rails cut to fit. I compared in my mind the labor re- quired to make that kind of a fence, absolutely without iron, with the modern method of nailing or stapling up wire to cedar posts.
There are a great many posts of that kind yet to be seen in this county, and none of them, I suppose, are much less than thirty years old. Some one should preserve a lot of them, for, like the men who made them, they are getting old, and within a few years will be a thing of the past. It seems almost a sacrilege to nail the modern steel barbed or electrically welded steel stock fence to those posts and leave the great gaping holes staring at the passerby in his stuttering automobile. But, like their makers, they are of the oak and are seasoned to hardships.
I had a short visit with W. H. Thompson, who lives on his farm near the creek, north of Geneva. He still (1904) owns and lives upon the quarter section which he took as government land and for which he holds a government patent signed by Franklin Pierce. There are cottonwood trees there which he set out, that are three feet in diameter. He is one of the old settlers and can tell many inter- esting things of the early days in the county .*
I went down through the live town of Geneva and was surprised at the life and the business I saw there. Geneva has entered upon a new era of prosperity and with the sort of business men she has and the fine country surrounding, is sure to keep pace with the best towns of her class. They were getting ready for their Bean Day festival and are preparing to take care of a big crowd that day. The crops in Mayne's creek valley north of town were very promising. That soil is warm.
From Geneva I went west through Maysville, and by the way, here's another place to let your fancy loose. I understand that at one time Maysville rivaled Hampton in importance. There are old shops and dwellings going to decay. Many of them were built of logs. We can imagine a time when the shops and stores were new, when the merchandise sold there to the settlers was all hauled, per- haps by ox team, from some town on a railroad many miles away. Why does not some one gather all that interesting history before it is everlastingly too late? It is history too full of interest to let perish, and those who can relate it are not going to remain many years to
*Mr. Thompson died since this was written.
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recite it. It should be written and much of it would be the oft re- peated story of how the railroads have made and unmade towns.
I had dinner at the home of a rich farmer over in Grant town- ship. They were stacking and there were four men there. One of them was inclined to complain of the bad crops of the past few years and the poor prospects for a crop this year. He certainly seemed to have just cause for complaint, but it was good to hear one, yes three of the others. They said they had lived all right and that now we have a good crop of oats, a good crop of potatoes and apples, truck, etc., and that we might yet have lots of corn. They reminded me of that youngster I got mixed up with when I was a boy at country school. I thought I was showing him a mighty hot time, but he kept coming back, grinning all the time. I kept wondering what he saw so all-fired funny about it, but after about four minutes dis- covered that it was because he was going to lick me. You can't down a fellow who does his best and keeps grinning.
I hope the farmers will not think I am urging any one to go out and get it, but there is a great crop of wild fruit in sight. Wild grapes, cherries, plums and crab apples are to be seen in abundance along fences and upon trees in the woods.
The north part of Grant has some good farms. Nate and Will Mulford each have a good farm. Oscar Webber and Ed Kratz have good ones and the Lyman and Merriss farms are other good ones in that locality. That is about ten miles from Hampton and Iowa Falls, yet they are connected by telephone so they can do business at those places and get their mail every day.
I came up through the old village of Reeve, and like Maysville, as a village it is no more. The rural mail delivery and the tele- phone have put it out of business.
Between there and Hampton are some good farms. Fred Alert owns the old Fults farm, then the line up is L. J. Kron, the Robinson farm where John Lowe lives, George Underkofler, Robert Wallace, W. T. Kline, E. A. Beemer, the two Carter and Slee farms with George Bird and George Selix, Joe Robert's Hill Crest Farm, John Shearer; then up farther, Mart Gokey and Gene Mallory, then Jim Sheets' and the Hoxie town farms and the Chris Shafer fine stock farm. It is certainly delightful to look over a country of rich farms at this season of the year and I expect to go out again.
Leaving Hampton by the east north road, one sees the prettiest grounds in the vicinity of Hampton. The natural groves on the Harriman and LeFever farms, with the mill creek and road wind-
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ing through, and with the hills and open glades, make a landscape that would be hard to improve for simple beauty.
I noticed that Fred Harriman has had constructed a convenient stone watering trough at the spring by the roadside there, which adds to the interest of that locality. Who has not noticed and ad- mired the magnificent grove of evergreens on this place, and espe- cially the rows on the north line? And what splendid farms in a group out there! The Chris Fink, John Dryer, George Hemm, Walter Beed and Silvius farms, and farther on another group, the Marble, Vought, Grabbe and Patton farms. With a new school- house of modern design, and such farm homes as those of Dick Pena- luna, August Shafer and the Patton places surrounding, there is a corner that will shine with the best of them.
Going on to Chapin, one passes the comfortable farm homes of William Hemm, Wes Rhutasel, Ernest Banker and N. J. Rhutasel. The Chapin merchants were not rushed with business, for between the fine weather for farm work and the picnic at Dougherty, not many were in to trade. The lumber and grain offices, however, and Green & Roberts, Van Nest's and Fred Gressler's stores were making sales right along.
From here I went west past the Thomas Doige, G. A. Mayer, W. B. Barney Home Farm and N. B. McClintock Sunny Side Farm. I was pleased to notice that Mr. McClintock has the name of his place in plain letters painted on his barn. By the way, here is a case where a man by right methods is getting rich on an eighty- acre farm, and a beautiful home it is, too.
I drove out to see W. D. F. Randolph and found him at home Mr. Randolph thinks he enjoys the distinction of having lived in one home longer than any other man in the county. He has occupied the house in which he now resides, forty-one years. It is a neat frame structure, made of lumber sawed at a mill not far from there, and seems as good as new. Right here I saw two kinds of fence, or the posts of them, not mentioned before. One was where small holes were bored in the posts through which to pass the old smooth wire, before the day of the barbed wire, and the other was where four large holes were bored in which to fix one end of the rail, the other being nailed to the next post. Mr. Randolph informed me that the fence was made the year the Iowa Central was put through-1870- so those posts are thirty-four years old.
I went on out past the historic Ross, Avery and Grinnell places. And those Avery and Grinnell elms! Where in the county can their
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equal be found? Magnificent things they are, standing up as monu- ments to the men who planted them years ago, their nether branches sweeping out and drooping nearly to the ground, the upper ones flung out to the sky and they have defied the storms of years and still are only in their prime. May they remain for many long years, as they will if unmolested, to perpetuate the names of the men who planted them.
From Old Chapin, I went north on the Richland and Ross town- ship line and saw some of the prettiest prairie country and finest farms I think that can be found in Iowa. The two Rust farms espe- cially struck my fancy. The home place of H. A. Rust is on upper Otter creek, which runs close to his barns. It is a delightful place, cool and clean and shady. I wanted to name the place Stony Brook Farm. Right around here in a nest are the splendid farms of H. F. Froning, M. W. Hollingsworth, J. H. Froning, and a little farther north, the 480-acre farm of Albert Engebretson. These are up-to- date farmers and their farms bear the same character. Of the $20,000,000 worth of Franklin county farms, these would foot up their part.
As you approach Sheffield from the west, you have a fine view of one of Iowa's typical small wooded streams.
We think of this county as a prairie country, and yet I surmise that one who has taken no note of the matter would be surprised to know the actual wooded area of the county. Of course it is all sec- ond growth and is small, but there is a lot of it, and what a beautiful thing it is to see a fringe of native groves stretch across the land- scape; somehow there is a charm about it that cannot be found in groves set out in regular order and of trees the same age.
Sheffield is looking well. As a town, she is up to date, as the farms around her, which indeed is saying a great deal. Her peo- ple were assisting Dougherty to keep Harvest Home day in proper style and the streets and stores reminded one of those of Hampton the Fourth of July last, when everybody went away celebrating.
I found a greater number of farmers at home, that is, about the house, than upon any of my former trips and it was really amusing how some of them received me as I turned to drive in. In some cases I think they took me for a candidate for office and instinctively felt for a match as they thought of the fragrant "two-fers" those fellows usually carry; and others, I fancied, thought I was an agent and sent the boy to the house for a gun, but when I told them I was a "friendly," that I wanted neither "support" nor money, but that I
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was just out for my health and to see and enjoy and learn something if I could, they were very friendly and willing to waste a few min- utes "gassing" with me.
Driving south two miles and west a mile, one passes other good farms, Fred Hall occupying the Arthur Bradshaw farm; Tom Wil- liams on the Peter Williams place; H. T. Long on one of Hans Petersen's farms, then Hans himself, is the way they run. Hans has two fine farms out there and is good for $20,000.
Going on south of Chapin quarry on this road, I venture to say you will find the hilliest two miles of road in the county, but you get some good views out of it.
At the Nelson Doyle schoolhouse I turned west and passed the Ed Knoll farm-a fine old place-and noticing an especially neat farm home, with well kept grounds, and an inviting driveway, I turned in and got acquainted with Uncle John Fredericks. He has an "eighty," with native groves, fine, well arranged buildings and fences and a desirable place in every way. In our conversation he told me he began without a cent, has his place and stock, has raised a family of nine children, and as they were married one by one, to the number of six, he gave each $500 in cash; and all upon eighty acres of Franklin county land.
On my way home from there, I saw some of the finest farms of my trip. I passed the Menning farms, the William Heineking and Fred Paullus places, and they are homes fit for a king.
Back by way of the mill I passed the well known Harriman, Schmidt, Fox, Green, Rowe and Hembd homes, and with a strong belief that I had seen some as fine farms and farm property as Iowa affords.
CHAPTER XII
THE FIRST PHYSICIANS ENDURED HARDSHIPS AND WERE POORLY PAID -PILLS AND QUININE COMPOSED THE PIONEER DOCTOR'S PHARMA- COEPIA-PLACED GREAT RELIANCE ON THE LANCET AND BLED HIS PATIENT WITH OR WITHOUT PROVOCATION-SOME OF THE PIONEER AND LATER PHYSICIANS OF THE COUNTY.
The pioneers of the healing art in Franklin county were the guardians of a widely dispersed population. Aside from their pro- fessional duties, they contributed their full share to the material development of a newly opened country. Some were men of culture, who had gained their medical education in college. Others were of limited educational attainments, whose professional knowledge had been acquired in the offices of established practitioners of more or less ability in the sections from which they emigrated. Of either class almost without exception, they were practical men of great force of character who gave cheerful and efficacious assistance to the suffering, daily journeying on horseback scores of miles, over a country almost destitute of roads and encountering swollen, un- bridged streams, without waterproof garments or other now com- mon protection against the elements. Out of necessity the pioneer physician developed rare quickness of perception and self-reliance. A specialist was then unknown, and the physician was called upon to treat every phase of bodily ailment, serving as physician, sur- geon, oculist and dentist. His books were few and there were no practitioners of more ability than himself with whom he might consult. His medicines were simple and carried on his person and every preparation of pill or solution was the work of his own hands.
During the summer and autumn of 1837 cases of bilious remit- ting fever occurred, which readily yielded to treatment. The win- ter following several cases of bilious pneumonia demanded prompt attendance and special vigilance in the observance of changes in- dicative of greater danger. These were the diseases and the prin-
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cipal ones which called for medical help up to the year 1849. Since that year, or from that period, the summer and autumnal fevers ceased to be epidemical and pneumonia became less frequent. It may be well to mention here that the fevers of 1849 after the third or fourth day assumed a typhoid character, the remission hardly observable, and the nervous depression occasioning great anxiety.
It was probably Dr. Rush of Philadelphia-a great name up to about 1825-who said the lancet was a "sheet anchor" in all inflam- matory diseases, so it might have been said of quinine, as used in remittent and intermittent fevers, in both the Mississippi and Mis- souri valleys from 1830 up to 1850. During that period 120,000 square miles west of the Mississippi and north of St. Louis became populated and all of it more or less malarious. In some of these years the demand for quinine was so great that the supply in the American market became exhausted. "Sappington's pills" were in- directly the power which worked steamboats up the river from 1835 to 1843. They were verily, the "sheet anchor," not only aboard boats but in many households. Dr. Sappington was a regular allo- pathic physician of considerable ability residing up the Missouri river, who thought it would be a benefaction to the new civilization of the west to prepare quinine ready to be taken in the form of pills. Boxes of his pills contained four dozen each and the pellets two grains each. The direction on the box was to take from two to twenty as the urgency of the case seemed to require, without refer- ence to the stage of the paroxysms.
The History of Franklin County, published in 1883, gives to "Dr." L. H. Arledge the distinction of being the first physician to practice medicine in Franklin county. To this Orson G. Reeve takes exception. He says Arledge attended the sick and met with a fair measure of success in relieving his patients of many ailments, but the impression always prevailed that Arledge was not a graduate of any school of medicine. He had but a common-school education and his knowledge of the principles of medicine were as limited as his skill in the recognized practices of the "regular" physician.
"Dr." Arledge, as he shall be here designated, located at Mavs- ville, then the principal trading point in Franklin county, in 1854, coming from Indiana. He was a minister of the Methodist Epis- copal church and probably was the first one to preach a regularly prepared sermon in the county. At the time of his arrival, Dr. Arledge bought a farm of John Mayne in Reeve township, which he afterwards sold to J. M. Soper. He then removed with his
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family to Minnesota, remaining there a few years and then return- ing to Franklin. Finally the doctor went to Nebraska and lost his life by being crushed to death under the wheels of a wagon loaded with logs.
The first "regular" practitioner in Franklin county was Dr. S. R. Mitchell, who located in Maysville in 1855. He was the first per- son in the county to hold the office of clerk of the courts. As a phy- sician Dr. Mitchell was held in high esteem. He was popular and had a large practice, in which he was often compelled to make many long rides to reach his patients.
The next physician to locate for the practice of his profession in Franklin county was Dr. Addis. He came in 1863 and located near Maysville. After several years' residence here he removed to Ponca, Nebraska, where he passed away.
In so far as the records go, it appears that a Dr. Guthrie was the first physician to locate in Hampton. He came in 1856 and besides following his profession, kept a little hotel in a building which stood on the northeast corner of Reeve and Fourth streets. In 1858 he re- moved to Hartford, in Butler county.
The next physician of note to settle in the early 'sos was Dr. T. H. Baker. He located in Reeve township and started the first store in the county. The cabin in which he kept his goods was located south of the J. M. Soper place and was built by Henry Garner when he took up the claim upon which it stood.
Of Dr. Baker, O. G. Reeve tells the following story: "It hap- pened that a man named Duke Whitmore was engaged in the '50s by Dr. Baker to break up some prairie for him. When the time came for a settlement, a dispute arose, which engendered bad feelings be- tween the two men. Whitmore had been engaged to haul a load of goods in the spring from Independence for Clock & Wheeler, who ran a store in Maysville. But Dr. Baker, who was also a lawyer, came to the Reeve house with a deputy sheriff to levy on Whitmore's team-which consisted of three yoke of oxen-before he could start for Independence. Baker and the officer stopped a little north of the Reeve house and seeing them, my father told me to unhitch the oxen and run the wagon into the timber. I followed his directions and hid it in some tall hazel brush, and then under his directions, went to Sturms' to play with his boys. Father told me to say nothing about this matter. While I was gone, Baker, the officer and Whit- more went into the house and arranged a settlement of some kind, which evidently was not to Whitmore's liking. He thereupon made
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up his mind to take satisfaction out of Dr. Baker's hide. Whitmore secured a shellbark hickory stock, one and three-fourths inches at the butt end and nine feet, eight inches in length, and meeting Baker in the road gave him a terrible lashing. For this Whitmore was fined one dollar and considered that he had more than gotten his money's worth."
Dr. J. S. Hurd practiced in Hampton in early days for a num- ber of years and then removed to Chapin.
Dr. C. F. West was an allopath, who came to Hampton in 1863 and remained two years. He then took up his residence for the re- sumption of the practice at Indianola, in Warren county.
Dr. O. B. Harriman came to Hampton in the spring of 1865 and almost immediately entered upon an extensive practice that con- tinued as long as his health would permit. In his profession he held high rank. He was a native of New Hampshire and attended high school in the town of his nativity, and also was a student in the Hop- kinton and Bosawen academies. Young Harriman began the study of medicine in 1857, attending three courses of lectures at Dartmouth Medical College and Bellevue Hospital Medical College. He also took post-graduate studies in New York and at the Chicago Poly- clinic. For several months the rising young physician was em- ployed in the government hospital service at Keokuk and later prac- ticed at Rockford and Marble Rock. In 1876, Dr. Harriman was chosen president of the Franklin County Medical Society and was a member of the Austin Flint Medical Society, of the Iowa State Medical Society, the Iowa State Association of Railway Surgeons, as well as of the national association of the same. He was selected in 1895 as one of the board of medical examiners of the state. In short, he was always recognized as one of the leaders among the medical fraternity. The death of Dr. Harriman occurred July 8. 1905.
Dr. James A. Norton was practicing in Hampton in 1869. About the year 1872 he returned to his native place-Bettsville, in Seneca county-and resumed the practice there. The doctor was small in stature, of quick, nervous temperament, a ready, fluent talker and a politician. Shortly after his return to Ohio, he was sent to the state Legislature, where he was Speaker pro tem. In the 'gos he repre- sented his district in the national halls of Congress two terms. While a resident of Franklin county, he married a Miss Heming, a native of Ohio. Dr. Norton died at his home in Tiffin, Ohio, in IQII.
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