USA > Iowa > Harrison County > History of Harrison County, Iowa, including a condensed history of the state, the early settlement of the county together with sketches of its pioneers > Part 14
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HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY. 167
1862, at which time the following resolutions were presented and adopted, viz .:
" Resolved, That any person who will enlist in the present company of Iowa volunteers now being raised in this county, shall receive at the time he is sworn into the service, a good and sufficient warranty deed for eighty acres of swamp and over- flowed lands in the county which at the present remains unsold, and which may be selected by him or his agent, and no swamp land shall be sold or deeded after this date until that provided for by this resolution has been selected, reasonable time being given such to select their lands.
" Resolved, That if the person so enlisting shall select in lieu of the land above provided for, a warrant on the swamp land fund for $100, he shall have the same at the time of enlistment, and the same shall be payable for the lands heretofore entered and be receivable either for principal or interest.
" Resolved, That in case the person so enlisting shall prefer, on enlisting, the warrants, then the board hereby instructs the clerk to draw to such a person a warrant on the said fund for $100, the same being hereby made assignable.
" Resolved, That this board will appoint some competent per- son to accompany the soldiers who may enlist under these reso- lutions to the hospitals or battle fields.
" Resolved, That this board will carefully provide for the families of any citizens of the county who will enlist and whose families may be in want during the time of said enlistment."
All the members of the board voted in favor of these resolu- . tions, and scarcely had the same been adopted until there came a deluge of applicants to join the company. A meeting was set for the 18th of August of the same year to complete the organ- ization of the company, and when the day arrived there was such an overwhelming turning out that many who were thought by the younger men to be too old were compelled to return to their homes without "'jining the army."
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Mr. Thomas F. Vanderhoof, Peter Brady, Jerry Motz, and a. whole squad of such old men were refused, because there were a better class of more physical young men who could, as was anticipated at that time, stand the roughs of army life much better than these last named.
It may be safely said, and truly, too, that there never was a company of one hundred men raised or enlisted in so short a period of time from a neighborhood made up of so few able bodied citizens. In the making up of the company above named only two of the members of the board enlisted: Wickliffe B. Copeland and Joe. H. Smith. The others, though earnestly pray- ing for the success of the Federal cause, fought the battle at a distance, believing that "distance lent enchantment."
This resolution, though a little out of the direct line, and which in these days of peace might be construed to be passing the Rubi- con of supervisor jurisdiction, yet at the time of the passage of the same there was no time to fool away in discussing fine dis- tinctions and constitutional questions. The war was upon us, and the fact was, somebody had to go to the front; and if I am not now mistaken, the thirteen who staid at home were just as willing that Copeland and Smith should enlist as any person. The draft clouds were hovering in the eastern horizon, and then, as now, there were just as many persons who would be willing that somebody else should be shot as to be the victims themselves. The act of the board in granting this bounty was subsequently legalized by the Legislature of this State, and up to the present time there has never been any "kicking " about this procedure. In seven days after the passage of these resolutions one hundred, men, the pick and choice from the county, were enlisted for three years or during the war, and has ever since that event been known as Company C, Twenty-ninth Regiment Iowa Volunteer Infantry.
The next question of importance which came before the board for adjudication, was that which was presented by those in the
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HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY.
interest of a railroad company, viz .: the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad Company, and this in 1864, when it was said that un- less the county of Harrison donated to this corporation all the unsold swamp and overflowed lands in the same, they would build their line directly west from Denison, and Harrison county would be left out in the cold, so far as railroad facilities were concerned. This proposition barely escaped passage, only being defeated by a majority of one. Notwithstanding the assertions of many of the friends of the road, and the agents who sought the bonus, the road was built just as soon as it would have been had the county donated all the unsold swamp land and thrown in a percentage for luck.
At the August session of 1861, being the first year of the Board of Supervisors, they selected for the purpose of selling and procur- a poor farm for the county, the following described swamp lands, viz .: the southwest quarter of section No. 7, township 79, range 44, and north half of southwest and the southeast quarter of the southwest quarter of lot No. 1, in section 15, township 80, range 45, all in the county. This was disposed of between the day of selection and the 1st of January, 1868, and the board, through its committee, Robert McGavren, James L. Roberts and Barzillai Price, selected as a poor farm the following described premises, viz .: the southwest quarter of section 22, in township 81, range 41, in Harrison township, being an improved tract, and then, as yet, one of the very best one hundred and sixty acres in the entire county, paying to Hammer & Ferbs the sum of $22.50 per acre, amounting in all to $3,600. This was used and occu- pied by the county as a poor farm up to and until a time when old Uncle Johnny Harshbarger wished to change his base, when the Board of Supervisors, through its committee, D. E. Brainard, J. S. Cole and Samuel DeCou, all being then members of the board, exchanged the poor farm last above described, with the said Harshbarger, for the farm now used and maintained by the county as a poor farm. There is not an individual in the entire
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county at the present date but would be willing to swear (and some use some harsh language) that the present farm now known as the county poor farm is the poorest farm for the purposes for which it is used, and for the money which it cost the county, in all the county. This sale, or swindle (whatever you may call it), was completed on the 19th of March, 1870, at a time when the tract at and near Dunlap was worth three times the amount of that given in exchange; besides, it was in a more healthy locality, and nearly tangent to the town of Dunlap, which place at that time was struggling under a very healthy boom. The tract now owned by the county is badly cut up by the Boyer river; has but a small selvedge of arable land, through which the Northwestern Railroad passed at the time of purchase, and the remainder, instead of lying, stands on its edge, and is fit only for observatories and bank barns. To this nearly worthless tract of land the different Boards of Supervisors, since the time of purchase as aforesaid, have paid out of the taxpayers' money, in the way of building a dwelling house, the sum of $4,700, and re- pairs yearly on the same not less than $75, as well as repairs to fences and out-buildings, $1,000; so that the present cost of this magnificent swindle to the county at this time is not less than $11,000, which the guardians of the county at this date lease to their present overseer, or steward, at the rate of $200, which he pays to the county in providing support to paupers at the rate of $3 or $3.25 per week.
This $200 is beyond question a very small percentage on the $11,000, but this was county funds, and you know that if the county funds are a little carelessly expended, the county being rich, the people would not miss such a trifle. It is too late in the day for any body now to ask an explanation and the public will be left to form and carefully express their judgments as to them shall seem to be in keeping with the men and times in which the matter took place. The poor house is acreditable building and suits well for the purpose for which it was built, but the same might
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just as well, so far as nearness to railroads is concerned, be in Allen or Union townships, as where now located.
THE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF THE COUNTY
was attempted to be made in the late fall of 1876, at the time the following gentlemen were acting as a Board of Supervisors or as guardians of the county's interest, viz .: H. B. Cox, H. V. Armstrong and Amos Chase.
A fellow by the name of W. P. Fox, a star in the geological firmament, of about such magnitude as the writer would be in the pulpit, strayed to this county from the back alleys of the city of Des Moines, and through the written recommendation of a great portion of the business men all over the county, procured from this Board a permit to make a geological survey of the county, having in view the discovery of coal. This "fox" was accompanied by a hack driver from Council Bluffs, and after prodding along the banks of the Boyer at not more than a dozen of places with a pole and two-inch auger for two or three weeks, and then making three or more trips to the Little Sioux saloons in search of " hardware," and then borrowing Joe. H. Smith's geological reports of the geological survey of the State of Iowa, together with the preparing of their minds by frequent and repeated drunks at the "stone church " (this was a saloon in Logan known by that name) a comprehensive report was made, by copying from the above reports, and filed in the office of the County Auditor, and before the January meeting of the Board in 1877, the bill for such survey was allowed and warrants drawn on the county fund for $700. Through and by these means the county was swindled out of that sum.
The Board of Supervisors above named were not so much to blame in this matter as were those who practiced a fraud on them by recommending such worthless tramps, but believing it would be benefical to the county that such survey should be made, and at the same time having no thought but the person recom-
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mended was competent to make a scientific survey, they con- sented, and with the result above stated.
This $700 warrant being issued a little out of season, i. e., before auditing by the Board, was as soon as issued sold to a well known firm in the county at a good shave, and hence at the time the Board met this $700 was in the hands of " innocent purchasers."
RODDING THE COURT HOUSE
With lightning rods, happened at a time when there was a "lightning rod revival" all over the county; the advance agent, by some means or other, having secured the written consent of the Board of Supervisors to rod the court house, put his " gang". to work at the job, and when they had finished, the entire roof, chimneys, cupola, etc., etc., were encased in a net work of iron rods, bristling with points and weather vanes. This, when com- pleted was followed by a bill of some $800, which so disgusted the Board and the County Auditor, it being so much more than any one had contemplated it would be, that William H. Eaton, who was then Auditor, paid a part of the bill himself, and Mr. H. B. Cox proposed to the other two members of the Board, that, in his opinion, the Board should pay for this themselves and not call on the county to put up for their want of foresight and discretion, and that if the other two members would each pay their pro rata, he would his, and the next time watch and not be drawn into any such financial whirlpools: this was not in keeping with the opinions of the other two members and the county compromised with these public vampires, by paying them $575.
These circumstances last above related, constitute nearly all of the mistakes of the Board of Supervisors since the time the same was transformed from a "debating society" to a business three, and I unhesitatingly say that there is not a county in the entire state of Iowa, to-day, that has been as well governed as Harrison.
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HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY.
The only indebtedness of the county at the present, is a bonded indebtedness of $16,500, which at the first thought can readily be understood. All persons who resided in the county in 1885 will remember that during that year the public roads of the county suffered more heavily by reasons of heavy rains and floods, than in all the past years of the county's life: that in all parts of the county the cry came up to these officials, " we must have means of egress and ingress; our highway bridges have been swept away by the floods, we cannot get away from our farms to market, neither can the officers get to our homes; we must have means of travel; " and the Supervisors knowing that these representations were true, and that these people needed this relief, cheerfully bonded the county at that time for $5,500, and again in June, 1886, bonded for $11,000 more, making in all $16,500.
It must not be understood that all of this sum last named was used in the building of county bridges, from the fact that a small portion was by the Board ordered to be used in keeping up the par value of county orders: because just as soon as there is a want of cash in the county treasury to cash county orders the same are thrown on the market and the party who served the county in any capacity or rendered any of the many services required, is compelled to suffer the loss of such shave as the money lender or merchant sees fit to allow.
These bonds are what are known as three and ten year bonds, being so negotiated and worded, that the county cannot pay the same sooner than three years from date, and the bond holder cannot compel payment sooner than ten years from date. The interest on these bonds runs at the rate of 6 per cent per annum, which all persons in the county pay in proportion to the amount of their taxable property. This is infinitely better than that the county warrants should go begging a purchaser and be hawked upon the streets at such price as corners would thrust them. At this date I am informed by the very gentlemanly County Auditor,
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HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY.
Mr. Frank Croesdale, that there is now on hand $5,000 ready for payment on this bonded indebtedness, which would leave the sum of $11,500 yet to be raised and eight years more for pay- ment.
THE FINANCES OF THE COUNTY,
From what has been said in the last remarks, show that the same could scarcely be in better condition than they are at the present.
From the organization of the county up to the year of 1866, being the time when Captain George S. Bacon was sworn into office as Treasurer, county warrants had been walloping round the streets, hedges and highways of the county, alternating in value, in proportion to the proximity of taxpaying time, and the opposition in the matter of procuring the same. It is well recol- lected, that during all the time prior to this the currency of the county was nearly made up by using county warrants, swamp- land scrip and cottonwood lumber. This condition of things afforded a fine opportunity for speculation in the purchase of these county orders, and some of the banking firms, merchants and others were not slow in catching on, and could to-day state that the stepping stone to their present wealth is due to the fact that county orders offered an opportunity for investment. This term, viz .: the years of 1866 and 1867, county orders were kept at their par value, and on the incoming of another man, viz .: A. W. Ford, as County Treasurer, they lapsed back to the old low-water mark of sixty cents on the dollar, and continued at that price during all of the year 1869.
On the 1st of January, 1870, Captain Bacon came into control of the business of the county treasury, and immediately these county orders went up to par and remained in that position until the latter part of the year of 1871, at which time the bot- tom fell out of the county coffers, there being no funds to redeem the same, but there were several men apparently on other busi- ness passing through the county, yet wherever there was a
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HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY.
county order found it was immediately purchased by these county order crystalizers, and who it was that made money out of this deal, is left to your own judgment and recollection. Not- withstanding all that may have taken place in the past, Harrison county, in this year of 1888, pays all her debts, dollar for dollar.
While the subject of county finance is under consideration, I cannot forbear making a statement of the extent to which the realty of the county is blanketed with mortgages, the same assuming a magnitude far exceeding the thought of the most observing. The real value of the realty of the county is placed at $12,477,090, to which add the value of the personalty, $3,644,571, amounts to $16,121,661; on this there is a tax of $166,035.55 for the year of 1887.
The mortgage indebtedness on the lands, represented to be worth $12,477,090, is $1,663,612, which, drawing interest at the rate of 8 per cent, each year amounts to the sum of $133,088, so that by adding the tax assessed for the year 1887 to the interest paid for the same year on the loans, amounts to the nice little sum of $299,124.51. It, at first thought, would hardly seem possible, that a little fraction of this great commonwealth, only twenty-four by twenty-seven miles, really makes and pays out, year by year, a fraction over a quarter of a million of dollars, but the facts warrant these figures. The further fact must be kept in view, that very many of the farms in the county are wholly free of mortgage embellishments, while many persons have crystalized the thought that interest is much cheaper than the usual rents demanded by the landlords, and, hence the mort- gage indebtedness as aforesaid.
Notwithstanding the appalling figures as above stated, very many of those on the west side of the county who, in the spring of 1887, were nearly mired by these loans, by reason of the grand yield of the corn crop of the same year as well as the good price which the same brought in market, applied the money received for the same in the extinguishment of these incumbran-
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ces, and at the present are nearly masters of the situation, and quite free of debt.
THE EARLY CURRENCY OF THE COUNTY
Up to the year of 1857 was gold and silver, which was occasioned by reason of the fact that persons settling in the county brought such with them, and again, because Council Bluffs was the great outfitting point for California and Great Salt Lake. They who came to Council Bluffs by water, would purchase teams, imple- ments, groceries, etc., etc., at this place, sufficient to last the trip, and this put this class of money into circulation, and little, if any, paper money was used as a medium of value until the latter part of 1857, and this became exceedingly plentiful up to the time of the breaking out of the rebellion. The reader must not indulge in the thought that gold and silver was very plenteous up to 1857, and from that to the time of the beginning of the war, for such a condition did not exist.
About the beginning of the year 1858 there were a great many saw mills located and running in the county and the timber along the Missouri bottoms and in many places in the groves in the up- lands, which occasioned a trade in this article, which the settlers, with this and swamp-land scrip, and now and then a county order, constituted the great bulk of the currency then in circulation. Bank bills representing money, said to have been issued by good, reliable banks in Missouri, Kansas, Illinois, Kentucky, Georgia, etc., etc., etc., with great red dogs, or deers, wild cats, handsome men and beauties of women pictured thereon, were at this time thrown broadcast all over the country, and so uncer- tain was the value of these that the banks, which by the detector and newspaper reports of yesterday were reported to be good, the day following would be wholly worthless. Never was there such uncertainty in monetary matters, and perhaps I could not better illustrate this uncertain condition than by telling a cir- cumstance, true in fact and particular, which occurred at the time I am now speaking of, and 'tis this:
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HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY.
Old Uncle Jakey Pate and Mike Wallace kept a wood-yard at a place now known as Sandy Point (the same being named for Mike because of his terribly red hair), and one day while they were at dinner a steamboat landed at their yard, and before they could put in an appearance the boatmen had ten or fifteen cords of dry wood carried on board of the boat, and when Uncle Jakey came he says, " Well, well, what are ye a-doin' here at my wood- pile, taking it without leave or license?" To which the clerk of the boat replied, "We will make it right, sir-all right, sir; you'll take paper money, won't you? And if you accept the paper money, about how much will you allow us for it, eh?" To which Mr. Pate replied, after squirting about a quart of tobacco juice on the gang-plank, "Allow you? Well, let me see; how many cords of wood did you take?" " Fifteen," says the clerk. " Well, well," says Pate, " I think we could about afford to take it cord for cord; what do you say, Mike? " "Yes, fif- teen eords of red dog, wild cat or any other good paper money you've got will be all right, won't it Mike?" Payment was made in gold at a little less than cord for cord.
Attacks have been made on the moneys paid into the county treasury at frequent intervals since the first payment was made of taxes in 1854.
It will be remembered that P. G. Cooper was the first County Treasurer elected, and that upon the resignation of Stephen King in October of 1853 as County Judge, that P. G. Cooper was appointed Clerk of the Courts, and his brother, William V. Cooper, was appointed Treasurer and Recorder. During the first part of the year of 1854, and up to and until the 1st of Septem- ber of the same year, this condition continued, and what little taxes were paid, were received by Wm. V. Cooper. At this time the county records were kept in a little log house quite near to the spot where Mr. I. V. Stewart now resides, in Magnolia. All of the county officers then occupied offices in this little building, and while the two Coopers were holding watch and vigil over the rec-
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ords and cash of the county, during the month of September of the year last named, by some mysterious providence, the build- ing caught fire, and the building. records, cash, etc., were burned.
It is said that Judge Cooper was full of " Paddy's eye- water," and came nearly perishing in the scorching flames, and while the principal part of the money then in the treasury was "gold," by reason of the heat of the burning building the gold was melted and was afterwards found in a conglomerate shape- less mass, nevertheless, when subjected to scientific test, proved to be the remains of an old brass candle-stick, which had found its way from Virginia and into these offices, and lastly into the scorching flames. The county then rubbed out all old scores and commenced in business de novo.
The next ripple upon the surface of county tax deposits was at the March meeting of the county court of 1858, when D. E. Brainard, then County Judge, requested the then Treasurer, John W. Cooper, to make report of the status of the funds in his hands, he Cooper having failed to make any report to the County Judge. Matters passed for three successive days, at which time Mr. Brainard became oblivious as to accommodations and caused the Sheriff of the county to serve on the Treasurer a written notice demanding the immediate appearance of the custodian of the funds and the instantaneous report as provided by law.
Mr. Cooper having used some of the funds and then being unable to make immediate replacement, suffered suit to be insti- tuted against him and his bondsmen in the district court, but before the same ripened into hearing, came forward with the proper report and cash, and the case was dismissed.
From the date last named until the last of the year 1865, no crookedness in the County Treasurer's office is found of record, while during the year of 1865, as well as the years 1866 and 1867 and that of 1868, the Board of Supervisors of the county for the year 1870 seem to have concluded that there were funds remain- ing in the hands of R. Yeisley for 1865, to the amount of
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$459.37; in the possession of Captain Geo. S. Bacon, for the year of 1866, the sum of $519.71, and for the year 1867, $753.28, and that A. W. Ford had failed to turn over, for the year 1868, the sum of $674.57, due from all former Treasurers, in all making the sum of $2,407.93. This searching of the records was had prior to and reported to the Board at the October session of 1870, at which time the county was represented by seventeen members, all of whom being present at said meeting passed the following resolution, which to-day stands upon the minutes of said Board, viz .:
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