USA > Iowa > Pottawattamie County > History of Pottawattamie County, Iowa. Containing a history from the earliest settlement to the present time biographical sketches; portraits of some of the early settlers, prominent men, etc. > Part 28
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er, the Mayor, made strenuous efforts to elose these institutions, as in violation of the Sun- day ordinance, but being inadequately sus- tained by public opinion, the effort failed.
One thousand dollars of the bonds for right of way for the Union Pacific were issued in the spring of 1871, under the authorization of 1868. In July, Gen. Dodge, on behalf of the company, requested the additional $4,000 to enable the company to complete the right of way, and the Council thereupon directed that they should be sold by the Mayor, and the proceeds applied to the appropriate pur- pose.
In this connection must not be forgotten a singular phenomenon, no other than the fa- mous " Potter Christ," as he called himself. During his life, he was a noted character upon the streets. At this date, he was a man of some seventy years of age: was heavy set and of stout build, with long. gray, venerable loeks, and not altogether of an unpreposses- sing appearance. He had come to this sec- tion with the Mormon emigration, and in brooding over religious subjects had become a monomaniac. He fancied himself the Mes- siah of a new dispensation, had fits of ecstasy, indulged in prolonged fasts and vigils, and cultivated the spirit of prophecy. The vagaries of his mind were regarded by him as inspiration, and were written down in a rhapsodical jargon, and some of them printed in slips and pamphlets. He was not without those who believed in his divine mision, but most people regarded him with pity. He had selected the 2d of August, 1871, as the day on which he would ascend into heaven. Clad in white robes, surrounded by half a dozen nearly demented followers bearing a banner cabalistically inseribed, he rode through the streets, surrounded by jeering and hooting crowds, preaching the advent of the day of judgment, and the necessity for immediate
repentence. The boisterous mob soon ended his efforts at demonstrating the truth of his prophesies, and his followers removed him in a short time to the outskirts of the city, where he disrobed, and gave up the fruitless enter- prise. He died in a year or two afterward in great poverty and wretchedness.
The annual session of the Iowa Teachers' Association was begun at Council Bluffs Au- gust 29, 1871, the meeting lasting three days, and the business sessions being conducted in Dohanny's Opera House. Spencer Smith, business manager of the Nonpareil, and for many years the efficient Secretary of the city School Board, delivered a welcome address, responded to by Prof. Fellows, of the Iowa University. Col. John W. Ross, who was then the manager of the Ogden House, gave the teachers of the State in attendance a com- plementary banquet.
Among the natural curiosities abounding in this vicinity, is what is called Spoon Lake, on the grounds of the Union Pacifie Rail- road, in the western part of the city. It is almost circular in shape, and very deep in many places. From the northern side ex- tends a narrow, curved arm resembling the handle of a spoon, the lake itself resembling the bowl or cup of the spoon. The lake has no surface outlet and the only apparent inlet is when the banks of Indian Creek or the Missouri River overflow, and the surplus water thus finds its way into this small lake, which is now used as a source of water supply for the Union Pacific depot, and for the use of their machinery and engines on this side of the river. Small fish, such as yellow perch, have from time immemorial abounded in the lake, but on the 28th of July a singular phenomenon presented itself. It was just at the close of a very heavy rain shower. Immense quantities of Missouri River fish made their appearance in the lake,
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such as enormous catfish weighing twenty and thirty pounds, pickerel of great size, and buffalo fish three or four feet long. Hun- dreds of pounds of these large fish were easily captured, and for many days the circumstance was simply the wonder of the locality. Some were of the opinion that the bottom over- flowed in the night time during the prevail- ing storm, and the fish thus had access from the river. Others, again, surmised that they came by the way of some underground chan- nel. Floods since have failed to repeat the exhibition, and the mystery is still unsolved.
Council Bluffs was honored in September by a visit from President Grant. The citizens without regard to party took carriages, and gave his party a view of the city. The day was one of the finest in autumn. Arriving at the Ogden House, after a tour of the city, the President gave an informal reception. The public schools were dismissed, so as to give the pupils an opportunity to take the hero of Vicksburg and of the Wilderness campaign by the hand. For hours a constant stream of sight-seers streamed through the corridors of the hotel. At the close of the reception, Mayor Bloomer and the leading citizens conducted the Presidential party in carriages to the St. Joseph depot, where they took the evening train south.
The news of the great fire in Chicago fell like a death knell upon the surprised citizens of Council Bluffs. They had full intelligence of the disaster the next morning, and proceeded at once to organize for the relief of the stricken city. A public meeting was at once called, and committees organized, and a depot established under the superintendence of the late Thomas Elder, one of the foremost citizens of Coun- cil Bluffs in all matters of charity. E. L. Shugart was charged with the proper distri- bution of the supplies, and the relief in money thus collected. The real value of the
contribution made by Council Bluffs cannot now be definitely known, but it is enough to say that rich and poor gave liberally and cheerfully. One of the most eloquent polit- ical speakers Council Bluffs ever had was John C. Turk, who was a brother-in-law of William G. Crawford, the Clerk of the Courts. Mr. Turk was a Democrat, and a fine lawyer and had been carefully educated for his pro- fession in his native State, Ohio. He was universally beloved. A sudden illness over- took him in the fall of 1871, and in a few days death closed his eloquent lips forever. His wife was a sister of Mrs. Crawford. The same family was visited by death again in a few weeks, on the 14th of November, when Mr. Crawford succumbed to consumption, which for years had been gradually wasting him away. He was a native of Ohio also, and at an early age emigrated to Eastern Iowa. When Nebraska Territory was organized, he settled there, and served for two years. as a member of its Legislature. He came to Council Bluffs in 1860, and formed a law partnership with Judge Street. He was a War Democrat, and held the offices of City Recorder, Recorder of Deeds and Clerk of the District Court. He was succeeded in the latter office by Capt. J. W. Robinson, who was appointed to fill the vacancy, but failed to get the nomination of his party, and re- tired to give place to R. Bryant, a nephew of Judge Bryant's. Robinson was afterward ap- pointed Register in Bankruptcy, and at the close of that system went to Leadville and Silver Cliff, in Colorado, to engage in min- ing enterprisos, where he has ever since lived. Bryant served one term as Clerk, and was succeeded by F. H. Warren, who served two terms, and was himself succeeded by S. D. Street, son of Judge Street, and who is now entering upon his second term. All these incumbents were Republicans.
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HISTORY OF POTTAWATTAMIE COUNTY.
1
On the 1st of November, a manufacturers' association was formed for the purpose of giving proper encouragement to the establish- ment of manufacturing industries. Gen. G. M. Dodge was made President; G. W. Lin- inger, now of Omaha, Vice President; S. Farnsworth, Cashier of the First National Bank, and E. L. Shugart. Vice President of that bank, Secretaries, and Col. H. C. Nutt, Treasurer. The association representing great capital and influence, did a good work in the direction of their object. The Patrons of Husbandry also organized a Grange during the same month, the leading members of which were Capt. D. B. Clark. Wooster Fay, Col. Babbitt, H. C. Raymond, and H. A. Terry, nurserymen, and J. A. Sylvester. Their grange meetings were held on Pearl street in the second story of one of the build- ings between Broadway and First avenue.
The most prominent event at the close of the year 1871 was the death and burial of Maj. M. L. McPherson. the District Attorney of this district. Maj. McPherson had lived at Winterset for many years, and at the breaking-out of the civil war, entered the service, and discharged the ardnous duties of Brigade Quartermaster in the armies of the West. In 1866, he was a candidate for the Republican nomination for Congress against Mr. Kasson, but Gen. Dodge succeeded in the nomination, as stated in his biographical sketchı. Toward the close of 1869, Maj. McPherson removed to Council Bluffs, as a wider field for the practice of his profession -- that of a lawyer-but Bright's disease of the kidneys had already set in and seriously impaired his health. He was elected District Attorney of this district in 1870, over Judge Morseman, his Democratic competitor, of Page County. Some months before the fall term of the District Court in 1871, he went to St. Louis in the hope of relief, leaving
Capt. D. W. Price to discharge the duties of his office at that term. Medical aid was of no avail, and on the 29th of December Maj. McPherson died in St. Louis, and his re- mains were brought here, and the funeral services were held in the Methodist Episcopal Church, of which society he was a member. Col. D. B. Dailey was appointed to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Maj. McPher son. At the next election, Col. Dailey was not a candidate. His law partner, L. W. Ross, was a candidate for the nomination of Dis- trict Judge, an ambition that was not grati- fied, through the success of Capt. J. R. Reed in carrying off the nomination and Col. Dailey waived his claims in favor of Mr. Ross.
The Pacific House met with a serious loss on the morning of the 11th of January, 1872. The new west wing took fire in one of the upper rooms, and before the fire department could get to work, owing to the intensely cold weather, that part of the structure was a mass of ruins. A heavy gale was blowing at the time, and it was with the greatest difficulty that the whole block, including Officer & Pusey's bank, was saved. Omaha sent one of her steam fire engines, but the flames were subdued by the time it reached here. The heavy loss sustained by Mr. Bay- liss, the owner of the building, ever after- ward crippled his energies and resources, and when he died it was in comparative poverty. Sylvanus Dodge, the father of Gen. Dodge, died on the 24th of December, 1871, and on the 1st of February, 1872, Nehe- miah Baldwin, the father of John T. Bald- win, and Judge Baldwin entered upon the duties of Register of the United States Land Office, to which he had been appointed as the successor of Mr. Dodge. The Iowa Leg- islature was in session. The Union Pacific bridge was completed, and in running order. It paid no attention to Council Bluffs, and
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regarded Omaha as its actual if not its legal terminus. The people of Council Bluffs were justly apprehensive that the Iowa roads would cross their trains, and meet the Union Pacific on the west bank of the river. In- deed, the Kansas City road, that it had been so largely aided with Council Bluff's money. and when had virtually absorbed the great swamp land fund of the county, were taking steps to carry out that design. That course once taken, the rivalry of business would have forced the other roads to follow the ex- ample of the Kansas City company. A bill was unamimously passed by both houses of the Legislature prohibiting the Iowa roads from running their trains into Omaha. A test case was made in the Circuit Court of this county before Judge Stockton by injune- tion, and decided against the company, but the latter having appealed to the Supreme Court, the decision of Judge Stockton was re- versed, and the Iowa statute declared un- constitutional, as beyond the power of the State to regulate commerce between the States, that authority being vested wholly in Congress. There was only a partial attempt to carry out the design of the railroads be- tween that date and the final determination of another question by the Supreme Court of the United States, in which the Union Pacific and certain citizens of Council Bluffs, ship- pers, were immediately interested. That case properly comes under its own date and heading. A meeting of all the General Super- intendents of the Iowa roads centering in Council Bluffs was held here on the 12th of March, and in response to the evident feel-
ing of the people of Iowa, as manifest through its Legislature, as well as through pub- lie opinion otherwise expressed, they arrived at the conclusion not to run their trains into Omaha, and so notified the officers of the Union Pacific at the same time. The Union
Pacific adhered to its own resolution, and re- fused to come to this side. The transfer busi- ness between the terminus of the Iowa roads and the so-called terminns of the Union Pacific was conducted by a sort of stub corporation and train until the Supreme Court of the United States finally settled the question that the actual and legal eastern terminus of the Union Pacific was in Council Bluffs and not in Omaha. The Union Pacific, however, erected a platform a little southwest of the present Union Pacific depot and a frame hotel. which was kept by ex-Mayor Palmer until it was destroyed by fire several years afterward. They also erected long freight sheds, and the Iowa roads built tracks and platforms so as to connect with the platform and track of the Union Pacific. The spring city election of 1872 was a hotly contested one. Dr. N. D. Lawrence was the Republican candidate for Mayor, and Sam Haas the nominee of the Democrats. Lawrence was elected by a ma- jority of 142 votes. One feature of the city campaign was the publication of the Daily Star, an evening Republican paper, by W. R. Vaughan, edited by John H. Keatley. During the canvass it kept the town in com - motion, and every evening was eagerly sought after, it being impossible to supply the de- mand for copies. John H. Keatley at that date was Chairman of the County Republi- can Committee. He had decided, in view of the fact that Grant would probably be the candi- date that year again for the presidency, to take part in the Liberal Republican movement which culminated in the nomination of Horace Greeley at Cincinnati. To that end, he sent his resignation as such Chairman to W. W. Maynard, editor of the Nonpareil, with his reasons for so doing, and the re- quest that they be made known. No other attention was paid to the matter, except by a three-line editorial announcement that such
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resignation had been made. W. F. Sapp was a candidate for the Republican nomination for Congress. The Nonpareil espoused the cause of James W. McDill, of Union County. The contest became a bitter one, and on the 2d day of July, 1872, W. R. Vaughan began the publication of the Daily Republican, ad- vocating the claims of Col. Sapp, as a Council Bluffs man. A complete new printing ou fit was procured in Cincinnati, and one of the most perfect printing offices established ever organized in the city. Col. Supp was de- feated in the convention; the paper was published as a daily until some time that autumn, and before the election ceased, ex- cept as a weekly. in the interests of the farming community. As such it existed for a year or two. Out of it grew an exceeding- ly bitter controversy between Mr. Vaughan and Capt. D. B. Clark, who was at the head of the grange movement in the county at that time. Mr. Clark charged in the columns of the Nonpareil that Mr. Vaughan, in procuring subscriptions to the stock of the Farmers' Publishing Company, under whose auspices the Weekly Republican was claimed to be conducted, had practiced a fraud upon the subscribers. This led to a libel suit for damages by Mr. Vaughan against Clark and the Nonpareil Printing Company. Judge Reed, in submitting the case to the jury, in- structed them, among other things, that if they found that the communication published by Clark was in good faith, whether true or false. it was priviledged. and Vaughan could not recover. and the verdict was against the latter. Early in the same summer, an effort was made to found a religious journal in this city that would occupy the field of Methodism in the Northwest, and accordingly the Council Bluffs Christian Adrocale was established by the Rev. Joseph Knotts and the Rev. P. P. Bresee. After a time, it too disappeared as
a fruitless speculation. The United Brethren Church also established an organ of their so- ciety about the same time, and, after publish- ing it for two years, it failed for want of sup- port.
A musical event occurred on the 2d of May at Dohany's Opera House that had a marked influence upon the career of a Council Bluffs young lady, Miss Fanny Kellogg, the now famous prima donna. She came to this city in her childhood, with her father and mother. Mr. and Mrs. C. P. Kellogg, and her half brother, E. F. Burdick, and grew up here. and here received her education. She early displayed remarkable musical talents, and these were as carefully cultivated as circum- stances would permit. She was always de- servedly popular, and a benefit for her was or- ganized, in which she was assisted by Mrs. George L. Everett and other musical ama- teurs. The opera house was crowded to over- flowing, and the result was a forecast of her future success. Since then, she has earned fame as a songstress. In the summer of 1882, she returned again, after several years of absence, and received a magnificent ovation. On the 28th of November, she paid anoth- er visit to her old home, singing to an im- mense audience at Dohany's Opera House, the scene of her first triumph, and at the head of the incomparable Kellogg-Brignoli combination, under the direction of Bach- ert. The event was marked by the pre- sentation by Miss Kellogg to each of her audience. her old friends and admirers of a vignette portrait of herself on the rich pro- gramme, as a souvenir of her early friend- ship.
Council Bluffs was visited by the Iowa Press Association on the 14th of June, while on their way to Salt Lake, on their annual excur- sion. At the annual commencement of the high school this year, held on the 14th of
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June, six young ladies graduated: Hattie Williams, Mary Warren, Lizzie Oliver, Ida Kirkpatrick, Ingeletta Smith, Verna Rey- nolds. The 4th of July, 1872, was celebrated among other things with a magnificent and attractive horse trot. The crowd was a large one, 2,800 tickets having been sold. There was also a fine picnic and celebration in Glen Dale.
As soon as the result of the Liberal Repub- lican convention at Cincinnati was known in the nomination of Horace Greeley for the presidency, and his endorsement by the De- mocracy at Baltimore, a large Greeley and Brown club was formed, with headquarters at Burhop's Hall. A very large number of persons who had hitherto acted with the Re- publican party in the city, joined in the movement, and took part in the active work. Among these was M. P. Brewer, a young lawyer of decided talent, and a public speaker of considerable power. Mr. Brewer was made President of the club, he having up to that time acted as a Republican. The mem- bers of the club, during the canvass, expressed their appreciation of his zeal and talonts in the presentation of a handsome gold-headed cane suitably inscribed. With the termina- tion of that campaign, Mr. Brewer's connec- tion with the opposition to the Republicans ceased. Another notable local event in con- nection with that campaign occurred during the summer. In August, the Liberal Repub- lican State Convention and the Democratic State Convention met on the same day in Des Moines, the Democrats in Moore's Hall and the Liberal Republicans in the court house. A joint meeting was held in the court house yard at Des Moines, where the two parties fraternized. Cassius M. Clay, of Kentucky. was present, and delivered an eloquent ad- dress. When it came to nominate a candi- date for Congress in this district in opposi-
tion to McDill, Republican, the Democrats and the Republicans of the district fraternized in a convention at Council Bluffs, and unani- mously nominated W. H. M. Pusey, a Demo- crat. Mr. Pusey accepted the nomination in an eloquent speech, and the necessary steps were taken to conduct an active canvass in his interests. After a lapse of several weeks, and after announcements of appointments for him had been made, the Central Committee were notified of his resolution to withdraw. He took this course, he said, because in ac- cepting the nomination he had not consulted his absent partner in business, Mr. Officer, and when the fact of the nomination had been made to the latter, he presented the alterna- tive of a dissolution of a banking firm of nearly a quarter of a century's duration or an abandonment of the canvass, and the second alternative had been resolved upon. This led to the calling of a meeting of the Central Committee at the Pacific House .. Col. W. P. Hepburn, now a Republican Congressman from Iowa, was Chairman, and J. S. Stidger, of Red Oak, now a Republican, was a member of that committee. After can- vassing the situation for an entire day, the committee placed the name of W. W. Merritt, of Red Oak, on the ticket, in opposition to McDill, and these two candidates conducted a joint discussion throughout the district. The antecedents of Mr. Merritt were Republican. He never again resumed his Republican party relations, and is now a Democrat. One of the most devastating fires that ever visited Council Bluffs occurred in the afternoon of the 16th of August, on Main street, in the furniture store of Joseph A. Eno, a little south of First avenue. Part of the building had been the brick Congregational Church, extend- ing to Pearl street. Three other buildings were destroyed at the same time. A series of important suits in the United States Dis-
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triet Court grew out of this fire. Eno sued on his policies of insurance, but the insur- ance companies denied his right to recover, among other grounds that there had been a fraudulent "raising" of his invoices after the fire occurred, in order to increase the amount of his loss. No clue to the origin of the fire was ever reached, and it was attributed to spontaneous combustion of rags and oil used about the building in cleaning furniture. The cases were tried several times to a jury, but after disagreement they wholly disap- peared from sight, and Eno returned to New Jersey, his former home, a financially ruined man.
A bold bank robbery occurred on the 5th of August, in which about $20,000 of paper currency were taken from the first National Bank. The money was in the bank safe. It was intact at the time the bank opened, and when last seen by Mr. Farnsworth, the Cashier, at 10 o'clock. Visiting the vault at 5 o'clock that afternoon, he discovered that the money was stolen. A side door led from Main street to an alcove in the bank, and from that to the vault door it was only a step. No other explanation of the theft could be given than that, while the back of the Cashier was turned in waiting on a customer, some adept in the business took the money. No trace of either thief or money was ever found. The banking house of Officer & Pusey was raided, and about $5,000 taken a year or two after- ward, and about in the same way, and no cine to either money or thief was ever found.
As an incident of the political contest of that year, and a protest against partyism, the Rev. Joseph Knotts started a weekly newspa- per, called the Council Bluffs Independent, with the printing office of the same, in one of the lower rooms of the Ogden House. He also announced himself as an independent candidate for Congress, and traversed the
district for several months in a still-hunt canvass, but, before election day, his name disappeared from among the list of contest- ants. In a few months, he received an ap- pointment from the President to one of the northern States of Mexico, where he was about to engage in silver mining, which he has since prosecuted with remarkable success.
The District Fair was held here on the 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th of September, on the grounds of the Pottawattamie County Agri- cultural Society. The district embraced all the country from Des Moines to the Missouri River. The affair was a failure, in part due to bad weather, and in great part to bad management. Col. John Scott, of Story County, delivered the address, and a uni- formed militia company from Des Moines gave a fancy drill.
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