USA > Iowa > Poweshiek County > History of Poweshiek County, Iowa: a record of settlement, organization, progress and achievement, Volume 1 > Part 40
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"S. W. SNIDER, Chairman, "M. M. SNIDER, Clerk."
At this election there were twenty-four votes cast, all being against the tax. There was no more definite railroad action for nine years.
At a meeting of the trustees June 9, 1880, a special election was ordered to be held June 26, 1880, to vote on the question of a railroad tax. This tax of five per cent was to aid the Iowa and Mississippi railroad. The tax, if voted, was to be collectible on condition that the road be finished by January 1, 1882, from Tama City, through Malcom on south to the coal fields of Mahaska, or Keokuk counties, with a depot within two miles of the center of Sheridan town- ship. At this election one hundred and twenty-three votes were cast, fifty for the tax, and seventy-three against it.
It is evident that the tax of five per cent was considered too high, for at a meeting of the trustees August 31, 1880, a second election was ordered to vote on a three per cent tax to aid the same railroad under the same conditions, ex- cept this time the depot was to be within one mile of the center of the township. This second election was held September 13, 1880. One hundred and forty-six votes were cast, seventy-five being for the three per cent tax, and seventy-one against it. The road was never built, therefore the tax was not paid.
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Railroad surveys have been made through the township at different times. The earliest one was at the time of the location of the Iowa Central railroad. Also one at the time of the proposed location of the Ottumwa and Tama City railroad. The third survey was through the northwest part of the township about 1883. During the past ten years there has been some railroad agitation, and meetings have been held to discuss the possibility of securing a railroad.
THE SHERIDAN CEMETERY.
The first action taken towards the location of the present cemetery was July 19, 1875. A meeting was held on this date of which George C. Campbell was president, and A. M. Waufle was secretary. It was voted that ground for a cemetery be procured of Amos Krise. The first officers of the association were : President, Edwin Wolcott; secretary, A. M. Waufle; treasurer, F. L. Orcutt; trustees, Amos Krise, James P. Chapin, and George H. Stocking. Resolutions and by-laws were adopted, article I being, "Resolved, That the name of the as- sociation shall be Sheridan Cemetery Association."
The deed given by Mr. and Mrs. Amos Krise for the ground now occupied by the cemetery calls for a little over two acres of land, and was made to Sheri- dan township and recorded in June, 1878. This deed conveying the land to the township gave the control of the cemetery into the hands of the trustees of the township. For three years they cared for the cemetery and the association ceased to exist. On September 22, 1881, the association organized anew with C. H. Maxfield as president. At a meeting of the township trustees October 3, 1881, the following minute is made by the clerk :
"Members of the Sheridan Cemetery Association applied for a quit-claim deed of the cemetery grounds situated near the church, which was granted.
I. B. BALDWIN, Township Clerk."
From that date the association has had an active existence. All persons own- ing a lot or lots in the cemetery became voters in the association. C. H. Maxfield served the association as president until 1884, then Rev. John Randall until 1892. At a meeting held March 1, 1892, this motion was adopted: "That all officers, except the secretary, of this association shall be ladies." Officers elected at that time were: President, Mrs. J. C. Reams; treasurer, Mrs. J. H. Smith; secre- tary, P. A. Krise; trustees, Mrs. William Wrage, Mrs. H. A. Dee, and Mrs. E. C. Graham. The ladies entered upon active work in caring for the cemetery grounds and made it a lovely spot.
The east half of the cemetery was platted into sixty-five lots, and the west half into thirty-nine lots. At a meeting of the association held in July, 1893, Lot No. 20 was set aside as Soldier's Lot. A monument to the soldiers was erected on the lot and added much to the beauty of the grounds.
Previous to the location of the present cemetery a burial ground had been laid out on the east side of section 4, on land then owned by Doctor Mann. Sev- eral interments were made there. After the church was built and the present cemetery located, those who had been interred in this burial ground were re- moved, some to Sheridan cemetery, and the others to Grandview cemetery in Tama county.
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OTTAWA, OFT'-CALLED HUMBUG CITY.
Ottawa City has an interesting history, in having no history at all, the most novel record of any part of the county. Most of the land on which this city ( ?) was laid out was entered by Hiram Pattee, July 26, 1854, the year that the first house was built in Sheridan township and a year before the first family made it their home.
The facts, as near as we can learn them, have been that 400 acres of land were laid out for a city, in sections 1 and 12. In May, 1859, L. Perry, of Phila- delphia, by his agent, J. F. Head, caused a plat of the "City of Ottawa" to be recorded, as shown by a part of the surveyor's record, which is as follows:
"Ottawa City-June 9, 1859."
The city as laid out included about 2,600 lots and the circular, or prospectus, indicated the existence of fine buildings, a navigable stream, with a floating steamer upon it. This plat was liberally distributed beyond the borders of Iowa and lots were sold chiefly by lottery. Buyers came hundreds of miles to see their land and observe the development of "Ottawa," but for years they found only as beautiful a prairie as the sun shone upon but no inhabitants except gophers, and not even a slough large enough to float a plank. Some of the purchasers paid taxes many years without seeing their real estate and others patiently paid the taxes on their town lots while "squatters" utilized some of the land by cul- tivating it.
Men have included "Ottawa" lots in their assets until very recently ; perhaps, even yet. The plat alone shows that it was a "city." The site is excellent farm- ing land. We do not know the humbugger or the humbug. They are not men of Poweshiek.
No water yet runs in the river outlined on the plat and it still remains about the farthest in the county from a railroad.
The following communications are self explanatory in this relation : "GRINNELL, Iowa, March, 191I. "Hon. J. F. Head, Jefferson, Iowa.
"MY DEAR SIR :- I notice that you were the attorney for G. L. Perry, for recording the plat of Ottawa City in this county in 1859. Can you tell me who that Perry was? How did he happen to make the plat with a navigable stream in it on the prairie, &c., &c. Was he a shyster ?
"Y'rs very truly,
"L. F. PARKER."
"JEFFERSON, Iowa, March 25, 19II. "Hon. L. F. Parker, Grinnell, Iowa.
"DEAR SIR :- My father, W. M. Head, now deceased, was at the time this plat was received, treasurer and recorder of the county and I was acting as his deputy. This man Perry, claiming to be of New Jersey (I think Jersey City), and his civil engineer, who accompanied him, appeared and filed the plat re- ferred to for record. We had not been in the county long and I didn't know how near the Iowa river run to the land platted and didn't then comprehend what there might be to it; but later discovered he used my name, on circulars he is-
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sued, as his agent here. I don't now remember of ever having any correspond- ence with him. It later appeared to me a scheme to sell the land, as he adver- tised to give the lots away, the purchasers to pay for making deeds and record- ing. If I remember right he charged five dollars for the deeds and a fee of fifty cents for recording them. The whole thing as it developed, was a fake and he was, as you guess, a shyster.
"Yours etc., "J. F. HEAD." "GRINNELL, Iowa, 4/29, 1911. "Hon. J. F. Head, Jefferson.
"MY DEAR SIR :- Your confirmation of the land fake in Sheridan confirms what I had supposed to be true as to Perry, and shows your connection as a purely business act of recording what came to you in your official relation.
"One man-only one-tells me he thinks Perry was an honorable man.
"I would like to publish your letter in my book-the History of Powesheik Co .- at least to give the facts as you state them.
"I have the impression he did not make much by his scheme.
"Yours very truly,
"L. F. PARKER." "JEFFERSON, Iowa, May 3, 191I. "Hon. L. F. Parker, Grinnell.
"DEAR SIR :- I stated in my reply to a former letter from you concerning the paper town in Sheridan township, Poweshiek county, 'Ottawa,' I believe it was called, my best recollections of the affair, and do not object to you publishing the facts as stated from what personal knowledge I have of the matter and as I remember it after a lapse of so many years. I think your impressions of the scheme are correct.
"Respectfully yours,
"J. F. HEAD."
If all the lots, as laid out, had been sold at $5.00 each, Mr. Perry would have received about $6,000.
The careful reader will notice that neither "Cumquick," nor "Carsner," nor "Perry" were citizens of this county !
Whatever may be true of "Ottawa City," the Sheridan farmers found no fraud in their homesteads. They are selling now, and they are worth it.
GRINNELL TOWNSHIP.
GRAND PERSONALITY OF MAN WHOSE NAME THE TOWNSHIP BEARS.
J. B. Grinnell loved to talk and to say what he thought. In 1853 he had been among the "Badgers" and enjoyed them and their home, and was traveling in Illi- nois, thinking of a place to locate. He fell into conversation with two men on the train. One theme had convulsed congress and the country in 1850 and was then reddening the nation with the hues of war. That theme was started, how, it is not known. Those gentlemen were accustomed to settle a difference, if with
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a negro by the use of the lash, if with a white, by pistols, which were the most effective argument on slavery-and pistols were soon drawn.
The passengers were alarmed. The conductor informed those in another car that a passenger's life was in danger. A venerable looking man took part in the affair, and wired that the slaveholders should be arrested at La Salle. The south- ern gentleman closed the controversy by dropping off the train at the first stop and perhaps Mr. Grinnell's life was saved.
But who was the Goffe who appeared in that hour of peril? He was Henry Farnam, a director of the Chicago & Rock Island road, on which they were rid- ing. That incident made Grinnell and Farnam life long friends, determined the location of the town, secured many favors in its building and made Mr. Grinnell a railroad director, interested in the two roads running through the town and much more. Mr. Farnam always remained a power for good to Grinnell, man and town.
A TOWN PLANNED.
Grinnell was no accident. It didn't "happen." It was born in the brain of one man, and then transferred to the Eighteen Mile Prairie by himself ad others. That "one man" was Josiah Bushnell Grinnell, of Vermont directly and from the Huguenots more remotely. He was active as a young man, a lively colporteur in Wisconsin, had preached in Union Mills, New York, and in Washington, D. C., had charge of boys in New York city and won the confidence of such men as Horace Greeley and Henry Ward Beecher, and sympathized with both of them.
He planned to found a town in the growing west. He published a call in the young Independent of New York for the cooperation of men, who would be "persons of congenial, moral and religious sentiments, embracing mechanics, and pecuniary ability to make the school and the church paramount and attractive in- stitutions from the outset." He had preached to "nabobs and niggers," it was said, at Union Mills, and been invited, with mobocratic energy to leave his church in Washington because he and it thought slavery an undesirable condition for master or his slave. His call in the Independent was enough to indicate who would be congenial.
GRINNELL.
Five townships in this county are named for presidents, four for American generals, but Grinnell alone has received its name in honor of one of its first settlers. This honor was well deserved. J. B. Grinnell was practically the or- iginator of the town, its leader, and leader in all best things. The first thought of the town was his. His was the call to cooperation in political, industrial, edu- cational, religious and benevolent enterprise, and with natural ability to become the Romulus of a new city, and his call brought men of kindred feeling and pur- pose together, and in a large degree held them together.
Josiah Bushnell Grinnell had "good blood in his veins," rich in Huguenot character and in enterprise that produced results. A rollicking boy, an enter- prising man, generous, sympathetic, an anti-slavery man like Beriah Green, not like Garrison, he had been invited to leave a Washington pulpit because he said there what he thought of slavery.
MR. GRINNELL'S PIONEER LOG CABIN HOME (From an old sketch)
J. B. GRINNELL RESIDENCE
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He published an invitation in the young Independent of New York to men of kindred spirit to go west with him to build a town where church and school should be paramount from the first.
Dr. Thomas Holyoke, of Maine, Rev. Homer Hamlin and H. M. Hamilton, of Ohio, joined Mr. Grinnell in this movement. A son of Dr. Leonard Bacon, then a civil engineer on the Mississippi & Missouri railroad, on its survey through lowa. told them of the "highest point between the Mississippi and Missouri riv- ers," as the most desirable on the line of their road. They accepted his recom- mendation and built their temporary log hut in Mattison's grove in Jesper county just west of the Poweshiek county line in March, 1854. Church and school were their central attractions.
Dr. Thomas Holyoke left his good practice in Searsport, Maine, to join those seeking a prairie home, as soon as they could build it east of their first shelter. He was soon their "beloved physician," their first banker, and ready for any service.
Homer Hamlin had looked up from reading his paper in Wellington, Ohio, one January evening, saying to his wife, "How do you know but that this is just the place for us?" She replied: "A man wants to start a settlement in the west with church and school paramount." Mr. Hamlin was an invalid, desiring health, a Christian philanthropist, seeking to be useful in the world. He was in a cabin in the grove before spring became warm.
Henry M. Hamilton, a young man of twenty-nine, just out of Western Reserve College, read that number of the Independent. He had a mind for large business and great were the opportunities in the west. Four were soon building the "Long Home," on the "Eighteen Mile Prairie," the beginning of Grinnell today, long in space, and long enough for individual homes, and long enough in time to serve as a temporary shelter for still others who soon joined them.
They put their original plan into early execution, holding religious services on Thursday and on Sunday without missing a day. Their services were held in private houses until they built a house for "church and school," in 1855, and for $200. It was made ready for use in six days, and without paint or plane. The green boards, fresh from the sawmill, touched each other when put up, but not long. They yawned and gaped as if inviting the wind and rain to come in, and wind and rain promptly accepted the invitation, leaving nothing dry unless it should be the sermon, and, if Mr. Grinnell should preach, that would not long remain so if Mr. Grinnell himself was obliged to introduce a smile. He would have plenty of company in a genuine laugh, too. Doubtless he might have the right often to answer a critic as Henry Ward Beecher answered one who crit- icised him for the same offense. He suggested that no one would complain of a laughter provoking sentence, if he knew how many he repressed.
Each one of these men had acquaintances in the east and winning power to bring others across the Indians' "Massa-Sepe." R. M. Kellogg left a plat of the city as it was in June, 1855. It contained fifteen houses and other buildings and four joining the plat. On the plat were Mr. Grinnell's house, L. C. Phelps, two Hays houses, Messrs. Bartlett's, W. S. Leisure's, Henry Hill's, L. H. Marsh's, Bodurtha's and A. Whitcomb's. Those beyond the village lines were Dr. Hol- yoke's on the east, Mr. Hamlin's on the northwest, A. F. Gillet's on the west Vol. I-23
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side of East street and half a mile south, and Amos Bixby's a quarter of a mile southeast.
Individual interest compelled those pioneers to build, and plow, and plant corn in the sod for their cattle and to chop pumpkins and squashes and melons for themselves. Their first winter was a very mild one, welcome to cattle in their slough hay barns, and to men who had only fuel cut from green trees by drawing it three miles over the prairie. The second winter was mild, but less so than the first, while the third winter, that of 1856, "Old Boreas" did his worst.
Three men responded in a short time. Dr. Thomas Holyoke, of Searsport, Maine, a moderate anti-slavery man, Henry M. Hamilton, a student from Western Reserve College, who became a railroad builder in the west and in the east, and Homer Hamlin, a Birneyite in reform and a seeker after health. All were Congregationalists or ready to become so, and warm friends of education. They chose the site where Grinnell now is, through the assistance of Henry Far- nam, the hero of the railroad incident just given, a director of the railroad which was completed to Rock Island in 1854, the year Grinnell settlers came west, and by the advice of a son of Dr. Leonard Bacon, a leading minister of New England. A picture of their first cabin appears in these pages as it was built in Mattison's grove. No one can tell the exact date in March, or April, 1854.
Their historian says: "That cabin was built of dead logs which Hamlin chopped, Hamilton drew with oxen, and Dr. Holyoke as chief architect hewed into place; E. D. Griswold drew the lumber for covering from a water mill east of the present Brooklyn of this county about twenty miles away. The dimen- sions of this new house were about fourteen by sixteen feet, and it served as a cook room, dining room, land office, hotel and sleeping room for ten or twelve persons, the bed frames supported in tiers by pins, which were driven into the logs and covered by painfully gaunt straw beds. Amos Bixby and Summer Bixby, from Maine, Henry Lawrence from Ohio, and A. F. Gillette, late of Western Reserve College, were soon added to the company." It was occupied in June. The green oak boards for the sides bent over the top for a roof, made a fair protection when it did not rain, and was warm enough in summer.
Thus quickly did eight or ten men locate themselves in that little cabin, and unite in wonderful cooperation for the dawning tomorrow.
But they must have more lumber and a good deal of it at once, they must push out upon the prairie. Oak trees must be hewed or sawed into shape and size for their use. The larger timbers could be hewed into usefulness, but they must saw the timber into boards. A mill must be secured. Twenty miles away there was a horse sawmill, which was brought by the temptation of an extra price for sawing and set up just east of the grove. After a few months of good service, Captain Clark and his son Rodney continued to run it advantageously.
THE FOURTH OF JULY.
On the Fourth of July those settlers had the "Long Home," Anor Scott's store, a flag and a bell erected on the townsite, and great preparation made for a grand celebration. Invitations had been sent out to all the groves in the vi-
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cinity. and their dwellers turned out generously. The children came to strike the bell and to run away, the men and women came to see and hear what could be done on the prairie. The speaking came from a lumber wagon and was con- cerning the grand country, in which they were, and its sublime prospects. Mr. Hamlin, Dr. Sanford, Amos Bixby, J. B. Grinnell, Levi H. Marsh and others de- livered stirring speeches, such as only very happy men could make. The music was furnished by Dr. Holyoke, Mr. Benjamin and Mesdames Bixby and Holyoke. The dinner was relished and the toasts even more. The coming railroad inter- ested them greatly but it was eight years in coming !
"Where did you come from?" followed the toasts to every one. It was found that twenty states were represented, and Canada, England and Scotland. Ire- land was called again and again without a response till a native American shouted, "There's not an Irishman within ten miles of here," and another, equally ardent, shouted back, "Bless the Lord." They forgot Montgomery and Sheri- dan for the moment. Then the crowd broke loose. The merry time closed the day.
MEN AND MILLS.
The Fourth of July celebration accomplished the result desired. The little Yankee group made itself known widely through the state. Friends of those already here were stimulated to come and others were told of the lively Yankee colony coming across the Mississippi.
The houseless group became carpenters, more or less skillful. George W. Chambers was a prominent builder and every man who wanted a house tried his " 'prentice hand" on it. During 1854 the founders arrived,-L. C. Phelps, Anor Scott, Amos Bixby, Captain Clark, Sumner Bixby, George W. Chambers, John Bailey, Benoni Howard, Levi H. Marsh, Abram Whitcomb, E. S. Bartlett, Henry Hill, A. F. Gillett, H. Wolcott, Henry Lawrence, many with their families, and the largest group of all were the members of the Hays families from Maryland, sixteen of them that fall, and six more of them two years later.
New Hampshire began to send its valued group in 1854 and 1855, when the Bartletts, Sutherlands and Masons were the forerunners of the largest number that ever came from one small town, when the later years added so many.
John Bailey rendered appreciated service by erecting his sawmill, with its grist mill attachment, near town, in the fall of 1854. Indeed, in that little com- munity every industrious man was appreciated and his presence was manifestly useful. In addition to these, others came in 1854. The inpour continued and among those who came in 1855, were the families of Samuel F. Cooper, S. N. Bartlett, William Beaton, J. M. Ladd, W. S. Leisure, M. W. Williams, David Sutherland, F. Morrison, A. P. Cook and others.
The pioneers must have lumber. The nearest grove was three miles from the site of the town. The nearest sawmill was four miles west of Montezuma and of eight-horse power. Grinnell and Hamilton tried to induce the owners to remove it in the spring of 1854 nearer Grinnell. They failed then but soon after Mr. Grinnell called again, offering ninety cents a hundred for sawing in place of seventy-five they were receiving, to board their "hands" and feed their wives,
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then said, "You may as well begin to load up, for you are going." That was in May and in May the work was begun in the grove west of town by the miller, C. H. McDonald. That mill furnished material for "dimension stuff" and some- times for all the lumber in a house.
The second sawmill was built at the north end of the grove, in the fall of 1854, by Captain Clark, and run by him for a time, when his son Rodney took charge of it for a few years, till saw logs became scarce.
Three Bailey families came to Grinnell early and from New York, John James F. and Lorenzo. John came in June, 1854, James a few months later. His horse-power sawmill at the west edge of the townsite broke down while sawing the second board. His steam sawmill which quickly followed, furnished lumber for the first schoolhouse and for many of the buildings.
T. B. Clark bought the first site for a grist mill in 1855 and his mill was in operation in 1856, with Putman Danner, as his miller, both of them live and capital men. The steam mill stood on the south side of a slough and close east of the present location of the United Presbyterian church. The first wheat crop raised was in 1855, the second, a very good one, the third a "bumper," and the next three years produced but little and the blight, smut, and chinch bugs made that little of such poor quality that the mill was closed through 1859 and 1860. The war followed with its four years of financial depression, except for those with government jobs, and railroads soon made flouring mills in a small town of little value.
LUMBER DEALERS.
Edward Griswold, of Warren township, furnished the first sawed lumber used in the building in the grove. No man started a lumber yard in Grinnell until near the '60s. Oak lumber was sawed in the local mills, and each man who built a house drew his own pine lumber from the Mississippi, and there would have been little or no local sale for it here, not enough to support a local yard.
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