USA > Iowa > Story County > History of Story County, Iowa; a record of organization, progress and achievement, Volume I > Part 48
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53
422
HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
ment of Pres. Knapp's son. Hermann Knapp, as treasurer of the college, which position he still holds. Pres. Knapp went to Louisiana, where he engaged in the sugar industry on a large scale, and continued to be chiefly so occupied until his recent death. President Welch continued to hold his professorship until his death in 1889. Leigh Hunt lasted at the college for about a year and one-half when he abruptly retired and was succeeded by President Chamberlain, who came from Ohio with excellent recommen- dlations, but who also failed to meet conspicuously the demands of the state. In 1891. he gave way to Pres. Beardshear, with whose administra- tion begins the later development of the college.
MOVING SHELDAHIL TO SLATER.
A mixed matter of railroads and towns in this period was the moving of Sheldahl to Slater. When the Milwaukee Railroad crossed the North- Western a mile and one-half north of Sheldahl. it made no attempt to locate a town. A law of the state, passed, we think in part for the sake of this particular matter, required the location of a station at the crossing of the roads, where there was no town near on either road: so a depot was built right at the crossing, and was known as Sheldahl Crossing. Some time later, when there came to be thought of a town there, the first town plat was called Sheldahl Crossing. As the idea developed of having a town of some consequence, however, the name which indicated that the town was incidental to Sheldahl, was no longer acceptable, and the new name of Slater was chosen. Nothing in particular happened, however, until a con- troversy arose between the shippers at Sheldahil and the North-Western Railroad. It was before the days of the Interstate Commerce laws, and the successful shippers, as a rule, were those who got sufficient rebates from the freight charges that they were supposed to pay. One of the circum- stances of the standardizing of the Narrow Gauge had been the attempted abandonment by the North-Western, of Polk City, and the straightening of the railroad so as to leave Polk City out and canse the location of the new station at Crocker. The North-Western did tear up the track south of Polk City, but Polk City having in the beginning voted a subsidy in aid of the narrow gauge, carried the case to the supreme court, and the rail- road was compelled to maintain its line to Polk City from the north ; but the railroad did not like the situation and Crocker got the benefit of the rebates. The fight in behalf of Crocker resulted to the disadvantage of Sheldahl, which was the next town north, and gradually Oley Nelson and the other shippers at Sheldahl found that they were facing a situation that they could not successfully meet, the margin between what their com- petitors were paying for grain and what they could get for grain in Chi- cago not being sufficient to pay the cost of carriage and furnish a business profit. Complaints to the North-Western officials were without result, and negotiations were opened with the Milwaukee management to move the
423
HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
town over to the Milwaukee Railroad. The Milwaukee, of course, was very glad to get the town and its business, and was willing to offer the considerations which were usual in the time. Finally, the North-Western was directly notified that it must change its policy immediately or the town would move, and there being no advice of a change the deal was closed with the Milwaukee. After this, the North-Western official car was side- tracked at Sheldall in the endeavor to effect an understanding, but the officials were advised that it was too late.
There followed the most notable move of a town that had occurred in the county. Arrangements were made so that those who abandoned their residence or business lots in Sheldahl, should get similar lots in Slater, and the town proceeded to move. A good trail was laid out across the prairie from one town to the other; and for several months a passenger on the Des Moines branch of the North-Western, in passing that neighborhood, always could see at least one house on the way from one town to the other. As has been before noted, Sheldahl was in three counties, the main part of the town being in Story. The proposition to move to Slater was entered into with much more enthusiasm by the residents of Story County at Shel- dahl than by the residents of Boone and Polk Counties. The business street of the town was the county line, and the business houses on the north side of the street and most of the residences north of the same street were moved to Slater. The buildings on the south of the street, however, gen- erally remained, and in course of time some of the lots on the north side were again built upon. The general effort, however, to make Slater in- stead of Sheldahil the business center for the Norwegian community in the southwestern part of the county was successful. The importance of Sheldahl was never restored, while Slater made rapid growth until it had reached the development which the conditions of the surrounding country fairly warranted. Slater was thus the last town of similar consequence to be actually established in the county. The building of the Short Line Rail- road long afterwards resulted in shipping points at Fernald and Shipley, but these stations have never developed the same importance as the older township centers. Slater, however, became almost at once, one of the four principal towns in the south part of the county, and so it promises permanently to be.
THE INFLUENCE OF FIRES.
In the development of Nevada and Ames during the eighties, the ele- ment of fire bore its gruesome part. Nevada had, in or about this period, three considerable fires. The first and greatest of these was in December, 1879. It started in a photographi gallery on the west side of the street and it spread both ways, cleaning out everything from the brick wall at the east end of the opera hall building to the veneered brick wall on the south side of Alderman's hardware building. Nevada's equipment for re- sisting fires consisted chiefly at this time of a hand fire engine, familiarly
424
HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
known as the "squirt gun ;" but this implement undoubtedly made it pos- sible to prevent the fire from taking the east side of the street also. Shortly after this fire the town council was hastily called together and an ordinance passed prescribing fire limits and prohibiting the erection of wooden buildings inside of the same. This action prevented the erection of some new wooden buildings on the burned district and resulted in the district being largely covered in the next two or three years by more sub- stantial brick structures.
The next fire in Nevada occurred in 1882 and was on the west side of the business street in the upper block. There was not so much here to burn as there had been in the lower block, but what there was was cleaned out. The east side fire did not occur until December, 1887, and then it was shut in between the White and Bamberger and old First National bank buildings at the north and the Ringheim building at the south. Be- tween these limits there was a solid row of wooden buildings and the fire took all of them excepting the okl Briggs building next to Ringheim's, which was saved by ripping out some of the smaller buildings next to it. This building survived until the row had all been built up again with good buildings and then one night it got afire and was sufficiently wrecked so that it had to be torn out.
Following these fires Nevada installed a waterworks system and since that has been in operation there have been several fires started in the busi- ness district, but only one building there has ever been burned down. This one exception was the old hotel building opposite the courthouse, which had long been unoccupied and which was burned in the early morning of July 15, 1909, without material damage to any other property.
Ames has been more fortunate than Nevada in some ways and not so fortunate in others. It never has had a fire to clean out an old row of wooden buildings and to compel their replacements with brick ones, the event most of this order being the destruction in two fires of the old main building at the college. In 1887, however, Ames had a fire that was dis- astrous to the town as well as to the people who lost the property. For several years there had been on the north side of the main business street near its east end. a really good opera hall building with other creditable buildings adjacent. This row went one night in 1887 and for several years thereafter Ames did not have a hall suitable for public meetings. This loss and the others incidental to it were of course ultimately replaced ; but when the replacement occurred, it was at the west end of the street and not at the east end, which has never regained its former relative busi- ness importance, although in time the burned district has been mostly re- covered. After this destructive fire Ames imitated Nevada by putting in
425
HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
waterworks, since the installation of which Ames also has been exempt from damaging fires.
THE PORTER MURDER CASE.
In the fall of 1882 occurred one of the most sensational murder cases that ever happened in the county. It was the murder of Samuel Porter, a farmer some past middle life, living east of Iowa Center. He was killed in a family row, and what was never definitely settled was how he came to be killed and who did the killing. The members of the family who were at home at the time were his wife, Elizabeth, and his youngest son, John. Also, it was a question whether an older son, George, was not at home at the same time. The murder occurred some time about mid-day, and Mr. Porter had been at Nevada in the morning and George was over in the direction of Collins in the afternoon. The belief of many was that George was at home when his father came and was the one to kill him in the ensuing row, and that he got off the place immediately after- wards. The story of the family, as finally told, was that Mr. Porter be- came involved in a quarrel and was shot by his son, John, as a measure of protection for his mother. After the murder, Mr. Porter's body was hid in a granary, and later it was taken to a field out some distance from the house and fixed up with a shot-gun so as to give the appearance of suicide. Then a young boy, Willie Pointer, who worked some for the family, was sent out to that part of the farm to herd cattle, with the re- sult that he found the body. Mrs. Porter and John and George were all indicted for murder ; and when the case came on for trial, George elected to be tried separately from the other two. These two were tried at Nevada, and were convicted of murder in the second degree. Afterwards they se- cured a reversal of judgment, and the case was retried at Toledo, in Tama County, with the same result, and both times they were sentenced to the penitentiary for terms of years; but in time they were both pardoned. When George's case came on for trial, in the fall of 1883, he took a change of venue to Boone County, where his trial occupied several days, Judge Reed of Council Bluffs, afterwards of the state supreme court, presiding. The result of this trial was a compromise verdict, part of the jurors be- lieving George guilty of murder and part of them believing him not guilty at all, and the whole splitting the difference by finding him guilty of man- slaughter. This verdict was set aside by Judge Reed as not being sup- ported by the evidence, all the circumstances of the case indicating that either George was guilty of murder or had nothing to do with the case, excepting, perhaps, to try to help conceal it afterwards. But the verdict of manslaughter amounted to an acquittal of the charge of murder; so the case was dismissed, and George relieved of further prosecution. This trial was the first which the editor of this history endeavored, as a young newspaper man, to report, and after hearing all the evidence in court, liis disposition was to believe the story of the family.
CHAPTER XLI.
POLITICS IN THE EIGHTIES.
THE LONG TERMERS.
Perhaps the most characteristic feature of the politics of the county in the eighties, was the long terms for the county officers, and the ruction by which a new regime was brought in. In 1880. Harry H. Boyes of lloward Township had been nominated to succeed Ole Hill, as recorder. and D. A. Bigelow had been retired as a member of the board of super- visors in favor of Russell W. Ballard, also of Howard. Mr. Boyes con- tinued in the recorder's office until the end of 1886 and Captain Smith, who had first been nominated in 1876, continued until the same time as clerk. Their last nominations were contested, but the contests were not effective. In 1881, there came in also a new group of county officials, who with Smith, Boyes and Banks, as clerk, recorder and sheriff, made a notable combination in the court house. This new group consisted of C. G. McCarthy as county auditor ; J. A. Mills as treasurer ; and Ole O. Roc as county superintendent. Mills had been deputy treasurer under King ; and his nomination in 1881 was effected without serious opposition. McCarthy, with the Ames support, defeated Wilbur Hunt, who had been the deputy-auditor, and Ole O. Roc ousted Baughman from the superin- tendency. Banks was renominated for sheriff and continued to be non- inated until 1887. Thus, it came about that the six principal offices in the court house, clerk, recorder, auditor, treasurer, sheriff and superintendent were without any change whatever from January. 1882, to January, 1887. making a somewhat remarkable record for continuity of official service for any county. These officials were all of them men with much political capacity, and they were very strong with different elements in the county. They did not necessarily agree in all things ; but. on the other hand, they did not fight each other where their personal interests were directly con- cerned; and the men of greatest influence over the county were generally favorable to the bunch. They gave the county a very capable business ad- ministration, and they maintained their ascendancy as long as any group of men could be expected in a county to maintain such an ascendancy.
In 1886, Smith and Boyes were not candidates for renomination. Smith was voted for strongly in the convention, but his support was not quite
426
427
HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
sufficient to nominate him for the sixth term. The nomination for clerk that year finally went to Henry Wilson of Ames, and J. M. Ingram of Sherman was the winner, after a very protracted contest, for recorder. At the same time, George W. Dyer was nominated with very slight opposition, as the first county attorney of the county. In 1887, Banks stayed out of the fight, and Curt A. Wood of Indian Creek was the winner of another notable battle for sheriff. These were all the changes in important county offices during the decade; excepting that in 1889, McCarthy gave up the auditorship to run for representative, and A. P. King, of Cambridge was nominated in his place as auditor.
LEGISLATIVE CANDIDATES.
The rule of long service in the county offices, however, did not apply to the representative position. The convention of 1881 nominated T. C. Mc- Call for representative. Capt. McCall had served one term in the house during the war, and had then left the county to serve as Quartermaster of the 32d Iowa. After the war, he had been active in most of the political controversies of the county, and in 1877 and 1879 had been strongly but unsuccessfully supported for the nomination for representative. In 1879, as before noted, W. D. Lucas had defeated him, but had rather overreached himself in doing so, and in 1881 McCall had Lucas so manifestly beaten that Lucas withdrew from the field and permitted McCall's nomination by acclamation. McCall was a strong representative, and in 1883, he was re- nominated, not without some opposition, however, in behalf of Oley Nelson of Sheldahl, who received the vote of the Norwegian Townships. The en- suing General Assembly was the one which enacted Prohibition, and Mr. McCall was active in the promotion of that measure. In 1885, Mr. McCall yielded gracefully to the two term rule and, by common consent, the nomi- nation was given to Oley Nelson, who served with much ability and was re- nominated in 1887. unanimously, save that the complimentary vote of Washington Township was cast for Geo. A. Underwood. In 1889. there were several candidates for representative, but Mr. McCarthy carried both Nevada and Ames and most of the outside townships, and was nominated by acclamation.
During the forepart of this period, the county had been represented in the state senate by J. D. Gillett of Boone County, who was renominated at Nevada in 1883 at a convention wherein the Boone delegation voted for Gillett, and the Story delegation voted for Dan McCarthy, the Boone vote being the larger and giving Gillett the nomination. During Gillett's second term of service, his bank at Ogden failed, and he became manifestly amenable to the law, for which he had himself voted, making it a felony for a banker to receive deposits, knowing his bank to be insolvent. When he saw the crash coming, Gillett left the state, and he was next located at Windsor, in Canada, across the river from Detroit. From there, he sent
428
HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
his resignation as senator, and in September, 1885, a special convention was held with a view to nominating his successor. Boone, at this time, still had the majority of delegates, but it was willing to concede the fractional term to Story, and a struggle ensued for the Story County endorsement. Dan McCarthy of Ames, and J. L. Dana of Nevada were candidates, and there was much pressure on Mr. McCall to be a candidate; the latter, however. finally declined, and Col. Scott came out. McCarthy rallied all of the Ames influence and much of the south part of the county. Dana, with the help of the court house influence, which was actually for McCarthy, succeeded in defeating Scott for the Nevada delegation; but Scott carried the whole north half of the county and Colo, and came into the convention the lead- ing candidate. There was long and very persistent balloting : but MeCarthy could not possibly win, and the Ames vote finally broke to J. W. Maxwell. When this was done, the Nevada delegation turned from Dana to Scott, giving the latter the county endorsement and contributing more than ever was contributed at any time toward the solution of the old slough con- troversy in Nevada. Two years later, Scott was not a candidate, and Story County went to the senatorial convention for MeCall. Boone, however, had had its own quarrel, resulting in the endorsement of D. B. Davidson of Madrid, and Boone, having the larger number of delegates. Davidson was nominated. The Story County delegation, however protested quite vig- orously, and the outcome was the passage of a resolution that, thereafter, the nomination should alternate between the two counties. This arrange- ment has been adhered to, and all the senatorial contests since that time in the district have been in turn for the endorsement of Story County or of Boone County, as the turn might indicate.
CONGRESSMEN.
Congressional matters in this decade opened with the renomination and reelection of Gov. Carpenter in 1880 by the old ninth district, but the census of that year gave lowa two additional congressmen, and by the reappor- tionment of 1882, a new tenth district was formed, including Story. Boone, Webster, Hamilton and Hardin Counties and thence to the north line of the state. Governor Carpenter, who had been twice nominated in the old ninth district, and whose home was at Ft. Dodge, was in the district, but had a number of new counties in the district which he had not represented. There were some very serious post office troubles in the old part of the district, particularly at Boone and Ames, and conditions were ripe for a fight against Carpenter. 'Among the results were. that Story County presented Col. Scott ; Boone County presented A. J. Holmes, who had been the unsuccess- ful nominee against Maxwell for Senator in 1871, and who was then state representative for Boone County: Franklin County presented Captain Benson, who was its representative; Wright County, Mr. Nagel, who had long been a prominent politician there ; Winnebago County, Eugene Secor,
429
HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
who was long one of the most prominent Norwegians of the state, and Cerro Gordo County presented John D. Glass, who afterwards served as state senator. Carpenter had the delegation from his own county of Web- ster, and also from Hardin and Humboldt and Hancock, while Hamilton, Kossuth and Worth were divided. The convention was at Webster City; and when the delegates arrived, there was a majority against Carpenter, but no agreement as to his successor. After much negotiation, the opposi- tion agreed to go into caucus and nominate a congressman, who should be supported by the entire coalition. A proviso, however was insisted upon by Glass of Cerro Gordo, whose confidence in his own prospects greatly ex- ceeded any warrant in the political situation, and this proviso was, "That if, before the announcement of the ballot in the convention, the Carpenter force should place to any candidate of the coalition votes enough so that his own county, by changing to him, could nominate him, his county should Le at liberty to make such change."
Upon these terms, the caucus was held, and after an all night session, Scott was named. The Carpenter force were advised of the situation and found that Carpenter was beaten. Then they offered their votes to Benson, but his county was not strong enough to turn the majority. The only county in the coalition that was strong enough was Boone, and so ultimately the Carpenter men determined to vote for Holmes. The Carpenter contingent in Hamilton, however, did not, upon the roll call, vote for Holmes, but stayed by Carpenter. In this situation, Boone stayed by Scott, whose nomi- nation was about to be announced when a clerk claimed an error in the tally, which error was investigated and found not to exist; and as the an- nouncement was again about to be made, Hamilton finally changed its vote to Holmes, and Boone did the same, thus giving effect to the Glass proviso and nominating Holmes in place of Scott. The change was almost tragic, after the apparent nomination of Scott, and it ended finally the Colonel's hopes of going to congress. As before noted, Scott received a consolation three years later in this last election to the State Senate. Holmes was nomi- nated in 1884 without difficulty.
In 1886 the state had been again re-districted, and Story County taken from the Tenth District and put in the Seventh ; thus for the first time since the admission of the state associating the county congressionally with the southern part of the state. The sitting congressman from the Seventh District at the time was Maj. E. H. Conger, who had been treasurer of state, and who later was Minister to Brazil and to China and Ambassador to Mexico. He was a very strong and popular congressman, but the terri- tory comprised in the Seventh District was not so strongly republican as it is now, this being in the time when the republican party in the state was much divided over the prohibtion issue, and the reliable Republican ma- jority in Story County was needed to make the district entirely safe; so in the re-districting, Story County had been put where it would do the most good. There was some demur in the county about being thrown into new Vol. I-28
430
HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
political relations ; but the new congressman was well received. He was renominated by the Republicans in the new district and his opponent was Mayor Carpenter of Des Moines. Carpenter had a faculty for getting votes from a good many sources, and he gave Major Conger a real chase in the southern part of the district ; but Story County made Major Conger's majority satisfactory. In 1888, there was some maneuvering in the south- ern part of the district to nominate some other congressman in Conger's place ; but Polk. Dallas and Story Counties instructed their delegations for him, and his nomination was thereby made absolutely certain.
Major Conger was consequently chosen to the famous Fifty-first Con- gress of which Thomas B. Reed was speaker, and in which he was chairman of the committee on coinage, weights and measures, and the chief manager in the house of representatives of the silver legislation in that congress : and possibly it is proper here to note that the editor of this history was clerk of his committee, and his private secretary, while he was rendering this service. In the forepart of the long session of the Fifty-first congress. Mr. Conger, having really wearied of congressional service, withdrew his name from consideration for renomination, although the sentiment of the Republicans of the district was at this time practically unanimous in sup- port of him; and in consequence of his withdrawal. the nomination was opened to Captain Hull, who had been secretary of state and lieutenant gov- ernor, and twice had made strong but unsuccessful campaigns for the nomi- nation for governor. Hull was nominated without opposition; and later Major Conger, having been appointed Minister to Brazil, resigned, and a convention was held to nominate his successor for the remaining short ses- sion of the fifty-first congress. Captain Hull and Polk County kept out of the contest for this nomination and it was fought out among outside candi- dates. Story County did not present a candidate, but it had. in Ole O. Roe. the chairman of the convention. The nomination finally went to Edward R. Hayes of Marion County, who was elected for the short term, and at the same time Captain Hull was elected for the long term. Thus it was that Capt. Hull entered upon his congressional service which continued for twenty years, or until March of the present year.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.