USA > Michigan > A history of the northern peninsula of Michigan and its people, its mining, lumber and agricultural industries, Volume I > Part 29
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The party had with them but a seant supply of provisions, and the abundance they had left at a located corner a few miles back afforded them no immediate relief, for they could not retrace their course with either a reliable compass, or the sight of the heavenly bodies to guide them. The supplies that had been intended but for a day were all that the party had for five days, with the exception of porenpine meat. which, under those eireinstances was a valuable addition to their bill of fare.
The effect of this magnetic ore upon the compass used in surveying not only led to the invention of the solar compass, but the report in the Lower Peninsula of the discovery of iron soon thereafter led to
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the beginning of the development of the extensive iron industries of the Peninsula. The following year, 1845, explorations of this locality were conducted by men from Jackson. Michigan, and location was then made of the since famous Jackson mine. In 1846 a quantity, approx- imately three hundred pounds, was taken as a test and smelted. In 1849 the Cleveland mine, near Ishpeming, was opened and in 1850 a small lot of its ore was shipped to Newcastle, Pennsylvania, where it was made into bar-iron, proving the excellent quality of the ore, and thus closing the first half of the century with a fair introduction of Michigan iron to the iron world.
In 1850 the government of the United States ceded to the several states the "swamp and overflowed lands" still remaining unsold within their respective boundaries, and by this act Michigan became possessed of the title to nearly six million acres of land that had been supposed to be fit for cultivation only after being properly drained; but a large portion of which were afterwards found to be very desirable for their timber, and as agricultural lands. The state made liberal use of these lands to induce the construction of state roads or highways, with a view to opening up the territory to actual and active settlement and improvement, and the Upper Peninsula came in for its share of these valuable lands, and many of them were secured hy enterprising citi- zens as compensation for highway construction. In the grants of such lands many private fortunes have found their inception, or have been greatly enhanced.
Prior to the adoption of the constitution of 1850. there were no privileges of general incorporation, and therefore corporations could only exist by means of private charters to be secured f: om the legisla- ture. for and against which powerful lobbies were often maintained to influence the legislature, and the granting of which was often the oe- casion of more or less scandal. Under the new constitution, adopted at just midway the nineteenth century, the way was opened for gen- eral incorporation of companies for various purposes, and the handling of large financial propositions which the Upper Peninsula presented was more readily accomplished, and the way seemed to be opening up for rapid progress.
Closely upon the heels of the copper development in the last decade of the first half of the nineteenth century, followed the intense interest in lumber and iron. in euch of which there was a scramble for the best locations, so that the last half of the nineteenth century practically be- gan with active interests in all three of those industries through which the Upper Peninsula has contributed in so large a measure to the com- merce of the world in the period of its most rapid development from that day to this.
WANING AND WAXING INDUSTRIES
At that period it was noticeable that the necessities of the Indians and the activities of the traders had serionsly depleted the source of
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supply of furs so that the business of the fur-traders was rapidly on the wane, and the coming of permanent settlers was destined to further reduce it. It declined rapidly with the advance of civilization, and now the remaining fragments of that once almost sole commercial in- dustry of this part of the country was scarcely reckoned with in making up an inventory of our commercial and industrial assets. The American Fur Company abandoned the field as the location of its headquarters as early as 1854.
The fishing industry developed rapidly, especially in the vicinity of Mackinac, during the second quarter of the nineteenth century, and had assumed considerable proportions, before the advent of a commer- cialism in our iron and copper, and when lumber was considered for little else than the supply of a very limited local demand. It has con- tinued to be an active participant in the furnishing of supplies to the wide world, and is today an industry of large proportions.
Aside from a considerable influx of population into the copper re- gions during the five years preceding 1850, there was comparatively little progress in the way of settlement in the Peninsula except at the Sault and Mackinac.
We have already mentioned the early traders on the mainland and islands of Lake Superior, and those at the mouth of the Menominee. At the last named place a silght interest in lumbering was exhibited during the second quarter of the nineteenth century, but this will be written of in the chapter relating to Menominee county. Aside from the early settlers already named as having located at Menominee, there came also, before the year 1850, Andrus Eveland in 1842 and John Quimby in 1845, both of whom engaged extensively in the fishing busi- ness, and each of whom subsequently laid out village plats or additions in what is now the city of Menominee.
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CHAPTER XI PIONEERS PRIOR TO 1850
FIRST COMERS TO DELTA COUNTY-MISSIONARIES TO BARAGA COUNTY- FOUNDING OF MARQUETTE-ONTONAGON AND RISE OF COPPER MINING -THE SAULT AND MACKINAC AGAIN.
We have also mentioned the fact that Mr. and Mrs. L. A. Roberts were the first permanent white settlers at what is now Escanaba, Delta County, and that they located there in 1838. They settled first upon the banks of the Whitefish river, a short distance above its outlet into Green Bay. Before their arrival there had been a small sawmill con- structed there by parties whose names are now unknown, and that mill was then in operation. About 1842 it passed into the hands of John and Joseph Smith, but was abandoned by them in 1844, at which time the proprietors located anew at the present site of the mill of the N. Ludington Company, and there they built the first steam sawmill in that locality. During that year Darius Clark and Silas Billings took up their abode at that place. In 1846 Messrs. Clark and Roberts erected a small water-mill about five miles up the Whitefish river from its mouth, and in the same year the Clark and Roberts mill passed into the hands of Jefferson Sinclair and Daniel Wells of Milwaukee, and three years later, in 1851, became the property of the N. Ludington Company. This mill had among its early employees some of those who later became prominent citizens of the Peninsula, and who reaped rich fortunes in its lumber resources.
One other saw-mill was constructed in that vicinity in 1845 by Silas Billings, George Richards, and David Bliss. It was a water-mill and was operated for about ten years.
MISSIONARIES TO BARAGA COUNTY
There was, in what is now Baraga county, but little of civilization after the death of the lamented Father Menard, during his missionary work, for many years, though the place was known to and visited by the traders frequently, and the American Fur Company maintained a trader's station there. In 1834 a Protestant mission was established
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by John Sunday, a Wesleyan preacher, and he was followed the same year by Rev. John Clark, who erected a log mission house and a school house at Kewawenon, on the shore of Keweenaw Bay. Under his dirce- tion quite a large number of Indian honses were also constructed in close proximity to the mission. In 1837 D. M. Chundler, the first reg- ularly appointed Methodist minister to the mission at the Sault and Kewawanon, came to this mission. In 1839 a blacksmith named W. H. Brockway, was appointed superintendent of missions, he having been acting minister at the Sault for the past year. Following Mr. Brock- way other Methodist ministers officiated at this mission as follows; George King, from 1838 to 1840; John Kahbeege in 1840; George W. Brown in 1841 and 1842; Peter Marksman in 1843; John H. Pitezel from 1844 to 1846; Joseph W. Holt in 1846 and 1847; Peter O. John- son in 1847; N. Barnum in 1848; and Rufus C. Crane in 1849.
Of the period in which Rev. Pitezel officiated at this mission he wrote descriptive of the mission and its surroundings as follows; "This mission is situated near the head of Keweenaw bay, one of the finest in the world, on a sightly spot, about forty rods back from the water. Near the house bursts forth from the side hill a living spring, an in- valuable treasure anywhere. From the shape of the bay, this region, for miles around, is called by the French L'Anse, which may apply to anything shaped like an arch. Should we use this word occasionally, instead of the longer Indian name, it will be understood as designating the same place. The Indian cabins lined the shore and were mostly those built by order of Rev. John Clark. They bore evident marks of age and decay. The mission-house was of hewed logs, about twenty- four by sixteen feet, one and one-half stories high, covered with cedar bark, and a little shanty appended, which some of the missionaries had used for a study. We had on one side of us. near-by, the government blacksmith, and on the other side the carpenter, and off some distance, in another direction, was the farmer's family. These constituted our white neighbors. Across the bay, directly opposite, was the Catholic mission, three miles distant."
The government blacksmith referred to was D. D. Brockway, sent there by the United States government in 1843, pursuant to a treaty with the Indians, and he was subsequently agent for the Cliff Mine and president of the Atlas Mining Company. C. T. Carrier was the farmer referred to, and Cornelius M. Johnson, the carpenter.
The Catholic mission referred to was established in 1843 by Rev. Frederick Buraga, and Rev. Edward Jaker, writing thereof, says: "The Rev. Barnga built a church and twenty-four substantial log houses for Indian converts, and that he officiated there until 1853, when there were about three hundred and fifty Indians and half-breeds, of all ages, belonging to the mission," Rev. Baraga was a very highly respected and worthy missionary, and of him Rev. Pitezel, of the Methodist mis- sion, wrote: "Rev. Frederick Buraga was the resident priest at L'Anse at our arrival ; then probably about fifty years old; descended from a
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family of distinction in Europe; well educated, speaking readily six or seven living languages, including German, French. English and Ojibwa. He spent years on the shores of Superior, building a church and making extensive improvements. He traveled extensively on foot and by all methods then in use. Temperate in his habits, devout and dignified in his private and ministerial bearing, he was unversally re- spected by Indians and the mining community, and affectionately loved by those in eloser fellowship. At a more recent date, in consideration of his sacrifices and meritorious services, the pope honored him with the miter of a bishop." The name of this reverend gentleman is appro- priately preserved in that of the county wherein he worked so earnestly for the conversion of the natives, and the pioneer miners.
FOUNDING OF MARQUETTE
Marquette county had little white population prior to 1850, though the discovery of iron brought in explorers and a few men engaged in the development of mining properties before that date. Interest in the mining resources of the county was awakened immediately follow- ing the discovery of iron ore in 1844, and that interest increased as discoveries and developments continued. Mr. Peter White, one of the earliest of the permanent settlers, came to Marquette in a company of ten associates, in 1849, and of the trip there, and the then existing con- ditions, he writes: "We succeeded in crowding our large Mackinac barge up the rapids, or falls, at Sault Ste. Marie, and, embarking our- selves and provisions, set sail on Lake Superior for the Carp River iron region. After eight days of rowing, towing. poling and sailing, we landed on the spot immediately in front of where Mr. George Craig's dwelling house stands. That was then called Indian Town, and was the landing place of the Jackson Company. We put up that night at the Cedar House, of Charlie Bawgam. It is true his rooms were not many, but he gave us plenty to cat, clean and well cooked. I remember that he had fresh venison, wild ducks and geese, fresh fish, good bread and butter, coffee and tea, and splendid potatoes.
"The next morning, we started for the much talked of iron hills; each one had a pack-strap and blanket, and was directed to exercise his own discretion in putting into a pack what he thought he could carry. I put up forty pounds and marched bravely up the hills with it for a distance of two miles, by which time I was about as good as used up. Graveract came up, and, taking my pack on top of his, a much heavier one, marched on with both, as if mine was only the addition of a feather, while I trudged on behind, and had hard work to keep up. Graveraet, seeing how fatigued I was, invited me to get on top of his load, saying he would carry me too, and he could have done it I believe; but I had too much pride to accept his offer. When we arrived at the little brook which runs by George Rublein's old brewery, we made some tea and lunched, after which I took my pack and carried it without much dif- ficulty to what is now known as the Cleveland Mine, then known as
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THE LATE HON. PETER WHITE, MARQUETTE
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Moody's location. On our way we had stopped a few minutes at the Jackson forge, where we met Mr. Everet, Charles Johnson, Alexander McKerchie, A. N. Barney, N. E. Eddy, Nahum Keys, and others. At the Cleveland we found Capt. Sam Moody and John H. Mann, who had spent the previous summer and winter there. I well remember how astonished I was next morning when Capt. Moody asked me to go with him to dig some potatoes for breakfast. He took a hoe and an old tin pail, and we ascended a high hill, now known as the Marquette Iron Company's mountain, and on its pinnacle found half an acre partially cleared and planted to potatoes. He opened but one or two hills when his pail was filled with large and perfectly sound potatoes-and then said: 'I may as well pull a few parsnips and carrots for dinner, to save coming up again'; and, sure enough, he had them there in abundance. This was in the month of May.
"From this time till the tenth of July, we kept possession of all the iron mountains then known west of the Jackson, employing our time fighting mosquitoes at night, and the black flies through the day; per- haps a small portion of it was given to denuding the iron hills of ex- traneous matter, preparing the way for the immense products that have since followed. On the 10th of July, we came away from the mountains, bag and baggage, arriving at the lake shore, as we then termed it, before noon. Mr. Harlow had arrived with quite a number of mechanics, some goods, lots of money, and, what was better than all, we got a glimpse of some female faces.
"At one o'clock of that day, we commeneed clearing the site of the of the present city of Marquette, though we called it Worcester in honor of Mr. Harlow's native city. We began by chopping off the trees and brush, at the point of rocks near the brick blacksmith shop, just south of the shore end of the Cleveland Ore Docks. We cut the trees close to the ground, and then threw them bodily over the bank onto the lake shore; then, under the direction of Capt. Moody, we began the con- struction of a dock, which was to stand like the ancient pyramids, for future ages to wonder at and admire! We did this by carrying these whole trees into water and piling them in tiers, crosswise, until the pile was even with the surface of the water. Then we wheeled sand and gravel upon it, and, by the end of the second day, we had completed a structure which we looked upon with no little pride. Its eastward or outward end was solid rock, and all inside of that was solid dirt, brush and leaves. We could not see why it should not stand as firm and as long as the adjacent beach itself. A vessel was expected in a few days, with a large lot of machinery and supplies, and we rejoiced in the faet that we had a dock upon which they could be landed. On the third day, we continued to improve it by corduroying the surface, and by night of that day, it was, in our eyes, a thing of beauty to behold. Our chagrin may be imagined, when, on rising the next morning, we found that a gentle sea had come in during the night and wafted our dock to some unknown point. Not a trace of it remained; not even a poplar leaf
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was left to mark the spot. The sand of the beach was as clean and smooth as if it had never been disturbed by the hand of man. I wrote in the smooth sand with a stick, 'This is the spot where Capt. Moody built his dock.' The Captain trod upon the record, and said I wonld get my discharge at the end of the month, but he either forgot or for- gave the affront. It was a long time before anyone hud the hardihood to attempt the building of another dock.
"The propellers would come to anchor, some times as far as two miles from the shore, and the freight and passengers had to be landed in small boats. Our large boilers, when they arrived, were plugged, thrown overboard, and floated ashore, and the other machinery was landed with our Mackinac boat, or a seow which we had constructed. Cattle and horses were always pitched overboard and made to swim ashore.
"Under the lead of James Kelly, the boss carpenter, who was from Boston, we improved our time, after six o'clock each evening, in erect- ing a log house for sleeping quarters for our particular party. When finished, we called it the Revere House, after the hotel of that name in Boston. This building stood on its original site as late as 1860.
"We continued clearing up the land south of Superior street, pre- paring the ground for a forge, machine shop, sawmill and coal house. Some time in August, the schooner .Fur Trader' arrived, bringing a large number of Germans, some Irish and a few French. Among this party were August Machts, George Rublein, Francis Dolf, and Patrick, James and Michael Atfield. All these have resided here continuously, ยท . . . It was cholera year; Clark died at the Sault on his way back; several others had died on the vessel, and many were landed very sick. We were all frightened; but the Indians, who lived here to the number of about one hundred, had everything embarked in their boats and canoes within sixty minutes, and started over the waters to escape a disease to them more fearful than the small-pox.
"At this time, the first steam boiler ever set up in this connty was ready to be filled with water, and it must be done the first time by hand. It was a locomotive boiler. A dollar and a half was offered for the job, and I took it; working three days and a night or two, I succeeded in hilling it. Steam was got up, and I then was installed as engineer and fireman.
"That summer there were but few boats of any kind on the lake. The reliable mail. freight and passenger craft was the schooner .Fnr Trader,' commanded by the veteran Capt. Calvin Ripley, from whom the picturesque rock in Marquette bay took its name.
"During the winter we had three or four mails only. Mr. Harlow was the first postmaster, and hired the Indian Jinmeea to go to L'Anse after the mail at a cost of ten dollars per trip. I believe the cost was made np by subscription.
"The Jackson Company had abont suspended operations; their credit was at a low ebb; their agent had left in the fall, and was
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succeeded by 'Czar' Jones, the President, but nearly all work was stopped, and the men thought seriously of hanging and quartering Mr. Jones, who soon after left the country. In the spring (1850) the Jackson Company 'bust' all up, and all work at their mine and forge was suspended. By this time the Marqnette Iron Company's forge was nearly completed and ready for making blooms. Many dwellings, shops, etc., had been erected, together with a small dock at which steamers could land."
Thus the beautiful and prosperous city of Marquette had its be- ginning in the last year of the first half of the nineteenth century and was equipped for a good start of what proved to be a prosperous future.
ONTONAGON AND RISE OF COPPER MINING
Prior to the original survey made by Mr. Burt, Samuel W. Hill, in 1841. conducted explorations on the Ontonagon river and he was af- terwards engaged in the geological surveys of that locality that were made under the direction of Doctor Douglass Houghton and of Foster and Whitney.
In 1843 James K. Paul made a preemption of land where the city of Ontonagon now stands, and he erected a log cabin thereon. Mr. Paul was a Virginian, brave, generous and open-hearted, and his small cabin served not only as a dwelling honse, but as a store where he dealt out supplies to the few people that came shortly after.
In 1844 the government established a mineral ageney at that point, and constructed a building sixteen by twenty feet for an office and Major Campbell was stationed there as the government agent. This was immediately following the ratification of the treaty whereby the Indian rights to lands in that vicinity were acquired by the govern- ment.
It was immediately following that treaty that the government be- gan the issning of mineral permits for leases, and the first permits were issned in 1843 to Wilson & Carson, Ansley & Company, and Turner & Company, and in 1844 C. C. Douglass, who had been assist. ant state geologist, began explorations under those permits. In 1845 the first practienl attention was given to the copper mining interests, at what was then called the Ontonagon mine, but later known as the Minnesota mine. Prominent men that had been connected with this mine are S. O. Knapp, its first superintendent, Capt. Wm. Harris, Mr. Townsend and Mr. Roberts.
C. C. Cushman, representing a Boston company, located under a permit, in 1845. in the same locality. His company was first called the Ontonagon Copper Company, and later the Forest Mining Com- pany. The same year Cyrus Mendenhall located a claim three miles square on the west side of the Ontonngon River for the Isle Royale Mining Company.
The following year many locations were made and the locality was a scene of considerable activity, and at a few places active operations
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were begun, and the prospects were very bright. Mining stocks were in good demand for a time, but by the fall of 1847 speculation in stoeks got a setback, and as a consequence, development was slow.
Among the very early settlers at this locality were F. G. White, John Cheynoweth, W. W. Spalding, A. Coburn, Abner Sherman, A. C. Davis, S. S. Robinson, Edward Sales, Doctor Osborn, Martin Beaser, and Messrs. Webb. Richards, Lockwood. Hoyt, Hardee, Anthony, Sanderson and Dickerson.
Of the early settlers Messrs. Cash, Spalding, and Lockwood built a boat in 1848, with which to do freighting upon the Ontonagon river. The lumber was eut with a whip-saw and the boat was seventy-five feet long, with an eight foot beam, flat bottomed, keel form, and of fifteen tons capacity. It was propelled by a crew of ten Indians, with poles, who were under the command of a white man. The boat was propelled up the river against the rapids by means of a seven hundred foot line which was stretched from the capstan to trees on the shore. It was eighteen miles from the mouth of the river to the mine and it required three days to make the trip up the river, though the boat was able to return down stream in one day.
In 1849 the first frame house in Ontonagon was built by Captain John G. Parker, and so the then village of Ontonagon had its begin- ning almost concurrently with the settlement at Marquette, just at the end of the first half of the nineteenth century.
So far as can be learned the first boat to arrive at Ontonagon was the propeller "Napoleon," which landed forty-four passengers on the eighth day of May, 1849. They were mainly laborers who came to work in the Minnesota copper mine.
The first shipment of copper was made June 15, 1849, by that com- pany, the copper being floated down the river in two canoes that were tied or lashed together.
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