USA > Michigan > Bay County > History of Bay County, Michigan, and representative citizens > Part 16
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HAMPTON .- The history of Hampton township, the first organized in Michigan north of Saginaw, is the early history of Bay City, Bay County, and the northern part of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan, from 1843 to 1857, when the county was organized. This township during its first years comprised more territory than many famed kingdoms of the Old World! As these outlying districts be- came settled, they secured separate organiza- tions, until to-day the township comprises but "23 full sections, and II fractional sections." Its boundaries are Saginaw Bay and Saginaw River on the north, Saginaw Bay and Tuscola County on the east, Merritt and Portsmouth townships on the south, and Bay City, the Saginaw River and Portsmouth township on the west. Since Bay City became a separate corporation, the village of Essexville is the am- bitious "capital" of Hampton, and the founders of the one are the pioneers of the other. Joseph Hudson and Ransom P. Essex, who came in 1850, were the first settlers of Hampton town- ship proper. Their descendants have done much to develop the rich farming country, which in 1850 was largely marsh, swamp and bayou. Huge ditches and numerous drains have been aided by a slight drop in the water level of the Great Lakes in leaving that rich alluvian soil in an ideal condition for culti- vation.
Three nationalities have distinct settlements in Hampton. The large colony of Hollanders, settled south and east of their pretty church property, found their advance guard in Henry
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Rooiaker, Gerardus Vennix, A. Van Wert, Peter Vanerp, Anthony Walraven, Charles God- deyne and P. Van Hamlin, pioneers of 1857- 60. The German colony, located in the south- ern section of Hampton, was led by Carl Wag- ner, Charles Wintemeyer, William Roecker, Michael Englehardt, Charles Weber, Philip Weber, Joseph Scheimer and John Meyer, all of whom took up the privations and incessant toil of pioneer life in Hampton in 1857-59. Louis Guilette, who married the widow of Leon Trombley, one of Bay County's first traders and settlers, and Joseph Paul DeCourval, were the first of the French Canadian nationality to appreciate the opportunities of Hampton, the former locating on a farm in 1858, the latter following the lumber and shingle business there since 1866.
One family has been signally honored by the township. Hon. Nathan Knight, a native of Maine, came to Hampton township in 1856 and hewed a farm out of the wilderness. He represented the Bay City district in the State Legislature of 1877-80, was justice of the peace for 10 years, and supervisor for 14 con- secutive years. In this office he was succeeded by his son, Hon. Birdsey Knight, who is still in the harness, and who also served four years in the State Legislature,-1891-94,-from this district. Father and son were Democrats, but their personal popularity carried them safely over several political landslides in their baili- wick.
Joseph Eddy came to Hampton in 1858, and five sons and one daughter reside there now. Three sons,-George P., Edward and Albert H.,-served through the entire Civil War in Company F, 23rd Reg., Michigan Vol. Inf., the former two being mustered out, when peace came to bless the land, as lieuten- ants, the last named with the rank of sergeant.
Hampton township has a beautiful location
on Saginaw Bay, and the wooded ridge which skirts Saginaw Bay below Oak Grove, the most popular resort for family picnics on the bay, will some day surely rival the booming summer resorts on the west shore of the bay. The Center and Woodside avenue stone roads, with excellent cross-roads and all the facilities of the belt line railway, which skirts Hampton and connects with all the railroads centering in Bay City, give unrivaled shipping facilities to this rich farming country. The early pio- neers paid $2.50 per acre of water, with here and there a visible speck of land thrown in for good measure, but by hard work, systematic draining and dyking in the lowest places, Hampton has been made one of the brightest flowers in this most favored garden spot of Michigan, where farm property ranges now from $100 to $250 per acre.
The industries of the township center in Essexville, and it was there that the first beet sugar factory, the Michigan, was built in 1898, to be closely followed by the mammoth Bay City Sugar Factory. The projectors of these factories selected these sites because they are in the very center of the most fertile lands in the county, lands owned and tilled by a sturdy race of intelligent and industrious farmers. Mere land grubbbers could never succeed in raising profitable sugar beets. The soil must be right, then it must be thoroughly and properly pre- pared, the planting must be done as early as will be consistent with a proper germination of the beet seed, the thinning out requires good judgment and thorough work, and no crop re- quires such freedom from noxious weeds, as do the sugar beets. Frequent cultivation is essential to their full and sweet development. Fine discrimination is also required in their harvesting. It will not do to pull them too early, for every day of the ripening season adds sugar to their contents. Neither
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must they be left too long, lest they fall victims to one of the periodical cold waves, and freeze fast in the ground, as has happened to farmers in Hampton. Then, too, freedom from dirt and proper topping will reduce the loss from tare at the sugar factory, and a proper appre- ciation of the food value of the beet tops and the beet pulp at the factory will mean much profit to the beet grower. It will readily be seen that few farm crops require such constant study and close attention, but the wise farmers of Hampton township and the county at large also know, that no other crop will yield such liberal and certain returns.
Since Hampton township has the distinc- tion of having the first beet sugar factory in Michigan, a word on the industry in this con- nection is both opportune and appropriate. Hampton also had two of the first chicory fac- tories, one on Borden avenue, which was de- stroyed by fire, and merged with the other plant recently enlarged and still doing a thriving business on Center and Livingston avenues, just east of the city limits. The location of these infant industries at the doors of Hampton reflect credit on the farmers tributary to these hives of industry. The investment of several million dollars was staked on the ability of these veteran farmers to supply the raw mate- rial needed and while there have been seasons when the farmers did not provide the acreage desired for a full operation of all these mam- moth plants, still the experimental stage has been safely passed and, with better understand- ing all around, beets and chicory will take a foremost place in the crop rotation of the suc- cessful farmers of Bay County. Since these factories are operated late in fall and early winter, they offer employment to the sons of the country folk at the precise season in the year, when work on the farm is slack. Every acre devoted to sugar beets or chicory removes
the competition of that acre from farm truck and other farm crops, which have ever since commanded higher prices. Hampton and the other townships have been correspondingly prosperous in recent years. Hundreds of mort- gages have been lifted and hundreds of farms improved with the cash proceeds of these new industries. One has but to drive over the fine roads of Hampton to appreciate the amount and extent of improvements carried out on the farms of the township, to appreciate how much good has been accomplished in six short years! Hampton's growth has been in keeping with these additions and improvements. The popu- lation in the State census of 1874 was 1,247; in the national census of 1880, it was 2,016; in 1894 it was 3,204; and in 1900 it was 3.319. In the fall election of 1904, Hampton gave a clean Republican victory, for the first time in its history, and on March 13, 1905, the village of Essexville also elected a Republican ticket, for the first time in many years. The present officers of Hampton, elected in April, are: Su- pervisor, Hon. Birdsey Knight; clerk, William J. Stagray; treasurer, Frank Sirmeyer; justice of the peace, John H. Sharp; highway com- missioner, John VanSumer.
KAWKAWLIN .- On January 7, 1868, the Board of Supervisors erected the township of Kawkawlin by detaching its territory from Bangor, upon the petition of O. A. Ballou, Samuel Woods, John Sutherland, Charles Rad- cliff, Patrick Reynolds, Jeremiah Mack, Alex. Baird, A. G. Sinclair, Charles Powell, E. E. Gill, Paul Leme and Owen A. Maloney. The first annual meeting was held at the home of O. A. Ballou, in the village of Kawkawlin, on the first Monday in April, 1868, at 10 o'clock in the forenoon. O. A. Ballou, John Suther- land and Dennis Stanton were the election in-
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spectors, and Alexander Beard was the first supervisor from Kawkawlin. The township is bounded on the east by Bangor township and Saginaw Bay, on the north by Fraser town- ship, on the west by Beaver township and on the south by Monitor township.
Kaw-kaw-lin, as the Indians pronounced it, is said to have been one of the aborigines' favorite hunting grounds, and well it might have been. The old German settlers still say that when the primeval forest was first seen by white men, it was blacker and denser than the historical Black Forest of Europe. The Indians called the river "O-gan-con-ning", or "the place of the pike," for then as now the streams of that vicinity were favorite haunts of the pike.
One of the oldest trading posts between the pale face trappers and traders and the Chippewas was at the mouth of the Kawkawlin, where O-at-ka summer resort is now situated, and Neh-way-go, the dare-devil warrior of the To-bi-co band of Indians, had his wigwam not far from where the modern water-works plant erected by West Bay City a few years ago is located.
Reluctantly enough, the Chippewas sold the 6,000 acres of their reservation along the north bank of the Kawkawlin in the treaty of 1837, for it was an ideal haunt for game of all kinds. The government sold it ere long for $1.25 per acre, and the purchasers realized for- tunes from its wealth of pine and other timber.
From 1842 to 1864 "Uncle" Harvey Wil- liams kept the Indian traders' station at the mouth of the Kawkawlin, and he was much beloved by the red men. His wise counsel and generous conduct did much to smooth the way for the first pioneers of Kawkawlin.
In the winter of 1844-45, Israel Catlin built the first sawmill in the midst of this
virgin forest on the Kawkawlin, utilizing the water power of the stream. For many years after, great log drives were brought down this river to be cut in the mammoth and modern sawmills at Bay City.
During the height of the logging operations along the Kawkawlin and its tributaries, the depth of the water in that river each spring was always a question of vital importance to the sawmill operators and employees. If the water was not sufficient to float the huge log jams, they would remain hung up all season. Equally vital was the question of snow for the many logging camps during each winter, for without snow it was a hard problem to get the logs to the streams. In later years water sprinklers were used to make icy roadways for the im- mense loads of logs that were drawn from the logging camps to the banks of the rivers.
In 1847 the first church, a humble mission for the Indians, was built on the banks of the Kawkawlin. The place is called Indiantown, and is still one of the main settlements of the natives in the county, but the numbers have been slowly but surely diminishing. With the stoicism ever characteristic of his proud race, Poor Lo at the dawn of the 20th century bears his deplorable lot in grim silence. The old men of the tribe recall the days when all this wealth of timber and prairie was all their own, and the comparison of those wild and care-free days with their hard lot at present cannot in- spire satisfaction. The industrious and thrifty pale faces settled all about the remnant of the red men, preach by their every-day lives an eloquent sermon on the only means by which to reach a higher plane of living, and how to attain the comforts of this progressive age. But apparently it is beyond the power of the average aborigine to forsake the deadliest foe of their race, and to take up "the white man's
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burden"! A very few have lifted themselves above the latter day level of their race, while most of them are now devout Christians.
Frederick A. Kaiser emigrated from Ger- many in 1849 and took up the work at the Kawkawlin's first sawmill for the late James Fraser. In 1862 he bored for salt, and during the next 15 years built a number of sawmills in that paradise of pine and hemlock. He was the founder of the villages of Kawkawlin and Pinconning, connected the two backwoods lum- ber camps by railway and did much to develop the natural resources of that section of the county. He cleared considerable of the land of its timber, and demonstrated that the valley 'of the Kawkawlin is one of the richest farming districts of the State, and thereafter the town- ship became rapidly settled. When the lumber jack left, with his axe and saw, the farmer followed with the plow and harrow, and pas- toral wealth and beauty now grace the shores of the Kawkawlin.
The population of Kawkawlin township in 1880 was 1,118. In 1894 it had grown to 1,627, and to 1,964 in 1900. The real estate valuation in 1882 was $298,462. There were 452 school children in 1883, and the chronicler of those years notes with pardonable pride, that there were 67 births in the township, includ- ing "three pairs of twins"! On the other hand the Grim Reaper gathered but 12 inhabitants to the Great Beyond, the healthful climate stay- ing his hand in most instances, until the burden of many years enfeebled the pioneers. The townspeople were busy building roads, drains and bridges during those years and their task is still far from done. This very year of 1905 several new steel bridges are planned to span the Kawkawlin and its tributaries, the stone road system will be extended and repaired, and new drains begun. The township spent $1,600 for school purposes in 1883, and is still keeping
up and enlarging this good work. The officers of the township for 1905 are: Supervisor, Peter Bressette; clerk, Robert D. Hartley ; treasurer, John Murphy; justice of the peace, George Goulette; highway commissioner, Fred D. Paige.
MERRITT township, which is bounded on the north by Portsmouth and Hampton town- ships, on the east by Tuscola County, on the south by Saginaw County and on the west by Portsmouth township and Saginaw County, was erected by the Board of Supervisors at a session held July 8, 1871, upon the petition of 12 freeholders of Portsmouth township. On June 8, 1871, 31 residents of the territory affected asked for separation. When the super- visors fixed the boundaries of the new township as including "all of Township 13 north, Range 6 east, also Sections 1, 2, 3, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 and 15, same Township, Range 5 east", some of the residents of these nine sections on range 5 east protested vigorously against the separation. Their protest was filed on June 13, 1871. Two weeks later II of the remonstra- tors relented, and the separation and erection of Merritt followed. The first election was held at the home of Joesph Gerard on the Tus- cola plank road. Gen. B. F. Partridge, Henry Hess and Martin Powell were named as elec- tion inspectors. Henry F. Shuler, a pioneer resident of Merritt, was elected to represent the new township on the Board of Supervisors.
Hundreds of acres of Merritt township have been redeemed for cultivation by draining, chiefly through the large Quanicassee ditch. These lands are exceptionally fertile, and all went well until Denmark and Gilford town- ships of Tuscola County directed their drain- age into the natural depression in the southeast corner of Merritt, since which time the town-
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ship has been involved in an almost intermin- able legal tangle with their neighbors of the next county. Bay County has taken a hand, by voting some of the funds necessary to carry on the legal battle. Up to date the victory rests with Merritt township, which has secured an injunction restraining the Tuscola County people from flooding Merritt. The Tuscola farmers are fighters, however, and the courts are still considering the efforts of Tuscola to dissolve the injunction.
Among the earliest settlers in Merritt were Rev. Thomas Histed and wife, who came here from Vassar with $3 in money, eight bushels of potatoes and a little flour. After cutting an opening through the woods for road purposes, building a cabin and draining his land, he created a fine farm. His crops were often de- stroyed by spring freshets and heavy rain- storms. He always found time from his farm work to preach the Gospel to his neighbors, who came many miles through the woods to 'hear the message of salvation. In 1854, Mar- tin Powell was employed in the sawmills of Bay City, and with his savings located 160 acres in Merritt township at one shilling per acre! After clearing it and making it habitable, he sold 30 acres for $1,450, and the rest is con- stantly increasing in value, being worth to-day about $100 per acre. Samuel M. Brown lo- cated and moved on his farm in Merritt town- ship in 1859. Ex-Supervisor B. Schabel re- ceived 38 cents for 12 hours work in the Bay City sawmills during 1857-58, when lumber was down to $5 per thousand, and wisely bought 160 acres of marsh lands, which by dint of his industry are to-day ideal farm prop- erty. Nicholas Thayer, Robert Whiteside, William Treiber, John Fegert, Frederick Beyer, A. Lovejoy, DeWitt Burr, Joseph B. Hazen and John M. Lefever were among the first permanent settlers of the township.
The prosperous little farm community at Munger station, on the Bay City Division of the Michigan Central Railroad, is the trading center for Merritt township, and Arn is another thriving little settlement on the same railroad a few miles further south. Horace D. Blodg- ett, one of Merritt's earliest settlers, is post- master at Munger; C. A. Howell, for many years supervisor from Merritt; Henry Horton, for years representing the township on the Re- publican County Committee; and F. R. Ten- nant are among the best known and highly esteemed residents of the township.
With the advent of the beet sugar and chicory factories in Bay City, farm property has advanced in value in Merritt township, and some of the banner crops in the county are harvested by its intelligent and industrious farmers. The township had but 26 farms in 1883, while to-day there are more than 200. The school facilities are excellent, and each of the leading denominations is represented by its house of worship and its devoted flock of parishioners.
The sinking of the What-Cheer coal mine in 1904 marks a new era for Merritt. The mine has one of the finest coal veins yet uncovered in Bay County, and all the surrounding terri- tory has been covered by coal leases, with indi- cations of a number of other mines going down in that vicinity in the near future. The farmers of the county at first sold the coal leases out- right, but experience has taught them that a good royalty is more profitable, and this is now their favorite course of action. The discovery of coal on the east side of the river will enhance farm values still more, and the hardy pioneers, who dared to enter the wilderness to bring order out of chaos and thriving farms from malaria-breeding swamps, or their descendants, are now reaping the well-merited harvest. The population of Merritt township was 1,217 in
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1894, and 1,562 in 1900. The new railroad planned to cross the "Thumb" of Michigan from Bay City to Port Huron will pass Mun- ger, and it is said that the coal mine people are back of the enterprise, in order to get a direct route to deep water, and from there to the East- ern market.
Munger township was named in honor of Curtis and Algernon S. Munger, the veteran merchants of Bay City, who early invested in some choice farm property in Merritt township. The township officials elected in 1905 are: Supervisor, C. A. Howell; clerk, Fred Beyer ; treasurer, Adam J. Schabel; justice of the peace, H. M. Rademacher; highway commis- sioner, Frank Laclair.
MONITOR township was created by the Leg- islature of 1869, including "Sections 30 and 31, Town 14 north, Range 5 east, and all of Town 14 north, Range 4 east, except Sections I and 2". The first election was held at the home of Owen C. White, on the first Monday in April, 1869. Owen C. White, Wil- liam H. Needham and William Hemingway were inspectors of election. William H. Need- ham was the first supervisor. The officials of Bangor township objected to the organization of Monitor, claiming it was done for political purposes, but since Bangor was then a very large township, the petition was granted. Mon- itor township is bounded on the north by Kaw- kawlin and Bangor townships, on the east by Bangor township and West Bay City, on the south by Frenkenlust township and on the west by Williams township.
The first settlers in Monitor were descend- ants and members of the German colony which settled Frankenlust, and the township has many of the characteristics of the older settlement. J. Rittershofer, Henry Kraner, P. Graul,
Charles Baxman, G. Schweinsberg and John Hunn were among the advance guard. Thomas Kent and five sons, James Felker, W. H. Need- ham, Jeremiah Waite, Fred Shaw, William Gaffney, Joseph Dell and T. C. Phillips were among the earliest pioneers of Monitor. The wilderness was unbroken from the banks of the Kawkawlin to the Indian trail through Frank- enlust. William Hemingway purchased 40 acres in 1858 in section 32. To reach his land he had to go to Kawkawlin over the corduroy road, up the Kawkawlin River in a dug-out canoe to the South Branch, then over a mean- dering Indian trail four miles south. After erecting a log hut, his first work was the clear- ing away of the trees and underbrush for a roadway large enough to pass a team of oxen, which roadway was used for many years after. Mr. Needham always pronounced Monitor one of the healthiest spots in Michigan, and as proof pointed with pride to his 12 children- six boys and six girls-all of whom attained their maturity. Joseph Dell settled on his "eighty" in 1859, cutting the trees, splitting the rails and erecting his log house, with rough oak flooring, and roofed with oak "shakes"!
Since then the township has been practically denuded of timber, and some of the finest farms in the county are within its borders. The Mid- land stone road runs straight through the cen- ter of the township, and just north of this fine highway is the Midland Branch of the Michi- gan Central Railroad, from which a number of . spurs run to the coal mines, offering excellent shipping facilities to the farmers. Much of the township was marsh and swamp when the first pioneer swung his axe in the silent forest, but many ditches and drains have reclaimed every acre for cultivation, and the two beet sugar factories on the West Side secure much of their supply from Monitor. The village of Kaw- kawlin is in Monitor township, and another
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thriving little settlement in the southwest por- tion of Monitor clusters about the German church and school erected in 1880. The town- ship has four other schools, all of which are well attended. During its early years the town- ship contained much railroad land exempt from taxation, which made the tax burden rather heavy for the pioneers. Henry Moeller, Sam- uel Hardy, Bernard Carroll, William Gillet, William Gaffney, and T. C. Phillips have done much for the schools of the township.
T. C. Phillips was one of the earliest busi- ness men in Bay City. In 1863 he served on the enrolling board of Bay County, this being the 85th subdistrict of Michigan, together with the late Judge Isaac Marston and R. P. Essex, of Hampton. Through the solicitation of Mr. Phillips at the War Department at Washing- ton, Bay County's quota of men for the con- scription was reduced 45 men, which meant a saving of $15,000 to the county, while the un- tiring efforts of the board to secure single and non-resident men was another material advan- tage locally. In 1870, Mr. Phillips was ap- pointed postmaster at Bay City. In 1878 Pres- ident Rutherford B. Hayes issued the now famous civil service order, and Mr. Phillips tendered his resignation in the following terse letter : "I tender my resignation as postmaster of Bay City, to take effect as soon as my suc- cessor shall be appointed and qualified, for these reasons : I am now a member of the Re- publican State Central Committee, and chair- man of the Bay County Republican Committee, and your civil service order obliges me to resign either the position of honor or profit. I therefore resign the office of profit"! And he forthwith retired to "Ne-bo-bish" Farm in Monitor. What a contrast between those sturdy pioneers in public affairs, and our own modern day ideals, or lack of them!
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