USA > Michigan > Bay County > History of Bay County, Michigan, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 11
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tions for females and fraudulent debtors; the whole structure is furnished with the most approved modern appliances for the safe and healthy detention of prisoners, pending their trial. Water pipes and closets are arranged with an eye to the comfort and health of the prisoners, while measures for their proper use of the same are fully provided for. The jail is esteemed a model one, and both it and the court house are taken as patterns by surrounding counties in similar erections. The cost of the jail building and court house was about $75,000. They are a credit to the county, and ornaments to the city. A view of each.is given in this work.
COUNTY FARM.
In the year 1866, the Board of Supervisors purchased a tract of prairie land, on the east side of the Saginaw River, near the bay, comprising about 120 acres, upon which suitable buildings have been erected, including a hospital, and retreat for mild cases of insanity, and the grounds have been thoroughly ditched, drained, and cultivated to a point, relieving the county of a large portion of expense attending the care of the few paupers who make claim as charges upon the county.
In 1863 a one story brick building was built just in front of where the jail now stands, for the use of the county offices.
SAW-MILLS, LOGS AND LUMBER.
EARLY HISTORY.
The subject of lumbering finds a very proper introduction in the language of Judge Albert Miller, of Bay City, as follows:
"The pioneers of Michigan, who settled in the northern part of the state forty years ago, were fully aware that there were vast forests of pine timber lying around their settlements, and to the north of them, but could not have anticipated the great value which the rapid improvement of our whole country, and especially the western portion of it, has found those forests to possess. The early settlers of that portion of Michigan of which I am writing, were principally from the New England States and from New York, and when they looked back to the large amount of pine timber they had left behind them, they did not suppose that in their life-time it would be exhausted, and that large amounts would have to be transported from a thousand miles interior to supply the Atlantic States. At that time Maine was of itself considered a 'world of pine forests,' and its proximity to Boston gave that city and the state of Massachusetts a supply of cheap lumber; and passing along farther west and south we find the Connecticut River reach- ing far up into the region of pine forests in northern Vermont and New Hampshire, and large quantities of pine in every shape, from the tall spar used in fitting out our Atlantic marine, down to man- ufactured clap-boards and shingles annually floated down its rapid current to supply western Massachusetts and the state which adopted the name of the said river, without a thought on the part of the consumers that the supply was ever to be exhausted. The supply of pine timber on the banks of the Connecticut River was considered by the early settlers in that region as inexhaustible. The writer has seen large quantities of pine logs near the banks of the river, not over one hundred miles from its mouth, which had been hauled from the land by the early settlers while clearing it for cultivation, rolled into a ravine and suffered to decay, which if they were now sound, would be worth more than the farm from which they were cut. If the man is not now living, he has but recently passed away, who was hired by the proprietor of this same farm to fell the pine trees on a certain tract of land for no other pur- pose than that they should not draw sustenance from the soil and
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HISTORY OF BAY COUNTY.
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thereby impoverish it and lessen its value for future cultivation. It must be admitted that said proprietor was not a skillful woodsman, nor an experienced agriculturist, he being an English sea captain. I mention this reckless destruction of a commodity which time and circumstances have made so valuable, as a warning to prevent the proprietors of Michigan forests from permitting any waste of their timber; for in less time than has passed away since the circum- stance transpired that I have related above, a good pine lumber tree will be as great a rarity in Michigan as it is now in that part of Vermont. I believe that every sound forest tree in Michigan, of whatever kind, is of more value to the proprietor than the ashes it will make, after bestowing much labor to convert it into that com- modity. If more land is required for cultivation, let it be supplied by the boundless prairies of the West, but let our Michigan forests remain till the timber is required for some useful purpose, and then let the land be put into the highest state of cultivation. But to re- turn to the pine forests of the Eastern States forty years ago. Pass- ing over the Green Mountains we come to the pine region of Lake Champlain, and the waters emptying into it, which, with regions on the head waters of the Hudson, produced such quantities of lumber, finding a market at Albany, that that city was for a long time the great lumber mart of the United States, and she still maintains an ascendency in that trade, although the great source of supply is now in the West and Canada. We might con- tinue and mention the regions of the Delaware and Susquehanna, as the great source of supply for the more Southern and Atlantic cities, and then pass on to western New York and look at the head waters of the Genesee and its branches. I was recently told by a pioneer of northern Michigan, that a little more than forty years ago, he was in the town of Dansville, which is situated on a branch of the Genesee River, and that within four or five miles of that town good pine lumber could be bought at the mills for $2.50 per thousand, and paid for in almost any kind of barter, and that in 1826, after the Erie Canal was open and in use from Albany to Buffalo, pine lumber was sold in the city of Rochester for $6, $8 and $10 per thousand. In view of the circumstances re- lated above, it cannot be supposed that at that time the idea could have been conceived of doing a profitable business by manufactur- ing lumber in the forests of Michigan, and transporting it to the Atlantic cities.
"The first saw mill that was ever built on waters that are trib- utary to the Saginaw River, was the one built on the Thread River at Grand Blanc, in 1828 and 1829, by Rowland Perry and Harvey Spencer. The object of building the mill was to supply the want of that settlement, the nearest mill to it then being at Water- ford, about twenty miles distant. There was no pine timber in the immediate vicinity of the mill, the nearest being a small pinery four or five miles distant, in a northeasterly direction, from which the farmers used to haul logs, to be manufactured into lumber for their own use. The mill was a poor affair, not profitable to the owners, and after three or four years was wholly abandoned, and the land which was occupied by the pond has been cultivated for over thirty years. The second mill was built by Rufus Stevens in 1829 and 1830, on the same stream, four or five miles north of the one first mentioned, and within two miles of the Flint River, just above the present location of the ' Thread Mills.' That mill was run a portion of each year for several years, but without much profit to the owner. The supply of pine logs was procured from the pinery heretofore mentioned, the pinery being within about two miles of the last mentioned mill. The first raft of lumber that ever floated on the tributaries of the Saginaw was manufactured at this mill, and hauled across to Flint River and floated down that stream. There was an attempt made in 1830 by Alden Tupper to
build a mill on the Flint River, below Flushing, but never progressed any further than to erect a frame which was suffered to stand without covering till it rotted down. No mills were built on any of the tributaries of the Saginaw except those above mentioned previous to the building of the steam mill by Harvey and G. D. and E. S. Williams in 1835. Harvey Williams had previously been engaged in Detroit in building the engines of the steamboat ' Michigan,' which in her day was the finest boat that had ever floated on the western lakes, and after completing his contract in winding up his business in that city, he took a steam engine and machinery for a saw mill which he transported to Saginaw, and in company with G. D. and E. S. Williams, erected in 1835 the mill at Saginaw City, which was the first steam mill erected in the Saginaw Valley, if not the first in the state of Michigan. Joel L. Day, late of Bay City, performed the mill-wright work and put in the first mulay saw that was ever used in this part of the country. During the Winter of 1835 and 1836, a fine stock of logs for the mill was provided on the banks of the Tittabawassee, near Sturgeon Creek, and run to the mill, and owing to the local demand for timber, I think the Messrs. Williams did a profitable business with their mill during the season of 1836.
"When the Messrs. Williams began to operate their mill, so little was known about running steam saw mills economically, that when they commenced to build their new mill they contracted for large quantities of cord wood to be delivered for fuel with which to run it.
"In 1834 there was but one saw running on the Saginaw River. That was before the days of mulay saws, but the machinery that propelled that saw was fearfully and wonderfully made. Charles A. Lull was the sash and I was the pitman. When I was a lumber- man, the season's cutting for one saw was estimated at one million feet. We fell short of that amount that year; but we did cut enough to lay the floors in Mr. Lull's log house that he built on his farm, which is now in the town of Spaulding, and which was the first house built in Saginaw County away from the banks of the river.
"FIRST MILL IN THE LOWER SAGINAW REGION.
"After purchasing the Portsmouth tract I found it would be necessary, in order to build up a town, to first erect a steam saw mill. The only one in the vicinity was the Williams' mill, at Saginaw City, and all the lumber that mill could manufacture was used up in that town as fast as it was sawed. I remember during the Summer 1836, a vessel came into the river from Chi- cago, and the parties controlling her offered to wait till a load of lumber could be sawed, and to pay the price that it was selling for at the mill, which was $12 per thousand feet as it run, and would give a bonus of $200 if they could be accommodated; but Messrs. Williams refused to do it for the reason that all the lumber they could make was required for use in their own town. The reason the Chicago parties were so anxious to obtain the lumber was that they had purchased lots in that town, a part of the consideration for which was the erection of buildings on them, and if they failed in that they would forfeit their lots, which were then becoming valu- able; but I do not think lots in Chicago that year sold as high as they did in Saginaw City. In pointing out the location of Ports- mouth on the map to some New York gentlemen, at the 'Exchange' in Detroit, they seemed to think well of it, but remarked that a dozen other locations on the river might be equally as valuable which would detract from the value of that particular location. A military looking gentleman standing by, who was a stranger to me, volunteered a minute description of every point on the Saginaw River from its mouth to the point where it is formed by the junction of the Shiawassee and Tittabawassee. I wondered
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HISTORY OF BAY COUNTY.
who it was that was so well acquainted with the formation of the land and water in that location; I afterwards learned that it was Colonel Baker, who commanded the troops while stationed at Saginaw in 1822. The mill built at Portsmouth in 1836 and 1837 was small compared with some built in these days, but when we look at the condition of the country at that time and the many difficulties to overcome in prosecuting an enterprise of that kind, we find the undertaking to be of greater magnitude than would appear to the reader of the present day.
"At the time the building of the mill was commenced, in October, 1836, Louis Masho resided with his family of half- breeds on what is now known as the Ingraham property. Joseph and Medor Trombley had a trading post where the Center House now stands. Neither of them had families then. John B. Trudell and family resided near where the Watson house now stands, and Leon Trombley resided near the point where the Birney Block in Bay City is now located. Those are all the families I now recollect that resided in this vicinity at that time; others came in soon after. Cromwell Barney, late of Bay City, under- took the erection of the frame of the wood-work of the mill (a house had first to be built to shelter the workmen), while I un- dertook the task of procuring an engine and machinery, which was no slight undertaking, when we consider the difficulties of transportation at that season of the year, and the fact that nothing of the kind could be procured in the state of Michigan. Harvey Williams was at the same time engaged in procuring machinery for the old yellow mill that formerly stood in the south part of East Saginaw. We went together to Cleveland to get our mill gearing, and while there I heard of a second-hand engine at Huron, O., which I purchased, and had the whole shipped to Detroit; and then the great difficulty was to get transportation to Portsmouth. The lateness of the season and the large amount of supplies that had to be shipped from New York and Ohio, to sup- port the large immigration into the state that year, rendered it very difficult to get anything transported to the Upper Lakes. After spending two weeks in Detroit, waiting to find a vessel that I could charter, the schooner 'Elizabeth Ward,' sixty-ton burthen, arrived from Buffalo, and I applied to Gray & Gallagher, who contracted her for charter to the Saginaw River. The captain of the vessel re- fused to make another trip that season, but the owners told me if I would furnish my own men they would let her make the trip for $800. At the same time they recommended a person whom I could get for master, in whose charge they would trust the vessel. In the meantime, while at Detroit I had purchased a stock of $4,000 or $5,000 worth of goods, and was determined that nothing that was within my power to overcome should prevent my pushing onward the enterprise of building the mill. Before accepting Gray & Gallagher's proposition for a charter, I got a proposition from them for the sale of the vessel at $2,500, so I purchased it, believing that to be the best bargain of the two; hired the man for master that was recommended by Gray & Gallagher, got my engine, boilers, machinery and goods on board, with considerable freight for other parties. Among the rest were a lot of supplies for Howard & Van Etten to be leftat the Sauble River. They had at that early day com- menced building a water mill at the outlet of Van Etten Lake, near the Sauble. They expended a great deal of money there, but after their dam had been carried away or undermined two or three times, they gave up the enterprise. I believe they never sawed any lumber there. High prices prevailed in every department in 1836. I had to pay $2.50 per day for common sailors, and for other labor in proportion. I had several men under wages on the vessel, employed to go to Portsmouth and assist in getting the mill to running. After getting everything and everybody on board the vessel, that I
thought was necessary, I saw her sail up the Detroit River, on the 22nd day of November, with a fair wind.
Immediately after that I started for Portsmouth on horseback, in order to meet the vessel on her arrival. By this time the weather had set in cold, and the mud in the road was partially frozen, which rendered the traveling very bad, but with some difficulty I arrived at Flint with my horse, and was there told by my friends that I might as well leave my horse there as to leave it in the woods on the way to Saginaw, for it would be impossible for a horse to perform the journey to Saginaw at that time. By leaving my horse at Flint I was obliged to undertake the journey to Portsmouth by water, as my health was so much impaired by exposure and fatigue in getting my vessel and making preparations for her sailing, that I dare not undertake the journey on foot. In those days I was as much at home, and almost as much at ease, in a canoe, as I am now in an arm-chair. I purchased a canoe and started on my way down Flint River, and met with no obstacle to impede my progress, till shortly after leaving Mr. McCormick's, at Pewanagowink, I encountered a jam of ice in the river, which filled it from shore to shore. I landed my canoe, and hauled it out on the bank, and started down the river, and had not proceeded far before encountering a bayou, which after endeavoring to pass around I had to cross, breaking the ice before me with my arms, and wading in cold water to my arm-pits. I arrived that night at the house of John Farquharson, who, with his son James, was keeping bachelor's hall near the drift-wood on the Flint. The next day I arrived at Mr. Jewett's, at Green Point, where I might have remained to recuperate my exhausted body after the exposure and fatigue it had endured, had not my anxiety about my vessel been so great that I could not rest. I immediately pushed onward, passing down the river on the east side from Green Point to Portsmouth, and here I found the river closed with ice, and no tidings of the vessel. The ice being strong enough to walk on, I sent men daily to the mouth of the river to see if they could gain any tidings of her, but nothing could be seen or heard respecting her. At that time there was no friendly light to guide the mariner to what is now one of the greatest lumber marts in the world, and we did not know but the vessel had missed her way and was frozen in at some other point in the Bay. Whenever a mail would arrive at Saginaw, which was once a month, I would send there for letters. Once I sent two young men in my employ to the postoffice, before the ice on the river was strong enough to bear, and in cross- ing the prairies they got lost and remained out all night. At last I got news that the man I had put in charge of the vessel had turned out to be an unprincipled scamp, and instead of endeavoring to push forward to the Saginaw River, he had sailed the vessel to Port Huron, tied up there and sent to Detroit for his family, and was living very comfortably on board. When I received the news I started again for Detroit. The ice on the Saginaw River would not bear a horse, so there was no way to go but to walk. My tired limbs performed their office till I reached Green Point, and then exhausted nature refused longer to obey the duties of the will. I was there thrown on a bed of sickness from which I did not arise for three weeks. As soon as I was able I proceeded to Detroit, where I found a friend who had been to Port Huron, discharged the faithless captain, paid off the crew, and stopped some of the heavy expenses that were running against me. While at Detroit I deter- mined to proceed with the building of the mill. I found on my ar- rival at Portsmouth that Mr. Barney had finished his part of the contract by having it ready to receive the machinery, and during the Winter of 1836-'37 I had all my stock of goods and every pound of iron that was used in building the mill hauled in sleighs through St. Clair, Macomb, Oakland, Genesee and Saginaw Counties to Portsmouth, and we got the mill running on the 1st of April, 1837,at
RES. OF PHILIP SIMON_ BAY CITY _ MICH.
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which time there was very little home demand for lumber, and there was no point to which lumber could be shipped where it would sell for enough to pay freight. The foregoing narrates some of the hardships endured, and difficulties encountered by the pioneers in endeavoring to inaugurate the manufacture of lumber in the Sagi- naw Valley."
The mill referred to stood on the present site of Albert Miller's upper salt block. For reasons already given, it was operated but a short time and then shut down. In 1841 it was purchased by James McCormick, and his son James J. They shipped the first cargo of lumber from the Saginaw River. This was shipped to Detroit and sold for $8 per thousand, one-third cash, balance at eight and ten months; the lumber running 60 per cent. uppers. It was carried by the Conneaut packet, commanded by Capt. George Raby. They operated the mill until 1846, when James McCormick died. James J. McCormick continued the business until 1849, when he went to California. The mill was destroyed by fire in 1862.
The lumber business languished for several years. The gen- eral depression crowded prices below cost of manufacturing, and the work of developing the vast lumber resources of this region was delayed until 1844. In the Winter of 1844-'45, Messrs. Crom- well Barney and James Fraser erected a water mill at Kawkawlin. This work was done under the supervision of Mr. Israel Catlin, who is still a resident of Bay City. Mr. Catlin superintended the running of the mill for about two years.
In 1845-'46 Messrs. Hopkins, Pomeroy and Fraser erected the first mill built in what was then Lower Saginaw. It stood on the present site of the mill owned by Mr. S. G. M. Gates, on Water Street, a short distance south of Center Street.
In 1847, Catlin & Fraser built the mill known afterward as the Jennison & Rouse Mill. Its original capacity was 6,000 feet of lumber a day. It was located on Water Street, between Eighth and Ninth Streets, and was finally destroyed by fire, and not rebuilt.
In 1850 building began in earnest, and some twelve to fourteen mills were built during the next four years, as will be seen in the history of the mills. In 1857 there were fourteen mills in Bay County, cutting from 1,500,000 to 4,000,000 each.
MANUFACTURERS AND PRODUCT OF 1865.
The following table shows the lumber manufacturers and product of each for the year 1865:
BAY CITY AND PORTSMOUTH.
FEET.
·Watrous & Southworth.
3,000,000
Youngs
1,250,000
Miller & Post. .
4,000,000
Peter & Lewis
4,000,000
J. J. McCormick.
4,400,000
J. F. Rust & Co ..
4,000,000
Watson . .
3,000,000
N. B. Bradley.
6,800,000
William Peter
7,200,000
Miller & Co.
6,000,000
H. M. Bradley.
4,000,000
Catlin & Jennison
3,500,000
Fay & Gates.
4,500,000
James Shearer.
6,815,000
Samuel Pitts
6,800,000
Dolsen & Walker
1,500,000
McEwan & Fraser.
6,000,000
Braddock's Mills
3,000,000
WENONA, BANGOR AND KAW-KAW-LIN.
Huron Salt & Lumber Co
3,180,000
Sage & McGraw.
9,000,000
Drake Mill.
3,000,000
Bolton. . .
5,500,000
Taylor & Moulthrop.
6,000,000
Moore & Smith
7,000,000
Kaw-kaw-lin . 5,000,000
Total
118,445,000
MANUFACTURERS AND PRODUCT FOR 1867.
O. A. Ballou & Co., Kaw-kaw-lin 10,000,000
Moore, Smith & Co., Bangor 6,400,000
William Crossthwaite, “ 400,000
Taylor & Moulthrop, 6,500,000
Keystone Salt & Lumber Co., Bangor. 8,169,617
Drake's Mill, Wenona 3,500,000
22,952,051
Huron Salt & Lumber Mfg. Co., Salzburg
4,000,000
G. W. Hotchkiss, Williams
1,850,000
A. Packard,
650,000
Gates & Fay,
Bay City
5,300,000
H. M. Bradley, & Co.,
5,815,000
Wm. Peter,
7,000,000
N. B. Bradley & Co.,
8,000,000
Eddy, Avery & Co.,
7,800,000
James McCormick,
4,551,000
Jennison & Rouse,
4,200,000
James Shearer & Co., 66
8,009,786
Samuel Pitts & Co.,
8,200,000
J. McEwan,
66
8,500,000
Dolsen & Walker,
6
3,513,000
Folsom & Arnold,
4,700,000
A. Rust & Co.,
6,070,577
Smith & Hart,
4,500,000
C. S. Marton & Co., Portsmouth.
2,020,000
A. Stevens & Co.,
1,500,000
Watrous & Southworth, 6
1,800,000
A. & A. Miller,
8,500,000
Hitchcock,
66
3,000,000
Lewis & Peter,
5,500,000
A. C. Rorison,
66
1,200,000
Total 186,641,031
SOME OF THE CHANGES OF TWENTY YEARS.
The following is from the pen of George W. Hotchkiss, secretary of the Chicago Lumberman's Exchange, and a former resident of Bay City. Speaking of the mills of 1860 he says:
" The saw mills of those days all used gate, muley and circular saws. I think there was but one gang on the river, and the manu- facture of timber amounted to about 300,000,000 feet of lumber and 300,000,000 cords of sawdust yearly. This latter estimate may be a trifle exaggerated, but the circular saws of that day were mostly of about six-gauge, swayed to four gauge, and the saw-dust heap rivaled the lumber pile. When the late Joseph E. Shaw ar- rived in the valley, proposing to build a saw mill, he remarked to me, as we stood by a circular which was cutting about a half-inch saw-kerf, ' I would like to get a contract for sawing 50,000,000 feet per year with gang saws, taking the saving in sawdust for my saw bill.'
" The 300,000,000 feet production of twenty years ago has in no wise decreased, and it is the boast of the citizens that the sea- son of 1882 will end with a record of not far from 1,000,000,000 feet production. I will at present speak simply of the changes in machinery which have enabled this enormous increase. There are not to exceed one-third more mills on the Saginaw River at this time than there were in 1860, but their capacity is fully three-fold. Where then the thick circular saw demanded a toll of pretty near one-half in kerf, and it cost the manufacturer of lumber nearly as much to get rid of his debris as to take care of his lumber, the manufacture of the present day is carried on with thin circulars judiciously swayed to a clearance of the saw blade, with a view to
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