USA > Michigan > Calhoun County > History of Calhoun county, Michigan, With Illustrations descriptive of its scenery > Part 13
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The society has done much to gather and preserve the early history of the county, and we are under many obligations to Mr. Lacey, the secretary, for his courtesy in allowing us access to the records and archives of the society in our work of compiling the history of Calhoun. He has done more to preserve what has been presented than almost any other man, because of taking notes of what has been said at the reunions and publishing the same in the Expounder, of which paper he is and has been the editor since 1873. The greater part of the business of gathering data has been presented orally, instead of by written docu- ments. Mrs. Hays' and Mrs. Ketchum's letters are valuable documents, and Colonel (now Judge) Dickey's paper was carefully prepared and is reliable. These and a few others are the only written documents possessed at the present time by the society.
BATTLE CREEK MEDICAL AND SURGICAL SANITARIUM.
This institution was established in the summer of 1866, under the name of " The Western Health Reform Institute." It is owned by an incorporated body of stockholders, who hold annual meetings for the purpose of electing a board of directors, who have the immediate control and management of the institution.
The buildings and grounds of the institution are situated in the most healthful and pleasant portion of the city of Battle Creek, about one-fourth of a mile within the corporation limits. The buildings comprise, in addition to those shown in the accompanying view, four cottages, a commodious laundry building, and a large · building in the rear of the main building, containing the finest bathing-rooms in the State.
The grounds connected with the several buildings comprise about fifteen acres, most of which is occupied with groves, flower-beds, fruit-trees, small fruit of various kinds, grape-vines, etc. A beautiful brook flows through the rear portion of the premises, running near the foot of the eminence upon which the buildings of the institution are located, the eastern slope of which is terraced and covered with a thrifty vineyard.
The elevated position of the main building, which is reached by a gradual ascent of about three-fourths of a mile from the central portion of the city, commands from the observatory which surmounts it a delightful view of the entire city, and many square miles of diversified landscape scenery in the vicinity. Beautiful hills and dells, meadows, lawns, parks, and groves, with here and there a water-course seen between the trees, make as fine a picture as is often met in the western States east of the Mississippi.
Nature of the institution .- Although at first founded as a water-cure, there has been a gradual change in the plan of treatment employed in the institution, by the introduction of additional methods and appliances. Within the last year especially (1876-77) such modifications have been made, through a change in the medical management, that the institution has been placed upon a strictly rational and scientific basis .. No special nor exclusive method of medical practice is either employed or recommended. Its medical corps are graduates from Bellevue hospital college, New York, and other first-class medical schools, being also members of the State Medical Association. In addition to the ordinary remedies employed in general medical practice, the physicians of this institution employ electricity in its various forms and by various methods, the Swedish movements, all approved hydropathic appliances, sun-bathing, the health lift and other forms of exercise, together with the Turkish and Russian baths, and all other appliances employed in hospitals and sanitariums.
From this it will be seen that this institution differs entirely from the numerous water-cures, health institutes, bathing resorts, and various other so-called " cures" scattered through the country. In addition to the various remedial agents em- ployed, great attention is bestowed upon the dietary of patients.
Objects of the institution .- The objects of this institution are-1, The relief of human suffering by medical and surgical treatment; and 2, The education of the people respecting the laws of health.
For the accomplishment of the first object the institution is fully equipped with all means required for the rational treatment of disease, the physicians in charge claiming to employ all known remedies which have been proven by experience to be of use in medical treatment.
In order to attain the second object of the institution, patients are instructed by parlor talks and lectures respecting the nature of diseases, their causes, and how to avoid them. Thus, while being cured of their various maladies, they are taught how to secure good health for the future.
The charitable character of the institution is established upon a permanent basis, by the assignment by each stockholder of all dividends which might accrue to the institution itself to be used in increasing the facilities for treating and accommodating patients, and in making other improvements. Thus it will be seen that no individual can be in any way benefited, pecuniarily, by the earnings of the institution.
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HISTORY OF CALHOUN COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
Success of the institution .- During the eleven years that the institution has been in operation there have been treated in it more than three thousand patients. Of those who visit it for treatment the majority are chronic invalids, who have been pronounced incurable at home, or given up to die by their friends. All are not cured, of course, but it is unquestionable that a larger percentage of patients recover under the varied treatment and favorable conditions here afforded than could under a less comprehensive mode of treatment.
The institution has an excellent and rapidly-increasing reputation, both at home and abroad, and is an ornament to the city in which it is located. It now accom- modates (1877) about seventy-five patients, and with the addition of the main building, now in process of erection, its capacity will be doubled.
CHAPTER XIII.
TOPOGRAPHY-DRAINAGE-SOIL-TIMBER-GEOLOGY-AREA-GEOGRAPHY -CLIMATOLOGY-FAUNA.
CALHOUN COUNTY, for eligibility of situation, fertility of soil, variety of natural productions, and salubriousness of climate, is not surpassed by any of her sister counties in the territory included in the Chicago treaty of 1821. Watered by the St. Joseph river in the southeastern portion of its area, by the Kalamazoo, which passes through its central and northern part from east to west, the Notta- wa-seepe in the southwestern area, Battle creek (Waupokisco in the Pottawatomie vernacular), Wilder creek, and Rice creek, the affluents of the Kalamazoo, and Pine creek, a tributary of the Nottawa-seepe, and numerous small creeks, its mill privileges are sufficient to propel a much greater amount of machinery than has hitherto been employed in the county, although it ranks among the first counties in the State in respect to flouring-mills at the present time. Its lakes are numerous, but not extensive in area, covering some six thousand three hundred and twenty- five acres of the surface of the county, the stream surface being approximately two thousand acres. The names of the lakes are Duck, Gang, and Prairie, in Clarence ; Hall's, Winnipeg, and Montcalm, in Sheridan ; Spectacle, in Albion ; Homer, in Homer; Lake of the Woods, Pardy, and School, in Lee; Mud, Willis, Ackley, Garfield, Lane's, and Potter, in Convis; Gardiner, in Marshall; Fisher, Cedar, Pout, Long, Lyon, and Fish, in Fredonia ; Brace lakes, in Fredonia and Eckford; Nottawa-seepe, in Fredonia and Tekonsha; Warner, in Tekonsha, and a cluster of lakes near Tekonsha village ; Turtle, in Burlington ; Lee's and Cotton, in Newton ; Beadle, in Emmett ; Clear, Pine, Bear, and St. Mary's, in Pennfield ; Wabasacon, in Bedford ; Hart, and the charming Goguac, in Battle Creek ; and Copanocan and Steamburg, in Le Roy.
THE SOIL
is a fertile sandy loam in the original openings, merging into a darker and heavier soil on the prairies. It is a light, quick, warm soil, and capable of producing abundantly of all the cereals, wheat being the staple product. Fruit is abundantly produced of all varieties common to the climate, and of a most excellent quality. Cranberries abound in all of the marshes, of which there are, in some portions of the county, a considerable area. The township of Lee is largely covered with marsh and tamarack swamp, nearly one-half of its area being so occupied.
THE TIMBER
of the county is principally white and burr oak, the surface originally being mostly the oak openings of the country. Heavy timber is found on the water- courses, wherein other varieties are found, such as sugar-maple, hickory, black walnut, elm, ash, sycamore, whitewood, etc. Some of the plains were very lightly covered with oak, and other parts were very heavily timbered openings.
THE SURFACE
of the county, generally, is a level, consisting of oak plains, prairies, and heavy timber, though in some portions the surface is broken and rolling, rising into rounded summits of some considerable elevation above the immediately surrounding area.
Geologically, the surface, to the unskilled observer, presents a tame and unin- teresting appearance; but to one who can see " books in running streams, and sermons in stones," it is eloquent in language that thrills his heart, and calls forth his best thoughts Scattered all over its surface lies the boulder drift, huge and lesser fragments of rocks, whose parent beds lie hundreds of miles to the north
of Lake Superior, and which fragments have been ground and transported in the great glaciers from the northeast, which plowed over the surface and planed down the rocks, pulverizing and mixing the debris to form the productive soil the present dweller finds at his hand and beneath his feet. Fossils that tell of ocean depths and the processes of creation are found permeating the soil in every locality, but all of them of foreign birth,-none of them are here in situ. They, too, were brought in the glacial drift, and, being composed largely of lime, give that peculiar quality to the soil which makes it so well adapted to the culture of wheat. The boulders form a not-to-be-despised portion of Calhoun's economic treasures, as they are largely used in the foundation walls of buildings, where they make a most solid and compact wall. They are used extensively, too, for inclosures, and when laid up carefully are not liable to fall down, and make an enduring fence. They are quite easily handled and wrought by skilled workmen.
The Marshall sandstone, so called, crops out along the Kalamazoo at Marshall and in Marengo township. The outcrop at Marshall gave the group its pro- visional name, and its stratification is thus given by Winchell :
4 sandstone, rather thick bed, reddish, ten feet.
3 dark reddish, rather hard, very fossiliferous, five feet.
2 reddish-green, homogeneous, thick-bedded, ten feet.
1 light greenish-gray, thick-bedded.
Several characteristic outcrops occur in Marengo. At Battle Creek the lower beds of the group are seen in places highly calcareous and very hard, but filled with characteristic fossils. The outcrop at Athens, Le Roy, and Newton, Win- chell places among the shales of the gritstones of Lake Huron, and says in Le Roy "these argillaceous beds present the characteristics of 'black bituminous shale.'" The outcrop at Albion is also of the Marshall sandstone. This stone is somewhat extensively used for building purposes. It is easily worked, hardens by exposure, and has a neat and substantial appearance. The first workings of the quarries were shaley and imperfect, and proved of insufficient strength for building purposes, but the lower strata are sound and firm. The quarries at Albion have not been utilized very much, and thus far are not considered as suf- ficiently valuable in quality to use for building purposes. Fossils have been col- lected in the Battle Creek outcrop, and described in Silliman's Journal, vol. xxv. page 262.
The area of the county contains four hundred and forty-five thousand two hundred and forty acres of land and eight thousand three hundred and thirty- three acres of water surface, approximately.
Geographically, the county is bounded north by Eaton, east by Jackson, south by Branch, and west by Kalamazoo counties.
Its climatology is similar to that of the surrounding area, being subject to sudden and marked changes of temperature. The range of the thermometer, however, seldom passes beyond ninety degrees above or ten degrees below the unit of Fahrenheit. Snow usually falls sufficiently frequent and heavy to make good sleighing during the greater part of the winter months. The county in the early days of its settlement was subject to malarial diseases of various types; but as the settlements have progressed, and the lands have become better drained and the annual decay of vegetation greatly lessened, these diseases have, in a great measure, disappeared, and the county at the present time ranks with the best in the State in point of health.
THE FAUNA
of the county originally was the same as that of Michigan generally. When the first settlers came to it wild game of all varieties was abundant, and the Indian had made it his hunting-ground for years. Deer in large herds covered the plains and filled the openings; gray wolves and his congener of the prairie, the coyote, were numerous; black bears trooped through the woods; lynxes and wildcats were frequently met with; foxes, red and gray, scampered in every direction; squirrels flirted their brushes, and chickareed in every tree; beaver and otter were occasion- ally met with on the streams, and the Mephitis Americana perfumed every breeze with its pungent odor; wild turkeys in broods strutted through the woods; par- tridges drummed on every log; grouse (prairie chickens) made melody in the spring mornings with their plaintive trumpeting or noisy cackling; wild ducks literally blackened the streams and lakes, and geese filled the air with their harsh cronk as they followed their leader in their triangular-shaped flight; wild pigeons dark- ened the sun with their immense flocks; quail whistled on every side, and snipe and plover cut the air in graceful curves, or "tetered" on the sandbars and shal- lows of the streams; song-birds of every variety and hue filled the woods with their melody, or flashed like sunbeams through the foliage, rivaling, in their bright plumage, the thousand-hued flowers that carpeted the earth on prairie and opening, filling the air with their fragrance and the eye with their loveliness; fish swarmed in every lake, and flashed and sported in every stream, from the muscu- lar sturgeon to the silvery minnow; pike, bass, sunfish, and perch dashed at the
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HISTORY OF CALHOUN COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
flies that sported on the surface of the water in a manner that would have glad- dened the heart of the dullest disciple of Isaak Walton. Wild bees hummed and flashed by like the wind, and stored their honey in hollow trees, in waiting for the settlers, who gathered the sweet deposit as a welcome addition to their meagre bill of fare. And such was Calhoun when, in the olden time, she put on her "beautiful garments" of summer, before the pioneer's axe and plow began to war upon nature in her wildest and most beautiful aspect.
CHAPTER XIV.
REMINISCENCE-CHOLERA-PIONEER VISITING-SOCIAL PARTIES-FIRST BALL -INDEPENDENCE DAY-A BEAR-FIGHT-BRUIN AND THE LOVERS- WOLVES-TRIBULATIONS OF PIONEER COURTSHIP.
A PIONEER life is made up of toil, privation, and suffering, largely, and yet it is not all gloom and shadow. The bright sunlight at times gleams athwart the dark clouds that hang upon the horizon, coloring with its soft, warm tints the blackness thereof, until the whole mass is suffused with the rays of hope, and bright anticipation casts its halo over the arching gloom, dispelling sadness and sorrow, grief and pain, and leading the mourner unconsciously upward and for- ward into more cheerful surroundings; and, though he may lapse therefrom many times and recur again to the depths below, yet the memory remains, and he is the sooner quickened by the next passing ray, momentary though it may be, and lifted thereby the more readily into an atmosphere rarer, clearer, purer, and more enduring.
The saddest experience that came to the first pioneers of Calhoun was that of 1832, when the dread pestilence, the Asiatic cholera, leaping over the bounds of the noisome cellars, filthy streets, hot and stifling brick walls of cities, fell like a thunderbolt from a clear sky among the settlers in the fresh woods, whose foli- age quivered in the summer breezes direct from the great lake beyond, and with- out warning gathered its victims ; reducing the handful of pioneers over a tenth in a few days. We have given elsewhere an account of the death of the first victim, Isaac H. Hurd. Mrs. Pierce, the beloved and estimable wife of Rev. J. D. Pierce, was the second one in Marshall, and Randall Hobart made her coffin, the first one in the county, and he and the husband buried her at night. The case of the Nichols family, of Athens, is given elsewhere. At the pioneer reunion of 1875, incidents were related of Rufus Hosmer, now deceased, who, while on his way to Grand Rapids with a friend, passed through forty miles of woods, and near the close of one day heard a halloo, and, upon following up the sound, came to a lone cabin and found a man alone with his dead wife. They stopped and made the best preparations they could, and the next day gave the wife a pioneer burial and went on their way, leaving the stricken husband alone with his sorrow. Dr. Comstock alluded to a pioneer funeral at Bellevue, where a hus- band took his dead wife into his sleigh and came through the woods forty miles to give her a Christian burial.
Those were days when among the pioneers
"Sorrow flowed from eye to eye, And joy from heart to heart."
When the griefs of a neighbor were made the common griefs of all, and the burdens were equally divided whenever it was possible for such disposition of them. Was any one glad, all rejoiced with him; did any one sorrow, all mourned. Neighbors were at long distances, and necessity made them all kin. What wonder then is it that the old pioneers, as they see their companions dropping by the wayside overcome by the heat and burden of the day, cling closer to one another, and, as they meet together at their reunions, speak lovingly and lingeringly of the " early days," when time was young with them, and hearts were buoyant and hopes high, and purpose firm. Well may they look back upon the days that will never return, and tell their stories o'er of hair-breadth 'scapes from the wild beasts, and the toils and sorrows of pioneer life, for such days are passed away forever. The railroads have taken the pioneer into the realms of the has been, and we shall ne'er look upon his like again.
But there was a humorous side to the pioneers' lives as well as a sorrowful and sad one, and the amusements of the day were entered into with a zest. Visits were made in those days, where calls are now in vogue. In the winter the whole family would pile into the sled and go off for a good time from five to ten miles. In the summer the ladies made their calls on horseback, with the larger olive- branches on the horse in front and the smaller ones behind. Judge Dickey tells how in those days every man was a neighbor; and says, "Now some go fifty miles to find one, because this one is too rich, that one not rich enough, or his
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politics or religion is wrong. There was no such trouble in our early associations. We then had no roads, but sometimes in going to balls and bees in timber lands a crotched sled hauled by oxen was used, and sometimes, in getting over a large log, the party would slide out behind, but that made no difference. A girl got quite as many invitations to dance as though she had not slipped off the sled. Then we had 'slews' of foot visiting, women and children in the afternoon and husbands in the evening ; and the fiddle was brought out and the dance went on, participated in by old and young." The first social party given in the county was by Sidney Ketchum, in Marshall, in his large log house, which stood on the present site of C. P. Dibble's elegant mansion. Every person in town was invited, and nearly all were there, infants included, and the house was not crowded. Mrs. Hays, in writing of it, says, " It was a fine entertainment, and the company were well appearing and well dressed, and would not disgrace Marshall or any town at the present day." The first regular ball was given on the occasion of the opening of the National in Marshall, January 1, 1836, by Colonel Andrew Mann, which was attended by the people for miles around. In April following Colonel Mann gave another soirée dansante, with great success.
The first celebration of the Fourth of July was, had in 1836, at Marshall, at which time there was a large concourse of people gathered into the village from the country round about. Horatio Hickok was president of the day, Boville Shum- way, reader; W. H. Brown, orator; Judge Dickey, marshal; S. S. Alcott, George S. Wright, and others, committee of arrangements. The oration was delivered in the woods, near the site of the present Lutheran church. The dinner was pro- vided by Colonel Mann, of the National, who graced his table with roast pigs at every eight feet, which one of the guests said " were cooked just enough to make them mad;" and these infantile porkers were flanked in front, rear, and all around with champagne-bottles, the tables being otherwise garnished with “ chicken fixins" of every attainable variety. The viands dispatched, the fluids and toasts were in order, and a jolly time was had, remembered by all who participated.
Jacob Ward, of Marengo, was returning from his work one night having his rifle over his shoulder, when he met a huge she-bear, and of course, hunter-like, could not forego the sending of a bullet crashing into her ribs. She fell to the shot, and he in his excitement spilled his percussion-pills which were then in vogue, before the introduction of caps, and was left with a useless gun. He cut a large club, and going up to the bear, which was still lying on the ground, struck it a heavy blow on the head, which, instead of stunning it, had the contrary effect of rousing it to action, and on the instant she rose to her feet and reached for the woodsman for a close, if not a loving embrace. He grasped her on either side of her shaggy head, when she bit him through the wrist. But it was life or death then with him, and he held on despite her fierce growls and sharp teeth. She bit his wrists through and through, lacerating them fearfully, but he kept her at a distance sufficient to prevent her using her hind feet on his person, and finally, by an almost superhuman effort, threw her down and got away. He had his wounds dressed at the first cabin he came to, the occupant taking his gun and going out to find the wounded brute. He had not gone far from the place where the struggle had been made before he found her in the death-throes, and soon dispatched her.
William R. McCall relates an incident of his courting days, where his privacy was interrupted by three of the plantigrade family at a time when two were company and more were in the way. When Mr. McCall was paying his addresses to his lady-love in 1833-34, he used to walk out into Marengo to see her of a Sunday, and as the house her parents lived in had but a single room, the young people used to go into the woods for their conversation, and to settle the prelimi- naries of their future housekeeping. One Sunday afternoon, when the usual walk had been made and the pair were coming back to the cabin, they sat down upon a log to prolong the pleasant interview; and while " eyes spoke love to eyes which spoke again," an old bear and two cubs came along and stopped to gaze at the unwonted vision. Madame Bruin looked at them, and then at her frolicking cubs, as if comparing the relative prettiness of the two pairs, and, as if content with her pair, walked slowly on with them and was soon out of sight. The seat on the log was soon vacated, for the shades of night were falling fast and the young man had the journey to Marshall to make through the woods, and did not care to meet such an interesting trio on his way. Prairie fires in the first two or three years used to run through the settlements, and sometimes caused consider- able damage. At other times, by dint of hard work " and fighting fire with fire " by setting back fires, the stacks and crops were saved. One night when John Bertram was building his frame barn in 1832, as the family of Burland 'and Ber- tram and his men were sitting about the fire-place chatting, a wolf poked his nose under the door of the cabin, and Bertram's dogs, of which he used to keep two or three, sounded the alarm, they too being in the house; and Burland firing from the window broke the brute's leg, and he was found by the dogs the next morning and dispatched.
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