History of Kalamazoo county, Michigan, Part 26

Author: Durant, Samuel W. comp
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia. Everts & Abbott
Number of Pages: 761

USA > Michigan > Kalamazoo County > History of Kalamazoo county, Michigan > Part 26

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

" If the bank printed its notes and the location in the same ink, it was denominated a 'wild-cat;' if the notes were left blank for the place of business to be stamped upon them in red ink, it was called a 'red dog ;' if the blank was stamped in blue ink, it was called a ' blue pup.' But all were of dangerous genus, and bit and scratched the dear people who ventured to handle them with equal delight."t

The experience of the Western States with various kinds of currency has been a very dear one, and every State lost millions of dollars in the break-ups and failures and swin- dling operations of the years of experimental banking. Even if a certain issue was sound of itself the counterfeits upon it were equal to the genuine in appearance and exe- cution, and would deceive an expert. No man dared to keep a bill or note overnight for fear the bank would " burst" before morning. Every merchant and business man kept a " counterfeit detector" in his money-drawer for both coin and paper, and even then he was a most remark- bly lucky individual who did not get a fair percentage of counterfeit or broken bank-notes.

The great civil war accomplished two things for which the American people should forever be thankful,-it made the United States a nation, and gave them a sound cur- rency. The " greenback" and national bank-note are good in every corner of the land, because a nation's wealth is pledged to make them equivalent to metal currency. State and corporate banks are passed away forever, and the canine and feline species are extinct in the land of their origin.

* From notes by Mr. Van Buren. 13

t Van Buren.

THE WILD-CAT DAYS.

The following account of the " wild-cat" experiences of this State is from a letter written to the Chicago Tribune, by Z. Eastman, of Elgin, Ill. :

"Michigan was lying snugly in the bosom of Uncle Sam, where it . was warmly nursed as a Territory, with a boy, Stevens T. Mason, less than one and twenty years of age, recognized by Gen. Jackson as Territorial Governor. Michigan was then the favorite place to which New England boys came to buy land. Paper money was freely taken by Uncle Sam, and his acres went off at a rapid pace, as the paper promises of the banks to pay came in. Money was as plenty as chips in the forests of that most progressive State of swamps and oak openings, and it did not much matter on what bank, strong or broken, safety-fund or shin-plaster, if it were only a printed bank-bill of any denomination,-the larger the better.

" Of the few old banks of Massachusetts which ever failed before these days was the Belchertown Bank,-a rural town of substantial farmers, with no commercial business. Here they had got up a bank to issue money, which they did all according to the charter; but, having no business, the bank of course failed. Their bills were printed upon an unusually transparent paper, tinted red, so that this money might well have taken a significant name that came after,-' red dog.'

" This Belchertown joins Amherst, Mass., that seat of learning and morality. One of the exemplary youths of that town came out to Michigan to spy the land and make an investment. He saw what a wonderful State Michigan was ; what vast resources for Yankee genius ; what a remarkably singular way they had of doing business there ; also the great abundance of money and the freedom with which it was used and, especially, paid out. He came back as a spy with a goodly report ; and he brought word that so free was the use of money in Michigan, and so great was the demand there, these people were not at all particular about the kind they received. Specie would not be refused, but bank-bills were preferred, and it did not much matter where the banks were located, East or West, or whether alive or broken, or the bills counterfeit even,-it was all the same to the good people in this eminently Democratic Territory, governed by a boy- governor, and not giving due heed to the sound doctrine of ' exclusive specie currency.' And the sober people of Amherst listened to the report of this young man, and thought favorably of the new Territory as a place for an investment; and so they gathered up their spare funds and searched everywhere, and in their old laid-away leather pocket-books, for the red bills of the defunct bank of Belchertown, which had at last found its place of redemption in the backwoods of Michigan ; and they sent back a young man well stocked with Belcher- town and other New England currency to make for them large entries of government lands. About the same time-that is to say, in 1834 or 1835-came also the president of the Bank of Amherst, an insti- tution that stood well, that redeemed all its issues in specie when called upon (which never happened) ; and he came for the purpose of entering wild and timbered lands in the State of Michigan, and to pay therefor the paper currency of his own bank. And he found such as suited hin well, and the lands on which the pine logs are cut that furnished millions of feet of lumber which came into the Chicago market every year from Muskegon. These he bought of occupants as well as at the land-office, and finding the section that suited him, and the payment being agreed upon, he would sit down upon a stump, take out a roll of the printed sheets of his bank, sign off the requisite amount of bills to pay the price, and receive a title to his land. Or the same formality in the land-office of the district resulted in the transfer of title from the government to the bank president,-his sig- nature to the bills being the pivot on which the transfer turned. Those were the days just prior to the coming of wild-cats into Michi- gan, and just preceded also a very ferocious ' varmint' of precisely the opposite genus, which was Jackson's specie circular. It is very pos- sible that this stern old man with the hickory face, sitting in his Presidential chair at Washington, had heard how they were buying up his broad acres in the Territory of Michigan and paying for them in those narrow slips of blue and red paper. This much he knew certainly, that the lands were going fast; that the grasp of the specu- lator was lapping upon township on township, far outstripping the march of even the squatter or the hunter after the deer; and in place of them, the receivers' offices were being surfeited with the money called 'paper promises to pay.' If the process went on, the public

HISTORY OF KALAMAZOO COUNTY, MICHIGAN.

lands would soon be all transformed into paper, and the ultimate prospect of redemption hopeless. At the same time he knew that work was getting sadly out of fashion; that few were producing any- thing, not even as much as the consumption of food, the majority living by their wits or sleight-of-hand in trade; and, according to the philosophy of this rigid old homespun, if this process continued, not only would the banks fail with their paper on his hands, but starva- tion must be the fate of a portion of the people. He rose up and swore with his favorite oath that he would mend matters or make them worse; and he commanded the Secretary of the Treasury and his under-servants of the land-office to receive no more of the frail stuff as money, called rags ; but to take only such as Senator Benton had full faith in, viz., gold and silver, in payment for the public lands ; and this was the specie circular. The United States Bank had already had the hickory cudgel over its proboscis, and it was spouting blood. This other was a blow at the land speculators, and an admonition to the State banks that the same doughty President had determined that it was time they should set their back counting-rooms in order. The nation staggered under this blow from Washington; it was felt in all parts of the land and by all classes. But Michigan had had a fair start under the speculative regime, and they were building fair and substantial towns in their woods, such as Ypsilanti, Ann Arbor, Jack- son, Marshall, Kalamazoo, etc., and before the stumps were out of their prominent streets they had substantial, large, brick structures up for hotels, stores, and dwellings, which stand to-day as proud monuments of the energy of the times when Jackson smote them.

"The Territory of Michigan was admitted as a State in 1837. It was an exemplary Democratic State, and its people meant to reflect in the very strongest light the sound doctrines of the Democratic party. They were opposed to monopolies and to a National bank, and were quite willing to swear by Benton's addendum-specie currency -and also the down-East commercial interpretation of the doctrine, free banking with real estate security. The Michiganders had plenty of land, which they had bought when paper was plenty, but were very poor in matters of dollars, and halves, and quarters; and since bank-bills would no longer buy lands of government, they had gone suddenly back whence they had come, and paper became as scarce as silver. There was not currency enough in the State to move the swamp lands. Under the license of party fidelity they proceeded at once to legislate for the emergency. How prone the people are to fly to the relief of the Legislature when they get hard up! They, there- fore, at Detroit, through their representatives, proceeded to legislate into full vitality the essential doctrine of the Democratic party,-that banking should not become a monopoly ; that all people had inalien- able rights to run a bank, provided they put up the security ; and, that land, being the surest of all property, was the best security that a person proposing to do banking could put up as a guarantee to all who might hold the bills of the bank that they could be redeemed or paid when call for payment should be made. Who could state a principle more logically than this ? And they passed a law that any number of persons combining together so and so, and pledging to the State a certain amount of real estate, unincumbered, and at certain presumed-to-be fair prices in valuation, should enjoy the privilege of issuing bills which should be deemed and taken as money, and which bills should entitle the holder to draw specie from the bank in re- demption for the same,-should he be so foolish as to call for it. Now all that was weak in this system was the possibility that the people would be foolish and call for specie when they did not want it, and when it could do them no good. Like Gunther's candy, then un- known, there was a fear that children might even cry for it. And, besides, there was that other equally Democratic doctrine, 'specie currency ;' and that possibly might come in and clash with the also Democratic doctrine, 'free banking.' And through this gate, which the legislators at Detroit set open, and propped with a good hickory stick, that looked some like Jackson's cudgel, the wild-cats came into Michigan. And these were the names of a part of scores or many scores of them : The ' Bank of Lapeer,' ' Oakland County,' ' Macomb,' 'Ypsilanti,' 'Bank of Washtenaw,' 'Calhoun,' ' County Bank,' ' Bank of Marshall,' 'Jackson,' ' Allegan,' 'Sandstone,' ' Huron,' etc. They issued their bills all according to law, all secured; the wealth of the lands, which could not depart, was represented in a currency which they called money, and to be used as the medium of trade, to raise crops and move crops; to buy and sell merchandise with, etc. They were good-looking bills, and seemed as much like money as a green- back of 1874. How very nice was all this ! The country was happy,

for they had money in great abundance. The merchants bought large stocks of goods; the stores were well filled. The people bor- rowed money of the banks freely ; everybody that could paid out. And money was again as plenty as when the worthy young man of Amherst disbursed Belchertown, or the venerable president made money from the stump of a tree with a stroke of his pen. But time hurries up events most marvelously. The financial convulsion, which Jackson either mended or made worse, came on unappeased, till at last his successor, Van Buren, when he took the Presidency, found all the banks of the country under a suspension; there were neither Nick Biddle's bills nor Benton's click of the dollar nor the shine of the eagles through the net-work of silk purses. The sound Common- wealth Bank of Boston, which secured itself by loaning to its cus- tomers on bonds and mortgages, and thus honored Democratic notions of banking in Boston, failed at the first dash, being sadly surprised to learn the flaw in the theory that good notes of hand, well secured, would not redeem bank-bills; that money, after all, was the only commodity that would redeem promises to pay.

" The banks of Michigan being so far out of the range of the finan- cial tornados that raged where money was, it was reasonable to think they might escape. It does not appear that any sudden squall keeled them over. Trade went on, the merchants sold goods rapidly, and bought what little produce the tillers of the soil had in those days to sell; goods grew gradually higher in the stores; money grew gradu- ally less in price. One bank far away would be worth ninety cents, another eighty, and so, graduated by no known rule, they stood, the representatives of values from twenty-five cents to par. Those at par were received for goods at twenty per cent. above cost in certain places (perhaps near home, if the unfortunate bantlings had any home), while they would be at twenty-five cents in another section of the State. The currency became a wonderment to all the Wolverines. It was laughed at, sneered at, or jeered at, as fancy might dictate, and thus became the prolific source of many grim jokes. The 'Sandstone' bank became the main butt. 'Lapeer' was another synonym of un- fathomable banking mysteries. 'Wild-Cat' was the general term by which the whole breed was known. 'Red Dog,' ' Blue Pup,'' Grind- stone,' ' Sandy Bay,' ' Sink-a-porc,' and other queer terms designated certain classes of this queer currency. And yet it may seem strange why it should be so very different from any other currency. It was authorized by law; it was the first complete trial of organizing a system by which the bill-holders should be secured by a pledge of real estate. The absurdity of the arrangement was, that it could have been supposed that the wild lands of Michigan could be con- verted at any reasonable period into anything with which bank-bills could be redeemed. The winding up, or rather closing up, of the ex- periment was as singular as its origin. They had but a year or so, and perhaps but a few months' trial of confidence before the public. We have no knowledge of any process of winding up, or foreclosing to save bill-holders; or that the lands put up were ever appropriated to redeem the currency. It rather 'petered' out. The public had their time for ridiculing that style of banking, and then very gener- ously abandoned the whole thing, leaving the expressive title as an inheritance to future generations."

When the bank commissioners came around to look into the financial condition of the various institutions, the officers had a very ingenious way of meeting the emergency. They found some bank or individual that had a few thousand dollars in specie. This they borrowed, and when their bank had passed examination and been pronounced sound, the money was loaned to the next in order, and so on in rotation until the commissioners had finished their work and departed. In this way a thousand dollars might serve as a specie basis for all the banks in the Territory or State; all that was necessary was to know the line of movement of the com- missioners, and an approximate to the date of their appear- ance.

An incident of the " wild-cat" days is related in connec- tion with the Battle Creek bank by Mr. Van Buren : A gentleman connected with the " wild-cat" bank at that place, in the fall of 1837, borrowed one thousand dollars in five-

CIVIL ORGANIZATION OF THE COUNTY.

franc pieces of a citizen of Le Roy, Calhoun Co. This he used at the inspection of the Battle Creek bank ; then taking it to the next in rotation, and so on, going the rounds of all the banks in the neighborhood, including " Sinkapore," at the mouth of the Kalamazoo River, keeping far enough ahead of the slow-going commissioners to make the deposit in time to meet them. He kept the money about a month or six weeks, and paid its owner forty bushels of wheat for its use when he returned it.

In the same way a citizen of Three Rivers borrowed the " specie basis" of Kalamazoo, to serve the bank in his place. On his way home, in a one-horse wagon, he lost his way, and was compelled to camp in the woods overnight. He slept with the " sub-treasury" under his head, and in the morning made his way joyfully to Three Rivers without meeting a Dick Turpin on the road. The commissioners found the bank all right, and certified accordingly, while the specie was quietly returned to its owner.

CHAPTER XV.

CIVIL ORGANIZATION OF THE COUNTY.

First Counties organized in the Territory-Organization of Kala- mazoo County-First Townships-County-Seat-Subdivisions.

THE earliest counties organized within the Territory of Michigan, from 1796 to 1830, were as follows: Wayne, which included the . lower peninsula, by Gen. Anthony Wayne, after whom it was named,* in 1796; re-established by proclamation of Governor St. Clair, July 15th of the same year, and organized by proclamation of Governor Cass, Nov. 21, 1815 ; Monroe, taken from Wayne, organ- ized July 14, 1817; Mackinac, organized Oct. 26, 1818; Oakland, March 28, 1820; Washtenaw, 1826 ; Chippewa, from Mackinac, 1826; Lenawee, from Monroe, 1826; St. Joseph, from Lenawee, 1829; and Kalamazoo, from St. Joseph, July 30, 1830.

Under the act of October 29, 1829, providing for the laying out of certain counties, Kalamazoo County is de- scribed in the seventh section as follows :

" That so much of the county as lies south of the base line, and north of the line between townships four and five south of the base line, and west of the line between ranges eight and nine west of the meridian, and east of the line between ranges twelve and thirteen west of the meridian, be, and the same is hereby set off into a sepa- rate county, and the name thereof shall be Kalamazoo."t

The act erecting the counties of Cass and St. Joseph, approved Nov. 4, 1829, contained the following section :

"That the counties of Kalamazoo, Calhoun, Branch, Barry, and Eaton, and all the country lying north of township four north of the base line, west of the principal meridian, south of the county of Machilimackinac, and east of the line between ranges twelve and thirteen, and of Lake Michigan, where said range line intersects the lake, shall be attached to and compose a part of the county of St. . Joseph."}

* Albach's Annals of the West states that the county was organ- ized and the civil law established by Winthrop Sargent, secretary of the Northwest Territory, in September, 1796. The statement copied is from the State Census Report for 1874. Judge Campbell says Sar- gent set off the county on the 18th of August, 1796.

t Territorial Laws, vol. ii. page 736. New edition.

# Ibid., page 745.

On the 5th of November, 1829, an act was passed for the subdivision of certain counties, section 4 of which reads as follows :

"That the counties of Kalamazoo and Barry, and all the country lying north of the same, which are attached to and compose a part of the county of St. Joseph, shall form a township of the name of Brady, and the first township-meeting be held at the house of Abram I. Shaver, in said township."?

ACT OF ORGANIZATION.|

" Be it enacted by the Legislative Council of the Territory of Michi- gan, That the county of Kalamazoo shall be organized from and after the taking effect of this act, and the inhabitants thereof entitled to all the rights and privileges to which by law the inhabitants of the other organized counties of this Territory are entitled.

"SEC. 2. That there shall be a county court established in the said county, which court shall be held on the third Tuesday of October in each year.

"SEC. 3. That a circuit court shall also be held in the said county, and that the several acts concerning the Supreme, circuit, and county courts of the Territory of Michigan, defining their jurisdiction and powers, and directing the pleadings and practice therein in certain cases, be, and the same are hereby made applicable to the circuit court in the aforesaid county of Kalamazoo.

"SEC. 4. That the said county of Kalamazoo shall be one circuit, and the court for the same shall be held hereafter on the first Tuesday of September in each year.

"SEC. 5. That all suits, prosecutions, and other matters now pend- ing before the circuit or county courts of the county of St. Joseph, or before any justice of the peace of said county, shall be prosecuted to final judgment and execution ; and all taxes heretofore levied, or which may be hereafter levied for the year one thousand eight hun- dred and thirty, shall be collected in the same manner as though the said county of Kalamazoo had not been organized.

"SEC. 6. That the circuit and county courts shall be held at the county-seat, at the court-house or other usual place of holding courts therein, provided that the first term of said courts shall be holden at the house of Abraham I. Shaver, " in said county : Provided, That it shall be lawful for the said circuit and county courts to adjourn the first term of said courts from the house of said Shaver to such other place in said county as to said courts may appear expedient.

" SEC. 7. That the counties of Calhoun, Barry, and Eaton, and all the country lying north of township four, north of the base line, west of the principal meridian, south of the county of Michilimackinac, and east of the line between ranges twelve and thirteen and of Lake Michigan, where said range line intersects the lake, shall be attached to and compose a part of the county of Kalamazoo for judicial pur- poses.

"SEC. 8. That all acts and parts of acts now in force contravening the provisions of this act be, and the same are hereby repealed. This act shall take effect and be in force from and after the first day of October, one thousand eight hundred and thirty.

"Approved July 30, 1830."

From the above extracts it appears that Kalamazoo County formed a part of the county of St. Joseph from Nov. 4, 1829, to Oct. 1, 1830, and during nearly the same period constituted also a part of the township of Brady, which included about one-fifth of the area of the lower peninsula.

It does not appear by any written or printed record that this great township performed during this period any legal or corporate act. If its citizens ever assembled to transact township business the records are in St. Joseph County.

" AN ACT to organize the townships of Arcadia and Brady, in the county of Kalamazoo.

" Be it enacted by the Legislative Council of the Territory of Michi- gan, That all that part of the county of Kalamazoo comprised in

¿ Ibid., page 787. | Ibid., page 836.

" This name is printed in the Territorial Laws both Abram and Abraham.

100

HISTORY OF KALAMAZOO COUNTY, MICHIGAN.

townships one and two south of the base line, and in ranges nine, ten, eleven, and twelve west of the principal meridian, shall be a town- ship by the name of Arcadia, and that the first township-meeting shall be holden at the house of Titus Brownson,* in said township.

"SEC. 2. That all that district of country known and distinguished as townships three and four south, and ranges nine, ten, eleven, and twelve west, in said county of Kalamazoo, shall be a township by the name of Brady ; and that the first township-meeting shall be holden at the house of Abram I. Shaver, in said township.t

" Approved July 30, 1830."

This original subdivision of the county divided it into two equal parts, as will be seen by reference to the follow- ing outline map.

Range 12.

Range 11.

Range 10.

Range 9.

Town 1.

GULL

LAKE:

AUGUSTA.

Town 2.

CLIMAX

Town 3.

Town 4.

SCHOOLCRAFT

VICKSBURG

MAP SHOWING FIRST SUBDIVISION OF THE COUNTY IN 1830.

The settlement where the village of Kalamazoo now stands, made by Titus Bronson, in June, 1829, had in- creased to quite a hamlet, and had been named Bronson, in honor of its proprietor, or, rather, one of its proprietors, for Stephen H. Richardson was a partner in laying out the village .¿ In the latter part of the year 1830, immediately after the organization of the county, the question of a county- seat began to be agitated, and Governor Cass appointed two commissioners for the purpose of ascertaining the most proper point for its location. Their report, after due in- vestigation, was as follows :

"To his Excellency Lewis Cass, Governor of Michigan :

"SIR,-The commissioners appointed by your excellency to locate the seat of justice for the county of Kalamazoo beg leave respectfully to report :

" That, after taking the oath prescribed by law, and within thirty days after being notified of their appointment, they proceeded to the county and entered upon the duty assigned them with a firm deter- mination to discharge it fearlessly and without reference to any object rather than the public good. Many difficulties stood in the way of a speedy determination of the most suitable site for the county-seat, which led to a much more thorough examination of the county than was at first contemplated.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Kalamazoo county, Michigan, Part 26

Author: Durant, Samuel W. comp Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Philadelphia. Everts & Abbott Number of Pages: 761

Author: Durant, Samuel W. comp
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia. Everts & Abbott
Number of Pages: 761