USA > Michigan > Wexford County > History of Wexford County, Michigan, embracing a concise review of its early settlement, industrial development and present conditions > Part 28
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As soon as the snow had melted away in the spring of 1863, which in those days was not until well into May, with such of his worldly possessions as he could convey in a one horse-wagon, Mr. Hall, with his wife, a cow, some pigs and some chickens, started over what is now called the old State road. Fallen tree trunks, tangled un- derbrush and bridgeless streams he had to encounter and overcome, but no obstacles were sufficient to baffle his determination to make for himself a home in Wexford coun-
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ty. For three full weeks he battled with con- stantly recurring difficulties, at the end of which time he reached the Manistee river. Not a soul had they seen since starting on their trip, for there was not a dwelling be- tween Big Prairie on the south till the Mon- roe settlement in Grand Traverse county was reached. Arriving at the river, the next thing was how to cross it. Some two miles up the river from the line of the state road was what was known as the " pony jam," where the Indians were in the habit of cross- ing with their ponies on their hunting or migratory trips. About eighty rods down the river was another jam which afforded easy crossing on foot but was not very safe for four-footed animals. These "jams" were made of the trunks of trees which had been torn from the banks by the ever-chang- ing channel of the river and carried down stream until arrested by some projecting point of land. Thus for ages and ages had these accumulations increased until in some cases, like that of the "pony jam," they had entirely covered the river. To see the Manis- tee river today one would almost think this statement was a fairy tale, but it is never- theless true, as a number of people yet liv- ing in Wexford county can testify from ac- tua! and personal knowledge. While Mr. Hall was inspecting the jam below the state road with a view of making such additions to the nearly perfect natural bridge as would enable him to move his belongings to the north bank of the river, he was agreeably surprised to find that another adventurous person like himself was camped on the north side of the river. bent on getting his mova- bles to the south bank of the river. Both having the one desire of crossing the river in view, the task was much more easily ac- complished than either had supposed, and it
was not long before the crossing was com- pleted and each went on his way rejoicing. This second settler was Dr. John Perry, who was the first settler in the county on the south side of the Manistee river.
The homestead law was an important factor in the settlement of Wexford as well as all the other counties in northern Michi- gan, and before the close of navigation in 1864 nearly every available piece of govern- ment land along the line of the state road for seven miles from the north line of the county had been taken. This did not mean that the new settlers were very numerous, as each homesteader was entitled to a piece of land half a mile square, so it took only four families to locate a whole section of land, and as every alternate section had been set apart for the purpose of aiding in the building of a railroad, the settlers were necessarily widely separated. Notwith- standing this fact everybody was every- body's neighbor, for, as Will Carleton very aptly puts it in his "First Settler's Story." "Neighbors meant counties in those days." People would go three or four miles to a so- cial gathering, or to assist a "neighbor" in raising a log house, or join in a "logging bee" to enable him to get a small patch of land ready to raise a little something for himself and family to eat. Thus during the summer of 1864 log cabins and small clear- ings made their appearance in quite a num- ber of places in Wexford county where pre- viously, for unnumbered centuries, the pri- meval forest had reigned supreme, undis- turbed by naught save the wild denizens who found homes beneath its sheltering branches and in its tangled jungles, and the almost equally wild Indians who roamed at will through its majestic solitudes or fought each other to the death in its shadows.
CHAPTER III.
ARRIVAL OF NEW SETTLERS CONTINUES.
As soon as the snow was gone and navi- gation opened in the spring of 1864, the tide of emigration to the Grand Traverse region set in with renewed vigor, and Wexford county got its full share of the newcomers. These later arrivals were forced to take lands farther back from the state road, and consequently had to make roads for them- selves from the state road back to their re- spective homesteads. There was no high- way commissioner to lay out roads, and no way to raise funds by tax to open them, therefore the roads or "blazed trails" were not made on section lines, neither did they follow any particular point of the compass. They usually took the shortest route to the settler's home except where hills or swamps intervened, in which case they would pass around the obstruction. It was no easy mat- ter to follow these trails by those unaccus- tomed to "woods lore," and especially was it difficult in the twilight or after dark, which often occurred with those who were forced to work out a part of the time to earn something to support their families, or in returning from house raisings or logging bees.
An amusing incident was related to the writer by a Mr. Durbin, who lived only half
a mile from the state road, which fully illus- trates these difficulties. He had been away from home at work and, supper being a lit- tle late, it was quite dark by the time he reached the point where he had to leave the state road. About half way to his house a tree had blown down, the top falling di- rectly in the path. When he reached this tree-top he thought he could pick his way around it and tell when he struck the path again, as every one familiar with such mat- ters knows t that there is no sound of breaking twigs or crushing leaves in a wellbeaten path. He confidently started around the tree top, but did not find the path. He kept on going, however, and soon found himself back to the state road. He soon found where his path turned into the woods again and started for home. When he reached the fallen tree-top he resolved to take extra cantion this time and find the path on the other side. He moved very carefully and listened intently for the lack of snapping and crunching which would in- indicate the finding of the path, but, not find- ing it, kept on going, hoping he might see the light in his home, when, to his great surprise, he finally reached the state road again. He was thoroughly baffled and not
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a little frightened at this turn of events, but finally decided to try it once more. This time when he reached the fallen tree-top he crawled through it, over the limbs and under the brush, never losing touch of the beaten path and of course got home all right that time.
When the summer of 1864 closed there were some twenty families in the county. These were nearly all on the line of the state road or within two miles of it. In the spring of 1865 the settlement received numerous additions, some coming by boat and some overland. During the summer of 1865 an arrangement was made by which Jacob York, one of the newcomers who had a horse and wagon, made weekly trips to Traverse City to take out and bring in the mail for the set- tlement, and also to do such errands and bring in such light articles of merchandise or freight as he could in his light wagon. By common consent the house of William Masters, on the state road, was chosen as the place for leaving and receiving letters and parcels, and his house soon came to be called the "Postoffice." Later in the year Mir. Masters was appointed postmaster and a mail sack was furnished in which to carry the mail, but the settlers had to pay Mr. York for his services for a year before the postoffice department would consent to es- tablish a mail route to the new settlement.
The first school house built in Wexford county was made of logs and was situated near the county line between Wexford and Grand Traverse counties. It was put up by volunteer work on the part of those interested in having a school, and the first teacher, Zylphia Harper, was paid under the old sys- tem of rate bill. for as yet there was not even a township or school district organization
in the county. This school house was, a few years later, the scene of the first law snit ever held in Wexford county. It was a case of assault and battery between Jay J Copley and Myron Baldwin and grew out of the holding of the second caucus in Wexford county. The case was presided over by I. U. Davis, one of the justices of the peace elected at the first township election held in the county. The writer had charge of the jury after the final pleas were made on each side, and there being but one room to the school house, and no other building within half a mile, he had to turn the spectators. lawyers and even the "court" out into the street so that the jury could deliberate in seclusion.
Among the arrivals in the fall of 1865 was J. H. Wheeler. from western New York. who had heard of the wonders of Wexford county through a brother of B. W. Hall. the first settler in the county. Being some- what familiar with the saw-mill business, he came with the intent of building a saw-mill with which to supply the needs of the new settlers in the way of lumber. It should be remarked here that nearly every house in the settlement had thus far been built prac- tically without a foot of lumber, for lum- ber was very high priced and. besides, it would cost thirty to forty dollars per one thousand feet to hire it hauled from Tray- erse City, the nearest place where a board could be found. After the settler had got the "body" of his house up, he would hew out some poles for rafters, split out some "ribs" and nail then to the rafters, from six inches to one foot apart (according to whether he intended to use "shakes" or shingles ), and nail the shingles or "shakes" to these "ribs." By setting up other hewed
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poles in the gable ends of the house from the top log to the rafters and nailing "ribs" and "shakes" to them, the same as for the roof, he soon had his house enclosed. The floor was usually made of thin slabs of elm or bass-wood split out and hewed straight on the edges and then fitted to the sleepers on the lower sides, after which they could be lined and hewed to make them as even as possible on the upper surface. Some- times roofs were made of bark and occa- sionally an entire "shanty" was built of that material. Mr. Hall lived a year in a bark "shanty" when he first settled in the county. We can yet see, occasionally, a log house that was built thirty or thirty-five years ago as a home for some homesteader when he first became a resident of the county.
The whole settlement were anxious to have a saw-mill built and readily subscribed a liberal amount of work toward its erection. Plans were perfected during the winter and work commenced the following spring, but owing to unforseen obstacles encountered in building the dam the work was delayed un- til the summer of 1867. when the mill was started, much to the gratification of the community, as well as the owner. This was the first saw-mill built in Wexford county. It was an old fashioned "muley" mill. something like the one heretofore de- scribed as the first mill in northern Michi- gan, but it performed an important part in the early development of the county. It was built on what for many years was known as the Wheeler creek, which empties into the Manistee river about a mile north of the present village of Sherman. . \ mill still oc- cupies the same site, though two structures on the same site have been destroyed by fire. Mr. Wheeler also built a frame house
in the summer of 1867, which was the first frame house built in the county.
I had almost forgotten to describe the manner of wintering the stock in those early days. Hay there was none for the first two years on the homestead, and straw was very scarce, so some other food must be substituted. After it was too late in the spring to plant ordinary crops the settler would clear off a patch for turnips or rutabagas, even sometimes sowing the seed among the logs after the brush had been burned away, not having time to entirely clear the land. This crop could be put out as late as the 20th of July with good results and needed no care from seed time until late in the fall, when they were pulled and put into pits for the winter use. When the snow got so deep that the cattle could no longer subsist on the "Michi- gan clover." heretofore referred to, the set- tler would start in on his winter's job of felling trees upon which to browse his stock. The cattle soon began to relish and even thrive upon the fine twigs of the ma- ples, and this, with a liberal feeding of the turnips or rutabagas, brought them through the winter apparently in as good condition as if they had been wintered upon the best quality of hay. At the same time necessity on the part of the settler to provide for his stock was really a virtue in another direc- tion, for the more timber he was obliged to cut in the winter the more acres he could clear off in the summer.
Judge Chubb, one of the first settlers in the township of Cleon, once forming a part of Wexford county, and who still resides at Copemish in that township. often relates his experience in getting through his stock the first winter after his arrival. Among
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the other animals he brought with him were some pigs, never dreaming of the difficulty of getting them through the winter, thirty miles from the nearest point where feed 'could be had, and with roads-such as they were-made impassible by four feet of snow. When he had fed out the last of what he had provided for them, and with no possible way of getting more food, he was in de- spair and was sure they would die. If they had been in condition to make pork, he says, he would have killed them and got some ben- efit from them in that way, but to put off the evil day as long as possible in the hope that the snow might settle so that he could get out to Traverse City for supplies. the rations to the pigs had been curtailed al- most to the starvation point so that there was not much left of the pigs, as he puts it. but their "squeal." AAs a last resort, and entirely as an experiment, having never heard of the like before, he drove his pigs to the woods one morning with the rest of the stock and, to his utter amazement, they took right hokl of the "browse," and from that day on to spring they followed the cattle every morning to the woods and he actually kept them the remainder of that winter on "browse."
In 1867 Oren Fletcher settled in W'ex- ford county and being a miller by trade, and seeing the absolute necessity of a grist-mill. he interested the people in the matter, and through the encouragements received and. donations offered, at once commenced the construction of the first grist-mill in the county. The work was pushed vigorously and before winter set in the settlers had the satisfaction of knowing that they could get their gristing done without having to go twenty-five or thirty miles to Traverse City
for it, as had hitherto been the case. This mil! was built on the creek ever since known as Fletcher creek and for some ten years was the only grist-mill in the county.
It was also during the summer of 1867 that the work of putting the state road in passable shape for travel was completed. While a goodly number of settlers had al- ready arrived in the county over "the trail," it was, as the word indicates, only a "trail" in many places and far from being in a suit- able condition for travel. However, steps had been taken for an overland mail route and the first thing to be done was to put the state road in shape for travel. This being done, the mail route was established, and di- rect intercourse with the "outside" during the whole year was henceforth to be a real- ity. Hitherto the only means by which a person could leave the Grand Traverse re- gion during the winter was on foot with the aid of snow shoes. Those were long win- ters indeed to many, who were strangers among strangers, and especially to those who were inclined to be at all "homesick." for with the slow way of getting mail to and from Traverse City, and the fact that all mail had to be carried on foot or on horse back over an Indian trail from Traverse City to Manistee or Muskegon, it took from three to four weeks for a letter to go and an answer to return from any outside point.
Everybody in the Grand Traverse re- gion had been up to this time dependent upon Traverse City for provisions, and as Hannah, Lay & Company were the princi- pal firm at that place it was necessary for them to anticipate the needs of the entire region from November, when navigation closed, until May, when the first boat could be expected. The influx of settlers some-
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times exceeded calculation, and consequently provisions at the company's store would ruu pretty low before navigation opened. The winter of 1866-7 witnessed such a heavy drain upon their stock of supplies that it became necessary for them to adopt the plan of selling only fifty pounds of flour and ten or fifteen pounds of pork to one person, in order to piece the supply out and make it last until the first boat should ar- rive.
As soon as the state road was suffi- ciently improved to permit of it a mail route was established, at first with only weekly trips, but very soon the service was increased to six times a week. It required two and a half days to make the trip from Traverse City to Cedar Springs, the then northern terminus of the Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad. At this period George W. Bry- ant, of Traverse City, erected quite a large two-story building just south of the old state road bridge over the Manistee river, intending it for a sort of hotel and grocery store combined. The work was done by Lewis J. Clark, who for some time acted as salesman for Mr. Bryant and also as as- sistant postmaster for the second postoffice established in the county. The name given to this postoffice was Sherman, we suppose in honor of General Sherman, as it was quite the custom in those days to name towns, cities, villages and postoffices after some noted general of the late war. This name. Sherman, attached itself to the huid- (lle of houses that were put up when the county was organized and the county seat established, and is still retained by the pros- perous village near the Manistee river in the northwestern part of the county. Mr. Bry- ant's object in building nearly a mile north
of the present location of the village of Sherman developed a little later when the legislature passed an act organi- zing the county of Wexford. The post- master at this second postoffice was Dr. John Perry, heretofore spoken of as the first settler on the south side of Manistee river. New settlers in search of homestead locations had kept going farther and farther east of the state road until some of them were ten or twelve miles distant from the new postoffice and it was a decided relief to them to be able to post a letter. buy a pound of soda, tea or tobacco or twenty-five pounds of flour without having to go four miles farther north to the little grocery kept by Mr. Masters, the first post- master in the county.
Mr. Clark used to tell an amusing story of a settler living eight miles east of the postoffice coming in one day for some gro- ceries. Among other things he wanted a hundred pounds of flour, and when asked by Mr. Clark how he was going to get the things home, replied, "On my back." Upon being told by Mr. Clark that his supply of flour was quite low, and that it would be several days before he received a new sup- ply, and that consequently he could only spare him twenty-five pounds, in order that he might have some left to supply the wants of other needy customers. the man replied, "Huh! that would not make biscuit for breakfast for my family." It may seem strange to state that a man would think of carrying a hundred pounds of flour besides other small groceries a distance of eight miles on his back, but backing, or "packing." as it was then called, was a common way for the settler to get his provisions home. There is a man living in the county today who on
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more than one occasion carried a hundred pounds of flour and several packages of small groceries from Traverse City to his home in what in now Wexford township, a distance of twenty-eight miles and would do it between sunrise and sunset. This man's name is R. W. Updike, a man whose repu- tation for truth and veracity was never ques- tioned by those who knew him.
Thus will be seen some of the difficul- ties surrounding the new settlers. Most of them were from the common walks of life, and not one in ten of them was able to pro- vide himself with a team as one of the nec- essary things to take with him into a new wilderness country. Consequently "pack- ing" was a very common thing, and clearing land by hard labor about as common. The first crop was always sown without plow- ing the land, and frequently the second crop would be put in the same way, it being im-
possible to get team work to do more than harrow in the seed. Corn was frequently and potatoes nearly always planted just as the fire left the land, without the aid of either plow or harrow. This cumpulsory manner of farming did not bring the results that a better system would have done. but it was the best many could do and sufficed to keep the wolf from the door until such time as team work would be more plentiful. For three or four years there was but one horse team in the county and but three or four ox teams, and in drawing supplies from Traverse City, hauling together the logs for the houses of the new settlers, at- tending logging bees to enable some new comer to get in a few potatoes or a small patch of winter wheat, they had all they could possibly do without drawing the plow.
CHAPTER IV.
FIRST ELECTIONS.
Wexford county, up to the year 1866, was attached to the township of Brown, of Manistee county, for assessment and judi- cial purposes. At the annual meeting of the board of supervisors of Manistee county in 1866 the whole county of Wexford was or- ganized into a new township, to be known by the name of Wexford. It was ordered
that the first election should be held on the first Monday of April in 1867, when a full set of township officers should be elected. Previous to this time none of the numerous voters in the county had cast a ballot since he had resided in the county. One could have voted if he wanted to do so bad enough to
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tramp through the woods a distance of twenty-five or thirty miles to the polling place in the township of Brown in Manistee county, but no one had availed himself of that privilege.
Just a day or two before town meeting day, a couple of families got together one evening and made up a ticket for the com- ing election. The head of one family was put on for supervisor and one of the justices of the peace and his son for township clerk, while the head of the other family was not forgotten, being allotted one of the high- way commissionerships, there being three for each township in those days. There was quite a little gathering at the polling place- being the first school house heretofore re- ferred to-and, being shown the tickets, which had been written out for the occasion, they began to inquire where and when the caucus was held that selected these candi- dates. The nominee for supervisor, Hiram Copley, made the remark that if they did not like the ticket they could go around back of the school house and hold another can- cus and put up another ticket. This was said in a manner that indicated that he was sure of his election, no matter what was done, as he was at the head of the Republi- can ticket and nearly all of the voters were Republicans. However, a majority of those present took him at his word. They got together on the sunny side of the school house, for it was a raw April day with lots of snow on the ground, and made up a ticket and then went in and elected it. We are unable to give the exact number of votes polled at that election, but from the best recollection of the writer, who was there and stayed until the votes were counted, there were not to exceed thirty votes cast.
As soon as possible after this election the highway commissioners commenced the work of laying out such roads as were nec- essary, and the school inspectors, acting in conjunction with those in the adjoining township of Grand Traverse county, organ- ized a fractional school district, comprising territory on either side of the county line between the two counties. The site of the school house was in Wexford county, thus making this the first duly organized school district in the county. At the first election, Lewis C. Dunham was elected supervisor and George A. Smalley township clerk.
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