USA > Minnesota > Hennepin County > Minneapolis > Compendium of history and biography of Minneapolis and Hennepin County, Minnesota > Part 18
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In 1847 Mr. Steele established the first ferry. It ran only between Nicollet Island and the west bank. Teams wishing to cross from the east side had to fol- low the ledge of tlie cataract to the foot of Nicollet Island, and thence up the Island to the ferry landing. The ferry was a flatboat attached to a rope stretched across the stream and fastened to large posts at cither end. The boat was constructed at Fort Snelling of lumber brought from the St. Croix. The ferry was of great convenience in crossing the river between Fort Snelling and St. Anthony, and as time passed became indispensable.
R. P. Russell, as Steele's agent, took charge of the ferry, whose track across the river was substantially where afterward was the route of the suspension bridge, and a little hut was built for the ferryman on the island. The first ferryman was a voyageur from the Fort named Dubois, (some Minneapolis histories call him "Dubey.") Edgar Folsom, a brother of Simeon P., came late in the fall of 1847, and the next summer took charge of the ferry and with the help of an employe ran it one season. He met with so many mishaps that he was quite dis- gusted with the business. On one occasion the boat rope threw him twenty feet into an ice-pack, and he nearly lost his life.
At another time (and this story is vouched for as truc) Miss Sallie E. Bean, the daughter of Reuben Bean, who lived at the old mill, on the west side, was out in her canoe above the falls. She was raised on the Illinois river and knew how to manage a canoe, but this time she lost her paddle and her little craft floated against the ferry rope. In an instant she was struggling for her life in the deep water. However she contrived to clutch the rope to which she clung until Folsom paddled out in another canoc and rescued her.
ESCAPES DEATH AND MATRIMONY.
When he had borne her safely ashore, Folsom nervily said to the girl that he thought she ought to marry him as a reward for having saved her life. "But for me you would have drowned," he said; "for you could hardly have saved yourself." Folsom was quite plain featured, and gazing at him a moment the satiric damsel, with affected alarm, exclaimed : "O, put me back on the rope!"
The incident became known and Folsom soon re- signed. He was succeeded by Captain John Tap- per, of noble memory, (and who died recently), and who operated it until the bridge was built, in which work he assisted, and then he was given charge of the bridge and collected tolls on it for several years.
In her usually correct narration of early incidents in her book "Floral Homes," (p. 203) Miss Harriet
E. Bishop says that Miss Bean's father rescued her. Editor Goodhue, of the Minnesota Pioneer, got the particulars, from first hands. He was a member of Judge Meeker's grand jury which convened at the Government Mill in the summer of 1849 and took dinner at the hospitable table of Reuben Bean, in the little hut adjoining the Mill. From the family he obtained the details of the incident and thus related them in the next issue (August 16, 1849,) of the Pioneer :
A Fortunate Rescue.
"A few days since Miss S. E. Bean, a young lady residing on the west side of the Falls, experienced a scene of romantic peril. She left home for the school which she attends on the east side of the river. When she arrived at the ferry, the young man usually in attendance was absent; she, therefore, took the canoe and proceeded alone. When about two-thirds of the way across the stream, a flaw of wind somehow car- ried away her paddle, leaving her helpless. A short distance below the ferry the current, which is every- where rapid, begins to accelerate in its descent towards the Falls, which are only a few rods below. Had it not been for the ferry rope, which is stretched from shore to shore, Miss Bean must inevitably been carried to a swift destruction; for the boat, after descending a short distance, was seized up by the rope and received such a jerk and lifting up that the young lady was thrown into the dangerous water. In an instant, however, she seized the rope and saved herself from either sinking or being swept over the Falls. She nerved her strength to the occasion, and even worked her way along the rope for some five rods. When her strength was almost exhausted, Mr. Edgar Folsom, the ferryman, arrived with a boat and saved her."
THE BOOM OF 1849.
St. Anthony grew very steadily, even during the winter of 1849, and in the spring advanced rapidly. Stanchfield says that before Gov. Ramsey, the new Territorial Governor, proclaimed the organization of Minnesota Territory, which was June 1, 1849, "a busy town had grown up called St. Anthony, built mostly by New England immigrants and presenting the ap- pearance of a thriving New England village." Steele's mill ran day and night in order to supply the demands for lumber for houses, which were going up all over the place. They were built chiefly of green pine lumber; there was no time to wait for it to become seasoned. When dry lumber had to be used it was hauled across from Stillwater. Carpenters and other skilled workmen, as well as common labor- ers, were scarce, for Steele's mill company employed all that could possibly be used on the mill improve- ments.
When river navigation opened in 1849 immigrants came in what for the time was considered great num- bers. They came to St. Paul by steamboat, and then in vehicles to St. Anthony, for at that date St. Paul was the head of navigation. Both St. Paul and St.
75
HISTORY OF MINNEAPOLIS AND HENNEPIN COUNTY, MINNESOTA
Anthony doubled their improvements and population in 1849. At St. Anthony among the new improve- ments was a store in a fairly sized building erected by Daniel Stanchfield, who put in a general stock of merchandise and did a thriving business. Anson Northrup commenced the erection of the St. Charles Hotel and finished it the following year; in 1848 he had built the American House, (first called the Rice House) at St. Paul, and it was opened in June, 1849.
MINNESOTA'S GOVERNMENTAL MACHINERY IS SET UP.
As has been stated the last official act of President James K. Polk, on the night of March 3, 1849, was the signing of the bill creating Minnesota Territory. Polk was a Democrat, but his administration did not last long enough to allow him to appoint members of his party as officers of the new Territory. The incoming Whig President, Gen. Zachary Taylor, attended to the selection of the officials, with the result that they were all Whigs. He appointed Alexander Ramsey, an ex-member of Congress from Pennsylvania, to the position of Territorial Governor; Chas. K. Smith, of Ohio, Secretary; Henry L. Moss, of Stillwater, Dis- trict Attorney ; Col. Alexander M. Mitchell, of Ohio, Marshal; Aaron Goodrich, of Tennessee, Chief Justice of the Territorial Court, and David Cooper, of Penn- sylvania, and Bradley B. Meeker, of Kentucky, As- sociate Justices. The Territory was divided into three districts, and each Judge presided over a district. In cases of appeal all three of the Judges sat en banc; but in every such case the Judge whose deci- sion had been appealed from took no part in the final decision.
All of the appointees reached the scene of their duties in proper course. The Governor and his wife arrived at St. Paul, May 27, but suitable quarters could not be found for them in the village which, according to Editor Goodhue, (quoted in Williams' History, p. 208) had but 30 buildings in April, although Seymour says (p. 99 of his sketches) that in June he counted 142. Governor and Mrs. Ramsey, by cordial invitation, were for some weeks the guests of Mr. and Mrs. Sibley in the historic old Sibley house (still preserved by the Daughters of the American Revolution) at Mendota. The first Governor's man- sion was a small frame cottage on West Third Street, St. Paul, (which afterward became the noted hotel called the New England House) and was first oc- cupied June 25, 1849 .*
June 1 Gov. Ramsey and the Judicial officers pre- pared and published the celebrated "First of June Proclamation," which announced that Territorial officers had been appointed and had assumed their duties, and also declared: "Said Territorial Govern- ment is declared to be organized and established, and
all persons are enjoined to obey, conform to, and re- spect the laws thereof accordingly." June 11, the Governor divided the Territory into three judicial districts. St. Anthony was in the Second District; Associate Justice Meeker was appointed the Judge and ordered to hold court "at the Falls of St. Anthony" on the third Monday in August and Feb- ruary following. The boundaries of the district by political divisions could not be given, because there were no such divisions then.
THE FIRST BOUNDARIES OF MINNESOTA.
When Minnesota was made a Territory the boun- daries were more comprehensive than at present. The Territory lay between the St. Croix River on the east and the Missouri on the west, and between the Cana- dian boundary on the north and the Iowa line on the south, including, however, a great part of what is now South Dakota down to the Missouri River and east- ward to Sioux City. The southern boundary was as at present except that from the northwest corner of Iowa the line extended "southerly along the western boundary of said State to the point where said boun- dary strikes the Missouri River."
The western boundary ran from Sioux City up the middle of the Missouri to the mouth of the northern White Earth River (about 60 miles east of Fort Buford, or the western line of North Dakota), and thence up that river to the British boundary. The northern and eastern lines were as at present. The area of the entire Territory was about 150,000 square miles, or 96,000,000 acres in extent; but of this vast area less than a million acres were open to white settlement.
THE FIRST CENSUS.
Pursuant to a provision in the Organic Act, the Governor ordered John Morgan, then sheriff of St. Croix County, to take an accurate enumeration of all the inhabitants within the Territory June 11, full- blood Indians excepted. The census was to include mixed-blood people who were living "in civilization," and to exclude those living in barbarism. The sheriff and his deputies worked hard, and some of them trav- eled far, in the prosecution of their duties, but doubt- less their work was quite inaccurate. Animated them- selves and stimulated and encouraged by everybody to boom the Territory, their count by no means under- stated the population.
The returns showed a population in the entire Ter- ritory of 3,058 males and 1,706 females a total of 4,764. Unfortunately St. Anthony was counted with Little Canada, the French settlement north of St. Paul. The aggregate population of St. Anthony and Little Canada was 352 males and 219 females, or 571 in all.
The census gave St. Paul a white and mixed blood population of 840; Stillwater, 609; Pembina, 637; . Crow Wing, both sides of the river, 244; Wabashaw and Root River, 114; Fort Snelling, 38; Mendota, 122 ; soldiers, women, and children in Forts Snelling and Ripley, 317, etc., etc.
* St. Paul secured the Territorial Capital only by the efforts of Delegate Sibley. He prepared and introduced the organic act in which St. Paul was designated as the seat of govern- ment; but Senator Douglas, who had charge of the bill in Congress, struck out St. Paul, and inserted Mendota. He had visited the Territory and thought Pilot Knob would be a fine site for a State House. It was with difficulty that Sibley induced him to consent to the change to St. Paul.
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HISTORY OF MINNEAPOLIS AND HENNEPIN COUNTY, MINNESOTA
As stated, St. Anthony and Little Canada, being in one election district, were counted together. In taking the census only the names of the heads of households were recorded; the number of inmates of cach household was given numerically, by sexes, thus : 'Calvin A. Tuttle, 4 males, 2 females; total 6."
The following is from the Journals of the Ter- ritorial Council and House for 1849-the Council Journal printed by McLean & Owens and the House Journal by J. M. Goodhue, bound in one volume-and is believed to be a list of the families and heads of households in each in the St. Anthony sub-district of the Third Council District, on June 11, 1849, when the first census was taken :
Heads of Households.
Males. Females. Total.
Calvin A. Tuttle
4
2
6
E. P. Lewis
4
2
6
C. A. Loomis
5
3
8
Benj. La Fou
2
2
4
Edmond Brisette
3
3
6
Charles Mousseau
7
4
11
John Reynolds
7
3
10
Ard Godfrey
43
7
50
Wm. Marat
3
3
6
Wm. D. Getchell
5
4
9
S. Huse
7
5
12
R. Furnell
10
5
15
Daniel Stanchfield
4
0
4
John Stanchfield
2
0
2
G. M. Lowe
4
1
5 10
Rondo, (?)
5
3
Joseph Reasche
6
5
Peter Bottineau
17
5
22
Michel Reasche
1
2
3
John Banfil
7
2
9
Wm. Line
3
1
4
Wm. Freeborn
5
3
8
Alex. Paul
4
3
7
Heads of Households.
Malcs. Females. Total. 6 10 4
Louis Auge Saml. J. Findlay
3 7
173 80 253
Thus there were 26 households with an average of ncarly 10 to the household.
Of the foregoing it is known that several of the heads of households lived beyond the confines of St. Anthony. Charles Mousseau lived on the shore of Lake Harriet on the west side of the river, on the claim which had been occupied by the missionary brothers, Gideon HI. and Saml. W. Pond, nearly 15 years before. "Rondo," if it was Joseph Rondo that was meant, lived east of the village, as did William Marat, (or Marette.) Louis Auge (pronounced O-zhay) and Saml. J. Findlay also lived on the west side, well down toward Fort Snelling. Benj. La Fou's residence may be considered doubtful. His name appears twice in the list of householders of the combined precincts, and he lived out Little Canada way. He and his household were counted twice.
Circumstantial evidence indicates that the entire census of the Territory was "padded" largely and even shamefully. St. Anthony was not an excep- tion. It is difficult to believe that the little log cabins of the village accommodated an average of 10 per- sons to the cabin. Ard Godfrey is given 43 males, mill-hands or lumbermen ; it is said he had only 25.
FIRST POSTOFFICE AT ST. ANTHONY.
A. E. C.
7
3
8 11
In 1848 the population of the village of St. Anthony had increased until a postoffice was demanded and made necessary. A petition to the National Postoffice Department was favorably considered and the office established. Upon the recommendation of Frank Steele, and nearly every citizen of the village, Ard Godfrey, Steele's millwright, was appointed post- master, and he held the position until in 1850.
CHAPTER IX. PRIMITIVE SCENES AND CONDITIONS.
ST. ANTHONY IN ITS FIRST DAYS AS DESCRIBED BY WRITERS AND ACTUAL RESIDENTS-E. S. SEYMOUR, THE NOTED NORTHWESTERN TRAVELER AND DESCRIPTIVE WRITER, PRESENTS WORD PAINTINGS OF THE LITTLE FRONTIER VIL- LAGE IN 1849-EDITOR GOODHUE, OF THE FIRST MINNESOTA NEWSPAPER, MAKES THE FIRST PRINTED MENTION OF THE TOWN-ONE OF THE FIRST LADY RESIDENTS GIVES REMINISCENCES OF PIONEER DAYS AND DOINGS.
Very early in its career, when there were but a few log cabins on the site, descriptive writers visited St. Anthony and its noted Falls and made them known to the outside world.
SEYMOUR DESCRIBES ST. ANTHONY IN 1849.
In the summer of 1849 Mr. E. Sanford Seymour, of Galena, an accomplished writer, (died in 1852) visited Minnesota and spent several weeks in the vicinity of St. Paul and St. Anthony. In his volume of "Sketches of Minnesota," printed in 1850, he de- scribes (on page 120 et seq.) the situation at St. An- thony in the summer of 1849:
We spent the forenoon in examining the curiosities about the Falls. The river at this point is 627 yards in width, and is divided into two unequal channels by Cataract Island, which extends several rods above and below the Falls, and is about 100 yards wide. This is an elevated, rocky island, covered with trees and shrubbery. At the upper end of this island a dam is thrown across the eastern channel, so that a larger portion of the river flows through the western channel, which is about 310 yards wide. There the rapids commence many rods above the perpendicular fall, the water foaming and boiling with great vio- lence whenever it meets a rock or other obstruction. Reaching the verge of the cataract, it precipitates it- self perpendicularly about 16 feet.
"The upper rock over which the water flows and falls is limestone, several feet in thickness. It rests upon a crumbling sandstone, whose partieles are so slightly cemented together that it is with difficulty a solid specimen can be obtained. The water enters the extensive rents which cross the strata above the Falls, gradually washes out the particles of sand on which the limestone ledge rests, causes these particles to loosen and sink, and then huge blocks are detached and precipitated into the rapids beneath. This sand- stone is more easily washed away than the shale under Niagara Falls.
"These Falls were named by Father Hennepin for his patron saint, Saint Anthony of Padua. They are appropriately called by the Chippewas 'Kah-Kah-be- Kah' or sevcred rock, and the Sioux call them, ' Hkah-hkah,' from 'e-kah-kah,' to laugh."
Here as well as elsewhere it may be said that the Sioux did not name the Falls from their name for
the verb to laugh ; they named them from their phrase for waterfalls, or water that falls and then takes a curling or whirling motion. In very many instances a Sioux noun in the plural is described by a double adjective of description. Pah-shah means red head ; but the Sioux for red heads, or more than one head, is pah shah-shah. The Sioux word for curl is hkah, which is difficult of pronunciation because of the hawking sound involved. The Sioux for water that falls and curls is Minne hkah-that is water consid- ered in the singular number. Water composing a falls or cataract is considered in the plural, and the phrase for a cataract, a rapids, or a waterfall is Minne hkah-hkah.
The Sioux called the Falls of St. Anthony, "Minne- hkah-hkah," meaning, "where the curling and whirl- ing waters fall." The old Sioux now in the State still call them, and even Minneapolis, by the old name. They called and still call, the Chippewas, "Hkah- hkah Tonwan," or the Falls People, "Hkah-hkah," meaning waterfalls, or rapids, and "Tonwan" mean- ing people or village. When they first knew the Chip- pewas the latter lived at the Falls, or Rapids, of Sault Ste. Marie, or St. Mary's Falls, and the name given them then was always used.
The beautiful and now celebrated little waterfall called Minnehaha-interpreted by those who don't know the Sioux language as meaning "laughing water," -was of course known to the old Sioux, but they had no distinctive name for it, simply calling it. "minne-hkah che-stina," or the little waterfall-che- stina (accent on first syllable) means little. The Sioux word for laugh, as a verb, is e-khah, accent on first syllable. Laughing water in Sioux is Minne-e-hkah. St. Anthony Falls is the true "Minne-hkah-hkah"- or "Minnehaha." (See Riggs's or Williamson's Dic- tionaries of the Sioux Language.)
Further describing conditions at St. Anthony, Mr. Seymour wrote :
"There are various opinions with regard to the practicability of improving the river for steamboat navigation to within a short distance of the Falls. St. Anthony City, on the east side of the river, about a mile below the Falls, and below the worst rapids, has been laid out with a view probably of its ultimately being the head of navigation; but the more general opinion seems to be that the improvement of the river to that point will be attended with too much expense
77
78
HISTORY OF MINNEAPOLIS AND HENNEPIN COUNTY, MINNESOTA
to be attempted before the country above shall have become quite populous. * *
"A dam is thrown across the eastern channel from the main land to the upper end of the island, a dis- tance of about 400 feet, and extending thence up stream about 350 feet to another island above, thus forming the two sides of a right-angled triangle, and affording, in the present stage of low water, an excel- lent promenade. The foundation on which the dam is constructed is a smooth limestone rock, presenting at its surface a level plane or floor, to which the tim- ber is attached by bolts, and the structure thus formed seems capable of resisting the utmost violence of the waters. This horizontal plane of limestone rock occu- pies the bed of the channel from the dam to the per- pendicular fall, some forty rods below, and affords an excellent foundation for the erection of mills. The dam is so constructed as to admit of 18 flumes, extend- ing at regular intervals along its course and capable of propelling 18 saws or other machinery. Two saws are now in operation and cutting at the lowest esti- mate, 13.000 feet of lumber daily. The head obtained at the lowest stage of water is eight feet.
"Mr. Steele, the principal proprietor, informed me that he made a claim here in 1837. The improvement of the water power was commenced in the autumn of 1847, and the saws commenced running in the autumn of 1848. The land, including the town-site and the water power, was entered at the U. S. Land Office last summer (1848) by Mr. Steele, at $1.25 per acre, under his claim or pre-emption. The expense of the im- provements are estimated by him at $35,000. Mr. A. W. Taylor, of Boston, who is here to-day, has re- cently purchased one of the water powers for about $20,000.
"The mill has not been able to supply the demand for lumber, which is taken as fast as it can be sawed at $12 per thousand feet for clear stuff and $10 for common. The logs were obtained this season on Rum and Crow Wing Rivers, which are tributaries of the Mississippi. Pine timber is said to abound on the upper tributaries of the latter river in inexhaustible quantities.
"Two long and narrow islands extending from the western end of the dam nearly a mile up the river form a secure harbor or mill-pond for an immense number of logs. Another dam might be constructed below the other, across the eastern channel. where there is a perpendicular fall of 12 feet or more.
"The land on the opposite side of the river is in- cluded in the military reservation of Fort Snelling : a house and mills were erected here for the use of the garrison nearly thirty years ago. They were formerly protected by a sergeant's guard. [five men] but have not been occupied recently. It is currently reported here that Hon. Robert Smith, of Illinois, has leased this property of the General Government for a term of years, and that he intends to put the mills in operation."
There are indications that when Mr, Seymour was here in 1849 he was writing a series of letters de- scriptive of the Minnesota country, probably to an Eastern journal, and that a compilation of these
sketches made up his "Sketches of Minnesota," a most admirable publication in every way. The expressions "to-day," "this morning," and the like, are common in the author's descriptions ; apparently he neglected to omit them when he transferred his sketches to book form. Of St. Anthony in June, 1849, he writes :
"Saint Anthony, which is laid out on the east bank of the Mississippi, directly opposite the cataract, is a beautiful town-site. A handsome elevated prairie, with a gentle inclination toward the river bank, and of sufficient width for several parallel streets, extends indefinitely up and down the river. In the rear of this another bench of table land swells up some 30 feet high, forming a beautiful and elevated plateau. A year ago there was only one [ ?] house here; now there are about a dozen new framed buildings, including a store [Marshall's] and a hotel, [Northrup's] nearly completed. During the summer it is expected that a large number of houses will be erected. Lots are sold by the proprietor [Frank Steele] with a clause in the deed prohibiting the retail of ardent spirits on the premises [for two years].
"Saint Anthony is eight miles from St. Paul and about the same distance from Mendota. It will prob- ably be connected with the former place at no very distant day by a railroad; its manufacturing facilities will soon render such an improvement indispensable.
"Taking into consideration the amount of fall, the volume of water, the facility with which the water power may be appropriated, and the beautiful coun- try by which it is surrounded, its proximity to the head of 20,000 miles of steamboat navigation in the Mississippi valley, and lastly its location in a healthy climate, there is not perhaps a superior water-power site in the United States than that of St. Anthony. That it will eventually become a great manufacturing town there is no doubt. Water-power in Minnesota is abundant, but this at St. Anthony is so extensive and so favorably situated, that it will invite a concen- tration of mechanical talent and of population where- by the necessary facilities for profitable manufactur- ing will be abundantly afforded. It is not, indeed, expected that a Lowell, of mushroom growth, will spring up here in a day ; such a state of things, if prac- ticable, is not desirable. But let the town only keep pace with the country and a city will spring up in these 'polar regions,' (as some people choose to call this country) sooner than is anticipated."
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