USA > Minnesota > Polk County > Compendium of history and biography of Polk County, Minnesota > Part 63
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Mr. Steenerson settled on a section of school land on which another man had built a shack. Finding that he was on a school section, the first comer had abandoned it and the shack served Mr. Steenerson as a home and a schoolhouse. It was 24 by 14 feet in size and very crude in construction. The pioneer school teacher had driven sixty head of cattle to this section from Houston county. His brother Levi was his partner in the enterprise, and the cattle were driven to Pembina, where part of them were sold and the rest were disposed of in Winnipeg after reaching that city.
After this trip Mr. Steenerson went to Moorhead and built a flat boat for shiping grain. He loaded his own and his brother Levi's grain on this boat and the grain of some other persons, and with about 2,000 bushels on board started down the river. The time was November and ice was forming in the river. Progress became slow, and about ten miles south of Winnipeg the boat was frozen in. This event hap- pened at a mill on the river, however, and although the grain was sold in Winnipeg it was left at the mill. This was in 1876 and the last of the shipment of grain in that way at a profit.
In 1877 Estenson school district No. 6 was organ- ized and the school house was located about three
miles from Mr. Steenerson's farm. He taught this school the first winter it was in operation, and it was the first public school taught in that region. Before the end of 1877 he was elected county school super- intendent, the first occupant of that office, and he filled it until he was elected clerk of the district court in 1879. At the end of one term as clerk of the district court he took a pre-emption claim in Clearwater county, on which he lived three years and was en- gaged in lumbering on the Clearwater river. He then returned to his Polk county farm, on which he has made his home ever since. It is one mile and a half from Climax.
The first postoffice in this neighborhood was that of Meos, which was established about 1878, the name being that of Mr. Steenerson's father's farm in Nor- way, and his father was appointed postmaster. When Christopher returned from Clearwater county the of- fice was moved to his home and he was made post- master. At that time the name of the office was changed to Climax, and when the railroad was built in 1896 he moved the office to the station and indneed the railroad company to adopt the same name for it. But this did not happen until some months after the trains had begun running. Ife also built the house in which the postoffice is now located.
Mr. Steenerson owns 300 acres of land and has it nearly all under cultivation. He manages his farming operations with vigor and raises good erops as the result of his industry, judgment and skill as a farmer. In addition to all his other public activities he has served as a justice of the peace from the time of his arrival in the township. Late in life he was united in marriage with Miss Dorothy Lee. They have no children.
ANSON CHARLES MERRILL.
The late Anson C. Merrill, who lived on Section 10, on January 21, 1897, at the early age of thirty-four Fisher township, two miles north of the village of years, everybody who knew him or of him felt that a career of imperial magnitude and consequence had come to an unfortunate and very untimely end. Mr. Fisher, was one of the greatest farmers Polk county has ever had, and when death cut short his usefulness
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COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY OF POLK COUNTY
Merrill was born in Illinois October 10, 1863, and came to Polk county in his boyhood with his parents, J. B. and Polly (Brainerd) Merrill. The family located on the farm which is a part of the one owned and operated by the widow of their son Anson C., the father having sold it to him when he was ready to take charge of it. The parents then moved to Fisher, and there the father kept a general store in partner- ship with his son, C. B. Merrill, until the father died as the result of an accident, his wife also passing away at Fisher five years afterward.
Some time later C. B. Merrill moved to the state of Washington. A. A. Merrill, another son of the fam- ily, was a farmer in Nesbit township, one mile north of the old family home, and died on his farm in July, 1914. The members of his family are still living on that farm. Still another son, G. E. Merrill, owned a farm half a mile east of the old home. He is now liv- ing at Tlood River, in the state of Oregon. Their sis- ter Ella is the wife of O. J. Tinkham, of Fisher town- ship.
The elder Mr. Merrill owned a considerable body of land which became the property of his children. Anson C. got the old home place of 160 acres, and to this he kept adding by successive purchases until he owned two whole sections and a quarter of another one, also 40 acres of timber or 1,480 aeres in all, and the whole body of this land is still in the possession of his family. He raised great quantities of grain and kept six to eight men in his employ all the time. He also raised and handled large numbers of eattle, fat- tening beeves for the markets himself and buying and shipping all the live stock in the neighborhood that
was intended for the market. The dwelling house on the farm was built by him, but the barn and some of the other improvements were added after his death, but were included in his plans while living.
Mr. Merrill was married January 22, 1893, to Miss Ida Strande, a daughter of Ole K. and Carrie (Skat- rud) Strande, of Nesbit township. She was born in Manitowoe county, Wisconsin, and was seven years old when the family moved to Polk county and twenty- one at the time of her marriage. Three children, Alvis, Ellen and Anson, were born of the union, and all of whom are living. Ellen was a Polk county school teacher for two years. At the time of Mr. Merrill's death the oldest of the three was only three years of age. He is now twenty-one. He has given careful at- tention to a course of study in agriculture at the state farm.
Mrs. Merrill has won warm admiration and high praise from the whole people of her own and the sur- rounding townships. Left a young widow, with three small children and a very large body of land to look after, she entered upon her heavy and momentous duties with a resolute spirit and the heroie fortitude of a Spartan matron, and she has met the requirements of her position with great fidelity and ability. She has continued to carry on the farm on a seale equal to that of her husband and made every phase and feature of its business profitable. She has also reared her children with the utmost care and developed them into very useful and worthy members of the com- munity, furnishing an admirable example of sturdy American womanhood at its best under severe trials and responsibilities.
JOIIN E. ELG.
As the founder of the village of Eldred, for which he obtained its selection as a station on the Great Northern railroad, and as one of its leading merchants and business men, John E. Elg has been and is a source of service and benefit to the part of Polk county in which the village is located for which its residents are
grateful. By his eourse he has shown himself to be enterprising and progressive, and these qualities have won for him all the sueeess he enjoys in life.
Mr. Elg was born in Sweden January 8, 1858, and in 1872 he came to the United States and located in Washington county, Minnesota. In 1883 he moved to
DR. ARNE NELSON
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COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY OF POLK COUNTY
Polk county, and for some years thereafter he was employed in Montana in the service of the Northern Pacific railroad. He had no capital and was obliged to work at whatever he could get to do to make a living. But before going to Montana he bought 160 acres of land of the Great Northern railroad at $3 an acre, and four years later he bought 160 more at $7 an acre.
On his return to this county Mr. Elg spent ten to twelve years on his farm and got it practically all under cultivation, then sold it in 1903 at $25 an acre. When the railroad was built through this section he donated the right of way for a mile to the company and thereby induced it to establish a station at Eldred. For a number of years he conducted a confectionery store at Eldred and for three years he was postmaster of the village. In 1915 he opened the general store he is now conducting. His first store was the second one in the village, the first being kept by T. M. Boyer, who is now in Beltrami and a sketch of whom appears in this work.
Eldred was platted in 1897 by Mr. Elg, who laid out
twenty-eight acres as its site, and of this he has sold about onc-fourth to residents. The first building erected in the village was the Northwestern elevator, the first store put up was that of T. M. Boyer, who was the first merchant at the place, and the second store building was that of Mr. Elg, which was erected in the fall of 1898. The postoffice was established in 1899, Mr. Boyer being the first postmaster. Mr. Elg's present store building, the one occupied by his own business, was put up in 1915. He has also built a small residence in the village. It is on the Great Northern railroad between Moorhead and Crookston, in Roome township, and has about 200 population. It has a union school formed by a combination of four districts, and in this agriculture and domestic science are taught, the state aiding it to the extent of $2,200 a year for the purpose. The school has 120 pupils and employs four teachers, and two years of its course are in the high school grades. The school is very popular and is considered a source of great benefit to its patrons and the whole region lying around it.
DR. ARNE NELSON.
The name of this pioneer physician and surgeon and leading merchant for many years in this part of the Northwest is remembered with cordial esteem and his memory is cherished with veneration by all who had the benefit of acquaintance and association with him in his lifetime or enjoy any part of the fruits of his usefulness and great service to Polk county and the Red river valley in general. In the early years of his residence in Polk county he was an active promoter of immigration to the county, and he dealt in lands for the purpose of carrying on this business extensively. And during the whole period of his residence here he was in active practice as a physician and in mercantile business as a druggist, so that every phase of his activity was serviceable to the region and its residents.
Dr. Nelson was born in Voss, Norway, in March, 1851. He was a brother of Knute Nelson, the present
postmaster of Fertile, a sketch of whose life will be found in this work. The doctor was reared in his native land and obtained his academic education at the state public schools and a normal school in that country, and after completing his course there he followed teaching for five years. In 1873 he came to the United States and located in Southern Min- nesota. He found employment with Dr. MeNamara at Owatonna, Minnesota, and in the course of a little time afterward began the study of medicine under the direction of his employer. He began his practice at Hartland, in Freeborn county, Minnesota, where he remained two years, then moved to Aldal, Min- nesota.
In 1882 the doctor became a partner of Andrew Opheim in a general merchandise and drug business at Aldal. They carried on an extensive trade at that place until 1887, when they moved to Fertile,
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taking their store building and all their stoek to the new site, and their continuing at the head of an active and profitable business until 1893, when they dis- solved partnership and divided their stock, Dr. Nelson taking the drugs and Mr. Opheim the other goods. The same year he erected the building now used by his nephew, Nels Vasenden, in conducting the same business.
The doetor earried on his drug business and kept up his praetiee as a physician until his death on May 2, 1908. He was widely known in Polk county and the counties adjoining it as an able physician and a progressive and public-spirited eitizen, of great foree for good in this region. He held membership in sev- eral different medieal societies, was a member of the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and took an earnest interest and an active part in everything that pertained to the progress and improvement of his community.
Dr. Nelson was married in 1878 to Miss Bessie Hatleberg, a native of Wisconsin. They became the parents of five children, all of whom died in child- hood except their daughter Clara, who is now the wife of Odd Eide, of Fertile. In politieal faith the doctor was a Republican of strong convictions and he was a leader in the councils of his party in this locality. His religious connection was with the Nor- wegian Lutheran church. For a number of years he served as president of the village council of Fertile.
HELGE II. THORESON.
This gentleman, who is now serving his third sue- cessive term as one of the county commissioners of Polk county, is not only one of the most useful publie men but also one of the most enterprising and suecess- ful farmers in the county. ITe located in it in 1878 with his parents, who had nothing whatever in the way of capital or property, and he now owns 600 aeres of highly improved and well cultivated land, with good buildings on it and everything necessary for car- rying on his extensive farming operations, and he has a record of public service to his township and the county of which any citizen might justly feel proud, but which his modesty forbids him to mention. His farm is in Roome township, Seetion 19, sixteen miles southwest of Crookston, two miles and a half east of the Red river and eight miles north of Climax.
Mr. Thoreson was born in Norway May 2, 1864, the son of Helge and Johannah T. (Volden) Thoreson, and was brought by them to the United States in 1868. The family located in Fillmore county, Minnesota, and remained there until 1871, when it moved with oxen to Ottertail county, the father taking up a homestead at Parkdale in that county. The family was very poor in those days, and the father had to make all the
furniture for the home and shoes for the family. In 1878 he sold his land in Ottertail county and moved with oxen to Polk county, locating on Section 13, Tyn- sid township, one mile northwest of the present home of his son IIelge, on which he died in 1892, aged fifty- five, and his wife fourteen years later.
The elder Mr. Thoreson bought prairie railroad land at $5 an aere but broke enough within the prescribed time to reduce the price of his whole tract to $3 an acre. He built a good frame house and other build- ings in time, and owned 680 acres of land at the time of his death. But his first house was the first one on the prairie, and he had many hardships and privations to undergo. When he arrived on his land he camped one night on the prairie, and the next morning he began plowing on two traets of land before daylight in order to get the start of other men who were on the road to locate on it. He was a member and one of the founders of Sand Hill Free Lutheran church and served some years as township treasurer and as school treasurer. All of his eleven children are living and held a reunion in 1915. His farm is now owned by his youngest son.
Helge H. Thoreson remained with his parents until
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he reached the age of twenty-two. At fourteen he attended a school half-way to Crookston, walking to it and back home onee a week. The next winter they had a school at home, which was taught by a Miss Sprague from Fisher. Helge carried the mail two years between Fisher and Neby, three miles south of his home, and the next year also on to Climax, going to Neby three times a week and to Climax once, and was the first carrier paid by the government on that route, receiving $340 the first year, and $375 the sec- ond year ; by the time he was of age he had saved $300.
In the fall of 1885, when he was almost twenty-two, he bought eighty aeres of land, the traet being a part of his present farm, for which he paid $9 an acre. In 1886 he began to farm his land, borrowing oxen from his father and starting plowing May 17. The ground was so wet that the oxen mired in it, but by the last of May he had twenty-three acres plowed and sceded, and from this he got a fair crop. He was then living with his parents, but on Jannary 6, 1887, he was mar- ried to Miss Anna Bangen, a daughter of Ole and Caroline T. (Bangen) Bangen, of Tynsid township.
The young couple began housekeeping under great difficulties. They had a little shanty, which is still standing, that gave them some shelter, but they were obliged to sleep on the floor and eat off a dry goods box. On the night of February 25, their first in the shanty, Mrs. Thoreson took a lamb into the shanty to protect it from the cold, but it froze to death that night. But they were not dismayed and put all their energies at work to get ahead. Mr. Thoreson paid for
his first land and as he prospered kept adding to it until he now owns 600 acres, 520 aeres of which are in Section 19, Roome township. He has about 320 acres under cultivation, mostly in grain, and in 1915 raised 8,000 bushels, an average of about 25 bushels to the aere. He keeps graded Holstein cows and supplies cream to the co-operative ereamery at Climax. The barn now on the place was built in 1892, the granary in 1896 and the house in 1898.
Mr. Thoreson was township treasurer six years, as- sessor two years, and has served on the school board since 1889, except during one term of three years. He was elected county commissioner in 1906 for a term of four years, and was re-elected in 1910 and again in 1914. He is a Republican in politics, but is devoted to the welfare of the county without regard to partisan considerations. As he is on the road and bridge com- mittee of the board he is obliged to devote a great deal of his time to his official duties. His religious con- nection is with the Sand Hill Free Lutheran church.
Mr. and Mrs. Thoreson have a family of eight chil- dren living. Josephine is the wife of Martin Larsen, a farmer living near her father's home. Christine is the wife of John Holm, also a neighboring farmer. Amanda, who was for a time a Polk county school teacher, is now the wife of Carl Olson, of Beltrami county, Minnesota. Thilda is the wife of Hans Han- stad, a near-by farmer. And Olga, Ole, Eddie and Ingman are still at home with their parents. A son named Helge died at the age of fourteen.
HENRY C. HENDRICKS.
The late Henry C. Hendricks of Garden township, this county, who died February 13, 1912, at the age of sixty years, when it appeared there were still many years of usefulness before him, was born in Norway May 4, 1852, and came to the United States with his parents when he was sixteen years of age. His parents were Christian and Sophia Hendricks, also natives of Norway. The mother died in Nicollet
county and the father at the home of his son Henry in Polk county, passing away there in 1909 in the ninety- third year of his age.
Their son Henry C. came to Polk county in 1880, and was one of the first settlers in what is now Gar- den township. He took a homestead which is still a part of the farm on which the family lives, and put up a little log house in which he lived for a number of
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years, with his sister keeping house for him before his marriage and his wife doing the same afterward, the present dwelling house not being ereeted until 1900, although the barn was built some years before that time and other improvements were also made earlier.
The farm, which is five and a half miles east of the village of Fertile, now comprises 320 aeres, Mr. Ilendricks having bought the adjoining quarter-see- tion of land for $2,200 about 1895. About 225 aeres are under eultivation, nearly all of which was cleared by the owner during his lifetime. For many years he depended mainly on raising grain, but of late he gave more attention to raising live stock, and always kept twelve to sixteen milch eows for furnish- ing milk to the co-operative ereameries at Fertile and Rindal, in both of which he owned stoek.
Mr. Hendricks was a Republican in his political faith and always made it a matter of duty to vote at every election. He was one of the first members of Faaberg United Lutheran church at Rindal, but aside from his duties in the church and as a citizen, he gave his attention exclusively to his farm, exeept that for a number of years he was in partnership with his brother, N. C. Hendrieks, in carrying on a dry goods store at Fertile, remaining in the firm, which
bore the name of the Hendricks Dry Goods company, until his brother left the county.
On August 8, 1884, Mr. Hendricks was united in marriage with Miss Laura Larson, a daughter of John and Eli Larson, who lived in Nicollet county, this state, for a time and moved to Polk county in 1880, also becoming homesteaders in Garden township not far from Rindal. Mrs. Hendricks was not yet nineteen at the time of her marriage, but she imme- diately took charge of the housekeeping for her hus- band, although she had very little furniture and her culinary supplies were often scant and limited to a few very plain articles of food.
Mr. and Mrs. Hendrieks were the parents of ten children, one of whom, a son named Arnold Theodore, and the eighth child in the order of birth, died at the age of seven years. The children who are living are : Ella Sophia, now the wife of Thomas P. Bugge, of Seattle, Washington; Wilbert Eugene, who is liv- ing at home; Cora Josephine, who is a school teaeller in Norman county and has taught in Polk county; Hilma Lorando, who works in Seattle; Lawrence Joseph, who has charge of the home farm; and Clarence Julius, Clara Matilda, Norma Luella and Arnold Leland, who are still members of the parental family circle, and take an active part in all its inter- ests and industries.
CARL LUDWIG HANSEN.
Making his way in a new world under difficulties ineident to a wild frontier and seriously handicapped by the loss of his right arm when he was but thir- teen years old, Carl Ludwig Hansen, one of the sub- stantial and progressive farmers of Garden township, this eounty, with a tract of 320 aeres of land in see- tions 28-26, 29, which he has made into a fine farm, with 200 acres yielding good erops, has worked out steady progress for himself by his persistent industry, prudent frugality and excellent management of his affairs.
Mr. Hansen was born near the city of Christiania, Norway, December 15, 1849, and in 1854 came with
his parents, Lewis and Anna Maria Hansen, to the United States, loeating at St. Peter, Nicollet county, Minnesota, where the mother died six weeks later, and was the first white person to die in the township of their residence. What is now the eity of St. Peter was then called Travers de Sioux, and there was a missionary family living there. This family took charge of an infant daughter left by Mrs. Hansen, and reared her as their own child. She never knew until after marriage that she was not the daughter of the missionary. Then she learned who she was and opened a correspondenee with her brother Carl. The father improved a farm three miles from St. Peter,
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but passed his last years at Big Stone Lake in what is now South Dakota, where he died, aged more than seventy years, after a long continuance of useful labor.
Carl L. Hansen took np his residence at Crookston June 18, 1881, when the settlement was but a strag- gling hamlet with big stumps in the middle of its main street. Ole Rindahl, Andrew Olson, Christ Olson, and Ole, Steffen and Martin Horstad, friends of his in Nicollet county, had located here the previous year, and two of them, Ole Horstad and Andrew Olson, are still residents of Garden township. Mr. Hansen took up part of his land in 1881 as a pre-emption claim and built his present dwelling of logs cut on the place, which was all covered with timber.
"Garden" was suggested by Mr. Hansen as a suit- able name for the township when it was organized because of the abundance of wild strawberries in it, and his suggestion was adopted. When he located here he had a wife and seven children, a team of horses and a wagon, two cows and $15 in his vest pocket. So he worked out to provide for his family, especially in harvest times, and gradually got a start. In the meantime, when he had opportunity, he worked on his own land and by persistent industry he has transformed its wild expanse into a well improved and highly productive farm.
Mr. Hansen's main dependence has been growing grain, but he keeps ten to twelve cows to furnish milk for the Co-operative Creamery association at Rindal, in which he is a stockholder, as he is also in the Co- operative store at the same place, which is a mile and a half from his home. There is a feed mill at the creamery which is operated in connection with it and does an extensive business and is a great convenience to the farmers.
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