History of Goodhue County, Minnesota, Part 34

Author: Curtiss-Wedge, Franklyn
Publication date: 1909
Publisher: Chicago, H.C. Cooper
Number of Pages: 1264

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Vasa .- This post-office also dates from the fifties. It is today the only post-office in Goodhue county not located on a railroad, receiving its mail from the Welch station on the Chicago Great Western Railway. The office serves the hamlet Vasa and a limited territory around there. N. B. Ofelt is the present postmaster.

Wanamingo .- The post-office at Wanamingo is among the old- est in the county. It was established in the fifties, with James Brown as postmaster. Martin Halvorson served as postmaster there for nearly thirty years, and after him his son, Henry M. Halvorson, served eleven years. Herman O. Naeseth is the pres- ent postmaster. The mail supply of the office for more than forty years was by stage; at present the supply and dispatch is by rail- way service.

Welch .- This office is located on the Northfield branch of the Milwaukee road, about twelve miles west of Red Wing. Samnel Nelson is the postmaster.

Zumbrota .- The post-office at Zumbrota was established late in the fifties, with Thomas P. Kellett as postmaster and an author- ization of one mail a week each way by stage from Red Wing. This service subsequently increased to three times a week and still later to a daily service, continued until 1878, when the build- ing of a railroad into the village from Rochester enabled the es- tablishment of a railroad supply.

For nearly twenty years, or until 1875, the office remained in the general store of Mr. Kellett, under his charge. Henry Blanchard was then appointed postmaster and the office removed to his shoe store. Some home-made fixtures, very erude in a way, were installed, but they did very good service. At that time post- offices had been established at Minneola. Roscoe, Wanamingo and Hader, and as the population was not large the mail was very light at all the points.

Mr. Blanchard retained the office until 1887, when C. B. An- derson was appointed. He installed new fixtures and moved into quarters by himself. In 1891 Ira D. Warren succeeded to the office. During his term it became third class. In 1895 Mr. An- derson was again appointed postmaster. During this term the office again dropped to the fourth class. In 1899 B. C. Grover was appointed postmaster and held the office until 1908. During

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his term the office again became third class, six rural routes were established and the service generally improved.

In 1908 S. B. Scott succeeded to the office and still holds it. Under his management many new improvements have been made and the service generally rendered more efficient. For the year 1908 the receipts were $5,400. the largest in the history of the office.

The office has become an important junction point, receiving and dispatching mails on the Chicago Great Western. C., M. & St. P. and Chicago & Northwestern Railways.

DISCONTINUED POST-OFFICES.

Aspelund .- This post-office, which was located in Wanamingo, was established early in the sixties and conducted about thirty years, being discontinued in consequence of the establishment of rural mail delivery.

Ayr .- This office was located in Cherry Grove. It was estab- lished in the sixties and served its patrons for about thirty years also.

Belvidere Mills .- This office, located in Belvidere, was one of the earliest offices in the country. It was established about 1855, with N. B. Gaylord as postmaster. He served the public in that capacity for more than forty years. The office was discontinued about five years ago.

Burley .- This office, which was located in Featherstone town- ship, had a very short career. When established it supplied a considerable territory, but rural delivery being introduced soon afterwards, its usefulness was early at an end.

Burr Oak .- This office was located in Belle Creek township, being established in 1854. It was on the line of the old St. Paul and Dubuque stage route and when that was discontinued about two years later. the supply being cut off, the office was discon- tinued. Later it was re-established as Belle Creek post-office in the southern part of the town, which office was also discontinued and its place supplied by Ryan in the east part of the town, which served its neighborhood up to a few years ago.

Eidsvold .- This was an office in Holden township, established about 1875. It had a life of about twenty years.

Fairpoint .- This office, in Cherry Grove township, was estab- lished in 1858 and discontinued in 1861, and later, being re-estab- lished, did service for a little more than thirty years, rural deliv- ery also supplanting it.

Forest Mills .- This was a small office in Zumbrota township, a few miles east of Zumbrota. It had a career of about fifteen years.

THE NEW YORK PUBLIC DIR

ASTER. 12~1 TILDEV MA

C. A. RASMUSSEN

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HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

Hader .-- This office, in Wanamingo, was among those estab- lished early in the sixties. It served the publie for about forty years.

Hay Creek .- This office, which was located in Featherstone on the line of Hay Creek, was established in the sixties and served the community in which it was located about forty years.

Holden .- This office, in Holden township, was established in 1863 .. It had a career of nearly forty years, rural delivery sup- planting it.

Nansen .- This office, also in Holden, had a short career. When established it served a considerable territory, but rural delivery coming in cut off its patronage and it was discontinued.

Poplar Grove .- This was one of the early offices located in Pine Island township on the line of one of the old stage routes. It had a short career.

Sogn .- This office, on the east line of Warsaw, gave service for about fifteen years during the eighties and nineties.

Spring Creek .- This office, in Cherry Grove township, was established in 1861. It served its community about forty years.

Sunapee .- This was an office in Roseoe township, established in 1858. Later the name was changed to Roscoe and under that name it gave service to a considerable territory for nearly forty years.

Thoten .- This office, which was located in Belvidere, was a small one. For more than twenty years, from the sixties to the eighties, it furnished service to a limited area.

Wacouta .- This office, which was established in 1855, was one of the first in the county. For a time it developed into consider- able proportions, a few years after it had been established paying $300.00 a year. Red Wing forging ahead, however, the town gradually fell away and with that the post-office business de- creased to a very small item. The office continued to exist until 1905, however, when it was discontinued in consequence of rural delivery.

Wangs .- This office was located in Warsaw. Its career was not long and its eleritage never considerable.

Wastedo .- This office was located in Leon township. It had a career of more than thirty years and at one time served a large territory.

White Rock .- This office was located in Vasa. Like Wastedo it served the community in which it was established for more than thirty years, rural delivery being responsible for its discontinu- ance.

Christian A. Rasmussen was one of the moving spirits in that revival of activity in Red Wing which has made this city famous throughout the United States. He was born in the city of Copen-

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hagen, Denmark, October 30, 1868, son of Christian and Rasmina Rasmussen, natives of that country. At the age of four years he was brought to Minnesota by his parents and received his educa- tion in the public schools of Red Wing, graduating in 1885. After graduation he entered the employ of the Red Wing Printing Company. October 12. 1885, when the "Daily Republican" was started. Having a particular aptitude for this work he rose to the position of managing editor, a situation in which he remained until April 1, 1899. During this time the paper grew in impor- tance and circulation and had a powerful influence in shaping the destinies of the city and county. April 1, 1899, Mr. Ras- mussen laid down the editorial pen to take up the duties of post- master at Red Wing. Previous to this he was chairman of the Republican county committee in 1896 and 1898, and in the latter year ably performed the duties of secretary to the Republican state central committee. He has also served on the school board. Mr. Rasmussen's term as postmaster has been a long record of faithful public service, his efforts having been crowned with an increased efficiency on the part of the local postal service, and also with a large increase in business. Some years ago he became interested in the work of the State Postmasters' Association of Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota. and at the present time is serving this association as secretary. For two years he acted in a similar capacity for the Red Wing Commercial Club, and his business interests include the Red Wing Printing Com- pany, the First National Bank, the Red Wing Advertising Com- pany and the Red Wing Telephone Company. Mr. Rasmussen's postal history, which appears in this work, not only shows the increase in the volume of business and efficiency of service during his administration, but also demonstrates his ability as a writer and painstaking collector of exact data and statistical facts. April 30, 1901, Mr. Rasmussen was married to Lesa M. Johnson, by whom he has one daughter, Charlotte Katherine.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE PHYSICIAN.

His Proud Achievements-His Solemn Oath-His Ethics-The True Physician-His Reward-His Delicate Relation to the Human Family-His Inventions and Discoveries Free Gifts- The Pioneer Doctor-His Character-His Services-His Lim- itations-The March of Medicine-Biographies-A Roll of Honor-The Goodhue County Medical Society-The Twen- tieth Century-Preventive Medicine-The Physician as an Educator .- By George C. Wellner, M. D.

"Men most nearly resemble the gods when They afford health to their fellow men."

In an age when, in the combat of man against man, heroes are worshipped according to the number they slay in battle, it is inspiring and elevating to be permitted to pay tribute to the men who won glory in fighting disease and through whose devotion and skill thousands of useful lives have been saved and been made happy.

"For every man slain by Caesar, Napoleon and Grant in all their bloody campaigns, Jenner, Pasteur and Lister have saved alive a thousand." The first anaesthetic has done more for the real happiness of mankind than all the philosophers from Soerates to Mills. Society laurels the soldier and the philosopher and practically ignores the physician. Few remember his labors, for what Sir Thomas Browne said three hundred years ago is surely true : "The iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy and deals with the memory of men without distinction to merit to perpetuity."

"Medicine is the most cosmopolitan of the three great 'learned' professions. Medieine never built a prison or lit a fagot, never incited men to battle or crucified anyone. Saint and sinner, white and black, rich and poor, are equal and alike when they cross the sacred portals of the temple of zEsenlapins." No other secular profession has ever reached such a consciousness of duties which it corporately owes to the rest of the world. What

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are the principles which a profession, more profuse in its disinter- ested charities than any other profession in the world has estab- lished for its guidance ?

It was about 2,300 years ago that the practicers of the art of healing began to take an oath emphasizing the responsibilities which the nobility and holiness of the art imposed upon them. Hippocrates, forever to be revered, gave the oath his name. When a Greek physician took the Hippocratic oath and a graduate of the modern medical school takes it, the act is one not only of obligation for himself, but of recognition of a great benefactor of mankind. The Hippocratic oath assumes that simply because a man has learned the art of restoring the sick to health he has passed into a realm in which the rules of personal selfishness are immediately abridged, if not expunged, and recognized in a sys- tem of principles and rules governing all licensed physicians, and enforced and respected by high-toned and cultured gentlemen-a standard of professional honor so sacred and inviolate that no graduate or regular practitioner will ever presume or dare to violate it.

Robert Louis Stevenson, seeing the life of the medical man only from without, was not far wrong when he spoke of the modern scientific medical man as probably the noblest figure of the age. The noble and exalted character of the ancient pro- fession of medicine is surpassed by no sister science in the mag- nificence of its gifts. Reflecting upon its purity, beneficence and grandeur it must be accorded to be the noblest of professions. Though the noblest of professions it is the meanest of trades. Unless the physician will live a life of purity, of virtue, of honor and of honesty, he should seek a livelihood elsewhere, and "In- sult not the gods by striving through base methods and ignoble ambitions in resembling them."

The true physician will make his profession no trade, but will administer his duties with the love of man in his heart and the glory of God in his soul, his aim will be: To be accurate in diagnosis and painstaking in prescribing, to allow no prejudice nor theory to interfere with the relief of human suffering and the saving of human life; to lay under contribution every source of information. be it humble or exalted, that can be made useful in the cure of disease; to be kind to the poor, sympathetic with the sick, ethical toward medical colleagues and courteous toward all men; to regard his calling as that of one anointed to holy office, firmly convinced that no nobler work can be given to man, and to go forth to his labor with love for humanity, inspired with a reverent assurance that for this cause came he into the world.

The reward of such a man. says Prof. T. Gaillard Thomas, "Comes from the hand of no emperor; his glory from the appre-

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ciation of no applauding multitude; his renown from the pen of no fulsome historian. For him the vietor's crown comes from the hand of the immortal God. He that has done the greatest good for his fellow man, has, in the doing of it, won the greatest reward in earth's possession, even though no mortal man know of the deed but him !"

The true physician is he who has a proper conception and estimation of the real character of his profession; whose intel- lectual and moral fitness give weight, standing and character in the consideration and estimation of society and the public at large. His privileges and powers for good or for evil are great; in fact no other profession. ealling or vocation in this life occupies such a delicate relation to the human family.

There is a tremendous developing and edueating power in medieal work. The medical man is almost the only member of the community who does not make money out of his important discoveries. It is a point of honor with him to allow the whole world to profit by his researches when he finds a new remedy for disease. The greatest and best medical and surgical discoveries and inventions have been free gifts to suffering humanity the moment their value was demonstrated. The reward of the physi- cian is in the benefit which the sick and helpless receive, and in the gratitude, which should not be stinted, of the community at large. Medieal men are not angels; they are in fact very human creatures with hard work to do, and often many months to feed; but there is a strain of benevolence in all their work. From the beginning they are taught a doctrine of helpfulness to others, and are made to think that their lifework should not be one in which every service must receive its peeuniary reward. The physician is a host in himself, a natural leader among his fellowmen, a een- ter of influence for the most practical good, an efficient helper in times of direst need, a trusted and honest eitizen. What more can any prophet ask than honor in his own country and a daily welcome among his own friends !

It does not take long for the waves of oblivion to close over those who have taken a most prominent and active part in the affairs of the day. The life of the pioneer doetor is no exception to this law, for, as Dr. John Browne tells us, "It is the lot of the successful medieal practitioner to be invaluable when alive, and to be forgotten soon after he is dead, and this is not altogether or chiefly from any special ingratitude or injustice on the part of mankind, but from the very nature of the case." However, the pioneer physician still lives in the memory of many of us, though he is now more rare as an individual than in the years gone by, and is gradually passing out of existenee. The history, written and unwritten, of the pioneer physician of Goodhue eounty. as

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elsewhere, presents him to view as working out the destiny of the wilderness, hand in hand with the other forces of civilization for the common good. He was an integral part of the primitive social fabrie. As such he shared the manners, the customs, the aims, and the ambitions of his companions, and he, with them, was controlled by the forces which determine the common state and the common destiny. The chief concerns of himself and com- panions were material-engaged with the serious problem of existence. The struggle to survive was, at its best, a competition with nature. Hard winters and poor roads were the chief impedi- ments. Only rough outlines remain of the heroie and adventurous side of the pioneer physician's long. active and honored life. The · imagination cannot, unaided by the facts. picture the primitive conditions with which he had to contend. Long and dreary rides, by day and night. in summer's heat and winter's cold, through snow. and mud. and rain, was his common lot. He trusted him- self to. the mercy of the elements. crossed unbridged streams, made his way through uncut forests, and traveled the roadless wilderness. He spent one-fifth of his life in his conveyance, and in some cases traveled as many as two hundred thousand miles in the same.

Dr. Oliver. Wendell Holmes has graphically described the old doctor's daily routine : "Half a dollar a visit-drive. drive, drive, all day; get up in the night and harness your own horse-drive again ten miles in a snowstorm; shake powders out of a vial- drive back again, if you don't happen to be stuck in a drift; no home, no peace, no continuous meals, no unbroken sleep. no Sunday, no holiday, no social intercourse, but eternal jog, jog, jog in a sulky."

He always responded to the call of the poor, and gave freely his services to those who could not pay without hardship. Who can narrate the past events in the life of such a man? His deeds were "written upon the tablets of loving and grateful hearts, and the hearts are now dust. The long and exhausting rides through storm, or mud. or snow; the exposure to contagions; the patient vigils by the bedside of pain; the kindly deeds of charity; the reassuring messages to the despondent ; the shielding of the inno- cent : the guarding of secrets; the numberless self-abnegations that cannot be tabulated. and are soon forgotten. like the roses of yesterday." Wealth did not flow into the old practitioner's coffers; in fact, he needed no coffers. He was a poor collector, and with all his efforts he obtained but little, and never what was his due. As an offset to the generally acknowledged abili- ties of the old doctor in every other line of his work, it must also be admitted that he was greatly deficient in business tact. Often

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content with the sentiment of apparent appreciation of services rendered to his patrons, of lives saved, of sufferings assuaged, and of health restored. he was too easily satisfied with the reflection that he had a very noble profession, but a very poor trade.

Though poor in purse, he was rich in heart, in head, and in publie esteem. He made at least a very measurable success of life, if success consists in being of some small use to the com- munity or country in which one lives; if it consists in having an intelligent, sympathetic outlook for human needs; if it is success to love one's work ; if it is success to have friends and be a friend, then the old doctor has made a success of life.

IIe was a lonely worker. and relied largely on his own unaided observation for his knowledge. Isolated by the conditions of his life, he did not know the educating influences of society work. He was a busy man. with little leisure for the indulgence of lit- erary or other tastes. He possessed, however, what no books or laboratories can furnish. and that is : a capacity for work, willing- ness to be helpful, broad sympathies, honesty, and a great deal of common sense. His greatest fame was the fealty of a few friends ; his recompense a final peace at life's twilight hour. He was a hardworking man, beloved and revered by all. He was discreet and silent, and held his counsel when he entered the sick-room. In every family he was indispensable, important, and oftentimes a dignified personage. He was the adviser of the family in mat- ters not always purely medical. As time passed, the circle of his friends enlarged, his brain expanded, and his heart steadily grew mellower. Could all the pleasant, touching, heroic incidents be told in connection with the old doctor, it would be a revelation to the young physician of today; but he can never know the admiration and love in which the old doctor was held. "How like an angel light was his coming in the stormy midnight to the lonely cabin miles away from the nearest neighbor. Earnest, cheery, confident, his presence lighted the burden, took away the responsibility, dispelled the gloom. The old doctor, with his two- wheeled gig and saddle bags, his setons, ernde herbs, and vene- sections, resourceful, brave and true; busy, blunt, and honest, loyally doing his best-who was physician, surgeon, obstetrician, oeulist, aurist, guide, philosopher and friend-is sleeping under the oaks on the prairies he loved so well."

"We shall ne'er see his like again, Not a better man was found, By the Crier on his round, Through the town."

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The early history of the pioneer physician is naturally a story of feeble resources. His professional limitations were, therefore, necessarily great. To enable us to understand these limitations we must take a retrospective glance at the condition of medieine sixty years ago. Imagine, if you can. the forlorn condition of the doctor without our present means of physical diagnosis, without the clinical thermometer, the various specula, the hypodermatic syringe. the ophthalmoscope, the otoscope, the rhinoscope, the aspirator, and many other similar instruments; without the aid of hematology, of anaesthetics, of antisepsis, of the modern micro- scope, without our laboratories and experiments, our chemistry, our bacteriology, our Roentgen .rays, our experimental pharma- cology. and our antitoxins-without anything except his eyes, his ears, his fingers, his native vigor and resourcefulness; then we can appreciate the professional limitations of our fathers, appre- ciate no less the triumphal march of medicine during a single lifetime. It requires no prophet's power to foretell the fact that the science of medicine stands at this hour upon the threshold of an era which will belittle all the past. In this most wonderful era of the world's history, this magic age, the science of medicine is rapidly being elevated into the position of one of the bulwarks of society and one of the mainstays of civilization. It made possible the building of the Panama canal, made Havana a clean city, and diminished the possibility of introducing yellow fever among us. It has kept cholera in check, pointed out the danger of bubonic plague through the rat-infested districts of San Francisco, and it now urges that the government shall maintain sentinels to guard the Gulf coast from yellow fever. the Mississippi from cholera, the whole United States from bubonic plague. It also discovered the stegomyia as a yellow-fever carrier, and the rat and ground squirrel as plague distributors.

Though none of the immortal discoveries or inventions were made in Goodhue county. all of them have been applied and util- ized for the benefit of the people in this vicinity. The practice of medicine has had some able representatives in this county, many of whom have gained distinction and an honorable place among their fellows. Some of them have been sought out for public service and broader fields of usefulness, while others have led a quieter but no less honorable existence in the sphere of their choice, many being laid to rest after lives of sacrifice to the community amidst general regret and deep sorrow.

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History of Goodhue County, Minnesota, Part 34

Author: Curtiss-Wedge, Franklyn Publication date: 1909 Publisher: Chicago, H.C. Cooper Number of Pages: 1264

Author: Curtiss-Wedge, Franklyn
Publication date: 1909
Publisher: Chicago, H.C. Cooper
Number of Pages: 1264