History of Goodhue County, Minnesota, Part 4

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

USA > Minnesota > Goodhue County > History of Goodhue County, Minnesota > Part 4

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

HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

sent wild animals. In height the mounds usually vary from a swell of land to four feet. Some are considerably higher. On the terrace opposite the mouth of Belle creek is a mound sixty- five feet long. thirty feet wide and three feet high. Another mound in the same group is eighty-six feet long, fifty feet wide from base to base across the top, and six feet high at one end. One of the mounds on the brow of Diamond bluff was originally twelve feet high. This mound was selected by four of us as a favorable specimen for exploration. We were, however, ill repaid for our labor as far as finding any relies was concerned. The round-topped mounds measure from ten to forty feet or more in diameter. Their circumference is usually circular. Departures from this shape are due to weather erosion. or to some other degrading ageney. Occasionally walls of earth many feet in length but low in elevation are found. A portion of such a wall was removed in grading a street on the fair grounds at Red Wing. and thirteen skeletons were brought to light. It would seem as though these earthenwork walls were formed by burying a large number of dead in a row. The burials may have occurred at different intervals, and in course of time a long earthwork was the result. The arrangement of mounds in the various groups does not seem to depend on any definite rule of order, but seems to result from a process of mound building extending over a considerable period of time, each site for a mound being selected by the builders according to the space, material or topography of the locality. Undoubtedly each mound was placed for some definite purpose in the spot where it is found today, but what the purpose of any mound was may be difficult to say. The spade often partially tells us what we want to know, but sometimes it leaves us as much as ever in the dark. When the interior of a mound reveals human bones, then the inference is that the mound served as a tomb, but intrusive burials may, of course, complicate the problem. But when a mound can be opened without revealing any trace of human remains or of artificial articles. it seems safe to conclude that not all the mounds were built for burial purposes. The erection of such a large number of mounds must have required an enormous expenditure of time and energy. If all the mounds in Goodhue county were placed in a row they would form a line of earth- works many miles in length. The tools with which all the work was done were probably wooden spades, stone hoes and similar implements that indicate a low degree of culture. Where the whole village population turned out for a holiday or a funeral a large mound could be built in a mueh shorter time than if the work was performed by only a few individuals. The surface of the land adjoining the mound frequently shows plain evidences

HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

of where the material was obtained for the construction of the mound. All in all, the regularity, symmetry and even mathe- matical exactness with which the mounds are built show con- siderable skill and taste. The reader can picture to himself the funeral scenes, the wailing of the sorrowing survivors and the flames of funeral pyres which were sometimes built.

Another interesting class of aboriginal remains in Goodhue county are the so-called "stone cairns" found, with few excep- tions, on the bluffs between Hay creek and Spring creek. A baker's dozen of these have been located. They are conical piles of stones, now much mutilated, measuring up to twelve feet in diameter at the base. They are about as unique archaeological structures as any found in the state, because no others are found, if memory serves me right, nearer than in Illinois and Kansas. There is little reason to doubt that they are old stone graves, so old that all positive traces of human bodies buried in them have been obliterated. Therefore they are hundreds of years old. and may have been built by a tribe of Indians who lived here before the Sioux arrived. If they were built by the Sioux, then it is strange that the number of cairns is so small and confined to such a limited area.

In regard to the origin of the mounds it may be said in brief that they are of Indian origin. The idea of a prehistoric race of mound builders distinct from the Indian has been exploded by archæological research, but it is very common to find this idea expressed in books of the last generation and in the minds of those who in early childhood had the "mound builder" theory instilled into them. The real mound builder was a genuine Indian and not a member of some other race. The evidences of this are many. Indians are known to have built mounds. The articles found in the mounds are the same in kind and make as those found on the nearby village site. Invariably a large mound group has a village site elose by. The articles found on the sites and in the mounds are such as the Indians used. Space forbids a discussion of this subjeet, but here is a partial list of the objects that have been found in . Goodhue county: Arrows, of various sizes and shapes, made of chert, quartz, quartzite, gunflint and other varieties of rock; spearheads, knives. awls, needles, hammerstones, millstones, clubs, sinkers, bone implements, fragments of pipes, scrapers in profusion, ice-axes, spuds, chungee stones, paint pots, paint eups, hammers of hematite and other kinds of rocks, fleshers, polishing stones. drills, hairpins, a decorated buffalo-rib knife, mauls, stone balls, flakes, chisels, lances, mullers, mortars. whetstones, deco- rated pieces of elam shells, also vast numbers of spalls, chips, rejeets and fragmentary implements in various stages of com-

HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

pletion, a slate charm, pieces of lead probably brought up from Missouri, bones of many kinds of animals, rough tools, etc. Vast numbers of pottery fragments and a few entire vessels have also been found. Also a copper spear at Spring creek, two large copper spuds near Diamond bluff, a small hoe made from a piece of rifle barrel deposited in one of the Indian graves where the Red Wing Seminary main building stands, and shell beads from the same locality. Space forbids a detailed description of these relics. However, a few thoughts suggested by them relative to the state of culture. habits, modes of life and occupations of our predecessors may be mentioned. Fortified hills, tomahawks, bat- tle clubs. spearheads, etc., mean war. Arrows signify war and the chase. We do not know what human beings first beheld the beautiful hills and valleys of Goodhue county and claimed them as their home. We may never be able to look beyond the veil or penetrate the mists that enshroud the history of the past, yet we are not left in utter darkness. The relies mentioned tell ns many interesting stories. The absence of great architectural ruins show that the mound builders lived in frail homes. The dearth of agricultural implements does not spell waving fields of golden grain. The ashpits and fireplaces mark the bare ground as the aboriginal stove. Net-sinkers imply the use of nets; ice- axes the chopping of holes in the ice to procure water, stone axes a clumsy deviee for splitting wood; stone knives for sealp- ing, cutting meat, leather and twigs; countless flakes mark the ancient arrow maker's workshop; cracked bones show the Indian's love for marrow ; shell beads, charms and ornaments in the shape of fish and other designs reveal a primitive desire for ornamentation ; chisels and gouges recall the making of canoes; sun-dried pottery made of clay mixed with coarse sand, clam shells or powdered granite and marked with rows of dots made with a stick, thumbnail or other objects, or else marked with lines, V-shaped figures or chevrons, all are an index of a rather crude state of pottery making. The hand supplied the lathe and the wheel. Inasmuch as some of the most ancient remains show great similarity to the more recent, we feel certain that no great progress was made by these early inhabitants. A copper. . spear of recent date shows no more signs of smelting than does the copper blade that has been much corroded by a great lapse of time. Trees hundreds of years old give us at least some measure of estimating the age of the contents of the mounds on which they stand, and it also means that the mound builder lived there several hundred years, if not longer. By such proc- esses of reasoning we can learn a good deal of the social, indi- vidual and family life of the savage mound builder.

Besides the mounds previously mentioned, which occur on

HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

elevated terraces, knolls and bluffs, there is another type of mound found in Goodhue county, which differs in several impor- tant respects from the former. The first group of mounds may be named highland mounds and the others lowland mounds. Lowland mounds ocenr in the town of Stanton, Warsaw and Kenyon. They are far more numerous in Dakota and Rice counties, where, in the summer of 1907, I located some 1,700. For some reason these mounds have hitherto escaped observa- tion. Possibly the mound hunter, accustomed to look for mounds on highlands, would not expect to find mounds in such localities where the lowland mounds occur.

The following is a brief resume of a paper read before the Minnesota State Historical Society at the December meeting in 1908. The subject of the paper. "Lowland Mounds in Dakota, Rice and Goodhue Counties." reveals where these mounds are found and implies that they all belong to the same class and are related to each other :

"In the southern part of Dakota county, particularly in the town of Greenvale and the western part of Waterford, is found a large number of mounds which, to all outward appearance, are Indian mounds. They differ, however, from the well known Indian mounds that abound in the Mississippi valley and interior parts of Wisconsin and Minnesota in this respect, that they are usually situated on low, level. and often wet ground. Mounds are usually situated on land that is rather high relative to the surrounding topography. For example, the mounds in the vicinity of Red Wing, Cannon Junction, Welch and Diamond bluff are, as a rule, situated on terraces that skirt the river, or on the brows of prominent bluffs. The mounds found near our inland lakes are almost invariably placed well beyond the reach of water. The mounds under consideration are located on low, often marshy ground. For this reason a person accustomed to mound hunting along the Mississippi would easily pass by these lowland mounds without paying much attention to them. He might think they were curious freaks, chance formations of nature. Mounds of this type are also found south of Northfield, Rice county ; also near Dundas and south of there along the east side of Cannon river. Near Dennison is a large number, par- ticularly about one mile west of the town along Prairie creek. All these locations are immature water courses that lie on glacial outwash plains or along the Cannon river. The Stanton flats contain hundreds of these mounds. On the flats near Farming- ton and Castle Rock are found numbers of mounds in similar Jocations. The total number observed and recorded is over 1,500. The western part of Dakota and Rice counties is strik- ingly poor in mounds. One might expect to find a large number

HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

on the shore of the chain of lakes that occurs there. The absence of mounds in this locality is probably due to the faet that this is a morainie country made rough and hilly by the ice lobe which stood there in times long ago. A few such mounds are also found in the town of Warsaw, Goodhue county. They occur in lowland tributary to the Stanton flats. The peculiar problem presented by these mounds is this: No positive evidence has been found by digging into them or by searching the surface of adjacent fields that would establish the origin of the mounds as being Indian mounds. Hence the question arises: What reasons have we to think that these mounds were built by man. and that by the prehistorie inhabitants, the Indians ?

"The mounds are either artificial or else they are not artifi- cial. If natural forces made them, then geologists ought to explain them, since the mounds are an interesting feature in the topography of the country. If these mounds are of a natural origin. then many other tumuli jotted down as mounds may be called in question. However, geology and physical geography fail to account for them. The only forces which one might con- cieve of as able to make some of the mounds in the location under consideration would be springs. the wind. and floods, but a knowledge of the distribution of these mounds sets these agencies aside as inadequate to form all these mounds in all the places where they occur. There are innumerable places where mounds ought to have been formed just as easily by nature, but no mounds are to be found.

"The mounds are invariably round; they measure from twenty to forty feet across. and are from half a foot to three feet high. Occasional specimens may be higher, hence they may form very conspicuous objects in the landscape; for example, in the spring when the grass has been burned off.

"People living near the mounds often have various ideas as to the origin of the mounds. Some think they are the remains of hay stacks; others think they are gopher hills or ant hills. However, hay, when rotting, does not leave a residue of soil, sand and stones. The mounds occur in places where no hay ever was stacked. for example. in woods, or where water stands the year round, making the place wet and soggy. Gophers are oeca- sionally found burrowing in the mounds, but gophers do not live in woods nor in marshes. and where they are found burrow- ing in mounds on high land they usually spoil the smooth convex outline of the mound with little dirt heaps, giving the mound a warty appearance. If gophers build mounds, why did not the legions of gophers in Goodhue county build mounds of all sizes up to forty feet across and up to four feet high in other parts

HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

of the county? Similar reasons might be brought up against the idea of these earth heaps being ant hills.

"In no case were ants found to inhabit these mounds, nor do such mounds occur where ants are very numerous. A zoolo- gist or botanist would have a hard time to account for the origin of these mounds by referring them to the work of animals or plants.

"These are only a few of the reasons which seem to warrant the conclusion that these mounds are not the accumulations of geological nor of botanical agencies, and since it is very certain that the white man did not build them, there seems to be but one other reasonable conclusion to draw, namely. that the mounds were built by prehistoric men who for some reason lived there either temporarily in the course of years or for longer periods of time.

"The creeks, sloughs and ponds furnished an abundance of water. Fuel in great abundance was near at hand. The sloughs contained beavers, mink, muskrats and other game. In the nearby forests lived the deer in great abundance. Moose and elk were also here. Farmers tell of having plowed up bones belong- ing to these animals. Of buffalos there is scarcely a trace, if any, of their former presence. The only buffalo relic observed was a partially decayed horn which I found near the mounds in the Greenvale slough.

"If closer study should prove the mounds to be burial places, then they are witnesses both of the large number of Indians buried here as well as the much larger population which was not honored by a monument of earth. The groups in the vicinity of Dennison probably indicate that somewhere between North- field and Faribault a trail passed from Cannon river to Prairie creek, while the southern end of the Stanton flats served as a halting place or station. Traces of such trails still exist.

"The distribution of the mounds seems to be governed by the river courses and their tributaries, and by large flats which were either quite free from timber of else full of game. The absence of long mounds and the inability to find any traces of village sites or Indian relies of any kind seem to point to the great antiquity of these mounds, or else to warrant the view that with Red Wing, Spring Creek, Cannon Junction, Welch and other places along the Mississippi as headquarters, the Indians followed the water courses in temporary quest of game. They went along the Cannon to Faribault, Cannon lake, and very likely from there south into Steele, Mower and Freeborn counties. At least some mounds are found here and there in these counties, but, next to the Mississippi, the valley of the C'annon seems to

HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

have been the most favored of valleys as a route of travel, but Red Wing and vieinity for permanent villages.

"In the absence of any better explanation. we may tentatively accept the hypothesis that these mounds belong to the province of archæology, and that the larger valleys and their water courses have played a large role in the distribution of the mounds. The distribution of the mounds along these water courses is sneh that the law of arrangement governing them is in perfeet harmony with the law governing the general arrangement of mounds along waterways in other parts of the county, where we know that Indians lived and built mounds.

"If these deductions are true, then the seemingly unsolved problem of this singular type of mound finds its solution in the conclusion that these mounds are the products of human activity in prehistoric times. Thus they will form another link in Min- nesota archæology that will undoubtedly reward further study and possibly help to lift the veil that hangs over the past history of our state's aboriginal inhabitants and their mode of life. It unexpectedly shows that Indians built mounds in low lands as well as on higher lands.

"But if it should ever be shown that these mounds are not the tombs or camping places of a departed race, then they ought to be accorded a place in that science whose province it will be to explain them.

Warren Upham. secretary of the society, and well known for his writings on glacial questions, suggests that these mounds are of very ancient origin, dating back to the time of the glacier's recession or a little later. The lapse of so long a time would account for the disappearance of all human remains. In Septem- ber. 1908, Prof. N. Winchell hired men and had a number of these, mounds trenched. Despite the very careful work and search. our hopes of establishing beyond a doubt the artificial origin of the mounds by means of exhumed relies were frustrated. We spent three days at this work.

The southern part of the county still requires careful explora- tion. In the following townships the writer was unable to find any mounds: Vasa, Cannon Falls, Leon, Wanamingo, and Min- neola. Very likely some mounds will be found along the forks of the Zumbro. A few were seen near Kenyon. Warsaw has ten on section 8, and others near Dennison. Florence has a niee group on the terrace near the mouth of Wells creek. The inability to report fully on all townships is pardonable when it is remem- bered that it requires much time and thousands of miles of travel to visit and carefully examine a large county and do it at one's own expense .- Edward William Schmidt.

121 PUBLIC LL.

AUTOZ, LEN9X AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

Theodore, B. Sheldon

HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

Theodore B. Sheldon is a name that will always be remem- bered in Red Wing for what he accomplished during his long life here, as well as for the beautiful T. B. Sheldon Auditorium, which was built with the money which he left to be expended for the good of Red Wing. He was born January 31, 1820, at Bernardston. Franklin county, Massachusetts, not far from the village of Northfield, made famous by the evangelist, D. L. Moody. He received a common school education in the schools of his neighborhood, and at the age of twelve began work in a woolen mill in Greenfield. Mass., where he remained until 1840, when he entered the employ of a cutlery manufacturer. In this business he remained three years and then went to Springfield, Mass., where he obtained a situation with a tool and lock manu- facturing company. Two years later he removed to Whitney- ville, Conn., where he worked in a gun and rifle factory two years. later taking up similar work for a similar period in Windsor, Vt. He arrived in Red Wing in the autumn of 1856 and went into partnership with Jesse MeIntire in the mercantile business. In 1860 he sold out to his partner and in the fall of that year built a warehouse and went into the grain business. Shortly afterward he took his clerk, E. H. Blodgett, as a partner. this arrangement continuing until Mr. Sheldon's death. Mr. Sheldon was identified with most of the leading enterprises of Red Wing. In the early days he represented the steamboat lines and express companies doing business here, and was also agent for the Milwaukee road until the line was completed from St. Paul to La Crosse. He was largely interested in the First National and Goodhue County banks, being president of the former and vice president of the latter. He was president of the Goodhue County Savings bank, conducted in connection with the latter institution. He was also president of the Red Wing & Trenton Transit Company when that company was organized for the purpose of operating a ferry across the river and a road over the island. In this capacity he continued until within a short time of his death. Mr. Sheldon was one of the prime movers in the Minnesota Stoneware Company, and also in the Red Wing Gas, Light & Power Company, the Red Wing Furniture Company, and the Duluth, Red Wing & Southern Railway Company. His business capacity was recognized by his election as president of all these companies. He was vice presi- dent of the La Grange mills, and the Red Wing. Duluth & Sioux City Construction Company. He was also associated with various other enterprises as stockholder or director. He served as one of the supervisors of Red Wing while the township organization was still in force, and after the organization of the city was a member of the council. In politics he was a Democrat, and his

HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY

church affiliations were with the Episcopal faith. Of him it has well been said, "He was a striking type of the practical self- made man, and his success in life was due to his energy, honesty, foresight and fine business ability. His death was lamented by a community in which every man, woman and child was his friend." Mr. Sheldon died April 3, 1900, at the age of eighty years. T. B. Sheldon was married in 1848 to Mary T. Sturtevant, of Hartland, Vt. Five children were born to them, all of whom died. Mrs. Mary Sheldon died in November, 1891. In June, 1893, Mr. Sheldon married, at Milwaukee, Wis., to Annie L. Langton. who recently died. She was one of the committee with E. H. Blodgett and F. Busch named in the will to determine how the bequest of her husband should be spent to best benefit the city, and many of the artistic features of the Auditorium are the fruits of her suggestions.

CHIAPTER IV.

EARLY DAYS.

Possession by Indians-The Dakotas-Traditions and Opinions --- Col. Colville's Views-Origin of Name "Red Wing"-The Raidsson-Groseillers Allegations-No Proof that These Men Ever Saw Goodhue County-Hennepin Lands at Red Wing's Village-Duluth Passes the Village-LeSueur at Prairie Island-Fort Beauharnois and Its Successors-Carver Passes Through Wisconsin Channel-Pike and His Narrative- Meets Red Wing and Calls Him by His English Name- Leavenworth-First Steamers-Denton and Gavin-Aiton and Hancock-Tribute to Rev. Hancock-Early Schooling- The Pioneers Arrive-By Dr. W. M. Sweney.

Through how many ages the Indians flourished in this county is a question that will never be satisfactorily settled. At any event. the white men found here a band of Indians whose ances- tors, according to their tribal traditions, had occupied the land for ages, and had for headquarters. "Hem-minne-cha," which is now known as Cannon Junction, with straggling villages extend- ing in every direction within a radius of six miles. The villages of the Sioux Indians were usually found situated near a collee- tion of earth mounds; but there are no well authenticated ac- counts of the Indians found there by the early explorer, having practiced to any great extent mound burial, but they did follow the custom of scaffold burial, as was noticed by Hennepin at Prescott Point, at the mouth of the St. Croix in 1680. This prac- tice I have myself seen in Red Wing. a great many times. Such flint, stone. bone and copper implements, and rude pottery, as were found to be in general use in the hands of the Indians, when first visited by the whites, are usually found at the bottom of a mound when excavated. yet the natives had no traditions as to who were the makers of the artifaets, or who were the builders of the mounds. Within a radius of six miles from Cannon Junc- tion I have located, mapped and charted over four thousand In- dian burial mounds, earthworks, stone cairns, etc., showing con- clusively that this region must have been inhabited for many ages. I can show today an oak stump standing on top of a burial

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

History of Goodhue County, Minnesota, Part 4

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