USA > Minnesota > Morrison County > History of Morrison and Todd counties, Minnesota, their people, industries and institutions, Volume I > Part 4
USA > Minnesota > Todd County > History of Morrison and Todd counties, Minnesota, their people, industries and institutions, Volume I > Part 4
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About six miles above Granite City, on the northwest side of Skunk (4)
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river, a little beyond where this stream is crossed by the road used for carrying the supplies distributed yearly to the Mille Lacs Indians, rock exposures are reported to cover as large an area as at Granite City, but to have less height above the adjoining surface of the drift. This is near the northwest corner of township 41, range 28.
The rocks found in Morrison county, along the Mississippi river and west of it, belong to a group lithologically different from the foregoing, and doubtless newer in age. The first exposure is on the Little Elk river near its mouth, two and half miles north of Little Falls. It continues northwest above the dam, and is also visible in low exposures at the bridge, twenty rods above the dam. This slate contains occasional veins of quartz from a quarter of an inch to three inches in width, and from one to twenty feet in length.
At the rapids at Little Falls on the Mississippi, beside the town of this name, this dark slate, varying from mica schist to argillyte, has extensive outcrops in each shore and forms the north end of Mill island, on the west side of which it makes a perpendicular cliff twenty feet high. The princi- pal rapid extends a fifth of a mile from about six hundred feet above the island to five hundred feet below its north end, the descent being five feet. The stone was slightly quarried here prior to 1888, nearly opposite tlie north end of Mill island, for use in foundations, but no massive blocks nor any of regular form are obtainable. In this slate, veins of white quartz occur, varying from an eighth of an inch to one inch in thickness and extending out as far as seventy feet in places. The thickest of these veins is situated in the channel of the river, where it is about one foot wide. In the eastern part of Little Falls this slate is encountered at a depth of ten feet in digging wells, but it is not found thus in the west part, between this and its exposure at the river.
This same geological formation is found outcropping at other points, as for example at Cash's rapids, below Pike's rapids, at the middle of Nun- cy's rapids, and at other points within Morrison county.
Of the cretaceous beds of the county it should be said that at the mouth of main Two rivers these beds outcrop in the west bank of the Mis- sissippi along a distance of a quarter of a mile and in the banks of Two rivers it is overlaid by from ten to thirty feet of drift. A perfect shark's tooth was found about thirty years ago by Eddie Young on a sandbar of Two rivers, a fourth of a mile above its mouth. Other shark's teeth have been discovered since that date. all indicating that marine cretaceous beds probably underly the drift somewhere within the basin of the stream, though
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possibly they are eroded by the ice, their fossils being now contained in the drift.
The modified drift of the Mississippi river valley discloses that at Hay creek, where the river-road crosses, near the south line of Swan River town- ship, out of every one hundred pebbles found, about two are limestone; a hundredth part are red sandstone; the remainder, nearly ninety-nine per cent., are dark greenish or brown trap, redish and gray granite, cyanite and other crystalline rocks.
The wells in Morrison county have a depth ranging from fifteen to fifty-five feet; usually about thirty feet from the surface good drinking water is obtained by digging for it.
MATERIAL RESOURCES.
In 1881, when a geological survey was made of Morrison county by Warren Upham, now of the Historical Society of Minnesota, he found water-powers in use and dams for lumbering purposes as follow :
On Skunk river, at Kasper's grist-mill, two miles northeast of Pierz, with an eight-foot head, as well as another in way of a saw-mill in section 30, with a seven-foot head. On Hillman brook and its branches, dams to supply water for log driving and other purposes, amounting in all to a half dozen or more. On Platte river two dams were in existence for lumbering and had a head of six feet. On Skunk brook, the Northern Pacific flouring- mills, in section 27, had a sixteen-foot head and run a three run of stones. On Two rivers there was a flouring-mill, with a twenty-foot head and numer- ous saw-mills. On Swan river, in the east edge of section 12, a third of a mile from its mouth, the Swan River flouring-mills, with a head of eleven feet. On the Little Elk river, Hill's grist-mill and saw-mill had a twelve- feet head, besides a large shingle-mill in the west part of section 8. Other good water powers, said Mr. Upham, waited to be employed on these streams, and on the Nokasippi, and especially on the Mississippi river at Little Falls and Pike rapids.
Building Stone .- The outcrops of rock in Morrison county have been but slightly quarried at several localities. The most promising seems to be the granite seen a short distance south of Fish lake, three miles southwest of Rich Prairie. Drift builders are considerably used for rough masonry.
Bricks. When Fort Ripley was built the bricks used were made on the west side of the Mississippi, near the site of the fort. They were red
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and of excellent quality. In 1879 brick-making was begun by William Schwartz on the east side of the Mississippi a mile northeast from Brainerd.
ARCHAEOLOGY.
Without entering deep into the mysteries of this interesting subject, it should be stated, in brief, that this county affords a wonderland for scien- tific investigation along these lines. Peculiar earthworks are found less than a mile north of Little Falls, near the present. town plat. Professor Winchell described these in his work in the eighties in the following lan- guage :
"Low circular ridges, from eight to twelve feet across, rising but two to three feet above the common level, are scattered over a small distance. They may have been designed for human habitation, having been formed at first by slightly excavating the surface of the ground, and then building rude, arched coverings, supported by wooden branches and enclosed by earth. If all these decayed and fell in, the resulting forms would be exactly what are now seen. Beyond the limits of the village, farther north, is an interesting ridge, nearly straight, running obliquely back from the river and one hundred and elght paces in length. It has two low spots, or open- ings, through it, which separate it into three main parts. It does not extend to the immediate river bank, but is separated from it by several rods. The design of this ridge is not evident, but it must have sustained some relation to other works in the neighborhood. It may not, however, have the same age as the smaller circling ridges."
NATIIAN RICHARDSON'S ACCOUNT OF MOUNDS.
That well-posted gentleman, Nathan Richardson, one of the first county officials and a man of learning and much local research, wrote on the subject of mounds over a quarter of a century ago as follows:
"On section 35, township 41, range 31, in the south edge of Belle Prairie, six miles east of Little Falls, nearly forty mounds are 'found around the shore of a lake, which by the Indians was called 'the lake between the hills'. A mile east from this lake is a group of about a dozen mounds, two of which were dug into a few years ago, a skeleton being found in cach. Going from these nearly south about two miles, on the point of dry land running down to the thoroughfare between the two Rice
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lakes, there are three mounds near together, much larger than these I have mentioned. Then, by crossing the stream connecting the two lakes and following down the strip of dry land between them about a half-mile, one comes to the largest mound known in Morrison county. It is about twelve feet in height. Passing on about one mile, on the southwest bank of East Rice lake, eight or ten more of the smaller size are found. Occasionally one or two small ones are met with in other parts of the county."
HOLE-IN-THE-DAY'S BLUFF.
Hole-in-the-Day's Bluff is one and one-half miles northeast from Lit- tle Falls. It received its name from that of a famous Chippewa Indian slayer of Sioux (Dakotahs) in the terrible conflicts between these two tribes, and who was buried, in accordance with his wishes, at the top of the hill. The prospect from it is beautiful, overlooking a wide extent of coun- try in every direction, with the smooth Belle prairie and the Mississippi river at its foot on the west.
CHAPTER III.
INDIAN TRIBES AND EARLY MISSIONARIES.
Before entering into the modern history of Morrison and Todd coun- ties it will be well to consider some of the conditions found in this domain, while Minnesota was yet a territory, and trace briefly some of historic events which led up to its final development by the white race. To begin with, it should be stated that three separate Indian tribes were present in northern Minnesota at the time the state was admitted into the Union in 1858. These tribes were the Sioux, or Dakotahs; the Chippewas, or Ojib- ways, and the Winnebagoes, or Ho-tchungraws.
THE SIOUX INDIANS.
The Sioux tribe was an entirely different group from the Algonquin and Iroquois, who were found by the early settlers of the Atlantic states on the banks of the Connecticut, Mohawk and Susquehanna rivers. When the Dakotahs were first noticed by the European adventurers large num- bers were occupying the Mille Lacs region of the country, and appropriately called by the voyageur "People of the Lac," "Gens du Lac." Tradition states that here, in ancient times, was the center of this tribe. Though we have traces of their warring and hunting on the shores of Lake Superior, there is no satisfactory evidence of their residence east of the Mille Lacs region, as they have no name for Lake Superior. The word Dakotah, by which they love best to be designated, signifies allied or joined together in friendly compact, and is equivalent to "E pluribus unum," the motto of the United States.
More than two hundred years ago, it was written by La Pointe Mis- sion authors in Wisconsin thus: "For sixty leagues from the extremity of the Upper lake, toward sunset, and, as it were, in the center of the western nations, they have all united their force by a general league."
Historians all know that from the earliest documents the Dakotahs
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have been called the Sioux, Scioux or Soos. The name originated with the early voyageurs. For centuries the Ojibways of Lake Superior waged war against the Dakotahs and, whenever they spoke of them, called them Nado- waysioux, signifying enemies. To avoid exciting the attention of Indians, while conversing in their presence, the French traders called them by names which they could not understand. The Dakotahs were nicknamed Sioux, a word composed of the last two syllables of the Ojibway word for foes.
Under the influence of the early French traders the eastern Sioux began to wander from the Mills Lacs region. A trading post at O-ton-we- kpadan, or Rice creek, above the falls of St. Anthony, induced some to erect there their summer dwellings and plant corn, which took the place of wild rice. Those who dwelt here were called Wa-kpa-a-ton-we-dan, or, those who dwell on the creek. Another division was styled the Ma-tan-ton-wan. About 1790, or a little later, the eastern Sioux, pressed by the Chippewas, and influenced by traders, moved seven miles above Ft. Snelling on the Min- nesota river.
In 1849, only sixty-six years ago, there were seven villages of Med- day-kawn-twawn Sioux-one below Lake Pepin, where now stands the city of Winona, known as Wapashaw, and of whom Bounding Wind was chief ; one at the head of Lake Pepin, where, under the lofty bluff, was the Red Wing village, of which Shooter was the big chief ; one, styled Kaposia, oppo- site Pig's Eye Marsh, of which the chief was Little Crow, who became notorious as the wicked leader of the 1862 massacre; Black Dog Village, on the Minnesota river a few miles above Ft. Snelling, inhabited by Ma-ga-yu-tay-shnee, of whom Gray Iron was chief; at Oak Grove, on the north side of the river, eight miles above the fort, was Hay-ya-ta-o-ton-wan (Inland Village, because they formerly lived at Lake Calhoun) ; the sixth branch of this tribe of Dakotahs was the "Bad People," or O-ya-tay-shee-ka, and the seventh band was styled Tin-ta-ton-wan ( Prairie Village) ; Shok- pay, or Six, was the chief, and it is now the site of the town of Shakopee.
West of this division of the Sioux were the Leaf Shooters (War-pay- ku-ray), who occupied the region south of the Minnesota river, near the headwaters of the Blue Earth and Cannon rivers; north and west of this band were the War-pay-twawns (people of the leaf), who numbered about fifteen hundred and lived in a village known as Lac qui Parle; still to the west of these were the Se-see-twawns (Sissetoans), or Swamp Dwellers. This band claimed the land west of the Blue Earth to James river. They it was who held title and sacredly guarded the famous sacred red pipestone
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quarry. Their principal village was at Traverse, and they numbered fully four thousand.
Finally, the Ho-tchun-graws, or Winnebagoes, who also belong to the Dakotah family of aborigines, perhaps the dirtiest and most unattractive band of all Indian tribes, were, by a treaty in 1837, removed to Iowa, and by another treaty, in October, 1846, they came to Minnesota, in the spring of 1848, to the country between the Long Prairie and Crow Wing rivers. Their agency was located on Long Prairie river, forty miles from the Mis- sissippi river, and in 1849 the tribe numbered twenty-five hundred souls. In February, 1855, another treaty was effected with them, and that spring they removed to lands on the Blue Earth river. Owing to the panic caused by the outbreak of the Sioux in 1862, Congress, by a special act, in 1863, without consulting them, removed them from their fields in Minnesota to the Missouri river, and, in the words of a missionary, "they were, like the Sioux, dumped in the desert, one hundred miles above Ft. Randall."
OJIBWAY OR CHIPPEWA NATION.
This tribe of Indians, when the French first came to Lake Superior, had their chief setlement at Sault St. Marie. They were called by the French, Saulteurs, and by the Sioux, Hah-ha-tonwan, "Dwellers at the Falls of Leaping Waters." When Duluth erected his trading post at the western extremity of Lake Superior, they had not obtained a foothold in Minnesota and were constantly at war with their hereditary enemies, the Nadouaysioux. But by the middle of the eighteenth century they had pushed in and occupied Sandy, Leech, Mille Lacs and other points between Lake Superior and the Mississippi, which had been the dwelling places of the Sioux. In 1820 the main villages of the Ojibways in Minnesota were at Fond du Lac, Leech lake and Sandy lake. In 1837 they ceded most of their lands. Since then other treaties have been made, until by 1880 they were confined to a few reservations, in northern Minnesota and vicinity.
EARLY CHURCHI MISSIONS.
As Morrison county once had a large Indian school and a religious mission within its borders, it is well to give a brief account of the various missions established by Catholics, Methodist Episcopal and other denomi- nations, in this portion of the great Northwest.
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After the American Fur Company was formed, the island of Macki- naw became the residence of the principal agent for the Northwest, Robert Stuart. a Scotchman and devoted Presbyterian. In June, 1820, the Rev. Dr. Morse, father of the world-famous inventor of the telegraph, visited and preached at Mackinaw, and later, at his suggestion the Presbyterian Missionary Society sent a graduate of Union College, Rev. W. M. Ferry, father of the man who was later United States senator from Michigan, to explore the field. In 1823 he established a large boarding school, com- posed of children of various tribes, and here some were educated and became wives of men of intelligence and influence at St. Paul. Later this plan of a central school was changed and there were sent teachers to the various tribes. Rev. Alvin Coe and J. D. Stevens arrived at Ft. Snelling in Sep- tember, 1829. The Historical Society has in its possession the journal of Major Lawrence Taliaferro, in which this entry appears: "The Rev. Mr. Coe and Stevens reported to be on their way to this post; members of the Presbyterian church looking for suitable places to make missionary estab- lishments for the Sioux and Chippewas, found schools, and instruct in the arts of agriculture."
During this visit the government agent offered for a Presbyterian mis- sion the mill which stood on the present site of Minneapolis, that had been erected by the government, as well as the farm at Lake Calhoun, which was established to teach the Sioux agriculture.
In 1830 Frederick Ayer, one of the teachers at Mackinaw, made an exploration as far as La Pointe, and returned, and in about one year a mis- sion was established by the church at La Pointe. In 1833 Rev. Ayer opened a school at Yellow Lake, Wisconsin, and F. F. Ely became a teacher at Aitkins trading post at Sandy lake. In 1834-35 a mission was formed as well as a Presbyterian church organized at Ft. Snelling.
In the autumn of 1841 the Roman Catholic church attempted to estab- lish a mission at Mendota, which, however, did not remain long in the work.
The Chippewa mission was at Pokeguma, one of the "mille lacs", or thousand beautiful lakes for which Minnesota is remarkable. It is twenty miles above the junction of Snake river and St. Croix river and was estab- lished in 1836. among the Ojibways and Pokeguma, to promote their spir- itual and temporal welfare. The mission house was erected on the east side of the lake, but the Indian village was on the island, not far from shore. A year later, 1837, a journal says: "The young women and girls now make, mend, wash and iron after our manner. The men have learned
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to build log houses, drive team, plow, hoe and handle an American axe with skill in cutting large trees, the size of which, two years ago, would have afforded them sufficient reason why they should not meddle with them."
In 1837 Rev. A. Brunson commenced a Methodist mission at Kaposia, four miles below and opposite St. Paul. It was subsequently removed to the west side at Red Rock. The Rev. Spates and a few others also labored among the Ojibways for a brief period.
At the stations the Dakotah language was diligently studied. Rev. S. W. Pond had prepared a dictionary of three thousand words, and also a small grammar. The Rev. S. R. Riggs, who had joined the mission in 1837, in a letter dated February 24, 1841, writes: "Last summer, after returning from Ft. Snelling, I spent five weeks in copying again the Sioux vocabu- lary which we had collected and arranged at this station. It contained then about five thousand five hundred words, not including the various forms of the verbs. Since that time the words collected by myself and Doctor Will- iamson have, I presume, increased the number to fully six thousand. Mrs. Riggs and otliers wrote a vocabulary of about three thousand words."
Steadily the number of Indian missionaries increased, and in 1851. before the lands of the Dakotahs west of the Mississippi river were ceded to the whites, they were disposed of as follows by the Dakotah presbytery : Lac-qui-parle, Rev. S. R. Riggs, Rev. M. N. Adams and assistants; Trav- erses des Sioux, Rev. Robert Hopkins, missionary, and assistants; Shack- pay. Rev. Samuel W. Pond, missionary, and assistants; Oak Grove, Rev. Gideon H. Pond and wife; Kaposia, Rev. Thomas Williamson, M. D., mis- sionary and physician, and assistants; Red Wing, Rev. James F. Alton, Rev. Joseph W. Hancock, missionaries, with their devoted wives and assist- ants.
An account of the Indian school and church established in Morrison county by Rev. Frederick Ayer, a Congregational minister of Massachu- setts, will be found in the county chapters of this work. His son is still an honored resident and business factor at Little Falls. Thus the heralds of the Cross endured the privations and sacrifices of a wilderness, away back in the thirties, forties and fifties, that the pioneer and red man might be taught the way of truth and goodness.
FINAL DISPOSITION OF INDIANS.
The Winnebagoes were for some years located within the bounds of Todd and Morrison counties. In 1848 General Fletcher removed them
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from Ft. Atkinson, Iowa, to Long Prairie, west side of the Mississippi river ; but, although the agency was located at Long Prairie, the Indians occupied the Swan river valley, within the present limits of Morrison county for a period of seven years, where they engaged partly in hunting and partly in farming, having about two hundred acres under cultivation, but they became dissatisfied and were removed to the Blue Earth country.
When the Winnebago Indians were brought to Long Prairie and Swan river valley, in 1848, the government built Ft. Ripley on the west bank of the Mississippi river, about twenty miles above the mouth of Swan river. During the outbreak of Indians in 1862 it became necessary to station a large force of soldiers here to overawe the redskins-to hold back the Chip- pewas, who were then suspected of an intention to make common cause with the hostile Sioux in warfare against the whites. The Seventh United States Regulars were there stationed for quite a period until the Indian war had subsided.
CHAPTER IV.
EARLY SETTLEMENT OF MORRISON COUNTY.
Morrison is one of the central counties of Minnesota; it is about forty by forty-two miles, respectively, east and west and north and south, and has an area of one thousand one hundred and thirty-nine square miles, equal to almost seven hundred and twenty-nine thousand acres. That por- tion lying east of the Mississippi river was originally included in Benton county, while that to the west of that river was a part of Todd county. Cass and Crow Wing counties are at the north of Morrison; Crow Wing and Mille Lacs on the east; Benton and Stearns on the south and Todd county at the west.
The surface is rolling and originally well timbered, but interspersed with lakes and beautiful prairies. Ten townships in the eastern portion were, as late as 1882, noted for their heavy pine and maple timber. In the northwestern part of the county five other congressional townships had the same kind of native forest lands. At that date, from the pine region north on the west side of the Mississippi river, south to the county line, an unbroken forest existed. The soil in this particular portion is excep- tionally fine. For ten miles south of the pine region extensive natural meadows existed. On the east side of the Mississippi river the country not included in the pine belt has but little timber of any sort, but is made up largely of brush land, marsh and meadowland, with some good prairie land. The soil is generally good for this section of Minnesota.
The population of Morrison county, according to the census of 1910, was twenty-four thousand and fifty-three; Little Falls, its seat of justice, having at that date six thousand and seventy-eight.
Among the points of historic interest in this county is that where Pike's fort was situated, on the west side of the Mississippi below the rap- ids south of Little Falls. At this place the bank rises fifteen feet, on the summit of which the stockade was built. Measurements taken in 1879 showed it to have been thirty-eight feet square. In Pike's own official
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account it is stated that his fleet consisted of two long boats, one of which was put upon either side of the passage-way from the stockade to the river. The distance from the water's edge being not over sixty feet in low water, there is no inconsistency in the statement.
This was Lieut. Zebulon M. Pike, the first United States Army officer sent to the upper Mississippi. He was later made famous by his explora- tions in the Rocky Mountain country, where a celebrated mountain peak was named for him-Pike's Peak. After building the stockade near Swan river, he passed a month in hunting and exploring the vicinity, but toward the close of November he began to make plans to visit the trading posts of British traders. On December 10 he left his little stockade near Little Falls. The party took with them prairie sleds and a preoque, towed by three men. On December 14, just after leaving the encampment, the fore- most sled, carrying his baggage and powder, fell into the river. But suffi- cient was saved to continue the journey. On December 31, 1805, he passed the mouth of Pine river. On January 2, 1806, just as he was encamping, four, Chippewas, Grant, an Englishman, and a Frenchman of the North- west Company arrived. The next day Pike returned with Grant to one of the posts on the Red Cedar lake and found the British flag flying. That night he came back to his men. On January 8 he reached Sandy lake, Grant's residence, and was received with hospitality. After a visit of twelve days, he left on the 20th, and on February I he crossed Leach lake, twelve miles from the establishment of the Northwest Company, where he arrived at three o'clock in the afternoon. The gates were locked, but, upon knock- ing, he was admitted and cordially greeted by Hugh McGillis, the principal trader of the Northwest Company west of Lake Superior, being the director of the Fond du Lac department.
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