USA > Minnesota > Stearns County > History of Stearns County, Minnesota, Volume I > Part 57
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Among the early settlers there was no lack of ability, either in this upper country or in the territory at large. Considering the small number here prior to 1855, there were among them a very large number of men of a high order of ability for public affairs. During the more recent years, not among any similar body of men, or thrice their number, has their mental ability, polit- ical skill and diseretion been equaled, if indeed it has at all in Minnesota. It will be a far-off day when the people ean look at any one time at such an ar- ray of able men as existed prior to 1855 in the persons of the Rices, Sibley, Ramsay, Marshall, Joseph R. Brown, Brisbin, Murray, Steele, the Me- Kusieks, the Olmsteds, Wilkinson, Goodhue, Gorman, North, the Folsoms, Becker, Fridley, Lowry, Major Randall and their associates; and in the law and other professions there was no deficiency. The foundations of the state essential to prosperity were well and ably laid, for which this later genera- tion, in which we few survivers find ourselves, may feel duly thankful. During our time here we have had some fun; we have seen how the state has been transformed by improvements; wonderful inventions have been made; great wars have interested us, and our experiences have been so great that we may well wonder if new things in the future can happen to interest those who unfortunately were born too late to enjoy what has been experienced by us.
Captain J. E. West. "Where the Pioneers Slept" (1906). In our remi- niscenees as to where we slept, it is easier to remember the delightful sleeping- places of the pioneer days than it is to recollect the nights we spent in misery and grief.
We slept in or under our "prairie schooners" on our long tiresome trip over new roads and through the woodland while seeking a new home on the frontier. Some of us remember the delightful trip on one of the great float- ing palaces that steamed up the river from Galena to St. Paul. After the pleasant evening of a glorious October day spent on deck, drinking in the pure fresh air and enjoying the grand scenery and gorgeous foliage that covered the bluffs, how delightfully we slept in the large and comfortable staterooms. As we passed up through Lake Pepin we can remember our excitement, as in the early morning we heard the call, "We are in sight of Maiden Rock." How rapidly we dressed and hastened on deck to get a view of this romantic spot. In our youthful imaginations we could see the beautiful Indian maiden in her short buckskin skirt, with her long, black hair over her shoulders, as she made the fearful leap from this great rock that reached far out over the lake. Then as we looked again we could see her, in our imagination, waving her hand in defiance at her father, the great chieftain, because he would not permit her to marry her lover, an Indian brave of another band.
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When we landed at the wharf at the village of St. Paul we were sorry to leave our delightful sleeping places. Then we slept in small, untidy rooms at the old Merchants, the American House and the St. Charles. During the winter of 1854 we slept on bed-ticks filled with prairie grass, in eold houses in the village of St. Anthony, and on elaims in the new country. In the early spring of 1855 some of us slept one fearful stormy night where we were awak- ened by the terrific crash as the beautiful suspension bridge was blown from its cables and fell, a complete wreck, on the ice below.
Then we slept on the wild and beautiful banks of Lakes Calhoun, Harriet and Minnetonka before the artisan had attempted to improve on God's glori- ous work. We slept within hearing of the waterfall as it rushed with all its grandeur over the precipice forming the Bridal Veil at the then beautiful Minnehaha, and before we had learned by our sad experience with the red men that Longfellow's poem was nothing but a hoax.
Then we slept under the beautiful trees on what is now University campus, and in the shadow of Cheever's Tower, where we could read the sign, "Pay your dime and elimb." Then after climbing the long stairs, sleep was driven from our eyes as we looked out and saw in the distance the grand and glorious cataract, where the great volume of water rushed in its mad splash- ing career over the original Falls of St. Anthony, and on every side we eould see God's glorious and beautiful world. When we reached the ground we leaned against the tower and slept, and dreamed of the beautiful new world we had found.
Then we slept in the small, crowded staterooms on the old steamers Gov. Ramsey and H. M. Rice as they came slowly up the river from St. Anthony to St. Cloud and Sauk Rapids. We slept on these boats while they were stuck fast on the sand-bars among the islands below St. Cloud, and were awakened by the loud shouting of one hundred log-drivers as they waded under the sides of the boat and with their long poles lifted her from the sand-bar and sent her floating down the stream.
During that fearful long, cold winter of 1855 we slept in board shanties with only one inch of lumber to protect us from the cold of 50 degrees below zero. We cooked, lived, ate and slept in these shanties and log cabins, with our bed in the center of the room between two stoves. When we retired the stove would be red hot and water boiling, and in the morning it would be frozen solid.
We slept in kind-hearted squatters' cabins, having two or three children for bed-fellows, sleeping between two great feather-beds. Then we slept in other eabins with scant covering, and we slept on the floor of these cabins, wrapped in our buffalo robes. We slept in rooms where frost gathered on the windows three inches thick. We slept in lofts and garrets where we would be covered with snow as it drifted through the roof, and we slept where our breath froze our whiskers and hair to the bedding.
During our noon hour, we slept on piles of wood or rails before great fires in the forest. Then after a night and day lost in the woods, we slept before other great fires that served the double purpose of keeping us warm and holding at bay the howling pack of timber wolves. During the summer
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after a day's tramping on the boundless prairie sea, the sun hid under a cloud, we were most fearfully lost. We made beds from the marsh grass and in the midst of thousands and thousands of beautiful flowers, such as grow only in God's great flower garden, we had refreshing sleep and were awak- ened by the bright and glorious sun as it appeared in the east, bringing us the greetings of another day and pointing out the road to our homes. Never was the sun more beautiful; we gave it a warm welcome and accepted its greeting with joyful hearts.
Then we slept in the old-fashioned stagecoach as it rocked on its great leather straps, and went bouncing over the prairie from St. Paul to St. Cloud, and as it was rattling and bumping over the rough corduroy roads through the big woods near Alexandria. We slept in our log or board claim shanties which we had hastily converted into forts; and as we were awakened by the wild yells of a drunken mob calling themselves the Claim Association, we snatched our shotguns and rifles from the pegs on the wall and defiantly com- manded a halt. Surprised at meeting an honest and determined resistance these men would hastily retreat and look up some tenderfoot squatter who had loeated too near some speculator's boundless claim, and while under the influence of "fire-water" and meeting no resistance they would shave the squatters' heads to the skin and then ride them on a rail out of town.
While on the road to St. Paul for merchandise, we slept in our wagons or on the ground under them, while our oxen fed on the prairie near by.
In the colder weather we slept or tried to sleep in the old hotels at Coon Creek, Itasca, Elk River and Big Lake, but were driven from the beds by armies of bugs, commanded by a general and his staff, they being determined that their homes should not be molested by the tender-footed white man.
Then we slept in a better class of hotels, at St. Cloud, Sank Rapids, Watab and other pretentious cities. Frequently we had one or sometimes two strang- ers for companions ; or we slept on the floor, furnishing our own blankets and surrounded by scores of strangers, each man paying fifty cents for the use of the floor and the privilege of swearing.
I remember C. C. Andrews, afterwards General Andrews, when he made his trip of inspection through this part of the frontier. He was just out of college. The ink was hardly dry on his diploma. He passed St. Paul, St. Anthony, St. Cloud and Sauk Rapids, believing that he could find a more desirable location for a young and rising attorney. When he arrived at Watab, then the metropolis of the upper Mississippi, he abandoned the stagecoach and engaged lodging at the City Hotel. He was a tall, straight, dignified, well- dressed young gentleman, and commanded the respect of those he met. At the proper time he was shown his bed, which was in a room with five or six others. He retired and was lost in sleep, when the landlord shook him and said, "Stranger, roll over and make room for this man." Andrews said, "What, a strange bed-fellow?" The landlord said "Yes, and before morn- ing yon may have another." He got up and dressed himself, went to the sit- ting room expecting to sit by the fire, but every inch of space was taken by men sleeping on the floor. He then sought comfort in the streets of that city, and when he was tired out by his long night's walk, he stopped and for one-
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half hour leaned against the corner of the building and slept, for which he was charged and paid fifty cents.
Then during a long trip in the winter from St. Paul to Dubuque, in open sleds called stages, the passengers braced themselves against each other and entirely covering themselves with buffalo robes and blankets, slept.
Then we slept on the track of the wounded deer or bear that we had fol- lowed until dark, so that at early daylight we could start, hoping to catch up with our game before it had left its resting-place.
Then we slept in the woods, with our blankets and buffalo-robes stretched on poles for a tent, with great log fires in front of us while the mercury was frozen out of sight. Our young vigor and enthusiasm kept us warm and com- fortable while we slept, or platted the townsites of Hartford, Newburg, Brotts- burg and seores of other townsites that have long since been forgotten.
Some of us remember sleeping in Moffett's Castle in St. Paul, a quaint old building that had story after story added as the streets were graded np around it, and when we were shown to our room we would never know whether we were to go up or downstairs.
Before the days of mosquito netting we slept in houses where we could only find rest by filling the room with smudge smoke so dense that mosquitoes could not exist. On our fishing trips, after being driven from our beds, we would row far out on the water where the breeze would keep the mosquitoes from coming; then we would let the boat drift while we slept.
While burning lime or brick, we slept on the ground until it was our turn to watch the fires.
During that great grasshopper storm, while millions and millions of the little pests were raining down from the clouds and like hail pelting the win- dows of our cabins and covering the earth from sight, after we recovered from our astonishment, and while the 'hoppers were devouring all vegetation, we the pioneers slept.
During our visits to the lumber eamps, three hundred miles from civiliza- tion, surrounded by lumbermen who had been in the woods six or eight months, and after an hour spent telling these men of their families and of the world, we climbed up to one of those upper bunks and slept.
In June, when the great mass of logs were being driven down the rivers, hundreds of the log-drivers all dressed in red-blanket suits would celebrate their home-coming by drinking poor whisky until they were wild, and then they would paint the town red with their fearful yelling up and down the streets. For several nights if we slept at all, it was within hearing of their continued yells, ten thousand times more hideous than dangerous. For drunk or sober the rough pioneer lumbermen of Minnesota were big-hearted, big- souled men who would do no harm if not molested.
Then we slept in lumbermen's wanegans and tents on the banks of the river, and ate with them of their delicious baked beans.
Then on the nights of the Fourth of July and other holidays we slept in tents and under our branching native trees, with "Old Glory" floating from the flag-staff, and we dreaming of the happy future when another star would be added to the constellation, representing our own beautiful Minnesota. Then
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later we slept during the dark, stormy days of the Civil War under the pro- tecting folds of that same flag, with one of the brightest stars representing our state, and our War Governor Ramsey determined to furnish our quota of fight- ing men to protect every star and to see that not one should be torn from the azure of blue.
During the prosperous days of 1856 and early '57, we slept in our new cottages that replaced the shanties and cabins, in rooms all fresh and sweet, with new and beautiful white plaster, and as we rested on our cane-seat rocker or rolled with the little ones on the new ingrain carpet that had taken the place of the old hit-or-miss rag rug, we slept in comfortable beds surrounded with these extravagant and luxurious comforts, and we were as happy as kings.
Then the great financial crash of 1857 came like a flash of lightning, and in a moment we were reduced from what was a pioneer's wealth to one of poverty. But like frontiersmen we started with renewed courage, and while we explored the prairie and timber lands in search of new investments we slept in the tall grass where we could see the approaching fire as it leaped from marsh to marsh, licking up in great flames all the dry, combustible ma- terial, compelling us to set back fires, and after we had burned a large space around our camp we watched the fearful, raging fire, hoping that all camp- ing parties were safe, and then we slept.
When mosquito netting was invented we slept under canopies around our beds, where the buzzing sounds of millions of mosquitoes made us think that they were gritting their teeth and ripping the netting from the canopy.
Then during our first harvest we slept in the fields on bundles of grain while we were assisting the farmer; and while threshing we slept in the staeks of clean, fresh straw. Then we slept in the little grist-mill while waiting for our grain to be ground.
In 1860, after the Chippewa Indians had fought the Sioux at Maine Prairie, and were returning with three sealps and one Indian head, they camped in lower town, on the ground now occupied by our townsman, James E. Jenks, and some of us heard all through that long tedious night the ever- lasting "Yo, yo!" of the war-dance, with the frightful and hideous war-whoop, and with these surrounding us we slept.
Just as we were beginning to recover from the disastrous crash of 1857 the discontent of the South could be heard. Then Sumter was fired upon, war was declared. Then we slept within hearing of the beating of drums, and the tramp, tramp of citizen soldiers; and after one long year of war, of victory and defeat, when the call came for 300,000 more, excitement was every- where; and in the midst of it the news of the Sioux Indian massacre was re- ceived, when the excitement became intense. Business was suspended, most of our able-bodied men had enlisted and had left or were on the eve of leaving for the South. Home guards were hastily organized in every town, stockades were erected, and in these stockades those not on guard duty slept. Brick buildings were turned into forts, and men were kept on guard, while those off duty and the women and children slept on the counters or piles of merchan-
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dise and on the floor. Rifle-pits were dug around St. Cloud and other villages, and night and day men were stationed in them, and while some slept the others kept strict guard.
The pioneers who escaped the scalping knife of the barbarous and blood- thirsty Indians, while on their desperate flight to the settlements that were unmolested, slept during the day in the tall grass or in the swamps, watching and sleeping in turns until darkness would protect them during a long night's march.
Some of you will remember our old citizen, O. E. Garrison. While he and his wife were escaping from the Indians on a dark night, they found themselves in the midst of an Indian camp. Mr. Garrison, to quict his little dog, choked it to death. They traveled for several nights, sleeping in the grass during the day, with nothing but roots and berries to eat. Many of the wounded pioneers, unable to travel, slept in the marshes near water, where they could bathe their fevered heads until assistance reached them and took them to a place of safety.
Mary E. Ketcham (1906). "And it came to pass" on Monday, the tenth day of April, 1854, that our company of ten left the depot at Tecumseh, Mich- igan, buying our tickets for the fair land of Minnesota. It was nearly the end of the week before we reached Galena, where we took passage on the steamboat, the "War Eagle," for St. Paul, at which place we arrived in four or five days. Taking the stage from there to St. Anthony Falls, as East Min- neapolis was then called, we made our final purchases for commencing house- keeping in a new country. There we had to wait a little for the steamer "Gov. Ramsey" to get steam up for her first trip up to Sauk Rapids that spring. But the water being very low they were fearful they might not reach their landing just opposite here, which they did not, but landed us at Monticello, and for one reason or another we did not reach Sauk Rapids until the next Saturday, making it three weeks to a day or two from the time we left Te- cumseh, very different from what it would be at this time.
Then commenced the tug of our life time. Mr. Ketcham and Mr. Addison Gilmore, he and his wife being members of our company, had rented a farm belonging to James Keough, two miles above the Fur Company farm, making it four miles above Sauk Rapids. We remained at Mr. Russell's Sunday and Monday, but during that Monday Mr. Ketcham hired himself and myself out to keep house for a Mons. Coonrawdy, who kept a place of entertainment a little way above the Fur Company's building. I was to do the work and Mr. Ketcham was to get the glory and the pay, for all which we were to receive the magnificent sum of $30 per month. We started on our work and next morning shortly after we had begun William Wood, of Lynden Terrace, came by and Mr. Coonrawdy called him in to see that he "had a woman's bonnet in the house." He said he never was so happy in all his life. Mr. Wood, being an old acquaintance, came into the kitchen to tell me. I replied that he might be just as happy to get it out again. It was a pretty hard place to put a young thing like me, who had never had charge of a house before and with nothing to do with but salt pork, potatoes, dried peas, and dried apples of the poorest quality. No butter, no milk, and bread made from such poor gray flour that
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it was almost impossible to make it rise. Before the first week was out, I was at my wits' end to know what we should have for dinner that day, so went to the Mons. himself. "Oh," he said, "give them some pea soup." I replied that I didn't know how to get that up, as we had never used it at home. He said, "I show you; eome." We went into the kitchen; he put over a large two-pail kettle, nearly filling it with water, then taking a quart measure he dipped it full of peas and without allowing me to clean them in any way, poured them into the kettle. Then going to a barrel of hogs' heads he took one out and treating it the same as he had the peas, said, "Now, keep a good fire and it will be ready for dinner," and so it was, but not for me. The next week, thinking we would have something different on our bread than salt-pork gravy and black-strap molasses, I took the liberty to stew some of the dried apples. But he did not like it, said it was too extravagant, and by the end of two weeks we all came to the conclusion that the farm would be the better place for us. So we took that "woman's bonnet" out of his house and my prophecy came true.
Sometime the latter part of May two young men, one by the name of John C. Hicks, and the other Andrew C. Dunn, came to Sauk Rapids. I re- member them particularly, as they were both good singers. During the month of June we had our first Gospel service, held in the little old log court house, near the Fur Company's building. Later Father Hall came. He had been a missionary for twenty years or more to the Chippewa Indians, but they hav- ing recently been removed he started to go down to Clearwater, but for some reason was stopped at Sauk Rapids, where he built his house and made his home, and the Sauk Rapids people were thus getting the benefit of his preaeh- ing on Sunday.
Shortly after coming we found there was another small settlement up at Watab, it being the trading post of the Winnebago Indians, where Gen. S. B. Lowry, proprietor of the present Lowry's Addition to St. Cloud, and a Mr. Marks had stores for the benefit of "poor Lo." David Gilman and family were keeping a house of entertainment for the traveling public. N. Lamb and family had come there in 1851 from Kalamazoo, Mich. P. Lamb eame later and is now at Sauk Centre. Mrs. Ellen Lamb is still living in St. Cloud and has been for over fifty years. We were greatly surprised one evening, the first of July, to hear that George W. Benedict and wife had arrived from Te- cumseh, where he had been publisher of the Teeumseh Herald for several years, and now he had come at the solicitation of the Sauk Rapids Company to do the same for them; George W. Sweet put up a building in which he was to have a small store, the post office was also to be kept there, while the back room up stairs was to be the printing office where the Sauk Rapids Frontier- man was to be issued, Mr. Benedict and wife occupying the front chamber as their living room. He tells me he went to St. Paul and worked the paper off in one of the offiees there for several weeks before they could get their presses and everything up to the Rapids.
During the summer, sometime, Mr. Bohmer put up a log building in which he started a blacksmith shop. Sometime during the summer a Mr. Crane, of the firm of VanNest & Crane, of Tecumseh, Mich., arrived and put up a build-
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ing near the creek. They would occupy the lower part for general merchan- dise, and the upper part for living rooms, but this building was not finished and fitted until the next spring.
During the month of July a great-uncle, a Mr. Hixon, came from Clinton, Mich. He thought we had pretty hard living, so before he went home he left money with William Wood to buy us a young cow from Father Ayer's herd, which we received in August, and then having milk and butter, with the new vegetables, we lived well, for this little cow was part buffalo and gave very dif- ferent milk from that we buy now.
In September we moved down to Sauk Rapids into a log house belonging to William Wood, where we remained until the next April. Later in the fall Mr. Hicks gathered the people together in a singing class and we had that to look forward to once a week for three months, making it seem more like the old home.
So the winter wore away and the first of April, 1855, the time to hold the first election in St. Cloud and to organize the county drew near. The men to hold these offices were obliged to sleep one night at least in the county before they could do so. Mr. Ketcham and D. T. Wood having been selected for two of the offices, they started out on Sunday morning with their packs on their backs, having to walk three miles out to a farm by the present covered bridge before they could get a place to sleep. As the house had been lately put up the windows were not in and beside lunch enough to last over two days and several other things, they each had to carry a half a window, for it was not summer weather yet. The only way we had for crossing the Mis- sissippi was in an old dugout canoe with one end broken out and held in place by a piece of hoop iron, and somebody had to go along to take the canoe back. This time William Wood went with them. Then when they returned they had to shout until someone heard them. Mr. Keteham had to start out that week to hunt a place for us to live in until he could get lumber from Little Falls, where there was a sawmill. James Keough took pity on us and let us come in with him, although there was only one room below with an attic above, but we got along very nicely. We didn't get our lumber until in July, when Mr. Ketcham succeeded in getting it by sitting on the river bank, watching for three days after hearing the raft had started. The shanty was put up for summer weather, Mr. Ketcham intending to get more lumber and put up a good house before cold weather came, but being disappointed in getting some lumber we were obliged to live in it just as it was through the coldest winter that has ever been known in Minnesota, the thermometer going down, up country, to 60 degrees below zero, in spirit thermometers, and then bursting. From the first week in January to the middle of February it was no warmer here than 20 de- grees below zero at any time. The first week of this awful cold the sun came up on Monday morning surrounded with the brightest of "sun dogs." At noon they could be plainly seen, and they went to bed with it at night. When the moon came up in the evening it had the same company, by which we knew we might expect something out of the usual line. I can assure you it was most dreadful getting out in the mornings to build a fire, and everything frozen solid, the bread being so hard I could not cut it. I had to set the loaf down
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