USA > Minnesota > Renville County > The history of Renville County, Minnesota, Volume II > Part 76
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BIRD ISLAND TOWNSHIP.
Bird Island township embraces township 115-34. It is bounded on the north by Kingman township, on the east by Melville township, on the south by Norfolk town- ship and on the west by Troy township. The villages of Bird Island and Olivia are within its boundaries.
The township of Bird Island was organ- ized Oct. 2. 1876, and an election was held at the home of Joseph Feeter, Oct. 21.
1876, at which seven votes were cast and the following officers elected: Supervisors. Charles Humboldt (chairman), J. H. Feeter and J. Balsey: Clerk, J. S. Bowler; as- sessor, Benjamin Feeder; treasurer, Na- hum Tainter; justices, Edward Bowler and R. G. Harter: constables, George Miller and John Engstrom.
The present officers of the township are: Supervisors, Mike Jungers (chairman), John Hopman. John Menz; clerk, R. S. Amberg.
The story of the early settlement of Bird Island has been told for this work by J. M. Bowler, as follows:
"In the spring of 1871, Captain Jolin King. a Civil war veteran, of Hastings, filed on a Government homestead in Pal- myra, Renville county, near the southwest corner. He gave to his neighbors such a rosy account of the country that, when he went to improve his homestead late in October, he was accompanied by Marion Boyer, Calvin Boyer, Nicholas O'Brien, Joseph S. Bowler, James M. Bowler and John A. Johnson. all except Jolinson being ('ivil war veterans and entitled to a full 160-acre homestead. The party had four teams and journeyed via New Ulm, Fort Ridgeley and Birch Conlie. We camped nights and had a jolly trip. We took along materials enough to build a claim shanty, 14 by 16 feet, on King's homestead. He had told us that the whole township (now Palmyra ) was vacant and ours for the tak- ing. Eager to reach the promised land, we plied him with all manner of questions about it. He assured us that the nearest settlers, in Birch Coulie, were a mixed population, but when confronted with the nanies Reagan. Leary, Mclaughlin, Pat Williams, Gillen, Dougherty and others of the same "mixed" significance which he had given us in his glowing account of his former trip to that land of milk and honey, he humorously admitted, now that we had come too far to turn back, that the people were all like himself, of a fierce Irish clan, who would help him to make way with the rest of us and he would have our teams. wagons and outfits and be able to start farming in good shape. But, after a good hearty laugh. ('ap affected to relent and said that, as we had been neighbors and friends so long, he would get some red paint at Fort Ridgeley, paint our mouths, change our names and pass us off as Irish. Said he, 'There is O'Brien, his name is all right: the Boyers we'll change to Bogerty and the Bowlers to Bolarity; your mugs are all right and will pass for Irish any- where. But that Swede Johnson; no use to change his name; he can't hit the brogue; they'll kill him sure.'
"Camping at Birch Coulie on the last leg of our outward trip, we met a goodly number of those same Irish and were re- ceived with the generous hospitality pecu- liar to pioneers and which culminated in long years of mutual regard and friend-
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ship. Some have passed on to a better sphere, but a few of us remain, and though scattered, occasionally meet and greet each ethier with the old time fervor. The sub- ject would fill a book, precious with memories to the sturdy characters wlio bore a worthy part in the settlement of one of Minnesota's finest counties.
"From Birch Coulie in the early morn- ing we drove out to Capt. King's claim. As far as we could see, 'vacant' Palmyra was dotted with board and sod claim shanties. Before supper we had built King's shanty and had it ready for occu- pancy that night when we noticed a man on horseback coming towards us. He proved to be Ed. H. Oleson, who was for many years thereafter a well-known resi- dent of Renville county. He presented to King for his signature a petition for organizing the town of Palmyra. It already contained the signatures of a goodly nuni- ber of petitioners. As King read the paper I looked over his shoulder and read it, too. The names were all Norwegian or Swede, King turned to me and said, 'My name is Kingson; what's yours?' 1 re- plied, 'I'm a Bowlerson.' That night, with blankets over it, but nothing under us but the cold, frozen prairie, we were kept busy rolling over and over in vain efforts to get warm.
"The next day, piloted by Ed. H. Oleson, we went claim hunting, but lost our bear- ing. and towards evening brought up amongst the sloughs in the southwest corner of what is now the town of Mel- ville. The next morning, led by Pat Will- iams, we followed the survey north through what is now Norfolk into Bird Island and by 4 o'clock that afternoon had the Boyers located in section 28. Johnson in 32. O'Brien and J. S. Bowler in 26 and J. M. Bowler in 24. Williams was a powerful man physically, mentally alert and keen, and a great hustler. You couldn't lose hin where Uncle Sam's marks were to be found on the prairie. He was at one time county commissioner. He died a few years ago in Minneapolis where some of his sons have become prominent in business.
"November 4 we went to the United States land office at New Ulm and made our homestead filings, the first ones in the township except that of Rev. Nahum Tainter, made November 3, on land in sec- tion 24. He and I were neighbors for many years. Like myself, he had faults and we sometimes foolishly met in anger which has long since melted into kindly remembrance of his many generous acts. for which I feel myself greatly indebted to him.
"The evening of November 6, after a day's dreary drive in a cold rain, found us at home again. Next day my son, Bur- ton H., came to celebrate the prospect of our new home on the prairie where just 21 years later he cast his first vote. May 5. 1872, in prairie schooners, we drove on
to our respective claims and camped while we hauled Imber from Atwater, 30 miles north of us, half the way trackless prairie. Sometimes we got stuck in sloughs and had to pack our loads to dry land and then haul the wagon ashore with team at one end of several rods of rope and wagon at the other end. It was trying work, but we were in the prime of manhood with hope and the grand future of Renville county to beckon us on. Our nearest post office and trading point was at Beaver Falls, the county seat, 15 miles distant 'as the crow flies.'
"There was everything to do; homes and shelter for stock to build; prairie to be broken, and hay to be put up, and fuel to be hauled a dozen miles or more.
"Wild geese, ducks, sand-hill cranes and prairie chickens abounded and there were some fine herds of elk which furnished sport for the huntsman and good eating for the table.
."A few settlers came to our neighbor- hood that summer: Newton G. Poor. George Yeager and Ferdinand Steffen from Hastings, and Benjamin Feeder and J. H. Feeter from New Ulm, and later Edward Bowler. Samuel Caleff, J. J. Stearns, John Engstrom, Richard Camish. Sam Camish. Hamline V. Poor, George H. Megquier, Ferdinand Wolff, Kjel Olson and others whose names 1 do not recall.
"We raised a small crop of wheat and oats in 1873, and Libbens White came six miles with his machine and crew, un- invited, and threshed for us.
"In 1875 the grasshoppers made their appearance in Renville county, doing more or less damage in certain localities in 1875 and 1876. In 1877 they made nearly a clean sweep and went away almost in a day while wheat was in the milk. I saved forty acres of wheat by fighting the 'hoppers with coal tar and threshed over 800 bushels of the best wheat I ever raised. Some farmers raised a little, but most of the fields were eaten bare' of everything but sorrel and wild buckwheat. Many set- tlers left their claims and some never re- turned.
"In 1878 the H. & D. Railroad was ex- tended from Glencoe west through Renville county, which brought in settlers with a rush and put the villages of Hector, Bird Island. Olivia, Renville and Sacred Heart on the map. Bird Island possessed the advantage of being the end of a division. It became ambitious and went after the county seat. At the legislative session of 1879 it secured the passage of an act re- moving the county seat from Beaver Falls to Bird Island, subject to a vote of the people at a special election, at which re- moval was defeated. It could have been carried by good management but those of us who took an active part in it failed for want of knowledge of the proper methods. We simply did not 'know how.' County seat removals are usually dirty
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jobs. One dose was enough for me and I never again took an active part in one. "Blizzards were a feature in Renville county in those days. Sometimes for 48 hours or more at a stretch fine snow would be driven before a cold northwest gale of such force that the strongest of men could not keep their feet without support of some sort, and few could survive long when ex- posed. Many a hair-breadth escape could be related and not a few lost their lives by being caught out in them. Many cattle perished in them. In 1875 a Mr. Nelson. traveling from Willmar south on skis, got caught in a fierce blizzard. He sought to save himself by digging himself in under the snow and waiting for the storm to sub- side. One hour was enough to convince him that he would freeze to death if he remained there, so he resumed his journey. going southeast before the gale. In the night one ski came off, and. not being able to fasten it on, he took the other one off. left them, but retained his balancing stick and kept on. About 28 hours brought him into our neighborhood some 35 miles south- east from Willmar. He heard a dog bark, but, as he could not see in the blinding snow and could not follow the sound of the dog, there was nothing he could do but drift along with the storm until find- ing himself in some very tall. coarse slough grass, and being almost exhausted from cold. hunger and walking in the snow, he again dug in, but soon found that he would perish there, and on he went again. About half a mile brought him to the sled-track from my house to Beaver Falls, which he noticed by mere chance, and some guardian angel must have caused him to follow the track to the left towards my house. about 80 rods distant. The first sign of land was the corn stubble; then he stumbled on to my sled in the door-yard, and the woodpile sticking out through the snow. Finally he hit the house which he had been unable to see though only 15 feet from the wood- pile. His knock on the door surprised us as would a voice from the grave. Needless to say we took him in and did for him the best we knew how. His feet and hands were pretty badly frozen and the fine snow lad penetrated and packed into his cloth- ing almost like ice. His shoes and over- coat were quite light for winter. But he was a man of iron with the courage of a lion. He said it was the second time in his life that he had worn an overcoat,
"In a few days the weather moderated and we were able to take him to Hart's at Lake Lillian. where, under the intel- ligent treatment and nursing of good Mother Hart, his hands and feet were saved in good condition. Hart's was the half-way house between Bird Island and Atwater, our grain market and trading point. The old settlers spent many a pleas- ant night under his roof and enjoyed to the limit Mrs. Hart's excellent cooking. Dur- ing the spring run they secured some good
hauls of fish from Crow river, the outlet of Lake Lillian.
"Once a bunch of us with seven teams returning from Atwater were overtaken by a fierce blizzard, but were able to reach Hart's about supper time. The storm did not abate its fury for 36 hours. All but myself refused to move until the weather cleared. I pulled out about 10 o'clock the next forenoon for home, 15 miles due south, with the northwest gale and blinding snow beating my back and right side. Once started there was no such thing as turn- ing back, and there was no place to stop. It was simply go on and take the chances or perish. Not a rod of the way could the team move faster than a slow walk. Safety depended on the ability of my team to keep the track and hold out until we could reach home. All I could see was my sled and team and the swirling clouds of finest snow, which at the distance of a few yards became as dense as an ocean fog. The roar of the storm was terrifying. If once we lost the track even by a few feet all hope was gone. Imagine if you can the state of one's mind under such conditions as hour after hour wore on without any change except when occasionally the horses became so blinded by ice gathering on their eye winkers that they would stop until I rubbed it off! While I was attend- ing to one. the other would help himself by using me for a rubbing post.
"About four o'clock in the afternoon I reached Kjel Olson's, 112 miles north of my home, and stopped long enough to ascertain that his family and stock were all right. He had remained at Hart's.
"The last half mile was across a lake three-fourths ice and the rest bunches ot snow. It was getting dark and the storm, with increased fury, swept across the smooth bosom of the lake and up against the south shore and fringe of small willow trees. It blew my sled around and headed the team northwest. It was a most critical situation. 1 seemed to be wrestling with fate. I was almost home and thought fast and acted quickly with a supreme effort to reach it, and by making use of the small stretches of snow and rushing the team across the icy spaces I managed to reach the south shore and find the opening that led up through the willows into my door yard. Home, sweet home. at last! It was a great relief to me. My wife was amazed. but no less glad to see me. Somehow she and the children never seemed dearer to me than at that moment. It was a fool- hardy risk which I never repeated.
"One summer I received a bad puncture in the center of my left heel by stepping barefoot on a rusty nail. We had no doc- tor but applied home remedies and I kept right on at hard work, harvesting, thresh- ing, plowing and hauling wheat to market, not able to touch my heel to the ground for more than six months, and much of the time I suffered intense pain. The winter
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came on and I had to get my wood from the Bird Coulie bottoms, 15 miles away, over a winter trail but very little traveled. 1 usually started with my trusty team at the first streak of daylight and by 10 a. m. l was in the timber cutting my load, the team eating hay. An hour later the team and 1 took our noon meal, hooked up and picked up our load and started home- ward, i being pretty well warmed up by the hurried exercise. For a mile going up out of the river bottomis it was pretty comfort- able, but once fairly 'out on the prairie,' partly facing the bitter cold northwest wind, I would have to walk off and on. tip- toeing on my sore foot to keep from freez- ing, the poor horses patiently tugging away in the snow-filled track until we reached home, sometimes as late as nine o'clock in the evening and dark as Egypt. 1 had one vary intelligent horse upon whom 1 depended to keep the trail and he never failed me.
"Those were severe trials, those long hours of wading in the snow, of bitter cold and sometimes storms, darkness and doubt. How different it seemed when the team was under cover and l 'toasting my shins' in the 'bosom of my family!'
"1 finished my fuel job in February and then took time to attend to my sore heal. A pipe had formed in the wound, but l nad kept it open and running. Screwing my courage up to the sticking point, 1 seized the glass syringe and bottle of cor- rosive sublimate and turpentine which Dr. Sherwin had prescribed sometime before, and injected the stuff into the wound. In almost no time I was holding my sore foot with both hands and dancing a hornpipe on the other. A few days later 1 repeated the operation. It did its perfect work by cleaning the wound of pipe formation and bringing out slivers of bone. It healed slowly and in a few months was as good as new."
A typical pioneer letter, written more than forty years ago by Joseph S. Bowler, gives a splendid picture of Bird Island life in the early days. The letter was written by Joseph S. Bowler. at Bird Island, July 6, 1873, to his sister, Georgetta, then liv- ing at Lee, Maine. -
Joseph S. Bowler was one of the early settlers of Bird Island and was widely known throughout the county at the time of his death in 1SS7. He was popular and held in high esteem by Renville county people. The letter follows:
"Dear Sister Georgie: I suppose it seems a long time since I wrote to you, and in- deed so it is-and I feel little like writ- ing today, but duty impels me to. Yester- day I dug, or commenced to dig, a well, sunk it eleven feet, and today 1 feel the effects of it. 1 reached water but uot in quantities to suit me, but not having a wind-lass to draw up the earth, 1 sus- pended. Eleven feet perpendicular is about as far as I can throw wet clay.
"We take but little recreation in this country. Sunday most of ns rest a little. The Glorious Fourth I went to Madison's and helped him hoe garden part of the time, and part of the time we recreated. We intended to give the women and cliil- dren a boat ride on the lake, but the wind blew and made it too rough. The chil- dren had sport, however, making marbles from clay.
"We have been fairly settled here four weeks, and it begins to look a little like home. We have a good garden and have had green peas once, but greens several times. 1 planted some seed of the box elder-a sizeable forest tree-very orna- mental-and they are now three or four inches in height and growing finely, so you see I am near timber. Back of the house I have a row of California sun- fiowers. They look quite lofty. Sarah has a fine flower garden in blossom. For stock I have a cow, a Dorking hen, a Buff Cochin and a Pencil-neck Brahma cock -- the poul- try being a present to me. Madison is going to give me a young swan; he caught five in the lake a few days ago. I have borrowed a heifer from Madison to keep my cow company.
"For crops I have twenty acres of wheat, three-fourths acre of potatoes, one-half acre of beans and my garden. The spring being unnsually wet, some of my wheat was drowned and will amount to but little, but the most of it is quite good. Have very few potato-bugs-not enough to no- tice. We have thousands of acres of natural meadow that produces from one to four tons of hay to the acre. In low places and swamps it is uow as high as one's head. Throughout the country west of the big woods hay is worth just the cost of putting it up-about $2.50 per ton.
"We now have a mail route through here. Started the first of the month. It runs from Beaver Falls east to Birch Coulie, thence north by us to Kosmos in Meeker county. After a time we shall try for a post office here. We can get our mail brought to us, however, so you see we are within the pale of civilization. Our post office address is Beaver Falls, Renville County, Minnesota, at present.
"There is some travel through here now; more than there was last summer, con- siderable. The route from Preston Lake to Bird Island was terra incognito before we came through to everybody but trap- pers, but, since we made a track through, emigrants go this way instead of taking the old route, which was farther north.
"I must give you some little account of our move up here this spring. Madison and I came up before our families did. After we got our crops in we were ready to start back. We waited one day for it to stop raining and on the 21st of May we started. After going a mile it commenced to rain and it poured for six hours. It seemed before that the land would hold
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10 more water. The sloughs were full and the high prairie was soft. During the first twelve miles we were nearly mired several times on high prairie, to say noth- ing of the sloughs, but I must explain this term 'slough' (western pronunciation. 'slew').
"Sloughs are either the natural drain from the prairie to the creeks and rivers. or are basins having no outlets and hold- ing water some part of the season and mud when there is no water. If this were a timber country and the rainfall were greater, most of these sloughs would be creeks or lakes. This spring being so wet, all the sloughs filled with water and were in fact creeks. When a slough is narrow. say not more than two or three rods wide. it is not a difficult matter to cross, but when it is twenty rods wide or more it is no fun. The modus operandi of crossing sloughs with a load is this: take a long rope or chain-it should be long enoughi to cross the slough, but generally is not- attach it to the end of the wagon pole and get the horses as far from the wagon as possible. At the word 'Ready,' horses that have been there a few times will start on the canter and not stop till they are across, unless they get down in the mud. and, if they do, unhitch. drive them out and swing to the right or left and start again. These places are turnpiked and bridged in settled communities.
"But to return. After getting as wet as we could hold we got to Preston Lake and got some dinner and at night stopped about seven miles west of Glencoe. We got home all right in three and one-half days on Saturday. Sunday we rested and Monday we went to packing, intending to start Thursday morning. Got all ready Wednes- day night but it rained so we waited till the next day. Friday. Friday morning Madison and I started with the team and stock, Vic and a girl who is stopping with us this summer going with us. also a young man who was going to look up land. We expected to reach Glencoe, the end of the railroad, Sunday night, so we arranged to have the families start on Monday morn- ing and join us in Glencoe. Our household goods we had shipped to Glencoe and ex- pected some of our folks from this settle- ment with teams to take them. 1 should tell you, however, that it had rained half the time we were at Nininger getting ready: and as we had to cross the Min- nesota river at Shakopee, I feared that the ferry-boat would not run. 1 advised Madi- son to telegraph to Shakopee and ascertain whether that were the fact, but he had no idea that such was the case, and, as he knew more about the country than 1. 1 did not urge the matter. We made good time Friday and camped at ('redit river in Scott county. I had a little difficulty the first morning in breaking a heifer to the halter. Got an early start the next morning and at 9 o'clock a. m. were in Shakopee; and
lo! the river was all over the bottoms. and the current was like a mill race. No crossing with teams! Footpads could cross in a skiff, but as the ferry-boat was usually propelled by means of a rope that was played out. Madison went to the rail- road depot and tried to get a car to put us across on the railroad bridge. He found he could not get one before Tuesday and then it would cost ten or twelve dollars: besides, we would have to take the wagon to pieces. ] advised going back to St. Paul at once and get across the river by going around the mouth, crossing the Miss- issippi twice on bridges, once at St. Paul on the south side of the mouth of the Minnesota and back at Minneapolis on the north side. That would take us three days more. But, when Madison gets his mind made up to take one particular route, he sticks to that and nothing seems to deter him. He was bound to get across the Minnesota at Shakopee some way. We heard that a steamer was expected the next day. Sunday; and supposed we could get across on that. So Sunday morning a steamer did come, but wanted fifty dollars for setting our outfit across. So we let them go, and, as a last resort, Madison went to the ferry-man and induced him to let him have his ferry-boat and to help us get across if possible. It was a risky under- taking, for, had anything happened. horses and stock would have gone to the bottom. by working hard all day we got across without any accident, and camped at Chaska, five miles from Shakopee.
"When we found we could not cross at Shakopee, or supposed we could not, we telegraphed to our families to wait further advice. Monday morning we started and I went off the road about a mile to Carver and telegraphed to the folks to start at once. We went about ten miles further. to within a few rods of Carver creek, and found that we were balked again, for the bridge was washed away, and we were told that we must go back to Chaska and take another road. But, 'No,' says Madison, '1 can get to that other road without going all the way back to Chaska.' So he and I started to explore and found that we could get to the other road by going a mile south through woods and swamps- all of which we did, and got within six miles of Glencoe that Monday night. At eight o'clock Tuesday morning we were in Glencoe waiting for the two o'clock train with the families. Rained that day. Found that the teams we had expected that day had come, taken a part of Madison's goods and all of mine and gone on. So we con- chided we would lie by the remainder of the day and take a fair start Wednesday. Got the women and babies in a house, put the children in the wagon and we camped on the ground.
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