Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume III, Part 139

Author: Stout, Tom, 1879- ed
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Chicago, American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 1144

USA > Montana > Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume III > Part 139

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Mr. Logan has always been one of the boosters of Flathead County, and his progressive spirit has been evidenced in every civic improvement that has been inaugurated. A lawyer of far more than or- dinary ability, he enjoys a large practice and has been connected with some of the most important jurisprudence of the state. Fraternally he is a mem- ber of the Elks, of which he is past exalted ruler ; and of the Modern Woodmen. Both he and his family belong to the Disciples Church. One hundred

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HISTORY OF MONTANA

per cent a republican, he has adhered to its principles since boyhood, and served Kalispell as mayor. In 1892 he was assistant secretary of state, and from 1891 to 1896 served as attorney of Flathead County. A member of the board of park commissioners, he assisted in securing for Kalispell one of the finest boulevard and park systems in Montana. The pres- ent handsome Carnegie Library was constructed dur- ing his term of office. Mr .. Logan went the limit during the great war in war work and was one of the nine men appointed by Governor Stuart to form the Montana Council of Defense, an honor he highly appreciated.

On June 25, 1890, Mr. Logan was married at Helena, Montana, to Miss Cleora Stout, a daughter of R. P. and Ella (Toole) Stouf, and a niece of ex-Governor Toole. Mr. and Mrs. Logan became the parents of the following children: Cleora Felice, wife of R. A. Thon, of Great Falls; Mary Luella, who became the wife of Dr. C. M. Orser of Kalis- pell; Eula Odelia, who married Edward L. Houtz, late editor of the Kalispell Journal, now residing in Great Falls; Sidney M., Jr., a law student, and veteran of the great war, spent sixteen months in France as a member of Company G, Twenty-third Engineers, and participated in the battles of St. Mihiel, Argonne, Meuse, St. Remy Offensive and Toul sector ; and William R., who is studying min- ing and metallurgy and during vacations is a guide in Glacier National Park. The latter twice volun- teered for service, but was each time rejected on account of physical disability. The Logan boys, coming as they do 'from good old Scotch fighting stock, naturally responded to their country's call for defenders of its honor and possessions. Loyal to the standard of "Old Glory" as their father and grandfather before them, they had not the slightest desire or even thought of shirking their duty, or fail- ing to live up to the example of that brave grand- father who sleeps on the Custer battlefield. America loves to render due honor to her soldiers who left to us

"Much more by far, than all the crowns That Europe's monarch ever wore, The heritage our heroes left A nation free from shore to shore."

JOHN H. DOLIN, editor and proprietor of the Medicine Lake Wave, is a veteran printer and news- paper man, having heen in the profession and trade for a period of thirty-five years. He has been a factor in Montana journalism since 1909.

Mr. Dolin was born at Taunton, Massachusetts, January 21, 1861. His parents, however, were west- ern people at that time and he was born during a visit of his mother in Massachusetts. His father, Felix Dolin, came from County Fermanagh, Ireland, when a young man, was employed as a laborer on public works for a time, and subsequently moved out to Minnesota and buying a small farm midway between St. Paul and Hastings. In 1863 he moved from there to Sibley County, Minnesota, and acquired wealth as a farmer in that locality, where he died at the age of seventy-eight. He married Elizabeth Clemens, a native of Tipperary, Ireland, who sur- vived her husband a few years.

John H. Dolin, the only child of his parents, was reared in a devout Catholic home and grew up in the atmosphere of a farm. He acquired a good com- mon school education, supplemented by two years of high school at Henderson, Minnesota. Whatever the influences were that caused him to take up printing he found that trade a congenial one and has been satisfied to make it the hasis of a life profession. At the age of sixteen he began learning

his trade in the office of the Sibley County Inde- pendent at Henderson, and spent five years there. He then became self supporting, removed to St. Paul, and in order to perfect himself in all branches of the business remained for three years in Brown and Tracey's job office. For two years he was foreman for the Northwestern Chronicle, and remained in St. Paul in different offices until 1889. Going fur- ther west, he was with the Free Press at Devil's Lake, North Dakota, working for Mr. McGahan un- til 1896, and from there moved to York, North Dakota, where he founded his first paper, the York Ledger. Of the Ledger he was publisher until he left North Dakota and came to Montana in 1909. In November of that year he began his connection with the Medicine Lake Wave, which had been founded by his son Joseph F. Dolin. John H. Dolin has been actively identified with the Wave ever since, and on January 1, 1920, bought the plant and is now both editor and proprietor.

His father was a democrat and he cast his first presidential vote for Mr. Cleveland in 1884. How- ever, since 1888 he has supported the republican party and has always voted at national elections. For a number of years he was a member and is a Past Master Workman of the Ancient Order of United Workmen, and is now affiliated with the Knights of Columbus.

In May, 1883, in Sibley County, Minnesota, he married Miss Mary Ann Doheny. Her father, Dennis Doheny, was born in Tipperary, Ireland, came to the United States when a boy, was brought up in Pennsylvania, became a farmer and stockman, and later moved west and settled in Sibley County, Minnesota, where he continued farming. His last years were spent at Grand Harbor, North Dakota, where he died at the age of sixty-five. He married a Miss Cunningham, who survived him a few years. Mrs. Dolin, who was born March 15, 1865, is the youngest of five children, the others being: Mrs. Kate McAuliff, of South St. Paul; Jack, who died in South St. Paul; Walter, of Minneapolis; and Thomas, of Long Lake, Minnesota. Mr. and Mrs. Dolin have three children: Joseph F., the well known newspaper man of Plentywood, whose career is sketched elsewhere; Mrs. Sam Rettinger, of Long Lake, Minnesota; and Mrs. Otmar Bottger, of Fair- field, Iowa.

LESLIE F. MILLER, The successful management of an important business industry in a community where competition is rife and high standards pre- vail presupposes the possession of more than ordi- nary commercial ability as well as a comprehensive knowledge of the particular line involved. When these requisites are met in the head of a large milling business, and to them is added the progress- ive and enquiring tendencies of the younger and physically sturdier member of the family, a harmony should result as gratifying generally as it is finan- cially. Such a combination of interests is found in the Russell-Miller Milling Company, of which Ar- thur Miller, the father. is a member of the firm, and Leslie F. Miller, the son, is manager of the business at Billings.

Leslie F. Miller was born at Valley City, North Dakota, August 25, 1883, a son of Arthur and Clara (Russell) Miller. Arthur Miller was born in Eng- land in 1852 and was seventeen years of age when he came to the United States, settling in Minne- sota, in which state he was married to Clara Rus- sell, daughter of John Russell, she having been born in that state in 1858. Shortly after their union they moved to Valley City, North Dakota, where in 1879 was founded the Russell-Miller Milling Company,

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the organizers being Mr. Miller and his father-in- law, John Russell. Mr. Miller had full charge of the business at Valley City, where he remained until 1893, in that year going to West Superior, Wiscon- sin. where he assisted in the building of a mill for the company. This he managed until 1899, when he went to Minneapolis and erected a mill for the concern of which he is vice president and general superintendent, his home now being in that city. Mr. Miller is an independent voter upon political ques- tions, is a member of the Congregational Church, and is affiliated with the Masons. He and Mrs. Miller became the parents of the following children : Jessie, who is the wife of Robert H. Bosard, an attorney of Minneapolis; Edith, the wife of Harry C. Buffington, executive engineer of the Holt Trac- tor Company, Peoria, Illinois; Leslie F .; and Ar- leigh, assistant sales manager of the Russell-Miller Milling Company, who died January 7, 1919, at Minneapolis, at the age of thirty-two years.

Leslie F. Miller received his education in the public schools of Valley City, North Dakota, and West Superior, Wisconsin, and after his graduation from the high school at Minneapolis in 1902, en- tered the University of Minnesota, where he com- pleted his junior year. He is a member of the ex- clusive Delta Upsilon Greek letter fraternity. In 1905 Mr. Miller went on the road as a traveling representative for the Russell-Miller Milling Com- pany, his territory being North Dakota and Mon- tana, and made his advent in the latter state on his first trip in July, 1906. In 1907 he was placed in charge of the mill at Minot, North Dakota, which was built at that time, and remained there until February, 1912, when he came to Billings, as man- ager of the company here, a capacity in which he has acted very efficiently to the present time. The mill, elevator and offices are situated on First Ave- nue, South, between Thirty-sixth and Thirty-seventh streets, and the capacity of the mill is 650 barrels of flour daily, necessitating the employment of forty men, who are under Mr. Miller's supervision. The company now has mills at Minneapolis, Minnesota; Valley City, Grand Forks, Minot, Jamestown, Bis- marck, Mandan and Dickinson, North Dakota; and Sidney and Billings, Montana. The officers of the company are : E. P. Wells, president ; H. S. Helm, general manager; and Arthur Miller, vice presi- dent and general superintendent.

Leslie F. Miller is a business man of proved ability, who has various important connections in commercial and financial circles, being a stockholder in the company which he represents as manager at Billings; president and majority stockholder in the Purity Bread Company of Billings, and a stock- holder in the Logan Farmers Elevator Company at Logan, North Dakota. He is an independent voter, and belongs to Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, the Rotary Club of Billings, and the Billings Golf and Country Club.

On November 24, 1914. Mr. Miller was united in marriage at Billings with Miss Harriet Rowley, daughter of Col. H. W. and Harriet (Meeker) Rowley, of Billings, where Colonel Rowley is a capitalist. Three children have blessed this union : Martha, born December 15, 1915; Rowley, born January 26, 1917; and Arthur, born May 8, 1919.

BENJAMIN VAN VOROUS. One of the leading mer- chants of Homestead is Benjamin Van Vorous, who has been identified with the business life of the place since 1913. Although not the pioneer merchant of the town for two other stores were doing busi- ness when he located here, he is now the oldest merchant of the village, his original competitors having abandoned the fight.

Mr. Van Vorous was born in Door County, Wis- consin, October 15, 1878, a son of Levi Van Vorous and a grandson of Armstrong. The last named spelled his name Van Voorhees, as did all his New York ancestors, who were of the old Holland Dutch settlers and of the old Dutch patroons of Amsterdam, now the City of New York. This family claim heirship to the original townsite of New York City the ground upon which the old town was built.

Levi Van Vorous was born in Geneva, New York, grew up in the home of his blacksmith father there, received a limited educational training, and began life for himself as a laborer. At one time he was employed on the Erie Canal. In about 1865 he went out to Wisconsin, where he bought fish for De- troit and Buffalo firms at Washington Island, and in time became one of the largest fish dealers in the United States. At Fish Creek he also embarked in a general mercantile business, and he spent the re- mainder of his life at that place.

Levi Vorous married Rachel McGee, the daughter of Benjamin McGee, a New York farmer and a native of that state. Mrs. Van Vorous was also born in the Empire state and she still sur- vives her husband and resides at Fish Creek. Mr. Van Vorous passed away in 1913, when he had reached the age of seventy-seven years. Of their twelve children, eleven attained years of maturity, namely: Okey J., whose home is in Bayfield, Wis- consin; Cora, who became the wife of Gunder Gun- derson and died at Fish Creek; Margaret, who mar- ried Henry Birmingham, of Sturgeon Bay, where she passed away; Marie, who married E. T. LeClair deceased; and she is living in Boston, Massachusetts ; Joseph, who was drowned at Fish Creek, leaving a family; Bert, of Lewistown, Idaho; Ruth, who be- came the wife of George Sutherland and died at Fish Creek; Benjamin, the Homestead business man ; Pearl, of Minneapolis, the wife of Colonel George E. Leach; Grace who married Clarence LaPeer, of Fish Creek; and William, whose home is in Mil- waukee.

Levi Van Vorous supported first the democratic and then republican principles, but beyond his in- terest in elections gave little time to politics.

The home surroundings of Benjamin Van Vorous during his youth were the farm, and his education came from the schools of the locality. He remained with his parents until past his majority, and then engaged in teaching country school, but not being satisfied with this vocation he found a more con- genial field in mercantile employment. Going to Minneapolis, Minnesota, he secured the position of assistant window trimmer with Donaldson's Glass Block, and after completing his apprenticeship with them as a window trimmer he went on to Duluth and served another firm in the Glass Block there. He remained at the head of the lake district for four years, employed in various mercantile lines, and from there made his first trip into the Northwest and passed through Montana enroute to Seattle.

After a short time spent in prospecting in and around Seattle Mr. Van Vorous came back to Mon- tana in February 1903, and secured employment with the Butterey people, general merchants at Havre. After a year or so he went on to Billings and en- tered the old McCormick house of general mer- chants as a clerk, remaining in their service for two years. His next employment was in Bismarck, North Dakota, where for a year he was employed by Webb Brothers, and then returned to his home state of Wisconsin. Mr. Van Vorous remained in that state one year, lumbering and merchandising at Fish Creek, but having once breathed the western air he longed for it again and once more returning to Mon-

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tana located at Kalispell, where he was with the clothier George Wilson for four years. He then sought the advantages of Eastern Montana, which was rapidly being settled and proving itself pro- ductive, and selecting Homestead as his business point he opened his trade relations here under the name of the Farmers Store. His store room was twenty-two by thirty-six feet stocked with groceries, but later dry goods were added, and still later shoes and hardware, in all of which lines he is still in- terested. The only other enterprise of Homestead with which he has been connected is the Homestead State Bank, of which for a short time he was a director and the vice president.

In Duluth, Minnesota, November 20, 1901, Mr. Van Vorous was married to Miss Ida Johnson, who was born at Eagle Bend, Minnesota, March 31, 1876, a daughter of Nels Johnson, of Swedish birth and a life-long farmer. He was the father of eleven children. Mr. Van Vorous was chairman of the first Liberty Loan drive at Homestead in the interest of the World war, and bore an active part in all other war work, while Mrs. Van Vorous gave her time unstintedly to the success of the Red Cross Chapter here and was one of the efficient knitting force of the village. When he reached the voting age Mr. Van Vorous espoused the cause of the democratic party and gave his first presidential vote to Mr. Bryan, next to Colonel Roosevelt in 1904, again to Mr. Bryan in 1908, to Colonel Roosevelt in 1912, and in 1916 supported Mr. Hughes for the presidency. He took his initial degrees in Masonry at Kalispell, and holds his B. L. membership in Plentywood.

CHRISTIAN F. WINTER, of Medicine Lake, is the proprietor of the pioneer meat market of the town. He was born in Sibley County, Minnesota, July 29, 1884, and his boyhood days were passed on a farm there. His education came from the district schools, but his attendance therein was so short as to be almost unmentionable, yet it sufficed to enable him to conduct his business successfully. Before reaching his majority he worked for wages as a farm hand, and his parents received the wages until he became of age.

His parents are Joseph P. and Catherine (Dressel) Winter, both of German birth. They came to the United States, however, when they were children, and were married at LeSueur, Minnesota. Joseph P. Winter spent some time in a store and later en- gaged in the saloon business, but eventually became a farmer, and that proved in the main his life's work. He finally sold his farm at LeSueur and moved to Montana, being still a resident of Medicine Lake. During the period of the Civil war he served as a laborer in the vicinity of St. Paul, and he had an older brother who was a Union soldier.

Joseph .P. Winter was born in 1844, and his wife was six years younger, and she passed away in the fall of 1916, at Medicine Lake. Their children were as follows: Frances, the wife of Theodore Tax, a homesteader near Medicine Lake; Adam, of Deering, North Dakota; Mary, the wife of A. F. Metzler, of Red Wing, Minnesota; Charles, whose home is in Froid, Montana; John, a farmer at Trenton, North Dakota; Christian, of this review; Joseph P., en- gaged in the garage business in Medicine Lake; Louise, the widow of John I. Mead, of Medicine Lake; and Phillip A., who was the soldier son, and suffered the loss of his right arm in the famous Argonne battle of France. He is now in vocational training in St. Paul.

In March, 1909, Christian F. Winter came into Montana, shipping an emigrant car containing horses and machinery to Culbertson, where he unloaded and

brought them to his claim. He entered his land in sections 31 and 32, township 32, range 57, 87/2 miles south of Medicine Lake, proved it up in 1913, and this claim still forms a part of his real estate posses- sions. He at once purchased a 10 by 12 shack of a settler who had abandoned the region, and in this he housed his effects and began his bachelor ex- istence in Montana. His brother, who had preceded him to the state, was living within half a mile of the claim of Christian Winter, and the home of the brother became somewhat his home. During the four years he lived on the claim and while proving up he made his living chiefly outside of the soil, working for wages while his brother looked after their combined interests and in reversed order. The pioneer shack in time gave place to a three-room house, a well was dug, one quarter of his land was fenced, and ninety-five acres were put under the plow, where he raised wheat, oats and flax his ban- ner grain yield coming to him in 1912. Mr. Winter also had a few cattle, and his claim began to take on the appearance of the home of a permanent settler, but about this time his wife died and he dis- posed of his stock to his brother and left the state.

Going then to Noonan, North Dakota, Mr. Winter engaged in the butcher business with another brother, Charles Winter. He conducted a shop for this brother during the three years he was located there, and returning then to Medicine Lake in De- cember, 1916, he opened a shop here and has con- tinued in the business ever since. He has the dis- tinction of occupying the original meat market of the town built by the pioneer butcher and market man of Medicine Lake.

Mr. Winter was married first at LeSueur, Min- nesota, to Miss Mary Huber, a daughter of Alois Huber. She was born in that Minnesota town, and died on their Montana homestead without issue. On the 23d of April, 1916, at Brookings, South Dakota, Mr. Winter was married to Miss Alice Mckinney, a daughter of Thomas and Elizabeth (Hurd) Mc- Kinney. Mrs. Winter was born at Brookings Decem- ber 1, 1893 and is one of a family of three sons and five daughters. They were farming people, and the parents came into South Dakota from Wisconsin. A daughter, Phylis, was born to Mr. and Mrs. Win- ter May 7, 1918.

The political faith of the Winter family has been democratic, although in recent years Joseph P. Win- ter has allowed his faith in those party lines to wane. In national affairs his son Christian has followed in his footsteps, and cast his first presidential vote for Mr. Bryan in 1908. Later he supported Mr. Wilson in both his campaigns for the presidency.

THOMAS E. BOWMAN. The early pioneers of Eastern Montana numbers Thomas E. Bowman, of Medicine Lake, a settler of this locality in the year 1900, but his advent into the state dates much far- ther back than that for he first came here in the early eighties, when a youth of twenty, accompany- ing his parents to the Black Hills country.

The Bowman family started west from Roane County, Tennessee. They journeyed by rail to Southeastern Kansas, stopping in Montgomery County, and in the spring of 1870 they located at Independence, Kansas, spending eleven years there as farmers. Then loading their wagons, they re- sumed their journey and came on to the Northwest, to the Black Hills country, stopping at Spearfish South Dakota, where the head of the family en- gaged in freighting and also in farming.

From that point Thomas E. Bowman started out for himself. He had received a district school edu- cation in Kansas, and his first several years after

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HISTORY OF MONTANA

reaching the age of maturity were spent as a stock- man on the range and as a buffalo hunter in South- eastern Montana and South Dakota. He covered the Little Missouri River country as a cowboy, and among his employers were the 3-9 outfit on Lance Creek, the Y. T. people in Crook County, Wyom- ing, the LAK outfit on Beaver Creek and the 101 outfit in Wyoming. During five years he rode the range as a wage earner, and then engaged in the stock business for himself in Crook County, Wyom- ing. He ran his stock under the brand "76," and for a time was engaged in ranching on the Alkali Hills in Meade County, South Dakota. He was one of the early shippers of beef cattle out of that coun- try, loading at Olrich, South Dakota, for the Chicago market.

Early in the eighties Mr. Bowman began hunting buffalo for the hides and the carcasses which during three or four winters covered the country along Beaver Creek and in the Little Missouri and Box Elder regions of what is now Carter County, Mon- tana. In partnership with a "Lame" Jones he car- ried on the business when David Russell and Oscar Brackett and other old hunters yet alive were mak- ing records as hunters of this big game, and the scene of the big slaughters of the Bowman-Jones party was around Chalk Buttes and on Beaver and Fallon Creeks. The region was then stocked with buffalo as numerous as ever cattle grazed it later, and it was not difficult to find a stand where the animals could be reached in quantities with the old Sharps rifle he carried. While many wonderful records were made by the old hunters at a single stand, the best work done by Mr. Bowman was seventeen buffalo without moving from his stand. There was a good market for the beef in the Black Hills at six cents a pound, and the business of buffalo hunting was profitable in season until 1883, when the remnant of the discouraged band gave up this coun- try to the white man, as did the Indian later and moved into the open country of Canada.

In 1895 Mr. Bowman removed north to Ekalaka and ranched in the Hill country between there and Camp Crook, and remained there with his "76" brand until 1898, when he went farther north to the Yellowstone country, near Sidney, Montana. There were but few people scattered over that valley re- gion at that time, and it was a stock country only. In 1899 he continued on north, crossed the Missouri River, and located where Bainville now stands, hold- ing his stock there during one winter, and the next year reached the spot which he has ever since called home, Medicine Lake.

When Mr. Bowman came into this part of old Valley County he brought about one hundred head of his old "76" brand of cattle and squatted where but few settlers had then located. No survey of this region had been made, and those intending to settle and acquire land had the choice of the locality. Mr. Bowman built his shack on the bank of Lake Creek, an arm of the Big Muddy, and this pioneer dwelling with its additions has sheltered the family ever since. During more than a dozen years he had access to the open range, and his cattle and horses had un- disputed possession of this grassy region. But set- tlement began with the surveying of the country, and within a few years all the vacant land had been located and a community of people lived where jack- rabbits and coyotes formerly held sway.

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Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume III, Part 139

Author: Stout, Tom, 1879- ed Publication date: 1921 Publisher: Chicago, American Historical Society Number of Pages: 1144

Author: Stout, Tom, 1879- ed
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Chicago, American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 1144