Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume III, Part 178

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 178

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Thomas Johnstone, the son, received a meager educational training in the schools of his native heath, but his school days were over when he reached the age of fifteen. He was yet a young unmarried man when he left his native land for the United States, sailing from Glasgow aboard the steamship Iowa, and landed in the harbor of New York and passed through old Castle Garden June 9, 1868, accompanied by a sister and other near relatives. He was bound for Barclay, Pennsylvania, and it was there he performed his first work in the United States. He grew up under mining influences in his old Scotch home, and this trade finally became his own, and since landing on American shores he has worked in the coal fields of Pennsylvania, Iowa, Wyoming and for two years he dug coal near Miles City, Montana.

Mr. Johnstone was about twenty years of age when he first saw the broad and frontier west at Carbon, Wyoming, and there he spent six months in the mines. Returning at the end of that period to Barclay, Pennsylvania, he was married there and again started toward the West. At Mongonia, Iowa, he followed mining for some time, and from that point continued his westward course to Central City, South Dakota, arriving there in April, 1878, and for some time afterward followed mining in the hills between Deadwood and Lead. When he finally decided to locate in 'Montana and take up land for his future home he owned the yoke of steers which brought the family to the state and had sufficient cash capital to provide food for his family during the summer, occasionally replenishing the larder as a buffalo hunter, which also proved a source of some revenue.

Mr. Johnstone chose for his first permanent Mon- tana home a pre-emption in the valley of the Little Missouri, and he lived upon this claim and improved it for fifteen years, his post office having been at Five Miles, which site is now a part of the John- stone ranch. He selected his homestead not far from his pre-emption, and his latter site has been the family home for a quarter of a century and the spot where their success has been achieved.

The entry of Mr. Jolinstone into the stock business occurred after his two years spent at mining, and it was a most humble entry. His first cow was pur- chased by funds provided by his father, and from that one cow as a nucleus he slowly developed a herd and in time became one of the well-known cattlemen of the region. He bought seventy-five cows from James Craig, of Belle Fourche, South Dakota. He proved up his pre-emption, his home- stead and a desert claim, and his additions by pur- chase gave him title to one thousand acres of land along the Little Missouri. Early in the history of his career as a cattleman he took his two sons into a partnership with him, and Johnstone & Sons continued the business from April, 1904, until Sep- tember, 1910. Their cattle brand was the "T-J," although each member of the firm had a private brand also, that of the father being known as the "lazy R." In the heighth of their success as cattle- men the company owned cattle to the number of eight hundred head, and the entire herd was shipped out when the partnership dissolved. The sons are still actively engaged in the business, chiefly at Ridgeway, Montana.

Thomas Johnstone took out his citizenship papers in Towanda, Pennsylvania, and he cast his first vote there. His first presidential ballot was given to Rutherford B. Hayes, but he was afterward obliged to miss a few presidential elections by reason of his having lived in Montana before it became a state. He has always given his allegiance to the principles

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of the republican party. Mrs. Johnstone cast her first presidential vote in 1916, supporting Mr. Hughes, the republican candidate.

On the 7th of July, 1873, Mr. Johnstone married the choice of his youth, Margaret Hodge. She was born in Kirkcaldy, Scotland, a daughter of William and Mary (Waters) Hodge. The father, who was a coal miner, lost his life in a coal pit in 1859. Mr. and Mrs. Hodge were the parents of the following children: Margaret, who was born May 14, 1854; Christina, the wife of John Gillesvie,- of Glasgow, Scotland; and John, who was killed in the mines in Central City, South Dakota.

A large family of children have been born to bless the union of Thomas and Margaret Johnstone, namely: Mary, who became the wife of Elmer Holman, and died in Belle Fourche, South Dakota, leaving two sons; Thomas, Jr., a well-known ranch- man of Carter County, 'Montana; Caroline, wife of Leslie White, whose home is in Vale, South Dakota ; William, a ranchman at Box Elder, Montana; Mag- gie, wife of W. F. Harrington, a rancher on Box Elder; John, a Ridgeway, Montana, ranchman; Charles, who is also engaged in ranching in that region; Allen, a ranchman near his brothers; and George Alexander, who is ranching at the old parental home. This youngest son spent two months in Bozeman, Montana, as mechanic while training for service in the World war; also spent four months in Camp Zacharia Taylor, Kentucky, and was discharged from the service December 14, 1918.

Both the Johnstone and Waters families are of old Presbyterian stock, and to this church Mr. and Mrs. Johnstone also belonged prior to their advent into Montana.

WILLIAM C. EVANS, who is now enjoying the comfort of a retired home at Bainville, was for forty years an active stockman of Montana, and is a real veteran of that industry. For a long time he was identified with ranching around old Fort Benton, but the greater part of the present century has been spent in Eastern Montana, in what is now Roosevelt County.

Few men have seen more of the real pioneering and frontier life of the Middle West during the last half of the nineteenth century than Mr. Evans. He was thoroughly inured to hardship and danger before he came to the Northwest. He was born at Marietta, Ohio, February 21, 1849, son of Jeremiah and Hannah (Quimby) Evans. His parents were natives of Ohio, spent their lives as farmers, and about 1854, when their son William was five years of age, they pioneered to Iowa, settling in Palo Alto County, not far from where the Town of West Bend grew up. Jeremiah Evans lived only a few years after going to Iowa, and died at McKnight's Point in 1859, at the age of forty-two, and was laid to rest on the West Fork of Des Moines River. His surviving children were: Hiram, who was the pio- neer of the family in Montana, coming out to the territory in 1866 and spent the rest of his life at Fort Benton; Jane, who died in Iowa about 1881, the wife of John Mulroney; John, who with his brother Hiram was a Union soldier during the Civil war and came out to Montana at the close of the struggle, was for some years in business at Fort Benton, and is now residing near Seattle; William C., of this notice; and Winfield S., who came with his brother William to Montana in 1877, and spent his last years on a ranch near Bainville. The mother of these children came with her sons to Montana in 1877, and died at the home of her son Winfield at Fort Benton in 1889, at the age of seventy-one.

Iowa during the '50s and '6os was still a very

new country, and the locality in which the Evans family lived was largely isolated so far as schools and other institutions were concerned. With the nearest school twenty miles from home William C. Evans learned his letters and the fundamentals of reading from his mother. When a school was es- tablished nearby he attended two winter terms, and his school days were complete when about seven- teen. He had a serious sense of responsibility in helping his mother provide for the household, and remained with her until past his majority. Only once while they lived in Iowa were the Evans fam- ily exposed to Indian troubles. A band of wandering Sioux camped in the forest near their home and troubled them for provisions all winter. The In- dians were threatening and the few whites did all they could to conciliate them. The Indians had promised to leave the country when spring came and when the grass got "so high," but on their leav- ing the Evans and Carter families discovered their cattle had gone along. One yoke of cattle being used by the Evans family remained, and a few were left at the Carter home. A party of three, Jeremiah and Hiram Evans, and one of the Car- ters followed afoot with their rifles, overtaking the Indians on the east branch of the Des Moines River, about fifteen miles below Algona, Iowa. They succeeded in rounding up the cattle grazing in the woods and drove them off without molestation from the tribe. One ox belonging to the Evans family had evidently been killed by the Indians.

A little before he was twenty-one years of age William C. Evans married Lucinda St. John. She was the mother of a daughter, Mary, now Mrs. George Reynolds, wife of a ranchman at Snake Butte, Roosevelt County, Montana. Mrs. Reynolds had the following children: Maggie, Anna, Emma (who died at the age of sixteen), Curtis, Elva and Mary.

Leaving his wife and child at West Bend in Palo Alto County William C. Evans accompanied his brother Winfield S. and the latter's family, their mother being also a member of the party, overland to Yankton, South Dakota. There they became pas- sengers on the steamboat Benton of the Powers Line, and after thirty-five days reached Fort Ben- ton, Montana, May 14, 1877. The steamer was loaded with 400 tons of provisions for distribution from Fort Benton to Montana and Canadian points, and the passenger list included 135 adults and 30 chil- dren.

The Evans brothers brought with them seven head of horses, also part of the Benton's cargo. Reach- ing Fort Benton William Evans hired to R. G. Baker and Company to drive bull teams carrying freight to Fort McLeod, Canada. His own outfit consisted of nine yoke of cattle and three wagons, two being trail wagons, and besides himself there was a wagon boss and a herder. Eight other teams of equal size made up the train, with about a dozen men all told. It was 225 miles to Fort McLeod, and the country was hostile and infested with roaming Indians. Each man of the party was ready for attack at a moment's notice, with his rifle in his bunk at night, and twice Indians invaded their camp to steal, and one In- dian was once wounded in the fight and also cap- tured. Six weeks were required to make the round trip and some of the supplies were sought in the game which had as yet hardly been disturbed. Mr. Evans participated in two of these round trips dur- ing the summer of 1877.

In the fall of that year he started East, traveling by the steamer Mackinaw to Bismarck and thence by rail. On arriving at his home in Iowa he rapped on the door, expecting his wife to meet him. There

WG Evans

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was no response, and he made inquiries of a neigh- bor who gave him the tragic and shocking intelli- gence that his wife was dead. He remained in the old home locality several months before making definite plans for the future. The following spring, having married again, he brought his family to Mon- tana, and then established himself as a ranchman near Fort Benton. He bought a few cattle and continued running them over the range in that lo- cality until 1902, when he entered a pre-emption and tree claim upon the survey of the public domain. His improvements constituted his ranch headquar- ters. The lumber for his first frame home he hauled from Helena, 140 miles away. His stock was run under the brand "2E," and he continued the same mark after 1902, when he moved his in- terests to Eastern Montana and established his ranch near Snake Butte on Snake Creek, eight miles north of the present Town of Bainville.

Mr. Evans acquired a very intimate knowledge of conditions around Fort Benton when that Gov- ernment military post was a center of activity for all the western country. Navigation was usually open on the Missouri as far as Fort Benton only during the high water months of May, June and July, and during the rest of the season boats came up only as far as Cow Island, and all freighting to Mon- tana points was made to that river port. Mr. Evans sold his surplus cattle to the butchers of Fort Ben- ton, who supplied the regions in every direction for some years. Later Great Falls became a center of trade. Mr. Evans gave his time studiously to his ranch interests and never participated to any extent in hunting the big game of the plains. During his trip down the Missouri on the Mackinaw he and his party were tempted by the number of buffalo along the Missouri to go ashore and kill them for meat, and that was about his only acquaintance with the sport which men found in slaying the king of the American desert and plain.

Mr. Evans was one among many cattle men who had to yield before the encroachments of sheep men, and on seeking the new location he came to what is now Roosevelt County, then Valley County, start- ing with only a small nucleus of stock. He con- tinued the business actively until August, 1919, when he sold his stock and ranch and moved to Bain- ville.

In March, 1878, Mr. Evans married Libbie Whealy, daughter of Thomas and Isabella Whealy. She was born in Eastern Canada March 18, 1854, and went with her parents to Minnesota in 1864. She was reared in that state, acquired a liberal educa- tion and was a successful teacher before her mar- riage. She died at Fort Benton in 1896. Of her children Josephine, the oldest, is the wife of Rob- ert M. Miller, a ranchman a few miles east of Snake Butte in Roosevelt County. Mr. and Mrs. Miller have three children: Robert, Gladys and Nelson. Leroy Evans, the second child, is a resident of Bainville, and his children are Elsie, Rose, Alice, William and Edna. Myrtle is the wife of B. E. Barrett, of Jordan, Montana, and their children are Elizabeth, Ethel, Clara, Gladys and Shirley. Elva Evans became the wife of P. J. Connolly, of Cut- hank, Montana, and is the mother of Annie, John and Kathleen. Earl, a ranchman at Jordan, married Effie Boyd, and they have Veronica, John, Joseph and Robert. Near Fort Benton October 26, 1898, William C. Evans married Mrs. Catherine Scott. She was born in Grant County, Wisconsin, May 29, 1851, daughter of John and Catherine (Polmear) Walker. Her parents were born in England, were brought to the United States when children, were married in Lancaster, Wisconsin, and her father was

a miner by trade and also a farmer. He finally werft to Colorado for his health and died at Blackhawk in that state. Mrs. Evans' mother died in March, 1919, at West Bend, Iowa, when almost eighty-nine years of age. In the Walker family were the fol- lowing children: Thomas E., who died in Iowa; Mrs. Catherine Evans; John P., who came to Mon- tana in the early '8os, but spent only a few years in the state, and is now a resident of Rodman, Iowa; James E., of Highwood, Montana; Mary, wife of J. C. Martin, at Kuna, Idaho; Joseph S., of Malen, Washington; and Maggie, wife of B. F. McFarland, of West Bend, Iowa.

Mr. Evans gave his first presidential vote to Gen- eral Grant in 1872. Like many other republicans, he supported Samuel J. Tilden in 1876 and has been affiliated as a democrat in national affairs since then. He joined the Odd Fellows Lodge at Bain- ville and is still a member. During the World war he was a bond and stamp buyer, and besides many contributions the home was the scene of much knit- ting for the boys at the front. Mr. Evans was reared a Presbyterian, but for the most part he has been , "quiet" Methodist. a

WARREN E. POLLINGER. In the new era which has dawned for American agriculture probably no one official position has greater opportunities than that of county agricultural agent. The county agri- cultural agent bears much the same relationship to the farmers of his county as the superintendent of schools does to the schools of the county.

When he entered upon his duties as county agri- cultural agent of Missoula County, Warren E. Pol- linger had the broad experience and the fundamental abilities to make him the one best choice for that office. He is a native Montanan, and has grown up in a close touch with its agricultural, horticul- tural and livestock industry.

He was born at Twin Bridges, November 17, 1882. Several generations ago his paternal ancestors came out of Sweden and settled in Pennsylvania. His father, Gov. E. M. Pollinger, was born at Har- risburg, Pennsylvania, in 1836, but at an early age became tired of his home environment and went to Kansas. That was in 1857, while Kansas was in the throes of a revolution over the issues of slavery and freedom.

In 1872 Mr. Pollinger secured an interest in Mon- tana lands by homesteading a hundred and sixty acres and taking up a desert claim of another quarter section northeast of Twin Bridges. When he left his employment with the stage company he lived on this ranch, developed it, and acquired a total of two thousand acres. He remained on his ranch until 1900. During the subsequent years of his life he spent the winters chiefly on the Pacific Coast and the rest of the year lived at Hamilton, Montana, where he died in 19II. He was a democrat of the old school and a member of the Episcopal Church. Gov. E. M. Pollinger married Helen Cook, who still lives at Hamilton. She was born in Michigan in 1857. She is the mother of nine children.

Warren E. Pollinger attended public school at Twin Bridges and Sheridan, graduated from the high school in 1901, and for twenty years his chief en- thusiasm and work have been farming, horticulture and stock raising. He had some extensive experi- ence on his father's ranch and on other farms until 1908. He then went into the Bitter Root Valley, worked and studied the most advanced practices of horticulture and the handling of the fruit crop. He was foreman of the Bitter Root Stock Farm, then superintendent of the Bitter Root Plantation Com- pany, and for two years foreman of the Bitter Root

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Valley Irrigation Company. For one year he served as local inspector and for two years was district inspector under the State Board of Horticulture. During that time his home was at Hamilton. On September 1, 1918, Mr. Pollinger moved to Missoula and took up his duties as assistant county agricul- tural agent, and since the first of December of that year has been county agricultural agent. He has made his office a real source of benefit to every farmer and livestock grower in the county. His personal advice is available to every agriculturist in the county.

Mr. Pollinger is a republican and a member of the Episcopal Church. October 25, 1910, at Como, Mon- tana, he married Miss Hazel Nicholson, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. R. B. Nicholson, the latter now deceased. Her father is a farmer at Como. Mrs. Pollinger is a graduate of the high school at Darby, Montana.

They have two daughters, Ella Catherine, born October 1, 1911, and Helen A., born August II, 1913.

CHARLES WALTER ADAMS. Early training and ex- perience have given Mr. Adams a prominent place among the mining engineers of Montana and. the West. Most of his active work has been with the American Smelting & Refining Company, and he is now manager of its East Helena plant.

He was born at 'Mitchell, South Dakota, June 6, 1888, son of a prominent and wealthy merchant in that city, Charles W. Adams, sr. The latter was born in Germany, March 14, 1855, and came with relatives to this country at the age of twelve years. He grew up in Clayton County, Iowa, attended the public school of that state, married there, and soon afterward removed to Mitchell, South Dakota, where he had one of the first stores. He has been very successful in business, and has enjoyed many prom- inent relations with the community and state. He has served as president of the school Board, mem- ber of the city council, and as delegate to various state conventions of the republican party. He is a prominent Mason, being a past grand commander of the Grand Commandery of the state of South Dakota, and is also affiliated with the Elks. He mar- ried Sarah Grotewohl, who was born in Clayton County, Iowa, in 1860, and died at Mitchell, South Dakota, in 1890. She was the mother of two sons, Fred C. and Charles W. The former was auditor of the Floete Lumber Company at Spencer, Iowa, when he died in I91I.

Charles W. Adams acquired a public school edu- cation at Mitchell, being a graduate of the high school, attended Dakota Wesleyan University, and took his professional training in the South Dakota School of Mines, the Utah School of Mines and the Missouri School of 'Mines. While in college he was affiliated with the Kappa Alpha fraternity and was also a member of the Triangle Club.

The first two years after leaving university he was with the Midland Bridge Company, and in 1912 went to work for the American Smelting and Refining Company. He was attracted to this busi- ness more for the purpose of professional experience than by the initial salary, and he worked in prac- tically every department at the smelter, and from one responsibility to another was promoted until he is manager of the East Helena plant. The offices of the smelter are in East Helena, and under his supervision are five hundred employes.

Mr. Adams is also a director of. the Western Union Consolidated Oil Company and the Christmas Mining Company. He makes his home near the plant. He is a member of the American Institute of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers.

In 1919, at Salt Lake City, he married Miss Mary Crowley, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. William A. Crowley of Salt Lake. Mrs. Adams is a graduate of a convent school at Newport, Kentucky. Mr. Adams is a member of the University Club of Salt Lake City, the Pan-Hellenic Club, the Boneville Club, the Rotary, Montana and Country Clubs of Helena, the Helena and East Helena Commercial Clubs, and is affiliated with El Kalah Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Salt Lake City.

HENRY C. HELGESON. It is the initiative and enterprise of Henry C. Helgeson that has had most to do with the commercial activities of the town of Belmont. Mr. Helgeson a number of years ago entered general merchandising, and has developed the largest general store in that section of Musselshell County.

Mr. Helgeson, who is also a Montana home- steader, was born in Crawford County, Wisconsin, February 16, 1880. His parents were Ole H. and Christina Helgeson, both born near Christinia, Nor- way. The grandfather, Helge Helgeson, brought his family from Norway in 1856 and became a pioneer farmer in Crawford County, Wisconsin, where he spent the rest of his life. Ole H. Hel- geson, who was born in 1850, was six years of age when brought to this country, was educated and married in Crawford County, Wisconsin, and re- mained on a farm there until 1891. The following seven years he was in the hotel business at Viroqua, Wisconsin, and then engaged in the tobacco business, buying, packing, sorting and selling tobacco at Viro- qua, which is an important center of the great Wis- consin tobacco industry. Ole Helgeson removed to Belmont, 'Montana, in 1908, and was actively en- gaged in ranching for about ten years. Since 1919 he has lived retired at Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. He is a republican and a member of the Lutheran Church, and is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and Modern Woodmen of America. A brief record of his children is as follows: Bertha, wife of Anton Wiken, a merchant at Sherry, Wis- consin ; Samuel, who died at the age of twenty-one; Sophia, who died in Vernon County, Wisconsin. aged forty-two, was the wife of Ole Moe, who still lives there; Olive, employed in a drug store at Viro- qua; Hilda, wife of Oscar Anderson, a furniture merchant at Reachtown, Wisconsin; Henry C .; James, living with his parents; and Julia, living on her ranch at Belmont, widow of Ole Langve, who died in .1919.

Henry C. Helgeson attended rural schools in Craw- ford County, Wisconsin, also the grade schools at Viroqua, and spent two years in a high school there. In 1901 he graduated from the Wisconsin Business University at La Crosse, and after one year spent in a clothing store at Viroqua gained a thorough knowledge of the mercantile business in a general store at Westby, Wisconsin. In July, 1908, Mr. Helgeson came to Montana, filed on a homestead of a hundred sixty acres, and occupied it until the fall of 1919. At the present time he has two hun- dred acres of well developed farm and ranch prop- erty. In 1909, while looking after his claim, he established the leading general store at Belmont, and erected a modern brick building, the only struc- ture of its kind in Belmont. He has a busy store, his trade coming from a distance of twenty miles, and he carries all the goods required by his large patronage.

Mr. Helgeson also served as postmaster of Bel- mont under appointment by President Taft, holding that office from 1909 until 1919. He is a republican, and is a trustee of the Lutheran Church. In 1905,

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in Vernon County, Wisconsin, he married Miss Tina Jeffeson, a native of Wisconsin. They have five children: Inez E., born May 13, 1906; Henry, born June 3, 1908; Phyllis, born in 1910; Basil, born February 1, 1914; and Alton, born in 1916.

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Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume III, Part 178

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