Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume III, Part 182

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 182

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Kansas City, back to St. Louis, from St. Louis went to Chicago, and followed his trade at Kalamazoo, Detroit, Buffalo, Niagara and other points in the East. Thus his experience covers many of the im- portant cities from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

In 1896 Mr. Green went back to Seattle, Wash- ington, with the idea of continuing his journey to Alaska. Failing of securing a passage on a steamer, he returned to Chicago, and in the winter of 1897 arrived at Butte, Montana. The following spring he was working on some of the university buildings at Missoula, and then worked at lining furnaces on . smelters at Anaconda, Helena and Great Falls. He came to Lewistown by stage coach, and here engaged in a very successful contracting and building business until 1902. His firm was Green & Smith. They built the Bright Hotel, also the Green Block, owned by Mr. Green, and many other structures. They were also the firm who took contracts to move the old Day Hotel from Main to Broadway, and then gave this noted old time hostelry its brick addition.

In 1902 Mr. Green took up a homestead two miles from Lewistown on the Castle Butte road. He has increased his landed possessions until they comprise 640 acres. For several years in addition to handling his homestead he was in the coal business as secretary of the Spring Creek Company. In later years he has devoted his time chiefly to grain raising and general farming. Mr. Green is a stockholder in the Lewis- town State Bank, is a member of Lewistown Lodge No. 37, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and also belongs to the Woodmen of the World and the Im- proved Order of Red Men. Politically he supports the republican party.

In 1898 Mr. Green married Miss Sarah Ann Day, who was born at Mineral Point, Wisconsin, and is a member of an old and prominent family of Mon- tana. They had two children: Thomas M., a stu- dent in the Ferguson County High School; and Chester A., who died at the age of five and a half years.

LOWELL C. BURNS. Of the business men of Baker who have found success in the handling of realty, one who has made rapid progress, is Lowell C. Burns, who has been identified with real estate lines since 1913, but who has been a resident of Baker since December, 1909. Mr. Burns is a native of Sullivan County, Missouri, and was born on a farm near Green City, that state, June 19, 1883, a son of George S. Burns.

Enoch W. Burns, the paternal grandfather of Lowell C. Burns, came from Eastern Kentucky and settled on a farm in Ralls County, Missouri, later moving to Sullivan County, where he died in 1909, at the advanced age of ninety-three years. His wife was a Miss Boyd, who left her husband five sons and a daughter. Of these, William, James and Wesley, and their father, were soldiers of the Union during the Civil war.

George S. Burns, father of Lowell C., was born in Ralls County, Missouri, and was reared near New London, where he was limitedly educated. He was reared as a farmer, but later entered merchandising at Winigan, Missouri, and completed his career there, passing away November 17, 1916, at the age of fifty- seven years. He married Julia E. Shaver, who was born in Putnam County, Missouri, a daughter of George W. and Anna (Lipp) Shaver, natives of Germany who became farming people. Mrs. Burns, who was the youngest of eleven children, passed away in 1901. She and her husband reared the following children : Nora, who became Mrs. E. C. Millay and died at Kirksville, Missouri, in 1908; Lowell C .; Rev. Asa O., of Mexico, Missouri; Sylvia D., the wife of

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J. W. Bundridge, of Moberly, Missouri; Goldie Ruth, who died unmarried in 1916; Ruby Icle, who is a teacher in a business college at Moberly; and El- wood Mckinley, who is with the Sweeney Auto School of Kansas City, Missouri. Of these children Rev. Asa O. Burns is one of the accomplished classi- cal instructors in Hardin College of Mexico, Mis- souri, and prominent as a public speaker, who is also widely known in the field of evangelistic work. Doctor Burns, as his state knows and calls him, out- lined, at the suggestion and with the aid of his brother Lowell, when he was seventeen years old, a course of study to cover a period of twelve years, and this plan he followed without resources other than those he provided himself as he went along.

Lowell C. Burns continued his farm experience until he reached the age of fourteen years, at which time his father engaged in merchandising at Winigan, Missouri, and in this business the son was trained. For six years he followed merchandising, and left his native state when he came to Montana, locating at Billings, where his maiden work was as ticket clerk for the Burlington and North Pacific Railroad. He was thus engaged for a year and one-half, and then went to Bridger, Montana, where he was asso- ciated with the Bridger Coal and Improvement Com- pany until he came on east and engaged in mer- chandising at Miles City. This venture proved event- ful but unprofitable, and he left that community ready to begin life over. Mr. Burns' prospecting for a location resulted in his selection of Baker as a point to make another start. The Milwaukee road had built in here the year before, and this country had been opened to settlement recently, a fact which led Mr. Burns to believe that it would be fully populated sometime. So he came into the Village of Baker, then with a population of some fifty people, and en- tered the employ of J. Land & Son as bookkeeper, a capacity in which he earned his first dollar in Fallon County. He served this firm about three and one-half years and then opened a real estate office as the successor to W. R. Barber, who had been dealing in real estate and who was also United States commissioner.

Through Mr. Burns' efforts as an advertiser of the state at least this end of it has been placed before the homeseeker and investor to its advantage. He placed an agricultural exhibit of Fallon County farm products before the people of St. Paul during the Farmers Equity Convention in 1916, and has lost no opportunity since to give the world the truth about the opportunities for the homeseeker in Eastern Mon- tana. His work is done as a broker, and his sales have occurred among landseekers from the states of Minnesota and Iowa. His aspirations personally have taken the form of the development of the agricul- tural, educational and industrial field about Baker. He has been connected with the public schools as a board member a number of years, which schools com- prise twelve grades and provide for education and graduation of pupils who enter, and are affiliated with the state educational institutions of Montana. Only three classes have gone out of this high school carry- ing its diploma and to take positions of trust and as good citizens everywhere or anywhere.

Mr. Burns was married at Winigan, Missouri, May 3, 1907, to Miss Lula B. Wallace, whose father, Isaiah Wallace, came with his wife from Nova Scotia and settled among the Missouri pioneers. Mrs. Burns was born in Linn County, Missouri, within twelve miles of the birthplace of General Pershing, Decem- her 17, 1884, and is one of a family of eleven children. Four children have been born to her and her hus- band: Gretta Lorain, Gwendolin Persus and Rich- ard Wallace, who reside with their parents; and Gordon H., who died in infancy.

Mr. Burns affiliates with the republican party and voted first for Theodore Roosevelt for President. His Masonic connections are with the Blue Lodge and Chapter, the former at Baker and the latter at Miles City.

NEPTUNE LYNCH, whose record as a pioneer is properly told in this work, was born in County Galway, Ireland, in 1824, and acquired all his edu- cation before leaving his native land. He came to this country at the age of fourteen, and leaving Castle Garden rode horseback across half the con- tinent, at a time when there were no railroads, to Roanoke, Howard County, Missouri. There he made his home with his Uncle Lynch to the age of twenty. He then married Miss Elizabeth S. Alexander. They became the parents of five children : Charles A., who is a resident of Kalispell, Montana, and has three sons; James D., who died in Calgary, Canada, thirty years ago; Neptune, Jr., who died at Plains twenty years ago, leaving two daughters and one son ; Mrs. Elizabeth Lee Grinnell, who died in Spo- kane eleven years ago; and Mrs. Mary Lynch Boyer, a resident of Plains, and proprietor of the Hotel Northern of that city.

In 1849, leaving his wife and two children with his uncle in Missouri, Neptune Lynch went by way of Panama to California, and remained in the far West six years. Returning to Missouri, after settling his uncle's estate he gathered his family around him, and in 1860 started again for the setting sun. His first location was at Denver; in 1862 he removed to Boise, Idaho, and in 1866 came to Montana, first locating at Helena, and for two years farming near the present site of Townsend. In the spring of 1870, following the Cedar Creek gold excitement, he joined that stampede and in November came to "Horse Plains," now Plains. Here he followed farming and stock raising the rest of his life. The family in the early days had frequent troubles with Indians, and endured many other hardships. One time the household was confined to an unvarying diet of potatoes for three weeks, and were thank- ful for that. There were no schools nor churches, but despite the lack of such advantages the Lynch home was a very happy one. Neptune Lynch was a democrat in politics and a Catholic in religion. For several years while living in Missouri he studied medicine with Doctor Blake in that state. He obtained a knowledge that was useful to him and his family and to the entire community in Montana. He was able to handle all ordinary cases of illness in his own family, and was the doctor and nurse for all the people who lived in Plains during the seventies and eighties. In 1893 Mr. Lynch was in a railway accident, losing his left leg just below the knee, and suffered a great deal and was never quite the same strong man afterward. He was a rugged character, strong, kindly, sympathetic and greatly beloved by all who knew him. His generosity caused him to divide all that he had.

His death occurred May 25, 1898, as a result of pneumonia, and his widow, who survived him six years, died of the same disease. Her people were Kentuckians, and she was born in that state, going with her family at the age of four years to Missouri. She was a great-grandniece to Daniel Boone. Her grand father's name was Sidney Logan and her father's name John Alexander. Neptune Lynch served for a number of years as postmaster at Plains, finally resigning that office in 1883.

EDWARD E. GAINES, M. D. A skilled physician, a high-minded citizen, Doctor Gaines has thoroughly earned the esteem and affection of the people of Wilbaux and the surrounding territory since he lo-

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cated there in November, 1907. A physician is al- ways more or less of a public servant, and Doctor Gaines has emphasized that feature of his work, and has given himself with unremitting energy and faithfulness to all the duties imposed upon him both professionally and as a private citizen.

Doctor Gaines was born in Vernon County, Wis- consin, May 19, 1862. His grandfather, Theodore Gaines, was a native of New York state, and a pi- oneer settler in Wisconsin. He came West from Connecticut in the early '50s, and made the journey to Lake County, Illinois, with ox teams. While pass- ing through the city of Chicago his wagons were grinding. Theodore Gaines married Adaline Peck, and of their three sons and two daughters the fol- lowing are still living: John J., of Spokane, Wash- ington; James, of Sparta, Wisconsin; and Mrs. F. M. Sears, of St. Paul. Theodore Gaines was born July 22, 1810, and died at Viroqua, Wisconsin, in 1862.

Levi Gaines, father of Doctor Gaines, was born at Hartford, Connecticut, May 26, 1832, and had a common school education. He spent a seven years' apprenticeship as a carpenter and joiner, and fol- lowed that trade throughout his active career. He lived in Lake County, Illinois, for a time and in 1856 went to" Viroqua, Wisconsin, accompanied by his wife and child and driving two yoke of oxen. He built most of the buildings of that new and developing town. For a physical disability he was rejected when he volunteered in the Civil war. He was a republican, a member of the Congregational Church and affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Levi Gaines died in September, 1905. He married Cornelia Stevens, whose father, Eber C. Stevens, was a New York man and spent many years as a farmer and broker at Rockford and Free- port, Illinois. Mrs. Levi Gaines, who died August 10, 1910, was the mother of two sons, Eugene and Doctor Gaines, the former a resident of Los Angeles.

Doctor Gaines completed his early education in the Viroqua High School, and while there he was employed as a drug clerk and learned the profession of pharmacy, which he practiced in different places in Wisconsin. He also studied medicine at Viroqua under Dr. H. A. Chase, and in 1882 entered Rush Medical College at Chicago, where he was graduated February 26, 1886. For a year of that time he worked as a druggist. Doctor Gaines practiced med- icine at Rhinelander, Wisconsin, for three years, and then for seven years at Cashton, Wisconsin, where he was also prominent in local affairs, taking an active part in the movement to incorporate the vil- lage, served as village officer and as health officer and county physician. His home for many years before coming to Montana was at La Farge, Wis- consin, where he was not only burdened with a busy practice as a physician but bore an equally prominent part in civic affairs, helping incorporate the town, serving as health officer, and as member of the school board for many years his efforts carried the school bonds voted for the erection of the La Farge school building. He was also a member of the council, president of the village, and his name is held in high esteem in that locality.

Doctor Gaines considers the years spent in Mon- tana as the most strenuous of his career. He has always engaged in general practice and has been honored with the positions of county and city health officer and has contributed in other ways to the im- provement of the community. During the war he was a member of and examining physician for the local Selective Draft Board, and he and his wife were active in Red Cross and other war auxiliary

movements. During the influenza epidemic Doctor Gaines was the only physician in the county, and literally wore himself out attending to his patients, while Mrs. Gaines did hospital work as a nurse during the epidemic. Doctor and Mrs. Gaines have contributed to the Roosevelt Memorial Fund. In Wibaux they have built a six-room bungalow, mod- ern in every particular, located on Esther Street in the Davis Addition.

Doctor Gaines began voting as a republican, cast- ing his ballot for James G. Blaine in 1884. He be- came an Odd Fellow at Cashton, Wisconsin, and since coming to Wibaux has taken his Masonic de- stuck in the muddy streets. His trade was scythe . grees and has done the work of Blue Lodge No. 81.

At Antioch, Illinois, Doctor Gaines married for his first wife Miss Agnes LaPlant. She was the mother of three children. Harry J., the oldest, who was registered in the draft but was not called, is principal of the high school at North Crandon, Wis- consin, and finished his education at Beloit College. He married Lura Osborne, and their three children are Marjorie, John and Earl. The second of the family, Earl Gaines, secretary and treasurer of the Wheatland Lumber Company of Harlowton, Mon- tana, married for his first wife Nina Anderson, who died, leaving a son, Eugene, and for his second wife married Cecil Boufelette, who is mother of a son, George Boufelette Gaines. The third child of Doctor Gaines is Gertrude.

At Cashton, Wisconsin, Doctor Gaines married Miss Olga Fenholt. She was born at Christiania, Norway. Her father, John Fenholt, who married Frederica Berg was a stage man in Christiania, and after his death his family came to the United States, locating at Cashton, Wisconsin, where Mrs. Gaines grew up and received her education. She was an only child. Doctor and Mrs. Gaines have a son, Dwight, born February 14, 1902.

GEORGE W. CLEVELAND. Specific mention is made of many of the worthy citizens of Carter County within the pages of this work, citizens who have figured in the growth and development of this favored locality and whose interests have been iden- tified with its every phase of progress, each con- tributing in his sphere of action to the well being of the community in which he resides and to the advancement of its normal and legitimate growth. Among this number is he whose name appears above, present assessor of Carter County, peculiar interest attaching to his career from the fact that more than forty years have elapsed since he first came person- ally into touch with this locality.

George W. Cleveland was born at Davenport, Iowa, on August 3, 1860, the son of Jeff and Anna (Joyce) Cleveland. The father was born in New York state, where he was reared and received a limited educa- tion. Early in life he accompanied the family on their removal to Michigan, where, eventually, he became a farmer and railroad contractor. During the Civil war he took an active part in the recruiting service, serving as wagon master in getting men started for the front. He had charge of the trans- fer company in St. Louis, Missouri, where he lived during the early years of the war. Finally he be- came a freighter and merchant in the Black Hills, though prior to that he had operated a woodyard at Sioux Point, removing from there to Sioux City in 1868, where he remained until 1876, when he made his final move to Deadwood. His death oc- curred at Spearfish in 1894. At Cynthiana, Ken- tucky, Jeff Cleveland married Anna Joyce, a native of that place and whose sympathies during the Civil war were with the South. She died at Ekalaka, Montana, 1907, at the age of sixty-four years. To

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this worthy couple were born the following children : George W., the immediate subject of this review; Edward, deceased; Isabel, Mrs. B. F. Francis, of Fresno, California; James, of Carter County, Mon- tana; Ella, wife of A. J. Speelman, of Ekalaka; and Nannie, of San Francisco.

George W. Cleveland was reared under the paren- tal roof, but his school education was somewhat limited. However, this deficiency has been abun- dantly made up by much reading, close habits of observation of men and events and extensive business experience, so that today he is considered a well- informed man on general topics. While but a mere child he accompanied his parents on their removals, first up the Missouri River to Sioux City, and later to Sioux Point, remaining with his parents until his marriage, and during this time contributing his share to the family exchequer. He established his own home in the Black Hills as a farmer, his home being located about twelve miles northeast of Spear- fish, where he took a pre-emption. This he relin- quished in 1894 and came to Montana, locating where he now lives, on the head of Cripple Creek, where he entered a homestead at the foot of Conger Hill and built a dugout for his pioneer home. As soon as he had his family established he set to work to erect a better home, and by the next fall had completed a comfortable log house.

While at that time Mr. Cleveland owned a few head of horses and cattle, he needed some ready cash and to obtain this he began freighting from Belle Fourche to Miles City and Wibaux. He fol- lowed this vocation for fifteen years, and through it he was enabled to remain on his first land and to prove up on it. He has developed the place, which now comprises 480 acres, and one of the features of the ranch is the famous Cleveland Spring, which furnishes water sufficient to irrigate ten acres, the flow never being decreased by the most extreme droughts.

At Crawford, Nebraska, where Mr. Cleveland was working temporarily in the construction of the B. & M. Railroad, he married Mattie Miller, who was born in Iowa in January, 1870. Her father, Benjamin H. Miller, had moved to Crawford from Hazelton, Iowa. His children, seven in number, were as follows: Mattie, Mrs. Cleveland; Warren, of Douglas, Wyoming; Benjamin, of Crawford, Ne- braska; Mrs. Gertrude Hodge, of Crawford; Ulster, of Casper, Wyoming; Howard, of Casper; and Mrs. Laura Sullenberger, who died at Sundance, Wyo- ming. To Mr. and Mrs. Cleveland have been born the following children: Inez, the wife of Herbert Stoddard, of Cedar Butte, South Dakota; Grover, George, Warren, Kyle, James, Frank, Wealthy and Dora.

Politically Mr. Cleveland has always given his support to the democratic party. He was serving his district as school trustee when he was elected assessor of Custer County. In the bill creating Carter County he was named the first county asses- sor, and at the ensuing election was chosen to suc- ceed himself, being the present incumbent of the office. He organized the work of his office and has assessed the county three times. In all life's rela- tions he has been true and faithful to duty and the trusts reposed in him, and thereby he has won the unqualified confidence and respect of his fellow men.

LEO BEAN, one of the leading business men of Baker, and a man who has earned the respect of the people of this city, is a representative of the Chinese nation. He was born in the province of Canton, China, on July 11, 1866, a son of Leo Yee, who spent twenty-five years in the United States

as a shoemaker and cobbler and then returned to China. He is still living and resides at Honan, China. Leo Bean is the only child of his father.

In 1880 he sailed from Hong Kong, China, for Portland, Oregon, accompanying some friends to the New World, and since his landing here has made this country his home. He spent a year in Portland and then went to San Francisco, Cali- fornia, where he attended a Chinese school to com- plete the studies begun in his native land. For the subsequent four years he continued a student, al- though during a portion of the time had to attend school at night, working as a porter in a saloon to earn his living. In 1893 he came to Montana, and in December of that year secured employment in a Chinese laundry, working there and in a restaurant for eighteen months, saving his money carefully. Having by that time been able to accumulate a little capital, he borrowed some more money from a cousin and embarked in a restaurant business of his own, conducting it under the name of the Billings Res- taurant, and during the dozen years he owned it he made his first permanent success. Leaving Billings, he went to Beaumont, Texas, and for five years conducted a restaurant there under the name of the Canton Restaurant. In this undertaking Mr. Bean had a partner, one of his countrymen.

Returning to Billings, Mr. Bean opened the Cali- fornia Restaurant and conducted it in partnership with another countryman. A year later he began prospecting in Eastern Montana to find a location that suited him for permanent occupancy, and found what he wanted at Baker, where he located in 1909, al- though he continued to own his Billings restaurant for a time, or until he sold it at a profit.

Mr. Bean bought the Hitch lunch counter, which he subsequently enlarged into a restaurant, taking over additional space built for him, and occupied the place until the building was lost through the misfortune of his landlord. He then bought a lot on which he erected his own business building, and in it established the Montana Cafe. His friends called him "Lew Jim," the name having been be- stowed upon him at Billings, and as his Chinese name is one difficult to translate into English he has kept the one given him by one of his associates. His parents named him Leo, which has since been corrupted into Lew. Officially he is known as Leo Bean, and all of his legal transactions are made under that name, it having come to him as a result of an error on the part of the court officer who made out his first legal papers at Billings.

Leo Bean has not confined himself to the res- taurant business at Baker, but had accomplished much of importance there, especially in the line of making permanent improvements, and owns three business houses on Main Street, eight dwellings and a laundry building. Mr. Bean provided the capital for establishing the Sam Lee Laundry, a steam plant which accommodates the people of Baker and the surrounding territory. He also owns four houses in the Barstow addition to Baker, two lots in the Savage addition to Baker and forty acres of land three miles east of Baker in what is called the "oil land" locality.

In every movement started for the betterment of Baker Mr. Bean has been conspicuous in his will- ingness to give it support, and his money has been liberally donated to provide entertainment for the people of Baker. He has shown a special interest in baseball, of which sport he is very fond, and has sacrificed time and money willingly and voluntarily in behalf of the Baker team, driving the players in his machine to points over the circuit so that match games might be promptly played. A member of the

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Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume III, Part 182

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