History of Richardson County, Nebraska : its people, industries and institutions, Part 18

Author: Edwards, Lewis C
Publication date: 1917
Publisher: Indianapolis : B.F. Bowen
Number of Pages: 1742

USA > Nebraska > Richardson County > History of Richardson County, Nebraska : its people, industries and institutions > Part 18

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The last governor, the Hon. John H. Morehead, began his life in this county in this precinct, where for many years he conducted successfully a

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mercantile business and later became the owner of many highly-improved farms, which he still owns.

Hon. Henry Gerdes, member of the state board of control of state insti- tutions, spent most of his life in this precinct, where he and his son still have valuable holdings of real estate.

The apple orchards alone have made this precinct famous throughout the state, as the quality raised there always command the highest prices.

ST. STEPHENS PRECINCT.

St. Stephens precinct lies in the northeast corner of the county ex- tending to the Missouri river on the east and the county line on the north. It has in later years been joined on to Barada and is now so known. The precinct took its name from the old town of St. Stephens, which no doubt took its name from the predeliction of some Frenchman for a saintly name for a cluster of very rough and ragged hills and bluffs that constituted the site upon which the so-called town was located. The precinct had a fewer number of acres than any other precinct in the county.

The surface of the country in this section is quite uneven and a large portion of the lands being broken and bluffy. This disadvantage was how- ever counterbalanced by a goodly supply of good hard wood timber and excellent water. There is a considerable amount of good tillable land lying in the southwest part of the precinct, on the head waters of the Half-Breed creek.

The Missouri bottom lands in this precinct amount to several thousand acres and. include timber, swamp and some of the best land in the county. The timber is mostly cottonwood, walnut and sycamore. The timber in the early days was large and afforded abundant supply of saw logs, which were rapidly transformed into lumber of the first quality by Sweet & Patterson, who owned a good saw-mill, to which they later added a grist-mill. The demand at this point for lumber was great and these early lumbermen were not able to supply the quantity required, yet running their mill to its utmost capacity.

James Cottier was one of the early landholders of prominence, as well as Gus Duerfeldt, Mr. Stump, and William Parchen.

The precinct in the early days had a postoffice known as Williamsville. but its market at that time was at Arago.

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FALLS CITY PRECINCT.

Falls City precinct is six miles square, bordered on the south by the Kansas-Nebraska state line and is southermost of the second tier of precincts west from the Missouri river, and includes some of the most beautiful and fertile lands to be found in southeast Nebraska.

Nature has dealt most generously with this locality, bestowing upon it such a combination of her favors as is seldom granted to any section. The land is smooth, undulating and almost inexhaustible in fertility. An abund- ance of never-failing stock water, supplied by springs and small streams, is found almost upon every quarter section in the precinct. A plentiful supply of good building stone is found on the Great Nemaha river and Pony creek. In addition to all this, a most beautiful landscape is afforded by a combina- tion of uplands, broad valleys and beautiful groves constantly presented to the eye.

These are some of the general features and advantages of this precinct, besides which it has many special ones that are deserving of notice. Of these the most important is the Great Nemaha river, which runs entirely through the precinct from west to east ; its valley, the most beautiful in the west, is from one to two miles in width. The lands it embraces are rich, alluvial flats or bottom lands, wet in places, but all susceptible to drainage, and as corn and grass lands unexcelled by any that the sun ever shone upon.

The Great Nemaha is more than one hundred miles in length, reaching far into Kansas, with its southwest branches and nearly to the state capitol in the northwest. draining an immense area of country and furnishing a never- failing volume of water.

The Falls of the Nemaha, where the banks and bed of the stream in the early times were formed of stone and where the water had a perpendicular fall of four feet over a ledge of rock, gave the name to the precinct as well as to the city, which we know as Falls City.

The power furnished by these falls was used for many years by String- field & Stumbo for a mill.

On the south side of the Nemaha river, and extending to the Kansas line, is a body of fine land that once formed a part of the Sac & Fox Indian reservation, but which was purchased from the Indians and thrown open for occupation and improvement by the white man. This section now presents one of the best settled neighborhoods in the entire county.

The Nemaha has two tributaries from the south within the limits of the precinct. The first is Pony creek, a small creek which empties into the

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Nemaha a half mile below the falls. The land lying between the Pony creek and the Nemaha is very choice, being mostly second bottom lands of great richness and beautifully situated. The corn patches, or farms, of the Sac & Fox Indians were located here. The old Indian village occupied the bluff, or fine plateau, above and south of the Falls of the Nemaha.

The village site and adjacent lands are now corn and wheat fields; and within a half mile from the spot where the bark wigwams once stood was later a neat and substantial school house, indicating the intelligence and enter- prise of this later commimunity.

Below Pony creek, some two or three miles, the waters of Walnut creek flow into the Nemaha. This stream is of considerable size and runs due north for a distance of seven or eight miles from Hiawatha, Kansas. The Southern Nebraska & Northern Kansas railroad was, as surveyed, to run from Hiawatha to Falls City along this valley. The Walnut lands are generally excellent in quality and among the highest priced lands in the county.

THE LOREE BRIDGE.

At the crossing of the Nemaha near the old Burbank farm, a portion of which is now owned by James Neeld, and on the main line of travel from southern Nebraska to northern Kansas was the Loree bridge, a substantial structure above high water, erected by the county at a cost of three thousand dollars. This bridge was built by Major Loree and the mud sills used were hewn from trees grown in the county. One, an oak, was obtained from the farm of William Boyd, near Salem, and the other, a walnut, was got from the Indian reservation east of Falls City, special permission being had from the government to cut the same. The remarkable fact about these two heavy timbers, so far as this country is concerned, if judged from the present when there is hardly any timber in the county which might properly be called "saw- timber," is the fact that they each squared eighteen inches on both ends and were forty feet long. Imagine the size of a tree at the base which, when hewn, might square as above indicated and forty feet in length and the value of either (oak or walnut) at the present-day prices. In placing them, special block and taekle equipment was brought from St. Joseph, Missouri.

The Muddy creek runs through the northeast part of the precinct. What was known in the earlier days as the Archer bridge spanned this stream on the road between Falls City and Arago. Near the bridge on the south side of the Muddy was the old Archer camp meeting grove where many revivals had been experienced and immense concourses had often met: where Fourth

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of July picnics and celebrations had been held and many interesting events transpired, that will form a part of the unwritten history of this community and county.

Not far from the camp ground was the residence of Isaac Crook, one of the first pioneers settlers of the precinct and county, who arrived in 1855 and who was the first county treasurer.

The lands lying between the Muddy and the Nemaha could not be improved upon, either as to situation or soil. It is no exaggeration to say that of the twenty or thirty sections of upland that lie between these two streams within the precinct, there is not one foot that cannot easily be culti- vated.

The town of Falls City is located upon the beautiful ridge that divides the waters of the Great Nemaha river and Muddy creek. Its location is declared by all who have ever visited it, to be one of the most delightful -- the grounds upon which it is built, sloping gently to the south and commanding a view of the country for miles in every direction. The townsite was laid off and occupied some time during the summer of 1857 by James Lane, John A. and J. E. Burbank, Isaac L. Hamby and others. Among the early resi- dents and those who have done most to upbuild this town and to advance its interests and who were its most active citizens, were Hon. E. S. Dundy, Hon. Isham Reavis, Daniel Reavis, August Schoenheit, David R. Holt, Jesse Crook, Ed. S. Towle, James Cameron, Anderson Miller, W. M. Maddox, Dr. H. O. Hanna, David Dorrington and William H. Mann.

Up until 1870-71 the population had not reached above about seven hun- dred, but with the coming of the railroad the business interests experienced a boom and the town grew very rapidly. The next greatest period of boom was in later years, in 1912 and 1913, when the Missouri Pacific Division was finally located here, when it experienced the greatest boom in all its history for the same period of time.

RULO PRECINCT.

Rulo precinct occupies the southeast corner and takes its name from the city of Rulo. The town was founded by Charles Rouleau, a Frenchman, who settled on the site of the town in 1855. The town is located on the Missouri river about two miles north of the Great Nemaha, and lies on what was formerly known as the Half-Breed tract; consequently, the town and the land surrounding it were allotted to and for a long time held by the half- breed Indians and white men who had married into the Lo family.

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This class of occupants was not particularly distinguished for enter- prise, if we accept the lively manner in which they conducted their real-estate transactions, frequently disposing of the same piece of land two or three times, and their very liberal patronage of the dealer in the fluid extract of sod corn.

For some years this element seriously retarded the progress and growth of this section of our county, but they disappeared before the tide of immi- gration that was attracted to this vicinity by its many natural advantages. The town of Rulo contained several hundred (perhaps seven or eight hun- dred ) people prior to the coming of the railroad in 1871 and thereafter rapidly improved. In the year 1870, just prior to the coming of the railroad, which was built in from the south on this side of the river, this point handled more than one hundred thousand bushels of corn. A steam corn sheller was used for shelling the corn and the grain merchants there had much to complain of in regard to transportation facilities. One line of steamers had a monopoly upon the entire carrying trade on the river and practiced extortion in the way of high freight rates and, like the later and greater railroad monopoly, were as much displeasing to the shipper, as they carried the grain when they pleased, without reference to the convenience or interest of the shippers. This condi- tion caused the shippers to pray for the speedy arrival of the "iron horse," which forever (or at least to the present time), has put the boats out of busi- ness. They felt that the first snort of the iron horse coming from the south or east, along the valley of the Missouri, would spoil the nice little thing so long enjoyed by the steamboat men exclusively.

This precinct embraces a very excellent body of land, all of which is now highly improved. The character of the farm buildings, improvements and so forth, will compare favorably with those of any other part of the state.

In the early days cheap lumber was obtained from the Rush bottoms just across the river and from the extensive establishment of Mr. Sprinkle, near the Yankton townsite north of Rulo. The Great Nemaha river runs through the southern part of the precinct. The uplands of this valley consist of smooth undulating prairie, which in most cases slopes gradually down to the bottoni lands of the Nemaha, which are from one to two miles wide. Several small streams afford an abundance of water and groves of timber.

A portion of the Sac and Fox and Iowa Indian reservations were located in this precinct, on the south side of the Nemaha river.

Rulo precinct has grown rapidly and is one of the wealthy precincts of the county.

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ARAGO PRECINCT.

Arago precinct lies in the central east portion of the county, and extends to the Missouri river.

The town of Arago gives the name to the precinct. This town was founded by a colony of Germans from Buffalo, New York, in the summer of 1858. Owing to its location on the Missouri river, where it had a boat service both up and down that stream, and its other flattering prospects as a town, the sale of town lots was quite lively. Judge C. H. Walther was the pioneer merchant of the place, and there also was at the time Hon. Lewis Algewahr, who was then running a saw-mill, surveying the township, etc. Somerland was with the Burchards, Fredericks ( Uncle Peter), the Neitzels, Nutzmans, Stock and Wirth among its citizens. The first and greatest attempt at a packing house was the pork-packing establishment conducted at this place, by Mr. Lewis Algewahr. As a grain market Arago stood second to no other place in the county in the early days. It had dry goods, drugs, meat market, pork-packing establishment, cooper shop, flour- and saw-mills, grain merchants, brewery, furniture store, jewelry, blacksmith, tin, and shoe shops, hotels, saloon, a singer hall, a fine brass band, etc., etc., besides a jolly, good-natured population.

The precinct embraces some very fine land, and is well supplied with those essentials for farming purposes-timber and good water. The land in some portions of the precinct is a little rough, but is used as pastures. The population is now, as in the older days, largely German, as any one can see not only from the dialect and customs prevailing, but from the thrift and prosperity everywhere prevailing.

The German settlement was first commenced by a colony from Buffalo, to which we have already alluded as founding the village of Arago in 1858. Rallying around the little nucleus formed at Arago, the settlement rapidly extended until it became a large and distinctive element in our population. Prior to the organization and location of the German colony, there was some settlement made in this precinct, but mostly from Missouri. The lands of this precinct being altogether on the Half-Breed Reserve, were allotted to half-breed Indians.

Among the early settlers in this vicinity were Houston Nuckols, Stephen Story, Steve Lyon Picotte, William R. Cain. Mr. Cain remained on his farm for many years an honored and honorable citizen, but in later years removed to Falls City, where he spent his declining years. Houston Nuckols has passed from this stage of action "to that bourne from whence no

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traveler ever returns." Who among the old settlers can forget Houston Nuckols and his schemes? How he ruled the limited world in which he moved; how he carried on his real-estate transactions, much as boys would swap jack knives, and how, after a few years of active and, in many respects, successful strife with the world, he at last fell a victim to the fatal cup. St. Stephens, which was founded by Nuckols and Story, flourished for a few years as a trading post and ferry crossing the Missouri, but was finally absorbed by the more enterprising town of Arago. Many of the pioneers crossed on this ferry, with its captain, sometimes called "Pap Price."

The precinct made very little progress until the coming of the Germans from Buffalo, since which time it has improved steadily and rapidly until at the present time it is one continuous field of highly improved farms.

Winnebago Branch runs through this precinct from northwest to south- east, and the Half-Breed Branch from the north through the entire length of the precinct to the south, with many diverging branches that afford an abundant supply of water.

The soil, location and exposure of the lands in this precinct are well adapted to the culture of all kinds of fruit. It must take first rank in this respect. The precinct is well supplied with schools in the hands of very competent instructors and as a consequence contains a highly intelligent class of people. The advantages of soil, water, etc., together with the energy and enterprise of the people, combine to make it a powerful com- munity.

OHIO TOWNSHIP.

The first permanent settlement made in Richardson county was at a point now embraced within the limits of what is known as Ohio precinct or township.

During the summer of 1854 John Level settled at Archer Grove. He was the first white man who broke the solitude of this beautiful expanse of prairie wilderness : the first of a population now numbering many thousand people. He did not have time to sing "Oh! solitude, where are thy charms," for he was quickly followed by others and in a few months a settlement was formed and the town of old Archer laid off at which the seat of government was at once established.

The Half-Breed Reservation complication which arose about this time soon ruined the prospects of the new town, the seat of government departed, and with it the glory of Archer.

But this did not very much retard the settlement of the rich fine lands

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of Ohio township. Prior to the laying out of old Archer and early in the year of 1855 Uncle Billy Goolsby located on Goolsby Branch at Goolsby Grove, where he at once inaugurated a vigorous war of extermination upon the wolves and wildcats of that section, which he prosecuted as long as a wolf or wildcat could be started within five miles of the premises, and where he lived for many years in the possession of one of the most beautiful and valuable farms in the county. At about the same time or perhaps a little earlier John F. Harkendorf settled on Muddy creek, near the present crossing of that stream, known as the Harkendorf bridge. He was probably the first German settler in the county and a fair representative of that thriving and prosperous class of our citizens.

These were among the first settlers of the county. In the spring of 1856 the Widow McElroy settled on McElroy Branch and gave name to that stream. Since that time, each succeeding year, saw an influx of immi- gration. The settlement of this township was for most part in the ordinary way, by people from different states and countries. In the northeast part of the township a settlement of Germans had been formed who, with their usual industry, rapidly improved their lands.

Within two years antedating 1870 the most important event in the set- tlement of this precinct was the advent of a large class of Dunkards. They were sober and industrious in habits, normal and upright in principle and possessing energy and intelligence and means, which made them ever useful and desirable citizens.

The natural resources and character of the land entitle it to especial notice. The soil is the best, being deep, rich and fine. From the location of the principal stream through the southern part of the township the lands nearly all lie to the south, causing grass and grains to start earlier than with any other exposure. It is well watered. The Muddy creek runs entirely through the southern part of the township. Three smaller streams empty into it from the north, affording abundant water in every section. These streams are all fed by unfailing springs of excellent soft water, and do not dry up in the dryest season. The lands lie smooth down to the water's edge, there being no bluffs or rough lands in the whole township. The valley of the Muddy is from one to two miles wide and consists of first bottom lands. From the Muddy northward the land rises gradually to the north end of the precinct.

This township is amply supplied with good schools and churches and is one of the best of the county.

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MUDDY PRECINCT.

Muddy precinct is at present composed of a single township, with two voting places, the one at Stella and the other at Shubert, and for conven- ience known as east and west Muddy. Formerly it embraced about one- fifth the area of the entire county, including the Muddy creek for several miles and all north of that stream to the county line. As at present bounded it comprises a fine body of land on the north side of the Muddy and extend- ing to the county line. Sardine branch and several other streams pene- trating it in various directions, afford to this part of the county an abundance of good water. The soil, like that of most of the uplands of the county, is a rich, sandy loam, well adapted to the culture of corn, wheat, oats, rye, barley and potatoes. The supply of timber within the precinct is not very good.

The first settlement of this precinct was made as early as 1858. About this time G. B. Patterson and C. Slagel located on Sardine branch; C. Van Deventer and the Wilkinson family on "Johnny Cake ridge," and the Hays family on Muddy creek. A large amount of lands in this precinct early fell into the hands of land speculators, who proved a curse to the country and much retarded the early and rapid settlement, holding their lands until the sweat and toil of the pioneer had enhanced prices and enabled them to obtain enormous returns upon their small investments. The lands are now among the best and command the highest prices paid for land in the county. The land warrants with which they were entered cost the speculator from seventy-five to eighty cents per acre. Of course the increased value was owing to the increased value made by the actual occupants, and it is not strange that all manner of expedients were resorted to. to oblige the capitalists to pay for a small portion of the improvements in the way of school houses and road taxes.

The large amount of these speculators' land for a long time accounted for the light population of this precinct, but in time, like in all the country, this impediment was swept away and the precinct is now as well settled as any and as prosperous as the best.

The citizens of Muddy are intelligent and wideawake and have always taken an active interest in the political and material questions connected with the history of our county.

The vote of the precinct has always been counted as being solid for the party of progress. Since the first settlement in 1858, schools have been maintained in the different neighborhoods of the precinct. In the earlier

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times mail facilities were poorly arranged and mail from this point was routed to cross the Missouri river and thence was carried north nearly to the Iowa state line, where it again crossed the Missouri at Aspinwall and thence to its destination in Liberty precinct.

Muddy is the home of two of the liveliest towns of the county, Stella and Shubert, the former in the extreme west and the latter in the extreme east part of the precinct, both having railway connection, the former on the Mis- souri-Pacific railroad and the latter on the Nebraska City branch of the Burlington railroad.

PORTER PRECINCT.

Porter precinct, named in honor of Colonel Porter, the first settler in this locality, is situated in the northwestern part of the county. It contains thirty-six sections of as fine land as Nebraska affords. There was early a scarcity of timber in this part of the country, but wherever settlements were made groves and hedges were planted so this deficiency was not long felt. The branches of the Little Muddy, a tributary of Muddy creek, waters the township.

The precinct settled slowly from the fact that large bodies of the land was held by speculators, who were slow to part with it; but in later times it got more and more into the hands of actual occupants, who speedily went to work in a way of making development of the same.

Dr. R. S. Molony, Sr., of Galesburg, Illinois, was the owner of one of these tracts containing some four thousand acres. This tract was put on the market in such a way as to prove profitable to the new owners and convenient to many persons of limited means, who were seeking homes. The owner, Dr. R. S. Molony, sold alternate sections in farms of eighty to one hundred and sixty acres on ten years' time at ten dollars per acre, with ten per cent interest. He rapidly found purchasers for a considerable portion of his land, and a live, energetic settlement of people was soon formed in that vicinity. His son, R. S. Molony, a very enterprising young gentle- man, soon made a fine three hundred and sixty acre farm adjoining this tract and acted as agent for the sale of the remainder of the land. This land, which is accounted among the very best in Richardson county today, and readily sells for more than two hundred dollars per acre, was originally bought by the senior Molony with school script during war times for the very meager sum of but a few cents per acre.

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History of Richardson County, Nebraska : its people, industries and institutions, Part 18

Author: Edwards, Lewis C Publication date: 1917 Publisher: Indianapolis : B.F. Bowen Number of Pages: 1742

Author: Edwards, Lewis C
Publication date: 1917
Publisher: Indianapolis : B.F. Bowen
Number of Pages: 1742