USA > Wisconsin > Columbia County > A history of Columbia County, Wisconsin : a narrative account of its historical progress, its people, and its principal interests > Part 36
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HIS RELIGIOUS CREED
While several members of his family in Wisconsin were active workers in the Presbyterian church, Mr. Jamieson says of his own religious experience-"I have never sought for admission to become a member of any religious body, for the reason that I do not believe that with my hasty and impulsive temper, which I confess I have never been able to entirely subdue, I could honestly and conscientiously comply with the vows or obligations a member has to take in uniting with such organizations. And I believe I will be more acceptable to the Master not to take those vows, than to take them and afterwards violate them. Besides I regard every man as a Christian that labors for the public weal, and the advancement and elevation of his race, for if Christianity means anything, it certainly means this. I believe, however, in church organization, and think that all who can honestly live up to the vows taken on uniting with the church ought not to hesitate in becoming a member of whatever church is best suited to their minds.
"My efforts in Columbia County, notwithstanding my poor health have been reasonably successful, so far as the accumulation of property is concerned, as my tax receipts will show. My first tax paid in the county for the year 1848, as before stated, was two dollars and thirty
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cents on eighty acres of land, inclusive of highway taxes; and the receipt which I hold for taxes paid ou eleven hundred and six acres which I now own, inclusive of highway taxes and personal property for the year 1882 amounts to over five hundred dolars. Some people may think I have not used the means placed in my hands just as they would have done. In this, however, I have been governed wholly by my own judge- ment, and hold myself responsible only to the power that placed it in my keeping. What little property I have acquired has been made from strictly legitimate business transactions, and not through any gambling or speculative operations."
GOOD FAMILY STOCK
Modern science takes much account of the influence that a family stock has on the social health and wellbeing of any given community. It is known that one family, given to dissipation and vagabondage, will cause thousands of dollars of expense to a county and will extend its weakening and corrupting influence to many others in the neighbor- hood. In the light of these facts, the concluding sentences of Hugh Jamieson's memoirs may very properly be quoted. During the years both himself and other members of his immediate family had lived in Wisconsin, besides contributing to the general support of government and schools and institutions, he was able to state that not one "has ever caused the state or county in which we live to be at one dollar of expense in prosecuting or defending an action, either of a civil or criminal nature, nor for any other purpose whatsoever, except as sharers of the general expense in governing the whole, our full proportion of which has always been cheerfully and willingly paid. I might as well state here also that while our ancestors are known to have lived in the same parish (viz. that of Loudon in Ayrshire (Scotland), for upwards of three hundred and fifty years, several of whom are known to have fought, bled and died for the civil and religious freedom of their country, (as the battle of Bothwell Bridge and other battlefields will fully attest), I think the court records of the county in which they live might be searched in vain for any evidence of a criminal or even civil action of any consequence in which any of them were ever engaged, except in defense of their civil or religious rights. And I am satisfied that the records of no poor house ever contained one of their names, for all of which I sincerely thank God, and only hope that those who come after us may not defile the records; and that the country of our adoption may never have cause to regret the transplanting made in Wisconsin in the years 1848 and
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1849 from that small manufacturing town on the banks of Irvine in Ayrshire, Scotland."
MR. JAMIESON'S DEATH
The writer of these memoirs lived fully fifteen years after he had penned the last words of the manuscript and died at his home in Poy- nette, January 20, 1898.
CHAPTER XXIII
WYOCENA
FOUNDED BY MAJOR ELBERT DICKASON-NAMING OF WYOCENA-HIGH GRADE OF EARLY SETTLERS-FIRST STORE-MESSRS. DEY AND DICKA- SON-THE DAIRY INDUSTRIES-PICNIC HELD ON HISTORIC GROUND SKETCH OF J. M. BUSHNELL.
A few miles northwest of the center of Columbia County is Wyocena; famed more than sixty years ago as the headquarters of the county gov- ernment, but now rather quiet and subdued, although neat and bright. The village has long been the seat of the County Insane Asylum and Poor Home; a full history of which will be found in the chapter on "County Organization." It is the center of a rich dairy district, and has a modern creamery, several business places, a substantial bank and a flour mill (located outside the village limits). Wyocena was incor- porated as a village in 1909.
FOUNDED BY MAJOR ELBERT DICKASON
Sometime in the fall of 1843. after his ruinous experience as the founder of Columbus, Maj. Elbert Diekason opened a farm on what is now Duck Creek, in the northern part of Section 21, present Town of Wyocena. He was poverty-stricken, but still brave and hopeful. He converted a portion of his log house into a "hotel," and in 1846. when the county was organized, platted a village upon his farm. When he arrived upon the ground he named the stream Duck Creek, and the post- office established at that point in 1845 was given that name also.
NAMING OF WYOCENA
What occurred soon afterward. in order to christen it more euphoni- ously, and more befitting its ambition as an aspirant for the county seat. is told by J. M. Bushnell, of the Wyocena Advance, who is a native of
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the village and also a representative of one of the pioneer families of the town :
"This, one of the first settlements in Columbia County," le says, "was known as Duck Creek until the summer of 1846, when it was a prominent candidate for the seat of government of the county. The ambitious early settlers of Duck Creek decided that in order to succeed in this direction they needed a different name for the settlement.
"Many and various were the names presented by the ones who usually congregated at the publie house of Major Dickason daily. During this discussion the major had a dream which resulted in a name for the set- tlement. The following morning he related it to the assembled settlers as follows: He said he had been on a journey the night before to a county metropolis, where all was business and hustle and the name of the city was Wyocena. This so enthused his guests that they at once decided to call it by that name and so the name has remained, but the early orthography has changed several times.
"It was probably during the following year, 1847, that one Parks Bronson, a pioneer pedagogue in this section gave to it its present spelling.
"The name is not Indian. No one of our Indian students has been able to find anything in any of the Indian tongues that will admit of such a construction.
"Then again the major would have nothing Indian in his. He had occasion the first year of his residence to dislike them. His first crop of wheat proved to be too good a food for their ponies to have any left for his own necessities. It is said that while an Indian was well treated at the log tavern, his scalp was in need of insurance if he met the major in the woods.
"The early name for the stream on which Wyocena is located was Wauona River, and this beautiful name had to give way to the major's dislike of Indian names and be christened Duck Creek, much to the dis- like of many.
"Wyocena had the proud distinction of having been the county seat in 1847 and 1848, and again in 1850. The usual scramble for county seat honors was rampant in those pioneer days, and in 1851 it was perma- nently located at Portage-though the early settlers made the claim that it was done by the floating vote of laborers on the, then building, canal.
HIGH GRADE OF EARLY SETTLERS
"Perhaps no town was ever settled with a more intelligent, sturdy and industrious people than was Wyocena. They endured many hardships and saw much of privation, though few ever knew real want, for the land
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was very productive and easily tilled so that the necessaries were at hand if the luxuries were missing. Mills and markets were far away at the start, and the teamster was obliged to carry tools on his trips to repair an axletree or a wagon tongue when broken.
"Many of them started out for market with a load of grain and returned in debt. These were some of the many hardships endured by the early settlers.
"The fabulous crops easily grown induced many to come here and settle and probably no town in Wisconsin had more of its first settlers make permanent homes than did Wyocena."
FIRST STORE
Jacob Rogers opened the first store in Wyocena, during 1847, and, as was customary, his was a forerunner of one of our modern "depart- ment stores." The settlers did not have to go elsewhere for anything on earth they required-fortunately for them.
PIONEER SCHOOLS AND CHURCHES
Also in 1847, when Wyocena was the temporary county seat, the citizens erected a small frame building for school purposes. It was used eight years, when the district erected a larger two-story frame school- house, 32x40 feet, and the scholars were divided into two departments, the primary pupils occupying the lower room and those more advanced, the upper.
Two years before the completion of this building, Elder S. E. Miner, of the Congregational Church, erected a building for a select school, in which the higher branches should be taught-a preparatory institution for those designed for a collegiate education. The venture was not sue- cessful, and in 1847, the building was disposed of to the Methodists and Baptists for church purposes.
In the meantime (1845), Wyocena had been honored with a postoffice, with Harvey Bush as first postmaster.
MESSRS. DEY AND DICKASON
The first grist mill was erected by John Hunter and Chauncey Spear in 1853, Benjamin Dey purchasing an interest in the fall of the year. Af- ter being operated two years under the firm name Hunter & Dey, the lat- ter became sole proprietor. The mill was burned in the fall of 1855, but Mr. Dey immediately rebuilt and operated it until the Civil war. At
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the opening of hostilities he went to Missouri as a wagonmaster, and was in the cavalry service during the last two years of the war. At its con- clusion he returned to Wyocena, and engaged in farming or milling dur- ing the remainder of his life. Mr. Dey first settled in the locality in 1844, and was a co-temporary of Major Diekason, who died in 1848.
The major was a hearty, honest man, somewhat abrupt and occa- sionally domineering, but generally respected and popular, despite the fact that he was by no means what a citizen of the world would call suc- cessful. But he "tried hard;" so rest to his fruitless striving !
THE DAIRY INDUSTRIES
Among the industries which obtained a later foothold in Wyocena,
WYOCENA PUBLIC SCHOOL
was the manufacture of cheese. The Wyocena Cheese Factory was estab- lished in the village in 1875, and three years afterward Chauncey Spear founded a factory one mile east.
At the commencement of the industry, not ouly at Wyocena, but throughout the county, the manufacture of cheese made little progress on account of the short and irregular supply of milk, but with the growth of dairy farming that drawback was overcome; and the cream- eries sprung up and flourished even more vigorously than the cheese factories.
Wyocena is now represented by a neat busy creamery, conducted by E. V. Harpold, and although it is but a few years old it is turning out 100,000 pounds of butter annually.
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WYOCENA STATE BANK
The Wyocena State Bank was organized in 1910. It has a capital of $12,000, and deposits amounting to $40,000. Present officers: S. C. Cushman, president ; W. J. Steele, vice president ; J. H. Dooley. cashier.
THE BAPTISTS
The Baptists and Congregationalists have societies in Wyocena. The former held the first religious services in town at which there was preach- ing. This was in the summer of 1846, when Elder Wood, a Baptist min- ister conducted services, preaching occasionally at Wyocena for a year thereafter. In 1852. Elder Moses Rowley organized a congregation, and in the following year Elder Wood returned and remained as a regular pastor for four years : assumed the pastorate, for the third time, in 1860, and thus continued for over twenty years. At present the Baptist Church is without a settled pastor. It has a membership of about sixty.
THE CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH
The Congregationalists are under the pastoral care of Rev. R. C. Ben- nett. who also has charge of the church at Rio. The origin of the society at Wyocena dates from 1850. In that year an Old School Presbyterian Church was organized by Rev. William W. McNair of Portage, who preached for a short time. At first services were held in the old school- house. The original church consisted of nine members. On March 11. 1853, a meeting of the First Presbyterian Church of Wyocena was called at the house of Rev. S. E. Miner, who was invited to act as moderator. Parks Bronson was elected temporary clerk, and letters of dismissal were granted to the following eight members of the First Presbyterian : Linus Blair. Harvey White, Parks Bronson, George Gregg. Nancy Blair, Mrs. H. White, and Mr. and Mrs. John Ferrier.
Steps were at once taken to organize a Congregational Church, such being the unanimous recommendation of those present. Thus originated the First Congregational Church of Wyocena. Eighteen members organ- ized under the articles of faith and covenant of the General Convention of Wisconsin, and elected Linus Blair and Harvey White as deacons. A formal organization was effected April 9, 1853, and church building was dedicated in March, 1855.
SOCIAL AND LITERARY
Wyocena has a number of societies of a social and literary nature which tend to make life worth living. Perhaps the most active of these
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is the camp of the Royal Neighbors of America. The Woodmen of America have also a good lodge and the Study Club, organized and sup- ported by the women, is the means of many pleasant and profitable gather- ings. Through the latter organization the village has collected a well- selected traveling library, which is the undoubted nucleus of a larger and more permanent institution.
PICNIC HELD ON HISTORIC GROUND
In connection with the social activities of Wyocena, mention is due of the very successful picnic at that village, given by the Royal Neigh- bors and Modern Woodmen of the county, on June 14-15, 1905. J. M. Bushnell was elected president of the Pienie Association. Some seven thousand visitors were present, and the Royal Neighbors won the prize drill. The procession was a great success, as was the picnic proper in the beautiful oak grove at the Point, east of the village where the branches of Duck Creek come together. Not only the natural charms of the spot and the surroundings, but the remains of the old military breast-works in the grove, the site of the Indian village opposite (now almost covered by the waters of the stream), and the knowledge that almost within hail- ing distance of the jolly and secure picnickers once ran the old Military Road, along which Uncle Sam's boys, Indians and the traders measured many a weary mile in the wilderness of Central Wisconsin-all these charms of Nature and historic associations combined to make the big gathering at Wyocena an occasion long to be remembered.
SKETCH OF J. M. BUSHNELL
J. Monroe Bushnell was born in Wyocena, July 14, 1851, on a farm adjoining the village, the son of D. S. and Sarah A. (Brown) Bushnell, who came to Wyocena from Jefferson County, New York in 1848. D. S. Bushnell was born in Waitsfield, Vermont, April 5, 1803, and died at Wyocena September 8, 1887; Sarah A. Brown, born at Sprague Corners, New York, March 12, 1823, died at Wyocena, April 12, 1894.
Mr. Bushnell, of this sketch, was educated in the public schools and also attended at the Oshkosh Normal. He taught schools in Wisconsin and Iowa for several years; was a traveling salesman for a number of years; has held numerous local offices, and was the presidential elector from the Second District of Wisconsin in 1904. He has followed other pursuits, but for some time now has edited the Wyocena Advance.
On June 12, 1874, Mr. Bushnell, married Jennie M. Scott of Spring- vale, who was born February 17, 1854, and died June 5, 1880.
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On February 28, 1884, he was united in marriage to Ida A. West- cott of River Falls, Wis., who is a graduate of the Normal School at that that place. She taught school for several years ; was a teacher in the acad- emy at River Falls for a time and principal of the Baldwin graded schools for two years. Mrs. Bushnell has always taken much interest in educa- tional work; was clerk of the local schools for fourteen years and has been secretary and one of the directors of the County Traveling Library Board since its inception nine years ago.
Mr. and Mrs. Bushnell trace their ancestry back to the first settle- ments of the New World; her ancesters coming over in the ship William and Francis in 1632, and his on the ship Planter in 1635.
CHAPTER XXIV
FOUNTAIN PRAIRIE (FALL RIVER)
DRAINAGE AND LAND SURFACE-CHESTER BUSHNELL, FIRST SETTLER- DYER, BROWN AND SAGE LOCATE-THE MAGNIFICENT MCCAFFERTY- FIRST LAND ENTRIES-SCHOOL AND CHURCH ON SECTION 23-TOWN GOVERNMENT IN RUNNING ORDER-REMINISCENCES OF JAMES C. CARR (BY HIS DAUGHTER, MRS. GERTRUDE C. FULLER)-FIRST BIRTH AND FIRST DEATH-FARMING UNDER DIFFICULTIES-AN OPINIONATED APPLICANT-PUBLIC SERVICE OF CARR AND ADAMS-STORY HE TOLD ON BROTHER SAGE-BENJAMIN SAGE, THE VICTIM-VILLAGE OF FALL RIVER-A. A. BRAYTON, FIRST SETTLER-POSTOFFICE IN 1847-THE VILLAGE SCHOOLS-METHODIST AND BAPTIST CHURCHES -- EARLY TIMES IN VILLACE AND TOWN.
The town of Fountain Prairie lies in the southeastern part of the county, in the first eastern tier of townships, Dodge County being to the east. It received its name from the fact that there was a spring or stream of living water on every section of land save three.
DRAINAGE AND LAND SURFACE
The north branch of the Crawfish River enters the town on Section 18, passes through into 17, 8, 9, 10, and 16, where it unites with the main stream; the south branch enters on Section 30, runs through 31, 29, 20, and 21, and on 16 joins the main stream, which courses through Sections 15, 14, 13, 23, 26, 27, 34 and 35, and passes out from Section 36.
Fountain Prairie lies directly south of the town of Courtland, but is considerably lower than the latter, the dividing ridge veering to the westward. Prairie occurs in the southwestern sections only. Narrow marshy belts are seen in the northern and middle portions. The largest part of the town lies at an altitude of 300 to 350 feet, the extremes being from 250 feet along the Crawfish in the southeastern part to 400 feet
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in the northwestern. The streams run in shallow, but well defined valleys.
CHESTER BUSHNELL, FIRST SETTLER
The first actual settler of the town was Chester Bushnell, who arrived in the spring of 1843 and erected a board shanty on Section 33, in the extreme southern part of the town.
DYER, BROWN AND SAGE LOCATE
In September of that year Wayne B. Dyer located, and built the first log house, while about the same time John Brown and Benjamin Sage selected land in the south of the town. Mr. Brown built a log house on his land in Section 34 and Mr. Sage returned to Vermont for his family. In July of the succeeding year Mr. Sage brought his household with him and established a homestead in the same section in which Mr. Brown resided.
Mr. Sage became settled none too soon, as on the 2d of the following month his wife presented him with a daughter, whom they named Martha -the first child to be born in the Town of Fountain Prairie.
THE MAGNIFICENT MCCAFFERTY
Belonging to this year of the first pioneer (1843), is the name of H. W. McCafferty. "MeCafferty's claim was on Section 21 and adjoin- ing sections. Mac had an eye to a ranch of magnificent proportions. He plowed a few acres and sowed it to winter wheat in the fall of 1843; a very fair crop was harvested, although somewhat injured by the deer feeding upon it. The California gold fever breaking out soon after this, MeCafferty was swept along with it. When he returned, part of his claim had been taken up by others and the remainder had been despoiled of its timber; so he abandoned it. Yet his name adheres to the place, as the high ridge of land running through Sections 21 and 15 is known as MeCafferty's Ridge."
FIRST LAND ENTRIES
The first entry of land in the town was made by James C. Carr, on July 15, 1843. He settled upon his land in June, 1844, and the railway station at Fall River now occupies a portion of it. Carr was a New
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Yorker, held several local offices, but moved to Colorado in 1863. The first death in the town, that of his wife, occurred in August, 1845.
Wayne B. Dyer, the next to enter land, made claims on Sections 34 and 26, in August and October, 1843, but soon afterward sold them and located in the present Town of Otsego, where he was the first settler and the first house-builder.
SCHOOL AND CHURCH ON SECTION 23
Quite a settlement was effected in the southeast corner of the town as early as 1845, and in the fall of that year a schoolhouse was built on Section 23.
The building was also used for religious purposes, irrespective of creed. There Rev. Stephen Jones, N. S. Green, E. J. Smith and other pioneer ministers preached the Word as they saw it. School was held in that little house, summer and winter, until the organization of the town into school districts in 1849, when a better structure was provided for the youth; but the religious elders occupied the church for several years thereafter.
TOWN GOVERNMENT IN RUNNING ORDER
In January, 1849, a township under the name of Fountain Prairie was set off by the Board of County Commissioners from the voting pre- cinct created three years before. The store of A. A. Brayton was desig- nated as the place for holding the first election. There were sixty-two names on the poll list, and Mr. Brayton was elected chairman of the town board; John Q. Adams, superintendent of schools, and Nelson S. Green, treasurer. Thus the township government was put in running order. In the earlier years the most prominent members of the board were Messrs, Alfred A. Brayton, John Q. Adams, James C. Carr, Henry C. Brace, H. C. Field, William H. Proctor and M. C. Hobart.
REMINISCENCES OF JAMES C. CARR By His Daughter, Mrs. Gertrude C. Fuller
James C. Carr, who made the first entry of land within the limits of the present Town of Fountain Prairie, was among the most widely known pioneers of that section and throughout the county. His daughter, now Mrs. Gertrude C. Fuller, of Merrimack, Sauk County, contributes the following interesting paper concerning her father and several of his
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friends who assisted him in making old Columbia County habitable and pleasant :
"James Cary Carr was born at Laurens, Otsego County, N. Y., Febru- ary 21, 1817, where he grew to manhood; working on the farm during the summer, attending the village school during the winters until he became able to teach. When he had secured enough means to pay his way through the academy at Cazenovia, N. Y., he gave up farming. Later he entered a medical college, but soon gave that up and decided to take his chances in the fast developing West.
"Coming to Wisconsin in 1842, he selected a farm on Fountain Prai- rie, one mile west of the present village of Fall River, Columbia County. On a little knoll near a spring he put up a small shanty, and also planted a few apple seeds that he had brought West in his pocket. This was his first home and the first orchard started on the prairie.
FIRST BIRTH AND FIRST DEATH
"The following year Mr. Carr returned to New York, where he was married to Mary Ann Self, whom he brought to his new home in a cov- ered wagon, with oxen for a team. They then built a frame house, the first one in the vicinity and were soon joined by John (Scotch) Brown and John Quincy Adams, who being unmarried, boarded with them. Here March 29, 1845, was born the first white child on Fountain Prairie (now Hattie C. Shepard, of Winona, Minn.). In the following August, Mrs. Carr died, the first death on the prairie, leaving Mr. Carr with a five-months' old babe to care for. He hired Mrs. Unele Tommy Swarth- out, who had settled first south of him, to care for the little one and told his friends they must look for a home elsewhere, as he must now batch it. But both begged him to let them share with him till they were mar- ried themselves, which he did, and afterward, being a justice of the peace, he performed the ceremony that united John Brown and Caroline Hughes in holy matrimony.
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