History of Marathon County, Wisconsin and representative citizens, Part 8

Author: Marchetti, Louis. cn
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: Chicago : Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1042

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Up to this time the population was largely native American and Canadian French, with a sprinkling of Scotch, Irish and Norwegian.

The first Germans coming to Wausau were Jacob Paff and Henry Treibel ; they opened a carpenter shop, making furniture in a little building back of the J. Paff corner store on Third street. Another newcomer was W. H. Kennedy. He had been a delegate to the second constitutional convention in 1847, his postoffice address being given at that time as Plover Portage. After Marathon county was set off as a separate county, or some time before, he came to Wausau and took up his residence in the new county. He was admitted to the bar in Marathon county and formed a partnership with Hiram Calkins for the practice of law, but was also engaged in lumbering; he was elected the first county judge of Marathon county, and he was also the first man to clear a space of ground for raising vegetables and planting. It was near Half Moon lake close to the city limits. He was succeeded as county judge by his part- ner, Hiram Calkins, in 1858, and died of cholera in St. Louis in 1859, while there attending to the sale of his lumber. At the time of his death his resi- dence was on Shingle street.

In 1852 Burton Millard appeared and opened a wagon shop on the corner of Third and Washington streets. The property is still owned by his children and is one of the most valuable commercial business sites in the city. He married Miss Harriett Crown, now the widow of Dr. T. Smith. Mr. Burton Millard enlisted as a volunteer in the war in 1861, and was the first man from Marathon county that was killed by a shot from the enemy.

Meanwhile John Le Messurier had come back from Pine river, where he spent some time to help Grundy and Isaac Coulthurst build their mill, and commenced the building of the Lake Superior House, to which additions were made from time to time, until it was for a long time the largest hotel in Wausau. Among other newcomers at that time was William Gowan, for many years the foremost millwright in the pinery.

AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS

Walter D. McIndoe had built a store on Main street with an office for Charles Shuter, which stood nearly opposite the Alexander Stewart Lumber Co. office, and B. Barnes also had a store on Plumers Island, in fact each mill had a sort of store or warehouse of their own, but the stock consisted only of provisions and probably blankets. The first postoffice was in McIndoe's store.

In 1849 two young men had come to Wausau who in time became the largest business men on the Wisconsin river. They were the brothers, John and Alexander Stewart. They came from New Brunswick, were familiar with logging and the running of lumber. They commenced to work for Good- rich, Fehely and Flemming, taking their pay in lumber as was the rule, rafted it and with the lumber of some other men run it to market on the Mississippi. They returned working on, and running their lumber down until after several years they were able to put in logs themselves on their own account, and by carefully husbanding their resources, never branching out beyond their means, laid the foundation to the wealth which became theirs in after years. Another store, probably the first general store in Wausau, was kept at that time by Doolittle, after whom the Doolittle place near the Brokaw dam is named. It stood on the side afterwards occupied by the August Kickbush retail store.

Doolittle soon returned to Pennsylvania, and in 1910 his son, who had become a circuit judge in West Virginia, came here to see the place where he was born and where his father had attempted to make a farm in the wilds of Marathon county. Among newcomers were John Dobbie and Louis Lenne- ville, rivermen who built their houses on what is now Mcclellan street, and W. W. Wilson, who located on corner of Fourth and Scott streets; but there was no semblance of a street at that time.

A brother of Thomas Hinton had a blacksmith shop at what is now the southwest corner of McIndoe park.

John Dern came in 1853 and William Gouldsbury, a millwright, came in 1854 with his family. He lived first in a house belonging to John Tuttle, standing where the Sauerhering flat stands now. There was not even a bridge across the slough to the island in 1852, and people had to cross on the boom sticks. A bridge across the Wisconsin at the falls was built but on trustles, which was swept away in a few years by a flood.

Mr. Poor lived on Shingle street, but as early as 1855 built a residence on the west side of the river a little north, where Elm street strikes First avenue. In 1853 I. E. Thayer was a practicing physician here, and at one time lived on land now owned by Mrs. Aug. Kickbusch, the house standing nearly opposite the north gate of the fair grounds. 5

HISTORY OF MARATHON COUNTY

On Shingle street there also resided N. B. Thayer, who afterwards, with Mr. Corey, built the flour mill at the dam, now the McEachron mill.

A brother of Dr. Thayer, Lyman Thayer, father of E. B. Thayer, had come; he was a lawyer by profession and brought with him his family; he lived on the corner of Forest and Fourth streets, where Mr. Seim's house now stands. Law business was less than dull, and for a few years he took to teaching in Wausau.

In 1853 there were four fair-sized hotels at Wausau, the oldest one the "Blue Eagle," next the Lake Superior House, and about the same time the Riverside House, which still stands, and the Forest House.

With the creation of Marathon county and Wausau as its county seat, there was an influx of new blood, young men who made their mark in later years. First among them must be mentioned Rufus P. Manson, then nineteen years old, who had a good education, but commenced like everybody else here, ax in hand.

In time he became one of the most prominent men in the pinery in busi- ness circles as well as socially and politically.

Michael Stafford was another; he came in 1851, and Charles Winkley. The last one mentioned opened the first butcher shop in Wausau (in 1853). but he soon discovered that the town could not yet afford such a luxury and closed the shop, and later built the "Winkley House"-a hotel.

A saloon was located on Plumer's Island between the bridge and the mill boarding house, kept by a Canadian, and Mr. Philbreek had put up a little log house, and fenced a small place with slabs, which stood there until 1874, when it was found to be in the way of the railroad track which was laid down upon the island, and was then torn down.

Lawyer Hiram Calkins, too, lived on Shingle street, and it may seem curious how so many people would locate on that street so near the river, exposed to floods, but it must be remembered that the dam across the Wis- consin river was not so high as at present and the water could flow off with- out rising to the heights it rose in later years.

Young America, too, had made its appearance in Wausau, and the settlers were not backward in providing means for their education, of course not in regular school houses built for the purpose, but they did the best they could, and results were obtained which can compare well enough with results in later years.

The first school was taught in a building owned by Thomas Hinton on Jackson street, with Dr. W. A. Gordon as teacher. He taught school while preparing himself for the study of medicine, and was later admitted to the practice of medicine, practicing in Wausau for a while.

AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS

The following year Miss Mary E. Slosson taught school in a vacant tailor shop on the same street to a class of six, and a daughter of William Goulds- bury, now Mrs. W. W. DeVoe among them, and also Edward Nicholls, and afterwards Mr. Lyman Thayer taught school in a room in the store building of Lyman on Forest street west of the present city hall site. These were the earliest schools in Wausau; a little later there was a small schoolhouse on Harrison boulevard, facing Forest street in the east. They were all tempo- rary, but years expired until the first schoolhouse was built.

The bulk of the town was still on Clarks Island, on Shingle street, and Main and Jackson streets with a few scattering buildings further north; but there was no semblance of any street except Shingle street.

Up to 1852 there were only two horse teams in town, one owned by W. D. McIndoe and another by J. L. Moore.

The energies of the population were expended in logging, sawing and running out lumber and making shingles, and all farming was limited to the cutting of the blue joint and red top standing in profusion in the river bot- toms and on islands. But on the logging road where manure was dropped there sprang up clover and timothy, much to the astonishment of the men. That, and the fact that cattle turned out in the woods after camps broke up, were found in the fall sleek and fat for butchering, convinced the pinery men that at least grasses could be raised here with advantage, and some employed their spare time in clearing land for farming. The first land cleared here for farming, was the Joseph Dessert farm near Marathon City, the Marshall farm, on top of Marshall Hill (now Graff farm), the Dodge (now Treu farm), the Norwegian farm (now Röder), both in town Settin, the Armstrong and Main farm, both in town Main (now owned by Fitzke and M. Callon respec- tively ), and the Hogarthy farm in town Harrison.

The returns proved satisfactory enough, but it was hard, slow work and did not appeal to the lumbermen generally. The hardwood timber which was cut down had to be put in piles and burned, because it could not be floated out, and was of no value otherwise. It was too costly to hire the work done to make farming profitable, but it established the fact that the land was good for agricultual purposes and disposed forever of the slander of the poverty of the soil which had been spread broadcast by the fur and Indian trader. But lies travel fast and far, and to disprove them takes much longer. And it took a long time here until the fertility of Marathon county was gen- erally acknowledged.

There was no real progress made in farming until the German settlers arrived here from Pittsburg and from Germany direct, which was in 1856

HISTORY OF MARATHON COUNTY

and 1857, when there was a large influx of farmers, who came here with the determination to get land and make homes for themselves and their families. They could get eighty acres of land for $100, the government price, upon which they intended to make themselves independent and comfortable in old age. They were not disappointed in their hopes, although it took all their industry, economy and frugality to accomplish their object. These first farm settlements deserve a separate chapter.

In 1852, W. D. McIndoe had the village part surveyed and plotted out, the plat of the original part being recorded March 26, 1852. It included all the territory from the mill pond, or slough, east to Fifth street, and from Forest street to McClellan street, and about one and one-half blocks on the south side of Forest street from the south end of Fifth street.

The government had established a United States land office at Stevens Point in 1853, and the land boom which had spread all over the southern part of Wisconsin made itself somewhat felt even in this faroff region; but the by far largest portion of lands entered in Marathon county was entered by actual settlers, those that were already living on the land before it was surveyed, and lands in their immediate neighborhood.

The location of the land office at Stevens Point was of great material benefit to the people here and in Portage county, as theretofore they had to apply at the land office in Mineral Point far away from here. It caused farmers to emigrate to Marathon county, who otherwise would have remained in the southern part, and they became a large factor in after years in opening up the resources of the county.

That for the first ten years at least, the pinery settlement was regarded by the settlers themselves as only temporarily, appears from the fact that not even a postoffice was established, although there were then a number of little saw mills in operation within a radius of twenty miles from Wausau, mostly too on a north and south line from Wausau.

No road, no postoffice until 1850, although lumber and shingles had been made and exported on the Wisconsin river for eight or nine years, both from Wausan and Mosinee; what more can be said or shown to prove the tem- porary character of the settlement, the absence of all comfort, than being almost completely cut off from all means of communication with the outside world ?

But with the establishment of a county in 1850, there was also established a postoffice, and Charles Shuter was appointed the first postmaster on the 4th day of May, A. D. 1850, opening an office in the W. D. McIndoe store. Up to that time the mail was brought first from Plover and later from Stevens Point by courtesy of the traveling public.

CHAPTER VIII.

The Wausau and South Line Plank Road-First Issue of Bonds for Highway Work-The Mechanic's Ridge-Inauguration Ball at , Wausau on the Event of President Pierce's Inauguration-Mike Rousseau's Band-The Finest House in Wausau-Chonge of Place of Supplies-Hou. George W. Cate-Mail Route from Ontonagon to Wausau.

The deplorable condition of all means of communication with the outside world except the turbulent river, continued to exist as shown by these well remembered facts : Miss Harriett Crown came with the family of James Single up here from Stevens Point in 1852; they were traveling with a horse team; but it took them three days to come to Wausau. Of course after Miss Crown had arrived here she was in some way compensated for the hard journey by the hearty welcome of the members of her own sex, who held a little party in her honor, so that they could become acquainted with her, and in counting the number of the women folks, they found that the newcomer was the eleventh of them, two only being single, which in the case of Miss Crown was soon changed, as in the following year she became the wife of Burton Millard.

In one of the mills on the Eau Claire the provisions gave unexpectedly out and more had to be had without delay. A horse team was procured to go to Stevens Point, and to make sure of a quick arrival with the needed food- stuff, five men besides the teamster went with the team to clear out the road and help the wagon out of tight places, and it took the team three and a half days to return from the Point with a load of 1,200 pounds.

The population had grown and the demand for food supplies increased, but the taxable resources did not keep step, most of all lands being still untax- able and the means to obtain supplies were as bad as ever.

The situation had become unbearable, and on the 26th day of August, 1854, the county board, C. A. Single and B. F. Berry, the chairman being absent, "Ordered, that a notice be published in the Il'isconsin Pinery (a news- paper published at Stevens Point) for four successive weeks, calling an

HISTORY OF MARATHON COUNTY

election for the testing the sense of the voters in relation to the loaning of the credit of the county for the purpose of assisting in building the South Line & Wausau Plank Road." *

On the seventh day of October, 1854, the election was held and there were 77 votes for, and 2 against it ; a very light vote on such an important question.

In consequence of this vote and probably having found a party or parties willing to undertake the building of this road on the security furnished by the county, the county board on the 29th day of March, 1855, appointed Ben- jamin Single as stock commissioner, and directed him to subscribe in behalf of Marathon county $10,000 to the capital stock of the South Line and Wausau Plank Road Company and sign the bonds in behalf of the county.

Mr. B. Single evidently was not in sympathy with this move to bond the county, paying 12% interest thereon, and refused to accept the office, where- upon on July 2, 1855, the county board appointed Asa Lawrence in his place and stead.

The bonds were issued later in portions of $2,500 at a time and turned over to the contractor as the road work progressed, but it was not until 1857 that the work was begun and the opening of the road was not completed until 1858; but it was many years and after an additional expense of ten thousand dollars by the county besides the expenses had by the towns through which it ran, to make a fairly passable road.

But it was a great improvement, making the distance to Stevens Point shorter by ten miles and enabled people to come to Wausau in two instead of three or four days, and making it passable for horse teams by taking due care.

A bridge was built across the Wisconsin at Mosinee by Henry Cate in 1854-1855, and a bridge ordered to be built across the Eau Claire river at Scholfield by C. A. Single for $1,250, and one across the Wisconsin at Wausau by Perley Dodge for $1.815. The years from 1855 to 1857 were the flush times of Wisconsin.

An emigration unprecedented in the annals of the United States had set in and was coming to the new state of Wisconsin. The great majority of the emigrants were German farmers who settled on lands in the southern and western parts of the state, next in numbers were the Norwegians, and then the Irish, most all of whom took to farming, only Milwaukee attracting a considerable number of professional workers. The population had increased

* Several questions of similar kind regarding tax levies had been submitted to a vote of the people, which shows that the referendum was made use of by our forefathers as a self-evident proposition, but they did not think worth while to claim a patent right as for an invention.

AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS

from 305,391 in 1850 to 552,109 in 1855; the emmigrants, as a rule, brought sufficient money with them to buy the cheap lands which attracted them; they were industrious and thrifty, all of which stimulated business and helped to make good times. But it gave at the same time an impulse to speculation, which was aided by the issue of large amounts of notes of state banks which circulated as money. Railroad building was contemplated, promised to be built into every settlement, and farmers and village residents were induced to subscribe for railroad stocks, and gave notes secured by mortgages on their real estate in payment for stock, expecting rich returns from the increased value of their land after the railroad came within a short distance from their farms or villages. The Milwaukee & Horican Railroad succeeded in securing quite a large amount of mortgages in the pinery at Wausau on village lots and lands in Marathon county as well as in other parts of the state. These securities were sold, came in the hands of innocent purchasers (so-called) long before they became due, and had to be paid, although the railroad stock given in exchange was absolutely worthless, the promised railroad not having been built. Some of the Wausau parties who had subscribed paid, some set- tled, some let their lands go for the mortgage, and in many instances the mortgages were cut off by later tax deeds, and by some sharp practice some of the bitten victims escaped payment. But in the south where farmers were living and occupying their lands, they had to pay when the bubble bursted. Marathon county profited indirectly in this flush times; the bonds were taken and the road to Stevens Point cut out in 1857-1858; lumber prices were high and this county got a share of the most desirable emigration, Germans and Irish, going farming.

The road to Stevens Point was cut out where it is now located with very slight changes made later; it stopped at the south line of the county on the town line of 25 and 26 from where it was yet eighteen miles to Stevens Point. It has always been claimed by the supply teamsters, who knew every foot of the road, that Portage county refused to improve the road from the county line to Stevens Point to the great dissatisfaction and hurt of the people in Marathon county. The whole supply trade came now from Berlin in the winter and from Gills Landing in the summer via Stevens Point, and Stevens Point profited undoubtedly greatly by the constant travel and hauling of sup- plies. But its failure to do its share in making a fairly passable road to con- nect the end of the South Line road with Stevens Point created an unfriendly feeling in the minds of the Wausau people against Portage county which existed for many years and asserted itself finally in the determination of the Wausau business men to resist the building of the Wisconsin Valley Railroad

HISTORY OF MARATHON COUNTY

to Wausau via Stevens Point, leaving the two cities unconnected by railroad, except by way of Junction City, no doubt to the detriment of both places. It is surmised if not susceptible of proof, that the sum of $25,000 given by a large number of the business men of Marathon county, nearly all Wausau men, as an additional contribution to the Wisconsin Valley Railroad after it had already contracted with the county for the building of the road to Wau- sau, was expressly given on condition that said railroad should not run into Stevens Point. They seemed to fear that if the road once struck Stevens Point, some mysterious influence would prevent the building of the road to Wausau.

If the Wisconsin Valley Railroad would have run into Stevens Point and then to Wausau instead of cutting off the latter city by way of Junction City, it would have benefited both cities, but that unfriendly feeling referred to had its baneful effect for the existence of which, however, Portage county must be held responsible.

The next term of the circuit court was held in the "Blue Eagle"-a one and one-half story building. It opened February 16, 1852, with the same judge and other officers, and an indictment was found against Timothy Engler, the town treasurer. He had collected some of the taxes and absconded, but the amount must have been hardly more than to get him out of the country, because it appears in later proceedings that the bondsman, G. G. Green, was discharged from all liability by the payment of $200.

Walter D. McIndoe was again the man upon whom the task fell to accept the vacant office and bring order in the chaos brought about by Engler's flight.

There were several other indictments found which, however, never cul- minated in a trial, and there being no other business, court adjourned Feb- ruary 17th, after one day's session. The next and last court held by Judge Larrabbee was held in August, 1853, and again adjourned without any impor- tant business having been brought to the attention of the court.

The building and erection of the saw mills and keeping them in repair had brought quite a number of millwrights and mechanics to Wausau. After they had ascertained that the hardwood ridges around Wausau were good, arable land, they improved the opportunity to enter lands from the govern- ment as soon as it was surveyed and subject to entry, secured eighty acres, and they went farming. They could clear and plant when not otherwise engaged, leave their families on the land (those who had families), raise some vegetables and keep at least a cow. Cows were purchased and brought up from what was then called "The Indian Country" in the Green Lake prairie near Berlin and Princeton. They cut the road out in 1854 and started. The

AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS

road went slanting up the east hill, beginning somewhere at the east end of La Salle street, and from the top of the hill took a northeasterly direction not quite reaching what is now called Nutterville. Along that road they set -. tled, scattering from four to six miles and started farming. There were D. Ferguson, William Gowan, Daniel Gowan, W. W. Wilson, B. Millard, E. Wilson, Calvin Crocker, Hass and M. F. Billing, G. Perkins, and later Wil- liam Bradford, J. W. Nutter and F. Constable. Nearly all sold out as soon as German emigration had given more value to the land, except J. W. Nutter, who died after making a fine farm. The ridge whereon they settled is one of the finest in all Marathon county, and became widely known as "Mechanic's Ridge."

Another short road was begun to be cut out by the county to lead up into town Texas, a little north from James Moore creek, going east and then north, which became known as the "Whiskey Road" from the fact that in the opinion of the county board too much whiskey was consumed while cut out, which unnecessarily increased the cost.

Among the new arrivals in 1854 was Dr. D. B. Wiley, who engaged in lumbering; bringing up here the first portable mill in 1856, where logs were hauled to the mill in the winter and sawed, the lumber hauled to the river below the fall, and rafted during the winter, and run out in the same spring, where there was always a good reliable freshet.

It has already been described how the pinery settlements were scattered over a large territory and there was little chance if any for social gatherings. Nevertheless or because of that scattered condition, they felt the need of coming together sometimes, and the distance to be walked or traveled by ox team, there being neither stage nor stage horses or roads, only lent increased charms to occasions of that kind. In the spring of 1853, John Le Messurier had his new hotel or tavern finished, and the event was celebrated with a dance, solemn for the occasion and the published program printed in Stevens Point, because there was then no printing office here, is reprinted here to show how far people at that time would go or come for a social gathering.

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History of Marathon County, Wisconsin and representative citizens, Part 8

Author: Marchetti, Louis. cn Publication date: 1913 Publisher: Chicago : Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 1042

Author: Marchetti, Louis. cn
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: Chicago : Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1042