The History of Waukesha County, Wisconsin. Containing an account of its settlement, growth, development and resources; an extensive and minute sketch of its cities, towns and villages etc, Part 71

Author: Western Historical Co., pub
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Chicago : Western Historical Company
Number of Pages: 1050

USA > Wisconsin > Waukesha County > The History of Waukesha County, Wisconsin. Containing an account of its settlement, growth, development and resources; an extensive and minute sketch of its cities, towns and villages etc > Part 71

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

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HISTORY OF WAUKESHA COUNTY.

Perry and I bought a prairie team-five yoke of oxen. We went and broke up sixty acres of land for Ben Jenkins, of Jenkinsville, Genesee. It was the same team that broke up the Hodg- son farm, owned by Mr. Payne.

I sold claims here for a year or two, until the great land sale in 1839.

All the politics I found here was Kilbourn and Sweet. Kilbourn for the Rock River Canal, and Sweet opposing it. Excitement ran high sometimes.

At the land sale, I bought a piece of land joining some that Allen Clinton bought of Will- iam T. Bidwell. After the land sale, I helped Allen Clinton build a neat log house on his place. That winter, he and I borrowed rails enough of Uncle Sam to fence his farm. I never worked harder in my life than I did that winter. I cut for him to drive the two teams. As his farm was a little farther away and up hill, we thought we'd fence his land first while it was good sledding, which took us into March. I got one load of rail stuff for myself, when a thaw came and took off all the snow. Then, as I could not farm it for want of a fence, I looked about for business. I came down to the village and made an arrangement with Mr. Cutler and opened his limestone quarry, and went into the lime and stone business. I built a limekiln- the second built in Waukesha County, Deacon Mendall having built the first, which was a small, inferior one. When mine was built, it ran his out. I never sold lime for less than 25 cents per bushel, and, two or three years after, there was an opposition limekiln which brought lime down to a shilling per bushel, which did not pay for the wood to burn it. I delivered stone for 50 cents a perch, and sand for 50 cents a load. I delivered sand, stone and lime for the first stone dwelling-house for 76 cents a perch, measured in the wall, with the openings out. I did this to show what the stone would do, and to get people to build; but it was hard to get them to raise in price on the stone. They'd say they wouldn't build if they couldn't get the mate- rials cheap. When I got the quarry nicely opened, the limekiln built and all ready for busi- ness, about the last of June, I entered into partnership with William T. Bidwell. to put up a stone building. He at first wanted to put up a small, one-story building, just large enough for a schoolhouse, as he had been a school-teacher. I said no; if we build anything, we will build something that will be permanent and salable. We were offered $400 on time to build with. We hired the money of Mr. Nanscawen on time, Cutler giving us the lots to build on. We inclosed the building, and I sold out to my partner, Mr. Bidwell. If it had not been for the early March thaw in 1840, the old Prairieville Academy would never have been built. I was the first Constable elected in Waukesha; was elected the third time, but only served two and one-half years, as the election changed from fall to spring. I was Road Supervisor of the whole town, excepting a little district set off by Pratt in the southwest corner of town. I was appointed first Collector here. I think the tax only consisted of school taxes, and, in collecting it, I made a great many enemies among people who did not send children to school, who com- plained they had no benefit from the school. I furnished stone, lime and sand to the village until the year 1846 or 1847, and dug a good many cellars and stoned them. In 1843, there was a good deal of excitement about the slavery question. I was charged by A. F. Pratt and others with running off a slave girl to Canada. On account of the fugitive-slave law, I would not own it nor have much to say to them or anybody else; but did say to Abolition friends that I was down to Canada on business and saw her across the river in Canada. But since that law was abolished, I can talk about it.

I was married in 1844. About this time my health failed. Lifting in the quarry brought on a kidney complaint, and we then knew nothing of the value of the mineral springs, and I had to give up hard work. In the spring of 1848, I moved up to Omro, Winnebago County, with my family, thinking that I could make something claiming Government land, which I did. I made a claim and stayed on it two or three months, then sold it and cleared agood yoke of oxen. I was watching to take advantage of the pending treaty with the Menomonee Indians, which took place the 18th of October or November. I moved my family the next day onto a claim I had looked out before, it being timber and heavy openings. I was the first family on the Menomonee lands, and my third child the first white child born on those lands. I stayed on my

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HISTORY OF WAUKESHA COUNTY.

claim about two years. My health grew worse, and finally there came a Mr. Arnold from Wauwatosa to whom I sold my claim for $600. I moved back to Waukesha (the name was changed in 1846 or 1847) late in the fall of 1850, and they were just finishing the old railroad depot, preparatory to having a railroad run through the place, which they accomplished the next spring (1851). My health was so poor for twelve or thirteen years that I could scarcely do anything. I have had my "ups " and "downs ;" have been pretty well off several times, but circumstances change so that I cannot boast of having too much at present, though I have lived in Waukesha long enough to have become the richest man in it. Had I known of the virtues of our mineral water thirty-four years ago, I should have been in different circumstances.

BY MRS. TALBOT C. DOUSMAN, 1880.

Early in February, 1838, my father left Ohio, where he had been an unsuccessful merchant, for the West. Having purchased six yokes of oxen, as nearly matched as possible, each with bright buttons on his horns, and, having found a tall, raw-boned Yankee who could gee ! whoa ! haw ! sonorously, and could cover his six yokes with his tremendous gad, he fitted out two long wagons with covers, filled them with such supplies as he had in store and as he knew would be needed in a new country, and driving the horses himself, started his caravan. It was a caravan indeed, and created as much excitement as any menagerie of the present day, as he halted in the middle of Superior street, Cleveland, for the admiring crowds to make an examination. He reached Town 7, Range 18, now Delafield, after a journey of four or five weeks; made his claim and built his log cabin, in time to put in quite a crop that spring, doing his own cooking for himself and men, as all the female members of the family remained for navigation to open. We, the portion of the family left behind, landed in . Milwaukee on the evening of the 14th of June, 1838, after a journey of eight days, by steam, from Cleveland (one can go half around the world in that time now). Our first impressions of Milwaukee were not very favorable, as the hilarity of song-singing and story-telling, with its usual accompaniments, kept up till a very late hour, was unusual to us. But the next morning was bright and beautiful, and all gloomy forebodings were dispelled on seeing a young man approaching the hotel with his hands filled with wild flowers. Some were such as we had cultivated with the greatest care in the East ; others, again, we had never seen, but all were indicative of something more than the roughness of border-life generally. A message was sent to my father, and, three days afterward, we started for our home in the woods. When about ten miles out, we stopped for dinner, and, dismounting from our high perch on the lumber-wagon, filled with luggage, my sister entered a famous eating-house (quite as much so then as the Plankinton is now), where she found the good lady of the house preparing dinner before a huge fireplace. The dinner, consisting of the tradi- tional fried pork and potatoes and saleratus biscuit, with a cup of tea, and the table set in the overheated room, was a sorry damper to her spirits, and she came out to the wagon, with the tears streaming down her face, exclaiming : "Father ! have we got to live in such a house ?" -a hard question for one of his sensitive spirit. But I, who was still chatting with him, laughingly asked if she expected to dwell in " marble halls " in the wilderness. She knew very little of log houses, though she " came to " afterward.

Among the many curious things of pioneer housekeeping, one of our neighbors used to renew her floor every week by turning the boards over, as each one made an individual cradle of itself. By so doing, and putting her carpet over them, the floor was soon brought into shape again.

After dinner, we proceeded on our way again through the heavy timber. The road not being cut through, it seemed as if we had to wind twice around every other tree till we reached Poplar Creek, about sixteen miles from Milwaukee, when we came upon the oak openings ; but, to describe the beautiful scenes surpasses my pen. They had the appearance of a large park, the verdure being very dense, filled with most lovely flowers, which stood as high as the horses' knees, while the trees were about the size and appeared to be about as near like each other as the very old orchards at the East. Invariably we found ourselves looking about for the house belonging to these beautiful grounds ; but it was emphatically " God's country," without sight

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or sound of human habitation, from the house where we dined till we reached our home in the woods, thirty miles from Milwaukee. Such a house of spare rooms ! entirely spare of furni- ture for four weeks, for we were waiting for it to come by sailing vessel. We managed to sit on trunks and benches, and sleep on prairie hay. Fortunately, by mistake, we had brought a trunk of bed-linen instead of clothing, and it being summer-time, our shawls made good blankets. My father's bachelor's-hall furniture consisted of a good cooking-stove and its belongings; six white bowls for tea and coffee; six white plates, such as are used for baking pies; and, for an extra plate for bread, a clean chip was substituted, and for butter, a like chip, covered with foolscap paper bent to hold it, was used, and so on. We thought ourselves quite comfortable, even with these inconveniences. People scarcely know with how little they can get along until compelled to ; but it teaches ingenuity, as " necessity is the mother of invention." All this time, we were having company, scarcely ever taking a meal entirely alone, as people prospecting through the country always sought the habitations, if there were any.

The business of the day usually began with a general hunt for the cattle, as they strayed off for feed, and, it being the breaking season, to find them was imperative. And a genuine breaking seuson it was, for it seemed as often as every three days the plow or some of its belong. ings broke down, and we had to go ten miles to a blacksmith. On one of these trips, myself and sister made our first visit to Prairieville, spending the day at Deacon Love's, near where the State Reform School now stands.

There was at that time no road, except such as each one made for himself, which was an easy thing to do, only avoiding the miry ground, which was indicated by an absence of the rosin-weed ; wherever that grew it was safe to travel. Our home was very pleasantly situated, on the bank of a little stream called Checoopenon, whose waters were clear and beautiful, and plentiful withal. Father had drawn the trees, which had been felled in the clearing, and turned their tops toward the house, thus forming a beautiful hedge, also a protection from wind and sun. To make it very romantic, we sometimes had most delightful serenades from behind this beautiful screen, having two gentlemen friends who played the flute very finely. Notwithstand- ing all that was done for our pleasure, many were the tears we shed. The summer wore on. Mr. Hosmer married and brought his wife within a mile of us ; and Mr. Edgerton went East in the fall and brought a wife to his home, three miles west. Mr. Flusky and family were one mile east, and Mr. Dousman spent most of the winter at his farm, three miles southwest of us. This little neighborhood at that time was known as Genesee, and its inhabitants were all orig- inally from New York State, except Mr. Dousman. We soon became acquainted and very sociable, so that during the winter we managed to meet two or three times a week, at one house or the other, to spend the evening. We made three miles and longer journeys with oxen, because they were more easily cared for after reaching home, and they trotted off nearly as briskly as horses.

For a long time our nearest post-office was Milwaukee; but nearly every week some one had occasion to go to town, and generally brought the mail for the whole neighborhood. We then thought it a great privilege to get our mail once a week ; but now we feel greatly abused without at least a mail once or twice a day, or oftener.

All those old-time inconveniences taught us to appreciate friends, and I used to feel it my bounden duty to call upon all who came within ten miles of me, if I heard of their coming. The social status of the country warrants me in assuring you that, in the course of three or four years, we could assemble a goodly company of as high culture as you could wish to find any- where, East or West, and in that early time all who were here were cultivated people.

As to the religious condition of the people, we were told by one elderly lady that the religion of the East didn't bear transportation ; that they considered themselves quite pious at home ; but here she hardly knew when Sunday came except by hearing a gun go off a little more frequently, and all the boys wanting clean shirts. In 1840, the Episcopal clergyman of Milwaukee, the Rev. Mr. Hull, used to come out and preach in the different houses in the neighborhood and at Oconomowoc, and in 1842 the Revs. Breck, Adams and Hobart com-

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menced their mission at Nashotah. They circulated through the country, preaching to all deluded souls who needed their ministrations, enduring privations and hardships almost equal to those of the martyrs of old.

The first picnic in the town occurred on the 29th of June, 1839. The second day after my marriage, Mrs. Edgerton invited the wedding guests to join her in a picnic, and to spend the evening at her house afterward. We went about four miles south of where we now live, on buckboards, through the woods without roads, fording the streams, the gentlemen with their rifles shooting pigeons, and the ladies picking strawberries, till we found a beautiful spot near a spring, where we spread our cloth. Toasts were drank, speeches made, and guns were fired and a good time had generally. This anniversary was observed for some years afterward. One of the first Fourth of July celebrations was a picnic at Nashotah. Mr. Breck invited all to whom he ministered, and the different congregations assembled from far and near and had a glorious time.

To show that in those days all social formalities were ignored, one of our neighbors had business at Prairieville, and having only oxen as a means of locomotion, was obliged to be gone some days. The wife must go with him or be left alone. Accordingly the wife and child occu- pied the front of the wagon, the family of pigs the back part, and the cow was tied behind-for it would not do to leave anything alone-and so they went visiting. But ourselves were not exempt from contretemps. One day in the fall, my father and his men had been all day carrying potatoes into the cellar, to reach which the whole length of the sitting-room had to be traversed, and of course no little dirt was brought with them. Just before finishing, a carriage drove up with a bridal party from Milwaukee, on their way to Nashotah to be married. They were so late, the night so dark, and the road so difficult to find, my father would not permit them to attempt the drive, but jumped on his horse and rode the distance of seven miles for Mr. Breck to come there and perform the ceremony. It was rather a poser to make the room in order for a high-toned wedding under the circumstances, but nimble feet and ready hands soon brought order out of chaos. I can fully appreciate the fact now, and could then, that the odor of freshly gathered potatoes was not quite as agreeable as the perfume of the flowers that adorn such occasions at the present time. However, those are all dearly remembered experiences, and I would not strike them from the pages of the past if I could.

BY ALMON WELCH, 1880.

I started with team by land from Cortland Village, N. Y., accompanied by Asa A. Flint, his mother and sisters, and, without change of team, reached Oak Creek, Wis., July 9, 1837, after a journey of six weeks. Mr. Flint remained at Oak Creek while I started for my destination. I struck a camp of 300 Indians on the east side of Big Muskego Lake, and marched on the regular trail right through the camp. When at the outlet of Little Muskego Lake, I inquired of a lone settler named Parker for Isaac Flint or N. K. Smith. Mr. Parker told me to keep the trail, which I did, reaching N. K. Smith's in safety. A. A. Flint soon followed with his family, which was the fourth family in the town of Vernon, N. K. Smith, Joel Day and Gaius Munger preceeding him with their families. Alvah Plumb soon followed with his family, but all other settlers in the town were bachelors. H. Vail got our first Sunday dinner by carrying a pan of flour one-half mile to a creek to wet and mix it, and, when baked with bacon, made a well-relished dinner. Mr. Vail settled on the farm now owned by Amos Goff. The happiest days of my life were those when I could take enough " grub " to last a week, and with my ax go into the woods rail-splitting, sleeping on logs at night, lulled by the howling of the wolves. My first crop of corn, oats, wheat and potatoes was raised in 1838. I buried the potatoes in the ground, as it was impossible to sell or give them away, although the seed had cost an out- rageously high price only the spring before. Mr. Smith being a great bee-hunter, he and I captured forty swarms of bees in the fall of 1839, selling the honey in Milwaukee for $60, and with my share of the proceeds, together with my summer's wages at $10 per month, paid for my claim. Mr. Vail left his crop in the fall of 1839 and went to Indiana, but never returned,

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having died there ; and his corn, stored in the loft of my house, was all carried away by the rats, mice and squirrels. During a portion of 1837, Leonard Martin and I kept "old bach" in his cabin. That winter, I split rails to fence the farms of Leonard Martin, Almon Osborn and L. Whipple. Right here I want it distinctly understood that I did not give up to " Old Abe " or any other man in splitting rails or other hard work. I chopped and split 150 every day ; where the timber was chopped, I split 300 per day. In eight days I split 3,000 rails for Gaius Mun- ger. The first day I traveled thirteen miles and split 339. I received 50 cents per 100. Leonard Martin and I were then making our home at N. K. Smith's. In those days there was an abundance of wild fruit, such as raspberries, blackberries, strawberries, plums, crab-apples, etc., which grew in open places in the woods. On Sundays, Mrs. Smith would send ns for berries for pies, and then, to pay for this work, she would send us a pie once in awhile, which we would cut into four pieces. Each ate a piece for supper and left two pieces for breakfast. Mr. Martin would say, "Now, Al, take your choice, but don't take the largest piece." We had to go to Milwaukee for our provisions, which were nearly all shipped from Buffalo. It took three days to make the trip to Milwaukee with two yokes of cattle to draw two barrels of flour ; and at night we had to sleep under our wagons. We paid $16 per barrel for flour and $32 for pork. In 1839, I worked for N. K. Smith. When we had cut all of his grain but five acres, Mr. Munger wanted his cradle, which we had borrowed. Mr. Smith says to me: " Al, for your stint to-day, you may cut that wheat and take the cradle home." After breakfast, Mr. Smith helped me to grind the scythe, and I went to my work, which I had finished at 3 o'clock ; then, shouldering the cradle, carried it to Mr. Munger's, seven miles distant, arriving there before sunset ; then went back to Mr. Flint's, which was three miles more. That would be a good day's work for the soft-soldered youngsters of to-day.

The wolves, deer, wild cat and lynx were plenty at that time. In the fall of 1839, Mr. Smith and I caught eleven prairie wolves in a trap. The same fall, we went to a neighbor's to raise a barn, and on our way home we were followed by two gray wolves to the Fox River, a distance of three miles. Many a night I have been followed home by the wolves. The way I knew was by their tracks which I found the next morning in the light fall of snow, even on the doorstep and along the trail. I never was startled by them. They sometimes killed calves and yearlings, but seldom attacked man. They would go in droves and surround a deer, then set up a terrible pow-wow, frightening the poor animal so it could not stir, and then they would kill it. I found one which they had killed in Mr. Martin's wheatfield, but it had been dead too long to be fit for eating.

When I first came to Waukesha County, Leonard Martin, Lazarus Whipple, Nelson K. Smith, A. A. Flint and Isaac Flint, each got a yoke of oxen, and we went to breaking; it required from four to six yokes of oxen to break the ground. We commenced the 1st of May, and finished about the 4th of July. I helped break, fence and improve their places before I could do much on mine, for I had to earn money to pay for it. We had no pastures fenced, and had to turn the oxen out at night to go where they pleased, and then get up the next morn- ing at 4 o'clock, and start out in search of them, through the brush, woods and dew. After searching for five minutes, we would be as wet from head to foot as a drowned rat. It would take from 9 to 12 o'clock to get the teams together and ready for the plow, after which we would get our " grub," and go to our work. As we were keeping "bach," we could not spend time to cook, or wash dishes through the day, so we would cook each night enough to last through the day. We ate our meals and turned our plates over, so the mice should not muss them, until we could get time to wash them, which would sometimes not be in four or five days. Many a time I have gone to bed without my supper, because I was so tired I could not cook it. In the fall of 1838, Mr. Ellis and I commenced to dig a well, for there was no living water on our claim, and we had to carry water one and one-half miles. After digging down twenty feet, we came to a hardpan, which was nearly as hard as a rock. We worked at it for cight days, work- ing until 6 o'clock at night, after which, each day, we had to go seven miles and back to a place

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called Wedge's Mill, to a blacksmith named Hugh McIntyre, to get our pick-axes sharpened, for which we paid 50 cents. We could not stand this, so Mr. Ellis left for Indiana, and that was the last I ever saw of him. I held on to that claim of a quarter-section, and bought it at the land sale ; ten days after, I sold it to Asher Stillwell for $500. I was then bound to have a farm with living water on it. I then went to New York State, and, in the spring I came back and bought 160 acres of land, a yoke of oxen, two cows and calves, built a house and broke seven acres of land. I was married August 12, 1840, and went to living on my own account. The fall of 1840, I sowed five acres of winter wheat, which yielded forty bushels per acre. I sold wheat in Milwaukee as soon as there was a market established in that place. We raised winter wheat, and without any failures, for ten years; but soon after it became unsafe to sow winter wheat, for it was winter-killed ; then we began raising spring wheat. Now, 1880, winter wheat seems to be a safe crop again. I hardly know just where to leave off. I will stop right here, without looking further for a stopping place. Those who read this in print cannot see how difficult it is for my stiffened old hands to write as much as I have; and, if they had been compelled to begin the foundations of the present rich, beautiful and prosperous county of Wau- kesha, in which one house incloses more comforts and luxuries than all its inhabitants owned in those early days, their bones would be stiff too ; their sentences angular, and their grammar questionable. However, in looking over the fields of the past, I can see many large patches of roses, and long, long paths rich with the sweetest pleasures.

As soon as it was known that we were moved out in the country, men kept coming, so that our little log house was always full. The four weeks that the three families of us lived all together in one house, our floor was strewn with men (those who came to look for land and make claims) every night but one, and that night we felt rather lonely. There was only one room that we could use, for the upper floor was only laid half-way over, and no stairs to go above. So we had to crowd ourselves, fourteen of us, into one end of the room, which was partitioned off between the beds with quilts, to make room in the other end for company. Some of them brought their own provisions and we prepared it for them, and some of them boarded with us; but they all had to lie on the floor, as we had no bedsteads besides what we used ourselves, and those were home-made, and roughly made at that. As much crowded as we were, we were only too glad to divide our small room, and accommodate, as well as it was possible in our poor way, for we wanted neighbors as well as they wanted homes; and, if we were somewhat selfish, we had a desire to be kind and neighborly.

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The History of Waukesha County, Wisconsin. Containing an account of its settlement, growth, development and resources; an extensive and minute sketch of its cities, towns and villages etc, Part 71

Author: Western Historical Co., pub Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Chicago : Western Historical Company Number of Pages: 1050

Author: Western Historical Co., pub
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Chicago : Western Historical Company
Number of Pages: 1050