Freeborn County, Minnesota - Chapter 1: Natural Phenomena, 1911

Introduction - Location and Area - Natural Drainage - Surface Features - Soil and Timber - Trees and Shrubs - The Geolog¬ ical Structure - Natural Resources - The Coal Fiasco - Natural Gas - The Hunter's Paradise - Mastodon Remains.

Situated a little to the east of the south-central part of that beautiful sweep of rolling prairie known as southern Minnesota, lies a favored county which has taken its name from William Freeborn, an early pioneer, and a member of the council in several sessions of the Minnesota territorial legislature.

A rolling prairie, interspersed with natural and domestic groves, dotted with lakes, beautified by meandering streams, and surfaced with rich, deep soil, the county has advantages which have placed it in the foremost ranks of Minnesota's agricultural and grazing districts. The elevation of this stretch of land above the sea, its fine drainage and the dryness of the atmosphere give it a climate of unusual salubrity and pleasantness. Its latitude gives it correspondingly longer days in summer, and during the growing seasons about one and a half hours more of sunshine than in the latitude of St. Louis. The refreshing breezes and cool nights in summer prevent the debilitating effect of heat so often felt in lower latitudes. The winter climate is also one of the attractive features. Its uniformity and its dryness, together with the bright sunshine and the electrical condition of the air, all tend to enhance the personal comfort of the resident, and to make outdoor life and labor a pleasure.

Embracing, as the county does, so pleasing a prospect to the eye, and so fruitful a field for successful endeavor, it is natural that the people who from the earliest days were attracted here should be the possessors of steady virtues, ready to toil and to sacrifice, that their labors might be crowned with the fruits of prosperity and happiness. The cities and villages of the county have had their part in the general commercial upbuilding of the state, and furnish excellent trading and shipping facilities for the rural districts. In these centers, manufacturing is carried on to a greater or less extent, and the dairy and creamery interests are paramount.

contentment. The homes are substantially built, and furnished with the comforts and conveniences of modern life, stock is humanely housed and well pastured, the farm land is extensively tiled and productive, and the churches and schools which are seen on every side testify to an interest in the higher things of life by a law-abiding, progressive and loyal people.

It is indeed in its men and women, rather than in its grains and vegetables, its live stock and fruit, its factories and commerce, that Freeborn county takes its greatest pride. From her farms, from her villages and from her cities have gone forth those who have taken an important part in the activities of the world, and who, whether in commerce or diplomacy, in the professions or in the trades, have maintained that steadfastness of purpose and staunchness of character that mark true Freeborn county men and women wherever they may be found.

Usually blessed by nature with deep soil and abundant natural resources, and endowed with a wealth of prehistoric and historic lore, the county is a fitting home for the sturdy people who have here made their dwelling place. Hard-working, progressive, edu¬ cated and prosperous, they have appreciated the gifts which nature has spread for them, and have added their own toil, and the fruit of their intellects, to the work of the elements, making the country one of the beautiful spots of the earth. On the slopes of land graze cattle and sheep, while the level lands respond to the efforts of the springtime sower and planter with a wealth of harvest in the summer and autumn. On nearly every quarter section is reared a comfortable home and commodious barns, while from the crest of every swell of land are visible the churches and schools wherein the people worship the Giver of all Gifts, and educate their children. Thus blessed by God and beloved by man, the county today stands for all that is ideal in American life and is forging ahead to still wider influence and more extended opportunity.

Location and Area. Freeborn county borders on the state of Iowa, and is very near the center of the southern boundary line of Minnesota. It has the form of a rectangle, having a length, east and west, of five government towns, and north and south, a width of four, making an area of 720 square miles, or 449,235.63 acres, after deducting the areas covered by water. Freeborn is on the southern tier of Minnesota counties, the fourth from the Mississippi, and next to Mower county; on the south it has 'Winnebago and Worth counties in Iowa; on the west it is the sixth from the Dakota line, and next to Faribault; and Steele and Waseca are the northern neighbors.

lake, Twin lakes, and Pickerel lake. It is well watered, being really on a divide, with waters flowing north and south. Among the more noted streams are the Shell Rock river, Cobb river, Goose creek, Turtle creek, Deer creek, Bancroft creek, Stewart's creek, and State Line creek, with several others. These, with the lakes and other topographical features, receive special mention in the town histories. The twenty townships all coincide with the govern¬ ment survey, and have corresponding political organizations, named as follows : Freeborn, Carlston, Alden, Mansfield, Hartland, Manchester, Pickerel Lake, Nunda, Bath, Bancroft, Albert Lea, Freeman, Geneva, Riceland, Hayward, Shell Rock, Newry, Moscow, Oakland and London.

Natural Drainage. With the exception of Freeborn, Hartland and Carlston townships, the surface drainage is towards the south and southeast. The county embraces the headwaters of the Shell Rock and Cedar rivers of Iowa, and those of the Cobb river, which joins the Minnesota toward the north. Hence it lies on the watershed between two great drainage slopes. For the same reason none of its streams are large, the Shell Rock, where it leaves the state, being its largest. The streams have not much fall, but afford some water-power, which in the early days was improved to some extent for milling purposes.

Surface Features. The surface of the county, although hav¬ ing no remarkable and sudden changes of level, yet is consider¬ ably diversified as a rolling prairie, more or less covered with sparse oaks and oak bushes. This topic is more thoroughly dis¬ cussed in the history of the various townships found in this volume. North and west of Albert Lea is a very broken and rolling surface of sparse timber. This tract consists of bold hills and deep valleys wrought in the common drift of the country. On some of these hills are granitic boulders, but the country generally does not show many boulders. The drift is generally, in this broken tract, a gravel-clay. In some of the street-cuts for grading, a gravel is found containing some limestone. A great many of the marshes of the county are surrounded with tracts of oak openings, a fact which indicates that the marshes serve as barriers to the prairie fires. Since the coming of the white men, trees have been planted, and groves in plenty now dot the landscape.

Soil and Timber. Throughout the county the soil depends on the nature of the drift, combined with the various modifying local circumstances. There is nothing in the county that can properly be designated a limestone or a sandstone soil. The materials of which it is composed have been transported, per¬ haps, several hundred miles, and are so abundantly and univer¬ sally spread over the underlying rock that they receive no influ- ence from it. The subsoil is a gravelly clay, and in much of the county that also constitutes the surface soil. In low ground this, of course, is disguised by a wash from the higher ground, caus¬ ing sometimes a loam and sometimes a tough fine clay; the latter is particularly in those tracts that are subject to inundation by standing water. On an undulating prairie, with a close clay, or clayey subsoil, such low spots are apt to have a black rich loam or clayey loam, the color being derived from the annual prairie fires that left charred grass and other vegetation to mingle with the soil. The same takes place on wide tracts of flat prairie. In this soil may be boulders of various kinds - indeed, that is usually the case - but below the immediate surface, a foot or eighteen inches, a gravelly clay is always met with. This at first doubtless formed the soil, the disintegrating forces of frost, rain and wind, combined with the calcining effects of the prai¬ rie fires, having reduced the stones and gravel to powder, leaving a finely pulverized substance for a surface soil.

In a rolling tract of country, while the low ground is being filled slowly with the wash from the hills, and furnished with a fine soil the hills are left covered with a coarse and stony sur¬ face soil. For that reason a great many boulders are sometimes seen on the tops of drift knolls. Along the streams and about the shores of lakes, the action of the water has carried awav the clay of the soil and often eaten into the original drift, letting the stones and boulders tumble down to the bottom of the bank, where they are often very numerous. Along streams they are sometimes again covered with alluvium - indeed, are apt to be - but along the shores of lakes they are kept near the beach line by the action of the winter ice. These lakes sometimes extend their limits laterally, but slowly become shallower. Even in the short period that white men have lived in this county, the lakes have gradually filled up, and buildings have been reared, and crops planted on land which was under water fifty years ago. Old settlers predict that within a hundred years practically every lake in the county, except the very deepest, will be filled with the inwash of soil and dried up. When the white men came the lakes of the county were sightly and picturesque, with a clean shore line, but their beauty is now marred by marshy edges, undefined in outline, and abounding in reeds, rushes and swamp vegetation.

Trees and Shrubs. In the survey of the county the following species of trees and shrubs are noticed growing native : Burr Oak. Quercus macrocarpa. Miclix. Red Oak. Quercus rubra. L. (This species is not satisfactorily identified.) Aspen. Populus tremuloides. Miclix. Elm. Ulmus Americana. (PI. Clayt.) Wild. Black Cherry. Prunus serotina. Ehr. American Crab. Pyrus cor-

The Geological Structure. The geological structure of the county is fully treated in the Geological and Natural History Survey of Minnesota by N. FI. Winch ell and Warren Upham, pub¬ lished by the state of Minnesota. The article has so many times been published that it will not be reproduced here. The student will find useful material for study in the scholarly work just mentioned.

Natural Resources. Freeborn county is pre-eminently a farm¬ ing and grazing county, and its principal resources consist of its advantages from these standpoints. Good water is found through¬ out the county at a depth of from forty to 160 feet, and every farm is supplied with its well. In the earliest days, temporary wells were dug and water was reached at a depth of from six to fifteen feet. The water found has been almost uniformly good, although in some instances the purity of the wells was marred by the presence of vegetable matter, a condition which has practically passed away. There are a few artesian wells, this being the source of the Albert Lea water supply. The lakes and streams are but little used for watering stock and not at all for household purposes. No efforts have been made at quarrying. No lime is burned in the county, although at one time some lime was obtained by burning boulders which were found loose about the lakes. These boulders were round, and whitish in appear¬ ance, thus differing from the usual quarried limestone, which is grayish in color. Brick was burned as early as 1857. The first yard was located on Glenville road, about half a mile southeast from the present Luther Academy, and was in charge of G. AY. AYatrous. Since then the output of brick has been considerable in this county. Of late years tile has been made on a somewhat extensive scale, there being plants at Albert Lea and Glenville. No effort has been made to utilize the peat with which the county abounds. Sand in small quantities is used for building purposes.

The Coal Fiasco. In November, 1879, E. B. Clark commenced prospecting for coal, and employed F. D. Drake to put down a four-inch mining pipe. Air. Drake had been prospecting more or less at Freeborn for five years. At one time, in connection with L. T. Scott and E. D. Rogers, he had partially organized a coal company and taken leases of several hundred acres of land in that vicinity for coal purposes. This company bored in sev¬ eral places as far down as the second vein of water, about 100 feet, where they struck quicksand, but no coal. A man named A. Short, from La Crosse, AYisconsin, came to Freeborn and leased about 2,000 acres of land for prospecting purposes, worked a short time to make his leases hold good, and left. This was in 1875. After it became evident that he would do no more towards developing what coal or other substances might be there, E. B. Clark bought his interest in the leases, and in the fall of 1879, together with E. G. Perkins and AY. AY. Cargill, of La Crosse, commenced prospecting, and hired Air. Drake to put down the pipe. He not having had any experience in sinking such wells did not start the bore plumb, and after expending a large amount of labor, first by Drake and then by P. Alorse, of AYells, and George Cross, of Freeborn, the work in that well had to be aban¬ doned in consequence of trouble in the fall of 1880. In April, 1881, E. B. Clark, together with E. G. Perkins and AY. AA7. Car¬ gill, organized the Freeborn Consolidated Coal and Alining Com¬ pany, and in July following held its first meeting for election of officers. Small pieces of shale, having much the appearance of coal, were found in different locations, but never in sufficient quantities for mining, and the anticipation of fortunes out of coal were not realized. The Geological and Natural History Survey, mentioned above, contains much interesting information regarding the existence of coal in Freeborn county.

born township. Prof. N. H. AVinchell, the state geologist, who made a thorough examination of the matter, lias declared the presence of gas under the official sanction of his office, and the gentlemen who in the eighties spent considerable sums of money in prospecting still have the same faith which originally animated their investments. As early as 1860, the well at the AYebber house, Albert Lea, giving forth boiling sounds, caved in, evidently the result of gaseous activities. In 1887 a well which was being dug on the farm of L. T. Scott, in Freeborn township, gave evi¬ dence of gas, and a prospecting well which was bored produced gas in such quantities that it was piped into the house and used for illuminating purposes. Gas was also found on the farm of W. Jackman, E. D. Rodgers, F. D. Drake and many others in Freeborn township. A company, consisting largely of Albert Lea gentlemen, was formed, a well was bored, options were secured, and some $15,000 spent. It was found, however, that a much larger outlay was necessary, and as the stockholders had ex¬ pended all they cared to invest, operations were stopped, and the options lapsed. Members of the company who are living, however, are still firmly of the opinion that a fortune awaits any company that has sufficient capital to finance the proposition to a successful conclusion.

The Minnesota Natural Gas, Oil and Fuel Company, with headquarters at Albert Lea, was incorporated August 23, 1887, and started business two days later. The original incorporators, as recorded at the court house, were William P. Sergeant, Robert M. Todd, Edward S. Prentice, Darius F. Morgan (president), John P. Iloveland, Charles C. Dwight, William C. McAdam (sec¬ retary), Janies H. Parker and Thorvold V. Knatvold. The origi¬ nal capital stock was $1,500,000, but this was reduced to $150,- 000, the limit of liability and indebtedness being $5,000. Although the gentlemen named above were the incorporators, the real com¬ pany consisted of R. M. Todd, L. T. Scott, D. F. Morgan, T. V. Knatvold, H. P. Hall (St. Paul), H. G. Day, AY. C. McAdam, J. P. Hoveland, C. C. Dwight and E. S. Prentice.

AYhile the activities of this company were limited practically to Freeborn township, gas has also been found elsewhere in the county. May 29, 1887, while Anderson & Olson were boring a tubular well for Ole C. Olson, on section 30, in Riceland township, about six miles in a direct line northeast of Albert Lea, at a depth of sixty-three feet they encountered a powerful vein of natural gas. The force was so great that gravel and sand were thrown fifty feet or more into the air, and the roar of the escaping gas could be heard for a long distance. The well being near Air. Olson's barn, a reducer was put on the two-incli casting in the well and the gas was carried in an inch-an-a-half pipe about 100 feet to a safe distance. At the present time there are places in the county where even the most superficial borings result in a flow of gas which, when ignited, forms a column of flame many feet high.

Mastodon Remains. A vertebra of a prehistoric mastodon which roamed the plains of Minnesota 200,000 years ago, before the glaciers sweeping down from the north had devastated the feeding grounds of its kind, was exhumed in May, 1911, at Albert Lea, by workmen excavating for a cellar, and was presented to the department of zoology at the state universary and installed in the museum. Discovered in a state where little research work in prehistoric life has been done, it is considered by uni¬ versity specialists as a most valuable contribution to worldwide science. The vertebra discovered at Albert Lea was found twelve feet below the surface of the ground, in the glacial drift, at 237 East Clark street. It is called the atlas bone, a vertebra located at the neck, and is of enormous size measuring two feet across from shoulder to shoulder. From the top of the neck down it is fully a foot deep. The bone is carefully preserved in every detail, there being no sign of crumbling or decay. Though the excavation at Albert Lea was prolonged in the hope of find¬ ing other parts of the skeleton, none was discovered. The absence of other bones, however, is easily explained by experts in paleon¬ tology at the university. Members of the department say that carniverous beasts of that period that pre}Ted upon the mastodon may have detached the bone from the skeleton and carried it to the spot where it was found, either to eat the meat from it or play with it as the modern coyote, tiger or cat frequently plays with its prey, or separating itself from the carcass as it decomposed it may have rolled down a prehistoric hillside no longer existing, or have been carried there by the glaciers. The mastodon, called by science the mastodon Americanus, from which the bone was taken, lived 200,000 years ago in the pleisto¬ cene period, according to Prof. Henry F. Nachtrieb. The figures are obtained by careful investigation of the depth at which it was found, the character of the drift in which it lay, and from what is known of the animal from numerous other discoveries in the east and west, for it is a distinct American species. The mastodon became extinct in the period following the pleisto¬ cene era.

county. The pioneer sees great changes in them, for today many have become very unsightly. As soon as farming opera¬ tions began the soil of the fields washed into them and they have become two-thirds filled with mud during the past fifty years.

In early days those lakes teemed with all kinds of waterfowl that were bagged by the sportsman in large numbers, many coming from the eastern states during the autumn season on vacations especially to hunt. This was the nesting place of almost every known species of web-footecl fowl, and as the Indian by his tribal law never molests the nest of any game bird, they were raised in large numbers.

On Pickerel Lake island, of not over three acres in extent, in May, 1856, forty-two goose nests were counted, all nearly ready for hatching. The next spring equally as many were found, but the white man began his robbery, and a very few years later they ceased to claim this as their home. Today scarcely a goose or duck is seen, as the white man's sport has taught them to follow the Indian, as he is far less cruel, for when he shoots he takes no chances - he kills, not wounds.

Prairie chickens were found in great numbers and were so destructive to grain that many farmers destroyed every nest to be found. It was nothing uncommon for the sportsman to bag from three to five dozen a day. They came into the fields in large flocks, and when suddenly frightened their many wings sounded like distant thunder. Today, however, they have become virtually extinct.

For ten years after the first settlement our lakes fairly teemed with many kinds of fish, such as pickerel, sucker, muscallonge, bass, and many smaller varieties but little used by the settler. There was no market for them, but all had what they could consume for family use. One night in 1860 they were so plentiful at Albert Lea they crowded into the turbine wheel of Ruble's mill and put the mill out of commission until morn¬ ing. Hundreds were ground to death and the wasteway was vir¬ tually a river of blood. In January, 1866, J. B. Clifton, with the aid of two men at the townsite of old St. Nicholas, with pitchfork and sticks, threw onto the banks of a small spring run three wagonloads of pickerel in two hours. Many salted them down and they proved to be an excellent quality of food.

As the mill dams on the Shell Rock and Cedar rivers were built, stopping their ascent, our fish disappeared and are known in the county today only as a luxury. Scarcely any are to be found. - By M. V. Kellar.