Clifton Township

Clifton Township

Clitton is on the east side of the county, joiaiug Redwood county, witii Stanley north. Am iret south and Lake Marshall west. It is town 111, range 40. Its surface is all prairie with very little standuig or running water. The oatlet to Lake Marshall cuts the southwest corner, and is its only sti'eam. Oq section 28 and some adjoining territory a rather swampy lake called Goose Lake is found, and constitutes the town's lake inventory. The prairie soil of Clifton, however, is unsurpassed for fertility, and its meadows and grazing lands are among the best in the county. While the town has no native timber, there are numerous thrifty groves of cultivated forest [trees, some very fine, but a lew years hence the monotony ot prairie scenery will have disappeared in one of nature's pleasantest landscapes, ptairie and grove combined. The lands of Clifton are almost free from waste pieces, and it will in time, when its coming rich farais are opened and improved, become one ol Lyon county's best agricultural townships.

The first settlers who located homes in Clifton came in 1872. J. A. Dillman, a native Nova Scotia, who lives on section 30, took the first claim in June 1872, although he did not move his.famil}' tliere till the next May. He came from Hennepin county. In 1872, also, settlement was made on section 6 by li. D. Barnes and C. A. Cook, from Iowa and G. P. Ladenburg, from Hennepin Co., on section 18. The next two or three years brought in several settlers, and the town was organized in 1876, the 100th birth year of the U. S. Like the naming of a new child the christening ot Clifton was arrived at through nuicb discussion. Tho town Grsfc caaght the name of Edenview, a name couceiyed with June landscapes and an active imagination as a basis, but through the more practical ideas ot Christopher Dillman was changed to Clitton. This name of course, means a cliff town, and is appropriate lor this town because there isn't anything that the most vivid ideality could distort into a cliff within twenty miles or so ot it. The cliffs of Clifton are not a foot high, and raise rutabagas and wheat in immense quantities.

Miss Ida Mead taught the first public school m the town in 1876. There arc now thrie organized school districts with school buildings on sections 8, 11 and T3. ,

The first public religious services in the town at which preaching was done M'ere conducted in 1875 by llev. H, C. Simmons, a Congregational minister ot Marshall, and a church society has since been organized tliere preaching being supplied from the church in Marshall. Services are still held in the school house.