Grand Forks County, North Dakota - The whole text, 1900 (part 1 of 4)

Prefatory Remarks

rpHE history of the Red River Valley, so far as it has been published in _L this state, appears to have been confined to newspaper, magazine and other sketches. The next step is special pamphlets, and finally will come the bound books of the future. No really good history of the valley which will include the era of the settlements, can be written until some progress has been made in collecting facts of that character concerning each of the counties of the Red River tier. The history of that part of the valley south of the international boundary is chiefly confined to its North Dakota side, which, indeed, is the best portion of it in United States territory. The current of its history, however, also includes a strip of territory along the Minnesota side of Red River and which extends from Georgetown to Breckenridge. But the North Dakota side of the valley is specially historic ground, particularly its northern boundary around Pembina and Walhalla.

Any work, even in pamphlet form, purporting to be a history of any one of the counties of the Red River tier of North Dakota, must necessarily sift over the accumulating records that belong to the history of the yalley in its entirety, for unless this be done, its old phase of life, the sequence of events and their bearing on the commencement of the modern epoch cannot be duly appreciated. The present is the outgrowth of past conditions; no hiatus, no abrupt transition separated the old phase of life in the valley from the commencement of the present civilization. Yet with the beginning of the latter account has to be taken of the great migration which has rendered this civilization a possibility. For a century past we have before us a rather continuous historic stream in the Northwest with which white men have been concerned.

At present the literature bearing upon this subject, is in a rather discordant state, unsifted, and more or less filled with erroneous statements of fact, including discrepant and wrong dates. These sketches merely supply a temporary want. It would, perhaps, be a mistake to imagine that any permanent harm has been done in the matter of these errors; on the contrary, the discrepancies being apparent to anyone of critical intelligence, the outcome will be to stimulate others to investigate the facts they handle more carefully, so as to eliminate and correct the mistakes of their predecessors in the same field, also bringing to light other and new facts.

A valuable series of articles on "Old Times in the Red River Valley," written by M. H. Morrill, were published in the Richland County Gazette in 1897 and '98; during the first half of 1898 another valuable series entitled "The Long Ago" collected by Chas. H. Lee, editor of the Walhalla Mountaineer, appeared in his paper and were subsequently issued in pamphlet form. More recently, the Grand Forks Herald in a notable illustrated 40-page edition of June 27, 1899, commemorating its twentieth anniversary, was rich in respect to its historical contributions and which were remarkable for their accuracy. The Record Magazine, of Fargo, formerly edited by C. A. I^ounsberry, and more recently by W. F. Gushing, begun in May, 1895, has also since that date gathered a large fund of valuable historical and descriptive matter concerning the Red River Valley and state of North Dakota. Doubtless the files of the Northwest Magazine of St. Paul, contain many articles of similar character.

Numerous brief historical sketches concerning the city of Grand Forks were formerly included in special editions of the city papers and were also used in a few other Avorks. The earlier history of Grand Forks has never been more than merely skimmed over, no atteinpt ever having been made in these publications to treat the subject in detail. The original nucleus of these sketches appears to have been an historical article that appeared in a large illustrated edition of the Plaindealer for Christmas week. 1890, if, indeed, it was not older. It is observable that the style and subject matter of that sketch has tinctured all subsequent writings upon the subject. There was an historical sketch covering much the same ground and which appeared in the first number of the weekly Herald In June, 1879, but that of the Plaindealer appears to have been an independent production. The later sketches, although more or less amplified, as manipulated by different hands, all bear the stamp of the original exemplar.

Iv Prefatory Rem Arks

Portions of the present work have been clipped from articles by the writer that have appeared in the Larimore Pioneer during the last several years, the parts here retained having undergone more or less revision. In treating of the historical outline of the Red River Valley the earlier numbers ot the Record Magazine have occasionally been drawn upon for the basis of some of the facts narrated. As in the case of some other writers dealing with valley history, fragments from other sources have been now and then interwoven with the basis to round out paragraphs in respect to additional details, where these are not of the nature of extracts. In respect to the county history, much of it has been based upon the direct testimony of the Old Settlers, although contemporary records, always the best historical evidence, have been used so far as these have been obtainable. -

Although great care has been exercised by the author in eliminating errors of statement and particularly erroneous dates from the materials used, it would be too much to claim that this work can be faultless in these respects. But whatever accuracy that portion of it may possess which bears upon the early history of the county and the city of Grand Forks, is due to the kindly help of the Old Settlers of the Red River Valley whose contributiou of facts are acknowledged either in footnotes or by name in the text, though innumerable other points derived from them and others are inwrought into the various paragraphs of the last three parts of this work. In making these acknowledgments of assistance from others, we should also mention John Nelson, Register of Deeds of this county, in assisting us in an examination of the oldest records of his office: also W. P. Davies, city editor of the Grand Forks Herald, through whose courtesy we were enabled to look through the oldest bound file of that paper.

The author himself has been a resident of the county since May, 1880, and considerable matter has been incorporated in this work derived from his own personal knowledge and observations. Moreover, for many years past, much information covering innumerable points of local history, "has also been derived from persons resident in and around Larimore. The inferences that have been drawn from any special fact, or group of facts, or comments on the same, are generally the thoughts of the writer.

Page 2. - The breadth of the fiat valley plain on the main line of the Great NortLern Railway is at least thirteen miles wide. While the ten mile limit may be taken as a geological boundary, it is none the less certain that the district between the Elk Valley and Red River flats constitutes a distinct topographical land-belt of the county, although this may merge imperceptably with the valley plain. This correction also correspondingly modifies the stated breadth of this central land belt. See Note A, p. 127.

Page 103. - E. O. Steelman, now a resident of Elm Grove township, states that he was of the party who emigrated from Minnesota to Turtle river in June, 1878, but arrived at Grrand Forks about ten days later than the others. H. A. Morgan came through with a team of horses the next fall. Edward Wheeler, it seems, was not an original settler, but bought out the claim or right of a colored man named James Hawarden.

Pages 106 and 107. - The names of certain settlers of Inkster and Strabane townships given as Casey, Congrave and McEwen should have been spelled Corey, Congram and McElwain. Mr. Inkster states that he removed to the Mouse River country in August, 1882, and not in 1885. See Note H.

Position And Boundaries

HE NORTH jind south row of counties, six in number, tlmt border the enstern side of the ut.'ife of North Djikotii, constitute wiiat is called its "Ked Kiver tier." (irjind Forks county occupies nearly a midway position in this row, being: fourth in order from tlie south. The county is bounded north by Wsilsh, east by Red river which alwo forms the dividing line between INiinnesota and North J^akota, south by 'I'raill and Steele, and west by Nelson county. The 48th pariillel of latitude crosses the county about four miles to the north of its medial line, and its area is almost wholly included between the 96th and 97th meridians.

Dimensions And Area

'I'he county has an average length of -10 miles from east to west, yet there is a difference of about twelve miles between the length of its southern and northern boundary lines, whicli is chiefly due to the westerly trend of Ked river where this stream flows abreast of the county. The south line toucliing Traill and Steele counties has a westward extension of about 47 miles from ttie river; an<i the north line touching W^alsh county extends 85 miles west from the river. As there are six rows of townships between these two boundary lines, ('I'owns 149 to 154 inclusive) they give the county from south to north a. brea<lth of o(> miles. The county is divided into 42 townships, thirty-six of which correspond with the surveyor's or government townships, the remaining ones being those that border on lied river, or ihe parts of the congressional townships accruing to tho county by being bisected by this stream. The county contains 921,000 acres, or 1,440 square miles. This is a little more than (he total land area of the little state of l{hod(» Island.

Topography And Drainage

The Imiidreds of counties in the Union dider widely in respect to ilieir topoj^rnphy or surface features. Their surfaces vary from those that lie broadly level to those that are mountainous in their physical aspect. The presence of lakes, river valleys, outcropping ledges of rock, forests and wooded hills, creates variety in the scenery and beautifies the landscape. In this county the differences in altitude are such as to have caused very marked changes in the form of the surface were these elevations converged nearer together so as to have given rise to steep hill sides or abrupt declivities; but this is not the case here.

The surface of Grand Forks county is partially level and partially rolling, but, on the whole, has a graduiif ascent from the river to the height of the upland country, the surface being more prominent in tracts of successively higher elev;ition than any otiier form. A line drawn from the city of Grand Forks across the center of the county to its western verge would cross four separate land belts, or districts in which somewhat different topographical coiiditions exist. First and- lowest comes the Red r.ver flats, a level prairie plain next to the river, and which extends outward about ten miles on this line. Second in order, there occurs the midway slope of the main valley, a gradually ascending and gently rolling tract of about sixteen miles in width. 'I'he third land belt is the "Elk Valley," a level prairie district that is four miles wide on the line now under consideration. J.MStly there comes the upland country, a district more rolling than hilly, which, within ihe county limits, is eight miles across on its medial line.

Toward the southern border of tlie county the form of the surface is nearly similar to that just described .''or its incdial line, but with these viiriations: A narrower width to the fiat valley plain, a greater breadth to both the midway slope and the Elk Valley, and the inclusion of a wider portion of the upland country within the county limits.

In the northern part of the county, along its north tier of townships, the lay of the land varies a little from that already described. Here the flats extend somewhat farther west than in the southern half of the county; then a long, but slight ascent of the surface toward the west occurs, with an occasional slight ridge, until west of Inkster the latid further rises in a considerable ridge; between this elevation and the uplands there is a shallow valley (the northern extension of the Elk Valley) and west of this the uolands rise to their usual height, their aftitude being nearly uniform through the west part of the county, but the breadth of this hill distri-^^t in this part of the county is less than the distance across a township.

On the whole, the surfnce of the county is mainly of the nature of a gradual or very <>entle rise westward from Red river, attaining a height of over 600 feet in forty miles. It is not exact to state that the county is a vast level plain. lUit such ascent as exists, is Dot an uniformly smooth rise; were it so, this would only average fifteen or sixteen feet to the mile. Some of the slopes are several times greater than this, hut no very rough features exist in the county. 'I'he lowest land is presumably in 'I'urtle Kiver township; the highest in the county is some one of the elevated swells of the uplands, the extreme variation in altitude not being f.ir from 050 feet.

i'he topogrnphy of any countycliiefly determines its drainage directions. The drainage of Grand Forks county is chiefly fruin the uplands to Red river east by north, but with vaiiations from this direction in some parts of it. The central part is drained by Turtle river, a small stream with several smaller afttuents. To the north of the Turtle the slope of the land is more directly toward the east than the course of the stream itself,, but in the northern part of the county, within a limited area, the drainage slope is northward to Forest river. Tliis stieam is mainlv confined within the limits of Walsh county, but its upper reaches intersect Inkster and Strabane townships of this county. li\ the eastern part the drainage is b')th northerly to the 'I'urtle and east to lied river. In its southwestern part, the drain;ige is Irom the uplands toward the southeast or by way of (Joose river, the principal stream of 'J'raill county.

On the eastern slope ot the uplands, the drainnge lines are in the form of coulees, or narrow, winding ravines, some of which ai-e several miles in length, fifteen or twenty rods wide, and forty or fifty feet det^p, but dry through most of the year, though they sometimes contain through the summer pool-* and little trickling streams. Tfiere are a few small streams in the county, mere rills or brooks, which, after flowing several miles, disappear in the ground by absorption of the water, or in other cases, enter small ponds or marshes without permanent outlets.

The flowage of streams jn this part of tlie Northwest is considerably less tiiitn would otherwise be the case, were the country largely covereii with lorests and underlaid by stiata, of bedrock atamodeiate depth from the surface, neither of which factors are present here. But these facts have their bearing on the cultivable area ol the county, there beirjg lio great amount of waste latid in it, resulting either from thickets, miirshes or hilly tracts.

The Valley Plain

The valley plain forms a very extensive belt of level prairie land lying next to tJie river, and, in this county, it extends outward eight to twelve miles distant fronj the stream. The "Pied

Kiver flats," as tliese lands are sometimes cilled, correspond to tlie alluvial bottom lands of niany bluff hemmed western rivers, which usually have much less width thnn the IJed Iiiver V^alley. The land has a slight rise toward the west, iwo to ihree or more feet to the mile, or sufficient to insure drainnge and prevent the flat hind becoming a morass. 'IMie streams crossing it flow merely in chajinels sunk fifteen to twenty feet below the common prairie level. The altitude of Grjind Forks is 8oO leet above sea-level, and taking into consideration the slight westward ascent of this land and the northward descent of the valley of .'lbou^ one foot to the mile, the average elevation of thnt j);irtofthe valley plain comprised in this county would range about ten feet higher than the site of Grand Forks. 'i'his hind has a deep and rich alluvial soil entirely free from stone.

"Th'^ lied river has cut a channel twenty to fifty feet deep. It is bordered by only few and narrow areas of bottom land, instead «)f which its banks usually rise steeply on one side and by moderate slopes on the other to the lacustrine plain, which thence reaches nearly level ten to thirty miles from the river."*

A very nmrked feature of the northwestern country is the timber belts that fringe the banks of the larger ctrGams and to a considerable extent those of their tributaries. Helts of timber line both banks of Red river, following in a sort of zisr-zag or sinuous course, the windings of the stream, but as seen across country from a distance of several miles, it appears to form instead a dark band against the horizon that trends away to the north and south in nearly a straight course. This is all the more distinct in winter by contrast with the snow clad valley jilain. There are points in the county, where, from the higher land, the timl)er belt along Red river can be discerned at a distance of twenty to thirty miles,

The Midway Slope

There is a broad belt of bowlder clay land running north and south, or bearing a little northwest and s ..utheast, Through the middle part of the county. It comprises the gentle slope of the Red River valley between the Klk Valley and uplands on the west, Jind the valley plain on the east. 'I'his land belt also extends through Traill and W'alsh counties, and where it is transversely crossed by any of the tributaries of Red river, they flow in consideiable sized valleys containing timbered bottom Ian Is of limited extent, and as the streams have no very small amount of fall while crossing this belt, they have many rapids in bowlder strewn channels, with occasional reaches of slack water. I'o the south of Turtle river, this district is gently undulating, or characterized by low, broad ridges. Between Larimore and Ojata and on the line of the Great Xorthern Railway, the descent of this slopii anionnts to abont 275 feet. The western 1,000 feet coiitonr line of the lied Kiver Valley passes throngh this county along this slope between Emerado and Arvilla, sind within one niile^of the latter place. It approaches nearer to the river in the southern part of the county, and recedes nioie awny from it to the north of its central part. This land belt has a sandy, but fertile surface loam and bowlder clay subsoil. Its western portion is 1,100 feet above sea-level.

The Elk Valley

Persons living at a distance, and who are unfamiliar with this part of the county, are apt to suppose from its designation that the Elk N'^alley i^ the basin of some stream. h'rom McCanna south to CJoose river this land belt is more of the nature of a bench, or second prairie level of the main valley slope thiin an actual valley, since between the points named, it is bordere<i only on one'side of it by any prominent rise of the land. On its western border, the uplands constitute a prominent terrene, sufficiently marked to characterize one of the slopes of a broad and dee[) v lUey. Beyond McCanna the continuation of the liillc Valley is bordered on the east by a considerable ridge, hciii-e this p'jirt of it may properly be called a valley.

The Elk Valley, taken in its entirety as a physical unity, is confined within the limits of three counties, hence it will be convenient to describe it as a whole, notwithstanding its extension and projection into Walsh and 'I'raill counties, and division under two different local names. But mere local names do not imply any change of physical condition;s while geological boundaries are very apt to disregard civil boundaries.

'I'o the west of the center of Walsh county there occurs a broad ridge, which is quite distinct from the upbinds, and has nearly a north and south trend. Its location relative to the uplands is a few miles inward from the basi^ of the latter. The ridge has sotne extension into the northern part of Grand Forks county or through the townships of Jnkster and Agnes, reaching about to Turtle river. It is not continuous, since it is imerrupted at several point- by sags and depressions, including the passage through it of the Forest and the south branch of Park river. The ridge varies from abo:it one half mile to 2^ miles in breadth, its broader portions having an undulating contour of the surface. It widens toward the north and becomes more narrow and less prominently marked toward the south. Its western slope rises from 2') to 30 feet above tlie enclosed valley, with a larger amount (.f descent upon its eastern slope. Where the south Dranch of Bark rivei cuts through this ridge, it forms a gorge a quarter uf

In Walsh county the long", shallow depressi.)n between this ridge and the uplands is called the Golden Valley. As confined to Walsh county, it varies (rom 4^ to one mile in breadth, being contracted to this lesser distance at one point toward its northern termination. From the north branch of Forest river it has a northern extension of eighteen miles, and from the same point southward, so far as anything of the nature of a valley exists, it has a farther length of about sixteen miles. This sixteen mile stretch may properly be called the Elk Vallev.

Its southerly continuation through Grand* Forks county and overlap into 'i'raill county, covers a distance of S5 miles, and as stated, this portion of the tract is of the nature of a second prairie level, not being enclosed on the east bv any prominent rise cf ground. As mapped out, this portion of the land belt is in the form of an elongated key-stone, or of an estuary to a river, and varies from four or five to ten or twelve miles in Jjreadth. This part IS called by Warren Upham, "The Delta of ihe Flk Valley." This IS in relation to its geological formation. The most of this tract forms a level prairie belt along the base of the uplands which, at l.arimore, is four miles wide. Tiiere is but litile rise of the level part of this land belt toward the uplands and what ascent exists is confined to a fringe of territorv a mile in breadth along their base.

As a geological unity the whole tract, valley and prairie, has a total length of about 70 miles, with a very sliirht ascending slope from south to north, which is the reverse of that of the main valley. This is shown by the fact that iMayville and Portland m the neighborhood of the southern ternnnation of this delta deposit have an altitude of 978 and 983 feet respectively while the northern end of the Golden Valley is about 1 200 feet above the sea, and intermediate points have a gradually increasing elevation northward. Around Larimore the land' has an average altitude of 1,130 feet, with variations of a iew feet above and below this level.

The soil of the Flk Valley is a fertile, sandy clay loam the percentage of sand contained in it being of a fine sort rather than coarse grained. The subsoil is a sandy bed of clay but this IS not everywhere present. J.ike the soil of the valley plain, that of the Flk \ alley is free from bowlders, and more ponms.

The Western Escarpment

The western side Of the Red River Vallev in North Dakota and the Canadian provinces is bordered by a notable escarpment, much more conspicuous than the correspondiuir one on the eastern side of the valley. That on the west forms^ a second and for some portions of the v.illey, a third prairie level, wliicli is the Ciise in tliis county. This escarpment is separated at intervals by the entrnnce into the Red liiver Valley of streams from the west, vvhich in turn have wide valleys. These separated portions of the common escarpment bear specific names, as Pembina, Riding and Duck mountains. Along the upper portion of the valley from Lake Traverse northward for about one Jjundred miles, this escarpment is low, possessing only a nioderntely Jiscending slope, but farther north, and also in the Canadian Dominion, its height increases, both above Red river and sea-level. Toward Lake Traverse the altitude above sea-level is about 1,200 feet, gradually increasing to 1,500 feet in the Pembina mountains, and towering to an elevation of 2,700 feet to the west of l^ake Winnipeg. From the head of the Coteau des Prairies north to Pembina county, this escarpment bears no specific name, being called sometimes the 'uplands," but more commonly the "hills."

This escarpment forms the western verge of the ifJed River Valley. Its height forms a gently rolling upland country of a wid«^ area, extending westward toward J)evils lake. Belv/een Jiarimore and Devils Lake city, the surface nowhere exceeds an altitude of 1,585 feet on the railroad line. The hill country, within the limits of Grand Forks county, is commonly stated to have an elevation of oOO feet above the l^^lk Valley, and has about the same altitude within the limit just specified, as that of the village ot Niagara, which is 1,440 feet above sea-level. Some of the swells of the surface are likely to be more elevated.

The comparatively small portion of the upland country wllliin the limits of this county, constitutes about one-sixth of the area of said county. There are practically five of its townships thstt are included in its hill district, and alsf) parts of several others. The soil is a gravelly clay loam of decomposed glacial drift, well mixed with organic matter, and makes fairly fertile land.

'I'he Red liiver Valley is underlaid at a considerable depth below the surface by strata of limestone, sandstone and shales of Cambrian age. At or below the base of the Cambrian there is also a thick rock stratum of a doubtful kind but generally classed as archean, called Laurentian granite. Above the Uambrian are strata of upper and lower Hilurian age but these rocks do not appear to extend up the valley as far as the center of this county. Still nearer the surface, but more particularly beneath the higher land in the county, there exists a great body of marine clays and shales of middle and upper Cretaceous age. These latter series are overspread by the glacial and modified drift beds, which, with the topsoil, forms the surface deposits of the valley.

In the western part of the county the uplands consist almost bodily of alternating beds of blue clay and soft shales. Collectively, these Cielaceoiis strata are about one thousand feet in ihiclcness. The depth of the overlying drift varies from merely nothing on the tops of the higher eminences to twenty or more leet in j)laces on lower ground, but usually in ihe uplands the glacial drift amounts to only a few feet of bowlder clay, with many scattered bowlders at or near the surface. On the valley slope the drift has a greater thickness Ihan in the hill district of the county. The bowlders are of all sizes up to thos,; oflhiee to five feet in diameter, but in more rare cases a few are reported as being ten or twelve feet in diameter. They are usually of granite and associated rocks, with occasionally one of limestone. Some of sandstone occur here, but they are very rare. The "hardheads" came from the Laurentian axis of the continent around Hudson bay, and the liruestone bowlders are from the region around Lake Winnipeg.

The Cretaceous formation of the upland country was not only once continuous across the entire valley, but also was orijiinally 500 or more feet higher, as much as that amount having been denuded fioni the surface prior to the (Jlacial period. The hollowing out of the valley itself dates from about the close of Pliocene times and was completed essentially the same as it is now, some minor rough surface features and a deeper basin excepted, when the Ice age began. The great width of the va.ley is due to the easily erosihle nature of the strata in which it was excavated by rain and stream erosion.

Two of the land belts running through the county consist of i-edirftentary deposits more recent than the bowlder clay. The oldest of the two in relative age is the tract called the ElU V^illey. This is a delta deposit of sand and clay silt, formed l)y a tenjporary glacial river that came down from the Ciolden valley of Walsh county. This ice-born torrent flowed within a great rift ot the icesheet, the part of the rift new represented by the delta then forming an estuary-like inlet to the elacial Lake Agassiz. The lake then filled the lied Jiiver Valley as far north as Gram! Forks county, and was in process of lengthening northward to the country around Lake Winnipeg. 'J'he icesheet was probably about a half mile in thickness in tlie valley and during the epoch of the lake the ice margin was receding. The sediments of the delta extend from aronuil McCanna to the vicinity of Mayville and Portland and also include some of the ridgy land along its eastern border. The average thickness of this sedimentary belt is about, forty feet and Upham estimates its bulk at from H to 2 cubic miles. Its lower part is so saturated with water as to form a quicksand, which is reached in wells from 12 to 24 feet in depth, and fnrnidies an abundant supply of very pure water.

Tlie more recent land belt covering the glacial till of the valley, is the great bed of lacustrine and alluvial silt, that has filled its lower depression and extends from Wahpeton to Winnipeg. This forms tlie flat valley plain. In this county the formation extends from eight to twelve miles west from the river. Above the bedrock, according to Upham's view, most of the formation of the valley plain consists of glacial beds, with lacustrine clay above them that was brought into the lake by the streams while this ancient body of water was falling to low levels, and the remainder of the soil to the surface is alluvial, having been deposited by Red river duri.ig its flood stages.

But little of the sediments of the lake were deposited upon the midway slope, as this tract was much exposed to the erosion of the waves. Some of the soil was doubtless eroded from the eastern border of the KIk Valley delta. This land belt is marked by Mian}' successively lower beach ridges formed by the waves during as many periods of pause made by the receding waters while the lake was being drained away.

While the lake stood at its highest stage about five-sixths of the area of the county was submerged beneath the water. The western shore-line lay along the foot of the hills, about 35 miles west of the river. Only the upland district and parts of the ridge in Agnes and Inkster townships, which formed a chain of islands that was continued nearly through Walsh county, alone remained above water.

'I'he physical oiuse of this great glacial lake was wholly dependent upon the closing stages of the Ice age. When the icesheet was melting away, year by year, its southern margin stretched across the valley of Red river, thus forming a barrier to the pent up waters that prevented them from flowing away in the direction that the natural slope of the land would have led them. The lake finally drained away by successive stages, marking either side of the valley with many recurring beach lines, or gravel ridges, at lower and lower levels.

Grand Forks county does not seem to lie within the limits of any of the artesian basins of the Dakotas. Its flowing wells are small ones and none of them go to bedrock. They are, perhaps, nearly all confined to the valley plain and obtain their supply from the drift. There are a few with small flow in and around Ojata, several around Afanvel and many in the Forest river drai!iHge area in tiie northern part of the county. Two inch pipe is generally used, and <he wells vary, approximately, in depth, from 60 to 279 feet. Efforts to obtain flowing water on the higher land have not been successful. The water of these wells is sometimes good but apt to be more or less saline.

The following record of a boring niade at the Diamond Mill, Grand Forks, shows the charncter of the beds in this part of the vnlley down to bedrock. It was obtained through Trof. F. S. 15erg, of Lariinore, from Prof. Babcock, of the University.

Section of the Elk Valley delta at Larimore: Soil, 2 feet,; sandy clay, 5 feet; yellowish sand, 13 feet; dark sand, particles two-thirds cretaceous shale, containing much water, 40 feet. Total, 60 feet. Hard blue till at the bottom of the delta.

The Iniirage

FIftt regions like the lower depression of the Red River Valley are subject to mirages, and these aerial phenomena are also occasionally noticeable on the higher land of the valley* The followi»)g account of the mirage, as commonly witnessed in the valley, is given here as described by Warren Upham:

"In crossing the vast plain of the lied River Valley on clear days, the higher land at its sides and the groves along its rivers are first seen in the distance as if their upper edges were raised a little above the horizon, with. a very narrow strip of sky below. The first appearance of the tree-tops thus resembling that of dense flocks of birds flying very low several miles away. By rising a few feet, as from the ground to a wagon, or by nearer approach, the outlines become clearly defined as a grove, with a mere line of sky beneath it. This mirage is more or less observed on the valley plain every sunshiny day of the spring, summer and autumn months, especially during the forenoon, when the lowest stratum of the air, touching the surface of the ground, becomes heated sooner than the strata above it.

"A more complex and astonishing effect of mirage is often seen from the somewhat higher land that forms the slopes on either side of the plain. Thus, in lookinir across the flat valley a half hour or two hours after sunrise of a hot day following a cool night, the groves and houses, villages and grain elevators, loom up twice or thrice their true height, and places ordinarily hidden from sight by the earth's curvature are brought into view. Occasionally too, these objects, as trees and houses, are seen double, being repeated in an inverted position close above their real places, from which they are separated by a very narrow foglike belt. In its most perfect development the mirage shows the upper and lopsy-tui vey portion of the view quite as distinct MS the lower and true portion, and the two are separated, when seen from land about a iiundred feet above the plain, by an apparent vertical distanc<^ of 75 or 100 feet for objects at a distance of six or eight miles, and 300 to 500 feet if the view is fifteen to twenty miles away. Immediately above the inverted images there runs a level false horizon, which rises slightly as the view grows less distinct, until, as it fades and vanishes, the inverted groves, lone trees, church spires, elevators and houses at last resemble rags and tatters hung along a taut line.

"The traveler in the Red River Valley is reminded the same as at sea, that the earth is round. The surface of the plain is seen for a distance of only three or four iwiles; houses and grain stacks have their tops visible first, after which, in approaching, they gradually come into full view, and the highlands ten or fifteen miles away, forming the side of the valley apparently lie beyond a wide depression, like a distant coast."*

County Altitudes

'i'l>e following table gives the elevation in feet above sea-level of each station on the railroad lines within the county limits. That for Merrifield has had to be estimated, but cannot be much if anything, out of the way.

Historical Outline The Two Epochs

|T WILL now be proper to give a general outline of the old plinse of life and the sequence of events in the Red l^iver Valley from the earliest ~\y/xj)) time of wliich we have any authentic date down to the period when the present generation first began toes^tablish permanent settlements in this portion of the valley. In these affairs of the long ago, Grand Forks county was, to some extent at least, tlie scene. Hut from amidst the shifting scenes of this historic panorama there emerges one spot in the valley that becomes prominent as its historical focus, and that place is Pembina,

Without reckoning anything on the visits to the valley of Verendrye and DuLuth prior to the middle of the last century, it may be said that the past hundred years of its history presents two very distinctly marked epochs. The first of these is that characterized b}- the domination of the fur trading interests, politically represented by the government of the country as exercised by the Hudson Bay company; the seconti epoch is that marked by the settlement of the valley by the present popul:«- tion, its development, and founding of the state of North Dakota and the prijvince of Manitoba, with the organization of their respective governments; including also tlie occupation and development of that part of the valley that lies in Minnesota. This epoch lias not yet been succeeded by any other, though an industrial and manufactoring era, to some extent, with a greater |)opulation, will be apt to constitute the characteristic features of the next epoch, while agriculture and its associated commercial operations will doubtless remain the chief sources of the wealth of the valley.

It must not be supposed that when the settlement of the valley by an agricullural population had its beginning, its old epoch abruptly terminated and its new one began. Generally speaking, there is no abrupt termination of any one epoch and beginning of another. A transition period will likely ensue. The old epoch insensibly shades into, and is absorbed by the new one, each having its characteristic phase of life. Radical changes may ensue so as to bring about jinother and different state of things, but these are the growth of time. There is a gradual, a slow change to new conditions, and no one can say just when a previous era has ended and a new one has been ushered in.

In early times the plains of North Dakota formed a great range for the buffalo. The bison was a migratory animal, and in winter ranged southward to northern Texas. The increasing wartnth of spring:, which in that latitude ensues early, urged these animals to take to their northwardly leading trails, and they migrated in vast herds. By the month of June or earlier, they reached the Ifed River Valley.

The Dakotas, and much of the state of INIinnesota, was formerly the domain of the allied tribes called the Sioux. The eastern part of this state was occupied by the Yankton sept of the Sioux nation, although the Wahpetons and Sissetons were located at Lake Traverse later tlian the middle of the century. In northern INIinnesotji were the Chippeways, and to the north of our boundary dwelt the Crees. Saulteaus and Assiniboines. These latler tribts were often at war with the Sioux and made the northern part of this state their battle ground. 'I'he Wahpetons and Sissetons were accustomed to make journe3's to the north along Red river and as far as the Pembina river, to hunt the buffalo and to wage their predalory warfare against the northern tribes, including the Chippeways, During these journeys back and forth, the site of Grand Forks was one of their convenient camping places and an advantageous point to lay in wait for the scalps of members of the last named tribe.

The Indian tribes between tlie Mississippi and Rocky mountains largely derived their subsistenc*; by huntiuii: the buffalo. 'I'hese animals furnished them with robes and, in a measure, a living. But people in the savage state who depend on hunting and fishing for subsistence can never form communities comprising a numerous, much less a dense population. Their mode of life, exposure and liability to famine and tiieir almost constant warfare with other tribes, has a tendency to thin their numbers.

-'Comparative few Indians" says Warren IJpham "were able to derive their subsistence by hunting and fishing upon the area of J^ake Agassiz or in any other regio?i. Trobably their number

At a period that was long anterior to the occupation of this region b}- the hunting tribes that were known to the whites, there lived other tribes here of whom Upham remarks thnt they "probably lived more by agriculture and less by the chase," and who built the mounds found in the country, to some extent, by ihe first settlers. The builders of these mounds appear to have been offshoots of the ancient race known by their works as the Moutid Builders. Where they were the most numerous, as in the Ohio and Mississippi valleys, they were sufficiently advanced to make rude pottery, build fortifications on a large scale, also temple mounds and other earthworks. They also fashioned native copper obtained in the Lake Superior region, or picked up more sparingly from the glacial drift, into various utensils, but they do not appear to have been able to smelt it. They must also have possessed considerable skill in other arts, but at their best the .superiority of the IMound Buihlers that occupied the Red River Valley over the later Indian tribes was but slight, and even in the Mississippi Valley their handicraft was not at all comparable to that of the aboriginal races of Mexico and Peru.

It seems to be pretty well established that the Mound Builders were not racially distinct from the Indians and were probably the ancestors of tribes that were still existing within the present century, as the Mandans, for example. This early progress of the red race was probably due to intercourse with Mexico and Yucatan, also to early migrations of the race from those countries. Such advancement as they were making appears to have been interrupted several hundred years before the discovery of America by reason of the appearance east of the Mississippi of the bisoD, an event in the animal world that changed the population from semi-agriculturists into bands of nomadic hunters, thus terminating any farther progress toward civilization,

Relics of the occupation of this part of the state by the later Indian tribes, notwithstanding their recent possession of the country, have not been so abundantly found here as in some of the middle western states where the red men evidently were more numerous. Still, since the settlement of this state, arrow-heads, tomahawks, mortars and pestles and other stone implements have been picked up on the prairies in consi(Jerable numbers. It should be remembered that the states in which these relics of aboriginal life liave been most abundantly found were originally more or less forested, and in wooded districts the ituplements were more easily lost than in the open prairie regions. More- over, the prairies were nnmuilly burned over by the Indians, and until the grass grew again, things lost upon the surface were easily seen and recovered.

The Fitr Companies

In 1670, the Hudson l^ay Fur company was granted a charter by (/harles II, of England, giving to Prince Rupert and fourteen other members, their heirs and assigns, the right to the sole trade of tbe region around Hudson and James bays. The company began to establish themselves on these bays toward the close ot" tlie same century. Nearly a century more, however, parsed beTore we read of the lied River Valley being occupied either by this company or by any other of which the members were British subjects. In tlie meantime exploring and trading expeditions of the French, coming from Canada by way of the Great Lakes, penetrated the Northwest as far as the Ilea River Valley and even much farther west.

About the year 1679, Sieur DuLuth. who was conducting trading operations in the country around the head of Lake Su perior. made a brief and |>robabIy hasty expedition across northern iMinnesota, reaching some point inland about Lake VVinnipeg.

After DuLuth, Sieur Veiendrye, his sons and nephew Jeremaye, next penetrated the country to the valleys of the Red, Assiniboine, Missouri and Yellowstone rivers for the purposes of trade and exploration, and they built a post or two on the Assiniboine. These operations were continued between the years 1731 and 1748. 4'he conquest of Canada by the English in 1759 terminated l^'rench exploration, but the work of the missions and operations of individual traders still continued.

The first settler on North Dakota soil is claimed to have been a Canadian French trader who located at Rembina in 1780. While his name has n<)t been preserved, the fact is nevertheless nientioned by Prof. Keating, the chronicler of Major Long's expedition This party found tlie trader still living at Pembina ^3 years subsequent to the period of his location at that place.

In 1784 David Thompson, a person of sonie scientific attainments, entered the service of the Hudson Bay company and was appointed clerk. Later he was employed by the Northwest company as explorer and geographer. He was also an accomplished astronomer. In 1797 he visited the valleys ot the Bed, Assiniboine, Mouse and Missouri rivers. He was also sent by the Northwest company to visit the Missouri and the sources of the Mississippi for the purpose of making geographical and astronomical observations. In 1798 he was at Cass lake, in Minnesota, and fixed the latitude of the cotnpany's post at that point. He also fixed and recorded the latitude and longitude of many points thron<>hout the Northwest.

The Northwest Fur company whs orgiinized nt INfontreal in 1783. Their ciiief stiongholfl in the Northwest was Fort William «»n Ivrike Superior, now Port Arthur. Here, every antumn, the coiireurs <les bois, or men of the woods, and other employees of the comp.tny were accustomed to gather, spend their earnings for liquor and luxuries, and hold high carnival. 'I'he Northwest company controlled most of the fur trade ot the Red River Valley. Capt. Alexander Henry, an officer of this company, came to the valley in 1799 and was engaged in establishing trading posts. In the winter of 1797-8 a Oana<lian French trader named Ohabollier built a post at Pembina, but when Capt. Henry visited that point in 1800, he found the post unoccupied, and proceeded to establish his headquarters there,

About this time C;ipt. Henry had a post built on the Pembina river about nine miles below the point wherf^ the stream issues from the Pembina mountains, which in those times were called fhe Hair hills. This post was soon afterward removed farther np the river to the vicinity of the site ot St. Joseph, now the village of Walhalla, where, as ('aptain Henry says, "the waters of the Paubian leave the steep hills."

On September 8, 1800. Capt. Henry selected the site for a trading post on the plain between the lied and Park rivers, and not far from the mouth of the latter stream. One year later, to wit. in September, 1801, he sent a party of men to build another on the site of Grand Forks. This post, however, was not long maintained.* At this time Capt. Henry's party consisted of eighteen men, four women, and four children. Of the men, one was his clerk, and another acted as interpreter in dealing with the Indians. 'J'he same month and year, Thomas Miller, of the Hudson Bay company, with eight Orkney men arrived at Pembina and established a post on the east side of the river where Emerson now is. Agents of another organization called the X. Y. company also appeared in that part of the valley at this time, and for awhile maintained a post on the Pembina river. In 1801 also, the lied iliver cart was devised.

The canoe, the travial and the dog-sledge seen) to have been the only means of communication prior to the introduction of the lied River cart. At first Captain Henry considered

* It is a question in the mind of the writer Avhether Captain Henry ever established a trading post on the site of Grand Forks at all. He was one of the few men of that period who thought it worth the effort, while in the country, to keep a record of their movements and observations. His journal is carefully preserved in the Government Historical Library at Ottawa, Canada, and only extracts from it seem to have been published.' His references to the "forks of the river" appear to have meant the confluence of thf Red and Assiniboine, that is, the site of Winnipeg, It is therefore doubtful, whether or not, there has been some misunderstanding as to the location meant by him. unless he specially designates the forks of Red and Red Lake rivers as tho site of this post.

tliem to be a great improvement on the means of transportation previously in use, but two years later he says in his journal that the introduction of horses and carts into the country had the tendency of making the employees of the company more lazy and shiftless than before.

In 18U6 Captain Henry visited the country about the ^Fouse and upper Missouri rivers. He speaks of Pembina affairs again in 1808, when, besides the annual shipment of peltries, there was exported from the country 3,159 pounds of maple sugar. That year the Rocky mountain locust made one of their periodical visits and swarmed over the country. Captain Henry came to an untimely end. Having gone west of the Rocky mountains, to which region the Northwest company had extended their operations, he was drowned in the Columbia river, May 28, 1814.

The Selkirk Colony

From the beginning of the century the Red River Valley began to be occupied and traversed i»y the trappers and voyageurs of the fur companies, and soon afterward by a few independent traders. Rut a different class of people now came to the valley. These were the Selkirk colonists and their coming is the next important matter in valley history after the operations of Capt. Henry. This colony was composed of Higli landers who had been evicted from the estate of the Duchess o! Sutherland, in the north of Scotland. Says Warren Upham:

"The first immigration of white men to colonize the fertile basin of the Ked Iviver of the Xorth, bringing the civilize<l arts and agriculture of Europe, was in the years 1812 to 1816, when, under Lord Selkirk's farsishted and patriotic supervision, the early pioneers of the Selkirk settlements, coming by wMiy of Hudson bay and York Factory, reached Manitoba and estal>lished their homes along the river from the vicinity of Winnipeg to Pembina. In its beginning this colony experienced many hardships, but, in the words of one of these immigrants, whose narrative was written down in his old age, in 3881, 'by and by our troubles ended, war and famine and flood and poverty all passed away, and now we think there is no such place to be found as the valley of lied river.' "^

In 1811, Thomas Douglas, earl of Selkirk, having gained control of the Hudson Ray Fur Company interests so frtr as to enable him to do so, secured a tract of il>3J3(Xl acres of land in the Red River Valley on which he designed to plant his prospective colony. Its first ctnitingent arrived in 1812. The lands on which they settled included the site of the city of Winnipeg which was founded about sixty years later. About the year 1814 the locusts destroyed their crops and \v;mt drove tlif^m to the post of Pembina for food Mild shelter. But the Northwest Vur company were opposed to the settlement of an agricultural population in the country. 'They instigated their employees to annoy and harass the C(donists in many ways. About 150 of them they induced to desert, and the remainder they tried to frighten away by setting their halfbreed employees upon ihem disguised as Indians. In 1815 another contingent of the colonists arrived from Scotland. The Northwest C(»mpany now endeavored to expel them from the country. An affray ensued at Seven Oaks near the site of WinnipesT, in 1816, in which about twenty persons lost their lives, among whom was the Hudson Bay governor Semple. Lord Selkirk now interfered, protecting his colony Dy force of arms, and re-imbursed them for the losses of property they had sustained. The hostile criticism evoked by these troubles finally led to the coalition of tlie.^e antagonistic fur companies, which was effected in 1821. In that year the first l^'ort Garry was built.

The success of an agricultural colony such as this was, mainly depends upon favorable climatic and physical conditions, also a fair degree of competency to obtain subsistence from the region colonized, upon accessions in number, both to counterbalance losses and to increase the population, and largely, besides, upon the adaptability of the colonists themselves to adjust their mode of life to the usual changed conditions of new settlements. The Selkirk colonists found a fertile soil in the valley that was in strong contrast with that of the partially sterile and mountainous region of the north of Scotland, well adapted to agricultural pursuits, and a country posses.sing a healthy and tolerable climate. Coming from a high northern latitude in their former homes, the long days of summer and short ones of winter in I heir new abode presented no marked contrasts; but the physical aspect of the country they found to be far different, and Climatic conditions considerably so. .Already inured to hard conditions of life in their old homes, they were the kind of people to succeed and were deserving of the fair measure of success to which they ultimately attained.

Gradually the colony began to see some measure of prosperity. Other additions came from time to time, and they began to enlarge and extend their settlements. In 1821 two hundred Swiss emigrants arrived, who had been induced to leave their native country by an agent of Lord Selkirk. The colonists built churches and established .schools. They maintained amicable relations with the Indians from whom they purchased more land, extend-, ing tfieir settlements up the Assinil)oine and up Red river as far as Fembina. Their settlements were conipact, the individnnl holdings beiiiij six chains in width, and extending back from the river two miles on each side. They had mills for grinding grain, spini their own wool, wove their own cloth, and made their own clothinj^. lo guard against losses by locusts and drought, they were accustomed to keep three years supply of food and forage on hand. Thouuh liquor wsis to be had at the posts, intoxication among them was almost unknown. Presbyterians in Scotland, they niiiintained their religeous integrity in this country. Notwithstanding their privations and hardships and the dangers they were called upon to face, they succeeded in establishing in this remote part of the continetit a sturdy civilization.

There was but little communication between the colony and the old world. A vessel or two arrived about August of each year bringing ilie goods ordered before by dog-sledge packet to Montreal. They h;iil mail from (ireat Britain but once a year. It is related of Alexiinder Murray, a colonist of 1812. that he was a subscriber to the London Times, which had been issued under tliat name daily since .latiuary 1, 1788, and that he received a full yearly volume when the ship came. He was accustomed to read one copy a d;iy, that of the corresponding day of the previous year, and thus he kept up to within one year of the daily record of current events occurring in the old world.

Isolation Of The Country

While these events were in pr(»gress, that is to say throughout the first two decades of the century and, of course, earlier, the Red liiver Valley was so isolated from the United States that even the geographers of the eastern states seem to have known little or nothing of it. The school geographie.s of those days were like sciiool readers, mainly descriptive, having no map questions, and containing a crudely engraved map or two, uncolored, and folded into the book. Jedadiah Morse, the father of one of the inventors of the telegraph, published the first American geography for the schools of this country, in 1789. An examination of the editions of 1807 and ISll, in possession of the writer, shows no knowledge rf Red river as a stream of the United States, nor can this be expected, since the region west of the Mississippi river is spoken of as comprising '-unknown countries." Jonathan Carver, an Americiin traveler of the last century heard of the Ked river Irom the Indians while wintering among them at the mouth of tiie Cottonwood, and calls it a capital branch of the IJiver Bourbon, tliat is, of Nelson river. But during the tvvo decades under consideration, certain official and commercial classes in Canada and England »vere in possession of a larger amount of infornuition concerning this then far ofFnortiiwe.'dern country than was, at that time, known to the government of the United States.

States and the west hank in the possession of the French, operated not only to tertnitjute English and French exploration, but to retard that of llie United States. It was not till after the cession of Louisiana by France that the trovernment of the United States instituted measures for tiie exploration of the unknown countries west of the Mississippi, when in 1804 Captains J^ewis and Clarke were despatched to explore the Missouri river and l^ientenant Z. M. Pike to asceini the Mississippi to its source. J^ieut. FiUe found the upper Missisd[)pi country occupied by trading posts of the Northwest b^ir company over which was still flying the l*]nglish flag, a fact which attests the isolation of thjit region since the peace concIude<l in 1783."*

Betwt^en the years 1818 and 1823, Major Stephen H. Long, of the United Stales Army, had charge of the exploration of the country between the Mississippi and the Rocky mountains. In the latter year lie was directed by the Secretary of War to proceed to I'embina and establish the international boundary at that point. Several scientific gentlemen of Philadelphia, among whom was Prof. William Keating, of the University of Pennsylvania, accompanied the expedition. 'I'he Italian traveler, Beltrami, a political exile from his own country, also joined the party at Fort Snelling,

]\[ajor Long's party arrived at Fort Snelling July 2, 1823; on the 6th Prof. Keating, Beltrami and other gentlemen of the party, visited the Falls of St. Anthony, which then existed in their primeval condition; and on the 9th ihe expedition set out for the Ked River Valley. Proceeding in canoes up the Minnesota river, they abandoned this mode of conveyance at old Traverse des Sioux, and the remainder of the journey to Pembina was made by marching. After crossing Nicollet county, Minn., to \iedstone, so as to cut off the great bend of the Minnesota river, the route pursued was up the course of the strean>, the march being more upon the prairie above the south line of bluffs than along its valley bottoms. 'I'hey reached Big Scone lake on July 22. Here Major Long met and held a conference with Wanata, the chief of the Yanktons. After passing Lake Traverse, the line of march was next down the west side of Hed river along which route the old Red River trail was struck out some years afterward. This took the expedition through Grand Forks county and in the vicinity of the river. The [)arty reached I'enibina on the 5th of August. This was the upper settlement of the Selkirk colony, and a number of families were located arouinl this place. The tradijig post of the Northwest coujpany, estalilislied there in 1800 by Captain Henry, hsid been maintained down to within a few months of the arrival of Major Long's party. He found about three hundred halfbreeds there living in sixty log huts, and the traders located there possessed about two hundred horses. The day after his arrival, the buffalo liunters cume in from the chase, forming a procession consisting of 116 carts each loaded with about 800 pounds of buff'iilo meat. After several days observ;iti.)n the boundary was located and marked by setting up a few oak posts. On Augusc 8th, the American flag was officially displayed at Pembina for the first time, and proclamation made that all land on the river south of the established boundary was United States territory.

Hitherto, the colonists at Peml)in;i had supposed themselves to be in British territory, but finding themselves really between one and two miles south of the boundary line, they, being intensely loyal to the Britsh crown, abandoned their holdings and removing farther north, they settled at Kildonan, a few miles from the modern city of Winnipeg. The Italian traveler, Beltr.wni, considering himself discourteously treated by INIajor Long, separated from his party at Pembina. Procuring a halfbreed and two Chippeway Indians as attendants and guides, lie traveled southeast to Red Lake riyer, thence up to ited lake, from whence he sought the sources of the Mississippi river, by no means an easy task to accomplish in those times single handed. He next passed down the "Father of Waters" to New Orleans, and having returned to Europe, he published in l.oudon a book of his travels in 1828.

After leaving Pembina, ALajor Long's party descended the river to Lake Winnipeg, thence ascended the Winnipeg river to the Lake of the Woods, and returned to the United States by way of the llainy Lake region and I^ake Superior. Major Long was born in 1784, lived to an advanced age, and died at Washington in 1864. Beltrami died in 1855.

Prof. Keating was the historian of this expedition. He embodied the notes and manuscripts ot different membei^ of the party in a work of two volumes, which was published in London in 1825. Accompanying Keaiing's work was a map compiled from the observations made during the progress of the expedition and from various other sources of information. On this map the names and location of the streams tributary to Red river appear for the first time. On the whole. Prof. Keating's work "may be correctly pronounced the first attempt to apply the accurate methods of modern science to the exploration of any portion of the Northwest."* Major Long's official report was not publi<*hed until some time after the appearance of Keating's work, lieap-

In 1824 a family of the name ufTilly goin^ from Pembina to Fort Snelling, was murdered near the site of Cirand Forks by a band of Sioux Indians, who carried two children of this family, both boys, into captivity. The facts being made known to the C( mmandant at Fort Snelling by a trader, a scouting party was sent from the fort to the vsilley in 1826 and iescued the children. In the early part of the present decade, one of the rescued boys, having lived to become a man of advanced age, died in New .lersey.

The earl of Selkirk had died in the year 1820. Six years later, to wit, in 1826, a great flood occurred in the lower valley that effected his colony and which appears to have been the earliest one of which we have any record. , On INFa}' 2d the waters rose nine feet, and on the 5th the plains were submerged. 'I'he waters continued to rise until the 21st, doing considerable damage to the property of the colonists. Houses, barns, bodies of drowned cattle, household furniture, amidst logs and uprooted trees moved down strejim on the surface of the raging waters, and one night the house of a colonist floated by in flames, fo-ming an impressive spectacle to the awe struck beholders. 'J'he Swiss contingent of the Selkirk colony, becoming discouraged and dissatisfied with the country by reason of the losses they li:id sustained from the flood, left the valley that year and removed to Minnesota, journeying to their destination by way of the lakes and streams of tiiat state. They numbered 243 persons and became the first settlers upon and around the site of St. Paul.

Old Times In The Valley

For the next dozen or more years following the flood of 1826, there seems to occur a sort of Liatus in the history of the valley. At least, we have been able to find but little that has been recorded which pertains to those years. Probably no expeditions visited the country during thnt interval.

During each recurriuir summer tliere ensued the annual buffalo hunt, the chief event of the year. The hunting parties of the Northwest assembled at some appointed place between June 8th and 18th. Sometimes as many as a thousand or more persons took part in these hunts, their caravans at times consisting^ of as many as 600 carts. The hunters were accompanied by their women and children. I'hey were mainly hal (breeds, with some Indians and occasionally a few whites. Bands from some of the posts in Manitoba also joined them. Scouts w^ere first sent out to locate the herds, and on their return, the leaders having heard their reports, they determined from them the direction of the march to the prairies. The bnffa.lo ranges of the Northwest were along tlie Sheyenne, the Mouse, the neighborhood of the 'rnrile mountains, and tlie upper portion of the Red .liiver Valley. Reacliing any one of these ranges, the hunters attacked the herds on horseback, using long stocked guns with flint-lock fire, and slew the animals in large numbers. The remainder of the lierd stampeded away with a loud noise, raising a great cloud of dust. The men skinned the slain animals for their hides, and the women assisted m cutting up the meat and loading it into the carts for transportation to camp where it was cut into strips and dried for winter's use, and for making pemmican. The tongues of the buffalo were considered a choice part of these animals, 'i'hough not as choice as beef, buffalo meat nevertheless formed the chief article of food on the plains. The hides were brought to the posts for shipment with other peltries.

The pemmican. the only kind of bread known to the Indians, was made by cutting up the meat in long thin strips, drying and smoking it over a slow fire as it hung on racks made of small poles, and it was next placed upon tlie flesh side of a buffalo hide, whipped to fine shreds with flails, and then mixed with hot tallow in large kettles. The thick, pliable mass was then pcuired into sacks made of buffalo hide, liolding from 50 to 150 pounds according to the size of the skin, and would keep many years when hung up so as to allow the air to circulate around them. When used, the pemmican needed no further preparation, or it could be cooked with vegetables in several different ways.

The aristocracy of the plains consisted of the officers, traders and clerks at the posts, and the buffalo hunters. While the Selkirk colonists generally dressed in homespun clothino: and lived plainly, the men at the posts had every luxury that they could procure, including a stock of the finest liquors The importsition of some 01 the finer products of civilized life gradually became more common, even to silk dresses for the women of the posts. In dress the trappers and voyageurs, or caiuje men, and some other of the employees of the fur companies used a common sort of cloth that was imported, gray sui\s being much worn by them. With these classes, including the haifbrceds. there was also some admixture of vestments made ot the skins (»f animals, especially buckskin.

The buffalo whs the harvest of those days - running the buffalo, making pemmican and shipping furs. Trapping was the business of the spring, bnfl'alo hunting in the summer and fall, and in the winter the trappers, hunters and voyageurs devoted their principal attention to living and they lived right royally on the fruits of the summer's chase. * Those with many succeeding years constituted the "good old buffalo days."

The guns used in the Northwest were niiide in England specially for puvposes connected with the fur trading business. They were imported by way of York l^^actory and exchanged at the posts for peltries at certain values. They continued to have flint fire locks long after the percussion cap had came into general use, on account of the great distances to the points at which the caps might be obtained. If an Indian or other liunter happened to get out of his supply of percussion caps, on the supposition that lie used a percussion fire gun, it might be a hundred or more n>iles from the nearest |)()st, in which case his piece would be (t? no use to him, while a flint-lock gun was generally serviceable at any time.

'I'here were some salt springs in the valley that were utilized to some extent by the Selkirk colonists and the fur companies, on account of the expense of importing salt. "Considerable quantities" says Warren Upham "were yearly made by the evaporation of the water of salt springs. One of these springs from which much salt was made for the Hudson Bay compan}' is situated in the channel of the south branch of Two Rivers, about li^ mile above its junction with the north branch, and some six miles west of Hallock. It is exposed only when the river runs low, and in such part of the summer the work of salt-making was done."*

During the period mentioned above life in and around the trading posts continued the same as it had been. The country, the surroundings, the mode of life of the people, and its object, wa^ of that character which admitted ol but little change from one generation to another. The Selkirk colonists also continued their simple and isolated mode of life, having at last attained a fair measure of prosperity and happiness, and but little mindful of the continual progress and irresistible advancement of that westward tide of eniigration, which, both in Canada and in the United States, was destined in future yciirs to close in upon them and merge their descendants amidst the present population of the Northwest.

Jean N. Nicollet

Jean N. Nicollet was a Frenchman in the service of the bureau of topographical engineers. After exploring the basin of the Mississippi in the south with its vvestern affluents for geographical and natural history purposes, he was next assigned to the region of the upper Mississippi. These latter explorations covered the period between the years 1836 and 1843. Lieut. .1, C. Fremont was Nicollet's principal aid and assistant. Fremont was born in Savannah, Ga., in 1813, consequently he was merely a young man while in the service of government under Nicollet.

his fame a« aii explorer of western wilds being still in the future. But he was thus early gathering a profitable experience as an aid to Nicollet. *

The interior of Minnesota was now more thoroughly explored than it ever had been since the visits of the French explorers of the two preceding centuries, or of that of the y\merican traveler, .Jonathan Carver. The chief object of Nicollet's expeditions was for geographical purposes, as he and his party mapped out the streams, lakes and land heights, locating these physical features of the country in respect to their latitude and longitude as accurately as their imperfect appliances would admit of being done. Nicollet's party was again in the field during the warm season of 1839. Passing up the Missouri river, they left its banks in the vicinity of Pierre, S. J^., early in July, and struck out for the Devils Lake country. At first the party traveled northeast to the James river, which was then called the "Riviere a Jacques." On reaching this stream, its valley was followed* north to Bone hill in LaMoure county, N. I)., whence the expedition crossed over to the Sheyenne. This stream was followed up toward Devils Lake wlieie the party arrived in the latter part of July.

Several days were spent in exploring and mapping' out the shores of the lake and all prominent physical objects in its vicinity. Its western end, however, was not visited, but the party traversed both its north and south shores to considerable distances toward the west. The lake lay in the country of the Yankton Sioux. The salinity of its waters was noted and Nicollet designated the country around the lake on his published map as a '"'salt water region."

On August G. 1839, the party were at Stump lake, which Nicollet calls Wamdushka, its prevalentlndian name. Thence the party with its military escort marched eastward as far as the western part of Grand Forks county, probably camping on the night of August 8th near the center of Moraine township. Although headed toward lied river, the expedition next day wheeled about at nearly r\ii,ht angles to the line of march since leaving Stump lake and passed southward to explore and map th« physical features of the Coteau des Prairies. This took the ex-

* >Jicoilet was born in the village of Cluses, department ot Haute Savoie, France, in 1786, He studied astronomy under La Place, and in 1817 he was appointed secretary and librarian of the Paris observatory. With a good equipment of the physical knowledge of his time, he came to the United States in 1882, and entered the service of the Bureau of Topographical Engineers. So far as the historical sketches relative to North Dakota have come under the writer's notice, Nicollet has never received that recognition which his services entitle him to, or to sneak more truly, almosf no recognition at all. The allusions to his expedition are coupled with Fremont's name and that of Nicollet ignored, thus creating in the mind of the reader a false impression as to the officer in charge. Nicollet died at Washington in 184 while his report on his explorations was undergoing revision for the press.

peditioii through what is now Steele county, some distance to the west of where May ville and Portland now stand. It was more to Nicollet's purpose to penetrate and explore a region hitherto but little visited, than to traverse the level plains of the valley already mapped and described by Major Long and Prof. Keating.

Nicollet's map was published by government in 1812. It was called the "Map of the Hydrographical Basin of the Upper Mississippi River." It covered the entire states of ]\linnesota and Iowa and portions of the other states that adjoin them. In respect to the physical features of the country, it was rather minute for one of that period, and in later years Gen. G. K. Warren pronounced it "one of the greatest contributions ever made to American geography."

N. H. Winchell, in his historical sketch prefixed to the "Geolo<:ical and Natural History Survey of Minnesota," makes the following remarks on Nicollet's methods and work: "He aims to locate correctly^ by astronomical observations, the numerous streams and lakes, and the main geographical features of the country, filling in by eye-sketching, and by pacing, the intermediate objects. His methods, allowing for the imperfection of his applilinces, and the meagerness of his outfit and supplies, were established on the same principles as the most approved geodetic surveys of the present day. It would, perhaps, liave been well if the methods of Nicollet could have been adhered to in the further surveying and mapping of the territories. Their geography would have been less rapidly developed, but it would have been done more correctly. Nicollet's map embraces & multitude of names, including many new ones, which he gave to the lakes and streams."

A Buffalo Hunt

As has been stated, white men sometimes accompanied the halfbreeds to the buffalo ranges, either to participate in or to witness the slaughter of these animals. Alexander Ross describes a hunt which he witnessed near the Sheyenne, and in the vicinity of the site of Fargo, in 1840. He writes: "At eight o'clock the cavalcade made for the buffalo; first at a slow trot, then at a gallop, and lastly at full speed. Their advance was on a dead level, the plain having no hollow or shelter of any kind to conceal their approach. Within four or five hundred yards, the buffalo began to curve their tails and paw the ground, and in a moment more to take flight and the hunters burst in among them and fired. Those who have seen a squadron of horse dash into battle may imagine the scene. The earth seemed to tremble when the horses started; but when the animals fled it was like the shock of an earthquake. 1 he air was darkened, and the rapid firing at last became more faint as the hunters became more distant. During the day at least two thousand buffalo must have been killed for there were brouglit into camp 1,375 tongues. The hunters were followed by the carts whicli brought in tb& carcasses. Much of the meat was useless because of the heat of the season, but the tongues were cured, the skins saved and the pemmicaii prepared."

Traders And Trappers

As time in its course neared the middle of the century, communication between the valley and the outside world became all the more frequent. Cart routes leading to the head of navigation on the Mississippi began to be established by the traders, who, independent of the American and the Hudson Bay fur companies, had begun to locate at Pembina, St. Joseph and a few other points in the Northwest. At first, the objective point of these cart trails was Mendota, near Fort Snelling, but St. Paul having gotten its first start about the year 1846, the cart trains with their great packs of buffalo robes and bales of mink and other .skins thereafter went to that place. Here the steamboats took the peltries foi shipment to St. Louis. In these enterprises the famous Joe Rolette first appears.

Joe was a noted trader of those times. He was born at Prairie du Chien, October 23, 1820, his father, who was a native of Quebec, liaving been an Indian trader of note in the early days of Wisconsin. In early life Joe was sent to New York to be educated under the supervisionof Ramsey Crooks, president of the American Fur company. On his return to the west, he entered the service of his father in the fur trade. General Sibley was then residing in a stone built house at Mendota, which was his headquarters, and he had charge of the company's fur trading business in the Northwest. The elder Rolette died in 1842, and about that time the general sent Joe to Pembina in connection with the company's interests there, and he came in company with liis mother's brother, a Mr. Fisher, who had spent the most of his life trading with the Indians. Thenceforth Joe made Pembina his future home.

In 1843 Norman \V. Kittson, who was a relative of Captain Henry, and in modern times a wealthy railroad ofl!icial of St. Paul, also came to Pembina and began laying the foundation of his subsequent large fortune. In connection with Rolette, he established a trading post at Pembina, and removed in 1852 to St. Joseph, being associated there for awhile with a trader named Forbes, and a little later with Charles Cavileer.

Only six carts went from Pembina to the Mississippi in 1844, but with the passing years this small number increased to some hundreds as t!ie trade developed. The establishment in the Red River Valley of distinctively American traders, whatever their ancestry tnay h;ive been, led to the diversion of a part of the fur trade of this region to the hend of navigation on the Missis-^ippi. This trade had ari important influence on the founding and early growth (>- St. Paul. Some say that it was the making of that city, hut a large metropolis would have risen upon that site had there heen no fur trade, since conditions pertaining to physical geography and other factors had already determined tliat question.

The American traders at the Red Iliver posts suffered great losses from time to time from the agsfressions of the Hudson Hay company's men. They also furnished the Indians, in the way of traffic, with large quantities of whiskey, which the American traders were forbidden to do under severe penalties. In vain did Kittson protest and remonstrate and ask for protection and redress. General Sibley could not help him and the government would not. At last, in 1847, some Canjidian traders came near Pembina and set up a post two miles from Rolette's, and serjt out runners to the Indians that they wanted their furs for money and whiskey, liefore they had fairly beguci operations, Rolette took a dozen or so of his plucky retainers, half breeds for the most part, marched against the intruders, tumbled their goods out of their buildings, and burned them to the ground and drove the traders and their retainers back into Canada.*

The streams of the Northwest were everywhere traversed by the voyageurs in the employment of the fur companies, and their banks were familiar to the trappers and hunters of those limes. Probably most of the tributaries of Red river bear the names that these adventurous men applied to them. rhe Hudson Bay company engaged men from Canada, Scotland and England as employees in the varied services of the fur trading business, and many of the/n spent the remainder of their lives in the company's service. I'he Canadian French element predominated. All of them were men of vigorous, hardy constitutions, and their lives and labors were full ot hardship and often of excitement and peril. Out ()f every hundred, at least forty, it has been computed, perished through the perils that beset their dangerous mode of life. i3ut the men liked the business and the places of those who lost their lives by untimely deaths were soon filled by others. In the absence of white women many of these men took Indian wives, and there grew up around the trading posts a numerous progeny of half breeds. At one period this element in the population of North Dakota and Manitoba must have numbered about 3,000.

The voyageurs, trappers and hunters led a gay, joyous, but, on the whole, rather hard and dangerous sort of life, remote from most of the conversiences, comforts and luxuries of civilization.

Hut little concernina; their adventures and perils was ever left upon record. During the warm season of nnost every year the buffalo ranged over parts of the Northwest in immense herds and elk, deer, antelope, coyote, fox, beaver and many varieties of smaller animals were more or less common denizens of this region, and it was occasionally frequented by the hear. The hides and skins of these animals were eagerly sought afler, as collected by the trappers, hunters, Indians and halfbreeds, by tlie agents of the fur companies and by the independent traders. Some of the skins were rated more valuable than others on account of rarity. The great bulk of the packs and bales of furs annually shipped from the country consisted of buffalo hides notwithstanding the fact that there wa^5 a vast amount of other peltries also collected besides.

The cart brigades started for St. Paul in the latter part of June and were a month, niore or less, in making the down trip, according to the weather and the condition of the trails. "F'or shipment" says Charles Cavileer in one of his sketches "the robes were packed, ten robes to the pack, u^ing the wedge-press, making as compact a bale as the screw-press, but requiring more labor. Of furs, there were 500 skins to the pack, of mink, muskrats, martin, fishers, skunlf and all small animals. Of bear, foxes, wolverines, lynx, there were twenty to the pack. When not having' enough for the regulation bale we niade mixed packages, endeavoring to make all bales as nearly as possible of the same size and weight, in order that we might correctly estimate the weight of the load of the cart. From eight to ten packs were carried on each cart."

The Red River cait consisted of two strongly constructed wheels with large cylindrical hubs each bored through with a large hole for the axle, heavy oak rims or felloes four or five inches thick, an axle with straight phills, a bottom of boards or poles and a frame around and above the bottom about two feet high. 'I'hey resembled, at least in form, the two wheeled cart of the whites. They were made mostly of oak, the wheels were not banded with tires of any kind, and no iron whatever was used in their construction. In place of nails and bolts, wooden pins were used for the fastenings. The carts were used, eighty or a hundred in long strung trains which was called a brigade.

David Dale Owen

In 1848 Prof. David Dale Owen, a distinguished geologist of a past generation, visited the Red River Valley. He had been appointed the previous year by government to make a geological survey of Wisconsin, Iowa and jAlinnesota. Its primary object was to derive information for the removal of such lands as were valuable for their mineral resources from sale in the land office at Washington. Owen had a large number of assistants and hi.s report was published in 1852. In coming to the valley, he made a canoe voyage down Red river as far as J^ake Winnipeg, and also passed up the Pembina river as far as the vicinity of Walhalla. In what is now the western part of Pembina county, he examined the great delta of the Pembina river, called the First Pembina mountain, formed there during the highest stages of the ancient J.ake Agassiz. Owen surmised from the appearance of the Red River Valley that in some past epoch this great basin had been the bed of a fresh water lake of large proportions, but neither its physical cause nor the extent of the country it had covered were then known nor lor many years afterward.'..

Major Woods And Captain Fofe

In the summer of 1849 Major Woods was despatched by the Secretary of War to the Pembina settlement for the purpose of selecting the site for a military post. He was accompanied by Captain John Pope, of the Engineering Corps, who made a valuable report on the country that was traversed by the expedition. This left Fort Snelling on June 6th, proceeded up the Mississippi valley, thence across IMinnesota by way of the Sauk valley and J^ake Osakis, reaching the Ked river at a point about fifteen miles below the site of Wahpeton, having followed through Minnesota a cart route already well traveled by trains of Red River carts that went from Pembina to St. Paul. Crossing to the west side of the stream the remainder of their journey was down the valley in the footsteps of IMajor Long. On account of the near approach of the seventh decennial census of the United States, Major Woods had been (>rdered by Gov. llamsey, of the territory of Minnesota, to take it for the Pembina settlement. He found in and around this place 295 males and 342 females, the most of this population presumably being halfbreeds. In 1840 the traders had 1,210 carts and at the time of the takiug of Woods' census the number must have been many more.

Major Woods with the most of his party returned up the valley by the trail that they had followed down the same, but Captain Pope organized a secondary expedition at Pembina and returned up stream in canoes for the purpose of examining the river. He notes the streams that enter Red river Irom either side. Those between Pembina and ihe mouth of Ked Jiake river are stated by him to be as follows: 'I'wo Rivers, Park, Marais No. 1. (from the east) Big Salt, Marais No. 2, (from the we.st.) Turtle, Ma- .rais No. 3, (from the east) and a small stream called Coulee de V Anglais. The Park, Big Salt and Turtle he states to be about eighteen yards wide, and the Red Lake river as being fifty yards in width near its mouth, fourteen feet deep, and as having a more rapid current than Red river. He placed the head of navitration on Red river at the month of the Bois des Sioux.

Tre-Settlement Annals 31

In speaking of the country Captain Pope says: "The valley of Red liiver is entirely alluvial in its formation, no rocks iu place being found in its entire length within the territory of the United States. It abounds with bowlders or erratic blocks of granite, which in all cases are very much rounded by the action of water. They are most abundant upon the highest ridges of the prairies, and cause all the rapids in the small streams tributary to Red river. About seventy miles to the north of our frontier a secondary limestone appears at the falls of Red river, which is unquestionably the basis of the whole valley, but at what depth below the surface it is impossible to say."

Captain Pope's error m supposing that the partially rounded form of bowlders, really chiefly due to glacial agency, was the result of decomposition aided by running water or any form of fluvatile action, was but that of his time. His speculation respecting the bedrock of the whole valley being the same Silurian limestone that outcrops below Winnipeg, is but little borne out by the records of artesian wells that have been bored at many different points in the valley within the last dozen years. The limestone beds beneath the valley are of different epochs, and wherever present at all beneath the flat land of its lower depression, are apt to be overlain by successive beds of shale, though this is not invariably the case. The depth down to bedrock on the valley plain and through soil, clay, sand and gravel, varies, approximately, from 100 to 400 feet. And the first rock struck may be either shale, limestone, sandstone or Laurentian granite, according to locality. . (For this county see pages 7-10.)

Captain Pope also states that there were then three diflferent cart routes leading from the Red River Valley to St. Paul that were used by the traders and trappers of those times. These constituted a southern, middle and northern route. The first was by way of the Minnesota river to Big Stone lake, often taking to the prairies instead of following the valley bottom; the other two led as one up the Mississippi valley and then diverged, the middle route following the course of the Sauk river and across country to the site or vicinity of Fort Abercrombie. this being the route of the expedition; the more northern route was by way of Crow W;ng valley, passing around the north end of Otter Tail lake and reaching Red river at the mouth of the Buffalo river. These divergent trails passed down to Pembina on either side of Red river. In crossing Mitmesota, where the country was partially wooded, they followed the prairie as much as possible.

The First Post-Office In North Dakota

The first post-office in this state was established at Pembina about the year 1849. Previously, the Hudson Bay company had been forwarding their mail destined for Canada and England, twice a year, spring and fall, by special messengers or carriers to St. F;iiil, from whence it was forwarded to its destination. Each half year the mail as gathered from the company's numerous outposts consisted of a thousand or more packages. From England mail still came by ship through Hudson Bay.

Kittson interested himself in the etablishment of a monthly mail between Pembina and St. Paul. The mail was to leave Pembina the first of each month for Crow Wing village, but there was no specified time as to its arrival at that place or at Pembina on the return trip. The route was by way of Thief ri'er, Ked, Cass and Leech lakes. The carriers were halfbreeds, and the mail was forwarded either way by cart trains in summer, a part of the way by canoe, and by dog-sledges in winter. Joseph k. Brown was contractor for the route between Pembina and Crow Wing, another route already being in use from the latter place down to St. Paul.

Norman W. Kittson was appointed postmaster sometime in 1849. In 1851 Charles Cavileer came to Pembina and a few days after his arrival there was appointed assistant postmaster by Kittson and did all the business of the office. By that time the transportation business of the country had increased to such an extent that the government established a custom-house at Pembina and Charles Cavileer was appointed collector. 'I'he customhouse was one of the log buildings of the place, as was also the post-office. Arrangements were also made with the Hudson Bay company to deliver their mail at Pembina and have it forwarded from that point.

Political Representation

From 1849 to 1858 this portion of the Red lliver Valley was a part of Minnesota territory. Originally a part of the JA)uisiana purchase, the changes of name and of boundaries of the northwestern country down to the time Minnesota territory was created, were many, as this region became attached to one or another of the successive territories that from time to time were being formed. When the territory was organized on June 1, 1849, St. Paul, which became its capital, was nothing more than a village and at that time mainly dependent on the northwestern fur trade, while Minneapolis was not, as yet, founded, the site on the west side of the river then being a part of the Fort Snelling military reserve. Northwestern 31innesota and the Ked River country constituted the Pembina leo;islative district, and although the white population was scant, it was presumed that it was entitled to be represented in ihe territorial legislature. 'J'he district does not appear to have been represented in the first and second sessions of the legislature, nor to have voted in the first and second elections for delegate to Congress. But in 1852, at the third