Trempealeau County, Wisconsin - Chapter 10: Historical Papers, 1917 (part 2 of 4)

Perhaps these glimpses into pioneer life portray a condition full of poverty, misery, sorrow and hopelessness. But such was not the case. True, the early Scandinavians, like most all other new settlers in this county, had little of property and much of poverty, often misery and privations. But they did have a fund of good cheer and hope, and a hospitality that is unknown at this day prevailed. If one had little it was freely divided with one less fortunate. Lodging and board were given the traveler out of such scantiness as the house afforded, style and fashion never mentioned or thought of, the spare bedroom was always in order in the mansion which consisted of one room and perhaps an attic, a sociability and neighborly feeling there prevailed that does not exist today. Religious meetings, socia gatherings and dancing parties were had in these small and simple but happy homes. There were discussed the political affairs, county and town matters, church and domestic problems, agriculture and markets.

The early Scandinavians of this county were religiously inclined. Therefore, as soon as so many had located in a locality as to deserve the name of "settlement," the first work of a social nature was usually to perfect a church organization. Literary societies, debating clubs and singing schools were also common. The Scandinavians of Trempealeau County have now 27 churches, though nearly all are modest structures, they are all neat, comfortable and sufficient for the needs in their respective localities, and represent considerable money outlay. They have, to my knowledge, three parochial school houses, possibly more, one college, one Scandinavian insurance company which was organized in 1877 mainly by the efforts of Jens K. Hagestad, who became its first president, N. L. Tolvstad its first secretary, and Iver P. Enghagen its first treasurer, which office he has held continually and still holds. At its last annual meeting this company carried $5,058,376.00 in risks and had the neat little sum of $20,445.37 in its treasury.

As before mentioned, the Scandinavians who left their mother country to seek new homes were of the laboring class. So were the Scandinavian pioneers of this county. Labor was their only asset. Strong and willing hands, industrious and frugal habits, honest and cheerful hearts, perseverance and undaunted courage, was all they brought with them. These are worthy characteristics and made the Scandinavians a powerful factor in the development of this county. Labor was an absolute necessity in the building of homes and transforming the wild country into productive farms. Being honest and steady workers, they were sought by the older settlers as farm hands, artisans, salesmen, and so on, and they eagerly availed themselves of the opportunities when not needed on their claims.

Compared with their English, Scotch and Irish fellow pioneers, they were at a decided disadvantage, not being conversant with the language of their adopted country. Consequently, very few of them held public office or clerical positions - at any rate out of all proportion to their numbers or natural abilities. They were, however, well equipped in their own language, they could all read, most of them write and cipher, and many enjoyed higher education. Weekly newspapers were soon found in every home, and they were as well posted on current events as their English-speaking brethren. Therefore, though not foremost on the public rostrum, they were an intelligent and safe factor in the settlement of all public questions. Their patriotism and loyalty to the land of their adoption is evidenced by the number of volunteers that went forth from among them to save the Union during the dark days of the Rebellion, and their record for valor is second to none.

Of the manual labor that has gone into the development of this county, no nationality has contributed so much as the Scandinavians. Go where you will throughout this county and see the fertile, well-fenced farms, with their comfortable homes, spacious and well-painted barns and other farm buildings, good roads and substantial bridges, fine public buildings and parks, business houses and manufacturing estabhshments, it would be hard to point to that which has not some of the Scandinavian brain or brawn in its make-up, for which the pioneer directly or indirectly deserves credit.

Taken collectively, they had their faults as well as their virtues, but their good traits outweighed their bad ones, leaving the balance in their favor. This is the heritage they left to the cosmopolitan population of Trempealeau County of today. (By Peter H. Johnson.)

Scandinavian Settlers. In the spring of the year 1854, there was a large number of immigrants that left their native home, Hardanger, Norway, for the United States. Most of them settled temporarily in Dane and Columbia counties, this State.

At that time government lands that seemed to be of any value in these counties were taken up by settlers and speculators. These sturdy young men and women, without any means to buy the higher-priced lands held by speculators, and desiring to procure a home of their own without running too much in debt, began to look around for cheaper lands.

In 1855 the first immigration of Norwegians began in Trempealeau Valley, and the rumors of the fertile villages of Trempealeau and Jackson counties began to spread.

In 1857, Iver K. Syse, Iver and his son Orjans Torblaa arrived into North Beaver Creek. Mr. Syse settled in Trempealeau and the two Torblaas across the line in Jackson County.

two brothers, Thomas and Nels Herreid, the latter the father of C. N. Herreid, once Governor of South Dakota, Ole N. Skaar, Tosten R. Thompson, Nels B. Henderson, Lars Hanson, Ole Ellingson and Ole L Dale.

In 1859, Simon Nelson, Torkel Gunderson, Arne Arneson, Torkel Haldorson, Haldor and Iver Torkelson and Anve 0. Saed and several others arrived. These settled in the valley east and west of the county line in the vicinity of what was formerly known as Hegg Postoffice. The largest part of these settlers arrived on the same ship in 1854, including Knut K. Hagestad, Sr., and family.

The first settlers in Bear Creek Valley in 1858 were aforesaid Ole Ellingson, Lars Knutson, from Nummedahl, and Helge Knutson from Hallingdal. He served in the army and died in a Southern hospital in 1864. His brother, Anders Knutson, arrived three years later.

In 1860, Knut K. Hagestad, Sr., Lars Grinde, the two brothers Lars B. and Gullick Johnson, D. 0. Hagestad, Lasse Olson and several others arrived.

The first Norwegian Lutheran church organization was perfected in 1858. In 1859 the congregation decided to build a church, as the primitive farm dwellings were very inconvenient for religious gatherings. A large part of the dwellings were dug-outs in the side-hills, with Mother Earth for floors and walls, and poles, marsh hay and sod for roofing. Those that were more able built log houses 12 by 12 or 12 by 14, and the more pretentious structures were 16 by 16 by 10 feet high. The roofing consisted mostly of shakes cut out of oak logs with straight grain in 2-foot lengths and split similar to shingles with a broad ax for cleaver, and evened off to proper thickness with a hand ax.

After they had decided to build the church, every male member of the congregation that was able to swing an ax joined together and went south over the hills into South Beaver Creek to cut logs for the building. They were allowed for the sum of $4.00 to cut the logs that were needed for the structure 24 by 30 by 12 feet high on the lands of Ole Olson, a Swede. The logs were hewed in the woods and hauled in the winter of 1859-60, and the church was built likewise by the members in 1860-61. There was no money to spare to hire carpenters to do the work, but most of them were handy with tools, and all were wilhng to do their share of the work. This was the first Norwegian Lutheran church built in Western Wisconsin.

The old log church was superseded by a more modern frame structure in the early '70s. After the new church was completed, the old church was sold to Baard 0. Herreid, who moved it onto his farm one and one-half miles north of Hegg, and it is now used for a dwelling house.

The first School District of the North Branch of Beaver Creek was organized in 1861, now known as the Hegg district, and the Bear Creek District was organized in 1862.

The main promoter and organizer of the Ettrick Scandinavian Mutual Insurance Company was Jens K. Hagestad, who came into the valley in 1867 and bought the Iver K. Syse farm in 1868. The company was incorporated under the laws of the State February 16, 1877, and commenced business April 4, 1877, with the following oificers: Jens K. Hagestad, President; N. L. Tolvstad, Secretary, and Iver P. Engehagen, Treasurer, who has served the company as Treasurer up to the present time. (By E. J. Brovold.)

The County in 1871. At the close of school in March, 1871, I knew little of Trempealeau County personally, outside of Trempealeau Village, Galesville and the Prairie. The county was generally spoken of as the Tamarack, the Openings, Caledonia, Black River, Decorah Prairie, Hardy Creek, Beaver Creek, French Creek, Lake Cooley, Over the Pass, Holcomb Cooley, Over the Ridge, Square Bluff, American Valley, Travis Valley, Chimney Rock, Elk Creek, Bruce Valley, and the Beef River Valley. The county was localized in these terms, but the territory was not definite, as each overlapped the others nearby. The postoffices, as I recall them, were Trempealeau, Galesville, Ettrick, Arcadia, Pigeon Falls, Chimney Rock, Osseo, and Hamhn. The natural objects in the county were Trempealeau Mountain, Trempealeau Lake, Trempealeau Bluffs, Decorah Peak, Whistler Pass, Barn Bluff, Square Bluff and Chimney Rock. They no doubt will remain a monument to the Almighty power to whom all nature responds.

I had then been no farther north than the one trip to Arcadia Christmas Eve, but I knew of Caledonia as the home of Donald and Alex McGilvray, Joshua Rhodes, Charles Holmes, D. D. Chappell, Pussy WiUiams, John Bohrnstedt, Christian Schmidt, Thomas Hayter, John Arntz, William Suttie, Frank Bender, Ira Ramsden, John Hess, R. C. Towner, John Towner, Gilbert Gibbs, Al Gibbs, William Post, Moses Ladd, Charles Pickering, J. C. Polyblank, C. C. Bigelow and Mr. Beardsley.

Over the Pass - Dodge, not then organized, as the home of Mat Brom, R. Baumgartner, Charles Keith, Jake Schaffner, Joe Pellowski, Paul Rudneck, J. L. Sanderson, Joseph Utter, Frank Rushka, John Wier, Andrew Losinski, John Wicke, Peter Pellowski and Charles Cleveland.

Burnside as the home of George H. Markham, A. A. Markham, Giles Cripps, Martin W. Borst, Lee Hutchins, William Russell, D. C. Cilley, John Haakenson and James Reid.

Lincoln as the home of Thomas Lake, David Wade, Henry Stratton, Henry Freeman, F. W. Ingalls, Moses B. Ingalls, David Wood, Alvah Wood, G. M. Follette and Mr. Irving.

Sumner and Beef River Valley as the home of R. C. Field, J. L. Linderman, Ed. Matchette, Charles Shores, V. A. Gates, William Henry, Otto Langerfield, W. F. Carter, Alex, and John Tracy, W. H. Thomas, P. B. WiUiams, D. J. Lyon, Ben Webster, James Rice, Dennis Lawler, D. L. Remington, Thomas Cox, V. W. Campbell, James King, Hezekia Hyslop, Scott Hotchkiss, Elias Gay, F. Fuller, John Lovesey, William Lindsay, James Mclntyre, Henry Gilbert, John Carter, William Boyd, Zeb, John and Cosle Jones, James W. Grant and William Tomlinson and Robert Bowers.

There are other names which deserve mention and a place on this list that do not come to my memory after forty-one years of active busy life of responsibility and cares. I trust no person or family will feel disappointed or slighted in the omission of names from these lists. There has been no wish or purpose to leave any name off these lists ; and if names are not correctly spelled such errors were unintentional and unavoidable. To prepare such lists after a long span of years is not an easy task.

At the time of which I write, Whistler Pass, a fall or dent in the bluff above the farm of James Field, over which the highway was built from the Prairie and the Tamarack Valley into the Trempealeau Valley, now in the town of Dodge, was a term of frequent mention, and much of the travel from the western part of the territory over the ridge was on that highway. The Pass attracted my attention through curiosity, no doubt, and led me to make an early visit to it. From Martin's Corners the Pass was plainly seen to the north. Whistler Pass remains, but has lost much of its frequent mention, and of its early notoriety.

Many Winnebago Indians were then camped and lived much of the year along the river above Trempealeau Village, and one village near Trempealeau Lake was said to number 800 or more people, a portion of whom were of mixed blood. Several "half-breed" families lived in Trempealeau Village, the men generally being strong, fine-looking fellows, the most distinguished among them being Antoine Grignon, and some of his descendants, with those of the Bibault family, have been and are residents of the county, and on the whole have been good citizens. Thede Booher was styled "The Big Indian," a name generally applied to him about the county to the time of his decease.

Trempealeau Village, in the fall of 1870, was a thriving, busy place, its streets and market-places full of teams, and its business places full to overflowing with country people, farmers who came to market produce and purchase farm and home supplies. They came from Decorah Prairie and beyond Black River ; from the head of Beaver Creek Valley nearly to Black River Falls ; from the head of the Trempealeau Valley nearly to Merrilan ; from Pigeon Creek northeast into Jackson County; from the Elk Creek valleys and over the ridge in Beef River Valley ; they came from Chimney Rock Valley, and the Traverse Valley away out in the Mondovi country. Many came to the Trempealeau market 30, 40, 50 and 60 miles. Before this I had not seen so busy a mart, emporium, entrepot, or place of traffic as was the beautiful village of Trempealeau nestling at the foot of Trempealeau Bluffs, and fronting on the Mississippi River, with its teeming activity of soil pi'oducts and human freight carried by the then wonderful Mississippi River steamers, with skow bottom, and of ponderous width.

The most frequently mentioned as wealthy people in the county, as I recall, were Ben Healy, John Rhodes, W. A. Johnston, Isaac Clark, Wilson Davis, George H. Markham, and R. C. Field. The most popular politicians in the county, that is, the most likely to be elected when candidates for office, were N. D. Comstock, A. A. Arnold and A. W. Newman. The most noted horsemen were Moses King and Lee Hutchins. The wittiest lawyer was Frank Utter. Among the jolliest men were Ralph Martin, Pussy Williams, Marvin Babbit, Sr., Thomas Sutchff, Jimmy Field and Henry Teeple. The most popular man with the women was Gay T. Storm. The most frequently mentioned clei'gymen were James Squier and D. 0. Van Slyke. The most powerful men were Jack McCarthy, Aaron Kribs and John Bugbee. The only brewer was Jacob Melchoir ; the leading miller was Wilson Davis, and the best known butcher was Bill Blume. The noted Indians were old Chief Black Hawk and "Big Indian," Thede Booher. The most skillful blacksmith was J. B. Ingalls, while the greatest threshers were Jim Merwin and Ike Wright. The leading saloonkeeper was Pete Eichman, and the most dead-sure rifle shot was Bob Nibs. The great mule-driver was Philo Beard, and the best known stage-driver was Jerry Webber. It is my impression the most noted singers were the Grignon sisters. Others, no doubt, deserve mention, but memory fails me.

Some of the pioneer women of Trempealeau County had been delicately reared, most of them had known the com.forts of life, all had left associations which were dear to them. The sundering of these ties was not easy, nor was it a condition to be sought. It is but natural that they were strongly attached to their old homes, friends and comforts. Ties of kindred and friendship were to be broken; comfortable homes left behind; friends of a lifetime to be parted with, when with their husbands they set their faces westward for a new life and new homes, they knew not where. All beyond the city of Buffalo was then the West, Detroit was in the West, and Chicago and Milwaukee were in the far West. In many instances they knew it must be among strangers, and that privations, and even e.xtieme dangers, were to be met and mastered - at least endured. These pioneer women shared in all the toils of weary journeys, in sunshine and in storm, ever westward. They did not grumble of the coarse faro and humole, oftentimes rude, accommodations of wagon and roadside ; the canal-boat and tfte open stage, the log tavern, and at times the open-air bivouac. These women were always the brave members of the family or the party. Often late in autumn, or in the early spring, not infrequently in the cold storms, the discouraging sleet and mist and the complaining chilly winds, they went bravely on to the very outposts of civilization, over long, lonely and farreaching prairies, the gloomy forests, dismal roads, often mere trails beset with stumps, quagmire, and where no sign of civilization or human habitation was to be seen, except the wigwam and hut of the then dangerous savage. They traveled largely through a country without settlers or any evidence of civihzation, at times even making roads upon which to travel.

Can we picture the trials that came to their brave hearts, in hours of bitterness and loneliness, thus removed from the homes and kindred they had left behind - remembrances which must have risen up before them often and often, and how extremely bitter must have been those recollections, and yet, through their tears which must have silently flowed, they stood brave sentinels to their little ones who clung to them for comforting words and care. A word picture fails to give the full facts. Such feelings were natural and nurtured in their hearts ; yet they bore these and other burdens as bravely as did the renowned "mothers of ancient Sparta." Who will, I ask, who can pay these pioneer women of the West, and of Trempealeau County, the full measure of praise they so richly deserve?

The many sports and pleasures for the pioneer man, such as hunting the deer, the wolf, the wild fowls and other game; the sport of fishing, and the pleasure of roaming at will, all suitable to the rougher nature and coarser tastes of man were denied to these women, who with their children were shut up in log cabins or rude huts, often without floors, doors, or windows, - often filled with smoke and into which the chill of winter whistled, and the stars at night looked down upon those faithful women and mothers and their sleeping children; often with no furniture except the rudest kind, and without kitchen utensils save kettle and frying-pan, and almost totally destitute of crockery, - seldom even with tinware, they made that dearest condition of life, the home, possible and a positive fact. For weeks, for months and even for years in a continued struggle without modern-day conveniences and helps, they struggled and they won ; and these pioneer women helped make Trempealeau County what it is today. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

Cruise of the Spray. One day during the latter part of April in 1866 the little steamboat Spray swung up to the river front landing at Trempealeau and stopped for refreshments and supplies for the crew. "She was a trim little boat," said the old riverman, "about 30 feet long and 10 feet wide, and was a flat-bottomed craft with a stern paddle wheel."

The crew remained in town about an hour when the boat pulled out for its journey up the Trempealeau River. Arrived at the Trempealeau navigation became impeded by snags and leaning trees, and a gang of men was kept busy removing these obstacles. Saws and axes were brought into play, and now and then a headline was run out and fastened to a tree and the capstan used to drag the boat over a shoal. Two men stood on the forward deck with pike-poles to shove the boat away from the bank in

Thus the steamboat struggled slowly along up the river, clearing its way as it went, but of all the difficulties met with the wooden wagon bridge was the most formidable, for settlers living along the river hearing of the approaching steamboat where on hand to protest against the damaging of their bridges. However, in every case except one, the officers of the boat persuaded the people who resisted them that the establishment of navigation on the river meant more to them than the loss of a portion of their bridge. Some of the settlers hailed the coming of the boat with joy, taking it as a messenger of progress come to open an easy way to the world's markets, while others cursed the audacious little "Spray" as "another freak endeavoring to establish an impossibility," the navigability of the river. Still others took the steamboat venture as a joke and laughed at the idea of navigating a stream that a boy could wade when the water was at its normal stage. But still they must have looked at the coming of a steamboat more as a novelty than anything else, and made the most of it by being on hand to feast their eyes upon the wayward little craft.

Here and there along the route a few of the settlers would get aboard the Spray, to enjoy a ride on the Trempealeau River. Among these was Daniel Bigham of Arcadia, who boarded the boat down near the old Dan Enghsh place and rode nearly to the present site of Arcadia. Dan was interested in watching the boat navigate the river, but says if he had been in a hurry he would have made better time walking. "It took a good deal of time to cut out the snags and trees that obstructed the channel," said Dan, "and when we grounded the engine would stop and wait for the water to wash the sand from under the boat. They destroyed all of the bridges in the town of Arcadia," continued Mr. Bigham, "and it caused considerable commotion among the settlers, for in that day with but few sawmills and a scarcity of lumber it was difficult to build a bridge."

The news that a real live steamboat was actually navigating the modest little Treampealeau traveled so much faster than the boat itself that the up-river people were on hand to welcome the strange visitor when it arrived.

When the Williamsburg settlers heard the shrill whistle of the boat they flocked down to the landing on the Baker place, and as the gangplank touched shore many felt that the marvelous day of prosperity was at hand. In fact a market landed in the burg that day, for the captain of the boat bought bread and eggs from the inhabitants and paid the expectant farmers for it in clean cash.

On the 2nd day of May, 1866, George H. Markham made record in his diary of the passage up the Trempealeau River of the steamboat Spray. The Markhams settled in the Trempealeau valley not far from the site of the present village of Independence in 1856, and Mrs. Geo. H. Markham distinctly remembers seeing the boat on its journey up the river.

The Spray continued on its course up the river until the wagon bridge located three miles below Whitehall was reached, when it was met by David Wade and David Wood, representing the town of Lincoln, who refused it further passage on account of necessitating the destruction of the bridge.

The people of Lincoln had heard of the approaching steamboat and of its wanton destruction of bridges on the lower river, and had decided not to allow such destruction in their territory. They were practical men and had no rosy dreams of the future steamboat activity on the river, and considered their bridge worth more than the vague possibilities of a future waterway market.

And so the adventurous rivermen turned back, and on the journey down stream they stopped at Arcadia to take on a shipment of flour from the Massuere Company mill.

On account of the current and the river being free of snags and trees the return run was much faster and easier than the up-river trip. At Marshland the boat was laid up for some time, but it finally resumed its course into the Mississippi and completed its round trip at LaCrosse.

Why such a trip was undertaken is somewhat of a mystery. Some say that the Northwestern Railroad Company gave the owners of the boat a bonus for not compelling the road to maintain a draw bridge across the river at Marshland. Others say the journey was made to determine the navigability of the Trempealeau River. Whatever the motive it certainly established the fact that the river was not a suitable stream for navigation. - (By Eben D. Pierce.)

Early Trempealeau. I left the State of New York in the spring of 1851 for the West, traveling by rail, by stage, and on foot, and by steamboat, arriving at Montoville, now Trempealeau, Wisconsin, on May 6, 1851. As this place I found James Reed. He lived in a log cabin. His business was buying furs from the Indians for the Prairie du Chien Fur Company. While here for a short time I went out each day in different directions exploring the country, going on one trip north to the Trempealeau River near where the village of Blair now stands, finding the country everywhere swarming with wild deer and game of all kinds, and many large or small camps of Indians. The soil appeared to be of good quality, - some prairie, some burr oak openings, some rolling, and high bluffs and deep valleys, with plenty of good pure water, springs, creeks and rivers. After being out several days I returned to Mr. Reed's and then procured an axe of Mr. Reed and went northeast into the burr oak openings, and I selected a claim of 160 acres of land and cut logs and rolled up the body of a cabin, and marked out my claim, cutting name and date on the logs of the cabin, then returned to Mr. Reed's, after having made the first claim known to me in Trempealeau County. I then took the boat up the Mississippi River to look for work, .arriving at the mouth of Chippewa River and going up that river to the falls I obtained work for one year at good wages. During the year I wrote many letters to my father and friends in the East, describing the country about Montoville and urging them to come and settle there, and at the end of the year, the last of May, 1852, I returned to Montoville to look after my claim, and finding there a most wonderful change, new buildings along the river, and here and there out on the prairie. Mr. Reed was still there in business. I went out to see my claim and found one, Wilham Cram, had bought the land on the south and adjoining my claim, and was building a log house. I then did a little work on my claim, and then to keep my promise to work for the company another year I went back to Chippewa Falls, where I worked one year and seven montihs. Then in January, 1854, I returned to Montoville, then finding that a more wonderful change had taken place. Hotels, stores, shops and other business places, churches, school houses and farms scattered here and there in all directions, and going out to my claim I found that my father, with all of his family, had bought out William Cram, the place adjoining my claim, and that a man had jumped my claim and had made some improvements, for which he would not give up except upon the payment of fifty dollars, which I paid and took possession. Later I sold it to Charles Pickering.

In the spring of 1854 Alexander McGilvray settled on Black River and ran a ferry boat across the river, instead of fording as before. The place then became known as McGilvray's Ferry. In the summer I bought property there and built a store, blacksmith shop, and also opened a farm, and early in 1855 our settlers found the need for a school and rented the front room of my house for one year and employed Cecelia Segar to teach the first school at McGilvray's Ferry. A new school house was built for the second term, and Fanny A. Olds was employed as teacher, and here in this school house at the first term was organized the first debating school in the county. Our people all became so deeply interested that they came from far and near and took part in the debates, and established a weekly newspaper called the "Singinezia," to be edited by the members and read at each meeting. These schools were kept up for a number of years, discussing many great and important questions to the lasting benefit of all that took part in them. Mr. McGilvray, the grand old Scotchman, being the first settler here, named the place Caledonia, after his native place in Scotland. Soon after Trempealeau County was organized and the county seat was established at Galesville, a beautiful young town on the banks of Beaver creek. Our early settlers were a very intelligent, industrious and progressive people. Thus school houses, churches, villages, hotels, stores, grist mills, saw mills, and all kinds of public improvements was the order of the day from the beginning of our early settlement. Always manifesting the highest degree of intelligent progression, thus changing a land that was once the home of the Indian and wild beasts of the forest to a land that now stands upon the highest pinnacle of American civihzation. Thus we mention but a small part of the events of our pioneer days from 1851 to 1861.

From 1861 to the spring of 1864 I kept my place at McGilvray's Ferry, and in the month of May, 1864, Benjamin Oliver and I went north to look for land to homestead. We found a few settlers in Trempealeau valley near the mouth of Pigeon Creek. The settlement was called Whitehall. From there we went up Pigeon Creek about six miles. There we found Hely Fitch, his mother and sister, who told us that they had settled there the year before, and that Mr. Fitch froze to death in the winter of the deep snow ; that the old man had to go up into the cooley about three miles to cut and stack hay to winter his oxen on, and that the snow got so deep that he could not driver the oxen there after hay, and to keep them alive he would go on his snowshoes every day and bring a bundle of hay on his back. The weather turned very cold and he went for a bundle and came back about half way and fell with his hay, where they found him next day froze solid. Through the snow being so deep they could not walk through it and had to shovel and break a path to get to him, but they got him home late that night. Thus that cooley was named Fitch's Cooley. After hearing their heartrending story, we went on up the creek about four miles into a cooley southeast of Pigeon Falls, where Mr. Oliver selected his homestead. We then went north over the bluffs about one mile. There I selected my homestead. This Fitch family were the only settlers up in Pigeon valley in Trempealeau County. Mr. Oliver and myself moved onto our land in August, 1864, and George H. Olds and James Phillips moved in one month later. Then in the spring Wm. Olds and L. B. Man and H. Smith, P. Peterson, L. Larson, Phineas Wright, C. H. Hines, Andrew Peterson and Mr. Richardson, and some others, moved in during the summer of 1865.

In the faU of 1864 and early winter 1865, Mr. Oliver, Mr. Phillip, G. H. Olds and myself bought and hauled lumber from Merrilan and built a school house, and employed Mary Nott to teach the first term of school in Pigeon Valley, beginning with twelve scholars, but having some more at the close of the term. The second term was taught by Jane A. Olds, and the third term by Marilda Lyons. In these early days our people organized debating schools, where some of the most profound questions affecting the weal or woe of our people were discussed, and to this day we can see and realize the benefits from the food for thought that was brought out in those old debating schools, and I am happy to know that some of those lights that shone so brightly in those early days have not all gone out yet in 1912, and I hope that other and brighter lights will continue to shine until the end of time.

Among the many early settlers of Pigeon Valley was one, Mr. Fuller, who settled in a cooley northwest of Pigeon Falls about one mile, where he had built a small farm house, and during a heavy thunder storm had laid down with his wife upon a bed that stood with its head near a south window. Mr. Fuller lay on the bed, his head in line with the window, his wife lying back of him, when a bolt of lightning passed through the window, striking him on top of the head and passing the length of his body and from his feet to the floor and out through the side of the house and to the ground, thus killing him instantly, while his wife was unharmed except a slight shock. Thus this cooley was called Fuller's Cooley. A year or two after his body was taken up from his farm and was found to be petrified, and required five or six persons to take it out of the grave. - (J. D. Olds in letters to Hon. H. A. Anderson, Feb. 14 to Feb. 17, 1912.)

Trempealeau Prairie. William Trim has seen all the changes come to the county from its really wild state to its present condition of wealth and comfort, having resided in it since the fifteenth day of October, 1858, to this time, except during the three years that he was in the army. He saw the red schoolhouse built at Wright's Corners in 1862 by Al Holcomb ; saw the mill and dam put in by the Holcombs and Mr. Grant in 1860 ; knew the first teacher in the red schoolhouse, a Miss Sumara Grant, afterward Mrs. Carsely, her term being in 1862 and 1863. Mr. Carsely ran the saw- mill above Bortles, built by Mr. Grant when he and Holcomb dissolved partnership in the prairie mill. Abe Holcomb and Mr. Grant came to the prairie in the winter of 1860, Al Holcomb coming in the spring of that year. Hollister Wright was on his old farm when Mr. Trim settled in the vicinity in 1855. Elder Cook came in 1860, Ralph Martin in 1862. Trempealeau was a small village in October, 1858. Harvey Bowls kept a hotel, as also did Frank Utter. Thede Booher and Mr. Paine kept stores, and N. B. Grover a warehouse, to which he helped Mr. Wai'e haul corn in the winter of 1858-59 at 25 cents a bushel shelled. He attended the town meeting in the spring of 1859 at Trempealeau, the first meeting of that kind he ever attended, and there became acquainted with Mr. Sutcliffe and John Rhodes, Samuel Barr and others, who all lived in the Big Tamarack. He says a man by the name Whistler was an early settler over the Pass - being the first one - and that the Pass was named after him. The two sons of the man became homesick and traveled back to Dodge County, and Mr. Whistler and his wife soon abandoned the place and in an ox team returned to Dodge County. Thomas Knox was an early pioneer over the Pass and sold their claim to a Mr. Rudnick, who was the first Pole to settle in Pine Creek, in 1859 or 1860. This man and his wife paid Knox in halfdollar pieces the sum of $800 she had earned in Winona washing. Knox put the half dollars in a sack to carry on foot to Galesville, but at the Lee bridge over the Tamarack Creek he hid half of the money, finding the whole amount too heavy to carry at one time to Galesville, afterward returning for the half that he had hidden. In 1860 four Germans located north of Vernons, in the valley that has since been called German Valley. There were Koop, Pfefer, Were and Dopp. In 1858 the settlers in the Tamarack were Bortle, Cook and Vernon. On the west side of the prairie were Seby and Darwin Atwood, two Nashes and A. A. Whiting. In the south part were Stevens, Gillies, Brewins and Steadman. On the east toward Galesville were Anson Bell, Mr. King and a Mr. Hartz on the Isaac Wright farm, Thompson on old farm. A bai'n was built on the Thompson farm in 1859 ; the shingles were rived by Stark Butman from logs. Many of these shingles are now sound and good. William McDonough then lived on the old Martin farm, William Lee on the Chase Wasson farm. Later came Shaw and Howe above the Vernon farm. Castleman, a half -negro, lived on the Walsky farm. - (Interview with Stephen Richmond.)

Beaver Creek Valley. John Hess settled in Beaver Creek Valley in the fall of 1852. "There were very few families in this part of the country at that time," said Mr. Hess. "James Reed was living at Trempealeau or Reed's Landing, as it was called then, and he was the first white man I saw after coming here. The second season we were here I had a good crop of winter wheat, which had to be threshed with a flail. It was difficult to get it clean without a fanning-mill, and so I went down to Prairie du Chien to buy one and had it shipped to Trempealeau by boat. It was the only fanning-mill for miles around and I used to loan it to farmers up at Fountain City and across Black River in La Crosse County.

"Flour was hard to get, and one day when I was debating in my mind where I could get the next sack of flour, for we were out, James Reed came along and told me there was a mill over in Lewis Valley in La Crosse County, and described the trail leading to the valley so that I would have no trouble in following it. The next morning I got up at three o'clock and started over the trail for the mill, my wife accompanying me as far as Heuston's near Galesville. I found my way to Luther Lewis's mill, bought a fiftypound sack of flour, and walked home with it on my shoulder, having traveled between 25 and 30 miles.

"Pork was a luxury in those days and I remember walking up to North Bend to buy some of it of Thomas Douglass, who operated a sawmill on Black River. When I got there I found Mr. Douglass at work repairing a breakdown in the mill, and when I told him my errand he said he could let me have the pork, and as he was very much in need of help in repairing the mill he suggested that I pay for it in work.

"I worked for him five days for a hundred pounds of pork, and when I was ready to start home I built a raft of kant timbers, and loading my cargo onto it, started down river. I landed at the mouth of Beaver Creek and hid my pork in the woods and set out afoot for home to get an ox to 'pack' the meat with, but, as luck would have it, I came across my oxen feeding in the edge of a wood less than half a mile from where I landed. I drove one of the oxen down to the river and tied the pack of meat on his back with my suspenders and then drove him home.

"I'll tell you how we got our blacksmithing done the first few years after we came to Beaver Creek. We drove with an ox team to Trempealeau and then borrowed a skiff" and rowed across the river to Richmond, Minnesota, where there was a blacksmith shop. Sometimes it would take two days to make the trip, for if the smith had work ahead we would have to wait.

"Along in 1856-57 I bought a threshing machine. I went to Racine and bought a horse-power machine of the J. I. Case Company and paid $725 for it, and they shipped it to Chicago and thence to Dubuque, and from there it was shipped by boat to Trempealeau. It was the first threshing machine in this county, and I used to go many miles over mighty rough roads to do threshing. I went over to Arcadia and threshed for Noah Comstock, James Gaveney and Collins Bishop."

Mrs. Hess also has told in her quaint and pleasing way stories of pioneer experiences. She says: "The first few years we lived here our nearest neighbor was Charles H. Perkins, who lived over in the Tamarack, and as there was no road to their place from our home we used to go back and forth visiting, over a trail that lead across the bluffs. Mother was a great hand to knit and always took her knitting along when she went visiting, and that is how we happened to get our first chickens. You see we hadn't any chickens and had almost forgotten what an egg looked like, but Perkins' folks had a flock of chickens, though they didn't care to sell any. Well, mother was at their place one day and was just finishing a pair of stockings she was knitting when Mrs. Perkins asked her if she would sell a pair or two of them. Mother said no, she would not sell them, but would trade for some hens and offered to knit two pairs for four hens. The trade was agreed to and when mother completed her knitting contract she took the stockings over to Mrs. Perkins and brought the four hens home across the hills in her apron. To complete the flock father went to Treampealeau and succeeded in buying a rooster from Mr. Reed.

"Hogs were difficult to get, and the first one we were able to procure after we settled in our new home Mr. Hess got of James Reed in exchange for work. He cut nine cords of wood over on the island opposite Trempealeau for a sow, and was well pleased with the bargain.

"There were no churches anywhere near our place at that time, and it was a great treat when a preacher happened to come along and stay over Sunday with us. The neighbors would gather at our log house to hold religious services and after the meeting was over they would stay and visit.

"La Crosse was only a little country village then, with one hotel, a half dozen small stores, a blacksmith shop and a burned-down mill with the brick chimney left standing."

This was pioneering with all of its varied phases. There were hardships but joys as well, and it is hardship that gives zest to pleasure. There was a backwoods adventurous spirit in the rough life of that age and the pioneer will tell you that he took real comfort in his cabin home. And so we look back and see the log cabin dreaming in the solitude where the wild roses bloom in profusion, and the ox team and the breaking-plow creep slowly across the clearing, while the sunlight streaming through the valley turns the old grub-piles intoheaps of gold.-;-(By E. D. Pierce.)

Lewis Valley. In 1857 Lewis Niffin took up a quarter section of land about four miles above Arcadia, on a small creek that has since borne his name, being the first settler to locate directly above Arcadia. He erected a log hut near the creek, a few rods towards the Trempealeau River, from what is now the main road, between Arcadia and Independence. Mr. Niffin remained on his claim less than a year, when he abandoned it and left the country. In 1861 Richard Rook, an Englishman, came and picked out a location near Niffin's abandoned claim and put up a small building, but he was not favorably impressed with his new home and forsook it in a few months for a more suitable locality. Then came Alonzo Baker (about 1862) and took up a homestead in one of the branch coolies of Lewis Valley. But it remained for Capt. John D. Lewis to become the first settler in the main valley. In May, 1866, shortly after getting his discharge from the army, he took up the land now known as the Lewis farm and during the summer built a house and broke some land. The following summer, 1867, J. B. Gorton and Jonathan Busby moved into the valley. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

Newcomb Valley lies wholly in the town of Arcadia, opening into American Valley near the Penny schoolhouse, where the branches of the creek meet above the Miller and Bear pond. The valley runs east about four miles to the foot of the Preston hills. There are a number of small valleys known as coolies on either side in which good farms are located; among them are the Erickson, Hanson and Arneson farms, while the combes or coolies on the north side are known as the Knudtson and Rud farms and neighborhood. The main valley was settled in 1866 by Isaac Newcomb and his brother Harold, who came from Lewis Valley, La Crosse County, where they settled with their parents in 1855, emigrating from Tioga County, Pennsylvania. (In 1868 the parents also removed to Newcomb Valley, making their home with Isaac, with whom they hved out their lives, the father dying in 1873 and the mother in 1879.) So far as can be learned a family by the name of Van Scroch had for a short time occupied a log hut on an 85-acre tract, which Isaac Newcomb purchased through N. D. Comstock as agent, of Lot D. Rice, he getting his title from Dr. Bishop, who bought the lands from a Mrs. Hessey Vallandingham, the widow of a Kentucky soldier. She never occupied these lands. Mr. Newcomb homesteaded 160 acres adjoining this tract, which he improved and made into a valuable farm.

The early settlers who may be said to have been the pioneers in the valley were Isaac and Harold Newcomb, Andrew Knudtson, Arney Olson Rud, Stiner Knudtson, Lewis and Lars Hanson and a man named Rockwell. At the close of 1866 there were no settlers in the valley except the Newcombs, nor east to where Hans Solberg lived near Lake Slough. Solberg was known as Stocker in those early days. James McKivergin had settled in Preston on the old McKivergin farm, and the only tract over the hills was a single plow furrow to guide the traveler to these settlers' claims. The Knudtsons, Ruds, Ericksons and Hansons came in in 1867 and 1868, as did Mr. Scow. After that time settlers continued to locate in the valley, so that in 1876 all the lands had been taken up and were occupied. The Newcombs began improving their lands and in 1867 built houses and other buildings upon them. In the fall of 1868 the Penny schoolhouse was built, a mere board shell, and the winter term in 1868-69 was taught by W. L. Cummings, who boarded around with such settlers as were able to keep him. At some places Mr. Cummings was obliged to crawl to his bed because ' of the meagerness of the living and sleeping accommodations. He boarded principally with Jerry O'Brien, Ira Penny, Isaac Newcomb and John Truman. Other early teachers there were Kate Rudolf, Ida Smith and Eva Allen. The schoolhouse in Newcomb Valley was built in 1875 and was fir? taught by Ida Smith.

When Isaac Newcomb arrived he brought with him four cows, four head of young stock and a yoke of oxen, and with these possessions and 245 acres of land was considered as a well-to-do man.

The country was mighty new and people possessed of little money, but all were stout-hearted patriots determined to "make good," which many of them did after the coming of the railroad in 1874. About the only farm implement in the neighborhood was a dung-fork owned by Ira Penny, days might be written elaborately into pages of local incidents and gossip, among the most interesting being the bear story published in the Arcadia Leader in 1874, a newspaper owned by N. D. Comstock, and published after the new village was started on the Trempealeau River bottoms, where the flourishing village of Arcadia now stands.

families in the county, with comfortable homes and farm buildings, blooded stock, and being well provided with all farm conveniences, showing thrift and contentment. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

Holcomb Cooley lies partly in the town of Trempealeau, the greater part being in the town of Arcadia, and is in townships 19 and 20 north of range 8 west, opening into the Tamarack Valley, or running back east and northeast about two to three miles in width and footing up against French Creek and the Galesville hills more than three miles from the Tamarack Valley. Near the center it is widest. On the south side are several small valleys or coolies in the hills, with much the same conditions as on the north side, where in the early pioneer days stood dense forests of tamarack timber. Al and Abe Holcomb, brothers, who had settled on West Prairie and who had put in a dam in the Tamarack Creek, in section 5, township 18 north of range 9 west, and erected a saw mill, filed claims on much of the land in this cooley and, taking possession, began to cut and carry to their mills saw logs which were cut into lumber for use by the settlers. Hence the name Holcomb Valley, or Cooley, was given to the region by early settlers and has not been changed, though the men after whom the valley was named have been long dead. In 1870 the saw mill did little work, and about 1875 the mill and power were converted into a grist mill by Square A. Picket, who had come into possession of it, and who later sold it to other parties, who continued to operate it till 1885.

Much of the land in and about the region of the Tamarack Valley was marshy, and to reach the cooley when the ground was frozen was an almost impossible task, except by way of the French Creek Valley, until a series of corduroy roads was built over the marsh places. The Holcombs also built and for a number of years operated a windlass on the hills to facilitate transportation. The teams were unhitched from the vehicles and driven singly up the bluff and the loads dragged up by the windlass. In fact, teams descending could not be driven down the bluff side hitched to a wagon This was in operation as late as 1868 or 1869. It is a fact almost forgotten by the oldest living pioneer today, though familiar to all of them at the time. The first settlers to permanently locate and improve lands in the cooley were Wenzel Brom, known as Big Wenzel, and his cousin, Wenzel Brom, known as Little Wenzel, and John Holemy, Bohemians, who had immigrated m 1859 with Mathias Brom, who later settled in Pine Creek in what is now a part of the town of Dodge ; also Ole 0. Chestleson, still living in the cooley on the land he homesteaded or pre-empted; John Johnson, who later removed to the State of Nebraska; Oluff Olson, Hendrick Olson, Mat Olson and perhaps one or two other families. These settlers came in at various dates from 1861 to 1865. John Brom later than 1868 homesteaded lands in the cooley. Among those who came before 1869. not mentioned above were Hans Hanson, John Hanson and Easton Hoverson.

In 1868 a log schoolhouse was built in the cooley on the site of the present one, and the first school taught in the winter of 1868-69 The nearest business place was Old Arcadia, where Gay T. Storm conducter' a store and David Masseure owned and operated a grist mill in 1868 The road over the ridge to this store and mill was a rough unimproved tract

Frank Brom first visited these business places in the late fall of 1868 with Matthias Olson, they going to mill with two yoke of oxen and a cart, having to lead the oxen up and down the steep hillsides, and then it was a dangerous journey to make. The country was indeed wild and desolate in that late fall day, being a series of hills and bluffs on all sides, with scarcely a settler anywhere in sight till they trundled down into Arcadia. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

Albert Tracy came in the spring of 1865. Sydney Conant and the Messrs. Taft and Drake came in the fall of that year. The experiences of Conant are typical of early life in that valley. Starting out on foot from his old home in Amsterdam he encountered Mr. Tracy, who advised him to settle near Arcadia. But upon reaching the Tamarack and finding no one who had heard of Arcadia, he decided to enquire at Bishop's settlement. Arriving at the settlement he found that he was at Arcadia itself. From there he went to the head of what has since been called American Valley and staked out a claim. He had some breaking done and cut some marsh grass, and then started a house. Some of the lumber was hauled from Amsterdam. Most of it, however, was obtained from near what is now Merrillan, Tracy and Conant going to the woods there with two yoke of oxen each, and each bringing home a large load of lumber and shingles. Conant finished the woodwork of his house, but as the plasterer was taken ill was forced to move in before the interior was completed. Then came the terrible cold. Dry oak logs were burned for fuel. The stove was heated red-hot, a small space around the stove was enclosed with blankets, within which the family huddled. As soon as the weather moderated Conant made some plaster from lime, sand and horsehair, which he had secured, and started plastering. The plaster froze solid as soon as applied. On the following Sunday, Taft and Tracy helped complete the work.

Drake was not so fortunate. On his place adjoining Conant's he had gathered hay, erected a stable and provided for his stock. Lumber had been hauled for a house, but the weather was too cold for building operations. His family was then living near Trempealeau.

The Conants opened their home to them and the two families spent the winter in the one-roomed house, every inch of the floor space being occupied entirely by beds.

The next spring more land was broken and a fair acreage of crops put in. Breaking the land was an interesting operation. It was usually done with a big Whitewater plow and four or five yoke of oxen. The sight and sound of the large "grubs" being torn from the ground was an interesting one. Often the plow would be stuck in an unusually large "grub," and this meant a delay of an hour or more. As the year passed other settlers located in the valley, but to this day it has retained its original name, given in honor of the eastern ancestry of the pioneers.

Rainey Valley. In 1865 John Rainey, with his wife, settled on lands in sections 19, 21 and 9; James Hunter, a son-in-law, settled on lands in sections 20, 21 and 9 ; John Berner on lands in sections 29, 19 and 9 ; and Truman Brie on lands in 19 and 30, 19-9 west. They were the pioneers in the valley.

The valley is about two miles long, and branching in section 20 runs westerly one and a half miles into section 19. Later these lands all changed hands; John D. Rainey soon became the owner of lands settled by John Earner, and Samuel Rainey, James Pringle and others settled in the valley, and numerous parties took up the hill and bluff lands. The valley and the hill farms became valuable and have long been some of the most desirable about the village of Arcadia.

In 1865 David Bennett and his brother William Bennett settled across the river, northeast of Arcadia, and were also pioneers. John Weaver may be said to have been an early settler, as may also Casper Smith. John Rainey, James Hunter, John D. Rainey and Samuel Rainey were the most prominent of the pioneers and early settlers in the valley. Mrs. Catherine Hunter, later known as Catherine J. Beveridge, took an active part in the interests of the valley in early days. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

Meyers Valley is wholly in the town of Arcadia, and lies about one and a half miles south of the village of Arcadia. It is really a series of short pocket valleys with a rich black loam soil, and long has been one of the choice farm localities in the town, and perhaps in the county. Grain growing was long the chief industry, but stock raising, grass and corn has all along had much attention, and in recent years dairying has flourished among the people of the valley. It is a natural locality for diversified or intensive farming, and its people were really always well-to-do when the exclusively grain growing neighborhoods were poor and almost destitute of money. The first settlers in Meyers Valley were Frank J. and Carl Zeller and Nic and Caspar Meyers. The Zellers met the Meyers at Roxbury in Dane County, Wisconsin, and they soon formed plans to come to Trempealeau County, the Meyers furnishing ox team and wagon, by which they traveled. Arriving in Trempealeau Village, they were directed to go by way of the prairie and Whistler Pass to Arcadia, the route being little else than a trail. However, they completed the journey to the Bishop settlement, and partook of their first meal at the home of David Bishop, it being cooked and served by Mrs. Bishop, who, after the death of Mr. Bishop, married Charles Mercer, and who is the person who gave to Arcadia territory, town and village the name now and for long so well known. At that time there were but few settlers, among them being Collins and David Bishop and families, George Dewey and family, James Broiighton and family, George Shelley and family, Ira Penny and family, Carl Ernst and family, John McMaster with his family, Phillip Hartman and family, J. H. Gleason and family and N. D. Comstock, unmarried. The two Zellers and Nic and Caspar Meyers selected lands upon which they made some improvements with the intention of pre-empting them later, which they did. Frank J. Zeller located 120 acres and with his brother built a log house. Later he returned by ox team to Roxbury, Dane County, where, Nov. 26, 1856, he was married. All remained at Roxbury the winter of 1856 and 1857, returning to Arcadia in the spring of 1857, settling upon the lands they had located the previous summer, and which they later purchased of the Government and opened and improved into valuable farms.

In the summer of 1857 many settlers came and they continued to arrive until in 1876 the territory was practically occupied. Among the early arrivals were Christian and John Haines, Peter Meyers, George Cain, Theodore Tsherhardt, John Well, John Bill, Sr., John and Dan Bigham, James Gaveney, Dr. I. A. Briggs, David Massuere, Dan C. Dewey and Henry Dewey, Gay T. Storm and Casper Whifller.

During the early years of life in the valley, and up to the time of the Indian massacre in Minnesota in 1862, many Indians lived about Arcadia and were frequent or almost daily visitors at the homes of the settlers, being very industrious beggars, but committing no crimes upon the white people. The Indian troubles in Minnesota in 1862 were the occasion of much anxiety and great prudence on the part of the settlers of Arcadia. Every man was armed and equipped to do battle, if necessary, for the protection of family and home. However, no occasion arose necessitating bloodshed. In pioneer days at Arcadia Indians often remained at the homes of settlers until late into the night, visiting and being social in their ways. The market points for many years were Trempealeau and Fountain City in all seasons, and Winona during such time as the Mississippi river was frozen in winters.

In the early days a society known as the St. Joseph Catholic Congregation, built a frame church near where the highway divides to go to the Hartman Valley, and to turn into the main valley and over the Pine Creek Ridge and down over the country by way of Whistler Pass to Trempealeau, where services were held until the congregation was merged into the new society at Arcadia in 1883. The cemetery remains and is the silent restingplace of many of the early pioneers of not only Meyers Valley, but that whole vicinity.

The St. Joseph Church stands in the southeast corner of the southeast quarter of the southwest quarter, section 6-20-9; and the cemetery is in the southwest corner of the southwest quarter of the southeast quarter, section 6-20-9.

Meyers Valley proper, in which the Zeller farm is, has a creek that flows out of the northwest side of section 17-20-9, crossing sections 17, 8 and 7 in the same town ; while the Bill Valley may be said to be confined to sections 11, 12, 13 and 14 in 20-10 west.

The original trail out of Arcadia came up out of Pine Creek onto the Pine Creek ridge above these valleys and Trout Run, following these valleys to the Trempealeau River, and centered in early times at Old Arcadia, or Dewey's Corners, as it was by many known. Later Massuere's Mill became a landmark and point of pubhc interest.

The first white man to die in the Meyers Valley was Phillip Hartman, Sr., and the first to die in Arcadia was David Bishop, who was killed by a bolt of hghtning during a storm in 1868. The public school at the mouth

Thompson Valley is wholly in the town of Arcadia and runs south from American Valley, into which it opens near the upper end of the Miller and Bear mill pond. The valley is about three and a half miles long, footing up against the ridge which separates it from Norway Cooley. The first settler in the valley, so far as is known, was a man who took a claim but went to the war and was never more heard of. His claim was later filed upon by Thove Thompson, who occupied it, proved up his claim and developed it into a valuable farm, on which his widow and his two sons, Alex and Martin, now reside. At the time Thove Thompson settled in the valley, his brothers, Knut and Tolf, settled on lands they homesteaded and erected buildings on, and where they resided until their death. This was in May, 1865. These brothers came from Telemarken, Norway, in April, 1861, and settled in Iowa, where they remained until coming to the valley. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

Trout Run Valley is wholly in the town of Arcadia and is one of the early settled parts of Arcadia and of the county north of the ridge. It is a locality of fertile lands in which all the early pioneers were Germans, and is still their home and that of their children. The creek commences on the north side of the Pine Creek ridge, running in a northwesterly direction to the Trempealeau River a distance of four and a half miles. The valley includes the following sections, or the great part of them, namely: 9, 10, 14, 15, 23 and 24 in township 20, range 10, and 19 and 30 in township 20, range 9. The soil is a rich clay sand loam, highly productive of tame grasses, grains and vegetables.

The very early pioneers were Ludwig Hansel and family, Frederick Kiekhoefer and family, Charles Ulbrech and family and William Kiekhoefer and family. They settled in June, 1857, emigrating from Milwaukee and were four weeks on the journey, which was made with ox teams. William and Gust Garby located in the valley in 1859, making their home there during the remainder of their lives. Patrick and James Gibbons settled in the valley in 1862, Patrick later selling his lands and moving to Missouri. James Gibbons died on the old farm a few years ago. A. F. Hensel, who had lived in Buffalo County on the John Memietz farm a number of years, and who kept a small store there, and who located all the early settlers in the valley, settled in the valley in 1862. Jacob PeUowski settled on the Brownlie farm in 1862, as did Charles Fisher, whose widow sold the Fisher farm to Fred Kiekhoefer in 1866.

The Trempealeau Valley, north and south, is really a part of Trout Run Valley, in history at least. Among those who settled in the Trempealeau Valley in that vicinity were Thomas A. Simpson, in 1856, being then unmarried ; Milton Tucker and Sumner S. Tucker in 1858, Martin Manning in 1860, Joe Hausfair and Charles Sexhour in 1862, John Miller, Simon Jegi, Frank Knittle and Dan and Phil English in 1862.

The school district was organized and the schoolhouse built in 1865, and John McMaster was the first teacher. Jack Scond, Fannie Simpson and D. L. Holcomb were the succeeding teachers. T. A. Simpson was the first school clerk. The first school meeting was held in the home of Ludwig Hensel. The first schoolhouse was a log house built of logs cut in the valley and was built on the line between Fred Kiekhoefer's and T. A. Simpson's farms. The present schoolhouse is on a diiferent site or location.

The German settlers were Evangelical Methodists, and in 1869 they erected a church near where the present schoolhouse stands, in which religious services have since been held. The society has a cemetery grounds near the church, in which many of the old settlers are bui'ied. The first clergyman to hold services in the valley was from Winona, who came there occasionally on Sundays. The people were industrious, thrifty and thoroughly American, and have always been among the good citizens of the county. Nearly all of the early settlers were prosperous and for many years only ox teams were used. There were no roads, no bridges and no dugways.

A. W. Hensel, to whom we are indebted for many of the above facts, was born in Prussia, at Nougart, on November 7, 1840. He is a son of Ludwig Hensel and was past 16 years of age when he came to the valley. He served in Company F, 25th Regiment Wisconsin Volunteers, and was married in 1866 to Mary Wagoner. His father settled on and pre-empted 160 acres in section 23, township 20, range 10 west. Frederick Kiekhoefer pre-empted 160 acres in section 14, township 20, range 10 west, and Charles Ulbrech pre-empted 80 acres in section 23, township 20, range 10 west. These were the first farms opened in the valley. The valley was named Trout Run, because of the large numbei's of trout in the creek at the time this settlement was made. Mr. Hensel soon visited the Bishop settlement, and for many years took grists to the Masseure mill, trading at the stores kept by Briggs & Dewey and by Gay T. Storm. There was much timber in the valley when settled, a considerable quantity of it being large enough to be squared into 6 by 6, 30 feet long. There was plenty of oak timber for building fences and fuel. The locality was long known as Tucker's Corners. Later a postoffice was established at the home of T. A. Simpson and the name Home was given the locality. The first postoffice was estabhshed Nov. 28, 1865, and Seth Tucker was postmaster to June 12, 1868; Adam Bartch to June 30, 1868 ; Thomas A. Simpson to April 11, 1870 ; Peter Scholidon to April 21, 1871; Caroline Tucker to June 28, 1875, and Denton Tucker, April 4, 1891, to June 18, 1895, when the ofiice was discontinued. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

North Creek Valley lies wholly in the town of Arcadia and has its head in section 16, township 21, range 8, running southwesterly to the Trempealeau River in section 28, township 21, range 9, a distance of five and a half miles. The valley may be said to be embraced in sections 16, 17, 19 and 20 in 21-9, and sections 24, 25, 26, 27 and 28 in 21-9. The name came to be applied in this way : In the early pioneer days the valley was north from the Bishop settlement and hence was called North Creek. Its very first settlers were Polish families - those of Albert Bautsch, Joseph Stanoskey, and a man named Weaver, who settled there in 1867, and who were soon followed by Louis Wojczik and others in 1868, 1869 and 1870. Thereafter, up to 1875, Polish families continued to come in and the valley became the very first Polish settlement north of the ridge in the county. It has remained a settlement of these families and those of their nationality, industrious people, patriotic and intensely American.

The public school was built on the north half of the northeast quarter of 26-21-9, and a church was built nearby on the south half of said quarter. It has remained a place of pubUc worship since and a cemetery was at the same time located near the church.

The valley has good soil and its people have made substantial progress in all matters of farm improvements, homes and outbuildings, horses, stock and diversified farming, and rank among the best farmers in the county. The young people who were born there and have grown up in the valley are among the best people in the county, and are so Americanized that they may be said to be real "Yankees" in language, dress and the usual characteristics of our people. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

Bill's Valley is wholly in the town of Arcadia and may be said to cover or include sections 11, 12, 13 and 14 in 20-10. The valley is more of a depression than a valley, as it has no real creek or watercourse. It was settled in 1860 by John Bill, Sr., and soon others came, making it an early or pioneer community, principally of German families, though later many of the settlers were Irish. The soil in the valley is good and the farms valuable. In all ways the progress of the people has kept pace with that of the best settlements in the county. While it has been more or less a mixed community, its people have been good citizens and have taken an activinterest in public matters affecting the welfare of the town, county and State. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

Korpal Valley lies wholly in the town of Arcadia and may be said to be wholly within sections 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 and 15 in 21-9, and the Korpal Valley Creek runs west from a spring in the southwest quarter of the southeast quarter of 12-21-9, through sections 12, 13, 14 and 15, a distance of two and a half miles to the Trempealeau River. The first settler was James Fassett, the second a man by the name of Zabrota. Soon after this there arrived John Korpal, who with Louis Norwitzki settled in the valley, they becoming the first permanent settlers. Others soon followed and the valley and ridges in the vicinity were all settled prior to 1876. The people were industrious and the community has made good progress. The soil is rich and the value of the lands there has risen equally with other parts of Arcadia and the county. The valley and vicinity cannot be said to have been a Polish neighborhood, as many families, American born and Norwegian born, have all along owned and occupied farms there. In early days grain raising was the chief farm industry, but since 1882 the people have gone successfully into diversified farming and have made it as much of a success as any nearby community. - (By Stephen Richmond.)

The Banner Robbery. In the spring of 1860 there arrived in the Big Tamarack Valley an Enghshman who called himself John Banner. He seemed to have means and bought for cash eighty acres of land described as the south half of the southeast quarter of section five, township numbered nineteen, range nine (S. Uj of S. E. i/j. 5-19-9). For this he received a deed which he confided to the care of a neighbor. On this land he built a shanty and ox-shed, hired some breaking done, planted sod, corn and potatoes, bought a yoke of oxen and a cart, plow and a few other implements and tools. In the fall of 1860 he sowed six acres of winter wheat. Mr. Banner passed the winter of 1860-61 in the neighborhood, getting acquainted with the settlers, having a good time and being a good fellow generally. In the spring of 1861 he prepared to plant corn and make further improvements on his farm. About the middle of May, 1861, another Englishman, calling himself Nathan Mitchell, came on from England to visit his friend Banner, and, incidentally, to invest a few "sovereigns" in American unimproved real estate.

Mr. Mitchell arrived at Mr. Banner's on Friday. Saturday and Sunday Mr. Banner entertained his friend by walking with him from farm to farm and introducing him to the neighbors as "My especial friend, Mr. Mitchell, direct from Liverpool, looking for land," etc. On Monday morning Mr. Banner proposed to initiate his visitor into the American art of planting "maize," and, after getting started and working a while, asked to be excused "while he went to a neighbor's for some seed potatoes."

Mr. Mitchell worked away at his new job until hunger and thirst warned him that the mid-day lunch ought to be due. On going to the shanty the first thing he saw was his carpet-bag with the side cut open, and, lying near, was his "friend's" razor with lint on the edge. A hasty examination showed that a package containing one hundred and thirteen gold "sovereigns" had been taken, and that it was very evident that his friend Banner was the robber. After "a nine days' wonder" and unavailing efforts to trace the missing appropriator of his coin, Mr. Mitchell took legal process against Banner's personal belongings that were left behind, such as the oxen, cart, plow, cooking stove, shotgun, grindstone, bedding, etc., including the growing crop of winter wheat, sold the whole at sheriff's sale, pocketed his loss, shook the Big Tamarack dust from his square-toed gaiters and returned to Old England.

The first Polish settler in Dodge, Michael Chisin of Winona, was, in the spring of 1862, piloted to the John Banner farm by Charles J. Cleveland. To that farm he brought his bride, there his children were born, there he passed the rest of his life, and there he died. Several other Poles came into the Tamarack in the fall of 1862 and later. One of the later arrivals was also named "Michael" (Kolodsey or "Collins") and, as everybody was called by the person's given name, to distinguish the two "Mikes," Mrs. Chas. Cleveland gave Chisin the nickname of "Tamarack Mike" and Kolodsey was called "Winona Mike." The two men were very proud of their American names, announcing themselves to English speaking strangers always thus. - (By E. H. Cleveland.)

Williamsburg. The next settler after Lewis Niffin to locate directly up the Trempealeau Valley above Arcadia was Carl Ernst, a native of Germany. Ernst settled on a homestead about three miles above Arcadia, a shoi't distance from the state road, in 1859. The next year Moses Skillins, a native of Connecticut, came up from Winnebago County, Wisconsin, and settled on a piece of state land about four and one-half miles above Arcadia, on the state road. This was the beginning of the Williamsburg settlement. In 1862 Hiram Skillins, a Baptist preacher, and a brother of Moses Skillins, came from Winnecone, Wisconsin, and bought some state land about half a mile up the Trempealeau River from his brother's place.

We have noticed how customary it was for a new settlement to take its name from the original settler as instances. Reed's Landing, Bishop's Settlement, Lewis Valley. And so the Williamsburg settlement was first known as Skillins' Corners, and the small creek which flowed through Hiram's place was called Skillins' Creek.

Moses Skilhns had broken seven acres of land and erected a log shanty where he was "baching" when his brother arrived. But pioneering and "baching" were not to his taste, and he sold his right to his brother and returned to Connecticut.

Henry E. Pierce was the next Williamsburg settler to arrive. He was a native of New York State, and came from Sparta, Wisconsin, in May, 1863, and bought the Moses Skillins place from Hiram Skilhns and took the 140 acres of homestead land adjoining it. In June, the same year, William Eastman, another New York Stater, came and selected a homestead about a quarter of a mile above Skilhns' Corners, in Wickham Valley, and in August, James Wickham, arrived from New York State and picked out a homestead a few miles up the Wickham Valley for his son Andrew.

The next spring (1864) Douglas Arnold arrived and bought some State land and took up some government land, and in the fall his brother came and settled at Skillins' Corners. These two brothers were also from New York State. The same year William Boorman bought out the Skillins place, and Andrew T. Wickham moved onto his homestead in Wickham Valley.

The Williamsburg farmers were soon raising large crops of wheat, and getting war prices for it ; there was an abundance of wild grass for their herds, and the only drawback was the long distance to market. They hauled their wheat to Fountain City, Trempealeau, and in the winter when the Mississippi was frozen over they hauled the grain to the Pickwick mills, in Minnesota.

A postoffice was established in 1866, and thereafter the place was called Williamsburg. It had been known before this as Skillins' Corners, or simply the Corners.

W. B. Arnold has the honor of giving this name to the community, which was a very appropriate name on account of the three Williams, Arnold, Eastman and Boorman, all of whom lived near the Corners.

William Arnold was appointed postmaster at Williamsburg and held the office until it was discontinued in January, 1876. The first mail to Williamsburg was carried on horseback over the route from Minneska, Minnesota, to Black River Falls. Later it was carried by stage, and horseback when roads were bad from Trempealeau on the Trempealeau Elk Creek route. Perry Rumsy was mail carrier for years.

The same year the postoffice was established a schoolhouse was built about twenty rods above the Pierce home on the main road, and near the south corner of Douglas Arnold's place. The first school was taught by Miss Francis Lewis, a sister of Captain John D. Lewis, of Lewis Valley.

Things moved along rapidly now. The valleys tributary to Williamsburg vi'ere being taken up, and cultivated fields soon took the place of the rolling waste of wild grass, and the woodland hillsides resounded with the ax of the wood chopper.

A woodyard was opened, and soon the peddler's wagon found its way into the new settlement with shining new wares to attract the thrifty housewife. Occasionally the schoolhouse was utilized as a church, and on such Sundays the neighbors would gather from the country round about and hold rehgious services, and it would sometimes happen that on a pleasant summer Sabbath, some farmer who had been repairing pasture fences would loiter along the deserted road towards the old schoolhouse, and have his vision of rich golden harvest fields suddenly interrupted by the sound of the itinerant preacher's voice coming in sanctimonious quavers from the open windows of the schoolhouse; or perchance the lagging farmer would be stirred by the sound of the music, as out on the fragrant summer air there floated the strains of "The Sweet Bye and Bye."

Then one day from the Trempealeau River came the thrilling whistle of a steamboat. The peaceful quiet of the country was broken, and the inhabitants were stirred with excitement at this undreamed-of occurrence and people flocked down to the river to feast their eyes on a real live steamboat actually navigating the modest little Trempealeau River. A landing was made, the gangplank touched shore, and every inhabitant of Williamsburg felt his property rise in value so fast that it was necessary to hold onto the trees to keep from sliding downhill.

The steamboat men wanted to buy some eggs from the Williamsburg farmers, and William Eastman, eager to secure the trade of the boatmen, hurried home and in a short time returned with a basket of eggs. But, alas ! Mr. Eastman was more accustomed to walking the wide country roads than a narrow gangplank, and when he had taken a few steps on the plank he slipped and fell, but like the boy who tumbled out of the barn loft and clung to his pail of nails to keep them from spilling. Bill froze to his backet of eggs, and regained his foothold with but a few of them broken, and the captain of the boat paid him for the original number of eggs, and Mr. Eastman walked home the crowned monarch of the rural market, and the first and last Williamsburg settler to trade with a Trempealeau River steamboat.

The new community grew rapidly and prospered, for they were thrifty society should not be forgotten in Williamsburg history. In the winter time every other Friday night was given to the literary society or spelling school, and people would come from neighboring districts to attend. There was a great deal of rivalry between contending districts in these spelling school matches, and the pupils were kept in good trim for the contest. Then on a winter's night when the chores were done, there would be a merry jingle of sleigh bells vibrating along the road to the schoolhouse and by 8 o'clock in the evening the strains of some well-known school song would announce the opening of the exercises. And if you would listen in the course of an hour you would hear the droning of words as the teacher pronounced them to the pupils lined along the walls of the schoolroom eager for the spelling-down contest. It is surprising what large words some of those bright little country maidens would wade through - woi'ds that would give one a kink in the neck to pronounce were consumed as easily and greedily as a robin devours an angleworm.

The new community grew rapidly and prospered, for they were thrifty farmers, and brought from the Empire State a wealth of dairy experience and agricultural knowledge that proved useful in opening up the new country.

In the summer there was the school picnic, which was worth while to a hungry bunch of children. There under the green shade trees, near the limpid brook, where the blue violets bloomed in profusion we would enjoy a picnic dinner with tablecloths spread out on the ground and covered with, Oh, my, what good things to eat ! not to forget the blueberry pie.

There is not an original settler or a descendant of one left in Williamsburg. You hardly ever hear the name any more, except among a few of the old settlers who still tell of the days when there was good deer hunting in Wickham Valley, and elk horns were picked up on the hillside back of the old SkiUins place. (By Eben D. Pierce.)

McGilvray's Ferry, located on the Black River, in Caledonia Township, occupied an important place in Trempealeau County history for nearly four decades, from 1854 to 1892. Many of the early settlers passed into the county over this ferry, and the route of which it was a part is still an important thoroughfare, the ferry being now replaced by a neat bridge.

Alexander McGilvray, from whom the ferry took its name, located in Trempealeau (Reed's Landing) in 1852, and the following year moved his family to a homestead.

At that time people desiring to go to La Crosse, overland, went by way of the ford at what was afterward Gordon's ferry. The need of a ferry to shorten the route was imperative. Therefore in March, 1854, with the assistance of Charles Utter, Mr. McGilvray built a scow in the streets of Trempealeau, and later in the spring hauled it with teams to McGilvray's place, where it was launched and poled across Black River with Mr. Utter's team as its first cargo. The ferry was a reality now, and the first wagon road was opened into the south end of the county.

Poles to push the boat across the river were used only for a short time, when they were supplanted by an ordinary rope cable which was used one season, and was then replaced by a three-quarter-inch iron rod put together in sections. This was used until the wire cable took its place when the new cable was utilized until the ferry was discontinued.

The first ferryboat lasted two years, when a new one was constructed. In all five boats were built, the last one by G. O. McGilvray (now of Canyonville, Oregon), in 1890 and was run until the McGilvray bridge was completed February 22, 1892, when it was sold up the river to Decorah Prairie for Gordon's Ferry.

The rates charged for ferrying across the river were 25 cents for a team ; 35 cents for a four-horse wagon and 10 cents for a foot passenger.

along the river assumed larger proportions. Stage lines, and freight lines were established, and in the winter when the steamboats were frozen in, the travel was entirely by team and horseback, and by French train. Fourhorse freight wagons were commonlj- used, and the stages often used two teams on their coaches when the roads were heavy.

McGilvray's place assumed a busy aspect at times with the long line of freight wagons and stage coaches on the river bank waiting for their turn to be ferried over the river. Many of the travelers remained all night at McGilvray's, and the country inn, or tavern, was hurry and bustle on days of hea\'y travel. Here were congregated at times a rough and hardy lot of characters, and around the evening fire were told wild and fascinating stories of pioneer life, filled with thrilling adventure, and the comedy and tragedy of the backwoodsman's career, whose nearest neighbor lived miles away, and whose skill with the rifle furnished his rough-hewn table with plenty of savory venison, and made the wary Indian reluctant to disturb his cabin home.

The stage driver told of his wonderful feats of driving, and of his narrow escapes from robbers in attempted hold-ups ; and of the perilous risk he took of being thrown down some rocky embankment on mirky night drives. The trapper told of his long journeys alone into the pathless wilderness in quest of furs ; and the freighter was ready with his tales of hardy endurance, and of the miraculous journej's made with ponderous loads, up almost impassable roads, through snowdrifts or mud, until his destination was reached and he was a hero in his own mind, as well as the minds of some of his feUow listeners. The hunter and trader swapped yarns and mixed lies almost as strong as the rum in the freighter's wagon.

Alexander McGilvray entertained his guests occasionally with music on his bagpipe, an instrument he had brought from Inverness, Scotland, and the weary traveler would be stirred by the strains of "A Hundred pipers and a'," and would beat time to the Highland Fling as the piper weaved to and fro by the glowing fireside.

Rankin McGilvray was at this time a youth. In speaking of the early days in after years he said: "When the Civil War broke out, we began to caiTy soldiers across the ferry. Hardly a day went by until the close of the war that we did not carry some of the boys, and along at first they were all going one way. bound for La Crosse, and from there to ^ladison or Milwaukee, and then to the fi'ont. But after the first battle of Bull Run the wounded soldiers began to return, and then we were carrying soldiers both ways until the war ended. Y'ou could always tell one of the wounded ones, for they were bandaged, and crippled; a great many had their arms in slings, and others were walking with crutches ; while some had bandaged heads. I recollect one fellow who came back nearly shot to pieces. He was the most dilapidated looking soldier I ever saw. He was lame and his right arm was in a sMng and he had been hit in the face, and lost one eye, and couldn't see very well out of the other one, and was sour and cranky, and rather discouraged and I didn't blame him. Father kept him all night, and had one of the boys drive him to Trempealeau the next day. Father never charged the soldiers anything for carrying them across the ferry or for board and lodging and although he could not go to the war, he did this patriotic service for his country. My chances for going to the war were spoiled on account of the ferry. I was on fire to go all right, but instead of going to the front and dying for my country, I had to stay at home and bail the water out of the ferry boat and help run it."

Along in the early sixties logging began to interfere with the ferry. Sometimes teams would be compelled to wait for hours until a log jam was cleared. Usually the logs bothered only a few weeks in the spring or for a few hours only but occasionally the ferry was laid up a week or two on account of the jams, and in 1885 the logs extended in a solid mass from Lytles to the head of Decoras Prairie, about 200,000,000 feet in the jam, and in the summer of 1890 the ferry was blockaded for five months. This was done for the convenience of the logging companies by putting a jack boom across the river half a mile above Lytles and letting just enough logs go through to handle during the day, thus saving the company from employing the men to do the work the current did, when the river was kept open from Lytles to Onalaska.

After Alexander McGilvray's death in 1878, his son, G. 0. McGihTay operated the ferry until the bridge was erected, with the exception of one or two seasons when it was rented to William Kribbs.

Referring to the ice stopping the ferry, G. 0. McGilvray once wrote, "On November 6, 1868, five or six West Prairie farmers drove to Onalaska for lumber. The river was open and the ferry running. The next day the men returned and found the river had been closed twelve hours. The horses were unhitched and the wagons loaded with a thousand feet of lumber were run across the ice by hand and the horses led over in safety. That was closing in rather suddenly."

WTien one turns and looks backward at the changeless past, what strange visions come floating through the brain. One can see the long procession winding down the road and passing in grand review along the old ferry at Black River. The foot-sore land seeker walking along the blazed trail and dreaming of the land where he can find a free home in the unsettled wilderness; and following in his footsteps comes the prairie schooner drawn by a yoke of oxen, and headed toward the new settlement where lies the richest land that the sun ever shown on, almost unmarked by the plow share. And then the stream of pioneers increases, and the stage coach comes into view, and the long train of freight wagons, and the trader, and lumberman mingle with the varied throng. And now we see a line of blue creep into the procession as on it moves and we feel a patriotic pride as our soldier boys slowly cross the river, facing the grim reality of war where death stalks abroad. And we see the wounded return with empty sleeves and wan lips and take their way homeward. Onward the procession moves until on every vacant piece of land there rises a home, and the subdued soil blossoms with cultivated fields, where once the wild deer ranged. And anon the procession changes, the French-train and stage coach fade away, and in their place comes the lumber wagon filled with golden grain for the market while the hum of our commercial age makes the very hills tremble ; and the slow old ferry of long ago retreats up

A Wisconsin Pioneer. Albert Rouse Rathbone was one of the remarkable figures of early days in Trempealeau County. In many ways, the experiences of himself and his family were typical of hundreds of pioneers who found their way to this region and assisted in its development. His story, written with loving sympathy and understanding by his daughter, Mrs. Jennie Rathbone Webb.