John Collins House

I have the word of Mr. Elam Beardsley, for saying, that he was the first actual white settler in Caledonia. It has been said that John Davis preceded him, but though Mr. Davis may have first asserted a claim in the town, I think that Mr. Beardsley established the first actual settlement, and that Mrs. Beardsley was the first white woman who came into the county for a permanent home. He came from Michigan, bringing with him his family, and on the third night after lie set out on his perilous journey, he and his household jewels slept in a shanty on his claim in Caledonia.

Passage source: Official Record of the Old Settlers Society of Racine County, Wisconsin : with the Historical Address of Charles E. Dyer, Delivered at Burlington, Wis., February 22, 1871, published 1871.

On the fifteenth day of February, they made their claim. They staked out as they supposed, enough land for four ; but when the survey was made, it was found that they had only secured a sufficient quantity of land for two claims. They then visited the Rapids, and found there, Mr, See, who was building his mill. Upon returning to their claim, they built a log shanty without a window in it. They soon returned to Michigan and removed to Chicago where the family lived two years. Meanwhile, Lucius S. Blake and his brother, A. H. Blake, came back to the claim and resided in their cabin two seasons. They ploughed a portion of the land, made some fencing, and held the claim by actual occupancy until Mr. Levi Blake removed to it with his family in the fall of 1837. Capt. Blake's capacious log house, which he built on his premises, was a land mark in the country. It was always open to the settlers, and the hospitality of its proprietor gave it the appropriate name of " Our House." The farm now owned by James Wilson, constituted part of the Blake claim. Early in 1835, Edward Bradley and his brother made claims in Caledonia, and during the summer of 1835 and spring of '36, other settlers arrived with their families ; among them were Simeon Butler, Isaac Butler, Thomas Butler, Joseph Adams, and Shintafer, whom Mr. Blake describes as a daring specimen of a borderer. I think at about the same time Ezra Beardsley, the father of Elam Beardsley, and Ira Hurlbut, also, settled in the town. Ezra Beardsley was known as a sturdy pioneer of great heart and noble hospitality.

Passage source: Official Record of the Old Settlers Society of Racine County, Wisconsin : with the Historical Address of Charles E. Dyer, Delivered at Burlington, Wis., February 22, 1871, published 1871.

Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.

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