Merton Town (part 1 of 2)

Merton Town

Menomonee is from Mih-no-min-ee seepe, or "Wild Rice River." More properly tbe term should be rendered " rice" simply, as nothing was wild with the Indians. Bark River was called Coo-no-mo-wauk seepe by the Pottawatomies. The springs at Waukesha were called Tah-kip nee-peesh ; that is, spring water.

Indian Occupancy

Just wl^en the beautiful lakes, groves and prairies of Waukesha County were first occupied by the Indians, or whether the Indian tribes, as the whites now know them, had any predecessors in this vicinity, or precisely what tribes have from time to time made this fair land their hunting-grounds, battle-fields and burial place, will never be known. No record of them is left, and tradition, vague and unauthoritative at best, leads us but a short distance into the past, furnishing the most unsatisfactory fragments of information. Waukesha, however, seems to have been an important point in recent Indian history. So far as actual records determine, the Algic tribes claimed and in fact held sway over this and other portions of Wisconsin during a longer period than any others. There is no doubt that possession was the only title the aborigines ever had to the soil among themselves, and the Government also recognized the ownership of the tribe found in possession when any final treaty was made. In earlier days, first one tribe and then another would be in possession, owing to the numerous wars in which they engaged, driving each other from place to place ; but the last occupants were mainly Pottawatomies. After 1820, only a few straggling Winnebagoes and Menomonees infested what is now Waukesha County. The Pottawatomies, however, had several villages within its limits, traces of which can be distinctly seen at several points on the Fox River and some of the larger lakes - notably near Carroll College, at Waukesha, at Mukwonago and at Pewaukee. In 1827, Ebenezer Childs found several hundreds of them at Pewaukee Lake, and four hundred warriors where Waukesha now is, their village extending about a mile along the ridge south of where Carroll College is, also up and down the Fox River.

In 1835, George W. Featherstonhaugh, in his reports to the Government, mentioned that a large village of peaceable Pottawatomies was located where Waukesha now is. Mr. Childs mentioned (1827) that the Winnebagoes had been attempting to incite this village of Pottawatomies to join them on the war path ; and that, although this was not accomplished, the warriors were somewhat ugly and threatened to make him trouble. They let him go in peace, however, and did not aid the Winnebagoes in their assaults on the whites, nor aid them in their attempt to resist the arrest of the Winnebago murderers in 1828. Afterward, they became very friendly to the whites. In fact, this tribe was always remarkable for its peaceable relations with other tribes as well as with the whites. This is the testimony of all old settlers. In 1639, they occupied more or less of a strip of country from Green Bay extending below Milwaukee River, in company with Sauks and Winnebagoes.

Tradition has it that the Winnebagoes occupied the Waukesha and adjoining country over two centuries ago, having fled before the Spaniards from Mexico. This has some show of truth, as the tribe was named Weene-be-go by the Algonquins, a term signifying fetid, stinking or salt water. The French rendered it Ouinnebago, which finally degenerated into Winnebago. The truth of this tradition is more strongly fortified by the indisputable fact that the Winnebagoes knew and described the Spaniards, always manifesting the most intense hatred of them, when first discovered by the whites. But whether or not this is true, or whether they did actually reside in Waukesha, is of little importance to this work, and of still less interest to the county's present inhabitants. Of the Pottawatomies, with whom the whites became well acquainted, and who frequently furnished the early settlers with shelter, food, guides and warning information as to the movements of hostile tribes, something more should be said. Their graves, c6rn-hills and camp-fire remains have not all disappeared from the county even yet, and many families have numerous interesting relics obtained from them safely stored away. The men, or " bucks," Were expert hunters, athletic and lazy. No such embonpoint was ever discovered among them as is common everywhere with the whites, extreme laziness being universal. The women, or " squaws," did all the work while in camp, and generally carried their smaller children and bore all the other burdens when on the march. No matter how long and tedious the journey, they were not relieved by the warriors. A local writer, speaking of these Indians and the first settlers, said:

" It is well known that they continued to spend a portion of every year among the lakes and rivers of Waukesha County for years after the first settlements were begun, and consequently our oldest settlers became familiarly acquainted with hundreds of them. The disposition of the aborigines is uniformly described by those who knew them best, as having been extremely good. Malicious criminals were almost unknown among them, and the settlers suffered very little from petty depredations on the part of their copper- colored friends. The women are said to have been as virtuous generally as are those of an equal population of white people, at least in their relations with their own race.

" The manner of burial practiced by the Pottawatomies was similar to that of many of the wandering tribes to-day. The body of the deceased was clothed in the blanket worn during life, a pipe, tobacco and food were placed in its hands for solace during the journey to the happy hunting-grounds, and it was then set upon the ground with an enclosure of branches to keep it from the birds and beasts of prey, and was left to molder into dust. The variations from this manner of burial were few and of no importance. M. D. Cutler, who settled in Waukesha in 1834, states that he has seen a dead infant bound to the limb of a tree, and on one occasion discovered the body of a man tied in a standing position by the forehead, neck and waist, to the trunk of an old oak ; but in the latter case, also, there was the fence of broken limbs to protect the corpse from wild animals. The method first described was almost invariably practiced.

" None of these Indians were permanently located. During the season of corn- plan ting, their women and children occupied the higher lands among the lakes and rivers throughout the country, and pursued their primitive methods of agriculture, while the adult males spent the time in hunting, fishing and lounging about the camp. As winter approached, they removed to some rendezvous farther south, returning with the ensuing spring. It was with such people that our three young Hoosiers [Morris D. and A. R. Cutler and Henry Luther] foregathered during their explorations in the neighborhood of Waukesha. With the assistance of their dusky friends, they were enabled to proceed with promptness and thoroughness. They went to Prospect Hill on the east, and from that delightful eminence looked down the Muskego Valley, with its chain of silvery lakes stretching for ^ miles to the south, and in every other direction saw the undulating country covered with oaks and maples. To the west they journeyed among the hills and the lakes of Genesee and Delafield, and were shown the fishing-grounds of Pewaukee on the north by these friendly Indians."

After the Black Hawk war of 1832, and the subsequent treaty of 1833, the Indians mostly disappeared from this vicinity, and, in 1836, had no right here whatever, though wandering bands would return every spring, to fish and beg, for a period of twenty-five years. From first to last, they never did anything worse, the whites living near thetn in perfect friendliness and security. The large village, which was located where Carroll College now stands, and south of it, was a brigade of huts about twelve feet in height, and from twelve to twenty feet in diameter. They were made of poles, covered with bark or skins. This village was a permanent one until 1837, except during the winters. Some of the "bucks" were constantly making expeditions, north as well as south, but the huts were put up year by year, as the first settlers found them, until late in 1837 ; they were then transported by the Government,' with their occupants, to a new reservation. Near this village, called Prairie Village, whence Waukesha took its first name of Prairieville, were some noted cornfields, the hills in which the maize was planted being plainly and unmistakably discernible yet. The reason for this is that the Indian method of corn-planting was far difi"erent from that in vogue among the palefaces. They made large heaps, from three to five feet across, and as near together as convenient, and in them planted their corn year after year. The heaps or liills thus became as hard and permanent as any other elevation or depression of the soil, and those at Waukesha Village, if left undisturbed, will be plainly seen a thousand years hence. The present owners are determined to preserve them as they now are, fortunately, for the benefit of future generations.

The Indian trails in some portions of the county had been worn very deep by long years of use. The one leading to what is now known as Bethesda and Mineral Rock Springs was twenty inches in depth, and some leading to Pewaukee, across the prairie from the Fox River, were about two feet below the surface when the first settlers discovered them. They have been obliterated by the plow after serving thousands of years, perhaps, as the best highways the country afforded.

The leader of this band was, according to M. D. Cutler and others who kaew them several years, a man, not a chief, called " Wauk-tsha," whose name will be forever perpetuated in the corporate title of the town, city and county in which he once lived. He is described as tall, athletic, proud in his bearing, dignified and friendly, and as going about after the manner of a peafowl, anxious to show his richly-decorated skins, strings of beads and shells, and tufts of feathers. He had no trophies in the way of scalps or human bones ; nor did any members of his band, according to the testimony of the early settlers who lived near him.

Mukwonago was a very prominent point with the Pottawatomies, more so than any other in the county. How long this was the case of course cannot now be stated. By some, it has been designated as the "Pottawatomie capital." Whether it was or not is of little consequence ; it certainly was their leading village in the county as far back as Vieu's and Juneau's times. It was called Mukwonago also by the Indians, because, having returned from a fruitless hunting expedition up north and found here bears enough for their meat, they desired to mark the event and the place. Muk-woh, accent on the last syllable, in which "o" sounds like "o" in oats, is the Pottawatomie for bear ; and Mukwonago is the " place of the bear." Here they raised corn in very large quantities - Solomon Juneau says as much as 5,000 bushels per year. Here they also had permanent lodges, to which they returned every spring for planting, hunting and fishing. It was a fine place - beautiful as nature could make it, and in the midst of a rich-soiled country. Their large fields of corn- hills were plainly visible several years after the whites settled at Mukwonago. Near by, on land then owned by H. H. Camp, now deceased, the Indians had a smooth and level race-course, on which, at stated times, they gathered in immense numbers and indulged in the most novel and exciting horse-races imaginable ; and even after the whites had settled in the county in considerable numbers, these races with wild ponies were continued, at which the pioneers for miles around were always present, and apparently delighted spectators.

At Mukwonago also lived the last chief of the Pottawatomies, or leader of the bands at that point. His name was Wau-be-kee-tschuk, and was the only leader known by the whites. He was blind, hence his name, " Kee-tschuk," meaning eyes. The next man to him in tribal importance was Top-o-wihs (more properly Tauh-pauh-wihs), a very kind man. These important men had larger houses or wigwams than the others,'and were blessed with the privilege of having more wives. To illustrate that Top-o-wihs was a kind man : Once, while riding on the road from Milwaukee, he found a trunk which had been lost from a traveler's wagon. Top-owihs hid the trunk, without disturbing its contents, in the brush, returned to Mukwonago and told the whites of it. In a few days, a man returned, inquiring for a trunk. Top-o-wihs was found and kindly took his pony and rode fifteen miles to the place. The man was the rightful owner of the trunk, but paid the Indian nothing, not even a dinner, for his journey of thirty miles to make known its whereabouts. This made him angry, and he declared, on his return to Mukwonago, that if he ever found another white man's trunk he would break it with his tomahawk and take whatever of value it contained.

During several years after 1837, the year the Pottawatomies went farther west, they returned to the vicinity of Mukwonago, sometimes in parcels of 100, for the season, and occasionally staying in the neighboring woods through the winter. They have not been back in any considerable numbers since about 1860 ; and all those who returned in later years were gray and decrepit. They spoke fondly of Waukesha County, however, and remarked that they would like to return to it if the whites had not plowed so much of the land, felled so many of the trees and killed so much of the game. But they never will return, and more of the local history of a once powerful and happy nation will never be known than is here recorded.

After Andrew E. Elmore opened a store at Mukwonago, he learned the Pottawatomie language, and, on this account, got the custom of all the Indians in the vicinity as long as they returned, which was during nearly twenty years after they ceased to revisit any other portion of Waukesha County. Some of them came from the head-waters of the Des Moines River, their new reservation, for the express purpose of trading their furs to a merchant who understood their language.

The manner in which these Indians dressed was very simple. The hair was allowed to grow at will by both male and female, and the "bucks " had no more beard than the "squaws." The former wore, in summer, when the early settlers arrived, only breech clouts ; but in winter they added leggings of skin and square blankets furnished by the Grovernment. The latter were far less elaborate in their toilette than their white sisters of to-day, generally wearing about the same style and quantity of clothing as the males. After 1834, calico shirts became more common, and were considered a great luxury ; also, an occasional pair of pantaloons would be discovered on either a " buck " or a " squaw " - whichever first obtained possession of the garments generally got into them.

When the first white women came to Waukesha, the Indian women were deeply interested in their appearance and dress, and spent hours in watching and jabbering about them, in the most earnest manner imaginable. The youngsters - both boys and girls - ran about naked in summer, their greasy skins shining like polished mahogany.

The principal articles of food were fish, wild rice, muskrats, rabbits, prairie fowls, roots, Indian corn and wild fruits. The corn was raised in greater or less abundance, according to the industry of the squaws. Fish and game were furnished by the bucks ; but they never disgraced themselves by hoeing corn, gathering wild rice, plucking berries or crushing corn. ' They also brought game home, to be skinned, drawn and prepared for the spit, or the smokingcrotches, by the squaws. It was considered enough for them to do the mere shooting and trapping.

A dish which was said to be very palatable was made by boiling fish, wild rice and Indian corn together, with a seasoning of spicy berries or herbs. This mixture was called tassimanomin.

Their ceremonies at marriage, death and burial were as diflScult to describe as they seemed ridiculous to the early white settlers. They had several burial places - one near Muskego Lake ; one where the Park Hotel is, in Waukesha ; several on the lakes at Oconomowoc ; one at Mukwonago ; one near Pewaukee, and perhaps others. Sometimes the graves were covered with "shakes," stuck up crosswise (see plate " B ") ; sometimes with logs (see Fig. 6, plate " D ") ; sometimes with brush or stones, and frequently bodies were fastened upright to trees, guarded from the depredations of beasts and birds for a certain number of days, and then left to decay.

The Indians found in this vicinity lived to a great age, carried an erect figure till death and were hardly ever ill. Venereal and all contagious diseases were said to be entirely unknown among them, thus showing that their simple habits of life had many redeeming features. Smallpox, and various other contagious diseases introduced by the whites, almost always resulted fatally with the Indians.

As they left no recorded history, the memory of old settlers has been depended on for any information concerning those from whom the soil now occupied by the whites was wrested by the sheer power of superior force, and that is more or less imperfect. However, everything should be preserved that contains the remotest reference to their appearance, habits and customs ; for the day is not distant when history will record the utter extinction of a race that

Hunting And Trapping

But very few persons have any idea that hunting and trapping are carried on by professionala in Waukesha County for profit, and that a single trapper may clear several hundreds of dollars per month in the business. In early times, Waukesha County was a rich field for trappers, owing to the large number of lakes within her borders. This was known to the early traders, who sent agents, usually Indians or half breeds, from Green Bay, or across from Prairie du Chien, for furs ; and finally Mr. Vieu sent his son to remain in the county during portions of the year, to collect the furs of the Pottawatomies. There are still two professional trappers residing quietly in the county, the most successful being A. Vieu, living near Little Muskego Lake. Every season an agent of the leading fur dealers of Chicago, and agents from the Milwaukee fur dealers, visit Waukesha for the purpose of contracting for furs. The last season was not a favorable one, but Mr. Vieu took between 300 and 400 muskrats, fifty minks and about a dozen otter in a month.

The muskrat skins are valued at about $20 per hundred ; mink at from 75 cents to $2 each, and otter at from $9 to $20 each. Several Indians who formerly lived in the county return annually to set their traps, and then, after going to Milwaukee to sell their skins, return to the reservation to purchase supplies with the money thus earned. The casual observer would naturally suppose such persistent trapping would soon exfterminate the fur-bearing animals in this county ; but the trappers say they see no material decrease, that breeding goes on just about as rapidly as destruction.

An Early Experiment

In the year 1842, there came over, under the leadership of Thomas Hunt, a party of Englishmen and women, thirty-one in number, calling themselves the " Owenite Socialists," and united, according to that system, one of the best in theory, but a failure in practice, as the sequel proves. They had among them all, those who came and those who remained in England, a capital of several thousand dollars^ They first purchased 160 acres of land,, and elected a butcher by the name of Johnson farmer-in-chief, then went to work. Although they added to their first purchase of land, and labored hard for several years, yet the enterprise would not succeed. Being nearly all trained mechanics, they were unfitted for their chosen vocation, and as petty differences and jealousies constantly arose, adding to the unpleasantness of their situation, they at last decided to disband. As everything, except the women, had been held in common, so was everything equally divided, those at home receiving their share with the rest. They lost about S3^ per cent of their investment. The plan was to make Waukesha County the headquarters for a grand system of Oweniteism, but it failed.

The first census taken in the territory now known as the county of Waukesha is considered of sufficient importance to be made the subject of a separate chapter in this work. What follows is an exact copy of the census report made by the United States Government in 1888. The census-takers, whoever they were, committed some errors, perhaps unavoidably, as several unmarried men are credited to more than one town, and several prominent men, who had been residents of the county at least two years, and who reside within its borders still, were not mentioned. As to the correctness of names, the historian discovers everywhere that many persons change the spelling of their names as years go on, sometimes from a mere whim, and sometimes for good reasons, and it will thus be seen that, while one form of spelling was correct in 1838, another form has been adopted by the parties since that time. In the following list, the number

Just how far the above statement is faulty, the historian is not able to determine ; Lyman Goodnow, Deisner, John Gale, Jr., C. C. Olin, William T. Bidwell, Sewall Andrews, A. C. Nickell, Martin Field, Samuel Winch, C. B. Stockman, Lyman Hill, and, doubtless, several others were here when the census was taken. Some of them do not appear in name in this report, because they were merely boarders with those whose names are given. The document, however, is accurate enough to be of considerable value and great interest.

Plank-Roads

In the early days of the settlement of Waukesha County, little was known or thought of railroads. Plank-roads were the best highways then built, and to them the people, therefore, gave their undivided attention. Although lasting but a comparatively brief period, they were actually of considerable importance in their day, enabling farmers to haul respectable loads to market, at a fair rate of speed - something they otherwise could not have done.

One of the first plank-roads in Waukesha County was incorporated in 1846, as the Lisbon & Milwaukee. Afterward, the Lisbon & Hartland road was incorporated, and still later, in 1854, the two were consolidated. But one of the most important was the Milwaukee & Waukesha Plank-road, incorporated in 1852, by Joseph Cary, George Burnham, C. A. Hastings, C. C. Dewey, Bigelow Case, Ditmar Fishback and Joseph Guild. It extended through Brookfield, the southwest corner of Pewaukee, and to Waukesha Village.

The branch to Watertown turned northward in Section 30, in Brookfield, and passed through Pewaukee, Delafield and the southern portion of Oconomowoc.

The Milwaukee & Janesville road, incorporated in 1848, extended through New Berlin, Vernon, a small corner of Muskego and Mukwonago. It was a good thoroughfare, and has carried an incalculable amount of trade and travel to Milwaukee.

In 1854, the county had some trouble with the plank-roads then in existence, as to taxation, the assessors listing them as liable to the county and town taxation. Under the statutes, the plank-road companies refused to pay the taxes thus levied, and Edward G. Ryan, now Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, decided that the tax of 1 per cent on gross earnings exempted railroads and plank-roads from all other taxation.

The only roads in Waukesha County which now maintain toll-gates are the Milwaukee & Brookfield and the Milwaukee end of the old Milwaukee & Watertown roads. This latter road was a great help to Oconomowoc.

Waukesha is one of the few counties that owe but little of their wealth and importance to the railroads. The great market of Milwaukee is so near that much more than half of all the products raised in the county is taken by the farmers themselves direct to the commission men and warehouses of that city, thus saving the waste of handling twice, as well as the cost of transportation. Nevertheless, Waukesha haa made liberal use of her railway facilities, which privileges and facilities she has enjoyed longer than any other county in Wisconsin.

Milwaukee Sj- Waukesha Railway. - The very first railroad ever attempted or completed in the State, and which still has existence in this county in the Prairie du Chien Division of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway, was conceived in the desire of Milwaukee to have a better communication with the surrounding country - on which she was depending for her commercial greatness - than plank-roads. This first railroad was built by the Milwaukee & Mississippi Railroad Company, which was organized early in 1849. Its first Directors were Byron Kilbourn, John H. Tweedy, Dr. Lemuel W. Weeks, Anson Eldred, James Kneeland, Alexander Mitchell, Erastus B. Walcott, E. D. Clinton and Edward D. Holton. Byron Kilbourn was its first President.

Perhaps the most authentic account of the inception of what is now a branch of one of the greatest railway corporations in the world, and which was the pioneer line in Wisconsin, is the following extract from a speech, delivered in 1868, at the Chamber of Commerce in Milwaukee, by E. D. Holton, on railroads :

" It was a great undertaking for that day, under the circumstances. We were without money, as a people, either in city or country. Every man had come here with limited means - each had his house, his store, his shop, his barn, to build, his land to clear and fence, and how could he spare anything from his own individual necessities ? , Some wise men looked on and shook their heads, and there were many croakers. But in the minds of those who had assumed the undertaking, there was a sober, earnest purpose, to do what they could for its accomplishment. It was demanded of our people that they should lay aside all their feuds and personalities, and, one and all, join in the great work. To a very great extent this demand was complied with, and gentlemen were brought to work cordially and harmoniously together, who had stood aloof from each other for years. The spirit of union, harmony and concord exhibited by the people of the city was most cordially reciprocated by those of the country, along the contemplated line of road. Subscription books were widely circulated and the aggregate sum subscribed was very considerable. I said we had no money ; but we had things, and subscriptions were received with the understanding that they could be paid in such commodities as could be turned into the work of constructing the road. This method of building a railroad would be smiled at now, and was by some among us then. But it was, after all, a great source of our strength, and our success, at any rate for the time being. The work was commenced in the fall of 1849, and for one entire year the grading was prosecuted and paid for by orders, drawn upon merchants for goods, by carts from wagon-makers, by harness from harness-makers, by cattle, horses, beef, pork, oats, corn, potatoes and flour, from the farmers, all received on account of stock subscriptions, and turned over to the contractors in payment for work done upon the road. A large amount of the grading, from here to Waukesha, was done in this way.

" Upon seeing the work go on the people said everywhere, why, there is to be a railroad, surely : and the enterprise arose in public confidence. The Directors having concluded they could make headway against all difficulties, in casting up the road-bed, the pressing inquiry was, how can the road be ironed ? Iron costs money, and money we have not got. In this emergency a mass meeting of stockholders was called at Waukesha, in the spring of 1850. About three hundred people assembled, mostly farmers. The question propounded was, how can $250,000 be obtained for the purchase of iron to reach from Milwaukee to Whitewater.

" It was during this meeting, and after much discussion, that Joseph Goodrich, of Milton, said : ' See here ; I can mortgage my farm for $3,000, and go to the East, where I came from, and get the money for it. Now, are there not one hundred men between Milwaukee and Rock River, who can do the same? If so, here is your money. I will be one of them.'

" This was a new idea. It was turned over and over. It had serious objections, but, after all, it was the best thing that was presented, and the plan was adopted. And here arose, so far as I know, the plan of raising farm mortgages in aid of the construction of railroads. The one hundred men were found, who put up the required number of mortgages, and an attempt was made to negotiate them. This was found, at first, impossible. It was a class of security entirely unknown, and no market could be found for them. In the attempt to negotiate these mortgages it was found that while they would not sell, the bonds of the city of Milwaukee would sell. Whereupon an application was made to the city to come forward and issue $234,000 of her bonds, in aid of the road. The city promptly and cordially responded. The bonds sold for cash at par ; the money was at once invested in iron, at very low prices, and the success of the Milwaukee & Mississippi Railroad was set down as fixed."

The preliminary survey of the line was finished July 9, 1849, to Waukesha, and the road was completed, in a rough way, to the village of Waukesha, and cars were running in February, 1851 ; to Eagle in January, 1852, and to Milton, in Rock County, during the year 1852.

To return to the corporate concerns of this branch of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway : The first bill to incorporate the company was introduced in the Territorial Legislature in January, 1847, and approved by Gov. Henry Dodge, February 11, of the same year. Its text was said to have been written by Alexander W. Randall. The commissioners named in the original charter were William A. Barstow, Norman Clinton, Alexander W. Randall, and Alexander F. Pratt, of Waukesha County, and Paraclete Potter, Daniel Wells, Jr., Edward D. Holton, Byron Kilbourn and Lemuel W. Weeks, of Milwaukee County. On the 23d of Novomber, 1847, the commissioners opened books at Waukesha and Milwaukee, for subscriptions. The next year the company's charter was amended, so that the road might be extended to Madison and the Mississippi River, and to allow its capital stock to be increased to the sum of 13,000,000. On the 5th of April, 1849, the commissioners announced that the $100,000 required, had been subscribed and 5 per cent of it. paid, and that an election could therefore be had. The election resulted : Byron Kilbourn, President ; Lemuel W. Weeks, E. D. Holton, Alexander Mitchell, E. B. Wolcott, Anson Eldred, James Kneeland, John H. Tweedy, E. D. Clin, ton, Directors. Benjamin H. Edgerton was chosen Secretary and Walter P. Flanders, Treasr urer. In February, 1850, the name of the company was changed, by act of the Legislature, to the "Milwaukee & Mississippi Railway Company." At that time, individuals had paid over $300,000, and the city of Milwaukee $244,800 in bonds and cash. On April 15, 1857 - about seven years after ground was broken at Milwaukee, the road was completed from Lake Michigan to the Mississippi River, at Prairie du Chien. The road had cost $5,500,000, and its equipment a trifle over $1,000,000.

In 1860, Lewis H. Meyer, William P. Lynde, Allen Campbell, William Schall, John Wilkinson, John Catlin, Hercules L. Dousman and N. A. Cowdrey formed an association for the purchase of the Milwaukee & Mississippi Railway, and the new company took the name of the Milwaukee & Prairie du Chien Railway Company, L. H. Meyer, President. This corporation managed the road until 1866, when it was absorbed by the present Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company, of which Alexander Mitchell has been always President, and S. S. Merrill, General Manager, and forms a part of the largest line of road in the world controlled by a single corporation.

Of the original commissioners of this, the first line of railroad in Wisconsin, Edward D. HoU ton, of Milwaukee, Edmund D. Clinton, of Brodhead, Lemuel W. Weeks, of Oconomowoc, and Daniel Wells, Jr., remain in the land of the living. They undoubtedly did not suppose, when announcing svith much emphasis that for March, 1851, the receipts of the road were over $45 per day ; $55 to $60 per day for April, and at the middle of May had reached the astonishing figure of $114 per day, that the company would, in less than thirty years, own more miles of road than any other, and count its earnings by millions. Cars began running twice a day between Milwaukee and Waukesha April 15, 1851. They lived also to see no small amount of trouble grow out of the farm mortgages given by farmers to aid in constructing this pioneer railway. The original company received $40,000 in these mortgages in Waukesha County, and, in a comparatively large number of instances those who thus early mortgaged their farms were unable to lift the incumbrance, and therefore lost them.

The celebration had at Prairieville March 4, 1851, on the occasion of the formal opening of the Milwaukee & Mississippi Railway, was an elaborate aflPair. Don A. J. Upham was

President of the meeting, and J. Turner, Rufus King, J. Goodrich, Hans Crocker, S. B. Grant and Rufus Cheney, Vice Presidents. Among the speakers were A. W. Randall, Joseph Goodrich, E. D. Holton, Sherman M. Booth, James S. Brown, Rufus Cheney, Mr. Martyn and D. A. J. Upham. Nearly every person in the county was present, and the occasion was one of noisy and long-to-be-remembered enthusiasm.

The line passes through the towns of Brookfield, Pewaukee, Waukesha, Genesee, Eagle and a small corner of Mukwonago - a rich, populous and beautiful region of country. On Section 22, in Eagle, a branch of the Western Union (a division of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway) forms a junction with the Prairie du Chien Division, this making connections for the southwest.

Milwaukee ^ Watertown Railroad. - This railroad company was chartered by an act approved March 11, 1851, which appointed E. D. Holton, Alexander Mitchell, Eliphalet Cramer, James Kneeland, Daniel Wells, Jr., Hans Crocker, John H. Tweedy, George H. Walker, Byron Kilbourn, Daniel H. Chandler, J. W. Medberry, of Milwaukee County, and William Dennis, Daniel Jones, B. F. Fay, Luther A. Cole, Simeon Ford, Peter Rogan, P. V. Brown and Edward Gilmore, of Jefferson County, as Commissioners to form the corporation. They were authorized to construct' a line of road from Milwaukee, or some point on the Milwaukee & Mississippi Railway in Waukesha County, to Watertown. The first President was John S. Rockwell, of Oconomowoc ; E. D. Holton, of Milwaukee, the first Secretary, and Joshua Hathaway, Treasurer. The preliminary survey of the line was made in January, 1853, and, in March, the construction of the road was begun at Brookfield Junction, in the town of Brookfield, fourteen miles from Milwaukee. In December, 1854, the road was opened for traffic to Oconomowoc, and, October 1, 1855, to Watertown. In 1856, Congress made a large grant of public lands to aid in the construction of roads in Wisconsin, and the vigorous struggle between the Milwaukee & Watertown and Milwaukee & La Crosse roads to secure its ample benefits, Resulted in the practical consolidation of the two rival lines. In 1859, the name of the company was changed to Milwaukee, Watertown & Baraboo Valley Railway Company, and, June 8, 1863, the whole line and its appurtenances passed completely into the possession of the newly created Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company, where it has since remained as the La Crosse Division of their great railway line.

The original corporation had no small amount of trouble with those who mortgaged their farms to aid in its construction, a serious mob disturbance being at one time imminent.

Milwaukee ^ Beloit Railroad. - The barest mention of the name of this mythical railroad will recall more history to a large number of farmers in Waukesha County than will ever be written. A railroad was to be built from Milwaukee to Beloit, through Muskego, Vernon and Mukwonago, by a company chartered for that purpose in 1855. Work was begun, and during 1856-57 the managers, or their agents for them, on the strength of the work already done and numerous glowing promises, secured scores and scores of mortgages on the farms of those near the proposed line of road. The road never was built ; and, among other harsh things, the swindled inhabitants do not hesitate in saying that there was never an intention of building it. One of the county newspapers - the Waukesha Freeman - put the case into history thus briefly but plainly :

" In 1856-57, the Milwaukee & Beloit Railroad Company began work on their new road to pass through the Mukwonago. It is impossible to speak with any patience of the abominable swindle, whose managers induced the farmers along the route to mortgage their farms by the fairest promises, and who afterward violated their contracts, seriatim, by disposing of the mortgages at a small percentage, putting the charter in a situation to render the building of a road for many years a simple impossibility, pocketing whatever proceeds were available, and leaving these men who had befriended them - many of them to utter ruin, and all to years of sacrifice and labor which could only avail them to keep the officers of the law from their doors. The names of the villains who carried out this scheme ought to be preserved (though the last of the ' farm mortgages ' is now settled), that they might bear the eternal stigma of infamy, and be a warning to future swindlers and rascals who should be inclined to purchase wealth by the loss of honor. I hope sometime to be able to give a tolerably complete history of this matter ; but for the present must content myself with a passing allusion. Suffice it to say, that the New England and New York stock which had already carried this part of the county, in a few years, from barbarism to an enlightened prosperity, was found sufficient for the task of removing the incubus of debt which a civilized scoundrelism had loaded upon their shoulders."

This is strong language to be handed down in history, but anything else would be a libel, for the records in the Register's office at Waukesha are mottled with the entries, in the red ink always used for this particular purpose, of the foreclosures made by holders of Milwaukee & Beloit Railway mortgages, for which no farmer who lost his farm, or any portion of it, or who paid the mortgage and saved his land, ever received a dollar in return in any manner whatever. When the State ordered the compilation of railway statistics, the following report was made for Waukesha County :

" In accordance with an act of the Legislature, statistics of farm mortgages given in aid of railroads are being collected. In this county the amount of mortgages for the Milwaukee & Mississippi road was $-39,997 ; for the Milwaukee & Beloit, $27,600 ; for the La Crosse & Milwaukee, $16,838.50; for the Milwaukee & Watertown, $4,600; making a total of over $89,000. It will be remembered that the Beloit road was never built, so that the farmers were not only swindled out of their money by the company, but the officers were so greedy as not even to lay a track in order to develop the country at large."

During the rebellion, when strong efforts were making to clear the property of these incumbrances, farms changing hands very rapidly in those days, an association to resist payment of these railway farm mortgages, on the plea of fraud, or to compromise them, was formed in this county, and regular meetings were held during a year or more. Tirst and last, however, the agitation and resistance lasted nearly twenty years. A few, believing that the Contingencies upon which the mortgages were given had been so nearly fulfilled as to make the incumbrances good in law, compromised, some for 25, some for 35 and some for 50 per cent, without interest.

Various laws, at the instance of the association and of the railway company, were passed, looking to a settlement of the difficulties, some of which were declared unconstitutional, and others repealed.

Milwaukee^ Waukesha, Jefferson ^ Madison Railway Company. - By an act, approved March 29, 1858, Charles H. Wheeler, J. D. Webster, Duncan C. Reed, William H. Hawkins, Alanson Sweet, William A. Barstow, Elisha W. Edgerton, Alonzo Wing and Leonard J. Farwell were authorized to construct a line of railway from Milwaukee, through Waukesha and Jefferson, to Madison. The capital stock was fixed at $2,000,000. The historian will have done his duty well enough when he has added that this line of railroad never was constructed, although some preliminary labors were performed or attempted.

Fond du Lac ^ Wavkesha Railway Company. - By an act, passed March 7, 1857, Major J. Thomas, Elihu Enos, Jr., E. N. Foster, George Cairncross, James M. Lewis, J. W. Hunt, D. M. McDonald, H. Totten, C. C. Barnes, George W. Weikert and J. D. Reymert were given authority to build " one or more tracks of railroad," from Waukesha to Fond du Lac. The capital stock was fixed at $200,000, and fifteen years were given in which to complete " one track." Perhaps the financial crash of 1857 may be offered as the reason why the road never was built.

Fox River Valley Railroad. - One of the most elaborate railway charters ever granted was one, approved March 29, 1853, incorporating the Fox River Valley Railway Company, consisting of Preston Denton, Andrew E. Elmore, Winchell D. Bacon, Charles K. Watkins, W. K. Wilson, Pliny M. Perkins, Peter Forbes, Richard E. Ela, Philo Belden, J. C. McKesson, Arthur Mc- ^.rthur, William S. Hawkins, William A. Barstow, William A. Vanderpool, C. C. Clin, H. H. Camp, Stephen Sayles and Alexander F. Pratt. The capital stock was fixed at $800,000, and the next Saturday after the passage of the act of incorporation C. C. Olin took $20,000 in subscriptions to the stock. The company had power to construct a " single or double track " to the State line, from Waukesha, and from Rochester, in Racine County, to Milwaukee. The main line was to follow the valley of the Fox River. The historian hardly needs to add that the road never was built. So many other roads were then in process of construction that sufficient capital for the enterprise could not be enlisted. It would have been, however, a valuable road for Waukesha, opening a more direct route to Chicago.

Milwaukee & Rock River Canal

Although the Milwaukee & Rock River Canal was never constructed, for some years it was the main topic of conversation in Waukesha County, and was the only issue dividing political parties. " Canal " and " anti-canal," or " Sweet " and " Kilbourn," were the parties. Byron Kilbourn, of Milwaukee, was the father of a scheme to dig a canal from Milwaukee to the Rock River through Waukesha County, and Alanson Sweet opposed it.

Early in 1836, Byron Kilbourn, of the then village of Milwaukee, passed over the county between Lake Michigan and the Rock River, to discover the best route for a canal to connect those two waters. He concluded the cheapest and most feasible one was that from Milwaukee up the Menomonee River, through Waukesha County to near the present site of Oconomowoc, with a branch to Waukesha. He drew up a petition praying the Legislature to grant a charter for such an undertaking, and on the ^9th of November, 1836, a bill granting the necessary authority and power was introduced in the House of Representatives, in session at Belmont, Iowa County, which was laid on the table. The next year Dr. Increase A. Lapham made a preliminary survey and estimate of the probable cost of the canal. These, with strong arguments by Byron Kilbourn, were thoroughly published in the Milwaukee newspapers, the Advertiser being the acknowledged organ of the canal projectors. Another bill was introduced in the Legislature, in November, 1887, which became a law in January, 1838. It conferred the necessary power upon the Milwaukee & Rock River Canal Company " to construct, maintain and continue a navigable canal, or slackwater navigation from the town of Milwaukee to the Rock River; * * and also a branch canal to connect with the Fox or Pishtaka River, at or near Prairieville, in Milwaukee (now Waukesha) County." The capital stock was to be $100,000, with the privilege of increasing to $1,000,000. Work was to be begun within three years, and so much as was not completed in ten years should be forfeited. The act also provided that the State of Wisconsin, when it became such, might purchase the canal and all its rights by payment to the company of the amount actually expended, with not to exceed 7 per cent interest. To protect pioneer settlers, for there had been no land sale, the Legislature provided that if the corporation did not allow each settler to purchase the 160 acres of land he had claimed on any lands Congress might donate along such canal at 10 shillings per acre, the charter should be forfeited.

Dr. Lapham's estimates, with plats and maps, were sent to Congress with a prayer that land be granted to aid in constructing the canal, and June 18, 1838, the President signed an act granting all the odd-numbered sections in a strip ten sections in breadth along the entire length of the canal from Milwaukee through Waukesha County to Lake Koshkonong, to the Milwaukee & Rock River Canal Company. This land the Territory was to sell at prices not under $2.50 per acre, and devote the proceeds to the canal. Congress also gave Wisconsin Territory the right to defer the sale of lands until better prices could be realized, provided money for the construction of the canal was borrowed upon them. When the survey had been made it was estimated that Congress had granted 166,400 acres for the construction of the canal.

On the 26th of February, 1889, Gov. Dodge signed a bill providing for borrowing money ; for selling all unoccupied lands at not less than $2.50 per acre ; for appraising unoccupied lands and selling them for not less than appraised value whenever the Governor might direct, and for carrying into efiFect various other details. Among them was a section prohibiting any commissioner, stockholder, engineer or other person interested from purchasing canal lands. This was a bar which prevented hundreds of citizens from subscribing to the stock or paying for their lands by building portions of the canal. Under this act. Gov. Dodge appointed Hans Crocker as Register ; John H. Tweedy, Receiver ; L. W. Weeks, Acting Commissioner, and Alexander M. Mitchell, Chief Engineer. At the next session of the Legislature, in December, 1839, the Governor announced that the bonds he had issued upon the canal lands could not be sold. The Commissioner reported that the occupied lands, or 43,447 acres, had been sold at |2.50 per acre, and that the balance of the grant was 95,748 acres, which was unsold. These reports went before a committee, and Mr. Shew, of Milwaukee, its Chairman, reported against going on with the canal for the present, and against the manner in which settlers on adjoining Government lands were being treated. This resulted in a bill appointing a receiver, and providing that, if the desired loan could not be effected by September, 1840, all moneys thus far received from sales of lands should be used to pay interest and loans.

At the session of 1840-41, the Canal Commissioners made a most elaborate, earnest and exhaustive report to the Legislature, which resulted, December 24, 1840, in a bill postponing the payment of interest ; and February 12, 1841, in an act substituting wood for stone locks, and authorizing the issue of $100,000 of Territorial bonds at 7 per cent interest. Gov. Dodge authorized Byron Kilbourn to negotiate a loan of $100,000 on the bonds issued, but in September, 1841, James Duane Doty became Governor of the Territory, and recalled the power granted to Mr. Kilbourn, and also all documents and certificates of stock, as well as requiring him to make a detailed report of his acts. In this report, Mr. Kilbourn recited the difficulties of negotiating loans, and also explained the manner in which John H. Tweedy, Canal Receiver, had interfered with the negotiations by refusing to receive any but specie money, thus stopping work. The canal affairs were now in conflicting conditions ; that is, some of the canal officers were friends to the project and others were apparently its enemies, and the principal business done was the prosecution of a spirited quarrel with each other.

In February, 1842, a legislative committee, of which Morgan L. Martin was Chairman, reported that Gov. Dodge could give Byron Kilbourn no authority to negotiate loans, and that hence his acts were void and the Territory not bounden in any liability therefor. The Legislature then remitted all interest due from purchasers of canal bonds up to December 22, 1841, and passed a law revoking all power to make canal contracts, approve or pay for labor done, and repealed the act providing for the appointment of an engineer. The Legislature also prayed Congress to put all canal lands on the market at the usual Grovernment price of $1.25 per acre, and allow all who had purchased at double that price to have the excess refunded. A select committee was appointed from which two reports emanated. The minority report suggested that the Territory and the canal company cry quits, as each '' had gouged the other slightly." Montgomery M. Cothren, of Mineral Point, was said to be the author of the minority report.

After Wisconsin became a State the offices of Register and Receiver of Canal Lands were abolished, and an act passed April 2, 1853, whereby all persons who had bought canal lands and given mortgages thereon for the purchase money, were allowed to discharge their indebtedness, without interest, by the payment of fl.25 per acre for the lands.

The work done in Milwaukee on the canal - erecting a dam and creating a good water power - was sold at auction under the direction of the Governor. The time for completing the canal, ten years from June 18, 1838, elapsed, and all rights and privileges were thus forfeited, and by act of Congress all unsold canal lands were given to the State of Wisconsin for educar tional purposes, after paying certain small debts from the proceeds of their sale.

This is a brief history of a scheme full of jumbled-up, contradictory and unjust legislation, full of efforts to secure material advantages for certain persons, and which for several years greatly retarded the settlement, development and prosperity of the northern portion of the county, through which the canal was expected to pass.

The State of Wisconsin and the city of Milwaukee were the gainers by this canal scheme. The former received many thousands of acres of land for educational purposes, and the latter had built in an early day a fine dam and water-power at public expense. The whole amount of money expended was |56,745, of which the canal company paid $24,868, and the Territory, out of the proceeds of canal lands sold, the balance, or $31,877.

Although the Olins and Goodnows had trained a few in singing, the first regular singingschool was one taught by A. B. Parsons. He was not more prominent than several others in organizing the school, though the agreement to secure him a certain number of scholars was the reason of his making Waukesha his stopping-place. He is now a harness-maker in Delavan, Wis. It was begun with about twenty-five scholars late in the fall of 1838, and continued during the winter, meetings being held in the old log schoolhouse on the west side of the river in Prairieville - the first in the county. The members of that early class in music who still remain in the land of the living, recall the school as an excellent one, in which there was not only good music but lively good times, never to be forgotten by its participants. The class, as it was called, consisted of the following, and possibly three or four other persons not recalled :

Nelson Thomas and C. C. Olin, Lyman and E. W. Goodnow, Orson Tichenor, James and Charles Rossman, William T. and Joel E. Bidwell, Phineas Bissell, Mr. Dye, John Y. Smith, William S. Barnard, Nancy Maria Tichenor, Jennette and Catherine Stewart, Emily White, Mary and Loraine Church (now Mrs. 0. Z. and C. C. Olin), Mrs. Heath and Jane Hopkins.

This class was taught by Mr. Parsons during the winters of 1838 and 1889, and from it were turned out those trained musicians who became the first choir-singers of the first churches in Waukesha, or Prairieville, as the place was then called.

First Temperance Organization

Very few are acquainted with the astonishing magnitude of the temperance army in Wisconsin, composed of those who belong to the Good Templars, Juvenile Temples, Sons of Temperance, Temple of Honor, Washingtonians, Cold- Water Bands, Total Abstinence Societies and various other organizations ; and still fewer know what portion of Wisconsin claims or deserves the honor of forming and sustaining the pioneer temperance society. Waukesha County lays claim to that honor boldly, no locality, so far as known, pretending to have sustained .auch an organization before a very noted one existed at Prairieville. It was in working order during many years ; attracted much attention on account of the radical views of its members, as well as by reason of their ability and prominence, and the influence they wielded in matters outside of temperance. It was no child's organization, but a league of all the citizens for miles around Prairieville, with a few exceptions - a gathering whose appearance, debates and proceedings would be of unbounded interest at this period of time. Some of the men who belonged to it from first to last, afterward were among those who have occupied the highest positions in the State and the nation.

The honor of securing the permanent organization of this pioneer temperance, or total abstinence society, belongs almost exclusively to Lyman Goodnow, who mounted his horse after securing the signatures of all the residents of the village of Prairieville, and scoured the country for miles around, presenting the pledge to every person then residing in the surrounding towns. Mr. Goodnow secured over one hundred and sixty signatures, only two men to whom the pledge was presented refusing to sign. They were temperate men, however, and did not refuse to add their signatures on account of any love for liquor, claiming only that they did not wish to feel themselves bound by any pledge whatsoever.

The organization was not suggested by Lyman Goodnow alone, but by whom is not exactly known, William T. Bidwell, E. W. Goodnow and E. S. Purple having something to do with preparing the pledge for signatures. It was begun in 1889, but did not become a power until early in 1840, when Lyman Goodnow secured the large list of names just mentioned. This society, or rather its leaders, projected the first Fourth of July celebration of any note ever held in Waukesha County, Some of its prominent working members - recalled by the old settlers, as the records are not to be had - were as follows : William T. Bidwell, E. W. and Lyman Goodnow, Ezra S. Purple, Deacons Edmund D. Allen and Norman Clinton, John Y. Smith, Rev. Quaugh, Chauncey C, Thomas and Nelson Olin, Morris S. Barnett, John M. Wells, Peter N. Cushman, Sr., 0. M. Hubbard, George A. Hine, William S. Barnard, John Manderville, Deacon Ezra Mendall, James Rossman, Sr., James Rossman, Jr., Deacon J. Rice, Nathaniel Walton, A. J. Cole, Dr. Gilbert Wright, Moses, Vernon and Orson Tichenor, Horatio N. Davis, Henry Bowron, Morris D. and Alonzo R. Cutler, Ethan Owen, Ichabod Codding, Winchell D. Bacon, David Jackson (the first Postmaster), Jacob H. Kimball, Hamilton and John Nelson, David Reed, Charles R. Dakin, Cephas L. Rockwood, Abel and Lyman Brown, Mr. Day, Elder GrifiSn, Nathan Maynard, A. C. Nickell, Deacon Potter, Deacon Taylor, Plutarch Taylor, Deacon Hinman, William Smith, Nathan Whitcher, George McWhorter, William McWhorter, Matthew Ray McWhorter, Daniel Chandler, Robert Love, Dr. Van Vleck and his sons Aaron and Amos, C. S. Putney, Milo Putney, Zebulon and Joel E. Bidwell, Samuel and Phineas Bissell, Elon, Hosea and Randall Fuller, Isaac Judson, Dr. Potter, Gordon C. Cone, Rev. Absolom Miner, Ansel McCall, David Van Kirk, Malcom Sellers, Joseph O'Neill, Henry and Asa Davis, Joseph Williams, Dr. Albert Warner, Samuel Warner, Moses Ordway, Richard Moore, Albert and Almon White, Allen Root, 0. F. Curtis, Rev. Nicholls, Daniel and Levi Grant, Thomas Eggleston, Deacon Asa Clark, Lyman Clark, Uncle Stewart, William, Robert and Alexander Stewart, Deacon Crocker, Samuel and Stephen Beard, Benjamin and Levi Love, Joseph Turner, Barzilla Douglass, Harvey Church, Father Daugherty, I. W. Porter and of course, others.

What is most remarkable about this pioneer temperance organization, is that under manifold changes of name and management, it has been kept alive four decades, and its descendants now have an organization in the village of Waukesha.

In 1843, the society passed through a period of great and well-remembered excitement. A call had been issued by the Whigs for a mass-meeting at Milwaukee at which " roast ox, coon skins and hard cider " were to be dispensed in profusion. A large delegation of Whigs who belonged to the society participated in the jollification, the occasion being a memorable one. On the road home one member of the society asked another how he liked the cider. "It was good," he replied, smacking his lips. " It was good," piped a second and a third. At the next meeting the inquisitive member preferred charges against three or four of his leading brethren, one clause of the constitution requiring each member to report any other member known to have violated the pledge. One or two promptly acknowledged having fallen from grace, and asked to be forgiven, which was promptly done. The others refused to allow the difficulty to be thus easily and amicably settled, contending that as not an apple was raised in Wisconsin, the stuff called " hard cider '' which they had partaken of was " not cider, but a decoction invented for the occasion." The opposition contended that the accused drank it for cider, and as no positive proof had been oflfered that the so-called decoction was anything else than cider, the rebellious members must be expelled. Expulsion from so strong, important and influential an organization as the society then was, they could not stand, and finally, after several weeks of great excitement, confessions were made, and the erring members received into full and renewed fellowship. To see one portion of the prominent citizens of the community trying another portion for drinking hard cider made from anything but apples, would be an interesting event for the bustling vear of 1880.

County Finances

If there is anything of which the citizens of Waukesha County may feel justly proud, it is the general management of her public aifairs, during the last thirty-four years, and her present financial condition. While other counties are or have been groaning under their burden of railroad bonds, Waukesha has been wholly free from their depressive eifects, although she had a railroad before any other in the State, except Milwaukee. The citizens of this county have never been oppressed, or outside capitalists debarred from making investments within her lirdits, by such high taxation as is consequent upon carrying a heavy bonded indebtedness.

In October, 1846, at the first annual meeting of the Board of Supervisors, after the county had been set off from Milwaukee, Alfred L. Oastleman, Chairman of the Committee on Expenses, made the following report to the Board :

The Committee on expenses reports the following estimates for the county expenses for the current year, including the time past since the organization of the county :

Town Of New Beelin

Leiter, merchant princes of Chicago. Mr. P. is a Democrat, and, as Chairman for the town, did much to secure for New Berlin the splendid war record of which she is so justly proud ; one trip at his own expense rectified a blunder by which the officials in Milwaukee had required a quota of thirty-three men from New Berlin when twenty-eight was all she owed. Mr. P. has also been Supervisor and Town Clerk, and has held his present office of Justice for twenty-two consecutive years. He is a Roman Catholic.

ANDREW SXYDER, Sr., farmer. Sec. 22; P. 0. New Berlin; born Jan. 1, 1813, in Alsace, France; his parents, Andrew and Eve Snyder, came to America about 1825, located in Essex Co., N. Y., where Andrew grew up to man's estate. In 1843 he came to New Berlin, bought his present farm, and a yoke of cattle with it, for $8U0 ; left the oxen in Milwaukee, returned to New York for his family, made the trip up the lakes, and drove his ox team to the farm, which he reached July 12, 1844; there were two log houses, 8 acres cleared, and the rest a wilderness; Mr. Snyder ha'j cleared over a hundred acres, has 60 of timber; about 1860 built a large and substantial brick house; his sons have stood by him well in this good work, and two of them own farms given them by him. He married,

1842, in Buffalo, N. Y., Miss Catherine Casper, by whom he has six children - Andrew and George, born in New York State ; Anthony, Joseph, Catherine and Mary, all born in New Berlin. Mr. S. was the leader in building St. Valerius' church, owning the best team and drawing nearly every load of lumber used in it. The persecutions of the Republican party in Prance, upon his forefathers, cause him to be a Democrat here.

ANDREW SNYDER, Jr., farmer. Sec. 29; was born in Essex Co., N. Y., Dec. 12, 1841; son of Andrew and Catherine Snyder, who settled in New Berlin in 1845, with two children, Andrew and George ; they located on a heavily timbered farm on Sec. 22 ; two log houses and a log barn were all the buildings; the 173 acres were cleared and a handsome brick house built; the son did his full share at this; his farm was bought by his father in 1858, and it was almost in a state of nature at Andrew's settlement upon it in 1867; this sturdy young New Yorker has cleared 50 acres himself, and improved the remaining 25 acres by removing the stumps and stones; his large, well-painted and finished barn, and a tasteful and roomy brick farm-house, are among the rewards of his labor. His wife was Miss Susan, daugh er of Mathew Stephens, of New Berlin; they have four children - Andrew, Jr., Katie, Susanna, and Mary, all natives of New Berlin. Mr. S. is an Independent Democrat; was Assessor one year, and Town Clerk twelve years; is also Secretary of the New Berlin Town Insurance Company, and, with his wife, belongs to the Roman Catholic Church.

NICHOLAS STEPHENS, farmer. Sees. 23 and 26; P. 0. New Berlin; born May 14, 1844, in the town of New Berlin; his parents, Mathias and Barbara Stephens, Prussians, emigrated in

1843, coming direct to New Berlin, and settling on the present farm of Aug. Wilde; the family lived under a tree while building a log cabin, with Indians, deer, wolves, etc., for neighborsi Mr. S. was born here, and five or six years later, his people settled on his present farm of 109 acres; of the first 80, Mr. Stephens cleared all but 30, building a good frame house He died April 15, 1876, and his wife followed, Dec. 15, 1878. Nicholas Stephens married, in 1870, Miss Mary Mann, a native of Prussia, whose family emigrated 30 years ago; they have five children - Barbara, born March 14, 1871; Elizabeth, born Nov. 29, 1872; Katie, born March 16, 1875; Joseph, born Aug. 15, 1877, and Andrew, born Oct. 21, 1879 Mr. S. has added to his farm, and in 1879 built one of the largest and best barns in his town, 40x70x18 feet, with 8-foot basement, and well finished, ventilated, etc. He is a Democrat, and was Supervisor in 1878-79; is a Roman Catholic, and a live, stirring young farmer of his native town and county, growing both grain and stock.

PETER M. SWARTZ, farmer and stock-breeder. Sec 19; P. 0. Waukesha; born Feb. 12, 1842, in Columbia Co., N. Y. ; his parents, William and Anna Swartz, emigrated from Germany, married in New York, and came West in the spring of 1844, settling on 80 acres of the Swartz homestead ; all their means were expended in a log house and a cow, the use of Jacob Korn's team being earned by the labor of Mr. S. ; his first team was a pair of steers, earned two years later; his first vehicle was furnished with wheels sawed from oak logs, and he did good work, clearing slowly and well. He died March 29, 1874, and the labor of himself and his only son was rewarded, as may be seen, by the splendid farm of 160 acres, with its small village of buildings; the large two-story farm-house and two large barns, one 36x60 and one 32x105 feet, with other substantial buildings, were erected by these men, who chopped out the farm. Peter Swartz attended the early schools, walking two miles to the log house in the McWhorter district, also attending in the Smith district, Waukesha Township, and later his own district. No. 8. He married, Nov. 22, 1866, Catherine M. Phillips, who was born in New Berlin, July 18, 1850, her parents settling here in 1847 or 1848; Mr. and Mrs. S have four living children - William, born Oct.

17, 1867; David, born June 15, 1870; Lydia, born Jan. 14, 1872, and Catharine, born Sept. 6, 1874. Mr. Swartz is a Republican. As a breeder of stock, he has 200 fine-wool sheep, having bred for 15 years past, from flocks of R. Richards, Racine, George Lawrence, and J. H. Paul; he also has grade Ayrshire and Alderney cattle, with other stock.

T. S. WINTON, merchant and Postmaster, Prospect Hill; born Oct. 17, 1831, in Butternuts, Otsego Co., N. Y., son of J. B. and Sarah (Tillson) Winton, both natives of Otsego County, N. Y. ; in May, 1840, the parents and four children settled in Waukesha Township, the father building the third log house in that part of the town, Mr. ClufF building the first and M. R. Tillson the second; W. B. Sanford lived with Mr. T. in a bark-roofed shanty, floored and " doored " with puncheons ; the Wintons also spent several months here, settling then on the farm where J. B. Winton lived, until 1875, at which time he located near Waukesha; his wife died September, 1875, he now resides with a daughter in Iowa. T. S. Winton attained the rudiments of his education, on a slab-seated bench, in the old log schoolhouse, on his father's farm ; engaged in farming in Ashippun, Dodge Co., and in 1866, bought the stock and store of Daniel Church, and was appointed Postmaster the same year; Mr. Winton does a good business and owns two farms. He married, in 1855, Miss Emily A. Tillson, of his native town ; they have three children - Louis S., Theodora E. and John S. ; Arthur M. died when 15 years of age; all the children were born in Ashippun, except the youngest. T. S. Winton is a man who recalls with unusual interest, the scenes and incidents of frontier life ; he is a Republican, and has been Town Clerk of New Berlin, and Justice of the Peace in Ashippun.

Town Of Genesee

EDWIIN^ ALiLi^EX, farmer, Sec. 30; P. 0. North Prairie; born in Trimpton Broadwindsor, Dorsetshire, England, Feb. 18, 1818; in March, 1845, in company with his wife, he left South Perrot, England, for America; landing at New York, they came, via the Erie Canal and the lakes, to Wisconsin; reaching Genesee on Saturday night, he bought 80 acres of his present farm the next Monday ; about 13 acres were broken ; the yoiing couple spent their first year in a " claim shanty," 10x12, which still stands as a landmark; it had a shanty roof, and would hardly accommodate their scant furniture; Mr. Allen and the Pauls had three oxen each, and, by combining them, made out a breaking-team; Mr. Allen did real work here, added 64 acres the second year, built a good frame house and barn, etc. ; has steadily added to his land, now owning 194 acres, with two good barns and other substantial improvements.- His wife was born in Beaminster, Yorkshire, Oct. 8, 1815 ; married Nov. 3, 1842 ; they have four children - Susan J., William B., Mary II. and James A. ; the family are Episcopalians in belief. Mr. Allen is in politics a Democrat, and has been many years Assessor and Supervisor ; he has 105 merino sheep, cattle, bogs, etc., and has been an extensive dealer and breeder in fine horses ; his eldest son is married and settled as a Dakota farmer.

HEIVRY BOWMAN, merchant and Postmaster, Genesee; born in StaiFordshire, England, Jan. 13, 1829; spent his early life as a farmer in his native land: left Liverpool, England, on the good ship Waterloo, June the 28th, 1850, for the United States; the famous Italian patriots, Mazzini and Garibaldi, were his fellow-voyagers ; the Waterloo reaching New York City after a thirty days' run, Mr. Bowman came direct to Genesee, via Milwaukee ; began life here as a laborer, threshing grain on a barn floor during the first winter, at $7 per month ; the next summer he worked at his trade of carpenter, at $9 per month ; chopped cordwood the second winter, at 30 cents per cord, and thus worked his way up ; for fourteen years this man worked at any and every thing which would earn an honest penny, splitting rails like a second Lincoln, sheep-shearing, farm work, etc. ; the means thus earned enabled him, in 1864, to open business in Genesee, buying the stock of P. Barker, and, in 1865, the store of James Hamilton ; did business here until 1873, when he bought the old Treadway Hotel, and with it the adjoining storeroom, built by W. D. Medbury ; Mr. Bowman began with a capital of $500, and the same dauntless spirit which enabled him to earn it, has constantly increased his business, he carrying the only stock in the village, embracing dry goods, groceries, drugs and medicines, boots and shoes, hardware, glassware, , crockery, notions, etc. ; is also agent for the Continental Insurance Company, and is doing a good and satisfactory business. His wife was Miss Harriet J. Paul, of Somersetshire, England, she coming to America with her parents, John and Mary Paul, in 1841, they remaining in New York State until 1843, when they located in Genesee, Mr. Bowman and Miss Paul uniting their destinies in the fall of 1854; they have two children - Mary (Mrs. Eugene Proctor) and Henry ; have also lost a son. Mr. B. is a supporter of the local churches, and a steadfast Republican ; has been Chairman of Genesee, and Postmaster here sixteen years ; has also held minor offices, and is regarded as one of Genesee's stanchest temperance men.

JOHN BRATL.AY, farmer, Sees. 29 and 28 ; P. 0. North Prairie ; born in Dunnington-on- Bain, Lincolnshire, England, April 16, 1821; early life spent as a farm laborer; came to America in 1851, and at once to Mukwonago, where he worked in Galbraith's flax mill one year; he then engaged in farming for fourteen years in Concord, Jefferson Co., Wis. Married, in 1851, in Jericho, Miss Sarah Upton Howard, who died in Concord, 1856, leaving two children - John Snd Sarah E. ; John married Miss Ellen Brown, of North Prairie, and is now in charge of the homestead ; the daughter is now Mrs. Henry Paul, of Genesee; Mr. Bratlay married again, Mrs. Mary Paul, widow of John Paul, who, at his death, left seven children - Mary (Mrs. McKinzie) ; John, now in Dunn Co., Wis. ; Sarah J. (Mrs. McWalters) ; George, also in Dunn Co. ; Anne, now Mrs. Studley ; Mathew P. and Martha, who are alsodead. John Bratlay reached Wisconsin almost penniless ; began as a laborer and a renter, went into debt $1,600 on his first farm, was unable to hold it, but, by selling, saved himself; has owned several farms in Concord ; the year 1865 was a notable one with him, as he owned and successfully worked his Concord faim and his present homestead ; his only help was his 12-year-old son, they working by day, and driving from one farm to the other by night, the profits of the farms and a splendid hop-yard that summer being $4,000 ; has since sold the Concord farm, and now has a homestead of 178 acres, mostly cultivated, and with excellent buildings; all that need be said is, that he has always paid 100 cents on the dollar. The family are Methodists, he being Trustee and Steward. Mr. Bratlay is, politically, independent.

JOSEPH DODGE, farmer. Sec. 26; P. 0. Genesee ; born in the town of Andover, Windsor Co , Vt., Feb. 19, 1806 ; fifteen years of his life were spent as a shoemaker, in Mt. Holly, Vt., where he married Miss Lucy White, who died, leaving him three children - Emily, Joseph E. and Elbridge. In 1833, he married again. Miss Rowena Bryant ; the family came to Genesee and settled on the present homestead, in the fall of 1839, he buying 240 acres of the United States, a week after his arrival; for several weeks, his family shared the one-story log cabin of Edward Cavanagh, three families living in the one small room ; Mr. Dodge built a 12xl6-foot shanty, with rails laid for a chamber floor; the bedding being laid on several sides of sole leather, which he afterward worked up ; an occasional roll out of bed by one of the urchins above would reveal an arm or leg between the rails ; his table was a board fastened against the side of the room, and bedstead made of poles, and chairs ditto ; and yet, under this shake roof, he used to find bed and board for many a traveler; his family moved in here one December day and spent the winter there, with Stephen Sayles and sons, John Rankin, James Williams, Edward Manning and the father of Mr. Dodge for the only neighbors ; of these, seversl lived on puncheon floors, with bedsteads made by driving a post at the right distance from the inside corners of their cabins, then inserting poles from it either way to the log walls ; Mr. Cavanagh's roof was so leaky as to compel the inmates to " sleep under tin pans," as Mr. Dodge puts it; ox teams were driven half way to Waukesha (Prairieville) to church, and the milling for these rugged settlers done at " Jerusalem " (Eagleville), and the old Dakin mill (demolished) ; the farm of 223 acres, well improved, with good buildings at this date, is the result of these experiences. In thg spring of 1840, owiag to the ill-health of his wife, Mr. Dodge returned and lived in New York State until 1842, since which time he has lived in Genesee. Joseph E. Dodge served in the Union army until the close of the war, much of the time sick in the hospitals; his brother Elbridge, in the same noble cause, died at Columbus, Ky. Mr. and Mrs. Dodge have lost four children, their only living son, Cushman, born, 1836, in Vermont, now owning the farm, or part of it ; he married Miss Avis Parsons, of Columbia Co., N. Y., by whom he has four children - Hattie L., Clara E., Eben A. and Perry J.; the family are leading members of the Genesee Congregational Church, of which Mr. Dodge has been, for ten years, treasurer, and of which the son is clerk and deacon ; politics Republican. Mr. Joseph Dodge united with the Baptists over fifty years ago, in his native State.

D. Li. EDWARDS, merchant, Genesee Depot; born in Aberystwith, Cardiganshire, S. Wales, 1822 ; when 14 years of age, he was apprenticed for three years at the mercantile business ; was for five years a clerk in London, and, in 1847, came to America ; engaged in clerking in New York City until 1856, when he located in Milwaukee, as one of the head clerks in the large establishment of the Mack Bros.; in December, 1862, he bought out Mr. Steller, at Genesee Depot, for $500, added $1,500 wortb of goods, and has since done a large and most satisfactory business here, increasing his stock to about $7,000 ; his line of dry goods, groceries, drugs, hats and caps, boots and shoes, clothing, hardware, tinware, glassware, crockery, notions, etc., is most complete, and he proposes to sell any and everything needed by a farming community ; married Miss Margaret James, who, at her death, left him an only daughter,

Alice J.; married again, Miss Mary, daughter of Joha Jones (deceased), by whom he has four sons - John A., Thomas D., Kichard C. and Arthur J.; Mr. and Mrs. Edwards are members of the Welsh Presbyterian Church, of Genesee ; politics Demooraiic. Probably no man in Waukesha Co., to-day, has had the forty-three years' experience in mercantile pursuits that Mr. Edwards has, which experience enables him to buy judiciously.

WILL.IAM H. HARDY, farmer, Genesee; born Oct. 16, 1832, in Ovid, Seneca Co., N. Y. ; his father, George Hardy, born in Bath, England, learned the tailor's trade when but 8 or 9 years old ; when quite young he emigrifted to America, made a trip through the South and East, and located as a tailor in New York City, where he married Miss Mary Mcintosh, of Scotch ancestry; with his wife and eight children he located in Genesee in 1846, and engaged in tailoring for many years. William H., at 18 began as a clerk in Waukesha; his education then being most meager, he resolved to improve it; the first step was to learn daguerreotyping, which he did in three and a half days, of R. Radway ; some unknown friend of Mr. Hardy had spoken a good word for him to J. J. Jones, of Lynd, Wis., who had a picture car to dispose of, and who now trusted Mr. H. for every dollar of its value ; for the ensuing three years he followed the picture business in Waukesha, Jefferson and Walworth Counties, earning a snug sum of money, every dollar of which was spent by him in attaining his education in Carroll College and Lawrence University, Appleton, meanwhile teaching five terms of school, thus earning enough to buy a stock of goods, of which his father, then Postmaster here, had charge; the first term taught in the stone schoolhouse, Genesee, was by Mr. H. ; feeling more able to bufi«t with the world, he continued mercantile business in Genesee until 1863 or 1864; while assisting to take the State census in 1865, he began buying wool, which led to his engaging in the produce and lumber business in Genesee depot, where he built the elevator in 1867, at the time Chicago was made an ash heap; he had $100,000 worth of lumber on hand, which rapidly advanced ; after a most prosperous business career at this point, he sold out in 1873 to the Stewart Brothers; that summer, he and partners bought 100,000 pound of wool, and he has bought ever pinoe, also doing much legal business as Notary Public, which oflSce he has filled many years ; in 1877, he bought his homestead place of 55 acres, and in 1878 the old Stewart farm in Mukwonago, of 200 acres, his farming operations being carried on with the same energy and success which has characterized all his life work; his 160-acre farmin Trempeleau Co., Wis., was bought with his earnings as a teacher; Mr. Hardy has recently bought a flock of fine-wool sheep, of J. H. Paul, and will try the stock business; although no man has led a busier life, Mr. H., as a stanch and loyal Democrat, was called to represent his district in the Legislature, 1874 and 1876; was also Chairman of Genesee in 1873, Justice of the Peace, Town Clerk, etc. ; one of the most pleasurable of the recollections of this gentleman, is his Southern trip in 1876, at which time he was one of a large party invited to make the trip as representative men of the Northwest, he also being one of the visitors at the exposition of that year. Married in Palmyra, Wis., Nov. 14, 1860, Miss Asenath Hill, of Franklin Co., N. Y., by whom he has had five children - William H., Clarence F., Manning J., Freddie (died 1876) and Floyd M. None of the self-made men of this county have worked h rder, and to more purpose than William H. Hardy; during his student life he often rose and began s udy at 3 and 4 o'clock in the morning, and many an odd hour was spent over his books in the picture car; h is father died at 64, his mother at 76, now living in the State of New York.

JOHN HOOD, farmer, Sec. 31 ; P. 0. North Prairie; born March 30, 1818, in Abernethy Perthshire, Scotland-; has made farming his life-long occupation; in 1846, he removed to Durham,, England, and resided there as a farmer fifteen years ; here he married Miss Catherine Reid, a native of Auchtergaven, Perthshire; the family came to America in 1861, Mr. Hood buying his 160-acre farm of Mr. Murray; the buildings were a poor frame house and poorer sheds; eighteen years of well-directed toil and calculation on the part of this sturdy Scotch couple have wrought many changes ; the elegant two-story farmhouse, with hip roof and modern fixtures, and substantial barns, tell the story better than we can ; no more homelike place can be found in the county. There are four living children, all born in the County of Durham, Pjngland - Francis, Peter S., Catherine, Jennie A. and Marjory W. (Mrs. William Perry), died Dec. 27, 1877 ; Peter S., married Miss Sally Drew, of Milwaukee, and is a practical engineer in that city ; Catherine is the wife of John Burnell, Jr., of Mukwonago ; the eldest and youngest of the children are on the homestead ; the family belong to the Genesee Congregational Church ; father and sons being steadfast Republicans ; the second reaper (an Esterly) used on North Prairie was by Messrs. Hood & Shultis, 1862.

WILLIAM HORNE, blacksmith, Genesee; born Aug. 29, 1817, in Leslie, Fifeshire, Scotland; at seventeen he began at his trade, working: in Scotland until 1842, when he came to America and to Milwaukee, being the third or fourth blacksmith to locate there, doing much work for Byron Kilburn, a personal friend. Married in Milwaukee Jan. 1844, Miss Mary, daughter of David Johnston (see biography of William Johnston) ; her mother died in Scotland, leaving her in charge of several younger brothers and sisters; her father, one of Wisconsin's best-known pioneers, died in Madison, Wis., about 1857. Mr. and Mrs. Home settled in Genesee, 1852, building the first large frame house in the village, theii known as "the house with the green blinds," and which, with its recent improvements, is a most pleasant home ; Messrs. Home and William Johnston built the large stone shop at this time, where the sturdy old Scotch blacksmith has, by honest labor with his hammers, earned the means so usefully spent in educating his children - M. Jennie, the oldest, is now Mrs. John McViekar ; M. Elizabeth is now in Iowa, William H., one of Nebraska's live farmers, while John P., a graduate of Beloit College, has since spent a year at Yale, and one at Andover, Mass., from which theological school he will soon graduate ; he is the first native of Genesee, to enter the Christian ministry ; Annie I. will also graduate from the State University of Wis. ; Alice, the youngest, is with her parents ; the family are members of the Congregational Church of Genesee ; Mr. Home always refusing office, is a Republican.

ALFRED JACOBS, farmer, Sec. 32; P. O. North Prairie; born in Hornblotton, Somersetshire, Eng., April 14, 1824, immigrated to the United States in 1845, and at once came to Ottawa, buying 40 acres, which he sold ; in 1849, he went via the Isthmus to California, remaining two and a half years in the Golden State ; returned to Wisconsin the same route, and in 1852, visited his native land ; in May 1853, he again settled in Wisconsin, remaining there until fall, then visited Chautauqua, Co., N. Y., where he married, Feb. 14, 1854, Miss Mary Hayes, who was born April 21, 1831, in West Pennard, Somersetshire ; her parents and eleven children settled in C. County, 1850 ; here her father died, and her mother still lives at the age of 73 . Mr. and Mrs. Jacobs settled on the old " Silver Lake Hou-<e " farm in Ottawa, and nine years after, bought the old " Half Way House '' in the town of Eagle, where they kept store three years ; at the end of this time, Mr. Jacobs bought his present 140-acre farm of Thomas Sugden, it being well-improved, with good buildings; Mr. and Mrs. Jacobs have nine living childron - George B., Clyde, Hattie, Fred, Herbert H., Altamont A., Sydney R., Ralph D., and Minnie A. ; the firstborn, Fannie H., died when ton years old; in 1879, Mr. and Mrs. Jacobs made a visit to his father in England, who is hale and hearty at the age of 84 ; in 1878, Mrs. Jacobs attended a reunion of her family at her mother's home ; fourteen of her relatives meeting from Oregon, Kansas, Illinois, Wisconsin and New York ; her brother Henry, a New York Volunteer, died in the service at Fortress Monroe, Va. ; Mr. and Mrs. Jacobs are members of the Episcopal Church ; he is a Republican, and, while he has served on the town Boards of both Ottawa and Genesee, has refused many town offices.

WILiIjIAM JOHNSTON, proprietor of the Genesee Quarry, is a native of Glammis, Forfarshire, Scotland ; from 1818, began life at 18 in serving a four-year's apprenticeship as a stone-cuiter ; emigrated to the United States in March, 1842, reaching Milwaukee in November ; while on the road west of the town one morning in January following, he met Silas Remington, with a cart and four oxen, drawing a load of limestone; conversaiion ensued, by which he learned that the stones were fromMr. R.'s farm in Genesee ; this was the first load of building-stone drawn into that town ; Elisha Starr, having established a newspaper there, made inquiries about a suitable imposing stone, and was referred by Messrs. William Sevier and Johns' on, to the Genesee stone ; in search of such a stone, Mr J.'s first visit was made to the quarry in company with Mr. S. that month ; they found a blufi' or ledge of limestone, at the top of which Mr. Remington had taken out a few loads of stone ; the gray, moss-grown edges of which peered through the side of the bluff here, about 1 8 feet high ; a stone was selected and made a part of Mr. R's. second load to Milwaukee ; Mr. Johnston and his father cut and polished the imposing-stone, and cut the remainder of the load into grave-stones ; it is thought that the stone spoken of was the first one used in the Sentinel office ; during the next two years Mr. J. bought stone of Mr. Remington, part of which were used in the construction of the first stone buildings in the town. In 1844, Messrs. Johnston and Thomas Cook, an Englishman, bought the quarry, doing business a number of years; Mr. Cook selling his interest, removed to Waukesha, and finally to Milwaukee, w'nere, as senior member of the firm of Cook & Hyde, he is doing the best stone business in the city ; Mr. Johnston has sold this famous stone in all parts of Southeast Wisconsin, and thousands of bushels of lime, it being for years the only one open in that part of the Northwest, and no man is better or more favorably known here than he ; a Republican, he has ever refused office or honors ; married Miss Margaret Kidd, of his native parish ; by whom he has seven children ; William K. Agnes L., Anne, Mary J., David, John F. and Nellie E. The quarry is now in charge of the eldest son, his brothers working the 140-acre farm owned in connection with it.

DAVID JONES (Park), farmer. Sec. 12; P. 0. box 428 Waukesha ; born July 27, 1805, in Llodwyn, Cardiganshire, S. Wales ; was born and bred a farmer, receiving an excellent education ; married Miss Mary Evans, of the parish of Nantcuville, they coming to the United States, and to Genesee, in 1846, Mr. J. buying his 160-acre farm of David Hyde, about 15 acres were broken and fenced ; the frame house being then a rare acquisition, as there were but few in the town ; as a result of these 34 years of useful and honorable life, Mr. Jones has an improved farm, several substantial barns, and was enabled to celebrate the centennial by building a spacious and elegant residence ; Mr. Jones is a member of the Welsh Calvinistic M. E. Church, and a stalwart Republican ; was in an early day Assessor of Genesee ; his wife died Nov. 1, 1863, leaving nine children ; Elizabeth, Jane, David, John, Evan, Margaret (deceased), Rees, Mary and Anne, the three latter are natives of Genesee ; Mr. and Mrs. Jones had previously lost four children.

and Miry (Williams) Jones, and was born June 17, 1847 in Brecon, Breconshire, S. Wales ; the family came to America and to Genesee in 1854, Mr. Jones buying the homestead of 140 acres of John Hughes, it being then in a semi-cultivated state ; R. W. Jones did good work here with good results, as may be seen by the substantial buildings he erected, and the well cultivated and fenced farm ; his wife died in 1869, leaving him ten children; of these Morgan, the eighth, was educated in the common schools and in Carroll College, teaching one term each, in districts No. 1 and 4, in Genesee ; his wife was Miss Hattie Hopperton, a native of Genesee; they have three children, Sarah B., Mary E. and an infant as yet unnamed ; he is a Republican ; his father sold the farm to him in 1874, spent two years in Wales and has since been a resident, of Waukesha.

RICHARD JONES, retired farmer, Genesee Depot; was born March 5, 1805, in Aberystwith, Cardiganshire, South Wales ; is a son of John and Ann (Williams) Jones ; was fifteen years in the mercantile business, and came to the United States in 1842, with his wife and seveil children, buying, at $1,800, 240 acres on Sec. 3, in Genesee; himself and William Evans now being the fourth of the Welsh settlers; the first was John Hughes, 1840; next, Thomas Jones and Richard Jarmon, in 1841; none except Messrs. Jones and Evans are now living ; Mr. J. began in a log house and cleared up his farm, erected a good stone house and several substantial barns; renting his farm in 1863, he bought 9 acres of the village plat, which, with the depot building, he still owns ; was Station Agent here nine years, from 1863, which position he turned over to his son, Charles K. ; about ten years ago he sold his farm, built a pleasant home, and has given up active business. Married MisS Charlotte Jones, in Wales, who died in 1857, leaving eight children - ^varina, deceased ; Thomas R., deceased ; John R., Anne, deceased ; William R., Mary, Richard, Jr., deceased, and Charles R. ; the sons all take the initial of their honored sire's given name. In 1858 Mr. J. married Mrs. Catherine Jones, by whom he has a son, Daniel. Mr. Jones and family are members of the Welsh Presbyterian Church ; he is a Republican, whose active business life has never allowed him to hold oflBce; he, with his wife and youngest son, spent 1871 and 1872 in Wales, but so completely Americanized had he become that he was glad to return. Mr. J. is most kindly remembered by his early Welsh neighbors, as no man could, or did, assist them more in making locations in former days ; one of these, a Mr. Joseph Williams, in speaking of this to a party of Welsh, years ago, exclaimed : " He is your King," and the title, so worthily bestowed, has since clung to him, and he is best known as King Jones.