Spring Prairie Town

Spring Prairie Town

The highway from Lake Geneva to East Troy, by way of the village of Spring Prairie, is crossed by the railway 2.8 miles west of Lyons, on the south side of section 7. This road was for many years, before and after a station was made there, an important mail route, and hence a convenient point for retail trade, grain and wool buying, and lumber-selling. In the mid seventies considerable shipments of dressed poultry were made, largely to Boston buyers. Changes in the industries of the county, with consequent effects on the business of villages, have checked the growth of Springfield, though it is not yet a wholly deserted village. A fire in 1910 destroyed the station building. After more than a year of delay it was rebuilt, better than before, and this with a long line of wide cement platform shows that Springfield is yet of some importance to the railway company Amid the discontinuances of small postoffices the office at this place remains as one of the fourth class, indispensable for local and northern service. That part of the road between the station and Lake Geneva, about three and one-half miles, is a stage and mail route on which three trips are made daily, from the lake. For many years Ansel Knowles (died August 19, 1875), of Lake Geneva, made these trips through sunshine, rain and snow, and became well and favorably known to thousands of passengers.

The village was platted by Henry T. Fuller in 1855. There was once a prosperous cheese factor}- there, a hotel, and an Episcopal chapel, the service of which was supplied in turn by the clerical and lay professors from DeKoven Hall. Racine College. Among the more easily recalled active business men were Edwin Booth, Edwin Moorhouse, and Asa W. Phelps.

Among the few events which disturbed or enlivened the quiet routine of Lyonese life were two which may warrant a few words here. But it should be understood that there were and are somewhat varying versions of both these affairs, namely, the Neiheisel war and the Robins bridge case. Balthazar and Barbara Neiheisel ("both born in 1820) came from Germany to section 25, and by i860 had eight children. The father learned English but imperfectly, and his mind had become somewhat unsettled. A traveling agent had gone that way. about 1859, and would not see that neither himself nor his goods were welcome there. A quarrel arose, incoherent except for some pulling, pushing, and striking, and the agent complained to Jesse Taylor, justice of the peace. A warrant for Neiheisel's arrest was given to Sumner Chapin. who called Ebenezer Dayton. Rathbone R. Fellows, and Ralph Taylor to help him, and moved in pursuit of his plain duty. Mr.

Neiheisel, who seems to have understood little or nothing of the object of this invasion, resisted to the extent of firing on the party and wounding Mr. Fellows. The arrest was made, an examination held, and the poor man was lodged not in the jail but in the crazy wing of the county house. Rumor carried all this, enlarged and embellished, to other towns, and for years thereafter the Neiheisel war was a topic on which men might be as witty as they could, at the expense of the town, its local court, and its constabulary force. The state afterward voted a sum of money to compensate Mr. Fellows for his injury in faithful service. Two of the old man's sons, Moritz and Peter Neiheisel, enlisted in the reorganized First Infantry, one of the most serviceable regiments of the Civil war. Moritz served three years and Peter until he was discharged for disability, - a record for the family worth remembering at Lyons and elsewhere.

In 1873 the circuit court at its February term, after a trial by jury, entered a judgment in favor of Henry Robins against the town of Lyons for one thousand two hundred dollars damages and one hundred dollars and seventy-two cents costs. Mr. Robins had been hurt by or at a defective bridge or culvert, and his cause was taken into court by Capt. John A. Smith, of Lake Geneva, and Ithamar C. Sloan, of Janesville, with Dr. Benoni O. Reynolds as medico-surgical witness. Horatio S. Winsor, of Elkhorn, appeared for (he town. The result affected the town's vote at assembly district elections for several years afterward, for Smith and Reynolds were then leaders in district politics. The case seems to have been one in which law was on one side and equity on the other. The men of Lyons, at least, thought the injury was much overpaid by the sum awarded the sufferer. The town builds and maintains many bridges, now all of steel, and a similar courtcause is not likely to occur again.

There are nine school districts, of which one is a joint district with Bloomfield, one with Geneva, and one with Geneva and Spring Prairie. The school at Lyons village has two departments.

The county clerk's statistics for 1910 show that there were 22,619 acres of land in the town. (About five acres of section 31 is included within the

It is rarely that two successive censuses give exactly the same figures, as in 1870 and in 1880. It is quite possible that some small percentage of error affects all enumerations of population, and many another statistic statement besides. The villages were not enumerated separately from the town, but Springfield has about one-half as many inhabitants as Lyons, with less present tendency to increase.

Town Clerks

.Mr. Lyon became chief justice of the Wisconsin supreme court. Mr. Burdick was later of Linn, and Mr. Houghton of Elkhorn. The Campbells were father and son. Mr. Fowlston was a soldier of the war for Cuba Libre, [898.

Town Treasurers Justices Of The Peace

Rev. Benedict J. Smeddinck (1820-1881), then of the parish of St. Francis de Sales, Lake Geneva, came in 1868 to organise twelve families of Lyons as the congregation of St. Joseph, and began at once to build its church. This was a frame building, thirty-two by forty-eight feet, floor dimensions, at an outlay of one thousand seven hundred dollars; and a parsonage, ten by twenty-four feet, was built beside it. Father Smeddinck, a builder of churches, divided his time for four years between the parishes of Lake Geneva and Lyons. For twelve years from 1872 service was supplied at Lyons by priests at New Muenster (St. Alphonsus), at Lake Geneva, and by Capuchin fathers at Milwaukee. Among those from St. Alphonsus were that well tried soldier of the Cross, Rev. Franz Xavier Pfaller (1831-1892), and Rev. Leonard Blum. Rev. August Gardthaus was resident priest from 1884 to 1888, after whom came Rev. Charles Drees, under whose direction a school house was built at cost of seven hundred dollars. Rev. William Lette came in 1890. staying two years. After a short vacancy service was resumed by Rev. Cyrus Kufner, who came from Milwaukee on alternate Sundays, beginning in March, 1873. Rev. John Diebold, an eminent scholar and author, became resident priest from 1894. In his pastorate a new parsonage was built at cost of one thousand two hundred dollars. Rev. Henry John Korfhage served at the altar from 1898 to 1902.

Rev. Frederick J. Hillenbrand was sent here from Kenosha in July, 1903, and the next year a new school house, its cost three thousand dollars, replaced the old one. Under direction of two Sisters of the Order of St. Francis, forty pupils are taught in all the study courses of the eight grades of public schools and instruction in the German language is given to such as wish it In 1910 a wholly new church was built at expense of twelve thousand five hun dred dollars and furnished at nearly one thousand dollars. The parish now has about fifty families, among which are some of the most substantial of the township.

In 1856 a mission was established in section 34. a nearly five-mile ride due southward from the village, and was named St. Kilian's. Its service was for long supplied by Rev. Carl Josef Franz Schraudenbach and others of New Muenster, occasionally by priests of Lake Geneva, and for the last quartercentury by those of Lyons. The parish has about twenty families of Lyons and Bloomfield. Father Hillenbrand, a well-trained and true servant of the church, goes to the little chapel in the fields every Sunday, let the weather lie whal it may.

Tin- Methodist Episcopal society of Lyons was organized early and a church was built at the village in 1857. The names of the earlier clergy are not clearly shown, but those of Joseph C. Parks, Aurora Callender, and Joseph M. Walker, without dates, are followed, with occasional vacancies or uncertainties, by those of John H. Hazeltine. 1858-9; John Edwin Grant, 1861-2; W. Carver, 1863; G. A. Smith. 1864-5; William Sturges. 1866-7: William

Postmasters at the old village of Lyons were Thomas Lyon, Dr. John Stacy, William Fletcher Lyon, Lathrop Bullen, Seth P. Hall. After 1856 were Ebenezer Nicodemus White, Hamilton D. Brown, Wesley John Campbell. Giles G. Reeve, Peter Strassen, Jr., 1885, Horace Cole 1889, Andrew P. Prasch 1893, Joseph A. Strassen 1896, Dwight H. Cole 1897, Thomas H. Wilcox 1902, Joseph A. Strassen 1909. From 1893 to ner death in 1896 Cecile Aurelia Cole, daughter of Horace and Aurelia Celestine (Pendleton) Cole, performed the work of the office.

At the division of the county into five towns, January 2, 1838, the two townships, each numbered 3 north, lying in ranges 17 and 18 east, were included in the town of Spring Prairie, and were so joined until March 21, 1843. when the westernmost town was set off as Lafayette. The name was suggested to Mrs. Abigail A. ( Whitmore) Heminway by the natural features of the southern half of the town - the springs being in sections 19 and 20 and discharging themselves into Spring brook, a branch of Sugar creek. Rochester and Burlington lie eastward.

First settlers found about three-fourths of the township more or less wooded - forests and openings. Spring prairie, in the southwestern part, and Gardners prairie, in the southeastern quarter, have each from fifteen hundred to two thousand acres of natural garden. A smaller meadow, a half section or more in area, lies near Honey Creek, in the northeast. Sugar creek enters at section 7, crosses a little south of east and meets Honey creek near the county line at the southeast corner of section 13. The latter comes out of East Troy and runs nearly due southward through sections 1. 12 and 13. Spring brook, entering at section 19, meets Sugar creek near the town center. Marsh creek begins in section 10. and by way of section 1 1 reaches Honey creek in section 12. White river winds a few miles in section 36 and escapes into Racine county by way of the southeast corner of section 25. The southern sections are drained by small southward-flowing branches of the White. These larger streams were in earlier days made useful for driving saw-mills and grist-mills. For a few miles along Sugar creek, on each side, the ground rises to parallel ridges which give the highway from Spring Prairie village to East Troy almost a down-eastern ruggedness of profile Limestone crops out in some of the valleys, more noticeably in sections 16 and 36. though quarries have been worked but superficially and for local use. This is presumptively of the Niagara formation. Elevations above sea-level, at ten points of observation, vary between ju<< and 979 feet - the lowest in sections 36. the highest in section 5. The average height in sections 7 and 8 is 918 feet.

Population: 1N50. 1.418; [860, 1.311; 1870. 1,209; 1880. 1,107; ^8go, [,155; [900, 1,120; [910, 1,007. The difference between the first and the latest of these enumerations tells again the story of other towns, a tale in two parts - the one of busy mills and of small local shops supporting a few mechanics at "iicc hopeful village sites, and of sons who stayed at home to help the fathers on the farms: the other of the re-distribution of local trade by the coming of railways, of farms worked by machinery, and of the attraction of great cities and of the farther west.

I 'aimer Gardner came April 15. [836, to section 25, and two days later began to build. In May he planted and sowed, and in autumn gathered. Solomon Harvey, Dr. Ansel \. Ileminway. and David Pratt came in that year to section 30. In May, too. William J. Bentley and Isaac Chase came to sections 28. 20. and Daniel Salisbury to section 29. Frederick T. Hunt came to work for Mr. Gardner. Gilman Haines Hoyt reached section 1 in July, and with him came Reuben Clark. Rufus Billings came in October to section 23, Benjamin and Benj. C. Pearce to section 36.

Of the men of 1837 wen- ( hester Baker and sons, Edwin, Francis, section 10, and Purke, George and John Hell. 23; labesh T. Clement, millwright; Horace Coleman', 20. 30; William Darwin Grain. j~ : Isaiah Dike, 27 34; William II. Dunning, 34; John Fgerton Hopkins. 1; Benjamin Hoyt, 1 : Avery Hoyt, 2; lames McNay, 12: Roderick Merrick. 20, 29; Ansel Salisbury, 34; Perrin Smith and wife Abigail. 28, 33; Oliver Van Yalin,

Besides these, the dates of whose coming are fixed, the following named men bought land of the government : Harvey Bacon in section 33 ; Luke Billings, 23; Robert Brierly, 8; Arthur Brown, 19; Tyler M. Coles, 17; Joseph Dame, 21; Elijah Delap, 34; John Flitcroft, 5; Benjamin Haight, 11, 12; James Harkness, 18; George Healey, 4; Abiram Holbrook, 2; Benjamin Jones, George Kaiser, 7; George Kneeland, 17; William Lay, 21; Francis McKennan, 36; Austin L. Merrick, 21; James Monahan, 10; Jonathan Neff, 35; Benjamin Pearce, 6; Benj. Carpenter Pearce, 36; Lemuel Rugg, 7,^; William Maxwell Sherrard, 30, 31; Lemuel Rood Smith, 25; John Sweeney, 7; Amory Townshend, 2; William Brice Wade, 12; Bernhardt Weigert, 3; Joseph D. Whiteley, 4, 9; Joseph Whitmore, 18.

Dr. Daniel Allen (1787-1859) came from Hamburg, New York, with his wife, Olive English (1782-1864), to section 31, East Troy, in 1838, and to the next town. His son, Lucius, became a man of county affairs, and a daughter, Lucinda. was married first to John Mayhew and second to John Young.

Marcus R. Britten (4815-1890) was born at Amsterdam. New York. His wife was Caroline Klock (1815-1898). He was a Baptist deacon and opposed Freemasonry.

Samuel Brittain (T810-1890) was born in Lincolnshire and came to the States in 1N34. In 1836 he was at Geneva and took a two-handed part in the battle with Payne's man. Schoonover. His wife was Elizabeth (1814- [893), daughter of Benjamin Hoyt and Susan Hayes.

Benjamin Haight died in 1866. His first wife was Alma Beach. Genealogists find Haight and Hoyt descended from the same remote ancestors, but there was no known kinship between Mr. Haight and the Hoyts at Honey Creek.

Dr. Ansel Asa Heminway (1805-1895) was born in Erie county, Pennsylvania, and died at Eugene City, Oregon. He had studied medicine, and his service was early and for long in local demand. He was postmaster 1838-1845. His wife, Abigail A. ( 1814-1906), was a daughter of Joseph and Hannah Whitmore.

Benjamin Hoyt 1 1778-1860) was son of Joseph Hoyt and Abigail. daughter of Samuel and Mary Flanders. Older father ancestors were 1, John; 2, Thomas; 3. Benjamin; 4, Enoch. In 1807 he married Susan Hayes, who died in 1862. leaving seven children. Of these, not before named here. Simon Batchelder Hoyt (1811-1861) married Elizabeth D. Cady, at Honey Creek. Benjamin Hoyt, Jr. (born 1829), married, first, Sarah Robinson: second, Alvira Kellev. The elder Hoyt was born in Deerfield, New Hampshire: his children were born at Cabot, Vermont. From their third American ancestors. Benjamin Hoyt and Hannah Pillsburg, were also descended tin- Hoyl 1 if Allen Grove.

Gilman H. Hoyl 1 born 1808) married Elizabeth Heath in 1831). Their son. Clinton D. Hoyt (born 1842), was a sergeant of Company ( '. Twentythird Infantry.

\\erv A. Hoyl 1 1824-1906) married, in 1847. Caroline M. Hoyt (1828- [897), hi- cousin Tristram C. Hoyt's daughter. Her grandfather was Enoch, son of Joseph and Abigail, Mr. Hoyt was one of the farmer- whose intelligence and enterprise made of Spring Prairie a segment of the garden

Samuel P. Jenks (1809-1889). a native of Onondaga county, married Pamela | [808 [892), daughter of Dan Phelps and Elizabeth, daughter of Israel King and Elizabeth Johnson.

Alexander Porter (1803-1866) was born in Galloway (an old provincial name for the counties of Kirkcudbright and Wigton, in southwestern Scotland). His wife Isabella (1813-1886) was a native of county Roscommon. Ireland.

David Pratt (1803-1877) was born in Massachusetts and died at Clayton. Iowa. Samuel Pratt was his brother and a sister of Solomon Harvey was his wife.

Josiah Osgood Puffer (1814-1895) was born in western Massachusetts. He was son of Samuel Puffer, second husband of Eunice, daughter of Capt. Josiah Osgood and Jane Byington. Her earlier ancestors were 1, John; 2. Stephen: 3, Hooker; 4, David. Eunice's first husband, Samuel Osgood, was her second cousin. Mr. Puffer's first wife was Hannah M. Whitmore (died 1862) ; his second wife was her sister, Mrs. Mary Hatch, who died in 1897.

Erastus Otis Vaughn (1808-1880) was not related in known degree to the others of his name at Spring Prairie. His wife (born 1819. married 1837) was Olive, daughter of Benjamin and Susan Hoyt.

Samuel Cole Vaughn O802-1868) was a son of Samuel Vaughn and Ruth Bowker, the latter a daughter of Luke Bowker and Joanna Dunbar. His wife was Sarah Hart Mills Vose, daughter of Thomas Vickery Vose and Sarah Little, granddaughter of Samuel Vose and Phoebe Vickery, greatgranddaughter of Robert and Abigail Vose. Mrs. Vaughn's mother was daughter of Joseph Little and Hannah Tngalls.

Daniel Whitmore ( 1K17-1909), son of Joseph W'hitmore and Hannah Call and grandson of Daniel Whitmore. was born in Essex county, New York. His wife was Mary E. Nobles (1817-1896) Joseph ("1821-1898), his brother, married Sarah, daughter of Sims Edgerton and Harriet Benedict.

Rev. Benjamin C. Pearce built a frame house in 1836 and moved into it before the end of the year; but, for yet some time to come less pretentious dwellings met the first needs of newcomers. The rapid improvement of water-powers soon relieved a great part of the heavy burdens of building and of subsistence. Israel Williams built a mill forty-five by fifty feet, twostoried, with eighteen-foot overshot wheel and two runs of stones, at the springs in section 19. To this he added a distillery with capacity of about two barrels - a little more than he needed for household consumption. Samuel C. Vaughn built a saw mill in 1843 on Spring brook, at the northeast corner of section 20. John Martin 1 the judge) built a saw mill in 1846 on Sugar creek, which in time became a grist mill.

Village settlement began early and hopefully at Honey Creek in section 1. Spring Prairie in sections 29 and 30. Vienna in section 18, and Voree in the northeastern corner of section 36.

Honey Creek, on the stream so named, lies partly in Racine county, in which part is the Wisconsin Central Railway's station. The village has three stores, a church, and a cemetery. Among remembered pastors of the union church were George H. Hubbard, George E. Moore, and Frederick T. Bohl. The postoffice has two free delivery routes. The school is of two grades, and its district is partly of Rochester.

Vienna, on Sugar creek, was at first called Martinsburg, from the related Martin families who settled near that point. Judge Martin's saw mill gave place to a good grist mill, which in 1853 became the property of Edwan! /aim, who improved it greatly and for several years made his flour locally famous. His sons, Cornelius and Victor, continued the business for a few years. The mill was disused and then burned. Winslow Page Storms built the Vienna House in 1848 and used it for many years as a tavern and a store, and as a postoffice. It long ago became a private dwelling; for men go to Spring Prairie to buy, to Burlington for prescriptions, and each to his own door or gate for mail. A little burial ground lies a bit more than a half mile southwest of the village, on the way to Spring Prairie and to Burlington. Little mure than tradition now remains of Vienna and its past and prospective greatness.

Voree was the creation of Jesse James Strang, who came in 1844 from Nam i><> and began to build a city and temple. It is not told whether he Found the name for bis holy city in the Book of Mormon, or whether it was lied to him in another way. He assembled about three hundred disciples, and small, of whom he was ruler, chief priest, and prophet. He appointed a da) and hour, and September 13. 1N45. lie found his credentials directlj beneath a large tree, on the edge of a high bank of White river, in the form of three gold-colored plates on which bad been scratched mathe- 1 and astronomical symbols. These he interpreted as a revelation and a heaven] nission. Eighteen more plates were found later. Laban

Piatt, Van.,, Smith, lame- M Van Nostrand, Jared B. Whelan and Edward Whitcomb witnessed these revelations. He printed a new -paper, for which he wrote long "poems": but he did not finish his temple. In 1847 he flitted with his disciples to Beaver Island, in Mackinaw strait, and in 1856 his body was brought for burial after a conflict with a federal marshal's force. He had a few relatives in the town of Spring Prairie and this, with the natural advantages of rich land and good water power, may have determined the place of the city so short-lived, of which but a few fading memories are left.

Doctor Heminway built early in 1837, in section 30, at a meeting of half-section lines, one of the largest log taverns in the territory, two stories high. He made it in many ways useful, for he opened it for religious service, for other public meetings, for a store and postoffice, and for a township polling place. This edifice determined the site of Spring Prairie village. In the fall of that year Horace Coleman and J. Crawford placed a stock of goods in a corner of the Heminway House. Samuel Pratt and Erasmus D. Smith built a store in 1S44. Doctor Heminway rebuilt his house of brick in 1845. This house was sold in 1847 to William H. Rogers, in 1848 to Nathan A. Howes, in 1854 to Franklin Walbridge, in 1857 to Capt. Ezra F. Weed, its last landlord. It became a stately private dwelling.

Stephen Bull and Thomas Gage built a store across the road eastward and they were followed by a half-forgotten line of successors, each of whom, in his turn, was usually postmaster. The store was extended and a wing added for its hardware department. It was burned in January, 1894, and its business and its higher function passed to a new store at another corner, to which place went the postoffice.

Men of the second and later generations had made of the old hardware wing a smoking room and a kind of academic grove where each person was a "professor of things in general" and a receptive pupil. Their unending debates of all that ever was, is, and yet might be were not all profitless. There was much general and special intelligence, wit, racy humor, and harmless freedom of speech at these convocations. These wordy commotions were in no way enlivened artificially, for no man there could remember when drink that rages was sold at the village. Not a few of these men were called hence to the seats of the mighty at Madison and at Elkhorn, and each of these owed this later greatness to the quickening of faculties and sharpening of wits among the nail-kegs, garden tools, and grindstones. Their fathers had disagreed sturdily in matters of church discipline and town polity, and Otis Preston had observed that no man who did not hate somebody was qualified for citizenship at the village. This «;h far otherwise with their heirs and successors, and the great unifying influence was the blue haze of the hardware wing. Men gathered at other stores in other villages to hear and discuss news and as it were to strike fire out of dull substances; but berries are not alike on every bush. The perpetual session at the store was the peculiar institution of Spring Prairie, unlike that which was most nearly like it.

Franklin postoffice was established in 1838 with weekly mails to Racine and lanesville. The name must have been changed within that year, for Spring Prairie and not Franklin competed with Delavan, Elkhorn and Geneva at the choice of a county seat. As far as known the succession of postmasters with uncertain dates, has been: Ansel Asa Heminway, 1838; Erasmus

Josiah O. Puffer made and sold shoes as early as 1839. Jacob Kohler brought Parisian styles of men's clothing in 1843. ar>d Otis Preston brought still later styles, from White Pigeon, in 1846. Earliest named village smiths were Henry Elliott, 1840; Nathaniel H. Carswell, 1843: Harrison Armstrong. [845. After these were Orman Livingston, Stephen Coats, Edson Merrill, James A'. Hemstead, and in 1865 Henry J. Shaver ( 1832-1912). In [846 and until 184N Mr. Armstrong's skill and Israel Williams's money were joined for the production of serviceable home-made plows and henceforward the village blacksmith was known to the world and to the muses of lyric and satiric verse as "Uncle Hat, the Plow -maker." Between 1850 and 1855 Mr. Lobdell made small beer and found for it a nearly county-wide sale. This business passed for a short time to Brewster B. Drake. About 1S74 Cyril R. Aldrieh began to buy. dress and ship poultry to Boston and other places. Ileiii\ I ). Barnes became his partner, and later the firm was made up of Mr. Barnes, Fdward C. Hubbard and George D. Puffer. Their shipments reached fifty t"ii- each winter. For a few years either way from 1880 Orris Pratt made vinegar for domestic and foreign consumption.

In May, [841, steps were taken to organize the Baptist church of Spring Prairie and Burlington. Among the clergy who attended these preliminary ings wire Richard Griffingi Phipps W. Lake. Orra Martin. Benjamin e, Henry Topping and A. B. Winchell. The Burlingtonians withdrew in (843 to form a society at home. The church at Spring Prairie was builtin [846 by William Johnson .and James Harrington and extended as needed 1 't unknown elsewhere ami in other denominations have so weak- are not definitely known, but their order is nearly as shown : William R. Manning, 1841 ; Roswell Cheney, 1844; Spencer Carr, 1851 ; Rice R. Whittier, Cantine Garrison, Jacob Bailey, A. F. Randall, Thomas Bright, Edward L. Harris, A. Latham, John H. Dudley. Levi Parmly, J. C. Jackson, J. H. Estey, Charles William Palmer. James F. Merriam, Franklin Kidder, George M. Daniels, A. Freeman, J. S. Forward, about 1880. There seems to have been occasional supply from the pulpits at Burlington and Elkhorn. Elder Ebenezer Harrington, whom Mr. Dwinnell describes as an earnest, eccentric man. had begun in November, 1839, to prepare the way for this society.

Congregationalists met in 1840, and among them was Mr. Dwinnell. They acted jointly with members at Burlington for two years. Rev. Cyrus Xichols ministered at first to this mission. A society was fully organized February 8. 1852, by Rev. Samuel E. Miner. In i860 the Congregational and Methodist societies built a union church, with seats for about three hundred persons. Its building mechanics were Scott & Nims. This church, too, has been discontinued, in effect, since 1881. Its pastors were Christopher C. Cadwell, 1853: Jedidiah D. Stevens, 1854-5; Avelyn Sedgwick, 1861-2: P. C. Pettibone (from Burlington), 1863; E. D. Keevil, 1864-5; Sidney K. Barteau, 1866, and Charles Morgan.

In 1837 Jesse Halstead and Samuel Pillsbury traveled and preached in a circuit lying in four counties and having eleven infant Methodist societies. These were at Big Foot. Burlington, Caldwell's Prairie, East Troy. Fort Atkinson. Geneva. Hudson, Janesville, Rochester, Spring Prairie and Whitewater. David Worthington preached in 1840. From that date to i860 little is told. Since the latter date the yearly assignments of pastors have usually been to Lyons and Spring Prairie together. The parsonage is at Lyons. There is a German Methodist church in section 2.

Israel Williams sold one acre in the southwest corner of section 30. in ^42, where Nathaniel Bell laid out and named Hickory Grove cemetery. Its area has been increased and improved, and it is one of the finest rural burial grounds in the county. Its first tenant was the wife of William Baumis.

Juliette, daughter of Col. Perez Merrick, taught school in 1837 and 1838 at the Heminway House. In the spring of 1839 a school house, enclosed with rough oak boards, was built at the corners, and Mary S. Brewster taught there. In the same year Mrs. Coleman (no longer Miss Merrick) taught near Gardner's prairie. There are now six districts in the town, and besides there are two which are joint districts with parts of Racine county and one with part of Lafayette. At the village the house now in use was built in 1864. The partial list of teachers, with nearly correct dates as to the earlier named is:

Leander F. Frisby, 1847-8; William Wilcox, 1848-9; Mr. Paine, 1849-50; Frederick O. Thorp, about 1851; George W. Burchard, 1853-4; Almerin Gillette. 1854-5; Frank Hall, 1855-6: Frank Patten. 1856-7; Benjamin F. Skiff, 1857-8; O. F. Avery. 1858-9; Frank Hall. 1859 to '61; Daniel Pratt, [865-6; Orren T. Williams, 1866-7: Mary L. Edwards. Amanda Herkimer, Fred W. Isham, Rhoda Locke, May Merrick. Anna M. Greene. Alice Moloney, Patrick McCabe, Florence Shove, Edmund B. Gray. Frank Tyrrell, Harriet Allen. Bell Derthick. Mr. Frisby became attorney-general. Mr. Thorp served as state senator from West Bend. Mr. Burchard has been known in state affairs. Mr. Williams is now a judge of the Milwaukee circuit court. Miss Edwards became Mrs. James G. Kestol. of Whitewater. Miss Greene has since visited all quarters of the globe. Colonel Gray commanded the Twenty-eighth Infantry in the Civil war. Miss Shove practices usterppathy at Chicago. Mr. Isham became county superintendent. Lorenzo D. Harvey, afterward state superintendent, once taught a select school here.