The Good Old Days 

Compiled by Dee Zimmerman

Clark County News

December 1894

Strangers coming to Neillsville and learning of our poverty stricken railway and express facilities always declare that we can never expect to get factories to locate here, or to have other large industrial or commercial success until we take hold and get another railroad.  We believe this.  The indications are that the Foster railroad will soon be built through Green- wood to Loyal and that will give those places better railroad facilities than we have.  Neillsville should bunch its enterprise, push and smash up against this railroad question like a cannonball. Then we would be out of this bondage to one railroad and one express company, who may at will fleece us of the profits we ourselves should have. Let us go in for a new rail-road connection – which ought to be an extension up through Levis and Pine Valley of the McKenna feeder line of the St. Paul system.

Ed Lloyd and Hatty Wells were married on Dec. 4 at the home of the bride in Pine Valley, with Rev. G. N. Foster officiating.  The bride is the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Matt Wells.

Jas. G. Taylor, our alderman, builder, farmer and all around hustler, bought out the Mrs. Joe Silsbey bakery and confectionery store, taking possession on Monday morning.  He has employed a baker and is baking full blast.  The Silsbey family moved in with Albert Ludington.  Taylor has put in a new chandelier and made more desirable changes as well as having employed Carter Waring to run the bakery business.

A recent notable donation to the public museum of Milwaukee has been the gift of Mayor Koch.  It is a very fine mounted specimen of the American badger, captured in Wisconsin.  Custodian Nehrling says it is a much finer specimen than that purchased at the World’s Fair for the museum.  Not withstanding the fact that the badger is the most independent animal known, and noted for its immunity from the assaults of other beasts of the field, they have become rarer each year.  The Badger presented by the mayor is of about the ordinary size and is in a fine state of preservation.

This badger is the one which Wallace Allen and friends captured in Loyal last summer.  The Sentinel, which ran the above news item, should have mentioned its Clark County origin to be inscribed upon the pedestal of the mounted badger.

A report came into our office that Percy Northrup was nearly shot at a shivaree the other night in the Town of York.  A gun in the hands of a companion was accidentally discharged, the charge grazing one side of Northrup’s face, an ear and cheek.

Railroad surveyors from Fairchild have been running some lines near Greenwood that last ten days which has left the area people talking about building railroads.

Ed French has men at work chopping wood on his land out in the Town of Grant to fill contracts made with people in town.  He has a considerable amount of land laid in to rye, and unless fortune gives an unexpected twist to her wheel he will blossom into quite an agriculturist next season. 

Part of the big Weston bridge arrived Tuesday, and is being hauled to its destination by the indefatigable Krumrey.

The Jesse Lowe building is being rapidly made ready for the new drug store of H. Inckhausen (Enckhausen?) & Co., who took possession on Dec. 15.  The fixtures are being put in place.

A heavy rain on Saturday, Dec. 15, brought around a somewhat summery look and put trade in a slump. The mild, open look of winter since has been stepbrother to an Indian summer and threatens a “Green Christmas.”

Buy your supply of mixed Christmas candy from Chas. E. Lee’s shop for only ten cents per pound.

Early this fall John Shanks bought forty head of young stock at the Murray farm north of Withee.  At the time he shipped the stock, eight of them were so wild that they couldn’t be caught.  Last week Shanks took two hunters with their Winchesters and a butcher along intending to get the animals, dead or alive.  According to all reports Buffalo Bill never had such wild adventures as those boys did in running down and killing the young stock.  Shanks said he will match his brother, Dave against the world for getting over a fence quick.  They were gone on the hunt four days and succeeded in making beef of seven of them, leaving one still roaming in the woods.

The congregational fair of last week was one of the most successful this society has ever held. Hard times cut no figure whatever.  The fancy articles sold like hot cakes, and as for supper, well, it was just such as our Neillsville ladies know how to do up!  Whitcomb’s orchestra added greatly to the enjoyment of the occasion.  The net proceeds amounted to a little over one hundred dollars. A serious question: What would become of the churches in Neillsville if our people should lose their appetites for a month or two?

The brilliant Christmas celebrations at the various churches were of a character which calls for extended notices but lack of space forbids.  A pleasanter Christmas was never observed.

The dinner New Year’s Day at the W.R.C. Hall will be served by the Methodist Church Society ladies.  It will include the following bill of fare: roast turkey, dressing, chicken pie, jelly, salad, pickles, cheese, rolls, mince pie, rice pudding, pumpkin pie, tea and coffee.  Each meal is 25 cents.  Everybody is bidden to partake.

The merry hum of Swann’s saving (sawing) machine along Pleasant Ridge down in the Reed neighborhood is heard no more.  The Counsell’s, Benedicts, Gerhart’s and Slocomb’s all have piles of freshly sawed wood in their yards.

Last Friday, Principal Morrison treated the high school scholars to a barrel of nice eating apples.  The class rooms of Kitty Furlong and Vinnie Jones were given a surprise in the form of Christmas trees, which bore a present for each scholar.  Teachers make their work lighter by their winning the hearts of the pupils.

December 1954

Frank Arbelovsky, son of Mr. and Mrs. Joe Arbelovsky, arrived home Wednesday to spend a furlough with his parents.  He has been stationed with the air force in Labrador and expects to be transferred to California.  Miss Ardith Lindow and Frank Arbelovsky were honored at a coin shower Saturday afternoon in the church parlors of the E.U. B. church at Chili.

The following men left City Hall, Neillsville, by chartered Greyhound bus, on Dec. 1, 1954, and were inducted into the army at the Minneapolis examining and induction station: Raymond E. Miller, Jr., Colby; Ronald B. Braun, Greenwood; Robert P. Gregorich, Greenwood; Forest J. Larsen, Neillsville; Walden W. Gravunder, Spencer; Milton H. Molle, Unity; Vernon W. Wetzel, Withee.

All of the above men volunteered.

Santa Claus visited Willard Sunday afternoon during the annual Christmas party held in the Westside hall and sponsored by the members of the C.C.W., Mary of Help and the Holy Family Lodge.  During the party movies were shown, then Santa and his helpers distributed more than 200 bags of Christmas goodies to the boys and girls of the neighborhood.

Shop Penney’s in Neillsville for Christmas gifts.  Galey & Lord, woven plaid sport shirts, $2.98 each; gift-boxed pure silk bow ties, neat ready-made clip-ons 98¢; man’s fur-lined gloves of fine grade capeskin, $3.98.

Clark County Forestry has done a big business in Christmas trees this year.  The sale brought in $4,882.35 from 8, 376 trees and boughs. This was a larger sale than that of 1953, when the returns were $4,011.

The demand is strong for Norway pine rather than spruce. The sale of Norway pine was 5, 794 trees.  The largest tree sold was a spruce which was 12 feet high.

The Live and Learn Homemakers Club met in the Loyal Municipal building Thursday evening.  Mrs. Leonard Rueth became a member at this meeting.  Following the business meeting a Christmas party was held.  Games were played, gifts exchanged and names of Secret Pals drawn.  A supper was served by candlelight on tables trimmed with Christmas decorations.  Hostesses were Mrs. Raymond Johnson, Mrs. Eldred Judd, Mrs. Milton Knack, Mrs. Lee Favreau, Mrs. Harold Frances, Mrs. Clayton Engelbretson and Mrs. Leonard Kollmansberger. 

A work crew moved a large amount of ground as they developed a railroad bed for the Minneapolis, St. Paul & Sault Ste. Marie railway through what is referred to as the “big cut,” between Greenwood and Loyal.

As the photo depicts, the “live” horsepower pulled two horse-drawn slushers steered by a workman who lifted the slushers’ two wooden handles at the right time, emptying the soil at a designated area.  Though the method seems tedious and primitive, it appears to have done a fine job.