Clark County Press, Neillsville, WI

April 19, 2000, Page 11

Transcribed by Dolores (Mohr) Kenyon.

Index of "Oldies" Articles 

                             Compiled by Dee Zimmerman

 

Clark County News

 

April 1900

 

Last Saturday, Mrs. James Flynn was brought to Neillsville for the purpose of having an operation for the relief of a mastoid abscess.  The operation was successfully performed by Drs. Conroy, Lacey and French.  The operation, a difficult procedure, required trephining the skull.  A similar operation was performed by the same physicians last week on a child of Joseph Schwellenbach, living near Globe.

 

Colby is to have a State bank, the promoters’ are Wm. Johnson of Greenwood, Andrew Emerson of Loyal, Cullen Ayers of Unity, Erastus Bowen of Greenwood, Kinzie Andrews of Medford and R. B. Salter of Colby.  Capital stock is $25,000.  Kinzie Andrews will be cashier of the new bank. A brick building 28’ x 50’ will be built for the bank business.

 

Attention farmers: any good farmer who needs help with his farm work can come to the Clark County Courthouse. A young strong boy of age 15 years can be bound out to a farmer until he is 21 years old. The boy is to be clothed, fed and kept as a member of the family and must be paid $100 on his 21st birthday.  Call on Geo. L. Jacques, Clark County Judge if you are interested in giving this boy a home.

 

The Neillsville Brewery sold nearly a carload of their 1900 Bock beer last week here in the city.  It will be on tap again next Saturday.  Owing to the big demand for their imported barrel-shaped etched and gilt-edge beer glasses, the Neillsville Brewery has decided to give away one of these beauties with every case of their bottle beer that is sold.  Neillsville beer is delivered anywhere in the city of Neillsville.  Prices per two dozen quarts $2.00; one dozen quarts $1.00; 2 dozen pints, $1.25 or a small keg is sold for $1.00.  Order by next Saturday and your beer will be delivered in time for Easter Sunday.  Phone No. 42 to order.

 

The main portion of the old grist mill, along O’Neill Creek, is being town down.  It will be moved out to the Ring stock farm east of town.

 

The following marriage licenses were issued this past week by the Clark County Clerk: William C. Filwiler and Ethel King, Town of York; William Luecke and Mabel Lindow, Town of Fremont; Andrew Wrembelski and Mary Cheslick, Town of Withee; William Haselow, Town of Sherman and Bertha Bladow, Loyal.

 

S. F. Hewett wishes to announce that he has started a new milk route in Neillsville. He is prepared to furnish milk and cream to customers regularly or occasionally as required.  The milk wagon makes the rounds in the city every day.  Phone No. 11 for your delivery order.

 

The Village Board of Granton is going to allow $100 of the salon license money to be expended on new sidewalks for Granton.  This is without question the proper thing to be done, as during rainy weather it is next to impossible to get around town on account of mud.

 

Sheep owners in this area are having heavy losses in their herds. Some unknown illness has entered this area which attacks sheep.

 

On Monday, J. G. Mohlheinrich, President of the Reliable Furniture Manufacturing Co., of Baltimore, Md., was in Neillsville and obtained a lease on the furniture factory building for his business.  A western branch has been organized under the name of the Wisconsin Furniture Manufacturing Co.

 

Last week, Peter Marx exchanged his brick store, hotel and saloon building on Seventh Street, with William Pischer for his farm of 160 acres in the Town of Fremont.  Pischer will take possession on July 1st.

 

James Sturdevant is an old log-driver and has a little old time pride in his ability to ride a “bucking” log.  One morning this week, he mounted a precarious bit of timber down at Ross’ Eddy to show the boys how it was done. Somehow the log got a head-start and Sturdevant was out of sight for a few seconds. The water was cold, as he soon learned.

 

A new sidewalk is being built on the Hewett Street side of the Merchant’s Hotel. The reason everyone stops at the Merchant’s Hotel these days is because it is the neatest, cleanest and best managed hotel in Clark County.  The new sidewalk by the hotel will be another fine feature for the business.

 

Friday forenoon there were 16 twelve-inch mortar guns loaded on a freight train which passed through Neillsville en route to Seattle, Wash.  Each gun weighed 30 tons and looked capable of doing considerable destruction.

 

Huckstead and Randall are building a new barn for Fred Vine on his farm in the Pleasant Ridge area. They have the structure ready for raising.

 

April 1940

 

A special invitation to attend a free public dance in the Armory Friday night was extended to all farmers, friends and neighbors this week by Floyd H. Casler, president of the Neillsville Chamber of Commerce.

 

The dance is being given by the Chamber of Commerce in celebration of its organization.  The public is invited to attend and rub elbows, but no shin kicking will be permitted.  An orchestra which has filled several local engagements with success will play a program of old-time and popular numbers.

 

Dancing will start at 8:30 p.m. and there will be only one requirement; each person must dance on his or her own feet and not on their partner’s.

 

Since the Work Projects Administration was created in July 1935, more than 348 miles of highways, streets and roads in Clark County have been constructed or improved through projects employing WPA labor.  The recorded information was filed in a county physical accomplishments report compiled by G. E. Wiseman, district manager.

 

The inventory is the most comprehensive survey of WPA achievements ever conducted during the four and a half years of the program’s existence.  The report does not include accomplishments of the WPA or CWA programs or projects operated through other federal agencies which are financed from WPA funds.

 

Of the 348 miles of highways, streets and roads in Clark County upon which WPA labor was employed, four miles were streets and alleys in urban sections and three miles in parks.

 

In addition six bridges, having a total length of 365 feet, were constructed in Clark County.  Five bridges were of steel and one of masonry construction.

 

A total of 28 culverts were installed on projects employing WPA labor, nearly two miles of sidewalks and paths and more than six miles of curbs.

 

The report also shows that eight public buildings were constructed by WPA workers of Clark County and 25 buildings were reconstructed and improved.  The new construction included one recreational building, one garage and one storage building. 

 

The reconstruction included two schools, nine recreational buildings and eight administrative office buildings.

 

WPA workers were employed to improve one grandstand with a capacity of 5,000 people, two parks, one playground, one athletic field and two tennis courts.

 

Water mains laid in Clark County totaled three and a half miles.  WPA employees built one water storage tank of 50,000 gallon capacity and a 200 acre-foot reservoir impounded by a dam.  Also, installed were more than nine miles of storm and sanitary sewers, 131 manholes and catch basins.

 

WPA workers were employed also to erect nearly ten miles of telephone lines, clear four miles of fire trails and plant 600,000 trees on 1,500 acres of land.

 

The report shows that 250 linear feet of levees and embankments were constructed and 1,800 square yards of rip rap.  Nine conservation and flood control dams were built and eight dams were improved or reconstructed.

 

While the WPA has been inexistence four and a half years, the program was not fully developed until five or six months after its inception. As a result, the survey actually depicts work done by WPA employees in a little more than four years.

 

The survey does not convey all phases of work performed by WPA employees.  The projects reflected in the report are those of the larger projects.

 

A total of 2,180 fishing licenses were distributed this week to 38 outlets in Clark County by County Clerk, Calvin Mills, as preparations went ahead for the opening of most game fishing seasons, about a month from now.

 

There is only one change in the fishing laws for this year.  Persons using more than one cane pole and more than one line must have a license.  Up to the present, cane pole fishers have been free from license regulations. Residence licenses remain one dollar; non-resident are three dollars.

 

The smelt run in Marinette found at least two Clark County residents in the thick of dipping operations last Saturday night, April 13.  Carl A. Olson of Neillsville and Otto Stock of Loyal returned with a “catch” of two bushels of smelt, which they had dipped up during about two hours of the run.  Olson reported that the run this year had attracted tourists from several states of the Northwest and some came from the east, as far away as Ohio.  Marinette was decked out in holiday splendor with a street carnival, several bands and a huge pyrotechnic display.  (For those of you who don’t know what a pyrotechnic display is, the Webster dictionary defines it as “fireworks”.  D.Z.)

 

There is a longing, bewildered look in the eyes of the older residents of Trondhjem, Clark County these days.  For more than a score of years, several residents of that small farming community, a stone’s throw north and east of Greenwood, have followed peaceful pursuits.  Thrifty, as is the nature of the Scandinavians, they have worked long and hard, saving for the day they could return to visit the snow-capped mountains and deep, peaceful fjords they knew as children.

 

Now all thoughts of that are past.  Blood colors the deep, blue fjords.  The roar of cannons, the crack of rifle fire and the drone of war birds break the serenity that the mountains knew for nearly a century.

 

Residents of Trondhjem, Clark County, have been torn from their dreams by a world of stark realism, as armies’ battle and blood flows thick in the Trondhjem area, where they once lived.

 

Trondhjem is the way the Norwegians spell it: but news reports inflict an ironic German touch with the spelling, “Trondheim.”  It all means the same.  “Hjem” is “home” to the Norwegians as much as “heim” is home in German.  Trond was the name of the Norwegian after whom the area was named, literally, “the home of Trond.”

 

The Lutheran church, built about 30 years ago, is located in the center of the Trondhjem community near Greenwood.  In their time of sorrow for the land of their birth, older residents rally around their church and Rev. M. K. Aaberg watches over them as he has done for over 20 years.  The church always symbolized a tie between the new country which has adopted this group of native Norwegians and the Trondhjem across the waters.

 

The church was their first community enterprise.  It was named the Trondhjem church and the community has since taken over the name.

 

Thirty years ago the Engebretson’s, Danielson’s, Johnson’s, Hembres, Krogness’ and all the others went to church in the old Larson school, under the guidance of the Rev. J. C. Hougum, who is now in Stevens Point.  Finally, they decided to build their own church. Members gave willingly of their savings and energies.

 

Stone for the foundation was hauled from Ed Engebretson’s farm, a short distance from the home in which Mrs. Engebretson now lives.  The lot was donated by Simon Johnson.  Dave Danielson was the carpenter and he was assisted by Emil Engebretson.  I. O. Hembre and Chris Engebretson also were among those who helped construct the church.

 

After the church was built, the old Larson school was moved a short distance north of the Trondhjem corner, onto the old Christopherson farm.  It is from this farm that the name of the present school was taken, “Christopherson School.”

 

Mr. and Mrs. H. F. Wilsmann, who conduct the Merchants Hotel in Neillsville, celebrated their 56th wedding anniversary on April 17.  No special arrangements were made for the occasion except the congratulations of their friends and relatives.  “Quite different from the seventeenth of April, 56 years ago,” said Wilsmann, “when we had a big celebration at the farm home of my folks at Mishicot, Wis.  The Two Rivers brass band played from noon until nine o’clock the following day and the charge for their services was but twelve dollars.”  Rev. Phillip Koehler, brother of Rev. John Koehler of Neillsville, performed the ceremony, the latter being pastor of the Two Rivers and Mishicot churches at that time.  Rev. John Koehler was there that day too, as he was visiting his brother for a few days.

 

Everyone interested in playing golf is invited to attend the annual spring golf round-up at the Neillsville Country Club on Sunday, April 18.  Each of you can play golf all day and enjoy supper at the club house for only 75 cents per person.

 

Public Notice – Al Marg is establishing a town delivery service in Neillsville.  Each day he will make deliveries from the stores to the residences within the city.  The delivery service may be had for the small charge of 5 cents per delivery.

Harry F. Wilsmann and his wife, Elizabeth, operated the Merchants Hotel on the corner of Hewett and Seventh Streets, in Neillsville for several years.  This early 1920’s photo typified a business day in the hotel lobby.  Shown (left to right) Harry, his son William, and an unidentified traveling salesman.  (Photo from the Wilsmann family collection)

 

 


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