Clark County Press, Neillsville, WI

October 1, 2003, Page 14

Transcribed by Dolores (Mohr) Kenyon.

Index of "Oldies" Articles 

 

 

Compiled by Dee Zimmerman

 

 

Clark County News

 October 1868

 

Mr. Thomas LaFlesh, of Necedah, Juneau County, formerly of Neillsville, arrived in the village a few days ago.  He had a crew of men with him.  They were here to inspect over 20,000 acres of land in Clark County, land owned by General C. C. Washburn.  It is no small job and their work will keep them busy for several weeks.

••••••••••

A meeting was held in School District #1, at the schoolhouse in Weston.  The following business was transacted: W. H. Race was elected clerk and L. R. Stafford, treasurer.  Stafford has acted in this capacity for five years giving entire satisfaction to his position.  The tax voted was as follows: to the teacher for 10 months teaching school, $400; appropriated town orders on hand, $260; to increase the library, $50; to pay services of Librarian, $25; for incidental expenses, $25.  The proceedings of the meeting were characterized by unanimous feelings.

••••••••••

Hewett & Woods Company has put up one of the Fairbank’s hay scales, near their old store building.  A scale of this type has been long needed and it will be a great accommodation.

••••••••••

Henry Staring and Ed Markey are fitting up rooms for an oyster saloon in the building where the barbershop now is, for this winter.  They both have had experience in the business and know how to dish up oysters in the latest improved style.  Try them and you will find this to be so.

••••••••••

Some lumbermen have already gone into the woods to build camps and make roads.  They are preparing to commence their winter’s work early.  It is impossible now to give a close estimate of the amount of business that will be done next winter.  We have heard the opinion, however, that it would be about 100,000,000 feet.

••••••••••

The appearance of innumerable mice, in this section, is really unaccountable.  They are everywhere and in countless numbers.  In the woods, in the fields, in houses, stores, shops and places where it seems impossible for them to live.  They gnaw through old paper on the walls to get at the paste.  They are doing considerable mischief and are a source of great annoyance.  Mice are almost as plentiful this fall as potato bugs were last summer.  A few thousand cats could find steady and profitable employment in this county.

••••••••••

Yesterday, Mr. W. T. Hutchinson entered, under the Homestead Act, 1,880 acres of farming land to two different parties in Clark County.  One party of five or six persons, with families, took 920 acres in township 26, range one east.  The other group took 960 acres in township 27, 1 west, just one section and a half.  In both cases, the land was all in one tract.  Through Mr. Hutchinson’s agency, 10,000 acres of land have been taken by Homestead and pre-emption since the first of May.  We have plenty more land for new settlers.

••••••••••

George W. King, Esq., has just received a first-class planer and matcher to be put up in connection with his steam mill near Houghtonburg.  It is said to be one of the best planers on the market.  It will plane a board ¼ of an inch thick, or a plank 4 inches thick.  This will be a great convenience to the farmers in Garden Valley and Alma.

••••••••••

Mr. Hans Johnson has changed the name of the Neillsville House to “O’Neill House.”  This is appropriate.

 

Remember the soldiers’ grand ball and supper to be held at the O’Neill House next Friday night.  A big time may be expected.

••••••••••

The Methodist conference, at its last session, assigned to this village, Rev. J. J. Walker, who was for the last two or three years located at Monroe, Green County, Rev. Walker comes highly recommended and will doubtless be well liked here.  He preached at the courthouse, here, twice last Sabbath, morning and evening.  The attendance both times was large and the sermons were well received.  Rev. Walker is an energetic, wide-awake man and possesses some of those genial qualities that cannot fail placing him in full favor with the people here.

 

October 1938

 

Formal dedication of the new high school building at Loyal will be made in exercises in the school auditorium at 8 p.m. Friday.

 

The dedicatory address will be given by the State Superintendent of Public Instruction John Callahan.  A full program will introduce many persons prominent in the affairs of the school, in the past and present.

 

Construction on the new high school building was started December 5, 1937 and was completed, for all practical purposes, on September 2, 1938.  Three days later, 230 children of the village’s grade and high schools opened their classes there.

 

The building houses nine classrooms, a large study room and a large combination gymnasium and auditorium.  It was built at a cost of approximately $85,000, of which 45% was furnished by the PWA.  A part of the cost was paid by the school’s building fund and the remainder was secured through a loan by the state land office.  At present, the building is 60% paid for, in spite of the fact that taxes were reduced in the district, last summer.

 

Landscaping of the eight-acre plot, on which the building is located, is being carried on.  When completed, the campus will include at least two tennis courts, a softball diamond, baseball diamond, football field, a park with benches and parking lot with space for 100 cars.  A locker and shower room beneath the auditorium stage also remains to be completed.

 

Of practically fireproof construction, the building contains many windows, which make the rooms light and cheerful. All the space is utilized, with the basement housing the agricultural department, a new department in the school curriculum, this year.  The interior design had been drawn up by Principal M. D. Nedry.

 

Following the dedication exercises, the open house will be held in the building for about half-an-hour in order that the public may inspect the new building.  A dance will be held in the auditorium following the open house. Receipts from the dance will be used toward the purchase of new basketball uniforms for the high school’s varsity team.

 

The dedication program, arranged by Principal Nedry, is as follows:

 

The invocation will be presented by Rev. J. C. Langholz of the Trinity Lutheran Church; 15-minute concert by the Loyal High School band; introduction of members of the school board: who are Ray Prior, director, E. W. Sterr, treasurer and Albert Davel, clerk.  Introduction of V. A. Siebert of Milwaukee, representative of the PWA; introduction of the Rev. H. F. Leschensky, of Reedsburg, former minister of Trinity Lutheran Church, who was a clerk of the school board when the new school building was planned; four past principals, E. C. Hirsch of Wausau, E. J. McKean of Tomah, Nels Sorenson of St. Croix Falls and J. R. Thomas of Spencer.

 

The introductions will be followed by numbers of the high school chorus, and a baritone solo to be sung by Edward Trnka.  An introduction of the Loyal Village President Fred Laosky will be made as well as representatives of other village business organizations.

 

Preceding the dedication exercises, members of the Loyal Business Men’s association and their ladies will hold a banquet in the auditorium, at which guests will be presented.

 

The Clark County Education Association, an organization of rural, village and city schools teachers will meet there at 5 p.m. Monday afternoon.  The meeting will enable members to become acquainted with the functions of the Wisconsin Education Association and instruct county delegates to the state association meeting in Milwaukee in November.  At 1 p.m. Monday, principals and superintendents of all county schools are scheduled to inspect the new building and visit classes. They will confer at 4 p.m.

••••••••••

Five Neillsville youths pleaded guilty before Judge A. E. Dudley, Saturday morning, to charges of disturbing the peace.  They paid court costs totaling $19.75.  The youths were: Billy Lowe, Lester Stone, Clarence Peacock, Donald Whaley and Tommy Flynn.  The boys were told on Friday night to appear in court the following morning, by Night Policeman George Cramer.  Policeman Cramer said the boys had been shouting that evening.  Each youth paid a cost of $3.95.

••••••••••

Hay Creek Dam, in Foster Township, one of three dams planned in Clark County, to add recreational facilities and make the county one of the vacation spots of Wisconsin, is nearing completion.

 

The dam, located 14 miles west of Greenwood, will form a 125-acre lake.  The lake bottom has been cleared of stumps, brush and other snags.  The lake will be stocked with fish.

 

Two other dams have been planned to create artificial lakes for resort and recreation purposes.  One will be on Wedges Creek, west of Neillsville, and another, one mile north of Greenwood, on the Black River, by the Greenwood Park.

••••••••••

Mr. and Mrs. Grant Snyder of Section 6 Fremont Township have completed the job of putting nine children through high school.  The last child, Don, graduated from the Granton High School last June.

 

Neither Mr. nor Mrs. Snyder had the opportunity to go to high school.  An eighth-grade country school was the limit of their opportunity.  Perhaps all the more because of their meager opportunity, they were willing to make the effort to give their children a chance.

 

The nine children began with the sensible country school training, which has furnished the background for good Americans for many years.  All of the children started at the Heathville School, a mile and a-half away from home.  For that schooling, they mostly walked.

 

The Granton High School figured in the lives of all nine, but not all graduated from the school as Loyal and Neillsville schools also knew the Snyder children as students.  Their conveyance, particularly traveling to Granton, was a pony, an honored member of the family, which has about finished his job and is easing off, now that the school burden is over.  Part of the time the pony took the student of the family on its back; the rest of the time the pony drew a buggy.  Finally, a car arrived and furnished some relief.  But it was a long haul, even for a willing pony.  Perhaps some day one of the Snyders will figure out how many miles their pony traveled, in making its contribution to higher education.

 

Mr. and Mrs. Snyder have worked hard, but they have had certain compensations.  Twice, they have gone to southern California, which has called some of the children.   They have enjoyed the palms and balmy breezes of San Diego and the desert warmth of Riverside.  Very soon Paul and Ruth will start for California; Ruth to live with her sister, Hope, and Paul to be with his brother, Vere.

 

The Snyders came to Clark County from Richland County.  That was back in about 1907.  They had then four small children, Beatrice, Hope, Innis and Vere.  They brought eight or 10 cows and a team of horses.  At first, they purchased 40 acres of land, not much of which was cleared.  Mr. Snyder cleared it and after a time bought another 40 acres.  Dairying was the main business of the farm and the whole family worked at it, up to the limit of ability and strength.

 

The children did what they could and they worked hard, both at home and at school.  The value of schooling was impressed upon them by the effort which they had to make.

 

The oldest of the children is Beatrice and the second is Hope.  These two sisters went to school together.  They attended Granton High School and both then went to the teachers’ college at Eau Claire.  Beatrice taught for a time and also studied beauty culture, which she now works at, along with the care of her family.  She is the wife of Arthur Falk and has four girls.  The Falk family resides at Columbus, Wis.

 

Hope taught four years and became Hope Snyder Renne.  She and her husband live on a dairy farm near Riverside, Calif.  They have two children, a boy and a girl.

 

The next child, Innis, went to school at Granton and then took teacher’s training at Neillsville. She taught four years and married Ross Stevens.  She and her husband are on a farm near Spencer.

 

Vere graduated from the Granton High School, attended the University of Wisconsin for a short time and took a course in mineralogy in California.  He is now doing landscaping work at San Diego, Calif.  Vere married while out west, his bride being Alma Schlinsog.  Paul will be living with Vere and his wife.

 

Hulda majored at the State Teachers’ College at San Diego and taught in Wisconsin for eight years.  She married James Gilbert, a farmer residing near Spencer. She is the mother of a little girl.

 

Hazel attended the Loyal and Granton High Schools and took a teacher’s training course at Neillsville.  She is teaching at the Spokeville School.

 

Paul went to Loyal High School and graduated from Granton High School.  He also studied forestry in Montana for a time and then took a business course.  He had been working recently near home and will now join Vere in California.  A few days ago, Paul threw down his dinner pail.  This brought forcibly to Mrs. Snyder’s attention that she had probably packed the dinner pail for the last time.  For the past 30 years, the dinner pails have been a steady job.

 

Ruth started high school at Neillsville and finished at Granton.  She took a course in beauty culture at St. Paul and has worked in that line.

 

Don, the last of the nine, graduated from Granton High School this past June.  He is working on the farm, helping his father.

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Clark County’s second courthouse, built in 1874, stood on the crest of a hill in the East 200 block between Fifth and Sixth Street.  The windowed tower must have provided a most scenic view overlooking the city of Neillsville and its surrounding countryside.  (Photo courtesy of Bill Roberts’ family collection)

 

 


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