Clark County Press, Neillsville, Wisconsin

December 13, 2017 Page 9

Contributed by "The Clark Co. Press"

Transcribed by Dolores (Mohr) Kenyon.

Index of "Oldies" Articles 

 

Compiled by Dee Zimmerman

 

Clark County News

December 1907

 

Bills are out for a big basketball game at the Opera House Saturday Dec. 7.  There will be a game between the eighth grade of Neillsville schools and the eighth grade of Granton schools and between the first and second girls’ teams of Neillsville High School.  A dance will be held after the games.                        

•••••••••

Mr. A. A. Graves, who owns the electric light and franchise at loyal, has recently been trying to sell or lease the electric plant to the village.  Not succeeding in arranging terms with the village he has turned out the lights.

•••••••••

Wesley Hake, the 10-year-old son of G. G. Hake, had a narrow escape from drowning in the millpond last Thursday night.  He was playing on the ice under the bridge and went upon a place where the current had worn the ice thin and broke in.  Will Campman happened to be crossing the bridge and hearing the calls for help, ran down the bank and holding on to some willows, succeeded in getting out to the boy and saved his life.

•••••••••

The Flexible Flyer is the best, practical, most durable sled for boys or girls that ever was made.  You can steer it like a wagon without wearing out your shoes to turn it like other sleds.  Tragsdorf, Zimmerman & Co. are the only ones that have them; they come in all sizes, from a one-person to 8-persons size.

•••••••••

W. H. Huntly and Tony Shiller of Neillsville, on last Satruday, placed a fine monument marked with the Masonic emblem over the last resting place of N. Waterbury in the Methodist Cemetery and also a headstone over Mrs. P. Smith whose remains were recently removed from the Stowe farm.  Mr. Huntly has the reputation of doing the best of work. Loyal Tribune.                                                        

•••••••••

A stranger named Cummings, who is said to have lived near Greenwood, was about town last week, drinking some, but apparently harmless.  He was set upon Tuesday night by some ruffians and beaten in the most brutal manner.  Saturday, he was taken to the County Poor Farm, and is now under the care of the county physician.

•••••••••                                                                         

F. J. Brindley, town clerk of Pine Valley, has resigned his office and town board appointed Robert Garvin to take his place.  Mr. Brindley expects to visit his ole home in Indiana and perhaps go farther south before spring.

•••••••••

Regular services will be held in the Scandinavian Lutheran Church Sunday, Dec. 22, in Norwegian at 10:30 a.m. and Christmas Day there will be service only in the forenoon, in Norwegian.  A special invitation is extended to all Scandinavians in the vicinity of the city.  Rev. A. Svanoe.

.•••••••••

The Short family, consisting of the descendants of James and Betsy Short and their families are to hold a family reunion at Shaffer’s Hall in Shortville on New Year’s Day.  There are some twenty-seven families in the relationship, most of whom will probably be represented at the gathering.  They will assemble at the hall at ten o’clock, have a great family dinner and spend the day in visiting and family reminiscences.

•••••••••

On Friday, Robert Garvin received a telegram announcing the death of his father, Thomas Garvin in Seattle, Wash., Thursday, Dec. 19.  The deceased was one of the early settlers in this locality.  Some years ago, he went west and has made his home with his daughter, Mrs. Ella E. Lewis.

•••••••••

The ladies of the M. E. Church will serve dinner Jan. 1, 1908, in the Parlors of the church at 12 o’clock:

Menu: Roast Turkey, Plain Dressing, Cranberry Sauce, Roast Pork, Apple Salad, Mashed Potatoes, Giblet Gravy, Rutabagas, Rolls, Butter, Pickles, Plum Pudding, Mince and Apple Pie, Coffee.

•••••••••

Dr. L. Snyder, veterinary surgeon and dentist, Neillsville, Wis., licensed to practice veterinary medicine and surgery by the State Board of Veterinary Examiners, Professional calls promptly attended to day or night.  Service can be had at George Evan department shops, or Mead Bros.’. livery barn.

•••••••••

“That Black River Ghost Again.”

 

Winona, Minn., December 25, 1907. 

 

To Editor of R. and P.:

 

Dear Sir: In regard to the Black River

Bbridge ghost, I will say that about Dec. 5, I met two Indians near Blair who said they were going to La Crosse and seemed much excited about seeing a woman at a bridge near Neillsville.  The Indian buck told the story of the woman blowing away and swimming in the air and sent away flying; his wife said, “yes, yes, she see it, too, she see it, too,” and they traveled off excitedly.

 

Yours Respectfully,

Oscar Johnson.

 

(There was a legend of the early 1900s, of a ghost having been occasionally seen over the Black River Bridge, located on CTH H, west of Christie.  The story is that of Charlotte Mills, who live in the Christie are for a few years.  After the death of her two sons, and then her husband, Charlotte became very distraught, taking her on life by leaping from the Black River Bridge.  Thus, there were stories of her ghost occasionally being seen near and over the bridge.)

•••••••••

Yolo Charcoal Kilns

 

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, when the virgin hardwoods were being cut, there were three or four charcoal kilns, located in Clark County.  The Yolo Kilns were one mile west of Chili, in a little community named “Yolo.”  The word “Yolo” originated from Indian words meaning, “abounding in rushes.”  However,, Yolo could have been named after a family, or another theory is the name came from the echoing sound of a train’s whistle as it traveled along the nearby railroad-track.

 

Built with layers of granite, the cone-shaped kilns were burning pits, which processed hardwoods into charcoal. There was then a market for the charcoal that was needed in extracting metals from ore.

 

Yolo Charcoal Kilns

 

December 1947

 

“Neillsville School meeting decides to replace vehicles, which had gone on strike.”

 

The electors spent the better part of an hour discussing the general advantages and woes of bus transportation and the measures of reviving one old bus or of holding final obsequies for it. The more extreme position was suggested by the questions of Kurt Listeman, who wanted to know whether it was really desirable for a high school to have such growth as is made possible by maintaining bus service.

 

Mr. Peters did not attempt to paint a bright picture of the bus headache.  But to be without it, he said, was to abandon the natural school territory served by Neillsville to neighboring high schools, which and have come tight up to the territory served by Neillsville and have shown a willingness even to come still closer, if they get the opportunity.  To abandon the bus business, Mr. Peters said, would be to lose a substantial number of tuition pupils, and to reduce the revenue of the school without being able to reduce the expenses proportionately.

 

All of this talking had been done by the men.  Quite a few women were present, but they had been keeping still.  Finally, Mrs. W. H. Allen arose and said that they might as well get down to a decision.  They all knew, she declared, that what they were going to do was to buy a new bus.  They might as well say so and be done with it.  She said more in a minute than the men had said in an hour.  So, they took a vote and the whole thing was settled, just as Mrs. Allen said it would be.

 

The school board lost no time in acting upon the authorizations.  The purchase was made immediately of a heavy 48-passenger bus, which is new.  The list price of this bus was $5,163, and the board bought it by trading in the old bus and paying $3,150.                                              

•••••••••

Heron (Pink) Van Gorden is wondering a little about who is the goat in a hide deal he made Monday morning.  A man walked into Van Gorden’s, told Pink he had two “buck hides” in a gunnysack.  So, Pink paid him, and the man left.  A little later the hides were dumped out of the sack.  One was a buck deer hide.  The other may have belonged to a “buck,” all right; but it must have been a buck goat!

•••••••••,

Cement Blocks – Fire Safe – Economical – Permanent – An Ideal Building Material,

Made at Christie by – Christie Concrete Products. Phone Y-2431

•••••••••

We Serve Short Orders – Steaks – Chops – Sandwiches – Chicken Dinners – Fish Fries Fridays,

The Roadside Cafι, Hewett At Division Street.

•••••••••

Seniors at Granton High School are sponsoring a Christmas formal in the village hall Saturday evening.  Jane Crothers will be the queen and Merle Bartsch, the king.  Attendants will be Susan Moeller, Dick Kauth, Amber Marg and Harland Bartsch.  Music will be by Howard Sturtz’ Orchestra.  The public is invited.

•••••••••

Shades of Spring!

 

The first or last, depending on how one looks at it, robin of the season has been seen.

 

It was seen by Arthur Ackerman of Neillsville, route two, at exactly 12:46 p.m., Thursday, December 11!

 

His corroborators are Fred Hrach and Herbert Bardeleben, who were with him and saw the robin red-breast as it flew in front of the car five miles west of Neillsville and perched on a tree near the road.  The men couldn’t believe their eyes says Mr. Ackerman, so they stopped the car and just stared at it.

 

The location in which the three men saw the robin was given as the old August Dux “40” in the Town of Pine Valley.

 

Mr. Ackerman reported that George Fischer, who lives on the Rudolph Frantz farm in the Town of Hewett, attests that robins have been here all fall and winter, to date.  Mr. Fischer, according to Mr. Ackerman, tells of seeing one or more every day.                                                          

•••••••••

When the Rev. Jacob Stucki, preaching in the early days to the Winnebago Indians at the Black River Falls Mission, declared that Indians and whites were essentially the same kind of human beings, with the same sort of blood and same capacity for salvation, the Medicine Man of the tribe did some critical pondering.  The speaker was the well-known pioneer preacher, with his goatee upon his chin.  The Medicine Man was the tribal mystic bigwig, with the smooth face typical of the Indians.

 

Those whiskers; they were something, thought the Medicine Man.  As quick as he thought, he rushed up to the front of the table, across which Jacob Stucki was preaching.  He grabbed Mr. Stucki by the prominent goatee and shouted out his violent objection.  The same sort?  An Indian no better than a white man just same?  Perish the thought!  And a goatee; what better evidence?

 

That was a tough one for any preacher to meet and surmount, and it was typical of the problems, which faced this early missionary, and which doomed him to work for 20 years before a single Winnebago was converted.

 

This experience was related to the men’s Club of the Congregational Church last Thursday evening, by the Rev. Ben Stucki, son of the pioneer preacher and his successor in work for the Indians.  Mr. Stucki told how the Indians, in those early days, coming to church, sat around the hot stove and squirted tobacco juice against it.  One old chief, George Henaga, upon squaring away for the religious service, pulled out his tobacco pouch and clay pipe, filled the pipe and passed it on to his squaw.  Then he pulled out another and filled it for himself.  With two pipes going those Indians were ready for whatever the preacher might have to offer.

 

The origin of the Indian School was told by Mr. Stucki.  It started with Andrew Big Soldier, who had two children.  Big Soldier, like the others, was having tough sledding.  The only job he could get was at a distance, but what to do with the children?  So, he led them to the Stucki home, explaining the situation and proposed that Mr. Stucki take them in along with his own, care for them and give them an education.  This idea appealed to Mr. Stucki as having its points, and he accepted the two little children into his home.  But other Indians were in the same fix!  The idea appealed to them.  If the preacher would do it for one family, who not for others?  And so presently, the Stuckis found themselves living with Indian children all over the place, practically pushing through the roof and out the windows and doors.  The number grew to 48, and by that time the state authorities indicated concern.  The facilities were inadequate, as the Stuckis well knew.

 

It amounted to just this: the Stuckis had quite a school on their hands and had no place to put it.  So, they went to work to get a place, and that is the origin of the present fine structure on the banks of the Black River in Neillsville, which houses the present Indian School.

 

The early Winnebagos, once possessors of this part of Wisconsin, knew good land when they saw it, and lived upon it.  The arrowheads of the early days are found upon the rich soil, proving that the Indians lived there, not on the sandy soil where the remnants of the tribe now have had to live hereabouts.

 

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