A scene from an early logging camp

The man in white was the cook, Mr. Chris Nelson.

After the mill had been in operation a short time, Mr. S. Reynolds, also of Black River Falls, heard of the splendid opportunities here and was very much interested in its further development. He immediately journeyed to Unity and made arrangements to go into partnership with Mr. Spaulding. Because of the combined cooperation in the progress of the community and activities in the mill in general, the settlement grew quite rapidly.

More and more laborers were necessary to work in this mill and consequently an extensive farming region was organized as well as the further development of the village. We may definitely locate the Spaulding-Reynolds sawmill west the track near the Little Eau Pleine River. The vacant street extending north was once occupied by numerous houses of the mill workers.

The southernmost section of our community was inhabited first due to the favorable location for the mill. To accommodate the mill workers a boarding house and hotel had to be constructed. This was taken care of by the building of the same near the place we know today as the Redwood Club. A grocery store located on the west side of the tracks, near the hotel was also put up by the sawmill partners. The chief supplies in this store consisted of tobacco, whiskey, candy, nuts, as well as the few necessary groceries. The post office was now located in this building.

Up to a short time previous, the only streets or roads available, were the well trodden wagon tracks. Now the mill had made it possible to construct favorable roads with sawdust and corduroy. Many of these roads were build by Joe Greenwood, an early settler. He had a team of mules which was much tougher than horses and could stand the hard work better. After the streets were improved the population naturally increased and the people became quite prosperous.

All in all, those who heard of this new and flourishing colony were interested in its affairs and progress. A Doctor Wells who had heard of the existing condition, decided that this was a most desirable location for his practice. He therefore set up his office a little farther north of the aforesaid buildings in the east ward of the village.

This settlement had developed considerably in the two years of its existence and children were growing up and needed to be sent to school. These colonies hit upon the plan of erecting a school in their midst. Due to the persistent work of unskilled carpenters, they succeeded in raising a little one-room log schoolhouse in the year of 1874. Such was sufficient to accommodate the few children in attendance. Mr. H. L. Jacobitz received the untold honor of being the first teacher in the new school. As the main part of the community was formerly farther south that we know it today, the school was located there, namely on the easternmost section of the Creed homestead. The youngsters were quite enthused about the idea of having a school and were eager to learn about the work they were to take up. Mr. Jacobitz labored very hard to organize the small groups of students to get them adapted to the new conditions. His successor, Mary Eastman, was equally as successful in her teaching abilities. The third instructor was Mr. J.J. Austin and he too was intensely interested in his eager group and he planned an addition to the schoolhouse. He thus started and effectively carried out the two-room system. This divided the older and younger groups. The four lower grades occupied one section while the four upper grades the other.

During the period of organization of the school, progress was gaining ground elsewhere in the village. In 1874 the railroad was completed through the settlement by the Wisconsin Central. A depot was built south of the village but soon moved north to where our former stockyards were located. This change was made due to the fact that in its former location too much confusion resulted in the residential district. Mr. S. J. Sanford received the honor of being the first depot agent and his successor was known as O. D. Mooney.

Had we had the opportunity to look upon this group of happy settlers at this point in their history, we would have viewed a community quite complete, with the exception of but one thing. Though the number of people were few, they found it very essential to erect a place of worship as such had been left out. That does not say, however, that these pioneers neglected to worship. It was in fact quite the opposite, as a religious gathering in the home of a settler was witnessed every Sunday morning, and special prayer meetings were held frequently during the week. They had no special minister but one of their group would fill the position, each taking his turn at the various meetings. This was a very inconvenient means of worshipping as they naturally desired a separate church in which to carry on their activities. This church was accordingly built in 1880, located in the region near the school.

In the meantime the population had been continually increasing. Several changes had already been and were being made. Mr. Spaulding had sold his share of the Reynolds-Spaulding sawmill to H. J. Van Hoosear. There was still a demand for laborers as the forested area had not yet been entirely cleared. Various new businesses were consequently started by the incoming settlers. The post office, too, had been transferred to Mr. Darling, who had built a grocery store near the residential district.

As more businesses were started in the settlement, there was a gradual move northward from the original settling. Because the land toward the south had been quite thoroughly cleared of its forest, there was a tendency to create more cleared territory in another direction. A second sawmill was thus set up and operated farther north than the first. It was located on a portion of the farm owned and operated today by Wm. Schultz. Like the first mill there was an immediate development in the regions of the new mill. Practically one of the first buildings was that of a hotel under the supervision of Charles Duvall. Greenfield and Neuman, the operators of the mill, were equally as successful in creating a desire to enlarge the village.

About this time one of the early dwellers, namely Samuel Adam Cook built a grocery and dry goods store on the stop later occupied by the old I.O.O.F. hall. Shortly after its construction however, it was destroyed by fire and Mr. Cook built a second store, this time located almost directly opposite, east of the railroad tracks. This store is known to be the first on that side of the division line. It seemed a common habit for each new store to fall in line in giving space to the post office and thus Mr. Cook became Unity’s Postmaster.

While Unity was witnessing the establishing of new stores and businesses, a man of importance and prominence came into the community, namely John R. Salter. He, having attended the University of Wisconsin, was naturally quite interested in school affairs. Up until this time it was nothing more than a grade school, thus the students graduating from the eighth grade were forced, either to go to some distant place or to discontinue their education. To better such conditions, Mr. Salter in 1883 began plans to organize a High School. He, himself, consequently became its first Principal and taught in same for a period of four years. In Mr. Salter’s first graduation class of 1887 there were seven students; namely, Fred Vaughn, John Lamont, Arthur Ransom, Jennie and Worden Cook, Calvin Burton, and Grant McCurdy. Some of our old-timers of today remember some of these former graduates.

In spite of the good times and happy hours of this cheerful group, disaster would darken their path. One afternoon in the fall of 1890, children apparently amused themselves by playing with matches in the woodshed of the school building. Usually the outcome of such a game proves fatal as was the case in this incident. A fire was kindled in the wood shed and gained ground too rapidly for the children to control and as a result soon reached the school building. Before sufficient help could be secured, the school had completely burned. From then until time would permit the construction of a new building, classes were held in the drugstore, which was located a short distance south of our present post office. After a few months of combined efforts of the settlers a new and larger school building was finished and ready for occupancy. This was located in about the same place as the former. Several improvements had been made over the older building, and a new and more efficient set of textbooks had been installed.

Another sawmill operated by Richard Butler and William Granton had been built north of the established village. With the continual development in size and population, Unity was not satisfied with the small one-room church that had so faithfully served the purpose. The various denominations that had emerged wished a distinct church of their own in which to worship. Therefore, the Disciple Church was built located north of our present school building. It was followed by the small Swedish Lutheran and the original one-room building was used by the Methodists.

At this time Mr. Salter, who had discontinued his duties as teacher, had now gone into the combined grocery and dry goods business with H. G. Healy. He later built the present Ayer Grocery in which business he was interested for many years. The present Ray’s Market building was built shortly after as well as numerous other buildings, including the Post Office, Drug Store, a Bank, Hardware Meat Market Barber Shop, several Ice Cream Parlors, an Undertaking Parlor – Furniture Store, Telephone Office, and several small grocery stores located in different sections of the town. Also, the construction of a new school including both grades and high school was brought about, occurring in the year 1910.

Perhaps many of us are unaware of the scenes of wonder bestowed upon our village previous to this time. One thing of interest was the building of an arch bridge over the railroad track almost directly in front of the present Texaco filling station. Near the bridge was a flagpole which showed the intense patriotism of the villagers. This, together with the bridge, long remained objects of admiration and novelty to the settlers.

Wouldn’t we have been amused to see our community as it was then? A happy group of settlers living and loving their surroundings, did, and were doing all in their power to make theirs a desirable dwelling place.

This concludes the story of our early days as related in the essary in the "Dawn of Unity".