Memories of a pioneer child - Fred Larson's story - Part 2

As I work with my family history, I am constantly regretting that I didn't ask more questions of my parents and other family members when they were still alive.  And reading some of these stories about what my grandparents went through to come here to set up their home and the town really makes me appreciate them and all the work they did for their family.  Wait 'til you get to the part about the pot of beans left in the cabin and wood chunks for chairs!  What a welcome that would have been for my grandmother!

And I also want to thank my (second/third?) cousin, Del Lorentzson, who sent me this story yesterday.  He really has devoted much of his retirement years to gathering family information and putting all these stories together.  Lately he's been using https://familysearch.org/ as a free site for posting family stories.

Fred & Regina Larson - Port Wing Pioneers

And now, back to Fred Larson, the three-year-old pioneer arriving with his parents and two-year-old twins onto the shores of Lake Superior in Port Wing...which probably wasn't even called Port Wing at that point in time:

All of those Pennsylvania Dutch were nice people. Where they came from, I don't know. They were the first ones to have a sawmill here—it ran night and day; the Calkins.  They had their own electric plant.  Calkin's logging road ran through our land. They made the ice ruts in the fall. That mill burned. Dr. Merrill was the first doctor here.  Maybe Dr. Harder, but I don't know if he was practicing.

There was a passenger boat between Duluth and Ashland. The folks, my folks, took that. Pete[Braff] was with, he had his  family in Duluth. The first house we lived in was on Pete Braff 's—Larvick's—place. They had built a little homestead shanty, you know, right east of Eric Johnson's house. Pete Braff built that. It was his land. That summer, they started a passenger boat—a freight boat—between Duluth and Ashland. They dumped us off in the lake. There was no harbor and no dock. They took us in with rowboats and landed us along the beach. Pete knew that McCardle had a boat up there along Kinney Creek. So he waded across the slough, waist deep in water,  you know.

When he came back it was getting dark on the lake.  Pa stayed with ma and the kids.  A little wind had come up and pa had put up some blankets for shelter.  Then Pete came back.  That was a long trip from up there in Kinney Creek down to the lake.  Then we started to paddle up toward Kinney Creek.  And when we got up there it was nine o'clock. Dark. There was no road. So we hiked through the woods. Dad took me and Pete took Herb;  my mother took my sister. There was a trail through the woods from Kinney Creek up to that shack.  Pa and Pete went ahead and Mother came behind.    

Under windfalls and over windfalls. When Mother came into the shack, she cried. They had made a table of a sort, and there were wood chunks to sit on. Pa had baked a big pan of beans. To save for us. To treat the folks. He had put an old felt hat over the beans.  Ma said that when they lifted that felt hat, the beans were ready to blow up.  They had started to raise—stunk, they had to throw  them out.

Dugie McClain maybe had the mail route after Tummy.  Then Gidloff and Andrew Peterson. Then Eskil Swanson had it later. Jardine and Eric Sehlin had it too.

Ma was afraid to let the kids out alone. There were owls sitting in the trees looking at  them. And there were bobcats too.  One time, Uncle Charlie had bought a horse from Cameron. And he  came down into a cedar swamp—it was wet all over then. Water all over. The horse started to act up something terrible. Finally, he spied two lynx sitting up in a tree.  So he let the horse go. And one of the lynx jumped and landed on the hind end of the horse. Then the horse really went.

We had a black cow that was dumped off in the lake. It didn't want to follow the rowboat in but wanted to go back to the big boat. T. N. said, "The devil is in those black cows.”

And more to come tomorrow!

Memories of a pioneer child - Fred Larson's story

A few years ago I received an email from someone I didn't know who was asking questions about my paternal grandmother's family.  Her name was Regina Charlotta Peterson and then she married my grandfather, Fred Larson.  As it turned out, the person sending me the email was a cousin on my grandmother's side of the family, and I think he got my name from something I had posted on Ancestry.com.  He was from north of Duluth and we had a meet-up here in Port Wing 3-4 years ago with him and his wife, some friends of theirs who also do a lot with genealogy, and some of my Larson cousins from here.  He showed us all of the work he had done up until then and we all were really amazed, finding out things we never knew.  And we've been in touch from time to time ever since.

Yesterday I received an email from him asking me questions about the Fred Larson side of the family, and he mentioned about something that was written by Fred Larson.  I was confused and part of the confusion comes because my grandfather was Fred Larson, one of the original settlers here, and his oldest son was Fred Larson.  Well, this story was something the son, my Uncle Fred, had related to someone back in 1955.  After I saw it I realized I had seen it before, but I thought it was interesting enough to include here.

One more note of clarification - Fred, along with his sibling twins, was one of the first three children who came with his mother and father (my grandparents) to live here in Port Wing.  This was originally one long paragraph, but I'm going to break it up so it's more readable.  Now here's his story:

FRED LARSON

     My dad was one of the original settlers here. Of course McCardle was here but he hadn't brought his family yet. He built over by the Twin Falls.  My dad homesteaded here about 1890. He brought us kids and mother over here in 1891. He came from Duluth and he was a carpenter by trade. (Uncle) Charlie came in 1892. I was born in 1889.     

Fred Larson (back), twins Herbert & Hedvig (or vice versa?) photo from spring/summer 1891

Andrew Peterson and Samuelson came in 1891 because Braff and Dad helped them unload at the stone quarry and then they dragged it along the beach. Peterson brought a team of horses because he was draying in Duluth. Pete Braff and Dad came at the same time. The purpose was to file a homestead claim. The intention was to prove up and go back again, but they stayed here. 

My Dad had a ten room house in Duluth. He sold that then but he didn't get much for it. I was two going on three when I came. I was 66 the 6th of May.  T. N. Okerstrom was not here then. The land office for this territory was in Ashland.  T.N. Okerstrom came from Duluth where he stayed with my folks.  Then he boarded at Pete Braff's boarding house. 

T.N. was single then. Then he met Mary Okerstrom. She worked for Nilsenius in Ashland.  He met her there. Okerstrom had the first logging camp. That was up on Ed Danielson's place.  Julia McCardle had a homestead here, down in the draw between Rudolph's and Morrison's and Signe's place.  Julia was single.  Grandpa McCardle had a homestead over by the stone quarry.  But which stone quarry it was, I don't know. There was a stone quarry over by the Fred Sehlin place. That was the first stone quarry. Old man McCardle died over there and they buried him over there. But I suppose they moved him afterwards; I don't know where he is now.  I never saw the old man, but I seen the McCardle that was at Twin Falls and Mrs. McCardle. 

Grandma McCardle took care of Mother when Carl was born.  He was born in January, 1893. He was the first white child born here in Port Wing.  Alaena Okerstrom would have been the first one, but she was born in the hospital in Ashland. Esther Peterson—Mrs. Helsing—she was the first girl born. The first one to die here was Charlie Larson's boy, Rueben.  He was buried on Aaronson's homestead, where Christiansen (?) lives. I was at the funeral. Dan Daly's house used to be a blacksmith shop. The Iron River road went in back of the Catholic church, directly south. John Tummy drove, I remember that. He  was  a little  fellow—wore  a big black hat. (WE SHOULD ASK FRED LARSON TO DRAW A MAP SHOWING THE ROUTE OF THE  FIRST ROAD TO  IRON RIVER.) 

[That last line was a comment from someone back then who had heard his story.]

Stay tuned because there is more to come!

Maiden voyage to the Sugar Bush

Today's weather was just outstanding!  Temps were up into the 50s, water was ROLLING off the roof, and the sky was so blue I thought I was looking through some kind of a filter.  I guess my only filter was the last two months of bone-chilling cold.

Apple orchard on the way to the maple trees

 So we decided to use this beautiful day to scope out what we'll be facing when we start to tap our maple trees for making maple syrup.  Here's a view of the collection of trees and the hillside we were about to snowshoe down in order to get to the trees.

 And below is a view of my snowshoe with the boot still in it after I stepped into wet, cement-like snow nearly up to my waist.  The only way I could extract myself was to pull my foot out of the boot, and then try to dig out the boot and snowshoe.  Very thankful that it was warm out!  Leann also had a sinking mishap on the hillside, so she wondered if I had the phone in my pocket...in case we had REALLY gotten stuck.  I did but it probably wouldn't have worked down in that ravine anyway.  We'll check it out next time!  We promise!

So after I recovered my footwear, we went on our way, beating down paths to each of the trees.  It doesn't look so pristine down there now!  And it will probably snow again before the sap starts running.

Below is one tree that has the evidence of several years of being tapped.  The holes are all in various stages of healing up, and at various heights depending on how much snow there was in a given year.

And down along the creek was a well-worn deer trail that maybe we should have followed instead of trying to make our own.  We were also trying to guess the reason for some of the big depressions in the snow.  We don't know if deer just lie down in the snow or what goes on when nobody's looking.

So now we know we're dealing with a LOT of snow, but we probably knew that already.  We have our equipment all staged now, so maybe a few more warm days and cool nights like this will get the process started.  

And then I came home and took a nap!

Blogs in the Spotlight: S.O.S.-Sheri on Sports

Perhaps you've noticed that I've been having some fun with this blog.  As I've added more posts every day, I've worked up my courage to send the link out to some of my friends and now I'm getting some fun responses in return.

Today I heard from my friend, Sheri, from high school days.  Sheri and I were in band together and had lots of fun playing at basketball game half time performances, going to band camp, and we even marched at a Green Bay Packer game.  She played alto sax and I played French horn.  Sheri was really into sports back then, too, as much as we could be back in the pre-Title IX days when there were no sports for girls, except for GAA - Girls' Athletic Association.  Yes, it's true!

But Sheri has made up for it with her interest in sports since then! Sheri has been writing a blog called S.O.S.-Sheri on Sports for several years now.

Her blog is a part of the Chicago Now collection of bloggers.  Her blogs follow many of the women's pro teams, but she gets into all the other sports, too.  Her big passion, however, is golf.  In fact, in her email today she commented that she was waiting for the last few inches of the last big Chicago snowstorm to melt, because her golf game was waiting!

So, if you like sports, especially from a Chicago perspective, check out Sheri's blog and say "Hi!"