Clark County Press, Neillsville, Wisconsin

March 4, 2015 Page 9

Contributed by "The Clark Co. Press"

Transcribed by Dolores (Mohr) Kenyon.

Index of "Oldies" Articles 

 

Compiled by Dee Zimmerman

 

Clark County News

 February 1885

 

 A traveling agent has been supplying our people with complete sets of Dickens’ works the past week.  He is selling them on the monthly installment plan.                                                               

•••••••••

Jimmy McClenahan is kept busy pointing out the characteristics of his large white owl at the O’Neill House.  Jimmy claims the honor of capturing the bird in his room.                             

•••••••••

Mr. George Trogner was yesterday awarded the contract for building an addition to the county poor house, his bid of $1,000 being the lowest.                                                                     

•••••••••

The man who said the backbone of the winter was broken because the ground hog failed to see his shadow last week Monday will please cut a hole in the ice of the Black River and drown himself. 

 

Twenty-eight degrees below zero Wednesday morning reminds us that springtime has not yet come.

•••••••••

Some beautiful sundogs were seen in the heavens Wednesday and the old weather prophets shook their heads, looked wise, and whispered: ‘That means cold, stormy weather’.                                       

•••••••••

An exciting pig chase will take place at the roller rink Saturday evening.  A pig is to be turned loose on the floor and the gentlemen skaters are expected to capture it.  The ladies are prohibited from taking part in the chase on the grounds that it would be like casting pearls before the swine.  All lovers of pork are expected to attend.

 

News item included the following week: 

 

Owing to the scarcity of pork, the pig chase advertised for last Saturday night, did not come off.  Those who had been speculating on a bite of pork were disappointed.                                     

•••••••••

The days when our forefathers burned cobs to make Saleratus and Soda has passed away. The skill and science embodied in the manufacture of the celebrated Deland’s Saleratus and Soda enables the ladies to purchase for a few cents an elegant pound package of Deland’s Saleratus and Soda noted for its purity and strength with which the finest and most wholesome pasty can be made.                                                                                      

•••••••••

Merrillan is quite a lively town, if one can judge from the number and activity of its businessmen.  The Republican & Press men took in the town recently and made the acquaintance of several of the wide-awake businessmen of the place.  We found the Messrs. M. & J. Wicker, the grocery-men up to their arms in business, waiting upon customers.  J. H. Miller, the hardware-man, is doing everything in his power to furnish stoves and such, to the public.  D. O. Courtney keeps the people well supplied with choice meats of every description, having one of the finest meat markets in Jackson County.  Mr. A. Amundson keeps the Skandinavian Hotel and looks after the interests of his countrymen in good style.  Seymour & Bisnett are running a first-class restaurant, where the hungry can indulge in the delicious bivalves or anything else, which their appetite demands.                                                                                       

•••••••••

Mr. Wm Garvin, accompanied by his daughter, Mrs. Pickle, came down from his farm in the Town of York, last Friday.

•••••••••

The Monroe Sentinel says Green County has a milk cow for every inhabitant within its borders and that over 17,000 of these cows contribute milk to cheese factories.                                  

•••••••••

Eugene Brown of Sherwood Forest and James Hiles of Dexterville attended the anniversary ball of the Knights of Pythias last Thursday.                                                                                         

•••••••••

That the present winter is the coldest known for many years is shown by the fact that Lake Michigan for the first time since Wisconsin became a state is frozen over from shore to shore.           

•••••••••

How the hearts of a crowd swell and throb with pitiless hatred against the man who coughs during the performance at a theatre, when they know he is too stingy to invest twenty-five cents in a bottle of Dr. Bull’s Cough Syrup.

•••••••••

P. M. Stevens, of Greenwood, will give a grand May Pole Carnival and Prize Ball on the evening of May 1st, 1885. The tickets are $2.00 each and there are 68 prizes to be drawn.               

•••••••••

Next Saturday night, Mr. Nason will address the people of Nasonville and vicinity upon the subject of tariff reform.  Mr. Nason is opposed to the present system of robbing the people through a so-called protective tariff and proposes to give his views on the subject to his neighbors and friends at his own hall in Nasonville.  Let the people of that section turn out and hear him.                                                                                            

•••••••••

Mr. Johnson, the jeweler whose place of business has been in the store of Gates, Stanard & Co., will move across the street into Mr. Ferguson’s building.

 

February 1940

 

The large bell in the tower of the Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church at Granton peals forth with its usual round, clear tone on these quiet Sunday mornings.  But it was a serious question whether the bell ever again would call the congregation to worship.

 

For 19 years, the 1,200-pound bell tolled forth.  And throughout that period, the heavy clapper clanged against the same spot.  The years, though not heavy, caused the cast iron to crystallize.

 

Last October, the bell cracked, a jagged separation 17 inches long ran along one side.  Inquiries to the foundry in which it was cast indicated that the bell might never again be restored to its former clarity through repairs.  But a new bell ran into several hundred dollars.  To weld the one which had served so well would cost only a fraction of that.

 

It was a chance, but officials of the congregation decided to accept that chance. They talked the matter over with Ed Hagie, Shortville blacksmith, and Mr. Hagie started out to learn what he could about the technique of welding a heavy cast iron bell.  

 

Mr. Hagie’s inquiries had taken him as far away as St. Paul.  In order to maintain the tone, he learned, it was necessary to heat the bell evenly.  This brought on a problem of retaining the shape.  And other problems would arise.

 

After two weeks of investigation and study, he was ready to make the try.

 

The Rev. Arthur H. Laesch, pastor, and the church trustees, Louis Elmhorst, Henry Elmhorst and Henry Schlinsog, gathered a few members of the church for the job of removing the bell.  Among the others who aided were Hugo Trimberger, Armin Moh, Fred Bartsch, Ed Schlinsog and Fred Grottke.

 

After building braces to aid them in lowering the heavy bell, a block and tackle was attached.  What was believed would be a hard job became a simple task; for within 10 minutes after they started lowering the bell, it was on the ground.

 

The bell was trucked the nine miles to the Hagie smithy and Mr. Hagie started to work.  He first had to chisel out where the bell had cracked.  Then he had to grind it down to a ‘V’ shape at the top before the actual heating and welding of the bell could be started.

 

The heating of the entire bell evenly was one of the major tasks; for the bell stands three feet and four inches high, with a diameter of four feet at the base.  The thickness ranges from an inch and three-eighths at the top to three and five-eighths inches where the clapper strikes.

 

But the job was completed and apparently with success.  For after the bell was replaced, those who had heard it peal out for 19 years said that the tone was maintained.  It was the first time, to the knowledge of many in the vicinity, that such a bell had been repaired with success.

 

Hereafter church officials will make certain that the bell is turned periodically so that it will not be as likely to crack again.

 

(How many, still living, remember at that time the times during each day when the small town church bells tolled?  The bells tolled at 12 noon and 6 p.m. each day.  At the start of worship services, the bell would tall as a call and when a member of the congregation passed away, the bell rang with paused-between tolls, tolling with the number of years that person had lived.  People would listen, counting the number of tolls, and knowing of someone in their community who had been seriously ill, would assume that was who had passed away.  In out small town, there was a church on the north end of town and one on the south end, each with a bell that rang, from within a tall steeple.  DZ)

•••••••••

Firemen were called three times late last week to the O. W. Schoengarth building, which houses the Emma Roessler print shop on Seventh Street.  Two of the alarms received by Fire Chief William Dahnert were false and resulted from steam caused by the heating of the water-soaked building.

 

The first call, Thursday afternoon, came after a blaze had started in the second floor living quarters of Dick Baird.  Considerable damage was done to the building and printing equipment and stock by fire, smoke and water.

 

The second alarm was given early Saturday evening, when it appeared that smoke again was coming from the roof and through cracks in the brick veneer wall.  However, the department learned on arrival that the ‘smoke’ was really steam.

 

Again about midnight, Saturday, Chief Dahnert was notified that ‘smoke’ was coming from the building.  This time he investigated and found that the building was still ‘steaming out.’   

•••••••••

A headquarters camp for rough fish removal in the eighth WPA district of Wisconsin will be established on Lake Arbutus and work will be started February 19.  It was announced today by officials at the Black River-Lake Arbutus Conservation Club.  The club has been working to secure the project since shortly after its formation.

 

The camp will be established on the site of the old CCC camp on Arnold Creek, where a longtime lease on a 10-acre tract has been secured by the state from the Mississippi Valley Public Service Company. 

 

Plans include the building of a shelter house, tool house, drying rack for nets, and a holding pond near the mouth of the creek, and a portable shelter house.

 

According to word received here, the project will furnish employment for from 20 to 60 men over a long period of time.  Approximately 20 men are expected to start work on February 19.  It was expected that half of them would be drawn from Clark County WPA eligible roles and the other half would be from Jackson County.  The number of men employed is expected to be increased as the project gets under way.

 

Lake Arbutus is the first lake to be seined in the rough fish removal program.  Conservation experts estimated that about two years would be required to clean the lake bottom of stumps, logs and other snags and to get the lake ‘under control’.  By this expression, it was explained; they mean to strike a balance of about 25 percent rough fish to 75 percent game fish.

 

A game warden and an expert fisherman are expected to be stationed permanently at the former CCC campsite.  The state conservation department will furnish a dozen nets and trucks to enable 8immediate operations.

 

Marketable fish secured in the seining work will be loaded into tank cars and sent to eastern markets.  Smaller fish will be sent to the state conservation department’s fish cannery and will be used by fur and fox farms, and for the rearing of trout.

 

According to the way the project is set up. Other lakes in the district will see rough fish removal operations after the job at Lake Arbutus is completed.  However, the headquarters for operations will remain at Arbutus. 

 

Cooperating with the club in securing the project were Senator Robert M. Lafollet, Congressman Merlin Hull of the Lions Club of Black River Falls, the Neillsville Kiwanis Club, Assemblyman Peter Hemmy of Humbird, Sen. W. J. Rush, and others.

 

The Mississippi Valley Public Service Company, owners of the Hatfield Dam, worked side-by-side with the club to accomplish this purpose, and officials said that the power company has offered to set up a maximum and minimum table of levels to be adhered to as closely as possible without endangering life or property below the dam.

 

The establishment of a single level for the lake is impossible, the state public service commission told Dr. E. A. Peterson, president of the club and John Mattson, secretary, during their investigation.  They explained that the reason for this is the fact that Black River is one of the ‘flashiest’ streams in the nation.  Due to the rapid rise and fall of which the river is capable, it would be impossible to maintain a lake level without endangering lives and property below the dam.

•••••••••

The first series of resettlements in Clark County are being completed by the federal government.  The result is the closing and elimination of the Fernwald School in northern Butler and the consolidation of the forest area in that part of the county.

 

In carrying out this project, the government has helped W. L. Reasby make a transfer from his two eighties in Butler, Secs. 8 and 17, to a tract of land near Owen.  Ed Barr has been removed from Sect. 17 to Worden, and Nick Girard has also been removed from Sec. 18 to Worden.

 

A deal is now pending to take over the holdings of the Dominic LaPlaca estate in Sec. 8.

 

The program for 1940 will consist in certain removals from Foster, Mentor and Hewett.  The persons and parcels affected are as follows: C. A. Hizer, Sec. 17 and 20, Foster, and Harold Hurst, Sec. 20, Foster; in Mentor, the M. Potucek parcel; in Hewett, Sec. 31, a parcel belonging to J. Poertner.

 

As a result of some of the resettlement the patronage of the Lone Pine School will probably be lessened and it may become logical to bring about a consolidation in that location.                     

•••••••••

About 30 welders attended a school of instruction in the B & F machine shop here last week.  It was the first school of its kind held here and attendance was from Granton, Greenwood, Loyal, Willard, Shortville and other nearby communities.  Types of welding discussed included sheet metal, body and fender, aluminum and white metal.  A ‘Dutch’ lunch was served following the school.

 

(The referred to ‘Dutch’ lunch served then is what today is known as a ‘potluck’ lunch. DZ)

 

The B & F Machine Shop is located in the 100 block of East Sixth Street, Neillsville.  The above 1928-1929 photo shows the inside of the shop with Earl (Slim) Bruhn (left) and Martin (Max) Feuerstein (right), partners and developers of the business.

 

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