Historical Essay Feature: "Trains of the Past”

 Charley Fitzpatrick, St. Vincent depot station agent, circa 1922.

by Roxanne Friebohle

Today, there are actually some people that have never ridden on a train. These people have missed many happy experiences that were common to the pioneers. Trains are becoming more and more uncommon every day. Now people drive their car or take a plane when they are going somewhere. They miss seeing all the different people on the trains and the many sights along the way.

Today, the residents of St. Vincent could sleep all day and never be bothered by the noises of a train. In the pioneer days it wasn't that way at all. Many people were awakened every morning at 5:30 by the cheerful Choo-Choo of a train rolling into town.

The train that came into St. Vincent at 5:30 A.M. was known as the Great Northern Flyer. It started coming to St. Vincent in 1897. This train was the passenger train. At that time St. Vincent was the end of the line so the train stayed at the roundhouse all day. The roundhouse was located at the west end of St. Vincent. Since the train stopped there, many passengers also stopped at St. Vincent for awhile.

During the first years of the trains in St. Vincent (1878 onwards), there was a very large Great Northern Hotel located in the village. This hotel took care of the trainmen and the passengers.

There were also freight trains that came into St. Vincent regularly. The freight cars brought such things as machinery, auto parts, raw peanuts, fruits and vegetables from California and Florida, and bananas from Honduras. There were also many immigrants that rode the freight trains with their whole family, belongings, and even their livestock. Most of the immigrants came from Iowa and Illinois and were on their way to Canada. They would have to stop at St. Vincent since it was the last town before Canada. They had to get checked by the Customs before entering the country. The veterinarians would have to check their livestock also before they could get them through the border. There were cases when some of them settled in St. Vincent because they couldn't wait to get to Canada.

Coal was also shipped by the carloads to the St. Vincent depot. At that time it was used to heat homes. The coal was taken to the elevator which was located at the east end of town. People had to go out there to buy it.

After the freight was unloaded at the depot, it was taken to its destination by a drayman. Archie Darrach (and later Al Fitzpatrick) devoted much of his time to this job during the first days of the depot. He took care of all the freight that came in. He also took care of the breweries in the town. Whenever they ran out of beer he hauled it to them. One time when he was hauling freight to the town hall which was located at the west end of town, his horses became frightened and over turned the wagon. A piano which he was hauling hit him in the head and he never regained conscienceness. He was just one of the many men that lost his life for the railroad.

There was also much freight shipped into St. Vincent that had to go across the river. At that time there was no bridge so it all had to be ferried across the river.

The depot at St. Vincent was a very large one for that time. It was approximately three hundred feet long. It consisted of the Custom offices at the west end and the warehouses at the east. The depot agent made his home right in the depot. That way he could be there at any time to receive messages from other agents.
St. Vincent's roundhouse also played an important role in the railroad days. In the year 1897, the roundhouse was built with the backing of James J. Hill. The roundhouse was erected right west of the town of St. Vincent by Lake Stella. Today, the old stock yards are located in place of the roundhouse.

Today, you'd never believe that at one time St. Vincent was a thriving city. The days of the St. Vincent railroad were filled with much excitement and hard work. The train service in St. Vincent could almost be referred to as William Wordsworth (1) once stated, "Small service is true service while it lasts." The train service was a small one but there was always a way of getting from place to place. The old timers that remember the first trains remember them as a true service.

The depot went through two very hard floods, one in 1897 and one in 1950. The one in 1950 washed the tracks up so badly that they looked like a snow fence. The ties that were washed up were from 150 to 200 pounds. Most of the rails were about sixty pounds a yard and thirty three feet long. After all the hard work and slaving to lay the tracks the flood finished them off. The flood also played an important part in finishing the trains coming through St. Vincent altogether.

One experience during the flood in 1897 was when a women died. Because of the flood they had no place to bury her. They ended up keeping her body at the depot for a month and when the water finally went down they buried her. 

Another reason the railroad was taken out of St. Vincent was that the Northern Pacific train which came from Winnipeg wouldn't merge with them. They had the plans all ready for building new tracks but it didn't work out as planned.

Railroads helped to open a new era in mail and express transportation. There had been much talk of projecting a railroad through Kittson County long before the plan came true. Until 1862, Minnesota had no railroad service at all. In 1857, a charter was granted to the Minnesota and Pacific Railway Company. Later this company became the St. Paul and Pacific. At first, the railroad ran from St. Anthony to St. Paul, which was a ten mile stretch. Later this railway stretched all the way to St. Vincent and even later all the way to Canada.

The first engine used was the William Crooks engine named for its first engineer, who was a citizen of Crookston. This engine was the Great Northern's first engine.

As well as the other accomplishments of the railroads, it greatly increased and stimulated the settlements in many ways. Naturally, there had to be settlers to build the railways but the railroad company also induced settlement by offering its lands for sale. The company had been given a state government grant of every odd section in a strip extending from the Red River twenty miles east and running from Marsh River to the international border.

Railroad lands were offered at $5.00 an acre and rebates of $2.00 per acre, were followed if settlers broke three fourths of their tacts. The land was a little higher if it contained timber.

The settlement of Kittson County began slow in spite of land being sold. This was due mostly to the lack of drainage in the valley.

In order to build up the railroads in the northwest much hard work was needed and strong men to carry it out. James Jerome Hill, a farmer from Rockwood, Ontario was one of the many men that devoted his life to the development of the railroads. He first entered into the railroad business as a freight forwarder in 1865. He kept expanding into various trading and transportation enterprises. He built up the Great Northern much more than any other one man.

James J. Hill also built a very large house in Northcote, Minnesota for his son Walter. Many people from St. Vincent can recall the days when Walter Hill would come racing into town in his jeep, as some people called it. It was really an early Ford that didn't have a top, today known as a convertible. Some days he would be racing into town so fast that his hat flew off his head. But it didn't seem to bother him. He was said to be a very carefree person and full of fun.

Of the many experiences I've heard of people riding on trains, I especially enjoy the one that my grandparents used to tell about their trip from Emerson, Manitoba to Quebec, Ontario. It was a cold day in the middle of winter when they decided to take this trip. They got ready to leave and went to the depot in Emerson to wait for the train. Their parents were worried because it was a little stormy out and they hadn't got so that they trusted trains yet because they were still a new thing to them. My Grandmother and Grandfather didn't have any worries at all. When they finally started out it had gotten a little stormier and it was hard to see. They got three miles out of Emerson when the train ran into a bigger snowbank than it could cope with. It turned out that this storm lasted a bit longer than they had expected. They sat in the train for six days and nights before they could get help. In those days, trains didn't carry much food like they do today. The trainmen killed a cow and went to a nearby farmhouse and got some eggs and a few other things so the people could eat. When the storm finally ended they started out once more for Quebec. After two weeks they finally got there.

From that day, trains have improved greatly. Passengers are as comfortable as if they were at home when they take long trips. Still it seems like it doesn't matter how comfortable they are, they are still fading away into the past.

Today all that is left in many places is the memories and few traces of where they once went.

(1) Bartlett, John Familiar Quotations Little Brown and Company c. 1955 William Wordsworth

Bibliography:
Colliers Encyclopedia; James J. Hill

Friebohle, Glenice, I.; Interview, January 1, 1972
Friebohle, John, A.; Interview, January 1, 1972
Gooselaw, Eli; Interview, January 4, 1972
Kittson County Enterprise; 50th Anniversary Edition; page 68
Nordhaugen, Clarence; Interview January 1, 1972
Ryan, Margaret; Interview January 4, 1972

PROFILES: My Grandmother’s Friends

Left to right:  Mrs. Zaharia, Margaret 'Toots' Ryan, Florence Godon, Esther Cleem (Florence and Esther were Thiefault sisters...), and Alberta 'Pat' Fitzpatrick Baudette, and in front, my grandmother, Elizabeth Fitzgerald Fitzpatrick in the wheelchair...

All the women in this picture (with the exception of my Aunt Pat who just happened to be home visiting that day...) were part of a group of friends who regularly hung out with one another, on an almost daily basis.  Growing up in St. Vincent, I saw many of them myself daily, as we all went about our business.  Most of the time, they were busy keeping house, looking after their families.  But as they went about their days, they would often run into one another at stores or church, in their yards or on the street, or stop by and visit.  Years ago, there was no common desire to avoid people and self-isolate as is common today; quite the contrary - most people sought out opportunities to socialize, to catch up.  

Names that still conjure up well-remembered faces and voices:

• Mrs. Zahara (a Ukrainian lady whose strong accent made me nod a lot without knowing a thing she was actually saying), 
• Matilda Cameron (a well-regarded seamstress whose second husband Wallace Cameron was a famous town constable), 
• Esther Cleem (who along with her husband were victims of a home invasion turned deadly), 
• Mrs. Gardiner (whose family tragedies rivaled my own Aunt Lena’s), 
• Florence Godon, whose husband Bill worked for many years with my Dad at the Noyes depot,
• Toots Ryan (good friend and neighbor-across-the-alley of my grandmother),
• Glenice Friebohle (good friend of my mother’s), 
• Ena Scobbie (wife of first pastor I remember of St. Vincent Evangelical Free Church), and 
• Cousins Hattie  Schwenzfeier, Annie Nordine, Mabel Steien, and Faye Lyberg.

They all loved to gab, to share news and gossip, and to have a good laugh.  In other words, they loved to visit!  They were never at a loss for words.  There were no awkward silences.  If anything, people spoke over top of one another at times, interjected at others, and at still other times, the room divided into two or three subgroups like modern-day ‘threads’, multiple simultaneous conversations, and later came back into one again.  

The one who was more often than not dropping by Grandma’s place, or she to her’s, was Toots Ryan.  Toots lived north of Grandma’s place, just out the back door, through the back yard, and across the alley.  As you’d approach Toot’s house, you would notice the steps were higher than most around town.  That’s because the house had been put up on a higher foundation, my guess to protect the home’s contents in case of flooding.  It was the only house like that in town, but I later thought that was pretty smart thinking.  But as a little girl, the time period I knew Toots well, it never crossed my mind - it was just the way it was.  Her steps were harder to get up than my Grandma’s, each one a bit taller than normal, so I’d have to lift my little legs especially higher and give an extra hrmph to lift myself up.  The top step was a length of railroad tie, then the highest step of all over the lintel into the house proper.  

The door led into the kitchen, which as I recalled had one length of counter along the west wall.  There was a sink like at home, but instead of a faucet and water turns for hot and cold, there was a hand pump, which brought up water up from a private well under the house.  I have a feeling there was probably more of these at one time, but to my knowledge it was the only one left in town by then, the early 1960s.  There was still a town hand pump just kitty-corner from the Ryan home, by the town pond and curling rink.  Knowing more now historically, I think the town pond and pump may have served multiple reasons - for watering animals, water for people, water for fighting fires.  Heck, Grandma would have me go fetch buckets of water for her, to water her garden during the summer, since drinking water for her cost her precious money; at that time, most of us had our water brought in by water trucks, costing x-amount much per 1,000 gallons, stored under the house in cisterns. Anyways, I always thought it was so interesting that Toots still pumped her water.  She had a big stove in her house, too, but I never noticed what kind it was.  

The only other room in the downstairs was her parlor.  The first time I saw the parlor was on a visit to Toots with my Mom; in the parlor were two chairs, and a piano.  I hadn’t started playing the piano yet, but we had one that I was always tinkling on at home, showing an interest in learning already.  So it wasn’t surprising at all that I headed straight for it the first time I saw hers.  It had a fascinating seat, not a bench like ours, but a stool.  I found out immediately that it could be adjusting in height, delightfully by spinning it to the right for up, or left for down.  The stool’s feet looked like the claws of an animal, and clutched within those claw were small, clear, crystal balls.  I opened the lid to the keys to see keys that had faint marbling and yellowing, which I later learned meant they were real ivory keys made from elephant tusks.  A few were missing, but most were still there.  The really cool part was when I began ‘playing’ the keys, I learned the piano was badly out-of-tune.  However, to me, that made is all the more special:  It reminded me of the pianos played in the old western movies on TV - in tune enough to make out familiar melodies, but enough out-of-tune to be an authentic saloon piano!  

Once I wore out my welcome on the piano, I jumped off to rejoin the women (my Mom and Toots, visiting…)  Toots was a shorter-than-average lady, who was almost as round as she was tall.  That day, I was probably about four years old.  I interjected into their conversation with the observation, “You’re really fat!”  There was sudden silence.  Then Toots erupted into what I can now only describe as jolly laughter.  My Mom directed a mortified, “Patricia Kaye!” Towards me.  Toots came to my rescue by saying, “Patricia Kaye, eh?  That used to be my favorite chewing gum!”  She got a kick out of my outburst.  I had no idea I had done anything wrong, stating the obvious.  Toots and I always got along famously after that early meeting - I would often run out my Grandma’s back door and run over to her house and into her house up those high stairs.  

But when Grandma had friends drop by, there was a lot of visiting…and always over tea and baked goods.  The visiting might start off slow and casual, and build up to stories filled with gales of laughter; or they might start out with an excited, “Have you heard…?”  Whether it was a neighbor, or a cousin coming from across the county, in those days, people would often just pop in, no call ahead - no one minded, in fact, it was an occasion to be excited about.  Out would come the teapots full of Red Rose tea, served up with bars, cookies, and sometimes even cake…but always plenty of tea!  If Mrs. Zahara was in attendance when I was there, I would avail her of her talents and beg her for a reading of the tea leaves. I wish I could recall at least one of those readings now…

The History of the St. Vincent Weather Station: 1880-1892

The St. Vincent weather station was established by the War Department circa 1880.  During the period of 1880 to July 1891, it was under the Office of the Chief Signal Officer, Division of Telegrams and Reports for the Benefit of Commerce and Agriculture. 

St. Vincent was one of the three stations that were instrumental in reporting conditions on June 16, 1887, the day a major tornado hit Grand Forks, ND/East Grand Forks, MN - “Reshaping the Tornado Belt”  

Beginning in July 1891, weather services were established under the new Weather Bureau, and taken from the War Department and becoming part of the Department of Agriculture. St. Vincent remained an active weather station within the Weather Bureau until around 1940. 

Initially, the St. Vincent Signal Station, under the U.S. Army, was manned by soldiers from Fort Pembina.  From 1891 forward, civilian federal employees under the Department of Agriculture took over.  Many observers worked in St. Vincent over the years - men with last names of Day, Frank, Baldwin, Cobb, and Ellis - among others.   

St. Vincent Signal Station daily barometric pressure, temperature, and wind speed readings, for September 1885.

[Click to enlarge and more easily read…]

Cover of July 1885 monthly report, for St. Vincent, Minn. Signal Station.

[Click to enlarge and more easily read…]

April 1885 Monthly Meteorological Report for St. Vincent, Minn. Signal Station.

Sources:

National Archives [War Department. Office of the Chief Signal Officer. Division of Telegrams and Reports for the Benefit of Commerce and Agriculture. St. Vincent (Minnesota) Weather Station. (Ca. 1883-07/01/1891)]

Portrait: John Busha/Bushie/Boucher



John Boucher - Back row, on left (1855)


Provision was made in the ninth article of the treaty of October 2, 1863 (aka Old Crossing Treaty), with the Red Lake and Pembina bands of Chippewa for a reservation of 640 acres of land for the Chippewa chief  "Red Bear," to be located on the north side of the Pembina River. The agent reported that before he could make this selection, there was not a section of suitable land in one body remaining on the north side of the Pembina River for a long distance from its mouth, and he, therefore, made the selection on both sides of the river and reported it in that form. As this was not in accordance with the treaty, legislation by Congress was recommended in Office report of March 5, 1872, (H.R. Ex. Doc. 183,) authorizing the selection in this manner. Favorable action was not taken by Congress in the premises, and as such action is necessary in order to ensure to this chief the benefits contemplated by the treaty, Congress should be again be requested to legislate for his relief.

Boucher, John C. [*1868] ·P108.4d
Bushey, John [R.L. Scrip #331] ·
Bache, John [R.L. Scrip #331] ·
Pembina Annuity Roll, Mis co muh quah's Band, 1868:97 - 1 man, 1 woman $ 8 paid

National Archives, RG 75, Entry 363, "List of Persons to Whom Scrip was Issued under Red Lake & Pembina Treaties...", Halfbreed Scrip No. 331, issued April 15, 1874, under the authority of Secretarial Decision, June 12, 1872, delivered April 15, 1874, notation of alternate spelling "Bache"

National Archives, RG 75, Entry 364, "Treaty of April 12, 1864, Red Lake and Pembina Half-Breeds," Scrip Stubs, Number 331, dated April 15th, 1874, 160 Acres, delivered April 15th, 1874, issued to John Bushey (Bache), delivered to U.S. Indian Agent [Ebenezer] Douglass

PROFILE: Walter Hill (as Known by Kittson County Locals...)

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• Trish: Walter talked James J. into getting the first car the family had in 1905, but managed to wreck it by 1907.

• He got married in 1908, and he was put in charge of the Northcote farm in 1910, so I'll go with that...

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• Jim Benjaminson:

• Time line - Walter got married in 1908, his wife is in the car. He wrecked the first car by 1907...(wonder what it was???)

• So my guess-timate on the car at 1906-1908 wasn't too far off. I'll do a little research on the early Packard's to see if

• I can determine an exact year.

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• Jim Benjaminson:

• Searching information on Minnesota license plates - the plate has to be a multi-year 1912 plate which had dark letters on

• a silver background. The plates were good for three years so was valid 1912-1913-1914. All the earlier plates had dark

• background colors.

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• Steve Hannah:

• But is it a Packard? The radiator emblem was always Packard written at a slant. Everything else is very similar to

• a Model 30 Runabout.

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• Steve Hannah:

• I will agree with a 1910-1911 Packard Model 30 Runabout. The only thing is the radiator emblem. Did Hill have

• a Vanity emblem made? Money was no issue. I can't find a close match to that emblem shape.

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• Steve Hannah:

• Windshield, top, headlights removed.

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• Jim Benjaminson:

• I was wondering if it might be an emblem for a fraternal order or auto club or ???? Front fender on the Hill car

• seems a little flatter but that could have been a running change or model year change...

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• Steve Hannah:

• Walter loved speed, it is said his interests were tilted away from farming toward race cars. I' trying to identify the steamer

• but they all look alike. I counted around 50 horses though.

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• Jim Benjaminson:

• This looks like it might be a source - I contacted the library as I couldn't get any access to the Motor Vehicle and

• Driver License Registration Records, 1909-1921 Register of motor vehicles (1909-1914, with indexes), automobile

• license applications (1921), chauffeur’s record (1909-1911), and motorcycle registration record (1909-ca. 1913).

• MNHS call number: See the finding aid in the library (Secretary of State: Motor Vehicle Division).

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• Steve Hannah

• There is so much I could find out if the Gale Library wasn't 300 miles away. Keep scanning folks!

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• Bernie: my Great Uncle George Hugill played base ball with Walter and said he would chase rabbits in a white

• Stuz Bearcat. But that was 60 years later so maybe it was a Packard

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• Jim Benjaminson:

• Does anybody know if early Minnesota license registrations exist for these years?

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• Trish Short Lewis:

• Maybe this might help? https://libguides.mnhs.org/transport/automobiles

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• Jim Benjaminson:

• Probably a 1912 model - later than I first thought.1912, not much if any difference. 60 HP but Hill had a mechanic who could make it

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• Bernie Streed: My Great Uncle George Hugill was a contemporary friend of Walter Hill. What a character. During a

• winter storm he started telling me stories of how they would chase rabbits across plowed frozen fields with a white

• Stuz Bearcat convertible. He also told me he would order hand made oak barrels from Italy. Then he would stock the

• milking barns with long horn steers. They would lock horns in the narrow milking stalls. The barns were state of the art

• for the day, built with tile walls and sloping floors so manure could be flushed down trenches in the floor into the river

• below. Basically the bored millionaire would roll these oak barrels down the center of the barn agitating the long horn

• steers so they would kick the barrels to pieces. He and George would do this for hours till the barrels were gone. The

• whole farm was meant to get James J Hill's playboy youngest son out of St Paul to reform him.

Bernie:  These are my memories of Uncle George's visit. My mom, Amelia Streed, took her Aunt Amelia Diamond Hugill into town for an event at the Presbyterian church but they didn't want George to be alone in a storm so i sat with him. He started talking about his youth.. great stories. This was probably around 1968 or before. So I would have been in 8th grade maybe.

Trish: Walter Hill was a goer, or "someone vibrant for life." He hunted from his car, raced his draft horses in the streets of St. Vincent, and drank mightily. Before the fall harvest, he used to attach a hay-rack to the back of his car and go to Bronson, Minn., searching for labor. Men eager for jobs climbed onto the hay-rack and Hill drove them home in his usual manner. By the time he got back to the farm, there would be only one man left - the rest had jumped out along the way in fear for their lives.

Bernie: lol I can believe that. I know my Grandpa Bernhard Streed drove one of the steam tractors. He said he started in the dark of morning and made one swath to the Red River and back before sunset.

Keith Finney: I believe it was Byron or Marva that told me that he would go into Canada up by Tolstoi and get hired men. He would drive fast across the rough prairie and some would fall off on the way. Thus the illegal aliens that worked on the farm

Georgine Cleem Whalen: Thank you Trish for this wonderful information on Walter Hill and some of his escapades I see in one of the links that he passed in 1944 in the West which would have been during the time my Grandpa was working for him on the ranch he owned there in 1932. It became the Bishop Ranch in the 40's and I still remember them letting us swim in the pool as my mother worked for doc Bishop. It is not there anymore but they do have a street named Bishop place where this ranch set. I was wondering if Walter returned to Minnesota after my Grandpa Borgeson went to work for the shipyards along with his sons.

Trish this is how we 'Borgeson' family ended up in California. James Hill bought a horse ranch for Walter and my Grandpa Eric Borgeson went with him to work this ranch and property in 1932. The rest of the story is amazing how the whole family (13) left Mn. in a Franklin car and went west

I do not remember the name. I only remember after it became Bishop Ranch. I think my Mother said it was a horse ranch and her dad (Eric Borgeson) worked for Walter Hill and came to California in 1932. He sent for my grandma later and that's another wonderful story and they lived in the old red house there in Midway City, Ca. When my parents went to California in about 1942 sometime I was still the baby. We stayed at the old red house in the middle of a field just behind where the Hill place would have been. Shortly after my grandparents bought a place in Anaheim (this is where I lose track of Walter Hill about 1943/44) and my parents stayed at the old red house which was then bought my Hap Post who my dad worked for. We lived there till I was in high school when the property was sold by the Post Brothers. I digress here, the horse ranch that Walter Hill bought would be off Bolsa in Midway City, maybe considered Westminster at that time. I do remember this property as I got older. Walter Hill brought my grandpa a big old green rocking chair that is still in the family that all of us remember him rocking away in. Grandpa did change jobs at this time and I always wondered what happened to Walter Hill.

Going through picture albums and saw this paragraph in an article about midway city california and walter and james hill. I remember this hotel well on the cutoff there as our family knew the hokes well but never knew that walter hill had a hand in the start of that... From: “James J. Hill Banished his Errant Son to Kittson County” by Ruth Hammond - Walter Hill was a "a goer, or someone vibrant for life," Hanson said. He hunted from his car, raced his draft horses in the streets of St. Vincent, and drank mightily. Before the fall harvest, he used to attach a hay-rack to the back of his car and go to Bronson, Minn., searching for labor. Men eager for jobs climbed onto the hay-rack and Hill drove them home in his usual manner. "By the time he got back to the farm, there would be only one man left," Hanson said. The rest had jumped out along the way in fear for their lives.

The Last of the Fenian Raids

Before Pembina, there was Vermont...

Soon after joining up in 1870, Private William James Kneeshaw, along with his brother, Sergeant Ebenezer Muir Kneeshaw, saw action during a Fenian raid on the Quebec/Vermont border.  Their unit - the 11th Battalion's Argenteuil Rangers - defeated the Fenian's attempt at invasion of Canada, once again; it was another of an ongoing string of incursions along the 45th parallel beginning in 1866.

 

In 1871 John O'Neill and an odd character named W. B. O’Donoghue asked the Savage Wing Council to undertake another invasion of Canada across the Dakota Territory border. The Council, weary of Canadian adventures in general and O’Neill in particular, would have none of it. O'Neill's idea was turned down, but the Council promised to loan him arms and agreed they would not publicly denounce him and his raid. O'Neill resigned from the Fenians to lead the invasion, which was planned in Saint Paul, Minnesota, to invade Manitoba near Winnipeg. About 35 men, led by John O'Neill, William B. O'Donoghue, and John J. Donnelly, hoped to join forces with Louis Riel's Métis. 

On October 5, O'Neill's force managed to capture a Hudson's Bay Company post and a Canadian customs house which they believed to be just north of the international border. A U.S. survey team had determined the border was two miles further north, placing the Hudson's Bay post and the customs house both inside U.S. territory. O'Neill, J. J. Donnelly and ten others were taken prisoner near Pembina, Dakota Territory by U.S. soldiers led by  Captain Lloyd Wheaton.

A fascinating 'review' of the Pembina Raid...

The farcical raid was doomed from the very start. It actually took place inside the United States, and the Métis under Riel had signed a pact with the British just as the invasion began. Riel and his Métis captured O'Donoghue and gave him to U.S. authorities. In a somewhat muddled federal response, O'Neill was arrested twice - once in Dakota and once in Minnesota - but was released and never charged for "invading" U.S. territory. The men captured with him were released by the court as simply "dupes" of O'Neill and Donnelly.  It was John O'Neill's last hurrah.

And what happened to Vermont's W.J. and E.M. Kneeshaw?  Well, W.J. ironically emigrated to Pembina in 1873, not long after his militia service expired.  He became a lawyer, and eventually the well-known judge, Judge William J. Kneeshaw.  His older brother E.M. (or as Ebenezer preferred to be called, Muir) eventually followed him to Pembina in 1880, initially farming for a bit, later becoming a surveyor. 

On a medal that Muir received:  On one side it has Victoria Regina et Imperatrix meaning, "Victoria, Queen and Empress", along with her raised image in profile.  On the other side it has a raised image of the Canadian flag (1870 version), with the Union Jack and Canadian coat of arms, with some greenery.  Around the edge of the coin, is stamped the rank and name of Sergeant E. M. Kneeshaw, as seen below.  On a bar, across the base of the ribbon, is stamped, Fenian Raid 1870...

Christmas Sunday School Memories

Shared by Lori Wood Goertzen:

This photo was a Christmas gift from my favorite Sunday school teacher, Clara Loer. 

Left to right: Debbie Dykhuis, Danny Hodgson, Marilyn Loge, Anita Calkins and myself.

This was taken on the front steps of the old St. Vincent Evangelical Free Church.

Humboldt-St. Vincent Elevator Association: End of an Era

This week, it was announced that the Humboldt-St. Vincent Elevator Association was being dissolved and thus the closing of the elevator in Humboldt, St. Vincent's elevator having closed some years before.¹ 

St. Vincent Junction, with St. Vincent Elevator in the background (1948)

Upon hearing the news, Keith Finney, who had began his long career at the Humboldt elevator, recalled:  

Some of you may remember Silas Mathews who lived south of Humboldt. One summer afternoon in 1973, Silas and I were sitting on the railing going up the south driveway. It was a very quiet day. When we were visiting, a tandem truck pulled into the elevator with a load of grain. I unloaded the truck and returned to visit with Silas. For those who are younger, there were not that many tandem trucks before this time. Silas was kind of amazed at the size of the truck. I could tell he was in deep thought when I sat down on the railing to resume our visit. He then said, "You know Keith, with all of these big tractors and big trucks, farmers will soon be hauling all their grain to Crookston. There won't be many small farmers like today. They won't need this elevator any longer." 

That conversation with Silas never slipped my mind. I cherished every conversation I had with Silas. He passed away a couple years later...

In neighboring Emerson, a resident shared, "In the Emerson area in winter time, if you couldn’t see the St Vincent elevator, it was too stormy to be on the road!" 

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1 - The St. Vincent elevator was demolished on May 22, 2007...