Letter from Dennis Dunn to Mae and Ross Newman, Pine Co., MN "Hinckley of the Early Days Before the Fire" USGENWEB NOTICE: In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, material may be freely used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material, AND permission is obtained from the contributor of the file. These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by other organizations. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material for non-commercial purposes, MUST obtain the written consent of the contributor, OR the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. Made available to The USGenWeb Archives by: deddle@ix.netcom.com <deddle@ix.netcom.com> [BO:"Hinckley of the Early Days Before the Fire":BO]--letter from Dennis Dunn to Mae and Ross Newman Barnum, Minn. Dear Mae, Ross and All: Received your letter and if anything in this you can use, O.K. So here we are back to August 24, 1871, when we, the Dunn family, arrived in Hinckley, 12 Noon. And some town. Great pine trees everywhere, towering 80 to 100 feet and just seemed to wave a welcome to all. Father was section foreman on the Lake Superior and Mississippi Railroad, later the St. Paul, Duluth, and now the Northern Pacific. Just a few shacks and some log buildings. The depot was just finished--a large building nearly a block long, with hotel in it, about 20 bed-rooms, two dining rooms, passenger waiting rooms, telegraph and ticket office and a large freight shed. A man named Prille was in charge of the hotel part. All trains stopped one hour for meals. The dining rooms would seat five hundred people and many the time both dining rooms would be filled and then some. Before the depot was finished all trains stopped and passengers were fed at Camp Comfort, a great log camp about where the Great Northern railroad crosses the Northern Pacific just south of town now and well it was named Camp Comfort where there was always a welcome to all who came in. The engine house stood on the west side across from the depot. A long wooden building with one track so engines or locomotives were housed in a row, one run in, then the others. It held three. The water tank was about where the south end of the coal shed now stands--a large building with tank inside and the pumping was done by hand. A large jack-pump with a great wooden wheel. A man named Joe Grindell was pump man and he surely had some job. Joe was later a conductor on the railroad. Those days all locomotives were of the wood burning type with great smoke stacks five and one-half feet across the top, with a large head light a man could easily get inside of and be comfortable. What a contrast to the large locomotives of today. The box cars were 24 and 26 feet long and carried 20 and 24 thousand pounds each. Not much like the cars of today with a capacity of 60, 80 and 100 thousand pounds. And them days 20 cars was a train. North of Hinckley and in the fall and winter they had a pusher, that is an engine to push the trains over the hill out of Hinckley. For fuel they would get out wood at different points along the line and the wood-saw would come along and saw it to 16 inches. It was then piled in wood racks where train crews could throw it onto engines. Mr. McNeal was wood-man in Hinckley for years. Of course logging was the only work around Hinckley. Hundreds, yea thousands of lumber jacks were employed every winter, go to the woods in the fall, build log camps, cut roads, then cut the logs. Skid and deck them high on skidways. Oxen were used for skidding. Then when snow came, four and six horse teams hauled them to rivers to be floated down river. Back to hauling. The sleighs had a seven foot runner with bunks 14 and 16 feet long, and a load would be from five to ten thousand feet and some larger, depended on who the logger was. Men like Billie O'Brine and Quail Bros. sure hauled some mighty loads, as did the Brennan Lumber Co., Ann River Lumber Co., John Martin Lumber Co. of Mission Creek, and a few others. Hinckley was winter headquarters for many large lumber companies and toting supplies was done out many miles, west to Snake River and east to the St. Croix. It was a common thing to see 20 or 25 four-horse tote teams leaving Hinckley every morning all winter long. As for the logging camps--they weren't so fancy. One large sleeping shanty, as they called it, built for 50 or 75 or 100 men, whatever the crew was to be, with bunks built on both sides, one above the other, and benches, deacon seats they called them, along the lower bunks. A large stove about center of camp, a table to write on and hay wire or poles up over the stove to dry your socks at night. And the only ventilation was a sky-light. In the bunks, hay or spruce boughs for a mattress and two pair of blankets. Them beds wasn't so hot to stretch out on after a hard day's work. Yet few complained. Well., what good would it do if one did complain. If you did make any kick about your bed or the grub, the boss would tell them to go to the office, get theirs, and hit the tote road. The cook shanty was another camp with one or two large cook stoves and tables enough for the crew, tin dishes, with always plenty to eat. Sometimes good grub and sometimes pretty bum, depended on the logger and of course the cook had a lot to do with it. Some mighty good cooks in the camps and once in a while a stomach-robber. That wasn't so good. They used to say that in the early days that when a man got too dirty to drive oxen, they put him in cooking. Of course that was before my time, yet I have seen a few cooks I thought was too dirty to drive or care for a good ox. Now for mills. There was a little saw mill south of town at what is now known as Grant's Hill. A man named Grant owned it and he sawed most of his lumber for the railroad. Another small mill was near the railroad across from where the Mitchell home stands. Wasn't there long. Then McKane Bros. and Barto built the mill by the river, near where the dam is now. That mill was there until destroyed by the fire in 1894. McKane Bros and Barto went broke when they built the tram way for summer logging. Log rails and wheels on the cars to fit down over logs. The tram track ran south and east to where the Von Rueden farm now is. McKane Bros.-Bardo also built a large boarding house, west of the tracks, about just north of where the stock yard is now. That was where the store was and also the postoffice. Fred Hodge was clerk in the store and acting post-master. It was from that building the first telephone in Hinckley run to the depot. It was a waxed string hung in glass insulators from poles. The string went into a little box at each end and fastened to a button, and believe it or not they could understand what was being said on that rude piece of work. That was in the late seventies if I remember right. After McKane Bros.-Barto, Thomas Brennan took over the mill. He was road-master on the St. Paul-Duluth railroad. The company was later taken over by a Wisconsin firm known as the Brennan Lumber Co. and Hank Davis was manager. In the early days there was a few Indians around Hinckley. Most any time you went out or looked out you could see one or more of them and when we first came to Hinckley there were a few old blanket Indians still roaming around. One of their winter hangouts was at Squaw Point, about one half mile down river, Grindstone River, east from where the Great Northern bridge now stands. That was headed by Old Lew Grasshopper, and what a bunch. Another wintered at little Mission Creek about a mile or so south of Hinckley. They were headed by Chief Cowatosso and a fine old Indian he was. He had been a sharp-shooter in a Wisconsin Regiment in the Civil War. Then out at Pine Grove about a mile west of Hinckley where the Great Northern now runs was a bunch of Indians headed by John Baykettle. Not so good, but only stayed there winters. All hunted deer and sold it in town where all done their trading. In Spring all left for other parts. Of course there was plenty other bands living along Kettle River, St. Croix, Grindstone Lake and up on Snake River and all come to Hinckley to do their trading and get beat out of what they had by their so-called honest white brother. Many things can be wrote about the Indians of and around Hinckley, their pretty bead- work, fancy caps, buck-skin shirts and the wonderful birch bark canoes they used to build. Now for the first schools in Hinckley. The first school was in a private house and a Mrs. Linzie was the teacher. Then the mill boys built a dance hall. It stood about where the street crossed to the west side and where the street now runs by the old Joe Tew house. The mill boys then gave it to the school board and later it was moved to a lot where the O'Donnell oil station now stands It is there where some of us old timers went to school. Even I went sometimes. That old school was a one-room affair and the teacher sure had some job. Next school was built on lots where the school ground now is. It was two story and two teachers. Sure some school them days. First teacher was Minnie O'Brien upstairs where we big guys went. I don't remember who the teacher was downstairs. Teachers that I still remember who taught in the first school house were Miss Robbie, Miss Stone, Miss Ames, Mr. Moot, Mr. Martin, Mr. Clinch and Miss Minnie O'Brien and all good teachers and mighty fine people. Well, Mae, I guess about all at present. Don't know anything else to write about. It's so long ago and so many things one could write about. But don't waste this paper if you don't like the stuff on it, just pour a little glue on it, sprinkle with sugar and it will make mighty fine fly- paper. We are all fine here and do hope you, Ross, and all are fine, too , and hope you have a good summer of it so with best wishes to old time friends, Just, DINNIE The End