Dakota Territory History - 1880 This information appears in Chapter LII of "History of South Dakota" by Doane Robinson, Vol. I (1904), pages 302-305 and was scanned, OCRed and edited by Joy Fisher, http://www.rootsweb.com/~archreg/vols/00001.html#0000031 This file may be freely copied by individuals and non-profit organizations for their private use. Any other use, including publication, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission by electronic, mechanical, or other means requires the written approval of the file's author. This file is part of the SDGENWEB Archives. If you arrived here inside a frame or from a link from somewhere else, our front door is at http://www.usgwarchives.net/sd/sdfiles.htm CHAPTER LII THE SWELL OF THE BOOM IN 1880. By the spring of 1880 the boom in immigration and railroad building in the Dakota country had reached its great height and though it did not abate for several years, it still did not at any time reach greater proportions. During that year the Dakota Central division of the Northwestern was built from Volga to Pierre giving rise to Huron, Desmet, Miller, Highmore and all of the bright towns along that line. The Milwaukee was extended from Marion to Chamberlain, and Mitchell, Alexandria, Plankington and the towns along that railway came into being. Its Hastings and Dakota division was constructed from Big Stone to Webster, giving birth to Milbank aud Webster. The road from Egan to Sioux Falls was constructed and the Southern Minnesota extended from Flandreau to Madison. In the early spring of this vear the directors of the Dakota Southern Railway, representing a bare majority of the stock, sold the road to the Chicago, Milwankee & St. Paul, but John I. Blair. of St. Louis, the owner of forty-eight per cent. of the stock of the road and its financial sponser and its creditor for a large sum, attempted to restrain the sale by injunction. The matter dragged in the courts for several months, preventing the Milwaukee from making extensions in the southern portion of the territory, which it had in contemplation. The suit was compromised in July and the Milwaukee took the road. At this time every prospect pointed to the early construction of both the Pierre and Chamberlain extensions to the Hills, and it was undoubtedly the intention of the management of both lines to do so. Through the promotion of the railways the head men of the Tetons went to Washington to consider the means of selling the right of way for the railways through the reservation, and an agreement was reached and both companies paid a large sum of money for the concession. The Northwestern bought out the squatters upon the section of land on the west side of the Missouri, opposite Pierre, and covered the land with "Valentine script." Moreover extensive surveys were made and the immediate building of the extensions announced. There is reason to believe that at this juncture the Northwestern contemplated extending the Pierre line to the Pacific. Both the Northwestern and Milwaukee this year began the construction of the north and south lines in the Jim valley. Immigration everywhere flowed in the wake of the railways and not infrequently preceded it. There is no record of the numbers who came, but the ordinary estimates of the newspapers of the day placed the new arrivals of the year at one hundred thousand. Governor Nehemiah G. Ordway, who was appointed to fill the vacancy occasioned by the death of Governor Howard, arrived on the 24th of June and at once set out upon a personal examination of the territory. He delivered the Fourth of July oration at Mitchell and went thence to the Black Hills and Bismarck, across to Fargo and Grand Forks and in a short time had familiarized himself with the entire territory and made many acquaintances. He gathered up a car load of Dakota grains and vegetables and made an extended trip through the east exhibiting them and induced much additional immigration from the New England region. The harvest of the year proved excellent. Beginning on the 15th of October of this year, when the new settlers, many of them, had not completed their houses and stables, and were therefore illy provided for such a visitation, a terrific snow storm set in and continued for four days. The storm was unprecedented in its fury when the season is considered the snow fell to a great depth, blockading all of the railways for a long period and causing much suffering. Much stock perished and a few human lives were lost in South Dakota. This was the beginning of a winter which has become historic, a date line from which all pioneers reckon time. The hard winter of 1880 has become a proverb. The 1st day of May, 1880, the United States land office was removed from Springfield to Watertown. Arthur C. Mellette was register and L. D. F. Poore receiver. On September 21st the land office at Sioux Falls was removed to Mitchell, the lands in the vicinity of the Falls having all been taken, and the convenience of the homeseekers requiring that the office be brought nearer the point of general new settlement. During this season there was a general discussion of the possibility of obtaining water from sinking artesian wells. This was a topic of the first interest to the prairie towns and the boomers took up the exploitation of it with a will, but it remained for conservative old Yankton to make the first attempt and the first demonstration of its practicability. This, however, was not accomplished until the next year. The total assessed valuation of the territory this year was eleven million eight hundred and eight thousand dollars. The population by the census on the first of June was one hundred and thirty-five thousand and for the portion now South Dakota eighty-six thousand. This was a political year. Governor Howard died on April 10th and the appointment of a successor was a matter of great interest. A strong movement was started favorable to the appointment of George H. Hand, the secretary. He did not find favor with the administration. President Hayes offered the position to Judge Kidder, but the latter preferred to continue upon the bench. Finally Nehemiah G. Ordway, of New Hampshire, was chosen. Ordway had been sergeant-at- arms of the house of representatives. He was a gentleman of large means, and as sergeant-at-arms he had become a sort of private banker to a very large number of the impecunious congressmen, and in this way was enabled to bring to his support an almost irresistible demand for his appointment. It may be noted as an interesting coincident that he was a nephew of the Sergeant Ordway, who, in 1804, accompanied Lewis and Clarke through Dakota. The first convention of the season was held at Fargo May 19th by the Republicans for the purpose of electing delegates to Chicago for the national convention. There was a very full attendance, indicating the interest the newcomers took in public affairs. Charles T. McCoy, then of Bon Homme county, and Porter Warner, of Deadwood, were chosen as delegates, and they were instructed to support Newton Edmunds for national committeeman, but no choice was expressed by the convention as to the candidate for President, the sentiment of the territory being apparently divided about equally between Grant and Blame. At Chicago Mr. McCoy supported Grant and they united in support of Garfield. Mr. Warner did not understand that he was under instructions for Governor Edmunds for national committeeman and supported Seth Bullock. As a result of this disagreement no committeeman was appointed at the time for Dakota, but later in the season Mr. McCoy was chosen for the position by the territorial committee. The Democrats did not hold a spring convention, but the committee selected gentlemen to represent that party in the convention at Cincinnati, which nominated Hancock. The Republicans made a red-hot pre-convention campaign for delegate in congress. Senator Pettigrew, Delegate Bennett and John B. Raymond were active candidates. Alex Hughes, chairman of the central committee, called his committee to meet at Elk Point on July 24th to fix the time and place for holding the nominating convention, but found that Mr. Pettigrew had already secured from a majority of the committee a call for a convention to meet at Sioux Falls without consulting Hughes. A serious split was threatened, but a compromise was reached and the convention called to meet at Vermillion September 1st. In that convention seven ballots were taken before a choice was made, the original strength being Bennett and Pettigrew, fifty-five each, Raymond thirty- one. On the seventh ballot a break was made to Pettigrew and lie received one hundred and twenty-five votes. The Democratic convention met in Sioux Falls in September and Capt. M. L. MeCormack, of Grand Forks, was nominated without opposition. The only contest was over the selection of the chairman of the central committee, the result of the election in Maine having encouraged the Democrats to hope that Hancock might be elected, in which event the position of state chairman would carry a great deal of power in the matter of patronage. D. M. Inman was finally agreed upon as chairman. The election of course resulted in a great Republican victory, as the new immigration was almost entirely Republican. The administration of affairs in Lawrence county fell into the hands of a corrupt ring which resulted in the almost bankruptcy of the county. Bonds for more than three hundred thousand dollars were issued. Colonel Moody, as judge of the district court, took a strong position in opposition to the methods in operation there and was for a time deeply involved in a political-judicial turmoil, but came out with such credit that he was at once discussed as one of the United States senators to represent the new state, which at that time was thought to be near at hand. Brown county was organized July 20th, Beadle July 9th, Clark December 21st, Hughes November 20th and Miner November 8th. The last named county then included Sanborn county and the county seat was located at Forestburg. Among the notable deaths of the year was that of Governor Howard, which occurred at Washington on April 10th. Gov. William A. Howard was a native of Vermont, where he was born in 1812. He was a member of congress from Detroit Michigan, from 1856 to 1862, after which he was postmaster at Detroit for eight years. As an executive he ranks among the wisest and best Dakota has known. He was succeeded during the interregnum before the appointment of Ordway by George H. Hand, secretary and acting governor. Dr. Frank Wixson, a pioneer of 1860 and surgeon of Company B, of the Dakota Cavalry, died May 13th. He was also secretary of the council in 1867. Judge E. G. Wheeler, a lawyer of prominence, long a citizen of Yankton but recently removed to Beadle county, died July 25th. Mrs. Mary A. Kidder, wife of Judge Kidder, died in October. The great storm of October has already been mentioned. The entire season was characterized by storms of unusual violence. On May 17th a storm somewhat cyclonic struck the vicinity of Ashton and destroyed many homesteaders' improvements. Another of similar character wrought havoc in the vicinity of Mitchell and still later a violent storm devastated a portion of Lake county. Fortunately no lives were lost from this cause. While the public health was in general very good, an epidemic of smallpox, exceedingly virtilent and fatal, occurred at Jefferson, in Union county, in December. A few notable crimes are recorded for the year. William B. Gleason, first United States attorney for Dakota territory and later a judge of the territorial supreme court, for which he resigned to accept a consulate in Italy, had taken up the practice of law at his former home in Baltimore, Maryland, where during this summer he was convicted of perjury and disbarred from practice. John D. Cameron, a somewhat notorious resident of Sioux Falls, was indicted for subornation of perjury in the United States court, growing out of an attempt to secure title to forty-five quarter sections of government land near Huron, through fraudulent entries. Cameron was for a long period almost constantly under indictment for fraudulent practices relating to the public lands. Silas F. Beebe was sentenced by Judge Shannon to be hanged for the murder of George Lanphere, near Crow creek agency on July 4, 1879. He was reprieved and his sentence commuted to life imprisonment by the President. Arkansas Bill, a notorious desperado, was shot to death by a sheriff's posse at Pierre on November 18th.