BIOGRAPHIES: Andrew LARSON, Dovre Township, Barron County, WI ==================================================================== USGENWEB NOTICE: In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, data may be used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material. These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or for presentation by other persons or organizations. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material for purposes other than stated above must obtain the written consent of the file contributor, or the legal representative of the contributor, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by: Vic Gulickson 18 June 2001 ==================================================================== Andrew Larson, a veteran of the Civil War and an early settler in the southern part of Dover Township, was born in Norway, Feb. 14, 1825, and there grew to manhood. On June 24, 1847, he married Ingra Knudson, who was born in Norway, Dec. 21, 1824, and who was fifty-five days his senior. In 1863 they came to America, the voyage aboard the sailing vessel taking ten weeks and four days. The family landed in Quebec and then came to Eau Claire, in this state, where they lived for four years, Mr. Larson working in the mills and in the logging woods. While there he enlisted in Company H, 16th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry, and served as a good soldier for about nineteen months. In 1867 Mr. and Mrs. Larson came to Barron County and took a homestead near Sand Creek, on section 36, west, Dover Township. This was all wild land and there were only about four families in the whole settlement, there were no roads, and the principal route of travel was an Indian trail which crossed a corner of the farm, extending from the river to the present site of Bloomer. Here he built a log house and moved his family into it. The family came from Eau Claire with a hired team of horses. He himself drove up a pair of oxen which he had bought. That summer he got a cow. With almost nothing in the way of tools and equipment, he started clearing up the farm. For some years times and conditions were hard. But he and his wife worked hard, assisted by their family, and in due time won success. Both are now dead. Mr. Larson was the first to pass away, departing this life Nov. 15, 1894. Mrs. Larson's death came nearly nine years later, on Sunday, Oct. 4, 1903. They were devout members of the Norwegian Lutheran Church and early services of that denomination were held in their cabin. They had six children, Louis, Andrew, Martin, John, Carrie and Trena (Mrs. George Olson and Mrs. Theo. S. Peterson). --Taken from: History of Barron Co., Wisconsin, H. C. Cooper, Jr., & Co., 1922, pp. 597-598.