STORIES OF THE BADGER STATE. LIFE IN PIONEER DAYS ==================================================================== USGENWEB ARCHIVES 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. This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by: Tina S. Vickery ==================================================================== STORIES OF THE BADGER STATE by Reuben Gold Thwaites New York Cincinnati Chicago American Book Company Copyright, 1900, by Reuben Gold Thwaites. Sto. Badger Sta. W. P. 7 page(s) 171-176 LIFE IN PIONEER DAYS So long as the fur trade remained the principal business in Wisconsin, the French were still supreme at Green Bay and Prairie du Chien; and, until a third of the nineteenth century had passed away, there existed at these outposts of New France a social life which smacked of the " old regime," bearing more traces of seventeenth-century Normandy than of Puritan New England. With the decline of the fur trade, a new order of things slowly grew up. There being little legal machinery west of Lake Michigan, before Wisconsin Territory was erected, local government was slow to establish itself. Nothing but the, good temper and stout common sense of the people prevented anarchy, under such a condition of affairs. For many years, the few public enterprises were undertaken at private expense. At Green Bay, schools were thus conducted, as early as 1817. In 1821 the citizens of that village raised a fund by popular subscription, and built a jail; and eleven years later, they asked the legislature of Michigan Territory to pay for it. There were some Territorial taxes levied in 1817, but the gathering of them was not very successful. The first county to levy a tax was Crawford, of which Prairie du Chien was the seat, but considerable difficulty appear s to have been experienced in collecting the money. Finally, Wisconsin Territory was organized, and the legislature assembled 0838) in Madison, the new capital. The accommodations at that raw little woodland village were meager, even for pioneer times. The Territorial building of stone, and a few rude frame and log houses in the immediate neighborhood, were all there was of the infant city. Only fifty strangers could be decently lodged there, and a proposition to adjourn to Milwaukee was favored. But as the lake-shore metropolis, also a small village, could offer no better accommodations, it was decided to stay at the capital, and brave it out on the straw and hay mattresses, of which, however, there were not enough to supply the demand. This was long before railroads had reached Wisconsin. Travel through the new Territory was by boat, horseback, or a kind of snow sledge called a "French train." There were no roads, except such as had been developed from the old deep-worn Indian trails which interlaced the face of the country, and traces of which can still be seen in many portions of the State. The pioneers found that these trails, with a little straightening, often followed the best possible routes for bridle paths or wagon roads. It was not long before they were being used by long lines of teams, transporting smelted lead from the mines of southwest Wisconsin to the Milwaukee and Galena docks; on the return, they carried supplies for the "diggings," and sawmill machinery into the interior forests. Farmers' wagons and stagecoaches followed in due time. Bridges were but slowly built; the unloaded wagons were ferried across rivers in Indian "dugout" canoes, the horses swimming behind, and the freight being brought over relays. In 1837 there was a financial crisis throughout the country, and this checked Western immigration for a few years. But there was not enough money in Wisconsin for bank failures materially to affect the people; so, when the tide of settlement again flowed hither, the Badgers were as strong and hopeful as ever. People coming to Wisconsin from the East often traveled all the way in their own wagons; or would take a lake boat at Buffalo, and then proceed by water to Detroit, Green Bay, or Chicago, thence journeying in caravans to the interior. Frontier life, in those days, was of the simplest character. The immigrants were for the most part used to hard work and plain fare. Accordingly the privations of their new surroundings involved relatively little hardship, although sometimes a pioneer farmer was fifty or a hundred miles from a gristmill, a store, or a post office, and generally his highway thither was but a blazed bridle path through the tangled forest. Often his only entertainments throughout the year were "bees " for raising log houses or barns for newcomers, and on these occasions all the settlers for scores of miles around would gather in a spirit of helpful comradery. Occasionally the mail carrier, either afoot or on horseback, would wish accommodation over night. Particularly fortunate was the man who maintained a river ferry at the crossing of some much-frequented trail; he could have frequent chats with strangers, and collect stray shillings from mail carriers or other travelers whose business led them through the wilderness. Often the new settler brought considerable flour and salt pork with him, in his journey to the West; but it was not at first easy to get a fresh supply. Curiously enough, although in the midst of a wild abundance, civilized man at the outset sometimes suffered for the bare necessaries of life. As soon, however, as he could garner his first crop, and become accustomed to the new conditions, he was usually proof against disaster of this kind; fish and game were so abundant, in their season, that in due time the backwoodsman was able to win a wholesome livelihood from the storehouse of nature. Satisfactory education for youth was a plant of comparatively small growth. At first there was not enough money in the country to pay competent teachers. The half-educated sons and daughters of the pioneers taught the earliest schools, often upon a private subscription basis; text-books were few, appliances generally wanting, and the results were, for many years, far from satisfactory. As for spiritual instruction this was given by itinerant missionary preachers and priests, of various denominations, who braved eat hardships while making their rounds on horseback or afoot, and deserve to rank among the most daring of the pioneer class. In due time churches and schools were firmly established throughout the Territory. In addition to these farmer colonists, there came ,many young professional and business men, chiefly from New York and New England, seeking an opening in the new Territory for the acquisition of fame and wealth. Many of these were men of marked ability, with high ambition and progressive ideas, who soon took prominent part in molding public opinion in the young Wisconsin. There are, all things considered, no abler, more forceful men in the Wisconsin of to-day than were some of those, now practically all passed away, who shaped her destinies in the fourth and fifth decades of the nineteenth century. The sessions of the legislature were the principal events of the year. Prominent men from all over Wisconsin were each winter attracted to Madison, as legislators, lobbyists, or visitors, crowding the primitive little hotels and indulging, in rather boisterous gayety; for humor in those pioneer days was often uncouth. There was overmuch "horseplay," hard drinking, and profanity; and now and then, as the result of a warm discussion, a tussle with fists and canes. The newspapers were given to rude personal attacks upon their enemies; one would suppose, to read the columns of the , old journals, that editors thought it their chief business in life to carry on a wordy, bitter quarrel with some rival editor or politician. But this was largely on the surface, for effect. As a matter of fact, strong attachments between men were more frequent then than now. There was a deal of dancing and miscellaneous merrymaking at these legislative sessions ; and travelers have left us, in their letters, and journals, statements which show that they greatly relished the experience of tarrying there on their winter journeys across the Territory, and of being entertained by the good-hearted villagers. Pioneers, in their stories of those early years, are fond of calling them the "good old times," and styling present folk and manners degenerate. No doubt there was a certain charm in the rude simplicity of frontier life, but there were, as well, great inconveniences and rude discomforts, with which few pioneers of our day would wish to be confronted, after having tasted the pleasures arising from the wealth of conveniences of every sort which distinguishes these latter days. As far back in time as human records go, we ever find old men bewailing prevalent degeneracy, and sighing in vain for "the good old times " when they were young. It is a blessing given to the old that the disagreeable incidents of their youth should be forgotten, and only the pleasant events remembered. As a matter of fact, we of to-day may well rejoice that, while Wisconsin enjoyed a lusty youth, she has now, in the fullness of time, grown into a great and ambitious commonwealth, lacking nothing that her sisters own, in all that makes for the prosperity and happiness of her people.