The Winona Republican-Herald from Winona, Minnesota • Page 5

SATURDAY, JANUARY 23, 1954 THE WINONA REPUBLICAN-HERALD, WINONA, MINNESOTA Trempealeau County Marking 100th Anniversary on Sunday ginally established by a tribal treaty signed at Prairie du Chien Aug. 19, 1885. During the years 1S36-38 an unsuccessful attempt was made to establish a Swiss Mission station about three miles northwest of what is now the village of Trempealeau. The American Fur Prairie du Chien, established a steamboat landing site in 1837 in what is now Trempealeau County. John B.

Doville, of the employes of the fur company, became the first permanent settler. In 1840 James Reed brought his family from Prairie du Chien and built a log cabin on the banks of the Mississippi on the site of the present Trempealeau. This locality became known as Reed's' Town. Two surveys were made of the town in 1852 by conflicting inter- Judge Gale Led Legislative Drive To Recognize Area GALESVILLE, Wis. (Special) -Judge George Gale (1816-1868) was a behind-the-scenes "power" who persuaded the Wisconsin Legislature 100 years ago this week to found Trempealeau County from parts of La Crosse, Jackson and Buffalo counties.

The centennial anniversary of the county which came into being because Judge Gale wanted Galesville to be the county seat is day. I Gale, a native of Vermont, came more "than the "required to this section of Wisconsin to acreage and was subject to divi- settle. He decided that the area on A sec ond act of legislature then passed took the tract of land containing Montoyille from La Crosse County, a tier of townships ship 19, then designated for the courthouse." Pioneers had not though that another county would spring up in the area, for a constitutional provision prohibited the dividing of any county having an area of 900 acres without a vote of the people. In his little settlement just north of Black River, Judge George Gale who had chosen that spot to locate the university which he hoped would bring culture to the frontier, viewed the proceedings with a judicial eye, laying plans to circumvent the men who had shelved him and his village on the outskirts of the county. He began by interviewing and enlisting the support of legislators, and pursuing this scheme, the county of Buffalo was enlarged by extending it to its present northern and western boundaries.

Thus the coun- where Galesville now lies was the! one he wanted for the founding of a university which was bis dream. He founded Galesville and looked about him to establish a county to enclose it. At that time, the only town government in force was at nearby Trempealeau. Montoville, Holmes Landing and Twelve Mile Bluff were river towns; they still are, but today's population knows them as Trem- ests and the names Montoville and pealeau, Fountain City and Alma. Trempealeau were adopted.

The name "Trempealeau" is a St. Cloud Seeks Through Air tine To Chicago, East WASHINGTON UP) St. asked the Civil Aeronautics! Board Friday for through air serv- i Chicago ty have the same founding date, Wlth one or two intermediate stops. Jan 24 1854. All organizations in I The city asked the board to con- the city have been asked to seisd I solidate its request with the cur- representatives to the meeting, rent investigation of North Ceo- Galesville Meeting Monday to Discuss Double Celebration GALESVILLE, Wis.

(Special) -Galesville residents will hold a mass meeting at the city Monday evening when plans will be considered for a centennial ob- called by the city officers. Ural Airlines' services. Announcement of the meeting I it said North Central's current' was made at the weekly Lions Club meeting Monday evening, when general plans were outlined. Members were asked to attend the session in a body. The Lions Club safety committee, composed Clarence Brown, Henry Lovig and Lester Danuser, a uti vj.

uni wo i TM from Jackson County, and two! were asked to confer with the city council in the matter of licensing bicycles and establishing safety rules to govern them. The proposal to make the cut-off known as the bathhouse road a one-way street or to close it altogether to vehicle traffic was also referred to the safety committee, which will meet with the council. A Portrait Of The Founder of Trempealeau County--Judge George Gale--and the man after whom Galesville is named hangs in a place of honor in the Galesville Public Library. Left and right are Gayle Moulton, 16, high school junior who is the daughter of Mr. and Mrs Leonard Moulton, and Gail Flaherty, 4, daughter of Mr.

and Mrs. Hubert Flaherty, both of whom derive their first names from the founder, Judge George Gale. The name has been a favorite in Galesville since the days when the colorful judge cut such a large figure in county and city history. More than 50 years old, the picture, in a hand-carved Circassian walnut frame, hung originally in Gale University, founded by and named after the judge. When the university was closed, the picture was moved into the public library.

(Mrs. L. E. Danuser photo) Galesville Pastor Believed That Valley Was Garden of Eden WHITEHALL, Wis. (Special) Trempealeau County will be 100 years old Sunday.

This is not very old from a scientific. Biblical or historical standpoint. Scientists claim that the earth is between 2 and 5 billion years Mountain on his exploration of the Upper Mississippi on his way west. In 1817 Stephen H. Long and his party camped near Trempealeau Mountain in the course of an expedition up the Mississippi River.

Two years later Major Thomas Forsyth, who accompanied Colonel Henry Leavenworth on an expedition for the purpose of establishing a fort at the mouth of St. Peter's River, wrote in his journal that on Aug. 12 they had camped six miles below Trempealeau Mountain. In May, 1823, the Virginia, said to be the first steamboat to ascend the Mississippi Riv- old, basing their claims on the oldest radioactive rock which they er, passed by Trempealeau Moun- The 1855 census listed its po- corruption of the French phrase pulation of 338 under the name "La Montagne Qui Tremp Dans Montoville. It was not until 1856, jL'eau" which referred to the two years after the creation of that is steeped in wat- gept.

12, 1854, when he received Trempealeau County, that the town I er" or the now familiar Trempea- 2S 0 es Montoville and eight was formally named Trempealeau. leau Mountain. tiers from Buffalo County. Trempealeau was formed from the acreage thus salvaged, and was designated by this name by act of the Wisconsin legislature on Jan. 24, 1854, with Gale's village of Galesville designated as its county seat.

There were only two townships in the at first, Monto- ville and Gale. B. F. Heuston was elected the first county judge, on ischedule involves meeting connections at Minneapolis St. Paul, al-' though 40 per cent of the passen-' gers who boarded the line's planes at St.

Cloud in a six months test period last year were destined for Milwaukee, Chicago or beyond. St. Cloud said its need is one good air line service to Milwaukee, Chicago and points ea.st without the need to make connec-. tions at the Twin Cities. It said that the present connecting service means a delay of at least an hour.

"North Central schedules leave' St. Cloud, if they operate at so frequently late that connections in Gale. First county offices, The Wisconsin Territory was or- As the story goes, the enterpris- name in November of that year, ganized in 1836. At that time what ing Judge Gale noted that where mc i ded Charles Utter, district at Three new members were re- cannot be depended upon) the city ceived into the club with J. 0 said Beadle conducting initiation cere-i Th city proposed either that monies.

New Lions are Walter Johnson sponsored by Donald Haug; Douglas Sacia by Beadle, and Bernard Tandeski by Glen Boullion. is now Trempealeau County was a part of Crawford County. In 1851 La Crosse County, including within its boundaries the territory comprising the present Trempealeau County, was set off from Cravt ford County. On Feb. 11, 1853, Jackson County was set off from La Crosse County, and in July of the same year Buffalo County was set off from Jackson County.

Buffalo County included the hamlet of Galesville. Through the personal efforts of a shrewd and enterprising Galesville man, Judge George Gale, who lobbied in the Wisconsin Legislature, Trempealeau County came La Crosse and Buffalo counties joined, a strip of land might be secured to become a third county. torney; Ira E. Moore, sheriff; In the early days charcoal was George H. Smith, clerk of court; jused for the smelting of iron and Charles Utter, clerk of the board; have discovered.

tain en route to Fort Saellffig. Historically, the first records of man and his life are found in steamboat traffic thus opened, and great river valleys of the Nile, the Tigris and Euphrates, the Trempealeau Mountain and its ad- the Indus, the Ganges, the Yellow and the Yangtze, according to a late world history book. Garden of Eden? The Rev. D. 0.

Van Slyke, early clergyman residing at Galesville believed that the Garden of lay in a valley plain extending from just south of Winona to just north of La Crosse on the eastern side of the Mississippi River, a valley 35 miles long, five miles wide at each end and 10 miles through the center. The pastor's deductions were set fcrth in a 40- page pamphlet printed by the Independent Printing House of Galesville in 1886. If man first lived in Asia and Africa, the American Indians who lived in what is now Trempealeau County and other parts of this country probably crossed over this continent via Bering Strait. The area now included in Trempealeau a probably first seen by a white man, Father Louis Hennepin, who explored the upper Mississippi Valley in 1680. Du Lhut (Duluth), who came into this region via Lake Superior and the Bois Brule-St.

Croix waterway and rescued Hennepin from Sioux Indians, was probably the second. In 1683 Nicholas Perrpt built a fort near the present site of the village of Trempealeau and remained for about 20 years as trader and interpreter for the French. The remains of a French trading post at the foot of Trempealeau Mountain have been accepted by most authorities as Perrot's wintering place, according to a Wisconsin Historical Records Survey published in 1940. It has been claimed that Joseph Rocque was the first trapper and trader to have actually built a cabin in this county. Receives a Name jacent territory soon became widely known to traders, travelers and pioneer settlers.

Indians Cede Lands On their journeys into the North- In 1731, the survey says, the west the early explorers found the French government determined to land which is now Trempealeau County occupied by two branches of the Sioux family of Indians, the Dakotas, or Sioux proper and the Winnebagoes. In 1837 the Dakota and Winnebago Indians ceded to the U. S. government all their lands east of the Mississippi River, boundaries of which had been ori- establish a permanent post among the Sioux and sent an expedition in charge of Rene Godefrey, sieur de Linctot. Linctot built a fort on the Mississippi at a place which was then called "la montagne qui trempe a 1'eau" or "the mountain which is steeped in water." The French derived this name by translating two words which the Indians used to indicate the mountain, Pah-hah-dah, meaning "mountain separated by water," and Hay- nee-ah-chah, meaning "soaking mountain." Linctot's post was abandoned in 1737 because of Indian warfare.

A second post, established in 1750, was abandoned in 1763 as a result of the French and Indian war. French rule in the Upper Mississippi Valley was replaced by English rule by the Treaty of Paris in 1763. Jonathan Carver of the Connecticut Colony undertook to explore the immense territory acquired by the English as the result of this treaty, and in his book, "Travels in North America," wrote of his visit to Trempealeau Mountain in 1766. As a result of the acquisition of land east of the Mississippi River I at the Peace of Paris in 1783, and of land west of the river at the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, and after the War of 1812, a series of U. S.

government expeditions were undertaken to this region. Lieutenant Zebulon Pike, who discovered Pike's Peak in Colorado, observed Trempealeau into being and Galesville became! with which to lobby the required bill through the legislature. "The act was passed on July 6, 1853, one of its provisions being that the newly formed Buffalo County seat be at Sand Prairie, section lot 1, township 19, range 12, which James Pierce had entered at the United States landoffice a few weeks before. With the creation of that coun According to old historical records, i A- Arms trong, registrar; Hollis- the story follows: ter Wri treasurer; George F. "Marvin Pierce, who was some- thing of a politician, lived at Mon- toville.

With him were his two brothers, Wesley and James. John Buehler was a citizen of Holmes Landing. On a visit to his former home in Pierce County, Buehler stopped at Montoville, and interested Pierce in the project of establishing a new county (Buffalo). According to the story told in later life by Buehler, Pierce went to Holmes Landing and secured funds the first county seat. In 1857 the boundaries between Buffalo and Trempealeau counties were defined with relation to the channel and islands of the Trempealeau and Mississippi rivers.

In the same year the boundaries between Trempealeau and La Crosse counties were defined with reference to the channel of the Black River. Trempealeau County is 18 miles wide in the northern part, increasing to 23 miles in width in the lower central portion and then tapering down to five miles in width at its southern extremity. It is 42 miles long, and has an area of 742.77 square miles. The 1950 census gave the population of Trempealeau County as 23,730. Someone 'Lifted' 150-Pound Balls HOUSTON let Somebody stole 29 lead balls weighing 150 pounds each from the Schlum- berger Well Surveying Corp.

here. The balls are used to store radioactive materials. Company officials said they were empty and not radioactive. Police figure someone wanted to sell them as scrap. ty completed, people of Holme Landing believed that their hope of having their town become metropolis were about to be rea lized.

Montoville was left in Crosse County, and could neve hope to rival the settlement of Crosse as a county seat. The sit of Judge Gale's proposed villag was on the extreme eastern edg of the newly created Buffalo Coun ty, and could have no hope of se curing county seat advantages. "It is said that the residents Holmes Landing were indignan wien they heard that the Pierce had located the county seat on neighboring sandbar instead of i the established village, but the felt that only the matter of per suading supervisors to meet in th village instead of in the designate location was at stake. They wer correct in that plan, for the firs recorded meeting of supervisor was held at the home of Henr Goerke, at Lot 6, Section 8, Town STARTS MONDAY! LEAF'S- 'BIG BUNDLE" SPECIAL! SAVE! SAVE! SAVE! CLEANING A ORDER YOU SAVE $1.00 LEAF'S SAVE! SAVE! SAVE! A The First Newspaper Published in Trempealeau County is now framed at the House of Memories at Whitehall. Robert C.

Gauger, editor and publisher of the Whitehall Times, looks over Vol. 1, No. 1 of the Trempealeau Pioneer. The newspaper subscription price was $2 per year or 5 cents per copy. Advertising cost $1 per square of 100 words.

Advertisers were included from Winona. Gauger commented that subscription rates on weekly papers have not risen spectacularly in the last 100 years. Tie Times currently for $2.50 per year, (Mrs. Ruth Rogers photo) CLEANING 50 YOU SAVE $1.50 ORDER Free Pickup and Delivery On All Bundles PHONE 2222 LEAPS, SECOND AND MAIN ST. Turton, surveyor, and William Adams, coroner.

Courthouse Remains The first county courthouse built in Galesville still stands, incorporated in the present Co-op building. The contract was awarded two Montoville men who agreed to build a two-story frame structure 28 by 36 in size, for $1,000. The county made an appropriation of $50 for the purchase of material. This building became the cradle for first classes of Gale's university, for there the students met for classes while the school was being built. Galesville's honor of being the county seat was comparatively short-lived.

As the county devel-1 oped, it was feasible to locate county business more centrally, and afler considerable i among several villages which grew up, it was finally settled in Whitehall in 1882. serious damage to many forests resulted by heavy cutting to produce it. North Central which has requested permission service at St. Cloud to suspend be authorized to provide the new service, or that Northwest Airlines be required. to do so.

St. Cloud said it wants through air services of the type now provided at such cities as Oshkosh, Green Bay, Wausau, Eau Claire, and La Crosse, Wis. "IT'S EASY TO OWN WITH A FIDELITY LOAN" Home Loans FOR CONSTRUCTION, PURCHASE, REPAIRS OR REFINANCING Interest is charged only on the reducing monthly loan balances. We'll gladly give you full details. FIDELITY S1VI OS 102 Exchange Bldg.

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