Counties of Wisconsin; 34; Buffalo County

The first permanent settlement in today's county of Wisconsin was known as Holmes landing today. It's the site of Fountain City in 1848 a 12 mile bluff was settled. Now it's known as Elma. The county for this program is Buffalo and the conversations you'll hear were recorded in the courthouse and Ickes at LMA. Three University of Wisconsin Extension staff members. A dairy farmer and a foreach leader gathered to talk about extension programs and their county. First the description and general history. I march rumbled. I'm talking with Margaret Keyes our popular comedy only time as Lauren will. Young dairy farmer in Buffalo a comedy and just do. Geographically located in relation to the rest of the state were in west central

Wisconsin about 70 miles south of St. Paul Minnesota and about 50 miles north of Lacrosse Wisconsin. So. Located on the Mississippi River we have about 55 miles of shoreline Isle the Mississippi River in or adjacent to our boundary to the west and a good deal of the influence we do have in this county comes from Minnesota because we sort of jut out into that state. It is just the comedy is quite interesting and I think MARGARET He's our only economist who has done some research on this in the county and will make your program would have some really good comments to make relation to this. Still and was quite a few years ago. Quite an area for trapping and for hunting and so forth. The first people to settle here were the trappers who came. Most of them were associated with the French they came they trapped the country and so their furs to the post and sometimes trade with the Indians.

After the trappers came there were other settlers that came the first ones who came who was a minister who came to work with the Sioux Indians and his idea was to convert the Sioux to his theory of religion. It didn't work out so well and he moved. He originally started over what's now a known area and after he had problems with the Indians he moved across what is now called Fountain City. Shortly after that about a year later there were 12 Mina came up the Mississippi. One of them was Thomas Holmes. He and the first settled in the Fountain City area and gave the names of the homes landing. They originally were heading further north but because winter was coming be stopped at City and did stay there and make their home there. Shortly after that time quite a few other settlers came in at that time the cordwood business was becoming a big thing and so many of the people who were wood choppers and Plant City became well-known for

that. It even became one of the regular stops for steamships when they were coming up the Mississippi after that area known as now as was settled at that time was 12 miles off because it was 12 miles north of Fountain City. And although it isn't exactly 12 miles now I think at that time they were figuring by the river and found City original settlement was just slightly north of where the mean found City settlement is now 12 miles last block was mainly settled by the Swiss where I found City was mainly summoned by the Germans. As far as the name of Buffalo Carly's boozer and I really haven't had any real good documentation as to. This law this is called this. There was a gentleman who lives here and I would tell me one time that it was quite a story and by the way told me that there were some

people that person about to look on me are in this area. They brought some buffalo and tried to masticate him and. There was a ranch south of the. Village of Cochran and bubble economy that was known as a buffalo ranch where they race tried to domesticate these animals and they indicated they were. Quite difficult to to live with people were extremely fearful of them because they were. There was this because quite a while B style whether this is fact or fiction I don't know but it sounds good. Now maybe Marvel's got a different version of how this happened. No I think what I heard when I read a similar to this that they named it for the Buffalo that what I heard though was that the Buffalo Range here originally although this differs with different books that you were reading in the different people you're talking to. The main river that goes through the county now called the before sometimes the buffalo

was named Buffalo by the original people coming here and I think from that river they get the name of the county also they named the river because as I said before the buffalo ranging here when the French team through they called it riveted beef and in French I think that means river of Buffalo. And so therefore you got the name of the river also. So nowadays we know it is the B. Sometimes it's called the Buffalo. I'm not sure which when it's written down in the plat books and so forth but it. Is documented as the Buffalo River. Another version there of personal history Adam and Lars concerned that name. I was told to me one time to ride I think by someone who probably had bridges crossing that someone tried to. Drive a vertical beef cattle across this river and as a result it was in the spring of the year and it was high water and a number of animals drowned and as a

result they called it the be a river and so when you get back to Buffalo County history is real difficult to go back under twenty five hundred fifty years and glean all the facts it's too bad that summer isn't on the line. 60 70 years ago without a real good history about the economy there is one book written by a real good history factually of this commie had been made and that we could say it's a documented piece of evidence as to this is exactly true but maybe it's better this way too we have all the folklore. And all the wild stories that we are able to get but he said around talk to the older people especially many stories to tell about our economy. Getting away from this portion of the history I'd like to have Lauren Young dairy farmer here in the county. We go back to Lynn Reed our decisions. Activist.

Far more to a farm organization in the county is also a Tory leader and I think he's typical of very typical of the farmers that we have in the county. In many counties I think in the state we have problems at that age farmers have. Been going up but average age is quite old but I noticed in the 20 some years I've been here especially the last 10 or 15 years a number of young farmers have started farming and it's a real joy to me and I think it's good for the county the fact that we do have this transfer of land going into the hands of the people of the county. And they are making a success of farming in this country. The county is very difficult many ways to farm because it's not a grey sheeted area and it's covered with a series of hills and ridges and deep valleys with extremely

steep. Slopes so that a roast is a tremendous problem so anything anybody as far as farming is concerned one of the first considerations they have to give us what to list do as far as the land is concerned and conservation and I think Lauren who has a farm in this county has purchased the farm from his father. Give us some really good insight as to his thoughts and how they go about farming which is a typical farm. Thank you Archie I think it's quite interesting that we have the name of Buffalo County because Buffalo are now being somewhat domesticated and they're actually being raised for beef animals. There is a farm or ranch and just on the borderline of topicality that does raise Buffalo today. So we do still see it in our area pertaining to our farm. I have been farming 10 years and after came back from service I started farming in partnership with my dad and eventually purchased a personal property and real

estate. And Archie did mention that there are quite a few young farmers in the colony and this is very true especially in the area where I'm farming there are. A lot of young farmers in fact an average age last year was 36 years of age of the farmers in our valley which I think is quite young in comparison to average in the state. Our farm consists of about 700 acres of 350 acres of work land and Archie did mention that our for our county is good which means it's made up of valleys and ridges and our farm is that way. We have about 100 fields our own contour strips conservation is a very important practice we must follow. FARZAD tillage practices we have gone away from the board plough to using the chisel plow which to help prevent a row should we have a fairly large dairy herd consisting of 95 cows and I might add that there are quite a number of outstanding herds their herds in Buffalo County

in comparison to other counties in the state I think we rate quite high. I have mostly registered postings and we do merchandise some cattle do show some cattle but we basically raise mostly consist of about 20 acres of hay and 150 acres of corn and this is quite to what the average farm Buffel colony we really are in a green farming area where more or less roughly farming County and so we have a lot of lifestyle. Actually that's true Lauren and originally back in history a little bit. But look how you originally was producing county and I should like you belong and this is the stuff we've wheat production the fact is there's some warehouses still located here now and when they're been converted to other business places that were actually weak warehouses where the boats would come up and load we done to them and we shipped out. Now it's gone practically to nothing I would guess that maybe.

Less than three four hundred acres of winter wheat is being raised maybe to 300 acres this spring wheat in the county. A little cross-section of the whole county would get four hundred fifty four thousand acres we have in the county about 300 70000 still created in farms that actually it's farmland it's owned by farmers. The rest is road streets villages and government owned land. There's 55000 of acres of marshes and swamps in the county but 5000 acres of lakes and streams and about 200 acres of tillable crop and out of this 400 54000 that are really used for every cultural production and I have that. Like Lauren mentioned close to or better a third of it is kept in the hay and pasture. It's a closed to have around 50 60000 acres of corn each year and 23000 acres of spa grains and then there's mother. So I beat this 5000 acres and a

few other canning or vegetable crops specialty craft growing in northern part of our county logging and resting. We're an important part of the county's history logging became quite an industry in this county early mainly because of all the timber land around here plus the beefs Louis area made a good period to transport the logs down the river. The logging started around 1850 1855 the first lawyer for Samuel was me in this county because of this area being very close to the Chippewa River. Both areas were very big logging periods because of the closeness of the two. There was a lot of rivalry between the two areas. The logging in Buffalo County got started as I said around 1850 fifties and it started prospering shortly after that time when I started building quite large mills once the logging that started north in Suffolk County

in the Chippewa area and they started paying a good tribute for the logs coming down the river. The first ones to get their course got them fast money and so that started a lot of competition between Chippewa Millman and the whole county or the beef river Neeleman. And about that time the Chippewa River Millman decided that they would have to do something about Buffalo county's Millman getting their logs down the river and so forth so they secured special logging privileges for their area so that no one else could interfere with their trade. And at that same time they came through an injunction against the Buffalo County Millman so that the buckle County Millman couldn't get their logs down the river. The Buffel County wanted to put in specialists docks and so forth so that they could referee logs easier and the millman got a thing passed so that they could not do this and came down built a dam across all of the log and you know the buffalo County log could not keep their logs down the river.

Well this started quite an area quite a conflict between the two and it almost became a war between the two theories of Millman between the two logging people. But finally the public county logon got the damned thing out the chipper woman had need to get their meat into a special highway area so that it could be changed so that they could get their logs down river. But there was a lot of conflict between the two. I'm sure there's a lot of stories around between the conflicts of the admin about the Lockman coming to town into Elma. There were quite a few riffs I believe around in the taverns when the logon didn't get their money and so forth. He had quite a colorful history. Yes and this again is too bad it can't be documented all this information that we hear about this. Actually the settlement where this rafting company was located is north of the present city of ours and there is a state a stark society

is in the process of erecting a commemorative sign out there are a stark sign marker. So that there's information in that. Remember Jesus just given us here some of this will be on that historical marker so that people coming through and I was 35 they'll notice the sorrow and they'll have an opportunity to indeed to see where this all this activity took place it's hard to believe that this was such an important area as really was but it was a good spot with a lot of companies to congregate there logs and rafting together and ship downstream. Along with talking about the Mississippi River I failed to mention earlier that because real important that is that we have two locks and dams on the river that are operated by the U.S. Corps of Engineers. There's a number of these along Mississippi River from St. Paul to. Southern and I don't

know down far St. Louis or Prothero but there are some dams. Up in this area here the locks and dams are quite close together and we have two of them created in this 55 mile stretch that is. In Buffalo economy and this is quite a sight for Specter tours to see in the summertime. Or even in early spring in late fall the start about mid March with the first barge is coming up with coal and other materials shipped grain south the last two or three years there's been a tremendous amount of shipment on the river going to stop as well as going north and some of these toll have 8 10 12 16 barges on them and. The skill of these pilots in handling these tow boats is it's really quite a sight to see and in most cases they have parking facilities and also scenic spots where are

spectators positions where people can watch these boats go through the locks and see the actual procedure. I read one of the most interesting things that I found since living around here is that every spring as soon as the ice breaks how the tugs are racing to see who can get up to visit St. Paul so you can get up there first and it's a big stretch of water they have to break through is Lake Pepin which is a 50 mile. River type Lake located north of us here. Normally the ice will stay in there for a long time after the ice is left the regular portion of the channel. And they have to have powerful boats it's really a sight to see them go up through there breaking through 20 inches of ice with these big big barges and a Taurus but you're just around the middle of it or gorge in the March at the first with get up through.

As this I think of the foreign shipment of green because many of the big ruins on the river the last few years because the gradient coming out of the West is coming into the Twin Cities and loaded onto barges and shipped down to New Orleans and there is still a down to ocean going vessels for foreign shipment and this has been a real. Vital link in the transportation Midwest year without the river. I just but I'm a bit of a bit of time is that they are moving barges are large and they would be a whole lot of green and cold from the south as being shipped up through two of the power plants that are located along the river so the river is a real vital link in our operation here in this county 4-H leader Gene Stewart's and for each agent.

Dick walk. Join the conversation. Jean has been with one of the county's foreach clubs and Dick Walker asked her about some of their programs for a pioneer foreach over the period of I guess about the last four five years has pretty consistently been picking up speed for each award in the areas of first of safety and also in health and conservation. Jean I wonder since you provided a lot of the leadership in the safety area I wonder if we could start talking about some of the safety activities that. Are your club initiated took part in and that led to some of the awards. One of the things that we did we petitioned governor Lucy representative early and highway department to put in some no passing. Don't mind in the on the prairie of where our foreach club is located is located between Nelson and Rand. Within a month we had the highway department out there marking our wrote some of the other things that we have done there are making posters which have

been put on display in the business places and Brandon Maxfield another thing that we have done here is every year we expect all of the children to give health and safety talks. We've taken part in the bicycle safety program that the county has had some of our members have served on county committees. Through all of the areas there are stressed in the county. We also have received the National Safety Council award this past year which was a plaque. What one of the things that I'd like to go back and pick up on a little bit is you petition governor Lucy regarding someone say If I were conditions I think it might be kind of interesting to find out what sorts of NCI we conditions and what specific sorts of actions happen. Well the action that happened is that we had the no passing marks me on the highway and we also had the new triangular

signs put up the one place that we had asked for is still unsafe. But when the highway men were then there my husband happened to go with them and they didn't show up enough on the meter to merit the yellow lights it must have been too short a mine. But this this is a program of because of. Some problems are your problems in the community that you're clobbered in a fight and decided to take action on. Yes it actually happens to be right by our house and we've seen many cars go in the ditch trying to avoid hitting another car because it was enough of a know what you think Perri would straight but it isn't there really are enough of no wolves there that when a car would go to pass they would not see the cars coming from the other direction. In fact there had been an accident here a very serious accident and a couple of boys on a moving scooter and they were quite highly injured in that was a result because he could not see the car coming up which

really is a swale in the road. I know one of these was kind of interested me because it's been your while working with a local business is the amount of work that you've done in the Philly area of safety working with WRVA Radio. Maybe you could tell us a little bit about the safety campaigns if you organized in conjunction with the radio station. All of the children made up. Little announcements that they could say identifying themselves in giving little spot announcements that the station carried a number of times they did this they did the tape and redid the tape different times of the day. They the one year they stressed Highway Safety in particular of cars driving with their parking lights on rather than their headlights. This has been a concern of all of the children and the leaders there. Another thing that they did one other year was they had four or five different areas you could be

farm safety it was Highway Safety morning and things like that that they did in each of the children did these just a few minutes and then they would use them and spot announcements on the station a number of times during the day and during the whole year. Is this last year and you also receive state recognition for help in conservation activities. What specific sorts of things for example for club conservation conservation they too were concerned is Lauren stated about the conservation of the land our prairie was originally a real prairie where the sand was blowing where the buffalo used to roam. Also there was buffalo grass and there was a vast amount of windy roads and on the Prairie. During my lifetime the trees were planted and they are now taking up. Making a big

use of conservation as far as windy Roshan is concerned. Our club has been planting trees and shrubs of course the shrubs for the birds and the wild animals. Another thing is they have viewed the making of the dams for the wild reproach and even though our we do live on a prairie we have hills on both sides and have to be concerned of course again about the conveyors conservation of our land. What specific sorts of health activities are you participated in. That too has been health posters and health talks and they have taken part in Gary decent making the health posters and of course health is related to all of the activities whether it be in recreation that our commune Our club has been active in or whether it be safety to many of the things that are regarded to health are also regarded in safety.

He did not like to spend just a few minutes talking to Lauren wall for a little bit earlier. One of the things which I think has been kind of interesting is the golden Hornets 4-H Club has taken on a couple of what I think are real good bicentennial projects. I personally can't claim a lot of credit for the ideas came from there and the energy and everything else but. Or And have you kind of bring us up to be mean this is nine hundred seventy six to 200 bison tenor of the country. Our club decided we should try to find some projects that we could do during 176 that would tie in with this. We decided to do two different bicentennial projects. One would be the members are expected to give a demonstration or talk each year each for each year and this year each of the members are to give a historical talk and a demonstration of something that might been of history in their own family background. An example would be one

of the members had an old telephone hand turn telephone he brought it and explained that another one had an old steel an old family owned steel that they made liquor moonshine and he brought that to the club meeting and explained how it is done in fact in this case the parents came along and really explained it and this is what we've been doing each each month now. We've got 40 members in a club so we've got about three different talks each month on old things of history. The other bicentennial project is in our club area there originally were five one room grade schools that are now. Just bought all the torn doll in fact to see the buildings we can't even tell there ever had been there. We have gone back into the Arcadia school districts which Cajun cotton found City gone through their history in the files of the old schools and dug out the history of the schools and we were writing up a history of each of the five schools in June and July we will

be having them edited in our lead and also the current found city required each week of the various schools. We also have a harmonious society fraternal organization that had been active back at the turn of the century and a building had been sitting there for about 30 years. Empty the Rod and Gun Club bought this in 1050 and have now turned it into a park and a dance hall and we have also got some gotten some of the history of the harmonious society and have are rewriting this and trying to preserve it for the community. This program one of the series the counties of Wisconsin was produced a W H service of the University of Wisconsin Extension.