Promoting Center Valley, Mn

Back in June 2012, we did a post on Theo Billmeyer, the main promoter of a place called Center Valley.  Evidently, Theo had some big ideas about the marvelous-ness of this little valley 7 miles east of Pierz, Mn.
As we found more and more articles in the Pierz Journal reporting on Theo Billmeyer's efforts, we realized that they were poking fun at him.  Here they were in Pierz, a well established town, and there was Center Valley, where nothing was happening at all.  A store, a creamery and a Soo line spur, nothing more.  

But then, I think postmaster Theo was also the Center Valley reporter to the PJ, and he often poked fun at himself....good for him!

Theo Billmeyer of Center Valley

Ever since we started investigating south eastern Morrison county, the name Theo Billmeyer always shows up promoting Center Valley, a little place originally named Zerf, that never became the town he hoped for. 
 Theo was appointed postmaster there in 1910 and tirelessly promoted the place for the rest of his life.  Theo Sr's page on Find a Grave is just dates, but his son Theodore's obit gives us some info:


"....[The younger] Mr. Billmeyer was born March 2, 1892 in Granite Township, son of the late Theodore Sr. and Mary Billmeyer. He married Anna Huver May 5, 1925 in St. Joseph's Church in Pierz. He and his wife farmed in Granite Township, east of Pierz, most of their lives..."


Here are a few clippings from early Pierz Journal issues mentioning Theodore Sr. I think he wrote the Center Valley news for the PJ, too, cuz he was the most interested.  Still, no matter what he did, Center Valley never grew much beyond a creamery, store and Soo line freight stop.  


I'll ad more articles here as we find them, ok?

Oh YAY! More Center Valley info:

Whenever someone leaves a comment on any post on the blog, Larry and I get an email about it.  
Today, a woman who lives near Center Valley left TWO comments on THIS POST about the trip Sue and I took a couple summers ago to find the old store site.  I love that the info isn't being lost--it's here, online, thanks to people like her.

THANKS CHARLOTTE! ☺

The hill south of Center Valley

I had a chat with Eddie Hiemenz yesterday, and he told me about how he and his buddies would ride their bikes to Jake Kinzer's store in Center Valley.  (Eddie was born in 1927, so this memory is probably from about 1940 or so).  He said Jake promised the boys a free ice cream cone if they could start by the store and ride all the way to the top of the south hill without stopping.
OMG.
I asked if any of them ever made it, and Eddie said he didn't think so, but Mr Kinzer eventually gave them cones anyway.  It probably made Jake tired just watching them try...lol

THANKS for the story, Eddie.  
....Oh, and Happy 83rd Birthday ☺

YAY! Some new OLD info

Today, I had coffee with a couple who found info about Center Valley here on HH.  Gene and Jeanne Marshik have a double connection, since Gene's father was the buttermaker in CV, and Jeanne was a Mueller (her dad was John P.'s son Roman).
Between them, we have a few more people identified in old photos and Gene mentioned a few more facts about Center Valley--YAY!!
Gene remembers the creamery and other buildings there...he said the store that John Hesch & Ket (Mueller) Hesch ran for a while was eventually moved "up by the highway", or the road going east out of Pierz (now 153rd St /County Rd 39), which was widened and  tarred by then. He said it's still standing, minus the false front.
 Gene said the inside of the Center Valley store had the counter running along the left wall, and a staircase going to the second floor along the back wall.  Was the upstairs living quarters, or storage?

I asked what other buildings he remembered there, and he said there was an ice house behind the Creamery, and a storage shed as well as a garage.  He said the Soo line had a spur in Center Valley, but never a depot.

Jeanne knew "kids" in Buckman, and was able to identify these kids cuz SHE's one of them:

Joanne Suess, Pat Schmolke, Carol Schmolke, Doris Brandl, James Suess, Tom Schmolke.  The small kids in the front are Jeanne Mueller and Francis Schmolke.

Hooray! Thanks, Jeanne!!

And, Jeanne said the middle woman in this pic is Agnes Braun.

A day like today is so much FUN.  

THANK YOU, Gene and Jeanne!!

Oh, BTW, I've changed some info on a post from July 29th, 2009 cuz of new info from the Marshiks.

Center Valley, Minnesota

Julie brought this photo because she had no idea what it was doing in her family photos.  (Julie is John & Ket (Mueller) Hesch's grandaughter.  Her father, Johnny Boy, died when Julie was 11, so she didn't get to hear much about family history).

This is the store in Center Valley, and I just happened to find this blurb in the Pierz Journal December 30, 1909:
"Theo Billmeier informs us that the petition to the Soo RR Co for a station to be located six miles east of Pierz at a place formerly called Zerf has been granted, and will be called Center Valley".

So, the store and creamery there were built because of the station, or the station was granted because Center Valley was a new-born town?
(Click the link to read more about it). 
See what I mean about COOL connections yesterday? ☺

Center Valley in 1940

Remember the little place that Sue and I went to find last summer?  It was a potential village seven miles east of Pierz called Center Valley.  Her great grandparents, John and Ket (Mueller) Hesch, operated a store there around 1920.  We found only the foundations of a creamery and store, plus a few other odd buildings...in a pasture.  With an electric fence. 

WELL.  If you read the last post, you saw that Larry the wonder-researcher found a Minnesota DNR site with pictures taken from the air as early as 1940.  Yes, Center Valley was pictured, altho someone drew on the photo with a grease pencil, and circled the buildings in Center Valley.  But still.

 
Larry took the current aerial photo and faded it to the 1940 map--WAY COOL, huh??

(No, we didn't draw on the aerial map...someone did that in 1940).

Center Valley, Minnesota--1920's and yesterday!

I finally MET Sue yesterday--she's as nice as a Hesch gets ☺. She drove up from the cities and we went to see Buckman/Pierz/cemeteries/farms/houses/buildings/Aunt Jeanette. All that and MORE!

Keep an eye on this gas pump in the following pictures. Someone had captioned it "The lonely gas pump", so it must have been installed first, before the buildings.

If you recall, Sue's descended from Grandpa Anton's brother John.
This is part of his obituary from 1926..."the Centre Valley store"...

Sue remembered going to see what was left of it when she was a kid, so we went to find it again, yesterday. It was SO MUCH FUN!! We felt like archaeologists, because her mom had pics which Aunt Jeanette positively identified as the Centre (Center) Valley store.

See the false front on top? It's in the next picture, too....

See where the gas pump is in this pic? It's still shiny and new, and they're building the store.

The picture doesn't really show how much of a valley it is, but the road dips substantially there. The store used to be just beyond the triangle sign ahead to Sue's right...

I expected a bit of grown-over rubble along the road, but no! We found the foundations of at least four buildings there, in someones' pasture...look:

(I know the composite is bad, but this is sorta what it looks like. 'Course there's more, but I couldn't get it all in).

Oh, man...THIS had to be the front of the creamery's foundation! Looked like there were footings behind it, too, but not solid concrete like this part.

That four strand wire fence might have been electric, so we didn't try going closer.

This had to be the stores' foundation. Aunt Jeanette grew up within a few miles of Center Valley, so she remembered it well. Coming down the hill from the south, you crossed the Soo Line tracks, and in a bit there was the creamery, an ice house, and the store, before the creek at the bottom. Without walking back there, we couldn't tell what the other buildings might have been, but a shed or garage makes sense, too.

( See the gas pump on the left? The store had to be just beyond it).

That sturdy foundation would have been the loading dock--you'd drive alongside it and muscle milk cans inside thru that lower opening in the middle, and get empties back thru it too.
This little diagram is speculation, but probably close to what was there:
So, what happened? How come it's no longer there, even as empty relics of buildings? Our amazing MASTER REASEARCHER LARRY found this report from the Winona newspaper in May, 1955.

Was the store operating then? Center Valley was still a long way (7 miles) from Pierz in '55, but without a creamery out there, you'd have to take the milk into town now. Maybe the store was damaged by the fire...or maybe it wasn't open any longer anyway...we don't know. But with Larry on the case, we STILL might find out more!

YAY SUE and YAY LARRY!!