Paint, Poles, Religion, Soap and Calves ☺

 I always figured that the lead in lead-based paint was a secret ingredient.  I thought no one acknowledged it was there on your furniture, walls and toys until clever scientists in the 1970's figured it out. Looks like lead was a selling point and a promise, tho.

The Dutch Boy was a familiar trademark that we all associated with this kid, remember? ►

That Minnesota was the center of utility pole supply makes sense when you think of all the logs that were floated down streams and rivers in Minnesota.  Not every tree was big enough to be used for lumber, but that wouldn't have kept them upright in the woods.  Just think: "..15,000,000 poles holding up the wires of the Bell System" in 1924 (probably replacing the fence posts that farmer co-ops used).

(I tried googling the current pole numbers, but couldn't find any statistics.  I assume there are other sources these days, too).

And this, from the diocese of St Cloud and beyond, useful words like interdiction, promulgated and ascertaining, to make the message clearer.

 That Papal Interdiction.
Bishop Marty, speaking of the Papal interdiction against the order of the Knights of Pythias, Odd Fellows and Sons of Temperance, said that the decree had been promulgated throughout the St Cloud diocese on Sunday.  Asked as to what the conditions were upon which those already members of these orders would be allowed the rites of the church he said that it would depend upon the extent of their association with these secret societies.  It was recognized that many carried insurance in these societies.  It was not intended to deprive them of the benefits of this insurance, and the request for a consultation with the bishop or pastor was for the purpose of ascertaining whether they could not continue their membership in a purely formal manner--St Cloud Times
Although Little Falls is in the St Cloud diocese, the decree was not promulgated in the local Catholic churches.  It is likely the decree will be read next Sunday.

 You'd think that selling something called Santa Claus Soap would automatically produce images of sleighs and a jolly chubby elf. The images in this ad send such mixed messages. I suppose there were bad ad agencies back then, too.

This clipping makes me laugh every time I see it.  "Antoine" Hesch would be my great grand uncle, Paul's brother, and the son of (immigrant) John Hesch from the second clipping. John waited 3 months to post an ad, but Anton fed that calf for a whole year before he advertised.  I wonder if this was a legality--that you had to make a 'sincere' effort to find the actual owner before you could sell the animal or make sausage of it. I suspect so.

Some 1907- 1914 News

Today's post needs little explanation, being an odd collection of news like we've done before, but you know I'll chat you up anyway, right?  

  
I'd just found the P.H.Hartmann obit the night before Shari and I went to Oakland Cemetery in Little Falls (Mn), so I thought I'd look for his grave and get a photo.  Yes, I posted the obit on his Find a Grave page, just for equilibrium on the internet ☺. 



START DRIVING EARLY had a far different meaning once, but by 1911 it was already a play on words.  It worked on me ☺, reading the article 100 years later.  

What a neat view of the logging industry--the spring thaw was early that year, so the down-river mills fired up in early April.  The info would have been pertinent to just about 
everyone who lived in Morrison Co. because of all the tributary streams that fed the Mississippi.  Once the ice went out, logs followed. Between 20 and 25 MILLION feet of logs at the landing in Little Falls?!  Whew.

BTW, I mentioned this to a client who recalled pulling submerged pine logs out of the river in the 1970s, and using the wood.  Wait, didn't they have to be dried out first?  He said no, they came out of 60 years under water pretty much like they'd gone in--not at all water logged or rotted.  How cool to learn that!

                                                           

 John Naber, mom's uncle John, must have had problem when he drove the Studebaker home...




We explored Secret Societies in June 2010 (they were fashionable in Morrison Co too).  Below are a couple of articles about the Red Men in Little Falls, one that's just embarrassing  and one about how they became "Improved".  Yes, these were grown men (President Roosevelt among 'em).

The Reformatory in St Cloud has been "over-populated" for years, it seems.  Yeah, it was a different place in 1911.

A fire, a birthday, a town and a runaway

 From the Buckman News column, December 1910:
"The swamp fire is still burning south of our church.  The men gave up trying to put it out because they can't do so."  
What swamp?  Isn't the ball field south of the church?

 "A birthday party was given at the home of Mr and Mrs August B. Dehler in honor of their daughter Evelyn, it being her 5th birthday.  Those present were Erlinda and Loretta Janson, Rose Marion Seifert, from Little Falls.  Eleanor Davis, Lawrence Hortsch, Hildegard Dehler, Gertrude Schmolke.  The afternoon was spent in playing school and other games after which a bounteous supper was served.  Evelyn received many pretty little presents and her friends wished her many happy returns of the day."

Those few readers who've been following the New Pierz-Grainville-Genola saga might still scratch their heads over this clipping from 1915.

The tiny town we know as Genola, just south of Pierz, was still a big deal cuz it had the train depot, with merchants right across the street, including saloons.  If you intended to go somewhere, or arrived home from somewhere else, why go into Pierz to have a drink?  Flaudy Litke or the Kelzenbergs were right there...util a new state law came into effect whereby incorporating a town meant it had to be dry, liquor-wise.  This was a problem for our ancestors, let me tell ya.  The locals had just voted to drop the un-official "New Pierz" moniker and change it to Grainville, and that meant incorporating. DRY.  We know how this came out because it's not called Grainville anymore.

Now this clipping is especially interesting (and mystifying) to descendants of Michael Sand, whose own son Charlie had "left home as soon as he could". Evidently Mike replaced Charlie as choreboy on the farm with his grand-nephew, Mike Grittner.  It's incredible the article ever made the paper, knowing Mike Sand's standing in the Buckman community.  But then, see the next clipping below--a "V Grittner" had just returned home the year before.  Was it a rite of passage for Grittner boys?    LATER:  I know you're wondering if there are any other Grittners in our relationship--and there ARE!  Well, one, anyway:  Julia Grittner married mom's uncle, Gerhard Naber, about 1910. ☺

Gerhard Naber & Julia Grittner wedding.

December, 1916...or, Proof that Math was paid by the column-inch

CLICK to enlarge...




Well, great-uncle Math was getting his reporter sea-legs, it looks like. ( He claimed to have started reporting for the papers  9 years earlier in 1907). I was just re-reading the page on the right, where he makes maximum use of one incident,  an attack of appendicitis.
"Mrs Joe Wondro returned from Anoka Saturday, where she had an operation for appendicitis".
Then, farther down:
"Joe Otremba returned from Anoka Friday.  He was there with his daughter, Hattie, who had an operation for appendicitis"
and just in case you missed some part of the story--
"Mrs Joe Otremba returned from Anoka Friday, where she had been on a visit".
LOL!

(And in other news, it's pretty cool the Fishermen in Buckman even had a president, don't you think? ☺)

Buckman News in the Little Falls Herald, 1916

It was probably 2 years ago, on one of my first visits to the Weyerhauser Museum in Little Falls, that I really got into old   newspapers.  Of course I was looking for Buckman News, and yes, Great uncle Math was the reporter, tho he hadn't fully developed his distinctive style yet...lol  

Once I got home, I started highlighting mentions of family, but now, looking at these pages, there are plenty of other interesting people mentioned too.  The really cool part of these columns is the peripheral information in them, like who was employed in St Cloud, and who owned a car, and who advertised (like Dr Fortier, upper left: it tells what school he graduated from in Canada, and his office hours, PLUS his home address--wow!)  And look--Math owned the Excelsior motorcycle already in 1916, since he took it to St Cloud, see?
The pages are worth biggifying and reading edge to edge, just cuz.


I'm sorry I wrote on the legal notices ►, but you can still read em, I think.  I was experimenting with reducing the size so I could copy more on one sheet, but it may be too small.  If it is, try right clicking  and tick "save image as..."  Then, it'll be in your Pictures folder, and you can open it with a photo editing program, like Paint.
THAT might do it ☺.

I have about 15 pages copied here, mostly from the end of 1916.  They're such a small sample of these fascinating bits of our history--and Anon says that the newspapers are off limits now at the museum so they don't deteriorate more...but will still be around to digitize someday.  Sigh!