1903
Back to Main "Rosa Nettleton Book" Page
January 5, 1903
Capt. O. E. Wilbur Acquires Ownership of the Fox Estate, Bridge street Property
The most important transfer of real estate in Charlevoix for some time occurred yesterday, when Capt. O. E. Wilbur purchased of Mrs. Ella Fox the 165 feet on Bridge street extending from the river to the Sentinel building, including also the thirty feet dock property in the rear of the aforesaid building.
The property may be said to have two frontages-as the rear furnishes the best steam boat docking facilities in Charlevoix harbor. Capt. Wilbur has occupied the property the past eleven years under a lease, which has to run yet fourteen years. His lease also includes the dock front on the Gellick property.
Capt. Wilbur will not tell what price he paid for the property or what his plans are concerning it; but it is more than likely that it will be improved.
____________________________
January 12, 1903
Jos. R. Dixon and family leave next week for Ohio.
____________________________
January 12, 1903
The D. M. Ferry Seed Co., of Detroit recently purchased a site on Pine Lake of Mrs. Sweetland, adjoining the old Eaton factory, and will next spring erect a warehouse for the sorting, cleansing and shipping of seed peas. Mrs. L. D. Coulter will have charge of the plant.
____________________________
January 19, 1903
The U. T. D. Club met with Mr. and Mrs. P. A. Myers at "Cosy Corners" Saturday evening Jan. 17.
Progressive Pedro was the order of the evening, the head prize being won by Mrs. G. W. Priest and Chas. Shepard, and consolation by Mrs. R. B. Armstrong and D. F. Meech. A light luncheon followed the game, after which the guests departed having spent a very enjoyable evening.
____________________________
Born, Monday evening, to Mrs. Frank Sears, a bouncing daughter, and all doing well.
____________________________
February 2, 1903
On Monday evening last, Hose Co. No. 1, Charlevoix Fire Department elected the following officers: Pres., Daniel Durance; chief, A. B. Brink; assistant chief, Frank Lamphear; foreman of company, Daniel Durance; foreman of hose, Will Rice; secretary, C. H. Lamphear, treasurer, A. B. Brink.
____________________________
Supervisor John Ward announces that owing to failing health that he will not be a candidate for supervisor the coming spring. And this affords the Sentinel an opportunity to speak of the public services of Mr. Ward. John Ward came to Charlevoix county in 1869, the year the Sentinel was founded-thirty-four years ago. For 32 of these 34 years he has held office, and has never been defeated. He was supervisor of Marion fifteen years, and has been supervisor of Charlevoix township the past two years. No county of township ever had a more capable or faithful officer than John Ward has been. As a supervisor he has been especially valuable; and it is safe to say that no man knows more about real estate valuations in Charlevoix county, than John Ward - not even the celebrated Michigan Tax Commission.
____________________________
February 9, 1903
The Current Events Club is doing good work at the Thursday afternoon meetings. In the absence of Mrs. O. A. Sears, Mrs. J. L. Crane is acting president.
____________________________
February 9, 1903
The big thaw of Tuesday and Wednesday gives us a foretaste of what Bridge street will be when the robins nest again. The hummocks and holes, the sand-piles and maral beds, are enough to drive a tax-paying citizen to the asylum. It presents to the council a problem that they will soon be compelled to solve, and they may as well begin on the job. Some one advocates paving with brick, which an expert has declared will cost $14,000, but probably crushed stone will be the solution of the problem. There is no question about the quality and lasting features of a crushed stone pavement. It has been tried and proven. The village has the stone, the crusher and the road roller, and the council should at once begin operations looking towards early completion of the work. A crushed stone pavement can be built at less than half the expense of brick and can be kept in repair at much less expense than any other material.
____________________________
February 16, 1903
The Ferry Seed Co. last year shipped 88,000 bushels of peas from their Charlevoix warehouse. Mr. Coulter has already contracted for 5,000 acres of peas, and expects to get 1,000 acres more, besides a good acreage of beans.
____________________________
March 2, 1903
The fish hatchery is in full operation. Monday night, Mr. Platts arrived from Detroit with a consignment of trout eggs, and they were at once placed in the tanks. Mr. Platt will have charge of the plant, and Leslie Giddings has been engaged as night watching. Another consignment of trout eggs is expected soon, and later it is expected whitefish eggs will be put in progress of hatching.
____________________________
March 30, 1903
With this number the Sentinel begins the thirty-fifth year of its life.
Thirty-five years is a good while. It is a long time for a newspaper to be sent out by one publisher continuously. Yet such is the fact. The present publisher began his work here but a few months after he attained his majority; today he is on the shady side of life, but with a fair prospect of rounding out a half century of work with the Sentinel.
It is not out of place here to record a fact: the present editor of the Sentinel has been the longest in service on one paper on any now in the service north of Big Rapids in either peninsula and there is but one other editor north of Grand Rapids who has been so long in continuous editorial work.
The present publisher will not always be here; but the Sentinel will be here a hundred years hence. It has a record of which it is not ashamed.
____________________________
April 20, 1903
Supt. Guard has been busy the past week putting in branch water pipe at every building and lot on Bridge street, where they are not already in. This is a precautionary measure, in view of proposed pavement.
____________________________
April 6, 1903
Manager Crouter has received the material for the construction of a telephone line from Charlevoix to Phelps. A line to Barnard will soon be constructed, both lines taking in the farmers of those sections.
____________________________
Married Wednesday evening at the home of the bride in this village, Mr. Ervan Alcid Ruegsegger, of Boyne City, to Miss Mary Jeanette Lamereaux. Rev. Mr. Ray of Boyne City performed the ceremony. The house was profusely decorated with flowers, roses and carnations predominating. Wesley Ruegsegger, of Maple City, a brother of the groom, was best man, and Edith Lamereaux was bridesmaid. About forty, the friends of the contracting parties were present. Mr. and Mrs. Ruegsegger left that evening for a wedding trip to Grand Rapids. On their return they will be at home in Boyne City. The bride has many friends in Charlevoix, and the groom is also well thought of where he lives.
____________________________
Last Thursday afternoon, after the Sentinel had gone to press, a bolt of lightning struck the old central school building, damaging It to the extent of $800 or $1,000.
The school had just called, and all of the rooms were full. With a terrific crash the bolt struck the belfry, practically demolishing it. The lightning penetrated down to the old high school room, and its operations there strengthens a belief in miracles. At the northeast corner of the room the door into the office room, on the north, was open. This was torn from its hinges and thrown half the length of the room, along the north wall. The plaster and lath for a third of the width of the room was torn clean from the brick wall. A little girl sat on a front seat near this door which passed her not three feet away. The lightning passed along the entire length of the north wall, behind the teacher's desk, and broke out the transom over the door into the recitation room. It then apparently returned and spent itself through the cold air shaft that leads to the furnace from behind the teacher's desk. Prof. Ross, luckily, was sitting at one end of his desk, instead of behind it, or the story might have been differently told.
Of course there was a panic in the room, but it was only of brief duration. The pupils ran dazed about the room, throughout which plaster and lath were scattered. One little girl had reached the windowsill with the evident intention of jumping out when she was seized. About every other window in the room was broken.
Order was soon restored and the pupils from all the rooms soon passed out to the yard. A fire alarm had been sent in, and a hose cart was on the ground in five minutes from the time of the crash. But, strange to say, there was no ignition, although in the attic splinters from the wrecked belfry covered the unfloored lath and plaster. And more marvelous still was the fact that no one was injured.
____________________________
April 13, 1903
Lake Shore Drive
Charlevoix will have a Lake Shore Boulevard. Surveyor Nettleton this morning began a survey for a beach road from the water works to the south-west point, and beyond.
The scheme is being promoted by owners of property out at and near the point and it is expected that the village and township will aid in the enterprise.
It is proposed to made a wide and hard driveway just back from the beach far enough to be clear of the surf. There are thousands of tons of crushed limestone near the point which will be utilized.
____________________________
Charlevoix has a new firm and a new manufacturing industry. Frank Chaloupka, W. F. Bowen and L.S. See have formed a co-partnership under the name and style of the Charlevoix Fish Bait Co., to put on the market and preserve minnow fish bait. They have a solution that preserves the little fish for an indefinite period, in all their pristine beauty and palatability.
____________________________
April 20, 1903
Hon. R. W. Paddock has bought the property known as the Parmalee lot on Dixon Avenue and will erect a residence thereon this summer. Mr. J. T. Kirkpatrick is making the plans.
____________________________
Following is a list of the officers and crew of the Charlevoix Life Saving Station: Captain Frank Fountain, Nels Palmer, William S. Kibbe, Phil. Beaudineau, Edward Mason, Nels W. Olson, Delbert M. Clark, J. Peabody.
____________________________
A most enjoyable time was spent last Friday evening at the home of Mrs. Charles Carey in honor of her father's 73 birthday, it being a complete surprise to the old gentleman. There were present six of his own children, four daughters and two sons, also a good number of his old Canadian friends, which made it much more pleasant for him, for it brought back old scenes and faces that time is so apt to obliterate. After a jolly social time, Silas Alcock, presented Grandpa with a suit of clothes from his children. He was also the recipient of several other gifts from his old friends.
____________________________
April 27, 1903
The engineers' estimates of the cost of paving Bridge street is about $16,000. The street will be paved with brick and we are permitted to say that the work will be done by July 1st.
____________________________
Married Wednesday, April 29th, at the home of the bride, by Rev. A. F. Nagler, Mr. Morris Ackert to Miss Eva Marshall. Mr. and Mrs. Ackert will make their home here, but Morris will have charge of A. Mason's store at Phelps this summer.
____________________________
May 18, 1903
The telephone line put in by Father Zugelder at Beaver Island, is in splendid working order. George Emrey of Charlevoix, put in the line.
____________________________
The Sugar Factory construction force, about 80 strong, will appear in the Memorial Day procession under the command of superintendent Hartzig.
____________________________
May 18, 1903
An interesting and spirited ladies bowling contest occurred at the Merrifield alleys last evening. Mrs. Emmet Coulter headed No. 1 team, consisting of Mrs. Florence Johnson, Mrs. Mollie Smith, Mrs. John McCabe and Miss Carrie Geiken.
Team No. 2 was led by Mrs. Leslie Giddings and her bowlers were Mrs. L. E. Smith, Mrs. F. P. Geiken, Mrs. B. J. Gellick and Mrs. Wm. Taylor.
No. 1 team ran the score of 980 against 888 for No. 2 team.
____________________________
June 15, 1903
Eighty sugar beet laborers from Nebraska arrived on the Illinois early Monday morning and were at once sent to the beet fields in this vicinity.
____________________________
June 18, 1903
Quite a number of Charlevoix pioneers went to Northport yesterday on the steamer Silver Spray, to attend the Old Settlers' Meeting. The party included E. H. Green, A. Buttars, O. E. Wilbur, M. J. Stockman, Chas. R. Bellinger, Amon J. Beers of Advance, and H. O. Rose, of Petoskey, joined the party, the latter located in Northport in 1854, and resided there for more than thirty years. Another old settler who went along, was W. F. Gill of Harbor Springs. Mr. Gill was raised in Northport.
____________________________
July 27, 1903
Hon. R. W. Paddock received a letter from Hon. Wm. Alden Smith, today that he would be present and address the Farmers' Friendly Association at the Annual Picnic at Norwood, August 27th. This makes Geo. Van Pelt, the father of the Association, happy, and will be a great feature of the gathering.
____________________________
August 17, 1903
Rural Free Delivery Route No. 1, will begin service September 16th. This route goes into Banks township, Antrim Co. as far as the Boss school house, returning via the Wm. Withers road.
____________________________
A carload of machinery for the sugar beet factory is arriving every day, and about 65 men are at work crowding the big plant toward completion. Supt. Hartzig said this morning that the best sheds will be completed and ready to receive beets by Saturday of next week.
____________________________
September 7, 1903
Contractor Lee Howland with a force of ten men, began the work of putting in the curb and gutter for the Bridge street paving Monday morning, and is making good headway. The work was begun on Antrim street end. Civil Engineer W. F. Stratton of Kalamazoo as inspector is in charge for the village. He is also will be in charge of the paving proper for the village. Supt. Guard of the public water works, has a force of men engaged in constructing an auxiliary surface sewer system at the intersection on Mason street. Which will convey surface water to Round Lake.
____________________________
About the toughest looking street in Michigan is Bridge street, Charlevoix. It is a horrible spectacle - mud, ruts, and gulches. But the work has been commenced that will in six weeks transform it into one of the best streets in Michigan.
____________________________
The "big black devil" automobile of which we spoke recently has invaded the country roads south of here, and some of the farmers swear vengeance against the thing. It recently drove Alfred Van Dusen and his team with his family in the wagon, out into a cornfield and another prominent farmer in that vicinity was compelled to drive his team into the woods to avoid a smash-up or a run-away. The chief trouble is with the pig-headed idiot who runs the machine. He acts as though he thought the road was built for him alone; he never checks when he sees a team approaching, and is altogether an ass. Some of the farmers have suggested smashing the outfit, which we heartily approve. Automobiles have come to stay. Properly and decently handled they are all right, but when swell heads from Chicago or anywhere else come here and attempt to drive farmers from the roads which they built and maintain there will be trouble for the autos.
____________________________
September 14, 1903
Lou A. Comfort joined his wife here for a short visit this week. Mr. Comfort has been engaged in lighthouse work in Chicago lately on the same pier that Col. D. C. Wickham is doing work on life saving station buildings.
____________________________
E. R. Harris has fully 1,800 bushels of peaches on his Ellsworth farm, ten miles from Charlevoix. Yes, sir, Charlevoix is in the "peach belt" of Michigan. It is also embraced in several other "belts" of no less importance. It is the sugar belt, the potato belt, the apple belt, the health belt, and the Republican belt. It could name several other belts that come within its scope, but these all take the red ribbon.
____________________________
October 5, 1903
Never in the history of Charlevoix were local conditions at the high pitch that exists now. Sugar factory construction will keep a large force of men busy until well into the winter and following that will come the active operations of the big plant, which will considerably augment the force. Add to this is the paving work now under way. The Warren Co. will have at least 75 men at work on Bridge street this week, and the butter contract of Lee Howland employs at least fifteen more. The new bank building keeps about twenty men busy on Clinton street. A good sized gang is sewering about town, as well as on the resorts, carpenters and stone masons have work ahead well into the winter.
____________________________
October 12, 1903
PERPETUAL MOTION - Is what is being inaugurated up at the Charlevoix Sugar factory. Excepting the two hours in the four, required to make the shifts, work will proceed at the sugar factory night and day, and Sundays, until sugar begins to pour into the barrels in early winter. The force now consists of about 80 men, a large percentage of whom are skilled workmen, steamfitters, plumbers, machinists and blacksmiths. They are distributed on four floors, and the ponderous appliances by the aid of which sugar will be extracted from the beet, are being place. Carloads of tanks, odd looking castings, wheels and boxes arrive every day and are switched to the factory sidings.
Already there have been wonders done within the gray walls. On the ground floor pumps and engines rest on their concrete foundations, and steam pipes, big and little, meander about through space. Great, mysterious looking iron receptacles are perched midway between floor and ceiling on concrete bearings, and looking up through the openings may be seen on each of the four floors, tanks to wonder how they were ever raised. But Ben Hartsig knows, however. Outside, at the south end of the main building, the creek is being dammed. From this dam a concrete flume will convey the water to a large cistern flanking the south-east corner of the factory, from which the water supply will be pumped. An 8 inch pipe will go to Pine Lake, however, as a reserve expedient. Mr. Stacks has a large force grading, track laying and sewering. In fact everything goes along together. In the office, spread out upon tables, are hundreds of blue prints, and draughtsmen are making more of them as details arise to vex or puzzle the mechanics. Mr. A. Thomas, the chief engineer and chemist of the plant is on the ground directing the placing of the intricate maze of machinery, and which under his direction will open its first "campaign."
An electric lighting plant is being installed but, temporarily, the plant has been wired, and the city wires connected.
____________________________
October 21, 1903
An Island Outing - Three September days (when it don't rain) on Beaver Island three days with a hammerless breech loader, out in the old Mormon fields and through the well-trodden cattle paths along the beach and through the woods, are three days of rest for the weary laborer, and the writer of this had them last week.
On the way over, sitting on the deck of the steamer Beaver, we met an old acquaintance, who for twelve years has come up from Illinois to spend his vacation on Beaver Island. For twelve summers he has botanized along the woodside, geoligized in the fields and fraternalized with the hospitable people.
"The Sentinel has been singing the praises of Beaver Island for thirty-five years," we remarked.
"Yes," he replied, "and I am sorry for it."
"Why?"
"Because you have been an iconoclast. You have helped to destroy the good old Beaver Island, with its lingering memories and old ways; its bits of primitive nature teaching and its freedom from the taint of modern conventionalism. You have helped to drive out the old and bring in the new."
"But this must be, as a matter of business," we ventured.
"Yes, but I do not come here for business; I come to escape it," was the frank reply of our friend.
Well, he was right, but he was sensible to acknowledge that these changes must come. And the next morning we were thrown up against an object lesson. With Captain Bonner we rode out two miles along the right-of-way of the new railroad being built thru the heart of the island by the Beaver Island Lumber Co., and along which much of the iron is already laid. If you were not expecting a vision, what would you think if you were riding out of St. James, where King Strang once held sway, to come suddenly upon a locomotive on a side track with "Pere Marquette" painted in big letters on the cab? Yet this is the vision that arose before us as we came around a curve in the road, and it was a reality. And then we thought of what our Illinois friend had said the day before. It was truly the beginning of a transformation from the old to the new order of things. Out through the old Mormon clearings winds the "Iron sinews of commerce" along past the beautiful evergreens glades into which the rabbit jumps as you pass; on to the western beach and then with a lunge into the interior again and on again toward the "King's Highway" which King Strang built more than fifty years ago. We pass the construction gang, and they are tamping dirt under the ties just for the world, as they do on the main land. We hear the ring of the spike maul, and the clank of the rails as they are carried to the "front." And all this on Beaver Island.
Is it any wonder that the lover of nature should wail as the Jews wail at the walls of Jerusalem?
Next summer, when our friend comes up from Illinois with his microscope and his geologist's manner he will hear the clang of the locomotive bell and the screech of the whistle at the crossings. He will see log trains come in from the shores of Lake Genessaret and cedar ties from the forest about Mt. Pisgah.
____________________________
October 26, 1903
Fred Cartier is around this morning bragging about a boy that arrived at his home Tuesday.
____________________________
The office of the Charlevoix Sugar Co. was removed Tuesday from the Bartholomew Block to the factory. Mr. B. Saltonstall, a stockholder, has been engaged as bookkeeper for the company.
____________________________
The pay roll at the sugar factory is $3,000 per week. Adding to this the large force of men employed on paving, cement walk work, sewering, resort cottages, bank block, government work, skilled workmen and laborers in Charlevoix are being paid fully $6,000 per week. And this total amount will only be a commencement to what will be disbursed here when the beet crop begins to come in.
____________________________
November 2, 1903
A Bit of Local History
Just 46 years ago last Monday, M. J. Stockman and wife and Seth F. Mason and wife, landed at the mouth of Pine River in the small schooner Sonora, with all their household effects. Stockman and Mason had been here a month before and built a log house just under the bluff where the Charlevoix Lumber Co.'s saw mill now stands. The log house was still standing there when the Sentinel was established in 1869.
On their arrival in the schooner they were compelled to anchor outside and transfer their goods up the river with a small boat. The two families occupied the same log house that winter, when, later, Mr. Stockman built a log house for himself near the present Belvedere Hotel grounds, and Mr. Mason erected himself a home of the same sort under the bluff near where the old water works building now stands.
When Stockman and Mason landed at the mouth of Pine River, the only other white families here were those of Medad Thompson and John S. Dixon.
____________________________
November 9, 1903
Miss Edith Mason, of the U. S. hospital corps, left San Francisco Saturday for the Philippines, on the transport Sheridan, which will call at Honolulu and Guam on the way.
____________________________
Mrs. Kubin, wife of Supt. Kubin of the sugar factory, accompanied by her two sons arrived here from Italy yesterday, and the family are settled down already in the Blanchard house on Main street. Mrs. Kubin speaks no English.
____________________________
December 14, 1903
The Wagochance light keeper and his two assistants arrived here Monday evening, after having closed the station, and their arrival on the mainland was only after a very strenuous effort.
The tug Geiken had the contract to take off the keepers, and went there Monday for that purpose. Keeper Olsen and his three men were compelled to use the sailboat in tow of the tug, owing to the fact that the tug had no passenger license. The tug and two started out in a very heavy sea, and the three men signaled to be taken aboard the tug, which was successfully accomplished. Just off this port the sailboat was brought alongside the tug and Owen Gallagher was put back aboard to steady her in entering the piers. After squaring away for the river the boat capsized. Gallagher managed to hang on but all the personal effects of the two assistants were lost. Keeper Olsen had thoughtfully thrown his effects aboard the tug.
____________________________
December 21, 1903
The Booth Packing Co. Remove Their Petoskey Branch to Charlevoix
An important change in business circles occurred this week in the removal of the Booth Packing Co.'s Northern Michigan office from Petoskey to Charlevoix. This great Chicago firm of fish dealers have for the past twelve years conducted their extensive Northern Michigan business at Petoskey, under the management of Oluf Nordrum. At that place they have had a large freezing plant and the concern has, at that point and this, handled annually 3,000,000 pounds of fish. The business of the Petoskey office has amounted to $3,000 a month, every month in the year.
Now everything is to be consolidated at Charlevoix. The company's office is already temporarily established in the rear of R. A. Emrey's store, with Miss M. L. Balchelder as clerk and stenographer. The freezers at Petoskey will necessarily be filled and operated this winter. These freezers, before their recent damage by fire had a capacity of 500,000 pounds. Next year they will be removed here and increased to a capacity of 1,000,000 pounds.
The company already owns 76 x 300 feet between the railroad and Pine Lake just north of the station. A site will probably be secured on Round Lake, or at a more convenient point on Pine Lake for the freezers, and a permanent office established in town.
Mr. Nordrum, who is well known among Northern Michigan fishermen will remove here soon. Mr. Nordrum has many friends here who will welcome him.
This change means very much for Charlevoix. It makes Charlevoix the largest fish shipping point on the great lakes.
____________________________
December 21, 1903
Baxter Post, G. A. R., elected officers for 1904 as follows, viz: Harrison Berdan, Comdr.; Geo. O. Scott, S. V. C.; D. C. Nettleton, J. V. C.; E. H. Green, Adj.; S. W. Solter, Quartermaster; W. H. Collins, O. Day; Jacob Steed, Surgeon; John Miller, Chaplain; Leonard Whitmoyer, O. Guard; G. W. Cook, Sgt. Maj.; H. C. Plum, Delegate; A. C. Newman, Sentinel; A. E. Newberry, Alternate; E. B. Hodge, Installing Officer.
____________________________
Capt. Wm. Finucan arrive Saturday from Chicago, after having laid up the Illinois and will be ready for the S. S. S. meetings until it is time to fit out the new steamer Missouri in the spring.
____________________________