Chapter 1
-- Compiled by the Cumberland Women's Club
and Published by the Cumberland Advocate
1874-1974
(used by permission of the Cumberland Advocate)
Donated by Linda Mott
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Background and Early History
By Ruth Walton
Many nationalities have contributed to the cultural heritage of the Cumberland area. The Chippewa-Ojibwa or Anishinable (the Indian tribal name meaning Wood-people) inhabited these lands before the European immigration began.
In 1874 there was a small rush for homesteads in northern Wisconsin. Gunder O. Dahlby, Stevens Point, Wis., became interested. Mr. Dahlby, his wife Ellen, and son, Edwin, had emigrated from Norway in 1872, settling first at Stevens Point, where he worked in a sawmill for about a year.
There is little known about Dahlby's early life except that his parents died while he was young and he had to earn his own living at an early age. Some of his brothers also came to American but they were never located.
Dahlby, along with others, took a chance on homesteading the land sight unseen. He selected a tract of a little over 80 acres on an island in Beaver Dam Lake, Barron County, the present city of Cumberland.
In later years Dahlby explained his reason for choosing his homestead. He said he drew a straight line from Hudson to Ashland, which was the objective point of the then proposed North Wisconsin Railway, guessing that the railroad would someday cross the island. He came north and after locating the tract with some difficulty, he built a small log cabin, 18 x 18 feet, on his claim. The cabin was located about 300 feet north of the present grade school.
That same fall just prior to Dahlby's visit to the island, O.A. Ritan and R.H. Clothier came to the same area with the intention of homesteading. They found the island in the middle of Beaver Dam Lake, or, as the Chippewa Indians called it, Che-wa-cum-ma-towangok, meaning "The Lake of the Beavers."
After looking over the land the two men changed their minds and started to return to their homes in Hersey. On their return trip they met surveyors from the North Wisconsin Railway. The surveyors told them the railroad would probably run through or near the land they planned to homestead.
Later, after everything was frozen solid so he could cross creeks and sloughs, Dahlby returned with his family. They travelled to New Richmond by railroad and by team and wagon the rest of the way. He met O.A. Ritan at Downs Camp near Turtle Lake. Ritan decided to return to the Cumberland area with the Dahlbys. They arrived on the island, December 10, 1874, the Dahlby family sharing their cabin with the Ritan family. A month later the R.H. Clothier family arrived and also made their temporary home with the Dahlbys.
The cabin also served as a workshop. During the day the men rolled in huge white pine blocks and in the evening the split them with frows into shingle size and later dressed them with draw knives. They prepared other building materials as well so that they could build as soon as weather permitted in the spring.
O.A. Ritan filed a claim on land just south of the island and built his home there in the spring. Clothier constructed a house on land adjoining Ritan. Dahlby constructed a new log house on the hill overlooking the narrows between the east and north lake on Hunter Hill. It was a large, one story, two room structure of Knapp Stout architecture with Indian teepee style plumbing. It was in this house that Mrs. Dahlby's niece was married to Hans Howe.
There were no roads and the men had to follow blazed trails to either Rice Lake or Clayton for their supplies in the summer.
Dahlby worked in logging camps during logging season and tried to farm his homestead but was not successful in his farming venture. He did own a yoke of oxen and when the railroad construction again got underway in 1877 at Clayton he hauled supplies to the various construction camps, doing station works as a sideline.
The Dahlbys had one son, Andrew, born at Cumberland. He died in infancy.
Dahlby became a naturalized citizen at Barron in 1879. In 1880 he sold his homestead to the Mansfield Lang Lumber Company, the railroad having crossed his property. He moved to Chandler, now known as Spooner, where he opened a small store and was made postmaster.
In April 1875 G.C. Hodgkins came to the island. He had left his home in Trempealeau County, a few miles from Whitehall, in search of a new homestead. He came upon railroad engineers near Comstock who told him of the homesteads on the island.
He came to the island and built a temporary home. While he was building it two men came through from the north. They, also, were in search of land and liked the site Mr. Hodgkins was building on. They left immediately for St. Croix Falls by a southerly route to file claim on the land. Hodgkins learned of their intentions, quit work, cut a tree, made a log raft and pulled across the lake near the north Cumberland bridge. He followed Indian trails north until he came to an old state road crossing Sand Creek, went to St. Croix Falls and filed his claim, beating the men by two hours.
He then returned to his home near Whitehall to get his family, loaded his household goods into two wagons, and returned to the island. Three miles north of Barron one wagon mired completely down in the mud. Both teams were hooked to the other wagon to pull it the rest of the way.
Their last campsite was on the island at the outlet of Beaver Dam Lake into Hay River. The next day, June 1, 1875, they started their journey at 8:00 A.M. and finally arrived at their homestead at 2:00 P.M.. The journey through the brush, the necessity to cut down trees, and the removal of the logs had taken them six hours.
On their arrival the family had to remain indoors for a week because of rain. Later they returned for the second wagon near Barron and pulled it out of the mud.
The Hodgkin homestead consisted of 46 acres west of Second Ave. and north of Veterans St.. It included what is now known as Eagle Point. The Hodgkin home was built about 100 feet northeast of the old water tank.
Mae Jenet Hodgkins, the first white child born on the Island, was born September 10, 1876.
The only other white men on the lakes at the time of Hodgkins arrival on the Island was an Indian trader named Sam Jewell who lived on a site above Kidney Lake. Jewell had a 28 foot log canoe on Kidney Lake and he cut a channel between Kidney and Beaver Dam to get his canoe through to the whites on the Island. Kidney Lake was eleven inches higher than Beaver Dam at that time and Sand Lake was seventeen inches lower than Kidney Lake.
In November 1875 another family consisting of A.J. Cooke, his wife, their son, George, daughter and son-in-law, John Hopkins, and their two children arrived on the island. They spent their first winter, 1875-1876, in a tent. The tent had a tight wooden floor and was fairly comfortable. It was made of a material known as "factory" and was somewhat lighter than canvas. The material was stretched tightly across a framework of poles.
Another daughter, Mrs. Dora Brinkly, her husband and two sons, Robert and George, came to Cumberland five years later.
Speaking of these early settlers it has been said that during the first four years they experienced many hardships but they had always proved themselves to be brave men and true women. With the hope of a bright future before them it was comparatively easy for them to make the best of their present circumstances and struggle on as best they could. Fish and game were abundant.
What seemed harder to bear than anything was having to wait so long for letters and papers. They would be sent from one logging camp to another until they finally reached their destination. Sometimes the envelopes would be nearly worn out, the letters so defaced and dirty that it would take all the members of the family to decipher them. It was always a happy day when the mail arrived from family and friends.
A postoffice was established April 26, 1876 in Section 10, three miles east of the Island with L.L. Gunderson as postmaster. It was called Lakeland. In July 1878, Gunderson moved to the Island, bringing the postoffice with him.
At the request of John Humbird, President of the North Wisconsin Railway, the name was changed to Cumberland in honor or his hometown, Cumberland, Maryland, in 1879. Cumberland, Maryland was named for the Duke of Cumberland, the victor of the Battle of Culloden of Scotch-English history.
The railroad did not come through the area as soon as was expected. Litigation over land halted the construction temporarily and it was not until December 1878 that the first railroad stake was driven in what is now the city of Cumberland.
The first train of cars caused quite an exciting time. People turned out in full force to see and welcome it. A young man named Roberts, who was working with the engineers, sent a request to John Humbird, asking that a special whistle might be blown when the train reached the Island. The request was granted. The whistle blew and the people cheered.
It is recorded that a special train with Governor William E. Smith came into Cumberland January 1, 1879, and it is assumed this was the same train.
With the railroad came progress. David Ingle opened the first grocery store on the Island in August 1878. Previous to this provisions had been hauled from Rice Lake, Barron, or Clayton.
The settlement grew rapidly and on February 21, 1879, the land owned by the North Wisconsin Railroad was platted into lots for a village. North Cumberland was platted November 10, 1879. The surveyor was G.G. Hodgkins.
Upon petition of Thomas P. Stone, J.H. Smith, A.D. Fuller, and O.A. Ritan and C.A. Lamoureux, Cumberland was incorporated as a village November 28, 1881.
In an 1881 election J.F. Fuller was elected village president. Other elected officials were: D.W. Johnson, clerk; G.C. Hodgkins, justice; P.H. Varley, marshall; L.W. Austin, constable; and L.L. Gunderson, representative to the County board. The trustees were L.Q. Alcott, O.A. Ritan, J.H. Smith, Peter Hocom, Alex McDonald and W.B. Chamberlin.
In the Spring of 1885, Cumberland was incorporated as a city with three wards. By this time there were a number of businesses including several grocery stores, a drug store, furniture store, a photographer, boot and shoe shop, harness shop, dry goods store, restaurant, flour and feed mill, jeweler, milliner, and a vocal and instrumental instructor.
The first city officers elected were L.B. Royce, mayor; T. M. Purtell, city clerk; E.V. Benjamin; treasurer; A.F. Wright, assessor; S.W. Alderson and R.H. Clothier, justices of peace; and Mead and Wright, city attorneys.
Aldermen of the first ward were Supervisor J.H. Smith, James Griswold and T.A. Johnson. Second ward aldermen were Supervisor J.F. Miller, S.H. Waterman and M.D. Richards. Third ward aldermen were Supervisor Thomas H. Oakes and A.J. Cooke.
On April 2, 1891 the legislature passed an amendment which gave the city a practically new charter and at the time a fourth ward was created.
A complete sawmill was erected in North Cumberland in 1880. Is was destroyed by fire in 1884 but was rebuilt. At the height of the logging industry there were 24 saloons within the city limits.
While logging was the major
industry in the beginning, the city fathers were looking and planning ahead
a city that would remain after the logging industry was gone. A fire department
was established in 1885. Telephones and a water system came in 1895. Electric
street lights were installed in 1897.
to The
First Indians of What is Now Cumberland
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