MICHIGAN

PIONEER AND HISTORICAL SOCIETY.

ANNUAL MEETING, JUNE 7 AND 8, 1893.

The nineteenth annual meeting of the Michigan Pioneer and Historical Society, convened in the senate chamber of the capitol at Lansing, on Wednesday, June 7, at 2 o'clock, p. m.

The president, ex-Governor Alpheus Felch, called the meeting to order and the session was opened with prayer by Rev. Wm. H. Haze and singing of America by the audience.

The following officers were present:

President-ex-Governor Alpheus Felch, of Ann Arbor.

Recording and Corresponding Secretary-Geo. H. Greene, of Lansing. Treasurer-Merritt L. Coleman, of Lansing.

Executive Committee-Judge Albert Miller, Bay City, and Rev. R. C. Crawford, Grand Rapids.

Committee of Historians--Col. M. Shoemaker, Jackson, Hon. Henry H. Holt, Muskegon, and Fred Carlisle, Detroit.

Vice Presidents--Hon. Daniel Striker, Barry; Ralph Watson, Clinton; Rev. Wolcott B. Williams, Eaton; C. B. Stebbins, Ingham; Albert F. Morehouse, Ionia; Hon. Henry H. Holt, Muskegon; Hon. Enoch T. Mugford, Oceana; Alonzo H. Owens, Shiawassee; and J. Wilkie Moore, Wayne.

There were also delegates from county societies as follows:

Allegan, Dr. Osman E. Goodrich; Kent, Thomas D. Gilbert and

Noys L. Avery; Lenawee, Alfred L. Millard and Norman Geddes, Wayne, Francis I. Clark, J. Wilkie Moore, David Parsons, Stephen B. McCracken and Fred Carlisle.

The reading of the minutes of the annual meeting of 1892 was, on motion of Col. M. Shoemaker, dispensed with.

The reports of the recording secretary, the treasurer and the corresponding secretary were then read and on motion each was accepted and adopted.

A quartette, "While the Years are Rolling On," was then sung by the Plymouth church quartet.

Col. Michael Shoemaker, chairman of the committee of historians, submitted his report for the committee, which was also accepted and adopted.

Geo. H. Greene, chairman of the memorial committee, called the roll of counties for a memorial report when the following counties responded through their vice presidents either in person or by letter, viz.: Allegan, by Don C. Henderson; Barry, Daniel Striker; Branch, Harvey Haynes; Calhoun, John F. Hinman; Cass, Geo. T. Shaffer; Clinton, Ralph Watson; Eaton, Rev. Wolcott B. Williams; Genesee, Josiah W. Begole; Hillsdale, William Drake; Ingham, C. B. Stebbins; Ionia, Albert F. Morehouse; Jackson, Josiah B. Frost; Kalamazoo, Henry Bishop; Kent, William N. Cook; Lenawee, S. C. Stacy; Livingston, Albert Tooley; Muskegon, Henry H. Holt; Oceana, Enoch T. Mugford; Ottawa, Rev. A. S. Kedzie; Saginaw, Chas. W. Grant; Shiawassee, Alonzo H. Owens; St. Clair, Mrs. Helen W. Farrand; St. Joseph, Hiram Draper; Wayne, J. Wilkie Moore.

C. T. Mitchell of Hillsdale read a paper on "The Progress in Transportation and Mails in the last Fifty Years."

A solo, "The Last Rose of Summer," was then sung by Miss Osborne.

President O. Clute, of the Agricultural College, then read a well prepared memoir of President Theophilus C. Abbott.

A paper entitled, "A Picture of Memory-Settlement of Oakland County," was then read by John M. Norton of Rochester, after which the chair appointed a committee of three, consisting of Col. M. Shoemaker, M. D. Osbana, and Albert F. Morehouse to nominate officers for 1893-4.

Five minute speeches were then called for and responded to follows:

as

Stephen D. Bingham, Lansing-I want to say a few words in regard to the best man the society ever had, A. D. P. Van Buren. I can say in

behalf of all the old members of this society, that they never had a man who has done more for the Pioneer Society than Mr. Van Buren. His intense interest in this society, and the place he filled, could be filled by no other man who ever belonged to us. I trust that there is some member of this society who will write a sketch of this man, who has placed on record the sketches of so many men of the original pioneers of Michigan. I can say, as we can say of many others, that his place in the society can never again be filled.

Judge Albert Miller, Bay City-I got married in Detroit the 6th of February, 1838, and the verse which I quote serves to give a description of the railroads at that time.

"The rails were of wood, but the coaches were fine,
For there were two seats in each on which to recline.
The horses then hied us with speed and much strength
Over that railroad which was twelve miles in length.

At the end of the railroad then we there found

A stage coach in waiting for Pontiac bound.

But I must confess that at that early day,

A stage coach was nothing but an open sleigh.

But in a day's journey we succeeded so well,

That before night-fall we reached Judge Bagley's hotel."

Judge Andrew Howell, of Detroit, was then called for and responded as follows: I came here to listen and not to make any remarks in regard to pioneer matters. I can say only a few words in regard to Lenawee county where my life has been spent. There in those early days our people settled in a thickly wooded country and heavy forests. They came there young men and young women from New York and New England, and filled up the county of Lenawee. They were young people, not rich, or not the poorest, but in those days when it took three weeks to journey from central New York to Monroe, and three or four days from Monroe back into the wooded portions of Lenawee county, it took a pretty sturdy set of young men and young women to do it. They were all alike, there were no idlers among them; when they got there together they were a moral, industrious set of young men and women. Their children grew up like them, and they were as good a population of people as ever existed in this country or ever will exist. They were all alike then. They were all good and industrious, and so it has been with a large portion of Michigan, but especially

with the southern part.

L. D. Watkins, Manchester-I recollect when the circuit court was organized there was a judge from the eastern part of the State sent

out to organize the court in the county where I then lived. I happened to be on the grand jury, and he gave us a very voluminous charge on various matters that would need our attention, and among the rest, gambling, which was very common in our new counties. One evening I went into the office of a friend of mine and found the judge and half a dozen lawyers, that had congregated from the adjoining counties, and two or three citizens seated around the table playing poker, and my friend dragged me into the game. I did not know anything about it, and he told me to put up a little something, and we played until there was about five dollars in the pool; and the judge took all the good money I had in the world. I think if I would not have implicated myself I should have taught that judge a lesson. Two choruses, one entitled "Fancies" and the other "Sleep, Baby, Sleep," were sung by the pupils from the central school, and the meeting adjourned until 7 o'clock in the evening.

WEDNESDAY EVENING.

The society met pursuant to adjournment and was called to order by the president. Prayer was offered by Rev. C. H. Beale.

A solo "I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say" was sung by L. A. Baker. The president delivered his annual address for which a vote of thanks. was tendered him on motion of S. B. McCracken, followed by music "Softly now the Shadows Fall" sung by the high school ladies trio.

A memoir of Francis R. Stebbins, by Hon. Norman Geddes of Adrian,. was then read by him.

The high school male quartet sang "The Owl and the Pussy Cat" and responded to an encore with "Tinker's Song" from Robin Hood.. A paper entitled "Reminiscences of Oceana County" was then read by Hon. Enoch T. Mugford of Hart.

Five minute speeches were then called for and responded to as follows:

The secretary announced that he had just received a letter from Hon. S. W. Fowler of Manistee, which he would read as a five minute speech from him, as follows:

Manistee, Mich., June 5, 1893. Geo. H. Greene, Esq., Secretary of Michigan Pioneer and Historical Society, Lansing:

DEAR SIR-Allow me to thank you for your kind invitation to attend the coming annual meeting of your society. I hoped to have been.

present but unforseen events may prevent. I am interested in the early history of the state of my adoption. I first landed in Michigan at Detroit fifty-two years since, a boy twelve years old without an acquaintance in the State. Detroit was a small French settlement without a paved street or a sidewalk that I saw. The mud up Jefferson avenue was something fearful and if there were any carriages I failed to find them. The aristocracy of the place made their evening calls, went to mill and to market in small French carts that, to me, looked funny as they went bobbing up and down the streets. The Michigan Central R. R. was being built west. I first arrived at Lansing in 1848 in a stage coach from Jackson, and stopped at the Lansing House, then a wooden building located nearly opposite where the Hotel Downey is now located.

The constitutional convention was then in session, and there were few if any buildings between the capitol and upper and lower Lansing. The trees had just been cut down and a wilderness of stumps met the gaze in every direction.

The Battle Creek road had just been cut out but the logs prevented travel and there was not a house within ten miles in that direction and no possible way to go through except on foot, and as I was bound for Albion College I took to the woods afoot and alone, and after two days of the hardest and worst travel I ever had, I succeeded in reaching Albion. There was no house within ten miles of Albion in that direction, and the musquitoes were thicker, larger and hungrier than the celebrated Jersey musquitoes, and I was evidently the first morsel they had had in a long time, they improved their opportunities; while I, half crazed with pain, became lost and wandered miles out of my

way.

I afterwards took my revenge, in part, by introducing a bill in the senate which became a law, improving the road from Lansing to Charlotte, making it at the time one of the best roads in the State. When I located in Charlotte in 1853 and commenced practicing law, the fourth Michigan Report had just been published, now there are about ninetyfour volumes. Detroit has become one of the finest cities in the northwest, the wilderness around Lansing has been made to blossom like the rose, and Michigan has over 2,000,000 educated and thriving people. The pioneers of the State may well be proud of the progress made, and of the part they took in this advancement.

I would like to send greeting to the members, and hope this will be a very pleasant and profitable meeting.

Yours sincerely,

S. W. Fowler.