Part 18 (1/2)
MINOR HAPPENINGS.
Sept. 5, 1878, President Hayes made a short visit to the state, and delivered an address at the state agricultural fair.
On the 7th of September, 1876, an organized gang of bandits, which had been terrorizing the State of Missouri and surrounding states with impunity, entered this state, and attacked a bank in the town of Northfield, in Rice county, with the intent of looting it. The cas.h.i.+er, Mr. Haywood, resisted, and they shot him dead. The people of the town, hearing of the raid, turned out, and opened fire on the robbers, who fled, with the loss of one killed. In their flight they killed a Swede before they got out of the town. The people of the counties through which their flight led them, turned out, and before any of them pa.s.sed the border of the state, two more of them were killed and three captured. Two escaped. The captured were three brothers named Younger, and those who escaped were supposed to be the notorious James Brothers of Missouri. The three Younger Brothers pleaded guilty to a charge of murder, and on account of a peculiarity in the law, that only allowed the death sentence to be imposed by a jury, they were all sentenced to imprisonment for life. One of them has since died, and the other two remain in prison.
The manner in which this raid was handled by our citizens was of immense value to the state, as it proved a warning to all such desperadoes that Minnesota was a bad field for their operations, and we have had no more trouble from that cla.s.s of offenders.
In 1877 the const.i.tution was amended by providing for biennial, instead of annual, sessions of the legislature.
On May 2, 1878, a very singular and disastrous event took place at Minneapolis. Three large flouring mills were blown up by a dust explosion, and eighteen men killed. It was inexplicable for a time, but it was afterwards discovered that such explosions had occurred before, and prompt measures were taken to prevent a repet.i.tion of the trouble.
On the 15th day of November, 1880, a portion of the large insane asylum at St. Peter was destroyed by fire, and eighteen of the inmates were burned, others dying of injuries received. The pecuniary loss amounted to $150,000.
On the first day of March, 1881, the old capitol burned, while the legislature was in session. That body moved their sittings to the St.
Paul market house, which had just been finished, where they remained until the present capitol building was erected upon the site of the one destroyed.
On the twenty-fifth day of January, 1884, the state prison at Stillwater was partially burned.
On the fourteenth day of September, 1886, St. Cloud and Sauk Rapids were struck by a cyclone. Scores of buildings were destroyed, and about seventy of the inhabitants killed.
In the year 1889 the Australian system of voting at elections was introduced in cities of ten thousand inhabitants and over, and in 1892 the system was made general throughout the state.
On the seventh day of April, 1893, the legislature pa.s.sed an act for the building of a new state capitol in the city of St. Paul, and appointed commissioners to carry out the object. They selected an eligible and conspicuous site between University avenue, Cedar and Wabasha streets, near the head of Wabasha. They adopted for the materials which were to enter into it--granite for the lower and Georgia white marble for the upper stories. The whole cost was not to exceed $2,000,000. The corner stone of the building was laid on the twenty-seventh day of July, 1898, with appropriate and very imposing ceremonies, in the presence of an immense throng of citizens from all parts of the state. Senator Davis delivered the oration, and ex-Gov. Alexander Ramsey laid the corner stone. The building has reached the base of the dome, and will be a very beautiful and serviceable structure.
On Sept. 1, 1894, there was a most extensive and disastrous fire in Pine county. Four hundred square miles of territory were burned over by a forest fire, the towns of Hinckley and Sandstone were totally destroyed, and four hundred people burned. The money loss was estimated at $1,000,000. This disaster was exactly what was needed to awaken the people of the state to the necessity of providing means for the prevention of forest and prairie fires and the preservation of our forests. Shortly after the Hinckley fire a state convention was held at the Commercial Club in St. Paul, to devise legislation to accomplish this desirable end, which resulted in the pa.s.sage of an act, at the session of the legislature in 1895, ent.i.tled, ”An act for the preservation of forests of this state, and for the prevention and suppression of forest and prairie fires.” Under this act the state auditor was made the forest commissioner of the state, with authority to appoint a chief fire warden. The supervisors of towns, mayors of cities and presidents of village councils are made fire wardens of their respective local jurisdictions, and the machinery for the prevention of fires is put in motion that is of immense value to the state. The forest commissioner appointed Gen. C. C. Andrews chief fire warden, one of the best equipped men in the state for the position, and no serious trouble has since occurred in the way of fires.
On the ninth day of February, 1887, the Minnesota Historical Society pa.s.sed a resolution, declaring that the pretenses made by Capt. Willard Glazier to having been the discoverer of the source of the Mississippi river were false, and very little has been heard from him since.
On the tenth day of October, 1887, President Cleveland visited the state, and made a short stay.
This enumeration of pa.s.sing events looks a little like a catalogue of disasters (except the building of the new capitol and the visits of Presidents Hayes and Cleveland), but it must be remembered that Minnesota is such an empire in itself, that such happenings scarcely produce a ripple on the surface of its steady and continuous progress.
It is because these events can be particularized and described that they a.s.sume proportions beyond their real importance, but when compared with the colossal advances made by the state during the period covering them, they dwindle into mere points of educational experience, to be guarded against in the future, while the many blessings showered upon the state, consisting of the health and wealth imparting suns.h.i.+ne, the refres.h.i.+ng and fructifying rains and dews of heaven, which, like the smiles of providence and the life-sustaining air that surrounds us, are too intangible and indefinable for more than thankful recognition. Our tribulations were really blessings in disguise. The bold invasion of the robbers proved our courage; the storms and fires proved our generosity to the distressed, and taught us lessons in the wisdom of prevention.
Minnesota has as much to be thankful for and as little to regret as any state in the West, and our troubles only prove that we have a very robust vitality, difficult to permanently impair.
THE WAR WITH SPAIN.
For many years there has been a growing sentiment in the United States that Spain was governing Cuba and her other West Indian colonies in an oppressive and unjust manner, and the desire to interfere in behalf of the Cuban people received a good deal of encouragement, and its general expression succeeded in creating very strained relations between Spain and the United States. It is a well known fact that the Spanish people, from the north line of Mexico to Cape Horn, as well as the inhabitants of the Spanish Islands, hate the Americans most heartily. Why, I do not know; except that our social, governmental and religious habits, customs and beliefs are radically different from their own; but that such is the case no one doubts who knows these people. In 1897 some effort at conciliation was made, and Spain sent one of her wars.h.i.+ps to New York on a friendly visit; but she did not stay long, and got away as soon as she decently could. The United States sent the battles.h.i.+p Maine to Havana on the same friendly mission, where she was officially conveyed to her anchorage. She had been there but a short time when she was blown up, on Feb. 15, 1898, and 260 American seamen murdered. There was an official investigation to determine the cause of the explosion, but it found no solution of the disaster. Various theories were advanced of internal spontaneous explosion, but no one was misled. The general sentiment of Americans was that the Spanish in Cuba deliberately exploded a submarine torpedo under her, to accomplish the result that followed. Previous to this cowardly act there was much difference of opinion among the people of all sections of the country as to the propriety of declaring war against Spain, but public sentiment was at once unified in favor of war on the announcement of this outrage. On the 25th of April, 1898, congress pa.s.sed an act declaring that war against Spain had existed since the 21st of the same month. A requisition was made on Minnesota for its quota of troops immediately after war was declared, and late in the afternoon of the twenty-eighth day of April the governor issued an order to the adjutant general to a.s.semble the state troops at St. Paul.
The adjutant general, on the 29th, issued the following order, by telegraph, to the different commands:
”The First, Second and Third Regiments of infantry are hereby ordered to report at St. Paul on Friday morning, April 29, 1898, not later than eleven o'clock, with one day's cooked rations in their haversacks.”
The order was promptly obeyed, and all the field, staff and company officers, with their commands, reported before the time appointed, and on the afternoon of that day went into camp at the state fair grounds, which was named Camp Ramsey. Such promptness on the part of the state militia was remarkable, but it will be seen that they had been prepared for the order of the adjutant general before its final issue, who had antic.i.p.ated the declaration of war.
On April 18th he had issued the following order:
”The commanding officers of the infantry companies and artillery batteries composing the national guard will immediately take steps to recruit their commands up to one hundred men each. All recruits above the maximum peace footing of seventy-six men will be carried upon the muster roll as provisional recruits, to be discharged in case their services are not needed for field service.”