Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1885-05-22
BY Gone DAYS.

Tho Brainerd Journal Of last week
contains the following. mostso which.
will be corroborated by our old set
tiers: 3Z
Talk about hard times and business
epression. = remarked an old settler Of
Little Fal,s.vho came upto Brainerd the
ether day, '.why the people 4of Brainerd
don't know ANYTHING about business de
preston Just think Of what our town was
IN '63 and ,ee4. Before tie war we had a
dam acrnss fhc Mississippi river, and We
had mills and 4 bridge and the biggest
kind Of speculation III real estate man
would 20 out into the. woods and take a
claim, and sell out ia i few days for sever
alhundre,. dollars Instances Of that kind
were numerous it Houses went up like
mushrooms, and maps are still in, exist
ence showing Little Falls 10 be the com
mon centre Of an interninable number Of
projected railroada. People who owned
real estate anywhere near town were aris-
tocrats. AT that time, Little Falls was lar
ger than ST. Cloud, Il The dam was frail
affair, however, and Il WAS washed away
bv high water. Then q heavy wind blew
the bridge down and wrecked It. The
wafer power company ahand oned their
enterprise. and the achineryint the mills
was moved awav. When times we're flush
the town WIS full of frontiersunen, gam
hIers and outlaws, and orknnized battles
were actually fought and people killtd;in
contests between the desperadaes and law
abiding citizens. At that time DIR. i. o.:
Simmons who still livesthere,had large
store carrying general merchandise. One
Monday morning when he went to open
his store there wasn't 4 cents worth of
goods in it. The outlaws he'd made an
organized raid and got out Of town with
the entire stock betweet, Saturday night
| and Monday morning. The recovery of
the goods was impossible. Many secret
murder took place, where law abiding
citizens were more than suspicious, but
dared not investigate. We had q newspa.
Yer, too and it had No lack Of sensations.
Butthe dam the mills,the bridg ethe out
laws, the real estate sneculators and the
neuspaper,d Disappeared. Then the oat'
break Of the Sioux Indians took place in
1s62.and the question as to whether the
Chippewas would, join in the outbreak
hung in the balance in the Chippewa
counsals. For short time it looked as If
| there would be an immediate outbreak of
all the Chippewa tribes. Settlers in Nor.
,isor county assembled with their fami-
lies at Little Falls MS speedily as possible,
and were collected at the court house,
around which a stockade was hastilyput
up. Pockets were stationed at the out
skirts of town, and everything placed on
a war footing. The Chippewas finally con
/ cluded not to Join the outbreak and Little
Falls was safe The Indian scare fright
ened a good many settlers ont of the
country and many Little Fails property
| owners left with the determination never
toreturn ,consoling themselves for the loss
| ofall they@were weEthswith the happy
reflection that they and their families had
not lost their. lives while running the
| gauntlet Of robbers, murderers and blood
| thirsty Indians. Who'll rows Of houses
were tenentless, and If anybody wanted
to occupy a house :.hat was empty he
| simply moved intnit and had no rent to
pay. Hon. N. Richardson bought 16x24
story and a half house for 100 head Of
! cabbages. He moved it onto his premises
| and still uses it for barn Jim Brown,
now in the livery business there occupied
alarge $500 house for fifteen years
without knowing who owned ,t,snd final
| ly bid it in at tax sale. But notwith-
standing the acknowledgements of former
years, Little Falls is now a flnurishing
town of 1900 inhabitants = The old
timers have waited long and are glad"
| A full stock of gents and boys white
and colored shirts just received at -