St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1895-01-25
miscellany
A~RoCKYMOUNTAIN CHARACTER.


In last Tune there died in Midvale,
on the eastern edge OF the Rocky
mountains, in northern Montana, a
man who had been a hermit there tor
90 years. His name was Monroe,
and at the time Of his death he was
1OS a old. He had a curious his
r and three years beore his death
he had the pleasure ofseelng a railroad
for the first time. The engineers who
were engaged in its construction en-
loved his conversation hugely. 1t
was as if a man had come back from
the last century and had stumbled
upon improvements such as had never
been dreamed OF.
Monroe had long, white hair, and
a long, white beard. He was tooth
less, and as he walked about he al
WAYS carried a crooked stick. When
a boy of 10 he left Nova Scotia to go
out into British Columbia with the
agents of the Hudson Bay company.
He was to engage in the fur trade.
The company he was with had reach
ed the Selkirk mountain region, and
one day in the winter Monroe was
lost in a fierce storm, and nevercould
find his way back. He was picking
up traps that had been set for game.
Monroe wandered about for weeks
and finally travelled across the Dor
der into United States territory. Be-
fore that time he fell in with the Cree
Indians and was practically adopted
into their tribe. He married one OF
the squaws and then moved down to
where Midvale is at present and lived
there the life of a trapper, ignorant
OF what was going on in the world,
and practically ignorant OF where ne
was. Game was plenty and life was
easy for him. He mingled more or less
with the Indians in all that country,
learned their language and soon for
got part of his native tongue. lie
always kept his old flint lock musket
that he brought out from Nova SEQ
tia and used it up to the very last
weeks of his life. He raised a family,
and his progeny are numerous in up
per Montana.
When the engineers came to lay out
the railroad through Midvale, it is a
question which was more surprised,
Monre or the engineering party, at
the course of events. The old man
was somewhat shy, but soon came
to spend his entire time with the rail
road men. He examined all the in
struments, asked all sorts o fquestions
about the world, to which he had
been dead for years, and as the scope
of modern inventions was unfolded
to him, all he would say was:
almighty God is powerful"
A hundred times a day the old man
would use this expression. During
the evenings he would entertain the
railroad men with his experiences
among the Indians, and many was
the horrible tale of their crueltieSt that
he would relate. He had only one
eye, and he explained that he had lost
this in a fight in which his son vas
killed. He had one honor, and it will
always remain his. He named St.
Mary's lake in northern Montana, a
beautiful sheet Of water which sports
men frequent much.
Monroe was more curious about
electricity than any other Of the new
forces that came to his observation.
He could only comprehend it partially
as something that was borrowed
from the lightning, and when his in
tellect became dazed he would simply
exclaim:
Almighty God is powerful"
Monroe exclaimed naturally that
locomotives were iron horses, and
said that it would take many hun
dreds of horses to do the work of one
Of them. For a long time he would
not place his hands on any part of
their machinery, but by degrees he
got used to them, and wanted to
know how they were made, and ex-
actly what was the function of each
part OF the machinery.
At last Monroe got used to them,
and he would frequently spend days
in riding in the cabs of the construc.
ton engines that were on duty in that
section. The day before Monroe died
he drove a team of bronchos Is miles,
and when his funeral was held all the
railroad men who could get away
attended it. They said he was a low
able old man, and their association
with him was a revelation of what
questions would be asked if one of
those who lived In the last century
should return to life and begin to en-
quire as to the cause of the great
transformations that the present cen