Orange County observer. [volume] (Hillsborough, N.C.) 1880-1918, 1904-07-21
HEN Y #as fifteen years
old my two sisters, Doris
and Edith, took a home
stead on Big Fish Lake, in

NN y anu EuIlH, tOOk uOue-
\ ~ stead on Big Fish Lake, in
1CN the north woods of Mime
sofa. We went up there, not to farm,
but to raise ginseng. Doris had been
employed in a wholesale drug house,
and so had learned the possibilities of
ginseng culture.
The ginseng root grows wild on the
hardwood lands of Minnesota. Doris
believed that we could start ''planta-.
tom from these wild roots, which
were worth Sc pound!
We lived in pine log house, and our
nearest neighbors-two bachelor
WOodsmen-were two miles away
across an arm OF the lake. Our visi-
BILE resources were provisions enough
for few months, yoke of old oxen,
one cow and wagon and plow.
On the whole we had good times.
Fish and game and berries were abund-
ant, and we rigged a sailboat from a
four-oared skiff which had been left
at an abandoned sawmill. Doris and
Edith, like many Minnesota girls, were
good lake sailors.
We spent much time in open seasons
hunting for ginseng plants AS we
each carried a tin bucket and a butch
er knife with a long blade, we were
able to take up roots with plenty of
earth and to transplant them success
fully.
1--WE had rival "sang diggers" in our
woods, too. The Pillager Indians,
whose reservation line was but a few
miles away, were energetic hunters of
the root. There was one band of sew
eral men and women that we used to
meet frequently. The women would
scowl and mutter angrily when they
saw the green leaves of the 'tsang"
root in our pals.
One day in our second season Doris
and Edith met four Of these souaws,
who boldly attacked them, took away
their ginseng roots and beat them with
switches. This was too much for me,
and despite Nora's entreaties, 1 got my
gum and went after the Indians. I
knew where their camp was, and
went first after the Crosby boys-our
bachelor neighbors.
When they heard my story they also
took their guns. Then we rowed across
the lake and made those Pillagers
pack their wagons We drove them
six miles over logging road, to the
line of their reservation, where we
bade them never again to set foot on
our lake shore.
When 1 got home late at night Doris
and Edith were both crying, in fear
that something dreadful had happened
to me. Doris admitted that the In
dams should have been punished.
But" she said, 1--WE shall have more
trouble with them, they're so vindic
tive''
In September one of our oxen-the
latest disappeared under circum
stances which made it certain the ami
NAL had been stolen. We were sure
that Hawks band" as our Pillager ri
walls were called had taken the OK an(
killed it for beef.
The next spring the band agail
camped in our vicinity, this time pitch
ing their lodges at the north extrem
lty OF Big Fish Lake. Several time
Doris and Edith, while sang hunting
met the squaws who had punishe,
them with switches; but the women of
fered no hostile demonstration, and th
girls would not let me take any often
Sive action.
But all that spring and summer "
were careful not to leave our hons
and our growing ginseng patch unprc
tected.
The next spring, however. as the Ir
dlans had offered us no further mi.
chief, and there came on beautif,
weather for the ginseng hunter. W
We're less careful. We had now. nea
ly fenced, profit paying plantatio
OF nearly 1000 seed-bearing roots.
Then Little Hawk and his three W,
men descended upon our plantatio
and robbed us of 100 of our choices
plants.
II we had not returned early that a
ternoon our three years work wou]
have gone for nothing. AS It was. v
caught the scamps at the beginning
their foray.